FARAMUND

First, the ground trembled.
It was subtle at first, a faint shiver in the earth beneath the fog, but it quickly grew stronger, the land groaning ‘neath the weight of something so unnatural.

Then the spirit stirred, shifting in the mist as they sensed the intruder draw closer to the lighthouse. A hulking shadow that flitted through the swirling fog, its presence rippling through the thick air; a predator stalking its prey.

Pain rippled through the spirit's form, a sharp, searing agony that never left. They shuddered as the hunger surged again, gnawing at the edges of their being. Confusion clouded their thoughts—so much pain, so much anger.

The spirit’s vision pulsed, dark and red, flickering as they focused through the fog at the figure moving toward the lighthouse. He was cloaked in shadow, and the spirit could sense it, feel it coiling around the man’s soul. A great evil slumbered within him, an evil that kept the spirit from wrapping him in the fog, from binding him to the mists like they’d done to the others.

And they would not suffer such filth to walk freely in their village.

With a flicker of motion, the spirit vanished into the mist, becoming one with the fog as they moved around the man. Their form shifted in and out of view, just glimpses—hulking limbs, antlers that scraped the sky, the shimmer of their cracked fur. A faint, twisted grin crossed their face as they stalked closer, dancing through the shadows.

A cackle broke the silence, sharp and brittle like bone snapping. It echoed through the fog, bouncing off the stones of the lighthouse.. A low, gurgling growl followed, a wet and hacking cough that sounded almost like laughter. The spirit was near now, circling, watching. Hunger and confusion warred within them, but the man was there, too close.

He had come into their domain, and the spirit would make him regret it.

Their great skull emerged from the fog, pale and cracked, with a wide grin stretched across the bleached bone skull of a wolf, a strange rune carved on its forehead. Deer-like ears twitched, and great antlers crowned the hulking form, moss and lichen clinging to them like tattered banners. One tine of the antlers was wrapped with a silent silver bell. A soft, malevolent red light flickered in the hollow sockets where eyes should be, casting an eerie glow across Faramund’s gaunt face.

Four arms hung from its grotesque body—two clawed and furred, the others scaled and tipped with talons, like a hawk’s. Its body was pelted in motley grey, with patchy, great swathes of fur torn away, revealing claw-marked flesh beneath. As if the spirit had been the ones to try and rip itself apart. A long, bushy tail lashed behind it, trailing the scent of earth and decay, of moss and rot and the sea.

The spirit moved closer, cloven hooves sinking into the dirt with every step, until it loomed just at the edge of the man's vision.

"Why do you walk here, filthy thing?" the spirit’s voice rasped, the words choked and garbled, like they were being forced from a throat unused to speaking aloud. The spirit's gnarled maw twitched as they tried again, bone teeth clacking, a hacking cough escaping between each word. "A little man, walking in the fog... lost? Or perhaps... you're looking for something, hmm?"

The creature chuckled, a sound like brittle bones rattling together. "But you won't find it here. No, no, no... Here, only pain... only shadows..."

The spirit leaned forward, its massive form disappearing into the fog once more, only to reappear a moment later at the man’s side, then across from him again. It circled slowly, its monstrous shape visible only in flashes. "Do you think you can hide, hmmm? From the fog?" it whispered, its voice a mix of bitter laughter and a pained snarl. "From yourself?"

Another ragged chuckle escaped the spirit’s maw, but this time it was sharper, more unhinged. "Tell me, tricksy man..." it gurgled, its mouth twisting grotesquely, "what will you trade to leave this place, hmm?”

The spirit paused, and for a moment, all was still.

"Or will you stay, like the rest?"

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AARNO

A strange thing, shroudcraft. Especially the kind practiced by witches. It was one of the few things that could combat the ineffable magic of spirits. And so it was that the moment Aarno placed that witchstone over his eye, that the magic within carved small fissures through the mist’s hold, its influence spreading like delicate veins of light in dark waters.

Through the knight's defiant line of vision, a peculiar sight emerged—the vague, translucent figures of villagers. Faded, like they were people in an old painting that had known too much wear.

They drifted through the street, oblivious to anything beyond the trance that held them fast. Like the magic that had plucked them from reality, now bound them in a phantom imitation of life. Whispers of mundane conversations floated through the mist and into Aarno's ears. A faded litany of lighthearted tones mixed with the mumbled routines of everyday life, echoes of greetings, a market’s forgotten bustle, the sound of hollow laughter just out of reach.

