Caggan roars as the eagle pops into existence and unleashes its fury on him. Its claws grab and rake, but can't seem to get through his magically toughened hide. Vokrin's missiles fire across the room, nimbly move around Cimri, dodging those nasty tusks for her life, and create bloody punctures in the wereboar's body.
Cimri takes the distraction granted and slides her Kukri across Caggan's muscles, attempting to disable him.
Despite the magic bolstering the man-boar-pig thing Cimri's keen blade slices through skin and cords of muscle drawing forth a pained squeal from Caggan.
His small piggy eyes light upon Rurisa, and he barely snarls around his tusks, "This fight will be your end!" He stomps through the crowd of small folk and Cimri, ignoring anything they may attempt with his back turned to get to Rurisa.
His rage is more of a detriment to him than a help as his tusks rip into the floorboards, missing Rurisa entirely.
Rurisa keeps in good form as she sidesteps the wereboar's wild swing. "Try to take him alive, we can display to the town this monster we caught dwelling in their midst." As Caggan staggers off-balance from his miss the mercenary lashes out, trying to open his belly with her Hellrazor.
Trevor is almost trampled under the hooves of the creature and pokes at it with his dagger, trying to give Rurisa an opening
"If memory serves, his form will falter once unconscious..." Vokrin observes, but it seems that it will be lost in the shuffle as there are far more pressing matters at hand; namely the survival of their group and the death of Caggan. He once again makes arcane gestures and pits his will against the boar-man's.
Rurisa catches Caggan a glancing blow, but his thick boar skin stops the blade from cutting deep enough to hurt him .
Caggan's eyes begin to fuzz over before his rage brings him back to the present, ready to kill everyone in the room.
Cimri doesn't like where this is going and slips next to Caggan once more, this time opposite of Rurisa, hoping to distract the man from his target with her kukri.
Caggan's skin again stops the wound from reaching too deep as he snorts in annoyance.
"Fall! Penance ordered.
"I will not tolerate such outright insubordination, not in the middle of the sheriff's office. Your violence is unwarranted. Stand down my good man."
The fiendish bird continued to assault the boar-man to no avail but at least it would be a nuisance, maybe.
Caggan's knees tremble as Penance's command washes over him, but he continues standing firm, angrier than ever.
Finally drawing blood on the woman who has beaten him twice before Caggan stomps and roars his approval to the rafters, watching everyone waiting for your next move.
As Caggan's tusks tear across her ribs the mercenary hisses in laughter as the pain only sharpens her focus. As her blood falls--sizzling and smoking--to the wooden floor, her blood smeared across her greatsword ignites with terrible black flames as Rurisa sweeps her heavy blade at the wereboar's legs.
Trevor tries giving Rusia a bit more help by jabbing his knife at the manbearpig's ankles
Trevor is going to quickly find himself back at the slave pen
Rurisa's blade cuts deeply into Caggan's flesh, the silver blanch on the sword burning through the magic engulfing his skin and leaving a vast swath of neatly burned flesh and the smell of burnt hair. Caggan stumbles but continues moving around, fury growing as his blood gushes to the floor and mingles with hers.
Cimri sees an opportunity and moves to take advantage of it, slashing again with her finely honed kukri.
Cimri's blade finds its target, but it does nothing against the magic encasing the wereboar.
Vokrin ponders his supply of spells, which is running low. He grips his component pouch and draws some sand, which he allows to fall to the ground slowly. He hopes to put Caggan down for the count, but knows his efforts thus far have been ineffective.
"Oh this will not do, not do at all" Penance muttered. "Assaulting an officer, resisting an official order, blatant disrespect for the office of the sheriff, these charges are not helping your cause Caggen."
Penance maneuvered around to reach out and touch Rurisa, who seemed to be the most efficient at handling Caggen.
Caggan slumps to the floor as Vokrin's spell hits him, his devastating wounds taking their toll as he slowly shifts back to human form.
Trevor lays his hand on Caggan and mutters a few words, causing his blood to stop flowing
"Damn it all, he shifted back." Rurisa snarls, sagging a little as her hellspawned power drains away and the flames dancing across her blade vanish. "Vokrin, could you use your magic to charm a confession from him? Preferably a public demonstration as well to substantiate our claims. The rebels' job will be much harder if we can win the hearts of Longacre by keeping them safe from monsters."
"Could I? Yes. But I will not rob a man's will. I mean it's one thing to coerce, but there is a line I will not cross, as it welcomes recompense of the same sort. Comply or do not, accept the consequences of your actions, but I will not force a man to do aught. I will take a life before I will take a mind." He precariously ponders. "I did remind you, however, that he would shift back. We could simply hold a public demonstration, a full moon lasts three nights, if we chained him in the public square tomorrow night, he would likely shift. And we could likely corroborate testimony that he is oft absent at that time of the month. Proof is easy enough to procure or manufacture."
