Crystan: Dawn of War

"Don't scare me like that. I thought you were hurt."

The flash of white light around Chaos had driven the enemy back, blinded. Piesca had been shielded from it by the edge of the roof and she used the advantage to send her metal crossbow bolts into more enemies.

"I will have words with whoever killed those trees later!" Piesca called back as the trees burned like enormous torches.

She was getting low on crossbow bolts and was unwilling to use every one. It was time to go down to ground level.

Stowing the crossbow at her back, Piesca slid quickly down over the side of the roof, grasped the frame of it through the thatch and found herself looking directly through a small window.

Shar stood victoriously over an enemy soldier clad only in underpants. "Er..." said Piesca in spite of herself and nearly lost her grip on the roof.

Shaking her head she looked down and then dropped softly onto the storage lean-to that was against the tavern. All was quiet here as she rolled off of the pitched low roof and stood quickly on the ground.

She slipped around the side of the building just as an enemy soldier came the other way. Still dazzled by the bright light from the front of the building, he never saw her as she slit his throat.

 

"Well done, Solan"

"Nice hair." He said to Hoden. "But even nicer fighting. That sure made me thirsty, up for whatever the bartender is brewing?" It looked like the fight had scared the drunk right out of him. Besides, the Solan did not wish to stay amongst the dead soldiers.

 

"Nice hair." Elryn said to the grizzled cavalryman. Hoden looked at his hair, noticing the different shades of red, most of it blood.

"But even nicer fighting. That sure made me thirsty, up for whatever the bartender is brewing?" the Solan crystalmancer continued.

"I think I will accompany you, but iv'e had enough drinking tonight. We should check on the Aelin lord and the Alarin girl." Hoden replied, pushing the dead weight of a trooper off his lance.

Lisky followed up, his canine teeth stained red from the killing. The white wolf licked its own blood wet snout, and allowed Hoden to mount him.

"I will meet up with you in the tavern." Hoden said, riding off to check on the two younger members.

 

The fight was over.

Piesca stalked around the edge of the tavern, two soldiers dead by her knife in the shadows behind her. She scowled when she saw the trees still burning merrily, their black skeletons a contrast to the orange flames. A tragic waste.

She stomped up to the Solan and flung a hand out, indicating the burning woodland.

"You," she challenged the blue-skinned crystalmancer, "did YOU do this?"

 

"I will meet up with you in the tavern."

With that Elryn went to the tavern which now was littered with arrows and sat himself down on a bar stool. "I'll have a pint of that Elrissian brandy I had before."

 

Rani collected her arrows, many of them broken from the flesh of the soldiers. She pulled the knives from the mutilated soldier, his face unimaginably damaged. She couldn’t help but grimace as she looked at her blood padded hands. She walked into the tavern, and licked her paws gently as she took a seat at the bar. She noticed the wolf on her way, and quickly sauntered as far away as she could get. She continued to clean herself, letting her bloodied knives fall onto the bar-table in front of her.

"You," she heard a woman yell "did YOU do this?"

She couldn't help but turn to look, an arched eyebrow. Did she really care that much?

"I'll have a pint of that Elrissian brandy I had before."

She looked over at her comrade and gave him a nod, she paused at the bartender, "Ale please."

 

"did YOU do this?"

"It was either them or us." Elryn stated. "Besides, would you have been able to see them in the dark?"

 

Piesca hissed her annoyance at the stupid man.

"Them or us?" she mocked him, "You are so afraid of trees that you have to light them on fire?"

Her hair had partially fallen loose from her braid and formed wispy tendrils around her face.

"That is like me setting the homes of your people alight so I can read." she growled.

Turning, she stalked away to the other side of the tavern, as far from the Solan as she could get.

 

The only thing Piesca didn't realise was that the fireball that lit the trees was the one that was originally used to kill one of the soldiers, in turn lighting the tree. She also didn't realise that one of his only methods of defense was the fireball, and fireball plus forests equaled forest fire.

 

Rani grabbed the ale from the table, and slid her knives onto the loop of her sash. She walked over weaving around the tables and mess of the battle until she reached the upset young lady. She gave her a big smile as she took a seat. She slid the ale over to the woman.

