A dream within a dream (Isaac)

[Guest]

Isaac ignored the diminutive critic with the black hat, turned quickly to see Mio's hand, and circled around the pool, shoving aside the brush in his way, and clamoring through the undergrowth to get nearest her. He had run his staff through the ring of cloth at his back, should he need it, and stepped forwards till he came to what he thought was the lip of the pool; then, he went for the branch which she was holding, gripped it hard further up, and reached to grasp her hand in his, keeping a firm hold where he already had it, and struggling to maintain his balance, not letting his center of gravity fall too far from his anchor.

[Guest]

One...two...three...four... She counted in her head, giving her something to focus on against the prospect of giving in to the deadly shock that threatened to engulf her aching body. Five...six...seven...eight... The branch above was being lifted. Her wrist clicked with the effort of holding on. Head whirling dangerously, Mio clenched her teeth and dared to hope...Nine...ten...eleven...twelve... Breathing seemed like such a blessing, a nicety that had been taken away like a child loses its toy when naughty. People she knew flashed in fuzzy pictures beneath her closed eyelids: Her mother and father, Gwiryan, the faithful and lovable horse that he was, Anarie, the only true friend she had known, and then her Grandfather, like a shadow beside her. Thirteen...fourteen...fifteen... What came after fifteen? A hand closed around hers and Mio took it, gripping onto it for dear life...fifteen...fifteen...fifteen...

[Guest]

Everything had been changed so quickly for the worse by impossible means; their way, marked at so many points by new, absurd spectacles, had led to a device of slow death, conjured seemingly from nowhere: a drowning pool had been made of a heap of gold dust. A ways off, while he tried in desperation to wrench the girl free, there giggled and laughed yet another creature, such as he had never laid eyes upon, or dreamt could exist. The freaks of the forest were muliplying, apparently, and the rules governing this wooded environment and its adherence to more common models of form and behavior were being broken at an increasingly greater rate; and yet, for all that, Isaac felt himself and his sinking friend to be utterly powerless. That neither could rely on but his or her own bodily resources to escape dangers engineered through the worst of treacherous magick, was what inflicted Isaac with the most pain, with a sense of futility far more terrible than whatever reaction his ailing muscles could provoke in those lower regions of his mind responsible for elementary motor functions.

He pulled real hard on Mio's hand.

[Syrawenn]

He pulled real hard....and was rewarded by the muddy sight of the rather breathless woman. To Mio it was a renewed acqaintance with the fresh air, muddled by specks of gold dust in her throat and everywhere between her teeth. They were out of the golden trap, back unto sturdier grounds although the road they should have followed was still somewhere hidden back east. It was rapidly becoming obvious why they had been warned not to go west...and still they had taken the easy looking -but treacherous- path.

Meanwhile the little greenclad creature came bouncing back and twiddled his thumbs, looking from one to the other. He straightened his ridiculously big hat and stepped in to get a closer look. "Not from around, are ya?" He chirped. "I can tell. I can always tell. People never go west. Never go west, they say. Still people do, but then they are not from around here. You went west, so you're not from around here."

Happily repeating himself the little fellow skipped around the muddled pair. "Glad I came along? It was me who bent the branch, ya know. Me, at your service, me being Hollery Mick. Nice to meet you. Even nicer when you're clean, I think. So, what are you looking for here? Not that I can tell you where to go, but perhaps I can tell you where not to go?" He stopped, staring at Isaac as the appearant leader of the two.

[Guest]

Once Mio had emerged Isaac helped her to her feet, lifting her safely inland, and wiped the mud from off her face, taking care to inspect her eyes for harmful particles, and wiped the muck from off her hair with a quick pass of his sleeve. His heart beat and his breath was gone; with trouble he voiced his concern:

"Are you alright?" he asked.

