Completed Alone in the Chapel

[Tera Lynx]

Havilah soon also found herself in the thick of the flighting, indeed it seemed there was no end to these disguised humans as they drove Jane back into the alcove with her back to the wall.
Havilah had her own opponents to deal with, she used her upper arms as shields to block incoming attacks, catching the blades on her hooked spines and thick chitin, with quick twists of her arms she was able to snap the caught blades.
She also dealt devastating attacks with her claws, seeing a monster in the chapel the cultists tried to keep their distance, but found little room to back up and she quickly closed the space between her and her enemies.

One man charged her with a sword raised high, she caught the blade before it could come down and then proceeded to slash his chest and stomach with her lower pair of arms. She held her own, but even she occasionally felt the sting of a blade between her armored plates.
She was surrounded in the middle of the room with attacks coming from all sides, she turned and whirled as quickly as she could but eventually she felt blinding pain as one bold cultist rammed his dagger to the hilt onto a space between the plating on her ribs. She let out a shriek and tore his head off, but not before another blade sunk into her thigh.

She didn't have time, they would all be piling on her soon. With her remaining leg and the aid of her webs she lunged into the air and swung into the alcove, hitting the wall hard before landing beside Jane to give her support.
She was breathless but able to fight, she covered Jane's blind spots and kept the cultists at bey.
"We just need to hold them off a little longer, Friend Jane. My spawn have almost hatched and will aid us soon."
The bile that dripped and spread on the ground had stopped, but any who stood in it for very long would find themselves rather quickly being covered and consumed by the corrosive substance as if it were alive.

She spoke as she quickly dissected a cultist with her claws, opening him up quickly and methodically before removing his heart in a blink and dropping him dead to the floor.
"These humans will know death long before we do, my friend. Just do not allow yourself to die from your wounds."
The little familiar scurried around Jane's body and began closing the wounds using webbing as thread.

 

[Jane]

Four arms. Awfully nice for fighting. Presumably other things too.

Regardless of the advantage, Havilah came swinging back toward the Altar. Just their luck. All they wanted was to have a nice chat and exchange a familiar and then these robed men (cultists? Aw, how flattering) had to come in and threatened them with a good time. Dicey for Havilah though. She just got through saying how she would rather have good relations for her kind with humans. Eh, well, what could be done.

"And hold them off, we will," Jane said, lifting her shield to block an overhead swing from a halberd (formidable armaments, alright) and then lunging forward like a fencer to stab at a dagger-wielding man who thought it would've been cheeky to come at her while she was concerned with the halberd. Jane retreated back in two little one-footed hops to her position by the Altar, her breasts bouncing inconveniently as she did. Would've been nice to call a shrewd truce to at least get the girls wrapped up, buuuut...wasn't like she hadn't done this before. None of these guys looked like they'd lick her toes either.

Through the shifting shoulders of the gathered crowd before her and Havilah, Jane saw...that shit Havilah had vomited up. Eating (seemed the best word) some dolts who stepped in it. Huh. Well that was endearing. Dark One Halch approved, for sure.

"Heh. Don't worry, I'm much more into watching them die from their wounds," Jane said. Then, to the gathered would-be cultists, "Right, boys?"

Jane deflected another dastardly overhead strike from the halberd, the reach of the weapon exceeding the grasp of anyone's "bravery" this time, as none tried rushing forward for a follow-up.

Then Jane stiffened. Gave a brief tittering laugh as the familiar--ticklishly--went crawling around her body. She was about to say something in mild protest when she felt a measure of relief for the stab wound in her back. Oh...ooohhh...well that was nice. The little guy could help her out, do some tending of wounds. Which was fantastic because she loathed (like anyone else in their right mind) being in pain herself.

Jane relaxed some. Said with smiling elation to Havilah as she feinted a slash to keep the cultists at bay, "You didn't tell me the familiar could this. See? See what it's doing? That's nice."

Now only if she could train it to lick her toes.

Alright, add one more flogging to the tally for that thought.

 

[Tera Lynx]

"It will adapt when it sees a need, but bind your minds and it will adapt to your desires."
She worked around Jane, using her and her shield as a lynchpin for her defensive attacks. A cultist drew near on one side she went there, caught him by the head and bashed it against the edge of the shield.
On the other side she stabbed the human through the eyes with her claws. She dropped the body and took cover behind Jane once more as the halberd assaulted her once more.
The weapon was becoming troublesome, so on its next downward swing on her shield Havilah reached around her and caught the halberd by the haft, with another twist the head snapped off of the polearm.

Havilah remained directly behind Jane, serving as two more sets of arms to deal with their attackers. But now the cultists stood back, out of weapon range but using their own weapons to keep them cornered in the alcove. They came to a stalemate, waiting for the other to make the next move.
Havilah whispered in her ear, "Not long now... Their deaths will come from above."

