Ellian fell fast and hard, flailing in and out of the downward stream of water. He fell for a few seconds before coming crashing down into another wider, but shallower pool of water. Submerged, he began to move in the direction of the current, towards a opening in the rocky walls of the pool which presumably dropped down into another at a lower elevation. 

He let himself be pulled along by the current and at the final moment, burst out of the water and grabbed onto the edge, just before the opening. But just barely. His fingers trembled on the slippery rock that he was caught flush with, as faster flowing water buffeted him on its way into the lower pool. Pulling himself up, the boy collapsed onto the edge of the upper pool and rose to his feet, huffing hard. 

He stood on what amounted to a small cliff, overlooking a large grotto. Here too, the wall's bioluminescence allowed him to see the slippery rock that made up the confines of this undercroft that he had found himself in. Large pillars of rock connected from the ceiling to the floor. Stalactites and stalagmites were unevenly distributed. There were a few torches spread out here and there. The air was cold. Ellian was grateful for the poncho, even though it was wet, it gave some protection for his arms. Although, ruefully, his pants weren't long enough to cover his ankles. The constant submerging had left him shivering. 

Straining his eyes, he continued his examination of the grotto. Old wooden structures had been built along the walls, short scaffolding and beams were plentiful. He then saw a man run in from somewhere, and following him with his gaze, he was led to the company of men in black cloaks. That's them! They're the ones who ruined everything! Rage boiled up inside Ellian as he remembered the torment they had put him through. Then he saw Winfraeid. 

Or rather, he just about made out the outline of the captain. He was on his knees and his hands were probably bound. The anger within him surged, and as he watched, the visibility became better and he could see the captain clearly. Without questioning it he crouched and quickly surveyed the area. Both Efa and Clytyn had told him to properly identify the battlefield before going in for a battle. 

Winfraeid's on his knees, probably bound by rope, he's probably being tortured or interrogated. There's only a few men in here, about seven, three are guarding Winfraeid, and three were pacing around, one of them is off to the side; he's probably thinking of something so he'll be preoccupied. And the messenger who just ran in, he's talking with the interrogators. I can't take all of them in a melee, at best maybe two or three at once. Gotta kill them off quietly. They all have torches so their visibility is only within a certain range. Should try and find a dagger on one of them. Right that's enough planning, here's hoping I don't die.

He took a deep breath, locked onto the man who was off to the side, and did a dive into the pool of water below. Surfacing, he crawled out of the water. Any noise he made would be covered by the falling water, but he'd still have to be careful. He creeped his way to the man who had been separate from the others, crouching low and freezing every time something moved. The man walked behind a large pillar and Ellian dashed, drawing his sword and pouncing towards the man's cloaked back. In the span of heartbeats, he had locked his legs around the man's torso, clapped a hand over his mouth and shoved the cold hard steel blade sideways through his skull, the point shining with brain matter where it had exited. 

The man toppled to the side and Ellian leapt clear, leaving his sword still in the man's skull. He quickly patted the man's boot and sure enough there was a small dagger in its sheath. He took it and went to work freeing his sword from the man's head. He managed it with a lot of leveraging and pulling. His poncho was speckled with blood and his boots were too, it had pooled onto the rocks, making it slippery. 

He celebrated his success for a brief moment before moving onto the next victim. He looked around for an easy means of assassination. Noticing the scaffolding that was around one rocky pillar, he scaled it and hung precariously, getting a good look at the other's locations. Two of them were slowly walking towards Ellian, conversing in low tones.

"I swear! we're gonna be stuck here for a while if that barricade at the other side doesn't let up."

"That's why we're tryna get this fella to be a hostage."

"Do you really think that'll work?"

"I don't—" But he was cut short as a small figure landed on his shoulders, slicing his neck before swiveling off in a fraction of a second and pulling a sword across his friend's gushing throat.

They crumpled to the ground, their gurgling blending seamlessly with the noise of the falling water as viscous blood poured out of their necks. Ellian stalked away, panting a little. Three down. He paused for a breath when out of his periphery, he noticed the third man came to investigate the silhouettes of the bodies. Reacting fast, he pulled out his short sword and threw it like a javelin at the man's face. Ellian held his breath as the sword flew straight, hitting the man in the eye. 

Shit! 

The man roared in pain, clutching his bleeding eye. The sound echoing all around them. Those torturing Winfraeid dropped what they were doing and raced over. He was found. Thinking fast, he threw the dagger in the general direction of Winfraeid and dodged around a pillar, escaping the line of sight of one of the assailants. He still had the darkness on his side. Circling back to behind the men, Ellian dashed, going low to the ground, and cut the shins of one man before jumping straight up and dragging his blade across the same mans neck.

He dropped, giving Ellian time to dance out of sight again. He was going in circles around this one wide rocky pillar. Just when he was about to circle back, a voice boomed out, "Llewyrch!" And the entire grotto was filled with little globes of light, shining light through the black of darkness. Ellian lost his stealth advantage and almost to prove his point, a man appeared in front of him and thrust a hand out, firing off a large sonorous blast, sending the boy flying back. 

He flipped in mid-air and landed on his feet, dashing forward as if nothing had happened. He had just about closed the distance when a jet of green fire missed him by inches. Fired from his left, Ellian flipped around and saw another assailant. He was surrounded. Fear clouded him but clarity came in the form of a large rock crashing into the assailant behind him. Flicking his head back, he stared in awe as blood exploded from the man's head—or rather what was left of it. So fast was the rock that the man had been lifted off his feet and flung a few yards away.  

