Bia traveled North in a haze. She dimly noticed the walls of Akhar passing on her right and once the babble of people as she passed the western gate of the city. Long after dark, she dived into the shadows of the Old Wood and scrambled through the foreboding gloom. Strange roars and the groan of the trees drifted through the woods. It all passed unnoticed. Her focus was entirely consumed with the turmoil inside her mind. She slept when she could no longer rise and ate what she could find while walking - meager sustenance in her fugue state. All the while, the words of Myrkai whispered in the back of her head, He's dead…

While her mind tried to reason away the death of her master, her feet led her back to the beginning down the same trails she took to reach Akhar so recently and yet a lifetime ago. The trees of the northern wood bore silent witness to her quiet mumbling and occasional outburst. At the end of every denial and every self told lie, the facts of the situation would rear their ugly heads and to the echo of Myrkai's words, He's dead. Each time, her already battered fist slammed into yet another tree leaving a bloody mark.

The journey back to her village was almost 150 miles as the crow flies, but the winding trails of the forest added nearly half that to the journey. Bia's erratic path lengthened the journey even further with frequent stops and back tracking, yet her driving pace still managed to shorten the time. The journey which had taken the better part of two weeks when she first traveled to Akhar only required ten days for her to return back to the beginning to the grave of her master in the village of Tol'Sholen.

She knelt in front of his grave and touched her forehead to ground. "Master, I have failed," she whispered. As she rested, her mind drifted off between awake and nightmare, a cacophony of voices yelling at her. He's dead. Go! Climb! My Master. THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT! Her mind slipped into dreams where she by turns obeyed and fought her master and her old master. She killed him in some dreams or left him to die again. In other dreams, he punished her for her faithlessness and killed her in turn. Sometimes, she dreamed of dying. In her moments of lucidness, she realized she was dying of exposure and privation and it seemed just.

Myrkai had no idea it was so hard to track a crazy person. The Old Wood made him nervous and he tried to keep a low profile as he followed her path. Most of the time, she blazed an obvious trail straight through mud, brambles, and underbrush. Quite often Bia'Keres left bloody fist indents on the nearby trees like macabre trail markers. On the other hand, she would randomly backtrack, confusing the trail, or change direction contrary to logic or good sense. Worse, she would occasionally push through some really terrible terrain that he, in his sanity, didn't want to plunge into wildly.

After five days of travel, he felt he was actually catching up. That day, he went to cut ahead of her, avoiding some nasty brambles and rock scree, only to find that she hadn't come through to the other side of the terrain. At first, he thought he'd finally gotten ahead of her so he waited before canvassing the area anew. It wasn't until he admitted his mistake and tracked her path step by step into the heart of the thorns that he found out her path turned and broke out across a stream. It was so effective for losing him, he had to wonder if she did it on purpose. After that, making up the lost time was hard.

The woman traveled like a being possessed. He could tell she was living a fairy's diet of sunshine and dew, although she occasionally picked the most obvious of edible plants. His diet suffered just trying to keep up with her. She was traveling upwards of 20 hours a day and collapsing in place for a mere handful of hours before pushing forward again at the same berserk pace. Even though her travel wasn't the most efficient, he had a terrible time making up the distance. Initially, he had been about two days behind. After his gaffe tracking her through the briar, he had almost four days of travel to make up. So it was no surprise that he didn't catch up to her until she stopped.

Myrkai trudged out of the deep woods late on the twelfth day of the hardest travel of his life. The Old Wood behind him seemed happy to be rid of him and the shadows folded down almost like closing gates. Before him, a shallow dell sloped down to a back drop of sharp cliffs. The Continental Divide rose into the misty evening with no visible end. A handful of farmers fields and several thatched cottages represented the whole of this tiny settlement and Bia'Keres' footsteps led down the center street of the village.

"Excuse me, good farmer," Myrkai called out to a nearby farmer working in his field. The man glanced up just long enough to expose his toil hardened face before bending back to his task. "Excuse me," Myrkai repeated as he walked out into the field. The farmer seemed to realize he couldn't simply ignore Myrkai and raised his gaze. He leaned on his hoe while giving a grudging nod of recognition.

Myrkai performed a careful smile without exposing his fangs. "What is this village called?"

"Tol'Sholen," the farmer replied in a thickly accented voice.

"Tol'Sholen," Myrkai repeated not sure he'd heard correctly. The farmer merely gazed at him impassively. "Have you seen a young woman pass through here?" The farmer gave a grunt that could have meant anything but inclined his head deeper into the village in the direction Myrkai expected the trail to lead. Seeing that the conversation wasn't going very far, Myrkai once again gave a close lipped smile. "Thank you," he told the farmer before continuing on his way.

