Chapter Text
Brianna wakes with the gravel digging into her back, the sound of ashen wind in the treetops, and the start of a roaring migraine.
Everything hurt. In a way that hadn’t hurt since she’d been a child on the worst day of her life.
Opening her eyes to find herself alone, in a valley in the middle of nowhere, she realised that this was going to be a contender for the second worst.
Firstly, because she was in pain and alone. They’d promised if something ever happened then she wouldn’t be alone. She’d clearly had something happen in public and her friends had just gone. Sitting upright took some effort, but Brianna managed it, first to rest against her elbows and then onto her hands. Small breaths, Bree.
It’ll stop your head swimming, if nothing else.
She was one thing and that not a woman meant for the outdoors. The hobbit lifestyle of a comfortable armchair and her books would have served Brianna well, with the odd adventure sandwiched in-between. Said odd ‘adventure’ didn’t have to include medical problems in public. Again.
When Bree raised a hand to her forehead she found a small trail of blood, pain springing where her fingers touched skin - likely having found a graze. That would explain the headache pounding a rhythm behind her eyes.
Brushing hair away from her face, a few pieces of glass fell into the dust around her. I must look a wreck. What the hell happened?
Gone were the flat royal gardens the six had been exploring on their own week of adventures, though of a more gentle and historically informative variety. The first she’d taken in quite a while and this is what happened? She couldn’t recognise anything, even the soil felt wrong. Too much silt for this part of the country. Sat down in the dirt, even the shadows on the floor looked wrong; when Bree turned to look up, hand raising against the sun in her eyes, she learned why.
“No… that’s not -” She whispered. Deep breaths, Bree. On legs more wobbly than a young deer’s she climbed up slowly, using the nearby rocks as supports. More than once she had to stop and breathe through spots in her vision or the panic, but she made the small climb to stand on the outcrop of stone just beneath it.
The tentacles (or tentacle-shaped?) supports at the bottom had broken wildly and left the pod thing left tilting precariously over the edge of the rocky outcrop.
Bree reached over to poke it. The structure with the obsidian and the goo was real, didn’t disappear beneath her touch. Tipped over on its side, the cracked front window still showed the same brown hair, the same jeans and boots and leather jacket. Bree leaned closer to look at the expression of the odd woman – her wide green eyes didn’t look any different to yesterday morning. Who knows how long she crouched there staring at the reflection when she noticed the familiar fabric bunched amongst the debris, and pulled her backpack out of the wreckage. A little smokey, one of the outer side pockets was torn, but nothing seemed to be missing when she checked inside.
“But we were at Hampton Court Palace, in the gardens. The photo- weren’t we taking a...”
Her phone. They’d been taking a group photo by the lake when – Bree reached into her jeans pockets and there it was, screen somehow still uncracked when she pulled it into the sun. Nervous twitching fingers pressed the power button and without hesitation it unlocked. Still her in there, then. Well, mostly still her.
She rushed through to the last recording, only a minute or so long; it had been a quiet evening, the only ones left in rich historical gardens right before closing, and wanted one last group photo before the rain set in. Brianna watches the six bustle and shove themselves into the frame, the Tudor palace unseen behind the camera in favour of the conical trees lining the path to the fountain pond. They’d saved it for last, spending far too much time looking at paintings and coveting the starry skies painted on the ceiling in the chapel.
Hurry up would you! Scott had taken to reminding them all every five minutes for that last hour. It’s closing in ten minutes.
And we still need to get to the giftshop!
Bree take the bloody photo alre- Is this a recording?!- The audio overtaken by wild laughter; she watches herself dip the camera laughing harder, dodging swipes and elbows. Charlie get your phone and take an actual group photo.
Then she catches it; that moment where each of the six of them caught what was happening, what they saw arriving, first a reflection on screen – then as they turned to look over shoulders …
Get indoors – go! Brianna flinched hearing herself shout over the speakers. Was it really that quiet? Just six people shouting as the heavens split open and hell poured out? The sound of gravel crunching under foot, a gate slamming open before them; there’s just enough time for the old her to pull the camera up, to see the tendrils from something in the sky reaching towards her before the clip ends.
