A hurricane of wings and talons descended upon Orindil, forcing him into a rapid backpedal into the nearest tree. He whipped out his rapier in the same motion, stabbing it upwards into the lunging griffin's neck. The slender blade caught in the magnificent creature's thick mane and lodged there. Panic surmounting, he tugged at his rapier even as his other hand pulled out a dirk.

The griffin's lethally curved beak raked down the entire length of his left forearm, lacerating cloth and flesh and sending spasms of pain jolting up said appendage. Orindil ululated and jerked his arm back, the dirk dropping from nerveless fingers. Ever the opportunist, the lion-bird went in for the kill.

But the elf was flowing to the side, his working arm shooting out to snatch back his rapier. Diving under the feathered adversary's body, he stabbed upwards at its tawny underbelly. Blood erupted, and the griffin spasmed with a shriek of agony. The next instant, the great body was crashing down to crush the slender elf beneath it -

Nothing. A rush of warm air over his back as he crouched, bracing himself for the impact that could very well shatter his spine. Orindil rolled over in time to see a wisp of smoke, feathered and beaked, dissipate into nothingness.

Air elementals!

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Khienro caught the dagger thrown at him and swiftly slashed at the legs of the griffin taking off above them, rewarded with a loud screach. Though his victory was short lived, as a sharp, bony object ripped across his back, sending him in to a foggy world of pain. And adrenaline. How his body could use so much adrenaline in 48 hours, he did not know, but Khienro soon found that his dagger had found its way into the feather like fur covered underbelly of the griffin, who whimpered until it collapsed. Wincing back a new surge of firey pain, Khienro slowly got up and walked over, hunchback style, to his sword, siezing the hilt in his weakened hand.

Doing his best to fight off griffins, Khienro barely had time to glance at the air elementals out of the corner of his eye. Miraculously, he did not kill any of them in his confused raid, but several griffin corpses now littered the ground.

Looking up, Khienro spotted yet another griffin infront of him. He quickly dropped to the ground, wishing for the fierce animal to ignore him in the long grass. But, once the creature started inching towards him causiously, he decided it in vain, and quickly and suddenly leaped up to his feet. But, once again, he was demanding too much of his body. And this finally pushed his weak form over the edge.

His long sword dropping to the ground, Khienro's vision faded away as the blood could not reach his head, and little bells rang inside his ears as he fell to the ground.

The last thing he knew was a large, heavy pair of clawed paws resting on his chest... And then all became void as he lost conciousness.

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You may (or may not) know me elsewhere as Elfpen

Nakaida dimly saw Khienro fall from the corner of her eye, but was far to busy putting to work a strange combination of air manipulation and actual fighting to feel anything but a short rush of anxiety. This was going downhill, and the best course of action would be to retreat - but Nakaida did not need to glance about her to see that this was not an option.

She took another step backwards, and to her terror felt a thud as something landed immediately behind her. The identity of this something was not overly difficult to guess.

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Each time a griffin fell with its lifeblood pouring, its corporeal form seemed to scatter into a dissolute mist faintly bearing griffin-ish resemblence, before being whisked away by Nakaida's air manipulation. These were not ordinary enemies. Air elementals did not conceive upon the material plane, but were summoned or brought in through a scar between the planes.

Had Okandar truly been defeated?

Orindil had little time to ponder this. Darting under the raking talons of yet another elemental, he pivoted in time to see another griffin crouched over Khienro's inert form, ready to spring. Orindil came in rapier leading, ducking under the rearing creature and slashing left and right. The elemental recoiled with a predatory shriek. He seized Khienro and hauled him up, but was forced to give ground an instant later when the griffin returned with full vengeance. One talon raked across his leg, and he fell to one knee.

"Nakaida!" he shouted, glancing desperately at the young woman. At the same time the furious elemental reared lunged forth again, forcing him in a dive to the side, pain exploding in his shattered knee. Its beak tore Khienro's stomach. Bloodlust waxing, it prepared to feast.

An arrow thudding right into the side of its tufted face refuted that intention. Finding the griffin's full vindictive wrath now turned upon him, Orindil rapidly shuffled backwards, fumbling with another arrow.

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A whoosh of harsh wind drove the deceptively solid-looking griffin skittering through the trees, caught unawares by Nakaida's attack. She could spare barely a glance for Khienro and Orindil - though on the latter her gaze lingered a split second longer. Perhaps it was this slight hesitation that enabled a snarling griffin to dive, talons spread, and rake parallel gashes down her unprotected arm and side.

Nakaida cried out - and in that instant an outward explosion of air akin to a shock wave tore leaves from trees and swept dry brush away, leaving bare dirt. The griffins who had alighted on the ground dissipated with not even time for a snarl, their inferior magic laid low by hers - gift from the Goddess as it was, her vengeance carried out against any who opposed her Keepers.

