Chapitre 748: 748: A Sinister Plan

He woke up in the middle of the night drenched in sweat, covered in light sheets, and wrapped around the arms of his beloved. A classical opening scene in any drama but for those who know Jon Dare, he usually skips the drama and goes straight to action. Still, that's the "usually" of things.

That night, however, felt as if he was being suffocated by something in his sleep while he had the urgent feeling to feel the cold air of the top floor's balcony, consequently driving him outside out to breathe.

He would gaze up at the stars of the night sky, where the Magna-Ge stared down at the world of mortals, and lose himself in his thoughts as he recently was having these strange new feelings.

"Again?"

"I can't sleep."

Alina followed him outside covering herself in the sheet of their bed.

"A dream this time?"

"No. Just that feeling again."

"Boiling from the inside?"

"Yes."

"Even by your standards, darling, you should know this is not normal."

"I'm Dragonborn, when was anything ever normal?"

"I won't argue with that." She replied and put on a sweet smile, "Come on inside, I'll fix you something hot and soothing to drink."

"Alright."

Jon followed Alina back to their chambers and sat on his chair while resting his head backward. He was feeling nauseated and in a turbulent mood.

"All that sex we've been having, I am starting to think you are the one getting pregnant, not me." Alina cracked a joke from the corner where they kept their snacks and drinks behind a wooden curtain.

Jon paused for a while before replying.

"Usually I would take anything you say as funny but that's a terrible joke, honey." He replied with a slight smile.

"Huh! My jokes are terrible now, Firemane boy?" She looked at him with wide eyes and a playful smile from behind the wooden curtain.

"Excuse my rudeness then, dear wife." He didn't argue about it and backed away.

"You are excused, dear husband, and here's your herbal tea."

Getting the beverage she made with love and care, Jon started to sip it slowly and then had a big gulp as the heat was to his liking, but then…

*Growl*

His eyes widened, his stomach started to get upset and he suddenly took a run to the toilet.

*PUKE!*

Alina watched all of that happening and couldn't help but be taken aback. She looked at him as he came out wiping his mouth with a towel and asked.

"You okay?"

Jon's eyes raced between her and the towel and himself before trying to check his own innards with magic.

"That pregnant joke is starting to make more sense." He said while grinning to make it sound like nothing.

"That's a terrible joke, husband." Alina said, firing back the sarcasm.

Since he was feeling unwell, Jon had to be seriously diagnosed and Alina spared no effort with all her medical skills and spells but to their disappointment, Jon was feeling as healthy as ever, even healthier than usual if that can be believed.

"Your body is filled with more energy than usual, I can say I am sure of that, but you act like you're drained as if we had some freaky hot sex." She said.

"I know, right?" Jon nodded in agreement before thinking, "It's really weird to feel this way."

"Just chug up a stamina potion or something, you'll feel like yourself in no time."

"Stamina potion? The only potion I used to chug is Troll's Essence and that's before I got to make Dragon's Essence. Stamina potions are for weaklings." Jon proudly refused the potion even though Alina kept pushing it against him.

As the two started to act playfully while standing near the window, a yellow flash attracted their gazes to the outside of the tower down in the city. The two of them paused whatever they were doing and got closer to the window to see.

"A fire?" Jon asked.

"In that house?" Alina answered with a question.

The two of them looked at each other before Jon walked out to the balcony at once in order to get a closer look.

"That old man started experimenting with flaming fart once again?"

Even though Jon thought it was weird, that place down there was Jonrad's house where he lived along with Hilda and their young children. The thing is Jonrad is a master at manipulating Fire and something like that wouldn't happen even if he was to fuck up a spell.

But before Jon or Alina processed the situation, let alone reacted to it, a pillar of flame erupted from the house and enveloped it entirely.

"Fuck!" Jon didn't think far ahead and immediately jumped off the tower's balcony as he summoned his staff and transformed into a bolt of Magicka that landed nearby the house.

Just as he was about to cast a spell that would control this fire. A red line of energy flew out of the house and landed against the wall of a nearby building. It was a man Jon couldn't identify and stuck in his chest was Hilda's axe.

Soon after, Hilda jumped off the flame wearing her nightgown and seemed to be in a berserk state. The moment she saw Jon, she shouted.

"GO! Help Jonrad!"

Seeing that she handled her situation, Jon didn't think much and headed inside the burning house while surrounding himself with a Flame Cloak spell that siphoned away all the flame into his.

Just as he entered the house, he found that most of the furniture and the walls were already burning badly and it seemed like many attackers were lying around the place, all killed with their bodies slashed violently.

"Good God! The kids!"

He sped right away through the main hall up to the second floor where the flames were consuming the wooden stairs. He jumped to the hard part of the upper floor with a single leap and headed straight to Thor and Idun's room. There, of course, was Jonrad who stood in the doorway with his big body frame, covering the inside.

"Hey! Move aside! Where are the ki…"

Jon pushed Jonrad aside and looked inside the room that was somehow spared from the fire. However, Jon could see no Thor or Idun in there.

"Where are they?" Jon asked and turned to his father.

It was enough to look at the man's face and immediately know the answer. The look on Jonrad's face was bloody terrifying, his eyes were bloodshot with rage and he dug his teeth into his lower lips and his fingernails into his palms, causing the blood to drop from them.

