The Kaczmarek Killer

[channe]

"No!"

Chyort thing --
Chyort girl --

Patience, you have no right; that is what she'll tell you the next time she sees you, if she recognizes you -- and you'd better hope that Agnieszka Kaczmarek does not --

And with a terrible, shrieking, wordless cry, she launches herself at the retreating Ashfiend.

In her world, he does not get to simply walk off. Not after this.

[Carnath-Emory]

Patience, you have no right.

Neither did Aeryn Karolinger, who rained iron-capped bolts down upon Constabulary men engaged in their required duty. Neither did High Constable Calomel, who executed cultist after cultist. Neither did Ariane herself, who days ago drowned a very human sort of villain in the iron which is her own blood -- and had stopped, but only because she was made to.

Necessity, she'd said to Glenn Burnie, days and weeks ago. Some people do what is necessary, heeding few other concerns at all. Add squire Patience to that short list -- towards whom is flung such a gaze, as Ariane's horse draws near her; who is fixed with those grey eyes, sharp within the slit of vision that the helm allows. That monstrous helm, as twisted with cruel angles as is the rest of her armoured self, and this is what surely means to address the brave squire, what surely means to have quick and hard and urgent words with the woman. Except that behind her rises the terrible scream that she ought to have expected, knowing Agnieszka, knowing that loss --

So that with a twitch of the helmed head, she is tugging hard on those reins, is wheeling the great warhorse back about in a cloud of scorched dust. It is young Agnieszka who she must pursue now, and with real and sudden haste: the Janeiro girl will hear those hooves bearing down, long before Ariane's swung free of the saddle -- and she does this before the creature has quite begun to slow. A staggered landing, an armoured body briefly balanced upon two heels and five gauntleted fingertips, before with a shout of her own she is after the girl.

These hands mean to clutch, and the iron is melting from their palms to permit that. This body means to anchor Agnieszka's smaller one, and all the while:

"Ne pizdi, ne pizdi, it's done..."

[Cinnabar]

On some level, the squire's words register; on some level they are heard as more than simply background noise like the frightened shouts of the fleeing, or the roar and crackle of flames; on some level they are understood, and it is only this that has Calomel pausing as his makeshift cudgel is released from the Ashfiend's grasp, only this that holds him from beginning anew that attempt to pound the ghoul into oblivion.

And that simply, it's over. It's over, the fiend walks away, and they are safe, for now. For now. Perhaps.

There's a moment of indecision, a silvered glance between the Ashfiend and his blazing handiwork, and then Agnieszka is moving, is pursuing; a couple of brief steps are taken after her, but then here is Ariane or some figure of writhing armour who he can only presume is the swordswoman, bearing the girl to the ground and priorities change, decisions shift and adjust.

For the third time in one evening the Constable is bathed in flames as he drops his charred and splintered timber and dives back into one of the burning cottages with firm, deliberate motion, into the humble dwelling that faced the full force of the Ashfiend's sorcerous assault. Within that gutted and blazing shell timbers and beams are thrown aside with methodical force before he emerges a moment later, dragging some limp and blackened and armour-clad form from amid the ruin; hard to make out whether the fallen Brother-Corporal is truly dead or merely insensible, but there's not time to check and so he's laid out hurriedly, a safe enough distance from the fire.

Then Calomel's back into the cottage, returning this time with another indistinct form, though from the way this body's limbs are charred, near-severed, features barely recognisable as human, it's clear enough that no life remains. Elzhara Massry, identifiable only from the fact that it was her family's cottage, and perhaps from a few simple pieces of jewelry now fused with charred flesh.

To the next building now, don't stop don't stop keep moving, the wall nearest the blaze only just beginning to smoulder, and he emerges with the body of an unburned but blood-soaked man in his arms, who he sets down on the frost-and-cindered earth of the farmyard. Oliver Mason, alive but bearing grievous wounds from the Ashfiend's blade. Then he's turning to the last cottage, this one's roof-beams already burning fiercely, fire having spread across from that first violent conflagration. No care for the heat nor for the smoke nor the sparks and embers that rain down upon his scalp and shoulders, he ducks inside and is out of sight for a space of heartbeats.

