Trail to Charn (Part 3)
Critias turns a wrathful gaze at the door. Then he hears the strained voices of the sorcerers. He glances at Aya and Aryia, in their forms. He felt the evil wrongness, but perhaps in this form he was able to resist it. Or perhaps he's was just lucky. Regardless, he can distract and buy time for them to recover. Releasing his spell of invisibility, "Here I am!" he calls out. "Here I come!" His voice grows louder and deeper, as he swells in size and height…
With quick strides that is not quite a run, but might as well be one, Seldan takes off down the hall. With the rest of the group invisible, it is only Critias' shout that guides his step through the door to the left where the rest of the party has gone. He stops and quickly looks around, then looks after where the man has gone.
GAME: Critias rolls knowledge/arcana: (4)+14: 18 GAME: Critias rolls strength+4: (18)+6+4: 28 GAME: Telamon casts Disintegrate. Caster Level: 15 DC: 24 GAME: Telamon casts Haste/Quicken. Caster Level: 15 DC: 25
Critias finds himself in the middle of the party. At least that is his best guess, based on the sounds and scents he detects from the otherwise invisible sorcerers. He also guesses he can't do anything about the feeling of weakness emanating from the room. At least not from outside of it. He leaps onto the opposite wall, then pushes off with one foot to pinball back and over Aya and Aryia's forms so that his other knee smashes down the door. Even as he lands his arms grasp something on the roof and adjusts his descent so that he shimmies through the opening, aided by a subtle reduction in size before landing in the room in a three point stance.
Telamon pulls himself upright. Focus! His eyes fill with starlight, as he raises his hand, pointing at the wall in front of Aya and Aryia. "Ilim sugzag, gu ubri sahar," he hisses, and a searing beam of blue-white light strikes the wall, causing it to crumble away and reveal what lies beyond. Then he snatches a tiny handful of Time, and spits out, "Lukas, sa-i'iz!" A silver flash lines his invisible form for a moment, then jumps to Aya, Aryia, Critias, Cor'lana, and Seldan. Quickening their limbs, as he calls to Seldan, "My noble friend, my lady love is deeply weakened. Please, tend to her first!"
GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (9)+22+2+1: 34 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (8)+22+2+1: 33 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (4)+22+2+1: 29 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (12)+22+2+1: 37 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-5: aliased to weapon0+2+1-5: (10)+22+2+1+-5: 30 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-10: aliased to weapon0+2+1-10: (20)+22+2+1+-10: 35 (THREAT) GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-10: aliased to weapon0+2+1-10: (3)+22+2+1+-10: 18 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-15: aliased to weapon0+2+1-15: (1)+22+2+1+-15: 11 (EPIC FAIL) GAME: Aryia rolls crunch-1: aliased to 2d10+strength+2-1: (5)+1+2+-1: 7 GAME: Aryia rolls crunch-1: aliased to 2d10+strength+2-1: (9)+1+2+-1: 11
Aya focuses herself as things have gone from bad to worse. This starts with standing full upright again, and steeling herself against further magical assaults. Then what shadows are not occupied by the black smoking monstrosity are called and cling to her, darkening her flesh further. "Ready yourself, sister!" Hearing Telamon, she glances to the rushing Seldan and nods, "Tend her. Quickly!"
GAME: Seldan used a Potion of Lesser Restoration. GAME: Seldan rolls 1d4: (2): 2
The instructions reach Seldan's ears first. "Where are you, my lady?" Even as he speaks, he draws from his knapsack a box of vials, and quickly locates his requirements. The first is uncorked and offered to wherever the voice is. "A great evil struck you. What have you found?"
Aryia, wavering after getting rocked, grits her teeth as the others gird themselves. A glance to her disguised sibling. A firm nod. Breath In. Out.
Shimmering lines of energy race across her arms and face as her fists glow a pale moonlight. And the disguised slave bursts forward through the crumbling rubble of the wall, into the sulfurous, blasphemous room.
A hail of strikes attempt to assail one of the cultists, trying to cull the weaker one- wait, shit, this was- she redoubles her efforts, snarling as only a few strikes land.
GAME: Aya rolls will: (13)+17: 30 GAME: Aya rolls will: (6)+17: 23
There's a thickening of the smoke and then the demon, or the presence of evil seems to vanish. Meanwhile the clerics that did the summoning all quickly begin prayers of dark eldritch words, some moving a little away from those threatening them as they begin their works of magic.
