[center][h3][u][color=#cbc66d] Roslyn Wicke [/color][/u][/h3][/center][center][img]https://i.imgur.com/vzhDyH3.png[/img][/center][center][/center][h1][center]The Riddle of Lindenholdt Part 4. cont[/center][/h1][center][sub]Date: Zales 33rd
Location: Inn [/sub][/center][h2] Therapy Among Best Friends[/h2][hider=***********]

They all had come back safe and sound after the mass attack. Roslyn sat in silence. She rotated the mug on the table before she let someone take it away. The girl quietly pulled onto her feet. Abruptly, the room tilted and her arm snapped out to steady herself. She considered purging the alcohol from her system, but she knew she'd start to crack again. 

No, it was better to feel nothing right now. 

Testing her balance, she let go of the table and managed to stay upright. She gathered her things and grabbed the loot sack, now empty, along the way. It might do the trick for a makeshift holder until she purchased a proper scabbard. The girl soon disappeared into her room without a word.

She did not have more than a few minutes to spend there before there was a knock at the door.

The room was the last place Roslyn wanted to be. She didn't feel safe there. Not after being overheard not once, but twice. The alcohol in her system didn't help. In fact, it heightened her anxiety and now the whole inn crowded in on her. She dropped the sack and her things in a heap on the floor before her eyes turned to the glass window. 

If she had been home- 

The mousy girl stepped toward it. She reached out a hand and touched the cold surface. The warmth of her hand melted the frost, clearing the white away just enough to peer through it. A foolish thing to consider as her arm dropped at her side. Before she could consider something else, a knock drew her attention. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Now what?"[/color] She couldn't help the terseness in her voice as she opened the door.

She looked across and beheld Xiuyang; she looked down and there was Marceline, waving at her with a sickening amount of forced cheer. [color=598527]"Oira, suunei!"[/color] she chirped, hands falling to her wheels after a moment. Her over-the-top smile fell with it. 
[color=598527]"We came because we know you feel like shit,"[/color] she said flatly. 

[color=598527]"So do we, so let's let it out together, hmm?"[/color] Despite the tone, her face spoke to empathy.

[color=slateblue]"Oh, really? I was just finished feeling like shit. Is this the wrong room?"[/color] She took a step back jokingly, with a familiar tone of voice that had almost become a cue for Marci to call her "Bruja" and give her a light punch on the arm. The smell of alcohol was on Roslyn, and it threatened to bring back some bad memories. 

[color=slateblue]"We knocked this time,"[/color] she helpfully pointed out with a slightly guilty grin, and a voice that begged not to be shut out. [color=slateblue]"May we come in?"[/color]

[color=598527]"Tonta..."[/color] Marci muttered under her breath, taking a half-push back onto Xiuyang's toes. [color=598527]"And, yes, we knocked, and we love you, and you're hurting."[/color] The tethered made a pouty face, trying to ignore the stench of alcohol.

For a moment, Roslyn stood there. The urge to simply slam the door in their faces grew as her fingers gripped the frame. She seemed to go taut until finally she forced herself to relax. [color=#cbc66d]"To be honest, I'm surprised. It's not like I can stop you. You're both lucky I'm numb right now."[/color]

She pulled back, her balance staggered a bit. As her feet threatened to trip over themselves, she once more bumped into the wall and leaned against it. [color=#cbc66d]"I... can't even hold my own burdens on my own. Surprised you two put up with me."[/color]

[color=598527]"Surprised you put up with [i]me[/i],"[/color] Marceline grumbled, pushing her way in. [color=598527]"How many times did I drop the ball today?"[/color] She shook her head, rolling into the middle of the room. It reeked of depression to the point that it unnerved her. This place had the same awful feeling as that room she had spent her first week in after becoming paralyzed, hardly leaving her bed. Self-loathing clung to the walls almost to the point of stinking, and they closed in, claustrophobic. The tethered girl made for the curtains to throw them open. She shook her head. 

[color=598527]"And burdens?"[/color] Marceline asked. [color=598527]"I don't think you're alone in that."[/color] She turned, face concerned. 

[color=598527]"Really, you're not."[/color] Self-doubt began to creep in. Maybe she wasn't good at cheering people up. Maybe she should let Xiuyang take the lead.


[color=slateblue]"Because you're worth it,"[/color] Xiuyang replied to Roslyn without missing a beat. With just half a flick of her wrist to shut and lock the door, her arms were around her Hendlish friend. Running her fingers through the girl's hair, she gave her a touch of chemical magic to pull her from the precipice. Not enough to be fully sober—she'd been drinking for a reason, and she would not rob her of its medicine, but she had drunk to the point of poison.

[color=slateblue]"Come on."[/color] She squeezed gently. 

[color=slateblue]"We're girls, not rocks. We're not meant to carry heavy weights by ourselves."[/color] She patted Roslyn on the back. 

[color=slateblue]"None of us dropped the ball today. [i]I[/i] may have fumbled it to the point of looking like a juggler, but we got there in the end. We scored big today,"[/color] she said, for all three of their sakes.

Marci's eyes flicked to the side skeptically, but then she remembered to not be stupid and tamped down on the reflex. This wasn't about her. This was Roslyn's time, and she needed it. That much was clear. [color=598527][i]You can be altruistic,[/i][/color] she told herself. [color=598527][i]You care. Show it.[/i][/color] For a moment, she considered if, maybe, they should bring Ingrid in as well.

Roslyn sank into the hug and leaned her head into her friend's shoulder. As the chemical gift began to purge some of the haze from her thoughts, the numbness faded slightly. She didn't mind as she spoke. [color=#cbc66d]"I don't know if I agree with that. I might've taken a leaf out of Ingrid's book and nearly blew up a section of the Market Place. I don't know how she keeps from damaging everything. If not for Edith, I am pretty sure a few people would've gotten hurt. Including me.  And the school's information on Airburst demons needs updated."[/color]

Her eyes glanced at Marci and she gave her a weak smile. Her hand reached out past Xiuyang for her friend. [color=#cbc66d]"I know I overwhelmed you at one point and I'm sorry for that. The good news, I think we can trust Karl and Bastian. They are caught up with most of what we know now. "[/color]

She pulled away from Xiuyang and moved to the bed. As she sat down, she considered what to say. [color=#cbc66d]"The question is... where do we start? My head is nothing, but an emotional tangle. I can't get them to calm down in order to properly think. "[/color]

After Marci stated the obvious, Roslyn's head rested on the tether's shoulder. She didn't know if it was the alcohol or the comfort of her friends that stabilized her. Whatever was the source, she wasn't about to question it. When Marceline finished, she took the next turn. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Well, I'll one up you. I'm drunk and Hendlish. I [i]hate[/i] when people confuse me for Enthish."[/color] Roslyn was too drunk to keep the irritation out of her voice over the later part.

Marci listened and nodded. She'd read about this exercise in a book and wanted to try it out. [color=598527]"Now, I add onto what each of the other two people say and, when it's your turn, you do the same."[/color] She considered for a moment. [color=598527]"I know what it's like when people assume something about you and are wrong and then act like it's no big deal. It might not be to them, but it sucks for you."[/color] She paused. [color=598527]"And I think being Hendlish is a pretty good thing. Your country never bothers anyone... unlike some others."[/color]

She leaned forward to look at Xiuyang who'd felt... perhaps even more uncomfortable than Marci, judging by her hesitation a moment ago. [color=598527]"I think it's good to have a plan,"[/color] the sixteen-year-old declared. [color=598527]"A lot of people might think of it as calculating or manipulative or obsessive, but a plan is something to remind you of what your path ahead is even if things get tougher than expected. A plan is a guide and your family knows that."[/color] Colour rose in her cheeks a bit at her saccharine words, but she glanced at Roslyn next.

Roslyn reflected on the information at first. At one point in her life, she recalled her mother's balance being so bad she couldn't stand up at all. Not without tumbling over and eventually forced into a wheelchair. She addressed Marci first. 

[color=#cbc66d]"I don't know much about tethering. However, you've been a life saver many times. To me, it takes a lot of strength to be able to support at a distance. Especially when people you know are in danger."[/color] She paused for a breath, hoping she wasn't stirring up bitter feelings. 

[color=#cbc66d]"I also know it can't be easy being in a wheelchair. Mother was in one, but she wasn't tethered. I recall being helpless at seeing her try to hide the hurt in her eyes. I also see the strength you must've gained to ensure it."[/color]  

Her attention turned to Xiuyang who seemed to struggle with sharing. Not a surprise to the younger girl as she reached out a hand to squeeze her friend's. A small silent gesture that told Xiuyang it was all right. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Yeah, I agree. I wish I had planned a few times instead of just praying and doing what I could. It might've turned out better in some cases or dealt with some nasty surprises. And I will say this: I might not always know what it is, but I trust you and your plans. For better or worse."[/color]

Xiuyang seemed to relax a little once Marci fully explained the intent behind the 'game.' She looked between the two of them, listening to their input and trying to decide what to say, and who to say it to first. [color=slateblue]"I used to drink a lot more."[/color] She started with Roslyn. 

[color=slateblue]"I don't really get a buzz out of it. I have devouring blood, or whatever your favorite name for it is. For me to get drunk, I'd have to... well,"[/color] She exhaled and took another breath. [color=slateblue]"Drink like I'm trying to kill myself, I suppose. There's no polite way to say it. I tried it once. I hated it. I guess you can call me a social drinker. I do it to say: 'hey, I'm normal too. I'm okay. I'm happy like you.' When I'm really happy, I don't drink as much. I've started again, because, you know... war stuff. Marriage stuff. Stress."[/color] Her voice was flippant, but it seemed like she was trying to maintain that tone rather than use an honest one. [color=slateblue]"I am okay. I'm happy, mostly. I wasn't before, but I'm fine now."[/color] She squeezed Roslyn's hand to reassure her.


Xiuyang paused. Marci hadn't left much room to dance around the topic. She was a tethered. That was a statement of fact that she made. [color=slateblue]"I blame myself sometimes. In my lowest moments."[/color] She blurted it out. [color=slateblue]"Not because if I would've been there, it would have changed the outcome. I felt so small back then, and I was. But if I had been less bitter, maybe... I don't know. Maybe I could have tried to talk you out of it. I should have at least tried."[/color] 

Not a day went by where Marceline wasn't frustrated by having to cart the useless half of herself around in a wheelchair. Where everyone else took their movement for granted, usually not even giving any conscious thought to where their next step would land, just the act of moving her body through the world was a tenuous and strenuous chore. Loose dirt and sand, snow, gravel, rocks, roots, cobblestones, little gaps between planks: any one of these perfectly normal things was an immediate cause to strain her muscles and employ the Gift. Everyone knew that stairs were her nemesis, and the same could be said for ladders, but how about a narrow footpath through the forest or a rope bridge? She couldn't take it. A doorframe less than twenty-six inches wide? There was simply no getting through that. Even paying attention to the slope of a path, road, or sidewalk, and not just whether it ascended or descended, was a constant. Almost all sidewalks sloped towards the road and almost all roads sloped towards either the middle or the edges. A divot? A drainage gutter? The fact that people threw their sewage into the streets and you were supposed to use the stepping stones to cross if you needed to? All of it was annoying. It got to her at least a couple of times a day.

But that wasn't the real issue.

Aside from nine glorious months of reprieve, where she had run and walked with the others and believed herself saved, she had already learned to navigate the world without the use of legs. She had looked up to her mother, who didn't and Jocasta, who didn't. It was, honestly, the privy related issues that loomed larger. No, ultimately, Marci hadn't said that she was tethered because of the disability. It was the job she did because of it.

[color=598527]"Thanks, suuneix,"[/color] she replied, managing not to butcher the yasoi language in the process, [color=598527]"You don't owe anyone any second-guessing, Xiuyang, and you've been awesome by me, Roslyn. I think you get that I'm a stubborn little bruja and, if I really need help, I'll swallow my pride and ask for it. Otherwise, let me fall flat on my face once in awhile."[/color] She let out a faint snort of laughter and one corner of her mouth ticked up. [color=598527]"It keeps me from succumbing to Belthagor."[/color] She shook her head.

[color=598527]"As for being a gimp? Yeah, honestly, it sucks,"[/color] she admitted. [color=598527]"It's tough having to be slower or use magic for basic things or just being... different sometimes, but -"[/color] she continued, [color=598527]"it's actually just..."[/color] the tethered shrugged. [color=598527]"the act of being everyone's eye in the sky and long-range voice that fucks with me the most. I mean, maybe I'm giving myself too much credit, but I feel like I have this specialized role and so much hinges on me not screwing it up."[/color] There was a momentary pause. [color=598527]"I feel like, if I drop the ball or admit that I kinda don't like it, everyone will just little sister me. It's... already a bit of a struggle to be taken seriously as the youngest and..."[/color] She slapped her hands against her thighs with a sigh. [color=598527]"I feel like I screwed up today and it got me. Sorry if I was... not my best self to either of you because of it."[/color] Her eyes flicked between her hands, clasped in her lap, and Roslyn, who'd be next to speak.

When Marci mentioned Belthagor, Roslyn's fingers trembled slightly beneath Xiuyang's. Even now that name brought fear and anger into a toxic mix. She addressed the easier part first.

[color=#cbc66d]"I wish I could lie and say it's not a special role, but it is. However, you're human. Not an item or something else. Everyone has shortcomings. Even if we don't want to admit it. I think in those moments, we should lean on our strengths and friends to overcome them. Together, problems get solved. I've seen normal people work together to overcome impossible odds."[/color] She lowered her head a bit and moved on. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Belthagor, that name still makes me angry and scared. The words he said weren't wrong. I feel like no matter how hard I work, sacrifice, or what I do... I can never close the gap. Deep down, if he hadn't forced change on me, I'm scared of what I might've done. It crossed my mind to take what he offered. I still get nightmares from it and it makes it hard to sleep."[/color] 

Roslyn felt ashamed to admit it. Her fingers gripped Xiuyang's hand tighter then released again. [color=#cbc66d]"Xiuyang, I will admit I feel like I add to that stress when I don't want to. You're always there for me and I want to return that equally. Otherwise, what type of friend am I if I'm just part of the problem? Sadly, I can't force you to talk with me. I just have to trust that you remember I'm here when you need me. No matter what, you're my friend first."[/color]

She bit her lip. [color=#cbc66d]"I am sorry if that sounds like I'm blaming or whining. Not intentional."[/color] 

[color=slateblue]"You feel like you have to make up for the things you can't do with something only you can do?"[/color] Xiuyang inquired of Marci, unraveling her inferno blanket to share it with her two friends. It really did have a lot of holes, now—an almost unsettling amount. 

[color=slateblue]"I can relate to that. Don't tell Ciro that I said this, but I feel out of my depth sometimes when I'm with him. I'm not sure how you forge a sharper instrument than a Solari, but somehow..."[/color] She reflected on his loneliness, and thought she ought not to say more, filling the moment of silence with a light giggle. 

[color=slateblue]"I think about them too, you know—the burdens I put on other people. It's hard when one glance at a mirror is all it takes to remind you what they are. I thought about them before, and I think about them now, but never as much as the days that I covered my face. You have a hard job, and you do it well. When my life is in your hands, I'm not afraid. Don't let yourself get a distorted perspective of who you are or where your worth comes from."[/color] Xiuyang shot her a smile over Roslyn's shoulders.

She rather thought that she didn't fear death in general, anymore, but that seemed like a rather unsavory thing to say to a tethered. Instead, she turned her attention to Roslyn. 

