O’Kairyn shoved Haryk away and turned to run, but the burning was quickly spreading through his body. O’Kairyn knew what this was. What he was stabbed with was a toxin. Imitari had learned to harvest and brew a special toxin that stunned and immobilized its prey. It was difficult to brew, but it was highly effective. They tried using it on the Ordin, but it required a significant dose to render one unconscious, though O’Kairyn couldn’t see why.

Already, he could feel it pumping through his blood, spreading quickly from the rapid beating of his heart. His vision blurred and the tips of his fingers were tingling. He barely made it ten steps before his knees gave out.

“Wha… what have you done?” O’Kairyn said, speech slurring. He tried clawing his way forward to get away from Haryk, but it was pointless. Voice tense and shaking, Haryk’s reply was simple.

“I had to protect my family. This was the only way they would let us live. I… I’m sorry.”

The world was consumed in darkness as O’Kairyn slipped into unconsciousness.

There were moments of blurred focus for him.

He could hear Haryk’s voice shouting, calling out to someone. It was soon followed by a sharp pinch and the sensation of weightlessness. There was another shout of surprise. No matter how much O’Kairyn struggled to open his eyes, they were too heavy. The toxin was still running rampant in his bloodstream.

O’Kairyn wasn’t sure how much time passed, but what he did know was enough to crush what fighting spirit he possessed.

Bars.

Harsh, metallic bars.

They were everywhere.

O’Kairyn’s vision was enveloped by these bars around him. Inscribed into the top and bottom of his prison were those dreaded sigils negating his Essevi. There was no need to look for the dagger at his back or in his boot. They were gone. He could feel it. He also felt a twinge and glanced hopelessly at his left arm, which was hanging limp at his side and deeply bruised from what he could see beneath his simple leather and cloth armor.

That must’ve been where they grabbed me. It would be the Spirits’ will if it weren’t broken.

What was more surprising was that O’Kairyn wasn’t alone in his cage. Haryk was also there with O’Kairyn, trapped behind bars. The once freed runner didn’t expect anything different. Did Haryk think he would be safe? Did he think the Ordin would just let him go when he had been so compliant? Obedient and willing to act as a lure was what Haryk had established himself as, and they would keep using him.

Poor soul.

If things were different, O’Kairyn might actually feel inclined to attack Haryk; however, if O’Kairyn was right, the energy wouldn’t be worth it.

Their end was undoubtedly soon. Why fight with what would undoubtedly be the last Imitari he would ever come into contact with?

O’Kairyn popped his ears and forced his body to stretch. Thankfully, it didn’t feel like anything was broken, not that it mattered. His shoulder was dislocated, yes, but that was the least of his worries.

O’Kairyn was known among the Ordin. He had made their lives a living misery by helping raid their “harvests,” and now his life was forfeit as exchange. He clenched and unclenched his jaw to keep the swelling, choking feeling in his throat from rising up. If this were to be his end, he wouldn’t go out a blubbering fool.

Unlike O’Kairyn, Haryk was shouting at the top of his lungs at what were undoubtedly their captors. Haryk spoke in Common rather than the language of the Imitari, which was Tarian.

“I thought I could trust you!” Haryk shouted over and over. “Let me go! Give my family back! You swore!”

The sounds of desperate shouting were, if anything, annoying. O’Kairyn glared at Haryk’s back before letting his shoulders slump.

“Will you stop that. Have some dignity,” O’Kairyn muttered in Tarian and not in Common, clearing his throat a couple of times after in hopes to disguise the emotion he didn’t want to slip out. Haryk looked back at O’Kairyn, terror in his eyes.

“I… you… you’re awake… p-pl-please… I… I only w-wanted to save my family. I’m sorry. You have to understand,” pleaded Haryk, now looking like a cornered animal.

“You don’t get it, do you?” sighed O’Kairyn. “They tricked you. Your family is already dead, rotting inside one of them while they parade around with their Essevi.” Haryk collapsed to his knees, letting out a hysterical cry.

“No! They can’t be! I saw them before…”

“Before you went to ransom me? That was probably the last time you were ever going to see them. Hope you made your good-bye a good one,” muttered O’Kairyn, still speaking in Tarian. Arms wrapped around his torso, Haryk could only shake his head over and over in disbelief.

“You… you’re lying!” he shouted as he lunged at O’Kairyn, who made no effort to stop the angry Imitari from grabbing the collar of his shirt. Unintimidated, O’Kairyn stared blankly into his attacker’s eyes.

