A meeting in the City {Artemis~StormKatz}

Afraid to anger Eliza again and bring on his own doom, Leuan gave one of his well-practiced smiles in return to Eliza’s. Unlike her, though, he couldn’t really bring himself to find even black humour in their situation. That wyrm looked /nasty/- and it was most certainly making a beeline for him. How did it even know where to go for? Was it some kind of horrible coincidence, just bad luck for him? He’d been told more than once that karma would get him one day, but he’d assumed it would come in the form of a rejection or dismissal from some overly haughty woman rather than a manic wyrm of death with completely unreasonable proportions. As he watched, the creature’s tail whisked out of the hole, leaving it with what he guessed to be some 30 or 40 feet of length. He gaped in horror as the wyrm randomly struck out and took down a screaming man, wings twitching with the desire to flee as he backed further away.
“Right. Great. I think people have figured out to run by themselves.” Gulping nervously, he shuffled after Eliza, trying not to watch yet unable to tear himself away as the wyrm stuck again on its way towards them.

“Weapons, right,” he managed, getting something of a grip on himself after a moment. “I have… two hunting knives. That’s it though, I catch birds by hand when I’m flying. I, um…” Shaking his head, he quickly fumbled the knives from their sheaths and offered one to Eliza, blade first. Glancing down, he saw that his hand was shaking; trying not to flush, he spun the knife around, pressed the handle into Eliza’s hand and then clenched a fist around the other knife, trying to still the trembles. Another surreptitious glance out at the wyrm showed that it was only getting closer; without thinking about it, he stepped out into the street and vaulted up on top of the shop’s canopy with a strong beat of his wings.
“Eliza!” he called, leaning down and holding out his hands to pull her up- before realising what coming out in the rain would do to her, and freezing. Dealing with a sylph and a wyrm at once seemed unfair. If he went back inside or withdrew his hands now Eliza would realise at once that he knew her secret; he knew even from the short time they’d spent together that she wasn’t stupid. Yet he couldn’t let her turn into her sylph form, that would only have the same effect. Stiff with indecision, he remained in his position, eyes fixed on Eliza.

Great. The wyrm was basically made of rock, and all they had were a few hunting knives? Eliza didn’t even have her sword – she didn’t like to take it into cities because it could be stolen. But it was too late to think like that. Eliza reeled through the facts from the entry she had found in the library book, looking for a better solution. It was long and narrow, hard to detect, low to nil magic capabilities, which usually meant low immunity to magic attacks… it had to eat constantly to keep its life force up, and only ate stone for nutrition (although now it seemed to be branching out). Well, none of those helped them, did they? Eliza couldn’t use magic, and she didn’t think Leuan could either. They couldn’t hold it long enough to starve it, and they didn’t have anything heavy enough to shatter the creature.

As Leuan moved out into the rain, a thought hit Eliza. The creature’s eating habits… it could only barely sustain itself, and although she couldn’t use magic, her sylph form consumed life energy. It was an attack that usually had no effect unless the other party was willing, but she wondered if it would be enough to incapacitate this low-energy creature.

But that would reveal everything. Disappearing for a few years meant that people forgot her dress style and ignored the one of two disappearances, but all-out transforming in public would not be so easily forgotten. It all came down to whether or not she was prepared to leave Didienne, the city she was born in, forever. And what would Leuan do if he saw? She had been growing fond of the Avian…

The wyrm moved again, and headed straight towards the shop she was sheltering by. She might not have sacrificed her identity to save the people of the city, but to save her own life? She had decided faster than she could blink. Fixing a deep look at Leuan, almost saying sorry in advance, she ran straight out into the downpour, her human skin melting into the more comfortable blue scales she truly wore. Eventually her legs gave out, and she slid across the damp road, right up to the wyrm.

As it turned out, Leuan didn’t need to make any tricky decisions about what to do; Eliza made them for him. He watched, numb with horror and disbelief, as she hurled herself out into the downpour. Sure enough, her skin turned swiftly blue, looking more like that of a fish than of any human. He couldn’t tell what she was trying to convey in the second that she held his gaze- some kind of challenge? Regret?- but it didn’t matter much in the next second as she flopped onto the cobblestones and slide her way across them like some kind of predatory seal. In that moment, he realised he’d been underestimating sylphs. Yes, theoretically he had known that she must have killed countless men, and he had been somewhat scared of the same thing happening to him- but it wasn’t until he saw the way Eliza moved that he realised she was truly a natural predator, even if she hadn’t exactly been born that way.

For all that, though, going after the thing alone had to be suicidal, unless she had some kind of secret sylph power known only to her. And, despite knowing that she was a monster- for god’s sake, she was blue- somehow Leuan found himself caring enough to jump off the awning, swearing as he glided through the air to hover above Eliza. He had no idea what she was doing, looking like she was trying to strangle the wyrm as she wrapped her hands around its neck- ugh, was that webbing between her fingers?- but it didn’t seem to be having much effect that he could tell. Folding his wings, he dropped onto the creature, sitting on its back and trying to pin it down with his hands so that it couldn’t bite either of them.
“What are you doing?” he asked incredulously, briefly and miraculously forgetting that she was in sylph form- not to mention she didn’t know he knew. “Are you crazy?”

