(SW of Celen's Fall) Hunting to Kill (17th Board)

Dyavol snorted as the words ‘smaller members’ drifted up to him as he perched behind Vy’s horns. “I can’t imagine who she means by that.” He chuckled to himself, but before he had time to make any further of sarcastic comments the trees around him seemed to erupt. Vy hadn’t chosen the most comfortable way down through the greenery, and he was jolted around quite ferociously as she crashed through the treetops. Gripping on with his front paws, he closed his eyes until the rocking had stopped. His shoulders aches a little from clinging on so desperately, but at least he was out of the worst of the weather – the storm was getting stronger every few minutes, which was a huge problem for a dragon as small and structurally ‘flimsy’ as him.

“Yes, I’m still here!” he called down, having to shout just to be heard over the racket of cracking sticks. He risked scrambling a little higher up Vy’s head-frills now that they were under the relative shelter of the broken trees, and looked at Anae as she delivered the last part of her speech. Continuing on foot sounded good, certainly, and he was certainly not going to put in a complaint.

“Have we lost anyone? I can’t tell from up here.” He asked, not really expecting an answer. He knew that Vy and Anae at least had more important things to do, and doubted anyone else could hear him, but it seemed worth asking anyway. Not that he really cared – he didn’t really have much compassion left in hi to share with the dragons he fought alongside, but it was nice to know that their numbers hadn’t suffered in the fierce storm.

--

The rain at least didn’t bother Oceianna as she ran, but the lightning kept making her jump. She was so far away from home now, but then again her ‘home’ hadn’t been exactly homely for years now. She was looking for the dragons that called themselves Maledictus Eice, but all she had to go on was a whisper of a rumour, and the sound of screaming near here that she had heard a few days ago. Her energy was wasted away completely, and she was just about ready to give up. She was far enough away from where she had started to just stop, surely? Maybe she could just lie in the rainforest for a while to regain her strength…

What was that? Something was crashing, not too far away, and whatever it was sounded huge. She saw the trees in the distance shake, and realised that only a dragon could possibly move the ancient trees of the rainforests so drastically. Could it be she had found what she was looking for? Time to find out…

She changed her direction slightly, and started running again, hardly daring to hope. She had been so... frightened, and was certain that the only place she would be safe was surrounded by bloodthirsty dragons. Memories of the huge fight she had had with the wretched water sylph kept racing through her mind, and the watery scars on her back only renewed the images, making her more uneasy than ever.

She twisted between two trees and found a flattened sort of area, which seemed to be filled with dragons. Ocei blinked, not daring to believe, but she couldn’t imagine why else a group of dragons (some with blood spattered on their scales) would be gathered in the woods. She approached cautiously, suddenly nervous about the notorious group (well, only notorious among the other dragons so far, but she was sure they would soon be known across the whole island), before clearing her throat softly, trying to grab someone’s attention.

“Erm, excuse me? Are you the, er, maledictus eice? I’ve, erm, been hoping to find you…” she said, her speech littered with uncertain pauses. She was panting slightly from travelling through the storm, and her scales had certainly been in better conditions, so she must have looked a state, but she tried her best to look presentable, praying that the other dragons would accept her.

This had to be one of the more miserable campaigns the clubtails had led, what had possessed them to lead everyone through a storm? Did they think everyone was as big as they were, able to weather a storm no problem? He had had enough of being bounced around by turbulence. When Anae's voice cut into his mind he felt queasy, a pounding behind his eyes that spread to ache throughout his whole head. She assumed all dragons could take her projected booming, but never did she think it'd be uncomfortable. Gerris wasn't one to complain. These sisters valued uncompromising loyalty, and he was not going to openly challenge them on anything. Besides, from what he'd witnessed, they were puffed up so much on their own gasses that introducing any other kinds of ideas was like to be met with the business end of their tails and talons.

He snaked down to the clearing Anae had dropped into and spread his wings wide, softening his landing, his hind legs touching down before his forelegs. The handsome, full grown fume male knew his place among these dragons and, unfortunately, he ranked even lower than Vy's pet, Dyavol, whom he was careful to pump full of compliments and praise.