Behind the group of menacing cultists, up in the rafters, there was the sound like an egg being thrown at a wall, a noxious green liquid rained down as more similar sounds erupted.
Some cultists looked up, but it was difficult to discern anything in the darkness... Anything, that is, but glowing reptilian eyes that watched them from the rafters.
Havilah felt the minds of the new monsters she spawned and smiled.
"Friend Jane... Meet my new swords..."

A rattling hiss came down from the rafters as the creatures descended without a signal or command, dropping down amid the hapless humans.
Creatures that couldn't be classified or identified dropped into view of the dim torchlights.

These creatures were a mass of simple death, not a single inch wasted on anything but killing and survival. Six of these creatures dropped down and immediately began killing.

 

[Jane]

Sounded enticing. The whole binding the mind thing, to get the familiar to do exactly what she wanted. Buuut...she knew wouldn't. It'd make her the Eunuch to the familiar's young Jane. She didn't have some sort of grudge against Slave Masters or the practice of slavery in general--just the way the world worked in Cerak--but it simply wasn't for her. Possibly a bad comparison, but the binding of minds sounded too much like slavery to Jane. She preferred to see the little guy do things by itself--like a dog, say.

"I'll find out how keen it is on its own, then," Jane said with a fierce grin. He'd have his chance, the familiar. Just like Jane had hers.

Jane stayed on the defensive, keeping her Holy Shield up and blocking blows and dissuading would-be assailants from approaching with sweeps of her sword and threats of thrusts. And Havilah got that son of bitch with the halberd--snapped his damn weapon, nice.

The familiar scurried like a tiny healing gecko up from Jane's back and to her injured bicep. Started weaving that gash shut as well. And all for the better, too, that wound wouldn't have regenerated itself like her back.

Havilah whispered.

Then.

Holy shit.

Well no wonder Havilah had so many problems with humans. Heh, there was a world of difference between how Jane's new familiar looked and how these six spindly beasts--Havilah's "Swords"--looked. And Jane had thought Havilah looked like something Dark One Nebbatt might create, ha, was she wrong on that, comparing Havilah to these creatures now.

And Jane just watched for a moment. Mesmerized by the gory display and myriad, exquisite, orgasmic pain these creatures were unleashing on the screaming cultists. She thought of herself as one of the Swords, vicariously through her imagination joining in and ripping the men to shreds. Jane's cheeks flushed a hot red and her legs shuddered slightly, her brows bent lovingly and her smiling lips trembling from a slow, quivering exhale.

The tally probably got so numerous that it would stretch into the coming morning. But Jane didn't give a damn.

"Havilah..." she said.

Jane loosed intermittent, tittering laugh of gushing, satisfied joy.

"You make me happy. You know that?"

 

[Tera Lynx]

The swords were creatures of blood and slaughter, the bodies of their enemies were like water and these swords swam through them with little effort, even through armor and shield. A cacophony of screams, death cries, war cries, sounds of agony, and the Primal rattling call of the swords was the last thing these men heard.
The people that blocked them in were unwilling to turn their backs on Havilah and Jane, but they shook in their boots and kept glancing over their shoulders praying that the sounds of death wouldn't come closer.

A face, the face of one of the cultists, flew above their heads and slapped over the stone of the statue of Astra, giving her face a grim and grisly visage as the eyeless face cried tears of blood.
These swords were deadly with every inch of their bodies, even their small scales were bladed so that you couldn't brush against one without looking like you lost a fight with a cheese grater.

Havilah saw Jane's reaction to the carnage and smiled, there were many things she didn't understand about humans, but a love for slaughter is one thing she definitely understood. Even she had to admire her handiwork, these were the only ones of their kind, and only she possessed their template to spawn. They were essentially her private soldiers, her bodyguards, her personal weapons.
She absently placed her lower hands on Jane's bare shoulders while her upper claws remained poised for attack and defense.
She whispered in her ear again, but her voice also echoed in her mind.
"Beautiful, aren't they? Many humans have joined the Swarm to experience such power over other creatures, the ability to kill, to blindly slaughter. I've allowed them to indulge, but soon will come a time when the Swarm will be subdued. We will no longer kill blindly but only kill those who choose to be our enemies."

A dismembered arm fell on the should of one of the guarding cultists, he completely lost his head for a moment and jumped, slapping the gory appendage off of him, too late he found himself within range of the sexy paladin and the monster queen.
Havilah smiled wider.
It seemed she was deciding to allow the familiar to develop independence, such was her choice, the little creature had a promising future.

Without any direction the familiar took advantage of the new opponent and his moment of fear paralysis. It leaped up on the rim of Jane's shield and went from there to the shoulder of the man, immediately it bit the closest part of exposed flesh, which happened to be his throat, but it didn't stop there, it's mouth seemed to move in a blur and it quickly burrowed into his body, the man screamed in agony and fell to the floor writhing and clawing at the bloody hole in his neck.
The man thrashed on the floor for a moment before he stiffened, shuddered, and then exploded in a shower of blood.
The familiar sat where his chest used to be with a full stomach and a satisfied look on its little face. A little bigger than before.