It was difficult to get a firm grip on the wyrm in the rain – it wouldn’t stay still long enough for her to get a grip on it. Her sylph form was painfully weak on land, and when Leuan swooped down towards her, she thought she was done for. What reason did he have not to attack her instead of the wyrm they had been tracking? She was arguably the worse of the two monsters in the street right then.

Absurdly, however, he seemed like he was trying to help. A good amount of Eliza’s human nature dissolved when she changed forms, but she was aware that this was a good thing. When she was asked a question, though, she felt like she was almost slipping back into her other skin from shock. “What doessss it look like I’m doing? I’m trying to kill a goddamn wyrm to save Didienne’s architecture.” The sentence must have fallen out of the human half of her mind, because her sylph half had just found a good spot to fix her hands, not far from the wyrm’s blood supply, to begin draining energy. Her muscles tensed, and with each pulse she felt her own energy increase a little as the Wyrm’s energy was filtered out through her fingers. She had no idea how the beast would react, but it was worth a try. And, killing this thing like that meant she wouldn’t have to kill anyone in town to feed from, which was probably a good thing considering how close she had gotten with Leuan.

There was a small crowd watching now, but luckily the street had been quiet when she changed, so nobody should be able to trace her sylph form back to her human identity. Well, nobody except Leuan. Her sylph side was screaming that she should kill him too and be done with it, but something stopped her from finishing the thought off. That wasn’t important, she could decide what to do with the Avian once the immediate threat of the Wyrm was dealt with.

Leuan just gaped at Eliza when she spoke, an almost reptilian hiss adorning her words. He hadn’t got the faintest idea of how exactly she thought she was harming the wyrm, but now that he was up close he could get a look at those sylph teeth and he wasn’t about to argue. If it worked, then great; if not, the wyrm would kill him anyway and there was really nothing to gain from stopping Eliza. Maybe she’d even provide a distraction for it. Did he want her to die, though? She didn’t seem like a monster- well, obviously she looked plenty like one now, but surely she wouldn’t be trying to help the city if she was totally heartless? Maybe some of her humanity remained. He didn’t really fancy having to deal with her after all this if it didn’t; would she still try to eat him even then?

He was broken from his lingering moment of shock by an almighty blow to his side, which sent him sprawling across the cobblestones. Reeling, he tried to figure out what happened; it felt as if somebody had thrown a brick at him. After a moment, he realised why- the wyrm had apparently noticed them and had decided to do something about it, lashing out with its stony tail. With an incoherent yell of panic, Leuan just managed to scramble out of the way of another attack before it hit him in the face. The wyrm didn’t seem to be quite as strong as he had expected, though; it was mostly due to surprise that he’d been knocked so far before. Perhaps Eliza was actually doing something useful- she didn’t seem to have moved much as far as he could tell.

Weakened though it may be, the wyrm seemed to be lining up another attack. In a mad dash, Leuan half-crawled across the ground and stabbed ineffectually at its rocky skin with one of his hunting knives, trying to make any impact.

Apparently the Wyrm didn't like having its lifeforce drained, and was getting rather angry, lashing out all over the place. However, Eliza forced herself to hold on. The Wyrm bucked under her, lifting her to her feet. Its strength was surprising, but it was ebbing away. She tightened her grip, feeling the stony skin under her hands crack with the pressure. A thin, red trickle ran over her hand. The beast was flesh and bone, under its mineral-enforced shell, and she had just found a way in.

She looked over as Leuan yelped, glaring at the noisy avian. Patience was for more sentient beings than she was, the newly shed blood kicking her human half well out of the picture. She hissed at him, baring her teeth to tell him to shut up, then resumed attacking the wyrm. It was thrashing badly, but her claw-tipped fingers were thoroughly embedded in the creature's wound. She tore at the tough skin, and finally clamped her teeth down around the wyrm's slender body. She could drain energy through the skin slowly, but now that she was directly in touch with the blood supply, the raw blood magic was flowing through her much faster. Her skin darkened, and the purple sections of her body around her gills, fingers and toes seemed to glow in the overcast daylight.

When her strength was restored, and the wyrm weak, she pulled away, trying to snap the creature's spine with her teeth as she did so. Her teeth and chin were red, and she had probably never looked more horrifying in her life. Well, except maybe when she had a human dinner, rather than a building-destroying monster. She had done what she could, the creature would be hard pressed to get away. Whether or not it survived was just luck now.

Last edited by Artemis on Mon Dec 08, 2014 7:33 pm; edited 1 time in total

His attacks seemed to have no effect on the wyrm; its skin worked better than a suit of armour for protection. Desperate, he ducked under another flying blow from the tail and squinted along the body of the wyrm to Eliza, trying to see if she was having any more luck than him.