“No, I’m not. I don’t lie. Unlike the Ordin, I have no reason to lie, and you know it.”

At this, they heard a spine-chilling sound.

Laughing.

Neither Imitari could stop their bodies from shuddering as they watched two male Ordin approach the cage, which was suspended in the air by a rope which was hung on a low-hanging branch.

“Getting friendly,” grinned one of the Ordin as he spoke in Common, a sneer crawling across his lips sadistically. “One last go around?”

O’Kairyn let a growl rise up in his own throat as he forced himself shakily to his feet. He barely had the strength to glare at one of his captors, but he knew he had to confront his fate. He had already accepted it after all, despite every desire to live.

“Shut up!” O’Kairyn spat in Common. His aggression made Haryk whimper and curl into a ball in the corner of the cage. O’Kairyn ignored this and continued staring into the massive brown eyes peering in at him. The cage had bars on all sides and left no place to hide; and the Ordin took advantage of there being no hiding place by reaching up and pressing their fingers on all sides to make Haryk cower. O’Kairyn, on the other hand, stood what little ground he could.

“Bold little one, aren’t you? I’d expect no less from O’Kairyn the courageous,” he stated as he pressed his thick, meaty finger against the bars. O’Kairyn shuddered, thinking about how those fingers would probably be one of the last things he felt squeezing around his body.

The pad of the Ordin’s finger alone was about the size of O’Kairyn’s head, which only sent more chills down the Imitari’s spine. “You’ll be a fun one, won’t you. You’re going to be mine all night.”

O’Kairyn’s heart was beating wildly in sheer panic. Provoking them would only mean more torment, but he needed to have what was, in his mind, the last word.

“You spineless, worthless lump. Get on with it! Or do you just talk big?” spat O’Kairyn in Common. The Ordin grinned and chuckled, sharing a glance with their companion, before walking away back toward a wooden cart pulled by many horses. O’Kairyn continued to glare at them, refusing to break away until he was sure they wouldn’t see him fall to his knees.

O’Kairyn’s breathing was shallow as his mind ran rampant, but thankfully his features didn’t give him away. Haryk, on the other hand, whimpered and curled in on himself, looking to O’Kairyn after a minute of muttering to himself.

“What are we going to do?” he asked in Tarian finally, swallowing dryly. O’Kairyn let his body slump while his eyes latched onto the etchings and sigils that helped seal him into this cage and disconnect him from his Essevi. O’Kairyn’s mind would have stayed on those etchings if it had not picked up on some other word – we.

“We.” He said to himself in their language, not even looking at Haryk. “‘We’ implies a group of two or more.”

“That’s… that’s what we are though… right?” asked Haryk.

“No. There is no ‘we’. You gave that up when you surrendered yourself and sabotaged me, getting me captured,” sighed O’Kairyn. The defeat was obvious in his voice, and he wasn’t trying to disguise it.

“But… you… you’re O’Kairyn the courageous. You’ve evaded and fought a dozen Ordin at once. You’ve smuggled hundreds of Imitari to safety. You’ve had to have some kind of…”

“Escape plan?” finished O’Kairyn, letting his frustration and anger well up in him, straining his voice. “Yes, but it was always contingent on me being free. I have no Essevi, so my connection is severed. I have no weapons; you saw to that. The only thing I have is you, and that isn’t much. Titles and names mean nothing in the end.”

Haryk, hyperventilating, could only clutch either side of his head and let the tears stream down his face.

“So… we… everything… there’s nothing we can do?” asked Haryk.

O’Kairyn thought hard about the question as his life flashed before his eyes. He remembered his older sister and younger brother. He had fond memories of growing up in the Cromirth, their own small town hiding in the leaves of the trees. It felt like paradise – an escape and a sanctuary. O’Kairyn also remembered the flames and the screams of his friends and other relatives, begging him to save them or to run and not watch what was about to happen.

If only he had listened.

He did stay.

He started enacting a plan to free them all, but not before witnessing the Ordin’s form of torture to the Imitari.

It was… unspeakable…

O’Kairyn knew in his heart this was his fate too.

But…

It didn’t have to be…

“There’s nothing I can do, but there is something you can do,” said O’Kairyn, clenching his fist so tight his wound began to bleed. Haryk looked up at him eagerly.

“Yes? What is it? I-I-I’ll do anything,” Haryk stammered.

With a deadpan stare, O’Kairyn looked Haryk in the eye and said two simple words.

“Kill me.”

Haryk looked absolutely mortified.

“W-w-what?”

