Reluctantly Rogue Pt. 02 Ch. 04

(Note: This is a long, ongoing story. It is a story with sex. It's a sexy story. It is in many ways a story about sex. But, it is not strictly a sex story. Many chapters may even be SFW.

This chapter is SFW in the sex sense, but not entirely in the violence sense.)

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CHAPTER FOUR

Toil and Trouble

Outside the smithy, daggers safely stowed in his pack, Atyr leaned against the corner of the building, waiting for the road to be clear a ways in both directions before he spoke, muttering under his breath.

"To the witch?"

Pesky, already slumped against his neck where she sat on his shoulder, slumped further. "Fine."

"Anything I should do before we go?"

"Reconsider?"

He nodded. "Great. Onwards."

At the eastern edge of town, he paused to slide one of the sheathed blades onto his belt. Considering a moment, he shrugged and slid the second one on as well. Couldn't hurt.

His fae companion raised a brow. "Again, if talking to Wetlyn goes so badly you need those, it's not going to matter. She was long brewing when your grandmothers were not yet come-hither looks in their mothers' eyes."

He settled his pack back onto his shoulders. "Well, if she's that ancient, it should be easy to overpower her." Pesky looked unimpressed, and he sighed. "That was a joke."

"You don't joke much."

"I haven't had much to joke about since you decided to turn my life upside down."

"I think you've made plenty of comedic decisions, personally."

He glared. "Hah. Let's go."

"Alright, dummy."

She fluttered ahead, turning off the road and making for the steep trail up the spire to the old watchtower. Atyr trudged along behind.

The way grew swiftly rocky, rough-edged hunks strewn about and buried deep in the grass turf. The trail spiraled up and up and around the steep prominence. It was a short climb to the place where the green grass ended entirely, replaced now by the jumbled fall of boulders and jagged stones. The trail picked its winding way in and among them.

Above, the lichen-covered spire jutted high out of the earth. Atyr looked behind them, out over the low hills of Woodstead. He had never before ascended to the tower, and he found himself surprised at how high it really was. From a distance it had seemed almost comparable to the knoll on which the Birdhouse sat; climbing it, it was much taller.

Shortly before midday, the trail led under an immense slab of rock which lay across the entrance to a harsh cleft twice as tall as a man. The short cliffs on either side were jagged and overhung, defying those hiking the spire to attempt to scale them. Atyr paused when he saw it; it was as though a fortress had been made of the rock of the earth, hostile and imposing. In the warlike days of the past, the small watchtower must have been all but unassailable. He breathed once, deeply, and considered everything that had lead him here in recent weeks. Shaking his head to himself, he stepped into the shadow, in under the roof of stone.

"Hey, wait a second." Pesky's voice called him back from outside. "Couple things to go over before you throw yourself into the grasp of that unpleasant old hag."

Not minding a reason to delay traipsing off into the darkness of the crevice, he stopped, turning back into the sun. "Alright, like what?"

"Like, I'm not going with you."

"Really? You tell me now, at the gate?"

"This isn't the gate, dummy, it's just a crack in the rock." She crossed her arms at him. "So dramatic. No, I'll go in under the big scary rock with you, I'm just not going into the tower."

When he raised his eyebrows at her, she continued. "Trust me, it'll go better if you're alone."

Atyr nodded slowly. Considering how Pesky had talked about the witch, that might be understandable. If her relationship with Wetlyn was anything like her relationship with Helliot seemed to be...

"Also." Pesky tapped him on the nose. "Keep it civil. Keep it polite. No jokes. Just information. Say exactly what you mean. Don't try to hide things or butter her up or anything like that. Just..."

"Just what?"

"How about we assume she's faaaar smarter than you, and the best you can hope for is that she sees some use in you. You're not going to get the upper hand in conversation, let's put it that way. Alright?"

"Fine. So I just... I walk in and say, 'Hi, I'm Atyr Bracken, can you make me something that will allow a woman I know to see the fae?"

"Fiend."

"Right."

"But yes. Pretty much." Pesky smooshed her face into her palms for a moment. "Ahkck, I hate this." She sighed. "Basically, just try, try, try not to be a dummy, yes?"

"Thank you Pesky. It feels good to have someone believe in me."

"Oh, and Atyr?" Her tone was serious now. She pointed to the crack in the rocks. "When we head in here, have your blades ready. I don't know what we might find in the shadows." She disappeared into the dark cleft.

