“It was an arduous and annoying journey and I am glad to be back with you,” Scorpio appeared out of nowhere when Lena woke up. He had been called in for pawn duty while she slept, a practice that Lena found most disturbing.

“As bad as that, was it?” She got up and hugged him. “Want a nap before we set off? We can’t really have you too tired to concentrate on our own journey.”

“I don’t need a nap, you know that,” Scorpio frowned. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine,” Lena shook her head. “What’s with the dark rings under the eyes? When was the last time you slept? Or ate? Did that Arisen dismiss you or did you fall in battle? Or fell off a cliff? Or perhaps jumped into the water and drowned when you’ve had enough? Don’t think I don’t know all the tricks you pawns get up to…”

“Well… You’ve been around too long, I see I can’t fool you every time,” Scorpio smiled. “No, I stayed till the Arisen dismissed me. Here, I brought a gift for you, too. An apple.” He produced an apple from his pack.

“An apple?” Lena took it from him. “What a generous gift as well…” She sighed. “Oh never mind. How many times I myself sent pawns away with something similar… You said it was annoying… want to talk about it?”

“I think the sorcerer that we had with us last week, must have found walking with us annoying,” Scorpio gave Lena a long look. “He clearly wanted action, but you kept him back.”

“I didn’t, actually…” Lena was getting defensive. “Unless you mean that I charged ahead and didn’t give him a chance to be the front man… But he was a mage! Without any means of attacking foes up close! Mages, like archers, are supposed to keep back…”

“Supposed, but not always do,” Scorpio shook his head. “Like you don’t always keep back when you’re an archer. I guess I just didn’t fit into that team. They needed a healer, really, and although I can heal…”

“You are not Rook,” Lena summarised. “Very well. Do you want to switch vocation? Be a fighter again?”

“Not yet,” Scorpio shook his head. “What are you planning for today?”

“Saurians, ogres, bandits, phantasms and a wight,” Lena unrolled the map. “I want to go to the Waterfall Cavern.”

“Charming,” Scorpio grimaced. “We need holy magic for this, I’ll do it. You can’t get a mage with holy magic who also…”

“…doesn’t try to be the front man,” Lena grinned. “But the real reason that you want to stay on as a mage is that your wound reopened when you switched back to fighter last week. Don’t think I didn’t notice. Lie down.” She opened a cupboard and started putting jars and bottles on the table. “You cannot keep healing yourself as if it is a regular wound. You need real treatment.”

The wound in Scorpio’s side was no regular wound. Dragon blood had been injected into it, infecting him with Dragonsplague, a deadly disease that affected pawns. Lord Phaesus in Battahl had sought to capture an Arisen’s soul – Lena’s soul – through her pawn using a ritual known as the Transference of Souls. It involved sacrificing both the Arisen and the pawn, but Lord Phaesus wasn’t squeamish. Yet he underestimated just what Lena was prepared to do for her pawn… She took another step into the depths of vampirism and turned into a higher vampire just so that she could drink all of the dragon blood from Scorpio’s wound and cure his Dragonsplague. She did not die herself only thanks to Molag Bal’s gift… Which Molag Bal couldn’t wait to point out. It really did seem that despite all her efforts to free herself of vampirism, she only sank deeper and deeper in, towards the pure-blood form that Molag Bal was so keen to bestow upon her.

That wound in Scorpio’s side did not heal in the Rift like other wounds, and although it initially closed, it kept reopening from time to time, it kept hurting and kept reminding him of what had occurred.

“Could it be that I failed to cut out all of the necrotic tissue in that wound?” Lena frowned as she was applying ointment on the scar which was indeed oozing dark blood in a few places, as if there was a wound under the skin. “May be I missed something? This blood does not look fresh.”

“May be you missed something, or may be it’s just the nature of that wound,” Scorpio shrugged. “Don’t overthink it. What’s in that salve? It smells like nightshade…”

“Wolfsbane and nightshade,” Lena nodded. “My brother’s recipe. You’re not a witcher, but you come pretty close, being a pawn,” she smiled. “Let’s hope your holy magic won’t rip right through it.”

…

“Wouldn’t you want to have your pawn back with you, master?” One of the pawns in Lena’s party looked wistfully around him. They’d lost Scorpio in the previous fight, and there was no riftstone nearby to get him back. “The loss of our comrade will weigh heavily upon the morale.” He added, looking dejected. “Isn’t there a riftstone nearby?”

