MATURE: - Ongoing Rara Avis: Broken Bones

[AetherX]

Centuries ago, before the Pokémon League, before Poké Balls, even before trainers, the creatures we know as pokémon dominated the wilds. Only a rare few humans befriended pokémon, and most of those fought alongside them in deadly gladiatorial combat. To the average person, pokémon were simply monsters, mysterious demons and spirits that prowled the wilderness, bestowing swift and terrible death upon anyone unfortunate enough to cross their path.
But then, as now, the destinies of humans and pokémon are closely intertwined.


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Rated Mature for strong language, graphic violence and gore, death (human and Pokémon), physical and emotional abuse, and substance usage.

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PROLOGUE:
BLOOD IN THE SNOW​

The snow barely came up past Victor’s ankles, but by his complaining one would think he was trudging up a glacier. “It’s colder than a bergmite’s bum out here,” he grumbled.

Radovan smirked as he followed his apprentice down the road of frozen mud. “Pish-posh, it’s the warmest part of the day.”

Victor turned around to give him a serious look. “Wouldn’t you say it’s just a little bit cold? Perhaps you’ll need to go back soon.”

Radovan laughed. “You won’t get me to admit defeat, mountain-dweller. I may come from the lowlands, but these bones have been through far worse.”

Victor grinned and was about to continue his teasing when a mighty shrieking roar shook the forest around them, echoing off the mountainsides with a sound like shearing metal.

“What in the blazes?” Victor pulled his axe from the loop at his belt as the roar faded away. It was a basic woodsman’s axe, but it was the only weapon they had between the two of them.

A chill that had nothing to do with the cool mountain air creeped up Radovan’s spine. “We should head back,” the smith said. “Pokémon roam these woods that wouldn’t flinch at the sight of a simple axe.”

“You’re the one who made it,” Victor retorted, holding the tool at the ready as he scanned the tree-line.

“Aye. For chopping wood,” Radovan shot back.

Victor ignored him. “What if whatever made that sound got to the traders?”

Radovan sighed. The delivery of steel was already several days late, and after a recent round of battles in the Azurefell arena, there were plenty of customers that needed steelwork. Their stock running perilously low, Radovan and Victor had journeyed up the road in the hopes of finding the traders and their wagon, in case their horse had thrown a shoe or something of the sort. They found no sign of them. If a pokémon was indeed attacking travelers, they would need to report it to the Gladiators Guild. It was worth investigating. “Aye, alright, let’s go have a look. But if it’s anything bigger than a persian, we hoof it back home.”

Victor led the way off the road. “That didn’t sound like a persian,” he muttered under his breath.

Radovan agreed, but didn’t say anything. He followed his apprentice through the pine trees. The snow was a few inches deeper here than on the road, but it was older, frozen snow. The scant flurries that currently danced around on the wind had yet to accumulate much. They hadn’t gone far when something caught Radovan’s eye.

“Victor, look over there.” He gestured through the trees to a clearing where several dark shapes, very much resembling bodies, were lying in the snow. The two of them ran to the clearing.

“By the gods,” Radovan whispered. He had not seen such bloodshed since his days in the arena. He counted three human corpses and as many dead pokémon, their broken bodies making their species hard to discern at a glance. Scuffling feet had scraped away the snow in some areas, leaving visible patches of frozen dirt. Some of the trees surrounding the clearing had deep scars where they had been hit by some wayward weapon or attack by a pokémon. The snow was stained scarlet, the blood steaming slightly. This conflict was recent. Victor went to inspect one of the bodies.

Radovan knelt beside another one of the fallen men. The man wore the stylized armor preferred by arena gladiators, meant to resemble the pokémon they fought alongside. This man’s armor was red and flanged. He presumably had been partnered with the kingler whose smashed carcass lay nearby. Radovan wrinkled his nose at the kingler’s stench before inspecting the man’s wounds.

“These people were not killed by a beast.” Victor said it right as Radovan came to the same conclusion. “They killed each other.”

Radovan stood to inspect the third body as Victor continued. “But why? Was there a survivor? A winner? I’ll look for tracks.”

The third body lay at the base of a tree, limbs splayed awkwardly. Radovan frowned as he saw it was a young woman wearing a gambeson. She might have been pretty if not for the blood plastering her mousy brown hair to the side of her head. He began turning to leave when he saw a flicker of motion out of the corner of his eye. He looked back at the woman. There, just below her nose, the weakest breath was barely visible in the cold air.

“Victor!” Radovan shouted as he knelt to check her pulse. It beat faintly, but it beat. “This one’s alive!” He quickly checked her for any broken bones. Finding none, he picked her up. Despite getting on in years, Radovan was a strong man with muscles tempered by years of working the forge, and battling before that. He draped the woman over his shoulder. In his excitement, he didn’t notice the tremors that began to vibrate the forest.

Victor, still holding his axe, looked at the woman. “If that’s her only injury then–” Victor’s eyes suddenly widened as he looked over Radovan’s shoulder. “Run!” he screamed.

Radovan whipped around. A monstrous bipedal pokémon that must have stood over seven feet tall was crashing through the trees towards them. Literally crashing through the trees, tearing them apart like twigs that barely slowed its momentum. When it reached the edge of the clearing about twenty feet away, it punched its forelegs down into the ground to stop itself and let out the same terrifying roar that they had heard earlier. The screeching was so loud it made a lump of snow that had gathered on a nearby tree branch fall to the ground. Radovan resisted the instinctual urge to drop the woman to cover his ears.

Radovan didn’t have much time to look at it, only briefly taking in its steely armor, sharp horns, and piercing blue eyes full of bloodlust. He knew from his gladiator days that this was an aggron. He also knew that they were likely already dead. Instead of giving up, he ran as fast as he could back towards the road.

Victor had the opposite idea. With a mighty battlecry, he charged the aggron, axe raised.

“Victor, no!” Radovan watched his apprentice sprint at the beast. With a shout, Victor swung the axe straight into the aggron’s chest. The slash would have obliterated the ribcage of any ordinary man, but this creature was something else entirely. A small, bloodless gash in the thick hide of its chest was the only sign that the blow had even struck.

With a throaty growl, the aggron responded with a blow of its own, backhanding Victor across the clearing. It didn’t even use its claws. It didn’t have to. Sheer muscle was enough to kill a man.

Radovan’s mouth hung open and an icy cold feeling gripped his chest. The sickening crunch and the way that Victor lay crumpled on the ground was enough evidence that he was already dead. People weren’t supposed to bend like that.

The aggron roared again, making the hairs on Radovan’s arms stand on end. With the wounded woman still slung over his shoulder, Radovan fled as fast as his feet could take him.

 

[AetherX]

EPISODE I

Banner by me. Can't find the original source of the artwork.

- Part 1 -​

Avis’s stomach lurched as her pidgeot swooped down, just barely drifting over the treetops. The giddy feeling never got old to the girl.

“Go ahead and put us down, Aria,” Avis said with a smile as they reached the clearing near her house. They landed in the tall grass and Avis dismounted, one hand held out for balance, the other holding on to her bow. She stroked the pidgeot’s neck and sighed deeply. “Father and Vito should be back by now, go ahead and hunt or rest or whatever you’d like to do.”

Aria closed her eyes and nuzzled Avis’s cheek, then backed away and took flight off over the trees.

Avis’s heartbeat quickened as she headed down the trail to the little cottage where she lived with her father and brother. Today they were supposed to be returning from fighting in the arena. It was to be Vito’s first bout. It was a dangerous, bloody sport that often ended up with one or more combatants dead, human or pokémon. Vito had told her to be there when he returned, but she was unable to stand sitting around waiting for them, and so had left early that morning and spent the whole day flying and hunting with Aria.

She eventually came to their house. The shiny metallic mound of Peredur, her father’s aggron, lay resting in his usual place in their garden next to the potatoes. Turiel, Vito’s Lairon, was nowhere to be seen. Growing worried, she pushed open the door.

Her father was standing in the middle of the kitchen, staring at the wall. He wore his heavy plate armor, but his helmet lay haphazardly on the floor. His arms were covered in gore.

“Where’s V—,” Avis started, but she froze when her father’s gaze snapped to her.

A terrible fury burned in his cold blue eyes. He was a tall, imposing man, but the physical presence was nothing compared to the raw anger that bored its way into Avis, stopping her in her tracks and practically knocking the wind out of her.

Her father breathed through clenched teeth, glaring at Avis. Eventually the seething inhales and exhales slowed, but the rage didn’t dissipate. “He’s… dead.”

Avis let her bow clatter to the floor, her mouth hanging open slightly. “No…”

“He was… weak,” her father growled.

“I-I can’t… It’s n-not…” Avis stuttered through growing tears.

Her father let out a scream of rage, making Avis jump back in fear. Hauling back, he punched an armored fist straight through the wall. The wood splintered and broke like it was nothing but dry parchment.

“Weak…”

· · · · ·​

Avis awoke in a strange bed with a pounding headache. Startled by her surroundings, she tried to push herself upright, but the throbbing in her head kept her prone. Breathing slowly, she tried to focus. Feeling at the locus of the pain, her fingers found a bandage wrapped around her head. She blinked slowly and looked around.

She was in a small bedroom of a simple wooden house. The dandelion yellow tint of an afternoon sun through a tiny window above the bed was all that lit the room. The only furniture other than the bed was a dresser on which stood a set of knick-knacks including a geode and an oddly shaped piece of wood. More importantly, there was also a pitcher and a plate of bread and cheese.

Avis’s stomach growled. How long had she been out? How did she get here? Where was here? She tried to think, but her memory was hazy. If she hadn’t learned to avoid the habit, Avis would have thought she’d drank too much wine.

“Hello?” she called out. Her voice felt weak. It took effort to speak loudly.

At the other side of the room, the door hung open slightly. No one beyond it answered her cry.

Once the throbbing in her head had subsided enough, Avis scooted to the edge of the bed and sat upright. She grabbed the bread from the dresser and began hurriedly eating it.

The last thing she remembered was flying above the mountains with Aria. She had been… going to meet with her father somewhere… somewhere outside Azurefell where he had been fighting in the arena. And then… what? She had something she wanted to say to her father, but she couldn’t remember what it was.

After a quick drink of water, Avis stood up. Her head swam for a moment, but she stabilized herself against the dresser. Eventually the feeling passed. Her legs shook slightly, but as she paced back and forth across the room, they quickly recovered.

At the foot of the bed, she found her gambeson and the stylized leather jerkin she normally wore over it, as well as her belt with her hunting knife. Avis put the armor on. It wasn’t necessary, but the comforting weight of it made her feel safer. She hummed in annoyance as she realized that her bow and quiver were nowhere to be found.

“Is anyone there?” she called out, her voice working a little better this time.

Still no reply.

She pushed open the door and stepped out into the rest of the house. Hers was the only isolated room. There was a small hearth with a smoldering fire in the middle of a kitchen area, a table and some chairs, a stack of barrels, and a single bed tucked into a far corner next to a bookcase full of scrolls and a large locked chest.

Avis wandered out the front door, where a cold breeze quickly stole away the hearth’s warmth. An overhang covered a fully equipped blacksmith’s forge. She was in the middle of a city. A road of frozen mud ran by, empty except for a couple bundled up villagers ambling along between the thatch-roofed houses. Patches of snow marked the ground. Azurefell. It wasn’t far from where she last remembered being. She’d visited the small city many times before, as she had grown up relatively close by.

“Aria?” Avis called to the iron-gray clouds.

The only response she got was an odd look from a woman walking by.

A seed of worry began to grown in her heart. Aria must be out hunting. That’s the only reason she ever went far.

After thinking for a moment, Avis decided to wait for the blacksmith or whoever had cared for her to return. She went back inside and moved a chair over to the side of the living area opposite where she had woken up so that she could see whoever opened the door before they saw her. They probably didn’t mean her any harm, given that they had wrapped her head and left her with her knife, but she couldn’t help but be cautious.

· · · · ·​

More than an hour passed before Avis finally heard heavy boots outside the door. She sat up straight as it creaked open, ready for some answers.

A man walked in carrying a heavy backpack that he immediately set down with an odd clattering noise. He had graying black hair, a short beard, and a muscular build. He looked towards the room where Avis had woken up and, seeing the door open and the bed empty, swore out loud.

“I’m here,” Avis said.

The man jumped and looked at her.

“By the gods, you gave me a start,” he said. His voice was deep and rough, but not unkind.

Avis hesitated for a moment, suddenly nervous. “Th-thank you for looking after my injuries. You wouldn’t happen to know where Aria went? My pidgeot?”

The man frowned and looked her up and down. “Hmm… I was worried that might happen. How are you feeling?”

Confused as to why he wouldn’t answer the question, Avis paused a moment before responding. “Headache, tired, a little nauseous, but I’ve had worse. Have you seen Aria?”

“You don’t remember anything about the fight, do you?” the man said, pulling out another chair and sitting down.

The seed of worry grew into panic. She had amnesia. Something had happened. She’d been hit in the head and forgotten all of it. Avis shook her head slowly.

“Well, let’s try to piece this together then. My name’s Radovan Todorson, by the way. And yours?

“A-Avis.”

“Well Avis, what’s the last thing you remember?”

“I was flying through the mountains, going to meet with my father in the woods northeast of here.”

“Flying?”

“Yes, on Aria. What happened to her?” Avis’s heart began to beat faster.

Radovan let out a long sigh and lifted a hand to calm her. “I’ll start from the beginning then. My… apprentice and I were out on the road to Donchapel two days past, when we came across the site of a recent battle. That’s where we found you, as well as two dead men and a few dead pokémon. A kingler, a scyther, and a pidgeot, I’m afraid. Had an interesting little saddle on it.”

The seed of worry burst open into full blow shock and disbelief. Avis doubled over, clutching her gut. Her head pounded, her stomach convulsed, and her heart shattered. She squeezed her eyes shut, but the tears got through anyway.

After so long… After all they had shared…

It wasn’t fair. Aria was all she had. Her only friend. Her only ally against…

Avis straightened a bit, wiping the tears from her eyes and trying to keep her voice steady. “The other men… was one of them tall, dark hair, thick steel armor?”

Radovan looked at her sympathetically. “Aye… was that?”

“My father.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Hm,” was the only reply Avis could muster. She wasn’t sure how to feel about that. For so long she had trained in some kind of attempt to impress him. But for a while now she had grown disenchanted. A flicker of a memory returned.

She had been going to tell him that she never wanted to see him again.

“I was his apprentice after my brother died,” Avis continued, “but I never really wanted to fight like that. I wanted… I don’t know.” She wanted to be free. To explore and travel. With Aria. But that dream was gone now.

Whatever had happened, she knew it was his fault. All her father’s fault. It always was. Somehow, something had finally caught up to him. “W-Who was the other man?” she asked, still fighting back tears.

Radovan shrugged. “Another gladiator. I just went back with a few members of the Gladiators Guild to bury the bodies. They said they saw him in some recent arena matches.”

“You buried the pokémon too?”

“Aye. Didn’t want mandibuzz or mightyena getting attracted too close to the road.”

“I’d like to go there, if you could show me,” Avis said.

Radovan let out a long sigh. “It’s a few hours walk, so it’s a little late for that. Besides, I’d rather not head up there at all with an aggron running around. The Guild put a bounty on it, but I doubt anyone’ll take it.”

Avis’s eyes widened. “Peredur’s still alive?”

“What?”

“My father’s aggron. My father raised him to be vicious, distrustful, and cruel. If he’s wandering free, he could seriously hurt someone.”

Radovan leaned over and rubbed his temples for a few seconds before responding. “It already has. Killed my apprentice when we found you.”

He wouldn’t meet Avis’s eyes anymore.

“I’m sorry,” Avis said quietly.

“Me too.”

· · · · ·​

Avis spent the night at Radovan’s house. Even if she had anywhere else to go, Radovan insisted, saying he wanted to keep an eye on her in case her concussion resulted in any more issues.

Despite her exhaustion, Avis couldn’t sleep. Her head still throbbed and it felt like there was an empty space where her heart had once been.

Avis didn’t mourn for her father. Not really. When she was younger, she’d known he was an awful person, but part of her had always wanted to believe in him. She wanted to believe that he merely needed someone to carry on his name and legacy. But that was only an illusion she had created for herself. Sometimes she got the feeling the only reason he fought in the arena was so that he could kill people with no consequences, but the award money probably played a part too.

She tried not to think about Aria, but it was impossible. Avis couldn’t imagine a life without flying with her pidgeot. Everything felt so empty and devoid of purpose. With her father gone, Avis didn’t even have anyone to channel her anger into. There was no feasible, visible goal for the future anymore. No bonds to struggle against, nothing at all.

Radovan had said that he hadn’t seen her bow anywhere either. Avis had made that bow herself. It had taken her four tries before she managed to cut a decent staff from the yew tree she had felled. Unable to stand listening to the sounds of her father and brother sparring, she spent days out in the woods carving it into a proper shape, adding intricate bas-relief designs of vines and leaves, feathers and flowers. For years, she hunted with it. It was her proudest possession, and now it was stolen away, too.

Every last reminder of her previous life, good or bad, was gone.

Except Peredur…

She didn’t sleep the rest of the night, or at least she didn’t think she did. She had only one thing on her mind, waking or dreaming. Dawn had begun to creep its way through the wooden panels when she heard Radovan get up. She lay there for almost another hour with half a hope that she might catch a few minutes of sleep.

When she finally got up, she found Radovan working outside. The forge was lit, but he was at a table pouring over what looked like the blade of a scyther. He looked up when he noticed her.

“Morning,” he said.

“Good morning. Is that what I think it is?”

“Aye, I grabbed it from the scyther where we found you. One of the men I was with stepped on it on accident and it cut a chunk out of his boot. It’s sharper than anything I’ve seen a weaponsmith make, and it gave me an idea.”

Avis looked at his work so far. “Is there much of a market for weapons made from the body parts of a pokémon?”

“Not really, but I still don’t have any steel, and I need something to stay busy with to keep my mind off… things.”

“I understand.”

Radovan bent over and reached into his backpack, which lay under the table. “I found a couple other trinkets too.” He pulled out a sharp spike of metal a few inches long that looked like it had been torn off of something.

Avis’s jaw dropped. “That’s…”

Radovan nodded. “I think it’s the tip of one of that aggron’s horns. I didn’t notice it at the time, but I’d guess it broke off when… whatever happened to you happened. I was thinking of using it as a spearhead. I’d forge it into something else, but I’d need to get the forge hotter than the blazes of hell to be able to shape aggron steel.”

Avis couldn’t help but notice that talking about his craft seemed to put Radovan at ease. “You could do it with fire from a pokémon.”

Radovan smiled sadly. “True. I had a houndoom, Morana, back in my arena days. She could’ve done it. Didn’t start smithing until after she died, though.”

Avis wasn’t sure what to say.

“Oh, and I almost forgot. Grabbed this on a whim, mostly, but now I think you might like to have it.” He reached once more into his pack and pulled out a feather nearly a foot long. Jagged stripes alternated beige and brown all the way down to the white fluff around the quill.

Avis’s lips tightened. She reached out to delicately take the feather. Aria’s feather.

Something to hold on to.

She looked at it while Radovan went back to his work. Tears crept into her eyes for the first time that day. She held it close to her chest.

“Thank you,” she finally managed to say.

Radovan didn’t look up. “Mhm.”

“I mean it. Thank you.”

Radovan glanced up at her. Avis smiled.

The smith’s eyes darted around her face, like he was unsure if she was really there. Finally, a small smile snuck into his beard.

“I’d like to do something for you… and for me,” Avis said.

Radovan looked at her curiously. “What’s that?”

“I’m going to take out the bounty on that aggron. I’m going to kill Peredur.”

 

[AetherX]

EPISODE I

- Part 2 -​

Avis wiped a tear from her eye. Her sobs had long ago faded, but the tears just wouldn’t stop. She leaned into Aria, who sat on the ground with her, comforting Avis with her mere presence.

Vito was dead. Her brother, her only human friend, was gone forever. No more late nights spent discussing pokémon, philosophy, and fanciful dreams of adventure. No more exploring the woods between training sessions with their father. Vito, and Avis to a lesser extent, had been raised to fight. Their father had worked him hard. Perhaps too hard, Avis sometimes thought. Vito’s life was to be the life of a gladiator, but to fall in his first battle? It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.

Avis choked slightly. She didn’t have the energy to cry out anymore. All she wanted to do was go home and curl up in bed, but home was where her father was. She hugged Aria, who put a wing around her.

When her father had told her about Vito, he wasn’t sad. He was angry. Livid. At Vito’s weakness. Avis had left not long after, terrified of his violent attitude.

He had devoted so much time to training Vito, but for naught.

“No,” Avis said out loud.

Aria looked at her curiously.

“I can pick up where he left off.” She stood up suddenly. “I can convince Father to make me his new apprentice. I can keep Vito’s memory going. I can fight. I can be strong.”

It seemed so simple at the time. A solid purpose to hang on to like a piece of driftwood in the stormy ocean of despair. But it wouldn’t take long for her to discover the monster that lurked in the depths.

· · · · ·​

“You don’t honestly think you could take on a fully grown aggron by yourself, do you?” Radovan said incredulously over his bowl of porridge.

Avis stirred her bowl absentmindedly. They were having breakfast in Radovan’s kitchen. “It wouldn’t be easy, but I think I could do it. It just requires the right kind of knowledge and preparation.”

“And you have that kind of knowledge?’

“I’ve spent a lot of time in the wilderness with pokémon. I know a lot about them, Peredur most of all. I grew up with him. I know how he thinks, I know how he moves, I’ve even sparred with him before.”

“Did you win?”

Avis shifted uncomfortably. “With your help setting up, I could have a chance.”

Radovan seemed unconvinced, but played along. “Alright, where do we start?”

“By finding him. You wouldn’t happen to have a map of the area, would you?” Avis asked.

“Matter of fact, I do.” Radovan got up and went over to his shelf of scrolls. Rummaging through them for a minute, he eventually pulled one out. “From my arena days. This covers the entire Silver Empire.” He spread it out on the table.

The map was considerably more comprehensive than Avis was expecting. The map detailed everything from the Western Sea to the Argent Mountains, but she only cared about a square inch surrounding the little dot that represented Azurefell, nestled in the mountain range on the right side of the map.

“You didn’t see any sign of him when you went up there last?” Avis asked.

Radovan shook his head. “Snow had covered any tracks at that point, and we didn’t find anything else.”

“Where was it?”

Radovan pointed at a spot on the map several miles up the road from Azurefell towards Donchapel, near the other side of the mountains.

“Hmm…” Avis thought for a moment. “Aggron are pretty good at dealing with the cold, but I imagine he moved somewhere drier.”

“Where are you thinking?”

“Probably somewhere open and rocky, though I don’t know if I’d want to engage him on that kind of ground.” Her eyes wandered down the map to a point at the base of the mountains. “Unless…”

Radovan looked at her curiously.

“Unless he went home.”

“What?”

Avis pointed on the map. “I grew up in a little cottage here. That’s where my father trained my brother and me. Not long after my brother died, my father decided that he needed to spend more time in the arena, so we left. We haven’t been there in years, but Peredur would know how to get back. He might even see it as his territory.” She looked at Radovan.

The smith shrugged. “You’re the expert. That’s a long day’s walk, though. How long do you think it would take an aggron to get there?”

“More time than us, I’d imagine. He’d probably find the river and then navigate from there. It’s a considerably more winding path, so if we left today, we’d have plenty of time to spare.”

