Markana Family Reunion

"We have to get her!" Sydna adamantly says.

"No one is saying we don't, love. We just have to be smart about this. As much as I hate to say this, they have the advantage right now, not only with Kova, but with knowing who is here, and knowing we're already exhausted." Gilla replies, clearly trying to think of a plan of sorts.

Amilia pops a cracker into her mouth as she asks, "Why don't we just fucking run in and kill everyone? Shit-lickers deserve it anyway."

"Amilia, if everything were as simply as you wished it to be, then we would literally be back home after blowing a hole through our giant problem." Virra quips, earning a loving middle finger from her frenemy.

"What about sending half of us into the room whilst the others sneak around?" Lani suggests.

Kyuala is quick to give an answer to Lani's question. "They would most likely question where most of us are, and making them do so could result in either more hostages, or potential deaths."

"Well, no matter what, Kova is our main priority. We need to protect her. Maybe we can put a shield around her, and that's the signal for us to strike?" Sydna says.

"I definitely can put a ward around Kova without the guards noticing, but I would have to be mindful of it during the subsequent fight. If we can get a few people over to her to protect her, then I can drop the ward, and go balls to the wall, to steal a phrase from Amilia." Terra then looks over to John. "John, do you have any ideas?"

John's eyes are looking forward, staring at nothing as his mind is making him replay the kills from earlier. He remembers the flesh being pierced, the life draining from their eyes, and the stench of their blood as it painted his sword. It may have only been ten minutes since the fight, but the repeated flashes of the kills make him feel like he's aged about ten years.

Eventually, Terra places her hand on John's shoulder. "John, did you hear me?"

John snaps out of his memories, looking at Terra before saying, "Sorry, what'd you say?"

"I was asking if you had any sort of idea on how we could get Kova back?"

John thinks for a second before saying, "Well, they'll probably have someone ready to kill her if we did anything they deemed unruly, so we have to be careful with that alone. I'm assuming that they're not gonna let us get near her, so our only option to protect her from an attack is magic. Terra can obviously use hers, but I think Lani would be better."

Lani is surprised. "M-me?!"

"Yeah. Out of all of us, they're least likely to notice you if you're not there. If you can sneak around, hopefully you can get to Kova and take out the guard, if there's one there. You can let us know when you're about to take him out, and then we can get ready. Once you've taken the guy down, or got to Kova, you can put a ward around her. Terra can rush over to you, and help out if any guys run over. That gives us time to deal with the others and once they're all cleared out, then we can deal with Oliver and his merry ass-licker."

An impressed expression appears upon Gilla's face. "I have to admit John, I never expected a detailed plan like that from you. I am quite impressed."

"Thanks. Weirdly, this isn't my first time having to rescue a hostage, so I'm still learning." John remarks, remembering the situation prior to the group killing Nartho Knagstun. "But before we go any further, Lani, are you okay with doing this?"

Lani is obviously nervous about having to do something like this alone again, but she soon finds her confidence before saying, "Let's do it."

---

IN THE MAIN HALL:

"It wasn't supposed to go this far!" Oliver reprimands Haket, trying to establish some semblance of dominance.

"This is what you wanted, sire. You wanted to be the head of your family. You wanted so badly to be on that throne over there, and now you have that. As a leader, you will have to learn that to get the best results, you have to do whatever it takes."

"I didn't want the deaths of my family's guard! I've known these people and now they're dead! I simply wanted a takeover, not a massacre!"

Just then, Haket gets right up in Oliver's face. "Listen to me, boy. I have given you everything you wanted! Everything you dreamed about! Do you wish to continue to spit on my generosity for setting this all up?! Or do you wish to take the damned throne?!"

Oliver is startled as Haket's eyes begin burrowing into his. Haket might be smaller in stature, but it's obvious to anyone who looks that Oliver fears Haket at that moment. However, Oliver actually finds a semblance of spine within him as he firmly replies, "I think you forget just who you're speaking to. This is my family home, these are my men, and I think you'd do well to remember that, old man."

