Shienvien

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Sir Yanin Glade (and Jordan Forthey and Madara)

The male deigan was insistent the riders were not a threat even before they dismounted. Where from that certainty? Even if not conspired, several hostile parties could very well be in one place at the same time. Opportunism. Pick off the stragglers, claim whatever was advantageous, and most people would be none the wiser.
Most people here, at least those who reacted to the summons, were at least somewhat opportunistic. It would have been surprising enough if something like this hadn't already happened before.
Water. Lightning. Yanin simply nodded, sharply, still more focused on any motion that could be detected from the manor grounds, even as Lhirinthyl had made it head, and in a personal-space-defying manner that seemed characteristic to him, started questioning the first guy near the gate. One could only assume that much like the dead fellow in the Fadewatcher station, this one was one of Lady Bor's men.
A short distance back, there were two more humans - apparently domestic staff rather than fighters - and who was no doubt Lady Bor herself. Contrary to the fears of the watchmen back in the guardhouse, she looked to be doing just fine for herself, getting up there in age or not.
He himself was going to let the two other newcomers explain themselves before proceeding, however. The older rider, one-eyed and face more scar than skin, dismounted and took his time replying. The younger guy seemed to be looking from Yanin to his fellow rider - at least judging by the slight back-and forth notching of his head from the two being on opposite sides of one another. Neither of the two had visible sclerae or irides. Nightwalkers, then.
“Freagon, of the Knights of the Will,” the older nightwalker finally said. “The boy is my page. We're here to help.”
Yanin's helmet, being a helmet, quite fittingly had no expression to note, even though there was a good two-second beat. So it was that guy. His claims didn't make sense, but with him displaying equipment that would have made him well set for life if he ever wanted to put down his job, there was hardly any confusing him with any other contenders. The title itself, though? With no one to trulycontest him, the older nightwalker could have simply given it to himself. Not that Yanin couldn't understand the motivation. Titles were useful.
"Sir Yanin Glade," he simply stated. "Lieutenant of Fadewatchers." And promptly seemed to lose all interest in the nightwalkers for the time being, physically turning his attention to the manor, and tangentially to two deigan and the penin, instead.

"Jordan Forthey, squire of the Glades," Jordan offered next to and behind him, looking from Freagon to the "boy" who had not even been bothered to be named. Looked to be around his age, despite, apparently, only being a page still. And both of them were older than when Sir Yanin had been when knighted, although he was admittedly a bit of a special case. He shrugged. "Also a Fadewatcher, as of two years ago."

The others were busy requesting the manor inhabitants for more info, albeit in a rather verbose manner to contrast Yanin's own, rather terse manner of requesting information. It was only wonder people weren't more impatient than they appeared. Or perhaps the residents just hid it too well for Yanin to recognize it wt the best of his ability. Most likely the latter.
How many there were, who or what they were, what could they do... Probably a bit much to ask for the internal outlay of the building at this stage. They'd have to see as they go. Other questions, the two deigan mostly covered. Wraiths - at least four of them, perhaps uncontrolled, though no apparent magic. Yanin took a closer look at the - apparently steel - spear he was looking, and visibly scoffed. Seven guests, including the Melenian summoner and three overactive vigilantes.
"Not the first time?" he said at Irah, in a lowered tone. And, turning his head, mostly at Jordan, though equally loud and clear for anyone else who bothered to listen. "You use iron - the purer the better. Or magic." Much more pragmatic than simply announcing that he had heard about wraiths.

"Is summoning not illegal in Melenia or something?" Jordan asked, brow furrowed. A more socially adept individual might have inferred that is was a mostly rhetorical question rather than one he actually needed an answer to right then an there. Just ... sheer incredulousness at someone being dumb enough to just tell a room full of strangers that you were a summoner in a place were summoning most definitely was illegal.

The dark-skinned individual moved closer, the deep-red eyes looking from one to another as she urged each of them to hurry on before the wraiths could do even more damage. Now that he could see her up close, rather than through the slits of his visor and from more than hundred meters away with both of them running each in their own vaguely converging direction, it was also evident that the ears poking through her hair were long and pointed. Not human, then. Not that it mattered much at this time.
"Are you a fire elementalist?" he inquired, even as he tilted his head to observe the manor's iron fence. "And you're right. We can talk later. If someone has any iron at hand to spare, speak up. If anyone has not prepared something that might convince the wraiths to disperse, do so now. Wraiths can look like anything, as far as I know."
The manor looked still, deceptively peaceful. Door closed. No one close enough to windows to be seen. They'd probably have to breach again.
If no one had anything to offer, he began making his way toward the manor, , Jordan following him, wary and always keeping to the side of the door, keeping his attention divided on all of his surroundings with an almost inhuman diligence. As much as he lacked in making sense of the minute - and not so minute - details of humanoid expressions and intonations, he could notice many other details others missed. Especially if anything moved or made a sound.

A figure in dark green lingered behind, unarmored and apparently mostly unarmed - save for a dagger and a set of surgical implements.
"You're injured," she stated at the large man in brigandine armor as she sashayed closer, low voice quiet. "Is anyone else?"
It was a big manor for just a handful of people. She was moderately well-off herself - but she shared a much smaller two-storey building with two other business fronts with their owners' and their families' living quarters on the upper floor.

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Jordan Forthey

The deigan woman obtained a mien of acute exasperation and closed her eyes, seemingly trying to reconstitute herself. "He is my bodyguard and traveling companion, and he’s going to the Manor to investigate. You should follow, we have the situation in ha–”
Well, if his approach to investigating was the same as informing his companion-
Neither of them were given time to finish their thoughts before a bell rang out, loud, frantic. The expressions on the faces of the locals left no doubt in the nature of the sound. Well. Damn.
And how in the Realms had he known about it half a dozen seconds before the alarm was raised?
"Right," Jordan muttered, not even waiting for Sir Yanin to explicitly confirm that they were going to join in, making a quarter turn to sprint after the male deigan. His master was moving, too, and hadn't told or motioned him to stop, so ... there he had it.
"Mister!? I am coming with- " He didn't know either of the deigan's names, did he? Hoof-falls were gaining rapidly on them.
"Careful!" he shouted at the male deigan as he gritted his teeth and drew to the side just in time for the two horsemen to be able to come galloping through.
He was not entirely sure if he should permit those ones past, but nevertheless not entirely certain that they weren't the sorts who would try to trample him - or the male deigan. If you didn't care too much about the horse's well-being, or if the horse was driven or panicked enough to not care, hooves could do some serious harm, atop of them just being big enough to be quite persuasive. At other times, a hose might dance around and refuse to move forward an inch just because there was a leather cord on the ground. Horses were a bit weird like that.
In either case, a longsword was not the best tool to stop any number of horses galloping right towards you. Maybe if you swiped them from the side... What were the odds these two were just riding nearby when the bell rang, as opposed to being some kind of flanking operation?
Behind and to the side of him, there were a couple more people pouring out of the Fadewatcher station, his master ahead, the Reina's follower nearly on his heels; Jordan himself had just about made it to the corner of the wrought iron fence surrounding the manor's gardens, momentarily leaning to survey the manor surroundings through the rods as he was trying to formulate a course of action.
Sir Yanin caught up and half-tossed him a spear to supplement his own sword and dagger. He would probably hear a comment about how that was why his master himself often traveled in full armor to unfamiliar places... But later. Now was for hurrying the rest of the way along the fence, after his master.

