Yelena

She eyed him across the vista of spume and slime, feeling his ethereal fingers touching her ear, pricking her lobes, scratching the inside of their soft flesh.

Only the strange, labored chanting of the Red-Woman behind them filled the air, her moans rising and falling as she prayed to the God that would supposedly deliver them.

Then, the ghostly chill of wind roared through the sewer again, centering itself between the two opposing platforms, and in its fury there emanated a single, chilling whisper:

"Surrender."

Yelena stared through the gales at the Glancer that was fueling them, his Tigran retinue poised, crossbows drawn, ready to fire.

If her rage had truly been abated by the odd shrine the Red-Woman lay before, it was now back with a vengeance.

"Marius," she murmured. "Get back."

But as she stepped forward, sword drawn, she felt his hand grip her sword arm.

"Girl, you think I'm gonna let you do this alone?"

She shot him a look of hate, but he wasn't grinning his stupid smile. Instead, his face was neutral, grounded, and matched with the calm resolve that dominated his voice.

"I thought you told me I shouldn't trust you?"

"You don't gotta trust no one," he scoffed back. "But I'll be damned if I'm gonna let you die here and now. Not after the shit I went through to get you out."

He thumbed the hilt of the dagger at his waist and turned his attention towards the waterfall still streaming at one end of the vile ocean.

"Look," he whispered as Knox narrowed his eyes to viscious slits. "There's something I learned how to do recently. Maybe you won't trust my words, but will you trust the magic in this place?"

She felt him squeeze her arm and fought the urge to recoil, before her eyes widened and she saw exactly what he meant for her to see:

Sneak Attack DMG: x2

He was right. He could lie, but the Everloft could not. It laid ones soul bare, no matter their predilections. And he'd just showed her what he was capable of.

He winked, though there was no charm behind it. It was silent communication, nothing more.

Yelena looked at Knox, who had slowly begun to raise his arm in threat.

"He's a Level Four, and that means that in skills he's got the advantage."

Marius nodded. "But between us, we make one badass Level 5. Besides," he added. "It's not about the skills we've got, but how we can exploit them."

She regarded him with weary, skeptical eyes. But even she had to admit that there was something to his optimism. Even eying the vile sadist that was the Don's torture master, he had that hopeful glimmer born of righteous cunning in his eyes.

"How long do you need?" Yelena barked over her shoulder at the Red-Woman.

Through the slow, quiet chant she'd started up, she wheezed, "Ten."

"Minutes or hours?" Marius quipped.

"For our sake," Yelena replied. "Let's hope seconds. You ready?"

Marius braced. "As I'll ever be."

"Go!"

He slunk away into the shadows as she leaped into the air towards the opposing platform with more energy than she could have maintained as a mere mortal, bellowing her roar of defiance as she flew:

Battlecry: Activated.

The fury of the crossbow bolts seared her armor even as she brought up her sword in vain to deflect them:

HP: -4

HP: -6

HP: -1

HP: 19

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It was enough.

They'd taken the gambit and she consoled herself with that - flying through the air towards the guards she knew that at the very least Knox had not had time to prepare a spell.

That was his weakness: time.

Down in the dungeons with his little prizes in their cages he had all the time in the world to perfect his art. Here, he was facing free birds that sang their own tunes. And their songs were about to sting:

Searing Strike: Activated.

One slice through the air before she landed knocked four of the five guards from the platform into the ocean of sludge below. Their armor weighed them down and they vanished, leaving only popping mud-bubbles behind to tell of their life's expiry. The last one was finished by a dagger that flew out from the waterfall and embedded itself in his neck. As he fell she turned to the viscous Glancer and brought her sword down on his head.

His form shimmered away to nothing, and through a split-second look of confusion she saw what she had struck:

Aerial Mimic

Glance Type: WIND

HP: 0

The sound of a knife being scraped through the air itself was all she needed to hear to bring up her sword and block the strike that was launched from above. She barely managed it, dropping to one knee as she looked up to see the real Knox levitating down from the dark recesses of the ceiling.

She turned her sword and poised herself to meet him, but this time he was faster - another blade of wind sliced through the air and knocked her prone as he bore down on her, his hands moving with inhuman speed as they struck at her blade and broke her defense.

She staggered back to the edge of the platform. Her arm felt heavy - like he'd sapped her muscles of all strength. Yet still, as he brought his fists down again to strike at her she let her blade meet them, falling prone as the sheer power of his attack resonated through her whole body.

This frail little man - had the Glance really made him so powerful?

He smashed her blade again and she felt the metal give way. Now, she let the thing drop. Her arms were done.

