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A Rose In The Wind: A Saga of the Halmae -- Updated June 19, 2014
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<blockquote data-quote="Ilex" data-source="post: 5659084" data-attributes="member: 82687"><p><strong>23x03</strong></p><p></p><p>It was not the first time Kormick had faced the prospect of a street brawl after a night of carousing, but he was both uncharacteristically sober and uncharacteristically hungry after his performance as Tavi's servant at the party. This made the prospect less exhilarating. </p><p></p><p>Three attackers—two men and a woman—were closing in from behind them. Next to Kormick, Mena drew her sword and narrowed her eyes at the man wearing glasses who blocked their way forward. "You," she said. "I know you from somewhere…"</p><p></p><p>"Excellent. Let's find a bar," Kormick said. "Friends should have a drink before murdering each other in the gutter."</p><p></p><p>There was a yelp from behind him. Nyoko had just shot the female attacker, a fashion-plate blonde whose expression of fury read, "You got blood on my dress, you bitch." On cue, energy began to crackle between the spread hands of Glasses. </p><p></p><p><em>Sober murder it is, then,</em> Kormick sighed. </p><p></p><p>One of the other two male attackers—slight, dressed all in black—appeared like a shadow at Tavi's side, threw a cord around Tavi's neck, and pulled. "Hit him, Tavi!" yelled Mena, and in response to this unquestionably solid advice, Tavi jammed his sword straight backward and grazed the grappler, who grunted but didn't let go.</p><p></p><p>The final combatant—a burly man—charged Arden, bashing her with a flaming mace, just as the blonde flung out her hands and shot two lightning bolts. One bolt jittered over Nyoko's skin and the other one similarly convulsed Twiggy. </p><p></p><p>So now Nyoko and Twiggy were shocked, Tavi was being strangled to death, and the murder slave was concussed or on fire or both. </p><p></p><p>"You really don't want to make this <em>more</em> unpleasant," commented Glasses, letting loose with some kind of rippling energy that made both Savina and Twiggy scream and collapse to the road like puppets with strings cut.</p><p></p><p>Seeing Savina drop like that reminded Kormick of his sister. His sister at the end. Limp on the floor. The strength of fury began to overtake him.</p><p></p><p>"And you really, really shouldn't have attacked the Alirrian priestess," he answered. He strode forward with a warhammer in each hand and saw fear behind the glasses. </p><p></p><p>He slammed Glasses in the side of the head and, as the man slumped, caught him on the other side with a hammer to the ribs. Now he saw fear and pain, and that was even better. He crossed the hammers together and snapped his sister's name – "<em>Elizabette.</em>" A surge of brilliant wrath leapt out between the hammers and engulfed the man before him.</p><p></p><p>Suddenly Mena was beside him, a furious gorgeous avenging angel. Her sword took Glasses in the leg as he dodged backward.</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"><em>DM’s Note: That attack by Kormick, by the way, was something like at least one crit plus an action point, for a total of 60+ points of damage in a single round. Yet another beautiful moment where jonrog1’s dice decided to back up his role-playing.</em> </p><p></p><p>Savina dragged herself to her knees and, from there, prayed down Alirrian's wrath on the man grappling with Tavi. The man hauled Tavi around and used the kid's body to absorb the strike. "No!" cried Savina. Tavi looked close to unconsciousness.</p><p></p><p>"Wake up, Tavi!" yelled Mena. "Your duty isn't dead unless you are!" Tavi's eyes cleared and his knees looked less buckle-y. <em>So spectacularly… terrifying…</em> Kormick thought, fondness for Mena welling up amidst his rage.</p><p></p><p>That was when the girl in couture blasted both him and Mena with lightning. The shock hurt like Gert the Bloody Auntie’s time-honored pliers procedure back home, but worse, it screwed up Kormick's brain's ability to issue various fairly important orders to his body – orders like, "Take a step," or "don't go limp." Mena reeled sideways and Kormick felt his limbs quivering. He couldn't move. He was barely hanging onto basic sphincter functions.