Sir Yanin Glade

The older local Fadewatcher saluted, and gave a rough report of what had happened, though a lot of it was confirming what they already knew or suspected. They had better assume there were at least sixteen. Perhaps to the northeast - didn't seem to be the kind to obfuscate their tracks. Mixed bunch, variably equipped - if their weapons and armor weren't looted, it was nevertheless bound to be each providing for themselves. So it wasn't high-grade professionals - though they could've been nevertheless contracted by someone with more backing power.
The tail not returning spoke of either distances or one more being added to this day's count. Following them with what few men the locals had left would have been a futile endeavor. It wasn't, strictly taken, impossible, that said Bor's man tracking them had found something worth spying on, but odds were, not probable. If he wasn't the sort to try and free the - not unlikely injured - healer on his own. Proverbial poking of the hornet's nest.
Remembering that he hadn't replied, only listening intently, Yanin slowly nodded as the watchman finished explaining their reasoning. And was subsequently distracted by the little altercation near the door. Since Jordan hadn't felt the need to draw a weapon, he had halted himself at 'ready to,' body half-turned and hand on hilt. Let someone do the explaining. The language the deigan man had spoken, though - it was uncanny. He might have been only able to speak two, but he should have been able to at least recognize any from the surrounding regions.
It bothered him.
The deigan woman specified that the other deigan was with her, just about, before an alarm cut in and the local Fadewatcher sputtered something about the baroness.
"They're back," Yanin concluded, head notching up like that of a hound which had just heard something in the distance, his somewhat flattened affect making it hard to determine whether it was a question or a statement of fact. "Or their employer is." Either way, the trouble had returned.
He moved, paying no heed to the looks of terror or the reiteration of the baroness's importance, only briefly half-kneeling down to pick up two of the spears from other discarded weapons and miscellaneous bits of armor near the door.
"I am borrowing these," he informed the locals as he vanished beyond the door.

In the streets, people were emerging and disappearing into the buildings; two horsemen galloping by, a dark figure who was either the most southern human he had ever seen or an inhuman kind not seen in these lands for centuries rushing out from the winery a short way further down from the manor, Jordan sprinting after the male deigan, his female companion, the healer following on Yanin's own trail, bursting forth copious amounts of water from a nearby well and floating the mass of fluid overhead as if it were a second nature to her.
Combat-healer? It didn't take a large amount of water in someone's face to choke them. Not very immediately lethal, but rather disabling even without killing. Fast enough, hot enough, frozen enough, and there were many more ways water could turn a tide.
"Your companion," he insisted in a low tone as he tossed the extra spear to Jordan and the Reina's follower caught up. "What kind of magic does he wield?" Could be important. Either for tactical advantage, or to know to stay cautious.
As the follower of Reina had already seen to questioning the intent of the foreigner from the winery, he turned a fraction of his attention to the two horsemen even as he rapidly gained upon the gate and observed whatever motion in the manor garden or windows he could through the bars of the fence, "And you. Identify yourself."
He didn't like armed strangers of unknown allegiance behind his back if he were to make his way (in)to a building under attack. Didn't help that the fence was hardly a cover in either direction, though one near would have easier time shooting through without hindrance.

Madara

Not being one to stay deterred by miscellaneous distractions for long, Madara gently tilted the Fadewatcher's head back to inspect his injured jaw ... only to be distracted again, this time by a ringing bell. An eyebrow arched in her face as the man under her fingers stilled, eyes widening in quite the horrific realization. The follower of Reina sent her an inciting look, even as the Fadewatchers panicked. She could appreciate a person who could keep her calm. No good came from a surgeon or healer that lost her head as soon as blood began to flow.
None of the three (four, if you counted the Fadewatcher the knight had been talking to) they were yet to tend to were bound to suffer from abrupt death in the next few hours. It appeared the general consensus was that a healer might be much more urgently some hundred meters to the south.
"I will be returning to you as soon as I am able," she noted, drawing back the fingers she had been running along the man's jaw.
She wouldn't be needing her backpack; not much use of her spare tunic or waxen tent-cloth, nor her food. Most of her medical supplies were contained in the large pouches to her sides, and the bandages she'd already extracted from its depths. Just the bandages and the larger bottle in addition to the supplies already in her pouches or on her arm or belt, then.
Both in hand, she rose, tying the third, fabric bag to her belt and fitting the bottle in a pouch. She was ready to head out, following on the others' trail.

From Downfall ReRisen

Day ??? of year 384 Post-Downfall
74:04:75 LNT (early evening)
Sunstorm imminent

The Lone Survivor

Interrogation was ... easy. It might have been such in the most technical sense, but the mechanics of it remained the same. Someone asked questions. He answered. Simple. Only this time, there were no gunmen behind his back, the person was in front of him mattered rather than being a slightly shinier cog in the grinder, and most importantly, everyone was probably at least half as clueless as he was. So that was new.
Much like before, he disconnected his helmet from the fest of his armor, unlatched it, and carefully pulled it over his head, keeping it on his lap for security. Unlike before, he was at least inside - not that the shack would have stopped even the pickup they drove in on -, but it still felt odd. Vulnerable. As if he had lost half his senses.
He had technically lost half his senses, hadn't he? Too quiet, too loud, too bright, too dim, unable to see heat or EM. But he couldn't exactly eat or drink without removing it.
“The drone was too big to be a bug, too small to be a manned vehicle, and it can't have been remote-controlled during the sunstorm. So it's probably the thing to the west.”
The thing to the west... "There might be at least two. The thing to the west. Or, at the very least, it has two different kinds of units; we were ordered to fall back in either case. They stressed the importance of not letting anyone take hostages. It reads minds." He had promised to tell what he knew. The young renegade's eyes were slightly unfocused as he tried to recall what might have been relevant.
"Before - my first four years out of twelve [[1.24 and 3.72 Earth-years]] - there were cyborgs. Half-human, half-machine. They fought hard, but they were already few by that point. As far as I know, they're all gone. That land is now divided between Trenians and Anderekians to the north."

If anything, there were too many questions. "Kay-Gee told me some things about life is here usually. At best I could have managed on my own until I ran out of bullets and a direstalker figured it out. I would be fine living as a civilian or soldier in a different faction. I wouldn't know how to begin asking questions. Besides one, anyway. I'm here - now what?"
As he asked that, his head suddenly snapped to attention, gray-blue eyes in a still-youthful face focusing directly on Gramps. He hadn't come here just to die a different death for no good reason. He doubted anyone living here lived here to die a pointless death, either. Hide. Run. Fight. He only knew how to fight, and 'hide' had already failed. But where would they run?
He wasn't going to sit there and be blown up, he knew as much.