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Naidele had done all she could to help stop the air elementals. She sent blasts of fire at them, incinerating the griffins that she could. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Khienro fall. Her first instinct was to immediately go to his side, but in a flurry of beating wings another griffin was upon her making that impossible.

She fought it off with some difficulty. She didn't even bother to watch the wisps of air it left behind dissapate after she eliminated it. Her eyes immediately began searching for Khienro again. She knew it was not good to let herself become so distracted, but she couldn't help it.

Still more air elementals came at her and the others. Everything was chaos. Wisps of air as the elementals were killed, beating wings when they attacked, and Nakaida's and Naidele's air and fire attacks on them. She looked up to see a large griffin perched on Khienro's chest, ready to make the killing blow. A scream rose in her throat, but she thought she might be too scared to even summon it up. Then an arrow was suddenly jutting out of the griffin's side. Naidele didn't even have time to shoot Orindil a grateful look as the beast suddenly went after him.

She once again began moving to Khienro. When she rose her arms, summoning fire to destroy another griffin in her path, she suddenly heard Nakaida cry out. It was not a cry of pain or fear but one of anger and vengeance. Naidele's hair was blown wildly about her face as a huge gust of wind tore through the area. When she got her bearings back, she realized that Nakaida had banished the elementals.

Now that the battle was over, Naidele was able to make her way to Khienro. He had some wounds, but nothing fatal. She sighed with relief. She pressed her fingers to his temples and sent some heat into him. Not enough to wound him as she would her enemy but just enough to give him a jolt and startle him enough to wake. In case that didn't work, she sent her mind's voice to him. "Khienro," she thought, "Wake up. Wake up now."

Satisfied that he would wake soon, she let his head rest in her lap. Her eyes once again roved over his body, examining the wounds she had taken. Then she looked up to everyone else. "Are you all alright?" she asked, concerned.

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I'm back!

Khienro, who had been the equivalent of a rag doll through half of this battle, now awoke with a dull pain in his extrimeties. He felt very warm all over, as if he had been covered with layers of warm blankets. Letting a small smile flit across his face for a second or two, he intended to stay in his current position, as he was very comfortable. Save the pain in his stomach...

But, in due time before he fell asleep, Khienro jolted upwards after Naidele's voice resounded in his head, startling him to say the least. With a loud groan, he fell back, one hand going to his head, wishing for the little imaginary dwarves to stop their hammering, and the other to his stomach.

After regaining the strength and conciousness to speak, he glanced over at the fire keeper next to him.

"Naidele?" He asked quietly, "Do you always insist on yelling?" He smiled, trying to lighten the situation a bit. They may all be fine, but they still had to talk about what had caused all this.

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You may (or may not) know me elsewhere as Elfpen

A small smile pulled at the corners of Naidele's lips. She raised an eyebrow at Khienro. "I wouldn't have to do that if you could stay out of trouble," she teased, smiling to let him know that she was only jesting. She knew that she couldn't really say anything to anybody else about staying out of trouble. Trouble seemed to surround her these days.

But then her smile faded, and she drew her brows together. She gestured to Khienro's hand on his stomach. "How badly were you wounded?" she asked him, worry painting her features.

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I'm back!

Khienro winced inwardly and sighed as he went limp against the damp ground.

"Well, I can't rightly say - I'm no healer." A small tug pulled the corners of his mouth as he smiled for a split second. "And, its quite hard for one to address one's injuries when one hasn't the strength to sit up to examine said wounds." He tried to move himself back, as the feeling in his back was returning, along with the realzation that he was laying on a none too flat rock.

He winced again, this time visibly. "How is everyone else? I briefly recall Orindil sustaining some damage... Or its just me."

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You may (or may not) know me elsewhere as Elfpen

"Right here," Orindil replied wryly, dragging himself over on his shattered knee. He dropped a hand to his belt, where he discovered that his arsenal of herbs was ironically depleted. Nonetheless he leaned in to examine Khienro, drawing back a moment later with a curse. "Broken ribs," he reported none too lightly, pragmatically drawing back Khienro's tunic to reveal the bruise marks where the griffin's talons had dug into his ribcage.

Gritting his teeth through the pain in his knee, he rose to his feet and jerked his head at a stream trickling a small distance away, indicating for them to hurry in cleaning their wounds. "Someone's after us. We must make haste to Navhieri." He limped over to their horses that balked and reared like rabid beasts at the ends of their ropes. He found himself fervently grateful for rechecking their knots last night.

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Khienro nodded slowly, soon realizing that his happy-go-lucky optemistic streak wouldn't, and couldn't hold up much longer. Reaching carefully over to his pack, he retrieved the cotton sleeves that had torn off of his shirt (Ironicly, he had the majority of what remained of them) And ripped off the cleanest part that he could find. After he had a large piece, he got up slowly careful to regain his balance, and limped slightly on his numb leg over to the stream, fighting back a moan as his ribs seared with pain.

