RP:Queen Takes Pawn

Part of the A Line Drawn in the Sand Arc

Emilia starts to build an ice wall around the perimeter of the curse Gevuah has placed on the Coral Castle, a temporary measure to help save lives until the stone wall can be built.. After discovering Emilia's role in the plundering of an important Seaborn shrine, Mcracken negotiates a humane form of captivity for her in hope this will aid his quest for peace. But along comes a spider.. well, a lizard, because Mac totally killed the spider last time... bearing Gevurah, who deftly snatches Emilia from the kraken's grasp. Mac doesn't let her get away without a parting shot, however.

Stone Wharf, Cenril

Much the same as what you have observed recently in the nearby scenery, the large rocks and passing waves, most of which are pounding the southern surface of the rock's faces, eroding them into clean, smooth stones, age envisioned within their textures. The only notable difference from the western area is the crowded lot of clinging sea creatures actually adhered to the facades of the granite boulders. Mussels, few breeds of crab, urchins just above the water level, their tentacles writhing with the splash of moisture now and then. Of course, sea stars of six, seven, even up to eleven appendages at times, and of colors from pink to brown. Every so often, a gull will be daring enough to approach and attempt to steal away one of the appetizers before the waves come unto the rocks, but is usually not successful. To your west and east is near exact continuance of this.

Over the horizon at the point where water seems to stretch on without end in sight the colors of yellow-to-orange and pink streak through the fluffy white clouds and pale blue sky with a blurry reflection of the dawn coloring in the gentle lapping waves below. A would be beautiful morning along the wharf were it not for the visible dead bodies of sea life floating in the water. More deaths to add to the numerous ones before this day. The Genasi watched as the sun started to peak higher in the sky from one of the tents at the healer’s camp, ‘what should be a lovely sight destroyed by this ugly plague’ mouthed in a whisper to Nyna who sat half awake in her cot staring at the Genasi with that look of -what are you doing awake at this hour...-, but a sleepy nod was given in response of agreement to the other woman. A wave from the ice-woman toward the elf before she slid between the flaps of the tent out onto the shore. Those long white curls of the woman no longer carefree and wild this early morning, but braided against her scalp into two braids that fell mid-thigh in length. This was not the only change of style for the Genasi as she sported a two piece black bikini that stood out against her pale flesh, but almost matched that oddly glossy-black right hand of hers. It had been a mental debate over showing up at Dawn or skipping town in light of truths revealed the previous day, but true to her word Em arrived at the wharf just as dawn arrived. In her hands she carried a handful of parsley freshly picked for the sea dweller she was meeting with. Bare feet paced in silence along the stone wharf leaving behind faint prints of frost while she waited for Mcracken to arrive, mind racing over three things--what in the heck did he need parsley for when building a wall, why was raising a broken old sunken ship from the ocean depths so horrible, and of course, if this wall would truly solve anything.

Among those tentacles writhing around the stone wharf this day were Mac’s pale lemon-hued, blue-ringed appendages, as he clambered up the wharf from the water in caecelia-form, his upper half naked man, his lower half that of an octopoid. Pale suckers aided in the climb, making a series of rapid popping noises as they suctioned and lifted off the stone. Two long-boned humanoid arms also helped his ascent, until the kraken had his tentacley lower half wrapped around a tall mooring-post, his upper half facing Emilia, his silver-streaked dreads and beard streaming brine. The only adornment he wore this morning was that trillion-cut aquamarine gleaming in the hollow of his throat. Sputtering up a lungful of sea-water, he offered the woman a few words of greeting while staring alternately at the fistful of greenery she held, and the black ice hand he’d assumed the previous day to be some kind of glove. Here, in far closer proximity, he could not only see the difference, but felt the chill radiating from it. Mac nodded toward it, “Thy hand be most… strange, Lady. A recent development?”

