One after another the four Javhir and the Heir of Dumar climbed over a large fallen tree, its horizontal posture so large it rose to hip height for Olson and Aelina. Glass clinked in Brutus' bag as he jostled across the bark. Aelina wore a kafari slung over her back, intricate carvings on the dark wooden instrument. Last of them was Celine of Dumar who all but floated across the fallen arbor.

The sharp breeze cut between the bespoke uniforms of the Javhir. Sweeping and tender fabrics layed over the tailored uniforms. While each was white, the details varied for each one – Ymos with peat colouring, Aelina with carmine, Brutus with plum and Olson with sapphire.

Celine had been quiet all morning, keeping to her promise of silent supervision. Instead, simple songs of nearby birds melodied across the leaves of dark green needles. Thin shimmerings of the sun dotted the underbrush of the canopy.

Every couple of steps Ymos bent over and slipped leaves from the stems. His pencil scribbled down descriptions of environment, and colouring. Then, like clockwork he’d pop it into Brutus’ lumbering bag.

Cedar roofs began to peek out from between the amber-coloured trees, revealing piqued homes at the outskirts of the village of Pondbell.

The five slipped onto the pebble path towards the village which was smaller than he had remembered it. The homes were slightly disheveled with winding vines and agriculture beginning to overflow upon the architecture. Despite this, Pondbell lived up to its name as between each abode, a circular pond blessed the landscape. Mist from a nearby waterfall heavied the air and tossed a static-like hiss across the area.

As soon as presence of the Heir of Dumar was processed the citizens' eyes went wide with fear, children were pushed behind the backs of their parents. The once bustling market came to a gasping halt. A fearful unease suddenly swept through every doorframe and window of the village, leaving them in a choking silence.

Tearing a glance to her, mirroring the glimpses of Aelina and Brutus, Ymos found that she had no reaction. Her wooden mask and body language betrayed nothing to her true feelings. Her steps did not falter, and her gaze did not shift.

The group continued onwards until they came upon the precipice of a medium-sized but detail-oriented house. Its columns were carved with red ochre pressed into the wood. An attendant wearing a plain and flowing beige shawl. He greeted them by knocking on the large door twice before heaving it open.

Inside, the chief's home was decorated with similarly inscribed columns, although a dark blue pigment had instead been slipped between the engravings. Betwixt each column, a silk painting hung, each were quite delicate and shifted as the gusts of air from the exteriour sailed into the great house with the entrance of the Javhir.

The chief, adorned with a fiery red feather headdress slowly brought up his head to attend to his guests. His quill clattered harshly as he processed them, but before long he painted on a teeth-filled smile and pressed forward.

“Chief Adnaan.” Olson greeted, pressing a firm hand into the middle-aged mans'.

“Welcome esteemed Javhir. What has brought you to my humble Pondbell?” The four stood

“We come to document further your sick and your dead. How ahs the quarantine and precautions aided in slowing the illnesses' rampage?” Ymos questioned, beginning to press his quill to a small pad of bamboo paper.

“Ah, yes. The quarantine. It has gone spendidly.” He threw a glance to the surrounding attendants who gave a round of short nods, “We have had no dead since you last ventured here. And how was the trip? I do hope it was not too taxing.”

Aelina's eyes narrowed. Ymos scribbled and did not look up as he spoke although he smiled , “I am so glad to hear this! Hav

“Wonderfully they have! So well in fact, we have none left.” His bearlike eyes did not squint as he smiled.

Just as Ymos went to reach into his satchel, Aelina stepped forward. She began to mimic the pace of Chief Adnaan. “Quite a bustling market you have, and yet, many of your once growing homes have darkened with emptiness.”

He swallowed with great stuttering. “There is great migration in these times. But my market is of course, only full of the citizens of Pondbell.” He began to pace once more, making Brutus and Olson share a weary look.

Ymos' voice softened, “Has something gone wrong? Chief Adnaan, tell us we are here to help.”

