(2023-04-04) Controlled Violence

Details

Author:	Athena
Summary:	Aze's frustrations over the lack of weaponry reaches a peak, enough to ask Roper for help. His condition, however, means first they've got to test out how much she's recovered. Controlled violence ensues. Predominantly combat and chatting log. 12k-ish words.
Rating:	M for Mature 17+

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brief references to sex, mentions of use of recreational drugs, descriptions of violence, brief description of animal seeming to be in pain, death of demon dog, contains death knight, romance, romantic touching

Monday brings with it a chill in the air. It's not really the weather so much as the increasing tension in the Kaskala yurt as a very bored demon hunter stews in forced idleness with a frost death knight who seems immune to her plight.

Roper is tonguing a tooth in irritation as he makes another note on a blacksmithing plan on the table, annoyance almost audible in the scratching of the pencil.

The demon hunter in question walks down the ramp, her sister close behind. "I'm just saying, I don't understand how many fish they need me to catch to give me a fucking spear."

"You need to be patient," Syarra says, as if she's said this a fair number of times before. "It's their culture, you need to earn their trust. And you will, eventually. It's like he said, they don't care about the fel."

"Hey," Roper says in greeting, looking up at Syarra. There's a roguish smile on his face as though he's probably already heard some variation of this before.

"Hey," Syarra says with a brief smile, brushing past Aze as she comes into the yurt.

Aze pauses to wave absently at Roper. "Tell Syarra I can't fight the Scourge with my bare hands. I appreciate her confidence in me, but…"

"Syarra, she can't fight the Scourge with her bare hands," Roper says to Syarra, but he adds in a dramatic sin'dorei male dying-of-shock gasp, setting a hand on his chest.

"Look, I know you don't really want me here," Aze says, leaning against the wall. "I'm sure I'm cramping your torture style. Still. I'm being careful, like you wanted. Waiting till I have the gear to get by. But I bet I could, anyway."

"Hey, I'll have you know my torture style is cramp free and thrives in the cold," Roper drawls. "And watching you try to pace a hole through the floor is entertaining. I'm starting to think I should bet on you over the floor, which is the real fucking achievement. But, fine. You want to kill things with tools like civilized people. What kind? Knives? Polearms? Two hander like Syarra's?"

"Knives are good," Aze says, her hands twitching. "Or swords. Smaller ones. Anything sharp can work, but I'd prefer light and fast."

"Something more like mine then," Roper says, and the drawl has been plucked out of his voice like it never existed. "Dual wield or single, which hand is dominant?"

Aze's attention seems to sharpen on Roper at the change in his voice. "Dual. Slight right dominance, but nearly ambidextrous."

"Cross guard? Or minimal, keep them lighter so you can move them faster, and swap hands if you need to?" There's an odd professionalism in his tone, the kind of questions you could expect from a blacksmith, rather than some guy who just uses swords.

"Lighter," Aze says, stepping closer to him. "I like to keep it easier to move."

"Sin'dorei style blade. Wouldn't want someone taking a second look at why you're carrying an Alliance blade." Roper makes an amused sound. "Fuck, wouldn't even take a full day. Easier than Syarra's was."

"Wouldn't take…" Aze trails off. "Did you make Syarra's?"

"Yeah."

"And you have metal? A forge?" Aze shifts against the wall.

"Not in my pocket," Roper drawls. "But, yeah. Seeing as how I outfitted half the fucking militia in Farshire, Alliance hold, with weapons, I've got a standing invitation to use the forge in Valiance. And free use of their cobalt mine, since it's Scourge infested and they're just annoying to me rather than deadly." He gives Aze a lazy, wicked sort of grin that she, unfortunately, can't appreciate.

"Scourge-infested cobalt mine," Aze repeats. She rests a hand against the wall, tapping it with one finger, and finally says, "What would you charge me?"

"You'd have to ask for them," Roper says, watching the tapping with amusement as he picks up the same beat with his left hand. "And you'd only get to keep them if you can prove you're sound enough to use them properly. If you can stomach it — a simple spar, friendly like. Clean bill of violence health, and all that. I'm a monster, but I'm not impetuous."

"I know how to use them," Aze says. She considers Roper for a moment, and then adds, "Spar with what? Hand-to-hand? Or weapons, after they exist?"

"Weapons, after they exist. Hand-to-hand and I'll be snacking on you at every blow, and then it's sneezing, hives, the whole thing. Fel allergy, you know," Roper drawls. "I figure you know how to use them. I wanna make sure you're back to fighting form and not just bored enough to get reckless. I've got a reputation to maintain. You go out and die with my blades on you, you're ruining my perfect streak."

Syarra moves further into the yurt, keeping her eyes on the exchange but not interfering.

"Nobody ever died while they had one of your blades?" Aze asks, with half a smile. "Does your death count, or did this streak start just after?"

"After. I didn't use swords, before. I used knives, but." Everything about Roper's voice alters — the tone, the accent, and the suppression of the echo that he usually employs. The temperature of the room drops a few degrees, as his voice gets a horrifying echo. There's a dark command in him as he repeats, "A knight does not use a knife."

He blinks it away, a wry grin and his regular voice coming back as if nothing happened. "So I made swords. Apparently, before, I was too fucked up from how I learned to make them to make any. Now, it's fine. And so far, no one I've made a weapon for has died. I like streaks."

"'Apparently'," Aze repeats, tilting her head curiously. "So swords… what if I hurt you? Or you hurt me? Are you going to go all… hungry?"

Roper laughs, a cold sort of sound. The room is still colder around them. "If you hurt me, I'll heal. If I hurt you, my eyes will get itchy. You worried about my lack of control?"

"Then I won't need to be careful," Aze says, pushing off from the wall. "Alright, then, let's do it."

Roper just sits back more onto his heels, his brows raised as he waits.

Syarra makes a quiet exhale that might be a laugh. "There was a price."

Roper laces his fingers together and moves them behind his head as he looks at Aze with unblinking, amused eyes.

Aze tenses for a moment, then she takes a breath, deliberately relaxing. She shifts her hands behind her back and says, with some reluctance, "Will you make me a pair of swords, Roper?"

"Sure," Roper says easily. "Gimme a day. I can't get the fucking math on these things to add up anyway. Could use an afternoon taking it out on the Scourge." He rises with that too smooth, too liquid motion, stepping over to Syarra. "Get you anything while I'm out?" The difference in the tone of his voice is notable, and obvious. "Or you wanna come with?"

"You'll need someone to watch your back," Syarra says, reaching out one hand to his. She glances over briefly at Aze and adds, "And I wouldn't mind cutting down a few ghouls."

Roper takes Syarra's hand not unlike he's planning to dance with her, moving in closer. "Then gimme a minute. Those things get bitey and I don't wanna show up later with love bites and scandalize your sister wondering who I got them from," Roper drawls.

Syarra smiles briefly, reaching toward his collarbone with her free hand, and says, "I don't think much scandalizes her, but… yes, maybe another time, for that."

Roper just laughs, warm and low, pressing dangerously firmly into the touch, just enough to tempt a faint pain that he doesn't quite follow through on, before he steps away to pull on the rest of his armor, and go see about getting another sword for another girl.

Time Passes

It's early morning when Roper gets back, not bothering knocking. He unlocks the door and swings it open, bringing in a sudden rush of freezing cold air with him, the frost still heavy on his armor, as he mutters a string of curses. He shuts the door behind him.

Syarra is sitting at the table, looking over at the bedroom curtain, with a very settled sense that implies she might have been there for hours. She turns toward the burst of cold air and says, "Trouble?"

