That day, Mr. Rat had come upon a forest of pulsing black bracken, just frozen and smelling of fear. Well, Rat always liked to think he paralyzed everything with fear when he showed his face. And so, he decided to attack the the living dead things. There was a echoing cry and he scurried out of the way as a stampede was started and the bracken sprang to life. Mr. Rat watched his meal leave and twitched his whiskers unhappily, then left to go find some stringy snake for dinner.
Well, just two minutes after the band left, Kort found the blood. Panic settled in and he followed the scent, charging towards his friends. He searched for a good while through the mist until he rammed right into a good chunk of flesh which yelped and wheeled around. It was Dawe, who was limping due to a harsh rodent wound in his ankle.
Kort was very relieved when he heard the tale of the ugly rat who attacked the stallion with a surprising rage. Dawe expressed clear exasperation over everyone fussing and said "I hope that hideous thing doesn't have a disease." That certainly stared a bigger fret in the unicorns, especially by Fernly. Dawe seemed to tolerate her more than the others.
Kort decided it was safe to travel together now. They finally saw the castle, towering above them. It was old, with dead vines seeping up and over the stone walls, and crusty black wallflowers wilted on it. They hadn't yet even seen the inside and were already impressed by the abandoned fortress in the solitude of the harsh landscape.
Kort ran his horn along the stones until he found a particular one and pushed it in. "Only the ranked know of this, as everyone fears that a conspiracy will rise and a group will escape." he explained from the worried glances cast about by the unicorns. They entered a dark room which the demons could easily see in, but poor Celesty found herself squinting and bumping into her fellows and smashing her sensitive nose into the walls.
Dawe started to say something very rude to Celesty when she knocked into him for the fifth time when Lest finally came to her aid and talked her around her friends and the walls. They came to a row of bowls on the floor in no particular line, but filled with a oozy purple liquid and streaks of red. They were puzzled how a unicorn could ever use a bowel when he explained and pointed out the crusty bits of rope twined in through holes.
"Most of the unicorns are part snake collectors, part army horse, and part scout. The trick is you pick up a snake by the tail end and whip it down to the earth hard as you can. It will kill the snake but keep the head in tact. Then you bring the snake to the crushing room where you stamp down the snakes head and the poison flows out. That's why there's part blood as well. Then the snake is thrown into a pit and is done being dealt with. Everyone is careful not to get it on the twine for otherwise the ranked, who only perform carrying duty once a week, will bring it here where they store the poison for missions or when someones poison gets washed away by accident"
It seemed Yolise had thought through everything and everyone was dismayed that anyone could be so through and effective. Kort lead them through a passage way where he carefully pushed some more stoned which caused the door to move as if by magic to accept him. They slipped through several stone ways in this fashion until Kort told them to be quite. They slipped into a huge court area where hundreds of demon unicorns were laying all over the place. More impressive where the huge ones that towered over the sleeping recruits and made sure no one was awake and talking. Kort told them to lay down and they swiftly did. He informed them he'd be back and to hold on.
From there, Kort parted company with the five demons and the Celestial unicorn for a long time and he worked to complete his part of the mission he had discussed with them on the way...