He looked to Hollery. Ignorant of how he might interact on a formal level with their newfound savior, Isaac fell back upon his partial memories of greetings as witnessed between members of the lower gentry, for he had seen them when they sometimes chanced to divert from the urban to the rural tracts, for whatever unfortunate reason, and would meet at the edge of one or another of the farmsteads which constituted his native village, exchange their credentials and take temporary shelter within their common nobility from the rude dregs of the country scene, before catching the next available transport back into society. He sought such an example of elevated discourse, wishing, out of his gratitude to Hollery Mick, to manage an introduction for himself and his companion which might fully honor the little one's intervention in their predicament, and convey in some sense his great appreciation for the creature's most opportune appearance. But all that emerged upon his forced recollection were mere bits and pieces degraded by time, a nonsensical series of instants. Well, refinement and style were for the spotless, anyway.

He extended a hand. "I'm Isaac... this is Lomiodien, and you're right, we're definitely strangers around here. Never found anyplace like this, that I can truthfully say. But I'm ever so thankful you've turned up, Mick sir. Before we got swallowed up we were on our way to find a Miss Abigail, a member of the village Dolmenstead."

[Guest]

Air rushed like liquid gold into Mio's lungs, and she gulped it down hungrily, her breath rattling through her chest like an old car's engine spluttering to life. Her head whirled as she stood up, and she grabbed hold of Isaac's sleeve to steady herself while he wiped her face and hair.

'Are you alright?' The voice seemed to echo oddly in the air, and Mio looked up to meet Isaac's eyes with a blank look. Her gaze flew out of focus and she shook her head frustratedly to clear it. The movement made her brain feel as though it was rattling around inside her skull like a lead ball, and the adhiel sat on the floor suddenly and in one swift movement, her legs folding into under her so she was sat cross-legged, her head in her hands. She gripped her forehead to stop everything swaying with dizziness and opened her mouth to swallow more oxygen, as if it were medicine.

When the ground had stopped swaying, Mio looked up at Isaac and attempted a smile, 'I'm fine,' she croaked softly, 'I'll just....sit here for a moment.'

Being too occupied in catching her breath, Mio had failed to register the conversation between Isaac and the little man. In fact, she hadn't noticed him at all until now. From her position on the floor, she silently watched the two men converse without taking much of what they were saying in. She wished they would all move somewhere else to talk. Just being near the sandy hole made her shudder.

[Syrawenn]

The sharp cry of a bird was followed by wild fluttering and breaking branches off in the distance. A triumphant call went out a moment later. It did not seem to bother Hollery overly much as he surveyed the interesting tresspassers in the area. It was always the Tall ones breaking in and getting into trouble. Always.

Why they would not simply stick to the North path was beyond the little fellow. The only thing he could think of was the goldfaeries luring them in. Yet, would their call be strong enough to be heard on the North path? It made for an interesting internal discussion; one he would enjoy with some blueberries, no doubt.

He took off his giant hat and scratched behind a pointy ear when one of the Tallers offered him a hand big enough to grab him. The little man stepped back and bowed instead. "Nice to meet ya, I'm sure. But why are ye looking for the White Lady here when yer supposed to be somewhere else? Not to be confused with the White Ladies of course, oh no, never make that mistake!"

He grinned and twirled around. "If ye know the way, why don't ya simply follow it?" He peeked at Mio catching her breath and blinked. "Yer not coming down with a fever, are ya?" He asked curiously. "Not good to be sick here. They will know and come."

[Guest]

"White lady? As far as I know, she's nothing but human," Isaac said. He looked over at Mio, appraised the way in which she breathed and watched them talk.

"This whole place is worse than all the dark alleys of the Mouth combined," he said. "We've... strayed, is all. Though I'm glad to see there is good as well as bad, here and throughout." He reached for Mio. "I get the feeling we'd better move on. Need any help?"

That last piece of info let slip by the gnome was the worst irritant yet to land in Isaac's mind; without a doubt, Abigail, now that she was connected with the term White Lady, would grow increasingly ambiguous amongst his hurried calculations, and slowly change from a helpless damsel into a shadowy threat, however rigorously he should suppress that conception.

But he made the distinction-- to confuse her with the ladies Rackman's told you about would be a mistake.

