The Elements of Tyranny

by Wings of Black Glass

The 4th Session: Nightmares

In the darkness, the chill wind bites at them. The clouds above block the light of the moon from reaching them, and the trek back to the Naga’s lair is slow. Snow continues to fall slowly.

“If this snowfall continues we’ll lose any chance of tracking the Naga.”

“Then we had better hurry.”

“I see the jail!” Tiny points at the ancient security station ahead of them, barely visible in the dim light. “Ormr, do you sense that thing around here?”

“Yak doesn’t see snake.”

“Split up, look around, but stay close. If you find something, call it out.” They all head off in different directions, but before they all get out of sight Tiny shouts.

“If you find something worse, don’t hesitate to scream.”

“I think I’ve got something over here!” It takes several minutes of searching before Red calls it out. Tiny is the first to get to her. She’s standing over a depression in the snow, and she points along the path it takes. “It looks like a snake trail to me.” Eclipse and then Ormr arrive a moment later.

“That looks right to me.” Eclipse glances around and finds he can see the front entrance to the ancient prison by looking around a pile of rubble nearby. “It could have easily seen us from here.” He turns and gestures down the route the winding trail takes. They follow it as best they can, the Naga obviously kept to the shadows and slithered over rocks as much as possible. The trail takes them to a closed cellar door hidden underneath some wild shrubs.

“Think this leads to the cage room?”

“Probably.”

“Yak will open door!” Eclipse and Red immediately hold Ormr back while Tiny blocks his way.

“Hold on, big guy! We want to do this quietly.” Ormr glares down at Tiny and huffs disapprovingly, but does not push them aside. “Besides, I don’t think it’s locked.”

“I have an idea.” Eclipse glances at Tiny and Red. “Tiny, between us you’re the best at sneaking around, aren’t you?”

“Uh… maybe? I’m not an expert.”

“Well, I know I’m not that stealthy. And I think we can trust Ormr to make as much noise as a bull in a china shop. Red is a bit on the temperamental side.”

“Hey!” Red snaps at him.

“My point made. I want you to go down there and look around.”

“Alone?”

“Alone, but not without aid. Hold still.” Then Eclipse taps Tiny with his horn. From the point where he touched him, a white line radiates down Tiny’s body, and he begins to visibly waver and vanish until he disappears from view entirely.

“Very nice.” Tiny’s voice emits from the apparently empty space where he was standing.

“I can keep that going for about an hour, but don’t push your luck. If you get too aggressive you’ll lose it.”

“Got it.” The cellar door swings up, seemingly of its own accord, and Tiny’s hoofsteps disappear down into the darkness.

“Why not send Yak?”

“Because you’ll lose the invisibility almost instantly. We want to know what’s ahead of us before we go charging into danger.”

Down in the dark, Tiny enters the cage room. The first thing he notes is that all the cages are now open. Quietly he examines the laboratory and finds it silent, although most of the alchemical supplies are still there. Then he checks the resting area, what looked like the Naga’s bedroom. Everything here is untouched from before.

“I’ve got news.” He whispers it once he’s back outside, still quite invisible. Red startles when he speaks.

“Don’t do that!”

“Would you rather I tap your flank? OK, so the cages are open and I didn’t see the Naga down there. It’s not here.”

“The tracks ended here, where could it have gone?”

“If I were clever, which I am, I would follow my own trail back and then change directions at one of those spots where I had to cross some hard stone. No trail to follow that way, and it would lead us back here rather to anyplace we don’t know about.”

“Go take a look then. We’ll be right here until we’ve got somewhere better to be.” Tiny says nothing, but when they watch carefully they can see his hoofprints lead away and around a corner.

“We still don’t know where they disappeared to when you shot at them earlier, do we?”

“No, I don’t know what happened back there.”

“Could they have stepped into the Ethereal plane?”

“Like your spell?” Eclipse ponders for a moment. “It’s possible.”

“Let me go try that.”

“Be careful, you don’t want to get stuck there with an angry Naga and three Hell Horses.”