And yet, if Aarno looked closer, he could find the grim truth. Villagers marked by signs of exhaustion. Hollow cheeks, thin arms, and sunken, shadowed eyes.

At the edge of the village square, a man leaned on a broom, his hands gripping the worn handle with such fierce tenacity that his knuckles had gone pale. His arms shook with the strain, yet he continued to sweep the ground, moving in the same pattern as if it were the last task he’d ever do. His gaze was blank, unseeing, his face drawn and gaunt, eyes glazed over. Nearby, a woman hobbled past with an empty basket, her ankle swollen and bruised, yet she limped along, clutching the basket as if it held precious goods. Her steps were halting, yet never ceased, her feet barely lifting from the ground, trudging forward through a strange, silent agony. A young boy wandered past, his fingers wrapped around the string of a dried-up kite, tugging it along in its failed flight, his head drooped, eyes dull, his lips moving in silent words as he clutched the string tighter.

Every corner Aarno could see was full of people on the brink of starvation and collapse. For the witchstone had unveiled not life, but a mirage—a grim half-life, each of the villager's caught in a single, final memory. The spirit had bound them for their safety, desperate to shelter them from the horrors beyond, yet it had trapped them in an unyielding nightmare, blind to the agony it inflicted as it suffered from its own.

If the villagers were not broken from their waking dreams soon, they would waste away, consumed not by the creature of the fog, but by the very protections meant to save them.

@Aarno @Faramund
 
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Speak he might, none would hear. Meander about the streets he did, to notice of just as many. Reach out he dared once and twice, touch closing around bare air. They were all here and yet not, what felt like a whole world apart, himself peering at them through the smallest window.

Too small. And yet it’d shown him plenty, too much. It’s a trick. He shook his head, resisting the thought, that instinctive, cozy denial.

What if it isn’t— what if it’s real? What then? His breath was unsteady, a heaviness in his throat making it painful to swallow. It was but a small grace he saw none he recognized, none that looked anything like— Did Davina and her family share resemblance to her sister, even? The one he knew, or at least felt like he did.

Would it have helped if he had asked that, been more careful? Found them in the crowd, something. Should have, could have—

What then? He had no witchcraft for this. He wasn’t even a witch, just a—

His hold around the lookingstone tightened and he withdrew it from before his look, arm dropping to his side. He threw back his head and blinked away the sting in his eyes, huffing as he stood another moment in the silence that seemed to close around the square like a gloved hand. Cradling. Or was it suffocating?

Something pressed against his back, humming. Svala. He turned on heel, pressing his palm on the flat of the horse’s forehead and stroking down along its long face, more for his own comfort. As it rose its head, staring eye to eye, betwixt the triangle of its ears was a bright spot, a flare like that of the sun in the fog. And it was moving.

The lighthouse? He’d not spied it since they’d descended to the village, but perhaps in his wander he’d happened to draw closer to it. Or been drawn, by—

If you dare suggest a trick, I’m going to have a conniption. No. But it wasn’t nothing either, not out here.

“ We’ll go. A moment longer, friend. “ He affirmed out loud, keeping the rock stowed in his grip even as he shifted to mount. A tug of the reins a little bit of heel saw the horse turned, the gentlest clip clop on the cobbles rising to a brisk trot. Taking heading for the unexhaustible beacon.

That one last thing.
 
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The beastkin was unlike any Faramund had ever seen, though a part of him refused to be intimidated by the fact. Tall, muscular, its anatomy reminded him of the centaur-folk of the wild North. Hooved feet, arms as thick as tree stumps. Talons for shredding, antlers for skewering. And there, beneath the upper armpits...

Chicken wings.

Taking a subconscious step back, the thought struck Faramund with all the force of a war hammer, drawing a smile from the dawnling even as the spirit-thing continued to babble on about this and that. Chicken wings! The smile grew, became a grin. Laughter bubbled up from his throat as the creature issued its final threat. Fear fled in the face of such foolishness.

Laughing loudly, Faramund tried to keep from doubling over. He knew he was likely dead, that without the support of his friends it would be a short fight indeed. But he didn't care. Death was the last thing he feared; ask anyone, and they would tell you Syr Faramund of Dawn had been dead for a long time. Longer than the spirit-thing had existed. 'Oh, friend!' He chuckled, wiping at his mouth with the back of one gloved hand. 'I shall trade nothing. Pain and shadows be damned!'

Brandishing his sabre, he took another step back. The entrance to the lighthouse was right behind him, within arm's reach. If only he could turn and make his way inside, he could avoid a fight altogether.

