Fable - Ask [Phorasmos] To Wake in the Night

[Tristan Locke]

Targets all in mind, one for each Mourner, and Haka taking the lead. A solid plan, now all that was left was to execute. Tristan steeled himself as best he could, short sword in one hand, hand crossbow in the other.

Breathe. Just...breathe.

Easier thought than done. He could hear his own heartbeat hammering away so loudly in his ears, roaring over the quiet din of the forest or the constant scraping being projected by the Possessed that lay before them. Then, it came.

"Three!"

Tristan surged forward along with the other Mourners. Shunk! The bolt knocked in his crossbow was loosed, whistling as it sailed through the air. It plunged into the owl's wing even as the animal clawed at the warding monument. It shrieked horribly, and Tristan was unsure if that horrid sound it made was entirely natural or if it was somehow altered by the wretched spirit inside it.

Regardless, the bird fell to the ground, unable to keep itself aloft with only one functional wing. As he rushed up to it he tried to be quick about finishing it off with a stroke of his sword, but the revenant within would not go so easily. It contorted the owl's body wildly, making it behave much more like a snake than an owl, whipping deftly to avoid being cut in twain by Tristan. It brought beak and talons to bear against ornate steel, woefully underequipped for biting or slashing through the tough plate of the ghost mail.

Click! Tristan racked another bolt in his crossbow and fired again, this time impaling the owl dead in the center of its face. It fell backward, corporeal body bleeding and dying, before Tristan punted its whole body with great force, the feathered form smashing into the stone of the ward, a bloody ruin. The Revenant emerged, furious, shrieking, burning from its proximity to the ward. Oh gods...Now came the difficult part. Though clearly not so difficult for the most senior among them!

 

[Aeris Silversale]

Aeris had spent months becoming formidable with two blades. She had a talent at navigating her off hand just the same as her dominant, and plenty of Mourners tested her ability to wield dual swords in a fight. It made her a menace, feeding her satisfaction and power whenever she saw on her opponents' faces surprise and confusion as she switched up her stance.

But against a revenant, all sense of precision and strategy were not guaranteed.

Some used to be Mourners, movement remembered in their muscles' memories on how to fight, but often times... it's hopeless visitors that venture out into these lands without proper awareness to the goings on here in Phorasmos.

Her arms were poised readily, moving to strike.

The man, or what was once a man, still had a sense of mobility to their being. Aeris swore loudly as her blade aimed for the precise points at the back of his foot to slow them down, but they had moved quicker than Silversale had anticipated. Her second blade came to corral her target, singling them out against the rest.

She supposed it was easier to face something more human, something more familiar to what they hunted. It should be like clockwork, a routine, but that only counted if Aeris herself was consistent in every circumstance.

Her lack of sleep was weighing on her.

Her attacks were too wide, too slow in the recovery, but Aeris worked at slicing at the right places to slow down any mortal form. Thoughts all muddled, she could not decipher if she were simply working harder and not smarter, just as the corrupted man fell to their knees and Aeris took a moment to breathe before piercing her long blade through their chest.

 

[Ihaka Nikau]

Even through the staff's handle and his own armor Haka felt in his hands the tactile sensation of the wolf's neck parting under the cleaving blade. Barely a feral yelp had escaped its throat. Haka wrenched his weapon from his prey with a curt upward jerk, freeing it, and he kicked the body away from himself some few feet, putting some distance between himself and it for when the Revenant would come crawling out of the carcass.

Haka glanced around at the others. Quick looks to see how they were doing. Iruna was wrestling with the Elk; Tristan missed a sword-stroke against the eerily eel-like owl; and Aeris made to hamstring the man, but again odd and deft movements defied a Mourner's attack. Altogether things were going okay.

Haka looked back to the wolf, expecting that familiar sickly green glow to be emanating from the gaping wound, if not the Revenant itself in full. He saw neither—or rather, nothing like what he expected. Some of that green glow did emanate forth, and like some abyssal tentacle it whipped the head almost perfectly back into its place.

Then the wolf stood up on its hind legs like a man. The head listed heavily to the left like a sinking ship, its long tongue hanging lifelessly down from its slack jaw.

"Ai! What nasty trick is—!?"

The now bipedal wolf rushed at Ihaka like a necromancer's crazed minion. Haka had instinctively spun his taiaha around to greet the creature with its spearpoint, but the wolf impaled itself in its effort to tackle him and hardly was its frenzy stilled by the steel.

Both Haka and the wolf went down to the ground in a mad scramble.

Iruna Reverio Tristan Locke Aeris Silversale

 

[Iruna Reverio]

Iruna looked out to the others, and it seemed as if everyone was in a predicament. Aeris looked far more sluggish than usual, Tristan looked like he might struggle with the Revenant as close as it was considering his weapon, and Haka had to deal with something new with that demonic dog. The Man and The Owl were about to release their revenants into the air, so it should be one of them. Iruna apologized to Haka in her head as she eliminated him from the equation.

