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Unwilling to venture into the narrow entrance while the grease plugs the corridor, Kūtayak continues to wait in crouches posture with claws at the ready for whatever is holed up in the chamber to emerge. Glancing back to Shūkantayāk, the tengu conveys wordless concern to his eidolon, then swiftly sharpens his focus back on the bottneck of the doorway. _________________
Kūtayak is quick to move back when it becomes clear Selter is ambushed in the doorway. "Draw it out or push it further in!" He croaks in a raspy Taldan, talons clicking together in anticipation. Without being able to see the creature, Kūtayak has no idea what he and the others are up against. ______________
Looking at the narrow opening around the door, Kutayak lets out a noisy squaek and motions for Shukantayak to remain where he is. The tengu approaches the door, rolling back the sleeves of his robe and widening his stance. Watching Selter, the avian summoner readies to time his blows against the door with the nagaji's. When Selter moves in to slam the door, so too does Kutayak, bashing into it with his shoulder, until finally, the door gives way with a tremendous CRASH—
Letting out a low, grumbling squawk at the smell of the sewers, Kūtayak watches Kurse successfully make his way across. "Nnh, agile for..." he cuts himself off, shaking his head. Then, without further word, buth Kūtayak and Shūkantayāk leap and hop across the stones to the other side of the sewer, only the rustling of feathers and loose cloth to signal their passing until talons click loudly on the other side.
Unaware of the significance of what is transpiring, Kūtayak waits to see where Kurse and Selter's attempts at discussion get them. Instead, the summoner focuses his attention on more metaphysical tasks at hand, speaking a short and curt incantation as thin runes of light weave and twist around his talons, ending in a faint violet glow surrounding his eyes. Scanning the room, Kūtayak looks for evidence of something magical at work. _____________
Full of frenetic energy at the back of the room as the others move to speak with the mad painter, Kūtayak looks around with twitching interest. One moment his attention flicks to the stairs, another to the ceiling, then again back to the mural being painted on the wall. Shūkantayāk offers a steadier look to its master, offering a concerned look to the stairs, then to the painter. Neither say anything, but Kūtayak can be seen slipping a Harrow card out from the case at his belt. Flipping the card over in his hands, staring at the art with an ever-worried expression. "The Demon's Lantern..." Kūtayak whispers in rasping tone as his attention shifts suddenly to the painter. ________________________
"Not Desnan," Kūtayak squawks over his shoulder to Maedhros, "not this one, at least." Peering down the corridor, the Tengu furrows his feathered brows and clasps his taloned hands together. With a wave of one hand, he signals for Shūkantayāk's attention. The eidolon looks up from the other passage nearby, black eyes peering wordlessly to its master. But the two share a silent moment that seems anything but a master/servant dichotomy. Respectfully bowing its head, Shūkantayāk disappears a moment later in a flurry of strange cards and glowing sigils. "This one is Pharasmin," Kūtayak explains in the wake of his eidolon's dismissal, withdrawing a small silver disk from where it is tucked inside th eneckline of his robe. "This one sees the spiral, walks it with you, and acts as guide..." Raising his free hand, Kūtayak makes several gestures in the air, one by one plucking on unseen threads until a whirling cloud of sulphorous gas swirls black and sooty at his feet. With a flash of flame, a dog-sized rat appears from the smoke, red eyes gleaming and fur slick with what looks like oil. "Go," Kūtayak urges to the fiendish creature with a wave of his hand, "disrupt." With that, the rat scurries down the hall, its scaled tail snaking behind it until it disappears from view. As it does, Kūtayak looks to Maedhros again. "All walk the spiral," his black eyes peer down the stairwell, "some in shorter distances than others." ________________