The spirit-thing knew this, just as it knew the man-thing no longer had a choice.

Faramund realised this at the same time the monster struck.

Head lowered, it charged him, its intentions clear in the way it brayed for his blood. Throwing himself to the side, Faramund narrowly avoided the monster's antlers. His feet, cumbersome things at the best of times, caught on the uneven stone, and he fell, tucking into a roll at the last moment.

Coming up swinging he lashed out at the monster, his blade opening a bloody channel along the monster's arm. With a not-quite-growl, it turned on the spot, antlers sweeping to scoop the knight up into the air. Faramund barely had time to interpose his weapon before he found himself airborne. The ground rushed up to meet him.

@Farren Lóthlindor @Aarno
 

FARAMUND

The man's laughter splintered the last of the spirit's control. It was a provocation, an insult, a challenge that demanded an answer.

Its rage tore through the air with a mighty bellow and the hunt had begun. Blood. They needed his blood. Burning. Crimson. Sweet. Anything to drown out this pain. This agony that felt like its skin was bursting at the seams and its mind too small to contain all these jagged new parts.

Light shifted in fractured shards in its mind's eye, blinded by memories of a villager with hair of wheat, who had drawn a sigil inside the lighthouse and lured it there with the sweetest chiming bells it had ever heard. Peace, she had promised. Power, she had said. Protection, she had begged. And so, the spirit had given it.

Still screaming, its claws now tore into the earth where the man's head had landed when he fell. It raked the ground with a desperate swipe, sending jagged rocks and clumps of earth flying, and talons scraped metal and flesh, blood marking their first strike.

Claws raked again, tearing at the vulnerable joints of the man's armor. Sparks would fly as his blade met their scaled talons.

It hissed, the cold black oil of its blood soaking into its patched fur. The spirit dissolved into the fog—then reappeared, its skeletal face looming in front of the man, eyes glowing like malevolent rubies and antlers scraping the air like knives. A decaying, black slug of a tongue slipped from its maw, wrapping around its bony snout, curling like some grotesque appendage.

"We would say to you, filthy thing, that we cannot wait to break into your bones and suckle upon the marrow. But we fear the rot inside you would spoil such a fine meal."

A sound like a hiss and a growl echoed through the fog. In a blur, the spirit’s claws slashed at the man's chest and then flitted to his side, talons aimed for his throat, the foul scent of its blood staining the air.


With her heart in her stomach, Farren had taken a step outside of Davina's cottage to breath and give herself a moment to collect her thoughts and quiet her panic as she finally put the pieces together. But her steps halted in their stead. For instead of her cousin's wilted garden and her horse greeting her, she stood now in the center of the square she had lost her companions in.

Spinning in a circle, she found the cottage was gone now as well. Mist clung to the empty doorways of the market. Only Davina's abandoned letter, crumpled in Farren's hand was left as proof that she had even been inside.

The resounding clop of steady hooves on cobblestone had her whipping back around and peering into a thick wall of white mist. If this thing knew where they were no matter where in the town, then there was no use in hiding.

Breathing deep, Farren widened her stance and moved her other hand with creaking readiness to the hilt of her blade, the faint glow of blue bell runes illuminating the shadows of her clenched jaw.

But instead of horror, a familiar face emerged from the fog, the breadth of his shoulders and cut of his strong brow washing tension from Farren's shoulders. "Aarno." She breathed.

She found herself running to him, grabbing his boot in the stirrup and handing him the letter, her movements jarred and urgent. Without any pleasantries she began trying to explain to him all she had found. "It's not a what we're fighting, Aarno. It's a who. And it knows we're—"

A resounding roar echoed around them and stopped her blood cold, her head whipping in the direction of the lighthouse.

"—here..."

@Aarno @Faramund
 
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The mist swam so thick the horse had slowed, its shorter steps forced from urgency as distance grew blurred and then opaque, whitewashed walls of houses lurking within it. Svala’s ears swiveled and a little nicker left its mouth, but for what took him a moment longer to notice. A dark shape emerged from amidst the empty grey like a thief, directly ahead, facing the two of them.

And speak his name. His brows shot up and then pulled together, confusion and relief at odds on his face as the lost were found again, so unceremoniously he for a moment wrote her off as another ghost. But they hadn’t been ghosts, had they? And this one had seen him and quickly approached, touching.

