To Trap Your Hunter

::: subchapter Ooliri stumbles forward, his sandaled feet dragging over the muddy ground. A green tarsus holds his --- Quessa's foreleg is pulling the gray nymph forward. He looks around this clearing sprawled outside Wisterun's walls, eyeing all the ant majors gripping weapons in their mandibles, and at the white- and black-clad ant intently conversing with the One Who Bites Water --- and at his teammates, Awelah and Makuja, stalking forward with all the determination of trained soldiers. That should be me. Ooliri was the warden (aspiring warden, rather). He'd been trained to defend the banes and bugs of the Windborne Stronghold. Training neither of them had, and yet --- he couldn't even hold a baton straight, could he? What am I doing here? Ooliri has stopped, and Quessa is tugging on his arm. She turns with a frown. "Is something wrong?" "Maybe it would be better if I waited here. I, well, I don't think I'll be of much use on the hunt." The One Who Shapes the Sky Below had been right --- that one is a wise weaver after all. He is an... annoyance. It'd been assumed that he'd follow after the others wherever they went --- but had anyone asked him to come? Did their plans hinge on his capabilities? (Worsening the sting, he remembers a time before these sort of doubts accumulated without challenge. When Oocid was here, when there was someone to depend on, someone who could make him dependable. Yet even if there were no reassurance to be found, even if his brother would only scold or tease him... hearing his voice again would be enough.) "You're a vesperbane," Quessa says. "You're already a step above any laybug." Behind her, where the commander in white and black converses with Bites Water, a blue clad ant glances over at the pair of nymphs. "What if I mess something up?" The green nymph lifts antennae at that, palps parting in --- surprise? Recognition? "You're worried," she says. "Something's shaken you. I could cast Calm Draft?" "No --- no thanks. I'm calm, it's just... the One Who Shapes the Sky Below doesn't seem to like me. Didn't ask me to come. And that one is wise, you know? Maybe that one's on to something." "The one who shapes... yes, right, that." Had she forgotten? There's a chirping form beside her, now. The One Who Bites Water. Quessa casts a light, and this one already has a message woven. "The One Who \[Shapes\] has \[distrust\] of \[bat-bug : all\]. But the one who is \[Duskborn\] has \[adequacy\] and \[pleasantness.\] Not like \[others\]." Ooliri frowns, thinking back to that headache of a conversation down in the ant tunnels. "I guess that one didn't seem to like any of us very much. But why?" "\[Others\] have \[sourness\] in \[firstness\] of \[touch\]. \[Judgment\] has \[spoilage.\]" "Bad first impression? I guess Makuja didn't do us any favors." "Nai! Not the one who is \[knives\]. The one who..." Bites Water has to pause here, reaching into their clothy folds to retrieve a tag. "...\[Boleheva!\] The one who is \[worst\] of \[bat-bug.\]" Before Ooliri can ask for elaboration, a whistle sounds out from ahead of them. "Right, that's the signal. We should probably start moving." Quessa, still clasping Ooliri's tarsi, starts toward the ant in black and white, and he is tugged onward. Bites Water falls into step beside Ooliri, rubbing this one's head against him. Ahead, before they can set off, the One Who Hungers for Spears is approached by a tall major. Rather than a weapon grasped in his mandibles, it's a furry form. Ooliri makes a guess --- he'd seen small holes in the tunnels, saw traps set and waiting. Confirmation comes when Hunger grasps the form by the tail and brings it to a torch, where the fur burns and the skin bubbles. But with that brief illuminated glimpse, Ooliri identifies it as a rat. Too far away, Ooliri can't read or hear the conversation. Is it a complaint about rats in the tunnels? Bafflement as to why the major caught one and dragged it out? Ooliri averts his eyes as the poor thing burns. Other lights catch his eye. Strapped to the majors' thorax (or is the word mesosoma?), there sit long, oil-doused torches burning. The wavering lights summon ever-shifting shadows beyond the ferns and bushes that line the path. "Spooky," he says. "I should be used to the woods at night... but I guess we didn't have torches. Or maybe it's just because I know there's a direbeasts out there, close by." (Ahead, another whistle sounds, and legs start moving.) "We have a troop of ants and the vespers to protect us," Quessa says as they follow the marching ants. Walking in front of him, leading him, Ooliri can't see her wan smile, but can clearly imagine the subtle curve of her palps. "I think we will prevail." "Still, I wonder what it must be like to live out here, with none of that." Ooliri thinks of the Fisher, whose complaint is how they knew the direhound remained near the town. "It must be scary." As if reacting to something in his tone, Bites Water bumps a head against him again. Ooliri reaches over and scratches the ant in between the ocelli, and this one gives a higher pitched chirp. "Bites Water, you were saying something about Boleheva, weren't you? Why is she the worst?" Waiting a moment for Quessa to cast a light, the ant starts, "The one who \[Shapes\] the \[Sky\] of \[Below\] has \[knowledge\]. The one who \[knows\] had \[knowledge : always\]. The one who is \[Boleheva\] also had \[knowledge!