[h3]The Titan[/h3] [i]Early Morning, 15th of Sun’s Height, 4E208 Trailing the Southern Druadach Mountains, West of Falkreath Hold[/i] [hr] It was Maulakanth. He was bigger than she remembered. His muscles bulged with such barely restrained force they looked about ready to burst and dark veins spiderwebbed across his skin. It was inhuman, beastly, and Mazrah expected to see a snarl on his face. There was naught but cold death. She knew he had always been fond of strength potions to enhance his already absurd physical prowess, but this… had the Dwemer experimented on him? He looked [i]mutated.[/i] She stammered. “Maul--” The two massive orichalcum blades sheathed across his back, each large enough to be wielded with two hands by lesser men, were drawn with a wicked rasp and Maulakanth was on her in the blink of an eye. He moved with incredible speed for something of his size and Mazrah had to desperately fend him off with a series of parries from her spear, the treated ironwood shaft deflecting and redirecting the ferocious strikes of Maulakanth’s blades. There was enough force behind each swipe and slash to cleave her in twain. He had always been the better fighter of the two of them and it was obvious he hadn’t slacked in his training since they had last seen, but there was one thing Mazrah had that he didn’t; her balletic agility. She kept him at bay and maintained the reach advantage of her spear by leaping backwards as he advanced, deftly avoiding tripping over the uneven ground and even using the trees to bounce off of. Maulakanth just barreled through them, leaving splintered and pulped bark in his unstoppable wake. “Finnen!” she yelled again, more urgently this time. [hr] He was big. A colossus of meat and bone and wrath that stamped through the once quiet forest with the same ease as a rockslide, and no want for fury to match one. He was big. Bigger than the Red-Bear had been, and he knew the Red-Bear would look like a thin boy stood next to this beast. He stood, fear telling him to shrink away. Each call for help Mazrah made stabbed at him, more guilt to match the rising panic of each one. “Move,” a sharp whisper from his own mouth, a weak call to action, “Move.” Finnen’s trembling fingers reached down to his axe at his side and the knife opposite. What he once thought enough to fell any foe seemed now like toys in his hands. But as he watched Mazrah in her desperation, he knew he would never forgive himself if he watched her die. He knew he would never forgive himself if he stood and accepted his death next, like sheep to the butcher’s knife. “Move!” And he did. He pushed his fear aside, each step feeling like he was trying to run through the River Karth. But he charged, raising his axe aloft, he roared as he swung it. And a giant fist plucked the swing from the air like letting a feather drift into its palm. The beast looked at him, no hate, no anger, not even triumph. Like the jackdaw’s gaze on a maggot, he squeezed and Finnen felt the bones shift in his hand, grind against each other. His skin burned under its grasp, so fiercely that he yelped pitifully at first. Too much pain to haul in breath, too much agony to keep quiet. The big beast lifted him up, slow, but he knew it was not for any lack of strength. He was the dry leaf in a closing fist and he was brought down fast enough to feel the wind rushing in his face, whoop in his mouth like he’d jumped from a cliff. And the end of it was no different. It was as if the world crashed into him. He smacked his forehead off a rock and again was brought to look into the beast’s uncaring eyes before he was tossed aside like a broken doll. Spinning through the green trees, his vision a blur, his body a legion of pains. Blue sky, brown earth, green trees as he spun through the air. The wind left him as he crashed through the brush and into the ground. All was starting to fade, but the last thought of his was spent on his mentor. Mazrah. She was a warrior fit for the songs, but this huge beast was fit only for funeral dirges. He lay face down, dirt and twigs scratching and poking into him. His breath rattled deep inside his chest and as the hazy fringes of his vision closed in, he knew they might’ve been his last… “Gurgh.” Blood dribbled from his numb mouth. Everything wasted… When Mazrah lay dead, he knew Sora would stand no chance. And there was sorrow in him, panging deep in his chest until it turned cold. Far away, he heard Mazrah yell. But all he could think about