Garrett slides into the shadows and moves to get a clear shot at one of the men threatening his new allies.
"You know, your friend has the right of it. I mean, taken down by a group of kids? You'll never hear the end of it." With a wave of her arms and a few arcane words, Lina hurled a glob of acid towards the apron-wearing woman.
Pip keeps his steady narration "The looters were thinking of starting a combat dance
Did the looters wear yellow today or did they pee their pants?'
School enchantment (compulsion) [mind-affecting]; Level bard 0, inquisitor 0, magus 0, psychic 0, shaman 0, sorcerer/wizard 0, summoner/unchained summoner 0, witch 0
CASTING
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, M (a pinch of wool or similar substance)
EFFECT
Range close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Target one humanoid creature of 4 HD or less
Duration 1 round
Saving Throw Will negates; Spell Resistance yes
DESCRIPTION
This spell clouds the mind of a humanoid creature with 4 or fewer Hit Dice so that it takes no actions. Humanoids of 5 or more HD are not affected. A dazed subject is not stunned, so attackers get no special advantage against it. After a creature has been dazed by this spell, it is immune to the effects of this spell for 1 minute.
Dazed Condition: The creature is unable to act normally. A dazed creature can take no actions, but has no penalty to AC.
"Just leave. We know that you're thieves looking to take advantage of the riots," Audria says. "And know that Shelyn does not look kindly on those that would steal from artisans and craftsmen."
As she speaks, she draws her sword to defend herself or her allies.
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The handsome-challenged man's unsymmetrical eyes widen in terror as he looks upon Abella. In a hoarse voice, he shouts, "The face of Groetus surrounds her! Plague, death!" his voice cracks as he tries to shriek, little more than a terrible rasp emerges.
The woman turns toward the sound her eyes blinking. "Ah...uh..." is all she replies to the man's vision of doom. She in turn begins to scream as magical acid lands on her skin burning her terribly.
The greasy man looks at both of them, a shrewd awareness appears in his eyes. He snarls in Shrike's direction frustration in his eyes. In one smooth motion his free hand drops and whips back then forward, the long dagger he carried spins out to strike the vigilante.
Fortunately her armor seems to confound the weapon's penetration delivering a flesh wound at best. The man snarls again before turning on his heel to run. He shouts to Reluctant as he passes, "Get little Miss I-Must-Have-It and let's go!"
All this commotion has allowed Garrett to find the shadows along the building near a barrel for collecting the runoff from the rainspout and successfully disappear from the shopkeeper and his bodyguards looters' perception.
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It is your call if you would like to continue combat actions, or simply allow this to take place.
Pippin charges the reluctant one and sizzling magic runs down the rapier.
”Surrender and you will be spared.
Your friends are all running scared.”
"Bad move." Shrike doesn't bother to remove the greaseball's knife from her chain shirt. The tip barely scratched her; not enough to affect her aim anyway. The hatchet man seems like he is no longer a threat, by his raving about Groetus. "Try not to kill them," she tosses over her shoulder at her companions, and takes off after the leader, trying to trip him in his flight by tangling the blade of her polearm between his feet.
The reluctant looter is caught off guard as the singing halfling buries his rapier in the man's chest. His attention fixed on the woman screaming in pain, he was clearly not expecting such a lethal attack. A bloody froth erupts from his lips and his eyes roll back into his head as the unfortunate looter collapses onto the ground and begins to bleed out.
The greasy man isn't quite fast enough to escape the quick reflexes of the avenging Shrike as her guisarme catches his ankle, and he tumbles hard onto the dirty road stonework.
The ugly man continues his horrible rasp, and he turns to flee down the road at a full tilt run.
Pip looks concerned as his target falls. "He deserves punishment not death. Surrender and you will be spared and you give us time to keep your friends from dying."
Pip obviously liked the idea of heroic combat, but the blood has him reconsidering his brash actions.
Shrike does not stick her polearm out to trip the hatchetfaced man as he passes her in his panicked flight. The mask tilts down to the greasy man as his comrade's footfalls pound by. Her voice is a harsh croak. "I would've let you run."
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As soon as Pip runs the most reluctant of them through, Audria looks around and sees the other thugs in flight. The encounter has turned lethal, and it was those that she is with that had gone for the kill first. Talanaliel flitted up to the eaves of the buildings to keep an eye on Audria as she slides on her knees to the fallen man's side.
"Please still be alive. Please still be alive," she mutters again and again as she works stem the flow of his blood.
