Summer 1, 125
First day of the season. It was starting to get hot in the great forests of aelheim. "I'd rather get out of this heat," she said to herself as she walked along and spotted some enticing looking shops. They were outdoor stalls that she had little patience for. Oh how she envied mages who could conjure water or wind. It seemed like just weeks ago that she was trying to get away from the cold. The aelf saw someone warp space to escape into their pocket dimension. They bent the molecules to their will, collapsing them in on themselves to create a large enough space to walk through.
The exodii looked back over their shoulder and saw Fenrir’s jealous expression and smiled at her. They waved her over as if inviting her but she shook her head. The aelf shrugged then continued on inside. Space around the spatial tear seemed to shimmer and bend for a moment before it simply folded in on itself.
Suddenly someone grabbed her hand and pulled her to the side. She was so tiny for an aelf that she was easily moved into the shade shortly before crossing a doorway. As soon as she entered she instantly felt better as she felt cool air wash over her sweaty skin. The wind seemed to be coming from some kind of leaf fan that was powered by aerisite.
“Sorry, you looked hot out there and well, I’m trying out this fan that I’ve made. It’s nice, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is,” Fenrir said, looking at the male aelf that was addressing her. “It’s been so long, I’d forgotten how summers got in the forests.”
“I can imagine. Fenrir, right? You moved in nearby, last I heard.” He flourished his hand which caused a cup to fly over from a cabinet and fill with water. He handed it to her and she drank it in one big gulp.
“Thanks! And yes, I’m Fenrir. And you are?”
“My friends call me Thorn, on account of all my bound flora having thorns.” He motioned to his arms which had a variety of different sized and colored thorns growing out of them.
“I see… Well, thanks for the drink, but I really ought to be going. Lots to do and all.”
“Oh? I was hoping you could help me with something. A Fjalle Kniver like you is probably good with locks, no?”
“Uhm, yes I guess you could say that,” she said with a cocked eyebrow.
“Great! Because I got this… thing from Azreth, but I haven’t been able to open it. He told he that it might be destroyed if I do it wrong,” Thorn mused, settling down in a chair.
“I suppose I could give it a look,” she said, sitting next to him and grabbing the strange contraption off the table. “If I fail it would tarnish my sterling reputation,” she admitted, earning a snort from Thorn.
"Fortunately I wouldn’t spread such a rumor," he added, immediately sidling up towards the woman who had agreed to help him. "Plus, apparently there’s a prize inside, but he couldn’t guarantee that.”
“Hmm, I met him this time around as well. I opted to get a rock, so between the two of us you might have gotten the better gift.” Fenrir pulled some tools out of her pocket and started putting them into some of the locking mechanisms. She held it up to her ear with one hand and slowly pushed and turned her tools until there was a clicking sound. The contraption opened up and revealed a small collection of gemstones inside.
“There!” Fenrir said with a grin. “That wasn’t so bad.”
“You made it look easy for sure,” Thorn said as he scooped up the gemstones. “Fairly worthless prize though.”
“Eh, I suppose the most useful part is the locking mechanism. You could keep your belongings relatively safe with it. Might be a nice place to put your alkahest. Oh who am I kidding, crime is basically nonexistent here. Spending so much time away from AElheim changed how I think.”
“No, no, you make a good point. I might be able to find some use for this yet.” He closed the contraption again and it clicked again to signify that it was locked. “I’ll have to go get a key made so I can open and close it at will.”
Thorn tensed for a moment as if he sensed the presence of someone else in his vicinity. At first he kept his eyes shut, hoping the feeling would pass, but when they didn't he sighed and opened his eyes. “Excuse me, it seems like I have another guest.”
Clearly he had sensed someone enter his grove, which Fenrir assumed was centered on the home they were in. He stood up and waved his hand which caused the door to open. There he found a middle aged looking aelf standing there, scratching his back with a cane. Fenrir stood and nodded to the newcomer.
"Ah, Thorn... I hate you bother you, I know you hate that... But uh... you know who has asked to see you as soon as you can make it..." the man said, tugging at his beard. "Don't ask me why, I don't know why he does or says half the things he does." Thorn smiled and nodded as the other aelf closed the door and went off to wherever he’d come from.
“Awfully secretive, aren’t you?” Fenrir asked as she stood up. While she didn’t normally suspect random aelves of being involved in illegal activities, her mind naturally wandered there for a moment.
“Oh don’t mind him. It’s just an inside joke. You’re welcome to join me if you want, but I must warn you that we’re travelling a fair bit, towards the lake,” Thorn said with a laugh.
“Travelling? In this heat?” Fenrir asked, waving her hand.
“I can fly us, so it shouldn’t be too bad. Besides, when’s the last time you went to the lake? It’ll be fun!”
“Well, alright then.”
Torn stood up and stretched a bit before rising into the air and grabbing hold of Fenrir. He then flew them out a large window. In seconds they were speeding over forests, and then roads and even a whole city before the landscape showed them the lake. Soon they passed over the deep blue lake with its waves stretching seemingly infinitely into the distance.