“I can’t stay there long, only a few seconds at a time, and I can only maintain the blinks for about a minute. I won’t go far. I’ll be right back.” Red nods towards Eclipse and Ormr and then walks down into the Nightmare cage room. She takes a deep breath and then blinks out of reality.

In the Ethereal Plane, everything is insubstantial, the world is translucent and silvery. So it surprises her to find that the cages are quite substantial even here, they are obviously either made from a special material or enchanted somehow. When she looks around she cannot see the far edge of the chamber, at a distance everything on the Ethereal plane disappears into the strange silver mist that permeates it. She blinks back into the real world after only a few seconds.

At a dead run, she passes Eclipse and Tiny, blinking out to the Ethereal plane just as she reaches then. She glances around again but sees nothing new out in the ruins. With little time left on her spell, she sprints off in the direction Tiny went, hoping his theory was correct or that she might spot the Nightmares before her spell runs out. Three more times she disappears and reappears, with Eclipse and Ormr trying to follow along when they spot her.

On her sixth blink into the Ethereal Plane, she spots something odd ahead of her, a red glow that shouldn’t be there, and four figures of indistinct shape and form, although one appeared serpentine. She doesn’t have enough time to say or do anything before she returns to the real world. But she readies an attack, all the same, she won’t let them just get away if she can stop it.

Upon reappearing in the Ethereal plane she has enough time to confirm that the creatures ahead of her, heading north-ish, are the Nightmares and the Naga. She unleashes her magic, three bright beams of fire lancing out at the Naga. Two miss, cutting afterimages through the silvery mist. But the third hits the Naga hard in the back. It shrieks in pain and spins to face her, and she realizes now she is closer to them than she is to her friends.

Most of the time the Ethereal Plane is a safe place, not much can reach you here, but when your foes are already there? That’s a new problem entirely. The Naga hisses out a word and Red Haze finds herself unable to move, held in place by an invisible force.

“Stupid little pony.” It raises higher until it looms large over the Nightmares and her. The Naga glances down at its equine monster servants. “Kill her.” The Nightmares bolt towards her with terrifying speed. Held immobile, there’s nothing she can do as they close on her.

They kick and bite at her, she would scream if she could as one breaks a rib. Her only salvation is when her spell collapses and she returns to the real world. She still can’t move, but at least the Nightmares haven’t followed. Yet.

“Red!? What happened?” Tiny must be nearby, that was him shouting, she can’t even move her eyes to look for him. Not that she could see him, he’s still invisible. “Gads, those are ugly wounds. Drink this, if you can.” A vial of red fluid appears in the air, one of the healing potions they found earlier, and Tiny pours the liquid down her throat. She immediately feels better, her broken ribs knitting themselves back together, but still can’t move. Eclipse and Ormr run into the street where she reappeared, unaware of the threat. “What’s going- SHIT!” It’s fortunate none of the Nightmares can see Tiny, as they appear with a flash of flame and smoke all around Red.

“Fire ponies face Yak!” Ormr bellows, and the flaming equines turn on him. Two charge and the third is about to follow when Tiny takes his chance. The changeling thrusts his magic sword, materialized in an instant, into its side. The aggression cancels out the invisibility spell and Tiny’s body ripples back into view.

The first two reach Ormr with astonishing speed and begin to kick out at him. Ormr responds by slamming his body into one, despite the fire licking at his fur. It stumbles away a few steps but remains standing. The strange spectral yak spirits that appeared before return, surrounding the Nightmare he body-slammed and floating in the air around Ormr.

Eclipse darts around the yak and the two Nightmares attacking him, as he does he conjures a faintly glowing weapon in the space between them. It resembles three crescent moons attached at a central point, and it spins and cuts at the Nightmare Ormr slammed into. The spiritual weapon doesn’t cut deep, but he supports his offense with an arcane blast as well. His shots fly wide, missing both Nightmares.

Red struggles to break free from the spell holding her still, but the Naga’s magic is more than she can fight off.

Of the Naga itself, there is no sign, it’s still within the Ethereal plane, moving about the battlefield unable to interfere directly.