Much to his surprise, she was. He hadn’t the faintest idea how, but she seemed to have cracked open the wyrm’s stony shell like a nut, releasing splotches of blood which would probably be fairly disgusting to somebody who didn’t hunt for a living. What bothered Leuan more was the way Eliza seemed to be drinking its blood- what the fuck was up with that?! There didn’t seem to be much to do except stare in horrified fascination as Eliza took her fill, finally pulling away once her skin was flushed purple. Pinned underneath them, the wyrm continued to thrash weakly, but holding it down was now a feasible task- whatever creepy thing the sylph had done, it seemed to have worked.

Cringing a little at the proximity to what was, undeniably, a monster straight out of a kid’s nightmare, Leuan scooted towards the wound on the wyrm’s back and, trying not to think about how Eliza had been drinking from it moments before, plunged his knife into the creature’s flesh with conviction. Its body spasmed abruptly; gritting his teeth, he worked the knife in deeper and sawed it about a bit, hoping to do some damage to major nerves or blood vessels. The wyrm wasn’t dead yet- it still twitched dismally, laid out on the ground like a giant worm made out of stone- but it certainly seemed to be on the way. At the very least, it would probably be safe to stand up now, and Leuan did so, cleaning his knife on his already-bloody trousers and sheathing it, still numbed by everything which had just happened.

Eliza slid back across the ground, leaving the dying wyrm to Leuan. The energy she had drained fromt he creature gave a rather heady feeling, rushing around her skull, but as she sat back, her more sentient human half began to return. There were people everywhere, who had all seen her as a monster - they could not, under any circumstances, see her change back. That wouldn't happen unless she dried out, but the rain was easing, and even now there were patches of paler skin across her body, ready to turn.

She had to move. Her legs weren't strong enough to carry her yet (after all, they were meant for swimming, not standing), so she crawled towards the covered shop entrance on her elbows. She was fast, and the image of her sliding across the wet ground, feet flapping behind, was possibly one of the more horrible things the general public would have the displeasure to see. But time was of the essence for Eliza, if she wanted to avoid being caught.

She sat still, out of the spitting rain, for as long as she dared, then tried to stand. She was shaky, but this close to changing back, she would have to make do. She walked, slowly and unsteadily at first, then much faster, around the edge of the building, finally breaking into a run. She could feel her features shifting, and darted into a dim, narrow alley to get away from the crowd. Luckily they were distracted by the sound the dying wyrm was making, so nobody followed her.

She had barely sat down, tucked behind a pile of boxes, before she regained her human form completely, right down to the white dress. The rain was all but over, but she was going to have to go back. Leuan had seen everything, and she needed to guarantee his silence.

The idea of going back out in the open after such a public display was horrifying, but she knew she had to deal with the situation. She stood, and edged out again, very slowly. She took her time, taking the long way round where she could, but her intention was to return to Leuan to sort out the mess she had made...

He wouldn’t have thought it possible, but Leuan was so shellshocked by everything (he couldn’t decide whether he should be more disturbed by the wyrm or Eliza) that he stood vacantly in the gradually abating rain for what was apparently long enough for Eliza to make her escape. Well- was it an escape? God knew. The streets nearby were all but deserted, everyone having fled the commotion. No doubt the rumours were spreading like wildfire; he was pretty distinctive with his wings, that might reflect badly on him in the future… what was there to do now, though?

It took half an hour of sitting in a tavern and a generous quantity of ale before Leuan began to feel even vaguely coherent again. The moment he looked up and out of the slightly cloudy window, though, he wished he wasn’t. Try as he might to convince himself otherwise, there was no mistaking the woman passing outside for anyone but Eliza- she was returned to her human form now, although her clothes and hair still seemed a little damp. There didn’t seem to be much urgency in her pace- what was she doing? Wasn’t she worried about somebody recognising her? Dithering, Leuan drew closer to the glass and goggled out at Eliza, utterly torn as to whether or not he actually wanted to confront her after all that.

Nobody seemed to recognise Eliza - nobody had been around until after she changed - so she felt fairly safe walking the streets. Of course, the older generation might think they'd seen a ghost, but she could have been just anyone who had been caught in the rain right then. She spotted Leuan in the tavern as she walked past, and stopped. It would be much nicer to just leave town now, but she had to make sure she was safe to do so. Taking a deep breath, she pushed open the door and stepped inside. She bought a glass of wine and carried it to the table where Leuan was sitting, choosing the seat nearest the door on the table just in case this went badly.

"I'm here to apologise..." she said quietly, sipping her drink. "I didn't intend to do... that..."

It was strange apologising - normally after this long in a city she had made a kill, left the victim drowned and bloodless in a nearby water supply and left, without anyone being any the wiser. But she had gotten to like Leuan, and suddenly everything was more complicated. In hindsight, coming back to her birthplace had never been a good plan, but she hadn't expected all this.

"I, erm, was hoping that we could forget about that little incident without being too indiscrete." she added, taking another sip of wine which was really more of a gulp. Human sympathies were difficult. This was exactly why she preferred spending time as a Sylph - no awkward discussions in taverns necessary.