Emilia at first sound of the rapid popping noises jumped, almost knocking herself over the edge of the wharf, almost. Her balance was caught just as the human torso of the sea-man rose up from the water in view. A faint blue hue rushed over her freckled cheeks as she for a moment blushed at the embarrassing moment of nearly falling. Turning ice-blue eyes upon Mcracken she offered a soft timid smile that accompanied that flush in her face. Silence lingered as she waited until he had finished greeting and pointing out her black hand with a question. “Oh, yes, that would be a bit recent....” she replied while holding up the dark hand and turning it to look at herself, the faint rays of the early morning sun making it shimmer, “An incident after playing with some black-ice up in Frostmaw, no worries. I am sure it is just fine.” Finishing she turned the subject away from herself by offering over the greens she held in her hand to the man-octopus-sea creature. “I really do not understand your kind, but here is that parsley that you were wanting from last night. I suppose I should have asked how much you wanted of it, but it was freshly cut last night so it is still good for whatever it is you plan on doing that requires a normally used garnish for us land walkers....” the Genasi spoke as she waited for him to take the herb from her. Sea-folk, stranger than strange with their desires.

Mac was many things, but ‘sure’ this woman and her more than profoundly frost-bitten hand were ‘just fine’ was not one of them. Brows looming in concern, he said nothing more on that issue, but plucked the leafy greens from her grasp gently. He stared at the herb again, take a sniff, stare some more.. Parsley? It dawned on him, then, what this was all about, but he didn’t want to offend Emilia so offered her quiet thanks and stuffed the greenery into his mouth, chewing it as swiftly as one may chew a large bunch of parsley all at once, and when he’d swallowed it all, said, “Delicious…” rather unconvincingly, then: “Thou dost not need ‘garnish’, M’lady… didst I not make it clear yestereve, that I hold no desire to eat thee?” Moving smoothly on to the next and more important topic, he hoped the whole parsley issue was now at an end. “If thou dost recall, I told thee I had contracted builders to make a wall.. And this they will do, but as I said, they will require several weeks to complete it. Dost thou think thine ice-wall will stay solid until the stone may replace it?” His teeth, as he spoke, were dotted with green.

Emilia raised a brow staring at the other as he stuffed the greens into his mouth to snack on. Really? He just wanted a snack before building this wall? Oh, how strange the tastes of the sea-folk were. Unlike him she had not picked up on the mis-communication between his accent on the word ‘parlay’ for the words parsley. Shaking her head slowly the she let him finish talking before she politely pointed toward his teeth, “You have a bit of greens all over your teeth...” Next time he wanted a snack she would remember his odd taste in dining habits. Running that glossy black hand over her braids the Genasi tilted her head left then right as she was talking to herself in her head over the proper way to answer his question about the wall of ice going up while waiting for a stone wall to replace it. Calculating and self-debate continued for a few long moments of silence before she finally spoke again, “The wall of ice will not remain standing for weeks on its own, but with proper watching and tending it should hold, but that would also require a source of cold to remain in the area to keep the sun from melting it and the water from breaking it apart. If the men work in sections from the same start point and at the right pace it may work out just fine as they replace the weak ice before it turns to mush with rocks.”

Mcracken said, “Ghere gnay mbe a kholution…” he was picking parsley from his teeth as he spoke this. Realising the action probably wasn’t helping Emilia, especially in light of her obvious difficulty with comprehension, he pulled his forefinger out of his mouth to repeat the sentence, “Ahem. A solution, to that issue.” What he had to say next was of a most delicate and complicated nature, and he paused a few moments as he pondered how, exactly, to phrase it. Finally, his mismatched eyes fixed on Emilia’s ice blue gaze, his expression and tone telescoping the seriousness of what he was telling her, “I knowest not the reason for thy plundering the sacred shrine to Selene, but thine actions hath sparked a great rage among the seaborn, for the ship thou didst raise was our most holy of holies. Added to the atrocities perpetuated against the seaborn by raiders who seek to peddle their flesh, living or dead..” Mac shook his head, “War, I fear, is inevitable. And entirely justified, on the part of my people. However, as it seems thou dost share my unwillingness to see the lives of innocents paid for the transgressions of the guilty, it may be that if the seaborn see some measure of justice done… and our relics returned to us, all of them….then war mayest be averted.” He’d let all that sink in for a time, then went on, speaking quietly now, and carefully, “In brief, I am suggesting that thou dost offer thyself up to seaborn justice – as I see fit to mete it – and enter a period of imprisonment of thine own free will, during which thou wouldst be indentured to serve our cause, and its peaceful resolution… being, the upkeep of the ice while the wall is under construction.”

