Part 2: The meeting of paths

Seeing the strange, shadowy creature that Duar'ken has become, Sable has an idea come to mind and plucks a small piece of fleece from his spell component pouch. The old man's fingers curl around the fluffy pad, crackling with arcane energy as he incants a few specific words. Moments later a brilliant orb of light springs into life centered on Duar'ken.

When she spoke up just a few minutes earlier to Katrin to voice her concerns on what was going on in this place, it had never even once crossed her mind. Not for a second. She knew there must be more to it than ghostly, tentacled demons and slowly trudging creatures. But not once had it ever occurred to her he  would be here. That he even could  be here. How  could he be? How is he? Why the fuck  wasn't he dead?  A million neurons fired off in her brain, exploding in rage at the very sound of his name. Almost without even realizing it her body had started shaking -- trembling -- though in fear or anger she couldn't tell. Katrin is quick to voice some of the surface thoughts she had, but no words can leave her mouth for scarcely any could form in her head yet. Twice now . Her eyes were zeroed in on the mass of shadow the former spiritualist had become. Twice now this duk'hal had fallen, and twice he had defied death. What would it take? She only had a blade and her strength. If some physical means could not end him, then what could she hope to do? It was enough to give her something she hadn't felt in quite a long time -- not against any of the other demons they'd faced so far, not against the thugs who'd attacked Liliana, not even against the man himself, when he'd still been one -- pause. For a brief moment she stands, locked in a wash of anger and rage and terror and dread that threatened to consume her mind, until finally her rapid breaths reached their peak, frenetic and harried, and spilled out of her in a guttural cry of as her legs kicked into gear, dashing forward towards the beasts before her, her sword already rising as the rest of her matches suit. Her form swells in size, the adrenaline itself seemingly subconsciously triggering the giant's rune to activate as the tall orc woman nearly doubles in height upon approaching the first rutterkin. With eyes never wavering from Duar'ken, the sword crashes down upon the creature, threatening to tear it in two. Third time will  be the charm. She braces, steadying her breaths as the room comes alive in motion. I swear it.

Lilliana raises her arm into the air and clenches her fist just as she yanks her arm downward and away on the battlefield, several of the enemies flinch of they are pulled downward slightly, their bodies excessively heavier. She grimaces as she also notices Thezra's body also react with the abrupt shift in gravity, but now was not the time for such concerns and Lilli ducks behind a small cut out in the rock to give herself some cover against the numerous enemies beyond.

The rutterkin rush Thezra -- as much as they can, with Lilliana's spell weighing them down. But they are able to get to the enlarged half-orc and bat at her with toothy claws. Her armor takes the brunt of the blow and the poison that leeches off their slimy flesh isn't able to find purchase amidst her fierce constitution.  Ascian leans out from behind Akiran and calmly fires an arrow into the fleshy hide of the closest demon. The two hooded cultists draw daggers and approach the fight. Both began chanting incantations. A glow surrounds one of the axe-wielding cultists, while Thezra begins to feel her muscles seize up. She shakes off the effect with ease. The blindfolded man glances with unseeing eyes in Sable's direction as the sphere around Duar'ken flares to life again. He looks back at Duar'ken, and looks disgusted at the shadowy demon's confusion. "It's an illusion, you moron," he says in a droll tone. Then his unseeing face turns back to Sable. "Well played, but he needs all the help he can get." Fueled by this revelation and his apparent hatred for those responsible for his first undoing, Duar'ken flies through Sable's illusion and lashes out violently at Thezra. But his flurry of shadowy blows finds no purchase on the heavily armored orc. His scream of rage echoes through the chamber's vaulted ceiling.

Akiran slashes and puffs

The axe-wielders charge the two front-liners, bringing blows down on Thezra and Akiran. Akiran is able to strike a glancing blow with his sword against the axe-man. Both warriors are able to shrug away most of the impact, with their armor absorbing the rest.

