Hello, Everyone!
Welcome to another exciting chapter of Mary Windfiddle’s story!
Last time, our heroes went on trying to lure the kidnapper of elven maidens by using Aurum’s Alter Self ability. The bard went out, pretending to be a defenseless maiden walking through the forest at night, and, surely enough, promptly got attacked by a figure in a dark cloak.
A weird fight ensued. All physical attacks went right through the stranger, as if they were a ghost. And when Mary looked at their face, she thought she recognized them. But it wasn’t until Bruno actually yelled their name, that she realized who the attacker really was.
"Dorina, STOP!"
Mary’s heart skipped a beat. She could finally see it clearly! The person who tried to strangle the young, blonde elven woman at night. The person who almost killed Aurum.
It was Dorina Dwendel!
The woman was older than her portrait, but she was supposed to be. Six years had passed since it had been painted. Her auburn hair, which used to be right above shoulder-length, was now falling around her face, short and uneven, as if cut in field conditions. The clothes she was wearing, however, were clean and well maintained. Her face was lacking any definite expression.
But… It couldn’t be Dorina! Dorina was kind! Dorina was merciful! Dorina was good!
Dorina was gone.
Mary gasped, looking left and right for the woman’s figure. Then, she saw it emerging from the ground, right behind Bruno. Before anyone could react, Dorina thrust another, smaller dagger right inbetween two of the dwarf’s armour's plates. Blood started pouring from the slit.
“Dorina, please!” Mary yelled. “We know your family, they’re here! We can take you to them!”
The woman turned to her and laughed, ugly and maniacally.
Mary couldn’t accept that. Maybe Dorina was under some kind of a spell and just needed another reminder of her family! Mary weaved the illusion of Lord Dwendel reaching for his daughter and sent it ahead.
Dorina didn’t react. Mary’s heart tightened as a weird thought made its way inside. Was it possible that Dorina Dwendel had never actually cared about her family and all her father's affection was just one-sided?
A lightning bolt split the air, crackling towards the woman. It passed through her without any resistance and continued to the forest beside the road, catching trees and bushes in its way. Flames started rising from the greenery.
"Oops," Aurum said. "Didn't mean to do that…"
“One thing at a time!” Bruno said. He made a smooth motion to move his heating spell from the stiletto to the blade in Dorina's hand.
She didn't even make an attempt to hold on to it. She flung it on the ground, unceremoniously, and her eyes gleamed with excitement. She hurled towards the now cold stiletto, grabbed it and plunged into the ground.
Silence fell on the road. Mary and the others stood alert, expecting the attacker to jump back up at any moment, but she… didn't.
She'd vanished the same way she'd appeared.
The moment they felt that Dorina wouldn't come back, Mary ran to Aurum and wrapped her arms around his bloody chest.
"I'm so, so, so, so sorry!" she cried out. "It was my idea that almost got you killed! I’m so happy that you’re alive!"
"Don't worry, Mary!" He patted her on the back. "If it weren't for you, I'd have thought of something much stupider."
Tesaya dropped down and lay on the ground, her chest going up and down as she was trying to catch her breath.
"Holy bushes, that was a lot!" she laughed. "You guys are insane!"
"Hey," Bruno said, "should we do something about the fire?"
"No, don't worry," Tesaya said. "A forest protected by unicorns never burns down."
And true enough, the flames caused by Aurum's lightning bolt died down all by themselves. A few minutes later, the only sign that there had been anything out of the ordinary was the somehow charred line in the foliage.
Two sets of guards, attracted by the commotion, came to investigate the scene. Tesaya reassured them that it was all right, her companions were agents on a mission, and yes, there had been a fight, but it had been taken care of. The guards just nodded and went on their way.
"Why won't they stay to secure the road?" Mary frowned.
Tesaya raised her eyebrows.
“Not to be disrespectful,” Mary continued, “but I think your guards aren’t very competent.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, Dorina might come back and attack Aurum again!” Mary said. “Plus, they didn’t do anything when Lanna was wandering the streets after dark, and they know that girls like her get abducted! Why didn’t they take care of her?”
Everyone was now staring at her. Mary felt her sides flush but she was too angry at the elves to stop herself.
“I mean, I know that if they’d stopped her, our plan wouldn’t have worked,” she continued. “but they could have… I don’t know, done something…”
“Mary,” Tesaya said sternly, “the guard’s job is to protect and serve. They asked Lanna whether she wanted their protection and she said 'no'. What were they supposed to do? Disobey her wishes, follow her like a prisoner? Should they have entered her house as well, just to make sure she is well protected?"
Tesaya shook her head.
"The line between protection and intrusion is thin, but it must not be crossed. Serving the people means abiding by their free will."
Mary hung her head, mumbling an apology. She wasn’t ready to accept that the guards were completely right but she had to admit that Tesaya’s words made sense.
Just then, another patrol came down, this time accompanied by two half-elven women with buckets of water and some rags. The women started cleaning the ground at the scene. There was a lot of blood.
“I guess we can go now,” Tesaya said. “What would you say about a nice meal to fill us up after the fight?”
“Hell yeah!” Aurum said. “I’ve lost so much blood that I’ll need a lot of grub to make up for it!”
They stood up and started walking towards Tesaya’s home. A disgruntled groan came from behind them. The half-elves had just noticed the bloody trail their footsteps were leaving on the road.
So, I wrote down another of our fights. Do you think I did a good job? I’m not sure that I did the pacing well enough, and there might be parts that aren’t very clear…
Hope to get some thoughtful feedback!
Also, I'm short on illustrations again, so I'll make a small Interlude talking about Dorina and hoping to have the time to catch up with my drawings. If I don't succeed, you'll get to see my placeholder picture for a while... :(
See you in the Interlude, and if you don't care about it, just skip to the next episode. It'll be out this Friday!
Take care and be well!
(Also, here's a link to the Chapter Guide and the Glossary for the series. You're welcome!)
An important disclaimer: These are my notes from a D&D game turned into a narrative. All the worldbuilding and NPC encounters belong to our DM, and all the actions of the other main characters (Aurum and Bruno) belong to my co-players. My contribution to the story is only everything Mary-related (actions, reactions, inner thoughts), as well as the writing itself.