by James Hunt
"You haven't even introduced yourself." Garen called out as he ducked a wild haymaker swing. It caused her to step back with her fists poised to strike again. She looked at him oddly as she stood panting from the exertion. She glared at him as she backed away, utterly frustrated. She lowered her fists and stood up poised and defiant. Her chest heaved up and down, her bare breasts rising and falling, slick with rain and her nipples hard from the chill air. Her wet hair hung in faded blue clumps to her shoulders. Water even dribbled down her long ears to irritate her ear canals, causing her to shake her head violently from time to time. Despite all those inconveniences, what bothered her most was the look on Garen's face. There she stood naked before him - wet, aroused, and panting from their exchange -- she should be a very enticing vision to any male. But this Garen character looked at her with un-lusting eyes... and that pissed her off. She walked up to him until her face was within a few inches, and glared angrily with her hands on her hips. He didn't move, just met her gaze with a smug expression. "I am The Mischievous." She said calmly...right before thrusting her knee into his crotch and making very solid contact. The elusive Garen crumpled to the rooftop in agony, his spear clattered to the shingles.
"I'm surprised." She admitted as he groaned. "I apologize, I wasn't expecting there to be anything of value there."
Something moved in the distance, and she saw their rooftop dance had attracted spectators below. More soldiers carrying spears and looking just as imposing as Garen were looking up at her from the courtyard beyond. Luckily there was no one within range, but the moment she saw them leap right up onto the roofs and make their way speedily towards her, she knew her escape opportunity was quickly disappearing.
"I'm not done here yet." She said as she looked over her shoulder at the wall that was just within jumping distance. "Time for some payback." Garen had gotten to his feet, still struggling to overcome the pain in his loins. But The Mischievous had already disappeared below.
By the time night fell, the intruder hadn't been recaptured. The alarm was still in effect but no sign had been seen of her. This news distressed the priest as he knelt in prayer before the altar of his chapel. Pews lined the hall behind him all the way to a set of large double doors. He was an elderly man, with long grey hair streaked back with oils, and a wrinkled face with hollow cheeks. His nose was long and hawk like, to match his shrewd gaze whenever he opened his eyes. His robe was plain and light brown with just a rope belt to keep it secure. He was the spiritual leader of this place, and so knelt in privacy in this chapel while he prayed.
To The Mischievous he looked to be the best place to start for information.
She fell off the rafters above with grace and floated down to the ground aided by a little magic she knew. Her feet landed quietly and she walked with a silent sashay to her hips; she was enjoying stalking this prey, old men easily fell for her charms. In the time she was in hiding she had gotten her hands on some snug pants and one of those elite vests. It covered her chest well enough, but left nothing to the imagination the way she wore it open in the front. She had even captured a kitchen knife as long as her forearm, and carried it tucked behind her arm.
"I knew you would come, child" The priest said aloud. The Mischievous froze in her tracks. "I know you are there behind me, hmm, and I know you are armed. You want answers? Simply come and ask, but do not take me for a fool. Hmmph!" He said, but didn't turn around. He kept to his prayers as The Mischievous silently circled around to face him.
"Very well." She said as she came to squat before the old man. "Who are you?"
"I am the Father. I am in charge here." He stated sternly.
"What is this place?"
"A Monastery." He scoffed at her. "But we also train special soldiers here."
"What kind of soldiers?" she humored him.
"The same kind that snuck into your Zek stronghold and freed you." He snapped at her. That surprised her. The Mischievous was distracted as her mind went back to that moment in the Majestic's cells. She had thought he was just another slave come to collect her, but when this human undid her shackles he put some kind of vest on her and said a word. She woke up in a room on the surface -- here -- and had been held for interrogation ever since.
"Freed me??" She laughed. "You call that pathetic attempt at imprisonment, freedom?"
"You liked it didn't you?" He shot back, perturbed. "Hmph, you could have left at any time you wanted, but you Zeks let your sick lusts control you. You just couldn't leave until you... scratched that itch?" The Mischievous took a step back, horrified.
"You can read minds!?"
"Faugh!" the old man grunted disgusted. "No. Why would I want to see inside your depraved mind?" He gave her a sideways, disgusted look, before it melted a bit into begrudged acceptance. "You're predictable child. That's just the truth of it. But there is hope for you. You can be unpredictable when you want to. Maybe that's what he saw in you."
"Who?"
"The one that sent you here." The Father grumbled. "Not too bright though." He sighed. "We don't take prisoners child. We take students." The Mischievous crossed her arms over her partially exposed chest. One blue dyed eyebrow arched in a mix of confusion and intrigue.
"Why would I want to be one of your soldiers?"
"Same reason all the others do." He scoffed.
"Power." But she wasn't convinced. "But those kind of people never survive the training. Along the way you have to find a truth to it before you meet your end. That's the only advice I'm ever going to give."The Mischievous still wasn't satisfied, and she let it show on her face.
