“It Itches,” I said for what must have been the sixth time as I tugged at the armor constricting my chest.

Nel looked at me from under her hood, her eyebrows pulling together in amusement as she took in my discomfort. Those same eyes had looked at me with concern when I first brought it up this morning.

We had left Trade Town at first light, The Captain of the guard kept his promise and escorted us out of the front gates. We had set off in a southwestern direction, along the road that traveled to Kings landing, but once we were far enough away from the walls and any eyes that may have been watching the three of us turned off the road and looped around the town.

Now we traveled Northeast at a steady pace. The same pace we had kept all day, even with the sun beating down on us. I had started the day excited, I’ll admit. It may have had something to do with the thought of being decked out in shining armor like one of those awesome heroes in stories. It could also have had something to do with all the fine steel the Mayor had provided in the form of large solid bars that I had spent most of the night consuming.

The meal did wonders for my mood but the armor…yeah, the armor was a real let down. Plate mail and scale mail were rare, especially in Trades Town which was more agricultural and cultural trade focused. So I ended up in a mail shirt, much like the guards. Now, this is the part to remember, you can’t just chuck the coat of metal links over your head and be done with it, nope. First, you need padding which takes the form of leather that smells and is stiff and a little too tight. Then the mail, and then you need another layer because if you end up walking in the sun all day long those metal links are going to get real hot, real fast.

The weight of three layers and a belly full of metal left me feeling a little sluggish. Not something I was used to feeling and I wondered if I may have eaten too much.

I pulled up my stat screen and had a look anyway.

Well, I was a lot heavier even without the armor but with the rate I healed and how much damage I could take…I was practically a walking tank.

“So what’s the plan?” I asked, giving up on adjusting my armor and pack straps. At least my axe was nestled comfortably at the small of my back.

“We’ll have to wait for Twix to come back from scouting,” Nel said, her hood turning as she looked down the wide dirt road we were traveling along. “But I think we’ll make it there by nightfall.”

“And then we sneak around like a bunch of ninja assassins until we find ol’ Smith and I give him the old one-two.” I finished for her, jabbing the air.

“and if need be, I shall give him the three four five six,” Nel said, her spider legs flicking out from beneath her cloak to swipe at the air.

I had to laugh at that. The little bit of levity felt good. I kept expecting something bad to happen…like an army to come stampeding down the road.

Twenty minutes later and Twix seemed to grow from the side of the road. I was starting to wonder if she had magic.

“See anything?” I asked.

“Nothing suspicious.” She said, drifting along beside us. She still wore her cloak and I still had no idea what she looked like. With the heat of the sun and her layers of dark clothing, she couldn’t have been comfortable though. I was carrying the only pack of supplies so she was unburdened, that was something I guess. Kind of hard to be all stealthy when you have forty pounds of stuff strapped to your back.

“Do you want to try the mountain first or see the stone quarry?”

I considered her question, turning to Nel to see if she had any input but the Denvii just shrugged.

“Does it make much difference?”

“Yes. The Quarry will take longer to reach as we will have to pass around the base of Champions Fall to get there, but they may have information we could use.” A slim hand with pale fingers slid out of the folds of the cloak to point down the road. “On the other hand, this road will take us directly to the entrance to the mountains before branching off to the quarry.”

“You say entrance to the mountains but not to Champions Fall?” Nel asked.

“The central, most prominent mountain is known as Champions Fall and there is indeed an entrance at its base that leads through the heart of the mountain to its peak, but the mountain itself is bracketed by hills with a small but densely wooded valley leading to it.”

I looked up, judging the angle of the sun. We still had about three hours before sunset. I think.

“It may be best to head to the Mountain first and destroy the mutant-ball-chaos-seed thing. Smith is probably with it.”

“And if he is not?” Twix asked.

“Then we go to Quarry and see if the good stoneworkers have seen him,” I said with a shrug. To me it was simple. A little dumb, but simple.

“And if he is surrounded by this army he claims to have?” Nel asked. Twix’s hood bobbed as she nodded agreement.

“No way that’s happening. He was genuinely repulsed by the Denvii when he talked about them in the library. Forgotten would be so much worse. He’d think he was too important to be near them. I think he’s at the top of the mountain with the seed.”

“Then we had best pray his army is not camped out below him.” Twix said before drifting forward to scout once more.

-

The sun was setting when we made it to our valley and the branch in the road. The hills on either side of us cast deep shadows and the forest laid out before us was already shrouded in darkness.

“At least we will have the cover of darkness,” Twix said, her form barely distinguishable in the dying light.

“It may not make a difference if the Forgotten are around,” Nel said, her hood and cloak removed and her spider legs stretched out behind her. “Especially members of the Pack. Their minds may be dulled but their senses are as sharp as ever.”

