"Is that your win?"
"Twenty four points, yes."
"Damn, three for three. We really gotta step up our game."
Stokkie was in the middle of 'cleaning out' some of the nobility in attendance, assisted by Anbel. She didn't want him here, she continuously tried to drive him away, but here he was, making life difficult.
"How many times am I going to have to tell you to leave?" Her disgust with him was ill disguised. 'Trebar's Squad' had a reputation for infighting and squabbles to the point that a calm interaction between anyone who wasn't Kerefel or Trebar was incredibly suspicious. "I was hoping to finally get rid of you. Can't you bother somebody else?"
"I'm not bothering you though? You enjoy my company!"
"Leave!"
Kerefel, who had been tasked with keeping an eye on them, sighed. It was the usual song and dance - Anbel would 'flirt', Stokkie would get angry at him, and it would go on from there. It was Anbel's fault, he initiated, but Kerefel felt that Stokkie was the one who encouraged this behavior of his. If she just calmed down and ignored him he would find someone else to annoy, probably Zulf or one of the twins, but as she was now she was prime entertainment for him.
"I'm not going anywhere until you go on a date with me or beat me in a duel!"
"I beat you a week ago!"
"Yeah, once. That's a fluke in my eyes."
Her hand was inching towards the knife. It was slow enough for most people to not notice, but it didn't escape the eyes of Kerefel or Anbel. Of course, Anbel didn't react to this looming threat to his health. He also had a knife. Instead of backing away he pushed in, almost touching her with his shoulders.
"So about that date. . ."
It was time for Kerefel to make his move, before someone got hurt. He made it to their table just as Stokkie threw the knife at Anbel as she made some distance, Anbel mindlessly parrying it despite the short notice.
"IDIOTS!"
The knife spun wildly through the air as as the two of them darted into fighting positions, knives having made their way into all of their hands. Both were fairly prolific at wielding two weapons at once, though their styles couldn't be farther from each other. Kerefel could not be concerned with that though, he was forced to lunge over the table to block the wild knife from hitting somebody. He winced as he felt a sharp pain, the knife having stabbed into his forearm.
"That was a little rude, don't you think?"
"Beat it cloakweed!"
Kerefel assessed the damage to his arm as blood splattered onto the table. It wasn't too deep, most of the energy had been dissipated by the parry, but it was stuck in there. Removing it would only increase the bleeding.
"Bar fight?!?! BAR FIIIIGHT!!!!"
Kerefel watched on in absolute awe as another person entered the fray. He was wielding a longer knife, likely his personal weapon, as he stumbled towards them. He was drunk, the evidence being found in his slurred speech, but he definitely still had his wits about him. His stance was solid, though how long he would be able to last against either of those two was a question he didn't want to see answered.
The two primary combatants just ignored him, Stokkie dashing in to engage. Kerefel watched those who had been peacefully feasting and playing Cargo only moments before shuffle away from the action, Anbel jumping on one of the rapidly evacuating tables to get an elevation advantage on his foe. One of his foes at least.
The mystery man had decided that Anbel being on top of the table was all the justification he needed to flip it over.
"Thas not faaiiirrrrr!!!" He taunted nonsensically as he removed Anbel's stable footing, which forced him to jump away.
"What are you DOING?!"
Anbel was almost certainly the most rational of the three engaged in combat, one being enraged and the other being drunk, so he questioned what right this person had to intrude.
"Eat shit and DIE!" Stokkie charged the off balance Anbel, who only just managed to get out of range.
"Don ignore me!" A chair sailed through the air in their general direction, landing harmlessly in between them. It didn't do much aside from distract them. "I godda knife too!"
He made some flashy motions with it, twirling and whirling it around and brandishing it as if to impress, before charging towards them himself.
At this point, Kerefel was well and truly at a loss for what to do. If they hadn't picked up knives and had instead decided to use their fists, he could have resolved their dispute easily. However Kerefel did not fight with knives. Even if he did, there was currently one sticking out of his primary arm, so his ability to use it would definitely be limited. They were currently hot-blooded and unwilling to talk it out, and he lacked the ability to subdue them.
