RP:To Kill a Dragon

Part of the Surface Tension Arc

Synopsis: Hildegarde had sought some alone time in the Winter Berry Garden, the spot where she often likes to pray and beseech the gods for assistance. In a place where she is at peace, the woman does not bring weapons. It is here that Vakko, sent by Gevurah, makes his attempt on the Steward's life. He wounds her viciously, leaving her to mercy of the Kraken Bloom while his associates detonate explosives in the mess hall and the smithing supplies of Frostmaw's fort. Back the fort, Ayras, Laezila, and Kasyr try to locate the steward and make sense of the attack on Frostmaw. Eventually, they find the silver knight in the garden fighting to stay alive.

Winter Berry Garden

Hildegarde was a woman of faith and honour. Even in times of war, one must make time for the gods and the soul and the woman was making that time now. Kneeling in the garden below the boughs of the outreaching Winter Willow, the Silver kept her hands in her lap and had fallen into a state of relaxation. The garden was peaceful; untouched by the war and forever a place where she could pray in peace and contemplate the past, present and future. Even though the ever hungry Kraken Bloom lurked nearby, the Silver seemed undisturbed and at peace here in the garden. The fluffy bees that were native to the Frozen Tundra bumbled about her head and fiery hair – mistaking its vibrancy and colour for a plant of some kind – yet they did not bother The Steward of Frostmaw. She remained kneeling and content to remain deep in thought and prayer.

The stillness of the peaceful garden almost made the drow regret his business there. He hated this kind of work, assassinations where better left to typical drow, ones who hold no thoughts to honor. But he was compelled to this act by one that he feared just a little more than the silver kneeling amidst the garden. Not a single flake of snow would be disturbed at the figure, clad head to toe in white, seeming more a living gust of snow than any actual creature made its way into the garden, moving as if a ghost, not a sound of the footfalls as the figure closes in on the praying dragoness. A cloak shifts, a curved mithril blade, a golden vine pattern snaking its way along the blade, a weapon from the wood elves of the Sage Forest, a convenient thing now but a pace from the dragon the strike would be made. He knows she always wears armor, he angled to rapidly descending blade to slip in below the breastplate into her side. Hoping to end the detestable job in a single blow.

Hildegarde had been so enveloped in her prayers and thoughts, that nary a thought or care was given about any potential guests in the garden. And perhaps that might be her downfall. The blade pierced through chainmail, boiled leather and flesh alike to pierce her side: causing her to look sharply at Vakko with evident confusion and then complete fury. She has no words to offer him, why speak when you can strike? Her gauntleted hand reached for Vakko’s wrist, grasping it tightly as her other mailed hand struck outwards at his face. Her intention was to try and stop him from at least trying to stab or slash at her again.

Vakko smiled behind that faceless mask as she starts to fight back, how many others would have shrieked in pain and fell away, started begging for their life. But not this woman, she was going to go down fighting, Oh how he loved that. He released the dagger that was in her side, confident it was embedded far enough to remain and do a bit of lingering damage. He hand snapped back away from that grab at the same time his feet, in perfect balance quickstep back several paces to free himself from the range of the dragoness. A katana would appear in his hand so quickly it was as if it appeared there by magic. he would lung for her, both hands gripping the hilt of the curved blade thrusting with the blade, the tip aimed at her patched eye. But at the last moment the feint would be tripped, the thrust turning into a sudden downward slash to her thigh, aiming to cripple the dragon, best case opening the main vein in her leg.

Hildegarde rose to her feet with a grunt as Vakko anced backwards and relinquished the dagger, leaving it in her side. She was tempted to tear it out; to have something pointy to fight with but that might just end her all the quicker. No, she had to be sensible. She had to fight with her fists and hope to survive an encounter with an assassin. A katana was no blade to pierce through armour: it was made for quickly getting in between the joints and out again, it wasn’t made to hack through armour like a longsword was. The Silver, however, does not move as the blade attempts to slash through the armour of her thigh: the mithril plate defending her flesh well enough from this attack. Her first shot out swiftly to snap at Vakko’s sternum, intending to crack it and let the little bone pierce his heart.