He sat, tucking his wings against his back and wrapped his tail around as much of his body as he could manage, tapping it against the ground soundlessly as he waited. The rainwater gave his body a sheen, for he looked smoother than most dragons, almost without scales.

"A dangerous landing, fine dragoness, for a lesser dragon than you" he said as he observed the destruction about Vy. "Though I suppose a lesser dragon would not have been so bold as to create an entry for themselves" he admitted.

Reaching up with a claw, he adjusted the skull he wore round his neck, trailing it down the cranium to an eye socket. Sometimes he wished the old man was still alive, at least for the comfort and normalcy he had enjoyed before his fatal fall.

It was here in this clearing, trapped with two of the largest and most dangerous dragons he'd ever encountered that Gerris found himself quite uncomfortable, especially because it was lashing rain down upon them all... which hindered his ability to produce gases. Still, he was quick, and not without tooth or claw. As paranoid as ever, he made sure to note exit routes into the brush, and went over answers to questions they could theoretically pose to him.

He turned his gaze upon Anae and wondered, not for the first time, if she possessed her own brain, or did she really share one with Vy. Did she have her own wants and desires, or did the two of them share all but bodies?

Oceianna was quite taken aback when she was greeted so warmly. She had expected the dragons of ME to be harsh, but it seemed that , among themselves at least, there was enough kindness for one more. She smiled politely to the first dragon that came to greet her: a desert chaser, who seemed almost unnervingly polite. “Erm, hello. Yes, I was hoping to, erm, join you. If there’s room, of course – I mean…” she trailed off, her nervousness coiling around her words and stopping them from escaping. She was quite glad when the wolf dragon added his voice to the conversation.

“I came from… I’m not sure, really, but it was to the east?” she said, managing to speak up a little more this time. She must have looked like the twitchiest thing for miles, and was trying her best to make a proper impression. Finally, after a good deal of murmuring indicating her presence, on of the clubtail sisters made her way over. She had only heard them mentioned in passing, and had no idea which was which, but she had enough sense to stand to attention as she made her way closer. Her heart fluttered, but not in fear. No, it was hanging somewhere between nervousness and hope.

The sweetness in her voice surprised Ocei. She was sure it was a guise, of course, and that underneath there was a powerful leader, but even if the pleasantries were false she was safer here than where she had come from. She relaxed, feeling profoundly safer than she had moments before, and nodded happily at the offer. “Oh, yes please! I’d love to come – that is, if you’ll have me!” Her voice was filled with an almost childish happiness, and she barely managed to keep herself from jumping for joy. This was perfect!

Her smile only widened when the second clubtail sister acknowledged her, welcoming her. She was sure there would be more of an initiation thingy-whatsit later on, but for now, that was enough. She was in! She pranced behind he other dragons gleefully, her energy restored nicely with the new found safety and confidence that the dragons had given her.

--

Dyavol laughed as Temero commented on him making it there. “’Course I got here – I’m a big strong dragon, remember?” he laughed, shaking his head. He liked the wolf dragon – there were few members of the group that he actually /liked/, but Temero had earned his respect thoroughly. As he grinned, the flashing lightning illuminated the many bulges of bone scattered through his wings – he had hundreds of tiny, brittle bones in each wing, and he had broken all but three of them some while ago. They now stood as just another set of marks on his scarred form, but he was sure Temero would recognise the tiny little breaks when he saw them properly.

“I am glad – it would be dreadful to loose someone.” Dyavol replied to Vy, forcing empathy that wouldn’t quite come naturally. However, his attention was immediately snatched by the new dragon. A new recruit. His eyes scanned the tear dragon, and he snorted. She wouldn’t last five minutes – he doubted she’d even made her first kill yet. Some part of him rejoiced in the knowledge that he would get to watch her break…

From then on, he hid in the safety of Vy's horns, and watched the other dragons battling the storm behind them. That was one of the perks of being less than a foot across, he decided.