[color=slateblue]"I've said it before and I'll said it once more: if he shows his face again, I'll kick his ass."[/color] She hugged Roslyn tightly. 

[color=slateblue]"You're not a burden. It's... a faith thing. How do I put this..."[/color] She took a moment to think it all over. 

[color=slateblue]"I still struggle, sometimes, to believe that Eshiran will be as kind to my friends as she has been to me. I've learned to be brave, but I still fear losing people I love. It has nothing to do with me thinking you're weak or not capable. I know you are."[/color] Her hand found Roslyn's again, but she still had her in a one-armed hug. 

[color=slateblue]"But you don't need to force me to talk. I'm right here."[/color] Her red-brown eyes, mere inches from hers, radiated both warmth and concern. 

[color=598527]"I'll kick his ass too!"[/color] chirped Marci resolutely, pounding her fist into her palm, eyes narrowed, bearing intent before she broke out in a grin. [color=598527]"Me and these big ol' hammies."[/color] Her smile faded back into the equilibrium of her face, and she leaned in to Roslyn's side and hugged her. 

[color=598527]"You're safe with me. I promise. I know I'm kind of self-centered. I'm trying not to be, but both of you are safe with me. It's... nice to hear that I've earned your trust. I'll remind myself of that the next time I'm having doubts."[/color] She smiled again, taking in both of her friends. [color=598527]"I know it's kind of sappy, but both of you have mine, too - one hundred percent from Retan to Allummiut and back."[/color] She reached across to squeeze Xiuyang's shoulder. 

[color=598527]"You know, without a lot of feedback,"[/color] Marceline murmured, resting her chin on [i]Roslyn's[/i] shoulder, 
[color=598527]"it [i]is[/i] easy to lose your perspective."[/color] She offered a shrug. [color=598527]"You just don't know, and you don't realize that other people are having the same doubts, fears, and struggles that you are."[/color] Marci pursed her lips. 


[color=598527]"You're not Enna Lantisca, Roslyn, but I know that you can handle yourself. It's why I didn't tell anyone about you going after the sword this morning at first. It's why you were solo with Karl and Bastian, too. I trust you, too. And, Xiuyang,"[/color] she continued, leaning over a bit to look at her other friend, [color=598527]"Don't ever think of a legitimate request as a burden. You can lay it on these big ol' shoulders here. I can always handle it and, yeah, I might bitch and whine later, but I don't mean a word of it because I'm safe with you two. I know you do the same for me, no expectations of obligations, just... being friends in the good times and the tough ones."[/color] She swallowed and smiled and her eyes were actually a little bit wet. 

[color=598527]"You know... we should do this more often and not wait for a crisis next time."[/color] 


The tethered swallowed again, regaining her emotional equilibrium. She was comfortable enough to take a risk here, because this felt like the kind of moment to just air it all out, and she had, more or less. [color=598527]"I... feel like there's more, though." [/color] She held a hand up in front of herself, the other still wrapped around Roslyn and resting on Xiuyang. [color=598527]"And none of us should ever feel like... [i]obligated[/i] to say something or uncomfortable around any of the others, but if there is, you know... I'll listen and I won't judge, but I'll be honest."[/color]

Roslyn felt safest wedged between her best friends. Their reassurance had done wonders easing her frayed emotions. Like a balm on an open wound as it slowly closed. She stayed in the embrace and finally broke her silence. 

[color=#cbc66d]"I need honesty sometimes. Speaking of that, I have a few things I need help with and I think you two should know. First... this morning. You recall the individuals you found me with?""[/color] She checked to ensure both girls recalled them. [color=#cbc66d]"It turns out they have cousins in my home town. Their magic felt familiar like a hazy memory. I mentioned I struggled to recall why and one of them mentioned I might know their folks. They some times make people they like forget things to protect them. That's when I got trapped so I couldn't ask more about it."[/color]

Roslyn bit her lip a bit more then added. [color=#cbc66d]"That's not the only thing that hit me this morning. This part is unsettling. It turns out, Margarethe and I have something in common. We're both knower marked."[/color]

[color=slateblue]"Wow, I thought [i]*I*[/i] was laying it on a bit thick,"[/color] Xiuyang replied to Marci, her smirk playful and teasing.

[color=slateblue]"We should,"[/color] she eagerly agreed. When Marci implied that there was more, however, she went quiet, letting Roslyn take the lead.

She nodded along with Roslyn's story about the cherune. They were something she couldn't understand. [color=slateblue]"So that's what you and Margarethe were talking about. I thought she was working her rosebud magic on you. That's why I came upstairs to put a stop to it. Sorry if you felt, um... [i]*intruded on.*[/i] I know the damage they can cause when they're left alone."[/color] She bit her lip, trying not to think of the situation she'd thrust Ciro into. If he could handle Maria, he could handle a Margarethe.

She let silence pass. It seemed to her a slightly awkward silence, if it wasn't quite the same for her two friends. She enjoyed the closeness a while longer. If she told them everything... she would lose this. [color=slateblue]"We should go, Marci,"[/color] she whispered. [color=slateblue]"You know what, we should go shopping. Ride the happy vibe even longer,"[/color] she said a bit louder, patting Roslyn's back enthusiastically. 

[color=598527]"That explains a lot, actually."[/color] Marci nodded slowly as Roslyn concluded. She let the Hendlishwoman continue, and then Xiuyang and, it struck her, with a startling casualness, that the latter was deflecting. There [i]was[/i] more and she was not comfortable speaking about it. Perhaps she would never be.

Instead, something that Roslyn had said struck her. [color=598527]"Knower marked?"[/color] she questioned, tilting her head slightly.
[color=#cbc66d]"It's all right. I'm sure I frightened her and Dorothea didn't help at all. I haven't seen Margarethe since."[/color] Roslyn shrugged, disappointed in the fact. 

She knew Xiuyang had deflected like she had earlier. A soft, weary sigh escaped her lips. She couldn't hide it even if she wanted to. It made it hard to believe if what Xiuyang said earlier was true, but she wouldn't push. At least not now. [color=#cbc66d]"I would love that, but I will remind you that [i]you[/i] nudged me into a shopping trip with Dorothea later. I don't think it's a good idea to deny her that."[/color]

Her attention turned to Marceline. [color=#cbc66d]"I forgot, I haven't told you."[/color]

She pulled slightly away as she rolled up her sleeve and twisted to face Marci. The dark marks were easily seen on her skin as she let the tethered examine them. [color=#cbc66d]"I have had it since I was born. It's passed through the generations. Once it starts to spread, the person always dies before their time. That's how my mother died. Right now, my brother's has made him sick and the position of heir passed to me. Mine hasn't changed... yet. "[/color]

The mood in the room had dipped—not much, but enough to notice, and she could guess why. She flung her legs out from the bed like an impatient child trying to kick off her shoes. 

[color=slateblue]"Oh, her? She's sulking in another room."[/color] 'With Johann,' she mouthed to the two of them. 

[color=slateblue]"Besides, I need a set of sheaths for my new knives, too. So, let's go shopping instead. I'll let her know tomorrow if she'll really get offended by us paying for our own stuff."[/color] She pursed her lips. Meanwhile, she poked the top of Roslyn's leg, visible to Marci. [color=slateblue]<You. Can. Talk. To. Her. Later. I. Will. Arrange. It.>[/color] 

Marceline had studied the mark curiously for a good few seconds before allowing Roslyn the use of her arm again. She spoke and the tethered's insides tightened. Xiuyang spoke and Marci was given cause to grin and cover her mouth as her eyes darted in the other room's direction.

[color=598527]<Her. Gone. Is. Part. Of. The. Plan. Question.>[/color] she messaged Xiuyang back, in the way that she was accustomed. It took her a second, but she did the same for Roslyn. It felt good to be kept in the know. Out loud, however, she went with something different. [color=598527]"I could probably use a few things too, long as I'm not used as a trolley again."[/color] She smiled faintly, making an effort to lighten the mood. It was as if they were all working together to keep it buoyant despite the heavy things they were putting into it.

Some were working harder than others, though. Xiuyang, Marceline knew, was keeping secrets, and so was she. 
[color=598527][i]Roslyn could die.[/i][/color] That sat sour at the top of her mouth, and she tried to swallow it down. [color=598527][i]I could die.[/i][/color] The flaccid softness of the thigh beneath her hand reminded her of that. She'd lost half of herself in an instant. She would always be a single bad incident from death. It was, frankly, absurd of her not to have eaten the ambrosia seed already, but she would save it. She would save it for when she could make her legs work again. She would save it for when she was a little bit older and would not have to spend eternity in the body of a sixteen-year-old. Maybe, it occurred to her... she should save it for Roslyn. 

[color=598527]"We live the best we can with what we have, suunei,"[/color] she said by way of comfort, squeezing Roslyn's knee. 

[color=598527]"And sometimes, we bury the pain and worry by shopping instead of drinking, huh?"[/color] She shook her head.[/hider][h2] Shopping Run[/h2][hider=************]

[color=598527]"But... speaking of that,"[/color] she began to segue, [color=598527]"I'm going to try teleporting to Ersand'Enise. I need to pick up some stuff and... ask Jocasta a few things."[/color] She couldn't call her 'Zeno Re', no matter how much she was supposed to. [color=598527]"I've been practicing, you know."[/color] She took a deep breath and tried to forced the nervousness from her anticipatory smile. [color=598527]"Any requests while I'm there?"[/color]

Xiuyang was not unaware of the weight of this new concern Roslyn had shared with Marci. It occurred to her that, if neither of their circumstances changed, she would outlive them both. Her life would be longer than a human's. Hells, if the war didn't kill her, she might set a new record. Her new body seemed nearly indestructible, contrary to her two friends. If she allowed herself to dwell on that fact—the [i]unfairness[/i] of it—it was too sad and lonely to bear.

Xiuyang blinked twice, as was now her custom. [color=slateblue]"Why didn't I think of that?"[/color] she said suddenly, as if she'd only just thought of it. [color=slateblue]"I'm a Solari. When you have a Solari with you, the shops are never closed. I have the keys."[/color] She grinned mischievously. [color=slateblue]"Why don't you take us with you?"[/color] she suggested, as if it were her idea.
[color=slateblue]<Bet. Your. Ass.>[/color] Her smile was almost devilish with excitement.

[color=#cbc66d]"I suppose..."[/color] Roslyn felt a bit unsure, but not opposed to the idea. She felt the pinch and managed to keep her expression even. However, her eyes tightened in confusion briefly. Another secret... but she wouldn't judge. It was the nature of things and she had come to accept them. 

[i][color=#cbc66d]<Okay.| Feels. Like. I. Am. Missing. Something.| I. Trust. It. Is. For. Best.>[/color][/i] Roslyn pinched back to both of them. 

With a deep breath, she nodded. [color=#cbc66d]"I'm just glad I met you all and I think my life would be more miserable if I hadn't. And I agree,  a shopping trip will do me more good then another mug."[/color]

Roslyn frowned in thought then glanced at the sword. [color=#cbc66d]"There's two more concerns, but the more pressing matter is the sword. I don't know how to use it properly and I think it's smart to solve that issue sooner than later."[/color]

Marceline blinked at the idea, twice, just like Xiuyang. Was it done knowingly? She considered. 

[color=598527]"Okay."[/color] She held a finger up to forestall any immediate response. [color=598527]"However, I offer my disclaimer that I'm new to this kind of thing and coming with me may result in dismemberment and death."[/color] 

She shrugged. [color=598527]"If that still scares you at this point. Mind you,"[/color] she remembered, [color=598527]"Xiuyang here is 'not afraid' when her life is in my hands."[/color] The tethered grinned. 

Her wheelchair beckoned by the bedside and, with it, her purpose for the day. She swung herself in as the others talked. [color=598527]"Oh, do you want me to see if I can talk with Isabella about the blanket?"[/color] she offered, settling her feet onto their footrest. It occurred to Marci that she'd forgotten her ten second routine multiple times today. [color=598527]"And, if you want to train in the way of the blade, Zarina is your sensei, Roslyn."[/color] She flashed a smile. The Hendlishwoman had been an observer of her [i]own[/i] training, after all. 

What followed was a quick trip to Ingrid, who was in the midst of a very Shune-appropriate experimentation session, and a brief discussion on what she might need, a quick gathering of necessary things, and a bit of practice in sensing spacetime. Marceline's pulse quickened as she reconvened with Xiuyang and Roslyn in the courtyard. Somewhere nearby, she knew, Evander was meeting with his mysterious contact. Nonetheless, Marceline cleared her mind, took a couple of calming breaths, and explained how matters would work.

She reached out, found the space she was searching for, and found where she was in comparison to it. Some five seconds later, reality wavered and suddenly began to split. A rough, ragged portal crackled into being before Marceline, and her eyes widened as she tried to control its edges. They wavered and frayed but, sure enough, on the other side, one could see a quiet courtyard down a sidestreet in the Merchants' Quarter of Ersand'Enise. 

[color=598527]"Go!"[/color] the tethered girl urged. [color=598527]"Go go go!"[/color] She suited words to action and began pushing through, pausing only briefly to wave Roslyn and Xiuyang along.

[color=#cbc66d]"That feels like most of my life lately."[/color] Roslyn joked back at Marci's disclaimer. If the younger girl was nervous or bothered, she hid it well. It seemed like all the near death experiences gave her some resistance to it. 

She pushed off the bed and reached for the sword. At the mention of Zarina, she nodded and turned to face the others. [color=#cbc66d]"Yeah, but I haven't seen her around lately. It's hard to ask for help when the sensei is nowhere to be found. Also, I hope another sword doesn't 'call' out to someone else this time. I dread to think of someone else walking into another death trap."[/color]

She shuddered at the memory. Taking a deep breath, she followed Xiuyang into the courtyard until Marceline arrived. Marci shouted while Xiuyang grabbed Roslyn's hand. Together, all three of them rushed toward the portal. Her foot nearly stumbled as she pressed the blade close, keeping it from slicing anyone. Marceline's wheelchair blocked her causing her to slow with a yelp. Meanwhile, Xiuyang pulled harder to help her keep up. The portal edges closed faster causing her feet to pick up speed. 

Five...Four...Three...Two... 

Safe! 

 Roslyn's feet stumbled over each other. The edge of her skirt sliced nearly when the portal closed behind her. Surprised by the narrow escape, her balance tilted too far to one side. She smacked into Xiuyang while clutching the sword in hand. [color=#cbc66d]"Oomph! Sorry!"[/color]

Xiuyang gave Roslyn a noogie for her troubles. The upbeat mood she was maintaining regarding this shopping trip idea had been partly a farce, in the case that they were being eavesdropped upon, but now she found herself genuinely getting into the mood for a girls' night out. [color=slateblue]"Let's meet back at Dami's cross when we're done,"[/color] she said to Marci, waving her encouragement. There was a sense of purpose in her that didn't quite match theirs, and Xiuyang didn't wish to hold her up.

Xiuyang walked south, beckoning Roslyn to follow. It was late, but the streets weren't quite deserted yet. She stretched her arms up, groaning loudly as she put up a sonic bubble around the two of them. 

[color=slateblue]"Finally."[/color] She sensed around, a satisfied look on her face. Here, at the Ersand'Enise Academy of Thaumaturgy, their sonic bubble was just one of dozens between young students engaging in idle gossip, rather than the beacon of mischief it was in Lindenholdt.

[color=slateblue]"So here's what I need to catch you and Marci up on that I couldn't back there. Not with much confidence of privacy, that is."[/color] She tilted her head and popped her neck enthusiastically. 

