Carnifex's Story Hour (Updated January 20th, "The Union")

[Carnifex]

Wolf sat cross-legged with his bowl of soup in his lap, quietly observing the others across the dancing flames of the fire. The man felt distinctly ill at ease, though he wasn't about to let that show through to the others. The events of the past day troubled him, and looking at the mercenaries around him he was troubled even further.

Such a disparate band, and definitely not the kind of group he'd have normally considered collecting together for the mercenary trade. Kale and Sebastion maybe; both competent fighters even if Kale tended to get carried away with himself and act dangerously, and Sebastion had what Wolf considered a naive suspicion of magic. The veteran ran his fingers around the scars where his arm had been torn off, then re-attached by the Manipulator. No, magic was something to be utilised like any other tool of battle. Yet the rest of the band was so utterly mismatched for the mercenary trade, not hard-bitten fighters but a rag-tag collection of people who... Wolf suddenly realised just how young most of them were compared to himself. Burl must have been one of the oldest of Wolf's band excepting the veteran himself; reasonable enough considering how long it must take to get a solid grip on even the most basic of magic arcanae. Many of the others were barely into adulthood.

He felt the responsibility weighing down on him again. He'd fought many times, killed many men, and had his share of failure. He couldn't help but let his mind drift back to the Nightmare Company. The slaughter of well over a hundred men just because he was weak. And now he had to, what, act as guardian for these young bloods. It certainly seemed that half the world and its dog was out to get certain of them. And that worried him too.

This wasn't a mercenary company in any normal sense. It didn't work along the same lines as a mercenary company, for starters. Too small and personal, among other things. And their current task? Looting a probably deserted wizard's tower wasn't a job for military mercenaries, though it was the kind of thing that adventurers, as he understood the term, might do.

A company. That was a better term to use, not a mercenary band. To the veteran's eyes it seemed that all that held the band together was both the vagaries of chance in bringing them all together when they needed the aid that the others could give them, and the personal relations growing between them, the friendships and not-so-friendly ties that were evident.

Wolf watched Sebastion's surprise as Melisande asked for weapons training. The concept of the sorceress with a sword was evidently one that did not fit in the Huronese man's carefully ordered system of how the world should be.

Rubbing a weary shoulder, he set the bowl down. The world had just been too strange of late for his liking, and it was leaving him confused.

As well as a mercenary by trade, Wolf was, after all, an Azure Blade, and through the channels of information that the Blades used he was recieving worrying information. The Blades did their best at any time to be aware of current events, at least in the Middle Kingdoms and preferably further as well, and they did a decent job of it. It helped them in their attempts to hold back the darker elements where they could, like the slavers underneath Tarravus. The increase in such incidents in recent times was just one worrying sign, and the seemingly random mishaps befalling the party, with Toranite clerics chasing Burl and suchlike, just made him feel more uneasy. It didn't help that while they were out in the wilds he was cut off from any other Azure Blades.

He pondered that it might, before too long, be a wise idea to let the party in on the existence of the Blades. If they understood certain key things then they could prove to be a very positive element in the scheme of things.

Perhaps.

* * *

Wolf lay there in the deepest gloom of night, the fire barely even embers. One of the others was on watch, but he was certain they hadn't realised that the warrior was not in fact asleep at all. It didn't suit him to sleep.

What Melisande had mentioned about shadows in Kandathra, before they departed for the mountains proper, came to mind in this darkness. Wolf might have been tempted to dismiss it as imagination, if he didn't know that there was certainly at least a grain of truth to the idea of shadow-beings. The Azure Blades knew that much at least.

He continued to watch silently in the gloom, uneasy to his very bones about the way things were.

 

[Carnifex]

Coming Monday, 'Arrows from Beyond'

 

[Carnifex]

That morning, Kale pulled on the Wave Hawk's boots instead of his usual travelling footwear. They fit fairly well once adjustments had been made and they had been tied properly. Even so, the fact that the maker had incorporated the polished stone into the boot meant it was fairly heavy.


* * *


The new day brought with it the balmy rays of the sun and a gentle breeze that made travelling a veritable pleasure as the band made their way along through verdant vallies at the feet of the rising peaks around them. They were making good time, the horses covering the ground at a fair rate even considering the sometimes difficult terrain; but though the mountains around them might have been difficult to traverse their soaring peaks were certainly impressive, the higher areas seemingly still covered with ice and snow even in this fair summer weather. The call of an eagle sometimes rang across the void between mountains - and fortunately there was neither sight nor sound of a drazhikar cutting across the blue in search of prey.


