So begins the second interquel, delving into the Shadow Isles and the souls within it that will rise to challenge the return of Viego from within his very seat of power. Expect the unexpected and the odd with this one with the oddest straight man and comic pair I could think of: Yorick and Braum. Unlike the others, where the "party" is pretty much set, this one will see it grow and evolve across the breadth of the story.
For reference hopping into this one if one hasn't read Ruination Saga, I do suggest looking at chapters 8 and 14 first.
A Haven in the Isles Part I
Grasping for Hope Part I
Yorick feels the change in the air before he sees it.
A rippling in the sky above the Isles, a vast retraction of the Black Mists, like a wave crashing down upon itself.
He stares up in confusion, gripping his shovel tighter, and feels the growing aura of panic and worry from the spirits under his care.
They flicker and whirl about him while the greater specters emerge from their dens to stare at the phenomena as well.
"Calm." Yorick states, raising a hand to pacify the growing crowd, "Where is the Maiden?"
The young shepherd in her hood of red points towards the shore, where the crafted canoe had just been finished.
"Thank you." he mutters, ushering the smaller shades into her care, "Go inside. I will return with…news."
He trudges off, shifting through the ancient tombstones, trailed by those of braver soul, though as he nears the coast, they all scatter, leaving him alone with the looming shadow that had followed him since the original Ruination.
She was gaunt and tall, skin blacker than obsidian, a blue flame burning where her head should have been. A trailing black dress covered her, except for the oversized talons she kept wrapped around her shoulders, holding herself as if in the throughs of deepest grief.
"What has happened?" Yorick asks softly, joining her at the shore, seeing the fluttering of green light above mimicked in the slate grey waters lapping at the time-worn pebbles under his feet.
"The Ruined King has been killed." the wraith rasps, "The fool."
"Yet, still we remain," Yorick mutters, planting his shovel into the dirt and staring towards the horizon.
"The King is Deathless!" the Maiden snaps, "Not unkillable, you know this! He will return to continue his foolish quest."
"Then, the time to move is now," Yorick mutters, hefting his shovel.
"To gather your allies, to hope you stand a chance?" the Maiden taunts, "For what?! Some grand heist? Some grand hope. He is gone, for the moment, but his followers are free to do what they wish in his absence!"
"I do not fear his Camavoran rabble nor the Traitor." Yorick returns, "And if we want to see this ended, we must act. Do you not agree?"
"You still have hope, after all these years?" the Maiden demands, floating up behind him.
"There is some left, yes." Yorick states, looking ahead to where their guest was emerging from the Mist, "After all, the King has yet to know you are here."
Braum steps out of the Mist, hallowed in the whisps of smaller souls, a confused expression on his face, "The sky, it roils and crackles like Volibear's own. Has something happened?"
"Viego has returned to his rest. Someone got lucky." Yorick answers.
"Wonderful!" Braum cries with a massive grin, "Then why…."
The giant looks about him, gesturing to the assembled spirits.
"Nothing is ever so easy. He's recovering as he did before. This is not over, not as long as his quest goes unfinished." Yorick states.
"So…is it finally time?" Braum asks, an excited smile on his face.
"Yes, gather your things." Yorick mutters, "We will be leaving shortly."
"Finally, it has felt like ages since I got here." Braum remarks.
"Building a boat able to carry the both of us takes time." Yorick mutters, "And if memory serves, it would have gone quicker if you had not passed out from your numerous unmentioned wounds."
He stares up at the Northman with a flat expression, Braum rubbing the back of his head.
"We Iceborn are made of stern stuff," Braum remarks, "We do not always notice the pain."
"Until you keel over mid-hammer swing, coughing blood into your mustache." the Maiden hisses.
Braum nods mutely.
Yorick waves him off and turns to his flock, "We will be leaving for a time. The wards will hold but stay cautious, with the reins released…all manner of troubling things could happen."
