Dannan Raid

Following preparations in the camp and probably more practice torpedo-bombing runs than were strictly necessary, the force sets out.

In a sky heavy with cold, fat raindrops, there is a rush of air and suddenly there are dragons. And the rain is blocked as they blot out the gray sky over a part of the fleet and there is nothing but the sound of rain splattering the water until the rocks reach the ships. Many are hit and those that are not near to sinking have damage of their own to deal with. The strike has crippled a good part of the fleet.

And that's in the first bombing run. A rush of fierce pride and satisfaction brightly colors Jovian's link with Canareth, clearly meant for sharing with the entire wing. //Damn near perfect! Now look sharp - harry them, don't stick your necks out too far....//

From the harbormouth a great dragon's roar erupts and a crack like a cannonade erupts as the lighthouse is toppled by L'tarn's strike.

The whole tower? That was a little more than intended. Did L'tarn get a less than clean shot to the beacon, or was the lighthouse more poorly constructed than we counted on?

Hard to tell if the whole tower went over. The light went out and you're sorta busy.

[OOC: What is this mental block you have against typing "Maranth"?]

L'tarn has come in from seaward and continues over the fleet. Monarth is belching fire and several of the ships that were missed now have fires in their rigging. Only the rain prevents the spread of the fire within the fleet.

M'corli says "They've started the attack. We seem to have them by surprise. OK, they say that flying women are attacking them. That's our cue, right?" The water rushes through the waterways below you and you stand and drip on the ledge that you've been told is under the temple.

"Right" says Siege. He leads you to the top of a stair and pulls on it. It doesn't budge.

"One side, Siege." Robin says with a warm grin, though her face is still showing the paleness from the underground and wet trek.

Carefully placing her gull companions down on the stairs, the Ranger checks to make sure that both Siege and M'corli have the atlatls and spears she's equipped them with. Given that the inside crew isn't going to have the back-up of tons of fire breathing dragon, she makes sure that her companions are as armed as she could get them.

Assuming the Siege steps aside, Robin braces herself and gets a grip on the (stair? door? grate?) that the warleader was trying to budge. Robin takes a couple of breaths and then starts slowly applying the strength that is the heritage of Oberon's blood in a steady building pressure.

With a crack loud enough to be heard by the dragon riders above, Robin breaks the lock. You hear shouts and see three men running at you. M'Corli looks at you, briefly, as if awaiting your permission to charge in. Siege, never one to let an opportunity pass, is rushing at them, yelling.

Behind the three men you see perhaps a half dozen more. At least one of them seems to be running away.

Robin grins and winks, "Move out, greenrider. They'll never know what hit 'em." The Ranger's green eyes flicker wildly as she throws herself into the corridor. Mr. Running-Away-Guy gets an atlatl spearlet hucked at his back as soon as Robin has clearance for her arm.

[about clearance:That's gonna be the problem, as these people didn't believe in headroom when they cut these tunnels. atl-atl's aren't going to be of much use unless you get A: outside or B: to a natural cavern. The spears are still useful and can be thrown, but the extra lever arm of the atl-atl requires too much overhead space for this part of the complex.]

In fact, with the low clearance, the charging men in both directions, and the bad lighting, there is never a clear shot. You can take a risky shot, but it's risky...

Ah, what the hell. A little friendly fire never... well, yeah but. :) Robin'll go for the risky shot with a thrown atlatl spearlet.))

Clang! It hits the ceiling and then the floor, but nothing else. The spear spends the rest of the combat considering how it has wasted it's life and determines to be a chartered accountant in the next, because of their reputation for wooden-ness.

Oh, and one of these kind charging gentlemen will donate his sword to the cause, after his neck is broken. :)

He flinches, you do not. You are armed, and once armed, you quickly dispose of four of them (terminally or not, your choice).

Terminal, please. Quickly and definitively terminal. :)

M'Corli is getting a sword off the victim who seems to be keeping his spear. Siege has two of them covered and another down at his feet.

They went down quickly, but they managed to delay you from getting the final one disposed of.

Robin grins at M'Corli and gestures for him to watch one direction of the corridor. Her manic green eyes watch the other. Pursing her lips, the Ranger calls her two grumpy friends to her, fully expecting them to be even more grumpy with the low hops and walks the corridor will bring.

