SFS - Chapter 17 (Patreon)

I expected a disaster when I poked my head through the wall of the courtyard with Wraithwalk. The human obviously fell from a massive, unsurvivable height. I half expected to find a smear of blood at the end of the wind-sail’s cords.

A disaster indeed awaited me, though not the one I expected. A mass of Ophidian gathered in the courtyard just next to the tall building. Thirteen… ten… seventeen—ugh, there’s a lot, okay? I don’t need an exact count.

The source of the gathering was obvious even at a glance. Up several stories above the blighted, a figure dangled limply from the cords of the wind-sail. He wore cut up white robes like a scholar, though a scaled chest plate was on over it like a warrior. Blood leaked down from wounds all over his body, staining the robes red and dripping down into the Ophidian below. Each drop seemed to excite the monstrous non-humans more and more.

Is he… dead? Did I just come to rescue a corpse? I eyed the man. His chest rose and fell softly. Alive afterall, then. Definitely in a rough shape, though. I could see from the half collapsed eave above where he crashed into it. Tiles were splintered, and trails of blood marked them.

The man himself had a leg pointed in a weird direction, and one of his arms was tied up in the cords in a way that must’ve been painful. Maybe it was for the best that he was unconscious.

How am I going to do this? Cutting him down will just drop him into the waiting arms of the blighted. Getting the man I came to rescue killed wouldn’t be very noble of me. I eyed the cords, and my gaze lowered to one of the lower roofs below him. An idea slowly started to form—

“Gruh?” A curious noise erupted from one of the blighted, and it shifted its scaled head. A long, serpentine tongue flicked out and tasted the air.

I froze, and carefully pulled my head back through the wall until I was back in the alley. After a moment, I stuck my nose into my tail and took a huff. Do I stink? No—no way. That guy just had extremely good senses… or he was smelling the blood-scent of the human. Yip, it wasn’t me.

 Heisen shuffled around next to me. “Caw?”

”Yip yip! Yiii-yip. Kekekek—yip.” I quietly told him my plan. As per usual, the birdbrain didn’t seem to understand. He did, however, nod his head several times like he fully grasped my genius.

I huffed a sigh and moved around the alley to a better position. Once I was ready, I activated Wraithwalk again and phased into the courtyard. Without giving myself any time to hesitate, I prowled across the snowy ground with my belly hanging low against it. The blighted shuffled around me, but I didn’t spare them a glance. I just kept moving and carefully routing in between their scaled legs. 

Crunch! 

An Ophidian stepped down just next to me. I held my breath and slipped between its legs with a quick burst of speed. My paws silently scampered across the snow, and carried me closer to the building. I stepped up onto the wood walkway just before the wall and phased right into it.

A heavy breath left me as I felt my heart thunk around inside my chest. It was loud enough I was a little surprised the blighted couldn’t hear it. Not that I’d ever admit to such a thing. A noble creature such as myself didn’t get scared of mere peasant farmers, blight or not.

I didn’t see a set of stairs going up, which complicated things. Not by much, though. I headed to a nearby wall, and abused Wraithwalks mechanic of only phasing through the things I wanted to phase through. I stepped up onto the solid wall, then curved to follow along the wall while stepping up higher and higher like it was a set of stairs.

A few repetitions of my Wraithclimb technique later, and I phased through the wall fully onto a tiled roof arching around the building. Up above me, another section of the next floor’s eaves blocked out the sky. Just in front of me dangled my target. He looked even worse up close, with cuts and serrations scattered around his armor.

”Yip?” I barked softly and moved up through the snow. No reply. Of course there isn’t a reply. What am I thinking? He’s definitely incapacitated. 

I eyed him for a moment longer and then headed to the closest wall to Wraithclimb once more. I stopped on the top of the building where the canopy of his wind-sail was caught. Wind buffeted my small body, and snow scattered across the tile in rogue streaks. 

Heizen was already up here waiting for me. He lazily looked up from a snow mound and waved a wing. “Kraw.”

Lazy bastard. I shook my head and moved up alongside where the cords of the canopy dangled down to wrap my target. After a brief hesitation, I sliced one with my claw.

Twang!

A soft sound echoed out, and the tension of the cord caused it to whip up. The man down below sagged, and a shudder went through his unconscious body as the weight was transferred. I carefully peeked over the edge at him, and tried to count the number of cords reaching up here.

Well, whatever. I can just keep cutting till it feels about right. I moved around the canopy and sliced cord after cord. Each one caused the man to jolt and bounced around below me. He’d been stably dangling, but that stability faded as he started to bounce around and twirl with the wind more and more. Once there were a few more left, I stopped cutting.

”Yip!” I called out to Heizen to remind him of my plan and dropped through the ground. A snowbank on the layer below broke my fall, and I repeated the process to get back down to the man.

”Ugh—“ A soft groan left him as the wind caused his dangling body to shift and sway. 

I moved to the edge of the roof to lightly grab his robe with my teeth. Out of range. I paused for a moment and stared at the stubborn human who seemed like he didn’t want to be saved. The least you could do is help me out, bro. Seriously, why do you have to make everything so difficult? How am I—oh, that could work?

My hesitation lasted for a moment longer. This was stupid. It was a horrible idea… it’d probably work though. I took a breath and glanced at the sheer drop down. If I fell, I’d turn into a fox pancake. 

Before I could second guess myself, I sprinted off the side of the eave and launched my fluffy body at the man. I slammed into his ribs, and caught onto the cords wrapped around him to hold myself up. My paws wrapped around him to hold on for dear life.

Wind roared against my flattened ears, and my entire body tingled with terror as the ground fell out from below me. My fur exploded upright across my body. My tail, in particular, puffed up to at least two times its usual size.

