One Moo'r Plow - Book 2: Chapter 29: Gone but not forgotten.

Dragons, gods, the ability to shift between forms at will, apocalyptic wars once waged eons ago. I was not wholly shocked by this all, once the raw surge of memories had passed. If anything, I would have been flabbergasted if the history of this world were mundane.

My next words came after several moments of careful consideration.

“You’re a dragon.”

Perhaps I could have worded that to be less blunt, yet I merely stated the obvious.

“Oh no.” Le’rish shook her head, a tinge of regret and wistfulness in her voice. “Dragon-spawn at best. And even then among the weakest there might have been. See, I only ever found a sliver of the egg, a fraction of the intended power.”

“And that alone turned you into the Apex?”

“Forcibly.”

One thing did leap to mind upon hearing that.

“Why tell me? Why..now?”

Silence reigned for a moment.

“You were the first to uncover the truth. Kept the secret. Saved my life again.” She spoke hesitantly at first, conviction growing with every word.

“Not to interrupt, but Velton and-”

“They suspected. Never knew, I don’t think.” Le’rish interrupted. “For the several years that have passed since my transformation happened, I left them alone and they returned the favor. My nose was kept out of their business and their’s out of mine.”

This lined up with everything I had learned about the elf and his family. Le’rish was very much a loner, and they in turn had left her to her solitude.

“Why now?” I repeated.

“The dungeon is stirring. Again.”

Words that I dreaded to hear.

“Velton has spent almost no time in this house since I was placed here. Tehalis has not been home once. They refuse to tell Ishila anything, but I know what is happening.”

So suddenly tired was I that the need to ask her vanished. Only evermore trouble came from the mountain.

“The other fragments of the egg stir inside the dungeon. I can feel it. They demand to be made whole again. So that Ash-Tul’s specter can return.”

“And what, pray tell, do we do about that?”

Le’rish stopped mid-pace and shrugged, just as lost in all this as I was.

“Are we required to do anything about it?” She asked. “What obligates us to intervene? For my part, if not for Ishila, I would pack my things and leave.”

“An option I lack.”

I was now Godtouched. Of interest. Expected to provide entertainment to the Gods Above.

Some part of me wondered if this new stirring, this sudden development was not their doing. Had one of them decided the proverbial pot needed be shook and new flavor made to rise?

The great revelation that they were outsiders did not phase me, I found. The simple fact that Gods lived above and dictated this world had been a shock, yes. But their origins were irrelevant. They simple were. Perhaps this knowledge might upset those who believed otherwise, but what was in the past remained firmly there.

To leave the farm would be the safe, sensible option here. Travel somewhere safer, set up again and continue my toils.

Was there anywhere truly safe, however? That was the first and smallest inquiry.

The second was that I, on some level, utterly refused to be driven from my home. This I had shown before and would still do again. In the face of danger, I would persist, no matter the price.

And lastly, I felt as though I lacked that choice. If this was an intervention from the Gods Above to stir the area and provoke conflict, to run from it might lead to disastrous consequences. I had been gifted power -albeit unwillingly-, and they expected entertainment in return.

My farm tied me to this place. Here, I had already dug my grave. Now, I would triumph or die. In the face of this or any danger.

Le’rish was bound here by Ishila, who in turn stayed because of her parents. Why Velton and Tehalis stayed instead of vanishing into thin air I could not discern. I suspected once more it had to do with the dungeon.

Everything these days did, it seemed.

It was a small while later that I actually returned to why I had come to visit. My problems, I laid before Le’rish and asked if she could be the solution.

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“You don’t know where these warbands are currently?” She repeated, one of Velton’s maps unrolled before her.

“No.” Came the rumbled confirmation as I leaned over the table and for the first time glimpsed a complete map of the surrounding territories. “But I do know where they are likely to come from.”

My finger traced down the baron’s territory to a small corridor of marked land squashed between two larger kingdoms. A disputed no-man’s land constantly at war, home to outlaws and periodically hit by necromantic surges that reanimated those dead on its battlefields.

My trail led through that to another grey section that was marked as the Pits of Drogoss, where monsters were spewed periodically into this world. A place of constant combat where little grew and even less survived.

One of the great minotaur migrations sat at its edges, made perpetual camp there, and waited for every new spawning season to whet their blades in ichor and blood.

All of this, I knew. This was where I had made the journey from when I had first taken control of the old Garek’s body.

“They will come, or have already came, through the Roil-snake crags into Ironmoor’s territory. From there, what roads they follow here is anyone’s guess.

