"Here, Scramsax, let me take over flying the rug after our priest," says Gunnar, worried that the wagon seems to have traveled so quickly.
A worry begins to nag at Gunnar's mind driven by the sudden change of night into day when the beanstalk sundered the shadow plane bubble...Could more time have passed here than in the fey realm while they tarried there?
After several hours of fits brought on by pain and clinging to Ingryd and Gunnar like a child, Arianna is utterly exhausted and falls into an uneasy sleep.
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Aterro tried to balance the pot of stew on the rug, but with the constant turbulence he just sloshed most of it on himself.
As both air and bard grew worse in their condition, Aterro could do nothing about as the sloshed stew slowly soaked and froze itself to his jerkin. Thus thrice-cursed even the paladin's unworldly endurance was tasked beyond its ability to easily cope.
"Aye, of course we press on," he says.
Then you recall the lemonade stand was inside a bubble of the shadow plane, a waystop along one of the notorious shadow roads. You've read plenty of the various tomes and studies that warn of time differences in other planes. And especially within the shadow roads. It is what makes some of the roads so effective for travel. A month or two on the road results in only a few days passing in the mortal realm. Thus folk can travel great distances in a few days or with fewer rations. Of course, the opposite is also true in some instances. A leisurely journey of a couple days can result in arrival at your destination months or even years later.
An expert tracker could potentially tell you how old those wagon tracks were, but one thing you seem certain of at this point. You've lost time. Actual days passed in the one evening you were within the grasp of the shadow realm. How many you cannot say for certain. More than one or two. That is certain. Less than two weeks. That is your best estimate.
Another thought raises its ugly head, if others among the refugees were afflicted by the same condition as Arianna...
After a brief moment to deal with nature's business, everyone back onto the cramped confines of the Nasty Rug. Scramsax directs the rug back in the air. Travel through the night is hard. Rain pelts each of you from every direction. Arianna struggles in the grip of her demonic curse, requiring nearly everything Aterro can throw at her to keep the foul creatures from tearing her apart. Eyes gummy with grit and fatigue, Scramsax does he best to stay on course, but even the usually robust halfling begins to feel the weight of the journey and night slowly passes with no sign of Luthael or the wagon.
Gunnar says, ”It seems many days have passed while we were in the shadow realm. We may have a long night ahead of us.”
==22 total
"There's a light on the plain, there! Its gotta be the Invictusol..." the halfling hoped, veering the Nasty Rug that direction.
"Light? We should check it out. Just in case ready yourselves for battle!" Ingryd says as she smiles and looks at Aterro. Glad to have her battle buddy back.
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Arianna stirs, a whimpering in pain as something writhes beneath her skin. The writhing stops with Aterro's ministrations. Her soft cries and pleas to Elalune do not.
Arianna looked into the still pool of water and sighed with relief. Her hair was once again its natural color instead of the horrid green it had been for the past month. She swore it would be the last time she ever took a job from fey nobles without payment beforehand, especially matronly, busybody sprites. She was willing to admit she should not have played that song, but she also asked the ditsy dame a dozen times what she should play and never got an answer. She had even written out a list of songs for approval, and she had only gotten silence.
The blue sky overhead, the bright sun, and a cool breeze made the urges of her wanderlust harder to resist. The trees danced in the wind, twirling about one another as she walked down the Fey Road. It was a gorgeous day, and too nice of a day to be wasting worrying over the past, especially when she wouldn't have to worry about hiding her hair before setting foot into a town now.
She hummed to herself as the day quickly passed into the afternoon. Evening would soon be upon Arianna, and she would need to make camp again. Miles had passed beneath her feet, yet there were still many miles more to go before she would find a town again. She didn't mind. The stars and moon always shined brighter on the road anyway.
"Hello! Miss!"
Arianna stopped humming as she saw a man approaching, looking confused and a little haggard. She stopped to let him catch up, wondering what was going on and confident she could run away from the man if she needed to.
"Yes," she answers. "Are you heading to Dublintown as well?"
The man shook his head.
"Nay, I am looking for a village not far from here. The path is supposed to be around here, but I cannot find it."
Arianna smiled. Having lived on the tricky roads her whole life, she knew their tricks and traps fairly well. Sometimes they seemed to have a mind of their own. Apparently he had fallen prey to a particularly mischievous pathway.
"A path, you say? I think I can help you find it." She lead him a ways down the road as it looped around and around, seemingly forever. She was wise to the trick, however, and knew where the seams in the clever illusion lay. The man thanked her profusely as he ran down the path ahead of the setting sun.
"You should not have done that," a voice, thick with hatred and malice, said as the trees closed in overhead, blotting out the last of the sunlight.
Arianna ran, realizing her life depended on how fast she could get away. The trees in front of her grew further ahead, closing off the road with their branches stretching out to trap her. The form of a beautiful young woman in clothes that left just enough to the imagination stepped out in her path. It was a mask. Arianna could smell the stench of blood and the rot of cruel malice roiling out from beneath the fair façade.
She skidded to a stop and leapt for a seam, a spot where she could step sidereal and use one of the less traveled paths to get away. She ducked clutching talons and branches as she ran through the portal and onto the small path.
