Spooky Scary Skeletons [LCO]

[Perun]

It was a grim fate that had fallen on so much of Lycia. Where once roaming bands of brigands had been the largest threat to the people of its countryside, that position had moved on to roaming bands of monsters. Skeletons, Hellhounds, Walking Corpses, giant spiders, and all manner of other beast. It was enough to make a man who believed in loving gods think they had been abandoned.

So men who had been abandoned by their gods long ago were right at home. One such man, an giant covered from head to toe in muscle and orange hair, tried to be as unassuming as possible as he walked through a small farming village in Ryerde. On the road, he had passed knights and vassals, traveling to perform some duty for their lord. He was the same, though his 'lord' was his friend, and he had no title. He was Perun of clan Volsungg, and he was here in service to his friend, Donovan, who had taken command of a certain warrior movement in Lycia. Perun's job, was to kill any monsters he found, and to recruit anyone else willing to do so.

No one looked to want to fall in line with him. The people acted in their standard fashion when Perun walked past. The avoided looking directly at him, but he could feel their peripheral stares, eyeing up his large frame, trying to decide if they'd be better off killing him now before he could reveal a violent nature. As long as they were just afraid enough, but not too afraid, they'd leave him be.

He had bought a room at an inn, and was now simply looking about the small market at the center of the village. There was not a broad selection. Apples and corn filled the stalls, as well as a few fruits he could not recognize. There were a few beautiful works of pottery, some nice but simple jewelry, and some artistically woven clothes. Perun was not particularly interested in what was being sold, but if there was any place he could find news of warriors, or the warriors themselves, this was the place.

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Miles away from the village of Alnwick, a band of monsters marched. They did not march in any real sense of the word. The quickest monsters were as far as a few miles ahead of the slowest, but they were all bound together, and they were all going the same way. In fact they all had one leader, despite some being only constructs of bone while others were risen flesh. That leader was one of the walking skeletons, who wore the armor of an Etrurian knight, from a time before the Bandit war. Since rising from its grave, it had killed almost twenty living souls. It marched to add to the list.

[Jule]

Nothing but knives in this place, nothing one could truly call a "sword". Phooey. Almost like she was scared it had vanished after the last five checks, the swordswoman patted her side to make sure the short sword was still there. It wasn't in good shape, and it definitely wasn't ready for extended usage again. But as far as she could tell, there were no suitable replacements in this town. The merchant couldn't give her anything but a shrug and a smile, much less a name for any other town's armory.

Maybe it had been a coincidence that cast the giant's shadow over the small girl, or maybe it was destined to be. Whichever one truly happened, Jule didn't know. She turned away from the stall with meager pickings of swords, casting her eyes this way and that in search of a massive... thing. It had been so sunny a moment ago, and even Jule knew that clouds didn't move that fast. "What was that?" she turned to the apprehensive merchant, who could only shake one finger behind her. That thing was a man covered in animal skins, orange hair, and muscle. With a massive axe to boot; its height from hilt to tip was nearly as tall as the thief was. Jule knew that man; that "thing."  That man was Perun! How could she forget a man so larger than life like him? After the group and the thief had went their separate ways, Jule wasn't sure that she would ever see him or any of the rest again. But here he was, and here Jule was. And he was only two lanes over. "Wow... We'll talk later. I gotta go, bye!" She hugged her fur coat tighter, before taking off at a jog.

Trying to pace Perun wasn't nearly as easy as it was to track him. The warrior's head bobbed past the tapestry-covered vendors like a ship at sea, but his berth of step covered almost twice as much ground as Jule's gangly little legs carried her in a pace. Soon the girl was running, and then sprinting past the townspeople, brushing past them as if she was just a hot gust of air. Jule ducked from one stall to the next, earning herself a few choice words thrown at her while she continued her adventure.