Katrin peers through the conjured light swirling around the demonic shade of Duar'ken, looking past the creature to the man on the other side. She glances to her right, noting the man on the other dais, and the enemy nearest him. They're going to be a big problem. With an almost lazy wave of her hand, the hammer smashes down on the hapless rutterkin once again, leaving the creature in a staggering stupor, his brain meat thoroughly beaten and battered about it his skull. Her lazy wave turns to a quick flick of the wrist, and a small mote of radiant light flies from her fingertips towards the mage. It just misses, merely singeing the threads of his shirt, rather than his flesh. With a frustrated and quiet grunt, she steps past Thezra, and begins to make her way slowly around the perimeter of the room. 

Sable frowns at the mysterious blind-folded figure and changes tack, warping his illusion into a dense ball of brilliant light that be brings to sit atop Duar'ken's shadowy form.

The vast majority of the cultists and demons swarm upon the enlarged woman, striking glancing blows that, on their own, do little but annoy Thezra as she rages towards Duar'ken. Despite her own lack of reaction to them though, the cuts and bites begin to take their toll as they quickly amass, leaving her next two hits feeling more sluggish than normal as she cleaves the maw-arm of another rutterkin from its elbow and then turns to bash the pommel of her blade down into the chest of the axe-wielding bruiser below her.

The terror of the moment passes, but an overarching sense of dread lingers within Lilliana as she watches everyone striking out to take down the demon spawn within. She frowns with concern as Thezra is quickly swarmed by their enemies and she feels a twinge of regret at the placement of her last spell, but no time to worry about such things. Lilliana's green eyes suddenly flair a bright silver light as she once again uses her heavenly powers to exponentially increase the gravitational pull on the enemies try to surround Thezra and with grim satisfaction she watches as at least one of the rutterkin and thrown so hard to the ground with a sound of snapping bones and a wet thunk as its skull impacts hard with the floor. Without wasting even a moment,  she whips a black marble out of one of the pouches on her belt. She throws the marble over the heads of the enemies and just before it impacts with the ground she claps her hands together and the marble hovers in place... She grunts with monumental effort of pulling her hands back apart against the forces fighting against her as she digs deep within the reserves of her power, her eyes now looking like two pools of molten silver, and the marble expends out into a miniature star that begins to rapidly spin in place as it collapses down in on itself into a smaller point. The massive amount of gravity pulls towards Duar'ken, pulling him in to try and crush his essence into nothing more than raw energy! Lilliana pants with the effort, looking a little pale and drained, but she still smiles from behind her protective spot.

The remaining rutterkin slams is slimy fists into Thezra's armor again and again, but the orc warrior barely even feels it as she shrugs off the poison.

Ascian aims at a rutterkin clawing at Thezra and misses.

One of the cultists climbs the dais and reaches out a hand pulsing with sickly green energy toward Katrin, but the cleric darts out of the way. The other cultist lights up a fire beneath Akiran's feet, the dragonborn feeling it climb up and scorch the scales around his neck. The blindfolded man turns his head in Sable's direction again as the illusionist warps his spell. Duar'ken flinches at the brightly lit illusion. "You blithering idiot," the blindfolded man says. He raises his hand and snaps his fingers, and Sable feels his spell being wrenched away and destroyed. Duar'ken takes up attacking Thezra again, but the shadowy demon-orc can't get past the warrior's blade.

Akiran feints low before jumping back and slashing down hard with his broadsword. Catching the warrior off guard leaving a bloody gash, that would be sure to scar if Fortune allowed him to survive the day. Charging forward the Dragonborn slams his armored knee into the Axe wielding fighter, backhanding him with his shield hand as he withdraws.

The axe-wielding cultist is able to staunch the blood flowing from the gash that Akiran left, while the other attacks Thezra, nearly beating back the battered warrior's guard -- nearly, but not quite.

Out of the corner of her eye, Katrin notices the whirling shitstorm that Thezra seems to be barely enduring. Gritting her teeth, the Hammer moves to the last of the rutterkin, attempting another skull bash. Unfortunately, the demon ducks away just in time. "Fuck!" Her hand flies out, and a mote of radiance flies towards the demon, engulfing it in holy fire for a brief moment. A residual glow remains, making him a more obvious target for her friends.

Sable scowls as he feels his magic dispelled by the powerful stranger and twirls his staff in his hands, lashing out with his ire at the mind of the rutterkin that stands before Thezra.

