*Scene 01* – 00:00 (Writhing Waves)
The sinister silhouette tumbled, writhed and slithered toward us. A Lovecraftian nightmare, all too real and all too dangerous for us to ignore. We slowed our pace realizing that these things would be upon us in seconds and our weapons were woefully inadequate to defend us from the threat. We had to get out of the fog. We couldn’t fight what we could not see. The young Moon Sprites were angry and hungry. By whatever means of sensory function they had, we knew they would find us and savage us. Equipped with hard black beaks, clacking and snapping wildly, each creature could bite and torque, twisting off gobbets of flesh. These creatures worked in a frenzy, often causing victims to die from blood loss or shock, rather than from deeply wounded trauma. Their white and silver bodies made wet slapping noises as they surged through the fog, and we backed away, struggling not to lose balance, but they were coming upon us very fast.
“We’re gonna die!” I heard Mason say as he tried to turn and run.
On any other day, I would have agreed with him and made tracks, but the sight and thought of those creatures getting the upper hand, and Maeven bleeding to death and this mission ending here did not sit well with me. It made me angry and defiant. “Not today, we’re not!”
“What’re you gonna do?”
“You ever pole-vaulted?”
“On ice?!”
“We have the spear and a bow. Not much time and not much choice. We either move away and get caught in the fog, or toward them and over them. They’ll never expect it. We deal with the cow sprite, and then the children. Decide fast.”
“You’re putting this on me?!”
“Just asking you if you’ll join me in the attempt.”
They were almost upon us when I saw Mason nod and look me in the eye, “Let’s do this.”
I angled the point of the spear downward, just above the ice. I had hoped when we vaulted to drive the tip into the ice without busting through while simultaneously pulling my body weight up by grasping one of the leather throwing thongs at the back of the spear. We only needed to clear three feet in height and six feet in length. Not a particularly difficult vault but running on snow and ice made it that much more of a feat.
Maeven’s recurve longbow was more than just a projectile firing weapon. Its pointed wingtips where the woven string stretched tautly, called nocks, were capped with metal spurs, making the weapon versatile and useful as a brandishing weapon as well. Its thickly curved staff and strong wood made Mason’s vault attempt with the bow not as improbable as it might have seemed. The arced bows tapering from the grip to the upper and lower limbs were as thick as ram’s horns but vested with kinetic power. Mason held his bow at the ready, the metal-tipped nock poised to gouge the ice. Mason gripped the thick riser of the bow above the sight ready to pivot his weight over the bow.
The mad rush came almost at once. Mason and I drove our instruments into the ice sheet and lept forward.
A slush of ice and writhing white eels passed under us as we left our feet. Mason’s bow bent and it almost seemed as if it would give way, but its spring and power actually launched his body forward.
Much farther than I had expected.
Mason landed hard on the ice a good seven or eight feet, easily sliding past the last of the young Moon Sprites, but forward towards the waiting cow, sprawled at the base of the falls. Mason spun, freeing his bow tip from the ice gouge and rolling upward with one leg extended for balance and one knee on the ice for counterbalance.
My effort was not so graceful. The spear point jabbed into the ice, and I swung my legs forward, attempting to extend my reach as far as possible. The toe of my shoe caught one of the bounding Moon Sprites in an enthusiastic leap forward, kicking it spinning back towards its matron, snapping wildly at the air, before landing with a wet thud on the ice. My feet hit the ground not more than six inches from the tail of one of the straggler Moon Sprites, following the pack, and lunging forward to catch us.
Presently eyeless, yet with two flaring gill-like slits beyond the black beak, the one I missed stepping on, snapped from side to side, sensing motion and perceiving a scent of me somewhere close. The water from the falls had frozen in layers, creating a smooth, barely perceptible slope downward towards the river outlet at the far side of the lake. The momentum of these creatures drove them forward, and the slight slope encouraged their progress, albeit temporarily in the opposite direction of where Mason and I were now positioned.
