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| Details |
| Author: | Athena |
| Summary: | With a dangerous infiltration to rescue Solari Farrens underway in the main camp, three druids and a rogue strike team work together to take down two towers filled with four dangerous elite enemies to ensure success. They'll have to stay on their toes -- or their creepy bone talons -- and adapt on their feet to keep them attached. Action RP. Ominously 6666 words exactly. |
| Rating: | M for Mature 17+ |
Arc: The Red String Game
Where the druids arrive on the farthest northern side of Loch Verrall’s murky waters, the darkness has already claimed this place for its own, the sun fallen behind the higher peaks, the shadows of sunset nothing but a smudge in the west. The stars above are but faint dots not yet bright enough to pierce the oncoming gloom.
The water’s taint has not yet been cleansed fully, and the strange purple haze only worsens the dread that seeps into the skin as clinging waterweeds and sharp edged aquatic grasses move in unnatural currents, waving eerily at those invading this unholy place.
Plant life is not the only thing in the water the druids must swim past. Chained and anchored to the ground are the bloated, decaying corpses of Wildhammer dwarves, their beards floating like tape grass, granting the mercy of hiding what remains of their faces.
The center island of the lake is quiet, the dark shadows unrelieved by any purple flames now that the former occupant of it has been dispatched by Cobalt Company’s Blue Squad. It is here that the gryphons will wait, hidden by the darkness and the rocks that curve like a palm with protectively curled fingers.
But first, there are two towers that must be dealt with. The first is the Eastern Tower that overlooks the lake and the island, which is occupied by two cultists and three patrolling dark assassins. These are the druid team’s targets.
At the lower level of the tower stands a dark haired, dark eyed human woman with a great many knives on her belt, and two more in each of her hands, her face tattooed with deep slashes over eyes that stare out over the lake with an emptiness of a mind that has forgotten concepts like hope or mercy or blinking.
At the top, there watches over the lake from his higher vantage point a dwarven man who might have once been considered uncommonly handsome, before something contorted his soul, a shaman whose path has led him now to a corrupted elementalist, the rocks covering his lower body quivering with unspent wrath. His eyes are cast out beyond his body, far seeing, and the alarm of a horn and drum to beat to alert for intruders is but a stone’s throw away.
The dark assassins that patrol the lake’s edge are spread out, and that is their only weakness. They drift along, their minds consumed by the desire to shed blood, to kill, waiting for the unwary.
Emerine, who cannot turn into a seal, has pulled on one of those very clunky gnomish Alliance waterbreathing helmets over a slimmer and more streamlined diving suit, and she is checking over the neck seals of the helmet (not to be confused with the druid seals).
Ozzy, currently a cat, is staring at Emerine as she checks the seals. She says nothing, for once, just watches with curious forward-pricked ears and a lightly swishing tail.
Annai — Miss Curran if you're nasty if you prefer — stands nearby in an outfit unusual for her: loose, soft black trousers gathered at the ankle and a sleeveless black shirt that reveals arms surprisingly muscled for a lady who is usually so tweedy. Her dark hair is bound back in a heavy braid and she is not wearing her usual spectacles. She is gazing toward the eastern tower.
Ozzy pads over to stare at Miss Curran in the same curious, feline way. Her eyes are the same gray-green shade as in all her forms, but they currently have vertical pupils, mostly flared in the low light. They also reflect that light softly with a green-silver sheen.
Merelda, perhaps surprising to others, is also a cat — though one who moves more clumsily than Ozzy. It's almost as if she's not comfortable in the form. She moves silently enough, though, which was likely the point.
Miss Curran glances down at Ozzy and offers a polite smile.
Ozzy purrs at her. Friend?
Miss Curran reaches out silently to scritch a kitty jowl.
Purring intensifies. Then kitty gives a quiet little series of leaps toward the water. Excited to get started on this Adventure With Friends.
Annai turns her attention again to the eastern tower, and then she steps back from Ozzy and fluidly shifts.
She is… a thing shaped rather like an antlered saber cat, emphasis on the thing. Her antlers are bleached bone, her head a skull worn like a mask over a prowling form shaped of gnarled vines and thorns and bone. The empty sockets of her skull burn with an eerie green phosphorescence.
She sits down politely next to Merelda's cat form.