"Nonononono! Abella! I need help," she calls out to the only person she knows that might have some skill, ability, or magic to help her save this one's life.
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Abella snaps to attention as she hears her name, assuming that someone was about to yell at her for something as they always do. “You left bones all over the apartment again, Abella!” “You were supposed to make dinner, why are you sleeping, Abella?” “Stop offering thanergy demonstrations to the neighbors! It sounds like a threat, Abella!”
She is in-fact shocked that someone is not only not about to chastise her, but to ask for her help? Oh and it’s little Canary again. So tender-hearted. After that business with Lamm, she does her, doesn’t she? And really, killing someone who hasn’t even stolen anything yet? A bit gauche, if you ask her. The kind of gauche that might make the guard less likely to give them a big reward and more likely to clap them in irons.
She rushes over to Audria’s side and looks to the poor fellow on the ground.
She is not exactly practiced at putting bodies back together. Disassembling, deteriorating, destroying, and probably other de-words, sure. It takes her only a moment to work backwards towards what needs to be done, though.
”Just have to keep a cool head, Canary. That’s why you keep me around.” She flashes her janky smile.
Garrett steps back out of the shadows and looks at the men running. The asks, "Is he alive? I think we need to be careful about leaving trails of bodies in our wake. The local constables or hellknights would likely not approve."
"Blasted sun" Lina muttered to herself. She reached into the pouch hanging from her belt, her fingers coming away covered in a bit of soot. Wiping it on her brow and speaking the arcane words, she felt the brightness from above lessen to a tolerable level before making her way over to her companions gathered around the wounded man.
"Can I help? I have a bit of a knack for these things."
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The fallen man flips over onto his back looking daggers at Shrike. "You would've let me run? 'Thoa's dry..!!!" He spits an extremely foul curse .
The woman's shrieks have turned to moans, and she eyes Shrike and the others fearfully. She makes a show of dropping her cleaver and then backs up slowly before turning to run. She gives the oily man the barest glance, guilt on her face.
"Oi! Go on, run!" he sneers as he catches her eye. He returns his gaze to Shrike, giving her the rictus of a smile. "You rally ain't thinking this through, bird lady. You say I coulda run. Then what now? You gonna kill me the way your friend did Dendren there? Oi?" He flicks his chin in the direction of the reluctant looter.
Audria nods at Lina's question about if she can help.
Shrike plucks the dagger from where it lodged in her armor and makes a show of examining it, including the little trickle of blood on its blade. After a meaningful silence she says, flat and unimpressed, "Shame you couldn't put the kids to sleep. Your mistake was thinking this was a lullaby. But keep talking. Maybe it'll work for you."
She puts the dagger on her own belt, kicks the man's cosh away and hauls him ungently to his feet by his collar, dragging him back over to the others. The bird-masked elf drops him unceremoniously by his fallen comrade.
Then, however, the mask turns slightly toward Lina and the colorful, rapier-wielding halfling and her harsh voice says unemotionally, "You'd kill people for thieving." It could be a question, but it isn't.
"I think we are too on edge. That went far wilder then we needed it to go." Garrett says.
The man grunts as he makes hard contact with the stone once more. He glances over at the man he named Dendren and watches his ragged breathing.
"Keep talking, eh? I seriously doubt you and the younglings are gonna like what I have to say." His eyes travel over the group pausing on the halflings at whom he leers. Whatever misperceptions he may have had from a distance, he can clearly see the halflings aren't human children now. There's no doubt he intends the slight.
"And just look at that one," he makes a very pronounced gesture in Audria's direction clearly not wanting to spook anyone. "You're just doing a bang-up job babysitting," he says to Shrike, "getting your mini-bird there so worked up, she's going to cry at any minute."
He directs his eyes toward the tailor's storefront, at a green dress in the window. The oily man lifts his fingers where one hand touched the pool of Dendren's blood.
"...-ver a 'Gug-blasted dress," he mutters and then begins to chuckle bitterly.
Audria ignores the man as she works with Abella to help save the man, Dendren, from dying. Of course she wants to cry. Who wouldn't at seeing death coming so close to a man that has no fight left?
Talanaliel, however, isn't quite so ready to let things be. She flits down to land on the man's knee and stares into his eyes.
"She needs no babysitter, and I wouldn't be so quick to utter Rovagug's name," the little thrush tells the man. "The Devourer is not picky about his meals."