“I will take the lead, follow slowly and be vigilant. If you sense anything through the bond and are unsure what to do, stop and await my return.” Twix said before disappearing.

We had formed the group bond from my Gift of Unity earlier. There had been a bit of trouble at first since Twix needed to dissolve her current bond with Trinadelle for my one to take effect and she was loath to lose contact with him but she had agreed that if we were to fight together she needed to be intuned with Nel and I.

She wasn’t happy about it though and I could feel her displeasure like a constant weight at the back of my mind.

Nel and I entered the forest, the darkness hampering me for a second before I boosted my visual augments. I saw Nel eying the trees, her gaze sweeping across the canopy with an almost longing pout.

“Why don’t you travel through the trees. If anything attacks me you can jump on it from above.”

She beamed at me, her teeth flashing in the darkness.

“I won't have to jump on it. Nuala had a great stock of herbs and chemicals and I was able to make several potions and mixtures that I could throw at our enemies if it comes to a fight.”

“So that’s why you were with her all night?”

Nel blushed a little before nodding and scampering up a nearby tree.

Suddenly I felt very alone. The woods were quiet, but not the creepy quiet where you can’t even hear insects. Just the normal quiet. I could hear crickets chirping and the rustle of leaves and the occasional snap of a twig as something moved through the underbrush with me, but I felt no concern through the minds of Nel or Twix and nothing jumped out at me so I moved on.

It was fairly easy-going, even with very little light, and I made steady progress through the trees. I would stop occasionally to check in on Twix but she didn’t seem troubled, her thoughts placid, so I would continue on again.

It was truly night, weak moonbeams drifting through the leaves above to play across the forest floor when a spike of alarm went through me. But the emotion wasn’t mine. I stopped, crouching low to the ground out of instinct and easing the pack containing our supplies from my shoulders as I focused on my link with our scout.

I could feel her, off in the distance, but she was moving fast. Back towards me. After the initial spike of emotion, I hadn’t felt anything else but I unsheathed my axe anyway.

If it wasn’t for the link telling me she was beside me I would have screamed like a little girl when she stepped out of a shadow to my left. There was a low creak from the tree branch above her and I saw a pair of red eyes looking down at us.

“There is a nature spirit up ahead.” Twix said without preamble, her hood tilting so she could talk to Nel on the branch above her. “A young one, judging by the level of conversion.”

“Explain,” Nel said, dangling from the branch by her spider legs before they let go and she dropped to the ground lightly.

“It still retained human features, though its skin was patched with bark and moss in certain areas and its hair was vines.” Twix paused before saying the next part. “It had black veins.”

“Was it walking or floating?” Nel asked.

“Walking.” Twix answered and the Denvii let out a low sigh of relief.

I cocked an eyebrow at her and she said “It is not a complete forest spirit. That is good, or the trees around us would betray us. It also means that there is no other one nearby. This is its territory.”

“Unless Smith can override their animalistic instincts,” I suggested.

“I was also unsure if he would know if I killed the spirit.” Twix said.

I thought aloud. “If he still controlled the mayor then he thinks we are heading to Kings landing. And he wouldn’t expect only three people to come storming into what amounts to his stronghold. He probably thinks I’ve fled the town or we are all there cowering behind the walls. It’s what he would do…probably.”

I tapped a finger to my chin as I wondered how much we could get away with killing before drawing his attention.

“The last thing I want is to bring all of his creatures down on us.”

Twix slid closer to me. “If I may make a suggestion?”

I nodded my head.

“We move forward with the assumption that Smith is controlling every creature we come across, and we go as far as stealth will allow.”

So that’s what we did. Nel and Twix scouted the area around us as we moved forward, both of them much better at forest stealth than I. Occasional spikes of alarm would ring through our bounds if one of us saw something or heard something and the others would converge on them to lend a hand or in my case, show me where to put my foot so I could be a ninja.

Eventually, though we reached the cave entrance and I almost whistled in appreciation. The hole was set amongst the tree strewn rise of the mountain and had to be at least two stories tall, the rock edges uneven but smoothed by the elements. Vines and ferns hung down from the top, the leaves fluttering in the cool night air. The moonlight faded to darkness a few steps in and I squinted to try and get my augments to adjust to the blackness.

Twix led the way, Nel and I bringing up the rear. She slunk around one edge, her form pressed up against the side so as not to stand out against the forest background. I followed her lead, energy trickling through my sensory augments. I could have heard a fly fart.

The inside of the cave was massive in scale. Natural rock formations covered the ground in a serious of obstacles that faded out of sight. Moonlight, thin and weak, made it through cracks in the walls to alleviate some of the oppressive darkness. The drip drip drip of water could be heard and little pools of water glowed white in the moonlight.