“Today? Will you be up to fighting that beast so soon?”

Avis closed her eyes and nodded. “I’m ready now.”

“What do we need?”

Avis had been thinking of ideas all night. If Peredur really headed back home, then there were several that could work. “Hoes, maybe a shovel, an axe for firewood since we’ll need a fire going all night in case he shows up. Some other things too, but most importantly, you’ll need to finish those weapons you were working on.”

“What?”

“The scyther blade and aggron spear. I wouldn’t say no to a bow if you have it either,” Avis said

“You think they’ll work? That beast was well armored. The blade and spear might be dangerous enough, but that’s optimistic. Arrows will bounce right off.”

“They’ll work if you know where to hit it.”

“Better you than me, I suppose.” Radovan stood up.

They cleaned up and went outside while Avis discussed her plan. She leaned up against the side of the house, watching Radovan get to work attaching a handle to the scyther blade. A few minutes later, they were interrupted.

“Oy, smith!”

A pair of men walking up the street called out to Radovan. He seemed to recognize them and waved.

“Wanted to let you know we found that cart,” one of them said as the two walked up to the forge. They were wearing gambesons and helmets, and carried spears. The one who was talking had a long, hooked nose. “All the traders were dead, and the steel gone. Looked like the beast attacked them, dunno why it would take the steel, though.”

Avis almost spoke up, but decided against it. The two men didn’t appear to have noticed her in the shadows of the house’s eaves.

Radovan let out a heavy sigh. “If you have any gladiators headed up to Donchapel, I’d like to send a message letting them know.”

The other man shook his head, making his slightly-too-large helmet wobble a bit over his cap. “No arena in Donchapel. No reason to head that direction, especially with Darian patrols wandering through the mountains. It’s dangerous.”

“I understand,” Radovan said. “Did you tell the guards at least?”

“Aye,” the hooked nose man said. “Told them to keep an eye out for any bandits with a load of steel, too.”

“No,” Avis said out loud, surprising herself.

The two men looked at Avis, seeing her for the first time.

Avis took a second to find her words, a little nervous. “If the aggron attacked the wagon, it probably ate the steel.”

The men burst out laughing. Radovan looked thoughtful. Avis’s cheeks grew hot.

“Ate the steel!” the hook-nosed man hooted. “I’m surprised a shiftry didn’t come by and eat the cart!”

Avis’s brow furrowed as she began to get angry. The man whose helmet was too big appeared to notice, and the mirth quickly left his face.

“Y-you’re not serious, are you?”

Avis rolled her eyes. “It’s true. They prefer raw iron, but they’ll eat plenty of metals. It’s not their whole diet, but they need the minerals to regrow and heal their armor plates.”

The hook-nosed man had stopped laughing now, too. They just blinked at her. Avis was unsure if they were convinced. Radovan shrugged and appeared to accept this information.

The man whose helmet was too big looked at Radovan. “Hold on, is this the girl you saved?”

“Aye, the same.”

“What’s your name?” the man asked, eyes narrowing.

Avis blinked. “Uh… Avis.”

“Don’t suppose you know what happened?”

Avis pointed to the side of her head. She’d removed the bandage, but there was still a very visible bump. “Don’t remember a thing. The tall man in the steel armor was my father. It was his aggron. Trust me when I say he’s not worth mourning.”

“Fair enough,” the man whose helmet was too big said. “Met him a couple times. Seemed like a right prick anyway, even if he had a good record in the arena.”

“Anyway,” the hook-nosed man said. “The real reason we’re here is that we talked to Victor’s family just now.”

Radovan’s shoulders slumped. “Aye? What do they need?”

“Funeral service tonight. They’d like you to come and relate his final moments.”

Avis looked at the smith sadly. He rubbed his temples.

Eventually Radovan looked up at Avis.

Avis took a deep breath. “I can handle it myself,” she said. “Don’t worry. It’s my fight anyway.”

Radovan nodded slowly before looking back at the two men from the Guild. “I’ll be there.”

“We’ll let them know.” The men left.

Radovan wordlessly went back to work.

Avis watched him for a few minutes, but drowsiness was making her eyelids heavy. She must have dozed off, because the next thing she knew, Radovan had both weapons ready.

“Well, here they are,” he said. Avis straightened up.

The scyther blade was about two feet long, with an odd curvature to it. A scaly green vein ran down the back of it. It looked haphazard, but effective. A wooden handle was attached via rivets through the base of the blade.

“Not my best work, but it’ll do.”

Avis took the blade from him and gave it a few test swings, hours of sword practice with her father guiding her through the motions. It was surprisingly light. Though the handle was round, she had no trouble keeping edge alignment simply due to the shape and the way it was weighted. Radovan had also made a quick leather sheathe for it.

Radovan held out the spear next. Without being able to shape the tip, the spear wouldn’t be good for anything other than a direct thrust, but that was all Avis needed.

It took less than an hour for them to gather all the supplies Avis requested and pack them in Radovan’s backpack. He even pulled out a bow he used for hunting and a dozen arrows.

“Now I just need some kind of bait,” Avis said.

Radovan gave a long sigh, then went back to rummaging through his chest of tools. Eventually he pulled out two dark metal ingots.

“These are raw iron. They’re the only workable metal I have left until the next batch comes through. I’d really rather they not get eaten.” He hesitantly handed them over to Avis.

“I’ll do my best to keep them safe.” Avis tucked the ingots into the pack and hefted it onto her back. It was fairly heavy and felt odd, what with the hoe poking out the top and the bow tied awkwardly to the outside.

“You’re leaving now, then?” Radovan asked.

Avis nodded, leaning on the aggron spear. “The sooner I get down there, the more time I have to prepare.”

Radovan crossed his arms and looked her up and down. “You sure about this?”

“Absolutely.”

“Just be safe. I don’t want to have to wander through the woods looking for your body.”

“If I’m not back in a week, don’t bother,” Avis replied shakily.

Radovan’s lips tightened beneath his beard. “Bring me that bastard’s head.”

“I will.”

· · · · ·​

Avis knew her way around Azurefell. It wasn’t that big of a city, so it was easy to get to the western gate. Once one of the most hotly contested border cities, ever since the silver mines were depleted, interest in Azurefell’s defenses ran out. This resulted in an odd patchwork of partially completed stone walls and more crude palisades.

The road down out of the mountains was equally forgotten. As Avis began to descend through the forest to the lowlands, she stopped seeing even other foot traffic, never mind trade caravans or military patrols.

The solitude helped her keep a good pace, but it left her mind to wander, for better or for worse.

Avis couldn’t help but think about how much faster it would have been to fly to the cottage on Aria’s back. She looked up through the pine branches swaying in the breeze at the gray sky. That was where she belonged… or used to belong, at least. Just the two of them, hundreds of feet above the landscape, gently riding air currents wherever they might take them. Despite the constant wind rushing in her ears, it had always felt so still, like the whole world was frozen beneath them while they sailed on in beautiful solitude.

It wasn’t right that those were only memories now, that all of that was behind her. And to end so suddenly… Avis looked down at the ground, frowning, trying as hard as she could to remember. But the memory simply wasn’t there. It hurt. More than anything, it hurt to not even be able to remember Aria’s final moments.

She tried to think about something else, but the only thing that came to mind was her father. Avis felt a kind of numb sadness, but it was mostly from regret.

Two weeks before, she had been flying with Aria while her father stayed in Azurefell preparing for the upcoming battles when she had found another gladiator traveling with a metagross. He was kind and soft-spoken, and they had shared a meal together. He had asked her about her life, and for some reason, she had answered. Without even thinking about it, she had admitted to this complete stranger her true feelings about her father. Feelings that she herself hadn’t even fully recognized until then.

She hated him. He was manipulative, angry, and murderous. He’d never been affectionate or loving. All he’d ever cared about was fighting and winning. The only thing that brought them together was Avis’s insistence on being trained to fight. She never fought in the arena herself, she didn’t even really want to, but she did it. For him. But why? There was nothing that truly connected Avis to him, not since Vito had died.

After admitting this to the stranger, whose name she couldn’t even remember, she realized that she needed to escape. Eventually, she had decided to go tell her father that she was leaving. Where to? She wasn’t sure. But with Aria, she could have gone anywhere. And anywhere without her father was a place she wanted to go.

So she had set out to confront him. And then… and then what? The gap in her memory still made her uneasy. Had her father grown violent, and the other gladiator passing by had intervened? Or had the fight between the two men already started, for reasons unknown, when Avis had arrived?

Part of her didn’t really care that much, but another part wished she’d been able to tell her father off once and for all. Just to see how he’d react. Instead, that rage that had built up inside of her was left dangling, unresolved.

But on the other hand, would she really have been able to confront him? For as much anger as she felt toward her father, she feared him in equal parts. So much so that the concept of running away from him had never crossed her mind before. Standing in front of him, would she have been able to say what she wanted to say? Or would she once again have been intimidated into staying?

Avis stewed in thoughts like these the rest of the day. The dense fir forest became replaced by maples and cottonwoods as she descended out of the mountains. The sun was sinking low in the sky when she finally saw familiar landmarks. The road was intersected by a shallow stream that Avis knew ran towards a small pond near her destination. She stepped off the road to follow it, and in less than an hour, she saw the squat structure she had grown up in emerge from the trees.

She slowed to a stop as she approached, standing silently by the stream and listening intently. Avis hadn’t seen any sign of an aggron yet, but Peredur might have approached from a different direction. The only sounds she could hear was the quiet burbling of the stream and the occasional birdsong. There wasn’t even a breeze. Still unsure, Avis cautiously approached her old home.

It was a wooden house with a small fence surrounding a garden now overgrown with weeds. Her eyes darted around, but there was no glint of steel or loud huffing breath. Avis dropped her spear and pack in the little grassy clearing where her father and Vito had once spent so much time sparring. She looked at the dilapidated house, unsure if she wanted to go inside. To say she had no pleasant memories of home would be inaccurate, as she had plenty of fond memories of spending time with Vito, but there was a lingering sadness about the place.

She hadn’t returned here since Vito died. Her father had soon set out to compete in as many fights as possible, with the hope of being invited to the Tournament of Champions in the Silver Empire’s capital of Alaban. Naturally, Avis had gone with him.

But the time for reminiscing was not now. Now there was work to be done. Avis looked around the meadow, it was only about thirty feet long and maybe a bit more than that wide. This would be her arena. She pulled the hoe out of the backpack and began plowing the clearing, digging through the grass into the soil as deep as she could. Her feet hurt and she was tired, but if Peredur was on his way, Avis needed to be ready when he arrived.

She wasn’t totally sure that her plan would work, but fighting Peredur on even ground would be suicide. Her hope was that he would struggle in the loose soil due to his weight. She’d seen him stumble around a bit when the arena was torn up by pokémon with digging abilities. Every possible advantage was worth trying for.

By the time she had finished digging up the whole field, the sun had set and it was getting harder to see. Back when she had lived here, she’d needed to venture into the woods to find appropriate firewood. Some time since they had abandoned the house, however, a small cottonwood had fallen in a storm. The wood was dead and dry, perfect for her needs.

She started a fire at the edge of the clearing, using dead moss as a fire starter, building it in such a way that it would last for a while. Once that was done, she took the two iron ingots out of the backpack and dropped them in the middle of the plowed clearing.

Only then did she allow herself to rest. With a long sigh of exhaustion, Avis unrolled her bedroll and collapsed on it at the base of a tree near the fire. She pulled a waterskin and a loaf of tough bread from the pack and began to eat.

Avis tried to stay alert, but exhaustion overtook her and she slipped into fitful dreams.

· · · · ·​

When Avis awoke, it was not to the crashing sounds of an oncoming aggron as she had feared, but the familiar cawing of a murkrow. It was a sound she’d often woken up to when she had lived here, and brought back a torrent of memories. The sun wasn’t yet visible above the trees, but the sky was beginning to lighten as morning progressed.

She spent most of the day puttering around the clearing. She practiced a bit with the spear and scyther blade, getting used to the way they felt in her hands. It had been a long time since Avis had last sparred against Peredur. She tried to imagine him in front of her, clawing, biting, and slashing, but it was difficult to remember his fighting style in complete detail.

It was late afternoon when she began to grow frustrated. There was no sign of Peredur yet. No crashing of trees, no shaking of the earth beneath his lumbering footsteps. Avis began to worry that she had miscalculated. Maybe Peredur didn’t feel any kind of connection to this place? Maybe he wandered deeper into the mountains instead? At the other side of the range in the Kingdom of Darius, it was hot and dry. Perfect for an aggron. But he wouldn’t know that, would he?

It was a little chilly, so Avis re-lit the fire. Mostly just for something to do. As she gazed into the flames, she had a brief idea. Retrieving the aggron spear from where she had left it leaning against a tree, she carefully balanced it on a rock near the fire such that the tip was licked by the flames, but the wooden haft was untouched.

Building the fire had only taken a few minutes, and Avis was back to being bored. She stared at the ruined house, not for the first time, heartache clenching in her chest. Angry at herself for being so sensitive to the emotional effect of the place, Avis stood up and went to go walk through the woods for a bit.

A short distance into the brush she clambered over a small mound of dirt that must have once been an old stump and felt something shift under her foot. Avis figured it was some kind of loose rock or a root, but when she looked down she saw a glint of metal. Curious, she brushed away the dirt and grabbed onto the metal object. She yanked it free of the weeds and tree roots that had grown over it.

It was a sword. And not just any sword. It was Vito’s sword. It was rusted and dull. The shape of the hilt and pommel was nothing fancy, but Avis had seen this sword in her brother’s hands enough times to know that it was his.

“But… how?”

After a gladiator was slain in the arena, the Guild generally took possession of his gear so that it could be resold. Had her father taken it instead? But then what was it doing out here?

Setting the sword aside, Avis dug around in the dirt, looking for the scabbard or belt. Her hand found something knobbly protruding slightly from the mound she had climbed over. She dug until she could get a hand around whatever it was and pulled. It wouldn’t budge. It looked like it was grey or white, but in the shadows of the trees it was hard to tell.

She sat down on the ground and put a leg up on the mound for leverage and pulled again as hard as she could. This time, the mound collapsed slightly and she pulled the object from the loose dirt.

It was the skull of some kind of animal. Large and thick, bigger around than her torso. An angular steel plate grew out of the top.

It was the skull of a lairon.

Avis stared at it as she sat, legs splayed, dumbfounded. She brushed some of the dirt off.

“Turiel?”

Surely this wasn’t her brother’s lairon? A sort of terrifying confusion grasped her heart. What had happened here? Why was Vito’s sword and the body of his partner pokémon discarded, half buried in the woods?

Avis spent the better part of an hour digging out the rest of the small mound until her fingertips hurt. She unearthed the rest of a lairon skeleton, but nothing else.

Clutching her brother’s rusted sword to her chest, Avis staggered back to the clearing. Dazed, she blinked at the house. Maybe it was time to go in? If Peredur wasn’t going to show up, she might as well make the most of the trip.

Taking a deep breath to steady her nerves, Avis approached the house, sword still in hand.

She had to lean into the door with all her weight to overcome the stuck, rusted hinges. Once inside, Avis looked around at what was once her home.

Weeds were growing through the floorboards, while a thick layer of dust covered everything. The hearth was thick with cobwebs. The house was sparsely furnished, the only exceptional things being an assortment of rusted tools for weapon and armor maintenance that her father had left in the corner. A beam of fading light from the sun shone through the hole that her father had punched in the wall on that fateful day, illuminating clouds of dust that hung in the air like smoke. Besides the decay caused by the passage of time, it was all just as she last remembered seeing it.

On the mantle lay a dusty book, the only book Avis had ever read. It was a treatise on swordsmanship that her father had managed to get his hands on somehow. He had used it to teach Avis and her brother to read, only enough so that they could read arena flyers and tournament advertisements. Avis had never taken much to letters, but Vito had developed a keen interest in them. It got to the point where he was writing fanciful love poems to the girls he met whenever they went into town. Avis didn’t know if he ever had trysts with any of them, she always just thought he liked making them feel special.

Instinctively, Avis went for the doorway that led to the little room she had shared with Vito. It was nothing but two beds with straw mattresses that had long ago begun to rot. The only decoration was an old oyster that Vito had pulled from the nearby river, sitting on a shelf above his bed. He had forbidden Avis from touching it, saying that a pearl was growing inside. If she opened it, he insisted, the pearl would stop growing, but if they waited then it would eventually be large enough for them to buy their own house in Alaban. It was one of many fanciful dreams that Vito had planted in her head. Avis never quite believed him, but she played along. She told herself it was just for fun, but part of her secretly wanted it to be true.

A sad smile on her face, Avis sat down on Vito’s bed, setting his sword beside her, and grabbed the oyster from the shelf. Its surface was dry and flaky and just as dusty as everything else in the house. The two halves easily came apart in her hands. There was no pearl inside, but she was surprised to find a folded-up piece of parchment.

So this was where he kept his love poems. Avis laughed lightly, unfolding the piece of parchment that looked like it had been torn from her father’s treatise. It had been a long time since she had read anything, but she slowly worked out the words.

The ink had faded considerably, but it was still legible. The note was longer than she was expecting.

To her surprise, the first word was her name. Heart pounding, she read on.

Avis,

I wanted to tell you this before I left, but you had already run off with Aria. You really do need to stop fleeing the things that make you uncomfortable. Nevertheless, I have returned victorious from my first arena battle, and you are once again gone. I do not have much time, but I will try to explain as best I can.

Doran son of Shamus, the man we call ‘Father’, is not our father at all.

I do not know the name of our real father, only brief memories of his face and feelings of love and belonging. I was quite young when it happened, you were but a babe. Doran broke down the door of our house when our father was away, killed our mother in cold blood, and took us as his own.

I was too young to really understand what was going on, but I know now he wanted to raise me as an apprentice. He kept you as leverage against me. If I told you anything, or if I attempted to escape, he would kill you, or worse. Over time I grew used to our new life, cruel as it may be. I regret not telling you sooner, but I fear nothing more than for your safety. That was my weakness.

Upon winning my battle, I collected my prize money and came home as quickly as I could, ignoring our so-called father’s orders to give him the winnings, and leaving him behind. He must have realized by now what I mean to do and gave chase. Now I return here, ready to flee with you and our money, but you are nowhere to be found. I write this note in case he arrives before you do. If you find this, then I am likely dead.

Do not cower petrified in his shadow, dearest sister. Not like I did. You are meant for greater things.

With love,
Vito​

At first Avis was sure she had read it wrong. Reading again, she slowly sounded out the words letter by letter like she had been taught.

“The man you call ‘Father’, is not our father at all.”

Her hands trembled.

Vito…

All that time, he had been protecting her. And she hadn’t even realized. Then, in their one chance to escape, she wasn’t there for him. Because she was too afraid to face the reality of Vito’s first battle. Because she didn’t have faith in him…

Tears fell onto the note.

Sadness and confusion consumed her. She could not mourn parents she had never known, but…

Her father had killed Vito.

He had returned before she did, confronted her brother, and they had fought. That was the only explanation. Her father who was not her father had betrayed her, lied to her, torn her life apart and forced it back together in the most painful and twisted ways.

Avis stared at the wall, like she was trying to see through it. She had found Turiel, but somewhere out there was Vito’s body… lost to the woods…

Before she could fully process this new information, Avis felt something. It was a slight tremble that made the old house creak softly, barely distinguishable from a breeze, but it was exactly the tremble she had been waiting on tenterhooks for.

A spike of adrenaline shot through her, drying her tears in an instant and making her drop Vito’s final note to the ground. She felt the tremble again, then again. For a brief moment, Avis imagined Vito sitting there having finished writing the letter, hearing the same terrible sound and coming to the same terrible realization.

It was time to fight the very thing she had been running away from.

Avis dashed out of the house to the clearing. She dove for the backpack, pulling out Radovan’s bow and swinging the quiver of arrows over her shoulder. She checked to make sure the scyther blade was still at her belt while positioning herself at the west end of the clearing near the fire that crackled merrily, oblivious to what was about to happen.

The trembles were growing more intense. They were audible now, and she could also hear the cracking of tree branches.

Avis squinted through the woods at the far side of the clearing.

A minute later, she saw the light of the setting sun reflecting brightly off steel.

Peredur had arrived.

 

[Ghostsoul]

Prologue:

The first conversation between the characters seem to set up the scene very well, the reference to the Pokémon themselves really helps set the scene and get the reader invested in worldbuilding. Even if it is just the start of the plot. Although I think that two a small degree that the references could be seen as too numerous, especially since you mention in the introduction that Humans and Pokémon still lack understanding between each other. I would say as the inclusion of the rather dramatic inclusion of violence early on and reference to the blood and corpses was also well placed. It helps give the reader a sense of the plot’s ‘darkness’.

“Victor, no!” Radovan watched his apprentice sprint at the beast. With a shout, Victor swung the axe straight into the aggron’s chest. The slash would have obliterated the ribcage of any ordinary man, but this creature was something else entirely.

The strength and power of the individual Pokémon and its importance in the set-up of the plot is prominent and the action scenes are described well.

Sheer muscle was enough to kill a man.

I'm not sure if this needs to be here, since the reader could probably already guess the strength of the Aggron by what you wrote just before and just after this line.

 

[AetherX]

EPISODE I

- Part 3 -​

“Again!” her father shouted.

Avis groaned and massaged her arm. The glaive had left a small cut in her gambeson, but hadn’t drawn any blood. That didn’t mean it wasn’t going to bruise like hell, though. She ignored her father and lowered her sword.

He responded with a quick swing across her torso. Avis jumped back to avoid it.

“A sword isn’t fit for this,” Avis complained. “Getting inside your reach close enough to hit you is impossible.”

Her father sneered as he raised his polearm, leaning against it. “Impossible if you’re incompetent, perhaps. A sword is the best weapon for you to be learning.”

“Why won’t you just let me use my bow? I’m plenty competent with that!”

He laughed mockingly. “You’d only get one shot off before you were killed, and arrows would not pierce the armor that most gladiators wear.”

Avis sheathed her sword and walked over to where she had laid her bow. “They will if you know where to hit them.”

A few feet to the left of him, her father had placed his barbute helmet on a fence post. Avis nocked an arrow, aimed at it, and released.

The arrow stuck quivering in the wood, perfectly centered in the helmet’s gap for the wearer’s eyes and mouth.

Avis raised an eyebrow at her father. He looked unimpressed.

“A good shot,” he said coolly, “but unfortunately I’ve seen fence posts fight in the arena about as often as women.”

Avis was seething, but she returned her bow to the sidelines and drew her sword once more.

“Again!”

· · · · ·​

Peredur’s pace slowed as he approached the clearing. He stopped at the edge, his eyes going from Avis to the iron ingots still sitting in the middle of the field.

For a single, terrifying moment, Avis saw her father there and froze. His swaggering gait, his gaze like an eagle staring down a mouse… The figure that haunted her nightmares. He stood giant and daunting, the orange light of dusk casting wicked shadows with the spikes and contours of his polished steel armor.

“I will not cower petrified…” Avis whispered to herself, nocking an arrow.

This was not her father. Her father was not her father. Only a monster…

The next moment, he was just an aggron again. Frightening still, but real. Fightable. Beatable. Peredur was watching her closely, unmoving. Testing him, Avis took a step forward. Peredur mirrored it. She took another step. Peredur followed suit.

It clicked. To him, this was an arena battle. For her, her very first. For him, just one of many.