Simply another side to the maze that is this forest, he thought to himself; how many more will be revealed before the whole damn thing is done with and I can set foot back in civilization? His quick reference to the city scene as an escape from unsolved matters was unusual at the least; he most often took the opposite recourse, either in his imagination or in practice: that of removal to nature in flight from urban complications.

[Guest]

Mio jumped at the noise in the bushes and spun her head round to search for the source. She felt jumpy and shaky all over, and although she had now caught her breath, her heart was still rapping against her ribs at ten to the dozen.

Distracted by the noise the bird made in the bushes, the wide-eyed adhiel didn't comprehend the questions being asked of her, and she turned to look at Isaac and Hollery with confusion registering on her face.

'Uh.. I hope not... and... thank you.' she said, answering both questions at once. She grasped Isaac's outstretched hand and pulled herself up off the floor, finding herself keeping close to Isaac on his side furthest away from the quicksandy hole. She hugged her elbows defensively, trying to keep herself from bolting out of the clearing before anyone else moved. Her eagerness to get away made her feel impatient and skittish. They'd established that they should leave, so why weren't they leaving??

[Syrawenn]

ooc
Alright, because I'm stubborn, I'm taking this thread back

Bear with me if it's a slow ride, although I understood Mio is gone for 3 weeks now, so that gives me some time to think

[Syrawenn]

"Strayed, huh?" The little gnome replied, one tiny eyebrow lifted. "Just strayed? People never stray here. They choose to come here. I wonder what your reason was. But hey, no skin of my back! You'll have enough trouble getting out of here again." He nodded sagely. "So which way will you be going now?"

The forest lay peaceful around them. No more teasing golden voices lured them off the western path to the north. The east seemed all but closed by thick brambles and strange looking thorny flowers with long red leaves like flames.

"Of course I'm not allowed to say anything, really." Hollery apologized, taking off his huge hat in a lovely bow. "But there are a lot of things someone can say without actually saying anything that's against the rules! So if I can help...?"

Eager little eyes were shining under the broad rim of his hat. "Of course that means you'd have to trust me, and I'm not so sure if you ever trust anybody, master Isaac..."

[Guest]

ooc Glad to see you're back

ic If Isaac felt any irritation at being detained, it was wholly on his companion's behalf; he himself was rather appreciative of, if not somewhat disconcerted by, Hollery's ongoing presence, and hoped to extract whatever knowledge he could from the creature, before parting ways and again foraging unattended amidst an unpredictable society of spirits, puny demons entrenched beyond human or elvish sight throughout every part of the woods.

"Well, it was not by mistake that we've come so far," the halfbreed said. "We are at work- or I've come to be, at least- on righting things that, as I'm told, have been askew some time now, twisted about by meddling persons. I've nothing more specific to say that wouldn't simply muddle the situation. And now we go north."

His eyes narrowed at the reference to his lack of trust; but as an unnatural familiarity with a person's capacity for trust was the least of his worries, he simply responded:

"Well I've got about as much faith in strangers as any vagabond would nowatides. But who's to say, really? You've shown us such kindness, saving us from the muck and all, that I'd be foolish to turn you down. The truth is I know too little of this place to ask of anything especial. Merely going about is a task unto itself-- I'm sure whatever problems you should clear up, there would be newer ones to take their place. As it stands, the advice given me by a mister Rackman should do. They were to the effect of 'Go north, no matter what else you do;' though if there are any worse traps awaiting us than this, I would much like to be forewarned of them."

[Syrawenn]

ooc
Cause Mio is still on holiday I'll give you a little tie-over Wouldn't want you to get out of practice

ic
"A mistake? I'd say it was a mistake!" The little fellow repeated erroneously while he dusted off a nonexistant speck of mud from his colourful hat. "There would not have been any traps if you had just gone north from the start! But that being the nature of biggies, I guess you're not any worse than any of them. As a matter of fact..."

He peered curiously at Isaac's appearance. "You're not a human, are you?" He asked in surprise. "Oh! that changes everything!" Hollery jumped up and down with a cheerful whoot, waving his ludicrous hat around in a silly dance. "Oh, did you hear that?" He yelled at the air and the trees. "He's not a human!"