I looked up, trying to see the roof of the cavern but I wasn’t having much luck. There was only so much my augments could do and it was too far away. It just looked like a sea of inky blackness with little smudges of dark grey.

Twix had said there was a pathway that wound up the inside of the mountain and she seemed to know where to look. I had trouble following her form, I kept loosing her when she walked through a particularly dark patch of shadow, only for the bond we shared to inform me where she was.

Whats them stone things that spike out from the floor like stalactites? Stalagmites? Whatever…they littered the ground, each spike was twice as tall as me, some even larger, and as Twix led us around them, keeping close to the main wall, I reached out a ran a hand along one. It was wet and slippery to the touch and when I brought my hand away something seemed to stick to my fingers. Holding it up close to my face so I could see better in the gloom I rubbed it between my finger before giving the stuff a sniff.

“Fuck!” I hissed jerking my hand away from my nose. “That shit stinks.”

Twix’s hood turned to me, a pale finger held up to silence me. I grimaced in apology and shook the gunk from my hand, it hit the ground with a wet splat that sounded like I spat.

Our scout turned back around to continue and when I stepped to follow her I slipped. The same fungus or moss or whatever that grew on the stalagmites must cover patches of the floor.

From then on I moved slowly and cautiously, my booted feet barely rising above the rocky ground. The problem with that was the ground itself wasn’t very even and I kept tripping even as I avoided sliding.

And then I slipped and tripped and went down in a pile. I struggled to right myself, my mail clinking away merrily as the pack I wore jostled about and ruined my balance and I slipped in the slim again and went back down.

“Shhh.” Twix hissed as she glided back to hold me motionless.

I’m a city boy through and through and walking through a strange cave covered in slim and fungus in pitch black was only reinforcing that.

I lay on my back, propped up by the pack, and glowered up at the ceiling, hating the stupid cave. It was because I was looking up at the ceiling that I caught the disturbance.

Twix was next to me, her hand on my shoulder and one on my back as she went to help me up, Nel was in an almost identical position on my other side.

“Uhh, guys…why is the ceiling moving?” I asked, pulling my hand from Twix’s grip to point above us.

The sea of black that hung above us was rolling with grey waves and I tried harder to see what was going on. It looked like things were moving up there. Lots of things, in fact.

Twix and Nel followed my finger and I heard a very me type of swear come from out scout. Nel gasped, her hand reaching into the satchel at her waist.

“Twix, light!” Nel said, her voice shaking a little, as she handed the other woman a bundle of rags.

Twix moved with quick efficiency to wrap the cloth around the head of an arrow before holding it out to Nel.

I put a hand on the Denvii arm before she could strike the flint. “The light will draw attention.”

“Attention has already been drawn.” Twix said and Nel sparked the flint.

The cloth must have been soaked in something flammable because all it took was a spark before, with a whoosh, it burst into flame. I squinted at the sudden light. In one smooth move, Twix pulled her bow, strung the arrow, raised it, and let loose.

The three of us followed the flight of the arrow as it arced towards the ceiling, little trails of fiery sparks shooting out behind it like the tail of a comet.

At the apogee of its flight, it paused for a second. It hadn’t made the ceiling but the light given off by the flames were bright enough to cover the extra distance and show us the horror fest that was the ceiling.

Creatures that looked like bald bats hung upside down, their beady black eyes glowing orange in the firelight. Wings unfurled, the leathery skin pale as alabaster let the black veins stand in stark contrast as they snaked all over the inside folds of the appendages and covered bony skeletal chests.

I could have handled the large man bats. Sure they were ugly as fuck but what creeped me out was the worms. Great big fat worms hung around them, their swollen bodies stuffed into holes in the rook ceiling. The lumpy skin of the worms was mottled with splotches of pink and black and two softball-sized eyes, milky white and unseeing, seemed to absorb the firelight.

Then the arrow fell far enough away that the firelight faded and the ceiling once more turned dark.

“What the fuck…” I muttered.

“I have no idea what those were.” Twix said.

“Infected cave bats and Burrow Worms.” Nel supplied before shrugging. “I think.”

“Well, that’s all fu-”

The rest of my words were drowned out by a shrill, ear-splitting screech that was followed by more and more until the whole cave echoed with the calls. I felt, more then heard, the thump as something hit the ground. The first thump was followed by more and more and I lurched to my feet, my eyes darting around.

It was Twix that saw one first and her bow twanged. An arrow disappeared into the dark before I heard a meaty smack.

“The worms,” She said, twisting around, her cloak whipping out around her. “They are falling from the ceiling.”

