Standing around the corner of the two intersecting halls, Ulrich tries to compose himself after missing his target and risking drawing attention to himself. Seeing the assassin assessing the door in the hall, he tries to quickly determine a plan of action. His thoughts are interrupted, however, when he hears the voice of someone cry out for help in the closest room - likely another victim of these assassins, he assumes. Though Ulrich has no way of telling if stopping to help someone in this situation will do him more harm than good, he decides to risk it. From where he stands, Ulrich targets the assassin with another ray of magic, trying his best to aim for a more successful attack this time.

Quote from Terrakitten >>

Aquariel, after her first successful swipe, stabs out with her dagger again between the folds of the would-be-assassin's armor. She gets a decent cut on him, enough that when he goes to attack once more he flounders and ends up slipping his grip with the poisoned dagger. It tumbles, the point of the blade cutting into the skin between his thumb and forefinger. He louts out a shout and jerks back, stumbling down onto his ass.

Aquariel 21 to attack. 3 damage.
Assassin 4 and 11 to attack. CON save 18.

 

Given a moment's respite when the assasin falls, Aquariel grabs her second dagger from under her pillow, then closes in, attacking with both hands.

The assassin in Aquariel's room wheezed as both daggers twisted in to the unarmored portions of his flesh. He stumbled back, dropped his shortsword to grip at his arm, and then his eyes bulged wide and he dropped to the ground. His breathing was shallow--still alive, just unconscious. Given the slightly sickly hue to his skin it becomes apparent he was poisoned.

As Ulrich peeked out to fire off his ray of sickness, the assassin wheezes and stumbles to the ground. His skin turns a near sickly green from the blast and it crawls up along the veins--bulging and putting off a faint glow of illness. With a yell the assassin tears down after Ulrich. He throws his dagger, which tumbles off into the darkness beyond Ulrich's head, and raises a trembling arm to fire off a bolt from the handcrossbow. That too goes wide.

Grabbing the sheet from her bed, Aquariel quickly binds the hands and feet of her attacker. Grabbing her daggers, she enters the hallway.  The air immediately around her churns as though in a violent wind, and her hair looks as though it is being tossed about by a storm.  But she doesn't seem to notice.

 Entering the hallway, she sees another figure brandishing a presumably poisoned dagger at someone in the connecting hall.  Given that he is dressed the same as her own attacker, she makes a snap decision and rushes forward, flinging a dagger at the figure as she does so.  It hits true.  

Quote from Terrakitten >>

Quote from KrisseyCakes >>

"Right, then. If you could just point me in the direction of Rhein's place? Or was her name Rhyme? Something about a wench. I think." Angelus looked like he was trying to remember, but he wasn't very good with human names, or places. It all sounded the same to him. He looked expectantly at the tired human, so that he could hurry on his way.

 "Rheim," he drawled. "Out the doors. Out the building. Head south for about an hour. You can't miss it. Loud."

He doesn't offer anything else. He looks about ready to reiterate to get out of the way when there is a burst of magic.

Angelus, startled awake by the sudden entrance disturbing his meditation, acts on primal instinct slinging a chilling touch [spoiler] 2 [/spoiler] toward the would be "attacker", muttering the incantations before scuttling along the bed and pressing himself against the wall. Flattening himself he prepares for an altercation, ready to summon his formidable arcane might, before realizing exactly what had burst into the room. Seeing it is just some tired person who sucks at holding things he relaxes. Rather than apologizing for his cantrip assault, he berates the intruding roommate, "Don't sneak up on me like that! I'm liable to kill you with but a flick of my wrist. I'm a very powerful mage I'll have you know!"

Analyzing the situation further, he realizes the gasp of breath he heard from was from the Half-Elf laying in a bed across from him, bloodied and pale, and looking quite dead. His eyes shift to the one who made the dagger clatter upon the floor and had the awareness of the full situation at hand. He readies himself for another spell, watching to see what the would-be assassin is going to do next.

Desperate as the assassin closes in, Ulrich tightly grips the dagger he took from the intruder in his room and swings it for an attack, his hands trembling in panic and unfamiliarity with having to actually use a weapon for once as he does so.

Downstairs the assassin in Angelus' room curses, dives for his dagger and raises his hand crossbow as he does so. He fires off a shot, one that hits home rather quickly into Angelus' arm, and rolls up with his dagger now in hand. he scoots back until he reaches the edge of the bed with the dead half-elf, half crouched down and looking ready to either bolt, or throw the dagger into Angelus' face.