“ Farren. What happened— You’ve lost your horse. “ He responded in a bumble, having to tear his stare away from her and at what she offered him, something dry and brittle with words on it. Whatever he read he struggled to retain, the voice in his head spoken over by hers and the distressing tone of it. She’d barely begun when another interrupted, an inhuman call that froze the both of them. Svala, however, wasn’t having it, hooves beating an anxious rhythm as it adjusted in place, neck arched.

He dismounted quickly and let go of the reins, allowing the horse to meander unburdened which seemed to calm it. He’d never seen it like this, being of such a temperament as to put most of its kin to shame, almost unnatural with its nerves of a cow. Despite taking distance, it wouldn’t bolt, settling to hover at an arm's reach. The safety of company.

“ The letter— “ He started, offering it back to her. “ Suggests you know exactly what she did, your cousin. “ His eye fell on her without judgement, a concerned hand taking her by the shoulder.

“ And, perhaps, how to fix this result of it. " As he'd be the last to assume she'd meant any of what presently surrounded them. The who that was out there.

" Do you? “
 
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Bloodied but unbroken, the dawnling smiled in the face of death. 'You're right,' he said, back arching, head tilting back as the claws came for him again. A narrow miss. 'I'd probably give you the shits.' Pushing off his right leg, he drove in close, dealing a decisive cut to the creature's ribs, just below its armpit.

Black blood wept from the wound as it swung again, forcing him to retreat. He felt the tip of a yellowed nail brush his chin, another missing his throat by a hair's breadth.

The dance continued.

Back and forth they went, man and monster, mortal and spirit-made-flesh. Faramund's sabre was a blur in his hand, lightning-quick. A dozen paltry wounds marred the creature's body, proof of his intent. Inky black in the mist-light, the antlered one's blood flowed freely, falling to smoke before a single drop touched the cold, salt-slick stone beneath their feet. Faramund cursed, straight-arming a swiping claw aside with his offhand.

With a roar to shake the sky, the creature lowered its antlers and charged.

Jagged bone caught Faramund in his midriff, driving the air from his lungs. Heat bloomed in his chest and stomach as he was cast backwards, down towards the hungry waves. His trusty sabre slipped from his hand as he landed hard in the surf, the impact robbing him of his senses.

Above him, on the slopes leading to the lighthouse, the creature called out triumphantly, rising up on its hind legs to remind him what a fool he'd been to even attempt defeating it. 'Fucker...' Faramund spat. The sea continued to crash against the shore nearby, its voice muted by the water clogging his ears.

The pain flared up as blood began to colour the waters around him.

'Gods... What a shitty place to build a village,' he laughed, holding on to his earlier sentiment. The Antlered One started to move towards him. To finish it. 'No view, no tavern... just a big, stinky monster with chicken wings and a short temper.' He sighed, chuckled. 'Fuck me, I guess.'

@Farren Lóthlindor @Aarno
 

"You have to let it take me. Whatever happens, promise me you won't intervene." The soft chiming of Farren's bells felt heavy as they remounted his mare, Svala. "I have to bind it in the same circle that Davina used to make it." She had explained as they galloped for the lighthouse, the weight of Aarno at her back the only thing keeping her grounded. Taking solace in his warmth as she battled her trepidation at what was to come.

Her skin itching at the thought of embodying her wolf form once more. The memory of that night on the beach with the witch still fresh in her mind-and poignant in the way that hot panic, and shame bubbled just under the surface. Like a pot that was about to boil over. It was the weight of the parasite’s phantom that lingered, and with it, a searing vulnerability that scraped her raw. It was the knowledge of what returning to this transformation would finally demand of her: to let go. To step into the fire and not look back.

Because this is not then. This is now. Farren reminded herself as she breathed through her fear, her bells chiming faintly as Svala’s hooves pounded against the earth. Her thoughts coiled tightly, steeling against the last of her trembling doubt.

For a knight faced the dark, even when their hands shook while they held the light.

Farren lifted her gaze, the lighthouse’s lit silhouette rising like a glowing grave marker against the gray horizon. She thought of Davina, of the circle that would bind the spirit, of the lives that would be spared if she succeeded.

“Hold on,” she whispered, unsure if it was for Aarno, Faramund, or herself.

And then she finally saw him.

The spirit’s triumphant roar shattered the mist as Faramund’s body arced through the air, thrown like discarded prey. He crashed onto the jagged rocks below, his sabre seemingly lost in the surf, blood darkening the water around him.

“Faramund!” The cry tore from her throat, sharp and raw.

Farren didn’t wait. She leapt from the mare’s back, silver flames engulfing her as she fell.

