The Fifth Star - Chapter 13 (1/2) - Displaced

Darius is going to kill you for this, Elowyn berated herself as she darted through the small wood towards the city walls, but despite her half-hearted admonishment, her feet continued to carry her willingly. He’d promised he’d be back in an hour, ‘two at most,’ precisely speaking, and she had waited too long now, she was certain. What if he’d been taken? Hurt? Killed, even? Would she know when it happened, or would she wait with no word until darkness forced her hand to move onwards into lands she had not the smallest knowledge of?

Those were her reasonings when she came to this decision, and she still clung to them though she knew the feeble excuses would not protect her from Darius’s sure anger when she found him, or vice versa. But from the minute he’d travelled past the limits of her sight, a hard pit of worry had formed in her gut, a wordless sense that she was not safe apart from him. The trees meant to conceal her became in her imagination almost sinister instead, and she felt on edge within them. That, and the passing time, had made her mind for her - she cast a compulsion upon their two horses, and made off in the direction Darius had gone once enough time had passed to make her concerns justifiable.

When Elowyn drew close to the gate that graced the massive wall, she forced herself to cease running just before she broke through the outer line of trees, figuring the guards would be more prone to questioning her if she arrived looking completely panicked. With no way to conceal her face, she’d need to take the chance that the guards were not watching for her. She got her breathing under control and approached the pair of men guarding the open gate at a pace that felt painfully slow, her heart pounding hard in her throat as she drew close.

“Halt!” the man on the right side of the entry barked as she came close, “State your business in Reivic.”

Keeping her head at a carefully tipped angle to avert her eyes while looking respectful over fearful, she addressed him with a voice purposely laced with sweetness. “Pleasure and accomodation, good sirs,” she responded simply, then before the man could deny her entry she added, “I would be most grateful if you could point me towards an inn or a tavern that would likely have a free bed?”

The guard surveyed her up and down, took note of her odd ill-fitting clothing and the inappropriate slippers she still wore from the Nest, ruined now as they were, then tried to peer into her eyes. She turned her gaze to the other guard expectantly to prevent the first from getting a good look, awaiting an answer to her query. He coughed awkwardly under her scrutiny and responded, “Well, it’s hard to say, what with all the refugees cloggin’ up the place, but you might find a room at the Deep Well.”

She nodded and gave him her thanks accompanied by a suggestive wink and strode through the gate before one guard could contradict the other, putting a little extra swing into her hips. It was difficult to keep her stride relaxed and self-sure when she could practically feel their eyes boring into her back, but she managed the feat until she rounded a corner and stopped to collect herself. Is there war in the Empire? she thought. Why would there be refugees? Regardless, this was a matter to mull over later. For now, she needed to find Darius.

Despite the helpful suggestion from the guard, Elowyn wouldn’t have time to search every bar and brothel in the city so she decided against heading towards the Deep Well, wherever that happened to be. Instead, she recalled how when she was readying her aethris for a spell she could see that green magical tether, always leading to Darius. It seemed a much more effective method to her, so she decided to pick up his trail in that manner. She entered her mind after a brief pause to ensure no one watched her.

The connection was a pale shade of green at that moment, thinner too, like it was being physically stretched out over the distance between them. When she found it, she pointed herself in the direction it lead, then opened her eyes to follow it. Obviously she couldn’t walk about with her eyes closed, so every few blocks she’d duck into an alley to survey the magic line and ensure she was still on the correct path. After a time the connection became thicker, more saturated with colour, and she knew she was getting close even though Darius had not told her this was possible. A part of her gleamed with pride through her worry. Maybe he hadn’t even figured out yet that this connection worked in that manner.

It was during one such break that the anonymity she presumed she’d maintained in entering the city was proven wrong.

