Exodus

The woman stared at Vixen with scrutiny. 

"Hmmm, go collect monkshood, wheerot, wyrmsrune, and leech juice. Try and brew a potion from that and come back here, if you succeed not only will I teach you, but I'll give you an alchemist fire to hone and practice with. These items can be found outside of the mountain range so don't worry."

Vixen nodded and took off, she hadn't heard of any of those plants before. It was strange that she had a vague feeling about what they did. 

'It must be due to the skill I recieved,' she thought. Instincually she headed north, those plants preferred cool damp places. The mouths of caves and places that are shielded from direct sunlight will be the best place to find these plants. 

Her instincts proved true when she found a stalk of both monkshood and wrymsrune in a particularly shady area of the forest. Leech juice was easily found by still bodies of water like lakes and ponds. Wheerot would normally be the toughest thing to get because it was a parasitic weed that grew on the tops certain trees. 

The wheerot flower was beautiful but it was also big and spread out over a large area in attempts to rob the host tree of precious sunlight. 

She made sure no one was around before transforming into her swarm of hawks and scoured for the flower and a body of water. The flower was found and small lake was shortly found after taking to the skies. 

She grabbed the flower first before walking to the lake. When the wheerot flower was picked the whole weed died, subsequently saving the tree it was attached to. By the time she arrived at the lake bed it was nearly night fall. She would have to dig in the mud looking for the leeches she needed. 

She began digging, she wasn't sure how much juice she needed but ultimately decided that ten leeches should be efficient enough. Five, six; she was not having any trouble finding thr amount she needed, however, she felt like she'd have to change locations to find the other four she wanted. While she walked around the soft ground of the lake rim, her sensitive hearing picked up a peculiar noise. 

A group of men were riding on a pack of dire panthers. If dire were sedan sized wolves that weight eight hundred pounds, these cats were the size of minivans and weighed a thousand pounds. 

Their fierce gaze and razor sharp teeth glowed in the dimming light. The men riding them were uniformly dressed in all black leathers and wore face masks, not even their eyes showed. 

Six of them and one of her, but she didn't falter, she readied herself but a voice spoke out, "You're trespassing here human, be gone."

None of their mouths moved, she couldn't tell which one spoke, but she responded politely.

"I apologize I am not from these parts, I will depart the moment I can get what I came for, I only need a few more leeches."

"Did you not understand human? You are to be gone now!"

There was a silence before everything erupted at once. She dug her heel into the ground and launched herself at the nearest one to the left. Her heel connecting to the head of the first one who went spiraling off the giant panthers. The panther spun with a massive paw trying to swipe at her, but used her holy magic meteor spell to ram her shoulder into its ribs breaking them. The cat laid sideways on the ground alive, but not moving. 

Weapons could now be seen being drawn, all crude metal work. They attacked her simultaneously, it was hard for her to fend them off but not impossible. Between her enhanced physical abilities and her magic she was able to make due. 

Umbran came out to assist her as well eating one of the downed panthers, she worked hard to disarm and not kill anyone, that part of her remained uncorrupted. She was not a wonton killer, she had trespassed. 

Her sensitive hearing heard it, but with the other coordinated attacks she wasn't able to dodge. A sharp pain emanating from her ass cheek as she felt the projectile hit her skin. 

'Why always the ass?' She thought as she her eyes got heavy. Before she lost consciousness she felt herself hit the ground, unable to maintain the link himself Umbran returned to his slumber in her shadow.

"That was dangerous, she was much stronger than we expected, if there were not six of us we would have lost," one of the least injured said.

"What are you talking about? With our battle cats there were nearly twelve of us and we still almost lost Cobar." Said another. 

All these men were injured, the one from the beginning who was sucker-punched by Vixen's heel still hadnt gotten up. 

"How long will that sleeping dart keep her out for? We should seal her mana too," ask Cobar.

"I'll take care of it." The obvious leader said, and with a rock that bled like ink, began scribbling runes into her skin on her back. The others bound her like a hog on a spit roast and carried her back to their village. 

They kept the dart in but butt for a long time, the residual poison that induced sleep would continue to enter her blood stream for a while making the effects last longer. 

Serpraels, a group of people with a mystical snake bloodline who are like lamia with legs for both male and female, were a very secretive group.

Their numbers were small but had interesting techniques and a rich culture. They did not tolerate exposure and would constantly kidnap people who ventured too far into their territory. The men were used for labor and the woman were used for both child bearing and raring. 

If the woman was seen as unfit for child bearing they provided potions that would induce lactation and force them to breast feed their children. The only thing they all had in common was that once you were caught you were not allowed to leave. They protected their privacy and territory above all else.

There was a social hierarchy as well, Serprael born to other Serprael were considered pure bloods, they had strong abilities and would be lavished with gifts. Those Serprael born to humans didn't have all the same physiology as the pure bloods and thus discriminated against. 

They still had a much higher status in the society from the slaves. They still retained most of their abilities just their physiological differences, like the number of scales on their body were different. 

"Coper," one of the weaker Serpraels said, "Where do you think this onell go, rearing or breeding?"

Coper wasn't the leader who would decide the girl's fate but they all enjoyed making bets.

"This one will be particularly difficult, she's as beautiful as they come, but the children will love the size of her breasts."

Cobar joined in while laughing, "Everyone enjoys the size of her breasts." 

The rest of the group laughed merrily as Vixen dangled from a large branch carried between two panthers. She was inching ever closer to their village.