Arise, A Dragon's Boon

- RASOC -

The group paused in whole silence as Sarai rubbed across the half-mortal's face slowly perusing what may have happened to the scales that once covered it. After gaining a little courage Rocky picks up the piece of bandage on the bed and begins examining it.

"Look..."

Rocky tugged at Sarai's robe who abruptly turned to see what Rocky held in her hands.

"What is it?"

In the looming dusk, it was hard to tell what Rocky was showing to Sarai. Noticing her difficulty, Hielgan picked up a lamp from the table and lit it.

"Hold on." Hielgan walks over to the bedside and waves the light from the lamp over the bandage.

"Is that... a face?"

Sarai nods her head in agreement and then slowly turns to look at the half-mortal once more, as Hielgan slowly turns the light from the lamp to light the half-mortal's face.

"By Moria!" Shaemus shuddered.

"Could it be?" Sarai suddenly uttered. "You are not lizardfolk are you?"

The half-mortal's reptilian eyes sharpened as the iris in her eyes contracted into a slit, however, the group was shocked to see that the layer of scales across her face and most of her body had peeled away during the molting now what remained was soft scaleless skin.

"She is not?" Shaemus queried.

"But lizardfolk have scales and a tail right Sarai?" Rocky suddenly added to everyone's surprise.

Sarai paused and pondered on the matter for a moment, everyone fell silent as they awaited her comment on the matter since she was the one who knew the races.

"Einzig."

Sarai finally spoke.

"Einzig?" Shaemus asked.

"Rocky please fetch my book and bring it to me." Sarai instructed Rocky.

Rocky ran over to Sarai's bags and flipped through a few pouches before pausing and pulling out a large book that seemed to have an infinite number of pages.

Sarai flipped through the large book and Hielgan saw various pages with images depicting parts, arrows, symbols, and various other diagrams that he could barely recognize.

"A bestiary?" Hielgan asked.

"No, this is more than that." Sarai replied without turning away from the book.

Sarai continued to look through the images page by page until she came across an image that appeared like a half-mortal with a reptilian tail.

"Is that her?" Hielgan asked.

Sarai shook her head in contention as she brought the book closer to Hielgan's lamp to get a closer look.

"It can't be..." Sarai disagreed. "But the book says it."

"Says what?"

"That she's just like you."

Hielgan took a step backward and nearly stumbled in his frantic surprise, Sarai continued to draw closer as she needed the light to see the book clearly.

"Like me? What makes you say that?" Hielgan asked a moment after recollecting himself.

"In our first meeting, you saved Rocky from a Boldemoth by stopping its charge with your back." Sarai started as she flipped through the large book once more.

"Anyone could have done that..." Hielgan tried to guise his realization.

"Anyone else would have had their back shattered." Sarai dismissed Hielgan's unawareness and concluded it by showing him the image on the page she had turned to find.

In that diagram was a half-mortal with a strange bone structure running across its spine with bony plates aligned across it, it appeared as though this half-mortal had a reinforced spine.

"Einzig."

Hielgan sighed.

"Father said I was born special even among my people, a back strong enough to shatter steel." Hielgan pulled off his cuirass.

"Seems like every warrior's dream, to fight without worrying about watching your back." Shaemus commented.

"It feels like a real dragon's scale." Sarai drew closer and examined Hielgan's back, Hielgan felt her fingers rub across the plate-like feature on his back.

"That's enough right?" Sarai nodded and Hielgan pulled back his cuirass. "It feels like I was born with... a bag on my back."

Hielgan appeared troubled by the atmosphere, regardless of how useful the feature was, it was something that he considered vulgar.

When he turned his eyes to look at the half-mortal on his bed, she was clutching her tail in one of her hands and looked up at Hielgan with teary eyes.

'Normal mortals shouldn't have these... things.' Hielgan feined a smile to reassure the half-mortal.

