Edrukk nods back, getting a feeling that this is some game, but unfortunately, Edrukk does not fight for enjoyment. He fights for victory.
"Stand down, ye empty sack o' armor, 'r one o' us has to fall."
With that, he attempts to strike again.
plus
Edrukk's axe sweeps clean through the warrior, smashing through porcelain and causing the 'ribcage' to completely shatter. As his axe emerges on the other side, the warrior holds shape, just for a moment. It starts to say something.
Then the winds vanish, the ribbons stop blowing, and the beautiful ceramic armor set comes crashing down against the tile floor.
The dwarf looks at the remains impassively for a moment before raising his eyes to the other battles going on. "Kata, lass, Ah'm n' leavin' ye - tell me which fight we're joinin' 'n le's go 'elp 'r friends."
Kata's head swivels, a shiver of pain runs through her. To their north, Broccan and Alais, battled one of the room's horrors, and to the south, Venelle and Briar the other. A second passed, and it was an easy enough choice. Broccan and Alais were both skilled in the arts of violence. Venelle and Briar -- they were softer targets, more easily hurt in a melee.
"Venelle, Briar," Kata croaked a response to Eddruk, her mouth dry, throat ragged. The elegist stumbled south, the world hazy, her concentration on putting one foot in front of the other.
The point of Alaïs’ sword flicks in clear, thwarted frustration as Shame continues its reproving. Still trying to keep an eye on all the players as she hurries towards centre stage as quickly as her armour and wound allow, she answers Glory lightly,
– reached an impasse, is what she was going to say, when she sees Glory leave an opening for Venelle, and Seeker bravely try to distract Memory, and Edrukk wind up for a furious blow…
As Alaïs realizes what Glory meant, she quickly adds,
Given what Glory’s said about swords, she doubts that arrangement will be accepted. Regrettably, it looks like it will have to be tactics rather than gallantry today. And as the deadly dance plays out around her and she calls out into the confusion, there are still the new voices in the wisps that have swirled up around Alaïs as she draws on her magic. Whoever they are… Please, if you can help my friends, do so.
Edrukk hustles to keep up with the young woman. ”’ere now, stay b’hind me!”
Shame takes a step back, allows the fragments of its sword to fall away, and raises its free hand high. Winds swirl around its arm. The winds move in closer, tighter, a tiny cyclone clutched in its ceramic gauntlet. The winds tighten and solidify into a new solid porcelain blade.
Glory attempts to cut free of its own shadow, but can't seem to overcome the spell.
Briar retreats back over towards Kata, trying to coalesce the group into a tighter formation and recover. She weaves shadows around her body for extra protection as well.
The part of Alaïs that is always watching, in a manner of speaking, appreciates the pathos the moment. The parts of her that are trying to make sure her guts don’t spill out and keeping an eye out for a way to end this, latch onto the gap that briefly opens up as Shame bobs away from Broccan.
<"Your bravery honours us,"> a whisper - or a thought - in Elven that doesn't feel like her own encourages the flamboyant poet.
Broccan draws, loads, cocks, and fires his crossbow at the creature in one smooth motion.
Shame's armor cracks and crumbles as Alais's words of power tear at its being, as the bolt flies and punctures its helmet. It staggers, then straightens and stares Alais down, replying with a heavy voice.
Venelle springs back, dropping her shortsword on the tiles, and aims two shots at the wind warrior. Both arrows ping off of its armor.
Badly wounded, Seeker dives at the wind warrior's face, trying to impede its ability to dodge.
Seeker's wounds seem to be mending, the tear in her wing slowly knitting back together. At the same time, though, her tentacle-eyes are getting more and more red-rimmed, more and more capillaries bursting. It's almost as if the mending of the parasite's stolen body takes a toll on the parasite herself.
”D’ye ‘ave a plan, lass?”
"Plan?" Kata mumbles, her pain-fogged voice lilting upward. Does reciting an encouraging poem count as a plan? Kata straightens her back, her voice gains some of its authority, and the elegist continues her poem.
"Stern Lawgiver! yet thou dost wear
The Godhead's most benignant grace;
Nor know we anything so fair
As is the smile upon thy face:"
Shame seems to look between Alais and Broccan, but perhaps it is their extended conversation that piques its interest. It turns from Brocccan to zoom after the elf.
Glory lets out something like a laugh, a rustle of wind through leaves, as it sees Edrukk. It raises both swords and makes a declaration.
It is still bound by the shadow trap, but the magic seems to be waning. It simply adopts a readied pose and waits.
