Just wait until the *real* villain reveals itself…
Throwing a fireball into Audrae’s face had been briefly satisfying, but not all that effective. None of their attacks had been all that effective. Effective for what, though? It was unlikely that their thrown-together party could take out three Immortals, especially with one of them apparently augmented by a world-shattering ascension thingy. So what were they trying to accomplish, anyway?
Lots of things happened while Oram’s mind raced through tactical options. Cassion and Daia appeared, and began to fight Audrae and Tentacle Lady. Both declared that they might be able to weaken the malicious pair of Immortals enough that the mortals could finish them off. Faldrun sprang his champion from Tentacle Lady’s grasp. Some Other Lady appeared and offered to help, declaring that yet more assistance was on the way.
Things looked grim, though, especially with Kata. She seemed breathtakingly powerful, even by Immortal standards. She managed to warp the magical effects Varlum had unleashed, and had kicked the ithecal with devastating force, sending him reeling and to his knees. She grabbed one of Nir’wei’s wolves and cut it in half.
Oram’s eyes flicked anxiously to Choir. The song wolf wasn’t one of the ones engaging in frontal attacks on the crazed Immortal; he was more the devious sort, circling around the back, eyes steadily on the backs of Kata’s dangling legs, looking for a chance to clamp teeth onto a vulnerable calf or hamstring. A classic pack tactic, Oram recognized.
But Oram himself was not part of that pack fighting Kata just then. He faced another foe, a more familiar and personal foe. Audrae had recognized him and Zoro alike, and had declared her intention to kill them. For now, Daia had the Immortal of Shadows and Deception, and her whip and knife of darkness occupied, but they needed a way to get rid of her. Faldrun had gifted them with power. Varlum, too, though in his case he needed to decide on the exact form of that gift. Strength? Speed? Skill with his spear? He was not sure that any of those skills would carry the day.
Some Other Lady had said that more aid was on the way. They had but to last and keep fighting until that aid arrived somehow. They had to endure. Endure, yes. To keep attacking, to stay in their enemies’ faces until hopefully the tide turned for them somehow. So he used Varlum’s gift to augment his enduranceExpert->Master.
Oram summoned another fireball. Only this time, instead of throwing it, he tried something different, something he wasn’t sure would even work. He had heard tales of great champions wielding flaming swords to defeat mighty enemies. The hunter didn’t have a sword, of course, but a spear. And while setting the wooden shaft on fire didn’t seem like a good idea, perhaps he could do something to the head; experimentally, he passed the fireball in his hand over the spearhead as one might smear oil or venom over it to coat it.
What else had power? Oram looked to his patron, wrestling with Tentacle Lady. Stories had power. He had not forgotten the tale that Cassion had woven in the Heart of Scalvoris, how the events recounted had taken on reality. Oram was no Cassion, but he was Marked by Old Dust, and he had told a tale or two of his own in his time, sometimes with good effect. Perhaps he had another story in him yet.
”The huntsman faced the Immortal of Deception, armed with a flame-headed spear,” he declaimed loudly, as he raised the weapon over his head. Eying the whip, Oram had decided that holding his spear out in front of him and using it as a pokey stick wasn’t the ideal tactic. He raised the polearm all the way back over his head, so that the tip pointed behind him, and rotated the lugs so as to strike with them, like an impromptu axe. ”Side by side with the brave biqaj with his swift, shining scimitar, he fought Audrae. He *struck* with mighty blows…” Oram twisted and swung the spear overhead, crashing down Audrae’s head.
As soon as he could, the hunter retracted the spear back overhead, taking a breath before continuing. He would shout out snatches of the story as he struck each blow, the way some warriors would accompany their strikes with a shout. ”…again and again. The spearhead blazed…” he pulled the spear back, took a breath, struck again. ”…as he wielded it like a halberd…” another retraction, another breath, another strike: ”…while Zoro slashed and swirled like a brilliant whirlwind of light…Fire rained down repeatedly from overhead in heavy blows…while razor-edged death darted and raced from every quarter…”
As he inhaled and poised to strike once more, Oram noticed that Varlum was starting to grow into monstrous size. He also noticed that Choir was taking his shot, leaping at Kata’s calf. Then he turned attention back to his adversary and struck once more, and continued to shout out his tale in snatches as he did: ”…fire and light pressed the being of shadow sorely…his already-great stamina augmented by gifts from Faldrun and Varlum...the hunter beat Audrae back and beat her back…while the biqaj’ blade clove her shady minions into shreds…she could do nothing here…her shadows could not withstand such onslaught of light and fire…”
Would the story come true as he told it? Even in part? Oram didn’t know, but he would persist as long as he could. Maintaining story and onslaught alike took stamina, but stamina he had. His goal was to vanquish Audrae, beating her into retreat, or submission, or whatever happened to Immortals when they got beaten, and then turn to Tentacle Lady. Cassion had said something about using fire on that one once she was worn down, had he not? But that was for a future chapter.
