The Unicorn's Forest

Chapter 188: Chapter 52 part 4



Haln nodded and handed a tunic to her and helped her put it on. While she wanted to say that she could do it on her own, she couldn't bring herself when she saw how the boy looked. Not to mention the fact that he'd already seen everything that Jenn preferred wearing clothing in order to hide. Then after the tunic came the leggings, which Haln didn't seem as eager to help her put on. Which she was at least a little happy about.

When she was clothed, she got out of the bed that had been made for her and she walked away from it to get a good look around her. She felt more than saw Haln following her, but she didn't feel like telling him to stop as she really didn't know what she might even be looking for, just that there was something about this place that she felt was somehow familiar. Something that she felt she should know just by looking at it.

Around her, the cliff extended for a good distance along the road, with about at least thirty feet between it and the road. The wagons that the caravan she had been in consisted of were resting along the side of the cliff, even the ones that had the cages they had been in were there.

Jenn could see everyone had put some clothing on, which she was at least happy about, though most of it didn't seem like it fit them very well. Although, she wasn't sure if there was a reason for that that she just wasn't aware of.

"Mother!" a happy voice called out from by a wagon nearby.

Jenn turned to see Cithis jogging over to her, her hands dirtier than Jenn remembered them being. "I'm going to need to talk with you and your brother in a bit," Jenn said, hoping that Cithis wouldn't make the same protest about referring to her and Haln as siblings. "It's important."

"Okay, but mother, the others are waiting for you as well," Cithis said, sounding like her mind was on something other than anything Jenn had said.

Jenn couldn't say what Cithis might be indicating, but she also couldn't say that she wasn't going, since she hadn't a clue as to what it was about. As far as she knew, a group of the people wanted to thank her. Though, she kept trying to push out the point that she'd started to feel like these people had decided to make her their leader, even though it kept popping back in her head a moment after.

"Let's get this over with, then," Jenn said, feeling rather resigned about the whole matter to begin with.

Cithis led Jenn to the wagon she'd just left and she could still feel Haln following her. While she was feeling a little annoyed at that, she couldn't think of a reason to ask or tell him to leave her along. As such, she could only do her best to endure it.

Inside the wagon was a group of people, who all looked like they had some level of authority. Though Jenn couldn't help if it was just her imagination. Most of the people were women, wearing a tunic and leggings, though there were a couple men who also wore hooded dresses. Though, while so many people looked like they didn't have clothing that fit very well, these people had clothing that fit almost perfectly.

"So, I take if there's something you'd like to talk with me about?" Jenn asked, not sure what else to say.

"We can wait for the boy and girl to leave first," one of the men said, clearly referring to Jenn's kids.

Jenn glanced at Cithis and Haln who were already turning around to leave the wagon.

"Hold on," Jenn said, feeling like these people might be happy to know what she had to tell her kids as well. Although, she wished these people weren't looking at her like they needed to run something by her. "There's something I wanted to tell them, and from the looks of it, I'm sure all of you would want to know as well."

"Don't tell me that you're just going to leave us here after what you did you free us," one of the women in front of Jenn said. She had lilac hair and eyes, and while looked to be the youngest of those in front of Jenn, she was clearly closer to being middle aged.

While Jenn would like to say 'yes, yes she is,' she felt that it wouldn't go over well. Besides, she couldn't argue the unspoken point that because she'd freed them, she had a responsibility towards them. After all, she doubted any of them had seriously considered what they'd do if they could escape from being a slave.

Instead, she shook her head. "No, I'll do what I can to help," Jenn said. "It's just about the debt I incurred with the Lost for their assistance."

"The Lost?" a voice that Jenn immediately recognized said. She wasn't sure why she hadn't noticed him before, but she could see Polelin there in plain view. "Wasn't that you who did all of that? We knew you had wild magic, and everyone knows it can be rather unpredictable."

Jenn sighed. She was vaguely aware of their concept of 'wild magic,' but she hadn't planned on being around people in this world long enough to really deal with it. Instead, she just let the subject go, simply because she felt it would be mere trivia than anything else.

Plus, as much as she wanted to ask Polelin why he was there in the first place, she didn't want to change the subject right then. Besides, she didn't expect to really get much time to really need to know that anyway. It was mere trivia that wouldn't help her in anyway at all.