74:21:75 LNT

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Jordan Forthey

The small true deigan in the white garb of Reina quickly brushed past him, quietly mouthing 'thank you' before vanishing into the comparatively dim interior of the building, leaving her companion hanging a couple meters back, directly in front of human Fadewatcher guarding the door.
If the deigan woman, slight as she had been next to the human, had been about exactly the average height for their race, then the deigan man had evidently taken after whichever parent of his was ascended, as he stood nearly a head taller, albeit frailer. He was still almost half a head shorter than Jordan in turn, though, and though the human squire tended towards wiriness rather than sheer bulk, his armored frame was nevertheless significantly broader than that of the other.
The mostly-ascended deigan however lacked the healer's garb, and left a bit more haggard impression - as well as being armed. If his slight frame wouldn't have been able to take on much punishment otherwise, the hilt of the sword he was carrying rather heavily implied he didn't rely on strength, speed and endurance alone to fight. What he had was a rune sword - he was a magical fighter, then, and if the dark circles under his eyes were any indication, perhaps made more use of magic than was strictly taken healthy for him. And if Sir Yanin were to be cited, the mage you should worried about the most was often the one who looked the worst off - mages could be a bit counter-intuitive like that. Showed that they didn't mind damaging their body on their path to greatness, or had been too desperate to care many a time.
The deigan was staring at him a touch too intently for comfort, still gripping his sword as if ready to brandish, but not really doing much beside that. It should have been rather obvious what Jordan himself was doing. He looked like a Fadewatcher sans tabard and some pieces of his full armor, and was stood there blocking the door. He had long since dropped his hand from his sword, but the staring with hand-on-hilt of the other was getting a bit uncomfortable ... in a weird way, though, it was not dissimilar to how his master could sometimes stare someone down (or ignore them) without any real meaning to it.
One could assume the deigan was as much a guard to his female companion as a significant other. Should he reassure him that the inside was safe, or? After a time that felt too long for casual scrutiny, he shifted his focus to staring over Jordan's shoulder, mien thoughtful.
(Where had he been?)
Right, so Bren was indeed quite accomplished, both magically and alchemically - assuming he sourced his own medicine-
He didn't assign much meaning to the subtle smile on the male deigan's face - there was no obvious reason to smile, but perhaps he just remembered something, in thought as he appeared to be -, but his next actions were definitely a touch startling.
Without a word, an unspoken request, or indeed even the just stopping next to him and staring at him until he realized he was in the way like Sir Yanin sometimes did, the deigan decided to abruptly barrel through him, seemingly unaware that he was trying to just show an object notably heavier than himself aside.
"Hey!" Jordan yelped, voice a couple tones higher than his regular speaking tone, more out of surprise than actual loss of balance taking a step back into the building as he swung an arm out to further halt the oblivious intruder. He didn't try to reach for a weapon, just stayed physically blocking the other's advance, momentarily speechless past the first exclamation.
The man pushing against the metal on his arm said something in a language Jordan didn't know, evidently at the deigan woman, before just as abruptly breaking off his attempted intrusion, spinning on his heel, and beginning to stride off just like nothing had happened. You know, if you wanted to tell something to your companion, you could have just asked to be let in - not wanting to turn the spontaneous hospital room into the village gathering spot notwithstanding - or just said it over the door like normal people.
For about two more seconds, Jordan stood in the doorframe, blinking and mouth slightly agape, before addressing those in the room.
"What is his problem?" Still baffled, he looked from Sir Yanin, to the deigan woman, to the deigan man's rapidly distancing back around the edge of the door. "Should I go after him, or? I think he's headed for Bor Manor based on the direction he's going..."

Sir Yanin Glade

The money was still there (and he left it in place), so whoever had piled the corpses up had not searched them through - but barring stripping them entirely revealing something more, it didn't appear they carried any clues to who they were and where they had set up camp.
As he re-emerged from basement, the healer in green tunic requested the boiled water and a number of containers to be brought closer, so he complied, setting the items next to her before motioning the slightly older Fadewatcher with the injured arm over to a table away from the others. He seemed to be the more collected one of the two who still stood, and currently unemployed by either healer. The healer in white seemed to be busy inspecting the Fadewatcher with a head injury.
"I'm Sir Yanin Glade, lieutenant at Brow's Nest, Etlon," he finally took to introducing himself if the local Fadewatcher complied and followed him as indicated. "Seems that trouble doesn't rest, even if we were meant to, and it really did a number on you. Does anyone here have an idea who these people were, what they wanted, where they are and how many of them are left?"
The local Fadewatcher presumably had a bit of time to reply before another deigan attempted forceful empty, said something in a rather distinct language that was none of the surrounding lands, then hightailed out just as quickly, leaving Yanin half-prepared to stand and brandish his sword, body turned and hand on hilt. There were probably a couple seconds for either the deigan woman or the local Fadewatcher to react before he made a call regarding Jordan's question.

Madara

The guardhouse had filled with a different kind of energy, one which was more busyness than despair. The other healer took over with the one with the head injury, leaving one less thing that might be hard to accomplish with the physical and chemical alone.
When the knight reappeared, she pointedly requested for a separate pot, a jug and five cups, briefly simply holding a hand over the bandage on the guard's shoulder as she swiftly and precisely counted drops from her chemical and alchemical assortment into the containers, finally adding some herbs to the cups and decanting a measure of boiled - and still steaming - water into each. Her fingers felt cool against his skin.
It caught Madara's attention that the other healer used magic to boil water, and informed her that she could have more healing potions in mere hour, if need be. Rather accomplished beyond relying on her deity to aid, then. She might have carried a rather wide assortment of medicine, but most of them were sourced from a select few trusted vendors, rather than concocted by herself. The herbs and single- or few-ingredient straightforward mixes were quite easy to replicate, but the more complex compounds where exact precision was paramount were best left to people who had dedicated their lives solely to that branch of sciences.

She wet the bit of bandage gluing itself to the site of the injury, the infused water feeling hot as it penetrated the fabric, but not scalding. Hot, but also rapidly numbing, until only a distant, dull reminder of pain remained, and the adjacent muscles seemed to lax, regardless of will. Oddly enough, even before the numbness set in, the water didn't sting, unlike even regular plain old boiled water normally would.
"Hold the light still, could you? If you're not used to, though, you might want to focus on gaze on something else," he noted to the uninjured Fadewatcher before directly the addressing the one she was tending to, who presumably had a much easier time focusing now that the pain had become a vague impression of itself. "I'll be cleaning and putting your shoulder back in order now - it might be a bit uncomfortable, but not painful." Weird was perhaps the more accurate term, feeling pressure, but not the bite.
Blood started seeping a little as she washed out the injury of any debris, but not nearly in the quantities it had before, even as she proceeded to bring out an implement to hook the severed tendon together, hold it in place and apply pressure with one hand as her other carefully added a kind of silvery, very thin threat to a curved, perfectly honed dark and shining gray needle and began to secure the two detached ends of a tendon together. Live tendons were more flexible, even harder to pierce than sinew; you needed a very sharp, rigid tool and a lot of patience. Tendons were difficult to cut, but if once already sliced in two, they could fray from ends if you were careless, which was not ideal if you planned to use the same one for, oh, the next sixty years or so.
For a minute or two, there was focused silence, until she broke off this bit of thread and removed the implement she had been using to hold the tendon in place. Madara wiped off her hands and cleaned them with spirits once more before carefully lifting the man's arm to flex it. There; now it should stay as one and be able to glide freely. Repairing a small nick in one of the minor medium-sized blood-vessels in the region (another snip of the thread thread with something vaguely resembling a small seam cutter), a bit of damage in the adjacent muscles (snip, another wash) and skin was comparatively quicker and shorter work.
Just a bit of salve and a smaller strip of bandage to keep dust away and her job here was mostly done. Additional magical healing would speed things up, but past that it was mostly taking off remaining armor, washing off blood and grime, and finding clean clothes. The thread she used was not a concern; the body knew how to dissolve it in a month or two.
The deigan woman handed her a small vial she held up to the light, observing its colour and consistency, before uncorking it to pick up its scent. Goldberry. She was reasonably certain she knew exactly what type of healing potion it was. Shouldn't interact adversely with anything she had, or intended to use. She added a small amount of it to a cup near her - about a sixth of the vial -, and then handed it to the man, wrapping the fingers of his good hand around it and making sure he could hold it before letting go.
"Here, this will help with healing and the blood loss," she noted. The tea - if it could be called so - was strongly herbal, slightly sweet, and would actually have tasted quite pleasant, if it were not for the distinct note of saltiness underlining it all. "The faintness in your arm will wear off in an hour or so - but be careful about stressing your shoulder for a couple weeks, especially the first few days. There are yet those here in more dire need, but if you need something, let us know."