Upstairs in the hallway Aquariel's dagger lodges in the upper part of the assassin's arm. He lets out a yell, jerking wildly as he aimed to shoot at Ulrich. The bolt embedded into the ceiling above Ulrich's head. Wild eyed the assassin looked around, boxed in and heavily bleeding as he wheezed and wined.

Only just realizing another individual down the hall has joined the struggle, Ulrich feels some glimmer of hope that his choice if action up to this point may not have gotten him killed after all - maybe. In the chaos, he tries to focus enough to cast another spell against the assassin in front of him.

Mean while in Brash’s room, he hangs on for consciousness, scratching at the floor and gurgling out “If I Live, I Will Rip You To Shreeds you dishonorable puck bag”

She continues her rush forward and slashes at the figure with the dagger still in her hand.  Her blade sinks true and deep.

When the would-be assassin slumps to the ground, she quickly retrieves her dagger and looks carefully at the standing figure the assassin was attacking.  Seeing that he appeared unharmed, she says.  "I would suggest tying him up, lest he return to consciousness.  I will check the other rooms."  Entering the room next to her own, Aquariel sees an unconscious human she recognizes him as Brash, whom she met before. Hurrying to him, she does her best to tend his wounds, while calling out to the man in the hall.  "There's an unconscious man here, are you able to help?"

Angelus considers going on the defense for a moment, but changes his mind and summon his full arcane might, blasting forth an Ice Knife. The frozen, crystalline dagger shoots toward the would be assassin at blinding speed. Angelus seems pretty upset he was wounded. "Mongrel, I'll flay you alive for that.." (attack 24)(7 damage if the attack hits.) (Dexterity save for 4 damage if the attack hits, and the dexterity save fails) 

Upstairs there are now three unconscious people. The halls are quiet; aside from the faint breaths of the three assassins who attempted to assail Aquariel, Ulrich, and Brash, there is nothing. Not even the creaking of the house seems to remain.

Downstairs the assassin ducked under Angelus' ice knife with a laugh, but as soon as it hit the wall and shattered the assassin let out a cry of rage. He'd already moved to attack, hand poised to throw his dagger, when one of the shards stabbed straight through his wrist. The dagger fell to the ground, and the assassin gripped his hand, screaming, loud enough to wake the dead--or be heard up the stairs.

Seeing the final assassin fall, Ulrich pauses for a brief moment to collect himself. Hearing the woman's comments about tying up the assailants, and of the man in the other room, he tries to answer - "I can't say I have any means of healing the wounded, but there was another one of these people in my own room as well -" though before he can move to tie up the unconscious men he is interrupted by the sounds of a scream downstairs. Saying no more, he hurriedly moves towards the lower floor, simultaneously trying to remain hidden until he can gain an understanding of what state things are in down there.

Ulrich is capable of nearly getting to the end of the stairs when he hears a loud grunt and what sounds like running of footsteps. The noises are muffled, coming from below. The distance seems so far away.

Aquariel is capable of finding quite a fair bit off of the nearest unconscious body. She portions off a potion of healing, the assassins weapons -- shortsword, poisoned dagger, hand crossbow -- and unearths the man's money pouch full of twenty silver and a hidden pocket that holds three vials of mysterious liquid. Healing potion in hand she returns to Brash.

Downstairs Angelus has the perfect view of the would-be-assassin fumbling to duck under the ray of frost, and then bolting out of the door with a wheezing gasp. He clutched his hand close to his chest, trying to stem the bleeding from his wrist.

Aquariel kneels by Brash's unconscious form, forces his mouth open, and pours the healing potion in. Then she sits back on her heels and waits for Brash to awaken.  When he does, she says, "You were attacked, as were I and at least one other. I heard a scream a moment ago. I must go and see if I can help, but I shall return.". Then she rose and ran out the door, toward the stairs. 

As Brash regains his strength he feels his anger boiling to near rage as he gathers himself. He grabs his axe and begins down the hall with his back hunched and muscles bulging like a minotaur ready to charge.

The lone assassin downstairs has disappeared. The two floors go eerily quiet in the night. Upstairs on the third floor the three lone assassins who have been poisoned remain unconscious, their pallor growing worse by the minute. As the seconds tick past it grows more apparent that there are no more attackers incoming. The silence stretched on. The strangeness of the situation grew stronger. Something was not right, something beyond assassins in the dark.

With all the assailants unconscious or gone, and Brash on her feet, Aquariel returned to her room.  Biting her lip, she ponders letting her assailant dies.  She decides it may be helpful to have him alive for questioning, and tries to stabilize him, then searches his unconscious form.  Having done what she can there, she decides to check the remaining rooms on her floor.

Brash stops in his tracks feeling a strange uneasiness. He goes after Aquariel to see if she feels it too.