Asia's heart lifted instantly when she recognised Skye, even without his big beasts and spear, his hair was messy on top of his head and not swept back from the wind. They wore fresh clothes made out of cloth and leather which made them all look more uniformed.
Skye raised his hand and waved to them, and so did another woman with blond hair. Her frame was small and unthreatening and Aisa could feel her welcoming energy from there.
Once they got closer the Wardens all flocked to her side and she praised them for their good work, this sent them into a bit of a frenzy as they high fived each other and argued about who she thought was the best.
It felt like working dogs returning to their master after a long day of herding sheep. Did that mean they were her flock?
Skye spoke up before she could dive deeper into that thought.
"These were the people I was telling you about. Let's hurry up and get them in chains and make them work in the mines. Our master plans are complete."
Aisa froze in her tracks and so did the rest of the survivors, sheepishly looking around to each other. Should they run? Should they try to fight? Or just accept their life of working in the mine if it meant food and safety.
This world wasn't fair and sometimes just living was the best deal you could get.
She began to step back slowly until a long arm reached behind the group in front of her and smacked Skye in the back of the head. He spoke with a rough voice.
"You're not funny at the best of times and that was the worst of it."
"Ow dude, it was just a joke. They know that, we're all best friends after all. Tell him Aisa, tell him about how cool I was when I saved everyone."
The man who smacked him turned his attention back to the group. He was the tallest by a good amount and his hair moved slightly in the breeze. It was a light brown with blond streaks that shimmered in the sunlight.
"Don't mind him, the worms have gotten to his brain. Welcome in. I'm Kai. I'll let everyone else introduce themselves. I'm in charge of the Smiths here."
The next down the line spoke, a woman with slick back hair tied in a pony tail. Her features were sharp and her face unmoving to the events around her.
"I'm Nora, I'm in charge of the Legion. I'm also responsible for logistics and resource management. Happy to have you here."
"I'm Elli and I'm so sorry about your struggle getting here. We were caught off guard and that was my fault. The important part is that you've made it. I head the Sagittarius and manage our strategy and planning."
Asia looked at Elli and felt a bit flustered, her curly hair was dark and complemented her dark features. The brown of her eyes shined bright behind her ringlet bangs.
The way that she held herself and the energy that was felt from her, it felt.. Aisa couldn't put the words to it, but she wanted to listen to whatever she had to say.
Next to her, the smaller blond girl stepped forward and brought Aisa into a hug, her little body pressed against hers with an unexpected force. Aisa could almost feel the life leaving her body through the tightness of the embrace. After she let go, she introduced herself.
"I'm Claire, and welcome home. The Wardens are my problems to deal with and I'm sorry you had to spend all day with them. They're good people, just a bit…"
She trailed off, looking back at her Wardens, who were now taking off their armour and working out with logs. One was squatting a large log and others were just throwing them back and forth.
"Energetic. They just got back from training and yet here they go again. I also head up military training and missions."
Aisa looked at her, this little thing that was almost a head shorter than her, what a crazy time she must be having of it all.
Skye went to speak next but Elli cut him off.
"I think you've said enough for today Skye."
Skye wanted to object but decided to just hang his head a bit lower, they were right, it wasn't funny and he should feel a bit ashamed. He just wanted to lighten the mood and now had a sickly feeling in his gut. Elli continued;
"We have important things to talk about. Nora will have her people get you settled, but first, there is food and water waiting for you inside. I had Cookie make something special."
The idea of food sent a wave of energy through the crowd. Their faces lit up and Aisa could feel the renewed hunger growling behind her, she dared not make them wait. She waved them forward and said to the group.
"I'll follow you then. Come on Jacob."
The young man looked up to Aisa with a bit of a hurt expression, he also wanted food, couldn't she do this without him? He didn't want to seem unimportant in front of the new people, so he didn't protest much.
Entering the fort they were awe struck with what they saw, everything was built up and organised. People were moving from place to place with purpose, working together and laughing as they worked.
Someone came by and led the group to an open area where food was being prepared, Aisa and Jacob continued to follow the Marked.
They were led into a building in the middle of the fort, some of it still under construction. In fact a lot of the fort was still being built up. Wooden buildings were springing up all around them as they walked the dirt paths to the middle.
Once inside they sat at a table in the middle of the room, the back of the building was open and light was shining in while a tree stood young and strong in view.
"There are 190 of you that made it, over 300 died from the march, or what you experienced before it. We lost 4 from the Legion trying to lead you here. I cannot imagine what you've gone through but I'm forced to."