“Yes, I want to have Scorpio back as soon as possible and no, there is no riftstone nearby, as you well know!!!” Lena spun around to face him, her face pale with frustration. “What do you think I’m searching for – rabbits?!!”

The pawn backed off, nearly falling off a cliff and to his doom.

“This way, master, I think there’s a riftstone in that direction,” the other pawn, their fighter, touched Lena’s shoulder. “I think we’ve seen a riftstone there.” He spoke as soothingly as he could, which was quite a change from his usual brash manner.

Lena snorted and followed the path he indicated. The fighter leveled with the other pawn.

“No one in this party feels the loss of her pawn more acutely than she does,” he said quietly. “That reaction… she’s got nothing against you personally, I’m sure. But she didn’t need to hear what you said.”

“Blimey, that was unexpected,” the pawn shuddered. “I met enough masters who would just abandon their pawn…”

“Well, she isn’t like that,” the fighter interrupted. “I know what you mean, but you’re new here… You’ll understand in time.”

“You think she isn’t going to dismiss me at that riftstone?” The pawn sounded surprised.

“Nah, not for a few misspoken words,” the fighter shook his head. “She’s got a temper like a fury, but it doesn’t last… Ouch – watch out!!”

Their conversation was interrupted by a pack of goblins who just ran into a fury… Not bothering with her bow, Lena simply kicked them into the ground.

“What?” She turned to her pawns who didn’t even get a chance to draw their weapons. “I was too close to them to bother with the bow. And since I’m not allowed to carry daggers… What else was I supposed to do?” She grinned.

“Glad to see you’re feeling better,” the fighter grinned back. “The riftstone is just up ahead.”

…

“At last I’m reunited with you!” Scorpio appeared when Lena touched the riftstone. “It’s been ages!”

“There was no riftstone nearby,” Lena hugged him. “You fell off a cliff and I couldn’t get to you in time… Do you even remember what happened?”

“Of course I remember,” he nodded. “I even remember falling… Sorry about that.”

…

“To this world I return,” Scorpio appeared out of no where when Lena woke up. “It’s been… well… it’s been another journey. Nothing special.” He took a step forward and stumbled. Lena jumped up.

“What, they are calling upon you even when we’re camping?!” She exclaimed angrily. “I thought it was only when we stayed at an inn!”

“Ahhh, that explains why we hardly ever stay at an inn!” The fighter laughed. “And here I was, thinking that this Arisen simply enjoyed camping…”

“They can call upon us any time,” Scorpio nodded. “There’s a trick they do, and it appears to you that it happens while you sleep… but it doesn’t look that way to the other Arisen. They just summon pawns when they need them, as you do too.”

“Alright, this is all too confusing,” Lena shook her head. “But I don’t think you can walk.”

She had a point, Scorpio could barely stand. He was pressing his hand to his side, clearly in pain.

“I think the wound might have reopened…” He said apologetically.

“I must have missed something,” Lena looked worried. “Lie down.”

Scorpio’s wound was oozing dark blood again. There was no gash on the skin, it was just a scar, but Lena figured that the flesh must have reopened beneath it.

“This needs urgent treatment,” she concluded. “This requires surgery.” She looked around, but the campsite in the middle of a forest didn’t look remotely sterile. At least they had enough restorative potions in their packs… That would have to do. She sighed, touched Scorpio’s forehead checking for fever, aligned an array of potion bottles immediately in her reach, then turned to the other pawns. “We are not going anywhere today,” she said. “Nick, please guard the site,” she looked at the fighter. “Adam… I know you’re a sorcerer now, but you used to be a mage, can you still heal? You can use Scorpio’s staff.”

“I can still heal, yes,” Adam, their second pawn, squinted at Lena. “What are you planning? How can your pawn be ill if he just returned from the Rift?”

“I told you, you’d understand things in time,” the fighter said in his ear. “Looks like that time is now.”

“This isn’t an ordinary wound,” Lena was blotting out drops of dark blood that kept gathering around the scar in Scorpio’s side. “We’ll have time for explanations later. For now, just be ready to heal when I say so, and don’t be shocked or surprised at anything you’re about to see…” She rummaged in her pack and pulled out a pair of guilded daggers. “Silver would have been better…” she muttered. “But gold will have to do.” She removed her lorica and her chainmail sleeves. “Here we go… It’s better if you don’t witness this…” She smiled at Scorpio and turned his head sideways, exposing his neck. “Sweet dreams, my friend.” She closed her eyes for a moment, letting her fangs emerge, then bit Scorpio’s neck until he fell asleep. She did not need that much blood, but she did need some… There was no way around it.

