Tooth and Claw, Part 2
"Let's not take any risks just yet," you say, still watching the distant figures as they ride toward you. "But let's not try to throw them off our trail completely either. We'll string them along, until we can lure them close to the hidden elf village. Maybe we can get some extra help in dealing with them."
Verika hesitates for just a moment, and you can see the conflicted emotions in her face. It's a chance to see her precious adopted home again. And yet... she also knows that the elves believe her to have turned against them. From a certain perspective, it could even be said that she has betrayed the mercy that they showed her, when they nursed a child soldier of their ancient enemy back to health.
Just like so many others would have expected a drow to do.
Even if that's not how Verika herself sees her decision to join you, it's clear that a part of her is dreading this reunion. But she also sees the bigger picture. She knows what would give the best chance of keeping Juri safe. "That's a good plan for dealing with the assassins," she says, swallowing. "Just... how are we going to deal with the elves, once they have us?"
"Trust me," you say. "I'm sure we can reach common ground with them. They'll understand why you did what you did, eventually."
What ensues is a rugged contest of endurance and planning. You lead your pursuers in a careful chase, neither pulling too far ahead, nor allowing them to completely catch up. Your rests become briefer yet more staggered, and you take to flying much of the way, while Verika and Juri alternate which horse they ride. All in the name of squeezing out every last mile you can travel, without running your mounts ragged.
It's Verika's unmatched ranger skills that prove to be truly invaluable, her sense for exactly which paths to take, exactly how far to push things, exactly how much effort she can safely coax out of the horses before the cost outweighs the gain. The heroine takes complete command of your course... and try though they might, your pursuers are completely unable to close the gap. Verika maintains masterful control over the chase, holding the enemy in the palm of her hand, day after day after day.
She does allow them some hope as you start to approach elven territory, making it feel flawlessly natural as they start to slowly catch up. As though you were finally tiring, unable to maintain the pace. They take the bait, tracking you with increased aggression, pushing their mounts to the limit as they see a chance to achieve their murderous goal. Soon Verika has to cut loose your second horse, knowing that the final sprint is near.
By midday, the assassins are close enough that you can hear the hoof-beats as they gallop thunderously down the path. Verika and Juri are also moving at a full gallop now, the trees whipping past on either side as they weave their way along the winding trail. You follow overhead, soaring above the chase, periodically rebounding from tree to tree as you keep close watch on the fleeing pair. You're also searching the forest ahead, alert for the signs that will allow you to pull off this gambit.
Then your inhuman senses detect something. "Verika!" you call out. The drow glances up, and you give her a quick jerk of the head. She returns the nod, taking your meaning. Then, with an acrobatic twist, she flips off the horse, landing in a low run as she darts off to the side and out of sight.
At the same time, you swoop down to land on the horse from the air, grabbing hold of Juri. The horse starts to slow—you aren't a rider on the same level Verika is—and from behind, you can see over a score of deadly killers starting to catch up, coming just into view through the trees. Several of them raise their throwing knives...
...only for a savage flurry of arrows to fly in from the side, piercing through throat after throat after throat. The dying assassins tumble from their horses, fallling beneath the tightly-packed, pounding hooves of their fellows.
You hear cursing, but the killers react with impressive coordination and icy discipline. Half of the remainder peel off to pressure Verika, led by one of the Melcan priests. The other half continue to chase after you without the slightest pause. Two more priests accompany that group, as their fellows fight to buy them time. You grimace. These adversaries are skilled indeed.
Then you duck forward, pulling Juri close as several of their throwing blades rip through the air above you. One lodges into your upper wing, and you clench your teeth in pain. But you can already feel your regeneration closing the wound and negating the poison.
Unfortunately, that's not the only trick they have. You hear the priests behind you chanting an incantation from some malevolent Melcan scripture. Then the earth bucks violently beneath you, hurling you from the horse as the world spins in circles. Clutching Juri even tighter, you give a mighty flap of your wings, trying to gain some measure of control over your aerial trajectory. You manage to thread between two trees, slowing your fall and twisting to absorb the impact on your shoulder.