\] \[Knowledge\] of \[threat!\]. \[Threat\], yet no \[prevention\]. Nai!" "What was the threat?" "The one who is \[Quessa\] has \[remembrance\] of \[message\]? For \[pleading\]? \[Recollection\] of \[inquiry\]?" "It was," she hesitates, "about a clan and... world-scars? I don't know the specifics." "\[Knowledge\] of \[threat!\] \[Prior\] to \[wife\] of \[fisher\] having \[drowned\], the ones who \[deliver\] did \[depart\] for \[conveyance\] of \[inquiry\]. The one who \[Shapes\] the \[Sky\] of \[Below\] gave \[warning\] to \[bat-bug : worst\], \[warning\] of \[resistance\]. The ones who \[deliver\] had \[future\] of \[death!\] \[Death\] from \[assassins\]. \[Wife\] of \[fisher\] had \[future\] of \[death!\] Yet \[Bat-bug\] gave \[refusal\] of \[protection\]. \[Cause\] of \[death!\]" Ooliri put the pieces together. "Shapes the Sky figured out that there was someone dangerous in Wisterun." He glances at Quessa, slotting in her words into his model. "Someone involved with a clan? Or a world-scar? Shapes the Sky didn't have all the information needed, and tried to send an inquiry to another colony, but the messengers were killed and she didn't get the info in time. Fisher's wife drowned, somehow, which could have been prevented with the info?" Then he remembers what he heard earlier today, in the lobby. "Then the bees came. Being able to fly, they got a message out without getting assassinated. The colony sent back a response --- but being unfamiliar with Entcreek, they got attacked by a dire-anteater." "One which \[Bat-bug\] could have \[killed : sooner\]." Ooliri frowns. "That's a lot of mistakes. I can understand being frustrating but... well, I don't think Boleheva's a bad bane, certainly not the worst. She misjudged the threat to the messengers, of the anteaters... but it seems like she's trying?" "\[Misjudgment\] of \[bat-bug\] means \[death\] of \[many\]. \[\[Inadequate!\]\]" Bites Water taps this word many times. "That is true, but... still." Bites Water looks ahead on the trail, then back to where the other troop (behind them, Awelah and Makuja) follow. Closer to Ooliri, this one conveys, "This one may \[share\] of \[secret\]?" Ooliri nods. "The one who \[killed\] of \[messagers\] was \[bat-bug\]. The one who \[drowned\] of \[wife\] was \[bat-bug\]. The one who is \[threat\] is \[bat-bug.\]." Heartbeats later, Bites Water in untying and scrambling those tags. "\[Bat-bug\] who is \[Duskborn\] is \[okay\]. But \[bat-bugs\]..." The antennae glides along a thread to a blank spot, and Bites Water seems to pause wondering what tag to put there. Ooliri glances backward, to where he imagined beyond the shadows and hulking majors, Makuja strode forward with a tarsi on a knife hilt. He couldn't wait to share this, see what she made of these revelations. "There's another bane," Ooliri concludes. "Some other force in Wisterun, acting from the shadows. Maybe they sabotaged the zipline. Maybe they revived the direhound!" "Maybe there's no other bane," Quessa suggests. "And the root of it all is the same one who's been making it so easy for them." "Boleheva is a warden," Ooliri counters. "The bad guys, the ones who've been trying to kill us, they're mercenaries. Mavericks with no loyalty to a stronghold." "Yanseno is a maverick." Yanseno might've been hired by the bugs trying to kill us. But that's just speculation --- the world has to be larger than that, right? Not everyone they encountered could tie back into some grand conspiracy. Ooliri says, "Yanseno seems nice, but... there are more laws, procedures with the wardens. Boleheva has responsibilities --- once we make her aware of the dangers, she'll have to do something!" "\[History\] of \[refusal\]." They cross a log fallen across the path, and Ooliri thinks of his response as they climb over it. The wet wood is soft, crumbling to mush under their feet. "Did you make a formal appeal? If you commission protection through the right channels, the wardens will have to address it." "Why should it take such formality?" Quessa asks. "If she wanted to do something, she could have done something, she's a vesperbane. There's something Yanseno says sometimes: strongholds are as fast as a dictatorship, and as slow as a bureaucracy. All the rules and procedures can be skipped with a word if they want to do something, and must be followed to the letter if they don't." "\[Possibility\] of \[bat-bug : worst\] giving \[listening\] to \[bat-bug : fellow\]. Not \[ant\], not \[dismissed\]?" "Maybe," is all Qu