Chapter 211: Chapter 211
Skana threw back the wooden mug and drained the brew to the last drop. 'About now, Illyana has probably racked up a few hundred dead at least, if I'm to judge by the size of those escorts leaving town, damn dead fools. Almost as dumb as the ones who go flailing about the woods looking for her and her people.'
Skana ran a hand over the smooth green silk shirt and over her long black pants. Her disguise varied from place to place. A mistress to a wealthy merchant, wearing slightly lewd attire, a novice merchant in her own right, or a wife or daughter to some far off nobleman in a distant part of the Southern Holy Kingdom. It changed every time, and her clothing with it, from the nubile exotic to the demure and ladylike modesty. But the story was always structured the same way.
"It was such a terrible thing to see so many Southerners cut down, and what did the Queen do?"
She was careful to always just ask open-ended questions, letting the listeners fill the answers in themselves. Their outrage, coupled with the drinks she plied them with, it always sparked lively talk. 'Scum. If they had one ounce of real loyalty to them, or even gave a damn about finding out whether or not any of what I said was true, they'd not fall so easily towards rebellion. Pathetic fools.' The addiction to anger made them seek out reinforcement to confirm it, from each other, or from the memory of imagined slights that were nowhere near as great as they imagined them to be when they needed something to feed their hunger for righteous wrath.
'One ounce of decency…' Skana thought as she slid the mug over the bar to the bartender, a skinny old man with an indifferent look and a practiced hand, he caught it without looking and tossed it into a barrel full of water at his back. It landed with a splash before Skana was gone.
The woods were easy to find both night and day, and leaving the town without being seen was almost as easy as finding the woods. The auburn haired girl's bright green eyes caught the light of the moon and glowed like the eyes of a cat, a little cheshire smile swept over her face. 'I love my job.' Skana thought with a silent titter of breath in the cool night air, the demoness' instruction had worked wonders in their months of time together. From the tumbling and forms, to the occasional fencing with the doppelgangers, Skana's always lean dancer-frame was now tight as a drawn bow and her skills with a sword, once little more than for showy dancing to entice the hungers of strong men, were now sharper than real swords themselves.
She jumped as soon as the guard on the low stone wall passed out of view, her body easily cleared the fifteen feet of stone and she landed quiet as a cat's paws on the other side.
Normally her departures from various locations would be to bring Illyana word of some prize ready to leave a town or village, but on this occasion… 'Mistress will be summoning us back…'
It left a thrill in Skana's gut that made her every step lighter as she loped over the open ground, silent but aware, until she reached the woods the road went around by many miles. Of course, 'here' was the dangerous part.
She began to whistle and hold her hands up as much as she was able, tangled amidst the trees and bushes in the shadows. The night, even given a deeper shadow by the canopy of green overhead, posed no real obstacle to the now experienced agent of the demoness, but the deep growth that served as the shield of the elves was quite effective at slowing Skana down.
She whistled the signal tune until she heard someone whistle back. "Bold of you to whistle back." She called out into the dark.
Illyana came into view from on top of a high branch, her feet shoulder width apart, a bow slung on her back and her golden hair flitting lightly in the breeze. She rested one hand on the trunk of the tree from which the branch grew and smiled down at her from a stone's throw away.
"You'd know, my friend, you'd know." Illyana gave a mirthful smile down at the first, and thus far the only good human that she knew and hopped down from branch to branch when the mirthful smile was returned to her.
The former prostitute crossed the distance between them, her feet crushing the soft grass and crunching the fallen leaves under her high booted feet and embraced her comrade tightly breast to breast. Where Skana smelled of fermented beer and hot stew, Illyana smelled of grass and autumn breezes. The elf woman kissed her comrade's cheeks in contented greeting and then they stepped away from one another, if only by a forearm's length and clasped their hands together at waist height between one another.
"I take it my information helped?" Skana asked with an arched eyebrow.
"Very much so." Illyana said with a sharp, affirming nod. "Come see."
She turned and held Skana's hand while leading the woman through the trees toward the deepest part of the elven encampment. Other elves, some towering hulks, others even more slender than Illyana herself, gave begrudging, welcome nods to the human visitor. There were no more narrowed looks in her direction at least, though Skana still did her best to give warm smiles and waves to one and all.
She did however, hold Illyana's hand a little tighter, which brought a squeeze back her way, it was hard for the peasant not to be nervous still, the naked hatred of her race by the elves was a constant source of anxiety. The fate of elf women in Wenmark was something Skana acutely understood, and more than once she wondered, 'Will they turn on me the same way…?' The idea of bearing the brunt of their hatred for humanity left her trembling more than once when giving out information.
Her very existence, 'Only barely tolerated.' It still made her swallow hard, even if she was tolerated, and trusted, if not loved by those Skana sought to help. It left the human woman all the more in awe of Illyana's resilience and strength.
