After the battle, Bedwyr took a shower and with the aid of a druidic acolyte deep cleaned his arm. Little chunks of blood and meat were pulled from the little edges, and Bedwyr felt it steadily function better.
"You should do this after every fight," the acolyte said calmly, as if he were speaking of some innocuous maintenance. He gestured with a particularly dried up strip. "This has been in there for some time, you know."
"I'll keep that in mind," Bedwyr responded calmly.
After that, he fell asleep the instant his head touched the pillows. It was dreamless, blessedly, and it felt like only seconds had passed when he was shaken awake.
He sat up, feeling rested. "How long has it been?" he asked.
"You've been out for almost ten hours," Bedwin answered. The priest took a deep breath. "We've made a choice here, Bedwyr. Originally we were going to land at the hold of the Uncrowned King. Instead we are reaching land as quickly as we can."
Bedwyr nodded. He rose to his feet, pulling on his shirt. "Did the prisoner say anything?"
Bedwin shook his head. "He bit his tongue off and choked to death."
"That is almost more telling than if he told us there are a thousand ships after us."
A snort of agreement. "That's what Sir Pellinore said. So we are getting off the sea. We are out of ammo and have a better advantage on land."
"Armorica?" Bedwyr asked, remembering the burned out husk of a land he left behind so long ago.
"What's left of it," Bedwin confirmed, looking distinctly uncomfortable.
************
It was a clear day, and even from miles away, Bedwyr could make out a strong detail of the approaching realm. What was left of it indeed. There was nothing green on the shore of Armorica anymore. It was a dull, burned-out, black. There truly was nothing alive there anymore.
Pellinore patted his shoulder. "One day, loyal men will live there again." It seemed a hollow sentiment, but the thought was nice.
Bedwyr smiled up at his mentor, trying to put more energy into it than he really felt. It seemed to him that rebuilding such a thing as an entire kingdom would take a long, long, time. Still. One day, when the war was over, maybe it really could work out.
"Regardless, right now it is a burned out hellhole," said Sagramore. He glared across at the approaching continent. "And really, we best hope there isn't anything living there. I don't want to think about what could survive in that environment."
No one said anything more to that, their silence surviving as grim agreement with Sagramore's statement. Without the elements to support human life, or even xenos life, a realm could only support the dead. And those that were never really born.
The dead continent loomed larger and larger, and Bedwyr found himself thinking about when he had fled across this place. How, even on the cusp of invasion, it had seemed so vibrant and clean. It was a corpse now, burned as cold vengeance against the Pendragon.
They landed at a beach, the sand still pale gold to contrast with the black of the burned out earth. Bedwyr shivered. If you only looked to the sea and ignored the land, the place would almost be normal. It would almost be beautiful.
The druids were kind enough to provide them with trailers that connected to Sagramore and Pellinore's cars. They held rations and extra tools.
"Good as we are going to get," Liemire spat. He shook his head as the ship fled away as quickly as it could.
"You can't blame them," said Claire, "a small crew brings less attention, and evidently we have too much of that already."
Bedwyr shivered. It had warmed some, but thinking about how they may be under continued attack was not a pleasant thought. At least they didn't have to worry about being attacked by sea. Knights weren't exactly built for ship-to-ship combat, especially the melee-focused mounts that Pellinore and Sagramore rode into battle.
"Well," declared Pellinore. He looked at his companions. "This is it, the boundary into the Chaoslands. There is no turning back now, we aren't leaving until the Questing Beast is slain." He looked up into the sky. "We move out, and keep moving until night falls, then we set camp. We will keep a regular watch, we don't want to get ambushed out here."
"Really hope we don't have to sleep in our mounts," Sagramore said with a groan.
"It is probably for the best," Pellinore replied sympathetically.
"I was afraid of that."
"Full combat readiness," Pellinore said grimly, "this is our war, after all. Our little branch of this conflict. We have to behave like we are on campaign, like we would if we were off-world fighting for the Imperium."
"I know," Sagramore grumbled, "it is just so blasted uncomfortable." He shook his head. "I fought north in some skirmishes with the Picts, and the worst part, even moreso than the fighting itself, was sleeping in my damn mount."
"Worse than a pointless fight with loyal men?" Pellinore asked.
Sagramore flinched. "Perhaps not that bad. Coel and Caw's fight over who controls the north was a damn waste of time. At least Scathach stayed out of it."
"Scathach only cares about one war," Pellinore said, "her own against Chaos. For good and for bad."
Any further conversation about the north and the conflict between Pict, Graymerians, and Eiremen was dropped as they drove slowly into the dead country. Bedwyr was a bit disappointed, he had been curious and had wanted to know more about the conflicts between the rulers. The idea of open conflict had somehow never quite occurred to him.
He sat at the window and stared out at the ceaseless dark. Melancholy gripped him. Was this really a waste of time? Everything seemed to be falling apart back home without a High King. Did this even really mean anything?
Bedwin settled beside him. "Not a good sight, is it?" the priest asked stiffly. "I brought some books, but I don't think they will last."
Bedwyr grunted a response.
"Most are on theology, of course," Bedwin continued, seemingly just to fill the silence. "But I also brought some technical manuals and a novel I was able to smuggle from the city."
Bedwyr quirked an eyebrow. "A priest reading a novel? How scandalous."
Bedwin smiled. "It is a good book, I'm sure the God-Emperor will find it in his heart to forgive me. They do say Sanguinius wrote novels in his time."
"Is this one of them?" Bedwyr asked curiously. He would be interested, honestly, in reading a book written by a demigod.
"Of course not!" Bedwin declared. "Any copy is no doubt locked away in a Blood Angels Fortress Monastery. Besides, it is probably written in the tongue of Baal, which neither of us can read. No, this is just a tome written by a local woman."
Bedwyr grinned. "Well, I best get used to it, whatever it is. It and theology seem to be the one thing we will have on this trip."
"Pellinore has you reading chivalric texts, does he not?"
"Basically have those memorized," Bedwyr admitted, blushing a little. "I uh...kind of devoured them."
"Would that I had the same energy when it comes to the texts theological," Bedwin confessed. "You are lucky, I suppose. The Code Chivalric changes little among its practitioners. I have to go through dozens of shifting sects and opinions." He shook his head. "It will lead to trouble one day, mark my words. It already has, given the Reincarnationists and Redemptionists."
Bedwyr didn't much want to think about what could be happening if that particular issue was happening on an intergalactic scale. Though surely the Ecclesiarchy had a stronger basis than the fractured, threatened, church on Avalon.
Bedwyr returned to staring out the window, at the dead landscape. Not the true Chaoslands, he knew. This was only on the first step to truly being corrupted into the same corrupted hell. Even he hadn't truly lived in the Chaoslands, but just on the border. And even that was dangerous. He remembered stories from his childhood, and shuddered.
Something, almost invisible through black on black, stirred. He sat up. "Something is alive out there," he whispered.
Bedwin, who had been shifting in his pack, stiffened. "Tell me it is a starving dog or something," he stammered. He shoved his face next to Bedwyr's. "I don't see anything."
Bedwyr looked again, staring straight at the horizon. Nothing. The sense of motion he had noticed was no longer there. "Must have been a trick of the light," he said, a bit embarrassed.
Digging out two heavy, boring, tomes on the theological basis of the Church Imperial, the two quickly forgot what Bedwyr had thought he'd seen.
So they didn't see dark dust rise into the air with the disturbance of something heavy, fly like a tornado for a moment, and then fall back to the ashen earth.
