Spring 2, 122
Sand sharks were inbound, so Astra helped the merchants hide behind an imposing rock. It wasn't difficult to get them to listen. She had a feeling that Saahir and the guards would kill these sharks, but the possibility that one would pass between them was to be considered, given their impressive speed.
One of the guards that stepped up had a deck of cards in their hands. An ensorceller, by the look of them. Each card glowed mysteriously.
The guard muttered under their breath, "fire? No it's too hot I don't want to set anything on fire. Water and wind, that would be more than enough."
Saahir ran up and asked, "Sisyphus have you killed any of these before?"
"Yes, but never easily," said the guard. "They are fast..."
She observed Saahir and his imposing armor with a thoughtful air.
"Won't be easy, but we will manage."
Astra stepped forward with her sword drawn and said, "I can try to help as well, though I'm not sure if I will be able to do much."
Saahir looked like he was going to argue, but a rattle indicated the proximity of the sand sharks. There were two of them. Only two...? It was strange, for these beasts most often moving in groups of three or four. They would have to be careful. Astra gave her allies a final smile of encouragement. The further the fight took place from the rock, the less collateral damage would occur.
Sisyphus ran forwards and stopped in order to throw her first card. This one took advantage of a burst of aeris to give it some propulsion. When it got close to the first shark, it exploded into water and was frozen by the effect of a second card.
The shark had quickly avoided the attack, though dodging had certainly made it lose momentum. It still wasn't enough to stop the shark from colliding with Sisyphus. A fin pushed her back, before another shark popped out of the ground and sank its fangs into her forearm. Her face contorted with pain. Was that a bone she had heard crack?
Damn it!
Astra gritted her teeth. She'd expected more from an ensorceller. She took her sword and jammed it into the shark as it tried to drag Sisyphus to the ground. The creature didn't bleed as Astra expected it to. Sure, a little blood came out, but it was thick and course looking. What was worse was that she couldn't wrench her sword back out. It'd gotten stuck in the shark's unbelievably tight musculature.
Sisyphus dug her heels into the ground and hit the shark with a new pair of cards that glowed bright blue. The slightest wrong move could be fatal. As the pair of women rushed forward, Saahir began to run, his sword in his right hand, his left arm bent as if he were carrying an invisible shield.
"We're finally going to be able to have some fun!"
A second shark emerged from the sand. These monsters were more similar to giant lizards than sharks once they emerged from the sand. The shark gave Saahir a headbutt, but he half knocked himself out against Saahir's massive size and hard metal armor. Despite everything, the warrior had also felt the blow. He was much less enduring than before. The shark and Saahir each got back up to their feet. The shark turned violently, intending to throw the warrior with a blow of its tail. Saahir raised his sword at the same time. His goal was simple - to cut off the animal's tail.
Astra managed to finally tear her sword free and fall onto her butt while Sisyphus put on a wide simle. Her spell had worked and now the shark was caught in an icy vice. The spell was burning but paradoxically pleasant. She freed her hand, and jumped back from her opponent. Blood streamed down her arm, but she wasn't going to die immediately.
A glance at his behind told her that Saahir was taking care of the second opponent, or at least trying to... Astra became worried as she saw him moving further away as he was knocked aside by the tail. The ladies had to finish off their own shark quickly, in order to go and support their ally. That Saahir could move under that heat and weight already seemed like a miracle...
Distracted, Sisyphus avoided the shark's next attack a little too late. A fin hit his first bloody wound as he freed himself from his frozen restraint. The ensorceller did not allow herself any respite and gritting her teeth, she immediately retaliated with a new card, gold this time.
Water was still soaking into the creature... combined with electricity, it should be enough to render him unconscious - if it touched him.
Sahir grunted, "how could I have missed?"
While getting up, Saahir couldn't help but let out a laugh to mock himself. "Come on shark of misfortune, this is only the beginning!"
Saahir put himself on guard. The shark rushed, head down to knock the warrior out once again. At the last moment, Saahir managed to stop the shark's assault by blocking the head with his blade. He swung the blade upwards to knock the shark's head upwards, leaving the belly accessible for an attack. Saahir adjusted his sword and aimed the monster's belly with the tip of his blade.
Astra stabbed her sword back into her shark to try pinning it in place but it was much too strong for her to handle. She barely even pierced the skin as it burrowed once again. Sisyphus missed her spell as well. Electricity bzzzed in the air, but at least it'd pushed the shark away for the time being.