"Ask your questions fast, Siege. I don't want to hang around."

"I just have two questions, gentlemen. Is Avis down here? And is my grandmother?"

The two guards eyes go wide and one of them looks to the end of the hall.

"That would be yes. M'Corli, if you don't mind, tie these two up and throw them in a cell."

"They'll have another torture room down here. At the end of the hall."

He seems to be waiting on your orders.

Robin rolls her eyes to M'Corli. "Alright. Tie them up. And then watch the exit, please." She shakes her head with a rueful chuckle and looks over to Siege with glinting eyes.

M'Corli does so with dispatch.

"Okay, let's go see what trap your grandmother has set up." With a flash of white teeth, the Ranger starts pelting down the hall. (If this happens to pass by the spearlet contemplating its role in life, she'll scoop it up on the fly. :) )

the spearlet finds itself in your hands, and silently rejoices at this second chance.

Siege runs with you and shortly after M'Corli's footsteps can be heard slapping behind you. The hallway is not too long and ends in a stairway going up and a door to the left. The door is wooden and light leaks through it.

The stairway is filled with some kind of black smoke. Or something.

Robin eyes the black smoke-or-something with evident suspicion. She whistles a little more firmly, oh bird-buddies - let's get tail feathers up here.

She takes a deep breath of the clean, fresh, healthy dungeon air. And holds it.

Robin's plan is simple. Door to 'torture room' open, charge in, kill everything that's not Vianis or Avis, knock out Vianis, cut loose Avis, see if there's a grate to escape through like the other torture room. Anything crops up, Robin figures she'll wing it. :)

The door splinters under your heavy boot and you rush in shortly after the resounding crack! Your compatriots are right behind you, and all of you are yelling as you run.

The room is large and better appointed than the room in the other tower. At the far end is a desk, where Vianis sits, sipping a beverage from a china cup. Next to her is a woman with a bag over her head.

You rush up, intending to knock her unconscious, but you find yourself slowing as you approach her, as if you are running in mud, or perhaps treacle. Up to your chest in it. You are making no progress at all.

"If you stop fighting it, you may sit down." Vianis says archly, gesturing to chairs and another table nearby. "I believe we had not finished our discussion when you so unfortunately declined my further hospitality last night."

A dark chuckle ripples through Robin's frame. "Men. You can tell them and tell them." She shakes her head ruefully.

The Ranger stops pushing forward and glances over at the table and chairs, looking for the trap doors above and below. She looks back to Vianis and smiles.

And snaps the redemption-seeking spearlet she's carrying right at the Chancellor's chest.

The spear snaps out of Robin's grasp and flies across the room, stopping in mid-air about where you al had been previously fighting the barrier. It hangs incongruously in the air a few feet from the chancellor, it neither falls nor continues.

This takes the wind out of the sails of Siege and M'Corli.

Whereas, by the chuckle coming from the daughter of Julian, she finds the results both humorous and fascinating. Robin nods in admiration as though an expectation had been confirmed.

Vianis puts down her teacup and stands. She drags Avis's chair (and Avis with it) into the path of the stationary spear.

"Yes, that's what I needed. A threat. Thank you, dear. It would be very bad if you managed to defeat my barrier.

"Siege, please serve tea for everyone."

Robin's chuckle turns into a snicker. "You've got nice style, I'll admit that, Vianis." She grins. "Unfortunately the quandry here implies that I want to spare Avis more than I want to kill you. Whhhiiich I have not decided on yet."

"However," she holds up a hand to Siege, asking him to hold off the shock for a moment. "I'm willing to be civilized -- briefly -- if you are, Chancellor. First thing is no more orders. I'm just lousy at taking orders." She smiles friendlily to Vianis.

"You must be related to Prince Vere. You and he share a sense of reality widely at variance with what you could observe. It would even be an admirable trait if you were acting to create it, rather than just expecting the universe to conform to your expectations. Still, I think that Gerard would have told the Lady if he'd had a daughter, so you must be Julian's child.

She smiles back. You could cut glass with her smile.

Robin's return smile is bright and chipper.

"So, dear. Your demon allies are in retreat above my city, you can't get through my magic barrier to me, Avis will die by your hand if I drop my spell, and your tea is getting cold. Are you ready to answer my questions?"