Emilia tilted her head to the side staring at the man with his finger in his mouth while speaking as if he was now talking in an entire new tongue that was as far from common as it could get. Didn’t his mother teach him not to talk with his mouthful? After he removed his finger and repeated without the garble nonsense she took to listening with more interest on his idea of a solution of the melting of the wall without a caretaker. Unlike the folk of the sea the Genasi was not one to follow any sort of deity or belief in the Gods of Hollow for personal reasons from the past. This not shared commonality for belief in the higher beings that stood as a barrier between the ice woman and the sea man. How could anyone find a sunken ship of any value? “You are telling me that you find a ship that was sunk to the bottom of the ocean to be one of your most valued place of blessing? Pray tell the logic there. If a ship was cast down from the surface doomed to spend eternity at the bottom of the ocean wouldn’t that then be a place that would be unholy and doomed for the worse? The connection of a dead ship and of Selene blessing are not clicking here. The ship clearly wasn’t very well blessed at all if it ended up beneath the waves....” Em mumbled in comment on his statement about how holy of holies the place was for them, most of which was the Genasi talking aloud to herself without realizing her thoughts slipped the tongue. It was this moment that delayed the next part sinking in with serious nature of his request that she offer herself up to the sea dwellers as their prisoner...servant...indentured slave... Pause on the play. Did he really just suggest what she thought he said...? That look was ever evident on her face while she stared wide eyed into his mismatched gaze. Dead silence. Minutes of awkwardness with no words leaving those slightly parted lips as if she was about to say something then stopped, a few times over. Finally, a reply, “You are telling me that because I helped to raise a sunken ship...magically meaningful to you folk...you want justice from me giving myself over into your hands until the wall of ice...which was offered freely to aide in your cause...Haven’t I already brought you three healer’s of your request for aide to this curse of yours on top of offering to aide in creating a wall to keep the curse contained. And yet, you and your kind want me to jail myself to you, yet you do not make any promises that such an action will keep an unwanted war on both sides from erupting?”

Mac’s features betrayed no internal reaction to Emilia’s words other than utter calm as he listened, and when he was done he replied, hoping she would be able to understand his logic, “Not magically meaningful but religiously so, for aside from the fact it was a shrine, housed within were our sacred relics…One of which you didst mention, the Mother’s Mercy.. a blessed white stone that doth, say the legends, allow its bearer to heal most any wound when in proximity to the Oracle Shell. Away from it, the power is weakened, but still it hath influence.. The shell and the gems that accompany it were stolen, all but two of the Sacred Six, which I myself and a selkie maiden found in the wreck’s lower hold. As for the ship..” His shoulders lifted and dropped, “I doubt it was under any kind of holy protection, while still it sailed.” He’d leave that there, and move on, “Please, understand… I myself wouldst find thy present aid and the return of our relics enough. But I do not represent all of the seaborn, and as I just said, the reasons for their wrath against land-walkers are several, and all completely justified.” Mac wasn’t going to budge on that issue, it seemed. “Of course, I cannot feasibly guarantee peace will come of thy self-sacrifice, but it –would- give me a measure of leverage in negotiations for a peaceful resolution. That is…” he peered at the woman intently, as he said this, “.. if thou art not more interest in retaining our treasures, and in the wholesale slaughter of both land- and sea-peoples that will come, than thou art in peace.”

