Closed [Kabrin Road] Ice Clay and Flesh (Archailist)

[Revy Hiroe]

If the situation of the two women wasn't bad enough yet, another two guys appeared and spoke a little to the three in front of the women, which in turn started to laugh and made a path for the two, allowing them to join up with the other two. They hadn't stored their weapons yet, but the women had to get to their allies. They didn't have any time to spare. Revy and Theresa looked at each other and nodded. They had to get to Iros and Archailist. The squires whistled, calling Rosalind to her as she put her glaive back on her shoulder, cringing at the pain in her shoulder. And cringed even more as she climbed onto her horse rather clumsily. "Let's go, sera. We can't let those other two waiting.", she said eyeing the five bandits with suspicion. Riding the horses, for what seemed an eternity, they managed to reach Iros and Archailist. Theresa didn't waste any time and charged the guys tormenting Iros, only to get her horse impaled on the spear of the guy who reacted in time to her assault. She got launched over Iros and landed a couple feet in front of him. The air got knocked out of her lungs, yet still stood up rather quickly. And, with her Flamberge raised, started to support Iros, covering his back. Revy on the other hand, got off of Rosalind, sending her away again and drew her glaive. One of the archers had also turned to face this new threat. While they still outnumbered the knights, it was only by one right now. He nooked, aimed and shot at Revy in almost the blink of an eye. But bows didn't have the punching power of a crossbow and it skimped off of her breastplate, as the squire turned to face the threat. Together with Iros, Revy and Theresa managed to keep the guys with the spears and sword at a distance, but due to Revy's inexperience with the glaive, she couldn't manage to even land a blow, despite letting her gnosis mark's power flow throughout her body. And if that wasn't enough trouble, the guys that had let them go, joined up with the others now. "Ah petch. It's at least two on one now.", she softly cursed. "Got any ideas, ser and sera?", she asked. But her patron answered negatively.

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

By the the time Revy and Theresa arrived, things were already looking pretty bad. With several footprints left in his body, Arch was left in favor of the three taller knights. A healthy mix of ranged and close-combat weapons surrounded them. They wouldn't be able to run without getting a load of arrows in their back for the trouble, along with on the horses. With his monstrously heavy shield braced in both hands, the Akalak grunted when he felt a weight pressing against his back. "If I knew you were coming, I would have prepared a cake. As it stands, I didn't think you were stupid enough. Next time I'll try to be a little less optimistic." Blood was still seeping through the ringmail on his sides, not to mention the stuff weeping down his calves and shins from all the hard prods through the delicate spots on his armour. Though Revy was lucky for the first to bounce off her breast-plate, there was no telling where the next arrow would land; a gap in her midsection.. the back of a knee.. an eye..

"Now, I have an idea. Since we're outnumbered and outskilled, I'd suggest that we surrender everything we have. I don't fancy my chances." As he spoke, another jab rattled the heavy shield and set the Akalaks feet a little firmer into the ground as he leaned back and strained to push it away. For all his immense strength, the amount of strain he'd held for so long was pushing on the very limits of his body and possibly beyond. Veins were bulging in his neck, just beneath the heavy plate-mail; even his lips were struggling to pass words between them. "After all, they didn't look so good for my squire." Finally, he nodded his head over to Arch.

He was barely breathing. His tiny chest was still pushing, just about; a natural instinct that was there for nothing more than show, since he didn't have lungs, or a ribcage, or a diaphragm.. anything that would necessitate the need for any movement at all. Barely conscious too.. since they'd at least avoided crushing his tiny head. His limbs were beyond use though. Flattened thinner than paper and left with heavy prints over them, mangled into dirt and soil.

[Revy Hiroe]

Stalinsa saw how hopeless it was and started to snicker. What were they supposed to do now? But one quick glance on her squire and she didn't feel like giving up just yet. She had one more javelin left and with that one she would have to take out one of the archers. However, her main concern was Revy not having her longsword with her right now. Revy on the other hand, wanted to win this, one way or another. As she felt the power from her mark flowing throughout her body, she whispered her prayer to Myri: "Myri, bless my weapon and arm, let my weapons find my adversary's hearts, my feet the ground so I reach them." She could use her glaive, but with her inexperience with it, she wasn't going to be able to do a whole lot. Would it be a good thing if she used her patron's broadsword? Yeah it would, but she wasn't carrying it. Oh petch her. Then she'd just charge at em right? However, when she set her first foot forward, an arrow lodged itself right in between her greave and sabbaton. "Nngh. Bastards.", she hissed through her teeth as she almost collapsed on her feet. Stalinsa saw Revy taking that hit and decided that it was enough. That woman was in no shape to fight anymore. They had to surrender. "Iros, I'll get Revy to surrender if you're gonna do so too. She's got two arrows stuck in her now and I don't think that even she can take much more. Especially seeing how accurate those guys are.", she said. And if Iros agreed, she put her hands up as a sign of surrender.