They did not meet another beholder, either, and now they watched their surroundings with greater vigilance, the kind of vigilance that having such a dangerous encounter previously could instil. They saw some of the flightly animals of the wooded vallies upon occasion, or mountain foxes watching them warily from a distance as they meandered up a rocky valley-side.


Every so often Wolf would bring out the leather tubes which the maps were sealed within, unstoppering the end and unrolling the parchment, to reassure of direction and distances. The map was, of course, somewhat uncertain, as it only could be when dealing with the wild Sarokean mountains, yet still is was clear that they were making their way closer to the marked point of the arcanist's tower, where three vallies met at a lake.


* * *


And so the journey continued for several days as they trekked through the hills and mountains, stopping each night to rest and for Sebastion to give Melisande some more training. She picked up the basics with a natural talent; strong enough to strike effectively and possessed of considerable natural grace, the young aasimar also seemed to have a good deal of stamina and did not tire easily from the strains of the repeated, practical lessons Sebastion was showing her. Wolf couldn't help but, once or twice, comment to correct Sebastion on some of the methods he was demonstrating, but nonetheless the Huronese soldier was an able enough teacher to a willing student like Melisande.


* * *

To someone so young and purposeful, the world that unfolded below her steed had taken on a new aspect. Sweet and vulnerable as a sick child, it seemed to cry out to Melisande to fight its disease--to lance its boils with the figurative sword she was figuratively learning to wield.


But lancing boils isn't a very lovely image, Mel thought. There must be some more noble metaphor for this quest. And why won't anyone let me handle a real blade? Can't they see I'm doing well? Why do I get the feeling if I picked up a sword someone would tell me not to run with it?


But by and large she was quite pleased with the results so far. The training was just painful enough to feel effective (those big muscles in the backs of her legs ached constantly in a satisfying way) and she felt grateful for Sebastion's patience. She wasn't always sure he was as pleased with her progress as she was, but he had stuck with it for four whole days and seemed to be spending more time teaching tricks to her than to his horse, which was promising.


* * *

The days passed too quickly for Burl as it seemed that Wolf was really pushing. Any other time, he would have liked to more closely observe their new surroundings. Much wildlife was spotted here where very few ventured. High on the snow capped mountains, Burl even spotted a pair of large horned sheep or goats, he wasn’t sure which, but the sight was breath taking.


The pace was so exhausting that at night, Burl tried to rest as best he could. Watching Mel at practice had progressed from a joke to watching her progress under the close tutelage of Sebastian. It seemed that Spike and the two headed frog had made some progress from warily watching each other and trying to keep some space between themselves to one of shared existence.


* * *

Wyshira had plenty of time to think during the next few days of steady riding. It seemed clear now that 'bloodkin' was a word that referred to some special followers of Gilamesh, a ruling class maybe; and that somehow - through an accident of birth or otherwise - Burl was one of them.


They continued to ride together part of the time, the priestess and the necromancer, although Wyshira was now more prone to silent introspection when they were together. She didn't know what to say to him about it. She tried to stamp on the seeds of doubt that kept sprouting up in her mind. The Fire Snake called him Bloodkin! How could he not know what he is? Did she really think he was deceiving them? Of course he's not... Look at him!


And she did look at him when he wasn't paying attention to her, and saw the evidence of his intelligence and his curiosity as he observed his surroundings. That was all she could see: an inquisitive man on a journey. She sensed nothing sinister about him, and yet......


Remember the bird and the note?


Yes. The bird had shown up back at Lord Ecurius' estate, with a note attached to its leg. Burl had reacted oddly, but had explained that it was a letter from an acquaintance. It had seemed to Wyshira at the time that he was holding something back about it. But then she had decided that she was being too sensitive. Surely, it had been just what Burl said it was. A note from a friend. A woman friend, more precisely, and he had been embarassed by it. Nothing sinister about that......


But once doubt had begun to grow, Wyshira found that she couldn't get it out of her mind. She looked at Burl as they all sat around the campfire at night, and thought, Bloodkin!


* * *

The pace of the trail came back to Kale quickly, his body adapting quickly to the steady drain of days on the road. Spirits unprepared could be in for quite a shock, when the fantasy of travel meets the reality of ten hours walking and riding. And the body never seemed to remember: it had to be retought each time.