Mason had drawn from his slung quiver, notched an arrow and let fly, piercing the hide of the cow sprite beyond.
My spear point had been driven into the ice, and partially punctured and splintered the ice sheet so that water poured out of the cut and fissure from beneath. One young and angry Moon Sprite wriggled to my left, barely visible beneath the fog. Ahead, the cow sprite, glared at me with angry, flashing eyes, the light from which was beginning to make me feel disoriented and slightly nauseous. These were working in concert, for the Moon Sprite adult threatened to make me swoon, while the young one slithered hungrily towards me, its short nostril slits flaring. I buckled to my knees, that strobing light pulsing into my temples until my head throbbed with pain. That little brat sprite would chew my cheeks out and crawl down my throat to eat me from the inside. A terrible thought, with the certainty of it, somehow planted into my brain and conveyed through those pulsing eyes of the adult. Pure black hatred and evil pulling me into despair and toward oblivion.
Mason saw me slump over onto the ice, saw the wriggling young Moon Sprite nearly upon me, and responded by putting an arrow right through a silver eye of the matron Moon Sprite adult, driving the shaft deep into its skull. The cow’s other eye fluttered, flashed once more, and then went completely black.
Something happened with the young Moon Sprite at that moment as well. It was almost on top of me when suddenly it paused. Its back arched and it whipped its head downward toward its matron, lying still on the ice, one eye jet black and opaque, the other eye gushing silver around the feathered shaft of a buried arrow.
My head buzzed with a ringing noise. Tinnitus that sounded insectile. My skin crawled and itched. As my head began to clear I realized I had fallen and there was at least one remaining Moon Sprite too close for me to be anywhere prone. I flailed for the honor sword, panicked when I could not find it, but then realized that the pulling to my left, indicated that the scabbard was beneath me and tugging on my belt. I rolled to my right, hoping that I was rolling away from the Moon Sprite, and groggily made my way to my knees. The Moon Sprite was still to my left, its head raised up on an arched neck, its nostrils flaring, and two darkening spots appearing upwards behind its clacking beak. Suddenly the darkening spots blinked, and reappeared, with the faint glow of silver on them. Eyes. The young one had just been given eyes with the death of its matron. I don’t know how I knew this, but I was certain of it. That little mouthy white slug was about to be able to see us.
But not if I could help it.
My hand found the hilt of the honor sword and I drew it forth with a metallic wring, catching the sash and winding it as quickly as I dared. The blade began to scintillate, and the foggy mists began to clear away from the blade, bringing that remaining Moon Sprite into relief.
I lunged with a sharp slash, partially cleaving its head from its body, sweeping it into the air like a limp dishrag.
And then we both heard it.
The sound of the other Moon Sprites turning back and heading our way. Wet slaps, splashing and screeching noises, clicking and clacking black beaks, falling upon one another to get back up the slope and tear us apart.
From the far-right and behind us, something else moved swiftly our way, with the sound a steel marble might make as it is rolled across the surface of a wooden table.
The Pearl.
Something was happening with the Pearl.
*Scene 02* – 00:00 (Scene Title)
*Scene 03* – 00:00 (The Pool of Bethseda)
Far across the lake, where our company of travelers waited along the shoreline, a mist was rising off the lakebed, making the progress of our fellow fighters difficult to discern. More and more of our companions were beginning to arm themselves, preparing to join us out on the ice.
Shadowed in dappled moonlight and mist, the travelers murmured as they scanned the frosty surface, noting a figuring growing more solid as it approached at a run.
Begglar stood along the shore leaning upon a quarterstaff with brass caps on the ends, serving as both a walking staff and a bludgeoning weapon. Begglar watched the approaching figure, noticing his gait and the shifting of its body weight as it ran toward them.
“It is a male,” he muttered under his breath.
“Dominic?” Nell asked, hopefully.
“T’isn’t he,” Begglar sighed.
Nell made a slight high-pitched but soft sound in her throat, revealing her degree of worry.