The wee man turned to Isaac again with sparkling eyes. "Well, I can honestly tell you that it might get much, much worse. Wanna go look for clovers?"

[Guest]

Isaac was no longer irritated by the little one's habit of reckless speech, yet he burnt faintly red with embarassment at this accusation of inhumanity, and stifled the urge, as it immediately came, to shrink backwards and escape any additional disclosure of personal info. True, if seen closely enough his ears should tell of what mixture his blood was made; but though it was no deeply hidden secret, he preferred that his breeding not be dwelt upon by any observer, nor loudly reported to those as yet unaware of his impurity.

With a tremor in his voice he said, "Yeah, that's true. Not that I see how it makes a difference. And what should clovers do to help our situation?" He ground his teeth. "Why not expect even the lowliest of grasses to do what they can to heed our progress, if things are gonna go as badly as you say they will? What do they care how muddy the blood is that I've inherited?"

[Guest]

ooc: hello! *waves frantically* I'm back! yay!

ic: Mio frowned in sympathy with Isaac. Why should it matter if he was human or not? She herself was definitely not human, and yet the little man had not appeared to have picked up on it in the same way. She looked over Isaac with some curiosity; she'd hardly noticed he was a half-breed.

She still couldn't understand why they hadn't left the clearing. Clearly Hollery was just out to be a pest and lead them in the wrong direction, and the young adhiel felt a cold hand pass down her spine at the thought of landing themselves in the path of trickery once more. She turned to Isaac, still hugging her elbows defensively and gave him a pleading look. Could they go now?

She felt unconfident to voice her eagerness to leave in front of their newly found companion, finding that his raucous presence made her feel all the more anxious to be going. Isaac was right, what in Pan's name were clovers going to do for them?

[Guest]

ooc Hello again

ic Having seen in Mio's face the discomfort which she took in lingering there, and thinking little of what advice Hollery should next choose to feed them, Isaac moved to leave, looking about once again for what should appear to be their desired direction; and, finding it, said to Mio:

"Let's go."

His tone was icy, even professional, and there were signs of some fiery emotion in his eyes as he scanned their path for obstacles.

Addressing Hollery, he said, "Time's precious and all that, we've about stayed put too long. Tail behind if you want, I don't care." With those last words he looked to Mio for confirmatory purposes, and started off north.

[Syrawenn]

ooc Glad to have you back

ic
The little man held the rim of his hat with both hands and huffed and puffed until his face became an interesting shade of red. With a look of indignation he regarded the two travellers in his realm who had just told him blatantly to 'trail behind' while he was trying to save their lives!

Trail behind! As if he was no more than a dog!

"Fine!" He exploded. "If you don't want my protection, go run around like chickens. No clovers, fine. You try and manage without, you'll get into trouble again. Just you remember who was here to save you when you couldn’t! You'll see!"

With a sniff of his nose Hollery folded his arms and disappeared in a poof.

The wind pushed the treetops down as the unlikely couple moved through the woods to the north. It grew steadily colder as oaks and birch made way for pinetrees that sucked up the sun as they towered over the nonexistant path. Crackling and popping under their feet told the pair of untouched dead wood on the forest floor. Little frostcrystals started to form on the north side of the trees, sheltered from any warmth by the lack of sun. The ground started to crackle differently, frozen moss shattering under their feet.

Shadows moved around them. Unexpected cricks and cracks echoed through the pine maze. Something whizzed over Mio’s head with great speed and landed in the tree behind her. A little dancing light was changing colours from red to pale white and back to the sides, disappearing behind the bark, then appearing again. Something blinked to the left. More little lights, blinking on and off just over the ground.

[Guest]

He had looked on as the creature transformed from jolly to livid before finally vanishing; he'd peered through the space left empty in its wake, twisted his face up in annoyance and expressed some profanity with a flick of his hand, then turned back in further frustration and resumed his progress. The temperature dropped and the light dimmed; he reached into his pack and drew out his lamp, hung it from the end of his staff and lit it up, rested the haft upon his shoulder and held the glowing contraption above their heads to light the way and to relieve himself of the feeling of chilled air. After the uneasy sense of anger had dispersed and left him empty, he was found himself more than slightly shaken, and soon came to regret the way in which he had reacted.

