The Queen of Bats

The Queen of bats

Chapter One,” Broken fang”

Lizae was slowly stirring from her deep sleep. She lazily opened her marble-brown right eye, looking down at the ground below her.

She was sleeping upside down, as you would expect a bat to do, because look likes a bat, she most definitely did. Brown fur is covering her entire body and face. Large ears on top of her head and large, leathery wings at her back, enveloping her body for protection and warmth. She was glowing blue too, an odd trait she had gotten from a rather traumatic experience in her past childhood. Her shoulder length hair was an azure blue. Originally it had been a sandy blonde.

Her muzzle, tip of ears, feet and hands was marked by the strange glowing fur. Along with the occasional glowing spot over the rest of her pelt.

Not to make a mistake, she was still very much humanoid, walking on two legs, talking, thinking and of course the ability to reason. However, she lacked any major social experience and could appear a bit withdrawn most of the time.

Sluggishly Lizae thought about what had happened last night, something with the nearby village, and some... “Shinnies” she called out, the word sounded clumsy form her throat and a bit coarse yet distinctively feminine.

She was looking on the ground through her wings now. She loved her leathery, bat-like wings, right now they were keeping her warm from the chilly spring air, folded neatly around her entire body. Everything seemed a bit darker through them and more distorted.

She lived in a cave, just outside of a larger human village; she knew there where at least ten thousand fur-less humans in the village. There might even be hundreds of thousands, more likely. She was not that fond of the fur-less humans, having no real knowledge about them. Sure she knew of their basic way of living and all the myths and rumours, but she had never had a human friend.

After stirring in her upside down sleeping position on the ceiling of the cave, she released her grip in the rough stone, and fell down.

Bracing and spreading her brown wings for a softer landing, with a ‘Whoosh’ then a ‘clack’ from her claws, as she landed on the ground.

Now she remembered! She had been in the village to expand her treasury! She could not remember what she had taken though.

The glowing bat looked around her small cave, trying to spot if there was anything out of the ordinary.

It was dark and damp, with a small stream running through its entire length, making washing and drinking much easier for her. There were columns and stalagmites, in her small cave. She usually slept by one of the bigger ones, made climbing much easier, since there was not much room for her wings to flap around.

Lizae then turned her gaze upon herself, sometimes when she was ‘doing stuff at night’ in the village below, she would have gotten bite marks in her, scratches and bruises. Today was no different. She had a large bruise on the right side hip, right in the glowing mark she had there.

It stung at Lizae, and she became a bit worried from a self-preservation instinct. The wound was deep, and could have been from a sword or a dagger. She poked the wound, and saw that at least it had coagulated, and there was a nice, crust all the way into her bone... she could feel her bone!

Frightened she stepped back, now resting on the stalagmite, wings sprawling to the side and her glowing tail wagging from sheer nervousness. At least there was only a minimum of pain.

She realized that her nightly, ‘Raids’ were becoming out of hands. She was sick, in her head! This frightened her even more than the grievous wound in her hip. To not be in control of her own body!

After some time she slowly calmed down a bit, thinking.

She was still breathing fast and deep. She was sobbing and whimpering. Lizae was afraid, shocked it could have gone so wrong. What kind of person stabbed an innocent bat-lady for stealing? ‘A mentally disordered bat-lady’ she added.

Something caught her eyes, in the corner of her cave, right next to the spring of the caves water-stream, glinting in the grey darkness, glinting with a yellow glow.

Lizae did not have good colour vision, but she could see so many variations of grey that it did not matter to her, the only two colours she could recognise was a golden yellow, and the blue taint some of her fur emitted. Maybe that was not entirely accurate, she was able to see colours, and they were just very greyish and looked mattered. Either way, it still meant she knew what colours were, and how they looked.

Lizae took a deep, deep breath and got on her shaking digitigrades feet again. She lumped closer to the yellow, glinting and glowing thing.

There was a golden goblet on the cave-floor. She knew this was what had been her prize and the cost of her wound. It was beautiful, she thought. The goblet was about 30 centimetres high, and had a curved under part, where it could stand on a large foot. It was also filled with smaller golden items.

Lizae grabbed it and emptied the goblet on the cave-floor, golden nips, rings, trinkets, necklaces and small metal mirrors flew and made striking sound where they landed and re-bounced from, it had a hypnotic effect on Lizae, her eyes flying to watch all the small gold items bounce on the cold stone floor. And the sound! She knew why she loved that clinging, rattling sound. Hypnotising.

Lizae shook her head, clearing her thoughts again. This was a LOT of gold items; she quickly counted twenty gold rings, four small gold mirrors, eight silver rings, and two gold necklaces. This was indeed not the common loot she found herself with after a ‘raid’. It was way too much. The humans below would be more than just angry at her now.

She had stolen tings from the village most of her entire life. Always had the humans just allowed it to happen because, that they could then just laugh at the person whom had been careless enough to let their items be in the open, for Lizae to swoop down and grab.

Now they would come and kill her for sure, she knew. They hated thieves, and they liked gold, properly even more than Lizae did.

What should she do?

Fly away? Say sorry to the humans? Stand and fight? Hope they did not care? Seek help? These thoughts raced through Lizaes mind. She could not fight, the humans were bigger than her and they carried weapons. Neither could she seek help, her tribe had cast her out and she did not know anyone else.

Lizae scrambled to the cave entrance. There was sounds below her, angry yells, talk, clinging of armour moving, the clop of horses-shoes even.

The humans were below her cave, and moving up to her!

Lizae made a fast resolve, a resolve much alike a common beast; run and fly!

She peeked over the cave entrance, and sure enough, there were humans right under her nose. They literally were under her nose, as one of them ripped an arm at her, with a closed fist, intended to strike at her. And she got hit, on her forehead, right between the eyes.

Lizae recoiled, gasped and went cross-eyed, loosing focus and went staggering back. It did not hurt an awful lot, since the human could not strike hard enough from the lower ground. Lizae lumbered back into the cave. From her cross-eyed view she could see more iron-clad humans’ creping in from the side of the cave, with heavy nets in hand. She must fly now, she thought!

Taking a step back she spread her wings and leapt from the cave, over the mass of humans below.

The iron-dressed humans would have none of that, and two of them threw heavy nets at her, the first missed entirely, and Lizae was already beginning to think of where she could go now.

Then the second net hit her, more of a glancing blow really. Only her right wing was hit, ‘not a problem she thought’, just moments before the weight of the heavy net tore her down from the sky.

Lizae crash landed in the forest just below the cave. There was no fur-less humans here, yet. The fall was roughly five meters, not much for her, she’d have worse falls before, but her wounded hips coagulated crust was ripped open, and a steady flow of warm blood soaked the fur of her leg.

Looking back at her wings, while getting ready to fly once again, she could not lift her right wing due to a massive, heavy, black net trapping her entire wing. She clawed at the net franticly with her sharp claws, both her hands and feet tried to cut through it. But it seemed too tough, she tried to move it, but found it stuck completely in the three spikes growing from her wing joint.

The human shouts were getting louder now, previously a mere peep in the wind. The forest was thick and full of green oak, birch and some elm. She scrambled to her feet, and moved from one tree to another, keeping a look out for the humans and their shouts.

Lizae took cover near a large oak tree trunk, thinking where the human shouts had gone.

She heard a whisper from her right, there between the brushes! Then another whisper from her left, and some branches moved to her right again! Suddenly there were sounds and murmuring all around her.

She lifted her ears high, and made an echo shout, a high pitched tone from her throat. Seeking for a way to run... there was none, surrounded and unable to fly away. In her old tribal village, they would have laughed at her.

She heard a crack of fallen leaves behind her, and spun around. Then with a sharp pain on her left cheek, everything went white.

Lizae woke up again for the second time that day. This time, however, she felt horrible and not fresh at all. At least she thought it was still the same day, they had hit her pretty hard.

Lizae opened her large brown eyes, surveying her surroundings. She was sitting in a chair, a wooden one, with her arms tied to the armrest, with metal chains that felt cold through her fur. Her digitigraded feet were also strapped to the floor with chains. Luckily they were not too uncomfortable for her. What did bother her, was the metal table next to her, about a meter high with some shelves on it, to assist in carrying all those knifes, scissors, mirrors-with-a-stick, and some bloody rags of cloths.

Those made Lizae think a bit. What were they thinking of doing to her, Torture? Her old tribe tended to do that to intruders, but that was one of the reasons she had left them in the first place, that and the fact she had started to glow like a lamp post. In fact she believed that her glow was the only reason she could see anything down here, in this prison. She may be partly nocturnal, but she could not see in complete darkness, for that she would use her echo-call.

But an echo was not needed here. And she realized her glowing mouth was obstructed by some clothes. To keep her from screaming, and/or talking, she simply spat it out as it was not tied to her, merely stuffed in her mouth at some point.

Then Lizae proceeded to Jumping up and down in her restraints, her wings were free from the joint up. So she used them to shake up the wind in her little cell area. It quickly became dusty however, so she stopped flapping her wings after some time.

The air was dry and coarse, small particles tickling her sensitive nose.

Lizae sneezed just when the darkened door opened in the far end of her cell, letting in a ray of light that blinded Lizae. She squinted her eyes, and tried looking at the strong light between the gap of the door growing bigger and wider.

A voice boomed through the air: “Aha! So here is the thief, I hope they fixed you up for our conversation.” It stated. The voice was coming from a tall and wide humanlike figure, silhouetted by the strong light, beyond the open door.

The silhouetted figure was glinting and reflecting some of the luminescence from Lizaes body, he wore a chainmail, and plate greaves and some leather pads around his neck and shoulders and a dark purple tabard with a dark, faded sun symbol on the front, giving the person an intimidating and powerful look. He, for Lizae thought it must be a He from the voice, had a sword. Not drawn, thankfully, they were not here to kill her off just yet. She understood, letting go of a small sigh.

Lizae muttered some words as in greetings, and turned her head away from the blinding light. The voice spoke again; “I do believe you should look at me; when I talk to you, bat!” There was a hard tone to his voice, forcing Lizae to comply with what he said, looking up again, and cautiously opened her eyes, expecting the strong light once again. There was no light any more, just the humans’ face lit up by Lizaes’ glowing muzzle.

His features were strong, with scars on nearly every centimetre of his skin, a battle veteran for sure. He had greyish brown hair, short and not well kept. A warrior indeed. Like most people up here, blue was the colour of eyes, as it was with this warrior veteran.

“By the Gods! How do you manage to glow like that? It’s abnormal.” The warrior said slowly, in a mocking tone.

Lizae nervously coiled her glowing tail around the chair she was seated on; this man was looking a bit crazed, ‘Glowing bats were uncommon yes, but surely not unheard of?’ She thought. The warrior thought otherwise.

“I bet you have devoured something foul, maybe a mage poisoned you with wicked sorcery?” He leaned even closer to Lizaes glowing face, a sneer in his face. Lizae tried to move her own head back to evade his crazed eyes, but found only the hard and unforgiving, cold stone wall. Her ears went down, afraid.

“You are corrupted, bat! You should not be allowed to live!” the crazed warrior’s blue eyes said to Lizae. This scared Lizae immensely. ‘Kill?!’ was her only thought.

Lizae did the only thing she could; started to scream. As high as she could while keeping it in the hear able zone.

The warrior flinched, and stepped back by the sudden sound. Then, he stepped back at her with new resolve, drawing his short sword with a muffled hiss. He first cut off her screaming mouth with his armoured glove, silencing her scream. Then put his sword to her chest, and aligned it with her heart.