"I didn't want to stop looters, but we have a lady paladin who challenged them and her honor was insulted. Then I used magic to avoid a fight and you charged us."
Pip thinks for a bit. Then he speaks to the man as if he had an inspirational idea.
"We are going to rescue real kids. If you come with us and help, the lady here can give you amnesty and I can give you two gold each."
Abella holds up her hands. ”Ladies, gentlemen. Please relax, dears. Some people got insulted, some got scared off, some stabbed. We’re all still alive and I would rather not doing the moral math. Why don’t we just call it a wash? And if you need a dress for something, certainly there are other ways, yes?”
Talanaliel, however, isn't quite so ready to let things be. She flits down to land on the man's knee and stares into his eyes.
"She needs no babysitter, and I wouldn't be so quick to utter Rovagug's name," the little thrush tells the man. "The Devourer is not picky about his meals."
"Caiden's balls!!" The man's eyes go wide and he raises a hand as if to protect his face. After a second he relaxes, and he mutters, "...—king bird girls."
"I didn't want to stop looters, but we have a lady paladin who challenged them and her honor was insulted. Then I used magic to avoid a fight and you charged us."
Pip thinks for a bit. Then he speaks to the man as if he had an inspirational idea.
"We are going to rescue real kids. If you come with us and help, the lady here can give you amnesty and I can give you two gold each."
The man looks at Pippip confusedly. Between the talking bird and the halfling's self-justification, the man is a bit overwhelmed. At the last part, he huffs, "Oh, I'll get my nasty with your lady friend and your two gold someday soon."
Shrike is outwardly unmoved by both the aspersions cast on her babysitting skills and Pippip's justifications. "Don't stab people you don't want dead. Or throw acid at them. Clear?"
"I wouldn't trust that man near Lamm, much less any children," Audria says as she, with some help, gets Dendren on her back to carry him. "Take any weapons he has and tie him up for the guard. He still tried to rob this place and attacked instead of just running when caught red-handed."
Talanaliel zips to land on the wounded man's back as Audria leaves the alley behind to find where the children were. She never meant to take so long on this, only meaning to scare the thieves off, and she doesn't want to leave the children alone any longer than she has to.
The violence some of her companions showed worries her. Pip's attack on the one man who seemed to have a conscious dismayed her, but Lina's actions worried her more. Perhaps she is naïve, but it seems to her that her fellow Lamb is more deeply scarred than she thought for Lina to use something as painful as acid. Audria remembers the smell too well from all of the times Yargin had threatened with it.
Perhaps there were more reasons than just finding the missing children for her leaving that alley in such a hurry, she realizes. The violence worries her, yes, but the greasy man's words before she left send a chill down her spine. She doesn't doubt that he'd be very rough with her indeed if he caught her unawares.
"Audria, is something wrong," Talanaliel asks, her voice carrying a note of worry.
"I'm wondering what Shelyn must think of me to keep such company," the young woman answers. "I'm worried I may have made a mistake leaving them to that man, or that leaving him for the Guard is a mistake, or that there isn't a right answer here."
Audria takes in a deep breath as she hurries as much as she can carrying a man that out weighs her by a wide margin.
"I'm scared, Tallyfeather. It's all I can do not to go mad from worry."
Talanaliel hops onto Audria's less crowded shoulder and rubs her head against the young woman's cheek. There isn't anything the thrush can say. She knows all to well why Audria is worried, and prays quietly that Shelyn is keeping Eliana, Trinia, and the children safe.
Abella is about to notice something when she hears Pip’s offer to the would-be thieves. ”Hah! I do not anyone but the most forgiving would accept an offer from someone who just accosted them and had a bout, darling. Like I said, we should just call the whole thing a wash. A bit presumptuous to be acting as though we have some kind of legal authority here, yes? Also to try to ‘defend a paladin’s honor’ when she has not asked you to. All very silly, if you ask me.”
Abella throws up her hands and shakes her head as she walks away with Audria. ”Ah, well. That’s done. Let’s go turn in our royal bauble. After we find those kiddies first, of course.”
Garret is rather oblivious to what is going on as he watches to make see if the man will make it. "We should move on sooner rater then later." the halfling suggests as soon as they are done patching the man up.
The sun is rising higher over the city, a slight smoky haze is visible in swirls as the tiny figures of imps and house drakes winging above the city cause eddies in the air currents.
"Oi! Where are you taking him?" the greasy man yells, almost rising to stand, but flicks a sour look at Shrike and her gisarme and thinking better of the movement. Worry appears on his face as Audria and Abella begin to walk away.