A few clashes of metal followed as they danced, one elegant, one sturdy, and one wobbling. Kerefel was in the process of praying that nobody would get hurt when he heard the sound of footsteps slamming on the hardwood floors from the hallway behind him.
A flash of green passed his peripheral vision and immediately joined itself with the chaos taking place in his focus.
- - - - -
Titanyana heard the fighting long before she saw anything happening. She had heard everything important. She may have been in the room at the end of the hall, attempting to hold a conversation with a few of the nobles there, but her ears could have made out the sound of metal on metal and Kerefel's shout if the hall was full of people making conversation. She could have heard it if was a mile away.
That alone wasn't enough to make her jump into action. If the last word was an admonishment it would have ben safe to assume somebody had taken care of the issue. However the second clash was a clear sign that something had gotten out of hand.
She didn't bother giving an excuse before she darted, ditching her heeled shoes as she went. If she had to fight, she would prefer a wider and more flexible base to work with. If that meant she got shards of glass in her feet, oh well, but at least she would be able to fight - and it was clear that she was going to have to fight.
Titanyana 'dodged' the wary crowd that had formed at the entrance to the hall by jumping over them, landing at the front while keeping momentum and analyzing the situation. She could see three engaged in combat wielding knives and one standing off to the side. He was presumably injured, which would serve as further justification for the use of force should Donovan question her.
She wasn't worried about this fight. There might be three of them, but she had the element of surprise and the advantage in weapon range. She would have to keep her weapon sheathed of course, which meant she would be a little slower than usual, and she didn't have time to unfasten it from her belt. In a relatively smooth motion, she removed the leather strap from her waist and brought the sword out in front of her with an unusual grip.
Without time to strap the sheath to the cross guard, she had to wrap her thumb up and over it. Hitting someone like this would inevitably hurt her, but that wasn't a concern.
Acting swiftly, her first strike was from behind Anbel. It crashed into the side of his ribcage, almost certainly breaking a rib or two. She kept her momentum by spinning, bringing her sword close to her chest and passing the tip right across the drunken brawler's chin, rattling his brain and knocking him out. Hopefully it wasn't fast enough to do any lasting damage, but she didn't have the time to worry about that, he last blow being a lunge at the stunned Stokkie, slamming the hilt of her blade directly into her stomach and forcing her to double over in pain.
Still breathing a little heavily because of her sprint, she took a look around the room. She had to make sure that nobody else was misbehaving.
- - - - -
Kerefel was stunned for as long as it took him to figure out the green-clad figure was a certain nimble individual he had lost to in the field of battle. He knew that Anbel and Stokkie were close to first rate fighters, if not first rates already. They weren't yet at the level of top-grade, but it would be a struggle to subdue them even if hey were fighting without their preferred weapons.
From his own experience he knew that Titanyana was more that capable of dispatching them, especially with a range advantage that was probably and incredible rarity for her.
"Thank you, Lady Strapper." Kerefel was holding his impaled arm close to his chest, keeping the forearm at an upright angle to reduce the flow of blood. That same blood was dripping from his elbow, there was no hiding he needed medical attention. "I failed."
"Mm. I'll go get help." She turned away from the blood, looking at her victims with disgust.
Anbel, her first target, was rolling around on the ground holding the side of his chest. It hurt, obviously, but he was crying a little and coughing up something horrendous. Stokkie wasn't much better, in fact she was doing worse on a visual basis. Titanyana could surmise from the consistency and color of the material she was puking up that she had only recently partaken in a meal.
The third one was just sprawled out on the floor, unconscious. He looked familiar, but she really didn't feel like thinking abut it too much. It was far more important that she found someone who could render aid to the bleeding Kerefel. There was only one person who came to mind.
- - - - -
"Gretts, Cherry, I'm going to need a pile of cloths, a spool of thread, and a needle. If you can get me some scissors or something to cut the thread, that would be nice." Donovan had been summoned to the scene of the bar fight to analyze the injuries of those present. "I'll also need some soap, a bucket of hot water, and a bucket of cold water. If you could get me a cup or something to scoop and pour with that would be great."
