(Flashback) What? The Arrow Slipped (Berus)

[Aello]

Summer 1, 509 AV Aello was walking slowly through the snow, doing her best to make no sound whatsoever as her feet crunched into the large, glistening white expanse. Aello was holding her bow downwards, and towards the ground as she stepped, her eyes darting from left to right in search of something to eat. Aello had knocked an arrow onto the serving of her bow earlier in the day, and now, the peacock feathers tickled the fingers that wrapped around it as she continued to move forward. She hadn't found anything within the last hour, and now, she was truly starting to feel the winds that rustled her long woolen cloak. "Why does this place have to be so petching cold and devoid of life?" Aello muttered under her breath as she kept on walking. Finally, after several more minutes of walking through the snow, and muttering mild obscenities under her breath, the sound of a stick snapping reached her ears. Slowly, Aello raised her bow to the shooting position, and closed her left eye. The three middle fingers on her right hand wrapped more tightly around the arrow as she slowly began to pull the bowstring back a little farther. What was that? Aello wondered as her eyes darted back and forth, and she strained her ears for another sound, anything that may give the creature's current location away. Aello was standing on the tips of her toes. The top of her boots peaked out of the foot of snow that covered the ground, as she slowly twisted back and forth about the waist. It has to be out here somewhere. It's not as though it could simply disappear. Aello's heart was pounding as she waited for the next sound. Anything at all- another snapped branch, the sound of muffled footsteps in the snow, some sort of animal call. Her breath seemed to catch in her throat as she waited. The bow string had left its mark on Aello's fingers- a thin red line from her strain. She would have let them relax, would have let up on the string if only she knew that the creature had gone. If only she had known that there was no longer a chance of having something to eat tonight. Something she had caught herself. But she couldn't possibly know that such a thing was the case, so Aello didn't let go. She merely sighted down the arrow, silently waiting for whatever the animal was to make its move so she too, could strike. When Aello heard snow crunching behind her, she rapidly spun around, and let go of the bowstring. The arrow erupted out of the bow, and flew through the air. It soared in a relatively straight line, and only began to dip the farther and farther along it flew. Did we hit it? Aello wondered, as she lowered her bow and took a few steps forward, towards where she had shot the arrow. OOCAello doesn't have any special arrows yet, so there is nothing you really need to know about them... they're simply your avg. shortbow arrows.

[Berus]

Berus crept quietly through the snow, hands firmly grasped around a bottle of the finest wine in all of Avanthal. It was his duty, given to him by his good friend Steryn, to secret it straightaway to the Iceglaze Hold for a night of great celebration in honor of Jasten Skyglow’s newest masterpiece. It had been a bit of work to convince it to jump out of old man Jared’s cabinet and sneak through the Snowsong compound but it would all be worth it later tonight!

He had a difficult time convincing his toes of that, sadly, as snow burst through his boots and assaulted them in the merciless fashion very familiar to the poor little boy. All ten of his toes, in concert, went on strike in protest of the situation. All of them numbed, deciding that they would not allow the little boy to feel anything until the frost relented and they felt glorious, wonderful warmth once more.

Berus smiled wickedly at their pathetic efforts, however, for it only assisted him that they deprived him of the ability to feel! That only meant that the nagging, incessant pain was now gone and the trip would become much more comfortable. At his leisure, he would prop them up before a great roaring fire to accede to their wishes and regain what was lost. No one was to say that he was a completely pitiless taskmaster, he rewarded those that performed as he commanded!

He winced as his foot, determined to have its way, crunched as loudly as possible into the blanket of snow. He crouched immediately, arms cradling the glass of precious wine and eyes shooting all about incase a member of the Icewatch, ever present in Avanthal, was nearby with orders to track him down. He strained his ears to hear anything of the polar bear riding warriors even as he spotted a likely snowdrift he could burrow into to get out of sight and not get caught with his dangerous cargo!