The stronger specters nod at his words and return to their work, while the lesser spirits flutter and flicker nervously before darting away as Braum returns with a bag over one shoulder and his shield on his arm.
"Is this a poor time to reveal I am not a good swimmer?" Braum asks.
"Get in the boat." Yorick returns while the Maiden rasps something he can only assume is a swear under her breath, "This is going to be a bit of a journey."
And a bit of a journey it had been. Weeks of travel across slate grey water, occasionally battling the haunted sea life and the very sea itself at times.
As the journey progressed, Braum found himself missing his fellows, especially Sarah and her vessel. The Syren was a mighty vessel, able to withstand the shifting of the mightiest waves.
Yorick's slapdash vessel was not that.
Braum holds in a belch, looking over to Yorick manning the tiller, his chest not appearing to rise, his eyes locked on the horizon.
At one point, Braum would have found it odd to spend time with the living dead, but increasing his life in the Freljor felt like a distant memory.
He wonders if the medicine has made it back to his people, to the children.
He wonders what has become of his home.
He looks out to sea, seeing the Maiden listing above the waves, keeping pace with their vessel but never coming closer, many questions burn in him regarding her, and as the time continues to drag on, he dares to ask.
"Yorick," he begins, turning to the monk, "Who is she?"
He nods to the Maiden.
Yorick's eyes flick in her direction, "The better question should be, what is she, or maybe who was she."
"Who was she, then?" Braum amends.
"From what I have been told, collected from the memories of the broken and scatters, she was the young queen of a distant land, and…the Ruination broke her as readily as it did everything else."
Braum turns, staring at her, "She is Viego's love?"
"A part of her." Yorick returns, "The rest has been lost to time, it would seem. All she has left to her is her anger."
"I…my compatriots and I, when we first came to this place, heard of her story." Braum states, sitting forward, "Of Viego's, what he did to this place, did you know him?"
"I do not recall." Yorick mutters, "He was a desperate young man searching for an answer to a problem that didn't exist. I know the viper that whispered in his ear when my fellows turned him away, as do you. Latching on to Viego's hope like a parasite, but not even he knew what would happen next."
"Hope…" Braum mutters, rubbing his mustache, "I have always found it to be a comforting truth of this world."
"Really?" Yorick returns, "I have found that hope is one of the most dangerous emotions of them all. Fear, joy, anger, they can consume, control, command, but nothing, nothing is more blinding to the truth than Hope."
"You really believe so?" Braum asks.
"Of course," Yorick returns, tapping the vial around his neck, "Why else would I still be here?"
Braum frowns, but before he can speak, Yorick points, "We're here."
Braum turns, taking in a jutting spire of black rock emerging from the waves, and atop it rests a small cave, glimmering faintly with golden light. A dock only moored to the stone shifts in the waves at the base of a spire while steps slick with seawater spiral up at frantically crafted angles.
"What will we find here?" Braum asks.
"A sentinel, almost as old as I," Yorick states, pulling their ship in to dock, "And almost as mad as you."
Braum grins.
The walk up the steps is uneventful, Yorick looking out to the main isle, wherein the distance, he can see enormous beasts stalking amongst the ruins of his once verdant home.
A bit of mumbling rambling returns his attention to the location at hand as he crests into the cave and spots several spectral hounds get to their feet with low snarls—twisted nature spirits, crafted of hardened rock, spectral light gleaming from their toothy maws.
Braum raises his shield, working to push around Yorick, but the latter reaches out a hand to hold him back.
"Oh, hush up." a scratchy voice states as a head wreathed in matted white hair and a long white beard pokes down from above. Rail thin, with faintly glowing blue eyes, he stares directly at Yorick, his eyebrows rising. Caid, the Eldest member of the Sentinels of Light, the Hermit. He was remanded to this position for a disagreement with the rest of the Order decades ago. He was a survivor, a rarity amongst the Isles.
"Mori." Caid mutters, spitting a wad of tobacco onto the ground, "You're late."
"Am I?" Yorick returns.
