The Road to Tullybrook

"I think you have more than me. I didn't bother with most of them."

Perhaps Rally Rose should not have said that. That was one of those things that people tended to get weird about. Maybe they would just... not elaborate. Maybe they would talk about something else.

"I think we should keep it. The wyrm. I mean... I like having them around. And, you know, also if it's with us we can make sure it doesn't eat anyone else's horses. Or anyone else. No people, okay?" This last was to the wyrm, a little quietly.

"Maybe Lady Allard could ride the wyrm instead? I wonder..." Rally giggled at the thought, of the lady up there on top of the wyrm being so very prim and proper while the wyrm set the path ahead ablaze. "You could try it too, Abryxia. If you wanted. It'd be something to write a song about!"
 
Abryxia drew her hand from her forehead down to her chin, thumb rubbing at the edge of her eye.

"Miss Rally, I don' think -" she began. She glanced again at the wyrm. It had the tip of its snout pressed near Rally's face, again, bobbing its head slightly as they talked to it. As they mentioned riding it, it let out a huff, head tipped to the side as a plume of sparks erupted onto the forest floor. Abryxia hastily stomped on the smoldering leaves, then grimaced.

This close, it was a bit less scary. A bit. Maybe Rally being there helped. Maybe Rally - not being afraid at all helped. With a normal kid, Abryxia would chalk that up to reckless stupidty, sweep her arms under the tyke and sprint off as fast as her knobbly legs could carry her. But Rally wasn't normal. Rally was something -

Else.

"If it - if it wants ta come, I guess it can. But - but it's yer responsibility, hear? It tries to eat anyone, or anything, or - or so much as snort in tha way o' a village, it's gone."

She tapped her finger on the tip of Rally's nose for emphasis.

"Ye've gotta find out - how ta take care o' tha beastie. That's on ye."
 
"I'll do my best," Rally promised. They didn't really want to be getting told what to do, but then again, everything Abryxia was saying was so reasonable that it felt okay... but also, wasn't that how it had started last time? Everything had seemed so reasonable at first. That was the trouble with reasons. They just kept happening, and all of a sudden there were so many of them that you forgot who you were when you weren't being reasonable.

Or maybe that had come out wrong, even in their head. Rally Rose looked at the wyrm. It didn't seem to want anything, and maybe that was okay. Maybe that was the best. "And if... if it gets bad, we'll leave, okay? We'll go somewhere else again. Near the mountains."

Rally patted the wyrm's snout a little more. "I haven't been there in a long time."

Not for a very long time. They hadn't really planned on going back, but it was probably better than letting people get eaten. Probably.

"We should... go back to camp. You like them, don't you, Abryxia? People like Sae and Viviane..."
 
"Right - right!"

The tiefling clapped her hands together, putting on a wide, warm smile. Always better to be happy than anything else, right? And - besides, just a day ago she wouldn't have even fully believed creatures like this existed, let alone expect she'd ever meet one. Sure, it was scary, sure, it was unpredictable, but it was also an adventure, just like from the stories and songs!

And well - Rally had it well and handled.

Her attention lingered on Rally for a bit. There was something there. Something. An echo, like someone from the stories. The courage, the strength, the resolve. Maybe a hero in the making. Or maybe, sometimes, heroes of the past came round again.

I haven't been there in a long time.

She began to head back in way of the camp as well, laughing a bit at Rally's own question.

"I like most folk I meet. Din think I came cross a soul I couldn't find somethin' ta like about, aye? We all got our stories, we all got our faults. Jus' a matter of findin' the stuff to laugh an' smile over."

She paused.

"Ye ever have songs written bout ye, Miss Rally?" The wyrm huffed a bit as Rally pet it, and Abryxia didn't even flinch, this time. She still watched it warily as it flapped its little wings and part-slithered, part-walked after them, but she'd gotten past the fear. Something about that excited her, a little. "Cause I'd be willin', whether so or not. Yer the sort o' person folk write songs of, I think."
 
Things were, naturally, only getting more off-putting. Viviane quickly found herself appalled by the implications made by Riven, and this feeling manifested in a slight frown, eyes turning towards the fire slightly. She took a moment to consider her words before responding.

"I believe that what I will need to learn will be taught to me, miss, but your suggestion will be taken into consideration. Please do tell, who is this Alibaster, that he is so important for me to speak to and learn from? What would he know of my name, that I would not?"

