A Forest On Fire

The Murdered and The Murderer

 Loretta Julya Marietta-Sokolov was more concerned for her beloved creation than her grievous injury. Abraham had already pried her away from Doli and taken Loretta to the hospital; however, the small hospital scarcely had any supplies at all and could only clean and wrap the wound, and, thus, a few hours later, they were sent back to the hotel.

Doli could hardly stand after her run-in with the tuele when she attempted to protect all of them, and Loretta was simply poring and cooing over Doli's dented limbs and kept muttering to herself about how expensive it might be to buy new metal to repair them. Abraham then shuffled over to the girl and began telling her something, but Elliot was keen on hearing what the hell Vincent knew about this and paid them no mind.

Lydia calmly gazed down at the corpse and remained silent throughout nearly all of their conversation.

"What the hell was that, Faust? Do you know what that was?"

"Yeah. I-I do."

"Well?" She said impatiently.

"I'm no stranger to 'em. Miss Blackwater said that there was no English equivalent, right? I wondered why they always called 'em 'tuele'."

Elliot waited for Vincent for continue, for she was in too much of a shock to know that they even existed.

Vincent seemed wary of how to start. "One of 'em attacked me when I had first arrived 'ere. I was camping in the forest 'cause, well, I didn't 'ave a 'ome. It stole somethin' from me and just ran off, but I managed to 'unt it down with the 'elp of some couple nearby and got it back."

"Couple?" Elliot was suddenly brought back down to earth. "What did they look like?"

"They were two guys- one was a blonde, pretty tall, you know- and the other was shorter but an 'ell of a lot stronger. I think 'e was dark-haired, maybe black, but it might'a been brown."

"Did they give you their names?"

Vincent was clearly put off a little, but he told her nevertheless, "No, no, they didn'. I didn' stay with 'em for very long; they jus' let it go after we got my-" he stopped suddenly, apparently not wanting to tell them what it had stolen, but Elliot did not care.

"Do you know where they are now?"

Lydia seemed attentive.

"No, but the place where they found me isn' very far from 'ere. Jus' off the road and a li'le bit into the fores', and I've been workin' 'ere ever since because of the war; I've had an 'ell of a 'ard time tryin' to get back 'ome."

Elliot was a little crestfallen at his words. "This was before the war?"

"A li'le before, but I don' doubt they're still 'ere."

She sighed. "I see. I think we'll have to leave now, Blackwater, Abraham."

"Where will we go, Governor?" Lydia finally spoke now, and she was closer to Elliot.

"I don't think the theatre will be of much use to us, but I think we should check there before we move further into the Jausie, just in case."

Lydia smiled. "Good choice, Governor. Mr. Volleh, will you be joining us?"

He seemed not to have heard her question for a moment, but he stood, his chin buried in his pearly white cravat, and answered Elliot with a melancholy air as if Lydia had not been the one to ask. "Y-Yes, Elliot. Of course, I'll be joining you. This is all because of me, is it not?"

Lydia glanced down at Loretta and bent forward. "And what about you, girl?"

"What are you doing, Blackwater?" Elliot intervened. "She's not-"