Lizae looked down at herself in absolute horror. She was about to be killed like some common beast! He properly thought of her as one, for sure. But she did not want to die now! She ignored the sword at her chest and bit down at his fingers covering her mouth! With her two large fangs, she pierced the lightly armoured glove.

She sunk her teeth in with all of her might; she tasted his warm blood and the feeling of small metal shards ripping up her tongue, lips and inner mouth in return.

The crazed soldier quickly tore his injured hand to him, groaning in pain. The shook from his hands quick withdrawal caused two other things to happen.

One was that Lizae lost her left fang, causing her massive pain; it was torn clean off, and was remained stuck in the soldier’s hand.

The other thing to happen was the sword pointed at Lizaes chest flinched below to her stomach, to then impale her ribs on the blade. The second sword-wound in less than a day! It was not a deep wound, but seemed to have cut some blood veins, making her bleed precious blood, soiling down her stomach and spilling on the ground in small gushes.

“Aha! You were a rotten bat!” the soldier claimed, looking at the long fang impaled on his left hand. He did not pull it out, that would have caused more bleeding from his part.

As he spotted his short sword impaled on the unfortunate bat-woman, he sniggered, laughing at his doing. He was completely mad, Lizae realized in her blurry, sludgy thoughts. Slowly her mind dazed away, from sheer loss of blood and the shock of pain. She hardly noticed when the crazed warrior retrieved his sword from her stomach, with a bloody, wet sound. The wound could now bleed free of the sword.

The heavy door behind the crazed warrior was rattling, chains being unbuckled, locks torn away in a hurry and voices yelling orders.

The crazed soldier went to the door, to block it with his sword. Just a moment later, the last lock had been disengaged and there was a laud ‘THUMB’ from the heavy door. His sword snapped and gave a screeching, breaking noise, much to the disturbance of Lizaes giant ears.

Again the ‘THUMB’ came from the door, this time it opened partially before the crazed, soon to be, murderer blocked the door using his own weight, and he pushed the door shut. One of the people on the other side lost a finger in that process, as the door slammed shut.

As the door-brawling continued, Lizae looked down through her blurry vision, down at her ribcage. The sword was of course no longer present, as it had just snapped trying to hold the door, but Lizaes red life blood was still rippling out of the wound. She began to experience tunnel vision, the edge of what she could see, became black, focusing her view. She breathed in shallow tugs. She could not gasp a larger mouthful of air. Maybe she had punctured a lung? No, the wound was too far on her side, and too petty to reach into her innards. It was the chock keeping her from breathing.

A large ‘BANG’ was heard from the now broken door. The mass of people behind it had apparently rushed the door with so much force; it had been torn from its hinges. Door and crazy soldier went on the ground, and more soldiers with purple tabards ran in the cell.

There must have been at least ten soldiers in the room now, Lizae knew. Most of them began to drag the crazed soldier away. When the mad soldier began to protest and attempt to fight back however, they started to beat him with studded clubs they had at their sides.

Another solider left when the one assumingly in charge had said something to him. The soldier with an order ran away fast, yelling for something Lizae did not understand.

Then the leader turned back to her and started to talk again, this time to the last soldier in the room beside him. They quickly unstrapped Lizae from the wooden chair, and carried her down the stone hallway. The light was blinding to Lizae, and she found herself almost unable to open her eyes.

The two soldiers carrying her talked again more worried this time. She could only decipher some of the phrases they said. Something about a concussion, and told her not to fall asleep. Lizae realized she did feel like taking a nap. She already had her eyes closed, and she was being carried, how relaxing.

She felt the soldier carrying her by her shoulder shift his grip and opened her right eye, rather forcefully. She could only stare back, and curse that she was still being blinded by the torches light. She looked around to see what was happening.

That reaction seemed to reassure the carrying soldiers. As they talked again, telling her it was close by now. Lizae had no idea what they were close by, but figured it to be something that could help her take that nap, maybe.

She could feel the soldiers carrying her by her shoulder and hips. The one holding her behind was also applying pressure to her wound. It felt funny she thought. Almost like a small tingle, just to be replaced with a stab of pain and renewed fear when they shifted their grip on her or when she breathed just a bit too heavy. Lizaes arms were idle on her chest, trying not to move them much. Her wings were neatly folded behind her; they felt surprisingly light, like something was missing...

Lizae shifted her head around, trying to get a glimpse of her wings. But the strain of effort proved too much for her. And she flopped back to just being carried.

A sound of a door opened, and suddenly they were outside. Lizae could see the two moons high above them, circling each other around the world, as always, a comfortable sight really. She breathed in, gasping at the cold air. The soldiers carrying her, noticed it and continued to mutter encouraging words to her, that they were not far now.

‘Had they not already said that once before?’ Lizae thought.

“Stand clear! We got a wounded prisoner here!” the soldier in front yelled off into the distance. To a gate keeper Lizae knew when a metal screech pierced the cold, damp air, signalling that a large gate was being pulled opened.

“Get a mage set up!” A voice yelled from above, probably standing on a wall or a gatehouse.

The wounded bat-woman, started to shiver, as her blood loss became dominant. There was a large metal against metal rattle from around the carrying soldiers, as more people came running, to see what was happening, most of them gasped when the saw the glowing bat, some cursed at her and other yelled inappropriate things about her being almost naked.

Lizae did not care, shivering from imaginary cold caused by the wound. She closed her eye, but knew it would only serve to worry the soldiers transporting her, so she opened her other eye to keep them noticed that she was still conscious.

A new wooden door slammed open, and they trio stepped in a new building, then another door opened and they rushed onwards. Lizae saw only the ceiling, stone. Just like her cell had been. But these stones had a warmer glow to it; lanterns were hanging just inside of Lizaes view. They did, yet, nothing to warm the chilling feeling she experienced.

“Put her down over there” The soldier behind her said, pointing to a medical bed in a corner. Medical, as in it could be hidden with some brown linen curtains.

They put Lizae down with care, positioning her so that her wings were not in the way for whoever was to help fix her.

She yet tried to warp her wings around herself, instinctual. But they were being held back for her safety. Lizae tried to ask what had happened to her wings, but the words went missing in her mouth. Instead she tried to bend around to see what had occurred.

Lizae looked on her wings with a growl; they had clipped her wonderful spikes off! The three spikes protruding from where the wings bended into fingers, there were only the glowing tuft of fur there, no spikes.

The soldiers saw what Lizae was growling at, and talked for a while in-between each other, trying to remember what had happened to the bat, when she was captured.

“They were sawed off, when the nets did not come off. And they thought it was the easiest thing to do. Besides those horns will grow out again right?” One of them finally said in a low toned voice, calm and professional.

Lizae simply growled again, and yelped when a new human entered the room.

The new person was a human male, dressed in a wizard’s ceremonial dress. It was blue, grey and black, with a lot of mystical symbols sewn in it, at various locations. Along with one of those silly pointed wizard hats, blue and grey as well. His hands was covered and hidden from view by the large sleeves the dress had. But he was using a walking stick, or staff it could be called. But the wizard himself looked fairly young.

“Yes captain? Your request for my presence has been acknowledged, I hope that rousing me have not been in vain, like the last time...” the wizard spoke, with a surprisingly deep voice. In comparison, the captain was almost screeching.

“Yeah, yeah. Get to heal this prisoner right now!” The captain barked, like he was trying to compensate for a deep voice with a commanding presence instead. It seemed to work.

The wizard then turned to Lizae resting on the bedstead. Eyes widening, when he realized what the unnatural – natural glow was from, the bat was glowing. He instantly cast a warding spell around him, and backed a few steps back.

“What are you doing?!” The second soldier yelled at the blue dressed wizard, now shielded with some form of magi, responded with:

“It is not a normal! It glows!” he boomed, obviously worried for his own safety. “Where is it from? How did it begin to glow? It could be dangerous for us to stand here!” he continued, now wandering back to the door.

But the captain stopped him from going out the door.

“You will at least heal her!” he ordered grabbing the wizard’s shoulders, forcing him to look back at the bat woman again.

“So get to it!” The soldier commanded.

Lizae was beginning to regain her ability to speech, and thought it would be best if she explained that her glowing body parts were not dangerous. She talked, meek and weakly;

“I... am... no... Bad glow... no bad glow.” She rasped. A scrawling voice, soaked with her obvious distress.

The soldier at her side, keeping her wings from embracing herself, repeated the words to the other two. And they muttered more words to each other. For Lizae, the light was fading now having just used a lot of energy saying her glow was harmless.

The wizard was convinced otherwise.

“No! It’s not harmless! It just can’t be! The laws of magic don’t allow that to be! The source must come from somewhere! It could be our own life energy she is sapping!” He warned while removing his leather gloves. Apparently he still intended to heal her.

“Right... I am going to heal you now, bat. Brace yourself, it might sting quite a bit” Lizae heard from her darkness.

Then everything went white, again. But not as in she lost her consciousness, more of a pleasant one. She was being healed now, she knew. Her bleeding ribcage stopped bleeding and her hip wound felt funny as did her gums where the tooth had gone missing.

She could almost feel the skin, muscle and bone growing back together. New blood rushed through her, it was being replaced. Or most of her blood anyway.

Then the wizard stopped the spell, and backed off quickly. Lizae felt it, and opened her eyes once again. Blinking at first, then when she was not blinded she gazed around the room.

The mage was still trying to exit the room, but was being held back by the soldier. The second soldier was still at her side, examining her. She did not mind, and would like to see the effect of the healing herself.

The wound previously placed right in the middle of her right hips glowing spot was gone. The only thing missing was a patch of blue-glowing fur. Her skin, normally not visible due to fur, was showing. It made her feel naked... although she was ‘naked’ anyway, at least according to human standards. Her skin was not dark brown as her normal fur, but rather a faint blue glow. So it really was not just the fur that made her glow, it was the skin! The same thing had happened with her ribcage, a small fur-less spot.

Relived that the healing had gone well, she breathed out heavily, relaxing. Right now she felt more like finding a cave to curl up in and sleep until next dusk.

Lizae was finally allowed to make use of her wings again, they instantly curled around her body, knowing that the ‘nakedness’ of her, could make the humans worried.

It seemed that the discussion at the door had ended, and the wizard stood back and accepted whatever he had to do now.

Both the soldier and the wizard strode towards Lizae, and the second soldier that had just begun clearing the bed.

“Bat – you caused the wizard some distress! How did you do that!?” the soldier claimed, leaving Lizae to ponder on what she had done wrong now.

She felt something in her left hand, and felt on it when she became aware of its presence. It was an amulet of some sort. Round, silver, with a sapphire embedded in the middle. Apparently one of the three humans, amulet she knew. Her kleptomania had done its wicked works again.

She had stolen from her saviours. Her ears went down, along with her face, staring in the ground now. Lizae was greatly ashamed of her sick kleptomaniac actions.

“Oh so you know? You know how you blocked most of my magic spell? I can’t tell if you were trying to hinder or help me heal, but what you did was draining. I don’t have that kind of knowledge for healing spells!” the slightly exhausted wizard said. At least he behaved more calmly now than before.

‘Wait... she had hindered the spell?! How did that happen!?’ Lizae thought. She did not know anything about magic! No other than it took a long time to master and even longer time to sharpen the mind for that kind of thing. All she knew was from the one book she had found herself with one morning in her cave.

Lizae was just about to answer the wizard when she was cut off.

“HEY! That’s my amulet!” He yelled.

‘uh oh’ Lizae thought. And she began to fumble for an explanation, not knowing to start from the beginning of the kleptomaniacs start, or just had happened when she was healed.