Atyr watched her go for a moment, then tilted his head in a we'll see what happens sort of way, and stepped in after her, hand resting beside his new weaponry.

He paused just inside the entrance, letting his eyes adjust. Tall, rough walls stretched up on either side of him, shadowed and obscured. The stale scent of moss and mold hung in the air. He tightened his grip on the hilt at his side. A few paces in, the crack swung sharply to the left, and he smacked his forehead hard on a jutting angle of the wall. Stumbling back, he dropped on his ass on the damp floor, hand flying to his head. He could blood between his fingers. A reddish glow in the dark caught his mind's attention. Looking down, he noticed one of the rings surrounding his fae symbol was shining at him with a faint, misty light. It faded swiftly to nothing as he watched, the pain in his head diminishing along with it. Interesting.

"Hey Pesky?" he whispered. No response. She must have known he had a question. He made a note to ask her later.

Standing up carefully, he reached out to feel the wall. Past the turn of the crevice, the darkness completely obscured his vision. Drawing one of the daggers now, he inched forward silently, testing the floor with his toes.

Barely three paces on, the crack cut back to the right. He reached forward with a foot, and felt nothing. Crouching, he groped around for a place to step. Empty space.

He backed up slowly, pawing around for another way to go, but the walls were solid on either side.

"Pesky?" he hissed into the blackness. "Pesky, where are you?" The sound of his voice was dead in the cramped space. "Pesky, you luckless little pest, I'm stuck!"

Silence.

Working back to the edge, he felt again for the drop-off in the floor. He sat on the edge, reaching cautiously down with one leg as far as he could, but found no solid rest for his foot. With nothing else to do except retreat back to the sunlight, he ever-so-carefully swung both legs over, and wiggled his way out on his belly.

To his surprise, his feet found rock while he was still halfway on the ledge. He turned gingerly in place, and tested ahead of him. The ground continued. Running his hand along the walls, close now on either side, he found himself at a dead end.

One more time, he called softly for his fae companion. "Pesky, I swear, if I get lost in here, you'd better hope I stay lost for good."

He heard something then. Was it... a tiny bell-like giggle? It had come from below him, he thought. Getting down low on his knees, he felt the damp stone beneath him. It was solid, but a cool draft of air hushed across the floor, smelling of sun-warmed lichen. He followed it back, and found a low passage, too low even to crawl into on his knees, leading onwards.

"Of all the luckless..." Atyr began to wonder just how much he actually needed to talk to this witch. He sat in the dark for a long moment. Standing again, he felt high along the walls of the crevice, searching for another route. Finding none, he growled to himself in the lightless space, and swiftly fell to ruminating on the many injustices of his time since meeting Pesky.

Hoping then that the cliff face outside was perhaps not so daunting as he had first thought it to be, he retraced his path, up the small ledge, and around the two quick turns, finding himself swiftly back in the midday sun. The cliffs were every bit as un-scaleable as he had remembered. Not a single handhold presented itself to tempt his optimism.

He looked at the dagger in his hand, bit his lip, swore again at Pesky, and headed back into the dark of the crevice under the stone. Once more at the knee high passage, he steeled himself. He shook his head angrily, and rubbed at his face with his free hand, then dropped to his belly in the mold-sludge and squirmed his way forward into the low crack.

As soon as he was head and shoulders into the passage, he began to see a faint light ahead. A few slimy wriggles and the rock above him raised higher, and he was able to come up into a crouch. The light was enough to show dim shapes of stone in the dark. Two paces more and he could stand, seeing the light coming in stronger just above his head.

He sheathed the blade, and jumped, catching the ledge above him and working his way up into a brighter passage with close sides a man and a half high. It ran steeply up and to the left for a few paces, then turned left again where a shaft of bright sun shone on the wall. Never had a patch of light looked as beautiful as it did then.

Striding quickly forward, he turned the corner, and saw the outside world just a few steps away. He burst forth into the glare, laughing shakily to himself, and found himself face to face with a gleeful Pesky.

"Took you long enough! I'm sure you were up to all sorts of important things in there."

"You absolute, luckless little..." The laugh on his face collapsed into something like a snarl. "Any reason you couldn't have just shown me the way?"

"It's only a few paces." She gestured around them, and Atyr realized they were now just on top of the massive stone slab which covered the crevice. She flew in front of him to catch his eyes, obviously quite pleased with herself. "Not afraid of the dark, are you?"