Adam was watching in fascination. He had heard of vampires that could transform at will, they were very rare, and here was one before him. But surely she didn’t just fancy a drink… What was she planning?

Lena flicked her daggers together igniting them. When the fire went out and just the glow remained, she cut through Scorpio’s scar. The skin parted revealing a deep wound full of dark blood.

“Oh, it’s as bad as I feared,” she muttered, standing up. “Nothing else for it…” Another deep breath, and familiar sharp pain in her shoulder blades told her that she was transforming. Adam gasped. Nick took a step back. Scorpio was still asleep. Lena kneeled over his wound and started drinking the dark dragon blood from it.

…

“You will come to appreciate my offer in time,” she heard the voice of Molag Bal in her head. “Now again it is my gift that’s keeping you alive.”

“An Arisen is linked to the dragon… You and I are linked, Dragonborn,” Grigori’s voice joined in. “The more dragon blood you drink, the closer we become.”

Lena stopped drinking blood as she noticed a change in the way it tasted – the heavy bitterness was gone, replaced by the usual sweetness of human blood. She seemed to have cleansed the wound once again. “I did the same thing last time and I missed something,” she thought, picking up her dagger and examining carefully the tissue inside the wound. It all looked the same, none of it looked necrotic. “What is the source of the dragon blood here?” She wondered. And then she saw it – a tiny red crystal was lodged in the flesh, a Wyrmslife crystal. “Next time we’re in Battahl, Lord Phaesus will pay for this!” She promised herself, trying to keep rage at bay for the moment. “He made sure that Scorpio would never recover!”

Wyrmslife crystals were crystallised drops of dragon blood. When enclosed into a living body, they would transform its blood into dragon blood, thus infecting the host with Dragonsplague over and over again. Lena tried to remove the crystal from the wound, but it was deeply embedded into it. When she tried to lift it out, it crumbled. Cursing under her breath, she had no choice but to cut out more of the flesh…

“Your pawn has had dragon blood course through his veins for a long time now,” she heard Grigori’s voice again. “I’ve felt his presence… I’ve felt your presence too, since your souls are linked… I wonder just how far you will go, Dragonborn…”

Grigori’s voice faded away as if he flew off into the distance. Lena sighed. Just like in the very beginning of her journey as an Arisen, she was uncertain and confused. What did he mean – how far she would go? Wasn’t it the same cycle being repeated over and over again? It wasn’t always the same, true, but close enough… “Perhaps the answers will come to us without us searching for them,” she recalled Scorpio’s words, something he said after they’d spent hours talking through everything they knew trying to understand the meaning of the Pawn Legion. Some pieces of the puzzle were still missing. She shook her head and focused on closing Scorpio’s wound.

…

“…and that’s what happened in Battahl,” Lena finished telling the story of Scorpio’s wound to the other two pawns while Scorpio was sleeping. With all the restoratives and Adam’s healing magic, he was recovering well. Lena had ingested enough blood to transform back into her human form, and even her fangs had receded.

“I never knew such wickedness was possible!” Adam was still stunned by the story. “To inject dragon blood into a pawn’s body, it’s like… like… I cannot think of anything that could compare!” He exclaimed in horror and indignation. “I am so sorry for the things I said to you… about getting him back at a riftstone…” He blushed, looking embarrassed.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Lena shrugged. “I met pawns that have been abandoned… I know where you are coming from.”

Finally Scorpio stirred, waking up. He tried to sit up, but the pain must have been too severe.

“We shall be staying here for a few days,” Lena looked at her pawns in turn. “No monster hunting, just deer hunting for now. And don’t tell me that resting too much will make us unfit for battle. And no, I won’t dismiss you just yet, I don’t care what you tell your Arisen… Say it was the most boring journey ever, for all I care…”

“Boring? You’ve got to be joking,” the fighter smirked. “Besides, I’m sure you’ve got more stories to tell, Dragonborn.”

“Hmm.” Lena squinted at him. How did he know? She was sure she never mentioned that it was what Grigori called her. Or was it true perhaps that all pawns were linked to the dragon somehow? Once again, she had more questions than answers.