Their defense was tiered, one layer upon
another. Wolfram carved Long Scout symbols
into the trees on the edges of the clearing,
pressing his hand on the bark next to each to
leave a familiar scent should Drift have
forgotten the meaning of the symbols. Misha
assembled the pieces of Drift's battlestaff,
Whirlwind, and wedged it into a cleft in one of
the rocks. After the fight in the storm the
staff had been too damaged to repair but Misha
had brought it anyway. Charles hung a Metamor
banner on it and Saroth asked a gentle breeze
to keep the rampant stallion insignia
visible. Merai and Tychicus prepared more
forceful surprises in case the memory jog went
badly. In the middle of it all, a pan sizzled
Finally, they needed to draw the Beast's
attention, to bring him to them on their
timetable rather than his own. Once they had
finished their preparations, Wolfram had the
answer to that: a curving ram's horn plated
with brass on the inside. Misha's brow
furrowed as he looked from it to its mirrored
twin on Wolfram's head. "Is that, by any chance, your own horn?" he asked.
"The one Drift broke off, yes. Pascal repaired it for me."
"And you didn't get it 'repaired' back onto your head?"
Wolfram shrugged. "Waste not, want
not. It'll grow back, and I get a story and a battle horn out of the bargain."
That's another awesome thing about being an
anthro. I love that Wolfram did that. :-)
Faint crashes in the deep forest heralded
the approach of the Beast, growing louder with
alarming rapidity. Charles flicked out his
Sondeshike and moved closer to Merai. His ears
lowered and his whiskers backed. "I hope this
plan works, Misha. I only survived my last
fight against him because I had... help. If he
does not remember, this will not end
well." Turning his back to the clearing and
the fire, Charles watched their backs should
the approaching beast circle around to come at their flanks.
True on two levels. Yajakali stopped one
attack. Another ensured Charles survived because
for one moment Drift recognized him.
Treetops started vanishing on a
straight-line approach from the northeast,
clouds of leaves and limbs erupting into the
air as their trunks were shattered or smashed
down. Misha tightened his grip on Whisper and
bit back the 'me, too' in his mind from
becoming anything more than a heartfelt
prayer. "Here we go, people. Stay focused and
work together. Everyones turned, save the
rat, toward the path of destruction rapidly
approaching. Misha saw even Charles glance
back over his shoulder briefly. The fox took a
breath and tightened his hands upon the haft of his axe. Saroth? Now."
Yeah, the treetops vanishing is a great visual too.
With a gesture from the weather dragon a
breeze uncoiled itself from around the fire and
raced out to meet the onrushing beast. It
carried a message, a very simple message, yet
one that stopped the Beast in his tracks; the
smell of cooking trail-biscuit. Silence
settled on the forest like an uneasy fog. Ten
of the longest seconds of Misha's life followed
before Merai broke in. "He's moving again,
slowly this time. I think he's
circling." Elemacil lowered, its point
tracking on the Beast, and a moment later Merai
amended an affirmative, pivoting in place to maintain her facing.
I like how they are reaching out to him here.
The ram banged a pan against his
shield. "Hey, Drift!" he yelled. "Yes, you,
out in the forest! Stop sneaking around and get in here! Dinner's-"
A cavernous growl interrupted him. In the
shadows of the forest, a pair of golden lights
appeared. A red mouth opened into a snarl
beneath them, lined with darkly gleaming teeth
and a tongue stained black with lutin
blood. The head of a monstrous wolf resolved
itself from the darkness, its glowing golden
eyes showing neither pupil nor white. A
crimson paw the size of a draft horse's hoof
emerged into the light, followed by its
fellow. With the arrogant hauteur of a
conquering king and the narrow-eyed suspicion
of a combat veteran, the War Wolf of Revonos
strode into the clearing. This was a creature
that expected an attack at any moment, expected
to utterly destroy those who tried, and dripped
with the blood of his enemies to prove his capability.
Exchanging a glance between them, Saroth
and Tychicus began to applaud. This had been
Charles' addition to the plan. If Drift felt
like he was still in the arena it would be the
spectators who applauded, not the
combatants. There was no contest of might to
be had from spectators. It worked; the wolf
froze in confusion with one paw lifted
mid-stride. The two dragons were the only ones
with hands free to clap but, unasked for,
Wolfram let out a whoop worthy of the Summer Festival.
And a very clever addition too! For the first
time in all this I think Caracark is confused.
The beast's head snapped around, locking on
Wolfram like a lodestone to iron. Golden eyes
bored into the ram for a long moment, then
opened suddenly wide. Ears rose, pulling its
head upward out of an aggressive snarl. Its
jaw sagged open and its lifted forepaw dropped
back to the ground, bracing as if the earth had
suddenly begun to shift like a swaying ship
deck underneath it. Silence descended on the
clearing as the applause faltered.
"Drift?" Misha spoke quietly. He hadn't
meant to, but the name slipped past his lips before he could stop it.
