Eirlathion’s POV

 

Gaerien was nowhere to be seen, Rolwen was just here sitting by himself. He looked frantically around the room, not seeing the girl anywhere. When he looked back to Rolwen, he was pointing toward the wall behind him. It took Eirlathion a little while to realize the implications of what he was seeing, but when he did his eyes grew wide and he slammed his hand against the wall behind Rolwen and it was immediately spread open before him.

 

He could see the vines writing in the distance, probing around the trees and bushes like feelers and ripping small shrubs up by their roots as the demon pursued its lost prey. This direction lead straight to the thing! Had Gaerien really gone this way!?

 

Eirlathion ran to grab his staff and then to a nearby shrub a short distance outside the door. “Plant whisper” He said the trigger phrase for the spell almost like a curse. He pulled information from the shrub about the last creature to pass by it, and his dread was confirmed that it was a small crawling anthromorph that clearly met the characteristics of a baby.

 

“Why in all the…” He began to swear breathlessly, but his shocked mind simply could not process the end of that sentence and he trailed off. He tried to get some idea of how long ago this was, it seemed like she must have left just a few minutes after he and Sagal did. What was that child thinking!?

 

He ran back to Sagal and Túeth carrying only his staff in order to inform them of what he had just discovered.

 

“What!?” Túeth responded upon him telling her Gaerien was missing.

 

“She went off straight in the direction of the alra-une! She seems to have left shortly after Sagal and I did.”

 

“What!? How!? I didn’t!” Túeth was casting glances around everywhere, a complete mess of panic.

 

“Here, get down! Sagal and I will go and get her!” He says, wrapping the wooden hand around her other side as he steadies her with his normal hand, pulling her into himself and carrying her almost like she is carrying Aerien and Levin. He drops her off back in the tree, then re-casts his hand of the woodlands before jumping up on Sagal’s back. He has no time to worry about lashing himself to him, he just grabs the wooden blade off the ground and Sagal turns in the direction of the demon.

 

Seriously, what is that girl thinking!? Eirlathion was completely mystified. Could she just hate being held so much she actually ran away rather than having to be carried by him the rest of the trip!? No, she may act more like an infant now in this life, but she can’t be THAT illogically infantile as to throw herself into this much danger. A flame of hope ignited in Eirlathion’s heart as he thought of one possibility. Aerien had her energy summoning magic that empowered Dryad. Could Gaerien have some kind of powerful ability like that as well?

 

Even if she does have such an ability, what Gaerien is doing now is STILL as infantile as it gets. How could she do something like this to them!? He’s going to need to have a good talk with her and set her straight after this is all over. Let’s just hope they can get to her without anything bad happening.

 

Sagal’s pace was a slow trot and his eyes were to the ground as he tracked her trail. Eirlathion’s thoughts managed to wander into the realm of dark humor just long enough to appreciate the absurdity of being tracked by a moose, but his thoughts quickly settled back on looking ahead to catch any hint of Gaerien while Sagal kept his nose to the ground. After some time, he realized something strange. He was on guard and ready to warn Sagal if any vines lashed over in their direction, but for some reason all of them were avoiding this area.

 

Eirlathion had a bitter smile. It sure looks like she has some kind of ability alright. As they approached farther, Sagal’s pace began to slow. Eirlathion looked down, wondering what was going on, and he noticed that the changeling’s steps were becoming a little unstable. Finally, his moose form collapsed, forcing Eirlathion to roll off him.

 

“Sagal! Hey! What’s wrong!?”

 

The moose took a few heavy breaths and then began to dissolve into a mass of grey ooze that quickly reformed itself into an anthro form. Sagal was breathing heavy, and was not even able to color his skin and eyes as he usually would when retaking his natural form. That pale white skin with every vein visible under the surface of his skin seemed to serve as testament to how weak the man was at this moment.

 

“There... there is something here... it’s making me weak.” He gasped. Eirlathion looked around. The vines still seemed to be avoiding this area. Could this have something to do with Gaerien’s ability? If this was having the same kind of effect on the alra-une, then it would certainly explain a lot of things. But, why was it affecting Sagal and the demon, but not him?

 

In this moment, Eirlathion’s worry for Gaerien decreased. If she had this much of an effect when they still couldn’t even see her, he could probably spare some time to tend to Sagal. Focusing some mana toward his eyes, he activated his mana and spirit sight abilities and began looking at not only Sagal, but also the energies in the area. It seemed the mana and spirit energy were both still flowing freely in the area, but when he looked at Sagal he noticed something. He felt his energies with his hand in order to confirm it, but it seemed like he had stopped taking in spirit energy but was still leaking mana at a normal rate.

 

This would explain it. It’s probably not that he was free from the effects of whatever Gaerien was doing, but due to the fact that Elves had a far more physical body than most other fey he was just able to withstand the effects for longer.