However, his ears picked up neither the crunching of snow from under a great paw nor the telltale heavy breathing from one of the massive beasts, but rather a strange whirring sound. It sounded a bit like a rock flying through the air at a fast pace and reminded him quite a bit of a hurtling snowball. Strangely, it sounded a bit quieter and certainly lighter than any snowball, let alone a rock!

His mind raced to figure out what exactly the sound was even as his ears strained to get more information. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted something really odd. It looked like a stick flying through the air right toward him!

AN ARROW!

His thigh exploded in pain and he fell to the ground, dropping the precious wine bottle as his hand gripped the arrow sticking out of his leg! His eyes widened in horror, somehow seeing past the tears, at the blood seeping into his woolen pants. His mind was at a total blank at the moment as he simply pressed his hands against the wound. He roared loudly, more of a shrill yelp really, in the pain and surprise of it all.

His mouth stayed wide open; he’d never been shot by an arrow before! That wine bottle was more heavily guarded than he had ever suspected! Silently, Berus promised that he’d put the bottle back if the arrow would simply fly back out of the wound and his blood would stop flowing painfully from his ‘wound.’

Sadly enough, the arrow did not fly back out.

[Aello]

Aello heard a loud yelping noise coming from up ahead. Her grip tightened around her bow. The veins in the back of her hand seemed to pop as her knuckles turned white. "Well that didn't sound all that animalistic," she whispered, as a miniature cloud of frozen silver air floated around her mouth. It hovered there for a few seconds, before disappearing from sight. Ohh would you just go and look? An injured creature is an injured creature, they're all going to sound the same. Aello shook her head, "not quite," another puff of frozen air that soon disappeared. Aello crunched through the snow, and within one hundred paces, had reached the side of the injured Snowsong. "Well you're not exactly a snowshoe hare now are you?" Aello asked, as she placed her free hand on her hip. "Now, what may an archer ask, are you doing with a bottle of wine out alone, here in the cold? And what are you doing running in front of her arrows you silly thing?" Aello inquired. Her eyes were sparkling playfully in the pale morning light. She hadn't expected to run into anyone on her hunt, and yet, the gods seemed to deliver someone to her. A very stupid and accident prone someone. After a few moments, Aello pulled her bag off her shoulder, and placed it in the snow at her side. She delicately placed her bow on top of her bag, and made sure that it didn't touch the snow. She didn't want the wood to warp if it got too wet. She bent down beside the injured boy. "What's your name?" she asked, as she inspected the wound by delicately lifting the bottom of his woolen pants. There was blood everywhere. Well that doesn't look very pleasant. "Try not to move," Aello said as she took a deep breath in through her nose and out through her mouth. She would have to remove the arrow in order to clean the wound. Don't you think you should have studied medicine right about now? Aello ignored her mind's whispers. "This is going to hurt," she said, as she pressed her left hand into the boy's injured leg as lightly as she could. Her palm pressed into his woolen clothes, and fresh red blood. It felt warm. The arrow poked out from between her left thumb and index fingers. "Whatever you do, don't move," she whispered as she extended her right hand towards the bottom of the arrow. When she had reached it, Aello wrapped her trembling white fingers around it, and began to twist the arrow, before pulling it out of the boy's flesh. She waited for a scream as she wiped the tip delicately in the snow, to get the blood off. The snow turned a light red color, before Aello lifted the arrow, and began drying it on her cloak. When it was dry, she returned the arrow to her quiver. Snowsong's wound was oozing fresh, crimson red blood. You're going to have to clean that, and make it stop bleeding before he loses too much. Aello bit her bottom lip. She didn't exactly have a first aid kit in her bag. Wondering what to do now, the girl simply stared at him for a moment, as if he knew any better than she. It was only a few moments before she turned away. All there is in this bloody place is snow, snow, and more bloody snow! LITERALLY! It was difficult for her not to laugh, but Aello managed to suppress the urge as she picked up a ball of snow in her right hand. Her pale fingertips trembled beneath the white flurries. And it is petching cold! "Brace yourself," Aello whispered, as she lightly pressed the snow into the wound. She could see the blood trickling through the expanse, slowly dyeing it red. At first the snow was light in color, but the longer Aello held it against Snowsong's skin, the darker it got. Hopefully that cleaned it out enough for you to bandage it. At which point, you can help him get to someone who actually knows what they're doing. "Sorry, by the way," Aello finally mumbled as she pulled the snow away. "Do you have anything we could use to bandage you up? Perhaps a strip of fabric from the bottom of your pants? They're ruined anyway."