She feigned innocence, yet another practiced skill. In Duleis, and court at large, one could not come out and directly mock the intelligence of another. You had to be subtle, phrase things as questions, point out the folly in their statements and stances. The Lady mocked the head tilt of Riven, and while it did not show, a grand smile was played across her mind.
 
“Didn’t spend much time in the Longflat myself when I set off, always got the feeling that they held their grudges deeper than even old gram-gran.” Sae said with an agreeing nod. She slid a knife from her hip and picked up one of the thicker slices of bread. With a careful hand she turned one slice into two. She held one of the cuts out for Mayflower to take. “Wouldn’t go eating that until after you’ve finished your food.” Sae said with a wink.

Sae wiped the crumbs off her knife as she took a glance at Viviane when prompted, her little frown returning. They hadn’t been together long, but the problem sort of people usually made their problems clear soon enough. She turned back to Mayflower, and leaned in a bit. “The girl seems as good as they come, I’ve had, ah, less warm welcomes before when catching with a group on the move.” That seemed a good enough way to put it. “Should be a fine night’s rest, maybe once our bard returns we could see about starting up a song.” Sae added, with a little more cheer.
 
Abryxia had turned back to camp, which Rally Rose supposed was fair. They hadn't found the horse, but they had found the wyrm, so... maybe that was good enough? Or maybe it wasn't?

Rally Rose followed along a pace behind, keeping a hand on the wyrm. "So... did you eat the horse?" They weren't really sure about that. Maybe the horse had just run off someplace... or maybe they would never really know. Rally wasn't sure the wyrm could even understand the question - and if it did, maybe it just wouldn't want to answer.

At least Abryxia seemed happy again. Rally Rose started to hurry to catch up, then all of a sudden stopped very short at the question about songs. The wyrm didn't stop nearly as short, which meant Rally was suddenly being pushed forward several steps, landing in the mud.

Fortunately, they were quite already muddy.

Still, they only pushed back up to their knees, collecting their hat but only placing that in their lap, while the wyrm caught up once more, great snout bending down towards the fluff of Rally's hair.

"I... don't like songs about me."
 
The wyrm didn't make any indication that it undestood the question. Instead, its head was on a distracted swivel, looking every which way at each little sound of the nighttime forest. This wasn't its natural hunting ground - to it, everything was strange and new, and everything was a possible source of danger.

As Rally drew to a halt, however, the wyrm bumped into her, attention suddenly pulled forward as it let out a huff of surprise. It bobbed its snout over her head, huffed again, and blinked.

"Hmmm," Abryxia replied, tapping her finger on her chin. Her face broke into a wide grin as she held out a hand to the fallen child. "A background player, aye? Fair nuff, Miss Mystery. Up ye go!"

Helping Rally to their feet, Abryxia brushed them down, trying to get the worst of the mud and dirt off.

"Jus' means ye got more o' a chance ta make songs yerself bout others, aye? Like -" She glanced at the wyrm, lip quirked, thinking. "Oh, we got a friend, a friend, ye see - he lives amidst tha poplar trees - got a big scaly tail that flops around - an' when he walks it shakes tha ground!"

She looked to Rally expectedly.
 
Riven tutted.

"You're not as special as you think you are, Lady. You're a simple piece in a greater puzzle that spans centuries of time."

She leaned back, closing her eyes, tilting her face to the stars.

"Maybe if you took that to heart, you'd be able to speak your mind better, knowing how little weight your words truly hold."

-

Mayflower took the offered bread with a grin, crossing his fingers over his chest in an oath.

"Swear on my mother, my appetite shall be upheld," he replied, stowing the bread in his traveling cloak. "I'm glad to hear you've found good company, here. There's a sad lack of kindness in the world, of late. Too many people focused only on themselves, not caring about the struggles and pains of those around them. We're all cut of the same flesh, we're all part of the same tribe, but it hurts when so few recognize that."

At the mention of a song, his eyes lit up.

"Oh, that'd be lovely. I adore a good ditty. Back in my old hometown up north, I -" His words cut off, ear twitching. He glanced over his shoulder. "Is that your bard, then?"

There was a faint rustling. The faintest sound, distant, getting closer and closer. Footfalls, crushing grass and leaf and twigs underfoot with a heavy gait. Rhythmic. Inhuman. Mayflower pulled back a bit, and Riven reached inside her cloak.

From the edge of the forest brush, a horse poked its head.
 
