Private Tindercreek and Tillvale

Momo watched Walter ride off with the girl, his ears tracking the steady drumming of the drakehorse’s paws until the sound faded into the distance. He hoped the Huntsman was right about her condition. The child had looked terribly exhausted, and the way she'd doubled over in pain after the spirit's departure had done little to ease his concerns. Still, she was in better hands now than she would have been left wandering the streets alone. Walter would see her to the healers, and that was enough for the moment.

The sudden quiet left by their departure felt strangely abrupt. Momo stood in the road for a few moments, glancing down at the faint, intangible thread still binding his pinky to the little spirit. He turned his hand this way and that, trying to make sense of the connection, but it remained as elusive as ever. Whatever old law had taken hold of them, it was clearly not something he could simply dismiss. Walter had mentioned observing the old rites, and Momo had no intention of ignoring the advice. If this binding meant the spirit needed to be formally welcomed into Arpa before they ventured into the marshes, then he would see the matter properly attended to.

A rustle of feathers drew his attention back to the bird, whose head emerged from his white hair as it began preening itself with all the self-assurance of something that had not just crawled out of another person's throat. Momo's ears twitched, and a small, bemused smile tugged at his lips.

“Protect you?” he repeated, raising a brow. “I believe we agreed that I wouldn't harm or cage you. I don't recall agreeing to serve as your personal bodyguard.”

Despite the dry note in his voice, there was no real displeasure in it. He carefully reached up to ensure the bird's claws weren't caught in his hair, then lowered his hand. The creature seemed quite comfortable using him as a perch, and he had little desire to startle it into flight before they had settled their next steps.

“But yes, he's gone. For now, at least.” Momo glanced toward the road Walter had taken, his expression softening with concern. “He'll take her to the healers. Hopefully, she'll be feeling better soon.”

The bird's eagerness to leave prompted him to look toward the town gate. They still had a little time before Walter expected them to return, and Momo was reluctant to leave without following through on what the Huntsman had suggested. He wasn't familiar with the customs governing this particular sort of spirit, but he knew better than to dismiss old traditions simply because he did not understand them. The thread around his finger was proof enough that whatever agreement he'd made carried a weight beyond ordinary promises.

“Before we go anywhere, I think we ought to do this properly,” he told the bird, glancing at it over his shoulder.
“Lord Thornley mentioned observing the old rites. I take that to mean you should be welcomed into Arpa before we leave for the marshes, rather than simply slipping away with me and hoping the old laws consider that sufficient.”

He paused, considering the creature perched in his hair. “Unless there's some particular custom I'm missing. I'd rather not offend whatever ancient powers have decided to tie us together before we've even begun.”

His tone was light, but his expression remained thoughtful. Momo had no desire to bind the spirit more tightly than it already was, nor to mistake a courtesy for a demand. If the old rites were meant to establish its place within the town, he would respect that purpose. He only hoped the process would be straightforward.

Once the matter was settled, they could turn their attention to the marshes and whatever truth lay behind the spirit's anger. Momo still had no clear idea what awaited them there, but he had given his word, and the strange binding around his finger served as a rather pointed reminder of that fact.

He looked back at the bird, his expression settling into quiet resolve.

“Now, little bogling, before we head inside, tell me what you know of these rites. Is there somewhere specific we must go, someone we need to speak to, or something you need from me?” A faint, wry smile returned to his lips. “I'd prefer to know whether I'm about to perform a solemn ritual or make a complete fool of myself in front of the townsfolk.”

The critter fluffed its feathers, shakin the tiny beaked head until a face emerged again. Beady black eyes on a small white face looked at the fox-kin and the bogling smiled, tiny hands the color of ashberry bark emerging from the wings as if those were sleeves to grab onto his shoulder. It readjusted, retreating back into wings and beaked facade, and opened the beak for the voice to emerge from within.
"Be nice. Say words of welcome. Offer food. Give a nest. The better you give, the better we be to you and yours. Be friend to one, be friend to flock."

The wing extended to pat-pat the shaman awkwardly on the side of the head.
"You learn home laws, you be good spirit talker, dandelion."
And turned its wing to preen the edge of the flight feathers.

The Huntsman at the gate followed the shaman and the bird with a quiet tip of her hat to see them off, but no words spoken - she was on gate duty, not on rites, and matters beyond her purview were not of her concern.

Within, Geist was rider-less, unbridled, and being prepared for the journey, a spiderweb-shaped cover laid on his silver back by a house Thornley drake handler. Saddlebags came next, brought in from the quartermaster. A stablegirl tugged at the sleeve of Momo's haori - that one smelled like horses, not dressed in colors, but you could never quite tell for certain. "How do you want to traverse, master?" That is to say, if he could manage horseback, being, well, vulpine - but to say that out loud would be rude, and she seemed somewhat schooled in manners.

