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Caleb let her pass before kicking his horse into motion, his hand on his sword as he watched the ranger's back.

"There are crossbowmen up ahead," he finally said, "I want your complete cooperation, you understand? These are the Borderlands and I'm sure I can find out what I need in the wilderness as well as I can in Yvette's Keep. No one will interrupt someone with her heraldry."

He licked dry lips and covertly glanced around. How did the ranger know about the crossbowmen? They were upwind, around the bend in the brush... he'd taken every precaution to ensure even someone of her talents wouldn't know about them in advance. But then again, she was a ranger. Perhaps she did have senses he did not, just as he was attuned to dragons.

"Just keep moving and there won't be any trouble," he muttered, "And if there ARE dragons, I can handle them." And he smiled and gently caressed the clasp of his cloak.

"Oho," the voice said, slightly amused, "What spirit! For your information, I do not care about the prophetess. I'm here for you... just for you. You've attracted my attention, see? I know your future and I'm afraid it's not a good one. And I like your... pluck. I've got a deal for you." The voice became like silk. "It's a much better one than the one Caleb has in mind. Just do what I tell you to and you'll survive this - no - better than survive. You'll be stronger than the dragons. You'll be able to stand against the pawns of Sain even! How about that now? Beats torture, a knife across the throat, and a shallow grave, hrrrrm?"

Why did everyone have to remind her that she was in the Borderlands, the ranger thought to herself with exasperation. Was it because she was female? Granted one with swords was not all that common, but still.

At least she learned that there really were men with bolts waiting around the corner even though she did not get to catch the high guard's full reaction as she would have liked.

"Of course you have my cooperation. Can't give the crossbow men a reason to earn more pay, can we?" she answered to Caleb as she nudged Dulcimer to faster speeds. "If you want whatever dragon is tailing us, by all gales, you're free to handle it -or them- all to yourself." Her voice hailed a little louder this time as the noise of the hoof beats picked up.

To the voice in her head, Jay's initial reaction was to tell it off and inform it that she didn't make deals with dragons. One word stopped her though. One word that she had given up on and did not expect to hear, one that this voice should not have known.

What do you know of Sain? she mentally asked with a growl, cutting straight to what she wanted to know.

Caleb remained stoically silent, obviously dismissing any further conversation with the ranger. The voice, however, was obviously not done.

'Quite a bit,' it said pleasantly, 'You can consider me superior to Sain... I'm older and the power he commands is mine as well. Except while Sain used to be mortal, well, I've never tasted that end of the spectrum. Now here's an interesting tidbit - Sain knows your future as well. And yet he's left you here to be killed in one fashion or another. Isn't that... hrm, I can't quite find the word. Callous? But you already know him for what he is, don't you?'

Images flitted through Jay's head, much as Sain had so easily invaded. These were just pictures though, each one showing Jay a possible future that branched off this apparently critical moment in time for her. The last one lingered and it showed Jay alive and well, flying high above the earth with the steady beat of wings around her.

'No, I am not a dragon,' the voice said after the barrage was done, 'I am far older. So. Do you wish to live? You'll need help - specifically mine. While Sain used you for his own ends and then simply LEFT you I'm offering something better. There's a price. There always is. Interested? If not, I'll leave you.'

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Post for Rakura coming later!

"Some say that the Binding is our justice." Tarketh relaxed, falling into the smooth rhythm of reciting old legends. "Our way to take from you the very thing you took from us - freedom. We were lords and masters of the sky... now we crawl until we find a way to take our freedom back. Steal it as your kind stole it from us."

He stood, spurs scraping onto the stone, and leaned over the pit.

"Maybe it is justice. They took my wings before I was even born. I took them back... and continue to take what I wish."

He unclasped the spur around his front leg and held it out, dropping it at the human's feet. Tarketh looked around and flicked his tail, causing metal to sing out as he flipped a human-sized dagger off a table. This too fell to the pit.

"I cannot fully explain being Bound as I am always the master. But let me give you a taste. That spur before you is poisoned as all of my weapons are. The knife is not. Take your pick. Cut your palm with either of the two - the spur will kill you, not as fast as you'd wish, I'm sure, but death nonetheless. The knife will merely give me the blood I need for the binding ritual."

"Death or slavery. That is what being Bound is. That's what it's like to not have wings. At least you have a choice... so decide."

Unnerved, the ranger remained silent at the voice's departure, her attention diverted when the crossbowmen came out of hiding. With her own unconcealed looks, she scanned the men for possible rank and experience while trying to pick up a few words that they were passing amongst themselves. The whispers were too low, too far away to make out anything of note.

While biting her tongue, the ranger slid down from the saddle and took to walking with her own two feet while leading Dulcimer along. Unless magic was involved, a dead four-day run was impossible with the same horse. Even for a rider it was no easy thing when it meant sleeping in the saddle. She couldn't imagine that the head guard would go to the lengths of such tomfoolery as to not make camp for the night. He was brighter than that.

She still made plans in case.

Four days later, Jay watched as the stone walls grew and the small procession slowed down, the banners that signified who owned the keep rippling in the brisk breeze. It had been nearly a year and a half, maybe two, since she'd last come this close to this hold.

Dulcimer's familiar ambling gate comforted her some as they made there way to a gate. It might have taken riding on another horse part of the way to do it, but she got him here all the same. Granted she cheated and took most of the weighted packs of her horse and put it on the one she was 'borrowing', but it worked.

((Feel free to fast forward up to at/inside the keep itself. RJ will follow Caleb where she is directed.))

Dismounting with the rest of them, Jay waited with Dulcimer's reigns in hand. There were too many men around to do otherwise.

She looked around at the men she was left with, some she had managed to talk with a little around the campfire one or two nights of the ride. There were a few stories swapped, a few tale tales told, though none dared speak of anything related to why the ranger had been tracked down. Even now, they were silent, any camaraderie that might have been struck up on the road was either gone or feigned away. As long as the Baroness had 'plans' for the ranger, she would find no friends here.

Or it could have been their commander's tone that held them in few words. She couldn't have been the only one to catch the subtlety.

"So, how long is he going to be?" the ranger said quietly to the nearest of the guards regardless of how much they probably wanted to distance themselves from her. She wasn't a fool. This wasn't a social visit by any means or the crossbowmen wouldn't have even been involved - at least wasn't a social visit in the traditional sense. Someone, Baroness or not, wanted to speak with her but not over biscuits and drink.

"He won't be back," one of the men said, making to take Dulcimer's reins from her, "He's the Captain. He has other things to worry about now that he's carried out Lady Yvette's orders."

From the archway Caleb vanished into came three newcomers. The men she had rode with backed away, giving respectful bows. The man at the forefront of the group was a mage. He didn't look much different from others, dressed in a fine tunic, jacket, and breeches. However, the runes on his shaved head were enough to signal what he was. The two men following him were well-armed bodyguards.

"She reeks of it," the mage said, probably more to himself than others, "Take her to my lab and bind her."

He narrowed his eyes, glancing her over in quick, jerky pieces. The two men started forwards to take the ranger away.

-He looked at the spur one last time.-
"That's an interesting fact I did not know."
"And Neither did it answer my questions."

-Then he looked at the dagger as this distaste for certain types of dragons was stirring again.-

"Fine, I guess you have another slave."

-He then cut his palm like the dragon instructed earlier after all he is fortunate to be still living. Then he dropped the dagger and applied much pressure against the cut as his hand pulsed and stung from the sweat and dirt.-