Arden took the first watch that evening, and Kaleb the second. List, who hated being woken up in the middle of the night, would be up last, which left Xigbar and Valerie to take the third watch together, because nobody trusted Xigbar to keep watch by himself.
Xigbar tried to point out that he had just as much reason to be suspicious of sleeping while List was awake, but he had been thoroughly outvoted on the subject. List assured him that she would much rather he be awake when she killed him, before promptly passing out with a rock for a pillow. Somehow, that didn't make him feel any better.
In fact, he had been complaining about it for the first half hour of their shift, and even Valerie's patience had limits.
"Honestly, I feel like the rest of you want her to kill me," Xigbar said.
"Have you considered that you might be part of the problem?" Valerie asked.
"How do you mean?"
"Well, for starters, you did poison and rob us, and never apologized for it."
"I poisoned one of you. And you burned down my house. We're even."
"You also contribute as little as possible whenever things get dangerous."
"So wanting to live makes me a bad guy?"
"Everyone wants to live," Valerie snapped. "That's the reason we're all together. But you're the only one who doesn't seem to get that 'safety in numbers' only works if all of those numbers actually take care of each other, instead of one of the numbers using the other four like a set of human shields."
"Beats someone else using me as one!"
Valerie stared at him, at a loss for words. She wanted to be mad, and knew that if List were awake, she'd have thrown something at him already. But, despite her annoyance, all Valerie could really feel was sorry for him. He really couldn't see the difference between cooperation and exploitation. To him, there was no difference.
Who hurt him?
For a few seconds, the only sounds were the cracking logs in the fire, and light snoring from List as she drooled onto her rock pillow. Then, there was a faint, distant clink of metal. Valerie stiffened.
"Did you hear that?" Valerie asked.
"High-pitched, holier than thou moralizing? A bit, yeah," Xibgar said.
"No, listen," Valerie hissed, even as she locked a crossbolt into place on her wristbow. That made Xigbar take her seriously, and now he sat up straighter.
Neither of them made a sound, and for a moment, the silence of the forest made Valerie think she was crazy. Then, she heard it again. And again. And again. Now the clinks came in time with heavy thuds, like the footsteps of a massive, armored creature.
"You can't see in the dark, can you?" Xigbar asked.
"No, I can't," Valerie said.
"Something big, two o'clock."
Valerie squinted in the direction Xigbar indicated, trying to make anything out by the light of the fire. But beyond the immediate circle of their camp, the dark was impenetrable. Anxious for a visual, Valerie swapped bolts, prepped the ignition mechanism in her wristbow, and loosed an incendiary bolt into the forest.
The fiery bolt tore through the darkness, illuminating everything it passed like it was going through a tunnel. She saw trees, brush, a few rocks, and then the bolt pinged off of something metallic before pirouetting off course. It landed on the ground, casting a tiny light as it burnt itself out. And in that light, Valerie could just make out something big, glinting like metal in the light. It was hard to make out what exactly.
Until it started to glow blood red at the seams.
It was humanoid in shape, but easily eight feet tall, with a helmet shape like a dragon's head, and a long, thick tail lashing behind it encased entirely in segmented, black armor. In one of its hands, it held an axe with a head larger than Valerie's chest. It reminded Valerie of the Chosen's elites, only bigger, scarier, and clearly part-dragon. And it wasn't alone.
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Two more elites flanked it on either side, one with a halberd, the other a wicked looking hunting bow. They, at least, were more human-sized. But they were still elites.
"Oh shit," Xigbar breathed.
"WAKE UP!" Valerie shouted at the top of her lungs.
List jerked awake, bleary-eyed and confused. Kaleb and Arden were faster, bolting upright with weapons in hand. But none of them were fast enough to take in their situation before the Axe of the Chosen came crashing down on them.
Agnizzar surged forward like a predator on the hunt, axe swinging even as he charged. Valerie and Xigbar scattered, and the axe cleaved through the where Valerie had been sitting. When it struck, it left a crater in the ground, and a shockwave exploded out from the head, taking Valerie off her feet and flinging her across the clearing like a ragdoll.
At the same time, the archer let loose with a salvo of arrows, peppering the outsiders who had just woken up. The arrows left shallow slices in Kaleb's skin, and sent sparks flying from the shield Arden conjured to defend himself. One found List's hand, and the hellborn swore before tearing the arrow out with her free hand.