[color=slateblue]"[i]*She*[/i] is here now, with Ciro. I offered to send her here to keep her and her testimony safe after you-know-who threatened her. He's a strong chemical mage and I don't trust him to leave her alone after that. Not knowing where she is will scare him, hopefully into making a mistake."[/color] It was almost unsettling how quickly Xiuyang could shift into talking about something so serious—about how she intended to ruin a man she went to bat for against Evander just yesterday. She pursed her lips, pausing to let Roslyn absorb the information before moving on.


[color=slateblue]"Here's the deal. It occurred to me these past two days: our enemies seem to know every move we make. They must have eyes and ears all through that damned town, and we're the ones always reacting. So, I'm going to use Ersand'Enise as a back channel for communication. We tell [i]*them*[/i] everything we know about what you-know-who is involved with. They send that information back to town through their own channels, which are hopefully better than ours, shut down tight to the ears of the evil guys—and we finally get ahead on the intel game. They won't know how much we know, and we'll finally get one good haymaker past their guard. Their stupid tricks and traps are pissing me off."[/color]

She jogged ahead a few steps excitedly. They were heading to the Seagate, on their way to Belleville and the Volta Emporium just across the street from it. [color=slateblue]"I wanna hit 'em where it hurts. One big domino falls, and... who knows what else will come out? Maybe the big guy will talk when it's his ass or theirs."[/color] She smiled back at her.

[color=#cbc66d]"Hey! Stop, nooo!"[/color] Roslyn cried as she squirmed in her friend's grasp. 

Once she broke loose, she gave her best friend a raspberry then adjusted the sword in her grip. She considered leaving it here, but she dismissed the notion. It was best she had it on hand in case Laska requested to see it.
  
As she watched Marceline roll off, she fell into step beside Xiuyang. The world around the pair deafened and she took in the information poured out to her. It now made sense why she hadn't seen the woman since. She considered asking how, but thought better of it. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Agreed. The incident with the demons does a few things. No one in the town, aside from Karl, Edith, and Bastian, are going to want to talk with us. I also think they wanted to see how we do in a fight and our reaction time."[/color] Roslyn's insides clenched as she forced a breath through her nose. [color=#cbc66d]"I should've known it was him. He 'overheard' talk about me going out. Of course, I got attacked by another victim before the cherune arrived."[/color]

Roslyn glanced up from the path as they approached a familiar building. [color=#cbc66d]"And what happens if the enemy doesn't give us the chance to? I don't think they will simply wait for us to do something. Not with how much we've learned. One of my issues is that I'm running out of tricks to play."[/color]

[color=slateblue]"So he knew you were going out, and you were attacked,"[/color] Xiuyang calmly repeated. [color=slateblue]"How convenient."[/color] Her hands found her pockets, and the wheels in her head continued to turn. [color=slateblue]"I agree that they wanted to test us, but the timing was also rather convenient for a distraction. That's how the truly clever groups operate: multiple objectives at once, always."[/color] She spoke with authority on the matter, only some of which came from experience. Most of what she said at times like these was the repeated mantra of her family.

[color=slateblue]"They might've been counting on the townies to not cooperate with us after this—take up the local authorities' time complaining about the danger we put them in, but we killed it today. I'm pissed about what happened to Edith's little boy, and there was some collateral damage to some buildings, but in the end, nobody died, right? While we're licking our wounds, they're celebrating. The bad guys underestimated us this time. Tomorrow, they might get desperate if they think we have enough evidence to bring in even bigger guns. So, I think we kick back and let our 'reliable allies' do a little investigating while we prepare for the big fight. Let them get comfortable keeping an eye on us while our plan unfolds on the other side of the damn continent."[/color] She exhaled and smirked.


[color=slateblue]"You're right, they might attack us first—I think we all sleep in shifts tonight after what just happened—but we shouldn't give in to fear. What tonight's attack tells me is that they don't have the manpower to beat all of us in a fair fight if we stay close together. If they did, they would have just done it by now. They went after those who showed us kindness instead. They want us to leave, because we're a threat to them, and in case we don't leave, they want to know our weaknesses so that they can respond with their best matchups the next time we split up. So what happens if we just don't? Let's say they expect us to go running to the church and the constabulary first thing in the morning, charged with our findings and theories—but what if we just do rounds around town like we're trying to regain goodwill? What can they really do if we never stretch ourselves thin like we have been? Nothing."[/color] 

Even now, she seemed to be thinking out loud, plotting in real time, but Xiuyang's confidence in her ideas never faltered as she talked on and on.

Eventually, they reached the Emporium. [color=slateblue]"Okay, I know I said I had the keys, and I do, [i]*but.*[/i] I don't have them like, [i]*on*[/i] me, so."[/color] She put her locksmith skills to work on the door. [color=slateblue]"I have the right to be here, and I'm gonna pay, so no one's gonna say shit to me,"[/color] she assured Roslyn.

[color=#cbc66d]"Yeah. I gave him the benefit of the doubt. It is a mistake I will never do again."[/color] Roslyn rolled her tongue into her cheek. Her gaze averted from Xiuyang, hiding her embarrassment. She didn't seem nearly as confident as her friend. 

[color=#cbc66d]"I get what you mean, but we're not a cohesive group. Steinbauer and Dorothea bring a lot of issues. Especially if what Laska said is true. I want to empathize with her, but another part of me..."[/color] She trained off a bit then meekly shrugged. 

[color=#cbc66d]"There's something else that bothers me. Laska. We see her a lot when she's here with the church. On top of that, she did a turn with Dorothea. Went from vicious when she threatened to keep the sword to empathetic. She also let me keep the sword. Why? I doubt there's trust there, especially since it's a sanguinare sword."[/color]

At Xiuyang's mention of having 'keys', Roslyn cocked her hips and rested her hand on one side. [color=#cbc66d]"I swear, if we get into trouble, I'm gonna to stick adhesive in your hair."[/color]

[color=slateblue][i]*Steinbauer.*[/i][/color] Xiuyang smirked at Roslyn using his last name to emotionally distance herself from him. Xiuyang was hiding her anger, too. She got the door open and ushered her in. [color=slateblue]"We won't. And if we do, Ciro will bail us out."[/color] She flashed a mischievous grin.

[color=slateblue]"I know. We can't get the whole group to coordinate. But if the people who [i]*do*[/i] cooperate are the only ones with the most critical information, and we stress how unwise it is to split up at this point, I think we can get close. At least two groups rather than three or more."[/color]

There was another locked door between the main building with general goods and the armory, and she had it open in an equally short amount of time. She began to have a look at some small sheaths for her knives, trusting Roslyn to find something for the sword herself.
[color=slateblue]"I think Marci is right. Laska is testing us to see who can be trusted and who will break off with Johann and Dory. Compared to the threat of what they plan to do, a scary sword or a blood mage are small potatoes."[/color]

[color=#cbc66d]"The torture you must put that poor boy through."[/color] Roslyn mused as she stepped inside. She drifted to the side and gently placed the sword's tip against the floor, keeping an eye out. 

[color=#cbc66d]"I'm still miffed at the cnaf (knave), so I won't be going off anywhere with him. I try to think the best of people, but even I have limits."[/color] Roslyn couldn't say the same thing about Dorothea. She didn't know the woman well enough to make that judgement call. It didn't help Laska's earlier words muddied her judgement even further. Damn that nun! 

They entered the building. Immediately, her eyes ran over displays of scabbards and belts.  

[color=#cbc66d]"The biggest question is: who do we trust? Both out of our group and among our allies?"[/color] Her hand rubbed the reddish green stone tied to her wrist. A recent habit she had started to pick up. 

She found it hard to decide for some reason as she couldn't settle on the best scabbard. Leaning on logic, Roslyn compared the sizes with the sword until she found one close. Sliding the blade in, she strapped it to her hip where it rested comfortably.

[color=slateblue]"I do not!"[/color] Xiuyang sulked. Then, she took a moment to actually ponder over it. [color=slateblue]"I might've made him worry, once. My last mission wasn't easy."[/color] She quickly moved on from the topic, though.

[color=slateblue]"I trust you and Marci with my life. Ingrid too, but she tries to do too much on her own sometimes."[/color] Xiuyang reflected. 

[color=slateblue]"I guess we all do that sometimes. Maybe we aren't so different. Ingrid too."[/color] She nodded to herself. [color=slateblue]"Though I feel like she might be trying to distance herself because of the upcoming war."[/color] She lowered her head as she looked at the equipment.

[color=slateblue]"Both Laska and Marco. I wouldn't trust them with my personal business, but I don't think either of them would deal with demons. Laska definitely won't. Marco might be hiding something, but church people usually are. Evander... will focus on the mission. With Revidia leaving, we have even fewer reasons to worry that he might betray us."[/color]

She settled on a new bandolier, basic leather with six sheaths for the small set of knives. She would worry about getting something tailored and easily concealable later. For now, she told herself that showing herself armed to the people of Lindenholdt would make them feel [i]*less*[/i] uneasy. [color=slateblue]"Both Edith and Bastian are brave souls with a real heart for Lindenholdt and its people. I respect them and want to trust them to help us, but I wonder how it's possible that Edith would not know about a certain person of interest being in the area."[/color] She continued to speak in code when referring to Rosalinde. 

[color=slateblue]"Anyone else? Hardly, I think. Dietmar... I really ran him through the ol' wringer. Interrogated him, basically. If he doesn't check out, I don't know if I'll ever trust my instincts again. And our witness under protection can be trusted to act in her own best interest."[/color] She nodded.

Whether or not she could trust Ciro with the most critical part of her plan was a question that never entered into her consideration. Of course he would get the job done.

Roslyn resisted a snigger. Her tease had hit its mark and the tension released within her. That joyful moment faded when Xiuyang mentioned her last mission worried Ciro. Even during their trip to rescue Xiuyang from Yarsoc, he had been calm and collected. Hearing of him getting worried tugged at her instinct to want to know more. Of course, her friend moved on quickly to better topics. 

[color=#cbc66d]"There was a reason I asked Marci to tell Edith specifically about the bodies. It was a test to see if they would 'disappear' or not. The whole time, I tried to be selective about the information I gave out. I thought it might help me trace any traitors, but I'm not good with stuff like that."[/color] Roslyn bit her lip for a moment. 

[color=#cbc66d]"If someone or thing wants to hide bad enough, they will find a way. It could be an item, a spell or something else. Hells, Marci struggled to track me when I was with the cherune. And she's a tethered with academy training."[/color] She pointed out then added. [color=#cbc66d]"And at least your instincts have had some wins. I feel like mine just run me around in circles lately. "[/color] 
Speaking of circles, she twisted her conversation back to the earlier one. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Your last mission, it must've been pretty bad. What happened?"[/color] Roslyn didn't want to let this go.
[color=slateblue]"I had the same idea!"[/color] Xiuyang replied with excitement. 

[color=slateblue]"So, I kept a small sample of the red foam stuck in his nose as evidence of the cause of death. I wanted to see if they would tamper with the bodies and try to push a verdict on us."[/color] She grinned, and her eyes [i]*gleamed*[/i] with pride, like she was soaking up every ounce of validation her friend was offering. [color=slateblue]"See? You're plenty clever too. Don't deny yourself the credit."[/color]

She turned to head back to the main building. [color=slateblue]"I feel left behind by these rats too. Like I said, I'm pissed."[/color] She took out her purse and placed the appropriate number of magus on the front desk, which was quite a bit. [color=slateblue]"We've all been running around in circles for too long. Now we turn the tables."[/color]

Securing the doors behind them, she just smiled apologetically, shook her head and shrugged. [color=slateblue]"Sorry, Rose. It's not something I'm allowed to talk about—but, I think he feels guilty because I took his place. He was supposed to go, but I told him to leave it to me. I thought I was stronger than him and would be able to handle it better."[/color]

She turned to walk back to the Seagate. [color=slateblue]"Of course, that was stupid of me. Of [i]*course*[/i] he's stronger than I thought, or has tricks I don't know about. Just one of many reasons why I love him."[/color] Whatever her mission entailed, Roslyn was left to speculate, but she didn't seem nearly as traumatized by whatever had happened there as she had been by the knower titan.

Roslyn managed to snag a rosy wick or two before she pulled out her own money as well to pay for her share. She condoned Xiuyang's continued secretive nature. Unlike her friends, she had laid nearly all her secrets out to them. Almost. A part of her wondered if they thought less of her, but she pushed that thought away. She met her friend's gaze as she smiled.  

[color=#cbc66d]"I get it. I think it's the risk we take when we love someone, especially if they have been hurt. I still need to head to my dorm to get the skinglue and a letter. Do you think we have time to get any rosy wick? That stuff is useful with the bandit and also alone."[/color] 

Roslyn followed swiftly beneath so as not to be left behind.

[color=slateblue]"Yeah, you should be fine to go get some stuff. Don't feel rushed, but I'm gonna run to Dami's, because I feel like running."[/color] She flashed Roslyn a smile and took off. She suspected that it was Marci's turn to be hurting, now, and Xiuyang would be there to comfort her and catch her up on everything she'd told Roslyn. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Try to stay out of trouble."[/color] Roslyn called out before she took a turn and headed for her dorm first. It wouldn't take long despite each step bringing an emotional charge to her core. 

Along the way, she reflected on things until she reached the doorstep of her dorm. She paused at the door then glanced upward. With the absence of her roommates, the building leered down at her like a cold, distant monster. She lingered there before she reached for the hidden key. The lock clicked open as she pushed in and disappeared inside.

Roslyn sent a bauble of light into her palm. It stretched across the darkness as she crept up the stairs. Her eyes darted to the letter pinned beneath a box of skin glue. After popping the top open, she grabbed another four skinglue and the letter. It had been written since that dreadful day in the bog. Finally, she brought along the rifle and ammo pouch that Desmond built for her. Something that showed she took this seriously and used what he taught her.

Once back outside, her fingers fisted and extinguished the light bauble. She adjusted the rifle strap on her arm then took a step onto the path to Dami's. Suddenly, a flutter of wings caused her to stop. Her eyes turned skyward just in time to spot a black raven stare from a nearby tree. His head cocked, sizing her up with a bright blue eye. 

 Her eyes narrowed. [color=#cbc66d]"Hranf? Is that you?"[/color] 

She walked closer to the creature, her anxiety growing. [color=#cbc66d]"What are you doing here?"[/color]

A loud, shrill crow escaped the bird's beak followed by a leap to a nearby hitching post. His eyes zeroed on her wrist and she pulled it behind her. She fought not to roll her eyes. [color=#cbc66d]"I don't have time for your little games. Go back to Eike and the ship."[/color] 

She began to take her leave when he fluttered after her. Her lips pressed when she felt his weight land on her shoulder. With a brush of her hand, she huffed. [color=#cbc66d]"No, you can't came!"[/color]

A whine emitted from the creature's beak followed by a protesting growl. He clacked his beak and toyed with her hair. [color=#cbc66d]"Ugh, fine. You can walk with me, but afterwards, you go back to the ship. Understand?"[/color]
Hranf simply blinked. Accepting this as a yes, Roslyn casually walked back to where her friends waited for her.
Marceline could tell that Xiuyang was hiding something. To be fair, so was [i]she[/i], and she would not give it away cheaply. Instead of pressing - for now - she listened. [color=598527]"Well, it's nice not to have to be the brains of the outfit,"[/color] she declared afterwards, with a hint of a smirk. Pushing herself up with her hands, the sixteen-year-old sat for a moment, leaning back and posting her weight on them. 