“No, no! Lizae sorry, long time, me head sick!” Lizae started. “I not know, sorry, sorry! Have back, please. Me sorry!” she whimpered, gently giving the amulet back, and then retreating to hide behind her wings. She was so scared for her future. They would throw her back in the prison again! Never to fly again, then she would be executed at dusk. Lizae quietly sobbed, from the intermediate safety feeling of her big, leathery wings. Tears collecting on her lightly furred chin, and dripped in tiny drops from her nose.

Lizae did not even notice the sound of talking, or the passing of nearly a half hour. Only to be awaked by the smell and sound of new armoured, humans entering the room. They had metal shackles with them; this was the thing Lizae feared. Now she would be thrown in the prison again! She sobbed even harder now, but had no tears left to spill.

The shackles went on her, and the cold embrace on the feet and the base of the bat-wings went cold. It was then that she began to really hear what they were saying to her.

“Don’t worry; they are just taking you to the keep for transport. They won’t hurt you. You’ll have a fair trial.” One of the voices said to her.

She was not to be imprisoned and executed. But given a second chance. The thought made her stop crying instantly. She had been too dumb to realize that, killing was not the way of humans. They liked to be a symbol to the ‘lesser’ races around them. Mercy and the whatnot. Lizae was grateful for that gesture. In her old tribe, they would had have banished her and tried to kill her for stealing; which actually was what had occurred, coincidently.

Chapter II “The Trial”

The streets of Ut-Sted were buzzing with general excitement. The city guards had captured one of the pests that used to be raiding the city of Ut-Sted. The thieving bat, caught! And they were giving it a trial to speak for its crimes! As with all of the trials in Ut-Sted, it was held in public, at the town square. All the high standing citizens would show up, to cast their vote on whatever matter boggled the trial.

But today it was more exciting. One of the lesser races was present; it was very rare that they even got a trial. Mostly due to the fact that there was not great a number of, fur-men in the city. Their kind was of course welcomed to the city. But since Ut-Sted was a bastion of the great wall of Iore, and an army training ground, for the endless war with the fur-men race, the Lynnex. Most fur-men simply went for vest, or to the south for a better and safer living.

The city square, was of course square, a large square, busy shop stands nearly everywhere, large houses, warehouses, and smiths’ forges clinging the air with hammer blows. Workshops building weapons, refining trees into useable wood, exchange posts for travellers, small bars serving mead and brewages, jesters entertaining the crowd where they could. Near the centre of the mass, there was a fountain in place, forming a rocky mountain spraying water in a geyser like form.

Right next to the fountain, the high ground was placed. This was where the trial would be held.

People did not really care right now, money and mead exchanged hands as per usual. Some of the more keen market walkers would have spotted the small group of official looking folks preparing the high ground. A Trial was coming up, they knew, and set their shops up to cover the mass that would soon swarm to the area around the high ground.

In a carriage some kilometres away, Lizae was sitting, or rather lying, on the back of the horse pulled carriage. She had a completely dark sack over her head, and they had covered her glowing body with old, grey potato sacks. She could not see, hear or smell anything at all. The black bag over her head was enchanted to block the senses she could use to escape. Lizaes hands where bound as well, in metal shackles, as where her feet and wing-bases.

The soldier had explained the enchanted bags usage before they had given her it on. So Lizae was not worried, they had even told her to just rest up, since it would be very easy to do so with the bag.

So Lizae was sleeping in the back of the carriage. Like there was not a care in the world.

There were three carriages in the formation; Lizae was in the front one. The need for carriages had not surprised Lizae; the human’s cities were all absolutely enormous. This city was built with two walls, on thin and low on the far side all around the city, if Lizae had flew from an outer wall to the opposite outer wall, it would have taken her at least a half hour or more. About forty kilometres. So it was a large city, however it was not all houses and towers, castles, more like the wall created an area to house the small villages within it. Most of the land between the outer and inner wall was just farmland, making enough food for the entire mass of soldiers being trained and deployed here.

The outer wall connected with the great wall of Iore, at the south, and when Lizae had first seen the wall a few years back, when she gotten here, the sight of the wall had made her fall out of the sky, she had forgotten to flap her wings...

The wall of Iore was higher than what even the inner walls were. And just about twice as thick, with sentry towers placed for every hundred meters. On the great walls inside - leading in to the human land, there were even villages and cities, shaded in the stalwart walls protection.

Lizae knew why it had been build, to keep the Lynnex from raiding the land. The aggressive fur-man race that was living in the north. They were always trying to conquer the land vest of the great wall, ever attacking and ever watching for any weakness to exploit.

But for now the world was dark and Lizae was asleep. Wings curled around her, tail flopped down from the carriage, and worried the soldier guarding her; it was close to the ever spinning wheel of the moving cart.

Nothing happened with the wheel, luckily.

The carriage rider in front, yelled back to the group. “We are getting close to the inner wall! Prepare the prisoners! “He yelled.

Lizae was roused then. Enchanted bag pulled off her in a rather brutal way. She realised she was nearly falling of the carriage, and shifted back to sit balanced.

It was a bright day, nearly not a cloud in the sky, sun shining bright as ever; spring was even in the air, as flowers could be smelled from afar. Or Lizae could smell them from a great distance; humans had such bad smelling abilities.

Lizae looked down on the road leading to the white inner walls; it was a very worn down cobblestone road, and the carriages wheels rumbled when they skid across it.

She looked to the wall, now soaring above her faintly glowing ears. A small puzzled laugh was heard from the enamoured solider guarding her. She curiously looked back to see what was happening. The soldier noticed Lizaes curiosity, and turned to explain what he found funny; in his hands where the magic, sense hindering bag. He explained that it had lost its powers now.

“See here, it’s not working anymore.” He claimed, putting the bag over his own head. “Try and talk now, bat.” He said.

Lizae complied, but in her lack of a topic she talked about the time.

“The time is two-forty, and the sun is shining as bright as a crystal in the mother-cave.” She said with her raspier, yet feminine voice.

The soldier pulled off the bag and asked her to talk again.

Lizae repeated her previous sentence.

“See, I can hear you just as good with or without the bag. It have lost its enchantment!” the soldier proclaimed excited. “This is really odd” he added, now sinking deep into his own thoughts.

Lizae left him thinking.

The three carriages were still moving through the tunnel of the inner wall. They had already stopped twice to verify the ‘cargo’ with some tunnel guards, one of the tunnels guard was even a fur-man, Lynnex even! This fact surprised Lizae a bit. This city was build to protect against the Lynnex. She decided to ask the guard.

“Sir” she started, knowing it would be best to address him as a superior. “Why is there a Lynnex guarding the tunnel? Lizae thought they were enemies.” She finished her question.

The soldier put the black, now de-enchanted bag back under a seat. Then he answered:

“It’s not a north Lynnex; he is a black-tribe, from the south dessert. They are welcome here, as like any other fur-man would be, like you. If you could keep from stealing from everyone, that is” Said the soldier, making Lizae lower her head in somewhat shame.

“I have never meant to steal...” she mumbled, mostly to herself.

The soldier heard her, and responded:

“Nah, I understand it. You have some kind of disharmony in your head, right?”

Lizae confirmed it, nodding, making her ears flop around on top of her head. She hastily seized control of them again.

The three carriages now exited the tunnel, and the sun greeted them by warming them all from the chilly tunnel. It was a pleasant feeling. Lizae looked over the city, now in full view.

It had a lot of houses, tall most of them to save space, and most of them where made of wood and stone, there was also metal sentry towers, proving that it was a military city.

All of the houses and buildings were painted white, only the wooden supporters were left with their own brown colour, it gave the whole place a timid look, somewhat soothing for the eyes to look upon. Lizae herself did not see all the flags and colourful wimples, soaring high above the buildings. To her, it was just a relaxing mix of greys, blues and yellows.

She decided to ask the guard of what colour the flags were.

“Sir?” she began again, “What colour are your flags?” Lizae asked, looking at the flying flags.

The soldier followed Lizaes eyes to the flags she was looking at.

“Oh... those are not our flags, it’s just ceremonial flags, and they are mostly red and orange, some also purple and white.” He replied. Then continued asking a question of his own.

“But, why did you ask, can’t you see the colours yourself?” he asked.

Lizae had trouble to remember the word for colour-blindness.

“Lizae...err...cannot see most colours, just grey, yellow and blue.” She said, making the soldier nod that he understood, even suggesting that Lizae was maybe could see farther and better as a compensation for her lack of colour vision. That thought made Lizae think. It would be nice if that was true, although she doubted it.

They carriages now turned a corner of a very large hall, allowing them to see the city square. For Lizae it was massive, it always had been.

She had been here before, on nightly raids, but never been here in full consciousness. The crowd was so dense she had no idea how they would get past them in the wagons.

A horn blew from the back wagon, answering her conundrum.

The crowd did not act at first, and then it sounded again. The crowd became aware of the three wagons, and began making way for them.

“Just look calm, okay?” The soldier advised Lizae.

Well, she was kind of feeling the newfound pressure of being judged by so many people. They were not even her race. She felt alienated. Out of place, and it was getting to her.

She pulled her wings closer to her body, but the shackles was making it hard.

People that passed by looked perplexed by the effect Lizae had mainly her glowing muzzle, ears and glowing spots that dotted her pelt. She lowered her ears, and pulled her, also glowing, tail up to her chest. Lizae began stoking her tail in sheer despair.

The soldier looked as calm as ever. Like this happened all the time. But it was what the guard could not hear, that was making Lizae feel even more out of place.

She heard the crowd commentate on her strange look, like how did it happen to her?

“Oh my! Look at the thing! It’s abominable!” Lizae heard an elderly human say, from somewhere in the mass.

These voices made Lizae perk her ears up, trying to hear at least something else than bad stuff.

“Look! It’s one of them bats! You think it can fly?” She heard a small boy say, from the group of humans all around the three carriages.

After what seemed like an eternity they reached the high ground, where a lot of elderly humans were standing, all wearing some kind of robe. To Lizae they all looked grey. They properly were too.

The three carriages stopped once they had made a turn and backed into the high ground with the back. So that the prisoners could walk onto the cobblestone raise and so Lizae did.

She was the only prisoner from the first wagon, and was placed a long way from the podium.

The other wagons now started to open up and release their prisoners. Lizae had wondered what there had been in those wagons.

In the first wagon a few guards in mail armour, and purple tabards, jumped down and formed a thin line on the high ground. Then a small amount of shackled humans in rags, like the rags Lizae had been put into, jumped down and took place next to Lizae, all the way up to the podium. The five human prisoners all looked at Lizae like she was some kind of disgusting snail; the guy right next to her even barred his teeth and sneered at her.

Lizae sneered back, a bit lacking due to only having one long fang. But it must have looked more like a grin than a sneer, because the crowd pointed at Lizae and laughed at the other prisoner that had sneered first.

This proved to lighten Lizaes spirit just a little bit, maybe they was not so judging after all, these humans.

“Aww, look at it smile” Lizae heard a girl said from the crowd, “what could she have done to stand in row with those murders?”

“She has stolen a whole lot of the jarls gold!” a city guard said to the girl with a small laugh.

She had stolen the jarls gold?! Lizae shivered, in fear. The jarl had control over the entire city and answered only to the king, back in their capital; Ol-Stead. Meaning the old-city.

But the guard had laughed it off, morbid humour? Schadenfreude? Or was it really something to laugh over? Had something embarrassing happened that night? But then what about the sword wound she had gotten?