"Deep Green! You seriously think I would even consider drinking something poured at your command?" Robin laughs in amazement. "I mean, isn't that how we met?" Her white teeth flash in grin.

Then the Ranger's green eyes drift away across the chamber in thought. "Hmmmmm. You know, I... don't seem to be in a diplomatic mood, so I'll just cut to the chase."

She looks back to Vianis. "I'm not answering your questions. I don't care if Avis lives or dies. My demon buddies over the city are playing nice for right now -- get 'em pissed and it'll get real toasty out there. And if I don't get my things back, I'll bring your city, your people and your island down around your ears. Honestly, I don't care whether you hand my things back to me. Or I search for them through the rubble of what was once Mothersport. You see, Chancellor, I am not the honorable warrior-type."

"Aaannnnd..." Robin holds up a finger, "if you think that offing me will make things better?" That smile gets absolutely malicious, "Really, for the sake of your world, reconsider it."

"I wouldn't dream of casually killing you. It would take six months just to finish the preparatory ceremonies."

Robin purses her lips and nods thoughtfully.

"But yes, practicalities. I am glad you aren't, as you put it, 'the honorable warrior-type', like my grandchild or the stripling next to you. I can negotiate with practical women."

M'Corli stiffens a bit, but it is hard to deny that he looks very young.

Siege says "We don't even know that that's Avis!"

Those green eyes roll but the Ranger decides not to say anything.

Vianis shrugs and removes the hood from the woman. She seems alert and angry and stares at the spear for a moment before blinking and looking around the room. Vianis touches her lips and you get the impression that something happened.

"So, let us negotiate. You may be able to damage us, but I don't think you can do so unscathed. And you allies might not be so keen to murder the many innocent people who live in this town. Especially if it cost them some of their demons.

"I could give this to you, but you must give me something of value in return. I shall take Siege and Avis, and you shall have the card. Your demons shall go to the Lady's main encampment and drop rocks on their defenses in exchange for my ships that you have burned."

A chuckle shakes Robin's frame. "Oh, good. You can change thermals in the face of a cliff. You had me worried there for a moment, Chancellor." She grins.

"Yeah, my current allies might be a bit shy on the genocide angle," the girl shrugs. "What can I say? I was in a hurry. Next ones won't be so weak.

"As far as my possessions, you will return what you have stolen to me. The loss of your fleet you can write off as the regrettable consequence of trying to bottle a hurricane. Siege's position is not open to negotiation. And Avis? I wouldn't push me on that. I kinda like your grandson. Soooo" that cute button-nose wrinkles.

"Last time, Chancellor. You lost when you put me in that hole. I'm willing to be reasonable. But I'm not negotiating here." Robin smiles politely.

The Ranger uses her eye-rolling and her eyes-wandering-around-the-room time to take a very thorough stock of the place she is in. Specifically she is looking for the witch-queen (s) she is pretty sure is lurking within eye-sight. Eye holes in the walls, roof or floor? Possibly. Lurking in a dark corner or invisible? Ears and nose may tell what eyes do not.

No dark corner or obvious eyeholes.

There is something odd about how the smoke curls around the candle on the table that makes you think something isn't right over there. on the other hand, it's a pretty smoky candle. M'corli has that faraway look J'rim gets when he's talking to his dragon. Surprisingly, so does Siege.

Shortly after Monarth's flight, a woman, surrounded by a nimbus of light, rises like a rocket from the harbor. She focuses on Monarth and a spray of purple-green lightning erupts from her fingers and hits the pair as they fly away from the city.

Jovian picks his spot carefully, willing Canareth to appear from between in the witch-queen's blind spot, his crop full of phosphine gas ready to explode.....

And she burns away like paper. gone in a flash. Or else she went between.

//We did not hit her.//

//Aw, Carruth's left gonad.... How badly was Maranth hit?// Jovian peers into the dimness after the retreating bronze, not expecting to actually see a great deal.

//They will be back//

There is a bright flash of white light and you are momentarily blinded. You feel the same from Canareth and hear the roar of the dragons as they all react to the assault.

In the few moments while you are recovering your vision, you hear several thunks and a few more roars.