"Here we are." Illyana said offhandedly, oblivious to the admiring look the human woman gave to her back. She swept aside a curtain of leaves sewn into thick dark cloth to reveal a composite cage made out of metal, with heavy wooden logs secured to chains which were in turn bound to the wrists of human men, women, and children.
"We made a quick raid on Wenmark and recovered some of the 'iron jewelry' that they used to decorate us with." Illyana said with a cheery voice while her and Skana's eyes swept over the dozens of humans in fraying and dirtied fine clothing.
"I'm not sure they appreciate the irony. But even so?" She tittered a bit and let go of Skana's hand, and instead pulled the slender auburn haired human toward her at the hip, a tight little embrace that was a little tighter than it needed to be.
"H-How many were you able to get?" Skana asked without looking at the smiling elf. Instead she looked at the human captives, minor nobles and merchant guild members caught on the road, lured out by one of Skana's stories or whose travels Skana had learned of in advance and alerted the elves to.
"Almost all of them." Illyana acknowledged, one or two broke free and we had to kill them, but otherwise?" She laughed a rich, silvery laugh, "Everybody you warned us about. When the time comes and we reveal that these are still alive, we should have no trouble negotiating with the South for our way out of this hellhole."
The humans in the cages looked at Skana at first with pity, thinking her a captive, but as they heard the conversation, their faces all turned to anger, children, young ones as small as four or five, clung to their parents and cried. Older adults shook their chains and shouted at her, "Traitor! Traitor! Traiiiiiitor!"
"You'll be hanged for this! Drawn and quartered! Flayed alive! Burned! Torn limb from limb!" The promises of her dire fate rained down on Skana, and Illyana held her a little tighter.
"Can we… go and talk elsewhere?" Skana asked, doing her best to ignore the dirty faces and twisted anger of those trapped in the crude iron cage.
"Of course." Illyana said and dropped the curtain back so that it cut off the humans' view of her again. "This way." She said, and led Skana away and over to a large tree around which a high wall of sticks was jammed into the earth and then secured by dried vines, sat to offer some degree of privacy. There was no gate. Illyana simply let go, and jumped over to land on the other side.
Skana followed, and there she saw a bed of woven grass over which lay the fur of a slain brown bear, which Illyana promptly lay down on after tossing her bow onto a nearby hook hammered into the tree. The elven woman crossed her ankles and put her hands beneath her head then turned slightly to face her companion.
"Okay, we can talk, what's going on? Is something wrong?" Illyana asked, and Skana sat down cross legged beside her.
"Yes, I guess. Do you… do you hate humans? Still, I mean?" Skana asked.
Illyana's eyes widened a little. "Of course I do."
"Me?" Skana asked and closed her lips tight.
"No. You're alright on my scrolls." Illyana answered, "There probably aren't ten good humans in the world at any given time, I'm lucky enough that I finally met one who cared enough to help me. I doubt I'll ever meet another."
Skana searched for words to say while Illyana reached out, plucked a blade of dying grass from the soil and put the upper end of it in her mouth to chew. "I'm not going to hurt you, Skana. If that's what you're worried about. I hate your race, I can't help myself, even if I could stop hating humans, do you know how many human men, and even women, have hurt me over the years? Even if I got rid of my hatred, all that would leave me with is fear… would you rather I have that instead? That's all I've got, hatred or fear. That's all any of us have had for longer than your lifetime."
Skana hung her head. "I'm sorry for what my people did to you. I have no right to tell you how you should think or what you should feel. It's just, I care about you, a lot. It stings to think that when you look at me-"
Illyana sat upright at the waist before the sentence could be completed, and put a finger over Skana's lips. It was enough to stop the peasant from speaking, the light pressure might as well have been a steel bear trap, holding her mouth closed as it did.
"It's for the best if you don't finish that sentence, Skana. I'm an elf whore. Nothing good ever comes of a human getting involved with me beyond business. I like you too, a lot, a lot more than I thought. You put yourself out for me and… I see how some of my people look at you. It can't have been easy, I know, I was on the other end of that among your race. For you to stick with us, help us, risk getting caught… you're bold, and I'm proud to be at your side. To call you friend. But that's all."
Skana flushed red in the face until Illyana's finger came away, and she forced a laugh, throwing back her head and leaning back with her palms flat on the dying grass blades. "Did you think I was making a love confession… oh no, no no… I understand, it's just… I wanted to confirm that you and I were okay. I saw how you looked at those human prisoners, and-"
"Oh, of course." Illyana interjected with a laugh of her own, "What was I thinking? Well pardon me while I blush at my misunderstanding…" Which she did, and then patted Skana on the side of her knee, "Yes, we're just fine. The things I feel about humans are very… generalized. I don't have any ill feelings toward you… so… now that's out of the way, just for safety… just in case, why don't you lie down here with me while we wait for Lady Albedo to summon us. A little sleep before the [Gate] opens would be great."
"Right, I'm… I'm safe with you." Skana answered and lay down while Illyana did the same, they snuggled up close, scooting in to press and share the warmth of their bodies with one another, and quietly drifted off to sleep.
Or pretended to at least.
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