Chapter Three:
A particularly loud pop in the smoldering wood awoke Shiirai with a start, as she was convinced that the sound heralding the arrival of more goblins. What she awoke to was the pale mistiness of a swamp sunrise, and a look into the sleeping habits of her companions. Jeremiah was sprawled out on his makeshift bed, hair askew, blankets thrown hither and he was drooling on his pillow. Shiirai stifled a soft snicker at the man and shook her head, how attractive he looked in the morning. She was one to talk however, with the sticks and leaves that had worked themselves into her silky blonde hair. They made her look like some half crazed heathen jungle queen, considering her leather getup. Her fingers sought these out and removed them before she tossed them into the smoldering remains of their fire.
She was more interested in Taelia's sleeping habits however. She had fallen asleep before she saw how the woman managed it, but here she had a hammock of sorts strung up between her Imam's tusks and was asleep therein. His head was far enough from the ground that she hung there peacefully. She would have been content enough to let them sleep a bit later, however at that precise moment a very loud and unpleasant bird decided to scream loudly and startle everyone in the camp awake. Imam shot up from the ground and unceremoniously, although by accident, dumped Taelia onto the ground. She shouted and Jeremiah sat bolt upright, his hands flailed as he searched for his bow and shouted about "monkeys in the backpack". All and all the entire spectacle made Shiirai laugh, which carried on the entire time Taelia scolded a bird she could not see for startling her creature into dropping her.
After a short breakfast of sausages and hard crusted bread, and after having packed as well, they clambered aboard their respective creatures and set off towards a break in the swamp's thick trees. "Anywhere in particular you're headed Taelia?" Jeremiah called back shortly after breaking through the trees and into a bright sunny marsh. "I was on a scouting mission out of Ferionya. I was on my way back to report my findings." "Isn't that a bit off to send a one woman scout mission?" Jeremiah asked suspiciously of her, while Shiirai was all interest. "Scouting for what?" She asked eagerly of their new companion. "The trouble in the far east of the land. There's a mage there trying to do unspeakable things, or so the rumors go. My elders believe there may be truth in these rumors, as raiding parties set out from his lands with his mark upon them and bring terror and darkness with them. They are sending their best to investigate. So far all we have managed to glean from watching him is that he is calling upon dark magicks to gather powers that he should not have and using it to command unnatural armies. This path will take us there, but it will also lead through a few small towns, good for resupplying." she remarked as she pointed further in the direction they traveled in.
Shortly thereafter, the sound of rattling bones drew everyone but Taelia's attention. Jeremiah turned himself in his saddle and raised a brow at the sound and Shiirai mimicked this. The cause of such disturbance came up beside Imam quickly, a half decayed skeleton with an eyepatch. The small amount of hair it did have was scraggly and greyed, the remaining muscle on gleaned white bones turning brown with age and decay. It wore loose silkish fabric that was remarkably clean for it's wearer and within each of it's bony hands it had short but sharp swords. It's remaining eye wandered haphazardly up to Taelia's face and it made a sort of raspy wheezing sound, as a form of communication with her Shiirai figured later. Taelia seemed to understand. "Oh, by the by, this is Permian. He's my companion." Jeremiah shuddered and pulled his horses's reins in an effort to bring them to a quick stop. "Wait wait wait, I'm fine with riding about with a Necromancer, but no one said that she'd have an old victim as a pet!" He snapped shortly, his features pulled into a glare that he turned upon the dark haired elf. "He was not a victim!" She scathed at him even as she reached down to take one of the skeleton's shoulders under her hand, "He was my brother. I've had him with me for the better of three months now!" Jeremiah fell silent and took a pale pink tinge to his cheeks and abruptly turned in his saddle and rode on. The rattling bones turned to look up at Taelia and reached back to pat the hand on it's shoulder before they took continued on after Shiirai's already moving hippogriff.