"You are not abnormal, neither of you." Sarai started. "Don't you see that the blood in your veins is calling you to change? To take a stand for our races!"

"Our?" Hielgan noticed.

Sarai flipped backward through the pages of the book and found a page with an entire head of a half-mortal drawn on it. The head looked like that of any other half-mortal but with pointy ears and slightly larger eyes.

Arrows with words written on their ends pointed to parts of the head on the page, but the rest of the page was blank except for the diagram.

"What is this?" Sarai raised the book to shoulder height and looked straight at Hielgan with the book beside her. "No, this can't be... you."

Suddenly her eyes gave off a strange glow there was no bright light, however, Hielgan noticed the same starry night sky reflected from them. This time Hielgan noticed how large Sarai's eyes were compared to Rocky and Shaemus.

"What are we?" Conceding to her proof Hielgan finally asked.

"The next step for Morland."

- RASOC, INN -

Five days later the half-mortal had managed to fully recover her vitality and stamina, Sarai also found out that the illness that had nearly overtaken her was a rare self-inflicted curse that she unknowingly put on herself.

Sarai concluded that it must have been because of the various living conditions she had been subjected to when she was smuggled.

In the half-mortal's words, it seemed that most of the others had been afflicted by the same curse and many had died before reaching Rasoc. It seemed like nature's way of curling the weak from the strong in that situation.

'This one was the strongest one of the group then, she even managed to cling to life in her final hour.'

Hiegan pondered.

'I may have saved her and indirectly completed the job I had taken from Urrin, but what am I supposed to do with her now?'

Hielgan's mind had cleared after everything, but he still suffered from mild recurring thoughts once in a while.

"Umm Shuri?"

"It's Shuniri." The half-mortal responded to Hielgan with a mild tone.

"Sorry. How long have you been gone? From your home?" Hielgan asked knowing this may trigger unpleasant memories for the half-mortal Shuniri.

Shuniri looked around the room, first at Hielgan then at Sarai, Rocky, and Shaemus before returning her gaze to Hielgan. He figured it would be hard for her to trust others again, but who could blame her after what she had gone through?

"Seven moons." Shuniri responded.

Hielgan was surprised at her quick response, but he was relieved to see that she could communicate with him normally.

"Do you remember where you come from? We could help you go back?" Hielgan asked her once more.

"No... everything is gone."

"Gone?" Sarai voiced her question.

"Mercenaries attacked our village after a new elder was seated, many people died, and the others were captured." Shuniri explained briefly. " Our village was not within the border so the Geblüt would not help us."

Shuniri shook her head sideways in a forlorn manner, Hielgan could tell she was slowly recalling the sea of events that had occurred during the time she was a captive.

"After many days I woke up in a warehouse. Bread and water kept us alive as each one of my kin was taken away one by one." Shuniri paused and bit her lower lip.

"You don't need to continue..." Sarai assured her.

"No! I want you to know everything, he saved my life." Shuniri cupped her hands and gazed at Hielgan with teary eyes.

Hielgan nodded.

"I was wounded and fell ill, they could not sell me to anyone. However, because of my rare blood, they kept me just to see if I would recover." Shuniri seemed to smirk for a second.

"So that's why they left you down there?"

"They said to me; If you can't survive, then die and rot like the rest of the garbage!"

Unforgivable.

"Unfortunately for them, you came along." Shuniri gave a light-hearted smile.

Hielgan wondered how she could still try to be happy regardless of the vast amount of pain she had gone through. Shuniri seemed like the sort of half-mortal that would take every opportunity of happiness that life dangled in her face.

'I can't let you go back to living like that, not in this Morland.' Hielgan made up his mind.

"Do you have any other family?" Shaemus suddenly asked.

Shuniri paused and then looked over to the large bearded individual hulking behind the group and responded.

"My mother used to say we have cousins in Tearl."

"Tearl? I'm going in the same direction, I could get you there if you want?"