"Ooof. Ow!" Kjeta gets thrown to the ground like a rag doll, and sees a bit of blood on her trouser.
Dusting herself off and rising again, she notices the mountain dwarf attacking the elf she'd charmed. So much for that spell, she frowns.
"Alright, Ale-Mother, please rain your frothy blessing upon these other brave folk, who're riskin' their skin to protect this Temple of Volund."
As she prays, she holds her tankard overhead. It glows, and seems to grow in size.
Meanwhile, her allies within 30' feel the guiding hand of Ninkash lightening their steps.
Deimus, after commanding the elf, reaches for his belt and lets a dagger fly at the second elf.
The elf heard Lexi's taunt and couldn't argue the truth of it, the hurt she delivered was much more than the maul would have been. He grins, a line of blackish blood spilling over the dark blue leather "More than just a dart hurler, eh? Your grampa give you that steel?" The elitist apparently mocking her financial class.
Hrungnir nearly topples the dazed and confused elf, the tell tale *crack* of bone heard by all. But just as he is about the hit the floor he snaps out of it, rolling into a graceful 2 legged kip-up back into action.
Remarkably, Kjeta stands before the large hound in defiance, her tankard becoming a TOUS (tankard of unusual size) ready to brain the mutt for barking at her that way. Just the sight of the huge mug of beer is enough for the others nearby to feel their spirits soar with valor.
Then, an incredible thing happens.
The gearforged in the corner seems to alter and change form...what was once a rusty bolt becomes a polished platinum gear. A loose spring becomes a tightly wound harmonic oscillator. Dents and dings realign into an image of perfection---the ultimate machine.
The machine shouts its command...
...and you watch as the elf obeys. The rapier *clinks* pathetically to the ground, the master swordsman disarmed by nothing more than words.
The beautiful, perfect machine then executes a series of subroutines which serve to eject a dagger towards the other assassin...finding its mark.
With one of the elves near death, and the other disarmed they glance at each other and nod "Hold then. We give ourselves up to you...guardians. Surely our guilt can not be debated. Take us in to custody and let the court judge us fairly. Please, we will not resist. I will dismiss the hound of night with a word if you agree..." they offer their wrists to be manacled.
”Sorry, Hill Rats don’t speak elven!”
His runic hammer didn’t slow in the slightest. As far as he was concerned, they were murderers, were too damned confident...and they had insulted him. So he let his hammer finish the conversation.
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Some people have never seen a head actually explode...until now.
Brains, eyeballs, and skull fragments alike scattered like a sac of marbles across the temple dais. Hrungnir's strike carried the vengeance of the north, and you could be damn sure the elf would not return to the land of the living.
The other shouts an angry growl "Neeeeeh!"
Carnadine thinks back to his days of lute training. His family was well off enough for him to be exposed to a variety of woods, strings, and styles. He had once been given a plectrum of carved peacock feather whose colors had been illuminated with the thinnest of gold foils. A distant uncle had a soundboard crafted from the belly of a virgin doe, its bones lining the fretboard. He had been taken to a concert at a young age and witnessed a 500 year old man play eulogy atop strings from the guts of a drake.
Yet never had he heard a sound like this lutist was making in the theatre. There had to be more at play, some red magic, some hex-note, to incite such feelings with sound.
The young man doesn't return, but the guard does arrive in small number attempting to restore order. Legacy Chimera promptly exit stage.
"Stattu fast! Sigur er okkar!"
Raseri's call rings out and a nimbus of faint lightning surrounds Hrungnir, Kjeta, Lexi, and herself, mednign some of their hurts and closing the worst of their wounds. She sets her stance and growls as she channels the rumbling thunder she hears into her maul.
And misses by at least a foot as the elf dances away.
"I don't have a grandfather, thanks for asking." says Lexi without any malice before she drives her Scorpion Stiletto towards the Elf.
She then follows up with her off hand dagger.
Deimus is horrified by the grim sight of the Shadow Elf slumping down to the ground, his head turned to pulp. They had surrendered, he thought, yet the Northlander's rage seemed to know no bound.
Deimus shakes his head, but then returns his thought to the battle. He opens his arms and continues to speak in a voice like flowing gold, the candle light of the temple sparkling like delicate silvery lace on its golden plating. He keeps his attention turned to the elf and says: "Halt! Halt and behold the marvel and mysteries of Rava, protector of Zobeck, the Free City!"
Then his wrist flicks again and another dagger flies forth at the elf.
Kjeta shudders a bit when the mountain dwarf smashes the surrendering elf.
He's an impressive warrior anyway...and I suppose the elf was a murderer, but...