They continued along the marshy lands for some time in silence, Jeremiah presumably still recovering from his embarrassing accusation, and eventually came to the bank of a slow moving river that once crossed would put them inside the boundaries of the small town they were riding for. They paused here to clamber off their animals and sit down to eat lunch and consider stopping for the day. Jeremiah busied himself with making a cooking fire, and in Shiirai's eyes, did everything he could to avoid the dark haired elf. Permian set about making himself useful by taking up just one of his swords and wandered over to the river's edge, where he put the sharp blade to use catching fish in their sides as they swam past idly. Taelia, who had wandered off to collect wood, brought back a particularly sharp stick that she easily slid through the stabs in the fish and set them across the rocks separating their cooking fire from the grass nearby. In the end if fell on Shiirai to break the silence.
"How did Permian end up as he is now?" She asked timidly, not wanting to offend their companion, as Jeremiah had earlier. Taelia smiled absently as she dug about in her pouch to retrieve a small ebony wood box. "We were about a week out of Ferionya, to investigate the mage we spoke of earlier, when we were attacked by one of his raiding parties. Permian was mauled by a troll they had brought with them. Now the question you're after next, I'm sure, is why did I bring him back? I could not complete that journey all on my own as I am one Necromancer to however many raiding parties he has sent out. So, weighing my options and knowing what Permian would have wanted me to do in the long run, I resurrected his body, rather soon after his passing, which was a benefit, as I managed to salvage his soul enough that he remains my brother, and not a mindless thing that only bears his bones." She slid back the lid of this box as she spoke and extracted, rather carefully, a shiny black beetle, which clicked it's pincers madly and scrambled it's legs to escape her. She set the bug upon her brother's bones and it hurried to munch upon the remaining muscle it could reach. "I've been doing this for some time. The beetle removes the decaying flesh and keeps him from, well, smelling bad and decaying properly." Shiirai flinched but also privately thanked the woman for it, the smell would have been terrible.
After their lunch they loaded their things back up, as they had it on Taelia's good council that the town proper was only a short journey away from where they were now. Indeed, after they crossed the river, the town proper was a short hour journey. It was small and rundown in some places, but the inn was decent and lively, joyful song came from within it and it looked warm. They pulled their animals around to the stable behind it and set them up for a comfortable night. On their way into the inn, at sunset, a group of fishermen came jogging through the town quickly, most of them muttering about not wanting to be caught on the lake at night. While Jeremiah seemed to miss this, neither Shiirai nor Taelia did. They looked to one another and seemed to come to the unspoken agreement to find out what was going on inside.
The inn was indeed warm inside, and happy enough. There were a few drunken men singing a bar song loudly in one corner and the rest were talking loudly and merrily. Jeremiah negotiated them a room while Taelia and Shiirai managed to shoo off a few curious drunkards from pestering and poking Permian, who did not seem to notice them.
"I would send a man out to gather your belongin's, but we've been havin' troubles of late," the landlord mentioned darkly. "What sort of troubles?" both Shiirai and Taelia inquired of him almost immediately after the words left his mouth. He looked taken aback by their inquisitiveness, but answered them nonetheless. "We've gotten ourselves landed with a Kelpie. He stays down there in the lake during the day, sleepin' we usually think, but then at night, he gets bold. He comes up here and raids our town, pickin' off those who aren't so smart as to stay inside and lock their doors at night. Just last week, he broke into poor old Halyard's house and pulled him right out the bed!" He shuddered at this point and shook his head sadly. "Was a shame. Anyway, the beast's got a big red hand on it's chest. Markin' of it's master we reckon." This didn't strike anything in Shiirai or Jeremiah, but Taelia nodded darkly. "Of course."
She turned away from the landlord and pulled her companions off to the side. "A big red handprint? Is that the marking of the mage Taelia?" Shiirai probed with interest. Taelia had a steely glint in her pale yellow green eyes and she nodded curtly. "We should kill it then, before we leave." Jeremiah said as coldly as the elfin woman looked. "Yes. I agree on that point, but the difficult thing is, we shall need bait. Live bait." Jeremiah raised a brow and looked oddly at Taelia as she spoke and nearly jumped when he caught on. " Surely you don't mean Shiirai?" Taelia only nodded, but Shiirai looked alarmed. " What! Wait just a minute here! No one said anything to me about being Kelpie bait when I agreed to come on this fool adventure with you Jeremiah!" She cried out unhappily and brandished a finger at him. " That's what makes it an adventure," Taelia said deviously, "You never know what's going to happen."