The chronomantic storm was easy to locate because it was raining upside down.
In a secluded mountain vale bordering the Ohn’ahran Plains, droplets of spring rain rose from the emerald grass, floated toward the clouds, dissolved in a flash of bronze light, and began the entire sequence again every forty-seven seconds.
I. The Repeating Meadow #
“Bronze flight temporal resonance,” Zyneese declared, holding a brass astrolabe aloft with two fingers while keeping her robes elevated above the damp turf. “The local timeway is caught in an iterative loop. It repeats eight minutes of Tuesday morning indefinitely.”
“According to the Bronze Accord bounty,” Avelreese read from her binder, “an expeditionary botanist entered this valley nine days ago and failed to report. We advance in thirty-yard increments. Vyrneese on point; Reyneese on rearward shields.”
“The rain tastes like mint,” Vyrneese noted, catching a floating droplet on a clawed fingertip.
“Do not ingest temporal anomalies, Vyrneese!” Avelreese pleaded.
I took a sip of my cold rosehip tea and smiled into the mist. Over the past three weeks, our four-person unit had settled into a strange rhythm: Avelreese calculated our demise, Zyneese complained about aesthetic indignities, Vyrneese tested the limits of physics, and I made sure nobody bled to death while doing so.
We pushed through shimmering silverleaf bushes toward the center of the meadow, where a massive hollow willow pulsed with golden light. We expected an infinite drake or a chronomatic horror.
We were entirely unprepared for what actually came out of the tree.
II. Zero Boundaries #
“PEOPLE!”
A blur of vivid emerald and wild turquoise exploded from the hollow trunk.
Before Avelreese could initiate Phase One, two muscular blue arms wrapped around the human paladin in a bone-creaking bear hug.
“Actual living people with pulses and names!” the newcomer shouted in the melodic cadence of the Darkspear isles. “Do you have any idea how boring it is to talk to the same five squirrels for nine days?! They only know three gossip topics and all of them are about acorns!”
Avelreese’s greatsword clattered into the grass as she found herself hoisted six inches off the ground by a six-foot-four troll druid whose emerald hair was braided with living orchids and copper rings.
“Stand… down!” Avelreese wheezed. “Tactical… space… required!”
“Oh, look at you in your shiny little tin can!” The druid set Avel down, patted her armored cheek, and beamed at the rest of us. “I am Lulureese! And this—” she held up a plump green tree frog resting on her shoulder “—is Ribbert. He is a gentleman of refined taste.”
Ribbert let out a single, dignified croak.
Lulu turned to Vyrneese, placing a freshly woven crown of fragrant wild orchids between the dracthyr’s horns. Vyrneese froze, touched the petals, and looked at me. “Reyneese, this foliage has zero defensive value.”
“It suits your coloring,” I said.
Lulu was already spinning toward Zyneese, who backed away holding her grimoire like a holy ward. “Do not touch me. I am composed of void energies and severe boundaries.”
Lulu simply stepped into Zyneese’s space, leaned down, and tucked a pale purple star-lily behind the void elf’s pointed ear. “You look like you haven’t slept since the First War, honey. The void is loud, yeah? Ribbert knows. He sits with the quiet things.”
Ribbert hopped from Lulu’s shoulder directly onto Zyneese’s velvet mantle. The frog tucked his legs in and croaked softly.
Zyneese stared down at the creature. Her mouth opened, then closed. “The creature is… thermally neutral,” she muttered, adjusting her spectacles. “He may remain for eight minutes.”
III. The Five #
Breaking the temporal loop took fifteen minutes once our forces combined.
Zyneese anchored the fluctuating chronal lines with frost pylons; Avelreese purged the distortion with holy radiance; Vyrneese scattered the stagnant fog with Thunderfury’s gale; and Lulu summoned a tidal surge of wild growth that grounded the displaced earth back into the flow of time.
The rain stopped falling upward. Normal mountain rain pattered against the leaves.
“Contract completed,” Avelreese said, wiping her clipboard on her cloak. “We should escort you back to the flight master in Valdrakken, Lulureese.”
Lulu looked at Vyrneese with her flower crown, at Zyneese surreptitiously stroking Ribbert, at Avelreese clutching her battle notes, and at me leaning on my staff.
“Why would I go to Valdrakken?” Lulu asked. “You four are the best thing that’s happened to this continent in twenty years. Where you’re going, I’m going.”
“We are wandering mercenary contractors without a destination,” Vyrneese informed her.
“Even better!” Lulu clapped her hands. “Wandering is my favorite sport! Ribbert agrees!”
And just like that, four became five.
IV. The Reality of the Road #
The feeling of sisterhood was intoxicating. The practical reality of five wanderers living out of saddlebags was an unmitigated disaster.
Within two weeks, our fellowship began to unravel along logistical lines.
First was shelter: we possessed one three-person canvas tent. Avelreese insisted on sleeping outside in her armor and woke up coated in frost, sneezing while attempting dawn push-ups. Vyrneese frequently tore the tent stakes from the earth whenever she turned her wings in her sleep.
Second was food: Avelreese budgeted sixty copper per person per day. But Vyrneese’s draconic furnace required twelve pounds of red meat daily; Lulu’s foraged fruits spoiled within forty-eight hours; and Zyneese exhausted our coin on imported Dalaran flour and butter to bake at 4:00 AM to stave off anxiety.
Third was inventory:
“Who packed the teleportation reagents?!” Zyneese’s voice echoed through our muddy campsite one freezing evening near the Hinterlands.
Silence.
“According to Roster Schedule Delta,” Avelreese read frantically, “Vyrneese was assigned dry reagent transport.”
“I placed the sack beside the cooking fire to ensure it remained dry,” Vyrneese stated proudly. “However, the heat caused the arcane salts to combust into a vibrant violet flare.”
“You burned ninety gold pieces of portal dust,” Zyneese whispered, her spectacles fogging with fury. “We are stranded in a swamp sixty leagues from civilization, and my shoes are entirely ruined.”
“I brought three wild hedgehogs to keep us company!” Lulu announced, emerging from the brush covered in leaves. “They were cold!”
“Lulu, no more wildlife!” Avelreese shouted, clutching her head. “We have two wounded badgers in the wagon and a winged serpent eating our jerky!”
I sat on a damp log, watching the shouting, the smoke, and the hedgehogs. My herbal pouch was down to three sprigs of bruised Silverleaf; my mana was drained from treating Avel’s chronic colds and Vyrneese’s wing blisters; and my tea was freezing cold.
We loved each other. But raw power and good intentions cannot patch a canvas roof. Talent cannot keep a ledger.
We were five of the most powerful individuals on the continent. And we were slowly, inexorably falling apart.
Gallery #
