RP:The Herd is on the Move - Part 3

Part of the The White Hunt Arc

Summary:

Snowy Path

Leone 's boots crunch upon the well packed snow. Of course the mutlitude of horses had packed the powdery precipitation down to nearly ice. Half running, half sliding along, the High Priestess is moving at breakneck speed down the road - or what remains of the road through the wilds. Panting heavily, great gouts of air leaving her mouth in puffs of white, like the steam stack of a locomotive, the shaky shoer continues to beat feet away from the city and toward the ravages of vengeful spirits, wild animals, and punishing climate. Tiny and well-muscled, the bantam blacksmith is speedy for a human, though not supernaturally so.

Linn was more than fit to run and had the advantage of height, though the state of his ankle made it difficult to go at full speed. He was barely keeping pace with the priestess as he chased her who-knows-where through the forest, his boots crunching against the ice with each step. Soon enough he had given up on running his way to Leone; he had a slippery surface underneath, might as well use it to its fullest. The rhythmic sound of metal slamming on ice stopped to be replaced with a constant hissing as he slid down the icy path, keeping himself moving along upright with a combination of magic and great practice sliding around. Under this stance he was able to kick against the ice and gain some more speed to close the distance.

Leone turns a curious stare upon Linn as he comes scooting along, sliding down the icy road with little aide other than gravity and the occasional kick of his feet. The prietess slows down, just enough to really attempt to focus on the spellblade. The trial-and-error is useless, and one of her eyes drifts to the side, unable to focus. Already, the livid, deep red of a bruise is visible above the farrier's cloak collar on its slow, leeching path to her jaw. Another blue-tinged discoloration emerges from her hairline, moving along the bloodvessels in her forehead and temple like fingers of frost upon a window pane. "Go back," the High Priestess insists to her sliding shadow, her typically diametric notes of sand and silk harboring more grit and strain than normal.

Linn braked himself to match the priestess’s pace, skidding to a stop as the two finally met. His breathing was left shallow and quick from the exertion, but it left him more focused on her than anything. To Leone’s command he gave a serious look back, eyeing the growing bruises and repercussions of the recent events with some concern. “What are you looking for out here?” he commanded more than asked, the words carrying some personal weight to them, whether it be the answer itself or what that answer may be.

Leone purses her lips disapprovingly, tawny tiers flexing and yawing like an incoming tide while her mismatched eyes still struggle to focus upon the male. It's not Krice, she knew as much when Linn spoke; this was not Krice's voice that demanded answers of her in return. "I have to let them out," the plover declares in exasperation, one arm thrust outward, parallel to the ground, and the hand in the direction of the path further west, "Or they'll die in there. I can't leave an entire herd to die." Without further ado, the priestess then begins to march deeper into the wilds, and further away from the city.

Linn follows after Leone, suddenly perplexed at the answer. To think that there was just a whole stampede coming from this direction, that something could still be trapped? “Trapped?” came the single word from behind, much more curious this time around. He pulled alongside so that they could keep walking. The two weren’t anywhere near the location of his last incidents with the ghosts and undead, but there was still something wrong.

Leone sighs, her head lolling to the side to look at Linn as she walked, though one of the brilliant, jewel-bright orbs drifts to the side. "Yes. The frostmares will die inside the in-between if I don't let them out again. They're rare enough as is, I'm not going to condemn and entire herd," the priestess reiaterates, her words very carefully enunciated (though there's still a good bit of a slur to certain consonants). She continues to tromp along, the vibrant green gaze, like sunlight upon treetops, sweeping over the landscape as they travel.

Linn looked upwards with a half-smile of realization of what exactly was going on. It faded with a sigh as he looked at her condition with concern. His daze had mostly worn off, by now expressing itself only with a bit of lightheadedness, but the priestess looked like she just might collapse in comparison. “I’ll stay with you while you release them. Just in case I might have to carry you out afterwards.” A small smirk came across his face before he looked a little disappointed with himself. “It’s probably the most I could do to help with that situation.” He continued on with her, idly chipping at the ice that had formed over his armor as they travelled.

