(GrimAmentia)

A thick, ash-laden fog hung over the ruins of Kathri-tai, effectively smothering the waning sunlight and forcing the day to retreat in the face of the oncoming darkness. This dense, grey cloud mingled with poisonous fumes rising from the surface of the surrounding marsh, forming a filthy, vaporous mantle that protected the native wildlife from the harsh rays of the sun in the same manner that a security blanket would protect a child from the night.

Anjou awoke to the scent of burnt hair. His hair, or what was left of it. The few, wispy tufts of red down that had been spared by the flames were matted and caked with mud of a filthy, olivine hue. The bare portion of his scalp hadn't fared much better. The extreme burst of heat that had singed his bangs and disintegrated his eyebrows had left his bald crown blackened and blistered.

The young dragoon of Kathri-tai cracked open eyes half-blinded by soot to find that he was lying in a pool of stagnant water, his limbs ensnared by weeds. Coughing miserably, he disentangled himself from the slimy grip of the marsh plants and struggled to his feet. His knees hurt. A LOT. But the armor encasing his legs, however light, made it difficult for him to estimate the amount of damage inflicted upon his throbbing joints.

Wiping away a sheen of translucent slime from his forehead, Anjou began to look about for his helmet. The explosion had been violent, sure enough, put it hadn't pitched him too far out of the castle courtyard. His helmet couldn't have landed too far away.

. . . Damn alchemists.

(Biminator)

Anjou began to trudge painfully back to the courtyard, cursing those alchemists. Why in the hell would you need to turn lead into gold, anyway? Why the hell would you think gunpowder would do it?

Whatever.

The dragoon spotted a piece of metal. Inspecting it, he realized with displeasure that it was part of his helmet. Also with displeasure, he noticed some of his hair stuck to it.

"DAMMIT!"

Angrier than before, Anjou stomped over to the ruins of the castle. Laughing at an alchemist's dismembered head lightened his spirits, but not much.

Realizing that the fumes were getting to him, Anjou looked for any part of the fortress that was still standing.

(Renegade Peach)

The Outer Curtain wall was mostly intact, but then again, nothing could touch that massive work of three generations of craftsmen. The Inner Curtain was scorched, black soot smearing its granite facade. The protective runes blazed brightly from where they were carved into the stone, their magic flickering in the aftermath of the deafening explosion.

The castle, however, had not fared as well as the walls.

The Alchemist's Wing, a long extension from the main structure that the boy-King had demanded to be built was nothing more than shambles; scattered stones and splinters of wood covered the once-green courtyard, and he could see a few limbs that had been torn off from the unfortunate alchemists inside.

He clambered over a pile of stones, his armor making flexibility difficult. The Council had warned the young King Aaron that alchemists so close to his nobles and his own person was dangerous- for reasons that were now blatantly obvious. But the King was only a boy, barely old enough to take over his uncle's regency, and he was obsessed with everything magic. Alchemy, sorcery, witchcraft- all of it fascinated him. Many nobles quietly swore that all of it would be the death of the boy, and an early death at that. Aaron, upon hearing those rumors, had merely given a Royal Sniff and dismissed those nobles from his court.

"Ignorant little-" Anjou clamped his teeth before he said anything distasteful about the King. After all, he was a knight, sworn to the King's service, to uphold the honor of his Kingdom, to defend justice, to... well, all that other stuff that he had sworn to when he was knighted.

His dreams as the youngest son of a petty Earl had set his heart afire with the desire for knightlyhood, and he had been the first to start whacking everyone with sticks until he was directed to an Armsmaster for proper training. Ah, how ignorant he had been of the dreary, boring days that were before him.

Well, boring before those damn alchemists came along.

(Bitter Glee)

The knight sighed quietly. His breath came in ragged gasps, the soot coating his lungs making it difficult to walk very fast. He scaled the wall of what was left of the lower story of the Alchemists' Wing, and listened. A faint groan floated to him from the other side, near the Outer Curtain. He leapt the other wall and dashed to whence the noise had come, to discover an old man curled into a fetal position on the ground.