Rally accepted the hand up, carefully replacing the hat and giving the wyrm a reassuring pat. At least, they hoped it was a reassuring pat. Come to think of it, they weren't actually very sure what wyrms found reassuring.

They weren't actually very sure what people found reassuring either, so perhaps that was... well, not exactly fine, but at least it was normal? For them. If anything was normal for them.

At least Abryxia had agreed not to write songs about them. That was a very big relief. Rally had always felt that the songs left an awful lot out, and that was even before they started changing things up just because something was more interesting or rhymed better. And the thing about songs being written about people was that they were rarely given the opportunity to say No, thank you.

The song about the wyrm made them giggle. They wondered what the wyrm thought of it, but didn't think asking would get them an answer. Abryxia was looking at them expectantly, and Rally wasn't really sure where to take that.

"I've... never really made up my own songs before," they admitted. "I just sing the ones I know already." But Abryxia had started that one off, hadn't she? So it just had to be the same thing again, but a little bit different.

"Oh... we have a friend, a friend you see - he lives amidst the honey bees - and with his breath, the hives he roasts - to get the honey for his toast!"
 
Viviane was beginning to become quite tired of this conversation and the audacity put on display by one of their newfound guests. If given a moment, she would have likely gone on further, to pry as to what Riven meant, and why she seemed so set on tearing down a Lady, and one who had shown her more respect than it seemed she was owed, but the words never had the chance to come from her mouth. Instead, from behind them, she heard the rusting of bushes, and something exiting them.

She mostly expected Abryxia and Rally to be returning. That was not what she was faced with. Instead, it was a horse! Shocking, to be sure, and given how far it was, off in the shadow, she wasn't entirely sure it was her horse, but what were the odds it was someone else's? Viviane rose to her feet, brushing the dust from the knees of her pants as she stood, and began walking towards the horse, arms out in a placating, calming fashion.
 
It was, naturally, a horse, and one might even assume it was her horse. It certainly looked the same, albeit a tad spooked and a bit worse for wear, with singes on its mane and nettles in its tangled, matted coat, but underneath, the general horsiness seemed consistent. He trotted anxiously as Viviane approached, still obviously taken aback by whatever it'd encountered in the woods.

Riven stared from the fireside, arms folded tightly around her midriff.

"A wild horse at night is an odd sight," she mused. "Maybe it is a sign of troubles to come."

-

"That was right perfect, Miss Rally," Abryxia replied with a giggle of her own. She shifted back a bit, falling in line beside Rally to skip next to her. "Ye got a fast wit an' a good grasp fer rhythm! I'll make a proper songster of ye yet!"

She'd left her lute back at the camp, but that didn't matter. Instead, she began to clap, spinning around, walking backwards as she faced child and creature alike.

"An' when his day is nice and roused - he gets a hankerin' fer some grouse - those tiny wings can' lift him high - but he simple stretches his neck to the sky!"

This was - nice. Better. She wasn't scared, she wasn't anxious. The dark forest seemed brighter, and the wyrm - well, she wasn't fretting about whether or not it was gonna gobble them all up on a dime. It seemed to be enjoying the song, too. And - if that smell of smoke was anything to go by - they were almost back with the others, and Sae would have something nice and warm to put in their bellies.

Travelling wasn't so bad after all.
 
"It was? I do? I... wait, what?" Rally was not sure whether they were pleased with the enthusiasm or... concerned. They didn't want to be... made anything. Abryxia... no, she probably wasn't like that. Probably. But a lot of people didn't start out like that, Rally supposed.

"Um... I think... maybe we'll just let that be your dream." Abryxia had supplied another verse, and Rally decided not to follow it this time, just in case. They weren't sure what they wanted to be, but they were pretty sure a songster wasn't it. Too many songs got... well, complicated. "But I'd come listen to you sing, if I'm around. As long as you're not singing about me." That tended to get pretty uncomfortable, especially the way most of those songs went...

"I kind of like just wandering around, though," they admitted. "It's been nice. Just... being around people, a little bit. But not too much. Maybe that's what I'll do, just wander around the world. I can keep the wyrm with me, too. Maybe I'll call him Pony. I think he looks like a Pony. Hey, Abryxia? What do we say about him when we get back to camp?"
 
