During a hot and sunny day, an orc named Jaryn found himself all alone in the woods. Or, at least he thought he was alone. A groan snapped him out of his stupor from the hammock he rested in. Looking up, he yelled out upon discovering the rotting corpse of his fox brother, Ryo, biting his ankle. 
“Not you too!” He cried out, hopping off of the hammock as he bursted into a sprint. He looked back to find the zombie had suddenly morphed into his mother, sticking close behind him as Jaryn often struggled to run in this world. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to stir up trouble for us, please,” he sobbed.
“You could’ve had a normal life if you’d just stay compliant. Now look at you..” the voice shifted to a male’s voice mid sentence as his mother was now the village leader. “Outcast. Filthy outcast,” he snarled, reaching out his arms to grab Jaryn but narrowly avoided him.
Jaryn quickly ran towards the inn his other brother owned, heaving and ready to throw up. “Jal! Jal please tell me you’re here!”
“Of course I am,” the zombie’s voice shifted one more as it was now Jal. It leaned against the doorway as it struggled to make it up the stairs. Jaryn looked in pure terror as a purple butterfly covered its face, completely blocking out the grotesque features. That damn butterfly. It stumbled up and fell over, tripping over the last step. “Look what you made me do. My customers are gone. You will carry my burden!” It hissed out as the butterfly fluttered towards Jaryn.
Cornered against a wall, Jaryn could only cower as the butterfly drew closer, whimpering as it landed on his nose. Looking into the wings, he saw the frozen face of terror of Jal crying. As soon as it touched him, everything faded to black..
During a hot and sunny day, an orc named Jaryn found himself all alone in the woods. Or, at least he thought he was alone. He was greeted by the site of his fox brother Ryo, curled up on his chest and purring, concern etched on the fox’s face.
‘Same dream?’ He asked telepathically.
“Same dream,” Jaryn repeated quietly, wiping the tears from his eyes as he fully woke from his stupor.
‘You need to let go, being worked up over our banishment isn’t going to get us anywhere.’
“I swear I’m trying, really. I just can’t help it. Especially not when that purple butterfly shows up in my dreams.”
‘Look at it this way then! Dreams have meaning to them, and something cute like a butterfly is bound to mean something good. You just need to work towards it.’
“Not when it had Jal’s dying eyes plastered on it.”
‘You’ll be fine. We’ve been fine since we were banished,’ he said as he hopped down to the ground. ‘Will ya least visit him or something?’
“No way! He probably hates us like the rest of the village.”
‘You say that yet every time we visit he’s happy to help us. I don’t get why you’re so intent on acting like everyone’s out to get us, you need to get over it. The sooner you accept that the sooner we can find somewhere to live that isn’t just in the wild.’
Jaryn sighed. “I know, I know. Just, if they were willing to kick us out for something that unfair I’m afraid to think of what other stuff will get us banished,” he mumbled as he checked his canteen to find it nearly empty. “Fine,” he said as he took a small sip before offering some to Ryo, “let’s go see him.”
Ryo gleefully lapped up the water, his tail wagging. “Wee!” ‘Let’s go then. We can ask him for some tips to catch fish or something,” he said as he trotted in place.
Jaryn got off the hammock and packed it away before following Ryo down the dirt road North-East. Ryo eyed down a strange pattern of overgrown grass that followed the side of the road, and stopped abruptly two miles in. Jaryn took notice of this too, cocking an eyebrow. “Think there’s a drunk grass fairy flying around?” he asked jokingly after reaching the end of the tall strip of grass.
‘I don’t think grass fairies even exist. Not for something as specific as grass,’ Ryo replied, then pausing as he looked forward. He saw smoke in the distance, and a lot of it. ‘Do you think that’s coming from the inn?’