Vakko had to stifle a laugh as the thigh was armored as well, well he had never really been looking at her legs when they had met in the past, he made a note to do that from now on. Heels dig into the soft ground of the garden as he changed his momentum throwing himself back as quickly and as hard as he could to cushion that blow. Fist connected with chest as he started to move opposite the blow, his sternum did not crack under the lessened weight but the wind did get blasted from his lungs. Booted feet skid slightly on the soft ground form the force of his retreat. Standing tall he made now show that her blow did any damage at all. throwing his cloak open he reveals the hilt of yet another weapon that was strapped to his lower back. His offhand throws the katana away, the throw away weapon so easily replaced. Hand on hilt he charged her again. Snapping the red jasper longsword, something that was bought from the very markets of Frostmaw free from its scabbard tucking his main hand back as he neared he would punch out, sending the thrust at the dragonesses shoulder, unlike the katana, this weapon would do quite well against that wondrous armor.

Hildegarde watched as Vakko danced away from her strike, seemingly unfazed by the force of her punch. Her breathing was hard and heavy, it was becoming more difficult to draw in each breath with the blade in her side. Blood oozed from the puncture in her armour but she could not give up; she would not give up. With a huff of breath, the knight shuffled slightly into a prepared stance as Vakko charged forward with the jasper longsword. A decision had to be made. The Silver stood her ground as Vakko approached and she didn’t budge as that sword pierced through her pauldron and into the flesh of her shoulder. Once the blade had pierced through her armour, the knight grasped at Vakko with a roar of pain: her fingers curling tightly into his tunic to keep a strong hold of him as she waddled awkwardly towards the ever waiting and ever wanting Kraken Bloom. If she was going to die, she might as well take him with her.

Vakko was honestly surprised as she simply allows the blade to bite into her so easily, but he discovers her plan a second to late at those arms wrap rightly around his form and easily lifts him from his feet. He knew where she was going the moment she started her trembling steps, that damned vampire plant. He could not help but applaud her from the last ditch effort to at the very least not go alone. He gives the longsword embedded in her shoulder a sharp twist as her bear hug on him was starting to crack at his ribs, a wholly unpleasant experience all in all. He started to feel the waves of weakness fall over him as they neared the plant. If he could just break her hold he could slip away and leave the plant to finish his work for him, another twist of the blade was given.

Hildegarde roared with pain as the blade twisted, her steps staggering wildly and near veering away from the plant. But this pain, this wound he caused, it only added to her fury and indignation. Feed this cretin to the plant and be done with it; she could have strength left to walk away whilst the Bloom fed upon his flesh. Slow and uncertain steps carry him further forward, the knight even offering him a bloodied grin filled with the knowledge that she would be dragging him to his death. With the second twist of the blade, the knight cried out with pain and staggered again; falling forward but keeping her grip upon the assassin. She would crush him with her weight. “You could shank me a hundred times and still… still I will try,” she said breathlessly.

Vakko could not hope to contain his grin as she tried with all her might to feed him to that man eating plant, but alas that is something that he could not abide by. With the second twist of the blade as he steps falter he would find his feet on the ground again, his muscles straining to keep her upright along with himself, he did not feel like being crushed at the moment. To her words his head would slowly tilt to the side, as if trying to digest her words. But at that moment a loud explosion would be heard from the fort, the seat of Frostmaw power, where most of its supplies would be held. Black angry clouds would start to roll into the crisp night air. One of the smaller armories was on fire, along with a food storage area. It would appear that this assassin was not working alone. That would be noted again as the assassin was suddenly no longer in her arms. An outside force had cast a spell of teleportation upon him to free him from the grasp of the dragon. The heavily cloaked assassin now stands behind the dragoness looking upon her but makes not move to follow through on his attack. He simply looked upon the bleeding monarch of Frostmaw, the sword still in her shoulder and the dagger sticking from her side.

