3. Goodnight, little bird.

Goodnight, little bird.


  • _The drip, drip, drip of cave sweat accompanied the shambling figure over the dank woodrot; a sour rug of compost, putrid mud and millipedes proved as fitting a carpet to the comparably grotesque man.

    And was he a man? Now, or ever? When could he have last passed for any semblance of humanity? A slip, a trip, and the infestation of earth came to meet his face with a sickening schlock, a sound of a wet bar rag being tossed over careless shoulder. No. One glance at his outstretched fingers, poised and crooked to grasp and drag and claw a slow river through the semi-solid waste was enough; he'd no more pass for a man than a gargoyle might for an angel.

    The dung beetle lighting upon the rim of his mouth was enough to set his empty stomach off; he hadn't the strength to swat the bug, but he found the strength to wretch and heave. And heave. And dry heave. Every foot he'd ran and then walked and then crept and now crawled had been worse than the one before it; these next two would be worse by a far more literal degree. Through the trail of his own sick he squirmed, shimmied, sputtered and slid.

    This was a living nightmare. A tortured mind can concoct scenes of filth and horror to a degree that most won't and can't dare to fathom. His had been broken enough, prior to this recent and escalated chapter of destitution…. so what manner of sins and phantoms would plague his sleep, now? Do they have a classification for the things that would dance behind his eyes, supping on his rest and dining at his sanity? The furtive thought came and went with enough amusement to twitch his mouth; not enough to warrant a smile. He hadn't smiled in... years?

    A few feet further, and then a few feet further, and then a few feet further and yet a few more further brought a shaft of filtered sunlight to his face, matted over with hair and grime. The tunnel had broken; some mossy wood lie splayed out before him. A labored breath left his lungs, leaving him panting in shock for several moments before regaining composure enough to move. The pain in his eyes nearly blinded him, yet the pain in his mind forced him to stare.

    Compared to the gaping maw behind him, the swampy esophagus that'd been his life for however many tens-of-thousands of feet, this humble grove was a vast symphony of unparalleled light and sound. Concepts of "pink" and "green" and "blue" and "red" and nearly any other color than "black" came flooding from his recollection, adding to the wonderment, to the accelerated beating of his previously puttering heart. Birds chirping... He had heard birds chirping from through the bars of a cell... sometime ago...

    The dim fog of his battered recollection shifted and settled o'er him, ushering in a slow and steady darkness. His hand went ahead, grasping as it had been. More as a gesture to keep and hold the scene before him, rather than to progress any further, yet the sudden shock of the dazzling scene proved too much for the weary psyche. His outstretched hand went limp there at the edge of the cave, ridden and black with mud, blood, and strands of his own hair.

    The image that his eyes finally closed upon was that of the tiny wren that had perched upon his lifeless finger, a curious, cocked head with the friendliest little face that he could ever recall seeing...

    Black._


  • _What was once the den brother Vash't is now a smear of a man, lean as wood and not nearly so sturdy. As the gallons of fresh, summoned water run the caked filth from his features and his wounds are rightly tended, something is immediately evident; he's been damaged, and badly, but not left to his own recovery. Deep scars cover his chest and arms, but there is something conscious about the cleanliness of the carnage; each groove and gash once taken of his flesh was undoubtedly cured, and within days of the each individual attack. Whoever carried out this sadistic endeavor did so over the course of time; some of these would-be-wounds, healed though they may be, are older than others by seasons. Jerrick would recognize the difference between the year-old scars and those born maybe a month past, still pink and tightly knotted.

    As for his current condition, there are scores of small lacerations covering his back, and yet nothing threatens his wellbeing (unwell, as is the case) so much as the evident exposure and dehydration. He was never a beefy man, but the striations covering his wirey frame seem indicative of savage hunger and thirst. Damn the signs and sigils of potential torture; the man needs water, and a home.

    Luckily, thanks to some quick thinking, some bold acting, the luck of a tiny bird and the unerring instincts of an old, dear, dear friend… that home has been restored to him._


  • _The peculiar little wren, oddly enough is being followed. That in itself isn't that odd, as Wren is crunchy and good with various sauces… however it is odd nonetheless because it is being followed by a giant grey creature with a flash of red on it's muzzle and breast. Not blood red, but coppery red. Odd for a dire-wolf, really.

    The wren was really only needed to get a general bearing at one point... because past that, the scent of man unwashed assaulted the sensitive nose of the large creature. No, it was more than that. Man unwashed yes, but also man injured, man sick, man broken?

    The thought of that alone spurred the creature swiftly, until an underlying nuance of the scent slammed home in his memory like the swift crack of his mentor's staff across his muzzle when he misbehaved. Ah Fadia, lessons learned, lessons learned. The scent... was familiar. Man known. Man WELL known... hells, that was a man last seen when the Goddess herself arrived, and tasked them all to return that place to being full of life and laughter.

    The fur flies, the feet are fleet, and the wolf is almost directly under the wren. The old saying "as the bird flies" takes on a synonymous chord with "as the wolf crashes through anything in his way" suddenly, until with a wicked CRUNCH a man is kneeling next to vash and hurriedly checking his vitals with a surprising amount of care and skill.

    He uses "Create water" and some clean bandages to clean him up to be able to see the hurts, then bandages what he can. he knows magical healing would be a big shock, so he saves that for now except for small (light) healing spells before carrying him to the den. The only words he speaks are,

    "It's alright Vash't. It's Jerrick. You're safe now. I'm taking you home. "

    And with that, he treks carefully back to the den, his brother held carefully in his arms. He whistles quietly, and a Direwolf materializes from nearby to guard Jerrick and his delicate cargo._


  • _Left, right, up, down… the humble bird flits and jets through the mossy branches of the Rawnlinswood. No matter the cause, this noisy sister of nature is without regard of the cares of men. All she knows is new and bold; all men know is future and death.

    What she encountered there at the edge of the glade was without the concepts of revenge, safety, truth or memory. What she encountered rang of fun and truth and sky and freedom; concepts as alien to men as debt, ownership, lies and deceit might be to a bird.

    Nevertheless, a lengthy trek through the old wood would finally land her atop some hulking mangrove; the savagery of the moss and mud could confuse and perhaps reflect the ill-suited tracker, but would likely prove futile against one so aged as the wolf at hand.

    The quarry lies ahead. At the edge of a dense cavern lies the broken form of a would-be hunter. His hair is long, black and unkempt. His fingernails are caked and o'ertaken by mud and blood (his own, indicating a year's worth of struggles). The unconscious face, while placid, bares evidence of more pain and struggle and age that would ever warrant such false youth. He is young, and yet old.

    The wren, after full hour of searching and flitting, finally alights upon the outstretched fingers of a dead man. Alive in pulse, but dead in the eyes. The would-be corpse is posed in a scene reminiscent of one who might cast his last breath toward the hope of some seemly tomorrow; a thought of possible life, but likely death. And that pulse, slow and meticulous and nearly extinct, clicks and clicks ever onward with aching verisimilitude. The body must live, as the wind doth breeze, as the river must flow.

    Vash't Reinhardt has returned, and with much worse for wear. But despite his scars, which are many and disturbing, he lives. For the sake of the gods, he needs medical attention, and a million baths to wash away the stink of earth, rot, disease and bad luck._