Emilia even after Mcracken had gone into further detail to what made this previously sunken ship a sacred place for the ocean dwelling folks did not fully understand their faith in it as a shrine to a God, but she did find a peace of understanding in the desire to have relics of meaning returned to them just as the elves desired the return of the forest to them after the drow invaded and kicked them out. “I still do not fathom why your people would be silly enough to turn a sunk ship of all things into a shrine over any other location that would be more fitting to house relics of importance in. I mean, if I owned something of that high value I surely wouldn’t go leaving it laying around inside of a something lacking protection....” she replied as she shook her head sending those braids dancing around her small frame. Seems the land walker might never grasp the idea of a sunken ship as a shrine. Turning her gaze out to the water where she guessed by the new height of the sun roughly how far past dawn it was getting with their conversation. Her goal was to avoid the mid-day heat of the sun while working on this temporary confinement for whatever plague-curse the sea-folk had brought upon Cenril. “I can understand your desire for wanting a return of that which is relic to your kind, but I cannot place any meaning to this ship shrine the logic is not there in any sense. However, I do wish to remind you that because you came ashore and started appearing that this deadly curse has befallen the land killing not just your sea-kind, but spread to those of us who walk on land....” an added note from the Genasi before a brief pause to gather her words correctly, “If you want me to give myself over to you for a series of weeks in order to preserve the lives of both people then you need to make more of a return benefit for my scrawniness. I am not a peace-stick to be held onto by one side or the other. I am a creature of ice, not water. I am a mother of three, a guild member to the healer’s, a leader to the Adventurer’s guild, a wife, and all these duties that fall into my lap on a daily basis will be given up to you for what? A possible chance of avoiding a war. If you truly desires my slavery to your kind for a series of unknown weeks you need to make me a better offer of peace and lack of war. I value lives over death and have put my life into a path of a healer to prevent and heal harm on those in need and will comply to your request if you can comply to no war against land walkers while I am under your chains.”

Whatever the Ancient One may have had to say about the choice of the ship as a shrine, he kept it to himself, glossing over the topic in favor of the several more immediately important ones. “Chains? M’Lady, I wouldst not have thee suffer such indignity.. Thou wilt be free to come and go as thou wish, to tend to thy duties and children when necessary, and tell thy people of our good faith agreement, lest they are angered. There art means by which thou mayest be kept alive beneath the waves and come to no harm, and means by which thou canst counteract these measures, to see to thy responsibilities if and when matters of import arise. The important thing is that thou dost –appear- to be imprisoned and enslaved, to those who rally for war. I shall teach thee a song that will mask thy comings and goings, to aid in this…” Mac’s hand touched the gem he wore, “And whilst thou must reside in the sea, thou canst retain the holy gem in thy possession, for better it is in the hands of a healer, than not. Too, think of this as a mark of my good faith in thee.” The kraken glanced toward the shore then, and said, “For many centuries hath my people kept themselves to themselves, M’Lady, for the most part hidden from land-walkers and their matters. Not until the raiders came from these shores to steal our people, to enslave and murder them, did the seaborn rise… “ His face was a mask of sorrow, at the thought, “And this curse, no matter what excuses are mouthed for its presence, serveth no-one but the death god and his minions. Why else would his geis be set to kill so indiscriminately? The Deep-Elves, as thou surely must know, are not famed for their love of surface dwellers. Nay, more is afoot than may be plainly seen, on that front, I fear.”

Emilia glanced once more upon the sun over the ocean water watching as it barely moved higher with their conversation, but valuable time was passing when she could be getting started on this large scale ice project. A project that would leave the tiny white woman weakened from using her element in an area not matching of equal element to aide in her job. As such, the woman began to start a slow pacing along a length of roughly six to seven feet so that she never moved out of easy talking distance to Mcracken who might find that the land walker was just partaking in a noted human nervous behavior, especially since the movements began after he spoke on this jail being under water, her greatest fear. In reality the Genasi was allowing the chill from her small being leak out through her bare feet when she made contact with the ground below, getting it ready to support a frozen barrier sitting upon it. While she paced back and forth, twirling the ends of her braids around her thumbs she listened to him, taking in his words, making her true choice in the matter at hand, and of course, talking in response to him. “Until your kind emerged from their solitude in the ocean there was only myths and fairy tales about sea folk from ages ago. Rare moments of mermaid sightings from the sailors, but all pointed to seasickness from being aboard a ship for too long. Had that not been more than just bed time stories I can almost fully assure you that myself and those select few others who choose to rise the sunken ship from the depths would not have happened. We do try to harm as little as possible in our treasure hunting adventures....” she noted for whatever it may be worth to the sea-man. Her pacing continued nearly at an annoying rate the way she walked back and forth, back and forth in a near never ending cycle without ever straying from her line, frosted prints replaced by new ones with each passing step. “You do realize that you are now not only asking me to offer myself over to you, but to place myself into a confined space below water? To put myself into the thing that I fear the most in all of the land? You claim that you are not trying to kill me, but....” the thought never was completed as a gull from above came flying over the wharf and letting free a natural release of feces from the sky that so happened to land on the forehead of the ice-woman. To make such worse the white matter instantly froze to the chilled flesh of the lady. “...are you kidding me?” replaced the thought as Em shook her empty hands in the air with a bit of mixed anger-frustration at what just happened before promptly knocking the frozen gull-poo off her face in a single sideways slid of the thumb.