She shakes her head and--seeing the battle continues--bats at the hound in front of her with her Tankard of Unusual Size.
As she does, she calls out, "Mother of the Everflowing Keg, aid me in vanquishing these killers."...and another enormous golden tankard appears, this one flying unattended, and whacks at the hound from behind.
The elf squashes his body quick to avoid Ras' swing, but Lexi anticipated his move with perfect timing striking a vital artery on the elf's thigh.
Wounded, the assassin started seemingly to disengage, reaching out for his fallen companion, but froze mid movement. Held fast again by the machine's set of instructions...braced between its control structure.
He could not even move his eyes to watch the dagger sink into his chest.
Meanwhile, the hair-of-the-dog assaults the dog in a fantastical display of bewildering and hard to explain magicks. Not a drop of froth spilt, the night hound takes a hard pummeling to the face. It almost becomes enraged, its fine training the only thing keeping it from an insane feral state. After a confused look to its master it again tries to wrestle the booze priest to the ground...
...but its teeth slide and nip across cold iron, never finding purchase.
Raseri growls, her wounds continuing to mend as lightning wreathes her. She moves to block the elf's escape before delivering a vicious blow to his ribs.
"Maybe if you wag that fey tongue of yours, we might be more willing to not repay the blood-guilt," she says, her eyes flashing in anger. "Sing quickly, nightingale. Khors' priests cry out for vengeance."
After his stakeout, Carnadine reenters the theater intent to get the bottle of wine from his box and not be affected by the music again. Since it is not noble etiquette to hurry, he moves with deliberate speed.
Into the box. Snatch the bottle. Exit the theater.
Hrungnir moved from the elf to the hound. ”Sorry, pup. Nothing personal.” He said as he brought his hammer down directly onto it’s skull. Even as he did he spoke a word of runic power, causing his own wounds to heal faster than they naturally would.
Deimus's blank plated face glitters in the light of the candles as he moves to the centre of an aisle, his body blending in perfect symmetry, both geometric and metallic, with the tributes of mortals to the Sun god. Once in place, his voice echoes, multiplied in intensity by the careful geometry bound into the temple's stone by craftsmen, now long gone, who took their science with them to the Afterworld.
"HOLD! I say, dweller in the dark, for this is the Sun god's temple, and he, nor I, will have none of it!"
As he speaks, Deimus falls into the character he is creating as he goes, not a little surprise by the ease with which this old Kobolds blends into the machine.
Lexi stabs the Elf twice again.
She then kicks the man's rapier out of his reach.
"Hey murder-elf. I'd much rather you send this hound home, but if it stays, it's going to feel the Malty Might of Ninkash!!"
With that she (and the additional floating tankard) continue to batter the massive hound.
The tempest cleric wallops the elf with a crack of thunder, ringing his bells and then some. Lexi makes a precision attack at his heart, but seems to hit something solid in his vest pocket instead of the vital organ...though she follows up on the momentum with a left slice.
Stepping up to the beast, the dwarf stood like stone waiting patiently for its head to dip just so...crushing the alien antennae-like structures as the hound tried to shake the pain out of its skull. The confused mutt danced with the enchanted tankerds until feeling a heavy kiss from the biggest.
Some ancestral strength of the wilds at last wrenches the fey from the machines lull, and finding no weapon at hand save his trusty hound, gives what might be his final command "Vassa...exeunt!"
The hound rushes towards the elf assassin, nearly tackling him as a tear between dimensions forms at their feet. The portal swallows the hound and his master alike...
With gas lamps turned low, and the sounds of music and acting done, only the moaning of the wounded and aggressive shouts from a handful of pikemen remain to echo through the old amphitheater. They were mostly focused on a few fights that had devolved into tired wrestling matches, and the dhampir needed not expend any effort to slink back.
Carnadine strode up into the boxes to retrieve the bottle, but found a gruesome scene waiting for him there. The woman he had earlier noticed on the floor was beaten to a pulp, her pastel green gown now a shiny black in the dim light. He could tell by her rough and scraped fists she was not innocent either. It seems he got out at just the right time.
The bottle was just as he had left it, still 3 quarters full and fully breathed.
Taken by surprise, the dwarf swung wildly. An attack sure to miss...if not for the powers of his newfound comrades.
Kjeta realizes too late that the hound is retreating, but does her best to bring it down.
Hrungnir noticed his firey rune seemed extra potent against the hide of the hound, leaving a sizzling line down its side as it lunged to its master...sure to leave a permanent scar on an otherwise perfect animal. The dual tankards both swing towards the beast but its too quick, instead they simply 'cheers' each other with a solid clink.
