Amara is heeding his warning even before he finishes speaking it, and thinking of all the other cautions he doesn't speak aloud.  They have no breath for anything but running, no attention for anything but the terrain ahead.  And as they draw closer, and the stench chokes the air, there is for a time no room in her for anything but horror.<br/><br/>Bog-dwellers are little more than tales to her, but she nods her agreement, catching in the twisted shapes a sense of the way the stories describe them.  Focusing on this, the practical, helps keep her steady; but she still stays close to Marius, still can't quite look directly at the worst of the carnage.  For an instant, she feels weak and ashamed of that weakness, aching to be brave, like Marius.<br/><br/>The villagers relax faintly as they decide the new arrivals are no threat, but it's clear that none of them dare to rest yet.  Hands grip weapons, makeshift and otherwise, and shoulders are exhausted but grimly tense.  One man steps forward a little, older but still tough and strong.  For a moment he looks like Marius, but Amara soon realizes that there is no true resemblance; only a similarity in their bearing.  A soldier as well, with an old but well-cared for blade at his hip.<br/><br/>He nods, beyond any true formalities.  "All over now," he says, perhaps referring as much to the village itself as to the battle.  He nods next to the treeline, just to the side of where the two of them had appeared.  "Swept in from the woods there, no real warning.  It's been quiet here too long.  No one expected trouble."  He spits on the ground, giving a sense of cursing himself along with this general inattentiveness.  "Bog-dwellers we half expect.  But these had men with them."<br/><br/>A man nearby makes a sign against evil at this remark, before returning to his grisly work of sorting dead invaders from burned defenders.  The ex-soldier catches the movement and looks back, his eyes lingering reluctantly on the bodies before turning back to Marius and Amara.  "It's the men I wanted dead.  But they had their plan, and these things took the worst of it."  He kicks a bog-dweller half-heartedly.  "Most of the real villains lived.  And they did have a plan.  They wanted something here -- someone, I should say.  They wounded freely, but were careful who they killed."<br/><br/>Then something reminded him of the ordinary things again.  "Arden, village elder.  Last of the elders, I fear," he added, a shadow crossing his face.