The sun glares down on a swirling melee taking place on hot sand churned by the fighting. Shadows from megaliths in crystaling shapes stretch to and touch the rim of a canyon, where thousands of warriors bought with coin and promise of plunder make camp around the remains of strange ruins on the edge of a forbidden zone. Nine kirigai women in mirrored masks and colorful zolks dash fluidly amongst a ragtag band of defenders who gamely hold their own. Two lapis prove powerful fighters, a third supporting them with magical flames. A tenth kiriga fights alongside them, bright gold flashing, elegantly curved and wickedly barbed chitin swords a blur. Somewhere on the edge, a savanite tribesman blends into the the desert, looking for an opening to strike. A toothy beast with inky fur and wings snaps and snarls furiously at the kirigai attackers. Their defense is formidable, and the battle is grueling for all involved. However, strength in numbers has begun telling the mix of unlikely companions.
Umeko's face remains stern, cold even, as she fights back against the two handmaidens that press her. "He trained them well; in numbers they could have defeated him; yet they serve. It disturbing and difficult to understand," she thinks. Her movements are quick as she tries to focus her attacks on the more difficult of the pair that beset her; while now and then giving ground to ensure that they remain before her and do not position themselves on her sides or front to back, thus splitting her defenses.
Umeko's two attackers are relentless, refusing to give the young golden kiriga any room to breathe. Their focus is intense, bladed fans batting and slashing. Fighting them is bizarre. When they come from different angles, they seem to be aware of different things like flanking opponents will, but they also coordinate in unnaturally fluid ways, apparently trained to use their shared crystalline eye to an advantage rather than the hindrance it should be. Individually, they might not be a match, but together they've proved dangerous far beyond their individual abilities. The occasional glance up has given Umeko the impression that it's been difficult for the lapi trio as well. And clearly for Lilac... the beast lets out a bark of pain as her opponent overwhelms her defenses, putting a long gash along the creature's side.
Umeko's stern expression breaks when she hears the bark of pain for her injured friend. Her finned ears flare, then fold back. Warrior instinct tells her to do one thing; but her heart tells her another. She begins to give ground rapidly as she tries to move herself towards Lilac to defend her. She knows this may cost her some ability to defend and attack, but maybe if she does a quick surge to disorient them first ... that will buy her time to go to her friend's side.
Changing the direction of her skirmish is indeed costly, divided attention requiring Umeko to defend close calls that push her concentration ever harder. She catches a swift, short motion out of the corner of her eye. Her foot bumps something.
Umeko's ear fins are folded back and eyes narrow as she deflects another sweeping serpentine strike. This may afford her just enough time to spare to cast her eyes down to see what her foot hit. "/Why are my strikes not landing? Honor and courage is as strong as magic. That ... /eye/ they carry surely cannot be capable of defeating us," the golden kiriga frets.
A pale girl lays in the dust, her side and throat streaked with blood, her face turned slightly into the sand.
"Lilac!" Umeko screams. Her muscles tense and she strikes back against her foes in fury. "She cannot be dead. No. She cannot" the raging kiriga thinks.
There's no time to see if she's alive or not. No time to guess or mourn. The one who struck down Lilac joins her sisters, and Umeko feels zolk and chitin whistle past her face, has to blink away sand as a narrowly blocked kick throws grit in her face. She can feel her hair shake loose from its tie with the violent motions of her desperate defense.
No thought, no time to grieve. This may be the final dance and she must dance it with skill that would make her family proud. So, she spins and sidesteps, trying to position all three hand maidens in a fan in front of herself. Chitin blades draw in closer and eyes narrow even more. Her sandy-tone blades whirl once more and she goes on all-out assault on the women that threaten her and may have killed one of her friends.