From the bedroom there's a faint sound of muffled groan, but Aze does not emerge.

Roper removes his helm, tossing it with an expertise onto an armor stand in the corner. There's a look of banked fury on his face, but he shakes his head slightly. He gets in closer to Syarra, leaning down to her almost as if with the intent to kiss her or perhaps put his forehead against hers, one gauntleted hand reaching for her like he can't quite help himself even if he knows better than to try to touch her with the spikes on the tips of his fingers. "Later," he mumbles in a low voice.

Syarra reaches up to touch the side of his face with her cold fingertips, and nods. "Nothing to do with the swords then. The swords you made her as a favor, because she asked."

Roper is ice cold under the armor. Literally — the frost is thick enough to create a nearly invisible barrier of ice over him. He closes his eyes at the touch, and with some effort, lets the ice fade. His hand hovers over hers, a breath away from piercing the flesh. "Swords are done. Nothing about them." He straightens, pulling away, and opens his eyes. The rage is gone. For now. "Hey, Aze. Up and at them."

Aze stretches and slowly sits up, vaguely visible behind the curtains. There's something a little prompt about the reaction, such that one might guess she hadn't been asleep. She pushes the curtain aside and says cheerfully, "Problems? Felt like you brought a snowstorm in here."

"Not your problems," Roper says, as he spreads his hands in an open gesture. "Coffee before or after controlled violence?"

"Violence first," Aze says, something eager in her stance. "Whatever else later."

Syarra steps back, and adds, "Controlled. Controlled violence, Aze."

Roper sweeps a look over Aze, and raises a dark brow. He gives a light snort, maybe amusement. "Gimme a few. Armor is going to make this…" He waves a hand vaguely, as he walks to the other side of the room, pulling off his armor with small signs of lingering irritation. Aze might not be the only one up for some early morning violence in lieu of coffee.

Aze nods. "We need to be on fair footing. Well. As fair as it can be."

"Fair," Roper drawls, and the amusement grows. "Sure. No disease, and I won't use anything offensively. I want to make sure you can fight, and most things you'd be fighting out here won't fight like me anyway." There's a cold edge of rage in his voice that makes the husky note a scrape. "We'll head out by the fallen necropolis, outside where the Scourge sometimes still fucks around. Shouldn't be anyone nearby that's alive."

"Then on my side," Aze hesitates. "No fel, I guess, for your allergies. And… nothing demonic? Only combat."

"Oh, and I should say." Roper makes an annoyed tsch sound. It might not be directed at Aze. He seems to have gotten stuck with his breastplate. The less familiar Cobalt one, with the buckles on the sides, is clearly giving him trouble. He's tried unbuckling all one side at a time and it's swung to the side partially and twisted. "It's to the points of obvious defeat, not to the death. I left my dueling outfit back in Acherus."

"What's obvious defeat?" Aze asks, tapping her foot in mild impatience. "To blood? To surrender?"

Roper raises a brow, turning slightly. "Surrender, assuming you actually will. If it takes blood, I can do that just as well. Don't blame me when I sneeze in your face afterwards though." He still can't get the buckle to loosen. Judging by his body language, he's a few seconds away from just tearing it off in impatience.

Syarra moves over to help, pushing his hands away from the buckle.

"I love how you assume me," Aze grins. "Will you surrender? Do you bleed?"

Roper sighs, making an amused sound as Syarra takes over, putting his hands up in surrender.

"I bleed. And I have no problem surrendering when I need to," Roper drawls, giving Syarra a lopsided grin. "Just remember that I'm only playing nice as long as you are. You go for the throat for fucking real, you'll find out how cold it gets out there. I don't need to hurt you to stop you."

From her easier angle, Syarra shifts the breastplate to reduce the tension and undoes the offending buckle.

"I do remember how to spar," Aze says, with a trace of amusement. "I just haven't done it in a while, because all my partners are probably dead." She pauses, and seems to realize how that sounds. "Not by my hand, of course. Mostly."

Roper looks over at that, and up close it's easy for Syarra to see that sharp look in his eyes, like he's a cat that's found a stray thread to pounce on. His voice, however, betrays none of the interest in his face. He sounds just as annoyed and amused as a second before. "If it helps, I'm only mostly dead."

Syarra raises an eyebrow at Roper, though he isn't watching her, and says, "I think that's done it," pulling the breastplate off.

Aze smiles, but it doesn't look particularly happy. "Yeah, you're a lot more active than a dead demon hunter. We're kind of meant to have a pulse."

"Well, last time I sparred, I did. Technically they had us fighting each other when we were raised but I wouldn't call what we did in fucking training 'sparring.' They pit us against each other, and only one got to walk away. You just killed until they told you to stop and go kill something else." Roper gives Aze a sharp grin she can't see, before turning a more genuine smile on Syarra, reaching up a hand to brush a hair near her face into place. "Thanks, baby," he says in a softer voice, before he starts shedding the rest of the greaves so he can get the leather armor on.

"Of course," Syarra says, a faint smile flickering over her face before she turns to her sister. "Have you fought a death knight before?"

Aze turns away toward the ramp before admitting, "No. I meant to. The one who… you know. But then everyone I talk to throws a fit about it, saying you're our allies, and… I bet there'll be some on the other side. So I will, eventually."

Roper flicks his gaze at Syarra and then at Aze. "We are your allies. We get to choose now. There's a reason why Dick King has to use fucking mind control to keep his minions. But yeah. There's always those few who crawl back to master's leash. You want in on that kind of hunt," There's a subtle emphasis on the word, "We would welcome an ally in it. Because make no fucking mistake, Aze. We're Ebon Blade, not just death knights. Anyone still Scourge, trying to wear our fucking armor, dies screaming." There's a chill in the air at the last, before Roper tilts his head back and sighs heavily, trying to shake the rage off.

"I'd like that," Aze says, and it sounds sincere. "They should die screaming." She clasps her fingers together, still holding back impatience. "But on the other side… have you ever fought someone like me."

"Strictly speaking, and not just in parts of fighting sin'dorei and demons? No. Which means this'll be fun." Roper getting his leather armor on is a different beast than the plate. He's fast, and he wears it like a familiar second skin. "Let's go."

Aze grabs her boots by the door and pulls them on, touching one hand to her frostweave shirt. "I'm ready. I won't be shivering this time."

Roper laughs. "We'll see." He steps in closer to Syarra, reaching out to touch her elbow. "I'll be careful. We'll come back, both of us, one way or another, okay?"

"Hopefully not as a ghoul," she says, very quietly, and only a twitch at the corner of her lips makes it clear that she's joking.

Roper laughs again, but the sound is different. It's softer, without an edge of sarcasm. "No promises I wouldn't crawl out a grave for you. I'd say I'd be a cute ghoul, but we both know I'd probably be one of the bitey ones." He clicks his teeth in an audible bite as he flicks his brows up at her, his eyes darting to a place on her neck, before he turns away to get to the door.

A genuine smile crosses her face for a split-second, and she waves a farewell to the two… sparring partners?

Aze is already at the ramp and ready to go.

Outside the yurt, Roper is clearly comfortable. His hood is up, but the cold wind and fog of the Northrend morning bothers him not at all. "We walk out of the village, and then we'll take the horse." Singular. Roper doesn't pause to see if Aze is following or in agreement with this plan, as he walks in quick, silent strides to the edge of the tuskarr village.

Aze does follow, keeping pace with the death knight. "Horse?"

"Yeah. I've got a horse in my fucking pocket." Roper turns his head slightly over his shoulder. "Don't worry. It's already dead."