“Looks like it, or his tribe. Fuck,” he said, picking up Ryo and rushing towards the smoke. The closer they drew, the more thoughts raced through his head on what could have happened. A racist human? A crazy wizard? The tribesmen discovering the secret inn? One thing that’s for certain was that by the time the duo reached the inn, it was nothing but ash and smoke. "Maybe… Maybe brother had found a better place to set up? I'm sure sitting here this long would attract his tribe members. If they saw it, they'd sure flip out,” Jaryn tried to rationalise with a nervous chuckle.
Ryo looked on quietly as he was admittedly at a loss for words. His thoughts went to the tribesmen figuring out Jal had an inn, and burned it down before exiling him. At least, until he saw even more smoke rising up.
‘There!’ Ryo shouted, raising his paw to point left at the fork in the path. ‘Someone's attacking the tribe,’ he said, prompting Jaryn to break into a sprint down the much narrower path.
Upon reaching the tribe, they saw that whoever was attacking had been there a while. Many huts were destroyed, the grass a sickening black, and the fires were still ongoing, including his brother's. Ryo swiftly jumped off to fetch water from a nearby stream, with Jaryn following suit. They sprinted towards the hut after collecting it, the orange flames growing bigger and hotter consuming all in the path behind them. Jaryn threw water from a bucket onto the flame but it would only spit back at him with steam. "The flames are too hot," He yelled to Ryo in futility. 
Watching the flames they looked as if it were a demon or an angry god. The flames twisted burned and spewed smoke, you could practically see the distorted face of an entity in the flames. Jaryn cried out in frustration as he threw more and more water to no avail "Go out! Go out," tears were forming in his eyes at this point. The flames had spit at him this time not with smoke but with more flame. It burned his skin, causing him to fall back. What remained of the hut at this point was burned ash darker than the coldest of eyes. The distinct smell of burning flesh wisped through the air Jaryn finally realized he was still inside.
"Oh heavens no," Jaryn whispered. He tore away parts of the charred timber that was once his brother's hut, where the entrance used to be. The stench of a burnt corpse would hit him hard, causing him to gag.
"Jal… What have they done to you? Who did this?" The orc asked. All he received was silence from him, and the crinkling of the fire blazing throughout the tribe.
"This can't be happening. You…" He trailed off, before saying, "How could anyone want to murder you, Jal? The tribe may have been full of hate, but they still had a place for you as a family member! Even after they casted me out, you still saw the good in them. Who. Who did this?"
The small fox would approach Jaryn, and hopped onto his shoulder. ‘Before you break down, we need to find out who did this,’ Ryo said, looking away from what used to be his brother as well.
Their attention would be caught by the collapse of the last standing hut, with large amounts of ash spewing out. Once it cleared, they saw an elf standing before them and cracking a smirk. He ran out of the tribe, running barefoot despite stepping on hot wood from other collapsed huts. Just what kind of elf was he? Jaryn could have sworn he saw three eyes and long red hair.. But in this area? Why was he alone?
‘Hey, stop right there!’ Ryo roared to catch the elf's attention, but it only prompted him to flee faster. Jaryn sprinted in hopes to catch up before he got away. He huffed as his legs would drag. He pushed himself to move on, but couldn’t keep up. The only thing that kept him from losing the elf completely was his footsteps leaving a soot trail up until the main entrance of Çollinre Village. 
Jaryn stumbled through the open gateway, and approached a centaur guard, asking, "Excuse me, have you seen a rogue ivierae? He had weird squiggly tattoos all over himself, and-” he paused to breathe. “-looked to be an adult even though he didn't have a, a cae on. He was also very unkempt and had no shoes on?"
The guard turned to the orc, saying, "Those ivierae elves? No, but we'll keep an eye out. Is his owner looking for him?"
"No- he just murdered my brother and his entire tribe! Please sir, I need your help finding him," he pleaded.