The transformation was a violent rush of heat and power. Her limbs snapped and stretched, fur erupting across her skin as her form contorted. When she landed, it was not as a woman, but as a massive black wolf.

And from the fog came claws, came teeth, came rage.

She hit the spirit like a battering ram, jaws parted, saliva gleaming as a snarl ripped through her throat. The impact drove it back as her claws raked through its mist-bound flesh. The spirit roared, its claws slashing across her shoulder, but she twisted free, snapping at the appendage with teeth bared and bloodlust burning in her veins.

The fog coiled thickly around them, swallowing sound and light. They became two dark shapes, rolling and clashing in the murk, framed only by the faint silver glow of her eyes and the burning embers in its skull.

The spirit’s claws struck again, tearing through fur and flesh as they screamed its fury. Farren answered with her own, jaws snapping, black blood slicking her muzzle as she tore into it with unrelenting ferocity.

Its claws raked her side, sending her staggering. It pounced, all raw force and jagged edges, but she twisted at the last moment, her weight shifting to meet it head-on. Her teeth closed around its limb, cracking through the misty bone beneath, and it shrieked as she wrenched and ripped, crushing down until black ichor spilled onto her tongue, its bitter, sulfuric tang sending her stomach heaving.

Two sets of claws in her scruff ripped her away with a yelp and tossed her, she hit the ground and rolled, out of breath but lurching to her feet once more.

A pause where wolf and twisted spirit stared at each other, sides heaving and blood dripping in the quiet.

And then it charged.

Farren stood her ground, her silver eyes blazing. In one heartbeat, she was the wolf, crouched low and snarling; in the next, she shifted.

The transformation was instant, violent—a flash of silver fire that erupted from her body, consuming fur and reshaping her limbs. By the time the spirit’s antlers descended, they met hers.

The impact echoed like thunder, the force shaking the ground.

Her elk form now towered against the spirit's might, her black-furred body streaked with blood and silver flame. Her antlers gleaming like crescent moons. She pushed, muscles straining as she met the spirit’s strength with her own.

But it was stronger. It always had been. Her hooves scraped against the ground as it shoved her back, laughing—a cold, scraping sound like rusted blades grinding together.

Farren bellowed, a thunderous sound that rippled through the fog like a war cry. The spirit screeched in return, its claws scrabbling for purchase against her sides as they locked together once more.

It struck again, raking its claws across her flank. Blood poured from the wound, but Farren did not falter. She twisted her head, surging forward and throwing it sideways. The spirit crashed against the ground, its form shuddering and splitting before pulling itself back together.

They met again in a flurry of strikes, antlers crashing. The ground beneath them slick with her blood and the inky remnants of the spirit’s form. Farren felt her strength waning,

Hold the light, even when your hands shake.

The mantra burned in her mind as the fight raged on. For every wound she inflicted, the spirit gave back just as nasty. Her sides shuddered, her bloodied fur gleaming in the pale light. Still, she fought. The image of Faramund's body breaking on the rocks flashing again and again. The fear of Aarno falling to these claws keeping her upright.

She had to end this before it killed her.

Her elk form flickered, silver fire rushing over her again. She shifted, her body collapsing and reforming back into the wolf. Her growl was a guttural, ragged sound as she leapt forward, claws extended, her fangs closing on the spirit’s neck.

It screamed, its claws scrambling to rip her away, tearing at her sides. She held on, her jaws clamping tighter, her growl vibrating through the hollow cavity of its chest.

Then it threw her.

The impact was brutal. She struck the side of the lighthouse, her body crumpling against the stone like a ragdoll. A pained yelp escaped her as she hit the ground, her vision swimming with stars. She tried to rise, but her legs buckled beneath her. Blood matted her fur, her breaths coming in shallow, ragged bursts.

The spirit loomed over her, its antlers scraping the air as it stooped, claws wrapping around her limp body. Farren’s world spun as it dragged her toward the lighthouse door, her wolf form barely clinging to consciousness.

You can’t give up now.

The words felt distant, a whisper in the back of her mind. She had no strength left to fight, almost no power left to shift. But her grip on the spirit’s attention was firm, unwavering, as it carried her inside. This was the plan, wasn’t it? She just needed to hold on. To endure.

Faramund's scream tore through the air, distant but unmistakable, as the waves crashed outside. Her eyes fluttered open and they locked onto Aarno's eyes. A weak snarl escaping her as she hung limply in the spirit’s grasp. Stay back, she tried to tell him, even as darkness threatened to overtake her.

I just need to stay alive long enough to finish this.