But he did scream, not too loudly, when he tried to seat himself properly on the riverbank. As he dipped his make shift rag into the semi-clear water, the front of his shirt started to obtain growing stains of blood. Looking down with regret for his rather stupid actions, Khienro instinctivly wrapped his arm around his torso, hoping that it might stop the bleeding if not for a moment.

((I'm not sure if you meant that the talons actually pierced his skin, but by looking at the '...dug into his ribcage.' bit I am assuming so. *shrugs* Correct me if I'm wrong.))

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You may (or may not) know me elsewhere as Elfpen

Nakaida swiveled to assess the damage done to her companions, but as Khienro was no doubt well taken care of by Naidele she predictably found her gaze drawn to Orindil. She instantly forgot the burning, numbing pain in her arm and side.

"Your knee!" she gasped at him, flying to where he stood - or tried to - by the horses. Guilt flooded through her, flushing her ashen cheeks. "Goddess, Orindil, I'm sorry - " she hardly knew for what, but it seemed the only thing to say. "Here, let me help you."

Only upon plunging her hand into the saddlebag of one of their stolen horses did Nakaida notice her own injury enough to let out a little gasp of pain. The left side of her tunic was stained crimson and only a dull tingling ensued when she tried to move her fingers. Turning hastily to hide it she extracted a wad of bandages and held out her other hand to help him to the stream.

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Naidele walked with Khienro over to the stream. Guilt washed through her as she watched him limping and saw the pain etched out on his face. She hated that all of this trouble was cause by her and Nakaida. She wished she knew a way where everything could be resolved positively. She feared that there wasn't one.

She had been lucky enough not to have recieved any real injuries during the attack, but she began to wash away the dirt on her face and arms. She winced a little as she washed over the scratches she had earned, but she knew that she got the least of the injuries.

Her sight was torn away from her minor hurts as Khienro let out a muffled scream. She rushed to him and saw the growing blood stains on his shirt.

"Khienro," she breathed, voice full of worry, "Oh, I'm sorry." She moved his hands gently and took the strips of cloth away, examining his wounds. Then she replaced the cloths and put pressure on them, wincing at the blood that soaked through them. She knew that the pressure would cause him more pain because of his broken ribs, but it was the best thing to do. "We need to stop the blood," she explained as looked up at his face, "I'm sorry."

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I'm back!

Khienro shook his head, eyes closed. Don't be. Its not your fault. No one's fault." He clenched his hands, wishing that either he could lose conciousness right about now, or that the emmense pain in his chest would leave his body alone.

Now quite frustrated at his own weakness and helplessness, Khienro did his best not to make another sound, in fear that it would just convey another message of weakness. Besides, he had had broken ribs in the past, he was sitting in front of the woman whom he fancied, and he would have to suck it up for the journey. Out of habit, he drew in a large breath. Well, at least part of one. He soon found that it only caused him more pain.

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You may (or may not) know me elsewhere as Elfpen

A few suave words in the musical elven tongue had the horses quieted down. Leaning for support against the quivering flank of his steed - a bay mare he'd aptly named Spitfire - he began cleaning his own wounds with water from a canteen and some earthen-hued salve, when he heard Nakaida's voice above him.

"I'm fine," he replied calmly, a bit irritated at her concern. He'd sworn himself into this quest long ago, and there was scarcely anything to be sorry about or anyone to take the blame. Besides, he could take care of himself perfectly well without her -

He forced himself to take a profound breath. She was worried about him, that was all. By all rationality, he should be grateful! What had gotten into him? He essayed a brief smile for her sake, then nodded at the nasty gashes down her arm and side. Finished with binding his own leg, he straightened with a wince and proceeded to inspect her side. Bloodflow was a steady ooze, which implicated internal injuries that were generally more dangerous than external by far.

"Come," he beckoned her, stiffly making his way down to the stream with the salve, a tourniquet, and his empty water canteen. He flashed a glance at Khienro as he approached. "Your wound should fester within a few days if not treated properly. If we follow the stream, we may arrive at a welcoming village, but don't count on it."

He couldn't help the undercurrent of callous apathy in his voice. The journey ahead would prove perilous at best, and blind optimism would avail them little. But though he hinted at everything to the contrary, he actually found himself respecting his companions, who'd shown far more courage in the past trials than he could have ever expected.

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Several replies to the effect of "I'm fine" filed through Nakaida's head, but she voiced none of them. It wasn't true in any case. She followed him meekly, resolutely not looking down at the bloody gashes that were turning her tunic red.

A vague reminder of the fact that they had just been ambushed filtered through and Nakaida quickened her steps. To remain here for too long could mean nothing good. Stumbling to the edge of the water she ignored her aching head and dizziness and dropped to her knees, right hand flying to her side as it sent stabs of pain through the rest of her body.

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