Turning, Ellian saw Winfraeid standing with an outstretched arm, murderous intent visible clearly on his face. In his other hand he held the dagger, which he nonchalantly flicked into the nape of one of the assailant's who had not yet noticed his freeing. It hit home and without wasting an instant, Winfraeid spun on his feet and grunted with effort as a gradual stream of green flame materialized from his palms, In a fluid motion, the captain flung the curved mass of fire at the remaining two men. It travelled forward like a crescent moon, flickering with stray tongues of fire as it lit up the grotto in green. The flames cut through the men like butter, melting off their lower bodies in seconds. It hit the wall opposite and dissipated. The globes of light also vanished as its conjuror lay dead on the rocks. 

Ellian panted in the semi-darkness, his fingers were trembling, as they usually did after a fight. Nearby he heard Winfraeid snap his fingers and the same light spell created an army of globes. He covered his eyes, reeling slightly from the sudden influx of light in the dark cavern. He looked over to Winfraeid and remembered that he wasn't supposed to be here. Rubbing his arm, he cast his eyes down, staring intently at his feet. 

A hand ruffled his messy hair, adding to the chaos of curls and stray strands. He looked up at Winfraeid. His face tired and his head bleeding a little, he nevertheless gave a small smile at the boy and crouched down to his level. 

"I asked you not to follow me. . ." He sounded tired and amused rather than angry. 

"I never meant to get this far in, nor did I want to end up killing anyone, I was just looking for you." Ellian made a sharp intake of breath. Winfraeid had seem him killing. The captain had seen the violence he was capable of and he would now distance himself from the boy, or so Ellian thought. 

Instead Winfraeid asked a question, "was that the first time you've taken a life?" 

Ellian shook his head.

An expression came on the man's face before passing and the calm, confidant smile returned. He stood and stared at the wall. "How vile this world is for the cruelty it deals out ever so freely." he shook his head and put an arm round Ellian's shoulder. "Let's move. I hate myself for asking this, but can you back me up just once more? we need to clear the rest of this place." He started striding forward and said, "Just cover me in case something goes wrong."

Ellian had thought that I would be hard to get back out of the cavern system, but Winfraeid confidently led the boy through a small nook in the wall that spat them out into a manmade chamber via a rocky passage. They found a few stragglers here and there and Winfraeid easily incapacitated them, explaining to Ellian, "they managed to ambush me, otherwise I wouldn't have been in that predicament." 

They slowly made progress. They climbed up some stairs, walked along long passages and into more nooks before eventually ending up back next to the sewer entrance, this time on the other end, at the place in the woods. Walking out of the sewer entrance, they were greeted by almost three dozen or more men in armor and holding spears, who all ran forward cheering for the safe return of their captain. 

Ellian stood to the side, watching as Winfraeid gave orders to his men to go back into the sewers and do a thorough sweep of the place. 

"Make certain that none are left in there, I'll run an investigation into why they were here later." Finishing up with all that, the captain walked over to Ellian and beckoned for him to follow him. "I'll take you back by horse, I have something I want to give you. . . but that can wait till tomorrow. Come now! I can see you falling asleep where you stand!" 

The horse ride back was relaxing, neither of them spoke that much, both of them were tired of their individual ordeals. Ellian thought back on how he had let his fear take control, of how he had been saved by that water girl; Selkie was it? How he had fought and killed those men. It had been less than a day since his arrival in Thimbl and already bad things were happening. He wanted to find Efa and Clytyn and curl up next to them and fall into a sound sleep. 

Into the city they rode, winding around through roads and byroads and eventually nearing a large mansion that sat nestled between some trees, surrounded by fences and stables. It sat a fair few yards away from the nearest main road, connected by a dirt path. Once Winfraeid had brought his horse to a stop, Ellian swiftly dismounted. The sun had long since set by now and the nighttime looked pretty. 

"Can you find your way back?" Winfraeid asked, dismounting. 

"Probably." Ellian was really tired at this point, he didn't think he would make it back without collapsing a few times. 

"Very well then, I—" he cut himself short and his eyes flicked towards two people walking down the dirt path to where they stood. Ellian didn't take notice of them until Winfraeid hailed one of them.

"Hey there sweetie! you brought a friend?" 

Ellian turned to stare at an girl with pale white hair and pointy ears. But his eyes went immediately to the girl next to her and his mouth fell agape as Efa exclaimed, "w-what the bloody hell are you doing here!?" 

"I-I'd like to ask the same of you!?" They stuttered, arguing, disbelief evident in each insult thrown. "Where have you been?" Ellian inquired, "and who the hell is she!?"

"Where the hell have you been? and why do you smell like piss, shit and blood?!" Efa retorted.

Wynne looked between the two of them unsure of what to do. Winfraeid stared at this new development for a second longer before smiling to himself and saying, "well, I guess we have a few blanks to fill, I'll start: I'm Winfraeid, this is Wynne—he walked over to her and put a hand on her shoulder—my eldest. Wynne, this is Ellian, he helped me out today." He looked over at Efa, a pleasant smile playing on his lips. "And you are?"

"Efa Quickfoot," said Efa, staring sternly at Ellian, "I think we should sit down and have a talk. About our various escapades" She glanced at Winfraeid and back at Ellian and said, I also want to know why this child—" she jerked her head at Ellian "—smells like he fell in a pit of shit. . ."