As the fabric of reality restores itself, the temple is quiet again. However, today it was the site of 3 deaths: a priest, his acolyte, and a strange, murdering elf. The parchment on the door still waves in the chill wind from outside, undeciphered.
Roughly a pound of strange currency in a finely embroidered zipper bag at his belt.
4 black opals arranged in a diamond formation over his heart in a bandolier, the surface of which has been etched with the crest of an unknown king
Once hostilities have ended, Lexi immediately begins checking the dead bodies, including those of the priests who died. She calls out everything of value she finds before piling the pertinent items from each body next to them.
She then moves over and takes a look at the letter.
After examining the letter, she realizes she can't make heads or tails of it and offers it to one of the others.
"So, do any of you have any idea what this was all about?"
Hrungnir picked up the coin and looked at it quizzically. ”The elflings seemed to think that the city belonged to them. And I’d bet this coin will tell us something about who lays claim. Not sure what it is, but I do think I know where to go to find out.”
Old Deimus pulls back his cloak and wraps it around himself. As he does so, the glamour fades and his plating reverts to a dull rusty blandness. His spine seems to shrink and curve, making the Gearforged look small and frail.
With hesitant heavy steps, the short but heavy Deimus approaches the scene of the battle, his head tilted in curiosity: "Is the priest beyond saving? Was this these assassins’ purpose?" he asks.
Raseri looks over the bodies of the two Khors clergymen knowing it's likely futile, but compelled to try anyway.
"They are fey. Need they a reason to sow discord and strife," she asks rhetorically. "Few and lucky are those that find their way out of the wilds they roam."
Looking up from her task, her eyes meet Lexi's.
"Well fought, Shadow. You are truly a master of your blades," she says, a grin on her face as she turns back to her grisly work of examining the likely corpses.
Carnadine recorked the bottle and tucked it in his bag. He paused staring at the woman for a few seconds to let the hunger of his Dark Thirst wash over him. He wasn't injured, so his willpower held.
He stood in the shadows of his box watching and listening. The lute music had stopped, so he surmised that the danger had passed. But, he wanted to know more. Why did they do it? How did they do it? How could he target it?
Lexi, the priest and younger acolyte both carry holy symbols of Khors and a few other personal items of little value. The assassin's gear is finely crafted from a hide you do not recognize. His skin, whats left of it, seems unearthly and like no elf you've seen before.
Hrungnir, the Hedgehog tavern in the Collegium district is a popular hangout for scholars. The nearby Book Fetish has rows and rows of tomes you could employ for research.
Dei/Ras, the older man suffered 2 puncture wounds to the heart, as you witnessed. There was no err in the assassins' thrust. Even if the holes in the organ could be cinched, the loss of blood is too great. The other (who brought warning of the attack) has thawed somewhat from the hounds frosty blast, but his skin has blackened and his throat and lungs being frozen stiff and unable to function likely caused him a painful suffocation if the shock of it all did not do him in.
Lexi and Ras also notice the statue of Khors is oddly shadowy in some regions, as if an ink is growing from inside of it.
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Perhaps following after the Legacy Chimera, or inquiring about their lutist around town could further your investigation on that front.
As Raseri realizes how the younger man must have died, her smile fades and she shudders. Memories of numb, unfeeling feet and chattering teeth flit through her mind, and vanish before she can nail them down.
"Why thank you daughter of thunder. you do credit to your heavenly father." replied Lexi with a genuine smile.
Turning back to the Elven corpse, Lexi retrieved her dagger and it disappeared amongst her gear, as if it was never there, along with the weapons she had been wielding but a moment ago.
She then began poking and proding the Elf's body while removing his armor.
Kjeta walks somberly over and kneels beside the bodies of the priest and acolyte. Finding them beyond the reach of healing magic, she closes their eyes, dips her finger in her beer, and dabs some on each of theirs' lips.
"Fly swiftly to Valhalla, and raise a tankard to the gods. We'll be raising one to you, down here."
Then she rises to speak to the other brave souls who came along to defend the temple. Seeing the human female beside the acolyte, Kjeta reaches out a broad, calloused hand.
"Kjeta Strongmalt, sworn servant of Ninkash. Are you a cleric of Thor? I heard calling down divine magic in his name.
I'm sorry we couldn't save them, but we tried."
. . .
Turning to the others gathered, she raises her voice to say, "I appreciate the heroism of those who rush into danger, to protect those in need. If any of you care to wander back to my kegs at the theater with me, I'd happily offer you a pour from my finest ale...and a toast to heroism, in the name of the Mother of Ales.
"What say you?"