"You want me to ride a dead horse with you," Aze says, and it sounds more like an expression of dismay than a question.

"I want to get there quicker so we can start hitting each other with sharp sticks," Roper drawls. "Or do you really want to spend half an hour jogging alongside me through the snow? We can, but I'm going to talk the whole time."

You'd think he got an A+ in Torture School or something.

"I doubt you'll let a horse stop you," Aze says, with a brief laugh. "But I guess we would get there faster."

"Aw, you really are getting to know me," Roper says, holding out his left hand as they clear the village sign. The shadows gather, slipping around them, and from it he pulls a horse, screaming in equine fear and pain, as it emerges onto the tundra. Roper continues towards it in an unbroken stride like this is very normal.

"That's… a horse…" Aze says, like she's not entirely sure. "Do yours usually make that sound?"

"It's dead and it hangs out in a place of fucking eternal torment of restless shades in the Realm of Shadows," Roper says as he mounts up in a smooth motion. He pats the saddle behind him. "You want it to whinny playfully, bring the ghost of an apple next time."

"Would that work on you, too?" Aze asks, holding out a hand toward him.

Roper reaches down and closes a cold, firm, but perhaps surprisingly gentle grip over her wrist. He seems to be deliberately trying not to hurt her as he pulls up, and it doesn't seem to cost him anything to do it. The strength in him is not proportional to his size, and it's obvious. "I'd say ask your sister, but you'd make her blush." Roper doesn't make that sound nearly as undesirable as his words make it seem. "But you'd be surprised how nice I can be when people don't come at me with a fucking metaphorical or real pitchfork. It just doesn't happen often anymore."

Aze uses the leverage to swing up behind him, and shivers a little as she settles in the saddle against his back. After a moment, she says, "I don't have anything to stab you with. Is my sister going to be jealous if I hold on?"

"She'd be annoyed if you fell off because you're trying to avoid touching me." Roper reaches around to try to pull one her arms around him, impatiently. "Shouldn't you know that kind of thing, how jealous she gets? She's your sister. She's been around for 140 plus years. If no sin'dorei men were interested in her in all that time, I'm setting fire to Silvermoon because clearly they're too fucking stupid to live."

Aze lets him pull the arm, and follows with the other, wrapping around his waist. "I know my Yara, I don't know the walking corpse version. If you're asking about mine, then she knew I didn't fuck boys she liked. But… also I told her when they tried. It seemed wrong not to. So, yeah. Jealous."

"Well, mine," And there is a touch of a dangerous, hollow echoing in his voice on the word, lending it an eerie sound, "knows exactly how I feel about her. There's one woman in the whole fucking world as far as I'm concerned, and you're not her." There's no kick, or movement of the reins, no warning at all as the horse leaps forward into a rapid start of a gallop as it is trying to outrun death itself.

Aze's grip tightens on his waist, but she doesn't slip. She rests her head against his shoulder and speaks close to his ear, "Good. Because if any part of her is still my sister, and you were fucking playing her…"

"She'd crush me into fucking paste and raise up the remains before you could even get a good stab in," Roper says, and there's no denying the fondness in his voice. "But no. Sorry to disappoint, but I'm not playing a clever game. You have no idea what she means to me. Not unless you've looked out at your existence as nothing but a fucking bleak, dark wasteland devoid of anything but the thought that you'll get your revenge, finish that mission, and the void will just consume you after, and had someone come in like a light you can touch and feel and remember what life and happiness is, what it means to be a fucking person and not just the monster someone made you. Then maybe you can grasp the barest hint of what she is to me."

Aze huffs a laugh, settling in closer to him. "You're not as unique as you think you are. But sure. Pretend I can't understand."

"I didn't say you couldn't. You did. Have been, all this time. We're just fucking undead corpses, aren't we? What could we possibly feel," Roper says. "I'd have thought after what you did to yourself, you'd be the first one in line to understand her. What it's like to feel like your body isn't entirely yours anymore. People seeing the monster, not the girl. Alone. Scarred. But she didn't get rich friends and a nice room in Shattrath. She just got me and a corner in a necropolis. Speaking of," he says as the horse comes to a stop with a dangerously fast halt. "We're here."

Aze keeps her arms around him for another moment, maybe to make sure he doesn't throw her off. "Doesn't she? You seem pretty close to the Aspenwoods. Colson talks about you."

Roper gives a cold, bitter laugh. "Colson can barely see me as a person after he was guilt strong armed into it, and the others don't mind me as long as they can use me. Like Cressidha said. I'm useful. We don't socialize. No. I have someone else. Someone who loved who I was. And when I came back wrong. Not him. Fucked up in all sorts of ways…couldn’t even remember her. She just kept loving anyway. Unconditionally. You know. The way they always say 'family' will do," Roper says, a cold scathing note in his voice. "Hold on and get your feet under you," is the only warning he gives her before there's a sharp scream from the horse below them as Roper yanks it down into the shadows beneath them, catching his balance easily onto the snow.

Aze keeps her grip on Roper until she has her balance, then she pushes away from him. "Why the fuck does everyone think they can tell me what I feel?"

She shakes her head and flexes her fingers. "Whatever. Do you want to fight? Let's fight."

"Wasn't talking about you. Feel what you want, Aze. Doesn't change that Syarra deserved better, and I probably didn't deserve mine," Roper says, a note of something in his voice, flicking his hood back. Out here, there's no one to see them for at least a mile, and the Scourged magnataurs probably don't count. "Here. Test these out." He pulls out two matching weapons out of a Netherweave bag that doesn't look like it should be able to hold any weapons at all. He tosses them to her in an easy, underhand throw, one after the other.

They're technically swords, by the smallest possible margin for it. Even in the sheaths, they feel light. The cobalt they're made of however is strong, the stuff of sturdy defense shields. The guards on the hilts are minimal at best, more of an assassin's blade than a fighter's, meant for quick, brutal strikes for the kill. It's hard to see without looking at them, but they feel professionally made.

Aze easily catches one with her right hand, and then the other with her left. She unsheathes them, checks the balance and then smiles, tension flowing out of her form. She takes a deep breath and lets it out, and suddenly something like green-tinged fire flows over her skin, down onto the blades. It doesn't seem to hurt her, or to burn her own clothing. Then she looks at Roper and the flames vanish abruptly. She smiles. "So sorry. Your allergy. I'll be more careful."

There's a snap of frost over Roper, as the air around them grows colder, a hungering sense to it as though he's leaching heat away from their surroundings. "I'll keep my hankie ready. Breathing is fucking over rated anyway." There's a faint scrape of sound, and that's the only warning of him drawing his own before he launches forward into a sharp right hand strike to her left side, as if testing exactly how much she really has a slight right hand dominance. He's fast, much faster than any human has the right to be, and the strike he aims at her hits like a kodo charge.

Aze reacts immediately, stepping to the right quickly enough that the blow only glances off the blade. She shifts the step into a smooth turn, aiming a shallow slash at Roper's midsection with her right-hand blade.

Roper's speed kicks up another notch, deflecting the blow with a lazy, relaxed sort of roll of his wrist, except there's that power behind the blow. There's nothing inventive about the next strike back. The sword work is average. His footwork has the feel of a dancer though, as he continues the circle Aze has started, and keeps moving, trying to get the advantage of moving behind her. It's a classic.

Aze laughs, deflecting the strike and continuing the circle, keeping up with his unnatural speed. Her graceful footwork has a hint of playfulness in it, and she handles the swords as easily as if they were extensions of her own body. She seems to approve of the swords. She attacks in sharp, quick slashes, left and then right, more testing his guard than actually trying to harm.

