[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][color=darkgray][h1][i][b]Cavendish[/b][/i][/h1][/color][/center][center][color=darkgray][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] A10 -> [b]A12[/b][/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center]
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	As much as Cavendish was anxious to get back to the slaughter, there was more than a little regret as the magic from the pretty Half-Elf ripped into him, and everything around him. Bodies of more of his diminutive rat companions were cleft fully through, including the undead ones which were assailing his person, but deep furrows also cut his flesh in ways that connected and spiderwebbed like broken glass. It was then that he remembered the flash of purple that clouded his brain from the last time they tussled, filling him with whispers that he swore he recognized from previous victims. The spectral dagger that bobbed and weaved around him was not forgotten either; a potentially painful gift from the now obvious Cleric on the other side of the fire. It was only a matter of time before it scored a hit on his flesh, and this knife's cut would stay open and bleeding when it did. 

	To his estimation, they couldn't have had a lot of fight left in them, and if they stayed away because of the rats and the fire, he could pick them off with some expertly aimed Eldritch Blasts. There were two potential targets that might have been able to overpower him - okay, at least match him if they worked together - and one of them didn't seem to want a thing to do with him. Yes, the Constable could pull a win out of this. Even with the Bard's painful and unpredictable spell set, she HAD to be reaching her limit. Not a lot of magical staying power, those musicians. 

	But damn if they hadn't taken a lot out of him. He still had some tricks, and he did remember the near one-shot kill he delivered to the Tiefling. He could do that again readily enough. Yeah, Cavendish had this fight. And if they wanted to ignore him again, well... the prisoners wouldn't fare as well against black, crackling, eldritch magic. 

	Oh, and the glee that took his features when the tall one knocked the live rats off of herself and finally came forward was remarkable. Judging by her uneven gait around the fire and through the rats, she wasn't going to quite make it to him before he gave a parting gift to the ones farther back. This did not stop him from gripping his shortsword with expert dexterity and adopting a lower stance in anticipation of the melee to come. 

	But first! The parting gift. 

	He barely glanced his eyes away from Kathryn's approach. It was just long enough to select an appropriate target - one who had not felt the sting of his wrath yet, and obliterate her. It was only fair, singing those mortally painful tunes. He strafed to his left about ten or so feet to line up with the suddenly emboldened Bard and released a torrent of magical energy toward her. [color=darkgray][b]"Dance away from these,"[/b][/color] he hissed, the twin ebon snakes of eldritch power sizzling their way toward Victoria. Her trained agility did allow her to barely sidestep one of the blasts, but she caught the full force of the other squarely in the center of her torso, impacting with the force of a powerfully swung maul.  

	The sight of his most recent attacker in explosive pain seemed to energize the wire-furred form of the Rat Constable. With a sneer of contempt, he fixed his gaze between Marita and Kathryn, exclaiming, [color=darkgray][b]"I believe I've found my Second Wind. Come at me!"[/b][/color]



	
	
[color=red][b] - Victoria has taken 13 points of Force damage.[/b][/color]
	
[color=red][b] - Areas to the north that are aflame or containing rats are still considered [i]Difficult Terrain[/i], with appropriate movement penalties. The flames have additional, quite painful penalties for being walked through.[/b][/color]


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	From a dark place (and it's always a dark place, isn't it?) a muffled twang of a crossbow probably wasn't heard over the ambient sounds of battle going on. The bolt was readily enough felt by its intended target, however, sinking mercilessly into Tiefling flesh, seemingly out of nowhere. It was Sneaky. And it was an Attack. Luckily, it wasn't as vital a strike as it could have been. Whereupon its firer stood, none could say definitively. Wererats were rather adept at hiding, be it among trees, the detritus of urban decay, or in the shadows. 
 
 
[color=red][b] - Kosara has taken 8 points of Piercing damage.[/b][/color]

[@rivaan] [color=f7941d][b]Kosara[/b][/color] is up. Per usual, give me a tag so I can "Top O' Round" us, please.