//Finath's rider has been wounded. Maranth was not blinded and is attacking the bowmen.//

//Yes, we obey. // Canareth beats his wings powerfully upwards. //Hoshith has ordered the wings to fly up to get above the clouds.//

...

//Hoshith reports that everyone can see again and that Finath's rider was shot, but not badly. Maranth says they scattered the archers, but they have places to hide. His rider wants to know how strongly we should attack.//

//I want a picture of where those archers are - on the ships or dockside?// As he asks this, Jovian is already computing the effective range of average longbows vs. the distance across the harbor and what ships are beyond the bowmen's cover if the archers are on land.

//Maranth says they are in the city walls and wants to know if he should fetch another tree.//

Some ships may be out of range, especially in the rain, but for the most part the harbor is covered by the walls pretty well.

//Negative on the tree. Hang back. I want a couple fast, agile flyers to recon the inner side of that wall. Kalinth and Hoth,// Jovian adds, naming the two fastest blues. //Tell them to keep as high up as they can, but go in with a full crop - if the archers' positions are open behind the wall, they should take targets of opportunity.//

Kalinth and Hoth turn their heads in unison and receive firestone from their riders. A moment later they disappear on coordinates from Maranth, who reappears shortly.

//They are under cover. Wooden Cover. Hoth has lit it on fire. Kalinth's rider says they are like ants.//

The cloud below you begins to get brighter, as if lit from below.

//J'rim. This wind is not natural.//

You feel that he is right. Over the center of the town the wind is beginning to swirl, as if something were draining into the tower. The dragons have difficulty maintaining station.

//Right. So let's use it.//

Jovian orders present-time coordinates for the area where they collected rocks and practiced for the initial attack run, and on his mark, the wings - all of them, Kalinth and Hoth included - go between.

[Black, blacker, blackest...yes, Jovian does make a habit of checking the time it takes to go between hither and yon. If there's significant variation from the eight-second benchmark, he wants to know it.]

Once there, the order is passed for the dragons to gather the biggest rocks (or trees, if any really prefer) they can conveniently carry in flight.

When all have grasped their payload of choice, it's back aloft and between, back above the clouds over the city - but centered over the tower. And bombs away, through the clouds, into the heart of the winds' vortex.

You return and the vortex is more definitely formed. You are high above it. You order the wings to attack in waves.

Your wing drops their burdens as L'tarn's lines up for their run. You sense something is wrong and then Black, blacker, blackest... and you are back.

//No one was hit// Canareth says //but Hoshith and Maranth say that the storm threw the rocks back at us.//

//We need a better view of what's going on at that tower,// Jovian fumes mentally. //Tell Maranth to lead his wing in another run against the ships, and make sure someone gets a good look at that tower. Strike like lightning, then get back up here - they're not to give the archers time to draw.//

Meta: the battle continues, neither side gaining much advantage nor taking significant damage. The storm, like a miniature directed tornado, effectively prevents the dragons from approaching too closely to the harbor or the tower, but does little actual damage. L'tarn's suggestions turn out not to be helpful.

Jovian gives some serious thought to redirecting the attack, considering whether there are any tempting targets on land with a safe approach vector. But, as there probably aren't....

//Antrith reports that they are inside with their enemies. M'corli wishes to know if your sister could really destroy this place.//

//She's got the ability to force her will on reality shared by my father and me, and she's a borderline sociopath. It's possible.//

Jovian becomes a lot more interested in finding exposed targets, on land if necessary, the priority of distracting the witch-queens just having gotten a boost.

You can (and do) ratchet up the fighting. Perhaps one of these witch-queens is the center of the funnel cloud. It certainly acts as least as intelligent as a Lord Holder...

You do realize how little that's saying, don't you...?

[As a matter of fact, I was being very precise in a language we both know.]

Vianis holds the card near the lamp on her table and looks closely at it.

"If I thought you could get through the wall, I'd've already placed this card in the flame. You would have made a great priestess, you know. Even I can detect the magical potential that you have inherited. A pity it was your uncle who returned, not your father. He clearly inherited the better part of Rilga's divine nature."

The mention of the card burning sends a flare of anger driven by fear through the girl. And a snarl twists Robin's lips.