Roper reacts quickly, but he's clearly thinking about the move, not acting with decades of honed warrior precision. His thoughts are good, but they're slower than they should be. If she was moving any faster, she'd get through. His right side is slower, but the blows she lands barely even move his sword; his left is faster, but it's becoming more obvious that it's his weaker hand.

“So, what was it? Party scene grew too boring? Owe the wrong person money?” Roper’s voice sharpens, as he rotates his wrist too fast, in a way that might have hurt a living person’s tendons and doesn’t seem to slow him down at all, into a slashing strike meant to tempt her into overextending her guard or dodge further away into the circle they’re walking, his words as much as a strike as his runeblade. “Or someone see some tattoos they shouldn’t and try to cage you like a little bird?”

Aze reacts more with instinct than thought, and the words do nothing to dim her smile. "What does it matter? No one there knows I'm here. That was the point." She dodges away from the strike.

"Yeah. It's not like there's mail. Not like your first instinct isn't to look for more sin'dorei who might do something like write home about a girl they met, Aszera Sunstrike, and hey, that could never lead to a trail to follow. People don't do that." Roper pushes his speed a little faster, but it doesn't look like there's a lot much faster he can go. He pushes the advantage forward as he talks, but even with his words leaving his mouth, there's that unintentional shift in his own, an opening on his left as he tries to reposition closer. "By the way, you ever ask 'Sil' why he changed his name?"

Aze matches his speed, and for the moment seems too absorbed in the joy of movement to register his words fully. She catches the opening and darts in under his guard with a vicious strike.

Roper twitches back, but it lands enough to cut into the leather, only not sinking fully into him as Aze pulls the strike just enough. "Nice," he says immediately, holding in place for a moment. "Your point. Best two out three?"

"Sure, I'm not done yet," Aze steps back, taking a deep breath. She thinks through his words. "I'm not planning on running around and introducing myself. Big continent to get lost in. And yeah, because his family is fucking awful. And somehow still not to be killed."

"It's a big continent, but not if you play in the wrong sandboxes. A hypothetical Sin'dorei outpost? That's fucking tiny, Aze. One person recognizes you, and that's all it can take. That's all someone like me would need," Roper says, and there's an explosion of movement as he kicks off, literally, into a roundhouse that swings his blades around into her new position.

Aze jumps back, narrowly dodging the attack and there's a blur of something behind her shoulders as she lands lightly on her feet.

"I only asked, I didn't go," Aze says, and then rushes forward, moving back into the attack. With each strike, she continues, "I just. don't. like. Orcs."

Roper's fighting style lays bare where that motion of his comes from: there's a lack of tension in him except for explosive movement, a fluid grace that lets him fall back with the strikes more as if he's working with her in a tango than retreating. His voice has that husky throated sarcastic edge she's become familiar with over the past week.

"Now, now, Aze, next you're going to say you're not particularly fond of trolls or the fucking undead, and I'm going to start to think you're not much of a Horde patriot." The drawl gives no forewarning to when he stops the retreat, sidesteps with a flexible twist, and tries to use his slight advantage of reach on his weapon to come at the diagonal angle of her back.

He's fast, and driving the motion with a strength he shouldn't be able to get, but it's a deliberate, thinking choice again. It's no match for trained reflex from someone just as fast.

Aze catches the motion just in time, and dodges around him with a sudden burst of unnatural speed. A brief exhaled 'Ha!' gives her appreciation of the surprise strike. Then she starts pressing him from her new angle, moving back into the almost dance-like pattern of steps.

"Nobody asked me about that alliance," she says, with a laugh. She seems to be having fun. "I was on a different world at the time. Still, I'm doing as I'm told. With all our new allies."

"You're telling me. I was dead at the time. When I died, sin'dorei had left the Alliance, but we were still friendly. Woke up and you were Horde." Roper plays out the steps of the dance he's engaged in. He seems to be having trouble figuring out how to get through her guard when she's moving forward. "Probably one of the best things about me being what I fucking am. Ebon Blade, we're neutral. Or I'd probably have never gotten Syarra." There's an emotion of some sort in the words, undercut by the fact that Roper moves in the middle of her name, trying to step into Aze's space, almost breaking his wrist to turn one of his swords in time into the motion.

Aze shifts to let him under her guard, but she turns, dodging the blade. In the same motion, she tries to hook her leg around his, to throw him off-balance.

In plate armor, she'd have him on the ground. He wouldn't be able to move fast enough to catch his balance. In the leather, however, the movements of another life are obvious — he touch skips over her leg, leaning into her close enough to feel the chill of his skin, and hear the exhale of an amused laugh, before he twists out of the way, turning his back to her for a moment as he reverses a blade to try to stab at her back in the same place he almost had before.

It's not a bad strategy, except his right side is completely open by his ribs, and his left blade too far to defend it with any effectiveness.

For a moment it looks like the strike might land. Then, Aze is gone, leaving behind a sudden flash of heat and the lingering reek of fel. A few feet away, she's already turning to face him again. She isn't smiling anymore, and there's something like anger in the lines of her mouth. "It's worth what they did to you, then. Getting her."

"It's worth existing again," Roper counters, as he continues his own turn to face her. "I didn't want to die. I did it, for the fucking Alliance. But I died waiting for Colson to find me, poisoning myself to hold on a little longer. Hoping that even if I died before he got there, that'd my soul would stay on long enough that he'd pull me back. Now — " He doesn't finish the sentence, launching forward mid word, as he tries to tempt her into a fuller defense of her left, as he aims a better strike with his own left hand sword.

Aze moves back into the fight, something a little sharper or harsher evident in her usually fluid movements. She deflects the blow, and there's a faint shift to her left, but no clear opening to attack. She shifts in, trying to get under Roper's guard. "Now?" She prompts.

"I won't apologize for surviving," Roper says, the husky note prominent with a faint echo, as he moves back with her, his footwork a near perfect match to hers, but his sword work becoming easier to predict — the faster it is, the simpler it is. The clever strikes are too slow to keep up with her. "Like your people say. [Everything has a price.]"

"I don't expect any apology," Aze says, letting herself fall into the predictable pattern of strike and deflect. "I won't, either. I did what I did. But you should know… the first time I went back to Silvermoon, it wasn't for any fucking party. It was for her. Your version." As she finishes speaking, Aze switches the pattern without warning, feinting on the right and putting solid force behind a strike on the left.

As the strike hits, Roper doesn't defend himself. The blade goes in, deeper than it should have if he'd been trying to at least step out of it, before Aze pulls enough of the strike. "Fuck," Roper says, but there's no note of pain in his voice. That sounds more like irritation. "I just got these." Presumably he means the leathers, and not his internal organs.

"Shit," Aze says, stepping back, raising her blades in a peace-offering gesture. "I can replace it for you. When I have money."

Roper waves it away with a snort of amusement. "Don't worry about it. My fucking fault. I've gotten used to just taking the fucking hit. I can repair the plate." Blood is moving sluggishly from the wound, trickling down through gravity more than blood flow. "Syarra can fix something like this. Probably. And as for the body…"

Roper tosses his head in a 'come here' gesture. It might have seemed directed at Aze, except there's a stirring of Shadow around them, that coalesces around something under the snow. A beat later, a clawed hand bursts through, ghoulish fingers scrabbling against the frozen, packed snow they've been trodding on. There's a snap of power, and the hand stops moving, the lifeforce of it rushing into Roper. The wound in him closes fully.

It's over in seconds.

