Post #2451366 in The City of Chains, a roleplay on RPG

Perhaps fortunately for her peace of mind, Nostariel did not see the spectacularly-failed attempt at a leap, as she was caught up trying to stay alive. The men and women on these boats were a mix of poorly-armored, roughspun deckhands and what seemed to be the most elite fighters Leech had at his disposal. The boarding party they’d just dealt with had clearly comprised the middle. Coming across the gangplank, Nostariel was nearly beheaded, but she managed to lean back just in time to earn herself a nasty gash to the cheek instead. Too close to draw an arrow, she blasted the woman responsible with raw fire instead, sending her smoking over the side of the boat, probably to drown. Part of her winced, but there was simply no time to consider much of anything for long.

Lacking any significant melee capability, Nostariel knew that she had to get out of the way of the others, and quickly. Pursing her lips, she caught sight of some loose, low-hanging rigging rope, and decided that it was her best option. Channeling a much clumsier, less able version of everyone’s favorite Qunari, she ran for it, ducking past a few bewildered crewmen and shouldering her bow before using her momentum to leap as high as she could, catching the dangling rope with both hands and climbing it as several cutlasses made hasty swipes for her feet. Another occasion on which she owed her life to Amalia; she’d never have been able to support her own weight like this a few years ago. Now though, she managed to get herself partway up the rigging, bracing her feet in it as well as she could and drawing her bow again, nocking an arrow to the string and icing the projectile over. That, she fired into a knot of people making for Sparrow.

Rilien played a more flexible go-between, given that Sparrow was being attacked on one side of the boat and Lucien the other. Without the convenience of a chokepoint, both of them had their work cut out for them. Crouched behind an assassin of some kind, he used the strength in his legs to help drive his blade up into the back of the man’s neck, severing his spinal cord and ending his life, whirling in place to deflect an awkward scimitar strike with the other. Metal connected with metal, but the lightning woven into the silverite of his own traveled up the steel of the tall woman’s, and she hissed with her surprise, dropping her weapon and her only chance of survival. Swinging his body back the other way, Rilien laid open two wide slashes, one across her abdomen, and the other over her throat. A spray of arterial blood barely missed him, and he flowed smoothly to the next. It seemed Leech himself had yet to make an appearance.

She played a much poorer shield than Lucien, but that did not stop her from barreling after the deckhands who swung their blades after Nostariel—who'd impressively vaulted over their heads, dangling above them like one of those nice lasses she'd seen at the Blooming Rose. The circumstance, as it was, did not allow her to admire the woman's agility. She bullied her way into the fray, catching a man in the face with her bony elbow and allowing the momentum to catch another with her leather-clad fist. What she lacked in efficiency, discipline and a man's prowess, Sparrow made up for in pure reckless abandon, roaring like a wild-thing breaking out of a cage. It only took her a moment to snatch up her mace, and swing it in a heavy-handed arc, catching someone's shoulder and careening off into a cheek. She spun in a tight circle, avoiding a downward slash and followed up with the flanged underbelly of her mace, smashing it, two-handed, into the man's exposed chin. Teeth, lips, nose crushed inwards, spluttering florid red across her own face.

Damned thing was stuck. She grunted with the effort, trying to pull her mace from the mess-of-the-man's-skull. She poised her foot on the deckhands shoulder and tugged harder. It finally gave, but she heard a strangled cry. Someone behind her, intent on striking her down, thudded down at her feet. An arrow protruded from the back of his head. Straight through his eye socket, in all specificness. Fortunately for her, Sparrow's blind spots were covered by keen eyes, and a wicked hand. She spun the mace in a tight, controlled circle, spattering the remaining bits across the deck. Rilien always said that a weapon was best used in a clean state. She took up a defensive stance, eying the remaining deckhands she'd initially assaulted. Bloody-nose, and the one she'd elbowed. Both men, thankfully. Fighting women was still a sore subject. Bloody-nose howled or gurgled, rather, towards her, ambling to her right and wildly swinging that scimitar of his. The maneuver was laughably easy to parry, but she overcompensated. Underestimated, rather, that he would have been able to lock her mace in a standstill.

His friend, the one who smelt like dirty socks and onions, pounced to her left, driving a dagger into her hip. She didn't believe in the Maker. Not like people usually did. Lady luck, perhaps. Her boniness, probably. She felt it slip in and out just as easily, like a knife through butter. Like her fingers through water. She did not remember howling. She did not remember yanking herself away from bloody-nose, and wrestling the knife-wielder in a wild attempt to disengage herself. She remembered the body-quaking crash as they collided with the floorboards, in a tumble of arms and legs. She did not remember Ashton meeting them on the ship, either.

Lucien’s maneuvering was much less dramatic, by design: he simply moved himself across the gangplank from one ship to the other, this made easier by the fact that he was much more sure of step than the half-panicked enforcers, who were by now coming to the realization that despite the low number of their foes, they were by and large quite outclassed. He had no doubt that for thugs, they were quite stout and survivable. But they were still only thugs, self-trained, sloppy, and subject to the mental weaknesses of glory-seeking, overestimation of their own abilities, and—when these faded—fear enough to paralyze. He took what pity he could on them and chose to use the flat side of his axe to simply shove them into the water when he could. They’d chosen the wrong profession and the wrong employer, but that itself was not inherently worthy of death. Not if there was another way.