The one with head injury received a steaming cup with a slightly different mix of herbs in passing as Madara mover her things along to the next one in need - the one with missing fingers and broken jaw-, briefly noting to Irah that she was done with the one with the shoulder injury.
As she was moving to take a closer look at him than before, however, there was a commotion at the door, with a second deigan crashing into their door-guard, shouting something across the room, and just as quickly scurrying off, leaving the guard rather confused.
"Huh," was Madara's only utterance.

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Sir Yanin Glade

The first assumption had been accurate. The otherwise perfectly average storage space had been turned into a temporary holding cellar for the dead. All human, all armored. The usual faint mix of grains, fabric, maybe a bit of moisture and the vague hint of something molding was overshadowed by the distinct scent of blood. There was a heaviness to places like that that even Yanin could pick up on, at least when alone. Other people distracted from the impression, but just by himself... Eyes could see people, but there was no motion. There were bodies, but no warmth. There were others, but the only one you could hear was yourself.
He had no personal bonds to these specific individuals, and hence there was no sadness, no mourning, yet it felt wrong on a very primal level, and he didn't like it. The best he could have described it as was 'a distinct sense of he should not be here'.

But there were reasons to be here beyond checking if this area was currently safe. Four of the bodies down here were lined up neatly, three of them Fadewatchers. Yanin didn't touch the bodies, merely kneeling in front of them and observing for a handful of seconds. The fourth was quite unlike. Civilian? Someone off-duty? One of the targets of the attack? A passerby who intervened or a private guard? From the placement and care of positioning, it stood to reason it had been someone on 'their' side.
There didn't seem to be any distinct signs of magical or otherwise atypical method of attack - only injuries from regular old melee and ranged weapons. He could ask the minorly injured Fadewatcher upstairs for confirmation. It was a good idea to learn who - or what - you were up against, the sooner the better, especially if trouble were to make unexpected return.
Other dead had also been brought here, unceremoniously dumped into a pile of corpses. The other side of the equation. Six of them, once you tried to count the bodies and respective limbs, variably equipped and not discernibly marked. Common criminals wearing whatever armor and weapons they could loot or buy? The cheapest mercenaries someone could find? Unfortunately, the dead couldn't typically speak, only give some clues.
Anything else on them that might have indicated who they were and what they had wanted? If there were any obvious pouches or pockets to check, he would, otherwise...
Time to return among the living, at least for a bit. The living could often give answers faster.

Jordan Forthey

"Right; we will pay Lady Bor a visit once things have calmed down here," he replied to the notion of her men had attempted to lend their aid. As they had already intended to, before discovering the local division of Fadewatchers in figurative shambles... This was one seriously botched mess...
The girl took to recounting what she knew of Bren ... of a smiling, charitable man.
"He does seem kind. Can he do magic?" Jordan asked, even as a rather distinct couple on the street drew closer. Distinct, for they were a deigan couple, and in particular a true deigan - who were reasonably uncommon sight - and an ascended, no, ascended-true mixed-blood deigan, which was considerably more rare still.
From what little he knew of deigan culture, the fact that ascended deigan had done their best to genocide all of the true deigan race was one thing he was aware of, atop of many of them holding grudges for long and once adults, living unaging seemingly until something just took and killed them.
There was that, and also the fact that they appeared to be headed in their direction, rather than past them. The male eventually fell back, but the female continued forward, if anything only hastening her pace.
“You, Fadewatcher – forgive my brusqueness, but there isn’t time to dally. The injured appear to have been brought inside, yes? Are we in time?”
Another healer? She had the garb of Reina's follower, at least - and a rather tantalizing version of it, too - and appeared no more overtly armed than the previous woman who had made her way over. Would it really have been so long that someone had, magically or by rider, managed to summon healers from nearby settlements, too?
"Were you called-" Never mind. She seemed intent to push through, doing her best to look him in the eye as she proudly demonstrated two small vials in her hand, as if expecting him to immediately know what the fluid within did. She seemed genuine enough, and if this was a deception, it was the most blatant one he had seen to date. Jordan appeared slightly taken aback as he scrutinized her. "At least some of the injured, yes." He didn't know yet if any of Vela Bor's men were hurt or killed, and if so, whether they'd have been brought here or to the manor. "It had been hours before we got here not long ago. A surgeon from another down arrived just a couple minutes ago." She might have overheard enough to realize the local healer was missing in action, if whoever might have summoned her hadn't mentioned it already.
With this, he took a step back, keeping one eye on the newcomer and trying to see into the interior of the guardhouse over his shoulder with the other. There were two local Fadewatchers, one accompanying the surgeon kneeling next to one of the wounded, the other preparing something at the fireplace. Thankfully, his master made a reappearance from the basement, so Jordan referred to the Reina's follower and raised an eyebrow.
Sir Yanin looked at two of the occupied beds the surgeon was not at and shrugged. Barring any protests from the healthier local Fadewatchers, Jordan looked fully at the deigan woman and took a half-step to the side.
"I reckon you can go in," he noted, glancing back at the kids - and then the male deigan lurking behind.

Madara

Alas, no miracles occurred. Quietly and without much fuss, she tallied up the rest of the apparent injuries on the remaining four who were neither dead nor immediately dying, quietly half-asking them to let her look at them, half simply informing them that she was doing. Two slashing wounds, one hit to the head, two shattered bones (she didn't touch quite yet), missing fingers...
Slashes were comparatively easy to repair, though she might have to pull some tendons or muscle together - she could help them keep most of the function of their respective injured limbs - fingers could be sometimes sewn back - worked quite well with palanters, sometimes with humans, too - but not when they'd have been lost outside for hours, so it'd just be a matter of fixing the skin over the injury the best she could. Reassembling shattered bones was not her particular favourite, but she'll make do. Head injuries were the hardest to do much with, and most unpredictable the worst way possible. Scalp injuries bled a lot, but weren't overly dangerous, it was potential fractured skull and swelling she was worried about.
She'll fixing the injuries one by one, and afterwards seeing to additional medicine that could be drank with tea and actually getting them comfortable. They were still half in armor.
Most of her skill relied on physical reassembly and various chemicals derived from plants and creatures. If so desired, people could also seek magical healing to finish the job afterwards - aside of the most potent, radical forms of it, magical healing was complementary, not an equal or a substitute to surgery, nor was the latter only a means to make one survive for the first.
As a lot of what magical healing did was to mimic and accelerate natural healing, hence it was entirely possible to get a much worse result with magic alone - even leave someone unnecessarily crippled. On the opposite side, only cleaning and stitching flesh together still left a lot for time to mend. But bring the two together, reassembly first, a level of magical healing attainable for most people after? Everything clicked together. Everything was in its rightful place, the mage saved their energy, even divine taint was not much of an issue if you only had a hair-thin gap to bridge. Quick. Efficient.