There's likely only a moment before they will come into view down the street at this rate.
"I've had just about enough of you trying to tell me what to do. I'm sick of it, and I'm sick of you! Just...leave me alone." Lina turned and stalked off after Audria and Abella.
"Tally, get the others and tell them to hurry. I think we're gonna be in trouble if we don't get a move on," Audria says. The thrush takes off and flies back towards the alley where some of their merry company remain.
"Abella, can you help me carry him? The two that ran off came back and looked like they were plotting something before running off, and I don't like the sounds of the crowd I'm hearing."
Meanwhile, Talanaliel flies back to where Shrike and Pip remain.
"Audria says you need to hurry. Trouble's coming," she tells them as she lands on Shrike's shoulder.
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Abella gives Audria a blank, nonplussed stare. ”Carry…him? Like with my hands and muscles?” Cainabeth is the one with the muscles for this kind of thing. She herself isn’t exactly weak, but it really is the principle of the thing.
She looks over the man. He was reluctant to begin with, and he has not tried to attack them or anything of the like yet, and there is reason for him to want to rush away….
She weaves thalergy around her hand and taps the man with the back of her hand.
”There, now he can walk on his own, Canary. And we are not carrying someone with a time pressure on our hands.” And—most importantly—she herself does not have do physical labor
"Not your babysitter. Don't care about your tantrum. No one made you come."
Shrike retrieves the greasy man's cosh from the ground where she kicked it, and ties him up with Garrett's rope
She hustles in the direction that the orphan gave for the Street Hole, pausing when she sees Abella healing the stabbed looter with a touch. She shakes her head, nonplussed, but continues moving swiftly in the original direction.
"Let's hope mercy has not ruined any surprise."
Pip mounts up, offers a boost up to Garrett and gets ready to ride. He resumes his narration
"Saving a shop from break in and loot spree
the cleaver lady and friends would run free"
"And you're not the leader either."
The man named Dendren opens his eyes groggily and looks around. He appears quite bewildered at being over the armored shoulder of a young girl.
"U-uh, wha...?" he stammers. He glances from Abella to Lina and gulps worriedly realizing these were foes from moments ago. "Uh, I can walk...I think."
Shrike clocks the greasy man solidly enough that he slumps over unconscious and will no doubt have a raging headache when he awakens. She and the two halflings rush into the alley where some tension seems to have been building.
"Dendren, right," Audria asks the man. "I'm sorry about what happened. I was trying to scare you off, but things didn't go like I hoped. Abella was able to save you. You seem like you're not a bad man. Would you mind helping us get some hurt kids to the Sanctuary of Shelyn before things get worse?"
Audria's voice is soft and she has trouble looking at the man after what had happened.
Hearing the arguing continue Garrett shakes his head and says, "I think we should work on just getting along. Right now this place is falling apart and we need each other. We can work on how to address bullies in the future. For now lets get the kids and go." He looks at the man and smiles at him as he says, "A good deed would not hurt any of us. If you want to help then come along. If not then perhaps we can part ways and all forget this nasty ordeal took place."
Audria sees Talaniel still astride Shrike's shoulder as the rest of the party approaches.
The man seems to relax a bit more after Garrett's kind words but still seems on edge.
"Ah...well, it feels like you're not having any trouble on these streets, so...I imagine those children would be much safer with you," Dendren says nervously as he sees Pippip come riding up on his canine. "I really should be going...uh, I'm sure those other people I was with are going to need my help at some point."
He begins to slowly back away from the group, and unless stopped, he will eventually begin to run over to where the greasy man lies out cold.
The sounds of a large group of people just out of sight of the alley is unmistakable.
"Time for all of us to fly along!" Talaniel chirps regardless of whether Dendren is prevented from leaving.
As Dendren starts to leave, Audria places a hand on his arm.
"Why would you want to be with people who rob shops," she asks. "Please, come with us. We could use all of the help we can get, and you don't seem the type who likes hurting others. I know the priest in charge at the Sanctuary, maybe he can help you find a place where you can be yourself and do something that you can be proud of."
She looks the man in the eyes, letting him see her earnest sincerity.
"Please," she begs him, "For your sake if no one else's?"
Pip holds out two gold pieces and clearly clinks them together.
"I continue to offer genuine employment for a worthy cause."