"Hey, Peruuun!!" Jule cried out, rounding a bend and bumping straight into the giant's massive back. "Oof... My bad, sorry about your back, big guy. How've you been? It's been... a few weeks? A month?  Too long, if you ask me. Actually, I've been hopin' to run into you for a little while. Hehe, I never got the chance to fight you - one on one - personally. And after we fought together over in Laus, I'm sure you know a thing or two about that... axe of yours." She paused, looking up at his fierce weapon. She had only seen it tear into monsters from afar, never this close. Up close, it looked sharpened to a razor point. A proper instrument of combat. Not something Jule wanted on the bad end of, but the thrill of tackling something so challenging excited her. "You don't look too busy, wanna go a few rounds? With your big ol' axe, I mean."

[Aria]

Aria yawned and stretched as Chewy did the same. The red wyvern's wings acting like arms and moving much in the same manner as the sky haired rider. They had traveled between the lands on a bit of a family errand. Aria rented a room at the inn that fortunately had an open field nearby for Chewy to sleep in. As the brick colored wyvern was too large for the local stables.

There was a slight chill in the air this morning. Aria was forced to don her thicker clothes for her underarmor as well as a light cape. She kept her hair up in a high ponytail. The pair of them went about their morning routine doing their best not to be a disturbance to the locals. Aria managed to grab a pail of water to brush Chewy's teeth with. Out came the brush made of bristles and special paste made of mint, pumice, chalk, and crushed bone. She wet a rag and went to work.

"Alright Chew.. lets get this over with.. open up." She spoke with some tiredness in her voice. The wyvern who seemed to share the same tiredness open her mouth in front of the rider. Aria went to work. She picked out any stuck pieces of food from the wyvern's gums.

"Chew.. you've gotta stop chewing on wood. I swear... I can probably pick out a whole fence pike.." She muttered through her small mask. Before wiping the wyvern's mouth out with the wet rag. Then came the paste and the brushing. Chewy was being surprisingly well behaved for most of it. Normally the wyvern had an aversion to all things clean. Afterr a bit more brushing Aria wiped off the paste, cleaned the instruments, her hands, and then rinsed her mount's mouth with the remaining water.

"There. All brushed for the morning.. now I'm serious no more chewing wood. Now how about some breakfast."

[Perun]

The orange giant turned around as he felt a small weight hit his back. As he shifted his weight completely around, he saw that it was his small friend from Laus. He laughed heartily, and picked her up, crying out, "Jule!" Squeezing her as lightly as he could, Perun held her for a moment, laughing. The girl was tiny for her age, even compared to the women out in this world. "Perun's back is being fine, do not worry Jew-ull. Are you being okay? Perun has not been seeing you in a long time." Perun smiled broadly at her, before realizing he still had her in the air. He sat her down, she was so skinny he had forgotten he was holding anything.

He knit his brow. "You are being wanting to be fighting Perun? Okay little Jew-ull, you can being testing against Perun." The large giant pulled his axe from his belt and walked to a somewhat isolated area. He turned to face the short girl and smiled. The girl was quick, and more competent than she looked, or thought she was. Once the girl was all set up, Perun readied himself, then took a quick step forward, and made a harsh strike towards her left, his right, shoulder. It wasn't full speed, and he turned the axe so that the flat of the blade would be all that could hit. The girl was going to have to get good at dodging, or she'd not last very long in the world of battle. For a moment, Perun let himself forget that he was on a mission that could be instrumental in the long run of Lycia's future.

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The monsters slowly moved forward, shambling on along with no command. They were making poor time for a raid force.

[Jule]

"Life's been pretty good for me! I've gotten a little stronger, look here." Jule flexed a bicep for Perun, ignoring the fact that he was positively ripped. "You look pretty fine, too." Jule giggled as the man swept her off her feet to meet her eye to eye. "What's it been... a month? Two? I'm not very good at counting days." Too long; that's how long it had been if you asked Jule. They were such a lively bunch too. Remus, Donovan, Perun, Duma, Mila, Flynn... was there anyone else? Hmm... Looking back, there was that quiet magic boy, but for the life of her she just couldn't remember his name. More importantly, why had she gotten separated from them?

The thief exhaled sharply. It must not have been all that important if Jule couldn't remember, no sense in getting worked up about it right when she was reconnecting with one of her buddies.

"You are being wanting to be fighting Perun? Okay little Jew-ull, you can being testing against Perun."