"No, it was the Lost," Jenn said. "They apparently felt they owed me a little, but if I had been allowed to leave with Cithis and Haln, then the Lost wouldn't have killed all of them. The Lost were willing to help me and my kids get out, but I didn't want to be looking over my shoulder, so I agreed to a request from the Lost."

"Hold on, you said that you agreed to a request from them?" One of the older women asked, her hair a steel grey with pink eyes and rather well-defined muscles. "Since when can the Lost speak?"

Jenn felt like this was taking much longer than she'd like, but she still felt like they were at least making some forward progress on the subject. She just hoped that the same progress would continue and not stall out.

"Well, if you recall, one person said that I wasn't using magic, right?" Jenn asked, happy to get some nods. "At that time, it was the Lost who were speaking. I'd come up with the idea and what to say, but they did so because of them expecting me to fill my end of the deal. For them to speak so everyone could hear them, I guess it hurt them or something. If they did that too much, I guess it would be fatal to them."

"Then how are they able to talk to you?" another woman asked, this one with silver-blue hair and grey eyes.

Jenn sighed. She hoped the progress wasn't stalling out, but she wasn't sure if the topic was going to shift to her rather than what she wanted to say about her deal with the Lost.

"I really have no idea," she said flatly, suddenly getting an idea of what to say to end this game of twenty questions. "I hardly know anything about the Lost. However, the longer you ask me these questions, the longer it'll take for me to let you know what I was trying to say." Jenn paused for a moment before she thought of something else to add. "Which also means that what you wanted to discuss with me will take that much longer before we can get to it."

Jenn felt almost like she was in a dream as she saw people she looked at as adults looked apologetic with what she'd said. If anything, she'd expected them to either acknowledge the point she was going for or to get angry. For a moment she lost the train of thought she had going and even forgot what she was doing there.

"Mother, what is the request they asked of you?" Cithis asked, bringing Jenn back to the present.

"Oh yeah," Jenn said, hoping her embarrassment wasn't showing. "I'm not really sure exactly what I'll be doing for them, as they mentioned about doing something about unsettled emotions, so I don't really know myself. Though, it will take maybe… uh, four weeks? I'm not really sure, but I guess about then. I also asked them to return me back to this area, so I'll be back about then."

"My lady, what should we do for that time? If we just wait here, there's a possibility that some other caravan or even bandits could come on us and attack. Not to mention if the people who ran this caravan have people come looking for it, we'll end up back where we were. All of us," one of the other women asked, though Jenn wasn't able to identify who spoke.

Jenn nodded as if she had already considered this problem. She wasn't sure she should let them know this was the first she'd even thought about that, since she really didn't know anything about this world, but she could at least see the value in making them feel like the situation was well in hand.

In fact, some of the weird memories she had that she knew that weren't hers suddenly seemed to merge with some of her own memories and she suddenly knew of a place she could have these people wait where they'd be safe, as well as where they might be able to start a life for themselves if Jenn wasn't able to make it back herself for any reason.

It might take a little bit of walking, but she was certain she'd be able to lead them to the gate and from the look of a few of the people present, they'd probably be able to start growing some food for themselves so that by the time the food they had collected from the caravan was gone they'd be able to have more to work with.

Or at least Jenn hoped that'd be the case.

So, Jenn laid out what she had in mind for them and felt rather uneasy as everyone present listened to her as if she was already their leader. Which she couldn't say she felt pleased about. While she had an idea, she wouldn't mind if anyone had any suggestions to work with, rather than having all these adults accepting what she said without any qualms.

When she finished, she felt like she needed to go back to bed. She wasn't sure if it was from being emotionally tired, from not having really gotten fully rested when she slept before, or from any number of other issues like feeling the pressure of everyone looking to her to solve the problems they were currently facing.

"Okay, so, you'll lead us to this 'gate' and when we're through, you want us to… what?" Polelin asked, sounding like he was just making sure he understood what she had suggested.

Jenn sighed. She didn't see why she needed to go over this again, but she still wasn't sure if she could get away with just pushing that question to the side.

"I'll want all of you to start farming. I don't know if there's going to be anything you can use to create the tools you'll need in that world, but I don't think I'll be able to do anything about that myself before I have to leave. So, would anyone here be able to work with that?" Jenn wasn't sure if this was a good idea, but she couldn't think of how else to handle it.

"I'll see if anyone here were put into a mine to work or if anyone worked in a smithy," one of the men in front of her said. He had dark brown hair and pink eyes as well as skin that looked like it was often outside, in both sun and rain. Thoroughly weathered.