"He was my prey," the figure hissed behind Arianna. "Now I'll feast on you instead!"
Arianna needed no encouragement to run as fast as she could, she didn't need her fey-touched senses to know that the being chasing her was bad news. She ran on, jaunting left, then up, then nadir, then spinward. She could hear the howls now. They were closing in, their breath hot on her heels and back. She had little choice and jumped through another seam in the weave, a tear in the veil between. She tripped. Her fall took her past gnomes, psoglav, and strange fey bards. On and on the world spun around her.
When she finally stopped tumbling through time, she found herself sitting under a tree, wrapped up in Ingryd's arms. On her wrist was a balloon shaped like one of the gnomes she had seen as she tumbled past. She was safe. She wasn't hunted. She wasn't caught and kept in a cage.
"What is wrong, my little cub," Ingryd asked, her voice full of motherly concern and her breath smelling of mead.
"A nightmare," Arianna answered, "but it's over."
"Is it?" Ingryd's voice rang hollow and raspy, like a death rattle. The solid warmth disappeared and Arianna found herself on top of a bearskin rug with Ingryd's lifeless eyes staying coldly into Arianna's own.
"Nutty than a Barsellan whore in her cups," Scramsax said, maggots crawling out from the holes in his rotting skin and clothes as he held up her sword belt and quiver while placing a patchy-haired foot on her pack.
"A fool to fight, even more foolish to run from a battle with STEEL," Aterro's voice boomed as skeletal fingers knotted in her hair and yanked her, painfully, to her feet.
"Did'ya think ye escaped," Gunnar asked as he roughly hauled her up by the arm and gave her a gaunt-faced leer through his mangy beard.
Arianna screamed as the dwarf, his frame little more than a husk, let go and she fell from the sky. She was sure her body would be broken and mangled when she finally hit the ground. She was dead.
Her surprise was short-lived, quickly replaced by fear, when she landed on the Nasty Rug. Cats' claws and paws held her fast no matter how much she struggled. They forced her mouth open as the gnome-loon tied to her wrist gave her a wicked smile before twisting into a slimy, demonic snake and slithering down her throat. She coughed and screamed as it ate away at her insides.
"Elalune! Please," she begged. "Please! Save me!"
"Foolish girl," the woman of fair skin and foul aura chided. Her lambent eyes appearing over Arianna in the pitch darkness. "That false goddess can't help you. She can barely help herself."
The woman cackled as Arianna screamed and the demonic beasts tore her apart. The pain went on and on, lasting for what could only be an eternity.
Arianna awoke chained to a slab, the stone cold on her bare skin. To either side stood the woman she had ran from on the fey road and another elf of silver hair and blue eyes that shone with an eerie red light. Obsidian daggers were clutched in their hands and poised to strike at her heart.
"Don't worry, sweet child," the woman cooed. "We shall see each other again soon enough. Perhaps by then you'll have met your sister."
The daggers came down.
The first sign of Arianna's awakening is her hand reaching out and grabbing Ingryd's blouse. The second is the soft sobbing Ingryd can feel as hot tears joined the cold rain in soaking the bearkin's clothing.
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Ingryd instinctually pulls in Arianna and comforts her by stroking her pack. Holding her close she leans down and Whispers. "Shhh, It's okay you are safe, I won't let them take you. We will get you too Lutheal, He'll know what to do!"
Ingryd uses comforting noises. Well to her they were relaxing, low soft growls and rumbles. It worked for bear folk children. She also moved her cloak and blankets around to help shield her from the rain.
Eyes of cerulean peered through the night dark of the storm. Wind whistled beneath his outstretched wings. The charge of the air caused the occasional spark of static to dance along tickling his smooth rain slick hide. For several hours he'd circled the beacon with his brother and sister. The light shining on the wide open plain was at first a curiosity.
What could be so foolish, desperate, or powerful to announce its presence so openly out in these wilds? Was it connected to the massive world vine now looming to the south? The hunter wondered. His stomach grumbled. It had been days since they'd come upon that trio of centaurs. Days since the last descent meal.
But something kept him from diving toward the pack of humans hunkered against wind and rain. There was a stench rising from that small band. It curled the hunter's nose and queered his stomach. Demon stench, the hunter determined. Not a good meal save for one. That one smelled of light and rich, red blood. It also smelled of power, but power grown weak and vulnerable. But one could not truly feed three and he'd no wish to quarrel with the others over a such a minor meal.
He would have flown on if not for his sister's devious mind. "A signal. That's what is it brother's dear." She'd hissed as they circled high overhead, lurking within the cover or cloud and night. "Where there is one human of power, there are always others. Followers, minions, slaves, acolytes, allies, enemies. Mortals, especially humans, always attract more of their kind. This one's followers are sickly and dying, so he calls others into his aura. He summons forth new minions to submit to his will."
It was a sound possibility. And so they waited. Circled and watched. He was about ready to give up and move on or take the lone healthy meal when his nestmate's intuition proved itself accurate.
To his surprise they came out of the darkness flying upon a reeking rug that stank worse than the pestilence below. Although this group was polluted as well with the same curse, he counted four others that were not, including a big bearkin that could easily feed him for days.
