Chapter 1: Home is where the Hearth is

Osa, Ekina, and Quivina were all at the river swimming in the nude. Adunbi was standing by on guard, half watching his sisters and their attendant as they bathed, and half watching for voyeurs. From the distance they hear screaming and see smoke rising up from the direction of the village. Adunbi turns and runs toward the village as the three women rush out of the water and quickly dress. Osa is first to follow Adunbi, simply wrapping her dashiki around her waist and running bare-breasted after. Ekina and Quivina aid each other and then follow in the direction of the town.

When Osa arrives, she sees her village aflame, bodies of villagers rent and mangled, with a trail of orange skinned human-like creatures laying across what is left of the village. In the middle of it all is Adunbi, his skin of stone and blades of aglow with war magic, batting several dozen Orangemen. Their claws and fangs seemingly have little or no effect on him, while his short spears slash their flesh with ease.

Osa turns towards the river begins to summon an explosive turret of water that will fall on the village and extinguish the fires, which draws the attention of a pair of the Orangemen. Focused on her spell, Osa fails to notice the threat rapidly closing in on her until the rain starts, but by then it’s too late. One Orangeman slaps her across the chest and face, knocking her down and causing her to lose focus, the waters splash down on the village in an uncontrolled bombardment causing more damage than she wanted, but putting out the majority of the fires. The second Orangeman scoops her up and starts to carry her away.