Remembering the rules of combat, she took another step, then another, counting them. When they had each moved the requisite eight steps closer to each other, they were only about ten feet apart. Avis took a deep breath to steady herself.

Her heart pounded in her chest, her ears, even her fingertips. “I will not cower petrified…” Avis repeated under her breath.

Peredur looked at her, unblinking. Each breath of his was loud and hot enough to feel even at this distance.

“You were there when Vito died, weren’t you?” Avis said. “Maybe you even struck the final blow…” An adrenaline-fueled fire began to burn in her heart.

Peredur stared back, his eyes seeming to add an extra bite to the cool evening breeze.

“Yah!” Avis shouted, suddenly charging forward, feinting right then ducking left.

Peredur lurched in surprise, swinging at her with his huge left arm. She dodged the blow easily, then jumped over his tail as it slowly swung around.

Avis needed to create space, and running directly away from Peredur wasn’t the best way to do it. She had to confuse him first, and her sudden charge had done just that.

If she picked up her feet and stepped quickly, the loose dirt barely slowed her, but just as she had hoped, Peredur was struggling. His heavy weight sunk into the soil several inches, making his tail swing sluggish. It took him almost a full second to turn around.

That was all the time Avis needed. She reached the edge of the field, turned, and sighted down the arrow still nocked in the bow.

Peredur bent low on all fours and charged at her. His head was lowered, one and a half horns protruding ominously from his helmet-like skull. But Avis could see his blue eyes when his head swung upward during part of his awkward gallop.

Avis drew the bowstring back, taking in a deep breath and letting it out slowly. She could feel the strength of the bow in her arms, bending dutifully as she pulled, yet yearning to be let loose. Bit by bit, she eased the tension in her fingers until the string was barely restrained by her fingertips. She only had a couple seconds before Peredur would collide with her, likely killing her outright even if she dodged the horns. This shot had to count.

She waited patiently for her chance, watching Peredur’s head. Up-down. Up-down. Up-down. Up-

She released. Avis didn’t have time to see if the shot had hit, she just threw herself to the side. As she scrambled in the dirt, a piercing screech assaulted her ears. It was so loud and abrasive that it practically knocked her back down, like a nail drawn across a steel plate.

So she had hit it.

Avis spun around and got to her feet, trying to put distance between herself and the flailing aggron.

Peredur clawed at his face, snapping the arrow that was embedded in his left eye. Dark red blood flowed from the wound. His right eye burned with pain and hatred.

Bow still held in her left hand, Avis drew the scyther blade with her right just as Peredur came toward her. He clawed at her, but she jumped out of reach. Avis swung the scyther blade at Peredur’s outstretched arm, but it just skittered across the steel ring around his wrist without catching on anything that it could cut.

This happened a few more times, Avis dodging barely out of reach, but her strikes bouncing harmlessly off Peredur’s armor. She knew the steel plates were impenetrable, but the darker skin was just that: skin. It was thick and difficult to pierce, but vulnerable, especially under the arms and in the stomach area. Unfortunately, Peredur was quite good at catching blows on the armored parts of his body.

Peredur suddenly barged forwards, catching Avis by surprise. She lurched to the side, and pointed claws swung out towards her face. She tried to deflect the blow with her scyther blade, but although it cut into the flesh between Peredur’s claws, she couldn’t keep ahold of it. Peredur’s entire arm flinched in pain and the blade went flying out of her hand.

Avis tucked and rolled away, still holding the bow close to herself. As she stood up, Peredur gave another one of his shrieking roars. It almost threw Avis off-balance, but she saw a chance.

Quickly drawing another arrow, she let loose a rapid shot straight into Peredur’s gaping maw. She didn’t have much time to aim, but it was a big target.

Peredur’s mouth snapped shut with a loud clang right before the arrow hit, making it clatter off the invincible steel of his jaw.

Avis blinked, unsure of what to do next. Peredur had no such hesitation. He spun, plowing his tail through the dirt for a few feet before finally realizing that he needed to raise it to pick up momentum. Peredur was too close and the tail too large to dodge. Avis held out her hands in front of her and tried to roll with the blow.

It hit her smack in the chest, knocking her on her back and snapping the bow into multiple pieces. Head spinning, she coughed and frantically scrambled away from a follow-up slash. Two of the fingers on her left hand that had been holding the bow felt like they were on fire, possibly broken.

Avis clenched her teeth and dove for the dull green blade sticking out of the dirt a few feet away. Another slash went over her head, and she took the opportunity to charge in close, swinging the blade with both hands in a powerful draw cut along Peredur’s stomach. The razor-sharp blade sliced cleanly through the thick skin, but it only got deep enough to draw blood for a few inches of the cut.

Peredur roared again, this time he was so close that the sound felt like it would split Avis’s head open. It faded, leaving nothing but a relentless ringing in her ears. Too late, she noticed that she was too close to the aggron and had no way to escape. Peredur’s steely claws came in from either side, grasping Avis around her waist, hoisting her into the air, and slamming her down on the ground.

The blow wasn’t as bad as it would have been if she hadn’t plowed the dirt, but it still knocked the wind out of her. She coughed and choked, but didn’t have time to recover. Peredur looked down on her and growled. Blood dripped from his eye, splattering on the ground. Hot droplets of it splashed her face.

Peredur’s strength was incredible, she couldn’t even wriggle under his grip, but at least her arms were free. Panicking, Avis swung the scyther blade upwards, straight into Peredur’s right armpit. The blow didn’t have much strength behind it, but the sharpness of the blade did its work. It tore into the aggron’s flesh, severing muscles and tendons.

Before Peredur could bite Avis’s head off, the pain of the strike made him collapse on his side, letting out another roar that might have been loud if Avis already couldn’t hear anything besides ringing. The movement tore the blade from Avis’s grip.

Freed from Peredur’s grasp, Avis rolled away and staggered to her feet, still coughing and spluttering. Her whole body was in pain now. What was a bad injury and what she could live with, she wasn’t sure. It just hurt.

Avis tried to keep to Peredur’s left side, his blind side. He writhed in the dirt, blood flowing freely from his multiple wounds. His left arm, under which the scyther blade was still stuck, hung limply.

She panted, thinking. She could try to retrieve the blade. If she could get both hands on it, Avis was sure she could pull it free. But that would mean getting dangerously close. Her fingers still throbbed. Probably only one hand then.

The spear!

Avis looked around anxiously. The fire she had lit was still going, though it had burned down somewhat. The spear still leaned on a rock, the point jutting into the coals. She limped over to it as fast as she could while Peredur began to get his feet under him.

The very tip of the spear’s point glowed a cheerful orange, just like she had hoped. Grabbing the haft, she picked the weapon up and planted herself in front of a tree.

“Hey!” she shouted at Peredur, her own words barely audible in her ears. “I think this is yours!”

Even with only three usable limbs, Peredur moved with incredible speed for his size. Seeing his prey, he began lumbering across the field.

Avis squared her shoulders. Feeling around with the back end of the spear, she found a spot to plant it against the tree, and waited. Her muscles were trembling from fear, adrenaline, and exhaustion. The spear might not be sharp enough. It might not be a killing blow. But it was all she had left, and she was going to do it.

Avis refused to let herself close her eyes as Peredur bore down on her. She concentrated fiercely, aiming the spear right where his heart should be. She took a deep breath.

He hit her like a rock slide.

The single unbroken horn slid across her chest, tearing through her jerkin and gambeson, cutting a gash along her collarbone. His shoulder slammed into her right as she felt the spear buckle and snap under his weight. Avis was knocked off her feet, sent cartwheeling backwards like ragdoll before she crashed into another tree. Colors spun around her, and her head knocked against something hard.

Stars danced in her eyes as she crumpled to the ground, but she fought to stay conscious.

“Not… this… time…”

Alternating between ragged breaths and painful coughs, Avis rolled onto her side to look at Peredur.

The tree she had been bracing against was cracked and splintered. Shards of wood littered the ground. Seeing movement, she suddenly realized that the tree was about to fall.

One final burst of adrenaline was enough to help her scamper out of the way as the fir came crashing down, snapping branches and finally hammering the ground with a rumble that shook the forest.

Still breathing quickly, but with easier breaths, Avis pushed herself to her feet.

Peredur was slumped against the shattered stump, completely still.

Avis limped closer, listening carefully. The ringing in her ears had faded somewhat, but it was still impossible to tell if she could hear the aggron’s breathing. Once she got close enough, she reached out and cautiously prodded his arm. He still didn’t respond. Encouraged, Avis set her shoulder against the aggron’s bulk and pushed him over. There was a high-pitched squeal as the beast’s horn was dislodged from the remains of the tree. The body slumped to the side.

The shaft of the spear was protruding from his chest. The wound leaked steaming blood into the dirt, where it mixed with the blood from the cut on his stomach. His huge jaw hung open, purple tongue dangling out awkwardly. He was dead.

Avis let out a sigh of relief, then winced in pain. She probably had a broken rib or two. But it didn’t matter. Peredur was dead.

Peredur was dead and her father was not her father at all.

A sense of relief spread through her that she had not felt when she had initially read Vito’s note.

She was free now. Just like she had dreamed. Aria may not be able to share the dream with her, but if she could kill her father’s beast by herself, then she could handle anything.

As if to remind herself that she hadn’t made it up, Avis limped back inside and retrieved the note, bringing it outside to the firelight to read again, and again, and again. Eventually she had the words memorized, and she whispered them to herself as she tended to her wounds.

The sun had mostly set now.

Tired, sore, and relieved, she drifted off to sleep.

· · · · ·​

The next day, after replacing her bandages, she spent several hours searching the woods for Vito’s grave. There was nothing, not even a hint. Wherever it was, it had been long ago covered by blackberry vines and moss.

Exhausted, her shoulders slumped as she looked out through the trees.

“I hate to leave you here… but I’m not sure where else I would take you even if I could,” she said out loud. “This is… was… home. For better or for worse. A lot of unpleasant things may have happened here, but so did some of my only fond memories. Memories of me and you. Fishing in the creek. Chasing sentret through the woods. I remember carving my bow while you were off training. It was days and days of work, but I was so excited to show it to you.”

Avis talked to him like this for almost an hour while she cleaned up and prepared to leave. It sounded crazy, but it was cathartic. She reminisced of past adventures, inside jokes, and time shared together. It was the closest thing she could manage to a proper funeral service.

“At least I have some memories to take with me.” She glared at Peredur’s body. “The rest of it… I’m glad to put behind me.” She took a deep breath, trying to hold back the tears. “We beat him, in the end. Even if you’re not here to see it. We did it together.”

Avis smiled sadly. She could move on.

Eventually, she had no more excuse to dawdle. The tip of the aggron spear had been retrieved from Peredur’s body and packed away alongside Vito’s old rusty sword. She’d dug out the iron ingots from where Peredur had buried them under the loose dirt by stepping on them during the fight. All that was left was to retrieve her trophy.

Scyther blade in hand, Avis grabbed Peredur’s one remaining horn and pulled his head up to reveal his throat. It took several powerful hacks and a minute of sawing away, but eventually the head came loose, the skull armor plate sliding neatly off the vertebrae plates. It was quite heavy, so Avis used some spare rope from the supplies Radovan had provided and a few fence posts to lash together a sled. She’d splinted the injured fingers on her left hand and the grip of her right hand felt weak from exhaustion, so she opted to simply tie the rope from the sled around her waist.

After one last emotional glance at her childhood home, Avis began the slow and steady journey back to Azurefell, tugging the sled behind her. It took her two painful days to reach the city. She wanted to stop, to truly rest and recover, but the wilderness was no place for that. She had no choice but to put one foot in front of the other and keep going. When the dilapidated gates finally came into view, Avis let out a long sigh of relief. The increasingly frozen ground had made the sled more and more manageable to pull, but it was still quite heavy and awkward.

The two guardsmen stared at her without comment as she trudged the last fifty feet to the gates, the sled grinding loudly along. Avis was about to just push on through when one of them told her to stop.

More than a little impatient, Avis looked at the guard who had spoken. He wrinkled his nose at the severed aggron head, which had developed a powerful stench.

“What the hell is this? And why are you bringing it into the city?”

“I’m turning in a bounty on an aggron that the Guild put out,” Avis whispered as loud as she could manage. Pain and fatigue made it hard to talk properly.

The other guard scoffed. “You? You’re saying you killed an aggron? By yourself?”

“Aye.”

The guard looked at her torn gambeson and bloodstained bandages. His companion walked up to the sled to scrutinize her trophy.

“Hmm…” he said. He poked at the snapped arrow shaft still protruding from the left eye. “This must have been a tricky shot.”

“It was,” Avis said tersely. “Can I go now?”

The guard inspecting the head looked at his friend, who shrugged.

“Alright, just don’t cause any trouble.”

Avis thanked him and kept plodding forward.

Thankfully, Radovan’s house wasn’t far from the gate. Avis found the smith sitting outside on a stool, sharpening a wood axe. He looked up at the sound of Avis scraping down the road. When he saw her, a smile lit up his face. He dropped what he was doing and stood up to greet her.

Avis couldn’t help but smile as he approached. She dropped the rope attached to the sled and stood aside so that he could see.

“I brought you a gift,” Avis said.

Radovan didn’t even look at the head at first, instead striding right up and pulling her into a hug. He smelled like oil and wood smoke.

Avis recoiled slightly. “Ah! Bruised ribs. Please.”

Radovan released her. “Right, sorry,” he said, still smiling. “I’m glad you’re alright.” It was only then that he looked down at the head. “Well I’ll be damned. You did it.”

“Only thanks to your weapons. Broke your bow, by the way, sorry about that,” Avis said, looking down at the cargo she had been dragging behind her for the last two days.

Radovan waved it off. “Bah, I can get a new one. I’m just grateful that you’re alive… and that the beast is dead.”

They stood there in silence for a moment before Radovan spoke again.

“I know it doesn’t undo any of the problems this monster caused, but seeing that it’s dead does provide some relief. Some closure.”

Avis sighed. “That it does.” For the first time since she had awoken in Radovan’s house, she felt content, unburdened. Like her heart had been unchained from a heavy weight.

Nothing left to hold on to, but no reason to hold onto it anymore.

 

[AceTrainer14]

I knew I had to read this now or it would be six years before I got around to it.

I like the concept of the story. It is an original enough world, medieval Pokemon, and gives you a lot more freedom to create and play around with things. Definitely not a cliche this time While the concept of gladiatorial battles has not been explored just yet, I do look forward to seeing how it will unfold in later chapters presuming that is where the story is going.

Avis is a good lead. She has the spunk that many of our strong females do on this site, but she has vulnerability as well and a detailed backstory. I liked what we saw of Radovan, and you did a good job in painting a detailed picture of him by using subtle descriptions. I think he stood out a bit more really, as Avis was focused on her past and her grief rather than really standing out right away, but I think it is easier to portray supporting characters at times since we are not in their heads.

The plot of this little arc was good. The opening reminded me of the prologue to A Game of Thrones, and that similarity stuck during the story. The character types and the little subtleties really stood to me, and the battle scene was really well written. It flowed nicely and was the perfect length, and I really wasn't sure how the story would end. I liked the use of the various weapons and hoeing the battle field, and I think this might be one of my favourite battles ever on the site.

I had a few little niggles though. Mainly, things were a bit sparsely described at time. For example, I thought you missed an opportunity to highlight the carnage and bloodshed in the prologue. It was clear what had happened, and I liked the little touches like the blood in the air, but it just felt a bit brief and as though there was more to be highlighted in the horror. Similarly, while we got some description later, the introduction to the house in the second chapter was this: "It was a wooden house with a small fence surrounding a garden now overgrown with weeds." We could have gotten a touch more character here just to highlight what sort of place it was earlier on. I'd also paint the city in more depth in future chapters

The other issue I had was with the revelations and the conclusion to the father/Vito storyline. I liked both the revelation that the man was not actually their father and that he had killed Vito (possibly, I feel he might still be out there somewhere), but the letter felt like a rushed way to imply that. I think there could have been some mystery left in the air. I also don't think someone would have written a letter that length that quickly. It could have been reframed as something he might have written earlier hinting at things but not fully revealing them. As it stands, the end of the episode left me wondering what would come next: there was no cliffhanger or urgency as to what would come next. I know you are going for a self contained thing, but some hints at a bigger storyline or something to push Avis onwards would have worked wonders. As someone who has been told off in the past for spelling things out, I thought the paragraph beginning with "Despite the pain of her injuries, Avis felt at ease..." was a bit too direct and conclusive. Even changing that would have made things more ambigiuous and given her more to work on.

Mostly I really liked it. It was well written and I never felt bored. The characters were realistic and believable. My one take away thing would be to build the world a bit more and flesh things out. I'd like to see some flashbacks with Vito in them to make that relationship stronger. But asides from the two complaints, it is a solid story that I think will only grow from here

 

[diamondpearl876]

I got into this fic fairly quickly. The characterization - particularly through the dialogue - is strong and entertaining right off the bat. I had a strong hunch that something bad was going to happen, given how it's a medieval setting and gladiator battles are a thing, and boy, I was right. I felt awful for Victor and Radovan - Victor for his death, Radovan for the aftermath - and that's saying something given how little screen time they both had before anything major occurred.

Avis's dialogue feels slightly more forced, but I disagree with Ace and think that she actually stood out above Radovan for me. He might've been on equal footing with her if I could fully buy that he'd lend such important metal to Avis for her battle with Peredur when he's clearly in a difficult situation with finances and business. I understand he could've done it for Victor's sake, for revenge, but in the end, I don't think the ingots are even given back to Radovan, only the aggron's head.

As for Avis herself, her determination was clear and a refreshing change of pace from a lot of characters I see, her tragic backstory was a good read, and the emotions were overall well written. There were some instances where you described her emotions with cliche says - and I know you've said that cliches don't matter if you use them originally, but I'm of the opinion that it's hard to use cliche sayings originally when they're used word for word most of the time. Whenever I saw one, I was kind of taken out of the story and, in general, cliche emotional sayings only cover the surface of things when what you want, I assume, is depth. Overall, though, you did ask me how to power through the emotions, and I think you did well. How dare you pull at my heartstrings with Vito's family revelation. ;o;

The plot felt quickly paced to me, and while that wasn't necessarily a bad thing considering it was only an arc, I'm not sure if a fast pace was your intention or not. I felt like a whole story could've been written out of this arc's plot, and I wouldn't have minded seeing it. Regardless, you set up the world very nicely - all the subtle details, like Ace said, really make things feel real. Whatever comes next, I know it's going to be good.

 

[Misfit Angel]

Thoughts on the prologue:
Victor, you idiot...

I like it. I'm not sure there's much to say beyond it does a great job at setting the scene and the overall tone of the story.

Thoughts on Oak and Iron Bound: Part 1
Not much to say here, but I can definitely see what you meant when you said the Witcher series was an inspiration for this story. This is definitely set up in that same vein. The details about the world aren't the most vivid, but I can get a general feeling for what things are like and how this world works, especially as I move into part two.

Thoughts on Oak and Iron Bound: Part 2
Wow, what a set up. I wasn't quite expecting it. At the time of writing, I haven't started on part 3, and I'm really wondering if she'll get the closure she needs regarding the truth about her "father". I suspect she won't until her memory of what happened on the mountain pass returns.

Harkening back to a comparison to the Witcher series, I really loved the letter that Vito wrote. It felt like it was lifted straight out of one of the games. Well done!

Thoughts on Oak and Iron Bound: Part 3
"Did you bring my iron ingots back?" "Shit, I knew I forgot something..."

Fantastic fight scene. I know I say it a lot in my reviews and it probably wouldn't work in the context of pokemon vs. human, but I really, really appreciate that this isn't just a boring list of attack names one after the other. There's definitely something visceral about foregoing "use a slash attack!" and actually describing what happens.

As she scrambled in the dirt, a piercing screech assaulted her ears. It was so loud and abrasive that it practically knocked her back in the dirt,

The repetition here feels a little weird, but that might just be me.

Regarding closure, it does look like she got it. I don't know whether that's the end of it, as I imagine there's more to it for when her memory returns.

I wish I could say more, to be honest, but I always find myself stumped on stories that I find to be well written or enjoyable. Whether that says more about the story of my own inability to review properly, I don't know. Regardless, a solid read and something I can heartily recommend.

 

[Flaze]

Finally got around to reading this (mostly cause I had to read it for the awards) but I apologize because it's actually taken me a long while, months even. Regardless, it was great to read something from you again while Unpredictable is on its own kind of hiatus.

Prologue:

You do a good opener, easily one of the worst parts of starting a new fic, here, immediately giving us a look at Radovan and Victor as well as the basis for what makes them thick, the same could be said for your establishment of the setting. It's not super detailed but it's got enough flow and it create a vivid enough image to the reader without having to fall into purple prosing.

Then there's my favorite part of the prologue, which is when they meet Peredur. The scene is morbid and kind of creepy, conveying what the characters are feeling. However, the thing that made me do a double take the most out of the prologue is easily Victor's death. At first I though Rara Avis was going to be something completely different and you're able to juggle a good twist in making us think that Victor'll be our protagonist...only to kill him off by the end of the prologue.

Chapter 1

We're introduced to Avis right off the bat and it leads into one of the things that initially worried me about the story, amnesia. You know as well as I do that amnesia is used as a very convenient plot point in stories to justify character's learning things that they are supposed to know already. What saves this I think is the fact that Avis' isn't just any kind of amnesia, she hasn't actually forgotten everything about her life (which is why her personality is intact) just the event with her father and Peredur.

Moving on from that, the best part of this chapter is easily when Avis realizes that her Pidgeot is gone. It's a moment that carries a lot of weight and shows us how close Avis and her Pokemon were, even though we never actually saw the two of them together. The fact that you also explore Radovan's own grief and how these two characters have to comfort each other in order to get over their specific losses also helps add more nuance to the proceeding and shows us why Peredur has to be stopped.

All of this goes well with the small hints we get of Avis' life and how it used to be, letting us know what her situation was and also giving us some clues on what might have happened.

My only big issue with this chapter is that it's a little on the short side and it feels like not a lot happens, we get introduced to Avis, learn about her circumstances and also about what she has to do. The other thing I gotta remark on is the world, your world isn't bad but it's a bit hard for it to stand out. I mean, it's one of the best interpretation of a Medieval Pokemon World and it'll be interesting to see more of it, but there's not much detail to it to really set it apart from others.

Chapter 2

We start where we left off with Avis preparing to set out for her battle against Peredur and some more memories of her youth. One of the things that stood out to me the most was what you did with the Pokemon-based weapons, it's an idea that I don't remember seeing before and while it sounds kind of painful (for the Pokemon) it makes sense. I mean when you have monsters that are essentially walking weapons it'll make sense that humans would try and find ways to counteract. Also, a Scyther-blade is both really badass and kind of made me cringe when I thought of the poor sap who had their arm ripped off.

As the chapter goes on things become a little...different. Avis' journey to her house and her having to face her past and whether or not she's willing to enter the house where she had so many awful memories feel realistic and poignant. However, it's when she finds Vito's letter that things felt a bit jarring to me. Vito's letter is an interesting twist but...it feels kind of left field, I can buy that they weren't their dad's actual children and all, but the fact that Avis was dueling with the pressure of whether or not she could say goodbye to the memories of her time there, regardless of how awful they were, gets downplayed heavily by her realizing that "Nope, not her dad". It also feels like a melodramatic twist, like something taken out of a soap opera.

