The house looked subtly different from before. The many birdhouses were now mounted on the porch, for starters, and the small gardens and flowers had been left to go wild.

There was still a lot of traffic going in and out, as many women and few men bustled about here and there, getting ready for things.

The exclamations as Hazé came walking in from the back acreage were enough warning of her arrival, and she eyed the changes being made archly.

It was subtly jarring, being around people who weren’t Marked, and who she couldn’t just flick a thought at to give orders, acknowledge, or converse with, even while doing other things. With Sama’s Mark, she’d broken the 32 Intellect barrier, and had the four thought streams, which really, really helped with multi-tasking.

Still, it was just a shift back to an older paradigm, and she smiled at the women doing final gatherings of herbs and plants as she stepped up the back porch to the door.

“Mama, I’m home!” she called out, already hearing Mama giving directions from the former living room area.

“Oh, my sweet little girl!” Mama’s smile was as infectious as ever, turning and sweeping up to embrace Hazé warmly.

“You look like you’re lagging behind a bit, Mama,” Hazé said severely, looking about. Much of the furniture and ornamentation had been stowed away, taken over by storage cabinets, chests, supplies, and the like.

“We can up and leave in five minutes, dear,” Mama told her calmly, waving towards the kitchen, which still had a couple stools to perch on. The two of them sat down at the station in the middle to talk.

Hazé’s brow furrowed. “Then why are you still here?” she asked calmly. “The time is but days away. It will be difficult for you to bring more people away if you delay. Northmarch will be in chaos, even if you reach it in time...”

Mama sighed, reaching out to take Hazé’s hand. “It is because of you. You are a horrible influence on the women, once they found out you were one of Sylune’s own, and fighting against the filth that has risen up everywhere. They refuse to just leave everyone behind like that.

“When it comes time to go, we will withdraw, but we will not flee!”

Hazé heard the steel in her voice, and had to smile despite herself. There was a whole world of difference in those two words. “Well, then...” she reviewed what she had seen of the outside of the house. “What would you like me to help you with?”

“Ah! Well, there are a great number of things, but they will take several days worth of Valences...” Mama replied carefully.

“I am in a rather unique situation right now. I have a tie to a temporally accelerated area where time passes four hundred times faster. I can go through a Renewal roughly every four minutes, if need be.”

Mama Greta froze for a moment. “Sweet Sylune...” she managed to whisper after a moment. “Then... then it is best if you Cast as many spells as possible as quickly as possible, no?”

“I have been evacuating people from churches literally all over the Continent. I have an hour of time before they have more sites prepared for me, and I must go.”

Mama Greta promptly jumped up, still holding her hand, and burst out running towards the back yard, and the barn outside. “Then we must hurry!” she said over her shoulder to her little girl, smiling broadly. “Oh, there is so very much you can do in an hour...”

Clutching her Staff firmly, and quite bemused, Hazé let herself be dragged along by Mama Greta enthusiastically, already analyzing what Mama was doing, and what spells she might be needing. No doubt she would need to be Casting literally hundreds of Valences over the next hour of real time...

-------------

Rorn Greywolf’s Sword Mournfang took the Champion through the eyeslit, banefire eating away his warped brain and ending his fanatic devotion to Amourae in a last twitching, spastic dance, before the vivus ended that final bit of piety, too.

It had not been too many days since they went into Yle Tyorm, but the change on the battlefields was subtle, even wary now.

Truly, having Sama and the Brotherhood around had relieved a great deal of stress on the part of those fighting. Who wouldn’t be stirred, seeing those people cutting down Greater Demons more easily than the normal soldiers did Lesser ones? With such people around, there truly was no foe too terrible to worry about.

But they weren’t here now. They were driving into the depths of Yle Tyorm, where tales of endless monsters, fell beasts, undead horrors, living forests, and other things in endless numbers flowed out with powerful and skilled adventurers who went in, and most of whom came back out alive, albeit much bloodier and warier than they had been, and they had not been overconfident entering to begin with.

It was endless battle in time-accelerated Zones. The amount of combat experience to be harvested there was simply incredible.

The soldiers looked at the fell beasts, powerful monsters, and most mutated of the elite troops they were facing on the field, listened to the tales where such creatures were the least and weakest of the creatures being fought inside the city, with no gold for a reward, only the harvested carcasses of the slain, if they were lucky... and they decided to stick with the fight they knew.

The average soldier stepped up, goaded on by those tales, by men who certainly weren’t any better than they, right? The numbers of Warped they were facing were growing steadily, trying to balance out against the increasing skill, Levels, and Gear of their opponents, balanced on some paradigm of the Warped Gods that still couldn’t take into account the Marks, the Forsaken, and the boosted Warlord bonuses that applied to everyone on the field.

Rorn was satisfied.

He’d sent away the strongest men of the Kalden, the berserkers, and the North Wind. There had been complaints and protests, which he had silenced with curses and challenges to the courage of every loose-lipped, lazy shirker who dared call themselves a child of Kalden, daring them to be strong enough to not need those crutches.

Were the North Wind going to be there when raiders came in the night?