[Berus]

Berus took the impromptu bandaging of the mysterious woman with only a few loud yelps and much, much whimpering. The youth was simply too stunned that he had actually been shot by an arrow like an animal! His mouth hung open stupidly and drool would most assuredly have been rolling down his chin had his mouth not gone completely dry the instant the sharp pain of an arrow wound assaulted him. Numbly, dumbly, he obeyed the archer without complaint or resistance.

He looked down at the blood pouring from his beautiful, superb, loyal leg. It didn’t deserve this at all! It had always done as he commanded; only complaining a bit-with cause!-when he strained it beyond reason. He could think of several rebellions toes that warranted this treatment and pain much more than his magnificent, powerful leg. But no, it was the innocent that was stricken by the terrible arrow of pain and-

OW!

“Aaaaack!” he roared shrilly, voice echoing off the snow as it cried out in pain. His vision tinted red, turning all of the wonderful white snow into some field of blood and death. He gasped for breath, wondering of the spit now gathering in his mouth was composed at least a little of his precious lifeblood. His head waved back and forth as if it were drunk, his body rocking back and forth as it struggled against the waves of pain emanating from his injured appendage. His eyes fled even farther out of focus, now only registering the archer-quack as a dull blur in a world far away.

The film of red was thankfully dissolved by an invasion of tears that similarly obstructed his vision. He coughed pathetically and rubbed a sleeve across his face, dispelling the tears so that he could view the offending arrow starkly without any protective camouflage that it threw up to hide it.

However, his eyes widened as it saw that the arrow was out! The archer was crouched over his wound, the arrow nowhere to be seen but the snow tinted red near her feet. Since the offending weapon was nowhere to be seen, his eyes distantly focused on the archer herself. She was not too impressive of a figure; not even as tall or large as he himself! Still, the blood seeping into the snow was testament to her rampant destructive power. He did notice that his ears distantly caught the sounds of her talking to him in a soft voice… though his mind was too scrambled to figure out exactly what was being said.

His leg exploded in searing pain once more and Berus leaned down toward it, hands kept at bay merely out of fear of the great archer. Instead, they hovered weakly in the air as he watched in horror as she attempted to shove snow into his wound, his lifeblood managing to keep it at bay with a steady stream that infected the pathetic crystals of water. The archer pulled the snow back away from his wound, which ceased spitting up blood for the moment, and mumbled something that didn’t quite make it past his eardrums.

His horrified eyes settled on his wound as his mind crashed back into focus. He noticed then that he was very itchy! His skin was nearly lathered in sweat and he was still breathing very heavily, his lungs smashing against his ribcage painfully. His eyes flicked back and forth as he absentmindedly wiped away the spit that had flowed down onto his chin. His mind took just a moment to realign with the situation…

Then he was up like a rabbit!

Though his leg screamed that he was acting stupidly and shook painfully beneath him, he was on his feet in a sort of half-crouch. His hands had instantaneously found and grasped a long, hard tree branch and now held it out toward the archer as a strange defense. His instincts overrode any other thoughts as fear coursed through his veins.

Whatever had just transpired, he knew that the archer had wounded him grievously and probably meant to harm him further! He regarded the archer for just a moment, eyes flicking back and forth between her quiver and her face, before he tried to say ‘Back away from me now or I will attack!’ as coherently as possibly. Unfortunately, it only came out as “Gaah!” when his mouth muscles refused to work properly.

