The morning after Lauryn's nightmare, no one speaks to her of what happened. At breakfast, she can sense a tension in the air between Skotonys and his sister and brother-in-law, and their attitude towards her is even colder and more reserved than before. But no one suggests that she or Skotonys should leave. Skotonys does not go out that day as he usually has been. Instead, he spends the day with Lauryn and his father. In his queer Laosian fashion, he is as friendly as ever. They don't see the kits at all, however.
Two tense days pass like this, and then the same party that Skotonys brought her to town with reassembles. They don't go back to the fort. Rather, Skotonys announces that they are going on a brief excursion into the wilderness west of town for 'practice'. No one at the Kyrios' house asks what sort of practice.
It turns out to be practice for Lauryn with her 'sword without a sheathe'. They spend two days at a kind of traveller's shelter in a forest. Laos Enosi is full of these shelters there's one every quarter-mile or so along the roads, it seems. They're simple structures, usually open-sided roofed pavilions. Even when enclosed, they're never more than one room, although the single room might be a dozen yards across. The floors are usually tiles or clay bricks, and the shelters never have furnishings, nor is there anyone around to charge for staying at one. Or maintain them, for that matter, making their state of reasonably good repair another curiosity. They're probably more comfortable than sleeping on the ground would be.
Practice goes ... no worse than she'd expect. By the second day, Lauryn is feeling slightly better about her ability to control her nightmares. Not so much that she can control them, as that she thinks there's a chance that she might someday learn how to if she works hard enough at it.
On the morning of the third day, they pack to return to town. As they're setting out, a single human gallops towards them on an exhausted drokar. 'Ware! he shouts to them as he charges past. Neyemen raiders at Osaon! Beware!
He says nothing more, and doesn't slow to answer any questions they might have. The group's drokars shift uneasily as they pick up the scent of fear and unhappiness from the runner. Skotonys reins his in and looks down the road the messenger had come.
The last few days have numbered several firsts for Lauryn, all of which were of various forms of tense and uncomfortable. For one, where Lauryn comes from, sleeping in a room full of men as a lone woman would ahve been considered beyond the bounds of decency. She may be a mutt, but she lived with Gallee, and they're keen to impress their ideas of properness on anyone with the slightest tie to them, such as Lauryn. The second was practicing her nightmares, her 'sword without a sheath' -- or as she's also come to know it, her 'hungry sword,' for they never seems satisfied. Half the time it seemed like her nightmares would as soon attack her than her target, which resulted in her attempting to rally against them to various degrees of success. She often thought that, were she a real warrior with a sword of steel if she wouldn't have beheaded herself by now. Still, it's not all bad for all that. Lauryn enjoys the woods, for few are around to look down on her, and Skotonys is alwats a pleasure for her to be aro
Which is why his interest in the local conflict makes Lauryn frown when the rider delivers his dire message. "Raiders?" To Lauryn, raiders are nigh-fictional beings for stories and distant surface caravans to worry about, or at least they were. She leans foward, peering at the Archon. "You are thinking of going to them, Archon Skotonys?"
"The messenger rides for reinforcements from Theolisis," Skotonys says. It's not really an answer.
A Laosian answer, Lauryn thinks. She studies the man for a moment, puzzling him out. It strikes her that these foreigners are more than merely dfficult to comprehend because they are so foreign, but also because they are, by nature, an inscrutible and complex people.
"There are three of us," Rio Imirso says. Which is wrong: there are five of them. Skotony, Kathiko, Imirso, Ython, and Lauryn. Why does he say three?
Kathiko says, softly, "Your count may be off." The fox-soldier is looking down the road westwards, towards Osaon. No one else disputes Imirso's numbers.
Glancing towards the others as the speak, Lauryn comes to a conclusion. "Count me as well," she offers. It seems a simple enough stance to take, as worrisome as 'raiders' sound. She isn't about to remain behind and worry for Archon Skotonys. She owes him too much, and on a more pragmatic level, she knows she will not survive long in Laos without his patronage. There's more too: a fondness. If they regard her as brave, stupid, or completely incomprehensible, she does not know. But even if they deny them, she plans to follow anyway.