When the elementals crumble, Kūtayak lets out a shrill noise and tilts his head to the side, blinking slowly. THe tengu noses through the rubble with his beak for a moment, then watches as Ka removes one of the stones. Brows furrow and the bird-man straightens, looking over to Shūkantayāk wordlessly. The two exchange a moment of silence, then leave the crumbled elementals and the lazurite to Ka, following Sithiss and Selter into the adjacent chamber instead. Carefully moving around the nagaji and his serpent, Kūtayak and Shūkantayāk split up, moving around the perimeter of the room to the paired stairwells, each adopting a sentry position at the top. "Check room if necessary, this one," Kūtayak motions to himself, "will lead." Then, raising his hand away from his body, Kūtayak recited a litany of strange syllables and verses as whirling rings of eldritch writing appear around his hands. These patterns are swiftly woven into a coat of layered armor that appears, not over Kūtayak, but over Shūkantayāk as a shimmering field of lamellar plates made from moonlight and stardust. "This one is ready." _____________
Perception checks for going downstairs.:
Waiting for the elementals to move in and take both Selter and Sithiss as bait, Kūtayak and Shūkantayāk channel arcane energies through their bodies, creating a whirling haze of eldritch symbols around claws, beak, and fang. The eidolon and his summoner ready themselves, muscles tense, for the opportune moment to strike when the elementals are exposed! _________________________
Hearing the sound of sliding earth and stone, Kūtayak and Shūkantayāk break away from their investigations and hurry back towards the door. Shūkantayāk's clawed feet scramble across the stone as the horned creature comes to a skidding stop beside Selter, baring its fangs and letting out a low, audible growl. Kūtayak likewise hurries to Sithis' side, skidding to a stop and throwing back the sleeves of his robe, baring his curved talons. "Move back!" Kūtayak orders with a shrill tone, "We will draw them in and strike!" ____________________
Readied Actions:
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Knowledge (planes):
As the rats scurry out of the way, Kūtayak is quick to amble into the room with one taloned hand stroking the feathers beneath his beak. As he reaches the middle of the room, his beady black eyes scan over the corpses, but as Ka comes in to check on their condition his curiosities move towards the containers in the back of the chamber. Making a soft trilling sound in the back of his throat, Kūtayak motions to the southern wing where boxes and crates are stacked up. Shūkantayāk heads in that direction, sniffing at the ground and inquisitively watching his surroundings. Meanwhile, Kūtayak heads in the opposite direction and begins rooting around in the stores there.
Quiet since the group entered the prison, Kūtayak stalks from room to room, not so much searching for anything but seeming genuinely inquisitive about the nature of the structure. While his eidolon follows behind quietly, the tengu comes to stop in the doorway of the chapel, head tilting from one side to the next. He looks back to Kurse and Selter, then makes his way over to the pair. "Artifice is't not my strong suit," Kūtayak quietly explains as he walks past the two. "Language is, though Ka knows the words well." Looking to the double doors at the end of the market, Kūtayak clicks his beak. "A moment," Kūtayak offers, reaching down to his side to draw a single Harrow card from his deck. Inspecting it, the birdlike creature offers a shrill sound of displeasure, then tucks it back into the deck box on his belt. "Danger afoot," he intones, "the beating warns us of our weakness." With that, Kūtayak moves to the door with his eidolon swiftly following at his heels. "Ahead," Kūtayak urges, "lives hang in the balance."
Trilling loudly, Kūtayak ruffles his feathers and wipes his beak off with the sleeve of his robe. "Nnhh, danger abounds at all corners. Not as dangerous as expected, though." Looking over at Shūkantayāk, the tengu holds out his hand and closes his taloned fingers into a fist, then nods once slowly in some sort of gesture of appreciation. Shortly thereafter, Shūkantayāk shrinks back down to his normal size and approaches his master, brushing his antlers against his shoulder. "We should continue, before z'others realize that we ar't approachin'k." Clicking his beak open and closed, Kūtayak looks at the others and wonders aloud as an afterthought. "Is't anyone bleedin'k?"
