Chapter Thirteen

Even stranger…

The sun had risen high, its light filtering down through the thousands of leaves that shadowed the forest path from Draynor village to Lumbridge. It cast small shadows on the three moving figures below the woodland canopy. Its light also illuminated a forth figure... standing off the path slightly... watching the small group make their slow way eastwards...

Sweat trickled into Luthandros's eyes, blurring his view. The stillness, it was unnatural. 'The weather, it's never this still and quiet, ever.' Thought Luthandros bitterly. 'And it chooses to be freaking humid now, when I'm lugging a frigging heavy idiot...' his thoughts trailed off. It was probably just Luthandros's pessimistic nature that made him notice the unnatural change in the weather, far earlier than anyone else did.

Behind him, he could hear the noob mage panting heavily. He readjusted the staff on his shoulders, focused on the ground ahead and continued his slow progress east.

"Hey you! Can you tell me where I am?" a commanding voice came from ahead.

Luthandros reacted like he had been shot. He knew personally the tone of voice of every noob commander... and every noob that was not a commander, they never sounded this demanding. Unceremoniously dumping one end of the staff on the ground, ignoring his prisoner's yelp of pain, he grabbed his weapon and sprinted towards the speaker. Without stopping to let her explain, ignoring her surprised protests, he swung his scimitar at her - only to have it blocked by her staff. Luthandros pulled his weapon free and was about to swing it again when his enemy yelled, "Ultimentra Enfeebiliaris!"

Luthandros fell to the ground, gasping. Strength had never been his strongest point, and now he felt sapped of what little he already had.

"Go... tell Leafdarking... run... now... go!" Luthandros gasped out to the noob mage, who promptly dropped his end of the staff and sprinted off east.

"Entangle!" Yelled the new female mage, sending a blazing white bolt of energy towards the noob mage. The noob mage dodged the missile, through luck more than anything else, allowing it to hit a tree instead.

Turning back to Luthandros, who was now trying to force his weakened muscles to allow him to stand up, the newcomer asked the obvious, "Who are you?"

Luthandros gave up trying to stand, and rested on his side. He looked up at the mage that he had attacked, and added insult to injury by noticing her fighting abilities. She was only a level 12 combat; a full 37 combat levels beneath him. She was wearing a cheap, regular dark wizard's shirt, and blue trousers that looked like the dog had been playing with them. Her shock of bright orange hair looked as if it hadn't seen a comb for weeks. Luthandros feverently hoped that the no one he knew would find out that he had been bested by such a one.

"Hey, can you talk? Or are you just a noob that mugs people for free stuff instead of begging? Go on. Talk." The orange-haired mage demanded.

"Lu... Luthandros. I'm... Luthandros. An... And... get this... fk...ing curse... off...me." Luthandros was finding it very tiring to speak properly. The mage eyed him thoughtfully.

"You know, I don't think I will lift the curse. It should wear off in a few minutes anyway." She turned away from Luthandros and walked towards Kryarn, who was now examining his bonds carefully, trying to discover how to pick the knots.

"Oh yeah, my name's Cerrin Wyver by the way. Called Cerrin." The mage called back over her shoulder towards Luthandros. He had told her his name, so it was right for her to tell him her name, even if she was leaving him gasping like a landed trout for a while.

"Hey, you want some help there?" Cerrin asked Kryarn, who was having major difficulties unpicking Luthandros's knots.

"Yeah, sure." Kryarn answered. Cerrin took Luthandros's scimitar from him (he was too weak to argue), and cut Kryarn free in seconds. Rubbing his sore wrists and ankles, Kryarn looked over to where Luthandros was lying. A touch of his normal charm began to override the silent fury that had been consuming him since Port Sarim.

"My heartiest congratulations to you mate; I hail thee as the greatest knot tier a noob has ever been." Kryarn formally mocked Luthandros, who angrily concentrated on the ground near Kryarn's feet.

"So... what's going on here? Terrova told me before I teleported that it might be a bit unfriendly, but what did you do? And back to the question I asked Luthandros here before, where the hell am I?"

"Well what's going on... I really don't know. And oh yeah - you're in Runescape, kingdom of Misthalin, about halfway between Lumbridge and Draynor Village. And these guys knocked me out and were taking me eastwards, I really don't know why... It's not like I did something to them ever, seriously. Maybe I was rude to his friend once, or maybe Kysin was rude to him once and he knows I'm Kysin's pal... I really don't know. But I gotta get to Ardougne and I gotta get there soon and fast, so yeah, good luck and I gotta go now..." Kryarn was talking more to himself than Cerrin by the end of it, where he turned and began walking back the way he had come.

'Hey... wait' Kryarn's thoughts stopped him in his tracks. 'She's what level?' He turned back in time to see Cerrin hurl a spell that was unmistakably a wind wave at a goblin. The spell knocked the goblin off it's feet, and hurled it murderously hard against a fence. Observing her combat level, 12, his analytical mind began working over the impossibilities. 'Who is she? Terrova... that's the guy who first teaches magic on Tutorial Island... Entangle... she definitely cast that at the noob mage, but that's a level 79 magic spell... how does level 12 combat go with 79 magic? And what the hell is Ultimentra Enfeebilia?' Questions circling around his head, Kryarn asked them of the strange red-haired mage.

"Where are you from? And how do you know how to cast Entangle?" Kryarn asked.

"I'm from Padua, the island of Caenor. I just graduated from Caenor's school of Witchcraft and Witchery, and one of the magic instructors, Terrova said that he could teleport me here. He said it would be strange and a little harsh compared to Padua... And any graduate in defensive arts can cast Entangle. It's a difficult charm, I've only practiced it a few times, but they all worked. What?" She asked. Kryarn was staring at her with a blank look of incredulity on his face.

"Ok, nothing, it's just that... level 12 combat never casts entangle... at least, I've never seen them do so before... and there's no school for magic; mages learn new spells by practicing the old ones. You can't just... just read a book and suddenly have level 99 magic."

"I don't have level 99 magic, only 29. But that's only cause I haven't practiced much here. I learnt it all at school." She answered. "I've been testing the spells out here, cause there's so many legal restrictions back home. Hey, I haven't tried the new teleother spells yet, I mean, I tried it on some rats at school and I never saw them again; probably cause they ended up here, but can I test it on you?"

"No!" Kryarn answered quickly. "I really gotta meet my friends; they're in Ardougne now, or somewhere near there so... see ya."

"It would be so much faster if you'd just let me teleother you." Cerrin persisted.

"NO!" Kryarn yelled, surprised at his own infuriated response. He turned his back on Cerrin and ran west. The witch took her runes and her staff, and whispered a few well-memorized words. A vague beam of purple-colored light shot towards Kryarn's retreating figure. It hit him squarely on the back, shrinking him instantly.

Cerrin smiled to herself, for the teleother to Camelot spell had worked.

Kryarn knew exactly what had happened before he had left Misthalin. He screwed his eyes shut and tried to shut out the reality that he was passing through. Unbidden, his memory replayed the scene just the same. The towering, mechanical heads, the small, jet black eyes, the red...

And his feet hit hard, firm stone. He peeled one eye open a fraction, and breathed a deep sigh of relief when he saw the imposing structure of Camelot castle towering above him. He turned at a steady walk south, which quickly broke into a fast-paced lope. The lope became a sprint as he passed Thormac's tower, and the black sentinels perched outside.

He didn't stop running until he was within the city of East Ardougne.