The three hunters snarled toothy, reptilian, smiles and dove in the darkness toward the slow flying rug.
Arianna calms down after a few minutes of crying, her sobs fading into a quiet stillness. The exhaustion is wearing on her, hollowing out her spirit as much as whatever foul parasites are inside her are hollowing out her body. She couldn't sleep, however. The nightmare is still too fresh. Ingryd's rumbling growls are oddly soothing to the beleaguered elf, like the purring of a cat, and she is probably the driest person on the rug as wrapped up as she is.
The layers of blankets did nothing to hold back the chill running down her spine. Some sense she has never been able to explain screams at her that danger is about. She looks around before something in the currents of the wind or the pattern of the rain draws her gaze skyward.
"Gunnar," she cries, "Above us! Three beasts on the hunt!"
Ingryd looks up hearing Arianna's warning. Her soothing growls turned into aggressive ones. She shifts slightly and brings forth a hand axe with a weird bauble on it, she also moves to slide her shield over Arianna and smiles.
"We'll get them don't you worry"Ingryd says trying to be comforting as if a mother once more. It was a sensation she hadn't felt in a long time. Lost to her in her drink and rage. Now the Mead Makers wife, The Mother of Ivo and Aleen, had found a little bit of the old Ingryd. The Bearkin smiled. A genuine smile.A Smile that could lead to a new lease on life.
"Is it alright if I help," Arianna asks as she fishes out her bow and nocks an arrow.
"Yes, just don't exert yourself." Ingryd says with a smile and then thinks. She slips the hand axe back and pulls out her crossbow.
"A Bow would be better" She says as she begins to load it.
Looking up and seeing the hunters approach, Gunnar casts an arcane spell and touches Aterro and Ingryd, saying, "You two need maneuverability to help defend us. Let the rest of us try to get the rest of the way to the campfire on the carpet."
Casting Fly (at fourth level), Gunnar grants Aterro and Ingryd the ability to take to the skies to confront their attackers if they so desire.
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"Gratitude, Gunnar," Aterro acknowledges, and for a moment he is the old Aterro, the WarCleric, the Undying Warbringer.
"I was about to ask, but as ever you are already a step ahead of me!
Come, Ingryd, let us great these interlopers with a warm welcome!"
Aterro had been looking for something to hit all day. Though no longer living for GLORIOUS COMBAT as the sole purpose as he once did, still did he thirst for a chance to prove himself and the glory of Thor.
He brought forth his old friend, the Spiritual Hammer, and looked for the foe.
Ingryd smiles as she slips her crossbow back and pulls forth her hammer. She leaves her shield on the rug and then steps off maul in her hands. Soft words coax forth the enchanted weapons fiery swarm of angry bees, the orange-yellow crackle of death on a finely wrought hammer. This was the Savored Sting, the dangerous and deadly blessing of THe Bear Maiden and her blessed honey gave her this gift!
Whirling it she shifted to get between the Rug and the cloud. She growls and looks inwardly, her wellspring of anger, loss, grief, and strength. It was ready. She would welcome these dangerous foes with tooth, claw and hammer!
==26 total
Scram saw them, too...and didn't waste time talking. Handing the urine soaked tassels to Gunnar, he dove under his companions taking flight sending a barrage of invisible mind-scrambling daggers at whatever was pursuing them.
The three draconic shadows rapidly dive from the heights, their forms coalescing into familiar forms. Fortunately, not the familiar forms of true dragons, for three such creatures would be equivalent to a full scale invasion force. No, these are those lesser cousins to the powers and masterminds of the great Empire to the south. Wyverns. Scourge of the mountains, deadly enemy of caravans and travelers, poisonous brutes constantly hunting and feeding.
Stripes of electrical energy crackle and glow along flanks and wings and the three beasts close the distance. It is the telltale cerulean stripes that provide an indication something is amiss. For none have heard of such creatures crackling in such a manner. The second warning is when each of the creatures approaches within a hundred feet. Three massed sets of jaws open wide revealing a crackling electrical vortex swirling within reptilian gullets. An instant latter three lances of lightning lash toward their intended victims, Aterro, Ingryd, and Arianna on the rug. The final blast momentarily electrifies the rain and cat piss soaked rug threatening all aboard with an unpleasant shock.
Not so very far away, down upon the ground tucked beneath a leaking rain soaked makeshift shelter, Luthael and the others give a start as lightning flashes high overhead. But instead of being followed closely by the usual clap of thunder, another sound echoes across the plain. A draconic, beastial roar. One that has upon the eons warned humanity to run. To hide. To find shelter, else find yourself sating the beast's never ending hunger.
Startled shouts call out from the already worried and frightened refugees. Stark, pale, faces turn to the prophet of Khors. Hands point into the night sky, but darkness and cloud cover shroud the blooming melee above. Leaving imagination and fear to fill in what cannot be seen.
Arianna winces at the near-miss and the corona of electric sparks arcing over her. She snaps her bow up and takes aim, but her aching muscles quiver from the continuing demands she's placing on them and the shot is hardly her best as the arrow streaks out into the darkness towards the lightning-charged wyverns.