GAME: Aryia rolls sense motive: (3)+24: 27 GAME: Ravenstongue rolls Sense Motive: (2)+24: 26 GAME: Telamon rolls sense motive: (6)+23: 29 GAME: Critias rolls sense motive: (2)+18: 20 GAME: Seldan rolls sense motive: (7)+19: 26 GAME: Aryia rolls sense motive: (6)+24: 30 GAME: Ravenstongue rolls Sense Motive: (14)+24: 38 GAME: Telamon rolls spellcraft: (18)+16: 34 GAME: Ravenstongue rolls Spellcraft: (1)+17: 18 (EPIC FAIL) GAME: Aryia rolls spellcraft: (19)+3: 22 GAME: Critias rolls spellcraft: (7)+24: 31 GAME: Critias rolls 23: (15)+23: 38 GAME: Critias rolls 23: (8)+23: 31 GAME: Critias rolls 23: (2)+23: 25 GAME: Critias rolls 23: (13)+23: 36 GAME: Critias rolls 23: (7)+23: 30
Seldan's potion finds its target. Cor'lana takes it and drinks, coughing a little.
"Be careful--Aya looks--Aya looks strange, not like herself. I don't like it," Cor'lana says gently to Telamon and Seldan. She rises to her feet and murmurs an incantation as she touches Telamon with it. It's a protective measure against the demon. Maybe not much but it's a little.
She retreats back into the hallway, breathing harder than she's ever breathed.
GAME: Critias rolls 1d6+21: (5)+21: 26 GAME: Critias rolls 1d6+21: (1)+21: 22 GAME: Ravenstongue casts Magic Circle Against Evil. Caster Level: 14 DC: 20 GAME: Telamon casts Fireball. Caster Level: 15 DC: 21 GAME: Aya rolls will: (7)+17: 24 GAME: Telamon rolls 1d20+sorcerer+4: (4)+15+4: 23 GAME: Aryia rolls reflex+1: (8)+21+1: 30 GAME: Aryia rolls reflex+1: (4)+21+1: 26 GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+10: (19)+10: 29 GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+10: (19)+10: 29 GAME: Telamon used a Rod of Normal Persistent. GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+10: (14)+10: 24 GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+10: (18)+10: 28 GAME: Aryia rolls perception: (4)+31: 35 GAME: Telamon rolls perception: (15)+23: 38 GAME: Ravenstongue rolls Perception: (11)+18: 29 GAME: Seldan rolls perception: (7)+25: 32 GAME: Aryia rolls perception: (18)+31: 49
This has rapidly gone from a covert insertion to a full blown assault. Demons, cultists, Critias going beastman again... well, might as well make it official. "Fire in the hole!" Telamon calls, before rapidly incanting a spell, channeling the energy along his metamagic rod before flinging it into the room. There's a fiery WHOMPH as flames lick outward in the expanding fireball, washing over two of the clerics as the sorcerer curses. "Crap, we need more firepower here..."
Aya vanishes without a trace, and meanwhile the cultists move around the room. They seem... Very in sync and determined.
GAME: Aryia rolls 1d100: (87): 87 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (20)+22+2+1: 45 (THREAT) GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (18)+22+2+1: 43 GAME: Aryia rolls crunch+crunch-2: aliased to 2d10+strength+2+2d10+strength+2-2: (12)+1+2+(13)+1+2+-2: 29 GAME: Aya rolls fort: (1)+22: 23 (EPIC FAIL) GAME: Aya rolls will: (4)+17: 21 GAME: Aya rolls will: (11)+17: 28 GAME: Seldan used a Potion of Lesser Restoration. GAME: Seldan rolls 1d4: (4): 4
Aryia's head snaps over at Telamon's warning, her quickly catching on as she shoves the cultist away, quickly crouching and leaping into the ceiling to avoid the rush of flames. She falls down into a crouch. The evil is gone. Lana says the Aya isn't herself. "THAT BITCH HAS MY SISTER!" she gestures broadly, angrily fiercy. "GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE CELLS, DICK HEAD!"
The pugilist's form becomes an after image as she dips, slides, hops and rockets down the hallway, down the stairs, and coming to a sliding stop right in front of her disguised sibling.