The result is a bruising, end-over-end tumble, but you manage to shield the young orc maid in your arms from it. You roll back up to one knee, one hand outstretched toward your attackers. Ready to call on your own power if necessary, as they bear down on the two of you.
But then more arrows rain down from the surrounding trees, striking at the assassins from every direction. The timing, admittedly, ended up a bit closer than you intended... but your trap worked. The elves are here. And despite any misgivings they might have about Verika, they're still taking the side of their old comrade over the side of the orcs casting fell magic at a child.
Fortunately for such appearances, you didn't end up needing to use your summoning until after the elves committed themselves to the fight.
Now the battle truly devolves into chaos, with deadly projectiles flying every which way until the air is thick with them. The assassins dive from their horses, rolling behind trees for cover and returning fire with more hurled blades. The priests leap from their horses as well, but they simply stand there in the open, dark power gathering in their palms as they continue to chant. The elves try to stop them with a focused volley... but every arrow targeted at them is knocked off-course by an invisible force.
Which allows the priests the chance to strike again. They punctuate their chant with a throaty cry, and once again the ground erupts. This time it's even more devastating, with more time to channel their power. The earth explodes upward, sending rock and soil flying everywhere in a rain of deadly shrapnel aimed to catch both you and as many of the hidden elves as they can.
But you're already in the air again, wings flapping for all you're worth, Juri's small body clutched protectively to your chest. Just behind you, the surge of divine power uproots entire trees with the force of its upheval, and you can see glimpses of elves flung about like rag dolls as they try to leap out of the way without the benefit of flight. Several don't quite make it, sent sprawling as they're slammed by jagged rocks. The assassins immediately move to take advantage, targeting the injured rangers.
But you don't let them.
Before they can follow up on the attack, a tear opens in the fabric of reality, right in the assassins' midst. It disgorges a huge, shambling mass of tentacles, one that immediately lashes out to grab the nearest mortals. Most of the assassins leap out of its way, twisting between the writhing appendages... but two of them are caught by surprise and ensnared outright. The mindless monster starts to anally violate them, and within moments its aphrodisiac starts to take hold.
Even the orcs who do escape your summon fare little better. The distraction of avoiding the unexpected tentacle monster just leaves them easy prey for the remaining elves, who continue to fire arrows from behind the trees with deadly precision. The ones that survive are forced to take shelter behind the priests and their invisible barrier.
You alight on a nearby branch, your eyes narrowing as you study their supernatural defense. In their haste, one of the backpedaling assassins actually flees straight through the area that deflected the arrows, allowing to study the effect more closely. The orc's hair and clothes are whipped about, in a way that indicates magically controlled wind swirling around the priests at high velocity, creating protective shells. A divine blessing, doubtless prepared with Verika specifically in mind.
The orcish assassins succeed in putting those wind hemispheres between them and the still-standing elves. But even that gives them no respite, as they're ruthlessly cut down by another hail of arrows from behind. The efforts of this squad of rangers and your surprise summon have managed to protect Juri for crucial seconds.
And those crucial seconds were all Verika needed to absolutely annihilate her half of the attack force, all by herself.
She strides forward toward the attempted child-killers with wrath blazing in her eyes, the arrow-filled bodies of over a dozen orcish assassins littering the ground behind her. In the blink of an eye, the only ones left are the two priests, protected behind their shells of wind. Verika fires one shot, only for it to be deflected. Then a second, and then a third, each one targeting a different point on the shield. Snarling, the priests raise their hands, ready to invoke the might of their goddess on the heroine.
Verika draws her bow a fourth time, pulling it to its very limit. Then she fires a shot of devastating power. Not aiming anywhere near the priests themselves... but instead at the lower left edge of their invisible swirling defense. The course of this arrow is deflected too... but the shot is powerful enough to pierce the shell of wind itself. And Verika uses the change in trajectory that she calculated with the previous arrows to bend this arrow's course, curving it up under one of the priests' jaws and into his brain, toppling him like a puppet with its strings cut.
