//------------------------------// // 722 - One Down // Story: Lateral Movement // by Alzrius //------------------------------// The reaction to Lex’s murderous intent, as well as Woodheart’s suddenly being recaptured, was a stunned silence from all present. Then bedlam descended as everyone took action all at once. Grisela snarled a curse as she made a motion as though drawing a curtain closed, causing her to immediately fade from sight. That was enough to earn Solvei’s attention, the winter wolf – still clad in her black crystal armor and having increased her size – leaping at where the hag had been only moments before, only to snarl as she caught nothing but air for her trouble. But she had no time to focus on her failure as Blat, not at all discouraged from how poorly he’d fared against Solvei barely a minute ago, tackled her from the side, barely managing to unbalance the wolf as the two of them went down in a heap, howling as they tore at each other. Nearly as loud was Akna’s shouting in Olelowai, ordering her elementals to attack. The frozen behemoths immediately moved to comply, with half of their number moving to back up Solvei – sweeping their thick arms around in wide motions as they looked for Grisela – while the others raised their fists as they strode toward Paska and Vidrig. Unwilling to wait to meet her enemies, Vidrig threw herself at them, giving a screech of fury that sounded like a chalkboard being clawed to pieces. Ducking beneath a punch from the closest elemental as she got within its reach, Vidrig swung her axe with her full strength, gripping the handle with both hands as she pivoted at the hip, planting the blade deep in the creature’s leg. But with no muscles to sunder or blood to shed, her attack seemed to do little more than annoy her opponent, and it kicked out hard with its injured leg a moment later, doubling Vidrig over as she was sent flying nearly fifteen feet through the air. Cursing as he saw how ineffective his sister’s attack had been, Paska spun out of the way as two more of Akna’s icy servitors closed in, nimbly avoiding a heavy stomp followed by a punch from a frozen arm as thick as he was. Giving ground, Paska didn’t bother swinging his hammer at the creatures, instead fumbling with a leather tube hanging from his belt. “Vidrig, these things are big, but they’re slow!” he called, yanking out a scroll which he immediately shook, unfurling the rolled parchment. “Keep moving, and try to-, ngh!” The source of his frustrated grunt was obvious, as the left half of the scroll he’d been preparing to use – now cleanly bisected from the right half still in his grasp – fluttered to the ground, courtesy of Shadow Star. The masked mare snickered as she waved her dagger at Paska tauntingly. “Your skin may be too thick to cut, but your gear isn’t nearly so tough!” Swearing under his breath as he swung his hammer at the interloper, Paska’s attack failed to connect as Shadow retreated, taking cover behind the oncoming elementals. Unwilling to press the attack, Paska couldn’t do more than scowl as he continued to fall back, putting everything into defense as he worked to avoid the heavy strikes from the towering pillars of living ice. That it required so much of his concentration simply to avoid being bludgeoned by the trio of elementals that were moving to surround him allowed Valor to charge across the battlefield freely. Despite passing within range of Paska’s hammer, it didn’t surprise the mare-turned-bear in the least when he failed to take advantage of her guard being down, knowing that he was too busy defending himself to get in a strike against her. Instead, she went right by him, intent on getting to where Vidrig was picking herself up before the ponderous elementals reached her. Her target had just gotten back to her feet when Valor slammed bodily into her. Struck by several hundred pounds of fury, the two of them went tumbling, hitting a small creek that sent them both rolling down a low incline. Even then they both kept fighting, as Vidrig brought her axe up with a shriek, trying to press the blade of it against Valor’s neck. But the furious bear was already too close for her to use her weapon to its full effect, and Vidrig’s battle cry turned into a scream of pain as Valor’s teeth clamped down on her upper arm and bit down hard. From Lex’s position, Vidrig’s cry of pain was only barely drowned out by Mystaria and Spinner’s calling Woodheart’s name as they ran up to where the druid was laying in front of him, nonresponsive. “Hang on, Woodsy! I’ve got a healing spell ready to go!” muttered Spinner breathlessly as she threw herself down by the druid’s side, pressing her hoof against her. Immediately several of her friend’s bruises faded, her breathing becoming noticeably easier. Her condition improved further when Mystaria finished her own healing spell a moment later, leaving Woodheart with no visible injuries. But she still didn’t awaken. “Why isn’t she waking up?!” Putting a hoof on her friend’s shoulder, Spinner shook Woodheart, gently at first but with increasing force as her attempts to rouse the druid produced no effect. “C’mon, Woodheart, open your eyes already!” “Meep! Meep meep meep!” Waving his horn at Spinner threateningly when her efforts threatened to wrench Woodheart’s shoulder out of her socket, Littleknight turned back to its unresponsive mistress when the bard finally let Woodheart go. Licking her cheek, he meeped sadly when his nuzzling received no response, repeating the attempt. “I’m not seeing any weird spells on her,” noted Thermal Draft, having thrown together a basic spell to look into the magical spectrum. “Could this be some sort of poison?” “It might be. If she was just knocked out, that much healing magic should have been enough to