We’ll Make it Out
Whumptober, Day 1
For more info on characters and setting, go here
1780ish words
It didn't take Lenesse’s brain too long to catch her up to speed, even as she was still opening her eyes. Bound, sprawled on an icy stone floor in the Nyrthyl stronghold, still damp, covered head-to-toe in foul-smelling swamp mud, as well as various cuts, scrapes, and bruises that stung like she’d been bathed in lemon juice. Where the bog-walker had bitten off a chunk of her flesh burned and ached, itching fiercely from dried blood, dried mud, and the rough-woven ropes pulled tight just below it.
And before that: the panicked chase, running from Lanshir and his men. The border of the Nyr Swamp. Her brilliant idea that could maybe have given them a fighting chance — because of course no one would be stupid enough follow a quarry into a cursed swamp.
On the plus side, she had been right. No one had followed them.
On the down side, no one had needed to.
Considering the three different monster attacks in the space of five hours, the fog that got them instantly and hopelessly lost, the three-hour long limp along the bank of the one clear river in the swamp (their desperate thought being that maybe it flowed out of this Melsyth-forsaken hellscape), and the pathetic last stand they’d made against a band of magic-wielding Nyrthyl warriors — well, it was understandable why the Nyr Swamp had the (literally) accursed reputation it did.
And now we’re captured. Lenesse stared up at the faintly glowing stone ceiling. Makes sense. What else should I have been expecting? A way out? Something NOT terrible? At the very least one night of actual sleep? Well, that would be just… too much to ask for, I guess.
Esyin is probably flipping out even more now, what with the demon-spirit-things. I'm going to hear a lot of I-told-you-so's later, from both him and Andren.
Esyin. Andren.
Lenesse tried to push herself up on her elbows, but a spear haft shoved her back down, knocking her head back against the stone.
“Yeah, they're not letting us move around,” Andren's voice said from her left. "Best to stay still for now."
Lenesse turned her head to look at him. That small action seemed permitted by the guard, standing stiffly within spear-striking distance of all three of them. Esyin was closest to her, lying limply as if he had just been dumped off someone's shoulder - he still looked to be out cold, but his face was facing away from her, so she couldn't tell. Andren was slumped against the wall just beyond him, dried blood cracked across his cheek and matting the rough stubble along his jaw.
She couldn't remember if that injury had been there before. "You alright?"
Andren nodded. The black eye he’d gotten earlier looked worse in the pale, warmthless light; even more dried blood dribbled from his nose. It looked broken. Again.
She smiled. "You look great."
Andren tried to chuckle, but ending up coughing. The Nyrthyl shoved him back against the wall when he tried to shift into a more comfortable position. "You don't look too bad yourself, Less."
Lenesse rolled her eyes. "Come on, we’ve talked about the nickname thing."
Andren snorted. “What are you going to do? Give me a black eye?”
“Sure, that way you can have a matching set.”
"It'd probably be an improvement," Esyin croaked, stirring a bit for the first time. He tried to straighten out a bit, but got a sharp rap across his injured ankle for his trouble. He winced. "I mean," he added through gritted teeth, "you at least can’t make him look worse. Have you seen his face lately?"
"Well, I could help you out, too, if you want," Lenesse replied. “You can probably use it.”
"Eh. Go jump in a river."
“Rude.”
"Take a bath while you're at it," Andren added, "I've seen cleaner mudskippers."
Lenesse smiled. Her whole body shuddered from cold and exhaustion, but if she closed her eyes and listened only to their voices mumbling out familiar banter, maybe - just maybe - she could convince herself they were all back in the barracks. For one second she could be free of this whole dismal nightmare.
"Can you understand us?" Esyin said, breaking the illusion. He had turned to stare up at the Nyrthyl guarding them.
The Nyrthyl curled his lip, flat, glowering face and glowing skin radiating disdain. His mouth moved for a second, then he stopped.
"So, you can," Esyin said, relaxing back against the stone floor, "you just don't like us enough to try and respond."
"He could just be planning a surprise party for us," Lenesse said dully, still watching the Nyrthyl. His face twitched, and, without moving, his eyes shifted their glare towards her.
Yeah, he can understand us.
"Just doesn't want to risk giving away the secret," Andren agreed.
"That's probably also why he looks like he wants to throw up every time we talk," Lenesse added.
"I mean, he could just be allergic to cake," Andren said.