"Ingryd! Show them your strength and cut these beasts down!" The words carry a power in them, one that inspires warriors to strike truer and hit harder.
INgryd tryst to Dodge but instead takes it on the chin. Smoking a bit with singed hair Ingryd Moves using flight to move in and double moves to close the gap.
Once in the Wyverns face she roars. This is the primal font within channeled. She would give her friends some time.
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Aterro always loved flying.
On the few occasions that he had the chance, he RELISHED the feeling of being beyond the omnipotent grip of gravity and soar as a bird.
Such a feeling came with a sense of RIGHTEOUSNESS and POWER. Truly he could not fail while surrounded by Thor's own realm?
Thus was such faith tested when the lighting FLASHED and came down upon him with blindingly quick speed.
But alas! Such a thing, for all its celerity, was slow, too slow, too slow by half! Before he was even aware, Aterro's grace from the Thunderer kicked in and the electric bolt found NOTHING save Aterro's shining metal shield in its path, leaving the paladin untouched and still coming.
The sky LIGHTS as lightning strikes bright, flawless metal in a myriad storm of sparks and power.
But it is not the paladin that emerges from such a display of fireworks.
Nay! Now where was once but a mere mortal is a living EMBODIMENT of WAR and STRIFE. Where once flew but a man, now soars an AVENGING ANGEL the likes of which to make ALL THINGS cower in FEAR.
This must be why Valkyries are women, for a man thusly arraigned is be a terrible thing to behold.
His hand flashing in an arcane gesture to ward off the electrical damage, Gunnar finds he is not the primary target of the lightning bolt attacks…yet the near misses eat into his arcane shield.
”Hang on, this is about to get bumpy!” says Gunnar as the rug slows to a halt when Scramsax stops actively piloting it (looks like it takes an action to pilot the rug, and Gunnar has something else in mind).
Realizing his lightning spells are likely useless in this fight, Gunnar pulls out his magic horn of battle waits until the wyverns are all within 60 feet—likely to happen quickly as fast as they are diving) and sounds a glorious note of battle from his Silver Horn of Valhalla, summoning to appear (evenly distributed) on the foes, willing them to immediately start hacking with their great axes!
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Lightning arcs through Ingryd sending her into a rage. The roaring bearkin races upward eager to engage the massive reptilian creature that just blasted her with electrical power. In flight just behind the bearkin, Aterro momentarily ducks behind his shield, letting the protective barrier fend off the storm wyvern's power. The blast bursts upon the shield scattering into a thousand tiny arcs that flash and gleam angrily into the surrounding night sky. The paladin emerges from the blast transformed into a formidable figure of war and fury.
On the carpet, Scramsax and Arianna feel their fingers and feet tingle for a few moments as the third lightning blast electrifies the soaked rug. But neither suffers any real harm from the attack. The halfling continues to lay low and ready his attack while Arianna picks herself up and sends a feathered shaft streaking into the night sky. A few heartbeats later and the lead creature lets out a startled growl when the arrow finds its mark.
Arcane power flashes around Gunnar, absorbing the bulk of the electrical energy coursing across and through the rug. Dwarven eyes squint into the night. An idea flairs to life as the wizard grabs the silver horn hanging from his belt. The idea is quickly transformed into a series of arcane calculations using the best estimates for the enemy's size, speed, and closing distance. Satisfied with his quickly derived results Gunnar puts the horn to his lips and blows. A long, bass note bursts into the night air. A call to war. A summoning of the warriors of Valhalla to once again join the glory and honor of battle upon the fields of war. A second note sounds, followed shortly by a third. Three enemies, three calls to war.
**********
Rolf Wintermane was one of the most dreaded pirates to sail the northern seas. It took the combined efforts of Krakova, Courlandia, Tanserhall, and Vidim to finally put an end to the reaver's fearsome raids. With a sly grin his hands reached for Min's corset even as Gin started to unlace his boots. He'd a mind to plunder the two valhallan beauties like a harvest ripe coastline. Min giggled as his hand slip beneath the silky fabric of her...
A rings through the halls of valhalla. A note that cannot be ignored or disobeyed by those who hear its rousing call. Min's fleshy warmth still tingling upon his fingertips, Rolf Wintermane finds him self standing upon the back of a wild beast that crackles with storm energy. Clouds drift around his head and there is a certain instinctual knowledge that the ground is far, far below. Fear quickly transforms into rage. Rage at being brought into such a situation, but much more importantly, rage at being summoned away from his afterworldly delights, the pirate slides his fingers into the nearest seam between the creatures scales. With a chilling warcry, he draws the axe hanging from his belt and drives it into the wyvern's flesh. All the while he looks to see what mortal dared summon him from his dream into this airborn nightmare.
********
Helga Nordsdottir fought well and hard in the shield wall. She was one of the last standing having killed more than a dozen of the trollkin interlopers and the worg allies. But her little village was small and most had not the skill and prowess as golden haired Helga whose axe bathed in blood regularly. As so she fell on that winter's night. Blade in hand she died and received that ultimate reward joining her kith and kin in the sacred halls of Valhalla.
A laugh escapes her wine stained lips. Her cup slams on the table, empty for the seventh time in less than half that many minutes.