bring her back to consciousness.” Despite her voice being level, Mystaria was turning pale as she gripped her holy symbol. “I’m going to try a restorative spell. It won’t cure any toxins she might have been exposed to, but it might help alleviate-” She didn’t get a chance to finish as Lex began casting a spell, his eyes locked onto Sissel as he fired off a series of arcane syllables, his hoof making a series of precise gestures. Across from him, the pale giant was doing the same. Lex finished his spell first, causing all three mares to reflexively yelp as the wind suddenly picked up around them. The breeze was strong enough that Littleknight was torn from his place at Woodheart’s side, and it was only because Mystaria was in his path that the almiraj wasn’t blown away, with the nun grabbing onto him as she hunkered down, her cloak billowing around her. Spinner very nearly lost her lute, hugging the instrument to her chest as she shot Lex a stupefied look. “What’re you-” She didn’t have a chance to finish as Sissel’s spell went off. Immediately, the four of them – as well as Littleknight and Woodheart – were enveloped in a thick yellowish-green fog. Wet and heavy, it exuded a foul chemical odor that both mares could feel as much as smell it, the vapors immediately causing a stinging sensation to erupt across their skin even as a burning began to fill their eyes and mouths. Fortunately, the air current that Lex had conjured seized the poisonous mist before it was able to settle over them, the breeze grabbing the vapors and flinging them toward the edge of the battlefield where they were no harm to anyone. “I think that was a ‘cloudkill’ spell,” coughed Mystaria, one hoof coming up to rub her nose as she took a shuddering breath of clean air. “If you hadn’t conjured that wind wall, we all would have...” But Lex wasn’t listening, already starting on his next spell even as he reached out to contact Solvei telepathically. Solvei, if you can’t finish that creature off in the next few seconds, let Akna’s elementals deal with it! You need to work with Thermal Draft to make sure Grisela doesn’t sneak up on anyone while she's invisible! I...yes, Master. Solvei knew that the correct course of action was to abandon her fight with Blat in favor of immediately falling back to where Master, his mate, and those other ponies were. The fact that he’d telepathically told her to come back – rather than simply summoning her to his side – meant that he was concentrating hard on his magical duel with Sissel. It was the same reason why he hadn’t verbally reminded Thermal Draft to keep tabs on the hag’s position, since he couldn’t afford to cease casting, already midway through his next spell. If there was any chance that the winter hag was sneaking up on him, trying to take advantage of how distracted he and the others were, that was more than enough reason to ignore the thrashing manticore and return to her master’s side. But the words he’d said just now – telling her that if she couldn’t finish her enemy off, to let Akna’s creatures do it instead – prickled at the touch of nervous jealousy she’d felt for the adlet previously. A glance in Akna’s direction showed that she was still directing the ice elementals she’d summoned, rattling off a string of commands that kept each of them moving, acting as a cohesive unit, and Solvei felt her envy deepen. She’s got her own little army, and I’m here struggling with just one enemy! It wasn’t just a display of tactical prowess on the adlet’s part, but rather a show of which of them was more worthy of remaining at Lex’s side, and in that moment it was more than Solvei could bear. Wrenching her head out of the way as Blat – having been pinned beneath her – tried to claw at her eyes through her armor, Solvei called upon the arctic magic that her master had given her. Although she could use a modest degree of cryomancy – as he’d called it – without limit, she also possessed a modest reservoir of magical strength that allowed her to surpass how much power she could use at any one time. When called upon, she could use her magic to cover a wider area, last longer than normal, or otherwise simply make her magic far colder...and far deadlier. It was the latter effect that she went with now, gathering the same deep blue glow between her jaws that she’d used to finish off Prevarius. While she was fairly sure that Blat had some sort of spell on him to protect against the cold, he didn’t seem like he was completely immune to it the way that remorhaz they’d fought yesterday had been. Which meant that if she hit him with the coldest magic she was capable of using... “KILL YOU!” howled Blat, scratching at Solvei’s face, knowing that her eyes and the inside of her mouth were the only vulnerable parts of her. “CRACK SHELL, THEN EAT Y-” Howling as she opened her jaws wide, Solvei poured all of the magic she’d been able to gather into her breath weapon, striking Blat in the face from less than three feet away. Underneath her, the manticore began to shake, his body convulsing as his head was frozen solid. Sneering down at where the creature’s face was frozen in mid-snarl, Solvei allowed herself a moment of satisfaction before she leaned down and crushed Blat’s skull between her jaws. Gulping down the satisfying slurry, she licked her lips as she stood up, feeling better already. “Looks like my ‘shell’ was harder than your head.” Her tail wagging, Solvei couldn’t help but hope that her master had noticed her victory, even with how busy he- “LEX! BEHIND YOU!” Thermal Draft frightened cry sent Solvei’s heart into her throat, and she whirled around... Just in time to see Grisela fade back into visibility, cackling in triumph as she brought her staff of black ice around to strike Lex in the side of the head.