[Log] Don't Kill the Messenger
Who: Agrias Oaks, Reis Duelar, Simon Parker, Starfire
Where: House Oaks - Kingdom of Ivalice - Fantasy Sector
When: 07 September 2008
What: Simon attempts to drag Agrias back to the IPA, which doesn't end nearly as well as he would have hoped. The Balseraph ends up cursed for his efforts, prompting Reis and Starfire to come to his rescue.
Watch For: Only mostly dead. Right?
Warnings: There is a bit of "ick" factor with violence, here, but it is fairly glossed over and generalised. Still, if you're not comfortable with that kind of thing, consider yourself forewarned.
Fantasy Sector - Lesalia Imperial Capital
Lesalia Imperial Capital lay at the heart of Ivalice, in the central province of Lesalia. It is among the largest cities of this medieval kingdom, as well as one of the most ancient. The city has closely-packed houses, made of timber and sloped roofs, that hug to winding narrow streets. At the center of the city is an immense castle - the palace of the Ivalician royal family. It also houses the Senate, and countless nobles.
Contents:
Agrias Oaks
Reis Duelar
Simon Parker
Starfire
Obvious exits:
Northeast leads to Fantasy Sector - Nelveska Temple.
The howling wind of winter has claimed much of the southwestern Lesalian province by this point. Ice and snow are a common sight, even this early ahead of true winter, and they seem by far harsher than any natural winter that the land has contrived.
Such severe weather isn't without its toll, either. Many have been slain by a complete lack of preparation for this kind of weather. There's little in the way of foodstuffs for many of the smallfolk to store. Drought had struck this harvest season, and it seems in this regard, their luck has turned from bad to worse. Fresh graveyards have sprung up in many a town as a result.
It's near one of these resting places that a fresh contingent of soldiers roams. These, however, are not of the Crown, the Church, or any hue between. They bear the tattered raiments of House Oaks, an estate and family long since thought dead. One soldier hols the forefront, mounted on a fearsome steed - a chocobo, or what was once a chocobo. Alkoun has since succumbed to the Plague of the Unliving, a frightening creature neither living nor dead. His plumage is stark white instead of yellow, each feather frosted with black as they were in life... but there's a strange quality to the black. His large eyes are almost invisible; pools of luminsecent cyan, fiery and ethereal. His barding, too, is different; done up in the black and silver of the Scourge, all fearsome spikes and hard angles.
He scratches restlessly in the snow under the burden of his master. She, too, has been transformed thoroughly. Agrias Oaks is no longer human; that much is certain. Her skin is scant more hale than the snow they tread over. Just as in life, she wears no helm. Her hair is stark white, and her eyes the same glowing cyan of the Scourge. Her armour is a light-swallowing black, emanating a subtle wrongness; but not quite as wrong as the great zweihander strapped across her back - Rimehowl, the source of this unliving winter.
Her eyes rake the graveyard, the cyan light reflecting from the closest plates of armour to her face. "Search the graveyard." She commands a close contingent of revenants, the ghostly soldiers in hues of blue and the same fel cyan of the Scourge. Their apparent captain nods, turning and silently directing his warriors, fanning out and searching the graveyard for the resting places of theives, brigands, soldiers, and fighters. The farmers are useless to them.
I do not have time to train peasants, the Lich King agrees, in her head. Agrias remains stock-still in her saddle, even as Alkoun flicks a bleached white crest. Take what you might find, here, and raise them to the Scourge.
"Yes, my Lord," she hisses. But there is a faint note of displeasure in that voice, a faint flicker of yellow behind that Scourge-cyan.
She is certainly stubborn. She may be made ot serve, and she may be made to do things that she hates, with a frost wyrm set upon her to train her in the use of a Death Knight's skills and to guard her - but even with threat of such a large creature upon her, she will never be broken.
She twists in the saddle with a creak of leather, facing the revenants of House Oaks; her close honour guard. "Thee shall accompany my progress through the graves. If thou shalt find anything useful at all, thou wouldst do well to make it known."
Her brothers practically simmer. Her father and mother, however, merely look disappointed and very, very tired. All four ride their own ghostly chocobos, though none of them look as fierce or fundamentally wrong as Alkoun.
Together, they trudge as one through the graves. Skeletal attendants walk alongside the Death Knight and her honour guard, prodding the snow and exposing headstones to view when they're directed.
Agrias' next few moves were painfully obvious. Murder townsfolk, raise them as undead-scavenge graveyards like a vulture, raising anyone who'd make a good addition to her 'army'. A stranger has been haunting Southwest Lesalia, asking after the province's new master. He's gained scant information from his inquiries, but it's enough. It's enough to bring him to this graveyard, bundled in a heavy winter cloak to ward off the chill. A familiar sword is strapped to his back, but his face is shadowed by the cowl.
"Oaks," says Simon Parker. "Call off your minions." Heavy boots crunch through the snow as he fearlessly approaches the Death Knight, raising a hand in greeting. "Whatever you seek here, you'll have to go through me to get it." His tone is deadly serious, devoid of its usual sarcasm and smugness. "I'm here because I respected the woman you once were, and I'm not afraid to destroy you."
A hand reaches behind his back, and draws the Bloody-Handed Judge from its sheath.
"Single combat."
At the sound of the voice, a forest of spears raise, and about a dozen bowstrings are nocked and trained on the newcomer. Yet these Scourge-sworn remnants hold their attack, waiting for the word from their master.
Agrias turns Alkoun in an almost lazy circle, raising a slender white brow in askance.
How perfect, the Lich King asserts, tendrils of ice wrapping around her mind and slowly numbing her thoughts; quelling the residual anger of the real Agrias Oaks - the one who still resists this puppetry. Is he not of those you hate the most, my Knight? But you need not kill him. No, he would never serve the Scourge. Such a pity. But perhaps you may yet punish him for his insolence, comes the insidious suggestion.
A chill whip of wind snaps across the graveyard, and if Simon doesn't reach up to hold his cloak's hood, it'll whisk it right off the top of the Balseraph's head.
But if he's perceptive, mayhap he'll see a faint flicker; the look of somebody deeply unhappy with what they're about to do.
Another gust of scouring winter wind sweeps the shallow valley, and both expression and hesitation are gone. Agrias turns on Simon, prodding Alkoun forward a few steps before reining him in.
"I thought thee wouldst have better sense than to come here alone." She shakes her head, tilting her head to look down her nose at the demon. "But if that is thy wish, than so be it. I will not, however, grant thee such a clean death..." She smiles, nastily. "No. 'Tis too clean, for the likes of you..."
Pull out his eyes, the Lich King states crisply, and grant him eyes of stone, that he might see only that which was never meant to be seen. Would it not be fitting?
"Yes, my Lord." She reaches up, sliding Rimehowl down from the makeshift holster at her back. "Back," she calls, to her honour guard. "This one is mine, and mine alone."
The remnants of the Oaks bloodline back away, but they watch Simon with interest. Lord Argus Oaks tilts his head a bit, whispering something to Lady Addien Oaks, but whatever they say is lost to the spirit-world. Her brothers maintain their matching deeply unhappy, and perhaps slightly murderous-looking, scowls.
Curiously, there is no third brother there.
Agrias climbs down from Alkoun's saddle, landing easily and with no trace of injury in her right leg. It looks like it really was healed. She hands the reins off to a pike-bearing soldier, who takes the bird away towards the honour guard.
Black cloak snapping behind her, she turns to face Simon, standing straight and without any hint of hestiation. "Than I shall end thee," she states disdainfully. "I have little time to waste on such trivialities."
But again, there's a flicker of hesitation. "I give thee one last warning," she states, in a tone that seems curiously out of joint with her cold arrogance.
Why do you hesitate? the Lich King demands, cold anger lacing his tone. This is the hated one, a member of those who destroyed the entirety of your life! Am I not right?
No, Agrias asserts, brief anger flaring in the back of her mind, numbed as it is by the cold presence of the One True King. You are not right. This is an ally of mine. I should not be-
But you will, and you will do it now. Take his eyes and send him back as a warning!
"Yes, my Lord."
But the defeated, somewhat horrified tone is stolen by the wind; lost to the skirling, screaming gale that's begun to kick up.
And then, her resistance spent, spirit crushed; she turns towards Simon with an arrogant smirk. "Come, ye." With a clatter, Rimehowl is raised, held parallel to the ground as one might hold a slender, two-handed sword a fraction of the runeblade's weight. "Seek ye a taste of the Scourge's power, even still? THan I shall show it to thee!"