Leone frowns delicately in response to Linn. A moment later, the black and silver crown of the farrier is shaken in a nod, a silent acceptance of the male's offer to accompany her. Rounding a bend and seeing the lengths of the path before them, the blacksmith huffs a note, a grunt of approval, before she comes to a complete halt. Boots skidding on the ice, even after her legs have stopped moving, the farrier wheels her arms in order to stay upright and, finally finds her center of balance once more. A hand is flapped in the direction of Linn's blurry form before the metallurgist's pert mouth is again set into motion. "Back up," she instructs the spellblade, her tone flat and matter of fact.

Linn simply raises a brow to the frown before he chases after her once more, ending with eyes wide at a potential fall before the thought is arrested. Once they had stopped he backs up just as instructed, taking a spot in the denser packing of trees that would deter the charging frostmares. Whatever went in to that portal was probably about to come out in the same state, angry, frightened, and moving very quickly. He watched anxiously, hoping that the frostmares would at least stick together going away from them.

Leone repeats her earlier, initial actions at the stampede, one hand drawing a vertical line through the air, the terminating digit traced by a thin, white tract of light. Gripping the argent stream as if it were the hem of a bedsheet, the farrier then begins to pull the division between the living and dead worlds asunder once again. Colors separate like bad paint, leaving only the underlying tones of grey and brown in their wake. The petite plover's unsteady furling of the veil is abruptly interrupted. The Frostmares, eagre to be loosed from their monotone prison and spying the initial glimmer of light, are already charging through the meagre opening - and straight into the High Priestess. As the powerful, midnight blue equines burst through the scant slit in reality, the first one barrels head-first into Leone. The tide of hooves then surge outward, tromping and trampling over the diminutive wad of black and red huddled on the ground. Crescents of white, remnants of ice and snow begin to build up against the dark fabric, while below the cloistered mass, red starts to fan out, painting the icy ground in crimson ichor.

Linn watched the portal with intent as it opened up, eager to get a closer look at the fracture in the dimensions. His watch barely bought him enough time to see through the portal to find the frostmares already charging in Leone’s direction. By the time the first frostmare had knocked Leone over he was taking his leap onto the road to pull her from the tide of hooves. Interposing himself between the portal, the hooves, and the robed body of the priestess each blow was met with a flash of light from under his armor. No spot was safe as he was kicking his way out with the priestess held close; hooves landed on the solid plates of his limbs and chest, in the mail that covered his open joints, each strike causing the flexible armor to harden under the impact and mitigate the damage. Somehow his head, the one unprotected part of him made it out mostly intact, sustaining a kick or two to the back but he was still able to recover and get them out of the new stampede. Once they were out of the immediate danger he had a chance to notice the blood beginning to stain her robes. Cursing he lifted the reddened robes, looking for the damage she sustained.

Leone is mostly unconscious...mostly. The farrier has just enough awareness left to throw her weight to one side, and back toward the open doorway between the lands of the living and the dead. It is difficult to tell, amid the tide of blood and snow that covers her, exactly what is wrong with the High Priestess. Beneath the red and black Aramothian attire, the farrier's leathers do a decent enough job of holding her parts and pieces together - for now. Grotesquely visible and almost immediately apparent is the woman's fractured collarbone. A shard of white, slathered in darkening claret, juts up through a hole in her cream-colored skin. It is dangerously close to, and pointed at, her jugular. The frostmares finish exiting the between-worlds, evacuating with terrified haste to the south. Pulling against Linn's helpful (life-saving) efforts, the cleric is trying to get back to the portal. "Have to," the diminutive woman rasps out in a wheezy whisper, indicative of a collapsed or potentially punctured lung, "Close it."

Krice jogged in from the north, most likely following the sound of horse hooves and panicked whinnies - not to mention the crackling of that once-again opened portal. It took him only seconds to discern the two 'combatants' amid the flow of frostmares and he sprinted away from Callamyre to be at their side quickly. As he descended to his knees in front of Linn and Leone, his gaze shifted briefly to the dispersing horses just long enough to deduce that none of them were coming their way. With the sudden appearance of that light-shard jutting out from the priestess' skin, Krice reached down to help Linn keep her steady, his right hand flattening around the base of the shard against her neck - not her throat - whilst the other hovered around the shard itself. " Leo," he breathed, concern evident in his tone, though his features were mostly calm. " Don't move. You’re too injured."