More pleasant than most, the journey was: Kale spent his time floating within the group, exchanging words most often with Burl and Wyshira, burning time most often with Wolf. Yet despite his preference for known company, the young mercenary found himself near the others often enough.


Words with Cord were few, although much like Wolf the man shared company often without the need for speaking: travelling together, it could hardly be called silence. Sebastion and Melisande had formed a partnership, of sorts, while Kale volunteered himself time to time as a target. Stand still, be predictable, telegraph your movements- what not to do as an attacker could still provide novice instruction to one who was new with a blade. As for Ebri? Kale's brow always seemed to furrow at the thought. He could not avail himself to small talk with the woman, and that left little else to interact about, no matter how awkward. Curiosity about the mimir was about as far as he got into exploring the peculiar woman.


* * *


On the fourth day of their travel, when they could not be more than two days from the tower, trouble reared its ugly head.


The path made its way through a small valley where brooks burbled their way along, a mixture of small trees and shrubs populating its gravelly floor and rocky walls. There was, sadly, plenty of cover for the ambushers to make themselves virtually unnoticeable behind. It was also ill-fate that even though the adventurers were hardly complacent to the environment around them, even the most eagle-eyed of their number failed to see the warning signs. Blood would be the price of the failure.


* * *


Wolf leaned over to Kale as they rode down the valley. "It wont be too long before we arrive at the tower, Kale, and once we're there it's anybody's guess what dangers we might meet. I've been mulling over something these past few days and I think it might be the time to talk with you about it. You met Garadas, and you know that I'm a member of an organisation called the Blades - it's the Azure Blades in fact, though I don't know if you've ever heard of the name before you met me. Some people have, but it suits our purposes that few know of us. As it stands, I plan to, when or if we return, take you and maybe the others to meet a man called Tobias in Tarravus, a nobleman but also another individual involved with the Blades, because I believe..."


He was cut off by the whistle of an arrow launched from the side of the valley, the archer hidden amidst the shrubs and undergrowth.


"Ambush!" Wolf yelled, drawing his blade in a breath.

 

[Carnifex]

Some half a dozen men, brigands clad in crude leather armour or chain shirts and wielding an unpleasant array of hand weapons, rushed from either side as a few more arrows zipped inwith desultory effects, merely burying themselves into the soil and scaring the horses. The four archers could now be seen, lurking back and preparing to launch another volley as their comrades charged.


And then, ahead of the band in the direction they had been heading, a single man stepped out onto the path. Clad in elaborate and ornamented red scale mail, a conical helmet on his head which fully enclosed around his face such that merely two slits allowed the warrior to see out, he held a mighty bow he raised, a barbed arrow already notched and ready to be fired.


As the bandits closed in, the armoured man carefully raised the bow, took a moment to aim, and loosed the arrow. It arced through the air towards Wolf, and the mercenary raised a metal-bracered arm to try and protect himself from the projectile. It bit straight through the metal of the bracer and sunk deep into the warrior's flesh, and he gasped as if he had been dunked in ice cold water, the blood draining from his face as he nearly dropped his sword, fumbling clumsily to block the hatchet of one of the bandits.


Gritting his teeth in an attempt to bite down the numbing pain of the arrow in his arm, Wolf slashed downwards twice from his saddle at one of the bandits who had charged him, the metallic blade of the bastard sword glinting crimson as both strikes bit into the man and sent him tumbling down with a spatter of blood. Then the veteran, temporarily freed of any assailants, reached over to try and pull the barbed arrow that had punched deep into his arm. Through the agony, he thought it might well have shattered the bone from the sheer force of the impact.


The battle began to swirl in the now-familiar patterns of melee as shouts and cries, the sound of metal on metal and the alien noise of arcane syllables, heralded the beginnings of the real combat. Burl struck an impressive figure in his dark clothes as he drew the Fire Serpent rod and activated it; from the air ahead of the group sparks coalesced from nothing, quickly igniting into the serpentine firestorm of the elemental as it broke back into the material plane. This time it seemed to be more quickly aware of the situation around it, immediately whipping out its head to try and bite a bandit who was threatening to engage Burl. As the flame-wreathed snake dove in the man, witha fearful cry, deflected the strike with his crude wooden shield, but nonetheless the sudden appearance of the elemental in its coruscating glory seemed to shake the bandits, making them falter in their footsteps with sudden cowardice.