That was... unexpected. Jule figured it would've taken a little longer to move a mountain of a man like Perun. Doubly so, considering the massive height/weight/strength/pretty much everything difference between the two. Whatever the case, the little woman fumbled to draw her sword with excited fingers and trotted after Perun. The pair came to a halt at a clearing among the stalls and vendors, cornered by two walls of houses. "This is gonna be a good fight!" She cheered. "I'm ready when you are!"

Jule was prepared, but not prepared enough for someone like Perun. The warrior closed the gap between them in just single step, swinging his axe like it had all the weight of a tree branch. He aimed for the girl's left. "So, what brings you out here, anywa-HUAGH" Jule acted reflexively, dodging to the right. Again, she forgot just how mighty the man's reach was when the flat of his axe connected with her side like lightning and sent her sprawled to the ground in a tangle of limbs. She heard a clatter and felt a distinct lack of sword in her hand. It must've flown off somewhere when she fell. More importantly, did Perun just down Jule in one blow? "Darn...ugh." Jule groaned, face down. She had forgotten the first law of fighting people bigger than you: watch out for their momentum. "I'm... I'm fine, I'm fine. Sorry about that, big guy. I guess I really wasn't ready that time. Are you.. up for round two?"

[Aria]

Aria sighed and managed to bring a bucket of animal parts over to Chewy. Parts of various animals that some folk couldn't stand bits like liver, brains, hearts. Or tough end parts of meats that made it difficult to chew. Mostly it was parts of meats that the local butcher couldn't sell cause it had spoiled lightly. Slightly spoiled meats were nothing to a wyvern of Chewy's caliber. There were days that Aria had caught the red wyvern munching on the carcasses of dead deer. So long as it wasn't a dead or fresh farm animal then Aria had no qualms with it. And so long as it didn't cause much of a health concern for Chewy's alleged stomach of iron.

One large bucket of meat wasn't going to be enough to fill the wyvern up but at least it was enough so that she wouldn't starve. They would have to find another food source for Chewy sometime during lunch. As Aria gently shoved animal parts into her wyvern's mouth, her eyes caught a small spar between two people. They were too far away for her to make out who or what.. but it seemed that a large orange blur.. was sparing against a quick little blue dot. Or rather the orange circle of fuzz had shoved the little blue dot. Aria was about to use her hand to rub her eyes but stopped herself when she saw it was covered in blood. Wash face and hands later.

It wasn't long until the wyvern finished her bucket of food. Then Aria went off to clean herself up before gathering both of her and Chew's well worn but well kept armor. The wyvern meanwhile went ahead to wash down her light meal with some water from the nearby water trough. Aria called Chewy over, and the wyvern reluctantly went to her side. The brick colored wyvern lied down to allow Aria to put the first layer of hardy armor on her. As she worked to get the straps fastened she started to talk to Chewy like she always had.

"Let's see.. we've got a long flight back to Bern ahead of us.. Want to warm up the wings with a little patrol?"

Chewy gave a grunt and yawn as a response. It wasn't looking forward to flying today. If the wyvern had it's way it would probably like to spend the rest of they day napping.

"Lazy Bones.. come on. I bet you'd rather spend the day sleeping." She muttered as she pulled the saddle strap tight around the wyvern's body.

[Perun]

Perun had made an easy swing. A very easy swing, not intended to even come close to hurting the small girl. Yet, she fell onto the ground, tumbling into the dirt with a magnificent flourish. Perun's face was at first awash with disappointment, but quickly shifted to an expression of guilt. He knew how strong he was. He knew exactly how big a man or beast had to get before he could no longer pull his arm out of socket. He spent so long wearing kid gloves in this outside world, he forgot that the weaker people out here needed kid... mittens. Jule was strong in spirit, she wouldn't have survived Laus if she wasn't, but she was not very strong in body. For her, that blow must have been far harder than Perun was going for. A shadow crept over his heart. He didn't like to see women get hurt.