With the appearance of other lights he tensed and looked around. He was about to speak up, and communicate his doubt as to their way, when the object whizzed past Mio and lodged itself in the tree; turning, he took a step its direction to eye it where it had sunk, and determine whether they were under fire.


"Get down low!" he said to Mio, and planted his staff in the spot in the ground from which he creapt, the lamp still lit.

[Guest]

The young adhiel tensed, surprised at Hollery’s sudden disappearance, leaving her feeling quite alone. She followed Isaac without question out of the clearing. It was a relief to be rid of the place, but she found that her sensitive ears were picking up more than the usual noises, and she could not help but feel jumpy and alert.

‘Wha..??’ Mio threw her arms over her head and crouched in the dirt with a surprising reaction time and agility as something flew past her head at speed. After a moment of staring at the dirt, she lifted her head tentatively, her eyes registering fear, but only briefly, as annoyance quickly followed it,

‘I am down low!’ she hissed at Isaac’s back. Although it wasn’t at him that she aimed her anger, it was yet again the feeling of vulnerability that burned inside her like a flaming torch. Her sword was gone, and now she had no means to defend herself, which meant that Isaac would have the heavy responsibility for both of them. And she supposed, if she thought about it, that she felt some annoyance at the position that left her in, as if she was something small and helpless that needed protecting.

‘I’m low,’ she repeated, speaking more calmly, ‘What can you see?’ She raised herself from the ground and followed Isaac gingerly, making sure she stayed behind him. Her hands were shaking, and she clenched them tight, her nails biting into the soft flesh of her palm.

‘What are these lights?’ she whispered to herself in Elvish, finding it more reassuring to talk to herself in the lilting language she knew best. The memory of the quicksand was still fresh in her mind, and a fine shiver ran like liquid down her spine at the thought. If I ever find out the name of this place, she thought, I am never coming back.

[Guest]

At the sign of annoyance in her response his ears perked up; and with a smile, or rather with a strained attempt at one, he remembered his sense of mild disgust at Rackman's obsequious apology and at his show of regret towards their unseen aggressors; and Isaac felt again with keen discomfort the shame in having misjudged the man for that display-- which shortly afterwards had been proven to be a necessary measure, taken in desperation, against the terribly painful reprisal which nonetheless had followed, and which had left Isaac coiled on the ground in a burnt and miserable heap, tears streaming from his eyes.

She's behaving better than I did, he thought. At least she's got sense enough to appreciate whatever it is that's got us surrounded.

He noted with what closeness she creapt after him, and he smothered his natural concern, the emotion of a scale and potency to scramble what decent calculations he should try and make as to their chances of survival. Stopping in his tracks he chose in which direction he would speak; and, guessing from which point any enemy darts would most likely fly in response to his coming entreaty, placed himself so as to best shield Mio with his own body, or to most easily throw her, and himself, out of harm's way. It dawned on Isaac that if he were in her position, and dependent for survival, at the moment, upon someone whose record of recent decisions was as blemished as his own, that he would definitely want a way to act upon his own design, should it seem wiser.

He unsheathed his knife and handed her it. "I don't see anything but those crazy lights," he said. "More of the usual. But maybe if I speak up, they'll take us for friendly, instead of something else."

With that said, he rose and said in a loud voice, "We mean no disrespect to you, whoever you are-- please, accept my humblest apologies for having gone too far, if that's what I've done, into your territory. You've got no reason to expect anything bad of me; please, tell me how I've erred, so I won't repeat my mistake!"

He was ready to move if anything deadly flew their way.

[Guest]

Mio took the knife from Isaac, unclenching her hands to grasp the hilt. A bubble of relief floated contentedly around her stomach and she visibly relaxed, even managing a small smile in her companion’s direction,

‘Thank you,’ she said softly, keeping the knife in her hand and thinking that she could tuck it safely in her bodice when not in use.