"Huh," Aze says, lowering the blades. "I thought you needed pain. Does it feel pain?"

"Ghouls?" Roper gives a rolling sort of shrug. "Sort of. It's not what I'm taking though. It's like eating…shadow. Push it into them to bake in the oven, pull it back out to eat it. I can heal with it. It doesn't feed the fucking Hunger though. That's…it's like the difference between eating to stay alive and magic to heal you." Roper rotates his right hand sword idly. "Three out of five?"

"Yeah, sure," Aze says. "If you're all healed up. For me, it's more life. Taking life. And…" she hesitates. "…souls, I guess. Fucking demons, right? But I don't eat them."

"Like a warlock then," Roper says, and there's no surprise in his tone. From the way he tilts his head, there's a sense that it's confirming a suspicion, rather than new information. "Makes sense. I mean, technically I don't eat them either. Just…how my brain seems to think of it. Pain has a taste, and a smell. For me, anyway. But, I loved food, when I was alive. Cooking. Eating. Having enough," Roper says and in the middle of the word, launches forward again in that burst of movement that seems to be a signature opener for him. He's still testing Aze's left side, as if trying to determine just how much weaker it is from her right.

Not much seems to be the answer. She doesn't speak for the first few exchanges, absorbed by the combat itself. Then she says, a little breathily, "Not like a warlock. They make pacts with demons. We kill them. That's what we're for."

"You ever seen one of them take a piece of something's soul? Just as it's dying, pluck it right out in that moment when it dies. They use them to summon demons, so, if you had to fuel something like it…" Roper trails off in suggestion. "Figured it was something like that."

There's no change at all in him since he started. It's becoming more noticeable the longer they fight; he's attacking with the exact same level of full force as he started with, the same sprinting speed. He isn't getting tired, and he isn't slowing down.

Aze is still keeping up speed and ferocity, but she is breathing a little harder by now. It's not obvious in her motion, but one can hear it in her voice as she says, "Okay, given. But I'm not a warlock and I'm not a demon. I'm a weapon."

There's a shifting going on in Roper’s stance, and movement as they go. It's getting clearer as he circles: his footwork has started to mirror hers, picking up her body language more and more. "And I'm not the fucking Scourge no matter how much I was made into it. We choose what we do with what we've got. We don't call ourselves the Ebon Blade for nothing," Roper says, punctuating it with a strike that reads all too similar to one of Aze's own, even if it's slower, more deliberately chosen.

Aze side steps, and something about the movement seems startled. She starts to change up her footwork, trying to shift out of predictable patterns, and says, "I know you're not. I fought Scourge. With her. Not that."

Roper flows back into another footwork, but it's clear that he's watching her closer. Like a dancer following a lead, he's moving more and more in sync with her, and it's getting more difficult to get past his guard. He isn't getting any better at getting through hers though. "So, you went to Silvermoon for her. Why? Worried about the little ceramic turtle?"

Aze's guard falters for a split second, and she springs back to compensate with distance. "What? But she didn't… it's still there. I took her armor back. She wanted them to have it, the blood knights."

"You didn't think she'd bring something she cared about back to Acherus did you? She has a fucking corner there, Aze. This is the first place she's had since she was raised that was really hers." There's a hesitation, and something achingly human in his voice as he corrects, "Ours." The moment is broken as he drives forward to close the distance, the chill of him lessening, but his strikes are harder, stronger. "You ever even ask her about how they died?"

"I fucking know how she died," Aze says, trying to find a way past his guard. "Being fucking heroic, like always. Going after somebody. Knew she was going to die. Anything else she wants me to know, she'll tell me."

"What? You don't want to know what happened to Elivia? And here I thought you two were friends." Roper's guard is almost tantalizingly breakable. Enough to be suspicious, but he's been making mistakes already. If she closes hard enough on him, maybe she could get through on that left side. Just has to be fast enough.

Aze's physical guard might be hard to break through, but her emotional one is brittle, narrow and focused. And that went right around it, a blade straight into soft tissue. There's something bleaker than anger in her voice when she snaps, "I know what happened to her, she's dead. And unlike Syarra, she's not coming back." Aze aims a strike for his weak left guard, hard and fast.

Ice snaps over Roper's armor in a thick sheet, turning a blade like it's plate below it. He takes advantage of her over-extension to knock aside her other blade with the force of a mammoth with his right blade, as his left comes in hard for her neck, stopping just before it'd make contact.

Aze freezes, breathing hard, and then deliberately steps back, raising her hands. "I guess you did say nothing offensive."

Roper sounds amused as he cants his head at an angle. "Can't cut everything out or that'd just be insulting you. I was a shit swordsman alive. No challenge in that."

"Round four, then?" Aze asks, flexing her wrists. "Maybe I should be using more defense… "

Roper laughs, tossing back his head. He seems to be in a good mood, as if it's now him who is having fun. "Maybe you should."

"If you're going to cover yourself with fucking ice," Aze says, with a smile that does not seem attached to happiness, "Then I guess this counts as defense too, unless you disagree…"

The green-tinged flames flow over her skin again, giving her new swords an unhealthy glow. There's an intense heat radiating off of her.

Frost creeps back over him. "Now that's more like it." He doesn't hesitate as he starts the opening moves. It doesn't resemble Aze's fighting style — this feels eerily close to Syarra's.

Aze rushes in for the attack, shedding flames with each movement. As they exchange their first attacks, fire against ice, she notices the change in style almost immediately, and says, "Roper, what the fuck? Just fight like you."

"Oh, now you see, Aszera, I am doing precisely that." It's coming from him, but that is Colson's voice. As he speaks, he shifts back into closer to Aze's own style, mimicking back what he can see her doing.

Aze flinches at the voice and springs back. The flames flicker off. "You want to be like somebody else? Like me? Fucking fine."

Shadows weave around her feet and then billow up and out, obscuring her in darkness. "Come on, fight me blind. It's defensive."

Roper laughs again, and there's a dangerous edge to it, the wind picking up around them in a sharp whistling sound. He waits for her to strike out, but there's something eager in his stance, a little too sharp.

The strike, when it comes, is from a new angle. There's a flash of fel fire higher than she should have been able to reach, she descends with a vicious slash aimed to cut across his torso, a slash that carries the force of her strength, momentum, and possibly something beyond.

The frost on him fades, the air around him gets colder, and Roper moves faster than he has yet so far, stepping away from most of the strike, catching the rest of it on both runeblades as a shield forms around him in response to the fel fire. There's an immovable strength in him, like the ice is in his bones. "So you returned the armor, and just tripped into a party on the way back?" His voice sounds amused, but there's an echo in it, and the casual delivery doesn't match the vicious delight of his body language.

"Wouldn't expect you to understand," Aze says, immediately shifting into a new attack as the darkness fades. The heat and flames still flicker on her blades. "Can you even get high? Or you just have to fucking think about fucking everything all the fucking time."

This, it seems, is Roper’s true maximum speed. The strikes are terrifyingly quick, as he meets her attacks with the unrelenting pace. "We can feed the Hunger. That's as good as it fucking gets. There isn't anything else that even comes close to touching that." The echo in his voice is worse. "But I'll take thinking all the time over being nothing but a body in the fucking ground."

"I figured that's what she wanted from me, worst case," Aze moves in to match his speed, seeming to find something of a second wind. There's a growing eagerness in her expression, and when she smiles her teeth look a little too sharp. Suddenly she springs back out of range, a brief moment of fear crossing her face. Oddly, it doesn't seem directed at Roper. She takes a deep breath, moving into a defensive stance.