was the cold. Cold and colder, as if someone had stuck swelling ice in his belly. He saw a pale, thin-fingered hand in the dirt, raw and bloody to the elbow, tendons pale in the scratched and open flesh. It was his, he knew. When he tried to move the fingers they only closed tight, tighter still, ripping up clods of dirt as it shook under the fury of itself. There was ice, deep in him, and it spread. Out from his stomach, until it reached the tips of his fingers. Out, until all of him was numb. It was well that it did. “Yes,” Finnen hissed as he stirred, lips curling back to reveal his pink teeth, blood dribbling and trickling out into the grass as he was uncoiling from about himself like the serpent, “Yes.” His hand slithered through the grass, fingers tickling for the haft of his axe and closing tight around it when they did. Shakily, he rose to his feet. Up and up, onto one knee and he stood, knees almost buckling but he forced his legs straight. He felt pain stab into him from his chest as he rolled his shoulders, fingers tracing lines against the wrong shapes his ribs had become underneath the skin. Felt fear clawing his mind. But pain… pain and fear and anger… “Yes!” He growled, jaw set hard and eyes wild. Pain and fear were the fuel. [i]They made the fire grow.[/i] And Finnen laughed. And Pale-Feather laughed with him... [hr] “FINNEN!” Mazrah screamed, eyes wide in horror at the sight of his battered body cartwheeling through the air, landing somewhere out of sight. Maulakanth turned back to face her and for the first time she saw something of an emotion on his face; the hint of a smile. He was enjoying this. Hurting Finnen. Hurting [i]her.[/i] All of her lessons about control and focus, everything she had spent so long teaching to Finnen over the past few weeks, were forgotten in an instant. A roaring, seething rage burst forth from her glands and thundered through her veins, sweeping across her golden eyes and bathing them in crimson bloodlust. She screamed again, a primal noise that tore at her throat with its own fury, and she dashed towards her brother, determined to wipe that smug smile off his fucking face. He was fast but for a moment she was faster and her spear smacked both of his swords aside before thrusting once, twice, thrice, burying the tip into his thigh, side and arm, the barbed orichalcum pulling forth bright sprays of blood every time she yanked it free from his flesh. She heard him growl and she drove the spear up and towards his exposed throat. He dodged it. She’d barely seen his head move, but he dodged it, and the spear whizzed uselessly past his ear. Mazrah instantly realized that she’d overstepped and that she was within striking distance of Maulakanth now. It was a realization that she was only able to entertain unabused for a split second before a fierce, bone-crushing kick sent her sprawling on her back, gasping for breath and moaning in pain. Maulakanth looked down at the injuries he had sustained and grunted in approval as his flesh knitted itself back together. “Crafty people, those Dwemer,” he said, his voice low and grating, like the chest-thrum of a cave bear. “Looks like you picked the wrong side.” His incessant need to gloat gave Mazrah the time she needed to get back up on her feet and curse in disappointment at the sight of his mended wounds. “Fuck you,” she growled, her own voice having dropped an octave with the berserker rage roiling in her blood, and winced at the jolts of pain from her broken ribs. Maulakanth’s nostrils flared. “You betrayed me --” “Shut up and fight me already, you coward!” Mazrah yelled and resumed her frenzied offensive. Maulakanth roared and charged. Their dance of death left even more of the forest destroyed. As much as Mazrah tried, however, she could not manage to lay her spear on him again, slowed down by her ribs and increasing fatigue. Maulakanth seemed tireless and he forced her back more and more until Mazrah got the distinct impression he was toying with her, just to see how long she could keep this up. Enough backpedaling and leaping away saw Mazrah stumble through the last of the trees and into the clearing of the river crossing, the noise of the battle raging behind her suddenly loud and overwhelming. She resisted the urge to look over her shoulder to see what was going on -- it was obvious that Maulakanth had not attacked alone -- and kept her eyes on the towering beast that stepped out of the treeline and followed after her. His expression