"Again!" She roars, already seeing the telltale signs that young Brandt is nearly finished. Someone pours her eighth cup. The wager was hers for the taking now. "That gold torc will look good around a real warrior's arm." She says reaching for the cup. A note rings through the hall. Only she hears it. Realization strikes like a death blade. "Nooooo!" She roars....
And finds herself grabbing at the edge of a leathery wing. Wind rages and rain pummels her face. Lightning flashes. A bestial screech roars practically in her ear. With the reflexes of a warrior she snatches at sinew and bone, her callused hand gripping the storm wyvern's wing like a hunting dog with a bone. Her other hand grabs her short axe and begins the task of driving this beast closure to the ground. Closure to whoever cost her that gold torc.
**********
Knud Bannermann was finally going to be a winner. He'd died in the circle to that wife stealer and whore monger Hjalmar the Fair. It wasn't so much the losing, it was the fact that his accursed luck once again was the cause of his woe. It was pure bad luck that Hjalmar struck his shield on the one weak point neither he or the smith he'd bought it from had noticed. Pure bad luck that the shield chose that moment to sunder in two leaving him open to Hjalmar's blade.
But now his luck was finally turning. The dice had been hitting for him all night. Pretty Iona was even beginning to take notice at the gold stacked before him. He throws again. Cheers erupt as he hits yet again.
"Let it ride!" He says feeling confidence in Lady Luck for the first time in the before or after life. He rattles the dice in his hand. Puffs into his fist. A note rings out across the hall just as he sends the dice tumbling. "Wait? What's happening?"
He glances at the dice as they tumble to a stop. Snake eyes. Luck's callous laughter sends chills of betrayal, fury and rage churning through his body. He raises his head and screams.
His screams of fury are abruptly cut short as he finds himself astride the third storm wyvern. Cerulean eyes full of surprise and wickedness gaze back at Knud's startled spirit. The wyvern grunts as two more spirits grab onto her back. With a grunt the mighty beast flicks her wings and bucks twice. As luck would have it, the scale Knud grabbed hold of was just molting. It breaks free along with the warrior spirit's grip. Knud's curses are heard for the entirety of his fall before they abruptly end upon impact several hundred feet below.
*********
Nine raging warrior spirits answer the summons of the horn. Gunnar's calculations prove accurate as nearly all of the fierce warriors manage to land upon the backs and wings of the big beasts. Only one unlucky warrior tumbles away from the third wyvern, strange echoing curses streaming from its lips as it plummets to its doom. The others begin hacking away and flesh and bone.
Wyvern A: 119/140
Wyvern B: 131/140
Wyvern C: 136/140
Trusting Aterro and Ingryd to handle the first Wyvern (A), Gunnar seizes the tassels and flies the carpet away from the lead Wyvern and the one with only two warriors on it (Wyvern C) .
He asks, "Scramsax, how close do you need to be to hurl those psychic blades of yours?" and approaches the other Wyvern (B) at an oblique angle to get just in range for Scramsax and Arianna to get good shots at it.
As he flies, he calls out with a booming voice into the ether,
For himself, he mentally prepares for another lightning barrage from the Wyverns, planning to use his magic to blunt its impact (both his Arcane Ward and his Absorb Elements spell as a reaction if needed).
"What psychic blades?" the rogue smirked playfully, denying any role or culpability in the many deaths the energetic, neuron-dissolving bundles of destruction may have caused.
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As Aterro grimly flies toward the winged foe, fury and wrath on his face and all about his person, he is surprised and pleased in sublime amounts to see haughty warriors appear as if by divine inspiration all about the monstrous things.
"WahHAIL! What is this? Hail and kill, my brothers! By divine right do we hail and kill! You handful must needs stand HIGH in the eyes of Thor this day! For you alone have been plucked from the staid drinking halls to once again embrace GLORIOUS COMBAT in the hall of the living!
Let the blow come swift and the blood run red!"
Then he sees one of the warriors found lack lacking and sent to the ground post-haste.
"Well, except for that guy," he mumbles, taking up his own attack.
Long had he thought about this, and he raises DeathMetal high for a swing at the lead flyer!
Alas the physics of flight are not truly his as he spins a cartwheel in midair for his first attack. Fortunately the follow-through carries his weapon home with great inertia.
His own attack from the aether-world is also well guided.
Aura of Conquest
Starting at 7th level, you constantly emanate a menacing aura while you’re not incapacitated. The aura extends 10 feet from you in every direction, but not through total cover.
If a creature is frightened of you, its speed is reduced to 0 while in the aura, and that creature takes psychic damage equal to half your paladin level if it starts its turn there.
Ingryd shifts letting Aterro swing at the Dragons face. She dropped looking to aim at its chest. She roared defiantly as she whirled her hammer rage fueling her as Aterro went high and she went low.
Ingryd then shifts hoping to get closer to its wings if that doesn't work. As she does she keeps in front of the creature but off to the side hopefully making sure the beast has to choose which one to lash at instead of Both.
"ATERRO," Arianna calls out over storm and battle. "Show these beasts what a true Stormbringer looks like!"
As her call rings out on the wind, two more arrows go streaking towards the wyvern she had wounded.