“No! No! Everything is quite alright, thank you for your concern. We do not need the High Javhir to get involved with our small village.

“Tell us.” Olson demanded, and when the chief gave him nothing, he questioned the attendants who only gazed upon their feet with great study. “Please.”

A tense quiet settled through the rectangular room.

Aelina gestured for them to talk, moving closer to the main door she spoke authoritatively, “If he will not tell us, we will need to fan out and investigate the area ourselves. Whatever we find, Brutus, you will tell the All-Father, he likes you best. It will soften the blow.” A thin veil of blush settled over the gentle giants' dark cheeks.

“Sound good?” She finished. They all nodded in unison.

Just as the group began to take a step away from each other, a sigh emanated from the back of the room. Celine leaned against a column, watching the scene with an immense amount of ennui.

“This is your fault!” He snarled with a sudden violence and started his pace towards the Heir, “Your mere presence has damned my village to death!” Instead of bored, she looked intrigued, her head dipped down and then up once more in a horrifying analysis.

Her tone was clear and did not demand, “Tell them.”

Perhaps he thought he could ignore her long enough that she might get bored and give up. Or perhaps in some egotistical way he thought she lacked the power to truly make him divulge. His internal prayers were soon dismissed as her this flash of violence stabbed out from beneath her skin. A ripping, snarling thing. Her shoulders set back in attention, like a predator beginning its hunt. Her hands, which had once been linked at the small of her back had been brought before her stomach.

Anger contorted her body like a writhing animal which had just been impaled by an arrow. It slithered as invisible strings were tethered and woven. Then she stopped. Her thin fingers the only movement in the room. They twisted and cracked like every bone was nothing but fragments beneath the skin. She wrote an invisible ballad in the air before they dropped once more.

And Chief Adnaan's eyes began to twist into the back of his head. His body seized, his jaw agape, bearing even his molars to the Javhir. Groans emanated from his chest. One could tell that behind those eyes he was seeing something, his body twitched and slammed into itself. His headdress toppled from the crown of his head and trickled to the floor.

He began to cry. A thin dot of light illuminated his eyes and pearly tears dripped down his gaunt cheeks. He looked like a child, a face which begged for his mother. Ymos ran over, “Stop! Stop!” Before he could seize her hands, his body was immobilized, every muscle suddenly tensed.

Moments passed before, like the unthreading of a sewing needle, both men were let go. Ymos stumbled backwards.

The chief fell to his knees, “I did not close my gates! I have not halted trade! Many of my people are dead!” He sobbed into the floorboards, a ghastly wail. “I am sorry! I am sorry!”

Last night, among the stars, Ymos had momentarily forgotten the throne of Dumar, the power that came with this Kingdom. The overhwelming strength they wrought onto their enemies. This was not last night. He could all but see the crown atop the Heir's head.

His gaze lingered on her for a second afterwards. “What?” Celine of Dumar said with a bored tone which quickly grew and transformed into a snarling bite, “Have I begun to terrify?” But her body had been brought back to a state of boredom and silence. Her hands retangled at the small of her back, as though nothing had transpired.

One of the chief's attendants helped him to his weakened feet, the other placed the wilted headdress back upon him. He looked exhausted and weary, as though he had lived one thousand deaths.

“Show us.” Brutus’ soft tone raising into a demand. Without another word the Chief lead them through winding hallways in the back of the great house until they were lead into the blinding sunlight which traipsed upon an open field.

It was the smell that first seized them. First sweet then sharp. It became overhwelming. The sunlight quickly felt brittle and freezing. Ymos felt bile creeping up his esophagus.

“These are our dead.” The pit was deep, large and circular in nature. Bodies of various stages of decomposition were layered upon one another without much care. Bubbling torsos and pools of dried blood soaking into the Brutus gave a prayer which was carried upon the wind to his other Javhir.

“You have put every single citizen of Pondbell and Dumar alike in danger with your actions.” Aelina scolded.