"What? An entire tribe? There's no way," He said in a moment of disbelief. "I'll call on other guards to locate him. You must be exhausted; please, go relax in the tavern in the park whilst my men and I hunt him down. There's always a guard there so if we discover something, we can notify you quickly," He said, taking him Northwest from the entrance to a large hill of grass, and a large yurt right at the edge of the park.
“What? No, I don’t need to relax. I’m more than capable of helping you search,” Jaryn protested.
“I’m sorry, but it’s against the law of this province for anyone ranked below a guard to aid in investigations. Now that it’s in our hands, the only thing you can do is wait and confirm if we catch the right elf. If you resist any further, I have the right to arrest you. Now go, please,” the guard instructed.
‘Come on, Jaryn. They’re probably better at this than us. No use wasting your energy trying to protest. If we get another arrest on our record, we’ll be barred from Darʌkys,’ Ryo said with a defeated sigh, walking inside the yurt. The orc stared in Ryo’s direction before following suit, and prompting the guard to start the search with some back up.
Upon stepping inside the yurt, it looked so much more spacious than the outside made it look to be. He walked down to the centre where a fire was, as well as the chef. The tables had been arranged in a circle around the cooking station. Half of the tables were missing chairs, though did have large pillows on the ground. There must have been at least 30 there. One thing that's for sure is that they were spaced out enough to allow people as large as horses to walk. It was rather empty, aside for a few customers and the woman who was running the yurt tavern.
The chef in the centre would look to Jaryn with a friendly smile. "Welcome, friend. Can I get you anything to eat or drink? By the looks of your hair, it looks like you can use a place to rest as well. I have a smaller tent attached to the side, you're more than welcome to sleep there as long as you need," She said.
"Uhm. Thank you. I guess if you have any water and raw fish I'll have some of that please. And beetles or rodents for my brother," He said, collapsing at a table that had chairs. He would be right next to one that didn't, with a centaur sitting there, enjoying a cut up watermelon, munching on the rind with the flesh. She would pause when Jaryn sat down, and wiped her mouth with a piece of bread before eating it.
"You must be new here, I don't think I've seen you around. Welcome to Çollinre Village. I’m Havre, the governor in charge of this area," She started with a soft smile. "Though I must ask, why does Chef Belia think you need a place to rest because of your hair? Is it because it's unkempt?"
"I'd rather not talk about it," He murmured, resting his elbow on the table, and head in his hand. The chef walked over to Jaryn, her hooves clopping on the cobblestone floor. She placed down two plates on his table of raw salmon, a beetle with some cooked mice, as well as a large pitcher of water.
"Don't worry about payment, the food is always free here," She said before heading back to her station. Jaryn would mouth a 'thank you' before beginning to eat. He gulped down a quarter of the water before picking off small bits of his meal, reflecting to himself what just happened.
Jal is dead. A crazy ivierae burnt him. Was he part of a gang responsible for burning different villages? There was no way to know, his.. He couldn't even see the regular square shaped tattoo he had on his neck. He remembered when he and Jal had first got it; at the young age of 20 when the tribesmen had found out the two were birthed from an orc and a human. He pictured vividly when their orc mother explained the two needed to get a "special" tattoo, promising it meant nothing bad, though said with a solemn tone. When the elders arrived, they reached out their hands to the boys to take them to their hut.. Which was when Havre reached out to him to catch his attention.
"Mr.? Are you okay?” she asked. “You look rather down."
"Yeah. Yes, I'm fine. Just blanked out," He said, quickening his pace with his food.
“Hey, if something’s wrong, you can tell me. I want nothing more than to make sure my visitors are happy. Would you like some Jiana tea? It’s guaranteed to cheer you up.”
“No thanks, I don’t drink tea. But. My, my brother just died,” he said, looking down at his food.
“Oh my… I’m so sorry. What happened?”
“Burned. Not sure why. Some ivierae did it.”
“Do you think it could have been the butterfly murderer? I hear there’s a man running around, killing people with this spell that gives them this butterfly mark. I know I’ve heard some village burnings connected to him. Though. I don’t know why he’d attack an orc tribe when he’s been going after humans and wood elves,” Havre wondered.
