Escaping The Empire - The Nonhuman Chronicles

Wilhelmina approaches the wounded man. "Would you like to live?" Her voice sounds sweet, but there's an unsettling tinge to it as she wipes the blood from her mouth.

 

"Yes, I would..." The man groans and wheezes weakly as Wilhelmina approaches. Then suddenly he rushes and pulls a knife off of his belt and grabs at her with the clear intent to take her hostage.

<totally worth the whole day wait. Sorry folks>

 

Axel heaves his ax free of his slain foe and turns towards the rest of the battle. With their original assailant's knife throw against one of the newcomers, Axel reasoned that he wouldn't have to worry about him immediately. Talia seemed out of it, but not in any pressing danger. The vampire woman had seemingly come out of nowhere and was tangling with a wounded attacker. Ariel seemed to have debilitated a couple of the men with her magic, at least for a moment. He couldn't tell where Kerri was. With a snort, he lumbered up to the archers attempting to reload their weapons and, with all the ferocity he could muster, bellowed.

 

Wilhelmina can't help but flash a grin. "You haven't thought this through, have you?" She grabs the bandit's hand and pushes the knife into her throat. Withdrawing the blade, she smiles up at the bandit. "Why don't you put that down, and we'll have a chat like grown ups?"

 

Ariel had already started casting another spell when the guy asked her if she could make a bigger arrow, but paused when Wilhelmina approached the last bowman... then almost facepalmed when the guy tried taking the vampire hostage. Is this guy an idiot? She waited to see what would happen and whether she would need to finish her spell.

 

Gerid kept his eyes on the developing "hostage" situation, inching his way towards the dazed faun girl. He figured the winged woman could just shoot through the blood sucker to kill the man if need be and so long as the vampiress didn't try to turn him, how it otherwise played out did not really matter to him at the moment.

He crouched down next to Talia, holding out an arm for her to grab onto if she needed the help getting back to her feet. "You okay?"

 

"Fine..." The man groans and rolls his eyes in defeat as he sees his knife have no (very little) effect. You feel his muscles go limp as he willingly drops his knife to the floor with a defeated look on his face. "You win."

Talia is still dazed when the strange man approaches her. While he might be dressed differently, a quick flash enters her mind. The men grabbing her, ripping her clothes off and pinning her with her legs spread. The men laughing at her shame as she struggles against the much stronger men. One of the men grabs her tit roughly and pinching the nipple on the tip of it so hard that she winces in pain. All of these memories run through her in a moment and her breathing quickly speeds up in a panic. The fear of being dragged back is too much for her and she releases a shrill scream. She slaps the strange person's hand away from her with a shout. "Get away from me!"

 

Gerid's expression does not seem to change as his hand is knocked away but a closer look would show his eyes display more than a little bit of pity. He takes several steps back as requested, returning his arms to under his cloak.

"I'm sorry," he says, "You didn't deserve what happened to you."

 

Wilhelmina gives the bandit a condescending smirk. "What's your name, man?"

 

The girl staggers to her feet and bolts back behind Ariel and eyes you with an untrusting look.

He scoffs irritably. "I don't really think my name matters at this point. I'm of no value to you. So either kill me, or let me go. It's up to you."

 

Ariel turned her head half-way, so that she could still keep one eye on what was going on and look at Talia with the other. “It'll be alright. stay close to me.” She tried giving the faun girl a reassuring smile, though in the darkness of the night it was hard to tell if the scared girl could see it.

Hearing the man's words Ariel focused her attention to him. “No value to us? I'm not so sure about that. At the very least you seem to know the surrounding area...” she pointed out.

 

Talia clutches against your back and watches both the bandit and Gerid fearfully as the situation begins to deescalate.

The man grunts and clutches at one of his injuries. "You're surrounded by mountains, forests, and a couple of human towns. We had a camp nearby, but such a place doesn't really hold any more value." He sighs and pulls off his hood and you catch sight of a pair of pointed elf ears on either side of his head. "There's no gold and hardly any food left there. So I don't know what value you think I have, but it's less so."

 

"Of no value?" Wilhelmina smiles. "We're the ones that decide that. I'll give you a choice. You can drink my blood and become my personal servant, or I can drink you dry and leave you lying on the ground as a withered corpse."

 

Gerid sighs to himself at the faun girl's reaction. He is not surprised by it but he cannot linger on that for now. Right now, what he was worried about is what is happening in front of him, so that is where he needs to keep the majority of his attention.

He twitches slightly as he sees the elf ears, a jolt of anger running through him as he glowers at the would-be bandit. "If you have any pride in yourself," he all but growls, "you'll take the latter choice. Or have elves fallen so far they'll willingly bend the knee for Leaches now?"

 

He grimaces irritably and glares at Gerid. "and where did Elven Pride get us Empireman? Our capital is in ruins, our king executed, and his family gods know where, our people enslaved and subjugated. No, Free Elves do what they have to do to survive and not bend the knee to the human blight."

 

“And how does attacking us help you survive?” Ariel asked. “We're obviously not with the Empire, and we just as obviously have nothing worth stealing. Killing us would get you nothing.” She pointed out. “Unless, of course were planning to follow the humans' example and start selling slaves...”

 

"When you have nothing and are just trying to squeak out some kind of existence on the mountainside. Then anyone looks like a potential target." He motions at the large minotaur, Axel. "at the very least any kinds of weapons and armour any of you had could have sold for a few coins."

 

Ariel nodded in understanding – living in the mountains really did seem difficult. Then the man's last comment caught her attention. “Is that so? And to whom, exactly, were you planning to sell anything you got from us? Not the Empire, at least not officially, that's for sure...”

 

"It got you what you deserved," Gerid grumbles under his breath, though he tilts his head in interest at Ariel's question as she catches the implication of the elf's statement and he finds himself curious to hear the answer as well.

 

"We have a black market dealer that we trade with in the city of Aldenor on the far side of the mountains. She buys our wares for coin that we use for food and sells them to non-human criminal elements." He looks around at his dead comrades. "Not that any of that matters to me now."