This was only compounded when Melisande let loose bolts of brilliant sapphire which tore through the intervening gap between her position, elevated on her horse, and the armoured archer, the magic missiles impacting with force and sending the warrior a step backwards. What was perhaps truly mroe amazing than the display of arcane power was that the sorceress managed to keep control of her mount despite its sudden fear, staying in the saddle.


Despite the band's show of magic the bandits were not so cowed as to flee already, and now that the gap had been closed they picthed in to melee battle with wild abandon. Clearly men from the fringes of civilisation, the unkempt, disorderly scum yelled and shouted to try and bolster their own morale and intimidate their victims, one bearded man caught Kale with a glancing flesh wound with a jagged, short blade and another managed to hit Wolf in the leg with a hatchet, drawing more of the ranger's blood. Cord too suffered minor injuries from the assailants, though doubtless the blind dwarf that almost danced to gracefully dodge the unskilled hacks of his foes was unnerving to the bandits, who clearly disliked the idea of fighting those with unnatural powers as they shirked back from the fire serpent. Heeding the cries of their allies the archers in the bushes turned their bows against the elemental, arrows adding more to the confusion of the melee as they buried themselves around the fiery creature, one biting through tis ashen body to draw a hiss of irritation from it.


Sebastion loosed one of his own arrows, the enchanted missile followed by a stream of blue and white sparks as it arced to strike true into the archer. He staggered as it discharged into him with a crack, leaving a smoking crater in the centre of his chest where it had bitten through the scale mail, but the red-armoured warrior quickly recovered with the manner of a skilled warrior, watching Sebastion carefully in an attempt to avoid being struck by another of the Myrmecian arrows.


Ebri struck out with her fists, not landing a solid strike but sending a bandit reeling back in shock as he suddenly realised the woman before him was far from defenceless without a weapon; his face became truly fearful as he saw the glint of a silvery kama appear in one hand which had just pulled back from a feinting punch, and which hacked out like a serpent striking to bite into his chest, straight through his crude leathers. The man collapsed as blood spurted from the precision puncture, internal organs fatally speared.


Then with the scent of a sea breeze Wyshira brought forth a wind wall to hamper any further attempts by the bandit archers to rain down arrows upon the party. Nearby Kale quickly brought down another of the bandits with sword and flail, smashing the man to the ground and then stabbing him to finish him off, the brine blade eagerly corroding a wound through the warrior's meagre metal armour.


* * *


Clutching at the wound that Sebastion had inflicted on him, the red-armoured warrior watched the tides of the battle, face hidden from view by his visor such that he seemed like an impassive sentinel watching the vagaries of fate. As more bandits fell so that only three now stood against the combined might of the travellers, and the archers were rendered ineffectual by the genasi priestesses magic, it seemed that now was the time to release the second part of the ambush.


He waved one gauntleted hand in a signal, and then reached for another handful of arrows from his quiver, stabbing them point down into the earth by his foot. His actions now more pained and less smooth than before as the arrow-wound smarted and blood continued to flow, the archer nonetheless was able to bring his prowess to the fore, unleashing arrows at an incredible rate. Unlike the bandits, he was not hampered by the wind wall.


The first one tore towards Wolf, who once again managed to bring his already shattered arm round to fend it off, and with an unpleasant thunk it too buried itself deep in his flesh; followed mere seconds later by another one which caught the now reeling ranger in the stomach with a spurt of blood. Coughing up gore in shock, Wolf simply slid off his saddle to hit the brown earth with a thud.


From the side of the path another red armoured figure slipped from cover; clad in the same crimson scale mail, this warrior spun a bladed staff confidently from hand to hand, each end tipped with a slightly curved shear of metal, as he closed in to melee to support the bandits. Heavy boots thudding on the ground, he charged towards the archer who had fired upon his comrade, nearly introducing Sebastion to just how keen the edge of the double-sword was as he struck with an upswing towards the mounted man.


Even as Wolf was tumbling to the ground, the red-clad archer had turned his head for a moment, drawn by a faint sound from behind him, where the path led on. A mounted figure was approaching at high speed down the valley trail, the sound of hoofbeats upon ground becoming more clear as every moment passed...

 

[Carnifex]

Tomorrow's update, 'The Black Knight'

 

[Carnifex]

And you can even expect the return of my House Rules thread for this campaign, which I just bumped over in that forum I'm taking requests

 

[Carnifex]

The fire serpent had caused concern among the bandits as Burl had hoped, giving him time to slip from his horse. Although this meant that he wouldn’t have to contend with a bucking platform from which to cast his spells, it also meant he didn’t have as good a vantage point to see what was going on in the battle. What he could see was the three remaining bandits who were concentrating their efforts on the fire serpent. Burl was preparing a spell when, hearing a heavy thud, he turned in time to see Wolf hitting the ground.