The effect was instant. Ears flashing
straight backwards, the Beast flinched as if
from a blow, then froze as every muscle in his
body went iron-taut. For a moment, nothing
moved in the clearing except the faint wafts of
frost that passed for the Beast's breath. Then
slowly, as slowly as an iron statue being
dragged over barren rock, the wolf's head
turned from Wolfram. Tychicus and Saroth
passed under its scrutiny with barely a
flicker. Merai warranted a tightening of the
eyes, a strangled, agonized whimper. Charles
evoked a snarl and a shiver of pelt as muscle fought muscle. And then
Kill him.
And the Beast has found its target.
To the end of his days, Misha could never
say how he dodged that first strike. All he
knew for certain was that one moment he had
been staring into the wolf's eyes from across
the clearing, and in the next heartbeat Whisper
rang in his hands as its flat smashed across
the leading edge of a red blur. The axe rang
in his head, too, a cacophony of warning tones
that he had no time to process. He had
sidestepped, but not enough: even with those
deadly jaws diverted, the huge war-wolf's
shoulder sent Misha spinning to the ground,
just barely missing a disemboweling sweep of a
massive paw already coated in the gore of
countless creatures. The fox tumbled a few feet
onto his back, the world swimming briefly out
of focus before a huge, black-toothed maw
loomed over him, teeth bared for the kill.
Whisper is your friend, Misha. You do not know
how many times you owe it your life.
Gloved hands jerked Misha to his
feet. "On- on your feet, sir." Shock stumbled
Wolfram's words, but Misha paid him no
attention. Drift had slalomed through the holy
wards and weakened patches of ground that Merai
and Tychicus had made as if he could see them. How- ?
I'm hearing Sarah Conner tell Kyle Reese, "On
your feet, soldier!" I'm sure that wasn't
intentional, but it's what sprang to mind.
The wolf wheeled around, paws splaying, and
Misha's eyes widened. He'd seen dragons take
that stance before. "Cover!" he yelled, and
tackled Wolfram to the ground as the Beast's
maw opened. As the rest of the party
scattered, Tychicus mirrored the beast's
stance, robe dropping away as he grew. His
chest ballooned with indrawn breath until the
moment the war wolf's stomach tensed, and then
dragon's fire and hell-born ice crashed
together between them like the fists of
giants. With a thunderous, ground-shaking
roar, each nullified the other. Fog exploded
from the collision of extremes, the roiling
cloud instantly whiting out visibility to a
bare handful of strides. The evenly matched
contest lasted only a second before Tychicus'
fire blasted suddenly unopposed, coring a hole
through the cloud and lighting distant trees on fire. The wolf had vanished.
Naturally, he knows when his attacked is matched;
no sense wasting energy when it won't work.
"Drift? Are you-"
Misha, you really need to stop doing that.
A wedge of Longfugos force slashed through
the air a fraction of a second too late to
intercept the blast, but it drew the Beast's
attention. "Merai! Wolfram!" Charles yelled
as he ran into the assault path. "Get Misha
out of that ice before he
suffocates!" Spinning up his Sondeshike as a
shield, he turned his full focus on the beast
before him. Filling his lungs as full as he
could make them, he shouted, "Drift Edward
Snow! You know me! You know who I am! We met
in the Arena of Blood, where you saved my life! Now help me save yours!"
The Beast snarled. Was this tiny creature
a fool? He faced Carcarak! The Beast of
Revonos! The foremost servant and chosen
champion of the Lord of the Sundered
Shield! Not even the lowest, most witless of
imps would dare to bring a shield into his presence, and this... this...
Rat...
Recognition! It was only a week ago after all!
"You don't need to fight anymore- we are
both free! Our chains are broken! Come back to us as family! Come home!"
With a deafening roar, the Beast erupted
into sudden, brutal violence. Thrashing about
like a hooked fish, he slammed his head against
nearby boulders hard enough to crack stone, bit
his own limbs until bone gleamed, and churned a
bloody circle into the earth around
him. Tattered flesh and shattered bone healed
as quickly as Charles remembered, only to be
torn and broken anew in a mad paroxysm of
self-destructive fury, and Charles backed away
in shock in spite of himself. His shielding spin faltered.
Not quite the reaction Charles hoped for, but a
few moments fighting himself is good for Misha.
Had Charles' reactions been any slower, he
would not have caught the sudden shift from
thrashing to strike. The flurry of force
punches he hurled into the Beast's path split
the wolf into three directions as it dodged,
but the ones that sprinted left and right
shattered into snow spray almost
immediately. Only the one who had leaped
skyward landed whole, staggering and
panting. Many of the hits had landed, but it
only seemed to make the beast, if possible,
even angrier. Gathering his feet back under
him in a bound, the war wolf hurled himself,
jaws agape, at Charles.... and at the same time
held back, inhaling for another blizzard.
With only a fraction of a second to deduce
which threat was real, and the tattletale chain
obliterated in the earlier explosion, Charles
set himself for a Longfugos air slash to
counter the blizzard. The farther wolf looked
solid and real, while the leaping one flickered
and shimmered as if not able to fully
solidify. He guessed correctly: the pouncing
beast passed right through him with barely a
chill. But then the far one, mid-breath,
flickered and faded and Charles had just enough
time to hear movement behind him before two
massive hindpaws slammed into his
shoulders. Adamantite-coated claws knifed into
his back, lifting him from the ground and hurling him across the clearing.