Talking at these speeds was a pointless endeavor as the winds drowned out every question Fenrir tried to ask. She wanted to say how pretty everything was but that went without saying. Torn angled down and flew parallel with the surface of the water. Fenrir let out a yawn – the fight was making her sleepy. She leaned against his body, hugging him tightly and tried to relax. The wind hitting her body sure did feel nice…
"Welcome back, Master Thorn! He is waiting for you!" someone said, waking Fenrir up. She blinked her eyes then felt her feet connect with the ground.
She looked around and couldn’t see the lake anywhere because all she could see were buildings. She supposed they had landed in a different part of the city. She was now in a fairly simple looking building with a servant faelnir who was motioning for them to follow.
Thorn smiled at her and Fenrir returned it before following him. The pair went down a flight of stairs and soon stood at a simple wooden door. "He is inside." The servant said before bowing and leaving them alone in the hallway.
The aelf took a deep breath and pulled the door open. Inside stood an alef named Inge along with another person that he did not recognize. It was a very old fella with light purple skin.
"Ah, Thorn! Thank you for coming. I'd like to introduce you to a friend of mine," Inge said, motioning to the man. “and who is this that you’ve brought with you?”
Thorn's eyes went wide and his heart skipped a beat. He did a respectful nod and said, “nice to meet you. This is Fenrir, a Fjalle Kniver who recently moved into my neighborhood. I decided to bring her along.”
Fenrir said, “yes, I decided to come along. I was curious as to what Thorn here did in his free time.”
“Heh, sorry to disappoint, but Thorn helps keep our falenir workers in line. I own several farms that focus on farming saolite. Sometimes, as can be expected in magical endeavors, things go wrong or mysterious things start happening. Thorn has more arcana than most at his disposal and he seems to enjoy this sort of thing.”
“I see, well I haven’t any plans for today… so I could help. If my assistance is unnecessary I could explore the area for a while.”
“Nonsense, come with me!” Thorn said with a grin. He had a hint of attraction in his eyes that Fenrir still wasn’t too sure of. She had noticed it when they’d chatted in his house but she still didn’t know if she was ready for a man.
One thing led to another and they ended up on a farm. Fenrir’s boots thudded into the hard dirt, cracking the caked mud with every step. The farmer in front of them looked up with a fright to see the two aelves standing before him. Thorn was very tall with wide broad shoulders and muscular arms. He wore a suit of armor with both his arms and legs bare to the fresh breeze blowing off the lake.
The farmer’s hair was matted into thick knots, giving the man the uncomfortable authority of a savage. His face was twisted into a nervous smile, his dark brown eyes fixated on the aelves unsuredly.
“Hello,” his gravelly voice said. “can I help you? This is Ingel’s farm.”
“Excellent,” Thorn laughed. “I am here on behalf of Ingel. He’s told me to gather up all the faelnir for questioning regarding suspicious activity.”
The farmer didn’t hesitate – he took off at run, dropping his tools and heading for the small storage shed a ways away. Fenrir held out her hand, but Thorn pushed it down gently and shook his head. He followed the farmer leisurely pace, his head scanning back and forward, evaluating the area.
Soon the door to the house flew open. The faelnir stepped out, a crossbow in hand. “I don’t want to do this!” he shouted as he pointed it threateningly at them and fired. Thorn flicked his wrist, sending a gust of wind that threw the shot off by a wide margin. The wind kicked up dirt and mud that made it impossible to see each other.
The crossbow kicked back into the farmer’s shoulder as the bolt shot out with impossible speed and stuck into a tree far away. Thorn’s smile was the first thing the man saw when the debris cleared. A large, hand shot out and grabbed him by the throat and hauled him into the air.
The aelf laughed, throwing back his head and his shoulders bouncing up and down. His hand closed around the faelnir’s neck, the bones crunching and his windpipe collapsing. The last thing he saw were those dark brown eyes, happy and cruel.
“Something fishy is definitely going on,” Fenrir commented as the faelnir fell to the ground. “What could have possibly driven this farmer to attack?”
“I don’t know,” Thorn replied, “but it is looking like this will take a while to work out.”
Leaves whirled about her as Fenrir climbed up onto the top of the house to get a better vantage point. She saw more people working in the fields further away. They were far enough away to not know that there was a commotion happening. To one side was a blackened patch of ground where something had burned. Fenrir smiled, feeling a sense of warmth and purpose run through her body. The answer was out here… somewhere…
She knew these wanted to return home, to their families, assuming they were separated. Many of them had probably been field slaves for so long she wondered if they would have anything to go back to. She hopped down then started walking through the fields. She tried speaking with several of them, but many could not remember their own names, let alone where they had come from. And for some reason when they realized that she wasn’t their master they became aggressive. Fenrir was starting to think that some kind of drug was involved. These faelnir were particularly out of it, mentally. Efficient as hell when it came to working, but fucked in the head.