“Well, my dear, we wouldn’t dream of turning you away!” Anækileya assured the tear, her smile widening ever further and showing her teeth to generous advantage.
(( http://images.wikia.com/disney/images/9/94/Bruce-shark.jpg ))
This expression didn’t change as she turned her attention to that infuriating little desert chaser, her voice gaining an extra layer of syrupy falseness as she cooed, “And my dear Syntribos, I’m so glad that you’re taking an interest in our new members. We want them to feel included, after all!” With this piece of dripping sarcasm, she stretched her grin one more time before turning away.

Despite her simmering annoyance at Syntribos, travelling with her sister soon fell into a soothing routine as they switched places as was needed, communicating without speaking from their many years together. People could claim that they were poor leaders, that they were irrational, that they were mad- but one thing which was indisputable was that they were loyal and that they worked seamlessly as a team. By the time they reached the chasm in the ground, she wasn’t as tired as she could have been- though she was hardly enjoying the conditions. The sooner this was over, the better. Especially considering the complaints which had broken out over their ranks. Upon seeing how well-received her sister’s gesture was, Anækileya imitated her and spread her own vast wings out in a canopy over the other dragons. Maybe this would placate them somewhat; they’d have a chance to regain their strength as they decided how to proceed.
“Brothers, sisters, your quiet for a time please!” she bellowed out over the assembled dragons. Most of the noise died away, if perhaps not all, and she bowed her head in acknowledgement. Able to hear the others more clearly now, she turned expectantly to the lightning storms Vythiweiah had addressed, who had eagerly taken to the air once more as the trees became thin enough for them to do so. Their opinions seemed unanimous; they were circling the hole repeatedly, with sparks of lightning dancing over their skin. It had to be close now. Anæ wondered if she could even feel her skin tingling as the magic washed out over them, and clubtails possessed only the most basic magical powers in comparison to some other dragons. The obvious course of action was to investigate down the hole, but how to go about it? Obviously only flying dragons would be able to proceed- and they needed to hurry up about it, too. The constant onslaught of rain on the (relatively) thin membranes of her wings was making them ache with coldness, and it was an effort to hold them still for so long too. She flexed them slightly, working out some of the stiffness in them, and glanced across to Vythiweiah.
“My sister, your judgement is better than mine in this matter,” she said in a low tone which few of the other dragons would be able to hear over the wind and thunder. “How do you think we should proceed? We will not all be able to continue, that is undeniable…”

~

What miserable weather. How had he ended up here, anyway? It definitely wasn’t his sort of place, not at all. All the rain and lightning and thunder was very disturbing. And those trees just got in the way. At least they were good for cutting, which was what he was doing now, gouging huge slices in the bark with the claws which gave his breed its name. Not that he knew what that name was. Or what his name was, for that matter. This suddenly seemed somewhat distressing. What was it? Maybe he needed a new one, or at least a substitute until he remembered. Ripper? Claw? Slicer? Scowling and indecisive, he glared down at his feet- and realised, much to his surprise, that there was a word carved into his leathery skin there. The cuts were partially healed, but there was plenty of scarring and remaining injury to read what it said: Jitt. Of course! That was his name. It felt good to have that back, and he proceeded to carve it on an unfortunate nearby tree before smugly returning his attention to the large group of dragons on the other side of the pit before him.

There were lots of them. He couldn’t think why they were here, and he didn’t think he’d forgotten. They seemed suspicious. One of the big green ones let out a bellowing roar, and the others all seemed to look round. Maybe it was in charge of them, then. Well, he could see why they wouldn’t want to cross it. It didn’t look too friendly. In fact, he was sure none of them were too friendly. That was why he was staying back in the shadows of the trees, well hidden. He was just clever like that. And now, he could watch and wait them out. Feeling extremely pleased with himself, he sprawled his length messily down on the floor and waited.