When he appears again it is with head bowed, face hidden as he emerges, backlit by the hungry flames. A figure in a dress at his side, a slender arm limply draped across his shoulders, his own supporting her about the waist, holding her upright though her head slumps forwards. In his other arm, cradled carefully as if asleep, a smaller form rests its face against the side of his neck. Perhaps some instant of mad, impossible hope for onlookers, the thought that somehow, miraculously they might have survived.

It is an illusion that is broken as Calomel steps further away from the fires, no longer silhouetted by them but illuminated, and the truth becomes clear; dark blood soaks their clothing, flesh and bone marred by tainted steel; there is no life in those sightless eyes, nothing but fear and pain in those lifeless features. Laranna Kaczmarek lowered carefully to the ground in a pool of skirts, red hair disarrayed and clotted with blood, a simple stone pendant glinting at her throat. Little Mateusz Kaczmarek, his body small and frail and ruined with wounds that would have slain a grown man, set down with instinctive gentleness beside Laranna.

At length the Constable straightens, gaze upon the bodies lined up in front of their shattered homes for a long stretch of time, expression unreadable, gaze glittering with silver. Clad in blackened rags that were once good clothes, skin smeared with ash and char and blood, a haze of smoke drifting from places where his clothing still smoulders. He takes a halting step back, then another. When he speaks it's with a clear voice pitched to carry over the roar and crackle of flames, though his eyes do not leave those shattered forms laid out in the farmyard dust, and the words are curiously flat, stripped of emotion.

"There are buckets in the cattle shed. Bring water from the well, get these fires under control. You'll find blankets in the farmhouse, upstairs, bring those as well. And send word to the Rememdium, we'll need healers." Priorities. Get things organised. Save what you can. See to the living, and only once that's done can you grieve for the dead.

[Kait]

He had agreed. He had agreed?

Emory moving first toward her, then back to catch the Kaczmarek girl was somewhat lost in those first few seconds when a suddenly numbed mind tried to catch up with what had happened. Cumbersome as the idea was, Agnie's cry would belatedly register, and the world sped on blindingly as she watched with breath held. Patience would have her own revenge whether or not the fiend killed every last Kaczmarek this day, but that they were farmers, and good people her father had always had respect for piled upon the bitterness and fury she felt toward the fiend.

Catch her, save her, please. Gods help us all if you don't.

[Cinnabar]

On some level, the squire's words register; on some level they are heard as more than simply background noise like the frightened shouts of the fleeing, or the roar and crackle of flames; on some level they are understood, and it is only this that has Calomel pausing as his makeshift cudgel is released from the Ashfiend's grasp, only this that holds him from beginning anew that attempt to pound the ghoul into oblivion.

And that simply, it's over. It's over, the fiend walks away, and they are safe, for now. For now. Perhaps.

There's a moment of indecision, a silvered glance between the Ashfiend and his blazing handiwork, and then Agnieszka is moving, is pursuing; a couple of brief steps are taken after her, but then here is Ariane or some figure of writhing armour who he can only presume is the swordswoman, bearing the girl to the ground and priorities change, decisions shift and adjust.

For the third time in one evening the Constable is bathed in flames as he drops his charred and splintered timber and dives back into one of the burning cottages with firm, deliberate motion, into the humble dwelling that faced the full force of the Ashfiend's sorcerous assault. Within that gutted and blazing shell timbers and beams are thrown aside with methodical force before he emerges a moment later, dragging some limp and blackened and armour-clad form from amid the ruin; hard to make out whether the fallen Brother-Corporal is truly dead or merely insensible, but there's not time to check and so he's laid out hurriedly, a safe enough distance from the fire.

Then Calomel's back into the cottage, returning this time with another indistinct form, though from the way this body's limbs are charred, near-severed, features barely recognisable as human, it's clear enough that no life remains. Elzhara Massry, identifiable only from the fact that it was her family's cottage, and perhaps from a few simple pieces of jewelry now fused with charred flesh.

To the next building now, don't stop don't stop keep moving, the wall nearest the blaze only just beginning to smoulder, and he emerges with the body of an unburned but blood-soaked man in his arms, who he sets down on the frost-and-cindered earth of the farmyard. Oliver Mason, alive but bearing grievous wounds from the Ashfiend's blade. Then he's turning to the last cottage, this one's roof-beams already burning fiercely, fire having spread across from that first violent conflagration. No care for the heat nor for the smoke nor the sparks and embers that rain down upon his scalp and shoulders, he ducks inside and is out of sight for a space of heartbeats.

