It didn't take long for Cuthbert to lose sight of the small clearing where the wyvern attacked them. The canopy grew thicker the further in he walked and less and less light made its way down to the ground. His eyes adjusted quickly to the change yet the signs of life only grew more prominent to Cuthberts ever growing disconcert. The insects around him were deafening. They numbered in clicks, tics, rattles, and and hums, each forming its own rhythm, its own hymn. Cuthbert kept time with some of the bugs, at least he assumed they were bugs, as if they were a piece of sheet music to follow. One of his favorite pastimes in Academy whenever he was stuck doing mundane tasks he disliked doing.
Almost everything he heard scared him for being too close or having the effect of sounding like it was right behind you. Even the one foreign call that was particularly similar to the trumpet in 'March of the Redeemed' was unsettling for reasons in itself. The ending of that song didn't end well for the Redeemed marching into battle.
A strand of silk caught his arm—his first real sign that he was completely out of his element. The silk latched onto his arm so effortlessly and stretched whenever pulled. Yet no matter how much he pulled, the string never felt like its basic form was weakened. For a moment, Cuthbert wondered if his own body was spinning the silk. The thought was absurd—but then he looked up and saw it trailing from the canopy above.
In awe and fear Cuthberts heart rate gradually rose the more he stretched the string. He could feel beads of sweat forming on the side of his scalp, rolling behind his ear as the humidity finally started to catch up to him. His eyes frantically searching for an escape or anything remotely close to a solution before stretching the string any further. All the while the little trumpets in the background constantly announcing the start of the march that's always just a hair's breath away from pushing the beads of sweat sitting on top of his scalp.
As he looked around he realized that the only thing near him was foreign foliage and Cuthbert wasn't brave enough to experiment with plants and unknown compounds.
'A few drops of white vinegar is that too much to ask for.' The thought crossed his mind as it scrambled for another solution to this peculiar cord . His eyes quickly settled on a trunk of a tree that seemed sturdier than all the rest. He decided a more primitive method might be his best chance at removing the string.
Cuthbert started to wrap the string around a tree, after four revolutions the string sat softly around the tree. with no signs of overstretching. He kept going around the tree and pulling the string with no progress in sight. Cuthbert stopped walking, feeling his efforts to remove the string pointless.
'Why are you trying to escape so badly? Isn't this what you were trying to achieve moments ago with that Troglydte?'
Cuthbert stopped before he could spiral down another one of his self-loathing episodes, the thick air pressing down on all the while.
For the first time since entering the swamp, the orchestra of insects faltered—just for a moment. A brief silence, like a held breath before a verse change in a song– before the string became taught around the tree and pulled Cuthbert towards it. The tree cracked under the pressure of the string which was no longer as amiable as before. The string became like a needle point against his arm. Any movement felt like the needle was digging deeper into his skin. Cuthberts mind raced even more at the acknowledgement that this was a trap. But it wasn't the tree being crushed or the needle pinned onto his arm that alarmed him of the looming danger.
It was the change in the buzzing trumpets, after the tree snapped, to a beating drum tempo similar to the one in the fourth movement of 'Hell's Lament on Glory's Wings'.
Salvation comes to the Damned at last.