The alley she’d stepped into was exceedingly narrow, but still bathed in the rapidly fading late afternoon sunlight. The road she’d stepped off of was busier than she’d expected for the time, so she walked several paces back from it to avoid drawing attention, the murmur of the crowd quieting and making her focus easier. She closed her eyes as she had been, looked inward, tracked where she needed to go next. Nodding to herself, she opened her eyes again and turned to the exit, only to find she was no longer alone. Another pair of guards stood blocking the path she needed to take, both staring directly at her. She froze in place with shock but managed to keep herself from crying out. Elowyn spared a glance over her shoulder to see if maybe someone else captured their attention, but she had no such luck. They were definitely looking at her, and she was suddenly and acutely aware of her current state - unarmed and alone, with no one to rescue her if things went awry.

The two men were crammed shoulder to shoulder in the tiny space, and they simultaneously stepped towards her. She tried to make herself appear innocent, pitched her natural voice up to the falsely high and frilly tone some women adopted when speaking to men when she asked them, “Can I help you, gentlemen?”

“Yeah,” said one, “yeah, I think you can.” They stepped forward again, their eyes menacing. “Tell me, you know anythin’ about a girl who escaped from a prison in Lothan recently? Because, I got this poster here, and this girl,” he pulled the paper in question out of his belt and unrolled it, pointed accusingly at the depiction of her face and Darius’s drawn upon its surface, “I’d say she looks a lot like you, eh?”

Elowyn said nothing, only matched each of their forward steps with one of her own backwards. Unfortunately, that merely placed her closer to the wall that blocked the other end of the alley. Darius was right to be cautious. They sent warning ahead. Her heart sped its pace.

“Stupid girl,” the other piped, his eyes hungry, “lookit how scared she is. So, where’s your friend at, darlin’? I imagine Harlemont was more than a little upset to lose his favourite pet, as well as you.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she answered while her eyes shot about the space, searching for a way out, but she found none. Her heart pounded ever faster until she thought it was like to burst. The second guard whispered something into the ear of the first, which illicited a mischevious grin from him.

Without any more warning than that, the two guards rushed her. Elowyn screamed and took off in the other direction entirely out of reflex, but of course, she had nowhere to go. A half-rotten and hopefully abandoned house to her left had a back door that opened into the alley. She slammed her body against it desperately, and to her elated surprise it crashed inward easily, depositing her into a dark kitchen with nary a soul to be seen. Her eyes sought one of two things: a weapon, or an escape - a metallic glint caught her attention and she darted for it. Its source was a hefty kitchen knife, rusted with age and neglect, which she grabbed in a flurry before running from the kitchen, just as the two guards came in the open door.

As she entered the next room she stumbled over an unseen chair in her path, barely managing to keep her footing, launched over the dining table and continued to a door on the other side of the small space. Light shone through the crack at its bottom and she figured it let outside; she threw herself against it as with the first, but to her dismay it refused to open so easily. She tried it again to no avail, and was out of time. The sounds of heavy breathing came from behind her, and she spun to face them with her back against the wood.

“Stay back!” she warned, holding the knife out in front of her to keep them at bay. The point quivered in place, betraying the shaking of her hands.

The two men ignored her command, moving closer with smirks turning both their mouths upwards. The one who had been first to speak before did so again now, in a mocking tone, “Why don’t you put that knife down, sweetheart? We don’t want to have to hurt you.”

Elowyn merely gripped onto the blade’s handle tighter. The man looked at her expectantly, and when she did not drop the weapon and beg for mercy as he must have anticipated, he only shrugged. The two men split apart, each coming for her from either side of the table that separated her from them. Impossible as it was to keep her eyes on them both, she swung the blade wildly in wide arcs between each of them, hoping to keep them at a distance. Her brain scrambled in double time to try to remember her training with Darius thus far, but he’d not taught her anything to do with knife-fighting, and without the length advantage of a sword she knew she was in trouble. To move close enough to strike was to move close enough to be grabbed. The one on her left moved in and she slashed at him, but his talkative partner, now behind her since she’d turned, latched onto her wrist with an iron grip as she brought her arm back for a second slice.

