The moons were high in the sky, shining their soft, silver light across the forest clearing where the Black Kamber were camped. Jeshin watched down at them from a small rock outcropping, the light of the moon showing them in full features. The few guards on duty were picking at their teeth or yawning, boredom etched into their bodies. Jeshin knew the commander of the group was hiding somewhere.
Probably porking himself some poor village girl in his tent, she thought to herself with disgust. She had met him a few times before, when the various mercenary groups vied for contracts from cities. He was middle aged and was starting to bald, his short-cropped black hair covering his skull like a sad moss. He had been utterly calm and disciplined, but you could practically see the violence leak out of every pore. There had been reports that week in the city, of three prostitutes found in different alleys near where his mercenaries were holed up in. They had been covered in bruises, bodies broken like dolls. The third one was found alive and rushed to healers, but seemed completely incapable of speech or even recognizing those around her after. The group had denied all involvement with laughter.
Jeshin continued to look on, noting where they kept their resources and their horses. She could see one of the lieutenants in a dark corner of the camp, away from prying eyes, watching inside a tent. She couldn't quite remember his name, but she knew it was something strange. 'Yur-something,' she growled to herself, quieter than a whisper.
Joshua sidled up to her side in a crouch and looked. 'Yurda,' he says dispassionately. She looked at the hooded man, his nose wrinkled in disgust.
'His name is Yurda. He's a disgusting thing, has orctish and something else in him. Makes him look like he's been living in catacombs his entire life,' he says with a derisive sniff. 'He doesn't talk much, but I guess he likes to watch people go about their lives, like he's waiting to drag them off into some dark hole in the ground.'
Jeshin inclined her head. 'What's he looking at now, I wonder...' Joshua frowns at that, silent. Jeshin moves to a different vantage point on the outcropping, keeping Yurda in view. She slid closer on her belly, squinting, as she sees the opening Yurda was looking through, her disgust writ on her face.
In the tent, she could see a large, brown-furred nevorin riding a naked human. His arms and legs were tied to stakes in an X-form, but his right arm had been torn off, the stump cauterized by what she presumed was a heated brand lying in coals next to them. She sucked happily at the blood oozing from the limp arm, her teeth delicately plucking pieces of meat from the bone, chewing then swallowing with relish. The human was gagged, and she could only just hear the sound of his heavily muffled screams from where she perched. The nevorin rode the human harder, throwing the arm in the dirt as her teeth tore at his neck, his gagged screams immediately cut off as she seemed to howl in climax from the death and blood below her.
Jeshin heard the rest of their encampment cheer at the sound of the nevorin's climax, then cheering harder when she strode out of her tent, her fur and muzzle matted with wet blood, fully naked, the man's head gripped tightly in her hand. The head's mouth was open in a scream, the wound looking like it was torn from the torso. The camp laughed as she played with the head before licking the oozing blood, her tongue smearing the fluid across the deceased man's face. As Jeshin backed away from the lip of the ridge back to Joshua, he was frowning. 'That one is Telura. She's a piece of work. Only thing she loves more than slaughter is bathing in the blood of her enemies, which I hear is a thing for nevorin like her. They're called....Yishui. The Chosen, right?' She turned one eye to look at him, then snorted without a word.
She knew first hand of those that called themselves Thidros' yishui, the Chosen, but to see one so brazenly laughing in the face of Wielvel, the Hound of Death, was an affront not only to all nevorin, but to the various yishui throughout their kin. Her face was twisted into a feral snarl, but she carefully backed away from the ledge, then snuck back to where the rest of their band were waiting. The faces that looked at her as she came back into their view were set and grim, the previous smiles gone and replaced with the expectation of battle.
She hand signaled ~bows first~ to the group, and nine of their band came forward and snuck up the ledge where she had left Joshua, their bare feet making them seem they were floating up the overhang like ghosts, followed by Kor'lo, he himself truly floating. She directed Vara to one side of the overhang, taking six of their number including Cossack, while she directed Norvor and the rest to follow her around the other side.
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They snuck, slowly and carefully, toward the encampment, staying low and in the dark of the trees, not more than three or four feet from the nearest guards. She couldn't see the archers from the ridge, but she knew they could see her. She raised one arm slowly, fingers spread out, then snapped her fist closed. Two arrows immediately pincushioned the guard, one in the throat and one in the heart, as one of her party grabbed hold of the guard and pulled him out of sight of the rest of the mercenary group. Moments later, the figure came forward back into sight on the other side of the entrance. Jeshin raised her right arm slightly, then with one finger movement, the group went forward into the camp, hiding behind tents, boxes, barrels, anything large enough to hide them from sight.