had changed. Playtime was over. She was able to resist him for a few more precious seconds until a devastating two-handed strike finally sent her spear flying out of her exhausted grip, skittering away until it landed near Sevari’s dead horse. Time slowed down and Mazrah could only watch as his blades came for her. He was good. He was just too damn good. Blood arced in all directions. Mazrah felt herself tumbling through the air with the force of his blows until she fell, heavy and useless, onto the wet sand of the riverbank. Her belly was split open and her right arm, her spear-arm, was nearly severed at the shoulder. The ground around her colored crimson in a split second and she could feel her panicked heart fluttering in shock. “Fuck,” she gurgled, and coughed up blood. A sound like a butcher’s knife through thick, wet meat was heard. The wound was there, in Maulakanth’s shoulder, but the weapon that had made it was gone. Long gone with the one who wielded it. Deep enough to yawn open as he worked his neck and moved his shoulder, he moved his head to see the same little man he’d thrown away before... He was big. A colossus of meat and blood and bone. Jorwen was the same. Jorwen was vast, and this huge Orc was bigger still. He had been afraid at first, afraid of this giant as the child to a thunderstorm. Fear washed through him, fear and pain and Pale-Feather smiled wide, hot breath growling out of him. Livid face around a death’s head grin. How he was afraid of Jorwen, long ago. But Pale-Feather was meant to break such men. He thrust the thumb of his crook-fingered hand into his chest, “You? Kill me?” Pale-Feather frowned deep as he spat the words, before the wretched smile returned the fiercer at the head of sobbing, shrieking slaughterhouse giggling, mad as it came. “I do the killing, fool!” Quick as the coiled viper he came on, chopping with axe and slicing deep with knife. Looking to rend flesh from bone, bloody strings of spit flying from his roaring, laughing lips. He danced away from grabbing fists, snaked away from swinging arms, leaving only high, grating laughter for the giant’s useless fingers to clutch. The Red-Bear too had thought lightly of him, and he sent the Red-Bear home with his name on his tongue. Like the thousand hornets he rushed around this mountain of a warrior, every swat met only with laughter, every swipe met with the stinging cuts of his knife. His axe’s head tore through flesh, beautiful moments of crimson spray hot on his face, every grunt and grimace was music to him. As he moved, the pain in his chest grew more, but pain was only the fuel. And the flames surged higher yet. The Orc was quicker and quicker and the world around them swirled altogether. It was the music of battle and violence roaring loud in Pale-Feather’s ears once more and he reveled in it. The world was a crucible of their fury, and the two of them raged together like two suns. [hr] Everything had been chaos. The noise was deafening. The continuous dull thudding of Centurions being punched echoed through her mind. The hair-raising scrapes of metal on metal. Racing crackles of both flame and storms brewed from magicka. Screams and cries. It was discordant and uneven and frantic. Without melody to tie each element together, it was pure chaos. Yet, something came through underneath, something so powerful she swore she could feel the vibrations beneath her feet. The aching smash of something colliding with the unmoving trunks of the trees she had been admiring - now bent, broken, and split. Splinters were flung into the air like a rain, an absolute mockery of nature. Maul was at the centre, hurtling through Mazrah as if she was nothing, and with as much bolstered confidence and aggression that made him the God of this wood. But Raelynn could see that this was personal. He was no God, he had danced through to [i]them[/i] with his sadistic glee, his tiny eyes abundant with enough fury to turn ocean to fire. Alongside the rage in those eyes too was joy; unfettered joy and wrath in passionate embrace, a waltz in which virtue was dancing mad with sin. Raelynn watched through plumes of smoke as he tore at Maz. She felt her screams as if they were a hot blade carving through her own spine. Everything else that was happening around her was suddenly inconsequential, just slow motion white noise, diluted down to make way for the thunderous thrumming of war that Maul created in his wake. Ribbons of blood launched into the space between the two Orsimer like symbol slammed on symbol. Mazrah fell. And now Maul faced Finnen, [i]or was it?