<html> <head> <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> </head> <body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000"> -LurkingWolf ___ <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> March 7, 708 CR<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Julian was woken in the morning by an insistent tugging. At first he thought that someone was physically pulling on him, but as he slowly recovered his consciousness he recognized a distinct feeling that was slowly becoming familiar, that of his bond to Lucy being stretched to its utter limits.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> As he expected, the young mage’s bunk was empty, and seemed to have been that way for some time. Groaning, he managed to slide off of the bed that had been provided in the barracks’ common rest area. The cracks in the windows, all shut against the winter chill, still confirmed to him exactly what he suspected. The sun was still several hours from its own waking. The moondog shook his head and ran his fingers through the fur at the top of his head as though he still had human hair. How someone so young could bear to sleep so little and survive was well beyond his understanding.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> It took him little time to prepare himself for the day. Years with the wizard Nasoj had drilled discipline through his skull like a well-rehearsed catechism. Whether it was to gain favor with his superiors, or to seek opportunities to assassinate the man he claimed to serve, he had always taken pains to make brutal efficiency his most noteworthy trait. He never should have bothered; it was rumored that the dark wizard never slept. Even if that claim was false, his rest was taken behind magically sealed doors, doubtlessly leading to more and more numerous and sinister traps to fell those who managed to step beyond.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> He took a moment to be certain of where the bond led, but his initial guess was accurate. She had returned to the room where the ermine assassin would be kept until they discovered a way to reverse the spell that now bound him.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Or, perhaps, until they admitted that there was no solution.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> He shook his head. Cynicism was too easy a trait to cultivate in the company of the Keep’s enemies. While he sometimes regretted the circumstances that had forced his abandonment of that post, he never once regretted the opportunity to live amongst friends again.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> The door to the room was shut fast when he arrived, and Julian rapped on the wooden surface twice to alert Lucy to his presence. He could not detect any movement on the far end of the bond they shared, so he gently pushed the door open and slipped inside.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> The room was a little chilly after the stove had been left cold for the night, but the chill was quickly being banished by the fire. Lucy had already prepared for the day, it seemed.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> The mage herself was standing at the table in the center of the room. She glanced up casually to observe who was entering, but it seemed that she had already determined the answer using their mutual bond. She turned back to the cage on the table shortly, watching its small inhabitant sniffing about warily.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “I realized after last night that we forgot to find food for him yesterday,” she explained before Julian had ample opportunity to ask why she had returned at such an hour. “Thankfully I know a few things about what ermines eat, and the average Keeper’s diet is varied enough that finding something that he can safely eat was little trouble.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Julian nodded and watched the trapped creature for a few moments. It seemed that the ermine was wary of being handed food without having to hunt for it, but he was slowly beginning to gravitate towards the food out of desperate hunger.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “Don’t treat him too much like a pet, or he might come to you expecting food even after we bring him back,” he cautioned with a touch of sarcasm.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Lucy side and shook her head softly. “Please, do not even joke about that,” she muttered. “I know you were not at the Keep at the time of the Curse’s original casting, but after witnessing it myself, I find it difficult to tolerate even honest jokes regarding it.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Julian placed a paw on her shoulder to comfort her. “I am sorry for upsetting you,” he apologized.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “You couldn’t have known without living through it,” she responded in a low whisper. “The curse was meant to be the final blow to the Keep before Her defenses could even be fully brought to bear, and as such it was intended to be very, very final. Nasoj is not one of those fools who stands above his enemy and gloats as they die to give them an opportunity to kill him with their last breath. Should anyone under his command try to do such a thing, I am certain that he would impale them both with the same spear.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “You credit him with the quality of mercy,” Julian said with some chagrin. “With what I know of him, the two would beg for something so kind as a spear before they breathed their last.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Lucy hissed bitterly. “When the Curse struck, the effect was instant. For a few brief moments I was aware enough to be confused. Then, nothing. There was nothing but oblivion as I became an outcast in my own body, forced to lie and wail as a babe while unfathomable chaos unfolded about me. With the defenders gone, Nasoj’s horde began to overrun the walls.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “We all know the story from there; the countercurse was forged and the defenders fought back with all of their desperation and rage until the day was won. Many stories are hidden in those few words, but in the end I found myself thrust into an entirely new world.” She paused for a moment before continuing. “In the early days there were many stories about what the Curse could do, and of the limits of the countercurse were barely understood. Whispers suggested that some were never saved by the counterspell. Some said that some Keepers had left and wandered the forests and mere beasts, others lost in Kyia’s halls as strangers in their own bodies, a few more weeping in nurseries… Never did I determine if there was any truth to it, but with no chance of recognizing his face, it was a week until I found my father.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Julian winced. “I am sorry to hear that. At least you did find him at the end of it all.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Lucy nodded. “Yet there are others who were not so fortunate,” she admitted with evident sorrow. “Those who died in the battle could tell no one who they were. There are unmarked graves by the hundred to their memory, but many still do not know what became of their loved ones in those days. Some even still hope in those terrifying old rumors, thinking that perhaps their loved ones wander about the forests in ignorance of their pasts, perhaps to be awakened at the end by the return of some lost memory.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “Could the Curse truly do that?” Julian asked.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Lucy shrugged. “The exact nature of the interplay between curse and countercurse is unclear to me. The tangle of their weaves is so complex that I have heard it said that even the pantheon would have difficulty unbinding it. Is it possible that there are those who have remained fully Cursed? Perhaps, but I have never seen one myself.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “Are you certain?” Julian asked. Lucy began to answer, but then followed the moondog’s eyes to the cage at the center of the table. The realization of what he was saying struck her like a boulder from the sling of a trebuchet.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “No mark of outside magic besides the Curse and countercurse, and yet he remains an animal… That makes sense!” She danced about the table, shifting her vision to see the magic that bound the former assassin. She saw nothing that she had not seen on the day before, but now at last the pieces seemed to be falling into place.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> She quickly refocused her vision on the physical world. “If this is the case, no amount of prodding will reveal any anomalies in the magic that binds him,” she explained. “We need to start approaching this from another angle. Do you think you can find Balrog?”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Julian nodded. “As I understood, his entire patrol is resting in the common bunking area. They should be easy enough to find; Balrog at least is distinctive enough to be very recognizable.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> “Go find him. I don’t know exactly how to handle this, and the more magically-inclined minds we can fit in the same room, the more informative our discussion may become.”<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <span style="font-size:11.0pt;line-height:107%;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;mso-ansi-language:EN-US;mso-fareast-language: EN-US;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA">Julian did not wait for her to say anything more. He quickly departed from the room in search of the human mage, while Lucy began to rummage about in her pack in search of something. The moondog was correct in his conclusion; he was able to find Balrog with very little delay. The bunks in the barracks were actually quite empty with so many deployed to secure the valley during the time of the quarantine. <meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"> <meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 14"> <meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 14"> <link rel="File-List" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CNathan%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml">  <link rel="themeData" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CNathan%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_themedata.thmx"> <link rel="colorSchemeMapping" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CNathan%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_colorschememapping.xml">  <style>  </style> </body> </html>