Seeing the druid getting to his feet, Kūtayak swiftly lunges forward around the corner of the building. Jabbing out with his sharp beak to gouge at the off-balance enemy's eyes as he leaves himself open, Kūtayak is quick to break into a feral flurry of claw and bite attacks. Meanwhile, Shūkantayāk hunches down and begins growling as he watches the remaining rats and druids beyond the barrier of his allies. With quarters too crowded to wade into battle, the Storykin instead waits for the enemies to make the mistake of coming to him. ______________
As the vines erupt from the ground, Kūtayak lets out an avian cry and throws his hands into the air. "The Tangled Briar is upon us!" As the vines lash around Kūtayak's wrists and legs, he looks back to Shūkantayāk who furrows his brows and lets out a feral snarl. Struggling against the vines, Kūtayak begins chanting arcane verses with sibilant tone, eldritch runes blossoming to life in hues of blue and purple around his taloned hands. Reaching out with a shout, Kūtayak lays one hand on Shūkantayāk's back and channels the energy of his spell into the storykin. With a howl, Shūkantayāk begins to grow exponentially in size, feathers bristling, antlers growing and teeth extending outward until he has doubled in size, now six feet tall at the shoulder. "Go!" Kūtayak doesn't need to give the order, as his eidolon is already bounding through the vines and roots, skidding to a halt behind Maedhros. Now eye level with the nearest rat, Shūkantayāk lashes out with fanged maw as a surge of arcane energy rolls down his shoulders and throat, turning his teeth a gleaming shade of violet. ______________________
Reflex Save vs. Entangle if needed. Not entirely sure!:
> (failure)
With the others having moved up, Kūtayak and his storykin eidolon creep up on the battle being waged in the alley. Hunched over, the black-feathered tengu steeples his talons and watches the rats and humanoid figures with bird-like curiosity, while Shūkantayāk follows close behind, watching from around the summoner's silhouette. ___________
Kūtayak eyes Maedhros with the same quirked-head posture as Shūkantayāk. Then, after a moment of vacant expression, the tengu exhales a soft, wheezing laugh and shakes his head. "No, no. Not master." There's a dismissive wave of one taloned hand at that. "Never master, only storyteller." Though realizing that may not be the most satisfactory answer for the scholastically-minded Chelaxian, Kūtayak raps his talons on the side of his beak and contemplates something both simple and informative. "The cards," he finally decides to go with, "are more than just parchment an't ink. They represent a narrative with characters, yes? They are real; as real as you or I." Looking at Shūkantayāk, Kūtayak furrows his feathered brow. "That one is storykin, from that far off place..." Kūtayak's beady black eyes square back on Maedhros, "Stories are told, and... sometimes life becomes them, yes? Sometimes that is literal. It is hard to explain," he admits with a soft chirp, "I am not trained in magic, so much as it is a part of me. This one weave spells, but like a child finger painting. Beautiful in its own way, but not technical or precise." That said, Kūtayak lays a hand briefly on Maedhros' shoulder and walks past him. "Less speakings now, more doings." ______________
Hunched over in his hooded cloak, Kūtayak makes a single soft croaking caw when Nefti is finished speaking, then settles down in a squat within the shadows they had gathered in. The bird-like creature untucks the flap of a leather box at his belt, withdrawing a stack of cards from within—the came tall cards he'd thrown on the desk earlier at the meeting. Making a grumbling noise in the back of his throat, Kūtayak arranges the cards in a spiral pattern, then flips each one over one-by-one, murmuring something to himself as he does. As Kūtayak continues this ritual, the cards begin to shed a faint blue light—dimmer than that of a candle—and a soft breeze blows through the dark. Ruffling his feathers, Kūtayak flips over the last card over to reveal the image of a surprised looking, gray-haired human in a robe. One of his fingers points down to an open book, the other points upwards with fingertip aflame. At the bottom of the card is printed in Varisian, The Hidden Truth. "So it is," Kūtayak intones, as the entire spiral of cards erupts into the air, swirling around and fluttering wildly in the wind. The tengu throws up his arms in silence, talons reaching into the air, and snatches one of the cards out of the maelstrom, followed by the growl of some sort of animal rumbling nearby as a beast leaps out of the storm of cards. The creature is lupine in form, with the sinuous body of a wolf, but covered in the glossy black feathers of a raven. Its head resembles that of a fox, with a narrow, wedge-like mouth and pointed, feather-tipped ears tinged with green. A pair of ebony stag antlers protrude back from its head, eyes a glossy black like a bird's, and tiny stubs of feathery wings jut from its back. The creature's forelegs are scaled like a bird's feet, ending in wicked talons, while its rear haunches are leonine, and its tail scaly like that of a serpent. The creature blinks its coal blank eyes, sniffs the air, then turns to look back at Kūtayak as a shimmering symbol of a book appears on its brow and a matching sigil flares to life on Kūtayak's forehead. "यस खरायो र म कुरा थियो। म आशा तपाईं—" The creature chatters in a rasping bird-like tongue, then on spotting the others clears its throat and tilts its head to the side. "हामी कहाँ हो?" "Ugh," Kūtayak groans, rolls his eyes and throwing his hands into the air. "You're useless, it's only been two weeks, yes? I'll catch you up on the way in." Rising to his feet, the tengu picks up his scattered cards and returns them to the deck. "But, ah," Kūtayak rapidly begins pointing to the party members. "Starwalker, Snakes, Lispy, and the other mage," are apparently his shorthand for Ka, Selter, Kurse, and Maedhros, respectively. The creature quirks its head to the side and eyes Nefti. "के भनेर एक बारेमा?" Kūtayak arches a feathered brow and looks over his shoulder, then waves his hand dismissively. "Stays Behind," the tengu admits, "Not as important." Shuffling over to the creature, Kūtayak notices it giving him an expectant and somewhat frustrated stare. "Oh, yes—yes. The introduction'k thing." Motioning to the beast he summoned from the harrow deck, Kūtayak directs the others' attention to it. "This is Shūkantayāk. He will't be accompanyin'k us." As if that were enough explanation, the eccentric tengu tucks his arms within his sleeves and stands at the ready beside his eidolon. ______________________
Language (Tengu): "The hare and I were having words. I hope you—" "Where are we?" "What about him?"
