Olimpia

This was annoying.

What she was doing was important and necessary. Kathren knew that. Whispered that to herself many times over the last day.

But no matter how often she thought it, the embers of irritation remained within Kathren's gut. She spent her decade of service — which, no matter what people said, not everyone did, especially in the slums. Not signing up just meant you never left them. — and then she became a scout to entirely escape her past, never looking back.

Kathren had no family that would help her, no family outside of those she chose or made, and she hadn't done either of those yet. Leaving her to face the stark reality that no one would feed her if she decided to sit on her ass. No, she made the choice a decade ago that she would work for her keep.

She had enough of begging for handouts as a child. Or pickpocketing and stealing when she didn't get enough money to survive.

When she was finally able to join the legion, she discovered some things.

The work was hard. No, the work was grueling. It puts you in situations where death or severe injury is likely. And to survive, you had to kill and suffer.

But you had a purpose.

You knew that while some days all you did was lounge around, you earned your coin and far more when you were called upon. While everyone else wailed about the unjustness of their life, she stood between them and destruction. She actually made a difference, small as it was.

Such meaning called to her. And she never had to wonder where or if she would get her next meal. Where her coin came from. Or who.

So she joined the scouts to get more ale money and further distance herself from her origins.

"Can you spare a copper?" Kathren begged in her long disused feeble voice, holding out cupped hands to the passersby.

They ignored her, much to her irritation and pleasure. On the one hand, she had bathed in shit and mud before scraping it off, letting it dry, and doing it again. And did the same to a burlap sack that could be generously called a dress before putting it on.

Kathren didn't really understand when she was young, but an older girl took her aside one day and taught her how to look 'undesirable.' Kathren only stayed around because of the half-dead look in the young woman's eyes and the intensity of her emotions when she flatly said, "You learn this now, or I'll save you the pain of learning the hard way and slit your throat."

When it was put that way, she decided to stay and learn. But now she understood. The young woman's mind might have been broken from suffering no one should have to endure, but she meant well. More than most Kathren had met while in the slums.

And now, that lesson was coming in handy.

Some more bags that resembled shoes and a shawl that was more hole than thread, and Kathren was right back where she would be if she had never left the streets.

Which was great because that was her whole assignment. While the battle to retake the Triad raged, she was in the slums on a special mission to be covered in shit.

In comparison, her team had a simplistic mission of walking up and down a river's bank… Okay, Kathren really didn't know what their mission was. But! It would be hard to believe it was worse than hers.

A day had passed since the legions "retook" the Triad.

And since then, rumors of how the beastkins wanted peace with us have started circulating. With the disaster that the last two battles were — even if we technically won the last one — it was like the civilians were drowning, and now a life-saving hand was reaching out to them. Though there were a vocal few who only saw an enemy so hated they would rather stab a knife in their chest rather than accept help.

The topic was creating tension, but it was far less than fearing a lightning monster was about to fall on their head every time a cloud was spotted.

If the beastkin willingly handing over the Northern Fort wasn't a sign that they wanted peace, she didn't know what was. From what she had heard, if the beastkin desired to hold the fort, it would still be in their claws.

At least, that was the atmosphere in the middle and upper districts of South Town. In the slums, Kathren had never seen a place so tense. Everyone's head was down while throwing sidelong glances at anyone approaching them.

Even those who had been walking next to each other for a while would jump if anyone around them made a sudden movement. Hands never strayed too far from bulges in clothes that looked suspiciously like weapons.

With the sun setting, Kathren clambered to her feet, making a show of getting up. Then she started hobbling down the street with the help of a cane.

Looking weak was a mortal sin in the slums.

But looking weak, smelling bad, and appearing like your most valuable item was your dress which looked suspiciously like the rags in the gutter, made you no different than one of the other helpless wretches in every alley.

Wretches those people may be, but no one could deny they were survivors. Survivors who were crazy, and would do anything to survive when pressed.

People don't mess with crazy, especially in the slums. It was asking to get hurt. And getting hurt makes you look and actually become weaker. And weakness was death.

So that was what Kathren was hoping to appear as. She was confident in pulling it off too.