Briar sees Alaïs get struck again and rushes north towards the bridge. ”Alaïs! This isn’t one a your pretty songs! Stop playing the chancer and get over here so I can heal you!”
Alaïs is not surprised to see the elemental come after her, nor how quickly, but it does defeat her reflexes, especially given her previous wound. Shame pivots at the last approach to reach past the elf’s shield, scoring a clean hit on the upper arm behind that leaves Alaïs able to do little more than grip the shield as best she can and hope for the best.
Fortunately, she does not stand alone, even isolated from the others, and the spirit wisps that have risen around her rise and lash out furiously, cold Elven hissing outrage in a way that she’s sure would shriek if whatever it is that clusters around her were only stronger:
<“Do not fall, scion of the Fierani!”>
<“Still you dare to raise your hand against the guardians of the forest?!?”>
Pale with blood loss, Alaïs lifts her sword in a gesture of defiance, her lips twitching into a grimace of a grin.
Her last enchanted berry is burning a hole in her pocket, and as she keeps an eye out for an opening to get out of reach – down the tiny fruit? call upon her last bit of magic to empower her words? – she hears Briar’s frustrated plea for her to fall back and distantly considers that that might be wise, even as she thinks, Oh, I say! ‘Pretty songs!’ Really? That is...
As the shadow trap melts away, the wind warrior springs for Edrukk, dancing around Venelle to take a swing. Glory's stance is perfect, and its blade finds its mark between the plates guarding Edrukk's left shoulder.
Shame staggers back as Alais's spirits shred and crack its armor. It gives a barking, breaking sound that might be a laugh.
Edrukk scowls, but acknowledges the phantom armor's effective attack.
"Well struck, lad. My turn."
With that, he swings.
Broccan drops his crosswbow, and charges toward the wind-creature attacking Alaïs. As he moves, he draws his axe and swings it with all the force he can muster.
Both warriors deftly parry their attackers away.
Something about the better part of valour finally recurs to Alaïs' memory, and as Broccan charges in, the elf uses the distraction to slip away to where Briar's calling her.
"Can you hear it?!" she calls frantically to the others. "Let my spirits guard you! These things are elementals!"
The exertion is too much for her, and while she manages to avoid giving Shame an opening, the manner in which she has to twist away and her desperate attempt to offer some more assistance to her friends stretch the wound across her torso that much more, and she's still one step, two steps away...
"Hello, Miss Vervain," she says on a gasp, trying to put a brave face on it, "so sorry for the inconvenience-"
And then her knees give out.
Bad. Things were bad. Very bad. Even as she projects her poem about duty, Kata's mind is running on a different track - mostly one note, part grim observation, part almost suppressed panic. Well, Kata muses, she couldn't be in two places at once; Broccan would have to hold down the horror to their north. Hells, Kata was barely in one place at the moment. The elegist goes to cast a spell, and then quickly redirects herself as Alaïs falls/yells into Briar. Elementals! Can my magic even hurt them?
Best not risk it. Instead, Kata stabs over Eddruk's shoulder, intent to do her part in keeping the warpriest alive long enough to keep the nearest elemental away from her.
Kata pierces the wind warrior through the shoulder, sending chips of porcelain flying. It's a powerful, devastating blow that actually shoves Glory back a few inches.
Venelle hesitates, then races forward to stab at Glory--seeking not to damage it, but to create an opening for Edrukk. Unfortunately, she's unable to faze the single-minded soldier. "Um, back up so I can get behind it, if you don't mind?"
Seeker flutters weakly behind Venelle and stays there.
Shame watches Alais flee, and there is something hardened in its stance. It pursues, risking a swipe from Broccan to reach Alais and Briar and strike its swords together with a terrible clash. A lance of ear-piercing sound fires over Briar's and Alais's heads, and the shockwave is enough to make ears bleed.
Broccan manages a parting shot, his punch sending spiderweb cracks across the surface of the wind warrior's side.
Briar moves quickly to cover her ears, avoiding the worst of the blast of sound. Keeping her limited amount of spells in-mind and seeing how many hits the elemental has taken, she rushes forward to intercede between the elemental and Alaïs. ”Leave us alone!” She stabs for the elemental’s center, having little idea of where to strike most effectively.
Edrukk grunts, "Good job, lass. Keep behind me, strike true."
He swings again.
Unfortunately, Shame's own trick with sound is able to undo Briar's good work, and the still wobbly elf finally succumbs at last, crumbling as the oracle bravely interposes her dagger.