For a moment, Farren swore she heard the distant brittle chime of mourning bells.

And then, the doors of the lighthouse slammed shut behind them.

@Aarno @Faramund
 
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For a beat, his mind rung empty. The sight of Syr Faramund landing on the rocks, the monster, the scrape of hooves as Svala pulled to an abrupt halt, Farren—

Already gone in a click of bells and whip of her pale plait, assuming another skin. The horse beneath him nickered and spun in a nervous circle as the two beasts clashed and made their battlefield, pulled together and then apart again like rogue thunderbolts.

She’d made him promise, but he’d not given it in words. Just a tighter grip, acknowledging in a touch what he failed to utter out of fear of what his voice would sound like. The weight of it, how it wanted to say no such thing, but all manner of other things. Assurance, affection, argument against it all. To reason and to unearth some mystical catch, figure some way for none to go alone.

But what could himself have done? A precious nothing. It felt some grand test to spite him specifically, to stay his hand when he’d rather done too much than too little, to trust when he’d always disputed, to have faith when he rarely extended such a thing even unto himself. What if—

No. Holding onto the hilt of his sword, he swung his leg over the saddle and dismounted. Svala tossed its head and launched away a couple a paces, settling to hover in the mist at his heel as he ran for the rocks.

“ Faramund. “ He said simply, picking his way down to where he lay in the surf amidst so much jagged rubble. His throat felt hoarse and he cleared it in a low cough, squinting against the harsh seaside wind that’d spray salt and steal away the horrible sounds at his back.

This was absurd. He was being absurd.

“ Are you able to get up? I’ve— “ He started, taking a knee and glancing up at where his horse remained standing at the edge of the cliff, its ears turned all the way back even as it valiantly kept its nerve. Behind it the great pillar of the lighthouse stood still like a gravestone, a black spire towards the hueless heavens. The door, yet open. The cheerful chime of those silver bells was in the air, probably imagined to soothe some inconsolable part of him, the one that’d submit to merely watch, to meet eyes knowing he’d remember it forever.

And just like that, it was over. Brick and the very ground beneath him shuddered as something like thunder barred the way, shutting out all the rest.

For want of appearing anything but how he felt, he willed a cool anger upon his face, brows scrunched together as he inspected whom was immediately before him. He offered his arm and shoulder for support, to have his fellow knight out the water, whilst his gloved hand adjusted the torn fabric and mail about where he was bleeding.

“ Looks none too peachy. How does it feel? “
 
'How about you leave the fool-ass questions to me,' replied Faramund, smiling up at Aarno through gritted teeth. Blood stained the rings of mail covering his side, turning the water in which he lay red. A dramatic scene, to be sure. The act of dying sometimes was. 'Nevermind me!' He swore, exhaling sharply as the dusker helped him stand. 'Where's Farren? Did you-... did you see her fight that thing?'

Despite the pain and the fatigue, Faramund had retained enough presence of mind to witness her intercession. If not for her timely arrival, the creature would likely have finished him off. It still may.

'We need to-' He broke off as pain lanced through his body, almost driving him to his knees. He groaned. 'We need to get inside that lighthouse. The flame burns still, after everything that has befallen this place. Plus, I doubt chick-... I doubt the beast can fit through the door.'

Safe harbour. A bastion against the darkness that smothered the sleepy little seaside village. It might lend them so new clues as to how to lift the curse. Or at the very least how to combat it.

Glancing up the beach, to the monolith of stone looming over them, Faramund watched the final stages of the battle play out in real time. 'We need to get up there.' Casting around in the shallows, the dawnling caught a glimmer of light beneath the waves. Staggering drunkenly from side to side, he squatted down in the surf, left arm reaching out for the object lying just below the surface.

'Gods! I'm... I'm going to feel this in the morning.' Grinning, he forced himself to stand on leaden limbs. The world span as he turned towards the tower, shadowsteel in hand. 'Y'know, a part of me... wishes you'd just up and left me.' He paused, testing the weight of his words against the weapon by his side. 'But I'm glad you didn't,' he continued, smiling, the salt-sting twisting his expression into something foul.

'Now, hows about you and I go kill this fuckin' thing and save our friend, ey?'

@Farren Lóthlindor @Aarno
 
“ I’d never leave you, you damn oaf. And yes — I saw. “ He replied, left standing a touch awkwardly as the man broke off to fish for something in the water, striking quite the image as he did so. Actively bleeding, practically raving about what they should be doing, where they ought to have been going minutes ago already— Himself could but watch, a forlorn concern about him even as the saber was procured and brandished, so many words leveled at him no doubt in hopes of rousing fighting spirit.