As delicately as he could, he wrapped his wide fingers around the girls left wrist. Desperately trying not to pull too hard, he lifted the girl up, using his other hand to pull her up by the bag of her shirt. When she was on her feet once more, the Orange Giant said, "Perun is being thinking... he is too much mind things happening. Perun is being angry for thinking so much, and not being controlling strength. Should not be being fighting Jule like this." Perun slid his broad headed axe back into his belt. "Perun is being hunting monn-stars. It is like something called bounty hunting, but Perun is not getting gold coins, there are just being less monn-stars. Why is Jule being here?"

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The Armored Skeleton was growing impatient. The corpses could not move very fast, and the other soldiers of bone were growing restless. He was a former knight, and though he no longer rode, he now marched under a different darker banner. Metaphorically. Some form of his human self lingered, not in memory, but in flashes of how war was carried out. Small impulses, and instincts, that rang in his head at little moments. Many of the marching abomination shared this, having a grim seriousness in their desire to destroy the living. Some however, managed to create something of an anger within the mind of the Armored Skeleton, who was a remnant of a knight by the name of Langston. The skeletons who managed to so gravely upset their commander where Skeletons who somehow identified themselves as Rodrik, Kevin, Scott, Big Kevin, and Dave the Skeleton. They were prone to accident, or at least, the first four were. Dave the Skeleton was just a coward, an odd trait for something that shouldn't have possessed the emotion of fear.

Before him, Langston spied something, in his odd fashion of perception through no eyes. In the abyss which he stared into, he could see the light of a living soul which burned like fire. He could 'see' many things around him, like the trees, or the rise and fall of the surrounding landscape. These he saw almost through necessity, as the dark energy that held him together provided for his survival. The soul was human, and it began to run away. One of the Skeletons, Scott, took off after the human. It had taken about four steps, when its foot landed on something all the corpses and most other skeletons had managed to avoid. Scotts leg was snapped by a bear trap. Rather than stopping, Scott tried to continue to hop after the human. Langston would relish the day he could join a great legion, and be away from soldiers like this. Dave the Skeleton was not the being that would plant a black flag in the last mortal's grave.

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As Perun and Jule talked, a hunter sprinted past them toward the village center. His face was flushed white. He screamed, "MONSTERS! MONSTERS!" Perun ran after him, arriving just a few short seconds after the man stopped, and hearing him call to all who would listen. "There are monsters in the woods! Almost twenty of them, skeletons and revenants! They'll be here within forty minutes if they keep their pace!" The people fell immediately into an uproar, some people already running to get their loved ones and flee. Perun roared over all of them, "EVERYONE BE BEING QUIET!" They all stopped, and they were all silent. "You are not going to be being running away." Perun had a plan, or at least, what he thought could maybe be sort of a plan. He had that, four competent fighters he had brought, and himself. With almost thirty villagers of fighting age, he thought he could kill the monsters before the town was destroyed. Or at least kill the monsters as the town burned around him.

[Jule]

Slowly and delicately, Jule felt her face being peeled from the ground like a hunk of cheese that had sat in the sun too long. Maybe not the most apt comparison, but it gave her a rotten feeling immediately losing to the broad-shouldered man all the same. The girl wanted to put up at least some semblance of a fight for Perun. He was the biggest, toughest man she'd ever met - in her eyes, he was a paragon of fighting spirit. He also dwarfed the other "mightiest Elibeans" the swordswoman had seen by several inches. In height, musculature, and in hair power, none of them could add up. So if Jule could prove herself to someone like him, well...

Maybe it was best not to think about it, in case she seemed too openly giddy to get bodied again.

"No, no! You're fiiine," Jule interrupted the man as he gently set her upright. "I know you just kicked my butt and all, but this is the best way for me to get stronger is to fight guys like you I've got no chance against." Jule stretched her arms towards the sky, and grunted as her shoulder bones made a satisfying crack noise. Where'd her sword go? The girl glanced around, and moved to the wall her blade had ended up flinging against. The girl winced as she bent over to sheathe her sword, still reeling from the giant's blow. Jule really needed to work on holding that thing tighter when she got knocked around. "'Sides, throwing myself into adversity's the best way to toughen up, right? That's what it feels like anyway." It took a few tries but Jule managed to slide the blade smoothly back into its sheathe. There we go, all nice and tucked away. Perun didn't seem particularly willing to take her up on that round two so the thief didn't have a need for it now.