“What do you know about these workers,” Fenrir asked Thorn when they regrouped.
“Well, I know that Inge does a lot of experimentation. There’s a reason why he usually has me come by to clean up the mess.”
“To increase alkahest yields, I imagine?” she asked.
“Yes, among other reasons. This isn’t the first time I’ve had to slaughter his farmers.” He pointed over to a pile of bodies. Some were missing limbs, others complete sections of their bodies. He seemed to be a kill and ask questions later kind of guy.
“So what’s the play? Are you just going to kill them all?”
“Probably. I’m taking mental notes. Inge isn’t one for combat and I think a very motivated group of faelnir might be able to kill him. This has been going on for a few hundred years so it’s all very routine for me. I swing by every decade or so as requested.”
“I’m always up for killing faelnir,” Fenrir said as she stretched her arms.
“I’d love to see someone of your station in action. But you’ve got no weapon!”
“I’ll go grab the crossbow. Are there any particular faelnir that should be spared?”
“Children and adult males should be spared if possible. If they’re greying then they can be disposed of.”
Fenrir nodded, then got ready to cull the herd. The first faelnir who had attacked had used a crossbow and further inspection showed that there were dozens of bolts in the storage shed along with various weapons and tools. Why? She had no idea. She settled on the crossbow then started walking down the farm, shooting people that needed to die. Nobody seemed to care when a body dropped unexpectedly. It was like they were incapable of feeling empathy towards their fellow man. In fact, the only time they showed any emotion at all was when they saw her. It was always a mix of fear and anger, so Fenrir kept hidden as best she could.
Thorn went further towards the center of the property where there was a little town set up for the faelnir to live and trade in. It also housed the buildings that processed the crops to filter out the saolite. He flew then landed on a side path, making a crunch in the poorly kept plant matter beneath him. The town was busy with many people walking the streets, or commuting about on work ponies. He looked around and walked deciding to wait just a bit before blowing everything around him to kingdom come. He looked around at them pensively - the tall processing mills and streets were draped in pollen and debris from the processing.
Despite the heat, pedestrians were covered in poncho-liked clothes and gloves to keep the pollen off of them and a decent number with food in hand. There were adults and children alike at work. Each ‘block’ had several people on the floor slowly dying or having extreme reactions to the contaminants they breathed in. Druids would have natural resistance against this sort of thing. Ordinary faelnir? They didn’t have a chance against long term exposure.
Many walked passed him and just like those in the farms they freaked out when they noticed he was an aelf. He didn’t give any of them a chance to attack. Knowing the life he was going to pry away from them only would make this day more satisfying. He released a flare of wind that pushed the men and woman near him down to the ground and focused swirling orbs of air in each hand.
He walked up to each of them and smashed the orbs of air into the bodies, tearing them to bits. Fenrir caught up just as he finished off the group of workers. “There’s so many faelnir here,” she commented.
“Alkahest farming is an intense operation. There’s probably thousands of workers on the farm.”
“I have a mine myself,” Fenrir said, “I use treants though, so I don’t have to worry about things like insubordination.”
“Lucky you,” he replied, looking at the bodies upon bodies he left in his wake.
“It’s a shame, really,” Fenrir said as she looked at them all, “I could have really used these bodies for my own purposes. Alas you don’t really leave much for me to make use of. And manipulating flora is awfully costly when I’m not in my grove.”
“Ah, I hadn’t thought about that. You should have spoken up sooner!”
“It’s really not that big of a deal,” she said, waving her hand.
“Oh don’t say that. We’ll keep them in one piece from now on, how about that?”
“I suppose,” she said, and so they went about killing some faelnir. Fenrir was severely limited by her spell reserves, only capable of ‘creating’ about 40 verdant skeletons out of the faelnir. All in all, not a terrible use of her time, overall, but still annoying that she could only make so few. She threaded plants through their bodies and encased them in wood and used them to carry various other faelnir bodies that she thought she could put to use later when she had more reserves.
In all they killed several hundred faelnir. It seemed that the bulk of the issues were coming from faelnir in one particular area – the rest of the farm wasn’t having issues. Fenrir ended up with 40 verdent skeletons and 75 faelnir bodies that were transported to her grove.
Once she got home, she syphoned the reserves off of Mordva and Kringlo. Using those reserves she threaded plant matter through the rest of the corpses and encased them in wood just like the others. Then she raised them! It was slightly more efficient now that she was in her grove.
Reserves: 4 - .39ish (tethers) - 2.962 (80 apprentice casts - see below) + 3 (syphoned) - 0.695 (75 apprentice floramancy 1/4 cost) - 2.78 (x75 apprentice raise verdant skeleton) = 0.173
40x apprentice floramancy
40x apprentice raise verdant skeletons
Syphon via druidism (free via touch)
75x apprentice floramancy 1/4 cost due to grove discount
75x apprentice raise verdant skeletons
Net gain: +155 verdant skeletons
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