It was probably a working tactic, usually. But there was nothing usual about today, or what they found themselves in. He shifted on heel, jaw working as he tried to figure out how to say any of it. Simply?

“ She— Her cousin left instructions. “ He started, eyeing his fellow knight firmly from beneath his brow, wary of any ripple that’d betray disapproval. “ They weren’t all too clear to me, but she seemed to know what they meant. We aren’t to interfere. “

With that he turned, taking uphill as means to mark the conversation on the matter finished. One hand gripping the hilt of his sword like for support while the other fidgeted at his side, gloved fingertips stained with red. Useless as ever.

Let it take me, she’d said. Would Syr Faramund had let it happen?
 
Though the spirit could not die, Farren had bled the monstrosity. The tethers between the spirits it had been bound to weakening and made pliable to her meddling, giving her the chance she needed to rebind it to Davina's empty bell.

So it was, that, while Faramund and Aarno bickered, the fog blanketing the village began to shift, curling back like smoke losing its heat. The dreamlike state that had held some of the villagers captive, began to fracture, and reality seeped in, sharp and unkind for those brought back.

First, a young man staggered forward, his hollow eyes scanning the air as though unsure it could hold him. His trembling hands rose, reaching for something unseen. Behind him, a mother emerged, clutching her child close, her breath shuddering between sobs. The child did not cry, its small face slack with confusion, as if too long removed from the world to remember how to fear it.

Deep in the fog, faint wails began to rise— some mournful, others piercing, all tinged with the anguish of time spent in oblivion. Had they found some of their loved ones dead? Who had dropped from sickness? From hunger? From exhaustion. Rest now, only for their ghosts.

More figures stirred, their forms unsteady and pale, moving like ghosts themselves as they emerged. For weeks, they had been lost to a dream. Now, oblivion gave them back— some broken, and all afraid.

@Faramund @Aarno
 
'Right. Of course. Was that before or after she got her ass kicked?' Starting up the slope after Aarno, Faramund's gaze lingered on the lighthouse. Namely, on the form slumped at its foot. 'Hate to say this, brother, but I think we may have made a mistake in coming here.' It was a knight's business, protecting the smallfolk. But when those same folk went and started messing with spirits, well...

Gripping his sabre tight, the dawnling thrust the thought aside.

Picking up the pace, Faramund trudged past Aarno, his face pale in the wan light. Night had fallen some time ago, and yet the only thing limiting their vision was the mist. 'Somehow, I do not think we are in Urbos anymore.' Keeping a hand pressed to his side, he gestured at the landscape around them, at the skies above. 'No gulls,' he observed. 'No people. No dogs or cats or-' He had been about to say horses. But then there was Svala, Aarno's trusty steed.

The people followed soon after.

I take it back, he thought, casting around for the source of the noise rising from the sweeping mists. Screams, cries of anguish, even maddened laughter in one case. 'I think the reason I couldn't wound it was because it's tied to a realm beyond our own,' he proceeded, finding steps carved into the jagged stone leading up to the tower from the shoreline. 'Figure Farren knows that, too?' He didn't want to contemplate the alternative.

@Farren Lóthlindor @Aarno
 
Faramund’s initial remarks slid off him like water from upon the back of a duck, neither word nor gesture betraying that he was even listening. As the man kept painting little queer devils on the walls, be it about the myriad signs of further witchcraft about them or Farren’s implied fate, he busied his hands within the saddlebags, rummaging. Something for the wound and the pain —

The mist suddenly gaining a sort of wailing quality did slow his hassling ever so slightly, if being unable to evaporate all purpose from him. He suspected he knew the sight that awaited beyond the microcosm betwixt himself and his task, having seen it once over today already. Though it hadn’t been half as dark, then.

Nightime waves crashed, an absurd serenity of the sea all around them, uncaring for the terrors that’d haunt the hearts of men.

“ It is her people’s magic, this. “ He said, with conviction. “ I dare not speculate what it means or how it works, for that is wholly irrelevant when I promised to let her see it through. “ The glance he afforded Faramund, sidelong past his shoulder as he struggled to read labels on vials in the low light, was weary if firm.

“ And I’ll not have you doubt her, be it in any manner. “ Or any result, even failure. There’d be a good reason for that. He stopped suddenly, overcome by some unbidden boiling in his chest that willed his search to a stop, to merely look at the injured man alongside. Deadpan.