"F-CK Y-U!" she coughs and hisses, the blinding speed briefly picking up as the mute suddenly shoves forward and smashes Aya's head against the cell bar with a loud >CLANG!<, a brilliant burst of light coating the room as it seems to stick to the other mul'neissa. She isn't going anywhere. <Handspeech/Tongues>
Unable to see what is happening in that room, Seldan knows only what Lana and Telamon have said, those closest to him. Then, the scream rips across the house. "Withdraw!" he snarls. "The demon has her and we we cannot be seen here! Withdraw!" He does not move, instead handling another vial to RT and drawing his blade, waiting for the others to do as he bids.
GAME: Telamon rolls spellcraft: (15)+16: 31 GAME: Critias rolls spellcraft: (18)+24: 42
The priests work together now, their voices lifted in ominous unison. They are clearly doing something that is not good, and it's not hard to make a guess as to what it might be.
Meanwhile Aya's eyes are black-turned, but remorseful. Her hands covered in blood. Something evil boils to life inside them, but she doesn't move. Not yet.
GAME: Ravenstongue casts Greater Invisibility. Caster Level: 14 DC: 21 GAME: Ravenstongue casts Hideous Laughter/Quicken. Caster Level: 14 DC: 23 GAME: Aya rolls will: (6)+17: 23 GAME: Aya rolls will: (5)+17: 22
Cor'lana accepts the potion, and while she's not fully right as rain, she looks better in that brief moment where she's no longer invisible due to her spellcasting. "Thank you," she says. "I'm headed downstairs. Join me and let's get this demon _out_ of her, if we can."
Invisibility magic shimmers over her again with a few murmured words, and then she disappears downstairs. Once she gets Aya in sight, she says a few choice words, aided by magic:
"Is that an imp in your pocket or are you happy to see me?"
Really, she doesn't think that's very funny, but it was the only demon pun she had in--
Oh, no, that's _laughter_. No one can see the expression Cor'lana has on her face to see that it worked, but hey.
GAME: Telamon casts Reverse Gravity. Caster Level: 15 DC: 25 GAME: Telamon casts Dispel Magic/Quicken. Caster Level: 15 DC: 25 GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+25: (10)+25: 35 GAME: Telamon rolls sorcerer: (19)+15: 34
Critias hears the calls for a retreat, and then of course there was Aryia's cryptic signaling before that. Critias darts through the ruined wall, runs up and along walls in the hallway to make it past his comrades, and then dashes down the hallway on the other side. He caps it off with a loping run down the stairs that starts as an acrobatic roll, then dissolves into an uncontrolled tumble before somehow ending up on his feet and one hand in the prison room once more.
Things have spun out of control, and Sir Seldan, wisely, is calling the retreat. Telamon's face twists in anger, though -- he hates doing so. As the priests begin to chant again, he snarls, "Oh no, it's not THAT easy!" His fingers form a complex pattern, and the air takes on a chill. Ice forms on the walls in fractal patterns. And Telamon incants, "Atuku, sag zigara, emagar pagra!" Suddenly, down is -up- and the four priests are sent flying into the ceiling with loud thuds. Telamon snatches another stolen moment of time, focusing on the circle for that stolen second: "Emegar sag dar!" he chants, pointing at the circle -- and the light of it goes out! Enough for him, he whirls and runs for the door. "I'm out, sir knight! Let's go!"
Aya just had her forehead slammed into the bars of a cage. She is momentarily concussed. She is blinking away starts of light from her eyes. Those are just two of the more pleasant things in the past few moments.
She is swooning; laughing; her eyes are watering. Cor'lana's quip may be more on point than the sorceress believed. Aya has no imp in her pocket, but she does have something in her, that makes her realize she's had more daemon than Daed there in the past... year?
She can barely breathe, much less speak but she can still move, just a little. One hand making shaky, curt words.
"Don't stop. Keep it down. Beat it. Sister." She isn't the only only hampered.
GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (9)+22+2+1: 34 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (5)+22+2+1: 30 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (8)+22+2+1: 33 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (12)+22+2+1: 37 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-5: aliased to weapon0+2+1-5: (11)+22+2+1+-5: 31 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-10: aliased to weapon0+2+1-10: (11)+22+2+1+-10: 26 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-15: aliased to weapon0+2+1-15: (10)+22+2+1+-15: 20 GAME: Aryia rolls crunch-1+crunch-1+crunch-1+crunch-1: aliased to 2d10+strength+2-1+2d10+strength+2-1+2d10+strength+2-1+2d10+strength+2-1: (3)+1+2+-1+(8)+1+2+-1+(11)+1+2+-1+(4)+1+2+-1: 34 GAME: Aya rolls fort: (10)+22: 32 GAME: Seldan casts Wall of Force. Caster Level: 16 DC: 23
Aryia steadies her breathing as many, many things are folding in on this moment. Things are happening upstairs, the seconds are precious. The timing is shit, but it could never be more right. And here she finds herself in a position in the same manner as before.
