[Locked to Redflight] Sent into battle

[telaari]

Who: Vastania and the Red Dragonsworn
What: After a bit of divine inspiration, Vas is digging in her hooves and organizing people.
Where: The Ruby Sanctum
When: Backdated to the 5th
Warnings: Nothing NSFW, but Vas is likely to literally knock some sense into people if they're stubborn. Nothing that'll hurt too bad, but enough to rattle most people.

"I kneel before You to beg Your aid."

The words of the prayer come more easily to her in Eredun than in Common. "I carry Your standard in a strange land, far away from the reach of the Exiles.

"There are demons at our neck. Guide my blade and let it cleanse them of their corruption. Let my shield be immovable, unable to buckle beneath their terrible blows.

"Grant me the strength to face my maddened forefathers. Let me not fall into their corruption even as I strike them." A pause. "Grant me the strength to tell my allies of the Defiled Ones, and bless them with the sense to see that I am of Your domain. Let them see that I am Exiled for following Your command and that of the Prophet."

Another pause. Her voice drops to a whisper, even though she knows that no-one else here speaks her native language.

"O Light, grant them sense, and me the strength to lead them!"

She waits, still kneeling, for an answer. The Light stirs, but it offers none.

Vastania waits a while still, silent. If Fin could see her now, she'd likely laugh until her tail fell off. No- Fin would knock her onto her tail and tell her to get back up, that's what she'd do. She'd ask what she was doing, dragging her hooves and moping when there was work to be done. And she'd have had these humans trained and drilled ten days ago.

The Light stirs again. Your answer.

The Vindicator looks up sharply. The Light is usually not very straightforward, but even she understands what this means. She utters a word of thanks and draws herself up, sheathing her sword. To be more like Fin... she closes her eyes for a moment and imagines what it must be like, to have those outstretched horns and heavy armor, carrying that claymore as if it was a feather. What it must be like to be so surefooted, so confident, that she might go into battle with a smirk on her face.

What she would do to prepare them if she was here. What she would do if the others refused to listen.

She walks to the edge of the Sanctum's central pond, then turns so she faces away from it. Vas breathes in deeply once, twice, to quell her shaking nerves. A third time, to clear her head.

A fourth, to issue her command.

"Dragonsworn, to me! Today, you will learn to be soldiers in this war against the Legion!"

Comments

[telaari]

Vas has to force herself to not shrug again. "I've never fought one myself, but that is consistent with reports. Most of them will wear armor regardless of how tough their hides are."

In spite of her initial hesitation, though, the troll actually fascinates her. After talking with some of the other Redsworn, she's been expecting the youngest among them to be less tactically-inclined. "You say you hunt big game on your world?"

[bloodpainter]

"That's right! It's how I kept myself fed, and got blood to paint with. I used to have huge murals of my hunts and my friends all up on the walls of my cave back home."

The fact that most people would consider painting with blood, even animal blood, to be odd does not occur to her.

[telaari]

Vas slowly covers her mouth with a hand. She's always considered herself to have a strong stomach, but the thought of painting anything in blood is nauseating. She's spilled plenty in her time, but making whole murals with it is so... so deliberate.

"Ahhhh- why don't we move along, yes?" Light and life, just let her change the subject. The last thing she needs is to be sick in front of the people she's lecturing.

[bloodpainter]

"Oh right, um... so what exactly would you recommend doing if you run into one and you can't just avoid being seen?"

Well Vas has managed to prevent Nep from realizing just how close she came to making her lecturer lose her lunch completely inadvertently. Good job there.

[telaari]

She'd thank the Light that they've found something less disgusting to discuss, if they weren't discussing Pit Lords. Her face visibly pales, and she can't quite suppress the quiver creeping back into her voice.

"Your options then are... limited. You may fight, or you may flee." And one of those options will only delay the inevitable. Disgusting creature or not, the troll has a certain childlike sense about her. Telling her that her only option is to die is, well...

She still covers her mouth, but not because she feels sick.

[bloodpainter]

"And... how much of a chance do you really have if you try to flee?" She had seen the size of the beast's legs. The steps it could take had to be enormous in length. Trying to run from something like that... Somehow she doubted it would work out all that well.

[telaari]

Vas is silent as she searches for something to say, something that will inspire hope. This one is not a soldier in this holy war. Being killed in the line of duty is something that she accepted long ago. Telling Nepeta to die for the glory of the Draenei and the Light won't have the same effect that it would on a fellow Vindicator.

In the end, all she has is silence. The troll will have to take that as she will.

[bloodpainter]

The silence is enough. Nepeta gives a soft "ha" which is really more like a sigh than a laugh, and nods.

"Right. So you might as well go down fighting in that case. Well, there's only one thing to do then."