“Begglar!” the voice came between breathy panting ahead of the runner out of the rising mists.
“Aye!” Begglar hailed him, “Here lad!”
The figure came angling toward their location, catching his breath as the others reached for him and guided him up onto the shore. He sank down panting, clearly winded from the run through the frosts.
When he finally gathered himself together his first word caused them some puzzlement.
“Sugar,” he said, “Do you have any?”
Nell looked from the young man, up to Begglar who shrugged, and they squatted down to him, trying to understand the question.
“Why do ya want sugar, lad?”
“I need to know if you have any in the supplies. Christie asked for it. They’re bringing Maeven. She’s been hurt and Christie needed sugar for some reason.”
“Aye,” he nodded, rising back up with the staff to aid him, “I’ll see to it.”
“Tell us about the others, son,” Nell pressed, “O’Brian, James and Dominic, and the other boys. What’s happened to them. Are they coming?”
“Dominic and James are helping Christie to bring Maeven to shore. They should be here soon. They others…” he trailed off.
“Out with it, lad,” Nelled asked more urgently, “what’s happened to the others?”
“They’re still out there…fighting those weird creatures…,” he took in another ragged breath, “O’Brian and Mason went to find Will. He went off towards the falls. O’Brian told us to go on and attend to Maeven. There is a fifth one they went after.”
A young girl, Miray, by name, announced the approach of Christie, James, and Dominic carefully carrying Maeven, in an odd sort of way. “There they are!” she cried, almost weeping with joy to see their shadowy shapes emerge from the mist.
Three other men and four women rushed out to help gather them in towards the shore.
“We were so worried about you all,” one exclaimed. “What took you guys so long?” another asked.
“That was a foolish thing to do!” another groused. “Let us help you there,” another offered.
But Christie ignored them, attending to her patient, careful not to let the dressing become displaced, assisting Dominic to keep Maeven’s torso beneath the wound, bearing part of the load herself. As she came, she called out to Nell and Begglar, “She’s lost a lot of blood. Did you find the sugar? We need to start a fire quickly. I need the wood ash. The sugar will help but only to form a paste and some antiseptic benefit, but ash would work better.”
Begglar handed her a ceramic jar, with a metal clasp that he twisted open, as they lay Maeven down on a bed of grass near the bank. “Sugar,” he said, “I keep potash from the campfires also. I think it will suit your needs.”
He turned and headed back to the wagon.
Christie began to unpack Maeven’s wound and wipe some of the blood away from the edges of the gash. She gently shook the thick granules of sugar into the wound which dissolved into the pooling blood but caked a little along the descending edges forming a kind of viscous paste.
Maeven moaned and murmured something that was not quite intelligible, but Christie continued working to spread the sugary paste along the sides and edges of the wound, while the others, who could bear to looked on.
Begglar returned with the ashes in a wooden staved bucket with a wire handle and metal strip bands binding it together. He set the bucket down next to Christie, and put a metal scoop inside. Christie nodded to him and then scooped the ash, sprinkling it generously into the wound. James knelt beside her, holding Maeven’s hand, stroking her forehead to keep her calm. Christie smiled to herself, noticing James’ particular gentleness and attention towards Maeven. She wondered but said nothing. She busied herself with unfastening the tourniquet to see if her ministrations had made any difference. Maeven’s disorientation disturbed her and she hoped it did not signify that she had gone fully into hypovolemic shock. The white grayish ash in the wound reddened into a pinkish color but appeared to have staunched the bleeding for now. How much blood had she lost? One and a half liters, maybe two. Dangerous in either case.
Maeven muttered again, trying hard to say a word and strange phrase she had been repeating since they had lifted her off of the ice.
“Pulls. Take me.”
Christie and James had thought that Maeven was indicated that they were pulling her too hard as they were carrying her, but even now, laying upon the ground she kept groggily insisting with the repeated phrase, “Pulls. Take me. Siloam. Take me. Remember Bethseda.”