Meanwhile at Frostmaw Fort

Kasyr has been dawdling in Frostmaw, of late. Perhaps it was some uncanny knack of knowing something was going to happen, or more apt a distaste for becoming reimmersed within Vailkrins politics- either way, the Kensai was present when the explosion occured, and soon after jogging in its direction, a backpack full of blades slung over his shoulder. Ayras, in all likelihood, would be saluted as Kasyr bustled by- the Kensai seemingly keen on making a game out of arriving first upon spying him.

Ayras had run from the tavern after he heard the explosion. He wanted to curse whoever timed the explosion; they interrupted his date, damnit! He was eyeing the sky, examined the trails of smoke. He didn't bother returning Kasyr's salute, he just ran like hell to get into the fort. He wanted to make certain people were alright, that a certain drow was alright. His honor as a former Knight of Frostmaw would let him do no less.

Laezila was in the proper of the Fort, that main hall just beyond the courtyard, and the room was filled with the ambience of shouting belied by the booming commands of Frost Giant soldiers and guards; the reaction was swift. Both wings of the building, both east and west, were filled with thick and noxious plumes of smoke, as massive giants rushed back and forth in squads -some where running in with colossal barrels of water, apparently with the intention of putting out fires, as others went and arrived intermittently with oversized stretchers that carried both the wounded and the dead, either a giant upon them, or several of the smaller races. Healers frantically worked with doctors to quell the chorus of a backdrop of screams, moans, cries and sobs of agony between civilians, diplomats, guards, and anyone that might've taken residence who was in either of the two areas of explosion; the smithy, and the pantry, at the end of either hall. Laezila herself stumbled into the room from the westward hall, her form in a white and nearly transparent nightgown laid over a thin layer of soft pajamas for the chill of the environment. She was battered and had several burns, but so far none seemed to require medical attention; her survival instincts had kicked in. If the drow were good at anything in their maturity, it was because they were exceptionally skilled in survival. Smoke inhalation had the tiny drow coughing, but from behind a half-burnt and otherwise ivory faceless mask that only had two holes for striking sky-blue eyes to intensely peer from. But what once started as a stray shout now became a chorus of anxious guards and their captains, "Where's Hildegarde?!", "Find Hildegarde!", "Aramoth's daughter is missing!" "Get the Steward!", these were all some of the variants of an outcry that Hildegarde the Silver was, in fact, missing.

Kasyr, despite the morbid sense of glee that had carried him forward towards the center of this mess, finds his mood rapidly darkening. Touched as he is by an empathic gift, the Revenants zeal is soon overtaken, gnawed at instead by the anxiety, anger and other mixed emotions wrought in the aftermaths of the explosion. Bit by bit, Kasyrs' strides shift from the rapid jog he'd been practicing to a more purposeful run- everything about him now mirroring the gravity Ayras had been displaying as he moves headlong into the chaos which consumed the fort. "Madamoiselle Hildegarde!" The futility of the shout is not lost on the revenant, but it's the only thing he can think to do- and at the very least, maybe someone will know something. If not, the Kensai intends on plunging straight forward. After all, if the two noteworthy disasters were to either side- then they might be serving as smoke screens to something straight ahead.

Ayras was snarling by the time he came into the main room of the fort. There were so many bodies being moved, so many injured. It infuriated the vampire to know that someone struck so close to home. The heart of his home, it could be argued. He could hear the shouts for the Steward, heard Kasyr's voice join them, but he disregarded the noise; if people were calling for her so much, she could not have been here. He did not know the woman personally, but she seemed the sort to be in the middle of everything if she were present, to be busying herself helping out in every which way, not just simply barking commands. Silver eyes spotted a particular diminutive drow and he rushed over, gently grabbed the former Matron's arm. "What happened?" he asked as he looked about. "Who attacked? Do you know? Does anyone know?" He swept his gaze to the two directions that the smoke billowed from. He rushed to one side, pushed through the press of bodies that sought refuge from the smoke, only to return shortly to repeat the process on the other side. He was cursing in fluent drowish when he returned to stand amidst the crowd. Someone had wanted to cripple the fort, it seemed to him.