It was less than a second before the smaller sack that she'd placed on the bench, as if spooked by her sudden movement, twitched, reached out a couple of tentacles and pulled itself onto her wheelchair. [color=598527]"Holy shit,"[/color] Domino's owner cursed, [color=598527]"You sneaky little bugger."[/color] 

She reached out with her kinetic magic and plucked the small sumpfkrake from his seat. He dangled there, cross and limp, and let out a small wheeze, his big googly eyes levering her way as his tenacles dangled, noodle-like.

[color=598527]"I guess I owe you my part, huh?"[/color] Marceline admitted, letting Domino down onto her lap. He immediately wrapped himself around her knees. 

[color=598527]"Long, emotionally-laden story short,"[/color] she shared, [color=598527]"I spoke with Jocasta, who'd encountered the Mad Avatar in the woods outside of Madelein. She confirmed that Dory's account of Juulet killing Manfred, Qasem, and Ismette couldn't possibly have been true, since she'd been chased off by Jocasta after an absolute brawl between the two."[/color] 

The tethered shook her head and a sonic bubble dropped around the pair. [color=598527]"She's also on the school's demonic activity watchlist for association with a tier five or above demon,"[/color] she snorted. 

[color=598527]"Jocasta has orders to kill her immediately if she steps out of line or makes a move."[/color] She shook her head slowly as Domino began reaching for one of her arms with a tentacle. The sonic bubble fell. [color=598527]"So it's all falling into place not like I hoped, but like I'd feared."[/color]

Before she could share anymore, however, there came the distant - and fast-approaching - sound of footfalls in the shallow snow. It was accompanied, as Marci craned her neck, by the sight of Roslyn turning down the street that led to their courtyard, moments later. The tethered released a deep breath, grabbed her legs, and swung them over the edge of the bench, nearly spilling her pet to the ground with the act. He quickly scrambled to his second-favourite place, wrapped snugly around the axle of her wheelchair, which is where Roslyn and her [i]own[/i] animal familiar would find him when they arrived, just as Marceline finished placing her feet and straightening and Xiuyang hopped off of her seat on the table.

[color=slateblue]"You did great on your last performance report, so I thought I'd be gracious and give you a break,"[/color] Xiuyang joked back, reaching over and giving Domino a playful poke.

She listened to Marci and gave her shoulder an affectionate squeeze. [color=slateblue]"I'm sorry."[/color] It was all she could say. She hadn't suffered the kind of betrayal that Marci was feeling. She didn't leave those kinds of holes in her guard—but neither did Marci, she knew. If it could happen to Marci, it could happen to anyone, even herself.

Then, Roslyn arrived, which meant it was time to go. While the risk was low, leaving Lindenholdt had been a risk, and it continued to climb the longer they stayed. [color=slateblue]"Ready?"[/color] she asked the two. 

Upon being poked, Domino reared back. [color=598527]"Domino, Dukes!"[/color] Marci commanded, and the little octopus raised a pair of tentacles and balled up the ends, holding them out in front of himself like fists. He bobbed back and forth and flicked one in Xiuyang's direction - a jab, and then another - a right cross. [color=598527]"Good boy, Domino."[/color] The cephalopod's eyes levered her way expectantly, and she reached into a pocket in her dress to hold out a dried shrimp cracker. He immediately dropped his fisticuffs act and schnerbled back under her wheelchair with his treat.

[color=598527]"Hi, Rosy!"[/color] Marci waved. The gang was back together, almost absurdly encumbered with their - and other people's - gear, with the notable exception of Ingrid's legendary Kagemitsu Kenshin sword, 11 no Namida. It would take all night, Marz had explained gruffly, but she'd seen the cantankerous hegelan's eyes light up at the challenge nonetheless, and he'd assured her that it would be delivered - "by portal if needed, at her cost, ye hear?"

Already, the tethered was searching spacetime, extending her senses and beginning to draw.

[color=#cbc66d]"That's cute. "[/color] Roslyn cooed a bit, then turned to her own companion. 

[color=#cbc66d]"First, I need to send Hranf on his way. I think he missed me a bit too much."[/color] Roslyn glared at the raven still perched on her shoulder. He picked at her braid, shaking it in protest and producing a gurgling croak. Her hand came out to brush him aside. Like a feathery cobra, he bristled then snapped his beak at her. Her hand jerked back in surprise. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Oh come now! Shoo!"[/color] She frowned then tried to push him off again. His claws dug in as she winched at his surprisingly strong grip. Her eyes found Xiuyang and pleaded for help. 

Domino perked up at the mention of the word 'cute', sticking his little head out through the spokes in one of Marci's wheels. Hopefully, he extended a tentacle, suckers up, in her direction.

Xiuyang decided to respond in kind, falling back onto the table like she'd been hit, giggling. She wished she had more time to spend with her own pets. At Roslyn's pleading look, she could only roll her eyes and shrug, as if to say, 'what do you want me to do about it?' 
[color=slateblue]"Seems he doesn't want to let go."[/color]

Roslyn sighed and rubbed her temple with her free hand. [color=#cbc66d]"Not sure why. It's like he's scared he won't see me. I guess I have no choice, do I?"[/color]

She spotted the little outstretched tentacle and hunched down, gently extending her hand toward it. [color=#cbc66d]"He was like this two other times too come to think of it."[/color]

Neither, for what it was worth, did Domino, though the possibility of a handout from a human was enough to make him take the risk of holding a pleading tentacle out. Upon correctly discerning that Roslyn's outstretched hand carried nothing but the promise of friendship, he made the immediate decision that he had precious little use for such airy-fairy concepts and quickly withdrew his arm with a tired-sounding 'whuff'.

[color=598527]"Dommi,"[/color] scolded Marci, in her 'stern' voice, and he shrunk back for a moment before deciding to disregard the implied threat. [color=598527]"Octavius Domino Winfield III,"[/color] she snapped, and he disappeared under the chair but still refused to be pried from the axle. [color=598527]"I've missed you very much, but it is time to go home and I will see you in less than two days."[/color]

He clung, for it was all that he could do.

[color=598527]"You have five seconds, so help me, Dami, or I will take your bouncy ball."[/color]

In that moment, Domino knew true fear, true hopelessness, but he persevered. It was a standoff between human and octopus and, in the end, the superior brainpower and resolve of the latter triumphed, as it usually did. [color=598527]"Oh for fuck's sake, Winfield, you're going to get like... eaten by a shark demon or some shit and I'll have to get a new octopus."[/color]

The statement was alarming, no doubt, but Domino understood that humans were poor judges of the food chain and did not begrudge them their blissful ignorance. He released a tired sigh, schnerbled up onto her lap, conveniently preventing her from pushing her wheels in the process, and wrapped himself around her waist in a large, warm hug. Humans enjoyed this variety physical contact, he had learned, unless it came from Rikard.

[color=598527]"Oh Godsdammit, Dommi."[/color] She caved. She reached down and patted him, as she always did; exactly as he'd [i]known[/i] she would. [color=598527]"You're gonna be the death of me someday."[/color]

Fat chance of that, Octavius Domino Winfield III knew.

[color=598527]"Oh, as for your raven with the Viking name, that's all you, girl,"[/color] Marci said to Roslyn. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Thanks for the lesson, Marci. You're not doing any better."[/color] Roslyn retorted, unbothered by the octopus' reaction. She straightened up and glanced at Hranf. [color=#cbc66d]"Yeah, sadly, he's a wild creature. No control here."[/color] 

Against her better judgement, she scratched the corvid beneath the chin. [color=#cbc66d]"Truthfully, I don't have the energy to fight with him. Usually he sticks around my second mate who's a giant of man."[/color] 

Upon being compared favourably to the lesser species currently attempting to exert control over its second human, Domino puffed himself up proudly. He was not, at all, wild. He was an octopus of culture. Nonetheless, he could not help but feel a slight sense of kinship with the avian and begrudgingly wished it luck in his head.


[color=#cbc66d]"All right, you two. Marci, remind me later to ask Isabella for a bag later. It's going to be a bitch hauling everything  back later. I hate not having what I need on hand. "[/color] Roslyn commented. Meanwhile, Hranf bobbed his head as if mimicking the octopus with a mischievous twinkle in his eye. 

Against this backdrop, Marceline brought to life a second portal. It did not display some room in Die Tanzstiefel but, rather, the street immediately outside of the inn: a place of sparkling snow and the single warm light of a distant oil lamp on a post. 

[color=598527]"Okay, very cute,"[/color] she called, carting Domino away just as he was about to slug that bird and knock it out in one shot, for sure. [color=598527]"But it's time to go."[/color] She bustled through the portal, leaving her two friends to quickly follow.

[color=#cbc66d]"Well, I haven't had anything all day to eat. "[/color] Roslyn said and on cue, her stomach growled loudly. She wrapped her free arm about it to silence it. [color=#cbc66d]"And yes, I think that's safer. Marci suggested we take shifts for watch since we kicked the rats nest."[/color] 

Marci shrugged. [color=598527]"I think I'm gonna have a 'conks out the moment her head touches the pillow' kind of night,"[/color] she admitted, [color=598527]"but there's no one else I'd rather spend it with."[/color] She winked. Then, she scowled in momentary thought. [color=598527]"My room, though, maybe?"[/color] She glanced at the stairs and struggled to imagine herself navigating them half-asleep in the middle of the night if she ever needed to. She went to pat her stomach before realizing that Domino was still wrapped around her like a corset. The little sumpfkrake looked up at her and did the deed instead, successfully redirecting her pat towards [i]him[/i]. 

[color=598527]"I won't say 'no' to food,"[/color] she agreed. [color=598527]"It's been a nonstop kind of day."[/color]

The tethered yawned, ate most of her food (Domino demanded a tithe from the rest) and half-participated in their ambition, for the coming day, to track down and possibly save the as-yet-unfound Berthold Lothmann.

She then promptly rolled off to bed. The pillow fort lay there, half-built, around the time when she nodded off, one of her snuggly warm socks pulled all the way up almost to her knee and the other dangling from her foot. Roslyn lasted a scant five minutes longer, after taking a little time to check over her gear and stifle at least three yawns. Ingrid, supposed creature of the night, was already out. Dory had not been seen since her conversation with Johann, and [i]Johann[/i] had not been seen since [i]his[/i] with Ingrid. Evander was assumed asleep, as well, and Marco, after having spoken briefly with the girls as they plotted the next day, had also wandered off.[/hider] 

[h1][center]The Riddle of Lindenholdt Part 5[/center][/h1][center][sub]Date: Zales 34th

Location: Inn to theChurch [/sub][/center]

[h2]Silence Calls the Storm: Part 1[/h2][hider=*]

It was the dead of the night and hardly a soul in the great Towne of Lindenholdt was stirring. Snow fell softly on the cold and lonely ground, disturbed only by the footfalls of a handful of beggar priests and drunkards. Wind whistled through the trees and bare branches groaned. Birds hunkered together for warmth. Not a sound came from them, not a song.

Then, the silence called a storm.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BHVr3FQZc4[/youtube]

From Dom St. Adelheid, the monstrosity that lived at the edge of town, came the most beautiful of sounds. Berthold Lothmann, son of a farmer made to believe that he was Eike, last surviving heir to the Frickmayer dynasty, had returned in the hours when everyone slept. Eyes wild and bloodshot, fingers frostbitten, scarf ragged and draped about his frail shoulders, he splayed his hands across the pipe organ's keys and he did the one thing that he had wanted to do more than anything else for as long as he had lived.

It was not the grand mass on the first day of Ahn-Ipte-Zept 51. His cathedral was bare save for a few remaining pieces of scaffolding and some workman's tools. It did not matter. He would call to them with his music. His eyes bulged and his lip quivered. He played with fervent devotion: with all of his joy, his fear, and his fury. He played, and they would come. They would be his audience for - [i]this[/i] - the last concert ever heard in Lindenholdt.

Berthold Frickmayer reached down, bearing pained and joyous at once, let out a breath, and pulled the lever disguised as merely another one of the instrument's plethora of sonic tools. She was a beauty, and he lamented that he might not play her forever. The organ's voice sung deep and pure and stretched out over the town. Even those too far to hear her would [i]feel[/i] her song. This, he knew. [i]This,[/i] they had assured him of.

It was seconds later when the first foot left its imprint, bare, in the snow. From inside of houses, inns, and even a couple of workplaces, came the sounds of bodies in motion. Some thumped against doors. Others opened them. A handful crashed through windows, landing - broken - on the ground. All rose, if they could, or tried to, if they could not. All placed one foot, trancelike, in front of the other, oblivious to the dark of the night or the cold of the snow.

All began their final walk: to Dom St. Adelheid.

Xiuyang awoke to the sensation of something hitting her shin. [i]*Hard.*[/i] Slowly, groggily, she came to the realization that she was outside, in the cold, sans inferno blanket and sans clothes, save for her beanie and stockings. Only the omniphage coils partially preserved her modesty, but that thought hadn't even entered into her mind as a priority when the whole town could clearly see that she was an abomination. The first thing she did was reach for her mirror, the item that had reliably saved her from so many horrible nightmares, only to not find it.

But this wasn't a nightmare. The entire town had gathered outside and were slowly walking towards what could only be their doom. Few were paying her any mind at all, and she took the chance to sense for her allies. There, in the cathedral, were Evander and Johann, also under the spell. Whatever was about to happen, those closest to the destination were in the most danger. She rushed forward, on her four extra limbs, and found Evander. It was him, but she didn't recognize him with her other five senses.

She threw the thought to the back of her mind, scuttled up to him, and injected him with adrenaline. It was the only thing she could think to do, but it seemed to work. Then, she sensed Roslyn, coming up behind her, and her priority shifted. [color=slateblue]"Distract him!"[/color] she called after her fellow Revidian as she rushed to her friend's aid. Hesitantly, she gave her the same treatment, with a lower dose for the smaller girl than she'd given the grown man she now knew Evander to be.

For weeks she had agonized over what to say to her friends if they found out. She still remembered the face of mixed pity and disgust when she first showed Ciro, for she could not bear the guilt of keeping such a secret from her lover, of all people. Now, she had only moments to decide.

She reached out to hold Roslyn's face with her two [i]*human*[/i] appendages, keeping the slowly sharpening focus of Roslyn's eyes locked onto her own. [color=slateblue]"Focus, Rose! Destroy the organ. I'll kill Berthold. Don't ask questions, okay?"[/color] Her urgent words trailed off into regret as she released her, slowly backing away, as if it were the last time they would see each other.

As Roslyn woke, her sight beheld what she thought to be a nightmare: a twisted monster with Xiuyang's face. She blinked in stunned silence. She'd been lying if she said she wasn't frightened, but this was still her friend. Right? 

[color=#cbc66d]"Xiuyang? Wh-what happened? Are you okay?"[/color] She couldn't hide the concern or fear in her voice. Her hands lifted to grasp Xiuyang's as she struggled to process the reality before her. 

Pushing the fear down, she forced herself to shout over the organ's sound. [color=#cbc66d]"Right, but...!"[/color] 

She recalled that hellish nightmare once more. How Laska tried to stop Niallus only to be too late. [color=#cbc66d]"Back in the bog, we killed a demon. Laska tried to stop Niallus, but was too late. Belthagor was summoned."[/color]

[hr]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9XKy8uws1w[/youtube]

About forty people stood beneath the towering vaulted ceilings of the gothic cathedral, utterly and totally a slave to the command magic of its imposing pipe organ. The organist, Berthold, sat hunched over his keyboard, and barely paid them any heed as he continued to play.