Ozzy's cat form instantly jumps a couple of feet vertically, fur bristling, claws coming out, before she collects herself. f-f-friend….
Merelda's awkward-cat tilts a head, night-eyes widening. What the…?
What the, indeed.
Emerine turns her helmeted head towards Annai, her face difficult to see behind the glass. "Oh, gorgeous," she says, admiring. "I've never seen a transformation like that before."
Ozzy seems to calm a little more when Emerine seems fine with it. Her fur lies down.
The vine-thorn-bone creature makes a rumbling sound at Emerine that could be a purr.
Merelda cat slinks towards the water, and looks back at the others.
Ozzy pads quietly right behind her, tail lashing back and forth in predatory anticipation.
Annai-creature prowls soundlessly along with them. When she slips into the water, her form shifts abruptly to… a vaguely sea-lion shaped horror of bones and vines and thorns. It's a theme. She slides under the gleaming surface of the dark lake.
Merelda paddles quietly through the water as a cat for nearly a half a minute before she shimmers into sea lion form and slips below the surface.
Emerine follows the others, but when they get underwater, she slips into the lead, pointing in the correct direction.
Ozzy's transformation into sea lion form is instant and fluid the moment she slips into the water, and she swims a happy zigzag line in the approximate correct direction.
The ground here on the other side of the loch, deeper into the stronghold, has an unclean sense to it, malevolence rising up from each footfall in this place like a distant dirge sung out by a dying throat.
Darkness grows around them, but so paradoxically does the light of this place, the lanterns casting spiteful violet halos on the ground all around the watchtower – and also limiting the dark vision of the guards, their eyes not adjusted to the greater darkness around them.
Movement within the night's shroud of gloom isn’t entirely unusual, either, as the Dark Assassins weave their path along the lake’s perimeter, their endless, tireless patrol.
Ozzy slips back into cat form as she emerges from the lake, finding the deepest shadows in which to prowl undetected as her gaze darts between her companions and the hostile territory ahead.
She was still half in the water when she shifted; her front half is dry, but the fur of her hindquarters and tail is darker, clinging wetly to the skin.
When Emerine emerges from the lake, her diving suit is covered in a disgusting film of lake slime. She turns invisible to strip out of it for the time being, bundling it up in a bag that nobody can see the gnomish symbol for HAZARDOUS MATERIALS label on. She appears again in her armor, unfairly dry, gesturing towards the tower where the upper platform is exposed. "I'll get the one on the upper level," she says to her team.
"Where you want me?" whispers the tawny half-wet cat, seeming to assume Emerine is in charge.
The thorn creature has faded likewise into shadow; even the unearthly glow of her eyes is dimmer, as if veiled in mist. She is crouched with her belly low to the ground, her tail twitching restlessly from side to side. It is a very Feline Murder posture.
"Get close quietly, wait until you hear a noise, and then the three of you handle the one on the bottom," Emerine instructs.
Thorn monster makes another rumble, softer this time, and rises to slink sinuously through the shadows in the direction of the tower.
Ozzy nods obediently, and crouches down a little to demonstrate her fine stalking form.
Merelda surfaces a few moments after the others, and, after the sea lion bobs for a moment, turns into a cat to scramble after the others. She nods, looking a little worn already, but still capable.
Emerine coats her daggers in poison meant to slow down a spellcaster's casting time. "All ready to move in?"
Ozzy-cat nods.
Thorn monster lashes her tail impatiently.
Ozzy-cat tries to furtively sniff Thorn-monster.
Merelda rumbles a low affirmative growl and then murmurs, "Ready."
Emerine vanishes into stealth and approaches the tower. She circles around, avoiding the eyeline of the woman on watch and trying to get a view of the dwarf on the second level, giving her allies time to get into place.
Ozzy slinks into the shadows near the woman guarding the bottom of the tower, as silent and careful as she usually isn't. She places herself so that the guard is between her and the others, so she'll be surprised either way.
Merelda notes the flanking and crouches, muscles tense, ready to pounce at the signal.
The dark haired guard with too many knives tenses, some awareness tingling, as she scans her surroundings, wrists rotating as she loosens them, licking her lips in anticipation.
But she's looking the wrong way, out towards the edges of the camp, assuming what her senses tell her is a threat is over that way.