It also undermines Avis' arc a little bit and kind of makes Vito come off more as a plot device than an actual character, since his role was basically to leave the letter for Avis to find out. Also it feels kind of weird when you think about it, like Avis' father being abusive was all because they weren't actually their kids and removes weight to it.

Chapter 3

And so we reach the end of what's apparently the first arc of Rara Avis; this chapter itself is a lot different to the ones from before, with the main focus being the fight against Peredur. It's here that the story really shines, you've always had a good knack for doing action scenes and you don't fail here, being able to juggle Avis' and Peredur's actions seamlessly and letting us feel what's going on. We don't get stuck in their heads or spend too long on any one moment because this is a fight to the death and any form of hesitation could prove fatal.

Avis' struggle against the Aggron and her attempts at killing it are also amusing to see, especially with the back and forth that the two develop. However, while Avis does get the tables turned on her eventually, it does feel a bit like she won a little too easily like things went mostly according to plan and when they didn't it Avis was able to course correct. That being said, I think this speaks to Avis' own strategic side, her knowledge of Peredur and her own skills as a Battler.

The other thing that stands out to me about this chapter is the way it ends. It feels like a legit conclusion even though there's apparently more to come, which makes me wonder where Avis' character will go. At the same time I do have to say that I was a bit disheartened that Avis didn't find out what actually happened with her dad, I know you can't reveal all your cards in one go, but considering the fact that the story mostly closes off well it's still a bit off.

Overall Rara Avis is off to a great start, it works as a very focused and well developed character piece and Avis herself stands out as an interesting and unique protagonist with flaws and fears. I do think that she can come off as bland sometimes but she's got a lot of depth and I'm sure she'll go even further. So don't keep me waiting.

 

[lucarioknight56]

Post-Awards Review Time!

Grammar/Style:
Very few issues here, I have little to say.

Plot/Story:
Alright, now here's the good stuff. In just four chapters, you tell a gripping story with Avis and Peredur; when reading it, I didn't want to stop. Despite the simplicity of the plot, you made it compelling enough for us readers to want to find out Avis' past, the encounter with Peredur, and how everything else turns out. It was simply brilliant!

However, at the end of the day, it feels like the story is finished, despite the fact that there are more chapters to come. Everything was tied up so nicely and so...quickly, that there doesn't feel like anything more to tell, outside of the passing reference to her going back to the coliseum. It's rather disappointing, to be frank.

Characters:
With what few characters you have, you do quite well. Avis is the compelling protagonist (evidenced by her winning the Best Character award), Peredur is the brute antagonist (who does the job well, but is somewhat shallow), and Radovan is the simple, if useful, supporting character. You made them all quite believable and likeable!

However, as stated before, the episode just...ends. Avis already seems to have a full character arc, and there doesn't appear to be anywhere else for her to go. I know that more could come about from her returning to her battling career, but there is nothing foreshadowing future development, or if there is, there isn't much.

Setting:
When you describe the setting, it is wonderful, but it is sometimes unclear. There definitely could be more, but what's there is enough to get a decent picture.

Overall:
Absolutely deserving of the Best Alternate and Best Story awards. It is wonderful what you have here, and will always look forward to reading this when it is picked up once more!

 

[Ambyssin]

So, I saw this mentioned in that fic of the month thread and decided to give it a look see. I've never played the Witcher, or read/watched Game of Thrones. And the Middle Ages was always a spotty subject in history for me. But, for whatever it's worth, I think this was a fun first arc that definitely felt like what I've seen of the Witcher. The pace is snappy, and you transition from the quiet, somber scenes to the tenser, foreboding bits very well. There was enough descriptors for me to get a general sense of the layout of the land, as well. I know you're just getting started, so there are a few subjects I'm wondering if you'll be addressing. Most prominently being, well, how do humans forge bonds with pokémon in this time period, anyway? This arc wasn't focused on that, so it wasn't a huge deal. But I really am hoping that'll get addressed in the future. I think it could be quite interesting! ^^

As for the individual parts:

Spoiler

Prologue
Well, this is a chilling note to open on. Err... pun maybe intended? In any event, it starts off on the quiet side, with most of the focus on describing the carnage Victor and Radovan stumble upon. Minor detail that made me smile: these arena warriors having armor to match their pokémon partners. Nice way to have a human-pokémon bond in this time. I'm intrigued about the discover that the people they discovered all attacked each other. But, before we can get into that, giant aggron attack. RIP Victor; you were cool while you lasted. Still, fitting description of just how tough aggron are compared to a fragile human skeleton.

Part 1
Dang, that's one heck of a cold opener you got there. I'm no bit-time consumer of this kind of setting, but I seem to recall a characteristic of the Middle Ages being that men in the household were valued for their strength and if they didn't have that, then what good were they? That's what came to mind with Avis' father, anyway. I'll admit, I was a little bit confused, up until the third scene with Radovan appeared and links things up to the prologue. At first I thought there was some sort of time skip, but now I get what's happening. The itallics part was a flashback. Maybe the confusion was a good thing, though? At least I could understand how Avis was feeling initially. ^^;

On a side note, maybe I'm easy to impress, but I liked Avis' reaction to knews of Aria's death. Like, there's clear signs it's upset her a lot, but she's steeled (heh) enough to carry on the conversation and learn of Victor's fate. Which was a good ending note for that particular scene. And you managed to carry the momentum into the next day, which leads to the very quick reveal of Avis' plan to hunt down Peredur. I think it's a good build up that ends on the kind of wham line that's great for a cliffhanger.

Part 2
Another surprising start here. You totally got me. Here I was led to believe Avis was forced into taking up Vito's apprentice role. But, no, that was her decision. Certainly gives some context for her reckless thinking at the end of the last part, huh? This is probably just nitpicking on my part, since this is mostly Avis' tale, but I would've liked at least a little bit more of a background on the master/apprentice relationship b/w Radovan and Avis. I mainly say that b/c I know he wants to see Peredur dead, but I had a bit of trouble seeing why he'd go to such great lengths (and use up materials he could've turned for a profit) to equip Avis. I know the motivation is Victor's death. But some more context might help me believe that Radovan really wants the aggron dead. *shrug*

The quiet contemplation was nice too. You didn't milk it for too long, in my opinion. And the ongoing tension that her memory loss brings continues to even make me (as the reader) feel bad for her. I know you mentioned the Witcher, and it does certainly feel like the middle of this chapter is trying to channel that sort of "quiet lull" a game like that has as you're traversing the world. I think you did it well, for whatever it's worth. And that certainly makes the revelation from Vito's letter all the more jarring. Like, that completely blindsided me. Yeah, the letter probably isn't all that realistic. Since I'd imagine it'd be harder to write a letter super-quickly in this type of setting.

Part 3
Certainly a tense stand off to start things on. That coalescence of memories that Avis has with Peredur and her "father" is something that I always think it hard to pull of in writing, but it looks like you handled it very well. Then there's the dramatic, slow bow release. Kind of makes me think of the Tomb Raider reboot or the Hunger Games, even if they're not quite the right era. And, to your credit, you keep things tense. Things swing right back into Peredur's direction after the arrow shot. In fact, it goes really badly for her. Like, human trying to challenge a pokémon levels of badly. Peredur's hits, despite not explicitly saying any sort of attacking moves, still seem to pack a punch. I actually wasn't sure if Avis' gambit with the spear would actually work, but it did... sorta. The arc gets a proper closure with her return to Azurefall, too. I didn't mind the quick pace of all of it. It was entertaining.

 

[kintsugi]

some random prenote

Avis’s stomach lurched as her pidgeot swooped down, just barely drifting over the treetops. The giddy feeling never got old to the girl.

Wow that’s cute; that’s just like Baron and I like them already and I hope she has a nice little saddle like Baron and I hope nothing terrible happens to—

That’s where we found you, as well as two dead men and a few dead Pokémon. A kingler, a scyther, and a pidgeot, I’m afraid. Had an interesting little saddle on it.”

goddammit.

also, everyone in this story is sassy as fuck and I love it

useless/nitpicks

Radovan wrinkled his nose at the kingler’s stench before inspecting the man’s wounds.

The snow was stained scarlet, the blood steaming slightly.

If it's so cold that body-temperature blood steams, then these people were killed very recently. If they were killed very recently, the kingler doesn't smell bad (unless I'm missing something about how kingler should smell bad when they're alive; unsure; have owned hermit crabs and they smell like dead butts, but that’s mostly a byproduct of the tank). I would not normally care about this except for how spot-on the rest of your details are.


plot/structure

Shamelessly re-adapting a lot of this from the first time I dumped advice on you. I’m sorry.

There’s a clearly defined narrative arc here, and it starts off strong with a lot of forward momentum and doesn’t really stop. Avis is an interesting character, and her problems literally feed the plot, so she’s involved and discovering things alongside the reader and feeling tons of realistic emotions in response to the plot. It’s a revenge quest, but there’s a lot of neat elements to it: the protagonist actually asks for and receives help, and the fight feels balanced, and there’s a lot more time spent on personalities than normal. I liked this premise a lot, and although it had some old elements to it, it felt fresh and creative here.

I do think that part of that “it feels familiar” idea comes from how you structure the story: to me, early on, the conclusion felt inevitable. Avis is going to combat Peredur, symbolically destroying the influence that her father has over her. I was still excited for how this was going to go down, but I wasn’t shocked when it played out that way. I think a large part of that has to do with the structure of your flashback/real time stuff:

Ch 0. Victor and Radovan get nuked by Peredur -- the aggron, later revealed to be Peredur, is an antagonistic force in this story
Ch 1, A. Smol Avis and Aria land at home to find her father angry and her brother dead -- Avis's father is also an antagonistic force in this story
Ch 1, B-C. Avis wakes up from the attack and learns from Radovan that everyone left in her life is dead except Peredur -- Peredur is the only antagonistic force left in this story
Ch 1, D. Avis talks to Radovan for a bit, they learn more about each other, and then Avis vows to kill Peredur -- Avis and Radovan are the protagnistic force in this story and will fight the only antagonistic force left
Ch 2, A. Smol Avis mourns Vito's death and vows to become stronger -- Avis is stubborn, and also she relies on Vito to keep fighting
Ch 2, B. Radovan and Avis plan their attack on Peredur, Radovan is removed from the picture, and Avis goes to fight Peredur alone -- Avis is the only protagonistic force left in this story
Ch 2, C. Avis returns home, thinks about her past, and prepares for the battle ahead -- Avis, the only protagonistic force left, will fight the antagonists
Ch 2, D. Avis finds Vito's note -- Doran was a fucking asshole and was an antagonistic force in Avis's life / this story -- tying together him and Peredur once and for all and making them effectively the same antagonistic force.
Ch 3. Avis fights Peredur -- the only protagonistic force left meets the only antagonistic force left

Every scene is tidy and ties on to the next set of events. The flashbacks at the beginning of each chapter set it up each chapter perfectly. There aren’t any dangling loose ends or secondary conflicts. Radovan being with Avis in this fight would add some emotional complexities as they both seek revenge on the dangerous monster that killed people close to them, but he’s neatly removed before that can happen. Peredur being anything other than a soulless killing machine would add some conflict when Avis has to personally put him down, but he’s not. The characters are never wrong about things, or make assumptions that’ll make them have to do things in a way that wasn’t according to plan: Avis thinks Peredur will go back to their family home, and he does. Avis needs to be shocked by the revelation that Doran is a liar and abuser, but not shocked to inaction, and she isn’t. Avis thinks that the aggron horn/spear will pierce Peredur’s armor, and it does. In turn this is exacerbated by how quickly the plot moves around her—Avis is knocked out during the awkward parts that Radovan would need to narrate, letting her skip back to the action; Peredur shows up right after she reads the letter. The whole plot feels very one-directional, and the characters are almost eerily aware of the meta-ness of their situation/able to respond accordingly. The awkwardness of Avis needing to confront her actual father gets waved away by a letter; he isn’t actually her blood so it’s okay not to be upset that he’s dead and there’s no need to struggle with the fact that someone she should love has caused her a lot of hurt. None of that matters.

Smart people make smart decisions based on smart observations, and they can be right or wrong in real life. Usually they’re still wrong somehow. It’s those flaws that make them human. So in fiction, when they’re always right, and they’re never uncertain, it makes the plot feel very one-directional—things are constantly moving toward a fixed conclusion at the end of this 3-chapter arc of protagonist defeating antagonist that’s been set up almost by default: Avis and Peredur are the only protagonist and antagonists relevant to the plot at this point.

This is a weird one to fix, and I don’t know if a) it’s possible or b) it’s necessary. SHITTY REVIEW I KNOW. Because the thing is, your story still works. Blindly adding more plot doesn’t inherently create complexity, and it’s still an enjoyable, breathless ride even if we can see the end.


style/tone

It’s odd. I can’t tell you what you main character looks like, but this story still has a vivid feeling of depth to it. Your style is often barebones/functional style where you typically describe only the important things in the room (and it works really well for Keith), but I did like the narratively-useless details that you added in here, like

The other man shook his head, making his slightly-too-large helmet wobble a bit over his cap.

LIKE. We never see this guy again, and he’s really only here to take Radovan out of the story. But little details like this make too-big-helmet guy feel like a real human with actual goals and problems, which adds a depth to your world that you really couldn’t get through other means. And on the larger scale, it makes details like this one:

At first Avis was sure she had read it wrong. Reading again, she slowly sounded out the words letter by letter like she had been taught.

which feel grounded and precedented. Avis being so shocked that she initially rereads the letter because the idea of her being illiterate is more plausible to her than the note’s contents is a fantastic piece of detail that would normally feel like it was ruining the tension of this scene, except you have a rich history of having these tiny details scattered around. I loved it.

A minute later, she saw the light of the setting sun reflecting brightly off steel.

Peredur had arrived.

I loved how you handled this dramatic tension here. There’s so much buildup to this confrontation—and most of it is in the form of Peredur being an unstoppable tank of steel and rage—but this is quieter and understated. It’s just there, and readers can fill in the hype for themselves. It also makes for an excellent cliffhanger in this format.


overall

I also loved the premise of this. Forgot to say that elsewhere. The pokémon-human partnership deal is pretty cool, the arena is cool, a young woman stabbing an aggron with as superheated spear made of aggron horn is metal af and also cool. There’s a lot of awesome concepts here.

The one thing I wasn’t hooked on was the structure of your story, which, okay, is pretty hard to get around. But everything else—setting, style, characters, etc—I thought you handled beautifully. Good shit.

 

[Persephone]

This is kind of weird because I talked a lot about this fic in a place where you could see, but never quite in a concrit way. So some of this might be repetitive or I might leave things out or skim over them if I thought I talked enough about them in the final round.

The perks of this story:
-Setting. I love the setting. Past eras are often underexplored, which is odd to me since the games lend themselves so well to either high or low fantasy. You have gods and somewhat human-friendly monsters running around and everyone focuses on the present/near past/near future. And you do well with weaving in subtle things (clothing, weapons, hobbies, economic/city design) that emphasize that it's not quite a modern world.
-Mindless villain is fun and mindless and scary. Not much to say here, but I liked that Aggron a fair bit more than most non-talking 'mons. Was set up as terrifying from the prologue and, while it's not quite clear what happened there, he looms over things well.
-The aggron battle. It was good. Tactics were clever. I liked. Only flaw was that Avis was oddly confident that Aggron was going to return home to a degree that the story didn't quite seem to justify.
-Avis is awesome and I enjoy the birbgirl huntress theme. And how, even with her biggest enemies buried, she's still left with many unanswered questions in the future.

Struggles/weaknesses:
-Some of the development felt rushed. The letter in particular felt like something that would've come up in chapter ten+ to answer questions, rather than giving a plot twist that... affected characters who'd already been dead and had minimal flashbacks, in the brother's case. Hard to really care about him tbh. And character development that occurs over hours rather than weeks always feels off to me.
-You killed another birb you monster.

Advice going forward:
-Maybe have Avis still struggle with family issues? I could see trying to find her biological family, or whatever's left, also being a mid-term goal, if only for her brother's sake. And having him appear in flashbacks could partially rectify that situation. Either way, it'd balance out the quick reveal a bit.
-She gets another birb that you won't kill ever.

Overall, it was worthy of its prizes despite its short length. Look forward to seeing where it goes in the future.

 

[kyeugh]

hi there. i realize this is an ancient thread as the bulbagarden's "are you sure you want to post this" banner has helpfully reminded me, but i wanted to drop a review anyway because kintsugi bullied me into it this is a really neat story that i feel has a lot in common with my own. i had a great time reading it and wanted to share my thoughts. i don't know if you have any intentions to update and this was written a fair bit ago, so i'm gonna refrain from picking out line comments as i normally would, but let me know if that is something you're interested in and i can maybe do it in a gdoc or something.

zooming out a bit to a conceptual level, there is just a ton of awesome shit going on here aesthetically. i'm unabashedly a big huge fan of human vs. pokémon combat and feel that a medieval setting lends itself best to that dynamic—i think you really pull the best out of both here and make something awesome. the pokémon-derived weapons are just awesome. i loved the way the arena fighters' armor was designed to resemble the pokémon they fight alongside. on the one hand it's just cool but on the other i actually fully believe it in-world. tangential, but i remember reading eragon as a kid and even though i was like 14 i was like rolling my eyes at the fact that he gets forged le epic blue sword to match his dragon xd, but here it's like... the gladitorial flavor of the arena fights makes it believable that they'd do something like this, there's sort of a showman-y aspect to it. i don't know, that's a small thing but i really like to see stuff that's just Cool being worked into a world in a way that actually makes sense and doesn't lean too much on rule of cool. i actually kind of wanted to spend more time just reveling in the cool worldbuilding you've set up here. maybe that was intended for later on in the story... to which i say, good fic pls upd8.

anyway, had to get that out of the way. looking more closely at the worldbuilding, i thought you did a great job at quickly and efficiently conveying your unique setting. right off the bat we get that this is a medieval setting where pokémon are highly dangerous. bet. this feels like a fairly deep and complex world, but we only learn as much as we need to at a given moment to understand what's going on and receive an impression of a larger world to be potentially explored later. i was impressed with how economically you get some of your worldbuilding aspects across, particularly the arena fighting. you don't really spend a lot of time explaining it at all but i still feel like i have a solid idea of this system in the world, largely by way of avis's interactions with it and the dynamic of their family. if anything, i feel like the very first section of the prologue felt a little bit exposition-heavy—the way radovan's character is established through the dialogue feels a bit clumsy and ultimately not that useful to me, particularly the "you're the one who made the ax" line.

plot-wise, i know from the table of contents that this is intended to be a longer fic but i actually think that with a bit of tweaking this could kind of work as-is? there's definitely a complete arc here. if anything, some of the beats (particularly wrt the family revelations) feel a bit rushed, but i think maybe it only feels that way in the context of, like, the idea that this is a longer story. if i came into it expecting this to be it i think it would be a bit easier to overlook. i thought the pacing here was really good overall, you don't waste any time but you do linger on the emotional moments for just the right amount of time. the events all flow naturally and tie into avis's personal arc in a solid and well-crafted way.

i think the strongest part of the story is the bit where we get to know avis and she's attempting to figure out where she is and what happened. her character is developed strongly here and we get some pretty emotional insights into her backstory, just overall a strong sense of who she is, what she wants, what she wanted, what she misses, etc. i think once the story starts turning towards peredur, i agree with kint's assessment that there isn't a lot of tension—you basically know, ok, she's gonna go find the aggron and kill it cathartically. that said, the fight itself is very well choreographed. peredur feels like a properly impenetrable monster and extremely dangerous. it was always clear to me what was going on in the fight and who had the upper hand, which i think is a feat tbh—action sequences are hard! and there were plenty of awesome avis moments, especially the bullseye. wew lad. i think the only crit i have for the battle sequence itself was that i think you could have lingered a bit more on the actual damage peredur was inflicting while she was inflicting it; avis seems pretty beat up after the fact, but during the actual fight it seemed like she was able to shake off most of the hits without much issue. also, i felt like it was maybe a bit too much for peredur's jaws to be "boring down" on avis's head—i don't really know that she walks away from that like she did.

vaguely i wonder if there was a different angle this could have gone. on the one hand, i love humans fighting pokémon and the image of avis dragging this monster's severed head back to the village goes hard as hell. on the other, i feel like there was a potential missed opportunity to loop avis's family issues back into the present with this fight. it seems like her "father" was someone who abused and used everyone around him, including peredur. yet peredur is sort of portrayed as a mindless violent monster. i actually kind of wanted the pair of them to relate a little bit here. they sort of have a lot in common? they're the only parts of each other's old lives still alive. obviously that does come with baggage and the violence makes sense; avis sees peredur as a reminder and an extension of her hated father. but i feel like there's some potential for kinship there too. maybe vito was the only one who ever treated peredur well, and just as peredur is about to land the finishing blow on avis, she sees his sword and his lairon's skull and softens and decides not to go for the kill. maybe that doesn't work, kinda just spitballing there. bottom line being i did feel like there was an opportunity for something interesting there.

it seems like it was intended for the intrigue in the plot to stem more from avis's reckoning with her family and her past, but i honestly found it a little hard to engage... these people all seem to be dead, so while the revelations aren't uninteresting, i just didn't get the impression that it was going to have all that much bearing on anything that was happening going forward. felt more like closure on a situation that i was only just introduced to a few thousand words ago, i suppose. there are elements in the structure here that i think make up the backbone of what could be a really intriguing plot but the particular way they're arranged here makes them sort of fire off before they've developed enough momentum to land all that hard. that sounds a little harsh—as i said before, i enjoyed reading this story a lot, and i think avis is a well-written and well-developed character with very clear motivations, but i do think you could pull a lot more out of it.

random things i liked and wasn't sure where else to mention: radovan is best boy, i love him. also, i'm depressed that aria is dead, because the idea of an aggron-slaying pidgeot rider hedge knight is SO COOL and 10000% my style and i did not realize how much i needed it, please introduce a replacement bird immediately.

overall, sorry if this review feels really critical—i think this fic is really cool and way up my alley and next chapter when. the world you established here was really intriguing and i'd love to see more of it. i think the fact that what you have posted here feels relatively self-contained is maybe causing me to read in a way that isn't quite fair, because this is a story that was apparently intended to receive more breathing room and development. and imo it should get it!!! post moar!!!! #BringBackRaraAvis2k22!!!!!!!

 

[AetherX]

Longer in the making than it really needed, equally flawed, and even more self-indulgent, I present:

EPISODE II

Banner by me. Artwork by Dralsk.

- Part 1 -​

Avis knelt down in the snow, staring at the mound of frozen earth in front of her. A pauper’s grave for a man who deserved nothing more.

“I was ready to fight him, you know,” Avis said quietly. “When I came back to confront him. When… all of this happened. Maybe I did. Maybe I struck the killing blow and just don’t remember it.”

“Probably a blessing, that,” Radovan replied from behind her.

They were in the clearing where Radovan had first found Avis. She had offered to go to Donchapel to request another shipment of steel, and had asked Radovan to show her this place on the way.

“Killing the man who raised you wouldn’t be a pleasant memory, one way or another,” Radovan continued.

“He was not my father,” Avis said through clenched teeth, fighting to keep tears in.

“He may have been a right bastard, but he still raised you.” Radovan seemed to be picking his words carefully.

“That doesn’t make him my father,” Avis said, but the words tasted like ash in her mouth. She leaned forward, fists to the ground and eyes squeezed shut.