Now it was Burl’s turn to be scared. Wolf had always been the iron man of the troupe, often saving their lives. Now with him lying on the ground, dead or dying, it would be up to the rest of them as to whether they would live or die. Burl wasn’t sure if he was up to it or not, but he wasn’t going to die without a fight, he and his companions had too much for which to live.


Down on the ground, Wolf's blood continued to flow freely, staining the dry earth around him to a hint of crimson as the veteran continued to twitch and spasm, only the whites of his eyes visible. Wyshira might not have been the most experienced of healers yet but the savage injuries her companions had been suffering since she had started travelling were rapidly educating her, and she could not help but think that the arrows piercing the man's arm and abdomen shouldn't have been enough to bring the veteran down. One arm shattered, certainly, and a flesh wound to his stomach, but the state he was in was surely not just down to the physical punishment he had recieved. It looked like he had been poisoned.


Burl's fiery summoning writhed back and forth with the sound of slithering scales, sinuously dancing its head to block any avenue to Burl that the bandit before it attempted to take, trying to break past it to attack the wizard in melee. With a hiss it lashed out and sunk its fangs into the man's arm despite his best attempts to fend it off with his shield, sending him reeling off and shouting in pain from the seared flesh around the punture wounds. Shielded by the snake, Burl was able to let off his ice knife spell uninterrupted, and the resultant shard of frozen water bit through the red armour of Sebastion's attacker, freezing flesh and blood as it hit. Even so, the visored warrior fought on. Melisande unleashed another spray of magic missiles at the red-armoured archer, who saw the sapphire bolts coming and dived behind a nearby rock to evade them only for the eldritch attack to divert and follow him, sending him stumbling from the impacts.


The bandits fought on, bolstered by the aid of the second armoured trooper, but the ruffians didn't manage much now that the travellers had regained the initiative and recovered from the surprise of the ambush. Beyond the wind wall the archers realised the uselessness of further shots and scurried forth out of the cover of the rocks and shrubs, another four bandits to aid their fellows with glinting swords. In the melee Ebri and Cord cracked a few bones with their devastating strikes, holding the bulk of the enemy at bay.


With a thunderous rapport Sebastion drew and unleashed his brace of pistols at the armoured warrior assailing him. The pistol in his off-hand spat out a bullet that barely skimmed the man and sparked as it ricocheted off at an angle, but the double-barrel Ferechan-make hit full on to punch through the scale mail in two places, gore splashing down from the entry wounds as the sheer force sent his foe reeling with grievous wounds. With a muffled shout of both defiance and pain the man swung his bladestaff back up into guard position, showing he wasn't out of the fight yet, and with dangerous grace he entered into a complex series of strikes with his weapon; Kale, attempting to flank the man, found himself driven back a step or two just to avoid being slashed up and he couldn't get a solid hit of his own in, even as Sebastion met the other end of the bladestaff across his midriff, opening up a deep wound that hazed his vision with pain and even threatened to topple him off his horse.


Wyshira called out a prayer for sanctuary and then was quickly at Wolf's side, easily making her way through the confusion with the divine magic protecting her. Wolf's wounds, while bad, shouldn't prove fatal - but she couldn't tell what damage the poison she guessed was in his veins might inflict.


The armoured archer, still reeling from Melisande's magic, kept his head down and in good cover, still looking back now and then at the figure approaching the fight on horseback. He uncertainly notched his bow, unwilling to loose another arrow into the fray just yet lest the newcomer be hostile and set upon him by surprise.


Those looking out in that direction could see now that the rider approaching looked bulky, armoured. He closed the distance with great speed, the reason for which rapidly became clear; it was a man in full plate armour, riding a large warhorse which was covered in almost as much armour as the man atop it. Black armour, and a fully closed helm, all covered in elaborate detail which would need closer scrutiny to make out properly. In one hand was a hefty battleaxe and in the other, a pistol.


