Interlude 1: The Mission, part 1

Four years ago.

Not even half a day into the Worldwound and we were already surrounded by demons.

Not a problem. A magical diamond spray from me took out a third of them, while Arueshalae’s bow killed one and wounded two more. The new recruit was doing well for herself. The remaining demons circled us cautiously, seeing our prowess, and a couple of them charged. A claw bounced off my armor and another was dodged by Arueshalae. Six seconds later and the two of us were alone once more.

“Not bad,” I said to Arueshalae. “But those were weak scouts. You’ll have to do better against babaus and invidiaks. Don’t you have any cold iron arrows?”

“Don’t worry, I can take care of myself. You should watch your own technique - you could’ve hit two more of them with that spell if you’d aimed it more carefully,” she smirked. “As for cold iron… I don’t like carrying it. Feels like a crutch.”

“This is a training mission, girl. Keeping tabs on how you actually perform in the field is the entire reason we were sent out here.”

We cleaned up our wounds and equipment, then marched a while longer in silence. This girl was getting on my nerves a bit, acting reckless, as if she wasn’t taking this mission seriously. She had come back with the Queen on one of her patrols last year and joined the crusade; nobody had heard of her before then, but she quickly became fairly popular in the group - particularly with Queen Galfrey. I saw the two of them spending a lot of time together… rather suspiciously, considering how busy the Queen is.

Arueshalae trained with the crusaders for a while and went out on a few field missions as part of a group; I was on a few of those and had gotten to know her pretty well. I liked her; she was fierce and brave, and fit in with the group, even though she never talked about her past. Eventually, she was finally judged to be ready to go out on her own… after one more test. She and I were sent out on a scouting mission alone so I could watch her in action and judge her abilities. So far, it was going well for her, though I’d never admit it.

“So tell me, Casimir,” she said after a while. “How does a tiefling end up as a holy Mendev crusader?”

I bristled; I hated this topic. “You’re thinking I was sent here as a criminal. Because that’s what all tieflings are like, right? We can’t just happen to be somewhere or be doing something like normal people.”

“No - gods, no. I was just curious, and you’re the only one I’ve seen here. I’m sorry, forget I brought it up.”

I sighed. “No, I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have snapped at you. I just get that question all the time, usually with worse intentions. This looks like a good place to rest and eat.”

We sat down on some rocks and lay down our weapons next to us. “I was raised here”, I began. “My mother’s name was Iris; she was a human cleric of Iomedae and a great crusader.”

“Oh,” Arueshalae said. Then after a pause, “Oh.”

“It’s not what you’re thinking. I was adopted. She found me in a cult’s den; they had been breeding themselves with demons trying to gain power. She and her team wiped out the cult, and in the bloodbath she found a baby. Well, she wasn’t going to kill the infant, so she took it in and raised it.”

“That’s actually really nice. Tell me more about your mother,” Arueshalae said with a smile as she took out some rations.

“She’s the one who trained me in the ways of Iomedae. She was hard but fair, as you’d expect a professional crusader to be.”

“Is she still alive?”

“I’m ninety years old, Arueshalae. She died over fifty years ago.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Now, what about your past? I never hear you talk about it. I barely know anything about you at all, in fact.”

She opened her mouth to speak, but before she could make a sound a shadow passed over her. Before either of us could react, a great purple monster that looked vulture-like swooped down and grabbed her in its talons, then started flying back up.

A vrock. Dammit. We let our guards down too much and didn’t notice it coming. This was bad, these things were tough. I’d fought them before, but always as part of a team; I didn’t know if I could save Arueshalae from it by myself. Still, as a paladin of Iomedae, I had to try. “Hold on!” I yelled as I cast a spell of flight on myself and took off after the vulture demon.

It was flying erratically, leaving a trail of green spores that made it hard to get close to it. I could blast it with a spell, but I’d risk hitting Arueshalae, so I needed to rely on my sword. I decided to just fly straight through the spores to the vrock, letting them do their damage; I could take it. I charged through the air at the vrock and my blade connected with one of its wings. In response, it shrieked in agony; the horrible sound stunned me for a moment and it attacked me, wounding me several times before flying upwards. I watched in horror as it dropped Arueshalae from its talons and she fell limply towards the ground.