The central handmaiden holds up her crystal lense, sunlight glinting off it, and the other two women disperse to either side as Umeko maneuvers to keep them in front of her. Blows are exchanged, but none are decisive, Umeko's defense holding in the face of three attackers. Then one has to break off, as seemingly out of nowhere a stone spearhead lunges for one of the maiden's backs. The savanite on the other end makes the strike accurately enough, but skills learned hunting game in the desert are met with disciplined martial art mixed with preternatural awareness. The emerald kiriga weaves out of the way and snaps her fan open, allowing Long-Shadow's spear to pierce it, then closes it again, holding the knapped flint spearhead to one side while she rains kicks on the hapless cheetah. Miraculously, he manages to keep the haft of his spear between himself and the clawed foot, clinging stubbornly to his weapon.
In spite of the danger she knows Long-Shadow is in, she feels some semblance of hope return when he sweeps in and draws one of the maidens off for now. If only she can be dropped before she is able to harm her silent and spotted lover. So ... Umeko tries to drive her shorter blade into her back while defending herself with her longer one. "No one else dies today," she thinks with conviction.
The frustrated red-clad kiriga tussling with Long-Shadow finds that her fan is trapped just as much as the savanite's spear is, and the tribal hunter wrenches it back and forth, throwing the woman slightly off balance and keeping her attention away. There's a woosh, and a jet of flame billows over the sand, driving one of the kirigai assailants back. The lapi seem to be getting the better of their situation... maybe there's some hope after all! One of the two handmaidens engaged with Umeko seems to realize this, and she breaks off her engagement with Umeko, turning and running toward the other skirmish, leaving the golden dragoness with one opponent to face for the moment.
Umeko's lips betray a small smile. "Fast and drop her, we can turn the tide," she thinks as she surges forward towards her lone attacker in a serpentine almost sideways glide of her feet. Sandy-blades whirl as she goes on the offensive against her foe!
Blade and fan clash as Umeko meets her opponent, now more evenly matched at one to one, and Long-Shadow continues to lock up both his weapon and his kimono-clad adversary's, just barely hanging on. She can look past her opponent's shoulder to see the other kiriga that broke off, retreating. No, taking something from her sleeve. She turns and angles across the sand, and the reason only becomes apparent when she's more behind Anisa. The handmaiden's arm flicks out, and something shining darts out and lodges in Anisa's back. The doe staggers, her back stiffening, and she catches another blow on her forearms, before the kiriga in front of her closes her fan into a spike and drives it into the lapi's ribs. Gibson sounds very far away as he shouts his sister's name, furiously trying to fight his way toward her. One handmaiden turns toward Xander, while the other goes to support the warrior-woman holding Gibson off.
Anisa drops to the ground, red spreading through her blue traveller's jerkin. She tries to get up again, kicking at the sand a couple times, agony on her face. Then she curls and lies still, face turned away.
"Anisa! Xander!" Umeko cries out. Her jaws snap shut and lips draw back, revealing fangs. She shouldn't be mad; anger leads to carelessness ... but she's watching her friends fall one by one; and she's unable to help them at all. Her fingers flex and squeeze the grips of Autumn Harvest as she redoubles her effort to try and drop the one that threaten sher so that she can rey and save the friends she has left.
Umeko's ferocity breaks the standoff with her foe, forcing the other woman to fold her fan and deflect a sword strike off her forearm, the blade leaving a tear in her kimono. Long-Shadow finally wrests his opponent's weapon away, the fan dangling from the head of his spear... upon which he promptly receives a kick to the solar plexus and one in the head, sending him sprawling onto his back. It looks like he loses consciousness for a second before he squirms on his back, alive but obviously in no condition to fight anymore. The woman in front of Umeko finally speaks, the young noble seeing her face reflected and distorted in the mirrored mask. "Stop fighting," she says. "Stop fighting, and we will spare those left."
Umeko takes a step back and surveys the field. Her expression is impassive, though faint twitches try to break through her own 'mask' of expression. "Lilac. Anisa," she thinks, "I brought you into this mess and you have paid for my mistakes with your lives. Long Shadow, you have a strong heart but you do not have the skill to win. Xander and Gibson ... brave but ... at least if all of you live perhaps there is a future. If you die ... then there is truly no hope left." Umeko draws a breath ... and lowers Autumn Harvest. "If you let them leave and take the injured, I will surrender and go with you willingly. I will not fight. This is not their battle, it is mine. They should not pay the price for my choices."