No one looks at Lauryn, making her wonder if they heard her, or if they're deliberately ignoring her. Then again, they're not looking at each other when they speak right now, either: they are all looking either down the road the messenger came, or at the cloud of dust rising after him. A long moment passes. Skotonys reins his drokar around. Lauryn is riding behind him, while Ython is riding behind Kathiko. Ython looks nervous, ears and whiskers twitching. Maybe Imirso was counting drokars. "We go to reinforce Osaon," Skotonys commands. He knees his drokar to a canter -- a quick pace, but not the flat-out run that the messenger had spurred his drokar to. Nervous or not, everyone follows Skotonys's lead.
And that includes Lauryn. Lauryn, riding to war -- or at least some form of military engagement. To her, any battle with more than two people feels like a war. She's never been in a war before -- what could it be like? I am sure it is horrendous and will haunt me, like all other aspects of my life, she decides, finding her words stinging her more than she expected. Setting a grim face, she follows along.
They ride for what feels like an age to Lauryn. Their drokar's jostling canter is less comfortable than her normal walking pace, which isn't exactly comfortable itself. Lauryn's head and chin occassionally bump against Skotonys's armored back or shoulder no matter what position she tries. No one speaks as they ride; the thud of drokar feet against dirt road would make conversation difficult even with Skotonys right in front of her.
They take this turn and that as they come to forks and crossroads. Lauryn doesn't know where Osaon is or how far, but apparently Skotonys does. She doesn't even know what it is -- a settlement? A fort?
Already, Lauryn is disliking war. In the stories, it had seemed more glorious. Her brother often spoke of some day becoming a valiant warrior, perhaps a Gallisan campaigner or a member of the Rephidim officer corps. But this, this was never mentioned. Long, painful, bottom-bruising rides full of mostly silence. She decides asking if they're near Osaon or not might be improper, so she just waits -- and wonders.
The first sign she sees of Osaon isn't a good one: a thick column of smoke rising into the sky as they break from the woods and into tended fields. They've travelled -- several miles? at this point. She's not sure how far. It can't really have been forever, the sun's not much higher on the horizon than it was when they set out. The ground rises in a gentle slope before them. Skotonys raises one hand in gesture to the others, and slows his own drokar to a brisk walk. The others follow suit, and the animals are now quiet enough that they'd be able to talk easily. But no one speaks.
At least war is easy to find, Lauryn discovers. She also finds it more quiet than she expected -- aren't warriors supposed to declare oathes of glory and fealty at some point? Clearly and like with so much she has come to see in person, the stories aren't the reality. Again noting the silence, Lauryn can't help but feel this is some important part of war, which she guesses must involve not letting the enemy know they're here. This is a concept she can relate to; she often attempted to hide from her step-mother, who is certainly her enemy in some fashion or another. With little else to do but wait and watch, she looks around for a glimpse of her very first raider.
The group hugs the treeline, advancing sideways up the slope. After a hundred yards or so, Skotonys gestures to Kathiko. The other fox nods and dismounts. He sneaks further up the slope, dropping to a crouch and then crawling the last few yards on his belly. After several tense minutes, he returns. He reports in soft, quick Laosian. "Fields are burning to the west and south of Osaon. Attackers are Yemenos, not Neyemen. The southwest gate is destroyed. Eastern gate stands open but appears intact. Yemenos raiders all over the settlement, but concentrated on the astikan, where our people have withdrawn to make their stand. Yemenos have catapults and two rams. The astikan's ballistae have been destroyed. They're defending with arrows, but the shields over the Yemenos ram appear to be holding against that so far."
Lauryn listens intently, not because she can make sense of most of what the man reports, but because she feels it may come in handy in both the near and distant future. If she's goingt to be embroiled in any of this, this information may be vital, at least the pieces she understands. If she survives, understanding Laosian war may be important -- anything she can do or learn to be useful to these people and, thus, improve her station is invaluable. After listening, she looks to Archon Skotonys, awaiting his response.
Skotonys listens just as carefully, his face more inscrutable than ever -- which is saying something. "Street to street fighting?"
"Light," Kathiko answers. "No Laosian soldiers outside the astikan that I saw."