The pinpricks and bites had definitely added up, forcing Thezra's rage to subside just long enough to acknowledge the danger she was starting to be in - a death by a thousand cuts was nonetheless a death after all. With a touch more calm and focus, she stares down at the pipsqueak of a demon at her feet and raises her blade up, bringing it straight down, tip first, to cut through its arm at the shoulder and cleave the thing into goo. She lets out a sigh of relief. No more of those things, please. She glances around the room just to confirm none remained. The anger in her demanded a continued onslaught, spurring her on to strike again and again, but the trickles of blood running down her legs and stomach said otherwise. Wasting nary a moment, she reaches for a small red vial on her side, flicking the cap off and downing the tiny thing quickly. Feeling the wounds start to seal up with a surge of adrenaline, she rushes to slash once more at the axe-wielding warrior before her, her amplified strength crashing down upon the man with the added fury of his axe bearing the slightest bit of her blood on it. 

As Lilliana realizes that her miniature star is not holding the insubstantial form of Duar'ken, she lets out an angry huff and with a grasping and pulling motion she forces the star to rip into a transdimensional hole and thrust it back out to a position between more solid members of the enemy group. She sets the star to spinning once more and the dagger wielding cultist suddenly finds themselves pulled backwards into the grasp of the star, straining against the incredible pull. 

Ascian's bowstring pulls back again and releases an arrow at the axe cultist swinging at Thezra, glancing into the man's side. Behind him, Ember whines,  eager to charge, but his lips remain thin and pressed together. "No. Not this time."

The hooded cultists both unleash motes of radiant fire at Lilliana and Akiran. Both Fireblades take the full brunt of the singeing force, the cold heat sapping the moisture from their skin.  The human with the blindfold simply stands, his unseeing eyes turned toward the action -- simply observing as Duar'ken makes another futile swipe at Thezra. Literally a shadow of the man he used to be, the former orc spiritual leader struggles to hurt Thezra at all.

Akiran hopefully knocks a guy out

His leg snapped, one of the axe wielding cultists drops his axe and tries to staunch the bleeding from his wound, but passes out in the process. The other one ignores his own wound to attack Thezra again, but she is able to block the axe and stop its blade from touching her armor.

Katrin's spectral hammer, after gliding over the dead rutterkin, smashes down on the cultist, slamming into his shoulder and his grip on the axe loosens slightly. He's going to be a problem. As she moves towards the man with the blindfold, she raises her shield, and the failed attack thuds dully against it. A chill comes over her as the man with the blindfold turns, his gaze burning into hers.

Salbe spots the cultists raining fire on his allies from across the chamber and reaches into the mind of one in an attempt to mask his eyes with an illusion, but the man proves unexpectedly strong of will.

Thezra feels the adrenaline continue to surge within her, drawing her eyes off Duar'ken just long enough to pivot towards the axe-wielding fool who'd been harrying her all this time. With a decisive shunk  her blade sinks deep into his body, cleaving through a good portion of it from the shoulder inwards. As the body started to slink off the end of the red-coated metal, her attention finally turns in full back towards the shadow of a man that hovered below her. A man that for some time had seemed to tower above her, wielding power and influence she could never imagine having. A man that for some time had seemed unknowable, a three-dragon chessmaster behind a veil of enigma. A man that for some time had seemed vanquished, twice slain and quickly forgotten. And yet he returned nevertheless, a man that, in this moment now, seemed all of that and more. A man far removed from any shred of humanity; from any shred of the tribe she loved; from any shred of the corrupter she'd feared; from any shred of the demon she'd seen slaughtered. "You're just a monster," she growled lowly, bearing down upon him, "a twisted memory of a man that doesn't know when its time has past." She shoots a cold stare to the blindfolded man in the corner, Katrin quickly attempting to close the gap between them in the distance. "I almost pity you. You sold your soul and this is all you've gotten for it. When you die soon just know," she pulls the gory blade from the axeman and cleaves upwards with it, attempting to carve right through the shadow's body only for the creature to narrowly avoid its arc, "none shall remember you. You'll disappear from memory like that hellish form does from this world -- a stain fading to nothing."

