No was in a good mood as they walked back, and no one was in a good mood as they discussed what had happened. Aderyn and Lily snapped at each other early on, and it was only the priest's timely intervention that kept it from getting ugly. The scholar seemed to be withdrawing into his diagrams, and kept sketching wildly across pages upon pages, muttering to himself.
Hafros finally spoke up, drowning them all out with his sonorous tone.
"The way I see it," he said "Leaving that- twisted thing in the court is far worse than removing the king."
He cast his eyes around, and found everyone slowly nodding in agreement.
"Maybe we decide to stay." He said "Maybe not. I don't even know how much of a choice we'll have. But we need to make sure the king knows what he's dealing with there."
Aderyn sighed, and stretched.
"I'm going to go check that my bow is in order. I'm not going in there unarmed." She glanced around "You all should get some sort of weapons too."
Lily shook her head "I'll get my supplies set up anyway. Someone's bound to get hurt, sooner or later."
Soon, the priest found himself wandering the halls with Catrina and Hafros, who had decided to pilfer the armory. He still wasn't sure if he wanted to carry a weapon, truth be told, but he couldn't shake the feeling that he needed one. He hung outside in the court keeping watch while the other two went inside to pick things out. The bandages on his face itched, and he scratched at them. Then he turned, and found the Man in the Woods staring him in the face.
"You're lucky I'm not a guard." The man said "Or you'd all be dead."
The priest went scrambling backwards, choking down a yelp. He took several deep breaths.
"What are you all doing here?"
"We're getting weapons. We're going to the court tomorrow." He paused "You should come with us. We can explain everything, and we need you. We really do."
The man shook his head.
"The court wants me hung up by my throat, or with a sword through the gut. I'd be an idiot to go to court."
"But you're one of us!" the priest protested.
The beast man looked guilty, but shook his head.
"I'll come if you need me. Until then, I'm staying out of it."
"Mister priest!"
The priest turned to find Catrina dashing towards him, her belt arrayed with more daggers than he had ever seen. She spun, as if it was a new skirt.
"What do you think?"
"I just hope you don't have to use them." The priest said.
Hafros came ducking under the doorway, a smith's hammer in his grip. He grinned, and handed the priest a spear.
"Seemed appropriate." He said "Don't ask me why."
The priest hefted it nervously, and tried to imagine stabbing someone with it. He couldn't. As the other two played with their new weapons, the priest turned to look for the Man in the Woods. He was hardly even surprised to find that he had disappeared.
The court was crowded as could be that evening. They all filed in, dressed in various servants outfits to fit in. Servants were plentiful in such places, the scholar explained to them, and would hardly seem out of place.
Most of them hid weapons under their clothes. Aderyn wore a cloak to hide her bow. Catrina wore a tunic over the knives. The priest gladly found that there was no way to hide a spear, and made his excuses to stay unarmed. Even Lily brought a small knife though, and the thought made him nervous.
They filed into the room and stayed at the edges. The scholar was fidgeting the worst, and looked like he might be sick when they finally called him to the throne. The jester was crouching by the king's side, smiling a wan mischievous smile that doubtless seemed harmless to most everyone there.
"Your royal Majesty." The scholar bowed low, his fingers fidgeting nervously behind his back. "I and my compatriots have a… query for you."
The king smiled graciously, and gave an imperial nod.
"State your query then."
The scholar was clearly nervous beyond belief. He stumbled for words. Catrina stepped forward.
"You recognize me?" she asked.
A small furrow came between the King's eyes.
"You were in the garden."
"Yeah sire, I was. But even there, ya' knew me didn't ya?"
Catrina stepped to the side, and gestured to the others, still hugging the wall.
"And them. You recognize 'em? And the scholar. You recognized 'im too, right."
The confusion on the King's face grew deeper. There was murmuring in the hall now, as everyone wondered what in the world the purpose of this query was. The King turned back to the scholar.
"What is the meaning of this? I fail to understand."
The scholar bobbed humbly again, trying to keep up the smile.
"We know little more than you your majesty. Only that each and every one of us could recognize each other on sight, and that we all seem to have visions we can't explain. Does this sound familiar to you?"
The king opened his mouth to speak, when a high thin laugh cut through the air. It was the jester, tittering away. Slowly, the nobles began to laugh as well, then the servants, then the whole room was chortling at the joke. The king snorted himself, and shook his head.
"Visions, you say? You're the mad Mellan aren't you? I may have seen you around the castle yes. But this motley of servants is hardly familiar to me."
"You must recognize us!" the priest said, desperation cracking through "Don't you remember? Tell me you remember!"
For a moment, the priest thought he saw something flash in the king's eyes. Then the court jester leaned down to the king and placed a possessive hand on his shoulder.
"Sire," he murmured, the words carrying across the room "It's simply a trick. Nothing more."
As in a daze, the king nodded, and gestured to the guards.
"Arrest them. Put them in the dungeon."
The priest felt something sink in his chest, and the guards advanced. Then Catrina drew a dagger stabbed a knight in the chest, and chaos burst throughout the room like a ripe tomato. The guards came charging at them, and people were screaming. Hafros was swinging with the hammer, ringing on helms like gongs, Catrina bit and dodged, Aderyn clawed and struck at faces until they bled.
