"Oh, is that what you need, girl? Let's find you someone awful to eat then." Dismissing her gruesome maw, she climbs atop the horse. She'd done so without a thought to the fire that constitutes Énbarr's mane, and as her hand rests into the flame, she tenses in anticipation.  

Énbarr tenses, as though about to buck and resist, but then the spurs on Shiva's boots glow black along with the tack that the nightmare is dressed in. The light in the Énbarr's eyes dims and the flames on her back burn lower as the steed grows more docile.

Shiva's brow wrinkles as she takes note of how the nightmare seems to be subdued by the tack. Since the fire does not burn her, she pets Énbarr's neck tenderly. "Maybe I can take this off when we get to know each other better." Looking up towards the group, she smiles reassuringly. "We ready to start moving soon? Hopefully we'll find something for Énbarr to eat as we go."

Quote from Sphynxyy >>

Caio considers this for a moment, one black nailed finger tapping against his chin. “That could prove a tad inflammatory, particularly if this plot is not as developed as you fear. A letter would do, but perhaps make it more an insinuation than a damnation. You’re ‘concerned rumors may be true’ and you ‘implore loyal dwarves to stand up and resist the Sarameians’ or something like that.” he offers with a shrug. As much as he loved strategy and intrigue, politics and war were not exactly his forte.

     "Yes, that does sound a bit more tactful. I'm not good at these types of thi--..!"

     Astrid jumps up at the sudden appearance of the fiery steed. "A nightmare!" Her hand beings the motions of conjuring a spell of defense but relaxes upon seeing Shiva's familiarity with the creatures. "O-or the planes of hell," she adds to Caio's point. "Different - uh - flavors depending on where they come from. S-so you know this one?"

"Yes, sorry that I startled you by summoning her. She's one of the Collector's, looked like he had a whole stable of them. Other Shiva suggested that he provide us with a more permanent mount for the journey, and he offered Énbarr." Shiva continues to affectionately pet the beast. "Though it looks like her tack keeps her forcefully subjugated, and I already have a problem with that." 

Énbarr tosses her head and glares back at Shiva, snorting smoke.

Shiva frowns at the nightmare and hops off of her, coming around to look her in the eyes. "How do you wanna do this? I won't ride you if you don't want me to, but I can't just release you if it means you'll start eating travelers in the night."

Énbarr merely rolls her eyes at Shiva's antics and straightens stiffly.

Shiva sighs and rests her hands on her hips. "Alright, I guess we can try this all again another time." With that, she brings the spurs together again, expecting it to dismiss the horse.

Énbarr fixes Shiva with a searching stare as the nightmare's form dissolves into smoke and shadow until she is gone.

"That was interesting." She looks over to the caravan and the holy men, then back to the group. "Would you guys happen to know how to bond a nightmare to you without forcing it? She seemed to understand that she can't resist the influence of the tack, and I'd like to free her without making this area her new hunting grounds."

Caio lets out an exasperated sigh. “It’s a fiend, a particularly predatory one. It’s not a pet. Fiends are bound by force or by their own self interest. If you offer it something it desires then perhaps it will deem your company worthy of keeping, but only so long as you continue to provide your end of the exchange.” He motions for the group to get moving again, impatience clearly building. “And Shiva, dear, if you do free a ravenous fiend upon the land and fail to endear yourself to it then we will have to slay the thing. Please think carefully, with your brain and not just your heart, when dealing with creatures conjured from the lower planes. Not everything can be saved.”

Shiva is silent for several moments, taking in all that Caio had said. "I understand. I'll end her myself if we can't come to some kind of agreement. I'll let you know when I'm about to summon her again, so that you can be waiting in the shadows in case she tries to run." Shiva walks over to the horse that she had been riding throughout the journey, and looks back at Alaris before climbing onto its tack. 

"I know what you're thinking. And there is a cruel irony to it."  "Yeah. I know I'm more complicated than a nightmare, but the sentiment remains. And I just can't take part in the ownership of things intelligent enough to know they're slaves."  "I know, darling. You're doing what you feel to be right, and I respect and support your decision."  Shiva feels a brief warmth wrap around her and she smiles to herself.

Alaris lays a strong, encouraging hand on Shiva's shoulder and neck. "Your strength will win it over, I think. Even fiends respect strength of mind, heart, and body." Then they swing themselves onto Zadkiel and nod to Caio.

With a nod to Alaris, Shiva moves onward with her party through the forest. The stares and whispers of the pilgrims and holy men do not escape her, as Énbarr's appearance looks to have inspired a deeper mistrust. "Whatever. Once we drop them off I'll never have to deal with them. They can go **** themselves."

The following afternoon, as the caravan halts for a short rest, Shiva decides that now is as good a time as any. She alerts Caio of her intentions before finding a small clearing not far from the group. Walking out to its center, she takes a deep breath and clinks the spurs together.

