A Time to Fight
5/15 time for war
We went over the plan one more time, now that we knew a bit more about the situation. According to scouting from Dremuus, who snuck in close on foot, there was one rather large dragon, four large quadrapedal draconic creatures, and seventeen tall, semitransparent humanoids he didn’t recognize. My best guess at a translation for that was Ysondre, four dragonspawn, and seventeen night elf spirits. Probably druids; I couldn’t think of anyone else that would be in the Emerald Dream. With that in mind, we determined that we would focus on the druid spirits unless one of the dragon spawn got dangerously close to Onyxia.
I paired up each of the riders with a dragon. Norin was actually one of the biggest dragons present and I thought she’d be able to carry two; I put both Dremuus and Anetta on her back, figuring that he could protect the weakest person here better than most. Talaada got Paletress; she was probably the best flyer among the small team, and I wanted my new healer to be mobile. Plus, Talaada had soul talent for holy magic. Any level of interaction between those two would work in my favor. Malaar got Ursula, who would be carrying a soulstone keyed to me. I wanted that, and her, well protected, and Melaar was fairly old and strong. Abby got the other mage, and Caledra was perched on the last dragon, a relatively small one; probably someone raised on this planet. Figuring that it couldn't hurt, I had all of my demons, mostly imps, pile onto Onyxia’s back. She could barely feel their weight and I wasn’t sure if they could have meaningfully burnt her if they tried. She literally lives in a cave with volcanic vents.
Each of us had a small cocktail of potions to drink, mostly based on what was conveniently available to Abby. Minor defense potions which would slightly harden our skin and reduce bleeding, trollsblood potions that would rapidly heal minor wounds and scrapes and keep worse wounds from deteriorating, magic resistance potions for exactly what it says on the tin, and each of the riders was handed a couple healing potions and an elixir of poison resistance, which despite the name worked more like a universal antidote. Abby reminded me, somewhat acidly, that she was quite aware of the limits of body defense. I didn’t really have a response to that.
Ursula sent an Eye of Kilrogg, a flying demonic green eye, to watch for the harvest golems to enter so that we could join in soon after. It was a tense period of time, so I was almost relieved when she called out that the fight was starting. Each of us downed our short lasting antimagic potions and got to work.
The plan was that Onyxia would pin down Ysondre, using the Temptress bell to reduce the immediate threat, and then I’d get in close to toss on the globster. That would capture the big dragon, and once that happened we might as well just fuck off for all I cared. We’d stick around for cleanup but we’d draw back and let the harvest golems handle that if there was any danger to us.
••••••••••
As the battle began, Abbie surveyed the spectral elves and grinned as she realized something. Some, not all, of the female spirits were substantially more well endowed than the others. That made her suspicious, so she cast out her senses and… yes; they were undead. That meant they were vulnerable to her arts. She casually threw up an antimagic field around her mount and commanded him forward. It wouldn’t last forever, especially if the spirits started targeting her, but it should give her time to work.
Once she got close to her target, a tasty little morsel who was hanging back from the incoming swarm of golems, Abby reached out and grabbed hold of her. Commanding an undead was not so very difficult; one need only find their will, and substitute your own. For most undead, even those that theoretically still had one, the consciousness was not grounded inside of a brain, so it was far easier than one might expect to reach in and snag the mind. Her mount was being battered by lightning bolts and beams of light from the spirits who knew only that their comrade was curled on the ground screaming, but if she could just… There. Commanding an undead was not so different from when a person was possessed by a spirit; the elf’s goals and desires were replaced, entirely, with those that Abby thought most appropriate. She felt the thorns of the nightmare fighting to take back control, but it was a token kind of resistance which could not stop her from consolidating control for long. This was not where it’s focus truly lay.
Harnea Winterbough stood, no longer screaming. The world around her was as she remembered it, but she did not hate every living thing anymore. Especially not her allies riding the dragons. She looked over her enemies, the druids she knew by name, and began to call the wrath of the stars upon them, intending to cause chaos so that the lifeless things could come closer and kill them all. Save her of course, and her fellows that could be bound by her new mistress. They would flee as best they could when the lines broke. They were to be delivered to the master and fitted with a collar. He would be so pleased to receive such a gift.