Avis heard the snow crunch under Radovan’s boots as he took a few steps towards her.

“Avis…” he started.

“Stop,” Avis interrupted. “Just stop.”

“I don’t know wh-,”

“Stop!” Avis repeated, barely holding back the tears. “You didn’t know him and you barely know me. So you can stop with the platitudes. The only thing worse than what he did is what he deserved.”

Radovan was silent.

Decades of anger came pouring forth. Anger at the violent training, the verbal abuse, and every vile act that Doran Shamusson had ever committed. “He was the sole person responsible for every sorrow I ever felt. He couldn’t have ruined me more if he was actually my father.”

Avis jerked upright and glared at Radovan. “My whole life I’ve hated him, but I didn’t even know the half of it. He murdered my family!” she cried, tears beginning to stream. “All of them!”

Radovan just looked at her sadly.

“The only one I ever even knew was Vito… and now I discover that bastard was responsible for his death too!” Avis punched through the snow, one hand clawing at the frozen dirt. As if she could pull him from the grave just to kill him again.

“But then one day I wake up and it’s over.” Avis slumped and shut her eyes. “No farewells, no fighting, no ‘I hate yous’… it’s just done. Like waking up from a dream.” Avis breathed in deeply and wiped the tears from her eyes. “How am I…?” She stopped, frustration preventing her from even forming a cohesive thought. “I don’t expect you to be able to understand. Or anyone.”

“I’m sorry,” Radovan said quietly.

“I’d like to make the rest of the journey by myself,” Avis muttered to the ground.

“I don’t think-”

Avis straightened and looked at him. “Like you said. If you’re going to take on Victor’s little cousin as your new apprentice then you’ll need to get started as soon as possible with training him.” She brushed the snow off her sleeves. “So do that.”

“But-”

“Please. I need to be alone.” Avis tensed her muscles and looked away, trying not to shake.

“Very well,” Radovan said. He put a hand on Avis’s shoulder. “When you get there, ask for the baron. Stay safe. I’ll see you in a few weeks.” He stood over her for a few seconds before the comforting warmth of his hand left her shoulder and he trudged away.

As soon as his footfalls faded out of earshot, Avis let out a breath she didn’t realize she had been holding. It came out like a gasping sob. The sound briefly cut through the silence of the forest, but died, muffled by the snow. Silence engulfed her.

She had seen this moment coming ever since she had dragged Peredur’s head up to Radovan’s doorstep and the glow of victory had faded. Everything that Avis had ever known, everything she had ever called her own, everything she had ever wanted, was dead and gone. Her whole life might very well have never happened. All that remained was the empty shell that was her body, curled in the snow at the foot of her father’s grave.

Avis had thought that maybe with her father gone, she would have the freedom to move on. She could do anything she wanted now. But what was the point? There was nothing left.

Something nagged at her. Something she would never have admitted to Radovan. This man… her father who was not her father… had defined her. For so long she had worked… no, lived to please him, to make him proud. He had always been awful to her, but even now knowing the full extent of his crimes, Avis still couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe he had cared for her in his own way. His own selfish, despicable way. He could have killed her after he killed Vito, but he hadn’t. When she had said she wanted to be a gladiator, he had doubted her every step of the way… but he still trained her.

Avis wanted to scream as sorrow and rage and hope and terror waged war in her heart.

Vito had been her closest friend and confidant. Aria had been her sturdy rock in the storm that followed his death, as well as a promise of adventure and self-reliance. Vito and Aria were perhaps the only ones she had ever truly loved. They were both dead. Her father had provided structure. A purpose, however horrid. He was dead too.

Avis had nothing. No one.

She squeezed her eyes shut. Trying so hard to keep the tears in.

Somehow, it was rage that began to win the war inside her.

Why was this happening to her? Why?

Her life had been a living hell for so long, but right as things were looking up, it all crumbled to dust. And she couldn’t even remember why. Avis concentrated as hard as she could, thinking of that last flight with Aria to go meet her father. They were in the sky over the mountains and then… and then…

No memory came to her.

Avis screamed and punched the ground. The snow gave way, but the frozen earth stung her knuckles. The bruises on her fingers from the fight with Peredur throbbed painfully.

Her father was dead and she couldn’t remember why.

Her best friend was dead and she couldn’t remember why.

Avis immediately regretted asking Radovan to leave. She didn’t want him to see her like this, but she had never felt so very alone in her entire life.

Avis stood up, wiping away the tears. She felt so helpless. Her heart pounding with untargeted anger, she retrieved her pack and the remade aggron-horn spear from where she had laid them at the edge of the clearing. She needed something to focus on. Something to work towards. Anything. She chose the road.

· · · · ·​

It was freezing. Blue eyes flashed in the dark. Cold steel cut through her skin. The blood in her veins froze, tiny ice crystals prickling in her flesh. A hiss. A roar. A howl. A scream.

Avis woke with a start, heart pounding. She awkwardly crawled out of her bedroll, trying her best to forget the sheer terror from her nightmare.

It was still dark, but a tinge of indigo sky to the east heralded dawn through the trees. The dull, omnipresent roar of the wind blowing through the pines echoed throughout the mountains. It was cold, and the dying embers of last night’s campfire didn’t offer much warmth. Avis tossed the last of the kindling she had gathered onto the glowing coals and tried to coax a flame from them. Eventually, she got a puny fire relit. It flickered pitifully in the breeze, almost mimicking her own shivering.

Sunlight was still a good hour away, or at least enough sunlight to travel by. Avis didn’t want to try going back to sleep. Far more horrors dwelled in her dreams than even this grim alpine forest. She packed up her things, but that didn’t kill much time.

As she was stuffing her waterskin back into her pack, she saw Aria’s feather. The one Radovan had retrieved for her back when she’d woken up at his house. She took the feather out and twirled it in her hands. All she felt was sadness. No memories came to her, no realizations, no reassurances. Just a cloud of empty, impenetrable sadness. She put the feather away.

Avis’s gaze fell to the scyther blade strapped to the side of her pack. She pulled it out and gave it a few swings. It felt odd in her hands. The blade wasn’t weighted like any sword she had ever used. Most of the weight was in the bone along the back of the blade, giving it an odd balance. It undoubtedly added to the weapon’s chopping power, but made for clumsy parries.

“I might need a real sword…” Avis muttered.

Nevertheless, Avis shrugged off her cloak and began taking the blade through the sword exercises she had learned from training with her father.

She expected memories of their training to elicit bitterness or sorrow, but instead she felt surprisingly, refreshingly neutral. The familiar movements brought her back to a familiar time. When everything was simple and straightforward. She’d had a purpose, and companions to help her along the way. Even if one of them was a vile, murderous, monster…

Avis practiced until the sun had risen enough to see by. She picked up her pack and pulled her cloak tightly around herself. Despite the fact that she was wide awake with blood pumping, she somehow still felt cold and tired. Anger at her own state flared up inside her, anger that she took out on the road as best as she could, with fast and vigorous steps.

The pacing helped her make good time over the next several hours. If Avis could somehow see above the trees, she was sure she would be able to see Gods Peak, the mountain that towered over Donchapel. It would provide a good indicator of how far she had to go. She stopped and leaned on her aggron-horn spear she was using as a walking stick. The mountain slope she was traversing climbed upwards to the south. Looking through the trees, she could see a massive granite slab about a hundred yards off the road up the mountainside. It looked a good twenty or thirty feet tall. That would do.

Avis trudged through the shallow snow to the slab and began clambering up the shattered boulders around it. When she finally scrambled to the top above the trees, she could see for miles. Mountain peaks rose all around, but one towered above the rest to the east. She realized she had been able to see it through the trees, but she had mistaken it for the sky. A massive snowcapped volcano that put every other mountain to shame stretched up into the clouds. Gods Peak. Donchapel would be reachable that day if she kept up the pace.

She took a moment to rest, gazing out at the horizon. This would be the farthest east she had ever traveled. East of the mountains lay the Kingdom of Darius. Although the Darians were not officially at war with the Silver Empire, she had heard rumors for months of Darian patrols in the mountains. Scouting, prodding, encroaching on Imperial territory. The conflict of cultures, as well as a recently crowned, hot-headed king had led to a notable tension between the two bordering nations over the last few years. Most importantly to her father, they didn’t have arena battles.

Avis slid back down the granite-face as cautiously as she could. As she turned to follow her footprints back to the road, a pained screech echoed through the trees. Avis stopped, listening. It had sounded… human.

The scream came again, muffled by the snow and trees, but longer and louder than before.

Avis took off sprinting in the direction of the sound, farther up the mountainside. It wasn’t long before she saw footprints and evidence of activity in the snow. The scream came again, much closer this time.

Avis made sure the scyther blade was readily accessible at her belt. She could hear male voices ahead.

Seconds later, she burst through the trees into a campsite in a small clearing. Two men in identical armor turned to face her. They were adorned in heraldry that matched their tents: a golden fist clutching an arrow on a white field. Avis stared. She had heard stories of that insignia. Darians, but not just Darians…

“Halt!” One of the men drew his sword and approached her. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”

Avis gripped her spear tightly, eyes darting around.

The second man wielded a dagger and was standing over a white-haired woman kneeling in the snow. Her hands were bound behind her, and her long bloodstained hair veiled her downturned face. The one who had approached pointed his sword at Avis.

“I’m a traveler. Going to Donchapel. I heard a scream.” Avis spoke slowly, both hands on her spear, desperately fighting the urge to point it at the men.

“Venatores business. You should go back to the road.” The man lowered his sword but did not sheathe it.

Venatores… just what she was afraid of. They were fanatics, at least as far as Avis was told. An elite branch of the Darian army dedicated towards hunting and killing pokémon. Not because they were dangerous, but simply because the Venatores saw them as abominations.

“Hold on,” the other man said. “Is that an aggron horn?” He gestured towards her spear with his bloodstained knife. “Where’d a lady like you get a thing like that? And what are you doing traveling alone?” They both stared at her suspiciously.

Avis frowned, her anxiety deepening. “I killed an aggron. This is its horn.”

The one closer raised an eyebrow skeptically. “You Imperial? You look Imperial…”

Avis took half a step back. “I-I’m just a civilian. Traveling to Donchapel…”

“Well if you like killing monsters, you’ll fit right in in Darius.” His eyes lowered to the scyther blade hanging off her belt. “Unless of course you nicked those off a Venator…”

“Leave her alone, Gol, no reason to doubt her story,” the man with the knife interrupted. “Besides, we got work to finish here.”

The one in front of her looked back and forth between Avis and the bound woman. Finally, he sheathed his sword. “Hurry along now, little lady. We’ve got bigger fish to fry.”

Avis tried to play relaxed, but her nerves just kept building. “What’s going on here?” she said shakily.

The Venator in front of her looked her up and down one last time, then turned back to his real quarry. The other one responded. “Got the drop on a witch, we did!” The white-haired woman whimpered faintly. The man with the knife kicked her in the ribs, making her crumple into the snow.

Avis grimaced. She’d heard the occasional drunken tale of witches, but had never believed them.

“Mighty demon slayer or no, I don’t think you’ll want to see what we’re gonna do next. Best you leave.” The Venator grabbed the woman by the hair and pulled her back to her knees, and readied his dagger.

Avis didn’t have much time to think. They were going to kill her. This innocent woman. A witch indeed.

The bloody dagger moved closer to the woman’s throat.

Avis’s heart raced. Her eyes flicked around the scene, making quick estimates of distance and timing. Barely a conscious thought went through her head. It was all training and instinct. The only choice she made was to do it.

The haft of her spear whipped through the air as she spun it around and swung it hard into the back of the head of the Venator facing away from her. Both of these men had made the crucial mistake of being helmetless. He crumpled into the snow.

The other man dropped the woman and raised his dagger, a look of panic on his face. He didn’t have enough time to react. Avis lunged forward and struck him right in the nose with the butt end of her spear. He gave a muffled cry and staggered backward, clutching at his face. Blood streamed down his face and chest, staining his heraldry.

In one quick movement, Avis switched her spear to her left hand and drew the scyther blade. The white-haired woman’s eyes flicked to meet Avis’s. They were a sharp blue, lively and full of energy, unlike the rest of her face. She didn’t say anything.

Avis hesitated a moment when she saw the woman’s bindings. They were not ropes, but strange wooden manacles. Spikes like thorns lined the inside of the cuffs, drawing blood from the woman’s wrists. “This is barbaric…” The scyther blade could handle it anyway. The woman obligingly held out her hands, giving Avis room to strike. The first chop took a chunk of wood out of the middle of the manacles, which began to bend and crack as the woman strained against them.

The bloody-faced Venator was recovering and drawing his sword. The other one was still face down in the snow.

Avis struck again. This time the blade cut cleanly through and the manacles fell to pieces. Drops of the woman’s blood speckled the snow. Almost immediately, Avis felt a strange, sudden cold. Before she could help the woman to her feet, a powerful blast of wind knocked Avis backwards.

It was like a blizzard had been conjured from nowhere. The once still grey sky was now stark white. Everything was white. Thick snowfall tore through the air and stung her ears. Avis brushed snow from her eyes. She couldn’t see the Venatores’ tents anymore, the storm was so thick. She couldn’t even see the woman. She could barely breathe without inhaling snowflakes. She was alone in an infinite crystalline emptiness. The gale picked up, biting through her cloak, through her clothes, chewing at her bones.

“‘Tis a curious thing, a human who doth impress
With cunning and savagery… mine dearest huntress.”

The voice cut through the snow, somehow speaking clearly above the howling wind. It was light and feminine, almost singing. It sounded in part mocking, and yet somehow… tempting.

Avis didn’t respond. She couldn’t. She couldn’t even move. Terror and freezing cold held her tightly in place. Her heart pounded in fear to no avail. Even breathing the air seemed to freeze her lungs.

“Forsooth thou hast spared me, lest I be scourged,
So too, shalt thou survive, ere thy kin is purged.”

The wind and snow intensified, colder and more blinding than ever before. Avis could almost hear a soft humming on the breeze. A calm, haunting tune. Avis curled up, pulling her cloak close around her, desperately trying to keep the cold at bay. She crouched there for no more than a minute, head between her knees and desperately trying not to hyperventilate, when suddenly she realized… the wind had stopped.

She looked up slowly. The clearing was still and calm. A few stray snowflakes drifted down from the gray skies overhead, but there was no indication of the blizzard that had just happened. No indication aside from the now thick snow cover that blanketed everything. As Avis stood up, she shook a heavy layer of snow off of her cloak. The Venatores’ tents had crumpled beneath the downpour, and neither of the two men were anywhere to be seen.

The woman was gone.

This was too much. She needed to get out of here. Avis pulled her spear out of a newly sprouted snowbank where it had been half buried after being knocked out of her hand. She hooked the scyther blade back onto her belt and took several steps backwards through the suddenly much deeper snow, scanning the scene for any sign of life.

There was nothing. No men. No woman. No tents. No blood. No footprints. Just fresh fallen snow. Like Avis had imagined the entire experience. Avis turned and ran as quickly as she could. She didn’t look back.

· · · · ·​

The sun was just dimming in the east when Avis reached an opening in the trees and was able to look down on Donchapel. The town was smaller than Azurefell: nothing more than a couple dozen buildings of wood and stone with no defenses to speak of. A peppering of gray squares around the town looked like old walls and foundations, vestiges of a more prosperous time. A few roads snaked off into the trees towards the mountains, presumedly leading to mines. But something was off. It looked like a huge encampment was set up among the ruins on the south end of the village. Not military, for the tents were far too scattered and disorganized.

Avis briskly hiked the final mile of switchbacks down the mountainside. She sincerely hoped the encampment was benign, whatever it was. She was going to have to walk through it unless she wanted to traverse thick wilderness around to the other side of town.

As she approached, the encampment revealed itself to be populated by… ordinary people. Just normal common folk. Talking, trading, fixing tools, building a cart, wandering among the tents. Tired and dirty, perhaps, but ordinary. What were they doing here? They looked like they could be Darians, though they carried no heraldry. None of them were soldiers or Venatores.

Avis followed the path through the tents and ancient foundations, looking about curiously and receiving looks just as curious. Eventually the road forked, and Avis realized she didn’t really have a clue where she was going. She stopped in her tracks. Off in the distance she could hear the clinking of a blacksmith’s hammer. She felt a pang in her heart as she thought of Radovan. She felt terrible about what she had said and the way she had said it.

Off to the side of the road, a pair of men were sawing wood, aided by a tame timburr. A small pile of scrap wood chunks lay near their table.

“Excuse me?” Avis asked, approaching them.

The two men turned to look at her. Both were tall and well-built, but had the dry, sallow look of people who hadn’t had much to eat lately. The one closer to her, an older man, squinted in her direction. “What?”

Avis knelt down by their scrap wood. “This is aspen, right? Do you mind if I take one of these blocks… for carving?” she realized the two men were looking at her oddly. She quickly stood up, aspen block in hand.

The younger man, who had a huge blonde beard, leaned forward and whispered something in the older man’s ear. Their eyes flitted between Avis’s spear and the scyther blade clearly visible at her belt. Their timburr shyly hid behind the table.

“Where are you from, girl?”

“A-Azurefell…” Avis stammered, immediately regretting ever approaching them. “I’m here to ask for steel from… the baron.”

“Oh, leave the poor girl alone, boys.” A voice came from behind Avis. A woman walked up to them. She had long black hair and wore a pale cyan cloak that dragged noiselessly over the dirt as she approached. A basket full of what appeared to be mushroom caps was clasped in her hands.

The man with the beard pointed at Avis. “Her weapons, Minna. She might be a Venator.”

The woman, Minna, smiled sweetly at Avis. “Are you a Venator, dear?”

“Umm… no,” Avis said, heart racing.

“There,” Minna said, as if that settled it. “She says she’s not, so unless you have real reason to think she’s a threat, I say you should believe her.”

The older man stammered. “B-but…”

“Gino, let us not fearmonger,” Minna said reassuringly.

The two men looked at Avis, then each other, and nodded slowly. “You’re right, of course.” They returned to their work.

Minna took Avis by the arm and began leading her away. “Come along dear, I can help you find whoever you’re looking for.” A bit dazed by this woman’s sudden appearance, Avis followed along, unsure of what to say. Minna seemed to take her silence in stride. “Don’t you mind them. They’ve been through a lot. Rightfully suspicious, but you look far too cold and miserable to be a threat.”

“Thanks?” Avis realized she still held the aspen block. Never having received an answer to her original question, she quickly stuffed it in a pouch at her belt.

“What’s your name, my dear? And what brings you to Donchapel?” Minna asked.

“Avis. I’m here on behalf of the armorsmith in Azurefell. He’s requesting a new shipment of steel.” Avis got the impression she was going to be repeating that line a lot. “I’m supposed to talk to the baron?” Avis was unsure. Radovan was supposed to be with her, but she had so quickly dismissed him. Her heart immediately began tumbling back into the pit that she had slowly climbed out of over the last few days.

Minna stopped. “Is something wrong, dear?”

Avis looked at her, desperately trying to keep tears at bay. Minna was middle aged, and as covered in dirt as the rest of these people, but still quite beautiful. Her eyes were the color of honey, and her smile brought a much-needed warmth.

“No,” Avis said softly. “It’s just been a long journey and I’m not sure where to go next.”

Minna put a reassuring hand on Avis’s shoulder. “The baron should be able to help you. Or his steward. This way.” She tucked her arm through Avis’s and continued along the road. “He’s a good man. He’s done much to help these people.”

Avis looked at the encampment around them. The people here seemed to all know Minna, and respect her. Many nods and waves of acknowledgement and greeting came their way. “I have to ask, who are these people? Where did they come from?”

Minna gave a sad sigh. “Refugees. From the Kingdom’s heartland.”

“Refugees? From the Venatores?” Avis asked.

“That is the simple answer.”

It was only then that Avis noticed just how many pokémon wandered alongside the people. A fennekin, a lucario, a drilbur. A man nursed a pidgey. Avis’s heart dwelled on Aria. She knew what it was like to run away. The cost of running, but also of fighting. Sometimes life gave you no good answers.

“Are you a refugee too? Or are you from Donchapel?” Avis asked.

“Neither, really. I’m just helping these people get to the Empire.”

As the tents gave way to thatched roof houses, they passed by a group of armed guards bearing the insignia of a snow-capped peak. Even they nodded hello to Minna and let them pass without comment. At the end of the street was a house at least three times the size of the others. Two more guards standing at the door watched them warily.

Minna patted Avis’s arm. “Here you go, my dear. The baron manages the imports and exports and all sorts of other things. I’m sure he can help you.” The woman’s comforting warmth disappeared in an instant as she pulled away and trudged back down the muddy street from where they had come.

“Um, thanks…”

Avis looked up at the manor. Four lords ruled over Azurefell together, owners of the silver mines in the surrounding mountains. The best thing she could say about them is that their petty squabbles and bickering and political maneuvering tended to keep them largely out of the way. Azurefell’s success as a city came almost entirely as a result of its prime location between Darius and the Empire and the hard work of the traders and artisans who lived there. Avis did not have a high opinion of any nobility. A rich man in a giant house surrounded by poor refugees was unlikely to change that opinion.

“You Imperial?” one of the guards said through his bushy black beard.

Avis tried to comport herself, standing up a bit straighter. “I’m a messenger from Azurefell. I’m here to speak with the baron about a shipment of steel.”

“That so? Well, we’ll need to take your weapons. Then the steward should be able to sort you out.”

The bearded guard banged his fist three times on the door while the other approached Avis. She reluctantly gave up her spear and the scyther blade. The guard looked at both of them curiously, but didn’t say anything as he placed them gently in a wooden trunk next to the door.

“Do you want my carving knife?” Avis asked, pulling the blade from where she had tied it to the outside of her pack.

“Will I get in trouble if you kill the baron with it? If so, it goes in the box.”

Avis nervously handed over the knife, but when she made eye contact with the bearded guard again, he laughed. “No need to be worried, miss. The baron’s a good man. He’ll get you what you need. Always does.”

They were interrupted by the large door creaking open to reveal a bedraggled and balding man who had what was probably at one point a neatly groomed mustache.

“Messenger from Azurefell here, Calvus. Bet she has news on your missing boys,” said the bearded guard.

The steward Calvus looked her up and down. “Not good news if you’re here alone. Come on in and warm up.”

Avis clomped up the small set of wooden stairs that led to the door. Inside was the biggest house she had ever been in. A large hallway lined with hunting trophies led away to at least a half dozen rooms and a staircase that spiraled up to the second floor. Calvus showed her to a small foyer that was surprisingly sparsely furnished. A fire crackled merrily in a little fireplace, but the room was empty except for a writing desk covered in books and parchment. No rugs, no cushy chairs. Not exactly what she expected. The most expensive thing in the room was probably the fountain pen Calvus took up as he sat behind the desk and shuffled some parchment around.

“The baron is meeting with someone else at the moment. I should be able to get you what you need.” Calvus began flipping through one of his books.

Avis warmed her fingers by the fire. She hadn’t realized how cold they’d been since the… blizzard. Or whatever it was. She shivered involuntarily.

“Here we are,” Calvus eventually said. “Now, don’t bother beating around the bush. What happened to our last shipment?”

“It was attacked by an aggron. All the metal was lost. No survivors. I’m sorry.” Avis snuck a peek at Calvus as he began scribbling down notes in one of his books. He was focused and intent, but audibly swore under his breath at the mention of an aggron.