"Surrender your swords, golden one," says the leader. The woman standing over Long-Shadow picks her fan back up and pulls the hunter's spear out of it, but makes no further move to menace him. The maiden who approached Xander knocks him down with a palm strike, but it might as well be a love tap. She says something, and Xander lets what magical energy he had gathered dissolve. Gibson doesn't allow the same treatment. He doesn't allow any quarter at all, fighting with tears streaming down his face, blows vicious and frenetic. One of the handmaidens has to join her sister, and then another. The buck tackles one of them, both combatants going to the ground. Her fate isn't clear in the struggle that ensues, but as the other two warrior women strike again and again, Gibson's is.
"Gibson, you might be able to save her. Do not give up hope yet," Umeko calls out to the other lapi. "Please, live for her. It is what she would want you to do." The golden kiriga then hangs her head. Each of her blades is sheathed into their scabbards. Umeko's legs then fold beneath her as she kneels before the leader. Each sword is drawn from her obi and places on the ground at the leader's feet, laying in perfect parallel. "I give my life for theirs," she says softly. "Spare them. all of them." After all, what is the purpose of living if there is no one to share it with?
The cobalt kiriga kneels opposite Umeko in a strangely courteous manner, to accept the swords. She picks each up, and then places them in the sash of her kimono, and speaks orders to the remaining handmaidens. "See if the big one yet lives, bind all those who remain alive. Mask the golden one, we go to master at once." Someone at Umeko's back carefully lowers one of the mirrored masks down to her face.
Umeko's entire body tenses up and she bites her lower lip when the mask begins to descend on her face. She knows not what it does, or may do to her, or how it even is held on. It could be permanent! Still, she doesn't jump or otherwise move. All she does is ask, "Is the mask necessary?"
"Yes. We are taking you to the master. You may see when he allows it." The mask blocks out the light of the desert sun, and seems to be fitted near perfectly to Umeko's face. A deceptively delicate hand touches Umeko's shoulder, and moves to take her under the arm, beckoning her upright.
Umeko doesn't desist as she feels the numerous little catches secure the mask firmly to her face, encasing her world into darkness. "He may be your master, but I will never call him that," she thinks, trying to remain strong inside even in the face of the losses she just suffered. The hand on her should is welcome as she does use it to rise. She doesn't like this, feeling oddly crippled without her eyes. But, if it is to save her friends, she will endure.
The handmaidens dealing with Umeko are grimly silent as they stand her up. The move and direct her arms, not forcefully but insistently, holding them out slightly to her sides. Her obi is untied and pulled away, and her kimono allowed to fall open, then pulled off her shoulders and arms, leaving Umeko to feel the hot desert wind on her thinly scaled skin. Her fingertips feel zolk again, hands slipped into sleeves, sleeves drawn up to shoulders, kimono closed again. It's almost as if she were being dressed by her own handmaidens at home... except when they bring her hands up again. The kimono's sleeves are long, and they're pulled past Umeko's hands, then brought together. It feels like they're now in an unbroken tube of zolk. There are snatches of murmured voices in the distance, some of the other women talking quietly. "Tie this one's hands down completely. Gag him too." "The lens is only scratched." "Can you walk?" "Tie your hair up again, you must look proper." "How many?" "Three. The big one broke
her neck." "Take those masks back." "We will carry her." "Very well." "Leave them."
Umeko's brow rolls and furrows underneath the maks that blinds her. She has never felt this uncomfortable or helpless before. "It is not necessary to undress me," the kiriga says in a soft, and proper, voice as her clothing is stripped from her. Since her friends are still present, she cannot resist or they may decide to kill them instead. The redressing comes and that does remind her of home, except the kimono itself feels a little different. She rolls and moves her hands in those long sleeves, searching for a hole to free them. Her head also tilts this way and that as she listens to the others talk about her. There is some grim satisfaction in knowing that they did kill a few and that gives her a little hope and strength for the future. How will I walk if I cannot see the way?" she also asks those around her as the clothing fitting continues.