As Myrkai walked through the village he was met with a combination of curiosity and fear. This village was far from the beaten track and evidently self sufficient. The villagers peeked at him while pretending to keep up their tasks and a posse of small village children ranging in age from three to ten followed him through the village proper at a safe distance. Their whispers reached his keen hearing as they wondered what he was, where he was from, and why he was here. The stopped following him however as he left the far edge of the village and began to descend into a wide mouth cave.

Grass and moss blended together as he followed Bia'Keres' trail and the ever descending slope of the land until the immense stone of the cliff face above became a sloping roof that followed the contour of the ground downward. The cave was wide and shallow, so even the deepest part saw the light of day in the early morning, although it was very dark now. Myrkai's keen eyes picked a path downward and found a small fenced off graveyard with all the dead of the village from the time of its inception, perhaps two dozen souls. Each burial plot was part grave and part cairn with a simple stone engraved with the name and years of the person buried there.

At first, Myrkai thought he'd missed Bia'Keres somehow. The trail continued no further, yet he didn't immediately see her. It was only after he entered the cemetery and followed her trail almost to her feet that he saw her covered in her dark robe, curled over her knees before a grave slightly separate from the others.

"Bia'Keres," Myrkai called, but there was no response. He crouched next to her and felt her hands, but they were cold to the touch. Her brow was feverish and clammy while her body was so thin as to be almost transparent.

Swiftly, he picked her up and carried back to the village. He went to the first hut he reached and banged on the door. "Let me in, this woman is sick and needs care!" There was no response. This repeated as he banged on almost all the doors of the village. Finally, at the edge of the village off the beaten track, the door opened to his cries and knocking. A small bent old woman with white hair resembling a bird’s nest gestured him to lay Bia'Keres on a bed. The inside of the cottage was warm and thick with the smell of spices and herbs hung to dry from the ceiling.

"Ah, poor Nedorit again," mumbled the old woman. "You, cat, shoo. There is only one bed and you are not sick." Myrkai hesitated, but the old woman gently pushed him out the door. "I will see she doesn't die. See that you don't either," she said, once again shooing him on his way in a kindly manner.

So, in the late evening, Myrkai returned to the edge of the wood and set up camp, outside the bounds of the little village.

A week passed. The kindly old woman was called Bana, or Grandma Bana to the locals, and served the role of ambassador to the outside world, herbalist, and healer. Myrkai learned her name when next he came bearing gifts of wild game for the stew pot. The hunting in this part of the Old Wood was excellent, likely because this was practically the furthest place from civilization one could find. Whenever Myrkai had a successful hunt, he would visit the old woman's hut to share the meat and check on Bia'Keres' condition.

In the mean time, he learned from Bana some of the circumstances of Bia’Keres youth. Bia was raised here, the child of an unwanted pregnancy, by another village outcast, a strange old man called Astepta. Her youth apparently consisted of training and indoctrination of some kind. The villagers were mostly grateful that someone was taking care of the child formerly known as Nedorit, literally Unwanted in a local dialect. Astepta had died some time ago and Bia had left the village on some sort of holy quest. Myrkai couldn’t find out anything else of value.

Aside from speaking to Grandma Bana, Myrkai used the time to set up a permanent camp. After all this time, he still had the length of lever made from True Pearl. It made an effective club, but more importantly it would chip and shatter any weapon that met it in battle. In his downtime, he fashioned a comfortable leather grip for it and a good leather loop to hang it from his belt.

For the first week, everything seemed to be going well. The old woman, who never volunteered her name, spoon fed Bia'Keres and controlled her fever with herbs. Bia'Keres wasn't severely sick so much as she was starving and malnourished. Under the old woman's ministrations, she had rapidly improved.

This afternoon, however, things were different. As Myrkai approached the small cottage with a brace of hares, he heard the sounds of breaking pottery against the inside of the door. Tentatively, he knocked and the little old woman answered the door with soup in her hair and dumped down her shoulder.

"Is she awake?" Myrkai asked.

"You could say that," the old woman deadpanned. She took the hares from him and let him inside, he saw Bia'Keres on the bed, turned away from the room. The interior of the cottage was dim, but he could see her white shoulder peaking out above the covers.

"Bia'Keres?" he called. She pulled the cover up to hide herself further. He sighed quietly. "I was afraid of this."

The old woman leaned and spoke quietly for Myrkai's ears only. "Now that she's conscious, she's refusing to eat. Up till now, I thought she was breaking my dishes because of delirium. Now it seems she's been eating from delirium and breaking them in her right mind."

"I'll see if I can do anything," Myrkai said without much confidence.

Myrkai entered the cottage and sat on the edge of the tiny cot. Bia'Keres glanced his way and her eyes flashed angrily for a moment before she turned back to the wall.