They were taken!

Someone barged right into Saarthal, invaded Jonrad's house, caused the fire, and disappeared with the two toddlers who weren't even three years of age.

Jon's head suddenly caught on to reality as it caught on to him as if his head was lit on fire. He looked around the room and saw nothing as if he was desperately hoping for the kids to show up from their hiding hole.

Still, reality faced them with the truth everyone feared to even acknowledge.

Especially with Jonrad and Hilda, they had a bad history of people attempting to take away their child but for the first time, their youngest children were taken from them in a flash of flame.

Seeing the devastated face of Jonrad, who had to face Hilda as Jon dragged him from the burning house, was just too traumatic for these two.

Alina, who arrived late to the scene mustered all her magic to put out the fire as soon as possible and preserve what's left of the house in ice. Everyone else started to arrive right after that and they could understand the situation when Hilda punched Jonrad right in the face and Jon tried to intervene to make them see reason and start the chase immediately.

The children were still able to trace and whoever took them knew exactly what to do against Jonrad and Hilda, and knowing their enemies, there could be a lot of suspects.

So, how did it happen?

***

Earlier this evening…

It was an evening like any other beyond the walls of Saarthal, calm from the inside and defiant from the outside. Hilda just put the twins to bed and retreated to Jonrad's side without saying much. The two were exhausted and sleepy, and in their minds, there were a lot of tasks for them to get over with tomorrow, so they just surrendered to sleep.

In their minds, however, each had his dreams. Whereas Jonrad's mind was calm like the sea, hiding its undercurrents beneath a facade of stillness, Hilda's mind was rather peaceful without any noise in the background.

Even though she had the axe hanging at the wall in front of her eyes, something in her heart told her that she no longer needed such a blooded weapon, and the souls she reaped can be damned to Oblivion for all she cares about. She's a veteran who earned her rest.

But this peace was disturbed by the sound of metal coming from outside. It felt as if a marsh was happening outside and she could only hope that she was having one of those dreams about the Great War once again. Still, she was already wide awake and the sound was still there, even Jonrad heard it and had his eyes staring with full alertness.

The two warriors didn't even speak and the both of them grabbed their weapons from the wall racks. As they opened the door, there were their worst fears in front of their eyes.

A senseless fight broke out!

Who are these men? What's with their unusual auras? How many of them are there? What about the young ones?

At some point amidst all the hacking and slashing, the spellcasting and firemongering, Jonrad and Hilda are convinced this is some sort of a lucid dream, and their fears are somehow chasing them from the depth of their consciousness. But as they were hacked back with cold iron and struck with evil Magicka, their heads went blank with all the murder they had to commit in the hallway of their house, over to the kitchen, down to the dining room, up to the attic, and straight to the children's bedroom.

"Get the kids!" Hilda shouted at Jonrad and he took up to the room above while fighting his way through four enemies that were unusually stronger than the rest. Still, they were no match for him and only one of them was left standing at the door to the children's bedroom.

"Don't you…" Jonrad was about to say something as he struck with his sword aura from a distance but the man in front of him simply raised his greatsword like a shield and a red ward formed with the symbol of a shield on it, negating Jonrad's aura.

Jonrad and that man finally engaged in melee and they were closely matched in terms of skill but Jonrad was still overpowering the man with brute strength and magic output. Yet for many instances that man could at least counterattack or go wild and disregard his surroundings, but he did not, and he kept parrying, striking back systematically, and even enduring attacks.

He was clad in exquisite Nordic full-plate armor, resembling the one from the game, with all its carvings and glory. Yet despite that, the man's armor was rather light and didn't bother his movements. Moreover, it was keeping up with Jonrad's fire attacks, even though a regular armor piece would start to heat up from that heat a long time ago.

All the carvings on the armor seemed to have been imbued with the aura of fire that kept striking it and even Jonrad took notice that rather than being affected by the heat, it was emitting it back.

The heat around the armor created a lot of Magicka pressure, one that ought to blast to the outside and have a terrible effect but with Jonrad's style being heavily reliant on Fire, he noticed that his attacks were worsening the situation a bit too late and just as he was trying to drive the house invader outside by any means, it happened.

The armor burst with a terrible explosion, and all Jonrad could do was stand between the flames and the children's bedroom. He became occupied with halting down the fire to the point where he couldn't move an inch when he noticed that something had teleported behind him inside the children's room.

"NO! HILDA!"

He shouted for his wife to come but the explosion was consuming most of the air molecules and he had to hold his ground no matter what.

Then that thing teleported away and the fire explosion was finally contained.

The warrior that was facing Jonrad disappeared and so were the children from their bedroom.

It was all planned, designed, and executed to perfection, knowing how he would react, and that the strong explosion would disturb the magic protection around Saarthal, allowing one man to teleport right in and kidnap the children while another held Jonrad in place by reversing the output of his fire attacks into an explosion that would threaten his own children.

That sinister plan had a sinister planner, and that planner stood far above Mount Anthor where Saarthal could be seen bare from above and a sinister smile was enough reaction to convey that the plan worked.

Now, they have the children of Jonrad Firemane and the siblings of Jon Dare in hand.

A lot can be achieved if the cards are played right.