Madara knelt next to one of the wounded - the one with a slashed shoulder - and wasted no time picking out things from her pouches - a larger bottle bottle, a spool of thread, fabric - a set of implements rolled in leather - that she inverted and tied to her upper left arm like a toolbelt of sorts -, two tiny bottles and three vials that she fitted alongside the implements, three needles, assorted bandages in their own smaller bag-within-a-bag, two small bags of herbs...
The multitude of tiny bottles and vials she carried were an art form onto itself. Of painkillers that worked on humans alone, she had five different kinds on her, not counting the very minor secondary or ternary effects of concoctions of other primary uses.
One of them could remove virtually all pain where it touched exposed internal tissue, but too much of it in blood and it could kill, mostly because it was also slightly paralytic for the hour or two it was effective. If someone drank it, it did barely anything at all unless they also had a terrible case of ulcers. A second kind was mostly supposed to be taken with food or drink, but it also made one inebriated and drowsy. And in much higher quantities than that still, it could make one's body forget how to breathe and have a heartbeat. A third one, consumed or applied directly, helped quite well against pain and inflammation and fever, but it also made much harder to stop bleeding. A fourth one removed pain and inflammation, and also left you clear-headed, but if someone took more than a drop for five kilograms of body weight they allegedly turned slightly yellow and died a slow, painful death that was particularly hard to stave off - after several days of feeling perfectly fine after. She had not confirmed the latter fact for herself, but nevertheless had a bit of a morbid professional curiosity in regards to who and at which cost had figured that specific quantity in particular out... The fifth one, when applied directly, would alleviate pain and leave a pleasant warm sensation, but was also significantly weaker than the others, hence being less useful against the kind of debilitating pain that could give you a heart attack. It also did nothing when eaten, besides tasting positively vile for just about any mammal out there.
And then you had to remember how those, and all others, interacted between themselves. There were definitely reasons why she didn't permit anyone touch her vials' and bottles' contents in their pure form. She could genuinely state that she had nothing with the primary purpose purpose of causing death, but medicine used wrongly was just as harmful. Then again, a bottle of strong alcohol could technically kill just as well, and that was something people had been drinking for fun for millennia.

"I can help fixing your shoulder and mute the pain - if you could try to hold still and lean forward a little," Madara informed the man, her natural melodic mezzosoprano quiet, calm, giving him a second to accept that she was there as she wet her hands with a small amount of liquid from the larger bottle before actually touching him and starting to unravel the bandage covering the site. The fluid evaporated almost instantly, though the lingering smell indicated some kind of spirits.
There was some kind of commotion by the door, but she just about barely spared the follower of Reina a glance. She spoke, though, one hand briefly relieving itself as the second held everything in place, motioning towards the one of the occupied beds hosting the man with the head injury, but immediately resuming its work.
"If you have Reina's mercy by your side - or very potent anti-inflammatories - lend your aid to him first." He was the one she felt she could do the least for, and was also the most uncertain about.

If prayers could indeed summon followers, Reina must have had quite the sense of humour.

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Jordan Forthey

If it had, indeed, been hours, then it would explain why the streets seemed comparatively calm. Winter was coming and the crops didn't harvest themselves. Whether the kids were here because they wanted to be here or because their parents definitely didn't want them that far out of the village on that particular day was anyone's guess. He didn't think he wanted to explicitly ask if someone they knew was known to be injured or killed... It might come up, anyway, but still.
"Was anyone or anything else taken, besides the healer?" Or injured, or killed, atop of whatever poor Fadewatchers were there fast enough to try to intervene. "Or do you know of anyone who might know more of what happened? Besides our colleagues in there, I mean."
What manner of bandits would break in just to get the healer and no one else? Not riches or ... unless the particular healer was also the kind of herbalist that could make potent toxins and other substances of questionable legality, or someone had a personal qualm of some kind against her. If it was a matter of one of the bandits own needing a healer, surely they would have tried to make them come with more peacefully ... unless they'd tried to, and failed spectacularly?
A girl piped up, mentioning that "Bren" - presumably the healer - was nice.
"Ah? What are they like?" Might learn something, might not... But in any case, it would be awkward to stand in silence and stare at a number of upset yet anticipant kids until Sir Yanin decided he would be better used elsewhere or dismissed to do whatever.

Madara (and Sir Yanin Glade)

Evidently satisfied that there didn't seem to be any threats or items amiss on the ground floor of the guardhouse - if the dead and wounded could be counted as "not amiss", and in the absence of a second floor above (they'd have seen if there was anything notable on the roof), he seemed to intent on giving the lower floor the exact same kind of see-over, and headed downstairs to check everything there, too. Maybe he wasn't the most talkative sort, or just one who preferred to see everything for himself rather than take someone else's word.
(Bloody dragging marks? Had they taken the definite dead there? Caught someone?)

The quiet turned out to be the worst kind of quiet - not calm, not asleep, not even in shock or unconsciousness, but they apparently had ceased to be among them. Likely a while before she set foot inside. If they had breathed their last breath within her sight, maybe she could have attempted something, but it looked far beyond her - or any mundane's alone - ability already.
If she wanted, she could mostly tell how long it had been since someone died, from blood following gravity, from cooling of skin, from stiffness settling in, from natural breakdown laxing it, and finally putrefaction rotting the body. (Incidentally, an experienced butcher would, too. Perhaps not the stages of subsequent detrimental decay, but the initial states would be quite distinctly familiar.)
Gut wounds tended to be a bit of a wash even if she were there in time. At the end of the day, some parts of anatomy simply were significantly messier than others, and did no good inverted into the rest of the body. So all that could be done was to clean up things the best you could, bring out any anti-infection and anti-inflammatory stuff you had, and hope upon natural healing and pray to whatever gods bothered listening.
In a cruel twist to it all, unless one of the bigger blood-vessels in the area were also nicked, gut injuries also often took a long time to kill - hours, days even. Plenty of time to lie curled up in pain and contemplate your mortality while someone else scurried about to see if they could procure a very potent magical healer in time.
Femoral artery injuries were the exact opposite in many ways - you had to act fast, in many cases faster than it took to run a few hundred meters to fetch someone and back, but they were comparatively easy fix. You could hold off the bleeding enough with heavy pressure - enough pressure to leave deep bruises and hurt like burning iron pressed into one's flesh - but not with bandages. Simple bandages did almost nothing to stop that much blood.

If someone had known to ask, there might have yet been hope for this one.

"May Reina have mercy on you," she muttered under her breath, with her hand lightly on the dead man's shoulder. Or the Wanderer take good care of you, as the case might be; a human would have had to be steadfastly determined to not let go for more than a dozen minutes after the heart had stopped. Maybe a bit longer if freezing or drowning.
She wasn't the most devout follower, but many people had unwavering faith in their chosen deities' aid, and even so, it never hurt to ask, at least for things what were beyond what she could do. Maybe some days they were merciful, as they were supposed to be. Maybe they granted some of that mercy upon those she could help no more. And just maybe, they would give a second chance to someone who would otherwise have none.
There was a slight pause, perhaps of contemplation, or maybe to see if this day would be one of those miracles happened, Reina willing, but if nothing occurred, Madara moved on to whoever of the four downed seemed the next worst off. She was not finished here either way.
There was no need to say why she was moving on to those awake enough to pay attention to what she was doing, if they weren't aware of their fates already. Those who weren't well enough probably could do better without knowing just yet.

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Jordan Forthey

The kids were in no apparent hurry to leave, and the street remained bizarrely calm in stark contrast of the surge of rushing blood in his veins. Only when given distinct instructions did one on them speak up: “The bandits took our healer. There's no one to get.” Looked barely teenage - and on a normal day, he would probably be chastised for slacking off from picking potatoes. One could only hope that these kids weren't sticking around here because their parents or older siblings were Fadewatchers...
Sir Yanin tore the door open, ready to act if need be, but nothing burst forth. Jordan had reflexively taken a couple steps forward, half-turning his head, white-knuckle gripping his sword, yet his master didn't draw his, but rather seemed to merely assess the situation for a second or two.
Jordan released a breath and the hilt of his sword, and seemed to visibly relax a little, even as he continued to check the street every couple of seconds.
"Bandits?" he repeated, "Did any of you see what happened and how many there were, and where they went? Or if they are still in the area?" He should probably try not to ask all the possible checklist of questions at once and give them time to answer.
Someone - a young male voice - was now pleading inside the guardhouse, seemingly with Sir Yanin who had now moved to effortlessly fill the entirety of the left half of the double door. He couldn't exactly see past him, but there were definitely injured people in there.
"Eh, we are Fadewatchers, too, just usually in Brow's Nest, Etlon..." It probably made them as qualified as any other, since it seemed that the local Fadewatcher department was pretty much out of commission. There had to be something that could be done. If they didn't have a dedicated healer, then anyone who knew how to tie bandages in place would help. "Did- could anyone bring any supplies left behind? Or any bandages from surrounding houses with a few people who could help with tying them in place. Someone who has been a midwife, maybe? If it's reasonably safe, anyway." He was still saying too many things at once, wasn't he?
He sighed. "We can help you to find your healer, I hope." If said healer is alive, anyway.

