Reply to the reviews: Thank you for reviewing and sorry for the wait. I hope you enjoy this update!
3. The Cold, Dark Earth
They woke up with the dawn and ate in silence. Taylor hadn't slept well that night, her dreams filled with nightmares of rotting hands reaching for her from within an inferno as quills shot past.
However, by using the Paladin's aura, she was able to clear her head of the lingering cobwebs of sleep in time to sit down beside the main campfire with the rest of her impromptu group. She silently took the offered bowl of oatmeal and jerky and ate as the others talked.
"I will lead the way," Chilanik declared. "You two may be worried by the numbers, but the Fallen are petty creatures and I fear them not. While the Paladin and I keep them occupied, you two will focus on the shamans and any groups that try to slip past." That last comment was directed to Isendra and the Necromancer.
"Agreed, we are both suited to being in the thick of battle," Sir Cecil agreed. "I shall shift my aura to that of Holy Shock, to smite any foes that draw near any of us." Taylor was grateful for that assurance of added protection. She knew that of the team, she was really the only one liable to need it.
"Elemental Frost is the easiest way for my magics to render the Fallen unraisable by freezing them solid and then shattering them," Isendra commented. "I have two powerful spells that will help with this, however some of their effects can be… indiscriminate. They are blizzard, which rains Ice Bolts on an area, and Frost Orb, which is an orb that will send out Ice Bolts at all enemies in the area. AS I focused my studies on Fire and to a lesser degree, Lightning, my Cold magic is not as developed as it could be. However, I believe that it will be sufficient for our purposes."
"Very well," the Necromancer agreed. "The Teeth of Rathma and Bone Spears will help clear crowds, but my Curses will help our group more by weakening their mobs and sowing chaos." He looked to Taylor. "Despite us all having our sixth senses, most of our focus will be on holding off and eliminating our enemies at the front. You will stay back and make sure that none attempt to flank us."
"I will," Taylor agreed. She wanted to help, but was relieved that she wouldn't have to face the monsters herself. If each of them could match Isendra's display in their own way, then she felt confident that nothing could stop them.
"Good," the Necromancer agreed. "Our plan is fairly simple, so let's leave once you're finished. We can talk on the way."
Sir Cecil stood up and looked at their party. "With your aid, I shall cleanse this wilderness."
+OHA+
Over an hour later, they were crouched behind some brush a short distance at the entrance to the cave that Andariel's forces were using as a forward base. Taylor had been surprised that the cave was so close, given the muddy land of the moor with its numerous creaks and ponds. In fact, it was almost swampy. Bugs buzzed in the air, but as Taylor and the heroes marched along the raised dirt road, she began to wonder about why there weren't more. As far as Taylor could tell, it was summer here in this part of Sanctuary as well.
"Shouldn't there be more bugs in the air?" Taylor asked. "Back on Earth there would be mosquitoes everywhere in a place like this." The reminder of Earth brought the darkness creeping at the edges of her mind back in full force.
"You are not used to the countryside, are you?" the Isendra asked. "These moors are too cool for that, and many animals tend to either hibernate or leave areas that have been greatly tainted by demonic magic. Not all, obviously, as we were able to find game, but all living things can sense demonic magic on some level even if they are not aware of it."
"Though not all have the sense to stay away from it, do they Paladin?" the Necromancer asked.
Cecil frowned before lowering his visor. "No, they do not. That is why champions of the Light are needed."
"Or at least champions of humanity," the Necromancer replied before turning towards the path that led towards the cave.
It was clear that Isendra had employed her fire magic extensively. For what looked like several acres, the land had been scorched. The small, rocky hillock at the end of this branch of the path had a pile of boulders. It was clear that the demons had been working on moving it, as several short literally red-skinned creatures with scimitars and ponytails were gathered around a mob of zombies that were either slowly picking at the outside end of the rubble or pulling them out of place.
"This must have been a group that was already in the Blood Moor or was at least close by," the Necromancer commented. "Should we clear them out now or let them open the way for us?"
"We don't we just leave them buried?" Taylor asked. She had been wondering about it for a while, but hadn't worked up the courage to ask them. They were nice, but seeing how casually they dispatched the assorted monsters that they had encountered was intimidating.
"Demons don't have strict requirements for what they need to eat," the Paladin replied. "They will survive buried there until either they dig their way out or someone is foolish enough to do it for them. Killing them now will purge their presence and allow the land to heal without their evil festering under the earth."
"I imagine that a place named the Blood Moor has enough evil in its history," Isendra agreed.
"Alright," Taylor agreed.
Isendra pointed to one of the Fallen that that was waving a banner around. "Do you see him?" At Taylor's nod, the sorceress continued, "That is a shaman. As long as he lives, he can raise even the most burnt or battered of dead comrades to return to battle."