Callamyre followed alongside Krice, determined to help him the others. As they eventually came within perception of the unfolding events, Calla again gasped in wonder at Leone's portal-making abilities, a million questions bubbling up -- each once silenced as she truly took in the sight before her. As Krice moved forward, so too did the scientist, her glowing hazel eyes scrutinizing the scene, and without hesitation, she began to reach into the small pouch hanging from her left hip. From within the leather satchel the woman retrieved a vial and eyedropper, passing them to either Krice or Linn. "For her pain," she insisted first, then, looking at Leone, quickly came to the conclusion that something had to be done about her clavicle, and fast. Cursing her lack of tools, the woman knelt beside Krice, looking at him, Linn, then back to Leone. "No, do not move, ma'am," Calla insisted, echoing Krice's words. "Oh dear, oh dear." Swallowing, she turned her attention up to the cleric's face, and said, "Hello, I'm Callamyre, we've not yet had a chance to meet, but ... how do you feel about taking my blood?" She paused, then, to look at the menfolk, "Unless one of you has another suggestion? I am not a healing sort of, uh, doctor."

Linn’s gaze races up and down her body, taking in the pieces that were out of place. He sets down on the broken collarbone and winces briefly before attempting a spell, the effort of which makes him nearly collapse before he could get anywhere. He drew the violet crystal from his pouch again, the darkness within it an eerie shadow of death trapped inside the sparkling material. “One second” he coughs out, the black and blue veil of force seeping from the crystal before it made its way to the broken collarbone and attaching itself to the splintered end. “This is gonna hurt.” He stated before pulling her shoulder over to make space for the bone and setting it back into her body, the field finding the other end and pulling the two together, the cracks and chips in the bone making it clear that it was set, but still broken. That last magical effort costed him though; with the bone set his will faltered, every muscle in his body relaxing at once as he fell away from her, laying on the ground in exhaustion. “I can’t help much further right now.” He muttered, trying to regain his composure.

Leone coughs and wheezes, the sound like a deflated set of bagpipes upon the icy air. The plover reaches out toward Krice as soon as he speaks, her odd-sized pupils still not able to regulate themselves. Her fingers search through the air, the swordsman's words helping to direct her hand up toward her own splintered clavicle. "Have to," the plover once again grunts out, the effort to speak apparent in the way her stomach contracts in order to push the words out, "Close it." As Callamyre hovers over her, the partially blinded priestess reaches for the vampire in turn, a beseeching effort to gather the other woman's attention. "Get him away," she croaks cryptically to the woman, the last note of the word escalating into a gutteral scream as Linn resets the displaced collarbone amid the magical buzz and sizzle of his crystal spell containers. Depending upon attention shifting to Linn as he falls away, exhausted, the farrier rolls to one side and begins to crawl (using only one arm) toward the gaping rift in reality.

Krice had been so focused on Leone and her terrible condition that he hadn't noticed Linn's possession of such magics. When he procured the magical crystal and angled it toward the priestess' broken collar bone, he was -forced- to acknowledge the presence of magic and realization dawned on him. Despite his desire to keep hold of Leone, to keep her steady and motionless lest she damage her collarbone further, the warrior withdrew his hands to allow Linn room to mend what he could of her compound fracture, his lips pressed firmly together. The priestess' entreating words to Callamyre were not lost on the warrior, but if she attempted to move him away, he'd murmur a guttural, " No, don't." He couldn't leave the priestess' side, not whilst she was in such pain, and in so poor a state. As she screamed through the crystal's healing, he winced and set his jaw, guarding himself against the onslaught of sympathy and empathetic pain caused by her suffering. The energies that seeped out of the stone itself were very palpable to him, and it was with apprehension that he watched the crystal work, in that time noting the enchantments upon Linn's armour. What a... well-endowed user. And then it was over, and Linn collapsed away from the woman, which granted Krice space and time to slide his left arm beneath her shoulder blades. She seemed insistent on moving, and given the crackling energy of the open portal so nearby, he knew that she -needed- to. " Calla, be careful," he warned toward the vampire, nodding to indicate the fallen male. " Check him," he asked, sharing with the scientist an entreating frown as he moved to lead Leone closer to the portal but off to the side - for safety reasons. With his arm secured around her waist, he held her upright.