Haket is surprised that Oliver finally stood up to him for once, but Haket's plan is already too far ahead to stop now, so he simply bows his head in false submission. "My dearest apologies, sire. The heat and stress of the moment got to me. I only wanted you to realize how close you were to reaching your ambition and birthright, but I never should have lashed out at you like that. Please forgive this old fool."

Oliver chuffs before patting his adviser on the back. "Of course I forgive you. You helped me get to this point, but we must make amends for what has happened here. I shall explain to my sister, and beg for her forgiveness. My sister will know that I speak the truth."

"As you wish, sire." Haket says as he bows once more, this time with a sinister grin on his face.

Oliver then smiles, believing he has regained control of the situation as he straightens his jacket, readying for his sisters arrival.

He wouldn't have to wait long as the door is practically flung open, and a furious looking Gilla along with Sydna, her guards and the group all walk in.

"Oliver! What in the hells are you doing?! I thought this was supposed to be a damned parley?!"

Oliver takes a breath. "Gilla, I assure you, this is all just a massive misunderstanding."

"A misunderstanding?! You come into my home, kill my men and take Sydna's sister hostage, but it's all a misunderstanding?! What is there to misunderstand about those actions?!"

Oliver is confused. "Hold on, I didn't take Sydna's sister hostage, nor did I wish for anyone to be killed. I didn't give my men any of those orders."

"No. That would be me." Haket says as one of Oliver's men presses his sword against Oliver's throat.

"W-w-what are you doing?!" Oliver asks as he feels the steel just dig into his skin.

"Something that I waited to do since the moment I met you, you damned idiot." Haket replies before gesturing to the guard with his head. The guard then moves Oliver to the corner of the room as instructed before Haket turns back to the group. "Now, to deal with you vermin."

"Where's my sister?!" Sydna demands to know.

Haket chuckles. "Oh, don't worry, dear Sydna. I just so happen to be such a sucker for happy family reunions after all. Bring her in!"

The door behind Haket then opens up, and in walks a guard with a tied up Kova. Sydna, Terra and Virra immediately want to rush over to their sister, but they stand their ground as Lani, who is hiding behind John, moves down his leg before quickly flying to the closest chair. Lani thinks to herself how funny it is that she is doing pretty much the exact same thing to help save Kova that she did to save Kyuala and Amilia when they were taken hostage.

As Lani continues her careful advance, Gilla begins speaking once again. "Let her go. She has nothing to do with this. She is a mere bystander, nothing more."

Haket quickly responds. "And I believe that, truly I do. However, she is quite the bargaining chip. If I didn't have a sword to her throat, you would have just come in, spells blazing, ready to smear us against your ancient walls. It's actually quite amusing that I say that, because it reminds of a battle that happened decades ago."

"Who cares about a fuckin' fight that happened to a buncha old dicks? Do we look like we care?" Amilia quips.

"I CARE!" Haket snaps, his voice echoing out in the hall. "You have no idea how long I've longed for the opportunity to be in this position to have the Markana's at my mercy." Haket then looks at Gilla. "To be able to look one of your family dead in the eyes and see a fraction of the fear that the people of the North felt the night your grandfather gave the order to slay our people!"

Most of the group are all confused as they look amongst each other.

"What in the hells are you even talking about, you mad man?!" Sydna asks.

"I know what he's talking about." Gilla says. "He's talking about the night my grandfather put an end to the North's insurrection."

"Insurrection?! We were rebelling against your grandfathers tyranny!" Haket spits in response.

Gilla immediately snaps back. "You were murdering innocents! Those criminals stole from their own, and other prefectures! They burned down the homes of those who didn't want to be a part of their misguided war! The North Rebellion weren't heroes in some fairy-tale! You just wanted the power for yourselves, and damn whoever you cut down in your way!"

In the corner, Oliver hears his sisters words and begins to think about all those stories Haket told him during their time together. Oliver can recall the anger on Haket's face whenever he talked about the night that Oliver and Gilla's grandfather sent dozens of men to the North to slaughter innocent citizens, or at least, innocent in Haket's eyes. Now, after Haket betrayed him, Oliver isn't sure of what to believe anymore.

