Melody of Mana

On the outer edges of Westwood territory

The camp sat upon the edge of an open field, standard protocol. Circled around a cooking fire with a few guards spread out watching the various approaches. It had been easy to follow them here, they'd not even tried to hide the marks of their passage along the road, or towards this little offshoot.

I whistled, one of several calls standard to birds in this area, birds who only sang in the morning. Men returned the call, something only locals would realize was out of place. While I might be a soldier sworn to a noble family, operations like this weren't too out of place, the only thing we really had to worry about was the priest, and we'd be in and out quick, too quick for him to do much more than kill a few soldiers. That was fine, everyone here was disposable, and they all knew it, but were well enough paid for the risk.

My orders were clear, handed down from my captain, and on to him from another, it didn't matter who or why. All I needed to do was wait and act when the time was right. Get in, kill as many as possible, and grab the noble girl, those were our orders. Not sure who wanted her, but they'd put in that they wanted her unabused, lucky for her, not so much for any other women the men might grab in our little raid.

Looking up at the sky I saw the clouds, even they were perfect. By my guess we were in for rain, which would handily cover our tracks. Everything was easy, so very easy, like the world itself was egging us on towards our victory.

The commander, far from my position let out a battle-cry and we were off. I plunged through the bushes surrounding their little camp with a smile on my face and the promise of good pay at my back. The guards were slow, so very slow to respond, one looking up and pulling the little bow he had by his side.

As the arrow loosed something felt wrong, off, but I couldn't place it. Was it the way the arrow flew? Perhaps he was using some item to change something... the sound? Why had the bow not twanged? Why couldn't I hear much more than the mutter of voices, there should be the crackling of the fire too, but why?

As my blade reached him it slid into the guard like he wasn't even there. Literally like he wasn't there, nothing but air met the steel and the thrust, so true threw my balance right off. I could tell from the surprised sounds that I wasn't the only one thrown off either.

"Trap!" The commander screamed, a second too late.

A painful spear of white fell from above, missing me by feet. As I turned my eyes bulged, the men who'd not been so lucky were falling, smoking ruins where their skin should be.

Run, I had to run, escape from this oncoming death. My breath, so easy a few short moments ago now came in ragged, panicked gasps as I turned to bolt for the tree line. Before I could reach it though there was a glow, I dodged, only to see a wall of fire cutting off my route to freedom.

Alana

I didn't enjoy killing. Something about the way people screamed when they died, or realized that they were going to, cut deep into my heart. This world was hard though, and those men wouldn't have hesitated to pillage, kill, or any other horrible thing to anyone they could have gotten away with it on.

Selene on the other hand had a look of hatred on her face as she cast spell after spell. The walls of flame to keep them in had been inspired, and looked more like Dras' handiwork.

"Been practicing fire?" I asked, my part in the battle complete.

"Yeah, got some time recently and some good pointers. Seemed like a good time to loose it on some deserving bastards." She smiled, looking sinister as the orange light played over her soft features and messy hair.

"No mercy huh?"

"Think they'd have shown us any had they won?" She replied as she looked up. One of the men had leapt through her wall of fire and with a casual flick of her wrist she sent a spear forwards to immolate him.

I snorted, "You remind me of a priestess I used to know."

Before long the sergeant joined us from out vantage point nearby. He was wiping the blood from his sword like it was nothing but a small stain. While before he'd been pushing down on his power I could see at least some of it now. A bright streak floating in the air behind him like liquid flowing over stone.

"That was embarrassing," he said as he approached us.

"Um?" I had no context for it.

"Their skill, their operation. Heck, their signals were so obvious it was painful. I don't know how the old Ermathi bastards didn't take these fools, but if and when it comes to blows our men will crush them." We all knew that it was only a when, not an if, but for the priest's sake he acted as if there was a possibility of peace.

"I don't suppose you captured any?" I asked, our priest friend would surely be interested in talking to any captives.

"No, might have, but after you ladies cooked several of them the rest were too afraid to surrender. They knew their fate even if they did, and men like that don't give up."

"Shame," Selene said, though her cold tone betrayed her.

"Think we'll have these problems in every city?" I asked.

"Well, we've got ten more city-states between here and Linden, suppose we'll find out."

Lode's Point

I nodded to my partner. It'd been a long night and we couldn't get to the main target, but this one would have to do, she was not the diplomat, but some kind of assistant or something, and surely worth taking.

What was she doing down in the slums though? Was this some move by their empire against the city? Our walls, and the sheer mountain slopes had always served us well, but if they had some plan we needed to know."

As we, and our counterparts on the other side pulled into the alley though the girl was gone. Just gone, how? It all started mattering a lot less as something slammed through my back and out my chest.

Spatha

Men rushed in from all sides into the stable. The city guard were out in force against these outsiders, and we'd be taking them in. The little pouch of contraband rolling around my pouch would see to that.

"Alright, where did they go?" Asked the guard captain moments later.

"Sir, how did they go? We've been watching this place all night, nobody's come in or out." Was my only response.

I spent the next several days trying to find a trace of the caravan, or how they'd slipped from the building and out the gates without anyone seeing. Heads would roll when the traitors who'd aided them were found.

Polipol

Tonight was simple enough, get in, grab the girls, and get out. The extra guards they'd hired to watch their door were just foolish. As if they thought we couldn't put a few mercenaries in our own city on our payroll.

As my men and I crashed through their room door we found no girls, rather several armored, and highly angry looking men with swords. Poor Peter swung down from the roof, right through the window and into the waiting arms of one of their brutes.

Alana in Logista

I stared down from an unassuming room as the would be assailant slammed his weapon into our man.

"Hey, look at that, those are those sedative sticks the capture units back home use," I mused to Selene from her spot on the tiles beside me.

The man panicked as the girl he thought he was after turned into an irate soldier.

"I can't believe you told him he had to wear that over his armor for the illusion to take," she responded, looking at the poor man.

"I can't believe we found a dress that big and that frilly," I replied.

"Someone's grandmother is surely missing it." We both winced as the pink abomination over his armor was torn asunder in the violence the followed.

I, not for the first time, regretted that there were no cameras to catch certain moments.

Alana, just outside Linden

Rost looked at me with tired eyes. The horses were showing it too, a few had even been quietly traded out after getting too worn during this trip.

"Nobody who gets near us is going to be fooled by that, you know this right?" He looked me over once again.

I brushed off my clothes again. I was currently dressed as a peasant farmer, and a man, one of several guises I'd taken up on this overlong trip. Once I could pass as a boy easily enough, but nowadays my body was far too distinctly feminine, and without a lot of artifice there was only so much I could do.

"It only has to work from a distance, and I can toss up illusions to make it work better anyway, like with the carts," I mused while chewing on a piece of grass.

The caravan had gone through a number of changes. Sometimes we avoided all others, sometimes we went forth in all our full regalia. I'd even been working on hiding us to an extent, but with the size and movement illusions were quite difficult to keep up for any amount of time and wouldn't hold up to real scrutiny, particularly in the light of day.

"I'm glad this is nearly over." He said for what had to be the twentieth time.

"Me too. Don't think I've ever been this popular before," I agreed.

"Someone is clearly after us Alana, you in particular. I can't even say that they'll give up after you're done with your work in the city, and I won't be with you on the way home should anything go wrong."

"Noted, but don't worry." Our gate, and my way home, wouldn't be in the walls, but it would be near enough to the city that there should be no problems when it came time to leave. I just needed to make it through all the actual talks.