The middle of this holy place had been defaced with a ten-pointed Morningstar of Levidan the Accursed. Already, there were more than a dozen bodies piled up on top of it, one at each of the ten points and a handful in the middle. Desperately, the seven students freed themselves from the grasp of the instrument's command magic and, as one of the two who remained outside slammed the doors shut and barred them with a hastily-built barricade, Berthold's eyes flashed. He changed a handful of his notes and, immediately, the nearly three dozen townspeople inside rushed at their would-be saviours, including some familiar faces. [color=#DC143C]"You're too late,"[/color] the organist sneered. [color=#DC143C]"This rotten town and the traitors in it will get what they deserve."[/color]

[hr]

Xiuyang sighed. She might have appeared disappointed that her friend simply couldn't help but [i]*immediately*[/i] start asking questions, but in reality, she was disappointed in herself for never realizing that "are you okay" would always have been the first.

She nodded. [color=slateblue]"I'll settle for making him [i]*wish*[/i] he were dead, then,"[/color] she replied curtly, giving her friend's hands an affectionate squeeze. Roslyn's gentle acceptance of her [i]*condition*[/i] did not make this easier. Tears threatened to come, but she held them back. She would leave no regrets. This would be her final battle, and she would fight it well. If the church was going to kill her anyway, why hold back?

More students arrived, barricading the doors, and Berthold [i]*dared*[/i] to taunt them. If Xiuyang had any shred of sympathy for the fool, it evaporated when he showed his utter disdain for his victims—and his words were not his own, but that of Liesl Frickmayer, that much was true, but his sins would rest upon his own back just the same.

[color=slateblue]"And [i]*you*[/i] will not escape Dami's hell, false heir!"[/color] she responded in kind. As Hans Grunewald approached, she drew heat from the vapors in the air in front of him, causing them to fall and condense on the ground near his feet before freezing. She then used the energy to bind some of the water into an oily liquid with a lower freezing temperature, creating a slush that was even more slippery than solid ice. As he slid on his backside toward her, she would walk over him like he didn't exist. Her singular target was the demented organist and his tool of command magic. He would bear the fully unfettered fury of a woman with nothing to lose.

Outside, suddenly, the crowd swirled, surged, and grew violent, hurling their bodies at the locked doors and Marci's barricade. Inside, beneath Berthold's imperious, oppressive playing, eleven-year-old Constanze Zimmermann hurled herself at Marco like a wild animal. Sibylle Lorenz leapt forward, fingers curled like claws, aiming to rake Roslyn's face. Hans Grunewald swung with all of his massive bulk at Xiuyang, and Karl von Mollern, town constable, charged at Evander with all the sense of a maddened bull. At Ingrid hurtled the merchant Jana, eyes glassy and berserk. When Johann Krauss rushed at Edyta, she disappeared into greyspace. 

This was a fight that there seemed to be no escape from - unless they could find some way to stop the command magic.

[hr]

Xiuyang sighed. She might have appeared disappointed that her friend simply couldn't help but [i]*immediately*[/i] start asking questions, but in reality, she was disappointed in herself for never realizing that "are you okay" would always have been the first.

She nodded. [color=slateblue]"I'll settle for making him [i]*wish*[/i] he were dead, then,"[/color] she replied curtly, giving her friend's hands an affectionate squeeze. Roslyn's gentle acceptance of her [i]*condition*[/i] did not make this easier. Tears threatened to come, but she held them back. She would leave no regrets. This would be her final battle, and she would fight it well. If the church was going to kill her anyway, why hold back?

More students arrived, barricading the doors, and Berthold [i]*dared*[/i] to taunt them. If Xiuyang had any shred of sympathy for the fool, it evaporated when he showed his utter disdain for his victims—and his words were not his own, but that of Liesl Frickmayer, that much was true, but his sins would rest upon his own back just the same.

[color=slateblue]"And [i]*you*[/i] will not escape Dami's hell, false heir!"[/color] she responded in kind. As Hans Grunewald approached, she drew heat from the vapors in the air in front of him, causing them to fall and condense on the ground near his feet before freezing. She then used the energy to bind some of the water into an oily liquid with a lower freezing temperature, creating a slush that was even more slippery than solid ice. As he slid on his backside toward her, she would walk over him like he didn't exist. Her singular target was the demented organist and his tool of command magic. He would bear the fully unfettered fury of a woman with nothing to lose.

[color=#cbc66d]"Be careful."[/color] Roslyn said when she spotted movement from the corner of her eye.  Sibylle. Hair a mess and dressed in her nightgrown, the archivist rushed at her ready to claw her eyes out. The younger girl caught her cousin's wrists before being knocked hard into a pew. Her foot pulled upward then kicked hard into the woman's stomach, sending her flying back with a bit of kinetic energy. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Sorry, Sibylle."[/color] Abruptly, she cast adhesive aura. 

A thick, translucent liquid oozed from beneath Roslyn's numb feet. It slid across the floor and clung with a sticky grasp to anything within its range. Not wasting time, she moved for the stairs leading up. There were too many people for her to handle at her level. It was best to bottle neck them and limit the chances they could surround her.

Kuno hit the snow hard, landing flat on his back after Evander collided with him. The kid blinked up, startled, as Evander’s commandeered body strode past without a glance, leaving Kuno floundering in a cloud of frost and confusion. He was leading the town to midnight mass. No one paid him any mind and everyone was walking in the same direction. Toward the cathedral. 

He crossed the entrance threshold with Johann, who surprisingly moved quite quickly for a man his size. It was, shall we say, impressive. Still, upon stepping inside, Evander had no control over his faculties. He was simply a bystander behind his eyes. Until, he felt the hand of Xiuyang. A massive pump of energy swelled in his body, as if his lamp was lit and all the darkness and haze crawled to the corners of his mind  like the secrets he kept, while the rest filled with vibrant light. 

He barely made out the instruction of Xiuyang as his heightened state overwhelmed his senses for a brief moment as he acclimated. His heart fiercely pumping. Distract who? Evander thought. He could feel himself returning to normal as he scanned the nave and west end. But what time did Berthold give them before commanding his mind-leashed hounds to attack.

Hans reached at Xiuyang. Sibylle leapt at Roslyn, Constanze hurled at Marco. Krauss rushed at Edyta. Jana targeted Ingrid, and Karl... he came for Evander. All of them were in the way of the real threat, Berthold and his organ. The organ that kept all of them under his wicked spell. 

Evander waiting for the moment to separate himself from the nave's floor, found it right as Karl was within reach. The momentum behind Karl's legs would carry him far forward if Evander could clear Karl's head by launching up and skywalking toward Berthold. If he could get in range, it's possible he could create an opening for Xiuyang to clear Berthold from the board.

[hr]

Marceline tore at the scaffolding with wild abandon, hurling more and more pieces into her barricade, but some of the command zombies were now rushing for the other doors or leaping at the windows. The majority threw themselves at her barrier, and the tethered could hear the thump of bodies against it, the slap of skin, the snap - in some cases - of bones.

She drew to her full capacity, feeling a pressure in her head and a tingling around her waistline, and swept a couple dozen away with a telekinetic push. She shoved a few back from a secondary door and tried to start building a barricade there as well, but then a group of them blasted through her main defense and she needed to stop them.

It was too much! They were too many!

Marceline wracked her brain, still hazy from her own spell under the vile magic's influence. She used what little ability she had in the arcane to create a bubble of warmth around herself and loyal little Domino, but she was losing the war here. She knew that she was, even if she had won some battles. Magnetic! Maybe she could render them unconscious! But in [i]this[/i] weather? It was just a slower death by hypothermia. She couldn't save them all - not like this. Marci ground her teeth and felt the urge to [i]move[/i], but the snow was brutal and it clung to her wheelchair and she needed the Gift to save people, not move herself. She would have to take the risk of -

A woman slammed into the door hard enough that she fell back, conked her head on a plank of wood and rose, a moment later, woozy but very much in control again. [color=598527][i]Of course![/i][/color] A new idea occurred to the tethered and she thought herself rather thick for not having come upon it earlier. A second maximum draw, more pounding and tingling, but utter focus.

She called upon her best binding - the unsavoury side of binding that rubbed up against magic that the church did not like, but this was what would save the church, [i]literally[/i]. She rendered the debris metallic, as people began to batter their way through it. She rendered it [i]conductive[/i]. One man thumped against the door itself. She imbued it with a ferocious charge of static electricity, and then she watched, channeling her magic and maintaining it.

The moment each one hit, they would be zapped awake, and Marceline would put an end to this whole macabre affair.

[hr]

Dorothea's body moved despite her still being fast asleep. It was not a pleasant one, but she could not wake up from it. Her body dragged itself towards the cathedral at a snail's pace. 

Within her dream were friends and family, past and present. Their appearances are unclear but the feeling from them is nostalgic. It was warm, almost too nice of a sensation to feel. [color=86608E]"Have I done enough?"[/color] A faint smile would be the only thing she could muster. Yet as the echo of her own voice fell deep into the abyss, two silhouettes revealed themselves too clearly. 

[color=2E8B57]"You have endured more than most, yet you still stand."[/color] A moustached figure would slowly be made out.

[color=2E8B57]"But you have chosen this path so that the world would be more fair to people like me, like us, right?"[/color] A figure that looked eerily similar, yet without any facial hair spoke. 

The woman's lip trembled. [color=86608E]"But why must this path be so lonely? Why does seeing [b]them[/b].. hurt so much?"[/color] 

[color=2E8B57]"You're almost there, Dory. So close to salvation."[/color] The two spoke in unison as the silhouettes slowly faded away.

[color=86608E]"No. No. Stay with me!"[/color] She rushed over to the two men, yet they were already as good as gone. [color=86608E]"Don't leave me!!"[/color] Tears fell down her cheek as only one figure remained within her vision.

[color=goldenrod]"When will you accept that they are not your friends."[/color]

[color=86608E]"They are.."[/color] 

The rotund figure snorted. [color=goldenrod]"If they were, they would've helped you save this damned world."[/color] The form of the man grew, looming over the woman. [color=goldenrod]"I just need you to push through."[/color]

Any shred of confidence was gone from the woman, only despair and doubt were written on her self. [color=86608E]"I know..."[/color] The pained expression only worsened. [color=86608E]"I know what I have to do.... but I don't know if I have the strength left to do it."[/color] 

[color=goldenrod]"See this through."[/color] And with that, the final figure left. Only herself left to linger in her own mind as her body moved without her permission.

[hr]

The distressing quality of command magic was that it left your mind aware of what you were doing, and what was happening to you. Marco had mentally prepared himself to contend with a command mage a second time after his close call at the crypt, but what he had not prepared himself for was to be dragged into the cold in the dead of night without a coat. The shock of his bare toes sinking through the freezing snow might have stolen his breath away if his impulses weren’t under the control of his traitorous manas. He chose a bad night to take his socks off before bed… 

All Marco could do was stick by the teachings of his masters. When enthralled by a command mage, he could not allow fear or desperation to cloud his emotions. Remain calm, and be persistent. He had to spend every second giving orders until his manas obeyed him again. No matter how good they were, his captor could not maintain perfect control over hundreds of people at once. A crack in the spell would soon reveal itself, and when it did, Marco would slither through it like a slime. 

Eventually, the Century won his battle, approximately a hundred forty meters away from the cathedral. When his bodily autonomy finally returned to him, he chased after his colleagues without delay, all of them headed for the cathedral doors. He thought he might have been rushing into battle empty handed, but as luck would have it only one of his hands was empty. Marco’s body was so numb from the cold that he hadn’t noticed he was holding his longsword in a death grip, until he nearly sliced his own thigh at the start of his sprint. 

[color=7b6c64][i]Must have grabbed her in the middle of a bad dream.[/i][/color] Marco kissed the hilt of his beloved weapon. He didn’t need armor or tools as long as this beauty was by his side. Out of reflex the Century attempted to sheathe his sword, only to find that his belt and scabbard were absent. Not wanting to accidentally slice the townsfolk to ribbons in the heat of the moment, he made the choice to hurl his sword onto a nearby rooftop. If Marco needed Haghoridir he could always get her back later. 

He was through the door, and they were slammed shut behind him. It must have been the work of Marceline or Dorothea, as Marco couldn’t see either of them among his peers who made it inside the cathedral. They were clearly working hard to protect everyone though. The sound of bodies thumping against the entrances was still audible even over the sound of music. Thanks to the efforts of the girls outside, he would only have to break through a few dozen thralls instead of a thousand of them.

Marco had the desire to ask his allies for context, but there was no need to. He could see the sacrificial circle plain as day, and the perpetrator of tonight’s chaos was ranting at them like a madman from behind his grand organ. Berthold’s treachery was an unexpected surprise to Marco. The Century was apparently not a great detective. It was good that the fool was too impatient to wait for the academy’s delegation to leave before enacting his final gambit. They would crush him here and now and bring peace to Lindenholdt at last.

Marco wasted no words and simply charged at Bertholdt, hoping to snap the musician’s fingers before everyone's resistance towards the command magic faltered once more. He managed to duck and weave through the crowd long enough to make it halfway to the altar, but along the way Marco’s feet left the ground as his legs were tackled by a small child, sending him tumbling to the floor. Marco rolled his shoulder against the ground and landed upright just in time to intercept Constanze before the little girl could tackle him again. His feet were slippery from the blood of Berdholdt’s victims, and Constanze’s weight nearly knocked him down because of it.

[color=7b6c64]”Ow! Fuck!”[/color] She bit him, and hard. Marco pushed his hand against her forehead and forced her off of him, leaving a bloody wound in his left forearm where her teeth had broken the skin. Her fists and feet came flying at him with all the force a little girl could muster, but he casually held her back before dragging her to the ground. Using the abundant material beneath his feet, he bound a pair of makeshift shackles over her wrists that kept her stuck to the floor.

Perhaps recognizing the unique threat Marco presented to the master plan, a large portion of Bertholdt’s slaves began to swarm towards him in unison, surrounding him from all sides before he could pull enough magic to rush past them. He was forced to divert his kinetic draw towards holding back the weight of the crowd with a force barrier, pinning him in place, unable to move forward. 

[color=7b6c64]”Bastard…”[/color] Marco knew he could easily disperse the mob by simply blowing them all away, but he didn’t want to hurt these people. Someone needed to stop the blasted organ before he was forced to take more drastic self defense measures!

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jH2WKb3cIfo[/youtube]

It was a danse macabre. Bodies smashed into the floor and walls. Others crashed through the windows, joining the growing mob inside. Some slammed their heads into the floor or strangled themselves and others. At least five or six collapsed, dead, within the ten-pointed star. Most of the academy students who were valiantly trying to stop the mad organist were so singularly focused on the man himself, however, that they did little to prevent the incursions.

Of course, there were the poor mind-controlled souls hurling themselves at the young thaumaturges and, for those with restraint, it proved to be a mounting and even existential threat. Ingrid, focused on deleting Berthold from existence with her most advanced temporal spell, took a roundhouse right in the face from a bestial Jana, who hit her fellow Eskandishwoman so hard that both broken knuckles and a broken nose ensued. Roslyn was forced to wrestle an even more rabid Sybille to the ground with a mix of chemical magic, binding, and a good old-fashioned boot to the face. Edyta ducked into greyspace as Johann Krauss tried to murder her. 

Outside of the church itself, Marceline found herself beset by nearly a dozen humans snapping and snarling like dogs. Within, an even larger rush confronted Marco, grasping, clawing, and swinging wildly. It was appearing increasingly inevitable that he would soon have no choice but to employ 'drastic self defense measures', lest he be overwhelmed.