Dyavol gripped on desperately as Vy pitched towards the huge chasm behind them, but managed not to slip off, using Vy’s colossal scales as foot-holds. At Vy’s roar of ‘attack’, Dyavol added his own voice to the battle cry (small though it was in comparison to the clubtail whose head he was sitting on) to the roar, letting all of his pent up anger boil up, driving into a near-berserker frenzy. He got like that around the promise of violence – he had grown to love it, even if it /wasn’t/ against the bipeds he so detested. He didn’t dare face the storm with his own tiny wings, but he shuffled into a position where he could leap into the wind to attack when they got closer. These creatures looked like they were made of lightning, but he was convinced that a few slashes to the throat would still make them hurt – still make them /bleed/. Nothing the world could throw at him would manage to unnerve him – be that another rolled up scroll or some strange lightning-beast. “CHARGE!”

--

Oceianna felt overwhelmed – everyone seemed to be being so /nice/ - it was a little unnerving. She was used to being kicked, or worse sliced at with a shiny stick. All these smiles were a bit of a shock – she would find it easier when they wore off. She mumbled a few answers to vague questions, before finding her attention blown out of the water by Vy’s almighty speech. She paused, listening intently, clearly eating up every word. The mention of ‘pets’ made her shudder visibly – the angry scars on her back throbbing – but she held her nerve well enough. Things had changed now. Things would be better.

Everything seemed to happen so fast after that – she barely knew what to do when the battle-cry was sounded. However, her reaction was instantaneous – she followed the order as if she had been born to. She whirled around, teeth bared, ready to attack, not letting any other thought slip into her head. Thinking would put her off – she knew in her heart that she was too soft to /really/ hurt anything – so she decided to avoid it all costs. She picked out a small-ish lighting-thingywhatsit and pounced, hoping that was all there was to it. Clearly she was going to need some sort of instruction later on, but she was sure she had enough survival instinct to survive, if nothing else.

“I think I can look after her Temero, after all, I’ve managed well enough with Azenth,” Syn said curtly, not liking how the wolf dragon was trying to affect Oceianna like he himself was. The lash dragon had gotten hurt in Plurith but… well, that was Plurith, they had been fighting, and Azenth was Azenth. Everybody knew he was useless. He was hoping Oceianna would be a little more useful. Temero wasn’t all bad, but still, the desert chaser wasn’t going to have the wind taken out of his sails because the wolf dragon wanted a piece of the tear.

He shook the rain out of his pelt as Vythiweiah started giving them a nice history lecture, which might have been motivating once, if it had included anything vaguely interesting, or new. He had heard it all before, and had no wish to hear it all again- but neither did he want his head bashed in from one of the two sisters’ tails, so for the moment he kept his peace. That didn’t mean he had to listen however, so he just watched the others, frowning slightly when a slight blue colour started to overlay everyone. Being a desert chaser, he had barely any magic himself, but he was clever enough to recognize it.

That didn’t stop him from getting blinded by the bright lightning with everyone else when it came though, and he yelped, flicking his tail across his eyes too late for it to make any difference. As soon as he could see again, he decided attacking was probably the worst decision they could make (he didn’t want to get his precious tail seared off by some angry demon-thing), but Ocieanna had already leapt forwards to attack one monster, and Temero was hot on her tail. That slimy… trying to get his paws on a potential new “friend” of his! He snarled, making a show of pretending to attack, but still keeping rather out of the way. The tear could sort-of fight, but definitely not as well as some, and it was best for Temero to get on with taking down the shadow creature- Syn made a show of trying to keep Ocieanna safe, putting his claws out as the monster snapped its tail out towards them, batting it away and fluffing up his mane.
“Don’t be foolish and try to take them on yourself,” he growled, putting his ears back. “There’s more to come, no bloody doubt.” There was no way these things were the only protection the lightning stone had, and although there was going to probably be less danger up at the top of the Fall, that didn’t mean it would be danger free.

((Sorryyyyy for being lame and not replying for way too long))

As she usually did, Anækileya simply surveyed the ranks of Maledictus Eice as her sister made yet another speech. She herself wasn’t too much for excessive words, but she appreciated that it was necessary and so she did her part as was needed. All the same… Vythiweiah was the better speaker, and so she ended up doing most of the speaking.