The wind catches Parker's hood and flips it back, revealing a look of resolve and pride on the demon's slim face. He sees that look, and nods once, as though acknowledging that little flicker of Agrias-sure, it's probably just a trick, but it never hurts to be careful. His cloak flaps in the wind as he adopts his own battle-posture, bringing the Judge up to guard himself in case Agrias tries anything funny.
"Your own family..." Simon's tone is as icy as the wind. "Your former self would thank me for what I'm about to do. I won't bother to ask for forgiveness." And then the Balseraph lunges, bringing the Judge up and lashing out with the blade in a wide, violent swing. He extended his reach a bit too much there, but there's terrifying force behind the strike.
Simon Parker hits Agrias Oaks with his MIGHTY CLEAVE attack.
You take 14 damage.
Simon Parker fully heals Simon Parker with his whoops action.
As the gale howls around her, Agrias maintains her position, watching Simon lunge with those cyan eyes narrowed. Despite the impressive speed with which he approaches, she seems to be waiting for something, completely calm and collected in spite of her internal battle.
The Lich King has sunk his icy talons into her mind again; has regained control of his willful, disobedient vassal.
"My former self is naught but a shade of the glory I am now," she states, harshly. The lunge is carefully calculated, but rather than evade or parry, Agrias simply... lets it strike her. She then takes a lunging step forward, bringing the flat of Rimehowl up to the demon's face. It's going to be painful if it hits; a blow clearly meant to slam the flat of the runeblade into the side of Simon's head. Something that - if it strikes true - ought to send him reeling.
On the sidelines, the two elder Oaks watch the battle in silence, only whispering amongst themselves. The brothers maintain their unhappy stares, totally incomplacent, but Argus and Addien look distraught. Argus is a handsome man, with a neatly-trimmed beard of black and silver, and close-cropped hair. His eyes are hard, though; and his angular face is set in a displeased frown.
Addien, meanwhile, is the spitting image of Agrias; if Agrias had about eighteen to twenty more years to her, though somewhat less time-worn. She carries with her a spear, but she has it upright, watching in distress as her daughter seems to attack her own former ally.
"They are naught but servants," the Death Knight states in a tone of cool dismissal, stepping back and away from the demon once she's struck her attempted blow. Her plate boots crunch in the snow, and if anything, the drifts where they pass seem even higher. Her skin is pale as the ice underfoot, and nearly as cold. "Ye shall be naught but a messenger, a living example of what shall happen to those who defy the One True King!"
You get a glancing blow on Simon Parker with your Blade Slam attack.
Simon ends his stroke with the Judge too far out of position to block the incoming Runeblade. Agrias could've cut his head off if she'd meant to-but instead, Rimehowl strikes Simon's face and sends him reeling. Faint imprints of its runes are frozen into his right cheek as he recoils from the touch of the cursed weapon.
"You-" Simon snarls. "You won't make an example of me, I swear it!" The demon's voice rises in Song, and his eyes flash white. A coruscating nimbus of hellfire-bright lights forms at his feet, before a single beam lances out at Agrias.
Simon Parker misses Agrias Oaks with his Celestial Song of SHOOP DA WOOP attack.
The Death Knight's eyes flick back as she passes by the point where Simon guards, letting the momentum of her stroke carry her past him. She whirls even as she's still backing away, a spray of snow flying from the point where she plants a plated boot into the ground to halt her slide.
"Tch." Agrias clucks her tongue, shaking her head, though her eyes never leave Simon. "They are always so indignant, Rimehowl..."
Rimehowl, for its part, seems to revel in the combat; the chance to drink its fill. Runes flare in a brilliant, unholy cyan, as though it were actually answering its new master.
"What say we show this one the futility of his impudence? Yea, that will do finely." She advances, slowly, one step at a time. When Simon gives voice to the Song, Agrias brings up the light-swallowing blade in a swift motion, blocking the brunt of that white light. It actually seems to bend around the cursed blade, even as she advances.
She's sprinting by the time she reaches the lawyer, and brings the blade up in a flare of cyan and an unholy, sickly green light. She moves easily; too easily for Agrias Oaks - in her natural state, the Holy Knight simply doesn't have the strength to swing around a blade like that. So too does the Death Knight seem tos how a frightening endurance, simply walking into blows if it means dealing another. "Have a taste of the Plague, fell creature. Bring the essence of undeath back to your allies as an example. Behold what becomes of those who defy the One True King!"
You miss Simon Parker with your Plague Strike attack.
The Balseraph's eyes widen as Rimehowl simply absorbs the infernal light, sucking it in to fuel its own Runes-that unhealthy green glow isn't encouraging, either. His mind flashes back to his last sparring session, with Agrias, ironically enough, and remembers something. Simon flips the Judge upwards, angling it to catch Rimehowl along one of its serrated edges-the blades clash, the former locking into place against the latter. Hell-forged steel howls, but does not give.
"I am Balseraph! I am nobleman! I will not be driven forth like a common mortal!" Simon's voice rises in another one of those eerie songs... but nothing happens. Then there's a horrible squelching sound from deep within his throat-he spits, spewing a stream of sickly-looking greenish fluid at the deathknight. The corrosive poison is aimed at Agrias' face.
Simon Parker critically strikes Agrias Oaks with his Numinous Corpus: OH MY GOD IT BURNS attack.
You take 32 damage.
Rimehowl seems to be true to its namesake. A thick rime of frost seems to coat the blade at all times, and when denied a strike, as now, it seems to howl in the wintry wind. Agrias holds it steady, both hands clamped around the hilt. Though neither blade moves, she gives no quarter; holding her ground.
It seems less the kind of tenacity Agrias held before, though, and more a certain... immobility, about her; a certainy that she will have victory. It's subtly different than the Holy Knight's effort, and more the Death Knight's absolute conviction that victory will come to Arthas Menethil, and all in his service.
She's still advancing, boots crunching in the ever-building snow. And then suddenly, there's venom. In the face. Her head snaps sideways to try and preserve her eyes from the stuff, already bubbling at her skin.
Somewhere far below the Death Knight's tenacity and endurance, the real Agrias Oaks is screaming and writhing in pain. Or, she would be, if the Lich King hadn't exerted near-total control over her. On some level, she can feel that it burns, acidic and all-devouring.
Skin bubbles where the venom spatters, and some of it even eats away skin and muscle straight down, until some of the cheekbone itself is visible. There seems to be little difference between the hue of bone and flesh; and suspiciously little in the way of blood.
Agrias Oaks - or rather, the thing that she's become - smiles a hard-edged smile.
"A cunning trick, that I will grant ye. But animals are cunning. I care not what title thou shalt claim for thyself. It is as nothing before the might of the Scourge."
Rimehowl is brought up almost casually, even as a wreath of hazy black energy shifts around the cutting edges. Through the smoky aura, cyan runes blaze; the whole of it practically reeking of death. Agrias brings it up in a vicious two-handed blow, seeking to lay the Balseraph open from stem to stern.
And as she does, her voice is that same eerie calm. "You are as nothing before the Scourge."
You critically strike Simon Parker with your Death Strike attack.
Agrias is too fast. Rimehowl slips past the Judge, and carves a bloody, ragged swath across Parker's chest. The demon screams in pain, all satisfaction from the earlier attack gone-he stumbles backwards, wrenching himself off the Runeblade and drawing his own weapon in to cover himself. "Wretch," he hisses. "You'll pay for that." Parker switches up his grip on the Judge, holding it horizontally-and then swings the weapon in another mighty cleave.
He's hoping it bisects Agrias, widthwise. That would be really nice.
Simon Parker hits Agrias Oaks with his CLEAVE AGAIN attack.
You take 21 damage.
The look on the Death Knight's face is curious. While the pride and arrogance of the Lich King are there; there's also a stark horror just below the surface, and a horrible guilt. Agrias Oaks knows exactly what she's doing, and she also knows she doesn't have the fortitude to halt the corruption, or turn aside the Lich King's overpowering influence.
And then, as before, that moment of the real Agrias Oaks is gone.
"I shall pay for naught. You-" Black boots crunch in the snow as she backs away, raising Rimehowl. She leaves off her sentence, taking the blow right into the stomach. It doesn't bisect her, unfortunately. In fact, it doesn't seem to cut too deeply past her armour, but it's enough to lay open a wound that would most likely toe the edge of 'mortal' in anything else. This time, a spatter of blood does stain the snow, steaming, but it doesn't seem quite right.