Then, came the aura and, with it, deliverance. A swirling cloud of adhesive mist surrounded Roslyn and she made a beeline for the stairs to the organist's balcony. Sliding across the floor, she left a wide swathe of it coated with the incredibly sticky substance. The helpless thralls rushed right into it by the dozens and more than half were stopped dead, few reaching Marco. They cried and shouted inarticulately. Some began to claw their own skin away to escape, but Roslyn had bought her allies time; of that, there was no doubt.

Xiuyang was rushing forward over the collapsed form of Hans Grunewald, Evander had sent Karl von Mollern to the floor and was lifting into the air at everyone's common target. Ingrid staggered backwards, her nose busted and bell rung, even as the pain of broken knuckles broke Jana free of the command magic's spell and her eyes widened in horror and apology.

Ingrid staggered backwards, but she twisted even as she struggled for her balance, all for her spell: all to look for its effects. The space around Berthold Lothmann and his instrument of death warped, stretched, and then collapsed into nothingness for a moment. When the impossible scene cleared with a flash, there was a hole, and the simplest matter possible rushed to fill it: air.

A sizable gap loomed where the balcony had been and, of Lothmann himself, there was no sign. He had been deleted in his entirety from existence. In one fell swoop, and thanks to Ingrid's willingness to sacrifice, they had put an end to him.

...

......

............

For a moment, more than one of the students stood there, admiring their triumph. Their eyes darted about and their ears listened, and it occurred to them, then, that they could still hear the music of the great pipe organ of Dom St. Adelheid, as loud and clear as ever. It occurred to them that the townspeople remained, for the most part, enthralled. They cast about and, there, they saw the truth of it, even before the illusion disappeared. So eager had they been in their pursuit that they had not thought to do a sensory sweep. The pipe organ, the balcony, and [i]Berthold[/i], were on the opposite wall. More thralls broke in. Marceline shocked at least a dozen back to lucidity, but they just kept coming. Roslyn, pausing before a staircase that didn't exist, stuck at least that many more.

It mattered less than it should've. The windows continued to break. Lesser doors gave way. Two more killed themselves, and the ten-pointed star began to glow. It had now become a desperate race against time.

Roslyn would've shot Marco a cheeky smirk if not for the focus etched on her face. Feet slapped the floor and spread the thick ooze. In the background, windows shattered and doors splintered as more bodies flooded in. Beneath their feet, the demonic circle buzzed with energy. She knew she had to stop this. The familiarity threatened to bring her down as she locked on the stairwell. Her hand reached out... and grasped nothing. She dug in her heel and skidded to a stop. What, what? She panicked at seeing nothing, but the melody hadn't stopped. 

The bastard had tricked her. 

She couldn't reach him without wasting time and back tracking. Her eyes glanced at the people tearing into each or attacking her friends. The only ones not doing it were... Realization clicked in her head. Roslyn grounded herself as she rushed back to help Marco. 

Her hand wound back then shot forward. Lightning flicked across the skin as she punched one of his reminding attackers. The victim's muscles froze up for a few seconds. It would hurt, but she wasn't out to kill them. Reaching for another to throw him back into the adhesive, she shouted.        

[color=#cbc66d]"Marco, we need to wake people up! It will stop them from attacking!"[/color] 

A large, burly fellow came up behind her. She turned too late. His hand reached out and seized her long hair. He jerked back sending her on her back. The breath knocked out of her as his fist raised to bash her face in.  

# The Shield

Xiuyang whirled around, filled with a wide-eyed fury, so focused was she on her singular mission: taking that organist by the throat and [i]*unraveling*[/i] his traitorous fingers with blood magic until he [i]*begged*[/i] her to destroy his precious instrument, which he valued more than human life. She ought to have told Edith that she was not, in fact, 'done there,' and tracked down the little rat—

—but now, the morningstar of Levidan was glowing, and Xiuyang remembered the stakes of what he was doing. She did not have time for his fucking game of musical chairs. Any one of them, if they caught up to him, could kill him, and plenty of the students were focused on that objective. That was his aim: waste enough time for the ritual to succeed. Berthold likely did not care if he survived to see the results of his work, and Xiuyang had no guarantee that destroying the organ would just break the thralls from the spell instantly. What if the command persisted until they broke free on an individual basis?

The conclusion was as simple as it was terrible. There was only one thing Xiuyang, with her specialized focus on Shune and Oraff's magics could meaningfully accomplish to keep the thralls from the circle without slaughtering them, and she did not want to do it—but she was the only one who could. Her allies would curse her for her stupidity if this risk did not pay off. It could cost her everything.

[color=slateblue][i]*Yours to gamble, my Eshiran.*[/i][/color]

[youtube]https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=tNZseCk34_s[/youtube]

Her coils compressed and sprung her into action, directly into the pit of sacrifices. Two of her tendrils struck down into the pooling blood and began to suck it up, sending streaks of red through the white bandaged appendages covering her body. The limbs gorged and expanded like the body of a blood-sucking insect, and the two that weren't feeding began throwing dead bodies out of the circle and protecting Xiuyang from the living hordes trying to prevent her.

[color=slateblue]"Stop!"[/color] She raised a hand and used the blood she'd drained as fuel to heal the innocents desperately trying to kill themselves in obedience to their unholy command. [color=slateblue]"It wasn't your fault! Don't do this!"[/color] she cried, as if words alone could awaken them. Even six limbs were not enough to fuel her healing, keep the hordes at bay, and make any earnest attempt to awaken them short of slapping them across the face in self-defense.

They came at her with fists. They came at her with nails and with knives of sacrifice picked up off the floor. They struck her, and her body healed itself. They stabbed her, and her body healed itself.

She remembered her oath, from the time before she'd decided that Oraff had abandoned her to be used by Eshiran—to protect life, and especially the innocent.

She was the Regenerating Shield of Oraff-Zept.

[hr]

Hranf, in his slumber, had taken flight alongside the students. The cold air fluttered across his inky black feathers as his wings lifted him aloft on the warm drafts. Below, numerous specks of humans flocked to the church's melody. A primal instinct-older than him- stirred. It poked and nudged his half-sleep brain awake once more. 

The other eyes popped open as his head glanced down. This wasn't the warm, safe room he had been in earlier. Where was he? That instinct to seek out familiarity tugged at him. Finally, the raven's wings tucked in then dove downward. He scanned the crowd below as he swept over them. 

His eyes locked onto a chestnut haired woman trailing behind. Tilting his feathered tail downward, his claws reached out and dug into the shoulder. He found her ear. A quick nibble did nothing causing him to puff up. He edged closer then he pressed the tip of his beak into her ear. With a mighty inhale, he let out a shrill throaty CAW!

The entranced woman moved ever so slowly towards her ordered destination.  Too deep in her slumber for anything from within to wake her from that hellish dream. Yet one very unlikely feathered hero rescued her from this dreadful magic. 

Dory had been woken up by a sound that she had never expected to hear up close.

# CAAAAW!

Her face would soon turn to the corvid companion of the Hendlish girl who had made her shoulder its resting spot. [color=86608E]"Now, ain't that a surprise visit."[/color] The Raven's appearance would take her eyes away from the obvious goings-on. [color=86608E]"To think such disgusting magic could be hidden in beauty."[/color] 

She patted the Raven before moving herself.  [color=86608E]"Go see if you can help some of the others, okay?"[/color]

A nervous chuckle left her vocal chords as she headed towards the cathedral, the place she seemed to be drawn to before.  [color=86608E]"Never have been the brightest."[/color]

Being closer to the woman, Hranf inhaled a strange scent. Something sulfuric and... unsettling. Blagh dark magic, he shuddered. He couldn't understand how or why this fledgling got herself tangled up in such things. No different than those Seeing Eye fledglings he once aided. 

Alas, it wasn't his place to judge. No point in wasting the energy. 

Besides, he thought as he stretched out his head for the pats, She knew how to pet properly. His eyes closed briefly  to savor the touch then let out a harsh croak. A warning or urge to be careful? Dory would never know unless she knew raven. He bounced a bit before he dropped into the air and flapped off toward the church. It wasn't hard for him to figure out where they went. Now to find that beer fledgling or the worm star and his rolling pet.

[center]~~~~[/center]

Hranf floated higher and higher. His wings evened out on the updraft when he spotted something in the distance. The old bird inhaled, processing what he saw. How... odd, he thought. With a quick, agile twist of his tail, he circled about then once more lifted his claws to land upon the fledgling's shoulder. His throat puffed up before he let out a bellowing croak. He turned his head to the east-southeast direction, then picked at her hair. Follow me, fledgling over there, he pleaded. 

Immediately, his large form dipped from his perch and began to soar in that direction. Away from the church.

[hr]

Anger rushed into her as she fell victim to trickery. Had the pipe organ always been there, or was it just an illusion from the start? Whatever the case, his plan was moving forward, and their time was running out. They couldn't simply keep guessing if they had him dead. 

She leapt to a high spot of the wall, forming a place to hold onto it from the stonework. [color=8882be]"I'm going to try and find the pipe organ!"[/color] Ingrid yelled to her companions, only to then see what Xiuyang was doing. It was a horrible and gruesome thing, but she had trust Xiuyang was not going to throw her life away, not when it mattered so little here. 

She found the sound of the pipe organ and followed it through time, trying to find just where it came out of and where it originated. That was her only method available to her presently.

The horde continued to come, and Xiuyang dutifully rebuffed them, but she had not been cautious in her consumption of the sacrificed blood. She knew that there could be consequences, but believed that her biology would hold strong. This was the nature of the duties the gods had uniquely given her. Oraff had crafted her precisely for her work in the Forge, and Eshiran had sharpened her edge into a deadly weapon for combating evil.

It began as a creeping doubt. What had only been about a minute of fending off the mind-controlled civilians felt like fifteen, and that damnable organ was still playing. [color=black][i]*Are you really going to give up your future for these minnows?*[/i][/color]

[color=slateblue][i]*What future?*[/i][/color] Xiuyang rebuked. There was no choice but to focus on the present moment, because it was all she had for certainty. There was still a moment's hesitation when the barricade failed and roughly thirty new bodies flung themselves at her and the cult's circle of death.

Her coils were ready to propel her out, but she stood her ground. A vision from the Weggosi beanie showed her that Roslyn was in danger of turning back to rescue her. [color=slateblue]"Focus, Rose! I'm okay! Stop the organ!"[/color]

It was a pitched battle now. Xiuyang performed a desperate defence, risking her very soul to absorb the blood sacrifice. There were no demonic whispers in her ears yet, no 'temptations' or anything of the like. She was almost unbelievably effective, until nearly thirty new thralls hurled themselves not at her, but from the church's balconies and landings, intent on smashing their fragile bodies into the unforgiving marble below.

There were more now, too. Over twenty swarmed Marceline who was trying, at once, to maintain a barricade over the cathedral's massive double doors, keep it charged to shock them into consciousness, maintain a bubble of warmth around herself and Domino, and pull others away from secondary entrances. 

It was too much. A big raging man came charging through her kinetic slam with strength to spare and smashed into the much smaller tethered girl. Thrown from her wheelchair, Marceline panicked and hit back at him with her full magical force, hurling her attacker a solid fifty feet through the air. He landed broken and unmoving, but there were still more. These, she warded off with desperate defenses, but her concentration on the barricade collapsed, even as a few more thralls joined the ranks of the lucid.

Ingrid, high up on the wall, could see the doors give way and at least a hundred new bodies pouring into this cauldron of destruction. When it came to berthold, however, she did not trust her eyes after the earlier deception. Her nose stung and dripped blood - a reminder that this was a clever and ruthless enemy - but she could hardly allow herself to be distracted. Then, there was a pitchfork hurtling at her head from someone in the crowd, and only her sanguinaire reflexes allowed her to pluck it from the air. She now had a pitchfork. The organist. Was it really him there? She could see him on the far wall on the balcony, clear as day, but did she dare trust her senses this time?

Roslyn, meanwhile, found her tactic's success to be a mixed blessing. Dozens of onrushing thralls were stopped, and a few even came to their senses, but now their eyes were on [i]her[/i], and almost forty charged in her direction, eager to trample each other and their new target. This was, as it stood, clearly a losing battle. 

For Marco, the situation was similar. The threat that he represented could not be ignored, and even more than raced after Roslyn came for him. Some were still stopped by her adhesives, but there were so many glued to the floor and fallen over, now, that others simply used their bodies as a bridge, not caring about - or, more aptly, aware of - the damage that they were doing to their fellow people.

Evander, quick to act, decisive, nimble, and not yet representing a direct threat to Berthold Lothmann, found himself comparatively unmolested, with only a dozen or so thralls in pursuit of him. Xiuyang had revealed herself to be a monstrosity, and eagerly sucked up blood. Marco was soon to be overwhelmed, along with Roslyn. Ingrid was up on one of the walls like some sort of spider, even though it was her Retanese counterpart who was more spiderlike in appearance. Of Johann, the last he had seen was the hefty Kerreman still under demonic control. Edyta Laska, meanwhile, had disappeared entirely.

Matters were rather less dire for Dory, at her extreme range, at least in an immediate sense, but she could see the crowd pinch and swirl as they mobbed a target about eighty meters from her: Marceline. Then, there was Hranf, pulling her hair and cawing at her before taking off. He was trying to draw her attention somewhere to the east-southeast. Just what it was lay beyond her, but it was likely worth her time. The issue was, however: did it outstrip the value of Marceline's contribution and possibly her [i]life[/i]?

Through it all, Berthold continued to hammer away at his pipe organ. The music was beautiful, haunting, passionate, and the funeral march for this town. He [i]had[/i] to be stopped... at any cost.

There was a moment in flight. Between Evander's heel striking the back of Karl's skull and the beauty of the organ's music tugging at reality. If not for the organ's threatening power, it was sublime to witness. As Evander landed beyond Karl's reach, up on a ledge. He witnessed Roslyn sliding into action. Her small figure colliding with Berthold's machine and what happened shot pain into Evander's gut. 

He tricked us. 

The realization of Berthold's game was painful because it was obvious and it worked. His eyes darted upward, scanning the cathedral. Bodies continued to fall in, fly around, and fight. Some were destroying their own lives in the ritualistic circle bounded in the cathedral before the students. It was... surreal. 

Lives unknowingly throwing themselves at the devil's feet. 

Evander froze. His eyes widened more, he didn't have time to think, he needed to act. The music was still playing. The organ was still alive. 

He turned his head sharply, his senses extending through the magnetic fields like invisible tendrils. Where are you? There! The balcony, the organ, the heir to darkness. He was across the chamber.

"Damn it," he muttered, teeth clenched. 

As the star on the floor began to glow, Evander’s composure faltered for just an instant — the first flicker of genuine frustration. He was controlled by Berthold, tricked by Berthold, by Pentad he would not be killed by him too. The overwhelming sensory information bombarding him from the organ playing, the fighting, and his own disturbance clouded his ability to definitively say it was the real Berthold. But, it certainly appeared to be and it was certainly  someone or something performing strenuous work to keep things under control, this was enough for Evander to take his shot. 

"Up on the balcony!" He shouted to the others.

From where Evander was positioned on a ledge, he focused intensely on Berthold's position. Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves. He followed up by attempting to electromagnetically disrupt Berthold's manas.

The distance, the noise, the scene. It was too difficult to focus. Too challenging to force the manas into disarray. Instead, nothing. Not even a shrug from Berthold. Evander knew it was futile from this range with everything going on to try again. He broke concentration to focus elsewhere.