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

Iros wasn't in the mood for laughter and jokes, nor was this a time for them. He slammed an armoured elbow into her side to stifle her chuckles while his grime-soaked face glanced between the other attackers and Archailist. He was close to losing his squire - for good. There was no real telling if the squire was actually gone already; his clay was bleached to a pale shade and there wasn't any movement in his tiny body that the knight could see through the sweat and blood oozing over his eyes, beneath the restrictive metal mask of a helmet. Hopefully when they gave up all their weapons, the attacks would stop and they'd all be free to go after they gave the men and women.. whatever it was that they wanted.

That wouldn't be in the cards just yet though. The whispers of a prayer soon graced his ears.. there was no doubt what it was for, either. "You deaf, girl?" Apparently so; at least she paid for it quickly. Several more thunks resonated from the metal plate shielding the Akalak's body, but stepping out left the younger squire with an arrow lodged in her leg and a lot to answer for when he practically ripped the leather straps from his forearm and wheeled around on the spot, putting his back to the archers so that he could reach out and grab for her throat. "If you want to get yourself killed, I'll gladly help you, but you won't be doing it when there are lives at stake."

The fellow knight, Stalinsa, wasn't saved either as he turned on her. "I told you that already. She'd have one arrow in her if you'd both listened to what I said." The man was evidently fuming, though for many reasons - likely he'd be doing it for many more long after they'd even escaped. He wheeled back from scalding the other two as a father would their disobedient daughters just in time to see the archers reloading, spearmen at the ready to finish them all off. Shameful, how easily they'd ripped through the defenses; he didn't think any of them had landed much of a single hit on any of the unknown assailants.

Both of the Akalak's arms raised high. "We surrender. Cease. Stop." The group split and glanced between one-another in complete confusion, weapons still drawn and at the ready. Muffled voices begun speaking again in odd tongues, jabbering softly from underneath the heavy woolen masks until one of them - one of the archers - lowered his bow and returned the arrow notched and readied to its fur-lined quiver. The wide hood slowly pulled back to reveal a startlingly small face with piercing violet eyes and a snarky smile lifting the edges of his mouth. Vantha. An oddity.

"Gre-tings." He seemed to have a bit of trouble correctly pronouncing the common tongue. "Y-ou speak Vani?" The others, by now, had lowered their weapons as well - never sheathing, but keeping them held down against their sides. By the ways they simply watched, silent, it seemed as though only one of them was either brave enough to try Common or only one of them really knew enough of it to try and spark up some decent conversation.

[Revy Hiroe]

As if to mock the Akalak, sera Stalinsa started to laugh for real. Though she stopped the moment that Iros chided her squire. Despite his superior rank, he didn't have to do it like that. All he had to do was just sit back and wait. She wasn't going to let Revy get them killed, nor was she gonna let her squire bite the dust. "Shut it, Iros. She ain't moving an INCH anymore and you don't need to treat her like that.", she said. Revy almost froze as she heard her patron talk. Yep, she was in trouble now. Well.. even more then she was already, with that bolt and arrow sticking out of her body. The adrenalin that was coursing throughout her body, slowly started to diminish. This made it harder for her to bite through the pain and it showed on her forehead as she started to sweat. Though she was very reluctant, the squire had to surrender. There was no point in fighting anymore as it was impossible for her to move now. The pain almost paralyzed her. "I'll surr.... surrender too. Just.... don't expect me to move.", she said as she let herself drop. Removing the arrows would be the most sane thing to do, but she didn't know if they were jagged or not, so she couldn't say if she'd rip her flesh while trying to remove them. Theresa answered the Vantha, because she thought she was in the best position to do so. "Neither me, nor my squire speak Vani. I cannot speak for this Akalak but I dare say he doesn't know it either." God did the knight wish she had studied up on the Vantha race right now. Maybe then she could have held a better conversation with them, seeing how broken that person's common was.

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

The longer that Iros remained anywhere close to Stalinsa, the less he found himself caring about what she said. In fact, the less he found himself caring about her in general, or her squire. At her chiding once again, he turned to her and stared down, hard. "You're right, I don't. I'm going to though. If you've got a problem with it, you're welcome to turn around and leave right now." An obvious jab at their situation, which he personally blamed Stalinsa and Revy for. He didn't really have much of a reason for doing so, but the thoughts were swimming around his head by now. "Go ahead, turn and walk away right now. Take your stubborn child with you," he dared, "and see who will stab you in the back first."

After that, he remained silent. There was nothing else to say; he couldn't speak Vani and could barely understand the Vantha through the strange accent. Besides, the others were chattering softly amongst themselves and soon to the unmasked 'leader'. "Haha. Was not expecting Tikita to." There was no need to spit the words, but with a smile of smug satisfaction, that's exactly what he did. The others chuckled under their hoods, spurring their leader even further. "You-r tongues are as dull as you-r blades!" More laughter.