The Nyrthyl's hands shifted on his spear, tightening, knuckles whitening.
Man, Lenesse thought, he really is about two seconds from killing all of us.
"A very pleasant fellow," she said out loud.
Andren didn't seem to have anything to add. Esyin was still staring at the wall.
The silence seemed to echo in the small stone chamber, mingling with what sounded like a river just outside the door. Which was odd. But, come to think of it, legends did say that the Nyrthyl castle had a river flowing through it, so maybe there was even more truth to those tales than previously thought.
It’s probably the river we were following, Lenesse thought. The idea nearly sent her into a fit of hysterical laughter. That had been their last hope, to follow the river out of the swamp to safety. Of course it led them to the Nyrthyls. Of course it had.
Our last hope is going to be what kills us.
Lenesse bit the inside of her lip, strangling the high-pitched giggle she could feel bubbling up in her throat.
Of course. I mean, did we think we were getting OUT of this? ANY of this?
We marched into the heart of Lanshir's territory and we thought we were going to march back OUT?
It was harder now. She could taste blood on her lip as she bit down more, the suppressed laughter adding to her shudders, a manic grin fighting to break out on her face.
She couldn't even give herself the satisfaction of blaming herself for everyone dying. She might be responsible for them dying in the swamp, but they were always going to die - ever since they stepped out of City of Kings, like all the poor fools sent on this fools errand before them.
She thought of her two little brothers, her parents. Wondered when they'd be told that she was "missing in action". Wondered how Tresha and Ayin would take the news back in the city. Wondered what poor soul would be sent after them to meet a similar deadly fate. Maybe Sir Ralben would get the idea and stop sending his soldiers two by two to their deaths.
Yeah. Two by two. Because I was never even supposed to be here.
Another giggle bitten back. The crowning stupidity of it all was that if she had just done as Fylon had told her, she'd be back in the City of Kings — bored out of her skull, yes, but not tied up to be killed by Nyrthyls. Andren and Esyin would be out here dying on their own.
They'd already be dead, actually. Just at Lanshir's hands, not the Nyrthyls. Because, somehow, she had been stupid enough to think they had any sort of a fighting a chance in any version of events, and had given them all enough hope to drag this all out further. If it hadn’t been for her they'd already be corpses back in the forest.
That thought was the first to nearly brought a sob out of her.
She couldn't think about them dying.
She could die, probably with hysteric laughter if past experience was anything to go by. But not them. It couldn’t be them. Not them lying on the ground, blank eyes staring into nothing. Not them with a spear to their throats. Not them —
"If you don’t mind, why exactly are we still alive?" Esyin said suddenly.
The Nyrthyl stared at him but did not answer.
"We were trespassing on your land, and you apparently hate us. So why are we still alive? For you to kill us slower? Or do you have some other purpose in mind?"
The Nyrthyl jabbed at him sharply, speaking for the first time in broken, heavily-accented Trade. "No questions."
Answers or not, Esyin had a point.
Why were they still alive?
A shiver ran down her spine. It couldn’t be for anything good.
"I mean, thanks, though," Andren said. "This way you’re giving us enough time to escape and make it out of this mudhole."
Lenesse knew his confidence came from bravado and nothing else. She wasn't sure if she wanted to hug him for it or shake him for being an idiot.
The Nyrthyl laughed, the mocking sound bouncing off the stone room hideously. "Keep that thought, orsidtezc. It will make it more enjoying for me when you scream, dying."
Lenesse flinched involuntarily.
"Sure, if the idea makes you feel better." Andren looked down to lock eyes with Lenesse. "We are going to make it anyway. All the way out."
The fear behind that brash assurance, which she knew was an act for her benefit, nearly broke her resolve to keep from crying. She could see the reality in his posture, strung up as if by puppet wires — slumped but too tense, too ready to snap into sudden action to be believable. She could see it in how wide his eyes were, in how strained his mouth was as he tried to smile at her.
Oh Andren, she thought. I know you're just as scared as I am. Maybe even more so. You're terrified that you're going to have to watch your brother die in front of you. You're terrified of failing him and breaking your promise to keep him safe. You may even be scared of breaking that half-cocked promise you made about protecting me.
She knew it was all a lie. It didn't make it reassuring. But it did, somehow, make it infinitely more comforting.
"Yeah," she said, smiling grimly, trying to ignore the single, silent tear pooling up in the corner of her eye. "All the way out."