It didn’t seem like she would need to any speaking, though- with little warning other than a growing sense of magic which she barely even noticed, a colossal bolt of lightning shattered into creatures made of the stuff as it hit the ground. One part of her bitterly reflected that at least the shot had waited until the end of the speech; the rest was immediately slipping into battlemode, the clubtail flexing and beating her wings to warm and loosen them as she moved closer to her sister, assuming a defensive postion until she had assessed the situation. They were outnumbered, though not ridiculously so. Hopefully they would have cunning on their side over these insubstantial beasts, and many of the dragons had the advantage of side, too- but their opponents were obviously magical. There was no way to tell what abilities they may have. They seemed to be powerful ones, though, judging by their opening shot. She didn’t shy away from the noise, but she did jerk her head backwards, her head spikes dropping to cover her ears as much as they could and her mouth opening in a returning snarl. Anækileya was left with an aching head and a somewhat dented sense of hearing.

Nonetheless, the obvious course of action was to attack, and she was in perfect unison with Vythiweiah at the battlecry. There was little room for distractions while fightning, most of her focus on whether the shapes moving around her legs were those she was fighting or her fellow dragons, but she did her best to keep an eye on their newest recruit. The tear was at least making an attempt at attacking, which shifted her opinion of the little dragon. Maybe there was potential underneath that floaty, soft exterior. Everyone had to start somewhere, after all.

It was only after it had happened several times that the dragon realised not all of her attacks were landing where they should. Her initial worries were confirmed when she watched her club fly right through one of the creatures, exiting the shadowy mass with nothing but a shock to flare its painful way along her spine. With a furious snarl, she twisted on the beast and came down on it talons first, making short work of it. From then on she noticed some of the lightning things flickering into mere shadows as attacks came their way- she was just thankful that it never seemed to last long.

What did last a long time, however, was the fighting. Not knowing the source of their opponents, she didn’t see what they accomplished by merely attempting slaughter but gaining injuries of their own.
Vythiweiah, she projected to her sister’s mind, removing herself from the very centre of action though not ceasing to fight altogether. We must make a decision as to who will go down into the fall and order those who will not to fall back. We cannot keep up this defence forever if these creatures do not stop coming, and there is no guarantee that they will. The magic of the stones is one little understood.

~*~

There wasn’t a lot to do as he watched except continue digging away at the ground underneath his feet. Consequently, the furrows he was carving into the earth were big enough for a human to fit in by the time something diverted his attention. A blast of force through the earth, a huge yell, louder even than all that shouting they’d been doing before. His face darkening in annoyance, the dragon looked up and saw flashes across the chasm. Shapes moving around. Dragons lunging forwards to attack. But… things weren’t just happening on the other side of the fall. Out of the corner of his eye, the scythe claw caught sight of a flicker of blue, playing over a dark silhouette which was headed straight for him. With a wail, Jitt scrambled to his feet and flung his claws out before him, slashing wildly until it finally sank in that whatever-it-was had died.

The respite which followed this fight obviously wasn’t to be a long one, though. Staring around wild and bug-eyed, he could see more of the sparking creatures approaching. Closing in on him, coming to kill him, coming to get him, there was no way to get away-
Panicking, the dragon began to thrash his tail again the ground, churning up the earth which he had already moved with his claws. It was as he moved round on the spot, making an odd noise somewhere between a yowl and a growl, that he noticed the hole was… well, a hole. Distracted, he stopped dead and stared at it for a few moments. Jumpjumpjumpjump, his mind urged him- but something held him back, some uncomfortable feeling about the fall. Some trickle of logic telling him that there was no reason there wouldn’t be more things down there, too.

Well, logic held no place in Jitt’s mind anymore. When he vaguely saw some shape breaking off from the mass of brawling dragons to hurl itself into the chasm his mind was made up. Exploding into a lumbering run, he sprinted for the cliff-like rim of the hole, teetering on its brink for only a fleeting moment before letting himself fall off it and snapping his wings open to glide downwards, following the spiralling path of the other dragon.