Sure, anyone could cover themselves in grime and a rag and pretend to belong in the slums, but it wasn't about that. It was about attitude.

It was having a submissive deference to all who are stronger while having a steely resolve underneath. Honor and pride mean nothing, and you are willing to do and endure anything, but should you be presented with an opening, or there is no longer a chance at life, you will maule your way to one.

Kathren's situation wasn't great, but it was okay. She had no reputation, so no one should be blatantly hostile, but no one would fear her either. And fear did a lot more around these parts than anything else.

With how tense everyone was, you never knew exactly what people would do, so she always had to be on guard.

Slowly, Kathren started working her way deeper into the slums. She noted the watchers lounging in their alleys or on street corners and the different gang signs that were carved or painted onto walls. She didn't know the attitudes of each group yet, but it didn't hurt to know their territory before she learned.

It took some complicated routes, but she was able to thread her way around the boundaries of the gangs, as most had their borders along one street or another.

She went deeper than yesterday, but it was hardly past what would be considered the edge of the slums. Going deeper without being known would be dangerous. Not having more information would be deadly.

Finding the alley she had noted before, Kathren slipped into its dark entrance. She passed down its length, seeing only a few shadowy outlines of other figures on the ground.

Slipping around them, she moved to the right at the ever of the firelight illuminating the street, then dropped to the ground and curled up into a ball.

Just around the corner from her, under one of the few lamps in the slums, were four figures.

They served as a combination of muscle, an early warning, and gatekeepers for some territory or another.

But most of all, they were teenagers who didn't know when it was in their best interest to shut the fuck up. Seeing as there was an attractive young woman in their midst, Kathren assumed that sooner or later, one of them would bring up what no one was talking about, just to prove how manly he was.

It should give her an idea of where the dark elves were.

This isn't scout work, Kathren grumbled as she settled down for a long night, getting occasional whiffs of the shit smeared in her hair.

**********

"Why are we out here?" Whine asked Jankens for the fifth time in an hour.

"Shut up!" Snapped Opito Lun, the second — but really first — in command of their Century, though they weren't really a Century either. Then he said much softer, "This area doesn't feel right."

Leeroy had to agree. The forest they were passing through had an oppressive feel to it. And it felt like something was watching them… but those were thoughts for superiors.

"I told you he wouldn't answer," Leeroy said, making a grabby motion with his hand, into which Jankens flipped a silver. "Nice do'en business with cha." He chuckled while slipping the coin into his pouch.

"He answered the other times…" Jankens grumbled. Then he looked around, "What do you think is going on?"

"Someone dismissed our message as no big deal and never reported it. Happens all the time," Leeroy confidently stated. "Nothing to be worried over."

"Then where have our supplies for the last few weeks and other messengers gone?"

"Bandits."

"I don't know…" Jankens said, unconvinced, "You hear about bandits attacking legion convoys, but I've never met anyone who has seen it. And it never happens multiple times in a row."

Jankens was making sense, and in truth, Leeroy had thought of these vary same arguments to his answers. However, he was choosing to believe that if he ignored them long enough, the answers would change.

Not that it mattered one way or another. He couldn't change a void-forsaken thing, legion grunt that he was.

"You worry too much," Leeroy stated, "We will have a nice and uneventful trip to Basetown, then we will get our supplies and reinforcements, no doubt already prepared to join us, then march back to the forts. Actually, we are lucky. We get to miss some of the beastkin attacks at the cost of a little walking."

Some of the other legionaries around the pair turned their heads slightly, listening in, and started nodding along with Leeroy.

"Yahh," Jankens sighed more than said in embarrassment while rubbing the back of his head. "I guess there is nothing to w—

Leeroy's head snapped to the left side of the trail and then rolled to the right.

The hum in the back of his mind had turned into war drums, blocking out nearly everything else.

At Leeroy's movement, everyone around him snapped their shields up and reached for their gladius or javelins. A murmur ran through the Century, and soon the Opito was turning. A look of fear hidden deep in his eyes was rising up to the surface but not showing on his face.