Lauryn tilts her head, thinking. She isn't sure what a ballistae is and certainly not what an astikan might be, but the general layout if the situation seems clear: the town has withdrawn to some inner structure and is defending with arrows, while a large -- to her mind -- group of these 'Yemenos' fellows are running amuck in and outside the walls. She glances at her party, and frowns all the more. The odds are not good, and with only three of them fighers ... Unless ...
Lauryn frowns even more. She refocuses her attention on the smoke in the distance, and thinks.
Ython whispers, "Why would the Yemenos attack? What about the treaty?" No one answers him.
Skotonys dismounts and starts making marks with the tip of his sword's sheath in the dirt. Kathiko adds marks of his own -- some kind of diagram of the town, Lauryn guesses. "Did the Yemenos have scouts posted?" Skotonys asks.
"None that I saw."
"Then we try stealth. Rio Ython, stay with the drokars. The rest of you, with me." Skotonys sets out across the field. Like Kathiko, he crouches as he moves, putting his head below the level of the tall grain around them. He doesn't fall to his stomach as he nears the rise, however.
Still thinking, Lauryn studies the dirt map with sombre interest. The more she thinks on what to do, what she needs to do, the more she decides her thinking is just a starnge way of avoiding the inevitable. She knows she's neither warrior nor tactician; what she is, is a bringer of isityros -- of demons. The idea she may need to bring her powers to bear on these raiders fills her with anxiety, but also with anticipation. This may be her first real chance to prove she's more than a dangerous burden.
Ython flattens his ears, looking put out that he is left behind while Lauryn goes with the others. Kathiko and Imirso both look at her, but that's the closest they come to questioning Skotonys's command. They follow obediantly, in similar suit. Lauryn finds their crouching progress hard to imitate, and she feels like she's making a terrible racket moving through the grain.
But as they near the settlement, she hears a loud repeating THUD that must be the battering ram against the astikan's doors. There's shouting from within the walls, voices speaking a language she's never heard before, full of harsh complex consonant sounds. It's easier to imagine how the four of them might go unnoticed. The settlement walls are much lower and thinner than those of Theolisis, maybe eight feet tall and made of thick logs, with a kind of small brick tower beside the east gate. The top of the slope is above the level of the city, so she could glimpse the fighting within the walls for a few minutes. As they make their way downslope, the still-intact wall cuts off their view, and hopefully gives them cover. Assuming there really aren't any Yemenos scouts on the walls. She didn't see any.
If there were any, Lauryn rationalizes, the Archon would have spotted them. She certainly isn't going to think she's more keen eyed or aware than he, and she has high opinions of his fighting ability, even if she knows she really isn't fit to judge such things. As she sneaks, she consdiers what she might do to be more useful, but can think of little but keep her head down and consider her magics. Praying might seem likely, but she can't think of any god to pray to -- and if she had a god, her life seems to have proven she definatly doesn't hold any divine favor. "I'd be better off praying to my isityros, at least they listen to me on a rare occasion," she mummbles quietly to herself.
Then it suddenly strikes her. To the nearest Laosian, she asks, "Is there a deity of isityros," in as quiet as she can manage.
At her mumble, Kathiko makes a sharp gesture with a hand before his muzzle -- a Laosian gesture for silence. Skotonys nods to her question, but like Kathiko he motions for silence. They make it to lee of the wall and stealth along to the open east gate. Kathiko takes the lead again here. He pauses with ears cocked by the gate, then peers in, then slips quickly through it. A moment later, the tip of his tail flicks at them, and the others follow him through the gate. The broad street ahead is clear, although there's the sound of distant fighting. The group ducks between the first two buildings with a gap, and makes their way forward along a narrow alley in silence.
A good start to my bad impression in war, Lauryn grumps internally, thinking she should have known better than to ask now -- or ever. Shaking her head as she follows, Lauryn slips inside after the others. After having followed Kathiko through much of this infiltration, she decides he must be the Archon's scout and stealth-specialist, further wondering if he has an actual title for it or some other obscure name and tradition. Deciding now's a good time to exercise her newly relearned lesson, she decides not to ask -- ever.
Osaon is not a large settlement, perhaps six blocks long, if that. During her glimps from above, Lauryn could see all of it, with what must be the astikan near the center. As they near the end of this alley, Lauryn can see signs of the fighting before the astikan. The Yemenos look like Khatta warriors, clad in strange armor of chitin and leather. Many of them are gathered around a battering ram that's roofed by a giant 'shield' of canvas reinforced with wood, spreading some ten feet to either side and protecting them from assault from above. Arrows sticking out of the shield like a porcupine's bristles attest to its efficacy.