[/i] Then there was a light; light that broke through the clouds overhead. A spotlight that brought her eyes heavensward first, and then in its diagonal direction. It was flickering and flashing violently against the alloy of the dismembered Dwemer cannon she had mended. It stung to look at it, and it rang out like a repetitive piano key. A pitchy octave touched over and over, the build up to something unexpected. The note that gave way. If Finnen and Mazrah were to die, then this symphony would remain unfinished. If Maul was given the inch that her allies were clutching to with their lives, then the mile he would take after would be the one that ran them all down and filled the soil of the Druadach mountains with innocent blood. She would not say goodbye today. [i]Rise up my sunshine, eyes up.[/i] Amongst the music of the battle, she was the string, playing quietly under the noise until the noise slipped down. That small woman, easy-to-miss and easy to underestimate… It was Raelynn who picked up the cannon once more, called to it by that plucked piano key. She was the wavering string; the distressed and drawn out note that steadied until it became the melody of confidence. The instrument that waited its turn and rose for that turn; to finally slip through the net. It had but one purpose in the piece - to summon the crescendo. “Let’s see how hard you hit when you’re blowing in the wind.” [right][i]BANG[/i][/right] Maulakanth, the clenched fist of Mauloch, stumbled. The little man buzzing about him like a wasp had distracted him so much that he had not seen the rifle being aimed. He fell on one knee and gasped to regain the breath that had been knocked out of him. A horrible sucking noise drew his eyes down and he saw the hole that Raelynn’s bullet had carved in his chest. Already the incredibly powerful regenerative potion the Dwemer had given him was working overtime to repair the damage, but blood poured freely in the meantime and his head was spinning. “Fuck,” he gurgled, and coughed up blood. Now. Now was the glorious, fated moment. The Red-Bear had been big, but this giant was bigger yet. And still he was but a mountain of meaningless dust in the face of death’s breath. The tallest mountains may be sundered by the angry river’s white flow. Pale-Feather’s smiling lips oozed blood, lost among the spatters that almost caked the whole of his face and chest and arms from the cutting and gouging and hacking. “You’ll be remembered in the songs of me.” He said, words gravelly and harsh. Pale-Feather looked upon the pitiful thing before him. He raised his axe high, gripped in both tight, angry fists. The rising sun sending a shimmer down its honed edge. His breath hissed in his throat as he brought it down in a beautiful, furious red arc for the Giant’s head. [hr] She couldn’t tell what was going on anymore. Her ears were ringing and her vision was darkening at the edges. All she could see were the trees above her swaying in the breeze. As far as she knew, with Finnen and herself down and out for the count, there was nothing stopping Maulakanth anymore. The Orsimer huntress desperately tried to sit up, to get up, to do [i]anything,[/i] but her muscles removed to move. The adrenaline coursing through her veins was only working to pump the blood out of her faster. She was so weak. “Not like this,” Mazrah whispered through clenched teeth, tears in her eyes. [i]“Not like this...”[/i] Raelynn was now centre stage having made her way as light as a feather to the trauma. The harbinger of chaos and violence continued his dance in her backdrop, shrouded in the shadows of his own making, toe-to-toe with Pale-Feather who was percussive in each of his own furious motions of retaliation. They were untouchable by anything or anyone but each other. The lights were on her now, a break in the clouds flooded Mazrah in light and illuminated the crimson reservoir that was her stomach. Steel blue eyes, lined with kohl dark as a raven scanned the damage. Hands gloved in red to the elbow got to work. Lacerations, broken bones, tears, contusions. Her mind worked against the clock to plan out her strategy - but of course she already knew what had to be done. A heartbeat fluttered and a pulse faded. Life was drifting from Maz’s eyes and it was like watching something slowly fall to the dark bottom of a pool of water, the fight and flame winding down