The forest was the same as it had been for the past couple of days of travel. There was no difference perceptible by sound, smell, or sight, but Leeroy knew.

"Right," Leeroy whispered, already turning. He reached out with his free hand, grabbing hold of Jankens' arm and pulling him out of the formation. It was a good thing he decided to stand at the side of the collum that morning, as he could slip right out.

"Leeroy! Jankens~!" roared their Opito, "Get your asses back in formation, or I will skin you alive!"

"Ambush!" Shouted Leeroy, not looking back, "Charge right if you want to live!"

There was nothing for an instant. It was an instant of a man half your size suddenly standing up and slapping you in the face. It didn't hurt, not really, but the shock of the experience left you momentarily stunned. Then you got your shit together and punched that little, but ballzy, man in the face laying him out.

The Opito was in command of them all. It wasn't an entire century that their commanding Tribune sent out, as after the recent battle, they only numbered forty. And the way things were looking, their 4th Cohort of the 14th Legion couldn't afford to send out a whole Century. Which was a pretty bad sign, all things considered.

And even if they were a full century, they didn't even have a Centurion, as he was killed a week ago, along with their old Opito.

Which forced Guard Commander Lun to become Opito Lun, a promotion everyone knew he wasn't ready for, even him.

That unfortunate day, and a few more days before and since, the Century was only saved because of one reason.

Leeroy's supernatural nose for danger and instinct to know when to charge. It was an undeniable fact that if they shut up and just followed after Leeroy, everything would work out just fine.

As one, everyone standing on the road stampeded after him, quickly catching up thanks to the stumbling Jankens slowing Leeroy down. Those behind quickly formed into an arrowhead, with Leeroy at its head.

Leeroy took his first step into the tree line when the arrows started flying from up the road. Grunts of pain sounded behind him, and he could feel the loss of minds from the newly established Union, but he kept his eyes ahead and shield up.

Foot planting into a hole hidden by the grass, Leeroy stumbled. The change in position shifted his shield, and the edge of his shield deflected an up arrow that would have struck him in the throat.

Quickly getting his feet back under him, he changed directions slightly by shifting to the left. A javelin flew by his head with a whistle a moment later as someone spotted the archer crouched behind a tree. Leeroy got a good look at the archer as they passed and was surprised to see what looked like a dark-skinned elf, though he couldn't be sure from the scarf and hood the figure was wearing.

More arrows came flying from between the trees, but few were injured now, as the section of legionaries had shifted their shield to block their left flank, where most of the arrows were coming from.

"We need to get back to the Forts and warn them!" Shouted Lun mentally and vocally.

Leeroy looked to the right, back the way they had come, then turned forty-five degrees left, "This way!"

Seconds later, more arrows came from their right flank, claiming the lives of the unprotected legionaries.

Lun shut up at that moment as it became clear to all that they were surrounded.

A grim resignation started to fill the Union, but any commands to turn and fight never came. Because while no one else could see a way out of this, Leeroy's mind burned with absolute conviction.

They had a chance. It was small, and there would be many deaths, but some would escape.

So they ran, weathering the arrows that pelted them from all sides. Then all at once, the arrows stopped before sporadic arrows once more started coming from their rear.

After a dozen more feet, the press of the trees forced the legionaries to break their formation and become more of an off-centered line. But still, no one moved to get ahead of Leeroy.

Leeroy often changed directions seemingly at random, but the legionaries found themselves running through clearings or small trails, allowing easy passage.

But as the forced jog wore on, psy was used up, and wills began to falter. Those only thirty feet from the back of what had become a column found arrows sticking out of them within a moment, confirming their pursuers were still hounding them.

Many started stripping their weapons, shield, and armor as they ran, as speed and endurance became their only chance for life.

Minutes passed into what must have been an hour, and they arrived at the cliffs that made up the southern banks of the Twins. Without hesitation, Leeroy dashed for the edge and threw himself into the air.

The twenty that were left and still following behind him only paused for a moment of hesitation before an arrow skipped over the rocky ground between their feet, pushing them to follow.

"Elementals, damn you, Leeroy!" Hollered Opito Lun as he fell through the air.