“Only two that lead toward Hullbretch. One’s the longer way around, would take them a couple extra days to reach the redtip. Course, nobody would know that it they weren’t already familiar with these lands.”

In conclusion, we put together places where they might be, but the divided trails left us unsure.

“If they take the long route, the warband will have to pass within sight of Hullbretch. Station a man there with a fast horse and orders to ride hard once the watch sees something. In fact, put two.”

“And the other road?”

Le’rish sighed, deep and slow.

“I’ll watch that. Truth be told, I feel like I’ve been in here too long already. I feel trapped, but I stay because ishila wants me to. It’s time for me to slip back into the wild and stalk the forests once more. Could say i’m only doing this because I owe you for savin’ my life. Truth is, I’m doing it because I want to.”

“Don’t do anything stupid.” I fretted over her a while later as she packed and prepared to leave with me. “Just lay in wait and alert them once you see them. Don’t engage, don’t block their path. Just scout and scoot.”

“Mmmm.” Came the non-commital hum. The best I would get from her.

The pack she carried was smaller than mine. A bow at her side, dull clothes and some rations was all Le’rish saw fit to pack. I did not question her, merely accompanied her down the road, back towards my farm. There was some relief from the constant stress now that I had her as a living alarm.

If there was anyone I trusted to excel at this task, it was her.

“One more thing.” I spoke as we walked.

It was with some painful winces that I recounted the ambush on the road. Just to fill her in on the possible danger. She, however, had other intentions.

“Want me to track them down?”

And just like that, I had a painful choice in front of me.

What did I prioritize? The ambushers killing the baron’s men, or my own safety?

So far, none of my people had been targeted by whoever had ambushed the riders. All of my workers showing up unscathed could attest to that. I had little doubt that if I set Le’rish onto the trail, she could find whoever was responsible, or at least give me a decent idea of the threat.

But the threat of the warband was large, and, worst of all, unknown. I knew they were out there somewhere. I knew they were coming, but not from where. And if they arrived while I was unprepared, the consequences could be disastrous.

The decision was almost made for me. In all ways but one.

“The ambush site is not farm from the farm. I would appreciate it if you could look around quickly, tell me what you find and then move on. Don’t waste any time picking it apart or trying to chase the danger. In. Look. Out. I’ll come with you so you can relay the information and continue onwards.”

This we both agreed on. Trees fell away and we emerged into the barren area around my fortress-farm.

Le’rish eyebrows raised at the changes, but she declined to comment. Gates were hauled open and we entered to find Ishila with her arms crossed, her expression miffed.

“Off to risk your life again? We talked about this.”

There was tension in those words, a tone that made me wary enough to tread carefully.

“Not in particular,” Le’rsih muttered. “Just a scout job.”

Not really helping her own case there.

It took precious time to relay everything to Ishila, and even longer to convince her that I absolutely needed Le’rish for this. No one else would do. Tash waved as he went past, the satyr Beastmaster off to deal with unruly cows once more.

My train of thought mentally crashed to a halt and my eyes slid around once more. Wasn’t he a drow-

“Garek? Garek!?” Ishila’s voice broke through the haze.

I blinked, trying to remember what had just been said. Anything past Tash waving at me was a blank, and he was now down by the pens, the stubborn taur-cows firmly his problem.

“Sorry.” I apologized. “Must be more exhausted than I had reckoned.”

“That’s fine. Hard work does that to a man.” Ishila reassured me.

Yet, the thought of something nagged me. The feeling persisted through the conversation as ishila forcibly joined the party to travel to the ambush site. Even later, while we searched the dead riders and walked through fields of arrows, the sensation that something had happened once I had glimpsed Tash remained.

It seemed to fade from memory every time I thought too hard, and soon a massive headache thudded behind my eyes.

“So, good news and not-so good news.” Le’rish declared as she stepped from the bush.

I waved at her to let me what it, one hand against the side of my head as the migraine pounded away.

“You don’t have to worry about a mass of highly-trained archers or raiders on the edge of your land. That’s the good news. What you’ll hate hearing is that whoever killed everyone here,” She broadly indicated the now hours-old carnage with a sweeping gesture. “Was a single individual.”

Well, that was just fabulous to here. With that, her mission here was complete. Farewell said to me and embrace shared with Ishila, the huntress turned and vanished into the undergrowth, her own trails to be found amidst the choking greenery.

Migraine too intense to stay here and keep searching for some long-vanished archer, I too turned and trod my path back to the farm, my head clutched all the way.