The front line collapsed, barely resisting the topiary horrors’ assault for two and a half minutes. Some monsters snatched men and stuffed them whole into their gizzards before fleeing, others ripped men in half while fighting over prey.
They tore into the protected, and then the stronger hunters stepped forth. An elder hound pounced towards Skitt, who pretended to be injured so severely he could not stand. The battered one-eyed man gasped, believing his life over when a brilliant ax cleaved the topiary horror in half.
Laying prone on his back, Skitt failed to see his savior’s face. He only caught a flash of white and immediately knew how he had survived.
Sun clan’s guardian.
The white-robed man danced, reaping the advancing monsters’ lives with a glowing sword and a shining ax. Elder dogs were one of countless second level topiary horror species, able to slaughter regular humans. Five first level hunters might lose to one, yet those monsters were like helpless rabbits before the white-robed bodyguard.
He must be a level three!
However, Skitt’s moment of awe passed as quickly as it came, and the thoughts of survival gripped his mind. He glanced left, and found just the thing. He pulled over half of an elder dog’s corpse and covered himself with it, simultaneously obscuring his figure and scent.
Finally, Skitt dismissed his barkskin and smacked his temple against a rock, falling unconscious.
***
Drak watched the scene before him with disbelief. Three white-robed men wielding a weapon in each hand dispatched the topiary horrors like gods of war. He was so absorbed in the sight, he failed to notice the plantman creeping up behind him.
[What are you doing?] the vine asked, a slightly sour note of worry painting her question.
Luckily for Spring, regular humans could not detect bloom-folk speech. She wrapped her smooth, green hand around Drak’s, grasping both the hand and the short-bladed knife. Before the young man realized what was happening, she pulled, stabbing the blade into his throat.
Drak’s eyes went wide. He gasped and tried to scream, but only gurgles escaped him. Spring ignored his unspoken plea. She twisted his body around to face the other three bloom-folk.
[Sorry,] she gave a faint scent, which the wind instantly scattered. Then she yanked her hand and slit open Drak’s throat, spraying the confused bloom-folk with his gushing blood.
Vine was the first to understand what was happening as she caught the iron aroma of blood, mixed with the dying human’s last bowel movement.
While her mind staggered, coming to terms with reality, Spring kicked Drak towards her former companions.
[You know too much. I cannot risk the future of bloom-folk just to spare you. I’m sorry.]
[Rot take you!] vine cursed, and a wildling plowed into her, its thorns shredding her soft body.
[It will.] Spring took in their desperate stench from five steps away. She smelled the holy water of their bodies spilled as three bloom-folk lost consciousness and withered, trampled and mistakenly devoured.
[I will not ignore the evil I have committed. I will carry this sin for the sake of our people and to stop the Inferno’s march.] Spring cleaned the knife on the grass, removing all traces of blood from the implement. Then she caressed her abdomen. She ignored the feasting wildlings and the blaze baking her skin from the distance, enthralled by the bottom of her pitcher.
[What if this is a coincidence?] Her hand trembled as she touched the cold iron against her smooth green skin, drawing a bead of milky sap. [What if these wildlings have nothing to do with Thorn? What do I do if Thorn does not come?]
She smelled the oils suffusing the air. [Wildlings are dying in droves. This group has extraordinary martial might, but they are too far for me to identify their grafts. Have they seen me kill a human? What are the implications if they discover bloom-folk aren’t as docile as they believe? Will Salazar’s purge start sooner?]
The snowdrops of Spring’s hair closed tight. Hesitation gripped her. She did not doubt her memories, a seventh level floromancer like herself needed an unshakeable resolve to reach her height, doubly so since she was a blighted, not a human.
[However, I’m no longer a blighted. I could escape this chaos, go into the heart of the bloom, and, and…] The distant bonfire roasted her skin, and the grasses of her hair curled, not from the heat, but from the fear of the Inferno coming to consume them all.
Suddenly, Spring relaxed. The flowers of her hair opened and the leaves hung limply, swaying in the breeze created by the rampaging men and wildlings.