Xigbar barely had time to transform his armband into a snake before the elite with the halberd was on him, his weapon trailing red light and sizzling as it swung. Xigbar ducked beneath one swing, and the tree immediately behind him was cut down. The halberd didn't so much as slow down.
"What the fuck?!" List cursed, summoning her daggers in a flash of red.
"Ambush!" Arden shouted. "Everyone, regroup around—"
He was cut off as Agnizzar crashed his entire body into Arden's shield, knocking the priest off balance. The elite swung his axe, and Arden's shield became a spiderweb of cracks. With his second swing, Agnizzar buried his axehead halfway down Arden's shield, nearly reaching his arm. On the third, Arden's shield shattered into shards of light.
Kaleb rushed forward, blocking incoming with his shield as he charged, and threw everything he had into a haymaker punch aimed to cave Agnizzar's chest in. The elite caught Kaleb by the fist, stopping the blow without so much as budging.
Kaleb's eyes went wide, and he tried to pull his arm free. It stayed clenched in Agnizzar's fist. In fact, the Axe of the Chosen was starting to squeeze.
List jumped onto Agnizzar's back, her entire body coursing with red lightning. Her blades sank into the plates of Agnizzar's armor, and she felt flesh part beneath them. Her victory was short lived, as Agnizzar's tail snapped toward her like a whip. She had to leap off his back, and before she landed, she was hounded by arrows from the archer.
At the edge of the clearing, Valerie's ears were still ringing from Agnizzar's first attack, but she heard List's snarl of pain as an arrow sliced open her thigh. From the tone of the snarl, Valerie knew List was more angry than in danger, but the archer elite was a problem that needed to be solved. And there was only room for one archer in this fight.
Valerie knew her bolts could piece elite armor if she struck a weakpoint, but it was dark, and things were already spiraling out of control. Now was not the time for precision. So, she loaded an explosive bolt, aimed, and loosed.
It sank dead center mass on the archer, stuck into their breastplate without piercing the flesh. The archer glanced down, probably grateful their armor had saved them.
And then the bolt exploded, taking the archer with it.
"Helia!" the halberd wielding elite shouted, reaching out toward what was now little more than scrap metal and a pair of smoking boots.
Xigbar capitalized on the distraction, disengaging from his opponent and vanishing into the dark of the forest. If he just stayed hidden in the woods until the fight was over, Valerie was going to put a crossbolt through his foot.
List hadn't actually been able to distract Agnizzar enough to get him to release Kaleb, but luckily for the enziri, Arden rejoined the fight, this time brandishing his cane with the image of a golden mace imposed over it. It struck hard enough to knock the dragon elite back, and Agnizzar actually had to use his tail to halt himself. For the first time, a blow had actually rattled him.
It wasn't clear whether that was a good thing.
The dragon elite leveled his axe at the three outsiders that stood against him. "Outsiders. You face Agnizzar, the Axe of the Chosen. Surrender, and embrace your deaths."
"Embrace this, you overgrown lizard!" List retorted. With a flash, she traded her daggers for her whip, and lashed out.
The jaws of Agnizzar's helmet opened, revealing a dragonblood's mouth to match the helmet's muzzle, and he caught the whip in his teeth.
"Oh shiiiit!" List's initial curse was drawn out into a prolonged scream as she was yanked off her feet, twirled in a circle, and flung away. She crashed against a tree precariously close to the edge of the cliff they had been camping near, the wind knocked from her lungs.
Kaleb and Arden collided with Agnizzar together, bashing with shield and cane, but his footing was as solid as iron, and after only a second of weathering their blows, he spun with his axe and tail at the same time. The tail caught Arden in the legs, pinwheeling him into the air, while the axe clanged hard against Kaleb's shield and sent the boy sliding backward. Even after it was over, he felt the impact reverberating through every bone in his body, and his shield was vibrating like a tuning fork on his arm.
With room to move, Agnizzar set his sights on the still prone List, and raised his axe. Power gathered at the head of the axe, matching the glow of his armor until the weapon shone in the night like a blood red sun. Then he brought it straight down into the ground in front of him.
A shockwave tore through the ground toward List, who was knocked off her feet all over again as the trees closest to her toppled over, and the earth beneath her feet cracked apart and caved in. List's eyes went wide as, off balance, she could do nothing to save herself as the ground she had been standing on crumbled away, and she and it both tumbled down and into the canyon.
Kaleb jumped after her, and just like that, they both disappeared over the edge.