Mac glanced up sharply at the offending sea-bird, “Kerkaw!” he cried, which might come across to Emilia as some kind of random and bizarre attempt at a bird-call, rather than the flying creature’s name. “I forbid thee from any further attack,” he continued, shouting to the ominously circling bird above Emilia’s head in a chill, stern tone, “For whilst King of Gulls thou mayest claim to be, the sea is mine, and thou wilt find it most difficult to keep reign over thy people, if all that lies under the waves doth go to war with thee and thine!” The bird krawked loud protest at this, but quickly flew away, followed a host of his kin who rose from sea and shore, flapping off to less threatening climes. Mac shook his head in chagrin, “He wilt take any opportunity to show off his ‘might’, that one…” The kraken focussed once more on the issue at hand, “I am aware, M’lady, that the long ages of our seclusion hath remade us as myths in the minds of land-walkers. The stories are to this day told in your taverns, and the songs sung, but only in terms of legend. Why is it do you think that I seek not wrathful vengeance, but peace?” He watched her pacing a moment as he gathered his thoughts, “Thou needst not be ‘confined’ beyond the level that is necessary to keep thee safe, this I assure thee. Perhaps if thou dost see the wonders of the ocean as the seaborn do, thy fears will be abated?” He still hadn’t mentioned the issue of the ban from war on land-walkers, quite on purpose.

Emilia scratched at temple as she watched the scene unfold between bird and man. Perhaps the lack of proper oxygen to his head with living a life below water had gotten to his brain causing spurts of crazy out bursts. At least, this is what the Genasi is going with for the moment to explain his random bird calling. Shaking her head slowly after he had turned the subject back to the previous matter the ice woman rubbed her temples trying to put a full comprehension on the issue on the large scale from prevented war and deaths to being stuck under water to some crazed depth that might never let her out, personal fear. The pacing never stopped while she played a mini chess game in her head over the moves and outcomes of each move that could be made tonight. As the ground below began to chill from contact with the feet of the Genasi it would become more apparent that her inability to stand still was not simply out of nerves, but for a purpose. A thin layer of frost started as simple footprints had slowly turned itself into a six and a half foot section of thin ice on the ground with a width of about three feet. She was starting the first section of the wall with a basic foundation as she traveled in a pacing manner. “I am still finding that your offer on being shown off as a captive to your people not convincing to my terms previously stated. However long it takes your hired men to replace my wall of ice is how long I have to remain under you and your sea folks hold. If I must remain mostly captive to the sea then I want to hear that your kind will not start waging a war against mine on land. That is my terms to willing go with you. No war is to be started, if war is the must be answer, while I am not able to be fully free to aide in their needs,” she pointed out again in case he missed her terms for peace. Each passing change of direction now added a layer of ice onto the previously made base. Over the course of her talking she was walking along the top of a small section of wall standing roughly four inches off the ground.

Mcracken had been dodging this no-war part of their pact as a means of gaining time to think on how he might comply, given that he was not a god who could simply move people’s wills and bodies about like pieces in a game. His frown was deep by the time he finally spoke, but with thought rather than ire, “I can vow to thee that –I- will not wage war, nor will I support the efforts of any seaborn who may launch attack. I will defend, however, against those who wouldst move first to cause harm, which is only reasonable, surely, but I will do my utmost to keep peace, whilst thou art…”