Wiggling his talons as if tickling the keys of an invisible piano, Kūtayak views Ka with a side-long stare. "Nnnnh, Starwalker," he mumbles, head bobbing left to right in weighing of an opinion. "This one withdraws his prior doomsayin'k. There is't new information that has come to light, an't it seems as though the Caravan travels alongside us. This..." Kūtayak traces a finger in the air as if counting something, then shuffles through his deck of Harrow cards and withdraws another, keeping it close to his chest. "Yes, this changes things." With that "assessment" made, Kūtayak looks back over his shoulder to the Venture-Captain and tucks his harrow cards into a snug leather case on his belt. "This one will be assisting the Starwalker, then, yes?" By that title, he seems to imply Ka.. But the raving tengu seems uninterested in confirmation of the question he asked Hestia, apparently allowing it to fall into some sort of rhetorical purgatory. "Starwalker," Kūtayak sidles up to Ka, laying a taloned hand on his shoulder. "Do with the keepin'k out of harm's way, yes? You are fortune's friend and this one would prefer not to see fortune trying to hold in its insides with a free hand. Bad for morale." With his pep talk accomplished, Kūtayak looks to the other members of what he presumes is Ka's party and flourishes one hand in the air and then bows with the theatricality of a stage actor. "This one has spent a bit too much time starin'k at the cards and the space between the stars, yes? This one is Kūtayak Shîkrya. Soothsayer, speaker of the Harrow, and caller of the Storytime." Rising from the bow, Kūtayak lets out a soft croaking trill, and dusts off the front of his robe. "It is't pleasure to make your acquaintances."
With hunched posture, the hooded and birdlike creature at the back of the office shuffles some weathered script of cardstock around in his clawed hands. Beady eyes downturned to whatever is painted on the cards, he makes small trilling and croaking noises, occasionally clicking his dark beak in quick snap-snap-snap nervois tics. "Nnnh," he vocalizes, feathers at his crown ruffling. "This is no good," the creature admits regretfully in a coarse voice, thick with Varisian accent. "The cards," the tengu croaks, hurriedly pushing his way up to Hestia's desk, slapping down a handful of cards with clearly painted pictures face-up. "Do you not see, here," the tengu taps one talon down on a card depicting a red-robed figure in a mask. "The Inquisitor!" Beady eyes stare at the Venture-Captain as if his sudden outburst was neither weird nor unsolicited. "This entire operation is't courting danger.." Waving one clawed hand flippantly in the air, the tengu points back and forth across the seeming jumble of cards. "When aligned in such a fashion with the Joke and the Bear, there is't sign of strength, yes? Strength and adversity. But the Joke is misaligned," he casually turns a card showing a giant in a fit of laughter upside down, "an' this, this indicates the joke is on us." And that's it. That's where the tengu stops his frantic speech, looking up with feathery brows raised in expectant stare at Hestia, as if he fully expects her to see the "wisdom" in the cards without further explanation or elaboration. A moment of awkward silence passes, and the tengu clears his throat and sweeps the cards into one hand. "Kūtayak Shîkrya," the tengu says in introduction. "Perhaps... ah, startin'k with that. Yes? With the introductions." "Yes, introductions first. This is how the things work with the pople an't their skin hands." Kūtayak mutters to himself, wringing his free hand over a patterned blue/black scarf tied around his neck. "Then with the prophecy." |