“You heard me,” O’Kairyn said, turning toward Haryk. “Be honest with yourself and with me. They don’t know you from any other Imitari. Your death will be comparatively quick and painless unless they plan on using you again as bait for other runners like me. On the other hand, they know who I am. They know I have information they need to find our trails, and they won’t kill me until… Well… When they realize I won’t talk, I can at least hope my end comes swiftly.”

“W… No. N-n-no I… I can’t!” Haryk pleaded. “There must be something else.” O’Kairyn glanced over at his fellow Imitari with the same pleading eyes. His heart ached with the thought, but what other choice was there? Endure the fate to come?

“Please,” O’Kairyn said softly. “You put me in here. You resigned me to this fate. The least you could do for me is keep them from desecrating what will be left me. Haryk, lives are at stake. Imitari lives are at stake. If I break for whatever reason, the lives of runners and those they’re protecting are in danger. If you have a shred of dignity left… you’ll do this one thing for me.”

Haryk, hands clutched on either side of his head, shook violently as the severity of what O’Kairyn was asking of him set in. His head shook from side to side, unwilling to accept what was inevitably going to happen. O’Kairyn knew the look. It was the same look he saw in himself every time he left his home to fulfill his personal, moral duty of protecting other Imitari. O’Kairyn turned his body, clutching his injured arm close to his torso.

“Haryk,” O’Kairyn implored. “I’ve seen what the Ordin will do to me. My arm, here, is a fraction of what is to come. Please… don’t make me endure that too.”

The two Imitari shared a look, just a single look. It was one of finality and acceptance.

Haryk forced himself to his feet and stepped up behind O’Kairyn.

“A-a-re y-you…”

“Yes. Just… make it quick. If they see, they’ll stop you,” stated O’Kairyn stiffly. Haryk’s arm wrapped around his neck. Every impulse in O’Kairyn’s body screamed to fight. It was like his body had gained a mind of its own and began to tremble. Still, O’Kairyn mentally remained resolved and even managed a simple, “Thank you.”

The pressure around his neck began to increase. It was getting hard to breathe. O’Kairyn could sense Haryk hesitating…

But…

In that moment…

He was glad he did…

~~~^*^*^~~~

At that very moment, there was an ear shattering crack as if lightning struck directly from the heavens into the clearing; and, in a way, it did.

A searing, grey light shot out from the distant trees and set a crate of supplies ablaze, practically shattering the wood on impact. Both Ordin and Imitari jumped at the sudden attack, rising instinctually to their feet to face this unknown individual and their show of strength.

The two Ordin who had come to torment Haryk and O’Kairyn were the first to approach the flames, which were grey and burning with an unparalleled ferocity to any field fire they had witnessed.

“What do you suppo-” The first didn’t have time to finish his sentence because, in the same moment, a secondary flash burst through the darkened forest and began to burn him. He howled in pain and, in a blind panic, ran for the river.

Other Ordin turned and looked to the trees, now prepared for an attack. The second who had tormented the two caged Imitari stormed over and seized the bottom of the cage. In the meantime, Haryk had relinquished his grip on O’Kairyn’s neck while O’Kairyn had pushed himself to his feet. The cage beneath them jolted and they collided harshly against the metal bars.

“Where are your little friends hiding, huh?” he shouted in Common, making both Imitari wince and shy away from the booming voice. The other Ordin yelled at the top of their lungs and charged into the woods, swinging their weapons wildly high and low in hopes of revealing the Imitari responsible.

“Th-ther-re sho-shouldn’t be anyone e-else,” stammered Haryk. The Ordin’s dark brown eye squinted in suspicion. Another crackling bolt of flame flew past the Ordin in the woods and, this time, hit the cart with their precious “harvest.” In moments, the flames had engulfed the entire cart and ate through the ropes tethering the horses to it.

The Ordin cursed and charged after the horses, obviously seeing there was no saving the cart or their quarry inside. Despite their retreat, the onslaught didn’t cease. Three more grey bolts of flame shot from the depths of the forest and ensnared their prey, making the Ordin collapse and writhe as the flames ate away at their flesh.

Haryk, seeing this, screamed and clutched the edges of the bars. His family, every single one, was probably in that cart if they weren’t gone already. He sank to his knees in utter defeat as the Ordin who was holding onto their cage spat and stood his ground.

O’Kairyn, on the other hand, stayed kneeled on the base of the cage in awe.

Was this really happening? O’Kairyn didn’t know. What he did know rested in he saw moments later after three more blazing grey lights bolted from the forest to the remaining three Ordin who thought they had a prayer of escape.