Momo's ears perked at the bogling's instructions, and he regarded the little creature perched in his hair with a thoughtful tilt of his head. “Be nice, say words of welcome, offer food, give a nest,” he repeated, ticking each item off on his fingers. “Well, that hardly sounds unreasonable.” His gaze drifted toward the town, and a faint smile tugged at his lips. “Though I suspect the difficulty lies in finding out what you consider food and a nest.” The bird's affectionate pat to the side of his head earned it a bemused glance. Dandelion, was it? He kind of liked that actually.

With a quiet chuckle, he turned toward the stable girl, who had approached to ask how he intended to travel. “I'll walk, thank you. I wouldn't want to take a mount from someone who might need it more than I do.” Not that he would mention it to the girl, but he had his own transportation anyway. He glanced toward the stables, where Geist was being prepared for Walter's journey, then back to the girl. “But if you could help me find a few things for our guest, I'd be grateful. Something to eat, and something suitable for a nest. Apparently, I'm to learn the local customs by doing.”

It proved a rather more involved process than he'd hoped, though thankfully not a lengthy one. Momo took the task of finding suitable food seriously, gathering a small assortment of offerings from what the stable girl and nearby vendors could provide: dried fruit, a little bread, nuts, seeds, and a handful of fresh berries. He arranged the collection neatly on a cloth and presented it to the bird with a polite, “Welcome to Arpa. May you find shelter here, and may your flock find a friend in us.” The bogling inspected the spread, pecked once at a berry, and then promptly abandoned the entire affair. Momo stared as it hopped off his shoulder and disappeared into a patch of grass beside the stable. A moment later, it emerged with a plump beetle clamped in its beak, swallowing the unfortunate insect with evident satisfaction. It then began poking around the roots of a nearby fence post, eventually uncovering a fat grub that disappeared just as quickly.

Momo looked down at the carefully prepared offering, then at the bird, whose beady eyes suggested it could not fathom why anyone would make such a fuss over finding a perfectly good meal. “Of course,” he murmured. “Why eat the perfectly respectable food I've gone to the trouble of gathering when you could dig something out of the dirt?” The bogling gave a pleased little flutter, seemingly untroubled by his disappointment, and continued hunting. When it emerged with a tiny field mouse dangling from its beak, Momo's ears slowly tilted sideways. He watched the bird swallow its prize before glancing back at the berries, bread, and nuts he had collected. “I see. A discerning palate, indeed.” He sighed, though the corner of his mouth betrayed him with a smile. “Next time, I'll save myself the trouble and simply point you toward a patch of mud.” Still, the bogling seemed perfectly content, and perhaps that was what mattered. The old rites called for an offering of food, not necessarily for the spirit to eat what he provided. He would consider the meal an acceptable gesture of welcome, even if the recipient had apparently preferred to forage for its own dinner.

The nest proved equally particular. A bundle of clean straw was rejected outright, as was a folded scrap of soft cloth. The bogling flapped its wings and chattered at him until Momo finally located a shallow woven basket, which he lined with dry grass and a few pliant twigs gathered from the stable yard. That, at last, earned an approving shuffle of feathers. The little spirit hopped down long enough to inspect its new resting place, rearranged two twigs with great seriousness, and then returned to Momo's shoulder as though the entire affair had been its idea from the beginning. He watched it settle, then offered a small, formal bow of his head. “Then let this be your welcome to Arpa. May you find food beneath its eaves, shelter among its branches, and friends among its people. May your flock know the same kindness, and may those who would harm your home learn better.” He wasn't certain whether the words were precisely correct, but the bogling seemed satisfied; the faint Wyrd thread around his pinky gave a curious little tug before settling again.

“Well, there we are,” Momo murmured, looking at the bird with a smile. “I've fed you, furnished you, and apparently passed inspection. Though I'm beginning to suspect the food was more for my own peace of mind than yours.” He thanked the stable girl for her help, leaving the basket and his remaining offerings in her care with instructions that they were a gift for the bogling and its flock should they wish to return. Then he set off through Arpa's gates, following the road toward the lowlands. He had no intention of making a grand production of their departure; the sooner they reached the marshes, the sooner he could discover what had happened to the spirit's home and what could be done to set things right.

The road soon gave way to softer earth, damp grass, and the first glimmer of water between the reeds. Momo paused at the edge of the marshland, surveying the sprawling wetlands beyond. Walking would certainly get them there eventually, but traversing the flooded ground on foot hardly seemed the most sensible use of their time. “Now, then,” he murmured, glancing toward the little bird perched on his shoulder. “I think I have a more convenient way for us to travel.”