This wasn’t possible, but yet here she sat. She could hear fire – a big one – burning somewhere close, the smoke acrid with an undercurrent of barbecued seafood. The Nautiloid crash.
So it wasn’t a migraine then. The other five…
But she wasn’t on the beach. This starts on the beach. Her hands shook so badly that her phone dropped onto the open bag at her feet, sitting down on the rocky ledge when she finds she cannot stand anymore.
“Maybe I deserve this.” she whispers to herself with a little manic laugh. If she doesn’t laugh she’ll cry. Maybe they’ve already moved on to the Grove and left me here. Maybe they never found me at all…
Sitting there and crying sounded like an excellent idea. Wandering until she passed out and rescued, or got shot by goblins also sounded more like the true adventure she’d found herself in. Both options sounded exhausting, and equally as likely to get her lost. Did any of the figures she read about act like this? Their darkest moments where everything is hopeless and they had to be brave beyond reason?
This isn’t the worst moment. This is the prologue to those worst moments.
The sound of boots on stone, the crunch of gravel has her flinching; heavy prints, a man’s. Walking with intent, almost determined and getting closer.
Not the gait of her friends, and that brought about a flare of panic. Memories of people wanting to hurt them were suddenly very real and dangerous; weren’t there two fanatics roaming about trying to hunt and kill anyone who survived the crash?
Is there any sign of people? Brianna notices that there’s an old shortbow lying in the dirt, an arrow or two discarded by it. It’s been years since Bree had held one in her hands, but as the footsteps close in and get louder, she’d rather take the chance that muscle memory will take over. If in doubt, or in otherwise desperate need, she could throw it to buy herself a few seconds. There’s no blood beside it, so she hopes that whoever left it is okay.
Scampering down the rock Bree was debating how likely a sprint up and over the side or a dash right past them would be, when the figure revealed themselves.
Beneath a set of scorched but well-made armour walked in a man with dreads pulled back from his face revealing old, deep scars across one cheek. A rapier was held in one hand but eyes were soft with a genuine concern that damped the anxiety choking Brianna from her rocky perch.
“Well met” the man called, catching her standing there at the moment she saw him. He walked a bit into what was clearly a side path but he stopped a few meters away. “Are you alright?”
“Bit of a weird day, if I’m being honest.” Brianna said, wanting to give nothing away. She took in the rapier, the crossbow across his back that peeked out of one shoulder, the look of genuine concern even as they kept their distance. Discretely pinching the inside of her wrist didn’t dispel the illusion.
But he didn’t leave. He chuckles, running a hand over the gold cuff near his ear. “You could say that again.”
Brianna saw his gaze flick up over her shoulder, to the cracked and ruined pod, and back to her. He’d seen. Running was suddenly looking like a really good idea if she flubbed this.
“Do you need help?”
“No, I’m good.” The final hop down to the ground is taller than she thought and Brianna crouches low to save her knees, trying not to stagger or worse, fall over. Bree placed the bag down and zipped it up. “If you could give me directions to the nearest settlement then I’ll get out of your hair.”
That’s what all the adventurers said in the books, right?
She tried to walk past him, head held high, trying for a confidence Brianna didn’t entirely have.
When they were barely a meter apart from one another, she almost doubled over from a tingle that shot down her spine into the palms of her hands, the soles of her feet. The sensation of deja vu without the historical experience.
The twitch behind the eye. A Tadpole. Oh shit.
Brianna could smell sulfur, feel the flush of overwhelming humidity and heat like she was there, amongst the hunt herself. On a far ridge she catches the broken horn, the wide eyed fury – the hellfire pushing back the advances between them and their quarry.
She lurched back and saw Wyll – because who else was this going to be now? – do the same.
Given the option she would’ve shown something more impressive than the hours sitting before the empty page, before echoing historic halls. Then a wave of fear, helplessness that they know all too well; running, tripping over gravel, and then waking up a few feet from where they were standing.
A hand reaches out to her elbow, the anchor stopping her from falling over or darting into the woods like a spooked animal. “Hells great fires... you were on the ship as well.”