Were the berserkers going to save their villages from things come clawing for food in the winter? When out a-hunting? Would they beg and scream and cry for the North Wind to save them when brigands struck on the roads? Perhaps they could whine at the feet of the dwarven spears to fight for them, or bend their knees to the frippish elves, surely they didn’t need to fight for themselves any more...

He was a son of Kalden, a wolf among men, and if they wanted to be sheep bleating for a shepherd, let them go find one! Their time to be shorn, gutted, and roasted would be coming soon enough!

The complaints dried up. The grim men of Kalden settled down and did their jobs. No berserkers, no magical heroes. Oh, there were Skalds, there were priests and clerics, mostly Southerners, there to heal them when they were wounded, or counter the spells of the enemy.

But this was a fight to be won with Axe and Spear, Sword and Hammer. By normal men, strong of arm and stronger of will, fighting back against these freaks and mutant things from the Warp. With the fury of their ancestors, who were looking down and telling them to surpass their forefathers, to become something greater than Kalden had ever seen before!

Yes, the monstrously strong Heroes were engaged in some gods-damned Quest to the heart of Yle Tyorm, and the tales whispering back through the Marktell raised hackles at what they portended. But their fight, here, could not be finished until that fight was done, or all the horrors in Yle Tyorm might be unleashed upon the world, sweeping away everything.

Now, they had to fight, they had to kill an ever-increasing number of Warped fanatics and anthros, their very numbers indicating that they were better, stronger, more capable of killing, a salute, and a challenge to get even better!

After all, Rorn was right there. They knew his tale, they knew his background. Was he any better than them? Born of heroes, blessed by the gods, a fountain of luck, a child of destiny?

No, he was a Man. A Source. He made his own Fate, neither Valus nor Hurn was sitting back there showering him with gifts and destiny and good fortune.

And these gods-cursed Warped aliens were not going to keep him from achieving his dreams!

His howl of triumph carried over the battlefield, and drew many eyes. The light dimmed in the demented eyes of the Warped of Amourae, a greater fire lit up in the eyes of the Kalden fighting them.

He tossed the overwrought pink and yellow helm aside, and charged towards the nearest battle line, his shield leading the way. His countrymen cheered to see him coming, the enemy wavered and turned to greet him, and Mournfang sang an old, grim dirge of blood and steely doom as he hewed into them.

But not berserk, never berserk, roaring his orders and tracking the field, fighting with his countrymen, leading them to further glory.

==================

Back in the North, somewhere...

“You will go back.”

Cold winds rose at his words, swirled in the air, stirring old powers, ancient eyes turning this way.

The ghostly mounts of the Fey before him pawed nervously, able to sense his power, while the victims of the Hunt, captured and twisted into its Hounds, whined with both fear and hunger as they looked at the raven-winged erlking floating before them.

They could, of course, run on air, so flight was no escape from them. But this was an Erlking, a Fey of status equal to the Master of the Hunt, and not chosen prey.

“Neither Seelie nor Unseelie may command or deny the Hunt, only make a request of it,” the unperturbed Huntsmaster called back, dark eyes unflinching, his long and deadly Spear raised. “Be off with you, erlking. You have no place here.” His tone was mocking. An erlking was strong, but no match for a Hunt. Indeed, an erlking was meant to fight those who were often victims of a Hunt themselves, mortals intruding on Fey realms.

“You are no Hunt. Your wits are stirred by the things of the Warp, hooking you on your bloodlust, drawing you in to become slaves of the Warped Gods, fighting against those who would deny it entry to our realms. Return, or be deemed traitors to both Courts, Huntsmen, and sentence will follow!”

The cold wind blew again at the harsh rebuke, and the Hunt shifted uneasily. Those were not light words among the Fey.

“And how shall you stop us, erlking? You think your force of arms sufficient to even slow us down?” The Huntsmaster was unimpressed. “The Hunt goes where it is drawn!”

He edged his mount forwards a step, and at his will, the other eight members of the Hunt, Huntsmen and Hounds alike, advanced with him.

Noir Rabe did not sigh in regret, only grimaced knowingly. How did she know? Damn Hags...

His taloned hand drew a silver crown, a circlet, set with five black jewels, out from the purse at his side. He placed it on his head, and the world changed.

The Huntsmaster’s eyes widened in sudden shock and fear when the golden eyes of Noir Rabe opened, for now he saw that he was the erlking’s prey!

Noir Rabe’s shriek as he drove forwards with leveled Spear was laden with the strength of the ancients. Or, as Sama would have put it, his +10 Favored Enemy bonus against Humans had been transformed to a bonus against the Fey, accentuating a Spirited Charge and One Strike. His Spear and Sword were Named, burning green and grey with soulfire, not throwaway Weapons like others of his kind wielded. His Armor was actually enchanted separately, not merely empowered by him wearing it. Essence seethed in the air, glowed in lines on his arms, in his Weapons, and unseen about him; Soul magic the Fey, and other erlkings, had never used...

Today, a King was on the hunt, and they were the Hunted... and he knew all about them...