He shifted his weight, allowing the afternoon light to fall across the ground at his feet. His shadow stretched unnaturally long across the damp earth, reaching beyond his own silhouette as though something beneath it had begun to stir. The dark shape rippled, its edges wavering like ink disturbed in water, before spreading wide across the grass. A faint, iridescent shimmer flickered within its depths. Then a slender, serpentine head emerged, crowned with branching antlers and flowing whiskers, followed by a long, sinuous body that uncoiled from the shadow in one graceful, seemingly endless motion. Along its body were two sets of strong legs that ended in sharp talons. Its scales shimmered with the soft colors of a rainbow, pastel hues shifting between greens, blues, pinks, and golds as the creature lifted itself into the air. No wings beat against the breeze; the dragon simply floated, its long body winding through the air with the effortless grace of a river current.

Momo's expression warmed at the familiar sight. He reached out to stroke the dragon's neck, murmuring a few quiet words of greeting before turning his attention back to the bogling. “This should make the journey considerably easier.” With practiced ease, he climbed onto the dragon's back and settled himself securely along its long, curved spine, leaving room for their feathered companion to perch wherever it pleased. The dragon dipped its head and coiled part of its body beneath them, offering a steady perch before rising once more.

“Ready?” Momo asked the bogling, his ears angling forward. “Show me where we're going.”

At his gentle cue, the rainbow dragon glided upward, its long body winding through the air as it carried them above the reeds. Below, dark pools reflected the sky between tangled roots and patches of pale marsh grass, while narrow waterways wound through the landscape like silver threads. Its whiskers streamed in the breeze, and its colorful scales caught the daylight in fleeting iridescent flashes as it moved, undulating through the air like a celestial serpent. Momo leaned forward slightly, keeping his eyes trained on the terrain ahead as the dragon carried them deeper into the bogling's domain, ready to follow wherever the little spirit might lead.

The local spirits, Momo could infer, followed a pattern that seemed familiar between a few things here in Altalusia. These bird things, playful but benign, once started from the echoes of birds and a whimsy of the undulating Shroud - but, as all things not quite bound to the material realm, eventually had their change to the folks who saw them.

Perhaps, once upon a time, a soul attuned to the Shroud, with a mind vivid and colorful, and a heart that was not calloused, decided them to be friends, and offered them that first food offering of bugs and a little sour berry. Perhaps, the soul was of a youth, and when they saw friends in the little birds, their wish formed friends of their likeness. And then, it was a sort of fact, the same sort of fact as lucky charms and numbers of magpies. It took off, and spread, within the village, and across the villages, where simple folk knew not to bother leshens too much, and to respect the watermaids.

And so, the boglings came to be, with the same sincere faith forming a sort of weave of its own, in the same way that clay figurines granted a faint, but steady protection.

The same kind of force was now twisting the landscape where the veil was thinned enough for dormant or weak not-quite-weavers to affect it, with all the pain, fear and hunger that the meatgrinding machine of the battlefield wrought onto them, with the diseases that tormented them, with the grief of losing their brothers in arms, with the desperation, anger and hopelessness that mired everything into tears raining down from the sky as the husks of those people, once whole, walked restlessly across the deadlands.

This sort of thing, that required sincerity and did not take to industrialization, to being weaponized, was slowly fading from the cynical world - but it was that thing precisely, it would seem, that Walter understood.

"Dandelion, emissary of the boglings!" The bird fluttered, gob moving as it swallowed a strip of flesh from the mouse. "You are now friend! Arpa is now home!" Now that the hospitality has been indulged, it hopped a few tiny hops. Particularly enamored with its new baskety home, all straw and grass, and safe and dry to be if placed right. It pecked at the grass, as if to establish some orderliness of its own, and fluffed up several times, head sinking into the ball of feathers that was its torso in a contented bob. And then, it seemed to do its best to leave a couple tiny feet prints on the yellow haori with the dirt it hopped in before choosing to try and burrow into the folds, to hide from the giant serpentine one, and refused to leave. It could pinch a finger pretty good if it was forced to leave shelter!!..

"To the big rock over there!" a wing-hand pointed the direction. "And from there to the place where they felled trees, you'll see the clearing with the stumps!" Not that it wasn't a few hours away even by flight.

---

The clatter of the washing basins and weak scent of chamomile wafted through the air of the lazaret. Most of the healers were away, and Walter wished, briefly, in his heart, to see a single familiar face. The girl was taken from him, set on a cot under a blanket to convalesce, a spare folded towel under her head. And he watched, quietly, for a moment more after all was said that needed to be. Selfish, perhaps, a notion, but it felt good to still be capable of commiseration.

He had another place to be, however. And so, he bid goodbye to the tired doctor apprentice, and hurried out, towards the gate, and Geist.

Only to see a lithe shape floating gracefully into the air, its color bright even in the ever-dreary lighting of the overcast skies. Was he being left behind? The lord frowned, pace quickening as he nodded to the drake handler, receiving the reigns - they've been watching the thing in the sky, too.