He waited a moment for her to respond to his order and, after only a second of seeing that she did not understand, he stabbed his make-shift weapon forward toward her viciously.

[Aello]

Aello quickly swerved out of the way as Berus waved his stick at her. "You know, you can quit trying to be a tough guy," Aello commented as she ducked. He had swung the stick wildly across her body, as though he were trying to decapitate her. "You're not exactly going to impress anyone like that you know," she continued as she he swung at her again, and swiped her shoulder. OOOW. Aello stood up. "In fact, you're more than likely only going to make that wound even worse, and wind up on the ground, bathed in your own blood, clutching your leg, and whining like a baby all over again," she smirked. "Now, neither of us want that," Aello said as her eyes darted over to her things. If only she could reach them. "So why don't you just put your little stick down, and we talk this over like human beings?" Aello asked as he swiped at her again. Aello ran to the left to avoid him. "Or you can keep doing that, and when you've bled out enough, fall on the floor. In which case, you may be left here because of your generally ridiculous actions!" Aello warned. "Which have been proven ridiculous simply because the archer removed her arrow. After all, she wasn't exactly trying to kill the likes of you... just, you know, a rabbit or something for dinner." He swiped at her again, Aello dodged. "Oh, would you stop, you're acting like a two year old!" Aello sighed heavily as she ran around Berus, narrowly dodging just about every one of his attacks. Finally, she had decided that she had had enough. "You know, you have left your opponent with no choice..." Aello's voice trailed off as she ran to her bag and her bow as quickly as she could. In one fluid movement, she picked up her bow in her left hand, and her bag in her right. She slung her bag over her shoulder as she ran another few steps forward, and away from where she thought Berus would be. The guy has a bloody flesh wound in his leg, LITERALLY. Surely he can't keep up with you. As soon as she had stumbled forward, and gotten her bag into place, Aello turned abruptly on her heels. She pulled an arrow from her quiver, and knocked it as quickly as she could. In order to keep Berus from catching up with her, she ran several feet to her left, before turning around to face him. She lifted her bow, and wrapped the three middle fingers of her right hand around the arrow. She began to pull back on the bowstring as she lifted it. "Now don't you make a move, whoever you are. Unless, of course, you would like another arrow lodged into your skin." Aello closed her left eye as she lifted the bow ever so slightly, and sighted down the arrow. "Should you move, you shall be reinjured. Now, neither of us truly wants that, so why don't you just put the dam stick down, and we get you back to the city and a proper healer? Just as soon as we have bandaged that up. You know, just to be sure you don't bleed all over the place and pass out on us," Aello explained. "Because no one is carrying a bloody dead weight anywhere." There was a slight pause as she inched the bowstring farther and farther back. "Now how does that sound, friend?"

[Berus]

Berus coughed weakly as the archer, now armed with her deadly bow, looked at him with a look that seemed to be more of pity than of rage. She opened her mouth several times but the poor scattered little boy couldn’t quite make out a single word she was saying. Instead, he heard the continual thudding of blood pumping into his ears like a massive, incessant drum. He felt as if his very bones were shaking and, truly, his whole body still shook from the shock of the leg wound.

His head continued to weave back and forth as he found it difficult to keep his eyes on one thing for very long, all the world a mass of pain and fear. He spat on the ground and sighed in relief when he noticed that there wasn’t even a bit of red staining the thick liquid. He sucked in his breath sharply the next moment when he saw that blood actually was dripping slowly from the wound in his upper leg. In his crouched position there was nothing at all to hamper the steady drip.

His makeshift weapon quickly became his walking stick the next moment as the world started to spin. That horrible red tint came back as the archer seemed to dance before his vision. He lifted a very shaky hand toward the archer in a silent threat to stay away. To any observers, and most probably the archer, he would look like a boy who had drank far more than was suggested.

He thought he saw the archer start to come closer to him and he managed to find the strength to leap backwards into a feral crouch, stick-weapon held before him in defense. The rabbit became a tiger in an instant….