to the last of the embers before they were washed over and seduced to naught but the black. The Orc had been messily carved at the blade of her shoulder, and the ground beneath her was visible through the gap of shredded sinew and arteries holding on. The last string, buckling and fraying under the tension of the shrill notes of death. Blood was pooling and the scent of iron held strong in the air. The metallic tang combined with the musk of the rain bleached earth beneath her left consecrated ground to which very few could sow life back into. Raelynn’s expression hardened as she knelt astride the great huntress, but with none of her weight touching the body. A hand steadied over each deadly mutilation. She held herself there by the strength of her will, knees bent and hips turned - her core pulling tight to hold her upright above Mazrah - and still she looked elegant. Even despite the grey cloak, now saturated and slick with blood, she was the image of surgical poise. This was her stage now. Her delicate hands quickly began to glow white - tendrils of gold curling in the empty space between the Breton and the Orc. The rest she held controlled in her open palms - letting it wind around her arms to her shoulders like a serpent. Suddenly Raelynn was ensnared in it as it took to her face, stripping the blue from her eyes to leave two orbs of topaz behind, working to the crown of her head like a halo. There was no semblance of a smile upon her countenance, nor was there a modicum of fear held in her eyes - just absolute concentration exuding from her being. “Release,” she whispered under her breath, and like the darkest clouds that filled the sky before a storm; she burst. A deluge of golden light fell as liquid from benevolent hands, as naturally as if Raelynn was simply a statue of a nymph in a fountain, never changing, an image frozen as it was. She gave. The energy was vibrant, warm, and humming. Life itself. The control of the mage was so great and incredibly precise that she did not need to lay her hands against the wounds for the holy light to reach the intended destination. It fell freely and abundantly into Mazrah - a steady and gentle grace that caressed and embraced the Orc in absolute warmth and love, and soon she too was bathed in Raelynn’s light. Perhaps, under different circumstances, Mazrah’s eyes would have widened in delight and her lungs drawn a deep breath at the incredible relief that the healing tendrils of magic provided by mending her bruised and broken form, but not now. The damage had been too great and her mind had already closed itself off in a desperate attempt to protect her from the reality of her situation. She was stiff, jaw working, the fingers that still worked clenched, eyes staring dead ahead and straight up, the shock of her grievous injuries too much to bear. A tiny voice in the back of her head wondered what all the light was. [hr] It wasn’t Maulakanth’s head that split open. It was his hand. He caught the axe between his fingers and the blade lodged itself within the bones of his palm. If it caused him any pain, the giant Orsimer showed no sign of it. The wound on his chest had mostly closed, stemming the worst of the bleeding, and his lungs worked again. He looked up at Pale-Feather. The cold indifference had vanished; boiling, sulphuric rage greeted the Reachman now. Maulakanth’s eyes colored over scarlet. The world held its breath as the great titan gave in to the fury of his bloodline. Within a flash Maulakanth was back on his feet and pressing down on Pale-Feather, the axe digging deeper into his hand as he brought both arms to bear, fully intent on crushing the little man with his bare hands in a contest of brute strength. “No songs,” he growled, his face fully twisted in a monstrous snarl, revealing the beast within. “Only carrion!” His massive hands and arms threatened to envelope the Breton in an embrace he would undoubtedly not survive. Pale-Feather had known the great strength of the Red-Bear. Matched it, even. But he was not hurt then, not burdened under the fetters of a near-broken body. But this? He would not die for this. Not until he had the Orc’s head in his hands. Even so, Pale-Feather strained and strained, the head of his axe nibbling deeper and deeper into the Giant’s hand like slowly tearing cloth. The massive strength of this Giant was like holding up a mountain. But like the roots of the Reach’s trees, Pale-Feathers legs stood buckling, but strong enough, like