"Then I shall slay him," Chilanik declared. "The priest and I shall lead the way as we agreed, the rest of you support us." Upon seeing their agreement, he leapt into the air and came crashing down around two hundred feet away in the midst of the Fallen and the zombies. He threw back his head and roared, causing the Fallen to scatter in fear as Chilanik knocked the shaman to the ground.
"Impatient barbarian," Cecil muttered before charging after him.
Isendra gestured and three snakelike beings of fire emerged from the ground near the Fallen. The summoned creatures reared their heads back and spat out fire bolts at the panicked Fallen. Isendra gestured three more times and each time three more of the snakes emerged from the ground.
The three heads are each one creature, Taylor realized. Then she noticed that the Fallen had stopped running and had started attacking each other as the fire snakes, Chilanik and Cecil cut a swath through them.
Feeling left out, Taylor focused her sixth sense and concentrated on fire and conjured a small fire bolt into her hands. The Fallen were out of the reach of her sixth sense, but she could still fire it in the direction of the cluster of zombies. Chilanik was fighting them after having dispatched the shaman, but she didn't think that her fire bolt could actually hurt him. Well, she didn't expect it to do much against the zombies, but she didn't want to be dead weight either.
She held her hand towards the zombies and pushed the fiery mana that composed the fire bolt at them. It shot off across the moor past several of the restless dead to collide with the head of one at the back.
Taylor pumped her fist. It wasn't much, but from over two hundred feet away, she had staggered a zombie with one of her weak fire bolts.
Then she noticed the faint flames emanating out in rings from near Chilanik. Taylor looked to the resident expert on magical fire, Isendra. "What's that?"
"It's a Meteor," Isendra replied. "With focus, I can make sure that my fires don't burn some people within, though it is something many sorceresses take time to master, and even I have trouble doing it for more than a couple of people at a time. It's a skill that you will need to learn eventually, if only to avoid burning yourself alive with some of these spells."
Taylor flinched at that. That would be a bad way to go. She opened her mouth to reply, when she heard a descending roar joined by a red glare from above noticeable even during the day.
Reacting as quickly as she could, Taylor ducked and covered her ears.
Less than a second later, a deafening roar shook the ground and rattled Taylor's bones followed by a wave of heat that washed over her.
Picking herself up from where she'd fallen over, Taylor looked around at the inferno that had once been a battlefield. Taylor blinked. Sir Cecil was running through the flames without apparent care and Chilanik smashed a burning figure into the ground before throwing his head into the air and laughing raucously.
Taylor stared in shock. Either Isendra really had been able to protect them, or they were that superhumanly tough. Then an unsettling thought occurred to Taylor and she quickly turned to where Isendra stood with one hand on her staff and one on her hip, surveying her handiwork.
"You're not doing anything like that underground, are you?" Taylro asked with an edge of panic in her voice.
Isendra laughed and shook her head. "Don't worry about it Taylor," she replied before swiping her free hand at the ground, somehow snuffing out the meteor-created flames.
Taylor reluctantly followed, all too aware that Isendra hadn't actually answered.
+OHA+
The charred field was still smoking by the time Taylor joined the others in front of the boulders that blocked the cave's entrance.
The Necromancer walked up the collapsed rocks and slowly inhaled. He turned to where Isendra stood beside Chilanik and Sir Cecil. "I sense… death in the place."
Isendra raised an eyebrow and swept her hand to indicate the field of burnt undead and demon corpses.
"Not that," the Necromancer retorted. "Death has settled here for days, possibly even weeks. I believe this is where many zombies have gathered and been raised. I would not be surprised if a powerful undead were drawing others to it here."
"Though demonic taint is itself rare these days," Sir Cecil said before amending, "well, used too unless we stop Andariel and the Dark Wanderer, it is common for unusually powerful undead to rise at the site of mass deaths and gather others of its ilk to itself."
"Then we shall slay it and put a stop to its gathering!" Chilanik declared. He stepped up to the middle of the pile of boulders and drew back two large axes in order to strike.
Sir Cecil turned to where Taylor stood behind the others. "Evil dwells within this cave, and it will not go quietly."
"Good!" Chilanik shouted before hitting the rubble hard with a mana enhanced blow. With a crack and a boom, the rocks were knocked back into the caves and dust filled the air.
Isendra thrust out her left hand and a thick torrent of flame spewed into the mouth of the cave. After several seconds, she relented.
"Did you sense something?" Taylor asked as Chilanik leapt into the cave mouth with a war cry.
"No," Isendra replied, shaking her head, "but this place is trouble. We were nearly overwhelmed before."
"Then we should go and aid the Barbarian and the Zakarumite," the Necromancer told her. "No matter how much he might boast about his skill with weapons, I doubt that one Barbarian warrior is sufficient where a sorceress is not."