Once more, a cloud of smoke billows out from the clinking spurs, summoning Énbarr's flaming form. The towering steed looks down her nose at Shiva and whinnies a challenge.

Shiva steadies herself before the nightmare, holding its gaze with singular determination. She feels a stirring within her, a call to defend herself and make her strength known to the creature before her. She welcomes it, and pressure spreads throughout her limbs as her body shimmers and expands upwards and outwards. In a matter of seconds, she is now the one looking down at Énbarr, her muscular arms ending in the sharp points of her claws. Being that Énbarr is from the lower planes, she thinks to speak to her in the language that was taught to her many years ago. It takes a moment for the pronunciations and rhythm of the speech to return, but the fast-paced language quickly flows freely from her.

 Confident that she had gotten her point across, a shadow of a smile curls the corner of her mouth. Then a thrum fluttered from within her, more primal than the first, calling out for a deeper power. Thoughtlessly, she welcomed it. 

Her body seized, shimmering once more as bulbous formations took shape across her upper body. Backing away from Énbarr, she shook and howled in pain as her skin stretched and tore. Blood seeped from the openings as her legs began to buckle, the bones within shifting and breaking. The pain was more than she thought a person would be capable of feeling, as if she were being flayed, crushed, and immolated all at once. Then her view was shunted into a familiar darkness, with a light overhead that displayed the outside world. Beside her stood Shivala Ki-Tanra, who reached out and took her hand. "...I think you ****ed up." 

The legs of the demon come together as the flesh fuses, while the bulbous deformations across the head and shoulders erupt into a huge, writhing mass of snakes. The rest of the humanoid form sloughs away, leaving only a large serpent demon with wiry arms and shimmering blue scales across its body. The heads of the demon flick their tongues through the air, then turn to where Caio had hidden himself and hiss in unison. It drops low, then launches itself towards the shadar-kai.

Given Shiva’s past outbursts it shouldn’t be a surprise when it turns out that she is the fiend he needs to watch out for. For a moment his bow lowers as he watches the transformation, wonder quickly shifting to concern. He expects her to make a snack of the poor nightmare before her, but suddenly the serpentine demon turns towards him. He scoffs in annoyance then raises his bow once more as she charges. The arrow he lets loose punches right through one of the fiend’s unnatural joints, rendering the limb a piece of flailing flesh. Caio slips to Shiva’s side as her momentum carries her forward and her crippled claws scrape against the steel of his sword as he draws it in the same swift motion. “SHIVA! End this now or I shall exorcise these serpents with my blade. You may be foolish but you are stronger than this.”

At the same moment back in camp where Ghoul has remained perched near Alaris, the cormorant suddenly explodes into raucous squawking. The bird begins pecking and prodding at the paladin and Astrid in turn, attempting to drag them to where Shiva and Caio had slipped off earlier.

The demon hisses furiously as its right arm is nearly torn off its body. It whips itself around to face the hunter as he sidesteps, the many mouths of its head baring their fangs. 

"SHIVA!                                                      Exorcise these....                                    may be foolish but...."

From within, Shiva watches her viewpoint of the outside world barrel towards Caio in the bushes. She breathes a sigh of relief to see the hunter fire an arrow that slows the demon before avoiding its attack. "Shivala. This isn't your first rodeo, you understand more about yourself and where this strength comes from than the last time this happened." "Don't know what a rodeo is, but yes, I do." "Feel for the power like you do when you call upon your claws and increase your strength. This is all still you. You have control." 

With a deep breath, Shiva reaches down into the atramentous depths beneath her feet to drag forth a tangle of long chains. With a mighty heave, the chains go taut as she exterts her will over her physical form. But her demonic instincts struggle against her influence, beginning to pull her down into the darkness. Cautiously, she steps up and wraps her end of the chain around her forearm and pulls with all she has. For a moment there is a stalemate, then success as the opposing force gives and blinding light is dredged up.

Just like that, she's back in the clearing looking down at Caio as he brandishes his blade. There's an intial disorientation as she perceives through all of the eyes of the snakes separately, but the perspectives quickly unite and she is able to see clearly. The very next thing she feels is an explosion of pain from where her right arm had been severed. She slithers away-simultaneously registering that she was indeed slithering- and holds the wound. Green fluid is ejected from the barely-connected limb that sizzles and smokes as it lands on the grass. "I know that I wasn't in control, but what the ****, Caio?! I could lose my arm!!" 

"Hissssss Ha Hisss. Hiss Hiss Hissss Haa Hisss." Shiva raises her good arm to flick off the elf. 

Quote from ZeeOfIstus >>

With a nod to Alaris, Shiva moves onward with her party through the forest. The stares and whispers of the pilgrims and holy men do not escape her, as Énbarr's appearance looks to have inspired a deeper mistrust. "Whatever. Once we drop them off I'll never have to deal with them. They can go **** themselves."