"Wall?" Robin cocks her head and stares off into a corner thoughtfully. Her own eyes unfocus for a moment and the Ranger stands perfectly still. With a hunter's ears, she listens - for Avis' breath, for the crackle of the candle flame, for the echo of Vianis' movements off the stone walls. With a forest creature's senses, she reaches for the heat of how many humans within the room? How many heartbeats, how much air?

Is it a wall?.... Or a window.

It separates you, you don't smell Vianis or Avis and the air moves as if there is a barrier. You look at Avis and notice that her lips are moving slightly and her eyes are very dark and very large and...reflective. In the reflection you see yourself, your two companions, and a white-robed woman behind you, exactly where a woman would have to be standing to make the candle flame move as you recall it moving. Avis blinks and her eyes go back to normal, and she nods, minutely.

And just what is sneaking up on them from behind while Vianis fancy dances in front to hold their attention?

See above. :)

((Knew there had to be one around somewhere. If any of us survive this, we'll have to thank Avis. :) ))

"Hunh?" Robin looks back to Vianis, confusion showing in her emerald eyes. "What in the Green Hells are you talking about?" The Ranger throws up her hands in exasperation.

Not accidentally bringing her captured sword up and forward in a fast violent forward arc that continues back over her shoulder. The blade is released to shoot behind the girl in a lethal line aimed directly at the chest of something that would cause candle smoke to waiver in a certain way.

The throw is clean and strong and unexpected and Robin hears the sounds she'd expect to hear: the sound of metal hitting flesh, the grunt of a woman being hit by a sword, a heavy thump.

Robin feels a rush of air and sees the spear continue it's interrupted course.

At the same time, Robin throws herself forward, arm reaching out. She figures she can't stop the spearlet, but maybe she can slap the butt or something so that it will spin and hit Avis lengthwise instead of pointy bit first.

She reaches, throwing herself full out, heedless of where she'll land, stretching hopelessly for the butt, It is a heroic effort and she manages, against even her expectations, to brush it with her fingertips. As she falls to the ground, she watches it continue on a slightly altered trajectory towards Avis. Robin hears rather than seens the witch-queen and Siege struggling behind her.

She hits the ground, her shoulder absorbing the impact. Her eyes close involuntarily on impact and open a split-second later.

She quickly absorbs the scene.

M'corli has rushed Vianis and is grappling with her.

The table has been knocked aside and the lamp has been knocked over.

Avis has been hit with the spear in her side. Apparently Robin deflected it just enough to keep her from being killed.

From behind her, Robin hears a piercing woman's scream which cuts off abruptly.

Robin rolls to a crouch and springs over the desk to Vianis and M'corli like a stooping hawk. She'll take both down if she needs to, but she intends to bear Vianis to the ground. And introduce the Chancellor's head to the flagstones flooring of the dungeon rather firmly. Not enough to break open, mind you, but with definite authority.

The implications of M'corli's query begin to sink in as Jovian considers the tactical situation. If Robin - who didn't want this mission to become a war - is talking about wiping out the city, things are going badly indeed.

She must be in real trouble down there, to bluff that large - not the spectre of a double dozen unknowns, but a palpable threat. Anger begins to rise in the wingleader. Who the hell does this Vianis think she's toying with? She'd live to taste the fullness of regret - very briefly. And Mothersport needs to learn not to fuck with the Juliani....

Far out over the harbor he guides Canareth, until the funnel of wind stands directly between himself and the city's heart. //Get everyone behind me,// he orders. He barely waits.

His awareness thrusts outward, imposing itself upon the substance of this place. His mind's grip closes on the land- and airscape. When he can feel the currents of shadow acutely, he releases his rising fury to flow, rage and his birthright pouring the weather's natural and Pattern-induced instability into the funnel cloud to overload it and drive it before them - a vector meant to drive the tornado through the city's center.

The storm does not drive so much as disintegrate when hit with Jovian's pattern-based unmaking. Jovian feels as if he has swung a sword through a knight made of cotton candy. Only a tiny thing, barely visible, is left when the cloud dissolves.

Over the noise of the storm, Jovian hears a piercing woman's scream which cuts off abruptly.

The woman, the witch-queen, must have taken the brunt of Julian's attack. The dragons report that she broke apart and fell into the sea and the city.

Jovian can sense that there is still some disturbance where he hit her. And the air is becoming increasingly turbulent.

