“All human wisdom is contained in these two words - Wait and Hope”

- Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

The small stream meandered between the forested hilltops flanking its banks. The cold had frozen the whole surface save for a small gap where the rushing blue-grey waters frothing with foam glinted in the early morning sun.

“Mh. Looks like the Sleepy Green is not so sleepy this time of year.” Calvin mused.

“It’s mostly in the summer that he deserves that name.” The dark-haired girl- Kira, he reminded himself- spoke softly.

“And how do we get on the other side when we are avoiding the bridge?” Gina groused.

“Mh. My ice magic is somewhat unstable, but it's only a short hop, so….”

“I know a ford just upstream of here. Even with the ice breaking, it would only be knee-deep.” Kira’s eyes looked at Calvin cautiously.

“That seems like it would be a good idea. Let’s do it.” Calvin stood up decisively from where he had been kneeling.

The branches above were rustling in a sudden breeze, and just on the other side of the river, they could see the foundations of the old fort rising along the side of a rocky hill. As Calvin had learned, the main road curled around the sloping hill and reached the fort from the northern side opposite from the river, probably to avoid flooding. The sole bridge was guarded by a watchtower, thus not very suitable for a covert approach. Better not to arouse suspicion.

Traveling upstream, they soon reached an area where the stream spread across a giant slab of stone becoming broad and shallow in the process before falling in a series of waterfalls to then combine into the rapidly flowing waters they had seen at the fort.

Icicles hung thickly from the frozen granite, and Gina grinned in appreciation. “Now, that should be perfect for bathing in summer.”

“Shhh!” Kira hushed her with another look at Calvin.

“Oh, spoilsport…” Another look at her friend shut up the blonde troublemaker.

“I won’t rip your heads off just for talking.” Calvin sighed. “But I don’t blame you for being cautious. If you still have misgivings- And I would! Then you can go back to the last village, and I will even give you a few silvers for your discretion.”

“Dis...What’s that? Is it something dirty?” Gina asked suspiciously.

“Pff.” Calvin suppressed a laugh.

Kira sighed, “We won’t go. At least not now.”

The rushing waters filled the silence.

Ascending to the upper banks, they looked across the broken ice with gurgling water flowing between and beneath.

Calvin concentrated and spoke a complicated spell. Ice and snowflakes swirled up from the ground and formed into a silhouette of a small humanoid just two hand-spans high and perhaps a quarter that across. Never ceasing their dance, there was nevertheless the impression of a question.

“Form a path from here to the other side. Make it rough, please I don’t want to fall.” A second passed, two...then three. “Well, I know.” Calvin grabbed some bluish dust from a pouch at his side and sprinkled it liberally onto the creature. “There, satisfied?”

The figure vanished, and a line of light blossomed from their position to the opposite bank freezing everything in between.

“Let’s go; it will not hold forever.” Calvin nodded in thanks to the swirl of wind and snow before gingerly walking across, sliding once or twice.

“I wanna be a wizard when I get older.” Gina quietly confided to her friend. Kira seemed primarily apprehensive.

The crossing was uneventful, and they soon came to a neighboring hill overlooking the fort; crunching through the frozen snow, they ascended to the summit by a small game trail that Kira showed them.

“You are already proving to be an excellent addition. Thanks.” Calvin looked down on the fort and absentmindedly complimented the dark-haired girl.

The fort was shaped like a sharply pointed triangle with three large blockish towers rising above the walls made of broken rock. Many of the ramparts showed signs of recent repairs, and dark spots moved industriously between the remains of a large barracks and a building Calvin assumed had been a mess hall. There were dark lines imprinted on the ground in the area before the central building marking runes and spell circles. He squinted and strained his eyes, but the details were lost to distance.

“Mh. That looks like a summoning, perhaps?” Calvin mused. “Bad news if it is, but whatever for?”

“Like the snowflake you called?” Gina asked quietly.

“Something like that.”

“I will have to get closer and really take a look, but that will have to wait for nightfall. I recommend you two stay back, and we will meet back where we left the horse.”

Kira nodded, and shortly afterward, Gina sighed and shrugged.

The trek back to the logger's camp was silent. The Lieutenant was focused on the trail while their scout walked behind the group, sometimes completely lost in the shadows of the trees.

Alyssa gritted her teeth and walked with a lowered head thinking about what she had seen.

Asandria whispered, her hazy silhouette occasionally lit with a passing ray of light, ‘Three score trees and lives, hundreds of years of knowledge and magic snuffed out for a faster ship. Dryads are not sentient when they come into being. They coalesce out of the world's mana and then bond with a tree. After decades of growth, they awaken. It’s their fey nature that allows that or forces it- take your pick. They are curious beings without much malice, mischievous perhaps. Everything a humanoid does is interesting to them. They only know animals and trees for most of their existence. They become fully aware after a century or two, and if they grow old, they become wise and kind. Knowing no hardship and wanting nothing but new experiences or knowledge, they do not need to be greedy. They fight to defend their bonded trees, but they are not good at it. They manage well enough with their magics against common folk, but they have nothing but secrecy to protect them from a nation.’

“Are there any left?” Alyssa asked softly.

