In the midst of frantically testing every possible weakness in her impermeable prison, Merrin barely had time to dive for cover when scorching heat descended on her and the tent dissolved into flame. Half blinded by smoke she clawed herself upright, coughing violently, and stumbled through a haze of heat and smothering fumes. Something hard connected with her head and Merrin reached out, feeling the electric pulse of a warding spell. Something exploded with a roar behind her and in desperation she lashed out against the containing magic with gods-given power.

Something gave way. Merrin felt it. She dove through the ragged hole and whirled to find her bearings, still feeling half suffocated by smoke. Nothing was familiar or even still standing, tents leveled by fire and dragons swooping overhead. Merrin flung herself out of the way of another burst of flame and tried to quell the violent coughing that came with inhaling so much smoke.

"Kendath!" her voice was lost in the cacophony. Merrin tried again, voice shrill and panicked. "Kendath!"

_________________

Garthag inspected the situation from a far and smirked at the sight as he wasn`t forced to make an intervention thus allowing him a chance to try to free Merrin. But she was already free? How? The gods no doubt, they always did that, only at the critical moment did they act. Garthag shrugged and began moving as fast as he could towards Kendath, he was moving before Merrin.

Yet as fate would have it the Meiltha had some other magical wards around and suddenly Garthag was fully visible as two Meiltha mages spotted them.

"Oh saps"

He uttered with a frustrated tone as he himself turned to face the two mages, he couldn`t risk the two firing spells into their backs as they made a run for it. Garthag concentrated almost at the very same time as the mages and almost at the same time, three spells simultaneously terrorized the surroundings. A lightning bolt flashed trough the air, a fireball exploded and a rain of acid dropped onto the two mages melting away their clothes, skins and bones. With the collision of the three spells Garthag found himself laying on the ground, staring at the sky and pondering was he going to die right there. He felt no pain at the moment, but there was no guarantee and there was no guarantee that he could even walk. He turned onto his side and forced himself onto his knee`s to watch the Meiltha mages melt away.

Then he finally gazed towards Kendath and the renegades, then finally at Merrin who was running just past him shouting for Kendath. Garthag sighed and began walking after Merrin with his other leg dragging along the ground. His leg was terribly burned by the fire and the lightning, the skin had burnt off and even some muscle was showing.

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

Kendath didn't hear her, but a Renegade dragon did. Subcommander Helsay's, in fact. The scarlet female, her eyes scanning the ground for her rider, suddenly caught sight of a tiny figure amidst the chaos. That tiny figure could not be Meiltha. She swooped downwards and snatched Merrin up in her talons. "Steady, young one."

Meanwhile, Kendath found himself as close to panicked as he could recall himself being in years. As flames exploded all around them, he and Helsay raced through the prisoner camp, frenetically unbarring the metal cages. Renegade dragons descended in erratic intervals to snatch up as many as three or four liberated captives in one talon.

"That's all of them," Helsay gasped, when a conspicuous sight caught his eyes. He seized Kendaht's arm. "The trebuchets!"

The Renegade dragons had scorched nearly half the catapults - a monumental victory on their part. For Kendath's part, he didn't even spare it a second glance. They'd managed to free all the prisoners.

Merrin hadn't been one of them.

Could they have simply executed her? Considering the brutality of the Meiltha High General, it wasn't a notion to be dismissed. The thought chilled him to the marrow, despite the roaring conflagration that heated the place like a furnace.

"Kendath!" Helsay grasped his arm again. A shadow loomed - one of the Renegade dragons coming for them. "What's wrong with you, man? We have to go!"

"Not... until I find her," he snarled, wrenching himself away. Lungs burning from the smoke, he plunged deeper into the labyrinth of cages. He'd hardly gotten five steps when he felt something rather hard conk him on the back of his head. Pain exploded in his skull, and his world went black.

-----

Watching the petty slaughter from afar, she could only sigh in frustration. She touched her fingertips to her scrying device, sending power channeling through the artifact and into Garthag. "Don't be so ready to kill yourself, my mageling. Get yourself out of this mess before I decide to get you out myself... not a particularly comfortable process if you ask me."

_________________

"What in the blazes?"

Garthag uttered as he felt his strength replenishing, but he cursed as he heard the voice in his head and tried to reject the power that was being fed into him.

"Stop it! I don`t need your help right now, not yet."

He screamed desperately in his mind, he wouldn`t be humiliated like this, he would get out of this hell by his own power and on his terms, not aided by some wench he couldn`t trust. Garthag sighed as the renegade dragon grabbed Merrin and knew that they wouldn`t be picking him up unless he was with some he knew. So the obvious last choice was teleportation that was possible, thanks to the mysterious and powerful wench. Garthag concentrated and cast open a portal, it felt good to use such strong magic once more as he was now powered by some unknown source. Garthag slipped trough and appeared far away from the battle on a silent hillside, he gazed towards the fires of the battle and smiled slightly.