The wingleader grins savagely, snarling into the wind. Let Vianis ponder that - let her ruminate over the sound of her protector's death-scream while she considers her next move...he already knows his.

//M'hall and V'laren's wings are to hit the ships. Any dragons who dropped their payloads early, make them feel silly for it. L'tarn's group mops up the archers' positions that haven't been routed by Kalinth and Hoth. Our wing, for the tower. Swoop in close and blow fire into the windows, burn it from the inside!//

J'rim takes up firestone from the little-used sack behind him and holds it forward for Canareth.

The mental commands take but an instant, but as dragons move and heads turn back, the strength of the turbulent air increases. It's already nothing to fly near and it keeps increasing every moment. You may not have to do anything to destroy the fleet in harbor, except come back later to inspect the carnage. The waves are starting to crash into the lower part of the castle walls.

And it keeps getting worse. If it keeps this rate up, it will be bone-crushing in minutes.

The only question in J'rim's mind is which of Canareth, Kourin, M'hall, or V'laren will suggest a pull-back if J'rim doesn't.

Vianis throws her hands out and M'corli staggers back, interfering with Robin's leap. Robin and M'corli crash down onto the table. It cannot stand the strain and breaks under the weight of the two fighters immediately. The good news is the spilled, burning lamp-oil is no longer spreading across the table. It doesn't do enough damage to hurt Robin noticeably, and M'corli is busy screaming and holding his hands over his eyes.

Robin hears a cry of rage as Siege throws the short sword as if it were a spear. It goes over her head and through Vianis, hitting the back wall in the darkness.

Robin smells fire more than she sees it.

And Vianis is either invisible to her senses, or gone.

"Dung!" Robin rolls over to M'corli. "Hang on, dragonrider. Antirith! Can you hear me?" The Ranger only has an observed understanding of the telepathic connection but she's hoping. C'mon, M'corli. Let me see. Don't grind that stuff in!"

Robin gently but firmly reaches for M'corli's hands.

Robin receives no response from the dragon. M'corli is in pain, and screaming.

"Siege! How's Avis?" She commands as an aside.

"Alive" says an unfamiliar alto voice.

"Hit her arm." says Siege.

A snort of graveyard humor bursts forth from Robin. "Right. Her arm."

The room is suddenly lit with a wan blue glow coming from Avis's palm. She comes over and touches it to M'corli's forehead and he stops screaming.

"I disconnected him from the pain. I can't keep that going."

Siege says "I have some water."

"Toss it here." The Ranger holds out her hand in Seige's direction, while still concentrating on getting M'corli to lower his hands. She fully expects the erstwhile commander of the Brotherhood of the Stag to be able to land a canteen therein without her help.

((OOC - BTW, did Robin happen to notice where the card, her lifeline to sanity, was when her eyes opened after her initial fall? And where it might have gotten to now? :) ))

[It was on the table next to the oil lamp when the lamp got knocked over. It was on the table with the burning oil spreading towards it when you attempted to leap over the table. If your luck and your sense of spacial relations are good, you landed on it, then rolled off.]

Avis looks pale, as if she is spending resources that she doesn't have to spare.

"Thank you, Lady." Robin's murmur to Avis is sincerely grateful for all of its quietness. "I'll be as quick as I can. In the meantime, you wouldn't happen to be able to find a certain playing card amidst the wreckage I just vacated, would you?"

"Siege" she says. Robin thinks she may be near limits.

"I have it." says the familiar masculine voice.

Robin's plan with the injured dragonrider is to, firstly, get his hands away from his eyes and do a quick inspection of the damage.

If nothing's too badly popped or punctured, she'll take a quick hit off of Seige's canteen, swish it around in her mouth - using saliva to get the salinity and temperature up - and then carefully lay her mouth over one of M'corli's eyes. Using all her expertise in rough field medicine - and with a whistle player's tongue and breath control, Robin will rinse/gently suck the oil and debris out and hydrate the greenrider's injury/burns. Repeat with the other eye as necessary.

[[Medical types on the list -- please let me know if I'm full of caca about this theory. :) ]]

[[Well, the water isn't going to be sterile, but the human mouth is a cesspool. Given good medical or magical treatment soon, this is probably not the worst choice, but since he's magically sedated, you might choose to go with the canteen water straight. in either case, it doesn't matter now, so we'll assume you do one or the other.]]