</p><p></p><p>He could <em>watch</em>, though, as the guy with the flaming mace hammered Arden some more, then—chillingly—turned his attentions to Rose. Rose screamed as the mace wielder grabbed her by the hair and dragged her away from the fight. <em>So,</em> Kormick realized, though helpless to <em>do</em> anything about that realization, <em>they're here for Rose.</em> </p><p></p><p>Arden slashed at Rose's would-be abductor as he went, but it was shaping up to be a horrible, horrible day until, in an eyeblink, Tavi teleported away from his attacker's arms and landed next to Rose. He tore the man away from his sister, growled, "You're mine," and almost sliced the man's arm off with a flash of his flaming sword. </p><p></p><p>Kormick was so inspired that he successfully lifted his foot to take a step—</p><p></p><p>—but Glasses hit him and Mena with a shockwave of magical something-or-other. Suddenly it wasn't dawn, it felt like high noon, <em>how time flies when we're having fun</em>, and the summer sun plummeted down, developed fangs, and bit off the top of his skull. </p><p></p><p>So… that hurt.</p><p></p><p>Kormick shook the psychic vision from his eyes and saw Rose follow her brother’s lead and teleport away from her would-be captor and into an alley beside the Inn. The man who had tried to strangle Tavi glimpsed Rose, too, and took off after her. Twiggy flung out a hand holding a gleaming orb and knocked the man off his feet with a blast of invisible force. Kormick could guess how the guy felt as he slammed to the pavement, but that didn't mean Kormick pitied him. Twiggy, apparently feeling as irritated as Kormick, spun around with a firm gesture and ignited her flaming sphere. It swallowed both the blonde girl and the mace guy. They staggered out of the flames. The blonde girl's fancy clothes were now satisfyingly charred. The mace guy, though, seemed untouched. <em>Damn fire resistance,</em> Kormick thought.</p><p></p><p>Kormick didn't feel strong enough for the warhammers yet, but he yanked his dagger out of his belt and threw it, murder-slave style, at Glasses. Glasses hadn't been expecting that: Kormick heard him grunt "Ehkt's Balls!" as the dagger grazed his cheek. There was a flash as Glasses teleported, reappearing farther away down the road. "Don't go!" Kormick hollered after him. "I'm not done murdering you yet!"</p><p></p><p>"I've seen this coward before," Mena said, still looking a little dizzy as she stared down the road at Glasses. The sight of her swaying body unnerved Kormick, but then her voice grew stronger. "At the Questors. That's where."</p><p></p><p>"Which Questors?" Kormick asked. "Here in Cauldron?"</p><p></p><p>"Yes. I'm sure of it," she spat. Then she wheeled around, saw Tavi locked in a fierce battle against the mace-wielder, and yelled, "<em>Hit that hateful man, Tavi!</em>" </p><p></p><p>Kormick grinned. <em>There can't be too much wrong with the world if Dame Mena still has time to get angry.</em></p><p></p><p>The mace-wielder swung, sending ripples of fire toward Tavi. Tavi was unhurt. Two could play the fire resistance game. </p><p></p><p>The mace guy looked peeved about that.</p><p></p><p>He looked a little more peeved when Arden stabbed him in the back.</p><p></p><p>And he looked unconscious when Tavi seized the moment to clobber him over the head with his sword's pommel. "One down!" Tavi called.</p><p></p><p>A rush of chaotic energy—it was high noon again—and that gods-damned toothy carnivorous sun came dropping down from a desert sky on another mission from its gods-damned glasses-wearing master. The leering fireface licked Kormick's eyeballs and left him blind.</p><p></p><p>It wasn’t just Kormick, this time. "I can't see!" he heard Twiggy scream through the searing pain and all-consuming white-hot glow. "Me neither—Alirria!" He heard Savina begin to pray, but he also heard the ragged edge of agony in her throat. She was hurting as much as he was. He was grateful to hear her voice grow clearer as she finished the prayer, and from Twiggy's shout of thanks, he knew they were both healed.</p><p></p><p>In his case… the world still consisted of searing white light. Still, Kormick figured that Glasses must have sneaked back to the front lines while he and Mena had been watching Tavi duke it out with the mace-wielder. That meant that Glasses was probably still nearby. Yes—he could practically hear the coward snivelling. Kormick heaved up a hammer, and swung blindly once. Nothing.