Kathy might have expected a long, protracted bit of tense palaver then, culminating in their group having to either surrender weapons and armor or some other bit of tangible goods taken from them and what remained of the town. Given how Daggeuro seemed to want to avoid drawing attention to themselves before, she had assumed there wouldn't be anyone putting up a fight.
She had neglected the fact that there were adolescents on the scene, all raised and trained by a father who defined the term 'warrior'. She had not thought about all of the hardships and hostilities this family had faced for so long.
So when Daggeuro and Selena both pulled the couch roughly backward to spill the children end over end out of harm's way, hurtle-jumping over it with weapons on the draw, Kathy reacted out of pure instinct, ducking down as she drew out her axe, Byron quick-drawing his katana in a horizontal slash that might otherwise have hit her on its follow-through. His blade's tip kissed Hinswell's blunted reptilian snout, and he cried out, taking a half-step back as Boon and Bane stabbed into the men on Kathy's left, and a pair of fireballs took the two on the right, blasting them back into the wall.
Hinswell was about to swing his scimitar when Kathy rose up from her crouch, axe hissing as it took his weapon-wielding arm off at the elbow. If Regent was supposed to be a title that bore meaning for combat ability, this man wasn't living up to it. The lizardman leader howled, staring at his bloody stump, and was flung aside sharply by an unseen force. Rasmus came around the couch, and Kathy could see the veins in his temple throbbing through the thin fur. Telekenesis, she thought. It must be part of the High Mind.
Hinswell was soon up off the floor where he'd landed, and Kathy saw Rasmus begin to tremble, reaching one hand out, fingers splayed. He raised his arm, and Hinswell floated up off of the floor. Daggeuro looked horrified, sheathing Bane and reaching toward his youngest child. "Rasmus, no!" But his warning went unheeded. In the next moment, the youngest kennin crunched his hand into a fist, and with a shriek of bending metal, Hinswell's armor collapsed inward on him, crushing his body into a bleeding, writhing mass that was then dropped to the floor.
Rasmus staggered backward, twin streaks of blood leaking from his eyes. Selena caught him, lowering him gently to the floor, where he panted and shivered. Kathy crouched down opposite Selena, heart racing. "What's wrong with him? Why is he bleeding?"
"Rasmus is young, new to the High Mind," Selena said, waving her hands, glowing with pale blue light, over her youngest child. "Such powers are costly to one unpracticed in the arts it allows." After a minute, Rasmus's spasms subsided, as did the bleeding, and he began to moan, face crumbling as he cried. His mother scooped him up into an embrace, and Kathy rose, turned around and staggered aside, vomiting just outside the house doorway.
"Shut the door," Daggeuro said sternly, and she did, pulling it closed and hanging onto it tightly until her stomach was no longer tensed. She looked up at Byron, who stood wide-eyed, staring at Hinswell's ruined corpse. He soon sheathed his blade. "All right, let's get these bodies down into the cellar," Daggeuro said, grabbing his two kills by their wrists, dragging them toward the kitchen. Byron grabbed the two burned fellows and followed.
Marianna slowly padded over to Kathy. "You look unwell," the kennin girl said. "You should sit down." She gently guided Kathy by the shoulders over to Daggeuro's armchair, lowering her into it. She hunkered down so the two were gazing into one another's eyes. "Miss Kathy? Can you hear me?"
"Yes," Kathy breathed, still shaken by the sudden violence that had erupted. In less than a minute, five men had died terrible deaths. The nastiest shock had been the death of the Regent, particularly given the relative youth of the one who'd slain him. If all kennin aged like Daggeuro, then Ramsus was still technically a pup.
"Stay seated, I'll bring you water," Marianna said, leaving and coming back moments later with a pitcher of water and a glass, which she poured into, handing it to the Awakened woman. Kathy drank deep, which seemed to help jar her mind out of the muffled chamber it had retreated to. Daggeuro was back, now dragging Hinswell out of the room.
"Everybody, get your gear," Selena said as she helped Ramsus up. "Grab anything precious. We won't be able to come back for a long time." The children split off to their rooms, and Kathy managed to get back up, holstering her axe. Selena's stern stare softened as they looked upon one another. "I wouldn't blame you if you chose to go back to Mortal Plane now," she said.
"We're in this for the long haul," Kathy replied. "Byron? You okay?"