He was going to perform an incredibly rudimentary form of field surgery, basically something he had only really seen in the diagrams on first aid kits and in movies. There was some extra information he was working with here, no alcohol (great way to damage interior tissue) and no boiling water (great way to hinder recovery), but for the most part he was just doing what he thought might be right.
"How are you doing big boy? Can you still feel your arm?" Donovan made small talk with the patient as the servants dispersed to find the requested items.
"It is unfortunate, but I can most certainly feel the sting of a blade. I would appreciate it if you didn't patronize me."
"Sorry about that, I didn't know what sort of mental state you were working with. Are you feeling light headed?"
"Not particularly."
"But you are feeling light headed. Just to make sure you don't go unconscious while I'm working, I want you to lie on the ground and lift your arm in the air." Donovan supported Kerefel's head as he leaned back, making sure that he wouldn't hurt himself if he was playing the tough guy. "I came in and saw blood all over the floor, so you can probably imagine I'm a little worried that you might be running dry. I'll hold the wound shut."
Donovan, still on his knee, pinched the severed flesh to the interloping blade, reducing the space the blood had available to flow out of.
"Might I ask for a drink? Preferably something alcoholic?"
"I'm not sure booze is such a good idea when you're low on blood. That's a good way to get alcohol poisoning." Donovan still signaled a nearby waiter to bring over a glass of beer. "So, uh, would you mind filling me in on what happened here? Titanyana didn't get a good look before she knocked everyone out, so I don't exactly know who to yell at."
"Anbel and Stokkie had an argument that escalated into a fight. They threw a knife and I blocked it from hitting someone with my arm."
"I guess they aren't lying when they say you shouldn't give children knives, huh?" Donovan's little remark earned him a laugh. "Well, here's your booze. Try not to drink it all at once, you won't be getting another."
"Yes sir." He said that, but he downed it in one go. "How bad is it?"
"Doesn't look too bad, maybe an inch and a half deep at most. Judging by the blood it probably hit a bigger artery, but it shouldn't pose too much of an issue if I stitch it right." Donovan had compared the knife in Kerefel's arm to a similar looking knife elsewhere on the floor. "Of course, that means I have to do it right."
"I have the water buckets here Sir Donovan. Someone else is getting the cup and soap."
"Thank you Cherry, put it to the side for now. Can I ask you to start cleaning this mess up?"
"As you wish." Cherry skipped off to get a mop.
A servant with a white bar and a wooden cup showed up next, followed shortly by Gretts appearing from the other hall.
"Alright, here's the deal. First things first I'm going to have to take the knife out and clean out any debris in the wound, you don't want somebody's salad stuck in your arm for the rest of your life. The water is hot, so it might sting a little, but the real pain is going to be the cloth going in and rubbing around."
"Sounds wonderful."
"Glad to see you are on board. Now the second part is going to be a bit more difficult. I am going to try and tie the opening together with this thread. That means I need to poke some holes. Unfortunately this is my first time doing something like this and I am not very confident in my abilities, so I might miss or screw up a few times. Can you forgive me in advance?"
"I would prefer to thank you for the assistance."
"Great. Gretts, you are going to be my assistant while Cherry and the others clean up this mess. You won't need to get your hands dirty, just hand me what I need."
"I understand."
"Let's start with a cloth and the cup for water." Donovan gently moved Kerefel's arm to the ground, pinning his elbow to the ground with his knee. He hoped this would stymie the flow of blood. He removed the knife slowly as he let some water fall onto the wound, doing his best to prevent further injury.
"It's out, might want to hold your breath for this one." Don felt Kerefel's arm tense up, his cue to begin. As fast as he dared, he inserted the cloth into the gash and dumped the water, rubbing around a bit as he did so. He didn't bother looking at the cloth once it was out, instead pouring the rest of the water in to clear out as much blood as possible. "Needle and thread, Gretts."
The needle came first, and Donovan exhaled a little bit to relieve his tension. Before accepting the thread, he made the first puncture near one of the edges of the cut. Comfortable that it was far enough away to not tear under stress, he put the end of the thread into the needle's eye and pushed it through the hole. This probably wasn't the best way to do it, but Donovan really didn't want to fumble around with it with all of the blood. It was slippery after all.