"I'm not afraid of the dark, Pesky. I am... appropriately cautious when I have to wriggle like a worm into slimy holes underground." He glared. "Especially when a little sprite has just told me to keep my weapons ready and be prepared for anything."

She grinned at him, more devilishly than Helliot ever could.

"I thought you liked jokes?"

Atyr ignored that and looked around. The spire still stretched above them, a tumbled of fractured boulders, but they were getting closer now, the tower almost directly above them; close enough to make out windows and doors in its crumbling walls high overhead. He stared up at the ruin of the building.

"You coming all the way to the door?"

"If you need me to." Her voice was suddenly glum, the mirth completely drained from it.

He looked back at her to ask if she had any more last minute advice, and froze. A low, humanoid shape was creeping from between two of the jagged boulders behind her.

"Pesky! Behind you!"

The creature moved in a flash, fluid as a lunging wolf, an over-sized hand flying out and snatching her from the air. Atyr stumbled back, fumbling for a dagger, and the beast stared at him with tiny black eyes, one hand on the ground, the other clutching its fae prize.

It was like a human, but shorter and hunched, and many times more muscled. The skin was a mottled grey with green patches like the mossy stones around it. It raised itself up now, both massive arms above its head, and bellowed at Atyr. It wore no clothing, and he couldn't help noticing the impractically large appendage hanging between its thick legs.

He took a step back, but then set himself, drawing his other dagger and raising them both.

"Drop her, beast! Put her down!" He lunged forward at the space between them, menacing the monster.

The grey-skinned creature bellowed at him again, and, Pesky still struggling in its grasp, bounded away into the rocks of the spire. Atyr rushed forward after it, but it had vanished, moving more swiftly through the terrain than he ever could.

A rock scraped softly behind him. He spun. Three more grey, humanish forms were creeping slowly from among the tumbled boulders, looking almost like stone themselves. One of them was a male, but two were obviously female, heavy breasts swinging from their chests.

Atyr swung a blade through the air towards them, and they drew back a pace. He slashed again, both blades this time, but the three creatures didn't retreat any further. Glancing around, he found the trail running off and away behind him. Daggers held up between him and his opponents, he began to slowly back away along it. They watched him go, not moving to follow. He risked a look over his shoulder, and then snapped his gaze back to the beasts. They stood as if made of the stone of the spire.

Moving tensely, step by backwards step along the trail, he gained as much distance as he could. He stopped. Hands shaking, he slowly sheathed the blades. The creatures didn't move, watching him with their small, black eyes.

Slowly, slowly, he drew his bow and strung it. Still, they were motionless. Did they understand what a bow was? He couldn't know. He nocked an arrow, drawing halfway, sighting down the shaft at the male. It didn't move. He glanced at the other two. There was only one. He swore to himself, and drew full and loosed in one motion. The arrow sped true across the short distance, burying its large, broad head deep into the grey skin of the neck.

His victim reared back, a hollow shriek leaking from the ruined throat. Its thrashing body hit the stones, heavy arms pounding at earth and air. The remaining creature vanished back into the rocks.

Atyr didn't wait to find out where the other two had gone, or what would happen to the wounded monster; he turned and sprinted up the path, drawing a blade once more with his free hand. A warmth and a sense of accomplishment washed through him. Experience. The brief glow it granted spurred him on faster.

He rounded a corner in the trail, feet pounding over the mossy stone, and one of the beasts lunged from among the boulders. Agility born from years of running and hunting in the Brookwood saved him, and he stumbled away and fell, slashing wildly with the dagger, once, twice, again. He felt the blade bite on something hard, and the grey form drew back and vanished among the tumbled rocks.

Atyr scrambled to his feet. He was running again. The world was closing around him. He could smell the blood of the creature. He could hear his own blood in his ears. His breath rasped wildly from his throat. All he could see was the narrow track ahead, leading on and up as he dashed along it.

His chest burned, and he slowed, looking around. About him he saw only the grey stones of the spire. Still moving up the trail, he sheathed the dagger and nocked a second arrow. He kept going. On, up. On. The tower was getting closer now, maybe a few hundred paces. He slowed to a fast walk. On, on.

Light footsteps drummed rapidly behind him. He whipped around to see two of the creatures racing up the trail. He loosed the arrow, catching one of them in the arm, and the wounded thing shrieked, and fell back. Both beasts turned and loped off into the boulder field.