Jeshin took a shallow glance from her position and noticed Telura stopping mid-performance for the camp, then turn with a frown toward where they were hiding. She sniffed once, twice, then her face twisted into a savage snarl as she snarled heavily. The rest of the camp stopped what they were doing as she threw the head into the campfire behind her. 'Come out, WORM,' she screamed with a howl. Jeshin shouted a command, pulled a throng holding her greatsword strapped to her back and stepped forward.
Arrows began to snap into soldiers in the camp as Jeshin and Vara's groups surged forward toward the center, spears piercing through padded armor and swords slicing open the bellies of their enemies. The female nevorin grabbed a large, nearby staking hammer and wielded it in front of her, meeting Jeshin's greatsword. Jeshin was smaller than the massive nevorin in front of her, but she was able to easily keep in time with Telura, the nevorin's snarling muzzle opposing her own human-like one, snapping at each other. The brown nevorin's teeth caught Jeshin at her shoulders time and again, teeth catching her cheeks, while Jeshin's own teeth got underneath the nevorin's jaw, doing damage but unable to gash open her enemy's thick hide.
Jeshin twisted her sword to push away Telura, then slammed the hilt into her stomach. Telura sputtered as she jumped back, watching Jeshin in a crouch, her stomach wretching from her open snarl, bile spewing from her jaws. Jeshin flit her eyes quickly about the camp, noticing it had sprung to life in the few seconds of combat. Swords and pikes in hand, armor hastily slapped on from those that had been sleeping in tents, mercenary soldiers streaming from the tents around them. What the Black Kamber lacked in quality of mercenaries, they more than made up for in numbers, easily tripling the Voiceless Ring themselves.
Nearly a third of the camp had been taken out before they began fighting back, and while there were many of those in black garb, there were some of the blue and green of her own band lying still in the blood soaked ground. Vara wielded her waraxe easily, helping to defend her fellows with a light heater shield. Her clothes were soaked in the blood of others, and she attacked as much as she supported those next to her. She was facing against a balding man in heavy armor and wielding a longsword, a kite shield blocking and parrying Vara's axe as she did his sword.The arrows from Joshua's group had begun to slow, from using all of what they had, Jeshin considered. Even with Kor'lo's support, they could only kill so many. And although she couldn't see Norvor or Cossack, Jeshin could hear the unmistakable sounds of a staff cracking bone and the laughter of the dwarf woman cleaving her way through humanoid to humanoid.
She focused back on Telura in front of her, narrowly parrying the flying staking hammer with her sword as it veered into one of the tents causing it to collapse, the feeling of her arms going numb from the impact. She looked back at the nevorin, only seeing her hunched over, eyes turning a pure amber. Her fur began to lengthen and stand out like hackles, her teeth elongated and grew thicker, her paws and muscles growing to double their size. Her howl of rage and bloodlust curdled those around her, friend and foe alike.
Jeshin took one last look at the camp around her, noticing that her group was cleaning up the rest of the Black Kamber, taking those that surrendered prisoner. She noticed Vara break her shield on the leader's sword, raised her shield high with the sword stuck in the shards of wood, then jammed her axe into his neck, surprise and anger flooding his face.
The snarl in front of her made her brace herself as she felt the impact of the nevorin colliding into her, pushing her back. Telura's muzzle snapped at Jeshin's face rabidly while her claws dug into Jeshin's armor. She cried out in pain and kicked at Telura's knee, before being lifted and slammed into the dirt. Jeshin used her greatsword to block the nevorin's teeth inches from her face, before Telura hooked her claws into her armor and ripped it from her body with ease. She got her knee scrambled to her feet, Telura's bloodcurdling howl piercing the night around them.
Jeshin threw her greatsword at Telura, her huge form narrowly dodging as Jeshin snarled at her. Reaching deep into herself, she pulled that maddening howl from her belly, to her throat, and out into the night sky. Her "prayer" to Thidros was long and savage, as her body responded. Her eyesight burned on the edges with a green color, veins spidering along her vision. Her own muscles grew, her hair grew out along her back, and her humanoid face turned more bestial and savage. Her mouth widened across her face quickly, her jaw feeling stronger than before, like she could bite through stone itself.
She abandoned herself and rushed toward Telura, grabbed a hold of the nevorin and bit her shoulder, tearing out a furred chunk and making her howl in pain. The two slashed and bit and slammed each other into other objects and people. Jeshin slammed one fist into one of Telura's ears, causing her to stumble. She grabbed a hold of the nevorin's throat in both hands and ripped it apart, blood spattering the two of them. Telura gurgled as she fell backward as Jeshin fell on top of her. She repeatedly slammed her fists into the dying nevorin's muzzle and head, crushing her skull into a misty pulp, her rage unspent.
Eventually, Jeshin could feel herself stop, the thing's face below her entirely mush, chest caved in and ripped apart, limbs scattered about. She snarled and snapped at the corpse, then howled once, long into the brightening gloom.