Sometimes, however, there was not. No sooner had he made it to Leech’s own boat than he was immediately set upon by three remarkably-similar-looking men; triplets, if he had to guess. Each was large, broad, and bald, though they’d all chosen different weapon arrangements: one held a longsword and shield, one a pair of cudgels, and another a bastardsword, similar in intent if not in quality to Sophia’s Vesenia. He didn’t wield it half as well as she did either, and Lucien simply turned into his blow, the blade turning on the hardened leather of his chestplate. He’d have been better off stabbing, but it wasn’t a mistake he’d have much time to contemplate. Lucien hooked his axe behind the man’s knees and pulled, sending him to the deck and smashing the butt end of the haft into his forehead with a grisly crunch, but the time he took to do it forced him to take a shield bash from the next right in the shoulder.

The man’s size was comparable to his own, and his strength close as well—the joint dislocated. With a grunt, he swung his heavy weapon one handed, cracking up and into the man’s chest cavity, but the force of his opponent falling backwards and the weapon’s own weight tore it from his grip, and his hand went immediately to his injured shoulder, and he leaned back under the horizontal swing of the first cudgel, his heels meeting a bit of air and forcing him onto the balls of his feet if he wished to stay on board the boat. Understandably, the third of the triplets was in a rage at the deaths of his brothers, and quite intent on his vengeance. The second cudgel smashed uncomfortably into the chevalier’s ribs, cracking one of them. It’d have broken several more if Lucien hadn’t known how to move after such a hit, but even so… he wasn’t in the best of positions. Gritting his teeth, he popped his shoulder back into the socket, diving to the deck as the cudgels came in for another attempt. His ribcage protested the motion, but he came up on his feet, and no longer in danger of going overboard. The nearest weapon was the longsword the second had been holding, but Lucien wasn’t going to take it, so he grabbed the shield instead, bringing it up just in time to meet the double downward sweep of the clubs.

The wooden shield groaned under the blow, but it had done what it needed to. As the blows, the force excessive and therefore rebounding much harder than was safe for the wielder, ricocheted off the wood, Lucien put his back into it and smashed the man in the face, dropping him to the deck and then rolling him overboard with a foot. Perhaps he’d survive. The knight hoped so—drowning was not a very good way to die. Picking his axe back up, he waded deeper into the battle, glad of the overhead support from Nostariel and the flitting form of Rilien, coming and going as was necessary to assist both himself and Sparrow, who for now held the other end of the boat. The numbers of thugs and deckhands both were thinning rapidly—if Leech planned on surviving this, he had to show himself while he still had men left, and that wouldn’t be much longer now.

Like a mirror image of Ashton, Garrath danced across the gangplank behind Lucien. The man had a great way of pushing across to the other boat, making more than enough room for the man to follow. However, unlike Lucien, every arrow Garrath fired was one aimed to kill or maim. The less that remained of this lot, the better. He jumped onto the deck and put distance between him and his foes-- it was better he was far from that scrap. However, the fight would soon find him either way as he soon found out. Standing unprotected in the middle of the deck was stupid and he knew it, but he didn't have a choice. For this, he recieved a flaming arrow to the shoulder. Flesh sizzled under his muted show, and he quickly ripped the arrowhead out. The bit of cloth tied to the arrow to act as the flames wick saw to it that the arrow didn't dig far, but the pain and burning was still there. One good thing about the flaming arrow though-- it managed to cauterize the wound. At least he wouldn't bleed out.

He flipped the arrow around and nocked it into his own bow, returning it to the sender. It was the only arrow he could manage on the deck as a thug drew in to engage in close combat. Garrath responded to the challenge by swinging his bow at the man-- the light timber shattering on the man's thick padded leathers. As far as he could tell, the only damage it'd done was to evoke a grunt and piss him off a little bit. Garrath managed to roll under the large sword, drawing his own scimitar as he rose. Damn that Ashton, he thought as he plunged forward edge first.

He had just dodged another slash from the thug when something began to feel off. Nausea wracked his belly and a splitting headache worked it's way through the back of his skull. He barely had the sense to fend off another strike when he vomitted. "What the hell?" He asked as his hand went to his mouth. It was blood, he had just spat up his own blood. He pushed himself backward away from the thug, stopping only to vomit again. He quickly turned and looked toward the aft. Standing at the entrance to the Captain's Quarters was Leech, ribbons of crimson dripping from his hand. Blood magic. Leech had finally made an appearance. The bloodied hand clenched, and Garrath found himself expelling more of his own blood. "This isn't good," He muttered, weakly fending off another attack.