When he appears again it is with head bowed, face hidden as he emerges, backlit by the hungry flames. A figure in a dress at his side, a slender arm limply draped across his shoulders, his own supporting her about the waist, holding her upright though her head slumps forwards. In his other arm, cradled carefully as if asleep, a smaller form rests its face against the side of his neck. Perhaps some instant of mad, impossible hope for onlookers, the thought that somehow, miraculously they might have survived.

It is an illusion that is broken as Calomel steps further away from the fires, no longer silhouetted by them but illuminated, and the truth becomes clear; dark blood soaks their clothing, flesh and bone marred by tainted steel; there is no life in those sightless eyes, nothing but fear and pain in those lifeless features. Laranna Kaczmarek lowered carefully to the ground in a pool of skirts, red hair disarrayed and clotted with blood, a simple stone pendant glinting at her throat. Little Mateusz Kaczmarek, his body small and frail and ruined with wounds that would have slain a grown man, set down with instinctive gentleness beside Laranna.

At length the Constable straightens, gaze upon the bodies lined up in front of their shattered homes for a long stretch of time, expression unreadable, gaze glittering with silver. Clad in blackened rags that were once good clothes, skin smeared with ash and char and blood, a haze of smoke drifting from places where his clothing still smoulders. He takes a halting step back, then another. When he speaks it's with a clear voice pitched to carry over the roar and crackle of flames, though his eyes do not leave those shattered forms laid out in the farmyard dust, and the words are curiously flat, stripped of emotion.

"There are buckets in the cattle shed. Bring water from the well, get these fires under control. You'll find blankets in the farmhouse, upstairs, bring those as well. And send word to the Rememdium, we'll need healers." Priorities. Get things organised. Save what you can. See to the living, and only once that's done can you grieve for the dead.

[Sadism]

Just like that? It was incredible. It was...maddening... Callisto had not had his fill of the violence. Had not seen enough torment and sorrow, pain and suffering. Had not seen enough of -anything-. The brow over the visible eye arched downwards, narrowed into an angled line of vexation. It was not enough. He'd abandoned a perfectly good woman to come and see, and in the end, all he'd received was two unsatisfying deaths?

He'd not even been given a death-cry by either man whose life he was responsible for. How very irritating.

He'd shudder, however, lifting his back as the tremors ran through his body. Tentacles peeled away from him, rose and twined around one another in the air above him. It was a slow process. A remarkably slow process, for now. The collapse of the hut upon him; the fire; the light; his willpower had been drained. Maintaining his form was harder, and would grow harder still until he finally slept.

Those same leathery wings that had brought him to this place, had sent him smashing into a soldier, now hefted him into the air once more. He'd move in the direction of the Ashfiend, yet not at a pace that could be considered rushed. Lazy, almost, and well above those that could wield sword or staff.

If the Fiend did not simply vanish, Callisto intended to follow him. Curiosity killed the cat, they claim. Perhaps it was for the best that Callisto had died already, in his own fashion.

[Vanidor]

"Sister Kaczmarek! You will desist!" The words were a snarled command, coming from a throat made harsh from the mix of frost and fire. "To my side, Janerio! There is work to be done! Now!" If she heeded the order... No, if she -heard- the order, that was up to her. But the Marshal made it and in doing so he would turn to sweep a hand 'round to the four remaining men he had with him here. They had remained out of the combat, as if sensing that their own assaults may have hindered the whole operation. It might have been true. Though they might have made an end of the 'Fiend with their steel-tipped lances and the hefty weight of their war-horses.

But that was not for them to know, to tell the truth. Not now, in any case. Still, he was turning and motioning two of the men. Jhaed, the one who had been unhorsed by the violet glow, and Markus, a grizzle-pated veteran stepped forward. "See to the injured here. Give up your water to the High Constable.... Someone dig Makaan and Daeric out of the fire, if you can." There was a frown stretching across his face, and then eyes would sweep along the field towards the young squire. His eyes were hard, if you could see them so. Shadowed as they were by the flames, including the spar that had been spiked by Ariane.

Here then. The eyes were narrowed upon the Squire, there was -hatred- there, for the Marshal was of the opinion that they could have ended the unlife of the Ashfiend then and there. The Light knew that they had pounded the beast enough to do so. He was -certain- of it. So, hatred in those shadowed eyes, and then the sabre sheathed with careful intent. The gaze moved away, and focused upon his two men still mounted.

