Battle
Several minutes passed and the dragons didn't show up. The hitherto constant buzzing of insects and croaking of frogs had all but fallen into dead silence.
Neither woman had to say it. Something was coming. They stood back to back and scanned the surrounding bushes, watching, waiting and listening.
Suddenly, a head appeared above the bushes to the north. It was large, brutish and green. Two pointed fangs - more like tusks - jutted up from its lower lip. Small yellow eyes watched the humans with dull interest, and two more heads appeared beside the first.
Sniffing, one of the creatures pushed through the bushes and into the swampy clearing. It had a very man-like body, if one ignored the green colour, thick-looking skin, long limbs (like an ape, Rynn thought) and bulging muscles. Staring at the humans, it sniffed again. Then it started to drool.
"Watch it," Ebontyne said, turning to fully face the monster. "They look like some breed of troll."
It attacked. Jumping forward rather clumsily, it threw a punch at Ebontyne's face. Ebontyne merely leaned back and hacked at the arm with her shadowy sword, severing it just below the elbow. Bellowing in pain, it stumbled back with its arm leaking a blackish-green ichor. The other two monsters garbled angrily and smashed through the bushes into the clearing. One shambled towards Ebontyne and the other to Rynn.
Rynn circled left a little, quickly realising that she'd have to get in close to make a killing stroke. The monster had too much reach on her, even though she had Runeblade. But the monster was evidently unconcerned about its advantage. It charged right at her, both arms clawing out as if to grab her into a crushing embrace. She ducked under them, using her lesser height instead, and darted to one side. Runeblade lashed out to cut its side then bite into a thigh before she leaped back out of reach. It howled and swung a hand over her head, almost spinning itself around. Darting in, Rynn thrust Runeblade into its side and up into its chest.
Two powerful hands suddenly grabbed her around the throat from behind and lifted her up, choking and weaponless. As suddenly as the strangulation had begun, it ended. Ebontyne's sword cut through both wrists in one stroke and Rynn dropped to the mud, tearing the dead fingers from her neck.
"What's going on?" Ebontyne shouted hoarsely.
"What?" Rynn coughed. "What d'you..?" She stopped and looked around. The closest troll was stumbling away in pain with two stumps in place of its hands. Another troll, fully capable, was standing on the edge of the swamp and snarling brainlessly. The third had just thrown Rynn's sword into the mud. The bleeding wound in its side was regenerating by itself.
Ebontyne singled out the handless monster and pointed at it with her sword. She said something, and a burst of searing red flames leaped from the point and engulfed it in a roaring cloud.
"Maybe decapitation will work," Rynn said, eyeing her own recovering monster.
"It doesn't." Ebontyne pointed at the monster watching them, then at a head half-buried in the mud. "I already tried." More fire blasted from her sword and took down the troll. "Looks like they're flammable. Toast yours, Rynn."
"I... don't know how!" Rynn ducked as her creature attacked her again then threw herself at Runeblade. Her hands wrapped around the hilt and she rolled over in the mud. Ebontyne was now fighting the last monster, but was being forced back. She was perspiring heavily and didn't look too steady on her feet. At the last, Ebontyne ducked and thrust her sword up into the monster's stomach. She jumped away just as the weapon burst into flames, and its victim with it.
Gasping for breath, the War Mage glanced at Rynn. "Little help?" she said with heavy sarcasm.
Rynn got up, feeling useless. "I'm sorry. I just..." she wiped mud from her armour. "I don't know any magic."
Ebontyne scoffed. "You serious?"
"Before I was living off magic crystals and potions."
"Hm, perhaps I should teach you something then." Rubbing at her sweaty brow, she said, "Fire is usually easiest - it's fuelled by strong emotions, like anger and hate. Usually you channel these emotions to form words, or curses." She smiled a little, grimly. "Instead of doing that, or keeping it bottled inside you, try and force it through your hands."
Rynn raised a brow. "My hands? I'll... keep that in mind." She fished Ebontyne's sword out of the grimy ashes. Handing it over, she asked, "Are you all right?"
"Yeah, I'll live." It was a bit hard to tell if she was happy about that or not.
A little later the two dragons appeared. Ebontyne sent up a signal above the mists to show where they were, and Arokh and Morghus landed in the swamp.
"It's about time you showed up," Rynn said, mounting. "What kept you?"
"We were being attacked. They looked like harpies," Morghus said, "only significantly harder to kill. We didn't find anything useful, by the way."
"We did," Ebontyne told him. "Remember Vakailan? He told us where to find the fallen angel. That's where we're going now."