Knowing no better, and being mostly sure that the horse was, in fact, her horse, Viviane continued her approach, now with confidence. Hands raised, soothing sounds until the beast was calm enough to allow her to place hands on him. A quick inspection found that the reins and saddle were still present, along with her bags. His mane would need tending to, and he would need brushing, but overall...

She breathed a sigh of relief. "Wonderful. Good! You're okay. I never would have heard the end of it, had you gone missing," she said in low tones, before turning back towards the fire. Naturally, he wouldn't want to go nearer, so she resigned to once more tie him next to the tower, this time taking care to remove her things. The Lady was a spot less tired now, given all that had transpired, and was filled with a renewed diligence.

She looked to Riven, again, internally cursing herself for even considering engaging again. "It is not a wild horse. He's my horse. I am frankly quite lucky he found his way back, given that he ran from the fire a bit ago. Hopefully Miss Abryxia and Rally Rose aren't too lost looking for him..."
 
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Riven bared her teeth in something between a grimace or a sneer.

"Wild or not, it's an omen." She turned her pale eyes to the sky. "Many omens, tonight. Letarch is bright and tinged red. And earlier,"

She glanced at Mayflower, as if looking for his support.

"We saw a pillar of fire and light in the sky. Like a gleaming beacon beckoning us onward."

She grinned.

"Danger lurks. Maybe your Miss Abryxia and Rally Rose are in terrible trouble."

-

Abryxia paused, glancing aside, a little taken aback by the response, but still smiling.

"Jus' a sayin', Miss Rally! Ye can be whatever yer lil heart desires. A - a merchant with pockets o' gold, or a silk-draped noble, or a poet, or a warrior, or - or a fish!" She nodded sagely. "Lotta people dream ta be a fish. Tis a good life, I heard."

She gave a little hop.

"Wanderin's a good life, too, I'll bet. Lots o' the world ta see. Ain't seen a lot of it myself, but I heard lots an' lots o' stories. Ye an' Pony, travelin' around, ye'd have ta work hard nae ta have people makin' stories o' ye!"

They were close enough that they could catch the occasional word, and the fire flickered through the trees. Abryxia's stomach rumbled loudly - that bread earlier hadn't been nearly enough, and she was honestly a bit daft to think she'd be able to make it all the way to Tullybrook on it. Ah, well, fortune favored her tonight, at least. She looked to Rally again, and again paused.

"Er. Not quite sure. Didn' really think on it. Figured we'd say what feels right to say when we get there, aye? ...might be a bit rough, explainin' ta tha poor Lady that Pony here might'a gobbled her horse, though." She turned to Pony, hands on her hips. "Did ye, then? Eatin' horses is no' very proper, an' Lady Allard is a proper lady, so we'd have ta get that bit sorted. Figure that's - er - con-sum-mately reasonable, an' all."

The Wyrm - Pony, as he was being called - obviously didn't understand a word out of Abryxia, even though he did realize the attention was now on him. Opening his mouth, he stretched out, neck lowering towards the ground and tail swishing as he gave a low, rumbling roar.

-

From the darkness of the woods near those at the fire came the faint, distant sounds of someone else - or something - approaching.

And then, in a noise that would chill anyone sane to the bone, an inhuman sound echoed forth.

Wrooooooooagh.
 
“Doubtful Miss Viv’s horse will be singing for us any.” Sae said with a laugh. The elf stood, brushing off the back of her trousers to take a look at the horse, she wasn’t any sort of medicine woman but it didn’t take much expertise to see if it had got and gotten itself cut in the panic. “Got all your gear still set?” Sae asked.

“Be a shame to lose your riding pack but—” Sae’s ears twitched as she was cut short by a right gastly roar from out in the dark. “Viv, how about you and the horse get over to the fire, aye?” Sae took a step back as she spoke, squatting down to first pick up her hatchet and slide it back into the belt at her hip. She slid an unstrung bow from where she had it tied to her traveling pack and clicked her tongue as she sorted through her things looking for the string.

“Two of us go poke our heads outside to see what we can see, I think, and the other two keep to the fire. Sound good?” She plucked out the bow string, and it took only a try or three to get the loop properly hitched on the upper limb.
 
Riven was quickly proving to be a contemptible person who only strived to cause anxiety and strife. Unfortunately for her, however, Viviane knew what decorum was, and as such, she found herself beginning to ignore most of what the woman said. As she approached the tower, reins in hand, she responded to Riven's attempt to stir her up. "Oh, I doubt that they are in any considerable amount of danger. Rally Rose was the one who caused the pillar, after all. I imagine that if something were to go wrong, they would be able to handle it, to some degree," she said, somewhat smugly.