the roots that cracked and burrowed through stone. His muscles burned, ached, his blood ran hot in his face as he set his jaw, and his hissing breath became a growl, eyes bulging. As he raged against the Giant’s strength, the Orc crept closer still, like a glacier. If the Red-Bear had not killed him, this Giant would not. Fear came in sickly waves and pushed him towards the Giant, slowing the advance but only so. His growl gave way to a throaty roar. If this would be his end, he would not make it an easy one. [hr] The grotesque split of Mazrah’s stomach was pulling back together with each of Raelynn’s carefully measured breaths, her own fingers clenching and unclenching- hovering over the wound where they needed to be. Her eyes did not leave Maz’s, for physical wounds could be mended, but there was also that Maz was trapped in her own mind too. The huntress had never lost, at least not like this. That much was certain in the way that her eyes flitted around in their sockets. Was she aware she was doing it? Fear had it’s paralysing grip around her. The repugnant skeletal hand that would not let her go from it’s clutches choked her from inside. “Breathe Mazrah…” she said, and from behind the misty layers of the healing aura it was more of a soft vibration - an instinct. Stark contrast to the piercing knife edge of fear itself. With a wound mending she brought that hand up to Maz’s chest, and placed it as a closed fist between her collarbones, [i]“breathe,”[/i] she said slowly, taking a deep breath of her own, and as Raelynn’s own chest moved - so did Maz’s in a perfect unison. The arm was a problem. It was not bonding back to the shoulder, it was as if it was being rejected by Maz herself, and as that thought crept into Raelynn’s thoughts, Maul’s sinister movements behind them cast an incredibly long shadow and the clouds eclipsed the beam of light from above as if even they were fleeing him. A voice, barely more than a whisper, came to Mazrah from somewhere far away. Breathe… yes, breathe, she could do that. Or was someone doing it for her? The flow of oxygen to her brain brightened the darkness that had crept into her vision and sound returned slowly to her ears. Everything was so loud. Gunfire, yelling, clashing metal, and the deep growl of a… mountain bear? Abruptly and without warning, Mazrah felt that she was in terrible pain. She wanted to scream but only a whimper left her lips. At last, her eyes found Raelynn above her, an angelic shape wreathed in light. “My arm,” the Orsimer stammered, fear evident in her voice. “Raelynn… my arm…” “Working on it,” was Raelynn’s automatic response in an unusually monotonous tone - as if she was more concerned with the obstacle, as if it was mocking her in the refusal to mend. She knew that fixing the arm was going to take all of the energy she had so purposefully placed around Mazrah so far. She knew that to gather it into a singular charge would mean exposing her patient to the full force of the tremendous agony she was currently stabilising. The Breton forced herself to draw her eyes from the wound and to Maz’s again. It was now or never to make a decision, and in that moment of brief deliberation Raelynn knew that if any of them could survive it, it was the woman beneath her. The clouds broke once more as she brought back the pooling magicka to coalesce into her open hand until it took the form of a miniature burning sun, turning over in her palm, shimmering and radiant like a ball of liquid gold. It began to cast an amber glow against her face, highlighting the fire in her eyes, casting deep shadows beneath them. Raelynn's arm trembled under the strain of it before she pushed it against the Orc's shoulder blade. Her eyes were narrowed and harboured a deep intensity, her brows became sharp with the angle of which they furrowed into. Raelynn bit down hard, breathing through gritted teeth as she forcefully willed the separated limb back in place. The pain was overwhelming and Mazrah’s eyes rolled into the back of her head while her body buckled and spasmed in protest, before she suddenly went limp. The huntress was spent. She lost consciousness and everything went black. "That's it," Raelynn hissed, with gravel in her throat. "Good," she added as she watched the limb slowly mend before her eyes. She hooked the fingers of her free hand between her neck and the silken cloth of her ascott, loosening it with a swift rigour. She examined the way that Maz’s arm came back, it was as though