Above her, the elementalist remains in his channeling, his eyes open and far seeing beyond his immediate person.
Emerine shadowsteps up to the upper level of the tower, appearing directly behind the dwarven elementalist as she attempts to slit his throat.
An Earth Shield of pure rock encases his person so quickly that nothing more than a thin start of a line marks his throat where the dagger touched the skin.
The former shaman stomps one powerful foot, as a [Frost Shock] bursts out of him, encasing Emerine in a crust of cold that slows her movements.
Below, the rogue comes immediately alert at the sound, and she spins in the air, a [Fan of Knives] striking out.
Emerine swears loudly in Darnassian. That sounds like some kind of a signal.
Ozzy pounces on the woman the moment she moves, jumping //into/ the fan of knives and hurling her entire weight against her . Almost before the guard can even react to the impact, Ozzy's cat form elongates, spots appearing on her shorter, sleeker hide as she bounces off the woman's body like a ricocheting bullet and speeds up the spiraling ramp to the top of the tower.
One of the whirling daggers finds the thorn-monster's vined flank even as she springs nimbly aside, and Annai snarls, a ghastly sound. She leaps for the guard as Ozzy leaps away, and pins the woman with vicious thorn claws, her curving fangs bared.
Even as the guard is brought to the ground, she grins maniacally up at Annai. "Your blood will sing for the Gods!" she yells, as she brings a dagger to slice across Annai's side, the poison sting of it immediately apparent in the way it burns on contact and grows worse with each pump of the heart.
Annai gives a bloodcurdling sound, half a shriek and half a growl, but does not yield her hold. While she is still able, she goes for the rogue's throat with her fangs.
The Elementalist summons dark, twisted totems, one of which blasts out searing flames for Emerine, and another that reaches out binding vines that grab at Osylnn's legs, slowing her with each step she tries to take forward.
"You will return to the earth for the Masters!" he shouts triumphantly.
Only the lack of personnel nearby — expectedly so — prevents their shouts from alerting more.
It is unlikely that any cat has ever muttered the variety and pungency of curses that this cat is currently muttering as she struggles against the vines.
Then Ozzy remembers her training, and shifts back into the other cat form, the mysterious magic of the shift tricking the vines into thinking the cat they were grabbing has Somehow Disappeared, and they do not have Instructions about New Cat.
Ah, but they do — the bindings shift immediately, as the totem's waves continue to echo out, grabbing anything in the area.
More cursing ensues. Worse cursing. But not like, warlock cursing. Just really rude cursing.
The flames burn away some of the frost encrusted on Emerine. She snarls and turns her face away to preserve her eyebrows, stabbing into the Earthbind Totem, aiming for a rune to disrupt the magic.
Merelda shifts back into worgen form instantly, this one easy to hold. Green magic blooms from her hands, and the poison dissipates from Annai.
Poison dealt with, it is time to attack. Merelda considers, and rejects, using moonfire. Giant beacons of light are incompatible with stealth. Instead, she raises her hands and relies on her Silvershade training. BEES.
The bees swarm around Annai and the guard, avoiding Merelda's ally as they bite into the guard.
Ozzy continues to fight her way through the roots by sheer brute force, and to keep the volume of her muttered curses to a level that is only audible to those nearest her. Those would be: the guy whose ass she's aiming to kick, and Emerine.
Merelda keeps her attention on Annai and the guard, golden energy coiling and gathering around her fingers.
The Elementalist gnashes his teeth as he builds up a crackling wave of lightning to unleash against Emerine, who dares attack his totems.
Ozzy's fury clearly cannot be contained by quiet curses alone; she shifts again, this time to a great brown bear, and as she Struggle Butters her way to line of sight on the elementalist her fury reaches almost supernatural proportions, giving her the adrenaline to just burst through the totem's field, (lack of) mind over matter, and charge the bastard. The sheer weight of her is a stunning force, and she is ready with a forepaw to Bash the guy in the head again once he recovers from that.
The guard's strength to defend in this position is barely a match for Annai's, and then come the bees, buzzing and stinging, going straight for the eyes. Even a mad cultist feels pain, and her defense breaks.
As Annai's teeth close around the guard's throat, she lets out a choking gurgle, her body thrashing wildly, the last desperate attempts of a living creature following instinct to try to survive, even one who has given herself to the pursuit of death. A pursuit that is now complete.
