FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Well that took a while... Sorry if you were looking forward to this chapter coming out quicker; work has been a biiiiiiiitch.

Anywho, here it is! Chapter 3! Still don't know why copy/pasting it all from a word document to the site makes the indents all screwy! Oh well. Enjoy if it pleases you!

We all let out a deep sigh of relief as Miles closed the door to the kitchen behind us. My stomach was still churning and my fear of where we were and what we had to do had risen dramatically, but it wouldn't do any good to let it show now.

At least in this new room, there was light flooding in from three tall windows set high in the walls along the left hand side of the room. What it illuminated wasn't exactly what I was expecting after seeing the massacre in the kitchen however.

About twenty bedframes, each with a wooden chest sitting at the end, sat in ordered rows in the centre of the room. Of all twenty chests, two sat open, and Savrum took a moment to inspect each one only to find them empty. The shark then walked up to five of the closed chests and gave each one a light tap with his foot.

"Empty." He said, sounding disappointed. "I'd say it was the mercs, but from what those lads said back in the forest, no one that came in here ever left."

"Everything in here looks old and rotten." Jack said as he surveyed the room, spotting a door on the far side which we began moving towards. "The outside looks damn near brand new, the bodies looked relatively fresh, but everything else in here has been here for a long time."

It was true enough; the mattresses and blankets, or at least what was left of them, were rotting on the bedframes, surprisingly giving off little to no odour. Clumps of dark matter littered the ground where sections of them had fallen to pieces over however long they had been sitting there.

"It could be a side-effect." I chimed in as we reached the door, Savrum immediately starting to fiddle with the lock. "Certain magics drain the energy of their surroundings for fuel. Maybe whatever they stole the focus for is responsible?"

"It's as good a guess as any." Jack sighed as our assassin clicked open the old wooden door. The shark flinched as it swung open, earning a questioning look from Jack.

"What's wrong?" He asked.

It took a few moments for the shark to answer as he tried to see through the gloom beyond.

"Shadows playing tricks on me." Savrum said as he began moving forward.

"Really? I thought the shadows were your friends." Jack, despite looking more serious than I had ever seen him, at least seemed to be trying to keep the mood light.

"Oh ha ha ha." Savrum replied sarcastically. "Shadows are usually good, but these ones... I don't know, they _feel_different."

I hadn't realized that my companion had that kind of an ability. To be able to feel shadows? I figured it must have worked in the same way I could detect enchantments, how everything that had been altered gave off a certain vibration. But shadows were just an absence of light, how could they give off a feeling?

As we passed through the door, we found ourselves surrounded by gloom. Fortunately, it wasn't absolute darkness as light was pouring out from around the corner at the far end of the hall we now stood in. It wasn't flickering, and it wasn't torchlight, so I could only assume that it was likely another window around the bend. A few flashes of lightning seemed to confirm my assumption.

"Odd." Savrum said as we hugged the wall to our right, creeping slowly down the hallway. "That wall to our left; there should be an entrance there."

"To the outside?" Jack asked.

"Yeah." The shark confirmed. "We came in through the servant's entrance, which was just around the corner from the southern gate. That's the southern wall."

I couldn't help but feel a shiver of apprehension at the thought of false entrances and exits; the thought just made me extra paranoid about the threat of getting jumped on from behind or falling through a trap door.

I was too busy worrying about booby-traps that I walked straight into the shield strapped to Jack's back. The wolf turned as I held onto my nose, his expression one of annoyance.

I blushed as I stood there, the overwhelming sense of shame and embarrassment I felt taking a back seat once I realized that Savrum had disappeared. I was far too embarrassed to ask where the shark had gone, but thankfully it only took a few minutes of silent and, for me at least, awkward, waiting before he popped back from around the corner.

"Alright, there's a lot of debris blocking a hallway to the right," He had evidently scouted ahead. I shuddered at the thought of going off anywhere in this place on my own.

"There's a door on the left wall down at the end of this hallway, about fifty yards."

Jack simply nodded and motioned for us to start moving again. As we rounded the corner, I took notice of something strange.

