Finding Sanctuary(Kyra)

[Volinir Orchid]

Volinir stumbled forward as his hand closed around thin air. At around the same time, the boy with the cleaver decided to charge forward, the wide blade gleaming in the torch light before racing down to crack his skull open. Volinir hurled himself backwards, falling onto his rear and drawing his knees up to his chest as the knife clanged against the cobblestone, sparks flying from the impact site. The boy flinched as his shoulder jarred from the impact. Volinir lashed out at his head with both feet, knocking him to the floor. At around the same time, the woman fell upon him with a furious shriek, plunging her carving knife towards Volinir's face. He seized her wrist, groaning as he struggled against her aggregate weight as she leaned forward and pushed on the pommel with her other hand, the cold quivering steel tip of the weapon inching closer and closer to Volinir's exposed eye. When the blade was about a fingernail's length from his eye, he jerked his hand sideways without warning and relaxed his arm. The woman fell forward with a startled yelp, the knife scraping harmlessly on the floor a few inches from him. Volinir immediately lurched forward and bit down on her arm, long fangs pumping toxin into her. She hissed in pain before swaying slighting and collapsing with a quiet whine. He pushed the woman's now limp body off of him and scooped up the knife, ready to face the man with the chain. He smirked and stepped forward, rubbing one of the rusted links with his thumb. Volinir's brow furrowed, and he hurled the knife at his adversary. He whipped the chain in front of him, the poorly thrown weapon ricocheting off the blurring length of iron. The man spun the chain once over his head before swinging it at Volinir's head. The Symenestra ducked the flying chain with only inches to spare, the makeshift weapon grazing his hair and clanging against the wall. Again, another swing. This time it barely missed his scalp. "Shyke..." Volinir muttered under his breath as the man laughed spitefully and stepped forward, preparing for yet another swing. "This bastard will just keep going until he breaks something..." He backed up, getting ready to duck again, and possibly run.

[Kyra]

Kyra leaned forward and took short breaths, she wanted to relax a bit and check on her back which still held a burning sensation. But the men at her feet were only down and still very much alive. She moved around the man closest to her and stalked him slowly. Watching him as he groaned and held his hand where the blade had been driven into him, not once but twice. Kyra moved around him a bit more, she paused and suddenly dashed forward punting him in the side of his head, as she had done the first man.

His head shook violently and he tumbled over on his side. His eyes rolled into the back of his head as his hands fell free from the wound. She could easily see a dark patch, slowly growing on the inside of his shirt, the dark liquid started to leak out and into a puddle beneath him. Kyra sighed, looked toward the other man who still laid unconscious only a few feet away from her.

She stepped over the gutted pig and made her way over to the other man. Kneeling down beside him, she held his head still as she slowly dragged the blade across his throat. More dark liquid appeared, splashing and staining her blouse and pants. Kyra turned her head, trying to keep the blood from getting into her eyes as she ripped it the rest of the was to his other ear.

Standing up again, she breathed in deeply and exhaled. At this point, she could simply disappear and leave the blame of it all on the man they called spider. However, she had unfinished business with him as well. Turning back toward the street she had just raced down, Kyra headed back and peaked around the corner. She noticed the other chain wielding human attacking the tall man, and seemingly having the advantage. She thought for a brief moment about stepping in to help him out. However, if he couldn't handle a man with a simple chain, he wasn't worth saving.

A mischievous smile spread across her lips as she stepped just inside the alley and leaned against the wall and watched them continue."Poor little spider...Have you so little fight in you?"

[Volinir Orchid]

"Coming from the girl who ran for her life." Volinir retorted as he ducked yet another swing and snatched the cleaver from the ground. "I'm guessing you came back to see the show?" he said derisively before chucking the large bladed knife at the chain wielder. The man tried to repeat the trick of whirling the chain in front of him to deflect the cleaver, with very different results. The knife buried itself in his hand, causing him to drop the chain with a scream of pain. "Excuse me a moment..." He dashed towards his prey, the injured man stumbling back with a panicked yelp that was quickly cut off as Volinir's feet slammed into his chest. The Symenestra knelt over the former aggressor and started slashing savagely at his chest, and then his arms when he threw them up to defend himself. Wails of agony quickly devolved into tortured moans, until finally Volinir rose to his feet, his hands crimson, the man's arms and torso a mass of gore. He trotted back to the alley, bending over momentarily to wipe his hand off on the groaning original cleaver wielder before offering it to Kyra with a somewhat disdainful smile. "I prefer Volinir to spider, thank you very much. What shall I call you, minx?" While it would take a certain level of intuition or skill, one might notice the scorn in his expression wasn't quite real. He was annoyed, certainly, but he didn't hate her quite yet.