Aeris looked more immediately vulnerable so it was her that Iruna chose to defend. She sprinted with a speed only afforded by her armor, ideally just in time for the Revenant to be released. If she was too late then Aeris might take a hit from the revenant, too early and she'd lose her momentum for a less effective cut. She hoped her timing was true.

Aeris Silversale Tristan Locke Ihaka Nikau

 

[Tristan Locke]

The Revenant that emerged from within the owl had a form like billowing smoke, a pale blue light pouring from within its face and chest. The ward seemed to keep it from anything resembling coherency, both in a physical sense and in its ability to focus. Revenants were always chaotic creatures, of course, but this one seemed erratic, its hollow eyes unable to focus on any of the living things around it for more than a couple of seconds at a time.

The others were each handling their own ordeals; Tristan couldn't allow himself to be dead weight. Not now. There was an advantage to be had in the ghost's distraction. Tristan surged forward, finding his courage, and circled the Revenant. It swiped at him in turn, where he was previously, where it thought he would be, but never quite where Tristan actually stood. Time itself seemed to be eluding the thing, even as it sprouted extra limbs to try and claw at the life around it that it hated so deeply.

More limbs meant more targets. Tristan slashed with his requiem blade, cutting through ghostly smoke as though it were as true as flesh. He whittled away at its form, blow by blow, all the while Fane's energies imbuing Tristan's armor with just enough speed, just enough guidance, to stay out of the Revenant's reach.

Finally, the light that leaked from the creature's eyes and "mouth" (or what counted for one) became violent, skyward pillars. With a final shriek, the spirit fled with all haste into the night sky, far above the trees. Banished, but not slain. That would have to suffice for now.

Tristan wheeled. What was left? Iruna made to aid Aeris, but Haka fought alone. Tristan rushed to help him next. There might well have been no end to the tricks these Revenants held.

 

[Aeris Silversale]

Fuck, she was tired.

She could feel her arms weigh more in the seconds that had passed. That breath she had heaved into her lungs felt too heavy to expel, and her eyes flicked up to watch the unholy ghost of the Revenant seep from the mouth and hollowed spaces where eyes once were. It rose and rose, and Aeris gritted her teeth, told herself this was over soon.

But, to her shame and gratefulness, Iruna was at her side.

Blade forged to quell those restless spirits, made to undo the tethers that kept them here to this body.

Her strike was true.

Aeris witnessed as the phantom released skyward, and finally, her eyes could shut. She allowed herself a second to pretend that was all the rest she could take, before expelling that waiting breath from her lungs and pull her sword free. The Mourner turned, pulling her helm from her head and truly looked at Iruna. Emotions fought in those eyes, but Aeris was grateful either way for the assistance.

She will fall into the guilt later, when she was in bed and in a dark room.

 

[Ihaka Nikau]

Snapping jaws lunged at Haka's helm. He rolled his head to the left. To the right. The wolf's maw missed twice. It made to snap at him again, the very bones within its jaw creaking and snapping as its mouth stretched open to a gaping, snarling, salivating width that it just barely should not have been capable of. Haka, horrified by what the Revenants could do to the Possessed, spoke a hurried exclamation in his own tongue—

—just as the wolf, before it could snap down and lock its teeth into Haka's helm, went flying off of him. Something had smashed into it. Knocking it off. Haka looked. Tristan!

"Just in time, my friend!"

Haka stood upright, taking up his fighting stance side-by-side with Tristan. A ribbon of fleshy gore dangled from his weapon's spearpoint, torn out viciously from the wolf's body as it had been knocked off. Haka twirled the taiaha around, the ribbon fell to the ground with soft squelch, and Haka had the blade forward once again.

The wolf, twitching with inhuman spasms, nevertheless continued its imitation and stood again like a man. Green light poured now from the grievous wounds inflicted on the wolf, the ghostly creature wearing the wolf's body like a shell revealed all the more. Haka readied himself.

But a curious thing happened. The wolf suddenly dropped to the ground, completely limp, as though it were a thin garment discarded from the body of its wearer. The Revenant was now revealed in full, and it turned and fled, legless ethereal body soaring away through the forest as though a swift wind aided its retreat.

Haka relaxed, but only a little. He spared a glance over his shoulder, and then said to Tristan, "Was that the ward? Is it working, do you think?"

Tristan Locke Aeris Silversale Iruna Reverio

 

[Iruna Reverio]

"Two got away."

That didn't quite bode well, but it was better than any of their hearts stopping in their chests. They won, and that was most important. Iruna looked over everyone. They were all intact. The ward hopefully was as well. She turned to Tristan, and seeing he was okay, Iruna called to him.

"Get Ensis so he can take a look at this ward. It's obviously not working correctly and needs mending."

Iruna took her attention back to Aeris and held out her hand for stability. The poor girl really needed some rest. Hopefully it would come soon in some form or another.