It would have to wait, she did not know, but surely she would soon. The trial was starting.

The man looking the eldest and dressed in the most pompously dress, walked up the podium in an agonizingly slow pace. He was apparently really old. Then threw back his long hood when he reached the podium, then fumbled around beneath the podium. He had found a large metal hammer embedded with jewels and crystals. Lizae found herself starring at the glinting hammer. ‘So shiny!’ She thought.

Shaking her head from the kleptomaniac thoughts, she looked over the crowd of people, now silent as the grave. They were awaiting the hammer to fall. Then the trial could begin.

It seemed that the sole reason for the old man’s presence was to slam the hammer on the podium.

And so he did.

‘BANG! ‘The hammer slammed out.

“I hereby declare this public trial for, OPEN!” the old man yelled in the after math of the hammer stroke.

He then left the hammer on the podium and waddled away. His job was done it seemed. He took place in a chair among the rest of rich looking people, to the other side of the cobblestone-rise, the farthest away from Lizae.

A new man in the same dress as the others stood up and went to the podium. He was to announce what was supposed to happen now.

He quickly made the large crowd silent by raising his arm. He then slid back the hood and relieved, that he had a crown placed at the temples.

Lizaes stomach jumped at the fact that the man whom she had stolen from, was going to judge her crimes.

“WELCOME, citizens, welcome to the trial.” The jarl started. And the crowd responded with a roar of cheers! “As you all know, we are gathered here today, to judge and administer rightful justice for the criminals standing before us!” The Jarl bellowed out. More cheers escaped from the crowd, Lizae realized this was some kind of show for them.

“So let’s begin the judgement!” The Jarl exclaimed. Lizae saw the first in the row of prisoners get pushed in the back by a guard, and brought to stand next to the podium.

It was a lithe woman, with red hair, and dressed in the same kind of baggy clothes as the rest of them. The jarl addressed the prisoner with his questions:

“What is your name, and crimes?” The jarl asked loudly, so that everyone could hear.

The red-haired woman, looked down, and muttered some uncomprehending words. The jarl warned the girl to speak up. So she did;

“My name is Charlene, and they claimed me to be a whore!” she said out loud. Lizae could see her shaking a bit; people were judging her, talking about that crime. Someone from the crowd even yelled out that it was hardly a crime.

The jarl silenced the crowd again, with a raised arm.

“Yes” he said, “Being a whore is no major crime, but it is the circumstances around this woman that are to be judged.”

The woman looked nervously around, seeing the thousand of unfamiliar faces that made the mass. Then started to explain what her fraud went on.

Lizae did not understand most parts of it. But knew it was a sad story of how she had to abandon her own two children, to make money to feed them, her husband had died in a skirmish with the Lynnex. And she had been arrested by some patrolling guards after having injured the person that had been trafficking her as a whore. Now she was here. Lizae found the whole story quite touching, even though some of the words were new to her.

The mass of people had been quiet for the woman’s speech. Now they started to chat among themselves. Then they started yelling for a pardon of the woman.

“The council will now decide for her fate!” The jarl yelled, and then removed himself from the podium, to go and talk to the many dress-hooded people.

For five minutes the city square was murmuring in anticipation for the first judgement of the day.

Lizae was also ecstatic. The humans seemed quite understanding for the case she had just heard. Lizae then saw the Jarl make his way back to the podium.

“The council have decided to, Pardon this woman, thy shall be free, and receive a gift from the city to live on in peace!” the jarl exclaimed, then added: “And you have my condolence for your lost husband.” He addressed to the worried woman.

Some guard then released her from the shackles and lead her down the high ground to the keep.

The rest of the trial passed on, Lizae was the last to be judged. Meanwhile, the remaining four humans had been accused of murder and mayhem in some fur-men towns up north. They were all in one band, and had worked and killed together. Their motive was a sheer hatred for the lesser races, apparently not that uncommon among the crowd, as a few of them even yelled for a pardon.

They were all sentenced for execution, and one of them just for prison.

Then it was Lizaes turn to explain her crimes. She felt fearful to speak in front of so many people, she was not that good at even talking in the human tongue, not even her own native, clicking and sonic language.

The jarl called out for the glowing bat. The crowd went almost wild, now they would know what was up with the fur-man or woman rather, in the trial.

Lizae was still just standing there on her spot, as she had done for the entire length of the trial. She tried to move, but was too nervous to do it. She flapped her wings once, a bad attempt since they was restrained.

The guards reacted, and grabbed her by the shoulder and forced her to the podium. She tried to resist, but only managed to stumble down on the cobblestone high ground before the podium.

She almost landed on her face, just barely pushing herself from the ground with her shackled hands. The crowd laughed at her, knowing what she had done the night before. Lizae felt embarrassed. Even her clothes where against her, getting pulled into weird positions, around her tail and wings. She slowly rose to her knees, and then got helped up by the jarl.

The jarl introduced her to the crowd.

“This Fur-man, have raided the jarls quarters, MY quarters.” He started “She have successfully stolen, and emptied a full drawer of found rings and valuables from the guardhouse. And have escaped the guards within that same building! So we will ask you, how was it done, bat?” The jarl addressed the last part to Lizae, who standing right next to him, trying to draw her wings up to her face.

She peeked over the wings and into the crowd. All of the thousand faces there looked back, and she felt even more terrified than before. She decided to speak about her mental condition.

“I cannot remember any of it” She explained. “Lizae, sick in head, long time ago... Banish from cave-mother! Lizae not bad glow!” She tried to explain. She had spoken really quickly and had even mixed some clicking speech in it. It must have been hard to understand she realized just after.

The jarl looked doubtful of her mixed language. He asked:

“What is your name, bat?”

“Lizae is name of ‘tis one” she answered, relived of the new form of questions.

The jarl asked away: “How did you become to be banished?”

Lizae thought if it would not be appropriate to admit how... but still wanted to share the truth with the humans.

“Lizae, I, was princess of cave formation.” She admitted. Creating a small collective gasp from the crowd.

The jarl seemed a bit surprised as well. “So you are a fur-man royalty? How come you left that cave-land then?” He asked, still loud enough for everyone to hear.

“Lizae, I, went to bad-taboo-cave, deep within. Only goddess allow there. I sleep there, cave collapse. Lizae trapped, broken wing too.” Lizae explained, refrying to use the click language. “Lizae trapped for four moons! Glow crystal in cave make skin glow, fur glow.” She continued. It had been more like a half year in that cave, but she had only seen the skin-glow-effect in the four moons.

“I fled from cave, dig, dig, dig!” Lizae told, empathizing the dig. “I no get welcome, the bat-people not like me. I allowed living there still.” She finished sighing. The bad part was not over yet though.

“So how did you get banished?” the Jarl asked again.

Lizae had forgotten about that. It had been her kleptomaniac that had made the last drop.

“Other bat, not like me steals… Lizae did not mean to steal… I did not want to steal… They tried to kill me!”

Lizae was sitting on the edge of the high ground, wings laid blasted aback behind her. Tail down her right side, and glowing ears lying down as well. She looked sad and grey and very vulnerable. She was completely giving over her past, to these strangers. She hoped that they would understand. Lizae looked up on the Jarl, he looked down.

“Sorry” Lizae said then looked down again.

The jarl simply looked down, back at Lizae, and then turned around saying:

“We will now asset the final judgment” He said loudly addressing the crowd.

With that he walked back to the group of clerks and wise men, and what not.

Lizae simply sat on the high ground. She would accept anything the humans would judge her to. As long as she would still be allowed to fly. That point worried Lizae the most. She already knew that they would not execute her, in their eyes; theft was not that big a crime. Well, not just a bowl of lost gold anyway.

She looked to the crowd beneath her; they were all getting ready to go back to doing market things again, when the final verdict had been announced. Lizae could even see, hear and smell the bakers walking around the crowd, selling sweets for the guests.

She then looked back between her wings to see the jarl and the hooded people, talking. They stood in a circle. Then one of the white hooded people raised his hand, they all listened to the person, then started to nod in agreement. It seemed they had found a befitting punishment.

Lizae stood up, and shook her wings a bit, to get the blood flowing again. Her tongue darting to the missing fang’s place, it was unfamiliar; it made her a bit more nervous. The jarl then took his place at the podiums pedestal. Taking up the gemmed hammer. Lizae gasped at the sight of the beautiful hammer, her mind tugging her to take the thing. She dismissed the thought, for now.

“The council has decided the punishment of this case” The jarl yelled. “The Fur-man, called Lizae, a princess of the cave formation, is to be taught a lesson!” he continued. Lizae did not understand what was happening. Taught what?! Was this a common punishment?

“She will accompany a local mage in venturing to her tribe and making contact, in the name of Ut-Sted keep!” The jarl bellowed.

Lizae would not believe what she heard. To journey into her old tribe and befriend them, in the name of a human society?! It seemed like suicide for her. Her tribe was aggressive and did not like outsiders. The way there would even be hindered now that she could not just fly there in a straight line. She was to accompany a magic user in the trip.

“Furthermore, she will assist the mage with writing a journal of her lessons on how not to steal.” The jarl ended. “I hereby declare the Public trial for over!” He then slammed the hammer down.

“BANG” the hammer sounded.

The crowd instantly made a large cheer that soon dissolved into the normal market murmur. And everything went back to normal.

The jarl then walked up to Lizae, to talk with her himself. It surprised Lizae a bit, and made her feel insecure about the whole thing. Had it just been a ruse, and a real punishment was to come now?

“I want to ask you where your tribe is located.” The jarl said. He did not even ask about why she had raided his quarters, it made Lizae feel a bit better that they had apparently just chosen to forget her crime.

“And then I’ll ask you about why you raided my own quarters” the jarl said as if he could read her mind. “You did some rather disturbing things in there, you know.” He continued, and placed an arm around Lizaes shoulders, much to her displeasure. He then pushed gently on her back, making her follow him. He was about two heads taller than her, where a normal human was just one head taller than her. She just looked up, with an asking expression painted in her face.

“Well, answer the question bat.” The tall jarl said without even looking down.

“You have map?” she asked in respond while they entered the large stone keep behind the market square.

“Why yes, of course.” The jarl said. Now leading her through a number of doors each had a guard that looked bored out of his or her mind. They eventually got to a staircase, and ascended upwards. The stairs lead up high in the keep. The jarl opened a large wooden door, very much similar to every other door in the keep, and every other keep Lizae had ever seen.

Inside the big room had been luxuriously decorated to an extend Lizae had never seen before. Or apparently she had, because the room was messed up a whole bunch, and the bed, curtains, worktables and wardrobes were all open, had ripped open fabric and was stained with brown and some glowing fur strands. This was the jarls room.

The Jarl casually pointed upwards to the roof where two series of holes was present. Lizae stepped through the rubble of the messed up room to inspect the holes closer. It was claw marks in the stone ceiling. They looked very much like the claw marks in Lizaes own cave.

“I did all this?” she asked, voice filled with fear.

The jarl remained in the door opening. “Well yes, mostly.” He said. Arms crossed over his chest. “I found you upside down there on the ceiling, I guess you were asleep.” He stated.

“I am sorry I stabbed you.” The jarl said, not even flickering his eyes. He did not regret stabbing her, Lizae knew.

“But you did sort of try to strangle me when I shooed you away.” The jarl then pulled down a bit in his ceremonial dress, showing off a red and irritated collarbone. It was scratch marks, Lizae knew. She looked down on her dimly glowing hands.

“I am sorry.” Lizae said. “Lizae sorry for messing up in here… Lizae not know what do, in night.” She explained.”