The scholar stayed standing in the middle of the room, voicing protests as loudly as he could, but the king's ears were as stoppered as if they had been wadded up in cotton. The jester at his side laughed. He began to chant, singing in the king's ear like a nursery rhyme.
"We've played the game, we've had our fun,
"Be careful children, what you say,
"The curtain closes, the game is done.
"Now the Pied Piper leads you away."
He took a deep bow behind the king's back, and began to cackle, louder and louder.
No. the priest thought I won't let it end like this. But he had no idea what to do.
Then, all at once, there was the sound of shattering glass. A thing burst into the room. It seemed to be beast, then man, then something completely different. When everyone's gaze settled, a terrifying figure stood in front of them.
Everyone, even the jester, was shocked into silence
"The Man in the Woods" the court began to whisper "the Man in the Woods."
The fierce figure snarled, and shifted as if uncomfortable in the civilized lights. He glanced back at the six, then at the king.
"I don't know exactly what's going on." He said "But you're being a right fool."
The King bristled, and stood, drawing his sword.
"Monster." He said. "You've been plaguing my people for years, and now you choose to come into my own castle? One of us is a fool, that's for sure."
No more breath was wasted on words. The beast man leapt for the king's throat, teeth bared, and the king's sword swung. The beast man dodged, slashed at the King, and struck him several steps back. The sword came down, and bounced off something metal under the wolf's hide. The beast man snarled and slashed at the king again, this time raking his cheek and drawing blood. Everyone was screaming, and the scholar was clutching his head in terror.
"This is all wrong!" he said "This is all wrong, you need to stop fighting!"
The soldiers rushed forward, spears aimed at the beat man, but suddenly Hafros was in front of them, swinging left and right, like a living wall rebuffing their advances. Lily started screaming like a banshee, yelling about how the Man in the Woods would kill them all and rend them into several (graphically described) pieces. In moments the servant, and then the nobles, were doing their best to flee from the hall in abject panic, and the soldiers found themselves struggling upstream in a river of silks and perfume.
Catrina, pressed in a corner of this crowd, found Aderyn hauling her to her feet.
"You've got to get out of here Catrina. Before this get any worse."
Catrina cried out in protest, but Aderyn was already hauling her towards the door. Then, suddenly, the priest burst from the crowd, and grabbed ahold of both their arms. It was a weak grip, but the surprise stopped them.
"No. He said. No, you need to stay."
Aderyn rounded on him "Look, I appreciate your guff. I really do. But there's a time to cut and run."
The priest shook his head.
"We need to stop them right? Before they kill each other. And we need to shock the king out of whatever hold that sorcerer fool has on him."
"What do you have in mind?" Catrina asked.
The priest looked at Aderyn "Give Catrina your bow."
"What?!" Aderyn said, clutching at her weapon.
"I've never used one before!" Catrina protested.
The priest was feeling vertigo so strong that he was almost falling over.
"You have. Remember? And you've shot the king, or whoever he is, before. He'll remember too. So it needs to be you."
Catrina blanched "What if I kill him?"
"You'll have to make sure you don't."
Aderyn pressed the bow into Catrina's hand. "Do it. Before we all become sane."
Catrina took the bow with shaking hands. Then, like a crashing wave, Captain Dunn burst from the crowd, swinging his sword like a madmad.
"You're not ruining this!" he shouted "I'm not going back to being dead!"
Catrina screamed, but suddenly the priest was there, with a spear in hand. He struck the captain's sword aside, and drove him back, one step, then another.
"Do it!" he shouted "You need to do it now!"
The mercenary swung forward again, bellowing, but the priest somehow rebuffed the attack again, and again.
Catrina fit an arrow to the bow, and tried to aim it through the crowd.
"I can't see!"
Aderyn cast her eyes around, and caught sight of the window alcoves "Up there!"
She made a step with her hands "I'll boost you."
Catrina giggled, clearly terrified.
"Before we become sane."
She put her foot in the makeshift stirrup, and Aderyn hoisted her into the air. It was like she was flying. Catrina caught hold of the ledge with her hands like claws, and below Aderyn shoved her upwards until she was able to clamor into the alcove by hook and crook.
Panting, the girl stood up and fitted the bow to the arrow. Her heart was pounding, and the entire world was mad. The jester was laughing again, and everyone was screaming.
Catrina took a deep breath. She pulled the arrow back on the string. And she fired.
The arrow whizzed through the air, above everyone's heads and landed with a solid thunk. The king stumbled back, his hand going to his bleeding shoulder. The king looked up, and saw the girl on the ledge. A glint of recognition came to his eyes.
"You remember, don't you?"
The king looked at the Man in the Woods. The beast man seemed to be waiting to see what he would do.
"We were side by side. We were fighting. They pierced our hearts, with a spear, with an arrow. It made us strong. Do you remember?"
The king looked around him, confused. He saw the wild man, the scholar, the fisherman, the herb woman, the priest, the scrubby little foundling on the ledge. He turned to the beast man.
"You left." He said. "You left us, and we can't beat him without you."
"We need to get back, before we can't worry about that, now don't we?"
The king glanced around again, then, with one swooping motion he turned and drove his sword through the jester's heart.
The jester looked down at the bleeding wound, and smiled a wan smile.
"Well. It was a fun game anyway. I suppose I'll see you at the tip of the mountain then."
With a laugh, he dissolved into nothingness, and everything went white.