A Winter Night

[Cinnabar]

"Pay?" There is barely-suppressed hilarity in the man's voice, and unconcealed amusment in his grin. "Pay?"

He shakes his head, as if the man had offered to climb a ladder to the heavens and bribe him with mooncheese.

"What I would like, sir, is an opportunity to talk with you about this whole business." He waves a hand to take in the caves, the dais, Sventon's robes and so forth. "Without the obvious distractions present at the moment, of course. If that seems agreeable, I'll do what I can."

A brief look towards the bow-wielding types at the cavern entrance, then a somewhat critical inspection of Sventon's clothing. Hm. Regular garb beneath that white silk, which makes things a lot easier.

"No offense, but your robes make you something of a target. Would you object if I removed them?" Polite and courteous as ever.

[Sventon]

"What? My- " Sventon glanced down and creased his brow, some defensiveness initially in his tone of voice, "My robes?"

He frowned.

"Well, I guess. I mean, yes, of course. They are only robes, after all. Yes, whatever you think will help," he decided at last, clearly struggling with the notion. He raised his chin, standing very still - for his work clothes were underneath the robes; nonetheless, a little colour splotched his face.


~*~


Agnie's blade slammed into the belly of the incoherently shouting cultist, and he bent over it, crumpling to the floor with a spreading pool of blood on the stone floor, utterly incapacitated.

The other cultist still clutched his head, leaning against the door of the room where he'd shut himself away.

Blackening smoke came profusely from the cracks around the door at the end of the hall.

[Minty]

"Are you insane?! She came to -us-, and drew weapons on us...and she has used deadly force on me! This...-thing-, it is no friend! It has followed us here and means to end us!"

Ignas was pulled back suddenly, caught unawares, as he was busy with Athena, and didn't think anyone had the audacity to lay a hand on him when he was ready to kill and might inadvertently strike them. Still, he stood back. He had control. This wasn't any sort of anger or rage that had him. His decision was one of cold calculation, rather than anger or bloodlust. They simply couldn't risk it, in his opinion. "It will stab someone in the back. Think about it, Quincy. It was ready to kill us moments ago, when we were ready to simply restrain and talk."

[Rattrap]

Athena's coat fell away, shredded to some minor degree to ribbons. She was rather sore about that. There was a clean gash along one of her arms where Acteon's blade had indeed passed through the folds of chaotic fabric. The wound bled freely, but it stopped remarkably soon. Red marks left the impression of Ignas' hand where he had been pulled away - and a good thing, too, as that rapier had been rising to skewer the unnatural man from ear to ear. A violent measure, to be sure, but considering Athena had already mangled up a bit his torso without slowing him, not unwarranted.

Her long black hair framed her far-from-warrior features, one of the more central of which curled into a smile when Ariane stepped in to stop all the fighting. None of her blades were lowered, but none of them were poised against the armored woman. "Ariane, you're supposed to let me know when that rapier is going to see some action."

She glanced to each of her aggressors - and they had been the ones to initiate such, though Athena would waste no time arguing about it - and at Ariane before feeling confident enough to lower the four blades. One by one, they slipped into places at her sides. Then the cool dropped to give Ignas a vicious look: "The only 'it' here will be you after I'm done if you keep referring to me as a thing." The threat should be taken with a grain of salt, considering the lack of seriousness that occupied her expression. Athena kneeled to scoop up her poor coat and asked: "So, what's got everybody so jumpy around here?"

[channe]

Agnieszka leans over to yank the bloodstained dagger back from the man's body; blood pools at her feet for the very first time, and she has no time to think about what she has done.

Not now, at least. Right now she must deal with the matter of the two doors if she is to survive.

Behind one: a koltist enemy, one dagger, no armor. One fleet set of feet and a voice that can betray their presence.
Behind the other: Jons Feul, a man who can hold his own, who is hard to kill -- except, oh, that smoke worries her. But she can't let the koltist get even a foothold -- not when the group is so scattered, not when lives ride on it. There's no room for that kind of screwup.

Besides. She doesn't think the business she's about will take that long.

Hold the hell on, Lieut' --

So she indicates with a nod of her head that she's going to try to break down the door. "Get 'im to open the door, try that," she says, nearly subvocally; and with that, she applies to the door, turning the handle first, and if that doesn't work, turning it and attempting to force it open with a kick of her foot. If the door doesn't open -- if the koltist behind it holds fast, she'll turn and go for the door exuding smoke, expecting Rhaena to hold him there.

[Acteon]

Acteon did not stand down. He shared Ignas’s sentiment even though he didn’t voice it. His kukri was held ready to slash again and he wouldn't hesitate to if given the smallest reason. He didn't care that Athena had sheathed her blades.

That said; all that Acteon really wanted to do was get out of these caves and fast. This whole venture had been folly from the start. There had been no plan, nor any stealth. “Friendsâ€

[Altias_Bromn]

As Altias wound his way down the hallway toward the living quarters the smoke grew thicker. By the time he reached the fallen cultist, the hall was nearly black with smoke.

"Agnie! Jons!"

He shouted through the ever thickening wall of smoke, pushing the body of the dying cultist toward one wall with his boot.

They had to be down here somewhere, and from the smell of it, they were in a good deal of danger. The other girl was with them as well, though he did not know here name and could not call for her.

"Jons! Answer me man! Help me find you in this mess."

Never once did it occur to Altias that his shouting for them would alert any who might be laying in wait. All that mattered to him in this moment was making sure they all made it out of this alive.