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As the latest psychic blade was ejected from the peanut-sized brain of Scramsax the Barsellan Exile, the roots of the dryad's psionic endoskeleton shifted to compensate for the loss. The medulla oblongata was again jostled, in fact damaged in a way that could never be repaired. But the pulsing sapphiric energy surged into the empty space to brace the collapsing psyche, as it always did. Filling it with something new. Resonant memories. Memories of future events. Intercepted missives of normally unfathomable beings. This time the dream had again tapped the residual psychometrics of Zove's dagger, Morrin's Misery...the cold one Scram kept close to his spine.
Scram had in fact earlier fallen into one of Zove's memories, mistaking it for the waking present. In an attempt to dodge an enormous debt, the thief had imbibed a Potion of Gender-Bending...the contract was very specific about a 'halfling male'. A halfling female owed no debts. And anyways Dalliance was a place where anything were possible, far removed from the pesky moral adherences of a true court. Indulgent, hedonistic, filthy rich. Scram's kind of place, really, subconscious or not.
At the time, that is in Zove's actual past, there was a schism in the already miniscule Court of Dalliance...those loyal to the dangerously progressive Scarlet Heir were known as Shadowsworn, and were being slowly eradicated by more powerful houses. Mistaken for an agent, Scram was captured and questioned by a strange warpmaster mage...yet the attaché had nevertheless 'secured' the halfling's release. The following night, a certain well-known and disgruntled individual came aknockin' at Zove's door, with some matter of official inquiry...
"You're sure of it, a dhampir named 'Carnadine?' A mere Captain at Arms?" Ambassador Usior inquired. Usior, disguised as a mere investigative officer under the banner of One Million Stars.
"A cunning cavalryman, m'Lord. For a few like myself, it was not a surprise Haylcaster would be bested in that sort of formal, tournament combat...even if it were not a Ghost Knight. Anyways, as moebius mage he tickled the curvature of void, right? That must've been 'unsettling' for certain actors..." Zove paced about the tightly-woven carpet fabric, in her clean heels and scarven-robe fabrics encircling the perfect hourglass figure. She was pretending, just for a moment, that this investigative officer had any clue. "But see that's the kind of opportunity the machinery of Dalliance exploits. A clandestine resurrection of a house noble that had been obliterated by public humiliation. The perfect rogue."
"...and you now again killed him." the observer recorded. "The jug goes to the well until it breaks, so they say?"
"A service well-rendered." she bowed. "Let it not be said we of Dalliance are without reason." smirking a single fang out the corner of her mouth. The attaché was on spot that day, juggling the various Exemplar Instances shuffled her way...always on that same cold ivory plate, with solar-scorched configuration runes.
The pretend messenger was shocked, but dared not betray his station, taking the information with a nod. The rumors were true then, under this attaché's guidance the policy of 'everyone serving Dalliance in the end' was made literal. That was how this farce Court of less than a handful could yet rival Nightbrook or Corremel: they imported nobles by the coffin. Zove was at least sympathetic then to the Scarlet Heir, if not already true Shadowsworn. Paralyzed to the core, Usior managed to execute a perfect 180 maneuver and waltz out the door, closing it with a gentle click.
Scramsexy was behind the door.
"Heh, not a bad play of the law." she smirked. "No mention o'tha Raserian Artifacts you also snagged..." the gorgeous halfling recollected. "Aren't they remarkable? A cursed artisan, Thorsdottir no less, born again and again to hone her craft. Even the stodgiest xenophobe admits her work rivals that of the scathsidhé...she had once even garnered the special attention of the Black Prince. Practical art like that is always a good haul, yeah? Worth its weight in Memory Philters...and Thor loves heavy metal." In the shadow realm, one of the most valuable gemstones were such philters. The twisted fey consumed them like caviar, but they were actual memories mortals had traded (or were tricked into trading). The unique jewels of course caught Scram's attention.
Zove was not in the least surprised to see the little captive again, for a tiny lizard with strange antennae was making its zig-zag way along the nightbricks some 6 ft above Scram. Snickers had found the strange servant-thief hours ago as Zove was scribing the latest draft of the Oshragora Agreement. Certain amendments had lent themselves to a tall inkpot, one more for display than practical use, one reserved for tasks that took extreme concentration. Alerted of the skulking slime, Zove's penmanship suffered not in the slightest, the scathsidhé script flowing with wave and point...perfect alignment. Every row parallel to the next, each character allotted equal area...an aptitude held more often by wizards than foreign diplomats. "Hah. You've never heard of concealment." she scoffed, then gulped. "...and you've certainly learned a lot in a short period of time. The Court of One Million Stars can be spared one eensy-beensy single detail."
"Heh. No, I don't think it can be ignored, Attaché Zove. You see I'm here to make sure it isn't." the blackmailer revealed.
::Ensorcelling butler:: Zove mentally lamented. "...ehm. Of course each Mote of starlight has their Chariot, and each deserve attention of Prince Valendan, Speaker of the Sky." the shadow fey corrected. Holding back on Valendan wasn't the point, the funds from the Raserian Artifacts were allocated to other special projects...but as the halfling demonstrated, the situation the young attaché created could be perceived quite differently from another angle. Backed into a corner Zove dropped the act altogether, tapping her chin "Are you after coin, or a job?"