The jarl just shooed her off with a smile “Yes, I am aware now.”

Lizae looked around the mess, feeling guilty of ransacking the place just the night before.

“You want me to clean up place?” she asked, not really knowing what the full term of cleaning a room, she did not even know where to put the things she would find when cleaning.

“No, the maids will take care of it, they were bored anyway, and I even had to keep them out of here this morning.” The jarl laughed. “And I do not want a clumsy bat maid in this keep.” He said, still laughing.

Lizae just gawked at random. “What you stab me with?” Lizae wondered out loud.

The jarl stepped in the room, and rumoured around a pile of dirt near the bed. “Ahh! Here it is.” He exclaimed when he had found the object. It was a short dagger, with a silver handle and a ruby in the small pummel.

Lizae suddenly reached for the ruby, but received a slap across her fingers with the flat end of the dagger.

“You will have to keep you hands to yourself!” the jarl said casually. Sheathing the dagger in the scabbard he kicked up with his boot.

“Now about that map…” the jarl said when he had finished fastening the daggers scabbard to his waist.

Lizae just stood there, dumbfound over her… well dumbness. She had really just tried to seize a dagger from one of the human’s largest military cities, jarl. Just because of her silly kleptomaniac disorder. She held her right hand to her chest, feeling the numbness of the strike she had just received. She still really wanted that ruby… but that was a stupid thought.

The jarl had cleared a table near the window and spread a large map over it. Lizae walked over to the table carefully, not to knock anything down with either her tail or wings. This proved a bit hard, as several goblets and other nibs-objects slammed down on the floor.

She reached the table at last, after just five more pushed over objects, and a broken mirror. Lizae apologized deeply, but again the jarl dismissed the apology, saying he should have just moved the table to her instead. And noting that it would be another minus for her maid career, laughed the jarl.

‘Well this is going somewhat good all things considered.’ Lizae thought. These humans were almost too forgiving.

The jarl pointed to the map. “This is Ut-Sted” the jarl said and pointed out a red spot on the map, placed on the top of the large red line with the words of ‘Wall of Iore’ next to it. Ut-Sted is placed near the mountains, below the mere of Logrann.

Lizae knew the area; her tribe was somewhere up the Mere, and on the far side of the last mountain, close to the Lynnex-City of Imund. Lizae pointed at the area she knew her tribe was placed.

“There! There is Lizaes’ tribe!” She exclaimed excited.

The jarl noted the location on a smaller map her had conjured up from somewhere, using some charcoal.

“Great… I guess that’s it, then.” He said, folding the smaller, marked map into a roll. Then kicked up a small leather bag from the floor, and placed the map inside it.

“Here, bat, take care of that map.” He said, giving the small bag to Lizae, who mutedly accepted it. The bag did not have any straps for fastening the thing on her body somewhere, so she just carried it in the left hand.

Lizae thought back to the trial, they had laughed at her, knowing she had done something in the jarls quarters. Raiding, sleeping and assaulting the Jarl were no laughing matter.

“Mister Jarl – “Lizae started, carefully picking her words to be understood better. “Why did the people laugh at Lizae, when you said I had raided your room…? Is that normal to laugh at?” she asked.

The jarl looked a bit puzzled at best now… then with a smirk he explained the matter to Lizae.

“Well… you did raid the room, and you did sleep on the ceiling. But you did not try to strangle me… you… err… attempted to have your way with me…” He said calmly. Lizae was… well, she did not know what to feel. Apparently she had made an attempt at mating with the jarl… at least that was better than trying to strangle the jarl… right? She thought.

“I did not really realize what you were doing at first, thought you were strangling me, so I stabbed you. Then afterwards I realized…” the jarl finished.

Lizae still did not know what to say, so she remained quite…

“Can Lizae go now?” She asked instead, hoping to change the subject.

“Well sure, but we have to make sure you just don’t fly away when we get outside. So you will have to keep the wing shackles on. We have dealt with winged people before, you know.” The jarl confirmed. “You can walk about the city for a while, but you need to know where you must be this night. So follow me!” he said, starting to make his was out of the room, reaching the door faster than Lizae could. Lizae also knocked down a few more items, left alone by her first pass through, the tables and shelves in her way was left clean of items.

She muttered another excuse for the items, again. But the jarl dismissed the excuse again, as before. He waited for her in the door entrance, and then they walked down the stair to the keeps main floor together.

Lizae held the leather bag with the map, in her left hand; her right hand was held around an item unknown to Lizae. When she realized this object was in her hand, she yelped a cry, drawing the attention of both the jarl and a nearby female guard.

She dropped the heavy, shiny object on the thick red carpet floor in sheer shock. ‘Not again’ she thought.

“Oh, What did you take now, bat?!” the Jarl said in a rather annoyed tone, yet still having a slight smile in his face.

“I don’t know! Lizae not know!” She defended herself feebly.

The jarl then addressed the approaching guard. “Gilda, could you pick up the item please?” he questioned, or commanded, Lizae realized.

“Yes, my jarl!” The guard said, looking obviously relived that something had happened during her guard duty. She then bent down to the object in a rattle of her chainmail. Then emerged with an egg sized, ruby stone. “Oh look, it’s the blood of lake Logrann, Sir” the guard said, when she identified the red teardrop shaped ruby-stone.

The jarl casually took the tear-ruby from the guard, and placed it in his pocket.

“Gilda, you can contact the maids, and say they can clean up my quarters now, if they please.” He said, and then carefully shoved Lizae out towards the heavy wooden door.

Once they were outside, the jarl gave Lizae a hard slap across the back of her head. “Don’t steal again!” he said, looking calm as ever.

Lizae was kind of shocked by the smack, and felt up her head with her glowing right hand, it felt sore already. “Ow…” she mumbled, well knowing she had deserved the slap. “Sorry. Lizae sorry.” She said to the jarl walking in front of her.

“Don’t mention it.” The jarl said “I am just worried what other people will say if you do that, when I allow you to wander the city… Ah here we are.” He stopped walking, and until now Lizae had not paid attention to where they had gone to. She just followed him for a bit, and now they were standing in a garden like area, overlooking some of the city’s’ living houses, and she could see the marketplace she had been judged in.

The jarl pointed to the wall on the far side. Over the green garden area there was a single tower, which rose above the surrounding buildings, they all had a purple roof, and the whole district looked more ominous that the rest of the city, that mostly had red roofs.

“This is the Mages quarters. Your guide resides within. But you cannot go there now; you’ll have to wait until tomorrow.” The jarl said.

Lizae was puzzled, why could she not just go in there now?

“Why not now?” Lizae asked.

“Because then you’d have no gear for the trip.” The Jarl said, and gave Lizae a freshly looking letter envelope. She reluctantly took the letter, thinking it had something to do with a new punishment. Also she was a bad reader.

“This letter is an official order that you, the bearer of the letter, is to be helped and equipped with the best gear that you feel you need. Additionally it is a proof that you may stay at any inn in the city free of charge. Use it well” the jarl explained. But Lizae did not quite follow…

“You want Lizae to… have combat gear? Lizae no fighter. Never held sword before in life.” She yelped in reply. “Am I supposed to have sword?” she added, a bit more thrilled.

The jarl pointed back at the red roofed-district as a respond. “You can ask people where the shops and blacksmiths are. Just remember to get supplies for a week’s travel for two persons.” The jarl said, and gave Lizae another light shove in the back, to guide her towards the city looming below.

“And you might want to see a tailor about some proper clothing, bat. Good day, and may your travels be safe!” the jarl said and turned around leaving Lizae to look at the city below, and her own thoughts.

Chapter III “Market day”

Lizae shook her head in bewilderment, and looked to the jarl leaving her, down some stairs.

So she was supposed to retrieve a lot of gear and supplies for the impending travel… And the letter the Jarl gave her, would allow her to take what she wanted? Sounds right about right.

Lizae walked down the garden road, and through a stone threshold guarded by two bored looking guards, that stared after her when she had walked by. She reached some of the first housings in the trade district after some ten minutes of walking on the garden road. The people in the gardens were mostly pairs having a picnic on this warm and sunny day.

Lizae noticed that nearly all of the picnicking pairs that were not engrossed by kisses and the like were staring at her. She could hear them whisper inappropriate things about her clothing. ‘Looks like clothing is a first priority’ she thought. Humans were all so nicked-picky about clothing – ‘that’s because they don’t have wonderful fur like I do’ She thought with a one fanged grin.

She then turned a bit sad, when her tongue lashed over the hole in her gum. She missed that fang. Maybe she could get it back soon, and then get a mage to heal it back on? That would be possible, right? Lizae did not actually know about magic like that. So maybe it was possible! She would have to get her fang back soon… after she had gotten some appropriate clothes, she knew after some more people walked past her looking at her weirdly.

Lizae reached the edge of the market place and the air instantly turned more humid, and wet. The smells of spices and unfinished beverage reached her next, it was an odd combination, something she had only experienced once before, in an inn somewhere in the mountains, and of course when she had been judged just before.

The people there looked the same as when she had been here before. Only this time she would be among the people in the crowd and not on the high ground. Much could change in less than an hour, it seemed.

The dirt road she had been walking on changed to the city cobblestone and caused her clawed feet to make five, short clicks every time she took a step forward. It did not seem to bother anyone. They were also far too busy minding their own business, than to notice Lizaes clicking feet.

Lizae decided not to stride among the people in the middle of the marketplace, and started walking with the buildings around, to see if there was a tailor among them. She quickly noticed that the buildings surrounding the market place were all inns specialized to house the travelling salesmen than inhabited the market ground.

She made a kleptomaniac-check on herself, taking inventory so to speak: She was still dressed in the potato-sacks from the carriage ride to the central city. It was torn up most places and could hardly cover her chest and only reached to just above her knees. It was a depressive greyish brown.

In her left hand she had a small leather bag clenched; it contained the map and letter inside it. She then tentatively brought up her right hand also clenched; she opened it expecting some small item to be on her palm.

Luckily there was nothing there, just her furred white-blue hand and slim fingers. So no one had been unnecessary looted. ‘Good Lizae, good!’ She thought, giving her-self a mental shoulder clap. ‘Now to find that tailor’. Could be best to ask one of the locals, she decided that one of the inns’ would be a good start to ask, since the people outside looked way too busy.

She entered the closest inn on her right; “The Glowing Barb”, how fitting Lizae thought, looking at her glowing hands, ears, feet and muzzle. The door almost slammed close on her tail, forcing her to jump into the inn, in a rather panicked fashion.

“Oi! What can I do fer ya, lass?” a brawly voice sounded from the dark inn. Lizae clumsily stumbled the rest of the way in, and quickly sat down at the neatest table. The chair, however, blocked her large, folded wings, and made her sit on the chair in a slightly peculiar way.

The room was almost empty, except for a few dark dressed humans, and some smaller humans with large beards, drinking in the corners. They all looked at her, like the people at the garden had. One of them bashed his drinking partner on the shoulder, muttered a few words and pointed at Lizae.

She remembered why she was in the inn, and stood up again, meekly walked up to the innkeeper, who was a dwarf with a large red, fiery beard. Lizae being almost as tall as a normal human looked down on the short dwarf, who’d reach her chest if they were standing right next to each other.

“Aye lass. Ye be glowing like a ‘lantern! What can I do fer ya, eh?” the dwarf bellowed, not taking a care for the damped mood in the tavern. He was also clearing a dirty glass with a just as dirty a rag.

“Lizae, name of ‘tis one” Lizae introduced herself, as she had been taught from her old tribe, putting a clawed finger to her chin.