 

[Jane]

Hungry little bastard, huh. Only a few minutes old as far as Jane could tell and still the familiar went flying off of her shield and like a starving sailor rushing to the galley. Ah, those screams never got old to Jane--especially when they raised sharply in pitch right after being afflicted by some new thick splinter of pain and then, ahhhh, perfectly cut off.

Jane closed her eyes momentarily when the man's blood splashed over her, covering in a spotty, splattering way her face, hair, neck, the swell of her breasts and the flat of her stomach, and staining her dress, folded down her front and hanging about her armored thighs and knees. She ran her tongue out along her lips, licking up the blood around her mouth. Smacked her lips once done as if it were a delectable wine she had been drinking.

She hadn't turned around yet, so she didn't yet notice the defilement of the Idol of Astra.

She stood there, completely comfortable with Havilah's hands (one of two sets, as it were) on her shoulders. Sure it was a prime moment to get backstabbed, but Havilah had plenty of those moments before. And they did clear up the whole "thought you were gonna kill me" thing already.

The tandem voice in her ear, voice in her mind bit took some getting used to. But it didn't bother Jane so much now as it did initially.

"Heh, beautiful. I'll vouch for that," she said, just taking in and witnessing the last shreds of carnage. "But the guard force of Alliria isn't going to think so."

A glance back to her.

"You got a plan for that?"

Jane sure as hell didn't.

 

[Tera Lynx]

There were a few cultists who fled early in the fighting, but other than them, any who tried to run were caught at the door and brutally decimated.
The creatures were finishing up. By the end of the fight there wasn't a single body that wasn't missing something, and some were completely impossible to identify altogether as even human.

Jane mentioned the guard force and she shrugged.
"I assume they are humans we don't want to kill? No worries, I'll be gone before anymore creatures arrive."

Havilah gave Jane's shoulders a gentle squeeze before she let go and went out to walk among the dead. Jane brought up a valid question, but Havilah wasn't concerned.
The swords lined up before her and she worked her weaving magic again, or rather, un-weaving magic.
She held out a clawed hand and the green strands snaked out from the creatures. She gathered their essence into a small orb in her palm while their bodies reverted to biomass, piles of gore on the floor amid the virtual pools of gore.

"I hope the humans do not condemn you for this slaughter. I hope to meet you again in the future, and see how your familiar has developed."
She picked up the creature from the human carcass and placed it on Jane's shield.
"Once it's consumed enough biomass it will go into a cocoon and evolve. It will need your care and guidance, but it will grow large and strong to fight by your side."

 

[Jane]

Havilah walked out into the gathered dead and Jane watched and just took it all in. The streaks of red and squishy splatters of viscera and the tatters of robes strewn all about the chapel and the pews. A scene like this was certain to be horrific in the middle of Alliria, distressing back in Cerak, but absolutely normal in the Citadel belonging to the aptly named Sisters. Took her back, the sight of it. Also made her think that Astra had her own vicious streak; these would-be cultists walked into the wrong damn chapel, huh.

I hope the humans do not condemn you for this slaughter.

"I'm too convenient not to blame."

I hope to meet you again...

Jane smirked and tipped her head. Said, "Plenty of time, so long as one of us doesn't die."

She eyed the familiar placed onto her heater shield. It looked at her, she looked at it. Grinned. It tried to grin back. Then, to Havilah, Jane said, "Care and guidance, huh. That was a mistake. But I can give it an honest try; Astra would approve. I hope."

Jane crouched down and grabbed her sheath and sheathed her sword. Set it down on the ground for a moment as she went to one of the fallen men around the Altar that she and Havilah had slain and tore off a sizable chunk of his robe. Started wiping the blood of their foes from her skin. She was going to have to get at least somewhat cleaned up and dressed, preferably before the first guards started arriving.

A parting smile and parting words: "May Astra watch over you, Havilah."

 

[Tera Lynx]

She found her discarded robe under a pile of gore, in a human moment of lucidity she reflected that she should probably find a new disguise soon.
She wrapped herself in the bloody cloth and gave Jane one last look.

For the first time Havilah seemed to actually see her, to see her more than just another human, but a creature with features and character that she wanted to memorize.
There was no telling how the Swarm would be received by the world, but this human was a friend.

Havilah returned the smile and gave her a nod in return for the well wishes before she pulled up her hood and went to the doors of the cathedral.
She opened them and looked around at the empty streets, her sharp ears detected the sounds of many armored feet a hooves approaching from several directions, so she stole out of the chapel and rushed down a different street to flee detection, leaving a faint trail of blood behind her.
From there she vanished into the night.