Then the tiger pitched backward into the snow, passing out before he ever hit the ground.

[Aello]

Oh there he goes, wobbling about like a drunken idiot. "Are you sure you don't want to put that stick down?" Aello called. "Because you really don't look too good, in fact, you look like you're about to fall on your face. Or perhaps your butt, one of them... the point is, you're going to fall," Aello called as she inched the bowstring even farther back. The boy was wobbling all the more wildly now. It won't be long, will it? It wasn't long at all. Aello lowered her bow as the boy stumbled backwards, and into the snow. "Well, it was just as we said, he was going to pass out from the blood loss. It is his fault he didn't listen to reason," the girl muttered with a loud sigh. "Such a pity too, it's simply so tempting to leave him here for the animals to find. Surely they'd like to gnaw on his bones?" Aello giggled as she strode closer to the boy. "But leaving him wouldn't quite be the right thing to do, even with his stick wielding antics." Aello groaned as she knelt down beside him, and rested her bow in her lap. She tore a shred of fabric off his pants, and gently wrapped it around his leg. "Hopefully that will hold," she commented as she stood back up. "And now, we get to drag his stupid ass back into town. Ohhh what a lovely day this is turning out to be." Aello laced her bow over her left arm, so that the frame and the string was resting around her shoulder. She took a deep breath in through the nose, and out through the mouth. "Hopefully this won't hurt him too much," Aello muttered as she bent slightly at the waist, and grabbed his foot in her right hand. She straightened herself up again, as soon as she had tightened her grip on Berus. "Now which way is town?" Aello whispered as her breath froze in the thin mountain air. A puff of white that soon disappeared as she glanced from left to right, trying to figure out which way to go. Why does this part always have to be so damn difficult? After all, it all looks the bloody same around here after a while! It's just snow and more snow! No bloody landmarks or anything. Aello groaned as she began to drag the boy forwards. Hopefully, she'd run into someone who would be able to help her. Or, she'd suddenly remember which way is town. You know, neither of those things seems likely in this horrid winter wonderland. Aello ignored what her mind was telling her. You know, we set out for a rabbit and we bring back a bloody boy, Aello thought, as she rolled her eyes. Her heart was pounding in her chest. The gods must be smiling down upon us, don't you think? Aello growled. "Shut up you," she hissed, as she continued to drag the boy. "Damn it, this guy is heavy..." she groaned as her breath caught in her throat. "He could really use a workout or two... you know, shed a few pounds. Aello's feet crunched through the snow. There was a gentle woosh coming from behind her; the boy. "How much longer?" she groaned after having walked in silence for a few minutes.

[Berus]

Everything seemed to be sliding by in a slow blur. The sky slid past overhead like some sort of river as Berus floated along. No, not floated! He could feel snow sliding up into his shirt and attacking his skin with its deadly cold. One of his legs ached badly for some odd reason and the other felt as if it was being pulled slowly out of the socket! Overall, he thought it was a rather unpleasant experience.

He was being dragged through the snow!

He wiped one hand across his eyes and leaned his head up out of the snow to see what exactly was dragging him. Possibilities of being drug through the snow by a vicious bear or a hungry wolf rushed into his mind despite attempts to block them out and he very nearly soiled himself as momentary terror seized him. However, his eyes did not register the huge form of a bear nor the agile shape of a wolf but rather a girl with a bow and quiver resting on her back.

The archer!

Memories flooded back to him all at once; he winced as he sharply remembered the arrow stabbing into his leg and the subsequent assault by the evil archer. That same archer was dragging him through the snow right now! What could she have planned? the boy wondered. Could she be some evil soldier come here to capture me and torture me for information on Morwen’s palace? Do they know of my frequent intrusions there?

He kicked roughly, hoping the element of surprise would aid him, and ripped his foot out of the archer’s grasp. He sent his other leg in a kick at the back of the archer’s knee and slid onto his belly so that he could raise himself up onto his feet.