"My people only did what they had to because of your great grandfather's taxation! How are people supposed to feed their families when half of their yield is going to the rich?!"

Gilla laughs. "Funny, is that what your father told you? Because if I remember correctly, he was a part of the rich at one point. Whatever happened to him, I wonder?"

"DON'T YOU DARE SPEAK ABOUT MY FATHER!" Haket shouts, venom spewing from his mouth in the form of saliva.

Back with Lani, she has managed to get behind the guard that currently has Kova hostage, but is unsure of how to deal with him without harming Kova. She looks around, trying to find anything to help her, but as she's looking, she catches the gaze of Oliver. The Markana sibling looks Lani dead in the eyes, and realizes what she's trying to do. If this was Oliver just five minutes ago, he would've immediately shouted for Haket, but after what has happened, Oliver keeps his mouth shut before turning away.

Lani breathes a sigh of relief, knowing Oliver won't alert anyone to her presence, but that still doesn't help with her predicament.

"Don't speak about your father? Which one would that be? Because I definitely haven't heard of a noble that would sire such a revolting bastard such as yourself. He really must have been such an insignificant man, that the noble title wasn't even enough to make him worth anything."

Haket is practically foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog as he draws his sword. "YOU WATCH YOUR TONGUE WENCH, BEFORE I CUT IT OUT!"

The shouting gives Lani a brief moment, and she gets an idea. She then quietly casts a spell, aiming it on the right side of the guard's neck. The guard then immediately feels a pinch on his neck, akin to a bug bite, so he brings his sword arm up to swat away the perceived bug.

As the sword is moved away from Kova's neck, Lani decides to take the opportunity and prepares herself for something she would normally never do. Lani then casts a second spell, and a small pink spike appears in front of her. Lani then thrusts her hand forward, and the spike shoots ahead.

The spike then finds its target a moment later, and the guard immediately squeals as his eyes cross because the pink spike has found its way firmly into the guards brown starfish.

Everyone turns around, trying to see what the hell has happened. They see the guard is obviously in pain, but can't actually see why.

Lani then heads over to Kova, and says, "You might want stay still!"

Kova doesn't get a moment to respond as a ward encompasses her entire body with Lani standing on her shoulder.

Haket growls. "AHH! YOU DAMNED VERMIN!" Haket then turns to his men. "DEAL WITH THEM! I WANT GILLA'S HEAD ON A PLATTER! AND LEAVE OLIVER TO ME!" Haket then takes a few steps back as some guards form a semi-circle around him.

The group then take up arms along with Gilla and her guards, but some of the guards stay back to protect Sydna as the fight begins.

In the other corner, the guard still has his sword at Oliver's throat as he's trying to move the Markana brother over to Haket. Oliver tries to dig his feet into the marble floor, but the steel slightly digging into his jugular keeps him shuffling forward.

In the skirmish, Kyuala digs her axe into the shoulder into one of Haket's men, and the meaty slice is sickening to hear, but the clanging of steel almost muffled it out to the others.

A sword then comes down, ready to slash at John, but he stops the arm of the guard in motion before plunging his sword through the man's gut. He doesn't have any time to dwell on the kill though as he quickly swats away another attack, helping one of Gilla's men to defeat his attacker.

In the semi-circle, Haket is looking around, grimacing as his side is beginning to lose. He then looks to the right and sees Kova in the full body ward, and gets an idea. Haket then grabs two of his men and says, "Kill the girl!"

The guards immediately nods before heading over to the terrified Kova, and worried Lani. They then begin to attack the ward.

"What are we going to do?!" Kova asks in a panic.

Lani quickly presses on her ear piece. "Terra! We need help!"

Terra immediately looks over to Kova and Lani to see the duo getting attacked by the two guards, so she immediately takes off towards them.

Just two seconds later, the guard on Lani's right is hit with Terra's staff, knocking him into the other guard. The two men quickly collect themselves and turn to face Terra.

"Hello, gentlemen. How do you wish to be dealt with? I can use my magic or I can use my staff? Either way, there's going to be broken bones."

The two men share a glance before turning back and rushing forward.

Terra chuckles. "Staff it is."