"Karias," he said, touching the man's arm. The violet-robed Alchemist turned his head slightly, opening one eye. The elderly man's alabaster whiskers had been completely blown away, as had his remaining hair. He coughed, and Anjou swore he could see smoke from the old man's mouth.

"You're alive, Anjou. Good. Was the experiment a success?"

"How can you think about gold at a time like this," Anjou sighed, examining the man. "Are you badly hurt? Can you move?"

"I can't feel my left arm," the Alchemist winced. The dragoon gently pushed the ancient man onto his back. He had been the only person in the entire castle who had ever been truly kind to Anjou, back when he had just attained the rank of Squire. Now, Anjou was a Royal Dragoon, and nearly everyone treated him with respect. But it was superficial. Karias was the only one who was really fond of him, and an Alchemist, no less. All the other Alchemists had a well-earned reputation for being aloof and superior.

Anjou instantly realized why the old man could not move his arm. It was lying a hundred feet away, on the smoldering courtyard stones. "Oh, Jesus, Karias..." He wasn't actually sure who Jesus was, but it sounded right.

(GrimAmentia)

The old man let out a hacking cough that shook his scrawny frame to the bones. With his remaining hand, he gingerly dabbed away a quantity of powdery, black residue from beneath his long and visibly broken nose. Appearing quite unsettled, he tilted his head back and sniffed the air.

"It smells like rotten. . ."

Karias' rheumy blue eyes widened. "The fumes! Anjou, we have to get out of here!"

The dragoon abrupty stopped shaking and looked up from the old man's chest. His eyes were red and watery, though not due to any irritation caused by the soot. "Now?", he gasped, voice cracking like a pimply-faced scullery lad's, " But Karias, the others. . .Are there any others that might be left alive? We have to. . ."

The alchemist shook his head. "When we agreed to perform this experiment, it was with the knowledge that if anything went wrong, there would be no time for us to reflect upon our mistakes afterward."

Anjou looked out over the smoldering remains of the courtyard and sighed. Karias' was right.

"Come on then. We'd better be getting out of here", the dragoon said, hefting the old man over his shoulder once again.

"Right", answered Karias, "Just mind the arm, will you? I may not be able to feel the other, but this one hurts like the dickens."

(Phantom Pheather)

They walked. More precisely, Anjou walked. Karias was carried. They walked into the swamp, stumbling a bit. Metal armor was not the preferred medium for walking on water, and carrying an (admittedly light) old man didn't help.

Yet Anjou walked some more. Perhaps it was knighthood. They had always told them to obey their elders. Or was it hit them with swords? Regardless, it was partly because he was to obey/hit them with swords, and partly because...well...the further away Karias was from his arm, the less soon he was to become mildly upset over it.

"MEDIC!" Anjou broke the swampy silence, silencing the chattering insects and croaking frogs.

There had to be people out there, after all. And there was. Clerics and knights and a pair of cooks. Cooks always survived. Newton's second law. (Newton being the head cook, of course.)

One of the aforementioned clerics took a look at Karias, told Anjou to set him down on a raised board. Anjou did.

"This won't hurt, dear." The cleric applied a cloth to Karias' severed arm stump. She then clamped it on.

Anjou looked at it, a bit strangely. "What's the clamp for, miss?" he asked.

The cleric looked at him. "It's in case the bloodflow increases and shoots the cloth away."

Anjou winced, and turned away. It was never good when your medical staff said that your blood, under their control, had a chance to propel a cloth attached to your arm into the air. No sir.

Karias grabbed Anjou's collar, with his one good arm, and dragged him closer. "Listen...there are reasons...that we would pledge our lives. Things...rising..."

Karias coughed something up, red and filled with little chunks that looked suspiciously like potato.

"Find them, Anjou. Find them..."

The cleric pushed Anjou gently away, which elevated to a shove when Anjou didn't move.

Oh goody.