Some weeks ago, shortly after her discovery that the creature she wounded was in fact a kraken, Gevurah stationed scouts in Cenril to watch the castle from a distance. The distance was a matter of necessity, of course, as they too would perish if exposed to Vakmatharas’s curse. Frequently they reported to their mistress that the beached kraken flopped around on bipedal limbs around the castle perimeter, often in the company of healers and other surfacers dressed to impress a certain power or ability. Their surveillance had yielded little more than that. Though this had piqued Gevurah’s curiosity, more urgent crises vied for her attention and won. In Vakmatharas she trusts. The curse would have to hold, and nothing the scouts reported had led her to believe her curse would be lifted, until now. Ice? That was new. She stole away from the D’Artes estate alone, astride a black lizard and beneath the veil of a piwafwi enchanted to look like a shadow. When in motion, the enchantment appears like an undulating shadow, and this shadow undulated right out the rear of House D’Artes, across the northern cavern wall of Trist’oth, through the eastern tunnels until it surfaced in the gorge face beneath the bridge that connects Cenril to the central plateau, then along the underside of that same bridge, around the exterior southern wall of Cenril, over that wall like an insect, through Arril street, and finally, approaching from the north, into the castle proper under the protection of the curse. She levitated in the shadow of a crumbling turret and observed the beach herself. There he was as reported, with a pale woman Gevurah recognized in an instant. Xersom’s wife. Yes. The priestess had forgotten about her. She bid her time. It may turn out that this trip was for naught. Though drow do not live as long as kraken, they too are a race blessed with long life and patience, and she was more than happy to let Mcracken crack his own skull against her curse as she moved her pieces on the chessboard that has materialized between them.

Mcracken, oblivious to the shadowy figure spying on them from the accursed castle, continued, “…in my custody.” It was the best he had to offer her, as things stood.

Emilia appeared to have feet that did not stop walking, like standing in one place for more than a few seconds was impossible. The endless pacing back and forth along the section of dry land beneath her feet slowly rising the little pale woman higher into the air as she erected a section of wall made purely of ice to protect those outside the boundaries from a terrible fated death. She might not be good for much when it comes to being near the ocean with her fear of water, but she was pretty handy at making things cold and frozen. Lucky for Mcracken he was after a wall built from this trait of the Genasi. As she moved the ice began to stretch out from the initial six and a half foot long section to expand in length as well as height until one side bumped into the a piece of broken castle where it would form its starting link to the area. Now as the ice woman paced she was unaware of the shadow that had sneaked into their midst, spying on their every move. “I believe that if you can account for your choosing of peace to prevent war and making best attempts at keeping your own kind from turning war into the only option then we may consider making this deal of yours. I am taking this on word that you hold some decent bit of sway over the general population of your sea living folk,” Em rattled on with the chosen promise that Mcracken could make to her in the regards to peace. All the while pacing the ice to the point she was walking up and down the segments like stairs as it built itself up from the ground and expanded slowly out away from its latching point on land

Gevurah wasn’t sure if this ice wall would present a problem. What was the kraken doing? And why was Xersom’s wife involved? (Yes, yes, she had a name, but this is the trouble with marrying icons, everything close to icons is described by its relationship to the headliner.) Xersom had long ago left House D’Artes well alone, and Gevurah was more than happy to reciprocate with distance. Still, a recent discovery in the chaos realm had spooked the drow, and she could use Xersom’s power on her side of a war to come. Unfortunately she lacked negotiating power with Xersom. Until now. The shadow dropped back down onto the lizard and crept along the ground silently toward a section of the ice wall on the shore nearest the castle and furthest from Mcracken, who stood on the exterior of Emilia’s icey structure while Gevurah climbed up its interior. She pressed a palm to the wall and focused her mind. Her palm began to heat. Just when Emilia passed overhead again, a column of fire erupted from Gevurah’s palm upwards toward the cyromancer, melting (hopefully) a vertical shaft in the wall through which Emilia could fall as if in a sinkhole (or, you know, Connect Four!) If the woman fell, Gevurah would catch the slight woman, switch to her mastered craft as a priestess of Vakmatharas and quickly knock the genasi unconscious through a whispered spell, though the spell requires touch if the desired effect is to be immediate.