Laezila didn't know that Kasyr would find nothing but more wounded in the throne room, that being a place for the giants and healers to put dead and wounded there for the crowded and busy-intersection of the main hall being too dangerous; there was no attack there, and no Silver. What the matron did know, though, was the grasp of her arm that turned her masked face, coughing beneath the item, to look upon Ayras as he interjected question after question. Before she could even profess to have no idea, he was off, pushing down one wing of the fort, then the other successively, still to fail to find Hildegarde. It quickly became apparent to the ex-matron that the dragon steward was not present in the safety of the fort at all. For a moment, fear paralyzed her, and caused the drow to stand still as idle wind caressed through singed locks of otherwise glittering white hair. But her throat cleared, and her mask gave her that inner confidence; that symbolism of who she was marked by the intense stare from behind the faceless, expression and emotion-veiling garment. Her voice bellowed, not deep, but augmented to sound both louder and more distorted by the natural contours of the face-piece, and carrying her authoritive, yet feminine tone throughout the room, "Guards, focus on recovering wounded and putting out fires! Soldiers, form into squads of five, comb the region from border inward until you find Hildegarde, now! Ayras! Ka-" She had forgotten his name from the meeting, "Sir!" Good recovery? "Search or recover the wounded! Pick one! And would somebody get me a gods-forsaken weapon?!"

Kasyr didn't know what he was expecting to find when he entered the throne room. A fray, perhaps, or the remnants of one. Perhaps an indication of how the individuals responsible for this mess departed, or something -useful- to him. Instead, he finds himself immersed in yet more agonized empathic emanations, something which has him making for a beeline to the nearest one. The kensai is still Daedria's chosen paladin, after all, a status which enables him to draw deep from the bond he shares with his deity- so that he might be able to pour that energy into the chosen recipient. The goal is simple enough, to quell the agony the victim of the attack was suffering, for the sake of them as a citizen...but also to dull the pulse of negative emotion sifting through the air. And it's a task the Revenant is more than content to busy himself with, even as Ayras searches else. Until Laezila addresses him, and effectively reminds him what is yet at stake. What little he has done is hardly enough, but the Kensai is more than aware of where his aptitudes reside "...Recovery. Et if you need a sword, I have ample." His backpack is given a brief shake.

Ayras looked at the bodies, injured and otherwise, being dragged from the wings he had just checked. He looked at all the pain and suffering caused by the explosions. It made the vampire furious. He hadn't needed the prodding from Laezila to start seeking out wounded; with the drow being well enough, he had already moved on to help in the process of saving lives. He went back toward the smithy, the area that seemed hardest hit by the explosions. He had seen weapons and armor littered all over the place there, tools upturned, workstations in pieces. He shifted metal about, moved ruined armor from here to there. He wasn't sure how, but he found the master smith in there, injured but alive. He dug the man out of the mess that hindered him, called for assistance. "They'll be here to get you out of here in a minute," he said to the man before he moved on to seek out more survivors. He called out each time he found someone alive, mourned when he found a corpse. The corpses he moved on his own, with all the reverence a 6'2 elf could afford.

Laezila generally didn't need to prod either of them, but gorrammit, she was taking charge of the situation! The strangled cry of a man with a wooden shard through his shoulder caught her attention, and she briefly knelt down at the man's side. Both small, ebony-skinned hands took hold of the shard and pulled, yanking the object free before pressing both hands down upon the wound after tossing the item aside. A blood-covered hand lifted only briefly to remove her mask and let it fall to the ground, before the bruise-faced and scar-marred mien, a claw-mark diagonally across her face from forehead to opposite jawline, lowered in order to press her lips against the man crying out in pain. A mercurial crimson light swirled between the locked lips, and the hole bleeding beneath her hands rapidly closed and healed over. It drained her, and the man went unconscious as the liplock broke. The small ex-matron panted as she fluidly lifted to her feet; one man helped. Out of so many! She was too small to effectively do this task; perhaps she would be better suited for searching for the Steward. Either way, the drow wanted a weapon, immediately; her body sprang into movement to swiftly come to Kasyr's side, "Yes, a sword, a dagger, whatever you have-" if he had a bladed whip, she doubted it so the woman didn't ask, "I don't trust the elves in an emergency not to-" Stab her in the back, "Whatever it is, I need a weapon."