The archon doesn't motion for his squad to attack them, however. Instead, he gestures to the askew door on a nearby building, and the squad of them go inside.
It's an odd comfort for Lauryn to see a species she recognizes. Living in Rephidim, she's met Khattans before, especially as the Khattan Emirate has expanded its influence. But these felines are almost the polar opposite of Emirate Khattan: barbaric, warlike, and crude. That such a familiar race should be twisted and horrible here where she's been lost to the world seems only fitting for her life. It's as if all things have taken a darker hue, to better highlight her own cursed existance. I am in a play as an actor, and the stage is set to match, she thinks as she follows the men inside.
The walls of the building muffle the sounds of the fighting from without. It's a two-story tiered pagoda, like many of the Laosian buildings Lauryn's seen. There's the corpse of a human inside it, an unarmored man with his chest cut almost in two. Skotonys and his people don't pay much attention to the body, but muffled sounds from above draw their attention: intermittent whimpering, thumping noises, harsh feline voices. They advance in silence to the stairwell, and creep up it.
Lauryn stares at the dead man as she passes. She wonders, for a moment, who he was and what he did to deserve this fate -- if anything. Did he have children? Was he a good man? What were his hopes, and dreams? She frowns, ears wilting, and tries to shake off the thoughts even as she prepares herself to face whatever lurks above. As she accends, she thinks about the man again. He is, in an odd way, her people now -- even if her people hate her. But then again, all people seem to hate her equally. She can only assume these Neyemen will too, but should she raise her magic and unleash it upon them, at least maybe someone she actually wants to go away will run from her this time.
At the top is an even more grisly scene. Four more dead humans -- two of them children -- and one dead Yemenos litter the floor. Three living feline warriors surround the whimpering form of a human woman, who's scrabbling at the floor in a vain effort to escape as a fourth Kattha rapes her. A toddler is curled up at the far corner of the room, unattended by any one in the scene.
While Lauryn is still taking in the scene, Skotonys has already raised his hand in gesture. The three Laosian warriors make no warcry as the charge the Kattha raiders.
When Lauryn reaches the top of the stairs, she loses all pretense of composure and can only stare openly at the scene of horror. It's like another of her nightmares, only born from the sorrow of life, rather than from her. It's such a discordant thought, that such horrible things come from places beyond her. While haunted with horrors spawned from the dark receses of her mind all her life, from things she's read, and worries she's had, she's never seen a real horror of life before. Her mouth goes agape, and for the moment, she can only stare, stunned.
While she's staring, the scene gets worse. Or maybe better, depending on which side one takes. Kathiko skewers the Kattha rapist through the back, fountaining blood over the attacker's victim. The three Kattha warriors around him turn to face their assailants and raising their weapons. Two of them are armed with black-bladed axes, and the third with a sword like the Laosian's own; maybe it is a Laosian sword, judging by the close similarity. The ensuing melee is swift and hard to follow, full of attacks, blocks, counterattacks, shifting footing, and dodging about corpses.
Lauryn continues to watch, even once her shock passes. She isn't sure what to do, what she can do. Unleashing her magic here and now might threaten them all, even endanger her allies further. It's something she isn't willing to risk, not while her side still seems to ahve a good chance of winning. She considers martialling her power and holding it, but she knows where that road leads. Sooner or later it would slip from her, if it didn't bring her to her knees first. But, she wonders, can she just stand here while her allies fight, maybe die? What should she do?
Then her gaze returns to the woman, and the horror in the human's eyes presses her in to action. She waves the woman to her, away from the conflict. Even though the Laos hate her, and she's sure this woman would to, she can't stand to just remain idle while she suffers. It's an ironic feeling, since in abother situation, if she only heard about it perhaps, she might have ignored it as her jadedness from her own suffering caused her to push it aside. But here and now, right infront of her, she can't refuse or forget action.
The human woman is scrabbling to get out of the melee and stay out. She doesn't have a weapon, and both sides are ignoring her for now. When Lauryn beckons, her eyes widen further. After a bit of hesitation, she breaks towards the stairs. She motions to the toddler in the corner. "Ysonon!"