So he was looking for monster jobs too? That wasn't too strange, given the last time they had met was nearly non-stop monster fighting. But to work without pay? Talk about unheard of. Did he just catch his own meals instead of buy them? And what about his weapons; how did Perun keep them so fine-edged without gold? "Why am I here? That's... I'm a mercenary too, y'know!" She trotted back to Perun, and minus the dust in her hair it seemed like she had never been knocked down to begin with. "I go to places, I take jobs, I kill monsters dead. Well, I get help too. I don't have a troupe or anything to follow, but going it alone's a good way to get money, and it beats having to steeeaI MEAN, live without food!" NAILED IT. "So I get to fight, eat, and do whatever I want, all I want!"

Jule brushed the dust off of her coat, absentmindedly. "But it's been a while since last we fought together, y'know. I've got nothin -- well, what I mean is, I was getting bored of window shopping, heheh. Why don't I tag alon--" The child's voice was drowned out by a man running by, screaming his head off. "Monsters, monsters"? He must've had impressive lungs - Wait a tick. "'Monsters'?!" Jule's eyes lit up, and as Perun took off she sprinted after him. Fate was kind today.

If she had thought his slow trot earlier was the best his legs could do, she cursed herself for being so foolish. The small girl pumped her legs fast as she could, but she ate Perun's dust all the way. Finally, Jule bumped into him as he skidded to a halt. She bent to her knees and panted. "You... run... way too fast!" she hissed, going unheard under the crier's voice. Focused on her heart not exploding like she was, Jule only caught fractions of what the scout was saying. Woods. Skeletons. Forty minutes. That was good enough for her. As she rose from her hunch, she thanked her lucky stars that she was behind Perun and not in the way of his earth shattering roar. All fell silent, even her rasps for air. If he had a plan, the swordswoman knew things would be fine. "What's the... plan, Perun?" Jule quipped.

[Aria]

Aria finished putting the rest of Chewy's armor on. After that the wyvern simply turned onto it's side and continued to enjoy the warmth of the sun on her wings. Aria sighed softly. The rider had stripped herself down to her undershirt and pants for her morning duties and now she needed to put her own set of armor on. She managed to get her breast plate on when a scout from the village ran through. The man was shouting about monsters out in the woods. Before he kept running off deeper into the heart of the village. Aria turned her head to look at Chewy.

The wyvern turned her head up and looked out towards the direction the messenger ran towards. Then she looked over at the direction he came from. Then the wyvern stared at Aria for a moment before kicking her head back into the grass. She gave a snort and tried to feign sleep. Aria knew this.

"You know we are going to help the village.." She spoke to the wyvern. The wyvern gave a flick of it's tail. Chewy knew that they were going to help the village. But that wasn't going to stop her from enjoying a few more moments of sunlight. Aria continued to put the rest of her armor on. She quickly pulled her hair back then braided it down so it wouldn't be in the way as she flew. She put on her helmet and adjusted the straps. She called Chewy over and the wyven came. She checked the weapons she had on while the wyvern stretched and got ready.

"Ok.. looks like were all set. Ready?" She asked. Chew gave a snort and pushed her head into Aria's face. Of course the wyvern was ready, Aria had made sure that the wyvern was ready.

"Okay.. Stupid question. Let's go!" Aria gave the wyvern a light pat on it's head and got up onto Chewy's saddle. She buckled herself in and grabbed her lance out of it's holster. She pulled the reigns lightly and the wyvern kicked off the ground and went into the air.