For a moment she’s so stunned (and focusing on not being sick) all Bree can do is nod. The rush of relief of oh he’s not going to hurt you to wait it’s someone you recognise from a video game but in the flesh, was overwhelming. The semblance of a plan she had been trying to build was swiftly thrown from a cliff.
“Have you seen anyone else about? Anyone who might’ve been on the ship – my friends. They … “I’m hoping some of them got away,” she rambles, only for it to catch. Then just for herself: “I’m the slower runner; it got me first.”
“We survived,” he tries for a reasurring smile, but it came out as more of a wobbling frown. The kind parents wear to keep children from crying at bad news. “There’s a strong likelihood they did as well. They might meet us on the path to the Grove.”
Brianna frowns. “Grove?”
The not-introduced Wyll nodded and gestured back to the way he’d approached.
“I was told there’s a healer nearby, at a grove to the North-West. We should get your injury checked out. I’d offer you a potion of healing if I had any but alas…”
He gestures to Bree’s temple, but she brushes it aside. “Just a bruise, but you’re right. Maybe ... Maybe someone else already made it there?”
For a moment her left eye physically twitched, forcing Brianna to shut her eyes against the movement as the tadpole trying to reopen the mental connection between the two.
“What the hell did that do?
“It seems that our hitch-hikers have made fast friends,” he grimaces, rolling his shoulder. A barely concealed flinch. “And from that, I suppose an introduction is in order: The Blade of Frontiers, at your service.”
So it was Wyll. Nice to have a confirmation, she thinks idly as the man drips into a semi formal bow and Brianna tried not to make her replying laugh too overt, instead aiming for something more fitting for responding to a terrible pun.
“I can’t just keep calling you the Blade of Frontiers… do you happen to have a normal name?”
He chuckles and inclines his head. “Fair enough. Blade to the public, but to my friends… you can call me Wyll.”
“Brianna.” Was going to shake his hand too formal for a pair of survivors of inter-spacial squids? “Is the whole Blade thing a title you decided, one someone gave you, or the classic old school nickname?”
“A little bit of both, I suppose.” Wyll let out a sigh. “Though when the bards decided to try and see how many jokes they could get out of Blade as a euphemism I’ll never completely understand.”
“Ah, it’s easy pickings for them I suppose.” she grinned. “Hero with a saving people thing, I take it?”
Wyll, to his credit laughed through the small flush of embarrassment. “Well, there’s definitely been an adventure that’s helped a damsel in distress or two – more often than not it’s a monster in the wings or a runaway beast in the wilds. Ah, not that I mean there’s any around here...”
“Except the mind flayers and whatever else.”
He must have sensed that Brianna was still thrown off kilter with the whole revelation. She wondered what her face must have betrayed. Get it together, Bree.
Wyll stepped back and gestured to the wide map of wilderness beyond. “Shall we go and see about that healer? I can tell you some of the fabled history behind the moniker as we walk, if you need a distraction.”
“Get me in front of the idiot responsible for the tadpoles and we’ll see about that whole in distress thing. I’m certainly giving them a piece of my mind.”
But they start walking. A story you won’t believe is probably a good distraction.
~*~
The pair walked north away from the burning wreckage, hoping beyond belief that someone would be right around the corner. Wyll, ever the gentleman, never commented when she paused in their hikes for a breather, taking each opportunity to orientate themselves in the landscape. For which she was thankful because each tree and abandoned cart looked exactly the same.
Brianna looked down at her phone, chest aching every time she caught the No Signal in the top right corner beside the dwindling battery.
They found a few people who hadn’t made it; fishers crushed by the crash, one farmer strangled by something (Wyll had confirmed it was likely from an intellect devourer. The thought of a brain with feet and tentacles was not something she wanted to dwell on), the remnants of a goblin attack next to abandoned carts and rucksacks that had been ripped apart and sifted through.
Wyll seemed to be looking for something specific in the tracks. Maybe he would make a good ranger, she thought as she watched him sniffing the air near a scorch mark. When Wyll stood up again, she tried her best to put a kind expression on, hoping hiding the fact it did look somewhat ridiculous to unfamiliar witnesses.
“Who was that you were chasing? When the parasite … I don’t know, connected?”