Saroth, returning to the fray, swerved out
of a swooping side attack to pluck Charles from
midair, unconscious and bleeding. He winged
away, getting the rat to safety, but the
Beast's open maw tracked on them, preparing to
blast the bronze weather dragon from the sky.
That's twice now I've let you beat my character up. You owe me big time. ;-)
Merai lifted a hand in a warding gesture, a
glowing barrier sphere rising up around her,
but the shadow-wreathed servant of the Lord of
the Sundered Shield cleaved through it with
contemptuous ease. Arriving in a blur of
speed, darkly gleaming claws carved apart the
light like swords, shadow and light tangling
and dissipating in smoky swirls and
eddies. Frosted teeth bared to bite, but Merai
and Elemacil were waiting. The holy sword
flashed, forcing the hellbeast to flinch away,
and Merai swung with all her strength, guided
by the sword's spirit toward a decapitating strike.
Nice to see something actually hurt him.
Wolfram charged into their midst, bulling
shield-first into the Beast's shoulder. Teeth
snapped shut on air instead of priestess, and
white fire furrowed the wolf's cheek and ear
rather than spearing through his
brain. Carcarak rolled with the tackle,
snarling over his stolen kill, and launched
Wolfram into the air with all four paws. As
the swordless fighter land in a clanking
sprawl, the Beast turned away with a dismissive snort.
It was a mistake he would regret only
seconds later. As Carcarak inhaled to freeze
Merai and Misha in one blow, Wolfram's hooved
foot slammed upward between the Beast's hind
legs. The building icy blast choked off in an
anguished spray of frozen shards. In instant
response, one hind foot lashed out, catching
the frantically backpedaling ram across the
shield like a thunderstroke. With that much
power behind it, even a glancing blow smashed
Wolfram off his feet, nearly wrenching his
shoulder out of socket. The Beast followed a
moment later, whirling and pouncing with a
murderous roar. Metal-clad teeth cleaved into
the ram's upraised shield, crumpling it around
his arm like cheap tin foil. His blazing eyes
promised to cleave that arm apart and then rip
out the stump, then do the same to the other
arm, then each of the legs, and then... He
didn't get the time. Wolfram gritted his teeth
against the pain, seized Carcarak's ear with
his left hand, and slammed his horned head
against the beast's brow. It didn't do any
damage, but the forgotten familiarity of the
move bought the ram a moment's pause. He put
it to best use. "Payback for when you kicked
me there, Drift," Wolfram growled, his face
dripping with blood from the Beast's gory
fur. "Back in training when we first met. Remember?"
And this is why we love Wolfram. :-)
Then Misha broke free of his
fast-disintegrating ice prison. He hefted
Whisper into a crossing block. "Drift-"
Misha? SERIOUSLY?
Drift whirled, death in his eyes, and
slammed his jaws shut on the black axe's
shaft. The runic weapon struck back instantly,
ripping life energy from the beast like a
wolverine eviscerating a rabbit. Carcarak,
desperate to stay alive, pulled every last drop
of daedra energy from the broken linking spell
embedded in the collar around his neck,
devouring every spell and enchantment ever
woven into it or through it. The collar,
overstrained far beyond anything for which it
had ever been designed, flared white-hot for a
tenth of a second before detonating, hurling
Misha, Whisper, and the War Wolf in three separate directions.
This is why you need to carefully read the safety
precautions for a Runic Weapon before touching it.
Silence fell, broken only by the TCHOKK of
Whisper burying itself two feet into a boulder as it landed.
Cradling his right arm carefully across his
stomach to avoid all of the sheared and
crumpled edges of the destroyed shield wrapped
around it, Wolfram struggled to his feet,
muttering something he'd probably have to
confess to Father Hough later. His body ached
and his shoulder screamed at him with every
nudge or shift, but it still compared favorably
to getting thrown through a wall. Merai
dropped the energy shield she had re-raised
around her, her arm nearly finished thawing,
and Misha levered himself upright, both looking
about as bruised as Wolfram felt. "I'm getting
too old for this," the fox grumbled as he
pulled Whisper cleanly from the rock. Saroth
landed in a whirl of wings, still carrying
Charles. The rat wobbled drunkenly when the
dragon set him down, but gestured that he would
be okay. His mail would need to be replaced,
as would the padded undershirt, but together
they had taken the brunt of the claw strike:
the rat Sondeckis had been too light for the
wolf's double back-kick. Only Tychicus
remained insensate, and even his eyelids were beginning to flutter.
And in the middle of them all, his
blood-soaked fur charred and blackened where
the collar had been, the mighty Beast of
Revonos lay sprawled in limp-limbed oblivion.
And he made a satisfying whump when he hit the
floor! Excellent combat sequence and an
excellent and enjoyable next chapter in Drift's tale!
May He bless you and keep you in His grace and love,
Charles Matthias
_______________________________________________
MKGuild mailing list
[email protected]
http://lists.integral.org/listinfo/mkguild