she was turning back the hands of a clock. As her scarf came free, the magicka had been absorbed by flesh and in a flash she made a bandage of the silk, watching as Mazrah's blood soaked it from plum to black. [hr] Pale-Feather could feel the hot gusts of breath from the Giant on his face, both their visages locked in deep hatred and malice for each other. Pale-Feather’s let a smile across his lips, a wicked bearing of teeth. Finally, the Giant was showing his fury. He could feel it on him like flames licking at his skin, like he was hugging a furnace. As they struggled against each other, Pale-Feather was satisfied. The Red-Bear had been a challenge, his stories preceded him, the words like emissaries of hatred. But this Giant was like an avatar of malevolence. A true killer. A true rival. But lo, rage and scream and run and fight as one might, there is no killing death. Pale-Feather looked upon Maulakanth the Mountain that Walks. Held his gaze suspended on his own burning eyes, pupils the color of the hearts of flame, he growled past clenched teeth, “Mark this, Orc. I am the anger of your God given form!” With that, with all the roiling tension and rippling muscle of the two beasts, the daunting rage like the rockfall from the mountain clashing with the River Karth, the devastating flow of Pale-Feather’s fury ebbed at the last moment as he threw himself away and to the side of Maulakanth. The Orc stumbled forward as Pale-Feather clambered to his feet, beating his chest. The air around his skin shimmered and rippled like the mirage of the desert and his skin was iron. His shoulders heaved a great breath in and he held out the crook-finger hand that Maulakanth himself had maimed. He looked upon him like a sibling with a bitter rivalry to settle. Respect, and an undercurrent of hatred. “I am waiting.” Maulakanth rose to his full height. He plucked the axe from his ruined hand and threw it aside like a lesser man might flick away an insect. The blade buried itself four inches deep in the bark of a nearby tree. The little man had impeded his rampage long enough and he could hear from the sound of metal ripping and tearing behind him that the Centurions were not winning the fight by themselves. He briefly considered reaching for his blades again and making short work of the opponent in front of him like he had done his thrice-cursed sister, but decided against it. The mountain would bury the river. With a sickening sucking noise, the two split halves of his hand mended back together. He bared his tusks and an ululating thrum from deep within him rippled the water of the woodland stream with its subsonic vibrations. The assault that followed forced the air to part at speeds it was not accustomed to, sending up plumes of sand and dirt around the Orsimer and rustling the leaves on the trees with every shockwave. Maulakanth’s fists, battering rams of flesh and bone, struck once, twice, thrice every second, forcing Pale-Feather entirely on the defensive, relying on evasion and deflection to avoid being battered into the ground. Where his skills and speed failed him, Maulakanth landed blows that almost made the Ironskin spell buckle under their weight, casting a ringing sound like a gong throughout the clearing, bruising Pale-Feather’s skin and threatening to break his bones. Maulakanth roared in frustration after the Ironskin saved the Reachman again from a punch that should have pulped his head like a melon and he kicked with all of his weight behind it, hitting Pale-Feather square in the chest and sending him tumbling away across the earth. [i]“ROHI SIM! TARASK TUMN!”[/i] he bellowed in the old tongue and dashed after his foe, fully intent on stomping out his damnable life. Pale-Feather lay slumped at the head of four long scrapes in the ground where the dirt was bare. As he stood, the tree that caught him let loose it’s death groan, falling to the ground with the sound of hissing leaves before it crashed to its resting place. The Reachman swayed in place as he heard the infant-babble on the air. “Woe unto you!” Pale-Feather roared, bloody strings of spittle flying from cracked lips. He spread his arms wide as if to receive Maul in his embrace but the Orc’s arms hugged only air. Easier to snatch the smoke than Pale-Feather, better to hug the fire. A giant tree trunk of a limb soared over his ducking head, but as powerful as it was, it was just as sloppy. Maulakanth may as well have been moving at a snail’s speed. Pale-Feather