Emerine's body is wracked with pain, and she seizes up briefly as she is struck by lightning, but she is going to get rid of this totem, damn it.
As the Elemenatalist reels, blood streaming down his face from a broken nose and his teeth cutting into his lip, his totem sends out a blast of fire onto the bear's back, singeing the fur.
Beneath Emerine's attacks, the binding totem begins to crumble, the rune at the center pulsing — pulsing — pulsi — and then it stops as her knife chips into the center. The lack of the pressure of the binding may give a momentary sense of weightlessness from the relief of absence of the vines.
The dwarf shakes off the bash successfully. He is much less successful in shaking off the bear.
Ozzy makes Pained Bear Noises as her fur smolders, but continues to swipe and mangle with her massive claws as best she can.
Emerine lets Oslynn bait out the rest of the elementalist's Earth Shield before attempting to cut skin with her knives - not going for a proper backstab, just trying to get that poison into his bloodstream. "Need help up here," she calls down to Annai and Merelda.
Annai steps back from the dead woman's body, her jaws bloodied, and casts a foxfire look at Merelda that might be gratitude. Then she dashes for the stairs, thorn claws silent on the ramp.
Merelda moves after her, a little slower than the cat-like creature in her worgen form.
The Elementalist isn't going down without a fight — but he is going down. The earthen shield that surrounds him chips off in chunks first only of rock, but then increasingly pieces of the Elementalist himself as Oslynn's claws find purchase, and Emerine's knife finds flesh.
An arc of pure lightning crashes into first Oslynn, then Emerine, then Annai, and finally lightly zaps Merelda.
The totem strikes Oslynn again, the fire exploding over the bear's wide back.
Let's hope stealth is not super important, because the bear makes a VERY loud roar before shifting to cat form and Cowering its way out of eyeline.
Annai gives a feline growl-hiss at the lightning; a curl of smoke rises from her shoulder. She launches herself at the elementalist to take up Ozzy's work. But in a more bleed-y and less bash-y way.
The Elementalist knows death is coming, as he makes one final grab now for the horn to signal the camp, as Annai bears cats him to the ground.
"For you, Masters!" he cries, trying to bring the horn to his lips.
Ozzy swats.
Annai opens her jaws to clamp them on the dying dwarf's throat, but recoils at the smell of Emerine's poison now working its way through his bloodstream.
Merelda, lightly zapped, is just emerging at the top of the tower to see the elementalist's last moments.
The horn goes flying, spinning off to be underneath an altar with a cloth over it that will hide the presence of the horn, where it will fail to be in reach the next time a cultist mans the tower, and a Horde assassin sent to kill this new guard will scornfully disparage the Twilight's Hammer security protocols.
The Elementalist bleeds to death, the last moments spent in a combination of bloodloss and poison haze.
And then all is quiet again on the western eastern front.
Emerine is barely on her feet, her armor heavily singed.
"Noice." says the cat.
The cat also smells very much of burnt fur.
Annai shifts, and she is a woman again, crouched on the floor with the fingertips of one hand propped. Her hair is slightly disheveled. She looks from person to person, making a silent survey, and then nods at Merelda. "Thank you."
Ozzy-cat looks at Annai like she is memorizing that cool pose to try later.
"Everyone alright?" Merelda asks, as she settles a minor green healing magic on each of them for good measure.
"Hm." Emerine wipes her knives off and sheathes them. She flexes her fingers, evaluating the progress of the regenerative nature magic. "I could use a bit more than that," she says.
Ozzy-cat just stares at her. What, me heal?
Merelda takes a few moments to call up a slightly stronger healing magic that lingers.
"Thank you," Emerine says to Merelda. She does some quick stretches to test how much mobility she has back. "Good instincts, Ozzy. I underestimated him, or overestimated myself. Thanks."
Ozzy's ears go back… what is… this… thing that is…. happening…? She… GOOD job? Then the ears prick forward as her tail tip taps on the floor of the tower. She ducks her head shyly.
"We'll know for the next tower," Merelda says. "Maybe we should stick together, take out the one below silently, first? Or two and two from the beginning."
Emerine smiles at her. She looks at the drum - is today the day that she assassinates a perfectly good war drum? - and suddenly, sharply, turns her focus back to the body. "I've seen shamans return themselves to life before," she says, and begins to search the man's belongings.