</p><p></p><p>Again.</p><p></p><p>"Oh, you wouldn't hit a man with glasses, would—?"</p><p></p><p><em>Slam</em>. The hammer found flesh.</p><p></p><p>"I do, in fact, hit men with glasses," Kormick said. He swung again but found nothing: the wiseguy had probably teleported again.</p><p></p><p>Kormick listened, hard. He could hear the others still tangling with the blonde girl and the grappler. He heard lightening bolts, grunts of effort, Tavi's sword spinning with its characteristic flamey crackle, cries of pain, Mena shouting instructions, Twiggy incanting. </p><p></p><p>He didn't hear sniveling. </p><p></p><p>He waited, hands gripping the hammers. </p><p></p><p>He heard the blonde girl scream, "Catch me if you can, then!" and the sound of bespoke shoes racing away on the pavement. The sound of boots went after them. A scramble and second footrace suggested that the grappler was bolting, too, with someone in hot pursuit. </p><p></p><p>"Ah well. Not today, then," said the voice of Glasses, very close. Kormick spun in a circle with the hammer—still blind—but got nothing. He heard the man's footsteps as Glasses began his escape.</p><p></p><p>With spectacular timing, Savina's voice rang out over the running footsteps, praying for healing. In an instant, Kormick's eyes were clear and his strength returned. He charged after the robed man.</p><p></p><p>"Stop running!" he yelled.</p><p></p><p>"No!" returned Glasses.</p><p></p><p>"Jan! Hit Four-Eyes for me!" added Mena, and Kormick put on a burst of speed and walloped Glasses in the gut.</p><p></p><p>Glasses grunted, staggered, and then returned with a punch so adorably telegraphed and slow moving that Kormick didn't even bother to dodge. The man's fist wavered closer to Kormick's jaw—and then turned into <em>that blazing gods-damned head-biting—</em>and set his teeth, jaw, nose, and eyes on fire and filled his sinuses with magma. </p><p></p><p>Kormick fell back, hands clapped to his skull. He heard Glasses say "Tsk-tsk," before sprinting away. He dimly saw, down the road, the others returning from footraces empty-handed. The mace guy was their only prisoner, and Kormick's head was going to explode. He leaned forward and puked stupendously.</p><p></p><p><em>And this,</em> he concluded, <em>is the problem with brawling sober. You still get the hangover, but you never savored the buzz.</em></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Ilex, post: 5659084, member: 82687"] [b]23x03[/b] It was not the first time Kormick had faced the prospect of a street brawl after a night of carousing, but he was both uncharacteristically sober and uncharacteristically hungry after his performance as Tavi's servant at the party. This made the prospect less exhilarating. Three attackers—two men and a woman—were closing in from behind them. Next to Kormick, Mena drew her sword and narrowed her eyes at the man wearing glasses who blocked their way forward. "You," she said. "I know you from somewhere…" "Excellent. Let's find a bar," Kormick said. "Friends should have a drink before murdering each other in the gutter." There was a yelp from behind him. Nyoko had just shot the female attacker, a fashion-plate blonde whose expression of fury read, "You got blood on my dress, you bitch." On cue, energy began to crackle between the spread hands of Glasses. [i]Sober murder it is, then,[/i] Kormick sighed. One of the other two male attackers—slight, dressed all in black—appeared like a shadow at Tavi's side, threw a cord around Tavi's neck, and pulled. "Hit him, Tavi!" yelled Mena, and in response to this unquestionably solid advice, Tavi jammed his sword straight backward and grazed the grappler, who grunted but didn't let go. The final combatant—a burly man—charged Arden, bashing her with a flaming mace, just as the blonde flung out her hands and shot two lightning bolts. One bolt jittered over Nyoko's skin and the other one similarly convulsed Twiggy. So now Nyoko and Twiggy were shocked, Tavi was being strangled to death, and the murder slave was concussed or on fire or both. "You really don't want to make this [i]more[/i] unpleasant," commented Glasses, letting loose