"Now tell us. Why did y-ou atta-ck us." The man was still grinning as he spoke in that odd accent. For Eyris, it was pretty difficult to even take him seriously, despite all the others just waiting for one slip-up so that they could bury a few more arrows in them and laugh afterwards. It seemed like something they'd do. It wasn't like they'd stopped and asked any questions before just opening fire and attacking whoever stood in their way and they knew it just as much as Eyris did. There was no point answering, so he said nothing, despite the 'leader' staring him straight in the face with a grin diminishing by the tick. "No-thing?" He turned instead to Stalinsa.

"If you can not ex-plain, we will hand y-ou to the k-nights when we re-ach Sigh-ly-rahs." They butchered the name of the city with such terrible pronunciation that Eyris almost opened his mouth to ask where that was. When the leader turned back and eyed him eagerly, waiting for something, anything, the Akalak's mouth closed and a frown split over the Vantha's face.

[Revy Hiroe]

Theresa ignored the taunt from Iros. She had a totally different way of training her squire, so it was obvious he was going to disagree with her. But those vantha on the other hand... those remarks, they seemed to really piss her off. She wanted to retort with anger, but she bit through it. Something her squire didn't seem to be able to. Revy wasn't taking those taunts that well. "Oh yeah? Our blades are dull? You guys are bloody shykeheads, using bows and crossbows. Filthy Awathoklo.", she spat back at em. She wanted to continue, but the look on her patron's face silenced her. Perhaps it'd be best to just... bite through the embarrassment. She was rather embarrassed then that she was forced to, she didn't even want to think of it, studying from... books. When that Vantha went over to talking about Syliras, Stalinsa cringed at the pronunciation. But right after started laughing. Oh this was golden. These guys didn't realize that they were talking to knights. "Sure, bring us to these so called knights of Syliras. Let's see what happens shall we? I am sure they will listen to you guys.", she said glee. Right after she whispered to the other two: "Apparently we are to be taken to our own city and surrendered to the knights. Oh this is golden." When the ex-mercenary heard it, she couldn't help but laugh a little too. "Well, if we are supposed to go back to Syliras, I'll just call my horse, vagiks. Don't worry, I won't do anything to you, color-eyes. Won't need to.", she said just before she whistled Rosalind over, which came walking slowly. That Sungold was very aware of the tension in the air, even if her owner didn't seem to have much. "Iros, still got yer horse?", she asked.

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

Eyris remained silent, though there was quite a bit of smug satisfaction almost emanating from him when the Vantha frowned at Revy's words. As soon as she'd fallen silent, he took several quick steps forwards, lifted one hand and swung it around and over the left side of her face with a vicious backhand, not muffled at all by the thick gloves he wore. He didn't need to understand all the insults or curses she'd thrown at him, but he knew enough from that tone of voice to suggest that she wasn't being very polite. Given the position they all found themselves in, they'd be lucky to all make it back to Syliras in one piece. As illustrated by the next words that came from the leader. "We will be now taking you-r weapons and armor now."

They didn't like how abruptly gleeful the group had become - at least, two out of the three. Eyris was still pretty morbid. Then again, they were all slowly being pulled away from Arch. They were leaving him behind, completely. True enough, he wouldn't have to worry about being eaten by wolves or other creatures of the night, but that didn't make it safe for the Pycon to be left in the Bronze Woods, alone.. injured.

Instead, the Vantha with their weapons still prepared were taking more of an interest in the horses being brought out. The leader, especially, in the Sungold. "Love-ly horse." He turned back to Eyris and Stalinsa too. "Yes. Horses. You walk; horses are ours too." They were apparently intent on taking everything they could from their so-called attackers.. either to stop them from making an escape, or just because they wanted to and it wasn't as if any of them could disagree any more. "Give everything, now." He roughly shoved at Revy's chest to push her away from the horse. His horse, to be exact.

At the same time, the others were busy man-handling Eyris and approaching Stalinsa; ready to pull off their plate-mail pieces at a time to store away in their bags. Chattering begun once more, though they sampled the spear and the shield, the vambraces and other pieces they could find; arguing over how much they could sell the pieces for. Eyris' horse was quickly mounted by one of the spearmen, who made mocking yells as he gripped the reigns hard in one hand and spun his spear above his head with the other. The Akalak, as he watched, turned back to Sera Stalinsa. "Is this your idea of golden."