Kasyr's responses seem automatic, for even as he answered the former Matron, he was already in the process of shuffling towards another one of those who'd been wounded in the disaster, his hands shuffling over to where clothes and armouring had been shorn through by an unpleasent combination of kinetic force and shrapnel. With a sort of disattachment that would seem almost clinical were it not for the dazed expression on the Kensai's face, he presses his palms against the wound, even as the blood seeps forward, in a pink frothy mess- a bubble welling up beneath the Revenants fingers. For a moment, there's something almost animate in the way it twitches and shivers at the vampires touch- and then that familiar glow of divine energy pushes out from the paladins fingers, coiling about that precious Vitae and slowly forcing it back within the wound, whilst simultaneously forcing it to rapidly coagulate. The result is far from pretty, with the rapid formation of scabbing and scar tissue, but it gets the job done- and simply leaves the Kensai staring at the residue on his fingers, and the continued pulse that he felt from the room. Something other than emotions... Familiar. He's broken out of his thoughts by Laezila, head tilting towards her to stare, before he simply procures a somewhat dinted long sword from his pack. Neither better nor worse looking than the other assortment of 'borrowed' weapons the swordsman was carrying. "...Where was she last seen? Hildegarde. Obviously." ...There's an ominous sort of pulse he can feel, something that has whatever odd misgiving he had earlier about where his aptitudes lie only growing stronger. Like he's profaning something in simply -being- here.

Ayras deposited another corpse with the rest. He looked about, looked at the chaos that had ensued from the two explosions. The gods knew how long it would take for the fort to get back to operational. He was sure it would see a semblance of it soon enough, but for full functionality...He shook his head. "All this because of the war," he speculated, a snarl on his lips. He looked over to Kasyr, watched the sickening sight of that blood foaming and coagulating. He wanted to retch. He ripped his gaze away, sought Laezila in the crowd. "Ma-" He caught himself before he finished calling her by her former title. Now was not the time for another argument. "Laezila! Did you see anyone fleeing from the fort just before the explosion?" Finding the dead and wounded was just making the elf more irate.

Laezila easily took the unimpressive long sword from the offering hand of the revenant as Ayras called her, which yanked her now-unmasked face from the oddly-accented man and toward the red-head. "No," she called, as she offered Kasyr a pat on the shoulder in gratitude while simultaneously moving her tiny little frame toward the other vampire, "No, I was in my room, the door was closed. Everything was normal, then boom! I'm going out to search for the Steward," she -needed- her, 'lest they believe that she was a drow agent that had planned this for her people's cause. Hildegarde would be able to quell any rumors from being presented as official accusation, certainly. And more importantly, the drow actually cared for the dragon's life. She had the sinking feeling that she was captured, but she shook that and memories of Skylei from her mind with a shake of her white-haired head, "You can come with or stay here with that man," her thumb jerked toward Kasyr, 'cause his name eluded her, "But if you can help here, they need you here. I hope to find her well, but if I don't I will bring her back-" somehow, "or if I don't find her at all, we will have to see if she had left for any reason, or start planning a rescue." Because this had to be drow-caused. It was classic attack of supplies, they did it to one another's Houses often. The difference was the missing Steward, that she had never seen in one of the scenarios. Then the thought -what if they think she's just trying to flee? It'd actually be perfect if she -was- the person that committed the act.