Now the young adhiel grew to her full height behind Isaac, all of about five feet, her weapon clutched safely in her right palm. Her heart beat a constant thumping bass against her chest, and she could feel her pulse tapping lightly on the side of her throat. The lights continued to blink around them, and had Mio not been accustomed to the dangers of the area, she would have thought them just harmless and pretty, but now, in light of recent events – the same liquid shiver ran through her spine at the thought – the pretty adhiel felt that another danger was not far off.

Hazel eyes bright and alert, Mio could do nothing but wait.

[Syrawenn]

Rustling leaves in the wind while no breeze was blowing. The cold seeping into the ground and bodies. Isaac's words reached the line of fire and was met by another volley of treacherous little arrows. Several whizzed just overhead. Some were definitively going to hit the straightened out body of the Achadhiel in front of Mio. There was no time for thinking, just for acting.

The atmosphere breathed adrenalin with the sudden rushes of movement just out of eyesight, the fiery darts flying, just catching a glimpse of the sun. One of the archers stepped out of the shadows for the merest part of a flicker: a dark, hooded being, moving much faster than Hollery despite it's slightly greater height. Agressive little eyes shone from the shadow of it's face, meeting Mio's shortly. Visions of trees cut down and burned. The earth barren and empty. The safe darkness of the night lit up by the bonfires. A few jerky, determined motions later it was gone again and with it the strange hallucination.

[Guest]

Before he could say "incoming", Isaac had rolled forwards, below the estimated dip in the arrows' path-- and had managed, by the force of his forward lunge, to vacate that space in which he formerly had sworn to stay planted. It was with an odd sense of giddy satisfaction, too quickly felt to be named as such, and of a power to dampen his fear sparked earlier on, that he sought to recover his balance at the end of his dash, and to train his sight where their assailants should be hidden. His hopes lay in his own stealth, but he made no hasty attempt to reach his enemy, gripped as he was by doubt in his abilities of movement under fire and through unknown terrain; so he first he made to run for his staff. He had time enough to hope that Mio would provide them both with a plan of offense, discernable in her next act, and simple enough to succeed without spoken explanation. In his mind there flashed again and again the faintest imprint of past battles and he struggled to force his indefinite notions of conduct and response into a feasible, a coherent scheme of actual use.

[Guest]

Duck and roll. Duck and roll! Screamed a voice inside her head, and within moments, Mio had followed the instructions, throwing herself to the floor and rolling sausage-style as she hit, grunting as some of the air was forced from her lungs.

Flattening herself to the ground, the young adhiel could see that Isaac had taken a separate root, which was unfortunate, as the two now appeared to be separated. Deeply relieved that she had a weapon, Mio clutched the hilt of her dagger as tight as she could, every muscle tensing as she prepared to lunge and stab, should the opportunity arise.

Strangely, the adhiel felt no fear or panic, though her heart beat painfully against her ribs; so hard that she was sure their assailants would detect the drumming vibrating through the ground. A strange blind awareness came over her as the adrenalin coursed through her veins, and all Mio could think about was getting out of this alive.

[Syrawenn]

Soft thuds betrayed the landing of the pinpoints on solid ground. As soon as they hit, they started to burrow into the earth, disappearing from sight as if they had never existed. One grazed Isaac's skin, only to continue it's flight slightly off course into a helpless tree behind him. The burning sensation was nothing compared to the sheer agony when that first arrow had bitten him in the leg, almost costing him his life.

No offensive actions were forthcoming, however, as Mio ducked for cover herself. A wise course of action, considering the amount of arrows flying overhead. Communication was very hard now that the two travellers were seperated. Still within sight of each other it would be impossible to whisper. Of course there was always the off chance that their adversaries would not understand their language, but this too was a gamble.

More movement in the treelines!

Another volley went off into the air, yet these were clearly not going to hit anything. It was a strange contradiction with the earlier precision, soon explained by shadows moving in to surround Isaac. They were swift and soundless, save for a hissing that might be interpreted as a spoken language.