He twisted hard, sending ripples of pain shooting up her arm; a hiss of pain worked its way out between her teeth but she held on the best she could. Spare seconds later her fingers finally betrayed her; they released reflexively and dropped the knife to the floor with a noisy clatter.

She lost her control - she screamed at the men fiercely but she was no match for their combined strength as they dragged her to the table. They pushed her down over its surface with unyielding hands, and as her face was pressed down unforgivingly onto its splintering surface she realized exactly what their intentions were. In a frenzy, she thrashed about the best she could and dug into their skin with nails like claws when she was able, but the effort was ultimately wasted; each time she managed to push herself up off the table a few bare inches she was pushed back down forthright, gaining nothing and wasting her energy.

One of the men released her for a moment only to walk around to the other side of the table and assist his companion by holding her wrists down with near-excruciating pressure while the other’s rough hands began to pull at her clothing. Fear thundered through her unlike any she’d felt before, her mind gone half-mad with the sudden stress. She tried to slow her breathing, making a conscious effort to calm herself and ignore her primal reflexes to fight; she needed to use her magic, but she found she was unable to focus through the terror that flooded her. Her salvation was at hand but seemed just out of reach.

For an instant, Elowyn managed to get herself under control, got inside her mind and gathered her aethris as quick as she could. A voice broke through and shattered her concentration for a few precious moments; “Don’t look so dangerous now, does she?” Fingers squeezed her bared backside so hard she couldn’t help yelling out. “Just like every other bitch.” Calloused hands pushed her legs apart.

The backhanded comment enraged her, their actions moreso. How many others have suffered at these men’s hands before me? Her anger lent her strength, gave her enough focus that Elowyn collected herself enough to cast. “No!” she exclaimed, sending an enormous pulse of aethris breaking into his mind just as she felt his member press roughly against her flesh.

All at once, her perspective switched, and she immediately recognized she was no longer in her own body; everything felt wrong, different. What...? She forgot the horror she’d just been living through and time felt still in that moment as she tried as fast as she could to understand the situation at hand. She was standing, not over a table like a split second before. She looked down at her body; it was not hers either - it was that of the guard who she’d just cast on. His rough, large hands she now controlled held onto her true body, which slumped limply when she made the hands let go, put up no struggle at all. Elowyn’s breath caught in the stranger’s chest. How the hell is this possible? I need to get back! GET BACK!

The second guard looked up at his partner with worry on his face, pressed a hand against her body’s neck as he looked for a pulse. “She’s just passed out,” he proclaimed, the strain on his face a moment before gone already. “I guess that makes it easier,” he chuckled as he reached down to his own pants and worked to loosening them.

“To hell with that,” Elowyn growled aloud. She was completely lost, confused. Nothing Darius had told her could have prepared her for this, but she wasn’t about to let her - apparently still living - body be violated. She looked at the pants bunched around her ankles, saw the discarded sword belt laying there beside.

“The fuck’s gotten into you all a’ sudden?” the other guard’s voice was curious, but not angered, and he made no move to stop.

She bent down, pulled up the pants from the floor and cinched them tight. The weight of the weapon now on her hip was reassuring and she knew with a certainty that should have been unsettling that she was about to take her first life. These men deserved it. She’d worry about how to escape this body after she had the satisfaction of the other guard’s blood - she could feel this body’s owner present in the body they shared, and knew he witnessed all she was doing with his form. Good. Watch, she spat inwardly, hoping he could hear her, though she thought it likely he may not. Aloud, she was calm as she walked as casually as she could around the table, inching the blade slowly out of its sheath, “It’s jus- she seems pretty important, is all. Mightn’t be wise… We should just go turn this one in.”

“You might be onto something, I s’pose,” the other guard sighed wistfully, face resigned. Only then he looked away from his lacings.

Elowyn patted him jovially on the shoulder with her left hand as she came in range. Then a bare moment later, her right wielding the now exposed blade came up. She thrust it into the guard’s belly below his navel, angled high upwards into his torso, not a hint of hesitation staying her actions.