The dwarf simply shrugged, and waved for her to continue.

“Mmh… yes – Lizae be looking for…err…” she fumbled with the word, tailor. “Tailor” she said after a short break.

“So – ye be looking fer dem tailor, eh? Then you won’t be needin’d them rag’s you have there, eh?” The dwarf asked back and laughed with a quick bark.

Lizae thought about it… “No, Lizae will no longer need the potato sacks.” She said. After all, when she got directed to the tailor, so being almost nude would be no problem, she thought. It was just for a small time.

“So where is the tailor?” she asked, while pulling the rags off. Well, pulling was so much to say, it nearly fell off, really.

The dwarf looked a bit surprised that Lizae was indeed undressing in front of him. “erruhm” he stemmed. “Ye don’t need tah give them now, lass. I was just jokin’.”

Lizae had already kicked off the last rag, and placed them in a neat little pile on the desk. Somehow she could feel a slight breeze on her fur... her tail flanged up to her waist and hid her shame. She knew it was totally unnecessary, but it seemed to calm both her, and the patrons of the inn.

“Well?” She asked the perplexed dwarf, his face now as red as his beard.

He regained his posture, and shook his head. “Well there is’ no tailors within the markets buildings. But there be a lot of them in the square, just out-yonder.” The dwarf pointed out. “But ye are welcome to use yer rags, if ye feel uncomfortable outside.” He added, quickly seeing Lizaes face change from content and embarrassed, to just plain humiliated.

She did not mind being naked, she had been that all her life. But the way the humans looked and commented on her, made her feel very insecure. She accepted the offer and took the largest and most intact potato-bag, and put it on again. It was a whole lot more breezy than the full set of bag-rags. But it would do, and the dwarf could have the rest, so that they could do at least some good.

“What will you use the bags for?” Lizae asked him, after the train of thoughts she had been thinking of.

The dwarf casually discarded the rag he was using to clean the dirty mug, and tore off a piece of the potato-bag, and continued to clean the mug. Now it was actually being cleaned. “See?” he said simply.

Lizae just nodded, and asked if he knew a more specific place for the tailor to be in. The dwarf just mentioned the centre... and that the market shops moved around a lot. But a lot of kids could guide her, if she was new in town, they’d be happy to help... for a coin.

Lizae thanked the dwarf and went out in the sun again, feeling the chilling climate of the inn disappear in moments. After having missed her eyes in the bright light, she walked to the ‘Edge’ of the shopping crowd.

‘Maybe she could get one of the kids mentioned to help her navigate to a tailor’ she thought as she spotted a band of young kids. She approached them with a wave, and a small shout “‘Allo, kittens! Help please”

The kids instantly recognised the glowing bat, and ran to her, chattering among them self at a rapid rate. There were seven kids of various gender and age’s. All of them were human. The eldest looking of them, a boy, started talking an introduction: “Hello bat, I hope you need service of guides. And we are the best to navigate the seas of market-Square.” He said, it sounded almost as if someone had taught it to him.

“For only a single gold, we can take you to any stand in the market!” he claimed excited.

Lizae did not have any gold coins, well bronze was what it really was, and regardless she has none of them. She made a sour pout, and looked around; in hope of maybe spotting something glinting near the rain drain... the market did not even have a rain drain.

“Oh you have nothing?” The kid asked her, also looking a bit down.

Lizae nodded, making her ears flop around, she quickly seized them and froze when the kids started laughing at her. She looked over their faces fast; it was not humiliating laughs, more of a ‘hehe, those ears flop around, hehe’. Innocent Kids laugh. ‘Awww’ Lizae thought.

“Tell you what Bat-lady, if you let us pet your ears, we’ll help you!” One of the smaller kids said, still giggling.

Lizae was kind of worried that they would dislike her glowing spots and ear tips, like so many others had. But they seemed only interested in the soft feel of the short fur on the ears; when she had sat down to let them pat her ears. She felt like a house pet... but then discarded the thought, it was just kids after all.

When the kids had finally got their feel of her spongy ears, she stood up, and tried again to act like the adult she knew humans expected her to.

The band of kid’s made their way back to the spot they had stood on before rushing to Lizaes’ aid. One of the smaller girls remained with Lizae, and asked her: “So where do we need to go, Glow?”

Apparently she already had gotten herself a nickname.

“To the tailor-shop, we go” Lizae stated. The girl said a follow me, and started to walk into the mass of people constantly leaving and entering the market place.

Lizae followed as fast as she could, but instantly lost sight of the little girl. She stumbled around the crowd for a little while, bumping into people that gave her an ignored look or a shocked look, seeing her glowing nose, ears and hands. She carefully smiled back at those people.

Suddenly she felt a small tug on her right hand, when she looked down, it was the little girl that had grabbed her hand, and started to guide her through the mass. They soon arrived at a small market-stand. It looked polished and renowned, sporting a lot of what appeared to be blue clothing trimmed with gold.

The girl tugged at her, making Lizae look down again, “How will you pay for clothes?” the homeless girls asked.

“Don’t worry ‘bout it, Lizae have letter from the ‘jarl.” She said back. Then raised her hand and approached the merchant.

“’Allo, name of ‘tis one be Lizae” she greeted with a happy smile, or she thought it was a happy smile, because the merchant recoiled from the stand a bit. Then visibly eyed Lizae, from clawed feet to the point of her glowing ears.

“And what do you want?” the merchant asked, not impolitely.

“Yes, Lizae have letter from Jarl. I’d need clothes to travel!” she explained and found the letter from the bag. After the merchant had read it, he grunted, and yelled to an assistant to stand by. Two more assistant’s joined soon after, and the merchant bellowed a bunch of orders in a foreign language, the assistants left, running to every direction.

“Aha, that takes care of the supplies and backpacks I am to give you. Now I am to equip you with some clothes, sturdy enough to hold on a travel. If you could wait here just a moment, miss Lizae.” He said with a peaceful voice, a small bow and walked away, leaving another shopkeeper to take care of all the other people, buying stuff.

Lizae waited, her right hand was clenched, and she feared that she had stolen something from the passing merchant. Lizae looked down and, thankfully saw the small, homeless guide holding her hand with both of hers.

“Is there trouble, kitten?” Lizae asked seeing the worried face of the child.

“I don’t have any good socks! It is so cold at night!” the girl said almost too calmly but still had an expression of grief painted in her face.

Lizae had no idea of what socks was, but decided to try and make the merchant give her some as well, and just then the merchant appeared from the crowd again. He was carrying a large crate, and one of the assistants was behind him with a backpack that looked stuffed full.

“Okay Miss. Lizae, here you go.” The merchant said, and placed the heavy looking crate on the market-stand. He then flipped the lid off, and started to produce one outfit from another outfit that he offered Lizae.

Lizae had no idea of what would look okay, or be practical for a long travel on foot, so she looked to her guide a lot of time, getting help for what to take.

She ended up with some human undergarment, that made Lizae wriggle her nose, ‘Supportive’ the merchant claimed, ‘good for taking some of the burden from her front’.

Then she also laid claim to two long sleeved shirts, for the cold days in the mountains, he had said. She got pants with some pockets in them, one of them were in a mottled pattern, for hunting.

Some short-sleeved shirts were also given, for the warm days ahead in the coming summer. She too was given two pairs of leather gloves, one without fingers, and one with.

The merchant told her to try the clothes on so he could judge if it was appropriate. Lizae did. And it responded in a pat on her head from her small guide.

“These pants’ be falling off, and no room for Lizaes’ tail.” Lizae said, holding her newly acquired pants in a stiff grip to keep her tail forcing them down.

The merchant apologized and took a new pair and sat down behind the stand, and began working fast with a knife and a needle and thread.

Lizae made a mental note not to steal the shiny needle, however shiny they might be, they could hurt her if she grabbed them. It seemed to work, and she was soon standing in some modified human pants. Waging her tail to check the new hole, she said that they were still falling down, and the trader simply gave her a plain leather belt. Afterwards it worked like a charm, although Lizae would still have to get used to the whole, getting dressed thing.

When she had gotten all the excess clothes in her new backpack, she asked the trader if she could have some pairs of socks... whatever they was...

The merchant had laughed at first but then retrieved three pairs of the item in demand and handed them to Lizae.

“Thanks’ to you, mister.” Lizae thanked the merchant, who said it had been an honour, and that he would need to write some things on her letter from the jarl.

While he was writing things down on the letters blank side, he explained:

“You see, miss. Lizae, while you don’t get to pay for the clothes, the jarl will instead. So when you have gotten the rest of your gear, I suggest you give him this letter back, or hand it to one of his soldiers, they will know what to do with it.” The trader said, not looking up once from his furious writing.

“And while you are still here, I will say that this is not the first time the jarl does this, a lot of prisoners get sentenced to ‘honour by exploring’, and there for I will direct you to the White-Stream Blacksmith, for your weapons and armour.” The merchant said and gave back the now written letter, to Lizae, who carefully placed it in the smaller backpack on her hip.

She left the tailor shop, now dressed in human pants, shirt and a good large backpack filled with various supplies and extra clothing, and still leaving room for whatever, like loot and booty! Humans were just as possessed with personal belongings as she was, maybe even more.

The backpack did cause her already shackled wings some more stress, it would be nice to unfold her wings and just stretch them till she could feel her joints make a pop.

“Glow? Glow?” Lizae heard from somewhere near her left leg. It was her guide wanting the socks.

“Yes little kitten, Lizae have cloth to you.” Lizae said and rummaged through her new backpack, and found the three pairs of socks and handed them to the small girl, who was standing with her arms extended waiting for the gift.

“Here you are. Can you then lead Lizae to ‘tis blacksmith?” She asked the girl, who nodded excitedly, and grabbed Lizaes hand to lead her away from the market area.

When they where free from the bashing and rushing of people they proceeded down a wide and well kept alley. Lizae could hear water in the near distance. And the air was not longer clouded by the many beer sellers and kicked up dust from the market square. Instead the air felt brisk and salty, only proving that there was a stream up ahead, down the alley.

“Lizae not see stream, before. No river leading into city from outside.” Lizae stated questionable to the girl.

The small guide turned around, and explained; “Well, it’s a hidden stream, from the ground, it springs up around the city, all the way from top to bottom.” She told with a childish voice, and pointed to a small looking mill up ahead, nestled right next to a fast flowing stream. Lizae could see a small cave from where the stream flowed from, and it went past the mill, and disappeared in another miniature cave.

They stepped over a stone bride and entered the blacksmith from the front door, which had the sign: “White-Stream smith.” This was the place, Lizae knew.

The inside was dimly lit, and it was warm and humid, from the steam emitted by the cooling water used by the blacksmith, the forge was an orange glowing behemoth standing in a corner, sending off wave after wave of both concentrated heat and black smoke. A smith in a brown thick leather apron was standing near the forge with a hammer and was operating the forge, its back turned to the door. Cling! Cling! The hammer said. Cling! Cling!

Lizae raised her head and tried to catch the smiths’ attention by waving her arms, but when it did not work out, she made her way around the metal and wood worktable. She reached the working smith that had not stopped hammering at any point. When she was standing right behind the smith, the hammering stopped, allowing Lizae to speak up:

“Allo! Lizae, name of ‘tis one” She introduced herself, and added; “I no glow harm”

The smith stiffened and placed the hammer on the edge of the anvil, turning around slowly.

It was a black skinned human, somewhat uncommon up here in the north, however Lizae felt a comfort by this colour, as it assured her that her own main-fur colour was brown. He had a bald head and a surprised look in his face. He quickly brushed his hands off in the apron, and raised his hand to shake hands, the human custom.

