RP Session 1: "A Hart's Errand"

Breuddwyd wasn't certain what Tovrunn had in mind—their connection allowed the transmission of silent speech but anything else from one failed to coalesce for the other—but there was an awkward pause in her thought-transmission that seemed to linger and he wondered if she held the same notion as he. The spell he would use to make escape by boat quite difficult was as much in line with her shamanic traditions as his own naturalistic leanings so he dared to guess she could perform it just as well. Tovrunn seemed wise enough for a human. Putting their heads together after this was over and comparing notes, so to speak, to better combine their capabilities in future might bear ample fruit.

**Can only perceive words,** he informed the pale woman, almost apologetically. It was enough of a mental workout simply keeping the bond open and permitting her to send so clearly; the long reach of the Goedlan yng Cyfnos exacted its toll. From longer discussions with family in the past, Breuddwyd knew it as a delicious sort of ache, recognising that he was growing ever stronger.

**Have a spell in mind,** he went on. **To swamp their boat. Without harm to a hostage. But need to be closer.** He considered the extra squad of assailants flanking their party and allowed himself a fleeting instant in which to fantasise about the kind of magic he would one day master that could easily cleanse the thoroughfare of grimacing, small-minded despoilers. **Worth it to surrender? Then pick our battle.**

He considered the others around him, those having just arrived, and belatedly assessed the traces of arcana about the spindly foreigner. It wasn't just that hint of timorous, self-important, scholarly distraction in his bearing for Breuddwyd. Magic-users gave off slight phantom tells to his enhanced senses and this human left a faint but acrid flavor at the back of his tongue and a dry, musty odor that teased his nostrils like a greedily guarded library of old, rarely-tended books and myriad forgotten alchemical components. Knowledge bereft of beauty.

"Which one of these humans do you wish to claim?" Breuddwyd queried of the distant leader, hoping his voice sounded appropriately cowed by the threat of violence and largely disinterested in suffering for these others. Maybe this was just a simple misunderstanding. "Most of us have only just arrived here, we have. But we may not be at odds after all."

**Curb your buffoon. If you can.** He let Tovrunn ponder this, not relishing the chore himself. **Or let him loose. Flying bolts won't be picky.**

Almost equally apologetic, Tovrunn communicated through their mental link, **Sorry, this is new to me. I have the magical means to freeze the boat they wish our charge to board and to create a wall of ice between him and our new friends. If he were to go to the boat.**

Glancing over her shoulder at the arrival of the newcomers, Tovrunn felt repressed a shiver as the situation grew more dire by the second.

**Clever plan. I think I know of the spell you speak,** she continued, refocusing on her silent conversation with the normally silent elf. **Though distance is...an issue.** Glancing at Lancaelad, she grimaced. **Curbing him is like directing a charging bull; best done subtly and with no enraging influences. Which is not where we find ourselves.**

Still, she did call out quietly to the knight, careful so that she could not be heard from the brigands on the opposite pier. "Let us comply for now. I can protect our charge if he is in that boat, but not on the dock." To Aeric, who was so near that she could reach out and touch him, she said, "What magicks can you contribute?"

Corson, unsure of who is ally and who is foe, nods to Adalric. Holding his hands out, away from his weapons, he begins to make his way around toward the brigands, readying to run with his charge once they get around to the opposite side of the warehouse to the South... He does not spare a glance to the folk that he thinks may be his retinue, hoping that if they have a plan it will give them a chance to run.

As long as Salien is in the open, fighting is too dangerous...

So it was not to be chess, then. No battle of wits and position with the man across the water; he had brought in a flanking column of allies, and these ones looked more like rooks than pawns.

Lancaelad felt a chill run down his spine, and his maille clinked slightly as he trembled subtly. These were not good odds. Nine or ten against four or six, and those more numerous having the advantage of range, position and facing? What a worthless way to die, gutted by kidnappers and tossed into the Straits of Aerele like unwanted fish from the morning catch. Ser Lancaelad Noelon deserved a more glorious death than that.

He deserved not to die.

When Tovrunn offered an alternative, he grasped at it a little too eagerly. "Yes! Yes... a sound stratagem, my lady," he agreed, relieved. The young knight craned his head around at both sets of ruffians and the men down the pier by the gangplank. There was one more gambit, a slight one; he did not know Adalric Salien by sight, and perhaps neither did the assailants. After all, they had not indicated which man to bring over... the leader had said 'you know who'.

