Torgar with the wild leaps and surges of the unbridled fury that was Thibble dorf Pwent. Pwent had never viewed battle in terms of defensive formations. To his credit, though, the wild-eyed battlerager did not completely compromise the integrity of their defensive stand, and the bodies of dead orcs began to pile up around them.
But more took the places of the fallen - many more, an endless stream. As weapon arms drooped from simple weariness, the three frontline dwarves took more and more hits, and Cordio's spells of healing came nearly constant from his lips, depleting his magical energies.
They couldn't keep it up for much longer, all three knew, and even Pwent suspected that it would be their last, glorious stand.
The orc immediately before Torgar rushed forward suddenly. The Mirabarran dwarf turned the long handle of his axe at the last moment to deflect the creature aside, and only when it started to fall away did Torgar recognize that it was already mortally wounded, blood pouring from a deep wound in its back.
As the dwarf turned to face any other nearby orcs, he saw the way before him cleared of enemies, saw Hralien and Tos'un fighting side by side. They backed as Torgar shifted to his right, moving beside Shingles, and the defensive triangle became two, two and one, and with an apparent escape route open to the east. Hralien and Tos'un started that flight, Cordio bringing the others in behind.
But they became bogged down before they had ever really started, as more and more orcs joined the fray - orcs thirsty for vengeance for their fallen chieftain, and orcs simply thirsty for the taste of dwarf and elf blood.
The panther's claws raked the fallen orc's body, but Jack's wards held strong and Guenhwyvar did little real damage. Even as Guenhwyvar thrashed, Hakuun began to mouth the words of a spell as Jack took control.
Guenhwyvar understood well the power of wizards and priests, though, and the panther clamped her jaws over the orc's face, pressing and twisting. Still the wizard's defensive wards held, diminishing the effect. But Hakuun began to feel the pain, and knowing that the magical shields were being torn asunder, the orc panicked.
That mattered little to Jack, safe within Hakuun's head. Wise old Jack was worldly enough to recognize Guenhwyvar for what she was. In the shelter of Hakuun's thick skull, Jack calmly went about his task. He reached into the Weave of magical energy, found the nearby loose ends of enchanting emanations, and tied them together, filling the area with countering magical force.
Hakuun screamed as panther claws tore through his leather tunic and raked lines of blood along his shoulder. The cat retracted her huge maw, opened wide and snapped back at his face, and Hakuun screamed louder, certain that the wards were gone and that the panther would crush his skull to dust.
But that head dissipated as the panther bit down, and gray mist replaced the dispelled Guenhwyvar.
Hakuun lay there, trembling. He felt some of the magical wards being renewed about his disheveled frame.
Get up, you idiot! Jack screamed in his thoughts.
The orc shaman rolled to his side and up to one knee. He struggled to stand then stumbled away and back to the ground as a shower of sparks exploded beside him, a heavy punch knocking him backward.
He collected his wits and looked back in surprise to see the drow lifting a bow his way.
A second lightning-arrow streaked in, exploding, throwing him backward. But inside of Hakuun, Jack was already casting, and while the shaman struggled, one of his hands reached out, answering the drow's third shot with a bolt of white-hot lightning.
When his blindness cleared, Hakuun saw that his enemy was gone. Destroyed to a smoking husk, he hoped, but only briefly, as another arrow came in at him from a different angle.
Again Jack answered with a blast of his own, followed by a series of stinging magical missiles that weaved through the trees to strike at the drow.
Dual voices invaded Hakuun's head, as Jack prepared another evocation and Hakuun cast a spell of healing upon himself. He had just finished mending the panther's fleshy tear when the stubborn drow hit him with another arrow.
He felt the magical wards flicker dangerously.
"Kill him!" Hakuun begged Jack, for he understood that one of those deadly arrows, maybe the very next one, was going to get through.
They had fought minor skirmishes, as anticipated, but nothing more, as word arrived along the line that Grguch and Obould