“My brother is. Was half human. Some orcs of our tribe were. Do people really hate my kind that much?” Jaryn asked, looking directly at Havre. “I’dve thought the outside world was less racist towards us.”
“It’s not that you’re a hybrid. It’s just. Towards humans that their hatred is directed at. I can’t tell you how many times my mother got called a horse fucker just because my upper body looks human. They can’t accept that we’re our own person.” Jaryn would look away, not feeling much better at all.
Havre looked to him with concern, before putting back on a cheery expression. "Hey, how about I sing you a song? Whenever I'm feeling low, I like to sing a piece my mother created when she was trapped as a slave.”
Jaryn nodded. "I suppose it couldn't hurt, sure," He said. She then took a breath of air- but jumped when she heard a guard yell out. The two rushed outside and Jaryn gasped when he saw the guard that talked to him earlier fell to the ground, moaning out from being stabbed in the gut with an overgrown tree branch.
The other guards rushed to aid him, but all were struck in the head when the branch grew out from his back. Jaryn readied his glaive as Ryo ran off, the orc pausing when the elf from before jumped down from a short tree. “I would say I’m surprised you were able to find me, but I wasn’t helping myself much running around in an ashy village barefoot. Ah well. You best leave this village, half blood. It won’t be pretty what I’m about to do,” he said, arms crossed.
Jaryn death glared him, hands trembling with rage. “You murdered my brother in cold blood, you think I’d walk away from that? I’ll make you pay for what you’ve done!” He yelled, raising his glaive to charge. 
The ivierae’s third eye started to glow a bright blue, before turning purple. Jaryn’s eyes widened as a butterfly shaped beam of magic shot out of his eye, aimed right at him. He rolled, but hearing someone collapse he regretted that decision. He looked back to see a bystander sprawled out on the ground, twitching as a tattoo of the insect appeared at a torpid pace, killing him slowly.
“Guess I still have work to do mastering that spell. Ah well, you got lucky. But eventually, luck runs out,” the elf said, his eyes still glowing blue. Jaryn felt the ground in front of him rumble and jumped back as a small tree trunk shot up, just missing him. Havre who was watching in shock snapped back into reality when she realised what was going on. 
“Mr., look out! He’s going to-” she instinctively reached out her arm, but was cut off when a second trunk shot up from behind, skidding across the side of his head. Blood sputtered everywhere as he fell to the ground.
"Bold of you to warn him. I was expecting you to run off like every other politician I've come across. I was going to spare you, but now that you're in my way…" he trailed off, rolling his head toward her. The elf got ready to throw his next attack, but missed her entirely when Ryo jumped onto him from nowhere, mercilessly clawing at him. He yelped at the initial pounce that sent him to the ground and knocked out everything in his shallow pockets, and wrestled to get him off. Ryo landed a hit directly on his third eye. As his eye turned back to the green and white colour, he finally threw Ryo off. 
The elf stifled a yell from the pain of the attack, getting up to retreat. Jaryn stood back up slowly, grabbing his glaive. "Don't you try to retreat now, we're not done with you yet," he said.
He looked back to Jaryn, forcing a smirk on his face. "With all that blood loss, I'd say you are. I'll be back to finish you three off," he murmured, running off. Ryo chased after him as Havre rushed over to Jaryn. She pulled out a long strip of cloth and tightly wrapped his head. 
"Do you, do you always carry that?" He asked, trying to control his breathing and shaky hands.
"Yes, my siblings get crazy sometimes. I’m only using it to stop the bleeding but we need to go to the castle to get medicine,” she said. Jaryn started walking with her to the castle, but paused when he stepped on a piece of paper that was from the elf’s pockets. He picked it up, and read it to himself, seeing that it’s addressed to:
“… Lennon Benoist?” time...