"Is that your win?"
"Twenty four points, yes."
"Damn, three for three. We really gotta step up our game."
Stokkie was in the middle of 'cleaning out' some of the nobility in attendance, assisted by Anbel. She didn't want him here, she continuously tried to drive him away, but here he was, making life difficult.
"How many times am I going to have to tell you to leave?" Her disgust with him was ill disguised. 'Trebar's Squad' had a reputation for infighting and squabbles to the point that a calm interaction between anyone who wasn't Kerefel or Trebar was incredibly suspicious. "I was hoping to finally get rid of you. Can't you bother somebody else?"
"I'm not bothering you though? You enjoy my company!"
"Leave!"
Kerefel, who had been tasked with keeping an eye on them, sighed. It was the usual song and dance - Anbel would 'flirt', Stokkie would get angry at him, and it would go on from there. It was Anbel's fault, he initiated, but Kerefel felt that Stokkie was the one who encouraged this behavior of his. If she just calmed down and ignored him he would find someone else to annoy, probably Zulf or one of the twins, but as she was now she was prime entertainment for him.
"I'm not going anywhere until you go on a date with me or beat me in a duel!"
"I beat you a week ago!"
"Yeah, once. That's a fluke in my eyes."
Her hand was inching towards the knife. It was slow enough for most people to not notice, but it didn't escape the eyes of Kerefel or Anbel. Of course, Anbel didn't react to this looming threat to his health. He also had a knife. Instead of backing away he pushed in, almost touching her with his shoulders.
"So about that date. . ."
It was time for Kerefel to make his move, before someone got hurt. He made it to their table just as Stokkie threw the knife at Anbel as she made some distance, Anbel mindlessly parrying it despite the short notice.
"IDIOTS!"
The knife spun wildly through the air as as the two of them darted into fighting positions, knives having made their way into all of their hands. Both were fairly prolific at wielding two weapons at once, though their styles couldn't be farther from each other. Kerefel could not be concerned with that though, he was forced to lunge over the table to block the wild knife from hitting somebody. He winced as he felt a sharp pain, the knife having stabbed into his forearm.
"That was a little rude, don't you think?"
"Beat it cloakweed!"
Kerefel assessed the damage to his arm as blood splattered onto the table. It wasn't too deep, most of the energy had been dissipated by the parry, but it was stuck in there. Removing it would only increase the bleeding.
"Bar fight?!?! BAR FIIIIGHT!!!!"
Kerefel watched on in absolute awe as another person entered the fray. He was wielding a longer knife, likely his personal weapon, as he stumbled towards them. He was drunk, the evidence being found in his slurred speech, but he definitely still had his wits about him. His stance was solid, though how long he would be able to last against either of those two was a question he didn't want to see answered.
The two primary combatants just ignored him, Stokkie dashing in to engage. Kerefel watched those who had been peacefully feasting and playing Cargo only moments before shuffle away from the action, Anbel jumping on one of the rapidly evacuating tables to get an elevation advantage on his foe. One of his foes at least.
The mystery man had decided that Anbel being on top of the table was all the justification he needed to flip it over.
"Thas not faaiiirrrrr!!!" He taunted nonsensically as he removed Anbel's stable footing, which forced him to jump away.
"What are you DOING?!"
Anbel was almost certainly the most rational of the three engaged in combat, one being enraged and the other being drunk, so he questioned what right this person had to intrude.
"Eat shit and DIE!" Stokkie charged the off balance Anbel, who only just managed to get out of range.
"Don ignore me!" A chair sailed through the air in their general direction, landing harmlessly in between them. It didn't do much aside from distract them. "I godda knife too!"
He made some flashy motions with it, twirling and whirling it around and brandishing it as if to impress, before charging towards them himself.
At this point, Kerefel was well and truly at a loss for what to do. If they hadn't picked up knives and had instead decided to use their fists, he could have resolved their dispute easily. However Kerefel did not fight with knives. Even if he did, there was currently one sticking out of his primary arm, so his ability to use it would definitely be limited. They were currently hot-blooded and unwilling to talk it out, and he lacked the ability to subdue them.
