3.40 Wait Up

Bernt tasted blood in his mouth. His face burned, and something was pulling on his leg, dragging him across the ground. Rocks scraped across his back and head painfully – both had been scraped raw. He kicked weakly as he tried to blink his eyes open.

To his surprise, his captor lost his grip and stumbled forward with a curse.

It was a human – one of the guards from the cart. Before he could do anything else, though, the man shouted and came at him, planting a foot directly in Bernt’s stomach. The breath wooshed out of him and he choked for a moment, trying to draw it back in.

“Tough son of a bitch, aren’t you?” the guard spat, walking a few steps away and squatting down and out of sight for a moment. “I thought I already took care of you.” He popped back up, carrying a heavy rock. “That’s what I get for rushing. But there wasn’t time, see? One of the others would have got you first.” He planted another kick in Bernt’s stomach, who could only choke and retch in pain, too addled to do anything useful. 

What the hells was he blathering about?

This all was just too surreal. It felt like it was happening to someone else, as if he were watching from outside.

“Not on my watch!” he ranted. “No, the master’s going to make me rich. More than a man can spend on a bit of liquor! Got to be careful though. Don’t want to break your face too much, now. Don't want to lose the prize.”

He raised the rock high, poised to bring it down on Bernt’s head, or maybe his chest. He was going to kill him with a rock? This asshole, was going to kill him, a wizard and a pyromancer. With a rock. Hells, he had nearly killed him already.

No.

Bernt was too addled to cast, he could barely even think, but he knew that this wasn't how he was going to die. With a grunt of effort, he rolled to his left side, swung his right hand around and forcing power out through it with all the rage and desperation he could muster. A torrent of liquid white fire enveloped the man’s chest and neck and he reeled back, screaming and trying to slap at the flames. 

For a moment, Bernt just watched groggily. You couldn’t smother manaburn. It wouldn’t burn him from the inside, like it did mages, but it was still fire. Liquid fire that would burn forever.

He should probably put the asshole out of his misery.

Slowly, so slowly, Bernt heaved himself up into a sitting position. The guard was on the ground now, rolling back and forth. His screams were starting to sound grotesquely bubbly. Bernt managed to get his hands on the rock, but he couldn’t lift it. He was too weak.

The screams stopped.

Bernt sat back, just taking a moment to breathe. That was just as well. With a thought, he extinguished the flames, dispersing the mana that held it together back into the environment. Unsteadily, he rose to his feet, doing his best not to look at the smoking corpse.

There was no time to rest. He needed to get back to the others as quickly as possible, before the demons found him. Assuming that the others had made it. 

But it didn’t matter, he had to try – he couldn’t let himself get caught out here alone overnight. Looking around, Bernt tried to orient himself. He could see the Sunset Range across the valley from him, meaning that he was sitting on the slope north of the road. Where had the guard been dragging him? And how long had he been out?

Stumbling downhill Bernt felt his sleeves for his wand. It was gone. He didn’t even have any supplies. His bag was gone as well, probably back at the wagons. How far had he been dragged?

As it turned out, not very far. It was slow going, but barely five minutes later, Bernt stepped around a boulder to find himself back on the road. There was a body just a few steps away, sprawled across the worn stones. It was a demon of some kind, colored a deep black with wings and a long tail – not a type he’d ever seen before. To his right, the road ran relatively straight for at least a quarter of a league, and it was empty. 

He turned left.

The nearest bend wasn’t far, but it took Bernt another couple of minutes to get there. He was slowing down, but he could smell the charred wood from the burnt-out carriage. He was close, now. His head hurt terribly, and he had deep bruises on his back and neck that made it painful to move now that the adrenaline had worn off.

What he wouldn’t give for a healing potion.

The others must have passed this way after the ambush, killing the stray demon on their way. It couldn’t have been very long ago, but he wouldn’t be able to catch up to anyone in his current condition. He had to hope his bag was still there. In the worst case, he’d have to hope one of the dead bodies had an unbroken one on them – assuming the others hadn’t cleaned them out.

The sight that greeted him around the bend was even worse than he remembered. The carriage was a wreck, its metal frame warped visibly by the incredible heat of the hellfire that the strange cultist "merchant" had summoned. The bodies were similarly twisted and shrunken – not just the people, but also the two horses that had been pulling it. Bernt stepped past them, finding the spot where he’d landed after the cultist’s spell had blown him backward.

He breathed a sigh of relief at the sight that greeted him, despite the circumstances. His bag lay on the ground right where he’d fallen, the top flap thrown back and only slightly singed along the edges. He must have been shielding it with his body – Grixit had really outdone himself with that fire resistance on his robes. Could it really have worked that well? Bernt looked down at his hands. His right was completely fine, but the left was red, as if from a sunburn. He could barely feel it over all his other aches and pains. That explosion should have turned at least his unprotected hand into cinders. But... that was something to consider another day.

He picked it up the bag and checked the contents. Everything looked like it was in order. Pulling out a minor healing potion, he downed it and sighed with relief at the immediate pain relief it offered his headache.