Atyr stood still. Chest heaving, throat tight. Moments passed, and he heard nothing but the wind among the rocks. He smelled nothing but sun-warmed stone and shrub.

Whatever these grey-skinned, human-like monsters were, they seemed to have learned to fear his bow. He tried to smile, but the taste of bile in his throat twisted the expression into something else.

He had to find Pesky. Could she possibly be alive? He remembered then, her immense, star-born form, like an angel out of tales. Surely she could handle whatever these were?

But, he still hadn't asked her about that night. Was that... last night, the night before? It seemed like a memory long past. Could she become an angel at will? And if so, what did that mean now? She certainly hadn't looked anything but helpless, held in that massive, stony fist.

He looked up at the tower, a short sprint away. The path was clear. He could be there. He could be inside, away from this pack of stone-skinned hunters.

Swallowing the lump of his better judgment in his throat, Atyr assumed the role he had grown up in; stealthy hunter in the wilds. Tracking a pack of naked, grey, human-monsters was just like stalking deer, wasn't it? He stepped off the path and faded into the mossy stones, disappearing as the beasts had done. He had to find Pesky.

Not far into the steep slopes of the boulder field, he realized the futility of his search. What was he even searching for? Where could he start? There were no tracks to follow on the hard stones, no watering spot at which to lay in wait. He knew nothing of the habits of whatever these things were. There were at least four, he knew, but how many more could there be? Perhaps the best course of action was to make it to the tower after all. Would Wetlyn be willing to help? Was Pesky still alive to need helping?

He turned, staring back up over the jumbled boulders, to where the roof of the tower was yet visible. He started towards it.

An immense weight dropped on his back and crushed him to the ground, and a grey hand gripped his shoulder hard enough to crush muscle and crack bone. Atyr yelled, pain swelling down his arm.

His face ground into the rock, tearing against the harsh surface. The strength of the monster on top of him was irresistible; he was like a child in the arms of a bear.

A hand grasped his skull, and flipped him over on his back, wrenching his neck. A squashed, grey face growled low above his own, flat teeth bared. Its breath was like death and rot and mold. The beast picked him up and slammed him back down, driving the air from him, smashing his skull violently off the jagged stones. Light flashed across his vision, and his mouth opened in a breathless scream, as agony ripped through his body. The monster slammed him again and even as the pain smeared itself across him, something within him remembered to fight.

He slashed at the face, twice with his good arm, catching it across the mouth and glancing off the forehead, spattered dark blood across the stones. With a howling scream, the crushing weight lurched off of him, and he choked in a partial breath.

Possessed of a strange fury then, Atyr launched himself after it on hands and knees, lunging against the stumbling form and driving the dagger deep into the knotted muscles of its thigh. It stuck fast, and he left it there, drawing the second blade. The thing roared its pain to the sky, and seized Atyr by the skin of his chest, lifting him and shaking him like a hound shakes a squirrel.

Atyr screamed again, but this time in rage, slashing at the arm that held him until it threw him once more to the ground. The beast drew back and pawed at the dagger in its leg, stumbling away, and again Atyr lunged after it, onto its back. It spun and thrashed, flinging the thin man around wildly, but he clung tight around its torso with his legs. He stabbed it in the face from behind, not knowing where he hit, and it leapt backwards, crushing him against a boulder.

With his last shred of clarity through the pain and chaos, Atyr reached to the front of the head, and jammed the blade home, pressing in through the eye, deep.

The monster collapsed, twitching, and rolled onto its back. It lay still.

On the edge of collapse himself, Atyr slid down the rock, slowly to the ground. With every motion, his shoulder grated and screamed at him. He couldn't move the arm.

He watched a faint mist-form rise out of the stone-grey corpse in front of him, and race into his chest. A pulse of Experience warmed him, filling him with hope. Another sensation followed immediately, like the satisfaction of Experience, but more so. It was as though something real had been achieved, like something important had happened. It was almost overwhelming.

Caught up in the exhilaration, he climbed to his feet determined and empowered, but he felt ribs scrape inside him. He fell forward onto the body, catching himself with a groan on the hot, bloody flesh.

Something hard and smooth pressed into his palm. Atyr jerked his hand back, and found a tiny corked vial there, with a dark red liquid inside that looked uncomfortably like blood. He stared at it, but couldn't bring his mind to bear. He slipped it in his pack: a question for later. For Pesky? He could only hope.