At the end of the hall, there was another large window, giving us a good view of the trees outside thrashing around in the storm. It gave enough illumination that I didn't have to strain my eyes to see that the end of the hall was far beyond fifty yards away.

"Fifty yards?" Jack asked quietly, making me shamefully glad that I wasn't the only one noticing the distance. "Looks more like a hundred and fifty."

"I-It wasn't that long..." Savrum stuttered; the first time I had ever seen him anything but absolutely confident. "It only took me a few seconds to get to the end and back..."

None of us really knew what to say, but Miles at least put a comforting hand on Savrum's shoulder, and it seemed to do him a world of good. I trusted the shark implicitly, and I could only assume that after working together for so long, Jack and Miles felt the same way. We knew that he was telling the truth.

Knowing that, however, made us that much more uneasy. The manor seemed to be playing with our perceptions, and not in any natural way considering everyone's experience.

Savrum shook his head and started leading us down the long hallway. At one point it branched off to the right, but that path was blocked by a massive heap of collapsed stone and rotten wood.

"They weren't exactly big on decoration." I whispered to Miles, who only nodded in agreement as we passed by the blocked hallway.

Even in an old manor I would have expected murals or faded paintings hanging on the walls above couches and desks or pottery sitting on tables, but this place had nothing but a few torch sconces set into the stonework.

Granted, there were at least a few faded sections of stone that hinted at possible coverings, but with how faint they were, I figured they must have been bare for quite some time.

As we approached the door Savrum had found, we were halted in our tracks by another scream, this one noticeably closer than the last. The shark had his daggers drawn, Miles had knocked an arrow, and Jack unslung his shield and slid it onto his left arm.

While the chilling sound echoed down the dark hall into nothingness, Jack gave me a nudge. With his right hand, he reached to the back of his belt and pulled out a dagger, flipping it around so the handle pointed at me.

"Something is better than nothing." He said as I gingerly took the blade from him.

Because of my skills, combat had never been high on my training list, so while I was mediocre at best with a mace, this dagger, which to me was more like a short sword in size, was totally alien. Jack's words rang true however; as I weighed the blade in my hands, I felt myself relax. Relax might have been too strong of a word though...

That brief respite soon faded as Jack pulled his much larger sword free from its sheath and Savrum opened the door. Miles stood against the wall opposite the opening, his bow aimed and ready to fire at anything that moved. We all tensed, but nothing happened.

It was pitch black beyond the doorway, but the light from the window above us illuminated a few feet of stone steps leading down.

"These places always have underground sections." Savrum muttered as he took the first brave step forwards.

"Do you want some light?" I asked quietly, unsure if the group would appreciate the use of light considering how quiet we were trying to keep.

"It would be better than going in blind." Jack said as he followed Savrum. "If anyone's down there, they'll hear us scrabbling along trying to find our way anyways."

I reached into my back pouch and pulled out a small piece of wood about a foot in length. It fit snugly into my free hand as I whispered a word of power to it, and in an instant, the end sparked to life with white fire. It gave off no heat, but it illuminated the stairwell perfectly, revealing to us a curve to the stairs as it wound down to the left.

With Miles right behind me, I took a few hesitant steps forward, following Jack and Savrum as they continued down the winding stairs. I silently muttered to my torch to get it dim enough that I wouldn't be blinding everyone else.

We walked for a good twenty minutes. At least, to me it seemed like twenty minutes; it could have been five for all I knew. The stairs got gradually more and more cracked and broken until we reached the bottom, which I noticed was simply solid stone.

We seemed to have entered a natural cave in the rock beneath the manor, but there were signs that modifications had been made to it. Sections of the wall had clearly been cut away to allow for more room, room which allowed Savrum and Jack to walk side-by-side while myself and Miles followed closely behind them.

Even I could notice chisel and pickaxe marks, not to mention...

"Guys." I stopped in my tracks, and because I was holding the torch, everyone else followed suit.