Elli spoke with a soft yet confident manner, speaking the facts of the matter to let them know that they were up to speed on the situation.
"Now that you're here, I can promise you that you won't have to experience it again. We have lost people too, but they died fighting. That's the opportunity I'd like to give to all of you here."
Aisa crossed her arms and held herself tightly, the memories of the last few days felt like a dream, a horrible one that made it so she never wanted to sleep again. Elli didn't pause long enough to let those emotions wash over her.
"This is going to be hard, but I need you to tell me what we're up against. We have a general understanding of our surroundings. We've made contact with other groups as well."
She pointed to a stone laid out on the table, Aisa now just realising what she was looking at, it was a map more than it was a table. She didn't recognise most of it but she could see where she came from and where she was.
"Here, they have formed an alliance and are working together, just past the castle. This is where you just came from"
Her hand moved over to the east, and drew a line to the fort they were just in. There were other stones, some larger and some smaller, placed around the forts.
"Here, there used to be a group, and now."
She took the rock and tossed it over her shoulder. It bounced off the ground and rolled closer to the tree.
"They're gone. Disappeared. This morning when a Shadow who went to deliver a message returned we got the news. Not a single body left. No sign of monsters eating them."
Aisa felt frozen. It was close to her previous location and she could only guess what happened to them. She spoke up.
"Mikhail took them, but I'm sure you've already assumed that."
"I would rather not assume anything. Please tell me what you know."
"I know that he was creating more powerful Minions out of the bodies of humans. We left early due to the fear that he would start with us. He has a weird ability, it revolves around controlling the dead. He only kept us around because we could strip the monsters of their organic material and leave the bones. If he could control human skeletons, with human skeleton hands, what would he need us for?"
Elli chimed in to lead the conversation, she needed specifics to make a plan.
"How was this Mikhail able to have enough monsters to overwhelm a group of Marked?"
"I don't know the exact numbers, he stopped sharing details about his Mark soon after we met. At first he was shy and timid, but that all changed when he saw how powerful he was becoming. He told us his Minion could control 100 monsters, but they were slow and weak. When the people came and he found out about the Branded, and how they could extend his control of them and he could even control more…"
She trailed off, Elli looked over to Nora and Nora nodded at Elli. They had just done the math.
"So he had an army of 400 monsters that were not so weak anymore? That shouldn't be able to over run a fort of Marked."
"No…You don't understand."
Aisa's voice broke, the fear of it starting to show.
"Each of his Branded increased his control by 100…"
"2400."
Skye spoke up as soon as she said that, staring blankly into the roof. That was the amount of dead he was able to control that they knew of. There was a chance, like Skye, he could improve the number of Minions in other ways.
Would he be able to control more monsters the more powerful his Branded became? What happens when they absorb the 1000 slivers and moved on to the next stage like their weapons did, would their Minions double again?
There were too many unknowns and even the minimum number he could control was already too much to handle.
The room was silent. Everyone was having the same train of thought more or less. Kai looked less fazed than everyone else. Maybe he had more faith in their abilities or maybe he just thought his ring of protection would keep them all safe.
Claire broke the silence.
"How do we.. defend against something like that?"
"What does it matter? We'll find a way, this wont be the first time we've fought against a large number of monsters. Remember Tombstone? I bet you've killed at least a couple thousand skeletons that night."
Kai replied to her.
"That's not the same Kai. There are differences between individuals moving in a pack, mindless hordes, and human enemies. Look what happened only a few nights ago. With a leader, those monsters were able to do some serious damage and there were only a couple hundred of them."
Claire was stern and wanted to make sure he was taking this seriously. If those skeletons in Tombstone surrounded them and starved them out, or even just had the brains to set fire to the building, they would all be dead. This was not the same fight.
Kai leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table.
"Yeah, I get that, but let's not let the enemy bet us before we even try."
Elli was the one who spoke up this time.
"And we're not going to, we're not even going to wait until they come to us. It's too risky to defend against it, we assault it. Pushing forward and working with other groups we will force him to fight a war on multiple fronts. Can we fight against an enemy that outnumbers us four to one? No. So let's see if he can fight four enemies at once. He decided to go down this road alone and abuse the people around him."
She looked around the room, slowly holding the eye contact of each person, letting the silence hang in the air with the floating dust particles.
"He will lose everything and pay the price for his neglect. The world we're building has no room for people like him."
And with that the meeting moved on from a meet and great to preparation for the first world war.