"Two and two," Annai agrees. "We can't foresee everything, guarantee that the one downstairs will be silent and not alert the other. They should be taken down together, as far as is possible."
"Cut orff 'is 'ead," says the cat.
Annai nods at the scorch-smelling cat.
"That would prevent it, wouldn't it?" Merelda asks.
"Yeah if you take the 'ead away. Or loike, kick it orff the tower. Loike 'ow the orcs got Mal," she says to Merelda.
Merelda's expression falls for a moment, but the she nods. "We should do that, then."
"Even your worst day, you learn somefing," Ozzy-cat says quietly.
The dwarf has nothing on him. No personal items, no letters from loved ones, no mini portraits of children, and most importantly — no ankh.
Emerine switches gears accordingly: she cuts off the dwarf's head as suggested.
Ozzy watches, tail tip twitching.
Merelda turns away to keep watch down the tower, just in case.
Once it has been severed, Ozzy-cat swats the head off the edge of the tower platform.
"So," she says. "Next tower."
Their path to the next tower presents two options:
The first is to return to the loch, swim around and under detection, and prowl back up to the Eastern Tower. They won't encounter anything else, and get to their destination sooner.
The second that they could go over land along the edge of the lake, where the Dark Assassins prowl, will put them into direct combat now. But it will mean that they clear these places for the others later when an exit may be already fraught with danger.
"Next tower," Emerine says. "We take out whatever Dark Assassins we see on the way."
Annai slips into something more comfortable nightmare vine shape again.
"By land or sea?" Merelda asks looking out over the shore.
"Land," Emerine says. "Quick and quiet, now."
A few moments later, Merelda slips into something less comfortable — a stealthy cat form. She is ready.
Annai-creature nods brusque agreement or approval at Emerine, and turns to slink down the ramp and back out onto the rough, stained ground.
Ozzy growls softly at the answer, but doesn't argue, following close behind.
Merelda slips into stealth and follows.
It's shadows vs shadows as the stealthy ones encounter the dark ones, each Dark Assassin on its own, unprotected by friends or anyone who would care or notice if they were gone.
Emerine's knives fare much better against the spectres than they did against the elementalist. She collects a soul pendant from the first one they encounter, turning it over curiously in her hand.
Ozzy sniffs it. Then sneezes.
Annai-monster slides back from the shadows where she's left the misty remnant core of another Dark Assassin and pauses when she sees the pendant in Emerine's hand. She lowers her head warily; if she had hackles instead of vines and bones, they would be bristling.
"Don't leave these behind," Emerine murmurs. "Or they'll just come back."
Annai gives a soft growl but turns and slinks back to the remains of the other to nose around for the pendant.
Past the Dark Assassins rises the second, western tower.
Like the Eastern Tower, there are but two watchers, one per floor. The bottom tier is occupied by a corrupted cultist, this one a troll with broad shoulders and a mohawk that might have once been a source of pride, maybe even joy, but now sticks stiffly with lime and dark, old blood, neglected in his madness. His leathers are stained but studded with dark glittering gems, his wide, wicked edged machete wielded with fast twitches of muscle as he yearns to shed more life upon the tainted ground he patrols wildly.
Above him is an unnatural stillness of death and warped movement of elements: a forsaken woman – her eyes covered by straps – and yet something in her is able to see, to occupy this position of watcher. The earth crawls over her corpse, sands shifting along her legs like snakes, her hands clenched into two fists at her side with purple fire that licks along her fingers eagerly, unsated without a target to sink into.
There is another horn that hangs from her neck by a chain that would have choked the life out of someone who was, well, alive. There is no drum here though; budget cuts.
"I want the troll," Ozzy whispers. "Ain't bitin 'that mess up there."
Annai rumbles concession. She does not seem picky about what messes she bites, so long as they aren't freshly poisoned.
"Should I be top or bottom?" Merelda asks, gazing at the tower seriously. "Top might be good. I don't plan to bite anyone."
Ozzy snickers softly.
"Perhaps Miss Curran and I for the top, then," Merelda suggests. "Since we can fly… assuming you can fly?"