If things are badly popped, punctured or toasted, Robin will use a nerve pinch to put the dragonrider mercifully out. And bind his wounds quickly in the cleanest cloth around - most probably the ex-priestess' robes.

J'rim peers through the leaden, lashing darkness, looking for the edges of the storm, and finds himself unable to quite find them. //Shit and crackdust...that worked too well. Belay those orders, Canareth. Break off the attack - and tell Antrith it's time for the ground team to get the hell out, by the roof if they can manage.//

//Antrith says M'corli has been attacked, but that they are with him. She is doing quite well, for a green. I do not think that he can relay a message now. She says that he is asleep.// He pauses. //It is confusing,// he clarifies.

Sleeping, and Antrith hasn't manged to awaken him? Encorcelled, likely as not. Bad, very bad. And Robin's outsized seagulls wouldn't go out in this for anything....

//Someone's got to guide Antrith traveling between if M'corli can't,// Jovian insists. //Tell Hoshith one of the queens has to stay with her - and try to make enough noise that Siege and Robin get the point. Everyone else, we're going to the mustering point with now for a time- tick. No one goes to the caves and NO ONE times it alone! We are not returning to linear time without Antrith.//

In very short order the wings are in formation behind Canareth, awaiting his coordinates.

Jovian composes his mind for the jump between to the area that has yielded its rocks for the cause, awaiting Kourin's word on who's staying behind for the ground team before giving the order.

//Maranth, Tanith, and Antrith are staying. // Antrith is from one of Tanith's clutches, of course. //Hoshith will take L'tarn's wing between.// And the dragons switch rapidly behind Canareth.

Suddenly, Antrith breaks from the group and heads down towards the temple at high speed.

//Maranth says she is going to dig M'corli out. He is trying to protect her and Tanith wants to know if we should stop her or help her?//

Jovian curses in a unique blend of Thari and Calusan. //Help her. Follow. Guide her in from the side, they'll be expecting us on the roof. If there are windows in the first floor, that's where to hit. And our wing hangs back for defensive cover when the witches come out to complain.//

Robin shoots quick glances, when she can spare them, toward the splintered door and the spot where the grate was in the other tower.

Nothing in the doorway. You can see the black roilingness is still in the stairwell.

"Up!" says M'corli. "Antrith says we have to come out so she can take us away from the hurricane." He sounds, if it is possible, worse than Avis.

"Dung!" Robin mutters under her breath as she quickly ties off the bandages over M'Corli's eyes.

Quickly she scoops the dragonrider into a one-armed carry. "Okay, Lady. I've got him. You can release him now."

M'corli cries out, but quickly stifles it. He's in a great deal of pain.

The ranger waits for a second to control any convulsions or other disturbances from the green rider. And checks to make sure that Seige has charge of the failing Avis. Then she heads for the splintered door rapidly, scooping her sword out of the erstwhile priestess on the way.

Along the way, she lets her rage ignite the blue fire of the Pattern along her nerves - a freak wind, caused by new opening to the sewers and the strange waterflows therein, caused by the rain. Blowing upward and outward. Through the tunnels, and - hopefully - sweeping the stairwell clear of its odd atmosphere.

It doesn't seem to affect the atmosphere in the stairwell. Something is not right with the stuff of shadows, but Robin can't tell what immediately.

As the Ranger approaches the steps, she eyes the black smoke with deep suspicion. After all, the last time she charged into weird black smoke... well, she's still not sure she came out of it.

Nevertheless, after checking in with Siege and Avis, the Ranger takes a deep breath and plunges up the stairwell at full speed, carrying the injured M'corli with her.

The foursome climbs the stairs in the roiling smoke, two by two. It stings eyes and throats and everyone emerges into the temple gasping and coughing. Seige and Robin look for trouble but none springs immediately to the fore.

Inside, the place is made of three long rows of arched stone. There are mosaic-like windows of heavy leaded glass throughout the building; the ones on the right gleam a hellish blue from the constant lattice of lighting across the upper sky and Robin can hear a pounding rain on the roof, windows and doors. Very heavy, perhaps moreso than Robin expected, based on her efforts earlier this evening, err "now but before." (there really isn't a good way to express time travelling tenses, is there? Plupresent conditional?)