The impact caused him to swing out over open air, and the elastic ropes above groaned with the effort. We swung back toward the side of the building—but it just wasn’t enough. I flapped my tail like a wing behind us, throwing around our momentum to swing further and further. “Yip! Yip! Yip!”

“Ca-caw!” Heizen answered from above and cut through the rest of the ropes at the perfect moment. We flopped up onto the snow covered eaves and collapsed into the snow. The weight of the man made us roll several times until we ended up in a mound of fur and cloth. 

“Nyeeee~” A soft whine me, and I spat out a bolt of cloth from my snout. I pushed the suicidal man’s arm off of me and flopped to the side.

”Kakakakakaw.” Heizen flew down to us and perched on the edge of the roof.

Har har, so funny. I think I broke my tail bone. I looked myself over. A bit of blood splattered onto me, but nothing too crazy. My tail still flapped around just fine. “Yip?”

Heizen looked over the edge of the eave and shook his head. “Caw.”

Damn. I was hoping with the source of their hunger out of sight, the dumb blighted would scatter. Peasants would be peasants though. They were mere toads hungry for swan flesh—or something like that. The ancient texts I read a while ago had something like that in them. What even is a swan?

“Ugh…” The man groaned again. Our soft landing into the snow didn’t wake him up like I expected it to. 

I stood up and moved up to his side—

Plap!

My fluffy paw smacked the human across the cheek. Another groan left him—only to be silenced by a second hard slap going back the other direction. Just before I could unleash a third Furious Paw, the man caught me with his hand.

”D-dog?” He leaned up and blinked in confusion. His eyes were a muddy brown with streaks of blue like lightning. Even just looking at them made me a little uncomfortable. 

“Humph!” I pulled my paw out of his grasp and turned my head the other way. I saved your life, and this is how you treat this noble one? You’re the dog—your whole family are dogs! And your mother! Don’t even get me started on her—

“Caw!” Heizen’s croak had a touch of alarm to it this time. 

I glowered at the human for a moment longer before taking a breath. It was fine—I could be the bigger fox here. Live and let go like the snow of yesteryear, yip? I dropped my snout and bit onto the man’s collar to help him get up. “Yiii-yip!”

He tried to push himself up—only to half collapse onto me when his broken arm gave out underneath him. He groaned and slowly righted himself into a sitting position. “Sorry, little dog.”

Breathe! Just breathe through the rage settling through every fiber of your being, Snowie! It’s not worth it—him and his dog-loving brains aren’t worth the turmoil. Unfortunately, while my mind said to let it go, my body didn’t agree. I accidentally drooled all over his face.

”Yip?” Once I got my emotions under control, I nodded my head toward the human and backed away from him. I turned back to see if he could follow.

He coughed dryly and the blood-scent grew stronger. Red specks scattered across the pure snow surrounding him. The man looked up toward the dangling cords. 

“… you pulled me out of that?” His voice came out with a bloody rasp. He looked at my proudly raised snout and his lip curled up slightly. “Yeah—thanks, little guy.”

”Yip! Yiii~yip yip.” At least he didn’t call me a dog this time. I could insult him allI wanted, and he wouldn’t understand a thing though. “Kekekekek.”

”Somewhere safe? Do you know someone who can patch me up?” He seemed to understand what I was trying to get across. The man ran a hand down his face and slowly pushed himself to his feet. He pulled a long sword off his belt and leaned on it heavily like a cane to support his broken leg. 

“Yip?” They were far, though.

“Right, lead on.” His voice mellowed out slightly, though there was still that ground and rough rasp to it. “Name’s Crane.”

Crane? I eyed the man. He seemed more like Bull or Idiot. Weren’t cranes supposed to be noble and graceful? I looked up at the broken wind-sail. Not to mention he obviously couldn’t fly.

As if agreeing with me, the wind howled fiercely and carried with it a sharp storm-scent. My ears twitched toward it, catching the sounds moved with the wind. The wind-sail, without Crane weighing it down, was caught and scent flying up into the sky with ropes dangling. It caught on another nearby roof and billowed like a kite in the wind.

”Yip!” I moved toward a gap in the wall that was just big enough he could fit. We needed to get out of here before other humans came to investigate. There was a high chance they killed or captured this Crane fellow, and I wouldn’t be able to extract any information that way.

”I can walk—“ He took a step forward with his sword and sucked in a sharp breath. His face twisted into a bitter grin. “Just don’t make me run.”

I should take him to Graft’s, then. I doubted I could treat him… that meant going toward the south, though. That was… uncomfortable. I didn’t really have an option though. He didn’t look like he’d survive without a healer. 

The heavy clouds above caught my eye. Snow was falling denser than it had throughout the entire day. I had a feeling it’d get dark with storms soon, and the Ophidian would be out in full force then. It was bad timing to drop now on his part, and it’d be even worse timing if we stuck around any longer.

“Yip-yip!” My tail twitched back toward him. I slipped through the gap in the wall with one last bark to ensure he was following me.

— — —

AN: Cover’s almost done! Hopefully some time this week? I’m putting final touches on it, and fixing the shadowing with the light source and it should be good to go. I’ll hopefully have more time on my hands to write with that taken care of.

It’s been submitted into RR too. I’m hoping for a July/June launch? Maybe?

Oh, also, what do you think so far? I’m going to write to the end of Ghost Dragon Mountain regardless, so don’t worry. Some feedback would be nice, though. Pacing, tension, that kind of thing. Is the progression too slow? It’s about to pick up, but I might need to change some things if the hook isn’t good enough.