"What is it?" Jack asked, still sounding rather annoyed. I would have felt shamed and embarrassed again, but as everyone gathered around me, they understood why I was holding them up.

Four long gashes travelled along the lower part of the wall, easily missed by Jack and Savrum as they were focusing on what could be directly in front of them.

"Those don't look like tool marks." I said quietly, just in time for another scream to echo down the dark passage we stood in.

Everyone turned to face the direction the scream had come from, Savrum crouched low while Miles drew his bow behind him, and Jack held his shield before him with his grip on his sword tight enough that his finger joints popped.

The seconds dragged by. Or was it minutes? I was standing so still in petrified fear that I didn't even notice Miles had put his hand on my back to give me a gentle nudge.

When I didn't respond, he nuzzled against my shoulder, which snapped me out of my stupor. I chuckled weakly, trying to get rid of the worried look he was giving me. Worry wasn't an emotion that looked good on him; I couldn't wait to leave this place so he could smile again.

"Come on." Jack whispered before we began walking forward once more.

My heart was hammering in my chest as we continued on for another few minutes, the tunnel gradually becoming wider and wider until we came to a large cavern. It was so large the light from my torch couldn't illuminate any walls or even a ceiling.

Beneath the goosebumps and raised fur on the back of my neck, I felt a tingling sensation in my fingers; a sure sign that a powerful magic item was close.

"The focus must be nearby." I said with relief, knowing that once we had it we could leave this place. "I can feel powerful magic."

"Which direction?" Savrum asked, keeping his eyes peeled at the darkness surrounding our comparatively small bubble of light.

"It's hard to say..." I tried to focus as best I could, but there was something interfering, like a heavy blanket covering everything. A mage likely could have pinned down a direction with no problem, but all I had was the feeling in my fingers.

I took a few experimental steps forward, reaching an arm out before me as I tried to feel my way in the right direction. The tingling did get more pronounced, and it seemed to be coming from the center of the cavern we stood in, but how close or how far that was eluded me.

With the prospect of leaving this place to fuel me, I became a bit bolder with my steps, picking up speed as I followed my senses. I had to watch my step as I led the others further into the cavern, my torch unable to illuminate the tunnel we had come from any longer due to the distance we were putting between us.

I was feeling confident. My torch had just barely begun to illuminate some contraption a dozen paces ahead of us, and I thought we had our focus, but Savrum's hand closed around my shoulder and halted me in my tracks.

I at least had the decency to keep myself from screaming at the sudden contact.

"Watch your step." The shark said, pointing down to where my foot was just about to land.

There was a circular stone set into the ground, about a meter and a half in diameter, with a dozen holes drilled into its surface. It didn't take me long to realize that those holes could very well conceal deadly spears, or perhaps poisoned darts. All it would have taken was the weight of my foot to set it off...

"I don't suppose you can make anything of these little sigils carved around the edge?" Savrum asked as he knelt down to inspect the trap. There were several others that I could see within our circle of light, and probably far more beyond that we couldn't see.

My eyes moved to where he pointed, and sure enough, there was a line of inch-long symbols running around the entire outer edge of the stone circle.

"I've got no idea." I admitted with a blush. "Something like this is really more the specialty of mages."

Our attention was drawn to one of the other stone circles nearby, one that was sitting askew in its cradle, as if the job of setting it in place was abandoned halfway through.

We stepped over to the incomplete trap, noticing that the stone was partially covering a hole; a fairly deep hole at that considering the light from my torch couldn't illuminate the bottom.

"Look around the sides." Savrum said quietly, not sounding terribly thrilled at what he was seeing. I pulled my eyes from the absolute blackness that part of my mind was screaming at me to get away from and gazed at the sides of the hole.

Large gashes and claw marks decorated the walls of the pit, which only made that screaming voice in my head get louder.

"They... They were keeping something in here?" The thought of this dark pit as a dungeon made me wish our original theory of the stone circles being traps was the case instead. From where we were, I could see half a dozen of these covers...

What made those screams? Why couldn't we hear more of them? Why-

"Why is this one open..." Savrum asked. I like to think I wasn't the only one that wasn't exactly looking forward to getting an answer.