[I will suffer my blight. I will stop those fires from devouring my people.]
***
The battle died down, and wildlings no longer dashed out of the forest. The only sounds belonged to those departing with bellies full of prey.
Ten humans stood, gathered with the pyre protecting their backs.
“We survived!” Jasmine Searing laughed despite herself. She could not recall ever feeling as alive as she did at that moment.
Their situation was horrid. They had lost their porters and most of their hunters, but thanks to the Sun clan’s three third level florists, she and Searing Flame’s second level hunters survived. Nobody important had died.
“Thank you, lord, for saving Young Miss’s life,” Fon bowed to Eginal, the leader or Sun clan’s guardians.
Eginal turned to accept the formal gesture and waved Fon to cease with the pointless etiquette. “No need for thanks. We’re one fam—”
Suddenly, a stake, as long as a man’s forearm whizzed through the air and stabbed into the back of Eginal’s head. His skull burst and gore showered the still-bowing Fon.
The man raised his head, a dumb expression painting his face, only for a bolt to impale his nose and destroy his head.
Jasmine screamed, but another giant thorn pierced her chest, blowing a gaping hole through it, and her lifeless body fell to the ground.
The scent of fresh human deaths snapped Spring out of her rumination.
[Thorn.] Spring gave off a spicy fragrance and stabbed herself without hesitation. [The pain is manageable. The original me would have cried in agony, but I can’t draw their attention until all my water runs out.] Spring worked the knife to widen her wound as clear water and white sap mixed and flowed out of her.
The scent was as sweet as life, and Spring felt hungrier the more she smelled it. [I’m losing water fast. Dehydration is lethal for the folk. Blighted, however, despise water, it reminds them of everything they had lost, and they carry some only if they need to feed special grafts.]
Spring’s scents grew faint as her pitcher emptied. With the last bits of her strength, she threw the knife into the heap of her three companions’ remains.
[I must put my everything into this.] She gathered all the oils she had left for one last cry, [Help!]
***
“She’s there!” Creep rushed, dashing across trampled bushes. “Rot take them! Look at what they had done to our kind.”
The wrinkled man gaped at the trampled and torn remains of the folk, their white and yellow saps mixed with water and blood. A single bloom-folk lay motionless in a pool of white, a gaping wound at the bottom of her torso.
“She’s gone,” Creep sighed as the others caught up.
Spring’s finger twitched and she lifted her arm, moving in a desperate plea.
“She is still alive,” Thorn said.
“But we have no water. She will die within minutes. She’s lost a lot of sap, too.”
“Creep, we are surrounded by fresh blood. She will survive.”
Creep stared at Thorn. “You will blight her?”
“It’s better than dying. Now, hurry! Creep, you patch her wound. Everyone else, gather as much blood as you can.”
The nine blighted got to work, rushing to the bonfire where the freshest corpses lay.
“Whoops,” Bough crunched something beneath his foot. When he lifted his boot, he saw it painted red. Without thinking, he took a bowl and drained the body in a well practiced manner.
The group worked fast, and in less than a minute they had several bowls full of blood. They rushed back and saw Creep had done an emergency patchwork with resin and leaves.
“It’s a temporary solution, but it will hold until she regenerates.” Creep gazed at Thorn. “Are you sure about this? We’re inflicting her with a cursed life.”
“Even a cursed life is better than death. Make her a mouth.”
Creep did as Thorn ordered. His knife moved without hesitation, and he made a thin slit at the bottom of Spring’s smooth face.
Thorn opened Spring’s newly created orifice wide and poured blood into it.
“Hold her!” Thorn shouted as Spring started convulsing. Guttural gurgles escaped her mouth as blood surged in and the air left her empty pitcher.
Spring thrashed. Her glossy green body turned into a wrinkled brown ruin as curdling blood replaced the clear water and the white sap.
“A shame,” Creep wept, watching Spring’s beautiful, vibrant snowdrop blossoms turn rotten black.