She stumbles back a pace, head dropping to glance down at the deep rend laid open across her stomach. And, rather than show any alarm or distress, she simply snorts a plume of frosty breath.
"Knave," she scoffs, turning and advancing, heedless of the fact that she's been laid open. "Thy insolence shall have a price. Thou shalt know what it is to fear the Scourge."
As is proper, the Lich King asserts, a fresh howl of wintry wind swirling through the valley. The bannermen look on, uneased by seeing their master butchered by this insolent upstart, but true to their command to stay their weapons. Her immediate family looks a little less inclined to defend, though there is a pained expression on the face of Addien Oaks.
This corruption, this dishonour and disgrace; it was never meant to be.
"And you," Agrias states calmly, "shall pay for that." Rimehowl swings around to point at the blood spattered on the snow, and then comes up in a vicious, sweeping arc. It's meant to bite into the demon's side, but not to kill him. If he's familiar with his swordsmanship, he may recognise that.
"Stay thy blade. I would hate to see thee slain, messenger," she adds, her cold tone mocking. "A good messenger is difficult to come by."
You miss Simon Parker with your Frost Strike - We Kinda Hope You Have Antifreeze In Your Blood attack.
For a moment, it looks like that strike is going to hit home. Then the weapon-chain attached to the Bloody-Handed Judge's pommel seems to take on a life of its own, lashing out and wrapping around Rimehowl, jerking the blade away. The frost climbs up the chain, and Parker forces the weapon to let go before it reaches his hands.
"Face it, Oaks, you're nothing," Simon hisses. He lashes out with his blade again, hoping to catch Oaks right in the shoulder, in the gap between the pauldron and her neck. He is fighting to kill.
Simon Parker hits Agrias Oaks with his >:( attack.
You take 23 damage.
When the Bloody-Handed Judge wraps around Rimehowl, the Death Knight straightens, bracing against the pull of the chain. She has strength enough to prevent the chain from disarming her, but she doesn't have enough momentum built up to follow through with the strike.
Likely he may sense a lingering, cold anger about the blade; a subtle wrongness, a sharp clamour of discord in the Symphony. Make no mistake, that blade is evil.
"Ye doth speak Untruth, but that little surprises me." Agrias hauls against the chain, snapping the length of it taut and shattering the frost that has already begun to creep up the length of iron. Simon lets go of it, then, and Agrias reclaims her weapon, brandishing it.
Strike now, the Lich King commands, a fresh howl of wind battering the combatants. Let it be done, and send him back to his people as an example!
I do not want to, Agrias protests hotly. He is an ally, and though I mislike what he is, that does not give me the right to-
From somewhere beyond the clouds, Boreas gives voice to a full, throaty roar. He can't be seen, but the warning is clear.
Boreas does not only safeguard you, my Knight, the Lich King states, as though speaking to a small child. Do you really think I would set such a stubborn vassal loose with no contingencies? Defy me, and I will destroy you so thoroughly that you will be fit to serve as naught but the basest of crumbling skeletons. And when that is done, I will send them on to slay everyone and destroy everything you hold dear.
With seemingly no hesitation, the Death Knight walks straight into the blow, letting the Bloody-Handed Judge bite into her shoulder and neck. It won't take her head off, and it isn't a critical wound, but it would be threatening if she were still mortal.
One taloned gauntlet snaps out, seizing Simon by the front of his jacket and pulling him in close. She pulls him up until her face is in his, with an unearthly strength; those luminescent cyan eyes-
-flickering, for just a moment. It seems Agrias has managed to fight off control, for just a moment. "I am sorry," she whispers, stricken. "Help me!" Her voice, a raw whisper and sounding just a trace more like herself, is terrified. "I cannot resist his control, I-"
And then Boreas gives another roar, somewhere beyond the clouds, and that flash of Agrias Oaks is gone. Slowly, that cyan glow suffuses her eyes again, and that arrogance and disdain return to her features.
"Pathetic fool," she manages. He may feel the chill of her hand seeping through all of the clothing he's wearing. "What manner of fate shall I bestow on thee? Ah... such wonderful eyes." She reaches up with her free hand, holstering Rimehowl, and the hand drops to close talon-gauntleted fingers around Simon's chin, tilting his head this way and that. Her strength is incredible - and not at all human. "Yea, they are defiant, and proud. I shall have them."
She reaches up, pressing her hand over his eyes, as though she were closing them. But there is a chill, there; a growing numbness that will cut past his eyes; into his very mind, killing all sensation. She withdraws her hand, and in a swift motion, she lets the talons swipe across his face.
Blood spatters across the snow.
"And now you are so marked, mortal, with eyes of stone and ice." She narrows her own cyan eyes, looking towards Simon. "May you see naught but the spirit world, the weakest of the planes, and may you be cursed to endure this half-sight. Never again will you look on the world of mortals." Her smile is grim. "See ye only Essence, and the heart of all creation, but such is a confusing tangle."
One step is taken away from him, surveying her handiwork.
Satisfactory, the Lich King states. Now, he will return to his kind. He shall be living proof of the Scourge's indomitable will!
Inside, Agrias cries out in horror and rage, and not a little shame.
Thou shalt not teamkill.
"Now you are as nothing," she says instead, her voice cold as the wind whipping through the valley. "Go back to thy allies, and show to them how useless thou hast become."
Simon tries to wrench the Judge free, but it's... it's trapped in her armor. Almost like it's frozen in place by that horrid dread-plate, and while he tugs furiously, all he manages is an ineffectual rattling. And then Agrias grabs him and pulls him in; he wraps his hands around hers, letting go of the Judge's hilt.
And then he stares into her eyes. "Oaks. What are you-?!"
"No," he gasps, finally seeing what she's about to do. "No, what do you think you're-?!"
Blood stains the snow as Parker screams in agony. He crumples to the ground, crimson pouring from his face in a grotesque parody of tears.
Behind the blood and gore, empty sockets glow a baleful yellow-green.
Reis Duelar has arrived.
Starfire has arrived.
It is done. Wind whispers through the abandoned graveyard, ice and snow thick on the ground, despite it barely being into autumn's weather. The clouds roil overhead, black and heavy with storm. Bannermen of House Oaks stand in silence, ringing a generous area of the graveyard where the black-armoured Agrias Oaks stands, over the crumpled form of Simon Parker.
By all appearances, his eyes have just been torn out. Blood spatters the snow, and it also gathers on the talons at the end of the Death Knight's plate gauntlets.
The Death Knight steps back, watching disdainfully as the demon crumples to the ground, screaming in his agony. She seems to have no pity whatsoever for the pain she's just put him through, even if some small piece of herself mourns this.
At the moment, the Lich King is exerting his will. This insolent whelp will not defy him any longer, today.
"Enjoy this half-sight," she states coldly, reaching up for the runeblade. The blade is taken down from her shoulder, a whispering of frost already spreading and spiderwebbing over its surface. "I leave thee with one final parting gift," she states, in cold sarcasm. "May your blood wet these fields."
Rimehowl falls like a hammerblow, the blade whistling as the wind rises in a brief, howling crescendo; scattering snow and ice in its wake. It dies down quickly enough.
The sound of the blade's impact is sharp over the muted, otherwise silent snowfall.
Agrias withdraws the cursed sword with a wrench of her arm; but she makes no effort to clean it. If anything, Rimehowl seems to absorb the blood, red seeping into black.
She turns on her heel, crunching away in the snow. Yes, she just left him there. A skeletal attendant hands her Alkoun's reins, and she vaults into the saddle, turning to face Simon. Even Alkoun has the look of death about him; black-tipped yellow feathers bleached to a sickly white, tipped with the same sort of light-swallowing hue on the sword. His eyes are pools of blank cyan, luminous in the storm, his legs and beak a greyish black. His barding matches well the Death Knight's fearsome armour.
The rest of the soldiers are waved off, and her honour guard as well. "Return to thy estate," she commands, turning her eyes back to the stricken Balseraph. "I shall wait here and see that thine enemy is taken away. Boreas! To me!"
There is a roar, from far distant in the clouds, and the frost wyrm lands heavily; not far from the two. A spray of snow is sent up in his wake. His huge head swings over towards Agrias, his empty eyes fixed on the Death Knight. One wing furls, the other mantled. Those empty eyes turn back towards Simon.
"We wait," Agrias states, lifting her head and staring disdainfully at the demon. "Doubtless he has called for help. We shall see him off."
Boreas chuckles, the sound deep enough to bring the ground underfoot to quivering. "He shall make a fine example. I will see that they retrieve him, and nothing more."