“You’re that fur-man from the trial, good to see you here and not in the dungeon!” He said enthusiastic and lead Lizae to worktable and addressed her to a chair.

“You know, I was in the trial council.” The smith said, sitting down on the opposite side, and then signalled the small guide to come in as well.

“Some of the other members actually voted you should be banished, heh, even old grumpy Barthes wanted you executed.” He laughed. Lizae instantly covered her face with her fluorescent blue tainted hands. Execution?!

“Oh no! Don’t worry, nobody else believed that old elf. He is just old and tired after all the lynnex campaigns; he is just misunderstanding things’ a lot after that.” The smith assured, still smiling.

Lizae relaxed a bit more, and lowered her hands, muttering a small apology. Then she hastily brought the letter up, from the Jarl.

“Lizae have gotten, ‘tis letter...” Lizae started, but was cut off by the blacksmiths waving hand.

“Yeah, I know, I know. I was there, miss. I voted for the honour challenge” He said and rose to his feet, gesturing Lizae to do the same. She did.

“Now I am going to measure your details, so I can find the best suit of armour for you. I presume a leather hauberk, so you can still fly, hmm?”

Lizae nodded, and soon after the smith had measured her head, ears, shoulders, bust, abdomen, waist and ankles, as well as the length of her digitigraded, clawed feet.

Lizaes’ little guide went on her way, after having waited for a half hour. Lizae sat on her behind in the chair at the workbench, while the black-blacksmith went to assemble the perfect fitting armour for Lizae. He occasional measured another detail on Lizae, but other than that he was totally absorbed by his task.

In total it turned out to be one unexciting hour for Lizae. She had made a charcoal drawing of a lush apple tree, and some winged bats as herself flying around the tree in a peaceful manner. Up in the tree was a striped, feather winged fur-man, with the sun behind her.

Finally the smith returned with a fawn full of leather, some of it was studded with bolts, and some of it had some small chainmail parts. He dumped it all on the workbench.

“Now miss. We can start trying it out! How much of a burden can you fly with?” The smith asked Lizae, grabbing up his note book, with Lizaes’ drawing. Simply grunting at the drawing she had made.

“Lizae not so good fly with stuff. But Lizae thinks ‘tis backpack is near the top of my strength. But ‘Lizae can carry more if only short fly.” Lizae said after some thought.

“Good then!” the smith said, grabbing the hauberk from the pile and asked Lizae to stand and get it on. After some rummaging, the smith showed her how to take it on fast, and how it worked. It was double reinforced leather, chest piece, with straps allowing for tight and good fitting. It was studded with bolts on the front and the shoulder pieces where partly made of chainmail. Lizae thought it looked very protective.

“It will not save you from a stab or a very hard slash; it will really just protect you from minor slashes and attacks. Oh, and maces will crush you, even if it wore a plate mail” The smith said, pointing at various points at the hauberk, while he talked. “Best to just not get hit.”

Lizae stood model for the armourer, in nearly another hour, as most of the pieces did not fit properly, and that her wings proved to be a problem. It was all solved in the end, and she was standing in a full suit of studded leather armour, complete with hauberk, armoured gloves, knee plates, shin guards, helmet, and some small armour piece looking a bit akin shoes.

Lizae could feel the weight of the entire thing, and said she would not be able to fly very good in the whole thing.

The smith asked her what kind of fighting style she was planning to use, if she encountered any of the many creatures out in the mountains.

“Lizae always fly away when big, nasty bear or great ape tries and fight. They no fly. Lizae go new cave, and be live there.” She said. Remembering the creatures she had flown away from, in her time living above the city of Ut-Sted. There had not been many of the things that close to the large city, that both had hunters and soldiers’ patrolling the area and keeping it clear of trolls, ogres, bandits and aggressive fur-man tribes and of course the occasional Lynnex scout or assault. If she were to journey through the mere up around, it would be more crowded with wild-life and lawless people.

“So you will just abandon your mage buddy? I mean, Echo is well known to be an experienced traveller, but you could help him out.” The smith said, crossing his muscular arms across his chest.

“Lizae will fight! But not with this must weight on me.” She said, lifting the small helmet from her azure coloured hair.

“Okay, drop all armour, except for the hauberk, knee plates and the gloves. You’ll be glad for those!” the smith said, helping her out of the other armour pieces. “But what kind of weapon, can you see yourself using?”

“Can, smith show Lizae weapons?” Lizae asked, not knowing anything about weapons.

“Oh yes I can, follow me, miss!” The smith told and motioned her to follow him to another room, just one door away. It was an armoury, the walls filled with rags and rows of different weapons. There were a lot of weapons, swords in all shapes, some of them even looked glasslike and transparent. There were spears of all lengths, claymores, curved and broad ones, and bows, quivers filled with arrows and large battleaxes and pole arms. On one of the walls there were only short swords and daggers.

Lizae did not know anything about them, and what they were good for. She had not even considered that the outside really was that dangerous on foot, all the wild creatures and bandits just waiting to make a few pieces of gold off an exocentric little glowing bat-lady.

“Lizae, not know what they for use.” She said, looking over some cast away steel maces, lying on top of a crate.

The smith took down one of the glasslike sword, with a broad head.

“I reckon that you’d want to use one of the eleven weapons. They are very light and stronger than the average steel. They are however somewhat dull, compared to the steel and iron swords.” He said, giving the glasslike sword to Lizae.

It was a short sword, broad head, slim body, and an edge that seemed a bit thick compared with the centre. She held the sword by its handle very loosely, not sure what she was supposed to do.

“Well, swing it, bat!” the smith said, and stood back a bit.

Lizae did so, a stroke to the left. But when she had nearly finished the stroke, she lost her grip by the arc she had made, and the sword flew from her hand and clambered down on the cobblestone floor. The sword skipped to the corner with a loud noise. Lizae gasped and jumped back freighted by her fault.

“Lizae sorry!” she gasped, lowering her ears and went to pick up the sword.

“Strike again!” the smith yelled from the door entrance. “Actually, just stay here until you have tried all the weapons, and come back in the workshop when you know which you like.” He said, turning his back to her to walk out.

“Just don’t damage anything.” He said as a final sentence, and then he was out the door, leaving Lizae to herself and the room full of weapons. A bit later she could hear hammering from the workshop again. He apparently did not have time to watch a dumb bat of a fur-man choose a weapon. Well maybe not dumb, just truly inexperienced.

Another hour passed in the room, and the sun outside of the windows was setting fast behind the distant mountains. Lizae could feel the growing cold, even though the environment inside the weapons storage room was nice and warm from the nearby, working forge.

She had tried out all of the different weapons, very carefully, not to make some wild swing and hit her own wings or anything of herself. She had not dropped any of the weapons except for the first one.

Lizae had tried the maces, claymores, spears, axes, swords, daggers and attempted to string one of the bows, but had given up. Eventually she had decided on the glasslike eleven short sword from the beginning. Mostly because it was not that large, and it had a very small weight.

She exited the storage room and headed into the dark workshop again. The room lit up by her entrance, she was emitting an awful lot of clear blue light. And she gave the whole room a one shaded appearance, only interrupted by the orange glow from the hissing forge.

She carefully placed the sword on the worktable, and gave a small shout, calling for the smith, who was still working near the forge.

“Heh, you sure do glow an awfully lot, princess” The smith said walking away from the forge. Lizae had not been called a princess before, but it was her real title. Banished or not. She simply did not want to be looked upon as a higher standing person, because she did not feel like that.

“Please no call Lizae, princess. Lizae no like!” she said with a frown and crossed her glowing arms, hiding one of them, diming the light somewhat in the process.

“Oh okay, miss. I thought so... Now, you have chosen a weapon? Good!” the smith said enthusiastic and picked up the glasslike eleven blade. “A good choice really. I can think of a few fighting styles you could use, and with your wings you could do them even better.” He said.

“But that will give me two more things; I want you to have with you out there. First off, can you read, miss? “The black skinned smith asked, beginning to reach for a shelve nearby, and drew out an old book, while Lizae said:

“Yes, Lizae read some... Not good though.” She said, remembering that one book about basic magic she had stolen once... she had read it a lot, but had not understood an awful much of it.

“Here, this is a book about swordsmanship – or at least the basics of it. I have no need of it, but I bet you would, here, take it!” he said, and threw the book to Lizae who caught it with a left hand.

It was not the biggest book she had seen, it was even smaller than the magic-book she had at her cave. She curiously opened it to see what the text would look like; It was large and easy to read letters, supposedly because warriors not was that inclined to read.

She read the first paragraph:

“WARROR TRAINING IS A MUST FOR ALL WARRIORS’. THIS BOOK WILL SHOW YOU THE BEST WAY TO USE A SWORD, CHAPTER ONE; PARRY...”

This she could understand easily and it made her feel more confident in her soon to be new abilities.

“Is good book” Lizae said, “Then what second item you give Lizae is...?” She asked, hoping it to be something shiny... ‘oh no! Not that feeling again!’ Lizae thought. Getting afraid if she might have stolen something by accident, she quickly laid the book away and searched her pockets for anything unusual.

Her pockets where empty, thank the goddess.

“What was that for?” the smith asked, noting Lizaes’ hectic search. “Did your brain mess up?”

Lizae could only agree, yes her head was messed up at times.

“Well then, the second item I wanted to give you is a good dagger, because you never go out in the field with just ONE weapon.” He said, emphasising the ‘ONE’ while gesturing the eleven blade on the workbench.

He then quickly disappeared into the storage room, and came back out with a smaller blade, in the same style and shape as the sword, glass-like as well. He then placed both items on the workbench and told Lizae to just wait one moment so that he could find the correct sheets for them. While he did that, Lizae reflected over the last few days.

She had waked up one morning, finding herself wounded and in possession of a whole lot more loot than she was used to. Then a human-hunting party had forced her out of the sky and knocked her out. She had then been roused in a prison with a maniac of a guard and had been stabbed AND healed during the same hour. She had then been transported during night and most of morning to the central city, and been judged and had spoken with the jarl of her new punishment.

She had wandered the market, gotten clothes as a human would and weapons and armour as an adventure would have. Very busy day indeed. But not all that confusing.

Soon she would need a place to sleep... a tree would do fine she thought. Actually... she did have that letter from the jarl; maybe she could try and sleep in a real inn! A real one! She would try and sleep in a bed, just like all the other races did. No upside down sleeping tonight she thought happily.

She had lost herself in the thought of a warm hay filled bed that she had a big grin in her face. The smith had backed away a bit since it looked very intimidating with all of her teeth exposed. Even though she was missing one large fang.

“Miss? Why are you... smiling?” the smith asked cautiously, not handing Lizae the sheeted eleven sword just yet.

Lizae regained her composure, and closed her mouth with a ‘snap’.

“Uh... sorry, Lizae thinking about warm bed... first time sleeps in inn!” she told, not being able to force her grin all the way off.

The smith gave a quick laugh of this information, and offered her to follow him to one of the best inns in the city.

Lizae accepted. And so she followed him just after she had received all of her new eleven weapons, and he had wrote something in the letter from the jarl. She admired her own view in the stream as they passed.

Lizae was standing a bit shorter than the average human, with a height of just 150 centimetres. Lizae was build slim, but lean so she could fly easily. Her waist is thin, but her hips large, holding much power for Lizae to be able to jump into the air and fly.