"What are you up to witch?"

He muttered out loud wondering how this all would settle in the end.

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

Merrin could hear her heart pounding violently in her ears. The reprieve from trying to find Kendath in the chaos of a Meiltha camp was a welcome relief - so much so that to her horror Merrin could feel tears threatening. She swallowed them with an effort, dimly aware that she was on the brink of panicked hysteria, and carefully pulled herself up into the dragon's flight saddle, gasping a breathless thanks.

From the skies the sight was even more chaotic. Entire sections of tents had dissolved into searing flame, and the few Meiltha that were not occupied in holding the encouraged ranks of attacking Renegades were scattered throughout the camp like ants from a demolished hill. Merrin had no eyes for the Meiltha, searching the haze of smoke and flame for once figure. "Do - do you know one named Kendath?" she pressed the dragon while frantically scanning the ground. "Was he with you?"

Mentally she added Gods, let him be alive!

They swooped low over a series of smashed and half-melted iron cages, all empty and most on the point of collapsing. Merrin found her grip on the flight saddle a white-knuckled one, and it wasn't until she was forced to gulp for breath that she found she'd been holding it. Again she dimly resisted the urge to dissolve into tears of sheer panic and kept looking, hoping against hope that he was here, somewhere. He had to be.

Meiltha dragons slipped sinuously through the smoke and Merrin groped for a better hold as the scarlet dragon banked sharply without replying. For a moment she felt as though she were hanging in midair - and caught the barest glimpse of tousled black cloak in her peripheral vision. But the Meiltha were retreating in force. "Back, back there!" shrieked Merrin over the noise, gesticulating wildly.

_________________

Kendath swayed on his feet for a bit, promptly before slumping to the ground. Having knocked his companion out with the flat of his sword, Subcommander Helsay propped his arm under the man's shoulders and lifted him up with a grunt. "Lunatic," he muttered in no agreeable humor. "It's for your own good."

Who was this "she" that he'd been referring to? Family member, friend? Perhaps the heat had gotten to his head. In any case, the conflagration was rapidly building out of control. They had to make a quick exit, preferrably as soon as possible.

"Helsay! The shadow loomed over them again, and his dragon's voice pierced his thoughts. He'd never been happier to see Foxfire in his life. The scarlet female already had someone clutched in her talons. Her other talon opened, snatching both her rider and Kendath off the ground. Her wings pumped the air, and steadily they gained altitude above the stifling smoke.

Twenty minutes later, she set her three burdens down in the sheltering foothills a safe distance from the burning Meiltha camp. The other Renegade dragons rumbled at her arrival. Their infiltration had succeeded - they'd destroyed half the trebuchets, set the Meiltha officers in chaos, and rescued a score of prisoners.

_________________

Merrin stumbled and almost fell when her boots met solid ground, realizing vaguely that she was exhausted but banishing the thought. "Is he all right?" she demanded of Subcommander Helsay without really expecting a reply, too drained to even attempt politeness. It was a welcome relief to fold to her knees beside Kendath's prone form.

He seemed fine - alive, at least, as indicated by the pulse Merrin groped for. Her hands hovered anxiously over the bandages swathing his midsection and for what seemed the umpteenth time Merrin gulped back the desire to cry. She forced herself to take a deep breath, scanning him one last time. She didn't think she could have lived with herself if he'd died.

The onrush of conflicting emotions presented by this thought very nearly proved too much. Merrin got back to her feet, wondering dizzily if this was what it felt like to be hysterical.

"Thank you," she told Helsay, relief evident in her slightly unsteady voice. "I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't come."

_________________

The first thing Kendath noticed when he woke was his throbbing headache. Strange. He didn't recall any Meiltha wielding blunt cudgels.... Then it returned. A flash of firelit steel, uncannily reminiscent of a broadsword's blade...

Gods curse it. He was going to kill Helsay.

He put a hand to his temples and sat up. His gaze scanned his surroundings. No fire. Too many rocks. Looked familiar... Foothills around Vryngard. They'd come this way on their infiltration. People - dragonriders, former prisoners, Garthag at the side doing whatever it was Garthag did - were milling about in a more or less orderly fashion, taking stock of their injuries. Speaking of injuries... the adrenaline rush had abated, and he felt keenly the throbbing in his midsection. He'd also received a couple new wounds for his pains, the most serious of which was a brutal gash down his forearm. Not too bad. Could have been worse.

And speaking of prisoners...