The Nightmares facing Tiny rears and lashes out with flaming hooves, kicking the disguised Changeling hard in the side. Tiny gasps, nearly losing his blade, but recovers and grips the magic sword more tightly. The two assaulting Ormr kick and strike out at him, one hoof hits the Yak right in the eye. For the first time Ormr lets out a howl of pain as the flames char his face. The other one takes advantage of the Yak’s loss of balance and bites hard on his neck.

“Yak will not fall!” Ormr howls and shakes off the Nightmare, throwing it far from him. Then he rushes the other and slams a horn point first into its neck. The flaming pony shrieks, the fire in its core bursts out and consumes the monster, reducing it to ash in mere instants.

Ormr does not look well, he blinks past the blood and the pain, glancing about in confusion as he tries to find the other threats. Tiny isn’t doing much better, breathing heavily after the blow to his side. The Nightmare is unafraid of him or his magic blade, running circles around the much slower warlock as he does his best to keep it away from Red. The Unicorn is still held by the spell. Only Eclipse is not terribly wounded.

Eclipse sends his spiritual chakram-esque weapon to attack the Nightmare remaining nearby and fires more arcane blasts at the one after Tiny and Red. Neither of his attacks is particularly effective, but he’s trying to aid all of his allies at once, and the distractions help.

The Nightmare finally gets past Tiny’s blade and rears to deliver what would certainly be a fatal blow to Red.

“No!” Tiny shouts and the air vibrates with unseen powers. A shockwave booms from him, kicking up snow as it washes over the ground, both he and Red vanish in a strange burst of otherworldly light. The thunderous shockwave slams into the Nightmare, sending it falling to the ground some distance from where it was. A similar, if less violent, burst of light from behind a nearby ruin wall tells Eclipse they have reappeared not far away.

Eclipse uses the chance Tiny’s newfound power gives him to fire his starbolt into the tumbling Nightmare, and the beast explodes into ash. When he turns back to see the remaining flaming equine he finds it already bursting in flame, disappearing back into the Ethereal Plane.

“Where fire pony?” Ormr glances about.

“Red’s over here, she still alive!” Tiny calls from behind the rubble, misunderstanding Ormr’s question. The warlock pokes his head out of an empty window frame so they can see him. Ormr wanders over so he stands between Eclipse and Tiny, his spectral yak spirits fading.

“Be careful, that last Hell Horse and the Naga are still out there.” Eclipse turns in place, on alert for any threats. “Is everyone alright?” His spiritual weapon fades slowly as the spell ends.

“Barely.”

“Yak lives.”

“And Red?”

“Still paralyzed.” Then fire flares again. They all spin to face it. The Naga is rearing back as if to strike out, the escaped Nightmare at its side. Magical energy gathers about it as it begins to cast.

With a start, Eclipse realizes they have unwittingly all positioned themselves in a straight line, with the Naga facing them down the length. A perfect position to hit them all with a lightning bolt. Injured as they are, none will survive the spell.

The bolt lances out, but Eclipse wraps it in his own magic as he counters it. Eclectic energy whips about in the air as the two spellcasters fight for control of the spell. The blast recoils backward, errant streams of energy cutting through the remaining Nightmare and reducing it to a small pile of ash. Eclipse grits his teeth and braces himself, pushing the energy away as the Naga leans into the magic.

Eclipse wins the contest, thunder booms as the lightning bolt dissipates. For an instant the Naga and the Unicorn face each other, both panting hard as they process what just happened. A bolt of eldritch energy, very much like Eclipse’s arcane blast, if somewhat more violent, flashes past the Yak and the unicorn. The blast of energy impacts the Naga right through the center of its neck, tearing a gaping hole all the way through its body.

It blinks once, utterly surprised, and then collapses to the ground with a dull thud, quite dead. Red gasps as the magic holding her gives out. Everyone still standing turns to face Tiny, the source of the blast of eldritch energy.

“What was that?” Eclipse asks first, Tiny seems confused as to what exactly just happened.