"Good," Agrias states crisply, settling into her saddle to wait, hands on the reins.
Simon Parker offers absolutely no resistance to Rimehowl's blade. It cleaves clean through his side, leaving a sickening, ragged wound in its wake. The demon's head lolls back, all fight leaving him as he slips into sweet, merciful unconsciousness.
Reis Duelar is coming as fast as she can, hampered only by the fact that she is not entirely sure of her destination - not until she gets closer, and sees the graveyard. After that, there is only one place she thinks - knows - that Simon can be.
Reis rides Iskys, the black chocobo she rode before, leaning far forward in an attempt to get him to ride faster. It does not entirely work as well as she hopes; Reis keeps exhorting her to go faster, but there is only so much speed the poor animal can put on, no matter how much Reis asks of her.
The skeletal dragon is putting her even more on edge. Now she knows it's Agrias, and she's not happy - not to mention the dragon disturbs her for several other reasons, none of which she is willing to clearly think about. Iskys plows up snow as she keeps her running straight, still having not seen the worst of the carnage.
Starfire is not familiar with this world. She really should have visited it at some time, but there are just so many... and she has to help out in her homeplane too. Nevertheless, the orange-skinned alien superheroine flies about fifteen feet above the ground, keeping pace with Reis on her big black running bird. She's depending on Lady Duelar to lead the way through the snow, and is also Reis's backup in case the weather proves too tricky to navigate by chocobo.
Even though ice and snow cover the ground, she still wears her usual miniskirt and halter top uniform. Tamaraneans are well-suited to braving extreme temperatures. Being higher up than Reis, she sees the skeletal dragon from a slightly better vantage point - and spots the red of blood on the snow first. "Lady Duelar!" she calls down. "Be careful!"
Starfire banks away from Reis, and increases her speed, she practically falls from the sky, stopping to hover a foot or two above the ground between Agrias and Simon. Her fists and eyes glow with blinding green energy, and her posture is that of barely-restrained violence. "We are here to take Parker!" she declares.
There is a certain pride to the Death Knight, in the way she sits in her saddle and holds her head high. She's hardly outspoken about it, but posture is everything, and she seems barely affected by the cruel winds buffeting the valley. Winter lives here. Even the cold has a stark wrongness about it.
"They come." Boreas raises his head, his observation deep and sonorous. One wing sweeps around until he can fold it fastidiously, frost shaken loose in a clattering of bones. He settles beside the Death Knight. "Presumably to retrieve their fallen ally. Perhaps they can spread their message, from there."
"There will be no resisting the One True King," Agrias answers, her tone of voice that unearthly rasp again. Guilt and fear are gone, replaced with the mask of arrogance and lichborne confidence. "They shall all be laid low, before the Scourge, and made to serve."
The frost wyrm doesn't answer, the cyan fire of his eyes turned to focus on Reis. Perhaps he senses the remnants of dragon's blood in her, or perhaps he merely looks at her because she seems so uneasy.
"Hail and well-met," the Death Knight calls, her greeting a mockery. Her eyes are the same cyan as Boreas', the colour wisping as though it were wind or fire seeping from her very eyes. "I see thine ally was not foolish enough not to call for help."
She was hoping he'd do that before he crumpled.
She gestures dismissively towards the fallen Balseraph, taloned gauntlets clicking. "Take him away, if thy have a wish. I shall not stop thee. But bring him as an example. There shall be more of this treatment, if thy allies continue to defy the will of the Scourge."
A flicker of a smile crosses Agrias' face, cold and cruel. A hand raises, one talon from the gauntlet pointing straight for Reis. "Thy world shall be made to know true winter," she intones. "There is naught thee can do to turn aside this blade of winter. Resistance shall only bring retribution beyond thy imagining." Her hand lowers, clasping the reins again. "Remember that."
"Take thy ally away," she finally says, at length. "I've no more desire to see such a weak and pathetic fool. Yon creature thought he might best the champion of the One True King, but sad will be his lament. He could not, and thus has he paid the price. He shall be an example. And his fate is but the beginning."
But she doesn't leave; instead watching the two, and waiting. She'll stay until they leave, comfortable in the frozen gale, as comfortable as a normal person might be lying on a sunny hill. As long as the Lich King's proverbial talons are sunk into her mind and body, such fierce, frostbitten winters are comfortable and even rejuvenating.
Iskys slows. She has to; she can't run that hard and that fast in the cold, and Reis won't force her to kill herself for her transportation. The dragon scares her, too, and unlike Reis, she's not 'intelligent' enough to talk herself into doing scary things.
Reis dismounts and runs the rest of the way herself, letting Iskys shudder. Reis is cold herself, but pretending not to show it. She wishes she had heavier clothes than this. A fur mantle isn't cutting it and it's all she could find in time.
"Dame Oaks..." Reis looks at the woman, then back down, and away. How do you respond to something like that? "...I... We'll talk. Grant me that, at least, if you will not grant me anything else."
Looking away, she finally realizes that that blood - it's all, or mostly, Simon Parker's. "Good God!" she exclaims, startled, and runs - not walks - toward his side. She only has some potions with her; not many, but maybe enough... She no longer responds to Agrias. She has more important things to do.
Despite the howling cold and Simon's current lack of eyes, Starfire doesn't seem uncomfortable. Only furious. She has no way to help Simon except to carry him home with her, but she's much better suited to guarding him and Reis. Her boots do not yet touch the snow. "...Greetings," she responds stiffly to Agrias, when the blonde doesn't attack. "I thank you for not destroying our ally. But you will not bring this winter to our worlds. It will be contained here - and then it will be defeated, just as you and your King will be."
She doesn't dare to take her eyes off of Agrias and the skeletal dragon, and must trust Reis to tend to Simon herself. "We will not surrender. As long as one warrior remains, we will fight back." Her long hair flutters in the wind. Otherwise she remains motionless in the air save for a the gentle rise and fall of her floating body.
Agrias shifts her weight in the saddle, glowing cyan eyes raking the assembled company. She doesn't even bother to take Rimehowl down from her shoulder, apparently secure in the knowledge that they won't attack her.
RabbleAgrias Oaks, the lot of them. The Lich King's voice is for Agrias and Agrias alone, but the others may hear a faint howl of wind; a fresh gale of ripping cold sent through the valley. Send them running back to their allies, that they might sow fear and unrest. Let them prove what happens to those that defy the Scourge.
"Such is what happens to those who defy the One True King." Agrias lifts her head, but it's clear that she is no longer Agrias Oaks. The woman she was is somewhere else. Her eyes fall on Reis - and there's a faint flicker; a brief instant of terror and guilt, a brief and wordless plea to be freed from this prison - the look of somebody far beyond their element, and then just as quickly, the Death Knight is under the control of Arthas Menethil once again.
"If thou wouldst speak, thou may hold thy tongue for another day." Her voice is cold, and completely unlike the voice of the Holy Knight that Reis had known. Few traces are left of her. "Take thy ally, for today, and return from whence ye came. I have not a wish to see this wretch any longer."
"Pathetic little humans." Boreas, similarly, keeps his empty eyes on Starfire. Jaws part, faintly, and a wreath of frosty mist spills from them; but he doesn't attack. He's just taunting her. He might be grinning sadistically, if he had any features left with which to do that. He does laugh, though, an awful, dry, serpentine cackle; rearing up on his hind legs and beating his wings as he does. The motion stirs up a fresh swirl of powdery cold. "The rabble grows bold! Oh, this is amusement as such I have not had in many a generation. I look forward to fighting you," he adds, lowering his head to regard Reis and Starfire alike. "It has been long since I have fought a worthy battle for the Scourge."
"Too many times they are put to rout, and flee, and beg for their miserable lives," Boreas hisses, letting the last word draw out. "I will savour this!"
"Enough." Agrias jostles the reins, and Alkoun steps forward. Rimehowl is there, in her hand, pointed towards Starfire. "Thy courage is commendable, but courage is as easily called stupidity. Take thy ally. Begone from this place. And if thee should still have a wish for battle, then battle it shall be. But thy souls shall be added unto the Scourge."
She wheels Alkoun in a tight circle, letting the chocobo crunch away through the ice and snow. "Boreas. We go."
"As you wish, my lady," the dragon responds, leaping skyward with a single thrust of his powerful (and deteriorating) hind legs. Tattered wings beat once, twice; and he soon vanishes into the roiling clouds, winging his way towards House Oaks.