Kasyr's peculiar feeling settles into something far more concrete when he moves over to an elf whose arm was all but pulverized, and whose garments were an unrecognizeable wreck of smeared blood and furs. Drawn there by the individuals whimpering, the revenant was all but poised to force himself back to work- when a familiar noise issued forth from the sylvan. In and of themselves, Death rattles fail to terrify the revenant- and yet, it's the odd way the body begins to spasm following the elves death which perturbs the revenant, as the blood slowly begins to creep out from the wound, subtly swelling up as though reaching for the Kensai. For a brief moment Kasyr seems lost in thought, one finger moving to poke at the gory anomaly, before it abruptly seeps back, splashing back against the elf and mingling with their clothes and flesh. With a cursory glance to the room, and a slight bit of distress at the mess which is tracked across the floor, he steps away from the deceased- if only to wipe his hands off against his scarf. "I think I'll follow you. If you think there'll be trouble, i'm adept at that. Et, I don't think...it's appropriate for moi to be here." ...More like, the revenant was almost certain that if his focus lapsed, he was very liable to cause more harm than good. It was a curious thing to be around so many living, once more. Especially in a time of strife.

Kasyr said to Laezila, "Also, It's Kasyr. or just, Kas. Whichever."

Ayras was starting to get twitchy. There was so much blood around. The drow said he should stay if he could be of use. There was only so much the vampire could do, and he was hardly muzzled. No, a fort full of bloodied people was hardly the place for him. "You want to get out of here without arousing suspicion?" the elf asked as he moved nearer the drow. "Then you're going to want to leave -with- someone. Frostmaw recently entered the war. You are a drow. Who do you think they're going to blame?" So he got even closer to the former Matron and took her by the arm, jerked his head toward the entrance. "So come on." He looked over to Kasyr then as he made his choice to join them. He was sure the revenant knew where the vampire was coming from with the desire to do something useful elsewhere. "Just try not to cause -more- trouble, Kas, yeah? You know your own reputation as well as the rest of us."

Laezila briefly looked toward Kasyr with those scrutinizing, intense sky-blue eyes as the man opted to go with them; she wasn't going to refuse his help. Plus the reminder of his name was helpful, "Kas, I'm Laezila," she said simply, because more formal introductions required a time and place that was not this. Then Ayras moved nearer with those words, drawing on her until-now maintained and mostly suppressed fear of being accused for this, which caused her spine to stiffen and her form to tense up. Her arm was grasped, to be escorted toward the gate; that was a better idea than going alone. "I didn't do this," she insisted quietly to Ayras, and then offered a pleading look toward Kasyr, her weapon held in the hand of the arm not gripped; they didn't suspect her, did they? "We need to find Hildegarde," elves would surely start whispering now, the young drow girl needed the Silver more than ever. Hildegarde would believe her. "Outside-in, so if we'll cut her off if someone's taken her."

Kasyr's already in the process of moving, of effectively washing his hands of the situation. And really, following in tow of Ayras and Laezila meant he could allow his attention to wander towards the active suppression of the curious knack he'd developed as a revenant. To try and quell what minute damage might be caused by his ability to draw upon free flowing blood. Whilst it seemed to favour the recently deceased- he couldn't help but be concerned that enough individuals were straddling the line between living and dead to gamble with their odds of survival. "Lead the way, Madame et Monsieur. I'll do my best to limit my destructiveness." Mostly.

Winter Berry Garden

Hildegarde had not the strength to cry for help or to get up from her spot on the earth. She had fallen within range of the Kraken Bloom in some desperate attempt to ensure her assassin would be weakened along with her, but it had been in vain: he had vanished in the blink of an eye through foul magic, the kind of teleportation Svilfon had been grotesquely fond of. The knight never understood teleportation. What if you turned inside out? What if you were all back to front, what if this, what if that. Complexities to think of as she bled to death and suffered the Kraken Bloom’s endeavour to devour her. Its barbed vines had wrapped around her legs and a portion of her arm: pulling her towards its ‘mouth’ where one leg was firmly placed and the other was awkwardly joining it at a slow pace. The Bloom purred with voracious delight. Dragon was a rare treat. The vine upon her arm was not just resting on her arm, but inside her arm, having burst through the careful stitching Lanara had performed to burrow into the flesh and sap the life from the knight eagerly. A dagger rested in her side, along with a jasper longsword in her shoulder. Her breathing was raspy at best.