There's no pause as he presses forward, the blows meant to drive her back into retreat. "There are some things the Lich King took from us that we're never getting back. But not everything or everyone. Why is it so hard to believe that she, of all people, wouldn't want her sister back? You should hear how she talks about you. Like she's found a part of her that's been missing for years."

"I said worst case," Aze says, defending but not pressing the attack as Roper forces her back. "Convenient, isn't it? A sister made very durable, who can heal through violence. Still alive, but no one would look too hard if she disappeared. And she might feel guilty. I do think, you see, from time to time."

"Good, because some of us are like that. But not all of us. Your Syarra checked the mail every day you were gone. Mine checked the zeppelin every day since we got here." Roper is moving too fast, unfatigued, and he's pushing the advantage with his own fighting style right up until he pulls a feint of a strike, whipping around in place to spin in a bladed pirouette aimed for her left side.

Aze does not react quickly enough. From the conversation, the distraction of increasing magic, or simply fatigue, she's slowing down. Instead of dodging, shadows flow over her body, and the strike hits but doesn't cut into flesh.

"Yours," she says, and it probably means the match. Aze is breathing heavily, the fire gone. "She was supposed to be safe. That was the whole fucking point. We were finding the cure, so they wouldn't wither and die."

It takes Roper a fraction too long to move his runeblade away. The frost rolls over him in a ripple like a stone thrown into a pond. "She didn't need the fucking arcane cure to stop withering. She needed her sister. And I know you know that, because you read it. And you'd think you'd know what it means now. She doesn't need a cure for the Hunger in you, Aze. She wants you, as you are, demon shit fucking included." There's a sound of an inhale, and a rustling of the wind around them. "Two to you. Two to me. Next one."

"Give me a second," Aze says, lowering her blades. "I need… balance. And that's what she says, too, but I still don't get why."

There's a huff of something, almost a laugh, but there's a note in it, a thread of an emotion between pain and joy hovering between them. "Yeah. I know what you mean. I didn't think she'd ever want me either. Couldn't believe it. Thought she was playing me, seeing how far she could push it."

Aze does laugh, briefly, and takes another deep breath. "Not really her thing, or at least it wasn't. Not with… love. Or romance, or whatever."

"Still isn't. Serious and honest as a fucking paladin." Despite the words, his voice sounds softer, the echo absent. "She's so far out of my league, but she made her choice and I'm a monster enough to not convince her to leave. I did warn her that I'd keep her, no fine print. I'm a monster but I'm not a lawyer."

Aze nods, raising her blades. "You better. Only woman in the world, you said. Ready for round five?"

Roper’s answer is to launch forward, without hesitation, as fresh and sharp as he was when they started.

Fire envelopes Aze once again, so that the burning heat makes it painful to get in too close to her. Aze is still keeping up, but it seems to take more of her focus. She still has speed and grace, but it isn't as effortless as it was in the beginning. And she's leaning more heavily on the fel.

"What, you're not secretly hoping she'll ditch me and settle down with some nice sin'dorei boy?" Roper drawls, shifting back and forth between mimicking her footwork and brutal, relentless strikes.

"Nice sin'dorei boy," Aze repeats, still dodging and deflecting, and occasionally probing his defenses with quick, darting strikes. "Think she's tried enough of those, never worked out. If she wants you now, then I can work with that."

Roper’s defenses haven't changed, but she knows some of the tricks now: the ice armor is only a thought away. He doesn't seem to be particularly bothered by the fel fueled armor she's wrapped in, moving in. "I do come with some fringe benefits," he says. "How's the swords? Worth the cost?" Not knives. Very, very, very technically.

The cost is emphasized slightly by another bone jarring powerhouse of a hit from his right hand sword made with deceptive, lazy seeming ease.

Aze deflects most of the force as she spins away from the strike. "Definitely paid worse before. Fringe benefits? Like? I never knew her to be into humans before, but maybe it doesn't matter so much now."

Roper spins with her, closing faster, trying to get the edge of moving behind her or force her to retreat. "Who doesn't appreciate a fucking pocket blacksmith? And I'm a portable ice box. Beyond that, maybe you just can't see how fucking cute and round my ears are." The drawl is back.

Aze exhales a laugh, matching his footwork, but losing a little ground with each exchange. "I'd say I'm a portable oven, but only if you like your food to taste of the fel. I got sick enough of that back in Outland."

"What, the fact that it's a hunk of rock floating on the edge of the fucking Twisted Nether wasn't motivating enough to want to leave it?" Roper asks it, but it feels rhetorical as he continues in the same tone, "Silvermoon couldn't have been that bad in comparison. So, what'd it do to you to make you run. Did you make the mistake of not being fucking happy in front of a guardian and get sentenced to jail time? [Happiness is mandatory, citizen.]" The Thalassian has a strong Stormwind accent, but his mimicry of the guardian is uncannily accurate.

Aze laughs, but it sounds a little on edge. "No, of course I was fucking happy in Silvermoon. Why wouldn't I be? Good old Silvermoon… oh wait, I forgot, not old, because it got pretty much fucking razed and almost everyone died. Good resurrected corpse of a hometown, with everyone who really mattered missing from it."

The more Aze retreats, the stronger the cold seems to get around them. Roper's focus is narrowing, and it's becoming more obvious in the over eager strikes, several of which would leave him open for a riposte, but he's moving too fast to leave them for long enough. "Hey, at least your resurrected corpse of a city didn't stand there saying to your face that you're not even a person anymore. Apparently it doesn't count as wounded veteran if you just fucking died. No free drinks at the bar, just assholes waiting and wondering if the mob is on their side if they decide to throw a hit."

"I know she came back to the house," Aze says, making a frustrated sound at yet another half-strike she has to turn into a deflection. "She took stuff. So she got her home as much as I did. And you seriously think that mob wouldn't turn on me, if they thought about it long enough."

"I know they would. Why the fuck do you think I told Colson to tell you to get a better fucking cover story, even to someone who cares about you. That was too easy a trail to trace, Aze. I didn't even break a sweat. But." Roper punctuates it with a burst shot of a strike to her right as he side steps more into her left. "You can hide what you are. We can't. Unless, of course, you do something reckless like take your clothes off and show off those marks of yours."

Aze makes another sound of frustration. "I'm not living untouchable. Tried that in Shattrath, it doesn't work. I'll slip, either way. I make sure it's dark, or they're blindfolded. I'm careful."

"Yeah. So careful that you ended up running with the clothes on your back and nothing else," Roper points out as he circles her, moving in a quick step reminiscent of a dance.

"What's not careful about that?" Aze grins. "Not careful would be sticking around."

"Having a go bag for one. Planning that you might need to run," Roper says like that's a normal thing normal people do and not, you know, a spy thing. "The problem though with running from somewhere means something, or someone, chasing you." There's a dangerous echo note in his voice that sounds much too close to eagerness at that description. "And if anyone finds that trail, it goes to Syarra. Either because they find out where you went, or because she'll throw herself between you and it, and that makes it my problem."

Aze circles back, still trying to find a wide enough opening in his guard. "Last time I had to run it was through a portal to another world. Bag wouldn't have helped. And my plan this time was for there to be portals, so I didn't have to spend a fucking week trying to lie low on a zeppelin. Big thing about plans, they don't seem to work, pretty much ever. At least not for me. Works better to just wing it. If I need to run, I run. I'm not bringing anything down on Syarra."