“Nothing like a good smile and some ale to make your day better.” She said, a gentle purr escaping her lips, as means to calm her comrade, “I’m Rani.” She put her hand out towards the woman.

 

Hoden couldn't find the Alarin girl nor Chaos, but he had seen Elryn. Lisky prowled towards the Solan.

"Have you seen Piesca?" Hoden asked, Elryn shot him back a look of an accused criminal. The knight didn't understand what had happened, but he could tell it was recent.

He trodded off on Lisky in hopes of finding both of them unhurt.

 

Chaos had heard the conversation between Piesca and the Solan, and then watches as the Mahri tries to talk to her. Walking over to the two of them, he says to the Mahri "My friend doesn't know that much of Common."

He turns his attention towards Piesca and says, in Alerin, "Piesca, please don't get too upset. When that fireball hit an enemy soldier, it exploded and also hit the tree. He didn't burn the tree on purpose."

 

"Piesca, please don't get too upset. When that fireball hit an enemy soldier, it exploded and also hit the tree. He didn't burn the tree on purpose." he heard Chaos saying, as he and Lisky came up to them.

"Your both okay?" he asked.

 

Piesca sat under her own little black cloud until she looked up to see a cat woman sliding ale along the table to her.

“Nothing like a good smile and some ale to make your day better.” She said, a gentle purr escaping her lips, as means to calm her comrade, “I’m Rani.”

Piesca shook the proferred hand, her eyes brightening with curiosity at the strangeness of the creature.

"I am Piesca." She said, having understood enough to know the creature/woman was introducing herself.

She sipped her ale, shooting another glare across the room at the Solan.

"I forced team THAT one," she said to Rani in very broken Common, pointing at Elryn with her chin, "ignorant damn crystal man!"

Amazing how much her grasp of Common was improving.

"Piesca, please don't get too upset. When that fireball hit an enemy soldier, it exploded and also hit the tree. He didn't burn the tree on purpose." It was Chaos and right on his heels was the wolf rider.

"Your both okay?"

Piesca nodded, still sulky as she sipped her ale.

"Damn crystal man," she repeated then switched from tortured Common to Alarin and said with some heat, "But he will not replant! He does not understand."

 

Elryn saw Piesca glance at him and then he turned his back. This will be one interesting quest, atleast Hoden is in my party.

 

So sadly by the time I managed to get dressed and ready togo and have some fun the fighting was over so I returned to the man tied up and hauled him up. "Lets go shall we?" I asked him as I threw him out of the room and into the center of the tavern. He was awake now, if only slightly. "Any questions?" I asked before giving the man a quick boot to the ribs. "Feel free to ask anything of this man." I added and left him laying on the ground and sat down near the two women I had talked to during the walk over.

"Fine night to share a drink, don't you agree?" I asked slowly so that the Piesca could keep up and ordered myself an ale.

 

All conversation in the tavern was arrested as a bound stranger was knocked/tumbled/slammed into their midst, landing on the hard floor with a grunt and then he grunted again when Shar's boot buried itself in his ribs.

"Feel free to ask anything of this man." Shar strolled over to Rani's group and made himself comfortable, his long black-clad body totally at ease, one booted foot propped up on a bench that ran along the wall.

"Fine night to share a drink, don't you agree?" He spoke slowly and deliberately and Piesca understood him fairly well.

Red crept up her neck and stained her cheeks and she tried not to grin as she thought of him as she had seen him through the window, striking a heroic pose in his underpants.

To compose herself she lifted her mug to him in a brief toast and nodded, smiling because at least that way she didn't giggle, and took a sip of her ale.

 

Piesca smiled, nodded and joined me in a breif toast, though for some reason her face darkened, and her eyes seemed to smile, and laugh like she had shared some inside joke with herself. It threw me off for only a slight moment but I mentally shrugged it off and took a big gulp of ale. "It seems I somehow slept through most of the fighting." I continued slowly, pausing at the end to allow her to let me know if I went to fast. "Woke up with the man ready to turn me into a shishkabob." I jested, though truthfully I wished I had gotten more involved than handleing one rather sad opponent, though I was glad he wasn't better, sad or not I had several cuts.