As the battles continues to rage on and more enemies fall around her companions, Lilliana makes a tentative move into the room, rushing around to the left side near a tall statue. Once in a relatively safe space, she turns her attention back to her star, focusing all her energy on maintaining that insane rate of spin! The robed cultist groans as they fight against the wave of gravitational forces continue to pull it in towards itself, looking to turn them asunder with the sheer force. 

The commotion from inside grows louder, and Ascian pauses as Lilliana steps inside ahead of him, wondering vaguely if he should do the same. Behind him, Ember continues to whine, the wolf's eyes trained on his companion and moving to follow as soon as Ascian takes a step toward the door. Glancing back, he stills himself immediately, pressing against the opening instead. Ember's renewed vigor isn't something to gamble lightly, and as grey eyes steal toward the blind man at the far end of the room the thought of risking it leaves him feeling even hollower than usual.  He's still contemplating it when the faint shreds of mist snake from beneath his collar and sleeves, peeling pale and incorporeal from a body only a fraction more than each. They lift haphazard and lazy before curving abruptly out the doorway, soaring past Thezra to wind dizzingly around the thing that had once been Duar'ken. There's little to find purchase in, however, and the horrified shrieks Ascian has become accustomed to following their appearance doesn't quite come. If Duar'ken is even capable of shrieking still, he's no longer sure. Brow creasing, he looks instead past the shade, lifting his bow to aim just over where it's locked with Thezra. The cultist there lifts his hands, fingers beginning to move as an arcane word rises to the edge of his lips – and it stays there, stamped forever as an arrow from the doorway plunges neat and silent through his throat.

Even as his counterpart dies to Ascian's arrow, the other cultist points at Lilliana and whispers. She feels the cultist's voice seep into her mind, the word compelling as it is simple: Release. Before she can even think about what she's doing, Lilliana's spell loosens its grip on the cultist and he flees back toward Katrin, ready to stop the cleric from any further encroachment on her part. The blindfolded man speaks as Katrin approaches. "Hello, meddler," he says simply, his expression as ambivalent as his unseeing gaze. Duar'ken lashes out at Thezra but again, cannot even draw a single drop of blood. The former orc howls in misery and anger.

Seeing a clear path to the blindfolded mage Akiran launches forward. Confident that his raw strength would be enough to break through the barrier. Charging forward with his gleaming shield leading the lunge, the Dragonborn collides with the barrier and is slammed back. Rattled his snout fixed in a confused snarl, in a fluid motion drops his sword and draws a hand axe from his belt whipping it at the mage and his barrier. Letting out a frustrated roar when the weapon smashes into the barrier and drops to the ground.  Glaring at the mage he shouts "Coward! Either piss off or get out here and fight."

Katrin barely acknowledges the cultist rushing up behind her, choosing instead to bash his head with her flaming hammer. Her hands and lips move, and a mote of radiant light flies towards the blindfolded man. To her surprise and great frustration, it dissipates on the shield he was surrounded by. "Hi. So you're the guy we have to thank for pitting a nation of orcs against a farming community?"  

With only one cultist standing, Sable twirls his staff and sends a familiar trio of magical bolts of force streaking towards the remaining man.

Thezra lashes out at Duar’ken now, finally free to focus all her attention on the shadowy abomination. Her blade cleaves into his form, and she grimaces seeing it dissipate a bit around the blade only to reform mostly in tact still.

Lilliana shakes her head to clear out the fogginess still lingering from the intrusive spell cast by the cultist and narrows her eyes in anger. With a forceful yanking motion she rips the neutron star out of existence and thrusts it violently back into being adjacent to the same cultist. Again, they fight vainly against the strength of the miniature star as it pulls them into it's gravity pull, grunting and gasping as they try unsuccessfully to pull away! "I will never release you!"