“Nothing to be done about it now. The baron will likely want… hmm…” he began shuffling through another book before eventually giving up. “Never mind, I’ll figure out compensation for their families later. Where was this creature last seen? I don’t suppose the Azurefell city guard got involved and did anything about it.”

“The local branch of the Gladiators Guild put out a bounty on it. I filled it.”

The scratching of his pen stopped. Avis clenched her teeth and continued looking into the fire. She could feel Calvus’s skeptical eyes boring a hole in the back of her head.

“You…?”

“I killed it.”

“You killed it.”

“Aye.”

“By yourself?”

Avis spun around. “Me! Alone! His bloody horn as the tip of my spear is all that’s left. I broke too many bones killing that beast to have it doubted constantly. Show me another aggron and I’ll damn well do it again!” Avis took a deep breath through her nose as she felt color rising to her cheeks. She immediately regretted raising her voice, but she was tired of being treated like this. She wasn’t just a little girl who spent too much time in the woods anymore. She had lost too much over the last month to have her one singular victory be doubted by every arrogant sentry and useless bureaucrat.

Calvus stared at her, his mouth slightly open but his face otherwise unreadable in the flickering firelight.

“I’m sorry, I—” Avis stammered.

“Come with me,” Calvus interrupted her. He got up from his desk and went back out into the hallway. Avis followed timidly, unsure if she was about to be thrown out for her insolence. Nobles could be finicky. Had she gone too far?

To her surprise, Calvus did not lead her back to the front door, but to a large set of doors in the middle of the house. She could hear voices on the other side. Calvus pushed the doors open to reveal an enormous dining room.

A middle-aged man wearing furs sat at the far end of a massive table, while an older man stood by the roaring fireplace. They seemed to be in heated discussion, but both looked up when the doors swung open.

“Apologies for interrupting, my lord,” Calvus said, “but I believe your next audience may offer a solution. This woman came in earlier today from Azurefell and…” Calvus looked at her. “Tell the baron what you just told me.”

Unsure who she was supposed to be addressing, Avis looked nervously between the two men. “Your last shipment of steel to Azurefell was destroyed by an aggron–”

The man by the fireplace threw his hands up. “What did I tell you, Baron? Monsters along the whole road. It’s impassable.”

The man in furs, presumably the baron, shrugged. “She got here fine.”

“That’s–” the older man started.

Calvus interrupted them. “Tell them what happened to the aggron.”

Avis gritted her teeth. One last time. “I hunted it and killed it. It won’t cause anyone any problems anymore.”

The two men looked at each other, then the baron spoke. “You do much hunting of pokémon, miss? Know much about them?”

“More than most, I think,” Avis responded.

The older man’s eyes narrowed. Avis could see that his clothes looked like they were fancy at one point, but had long since become torn and faded shadows of themselves. The only remaining set of clothes of a man who had once lived a much more comfortable life. A refugee then. “Did you see any monsters on your travels here?” the man asked. “A winged horror perhaps, talons still stained with the blood of one of my men?”

A cold shiver ran down Avis’s spine. She could still feel the biting wind of the blizzard. “Nothing like that…”

The man approached her slowly. “Well, it’s out there. A wingspan that could fill up this room, wearing the bones of its prey and reeking of death, or so my scouts tell me. And my people aren’t going anywhere until it’s gone.”

“Sound like something you could handle?” the baron asked casually. “You’ll be suitably compensated of course, and we’ll send a full cartload of steel along with Enlil’s caravan.”

Avis took a deep breath. She wasn’t sure what she was getting in to. Her wounds from Peredur twinged an aching reminder. “Possibly. I could at least track down the beast and assess whether or not it’s actually a threat.”

“Is that satisfactory, Enlil?” the baron asked the other man.

Enlil hesitated.

“Who knows how much or how little time we may have before Venatores come prowling. This town has yet to be graced with their damnable presence, but it’s only a matter of time. And I’d rather your people have moved on when they do show up.” The baron sounded like he was reciting arguments the two men had been having for a while. “With all due respect.”

Enlil sighed. “Aye, alright. This will have to do. I’ll go speak with my scouts. They can brief you in the morning on what they saw and where you might find the creature.” He began to leave, but stopped right next to Avis and glared into her eyes. “My people will be putting a lot of faith in you, Lady Huntress. Do not disappoint.” He stormed out of the room before Avis could respond.

“Well!” The baron clapped his hands. “That is at least tomorrow’s problem if nothing else. Now, it’s surely been a long journey, do you have a place to stay for the night my Lady ahh…”

“Avis. No, I don’t.”

“Good, the only open beds are muddy ground in the Old Town anyway. The least I can offer you for coming all this way is what little hospitality we have left. Calvus, fetch us some cheese and wine, would you? And ask my wife to prepare a room for Avis here.”

Calvus, having nearly disappeared into the shadows in the corner, bowed and left the room.

“Have a seat by the fire,” The baron beckoned, standing and offering his own. “I’ve trekked the mountain pass a number of times. Much more pleasant in the summer months. You’ve earned some food and warmth, especially if you’re to hunt a monster tomorrow.”

“Thank you.” Avis sat in one of the chairs near the fireplace and warmed her tingling fingertips. “To be entirely honest though, it’s unlikely that any pokémon would pose a threat to a large group like the refugees, assuming that’s who Enlil’s people are.”

The baron buried his arms in his thick fur coat and stared into the embers, shifting uneasily from one foot to the other. “You’re right of course. But it’s about more than that.”

“What do you mean?”

The doors creaked open as Calvus entered with a carafe of wine and a platter of bread and cheese. Avis’s stomach grumbled. She hadn’t realized how hungry she was.

The baron took a bit of cheese from the platter and gestured vaguely. “Help yourself. My stores are mostly empty at this point, but I made sure to keep the fine cheeses for myself and my family.” He laughed and winked at her. Avis noticed a note of self-deprecation in his tone, but was uncertain what to think of the man. Personable though he may be, he was still nobility. With all the frills and privilege and apathy to the common man. Nevertheless, Avis tore off a chunk of bread and gleefully ate it. It was freshly baked.

The baron munched on his piece of cheese thoughtfully. “There’s only so much food and drink I can provide these people. What they need is a home. Somewhere they never have to run from again.”

“I was told they were refugees from Darius’s heartland. Fleeing the Venatores.”

The baron nodded solemnly.

“I didn’t realize how bad it was,” Avis said. “I guess I never really understood the whole thing.”

The baron sighed. “The Darians never took to pokémon in the way the Silver Empire did. At least, not for the most part. The species that populate the plains are dangerous, and often impossible to train.”

Avis could practically hear Peredur’s shrieking roar pierce her ears. “Plenty of pokémon in the Empire like that.”

“Of course,” the baron said. “But while your people learned to accept pokémon as an aspect of nature to be respected and dealt with in the same way you would treat a mountain or the sea, some Darians see pokémon as… monsters. An army of demons put on this earth to wipe out mankind. Or so their scriptures say.”

Avis knew little of The Church of Ahkiltal, the Darians’ primary religion. Only that they placed humanity above all. Didn’t seem so bad on the surface. She hadn’t realized that meant a fervent hatred of pokémon. Or apparently, anyone who interacted with them. “So those people were driven out for having pokémon as pets?”

The baron sighed again. “Pokémon are useful. I’m sure as an Imperial you know that. A graveler to dig in the mines, a murkrow to carry messages, a salandit to stoke the forge. There are many Darians who have benefitted from working alongside Pokémon. In the last few years, the Kingdom has grown increasingly intolerant of such behavior. I suppose it seems silly to you to sacrifice so much for a something like that.”

Avis’s heart dwelled on Aria. “No, it doesn’t,” she whispered.

It wasn’t clear whether the baron had heard her. “The Kingdom has been ruthless. Anyone who has owned a pokémon or knew or protected someone who did was at risk of arrest, torture, or even death. In response to this crusade, the Arceists fomented a rebellion. It was put down, quickly and severely. They were added to the list of undesirables. And so here we are. Most of these people are Arceists. The rest made the simple mistake of associating with pokémon.”

Avis took a sip of warm mulled wine and looked up at the vaulted ceiling. The columns were intricately carved with images of people and pokémon. This building was old. This whole village was old. Far older than Azurefell or any other city she had visited. She’d heard that Donchapel was where pilgrims would go before climbing Gods Peak to prove themselves before Arceus. Or something of the sort. It seemed fitting that the Arceists were finding refuge in such a place.

“So what do you get out of helping them?”

The baron looked at her skeptically. “Get out of it? These people are in need. I have the means to help, so I do.”

Avis returned the look of skepticism.

The baron smiled. “Consider Enlil. He was once the elder of a small farming village in the midlands. Now, he leads a hundred refugees to safety. They look to him for guidance and reassurance. He was chosen as their leader, and he serves the role well. I envy him.”

“You envy a man in rags running for his life?” The wine was starting to get to Avis. She clenched her mouth shut, uncertain if it was worth insulting the man who was offering her a place to stay for the night.

But the baron just laughed. “I like you! No, you’re right of course. I chose my words poorly. I simply mean that Enlil’s people love him because of what he has done for them. They chose to give him leadership and power over them. My power comes from being born to the right family. Every waking hour I strive to deserve this position. Like my father did. Like my… well, my grandfather was an ass. Regardless, if my people must ever choose, I would hope they choose me anyway. To try to be anything less would be a betrayal of my own good fortune.”

Avis chewed her bread slowly, unsure if she believed him.

The baron took a sip of wine. “You don’t much trust nobles, do you?”

Avis shrugged as noncommittally as she could.

“As well you shouldn’t. Greedy, entitled, and pompous for the most part. I’m glad my hold is far enough away from the seats of power that I don’t often have to play politics with others. A land in strife can often rightfully blame it on their leader. That said, bad things can happen to good people. A good king is not a guarantee of a thriving kingdom.”

Avis looked at him thoughtfully, unsure of how far she could push this. “When hard times come, the Lords of Azurefell blame each other, far off nobles, and even the commonfolk. Entitled, but also aloof. Always representative of their hold when life is good, but separate and above it all the moment they might be held accountable for something.”

The baron nodded slowly, sipping his wine. “I am after all, just a man. If it will make you feel more comfortable you can simply call me Onofrio instead of titles or honorifics. Not that you were anyway.”

Avis flushed. “Oh! I’m… sorry, my lord… um… Onofrio.”

He laughed and patted her shoulder. “I jest! So long as you don’t do it in front of my men. There is a value in formality when it comes to maintaining authority. Anyway, come, join my family for supper tonight. We’re picking over the last of my cheese stores as we speak. The rest went to the refugees. In return they occasionally gift me game. It won’t be the most lavish feast but I imagine you haven’t had a warm meal in a while.”

The prospect of a formal meal with nobility made Avis panic more than the promise of fighting some terrifying giant bird the next day.

 

[AetherX]

EPISODE II

Banner by me. Artwork by Dralsk.

- Part 2 -​

Avis needn’t have worried. Onofrio’s wife was kind and welcoming over dinner, and the baron happily carried most of the conversation. Their twin children, a boy and a girl, were far too shy to say a single word in front of Avis.

Dinner was more wine and cheese, smoked venison, stale bread, and a few slices of an apple. Avis hadn’t had an apple in ages. Orchards were all over Darius, but the fruit didn’t often find itself on the other side of the mountains. Avis drained the last of her wine, somewhat guilty they were having such a feast while the refugees withered away in their camp only a few hundred yards away.

The twins had excused themselves some time before, but were now bounding back into the room wielding wooden swords with the waving abandon of kids not quite understanding that the typical point of a sword fight was to strike their opponent, not simply whack their swords against each other. Avis caught herself smiling as she watched them play. The girl’s long braids swung about as she flailed around. Avis ran a hand through her own hair, cut boyishly short as her false father had insisted. While she hadn’t entirely avoided having a proper childhood, mostly thanks to the efforts of her brother, she had never really had a fair shot at girlhood. Avis wasn’t sure how she felt about that. How can you miss something you never had?

Onofrio refused to make more than pleasant small talk the rest of the evening, dodging questions Avis had about the upcoming job. Avis was unsure if it was because he didn’t know the answers, or just wanted to think about something else for the evening. Avis’s mind did not quiet so easily. Finally, the baron’s wife reappeared and offered to show Avis to her room. Avis gratefully went with her.

Then, she was alone again. Sitting on a bed of straw and furs in a silent cramped room all to herself, watching the candlelight throw flickering shadows up against the wall. The sun had long since set and no stars were visible through the narrow window. Her weapons had been brought up to the room. They lay neatly on a chest at the foot of the bed.

As she began taking off her gear, Avis pulled the block of aspen from her pouch. Hidden within it was a carving, she just had to free it. Maybe a houndoom. A gift for Radovan, as thanks for all he’d done for her. That would have to wait though. Avis let out a long sigh and set the block down.

She wished she could do more to prepare. Oil a blade, sharpen a spear, plan an encounter with… whatever it was she was supposed to go looking for. But her gear was already in fine shape, and Avis had no idea what to expect. There were not many large birds on this side of the mountains, and even fewer species that would pose a threat to an armed human. An exceptionally large honchkrow perhaps? No… they flocked with their murkrow brethren, which hadn’t been mentioned. A talonflame would have attacked with fire instead of talons, she’d seen them hunt before. And anyone who had ever seen the heraldry of the Silver Empire would be able to identify a pidgeot on sight with their flowing red and yellow crest. These people probably would have seen it as an omen that they weren’t welcome in the Empire.

Avis stripped down to her underclothes and crawled beneath the thick fur blankets, mind still racing trying to figure out what she would be up against. She was exhausted from her journey, and sleep quickly found her through it all, even if it just meant her worrying transformed from conscious thoughts to unsettling dreams.

Cool, piercing blue eyes. Her father’s. Peredur’s. That… woman in the mountains. Cold steel. Frozen blades. Blood freezing in her veins and pouring into the snow. And now above it all, dark wings beating like a thunderous drum.

· · · · ·​

The morning sun was still not visible over the towering peak that loomed over the village, but the refugee camp was already bustling. Enlil met Avis at the edge of town, arms crossed and scowling. Avis gripped her aggron spear tightly and adjusted the scyther blade hanging at her side. She’d made sure her trophies were readily apparent, which seemed to work as intended. Enlil gave her a once over, eyes lingering on the aggron horn in particular.

“Just realized I never got your name,” Enlil said in place of a greeting.

“Avis,” she replied.

“Hope the baron’s hospitality gave you plenty of rest,” Enlil said, beckoning for her to follow him through the camp. “He’s a generous man, despite all my complaining.”

“I understand,” Avis replied. She followed him down the muddy road. “You have to advocate for your people, even if it means asking for more than he can offer.”

Enlil grunted. “He’s certainly not a perfect leader, but then neither am I. Just men doing what we can.”

They soon came upon three rough looking men sitting around a fire eating some kind of stew.

“Eyes up, my friends,” Enlil said. “This is Avis. The baron and I think she may be our ticket out of here.” The men did not look as skeptical as Avis expected. “If you don’t trust me, ask her where she got the spear.”

“Looks like the horn of an aggron,” one of the men said.

“It is,” Avis responded. Unwilling to recount the whole story, she plowed forward. “I just need to know what you all ran across out there.”

“Everything you can remember,” Enlil added.

“We were about a day out,” one of the men began. “Well into the range. River was out of earshot. Road looked to be in good condition. The sun was going down, so we found a clearing north of the road to camp for the night before returning.”

“Jeffers got a deer,” one of the other men said. “We were cooking it up. Not sure if that attracted it.”

“Could’ve been,” Avis said. Equally likely that a fire would have kept it at bay though. “How many of you were there?”

“Four,” the third one said. “Us three and Jeffers.”

“When did it attack? Was it dark yet?”

“No, still twilight. We saw it circling first. Great big wings, black or dark brown maybe. We stuck close to the fire and hoped it wouldn’t come down, but apparently it realized it could take us. Don’t remember too much of the fight, just blood and feathers and mud.” The first man set down his stew bowl and rubbed his face.

“Do either of you remember what it looked like? How did it fight?”

“Beak and talon and beating wings. No magics,” one of the other men offered.

“I’ll never forget what it looked like,” said the third shakily. “Large as a man. Maybe bigger. It had a bald head and was wearing bones like jewelry. Smelled like rot.”

“Mandibuzz,” Avis said. Enlil’s flowery description from the previous night suddenly made more sense.

“You fought one of them before?” Enlil asked her.

“No, but I know of them. They’re highly territorial, but I don’t think enough to fight a group of men around a fire unless it was defending something.”

“Nest in the trees perhaps?” Enlil said.

“Was it just trees in the area?” Avis asked the third man. “Or was there a cliff or big rock nearby?”

“Just trees.”

“Hmm…” Avis looked off at the road up into the mountains. “You would have seen a nest, I think. They’re huge, and built out of bones, often with rotting meat still on them to feed their chicks. It may have been defending something else.”

“It didn’t chase us at least,” the first man said. “It slashed Jeffers across the chest badly. We picked him up before it could finish the job and carried him all night until we got back here. He died on the way.”

“I’m sorry to hear that…” Avis said. “I can’t promise vengeance though. Fully evolved raptors like that are hard to kill. Even if I could wound the beast, it would just flee to its nest where I couldn’t follow. But if I can figure out why it attacked you, we could know what to avoid. It’d be enough to get your people through the pass without incident.”

“You sure that will be enough?” Enlil asked.

“Just as safe as sitting here.” Avis remembered the baron’s warning about Venatores. She looked around at the roughly made tents and haggard refugees. Nearby a fletchling lit a fire for an old man and woman. Her heart ached for Aria. “Maybe safer.”

The men grumbled. Enlil looked thoughtful.

“Please, trust me,” Avis insisted. “I’ll be traveling back with you anyway. My job won’t be over until every one of you, people and pokémon, have made it to the Empire.”

Enlil nodded slowly. “It’s a deal then. We’ll prepare to leave two days from now. Try to return before then, or meet us on the road. I’ll make sure the baron sends the cart of steel you requested with us.”

“Thank you.”

“May the Three guide and protect you. For all our sakes.”

· · · · ·​

Avis thought she would feel more at ease once she was back in the wilderness and away from crowds, politics, and religion, but her anxiety would not abate. She was relieved the Mandibuzz didn’t seem to be related to… whatever it was she had witnessed with the Venatores, but that whatever it was could still be out there too.

There were cracks of blue sky peeking through the gray clouds, the warmth of the sun, and only a light breeze. No signs of sudden blizzards. Even if the so-called witch never appeared again, Avis still had a mighty monster to contend with. She was confident she would find whatever it was protecting and learn enough of the story to help the refugees avoid conflict, but it didn’t hurt to be prepared. She was thoughtful as she trekked back up into the mountains. How to kill a beast that could fly when she didn’t even have a bow anymore? How to overcome its strength and its speed. And more importantly, how to avoid the fate of Jeffers. She didn’t have anyone to drag her to safety.

Avis sighed. The sound of her own breath was overwhelmed by the rustling of trees in the wind and the roaring river off in the distance that winded its way back into Darius. The occasional birdcall cut through the noise, but their songs were not for her. She had only herself. She trudged on.

The scouts hadn’t given her much to go off of besides north of the road, about a day out from the village, out of earshot of the river. The day stretched on with no hint of how much Avis’s pace may have matched theirs. As the road took her deeper into the mountains and higher above the river, eventually its roar began to fade behind the growing sound of wind. The sun was still high, but Avis decided to start looking for game trails north of the road that might lead to a clearing.

The first little meadow she found was still and empty. No sign of a hastily abandoned campfire or a deer carcass or anything of the sort. The second was the same, and the third. It was at least another two miles before she found another. She followed a winding game trail a short way downhill to where she could see the sun brightly reflecting off a field of grass poking above the scarce snow that had yet to melt.

As Avis emerged from the cover of the pine trees she immediately knew this was it. The ashen remains of a campfire were smashed and smeared across the center of the clearing. Grass and earth were torn up everywhere. Avis stepped around the battlefield, carefully observing the signs. Dried blood stained a large patch of grass and snow. Likely where they butchered the deer. Another smaller patch of blood was a bit closer to the fire. She knelt down and ran a finger through the bloodstained dirt. Human or pokémon, she couldn’t tell. The scouts hadn’t mentioned wounding the beast. Probably human.

She stood back up and looked around the edges of the clearing intently, her eyes starting at the treetops and analyzing everything down to the roots. No nest was visible, not even a tree big enough to hold one. That’s why they usually made cliffside nests. The deer carcass was gone, likely taken by the mandibuzz.

Avis scouted around the meadow, eventually spiraling outward under the trees. Then she smelled something. It was at least ten yards out from the edge of the clearing, far enough the scouts wouldn’t have picked it up. Musty, thick, warm. But very, very slight. A patch of earth was covered in the same sorts of gouges she had found in the meadow. Something else had fought the Mandibuzz here, kicking up dirt and pine needles. A few enormous black feathers. There! Blood. Older than the rest. Whatever had fought the bird had died. Its body had lain in a visible divot in the ground. Blood and grease and rot had seeped into the frozen earth. She could still smell it, even though its flesh and bones had been taken away by the mandibuzz. Possibly in multiple trips.

Avis kicked around the little divot, looking for any sign of what it might have been or if there was enough remaining to justify the mandibuzz’s return. But it was mostly pine needles and pinecone flakes dropped there by generations of squirrels living in the trees above. Avis knelt down and ran her hand through it all, looking for fur or feathers. She found some dried blood here and even small chunks of rotting flesh there, but nothing to identify the creature by.

She stood up and headed back to the meadow. “Well…” that was likely that. The mandibuzz had thought the scouts were threatening to take its kill. They were strange creatures. They didn’t just eat their prey. They built nests from them. Wore their bones. Avis had no idea if it was supposed to be some kind of armor or a mating or dominance ritual, but it was certainly uncanny. She looked up at the aggron horn tipping the spear she had been using as a walking stick all day. Perhaps it wasn’t too uncanny. Or perhaps it was uncanny because it was a reminder how little separated them.

One way or another, Avis decided to wait for dusk. If the mandibuzz did not return then it had likely gone back to wherever its nest was, its business concluded. If it hadn’t been a problem before this then it probably wasn’t going to come back in this direction.

Avis went to the far edge of the clearing from where she had found the signs of fighting. She threw her pack down and dug through it, pulling out a length of rope she had bartered off some refugees on the way out. She didn’t think she’d have to fight the mandibuzz even if it did show up, but if worst came to worst, then this was her last chance to prepare. She looked around the forest floor, eventually finding a suitably strong looking thick branch that had fallen from one of the pines. She returned to her pack, pulled out her carving knife, and sat down to get to work.

Less than an hour later the sun was finally getting low in the sky and Avis had carved a thick stake like one would use for a tent, but bigger. She’d carved notches like serrations at the bottom that would hopefully make it somewhere between hard and impossible to pull out of the ground. She tied one of the ends of the rope tightly around the hook she’d carved at the top, wrapped it in the rest of the rope, and stowed it back in her pack. There was still no sign of enormous wings in the slowly darkening sky.

Next, she pulled out the small block of aspen from her pack and got to work on a much more calming project. Radovan had spoken fondly of his old partner pokémon, Morana. His ally in the arena. Avis still felt bad about how she had spoken to him before she left. He had been nothing but kind to her and she had pushed him away. A small gift could only do so much, but it was still worth giving. She listened to the birdsong as she carved away at the block, watching it slowly take the shape of a houndoom. She munched on some cheese and jerky the baron’s wife had packed for her while she worked. The carving wouldn’t come close to being done tonight, but she should be able to finish it before getting back to Azurefell.