Soon, too, the Death Knight is lost to the howling storm.
Where: House Oaks - Kingdom of Ivalice - Fantasy Sector
When: 07 September 2008
What: Simon attempts to drag Agrias back to the IPA, which doesn't end nearly as well as he would have hoped. The Balseraph ends up cursed for his efforts, prompting Reis and Starfire to come to his rescue.
Watch For: Only mostly dead. Right?
Warnings: There is a bit of "ick" factor with violence, here, but it is fairly glossed over and generalised. Still, if you're not comfortable with that kind of thing, consider yourself forewarned.
Fantasy Sector - Lesalia Imperial Capital
Lesalia Imperial Capital lay at the heart of Ivalice, in the central province of Lesalia. It is among the largest cities of this medieval kingdom, as well as one of the most ancient. The city has closely-packed houses, made of timber and sloped roofs, that hug to winding narrow streets. At the center of the city is an immense castle - the palace of the Ivalician royal family. It also houses the Senate, and countless nobles.
Contents:
Agrias Oaks
Reis Duelar
Simon Parker
Starfire
Obvious exits:
Northeast leads to Fantasy Sector - Nelveska Temple.
The howling wind of winter has claimed much of the southwestern Lesalian province by this point. Ice and snow are a common sight, even this early ahead of true winter, and they seem by far harsher than any natural winter that the land has contrived.
Such severe weather isn't without its toll, either. Many have been slain by a complete lack of preparation for this kind of weather. There's little in the way of foodstuffs for many of the smallfolk to store. Drought had struck this harvest season, and it seems in this regard, their luck has turned from bad to worse. Fresh graveyards have sprung up in many a town as a result.
It's near one of these resting places that a fresh contingent of soldiers roams. These, however, are not of the Crown, the Church, or any hue between. They bear the tattered raiments of House Oaks, an estate and family long since thought dead. One soldier hols the forefront, mounted on a fearsome steed - a chocobo, or what was once a chocobo. Alkoun has since succumbed to the Plague of the Unliving, a frightening creature neither living nor dead. His plumage is stark white instead of yellow, each feather frosted with black as they were in life... but there's a strange quality to the black. His large eyes are almost invisible; pools of luminsecent cyan, fiery and ethereal. His barding, too, is different; done up in the black and silver of the Scourge, all fearsome spikes and hard angles.
He scratches restlessly in the snow under the burden of his master. She, too, has been transformed thoroughly. Agrias Oaks is no longer human; that much is certain. Her skin is scant more hale than the snow they tread over. Just as in life, she wears no helm. Her hair is stark white, and her eyes the same glowing cyan of the Scourge. Her armour is a light-swallowing black, emanating a subtle wrongness; but not quite as wrong as the great zweihander strapped across her back - Rimehowl, the source of this unliving winter.
Her eyes rake the graveyard, the cyan light reflecting from the closest plates of armour to her face. "Search the graveyard." She commands a close contingent of revenants, the ghostly soldiers in hues of blue and the same fel cyan of the Scourge. Their apparent captain nods, turning and silently directing his warriors, fanning out and searching the graveyard for the resting places of theives, brigands, soldiers, and fighters. The farmers are useless to them.
I do not have time to train peasants, the Lich King agrees, in her head. Agrias remains stock-still in her saddle, even as Alkoun flicks a bleached white crest. Take what you might find, here, and raise them to the Scourge.
"Yes, my Lord," she hisses. But there is a faint note of displeasure in that voice, a faint flicker of yellow behind that Scourge-cyan.
She is certainly stubborn. She may be made ot serve, and she may be made to do things that she hates, with a frost wyrm set upon her to train her in the use of a Death Knight's skills and to guard her - but even with threat of such a large creature upon her, she will never be broken.
She twists in the saddle with a creak of leather, facing the revenants of House Oaks; her close honour guard. "Thee shall accompany my progress through the graves. If thou shalt find anything useful at all, thou wouldst do well to make it known."
Her brothers practically simmer. Her father and mother, however, merely look disappointed and very, very tired. All four ride their own ghostly chocobos, though none of them look as fierce or fundamentally wrong as Alkoun.
Together, they trudge as one through the graves. Skeletal attendants walk alongside the Death Knight and her honour guard, prodding the snow and exposing headstones to view when they're directed.
Agrias' next few moves were painfully obvious. Murder townsfolk, raise them as undead-scavenge graveyards like a vulture, raising anyone who'd make a good addition to her 'army'. A stranger has been haunting Southwest Lesalia, asking after the province's new master. He's gained scant information from his inquiries, but it's enough. It's enough to bring him to this graveyard, bundled in a heavy winter cloak to ward off the chill. A familiar sword is strapped to his back, but his face is shadowed by the cowl.
"Oaks," says Simon Parker. "Call off your minions." Heavy boots crunch through the snow as he fearlessly approaches the Death Knight, raising a hand in greeting. "Whatever you seek here, you'll have to go through me to get it." His tone is deadly serious, devoid of its usual sarcasm and smugness. "I'm here because I respected the woman you once were, and I'm not afraid to destroy you."
A hand reaches behind his back, and draws the Bloody-Handed Judge from its sheath.
"Single combat."
At the sound of the voice, a forest of spears raise, and about a dozen bowstrings are nocked and trained on the newcomer. Yet these Scourge-sworn remnants hold their attack, waiting for the word from their master.
Agrias turns Alkoun in an almost lazy circle, raising a slender white brow in askance.
How perfect, the Lich King asserts, tendrils of ice wrapping around her mind and slowly numbing her thoughts; quelling the residual anger of the real Agrias Oaks - the one who still resists this puppetry. Is he not of those you hate the most, my Knight? But you need not kill him. No, he would never serve the Scourge. Such a pity. But perhaps you may yet punish him for his insolence, comes the insidious suggestion.
A chill whip of wind snaps across the graveyard, and if Simon doesn't reach up to hold his cloak's hood, it'll whisk it right off the top of the Balseraph's head.
But if he's perceptive, mayhap he'll see a faint flicker; the look of somebody deeply unhappy with what they're about to do.
Another gust of scouring winter wind sweeps the shallow valley, and both expression and hesitation are gone. Agrias turns on Simon, prodding Alkoun forward a few steps before reining him in.
"I thought thee wouldst have better sense than to come here alone." She shakes her head, tilting her head to look down her nose at the demon. "But if that is thy wish, than so be it. I will not, however, grant thee such a clean death..." She smiles, nastily. "No. 'Tis too clean, for the likes of you..."
Pull out his eyes, the Lich King states crisply, and grant him eyes of stone, that he might see only that which was never meant to be seen. Would it not be fitting?
"Yes, my Lord." She reaches up, sliding Rimehowl down from the makeshift holster at her back. "Back," she calls, to her honour guard. "This one is mine, and mine alone."
The remnants of the Oaks bloodline back away, but they watch Simon with interest. Lord Argus Oaks tilts his head a bit, whispering something to Lady Addien Oaks, but whatever they say is lost to the spirit-world. Her brothers maintain their matching deeply unhappy, and perhaps slightly murderous-looking, scowls.
Curiously, there is no third brother there.
Agrias climbs down from Alkoun's saddle, landing easily and with no trace of injury in her right leg. It looks like it really was healed. She hands the reins off to a pike-bearing soldier, who takes the bird away towards the honour guard.
Black cloak snapping behind her, she turns to face Simon, standing straight and without any hint of hestiation. "Than I shall end thee," she states disdainfully. "I have little time to waste on such trivialities."
But again, there's a flicker of hesitation. "I give thee one last warning," she states, in a tone that seems curiously out of joint with her cold arrogance.
Why do you hesitate? the Lich King demands, cold anger lacing his tone. This is the hated one, a member of those who destroyed the entirety of your life! Am I not right?
No, Agrias asserts, brief anger flaring in the back of her mind, numbed as it is by the cold presence of the One True King. You are not right. This is an ally of mine. I should not be-
But you will, and you will do it now. Take his eyes and send him back as a warning!
"Yes, my Lord."
But the defeated, somewhat horrified tone is stolen by the wind; lost to the skirling, screaming gale that's begun to kick up.
And then, her resistance spent, spirit crushed; she turns towards Simon with an arrogant smirk. "Come, ye." With a clatter, Rimehowl is raised, held parallel to the ground as one might hold a slender, two-handed sword a fraction of the runeblade's weight. "Seek ye a taste of the Scourge's power, even still? THan I shall show it to thee!"