Mcracken had barely spoken a scant few words in reply to Emilia when a cloud of steam rose from the wall and the woman seemed to simply…vanish into the ice. Alarmed, he uncoiled his tentacular lower half from the mooring-post he’d used as a support, and with a cry of “M’lady!” used those rubbery, flexible lower limbs to push himself off the structure for a powerful leap into the waves. He could have shattered the ice, but wasn’t sure whether this would harm Emilia, and with the partially built structure blocking his view, his only recourse was go around the wall by sea. Ten strong limbs propelled him swiftly around the demi-built structure, the chill of the water impeding his haste somewhat, for he is after all a creature of the tropics in origin. As he cut through the water, he made a swift prayer to Selene for the safety of the Genasi… and while no deus ex machina hand of the goddess groped from the deeps to rescue the maiden, the sacred gem he wore flared into brilliance as he rounded the edge of the icy barrier…. The Star of the Sea, that holy relic, warding off the effects of the death-god’s curse, though Mac was unaware of this in the immediate moment. He was simply less concerned about his own well-being, than he was for Emilia’s.

Emilia turned to walk along the forming wall of ice in the direction away from the male company she was in with a pivot of bare feet over solid ice like a graceful dancer. With ice as her dance floor the ice maiden moved with ease and grace unlike her more clumsy nature on other terrains. It was this natural grace that faltered when the frozen mass beneath her gave way, collapsing into a slush of melted ice cold water below (Hopefully Gev brought her umbrella with her). The lass was clearly not expecting her work to crumble under the heat of the sun so quickly, her first mental assumption, nor a bursting of fire from below to randomly melt a section of her wall, the second mental assumption. Neither of which did the Genasi have time to act upon into full light thanks to the drow below. It was with a strange pitch of startled tone, like ice cracking below one’s feet, that accompanied her sudden plummet toward the ground. A sound that ended in the most abrupt of manners after being caught by someone unknown and knocked unconscious by a subsequent whispered spell. This would leave Gev with a rather limp rag-doll like version of the Genasi in her arms. Lucky for her the white woman was rather light weight and unlucky for her to be stuck holding a being cold as the ice in Frostmaw adorn in a two piece swimsuit just for this wall project exposing her to the direct contact of the frozen flesh---more often than not causing most to suffer from frostbite with prolonged exposure when her focus was not on keeping the chill in...something she is unable to do when unconscious.

Gevurah nearly dropped Emilia when the woman collapsed for the frost was so severe and unexpected. Quickly she removed her piwafwi and wedged it between her skin and Emilia’s to protect herself, hissing in pain as the lizard descended the lower portion of the ice wall and scuttled back to the castle. With the piwafwi removed, the shadow-enchantment dispelled and Mcracken could clearly see his favorite drow racing inland with her prize. The lizard zig zagged around structures and climbed vertical walls with ease in an instinctually evasive maneuver. Although the priestess heard the kraken cry out for Emilia, she did not linger to taunt him. The necromancer beast and its cult had seized her grim imagination and she must stash away Emilia posthaste in some secret, dark, lonely place in the underdark.

Mac gave not one iota of thought to the curse, as he plowed through the brine toward Gevurah, her lizard and their unconscious, chilly passenger. But while he moved as swiftly as any sea-creature was able, the drow and her mount had the twin advantages of both speed and a head start on land, and those octopoid legs of his were neither made for land-walking nor quickly enough exchanged for human limbs to make a chase across the beach possible— he was stuck at the shoreline. His only hope in stopping Gevurah was to employ the method used when last they’d met… His jaw dropped, and from the kraken’s throat rose a mighty swell of sound— a churning, shrill, hypnotic belt of magically-embued noise, aimed like an eardrum-and-mind-shattering spear directly at the dark elf, during one of her lizard’s vertical scurries. Gevurah, clever as she was, had made mistakes… and one of them was making an enemy of Laezila, who had most obligingly given Mac his current most handy weapon against Gev… her name! This sound was the kraken-language version of it, weaponised by Mac’s magical prowess coupled with the gem’s holy might. For names, as any smart magic user knows, hold power.. or danger, when known by one’s enemies. If this blast of noise reached its target and did not knock the drow out cold or physically stun her, it was very likely to echo around in her head for days, possibly weeks to come… around and around and around again.. each time her name was spoken in her hearing.