Celine of Dumar stood at the edge of the pit looking down upon the bodies. She then stepped backwards, her left shoulder only millimetres from the Chief's right shoulder which still trembled. Her head dipped slightly, part of her demon-painted face becoming obscured in the shared shadow.

The Chief scurried off.

They took stock of the dead. A brutalizing act, counting the dead. Noting the details of their decomposition.

Ymos jotted down the finalities of his notes, breathing a heavy sigh which wrinkled his chest, “And where are your sick?”

“This way.” An attendant pointed.

Pulling back the curtain of the shack, a frail man sat at the edge of a bed. He wore an outfit of soft green, complementing the viridescence of his wrinkled eyes. His body stiffened upon seeing the Javhir. He pulled at the skin of his fingers which lay in his thin lap.

“Good day, “Ymos greeted, attempting to be far more jovial than he felt. That putrid scient and acidic bile still lingered in his senses, “My name is Ymos of Tyria. How may I call you?”

“Horus of Pondbell.”

“It is nice to meet you Horus.”

“You as well.”

“Your chief tells me you have the signs and symptoms of the illness? The rash, sores and cough?” They had yet to give it a name. Names were a powerful thing in Dumar. The Javhir feared that upon designating it a name, they might damn themselves.

Horus pulled back his sleeves, his hands were bony and calloused but it was his forearms and elbows which were covered with a crimson rash. “My legs are similar. The cough gets worse every day.” Ymos steadied himself on a slightly concave stool.

“What sort of work do you do?”

“I am a woodworker, a carver by trade. Although more and more I find myself becoming a farmer. My daughter and son do it you see, harvesting is such a labour. I try to do my best to help.”

“You are a very good father. Your sores can be aided in the meantime with this. It is an herbal mixture to be applied twice a day until it is gone. Is there anything else which ails you?”

“It has little to do with the spreading disease.”

Ymos shook his head, “That is of no matter, I am here to aid you in any way I can.”

“It is my ankle you see.” Horus’ nimble fingers tugged at his flowing fibers to reveal a bulbous ankle with small, nucleated pustules surrounding it. Ymos bent over and began inspecting the man’s ankle as Horus described, “It has been here for years now. It comes and goes in flares and only hurts when it brushes against my fabrics or in the fields. Other than that, it does not hurt, but-.”

The man halted speaking, forcing Ymos to look up from his work. Celine of Dumar stood in the doorway. The empty eyes of her mask sent his skin into an uneasy prickle. He tried to return to his work and continue, but the man fell into a gulping disquiet before spluttering a mucus-filled cough.

“Disregard my presence,” She told the man, gazing at him with a Demon’s painted face, “I am simply here to observe.”

“My heir,” Ymos placated, “Might you step outside as I conduct my examination? It is private after all.” Her head tilted to the side as though she did not quite understand. The action left the three of them still before she finally disappeared outside once more. Leaving the curtain flipping with the soft wind.

He sighed with relief, this was the early stages he believed, it could be managed.

He was frustrated with her presence. With the horror she had done earlier. As well as, in all honesty, he was frustrated with his lack of progress with this disease. With his own academic inadequacies. Ymos culled a thin and small bottle from his bag, Toreen’ was a pallid tincture manufactured from the natural herbs in the region. He dabbed a few drops onto a stitched cloth.

Horus sighed with momentarily relief as he pressed the medicine across his dark skin. “I am sorry about the pain you are experiencing. We are working day and night.” Before the man could disagree, Ymos pressed the bottle and cloth into his aged hands.

Horus’ viridescent eyes softened, revealing an amalgamation of wonderfully worn crows’ eye wrinkles at the edges. “You do the Gods well, my son. It must not be an easy task this. I thank you for your aid.

Ymos returned a sweet smile and tried not to show the prickling teardrops. “You as well, Horus, your dedication to your people and land is not unnoticed. Do not hesitate to call upon the Javhir should you need additional medicine or even an ear to perch upon.”