Callamyre fell silence, not expecting any answer from Leone, especially not one as quizzical as the one eventually given her. "Huh?" the woman started, but then looked over to Linn as he began preparing the crystals for their intended use. Realizing magick was at play, she looked over to Krice, but his warning took the words from her mouth, and she sighed, resigned at his stubbornness. The cleric's screams inspired an empathetic wince from the vampire, but soon enough, the other woman was crawling toward the portal again. As Krice moved to help her finish what she'd started, she heeded the warrior's words, and turned her attentions now to Linn. Although she had only just met the other tonight -- and not even properly at that -- she was hesitant, but approached him anyway. "Hey," the brunette murmured, reaching out with a gloved hand to rest it tentatively upon one of Linn's shoulders. Assessing quickly that his condition was not unlike her own after a log of magick use, she offered him a small smile. "How are you doing?"

Linn couldn’t afford to have sympathy for Leone’s pain during the setting, his focus only intensified in order to block out the scream before he collapsed with his work done. The blue field of energy retreated to the crystal as he lay on the ground, too exhausted to even roll to his back. His breath was shaky from the exertion and current tension, eyes closed and brows furrowed as he sought some kind of mental rest. The enchantments over his armor had dimmed to mere traces of what they were supposed to be now that they had no more energy to draw on. As Callamyre came to inspect his condition she would see the back of his head beginning to gloss with blood from where he had been kicked as well as a series of old, chaotic scars over the back of his neck. He moaned at the question, eyes still closed. “It feels like I’ve been punched in the soul. Otherwise mostly okay.”

Leone lists heavily toward the portal when Krice draws her near. The plover is singularly focused, intent upon closing the wide, open doorway before something far more sinister than a herd of Frostmares decides to bless them with its presence. One hand extends toward the rift, the petite priestess hissing in pain as she reaches for the mass of grey nothingness. Notably, she is not bearing weight upon one leg, leaving Krice all the more burdened. Nothing happens. There is no pull, no movement to the curtain of perception between the worlds; the High Priestess fails to pull the portal shut. A steady, searching look is pinned to the swordsman's face, and the bantam blacksmith grimaces. "Have to," she half-growls, half-breathes out to the silver-haired male, "Go through."

Krice wasn't burdened at all, nor would he ever be whilst assisting Leone. As she extended her arm to pull the portal closed, he shifted out his right foot just a little to better brace them for whatever blowback might occur. With nothing happening, and the priestess regarding him with that particular stare, the warrior gazed down at her questioningly and was already frowning before she voiced her next plan of action. Going through the portal? " No, Leo," he quietly entreated, his fingers flexing around her ribs to keep her close. " What if you can't come out?" Though he was clearly concerned for her well-being, the silver-haired man attempted to remain at least -partially- composed in the face of this revelation.

Grailan was not going to let the manifests of the spectres and spirits, wraiths and poltergeists, out of the spectral plane that mirrored the physical, living realm and which had its barrier torn asunder in order to allow the movement of the stampeding herd; the man, if he could be called that definitively, manifested just outside the portal on the physical side, where the living dwelled. He was clad in glossy ebony, obsidian-like made armor from neck to feet and the outfit included pauldrons, cuirass, belt, greaves, boots, bracers, and gauntlets. It was an outfit that effectively made this pale man, whose flesh was pallid as if absolved of all blood flow and drained completely, clad in black. More curious than the actual plating of the armor itself, however, was the adornments that decorated it. Among these trophy-similar accents were mostly polished and bone-white skulls, and the second-majority of decorative pieces were spikes of the same make as the armor that were pointed outward from his body in a manner that seemed to attempt intimidation. While most of his body was clad in this morbid suit, his bloodless skin was made evident by his face; specifically the area of his mouth, nose, and chin were visible, as shadow veiled the rest from an overhanging hood of a midnight hue most complimentary to his armor. His hair was long, two cascading tresses escaping from along his neckline and death made visible by their decaying white color -as if it used to be a more vivid hue, but long since lost its life and rotted to a grotesque white. Both gauntlets and accompanying arms were spread wide in a wingspan out to either side of the cloaked and armored form, before they viciously ripped together in a semi-circle in front of him, to meet before his face with an unnaturally deafening clang of metal colliding with metal. And the portal, just like that, wrenched closed as if whatever was interfering with a naturally-inclined shutting of the threshold was suddenly removed, and like wanting to seal this entire time, the portal basically -slammed- closed from its previously and straining ajar state. Slowly, seemingly unconcerned as his arms fell to his sides, the hooded and cloaked -evidentally undead- creature turned as if on a macabre sense of foreboding, to face the High Priestess. Although his eyes were veiled by the shadow of his hood, it was made apparent his fixation by a funereal lack of haste that began the melancholy man's gait in a direct path toward the wounded, petite plover held upright by the silver-haired warrior. One gauntlet outstretched, palm opened, toward the pair, in gesture of emphasis that this creature wanted the High Priestess in his hold -his embrace, rather than the swordsman's.

