Kroos' eyes narrow and he says, "I do what I can to get by. I steal when I need to, kill when it is needed, and I survive because of it. I don't need to be a bandit to continue living my life, but if given the choice, I Kroos Stonegrove, would go back to my boys and continue on with much of the same. I'm not going to apologize or requite for my sins and won't change my ways just because of what happened today or because of threats. If you feel you need to send me, currently an unarmed man, to the boneyard because of it, then hurry up and do it love... I don't have all day and I'm guessing neither do you. I wouldn't hold it against ya if ya did, but if I'm going there anyway, it might as well be soon."
After his outburst, Kroos looks very tired but has a determined look on his face.
Raseri frowns and her eyes glitter dangerously.
"I see," she growls, Storhrid's hackles rising as she bares her teeth at the man. "Perhaps if you had heard of my clan, you would not have been so quick to admit to that."
She looks down at the white wolf at her side before pointing to where Tobias and Kaveri are.
"Vertu með þeim," she barks in a harsh tone,
The wolf looks at her, head cocked for a moment before obeying and standing next to kaveri, her ice-blue eyes on Kroos.
That taken care of, the Ulfen warrior pulls the axe from her belt and chunks it into the ground between the man's legs.
"Stand up and fight, or I shall kill for a coward," she snarls as she unstraps the greatsword from her back.
"Hold on a second, why does he need to fight you, he's already defeated, we won, why does there need to be more violence?" Lies, who had been quiet up until now, asks.
"Killing an unarmed man isn't honorable. It's the path of those who prey on the weak. That is not strength, but cowardice. I am no coward," Raseri grates out, "I will give him a chance to either turn from his ways or to defend himself. If he does neither, then I'll have no worries about ending him."
"We cannot afford a delay such as taking him back to town. If we bring him forward with us, it will be another enemy at our backs. And if we let him go, he will continue to prey upon the innocent." Tobias speaks levelly, his voice devoid of emotion. "Perhaps it would have been better to kill him outright, but now we have little choice."
-Posted with Wayfinder
"Then take away his weapons and gear, leaving him only the clothes on his back and leave him in this forest, at least that way he has a chance of living." Lies suggests.
Raseri barks a cold bitter laugh at Lies suggestion.
"Nay, not even a worm that thinks himself a wolf deserves to die like that, and he would die," she says, "to have your life sapped by the cold and the wind is a death that I wouldn't wish on anyone."
Grandma quietly observes the discussion but says nothing.
"You think he stands a better chance against you? Even if he did defeat you, it's unlikely the rest of us would just stand here and watch."
"So what would you do with him? He's already told us he would return to being a bandit," Raseri says, her temper beginning to get the better of her, "as for the rest of you, if he defeats me in combat, then you will let him go, and if any of you interfere, I will not be pleased. This is a fight between two warriors, if he so wishes to fight, otherwise, his choices are to beg forgiveness or die. We do not have time to haul his sorry carcass back to Heldren."
Raseri turns her baleful gaze to Kroos, her eyes blazing with cold, hungry fire.
"I grow tired of waiting, bandit. Will you fight? Will you atone for what you've done? Will you just sit there until my patience runs out and I end your miserable life? Well," she snarls, her teeth seeming to get just a little longer.
Lies looks at Kroos questioningly, wondering if the man had any opinion in the matter, it was after all his life that was being decided for him.
"If I was in his position, I would go back to being a bandit as well. Change is difficult and unnatural, of course he is going to resist change if something doesn't force that change upon him." Lies seems a little unsure of herself as she says this however.
"You can't force someone to change," Raseri shoots back at Lies, "they have to want it. They have to work at it, because it is hard. This one's lazy, and if he doesn't wish to change, then all I can do is keep him from hurting someone else. My clan has learned that even in mercy you cannot be soft."
"Perhaps I cannot, but circumstances can, if there was suddenly no one to steal from, then he would have to either change his methods of survival or die. Of course change is hard, but on the other hand homeostasis is not only easy, it's the natural state of things." Although the tone of her voice seemed to imply that Lies believed in what she was saying, she seemed somewhat offended, not by the fact that Raseri was arguing against her, but by the stance that Lies herself was taking.
If you are so against change, then why did you change anyway, it would've been easier to stay a slave. Besides, this form you keep isn't even one who is you, it is something you changed into. Lies looks away as she argues with herself inside of her head.
"Do whatever you must, but there is no beauty in this." She says softly as she takes a step away, lost in her thoughts.
Kroos is actually silent throughout the exchange. He does have a pondering look on his face though.