Her shining eyes water, fists clenched and shining. They glance down at the taut, barely made movements.
There wouldn't be a next time for this. One more breath In. A small, teary nod. Out.
A sudden kick to the skull whips out before a hail of shining punches dart against her sister's form, the light shed clinging and keeping her- and what's inside her- locked into this reality. The pieces are here. The pieces are here...
Even as Aryia pummels the demon it manages - somehow - to stay inside Aya. Is there more to this than meets the eye? It stays within the woman, and her words dissolve into choked chuckles and shaking fingers.
GAME: Ravenstongue casts Suggestion/Persistent. Caster Level: 14 DC: 22 GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+17: (6)+17: 23 GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+17: (5)+17: 22 GAME: Ravenstongue casts Shield/Quicken. Caster Level: 14 DC: 22
Cor'lana pads forward on invisible steps. There's, in truth, so many things going on in her mind right now. There's fear. There's anger. Anguish of her own sort. And yet there's Seldan, who is remaining so calm and collected in the face of all of this. And yet there's her husband, Telamon, who remains so stalwart in all of this. And yet there's Aryia, who's trying her hardest to get the demon out of her sister.
The demon that Cor'lana has a blade for, bartered by a deal that has now tormented her little brother, and yet remains undrawn in her bag.
_What would Mother do?_
Ah. Yes.
It's a deep-voiced, husky tone that leaves Cor'lana, not even really recognizable as herself. "Why don't you come out and play, darling fiend?" she asks, magically enhanced by the power of the enchantment magic running in her veins.
Maybe it'd work. Hope beyond hope, insanity beyond insanity.
GAME: Telamon casts Dimensional Anchor. Caster Level: 15 DC: 22 GAME: Telamon rolls ranged: (17)+9: 26
Critias watches Aya. He watches as her sister trying to deal with her, and then Cor'lana tries a different approach. Critias runs his gaze over their surroundings, and the slaves. He's no demon banisher. An investigator, maybe, a nature warrior, well he tries, and scout, perhaps. Wait, a scout. A quick glance tells Critias the stairs are still clear. He focuses his senses and sends his Sight beyond the secret door and into the sewer tunnel on the other side.
GAME: Telamon casts Mage Armor/Quicken. Caster Level: 15 DC: 23
Telamon watches with wide eyes as Lana makes her entreaties to the fiend in Aya's flesh. They've managed to hold her down... for now... but it's like a nightmare, as the mul'niessa woman writhes in mad laughter. Telamon begins to chant softly, planes of force snapping around him, before he invokes another spell, a greenish beam leaping out to connect himself and Aya. Locking her in place spatially, preventing her -- or the demon in her body -- from escaping. "Nowhere to hide, nowhere to run, fiend!"
GAME: Aya rolls will: (11)+17: 28 GAME: Aya rolls will: (14)+17: 31
Aya could not keep it out; it is (or has) a part of her, afterall. They are tied together. It might work both ways, though, so she embraced her failure and sought to keep it in; if she was off-balance and couldn't do anything, neither could it. It knew this, and had already tried to escape to one closest to her in both distance and semblance. All the more reason she fought it. Now, though, she is weakening. It has a renewed vigor. New enticement. It must be that time again.
Aya's laughing alters more to retching than cackling and she spasms as vile black smoke is ejected with each gagging, crying, chortling, gasping, twitching exhale.
GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (20)+22+2+1: 45 (THREAT) GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (4)+22+2+1: 29 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (11)+22+2+1: 36 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (18)+22+2+1: 43 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (1)+22+2+1: 26 (EPIC FAIL) GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-5: aliased to weapon0+2+1-5: (11)+22+2+1+-5: 31 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-10: aliased to weapon0+2+1-10: (6)+22+2+1+-10: 21 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1-15: aliased to weapon0+2+1-15: (13)+22+2+1+-15: 23 GAME: Aryia rolls punch+1: aliased to weapon0+2+1: (14)+22+2+1: 39 GAME: Aryia rolls crunch-1+crunch-1+crunch-1: aliased to 2d10+strength+2-1+2d10+strength+2-1+2d10+strength+2-1: (13)+1+2+-1+(9)+1+2+-1+(10)+1+2+-1: 38 GAME: Seldan rolls reunion+se+pa+haste+2: aliased to weapon1+charisma-4+1+2: (5)+24+8+-4+1+2: 36
So much is going on. Aryia's heart is racing as she's expecting the pain to come. But instead of what was expected: Aya turning and wailing on her. Instead... instead. It's ejected. It's out. It's pouring, pooling, forming-
There is no time for panic. For gasping. For unnerved knees shaking. The mute pugilist must do what her and her sister have spent countless hours, days, weeks, months, even a year on. Aryia juts forward.
