Tor, Morholt, and Gwaine led the company at the front. All three knew of Oxfordshire and it's ways. Gwaine was telling the Somerset knights about his time in the kingdom while the others listened in with varying degrees of interest behind them. This lasted much of the day as the country passed by them. At the end, they reached a wide dirt road. Two guards stood to either side of the road entrance.

“Halt!” One of them shouted and both pointed their spears forward. “Dismount immediately!”

Morholt instantly complied and all followed suit. “Greetings, sir! I am Sir Tor, and these behind me are knights of Camelot and friends. We have come for an audience with King Urien to request passage.”

The guard who had spoken nodded. “We of Oxfordshire thank you for honoring our customs.” He gestured down the road. “Over that hill will be White Horse Hill. Here you will find the castle and King Urien.”

“Thank you,” Morholt smiled wide and turned to the others. “Well, off we go.”

The group trotted down the road for a minute before Fira felt something rush over her. Whispers began to fill her head, whispers of “Beware the Green Knight.” She spun around, turning Aland back, and looked hard at where they'd come from.

“What's the matter?” Leon asked her, trotting back to where she sat on Aland, unmoving.

“Draw your swords.” That was all she said before she kicked Aland into a gallop and ran back towards the guards.

Leon cursed but did as she said. He shouted up to the others. “Everyone back! Swords out!”

“What's going on?” Gwaine asked him, pushing Gringolet to reach Leon.

Leon sighed. “I have no idea.”

Fira stopped for a moment half way between the knights and the guards of Oxfordshire. She looked deep into the trees before nodding to herself. They were here.

She galloped back to the spot where the guards stood at the beginning of the road. They looked at her in surprise as she dismounted and drew a dagger, approaching the trees.

“I know you're there,” she shouted. “Show yourselves!”

Aland reared back as men clothed in blacks and greens approached from the tree cover. Immediately the guards shouted; they knew these men were enemies. Both guards readied their spears. She didn't have time to consider whether or not magic was legal in Oxfordshire.

“Forbærnedest!” She threw both her hands out and the first row of mercenaries was consumed by fire.

The screams as they burned were ringing in her ears as her knightly companions rode forward and began their assault. Fira remained on foot, defending the two guards of Oxfordshire. She watched in awe as the knights slaughtered the enchanted mercenary force.

Tor and Morholt fought as one, obviously atuned to the other’s fighting style perfectly. It reminded her of Gareth and Gaheris. For indeed the brothers of Gwaine were working in tandem also. Gwaine himself was using his height upon Gringolet to his advantage and sped forward trampling the mercenaries.

With a flash of her eyes, she sent a mercenary flying backwards. This one had gotten a little close to comfort. She looked up and saw Galahad trip on a corpse, leaving him wide open. Fira incanted a spell that placed a shield of energy around him. She held it as long as she could before it collapsed, and she fell along with it. But it had saved one of her best friends.

On her knees, she looked up in dismay as a mercenary raised his sword to bring it down on top of her. She closed her eyes.

But the blow never met with her body. Instead a spear ran through the mercenary's body. Fira was helped up by the other guard. With a smile and a nod, she thanked them.

It was Galahad who rushed over to her. The young man took her hands. “You're alright?”

“Yes,” she assured them.

He wrapped her in a hug with a laugh. “Thanks. For saving me, I mean.”

She laughed with him as he pulled apart. “It's my job.”

Leon was busy trying to pull his sword from a corpse so everyone walked over to him to congregate. Fira looked around. There were at least forty corpses. The two guards joined them.

“You know of the Green and Black Menace, then, even in Camelot?” one asked.

“We told them,” Tor volunteered. “They are abundant in Somerset. We sought help.”

The second guard nodded quickly. “They are a plague on this land. Speak to King Urien about receiving help from this land, if vanquishing the Green and Black Menace is your goal.”

Leon nodded to them. “We will. Thank you.”

The first shook his head with a laugh. “No. Thank you. We would've been slaughtered without your help.”

The group bid farewell again. Together they rode for the rest of the day until they caught sight of an enormous city on a hill. The dirt road turned to cobble, the hooves of the horses clip-clopping on the stones. Down into the valley they went, entering the city.

Tor and Morholt spoke to the city guards. They were recognized almost immediately as the travellers from Somerset from a month before. A guard ran up through the city to ask the King for an audience.

Until then, the group was shown to a stable for their horses. Fira was loathe to leave Aland with anyone, but she obeyed when she realized Aland would have Gringolet as company. That was tolerable.

The city was similar to Camelot, except Fira noticed several shops with spell books. As they waited for an answer, she began to wander into one of these.

“Where are you going?” Galahad asked, sneaking up behind her. He had left his bright red Pendragon cloak with his saddle bag and hurried after her.

She shrugged. “I've never seen a Magic Shop. I was curious.”

“Then let's go in.” Galahad smiled and opened the door for her like a gentleman. As she went inside, he winked back at Gwaine who had sent him over to watch Fira.

As she stepped inside, she felt the tingling sensation of an abundance of magic. Spell tomes sat on bookshelves to her left on the wall and against the window at the front. A counter ran along the second half of the left wall, where an old man sat reading. It wasn't dark in the room at all; a bright, arcane glow filled the room from where a magical, green fire burned in the middle inside a fire pit.

“This is amazing.” She approached the right hand wall and looked at the alchemical ingredients. Herbs and other numerous ingredients were lined up and labeled.

Potions and poisons lined the back wall. Hemlock, Nightshade, Daphne poisons remained expensive just like back in Camelot, but there were other more exotic sounding poisons that Fira had never heard of that had list prices even higher.

“Good evening, sir!” Fira smiled and bounced on her heels as she approached the man behind the counter.

He nodded with a smile. “I sense skilled magic in you, child. Yet I've never seen you here?”

“I live…” she halted as she glanced at Galahad. “Far away. This is my first visit to Oxfordshire.”

“Well, it is my privilege to have you here.” He gestured around him. “Take a look around.”

Suddenly the door burst open and Leon stepped inside. His eyes met Fira and Galahad. “Time to go.”

She sighed but nodded to him. “I will try my best to stop in later, good sir.”

She and Galahad walked hand and hand out the door. Fira’s face fell as she left the magic shop, but she knew there were more important things to do than go shopping with nonexistent money. She walked in the middle of the knights. The sun had sunk below the horizon and the stars were starting to appear, blinking like little lights in the night sky.