"Doesn't matter." Jack's voice carried over to us easily. The black wolf stood with Miles a few feet away, evidently having gone ahead and inspected the contraption my light had revealed. He was holding a large crystal focus. "It was hooked into some kind of machine with cables running into the ground. I don't know how much power it's got, but at least we can leave now."

We found it. We found the focus!

I could barely contain my excitement at the prospect of leaving, and from the looks of relief on everyone's faces, I could tell they felt the same.

That was when our question of why one pit sat open was rudely answered.

A loud, wet thump echoed in the cavern, followed immediately by rapid, heavy breathing. It sounded as though something big was sucking in air through clenched teeth, almost as if it was in pain.

My mind put two-and-two together; the open pit covered in deep gashes made by claws, the screams... Whatever had been contained was now loose. Whatever was loose, was now watching us...

"Kris." Jack's surprisingly calm voice cut through my paralyzing fear like a hot knife through butter. "Does that light get any brighter?"

I turned to face him and brought my torch-wielding arm up, shaking so much I thought my teeth would vibrate out of my muzzle, and spoke a few quiet, panicked words to the device.

The light it gave off intensified as much as it could, illuminating another dozen feet of the cavern around us.

Now I could see the contraption that was holding the focus; it was some form of altar. It obviously wasn't made of stone as its sharp edges and flat faces shone brightly in the light. Perhaps marble? Maybe even metal?

It looked to be about seven feet long, with raised corners that curved upwards and met above its center just a few feet above the ground where the focus had been sitting. Even the dark stains that adorned nearly every face of the grey altar shone brilliantly in the light, which only served to unnerve me even more.

I thanked my mind for giving me something else to focus on, even if the object it took an interest in was so unsettling to look at, because if I had truly been paying attention to the looks my friends were giving me, I likely would have blacked out.

"Kris." There was Jack's calm, commanding voice again. "Kris, I need you to walk towards me very slowly."

My brain sent a signal to my legs to get them moving, but the message was jumbled as my body froze. Savrum, Miles, and Jack weren't looking at me; they were looking_behind_ me.

"Kris." Jack's voice felt like someone had smacked me upside the head for not paying attention in class. "Look at me."

My grey eyes met his deep brown, and the fear subsided enough for me to take one trembling half-step towards the others.

"That's it Kris." The wolf tried his best to comfort me, but through my peripherals, I could see Miles had his bow aimed at something. "Keep moving."

There was only about ten feet between myself and the others, but as I took several more steps, I realized just how far ten feet actually was; especially when I heard the wet thump of whatever it was behind me taking a step of its own.

I noticed Mile tense as dark cloud formed around the point of the arrow he was currently pointing at whatever was behind me. I couldn't see Savrum anymore, which, in addition to the fact that I had a marksman covering me, only melted my frozen joints more.

I began stepping a little faster, feeling more sure of myself while I kept direct eye contact with Jack. The wolf kept throwing glances behind me, but I wasn't about to let that stop me, despite the chills that continued to run down my spine at the sound of the heavy pained breathing behind me.

Another wet thump.

I was five feet from Jack now, which apparently was far enough for the others to make their move.

The sound of metal digging into flesh was the first thing I heard, followed immediately after by the same agonized scream we had heard before, only amplified by our proximity to its origin point. Jack stepped forward and grabbed my wrist, pulling me quickly towards him just as Miles released his arrow.

I was able to turn just before Jack could wrap his arm around my body, and what I saw I could barely think of words to describe.

The creature was completely furless and covered instead with glistening, wet skin that hung too loosely from its bones. It was presently hunched over, its fat hands trying to bat away a black cloud that lingered around the arrow that was sticking out from one of its eyes, but I could guess that it was at least ten feet tall if it stood straight.

Its legs seemed to be in proper proportion to its height, but its arms were at least three meters long, and were jointed twice instead of once.

Jack set me to the side and picked up his greatsword, hefting it with an ease that spoke to his years of experience wielding it, and charged at the monster.