Isendra hummed. "Yes, we should." She then gestured, fire sparking off of her hands and dissipating.
Taylor looked around to see that Sir Cecil had joined Chilanik in the cave. The Necromancer was following them with his golem trailing behind. He glanced back at Taylor. "Brace yourself."
"Wha-" Taylor started to say before she saw and heard another meteor coming down towards the hillock. She turned to Isendra and shouted, "What are you doing?!"
"It will go through the ground," the sorceress explained with an amused smile.
Taylor was too close to where it would land. Taylor crouched and covered her ears. Maybe Isendra was right in that she could protect Taylor from the flames, but after seeing the massive fiery explosions two times now, Taylor had a hard time believing it. Fear gnawed at her as she tried to think of something, anything. Maybe ice magic could help? In what to her were possibly the last few moments of her life, she concentrated on Cold wrapping around her, to shield her and protect her from the flames. She felt her mana take on the aspect of Frost and begin to swirl around her as the meteor landed and… passed through the ground.
"You've mastered Frozen Armor all by yourself!" Isendra exclaimed. "And without any prompting from me. I'm impressed."
Taylor drew in a ragged breath and tried to calm her nerves. "Uh, thanks."
"Stop wasting time you two!" the Necromancer called out from the cave entrance.
"Right, sorry!" Taylor shouted back as she and Isendra jogged over.
"What's the situation in there?" Isendra called out. "I can't sense anyone else in my range."
Taylor slowed to a walk and focused her sixth sense. Chilanik and Sir Cecil were in a chamber immediately within the cave's entrance, each standing guard at either of the two exits from the cave. Sir Cecil was off to Taylor's right and Chilanik was straight ahead at the farthest point of the chamber.
"There are many foes here…" Chilanik said, trailing off.
As Taylor crossed into the cave, she saw why: at both tunnels were what looked like a tide of undead pouring towards them.
"This is somewhat more than I had anticipated," the Necromancer remarked dryly and without apparent concern. He began gesturing and suddenly the twin charges stopped as the zombies and what looked like skeletons began attacking each other.
I suppose he really isn't concerned about it then, Taylor thought.
"What?!" Chilanik roared. "I'm right here!" He then leapt into the midst of the undead, knocking several over, before howling out a challenge to them for what to Taylor seemed inexplicable reasons. That many of the undead turned their focus from each other to him made her question him even more.
"Prepare for Holy Shock!" Sir Cecil called out, and suddenly Taylor felt an electric buzz crawling across her skin and through the air around her. Taylor found it both reassuring in the protection it offered and… agitated for a moment before she focused on calming the churning darkness that had consumed her sixth sense until it was clear again.
Instead of think about the aura and her reaction to it, Taylor turned her attention to the ongoing battle. With the Necromancer turning the undead against each other, Chilanik was free to cut a swath through them. He was like a whirlwind of death, constantly cutting down any who neared him. Taylor found it mesmerizing until a massive explosion shook the tunnel and engulfed the Barbarian and the undead he fought in raging flames.
Taylor turned to Isendra, who called down another Meteor somewhere. What are you thinking?! "Aren't you worried about the explosions?" Taylor asked Isendra.
"Don't worry, my Meteors aren't going to bring this cave down," Isendra assured Taylor. "I've been mastering these magics for all of my life, I know what it will take to destroy the roof's support. As my Cold magic is my least skilled, I plan on saving it until it is actually needed, and Fire is my best element."
"Okay…" Taylor looked to Sir Cecil, who stood amidst the undead as an immovable bulwark, holding and even pushing them back.
Then a meteor exploded near the Paladin and the tunnel was consumed in fire. He held his position for a moment, but apparently he saw no one else in that direction because he turned around and headed back to where Taylor and the other two held position.
"I saw signs of a Fallen encampment in a chamber beyond the undead," he called out as he walked over. "They did not join their 'comrades' in battle and are notoriously cowardly when at a disadvantage."
"It would be a pain to hunt down a band of them on the moor," the Necromancer commented, "though I suppose we could leave the stragglers to the Rogues and anyone else who follows. Our priority should be on defeating Andariel and what will aid us in the cause. Somehow, I doubt tedious trudging all over the wilderness will help us to that end."
Sir Cecil shook his head. "These monsters are here now. I will not pass by an opportunity to cleanse the world of their darkness and by that protect Sanctuary from Evil."
"If you insist, Zakarumite," the Necromancer agreed with a harrowing scowl. "So long as you use our terrain to keep them from surrounding you it shouldn't be much harder for you, though you will be without our support should something go wrong."
"I shall go with him," Isendra interjected. "My ice and fire will help him purge this den of evil. You should take Taylor and follow Chilanik. He will need your support."