Hearing the commotion inside, Ascian casts a hesitant glance back at Ember. "Stay here. I'll be right back."  The words are quiet, a mumble; as if the wizard that is Thrandimir but not might judge him for something so callous as caring. Without another word he slinks into the large room, flattening back against the wall to duck into the shadow of a statue. No sooner have the shadows enveloped him than those shards of smoke lift from his joints again, twisting past the statue to shriek into the remaining cultists' ears. There's a yell, and Ascian watches for a second too long as decay claims the man's hand before he turns to steady his bow at Duar'ken.

The cultist, looking in shock at his withered hand, tries to pull himself free from Lilliana's spell. He fails to do so, and his body crumples into the void, leaving nothing behind but the faint smell of rot. Duar'ken raises another shadowy claw to attack Thezra, but Ascian puts an arrow right through it. The shadow screams, and pushes Thezra's blade aside, fleeing toward the whirling sphere of energy. "Pleeeaaaaaaasseeeeee!" it shrieks, any shred of dignity cast aside in hopes of survival. "Help me!" The blindfold calmly regards the shadow, as an apothecary might eye a dragonfly who's wings it is about to clip. When he speaks, the word is slow, deliberate, and as cold as the iciest Heartlands winter.  "No."

His body still smarting from the collision with the barrier Akiran decides to shift his focus to the fleeing shadow demon. Snatching his broad sword from the ground as he dashes towards Daur'ken, he shifts his stance and attempts to make a quick stab at the shadow but the coward out maneuvers him. Grunting the Dragonborn wraps his shield arm around the shadow and quickly drives his knee into the fiend's stomach, feeling something pop out of place in the creature as his knee connects. Akiran then pivots around the shadow lifting his armored elbow high and slamming into the Demon's back with a satisfying crunch as the demon collapses to the ground. His voice winded yet cocky "two for two on this chump" Spitting on what remains of Duar'ken he adds with a glare at the watcher "Hey coward, if you're gonna stick round least you can do is bring the bastard back again so I can go for the trifecta."

Duar'ken's shadowy form slowly dissipates into nothingness. No body, no pile of demonic goo, just...nothingness. There's not even enough left of him to scream as he dies. The blind man turns his blindfold to Akiran. "Not cowardice, dragon-kin. This simply wasn't my fight," he says. He lets his eyes sweep across the group.  "But you made it yours...some of you to protect your home, some of you for money, and still others because you're so busy running from your various dubious pasts that you haven't take the time to think about what you're doing." " At any rate, thank you for sparing my organization a messy and prolonged split."

"So the orcs were just pawns? Like the villagers? And what, we're your clean-up crew?" The hammer floats up beside her, her voice hard and her eyes harder.

The blindfolded gaze turns to Katrin. "The villagers at Fireblade were not meant to be part of this," he says. "For that, you have my deepest apologies. That was purely a move on Duar'ken's part. If you were seeking revenge, you have it." He ponders for a moment, then continues. "But yes, if you insist on using a Dragonchess analogy: the orcs were pawns."

Akiran twists his snout into an approximation of a human smirk  "Guess that makes you the king then, or at least an up jumped bishop?" Sheathing his sword, though his hand still rest idly on it's pommel. "So what should we call you your highness, you owe us that much for handling your dirty work after your pawn shit the bed." 

Sable's mouth twists in a grimace at the mention of running from one's past and the wizard steps forwards out of the entry way, his staff clacking on the flagstones as he meanders towards the shimmering magical sphere. "He looks like a Cedrik to me," the old man quips. "I knew a Cedrik once. He also liked to spoil all my fun."

"Cedrik" chuckles. "I am not the king. Pray that you die long before you meet him. But my name is inconsequential and thus hardly worth a reward for a mercenary." He pulls a small coin-purse from within his robes and tosses it through the barrier to land at Akiran's feet. "There. That's more fitting, yes?"

