KORIK

‘They have taken another refuge from me. Those great monsters that slither forth from the shadows of night. Who crumble to earthen dust under the scorching light of day. I will not let them ever take another.’

— Korik, “Refuge” They Come at Night

«Wait until dawn and then run! You run until it hurts and then you keep running!»

«You have to live, Korik!» 

«KORIK!»

Her last words cut through everything like a blade.

Mamma…

I wake in a violent desperate struggle to reach the light. Gasping for air like I had been fighting a battle to the death for it.

But waking is no refuge. This bed isn’t mine—it’s got far too much give to it. And the ceiling overhead is too bright and…moving. 

Where am I? What is this place?

I scan my surroundings in quick darting flicks of my eyes. I’m in a large tent filled with cot after cot of others in various states of injury. 

I try to push myself up into a sitting position, and immediately regret it. 

“Ahh!” I flinch in pain and throw my weight off my palm as fast as dragokinly possible. 

 I’ve wounded myself somehow, but how? I lift my hand for a better look. The shape of the berry-colored bruise on my palm is unmistakable. I suddenly can’t breathe.

Where is it?! It was in my hand when I—

A familiar weight thumps against my breastbone as I start to shift about in a panic.

My hand goes to it immediately, fingers tracing the carving of the Great Scaled Mother over and over again until my pulse begins to slow. 

It’s still here. I didn’t lose it. Thank the Stars.

But how did it get back ‘round my neck?

My eyes drift down to my pendant which now hangs from a thin braided pearlescent cord. I lift it, running the braided cord back and forth between my finger and thumb.

This cord it’s…just like the ones on that sword Hal keeps under his bed. The one he thinks I know nothing about.

The one he had beside him when he was on his knees before the elder—

My forehead throbs with a blinding stab of pain and I drop my pendant to clutch it.

It hurts—it hurts so much. My head feels like it’s splitting open like a piece of overly ripe fruit. 

“Ughhh!” I cry out and make a futile attempt to run away from my own body. To push away from myself until everything stops. 

When I open my eyes again I find myself stumbling barefoot through the wreckage of what was once Ditchwater village. Not a single structure remains whole and unmolested. They’ve ruined it all.

I stagger onward through the muddy paths of an encampment born of tents and poached remnants of my former village, searching every face for familiarity. Trying to force my mind to lead me through the muddled events of the wurm attack. 

What happened after I came back into our room? What happened to Halden? He was on his knees. The elder lindwurm was opening its maw and…and… 

The pain in my head is so sudden and sharp that I all but walk full-on into three knights from the Wurm Wood garrison.

I hit the sodden earth only a heartbeat before I lose hold on the contents of my stomach.  

“The hells?” one knight growls in disgust.  

“Poor little fledgling. Must have been terrified,” someone comments in a pitying voice as they move around us in the muddy makeshift street.

“Can you blame ‘em? The whole village was massacred. Only a dozen or so made it out alive.”

The three Wurm Garrison knights give me an uneasy look before continuing on their way.

“But like I was saying they made the mistake in Ditchwater of thinking the elder wurm was dead when it was only knocked out cold,” the knight recounts to the other two. “Unlucky bastards paid the ultimate price.”

And as I watch them depart, a trail of blood starts to snake its way down along the side of my nose until it reaches the crest of my upper lip. 

I remember now what happened. What I did when I came back into our room. How we escaped that elder wurm.

I push myself to my feet. It’s started to rain and people are scurrying for shelter like rats. But I’m tired of running. From Gunther. From the lindwurms. From everything!

They have taken another refuge from me. Those great monsters that slither forth from the shadows of night. Who crumble to earthen dust under the scorching light of day.

I will not let them ever take another.

As refugees and patrols, knights and citizens flee to the relative shelter offered by this canvas village I make my way to the tent at the end of the muddy path.

The door flap has been lashed to forever stay open as if to give no one reason to lose their nerve and turn away. And so I enter the recruitment tent and walk right up to the table.

“I am here to volunteer for service.”

NOTE: dialogue in Guillemets— sideways double chevrons « and » —are in a language other than Dragotic the common Dragokin tongue.

Did Korik just draft himself into the war?! And how did he save them from that elder lindwurm? And where the hells is Halden?

What’s gonna happen next? Find out in the next episode of They Come at Night!