The wind catches Parker's hood and flips it back, revealing a look of resolve and pride on the demon's slim face. He sees that look, and nods once, as though acknowledging that little flicker of Agrias-sure, it's probably just a trick, but it never hurts to be careful. His cloak flaps in the wind as he adopts his own battle-posture, bringing the Judge up to guard himself in case Agrias tries anything funny.
"Your own family..." Simon's tone is as icy as the wind. "Your former self would thank me for what I'm about to do. I won't bother to ask for forgiveness." And then the Balseraph lunges, bringing the Judge up and lashing out with the blade in a wide, violent swing. He extended his reach a bit too much there, but there's terrifying force behind the strike.
Simon Parker hits Agrias Oaks with his MIGHTY CLEAVE attack.
You take 14 damage.
Simon Parker fully heals Simon Parker with his whoops action.
As the gale howls around her, Agrias maintains her position, watching Simon lunge with those cyan eyes narrowed. Despite the impressive speed with which he approaches, she seems to be waiting for something, completely calm and collected in spite of her internal battle.
The Lich King has sunk his icy talons into her mind again; has regained control of his willful, disobedient vassal.
"My former self is naught but a shade of the glory I am now," she states, harshly. The lunge is carefully calculated, but rather than evade or parry, Agrias simply... lets it strike her. She then takes a lunging step forward, bringing the flat of Rimehowl up to the demon's face. It's going to be painful if it hits; a blow clearly meant to slam the flat of the runeblade into the side of Simon's head. Something that - if it strikes true - ought to send him reeling.
On the sidelines, the two elder Oaks watch the battle in silence, only whispering amongst themselves. The brothers maintain their unhappy stares, totally incomplacent, but Argus and Addien look distraught. Argus is a handsome man, with a neatly-trimmed beard of black and silver, and close-cropped hair. His eyes are hard, though; and his angular face is set in a displeased frown.
Addien, meanwhile, is the spitting image of Agrias; if Agrias had about eighteen to twenty more years to her, though somewhat less time-worn. She carries with her a spear, but she has it upright, watching in distress as her daughter seems to attack her own former ally.
"They are naught but servants," the Death Knight states in a tone of cool dismissal, stepping back and away from the demon once she's struck her attempted blow. Her plate boots crunch in the snow, and if anything, the drifts where they pass seem even higher. Her skin is pale as the ice underfoot, and nearly as cold. "Ye shall be naught but a messenger, a living example of what shall happen to those who defy the One True King!"
You get a glancing blow on Simon Parker with your Blade Slam attack.
Simon ends his stroke with the Judge too far out of position to block the incoming Runeblade. Agrias could've cut his head off if she'd meant to-but instead, Rimehowl strikes Simon's face and sends him reeling. Faint imprints of its runes are frozen into his right cheek as he recoils from the touch of the cursed weapon.
"You-" Simon snarls. "You won't make an example of me, I swear it!" The demon's voice rises in Song, and his eyes flash white. A coruscating nimbus of hellfire-bright lights forms at his feet, before a single beam lances out at Agrias.
Simon Parker misses Agrias Oaks with his Celestial Song of SHOOP DA WOOP attack.
The Death Knight's eyes flick back as she passes by the point where Simon guards, letting the momentum of her stroke carry her past him. She whirls even as she's still backing away, a spray of snow flying from the point where she plants a plated boot into the ground to halt her slide.
"Tch." Agrias clucks her tongue, shaking her head, though her eyes never leave Simon. "They are always so indignant, Rimehowl..."
Rimehowl, for its part, seems to revel in the combat; the chance to drink its fill. Runes flare in a brilliant, unholy cyan, as though it were actually answering its new master.
"What say we show this one the futility of his impudence? Yea, that will do finely." She advances, slowly, one step at a time. When Simon gives voice to the Song, Agrias brings up the light-swallowing blade in a swift motion, blocking the brunt of that white light. It actually seems to bend around the cursed blade, even as she advances.
She's sprinting by the time she reaches the lawyer, and brings the blade up in a flare of cyan and an unholy, sickly green light. She moves easily; too easily for Agrias Oaks - in her natural state, the Holy Knight simply doesn't have the strength to swing around a blade like that. So too does the Death Knight seem tos how a frightening endurance, simply walking into blows if it means dealing another. "Have a taste of the Plague, fell creature. Bring the essence of undeath back to your allies as an example. Behold what becomes of those who defy the One True King!"
You miss Simon Parker with your Plague Strike attack.
The Balseraph's eyes widen as Rimehowl simply absorbs the infernal light, sucking it in to fuel its own Runes-that unhealthy green glow isn't encouraging, either. His mind flashes back to his last sparring session, with Agrias, ironically enough, and remembers something. Simon flips the Judge upwards, angling it to catch Rimehowl along one of its serrated edges-the blades clash, the former locking into place against the latter. Hell-forged steel howls, but does not give.
"I am Balseraph! I am nobleman! I will not be driven forth like a common mortal!" Simon's voice rises in another one of those eerie songs... but nothing happens. Then there's a horrible squelching sound from deep within his throat-he spits, spewing a stream of sickly-looking greenish fluid at the deathknight. The corrosive poison is aimed at Agrias' face.
Simon Parker critically strikes Agrias Oaks with his Numinous Corpus: OH MY GOD IT BURNS attack.
You take 32 damage.
Rimehowl seems to be true to its namesake. A thick rime of frost seems to coat the blade at all times, and when denied a strike, as now, it seems to howl in the wintry wind. Agrias holds it steady, both hands clamped around the hilt. Though neither blade moves, she gives no quarter; holding her ground.
It seems less the kind of tenacity Agrias held before, though, and more a certain... immobility, about her; a certainy that she will have victory. It's subtly different than the Holy Knight's effort, and more the Death Knight's absolute conviction that victory will come to Arthas Menethil, and all in his service.
She's still advancing, boots crunching in the ever-building snow. And then suddenly, there's venom. In the face. Her head snaps sideways to try and preserve her eyes from the stuff, already bubbling at her skin.
Somewhere far below the Death Knight's tenacity and endurance, the real Agrias Oaks is screaming and writhing in pain. Or, she would be, if the Lich King hadn't exerted near-total control over her. On some level, she can feel that it burns, acidic and all-devouring.
Skin bubbles where the venom spatters, and some of it even eats away skin and muscle straight down, until some of the cheekbone itself is visible. There seems to be little difference between the hue of bone and flesh; and suspiciously little in the way of blood.
Agrias Oaks - or rather, the thing that she's become - smiles a hard-edged smile.
"A cunning trick, that I will grant ye. But animals are cunning. I care not what title thou shalt claim for thyself. It is as nothing before the might of the Scourge."
Rimehowl is brought up almost casually, even as a wreath of hazy black energy shifts around the cutting edges. Through the smoky aura, cyan runes blaze; the whole of it practically reeking of death. Agrias brings it up in a vicious two-handed blow, seeking to lay the Balseraph open from stem to stern.
And as she does, her voice is that same eerie calm. "You are as nothing before the Scourge."
You critically strike Simon Parker with your Death Strike attack.
Agrias is too fast. Rimehowl slips past the Judge, and carves a bloody, ragged swath across Parker's chest. The demon screams in pain, all satisfaction from the earlier attack gone-he stumbles backwards, wrenching himself off the Runeblade and drawing his own weapon in to cover himself. "Wretch," he hisses. "You'll pay for that." Parker switches up his grip on the Judge, holding it horizontally-and then swings the weapon in another mighty cleave.
He's hoping it bisects Agrias, widthwise. That would be really nice.
Simon Parker hits Agrias Oaks with his CLEAVE AGAIN attack.
You take 21 damage.
The look on the Death Knight's face is curious. While the pride and arrogance of the Lich King are there; there's also a stark horror just below the surface, and a horrible guilt. Agrias Oaks knows exactly what she's doing, and she also knows she doesn't have the fortitude to halt the corruption, or turn aside the Lich King's overpowering influence.
And then, as before, that moment of the real Agrias Oaks is gone.
"I shall pay for naught. You-" Black boots crunch in the snow as she backs away, raising Rimehowl. She leaves off her sentence, taking the blow right into the stomach. It doesn't bisect her, unfortunately. In fact, it doesn't seem to cut too deeply past her armour, but it's enough to lay open a wound that would most likely toe the edge of 'mortal' in anything else. This time, a spatter of blood does stain the snow, steaming, but it doesn't seem quite right.