The man and horse thundered past the archer who hesistated, unsure of what to do, even as the knight flung himself from horseback with amazing ease and grace for a man in that much metal. He raised the pistol, a flash of light and noise and a cloud of powdersmoke as he fired it at the red-armoured archer, scoring a brutal hit on the man's shoulder, then easily shoving the pistol back in a belt hung round his waist and turning to put an axe in the nearest bandit. The warhorse ploughed on without him, hooves pummelling one of the would-be archers into the dirt. Despite the ominous black plate, the newcomer did not, so far, seem hostile to the band from Naseria.

 

[Greybar]

Carnifex, you have another reader... I got sucked in from your post to Piratecat's. I suppose sooner or later I'll have to go back to the beginning read forward!
-john

 

[Carnifex]

I suppose that was some pretty shameless pimping even by my standards Always glad to have another reader

Update coming soon...

 

[Carnifex]

The fists and feet of Cord and Ebri, along with a spray of lesser acid orbs from Burl, were driving the bandits back, and with the fire serpent hissing and attacking too their morale was quickly crumbling, seeing their leader in red armour assailed by more of Melisande's magic. Even then the warrior still stood, moving after Sebastion as the Huronese man brought round his own two-bladed weapon to bear.


They met with a clash of steel as the whirling bladestaff struck out again and again, Sebastion managing to fend off attacks with such strength behind them that the blades sparked as they met. On the defensive, Sebastion saw an opening and struck down hard, blade biting through an unarmoured spot and sinking into the red-armoured soldier with a spurt of blood.


The two-bladed sword seemed to thrum in his hand.


His breathing ragged from effort as the bladestaff-wielding foe slid off his weapon to crumple on the ground, Sebastion's vision seemed to fog momentarily, blood rushing in his ears.


* * *


Heavy armour enclosed him, the smell of blood and smoke thick in the air and the cries of battle on the wind. He pulled the double-blade back, letting the red-armoured soldier slide off it; the sword thrummed eagerly, the enchanted weapon having pierced easily through the scale mail. To either side of him other Huronese warriors clashed with more of the red-armoured troops, blades clamouring. The sandy red earth was being tainted a deeper crimson by the blood of the fallen today.


Beside him a huge, metal shape thundered past, smashing the red-armoured ones aside like ragdolls; the steam-powered armour of the Black Knight belching out smoke as he came to their aid, massive axe clenched in one powered fist. Further back, the wizard yelling to him. "Commander Cornell, step back! Alban, step back! The Flame Guild are going to fireba.." the ground shook nearby as fire ripped forth, the battle-lines thrown into complete confusion, and he staggered...


* * *


The din of combat faded around Sebastion as he blinked away the red mist and the momentary vision; the few remaining bandits fled as the black-armoured warrior cut down another with his axe, but the Huronese man was left atop his horse, which whinnied fearfully and trotted around uncertainly in the carnage, the blade still feeling strange in his hands.


* * *


Wyshira's attention was focused almost wholly on Wolf as he lay twitching and convulsing in the dirt. She was sure now that the red-armored man's arrows had poisoned the tough mercenary; and that it was the poison that had incapacitated him, not the wounds themselves.


Trying to hold him still with one hand, Wyshira reached with the other for Wolf's neck, feeling with her fingers for the throb of his jugular vein. She whispered the words of her spell, pumping divine energy into him which would lock away the poison in his system and prevent it from doing further harm. Lock it away, but not banish it. It would become active again when her spell wore off, and she could only hope that a cure could be found before then.


Wyshira muttered her prayer over Wolf as the bandits fled; the red-armoured archer seemed to have made his get-away too having seen the ambush crumble. As the spell took effect, the ravaging poison seemed to halt its rampage through the ranger's system, and his comatose form seemed to calm a little, the twitching stopping. Around her, the groans of the wounded and dying bandits arose.


The black knight whistled from within his helm, and the mighty warhorse he rode gave up chasing down bandits to obediently hurry back over to him. With clamouring footsteps he strode to the travellers, axe stowed back at his side and apparently with no hostile intent. The black armour was full plate and elaborate though even this close it was hard to make out the designs, but the amulet he wore round his neck was crafted of a small ruby, artfully depicting the emblem of Urazel, a dragon coiling around a flaming brazier.


He reached up to remove his helm; his face youthful but fine-featured and a head of cropped fair hair, smiling grimly.


"Hail and greetings," he said with a nod of acknowledgement. "Angelo Dar'Averask, Black Knight Novice of Zhatan, at your services, good people." His smile became more friendly. "I was hunting those bandits. It seems you were less on the way of easy pickings than they thought, from your display of defence."