Clawed paws dug into the road, the cant quickening with a jolt, then smoothing out as Geist stalked the road after the quickly diminishing figure. At least they got his supplies together in time...
Don't travel alone.
Half an hour, at the gate.
Bloody hell!

The little bogling's announcement earned Momo a quiet chuckle, though the sound was nearly lost to the rush of wind as the rainbow dragon carried them higher above the marsh. Dandelion, emissary of the boglings. He glanced down at the little creature, whose enthusiasm seemed to have grown considerably now that its hospitality had been properly acknowledged.
“Well, I suppose that makes it official,” he murmured, his ears giving a small, amused twitch. “Though I can't say I've ever held such an important title before.”

The bird's sudden interest in burrowing into the folds of his yellow haori earned another glance, followed by a fond, if somewhat bemused, smile. He made no effort to dislodge it. If the little thing had decided his robes were a suitable refuge from the enormous serpentine spirit carrying them, then he supposed he could accommodate that. One hand settled lightly against the dragon's scales to steady himself as he leaned forward, following the direction indicated by the bird's little wing-hand.

“The big rock first, then the clearing where they felled the trees,” he repeated, committing the directions to memory. A few hours even by flight, it seemed. That was quite a distance for such a small creature to call home, and Momo's expression grew a touch more thoughtful as he looked out across the wetlands. The deeper they traveled, the more the landscape seemed to change. The winding waterways gave way to broader pools of dark, still water, and the reeds grew thicker around the banks. He wondered how much of the bogling's home had been disturbed, and whether the damage was limited to the clearing or had spread farther into its domain. Whatever had happened, he had no intention of making assumptions before seeing it for himself. “All right, little one. Lead the way.”

The dragon banked gently in the direction indicated, its long body bending through the air with the fluid grace of a current turning around a stone. Momo kept his gaze trained ahead, occasionally glancing down to pick out landmarks as they passed over the marsh. He was so intent on following the bogling's directions that he didn't immediately notice the movement on the road behind them. It was only when a familiar shape began to emerge in the distance, accompanied by the unmistakable sound of claws striking the earth, that his ears shifted backward. His gaze traveled over the approaching rider, and recognition brought a sudden, sheepish realization.

Oh.

Walter.

The man had asked him to wait at the gate. Half an hour, he'd said. Momo's ears dipped, and his expression softened into an unmistakable look of guilt. Between seeing to the bogling's welcome and gathering its offerings, the thought had simply slipped away from him. He hadn't meant to leave Walter behind, certainly not after the man had gone to the trouble of arranging everything. The thought of having made him chase after them was rather embarrassing, to say the least. Momo shifted on the dragon's back, turning toward the approaching rider as he lifted a hand in greeting.

“Lord Thornley!” he called down, his voice carrying across the open marshland. “My apologies! The little one had rather a lot to show me, and I'm afraid I completely forgot we were meant to wait for you.” His gaze flickered briefly toward the bogling tucked safely into the folds of his yellow haori before returning to Walter. “I assure you, I hadn't intended to leave without you.” A small, apologetic smile touched his lips as the dragon slowed its pace, giving Walter and Geist an easier opportunity to catch up. “There's quite a bit of ground to cover, I'm afraid. I thought it best not to make the journey on foot.”

Geist observed the colorful ribbon with suspicion, a low hiss emerging from the reptilian throat. Walter patted him on the other side of the mane, thighs squeezing and calves shifting back as he commanded it to slow once they were abreast.
"Accepted," he called back. "Have you considered the effect of showing up in the sky atop of that, to whatever awaits us?"
While traipsing down the marshy woodlands and splashing about in the puddles was no one's favorite past time after this stay in Arpa's even enduring rains... Walter imagined that the dragon was quite noticeable, from quite afar.

Walter tugged at the edges of the woolen cloak around his shoulders.
His sigh came out in wisps of fog dispersing swiftly in the air, brows relaxing from a frown as he watched the spirit.
"You must be a grand weaver by your own right, Master Komori. Still, I would prefer that you did not make yourself into one of the walking dead before your time, if for the subject of your power remaining in place upon your passing. We could not count the spirits among the living, for the rule of not traversing alone - they are of the world more readily bent by the local... airs."
He did not mention himself, in that prospect of dying and undeath. There was a truth that Walter had made peace with a long, long time ago.

"If only I'd known you'd be airborne," he rued, quietly. "Can't sent Geist away to be stabled for a week, now can I?"
His fingers gently gathered the tight braids, silver trinkets rotating on their holder rings. Spearheads and bells without tongues. Geist huffed through the nostrils, a long whisper of powerful lungs, as if the beast could comprehend their conversation, and approved. Walter knew better than that - the drake loved to frolic, and now that he's been permitted speed, he was distraught at slowing down again.
"How do you wager we'd resolve that?" He offered. "It's not like I am particularly fond of the thought of camping in this sort of wilderness, either."