She stumbles back a pace, head dropping to glance down at the deep rend laid open across her stomach. And, rather than show any alarm or distress, she simply snorts a plume of frosty breath.
"Knave," she scoffs, turning and advancing, heedless of the fact that she's been laid open. "Thy insolence shall have a price. Thou shalt know what it is to fear the Scourge."
As is proper, the Lich King asserts, a fresh howl of wintry wind swirling through the valley. The bannermen look on, uneased by seeing their master butchered by this insolent upstart, but true to their command to stay their weapons. Her immediate family looks a little less inclined to defend, though there is a pained expression on the face of Addien Oaks.
This corruption, this dishonour and disgrace; it was never meant to be.
"And you," Agrias states calmly, "shall pay for that." Rimehowl swings around to point at the blood spattered on the snow, and then comes up in a vicious, sweeping arc. It's meant to bite into the demon's side, but not to kill him. If he's familiar with his swordsmanship, he may recognise that.
"Stay thy blade. I would hate to see thee slain, messenger," she adds, her cold tone mocking. "A good messenger is difficult to come by."
You miss Simon Parker with your Frost Strike - We Kinda Hope You Have Antifreeze In Your Blood attack.
For a moment, it looks like that strike is going to hit home. Then the weapon-chain attached to the Bloody-Handed Judge's pommel seems to take on a life of its own, lashing out and wrapping around Rimehowl, jerking the blade away. The frost climbs up the chain, and Parker forces the weapon to let go before it reaches his hands.
"Face it, Oaks, you're nothing," Simon hisses. He lashes out with his blade again, hoping to catch Oaks right in the shoulder, in the gap between the pauldron and her neck. He is fighting to kill.
Simon Parker hits Agrias Oaks with his >:( attack.
You take 23 damage.
When the Bloody-Handed Judge wraps around Rimehowl, the Death Knight straightens, bracing against the pull of the chain. She has strength enough to prevent the chain from disarming her, but she doesn't have enough momentum built up to follow through with the strike.
Likely he may sense a lingering, cold anger about the blade; a subtle wrongness, a sharp clamour of discord in the Symphony. Make no mistake, that blade is evil.
"Ye doth speak Untruth, but that little surprises me." Agrias hauls against the chain, snapping the length of it taut and shattering the frost that has already begun to creep up the length of iron. Simon lets go of it, then, and Agrias reclaims her weapon, brandishing it.
Strike now, the Lich King commands, a fresh howl of wind battering the combatants. Let it be done, and send him back to his people as an example!
I do not want to, Agrias protests hotly. He is an ally, and though I mislike what he is, that does not give me the right to-
From somewhere beyond the clouds, Boreas gives voice to a full, throaty roar. He can't be seen, but the warning is clear.
Boreas does not only safeguard you, my Knight, the Lich King states, as though speaking to a small child. Do you really think I would set such a stubborn vassal loose with no contingencies? Defy me, and I will destroy you so thoroughly that you will be fit to serve as naught but the basest of crumbling skeletons. And when that is done, I will send them on to slay everyone and destroy everything you hold dear.
With seemingly no hesitation, the Death Knight walks straight into the blow, letting the Bloody-Handed Judge bite into her shoulder and neck. It won't take her head off, and it isn't a critical wound, but it would be threatening if she were still mortal.
One taloned gauntlet snaps out, seizing Simon by the front of his jacket and pulling him in close. She pulls him up until her face is in his, with an unearthly strength; those luminescent cyan eyes-
-flickering, for just a moment. It seems Agrias has managed to fight off control, for just a moment. "I am sorry," she whispers, stricken. "Help me!" Her voice, a raw whisper and sounding just a trace more like herself, is terrified. "I cannot resist his control, I-"
And then Boreas gives another roar, somewhere beyond the clouds, and that flash of Agrias Oaks is gone. Slowly, that cyan glow suffuses her eyes again, and that arrogance and disdain return to her features.
"Pathetic fool," she manages. He may feel the chill of her hand seeping through all of the clothing he's wearing. "What manner of fate shall I bestow on thee? Ah... such wonderful eyes." She reaches up with her free hand, holstering Rimehowl, and the hand drops to close talon-gauntleted fingers around Simon's chin, tilting his head this way and that. Her strength is incredible - and not at all human. "Yea, they are defiant, and proud. I shall have them."
She reaches up, pressing her hand over his eyes, as though she were closing them. But there is a chill, there; a growing numbness that will cut past his eyes; into his very mind, killing all sensation. She withdraws her hand, and in a swift motion, she lets the talons swipe across his face.
Blood spatters across the snow.
"And now you are so marked, mortal, with eyes of stone and ice." She narrows her own cyan eyes, looking towards Simon. "May you see naught but the spirit world, the weakest of the planes, and may you be cursed to endure this half-sight. Never again will you look on the world of mortals." Her smile is grim. "See ye only Essence, and the heart of all creation, but such is a confusing tangle."
One step is taken away from him, surveying her handiwork.
Satisfactory, the Lich King states. Now, he will return to his kind. He shall be living proof of the Scourge's indomitable will!
Inside, Agrias cries out in horror and rage, and not a little shame.
Thou shalt not teamkill.
"Now you are as nothing," she says instead, her voice cold as the wind whipping through the valley. "Go back to thy allies, and show to them how useless thou hast become."
Simon tries to wrench the Judge free, but it's... it's trapped in her armor. Almost like it's frozen in place by that horrid dread-plate, and while he tugs furiously, all he manages is an ineffectual rattling. And then Agrias grabs him and pulls him in; he wraps his hands around hers, letting go of the Judge's hilt.
And then he stares into her eyes. "Oaks. What are you-?!"
"No," he gasps, finally seeing what she's about to do. "No, what do you think you're-?!"
Blood stains the snow as Parker screams in agony. He crumples to the ground, crimson pouring from his face in a grotesque parody of tears.
Behind the blood and gore, empty sockets glow a baleful yellow-green.
Reis Duelar has arrived.
Starfire has arrived.
It is done. Wind whispers through the abandoned graveyard, ice and snow thick on the ground, despite it barely being into autumn's weather. The clouds roil overhead, black and heavy with storm. Bannermen of House Oaks stand in silence, ringing a generous area of the graveyard where the black-armoured Agrias Oaks stands, over the crumpled form of Simon Parker.
By all appearances, his eyes have just been torn out. Blood spatters the snow, and it also gathers on the talons at the end of the Death Knight's plate gauntlets.
The Death Knight steps back, watching disdainfully as the demon crumples to the ground, screaming in his agony. She seems to have no pity whatsoever for the pain she's just put him through, even if some small piece of herself mourns this.
At the moment, the Lich King is exerting his will. This insolent whelp will not defy him any longer, today.
"Enjoy this half-sight," she states coldly, reaching up for the runeblade. The blade is taken down from her shoulder, a whispering of frost already spreading and spiderwebbing over its surface. "I leave thee with one final parting gift," she states, in cold sarcasm. "May your blood wet these fields."
Rimehowl falls like a hammerblow, the blade whistling as the wind rises in a brief, howling crescendo; scattering snow and ice in its wake. It dies down quickly enough.
The sound of the blade's impact is sharp over the muted, otherwise silent snowfall.
Agrias withdraws the cursed sword with a wrench of her arm; but she makes no effort to clean it. If anything, Rimehowl seems to absorb the blood, red seeping into black.
She turns on her heel, crunching away in the snow. Yes, she just left him there. A skeletal attendant hands her Alkoun's reins, and she vaults into the saddle, turning to face Simon. Even Alkoun has the look of death about him; black-tipped yellow feathers bleached to a sickly white, tipped with the same sort of light-swallowing hue on the sword. His eyes are pools of blank cyan, luminous in the storm, his legs and beak a greyish black. His barding matches well the Death Knight's fearsome armour.
The rest of the soldiers are waved off, and her honour guard as well. "Return to thy estate," she commands, turning her eyes back to the stricken Balseraph. "I shall wait here and see that thine enemy is taken away. Boreas! To me!"
There is a roar, from far distant in the clouds, and the frost wyrm lands heavily; not far from the two. A spray of snow is sent up in his wake. His huge head swings over towards Agrias, his empty eyes fixed on the Death Knight. One wing furls, the other mantled. Those empty eyes turn back towards Simon.
"We wait," Agrias states, lifting her head and staring disdainfully at the demon. "Doubtless he has called for help. We shall see him off."
Boreas chuckles, the sound deep enough to bring the ground underfoot to quivering. "He shall make a fine example. I will see that they retrieve him, and nothing more."
