As the others began making their way upthe icy cliff-face, Roze was still making no progress with the lock. Not only had the ice warped and rusted the metal mechanism within, but the cold climate was making her bare fingers numb and very uncooperative. After several broken picks had yielded nothing but small cuts on her freezing fingers, she was only too happy to let the sailor take over in a more brutal manner; standing back and sucking on her bloodied fingertips as the door was kicked open.

How thankful it was that her hand was by her face when the door did open - the group barely had time to react when a blue orb had sped from the open door, slamming into one of their comrades, and swiftly being followed by a number of others. Roze only just managed to cover her eyes with her raised hand as one of the anomalies slammed into her face and knocked her to the floor. With her other hand, she ripped the dagger tucked in her boot out and stabbed wildly at the orb, stopping in surprise to see how easily it had dissolved from her blade. It had left a bruise on her cheek, but Roze wasn't complaining - better her cheek than her eyes.

[i]"Or my neck - unlike that poor bastard."[/i] She mused in afterthought, glancing at the edge of the cliff where the sailor had fallen. The sickening crack of his bones had reverberated all the way up the cliff to them. It had not been a pleasant sound, that was for sure.

Thankfully, no more deaths followed, and the group continued on into the depths of the tower. There were strangely no other obstacles - no traps, no weird glowing magic things, and nothing vaguely Kamal or Daedric looking in sight. Roze contemplated as to whether the people at the College were even aware of what had transpired at Windhelm... if they didn't know about the Ice Demons, perhaps it was good that the group had joined in on the rescue. The College would be sitting ducks to the Kamal otherwise. And Roze didn't want to think of what such creatures could do with their hands on some of the things in the College. She'd heard stories of weapons of great power, ones that could rip open the barrier between Oblivion and Mundus itself; things that could summon, kill, or even control Gods; access to old powers, ones strong enough to sink cities and obliterate mountains. These were stories she had been told, and more often than not, she had simply accepted them as nothing more than fables or children's stories. But with what she had seen in the past few days? Roze could no longer be blind to such possibilities - especially if such items could fall into the hands of the Kamal.

After all, something like that had to have been what had destroyed Winterhold.

Noticing Ariane's comment, Roze followed suit and cast her own Life Detection spell, smiling slightly as blobs appeared above her. They did look vaguely humanoid, so that was good. Once Farid gave the go ahead for them to follow, all she had to do was to keep an eye out for Sebastian...

As it happened, Sebastian was right above them - puffing on a pipe quite happily in an alcove, to avoid the howling blizzard outside. Only when he heard Farid's voice did he cast his eyes to where the Redguard stood, and a smile danced upon his lips to see the newcomer - and the fairly defensive stance he was set in.

Resting his pipe on a crate out of the way of the snow, the mage walked around the alcove, staff in hand as he came up behind Farid - standing a good few paces away from the Redguard before talking.

"There's plenty of us to be found alive, friend!" He called out with a smile, casually leaning against the wall as if the situation was an entirely normal one. "However, now's not really the time for tourists - the College is far nicer in the summer months, after all. If you're here for the Archmage, he took a convenient little holiday somewhere before this all happened and remains there still. If you're here to take advantage of us poor little Mages and rob us, please feel free and try - we haven't had much in the way of entertainment these past few days." All of this said with a roguish grin, Sebastian waited on Farid's response, wondering silently just where the fellow had come from.


[hr][hr]


Rhasha was pleased to see the ship sailing towards the campfire, despite the Cat-Kicker's objections. The prospect of docking and walking upon solid land was a warming one; however, the situation on the shore wasn't looking all too friendly. As the hailstorm became worse, the fire died, and after a moment, the Khajiit realised what was happening.

[i]"Ice-Wraiths? Azurah, why does your favour seem to avoid this one these past few weeks?"[/i] Grumbling silently to himself, Rhasha'Dar - carefully - made his way down the boards, teeth gritted as he watched the roiling waters beneath. He couldn't decide what would be worse - dying to the icy bite of the wraith, or drowning in waters that were likely just as cold. Thankfully, he didn't have to test the latter, making his way onto land quite safely, and pulling one of his war-axes from his belt as he approached the fray; his other hand grasping the torch Leif had thrown. Rhasha had ran into Ice-wraiths plenty of times before, what with traversing such frosty climates with the caravan. The worst injury ever sustained from one of the beasts had been an awful bite to the leg of one of their guards; had it not been for Rhasha's efforts, the leg would have blackened and died from the ice. He only hoped that if it happened to someone here, he could once again do something to aid them - after all, an amputation in a place like this would likely not to do much to save a life.

Jabbing his torch towards the wraith that faced him, Rhasha slashed with his axe as it dodged the flames. It was unfortunately quick enough to avoid the main force of the weapon, but it glanced off the ice crystals that made up it's ghostly body, and it recoiled momentarily, hissing in pain. Rhasha hissed in response, fangs bared in an automatic reflex against the danger.