 

“Listen!” Eirlathion said loudly, “I will go on ahead, but first I am going to get you out of the area. We are in some kind of field that blocks us from absorbing spirit energy. You should recover quickly as soon as you are outside of it. Protect Túeth and the other kids, I will be back with Gaerien.”

 

With those words, and without giving Sagal a chance to protest, he increased the overall size of his wooden hand and used it to scoop up the changeling, and then thrust the arm straight for a long distance in the direction they had just come from. He stretched his hand to the limit until he felt it go slack at the end of its range. That would have to be enough to allow the man to recover.

 

After retracting his hand, he directed a bitter glance down toward the large wooden sword that had fallen to the side when he fell from Sagal’s back. He would not be able to carry that thing now. Guess his only hope at this point was to trust what he assumed was Gaerien’s power to properly protect them against this demon.

 

He was beginning to question his own logic and sanity as he trudged on through the forest toward the center of all those writhing vines. There was little doubt with the direction they had tracked Gaerien so far, she was definitely pursuing the alra-une. So, the fastest way to find Gaerien would probably be to go toward the alra-une’s main stalk. The question was though, why was he even doing this? He may be able to survive inside the field of whatever Gaerien’s ability is, but he was definitely going to be severely weakened. Meanwhile, he was also heading straight up to one of the strongest classes of demon short of the demonized fairies.

 

There was absolutely no logic to what he was doing. If Gaerien really did have some power, it would be better to simply leave this to her. Let her use this ability to finish off the demon and then come in to collect her after she has canceled this... what could be called a death-field to the fey races. And yet, he still continued to walk forward anyway. There was no logic, the only thing on his mind was that one of Túeth’s daughters was putting herself in danger. One of those girls that had made such a strong impression in his life in these short two seasons. She may have her memories from her previous life, but she was still just a baby and needed to be protected.

 

How did she even HAVE such an ability anyway!? Aerien had the ability to invigorate life in the spirits, Gaerien had the ability to cause death to the fey. There was a strange poetic duality to these two being twins. It was a good thing at least she seemed to be directing this powerful ability toward the demonized fey, but this ability was definitely dangerous.

 

As he looked around he realized something. Wasn’t there a lot less activity from the vines in the distance? It was starting to look like they were getting skinnier as well. Gaerien must be getting close to the main stalk. It’s loosing strength.

 

Rediculous. Both of those girls are ridiculous.

 

Eirlathion was beginning to feel tired as he continued on. The effects of this power he assumed were coming from Gaerien seemed to only get stronger closer to the source. He had to limit his use of mana. He began extracting mana from his spells, expending them in order to fuel himself. A few low rank spells should be fine for now. It was not as good as spirit energy, but his own mana was able to strengthen him for the time being.

 

That invigorated him. He raised his head as he was coming upon the main stalk of the alra-une once again. It seemed to be attempting to retreat, but it was moving slowly, seemingly out of energy.

 

It was muttering something in a low haggard voice. “help... help... don’t, don’t come. Wh... who? Who are you?” The female upper body gripped her arms across her chest and shivered. She looked like she was about to fall asleep, but was trying desperately to fight against it. He entered the clearing, and he finally saw the thing this demon was trying desperately to retreat from. A small baby that was just barely toddling on two legs. Sure enough, all of this was being done by Gaerien.

 

“No... NO!” The demon cried and sent a vine whipping toward the infant. Eirlathion staggered forward in order to try and protect her, but Gaerien met the oncoming vine with a back-hand that seemed eerily familiar to one she had directed at his hand once. As soon as her hand made contact with the vine, not only was it blown away, but it immediately began breaking appart into golden light.

 

“Eeeeek!” The alra-une cried, the female uper-half reeling back in a cry of anguish. “Stay! Stay away!” It had seemed as though the demon had a slight speed advantage over Gaerien up until now. They were both moving at a crawl, but the alra-une moved slightly faster. However, it was clear that the demon’s energy at a far more finite limit at this point than the infant’s.

 

It seemed almost comical that one of the most feared demons on the surface was utterly terrified of a baby to this extent. If Eirlathion had heard about this from anyone else, he would accuse them of having an incredibly fanciful imagination, but tell them to never take up writing. It was just too unbelievable, and yet he was seeing it right in front of him.

 

“Stay! Stay...” The demon shivered and collapsed, and then continued to struggle to pull itself away from the slowly approaching Gaerien.

 

Eirlathion walked up quietly behind Gaerien. She suddenly noticed him and had a look of shock on her face. Suddenly, he felt all his energy return to him. Had she just cancelled the effect for his sake!? But then that would mean the same is true for the demon!

 

“No! Gaerien, keep going! I’ll be fine!” He shouted at her, but when he turned to look at the alra-une, she did not seem to have recovered with the same speed or anything like the same extent that he had.