Atyr looked back at the tower where it extended over the rocks. Already, he could feel himself healing. Sharp pain still shot through his ribs, his neck ached and his shoulder still throbbed, but he could move his arm again, and the blood on his face had stopped flowing. He smiled grimly. One thing at least to thank the little sprite for if he ever saw her again.

A grey shape slunk out from behind a rock a dozen paces ahead of him. Of all the luckless, fae-cursed...

He swiftly nocked an arrow and sighted down it at the creeping predator. It drifted back into the boulders and was gone. They had learned to fear his bow indeed. He crept sideways, moving around where he had seen the form, arrow still at the ready. Another of the creatures climbed up onto a rock in the direction he now headed. Whether it was the same one or a second, he couldn't know. He took aim and it slid down the far side of the stone. Gone.

He cut straight towards the tower, but three grey shapes now crept forth a ways off, blocking his path. He ducked behind a rock and began to sneak out and around, looping far away through the boulders. Two more creatures headed him off, keeping their distance, and vanishing as soon as he lifted the bow.

He turned to head back the way he had come, but arrayed distantly among the stones and crags of the spire, he saw more shapes emerging, close to a dozen. He loosed a hopeless arrow at them, and several slipped away, only to reemerge elsewhere.

Atyr began to jog, every step sending pain through his side, and across his shoulder and up his spine. The shapes vanished whenever he tried to take aim, then reappeared, always moving slightly closer, slightly closer.

His thoughts began to melt into instinct. He moved, they moved, he aimed, they left. Sometimes he loosed an arrow, but he never knew if he hit. Slowly, he moved towards the tower, and slowly the grey creatures crept closer, forming a distant ring around him, off among the rocks. The tower was so near now. Just a short sprint to the door.

Suddenly, a beast that had snuck in close and unseen lunged forward from a shadow. Atyr loosed a shaft at it, and caught it in the chest. It screamed and shot away through the tumble, but the rest of the pack bellowed and began to chase.

Atyr took off. He raced through rock and ledge and scrub, flying on his feet, the pain of his body receding into a panic, and a dreadful hope.

They were all about him. They were closing. The tower was a bare dash away, but the beasts were ahead already. Without even an arrow nocked, he thrust the bow towards the closest of them and it fell back. He tore past, and a blur lunged for him. He slashed blindly with the arrow in his hand and the shape fell away, but still they came, and still they closed. It was too far.

He was at the edge of the tower yard now, the pack barely a leap behind him. He dashed across the open ground and flung himself towards the door, turning as he crashed into it, to place his back and make his stand.

And... nothing. Breath tearing at his chest, blood like a drum in his ears. At first he thought they had gone, vanished into the stones. But they were still there. He saw the grey shapes moving amongst the boulders, shifting here and there just beyond the edge of the clear space around the tower. They seemed unwilling, or unable, to approach.

Reaching behind him, Atyr felt for the handle and tried the door. It didn't open. In a surreal, civilized action, he rapped with his knuckles against the wood. He waited, then knocked again. Still the pack hovered within the edge of the stones.

Atyr let out a long, shaking breath. Unwilling to continue waiting for the creatures to overcome whatever held them back and race forward to make a meal of him, he pulled out the bit of the hatchet, still without a haft, and turned, praying that the door was as old and dry-rotted as it appeared. Grasping the bit in one hand, he began to hack, hewing chunks of age-softened wood out from around the latch and bolt.

He glanced behind him. The beasts were yet held at bay. A few more strikes at the wood, and he stood back. Another look behind. He kicked hard. Pain lanced across his partially healed wounds, but the wood burst asunder, and he threw himself inside, slamming it closed and leaning heavily against it.

Only then, it came into his mind that the rotten wood, now without a lock, would provide no safety from the predators outside. He would have to hope the fear of the tower continued to keep them at bay. Or whatever it was that was holding them back.

Peering through the shattered hole where the bolt had been, he could still see the shapes of his stalking hunters. Presently, from all among the boulders, over a dozen small grey motes drifted up and raced towards him, each flashing into his chest with a gentle hint of warmth. He stepped back in surprise. His heel caught against something, and a bell chimed somewhere higher in the tower. He looked down at the tripwire, taught against his boot. He shrugged. He hadn't been planning on sneaking up on the old woman anyway.

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As always, so many thanks for reading! I know some people have been itching for action, so I hope you enjoyed the kind we got, here.

-ScryBells