"Think so," Caid returns, clambering down into the cave, a faintly glowing spirit lantern resting on one hip, his relic-stone long rifle strapped across his back, "Who's the beef-slab?"
"Braum of the Freljord," Braum interjects, "Your pets are quite…interesting."
"Ain't they just?" Caid returns, turning back to Yorick, "This was the one Ledros went after?"
"Yes." Braum states.
"That was almost a month ago." Caid states, "What in the hells happened?"
"Unforeseen circumstances." Yorick returns, leaning against his shovel.
"Ah, them, dirty bitches." Caid mutters, "Well, where is Commander Heartbroken?"
"He went to join the other Sentinels," Yorick states flatly.
"So he did." Caid returns, scratching his chin, "How is that going?"
"Y-you don't know?" Braum asks.
"Shoot, no, the order doesn't talk to me." Caid barks, slapping the world stone beside him, "Cept those in the Serpent Isles, things were looking bad over there."
"The Sentinels have beaten back Viego." Yorick states, "Not permanently, but we have our chance to create a safe haven for a final push against him when the time is right."
"Right, right, I know the plan." Caid returns, waving his hands, pointing to a rucksack in the corner, "Been ready to get a move on for weeks, got the plans all scouted out, but never heard a peep from nobody. HQ has been as silent as the grave."
"Did you think to contact them?' Braum asks.
"Did I think to contact them," Caid snarks, "Of course I-wait no, no, I didn't."
Yorick sighs and Braum chuckles as one of the dogs comes up to him, looking for affection.
"This memory, I tell you it, will be the death of me." Caid mutters, "Right, just give me a second."
He reaches for the world stone, and Yorick hears something tear through the air behind him.
Braum moves before he can say anything, wrapping around Caid and one of the hounds, shield rising as part of the room explodes in a detonation of black fire.
Yorick takes the brunt of the blast and finds himself in the open air before he crashes into the water in a flurry of bubbles and numbed cold.
Breaking the surface, he sees bolts of light firing out from the spire far above, but closer, he hears the clanking of chains and a menacing laugh.
"Yorick Mori," Thresh states, standing at the base of the dock as Yorick pulls himself up. The specter spins his scythe, and very briefly, the flash of a very human face smiles from amongst the flames of his spectral head.
"Grael," Yorick growls, and from the sea, bodies of drenched flesh and piscean quality emerge, snapping their teeth and snarling as they charge Thresh, who laughs all the louder.
Braum looks down at Caid, clutched in his arm like a child.
"Are you alright?" Braum asks.
"Yes, get me out from your armpit, you big ox." Caid snaps.
Braum does so, releasing Caid, who scoops up his rucksack and unslings his rifle in one smooth motion.
"Now, where is the fucker who just killed my dogs?" Caid snaps, sliding around Braum's shield.
Braum stands, staring into the flames, spotting movement, girding the remaining hound as he moves.
Sliding free of the flames, a figure crafted of shadow emerges. The form is that of a tall, serene woman, composed entirely of shadow, looming twelve feet tall. Her face is obscured by an inky bridal veil, except for the two long fox-like ears that curve up from atop her head, her right arm hidden by lengthy cloth crafted of shadow. Flickers of purple and green light roil within her form, resembling the Black Mist.
And held in her left hand is a familiar blade.
The Blade of the Ruined King.
"Where is she?" the woman demands, the veil rippling as she speaks, her voice echoing oddly.
And before Braum can answer, she charges.
And so ends the first chapter!
Hope you enjoyed.
Caid…is a character from LoR, though the name is my invention. Not sure exactly where the personality came from but here we are.
I'm betting folks will be able to figure out who the "Mystery Woman" is, but y'all won't need to wait long for the reveal.
Should have the first chapter of Spirit Quest out tomorrow, and then the posting schedule becomes looser, might post several chapters of one story, might just continue this trend.
As always, comments, questions, and concerns are appreciated. This has been VerBeeker, signing off!