"Ehh.... This is getting old.."
Dörk grumbled low to the small group of his fellow skybinders. Among them, a man of about 60, Cecil. The man was grown and lived near the capital, close to Jerry.
"Pff... If you ask me, none of us have it easy. I for one am stuck mending back up some parts of the wall." mutters to himself, while rolling his eyes. "Well at least you're done in the infirmary, what else you got goin' on?" Cecil reached and rummages around in the inside pocket of his robe and pulled out a pipe. Inspecting the contents, he snaps his fingers to ignite the herbal blend.
Dörk merely sighed, sharpening one of the corners of his mouth, frowning. "With the infirmary complete, the too-great general wants me to set the field and the city walls with booby traps." The main man extends his hand to Cecil, to which the man returns the gesture by taking a puff from his pipe and passing it to Dörk.
The other colleague present, Mitch, looking about Jerry's age, had his own cigarette, already half smoked, dangling between his lips. "I suggested we change the trances. A little spell, altering the ground, a few sharp spikes. But we'll see, they told me they'll redo the layout and call me." he grumbles because of the cigarette.
Sucking on the pipe, Dörk just glared back to Mitch, also handing the pipe to Cecil for his turn. "That's a good idea. Maybe Nyx can come with you and learn?"
Mitch just shrugs. Though not in the decision-making circle, such action was sure to help and worst case, probably save lives from death. He observed the drama from a safe distance as did most of the Skybinders. The girl, Nyx, wasn't someone very strange at all. All his fellow comrades were strangers at some point, so she just had to get to know the rest of the people in the group. I guess it's my turn.
"That's splendid, cheers a lot." He cracks a smile. The thought of the sexy- fighting- killing- golem reminds Dörk about an important moment in their whole dynamic. Spell casting. "Can you see also how she's doing with magic? I showed her catapulting. Please check on her spell work."
The man just raised one eyebrow." The catapult-- Ah, you mean the spell. Sure, no problem." cutting off the image of the girl aiming from the top of the wall with the heavy war machine. With one last puff, he dropped the stub of his cigarette and extinguishing the flame with his foot.
The so-called tutor can only smile slightly at the deal with Mitch. "Thanks again, but... I guess I'll have to find her first. I haven't seen her for two days." He pulls himself up off the steps, straightening his frail knees and walking out of the alley with Mitch to follow not much behind.
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Two bloody days in these pits. Nyx snorted and kept on widening the pit. This must be the fifth pit dug. Quite slow, compared to the week of the siege when the men were functioning primarily on water, body fat, adrenaline and raw scraps, now still licking their wounds or recovering their strength.
From an unbiased perspective, midday shifts were digging and carrying more work to be done. The heat and sun were slowing everyone down, where the early morning shift was not having enough sleep, and the noon occasionally provided good shade or winds for the rest but still a sun over their heads.
Another thud of bodies hit the ground, from which the soldiers began to strip the corpses of their valuables. "Look-- it's Carl." sighed the soldier, stepping closer and analyzing Carl. Missing an entire arm from shoulder down and pale as a stone. "Poor little wimp". The soldier next tidied his helmet and carried on with his chores. And Nyx just kept digging.
"Okay, boys, lunch break. Gloves off, remember."
Commanding his subordinates, the man put in charge of the group turned to Nyx. "We don't have anything fancy, just dried meat and some potatoes."
But the man only gets a negative nod to his offer. "Just take a break." He said, and doesn't say or does anything else but to turn and walk to the soldiers who were seating down in a small, improvised camp.
Starting his break, Nyx sees if anyone was still stalking him. The soldiers were getting increasingly desperate, sometimes catching them staring at his ass or hitting his back with the tail-end of their shovels. By mistake, they said. But Nyx kept on digging, hoping he wouldn't have to split their heads open with the shovel. Or break some fingers. Proportional to the action, whatever were to be.
Letting go of the shovel, one hand grasps the open chest of a dead man, where the contents had begun to turn black. The watery sound, squeezing the lungs and what else it found. The blood flow was weak, but everything was a slow process.
Moving to the next corpse and reaching his hand to reach the lungs, he avoided the intestines, realizing they were just full of dubious fluids and of no use to him. Grabbing the liver, it was still intact, more blood than the rest had been absorbed.
The bodies are old already, but I can still---
A wide-eyed look flashes across his face, brought on by a jolt passing through his body. His body falling next to the rest of the bodies inside the pit. Eyes trembling, he turned his gaze skyward, forcing trying to force himself back on feet, but to with no avail, he passed out on the spot.
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"And I say-- Sorry I left salt on the table. And then she keeps complaining that I'm not doing anything. And she starts crying. And then we cuss each other like two fucking steers."
Passing under the city gate, both the master wizards had found something to talk about. Dörk, the self-anointed glyph-master, an adventurous traveler was listening on one of Mitch's stories about his half-wit wife's handiwork. The man in the subject spoke with a weary air, explaining that since his youth he had chosen his wife, Bella, a woman from the same village with whom he already had befriended and had a good connection. Now, he discussed sadly how their years together had become increasingly tiresome, not because of boredom, but because of the bickering between the two.