It wouldn’t fix him up very quickly, but he’d be back to normal within a few hours so long as he didn’t strain himself too hard. He should at least give it a few minutes head start before he pushed himself, though. Heaving himself to his feet, Bernt checked the now horseless wagons for anything he might be able to use.

The others had left a lot of the supplies, which made sense considering they hadn’t taken the wagons. The tools, quite a bit of the food, a rope, and a few packs and bags that had belonged to the dead, though it was clear that someone had already rummaged through them, probably to grab any healing potions or other critical supplies. Kanan’s barrel of salt pork was still there and Bernt got excited for a moment, but it was empty. They’d taken the contents along, probably loaded on one of the horses.

Bernt checked the bags again just to be sure. Most just contained clothes and a few personal effects, but one had a hidden compartment with a few coins in it, which he pocketed. He also nabbed two extra pairs of socks, a small pot and an extra blanket, all of which went into his bag of holding. Then he crammed as much food in as he could fit – travel biscuits, dried beans, peas and a small bag of dried apples that he found underneath the biscuits.

The bag was enchanted to fit quite a bit more than it should naturally, but it wasn't that big. In the end, Bernt still had to leave most of what was left behind. But he didn’t need to store everything in his nearly weightless enchanted bag. He also grabbed a hatchet, which went into his belt, and a handful of dried parsley, which went directly into his pocket. His robes were singed in the front and had a few tears in the back. Hopefully, it would be enough for the spiritually infused garment to begin healing itself.

Lastly, Bernt checked the bodies of the dead. Emata lay next to the wagon, her sword broken beneath her. Carefully, he checked her pockets and her belt. The sheath that had held her dagger at her belt was already empty, but she had another knife tucked into one boot, which Bernt took. Tarik had a mid-grade healing potion tucked under his armor. Bernt checked the others by the wagons, but they had nothing left worth taking. He skipped the carbonized remains around the carriage. There was practically no chance that they would have anything usable on them, and he felt sick enough after checking these ones. Looting the bodies of people you knew was just... wrong.

Besides, it was time to go. His headache was gone, replaced by a nervous sense of urgency. He had to try to catch up to the others as quickly as he could. If he was caught out in the dark by himself, he could easily be overwhelmed. On the other hand, he had to move carefully, too. The demons might be following above or below ground. He could just as easily stumble into a group of demons as his friends.

There were no good options, so he had to take the one he had.

Shouldering his bag, Bernt walked as quickly as he could without straining himself. He hadn’t managed to recover his wand, but he still had his iron ring on his left hand. Grixit had been right, all those months ago. The best kind of focus was one you couldn't lose.

After a few more minutes, Bernt chanced a light jog. To his surprise, the additional motion actually helped to ease the pain in some of his bruised muscles. Just a few minutes later, though, he had to stop and walk again, completely out of breath and sweaty. Robes were not designed for running.

Still, he didn't give up, alternating between a fast walk and a slow jog every few minutes.

An hour passed, then two. Bernt’s head was pounding again, his lungs burned and the savage cramp in his side had long since mellowed into a more companionable nauseating ache. His legs felt hollow and shook slightly when he stopped moving. The others had to be moving quickly, considering that he still hadn’t even managed to catch a glimpse – even on the longer straight sections, some of which extended what might have been half a league.

Bernt coughed up phlegm and spat. It looked normal, but it tasted like blood. Dully, he dug his cup out of his bag and began conjuring water into it. He needed a drink. How was it possible that he still hadn’t sighted the others? How fast could they be moving, and how long had he been out while that cultist dragged him over the rocks?

He drank, letting the conjured water wash the metallic taste out of his mouth. He should eat something, too, but the thought of running around on a full stomach didn’t appeal to him at all. He’d wait until he reached the rest of the group.

Packing the cup away again, Bernt began walking once more, working himself up to a jog after a few steps – he was exhausted. The road was windy here, working its way around absolutely massive boulders. If he was lucky, he’d find the others camped just around the next bend. Then he could stop to breathe, eat something and, gods willing, sleep for a few hours.

He was so wrapped up in the fantasy that he didn’t even see the damned demon before he ran into it. One moment he was jogging around a tight corner, the next he was on the ground. Something sharp dug into his side painfully, accompanied by a growl and a clawed hand that grasped at his face. Frantically, Bernt tried to push it away, forcing mana through his right hand and kicking with his feet. His shin connected painfully hard as fire washed over his adversary. 

The thing grunted and fell back, completely ignoring the flames that covered it. It was immune, just like the hellhounds he’d fought in the Undercity. Bernt had seen one like it before, during the first ambush after Fergefield. Its upper body was mostly humanoid, but its legs were hooved like those of a goat and covered in dark fur. It had short, pointy horns and a narrow snout rather than a nose. 

It snarled and started to move, raising a hand, but Bernt didn’t wait to find out what it would do next. Cold fire spewed from his left hand in a loose cone, almost completely enveloping the thing. It screamed in animalistic agony, but only for a moment. When the spell fizzled out, the top half of the demons was simply gone.

He let out a quivering breath, rubbing at his bruised shin. That had hurt. Had he kicked it in the head?

He really needed to be more careful.