It's a rare moment when Vokrin stands up for something, especially something so seemingly good.
Cimri looks down at her kukri a little disappointed it didn't do as much as it normally does. "Well, that was...something. Sort of explains his nightmares when Penance hit him with that fear spell thing."
Does anyone need some healing? I can provide assistance.
Rurisa scowls at the barkeep's unconscious form--and Vokrin's sudden qualms about free will--but restrains herself from a kick at the snoring man. "I could use a little healing, thank you Trevor."
"Vokrin's idea is sound, we'll chain him somewhere public and show the town that he's a werebeast. Might be worth cutting out his tongue, too, just so that we don't have to listen to his yammering about how terrible we are."
Turning her head as she goes for a pile of manacles, she addresses the others. "Well done to all of us, we should plan our big reveal of tusky here while we wait for Ertha and the rest."
Trevor waves his hand over Rurisa's wounds.
Caggan wakes with a start several minutes after Vokrin cast his spell, his face turning red as he realizes the predicament he's found himself in.
Vokrin looks astonished. "We could have slain you a dozen times over without blinking, we could have shown you to the world, which we likely shall, we could have done all manner of horror to you, and still you resist? When will you and the rest of this rabble learn what is good for you? Abide! Do as you are told! There are consequences and you are rapidly running out of grace."
Rurisa calmly kneels by the furious barkeep and grabs him by the hair, yanking his head to stare into his eyes. "Personal? You couldn't be more wrong, Caggan. The insurgents of this Glorious Reclamation are the enemy, you're just an annoyance that doesn't have the good sense to stay the hell out of our way."
Using core muscles developed from years of throwing disorderly drunks out of his bar Caggan surges up growling, "Then you all best kill me now, or I'll be the thorn in your side that spreads an infection that destroys you!" before falling back on his belly, face planting itself briefly in the wood floor.
Grinning wildly at the possibility of cutting out Caggan's tongue, Penance begins to open a small pouch and pull out a rather vicious looking pair of pliers. Next he removed a small serated scalpel that almost seems to glint in the light. He begins to step forward until Vokrin begins his speech.
With a rather dejected look and a small "hmmpphh", Penance began filing his tools back away. As Caggan regained consciousness, Penance frowned until the bound man suggested killing him. Penance began to nod in agreement as he started to pull out his tools again.
Trevor stands silently by, being a good slip.
Cimri scowls more and more as Caggan continues speaking. "I'm getting tired of hearing him. Also it sounds like he's not going to stop, should we just take care of him?"
"Not here. Publicly. What happens behind closed doors stays there, justice served should be done before the sight of all, lest it cause the masses to become more hostile toward us. We would already engender a great deal of displeasure for killing Caggan, as he is an institution here, but doing so here gains us nothing but a corpse. Doing so before the town can gain us..." He has trouble finding the words, and looks to the others to supply the remainder of his argument.
"Vokrin has the right of it. We're agents of the Archbaron, and we've been tasked with stamping out sedition. One of the ways we're going to do that is boosting our own reputations by exposing Caggan as a wereboar--I liked the suggestion that we stake him out tonight and let the town see him transform. After that, we'll convict him of whatever we need to and give him to Penance."
Cimri looks at Penance playing with his tools. "You may want to get some silver implements in case he gets...tusky"
The door to the jail creaks open and Ertha walks in followed by Ashel and Saster, carrying a small form between them. "Woah." Ertha looks around at the damage to the table, floor, and you. "What happened here?"
"Caggan is apparently a wereboar, and just attacked us. Your timing is impeccable, Deputy."
The deputy's collective jaws drop before they shake it off to present their catch. "Ma'am we were going to wait longer for you, but we found someone skulking around in the night. A...free slip who works at the general store." Ashel and Saster bring the small figure forward, revealing a Halfling woman just this side of middle age. She scowls at the room in general but doesn't say a word. Ertha produces a large sheaf of posters and pamphlets proclaiming the righteousness of the Glorious Reclamation. "She was distributing these..."
Oh tsk tsk, Not being able to swallow your rage is a tragic thing for our people. It looks like the pens for her. Trevor thinks to himself.
Swearing under her breath Rurisa leans her still-bloody sword against the sheriff's desk. "Okay, good work, I just wish the office was in better condition," she glowers at the prone form of Caggan for emphasis. "Let's do this on the porch then."
Eyeing the halfling woman, Rurisa sighs. "Well, lets start with an easy one. What's your name, and where did you print these fliers?"
The woman holds up a defiant face, speaking quickly and only as little as possible. "Caswella Runder. I made them."