Callamyre 's gaze went from Linn's head, to his feet, then back to his head again, her expression curious as she caught a glance of his scars. Her expression shifted to one with a more serious nature, and she sucked in a slight gasp. "You are hurt," the woman said to Linn, her voice very low as to not alarm him as to the potential severity. With a delicate touch, the vampire pressed against Linn's head -- if he'd allow her to, that is. Meanwhile, she dared a quick glance around them, something causing the fine golden hairs on the back for neck to stand on end. It was then that the vampire caught sight of Grailan and his approach of her companion and the cleric. "Go through?" she repeated half to herself. "With -him-?" The vampire's gold gaze streaked across to where Grailan stood, fixing him with an inquisitive stare before looking back down at Linn. "You have a wound, on the back of your head," she told him matter-of-factly. "It needs to be addressed." Head wounds usually did. Yet, even as the woman said this, her attention drifted back to where Krice supported Leone, nervous as to what was going on.

Linn opened his eyes at the clash of metal to find Grailan shutting the portal. His head tilted towards the ground from his laying position. A brief “Huh” escaped his mouth at the knight’s arrival, this time with much more respect and relief than defiance (Not that he was in a position to be unhappy with his presence). He winced at the mention that he was hurt, knowing the feeling of blood on that exact same place. Distracting himself from the wound with the unfolding scene in front of him he nodded as if to approve of Grailan’s request. Whatever he had done in their last meeting inspired some kind of respect in the spellblade. As the topic returned back to his wound he sighed, “Yeah, I can feel the blood now. Skull feels intact luckily, just stop the bleeding so we can get it looked at later.”

Leone is fixated up the portal, what little is left of her strength pulling, leveraging against the hold that Krice has upon her as she seeks to escape through the potentially dangerous opening - until it slams shut. The sound created by the dread knight's less than delicate handling of the magical opening causes a very visceral reaction in the cleric. She flinches bodily, her entire frame rising and locking into place for several moments. Blurred, unseeing eyes swim through the murky gloom of her injuries to land upon the darkened mass that betrays the outline of Grailan's form. She cannot see the undead reaching for her. With the realization that she is no longer being buffeted by a spectral wind, the priestess releases a groaning sigh before she sags against Krice. It is more than mere relaxation: the farrier's chin drops to her chest before her head lolls to one side and her legs give way entirely. It seems that the unconsciousness she has been fighting since the initial blow to the head has finally claimed the sacred smith.

Krice had been looking at Leone due to her earlier mention of needing to venture through the portal to close it, but he was not blind - or numb - to the presence of another; a more sinister form materializing from the plane across the threshold. Turning his head, the warrior locked his gilded stared upon the shadowed face of the Death Knight, whose presence wasn't ever welcomed - but not loathed, either. When he clapped shut the portal that rippled behind him, the silver-haired man couldn't help the hardening of his stare, reflecting some deeper distrust of the Knight. Since the portal was closed, however, Leone would no longer need to go through. This, at least, was one positive. Feeling Leone flinch, per his arm wrapped around her waist, he shifted his hold to both better support her and to give her reassurance that the sound was nothing to worry about. Grailan's approach was watched closely by Krice, who became distracted by the shifting of Leone's weight from supported to almost lifeless. Turning his attention off the Death Knight, the silver-haired man bent at the knees to move with Leone in preventing her body from jolting, and deftly slid his other arm into place beneath her knees before hoisting her up against his chest. With his left shoulder slightly higher than the other, he offered the Priestess' head a 'cushion' of support. Regarding Grailan past his unconscious companion, the hardened stare of the enigmatic swordsman accentuated his no-argument tone: " I've got her," he asserted. " Thanks for closing the portal." Before long, he took a single step back and turned toward Callamyre and Linn, but only to address the former. " I need to get her back to the fort, where other healers can tend to her in safety." Pressing his lips together, the warrior expressed regret for having to leave Linn - unless of course the vampire could assist him back - and then turned to depart the area. He didn't get more than two steps away before his supernatural senses detected something troubling. Halting, Krice lowered his gaze over Leone and watched her for a few seconds. Before long, he released a quiet curse that told of distress and urgency. A turn of the head aligned those gilded eyes onto Grailan again and he called out a firm - but not rude, " She's severely injured. Can you heal her right now, right here, or not?" A pause, and then a resolute, " I'm not letting you take her." Krice didn't know why the Death Knight was so possessive over Leone; all he knew was that -he- cared for her, and his concern for her well-being was tangible.