Then, at Sae's prompting, she looked over her things. Insofar as she could tell, everything was still there, secured firmly, perhaps with a streak of soot across it. She nodded to the elf, though her expression once again soured. "My name, Miss Sae, is Lady Viviane. But yes, all of my things are present. At least, it seems like it. Thank you for your concer-"

Something moved, in the woods. Or, growled. Roared? Some amount of terrifying noise came from the darkness, roughly but not quite where her horse had reemerged from behind her. The Lady's face almost certainly paled, and instead of correcting Sae once more on her name and title, she simply nodded. "Yes, of course," she said, rather quickly, before making her way just as quickly towards their campfire, in the (relative) safety of the ruined tower.
 
"I'm sure he's very sorry." The wyrm lowered his great head, and let out a rumble. Rally Rose nodded, as if this were perfectly sensible. "See? Very sorry. Or maybe that meant something different. I don't know. I suppose I haven't spent a great deal of time listening to wyrms. Maybe I should try to do more of that." Talking to wyrms was easy, but listening was harder. Rally Rose didn't really know what he was saying.

Of course, sometimes they did feel that way about people, too. The words made more sense, but everything behind them was very confusing.

"Come on, Pony. We can introduce you to the rest of our friends! Oh, Sae can show you how to light a fire!" The fact that Pony probably did not need this information was not at all a deterrent - after all, Rally Rose could light a fire other ways, too. They could see the flames ahead, a little flicker through the trees. They skipped ahead, probably not surprising Abryxia in the slightest.

"Hello! We're back. We didn't find the horse, but we found a Pony." Rally peered around the fire, which seemed to have two more people and one more horse than they had been expecting. "Oh! Lady Viviane! The horse found you! Pony didn't eat it after all!"
 
"Rally... Rose? Caused the pillar?" Riven replied. For the first time since she'd appeared around the campfire, she seemed completely taken aback.

There wasn't much time for contemplation, however, as that low roar echoed through the camp, setting all the travelers on edge. Mayflower shot up, smiling nervously.

"There aren't many large things this - this far south, right?" he said, glancing between the others quickly. "I - I remember hearing that. Perhaps it's simply a bear!"

It was more to reassure him than anything else. Riven drew back a bit, glaring into the darkness, hand resting somewhere in the folds of her cloak - as if clutching a weapon. As Sae told the others to hang back, approaching the edge of the firelight with her bow drawn -

Rally skipped out.

Abryxia followed a few seconds after, and then - and then -

While everyone here might have known it as a dragon, only two would know what that really meant. To Sae, this was a creature that was rarely seen at the Snaggletooth's edge, let alone all the way down in Southwater. It was a wyrm. A young wyrm - they got much, much larger - but a wyrm nonetheless, renowned for their ravenous appetites and territorial aggression.

"That's impossible. They don't migrate this far," Riven muttered. "This is another omen."

Abryxia's smile, meanwhile, melted off her face proper quick the moment she saw a bow drawn in their direction. She put her hands up in a warding gesture.

"Din shoot! It's jus' us! It's jus' - well, not jus' us. We got a - it's a - well, Rally made a friend, and I'm really sorry m'Lady, deathly sorry, but I think he might've ate yer horse?"
 
Viviane had never seen a dragon before. She assumed that most of them hadn't, especially not in Erdhol proper. She'd heard stories, though, and plenty songs. She'd even read about them on occasion, though those certainly weren't scientific texts. Usually, in what she read, they were great beasts besieging castles, terrorizing towns, grand, massive things that needed slaying by a brave hero or heroes.

She'd always wanted to see one, and now that she was, she was terrified. It wasn't quite as big as described in the books and songs- hardly large enough to eat a farm whole- but it was more than large enough to eat her alive. The way it pushed through the brush, and how it looked at each of them, the muscle beneath the scaled hide, all of it began to make Viviane uncomfortable. The Lady found herself stepping behind her horse, who was equally as, if not more, scared.

She looked between the beast, Rally, and Abryxia in sequence, at a loss for words for longer than she'd like. Eventually, she found herself enough to clear her throat and respond to the bard. "I- ah, Miss Abryxia, I believe my horse is right here. W-why have you brought a dragon back to camp?" she asked, as her eyes made their way back to the creature once more.
 
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