Meanwhile, the three-on-three fight is going well for the Laosians. The felines' axes are difficult to wield in such close quarters, and the Laosians are pressing their advantage. They fight grimly, the Laosians not asking for surrender and the Katthas not offering it. But the felines are shouting, presumably for help. The astikan where the bulk of the Yemenos forces are is close at hand, and it's too much to hope that they won't hear this commotion. It can't be long before reinforcements arrive.
Though relived the woman is escaping, Lauryn is faced with a whole new problem: the child. She's never picked up a child before; most children are kept far away from her. To her, it feels like her very advance could threaten the toddler, that it might shatter in her hands, and all will turn and look upon her, finally seeing her as a true monster. She hesitates, and her emotions eat at her, the crying rips at her heart, until she finds herself hurrying towards the child without remembering when she decided to move. She reaches to scoop the toddler up, and hold it close, as she backs towards a wall.
A swing from an axe that misses Skotonys almost hits Lauryn, but she manages to duck it as she backs out of the melee again. She's not stuck holding the boy very long. The woman now standing by the stairs holds out her arms to take the child from Lauryn. Tears are streaming down the woman's own face, but she cuddles the boy close and pats his back in an effort to soothe him. Meanwhile, the Laosians have managed to finish off two of the three warriors. The last jumps out a window to escape. The Laosians soldiers are all still alive, but no unhurt. The muzzleplate on Skotonys's helme is askew and a trickle of blood drips from its lower half. Imiros has a gash on his leg, behind the knee, and is limping a little. The armor over Kathiko's left arm is bashed in, splintering and gory. It must be smashed into his flesh, although he betrays no sign of pain.
"Balcony?" Skotonys asks the human woman. She blinks at him for a moment, stupid with shock, then points to the door behind her. The group heads for it.
Lauryn follows the men, but she pauses to look back at the woman and her child, just for a moment. When she turns to continue walking, the image seems burned in her mind. She doesn't think she'll ever forget it, or any of this. And for the first time in her life, she feels a burning rage for a reason other than people hurting her. Almost without thinking, she pulls the 'screaming wind' -- magic -- to herself. Here, in this place of horror and misery, it feels like it comes too readily, but Lauryn doesn't care. It must gravitate to her out of a kind of sympathetic bond with her isityros, and in her rage, she finds the demonic caress fuel to her fire.
The door led to another room, and then another door led out to the balcony here is at the side of the building facing away from the astikan. It has the typical rail, and a slope of the pagoda-style tiled roof that overhangs the lower level. The sloping roof below touches the roof on the adjoining side, leading to another balcony. As Kathiko vaults the rail and steps down one roof to the opposite one, Lauryn hears the crash of footsteps running into the building. There's no use in barricading the doors, as the walls are nothing more than thin paper between the supports. Skotonys looks to Lauryn. "I need a distraction. On the stairs."
"It will be done," Lauryn replies, unable to match the Archon's composure, the fury slipping in to her words and giving them a harsh edge. She whips around and faces the stairs, but she plans far more than a distraction. No restraint is needed, for this is her enemy, not a bystander or ally caught in one of her 'episodes.' This time, she can let her power flow free, to rend, tear, and eat at the minds of these beastial Yemenos -- and all they must do is heed her, leaving the Laosians alone. Already she can feel the power build, struggle against her grasp. Like a river, she cannot stop it once it starts, but she can at least direct it to flow where she wants, or try to. The fury and anicipation makes her skin tingle and her hackles bristle ... Finally she can release a life of pain against someone who deserves to suffer.
And this time, her isityros do not take the form of doctors or orderlies or nurses. This time, they are huge barbarian Kattha, wielding axes that drip with blood and wearing little armor beyond shin and shoulder guards. Their faces and ears drip with strange and disturbing growths in a multitude of colors, that wriggle like tiny tentacles as they move. For a moment, she fears they are nightmare versions of the Yemenos raiders, that will attack the Laosians.
But they do not turn on her. They charge down the stairs with whoops and shrieks, and the Yemenos warriors fall back in disarray before the onslaught.