Its mouth was agape, revealing rows of wide, blunt teeth as it let out another furious roar. Rather than try to clear away the blinding cloud, the creature simply began flailing its arms around it, forcing Savrum to backflip out of harm's way.

Jack, however, only picked up speed. As one of the monster's long arms swept down at him, he swung his sword upwards, driving the blade halfway through its arm before his forward momentum wrenched it free. A wet spray of black liquid splattered over the ground as the monster wailed once more, stumbling backwards as the end of its right arm hung limp and useless.

The wolf slammed shield-first into the already reeling monster, sending it crashing to the ground several feet away while he skidded to a stop.

All fear had suddenly left me, replaced by a burning desire to show the group that I wasn't completely useless in a fight. I charged forward a dozen paces, fumbling around in my back pouch for an item I never thought I'd have the chance to use.

I reached Jack's side, dropped the sword and torch, and pulled out a small role of paper.

"What the hell are you doing? Get back!" Even Jack's harsh tone couldn't slow me down as I unraveled the paper and faced it towards the slowly recovering abomination before us.

A single word of power was enough to make a blazing ball of fire erupt from the paper and fly straight into the face of the monster just as it righted itself.

The flesh began melting from its face as it let out another piercing shriek, and in some macabre way, I felt satisfied and proud. Enchanting may have gotten me used to a more sedate lifestyle, but it also meant I got to learn from master enchanters, even master mages.

To actually have proof that my extra studies were worth-while burning away before me... I couldn't help but smile.

The creature stumbled away from us, still blindly swinging its good arm in an attempt to find us, but its movements were quickly becoming more and more sluggish until it finally fell to its knees and expired.

"Not bad." Jack said after a few moments of silence as he hooked his sword onto his back once more.

I dropped the smoking paper and retrieved my torch and sword, and in spite of everything, I was beaming with pride at the compliment. Sure I felt a little sick from using more magic than I was used to in order to activate the scroll, but I just finished off a monster!

My elated mood was suddenly shaken from me as the sound of stone grinding against stone filled the chamber we were in. I couldn't tell which direction the noise was coming from, but it didn't sound good either way. Jack evidently agreed as he grabbed onto my arm and pulled me back to the others.

"Uh, lads..." Savrum said. The shark was pointing off to our left, at the very edge of my torch's light. Another stone circle was rising out of its cradle, and the more it rose, the easier it was to hear heavy breathing, growling, and screaming.

Several other circles had begun to rise that we could see, but there could have been dozens of others, maybe even hundreds of holding pens occupying the vast cavern we stood in. From the sounds of it, they were all starting to open...

"Start running." Jack commanded as we began backing up towards the tunnel we had entered from. "Start running and don't stop until we get up those stairs."

I turned in time to see Savrum take off like an arrow towards the exit. The shark paused by the entrance of the tunnel, and as soon as we passed by him and into the tunnel, he dropped two fist-sized orbs onto the ground, and before I knew it, he was running alongside me.

"W-what did you drop?" I couldn't help myself; my curiosity was the only thing that distracted my mind from the noises of so many pens opening in the cavern behind us.

"Oh you know," The shark started with a smile as we reached the base of the stairs. "They're like doorbells. Only they sound nicer and explode when something gets too close."

"How is that anything like a doorbell?!" I asked incredulously.

"Don't ask! Just run!" Jack yelled back at us.

We jumped the stairs two or three at a time, constantly followed by the sounds of roars and screams from below. It wasn't long before a dull boom echoed up from the depths, drowning out all other noise for a few brief moments.

It was comforting to know that the explosives Savrum dropped had worked, but it was also terrifying in equal measure; if the explosives were set off by proximity, it only meant that dozens of those abominations were chasing us. That little realization gave me an extra surge of adrenaline, and despite the burning pain of exertion in my legs, I gradually pulled ahead of Savrum despite his longer legs.

"Go ahead." The shark shouted from behind me with a laugh. "Get in front of me. I love the view!"

He was joking?!