She worked avidly for a while until she felt a scratching at her leg. Avis absentmindedly moved her hand to brush away whatever pine needle or twig was poking her, but instead it found scales.

Avis swore and jumped to her feet, dropping her carving. The lizard-like pokémon that had touched her leg made an awkward chirping sound and scuttled away, hiding behind the roots of a nearby tree. It was a rich brown color on its spiked back, except for a darker plate at its head, and a belly the color of cream. It was about a foot and a half long from the tip of its nose to the end of its stubby little tail. Though it mostly ran on four legs, it was with the awkward, bounding gait of a creature that would soon become bipedal once it had grown up a bit.

The creature poked its head up over the roots and looked at her. It chirped again.

Avis laughed and squatted back down, holding out a piece of jerky. “Is this what you wanted, little one?”

The pokémon cautiously crawled forward. Avis whispered calmingly to it and continued holding out the jerky in loose fingers, trying not to look at it directly to make it more comfortable. The lizard got closer and closer, eventually reaching out a stubby little clawed hand to swipe the dried meat from her grasp. It sat back on its haunches and nibbled away happily.

Avis smiled at the little creature. A juvenile cubone. Still too young to wear the skull that was its namesake. And too young to know to fear humans. But that typically meant… Avis scanned the area, eye out for an angry mother marowak. But none appeared. Cubone typically didn’t go out on their own until their mother died and passed their skull on to the largest of her hatchlings. The rest would claim skulls of other creatures or even each other. That meant this one was one of the runts. And exceptionally so…

The little cubone finished the jerky and looked back up at her expectantly, its big black eyes pleading for more. Too young to even feed itself. That meant…

“Oh. I understand.”

Avis got up and walked over to where she had found signs of fighting on the far side of the clearing. Sure enough, at the base of an enormous pine a small hollow was visible burrowed beneath the knotted roots. She knelt down and looked inside. It was dark, but she could hear snuffling. The cubone walked up slowly behind her, keeping a safe distance. Avis squinted into the darkness. Sure enough, there were at least two more cubone hiding in the far reaches of the burrow.

The pieces came together. Gouges in the dirt and bark around the hole confirmed it. Somehow, she had missed this.

“Sorry, little one. The world is a cruel place.” Avis thought back to Vito’s letter. How he described her father, no… not her father, murdering the mother she never knew, stealing them away.

The cubone behind her growled lightly in response. Sadly, perhaps.

They were interrupted by a sound almost like the woof of a dog. Avis’s head snapped upward. A huge shadow floated high above them. The mandibuzz had finally returned. Avis didn’t hesitate. She fled back to where she had dropped her things, quickly packing up and grabbing her spear.

The mandibuzz circled a few times, slowly descending to just above the treetops, occasionally making its barking call at her. It was huge. Its bald pink head turned to look at her as it circled. Avis continued muttering swears to herself as she backed away from the clearing.

She felt something at her leg. The little cubone was clinging to her boot. It looked up at her and gave a whiny chirp. Avis swore again and continued backing up, giving the mandibuzz more space.

Avis and the cubone watched through the trees until the mandibuzz eventually alighted on the ground. It watched them back for an uncomfortably long time, adjusting its wings and ruffling its feathers. A collar of fluffy beige feathers ringed its neck. A large bone was tucked into its crest, the only feathers on its bald pink head. A string of sinew swung from the bone sickeningly every time the beast turned to look at her. It was big for a mandibuzz, at least five feet tall. Probably pretty old. Eventually, mercifully, the mandibuzz turned away to the cubone den and began scratching away at it.

Avis could only watch in fascinated horror as the mandibuzz pulled a squealing cubone from the burrow. It didn’t even kill it. Just looked at Avis for a moment as if daring her to act, opening its wings wide, and taking back to the skies.

“Only one. Maybe one a day, that’s why it keeps coming back.” On a whim, Avis shook the cubone off her boot and took off after the bird. If she could verify where its nest was, she could be sure it wouldn’t bother travelers along the road. Finally, a simple solution. And if she kept her distance she wouldn’t even have to fight.

Avis was glad the sun was only just beginning to set. It was hard to track the mandibuzz through the trees. She often lost sight of it, but soon picked up the dark silhouette against the clouds. The occasional shrieks of its prey made the task much easier. It wasn’t flying fast. Birds this size preferred to soar, riding updrafts and gliding to avoid expending energy on flapping their wings. Nevertheless, Avis still had to run to keep up. It was fortunate that the terrain here was not too treacherous. She did have to slide down a small ravine and clamber up the far side once or twice. They were getting farther from the road and primarily travelling east, back towards Donchapel. Avis did her best to track landmarks and relative position to distant mountain peaks barely visible through the trees in case she ever had to return.

Luckily, she didn’t have to follow it far. Avis clambered up a final hillside, her legs protesting mightily. She slowed as she saw the terrain level out a little bit, then suddenly shoot upward as a rocky cliff face. The mandibuzz was circling. Descending. Avis squinted through the growing darkness and saw it. A nest about halfway up the cliff face. Built in a small landing and made from branches and bones. Whether it had eggs, Avis wasn’t sure. It wasn’t quite laying season yet, so it was likely just building a nest.

As the mandibuzz flew lower, it suddenly dropped the cubone into its nest. It circled once more before descending itself. Avis watched the bird pick up the cubone and toss it about. Sometimes with its talons, sometimes with its thick grey beak. Playing with its food. Finally, there was a sickening crunch and the cries stopped.

Avis watched the mandibuzz feed for a moment, then turned to leave. She tried to push thoughts of the cubone out of her mind. A morbid spectacle, but not something threatening to people. Not so long as they kept their distance. The scouts had likely not heard the fairly unassuming warning cries of the mandibuzz. Or perhaps the deer carcass marked them as competitors. Either way, it was not something the refugees would have to worry about. The mandibuzz would finish off the rest of the cubone by the time they got to this area anyway. She made her way as close to south as she could manage, hoping to find the road before it got too dark.

She hadn’t gone far before a cold breeze picked up. Avis froze, suddenly terrified. She looked around, but she was alone in the forest. She took a deep breath to steady herself, and continued marching. Then, a song on the wind…

“The vulture is cruel, to its own ends it strives;
Food, yes, and a nest, but it enjoys taking lives.”

Avis spun around again. This time she was there, standing by a tree. The woman from before. White hair blowing in the breeze. A layered white gown billowed behind her like a dozen snowy tails, far too thin to protect from the sudden cold. Her mouth did not move, but Avis heard her voice.

“The mother torn asunder, soul gone, body hollow;
Her children cower, the bird will be sure they follow.”

“What do you want from me?” Avis stumbled backwards. “I freed you, didn’t I? Now leave me alone!” Avis turned and ran.

But the woman appeared in front of her as she dodged around a tree. Avis swore and braced her spear.

“Thou watch them, feel for them, in them see thyself;
Why dost thou not bravely to their rescue delve?”

Fear paralyzed her. Avis had to consciously force herself to breathe, even though the frigid air burned her lungs. “It’s nature’s course, isn’t it? Why should I get involved?” Avis slowly moved away; spear still bared.

“Nature’s course, yes, like a river it runs;
Thy kin try to dam it, but it will see them undone.”

“Well, my ‘kin’ are about to travel through here, fleeing the same people who trapped you. You’d better not hurt them. Begone!”

The woman smiled widely. Her teeth were pointed.

“The one dragon’s frore breath shalt bind its own chain;
Until then, o huntress mine, may we meet again.”

Avis blinked and the woman was gone. The freezing wind died as quickly as it came. Avis shakily rubbed her eyes. There was frost on her eyelashes.

She ran as far as her legs would take her. She found the road but didn’t have the energy to make it all the way back to Donchapel. So, she quickly made a fire in the middle of the road and curled up next to it. Avis slept, but fitfully. Her spear never left her hands.

· · · · ·​

Avis left as soon as she woke up the next morning, unsure how much sleep she actually got. She buried the ashes of her fire as best she could to avoid disturbing the road, and headed back to Donchapel.

Sunlight did little to assuage her fear. But the more she walked, the more Avis calmed down. Whatever that witch was and whatever she wanted, she hadn’t hurt Avis. Not really. She could have, assuming the blizzard that had buried the Venatores was her doing.

Witches did not exist. Avis had never really believed stories of humans with powers like that. The stories themselves always seemed to have a sinister motive behind them. A pokémon then? An old one, like in the stories she did believe? Capable of changing its form, or at least creating an illusion. Dangerous for certain, but intelligent enough to be reasoned with. As she had done. Or maybe Avis was all wrong. Maybe there was something behind the Venatores’ fanaticism. Maybe she really was a witch and it was that simple. Either way, something about Avis’s answer to the witch’s questions had pleased her.

“May we meet again…” Avis muttered to herself, striking the butt of her spear into the dirt with more force than was really necessary as she strode along. “Hopefully not.”

But the witch’s question still stuck in her mind. Did Avis really believe in her answer? She thought of the little baby cubone that had begged some jerky from her. Tomorrow it would be dead along with its final remaining sibling. Did Avis really not care? Or was she just afraid of having to fight the mandibuzz? She was right to be, after seeing its size and strength.

Despite her worries, Avis made good time down out of the mountains. Donchapel was visible by early afternoon, nestled at the foot of Gods Peak. She hit the outskirts of the refugee camp before the sun had even started to get low. It was bustling with activity. People packed up their whole lives into carts and carriages, some well-traveled and some newly built. Avis had to wander a bit before seeing a familiar face.

She found Minna corralling some children away from a pair of men replacing a wagon wheel. The woman’s face lit up when she saw Avis. “Avis my dear! Welcome back.”

“Hi Minna. Do you know where I could find Enlil?”

“Yes, yes. Follow me.” Minna led her through the camp. “I heard about your task. Do you bring good news?”

Avis sighed. The witch hadn’t seemed to imply any direct malice against these people, and mentioning her would likely keep the refugees from ever making it to the Empire. The mandibuzz, on the other hand, was a much more tangible issue, but also not one that Avis thought would harm the refugees. “I think so. Didn’t kill the beast, but it’s not a threat to you. Just need to sell that to Enlil.”

Minna hooked her arm through Avis’s. “These people are looking for a reason to keep moving, it won’t be difficult to give them one.”

They found Enlil speaking quietly with a family of refugees. A number of others surrounded them. As soon as the man saw Avis, his mood appeared to brighten, but he only acknowledged her with a brief wave as he continued speaking to the family. Minna patted her on the arm and left Avis waiting for the refugees’ leader to spare a moment for her. Avis tried to stay at a respectful distance to avoid eavesdropping, but she could tell Enlil was trying to be reassuring to a mother on the verge of being distraught.

Finally, the family left and Enlil waved off the other surrounding people to approach Avis. “My apologies. That woman’s sister and brother-in-law were supposed to meet us here before we made way but that seems unlikely to happen. They will have to find their own way, should the Three see fit to bring them this far.”

Avis tried to smile reassuringly. She didn’t put much stock in faith, but this man’s belief in the Guardian trio that supposedly watched over humanity brought him comfort, so who was she to judge?

Enlil took a deep breath and looked around at the refugees surrounding them. He looked like he was bracing himself for bad news.

Avis spoke before he could ask a question, taking a cue from him to speak quietly. “I found the beast.”

Enlil nodded slowly. “Sooner than I expected. And you don’t bring its head.”

“Didn’t need to,” Avis said. “It’s definitely a mandibuzz. Big bird, scary, but not interested in humans. It killed a marowak and has been taking her hatchlings back to its nest one by one. I figure it saw your men as threats. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Shouldn’t even be visible from the road.”

Enlil squinted skeptically at her for a long moment. “You’re sure? Absolutely certain?”

“I saw it. Got close. Even followed it back to its nest. It never attacked me. I’ll be with you all so I can make sure you don’t get near its territory.”

Enlil continued to look at her. Avis refused to break eye contact. Finally, he looked away at one of his scouts who watched them from a short distance away. Enlil nodded at the man, who turned and scurried away, then looked back at Avis.

When Enlil spoke, he spoke loudly enough that everyone around could hear. “Alright then. We leave first thing tomorrow morning.” There was an audible sigh of relief from the crowd. Then he spoke more quietly to her. “My thanks, Lady Huntress. My people are in your debt.”

Avis just smiled and nodded, unsure if she really deserved it. Watching a mandibuzz destroy a family of cubone was hardly an act of heroism. She gripped her spear tightly and watched Enlil turn to deal with other refugees who had their own problems or concerns. These people were fleeing a force that hated them and wanted them dead for reasons out of their control. Simply because of who they were. To validate a way of life. Predators and prey.

Nature’s course.

Avis shifted uneasily. Unsure of where else to go, she made her way back to the baron’s manor.

 

[AetherX]

EPISODE II

Banner by me. Artwork by Dralsk.

- Part 3 -​

Avis stood amongst the bustling refugees as they finished breaking camp and watched the sun rise over the faraway ridges of Gods Peak. Its warmth hit her instantly, but she felt unsure. She adjusted her pack, now full of food and supplies that Baron Onofrio had insisted she take. It was more than she really felt like carrying all the way back to Azurefell, so she’d probably end up sharing most of it with the other travelers over the first few days.

Finally, the convoy began to make way. Avis returned the wave of the baron, who stood at the end of the muddy road into the town proper, then turned and marched alongside everyone else. Back home… or wherever. It didn’t really feel like going home to Avis.

As they walked, Avis slowly maneuvered through the convoy to find the cart carrying the steel for Radovan. It was technically under the ownership of a group of refugees including Enlil, who had purchased it from the Baron for cheap in the hopes that selling it in Azurefell would provide enough profit to fund a journey further into the Silver Empire. None of that group had a pokémon capable of pulling such a load, so the baron had lent them an ox. And who was guiding it, but Minna.

“Hello there, my dear.” The woman smiled at Avis, her eyes glittering brightly in the sun. “Come to keep me company?”

Avis just smiled in return, still lost in thought as they walked. Everything that had happened in the past few days danced around her head for what felt like hours. The mandibuzz, the hungry cubone, the witch… Despite it all, it was nice to walk next to Minna. The woman had a calming, encouraging presence about her. Avis looked at her cautiously. If there was anyone she could trust to open up to about this…

“So… all these people are just fleeing the Venatores?”

Minna sighed deeply. “The Venatores, and all they represent.”

“They hunt witches, don’t they?”

“So they say. And pokémon they deem dangerous, and people who harbor them.” Minna gave a strained laugh. “They have a broad definition of dangerous.”

“You don’t believe in witches then?” Avis asked.

Minna answered more quickly than Avis expected. “The Venatores see what they expect to see. Creatures exist that the Venatores would call witches, even if I wouldn’t use that word for them.”

Avis didn’t respond. She wasn’t sure how. She just stared at the dirt road ahead of her as they plodded along, listening to the heavy footfalls of the ox.

“Something on your mind, my dear?” Minna asked. “That was a rather specific line of questioning, if you don’t mind my saying.”

Every verse of the witch’s song rang hauntingly in Avis’s mind. O huntress mine…

“I—,” Avis finally stuttered. “I met one.”

“A witch?” Minna’s voice lowered.

“I think it’s taken an interest in me.”

Minna looked concerned. “Indeed? That’s… curious.”

“It hasn’t threatened me. Not really. But it feels like it’s only a matter of time.”

“They shouldn’t.” Minna’s tone had hardened. “I’ve travelled all over the world and seen and learned a great many things. If they appear again, remind them of the pact.”

“The pact?” Avis asked.

“Long ago… these creatures made a pact. The details are lost to time, but if my memory serves correctly, it prevents them from harming you if you do not harm them. In essence. If nothing else, knowledge of the pact will show you’re not someone to be trifled with.”

“A pact with who?”

“The only ones who matter. Each other, and the one being capable of holding them to their word.”

Avis stared at the road a bit longer, somewhat disappointed. “I… With all due respect, I don’t put much stock in things like Arceus.”

“But do you put stock in faith? Hope? These things bring life to many.”

Avis sighed. “I won’t take it from them. I just keep none for myself.”

Minna smiled sweetly. “I know. As do many. Which is why I do my best to provide it for them.”

“That’s why you’re here, then? You said you weren’t a refugee,” Avis asked.

“I am a refugee from many things, my dear, but you are correct. Not like them.”

Avis looked at the group walking ahead of the cart. Downtrodden, defeated, but still toiling along. Running from a faceless, intangible threat. An undefeatable threat. Something terrifying. She understood why you would run from something like that, but given the option to stay out of it entirely… Avis looked off through the trees. It was now past midday. In a few hours the last cubone would be taken by the mandibuzz and their suffering would finally end. All Avis had to do was wait. Far away and safe. Let nature take its course. Who was she to intervene?

Eventually, Avis spoke again. “If you don’t have to be here, then why?”

“I help because they need it and because I can.”

That sounded similar to what the baron had said. “But how do you decide… There are so many awful things going on in the world. How do you choose what to accept as inevitable and what to help with? Terrible things happen every day.”

Minna nodded slowly. “Evil things. Tragic things. Yes, everyone knows that.”

“And it’s not like we can really do anything about any of them,” Avis said quietly.

“So we tell ourselves,” Minna responded. “It’s much easier to believe that than to stand up when you can and prevent tragedy.”

“But… even if you did. It’s never a sure thing,” Avis said.

“Indeed. It requires sacrifice. You can cause yourself a lot of pain and still fail. Everyone knows that too. That’s why we all tend to stand by and watch tragedy happen. Because it’s impossible to save the world, so why try? Why get caught up? Why sacrifice anything?”

Avis could hear the whimpers of the cubone. The way it had looked at her expectantly begging for food. In desperate need of safety and protection and the love of a mother who had already been ripped away. But she could also see the talons of the mandibuzz tearing the cubone’s sibling from their den and carrying it off. Massive black wings beating in the cool air. A sharp beak all too capable of rending flesh. Her flesh. Avis shuddered. Every single wound that Peredur had inflicted on her panged a painful reminder of what it cost to challenge a fully grown pokémon. She had sacrificed so much already. And to what end?

“Because you don’t have to save the world,” Minna continued unabated. “But we can save something. Someone. We just have to act when the opportunity presents itself.”

Avis looked up at the aggron horn that tipped her spear. The one trophy she had from facing Peredur. Fixed to a spear made by Radovan. The one she had agreed to help because he needed it. The one who had refused to let her die in the forest. Perhaps she had won more than just a simple trophy from all that.

To that end.

Without comment, Avis shrugged off her pack and put it on the edge of the cart, franticly digging through it and placing everything that wasn’t absolutely necessary in the cart next to the bundles of steel ingots.

“Too much weight for you, my dear?” Minna asked.

Avis finished unloading and reshouldered her pack. “Feel free to have some of this food. I have somewhere to go. I’ll catch up as soon as I can.”

Before Minna could say anything else, Avis took off into the forest.

· · · · ·​

Avis rushed through the forest towards the clearing near the cubone den. But the sun was getting lower and lower. Eventually she saw exactly what she’d feared. Flashing shadows along the forest floor. High above, the mandibuzz soared towards the last of its prey. She wasn’t going to be able to get to the cubone in time. And if she was to fight this thing, she would need at least a few minutes to prepare. Avis slid to a stop, her mind racing. She scanned the horizon through the trees, trying to pick out where she had ended up when she was chasing the mandibuzz two days ago. She saw a ridgeline that looked familiar and began running towards it.

By the time trees gave way to stones and Avis reached the right cliff with the mandibuzz’s bristly nest a few dozen feet above, she was out of breath. But she didn’t have time to recover. She thought about climbing up to the nest. The stone was jagged and uneven granite, definitely climbable, but also brittle and shredded. Avis grabbed a bit of stone sticking out about face height. It held at first, but then crumbled right off. Half of this cliff face was just packed dirt, and the granite was heavily worn by the elements. It wasn’t worth the risk.

Avis threw down her pack, undid her cloak, and began to prepare. She found a small patch of earth nearby and began digging. First with the heel of her boot, then picking away at frozen dirt and packed earth with her spear. Eventually the ground seemed soft enough. She took out the stake she had carved when she’d originally prepared to fight the mandibuzz, unwound the rope, and began driving it into the ground, banging at it with the handle of the scyther blade. It sank all the way in, and did not give when she tugged on it. For good measure, she gathered some rocks and buried the stake as best she could. That would have to do.

At the other end of the rope, Avis tied a slip knot. If she could catch the mandibuzz, she could at least keep it from flying away. They’d have to fight. To the death. There was no running anymore. Avis didn’t have time to worry, but something drove her forward. Helped her focus. Similarly to when she had fought Peredur, she was able to push her fear to the side. She was good at this. She had done it before. This was where she thrived. Every adrenaline-fueled, terrified beat of her heat filled her with willpower. Avis gripped her spear in one hand and the rope in the other.

Far too soon, Avis heard the gruff woofing of a circling mandibuzz. It was here. A cubone squirmed and squealed in its talons. Avis switched the rope and spear to the same hand and picked up a fist-sized rock. The mandibuzz was not pleased she was so close to its nest. It descended, woofing louder and louder until it unceremoniously dropped the cubone in its nest. As soon as it did, Avis chucked the rock up at it. The rock hit the mandibuzz in its wing. Not hard enough to do any damage, but enough to make the bird angry. It hissed and dove down at her, talons outstretched.

Avis braced herself and pointed her spear. A single well-placed thrust could end this before it even started. But the mandibuzz seemed to recognize the threat and stopped itself just outside of the spear’s reach, wings beating furiously. The wind from the massive wingbeats buffeted Avis and made it hard to keep her eyes open, but she stood fast and jabbed with her spear. Despite being a large target, it was hard to land a hit on the mandibuzz with its sporadic, fluttering movements.

“Just a bit closer, you overgrown chicken.”

Avis thrusted hard at the mandibuzz’s fluffy chest. It jerked to the side and grabbed onto the spear with its talons. She tugged on the spear uselessly, trying to free it from the enormous bird’s grip. The mandibuzz suddenly switched tactics. Still gripping the spear, it pushed forward into Avis, trapping the spear against her chest. Its sharp talons clawed and squeezed at her, tearing up her gambeson. The musty smell of carrion overwhelmed her nostrils. Powerful wingbeats kicked up dust around her.

Avis looked down at the bird’s blackened talons. Its right foot had found itself inside the loop of the rope Avis was still holding with the spear.

“Got you.”

She adjusted her grip to push back with her right hand while pulling the rope tight with her left. It worked, partially. The loop tightened closed around the mandibuzz’s ankle, but trying to push back with only one hand threw Avis off balance. She fell over backward, hitting the rocky ground hard. She had the wherewithal to keep her head up to prevent it from hitting a stone, but the blow knocked the wind out of her lungs.

Avis gasped and coughed, trying to push the spear up off her chest to give herself room to breathe, but the mandibuzz was unrelenting. Its claws dug into her chest, tearing through her jerkin and gambeson and breaking her skin. Avis gasped in pain. The mandibuzz stood on her with all its weight, wings spread wide for balance, and lowered its sickening grey beak towards her head. Avis winced.