"Yes." The streets-dish-slinger was native to Dalliance as if its own creation.
Gunnar puts the carpet into a tight spin bringing it around on an intercept course for the big wyvern on the right wing of their formation. Sure to steer well clear of the burdened creature's melee range, the dwarf gives both Arianna and Scramsax a solid window to take their shots. Both elf and halfling oblige.
Arianna's first shot misses the mark, but her second arrow sinks deep into draconian flesh. Scram's whirling mental blades slice and dice their way through the beast's mind. Synapes are severed, neurons disrupted, impulses forced to reroute through uncustomary routes. The creature shudders and twitches for several moments before regaining its full cognitive abilities.
***********
The Hunter's initial roar of challenge and defiance quickly transforms into pain filled whimpers of confusion and fright. Bearkin fury of hammer and flame pummels the wyvern from the left leaving burnt flesh and broken bones. While on the opposite side, an apparition of war and death crushes more bones. Seeing the frightful spirit of doom, the hunter's beastly mind freezes along with its wounded body. Nothing but panic and fear fill its mind. An experience and emotions the hunter has never faced before. He has always been the cause of such things, not the victim. Thus it takes long, long moments for the hunter to try and claw its way free of the overwhelming fear. And in the meantime it tumbles from the sky, an electrified meteor of flesh and bone dropping from the night sky with nary a wish to be heard.
**********
Seeing her brother suddenly drop like a stone, Sister hisses a curse. Folding her wings, she throws herself into a tight downward spin. Both spirits still clinging to her back fly free, their mortal forms soon to be returned to the halls of Valhalla from whence they were called.
Free of the bothersome passengers, Sister continues her dive, picking up speed. The wind rushes across her scales and wings. Whistling a high pitched fury that echoed within her heart. One of her brothers was already doomed. The other would be her distraction.
Her eyes focused on the tiny orb of light that glowed on the plain below.
***********
Helga Nordsdottir felt her axe bite into scaled flesh. Her battle cry of triumph equal to the furious roars of the reptilian beast. Suddenly the beast shudders and spins. One of the other warriors slips. His screams fall into the dark night. She clamps her legs against the beast's flesh as if it were handsome Bjorn she rode. The wyvern's shudder's stop and it roars again. She readies her axe for another blow only to watch the sky suddenly spin.
Her braids fall past the crown of her head as she scrambles to maintain her hold as the beast inverts itself. Her legs are strong, her hands stronger. Her grip is one many a Valhallan warrior has enjoyed. And not once were they able to buck her off, she admitted with a wry grin. The second warrior falls free, his roar of failure carried with him back to death.
Strong and mighty as those bucking warriors haunting the halls of Valhalla might be, they are not equal to the beasts of tooth and claw. The wyvern undulates its body like a snake slithering through water. The whip like move takes Helga by surprise. Her hands, her legs slip free. Nothing but the cold air holds her aloft for a moment and then she too begins the long fall back to the afterlife. But she does so with a smile, for at the very least, she was the last to loose her grip.
***********
Rolf Wintermane feels the beast go limp beneath his rump. The heartbeat of warning allows him to tighten his grip upon beastly fur and scale. As the hunter falls, Rolf's cold eyes gleam. Glittering pinpoints of icy light in night's dark void. His axe works up and down. Chopping away at flesh and bone as he was compelled to do by the horn's call. But he felt no anger or hatred or even glory at killing this hapless beast. No those things were reserved for another.
Rolf Wintermane's eyes look upward. Focus on a flying carpet. A dwarf. The screams of his falling comrades are nothing compared to the screams of fury flowing within his own mind and spirit.
***********
Luthael and the other refugees watch the flashes of hammer flame, lightning, and spirit weapons as they light up the aerial combat high above. Anette gives out a quick whoop as she sees the lead beast start to tumble toward the earth seemingly unconscious or already dead. The others gasp in pity and shock as they spot the various doomed spirits of Valhalla thrown off like water drops shaken from a dogs back.
Those gasps quickly turn to fright as one of the wyvern's suddenly shifts course. It streaks through the night sky, a black shadow looming larger and larger with each passing moment.
Wyvern A: 30/140
Wyvern B: 101/140
Wyvern C: 136/140
Weak from exhaustion, the prophet follows the others' gaze skyward. He starts to struggle to stand, but Anette after protest helps him to his feet. Luthael lifts his pectoral, bejeweled sun and waits for the wyvern to get within range. "Fear not. The faith of Khors is with us."
Arianna feels the actions needed to shoot her bow coming more naturally now that she has had a chance to warm up. The pain of whatever is inside of her is forgotten for a moment as the elven traveler focuses on the fight. Seeing one of the wyverns dive for the glow below that was almost certainly Invictusol, she shifts her aim and two more arrows streak through the rain-laden sky with the famed accuracy of her kin.
"Clip its wings, Scramsax. I think that beast needs to say hello to the ground." The words thrum with unseen power and Scramsax feels as if he can nudge the strands of fate just a little more in his favor.
