Yefka: Mission

Yeka stood in front of the mirror looking at herself and her disguise. She’d gone to great lengths to copy the robes of the investigators she planned to infiltrate. Her hair brushed into long taupe colored curtains a far cry from her usual double braids. If she didn’t know it was her in the mirror she might mistake the image as a long lost sibling. She opened and closed her fists trying to calm the shaking. If what Lord Calabrix had said was true both were highly dangerous. And if one alone could force him to retreat then against two she stood as much of a chance as snowflake in the hells. “Why me…” she thought, but she knew the reason. In the Lord’s words she was the most innocent looking and unlikely to draw attention or seem like an open threat.

She checked herself in the mirror one last time before putting on the glasses provided to as Genlamin had put it, changing the shape of her face, or at the very least making her look different enough. Though the gesture felt pointless, they were no more than cheap metal polished to look expensive and the lenses no more than glass, providing no correction to her eyesight. She wished she could just use a glamour but that was hard to maintain and any mage worth their salt could tell it was happening or in the most serious cases see through it right away. Glamours typically only work against mundane mortals.

Her next task was packing her satchel with the provided items. A better wand, gemstones for magic casting, a sending stone, enchanted parchment and ink, several scrolls of offensive magic, an amulet of teleportation and detailed notes on the targets. Sliding the strap over her shoulder she clinched her fists again, the shaking returning.

“If you can’t stop that tremble you will be found out.” Genlamin said.

Having not heard him enter, Yefka nearly shrieked in terror. Her already rapid heart beat now in overdrive, feeling the drumming in her ears along with the heat at their tips with embarrassment for screaming over Genlamin sneaking up on her.

“If you are terrified of me you have no hope of returning.” he said, “And if you do survive and fail, Lord Calabrix will make his disappointment known.”

“What do you want?” Yefka asked, shame tinged her voice, as she avoided eye contact.

“I was sent to give you this.” he said, holding out what appeared to be a simple dagger, a medium brown leather sheath, and wrapping on the handle, and metal that looked something like bronze. “You are to take the initiative if provided the opening.” he said, giving the dagger a bounce in his palm.

Yefka reached out and took it from Genlamin, shoving it in her satchel all the way down to the bottom, both to hide it and provide an excuse that she couldn’t get to it in time to do that deed. She would provide Lord Calabrix with information on what the man was, and perhaps a weakness or way of taking him out but she would not do it herself. Even if it was ordered of her. Her vow was to heal not to harm, and though the mental tightrope she walked with this view was a hair thin one she wouldn’t kill the man even if she were the one giving the way of doing so.

Before Yefka could say anything else there was a commotion in the hallway. Or at least he carried through she couldn’t tell right away. But it was loud and frantic. Yefka nearly screamed again when Reinholds’ booming voice poured from the sending stone. “Yefka. Barracks. Now!”

Yefka ran from her room and to the barracks. Stopping in the doorway seeing the brutality. Men with injuries she’d rarely seen. Reinhold stood among a few of the least injured men showing little in the way of concern, simply asking questions about what had happened. She caught a few of the more key words. Something about the ‘rabbit man’ and ‘more dangerous’. She swallowed hard. One man with the power to take down Lord Calabrix’s men was bad enough now there were two of them?

“Yefka. Here. Now.” he said, pointing to his side.

“Yes my lord.” she said, coming forward and bowing.

“Save the ones you can. Don’t waste effort on the lost causes.” he instructed.

Yefka looked around and she saw plenty that looked almost too injured, that even with her healing their lives would be greatly altered. “Yes my lord.” she said, but Reinhold was already walking away.

It took several hours but she managed to save two thirds of the men. It took effort after to clean the blood from her hands and even when they were clean she scrubbed them raw. Losing even one weighed on her, but this was too much on top of everything else.

Reinhold knocked lightly on her door. He stood holding a small cloth sack. Without a word he tossed it underhand at Yefka who fumbled to catch it. “Be ready to leave in an hour,” he told her. “We are already behind schedule and you will have to rush to catch up to them.”

“C-catch up?” she asked. “What do you mean?”

“According to the men still stationed there they were seen heading out of town.” he said, “Meaning you will have to catch up to them, find them, and ingratiate to them with no backup.”

“Yes my lord.” Yefka said bowing before Reinhold left her alone to finish packing.

One hour later Yefka was on the inner sanctum standing at the center of a circle used for casting teleportation. Holding the amulet in her hand she whispered a few words of magic to link it with the circle.

“Good luck.” Genlamin said, “You’ll need it.”

“T-tha…” before Yefka could finish speaking she was blinded by a wash of bright light and the feeling of being pulled away from her own body as she was shunted across space to her intended location dropping two feet into tall grass. The faint stink of damp iron and the sweet stink of rotten fruit. She knew she had landed where the fight had occurred just hours ago.

The moon did little to provide light, leaving only impressions of things like trees and rocks as darker negatives over the near black grey of the night sky around them. Searching her surroundings to get her bearings before causing a spell for light, she noticed something in the distance on the road. It looked like a person, that looked like they were swaying with the wind, or were possibly drunk. It took a moment longer to realize it wasn’t facing away from her like she originally thought but was staring at her. It must have seen her arrival. But it suddenly shifted moving sideways into the opposite side of the road like a jello sliding off a plate and vanished. “What…” she mumbled and slowly approached, holding a shield spell up in one hand and light with the other, searching the portion of the road it vanished into but found nothing. “I did see that, didn't I?” She was questioning herself but didn’t have time to focus. She had a mission. She shook off the goosebumps and started towards the next town. Hurried but not suspiciously so.