Headache forgotten, he climbed to his feet - ignoring the way the world vertiginously spun around his head - and made his way towards the one person he'd thought would never see alive again. She didn't notice his approach, but he seized her from behind anyway and pulled her into a tight hug.

"Don't ever leave my side again," he growled, albeit in overwhelming relief.

_________________

Merrin only meant to hug him for a moment and give in to surges of violent relief. Unfortunately the tears that had been threatening decided they were done with hinting and came in full force.

The next minute she was sobbing unrestrainedly into his chest. It felt as though the stone sealing a dam had been pulled loose and all her emotions - fear, anxiety, anger, shock - were being expelled in a serious of gulping sobs. Merrin halfheartedly attempted to quell them, thinking dimly that she really shouldn't cry in front of all these people. It didn't work. The sensation of inexpressable relief at his being even alive was rather overwhelming.

"I was so scared," she managed to say into his armor as soon as she had breath to do anything besides cry. It sounded pathetically weak - Garthag would have been appalled - but Merrin really didn't care. "Ironlegs - Wyvern - " she mumbled, but words weren't making very much sense so she subsided. Vaguely she wondered how she'd ever be able to stop crying, and if he minded her getting his armor wet.

_________________

Merrin returned the embrace tenfold, and Kendath could only blink and stare in helpless confusion as she started sobbing onto his chest. He winced and awkwardly patted her on the back.

But she was flesh and blood - Merrin, the only anchor on his sanity at the moment - and before he knew it he was holding her with full intensity, gently rocking her and stroking her hair. He felt strangely whole then and there, as if his own private war had finally come to a closure. "Ironlegs?" he said softly, forcing out a chuckle. "He's one who needs to cheer up. Needs to find himself a better name too."

The sun's first intrepid rays were stretching over the mountaintops, though hazy smoke soon rose and obscured them and would obscure them for hours to come. For a long while Vryngard would know no sun. The Renegade dragonriders seemed keen on returning to the fortress. Subcommander Helsay offered Kendath an emphatic glance. They couldn't stay here much longer.

Kendath nodded over Merrin's shoulder. It didn't matter anyway. He had no intentions of returning to Vryngard. He's seen enough of Thorone for one night, and the prospect of running into a certain rambing Druid didn't invigorate him either. This quest had somehow become much more than a mere task assigned by Renegade officers, and as far as he was concerned, Renegade officers needed no more to interfere.

Merrin's sobs had abated a bit. Kendath looked into her eyes and attempted a contrived smile. "Feeling better?"

_________________

Merrin managed a tentative smile in return, eyes still decidedly tear-filled and shoulders still quivering with sobs, but she gulped the last of them back with an effort and reluctantly let go her hold on him to wipe her eyes. Her voice promised to quaver abominably so she just nodded, still not moving away. It was the safest she'd felt in far too long, standing there feeling his arms around her - gods, how she'd wanted that in those terrifying moments before Ironlegs and the rest! Kendath's arms around her could have fixed the world's hurts to the exhausted Merrin at that moment. "Thank you," she murmured, still mostly into his armor.

It took force of will to not burrow against him again even now that tears didn't threaten every moment. Merrin heaved an unsteady breath. It's over. He's fine. You're fine. Her eyes filled again upon thinking of Wyvern and Merrin managed an awkward, slightly hysterical laugh even as she went to dry them. "Are - are you all right?"

The bandages around his midsection seemed to have gotten slightly wet as well. Merrin noted that they were both of them covered in dust and grime, and thought with an air of resignation what a fright she must look after so many tears. Her splinted wrist felt stiff and unwieldy but she noticed it only dimly, rather more concerned with what seemed quite an extensive wound on his part.

_________________

Garthag gazed at the fires of the battle quietly before gazing around at the prisoners and the renegades near him, all a pathetic lot with their ragged clothes and now somewhat hope filled eyes. Garthag stopped his gaze and began limbing towards two very familiar figures, the pain in his leg began to blossom as the adrenaline pounding in his head wore off. Every step was excruciatingly painful, his leg burned and ached, it felt like it was being pierced by a hundred blades all at the same time. Garthag`s face distorted in pain before he was finally able to slump into a sitting position near Merrin and Kendath. He pulled up some of his burned robes and gazed at his foot with clear disgust, the power granted to him was power, but it was lent and it couldn`t heal wounds.

Garthag cursed before turning to Kendath and Merrin.

"And so we come to a happy reunion..."

He muttered venomously with a grin on his face, more due to the pain than anything else..

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

"Jolly as ever," Kendath replied. Catching sight of her splinted wrist, he gently took her forearm and turned it over. He lacked a professional eye, but it looked well tended for. He heard Garthag say something disparaging, but he ignored the mage and continued holding Merrin's forearm, his gaze downwards, staring with an odd expression at nothing in particular.