"I asked where, Miss Runder, not who. I understand that you don't like us, believe me I've been catching that from all sides lately." Rurisa doesn't glance at the deputies or indicate them in any way, but the blood on her armor underlines the point well enough. Kneeling down to look at the halfling woman, she puts as much empathy into her voice as she can manage. "I understand you're trying to help Longacre, and that you think we're your enemy, but what I'm trying to do is prevent violence. So I want to make you a deal: if you show us where and how you made all these, we'll assess you a small fine but we won't prosecute you or any friends who may have helped you. But the fliers have to stop. Does that seem fair?"
Caswella's face remains defiant, but quickly crumbles. "I made them myself," she repeats, but then continues, "in the basement of the grocery store. The Gields don't know anything about it, so please leave them be." She sounds defeated as her eyes drop to the ground.
Cimri whistles, "Well that explains that. Where should we put the slip? I'm beat..."
"We're not going to hurt the Gields, but we will need to hold you until we've verified your story." Rurisa turns to the deputies. "Place her in one of the holding cells, we'll go check out the grocers' basement. Then we'll assess the fine and she'll be free to go after we take a statement. Ertha, Ashel, I need you to drop in to the markets, churches, inns, wherever there are crowds and let people know about Caggan's condition--we have two more nights of full moon so we're going to demonstrate his next transformation publicly. Saster, you hold down the fort."
Stepping back inside, Rurisa looks over the party. "What do you think? We can question the slip now or when we come back from checking out the grocer's basement. I suspect she acted on her own initiative and will be another dead end towards finding this Angel Knight, but I guess we'll see. Either way I'll need to get cleaned up first."
"Lock it up, we shall deal with it in due time. At this moment there are far more pressing matters. I find it hard to believe that a sole actor is behind all the papering of our town, however." Vokrin considers the creature below even his concern. "We will root out this conspiracy against our town, our people, and our Lord, then tear them from the dark into the light and purge them in fire."
"Perhaps we could commission Miss Rudder to print some different fliers. Some fliers condemning the Glorious Reclamation, or some notices about our furry friend in there. I imagine even some fliers advertising the merits of the Archbaron may prove some what fruitful."
Trevor wonders just how much convincing Rudder will need. Making her print fliers decrying the Glorious Reclamation would be fitting.
Ertha and the others return from putting Caswella in the remaining cell, whistling low under their breaths. "It should be easy to convince people Caggan ain't normal, you should see what he did to the door..."
Cimri looks up, "I didn't get a good look at it cause I had a boar-man running at me at the time, but I believe it. It's late, but if you guys think we should head over to the Gields' to check out the basement we can. I'd rather let it sit until morning when we're all fresh."
"We will root out this conspiracy against our town, our people, and our Lord, then tear them from the dark into the light and purge them in fire."
"Just so Vokrin, your focus is an inspiration. Do you feel up to checking on the Gields tonight or would you prefer to rest and restore your magic? Penance and Trevor, your thoughts?"
"Perhaps we could commission Miss Rudder to print some different fliers. Some fliers condemning the Glorious Reclamation, or some notices about our furry friend in there. I imagine even some fliers advertising the merits of the Archbaron may prove some what fruitful."
Rurisa gives Penance a conspiratorial smile. "An excellent suggestion, Penance. One of the things the Hellrazors taught me is that resources should only be destroyed if you can't use them yourself--whether that be arms, forts, men, or materiel capturing them is two victories. First you deny it to your enemy and second you gain it for yourself. A skilled propagandist would be a fine weapon in this struggle for Longacre."
Vokrin looks somewhat weary, but doesn't try to let it on. "I have enough to go on, and I possess one spell yet which can be used to devastating effect... I pity those who would try to stand against me. That having been said, I have but the one potent spell, the rest are mere parlor tricks." He draws out his dagger and looks at it, checking that it is still sharp. He certainly hopes he doesn't have to wind up using it.
"Oh yes yes yes, we must investigate the Gields but perhaps discretion may be a better avenue than confrontation. If only we had a disguise. I wonder, do you think other slips may be involved? Perhaps our own Mr. Culexis may be able to uncover more details with less resistance."
I do have some interpersonal skills that I have put to use as a doctor and butler. One must have a good bedside manner.
Cimri stands and stretches, bending backwards to crack her back and stretching forward to crack her knuckles, one finger at a time. "All right, let's do this!" She leads everyone south through town, past one square and towards Odmer's cart. The moon shines down bright, leaving the roads well-lit. In accordance with the new laws no one is out and around and the path is wide open.
Cimri stops and points at the general store, with one lantern lit in the window for the home above the store. "We're here. Who's going first? Trevor?"
Trevor will head up to the building.
Assuming there are no troubles her listens to see if there is anyone inside.
Trevor ghosts up the stairs, not a board making a squeak or untimely squeal. Pausing at the door he hears the sounds of two women, speaking quietly, though he can't make out what it is they are saying.
Trevor waves to the others and holds up two fingers.