[Kyra]

"You sound angry. Are you upset because you couldn't catch me?" Kyra giggled at his response. The stranger amused her, and the fact that he thought that she would help him fight, was all to funny. She knew nothing about him, or what his motives were. He didn't seem very smart though, to have gotten caught doing whatever it was that he had done. Humans and non names like, who made such mistakes didn't last long, and weren't the kind she really needed as allies. "Come back to watch you die..Is that what you mean?"

When he excused himself and raced off to fight the man he had just injured, Kyra folded her arms and continued to rest against the wall as she watched the show. She found his manners refreshing, and the fact that he still used them when he was in the middle of a fight. Kyra watched as he pounced on the injured man and shredded into his chest. The gruesome scene brought back fond memories of something she'd done only a year ago.

Back in those days in the wild lands, the days when she shed her human emotions, and surrendered to the beast that he had wanted her to be. She was wild then, even feral. It was then that she had her first kill, committed her first murder. In those days, she had nothing to lose, and only the blood of the wilds to keep her going. Those days were gone now, but Kyra hadn't changed, she was a predator and Ravok was now her wild lands.

Once the stranger was done with his victim, and proceeded to clean off his hand before offering it to her. Kyra pushed herself off the wall, grabbing his wrist and turning his hand up so that she could better examine his nails. Black, sharp claws stretched out from his finger tips.

She also had claws, while in her animal form, but as a human her nails looked like any other. Releasing his hand, she glared back up at him. "I have many names." She flashed him a look, mimicking the look of scorn on his face and walked passed him. "If you want to call me Minx, then do so. Why should I care." Kyra stepped over to the closest man, and started to go through his pockets and taking anything of value.

[Volinir Orchid]

Volinir smirked a little when Kyra started peering at his hand. "Noticed my nails, have you?" When she glared at him and proclaimed her many titles, he rolled his eyes and folded his arms across his chest as she rummaged through the bodies. "Charming. I'm sorry if I hurt the feelings of as delicate a flower as yourself." he said only mostly sarcastically. The family had little more than a handful of coppers and a half eaten loaf of bread in their collective pockets; clearly not a very wealthy bunch. Volinir got to lazily picking small chunks of flesh out from underneath his fingernails. He wasn't particularly talkative, but now that the immediate threat was gone, he didn't know what to do next. "You do this for a living?" he asked casually, dropping his condescending tone. If this girl's profession was robbery, then she'd have the knowledge he needed; knowledge of a safe haven. He was only dimly aware of it at the moment, but there was a sound other than that of Kyra's scavenging. The faint clink of moving armor; and it was getting louder. A half chime after the sound started, Volinir stiffened and turned his head down the street towards the source. "Ebonstryfe..." he muttered under his breath before nudging Kyra with his foot. "Can you climb? We've got company, and it doesn't sound like an annoyed butcher." Whether or not she said she could, Volinir would lay his hands flat against the wall and start pulling himself up, the microscopic hooks in his hands and feet allowing him to scale the vertical surface with little effort aside from the exertion of climbing. A quick turn, and he was in the alley's shade. A few seconds more, and he was crawling along the roof. About a chime or so later, the wearer of the armor emerged from the darkness of the street. He was a low level grunt, clad in blackened iron plate mail. A rounded helmet protected his head, nose and cheeks, and shrouded his face in shadow. In his left hand was a black wood buckler shield with a small spike in its center. In his right was a vicious flail. His breath came in long, loud droughts, and he was far taller than both of them. A slight bow of his head was the only indication that his attention was currently fixed on the man bleeding to death at his feet.

[Kyra]

Kyra completely ignored him as he tried to taunt her. There was nothing about his tone that said that he felt sorry about anything. Either way it didn't matter to her, and she didn't care what he called her. She had different names in the past, none of them for more than a year, before she was off and being called something else by someone else. Just as well, he was no body to her and she didn't even plan on seeing him anymore after the night was over.

"I do what I have to..To survive. Is this what you do for a living? You're not very good at it." She giggled and continued to take what little coin she could find and stuff it into her pockets. If he said anything else she just ignored him as she went about looting. Kyra paused suddenly, another smell drew closer, another person. The sound of their armor rang in her ears and she figured that whoever it was had to be trouble.