A few clashes of metal followed as they danced, one elegant, one sturdy, and one wobbling. Kerefel was in the process of praying that nobody would get hurt when he heard the sound of footsteps slamming on the hardwood floors from the hallway behind him.
A flash of green passed his peripheral vision and immediately joined itself with the chaos taking place in his focus.
- - - - -
Titanyana heard the fighting long before she saw anything happening. She had heard everything important. She may have been in the room at the end of the hall, attempting to hold a conversation with a few of the nobles there, but her ears could have made out the sound of metal on metal and Kerefel's shout if the hall was full of people making conversation. She could have heard it if was a mile away.
That alone wasn't enough to make her jump into action. If the last word was an admonishment it would have ben safe to assume somebody had taken care of the issue. However the second clash was a clear sign that something had gotten out of hand.
She didn't bother giving an excuse before she darted, ditching her heeled shoes as she went. If she had to fight, she would prefer a wider and more flexible base to work with. If that meant she got shards of glass in her feet, oh well, but at least she would be able to fight - and it was clear that she was going to have to fight.
Titanyana 'dodged' the wary crowd that had formed at the entrance to the hall by jumping over them, landing at the front while keeping momentum and analyzing the situation. She could see three engaged in combat wielding knives and one standing off to the side. He was presumably injured, which would serve as further justification for the use of force should Donovan question her.
She wasn't worried about this fight. There might be three of them, but she had the element of surprise and the advantage in weapon range. She would have to keep her weapon sheathed of course, which meant she would be a little slower than usual, and she didn't have time to unfasten it from her belt. In a relatively smooth motion, she removed the leather strap from her waist and brought the sword out in front of her with an unusual grip.
Without time to strap the sheath to the cross guard, she had to wrap her thumb up and over it. Hitting someone like this would inevitably hurt her, but that wasn't a concern.
Acting swiftly, her first strike was from behind Anbel. It crashed into the side of his ribcage, almost certainly breaking a rib or two. She kept her momentum by spinning, bringing her sword close to her chest and passing the tip right across the drunken brawler's chin, rattling his brain and knocking him out. Hopefully it wasn't fast enough to do any lasting damage, but she didn't have the time to worry about that, he last blow being a lunge at the stunned Stokkie, slamming the hilt of her blade directly into her stomach and forcing her to double over in pain.
Still breathing a little heavily because of her sprint, she took a look around the room. She had to make sure that nobody else was misbehaving.
- - - - -
Kerefel was stunned for as long as it took him to figure out the green-clad figure was a certain nimble individual he had lost to in the field of battle. He knew that Anbel and Stokkie were close to first rate fighters, if not first rates already. They weren't yet at the level of top-grade, but it would be a struggle to subdue them even if hey were fighting without their preferred weapons.
From his own experience he knew that Titanyana was more that capable of dispatching them, especially with a range advantage that was probably and incredible rarity for her.
"Thank you, Lady Strapper." Kerefel was holding his impaled arm close to his chest, keeping the forearm at an upright angle to reduce the flow of blood. That same blood was dripping from his elbow, there was no hiding he needed medical attention. "I failed."
"Mm. I'll go get help." She turned away from the blood, looking at her victims with disgust.
Anbel, her first target, was rolling around on the ground holding the side of his chest. It hurt, obviously, but he was crying a little and coughing up something horrendous. Stokkie wasn't much better, in fact she was doing worse on a visual basis. Titanyana could surmise from the consistency and color of the material she was puking up that she had only recently partaken in a meal.
The third one was just sprawled out on the floor, unconscious. He looked familiar, but she really didn't feel like thinking abut it too much. It was far more important that she found someone who could render aid to the bleeding Kerefel. There was only one person who came to mind.
- - - - -
"Gretts, Cherry, I'm going to need a pile of cloths, a spool of thread, and a needle. If you can get me some scissors or something to cut the thread, that would be nice." Donovan had been summoned to the scene of the bar fight to analyze the injuries of those present. "I'll also need some soap, a bucket of hot water, and a bucket of cold water. If you could get me a cup or something to scoop and pour with that would be great."