 

Seeing that it was no immediate threat, he turned to look down at Gaerien. “You’re not going to catch it at this rate. I know you don’t like it, but it will only be for a few steps. Will you let me help you?”

 

She stares down at the ground for a few seconds, meanwhile the alra-une is breathing heavily and seems to be very slowly regaining her strength as well. Whatever happens, it’s going to have to happen quickly. Well, he couldn’t wait for her to affirmatively state her intentions at this rate, he would just have to take her lack of an obvious rejection as good enough. “Sorry about this.” He said, and then leaned down to pick her up.

 

“Wooowa!” Gaerien screams. “Ahh!”She looks about for a second as Eirlathion quickly walks toward the demon’s main stalk. He is without a weapon at this point, and his hand of the woodlands had long since disintegrated under the effects of this field. He had no weapon at all, except for the living weapon that he was holding in his arms at the moment. “Ah! Euu gant touch en I..!”

 

“Yes, that makes sense. I understand.” Eirlathion interrupts her

 

“Ah! No! Stay away!” The alra-une swings its vines as he begins to draw close. He ducks down to a kneeling position on the ground in order to avoid them, and then straightens his legs to extend his reach as he places Gaerien as far forward as he can with his extended arms, causing him to wind up face down on the ground with his hands straight out. Gaerien immediately rolls out of his grip. There is only half a body length more, but that is quite a bit of distance for an infant barely able to walk to cross. He saw the vines swinging down from above, and he braced himself before feeling them come down heavily on his back causing him to cry out in pain.

 

The thorns of the vines bit into his flesh and he felt his body begin to get dragged toward the creature’s body. In this case, it seems the creature’s instinct to bring prey in to feed on has worked in it’s favor, because he is pressed right into Gaerien as she approaches the creature. She is swept off her feet and the both of them are pressed against the base of the main stalk.

 

Well, they are nowhere near the flower. So, at least they are not at risk of being devoured. However, whether the demon knows it or not, it has gotten them into a very bad situation. As long as he is in physical contact with Gaerien, he will be caught up in whatever power it is that she intended to use against this thing.

 

More vines came in to assault them. He had no choice but to use his own body in order to shield Gaerien from the attack while he was pulled against the demon’s stalk. “Noooo! No no no!” The female voice from above them continuously cried.

 

“Gh! G-Gaerien! Just do it!” Eirlathion gasped. The constricting vines continuously rent the flesh of his back as they snaked and coiled over him. Indeed, the vines actually had thinned and decreased in strength compared to what he had fought before, but as one vine added to the next the combined force was still enough to have a crushing effect. It was all he could do just to keep his arms straight so he did not crush Gaerien between himself and the stalk he was being squeezed against.

 

Gaerien’s hand clutched at his sleeve. She was trying to pull herself up and out of his grip. She was trying to get clear of him, but there was no way for it to work. There was just not enough room for her to fit through, his head and shoulders were almost being pressed against the alra-une’s stalk.

 

“Gaerien! Now!” Eirlathion’s voice was coming out in strained gasps as he looked down at the child he was protecting.

 

Suddenly, there was a sound of a dull thud as he felt the entire stalk he was leaning against jerk to one side, and then something heavy fell beside them. All the vines seemed to stop pressing on him at once. “Ahh?” Eirlathion made a surprised sound, and then something very big and heavy struck the side of the stalk a short distance to his right and a lot of the tension in the vines let up, and then there was a large black furry hand ripping the vines off him from the other side of where the large object struck.

 

Eirlathion didn’t need to question who it was behind him, so he immediately turned his head to the right and immediately saw the wooden alra-slayer he had to abandon. He looked to his left to see what had fallen, it was the female upper body and several of the petals from the flower of the alra-une. And then, finally, behind him stood a massive silver-back gorilla that he knew in an instant was Sagal in a transformed state. It seemed they had provided him just enough distraction to get close in that slow but powerful form that had the weight and strength to carry that sword.

 

“Good, it looks like you found her.” The large gorilla said. “That was a lot of trouble to go through for a wagon, but it all seems to have ended well enough.”

2nd Arc: Capital

Act 2: To The Capital

End

 

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Q: What? Ending the act there!? But, they're only 2 days into a 4 day journey, and they haven't even really started the second day yet!

 

A: Yes, yes that IS the end of this act. When one day stretches this long, I couldn't really think of anything good to have come up on days 2 and 3 that wouldn't just become monotonous, boring, and repetitive. So, since this seemed like such a good place that felt like it just demanded an ending tag, I placed an ending tag, and now we will get a time skip for the rest of the journey.

 

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"dem yin/yang sisters with a perfect balance yo, bring it on dank elvs fear my aoe mana drain aura muhaha. The most fearsome baby them demons have ever met =P."

 

                                                                              -Roy

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Yeah, this was the only comment that was actually on topic and not about other craziness going on over on my Subscribe Star page. Things got weird around the time this one was released XD