We were getting chased by gods-knew how many spawns of hell, and he was wasting his breath joking!

I didn't have much time to dwell on it as I saw the blessed light filtering into the staircase through the open doorway. Jack and Miles were the first through; the wolf immediately turning to close the door while the coyote turned and nocked another arrow.

I dove forward through the opening, rolling along the ground to land at the hunters' feet, followed immediately by Savrum, who rolled right into me.

"Hello beautiful." He grinned down at me before standing and offering his hand to help me up. I took it gratefully just as Jack slammed the old wooden door shut, and without missing a beat, he started jogging down the hallway we had originally come from.

"That door won't hold those things for long once they make it up here." The wolf said as we followed him. I was panting fairly hard, but thankfully the adrenaline was keeping me going, and my curiosity was enough to distract my mind from the burning in my legs.

"What the hells were those things?" I asked breathlessly. "I've never heard of anything like them back home!"

"First time we've seen them too." Savrum answered as we rounded the corner and approached the servant's quarters. "Come to think of it, I don't think I've heard of anyone encountering something like this before."

"It's still a new, largely unexplored land." Jack said before we passed through the open door and into the brightly lit servants room. I was glad to see that the storm outside seemed to have abated as I doused my torch and returned it to my belt. "There are bound to be creatures we still haven't discovered."

"But it's been two-hundred years since the first settlers." Savrum said as he closed the door behind us. I helped Miles and Jack shift a number of chests in front of the door to help brace it against any of our pursuers. "And we're only three days from Janesport. We're well away from the Frontier."

Jack didn't seem to have anything to say to that, so I held my tongue. If these three didn't know what those creatures were, I certainly wasn't in a position to offer a suggestion. I had only been in this province for a week after all.

"We're done here either way." Jack said after we placed the last chest in front of the door. It would have taken a battering ram to gain entry to this room now. "Let's get out of this damn deathtrap."

We moved back to the kitchen, no longer worried about what lay beyond the door to that room considering the harrowing experience we had just gone through, but when Miles opened the door, there was nothing.

No bodies hanging from meat hooks, no organs lying in pots or limbs sitting on chopping blocks. There didn't even seem to be a speck of blood anywhere on the tables or floor.

I can't say that I was sorry to not have such a gruesome scene greet us, but the fact that there was no sign that what we had seen before was real was incredibly unsettling. We slowly moved into the room, keeping our weapons drawn just in case it was some kind of trap.

"I wasn't the only one that saw..." Savrum began. His voice betrayed just how confused he felt at the situation.

"No." Jack answered, sounding more annoyed than anything.

"So there was definitely..." The shark continued as we got closer to the servants entrance we had used to gain entry.

"Yes." The wolf led us over to our exit. Miles covered us as Savrum opened the door, allowing a strong gust of warm, damp air to wash over us.

I still felt terrified; we had made it out of the underground cavern full of,whatever those things were, and now we were about to start our journey home... My mind was still expecting something terrible to happen though.

We stepped outside onto the wet grass, the sunlight beaming down from the mostly clear evening sky causing the moisture to evaporate into thin wisps of mist that blew about in the warm breeze. Our steps were cautious in spite of the peaceful scene around us; evidently I wasn't the only one that expected one last surprise.

Our cautious walk from the manor to the perimeter wall went uninterrupted however, which began to make my mind relax. Unfortunately it also meant my body was beginning to catch up with its earlier over-exertion.

Savrum vaulted himself up onto the broken section of wall we had first scaled without effort and reached a hand down to help me follow him up once he noticed me struggling to climb past the halfway point.

Once I climbed halfway down the other side, I simply let myself drop to the forest floor below, not stumbling quite as much as I thought I would. I was followed quickly after by Miles, who immediately wrapped an arm around my waist to stand me up straight.

"I haven't exactly been through so much exercise before." I chuckled weakly as Jack and Savrum jumped down behind us. They retrieved all of our packs from their hiding places while Miles took it upon himself to pick me up into his arms.

"I can walk!" I yelped at the sudden movement, my head spinning with the sudden switch from vertical to horizontal.

