To The Caves!

From the fishing hamlet the road described a winding path along the coastline, snaking in between jagged outcrops of rock and sheer cliff faces. Sometimes passing by ramshackle homes that seemed to be populated exclusively by people with deer eyes and a worn down stance.

The lady regarded them with open contempt, she had been instilled growing up with a strong sense of her own worth. Of course her nannies had tried to teach her that her worth lay most as a wife but she had rejected that idea out of hand. She reasoned that she was born from the stock of some of the greatest people alive in the modern world. Her greatness was clear to see so why should she be shackled to some man, relegated to nothing more than a breeding sow?

She had rejected that and now felt overjoyed to have the chance to prove herself to the world. Of course that is what she had thought when she first left home but even now. Barely two weeks out from home, she was already starting to feel her creature comforts. They had not had a chance to bathe since hitting the road or rather, she had not had a chance to bathe.

Thanos, the heathen that he was, happily stripped off and cleaned himself in any clean water they found along the way. She had hidden her face, calling him every horrible name she had ever heard as he bathed nude in front of her, seeming to not care a jot about her high standing. Of course he enjoyed exposing himself to her, seeing her reaction, and she would snatch glances when he was not looking her way. Although she would rather die than admit that to anyone.

After three days on the coastal road she had begun to doubt that this cave existed at all, maybe the villagers had simply made it up to make her go away?

Before she could start to build up a real hate for them they crested a hill and came into view of what had to be the cave the villagers has spoken of.

The road wound its way down the side of a wide naturally formed bowl in the coast, crossing over a small stream that flowed into the ocean at the bottom of the bowl before rising back up the otherside. The stream itself flowed over and between a mess of jagged rocks before vanishing into the wide mouth of a cave that seemed to draw the eye as soon as you arrived.

It was bigger than any that either of the travellers had seen before, it was easy to understand how stories of a monster living inside it could have come about. Something about the gaping black maw suggested that something lived inside of that place and that it had evil designs on mankind.

Arimneste ordered Thanos to pull the chariot up beside the bridge that crossed over the steam just before it entered the ocean.

Jumping down she paced back and forth, her eyes locked on the cave up above. The sun was already passed its zenith but she was sure that there would be enough time left in the day to at least go and have a look around the entrance.

Of course if they did end up getting struck up there when night fell it would be suicide to try and climb back down over the slippery jagged rocks. That would mean spending the night and as much as she tried to convince herself that it was nothing more than empty cave the childhood memories of terrifying tales told by carers weighed heavily on her mind.