with some kind of rippling energy that made both Savina and Twiggy scream and collapse to the road like puppets with strings cut. Seeing Savina drop like that reminded Kormick of his sister. His sister at the end. Limp on the floor. The strength of fury began to overtake him. "And you really, really shouldn't have attacked the Alirrian priestess," he answered. He strode forward with a warhammer in each hand and saw fear behind the glasses. He slammed Glasses in the side of the head and, as the man slumped, caught him on the other side with a hammer to the ribs. Now he saw fear and pain, and that was even better. He crossed the hammers together and snapped his sister's name – "[i]Elizabette.[/i]" A surge of brilliant wrath leapt out between the hammers and engulfed the man before him. Suddenly Mena was beside him, a furious gorgeous avenging angel. Her sword took Glasses in the leg as he dodged backward. [INDENT][i]DM’s Note: That attack by Kormick, by the way, was something like at least one crit plus an action point, for a total of 60+ points of damage in a single round. Yet another beautiful moment where jonrog1’s dice decided to back up his role-playing.[/i] [/INDENT] Savina dragged herself to her knees and, from there, prayed down Alirrian's wrath on the man grappling with Tavi. The man hauled Tavi around and used the kid's body to absorb the strike. "No!" cried Savina. Tavi looked close to unconsciousness. "Wake up, Tavi!" yelled Mena. "Your duty isn't dead unless you are!" Tavi's eyes cleared and his knees looked less buckle-y. [i]So spectacularly… terrifying…[/i] Kormick thought, fondness for Mena welling up amidst his rage. That was when the girl in couture blasted both him and Mena with lightning. The shock hurt like Gert the Bloody Auntie’s time-honored pliers procedure back home, but worse, it screwed up Kormick's brain's ability to issue various fairly important orders to his body – orders like, "Take a step," or "don't go limp." Mena reeled sideways and Kormick felt his limbs quivering. He couldn't move. He was barely hanging onto basic sphincter functions. He could [i]watch[/i], though, as the guy with the flaming mace hammered Arden some more, then—chillingly—turned his attentions to Rose. Rose screamed as the mace wielder grabbed her by the hair and dragged her away from the fight. [i]So,[/i] Kormick realized, though helpless to [i]do[/i] anything about that realization, [i]they're here for Rose.[/i] Arden slashed at Rose's would-be abductor as he went, but it was shaping up to be a horrible, horrible day until, in an eyeblink, Tavi teleported away from his attacker's arms and landed next to Rose. He tore the man away from his sister, growled, "You're mine," and almost sliced the man's arm off with a flash of his flaming sword. Kormick was so inspired that he successfully lifted his foot to take a step— —but Glasses hit him and Mena with a shockwave of magical something-or-other. Suddenly it wasn't dawn, it felt like high noon, [i]how time flies when we're having fun[/i], and the summer sun plummeted down, developed fangs, and bit off the top of his skull. So… that hurt. Kormick shook the psychic vision from his eyes and saw Rose follow her brother’s lead and teleport away from her would-be captor and into an alley beside the Inn. The man who had tried to strangle Tavi glimpsed Rose, too, and took off after her. Twiggy flung out a hand holding a gleaming orb and knocked the man off his feet with a blast of invisible force. Kormick could guess how the guy felt as he slammed to the pavement, but that didn't mean Kormick pitied him. Twiggy, apparently feeling as irritated as Kormick, spun around with a firm gesture and ignited her flaming sphere. It swallowed both the blonde girl and the mace guy. They staggered out of the flames. The blonde girl's fancy clothes were now satisfyingly charred. The mace guy, though, seemed untouched. [i]Damn fire resistance,[/i] Kormick thought. Kormick didn't feel strong enough for the warhammers yet, but he yanked his dagger out of his belt and threw it, murder-slave style, at Glasses. Glasses hadn't been expecting that: Kormick heard him grunt "Ehkt's Balls!" as the dagger grazed his cheek. There was a flash as Glasses teleported, reappearing farther away down the road. "Don't go!" Kormick hollered after him. "I'm not done murdering you yet!" "I've seen this coward before," Mena said, still looking a little dizzy as she stared down the road at Glasses. The sight of her swaying body unnerved Kormick, but then her voice grew stronger. "At the Questors. That's where." "Which Questors?" Kormick asked. "Here in Cauldron?" "Yes. I'm sure of it," she spat. Then she wheeled around, saw Tavi locked in a fierce battle against the mace-wielder, and yelled, "[i]Hit that hateful man, Tavi![/i]" Kormick grinned. [i]There can't be too much wrong with the world if Dame Mena still has time to get angry.