"You don't have to do it on purpose for it come back on her. You have to know that by now. Fuck, even your voids damned blood knights could see it in her. That martyr streak a paladin mile wide. Whatever is behind you, Aze, she's going to be there, waiting to stop it from touching her little sister. And I'm going to stop it before it gets to her," Roper says as he gives her an opening. It's so tempting. And it's so obviously a trap this time.

Aze scoffs, and instead of going for the obvious trap she springs back, keeping her eyes on him. "Oh, come on, I'm not that easy. And don't worry. Anything catches up to me, it's just me. I'll keep her out of the way." A brief, cold laugh, and she launches back in, saying, "Like I don't know all about her martyr bullshit. I'm the one who makes sure she comes out of it alive. Or I was. Until." Her voice breaks a little on the last word, and she refocuses on the fight.

"Until you left her." There's a freezing echo in his voice. "Don't make the same fucking mistake, Aze. She's not going to just let you go, even if that means her back is wide open for someone to take a shot at." Even with the warning in the words, the spin on a dime twist to repeat the same move he tried before to get at her back happens with an explosive motion at the same high maximum speed he's kept up.

Aze sees the move with a sudden jolt of panic that she can't move quickly enough this time. Best three out of five. She reacts without thinking, or, in her words, wings it.

In this case literally, as she bursts out of her own body into a larger shape. Her skin darkens, fingers sharpen into claws, teeth into fangs, dark ragged wings extending out of her back. The demon looks down at Roper, green glowing fel visible behind the usual blindfold.

"Holy FUCK." Roper's ice armor snaps over him in reflex, as he leaps back half a body length. There's a howling wind that blasts across the tundra towards the demon Aze, pulling back from a full hit only just in time to not quite count as offensive skills. There's been a shift in him though, something much less controlled, and much more violent.

The other figures moving across the snow through the trees carefully and quietly as they set up their ambush might have gone unnoticed.

The demon [Moonrest Stalker] on the other hand…it isn't baying, it isn't barking, but its demonic aura is unmistakable.

The demon Aze bares her teeth at Roper in something that might be a smile, and then jerks her head like a hound scenting prey. She isn't even looking at him anymore when she says, "Roper. Demon."

She moves in immediate pursuit, her earlier fatigue forgotten.

It takes him a second. If she could see his face, the rare genuine confusion is there, the sense of 'yes, you are…?' written in large bold letters across his expression. The sudden movement almost makes it worse, running from him, but the line of sight makes it clearer that she's not running away. She's running at.

The demon dog has no fear, charging at the much larger demon.

The mage hunters are much closer than they should be, one a dragon on two legs, wielding an enormous halberd, and the other a sin'dorei mage standing tall and proud in her robes, taking aim at Aze with an arcane volley.

"Ah, fuck," Roper grinds out between clenched teeth, as he sprints after Aze, left hand stretching out as a hand of shadow twists from it, pulling the mage to him.

Aze notes the mages, but her main focus is on the demon dog. As she descends on it with dual blades, her style of fighting is recognizably Aze, but now with considerably more raw strength. That, and the wings that facilitate her movement around the demon.

The demon dog snaps at Aze's swords, ignoring the wounds it's taking, as it attempts to burn her mana.

That might be slightly more effective if she had mana to burn.

The mage is only briefly disoriented by Roper's pull, a mana shield snapping up around her before she blinks out of his grasp.

He makes no sound as chains of ice spin out of the snow to grasp onto the mage.

The mage hunter dragon with the halberd descends on Aze. Or starts to. There's a dark command as Roper yells, "Hey!" in resounding echo.

Two against one. That seems like a good idea.

Aze seems to be enjoying herself, any lingering problem from Roper's needling forgotten. The demon is fighting with ferocity, but it's mostly snapping at air as the girl who remade her entire form to fight demons weaves around its attacks.

Roper’s swords are engaged in fending off the long reach of the halberd, a fist of ice hitting the sin'dorei mage with shards that sink into her veins.

There's a scream of pain as the fever hits. Both mage hunters call up [Frost Reflection] shields just as a howling wind keens a counter note to the pain. It bounces off the reflection shield onto the death knight, throwing Roper several feet away, every exposed bit of his skin covered in lacerations that burn with ice.

So that's going well.

Aze turns at the mage's scream of pain, in time to see Roper's injuries. She gestures at the demon dog and the earth beneath it erupts with lines of fel, holding it still for the moment. She rushes over to slash at the offending mage, trailing fel fire.

The lacerations start closing, as Roper gets to his feet.

The mage's mana shield flickers under Aze's strike, as she readies a [Frost Bolt].

"Ah, ah, ah," comes echoing in the wind, as a hand of shadow closes hard around her throat, silencing the mage, and leaving her open for an attack.

Roper diverts some of his attention to the halberd wielding mage hunter in time to parry off a blow.

Aze doesn't hesitate, slashing into the mage as she moves with the same sort of dancing footwork she used to less deadly effect in the sparring match. The mage falls, bleeding from many wounds.

Roper is facing a distinct problem with the dragon mage hunter. It's nine feet tall and wielding an even longer weapon. The [Frost Reflection] makes all of his longer range attacks a Stop Hitting Yourself problem.

It looks like it's going badly, with the death knight in retreat. Except that he's turning the mage hunter in a deliberate circle, forcing it forward to him, and exposing the dragon's back to Aze.

It's a good plan.

Except for the dog.

Aze nods slightly, seeing the strategy, and darts in to stab the dragon mage hunter's unprotected back. She is not, for the moment, watching the dog.

Either in a shocking display of demon canine loyalty, or possibly more likely, demon canine fueled rage, the [Moonrest Stalker] launches itself at Aze, leaping to try to close its jaws over her arm aiming for the mage hunter.

The mage hunter sweeps at Roper fast enough that the weapon whistles through the air, as the death knight dances out of the way to the side with a bit off curse.

The demon dog's teeth sink into Aze's arm and she spins toward it, thrusting the knife in her other hand into the demon's flesh. It releases the bite and falls back. She looks down for a moment at her own torn flesh. Then she advances again on the demon.

Roper’s strategy is running into an external issue — he’s rapidly losing viable ground as the tundra slopes, the ice hard packed and slippery. He can't keep moving in the direction without risking losing his footing, so he adjusts.

Darting forward with a burst of speed, he tries for a slice along the side of the mage hunter, and pulls his attention with the death knight back towards Aze and the demon dog.

Aze is busy with the demon dog, dodging teeth and other vicious attacks. Then, finally, she slides a blade into its torso and then kicks it off the blade. It slumps to the ground as the bite marks on her arm quickly fade.

The mage hunter swaps targets. It's obvious in the direction of his halberd, directed at Aze, pulled back for a hard lunge.

Frost rushes back over the death knight, as he tosses out a coil of shadow, trying to draw the mage hunter's attention back to him, without success.

Aze turns to the new target, raising her blades to fight. And then, she seems to collapse in on herself.

Suddenly, it isn't a demon standing there, but Aze, rocking back on her feet, looking dazed.

The halberd is already too far into the strike for Roper to deflect it, at least with getting a blade in between it and Aze. Roper himself, however, is another story.

There's that feeling of the air around them dropping colder, as Roper interposes himself between Aze and the foot long blade. It sinks into his back, just above his left shoulder blade with an audible crunch; that might not be his bone, however, so much as ice. The blade halts only a few inches in.

Roper rips himself free in a twist of movement with a vicious sound, spinning in place to slam his runeblade through the wooden haft of the halberd, snapping it.

Aze takes a breath and raises her blade, looking at Roper in confusion.

Roper can't come to answer the phone at the moment. There's a deep puncture in him, something that might have been debilitating if he worried about things like blood or organs or health in general.