responded with a flurry of his own, roaring with each blow, the strength that had buckled the Red-Bear bloody behind each one. A kick into Maulakanth’s flat stomach was like kicking a rooted tree, each blow left his knuckles singing like striking stone. He pressed on still until a quick swipe grazed off his arm and sent him barreling across the ground. He came to his feet yet again, wiping a forearm across his lips and baring blood-pink teeth in a wolf’s grin. Say one thing to the fight, say Pale-Feather made good on not making it easy for the Giant. Not even ironhard fists were enough to do more than bruise the hide of the titan and Maulakanth shrugged off Pale-Feather’s blows with ease. His rage was boiling over and he was panting hard by now, the exertion of the fight finally catching up with the powerful Dwemer concoctions coursing through his veins. The wound in his hand had not healed entirely cleanly and the veins that spiderwebbed across his body had darkened even further. It was a clash of monsters and Maulakanth forgot his primary objective in the throes of his fury; all he could think of was winning. With one final, bloodcurdling roar, the great beast charged and rammed Pale-Feather before he could step side, lifting the small Reachman up and slamming him down into the ground, and again, and again, his berserker’s grip made of steel. Dirt rose from the violent impacts and scattered around them in a wide circle until Pale-Feather lay broken and cratered in the ground. Maulakanth hissed. His eyes were crimson with madness. He placed his foot on the Reachman’s chest and put his weight on it. His good hand reached for one of the blades sheathed across his back. The mountain [i]would[/i] bury the river. Pale-Feather raged against the thick leg of Maulakanth. He scratched and bit and tore at the skin, teeth bared as he growled the last of his strength from behind his teeth, vision hazy and double. He looked up and Maulakanth met his gaze. A deep frown was all that remained from Pale-Feather. His grip remained on Maulakanth’s foot, fingers digging into his skin as his hands tightened. The blade was held aloft and Pale-Feather bared his teeth a last time. A last whisper, a string of words cutting like winter gusts, “I’ll come calling in your peoples’ hell.” The blade came down, tip burying itself beside his head as the hand he’d split earlier showed the sky through a gory hole in the palm. Sevari heaved in a rattling breath, tossing his rifle aside and hefted the big Centurion cannon, a frown and a practiced squint was all Sevari gave the big bastard. He’d killed Stranger. He gutted men before, just for hard looks at the loyal steed. This was a crime worthy of execution. The green Giant turned and locked eyes with him. Sevari didn’t even give him a chance to roar, just squeezed the trigger and felt the big gun shove him back a step. It landed lower than he’d liked it to, a big chunk tore away from the Orc’s side as he charged heedless. He held the monster’s gaze still as he chambered the new round. He tried to kill Latro, or Finnen, or whatever the fuck his little friend was calling himself. He hung men for less. He hefted it again, the Giant was close. He sighted again, the Giant was nearly looming now. He spat still-dark blood to the side. “Down, boy.” [i]BOOM.[/i] It hit Maulakanth dead center. Solar plexus, diaphragm. He buckled, the wind and all of his strength knocked out of him by the two devastating shots, and he groaned in agony. Blood spurted from his wounds, black as ichor, and his heart thundered in his chest. Straining to move, to push ahead, to put that damn cat into the ground, Maulakanth was finally forced to admit defeat when he fell down on all fours, shoulders heaving. But he wasn’t going to die here. Not today. Before Sevari could finish the job, he used the last of his vigor to climb back to his feet, hands gouging deep into the dirt as he pulled himself up. The Centurion’s rifle was spent, he knew, and he shot one last look at Raelynn and Mazrah. His lip curled in disgust. Leaving a trail of blood Maulakanth turned and left, stumbling as he went but gradually picking up speed. The forest parted for his massive form and he disappeared behind the leaves of the fallen trees that he and Mazrah had toppled during their struggle, his heavy footfalls echoing through the clearing until they, too, were gone. Next to Pale-Feather, the gore on the sword he’d left behind was shockingly red in the mountain sun.