This temporary form which had been foisted onto me finally come in handy and I now had first hand experience what it's like to have the eyes of a cat's. More accurately a lion's eyes... lioness... But that was neither here nor there. The little shedevil leading the way never had problems giving me smug look on her face. She had an eerie ability to know exactly what I'm thinking by looking at my face, but I wasn't about to confirm it for her by spilling my guts about it out-loud.

 

Ba'el and I took cover behind where we could. Armed patrols rushed by in pairs every so often even this far down below the surface. I assumed any noncombatants had long since taken refuge elsewhere, because we had yet to meet anyone else heading in the opposite direction. Chris was still doing her part admirably and bought us these precious moments of chaos to do our part. More and more reinforcements were drawn up toward the surface and left fewer defenders in these depths. Somewhere down in these halls and rickety wooden scaffolding were Rose, Susan and Minte being held hostage. They had done so much for me and now it's my turn to return the favor. If that meant giving these hapless strangers the scare of their lives, then so be it.

 

     “I hope you are beginning to realize what a stupid idea this was!” Ba'el protested as she threw herself forward into exhaustion. “We don't know the layout. How are we supposed to get back out again?”

 

     “Worry about finding them, I'll think about how we get out afterward!” I shouted back.

 

     “Five, six if we're lucky, against a few dozen? Great odds! I'm looking forward to the harebrained scheme you cook up,” she hissed ripe with sarcasm.

 

     “They could lose us for days at a time in here. We don't need to fight that many! If worse comes to worst we raise enough hell and force them to terms.”

 

Ba'el stopped dead in her tracks, so quickly that we nearly collided and sent the two of us tumbling. I took a step back and she pressed her back up against me and pressed me back into the wall Not a second later the ears atop my head twitched involuntarily. They had a mind of their own and triangulated on some noise I had yet to be cognizant of. I hated admitting these odds and ends came in handy, because I was about to curse the girl out for nearly sending me into a tumble. Their footfalls took off down another corridor at a three-way junction not far ahead. We let out a collected sigh of relief and took a moment to catch our breath.

 

     “It's getting more cramped the further we go."

 

     “That means we're near the bottom,” I said, grasping at straws to rekindle some hope.

 

     “You'd think that, wouldn't you?” she said and clicked her tongue. “Well, since you haven't felt it yet, and likely never could, I'll spell it out for you. The further down we go the stronger I feel something pushing us back.”

 

She peeled herself off, spun on the spot and glared up at me with an uncommonly serious expression.

 

     “These girls didn't choose to set up shop here for no reason. If we go any further we'll likely see why... I'm not sure we want to find out.”

 

     I took a deep breath, sorted out the twisted feeling in my gut and said, “We're too far gone to pull out now. Whatever it is, they took everyone else prisoner... Probably because these girls don't want anyone else to know what that is.”

 

She grumbled while carefully fishing out the small golden ankh on a string. The holy symbol swayed to and fro until it began to slowly spin and pull ever so slightly in one direction. Certainly not under the effect of gravity or wind. It appeared as if it were ferrous, but is attracted to something distant that wasn't a magnet. Ba'el had jerry-rigged its attunement back to its source. This little trinket was our North Star for finding where the others were being kept... At least I hoped they were all being kept in one place.

 

Upon confirming the general direction we needed to be heading, the two of us set off again. The air which had been cold and stagnant before grew warmer. It wouldn't be too unusual for it to get a little hotter the further you go underground, but this was something else entirely. A tightening in my chest, not unlike a bad case of heartburn, gave me breathing difficulties that our brisk pace through the dungeon could not account for. I stole a glance at Ba'el who appeared to have been hiding a grave expression on her face until now. Experience warned me that what we were about to encounter could not be explained rationally without assuming the interference of the arcane on mundane reality. I'd likely give myself a headache on top of the chest pain if I tried making rational sense of it.

 

At last the winding corridors of limestone finally gave way to solid bedrock. That acute feeling of claustrophobia relented and gave way immediately to agoraphobia. High above us was an artificial canopy of wooden scaffolding betwixt large open chasms and roots the size of trees themselves. Winding and snaking roots with throbbing veins that pulsed a distinct radioactive green. Far and wide these roots spread, like a giant birch forest. Here lay the eldest, the source of these enchanted oaks. No sun needed to shine here, hardly any torches or candles were needed, the bio-luminescence lit up the whole cavern. Moss, mushroom and tall grasses grew here and there. A miracle of life in the underground.