Annai-beast answers by shifting again, this time into a — you guessed it — horrifying bird woven of vine-tangled bones and thorns. Her form is more that of a vulture than a crow. But, you know. It flies.
"Well, that works," Merelda nods with an amused-cat expression. There's a brief moment, and then she is a much more conventional stormcrow. She is all feathered up and ready to assassinate.
Emerine palms a spray bottle of some kind. "Use your claws, Gravehowl," she suggests quietly to Ozzy. "I'm going to try and stun the troll and meet you all up there. We get the caster first. She has the horn."
Merelda is suddenly a worgen again. "I thought we said we would learn from the last tower, and not do three and one."
Annai-vulture shifts back to her own form again. She is seated cross-legged on the floor and regards Emerine with a raised brow of inquiry.
"We should all start up there, then," Emerine says, and shrugs. "In a fair fight, I lose. Stall him, kill her, then come back for him."
Merelda looks between Annai and Emerine. "Miss Curran's suggestion before was that we should take them down simultaneously, since we can't foresee everything, or know what the other will do when they hear signs of a scuffle. I would not want any of us not to have backup, in case one or the other proves more challenging than expected."
Annai watches Emerine steadily. She gives a light shrug. "Emerine knows her own capabilities. I wouldn't like to jeopardize her unnecessarily. If she feels two and two is insufficient, we can certainly try as she suggests."
"I was wrong the last time," Emerine says, looking between the three druids. "But I can get away far more easily from an angry man with a machete than a caster who sees without eyes."
Miss Curran nods mildly and then is Horror Vulture again.
"Then to clarify, the plan is that Miss Nightvine attempts to stun the Troll, and then we all head up to take out the Forsaken together," Merelda says, making sure she's got this right. "I'd still suggest one druid stealth and move with Miss Nightvine, just in case the troll proves more resilient than expected. And then we time our attack from the ramp and the air on the Forsaken to be simultaneous."
Emerine nods. "Precisely. Gravehowl, you're with me. If the troll proves resistant, you can start biting as much as you'd like; otherwise, the two of us head up the ramp together. How's that sound?"
"Ugh," says Ozzy. "Oi 'ate foightin' 'em undead fings. But I do wot I'm told. Oi'm a good gel, oi am."
Emerine pats Ozzy approvingly on the head. "Nobody likes it, they're disgusting. We do what we must."
Ozzy purrs gently. Pats.
Merelda smiles down at the purring Ozzy-cat.
Then there's a brief hesitation and a look of focus in her eyes, and Merelda is once again stormcrow. Her form is a little smaller and looks considerably less nightmarish than Horror Vulture, but she wings up next to the strange bird, ready to work together.
Annai-vulture stretches her strange wings and stands poised for a moment, then takes flight silently into the dark.
Ozzy sticks close to Emerine's flank.
Emerine slips into stealth, one hand on Ozzy's back to guide her, and gets into place by the troll.
Ozzy tries to quiet her purring, and is mostly successful. But fren still tuch! A palpable vibration remains.
Merelda-crow follows, letting Annai set the approach.
Ozzy gazes at the troll and crouches, tail lashing.
Emerine gives them a moment to get in place, then attempts to sap the troll with everyone's favorite classic: blunt force trauma.
Annai, having made a leisurely, drifting circle above the roof of the hut, has perched herself at its edge to wait for an indication that the troll is dealt with.
Merelda has perched clumsily nearby, lacking the proper balance instincts of a bird.
The troll reels, dazed, as he suddenly has to cope with a brain bleed, as well as the devastating effect on his faded glory mohawk. It suddenly halts him mid-action, the frenetic energy coming to a stop. "Lilth sythn….aqev…aqev…" he murmurs through parched lips.
Above him, the Forsaken woman's head moves, breaking her own stillness in counterpoint.
"Let's go," Emerine whispers to Ozzy, and rushes for the ramp.
At the same moment, Annai-vulture spreads her wings and dives low under the roof's edge, talons out and aimed at the Forsaken woman's face.
Merelda times her landing and turning into a worgen on the top of the structure with the emergence of Ozzy and Emerine from the ramp.
Ozzy takes off after Emerine, light on her little cat feet, but stays just behind her, letting her take the lead.
The Forsaken woman throws back her head, crowing out triumphantly, "Puul qi'plahf ni oou bormax!"