Laezila had professed innocence. Ayras had deigned to escort her from the premises of the fort with Kasyr in tow behind them. He had not, however, reassured her by saying whether or not he believed her. He was more concerned with finding the Silver, of trying to get to the bottom of what happened. He had split up from the other two upon getting to the city, however. It wasn't until he heard Laezila's shout that he had bee-lined as best as the city's streets would allow to rejoin the pair. He skidded to a halt, however, when he saw the dragon's condition. The sentient plant gave him pause; he was no herbalist and had no clue what he would be getting into if he approached the thing. And there was the issue of the Steward's blood. But, gods be damned, he would help if he could. He threw caution to the wind and moved forward, eyeing the plant the whole while to figure out how to get it to release Hildegarde.

Laezila was not so cautious as Ayras; immediately, she ran forward toward the Kraken Bloom, her unimpressive long sword borrowed from Kasyr a flash of steel. Surprisingly, she didn't take to the air, but instead did as Ayras advised her and kept to the ground. The blade was flicked and switched with a fluid and expert level, attempting to slice apart those tendrils holding Hildegarde; she hacked through a few, but there were far too many to get her out this way, and Laezila had to become half-occupied between trying to free Hildegarde and cutting tendrils that sought to entrap the drow herself.

Kasyr had allowed himself a few moments to gauge the situation he had effectively bumbled into, but when Laezila rushed forward to aid Hildegarde, Kasyr was not far behind. It was during his dash forward that the revenant plucking out a rusty looking short sword from the mess of material that partially protruded from his pack. The revenants particular course is rather specific, as he intentionally moves to intersect between Laezila and Hildegarde, what unnatural speed he normally harbours growing a bit more pronounced than usual, courtesy of the brief flare of electrical energy about his person and weapon, his forward dive turning into a blinding quick forward slash which seems to be propelled by the very lightning the revenant is so fond to abuse. In essence, it turns into an attempt at both slashing and burning through the vines Laezila's struggling with, and therefore providing her an opening to carry forward. It also serves admirably to disarm Kasyr, given that the sword he was wielding essentially fractures into pieces a few moments after. Oops. At least when his dashing slash comes to an end, he's on the other side of the bloom?

Hildegarde groaned painfully as the vines were sliced and diced, forcibly separated from what remained about her limbs. “Hurry,” she urged the companions, explosion,” she murmured feebly, weak and weary from her encounter and the vampiric leeching of the bloom, “we have to go,” she breathed. Her eye could not stay open for long, fluttering open and shut in her effort to remain conscious. With the Bloom under attack, it made a low kind of rumble and retreated: the vines recoiled back into the main body of the bloom and the petals furled shut after ejecting the leg. Unfortunately for Hildegarde, the metal of her armour and flesh of her leg had been under attack all along. The digestive fluid of the plant had feasted upon her flesh.

Ayras hadn't been able to do anything to help during the assault on the plant. He wouldn't have known what to do if he wanted to, anyways. But that leg, it was a grotesque sight, partially digested as it was. He could not touch the woman to help, sadly. Her blood would burn through his flesh as the plant's fluids had burned through hers. It would leave him with nothing but bone, devoid of muscle. But...wait...Flesh. He blinked a few times and looked down to his mithril hand. It just might work. He knelt down next to the woman. The leg needed to be cauterized, 'lest the woman bleed out. Lightning played along the vampire's mithril arm, but he played it far closer to the surface than normal. He let the intensity of the lightning head the metal, let it turn the silvery arm into a burning red. "My apologies, Steward," he muttered and wrapped the super-heated hand around the limb. He'd save as much of it as he could.

Laezila, with Kasyr, continued to work on cutting the Steward free rather than healing her wounds; her dinghy long sword was flicked back and forth to several whatever she could; she was tired, though. One tendril grabbed her, and yanked her from her feet before she severed it, "Kas, the mouth!" She called as she scrambled to her feet. And her player needs to pick up drunk family members.