What an Odonine Mess

JP with Alexis, Gonyaul and Hunter:

Save from her bleeding hand and an extensive collection of bruises, Alexis was alright. Since Hunter clearly was, as well, she only nodded to him and began her way back to Alcuin and Gonyaul.
As her gaze fell upon the mutilated corpse of the formerly merely unconscious attacker, her eyes narrowed.

She wouldn’t cry for him, Pillars knew how many travellers had fallen victim to this brigands before they met Zinheim today. But there was something to be said about the brutality exercised on a helpless person, no matter what a sgumag they may have been.

Malacost became aware that the fighting had come to an end. Acting upon his thoughts would have blown his cover, so he let the pickaxe just rest down upon his shoulder and he reached out a hand to Gonyaul to help him.

“You going to be alright there young man?”

Gonyaul nodded and took the hand to aid him to his feet. Malacost helped to brush him off a little and then gave him a pat on the back.

“Yeah, you’ll be fine.” He smirked and started heading back to the horses and the others.

Gonyaul’s horse was about a hundred yards ahead in the ravine. He finished brushing himself off and massaged his neck as he walked back as well. He felt like he got thrown around quite a bit.

Gonyaul smiled and waved to the others further up ahead. He was so glad everyone was alive.

As everyone begun collecting their respective horses and gather together, Alexis took a short moment to clean and bandage the cut in her palm.

Looking about the bloodshed, she wondered where those brigands even came from. Probably not the Aghul. She was fairly certain they indeed wouldn’t attack anybody officially allowed to travel here. No one said they would provide protection, as well.

“We really didn’t need the delay.”

Gonyaul finally met up with the others. He put a hand on Alexis’s arm, reconnecting with his friend and thankful she was alive. He would retrieve his horse when they started moving forward again.

He tried to say something but it came out raspy and faint. He frowned and just nodded instead. It didn’t feel great to talk. His culture was used to using sign language as its primary language, so that didn’t bother him as much. Alas, no one here knew how to sign.

The two hand prints on his neck were still visible and the bruising was starting to show.

He made a gesture, that resembled should we bury the dead?

Alexis frowned at the abuse her friend had suffered, hand ghosting over the bruises on his neck but refraining to apply any pressure.

To his question, she shook her head no. Not only were they talking ten quite massive bodies here, the ground wasn’t exactly soft.

“That would take too much time we don’t have. At best we can burn them.”

No clue what the proper Odonine burial rites were. Or wether they would even be applied to muggers like this.

Malacost was already moving the bodies into a pile while the rest of them cleaned up and regrouped from the fight.

“Burn them. Meeting Zinheim without a proper burial would be like a wedding without a wedding dress.” He directed to Alexis. Then paused, thinking … yeah she probably hasn’t worn a dress in her entire life.

He looked to Gonyaul, “or like you not wearing a wedding dress.” He chuckled and went back to work piling and dragging bodies. It appeared he was trying to lighten the mood. In fact, Malacost took all things Zinheim very seriously.

Alexis squeezed Gonyaul’s shoulder and began to aid Alcuin with collecting the bodies. She agreed with not just leaving them to rot, and the faster they got this done, the faster they could move on.

Gonyaul gave a frustrated expression. He isn’t wearing a dress, it is a … oh never mind he thought. He likewise began helping. It looked like he was struggling handling the dead bodies, turning a little greener but was able to hold it together. He had to stop though when it came to the ones that were grotesquely disfigured. He excused himself to help clean up the horses and retrieved Amu.

Hunter watched as Gonyaul and Malacost were stacking bodies to burn. He noticed Gonyaul looked bruised and battered and Malacost seemed in better condition than Alexis. It was obvious this prospector worshiped Zinheim and had an odd sense of humor like Tarmen, however it irked Hunter that Malacost was in high spirits despite the situation. However he kept his thoughts to himself for now.

When the will of Zinheim had been sufficiently fulfilled and the brigands might or might not be led to his garden by the cleansing fire devouring their corpses, Alexis decided they should no longer tarry.

They had already lost too much time to this incident.

And so they mounted their horses to make good use of the already dwindling daylight.

They rode as far as they dared before the mercenary asked Hunter to look for a spot to spend the night.