"I assume you handled yourself better than to be caught unaware as I was." I said promting her to possibly give me a more detailed explanation of what had happened while I slept.

 

Hoden hopped off Lisky, looking at the man who Shar had threw onto the ground and proclaimed, "Feel free to ask anything of this man."

Hoden reached down to the bound man and lifted him off the ground with one burly arm, meeting him with his orbs of black. "Who sent you?" he said in a low growl. The man shook nervously and responded "Nothing, I will tell you nothing." in poor Erissian.

Hoden figured this was not the place for interrogation, and dragged the man by his leg, down the stairs and into the forest.

The knight could see easily in the darkness, as his eyes percieved it in a tint of frosty whites and greys. Hoden threw the man against a tree, watching as he kicked out helplessly.

"Why did you attack us, and who sent you?" Hoden hissed. Lisky circled the man, snapping its jaws and howling to instill sheer horror into the man. The soldier was bound in slightly loose ropes.

Hoden repeated the question, and recieved the same answer. The pale rider whistled, and Lisky began biting and tearing at the man's arm, he shrieked. The soldier pleaded for the wolf to stop, but Hoden stared idly.

Whistling again, Lisky withdrew, continuing its predatory circle. The man began to shift and writhe in the bounds hold. Hoden asked the question yet again, but this time only getting a yell of defiance.

"You will never know!" the man said, struggling out of the rope and grabbing a knife, he whipped it around, and aimed it at his own throat.

Hoden lifted his lance and propelled it straight into the man's wrist, impaling it into the tree. The man screamed in agony, his suicide attempt failing mid-blow.

The knight grabbed the man by the collar and dragged him back to the tavern, blood trailing from the man's hand wound.

Dropping him onto the ground, he asked. "Anyone else care an attempt?"

 

Piesca knitted her eyebrows as she struggled to keep pace with Shar's words.

The man on the floor of the tavern had tried to turn Shar into...food? Her eyebrows rose. Cannibals?

As she watched, Hoden dragged the prisoner from the room.

Then Shar spoke again and she caught the drift that he was asking what happened with her during the fight.

"Went...up," she said, pointing upward to clarify as she tortured some more Common words, "Roof shooting." She reached back and touched her crossbow so he might understand. "Then down," she said pointing down, "knife the dark."

Then her indignation grew again and she shot the Solan a killing look from across the room.

"Solan Damn Crystal bastard killed trees. Fire."

She snorted in disgust and drank some ale.

 

Elryn came out to help get the soldier to talk. He knew exactly what he'd use to interrogate him. When he got out there he nodded at Hoden and then got to the ground and held the soldier there. "We can make this easy, or we can make it hard." Said Elryn as a needle started protruding from his palm. The man said nothing but then Elryn started to push the needle into his chest.

"Wait! Wait!" yelled the man. Elryn looked up at Hoden in a look that said, what should i do next.

 

"We can make this easy, or we can make it hard." Elryn said, a needle appearing in his palm, somewhat reminiscent of an assassins blade.

Elryn punctured the mans chest with the thin needle, drawing droplets of red. The man yelled "Wait! Wait!" desperately. The soldier was stubborn and was refusing to give away information, but continuously begged for his life.

The blue skinned Solan shot him a look. Hoden was unsure of what to do with the man, there was only one way to threaten him and that was with death, but the man was holding the pain that Elryn and Lisky had given to him.

"What do you have in mind?" Hoden asked.

 

I smiled at her angry little remark and drew upon the splatering of words in other languages I knew, Leaned forward resting my chin on my hand, still smiling and said. "You cute angry." I remarked, knowing that though I might not be able to be witty, pretty girls loved to be reminded of the fact. I smiled kindly as I attempted to read her reaction.

 

Chaos downs his mug of ale, and then gets another. This was his first time drinking, and it was hitting him hard. He looks up at Piesca, who seems to be getting more attractive with every drink, and says "You handled yourself pretty good in that fight." in Alerin.

 

"What do you have in mind?"

"I think we should hold him until Hawk comes, but until then we can have some fun." The solan laughed grimly remembering what had he had done to lose his title of a Solanic master.