Even you can't help but boggle a little at such a ludicrous shot. The last remaining priest lets out a howl of rage... but the distraction of Verika's attack has, in turn, allowed your summon to get too close. Its meaty tentacles tear easily through the shell of wind, wrapping around the priest's waist from behind and hoisting him flailing into the air.
You let out a small exhale of relief. Juri is unhurt, and you've managed to utterly defeat the enemy force, with an overwhelming decisiveness that ensured none escaped to trouble you in the future. You even managed to obtain three prisoners.
But before you can even begin to work out the mechanics of how to extricate them from the tentacle demon without risking a last-ditch desperation attack from them, you hear them all scream in unison. Their bodies suddenly contort, wracked by a pain that even burns through the bliss of the aphrodisiac that they're experiencing. Before your eyes, their bodies start to bloat and melt as they thrash back and forth.
You cover Juri's eyes, as you see for yourself the brutal failsafe that Khaytala encountered on the assassin that she tried to take prisoner. Verika flinches, then raises her bow again, firing two more quick shots that put the assassins out of their misery. The priest she has to do by hand, "protected" as he is by his spell, but she darts in between the tentacles and kills him with a single quick slash of her knife.
And with that, it truly is over.
You quickly dismiss your tentacle demon, sending the mindless creature back to the Second Circle before it has a chance to move on to other—more elven—prey. Then, hopping off your high-up branch, you soar down to the ground with Juri cradled in your arms.
Now that the immediate threat is past, the elves regard you with uncertainty, not knowing what to make of the situation that they have stumbled into. Their eyes shift from Verika to you to Juri and back to Verika again, trying to make sense of it all. They know what they've been told about the threat you pose. They know what they just saw you summon.
But the orcs trying to kill you? The child that you're protecting? They have no idea how all of it fits together. Much less how they should respond. At this point, they're probably not even sure how much they ought to reveal about what Lady Alicia told them about you.
You, in turn, need to decide how you're going to approach them. In broad strokes, of course, you'll need to make the case that you're not their enemy. But what sort of posture will you adopt while doing so?
Glancing to your left, you see a perfect chance to make an impression—one way or another—as they're making up their minds. A good first opportunity to employ out whichever general approach you wish to follow. The fallen elves, injured by the priests' invocations.
In particular, you notice that one of the wounded rangers is even younger than Relis, probably just a cadet. She's clutching at her stomach, where blood is seeping between her fingers from a gash made by stone shrapnel. She's close to hyperventilating, and you'd bet quite a bit that this is the first true action she's ever seen.
Fortunately, you're pretty sure that her wound isn't nearly as bad as it looks, your superb eyesight telling you that the cut is actually fairly shallow. Your timely intervention with your tentacle monster prevented any serious harm to the elves. Which, in turn, allows you a choice in how to respond.
You could calm and reassure her. Let her know that she'll be fine, that she'll make it back to the village for their own cleric to treat. You could even offer to cure her right now with your Corruptive Boon, but make the full effects clear and present it without any pressure. It wouldn't do much for spreading outright corruption in the village, but the display of honesty could put the elves a bit more at ease overall.
On the other hand, in the state she's in, it would be trivial to convince her to accept your Corruptive Boon if you actually tried to persuade her. Especially if you didn't dispel her fears about how serious her wound really is. The elves could hardly complain about you "saving" one of their own. And your healing would erase any evidence to the contrary, while also infusing her with delightful temptations. You could even include a suitably lighthearted condition as "payment".
A reassuring posture would probably leave the most favorable impression on the village overall. It still probably wouldn't win many of them over to Kovora's side outright... but it might be enough to re-open the door for sending your agents to follow up with a more diplomatic seduction mission.
On the other hand, taking the more seductive approach could give you even more corrupted agents in the elven village. Such agents on the inside could allow a more... forceful... claiming of the village to proceed with far more trivial ease. An utter defeat, but one that would be exquisitely enjoyable for all.
Either way, whichever approach you choose, it's time to start making some moves. Which strategy do you adopt toward the elves?