He suddenly has a look of surprise while looking at Raseri and then masks it, "... You are from the high north... Land of the Linnorm Kings... I ask as a final boon... what clan do you hail?"
Slowly his accent changes while he speaks. To Raseri it sounds almost familiar.
Raseri looks at the man with a different look, one eyebrow arched quizzically as she hears a familiar lilting note in his voice.
"I am of the Whitescales. We are small, but strong. Winter's fury flows through our veins along side the blood of fey and dragon."
Kroos grabs the axe given to him and stands up, "I may not look it, but I am also from the high north... but took mostly after my mother I did. My clan was shattered a few years ago and flung to the four winds."
He smiles sadly, "This is how I ended up here and this is how I survived. Like I said before, I will not beg forgiveness for my sins and wouldn't have my life any other way. I will fight you on the shreds of honor left to the clan of the Stonegrove. Before my passing, which I have no doubt you will soon bring, I bring you news that I acquired but a month before. There is an upheaval in the north. Irrisen marches on its borders and many clans, including the Whitescales, stand in defense of the homeland." And with that, he goes into a fighting stance and his accent changes back to the one he was using before.
"Don't keep ol' Kroos waiting love. The Boneyard awaits me."
"Aye, and I'll send you there with Winter's own fury," she answers with wolfish smile before taking up her sword and charging him.
Grandma sadly watches the fight.
"To be one such as he, truly a lost soul."
Kroos dodges your attack and swings with his own,
and misses.
Raseri easily sidesteps the clumsy attack before going in with all of her strength once more.
A low growl comes from her throat as her own attack seems equally as clumsy.
Kroos lands a hit on your side with the axe.
"The world is a cruel place," Tobias says quietly to Lies. He crouches in the snow, one hand scratching the white wolf's ears, the other rubbing Kaveri's side firmly. "While there is beauty in it, there is also ugliness, and necessity. I regret that we have to do this, but Raseri is right." He glances sidelong at Mable, nodding in agreement. "I pity him, in a way. But not his choices."
When Kroos lands a hit on Raseri, he hisses through his teeth at the sight, Kaveri stiffening at his side, a growl building in his chest.
-Posted with Wayfinder
A sudden intake of breath is heard from Grandma when Raseri is hit.
"Now no more of that my dear. I will have to heal that up when you are done."
Raseri grits her teeth against the pain, a low snarl rumbling in her throat as she lines up a more careful strike.
After Kroos hits you, it opens him up to a counter strike that allows you to take off his "sword" arm and cut into his side. He clutches his stump as he bleeds out, but doesn't make a sound. He smiles at Raseri and then falls face first into the snow.
Mabs makes a sound that you can't identify, "Done with that now deary? You okay?"
Grandma works quickly to stop the bleeding and heal Raseri.
"Hmmm that won't due, it simple will not do!"
"I am afraid I only have one cure left for the day. Oh dear!"
Raseri's eyes are dim like leaden clouds that blot out the sun as she stands there panting. She waves off the others, building a pyre and laying the man out on it, his hand clutching one of the weapons he had before the others had taken them. After a few tries and more than a few soft curses, the pyre is lit and hungrily consuming the corpse that was once Kroos.
Only then does she let Mable see to her wounds.
"If you have mead, I hear that will do in a pinch," Raseri says with a weak laugh.
"I'm sorry I got blood all over these after you loaned them to me," she adds gesturing to the blood staining her clothing.
Storhrid canters up to where Raseri sits and lays down next to the young woman as she absently rubs the wolf's head. As the pyre burns, Raseri begins singing a slow, sad song.
"Lets move on while we still have some light, shall we?"
"My father was fond of that song," Tobias says quietly, placing a hand on Raseri's shoulder before sitting next to her. Kaveri sits alert at his side, watching the pyre. "Mother never liked him singing it around the house - said it was too morbid. Think you sing it better than he ever did."
He sits in silence for a while, watching the flames, and nods when Mable speaks up again. "Grandma's right. Let's see him finished and move on."
-Posted with Wayfinder
Raseri nods and stands up, Storhrid at her side.
"We should, aye," she says before turning away from the smouldering pyre and going back to the trail. After a while, the young woman looks at Tobias again.
"What clan does your father hail from?"
Lies still remains quiet, even as the others are quickly over with the issue at hand. Elizabeth does however pay her respects to the fallen, kneeling at the pyre to utter a silent prayer, a prayer that not everyone they meet will have to suffer the same consequences as this one, a prayer for those not willing to change from the path that know, and a prayer for those with no choice but to change, those like herself.