[/i] The mace-wielder swung, sending ripples of fire toward Tavi. Tavi was unhurt. Two could play the fire resistance game. The mace guy looked peeved about that. He looked a little more peeved when Arden stabbed him in the back. And he looked unconscious when Tavi seized the moment to clobber him over the head with his sword's pommel. "One down!" Tavi called. A rush of chaotic energy—it was high noon again—and that gods-damned toothy carnivorous sun came dropping down from a desert sky on another mission from its gods-damned glasses-wearing master. The leering fireface licked Kormick's eyeballs and left him blind. It wasn’t just Kormick, this time. "I can't see!" he heard Twiggy scream through the searing pain and all-consuming white-hot glow. "Me neither—Alirria!" He heard Savina begin to pray, but he also heard the ragged edge of agony in her throat. She was hurting as much as he was. He was grateful to hear her voice grow clearer as she finished the prayer, and from Twiggy's shout of thanks, he knew they were both healed. In his case… the world still consisted of searing white light. Still, Kormick figured that Glasses must have sneaked back to the front lines while he and Mena had been watching Tavi duke it out with the mace-wielder. That meant that Glasses was probably still nearby. Yes—he could practically hear the coward snivelling. Kormick heaved up a hammer, and swung blindly once. Nothing. Again. "Oh, you wouldn't hit a man with glasses, would—?" [i]Slam[/i]. The hammer found flesh. "I do, in fact, hit men with glasses," Kormick said. He swung again but found nothing: the wiseguy had probably teleported again. Kormick listened, hard. He could hear the others still tangling with the blonde girl and the grappler. He heard lightening bolts, grunts of effort, Tavi's sword spinning with its characteristic flamey crackle, cries of pain, Mena shouting instructions, Twiggy incanting. He didn't hear sniveling. He waited, hands gripping the hammers. He heard the blonde girl scream, "Catch me if you can, then!" and the sound of bespoke shoes racing away on the pavement. The sound of boots went after them. A scramble and second footrace suggested that the grappler was bolting, too, with someone in hot pursuit. "Ah well. Not today, then," said the voice of Glasses, very close. Kormick spun in a circle with the hammer—still blind—but got nothing. He heard the man's footsteps as Glasses began his escape. With spectacular timing, Savina's voice rang out over the running footsteps, praying for healing. In an instant, Kormick's eyes were clear and his strength returned. He charged after the robed man. "Stop running!" he yelled. "No!" returned Glasses. "Jan! Hit Four-Eyes for me!" added Mena, and Kormick put on a burst of speed and walloped Glasses in the gut. Glasses grunted, staggered, and then returned with a punch so adorably telegraphed and slow moving that Kormick didn't even bother to dodge. The man's fist wavered closer to Kormick's jaw—and then turned into [i]that blazing gods-damned head-biting—[/i]and set his teeth, jaw, nose, and eyes on fire and filled his sinuses with magma. Kormick fell back, hands clapped to his skull. He heard Glasses say "Tsk-tsk," before sprinting away. He dimly saw, down the road, the others returning from footraces empty-handed. The mace guy was their only prisoner, and Kormick's head was going to explode. He leaned forward and puked stupendously. [i]And this,[/i] he concluded, [i]is the problem with brawling sober. You still get the hangover, but you never savored the buzz.[/i] [/QUOTE]
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A Rose In The Wind: A Saga of the Halmae -- Updated June 19, 2014
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