“ I imagine you’d had some better idea, hmh? Always something, knowing and doing so competently as only yourself can, by some instinct or other? Who even are you, really? “
 
He didn't like being in the dark. There was so much about the situation that he did not know, and likely never would. Even so, he could not but agree that Aarno's words held some semblance of sense where there was none. Trust in her, he thought, the pain making him woozy, unsteady on his feet.

'How simple you make it sound.'

Stumbling to a halt, Faramund cast about for a place to sit. The venom rising up from his counterpart's gorge left little in the way of feeling, other than a numbness that rocked him to his core. 'Who am I, really?' The dawnling smiled as he fell down, cold stone robbing him of momentum. 'I am many things, Syr. A liar and a fool and a hypocrite...' He shrugged. 'But in this moment I am... concerned.'

Glancing up the slope, he sighed, unaware that his sabre had slipped from his grasp, as sure a sign as any that the fight had left him.

'Farren is many things that I am not. But the thought of her perishing whilst we did nothing, it... weighs on me.' Blinking the sweat and sea-spray from his eyes, Faramund turned his head warily to the side. 'That one so close to her affections could be so callous with her life... it makes me, I don't know...' He glanced back to the house on the rock, its light diminishing along with their chances of success.

'Look, Aarno! See her people's magic at work, hear their cries! Do you honestly believe things will play out as she intends? Will your belief in her bring you comfort when she's nothing more than a painful memory? A bitter reminder that you could have done something... but chose not to?'

Sagging, the dawnling's energy waned. What does it matter? He thought. He has already made his choice. All that remains is to witness the end. For what it was worth, he hoped the fool-ass was right to believe in Farren's plan. He smiled, then, amused by the wanderings of his mind.

'A promise is a promise, I s'pose,' he grinned bloodily. 'Has you by the balls, so she does. Gods, I hope we all survive this, if only... so you can say... I told you so.'

@Farren Lóthlindor @Aarno
 
How small they must’ve looked then — himself with his petty anger, his remaining company so called to rest closer to ground, bent to surrender by either weariness or pain. If the man felt the latter to even fraction of the degree warranted by the wound, he sure was being incredibly brave about it. Yet speaking, and just how much — Had it not been characteristic of Faramund, he would’ve suspected it all for the talking of a man who was desperate for distraction, to think of anything else but how he must’ve felt. Physically or otherwise.

The cavity of his chest lurched at being called out on both affection and callousness, neither of which he’d recognized just to their extent until they’d so wantonly be verbalized out loud. How obvious it was coming from Syr Faramund’s mouth — The forest and the trees. Shame burned him to silence, his stare averting from the dawn knight and into the howling fog as he was bade to look. See what that magic he wanted desperately to defend had wrought.

The shapes shambled, a whole village’s worth of people occupied with whomever they could recognize and reunite with in their new waking. Glass clicked as he dipped his look down, finally producing what he’d searched all the while a great many things called for attention right beyond the great frame of his horse.

Promise was a promise. But what had he promised, exactly? Turning on heel, he approached Syr Faramund, two vials and a folded length of cloth in hand.

“ By the balls, huh. “ He muttered like it was some great revelation in the field of physics, or a celestial event to itself. “ I do hope we survive as well, though saying some such as ‘I told you so’ isn’t exactly my style. Not anymore anyway. “ Ten years too late for that, not that he’d had terribly many opportunities for it even back then.

He tried a smile, but it was left a sad half of an attempt that befitted his otherwise grim countenance not at all. With purpose, he pushed one of the vials into the man’s hand.

“ Take that for the pain. It won’t numb it all, but it’ll take the edge off. “ For how long, wasn’t telling. But sometimes even a little was enough.

“ I’ve nothing quick for the wound, so— “ He trailed off in his lowering to a knee, eyes trained on the bloody gash on mail and gambeson both as he emptied the other vial on the square of cloth. It emitted a thick milky smoke as the contents of the vial reacted with air, a waft of alcohol about it as he pressed it against the man’s side without warning, hard.

He stared at it, frowning.

“ Faramund— "He started belatedly, some concern upon his face as he finally dared study that of his fellow knight. " I’m going to have to try and find Davina. " That was the least of it, wasn't it? Even if she didn't know anything more, she was bound to want to know what transpired. She's her family.

“ Do you think you can manage? I’ll leave Svala with you and— “ He begun to rise. And what. “ Pray there’s a healer that’s not half dead in this damn town. If I sew you up it'll be ugly. “
 
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