Roslyn's head jerked to the side, narrowly avoiding the punch. Using kinetic, she sent the man flying over her head and back into the mass behind her. She just got to her feet when she saw Xiuyang toss herself to the 'wolves'. 

No... NO! Her heart stopped in her chest. She took a step only for her friend's words to stop her in her tracks. Conflict and fear etched on the younger girl's face. Then her hesitation ripped her chance to help away. Feet shambled toward her as they started to circle her. Her wide eyes tracked them, her mind berating her and lashing out at her weakness. 

Weak... always weak. That was all she ever was. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Enough...ENOUGH!"[/color] Roslyn screamed, her voice lost in the organ's malice. 

 Her feet pulled back and her gift swirled about her. Chunks of wood cracked and formed into a waist high barrier, slowing the mob's approach. Their fingers clawed and tore at the flimsy wall. Their blood stained the surface. Roslyn whipped to the left sending a shock into the nearest threat. He crumbled and seized. 

One jumped over the barrier and rushed at her. A shard of broken glass fisted in his hand slashed toward her eye. Her arm came up as it stabbed deep. She hissed and kicked hard at his leg. He dropped only for her to bring his face to her knee. 

Keep going... she demanded. 

Ignoring the bleeding, she telekinetic sent another man flying backwards into his companions. She continued to cycle through her magics. Binding to block, magnetic to shock, chemical to boost adrenaline, arcane to blind, and kinetic to send flying back. Her body fell into numbing motions as she fought to keep back the mob.

They continued to pour forth like fish out of a net, throwing their lives away for their would-be master. A new group came from the windows, hurling themselves at the ground in an attempt to snap their own necks against the cathedral floor. Xiuyang's tendrils surged with blood magic, and she covered the floors in a spongy substance that would break their falls and absorb even more blood.

An overwhelming horde advanced, fearlessly attacking the Revidian monstrosity in groups of five. Yet Xiuyang knew they only appeared fearless because of the control Berthold's command had over even the smallest facial muscles. Beneath the veneer of blind rage, their souls surely felt absolute terror. Using the sacrificial blood as fuel for her attacks simplified the process of drawing, letting her put her full focus into prioritizing her opponents. Three, sometimes four of them demanded her focus at once, but hers never broke. She smote them back with a ruthless efficiency and angelic grace. Their strikes hardly phased her anymore.

She was getting accustomed to the pain. She was adapting well to the flow of combat. It felt as if nothing and no one could make her stop, except herself. Doubts would seep into even the smallest cracks found in every human psyche, however, no matter how cold and hardened. A feeling of dread had slowly come over her as she began to think... this was [i]*too easy.*[/i] Had she fallen for another of the organist's tricks? Was she under an illusion, and rather than saving these souls, she was killing them, completely unaware? No, Berthold was occupied defending his organ, and her mental faculties nominal. A brief glance his direction aside, her focus remained as sharp and direct as an arcane lance.

Was she... [i]*enjoying this too much?*[/i] Was this how it felt to become a demon? Unknowing, unfeeling violence? Such a lonely existence was something she couldn't bear alone. Ciro... She missed him. She made him sick with worry once. Would she do it again, now? But Ciro wasn't here. She was alone. Sure, her friends were here, but they were horrified beneath their plastic expressions of concern, pity and affection—

No... She wasn't alone. A subtle presence was trying to corrupt her without making itself known to her. Clear her mind—if she could just take a moment to breathe and clear her mind... [color=slateblue][i]*No, I need to purge my body!*[/i][/color] she realized, urgently.

[color=slateblue]"I can't—do this anymore!"[/color] she cried out, staggering away from the pit of bodies. Tangled, writhing, trying to get to their feet in a stack three high in a circle all around her, the piles of bodies really did resemble a macabre fire pit, with only a few left in the center. Her desperate gambit had born fruit, but she could continue no longer. She still had people who cared about her—she could not risk tying her soul to a demon—she would not go down this way, not like Dorothea! With another surge of blood magic, she formed a temporary hole in the wall of the cathedral to crash through. Outside—she had to go outside, away from the sacrifice.

With a horrible squelch and cry of pain, the coils constricted tightly around Xiuyang and around themselves, wringing a great pool of blood onto the earth outside the cathedral—in full view of Marci.

[hr]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InVxyzKEcg4&list=PLYRmKZBwiZg1uJJ6ulukHyKouHTuj_K_i&index=12[/youtube]

The barrier had given way and no help was coming. Instead, it was the opposite. They continued to swarm forward and Marceline could not so much as even climb back into her wheelchair before she had to blast a thrall back with a telekinetic wave or electrocute another. They surged from all directions and that was it. She could do no more like this. She drew all of the momentum from a quintet that had nearly reached her and blasted into the air, barely pulling her wheelchair free and dumping it ungracefully in a tree. 

Within seconds, the spot where she had been was subsumed. People writhed and twisted, they jerked and grated their teeth but, with her out of the way, they now resumed their death march to Dom. St. Adelheid. It was relentless. It was unstoppable! What were her friends inside of the cathedral [i]doing[/i]!?

She settled upon the tree where her wheelchair rested, feet dangling from the branch. No, they would fight with all that they had. She knew it. They would fight with compassion and determination and, if they were not succeeding, it was because the enemy was strong enough to stop them.

A sudden fear seized the young tethered's stomach, and she reached out with her senses, focused on the cathedral. It was such an energetic cacophony that it nearly overwhelmed her. She shook her head and had to grab onto a smaller branch for support while she tried again. 

There were so many people - [i]so[/i] many - streaming towards the great monolith on the hill at the edge of town, and yet... given the size of Lindenholdt, it felt as if there should be - 

And then, the organ stopped! Marceline was wrenched by the sudden reprieve. People everywhere, enslaved by its call, simply... stopped. They didn't return to consciousness, but they didn't move. They stood there, imperfect in their stillness, to be fair. They swayed. They twitched. They were, generally, uncanny.

That was not what grabbed her attention the most, however. Among the many thumps, bangs, and crashes that had assaulted her senses over the past few minutes, this one stood out. A monster with a vaguely human frame but multiple spider-like limbs came flying through a hole in the cathedral's wall, drenched in blood, its arms constricting and soaking the ground in cascades. 

It took Marceline a moment to realize that this was not... [color=598527][i]a monster[/i][/color]... at all. [color=598527][i]Xiuyang.[/i][/color]

[hr]

[color=7b6c64]"You think I hadn't already thought of- ACK!"[/color] Marco was about to shoot Roslyn a sarcastic remark, but as soon as he opened his mouth his breath was squeezed out of him by the weight of the mob swarming over him once more. Perhaps she had meant to help him, but breaking his concentration only served to release the hold he had on the brainwashed crowd. Now they were dogpiling him in an attempt to suffocate him, and the combined mass was crushing many of the townsfolk underneath it. If Roslyn needed his help now, he was in no position to offer it.  Everyone had their own problems to deal with first. 

Underneath the pile of squirming bodies, Marco's nostrils were assaulted by the stench of unwashed bodies, and as the weight on top of him grew, he came closer and closer to blacking out. Before he fell unconscious, the Century absorbed all the energy he could from the townsfolk. Kinetic motion, chemical signals, electrical impulses, it didn't matter. He took whatever his manas could wrestle out of them until he was full to bursting. Enhancing the power of his own muscles, Marco forced his way out from underneath the human crush, kicking and clawing his way forward one inch at a time. When his head finally breached, he gasped for air. When his arms were free, he pulled himself along the floor with all the strength he had. Another thrall fell on top of him in a mindless attempt to stop his escape, but Marco grabbed the woman's shirt from behind and flung her across the floor into the people trapped by the adhesive. 

With a final push, Marco was free, but he was not yet safe. He hunched over to rest and catch his breath, but the townsfolk weren't about to let him off so easily. Pairs of eyes locked onto him one after the other, and as the brainwashed slaves began to notice their target's escape, the mass of bodies began to collapse as they all attempted to chase after him in unison. At the bottom of the pile, many of the victims were expired or unconscious, having succumbed to a lack of air or simply internal trauma. Marco thought he could see a couple of children amongst the dead, but there was no time to mourn them. The thralls were coming for him again.

A jolt of pain from his bleeding arm distracted Marco. He was almost too late to spin out of the way of a tackle from one of the constables. As the man tumbled to the ground, Marco slapped him in the back of the head with a handful of electricity, sending him into a spasm, all of his muscles seizing up at once. After knocking out two more of his unwilling attackers, Marco punched the ground with both of his fists, shattering the wood and stone and laying out dozens of people as their footing caved in underneath them. He clambered out of the rubble and flew into the air like a bird, landing gracefully behind Roslyn just as she sent another member of the mob flying, and nearly getting himself punched in the process.

[color=7b6c64]"Easy there tiger!"[/color] Marco's calloused hand squeezed her wounded limb. He couldn't make it pretty, but a few seconds was enough to at least form some fibrous tissue and stop the bleeding. He did the same for himself, leaving a circle of tooth shaped scars on his forearm. 

[color=7b6c64]"Listen lady, we need to work faster than this. I'll keep them off your back while you knock them all out!"[/color] Marco intercepted a trio of townspeople by squashing them to the floor with a surge of gravity. His eyes remained on Roslyn, expecting a favorable answer from her. 

Roslyn didn't hear the thump behind her or Xiuyang's abrupt exit. She was lost in the flashbacks of the Wailing Leviathan. Screams and pleads, both present and past, echoed in her head. Men, women, and child dying in their own blood around her. Some crawling over each other to reach and drag her down. No escape. 

 She was no soldier. There was no training to kill or die, just the basic instinct to live. 

Another tingle of magnetic rushed through the girl's fist when someone grabbed her wounded arm. Pivoting on her foot, she spun to sock him when she stopped abruptly. She blinked. Marco?

Her fist lowered at his words as she slowly collected herself. She noticed the bleeding had stopped.[color=#cbc66d]"Right. On it."[/color]

Taking a deep breath, Roslyn's mind darted through her list of spells. The townsfolk were already knocked out so putting them even deeper under wasn't going to help. Sticking them in place worked, but they tore themselves up getting loose. Then a simple solution came. She had woken in fright so many times, she almost smacked herself for not thinking of it earlier. 

Gaze of terror! It might work. Truthfully, she had little choice and prayed they might not stampede over each other. It wasn't going to be easy to affect this big of a crowd and she just started to draw when the music stopped. 

This was their chance.

[hr]

The domineering presence in the air was enough to choke any other manifestation mage worth their salt. For the people who commanded demons to do their bidding, it was always the ones that could not be controlled that frightened most. It made her flesh crawl. Was this the reason she had avoided any other encounter with a Grand Demon before?

It would be then that her feathered friend gave her a different direction to go. [color=86608E]"Why are we going this way?"[/color] Were the only words she could muster as she followed the raven. If there was another threat she needed to deal with it before it could become a problem.

Hranf's eye stared and gave off a sense of experience. It seemed like he knew something she didn't. However, it was impossible tell for certain. His feathers puffed with hope when her eyes locked with his. The raven, who rarely spoke the human language, managed to croak out a single Eskandish word. "Folk." 

Abruptly he fluttered off her shoulder into the air. Higher he rose until he once more spotted the dark dots from earlier. Every so often, he checked to see if the woman kept up before circling to stay in sight. They had trailed further from the lambs marching to the slaughter as the music fell into silence. Maybe those caught fledglings might have a chance after all.

[hr]

Roslyn didn't hear the thump behind her or Xiuyang's abrupt exit. She was lost in the flashbacks of the Wailing Leviathan. Screams and pleads, both present and past, echoed in her head. Men, women, and children dying in their own blood around her. Some crawled over each other to reach and drag her down. No escape. 

 She was no soldier. There was no training to kill or die, just the basic instinct to live. 

Another tingle of magnetic rushed through the girl's fist when someone grabbed her wounded arm. Pivoting on her foot, she spun to sock him when she stopped abruptly. She blinked. Marco?

Her fist lowered at his words as she slowly collected herself. She noticed the bleeding had stopped.[color=#cbc66d]"Right. On it."[/color]

Taking a deep breath, Roslyn's mind darted through her list of spells. The townsfolk were already knocked out so putting them even deeper under wasn't going to help. Sticking them in place worked, but they tore themselves up getting loose. Then a simple solution came. She had woken in fright so many times, she almost smacked herself for not thinking of it earlier. 

Gaze of terror! It might work. Truthfully, she had little choice and prayed they might not stampede over each other. It wasn't going to be easy to affect this big of a crowd and she just started to draw when the music stopped. 

This was their chance.

Evander froze mid-step, eyes widening. "What the fuck is that?" he hissed, watching Xiuyang's body contort, skin splitting as something hungry and wrong forced its way through the hole it just created through the cathedral wall. Was she still... Xiuyang?

His jaw tightened, a vein twitching along his temple. "A little pressure and she turns into that, then the bitch splits?" he muttered under his breath. His fists clenched, and a surge of adrenaline clawed up his spine.

"Doesn't matter, she isn't here, and that monster behind the organ is. Focus." Evander retrained his sights on Berthold. He may have been unable to disrupt his manas from this distance, but closer, he'd have a greater shot. 

He tore his gaze from the abomination for only a moment to see where the others were positioned. Could they be useful? Roslyn and Marco were locked, hacking through the horde of glassy-eyed townsfolk. If Berthold wasn't stopped soon, exhaustion would certainly end the group of students before Berthold did. 

If Evander were honest with himself, the lives of the others weren't important. Not really. But letting Lindenholdt rot into a demonic hive sure was. If not on principle, there was also strategic value for Revidia to keep this place afloat. 

Evander's breath steaded. His eyes tracked Berthold's silhouette as he played, until he didn't. The sounds of the organ stopped. This was their moment! Evander had to close the distance.

He broke into a sprint along the narrow beams, the cracking of settling wood was drowned out by the chaos below. He raised his hand, snapping his wrist forward in a practiced motion. A tear in space unfurled, he would dive through and end up next to Berthold and the organ.

Xiuyang dropped to her knees with a groan. The demonic influence was not completely gone, but it had subsided fairly significantly. [color=black][i]*Even if wrung dry, a rag will never lose its stain.*[/i][/color] Doubt lingered, but she pushed it to the back of her mind.

She staggered past the frozen bodies of the unconscious mob to the front doors of the cathedral, ready to make another stand if the music continued to play. Out here, there were even more potential thralls than inside, but she could keep the situation inside from getting any worse.

She did not seem to see Marci. If the tethered wanted protection, she would have to call out to her—but [i]*would*[/i] she, with her friend in such a state?

Marci saw Xiuyang, but the reverse was not true. The tethered blinked, shook her head, and had no choice but to look out over the crowd. They just... [i]stood[/i] there, idle, in some sort of... holding state.

Indeed, it was the same picture inside. For a moment, the unwilling mob stilled, and Roslyn saw her opportunity. Unleashing a Gaze of Terror on them was a risk that she had to take - [i]anything[/i] to use this window to free them from their stupor. Whatever the process, the result was immediate and effective. A few stampeded, but something like seventy found themselves called back to consciousness. Marco's efforts only added to this number, and the freed former thralls, who included quite a few of the friendly townsfolk the students had met at various points, could now contribute to the defense against their fellows.

Ingrid, still shaken by the sheer scale of the unfolding disaster and her near-miss while trying to kill Berthold's precious pipe organ, clung to the wall and watched in growing horror, but Evander merely redoubled his efforts. Ripping through spacetime, he struck directly at the organ.

Marceline, recovering herself, lost track of Xiuyang as she returned to a normal-ish shape and weaved through the crowd. She did not know what to make of what she had seen. She did not have the chance to process it, but the sense that the Revidian had held some deeper secret close to her chest earlier was inescapable. 