Which would be, admittedly, probably a more effective threat if the others had any idea what it meant.
Twisted totems of Decay rise up around her, a pulse of a wave of fire hitting all those around her. An earth elemental manifests, its manacles formed of onyx that glitters malevolently in the flickering twilight lanterns.
The earth elemental punches a rocky fist out at Annai as the druid's talons sink into rotten flesh.
Ozzy shifts into bear form when she sees the hard-hitting elemental, and she lets out a mighty ROAR, trying to draw attention to herself.
Merelda grunts as she lands as a worgen and is immediately hit by a pulse of fire. For the moment, she leaves the attack to the others, as her own hands are alight with green magic that settles on each of the three others in turn and then herself.
Emerine is still holding that spray bottle from earlier. She darts in close and pulls the trigger, spraying some sort of green slime up the bell of the horn. She doesn't want that horn producing sound any time soon. She is burned for her trouble, although Merelda's magic begins to soothe that, and she feints away and ends up behind Ozzy.
Ozzy gives a big sweep of a massive brown forepaw, trying to strike the undead creature and as many totems as she can in one reckless blow.
Annai is knocked back by the earth elemental. She shifts in midair, twisting to land on four paws as a skull-headed wolf-cat-creature-thing. She crouches defensively as Merelda's healing spell takes hold.
Bear vs Earth Elemental ensues as the elemental switches targets at the roar, rumbling towards the creature that called for it, a massive rocky fist now rushing through the air for the bear's hard skull.
The elementalist screeches as she rips at the green slime covering her horn, her precious horn, and this distraction costs her. She and her totems both are caught in the swipe of claws, and while she doesn't bleed true blood, the wounds shred her muscles, making her clumsy, off balance.
The bear, bonked on the noggin by a rock, stands swaying for a moment. Its eyes are not cartoon swirls, but they may as well be.
Merelda gathers up yellow nature energy in her hands and tosses it at the elemental. She probably should have gone with the elementalist, but the elemental just smacked Ozzy.
The slime is so sticky. So gooey.
Emerine begins carving up a fire totem.
The magma totem breaks under pressure, relieving the onslaught of fire waves.
Annai has the elementalist covered, no worries Merelda. The Blair Witch Cat launches itself at the Forsaken woman again, this time packing substantially more muscle than the ragged vine vulture had.
The elementalist's defenses are her totems; the Forsaken woman herself is not prepared for the direct onslaught, and she falls. Her legs — held perfectly still by the summoned earth — snap off at the knees rather than bend as she's brought to the ground.
The earth elemental has one (1) job, and it is bound by its irons and chains to do it, as it pummels Oslynn with merciless force.
Ozzy recovers from the stun after a moment and gets back to swiping, her claws practically drawing sparks with the force of their dragging over rock. She's MAD NOW.
The elemental doesn't defend itself — that is not its orders — and pieces of it fall off as Oslynn's claws find purchase. As she pulls off more and more around the core, the elemental twitches, jerks to the side, and then collapses in a shower of dirt, the manacles clanging hard against the floor.
Below, the troll shakes his head with a groan of a man who was just awakened by noisy upstairs neighbors, and is groggily trying to make sense of the world again.
Annai is not as horrified as I am about the legs thing, and continues single-mindedly to savage the Forsaken woman. Her manner is reminiscent of an actual cat, who is Not Done Yet and may start trying to toss its prey in the air and catch and shake it in a minute.
The Forsaken woman claws back at her attacker in turn, her nails sharp — but only for a human. Something important is severed, a tear, a rip, and finally like a marionette whose strings have been cut, she ceases struggling with a raspy hiss. "N'zoth…"
The troll shakes off the last of his brain damage — surely a good idea — and lets out a savage battle cry as he recklessly charges up the ramp to find his attacker.
Which is why he's surprised when his slightly blurry vision reveals that either he's seeing quadruple and also hallucinating bears, nightmare cats, and noblewomen (wouldn't be the first time, which is why this troll doesn't drink the 220 proof dwarven liquor anymore), or his attacker has three friends.
The bear proves itself either not a hallucination or a really good one as it turns and roars and rakes claws at him, claws now unsanitarily coated in Elemental Dust.
Merelda turns to unleash a series of blasts of wrathful nature magic at the troll, power shimmering as it builds around her.
