Previous Chapters: (1), (2), (3), (4), (5)

Imrys accepted Crispin’s charge to choose their next course. With camp all set up, and the others scattered across the plain, the pair were free to pick a direction. Imrys stared out over the moors, noting that in some areas a low mist hung heavy in the air, draping the ground like ever-shifting cobwebs. The mist was an almost tangible thing, and as Imrys set out, vaguely aiming for one of the ruins, it was almost like moving over sand or through water. The mist seemed to drag at their steps. Or perhaps it was all in Imrys’ mind. 

There was a somber air to this place, so evidently the remains of a great battlefield. Imrys had seen the like before, though he couldn’t recall having participated in any battles directly. Mounds formed where bodies had fallen, detritus collecting against the remains like snowdrifts, and decomposition creating new soil. The battlefield was as ancient as the rest of the Dungeon, however, and what remains they found on the surface were nothing but dried bone.

Here and there some of the remains still wore fragments of armor or bits of tattered cloth. How the cloth had survived the uncounted centuries in this damp, dreary place was almost as much of a mystery as the battlefield itself. Imrys was a practical person, well versed in the simple mechanics of cloth and wood, stone and metal. All the knowledge accumulated in his past life as a blacksmith still lingered in his mind, coming in bits and pieces. He knew that wet cloth decayed faster than dry, but that cloth soaked in certain mineral solutions might be preserved far longer than it ought to. He wondered idly if the same iron-rich water that stained the soil a bloody red might also seep into cloth and leather, preserving it beyond its natural span. 

As they crested a hill they came to something of a ring of skeletal remains. Unlike so many of the bones, there were no crows perched here to harass them, and Imrys decided to take a closer look while the opportunity afforded. 

Tattered garments adorned the human skeletons, though much of the armor had been picked over, salvaged by Coursers seeking any memento of their forays into the Dungeon. Such trinkets, Imrys had come to learn, held great value for the Coursers. Human relics were especially prized by those who did not delve into the Dungeon themselves, or those who did not foray too deeply. It was as Imrys had already observed, almost like a religion among the Coursers, a reverence for a bygone era of which there was little enough collective memory. Humans were a known thing, if only because they had left enough of their remains and their goods behind that the Coursers could piece together something of their nature. The Coursers’ own legends told that once they’d lived closely with this other species, but there were no living humans left in all the lands of the Buried Kingdom or anywhere upon the surface above.

Imrys had enough bits and pieces of fractured memory that he was, perhaps, the only living Courser who had known humans personally, though he kept that knowledge to himself. He was enough of an oddity here that he didn’t care to make of himself some kind of borderline prophetic figure, preaching the true nature of humanity to the hungry ears of Coursers craving any link to their past. Someday, if he felt it safe to do so, he might write down his recollections and pass them along for other Coursers to read, but that day was well in the future. He still hoped to find some answers, and perhaps even find his way back to his previous life. But with every passing day, and week, and now moonturn, he was swiftly coming to lose any hope that such a thing would ever come to pass. 

As Imrys and Crispin examined what remained of the humans’ gear, they noticed time and again the same symbol. A five-pointed star, encircled, with a pair of equine heads locked in battle, their teeth set to their counterpart’s throat. The strange sigil decorated cloth and leather and armor: here as a button, there as a cabochon. It was worked into the stitching of a tattered doublet in a way that made clear it was some sort of coat of arms.

“I’ve seen it’s like before, of course, but no one really knows what it means. Coursers on the whole don’t fight one another, that’s simply not in our nature. While there are those who prefer solitude to community, it is rare for Coursers to fight. Most arguments are settled with words like sensible beings.” Crispin admitted.

“And you don’t think that’s strange?” Imrys inquired, honestly curious. Here they were on the midst of a battlefield, scattered with remains of human and equine alike, and yet the Courser claimed that combat between their own kind was a rarity. 

“It’s no stranger than anything else. Recall… we know full well our kind was not naturally born as beasts of the field. To the best of our historical knowledge, our race was guided into being by human hands. It seems logical that we would be disinclined to self-destructive behavior.” Crispin stated archly, full of a rare sort of hubris on behalf of his race.

“Yes, I suppose that is logical.” Imrys agreed for lack of any concrete reason to argue. Still, he wondered if some magic was at play, something which the Coursers themselves were not aware of. Regardless, he pulled the tattered remains of the tabard free lowering his head in benediction though he couldn’t say to precisely whom or what he prayed, as he tucked the tabard in his pack. 

“I’d like to make for those ruins, but we’ve been at it for a good long while already today, what with how long it took us to get down here. Perhaps we should head back to the campsite and see what the others might have found.” Imrys suggested. 

“Yes, I think you’re right. We can get a good rest and come at it fresh on the morrow.” Crispin agreed, turning his nose toward their base camp. 

They were unsurprised to find the others had followed their noses to the fire. Even in the dank mist of moor, the single clear thread of campfire smoke created a beacon. The light didn’t dim, coming as it was from crystals rather than sunlight, but Imrys felt certain it was coming on nightfall. He’d always had a good sense of time, and though they’d set out early in the morning, they’d taken their midday rest break while still high in the more familiar tunnels near the entrance. It had to have been getting on toward suppertime by the time they’d set up basecamp, and they might have stopped for the day then, but the eagerness to explore was alive and vivid in all of them. 

The atmosphere at the camp was convivial despite the somber environs, with the other Coursers telling stories of previous delves. The day had not produced any great wonders, but they hadn’t expected it to, not so near to well-charted paths. Perhaps tomorrow they might find something more remarkable, but at least they were set up now, with a safe place to store their supplies and to rest in between forays. 

~ Continue the story in Ch 7~