Sir Yanin Glade

Nothing. For a second or two, Yanin remained in the cover of the door, gaze attempting to pierce into the comparatively dim interior. Just about, he made out that nearly everyone in the room was down, and the last one had been startled off from fumbling with one of them. Two strides closer, and he was in the doorway, continuing to survey the situation as his eyes adjusted.
“Please, no more!” plead the only Fadewatcher that seemed to have remained standing.
"I am not a foe," the knight replied, still with a tension in his voice and seemingly ready to draw his sword.
Slowly, as if expecting danger to be lurking under any bed, chair or table, he began, eyes more often than not drifting to the stairs, noting the position of any bit of furniture, and blood-splatter. It looked like the aftermath of a massacre. But not one that took place here. Had been long enough for someone to at least try to bandage the wounded. Why would they have just one witless Fadewatcher trying to take care of six wounded, a couple of which did not look so good...
"Is there anyone else in the building?"

Madara

She was not going to apologize for good hearing. Bandits? Kidnapping? Looked like the two swordsmen were rather late to the party. And it was particularly their healer that had gone missing. What a coincidence.
Brushing an imaginary mote off her shoulder, the half-palanter stepped out from behind the carriage she had been using as a makeshift cover.
"You sure did give me a bit of a start, there," she made a vague gesture at the sword at Jordan's hip he had been clutching at just moments ago, "but I should be able to help. I am Madara, a surgeon in my hometown." Among other things.
"Right, the young guy muttered, dubiously looking over her, but evidently deeming her trustworthy enough. "Sir, Is it safe in there?" he asked the door.
"This room seems to be," a different male voice - presumably the big guy in full armor - replied.
Taking it as permission to approach, Madara strode over to the door, much like the knight before her briefly stopping at the door to assess the situation and carefully fold back the sleeves of her tunic.
"I might still need those extra bandages," she noted to those behind her back, her natural tendency to gesture kicking in, as even while she was busy pinning her sleeve to her shoulder, she still managed to hold up a finger. "Would someone kindly light the fire and get some water boiling? And bring a light; my sight in dark is not poor, but I a nightwalker I am not."
By the time she was finished pinning her second sleeve up, she was done running her little preliminary triage and moved in after the knight - "I'm here to help," she would assure the frayed Fadewatcher, but only in passing -, first opting to take a closer look at the quiet ones.
Dying just happened to take too much energy for any to be left over for being noisy, so quiet was sometimes a bit more concerning. Some people were unfazed by nature, others were too shocked to do much, but yet others ... had no more do
left in them. It was those that needed help the fastest, if there was any help left to give.

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Jordan Forthey

"This is the place?" inquired the voice of Jordan Forthey - a young guy atop a sorrel horse. In addition to the white linen shirt, grayish pants and brown boots any old peasant might wear, he had donned a slightly bleached blue-green gambeson and the cuirass, faulds and tassets a keen eye might recognize as being identical to many of those handed out to Fadewatchers, just without the tabard they typically displayed when on active duty, and leading along a bay pack mule that was nearly as big than the slight horse the guy himself rode on, and sturdier still.
"Yes," responded the other man, this one astride a large white gelding, about the length of a horse ahead. Not only did the other man seem much more blunt and laconic from the brief exchange, but he was also a much more imposing figure, both tall and fully armored - helmet and all - in a much better quality steel, clearly bearing the viper-and-falcon heraldics of a family of some note from Etlon.
"Looks ... smaller than I expected for a detour that long, I guess? I mean, not that I'd really have been in many estates besides the Glades' one." That one was more of a heavily guarded mansion, with a number of associated auxiliary buildings in the vicinity that directly belonged to the estate, and had their own workers employed by them. And then several dozen surrounding farm buildings in addition to those, scattered out among the fields. This one was more like a little village, buildings all neatly lined up against the road, with the manor just one of many on the same dirt street, just a little nicer, fenced in, and well, much bigger. "Sir," the young guy added after a pause, remembering that they were no longer alone on the road as some kid gawked at Sir Yanin Glade's big white "warhorse" and scurried off.
"Tareon is a warlord. Baroness Vela Bor is a retired adventurer." The statement was delivered matter-of-factly, as if this info alone was enough to explain everything. That was about par for the course for the young guy's master, who himself was not that much older under the helmet. Either he was arguing with someone, or particularly exited about something, or speaking just to fulfill a duty ... or you had to pry every single thing out of him separately.
Even the reasons for coming here in the first place were somewhat occluded. The most he could get out of his master was that there was something he needed to figure out ... and rather than show up at the Glades' mansion, where he was not bound to be welcomed (by his father, Sir Tareon Glade, anyway - Jordan thought Sir Jeran actually liked him, and the others either didn't care or just didn't want to piss Sir Tareon off), or try their luck with either of his older sisters in Zerul and Relimon, he might as well pay a visit to someone who was willing to invite them in. Granted, not them specifically, just any ... adventurer.
Not that Jordan would complain - they had pretty much taken a single day off from being guards or training for the past two years, so some change was nice. Now he could travel and train rather than patrol and train. It appeared training was not optional even on the move. Not that he'd be surprised after three years of what felt like disappointingly little progress, but ... his right shoulder still hurt from yesterday, for starters. And his left shin. And probably a few more places, though those were harder to tell over just muscles being sore from training and riding for so long alike.
"We will be stopping by the Fadewatcher Station before paying a visit to baroness Vela Bor," Sir Yanin suddenly interjected Jordan's mental recounting of every single place in his body that hurt. Did he decide that because he just happened to see the long wooden building with the sign of the Fadewatchers coming to sight, or?

Sir Yanin Glade

For the most part, he just wanted to know if this place had gone to shit just like everywhere else, legendary ex-adventurers or not. The roads were probably the least safe they had been in the last two decades and trustworthy men were too few, too far, or too weak to do enough about it. Not that he alone could do much about it, either, even if he didn't have his own personal demons and shortcomings to deal with.
Good memory, attentiveness, quick thinking and and outright extraordinary fighting ability were ultimately still limited. Very few actual problems consisted of armed humans conveniently lined up for mostly fair combat one or two at a time. Disease, toxins, being doused in oil and lit on fire, just blowing up the entire damn building, nonhumanoid threats, famine, total war, being ambushed while trying to sleep off exhaustion, pick your damn poison...
Politics were bullshit he could only figure out by watching people and their interactions for a long time, and then what? Who was going to listen a less favoured son of a minor noble? You could be a bloody mind-reader and expert negotiator and still someone figured out a way to remove you if they didn't like what you were advocating for.
It was always bastards like his father who found ways to stick around. No desire to be like that man. No ability, either. They, however, both knew that if the old Glade were to ever raise a sword against the Viper of Glades, he would die - and since killing him would have been too obvious, he was simply made unwelcome in his childhood home. He was worried about his oldest brother. Too nice of a guy to be allowed replace Tareon. Might have had something happen to him already if Manin hadn't just coincidentally gone and gotten himself killed first. His mother was not in a much better position. The others? Yanin guess they were less likely to be in the way for the time being.
All that aside, their colleagues were probably the closest thing to implicit allies they had, the couple family members who tolerated Yanin, and he didn't wish to drag into further mess if he could help it, notwithstanding. Even if they couldn't be as selective with whom they recruited as during better days ... it stood to reason that the odds were at the very least better than average.