"John. Gerald. Ride for the Remedium, direct any help you find in this direction. Once there, send a runner to the 'wood and send Scout-Sergeant Rautha to me. Go! GO!" And the two men would salute in the saddle, hands crashing 'gainst their plated chests, and they would ride off for the Remedium. As for Aeryn himself, he would turn and set his eyes upon the scene that remained before them. First to Agnieszka, with her response or not. Then to Ariane upon her horse. Then finally, his eyes darting to the Constable. There was still anger there, there was truth to that, but it was minor compared to the thoughtful glance he gave the man. There seemed a question there...

Yet, what was there to say?

[channe]

Stopping Agnieszka is like stopping a runaway cart; she struggles, at first, as if she hasn't been hurt at all, despite the sage-green party clothes have been ripped by Deliverance and stained with the blood brought forth by that fell blade. But then: foreign, familiar words, and a familiar voice, and she's got an answer for that.

Her whole demeanor changes, in fact.

"Not until he dies," she yells, turning in Ariane's grasp, clutching at her armor, overcome; she presses her forehead against the other woman's shoulder, and shakes terribly, heaving great breaths in her chest, overwhelmed for a moment with the anger and fear that were unspent and pushed aside during the fight. She turns her head, then, to see where Cinnabar carries Laranna and Mateusz, the child who'd followed her around the yard playing with a toy-sword firewood-stick; a sister-in-law that couldn't stop laughing, and that anger is turning to rage, and she's trying to get control of herself, control --

And then Aeryn calls.

Desist!

"I won't, you know that," is her low answer, audible to Ariane only -- but something in that affirmation is worming its way through her brain, changing her attitude, stilling her breath, causing her to look back one more time. And then: she looks up at her former teacher, and something has changed there; there is something irrevocably mad, something frightening, and she is gaining control of herself, releasing Ariane, disengaging gently from the woman's grasp if she'd let her --

-- and, she'd round on Patience, limping; not a friend, this one, but a familiar face at least, a girl she'd seen around and been friendly with. She's now playing squire because she hadn't got the guts to be a soldier, or at least that's Agnie's view, now that she's interfered in the situation so radically -- Agnieszka is obviously favoring one leg, now, and placing a hand to her belly where that slash'll need stitches and where some of those other places are in desperate need of bandaging and medical attention, but who cares? Who cares now?

It hurts, but there's something that hurts even worse -- Dominik, kneeling. But he has Rhaena there -- her friend won't leave him, that she's sure of, and she's this to say to impatient Patience before she goes to her brother, and by God in heaven, Dominik would understand, he'd approve, see, it's not that Agnie's not supportive, it's that she cares, cares, fights --

"We had him," she said, the anger still shuddering her shoulders and her voice, "we *had* him, you -- piz'dec --" an accusing tone, and shifts around on one foot, and becomes something infinitely strange: a young woman in blood and linen-gauze party-clothes, standing shaky-calm in front of the Marshal, bleeding and in shock and growing absolutely murderous with every moment that passes by, and she says --

"We were dancing."



Dominik's hand is cold-clammy, shaking incessantly in Rhaena's, as he slows to a stop.

The sound in his throat is strangled, hovering somewhere between words and wordlessness, and as Calomel comes out of the building, a being out of a nightmare carrying a nightmare beyond his worst imagining.

He stumbles close, tugging Rhaena alongside him, falls to his knees, and twists his fingers into Laranna's still ones, and anything else is lost around him as he mourns, the rushing of the soldiers and even the presence of Rhaena behind him, until he looks up at Cinnabar, and nobody's ever seen unflappable Dominik like this, ever --

"Get my brother," is all he says, and looks back down, bending over, laying his forehead on the dead woman's belly, the pain of the burns down his side ignored to deal with a deeper hurt.



At Calomel's big house, accompanied by wide-eyed Constables just arrived on the scene and still, stone-faced Brothers, the peasant families wait for news, which will come soon enough.

[Jirai]

Rhaena

She would not leave him, Agnieszka knew her that well. Even with the wash of unsteadiness following the Fiend's departure, even though Dominik's pain tore at her heart, bringing back memories that she did not wish to remember.