Grailan's manner didn't become any more hostile than it was previous; it neither wavered nor hardened in the slightest as Krice refused to hand over the High Priestess and asserted that he had the woman in a no-argument tone. The Dread Knight did not, however, argue. His hand opened further briefly with a slight thrust indicative of a reassertion of his own desire for the unconscious woman in his own care. Then, his voice came forth; it was upon moving lips, certainly, but the sound was echoed in several layers upon itself, as if the echo came too fast, or some disembodied version of his voice followed immediately after his tones in a very haunting and surreal manner, "She will die." It wasn't a statement of concrete resolution; it, in fact, made apparent the desire of the undead for that event not to pass due to a hint of pleading. A slight, melancholious hint. "Let me have her, or you will be responsible for her death." For the lifeless man, it was a Hell; she would surely pass on to an afterlife, unlike the accursed and condemned soul that Grailan was; forever to walk amidst the living and dead and never see either damnation or eternal paradise. Again his hand made that gesture, the quickened pace to make evident the increasing urgency.

Callamyre rose from where she'd been kneeling beside Linn, her attention still ensnared by the goings-on between Krice, Leone, and the as-of-yet unknown undead. Calla did not know most of the people gathered, and therefore had no idea if there was any pre-existing relationship between the High Priestess and Grailan. What she did know, however, was that the blacksmith was, in fact, badly injured, and she found herself looking between Krice and Grailan, concern and uncertainty blatant on her features. Without knowing the full extent of the woman's injuries, the vampire didn't know how else to help her; she -could- give her blood, or even -attempt- to use her own magick to heal the woman -- but both were tricky, and at least Krice and Grailan both seemed to have better, if not cryptic, ideas. To Linn, she spoke, "You need to have a proper doctor look at it, but ... here." As she addressed him, she raised a hand to the back of his head, where he might feel a sort of numbing warmth as she placed an invisible barrier against the wound. "It will not last for long," she added, withdrawing her hand once more. Turning now back to Krice, she said with a frown, "She is -very- badly hurt."

Linn finally pushed himself to a sitting position before clutching at his forehead, senses ringing from the blow to the other side. He shivered in an attempt to dispel the cold that had come from laying on the snow for so long and breathed a sigh, looking up to Krice and Grailan as they argued over who should care for Leone. “Do it” he spoke to Krice straightly as he tilted forward from Callamyre’s magical bandage. “It will last long enough.” He responded to the treatment as he got up to a knee before the ringing returned, having to brace himself again to not fall over. “Easy concussion. Horse hooves hurt.” An outward huff came at the way that sounded out, he was just looking to get back to the town at this point.

Krice 's jaw tensed as a result of Grailan's renewed request to receive (re, re, re) Leone. It was the Death Knight's insistence, and lack of a proper answer, that caused him more distress for the priestess' sake, not the man's accusation that Leone's death would be on -his- hands if he chose -not- to hand her over. He tightened his hold on her, keeping his arms steady so as not to jostle her unnecessarily, and called out to the Death Knight, " Heal her -now-. If you care about her at all, you'll make sure she's out of danger right -here-." Callamyre's nearness distracted him from Grailan briefly, and he listened to her reminder of Leone's condition with a disgruntled frown darkening his expression. Linn's input distressed him further. Could no one else see -why- he didn't want to pass Leone to Grailan? It wasn't about territory, or ownership over the Priestess. Not at -all-. " Can't you help her?" He entreated of the vampire next to him. " With your blood - or your magic? Or... Something..." The warrior trailed off and dropped his gaze from the vampire at his side, redirecting a troubled glare the way of the Death Knight.