The streets looked normal, if a bit empty, presumably because a lot of people were either in their respective workshops or out in the fields busy harvesting crops. A couple people glanced in their direction, but they always did. There had, indubitably, been a number of opportunistic odd folks going through coming through here ever since the open invitation went out, but in spite of that, they - or at the very least he - stood out enough.
Even so, his eyes behind the visor were constantly scanning the street, as if he were still on patrol. There was no reason trust this place - or any open area. And since he apparently lacked the innate ability of most people to simply know what anyone he was staring at felt unless they were expert at hiding it, the best he could do to make up for it was watch the people, too, and remember what they did.
There were no Fadewatchers in sight, not even as Prince, the knight's big white steed, came to a halt next to their building, impatiently huffing, stomping his hooves and shaking his head. A handful of kids were watching nearby, a few people were still on the street, there was no generalized panic, yet trouble was there before they had even arrived.
"Something is wrong," he stated, still trying to cover anything out of place in the broader vicinity, looking for anything else out of place in or near the adjacent houses, people who should not be there, watchers, ambush.
The horse danced around himself even as the man did so, making a nearly full turn before being urged behind around the corner into the year so that Yanin could dismount with a distinct clink of metal and loosely throw the reins around whichever object was closest. More for show rather than effect - Prince was quite capable of getting loose if something threatened him. Or biting off the ear of anyone who wasn't either Yanin himself or Jordan trying to touch their things.
Jordan followed suit. Yanin didn't particularly know yet if he would have been more useful on the ground or horseback, but...
"There is blood on the ground. Fresh." Red, semi-coagulated clumps of sludge left behind where the fluid could seep into soil and stone, not browned and flaking away. And there would usually be at least someone out at this hour. There wasn't. "Watch my back." Jordan was fumbling something, but dropped it to follow him back around the corner, to the double doors of the main entrance.
There had been some detective work in the past two years. Other things, you could fill in just by logic. Why was there blood outside? There didn't seem to be enough commotion for something dramatic - even a farmer injured by shrapnel while splitting rocks was bound to generate a spectacle in such a small place -, yet someone had gone in bleeding, or left bleeding.
Was there a distinct trail like someone shot or stabbed might leave? High marks of fresh, violent injury? Someone had said that if you lost half the blood in your body, you still had some chance of surviving. That was a lot of blood if it was distributed over a floor, even more so if it was a quantity that would definitely kill at least one person. Something else entirely? Acid? Acrid smoke? Anything but the scent and sight of blood itself?
As he neared the doors, faint sounds could be heard. Groans. Wails. There might not be enough time. The bloody fuck was going on in there? The voices were several. It kept feeling like the street was too peaceful for an overarching threat, for multiple someones to have escaped in while painting the ground. So what then? Something exploded in someone's face? People came in and attacked, with the last one stabbing whoever was in front of the door, dragging them in before anyone noticed, and neatly closing the door behind? Not enough time to analyze it properly when whatever was the cause could still be in there, continuing to do harm. He gritted his teeth, his right gauntleted hand wrapping around the handle of his sword so he could draw and parry with it in a single move. The left one grasped the handle of the door.
"Keep from line of sight of the door," he noted to Jordan, who side-stepped and turned just in time to see a woman in green tunic promptly slip behind a carriage across the street.
He'll be leaving the door between himself and whatever was inside for now. He was trying to listen keenly to whatever words might be possible to be made out from inside, but it didn't give an absolute guarantee whether the first one out would be a foe, an injured person trying to escape, or something else entirely. The door itself seemed strong enough to take a blast of some strength.

Jordan Forthey

Jordan looked from the carriage, to the kids on the street, to the surrounding houses, to sideways at Sir Yanin Glade and the ... muffled noise from behind the door. Even with just two or three seconds of hearing it, the... Well, he should probably get the civilians out of the way, just in case, he guessed. So much for vacation.
"Uh, kids? You should go," he instructed, loud and clear, if a tiny bit more shaken than he would have liked, his right hand straying near his hip in reflection to Sir Yanin even as his left vaguely motioned sideways, move along. "Go tell a healer to come here, I think we'll need one soon. Something ... not very nice is going on in there."
Next to him, Sir Yanin had moved in position behind the left side of the double door, skipping a beat - presumably to let the onlookers to actually scatter. They were both on the same side of the door, so his master was next to his left shoulder. A louder wail made the squire flinch.
"Actually, I think we might need several healers, if they're not all in there trying to help people already."

The wait was over. If the door was not locked or barred, Sir Yanin would tear it open as he stepped backwards, ready to face whatever was or wasn't inside.
Maybe it would all be for naught. Maybe it was all over and all that was indoors would be just a couple injured avid complainers, a healer that couldn't find fresh bandages or boiled water and a couple farmers who had seen what went down and were rather animatedly trying to convey its horrors. In which case they would have just opened the door a touch too aggressively, no harm done, they could all sigh a sigh of relief.
At worst ... well, they were as prepared as they could be in a dozen seconds.

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Madara

The half-palanter looked out of place in the small shop of both furniture and assorted knick-knacks - a slender yet strong figure in an almost immaculate dark green tunic weaving through the cramped interior of the shop with an odd kind of meticulously rehearsed ease. Even with a backpack slung over her shoulders and apparently heavy pouches tied to her waist, there was nary a sliver of fabric brushing against the wares. Long, slender, spidery fingers tracked the items on display, the ends of her pointed and oddly glinting - perhaps lacquered, or at least oiled - fingernails almost, but not quite touching the surfaces of the more finely crafted pieces.
Always almost. Perhaps it was a generalized mutual respect towards craftsmanship in any form, for she herself was a seamstress and a seller of assorted special wares. She preferred if people weren't overly handsy with anything on display, either. No matter how much you washed yourself, skin was inherently a bit oily. Fabrics, paper, wood, they all soaked it up, just a little. And more expensive pieces could have hundreds of contemplators who didn't quite want to take the plunge.
It was perhaps in stark contrast, then, that the very same half-palanter was also a somewhat accomplished surgeon. Same general concept, she would say. Just messier. Much, much messier.

Madara had in technicality little use for furniture made so far from her little town - not that of the ordinary variety, anyway -, but there was little to peruse in this quaint little village with, indeed, less than a third the houses of her hometown and none of the benefits from the added trade and business due to the transit between Nemhim and Wenal city. Some market stalls, someone to fix your plough, a herbalist, a winery (for later, either to celebrate, or ... just because) this here carpentry store and, of course, the main aim for this detour.
Would anything come of that? Maybe, maybe not, but there was no do without try and you had to go out of the way if you wanted more supplies beyond what traveling merchants offered nigh free of additional effort (but not free of sometimes rather excessive monetary cost). The two she left behind could deal with that and anything else usually expected of her just fine.

The small figurines of prooga displayed next to chairs, spinning wheels and other utilitarian items seemed almost as removed from the place as she herself, all traces of the original event they were commemorating long gone, but as it appeared, not quite forgotten. Well, at least one in the village had been then and there. Someone had taken the time and effort to painstakingly carve even the hair on some of the wooden prooga. Idly, she wondered if the same hands had crafted the sign above the door.
How long had it been, now? Perhaps enough to be not quite as early in the morning. Palanters tended towards nocturnality and slept little. Humans ... not quite so. She wasn't entirely certain on which side penin fell, but heavily suspected that it was closer to the latter, especially in a village as human-oriented.
A politer time for unscheduled visits, it would be. Without further ado, the ever so uncanny woman slipped out without making a purchase, straightening her shoulders and preparing to brace herself. But ah, it was actually quite mild now, almost warm, quite unlike the earliest crack of dawn.
With long, measured strides, she headed down the street, fully intent on just making an appointment out of herself.