"We will determine what is necessary, and then the master will determine what is necessary," comes the even-toned reply. There's no break in the sleeves to be found. It might have been possible to pull her arms in and shrug the kimono off, but then the handmaidens pin her elbows to her sides, and something else hooks to the front of the sleeves... it feels uncomfortably like being forced to look like a lady in a simple stroll, hands elegantly held in front. "You will not need to walk, golden one." The swish of zolk sliding over something is heard again... and then suddenly, Umeko can feel herself being hoisted off the ground! She's hanging from something by the back of her kimono, swinging gently as she's carried. It feels like a tether at the feet keep ker from swinging too far.
It's a good thing the mask Umeko wears obscures the expression of distaste that is creeping over her snout as her arms are pinned and locked into position. She knows how to walk as a proper lady, but being forced into that posture is degrading. It also means it is very unlikely she can mount any attempt as escape when they are further from her friends. Finding herself soon off the ground betrays that her legs cannot move far apart, not with her feet tethered and knees closely wrapped. "This is undignified," she says to those that now carry her. "And do not expect me to call him Master. I agreed to stop fighting, but I am not one of you."
The voice Umeko recognizes as the first says, "That is his concern. And it is true. You are not one of us. You are to be honored in a way we never shall be. A dignity we cannot attain. Perhaps in time you will come to see as he does. We have." Whatever it is that Umeko is hanging from begins moving, the trussed-up kiriga swinging back and forth as far as her leg tether will allow. It's certainly not comfortable like this, though Umeko's lightness and flexibility makes it easier on her than it might have been for others.
"You adore him so much. Why?" Umeko asks of her captors as she hangs uncomfortably from some unseen frame. "And ... if I am to be honored more than any of you, do you bear me any ill will for that? That one of you was not chosen?"
"The master is an artist. The artist. He lives in beauty, and appreciates only what is the most sublime. We are honored to be his brushes, his paper, his ink. We are elevated." She doesn't answer the other questions. Umeko can't tell if she struck a nerve without seeing or hearing anything more from the handmaiden.
"What does he intend for me? I cannot imagine how he would work another save for what he has already done to you," Umeko says quietly as she continues to sway uncomfortably in this odd binding of 'luxury'. "Do any of you have names?"
It feels like this strange procession is going downhill now. For what it's worth, whoever's carrying Umeko's frame is being relatively careful to move smoothly. "That is for the master to reveal to you, if it is his will."
"But you do know what he intends, then," Umeko says. She chews her lip in thought. Perhaps there will be chance yet to escape when they reach their destination. "I could ask him to choose on of you instead," she offers. "A willing piece of art is better than unwilling."
The cobalt kiriga says, "It is for the master to reveal, it does not mean we comprehend it." Down, down, down. Rocks and sand crunch under moving feet. "If he chooses you, he chooses you. If he chooses one of us, he chooses one of us. It is not for you to ask him to do anything."
"If you let me go there is greater chance of him choosing one of you," Umeko points out as she continues to sway uncomfortably. Her head tilts this and that as she tries to listen. "And how do you live in worlds of complete darkness? This mask makes me feel uncomfortable."
Bob, swing, bounce. It's a long way down. "There is no such chance or difference, golden one. We will give you to him, and he will decide what to do. We do not live in darkness. We see as we are intended to see, and look upon nothing but beauty."
"These women are hopeless. They dote on him and will not consider anything else," Umeko thinks as annoyance and frustration mount. They won't be lured by temptation into releasing her. Still, things are not all bleak; there is always the chance of escape once they are where she is going. There is also the option of ritual suicide as well; if she can for a moment find a weapon. Still ... for now she decides to remain silent and think on how she will survive...