“I… didn’t know I could do that. I just now knew what to do. I didn’t think I could teleport either, the power just… came to me.”

“Tiny…” Red limps over to stand next to him. “Thank you.” Tiny nods towards her, if there was any doubt of trust between them before, it is gone now that he has saved her life a second time.

“I think we know what you’ve gained out of the sap now.” Eclipse elaborates as they come back around to join them as they inspect the dead Naga. “It either granted you new knowledge or deepened your pact with the black blade. I suspect you have other spells you did not know you had.”

“Maybe. I feel pretty drained though. I don’t think I can do something that spectacular very many times before needing a rest.” Then Tiny blinks as Ormr begins to cut a length of the Naga’s scales off. “Ormr, that’s nasty.” He sighs, exasperated. “What are you doing?”

“Yak claims trophy.” Then Ormr ties the length of scales around him like a belt, and then nods approvingly. Eclipse frowns towards the Yak but does not reprimand him.

“Red, do you know how long we have before it revives?”

“I’m not sure.” She shakes her head. “The other one was up and alive again after a day, give or take a few hours.”

“Then we need to drag it back and make sure it’s secured before then.” Everyone nods and they manage to drape the Naga corpse over Ormr’s back.

“Snake is heavy.” The yak grunts, and has to walk slowly under the beast’s mass. It’s so long that it drags on on the ground on both sides of him, even looped around him once.

“What about the Hell Horses?”

“They burned themselves to ash upon being killed, there’s nothing we can do about them.” Eclipse sizes them all up, the battle was close. Red is still limping after the kick to her side that nearly killed her. Tiny looks like he might have internal injuries. Ormr can barely walk straight, he probably has a concussion, and his eye is swollen shut where the Nightmare struck him. Eclipse is relatively uninjured, but the spell the Naga cast on him earlier has still left him feeling ill. “We should get back to Shine Shire.”

Between the darkness, and the snow, and the heavy load, and all their injuries, the trip back to town takes far longer than they want. It’s well past midnight by the time they finally approach the gate. They are let inside and find the guard commander waiting for them, with quite a few of his soldiers and militia with him. The group murmurs when they see the large body of the Naga over Ormr’s back, none of them have seen anything like it before.

“Heavens above! It’s a monster!” Dusty Badge is equally in awe of it. Ormr hauls the body to the middle of town, where he drops it unceremoniously.

“Yak needs your spears.” A nearby militia passes his weapon to Ormr, unwilling to argue with the Yak. Then Ormr drives the spearpoint right through the Naga’s head and mouth, pinning it to the ground. He follows suit with several more such weapons all the way down its body until the Naga is well and thoroughly nailed to the ground.

“What happened out there? You lot look terrible.”

“So we’ve got good news and better news,” Tiny speaks first.

“That's not usually how that saying goes, so give us the good news.”

“The Naga is dead.” Red answers for him.

“And the better?”

“You’re safe now. We killed the Nightmares too.” The cluster of troops sighs in relief as Eclipse informs them. “We’ll make sure the Geode family hears of this, and that more aid is sent this way with the next convoy.”

“Right now, though.” Tiny holds up a hoof. “We really need to get some sleep. This day sucked.”

“If the doctor is still awake we should probably get some medical aid as well. This thing didn’t go down without a fight.”

“Are your wounds serious?”

“I don’t think any of them are life-threatening.” Eclipse shakes his head. Fortunately, the doctor is still awake, taking care of Breezy. He sighs in annoyance as they return covered in cuts and bruises, irritated at having so many new patients coming in so late at night. He checks them over but finds nothing particularly worrying. Tiny is badly bruised, and will be sore for a while, but needs no surgery. Red’s rib didn’t heal quite straight, but won’t be a health concern. Ormr has a concussion, and some superficial burns, but will heal quickly. Eclipse’s only injury is from the spell that was draining the fluid out of him, so he’s a bit dehydrated, but is otherwise fine.

“So what do we do now?” Red glances at the dead Naga in the town center after they leave the doctor.

“Tiny has the right idea, we sleep. We can discuss what to do next in the morning.”