Foxfire's impatient rumbling shook him out of it. Hastily clearing his throat, he released Merrin and stepped back to confront Subcommander Helsay. "Our thanks for your help, but we won't be returning with you," he decided, shading his eyes against the storm of dust picked up by Foxfire's wings.

He couldn't see Helsay's expression clearly from down there, but he ventured to guess it looked surprised. "Where will you go, then? You have no dragons."

Really, I had no idea. "We have... an unfinished task. Send the esteemed Commander Thorone my regards."

The sarcasm flew right over Helsay's head. He might have still been doubtful, but his anticipation to rejoin Vryngard's defense ran deeper. He saluted them as his dragon lifted into the air. Beating dragons' wings, whipping up tiny debris, whooshed over their heads. The Renegade dragons gained altitude and, carrying the liberated prisoners in their talons, banked over the foothills back the way they'd come.

The three of them - bogus dragonriders and white-robed wizard - stood alone on the bluff.

"That's it," Kendath said incisively. He began making his way east, where he knew ran the main merchant road. "We'll need horses. Then we're off to find our dooms and our friends the Shadowers. Any misgivings?"

_________________

"So many I can't count," said Merrin, intending it for a wry comment. It came out rather more soberly. She let her eyes rove once more over the city, stone mountainsides half obscured by rising smoke but no longer driving back attacking Meiltha, and started slowly down the bluff after him.

The violent surge of conflicting emotions expelled in her storm of tears left her feeling drained, almost empty of any emotion at all, and so weary Merrin was sure she could have slept anywhere right then. Questions wanted asking - why they couldn't go back to Vryngard, and what about reporting to the Council - but those too went unspoken and therefore unanswered. Really, the effort it took to put one foot in front of the other superseded all.

One question really did need asking, however. "Kendath - what of the Cloud Crystal?" Merrin ventured. "You...you don't have it...and Ironlegs said..." she trailed off uncertainly, knowing with a sick feeling in her stomach that her desperate action likely hadn't saved the artifact. Her rapier was gone, too, like as not. Somehow Merrin had trouble caring...everything seemed trivial in the confused jumble that made up her current thoughts.

_________________

Strangely enough, Kendath didn't care as much as he should have about the location of the Cloud Crystal. Vryngard's problem, not theirs. The rambling Druid could deal with it. Nonetheless the uncertainty in Merrin's voice did make him glance once over his shoulder. "Didn't the Meiltha take it when they captured you?"

They reached a steep ravine spanned by a more or less sturdy wooden bridge. On the other side was the merchant road, bordering a towering evergreen forest. Kendath motioned for Merrin and Garthag to go on and cross. He lingered behind next to the gorge, fighting an inner urge. His hand dropped to his pocket, where it fingered the cold High Meiltha ring, then moved on to his hip.

When Kendath crossed the bridge at last, only one falchion hung from his weapons belt.

The fires of Vryngard were out of sight now, save for the tell-tale columns of smoke and occassional rumble of masonry. The sun's ardent rays stretched above the tops of the quiet conifers. Despite the warmth, he felt pervaded by cold. It'd taken him this long to realize how jaded he was. When was the last time any of them had slept? And no, his short nap courtesy of Subcommander Helsay didn't count.

He drew level with Merrin. "Tired?" he asked, reluctant to stop despite his weariness.

_________________

Garthag cursed as they once more departed, his leg wouldn`t have anytime to heal and the bandages he used to cover the wounds wouldn`t stop the pain from tearing his thought apart with every step. He stayed behind the two and quietly pondered about his current situation whenever he wasn`t concentrating on trying not to curse out loud. His world was hanging in the balance, he had two untrustworthy yet manipulatable allies before him and one more powerful than him. The wench who had intruded into his mind worried him and Garthag could only guess for the worst about her identity, she was not to be trusted or relied upon.

Still now that he thought of the wench he came to think of lich and the fact that it had served the wench. What did the wench want with him then? Simply to use him to erase the lich or was there something more behind this? It was obvious that the lich was a powerful magic user and couldn`t be defeated with ease. So how powerful could one be in order to control or to have a lich serve her? A god? He hope not for the irony of the whole situation would be overwhelming.

"Tired?"

Garthag heard Kendath ask from Merrin and this made Garthag curse as his leg was surely in need of rest. Garthag cursed and soon enough to stopped to sit down with an exhausted expression on his face.

"I am not going any further without rest"

He informed and showed his leg that was bandaged, the dark burn marks showed slightly on the edge of the bandages and Garthag began readjusting them so that they wouldn`t loosen at any point.

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!