"Protect the others I shall follow our FOE!!!" Ingryd says as she seems to just fall rapidly down in hopes of attacking the Wyvern!!!
Scramsax took the elf literally, gripping Morrin's Misery in his teeth and preparing to jump...
As the Valhalla berserkers fling loose from the Wyverns like dogs shedding fleas, Gunnar motions quickly, slowing the fall of as many of them as possible .
Then as spells and weapons fly, he maneuvers to catch as many of them on the carpet as possible, using whatever speed is left in the carpet to start a dive after the wyvern heading towards his friends on the ground
Ingryd closed the gap and from above she came, fiery fury as she used the fall to swing hard and strong!
The first strike was hard pressed to the shoulder blades, while the second hammered to the joint on one of the wings. She wanted this beast to suffer.
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Seeing the other two wyverns in capable hands, Aterro notices the middle one shake off it's worthy riders and go unattended. This will not do.
The Avatar of War that is the paladin LAUGHS in earnest anticipation at MORE BATTLE yet to come. He sings with great lust and a deep, booming voice.
"I have no fear! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
Death and glory! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
Both draw near."
His magical flight takes him swiftly face-to-face with the terrible beast.
"Oh-ho! You do not normally see MEN up here to challenge you, aye? Does this not shake thy faith? Does this not crack...your spine?"
His words have a special, enhanced meaning. Thus spoken by one so intimately versed in FEAR, they reverberate through their intended target, melting will and shaking whatever core this creature has.
With the target so close to hand, Aterro is no longer able to keep DeathMetal from going about his business.
Seeing his first hit land so palpably, he deftly switches tact and uses his gliding bulk to RAM into the wyvern bodily.
Arianna snaps off two quick shots at the diving wyvern as Gunnar sends the carpet diving toward the scattered, falling berserkers. Both feathered shafts slam into the beast, but neither hinders the creature's rapid flight.
Scramsax unleashes another barrage of psychic power upon the other wyvern as Aterro launches himself on an intercept vector toward the creature. Before the holy knight of war arrives, Gunnar dives the flying carpet among the falling warrior spirits. Stretching out his hands, the dwarf gestures as if lifting them all up upon a cloud of feathers and soft cotton. Arcane power engulfs the likes of Helga Nordsdottir in its comforting power. Glittering in sparkling electrical light each of the five falling Valhallans suddenly slows. Their calamitous drop now nothing more than a leisurely drift toward the small dome of light far below upon the plain.
As Gunnar prevents several of the warriors summoned from Thor's boisterous halls, Ingryd tucks and dives after the lead beast who tumbles out of control. The bearkin dives, her snarling lips quivering in the rushing wind. Her hair slicked back. Mind still locked in never experienced fright, the wyvern offers little resistance and hammer and flame crash once again into its scaled hide. Bones snaps, blood vessels burst, a massive lung collapses.
The sound of axes hammering into flesh along with the battlecries of Rolf Wintermane and the two other berserkers still riding the creature echo across the night sky. A storm of death riding the hunter's carcass to its final doom.
A hundred feet higher, Aterro intercepts the hunter's clutchmate. Witnessing its larger, stronger, and older brother pulverized in a matter of mere moments and suddenly overwhelmed by scale splitting head aches, the creature is no match to the holy warriors power. Panic rages in its mind and the beast's only thoughts are of escape. Alas, such thoughts spell its own doom as Aterro rams into the beast knocking it completely out of sync and momentarily causes its muscles to seize. With a pitiful whine it begins its own death spiral toward the ground.
On the ground, seeing the oncoming wyvern, Luthael shouts at the others to take cover even as the prophet of Khors stands tall and resolute in the face of oncoming fury and death. Holy fire slowly builds in his hand. Growing ever more potent with each passing moment as he waits patiently to deliver his gods retribution.
Wyvern A: 0/140
Wyvern B: 63/140
Wyvern C: 118/140
"Why won't this overgrown lizard just die already?!"
Arianna's hand plucks two more arrows from her rapidly emptying quiver to nock on her bowstring. The wyvern had flown far enough to make the shots more difficult, true, but they were hardly impossible.
=> 18
=> 8
"OI! Ya scaly bastard! Scared of the twiggy elf," she bellows out after her second arrow goes awry in a pretty good impression of a dwarven lass.
Gathering what floating berserkers might be near his flight path, Gunnar urges the carpet down and towards the light, racing along behind (and probably below) the remaining Wyvern threat in a plummeting dive!
”Well fought, honored warriors of Thor! Let us make haste that the battle may still be raging as we rejoin it!” he calls as he shuttles what warriors he can along after the Wyvern.
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Aterro chuckles, low and dangerous. 'As it should be,' he thinks as his powers over FEAR overcome the beast. Though fearsome in their own right, the animal's base instincts are as naught before the power of Asgard.
With the whole of their force chasing the lone running creature, and with himself much too far away to change any outcome, he decides to have done with this loathsome thing to be sure its days of making mischief are behind it. Thus it is to Douse the Flame of Hope.
With a BARBARIC HOWL of FURY and BATTLE-JOY, he descends upon the thing and keeps up his sound beating.
Scram prepares to sling-a-ling another ding-ringer at the giant winged creature once its in range...