She had large brown eyes that looked soft and round. Her fur colour was a light brown with white-blue spots dotted around her brown fur. Her hands, feet, tip of ears, wing joint and muzzle were the entire glowing white-blue colour. The underside of her tail was bluer than white, and the brown topside of her tail had no spots.

Her shoulder length hair had a dark azure colour. Her large and floppy, bunny like ears were placed high on her head, poking upwards most of the time, lowering when she felt in another mood than content. Her ears would pivot against sudden noises and objects of her own interest.

She had large leathery wings attached to her back, right behind her normal shoulders. They where folded neatly behind her most of the time, but allowed her to fly, if it was not for the metal shackles currently holding her wings from moving up or down. In some bizarre way, Lizae realised she had four arms. Not that it was that uncommon. All flyers and taurs would have six limps in total. Even the legendary four winged felines and spidery driders had more limps, eight.

She was wearing some dark grey pants with a lot of pockets, a shirt with short sleeves, and on top of that, a studded leather hauberk. She also had armoured gloves and some knee-guards.

At her side there were hanging two simple leather sheets, one bigger than the other, for her short sword and dagger. On her back, below and hidden behind her wings, a red-brown backpack was placed, looking filled with various supplies. She also had a smaller bag hanging from the bigger one. This one contained her letter and the map with her home tribes’ cave marked on it; the bags were within her reach if she should need anything from them.

All in all, she was looking pretty much like a real adventure. She just did not feel like one just yet, but the outfit sure did help towards that feeling.

Lizae followed the bald, black skinned smith across the now dark city. The sun would settle really fast behind the mountains. So it was only natural that people here slept early and awoken early. In fact, Lizae was sure she could see some houses light disappearing as their lanterns was closed.

They walked in the cold mountain air, feeling the wateriness of the air, and the slight breeze, moving the leaves around. Lizae wagged her tail, just a little bit. She was feeling a bit more confident already.

She was missing her fang though. And the prison where the other guard had been, was too far away if she could not fly. It looked like all she could do was to meet up with the mage, at their district, and hope he would understand why she needed her fang again... well, she did not need it that much, but it would take a long time before she would grow a new one.

In fact; she was not even sure if her race could grow new teeth. But it seemed possible that she could, since back at home it was custom among the males to keep punching at each other, to see how could knock whose fangs out first, to win some woman. That was how things worked back there... lot of unnecessary violence.

That mage she was going to travel with better had to be a good mage... the smith had said his name once... Emca? Elow? No, Echo! Just like the shout she could do... what a coincidence. Lizae the bat princess and Echo the mage. Fit okay, she thought.

The two wanderers had come to an end outside of a white polished building with three stories.

“This is the only eleven driven inn in the whole city of Ut-Sted. And it is also the best inn here!” The smith said, and gestured Lizae to go inside.

She approached the door, a white, big in scripted thing, with two handles. Since she could not read elfish, she skipped reading them and opened the doors.

The first impression to her was the colour white. She had no idea that walls could be so white.

It was a room with a lot of furniture’s, and unlike the dwarfs’ inn, they were not dirty, and people did not sit in them to drink, but to talk and dine. There were one set of stairs, leading up to the other floors. She also realized that everything in here was made of wood. Even the windows, and the glasses people were using for what appeared to be normal water.

Lizae sniffed in the air to smell what there was to smell. The odour was like the forest she had lived in once before getting chased off by some angry bears. She could link the smell to the peaceful time she have had there.

She walked to the only counter in the room, located in the centre of the whole thing. It was occupied by one eleven lady with long ears, reaching backwards in a swooping way. She was also dressed in white that looked like it had been stitched together by grass. She had long flowing blonde hair, and a fittingly beautiful face. A bit longer chins than the humans had, making them look more meaningful and petite. She was also a bit taller than the already short Lizae. This was why the humans also included them in the “lesser race” philosophy. But not by much.

“How can I help this glow-princess?” The elf sang. Making Lizae doubt the prettiness of her own, rusty voice.

“Errr...” Lizae started, looking around to get help from the blacksmith. As Lizae had spun around a few times she noticed that the blacksmith was no where around. He had done what he had said he would; lead her to the best inn in town. Then he had apparently gone back. Lizae blushed a bit because of her own failure of awareness.

“Is there a problem miss?” the white elf sang. A slight discerning frown forming on her graceful brows.

Lizae started to stutter in her speech. “N-no. There is no problem... p-please call me L-Lizae.” She stuttered.

“Lizae, like to have room, for tonight.” She ordered, remembering it was still an inn. “And Lizae would like some food, for now, please.”

The elf looked a bit puzzled by Lizaes requests, not that it was uncommon to order food, and just that Lizae had not even looked at the places’ menu card, which was branded everywhere in both common language and elfish.

“How will you pay for all that? And what would you like to eat?” the elf asked nicely, giving a menu card for Lizae to take.

Lizae held the card in stiff arms, looking at it oddly; she did not know what to do with it. She had having never really been at an inn before. Let alone actually be welcomed at an inn before.

“What are Lizae to do with this? Read it?” Lizae asked, opening the menu card and skimmed the first few lines... then it dawned on her.

“OH! Lizae choose food from card and then elf brings Lizae food?! Yes?” She asked in a loud speak, confirming her suspicion and slapping an armoured glove to her lightly furred forehead, with a small ‘slap’.

The elf looked even more perplexed now. Baffled that the fur-man did not even know what a simple menu card was. She raised an eyebrow and asked:

“Well, yes that is what they are for, but how will you pay for what you choose?” the elf was no longer talking in that singing voice, but it still sounded pretty.

“Oh! Yes, Lizae is punished by great Jarl, give Lizae letter. Here, here!” Lizae said, opening the smaller of her backpacks, finding the letter there. She carefully made sure it was okay from being in the bag, and then she placed it on the counter, with the text part headed towards the bartending elf.

The elf looked at the letter; she read it very fast and then flipped it over to write on it.

“There we go, miss. You can now order whatever you wish.” The elf said, “Now... I will have a room prepared for you soon, you can sit at any table and a waiter will be right with you.” She finished, gesturing her towards the many tables in the room. Lizae then took back the letter, and went to have a seat on the nearest table. Her clawed feet making loud clicking noises against the stone floor.

Just when she had taken a seat at the table, a waiter arrived to assist her, but not without some warning, as he addressed his arrival talking.

“Miss, I must tell you to walk differently, as your claws seem to do damage to the floor.” He told in a nonchalant manner. “Now, what would you like to eat?”

Lizae was taken aback by the elf that seemed twofaced. First he had corrected her in a rather peaceful manner, but still a correction nonetheless. Then he had offered her food... ‘Oh well’ she thought, elves would be elves...

Lizae made and apology for the stone floor, then turned to read the menu card. The elf patiently waited for her to choose what meal she would have. She did have some trouble as most of the dishes she could order was described as something else, like the Man’O’meal, coome’se’parisane. Many words she did not know what meant. She asked the elf a lot, and finally decided on a simple dish made of fish and potatoes, shrimps, mushrooms and an alcohol Lizae had never heard of.

The waiter elf made a nod, and then walked away, heading for the kitchen area.

Lizae took the time to look around some more, mainly noting the other people there was in the wooden, white elfish inn.

She was not the only fur-man in here. But she was the only one with actual fur. The other fur-man, or scale-man, was a lizard like man, with a lizard like face; he did not have fur or hair for that matter, but had small red feathers on his head. The green lizard man was dressed nicely and seemed to fit in good. He was eating like you could expect a gentleman to. A red steak, a piece of meat, Lizae saw. That made her own mouth water, and she was expecting her own food more now.

The rest of the room was filled with normal humans and elves dining in peace.

Lizae sat for ten minutes, just playing with her tail, making it dud around the tabletop lazily. The natural glow from her tail bounced around in the appealing and shiny wooden table. When the elf came with her food, Lizae quickly brushed off her tail from the table, and saw some strands of glowing hair still there. She brushed them off hastily as well.

Her dish was served together with the alcohol and a jug of water.

She casually poked at her fish with a fork; it looked very different from the ones she had once eaten. It was yellow and orange, she was told, when she had asked about the colour.

Perplexed she picked it up disregarding the fork, and gave the fish a light nibble. She munched a bit on the fish, for a while and decided that it tasted good. So she quickly swallowed the whole fish, bones and all.

She noticed that she was being watched by both the bar-elf, and the lizard man.

The bar-elf had a serious frown, while the lizard man was snickering, clearly enjoying the simple dining approach of Lizaes way to eat.

She gave both of them a one-fanged smile, and proceeded though her dish. The potatoes were nice too, and warm. She had never eaten boiled potatoes before, but she enjoyed it immensely.

She found nothing wrong with the shrimp or mushrooms, only that they were both covered in what she believed to be honey. The fact that the shrimps were still in their shell when Lizae ate them only proved to grant her enjoyment, as she giggling would try and enhance the ‘Crunch’ sound of the shrimp by chewing differently each time.

Then she wanted to figure out what the alcohol was… she had tried alcohol before, as she often found herself with beer and the likes after her nightly raids.

But this mead-like drink was bubbling with shiny bubbles, which did not burst at the surface; but continued up in the air for a little time. She tentatively took a tiny sip of the drink. Then spat it back in the mug quietly. She moved the mug to the side, and drank some of the cold and pleasant water instead.

After Lizae had done eating; the table was a mess. Small pieces of shrimps, mushroom and orange fish was littered over the small area. She ate up the biggest of them then rose to talk with the bar-elf.

She walked differently this time, trying only to walk on her footpads, and not her clawed toes.

The elf was expecting Lizae to want a room now and quickly led her up the stairs to the top floor. Here she opened a door and said this would be her room for the night, and asked what time she would like to be awoken, and have a breakfast.

“You be good elf, can please wake Lizae, late morning?” Lizae asked while looking at her sleeping room. Then the elf left with a small nod.

It was not the largest room she had seen; there really was just one bed, a drawer, and a door that lead to a private restroom. The whole room was not as white as the main room below had been, but was darker and more colored. Or so Lizae thought, as many of the grayscales were something she had begun to connect with actual colours.

The bed was a big thing, lots and lots of puffy blankets and pillows. She took a step towards the restroom after having looked at the bed. There was a bathtub, and some rows filled with towels and bottles, which content Lizae could smell from the door entrance.

She deicide that a bath would be good before she could go nuzzle down in the bed.

Two hours later, Lizae was standing in front of the window, behind her, there were a lot of white towels scattered around. She was wearing one herself. It had taken a few tries to get the bathtub to work, and then she had submerged herself in the water, pretending to be an orange fish.

She had then explored the many bottles of scent there was present – most of them made her wriggle her nose. She eventually found one that reminded her of a red, thorny flower she had once smelled. She had poured the entire bottle down in the bathtub – ‘what a good scent I will make.’ She thought.

She had left the water inside the tub, for the next person who would use this room; it would be a waste of good water otherwise.

After having looked out at the night sky, she jumped up onto the bed, clawed feet tearing up some of the puffy blankets. She dropped to all four and thought about how she was to sleep on the whole thing.

Lying on her side did not work as her wings where in the way, neither did lying on her back, due to the shackles. The best position she could find was lying on her stomach, but the whole thing made her dizzy, also again caused by the shackles.

Lizae then spotted the ceiling; it had a support beam that looked very sturdy. She could sleep from up there! So she grabbed a blanket and wrapped it around her body, making sure her wings were free, then defied gravity with a high and powerful jump and attached her clawed feet to the wooden beam.

‘Much better’ she thought, now getting really relaxed and tired from her upside down position.

Carefully wrapping her wings around her body, Lizae fell asleep.