[Vanidor]

Smoke curled out from a slightly larger hole in the sturdy wooden door. Bellowed out, was more like it, for the fire within the room was more smoke than true flame and heat. At least for the time being it was. Still, it was enough to make the indomitable Lieutenant hunker down and suck in shallow breathes. He'd always throught he'd die in a gruesome way. Like on the end of a pike, or perhaps pincushioned by a dozen arrows.

Not smothered by smoke from a fire he set himself. Jons almost laughed.

Yet here. There was yelling on the otherside of the door. Jons paused to listen to it over the crackle of his fire. A hacking laugh for truth, and he rose and thrust his hand through the hole he had made. Too damned bad he hadn't the air to make it large enough for his -head-. The dark-clad arm waved a couple of times. He was right there. Not going anywhere fast.

[channe]

And all of a sudden, there's an arm sticking out of the hole; black-clad, not silver-clad, and isn't that a sight for sore eyes.

"Hold the shithead sick, Rhae," she says, squeezing the girl on the shoulder, and then -- another welcome sight! Altias Bromn, to think that you'd be given orders by this slip of a Sister, this smirking ingrate -- to think that she'd grab you next by the arm, and muscle you forward, and give you orders.

"Don't think you 'ave an axe or somethin', do you. Lieut'! Pull the shit out of the door. Okay, Guv. Rhae's gotta hold the shithead in the closet, you help me break it down. We are getting the bloody shit out of here."

And that would be Agnie attempting to kick open the door, applying her shoulder to it, basically anything that might get the thing -- damaged by Jons' attentions -- to budge. And if it doesn't, she'd stop, kneel, and make an attempt to poke around in the door's lock-hole with her bloodstained dagger, trying to trip the lock.

[Altias_Bromn]

The shamshir was by no means and axe, but it was sharp, and relatively heavy. It could be replaced. Jons, could not.

As Agnie went about her business, Altias set about hammering at the door with the blade, careful to avoid the little upstart's head.

"Stand back a bit, Jons. We'll have you out of there in no time!"

He hoped Agnie would have a bit of luck with the lock. These were heavy doors, and it seemed the fire was faring a bit better than his blade.

[Cinnabar]

"Wise man."

Quiet words of approval, and then that dagger's in the apprentice's hands again. Two quick movements, the hiss of steel shearing silk, and Sventon's robe is slit from collar to cuffs along the top of each sleeve. The pallid fabric drops to the ground like a shed skin, pooling around the man's feet to leave him standing in his workaday clothes. No longer a sinister figure in ghostly robes, instead a bruised, begrimed and subdued young man with wrists bound firmly at his back.

Cinnabar, for his part, seems quite pleased with his handiwork, returning the dagger to his belt and nodding approval. Acteon's words have him lifting his head to scent the air, however, brow furrowing.

Well, it's as good a distraction as any, and he takes the time to usher his captive back down the tunnel towards the holding cells. Let's see what we can work out.

[Vanidor]

They hammered at the door behind which he was trapped. He had to laugh again for a moment as he saw the blade hack down at the door once, then twice. At the third time Jons laughed again, then stepped back up to the door. A moment was taken before he slid the mace out if it's place upon his hip and tossed it about. A cough before he could do anything else with it.

And this was what he did. Stood and brought the mace up to the hole his hammering had made. Then thrust the handle through the opening despite the whacking of the sword-blade. If it hit the handle, that would suck, but at least it wouldn't hit his -arm-, which was for the best.

There it was. The bashing weapon waiting to be taken... At least it was still being held by a strong hand, but how much longer could -that- last...


----------------

In the corridor further down the way a trio of men squeezed their way into it. The two to the front carried their crossbows one aimed over the shoulder of the first, and when people were seen they immediately crouched and aimed their weapons forwards. Both were dressed in the slate-grey coats of Janerio. To the rear of them stood Rautha, his usual hat pulled off of his head and stuffed into his wide belt. No weapon in his hands this time, for he was sure the other two would have -that- angle covered.

"Ariane. Start getting people out of here. I have orders to blow this place to Hades if I saw any smoke. And by Adon's Rumpled Ass I'm going to do it."

[Altias_Bromn]

The mace stuck through the hole in the door, dangling, waiting to be taken. This brought a wide smile from Altias, as he sheathed the shamshir. The mace was taken as the first of a series of lung pounding coughs overtook him.

"Got it, Jons, now get away from the door. You too, Agnie."

Altias woudl begin beating on the door as if his life depended on it, because at least one person's life did. He had yet to notice the others further down the hall, he was too engrossed in freeing the man within.

Wood splintered and cracked as he worked, the blows having greater effect as the moisture was leeched from the door by the fire within. Between blows he would gasp for air from time to time, as the smoke filled his lungs. He could only imagine how bad it was for Jons within, as black smoke rolled into the hallway with greater mass as the hole in the door grew larger.

[Minty]

Smoke. That was bad. "I don't think we have a choice but to accept its presence if people aren't going to let us kill it...it seems worse things are at hand.", he would walk behind Athena, if the group moved. Moving was probably a good idea. He didn't intend to be far from her, though. Someone with that many arms was capable of shredding through a small group of unprepared people. There was just too large a risk to -not- be paranoid.

[channe]

"Smash the door workin's, Guv!" she calls, interrupted by coughs, retreating from the wild mace-swings like she was told, for a moment standing and pointing, as she could do no else with something like that whirling in the air besides get in the way and get her skull mashed open -- "get the mechanical shit, door'll open then!"