FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Imagine if you will, a blasted landscape. Rocks here and there, dry soil mixed with clay and sand...the occasional scrub brush here and there. Barely any shade to be found save for from a few scraggly trees and over tall cacti. Take all of that in, the sun beating down upon you as far as the eye can see, and then right at the crossroads picture what could only be called a shop that looks to have grown right out of the ground. Vines, greenery, tree branches, hanging spanish moss as curtains, a brilliant sign made of flowers and fungus. Now, if you were trudging through this landscape, wounded and battle weary, your rations grown low...would you enter such a riotous place?

Well for Duschesca Von Luftfleiter or Duchess to her friends, both the sight and smell of this well hydrated felt surreal and irresistible. She'd been forced to shed much of her armor due to repeated gnoll, kobold and lizardman attacks. Her mission to rally aid from a neighboring tribe having proven futile as the other tribe was just as embattled as her own and the unclaimed regions between were chaotic and as bandit riddled as could be. She worried some of her wounds might fester, her first aid less than the best and the nigh constant flight from one ambush or another had worn down her great strength and endurance to the point of near collapse.

She struggled the painful limping steps that drew her nearer to the impossible oasis of sorts she was witnessing. Her halberd serving as a crutch to hold her up as she stepped and stumbled closer, finally dropping into a heap a few feet from one of the cool, fruit scented walls of the shack, her helmeted head clanging against a rock before her vision blurred and she blissfully allowed darkness to claim her. Now it was over right? She could forget her mission now, clearly she'd failed and now it was time to rest in the soil...NO!

Struggling against consciousness and weight upon her limbs, Duchess fought to rise of her own strength. She was a proud unwavering shield maiden for her people. The ironhoof tribe were not to quitters nor to be looked down upon! Reaching up and out, she shed layers of weakness and slumber until in a blinding flare of light she closed her hands upon the rigid shaft of her Halberd and pulled her torso up to rest it between her breasts.

"Papa!"

"Shhh, don't worry it will be just fine, remove the sedatives and just wait and see like a good girl."

Duchess could hear voices, one soft and reedy, girlish...the other was odd, muffled, accented but decidedly masculine, just hard to place. Finally opening her eyes she found that the area wasn't that bright, but part of the roof of the store was acting like a forest canopy and allowing a few sun beams to pierce through and illuminate her without the full force of the sun's naked glare. Beneath her she found the ground was spongy with moss, though pulling away further revealed slight tugging from her skin where it seemed roots had grown into her body briefly. Further examination revealed the rock she'd hit her head on present...it was almost as if the shelter had grown larger to cover her as opposed to her having been brought to it...but that was silly, right?

Getting a look at her...saviors? She found a young girl that appeared human at first until you noticed that her hair and clothing were all made of plant matter and it seemed like vines from the room grew into her from various directions that were tricky to verify in polite company. Perhaps a new species of Alraune? The other...now here was the embodiment of the term mystery. Swaddled in white robes, the other person in the shop stood seemingly hunched over with age, the silver trimmed cloth showing many a magical rune or design that she somewhat knew to be tied to alchemy among other spells, but he hood of the robes exposed only a brushed black and silver mask of an owl, the feathers set around the edges ensuring that the cowl was impossible to look into and that the wearer was perfectly anonymous.

At the end of one robed arm a slender limb wrapped in a combination of leather straps and cloth stained black over some sort of inscribing, like bandages having been enchanted and then dyed completely encased hands that looked as if they sported some impressive hooked talons, like perhaps the avian face of the mask, though not even the claws themselves went unwrapped where the alchemist was holding the halberd and centaur steady with surprising strength for such a frail-seeming frame. "There we go...all better now...child? Matilda and....Myself gave you water and treatment. Sadly...you will need to eat and rest a bit more before you can....resume travel."

His voice was like a caressing breeze coming in from across water on a hot dry day. He spoke haltingly as if he had to pause for breath, but he spoke in a gentle whisper that unerringly reached the ear despite how soft it was and yet that implacable accent with its rolling rs. Duchess felt unable to help but relax in his presence as if all of her already belonged to him and he simply hadn't collected it yet. "I..I thank thee for thine timely aid, but I must make haste to my tribe to alert them of the bandit activity in the region."

Once more the centaur struggled to rise only to feel a gentle touch on her shoulder ease her effortlessly back into a partially inclined position, though now the moss and soil rose up in enough of a slope to allow her to feel more like she were lounging than laid out. What form of strength was that he used, she was utterly unable to resist and while he touched her there was a soft coolness like being under deep shade where the sun couldn't reach. She didn't feel weakened, just momentarily overwhelmed without force? "Be still child, Nox willing, all things will be as they should. But if it is dire enough I can send your word by...wing so long as you perform a service in kind that only one of your.....build can. For now, hush child. Shhh."

Duchess felt her fingers slip from around the haft of her Halberd as slumber rose to claim her mind with the command of the alchemist. More words were spoken by him, but she did not understand them, only saw with fading eyes the curtsey his companion gave in response. From there she faded in and out like turning pages in a book casually. His voice somehow having drawn her forth as he wrote on a parchment with a lengthy ebon quill, his script seemingly flowing between the crimson, blue and black of blood with each breath she took, but surely this was imagined as she soon faded once more. Another rise into awareness and it was dark save the soft azure glow of cave moss and strange fungus she did not recognize. A full bladder had awakened her, but then Matilda was there and something was touching her nethers and her discomfort grew with a sense of violation and then there was only pleasure, relief and the bliss of darkness once more.

How much time had was passing? Had she witnessed him sending a scroll away in the grip of a raven? She knew only that she was being treated, pampered and prepared for something...likely her end of a bargain she only vaguely recalled having a say in. Abruptly she was aware all too aware, the last few days was a little fuzzy, but she was on her feet, Matilda speaking to her from behind a curtain as Duchess checked the harness that had replaced her ruined armor about her torso. "Yes, yes I'm ready to pull, I wont fail in this task! I was born for this, this little wagon is nothing before my centaur might!"

Yes, she'd fallen from injury and nature, her dying wish for her news to be delivered to her people. In return, her body was revived in the service of the shop. Yes, that is how she remembered it A fallen warrior was always sworn to the master that carried out their last wish until they could save him in turn. Amazingly her body was wiped clean of scar and blemish, showing only a few silvery bits of script on her face in a few places that looked as much like decorations as anything. She wasn't inclined to think too hard about it and in truth, she never had been the intelligent type. Simple things suited her and as long as everyone was happy and she was using her body, all felt right as if her satisfaction came from some primal place beyond thought and knowledge, like her very blood was telling her everything was as it should be.

In the gloom of the wagon that was once a stall rooted in the ground of a crossroad, a certain alchemist sat quietly in the gloom, pleased with his acquisition, idly considering wether he should create a training and breeding schedule for his new mare and if he should collect any more samples from the local fauna before moving on from this country...truth be told, he did need an errand runner...perhaps a Kobold later.