Myrkai organized his thoughts as he attempted to broach the issue as obliquely as possible. "Have you ever heard the tale of the Final Hunt?” Bia’Keres predictably gave no response.

“When I was a kitten, I remember a hunting party that never came back. They were lost, every Bast of them,” Myrkai recalled. “Of course, I barely knew them, but the thought of death frightened and intrigued me. Already, I was being labeled dead this and dead that, due to my coloring.” Myrkai glanced at Bia and caught a flash of blue eyes.

“The elders told us the story of the Final Hunt.” Myrkai hummed in his throat as he tried to establish the cadence used by the old taletellers. He was no bard, but this was a story deserving of whatever skill he could grasp.

For every Bast the final gasp arrives

And takes thy path to Mora then

To hunt across the endless plains of Mora.

And good thou wert in life and hunt

Thy path shall lead to Immerens

Or hunt across the endless plains of Mora.

If ill thy path in life and hunt

Then down you fall to Rebus depths

Or hunt across the endless plains of Mora.

But none shall pass nor quick nor strong

Until the bitter Lethe bless

The hunt across the endless plains of Mora.

Then after ages lost and dark

Thy soul shall rise to Immerens

and end the hunt across the plains of Mora

Myrkai cleared his throat after the verse. “The elders always taught that this life is neither the beginning nor the end of the journey. Rather, life is an eternal cycle through birth to death across Mora until you are washed of your previous life in the great river Lethe and rise to Immerens to be born anew. There is more to the lay, of course, but I remember that bit to remind me that death is but a path to new beginnings. Perhaps, in another life, as they say?”

Myrkai was back and he was babbling again, Bia noted. She’d thought herself rid of the cat when he pronounced his sentence upon her master, yet here he was again. She listened to him droning on, badly, about the afterlife, referencing the plains of Mora. What he was saying did align with the teachings of her master, her first master, regarding the afterlife. No one reached the end quickly. It was a debate of scholars whether travels across Mora spent decades, centuries, or millennia in transit, but with no volunteers to go count paces in the afterlife, no one would ever see the end of that debate.

Decades! Bia suddenly latched onto that thought. Her master was dead, perhaps, but certainly still wandering the plains of Mora. More than a few legends alleged of ways to retrieve a soul from Mora and return it to the mortal realm. She knew of one that was more than merely legend.

“Perhaps, in another life, as they say?” Myrkai babbled. Bia grasped at those words.

Bia coughed, clearing a throat used too much for grief and gasping. “What if he didn’t have to stay dead?” She rasped.

“What?” Myrkai asked blankly.

“We can bring him back!” Bia felt new strength flooding through her limbs at the thought. Mere death wasn’t proper atonement. She had to make right what she had broken. She would raise him up from the dead and certainly then, she would be a worthy servant. She began to struggle to get out of the cot.

“Wait, how?” Myrkai easily pushed her back into bed, but he appeared to be listening. Bia suddenly recalled that he too was a follower of Ker’Haros. What’s more, his help could be valuable.

“The Wailing Tome, have you heard of it?” Bia confided hoarsely.

“I seem to remember it was a tool of necromancers and worse,” Myrkai hedged.

Bia waved away his concerns animatedly, “In the hands of fools, perhaps. Ker’Haros is its rightful master, too.”

“Too?”

“Like us, we are both followers of the Chosen of Death! Together, we can go get it and-“ Bia struggled to get up. She would leave right now and wash away her sins. Her atonement would be like she had never done any wrong.

“Wait, hold on,” Myrkai argued, easily keeping her weakened form prone in the cot. “You’re in no condition to travel across the countryside. This will be dangerous, right?”

Bia paused in her efforts, a slight flush rising to her cheeks. “Yes,” she admitted. “I, perhaps, I am not quite up to exploring a crypt.” She realized her current position, struggling with all her strength to rise in bed and being held in place easily by a single arm of the cat warrior. No, this would not do. She could not show her lord such an embarrassing sight were she to raise him from the dead.

Myrkai left the cottage severely conflicted. Bia’Keres mania was still as bad as ever, but at least she had latched onto a reason for living. Her intent to die in front of Astepta’s grave had been clear. If Myrkai hadn’t shown up, she probably would have succeeded, given the general helpfulness of the villagers here. The new plan didn’t fill him with optimism, however.

He sighed and resolved to keep doing what he could. When her body was healthier, it would be time enough for her mind to heal, hopefully. In any case, Bia had agreed to rest and recuperate for a few weeks before they set out for the location of the Wailing Tome. She hadn’t mentioned exactly where it was and Myrkai half hoped it was because she didn’t know where it was located. The longer it took to find it, the longer he could put off making a final decision as to whether his fealty to Ker’Haros included plundering necromantic tomes from crypts and defying the forces of life and death.