Immediately, Terra gets to work dealing with the men. She sends her staff into one of the guard's abdomen before whipping the other end across the cheek of his friend. The second guard quickly comes back, trying to get **** for the proverbial bitch slap with the staff, but Terra leans back, avoiding the swipe with the sword before sending the tip of her staff into his nether regions.

As the second guard feels his testicles bounce against his insides, the first guard sends a boot into Terra's stomach, sending her back a few feet. Terra loses her balance, and as she's falling back, she turns it into a backwards roll before stopping herself. Terra then looks up and sees the first guard coming towards her for round two.

The metal staff clangs against the steel armour as Terra batters her weapon against the guard who does his best to block her rapid attacks. However, the man keeping his guard up is all a part of Terra's plan of attack as she then moves to his legs. The inside of his legs becomes her target as she thrusts down with great ****, practically separating the muscle from the bone with every strike.

The soldier quickly falls and Terra takes the opportunity to disarm him. His sword clatters across the floor as Terra deals the final blow, cracking her staff across his face, causing blood and fragments of teeth to fly from his mouth.

Terra then looks back up and sees that the second soldier is back to attacking Lani's ward over Kova. Lani is keeping the ward up, but the soldier's attacks are chipping away at the ward.

Terra immediately rushes up, and begins to swiftly deal with the second guard. She immediately leaps up and drives her foot into the back of his kneecap, forcing him to collapse to a knee the ground. Terra then uses her staff to quickly finish the man off as he can't put up even the tiniest of fights against Terra whilst on the ground.

As Terra strikes the final blow on the second guard, she looks up at Lani and Kova. "Maybe I should fight one handed next time." Terra jokes before saying, "Are you two alright?"

"Yeah, we're fi- LOOK OUT!"

Terra doesn't get much time to react to Lani's warning as she's hit with a magic shield that sends her flying across the room.

"TERRA!" Kova calls out, scared for her sister's safety. Her attention would soon shift however, as she looks up and sees the soldier that struck Terra. The man has a dark blue shield, completely formed by magic that also crackles with that same magical energy. A steel sword is gripped in his right hand, but his gaze is solely on Kova and Lani.

He swings his sword and it batters against the ward. Lani is confident that her ward can survive a good few minutes against basic swings as this man isn't anywhere near as strong as the large soldier from earlier.

However...

Lani's confidence is quickly destroyed as the soldier transfers the magic from the shield into his sword. The sword now glows the same dark blue with the magical energy pulsating up and down the entire blade.

The soldier then brings down his sword on Lani's ward once again, and Lani is shocked by the change in power in the attack. The bigger problem about this sudden increase in strength, is that a crack has appeared in the ward.

Lani looks at the crack in the ward, and is now just as terrified as Kova, but tries her best to ignore it. The crack itself looks like a crack in the middle of a thick chunk of ice, but not only did the attack cause the ward to crack, Lani also felt her hands vibrate due to the **** of said attack.

Lani doesn't get much chance to recover after the first attack as the man follows it up with a repeat strike, causing the crack to grow. The original crack, which was around four inches, has now become ten inches. Lani's hands also felt another large vibration, but it's much worse this time around, to the point where Lani's hands start to hurt.

The vibrations also cause fear to engulf Lani's entire body as she realizes that the ward that could've survived a few minutes, is mere moments away from shattering. Lani then starts to think of a backup plan as she knows that without help, she and Kova won't last long. Lani looks over to the fight, hoping for a saviour, but sees that the guards have created a line, separating her friends as well as Gilla and her guards from getting to herself and Kova. Lani also looks over at Terra, and sees that she's knocked out, or incredibly hurt at the very least.

So, with not a lot of options left, Lani makes a plan. She actually lessens her focus on the ward, and prepares a second spell for when the ward eventually breaks.

The third and fourth strikes don't crack the ward, but Lani knows that the fifth is going to be the one. She then charges up her spell in her right hand, feigning as if her hand had been injured because of the vibrations.

The magic infused sword makes contact with the ward, and the ward shatters like a pane of glass being dropped onto concrete.