[Revy Hiroe]

Revy wasn't so gleeful when she got smacked in her face like that. Besides it hurting bad, she tasted blood in her mouth. She wanted to curse the living shyke out of them, but she didn't. She didn't want to be put back in that position she was in, in Fall. But she didn't submit. She wasn't going to admit defeat, no matter what. Not again. So as to state that fact, she spat out the blood to the side. Theresa immediately realized that the Vantha were driving them away from Archailist and spoke up: "Oi, if you guys are going to surrender us to the knights, at least bring our Pycon with us. That thing you were so conveniently squashing. Even if it's just made out of clay, it's a living thing.", she said. "I won't be doing anything, if you at least see to that and if you take care of Revy's wounds." When the bandits started to try and take off Revy's armor, they pulled out the arrow in her foot rather easily. Of course it hurt like hell when they did so and it started to bleed, but when they tried to pull out the bolt, the pain was excruciating. It seemed to be lodged into her shoulderbone and was nearly impossible to pull out. The woman had a hard time staying conscious and groaned from the pain. The moment that leader figure pushed Revy back, away from Rosalind, the horse immediately moved over, knocking that guy over and parked herself protectively over Revy, not moving an inch from it's spot and biting to anyone coming from the sides or front and kicking any trying to approach from the back. Theresa couldn't help but laugh. "You know guys, not even I am allowed to ride that horse. It throws anyone, that's not that woman, off. I don't really know why it does that, but I gave up trying. Perhaps it'd be better if you guys just left her alone and let her ride on her own horse. It's not like she can do anything at the moment. That arrow in her foot will make it impossible for her to walk on it and that bolt in her shoulder locks it in place.", she said. Revy decided to pull out both the arrow and bolt. That way she could perhaps move her left arm and foot. But the moment she tried to pull out hte bolt, she screamed in pain. That thing didn't budge at all and hurt like hell when she tried. She nearly lost conscience trying to pull it out. Sweat almost gushed from her forehead, her eyes close to dilluted from the pain. That thing seemed to be lodged in her bone. Perhaps that's why she couldn't move it.

oocWell.. Revy won't be doing much anymore. She's kinda... well barely conscious

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

The Vantha leader sneered in satisfaction, with some of the others behind him chuckling with snide words passed in foreign tongues between. They knew that they were in control.. and they had no qualms showing it either as they strolled casually around, tugging off pieces of armour and paying little attention to the pain it might have caused to Revy given the arrows stuck inside her. Eyris winced as well when they stripped away his heavy plate, piece-by-piece, sometimes just cutting off the leather straps that held it together; they didn't care if the blade dug a little too deep and took off some skin as well. "This will fetch good prices, no?"

Of course, Revy had to be the difficult one. Given how snide she'd been before, there was little remorse as they twisted the arrows from her.. nor even when she showed signs of extreme pain thanks to the bolt lodged firmly in her shoulder. Unfortunately, given how deep it was, they had to relent afterwards and leave Revy with at least some pieces of armour.. though it was limited to those that they couldn't take off thanks to the bolt, and not a scrap more. After all, it was all worth something at the very least. Eyris, Stalinsa and Revy were all lucky that none of their attackers paid attention to the pins worn by Eyris, marking him as a knight with a single sword.

They reacted more when the horse suddenly begun lashing out. Thankfully there were more Vantha than there were horses.. meaning that they could sneak around the other side, grab Revy and pry her away from her precious Sungold one way or another. The leader still wasn't impressed; even less so when he heard the comments made by Stalinsa. Instead, he wheeled around on her and only managed a small glance to the small Pycon off to the corner. "Wh-y should I do that?"

He was relishing in his opportunity for superiority. That much was blatantly obvious with how he held himself. "W-hy should I care what happens to you? Why sho-uld I go out of my w-ay to help the same thing that at-tacked me? It ca-n stay here and d-ie for all I care. Maybe it'll make y-ou thieves and bandits a little more compassionate. We'll be doing you a service in the fu-ture." This was what they got for not explaining who they were and what they were doing. Eyris shook his head quietly but refused to speak up; he'd listened to Stalinsa so far and all he could do now was trust in her 'plan' to get them back to the city. For once, he was actually putting his trust in the same knight that had laughed at him before.

All this, conveyed in a single glance thrown to the female knight before he returned to staring down at the floor, breathing silently. For all the strength he held, there was nothing he could do; not even Wysar himself could go out against so many armed, armoured and skilled men with no armour or weapons to call his own. Not to mention the fact that he really didn't have any understanding of how to fight when left without his spear or shield. All he had now was the Lakan, thankfully untouched since he held it tight against his hip, underneath the clothes underneath even that of his armour.

"You attacked us. You pay the price. Now you walk. All of you. If I can not ri-de the horse.. guess what? No-body can. If she cannot walk.. then you can carry her. Or she can sta-y here with the Py-con for the night." Evidently he was telling the truth; he really couldn't give less of a shyke about the wellbeing of his new 'prisoners'. He had no reason to.. they couldn't even give a decent explanation for who they were.. or any explanation at all.