A wave of sharp pain erupted from his leg the next moment and Berus found himself face-down in the snow. His wounded leg would not allow him to escape from this deadly and horrible warrior that had struck him down and captured him so brutally. She had already won this battle. Berus rolled back over onto his back to face his captor, wishing he still had that bottle with him to make these last few moments much easier. Even without it, however, Berus intended to go down fighting.

[Aello]

Aello felt the boy's leg wiggling. "Oh, you're awake!" she commented as she let go of his foot, just as he was giving another kick. "Great, in that case, you can walk your own sorry arse back to your city." There was a slight pause, "since there is no longer a need for anyone to carry you." Aello took several more steps forward. There was no need for her to look after someone who didn't want to be looked after. "Since you can take care of yourself," Aello continued. "Blood-stained leg and all." A slight pause. "Yup, even with all that blood loss, you haven't managed to pass out yet, and can make it back all on your own before the animals get to ya." There was another pause as Aello's feet crunched into the snow. "We humans should be jealous of a guy like you. A guy who is so very strong; has such amazing endurance, and can laugh in the face of a mere flesh wound." Another crunch of snow beneath Aello's feet. "Ohhh... and we forgot the part about being capable of cleaning and bandaging your own wounds... sorry about that love," Aello added sarcastically as she rolled her eyes. What a petching idiot! If his fat, lazy, whining arse wants to freeze to death out here in Morwen's land, then we should let him. We can't let ourselves be bothered by such fools. The girl stomped along some more, before glancing over her shoulder. Aello didn't notice Berus following her. Well, it looks like he fell back into the snow after all. Serves him right for biting the hand that was trying to help him, Aello thought. She had stopped in her tracks, and begun to look left and right again. "Now where did Avanthal get to?" she whispered into the winds, before shrugging, and heading off and to the right. OOCSorry, but since Berus is not behaving, she is going to leave you there... she can't be bothered with your strange antics.

[Berus]

Berus gave the archer a look of confusion as she spoke, her words finally ringing clear in his ears now that the drums had abated. They were strange-not at all what he’d expect from an enemy!-and were tinged with emotions that weren’t truly akin to anger, more of frustration. In fact, her face did not at all seem the snarling, animalistic visage he imagined would adorn an enemy. She was foreign, as he expected an evil agent to be, but she didn’t truly look very deadly at all! She was incredibly short and hardly possessed the gravity of one who was a professional killer.

The little boy bore her sarcastic remarks in silence, still pondering the situation and cradling his hurt leg. She started to taper off toward the end and finally, seemingly thoroughly frustrated, turned around stomped off toward the frozen wasteland. He stared after her departure for several moments.

He couldn’t quite figure the archer out! She did not look and act like an enemy, yet the evidence that she was lay right down in the leg he was cradling. Still, she did not drag him off nor did she kill him, so she wasn’t after his life…

His wine bottle! She was a bandit that had stolen his wine bottle!

Blood rushed to his head at the thought, warming his body and causing his face to redden in embarrassment and rage that he had been robbed so easily so close to his home! He had actually been shot down and easily maneuvered out of his prized wine bottle! Mugging! He could imagine the archer running off to her little hideout now, grinning as she snuggled her prize and looked ahead to a night of celebration and drinking. That was Berus’s night of celebration of drinking and she’d stolen it!

He winced then, his anger deflated, as his wound throbbed. He looked about him, realizing that if he stayed out here much longer then even if he didn’t bleed out from the trek home he might get an infection and die. Too many good Vantha had fallen that way for Berus to not shudder in terror at that possibility. It seemed the archer had not only stolen his wine bottle and his celebration, but also his life.

Stubborn, the little boy rolled over on all fours and crawled through the snow to the right of where he had been laying. That was the most direct route to his hold and his only hope of staying alive. All he had to do was keep his limbs moving and not submit to the pain and despair.

All the while, thoughts of his bones being found in the snow slowed his efforts even more than the ever present hampering gravity.