The troll, caught between a bear and nature, fights viciously in return, slicing knives across the fur of the bear, throwing another at Merelda aiming for her center mass. But he's taking on too many points of attack at once, and it becomes obvious within a few moves that he will prove no match for their combined efforts. The smart thing to do might have been to snatch up the signal horn and vanish.
The insane thing to do would be to try to headbutt the bear.
He headbutts the bear.
Merelda makes a sound of dismay. She makes her own calculation, on whether trying to heal or attack is more likely to result in a live bear at the end of this. She settles on continuing to attack.
But first, she lines the troll with faerie fire, to make him an easier target.
Annai leaps forward to seize the troll's lower leg in her fanged grasp, shaking her head in a vigorous attempt to tear out flesh and muscle.
Emerine snatches the knife intended for Merelda out of the air, reverses her grip, and throws it right back.
Merelda gasps, that knife would surely have hit her.
Ozzy spends another minute looking dazed and doing not much of anything as the impact of troll skull throws her off balance for the second time in the fight. Her two contributing factors to the battle at this particular moment are that she is attracting the troll's attention… and that she has a very thick skull. This gives her friends a bit more breathing room to do some awesome maneuvers.
The knife lands with force, the troll tripping backwards as his shredded leg muscle gives out beneath him.
He drops to the ground, grasping, fighting, twitching, twitching, and then stillness.
The two towers are now both unmanned. All that remains is the return of the king gryphons from their mountainous holding place to be sneaked onto the center island, awaiting the others as the getaway plan from an entire army soon to be pitted against our rescuers.
Merelda takes a deep breath. "That should be the last of them, then. I certainly hope the prisoner ruse worked, and we'll be helping the escape soon."
Annai shapeshifts again and is an ordinary woman crouched by the troll's corpse. Her mouth is disconcertingly bloody, and she wipes the back of her hand across it absently. "Should one of us give it a flyover?" she asks quietly.
Ozzy recovers and falls back into her human form for a moment, frail-looking by comparison but nearly as grubby as the bear.
"Good work," Emerine says, patting Ozzy's shoulder. "Veyne, can you get her patched up?"
As if on cue, a shudder goes through the land like a twisted onxy vine felt rather than seen, the waking of a vengeful darkness. The Shadow Man begins his assault on the rescuers.
Ozzy gazes at Emerine, a bit starry-eyed at the praise and pats.
"Yes, I'll try," Merelda says, stepping over to Ozzy and wreathing her in healing magic. Then she flinches at the shudder in the earth. "That doesn't seem like a good sign."
Emerine frowns. "We'd best hurry and get the gryphons in place. They'll need their escape route."
Ozzy looks down at her feet, then up at the others.
Merelda nods. "Miss Curran, would you like to do a flyover to check for more guards? The three of us can head for the gryphons meanwhile."
Ozzy regards Miss Curran with a slightly nervous fascination; perhaps she's looking to see if she'll turn into the creepy vine-vulture thing again.
Annai shifts wordlessly, shrinking and warping, and Ozzy's question is answered in the affirmative. She takes off with a soundless beat of vine-woven wings.
"Cor…" Ozzy whispers, watching her go.
Annai lands silently at the edge of the hut-floor and becomes Annai again. "They've done it," she says low-voiced. There is a certain urgency to her manner. "They're all there, with the woman, and they've killed a n'raqi. Their way here looks clear."
"YES!!" Ozzy says, doing a bit of a bear-dance… but in human form.
Merelda looks altogether pleased. "Well. We should go meet them, shouldn't we?"
Annai looks over her shoulder to survey the grounds. "We should."
They really should. Their friends are about to be unfortunately extraordinarily popular, in a these cultists want to carve their friends to pieces for a path of bones and bathe in their blood on behalf of their gods of destruction and death in a celebration of their hoped for end of the universe bang sort of way.
Annai is not into those sorts of parties since she graduated from college.
Ozzy cracks her knuckles, rolls her neck, then turns back into a bear.
Annai shifts back into terrorbird and drops silently from the hut's edge to the ground below, where she shifts into terrorcat.
"Ready when you lot are," she growls.
Merelda flexes her wrists, ready to dole out the nature magic. "I believe I'm well-prepared."
That, or she has no idea what's ahead of her.