Kyra didn't answer when he asked if she could climb. Climbing wasn't the only way to escape, and she could do fine on her own. She was surprised, when he moved to the wall and started to climb up without any support for his hands and feet. She didn't know how he could achieve this, but there wasn't time to stand and watch. The armor clan mystery was approaching and she had to escape.

Thinking quickly, Kyra raced up behind him and jumped on his back. She wrapped her arms over his shoulders and her legs around his waist. He was much bigger than she was and her added weight shouldn't have caused him much trouble, unless he was just weak.

Once they were at the roof, she crawled over him, planting her own hands and feet onto the roofing and continued to move along. She didn't know who was on the ground, and she didn't care to stay and find out. In truth, most of the people in the city didn't even know she was there, and that was how she liked it...She lived in the shadows.

[Volinir Orchid]

"It's not surprising, because I don't. Fortune's just been cruel as of late. Still, I'm not the one who has to change his clothes." Volinir said defensively before falling silent again. At this point it was more or less habit not to speak until spoken to... Most of the time. He barely slowed down at all when she clung onto him, though a bit of color also rushed to his face. "Clever." he whispered, smiling softly. The soldier slowly tramped his way through the street and down the alley, rummaging through abandoned shops, peering through windows, searching just about everywhere except the roof. "They never look up..." he murmured smugly as he pulled himself onto the roof. When Kyra crawled over him, Volinir turned a bright pink. It wasn't often that a little lady in skin tight clothing chose to make that much contact with you, after all. Seeing her starting to leave, he tried to grab hold of her ankle, sharp nails poking pale skin, "Oi, Madame master thief, you have somewhere someone new to the trade can hide, yes?" The soldier was starting to walk away, and Volinir did not want to have to explain why there were bodies linked to him.

[Kyra]

Kyra was disappointed, what had started out as a boring night, filled with memories that she'd rather forget and truths she'd rather not know. Had suddenly turn brighter, with the possibility of a fun evening. However, those hopes were crushed, as she soon found herself in a fight where she gained very little from, if anything at all. Frustration set in, and she wanted to be done with the whole matter. But it seemed that Volinir had other ideas and wanted to stay close for a while more.

When he reached out and grabbed her ankle, he pulled her off balance, and she almost fell flat on her chest. Frowning, Kyra pushed herself back up and glared back at him hissing. "Unhand me.." Another hiss slipped from her lips as she forcefully pulled her leg free. He was bold, still continuing to reach for her, and while Kyra might find it amusing, she was no longer in the mood. She stared to kick him, two hard kicks in succession should have been enough to send him backwards and off the roof top.

She decided against the idea, not wanting to be caught by those long arms of his and pulled off the roof as well. She still wasn't sure of who had come into the alley, but she had an idea. There had been far too much yelling and commotion not to alert the Ebonstryfe. Kyra wasn't afraid of them, they were brutes like any other, only with better armor and weaponry. Still, it was better not to cause any more trouble, and remain unnoticed.

The question he asked proved his boldness, or stupidity. He was a stranger, and he hadn't told her the truth about anything, and yet he expected her to help him find refuge? She decided to put him off until later, at the moment she was more concerned with escape. Once they were alone, and away from the soldier, she would deal with him. "Follow me.."

[Verilian]

. . Thread Award . . Volinir Orchid +2 Running +3 Unarmed Combat +1 Intimidation +1 Climbing +1 Bodybuilding Lores: Fleeing the Scene, Aided by a Stranger, Fooled by a Stranger, The Silver-Haired Minx, Close Contact with a Minx Kyra +1 Climbing +1 Subterfuge +3 Unarmed Combat +1 Intimidation +2 Dagger Lores: Aiding a Thief, Fooling a Thief, Volinir the Spider, Using Volinir as a Ladder Loot: 5 copper, 1 silver You Question My Logic? : If you have any questions about your reward, feel free to PM me. Notes: Another enjoyable thread that was cut short. So sad... anyway, good work, and keep on writing! Notice As per the request of the Founders, threads cannot be graded unless your CS is up to date. This means you need to add threads to your thread list when you make new threads, keep your skills up to date, ledger, living expenses, ect. If you aren't up to date, you'll get a PM from me before i grade your thread. If you are up to date, disregard this notice.