“Her name is Karlach,” he replied, the words dripping like venomous bile. “Advocatus diaboli – a devil’s advocate, one of the main combatants for the Archdevils in the Blood War. I tracked her through the Hells, and could have ended things there…”
“If only the mind flayers hadn’t turned up.” She finished. It made her feel sick saying out loud. Making it real. But Karlach isn’t evil, she wanted to yell just as loudly.
“She’s out there right now, preying on the innocent souls who live around here.”
For such a kind man, the venom in Wyll’s words left her with no response other than a shudder. A distinct reminder that good is not nice on the Sword Coast.
They walk on, and Wyll asks a few questions about herself, her missing friends. Brianna gives him a few details on what they look like, vague heights and what they were wearing. On instinct she brought up photos of their trip, went to show part of the video of the Nautiloid, before realising when he was surprised and awed by the ‘magic’ of the object that she didn’t have the patience to explain electronic technology.
Rustling in the pathway to their left; the noise was slow, drawn out scratches on the earth a slow dirge to an unfortunate fate. Wyll, shoulders tense, was discretely trying to usher Brianna to stand behind him. They listened closely, ready for fight or flight – when, instead of an armed onslaught Brianna can hear crying.
“- nonono, I shouldn’t have taken it until I got back to the Grove,” the figure said, speaking low to themselves which swiftly followed by a sob.
It barely took the two humans the time to glance at one another before they were both running towards the noise. Wyll found her first, crawling down the path. The leathers were scratched and behind them was a long indent in the dust; they’d clearly forced themselves to just keep moving until they’d physically collapsed.
He calling out to the person on the ground, their rust red skin trembling as they struggled onto their forearms and at the sound of the two set of footsteps looks up. The black hair flinging back to reveal that she had horns. A tiefling.
She flinches back at the flash of sun on Wyll’s rapier, but doesn’t fight them.
“Get her left,” he ordered Bree, already wrapping an arm around their waist, and her arm around his shoulders. Brianna did the same on the other side and between the two of them, they managed to get her feet beneath her enough to push her up out of the dirt.
Bree shifted the new weight around her bag. This new and unknown being was a fair bit taller than her, and Wyll taller than that. “What happened?”
“A hag,” the woman gave out another sob as her foot caught and ankle rolled. “She was so nice, gave me something to help that would’ve given me the strength of a bugbear so I could help.”
The three helped her take a tentative step forward. The woman’s feet dragged at an uncomfortable angle and didn’t regain purchase on the path. “Gah, it’s all pins and thorns from my knees downwards.”
“We’ll take you back,” Bree said right away. “Just tell us which roads to take.”
“It’s to the left, up here.” She pulled her arm from around Wyll’s shoulders to point and nearly ended up back on the ground. “You’ve certainly picked a rough time to turn up. The druids are going to be forcing everyone out sooner or later.”
“What? Why would they do such a thing?” from what Bree could see of his face, Wyll looked aghast at the news. “The Druids I’ve met in the past would never -”
“Well you can take it up with them for all I care.” Another whine of pain and the tiefling’s knee buckled again. “Can we hurry up? There’s goblins in the area and I’d rather we didn’t find out just how many there are right now.”
With most of the tiefling’s bodyweight on them both, their movement slowed drastically. But beneath the heavy summer sun that crept along the sky with them, sweat dripping down their brows and backs, but they never stopped moving towards their destination.
It seemed all too long to Brianna before the tiefling said that they were almost there. She didn’t see it at first, the portcullis blending in with the surroundings - the darker green in the vines that had dried in the summer heat. The unlikely party stopped a few feet away. They waited. But the gate didn’t open.
Beside her Wyll shouted up, and a pair of horns above skin a mustardy yellow pick themselves out of the blue sky to answer back. Brianna didn’t listen to what he was saying, turned to the greenery behind them, hoping to see five familiar faces appearing out of the foliage.
Please. Where are you all?
“Kanon just open the bloody gates, would you!” the tiefling between the two yelled up.
Whoever Wyll had been arguing with stopped in their speech at that, spluttering around the swift course correction. Next thing the trio knew there was a creaking of old, sturdy wood and the vines before them opened up into a walkway to safety.