With her prayer finished, Lies stands up, and Lucine peeks out from her shirt, Lies petting the small Fox gently.
Grandma quietly repeats the last rites for the soul moving on, then she moves over to the path.
"Its such a shame poor lost lamb!"
The funeral pyre crackles as it lays the man to rest.
"My father, Johan, is a man of the Rimesong clan," Tobias replies, by way of small talk. "Many of his shield-brothers were skalds, singers of songs and tellers of tales. He was more tempted by the lure of gold, and joined the guard." Kaveri sneezes at his side, a snorting sound as if to punctuate his distaste. "Now, where did this trail lead...?" the hunter mutters, frowning.
-Posted with Wayfinder
Raseri snorts in laughter at Kaveri's reaction to Tobias' explanation of where his father came from, and why he was in Taldor.
"It seems that Kaveri disapproves. I hope that he still likes me after he figures out that I'm here from much the same," she says with a smile.
Then she sobers.
"I've heard a little of the Rimesong, but not enough to say that I know more than the name," she says, "my clan is small, and often overlooked by the others, when they aren't saying we're soft, or weak, or..." The young woman stops herself, taking in a deep breath and slowly letting it out, "I guess that's why I really came here. To prove that we aren't weak nor soft. We are strong, and we are as capable as any other ulfen that cares to match us deed for deed. All I managed was to prove that I cannot leash my temper instead," she finishes bitterly.
"Raseri dear, you did what had to be done. All we can do is wish his soul to a better life than the one he had here. Come it is time to move on and leave the past behind as best we can."
Grandma rumages through her pack and pulls our some cookies.
"Here have a cookie it will make you feel better."
"Ah, don't mind him. He's just not used to snow; think he's getting it in his nose," Tobias says absently, squinting briefly into the sun to determine his position. "Besides, if he didn't like you, he wouldn't keep hanging around you and your new friend like a lost puppy. And hey, everyone has their own goals. I could have had an easy life back in Oppara; instead, I'm sleeping under the stars and living rough. 'S what I wanted. Long 's you don't regret your decision." He grins at Raseri, adding, "As long as the temper's not aimed at me, can't say I mind it. You're assertive, and not willing to let people push you around. Not entirely bad qualities."
He chuckles when Mable pulls out the cookies. "Well, I suppose I shouldn't expect anything else from you, eh Grandma?"
"Decking a noble twit and meeting all of you certainly outweigh any regrets I might have had," Raseri says with a chuckle as she scratches Storhrid's ear with one hand while taking a cookie with the other. Her eyes light up as she takes a small bite of the small, round sweet.
"Whaddya call this again? I have some cousins that would love you to bits," she says with a grin before taking another nibble of the cookie.
You hear the crunch of snow very close by as someone walks in your direction, "Kroos? You and the boys cookin' somethin? Been a while since you checked back in. We could see smoke all the way from the..."
He slows down as he spots your group and stares dumbly at you all for a few seconds.
Raseri lets loose a short venomous curse before charging the man and hoping to tackle him before he can run for help.
The man gets tackled into the snow and is stunned for a second as the wind gets knocked out of him.
"So now what, are we just going to kill this one too if he doesn't change his ways?" Elizabeth cannot help but ask as the Ulfen jumps on the surprised man.
"Which would you prefer, a quick death or a slow one freezing and tied to a tree," Raseri snarls as quietly as she can while trying to keep a hold on the man and keep him from calling for help.
"The smoke was from Kroos' funeral pyre," the ulfen whispers in the man's ear, "If you wish to join him, that can be arranged, but I'd rather not kill you if I didn't have to, understand."
"However, I need something from you in return. I have some questions, and you seem like a fellow with answers to them. If you answer them truthfully, and don't start screaming, you'll be fine. Now, my first question is easy, just nod or shake your head. If I remove my hand from your mouth, will you keep quiet?"
Before he can do anything, a second bandit appears a few yards behind the the first, out behind some trees. Upon seeing the group and his captured fellow bandit, he reacts immediately and turns around to run away.
"...What is it? A voice says barely audible.
"Run! There are too many of em! They have Trev." the "close by," fleeing form of the bandit yells.
Well, this won't end well... Lies lets out a convoluted sigh before looking at Raseri with a 'see what you've done now' stare.
Raseri doesn't even glance at Lies as she has much bigger problems than a snarky waif at the moment. Seeing that they weren't going to be able to get anything useful quickly enough, she decides to punch the guys lights out instead and go after the others.