Tarrin stared in shock as the Demon struggled back to its feet. It was wounded! He had hurt it! No, he hadn't hurt it. The staff did!
There's a bit of magic hiding in the staff, a magic that gives the wood its unusual properties, that short, bald human Sorcerer had said back in the Tower, the botanist that had been studying his staff. Something about the Demon was causing that magic to come forth, causing it to inflict true injury to the Demon. At first, he dismissed the staff's abilities and unusual attributes as merely curious, but now, now it mattered. The wood had injured to the Demon, and the Demon was afraid of it. That had to be it. Why would it bother parrying the staff, when it could do it no harm? It should have simply allowed Tarrin to hit him, then stabbed him with the sword. It was what Tarrin would have done, if he was facing a human with a non-magical steel sword. But it didn't. It seemed to sense that the staff was dangerous, even when Tarrin could not.
Was the wood unworldly? Could that be where it got its unusual magical properties from? It was possible. Ironwood was dreadfully rare. It only grew in the forests surrounding Aldreth, and finding a tree was a search that sometimes took months to accomplish. Maybe it was that rare because it had come from some other world, and had only just begun to spread on this one. If that were so, then it could harm the Demon.
There was one way to find out, one way or another.
Ears laying back, Tarrin exploded into motion, moving with the speed of a striking viper. He closed the distance on the Demon before it had the chance to react to his blazing eruption of activity, staff low and wide. It did manage to raise its sword when he was on top of it, but Tarrin had the longer weapon. Holding the staff in both hands, he drove it before him, past the sword, allowing its greater reach to strike the Demon before the Demon's sword could reach him. With eerie ease, Tarrin drove the tip of his staff like a spear, and thrusted it against the chest of his startled opponent. An opponent that made no attempt to defend itself.
The effect was immediate and dramatic. The staff encountered no resistance as it made contact with the Demon's chest, and it kept going. The staff erupted from the back of the Demon's cloak, pushing it out as the end drove out of its back. Tarrin had to twist his head aside as the distance between the two of them disappeared, and the Demon's weapon very nearly plunged through his left eye. He had expected, at the very least, that the staff would hit it and push it back. He didn't expect it to blow through the Demon's chest like a red-hot brand through ice. The Demon's eyes widened, and then a gush of horrible black ichor spewed from its mouth. He felt it sag against the weapon, the only thing holding it up, and the sword slipped from its limp fingers.
With a flick of his staff, Tarrin tossed the unmoving form off the end of his staff, off the roof. It tumbled thirty spans to land in a heap on the street, and it did not move again.
The other three were all free of his dome and vacuum; they must have freed themselves while he was busy with their brother. Tarrin rose up and stared at them challengingly, brandishing his staff. Then he levelled the tip at them, his expression again an emotionless, stony mask. "You'll never get over here," he called over to them. "I'll gut you as you land. You might be able to make it alive if you all jump at once, but I'll kill at least one of you in the bargain. Which one of you wants to die?"
They all looked at one another, and it was clear that they were afraid. Then, as one, they turned and fled back the way they came, abandoning their Were-cat prey.
Prey that had become the predator.
Blowing out his breath, he immediately gagged at the horrid smell assaulting him. The ichor and black blood that had come out of the body of the Demon were bubbling and sizzling on the roof, eating into it like an acid. The smell was ghastly. Tarrin retreated from that smell, from the acrid smoke issuing from just in front of his feet, and his worry turned to the staff. Could it be eating it away as well? He looked at it, and saw, to his relief, that it was completely clean. As if it had never been plunged through the chest of an unworldy opponent.
"Tarrin, did you do that?" Jula asked in wonder, as she and Sarraya came over to him.
"Do what?"
"Kill that thing!"
"It was the staff!" Sarraya said. "It hurt the Demon!"
"I think Ironwood didn't come from this world," he surmised calmly, looking at his treasured weapon with respect and appreciation. "Thank the Goddess I've managed to keep this. It just saved our butts." He looked at them. "Thanks, Sarraya."
"Thank Camara Tal and Allia," she replied. "They're the ones that threatened to tear off my wings if I didn't follow you. Are you alright?"
"It didn't even touch me," he answered her.
They looked over the edge of the roof, to the avenue below. The body of the Demon was dissolving even as they watched, turning into a grisly black spoor that melted and burned the cobblestones, eating them away and sending a greasy, acrid smoke rising from it. A Demon. They had faced Demons, and thanks to his staff, his precious staff, they had surived. They had even won. He never dreamed his staff had that kind of power, he never dreamed that it could be so critical. He'd had it for so long, he never associated it with anything special or amazing, outside of the fact that it was Ironwood.
"We'd better get back," Sarraya said. "Dolanna needs to know about this. And your kitten there looks about ready to fall over."
Quiet, his expression giving nothing away, he reached over and put his paw to the side of Jula's cheek. She seemed surprised when he pulled her close, then leaned in and kissed her on the other cheek. "I always keep my word," he told her with the slightest hint of amusement in his eyes. "Let's get back. We have alot of things to sort out."
"And I want a look at that staff," Sarraya stated as she turned and started back towards the circus. "Follow me! I know the way!"
Holding his staff in one paw, Tarrin herded Jula in front of him with a paw pushing against her shoulder, and then followed her as she started after the airborne Faerie.
Behind them, the eerie, hair-raising baying of the Hellhounds ceased. In its place rose a mournful howl, a howl that froze the marrow in Tarrin's bones.
It was far from over, but at least now he knew who would be sending them.
None other than the Empress of Arak.
A tent never looked so good.
Tarrin sat on the floor, what was left of a bowl of Deward's stew in his lap, sitting beside Jula. She had already devoured her stew, soaking up the gravy with a thick slice of bread. He had his staff right beside him, and he wasn't about to let it out of his sight, for quite a while. They were both tired, very tired. Using High Sorcery the first time had wiped him out, and using it again with Sarraya's help didn't do him much good. Jula had been pushed to her physical limit, then turned around and used Sorcery on top of it, which places a large demand on the body.
Jula. The cub had alot of guts. She didn't obey him, she stuck with him instead. She even attacked the Demons-before she knew what they were-to help him. He had the feeling that if they would have threatened her, she would have fought them, fought them as fanatically as she had fought against him when they battled. She probably would have lost, but she wouldn't back down, and she wouldn't run. And now that he thought about it, she could have easily put that lightning in his back rather than using it against the Demons. Her act of loyalty had raised his opinion of her several notches in his mind. If she was willing to fight with him, fight for him, behave when he was forced to place trust in her, then perhaps she was worth treating her like more than a burden.
They hadn't explained things yet. The others were all in Renoit's tent, as well as Renoit, sitting at chairs scrounged up and placed around his small table. The others knew something was going on, mainly because Sarraya had awakened Camara Tal, Dar, and Dolanna while Tarrin and Jula got some warm stew left on the embers of a cooking fire behind the main tent. Tarrin finished the rest of his stew quickly as Dolanna was served tea by Dar, and Camara Tal and Allia spoke quietly with one another. Sarraya flitted over and landed on Tarrin's head, sitting between his ears, and she was the one that started.