The tethered glanced down. She glanced over at her wheelchair, perched precariously on another branch, and spotted something she had not noticed before, stuck between her backrest and cushion: Roslyn's compass! Snapping it to her hand with telekinesis, she looked out over the scene and took a steadying breath. She had to do something. So, for the third time this very early day, Marceline drew with all the capacity that she had. Her head throbbed, a slight tinnitus filled her ears, and her waistline prickled with pins and needles. Another fifty townsfolk were shocked back to alertness. She drew again and went to repeat the same ritual.

Xiuyang was still out there. Was she... still Xiuyang? Marci didn't have time. She likely was. This was likely the secret from before. She had other things to focus on. Their gear! She could retrieve it. They would need it!

Much closer to the place where Marci would find it was Dorothea Hohnstein von Albesatz-Danzau. She hurried after the persistent black bird, through endless crowds, but she began to get the sense that there were, perhaps, not [i]quite[/i] as many people here as there should've been. Further, she went, breaking off from the main crowd, but, much to her surprise and confusion, there was a second stream of bodies. It was smaller than the first, but it was headed... across the fields at Lindenholdt's edge, past the farms and a swampy area where the forest rose on rocky ridges and, beyond, to the... 

[color=#DC143C]"Mein Eschi!"[/color] shouted Berthold, leaping out of the way as Evander appeared, but he was not the target. It was the organ, and nothing now stood between the devilish instrument and his attack.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLjgDDzH0SQ[/youtube]

Except for Marcella Brandt. She reached out an arm and blocked the entirety of his magic with an exceptionally strong magnetic pulse. Her sleeve shattered in the act and, with it, some of her skin. An ugly sneer twisted her face. [color=#8B0000]"Our ceremony will proceed just as planned, interloper."[/color] She tilted her head and, from her fingertip, a beam of pure light emerged. It widened into a great scything blade that aimed to slice the Revidian in twain..

Xiuyang narrowly dodged the stampede of newly-awakened townfolk rushing to the exit. It was a horror show—people climbed over the unconscious bodies left in the doorway while the Revidian sidled along the wall to avoid the crowds as much as possible, but she was pinned and couldn't move.

Marcella Brandt appeared, and Xiuyang clicked her tongue. How many more of these cheap tricks would they have to endure? She reached out with her senses, both to find more hidden enemies and allies not yet awakened. Instead of doing a head count of everyone she knew was awake, she simply looked for beacons of high RAS.

Closing her eyes, Roslyn focused on her task. Her ears blotted out the chaos and forced her heart steady, her attention faded from the present. Among the discord, she tried to replicate the fear within herself. She let it fuel her efforts. Making a ring with her fingers, she blew through the center. A thick, unsettling mist erupted from her lips to surround those surrounding her. 

At the spell's peak, her eyes snapped open. Her pupils dilated when her gift flooded their system and latch onto their hormones. In an instant, horror poured into their souls. The impact was immediate. Several eyes shot open as they left one nightmare and woke into another.  Their bodies slammed into each other as a poor soul fell underfoot, their life swiftly ushered into Eshiran's embrace. 

Among them, Roslyn spotted a familiar face among the group. Constanze.. She was getting trampled. Empathy won over logic in the end. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Constanze!"[/color] Roslyn stepped away from Marco's side to keep the child in sight. 

Her telekinesis roughly pulled Constanze into her arms. Pressing the girl close to her body, Roslyn had just turned when an elbow found her cheek. Pain and stars spun her vision as they both crumbled. She pressed them both against an upturned pew while more bodies shoved them about. Still, she held the zombie-like child close. 

When a gap appeared, she pushed back onto her feet.  

A sudden boom of magnetic waves caught her attention. Instead of the crushed remains of the organ, a woman stood in its defense. A few chunks of skin had broken off her arm before she summoned a humming blade of light then lashed out at Evander. 

[color=#cbc66d]"Who the fuck is that?"[/color] Roslyn asked as she acted quickly. Drawing from time, she aimed the Light of Ahn-Shune at the woman's eyes to disorient her. Roslyn might've disliked Evander, but she didn't want to see him killed. 

Stuck between a wall of bricks and a wall of bodies, Xiuyang felt like there was nothing she could do. Her senses as a mage told her the same old story they always did: once more, they were fucked. Five new and very strong energy signatures approached from Die Tanzstiefel. Either they were Edyta's allies from the church or they were cultists who had just armed themselves with the biros' weapons—Marci was either very happy right now or very dead soon. A situation out of her control.

The inside of the cathedral was much the same. Fritz von Mollern was drawing an amount of energy that would give Jocasta pause. Either Roslyn's hunch was right, and the von Mollerns were secret allies, or they were all going to die here, pincered as they were between him and Marcella. Xiuyang did not want to abandon her friends, but even if she did have the heart to do it, there were five more mages she couldn't handle standing between her and her precious mirror. Just another situation out of her control. She scoffed. She thought she was going somewhere with her plans last night. She was nothing and nobody. Without the direct intervention of Eshiran, Laska was right: she was paste.

But there was exactly one person in this situation that she could kill on her way to Eshiran's final embrace, and that was Berthold. He would die here, he would die before her friends did. He would die painfully. But first, she needed a distraction.

Two targets—one call to make. Xiuyang's voice caught in her throat as the words came to her, but did she have the courage to make the call again? In Belleville, with the Colas, she had made the call, and everyone blamed her when it didn't work out. It would happen again if she made the wrong call. Could she trust Fritz von Mollern? She had heard his name in the mines. The demonic woman whom she now theorized to be Marcella Brandt had spoken to him, seemingly asked him for orders.

But if Fritz were an enemy, what then? They all converge on him, and Marcella blasts them all in the back one by one as they stall for time in the hope that those approaching from the inn were allies? So she'd foil an attempted back stab from the von Mollerns, but only succeed in delaying the inevitable, unless they were lucky enough to have reinforcements. If Fritz were not an enemy, then she'd kill him if she made the wrong call. If he was, she accepted that she and her friends were dead if she made the call to converge on Marcella. Did she trust Roslyn's judgment, or her own?

Karl von Mollern did not hurt Roslyn. He'd caught Johann in a lie when Roslyn was none the wiser. Would a person like that work with demons? She'd doubted Roslyn's judgment on account of her innocence before, and the incident with the sword was a fresh wound, learning that Marci had been in on it but not her. [color=slateblue][i]*Not this time. I can't make the call. It's yours, Roslyn.*[/i][/color]

[color=slateblue]"ON MAGUS!!"[/color] Xiuyang shouted the universally recognized order, pointing at Marcella. There were no magusjaegers in the building, but she hoped her allies would get the point.

The attack unleashed was unassuming, but it seemed to have endless power, and only the collective efforts of Evander and Roslyn, combined with some quick thought, divine armour, and mobility, saved the former's life. For a moment, as the Light of Ahn-Shune bathed her form in its holy, blinding light, a couple of the more perceptive Biro's caught sight of something truly [i]monstrous[/i] beneath. It was... goatlike or sheeplike and twisted an sneering, with black soulless eyes.

Ingrid was one of those who saw, with her keen senses, and that also made her a target. She dodged only with the help of superhuman reflexes and a spot-teleport behind a wall. Marcella's beam of pure fiery death scythed through support pillars, melted stonework, and evaporated bodies. More of the former thralls broke free of their mind control and the screams of terror that rose from Dom St. Adelheid were enough to induce only further chaos.

Hair undone, eyes bloodshot, and a wild triumphant grin on her face, the right-hand woman of Liesl Frickmayer strode forward. [color=#8B0000]"Eight [i]hundred[/i] years!"[/color] she crowed, drawing with a speed and deep strength that simply wasn't human. [color=#8B0000]"Endless sacrifice, living within the filth of these people. Watching them fail again and again, bearing witness their stupidity, simplicity, and weakness, all for this moment."[/color] She shook her head and turned her gaze upon Xiuyang, who, this moment, was focusing her energy sense and perceiving things of truly great import. [color=#8B0000]"You won't stop us,"[/color] she declared factually, with a small tight shake of her head. [color=#8B0000]"This is greater than you and, Levidan knows, this disgusting world [i]needs[/i] it."[/color]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_3ITHSAcro[/youtube]

As if to punctuate her point, the hulking pipe organ that infected this cathedral started up again, Berthold playing madly, hair disheveled, eyes bugged out, scarf tossed carelessly over one shoulder. The thralls began to move under his command once more. Perhaps seventy or eighty people had now died and the ten-pointed star was bubbling with their blood and glowing. The entire building thrummed with a fell and otherworldly energy. All could sense it. 

Chin raised high, bearing disdainful and imperious, she reached one hand out, clawlike, and conjured a thousand small explosions all around Xiuyang with a flick of her wrist. [color=#8B0000]"By the Gods, you're ugly,"[/color] she sneered. [color=#8B0000]"Please disappear."[/color]

The Revidian could sense what was coming, however, and she had decided that her singular focus should be on eliminating Berthold once and for all. [color=slateblue]"ON MAGUS!!"[/color] came her call and gesture, and everyone who could muster an attack turned to launch what they had at Marcella.

It was at that moment that there was a colossal surge of energy from the center of the church. People fell, writhing and vomiting. Others gripped their temples and screamed. A handful simply passed out. Even Evander and Roslyn felt a distinct discomfort and dizziness. 

Fritz von Mollern, patriarch of his noble house, stood alone, as others collapsed or fled, the fine silks of his nightgown tattered and filthy, bloodshot eyes narrowed. [color=#3CB371]"You talk too much,"[/color] he growled, unheard, even as blood began to trickle from his nose. With that, like a dam bursting, all of the energy he had been holding was unleashed, and it was a [i]mighty[/i] torrent indeed. Great stone pillars, thousands of pounds each, gargoyles, pews, parts of the floor and roof: all of them shot towards the demon opposite him with the velocity of bullets fired from a magusjaeger's rifle.

It took less than a second and Marcella was so busy defending the other attacks that she didn't even notice until the maelstrom converged. The massive [i]"CRACK!!!"[/i] and shockwave that followed flattened even more people as eruptions of dust and rubble billowed outwards. Dom St. Adelheid trembled under the onslaught and those with the ability to sense energy reached out even before they could see.

In the middle stood, not Marcella Brandt, head maid of the noble House of Frickmayer, but the vendemon Saivel, the wolf in sheep's clothing and second of Lord Iptacht himself. The scraps of human form sloughed away and she stood there, bloodied and panting. Her canine lips curled up in a snarl and her claws extended. [color=#8B0000]"That's everything, then,"[/color] she coughed. [color=#8B0000]"That's all you've got."[/color] Despite herself, she smiled. [color=#8B0000]"[i]My[/i] turn now!"[/color]

What she wasn't watching, however, was Berthold Lothmann, her most useful dupe. He and his instrument of coercion had lain, for a moment, utterly undefended.

Saivel attacked, but so did Fritz, and Xiuyang received the cover she needed. With her mastery of Arcane magics, the remnants of Saivel's assault were defended and the Revidian dived in for the kill. A Loon's Call rang out, and Berthold found a six-legged, blood-hungry beast skittering in his direction, weaving through the crowd as if all those people simply didn't exist. Ingrid seemed to catch on to Xiuyang's plan and bound the man in place with stasis, bindings, and a touch of her own dark magic.

The Revidian was on him and there was neither any escape nor anyone to help him. His fingers began to unravel, in a manner not unlike the omniphage coils on her own body. [color=slateblue]"Going to be hard to play like that,"[/color] Xiuyang quipped callously, as the curse progressed past his hands and up his arms. Still, he was not suffering enough. Two of the coils latched onto him next, draining his blood. At this rate, if no one stopped her, she would simply devour him.

Fritz von Mollern's face curdled in disgust. [color=#3CB371]"Of course you would not die from this,"[/color] he sneered, wiping the blood dribbling from his nose with the back of his wrist. he swayed a bit where he stood, clearly exhausted from the barrage, but then came the students' attack on Berthold, and his eyebrows shot together in alarm. [color=#3CB371]"I came to defeat demons,"[/color] he shouted, [color=#3CB371]"not [i]ally[/i] with them!"[/color] 

He was drawing again, but Saivel's claws shot out and she launched herself at the lord of Lindenholdt. As strong as he was, a previous graduate of Ersand'Enise and victor of the AIZ55 Trials, he could not hope to stand alone against the power of this vendemon now that his ironblood manas had exhausted themselves to their utmost. Nonetheless, he would not budge as Saivel came at him with tooth and claw empowered to ridiculous levels of speed, force, and sharpness by her magic. 

Fritz stood his ground and, suddenly, there were five of him. Before each was a wall. Behind each, he was in motion, slipping to the side or laying down another barrier. The vendemon swiped and slashed, obliterating most everything in her path, but she laid not a finger on the good Baron.

In the meantime, as Xiuyang tortured Berthold to death and reveled in it, Roslyn came in to blow up the pipe organ that had called so many people here to their deaths. Below, Baron von Mollern and Saivel exchanged taunts as Ingrid clung to the wall, offering an unseen helping hand to the former. The massive instrument detonated with a far larger explosion than it should've, shaking the entire building as if collapsed to the floor below. 

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PosSbML1k98[/youtube]

Roslyn emerged from the dust and smoke, coughing and scalded but unharmed. Xiuyang and the terribly wounded Berthold were thrown apart by the calamity. Marco and Evander were unaffected, but there was still Saivel to deal with, who might kill any one of them in a single blow. She was, for what it was worth, subtly avoiding the former. Perhaps he was their best shot at actually [i]winning[/i] this fight.

[hr]

Then, there was Marceline. [color=598527]<I'm. At. The. Inn. And. I. Have. Your. Gear.>[/color] she messaged all but Johann and Dory. [color=598527]<Is. It. Safe. To. Teleport. Back. With. It. Question.>[/color] She reached out with her senses, however, and could [i]feel[/i] that something wasn't right. The townspeople had gone still, for the most part, but there were two streams' worth. While the majority had ended up at the church, hundreds more had gone a different way and they were... [color=598527]"Mines,"[/color] the tethered whispered to herself, heartrate quickening. She had left her wheelchair in the tree as she'd rocketed back to the inn, and was now sitting awkwardly on her bed, having gathered everything of use that she could. Before Marci sat a small chest with a secret in it. She swallowed, took a steadying breath, and decided against using it. Not yet. The time wasn't right. She still looked half a girl and still had half a body. [color=598527][i]Patience,[/i][/color] she counseled herself. 

[color=598527][i]Patience.[/i][/color] She began rifling through the threads of space and time, eager to open a portal and deliver what was so sorely needed.

To Dory, however, she sent a different message, as the Feskan drew close to the mines and [i]Johann[/i] drew close to her. [color=598527]<Dory. I. Have. Your. Things. | Why. Are. You. Out. There. Question. | What. Is. Going. On. There. Question.>[/color] Indeed, Lady Dorothea could see it for herself: the human sacrifices standing motionless outside of the mine, a long line of them stretching into its depths. There were a multitude already present and, in their midst... that was a demon of the sixth tier! Not a grand demon, perhaps, but... [i]No![/i] Not yet, only! Not [i]yet[/i]! Something [i]far[/i] more terrible than a mere vendemon was about to emerge from that unholy place! It was at about the same time as Marceline's message that a voice came to Dory, inside of her head, and [i]this[/i] was chilling in its simplicity: [color=#FF4500]"Are you with us or are you against us?"[/color][/hider]