The first runeblade drags a line down the mage hunter's face, leaving a streak of burning shadow behind. The [Frost Reflection] finally drops, and a punch of ice soars out, shards piercing the skin as the fever takes root. With a cruel, deliberate slowness, Roper sinks his blade into the side of the dragon's neck, pressing hard as chains of ice pull it to a near stop, unable to get away.

There's a pressure of something in the air around them, and without waiting, Roper strikes hard into the mage hunter, once, then twice. As the dragonkin dies, Roper's wound closes, the flesh knitting back together.

The leather on the other hand is going to need someone to mend it.

Aze drops to sit on her knees, breathing hard, with the fight now apparently complete. She crosses her arms over her chest, holding herself, and murmurs something quietly while Roper finishes killing the mage hunter.

The mage hunter bleeds out slowly, under Roper's watchful gaze, the sound of deep breathing a softer counterpoint to the death throes of the dragonkin.

Once it's over, Roper shakes his runeblades, scattering blood onto the snow, and turns to look at Aze. "So, anyway," he drawls. "That's why Cressidha Aspenwood doesn't go anywhere alone." It takes him another moment before he kneels down next to her in the snow. He doesn't reach out to touch her, but there's a sense that he's waiting with her.

"I'm still me," Aze is saying very quietly, but it sounds like she's talking to herself and not Roper. She seems to register him speaking to her and quietens, then reaches for her new blades. "Yeah? Good reason. We're not mages, though."

"Arcane shit attracts them. Might have thought we were up to something." Roper tilts his head, resting his arms on his knees, runeblades tucked back along his wrists. "An actual demon then. Not just the fel." He sounds intrigued, more than anything, like she's revealed she's actually a blonde.

"Thought you and Yara knew about all that," she mutters. Then, a little bit louder, she clarifies, "Yes, an actual demon. That's how it works. Kill it, eat its heart…" She trails off.

"Borrow its skin in a pinch," Roper drawls.

"It's soul, I guess? The part I kept," She starts to push to her feet. "I didn't mean to do that. There's always a risk. I'm alright, though. This time."

Roper sheaths his right runeblade and offers out a hand as he stands in an easy motion. There's a pause. "Sorry. That was probably…as much me as you. It gets harder sometimes, in a fight, to stop it. The urge to just push."

She reaches out to take his hand. "I could argue that was a defensive ability. I mean it definitely does help with defense. But I… I don't think I would've gotten any more carried away."

Roper pulls her up with a tempered version of his strength, deliberately trying not to over pull her off balance. "I probably would have pushed it. Hard not to just default to what they trained us to do. Freeze you. Shatter the ice with the wind. It's a whole fucking thing." He nods to the swords. "They're yours. Deal's a deal."

"Thanks," Aze says, standing, and the hesitates before adding, "And for… fucking up your armor. For me. Or for Syarra, I guess, whatever."

"It wouldn't be the first time." Roper lets go of her hand once she is up, turns his head to look over his shoulder to try to assess the damage and there's an all too human faint groan as he does. "That's gonna be an eyebrow," he mutters. In Syarra's eyebrow raising defense, the hole through him does not look much like 'controlled violence.' "Should never have let them get that fucking close."

"Probably my fault," Aze says, running one hand along her arm. "Arcane shit attracting them."

Roper shrugs his right shoulder in an eerie echo of the way Colson shrugs, but it doesn't seem to be entirely deliberate. "I wasn't paying attention, which is fucking stupid of me." He nods his head towards Dragonblight. "They have some kind of base or gathering that way. Thought they were too far to account for. Didn't realize they had the demon dog things. Wasn't looking for them before. How long is that range of yours."

"Pretty far, for demons." Aze raises one hand to her blindfold. "That's what I'm made for. They can't hide what they are. Nothing hides it. …I should've noticed earlier. Guess I was getting tired, too focused on the fight."

"You weren't fucking exaggerating though. You can keep up with one of us. And you're good." Roper puts his other runeblade away. "But that's the danger of us, Aze. We never get tired. The longer we fight, the stronger we get. You fight one of us for real, remember that."

"Yeah," Aze says, moving over to where the sheathes for her new weapons lay. "I was picking that up. No fucking around, if it's for real. I'll just go for the kill as quickly as possible."

"How risky is that demon…soul form?" Roper asks as he tugs up his hood over his face.

"On a scale of what?" Aze says with a brief, nervous laugh. "Definitely seen it go wrong before." She moves like she's going to wipe off her blade on her sleeve, and then pauses to ask, "You got a rag or anything?"

Roper reaches into a bag, and pulls out a cloth, tossing it to Aze. He takes out another, and that one seems to be for himself as he unsheathes one blade at a time to clean it off. "Wrong? Like you pass out wrong, or like full demon upper body but you just keep your own legs and tip over wrong?"

Aze catches the cloth and focuses on cleaning her blades as she answers,"Wrong as in you're gone. Nothing for it but to kill the demon."

Roper is quick and efficient at it, but it's unclear how much blood was even left on his blades. "So you've got a lifetime membership to the 'lose control over the thing that gives you power and potentially forever lose yourself to the fucking monster of it' club. I'm a subscriber myself," Roper drawls.

Aze exhales a laugh, sheathing the blades. "And here I worried we didn't have anything in common. Yara will be so pleased." She turns her face up to Roper. "After you explain that I didn't stab you in the back."

There's an amused chuckle at that. "Wouldn't dream of saying otherwise. I don't lie to her, Aze." He looks at the corpse of the mage hunter. "Though if you didn't mention that I missed them until they were practically in hugging distance because I was losing control of the violence on her little sister…" Roper trails off.

"Sure," Aze says easily. She pauses. "What would happen, if you lost control? You wouldn't… turn into anything, right? So how would I know?"

"If I've really fucking lost it? You'll know. For one thing, I'll shut up." Roper sheathes both blades, and tucks the cloth back into another, different bag.

"That would be unusual," Aze smirks, and tosses her cloth back toward him. She isn't carrying a bag at the moment. "So if you're quiet, I should get the fuck away."

Roper catches it out of the air with an easy movement. "No. Don't run." There's an odd note in his voice, a tremor of echo on the word 'run.' "I don't…it's worse. When they run. If you run, I will chase you. And I will…catch you. And I won't — " Roper blows out a breath, tilting his head up. "If I lose it, just hold out, and remind me of her. Thinking about her makes it easier to remember me." The 'her' is probably obvious.

"Got it, don't run," Aze nods. "I can understand that. You don't need to worry about me that way, unless you somehow look like a demon while you run away. You don't, though. Just Sc… just undead. And I've got a lot of years of stories about Yara to tell, if I need to."

"I left my demon skin in my other pants," Roper says as he tucks the rag into a different bag than the other one his went into. Who knows why? Roper, probably. "That fire thing of yours. You able to direct it out, like setting corpses on fire?" He holds his hands up in a sketch of surrender. "The ones on the ground. I'm more of a 'don't try to set me on fire until I've had my coffee' kind of guy."

"I… can… yes," Aze glances over at the corpses. "There's no way I could justify that as a defensive power, so I haven't."

She stands, and moves over to the corpses, then turns back to Roper. "If I ever lose it, don't try to reach me with feelings or some shit like that. There'll be no me. Nothing to reach. Just leave. Make sure she does, too."

Roper looks at the corpses, and there's a sound of the wind picking up around him. A block of ice covers the demon dog for a moment, and there's a scream of air before it shatters, leaving it in pieces. His runeblades are still away. "I'll stop what's left, and she will get away. I can promise that."