‘Yes. Out of those here in this wood, there will only be the one who came first. She who grew on the ley line node when there were no humans in this world. Her tree is still standing, but she must have fought and lost for her kin to die, so it is only a question of time until she too is killed.’

Talbert and Jeremy joked with the two sisters while Annabeth was silent and pensive. Mireille was silently fuming until Alea softly patted her arm.

Stepping through the last trees at the edge of the clearing, the logger's camp came into view. The foreman was arguing with two of his men near the strange cutting machines.

Alyssa looked at Butler One, who strode through the snow with fluid mechanical precision, and then her gaze drifted back to the rusted monstrosities. No comparison at all.

Lieutenant Philias hailed the foreman, Morten, and the two exchanged a few words as the students waited. Mireille stamped her feet and rubbed her hands, standing still in the open while the cold winds robbed her of warmth. She looked at Cyrus and then asked Alyssa, “How come Cyrus doesn’t freeze? He is thin and a reptile.”

“The book says it’s his blood; there is some fire magic in it even if he’s not a ‘true’ dragon.” The last was said with an apologetic look at her familiar.

Three of the men climbed the rungs welded to the side of the constructs and opened hatches at the side of the ‘cages’ before clambering inside. Arcs of arcane energy erupted from rents and tears in the bulky machinery accompanied by the grinding of gears, and after a few minutes of adjustment, the machines began to shuffle forward on their crablike appendages.

Calvin secured his gear and took a last look at the departing girl’s backs. “I hope I don’t have to chase the horse again.” Muttering under his breath, he gauged the amount of daylight left, nodded, and began to carefully descend toward the fort. They had rested for a while, and now the sun began its descent towards the distant horizon, hazy blue peaks only just visible began to shimmer in a pinkish hue.

When he reached the small ridge between the two hills, he walked parallel to the curving road making good use of the cover afforded by the scraggly trees and underbrush growing on the rocky terrain until he reached the walls of the fort.

Overhead a soldier shone his lantern into the deepening gloom and cursed before spitting – and just missing Calvin- over the side of the parapet.

A deep male voice grumbled, “Colder than a witch's arse.”

Another answered, “You would know.”

Coarse laughter sounded until it was interrupted by a hacking cough.

“Careful, it’s cold enough. The wind will cut your throat.”

“At least them corpses don’t stink as much. Remember last summer?”

“Bah, don’t make me remember. When Josef was drunk and fell on the pile, they were all mushy-like.”

A retching sound was followed by another sentence, “And then he caught the corpse plague and joined them.”

“Mh.”

“Still have some liquor left?”

“No, it’s all gone. We should’ve killed that merchant. He had some more, I’m sure of it!”

“Even when you cut his son? Do you think he still held out?”

Another glob of phlegm flew over the side of the wall. “’am sure of it. But the sergeant didn’t want to kill another one. Got into trouble over the others we done in. But now we don’t have any liquor left!”

“Shit times, shit times.” Commiserating with his partner, the light and the footsteps receded along the wall toward the next large tower.

Making sure that no one was near, Calvin whispered an incantation and rapidly ascended the wall before swiftly descending on the other side.

Dark shapes stacked like firewood in the corners of the courtyard rose above chest height. Some were covered with planks; most were snowed in. The stars and Ioreth the reddish moon shone from above, and the light glinted in frozen eyes, fell on hands and feet. Corpses new and old, mostly the latter, were piled on top of each other in several large mounds.

Grimacing, Calvin pressed a hand to his mouth to keep from vomiting. He was quietly thankful for the cold and the snow.

Several shambling figures walked out of an empty doorway. Behind them, he could just glimpse a passage sloping sharply downward.

The figures, five of them, grabbed corpses from the pile and began to drag them back the way they came.

The scraping and sliding sounds of the small procession faded away, and the night was silent again. A nightbird called in the distance, and a sudden wind rustled the forest's branches.

Calvin silently walked up to the massive runic circles spread over the center of the courtyard and began to inspect the writing. Cursing inside at his lack of knowledge regarding void and necromancy, he scratched his head.

“Taking a piss?” A voice sounded from the side, and Calvin tensed violently before taking a careful look. Two men stood beside the corpse pile, and then a soft hissing of liquid striking the wall accompanied by a bit of mist revealed their purpose.

“Couldn’t sleep with all the coughing going on.”

“Worst winter for dozens of years! The last time it’s said, a frost giant sorcerer made a great spell to punish a thief.”

“Perhaps I should’ve followed Jim to the big city.”

“You would only have ended in them factories, and the machines would’ve eaten you.”

“Bah, nonsense. It would’ve at least been warm.”

“Who couldn’t be bothered to cut some wood for the fire? Mh?”

Calvin’s rapidly beating heart became calm again, and he watched the two men enter the main building via a side door nearly hidden by drifts of snow.

Clouds drifted, and the moon shone more brightly, illuminating the inscriptions.

Tracing the runes and mumbling to himself, Calvin suddenly rose and looked at the ramp, ‘Call those who cannot sleep, call those whose hatred lies too deep, with blood and flesh and bone and grief, let them vent their rage to find relief.’

Cold sweat chilled his back, and his mouth became dry. There was no part of those circles that spoke of control.