Jenn nodded. "That's a start," she said. Feeling like this might actually work despite almost all of it coming from her. She wasn't sure if it was from having someone ask that question, but she suddenly felt a surge of energy that helped propel her forward. "Any other thoughts?"

She wasn't sure what she had expected, but she felt like there was an energy with the discussion that seemed to remove the fatigue she'd been feeling earlier. However, what she couldn't understand was why as the others offered suggestions, whatever stance she took on a suggestion or idea was what everyone else went with. She wasn't sure if this was a dream itself and she was still asleep in that warm, comfortable bed that had been created for her.

At the end of the 'meeting' Jenn was surprised to see the sky starting to lighten with the coming morning. She wasn't sure what time she'd woken up at, but she certainly hadn't expected to have the rest of the night taken up with this 'meeting.' Especially when it was like everyone was looking to her for answers and weren't as eager to think of them on their own. At least not without her personal approval.

She also wasn't sure when Cithis and Haln had left, she just knew at one point she looked over to where they had been and didn't see them. Though, she was a little too busy to be able to see where they might have gone, as she could tell the others at the 'meeting' weren't going to let her go until it was over.

"So, everyone here carries something with us as we go," Jenn reminded everyone present as they started to separate to get everything ready for them to leave.

While Jenn hoped that she wouldn't have to deal with anything else like this for a while yet, if at all, her hopes were quickly dashed moments after that.

"My lady!" a young woman about Jenn's age ran up, clearly out of breath and a cut bleeding on her left cheek. She had bright green hair and green eyes. Jenn felt that she wouldn't be surprised if the young woman's skin was green too. "We found a survivor of the caravan people."

Jenn wasn't sure why they felt the need to inform her of this fact, but at the moment she didn't have the energy to inquire about that. If only because she wanted to make sure that she'd be able to lead everyone to the gate before the Lost came to collect her.

"Lead me to them," Jenn said feeling resigned.

She also suddenly realized what she was being called and wasn't sure why. She hadn't thought about it before, but it struck her as odd that they would call her that. After all, it wasn't like she was anyone important. All she did was make it so these people didn't have to be slaves anymore. In the end, she was still who she had been before: a sophomore high school student who was trying to accomplish what she'd originally set out to do. To recover the crystal that she'd dropped when she was dangling over a griffin canyon.

Her thoughts were preoccupied with that as the young woman led Jenn through the camp. Jenn wasn't sure if this survivor was trying to recapture them or what might have led to this young woman running to her for help, but she wanted to at least make sure that these people would be safe, no matter what else happened while she was gone.

With that in mind, Jenn felt like she hadn't really prepared to find what the issue was. It wasn't a person trying to make them go back into the caged wagons or anything close to that. Instead, it was another young woman who looked terrified as others were forcibly stripping her and beating her. This one looked to be at about the same age as Jenn herself and had light green hair and pink eyes, eyes that were darting around frantically and leaking some tears, showing how scared she was.

"Is she the survivor?" Jenn asked, feeling like she'd been brought to the wrong location if so.

"Yes, we saw her trying to get away, so we cornered her. Though, I guess the others were able to subdue her," the young woman answered with a pride Jenn felt appalling.

"Tell them to stop beating her," Jenn ordered, not caring what she'd have to do if they didn't comply. She certainly wasn't going to condone such behavior. Especially when it was over someone who was merely trying to leave quietly.

"My lady?" the young woman asked, sounding confused.

Jenn merely glanced at the young woman who didn't say anything more, but ran over as fast as she could, calling out to the others to stop. The others looked at the approaching young woman with surprise, but stopped when their heads turned towards Jenn. At which point they held their captive upright with her clothing in a pile on the ground.

Jenn had to force herself from looking at they young woman's body, as she felt her interest rising. Yet, she knew even if she didn't have Alex waiting for her back on Earth, it would be wrong for her to force this young woman to fill any desire she had at that moment.

Jenn walked over, her focus on the captive, as she did her best to ignore the pride showing from the people who had been mistreating this young woman a moment ago. Jenn wanted to knock those looks off the people before her, but at the same time, felt like that would be wrong as well. After all, they hadn't been told to do anything or not to do anything about any survivors, so she couldn't really blame them for having done this.

That said, she couldn't let this stand either. She just hoped that she wouldn't screw this up with being so tired right then. In addition to doing what she could to get these people to actually listen to her.


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