"You should drink a little more. Same to her. I mean.. No offense, but how come you're still with her?" the main man asked. He was pretty sure Mitch didn't have a thing for Bellaanymore. Maybe one cause of all the problems was the lack of a child, but neither he or she apparently wanted to open the subject with each other. "Really, you want some?" Dörk poked through the things in his pouch, pointing to a small glass vial. "It's vodka!" he whispers back to Mitch.
The wizard's motion could only be described as nothing but athletic, beyond any scope of error. Popping the cork of the small bottle, he drew the shot of alcohol from the entire cylinder, swallowing it all at once. "EEh... Thanks," he spoke between heavy gulps of air from his burned throat.
Over the few minutes of walking, Mitch's hot sting slowly faded, going back to talking about Bella. "She's staying by my side to see if I do things her way." The memory causes Mitch to roll his eyes. "I don't know... I think she's just stressed."
Both men continue following the road, now bouncing in big steps downhill. "Yeah, and you're not? Working home, traveling to make money. Oh... and you're a wizard!" but Dörk just sighs. Yes, the main man giving marriage advice was baffling. As he wasn't married. But the experience in a home, in a marriage, might as well be a mixture of all kinds of relationships. So ultimately it's experience and temperament that counts. "Why don't you visit a bathhouse? You know... relax... and stuff?" he gives Mitch a long wink mixted with a nod.
A moment of consideration doesn't pass before Mitch answers. "We've gone a couple times, but she doesn't want that anymore either. Says we're losing big money." he frowns. "She says I do enough traveling, so I should stick around the house."
A little more silence passes before Mitch and Dörk start talking again. "I don't know, I tried to talk to her mom but--"
"Mother-in-laws." Dörk sighs in disgust. "We're never good enough for their princesses!" He shouts at the top of his lungs, waving his hands madly, clearly showing the world, practically no one else but Mitch that he understands the fate of every married man. Mother-in-laws are cunts.
The unexpected reaction gives Mitch a temporary cheer, little by little, he chases away the bad thoughts of his marriage. "But you sir? You never tried to get married? Can't be all bad." Now Mitch tries to follow up with some advice.
He just licks lightly over his lips. His eyes far across the field and moving with the horizon. "I tried once." A twitch of his neck, Dörk turns to Mitch. "Point taken. Mother-in-laws are cunts wherever you go." He gestures skyward. "And then I tried again... but not as interesting. We broke up." He shrugs slightly. "It happens sometimes."
Dörk's destiny in love had begun to cause an uneasiness in the back of Mitch's mind. Breaking up with Bella?I never wanted that. But like any troubled person, little scenarios sometimes occur. Moving time backwards. Reconsidering decisions. But Bella has... always been a part of my life. I don't even remember how we met as kids.
More minutes of silence pass before the two wizards reach the line of corpses formed after days upon days of fighting. Easily visible beyond it about three times as many.
"It really is a waste."
"It kind of is."
Long down among the small mounds of earth, the group of men responsible for digging and burying the bodies were standing docked, talking among themselves. One showing a level of concern was propping his hands on the hips, glancing left and right until he saw the two wizards approaching from the distance. Extending one hand and waving at them.
Men from both sides approached each other. Of the three people, the lieutenant in command spoke first.
"Hey! I know she's with you guys. We swear we found her like this." He had raised his hands in defense, worried about the situation and maybe concerned about what one might think and talk his way through the ranks of the city soldiers, and particularly the ranks where it counted. Everyone was moving back to the edge of the pit, where Dörk and Mitch's spirits sank.
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"You're moving too fast! Just wait for me!"
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"That tastes good!! I love lemon."
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"What's so hard? Just put on the dress and dance at the ball!"
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"What's that on your hand?"
"I... I don't want to discuss it."
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"I'm a slave, Kara. Not like you!"
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"Please, leave me alone."
"No!"
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"What do you want to do today?"
"I don't know. Wanna train?"
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"Fuck yo--- AAH!"
"YOU WILL NEVER TALK BACK TO ME!! YOU UNDERSTAND !?!"
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"Speak! While you still have both hands!"
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"We're all gonna die!"
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I want out... out, out, out!!! So thick... I can't breathe, I can't move-- Somebody please let me OUT!!
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A spark. Followed by three others. Another nine. Another hundred. Each tearing through the veil of dreams, igniting to life the links in his inorganic brain. Birthing back his consciousness.
Moon-white eyes see daylight again, as Nyx escapes the darkness of the void again, he is greeted with the green of a tree. His head rises at a slight angle, just enough to allow enough to scan the grounds past his feet. The slight shift of his eyes makes him quickly aware he's up a slope, stretched flat.
A quick impulse makes him check his body. Checking for damage. Or things missing. At least I'm stilldressed.
"Good morning, good looking." Dörk had revealed his presence from the left, sitting on the same slope, head resting propped on the hands arch, looking directly at me. "Did you take a nap or faint from the smell?" he joked lightly, sneezing and nodding to the right, toward the troop of soldiers who had resumed their work.
"Eehhh-- The smell definitely." Nyx said, lifting off his back and finding a more ass-comfortable position, settling at last on his ass on the short grass.
The moment described moments ago made Dörk feel like after a long coffee. "My gosh! You can talk now! You can talk!" The wizard crawls down beside the golem, expressing all possible joy, hoping that her new ability will be permanent.
Nyx spoke unconsciously he too in a small pause, his movement startling him, but slightly cracking a smile along his mouth.