[Perun]

Plan. What is the plan. Plans, planning things. Plans were things that leaders had. Donovan was good at coming up with plans, especially when that plan involved Perun hitting things. That was what Perun was good at, he was like an arrow, and Donovan was the archer. Now he had to be both. A plan, what was he to do, to defend all these people? If he had something, if he had walls. Would monsters have fire? Probably not, fire was something which could easily turn against them. The buildings were very close together, if he could put all the civilians in one place and draw the monsters to the main road, they'd have two broad entrances, and a few other small entrances. The monsters could only get through those one at a time if they were the size of a man, that might work. While Perun was still in thought, three men sprinted up to the cluster of people. Two of them had blue hair, though that was where their similarities in appearance stopped. The younger one was a bright eyed tall young Lycian swordsman whose face appeared unblemished by harsh times. The older one was a short hairy Ilian mage with a band of cloth wrapped around his face to hide his empty eye socket. The third man was a little shorter than Perun but nearly as large in muscle, with snowy white hair and violent orange eyes. He would have gone into battle in full heavy plate, but for now he wore a plain undershirt and cloth britches. Their names in order were Dorril, Kesh, and Mernatel. They were members of the Band of Fellows and they were Perun's personal guard so to speak. Behind them were some mercenaries Perun had hired on the way to the town, Lolys, Grunn, Potts, and Birch.

Mernatel spoke first, he was the commander for the band after all, "Perun! We came as soon as we heard, what would you like us to do?" Even though the last few years of his life had been a downward spiral of liquor and fighting, and he'd not been near a noble in sometime, Mernatel still had a twinge of noble breeding in his voice. He sounded just different enough to not fit in in a banquet hall or a common tavern. Dorril spoke right after him, "Are we gonna go out an' meet 'em boss?" His voice was clearly common. "No. We are going to be being to defend here." He turned to the people and raised his voice. "We are going to be drawing the monn-stars here. Everyone who is being able to be fighting grab anything that is being like a weapon. Everyone else, you are going to be going to the biggest building in town and staying safe in there. Before that, take everything from the stalls and be putting them in a house." Kesh interrupted him. "You want to move the stalls to block the main road entrance." Perun merely nodded.

The snowy haired man of Bern scratched his chin, "We should put anyone with a bow on the rooftops, so that they can attack the monsters without any difficulty." He snapped his head to look at his young companion. "Dorril, go back to the inn, call any travelers that can fight, then lead everyone back here. Bring my plate and lance." Dorril took off at full tilt. Perun yelled after him, "And Perun's bow!" The boy threw up an arm, but then he was gone. Perun looked at the people of the village, "GO!" The men and women went about moving the stalls once they were cleared. Kesh went to climb a roof to begin the duty of lookout, as Mernatel instructed the mercenaries and townsfolk on where to place the stalls. The mayor approached Perun, in a huff, "No ill speaking mercenary is going to-" Perun slammed his left fist into the mans nose, but caught the man as he fell. He looked to the man who'd been running from the monsters and said, "What is being the biggest building?" The man hesitated, "The chapel." Perun slung the mayor onto the man's shoulders, "Be taking him, children and sick people up to it, then return. Perun will be picking where you stand."

Perun looked around, they were moving fast, that was good. He looked over at Jule, Perun is thinking you should be guarding the chapel Jew-ull."

[Aria]

And then they were off, both wyvern and rider were flying around the air. They flew around the town circling around and watching how the townsfolk scattered about. From up in the air Aria could see lots of things, the town, the people. the landscape, the way the birds seemed to fly out of one patch of woods. That's probably where they are coming from. She started to calculate time and distance between the town and the disturbance in the woods.

"Hmm.. roughly about thirty minutes.." She looked out over towards the town once more. People were rallying and taking orders around a large orange haired man. Chewy gave a bit of a roar out towards the area where the monsters were coming from. The brick colored wyvern was eager to rush out into the fray. And where was this enthusiasm when we were on the ground? She thought to herself before tugging on the reigns. She flew out towards the woods and drove a red ribbon javelin down to towards the ground. She then tugged at the reigns to turn Chewy back towards civilization.

Aria brought herself down closer towards the orange man and his group. Chewy flapped her wings hard in order to signal people to move out the way of the landing wyvern.

"Hey! Orange man! You leading the bunch?" The wyvern rider asked through her small cloth bandanna.

"Can you tell the group not to hit me with arrows. I'll be providing aid from the air! I threw a beacon down in the path ahead. Once the monsters reach it they will be ten minutes away from the gates."

