#w/ormir.2

[witchertorsten]

@ormir location: Nornwatch Keep notes: Mid Event, The Last Night at Nornwatch Keep

Afshin was gone. They'd been together when chaos had erupted and somehow the Kingsguard had lost him. The witcher wouldn't ruminate on this for long, if the prince had sense, he'd know the most well-protected region of the castle was the domain of the High King. Makeshift fortifications had been prepared, but they did not hold up as well when the forces of Nornwatch Keep had been caught so effectively unaware.

Starlit, silver mithril armor glinted with the shifting turn of Torsten's blade. Capturing moonlight and splattering tainted, acrid blood against the battered walls of the Legion's Keep. These legionnaires were nowhere in sight now that their ancient enemy had fallen upon them, but Torsten had not been relying on such a small force where the defence of the Iskarans had been concerned. The people had been training, every man, woman, and child who could hold a sword had been preparing. Working through their hunger, sharpening sticks to layer pitfalls in the event the worst should happen.

Torsten brought a hurlock low, and in an instant a shaft of quicksilver cut the air before a torrent of ichor rained from above; the witcher tilted his shield to catch the spray before it landed on his face. He was no legionnaire but the principle was simple, don't ingest the darkspawn blood whenever possible lest he consign his fate to the taint of these vile beasts.

Torsten wrenched one of their twisted shields from the dead grip of the fallen hurlock and shoved it into the arms of a hapless warrior caught unaware and unarmed. "To your King!" The witcher cried as he pushed forward, feeling the heat of battle up ahead as he immersed himself in the throngs of darkspawn battling his fellow Kingsguard outside Orhan's chambers. Magic sang through the air and coated the tarmac of his tongue with the familiar taste of iron, it rang in his ears as the witcher's senses were placed on high alert. With a turn flames from threads of fire, incensed by air were captured before Torsten's raised sword. Churning in a ball of light that cascaded dark shadows across the horrific faces of the darkspawn.

Charred bodies lay behind Torsten as he stepped through the makeshift fortifications in the hallways; furniture fashioned together with shields and spears to choke the enemy in the narrow corridors. One man could hold fifty here, and fortunately, they had more than just one. The reinforcements that Torsten had wrenched from the thick of the fray on his way from the training grounds, to the King's chamber joined the kingsguard stationed here tonight.

"Lord Hand." Torsten greeted, cordial with the noted bite of urgency that held fast to the witcher's Iskaran intonation. "The eye of the Dark One has fallen on us tonight," Monsters never changed, they had only moments before the next wave breached the halls; Torsten set his intention towards the coming darkspawn and turned his blade idly in his hand, flicking the blood that had gathered across it onto the stone beneath his feet. Shield at the ready. "and the ravens are begging to be fed."