As they stumble inside, a dozen or more tieflings appeared into view from where they had been lingering near the overhang, with all kinds of improvised weapons visible alongside the crossbows and halberds. Few gave Brianna a second look, though some of those who had their hands free and were close nodded to Wyll.
Arms reached out to take her, more tieflings like Pandirna - some more battered and bruised than others, but all in clothing or armour that had seen better days. All looked exhausted, even as they
“Pandirna!” barked a battleworn commander approaching the gathering from down the hill.
Even from the crowd of people, weaponry and horns, Brianna could spot the flinch at what was undoubtedly the woman’s name. The sea of people not holding onto her disappeared sharpish, scattering to what they were doing before. Brianna caught more than a few of them listening in, watching out of the corners of their eyes.
“Zevlor, listen-”
“No.” He held up a hand and she fell silent, the reasoning dying on the end of her tongue. Zevlor bristled, evidently only just able to keep his anger under control. “Pandirna what were you thinking?”
Pandirna didn’t have an answer.
“Take her inside and see if the druids will finally give her something to fix it. Even they can’t be cruel enough to turn away an injured fool.”
“Thank you,” she managed to call to Brianna and Wyll before she was led further into the settlement.
“You seem to be making a habit of this,” Bree muttered to Wyll once Pandirna and her entourage had wandered out of earshot.
“Not intentionally.”
“I promise you I’m not about to go running to fight a hag. I’ll wait at least a week.”
That was greeted with a quick laugh, a bemused shake of the head.
The hellrider, (Zevlor, Brianna heard the others say. And that was a memory she wanted to forget) turned to the two new arrivals with a tired sigh. He did at least try to appear to be getting frustration under control. “Thank you both, for bringing her back.”
“Well, we could hardly leave her on the side of the road in that much pain,” Wyll brushed aside the gratitude, reaching out to clasp the tiefling’s arm with his. “Not least when she mentioned goblins in the area.”
“Many would have done.” He looked over to Wyll. He looked so tired, as the mask slipped just a little. “It’s good to see you again, Blade.”
He held out a hand and Wyll took it, grasping the man’s arm. The camaraderie spoke of having fought together for some time, and a reunion long in the making.
“We heard rumours about what had befallen you, after you got left behind in Avernus to find your quarry…”
“Your recruits have been telling stories, Hellrider.” Wyll chuckles. Brianna noticed the charm dissuading from anything further. “It’s good to see many of you here in one piece – though I’d hoped in better circumstances.”
“Hmm, quite. But your arrival is a ray of sunlight that I feel we could all need. The children have ben wondering when the next fencing lesson with the Blade of Frontiers would be.”
Wyll’s face brightened. “Ah, excellent. I’d been wondering how Umi has been getting on.”
he clapped Zevlor on the shoulder and went to head off to find them but then seemed to remember that Bree was still standing beside him.
I don’t know anyone here and my friends are missing. Don’t you disappear too.
She smiled and nodded. “I’ll be fine. Go see your adoring fans.”
He still hesitated for a moment longer. Only at Brianna’s nod and small smile did he excuse himself. Even so, she watched him disappear into the grove’s rabbit warren of tunnels and rock formations, the cheer of the small bunch of small kids that sprinting to his legs and engulfed him into a merry sea of laughter and determined joy.
You’re a big girl, Bree. Maybe out of practise with people skills, but you can handle this on your own – for a little while.
“Wyll is known to many people around here, but you’re not. I’m Zevlor, defacto leader of the refugees in these parts. Any friend of the Blade of Frontiers has already earned our ears, which is more than can be said for a certain group of druids…”
Bree introduced herself, gave a few details about how she and Wyll had stumbled upon one another. Said that five of her friends had gotten separated from her and that she needed to find them.
When she asked if he’d seen anyone else wander into the Grove in the last day or so, Zevlor had the dignity to look concerned on her behalf. “No, you two are the first since the Archdruid Halsin set out with that fool Aradin and his compatriots. We sent some scouts out earlier this morning – surprised neither of you had run into them on your way here.”
She felt her shoulders drop; even knowing that most of the other companions would be hours behind them, if they all managed to find each other at all. So much could go wrong between the wreck and the Grove.