Over the course of that day, Alaris rides forward several times to check with Caio, then drops back to engage with the rest of the travelers. They wave to Shiva as she takes her position ahead of the carriage, before leaning over from the saddle to rap gently on the carriage wall. "Everyone doing well in there?"

The atmosphere inside the carriage is frigid and stiff. The priors remain silent as they huddle around the Lady's relic, allowing Brother Ludomir to speak for them.

"She endangers us all," he tells Alaris darkly, throwing a glare in Shiva's direction. "It is your duty to guide her to the Lady's light and yet you tolerate such blasphemy?"

The tension crackles between the bogatyr and the prior as Alaris rocks back in their saddle from the rebuke. Zadkiel tosses her head and Alaris clucks softly to bring her back into calm.

"She is a greater danger to the enemies of the Lady than she is to you. The Church pays her to be dangerous, not to be holy," Alaris replies. "How many people like her have you ever even spoken to, Brother, much less sought to love and woo towards the Lady? The path is long, and she has come farther than you know."

"Is consorting with a beast of shadow and hellfire helping her along that path?" Brother Ludomir challenges. "Your heart is true, Bogatyr, but your affection for these lost souls blinds you. That one strays from the light."

"Is being held prisoner and forced to serve the Church on pain of death helping her along that path? She isn't the only stray the Lady is calling to repent." Alaris sighs. "I will handle it with her, according to the Oath I swore."

"I am not the tiefling's jailer," Ludomir tells Alaris pointedly, "but if any here feel bound by their conscience to speak of what they have seen on this journey, then you may find that the Commander in Paragon does not take kindly to it."

"You must do what you feel is right, of course." Light flickers off of the aasimar's armor as they gather Zadkiel's reins again. Alaris nods curtly and nudges the horse away from the carriage. Over their shoulder, they call out, "Do not forget to ponder, though, why the Lady provided you these lost souls to escort her relic to its resting place." With that, Alaris rides back to check the group's backtrail and vents some of their anger and frustration. Zadkiel's ears flick back and forth periodically, as if to say, "That's above my pay grade..."

After half an hour, Alaris circles back to the group and approaches the family of camp followers. "Good morn, friends. I trust you are as well as can be expected given our travels?"

The four travellers are cold and tired, but the family father, Ivan, nods stoically in response to Alaris as they push on on foot. Alaris dismounts and offers Zadkiel's broad back to the mother and smaller child. "Are you getting enough food? I appreciate your willingness to stay with us. What are your plans, if I may ask?"

"We have family in Paragon," Ivan's wife, Melina, explains, gratefully accepting the offer of a ride for her and her daughter, "but it is not a journey made lightly. The children are hungrier than we are, if you have rations to spare."

"I will see what we can find. How are you, Piotr? Looking forward to seeing Paragon?"

Piotr has been in something of a daydream since Alaris came by, staring vacantly at the light glistening off of the paladin's armour and hair. "Oh, um, yes, I suppose," he responds with a nervous smile when he realizes that they are talking to him.

Alaris nods, then turns back to Ivan. "What sort of work do you do, Ivan?"

"I am a cobbler," Ivan replies simply, "I have heard that there is good coin to be made shoeing the little folk."

Alaris smiles and nods, then says, "And is this the life for Piotr Ivanovich too, do you think?"

Ivan scoffs wearily. "I would love for Piotr to learn a respectable trade, but his head is too high amongst the clouds for putting shoes on peoples' feet."

"No, no, no..." Alaris grouses, turning towards Piotr. "How can you learn to serve the Lady, Piotr, if you cannot even set your mind to learn to help your own father?"

"I help father!" Piotr protests with indignance. "I just... I want more than baking bread and tilling soil and making shoes, but father says that that is only for those of noble blood. Are you of noble blood?" The boy staring up at Alaris is almost a man and the aasimar's shining eyes and glistening hair make them seem like their blood must be very noble indeed.

"I am no noble. I know not more than that. My parents died when I was very young. I lived by my wits on the streets of Tanemburg until the Lady embraced me." Alaris lays their steady and serious gaze on father and son in turn. "Accident of birth has power, to be sure, but those with determination and strength of will can make for themselves a different way." Piotr listens to Alaris's tale with rapt attention, while his father wearily, but politely, waits for the paladin to finish. 

"Piotr Ivanovich, I want you to dedicate yourself to learning your father's skills. Show humility and determination and respect. Spend the next year doing this - prove your mettle - and perhaps the Lady will find a place for you among the Volkfelder." Alaris nods, then continues, "I will be right back." The paladin returns shortly with additional rations for the family, and stays with them until the group makes camp before leading Zadkiel away.

For the next day or two, Alaris wanders camp during mealtimes, brooding a bit and watching the sky and the trees.