She was kneeling beside the older Kaczmarek, gloved hands light on his shoulders, silent support. What could one say, after all? Nothing, and she knew that all too well. His demand for the Constable is followed by a small tilt of the girl's veiled head as she looked up at Calomel - it was directional. "Piotr. And Lina. They are that way." Her voice was quiet and hoarse.

[Carnath-Emory]

That she struggles is dangerous, because there is significant damage done to her, and nevermind that Ariane can't see a bit of it; Ashfiend cannot stand near a thing and leave it unscathed. That she struggles is also inevitable, and Ariane's armour is melting away to accomodate this, if unwillingly so, for something has unnerved it. Something has twisted it into strange and malicious shapes for which it was never properly designed...

At this particular point of time, the swordswoman has no attention whatsoever for that fact.

There is simply this girl. This girl-shaped fury, who Ariane's held gripped roughly at one shoulder and at one arm, because roughness is all that the swordswoman can generally bear, at times like these. The trick is to keep Agnieszka from tearing herself open with that struggling, and it's easier when the girl turns. It can be an embrace then, brief and fierce and "I know," she's whispering, "I know,", and releasing her at the end of it, so that she can turn upon squire Patience.

There'll be no arguing with Agnieszka tonight: a woman well-aquainted with grief, she knows the futility of that, the outright folly. As with any volatile force, the trick is not to dominate but to contain, and she means to -- with a palm to the girl's shoulder, light and firm. With a glance past it, towards the squire, towards Karolinger too -- and not Dominik, for she cannot quite stand that sight, nor even charred Calomel. Let the girl talk, let the girl speak these words, because they are absolutely pointless and absolutely essential, and only at the end of them does she murmur:

"It's not the time for this."

[Cinnabar]

It's a desolate gaze that turns to Dominik Kaczmarek as he speaks, hollow and almost uncomprehending; his attention returns to those bodies, that scattered line of supine forms bearing terrible hurts where they'd been touched by blade and fire. Dancing and gaiety and cheer turned to this, to char and grief and death in abundance.

After a time he looks around the scene slowly, as if seeing it for the first time; his gaze pauses upon Agnieszka, and Ariane who both restrains and comforts her; upon the squire Patience who halted the Ashfiend's assault with a desperate promise, a bargain with the ghoul; upon Karolinger, who casts him a contemplative gaze in return; finally upon grieving Dominik and Rhaena who kneels beside him. At the veiled girl's words he nods silently, and turns to trudge towards the big house, where a crowd gathers in the aftermath of the attack.

It takes a conscious effort to straighten, to lift his head and affix some expression other than blank shock upon his features as he approaches the house, an exercise of will to disdain the reluctance and dread that threatens to still his limbs with every step closer to that crowd full of anxious, fearful faces. But it is necessary, and so it is done. He's a creature of soot and filth and blood, charred shirt and doublet clogged against his ribs, but he moves with assurance, with authority, and questioning eyes turn to him expectantly.

He calls out as he draws near enough to recognise the figures that stand in the light of lanterns that seem dim and uncertain after the heart of the blaze; he calls names that he'd only learned to associate with those faces an hour or two ago, a lifetime ago, in a world of revelry and laughter. So he walks among them, speaking softly with quiet authority that cuts through frantic questions and distraught protests, assigning tasks, things to do, ways they can help.

You, you and you, take your sons and fetch buckets from the milking shed, I need those fires put out. Constables, please assist with that. You and you, ladies, please bring down the bedlinen from the cupboard upstairs; yes, the clean stuff, and the blankets too if you could. You and you, you as well, I'd be most grateful if you could start heating kettles of water on the kitchen stove, there's wounded that want tending and the healers'll need it. You, young miss, can you and your sister take the little ones upstairs for a while? It's noisy and things'll be busy down here in a short while, and that young man there will have the top of his head fall off if he yawns any wider. Take your pick of the rooms upstairs, there's space enough and a bed or two as well if they need to sleep.

And so it goes, with a light touch to a shoulder or arm here and there as he gives them something to lend purpose to their thoughts and hands until there is a bustle of determined activity around the house. It's only then that he turns to the few to whom he's not given jobs; Piotr and Lina Kaczmarek, Donald and Molly Massry. He's silent for a moment, and his first attempt at speech sees him cough on some fragment of ash or smoke, so he must clear his throat and try again.

"You're needed over there." He nods towards the burning cottages, where already there's an enthusiastic if disorganised bucket chain attempting to subdue the flames. If there's a spark of hope in their eyes, though, it is surely extinguished by the small shake of his head, his downcast gaze, and two dreadful words.