But before it could tear off her face, something bounced off the mandibuzz’s head. It landed in the dirt next to Avis: a broken femur bone. In the nest above, the cubone gave a gurgling battle cry and tossed another bone, this one falling well short of the mandibuzz. The bird huffed as it looked upward at its prey-turned-assailant. Avis took the opportunity to heave with all her might. Distracted, it was the mandibuzz’s turn to lose its balance. It stepped off Avis with a single foot. It was just enough of an opening to reach down with one hand and pull the scyther blade from her belt. She didn’t have room for a proper chop, but she drew the razor-sharp blade across the wrinkled pink skin of the mandibuzz’s ankle on her chest. Blood gushed from the wound onto her gambeson. The mandibuzz hissed, a much higher pitched sound than anything it had made before. Avis easily pushed the spear, and the bird, off her. The mandibuzz stumbled to the side and flapped its wings, taking to the air.

Avis rolled back to her feet, watching the mandibuzz flap up towards its nest where the cubone peered over the edge, occasionally throwing a bone or branch. It didn’t get far. The loop held fast around the mandibuzz’s ankle, and when the rope ran out, it jerked suddenly and almost fell out of the sky. The mandibuzz cried out in surprise. The stake held. Avis smiled, though the wounds on her chest stung. They weren’t deep. She could keep fighting. She stuffed the scyther blade back into her belt, not wanting to accidentally cut the rope that was now the only thing keeping the mandibuzz from reaching the cubone in the nest above.

“Leave him alone,” Avis challenged the mandibuzz. “It’s just you and me.” The mandibuzz did not turn to look at her, but another chunk of bone cast from above hit it in the face, sort of undercutting Avis’s point.

Avis charged forward with spear extended. All she needed was one blow. For the briefest moment she thought she had it. A jab straight through the back while the mandibuzz was distracted. But right before she could strike, the mandibuzz jumped up and tried flying back to its nest again, growling at the defiant cubone above them. Avis’s thrust caught nothing but tailfeathers.

The mandibuzz was not caught by surprise this time when the rope pulled taught. With massive wingbeats, it strained against its bonds. Avis grabbed onto the taught rope that quivered in the air next to her and pulled as hard as she could with one hand. It wasn’t enough to pull the bird down, but it was enough to get its attention. The mandibuzz turned and beat its wings towards Avis, making her squint against the sudden storm of dust.

“Down. Here.” She pulled twice more.

The mandibuzz finally acquiesced. Ignoring the cubone’s largely harmless missiles, it bore down on Avis. She abandoned the rope and met it spear first with a jab that tore a few fluffy feathers off the monster’s chest. Avis couldn’t tell if it had drawn blood, but it definitely made the mandibuzz rethink its dive towards her. It flew backwards a few feet and alighted on the ground. It bounced around, both jumping and flying as Avis jabbed again and again, never quite getting a solid hit.

This continued for some time. Avis hoped the mandibuzz would eventually get tired and she’d have a decent opening, but for now it was deceptively agile for its size. She got a few jabs in here and there, but nothing substantial. At first, she thought she could hear her heartbeat pumping in her ears, but it was actually the mandibuzz’s huge heart drumming away. The bird’s beak hung open, its breathing coming in strained gasps. Avis wasn’t in a much better state. All the running hadn’t left her with much energy, and her reflexes were starting to slow.

Avis stepped backward a bit in the hopes of maybe catching her breath. Instead, her foot landed awkwardly on a rock. She looked down as her ankle slipped and she realized she was stepping over the pile of rocks she’d made on top of the stake. By the time she looked back up the mandibuzz was on her. Avis tried to meet it with the tip of her spear, but the mandibuzz twisted its neck and grabbed the shaft in its sickly grey beak and tore the spear from her grasp. Avis tried to hold on in vain and lost her balance for it. Her foot caught the pile of rocks again and she fell as the mandibuzz tossed her spear away with a single motion.

The spear clattered against the cliff face on the far side of Avis’s foe while she tumbled down the hillside. She managed to stop herself, sharp stones cutting into her hands, and stood up before the mandibuzz could follow up. The monster just looked at her, now a good ten yards away, its wings outstretched. Avis pulled the scyther blade from her belt again. The mandibuzz hissed a challenge, its heart thumping a haunting beat that Avis could still hear even from this distance.

Ignoring the pain from her various wounds, old and new, Avis cried out and charged forward with the scyther blade. If she could at least get past the thing she could get to her spear. The mandibuzz’s huge wings kicked up a cloud of dust again and a surprisingly powerful gust of wind, but Avis continued forward.

Except the mandibuzz ignored her. It turned and once again took to the air. The rope pulled taught around its leg as Avis took advantage and dashed under to retrieve her spear from where it lay at the base of the cliff. Something was different this time. The mandibuzz’s wings beat furiously as it fought against the rope, and with each beat… the rope began to give. Avis’s eyes widened as she followed the rope back down to the stake in the ground. The rocks now knocked away, it was beginning to inch upwards. The immense strength of each wingbeat pulled it a little farther out of the ground, tearing the earth with it.

Avis dropped both her weapons in a panic as the stake finally popped out of the ground and the mandibuzz surged upwards. The cubone shrieked in fear, a sound that chilled Avis to the bone. Her quarry now out of reach, Avis instead ran towards the rope and the stake skittering harmlessly over the stones and dirt. She sprinted down the hillside, grabbing the rope and wrapping it around her arm. Without thinking, she leaped into the air and tucked her limbs. The mandibuzz wasn’t expecting the sudden weight. She pulled it out of the air, but paid for her gambit, hitting the ground hard and tumbling a short way down the hill.

Adrenaline pushing aside all thoughts of pain and exhaustion, Avis scrambled to her feet once more, wrapping as much slack around her left arm as she could. Looking back up the hill toward the cliff face, Avis could see a crumpled mass of feathers also making its way back to its feet. She looked around frantically. A nearby pine tree caught her eye. She let some of the rope around her arm unspool and rushed towards it. If she could just quickly tie the rope to the tree it would be just as good as the stake. If she’d been able to lure it this far down in the first place then maybe she wouldn’t have even needed the stake in the first place.

But as she nearly finished unwinding the rope from her arm, she realized she wouldn’t have time. The mandibuzz had recovered. It sent a withering hiss her way, then spread its wings to take to the sky and finally finish off the last cubone. Avis took a deep breath and started wrapping the rope back around her left arm. This was going to hurt. A lot.

She had just enough slack and time left to wrap her other arm around the pine tree before the mandibuzz pulled the rope tight. Avis held on, both the rope and the bark of the tree biting into the already torn sleeves of her gambeson. The mandibuzz hissed loudly into the cloudy sky as it strained, each wingbeat pulling at Avis’s arm. She pulled back as hard as she could, wrapping her legs around the tree before her right arm could give way.

“Not. This. Time,” Avis hissed back at the mandibuzz through gritted teeth. She could feel her muscles straining to their limit.

The cubone shrieked again as the mandibuzz inched higher, pulling Avis up the tree slightly.

“Fight. Me!”

The tree creaked and leaned ever so slightly. It was barely eight inches in diameter, but sturdy. Avis had no delusions. Her body was the weak link in this chain.

“Fight! Me!” Avis heaved with what little might she had left.

The mandibuzz heaved back. Something popped in Avis’s shoulder. She screamed, finally relinquishing her hold on the tree. Pain shot through her arm and shoulder as she crashed to the ground, the rope dragging her like a ragdoll a short way up the hill before finally unspooling from her arm.

Avis cried out through gritted teeth and wiped away tears of pain with her functioning right arm. Her left arm had been dislocated at the shoulder. She’d experienced this before in a particularly harsh training session with her father. In perhaps the only moment of mercy that man ever had in his whole life, he had also shown her how to fix it. Still laying on the ground, Avis crawled up next to a nearby boulder. She only had seconds to spare. The wounded and exhausted mandibuzz was quickly approaching the cliff face and the defenseless cubone in its nest. Avis set her back against the boulder and bent her arm like her father had shown her years ago. With a deep breath, she grabbed her own wrist and twisted her arm back into place.

There was a sickening snick and a flash of searing pain. Avis screamed again, the sound echoing ominously off the cliff and trees. She couldn’t give up. Not after all this. She pushed herself to her feet, pain still flooding her whole body. Her breath came in raggedy sobs. Avis wasn’t sure she really stopped screaming, she just gritted her teeth and ran up the hill to the cliff face where the stake at the end of the rope slowly clattered upward.

She had no choice now but to climb. So she climbed. The crumbling, harsh granite dug into the skin of her fingers where it didn’t outright give way. Her left shoulder screamed back at her in pain, leaving that arm nearly useless. So she just climbed with her feet and one arm. As the stake came into reach, she grabbed it with her right arm, pulling helplessly. She didn’t have the strength to beat the mandibuzz before, and she definitely didn’t now. Instead, she let it pull her upward, scrambling with her feet to find footholds.

Far too soon, the mandibuzz reached its nest above her. It hissed a relieved victory cry. The cubone shrieked. But the beast hadn’t shaken Avis yet. Without looking down, Avis gripped the stake as hard as she could and jumped out from the cliff. Once again, she tucked around the rope and let her body weight do the work.

The rope yanked the mandibuzz from its perch. It beat its wings and clawed at the ground with its talons in a panic, flaying its own nest, tearing chunks of stone and dirt from the cliff top, and finally falling after Avis, bringing the entire cliffside down with it.

· · · · ·​

Avis wasn’t sure how long she was out, or why. But when she came to, she was pinned to the ground by a heavy yet surprisingly soft weight. Her whole body was racked with pain. The sickly stench of carrion filled her first sputtering breath, making her cough. Coughing hurt too. Her left arm still wasn’t participating, so she braced her right arm under her and pushed herself free.

The hill was a mess. It looked like the entire cliff face had crumbled from the mandibuzz’s flailing. The huge bird had landed on top of Avis, likely sparing her from the brunt of the rock slide. Avis slowly got to her feet and kicked the fallen beast. It didn’t move. Blood poured from a head wound likely torn open by one of the many granite boulders that were now piled across the hillside along with the remnants of the mandibuzz’s nest.

Avis looked around, too tired to panic. Bones and branches were scattered among the boulders, but no lizards.

“You still alive, little one?” Avis raspingly called out as loud as she could manage. The effort made her cough.

A soft chirp answered her from above. Avis looked up to see the cubone climbing headfirst down the collapsed cliff on all fours. He skittered right for Avis and looked up at her with his big black eyes. It was the same one that had begged for her food two days ago.

“Are you hurt?”

The cubone stood up on two legs and kept staring at her.

“Well, I am.” Avis grunted and began making her way back to her pack at the tree line. Mercifully, it was undamaged. She needed a sling for her arm first and foremost, but she started by taking a bit of jerky and tossing it to the cubone. He happily grabbed it and began chewing away.

She quickly made a sling from linen bandages Onofrio had provided her along with some other medical supplies. Once the sling was done, she tended to her other wounds. She had multiple cuts on her chest from the mandibuzz’s talons that needed cleaning and bandaging. She hurt everywhere, but those were the only things she could fix for now. With that taken care of, she picked up her cloak and slumped at the foot of a tree. There was still more to do before she could catch back up with the refugee convoy, but for now…

Avis slipped easily into sleep. The sun was setting by the time she stirred. Blinking the bleariness away, she took stock of her surroundings. The mandibuzz was still dead. The cliff was still collapsed. And the cubone had curled up and fallen asleep on her lap. Avis smiled and rubbed the top of its head. The little lizard made a sound almost like the purring of cat and stretched out.

“I’m glad you’re okay, little one.” Avis sighed and looked around. “No one deserves what you’ve gone through. Even if it happens all the time.” She gently lifted the cubone from her lap and set him on the ground. He looked up at her expectantly.

“Sorry, but I need to get to work even if I’m not going to do any traveling tonight.”

Avis pulled out her knife and headed towards the mandibuzz. Its body was partially buried in stones that Avis was mostly able to clear by kicking them away. Carving up the beast with one hand was challenging, but she felt it was necessary. None of this should go to waste. The head would bring some solace to Enlil’s scouts, and perhaps the skull would have some use. The meat would almost certainly be inedible from a taste perspective. Large feathers were always useful. Bird skin was riddled with holes where feathers poked through, but Avis hoped someone might be able to make something of it.

While she worked, Avis watched the cubone snoop around the remnants of the mandibuzz’s nest. She had an inkling what it was looking for. Indeed, as she was finishing up the little lizard approached her pushing a skull in front of it. The skull was reptilian for sure, but all its flesh was picked clean. Gouges likely left by the mandibuzz’s sharp beak riddled its surface. Even still, Avis thought she knew what it was.

“That’s a little big for you, isn’t it?”

The cubone grunted with exertion as he lifted the marowak skull up with his nose and stuck his head inside. He shakily stood up on his rear legs. The eye sockets lined up reasonably well, but the skull wobbled precariously. The cubone was far too young for this.

“I suppose it’s your birthright though. I won’t take it from you.” Avis smiled at the little creature. He was doomed for a lonely existence. Everything he had ever known was dead and gone. Even if he was bringing a little piece of his mother with him.

The cubone picked up a broken piece of femur. Perhaps the one he had ricocheted off the mandibuzz’s head to save her, or perhaps a completely identical one from the many shards scattered across the hillside. A fitting weapon, stolen from the hoard of the beast that had destroyed his life.

Avis thought for a moment. “Would you… like to come with me?” She was unsure if the cubone could understand what she meant.

The cubone looked at her, then marched towards the carved-up corpse of the mandibuzz to where its head lay in the dirt, beak hanging open lamely. The cubone whacked the head with his bone. Satisfied, he turned and hobbled towards Avis, clearly still struggling with bipedal movement. He hugged her leg, bone in hand, and let out a soft purr.

Perhaps that had always been his plan. Avis smiled, then laughed. “Very well. We’ll need a name for you though. I’ll think on it.”

She began packing up her trophies and prepared to return to the road. But before she could heft her pack, a cold breeze chilled her.

Avis jumped upright and grabbed the scyther blade. The cubone chirped in surprise. Snowflakes danced on the freezing wind.

“Show yourself, witch!” Avis called out. “Or whatever you are!”

“If a witch I am to thee, then a witch I shall be;
So long as thou refuse to believe what thou see.”

Avis spun around to see the woman standing beneath a nearby pine. She still wore the lace gown that billowed identically to her long white hair, and she was still visibly unbothered by the cold. Her bright blue eyes surveyed the battlefield. She frowned. Her song echoed hauntingly across the hillside.

“I thought thee different, above thy kin, enlightened;
Yet thou fight nature’s course, thy grip on the world tightens.”

“I did what I thought was right.” Avis took a deep breath to still her rapidly beating heart. A few minutes ago, she would have thought she didn’t have any more adrenaline to spare, but now she was practically shaking. She remembered Minna’s words. It was worth a shot. “Now begone. You may not like what I’ve done, but you don’t scare me. The pact compels you.”

The witch’s eyes locked with her own. The piercing blue bore into Avis’s very mind. She struggled to maintain eye contact, unsure if she was shivering from adrenaline or the cold. The witch hissed and bared her pointed teeth.

“There is no more Pact. The Pact is unbound;
If He shall enforce it, then let Him be found.”

Assuming Avis was interpreting that right, she could hardly refute it. Even in the most whimsical legends, Arceus had not appeared in their world for over a thousand years. The cubone hugged her leg, whimpering in fear. “Nature’s course had you at the mercy of a couple Venatores. But I saved you. Didn’t have a problem with that one, did you?”

The witch frowned at her, then nodded slowly.

“A promise made is a promise kept to thee;
Thou art spared for now, but do not tempt me.”

Avis blinked and the witch was gone. The wind ceased and snowflakes fluttered harmlessly to the ground. The witch’s song rang in Avis’s ears, but faded. Avis waited for a minute, still gripping the scyther blade tightly, then finally relaxed.

She knelt down to comfort the cubone. “It’s alright, little one. This is where we leave her behind.”

Or so she hoped.

· · · · ·​

It took Avis two days to catch up to the caravan. A full night’s sleep did little to help her injuries so it was slow going, but not as slow as wrangling a hundred people. One of Enlil’s scouts, a hulking man named Medved, was taking up the rear guard and was ecstatic to see she had slain the monster that had killed his friend. He and the other scouts insisted on her having almost all their rations of wine and made her tell the story of her fight with the mandibuzz over and over again every night until they reached Azurefell. They even made her recount her fight with Peredur.

“Imagine,” said Enlil one night, “a Venator that cares more about people than dogma.”

“I’m not-,” Avis started.

“I know, I know. I’m just saying not many could do what you’ve done. Or would.”

“Could make a career out of this, you could,” said Medved. There was a murmur of agreement.

Avis just stared into their campfire and sipped her wine.

The cubone, who Avis had decided to name Tristan after a character from one of the bedtime stories Vito used to tell her, was timid but got along well with the refugees. They took easily to pokémon and never once questioned her decision to bring him along. She carried him on her good shoulder or in her backpack most of the way, though he was getting better and better at walking upright. It would be a while before he grew into the skull helmet, which still wobbled comically atop his head.

The trek back to Azurefell was uneventful, and when the city’s palisade walls came into view, a number of the refugees cried out in joy. Avis wasn’t sure how to feel. They still had a long road ahead of them, even if they didn’t realize it yet. Hopefully the lords of Azurefell would at least help them along into the Empire’s heartland. They weren’t likely to find a nobleman as generous as Onofrio here.

Avis was worried she’d have to vouch for Enlil to help them pass the very confused guards at the city’s eastern gate, but he was quick and effective with his words. He convinced the guards to let them into the city, even if they couldn’t guarantee a place to stay the night. The cart full of steel was a useful bartering chip.

Avis bade goodbye to Minna and Enlil as soon as they were in the city.

“Farewell, Huntress. Again, my people are in your debt,” Enlil said with a bow. “We won’t forget it. None of us.”

“Get some rest, my dear. You deserve it.” Minna smiled her sweet smile, her honey-colored eyes glowing in the sunlight.

Avis thanked them both and left down one of Azurefell’s muddy roads. She had somewhere to go.

To her surprise, smoke was rising from Radovan’s forge.

“Ow! Not on me, mutt! Into the forge!” Radovan’s voice echoed down the street.

“Right here, Kaipo! Fire!” Avis could make out the voice of a small boy.

Avis approached Radovan’s house to see a growlithe barking happily and breathing flame into the base of the forge that stood under the house’s overhang. A little boy cheered the growlithe on. Radovan, holding a pair of tongs, was clearly trying to hide a smile in his beard. He looked up when he noticed Avis, quickly setting down the tongs and rushing out to meet her.

Radovan beamed at her and stretched his arms out for a hug, but paused when he noticed her sling. And probably the bloodstains on her gambeson. “What did you do to yourself?”

“Got into another scrape. I’ll be fine.” Avis paused for a moment. “Radovan… I—”

A plaintive chirp sounded from Avis’s backpack. Tristan poked his head out.

“Who’s this?” Radovan asked.

“Tristan. A new friend.”

Radovan smiled and reached out to scratch Tristan under the chin. “Good. Very good. Come. There’s someone I want you to meet.”

He led Avis back to the forge where he introduced his new apprentice Valter, a boy of around ten, and Valter’s growlithe, Kaipo. The little boy was a bit shy, but opened up when he saw that Avis had a pokémon too. Tristan was less interested in socializing with a growlithe.

“Want to show Avis what we made for her?” Radovan said.

Valter ran into the house and came back out with shiny steel helmet that he proudly presented to Avis.

“Made from what remained of the aggron head. I am mostly an armorer for the gladiators after all, but it’s as practical as it is ornamental. I figure they take the visage of the beasts they fight alongside, why not take the visage of the beast you killed?”

Avis took the helm in her hands. It looked like a bellows-faced sallet with some modifications. An articulated tail was identical to the plates protecting the back of an aggron’s neck. Two small horns jutted forward from just above the forehead, not big enough for an enemy to get a good grip on, and sharpened like the tip of a spear. The bellows of the visor were jagged like an aggron’s teeth and the visor stretched slightly farther down the throat than usual. Avis flipped the visor up. As she suspected, in the upward position the visor evoked the beak-like horn above an aggron’s eyes, though shorter and more rounded.

“Thank you. Both of you.” Avis smiled at Valter, who beamed back up at her. “It’s beautiful.”

“More importantly, it will keep you safe. Helmet’s the most important piece of armor you can wear.”

Avis knelt to where Tristan was hiding behind her leg and showed him the helmet. He cautiously tapped it with his bone. She set the helmet on the floor for him to inspect more thoroughly and reached into the pouch at her belt.

Rising, she said, “Radovan, I’m…” She sighed, turning the finished wooden carving of a houndoom over in her hand. “I’m sorry for how I spoke to you when I left. Your kindness has helped me so much. These past couple weeks would have been better if you came along.” She handed him the carving. “It’s—”

“Morana...” Radovan held the little wooden dog like it was a priceless gem. He looked up at Avis, eyes teary. He hugged her gently, careful to avoid hurting her. It hurt anyway. Avis didn’t care.

A mandibuzz was dead. A witch ran free. Wounds that would take months to heal wracked Avis’s body, and the nightmares would linger far longer.

A lonely cubone in desperate need of a family had found one. A people searching for a new home had taken a huge step towards safety. For the time being, Avis had a place to belong.

Sometimes… the sacrifices were worth it in the end.

 

[Apopheniac]

I'm not super big on stuff like The Witcher or Game of Thrones, but I had fun reading this. Your prose is definitely much improved in Episode II from Episode I.

The worldbuilding is in line with what I'd expect from the setting, though I find it a little odd that the Darians are able to maintain their economic and military might after rejecting Pokémon wholesale given what we've seen of others' domestication of them. I suppose it's hard to judge assess the relative distributions of animals versus Pokémon geographically, although maybe I'm there's an allusion to the historical Darius that I'm missing.

I did really enjoy the portrayal of Pokémon and their biology. You cover it from a few different perspectives in the story, and details like the differences of compositions between a Pokémon's anatomical features help a lot in selling the intensity of the fights, though I am a little concerned about how Avis's condition with how badly she's been battered now.

 

[AetherX]

I'm not super big on stuff like The Witcher or Game of Thrones, but I had fun reading this. Your prose is definitely much improved in Episode II from Episode I.

The worldbuilding is in line with what I'd expect from the setting, though I find it a little odd that the Darians are able to maintain their economic and military might after rejecting Pokémon wholesale given what we've seen of others' domestication of them. I suppose it's hard to judge assess the relative distributions of animals versus Pokémon geographically, although maybe I'm there's an allusion to the historical Darius that I'm missing.

I did really enjoy the portrayal of Pokémon and their biology. You cover it from a few different perspectives in the story, and details like the differences of compositions between a Pokémon's anatomical features help a lot in selling the intensity of the fights, though I am a little concerned about how Avis's condition with how badly she's been battered now.

Hey thanks! It's nice to know somebody read this.

Regarding the Darians: That's definitely a prescient point, and one that I've thought a lot about myself. My biggest struggle with writing lately has been writing too much exposition, and this particular point isn't entirely relevant to the plot so it may never come up. I've been thinking of them as relying more heavily on normal animals as pack animals and related labor like pulling plows and such. They also have a pretty large cavalry, which functions well on the wide open fields and hills of the Kingdom. The real reason they've remained separate from the Argent Empire though is that there's a big mountain range in between them that it would be a pain to move and supply an army across. No reference to any historical Darius. Honestly I've wanted to change the name for a while to avoid unintended connections, but I've just rolled with it for so long at this point.

Avis will definitely get a nice long rest to recover and heal before any other adventures. Although some wounds never really heal. Thanks again for reading and commenting. It's nice to see someone engage and pick up on the little details I put a lot of effort into. I really appreciate it!