 

     “I wouldn't have believed it till now,” Ba'el said with mouth agape. “These were supposed to have gone extinct a long time ago.”

 

     “And what would these be?” I asked.

 

     “Roots of a world tree,” Ba'el said, half in a stupor, as she gawked and spun around to take it all in. “Seedlings of the world tree... Now all this ambient magic makes sense.”

 

My eyes kept wandering up the great glowing roots where they met at the massive trunk of the tree. There the great oak had split the earth high above us. The faintest natural sunlight could barely be seen. Besides the distance, the line of sight was broken by wooden walkways and boardwalks. That which had blocked our view from up high and where these monster girls had cobbled their city together after what could be decades in the least.

 

     “He is dying,” Came a deep—but soothing—woman's voice piercing through the darkness in front of us.

 

Ba'el and I's attention snapped back to the present. Our knees bent, our eyes fixed and fingers flexed ready to fight. Our surprise host lackadaisically emerged from the darkness, eyes materializing out of the shadows before the rest of her. They were of considerable size, the girl's obvious charm point gathered all in one place. With the matching length in the lashes. They glittered with an amethyst sheen. A crown of feathers resembling an olive leaf laurel, or horns, sat atop her head her scruffy shoulder length hair. She wings for arms, so it's impossible to mistake her for anything but a harpy. Orange and brown, the same as her hair, camouflage patterned bark on autumn trees. Large and dangerous looking talons for feet.

 

     “Gah, Evil Eye!” Ba'el groaned as she suddenly averted her eyes.

 

I was, however, not quick enough on the uptake. I had foolishly strained my eyes to separate this strange woman from the shadows behind her. A coat of feathers adorned her like a robe. A feathery mink coat, bloomers and tube socks around her calves. Except these were not just feathery in appearance, but part of her body. I could spy her swaying her bare hips and thighs which were clad in the most skintight body suit of a silky black material. A strap of cloth, of different material to coat around her shoulders, strained to keep her bust in check and is audaciously provocative. A collar of that feather wrapped around her collar bone and reached far enough up to obscure her mouth. It drew all the focus onto those eyes of hers where my wandering eyes felt as if they were sucked into a black hole.

 

For a brief moment my entire body was paralyzed. A shimmer, a glint, of red light from her bottomless black pupils almost made everything stop, including my breathing and even my heart. Whatever icy hand grasped it quickly dissipated and with a groan and a shake of my head I shook it off in time. Almost as surprised as I was the monster herself whose eyes widened briefly which is first show of any emotion on her part since we met.

 

     “Impressive,” the owl-like girl muttered under her breathe, to only herself. “I do not know by which means you can resist such a curse.”

 

     “Ba'el? Who the hell is this and what is going on?” I said while laboring to refill my lungs with air.

 

     “It looks like we've been found out,” she said while balling her fingers into fists.

 

     “A well executed diversion to be sure,” the owl interjected. “Your mistake was seeking these sacred roots. Had your intention been plunder there were many other treasures to abscond with and escaped by now. To protect this place is our most sacred duty and you will not leave this place.”

 

     “The diversion is still going strong!” Ba'el yelled and from behind her back threw an underhand ball of dark colored flame the size of a baseball.

 

It shrieked through the air, curved impossibly to the left and swung back around dead straight on target. The ball of ebony flame wailed like a pack of ghosts rather than rumble and roar of flames. But upon impact there wasn't burnt hair, feathers and flesh. Likewise, there's no concussive shockwave to blow its victims at the point of impact. A translucent field, flickering white, appeared around the owl for a moment before the ebony flames petered out and died. A flick of the woman's wing tip and the smoke cleared away with a freak gust of wind and there she stood none worse for wear.

 

     “That trick usually works,” Ba'el grimaced before her whole body went rigid with a sudden fright. “Outta the way!” She suddenly screamed and pushed me aside.

 

     “All those scattered treasures were not enough. Your curiosity too great? You'll pay dearly for it,” the owl women continued unfazed.