It felt like his blood was boiling, straining to escape his veins and burst out of any possible rupture in his skin. Lucien was not entirely free of those, not after all they’d been through this night, and in the end, what Leech’s spell did was simply make him bleed more and faster. It was far from pleasant, but it wasn’t intolerable. Very little was intolerable for someone who bet his survival on his fortitude so often. Even so, his movements were slower, and a quick rogue darted in under his guard and slid a knife between a pair of his ribs, at the place the boiled leather plates of his armor joined together. Grunting with the effort it took, Lucien hauled his axe backwards, slamming the pommel into the back of the woman’s head and taking her to the ground with it. It would be better, perhaps, just to leave the knife be for now—lest the blood mage’s work cause him to lose too much of his own to remain standing. If he fell, there was no guarantee he’d be able to get back up again.

She finally bounced back from her initial tussle, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt. Dirty, spattered with blood; dry and wet alike. And already panting like a beaten dog. But, it was she who walked away alive and breathing—not that trout-lipped bastard blubbering on the ground, holding his pudgy fingers against the wound she'd opened across his throat. Hidden blades, as Rilien had taught her, often decided whether one would live or die. So did striking a man in his precious bits. Fighting fairly, with honor and propriety, had never served her well, and so she'd live to see another day. She stumbled sideways, catching Garrath's shoulder before steadying herself. He was on the ground, vomiting and she could not understand why. Vomiting blood, all over her boots. Repulsion would have been her reaction, had it not been for the searing pain cutting through her abdomen like a coal-hot blade. It felt like her intestines were falling out. Her hand fumbled across her belly, just to be sure. A savage snarl ripped from her lips as she stepped in front of Garrath, sinking her knife into the crewman's bulging eye just as he was about to strike down. “W—What's happening?” As if Garrath had an answer. Dribbles of blood poured from the corner of her lips, at the same time blood began pooling under her leathers, blossoming like ruby wildflowers.

Nostariel could do little against the hemorrhage spell, and in fact, it nearly caused her to lose her grip on the rigging, and she was forced to stop shooting, doubled over in pain and leaking too much blood from her nose and mouth especially. She was familiar with the spell, and knew it meant that Leech was somewhere nearby, though she was having trouble holding her head up long enough to tell just where at the moment, dizzy as she was. She did manage to fire off a group heal, which should help mitigate the damage, but their biggest mercy right now was that spells like this took a lot out of the caster, and they could not last forever. Rilien was of a similar mind, though he was perhaps a bit better at ignoring the discomfort of his body than most of them were. It hurt, there was no mistaking that, but of anxiety about his lack of control or fear of what might happen if the spell continued, he simply had none. Though his blood trickled down his face and poured from his wounds, he still swung his knives, still fought through the thinning tide of thugs, attempting with what force he could muster to reach the mage before he bled out instead.

Leech looked between the assembled fools bleeding on his deck with a look of utmost distaste and disgust. He counted off their number-- noting a particular archer was missing-- and simply shook his head. Of all his men, to think these few could cause him so much damage. Were they simply that good, or was he simply surrounded by idiots? Possibly a combination of the two. He rolled his eyes as he waved the few remaining men that were still alive off. He'd finish them himself. His hand flexed, drawing more of his own blood to further fuel the spell. The blood mage took his time to pick his first target, lifting his bladed staff over his head and resting in on his shoulder.

His eyes fell upon the woman nearest to him, the elf with the shorn ears. Her, he'd start with her. He simply strolled toward her-- keeping out of the way of the elf with the sunburst. There was still a lot of fight in him, he'd have to be dealt with last. There weren't any urgency to his steps, they were already in his web. The only thing he had to do was deal with the little flies. "You've all cost me a lot of money, you know," He said with an indifferent tone, "Though, it'll cost you all a lot more in the end."

He stood over Sparrow, and considered her words before revealing his bloodied hand to her, "Does this solve the mystery? The blood coarsing through your system? I control it, I tell it what to do. It's mine." He tilted his head before shrugging speaking again, "Don't worry, it won't kill you. You don't have that much time, I'm afraid," He said, lifting the bladed staff above his head. In a moment, his hands tensed about the bring the blade down before something stopped him. He stood motionless for a time and a silence echoed around the ship. In the next moment, the staff slipped out of his hand and stuck harmlessly in the deck as his entire body went limp.

The white fletched arrow sticking from the center of his forehead told the tale. He was not the only to fall either. A number of his thugs fell in quick succession until only a handful remained. Each with a white fletched arrow in his head, and those that remained without an arrow threw their weapons down. The man who paid them was dead, and they weren't about to follow suit. At the other end of the ship near the bow, the hatch leading into the lower deck was open and standing halfway out was a battered Ashton, his entire quiver emptied.

The man stood injured and bruised. He had a black eye, a cut along his jaw, his entire shoulder was moist from a wound in his shoulder, and his fingers dripped blood. He breathed heavily and winced with every exhale, a sure sign of a couple of broken ribs. The holds had not been as empty as he would have liked, apparently. He scanned the deck, counting off to make sure that all of his friends were still alive, if not up and about. Satisfied that everyone who had thrown their lot in with him was still alive. His mouth worked, trying to find the words that would fill it, but for once in his life none were coming to him. Instead, he simply shut his lips and leaned back, taking a deep breath into his lungs.

It was over.

Snippet #2451366

located in Kirkwall, a part of The City of Chains, one of the many universes on RPG.

Setting

Characters Present

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