There were sparse people wandering on the streets, minding their own business, and she would have reached her destination just the same, too, if it weren't a small bit of something particular catching the front and center of her field of vision just as she was taking the right turn that would have led her straight to Bor Manor, necessitating a pause and a quick side-step onto the grounds of whichever villager just happened to have their house across the street from both the inn and the guardhouse, and behind a carriage parked there.
The tall, armored man approaching the Fadewatcher Station? He quite very definitely had a hand on his sword. A smaller guy - also armored, but resembling a Fadewatcher in his attire, albeit not bearing their tabard - was facing the street. Well, something was definitely happening, and it might just come to be that her services would be needed even before she got to where she was headed. Not that she'd be intervening just yet, oh no - she had no intentions of engaging in open combat with two professional-looking armored swordsmen with just teeth, nails and a dagger.
She could fight, if need be, but she was not a fighter, and it would be terribly unproductive if the only person in vicinity who knew how to attach a tendon to bone or sew a jugular back together before you bled out got her hand lopped off during the first stage of the conflict. It was only practical that she simply resolved to protect herself rather than rush headlong into ... whatever was actually about to go down in there. Surely, no one would aim to ambush a guardhouse through the front door, the very people who you'd usually go to in case of an armed break-in, in the middle of a village, with just two people?
The smaller guy might have noticed her already, for better or worse, as for a moment he appeared to look straight at her. Oh well.

The Prophecy - Dreams of Destiny

Name: Jordan Forthey

Ethnicity and species: Rodorian, human (white)

Sex/gender: Male/man

Age: 19

Physical build and appearance:
Jordan is about 1.83 tall (a notch over 6 feet), leanly built, but quite fit guy. He has shoulder-length hair that, much to his annoyance, has been described as "potato-colored" - a sort of uneven light brown that's almost, but not quite dirty blond -, perpetually slightly concerned blueish-gray eyes, and quite youthful face which seems to acquire a random thin mess of (for some reason) blond hair, should he ever go more than two days without shaving. Often has a bruise or a few to show for his efforts of trying to learn combat.

Languages:
Native Rodorian speaker; his master has been trying to teach him to write on slow days, so he knows what the letters look like and can mostly read and somewhat write, but not exactly fluently and without error.

Magic:
Has never used any or tested for it, hence it remains to be seen if he'd be innately gifted enough for it. Has - unbeknownst to him at this point - affinity to lightning and strength of soul just about average for humans, or 0.3kWh.

Usual attire:
He is typically seen wearing worn brown leather boots, brown leather belt, gray pants, a white cotton shirt and (in colder weather) a black wool coat. Courtesy of his service a Fadewatcher, his own coin and Sir Yanin, he also has steel plate armor to wear. It's mass-produced, much simpler than Sir Yanin's, and fits decently enough rather than nigh perfectly. Much akin to his master and weather permitting, he can thus be seen wearing the cuirass, faulds and tassets of his armor atop a simple dark greenish blue gambeson even when minding his business, and supplement those with greaves, gauntlets, cuisses and a sallet helmet when conflict is anticipated. As his armor lacks some of the joint protection Sir Yanin's does, it's necessary for him to exercise a bit more caution.
He also has a simple, but steel, longsword with its own brown leather sheath, attached to his belt at the left. The sword itself is not much of a looker with its simple crossguard and round pommel; one can tell it's been fixed a few times - the blade has been ground down to 93 cm from the original probably around a meter to correct a lost tip -, but it serves its purpose, and Jordan's master insists it's still semi-decently balanced. Its material is on the softer side for a steel sword, but seems to be without rust veins or other distinct defects. He also has a dagger with a 22cm blade (again with its own leather sheath, though this one attached at the right hip), which is actually new and harder steel.

Other equipment, rations and clothing (includes that carried by, but not associated with, his horse):
A whole thirty-eight rodlin. Not too much on the grand scheme of things, but it's his to do whatever he wishes with.
A leaf-bladed iron spear, ash pole, 2 meters long.
A heater shield (standard Fadewatcher fare).
An iron cudgel (standard Fadewatcher fare).
A crossbow (standard Fadewatcher fare).
An extra pair of gray pants.
Two extra shirts.
Five extra socks ... he is unsure where the sixth went, but guesses that should he lose another one, he'd have an even number again.
Spare underwear (3).
Flint and iron.
About half a kilogram of dried jerky. Two loaves of bread.
A little bottle of vegetable oil, a whetstone and a rag.
Soap. Straight razor.
About six meters of rope.
Cloth that can be used as bandages.
A small bottle of strong alcohol (moonshine).

Social status and family ties:
He's been Sir Yanin Glade's squire for about three years now, formerly having been the Glades' stable hand since he was about eleven. For the past two years, he has also been serving as a Fadewatcher alongside his master, albeit much like Sir Yanin, he's currently on leave; that's about as far as his standing goes.
His family are farmers in Nemhim, owners of a small household, a couple of fields, and a dozen cattle. The household consists of Jordan's mother (38), his father's elderly mother (78), as well as still hosts his two sisters (8 and 12) and brother (9). His third sister and father succumbed to the withering a few years back.
Aside of Jordan, the Fortheys are otherwise unaffiliated with the Glades, and in fact condone his continued service after the demise of his father, when it should be his, as the oldest son's, duty to take over his father's place rather than go pursue some illusions of grandeur and potentially get himself killed. Him sending part of his paycheck back to his family the past two years has not seemed to affect their (or at least his mother and grandmother's) opinion on the matter much.

Additional notes abilities and skills:
Knows how to take care of and ride horses. Knows how to cook. Knows how to take care of laundry and sort out supplies. Knows how to clean and maintain weapons and armor. Knows common commands and procedures for a guard and most common laws relevant to those patrolling the streets. In general, has a number of fairly mundane everyday skills expected of a squire, a stable hand, or, more recently, a Fadewatcher.
As a part of acquiring his status as a Sir Yanin Glade's squire (something he still feels indebted for, seeing that he didn't have the social standing or prowess otherwise), his master has also been trying to teach him combat and social manners.
Sir Yanin is a decent, if somewhat impatient teacher of martial arts. Although his master insists he has definitely improved, remaining steeply outclassed even when his master has significant handicap has somewhat curbed Jordan's enthusiasm in regards to his own progress. He intends to keep trying, though, and if it means he gets to keep saving lives and make Rodoria a safer place for everyone, the pain, exhaustion and failures are worth it.
As far as social manners go ... a lot of rules. Sir Yanin doesn't seem particularly pleased with those himself, and is even liable to outright ignore his own teachings. But sir Yanin was also an actual knight of a decently well-known family, regardless of his standing within the family itself. A peasant squire is probably not permitted to follow suit, even if Jordan weren't innately bound to be more on the reserved side.

Name: Buddy
Species: Horse
Sex: Male (gelding)
Age: 4
Physical build and appearance: A slight sorrel horse at barely more than 15 hands (152.4 cm) tall. Who knows what exactly he's supposed to be, but Jordan seems to be quite fond of him.
Associated equipment: Has a brown leather saddle and saddle bags, standard and a bit worn, but not bad quality, stirrups, bridle, a dark gray saddle blanket, and an old patchwork winter blanket. The latter's mostly light gray, but seems to have once been white and cobalt blue. Buddy goes bare-hoofed. In addition, a feeding bag, brush, comb, washcloth, lead rope (stored).