 

My feet—hooves—left the floor as I went tumbling over sideways and slamming into the floor only to stop after skidding across it to my eventual and painful stop. Weathering a storm, a sudden gale, was Ba'el trying to dig her heels in against a barrage of what looked like star dust. A million twinkling particles of light swarming in from the owl mage. Piece by piece the disguise which had ensorcelled Ba'el was stripped away. I watched in a matter of seconds the poly-morph she had fine tuned tore to ribbons before shattering completely. A thousand pieces of what appeared like glass winked out of existence, one by one, in a cascade that ended in a couple of seconds. Reduced back to her original form, horns, hooves, claws and all.

 

     “Dark beast,” the mysterious woman declared with narrowing eyes. “One of the Baphomet. Today is full of surprises.”

 

     “You need to go, now!” Ba'el cried out while her massive scythe materialized out of the aether and fell into her waiting hands.

 

     “No, she wont be going anywhere,” came a second voice from behind, “Neither of you will.”

 

Out from where we came in strode another imposing figure. Silently, on cat's paws, but with wings from her back unfurled which made her appear twice as large. Windswept tan colored hair, streaked with bleached white, all in a knotted ponytail that billowed long behind her. Swishing back and forth was a lioness' tail. She cracked the knuckles of what looked like eagle claws in mimicry of human hands. This newcomer had the look of a chimera as well, but only of two beasts. I recalled the image on ancient heraldry before, so it was unmistakably that of a griffin, in the flesh.

 

With eyes of gold and large pitch black pupils. A dignified aquiline nose accompanying sharp facial features. She appeared to be constantly looking down her nose at others with derision and contempt. Her face had a similar aversion to emoting, like the owl, but rather than somber and passive she appeared wound up and ready to strike. A spitting image of a soldier. Lithe and well toned. Unlike a soldier, she clothed herself with nothing but tribal patterned poncho draped around her shoulders and another around her waist. Underneath it hid scandalous scale-mail barding that protected the vitals of her otherwise lily white and vulnerable looking flesh. Dangling down from her neck a silver talisman which resembled the long hooked beak of a bird-of-prey.

 

     “How fortunate of you to come, dear sister,” the owl greeted the griffon woman. “But wouldn't your guards be overburdened with our third interloper?”

 

     “She is no threat,” her gruff and taciturn voice spat. “It would appear you were correct all along. The wyvern is averse to causing any sort of real harm. It is all for show.”

 

Her stern eyes burrowed straight into me and finished sizing me up almost instantaneously.

 

     “You three have caused enough trouble. Surrender. Now,” her voice became deep and threatening.

 

Ba'el and I were back to back. In each direction, behind and us and in front of us, both our exits, were blocked. These two women didn't have the air about them of grunt or lacky, the two of them let off an air of authority. If I could fly we might take off above, but we were being confronted by a pair of avians, so that likely wouldn't be easy if I could.

 

     “While it's the two of us, if you would,” the griffon menaced. “If you make us struggle until reinforcements arrive, it will not be so painless.”

 

     “Stall for me,” Ba'el hissed quietly through clenched teeth.

 

This wasn't the time nor place to argue, so I did as asked.

 

     “Surrender to who and why?” I bellowed while squaring my—these—slender shoulders wide.

 

     “Kal'Rien'da'Furr, Great Guardian and Steward of the Ley,” the Owl replied. “You have trespassed on this sacred place. We, Sisters of—”

 

     “Ascia, shut up for once and don't fall for it,” the griffon raised her voice to interrupt.

 

     “The accused have rights to know, Shira,” the owl snapped back.

 

     “Ascia and Shira, I think we've got a misunderstanding going on here,” I interjected in a vain hope to simmer down tensions.

 

     “See? Now she knows our names, idiot!” Shira flailed with one arm in an irritated gesture.

 

     “Do not call me an idiot,” a faint sliver of emotion, annoyance, came out the owl for the first time.