The Necromancer's scowl deepened. "Splitting our spell power like this could weaken our group." He looked to Sir Cecil. "But if you're careful, then it could make this battle easier." He started walking after Chilanik, who could be heard mocking some Fallen up ahead. "Come Taylor, I shall show you more of the power of the Cult of Rathma."
Taylor looked between the retreating back of the Necromancer and Isendra. "Go on, Taylor," Isendra told her. "You'll be safe with them, and we'll be fine."
"You had to retreat last time," Taylor countered.
"But we did not have the three of you to keep them separated," Sir Cecil countered. "So long as the Light guides our path, we will triumph."
Taylor sighed. "Okay… but I'd like to stay with you two next time. I don't like their teaching methods."
Isendra laughed. "Very well, Taylor. We shall be your companions the next time we split up."
With that, the two heroes left down the right-hand corridor and Taylor followed the sounds of battle.
The tunnel was filled with charred and dismembered dead. Taylor had seen the slain undead and animals before, but even on her way to the entrance of the cave it had been from a distance. Here, the charnel house was in her face, a stench sickeningly similar to pork mingling with despoiled and rotten meat.
Taylor tried to cover her mouth, but it didn't block out the smell. It wormed its way into her mouth and nose until it was all she could smell or taste.
She collapsed to the ground, gagging on rising gorge until she vomited in the tainted cavern floor. She emptied her stomach and continued dry heaving for… she didn't know how long.
Eventually she felt a hand on her shoulder.
Wiping her mouth, Taylor looked up from where she crouched to see the sunk, gaunt face of the Necromancer twisted in pity. "We could use a lookout outside."
Taylor started to inhale more of the putrid air before stopping herself and nodding gratefully to him. "I… "
"We should not have brought you here, child," he said, cutting her off. "Go and wait for us outside."
Taylor started to push herself to her feet and the Necromancer helped pull her up. She opened and closed her mouth, torn about what to do. But, in the end they were so far beyond her abilities that there really wasn't anything that she could contribute here.
Taylor's shoulders slumped as she made her way back out of the cave.
+OHA+
She found her way to the gnarled roots of a charred tree that perched atop the hillock. Even there, the smell reached her, and far too many of the sights that she had seen since her arrival drifted through her mind. She wondered if they would ever leave her now, or if it would cling to her like evil tainted the lands she had been banished too.
She wondered if she'd ever see home. But, there really wasn't anything that she could do, was there?
And so she sat, her eyes unfocused on anything before them.
The sun rose high in the sky and began its descent towards the western horizon, but despite the hour Taylor couldn't muster up an appetite. Nearly being killed twice before even reaching the Rogues, only to find out that her only hope of finding a way back was so far out of reach… nearly dying again…
She didn't want her childhood dream of being a hero anymore. She wanted to go home, to see Dad, and Emma… Mom, even though she was dead.
Taylor curled up under the tree, closed her eyes and buried her face in her knees as tears streamed down her face.
+OHA+
"Wake up," a warm voice asked of her.
Taylor blinked. She was sore from remaining curled up on the gnarled roots for so long. She sat up and stretched her arms as she looked at the person that had awoken her.
It was Sir Cecil, crouched before her with an expression of concern on his face. "I'm sorry," he told her.
"For what?" Taylor asked, confused.
"You're just a child, despite your quick grasp of magic," he said. "You're what? Thirteen? Fourteen? And form your build, I'm guess that you are used to the peaceful life of a merchant's daughter?"
Taylor looked down at the ashen ground. "My Dad's the Head of Hiring for the Dockworker's Union back home…but, yeah. This is… nothing like back home."
Sir Cecil sighed. "I should not have let them bring you along. I set out to become a Paladin so that people lie you would not have to face these horrors, and in my zeal I forgot why I do this. It would be best if you remained back at camp from now on."
Taylor opened and closed her mouth. He was right, they didn't need her help, did they?
"Nonsense!" Chilanik shouted as he landed beside them. "Taylor here may not be ready for battle, but she has great potential as a warrior. Why, she had no prior experience with an axe and was using it like any member of my clan her age. She can become a great warrior, but how can she prove her mettle if she does not come with us?"
"T-thanks," Taylor stammered to Chilanik.
"Any time," he replied cheerfully.
Footsteps crunched up the burnt hill as Ishendra and the Necromancer made their way up.
"This cave has been purged of evil," the Sorceress declared. "We should return to the Rogues' encampment to inform Akara and Kashya of our victory."
Chilanik surveyed their surroundings before adding in a harder tone of voice, "The Rogues are safe…for now."
"Is that enough to earn the Rogues' trust?" the Necromancer asked.
Sir Cecil stood and said, "It will have to be. Their assistance will be invaluable in making our way through the wilderness and to the monastery." He started down the hill and gestured for the others to follow. "Come. With your aid, my duty here is done. But this is far from over."
Taylor picked herself up and focused on her hands, watching the fire that leapt into being there. No, it isn't.