The front line collapsed, barely resisting the topiary horrors’ assault for two and a half minutes. Some monsters snatched men and stuffed them whole into their gizzards before fleeing, others ripped men in half while fighting over prey.
They tore into the protected, and then the stronger hunters stepped forth. An elder hound pounced towards Skitt, who pretended to be injured so severely he could not stand. The battered one-eyed man gasped, believing his life over when a brilliant ax cleaved the topiary horror in half.
Laying prone on his back, Skitt failed to see his savior’s face. He only caught a flash of white and immediately knew how he had survived.
Sun clan’s guardian.
The white-robed man danced, reaping the advancing monsters’ lives with a glowing sword and a shining ax. Elder dogs were one of countless second level topiary horror species, able to slaughter regular humans. Five first level hunters might lose to one, yet those monsters were like helpless rabbits before the white-robed bodyguard.
He must be a level three!
However, Skitt’s moment of awe passed as quickly as it came, and the thoughts of survival gripped his mind. He glanced left, and found just the thing. He pulled over half of an elder dog’s corpse and covered himself with it, simultaneously obscuring his figure and scent.
Finally, Skitt dismissed his barkskin and smacked his temple against a rock, falling unconscious.
***
Drak watched the scene before him with disbelief. Three white-robed men wielding a weapon in each hand dispatched the topiary horrors like gods of war. He was so absorbed in the sight, he failed to notice the plantman creeping up behind him.
[What are you doing?] the vine asked, a slightly sour note of worry painting her question.
Luckily for Spring, regular humans could not detect bloom-folk speech. She wrapped her smooth, green hand around Drak’s, grasping both the hand and the short-bladed knife. Before the young man realized what was happening, she pulled, stabbing the blade into his throat.
Drak’s eyes went wide. He gasped and tried to scream, but only gurgles escaped him. Spring ignored his unspoken plea. She twisted his body around to face the other three bloom-folk.
[Sorry,] she gave a faint scent, which the wind instantly scattered. Then she yanked her hand and slit open Drak’s throat, spraying the confused bloom-folk with his gushing blood.
Vine was the first to understand what was happening as she caught the iron aroma of blood, mixed with the dying human’s last bowel movement.
While her mind staggered, coming to terms with reality, Spring kicked Drak towards her former companions.
[You know too much. I cannot risk the future of bloom-folk just to spare you. I’m sorry.]
[Rot take you!] vine cursed, and a wildling plowed into her, its thorns shredding her soft body.
[It will.] Spring took in their desperate stench from five steps away. She smelled the holy water of their bodies spilled as three bloom-folk lost consciousness and withered, trampled and mistakenly devoured.
[I will not ignore the evil I have committed. I will carry this sin for the sake of our people and to stop the Inferno’s march.] Spring cleaned the knife on the grass, removing all traces of blood from the implement. Then she caressed her abdomen. She ignored the feasting wildlings and the blaze baking her skin from the distance, enthralled by the bottom of her pitcher.
[What if this is a coincidence?] Her hand trembled as she touched the cold iron against her smooth green skin, drawing a bead of milky sap. [What if these wildlings have nothing to do with Thorn? What do I do if Thorn does not come?]
She smelled the oils suffusing the air. [Wildlings are dying in droves. This group has extraordinary martial might, but they are too far for me to identify their grafts. Have they seen me kill a human? What are the implications if they discover bloom-folk aren’t as docile as they believe? Will Salazar’s purge start sooner?]
The snowdrops of Spring’s hair closed tight. Hesitation gripped her. She did not doubt her memories, a seventh level floromancer like herself needed an unshakeable resolve to reach her height, doubly so since she was a blighted, not a human.
[However, I’m no longer a blighted. I could escape this chaos, go into the heart of the bloom, and, and…] The distant bonfire roasted her skin, and the grasses of her hair curled, not from the heat, but from the fear of the Inferno coming to consume them all.
Suddenly, Spring relaxed. The flowers of her hair opened and the leaves hung limply, swaying in the breeze created by the rampaging men and wildlings.