"If I meet the Lady first, I'll ask her to save a kiss for you," she manages to get out, irrepressible to the last, before darkness sweeps over her eyes.
Glory slashes at Edrukk, its strikes expert and merciless, but Edrukk parries them away--but his own blow is, unfortunately, too off-balance to connect with its full force. Steel clangs against porcelain.
Meanwhile, Briar darts forward and jams her dagger between the ceramic plates of Shame's armor. Shame stares at Briar long before saying something she cannot understand.
Broccan moves up behind the air elemental warrior attacking Alaïs and Briar, dropping his axe as he moves. He tries to envelop the creature in his tightly muscled arms, and fix his grip upon its armor.
It's probably for the best that Alaïs, going into shock from her wounds, isn't conscious to hear Shame's inevitable gloating: that would probably have given her an apoplexy and tipped her over the edge anyway, so it was a matter of time, really.
As it is, as her gravest wound starts to scab over properly, the elf lady clings on to life, as if from spite.
Kata thinks of stabbing again, but then she was no warrior, and Eddruk was. Instead, Kata picks her poem back up, hoping it will inspire the others to finish their foes.
"To humbler functions, awful Power!
I call thee: I myself commend
Unto thy guidance from this hour;
Oh, let my weakness have an end!
And in the light of truth thy
Tenacity, let me live!"
Broccan attempts to tackle the wind warrior, but unlucky positioning allows it to twist and lurch out of reach.
Venelle's head twists up, seeing Alais downed and Briar locked in a very undesirable-looking melee. "Fiddlesticks!"
She races around Edrukk's melee and looses an arrow for Shame's head. Unfortunately, her nerves throw off her aim.
Left alone without protection, the injured Seeker flies after Venelle. "A wand!" she calls to the party. "Anything I can use! I am a familiar; I know enough magic for a working!"
With another whisper Briar cannot understand, Shame twirls in a wide arc, slashing for Briar with one sword and for Broccan with the other. At Briar, though, its attention proves to be not on her--but her blade.
Meanwhile, Glory battles Edrukk with brutal, bloody abandon.
Broccan swings his fists in furious defiance of the agile, sword-wielding wind creature.
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Briar was already on the defensive and she holds onto her dagger thanks to her wariness. ”I still have the Ravid Maple, Seeker! Right here on my belt.”
She grips her dagger all-the-tighter as she continues trying to hold the elemental at bay long enough for the actual warriors to knock it out. ”I won’t let you kill Alaïs! She’s too sweet to go out like this.”
Broccan manages a brutal blow against his foe, exploiting the cracks Carnwennan made moments ago. The wind warrior nearly loses balance, but manages to recover itself just in time to parry Briar's stroke away.
Alaïs' unconscious form lies bloody and still; almost peaceful, for now, despite the melee raging above her. Hopefully, it won't be too long before the others can make sure things don't take a turn for the worse even if they're forced to rely on linen and salve for the day.
”We need t’ make ‘em move, lass! Give ‘‘em a poke, then retreat a bit. Lettin’ ‘im use both swords is gonna kill this old dwarf!”
Kata carefully retreats, a song on her lips, but Edrukk's advice ringing in her ears.
Meanwhile, Edrukk growls at the warrior of wind. "Gorum hates retreat, but I need t' be protectin' me friends." He carefully withdraws, avoiding attacks from the room's protector.
Venelle hesitates, looking between the active threat before her and the warrior that remains barely standing. She chooses the latter, firing two more desperate shots at Shame.
At long last, she connects. One of her arrows thunks directly into the center of the spiderwebbing cracks, and Shame's form rattles and shakes like china in a bull pen. Then its breastplate shatters, the winds scatter, and the suit of armor comes crashing to the ground.
With an uneasy glance at Edrukk and no celebration, she takes a step to the south.
Following Briar's call and noting Shame's destruction, Seeker zooms over toward Briar and snatches the ravid maple from her belt. "Good! Good! Give it to us, quick, now!"
The last wind warrior stares Edrukk down, raises its sword high, and charges. At last, Edrukk's indomitable defense gives way, and the porcelain sword pierces straight through his armor and slides between his ribs. Glory pulls back and raises its sword high, dripping blood, and whirls to face its other enemies. Its words are lost to the wind.
Seeing his friend and mentor fall to the remaining wind warrior, Broccan hustles over to stand over Edrukk, his fists raised in defiance. He aims a brutal swing at the creature.
Broccan cracks porcelain and breaks off a large plate of the armor, leaving the flowing winds within exposed for all to see.