He was going to perform an incredibly rudimentary form of field surgery, basically something he had only really seen in the diagrams on first aid kits and in movies. There was some extra information he was working with here, no alcohol (great way to damage interior tissue) and no boiling water (great way to hinder recovery), but for the most part he was just doing what he thought might be right.
"How are you doing big boy? Can you still feel your arm?" Donovan made small talk with the patient as the servants dispersed to find the requested items.
"It is unfortunate, but I can most certainly feel the sting of a blade. I would appreciate it if you didn't patronize me."
"Sorry about that, I didn't know what sort of mental state you were working with. Are you feeling light headed?"
"Not particularly."
"But you are feeling light headed. Just to make sure you don't go unconscious while I'm working, I want you to lie on the ground and lift your arm in the air." Donovan supported Kerefel's head as he leaned back, making sure that he wouldn't hurt himself if he was playing the tough guy. "I came in and saw blood all over the floor, so you can probably imagine I'm a little worried that you might be running dry. I'll hold the wound shut."
Donovan, still on his knee, pinched the severed flesh to the interloping blade, reducing the space the blood had available to flow out of.
"Might I ask for a drink? Preferably something alcoholic?"
"I'm not sure booze is such a good idea when you're low on blood. That's a good way to get alcohol poisoning." Donovan still signaled a nearby waiter to bring over a glass of beer. "So, uh, would you mind filling me in on what happened here? Titanyana didn't get a good look before she knocked everyone out, so I don't exactly know who to yell at."
"Anbel and Stokkie had an argument that escalated into a fight. They threw a knife and I blocked it from hitting someone with my arm."
"I guess they aren't lying when they say you shouldn't give children knives, huh?" Donovan's little remark earned him a laugh. "Well, here's your booze. Try not to drink it all at once, you won't be getting another."
"Yes sir." He said that, but he downed it in one go. "How bad is it?"
"Doesn't look too bad, maybe an inch and a half deep at most. Judging by the blood it probably hit a bigger artery, but it shouldn't pose too much of an issue if I stitch it right." Donovan had compared the knife in Kerefel's arm to a similar looking knife elsewhere on the floor. "Of course, that means I have to do it right."
"I have the water buckets here Sir Donovan. Someone else is getting the cup and soap."
"Thank you Cherry, put it to the side for now. Can I ask you to start cleaning this mess up?"
"As you wish." Cherry skipped off to get a mop.
A servant with a white bar and a wooden cup showed up next, followed shortly by Gretts appearing from the other hall.
"Alright, here's the deal. First things first I'm going to have to take the knife out and clean out any debris in the wound, you don't want somebody's salad stuck in your arm for the rest of your life. The water is hot, so it might sting a little, but the real pain is going to be the cloth going in and rubbing around."
"Sounds wonderful."
"Glad to see you are on board. Now the second part is going to be a bit more difficult. I am going to try and tie the opening together with this thread. That means I need to poke some holes. Unfortunately this is my first time doing something like this and I am not very confident in my abilities, so I might miss or screw up a few times. Can you forgive me in advance?"
"I would prefer to thank you for the assistance."
"Great. Gretts, you are going to be my assistant while Cherry and the others clean up this mess. You won't need to get your hands dirty, just hand me what I need."
"I understand."
"Let's start with a cloth and the cup for water." Donovan gently moved Kerefel's arm to the ground, pinning his elbow to the ground with his knee. He hoped this would stymie the flow of blood. He removed the knife slowly as he let some water fall onto the wound, doing his best to prevent further injury.
"It's out, might want to hold your breath for this one." Don felt Kerefel's arm tense up, his cue to begin. As fast as he dared, he inserted the cloth into the gash and dumped the water, rubbing around a bit as he did so. He didn't bother looking at the cloth once it was out, instead pouring the rest of the water in to clear out as much blood as possible. "Needle and thread, Gretts."
The needle came first, and Donovan exhaled a little bit to relieve his tension. Before accepting the thread, he made the first puncture near one of the edges of the cut. Comfortable that it was far enough away to not tear under stress, he put the end of the thread into the needle's eye and pushed it through the hole. This probably wasn't the best way to do it, but Donovan really didn't want to fumble around with it with all of the blood. It was slippery after all.