A breeze wafts through the building, causing the candles to flicker. Their light is pure; they must have been made of the best beeswax. Some of the candles are burnt almost completely down, but others are tall, and can only have been lit very recently. Not all of them are the same size, and there is no indication of how long they might burn.

On the dais, at almost the far end of the building, there is a large stone block that might once have been carefully placed, but now is cast aside and broken. Beneath it there is a stairway, leading down. The candles nearest the stairway are also flickering.

Robin gasps as though she's been gut-punched, and her grip tightens on the unfortunate M'corli convulsively. The girl's face sheets white in the flickering candle-light. Her green eyes are wide and staring, the whites showing around the edges like a startling falcon.

"Uhh..." a quick flick of her tongue and a swallow against the hoarseness. "Is this your guys' Temple?" Her voice is not steady, not steady at all.

"No." says Siege.

"They changed it." says Avis.

They sound very unhappy, not unlike rain-soaked gulls.

Avis walks up to Robin and holds out a card.

"Thank you." The girl murmurs, somewhat shamefacedly. Robin glances at the card quickly, hoping that if Vianis was stupid enough to bait the trap with the real Avis, she was doubly stupid enough to add the real Trump as well.

Cold and hard, the way some describe your father--those who are not allowed inside his armored protection, those who do not know him. You feel the whisper-touch of contact and unless you tear your eyes away right now, you'll be in contact with him in another breath....

Green eyes close as tears leak from under blonde lashes. Robin wants her father, so very much, it's as though her heart were clutching and cramping. But she won't call to him. From this place, that Vianis has set up as a trap for the men of her line.

Though she knows her father is more than a match for any shadow spider, still - stubborn pride etches its way across a face filled with longing - she won't call him to the trap. She won't.

M'corli moans in pain. The windows on one side light up in crazy red patterns, as if the sky were on fire.

"Okay." The Ranger gets her shakiness under control with a quick head shake. "We've got to get the three of you out of here." She turns briskly toward the doors she knows are at her back, sweeping M'corli up into her arms. Long strides carry her to whatever hell awaits her three companions outside. So different from the hell that awaits herself below.

"Listen, Siege. See if you can get the guys to give you and Avis a lift back to Methrin, okay? And... Lady?" Green eyes turn toward the Commander. "There's a certain green-eyed cave goblin of Siege's acquaintance who really needs to get his butt out of your world as quickly as he can. I... I'd take it as a personal favor if you could see to that." The flat line of Robin's lips indicate just how much she enjoys handing out debts like that, but also how important it is to her that Jovian leave this place.

"I am your servant." She says. You suspect that that is a stock 'priestess-addressing-a-goddess' statement.

The building begins shaking and red flashes cross the sky.

"Fine, good. Stay a living servant then." Robin answers shortly, delivering a mighty kick to the door, hoping it will get them outside as opposed to bringing the lintel down on them all.

There are windows, but they are behind the flying buttresses. And they seem small. Antrith starts digging at the ground, but now seems intent on ripping apart the buttresses.

From the chancellery, a bolt of strange lightning strikes out at Antrith. Her mental cry of agony is felt by all the dragons.

Maranth puts a stop to it with a flaming pass over the tower, and returns to cover Antrith, who has returned to her desperate scrabbling.

//Help her, I said! Get one of the browns pushing at that buttress with her! And have our wing set up for another flaming pass at that tower, just to be sure.//

The wing sets up and executes a flaming pass, the GM fails to resist a very bad joke, and the dragons get the idea that they're supposed to dig into the temple. You think it will take them a few moments to open the place without bringing it down.

Not bringing it down is good. Taking too many moments is bad.

//Have Antrith warn M'corli to get away from the wall. A section of roof may come down when they break through.//

Jovian continues directing his wing to circle against additional threats, not nervous - never nervous - but very sharply alert.

The door kicks open with a satisfying crack and swings outward only to be slammed against the outer wall by the rising gale outside. Robin doesn't recall summoning this kind of weather, but maybe it's a ripple effect from the on-again/off-again storm-making.

You blink at the lashing rain that is coming in and are about to act when the wall at the end of the temple collapses, burying the altar under a hail of massive stone blocks. Over the rain you hear the triumphal bugle of a dragon.