[I will suffer my blight. I will stop those fires from devouring my people.]
***
The battle died down, and wildlings no longer dashed out of the forest. The only sounds belonged to those departing with bellies full of prey.
Ten humans stood, gathered with the pyre protecting their backs.
“We survived!” Jasmine Searing laughed despite herself. She could not recall ever feeling as alive as she did at that moment.
Their situation was horrid. They had lost their porters and most of their hunters, but thanks to the Sun clan’s three third level florists, she and Searing Flame’s second level hunters survived. Nobody important had died.
“Thank you, lord, for saving Young Miss’s life,” Fon bowed to Eginal, the leader or Sun clan’s guardians.
Eginal turned to accept the formal gesture and waved Fon to cease with the pointless etiquette. “No need for thanks. We’re one fam—”
Suddenly, a stake, as long as a man’s forearm whizzed through the air and stabbed into the back of Eginal’s head. His skull burst and gore showered the still-bowing Fon.
The man raised his head, a dumb expression painting his face, only for a bolt to impale his nose and destroy his head.
Jasmine screamed, but another giant thorn pierced her chest, blowing a gaping hole through it, and her lifeless body fell to the ground.
The scent of fresh human deaths snapped Spring out of her rumination.
[Thorn.] Spring gave off a spicy fragrance and stabbed herself without hesitation. [The pain is manageable. The original me would have cried in agony, but I can’t draw their attention until all my water runs out.] Spring worked the knife to widen her wound as clear water and white sap mixed and flowed out of her.
The scent was as sweet as life, and Spring felt hungrier the more she smelled it. [I’m losing water fast. Dehydration is lethal for the folk. Blighted, however, despise water, it reminds them of everything they had lost, and they carry some only if they need to feed special grafts.]
Spring’s scents grew faint as her pitcher emptied. With the last bits of her strength, she threw the knife into the heap of her three companions’ remains.
[I must put my everything into this.] She gathered all the oils she had left for one last cry, [Help!]
***
“She’s there!” Creep rushed, dashing across trampled bushes. “Rot take them! Look at what they had done to our kind.”
The wrinkled man gaped at the trampled and torn remains of the folk, their white and yellow saps mixed with water and blood. A single bloom-folk lay motionless in a pool of white, a gaping wound at the bottom of her torso.
“She’s gone,” Creep sighed as the others caught up.
Spring’s finger twitched and she lifted her arm, moving in a desperate plea.
“She is still alive,” Thorn said.
“But we have no water. She will die within minutes. She’s lost a lot of sap, too.”
“Creep, we are surrounded by fresh blood. She will survive.”
Creep stared at Thorn. “You will blight her?”
“It’s better than dying. Now, hurry! Creep, you patch her wound. Everyone else, gather as much blood as you can.”
The nine blighted got to work, rushing to the bonfire where the freshest corpses lay.
“Whoops,” Bough crunched something beneath his foot. When he lifted his boot, he saw it painted red. Without thinking, he took a bowl and drained the body in a well practiced manner.
The group worked fast, and in less than a minute they had several bowls full of blood. They rushed back and saw Creep had done an emergency patchwork with resin and leaves.
“It’s a temporary solution, but it will hold until she regenerates.” Creep gazed at Thorn. “Are you sure about this? We’re inflicting her with a cursed life.”
“Even a cursed life is better than death. Make her a mouth.”
Creep did as Thorn ordered. His knife moved without hesitation, and he made a thin slit at the bottom of Spring’s smooth face.
Thorn opened Spring’s newly created orifice wide and poured blood into it.
“Hold her!” Thorn shouted as Spring started convulsing. Guttural gurgles escaped her mouth as blood surged in and the air left her empty pitcher.
Spring thrashed. Her glossy green body turned into a wrinkled brown ruin as curdling blood replaced the clear water and the white sap.
“A shame,” Creep wept, watching Spring’s beautiful, vibrant snowdrop blossoms turn rotten black.