[Jule]

The girl had asked him for a plan, but as the husky man rounded up his cronies and anyone who was willing to listen, Jule found herself losing interest in her previous thoughts. She was too busy being preoccupied with all the people who seemed to pour from the woodwork. Earlier the town felt lifeless, and now here they were, dead in the center of all the action. Looking at the crowd of people forming Perun's speech came through one ear for the girl and right out the other. Listening to an important, possibly critically important strategy meeting was too hard to do when you were too busy looking at all the folks' faces. Jule scanned the crowd from behind Perun's back. Some were afraid, and rightfully so. Some were angry, some were apprehensive of the man. A few even had wicked looking grins on their faces - people looking for some action.

It was only when the giant roared again that Jule had the thought "oh yeah i was listening to something wasn't i"

 Turning back towards Perun she expected him to still be speaking, not slugging a man across the face. The child snickered. And suddenly the villager with a broken nose was slung over another man's back and then, gone. That little exchange aside, Perun turned to face Jule's blank stare. Once she found out her role in the fight, her thoughts scrambled to piece themselves together to find the words to express herself. "Wh.. wbut I.. " Yes, that was the ticket.

"Aw, c'mon! Nothin's gonna show up at the stinkin' church! Spooks hate saints or somethin' like that." The swordswoman furrowed her brow and scowled, but it melted away along with the rest of her nerve looking up at Perun's figure looming over her like storm clouds. He was big; indomitable; orange. Well, an orange storm cloud. Nevermind. "Oh, fine... You lot get to have all the fun. Save one or two monsters for me, a'right? And don't you get yourself messed up out there!" Jule exhaled sharply and slid the sword at her hip from its sheathe. Even if the thief didn't get a chance to fight any monsters, that wouldn't stop her from practicing on her own. The thought by its lonesome was enough to send her jogging off towards the chapel, ready for a round of shadowboxing fight.

[Perun]

Things were happening. The stalls were being shoved all around, several blocking the southern entrance to the main road, and more blocking the individual alleyways. They couldn't plug all the holes however, and there were three very narrow alleyways the monsters could perhaps slide into one at a time. Other than that there was the open north entrance to the main road. Hopefully, the monsters would simply funnel in through there, and the battle would only be uphill in one direction. To Perun's shock a Wyvern and its Rider plopped down near him, and the woman riding asked that the archers avoid shooting at her. Worked for the big Ilian, he simply said, "Perun is promise you are not going to be being aimed at."

Quickly after that, and after Jule had left rather reluctantly, Dorril returned, carrying a mass in both arms. The young man assisted Mernatel in putting his plate on as Perun slung his quiver on his shoulder and strung his longbow. Turning, Perun noted that most of the village folk who stayed had armed themselves with spears, hatchets, the occasional sword, and hammer. Perun looked at Mernatel and said, "You are being needed at the chapel. Be being take Lolys and Grunn with you. Also be being take..." Perun trailed off, then he looked back at the villagers. He pointed at two old men, a pair of men a few years older than Dorril and a pair of women who were at least thirty. "Them." The heavily armored fellow nodded and said, "Understood." He called over the mercenaries and townsfolk and then they were off to help protect those who could not fight.

Perun looked at the rest of the villagers. They were scared, mortified at the thought of the abominations knocking at their door. He said then, loudly, "Perun is needing five men to be coming with him." Slowly, a few of the older men stepped forward. A blacksmith, a brewer, a farmer, and a tailor, all older than Perun. Then he called again, "You who are not coming to be with Perun are being to stay here. Watch sides of road."[/color] Then Perun turned, and said to Dorril, "You are to be coming with Perun." The boy grinned only for a moment before making his face serious again. Then they were off.

---

Kesh had gotten the archers into position, near the assembly of townsfolk along both sides of the rooftops. There were only six of them, then Kesh made a seventh attacker from above. Perun, Dorril and the villagers with them now stood just inside the village, staring out at the forest. The plan now was to make sure as many monsters followed them as they could to where the rest of the humans waited.