"I'm sorry."

[Vanidor]

"We had the beast, indeed." Karolinger glanced towards Agnieszka, downwards at her, though the distance was not so far at all. See a mirror to your smoldering hatred there, he too, would have felt no shame in assaulting the rear of the beast. Had it not been Ariane that had first supported the young Squire this evening. Respect went so far. Passions could be ruled by that respect, now and again. Still.

"And we will be finding a way to destroy him, one way or another." A pause. He said that with enough force that he was sure those around him would have heard the statement. It was directed at the girl. And at Patience. Here then, while his two remaining were soon to join the conglomeration of farmers and their folk to combat and contain and to save, Aeryn simply looked over the head of his lover. A focus, upon the Squire.

"If this... Thing you do, do no work. I will destroy you for the failure. And the Knights will know my fury as well, this I do swear by the blood of my Mother!" There was the hot-tempered Almarkian blood surging to the fore. And with this... this declaration, he would turn away from all of them. Perhaps here one could see the drizzle of crimson that seeped down his arm, for the ornately inscribed plate there was ruined from the force of the Ashfiend's assault. He would walk past his dead, a glance downwards to the two of them as he went on by.

And onwards he would go, away from the scene. If any were to track him, that simple trail of blood would be a good course to follow...

[Awry]

And with the departure of Vanidor, there was the quiet arrival of two - one that did not have as much boiling blood to add, not any words to add, and one that simple yawned, sat, and watched.

He watched the wounded Vanidor leave with watery blue eyes - peculiar eyes. Lazy-looking, observant, quiet, impassive when they needed to be, empathetic when they needed to be; now, there was nothing but thought behind the rippling sheen, behind the pupil. Absent-minded, or absent-tongued, or neither. The gaze turned over the others, wordless not for loss of words but for something else.

He looked at Ariane, Agnieszka. The squire, threatened with the impetus of Vanidor's doom. Then, at the now-distant digure of the declaimed Teron Ashfiend - original name unknown. Had it always been that? The half-lidded eyes squinted, a bit, as if they tried to pierce what mysteries lay behind this burning, broken scene, behind the stalking death knight, behind this *misery*. They did not, of course; nor did they try to. There was no sense of loss, despite the scene at hand.

This was not his country.

As was customary, he took a position out of the way, leaning against a nearby edifice; crossing his bare, scar-lined arms, he *thought*. About what, was anyone's guess, but his eyes remained vigilant.

[channe]

Make no mistake, there's more than one mother they'll swear on, Patience; Agnieszka has one, too, one that would be glad to shed her blood for her children if that's what it takes.

All of a sudden the Kaczmarek girl -- adrenaline wearing off, the feather's effect lessening, most certainly, and thus allowing her body to move back to a more normal state -- finds herself standing in the yard without a medic, desperately needing one, fighting -- panic? Perhaps. At any rate, she's wheeling off without a second thought for Patience, as Aeryn's said all there is to say on that matter --

She walks over to her brother, sitting; she turns her head to Ariane and Rhaena in turn, mouths a quiet 'help me,' and then leans over to Dominik to place a hand on his back and then to whisper into his ear. He'll manage a weak shake of his head and a whisper back to his sister before Agnie begins to raid the hems of her pants for material to form makeshift bandages.



Behind them, three figures approach.

The younger Massry sister -- not so young, really, at a respectable fifty-two -- will not come closer; instead, she turns to the Constable that escorts her and will go no further.

A Kaczmarek, though, has a stronger stomach --

The eldest son approaches slowly, his arm around his wife; Lina will not look, not *yet*, deigning herself to be led by her husband, a man who has always been the most serious of all the siblings. He is serious now, too, serious until he is barely five steps from Mateusz, serious until he kneels and scoops the boy up into his arms --

And for a very long time, the only movement around the Ashfiend's still victims will be Agnieszka, making a hash out of her party clothes in the hopes that she will not become yet another one, and those that help her.

[Jirai]

Rhaena

She would help Agnieszka with the bandaging, sacrificing some of her own skirts to that purpose as well. And then? "I'll be back." She muttered hoarsely to her friend.

And she would, not too much later, returning with two bottles of something incredibly alcoholic and one mapmaker. The full bottle was destined for Dominik, the other for whomever needed it.