The two women there, waiting for it to come back to the surface... Where would it appear? Would it even reappear? A growl indicated its proximity. It came from below, and jumped, its gaping jaws ready to devour Astra. Astra dodged to the side but the tail managed to throw her to the ground. She winced as she landed on her shoulder.
Sisyphus at least had the reflex to respond immediately with another electric spell, hitting it square in the stomach and searing its entire body. That'd been an expensive spell…
Saahir was not having the same amount of luck. He managed to slice open the shark's stomach and it had somehow stayed standing. It had screamed, of course, and its way of reacting to the pain was to swing its tail around in an arc to knock Saahir down again. The warrior coughed and got up, adjusting his helmet.
The shark might have had a hole in the middle of its belly, but that didn't stop it from continuing to fight. It tried another tail strike that Saahir managed to narrowly dodge by ducking. As the shark showed its head again, the warrior took advantage. Saahir gave a big blow to the head with the hilt of his sword which stunned the shark a little. He raised his sword once more and aimed at the beast's neck. It's normally a very resistant place for sand sharks, but it had to be tried.
Astra and Sisyphus had their shark lying there. Astra had been worried about Saahir since she'd seen him get whacked the first time. Not to mention the absence of the third shark. Were they really not a group of three, or was the last one hanging around, waiting for the right opportunity to take them by surprise?
Nevertheless, Astra could see that their ally had done his job nicely. Astra was about to reach out a hand and stop the shark from moving no matter how much energy it took, but Sisyphus shot out a spell towards the shark's wound. Its insides erupted into flames just as Saahir raised his sword to finish off his enemy. Saahir let out a tired sigh and rested his sword on his shoulder.
"Are you okay, nothing broken?"
Saahir had seen the ensorceller get bitten and the blood didn't look pretty. The rest of the convoy began to come out of the rock but Saahir said, "don't come out right away, wait a little longer. We want to make sure they're all gone."
"I'll survive," said the ensorceller as she flipped through her cards, looking for a healing spell. She briefly examined the wound on her arm before applying a healing spell to it. She winced in pain but it was always worth it. infection. Besides, her current contract required her to be in top shape. The card held over her wound then she raised a questioning eyebrow at Saahir, in case he too needed to be healed.
Astra was uninjured but tired as she walked towards the corpses. "We don't want any scavengers to come for this meat before we leave," she said to herself.
Saahir sheathed his sword. Both sharks were dead, but the warrior still kept one hand on his sword in case another danger arose. Saahir would normally have salivated at the sight of the meat. But the heat was too strong to eat anything. When he came back from a skirmish, he could eat pounds of meat. But that day, between the heat and his mouth filled with bits of sand, he thought that swallowing anything but water was not going to be worth it.
Astra wanted to harvest the blood, but there were so many people around. She didn't have time to think about a good slice of shark before a frightening cry ran through the desert. She turned her head and saw another sand shark in the distance. But this one was much bigger and much more violent than the other two. Its skin was gray, almost black, instead of being light brown like its peers.
"Oh, that's bad. An alpha shark. Surely the leader of the pack. We probably just killed two females who were looking for food."
The enormous sand shark screamed once more and dove into the sand, determined to shred the guards and the rest of the convoy.
"At least we won't starve to death along the way!"
The ensorceller gave a thin smile and immediately prepared to meet this new enemy. Her wound hadn't yet had time to heal perfectly and her old hip wound was starting to hurt from moving around like that, but it was all bearable. She would leave the bulk of the close-range attacks for Saahir for this fight. She would use projectiles. What worried her more was the speed at which she would use her spells... They weren't infinite.
A set of five cards nestled in her hand. Folding three fingers, she launched the first attack to attract the shark's attention. "It mustn't go to the rock where the merchants haven taken refuge..."
The card exploded with a thunderous roar of fabula. The shark reoriented itself towards the source of the noise, accelerating a little more. Astra glanced at Saahir before launching herself to the side, out of the way of the shark's new trajectory.
Unfolding her fingers, the Sisphylus threw three of her four remaining cards consecutively. They were infused with aeris and sliced through the fin, for all the good that it did. Saahir quickly drifted to the right, while the alpha shark had Astra in its sights. Once he had moved far enough away, the warrior rushed towards the shark's side. Just before the monster saw him, he aimed at the right flank with a large horizontal sword strike.
"Take that!"
At the same time, he saw out of the corner of his eye the shark's mouth wide open. Too bad for the attack, he had to protect himself as quickly as possible. Instead of aiming for the side, he aimed for the mouth of the monster that twisted towards him. The sword hit the head, but didn't cut anything.
"Well, you're hard-headed!"