"Don't bother trying to stop him." Savrum chuckled as he adjusted his backpack before tossing mine onto his shoulder. "He's stubborn as hell on a good day."

"You did good back there, Kris." Jack's compliment made me blush furiously. "You got any more of those scrolls?"

"Only the one." I said as we started walking to our previous campsite the night before. Even I could notice a slight slur to my words as I came down from my adrenaline high. "Enchanters get taught by clerics and mages. I came in at the top of my class, so my teacher gave that to me."

"Am I the only one that's worried about that horde of... things?" Savrum piped up, constantly looking over his shoulder as we began our hike up the hill to our campsite. "I'm all for getting the hells out of here, but what are we going to do about them?"

"Once we get back to Janesport we'll tell the authorities." Jack said simply. I couldn't help but find myself agreeing with Savrum, though.

"But by then they could have gotten out." I pointed out. I felt well enough to walk on my own, and with a bit of goading, I was able to get Miles to let me walk beside him. "How many do you think there were? Dozens? Hundreds? What are the odds that stairwell door could hold them back?"

Jack let out a disgruntled sigh as we reached the top of the steep hill. I immediately spotted the rock we slept behind the night before, and in spite of our current situation, I felt relaxed knowing that we were out of harm's way.

For now at least.

"If there were dozens or even hundreds of them, what could the four of us do?" The wolf asked as he began setting up our tent. "One of them stood up to Sav's blades in its back and an arrow through the head. I'm confident we could take out two or three at once, but any more than that and we'd get overwhelmed in no time."

"Lads, I don't think that'll be a problem." Savrum's voice caught our attention from the edge of the hill overlooking the valley. He was gazing down towards the manor with a puzzled look on his face.

We all stepped over to him, wondering what could have been going on.

Amidst the lush glistening greens of the forest below us stood the two large chimneys of the manor, but rather than their original smooth stonework, their colours had darkened while large chunks of stone began breaking away and falling to the ground below.

We watched in silence as the towers crumbled away, followed quickly by what little of the roof we could see. A thick column of dust rose from where the manor once stood, and sharp cracks split the air as a large section of forest suddenly dropped down out of sight.

Shouts echoed up from the valley below us; shouts I assumed belonged to what remained of the mercenaries camped just outside of the manor's walls. At least now they had a good reason to leave, as if their missing comrades wasn't distressing enough for it to have happened sooner.

"Well..." Savrum said casually. "That takes care of that problem I think?"

"So the entire place just collapsed on itself?" Jack asked, truly confused at what had just happened.

"It might have had something to do with us removing the focus." I chimed in as we watched the column of smoke and dust rise ever higher. "It was probably the only thing holding that place together."

"We'll tell the authorities about this too." With a huff, Jack turned back to set up our tent. "Sav, Miles, give the place a quick once-over tomorrow morning. If you see any more of those things, come back and get us. Provided there aren't too many survivors, we can at least mop them up for anyone that comes in after us."

"Sounds good to me." Savrum turned away from the valley below to drop our bags next to the tent, while Miles simply gave a nod of his head.

I stood there watching the column of dust for a little while longer. The setting sun coloured it in rather brilliant shades of orange and red, making it look more like a massive tower of flame. I found it quite beautiful, but a shiver travelled up my spine when I thought of what was contained inside the manor.

It played with our perceptions, it held the illusion of a massacre in the kitchen that disappeared when we left, and those monsters...

The strong comforting arm of Miles wrapped around my waist, pulling me against his side just before I felt his tongue dart over one of my short ears. Despite everything, I found myself smiling; the coyote had an innate ability to calm me, and that alone made me incredibly thankful I was where I was.

Though, I could have done without the monsters...

----And now that I'm typing down here, I can't use both Italics and Bold... God I hate technology...

Anyways! Hope you enjoyed all of that! I'm paranoid about my pacing skills, or lack thereof, so any questions, comments, criticisms, (Constructive ones. Being a dick will earn you a baseball bat to the kneecaps), are all welcome!