"Yeah," he said, coming back into the living room. "Daggeuro says we'll have to leave quickly now. Selena? He wanted me to tell you to grab the cabinet." Selena nodded, closing her eyes, pressing her palms together. An orange light flared briefly over her chest, and a pale wooden door appeared behind her, fixed to nothing. Byron blinked rapidly at it.
"Pocket realm," Kathy said. "Daggeuro has one too. Is it tied to you, Selena?"
"Aye, it is," she said. She opened the door, revealing a small, quaint study, complete with fireplace, inside. "Byron, help me get that cabinet in there," she said, pointing to a black armoire by the north wall. She and Byron grunted as they lifted it, walking it carefully through the doorway into her pocket realm. Once they had it inside, Selena ushered Byron out and followed him, the door vanishing behind her when she pulled it shut.
Daggeuro and his three children reentered the living room, all carrying their gear duffels. "We're getting out of here now," the kennin warrior said, leading the way to the front door. "Selena, Byron, you two up front. Children, you will follow in sweep formation in the middle. Kathy, you and I shall be rearguard with true sight. Understood?"
"Refresh my memory," she prodded.
"You and I will always have a direct eyesight line available to each other, ten to twenty yards apart at all times, no less, no more. Let's go!" Selena was out the door then, followed by Byron, the children and finally Kathy and Daggeuro. They immediately turned north at an intersection, Selena leading the way to the ruins of the Royal Guard barracks, making for the Ether Doors.
The group moved swiftly, but not enough so to avoid trouble. Using fire and ice, Selena and Byron quickly dispatched a pair of guards they came across, leaving one more for Turot to decapitate with his own long sword in a clean arcing swing as the children followed. Kathy looked back, saw no ground pursuit, but her eyes twitched skyward.
Far away in the sky, she saw a speck of movement. Ignoring every impulse to keep an eye on that speck, she faced forward again, regulating her breathing as she jogged along at the back of the group. Ahead, Selena was leading them through a narrow chute surrounded with rubble and still-smoking debris. As Daggeuro slowed to allow her through first, Kathy gagged and coughed, sputtering as she pelted along to try and keep her mouth clear of ashes and dust. When she came out the other side, she could see the wispy tail end of another fireball hurled by Selena. She stole a look back and up once more.
The speck was bigger now, a dot forming into a recognizable shape.
She looked over to Daggeuro, who was just then looking toward their distant trouble. She heard something greasy come from his mouth in his native tongue. He called ahead, "Up the pace, let's go!" Selena increased her speed a litte, Byron flagging badly, almost running even now with the adolescent kennin. After another minute, Kathy recognized the remains of the wall that had once separated the outer town from the inner court, which housed the High Council, the Council Hall, the Royal Guard barracks, and the Royal Manor.
Yet as she followed the kids through the rubble, picking her way carefully over fallen stone and crags, she could see that very little remained of those once-proud structures. The Royal Manor itself had been flattened out of all visible existence. As she got back on even ground she looked back once more.
The dragon was only three or four miles away now, its wing beats audible, scowling, scaled face clear to her vision. "Daggeuro," she called out, pointing. He grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her after him.
"No time," he shouted, propelling her ahead of him. Kathy could see the last of the children disappearing down a slide chute in the collapsed exterior of the barracks, Byron standing beside the hole that allowed access. He had a card in one hand, and was writing frantically on it with a pen in the other. "What are you doing," Daggeuro snapped as he skidded to a halt, trying to press Kathy into the chute.
"We're out of here in a minute anyway, right," Byron shouted, trying to be heard over the oncoming roar of the great green wyrm.
"Good point! Make it interesting," Daggeuro called out. As the dragon landed fifteen yards away, crushing down upon another ruins, Byron tossed the card up. In a flash of purple light, six vampires, classic cloaks and pale flesh and huge fangs poking out, appeared in the air, hissing at the dragon, which flinched back in amazement. "What did you write," Daggeuro asked.
"'Six vampires attacking dragon'", Byron said with a smile. The vampires darted at the dragon, and Kathy slid down the chute into the darkened Ether Door chamber beneath the barracks, landing with a gasp after dropping off the slide, which ended two feet shy of the floor. Turot hauled her up by one arm and whipped her toward Selena and the other two youths. Byron came next, and finally Daggeuro, who was chuckling darkly.
"Through now, let's go," he called ahead to Selena, who threw open one of the doors nearby. "On to the Boneyard!" Kathy and Byron followed Selena and her brood into the familiar blue brick corridor, bound away from the desolation of Celia.