At Audria’s question to the reluctant thief—“why would you want to be with people who rob shops”—Abella laughs out loud. ”Oh, sweet, innocent Canary.” She shakes her head. It truly shocks her sometimes just how different the world seems to some people, how simple and clear.
She gives the young man a sad, knowing smile. ”You go be their voice of reason. Remind them to listen to you next time you advise caution.” She pats him on the back to send him on his way. Whatever is ahead of him with that group, it is probably nothing good, but that is a mistake he will have to keep making until he learns. That’s just how it goes.
"Don't be silly. The bird's in charge." Shrike's voice is flat and bored.
Shrike has paused a few yards beyond the knot of people forming around Audria, Abella, and the reluctant looter when she hears a conversation happening that, incredibly, seems to be aimed at getting him to come along. She doesn't understand why they would want him to, much less why he would ever be willing to work for a stranger who had mortally injured him while he was trying to retreat from an otherwise minor street scuffle he had neither wanted nor participated in. She turns around, still holding the greasy man's blackjack in one hand.
She adds to Abella's words, "You tried to save one of them. But all three of your cronies ran and left you to die when the job went sour. You're alive because these two showed you mercy at a cost to themselves." A jerk of her head at Audria and Abella makes it clear who she means, but the harsh croak makes it unclear if she approves. "Remember that."
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Dendren stiffens at Audria's words, his jaw tightening and several emotions cross his features. "I...it..." Then he just shakes his head. "You clearly wouldn't understand."
The man looks on Audria with something akin to pity. "I'll pray to Shelyn that your journey leads you far from the paths I've walked, young one."
To Pippip, Dendren replies, "Keep your coin, bard. I've not yet heard a song of freedom from you. Until you sing of the Usurper's downfall, you'll never have my sword."
The man receives Abella's kind gesture with surprise and nods awkwardly in return before leaving the alley and hurrying to the side of his unconscious comrade.
At the urging of the party's feathery leader, the team rushes down the alley. Behind come cries of alarm as the mob of rioters come to realize one of their own lies in a heap with Dendren attending. There's no doubt things would have been very ugly had they remained.
Soon enough, the alley gives way to the next street, and the rescuers move quickly to find the so-called "Street Hole" the Lambs described. A few Korvosan citizens move quickly down the streets doing their best to avoid looking at the armed party as Shrike's appearance and resting frown face does much to discourage interest in the group.
Lina begins to wince as the late morning sunlight troubles her eyes. She takes a moment to reapply her beloved spell.
From down a narrow space between two buildings, a young boy's voice can be heard crying out in fear.
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Audria finds herself at a loss for words. She watches the young man leave and gives a silent prayer that Shelyn would help him see right from wrong before Talanaliel twitters to get everyone's attention.
"We should go before they find us!"
Audria hears the boy's cry and sprints to see what is going on. Her hand reaches for her sword, but she hesitates. Should she draw it? She doesn't want to kill anyone. She doesn't want to fight, but the fear in the boy's voice sparks something within her. Lamm and his cronies had done enough to these children. She would not allow them to be harmed as long as she drew breath.
Steel rings as she draws her blade and sets her jaw. She rounds the corner to the alley between the two buildings where she'd heard the voice as Talanaliel takes flight to keep an eye on things from above.
"I care not who you are," she calls out to whatever thugs or monsters threaten the children, "Leave them be or I will see that you threaten no one ever again!"
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"Keep your coin, bard. I've not yet heard a song of freedom from you. Until you sing of the Usurper's downfall, you'll never have my sword."
He's no pincher. Educated, fancies himself a revolutionary. Stranger to the milling lay, but not to the sword. The mask does not move even an inch to watch the man go back to his greasy friend, but inwardly Lania wonders at it. And why is everyone calling her Usurper? Where was this revolutionary fervor when a mad old pervert sat on the throne bleeding the city's coffers dry to wench himself into a poxy grave?
From down a narrow space between two buildings, a young boy's voice can be heard crying out in fear.
Shrike's narrow-eyed mask snaps toward the sound of the cry as they hear it, but rather than storm directly in, her instinct is to sneak up to the corner, crossbow readied.
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The group enters into a narrow section of rundown buildings. Shrike can see two of the many Korvosan devil imps menacing something out of sight around the corner of a rundown pavilion in front of an old storefront. The boy's cries comes from the direction the imps are focused. One dives forward and buzzes the unseen child.
Someone yells, "Go away! Leave us alone!"
The imps cackle impishly.
Shrike has successfully managed to avoid being noticed.