"There are worse things in this world than monsters that eat children. There are people powerful enough to ruin it for all of us." He looked up at her with a dark look - a dangerous look. For the first time she felt she was seeing the real "Father". But he wouldn't say any more, he just glared at her.
"Your special soldiers kill those people, don't they?"
"You aren't so dumb after all," He muttered, and snorted. The Mischievous looked down to the floor with a scowl, her brain was running at high speed digesting all of this and trying to figure out why they sent one of their men to Zecair. These kind of soldiers weren't soldiers at all, they were just plain assassins.
"So you train assassins?" She pried.
"Fugh." The old man griped. "Assassins are murderers for hire. Sinful lot, those types. We... we are soldiers of God. We start wars between nations, or we end them. Depends on who's in favor. We're called Disruptors."
"Who was the target in Zecair?" She pressed. But the old man didn't answer. "What if I don't want to be a... Disruptor."
"We don't take prisoners. Only students." He repeated, as if to answer her question. The Mischievous walked up to stand before him and brought the knife up to her side
"Who's to stop me from slitting your throat?" She dared him, and brought the blade to within inches of his face.
"Trust this girl." He gave her a stern look. "No one leaves here alive that I don't give permission to. The boys you played with outside are just trainees. The real danger here is me" He reached up, grabbed her knife with his bare hand, and with a quick flick of his wrist snapped the blade off the handle. The Mischievous reeled back, taken by surprise by the strength of this old geezer. She didn't notice him move until the sharp pain of all five inches of sharp steel pierced her thigh and split her thigh bone.
She didn't scream. Her Zecairin training gave her that. But she did crumple to the ground clutching her leg. Her whole body trembled from the pain, her hands could barely hold her leg and pinch off the blood as it flowed.
"Use your magic girl." The Father sternly said as he stood up. "You'll need that leg for your training tomorrow." He left her there alone in the chapel and opened the doors to the rain outside. The old man left into the night. Had he looked back he would have seen the bloody knife blade meant for his back fall short and clatter to the stone floor. It had taken all her strength to pull the damn thing out, she didn't have any l
eft to clear the distance with the throw.
There she stayed for the night, alone with her pain and her humiliation. Alone to consider what the morning would bring.
*****
Niyana
The woods had thinned along their journey. Instead of a tightly packed forest of pine and maple, scrawny firs and oaks stood tall like spears thrust at the sky. It made Kreth uncomfortable. He had stopped talking, and kept looking from treetop to treetop. It was just as well, Niyana had been brooding silently to herself since their last passionate pairing. She was taking the quiet of their journey to search her soul. No matter how many miles they put between themselves and Zecair, that terrible place still haunted her. Shadows in every corner, smiles were more of a threat than a welcome; it was a place of constant worry and danger. The peace of this forest didn't bring her any comfort. Secretly, she thought nothing ever would.
A soft whistle broke the silence, and the lizard jerked suddenly to one side. Niyana was immediately tossed free and let out a short scream of alarm. Kreth held on to the rein and went down with the strider as it twisted and jerked, trying to dislodge something embedded in the back of its neck. One thickly clawed paw came at him and Kreth was forced to jump away before getting mauled. He didn't have a chance to investigate the cause of the lizard's violent thrashing as another soft whistle sounded. Kreth jerked his head to one side suddenly in anticipation of the arrow that flew past his ear.
"Get cover!" He shouted Niyana, and turned to run. More arrows zinged almost silently through the trees after him. The elven princess rolled along the ground under a fallen log. It wasn't enough to cover her completely, but kept her head and chest safe. She watched the lizard thrash helplessly. She couldn't ease its pain or help it without risking her safety. As it rolled onto its side, she saw the wooden shaft that protruded from the creature's shoulder and recognized it. Anger twisted inside her like a rope, and she darted out from under her cover.
"COME OUT AND FACE ME! I HAVE THAT RIGHT!" She shouted to the trees in Lunarian, her native language. The arrows whizzed by her face and cut a red line across her cheek. The challenge had been refused.
She had been born a princess, but a soldier was what she had made of herself. The direction the shot came from was easy to tell from the grazing. Niyana put a tree between herself and her attacker - a move that would cause them to relocate. She climbed the tree quickly and silently. Her fingers and toes dug into the crevices between the bark and, skillful as a spider, she was up to its top branches in seconds. She closed her eyes and focused her will on the use of magic. Slowly her skin turned shades of mottled grey and brown with splotches of leafy green. It was magic camouflage, and would last only so long as she remained still. This was the arena of the Lunarian military, and the trees were where they trained. She clung to the thinning trunk, and ever so slowly peered around its edge so her camouflage could follow. Motionless, expressionless, she watched the leaves and branches for any movement and was soon rewarded. Something lower on the trees moved from one perch to another.
Her quarry moved close enough to see; Niyana made out the leafy brown and green camouflage uniform on her own people. The knotted rope in her stomach suddenly burst, and her cheeks turned flush with a violent anger. This betrayal was worse than her brothers. His was due to madness; theirs was due to loyalty to that madness.