Saahir rolled loudly to the side and tried again to aim for the tail, while the shark was still stunned from the last blow. Astra followed at a careful distance with her sword at the ready. She saw the opportunity to strike and ran forwards, slashing into the flank from the other side. Unfortunately, superficial damage was not going to cut it.
Even Saahir who's sword had sunk several inches into the firm flesh of the monster, was worried that he wouldn't be able to kill it. Saahir withdrew the sword and dodged another tail strike with another roll. Astra had just attracted the shark's attention once again and Sisyphus tried to electrocute it with another of her cards. But for a reason that Saahir does not know, the shark had not shown any signs of fatigue.
Saahir got up, brandished his sword in the air and aimed at the tail that he had dodged a few seconds before. The sword swooped down on the sand shark's tail and sliced it cleanly. The tail flew a few feet away and was still moving compulsively against a dune. Saahir raised his sword and saw Sisyphus prepare a final card. The monster weakened, she probably wanted to finish very quickly, so the warrior decided to back up while dragging Astra by the arm. They had done well.
A spell shot out at full speed and a burst of flames enveloped the shark who had not even had time to register where the attack had come from. After a few seconds, the time for the flames to dissipate, nothing remained of the shark. A few bones had resisted the fire like the skull, but the rest was only ashes and charred meat.
Saahir put his sword back in its sheath. He knew that with the alpha male killed, they should have peace for the rest of the trip.
"We won't be able to get much meat from this one! But your last attack was impressive! And Astra, you were really brave! You might have a knack for this sort of thing."
"Sorry, I almost got you two with that spell," Sisyphus said.
Saahir went to the shark's tail, which was still moving a little, and pulled it to the convoy. "Fortunately there is this piece left. The meat is tender, maybe a little bland, but it's edible." He gave anything but the impression of having fought three sand sharks including an alpha. It was certainly worrying but above all respectable.
Astra dusted off her dress with small, measured gestures as she regained some composure. However, one could read on her face that she was fatigued and a headache was setting in. Her flurry of slashes had indeed exhausted all her stamina.
Astra's gaze moved towards the sky. Time had flown and they were now getting ready to camp yet again. They had to smoke the meat quickly to preserve it without attracting predators and a rest was very welcome. With a bit of luck, they would only have another day of travel left.
Later, she went to enjoy some of this shark by the fire in the company of the merchants in a cheerful mood. Just a bite or two, as she didn't really need to eat anymore. They congratulated her for helping with the fight earlier and did not skimp on friendly pats or a swig of lukewarm beer. Saahir had eaten very well. But he still had not taken off his helmet. He had just raised the movable guard of his helm to be able to eat the grilled shark meat.
Saahir still wondered about the origin of the ensorceller's magic. He had seen magicians create fireballs, ice storms or other miracles, he had also seen sorcerers capable of producing lightning at will, but he had never seen anyone fight with cards. He thought it a novel concept.
Astra walked over to him and sat next to him. "So, what do you do to relax after one of your battles?" she put on her most seductive tone of voice and put her hand on his. She was being extra forward today.
"Relax? I suppose I can get some sleep tonight." He thought about the guards that hadn't helped with the sharks but had instead stayed with the group and protected their flank. They would be the ones doing the guarding tonight while he and Sisyphus slept.
Astra nodded, "I don't suppose you need some company? I feel scared. It would feel much more safe if I were sleeping next to you." She put on an innocent expression. She needed to feed and this delay in getting to town wasn't doing her any favors. She'd snuck off to drain one of the shark corpses but she needed emotional fulfillment.
"With someone as pretty as you?" he asked in surprise. "I don't… know how to respond…" To lay with someone like Astra was like using a muddy boot to stomp all over a bed of roses. It was a dishonor… but he wanted it to happen.
"You respond by saying yes," Astra grinned, "and you get a move on before I change my mind." She hated having to convince people that she wasn't joking. Didn't these people know not to look a gift horse in the mouth?
Saahir got up and led her to his tent where they laid down for activities. There were many sounds that came from that tent, and one of them sounded like Saahir was having his very essence drained away and yet was somehow undistinguishable from someone who was having the time of his life. He passed out moments later as Astra had sucked out most of his life force. She emerged from the tent with a happy look on her face before going to her own tent for the rest of the night.
The next day, the convoy was able to travel without any incident except for the death of one of the horses who fell ill. The heat indeed tired the entire crew, men and animals alike, only sparing them briefly when they got to town and got to refill their water supplies. Astra met up with her sister and they were able to head back to the kingdom.
no spells used