She could see the sickly smile that was drawing at the sides of his mouth. It was the smile of a cat licking its lips as it toyed with its prey. He brought his hands together and she felt an invisible noose clench itself round her neck.

And as he did so, enjoying her grimace of pain, she heard the sounds of footsteps approaching nearby - leather boots on metal.

"You - are - happy," she croaked. "Watching - pain."

Somewhere nearby, a dagger was removed from a twitching corpse.

His smile grew, and the noose tightened. She would have let her head fall back were it not for the the sight she wanted to see most: the sight of his smile slowly dropping to a frown as she started grinning right back at him.

Then, the moment came.

"Sneak attack, motherfucker!"

Knox's eyes bulged and he coughed a cloud of crimson into her face as Marius plunged his retrieved knife into the torture master's jugular. He recoiled, opened his mouth in a silent scream, and, before he could summon another deathly gale, Yelena's sword arm shot forth.

Searing Strike: Activated.

The blow was struck across his face and the shockwave tossed his body from the platform. His eyes, however, dropped down on Yelena's chestplate in two wet, bloody bags - sliced apart.

She watched him flail around in the waters below, mouth agape, trying to claw his way back into the air, twisting around like a ship run aground at sea.

"You wish to see pain now?" Yelena spat at him. "Use your imagination."

His face twisted in a bloody, visceral image of pure animal rage as he flew towards them again, intoning a spell to rip them apart.

Then, as both warriors readied themselves, the Red-Woman let out an inhuman wail:

"Atash K'umeriah!"

First came the sensation of heat pricking skin, followed by the sight of a burning sun exploding from the epicenter of the hidden room as though it was spewed from the mouth of the inanimate statue that stood there with open arms.

Through the supplicant silhouette of the Red-Woman, a gout of fire raged. Like a living snake of sunlight it weaved through the chamber and tore through the wall of the sewer, carrying with it the three escapees and throwing Knox back into the sizzling black waters.

Yelena saw the cloudless, purpled sky of the Everloft above. Then, blinking through the feeling of the desert winds buffeting her face, she felt Marius grab her arm.

"Hang on!" he screamed through the still raging mass of fire, the Red-Woman not far behind.

Together they flew from the palace, seeing the bewildered faces of the servants and townsfolk alike. Yelena looked at them scurrying around the golden courtyards and broken, hollowed out ruins that remained of the city they called Antakram below. The three eventually landed with a unceremonious thud on the hard stone floor of the town outskirts.

HP: -10

HP: 9

Yelena groaned to her feet, watching Marius make the same, lethargic movement behind her. Only the Red-Woman seemed cognizant, her eyes brimming with the wonders she had just summoned. The sun glinted off something she held in her hand.

"What..." Yelena breathed. "What now?"

"Why, we call our carriage, of course."

Before she could turn to question him, Marius was already smiling at the Red-Woman's frenzied shaking, her arm flailing in the air with the lead red Yelena now remembered from their first entrance to the city.

"Is that...?"

"The final piece of the puzzle," Marius finished for her. Running short on breath himself. The thief seemed like he could barely keep standing.

Through the shouts of alarm that sang from the palace watchtowers, another sound began to penetrate: that of worried townsfolk screaming, ducking out of the way of the beetle that scurried towards them and skidded to a halt before its new master.

"Edna," Marius wheezed. "I've never been more happy to see a disgusting giant insect."

The Red-Woman boarded the creature first while the town erupted in panic.

"Be swift!" she shouted through ailing breath. "We must be gone!"

Without another word they boarded the beetle and were off - past the bemused guards at the ramshackle town gate, smashing through the gate itself, and roaring down the Shifting Sands towards the blank desert horizon.

"Well?" Marius coughed, wiping sand grains from his face that the beetle was whipping up with every movement of its skittering legs. "See what one little lie can get you? You gotta admit that was an adventure, even for an Argent."

She said nothing in reply. She slumped back against the hollowed out hide of the cart-creature and turned her head back to see her prison vanish into obscurity.

Caer Akris...

The place Lord Jael had made his home when he came here. The place he had built with his own hands, if the words of the treacherous bird were to be believed.

Turned to ruin. A temple of sin.

She heard the voice of doubt within her then, hiding away, always watching. Waiting.

It had never come out this time. Then with one look at her bloodied hands, covered in clotted chunks of flesh, she realized: it didn't have to. It would taunt her with her own actions, this time.

But it was Virtir's voice she heard then as the last spire of the golden palace disappeared from sight. And as she listened, she knew that the renouncement of her oath for a moment of peace was only the beginning:

Will you be joining us soon, sister?