Thezra is still fuming, even as the cowardly Duar'ken once more is sliced down before she can end him herself. Matters little though -- he matters little, just as she'd told him. Strutting slowly forward, her every step lightly shaking the room as she goes, she reaches just in time for the man to toss a sack through the barrier towards Akiran. "You think you are untouchable," She glowers down towards the man, her stare boring through the blindfold toward where his eyes should be, if he even has any. "You see this king of yours and yourself as somehow beyond our grasp. A fancy bit of magic," she notes towards the invisible barrier between them, " a puppet in your stead-" she steps past Duar'ken's quickly dissipating form - "and you are unknowable; chessmasters manipulating the world from high above."  As the sack clangs to the ground ahead, she raises her blade, blood still dripping from its cold, blackened metal - "But you are wrong."  Without hesitation the honed edge of the sword drags slowly across her wrist. But there is no blood; no gash of marred flesh. Instead, a faint silvery glow rises up from around the blade, and is mirrored as there, across the barrier, beyond the veil, the faintly shimmering visage of her sword wisps into being - a soulless ghost that cuts sharply across the man's still-outstretched wrist, carving a wide valley into his flesh that seeps blood.  The man stumbles back staggered, clutching at the wound, but the damage has already been done. "You offer us a gift, there's yours." She stops just before the barrier, stabbing her blade down through the sack of gold to pin it to the ground, then shoves it up against the barrier. "We don't want your blood money. Keep it, you'll probably need it more. Use it wisely to consider this: no one  uses my-" she pauses, looking back towards the others. Towards Katrin, and the innocent people of the Fireblade that had equally fallen prey. "- our  people as pawns. Remember that when you tend to that arm there."

Recovering from his sudden wound, the man stands and straightens his robes, looking at Thezra with a mild look of interest, surprise, and amusement on his face. "You seem quite angry, child," he says. " I  did not use your people as pawns. Duar'ken was the one that looked to the Abyss for power. We used demons. He used you. And he has been punished for it. Think on that  for a few moments." He waves his hand, and Thezra winks out of existence. The money she had pinned against the barrier drops to the ground and rolls back to Akiran's feet.  "Worry not," he says. "She'll be back in a minute or so." Thezra finds herself in a void, the light around her diffused and dim. There is nothingness as far as the eye can see.

Katrin gives Thezra a grateful look. Which then turns to slight confusion and wariness when the woman disappears. She shifts her grip on her shield slightly. "Why demons. If you think you're just going to be able to disappear and we'll forget everything that happened, then you don't know the woman you just sent away. She's not going to let this rest. Hells, I don't know if I can let this rest."

"The demons were useful to my organization, for a time," he says. "But their chaotic nature proved...more problematic than helpful in the end. But I don't care if you forget everything that happened. I can assure you, Fireblade is in no more danger now than the rest of the world. And the corruption within the orcs of Ore'Agah died with Duar'ken...at least, as far as the demons are concerned."

Eyeing the pouch of gold at his feet, the dragonborn is surprisingly unsurprised at both Thezra's outburst and then her magical disappearance. As the orc is blipped from existence, Akiran's usual calculations begin playing through his head. Cedrik clearly has strong magics and taken at his word didn't kill the orc when given clear reason to. Better to play this friendly for now, and see what we can get from him. His voice losing it's sardonic tone and taking on a more amiable if not friendly quality "So where from here? You're clearly a man of power and restraint, and we have already proven ourselves a nuisance." With a nod to Katrin "And as she said, some will not be able to let this go, and the biggest surprise  is that you don't seem to want us dead. Combined together this could cause us to become a thorn in your side......"  Akiran pauses holding the thought for a moment as his grey eyes focus on the mage  "if we are not properly informed. Perhaps if you fill us in on what you and your organization hope to accomplish, we may stand down." Lowering his eyes to the gold sack before raising them again  "You said it yourself, I'm a mercenary perhaps with the right words and a good price we could even become allies." He had no wish to work for demons but better to hear them out than wind up wherever the hell Thezra was.

Vesh  said: " "We don't want your blood money. Keep it, you'll probably need it more." "Speak for yourself, Thezra,"  Sable chuckles quietly, flashing a wink at Akiran. The wizard paces back and forth while the others talk, inspecting the magical barrier with careful interest. "I can't help but be inclined to agree with our dragonborn friend."

"Cedrik" lets out a sharp laugh at Akiran's words.  "So, what? If I don't hire you, you'll try to sabotage our work? You haven't even got the slightest clue what our work is. You don't know who I am, you don't know who I work with, you don't know our goals. Pray tell,  how  exactly will you become a thorn in my side?"