And Lauryn follows. Soon she is behind her isityros, staring down the stairs at the Yemenos warriors as they split in disarray. Channeling so much power makes her skin feel like fire and her muzzle seems to acrue a strange glow to her gaze -- the baleful luminescence of her glowing eyes. She urges her isityros foward, goading them on with words and will, caught up in her fury and and its release. To finally be able to use her power freely, to channel so much power and emotion creates a kind of sinister euphoria, addictive as it is inhuman.
Her battle-euphoria is interrputed by a hand on her shoulder. Skotonys's voice at her shoulder says, "Ria Lauryn. With me." A light tug, back up the stairs, as the isityros and the Yemenos boil back out onto the street.
"I ... " Lauryn sounds as dazed as she feels; for a moment she had forgotten what she was going beyond wanting to crush these raiders and inflict every pain back upon them she and the Laosian woman ever suffered. As she comes to her senses, it worries her that channeling so seems to take her along with it, as if her own magic somehow leaked in to her being, making her more like it. She steps away, one step, then another, slowly, until she's following the Archon. As she walks from her isityros, she can feel her bond with them weaken, but also strengten from ... something. She hasn't time to wonder at how this can be or what may cause it, turning her attention to Archon Skotonys. "I want to make them suffer," she tells him, in a quiet voice.
"As do we all." Skotonys doesn't sound angry, though. He is as calm and collected as ever, even though his strides up the stairs are swift. "Do not let your rage control your actions. Anger is the great weakness of the prodotis fighters." On the balcony, Kathiko is helping Imiros over the opposite rail. The door in the new building behind them is open to a room in disarray but empty. Skotonys vaults the near rail and pauses to make sure Lauryn doesn't need help.
"But ... I want to ... " It's s strain for Lauryn to articulate the complex emotion driving her fury, made more complicated by her mixed emotions at arguing with Archon Skotonys at all. She has no idea how he can be so calm, or how calmness is even possible in this situation, let alone wielding isityros who seem to be made of the most potent of terrible emotion. But, she nods stiffly. She climbs over the railing, stumbling on landing, but otherwise okay. She puts a hand to her temple as she proceeds; her isityros are more distant now, but still she can feel them, feel her mind reach for them and try and will them on.
"Victory," Skotonys tells her. "Your actions are for victory. All else is distraction." It's an instruction more than a statement." The strain of the roiling nightmares makes her vision cloudy. Or maybe that's the smoke from the burning field. Skotonys helps her into the building. From there, the group proceeds cautiously to the ground floor and out to the main street again, and then they sidle towards the astikan again. The isityros are running amok amongst the Yemenos soldiers around the astikan. The battering ram has been dropped, and the Laosian archers above are picking off targets that are now occupied fighting an illusory foe. The Laosians are somewhat hampered by not knowing whose side the hallucinations are on, or that they're not real.
"Victory," Lauryn repeats, with somewhat of muted enthusiasim. It seems so easy to let herself go, to align with the dark magics and emotions, to let them flow through and out of her like a black wave. But, she resists enough to guide them. Letting them run free would be worse than a mistake, a outcome she'd rather not even think about. So, she watches her isityros work, feeling oddly proud of them even as she tries to remember all they do. If they wound someone, she takes note. If one is fought off, she tries to remember that. Victory, said the Archon. So, she tries to remember the right path, starting with the flow of her 'sword.'
Skotonys considers the situation. "Ria, are you in control? How long will the isityros last?"
"I am ... in ... I am ... controlling them," the Gallah answers, sounding distant. She considers the Archon's question, focusing on her isityros, feeling their presence like a raging wildfire, with her as the wind. "But I ... cannot say. The sword is, is hungry and ... " she tries to find the right way of phrasing the ambiance of terror that seems to exist, like a cloud, along with her magic. It's almost as if she can taste it, and she can't help but feel on some level the isityros taste it too, " ... there is ... is much to feast upon. Can you ... Can you feel it? In the air ... Like ... " No word properly describes the aura of terror, so Lauryn can only let her question hang unifinished.
Imiros and Kathiko exchange uneasy, nervous glances. "I see," Skotonys says, as cool as ever. "Herd the enemy to the southeast if you can, Ria." He points towards the main door, where the battering ram lies. "We need to rendevous with the defenders in the astikan; we can try the north door if you can draw the Yemenos off of it."