Immediately, Lani unleashes a pink bolt that hits the soldier just above his left eye, scorching the top of his forehead and some of his hair. The soldier drops his sword before falling to the ground, screaming in agony as he clutches at his singed skin and hair.

Lani then turns to Kova. "Are you okay?"

"I think so." Kova replies, still filled to the brim with fear.

"Okay. We need to get out of here. Let's go." Lani says, getting read to head for the door.

As Kova starts to get up, the hairs on the back of Lani's neck stand up. She then quickly turns around and sees the guard is on his knees and has started to swing his sword.

"Look out!" Lani says as she dodges to the side, narrowly dodging the wildly swinging blade. Unfortunately for Lani, the guard's arm just clips her, sending her down to the ground.

"Lani!" Kova calls out, worrying about her saviour.

However, Kova wouldn't get much respite either as the guard growls at her. "You... bitch!" Kova's eyes then open as wide as a frisbee as she sees his sword back in his hand, and he points it towards Kova. "Time for you to die!"

Befire the guard can get a little closer to Kova, she takes off towards the door and opens it up before running out. The guard soon follows behind with murderous intent on his face and anger spewing from his mouth like a rabid dog.

Meanwhile, Gilla finishes of the soldier attacking her before looking up and seeing Kova dashing out of the door. She then looks around, seeing the others have this fight in hand, so Gilla takes off in tow.

---

IN THE HALLWAY:

Kova is running through the halls, looking back every few seconds to see the guard still hot on her heels. Kova's feet are on fire, thanking her lucky stars that she threw her heels at the guards when they first showed up go take her. The only downside of no shoes, is that her feet are on fire due to the combination of frantic running, and the cold stone floor. Eventually, the pain starts to become too much for her feet, so she decides to try and hide from her chaser.

Kova turns a corner, escaping from the guards vision for a few brief moments, so she decides to dart into a room. She quickly but quietly closes the door behind her, trying to trick the guard into passing by the room.

Kova puts her ear to the door, listening for the heavy footsteps that followed her. The guards thudding steps soon turn the corner, but comes to a stop before advancing any further. He slowly begins to walk forward, muttering to himself about that "fuckin' fairy" and that he's going to "gut that rich bitch, and use the fairy's bones as toothpicks."

Kova continues to listen closely, making sure to try and keep her breaths quiet as best she can, hoping the bastard keeps walking.

The guard eventually begins to stroll up the hallway, muttering once again. "She couldn't have got to the end before I turned the corner, so she's gotta be in one of these rooms."

The guard then walks to the first room on his right, and kicks the door open. Kova listens intently, hearing the soldier rummage around the room for a few moments before walking back out.

This pattern continues for the next few rooms, but eventually the soldier stops outside of the room Kova is hiding in. Kova is too frightened to move, so she moves her head away from the door and puts her hand over her mouth to try and hide any potential sounds of breathing.

A few intense moments pass by as Kova doesn't hear the man do anything, she's also too scared to even put her ear back to the door in case he hears even the slightest of noises. Kova continues to listen, but still hears nothing which worries her even more.

Eventually, Kova hears some footsteps moving away from the door, and she lets out a small sigh of relief. She waits for a few more moments before taking a slight step forward and goes to her ear to the door.

Suddenly, Kova yells in pain as she's thrown back because the door is kicked open. Kova tumbles back a good few feet, holding her head as a blood begins to appear.

"Found you." The soldier says in a creepy sing-songy tone as he steps into the room.

Kova quickly realizes what has happened, and goes into survival overdrive. She grabs everything she can and begins to throw all of it at the soldier as she tries to move back in the decently sized room, but there is only one escape route.

The soldier gets frustrated with books and other random items being thrown at him, so he eventually grabs her wrist and throws her to the ground. "You know, I was just following orders at first, but I'm really going to enjoy seeing the life drain from your eyes."

"P-p-please, don't do this!" Kova begs.

"Too late for that now, sunshine. Now? I'm going to paint this pretty white room a shade of red." The soldier then raises his sword up, ready to strike as a whimpering Kova closes her eyes, getting ready for the end.

A single moment later, the sound of pierced flesh is heard.