And a shining SLAP crashes through the smoke, the moonlight clinging to it's form. Momentum carries as more moonhued kicks carved into what she could hit. But she was hitting. She was hitting! She was hitting! "IT'S TIME!" she gestures to the group, light diffracting off the cell bars. As her light is keeping it locked in this plane. <Handspeech/Tongues>
GAME: Seldan rolls reuniondmg+sedmg+sedmg+padmg: aliased to 1d8+9+8+8+8: (8)+9+8+8+8: 41 GAME: Aryia rolls will: (11)+17: 28 GAME: Aryia rolls will: (18)+17: 35
Seldan needs not be told twice - or, indeed, at all. The presence of the smoke makes the situation clear enough, even as he finishes the wall of force and dashes to join the others. Reunion comes out, even as he runs. "You show yourself. In the name of the Holy Dreamer, you are mine, demon!" The sound of gleeful laughter in the voice of a crotchety old man echoes his words, and the blade comes crashing down into the smoke, shining with a silvery light.
The demon's unnatural black smoke tries to pour itself down Aryia's throat, seeks entrance through her eyes and ears, but her fury keeps it at bay - at first by small measure, but then with concentrated force it is rebuffed and takes vague form before them. It looks like Aya... were she a demon. "Almost had you sister." It licks its lips.
GAME: Ravenstongue casts True Strike/Quicken. Caster Level: 14 DC: 22 GAME: Ravenstongue rolls melee+20+1+2: (6)+8+20+1+2: 37 GAME: Ravenstongue rolls melee+20+1+2: (18)+8+20+1+2: 49
It's the moment she's been waiting for.
The feytouched child is here, having made a deal with the queen she, in some darkest part of her Unseelie bloodline, admires, fears, loves, hates, cherishes, abhors--but that is only natural, for love and hate are two sides of the same coin. But for this moment, she forgets it all--and relishes within it. For this moment, she is the raven.
And she is about to soar.
"Watch me take flight," she murmurs--to Grandfather, to the Queen of Air and Darkness, to Ni'essa the Skysinger, to Vaire the Lady of Inspiration, to Zalgiman Joaki who dwells in the Halls, to all of the ancestors who have lived and died and _live again within her_. Her finger runs across the the sewing needle hidden in her sleeve. She feeds the pact mark on the chest and she hums with power. She feels the pulse of knowledge within her, knowing so much more now, knowing exactly what she needs.
She strides forward and she pulls that terrible blade from its bag. She feels its weight in her hands, that horrid blade of truedeath that she's guarded and kept, that she's come to dread as much as its name implies and befits. But in this moment she names it an ally. In this moment she turns the hate to the other side of the coin into a love, because that's why she did it to begin with, because she knows this demon's hands once wrapped around her husband's neck. She knows this demon once tried to kill that which she loved more than anything in this world, and to that: she will only repay it with the same.
An incantation falls from her lips to strike true, faster than ever she's recited it before. Because she is not alone, because she hears all of Them singing in her head. Her mother is with her, everyone is with her--
And the blade sinks into the demon's stomach, and before she knows it, before she realizes it, the blade moves of its own accord. Tearing up through the demon's body and shreds it apart, seeking the heart. Cor'lana's arms are soaked with its blood and she watches, _watches_, with bright and glowing violet eyes as it's unmade before her. Turning to ash before her, like her mother did before her eyes.
Like how her mother died.
But it's the poet who speaks first before the rest of her does, the words falling from the lips of Cor'lana Lupecyll-Atlon, inheritor of Apotheosis, beloved child of Alud'rigan, the Feathered One... wielder of Mortal Dread.
"Today, everyone lives."
And then the tears fall from her eyes, unbidden. A weight off of her so massive and so large. A victor. A conqueror.
-End