From the body, and what you saw up close of the other, they look like fey creatures. However, they are not elves but rather scathsidhe, or shadow fey. They are a legend in Zobeck, long since vanished from everyday life. The shadow fey are creatures of neither the forest nor the fey wilderness. Rather, they are natives of the Shadow Realm...which is another plane of existence and the source of shadow magic.
Kjeta's greeting snaps Raseri out of her reverie. She smiles, this time a sad smile.
"I am learning that sometimes that is all one can do," she says before clasping Kjeta's outstretched forearm. "Raseri Whitescale, and I am indeed a priestess of the Thundering Son. I hale from the Northlands, but of late I find myself in Zobeck, sometimes wrangling drakes' fire and taming wyrms' tongues at the forge thanks to Volund and sometimes acting as champion when honorless curs dare strike from their shadows thanks to Sif."
On either side of the engraved hammer symbol of Thor that hangs from her neck, two smaller symbols can be seen, one for Volund and one for Sif.
"If you have the bee-wolf's drink, Kjeta, then we should celebrate their bravery."
"To see legends come to life..." mutters Lexi to herself while continuing to stripe the Elf bare.
Finishing her task, Lexi says "Are any of you experts on the shadow realm?"
Carnadine continues to wait in the shadows until members of the Legacy Chimera emerge to clean the theater of bodies. He will observe what they do with them: loot, cart off, etc. He studies the cleaners to determine if they are part of the troupe and not some random cleaning staff who would not know what happened.
If the cleaners are NOT part of the troupe and do NOT appear to be in the know about what happened to the people, because he would hear them speculating what happened to the bodies while they cleaned, he heads toward backstage to find a member of the troupe. If the cleaners are part of the troupe and appear to be in the know about what happened to the people, he waits for the cleaner of his box.
When he finds a non-elven member of the troupe alone, Carnadine uses his Predatory Charm to get them to tell him everything that they know about the lutist and the scheme.
Hrungnir wasn’t really paying attention to what everyone was saying. He was instead focused on the coin. They seemed to be in a celebratory mood. He wasn’t. His love had wanted him to be here, and he was certain that the ‘why’ had to do with these shadow fey. He *needed* to know more.
”What happened here was blasphemy to the gods. And I’d bet it’ll get worse from here. I’m off to the Hedgehog Tavern. See if I can find a scholar there who knows what this is.” He held up the coin. ”See if we can learn where they’re from and who they might work for.” After a moment he added:
”Any of ye mad fookers are welcome to come with. Mayhaps your words will be smoother than mine.”
Deimus approaches the rest of the group when Kjeta thanks them and offers them to have a drink: "I am Deimus, a K-... a representative for the Kobold folks of Zobeck. Delighted to meet valorous folks such as you. I am most curious of the reasons behind this attack; blasphemy as you call it. I wonder why the hound appeared in the theatre first. But for now, I must confess that the idea of refreshing ale brings naught but sorrow to my metallic heart and, if you will forgive me, I would prefer to hang to this brave Dwarf's coattails as he looks for further clues for tonight's mystery. Say, friend; may I call you friend? What is your name?" he says, looking at Hrungnir.
”Deimus, eh? Name’s Hrungnir. We ‘ain’t friends yet, so no reason to call me that. Cheapens the word. Words have power, and are to be respected. But we spilled blood together so I’ll call ye comrade.” He responded.
Lexi chuckled at the interactino between the Dwarf and the Gearforged, and then said "I'm hardly valorous, but I think it would be best if we stay together, since the Shadow Fey that escaped has seen all of our faces, and this is likely the first salvo in a much larger conflict."
Lexi turned towards the Dwarf "Hrungnir, was it? It sounds like you have at least an idea of where to start finding out what's going on. Will the person you're going to talk to know how to read this?" she finished as she handed the letter to him.
Kjeta had previously been focused on administering to the dead...and then thoughts of ale...but her mountain cousin's words catch her attention.
"Oh, ye found some fey coin on them? Ahh, and the letter.
"Alright, the Hedgehowg serves good beer as well. Raseri, mind if we head there instead? While it's our Holy Duty to drink for the fallen, there's no reason we can't learn a bit more about those fey at the same time, eh?"
As the group prepares to go, Kjeta hollers "One sec!" and then ducks into the theater.
"Brumdal? You'll need to pack up and take Hopper and the wagon back to the brewery. Gotta run. Thanks."
Then she comes back out and hustles to keep up with the others.
Lexi pulled off her cloak and piled everything of value she collected from the bodies onto it, pausing for a moment when she reaches out for the belongings of the priests to see if anyone says anything and then ties up her cloak as a makeshift sack which she hangs over her shoulder and says "I'm ready to go."