She could almost make out their face, when suddenly they looked up at her with a start. She realized that her anger had broken her concentration, and now she was perfectly visible amid the trees. Her opponent drew back an arrow, and Niyana dropped through the branches before it struck. She knew where he was now, and she didn't care how many stinging arrows dug into her legs and arms as she swung from branch to branch towards him. Lunarians were peerless acrobats in the trees, and so was their princess. Niyana closed the distance between them in a few swinging vaults. Each one was a brief moment of vulnerability where her opponent embedded a few more shafts into her. Despite his skill, he couldn't land a serious hit and knock her from the branches before she swung out of view only yards away.
Panic beaded down his chin in the form of sweat. The Lunarian archer jerked his bow from left to right, trying to catch sight of her and loose another shot. She had gotten too close too soon, and he hadn't prepared for that.
Something grabbed his neck, and he saw a pair of small feminine feet lock together in front of his face before they jerked him backwards off his perch. Down to the ground he fell, screaming with surprise. The jolt of hitting the ground forced all the air out of his lungs and sent stars before his eyes. They blotted out the vision of angry death that fell through the leaves after him with a pair of arrow shafts clutched in each of her palms. He did, however, feel them when they pierced his stomach.
"WHY?!" Niyana snarled at him. Her teeth bared inches from his face.
"C-contaminated." He wheezed, despite the pain. "You're... contaminated..." he panted. Niyana sank away. The bloodthirsty anger was subdued as she processed what this meant. "If you...return," He continued, drawing in deep gasps of breath, his hands trembling as they reached for the arrows sticking from his gut, "you'll infect us... all..."
Niyana shuddered in revulsion at this; despite her many small wounds she couldn't process this final blow. That knot of anger returned deep inside her. She tried to fight it back, her sorrow for her people's decision fought against it, but she could only take so much. She pulled a knife from his own belt and ended his suffering with a strike to the heart.
Niyana threw her head back and screamed to the heavens.
Once the rage subsided she looked down at the body below as if seeing it for the first time. Terror and revulsion now churned in her stomach where anger once resided.
"Oh elders... what have I done?" she cried softly and touched the man's cheek. She shouldn't be capable of this... this bloodlust. Her fingers gently closed his eyes. Softly, hands red with blood held his cheeks to her own face, and she whispered a quiet prayer for the soldier's spirit. Something suddenly smelled intoxicating, and that warm flush that had come with her anger suddenly returned to her cheeks. The smell came from her fingers, so she licked them in experimentation. The taste of blood sent her body into warm shivers and she couldn't help but sink her lips on the source below her. Soft moans fought their way out amid the slurping of the dead elf's spilled essence. Then like a shock to her system she jerked away and screamed in horrified denial - she was drinking his blood.
Frantically she wiped the blood off her fingers onto the body. She needed to get it off. She needed to get away from it. Whatever it was, it was driving her mad. Niyana ran through the forest towards the one person that could help her.
Niyana could easily follow the trail Kreth made through the brush. There were arrows scattered here and there along with broken twigs and trampled saplings. Her wounds were still bleeding; she only had time to take the arrows out least they get snagged on something. She found him not far off -- Kreth, and the archer. The elf girl sniper had an obvious wound, her face was ruined by a rock, but Kreth didn't seem injured. Her soldier's instincts told her there was something more here than what appeared. She took cover with her back to a tree and just listened, her eyes scanned the treetops that she could see. Nothing stirred that shouldn't be stirring. If there was a third archer, they already had the shot they needed, yet no shot came.
Cautiously she approached the two on the ground. Kreth wasn't breathing and a panic started to grow in her stomach. Her fingers touched his neck and felt no pulse. There wasn't a sizable wound, only small cuts, and yet something acrid tingled her nose ever so slightly. Niyana leaned down to a significant cut on his arm, and breathed normally -- the acrid smell was coming from his wound, and also from the arrow clutched in his hand. The tips had been poisoned.
Her hand rested on the human's forehead, it was cold and growing colder. Niyana sank to her knees as her heart fell with her -- Kreth was gone. She would cry for him, and honor his memory and the help he had given her, but no
t now.
Niyana pulled the servant's dress from her body and laid it over the man's face. Quickly she set about stripping the archer of her clothes and gear; she found the petite girl was just a size smaller than herself. Snug enough to wear, but uncomfortable in a real fight. It would have to do.
Dressed as one of them now, she pulled the tattered dress over the corpse and completed the ruse, and her transformation. Princess Niyana and Kreth had died here, slain by an unknown attacker. Only a soldier left here alive to report the deed done. She set to climbing a tall oak, careful to keep an eye to the branches above for onlookers or spies. The stolen outfit stretched against the larger curves of her hips and chest, she was a bit malnourished from her imprisonment, and therefore slimmer than usual, yet even so the garb was uncomfortable to move in. In time, however, it would wear to fit, just like the last uniform she wore.
Once she was perched high above, with the wilderness floor far below, her legs and arms remembered their training and she leapt high and far into the leaves. She would find the squad sent out to kill her, and then she would get her own answers.