[color=salmon]"Mara's mercy..."[/color] Fiona breathed, as the tavern erupted into an all-out struggle on her way back from acquiring another round. That stupid, wicked, pathetic man... he was going to get everyone in here killed because he couldn't have his way and because Fiona had made him pay for it. Even now the orc was already dismembering a fool that attempted to fight him. Could they not see that they were provoking experienced killers? Fiona never wanted any of this.

But her wants were irrelevant, as Nolan had stirred up the locals into wanting her entire group gone, or better yet, dead, and while the orc was intimidating to approach, Fiona was rather the center of the man's ire, and thus she immediately became a target. A problem made yet worse by the fact that she was only armed with a tankard of ale, her sword still half a room away. She held out a hand to the barmaid still behind her. [color=salmon]"Stay back!"[/color] she shouted, just as the first man rushed her from the front. Fiona threw her ale in his eyes, temporarily blinding him, before she punched him in the throat hard enough to send him collapsing to the floor.

A shoulder rammed into her side, and sent Fiona stumbling into the nearest table, which sent a jarring blow into her hip. She lashed out with the tankard and caught the aggressor across the jaw, spinning him around, and she shoved him away with her boot. Then it was Nolan that was on her, his face now decorated with the improvements Fiona had made. He was knife-armed now, one hand going straight for her throat, while the other tried to plunge the blade into her chest.

His weight forced Fiona back, until she was horizontal atop the table. Nolan pressed down on top of her, tightening his grip on her throat, and she couldn't remove the hand, not while she was preoccupied keeping the knife out of her heart. She threw her weight sideways, and the entire table tipped over, sending the two of them crashing painfully into chairs, and eventually the floor.

Fiona scrambled up, reaching for her blade, and managing to grasp the hilt, just before Nolan seized a fistful of her red hair from behind, yanking her head back. She yelped in pain, turned sharply, and drove the butt of her sword into Nolan's thick gut, which had less of an effect than she would've liked. There was no room to swing such a long sword in here. By her hair Nolan pulled Fiona around, off balance, but still focused on him.

Then a knife was jammed into her right side from behind, the blade sinking in just above her hip. Fiona gasped and turned to catch a glimpse of the barmaid she'd told to keep away, infected by the same rage that gripped the others. It was all she had time to see, before Nolan charged into her. Fiona caught his wrist before he could stab her, but the man's shoulder rammed into her gut, the charge lifting her from her feet and carrying her backwards, pulling the knife free from the wench's hand. The tackle carried Fiona right into a window, and the pair shattered right through it, tumbling out of the tavern.

The air suddenly became bitingly cold all around them, as Fiona was deposited roughly onto the snow-speckled ground. Maintaining her grip on Nolan's wrist, the man still pressing his weight down on top of her, Fiona abandoned her sword, which was pinned under her, and better grasped his hand. She wrenched it unnaturally, a telltale cracking signaling his wrist breaking. He let the knife fall, crying out, but simultaneously grasping the one in her side, and twisting. She writhed under him, features twisting in pain.

His lost knife fell lightly on her shoulder, and Fiona grabbed it, unthinking. Flipping it backwards in her hand, she drove it up and sideways, right into Nolan's neck. His grunts of effort turned into gurgling chokes, blood squirting from the puncture sideways onto the snowy ground as his eyes went wide. With one more push Fiona removed him from her, and toppled him over. He was dead a moment later.

Gingerly, Fiona got to her knees, and pulled the knife from her side with another gasp. She cast it aside and pressed her hand against the wound to slow the bleeding. Her sword she placed in front of her, to have ready in case it was needed again. She could still hear struggling coming from inside the tavern. But Fiona wanted no part of it, instead remaining still, trying to catch her breath and pull herself together. More than her wound, it was guilt that racked her.

She didn't even feel remorse, for killing a man when she didn't need to. She felt relieved, actually. And that was the worst thing of all.