••••••••••
When Abby flew off, wreathed in dark power, I was more than a little bit concerned, but she was a big girl and could take care of herself. I circled the battlefield in stealth, waiting until I had an opportunity worth risking myself over. I wasn’t sure if I’d need it; the fight seemed pretty clearly to be in our favor.
The harvest golems were individually similar to Stitches, but much less powerful. A harvest golem would fuck you up if it hit you and could take a hit, but it was slow and predictable. Easily dodged by a sufficiently talented individual. Of course, if five of them were swinging at you at the same time, good luck dodging all of them. That was the lesson being learned by the druid spirits and dragonspawn as they were outnumbered more than twenty to one. The adds were well in hand, it seemed. Oil and gears were flying everywhere, but the druids seemed to be having difficulty focusing on anything but defending themselves. The dragonspawn were having quite a bit more luck, but they still needed to focus on not letting themselves get shredded.
Onyxia had opened the fight by using the temptress bell on Ysondre, before crashing into her. I’d worried for a moment when I’d seen that her eyes were closed like Imriss, and she had that same instinctive feeling to her actions. It was possible that she was just a puppet right now, so the bell might have been wasted. I shouldn't have worried.
While Onyxia was only too happy to claw and bite, and the imps on her back jumped to the ground to add a chorus of firebolts to the mix, Ysondre seemed more inclined to try to pin the bigger black dragon. She healed herself, a green glow washing over her body and rapidly closing her wounds, proving that with enough skill you could cast even while you were in the middle of a struggle. Ysondre seemed better at wrestling, and a single spray of acid dismissed half the imps in a second. She repeatedly gained the upper hand, but wasn’t able to capitalize on it.
••••••••••
If she could only pin him down, she could save him; purify him. Ysondre was sure of it. Her mate, in his nightmare maddened state, had come for her. She didn’t know what he saw, what he thought he was doing, but she had to at least try to heal him. If she could only get the upper hand, she could save him. Maybe. She prayed.
In the meantime, there were far more of her flight that had come with him, bearing cackling satyrs and reveling in the destructive tide of dark minions they had brought. Those ones were beyond saving, she could tell. She was too focused on the fight with her mate to act with precision, so Ysondre began a chant, nearly subvocal, which she had practiced for many years now. She couldn’t direct it, but it was all she could hope to use to protect her companions.
••••••••••
The fog came first, a billowing green cloud that formed, actively chasing anything uncorrupted by the nightmare, myself included. It formed right on top of me, just bad luck as far as I could tell, and I suddenly felt so, so drowsy. I scrabbled for my universal antidote as I started to lose altitude, and felt my mind starting to clear as I drank it.
Then the lightning started. An arcing blast of electricity that leapt from Ysondre to Talaada, arcing in a chain from dragon to dragon, and seemed to get more powerful as it went. Talaada seemed to be only slightly singed, but every other dragon was forced to land as their wings locked up or burnt with the high voltage. Then the second blast, aimed at the harvest reapers, obliterated nine of them before abruptly changing direction; towards me. I took the full brunt, my spellstone shattering, and I clutched my healthstone in a panic as I fell from the sky. In among the harvest golems who had very little ability to identify friend or foe. I was too stunned by the fall to choke out the deactivation code, and I was trampled and ripped apart, dying for the second time in the same day.
The experience was a bit different at least. Instead of appearing in a graveyard, I suddenly felt very small, and was strapped to Ursula’s hip. I couldn’t see much, couldn’t hear much except her cursing, and couldn’t do much except wait. Oh yeah. And I was still faintly aware of my body, which was currently in five pieces. Ouch.
••••••••••
Sadie’s heart sank when she saw the chosen one go down, but she decided to have faith in whatever dark trickery the warlock had chosen to use. Right now she had to focus on triage. She healed each of the dragons, starting with the most injured living one, as the little one had died instantly. Sad, but she would mourn him later. Ask his name so she could remember him.
Ideally she would have asked that they come together so that she could heal them all with a single prayer, but that lightning seemed to prey upon them when they gathered, and the clouds forced them to keep moving, so they had all spread out. Probably necessary, but it made healing them harder.