Lancaelad raised his hand at the moustachioed man also in armour who was slowly approaching. "Yes, Goodman Salien come forward! Leave your manservant and come forward."

It did not sound very convincing, even to him.

Corson looked at Lancaelad and cocked his head. "I will not leave my man's side until he is delivered safely. Step out of the way or help, there is no other choice."

The man who must be Adalric Salien set off in his protector's wake, but with an inarticulate cry he flung himself against a pile of crates when the man fell in a bloody heap mere yards ahead. Wide eyed he looked up at Tovrunn and Aeric where they shared the shelter of a single large crate, and met their eyes with uncomprehending horror.

"Gweithredol," Breuddwyd hissed, waving one hand almost dismissively to deny a well-aimed bolt its svelte elven target. So very calm, as if he was shot at every day, as if his heart wasn't hammering out a beat like frantic leporine footsteps fleeing every which way within his slender chest. Falling back to the crates alongside Tovrunn, he shook his head and grumbled, "Has it just been my experience or do all human males truly tend to lead with their pointy bits?"

Not waiting for a response, the dark eyes peeking out from beneath his hood fastened on the nearest of the unwashed chargers, dedicated to making him pay first for his band's wretched opportunistic treachery.

"Methiant arwrol," the sorcerer and would-be sovereign growled, brandishing his crystalline focus to set a crude but effective hex of the darkest woods upon the man before following up with the plain elegance of a dart comprised purely of flaming cinders, thrown sidearm like a pinecone whipped at nettlesome peers (the type who never see fit to show any respect for a skinny, doleful child with a solemn outlook). "Adain dân."

His salvo loosed—and with Arglwyddes pelting silently away, apparently determined to follow Lancaelad into combat despite Breuddwyd's own misgivings—he dared a glance back to address the foreign arcanist cowering by the ship. The magic he smelled on the man suggested he might not be completely useless in a skirmish.

"Will you not contribute? I doubt they're of a mind for leaving witnesses behind, no matter how lush your dress."

Ser Lancaelad grunted as the strange knight misunderstood the ploy and affirmed his determination to defend the man who must be his charge. It had been an unworthy ruse of war on his part; and in any case, the ambushers seemed to have decided the quickest way through was at the point of a bolt.

The swarm of shots were on him before he could limber his shield. Like hornets, buzzing and jagged, most of them glanced off his maille but left him buffetted and bruised. The sting from his flank registered dimly, distantly, and he glanced down to see blood – his own blood – trickling through the links in the armour and staining his surcoat crimson. The pain of the graze was secondary to the chill of fear that ran through his body at the realisation that they were outnumbered, their backs to the sea, against an enemy with every tactical advantage.

A wall of ruffians reloading their crossbows lay between him and escape. The best he could do was try and shape the battlefield to his benefit – and his eyes fell on the stack of wooden crates and shipping chests at the base of the pier. Lowering his head and shielding his face with his armoured sleeve, Lancaelad charged recklessly through the next wave of missiles, the planks creaking and shaking under his boots, and threw the brawn of his shoulder into the crates.

Wrapping his arms around one of the boxes at the base of the pile he wrenched with a ox-like snort of effort, and the stack of crates came tumbling down across the ground towards the ruffians. Salt herring, Erebanien almonds and bolts of wool scattered as crates broke and lids spilled their goods, splinters flying all about. Huffing with effort, Lancaelad straightened and unhooked his war-hatchet from his belt, glowering at the men across the debris. "Come, then. Who's first to meet the Cold Rider?"

Unable to comprehend the suddenly deteriorating turn of events, Aeric for a moment stood looking at the dying man-at-arms that seemed to be protecting Adalric. What could have been the cause of such dedication and folly? As much as he wished to help the man, the arrival of new brigands to flank them would certainly be his doom unless he was able to create a distraction.

"Crouch behind this crate stay in cover, don’t let these brigands see a single hair on your head" he ordered Adalric as he began the incantation for a spell he hoped would buy them precious time. He conjured an image of Adalric in his mind and projected it into reality, which started running from behind the crate to away from the ambushing thugs. It was a long shot, but he decided to shout "Where are you running, you idiot!", hoping some of the thugs would pursue the image, allowing them to have a chance of dealing with the rest. He followed after the image, both to make it beliavable, and to find better cover from the hailing arrows.