“Eww!” I grimaced at the thought. I shrugged off the pack of supplies and set it aside. “We need light.”

Nel shoved two balls made of cool glass into my hand before pulling out some more from her satchel. “Toss these out. Make sure the two balls break in the same location.”

Following her own instructions, she tossed first one ball then the other in the same place, some twenty feet in front of her. There was the sound of breaking glass, distinguishable even amongst the thumps and screeches, and a bright yellow light spread out from where she had thrown the balls.

Cool.

I turned and tossed mine a little further out, hoping my glow would overlap with hers. The same yellow light spread out and I could see it was some sort of liquid this time, the color running and dripping through the cracks in the stone floor.

The twang of Twix’s bow was almost constant now as she twirled around us. She was aiming up as much as down and occasionally the screech of a bat would change tones and I wondered if she was actually killing any.

Leaving Nel to throw more of her lights I turned my mind to defense. In my case that also meant offense.

The worms were easiest to spot, they slithered across the uneven ground like maggots, the yellow glow adding a sickly pallor to their lumpy flesh.

I shivered in revulsion but not much fear. What could worms really do? That’s when one of them screamed. The flesh under its eyes rippled before pulling apart into a mouth, flaps and strings of white flesh still clung between the seam but through the gaps, I could make out undulating rows of teeth. I nearly screamed right back at it.

Then a bat dove out of the darkness above us and plucked it from the ground before soaring away.

I laughed, pumping my hand in the air. “Yeah boy!”

I turned back to our little group. A worm was approaching Nel's side, its flap mouth open to bite her leg, and she was looking the other way. I opened my mouth to call a warning, but her spider leg flashed out to strike the creature between its eyes before lashing out again to roll it away.

“Twix, it’s cool. The Bats are eating the worms.” I called out happily.

“They have also tried to eat us.” She informed me, her hood jerking to the side even as she fired another arrow at a worm that was sliding through a puddle of glow juice.

I followed her head and saw the still form of a bat, its wings spread out, and three arrows sticking out of its face.

“It was coming for me,” Nel said, her hands reaching into her satchel again as she surveyed the battlefield.

Good enough for me. Kill them all.

I took a quick look around. It was chaos but controlled. The worms kept falling from the ceiling and trying to crawl at us, their creepy little mouths open wide, and the bats flew around above us screeching and dive-bombing indiscriminately. We stood in our little circle of glowing liquid and Twix took potshots as Nel backed her up with balls of powder that sent the worms rolling away, their skin bubbling.

I picked up a few good rocks and boosted a little. Picking my target I let loose. There was a crack as the improvised projectile left my hand and a fine explosion of dust filled the air as the force behind the throw broke off some of the rock but my stone sailed true. A worm burst, weird creamy slop pouring from the wounds to cover the dark ground.

That may have been overkill.

A screech from above made me duck instinctively and a bat went soaring over my head, its wings spread wide. I threw again. A crack followed by a smack, and the bat fell from the sky, a bloody hole through its wing.

“Impressive.” Twix said before going back to shooting.

I was looking for another target when I noticed a group of three worms converge on the fallen bat. It screeched and staggered on its two clawed feet and the worms latched onto it. I watched in horror as they burrowed through it. Literally, through it. Their mouths opened wide and they sucked great big mouthfuls of meat into their maws before doing it all over again.

The bat didn’t stand a chance. It twitched and screeched and tried to pull itself away but the worms just kept right on eating. I took pity on the creature and sent a rock through its skull. The bat slumped over dead and the worms fled the body, their white flesh stained red and black with blood.

“We need to move!” I called out.

“Agreed!” Twix called back.

“I’ll light the way!” Nel said, her spider legs already moving her towards Twix. “Just show me the way.”

Twix pointed off to the side and Nel began chucking her glass balls. I don’t know how many she had, I just hoped she didn’t run out.

I scooped up a few more stones and fell in behind Twix as she covered Nel. Moving in a train formation we set off. It was slow going, the worms hampering us from the ground as the occasional bat screeched over our heads, but we were doing it. The light Nel provided let Twix shoot far enough out that we didn’t get overwhelmed and my incredibly accurate, insanely powerful, stone throws took down anything she missed. The problem was she didn't miss so, in reality, I just jogged behind them a little bored.

“There are steps against the wall!” Twix called out to Nel, hr rapid fire shots slowing as she looked around. “I’ve only been here during the day and that was years ago but I remember it was marked by a stone arch. The steps are little more than a ledge and may be hard to spot.”

I took advantage of her distraction to get a few shots off before she could and three more worms met their disgusting end. That was when the bat came swooping down on silent wings and wrapped its clawed feet around my arms.