It didn’t make sense, but Nell bent down to hear her this time, holding her other hand.
“Pulls. Take me. Siloam. Bethseda.”
Something about those last two worlds seemed oddly familiar to her, and then Nell’s eyes widened.
“We’ve got to get her back out there.”
Christie jerked her head up, as did James and the others focusing on Nell.
“Didn’t you hear her?”
The others stared, blankly, the words seemed nonsensical but vaguely familiar as if they stood on the far edge of memory.
“Siloam. Bethseda. The healing pools under the waterfall.”
James’ jaw dropped. “Of course. Both were names of pools where figures in the story of the Ancient Texts received supernatural healing. The Pool of Siloam, where the One has sent a blind man to wash and receive his sight, by following instructions. The Pool of Bethseda, said to have been stirred by the angels of Heaven with remarkable healing properties.”
Begglar and Nell nodded and urged the others to assist them to bring Maeven back towards the wagon. On the underside, beneath the planked bed of the wagon, Begglar pulled two wooden staves outward and lowered a small sled bound to the underside down to the ground.
*Scene 04* – 00:00 (Scene Title)
*Scene 05* – 00:00 (Scene Title)
“What is this?” Christie queried.
“It is a sled, lassie,” he offered, as if that answered everything, “We all travel through snow country. Our buckboards come with a sled underneath in case we ever got stranded in impassable snow with supplies that we could not leave behind.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“Have ya naught been listenin’?” he shook his head in exasperation, “We’ve gotta take her back out there. The falls are frozen now. There’s finally a chance ta get inta tha Ghost Pools, after all these years.”
“What does that have to do with Maeven?! We’ve just got her to shore. I’ve treated her wound. She needs to rest and recover. We’re not taking her back out there. Those creatures on the ice nearly killed us. She doesn’t need to be in this!”
Begglar put his hands on his hips. Being of portly girth, it looked almost comical as he stood, glaring down at Christie, with her insistence, and he with his sureness that this idea of mystical pools offered Maeven something more than her medical expertise could offer. “Like it or no, lassie. Maeven’s requesting the Ghost Pools, and we’re deliverin’ her there. Ya can stand aside, or be goin’ with us, but we’re takin’ her there.”
Christie clenched and unclenched her fists, ready to smack Begglar into the forthcoming week, but she saw a determination in his eyes that she had not seen before now. Begglar had done everything she had asked of him. Produced the sugar, brought forth the ash, and she could not afford to resist him at this point, should Maeven get any worse. She had done all she knew to do. Maeven was now in the Hands of Providence, and Begglar and Nell, who had known Maeven far longer than she had, and had much more of a history to their friendship, deserved the chance to try to participate in saving Maeven as well, however, misguided it might seem to her. Perhaps Maeven could sleep on the sled as they dragged her back across the lake. At least she might cease straining herself if she felt they were taking action on her strange requests.
*Scene 06* – 00:00 (Scene Title)
*Scene 07* – 00:00 (Silver Sight)
Out on the surface of the lake, the four Moon Sprites hung slouched over the ice, slumped into the pockets where they had been slain. No silver mercurial blood splattered or marked their death. A gathering of frost encrusted their bodies, as the wind picked up over the surface of the lake. Their hoary heads, once full of writhing white tentacles with black beaks on the ends, were now devoid of those writing limbs. Marks of worm-like northern passages in the snow were rapidly covered and swept by the wind, erasing all traces of the trek of the surviving Moon Sprite brood.
Four adult Moon Sprites had perished in a semi-circular ring out on the lake, as they had moved in to kill the Manticore that had foolishly entered their waters. Now, these dead adults would be avenged by nearly sixty of their hellish progeny. All slithering silently under the lake mists towards the Falls.
Each of these new broods had something they had lacked while attached to their matrons in each nest. Eyes.
Each of these writhing, disgusting creatures now had an individual pair of flashing silver eyes that made their approach across the frozen lake look like the onrushing charges of a lightning storm.
Excavatia 