The violence that erupted on the pier was astounding, both in its breadth and in its suddenness, and watching the stranger who seemed to be their charges bodyguard peppered with bolts and arrows stunned Tovrunn into stillness. It wasn't until the sidhe's odd noiseless speaking pushed it's way into the corners of her mind and she could attach meaning to words did she move. A few short breaths later, she was back, though the shaking in her hands and the pounding of her heart seemed paralyzing.

First things first. Save the knight.

Having the wherewithal to see Aeric's ruse for what it was, Tovrunn spoke the words and drew the gestures of healing over the still twitching and groaning knight, infusing his body with rejuvenating energy and bringing him back to consciousness. "Do not speak!" She hissed as he awoke. "Your charge is safe, the enemy chases illusions, do not correct them! Can you fight?"

The sounds of battle and the noxious fumes of burning flesh and hair drew Tovrunn's attention, and she snapped fire to life in her hand, pitching it at the nearest enemy, one of the fishermen whose flesh was already burnt, before dipping back behind cover.

Corson's eyes flutter open, taking a moment to digest Tovrunn's words, the supine warrior listens around him, staring up at the sky. One enemy, cries out in pain, in the direction of my feet... that one.

The squire takes a deep breath, Do what must be done.

Corson rolls over and scrambles toward his savior, and past, slinging his shield off his back as he takes to his feet!

Breuddwyd noted the sudden vanishing act of the foreign practitioner and watched without expression as Arglwyddes leaped dependably into the fray. She never produced much noise at all but that didn't make her any less fearsome when she was laying back her ears and showing a mouthful of big and pointed teeth to those who crossed her. He almost felt empathy for the man he had burned.

"Adain dân," Breuddwyd uttered once more and the Sidhelien words "fire wing" were an apt description. Tossing another incendiary blast across the distance separating them with an air of disdain, he considered his options.

"Hanghoeth," he muttered with a shake of his head, glancing towards Lancaelad and the other warrior from the ship, a bodyguard perhaps. The second man made for a very able puncushion, it seemed. There certainly were a lot more humans arrayed against them. This would be a taxing affair, likely to get far worse before it got better. The young sorcerer focused his sharp mind and his pinched visage grew incrementally more sour for a moment as his meta-elven will readjusted to help bear the load of his magical demands, like wooden puzzle-block pieces fitting more firmly together.

With that settled, he turned his attention to the few among their enemies who actually might have a clear shot at his position. Breuddwyd didn't hesitate to drop to his belly on the planks, watching the verbose human on the distant pier for a reaction. Being prone wouldn't undermine his affinity for spellcraft but it might make him a less appealing target for the marksmen.

**If you've any fresh ideas. I'm all ears.** he wryly sent to Tovrunn. **Or so I've heard.**

Corson, swatting the incoming quarrel aside, moved toward the pair of crossbowmen! Hoping to break the line to open an escape route, he surged forward, drawing his blade slashing at the nearest brigand!

Snarling through gritted teeth,as they fought a battle on two fronts, Lancaelad heard the eerie sizzle of fairfolk magic and the cry of the strange knight plunging into the fray. The man was admirably relentless, if nothing else; he had as much fletching stuck to his shield and armour as a badly-plucked chicken.

Deciding that the other approach, the pier not blocked off by debris, was in greatest need of being held, Lancaelad looked at one of the brutes charging after the figure of Salien. "Salien! Storm strike you, come back!" he yelled in frustration, not quite grasping that there were two of the sun-browned men on the field now. For a parting shot he hefted his arm back and hurled his axe in an overhand whirl of steel that struck over the barricade and grazed the brute's shoulderblade, leaving a crimson rent in his tunic.

Snorting in satisfaction, Lancaelad turned and strode towards the walkway between the building and the sea, unlimbering his crow's bill. "Hold the line! Each foot of Roesonean soil is paid for with a hogshead of foeman's blood!"

Aeric, satisfied that his trick seemed to be working, managed a thin smile. He had thought that the momentary diversion might have enabled them to make a break, but his hopes faded as he witnessed the calm yet determines fighting spirit of Salien’s escort - and Lancaelad’s boiling blood. With a sigh, he realised those two would not withdraw, he might as well aid them. "These brigands signed their death warrant the moment they decided to challenge the best Roesone can offer! Dispatch them swiftly, Knights!" he shouted, hoping to instil some confidence into the frontline fighters, and then focused on the image, moving it further away from the thugs. Perhaps, witnessing their quarry slipping through their grasp, the thugs would panic and be more prone to tactical errors and rash decisions.