Grailan remained in that position, several long and silent moments that came with a certain morbid -or perhaps funereal lack of haste. It wasn't so much that he didn't care; his subtle manner of pleading toward Krice was the very definition of begging for the ageless Dread Knight that had served, in his un-life, many masters. Again, there was that very faint, very belied and underlying notion of pleading in his eerie, haunting, and echoing voice, like some disembodied ghost repeating everything he said from everywhere around the group, "I must have her, to take her wounds..." A pause, punctuated by yet another thrust and spread of his hand in a gesture of growing impatience, "...please..."

Callamyre felt anxious as she assessed the situation; she had not been here when Leone was hurt, but given the woman's current lack of consciousness, she felt like she had to do -something-. However, her magick was not something she was particularly skilled with outside of moving objects around and creating magic band-aids; actually healing people was another thing entirely. When she spoke, her voice was directed at Grailan, and her brows wrinkled. "Take her wounds?" she asked him. "How? How would you take her wounds?"

Linn took his time composing himself on his knee silently, taking in the conversation around him. However Grailan expected to heal Leone he didn’t know, but the way they hop through immaterial space gave him some kind of hope that the dread knight knew how to handle this situation. Maybe it was just the similarity in his work with the priestess. He continued looking towards the ground, waiting for a resolution.

Krice was torn. He wanted to keep Leone safe, but he wanted a little less to keep her safe by causing her -death-. Damn. He seemed to waver ever so slightly, undecided, when Grailan's use of 'take her wounds' piqued his suspicions. Thankfully, Callamyre saw fit to ask the Death Knight just how he would do that, and the warrior held his silence - and his ground - to await the answer.

Grailan 's hood and half-veiled face turned blatantly toward Callamyre, "This vessel will take upon itself her wounds, ensuring her survival. I am already dead." Slowly, that macabre lack of haste, turned back to face Krice, "Time is running out. Her soul is leaving her body. ...Please." A reiteration of that word; subtle, but present -the closest thing the dead man had ever come to begging.

Krice almost blanched. 'Her soul is leaving her body'. As much as it pained him to pass over his vulnerable comrade to a sickly being such as a Death Knight, one he didn't -trust-, the warrior stepped forward and did so, gently extending his arms to transfer the unconscious woman into the morose embrace of the otherworldly male. As soon as Leone was secure, Krice stepped back to distance himself from the creature, and with his chin lifted slightly, he stiffly watched as the Death Knight presumably turned into another portal - or somehow transferred them both into the other realm.

Callamyre didn't know what to do; she wasn't exactly a skilled healer, and so when Grailan replied to her, her frown deepened. "Oh, no," the vampire murmured, shaking her head. It was then taht she looked back to Krice, understanding why he at last gave the Death Knight permission to take Leone's unconscious body with him. The woman really had no idea what was going, but if Grailan said he could help the cleric, then at least that was a good start. Once the warrior had been relieved of the blacksmith, Calla turned her attentions wholly upon Krice, moving and reaching toward him to place a reassuring hand upon his shoulder. "She'll be okay," the golden-eyed woman murmured.

Grailan did, in fact, step back to be swallowed up with Leone into another realm as if the air behind him were some pool's surface to calmly press into.

Krice's lashes flickered as Callamyre's hand fell to his shoulder, her murmured words doing little to assuage the concern he felt for Leone's welfare. At length, steeling himself in the face of unwelcome emotions, the man turned to glance at Linn over his right shoulder, affording the vampire a perfect view of his faintly-scarred left cheek and jaw. " He needs to be seen to," murmured the man, guarded and quiet.

Callamyre did not pull her hand from Krice's shoulder, and instead gave it a squeeze. "As do you," the woman murmured, moving closer to the warrior as her hand circled around his shoulder, careful of any other bruises he might have. "The both of you need to be seen," she repeated, addressing both men. And, with Krice's help, she would then assist Linn back to the fort, in a very insistent no-questions-asked manner.

Krice diverted from Callamyre after glancing at her for a moment, a softened look that acknowledged her words. Whether or not he'd be seen to once he got to the fort was one matter entirely. For now, he slid his right arm under Linn's left side, wrapped it around his back, and assisted him with Calla to the fort to be treated.