The first monster came through the treeline, then all the rest. Good. I'm sick of waiting like a lamb for the lion, Perun thought. He pulled three arrows from his quiver and shoved two into his mouth horizontally so that with just the slightest pressure he held them between his teeth. The third he nocked in the bowstring and took aim. His eagle eyes made out the monster in front, a walking skeleton, this one in gold plated armor rusted from ages past. He loosed, and didn't have to look to know where it went, the arrow flew straight into the empty socket of its right eye, but simply hung lazily. The beast was not even staggered. Perun nocked, and took aim once more. He'd focus on ones with flesh then, if the bones were to difficult to shatter with arrows. [/font]

[Aria]

"Perun is promise you are not going to be being aimed at." The large orange haired man had assured Aria that their archers wouldn't attack her or her wyvern.

"Sweet! Thanks Big Guy!" She shouted back before tapping her heels on Chewy's sides. Chewy gave a few flaps of her mighty wings and pushed off the ground back up into the skies again. From the air Aria could see the monsters were mostly heading from the southern end of the main road. That side was well defended with several stalls acting like a barricade. Her red tressed Javelin still lay in the main path untouched by the monsters. But she knew that they would be there soon. This just left the northern half of the main road open. The forest stretched on for a bit and there was the possibility of a handful of shambling living corpses to sneak around and come in from the north. The rider had no idea how intelligent the living dead were.

So she kept her eyes trained on the tree line. Where ever the skeletons went the forest seemed to respond. Birds would fly up out of the air, deer would run, and tree branches would rustle. Though these signs of movement among the wood were brief she would still keep a look out for them. Now.. what do we do?

Aria hadn't planned exactly how she was going to do her manner of attacking. She could lead Chewy deeper into the woods and attack the remaining monsters from above. But that was unwise due the fact that she had no idea what sort of weapons, or numbers the skeletons might have. If she were to attack them as they made their way down the path she could be struck accidentally by arrows. Archers cannot stop arrows that have already been launched. And diving head first into the firing range sounded like a sure fire way to die.

Chewy tilted her head back to look at Aria. Curious to know why they were taking so long to make a move.

"Hang on i'm thinking! I can't just have you dive bomb into the thick of it."

But then there it was. The subtle signs of the forest she was looking for. There was some movement heading out away from the southern path. She decided to fly out towards it to see what it was.

[Jule]

Around the bend, take a left, a stone's throw over on the right... The girl's jog to the church broke into a brisk walk as she came to the conclusion that this wouldn't be as fun as she had hoped it would be. The thought of bailing was a tempting one, but she'd never abandon something the big man had assigned her.

Well, not on purpose.

So she resigned herself to guarding the unimpressive door of the equally unimpressive-looking sanctuary. There wasn't much to get in the way of fighting in the plaza surrounding the holy house. A few barrels and bales of hay, along with some other odd and end amenities one could only find piled up on the side of a corner house. That meant no distractions, but it also meant nothing she could use in case a zombie got too close. Faces of people, who for all the world could've been zombies themselves trudged by they as filtered into the church. Fear, sorrow, resignation, all of these thing and more obviously weighed on their expressions. The elderly tried to hush the crying children tugging at their sleeves, the sick coughed and hacked, one hefty man dragged inside by someone who wanted to be doing anything but "dragging ol' Broken-Nose Mcfatty through the streets by his heels". It was just a bad time all around.

The swordswoman put her thumb to her jaw. They reminded her an awful lot of that old man she met in Santaruz. Just what was with all of these small towns being one tiny accident away from the brink of destruction? The thought made her wince, and she decided to think on it no more as she dropped her hand to the hilt of her sword.

The door behind her was slammed shut as the man carrying the mayor departed. Jule shot a glance at him, and he nodded back to her. As he strode away, he glanced backward in a double-take. He said nothing, but his eyes slowly widening spoke volumes: 'They put a pipsqueak like her in front of the door?' The girl raised an eyebrow. "What's the matter? Never seen a merc before?" All the hunter could manage was a shrugging, nervous laugh as he dodged off. From within the church the thief could hear a shuffle and groan of floorboards as something heavy moved in front of the wooden doorframe.