"I will ... I will need to go. To them." Lauryn points to her isityros, and the battlefield around them. "It's easier when I am ... closer." Her head tilts, her eyes seeming unfocused even as they dart to watch the battle rage on. "Herd them?" She blinks, as if just registering the question. She may be in control to a degree, but the focus eats much of her willpower, diverting her attention to a greta degree. "They are not ... soldiers? ... If the ... the Yemenos run they will ... follow I think." Another pause, then Lauryn asks, "Do they have a ... a head? A Archon ... to ... to lead them ... I can ... They can ... to him."
"The standard bearers." Skotonys points to three Yemenos that have tall poles strapped to their backs. The posts are each topped with different carvings of stylized beasts or strange symbols. "If you can make the isityros form up in the north and then push southeast, the Yemenos will run from them in a single direction." Right now, the isityros are a disorganized mob of monsters, and the Yemenos run in all directions. They're getting bigger and less cohesive, and some of them aren't looking so much like Kattha barbarians any more. More like ... Asylum orderlies.
Lauryn can't help but be perversely amused as Asylum orderlies terrorize the sinister Khatta. It's so morbidly comical she suddenly laughs, rich and amused, completly at odds with the situation. Even as she responds, she has a hard time keeping the laughter away -- with her willpower focused and her body flowing with power and emotion, reigning in any other impulse seems like an indulgence she can't spare. "I will. I will try," she answers, once she has her breath.
Stepping forward, Lauryn reaches with her mind and the invisible strands of magic that connect her to her isityros, and grabs hold as tight as she is able. One by one she tries to bend their attention to the flag bearers when they're alignd properly to make a straight approach to them. Complex manuvers seem impossible, like trying to get fire to burn in a precise fashion. She can only guide and hope her plan works. It all feels very chaotic to her, but it's the most control she's ever had -- and that says a lot.
She gets handfuls of the isityros to do what she wants, but there are so many of them now and it's all so confused. As she reaches for one of the orderlies, fear wells in her own mind. The image of the scrabbling, trapped woman helpless before the rapists rises before her eyes, and vies with her own memories of being trapped, tied down to an Asylum bed. The isityros orderlies isn't going after the Yemenos now -- they're coming for her.
Skotonys takes Lauryn's right arm in his left hand as his men draw back in the face of the spirit charge. "Run for the astikan north door!" he commands them. "Ignore the isityros and cut down any Yemenos in your way." The men obey him, running for the door. Skotonys follows, pulling Lauryn with him. He has his sword out, of course, and his eye on the orderlies.
Lauryn squeezes her eyes shut as she loses control of some of her isityros, and she shakes her head violently. "Archon," she pleads, hoping -- knowing he'll understand what she needs. And then, he takes her hand and they're running. Later, she'll look back on this moment and realize she may understand the Archon on a deeper level, but for now, it's all she can do to hold on to her control of the remnants and force them to the Archon's plan -- if she even can.
The next few minutes are blurred and confused for Lauryn. At points, she thinks she's back in the Asylum. The orderlies are the only real things, and the battle of Osaon is only another nightmare. When Skotonys's sword cuts through them, she knows that's not right, but she isn't sure what is. There's blood and death and shouting everywhere.
Then at last a door opens before her, and Skotonys pulls her through. A strange fox is with them, and they speak in Laosian Lauryn is too dazed to follow as they barricade the door again. Skotonys barks an order: Kathiko and Imirio follow the stranger deeeper inside.
Skotonys throws back the twisted muzzle plate on his helmet and cups Lauryn's face in his gauntleted hands. "The isityros cannot come through this door." His voice is firm and calm, but there's an underlying intensity and urgency to it. "Do you understand me, Ria Lauryn? The isityros cannot enter the astikan. Do you believe?"
Lauryn isn't sure she does believe. She blinks blearily at the Archon, feeling like the power she uses has scowered her being and turned her muscles to jelly. Even standing seems like work, let alone holding reality together. But as she stares at the Archon, Lauryn does know she belives one thing that can hold them back.
"The isityros will not approach Archon Skotonys ... " She sucks in a breath, and adds, "we are safe," before she releases her hold on her magic and slumps.