Like any competent healer, Sadie had long ago learned how to carefully measure her output, categorizing it from a type one lesser heal, a trifling courtesy she could give someone who had a minor scrape in a highly localized area, to a type five greater heal, a burst of healing energy that could rip someone back from the edge of death by infusing every inch of their body with holy light.
Caledra, the most badly hit save her mount, required a greater 5; she seemed to be on the verge of unconsciousness after that blast combined with the fall, and her hair and skin were burnt black. Sadie focused her whole being upon that spell, allowing it to flow through her without cost. It largely eliminated the mana drain of the spell, but it was emotionally taxing to do; she saved that reserve of inner focus for large spells. The rest were in somewhat better shape; type three medium should serve most of them, focusing a large burst upon the most injured area. It wouldn’t heal everything, but she needed to focus on keeping people alive and in the fight, and she couldn’t afford to be out of energy if something like this happened again. Once everyone seemed to be in a good place, she started spreading renews to everyone remaining and kept a poison cure spell ready, in case someone was caught by the clouds.
••••••••••
Shit. That was Bismark wasn’t it? Ursula had heard the plan. He was supposed to do… something, and that would stop the dragon. Well, the dragon was definitely the biggest threat, she agreed with that much. “Get in closer to the dragon. The first arc of the lightning doesn’t seem so bad.” Of course, their spellstone had shattered so it’s likely nobody would get through this fresh as daisies, but she needed her dragon to do as commanded; he didn’t need to trust her in the future. He loped over on foot, his wing at an odd and likely unhealthy angle, and Ursula opened with a curse of tongues. It would slow the dragon’s ability to cast; she followed up with a spell that hopefully wasn’t stupid, connecting to the dragon’s soul to steal her mana. No one could do much with magic if they couldn’t focus on anything.
••••••••••
Dremuus appreciated the efforts of the human beside him, taking special care of his beloved, but he didn’t think she really belonged on this battlefield. She was too easily flustered. Too green. It was to her credit that she was doing all she could, but she was clearly only a novice healer. He left them in a defensible spot, etched a few trap runes in the area around them, and rejoined the fight.
He didn’t have enough arrows, so he needed to rely on spellshots more than he would like. Arcane shot to replace an arrow with a bolt of energy, and stings to replicate the venom of a wild beast. The big quadrupeds got scorpion venom, to partially paralyze them and make them less deadly. The small transparent ones seemed to be a minimal threat; if anything they were keeping the constructs busy. The death mage seemed to have them well in hand. He’d leave them to her.
He hated the idea of following a warlock’s lead, but she was likely correct. Viper venom, to numb the mind. Combined with continued pressure forcing constant healing, and the dragon should be rendered manageable, if not harmless.
There was a hum in the air, one Dremuus recognized from the early days of the Last War, before the orcs had abandoned shamanism. He dropped his bow and quickly grounded himself, hoping against hope that the magic resistance potion was all it was cracked up to be. The bolt was searingly painful, but mostly dissipated into the ground; there was no one else close enough for it to leap to.
The old Rangari downed his healing potion with a smile, and took up his bow again. He didn’t need the second initiation; as of today, he felt like himself again.
••••••••••
The battle went pretty well, I’m told. I wish I could have seen it a bit better. Once Ysondre was sufficiently drained, they got a necklace around her neck, gave her a paralysis command, and finished off the adds. There was a bit of a surprise when another wave of druid spirits came out of the gate, but they actually weren’t that big a threat if you removed the giant dragon from the equation. They also didn’t seem to have been expecting an immediate fight. I have a creeping suspicion that what we just fought was about one day’s worth of reinforcements. The next fights would be harder, especially since about half our killbots were toasted.
I got to see my own body too; it was still “alive” thanks to the soul stone and could be healed before they put me back in, but at least one of my arms was shattered pulp and my legs and wings were all broken. This was going to take a bit of time to heal; Abby guessed three to four days with continuous doses of Trollsblood potion. They dropped me off in the apartment in my human form with Paletress looking after me, doing what she could to accelerate my recovery. Hopefully when they got back I’d get some good news.