"Good," Agrias states crisply, settling into her saddle to wait, hands on the reins.
Simon Parker offers absolutely no resistance to Rimehowl's blade. It cleaves clean through his side, leaving a sickening, ragged wound in its wake. The demon's head lolls back, all fight leaving him as he slips into sweet, merciful unconsciousness.
Reis Duelar is coming as fast as she can, hampered only by the fact that she is not entirely sure of her destination - not until she gets closer, and sees the graveyard. After that, there is only one place she thinks - knows - that Simon can be.
Reis rides Iskys, the black chocobo she rode before, leaning far forward in an attempt to get him to ride faster. It does not entirely work as well as she hopes; Reis keeps exhorting her to go faster, but there is only so much speed the poor animal can put on, no matter how much Reis asks of her.
The skeletal dragon is putting her even more on edge. Now she knows it's Agrias, and she's not happy - not to mention the dragon disturbs her for several other reasons, none of which she is willing to clearly think about. Iskys plows up snow as she keeps her running straight, still having not seen the worst of the carnage.
Starfire is not familiar with this world. She really should have visited it at some time, but there are just so many... and she has to help out in her homeplane too. Nevertheless, the orange-skinned alien superheroine flies about fifteen feet above the ground, keeping pace with Reis on her big black running bird. She's depending on Lady Duelar to lead the way through the snow, and is also Reis's backup in case the weather proves too tricky to navigate by chocobo.
Even though ice and snow cover the ground, she still wears her usual miniskirt and halter top uniform. Tamaraneans are well-suited to braving extreme temperatures. Being higher up than Reis, she sees the skeletal dragon from a slightly better vantage point - and spots the red of blood on the snow first. "Lady Duelar!" she calls down. "Be careful!"
Starfire banks away from Reis, and increases her speed, she practically falls from the sky, stopping to hover a foot or two above the ground between Agrias and Simon. Her fists and eyes glow with blinding green energy, and her posture is that of barely-restrained violence. "We are here to take Parker!" she declares.
There is a certain pride to the Death Knight, in the way she sits in her saddle and holds her head high. She's hardly outspoken about it, but posture is everything, and she seems barely affected by the cruel winds buffeting the valley. Winter lives here. Even the cold has a stark wrongness about it.
"They come." Boreas raises his head, his observation deep and sonorous. One wing sweeps around until he can fold it fastidiously, frost shaken loose in a clattering of bones. He settles beside the Death Knight. "Presumably to retrieve their fallen ally. Perhaps they can spread their message, from there."
"There will be no resisting the One True King," Agrias answers, her tone of voice that unearthly rasp again. Guilt and fear are gone, replaced with the mask of arrogance and lichborne confidence. "They shall all be laid low, before the Scourge, and made to serve."
The frost wyrm doesn't answer, the cyan fire of his eyes turned to focus on Reis. Perhaps he senses the remnants of dragon's blood in her, or perhaps he merely looks at her because she seems so uneasy.
"Hail and well-met," the Death Knight calls, her greeting a mockery. Her eyes are the same cyan as Boreas', the colour wisping as though it were wind or fire seeping from her very eyes. "I see thine ally was not foolish enough not to call for help."
She was hoping he'd do that before he crumpled.
She gestures dismissively towards the fallen Balseraph, taloned gauntlets clicking. "Take him away, if thy have a wish. I shall not stop thee. But bring him as an example. There shall be more of this treatment, if thy allies continue to defy the will of the Scourge."
A flicker of a smile crosses Agrias' face, cold and cruel. A hand raises, one talon from the gauntlet pointing straight for Reis. "Thy world shall be made to know true winter," she intones. "There is naught thee can do to turn aside this blade of winter. Resistance shall only bring retribution beyond thy imagining." Her hand lowers, clasping the reins again. "Remember that."
"Take thy ally away," she finally says, at length. "I've no more desire to see such a weak and pathetic fool. Yon creature thought he might best the champion of the One True King, but sad will be his lament. He could not, and thus has he paid the price. He shall be an example. And his fate is but the beginning."
But she doesn't leave; instead watching the two, and waiting. She'll stay until they leave, comfortable in the frozen gale, as comfortable as a normal person might be lying on a sunny hill. As long as the Lich King's proverbial talons are sunk into her mind and body, such fierce, frostbitten winters are comfortable and even rejuvenating.
Iskys slows. She has to; she can't run that hard and that fast in the cold, and Reis won't force her to kill herself for her transportation. The dragon scares her, too, and unlike Reis, she's not 'intelligent' enough to talk herself into doing scary things.
Reis dismounts and runs the rest of the way herself, letting Iskys shudder. Reis is cold herself, but pretending not to show it. She wishes she had heavier clothes than this. A fur mantle isn't cutting it and it's all she could find in time.
"Dame Oaks..." Reis looks at the woman, then back down, and away. How do you respond to something like that? "...I... We'll talk. Grant me that, at least, if you will not grant me anything else."
Looking away, she finally realizes that that blood - it's all, or mostly, Simon Parker's. "Good God!" she exclaims, startled, and runs - not walks - toward his side. She only has some potions with her; not many, but maybe enough... She no longer responds to Agrias. She has more important things to do.
Despite the howling cold and Simon's current lack of eyes, Starfire doesn't seem uncomfortable. Only furious. She has no way to help Simon except to carry him home with her, but she's much better suited to guarding him and Reis. Her boots do not yet touch the snow. "...Greetings," she responds stiffly to Agrias, when the blonde doesn't attack. "I thank you for not destroying our ally. But you will not bring this winter to our worlds. It will be contained here - and then it will be defeated, just as you and your King will be."
She doesn't dare to take her eyes off of Agrias and the skeletal dragon, and must trust Reis to tend to Simon herself. "We will not surrender. As long as one warrior remains, we will fight back." Her long hair flutters in the wind. Otherwise she remains motionless in the air save for a the gentle rise and fall of her floating body.
Agrias shifts her weight in the saddle, glowing cyan eyes raking the assembled company. She doesn't even bother to take Rimehowl down from her shoulder, apparently secure in the knowledge that they won't attack her.
RabbleAgrias Oaks, the lot of them. The Lich King's voice is for Agrias and Agrias alone, but the others may hear a faint howl of wind; a fresh gale of ripping cold sent through the valley. Send them running back to their allies, that they might sow fear and unrest. Let them prove what happens to those that defy the Scourge.
"Such is what happens to those who defy the One True King." Agrias lifts her head, but it's clear that she is no longer Agrias Oaks. The woman she was is somewhere else. Her eyes fall on Reis - and there's a faint flicker; a brief instant of terror and guilt, a brief and wordless plea to be freed from this prison - the look of somebody far beyond their element, and then just as quickly, the Death Knight is under the control of Arthas Menethil once again.
"If thou wouldst speak, thou may hold thy tongue for another day." Her voice is cold, and completely unlike the voice of the Holy Knight that Reis had known. Few traces are left of her. "Take thy ally, for today, and return from whence ye came. I have not a wish to see this wretch any longer."
"Pathetic little humans." Boreas, similarly, keeps his empty eyes on Starfire. Jaws part, faintly, and a wreath of frosty mist spills from them; but he doesn't attack. He's just taunting her. He might be grinning sadistically, if he had any features left with which to do that. He does laugh, though, an awful, dry, serpentine cackle; rearing up on his hind legs and beating his wings as he does. The motion stirs up a fresh swirl of powdery cold. "The rabble grows bold! Oh, this is amusement as such I have not had in many a generation. I look forward to fighting you," he adds, lowering his head to regard Reis and Starfire alike. "It has been long since I have fought a worthy battle for the Scourge."
"Too many times they are put to rout, and flee, and beg for their miserable lives," Boreas hisses, letting the last word draw out. "I will savour this!"
"Enough." Agrias jostles the reins, and Alkoun steps forward. Rimehowl is there, in her hand, pointed towards Starfire. "Thy courage is commendable, but courage is as easily called stupidity. Take thy ally. Begone from this place. And if thee should still have a wish for battle, then battle it shall be. But thy souls shall be added unto the Scourge."
She wheels Alkoun in a tight circle, letting the chocobo crunch away through the ice and snow. "Boreas. We go."
"As you wish, my lady," the dragon responds, leaping skyward with a single thrust of his powerful (and deteriorating) hind legs. Tattered wings beat once, twice; and he soon vanishes into the roiling clouds, winging his way towards House Oaks.
Soon, too, the Death Knight is lost to the howling storm.