 

     “They're related all right,” Ba'el sighed quietly and muttered under her breath. “Good work. Give me a few more seconds to prepare something—”

 

What felt like an earthquake nearly sent Ba'el and I tumbling to the ground again, but we both realized it wasn't the ground shaking, but the air itself. I watched as the glowing veins of magic energy increase in luminosity. My eyes eventually stumbled upon the source of the disturbance. Floating before Ascia, as if grasped by some spectral and unseen hand, was a short one foot wooden shaft with a glowing ruby crown. Whatever Ba'el had been cooking up appeared to fizzle out. I could actually see the mana she had gathered slough off.

 

     “You wont be doing that again,” the owl mage chided in her usual apathetic timbre.

     
     “If we don't want spells cast here, then they don't, see?” Shira said as she cracked her neck while rolling her neck and ambling slowly toward us. “So unless you got something to say about it... And I hope you do~”

 

Shira's sharp talons had a sinister glint to them in the artificial light. Surely as sharp, if not sharper, than folded steel. Ba'el is defenseless if the owl is draining the mana straight out of her. Without magic, the goat had as much power as a middle-school girl. I, meanwhile, had nothing. Standing here I might as well be naked. My heart began to beat faster and faster the closer the griffon got. My brain tumbled over and over in my skull struggling to think its way out of this one. Surrender or a sound beating seemed imminent.

 

You've done more than enough.

 

A strange voice spoke aloud inside my head. It was so deafening that my ears rung with acute tinnitus afterward. Despite the ringing pain, the voice spoke with much more clarity the second time.

 

It is far too soon, but I offer what little boon I can. Bring sense to these paranoid souls.

 

The voice was decidedly less androgynous the second time around. It's some woman's voice. Not one I had heard in my head before. This wasn't Iris, that strange squid woman. This is someone else. Her voice had silenced all other sound. As quickly as the pain in my skull arrived it left. Replaced by a searing sensation in my chest that almost caused my vision to white out. My heart felt as if it were on fire. My knees nearly buckled and I clenched through my bust. Each heart-beat felt strong enough that my heart might rip straight through and burst out from my rib cage.

 

     “Laven, what's wrong? Laven!” I heard Ba'el's voice rife with genuine concern, for once.

 

My vision returned and I saw Shira nearly within arm's reach. A proud sneer on her face and she closed in on her helpless prey—me.

 

     “Don't try anything stupid,” Shira smirked. “Come along quiet, sit in your cell like a good girl and await trial with the others.”

 

With great constrictive force I felt the talon of the griffon seize me by the wrist. As if I had been floating on a cloud before, the world came back to me all at once. I instinctively tore my left arm free, my lion's paw, away. I pulled it free with ease. The next few seconds went by as if in slow motion. Shira and I were both thrown off balance. Her eyes widened in surprise and then furrowed in anger. My arm felt the same sensation in my chest. It burned. It hurt. My anger and frustration came out all at once with a bang. I swung wide with my right dragon scale clad arm and struck home dead on Shira's sternum. Yet another deafening sound echoed out and off the cavern walls on impact. My clawed fist followed through and the griffon was lifted off the ground and sent flying backwards. She landed on her back and skidded across the smooth stone floor for quite a few feet before eventually coming to a stop.

 

Everyone gathered stopped and time felt as thought it had joined in. Ba'el's mouth once again agape and the owl mage Ascia's was completely bug-eyed. I looked down at my clenched fist. Polymorphed dragon's claw with purplish-black scales. My knuckles were letting off some smoke from the point of impact. I rotated my wrist and slowly peeled back each talon and every joint cracked and popped. It didn't hurt at all.

 

My thoughts were going a mile a minute. I tried desperately to comprehend what that was and how it happened. Sending someone flying like that, with a deafening crack of impact like that didn't add up. My arm had followed its arc faster than I ever recall having thrown a punch before. Even then, the mass I had meant I shouldn't have hit that hard to send someone flying back like that A burning sensation in my chest flared up again and tore my thoughts away from trying to square that circle. Rooted square in the middle of my chest, between these breasts, shone a blue stone which pulsed and hummed.

 

“When did that start?” I gawped while staring down cleavage at the now glowing stone.

 

I'm not entirely sure it made a sound that I didn't hear inside my own head, because the next sound I heard was the shattering of still air. I looked back up and saw a blur coming straight at me. Flying a mere inches off the ground, the griffon came at me in a full on flying tackle and lifted me off my feet. The slap of flesh and crack of bone on bone resonated across the cavern. My back broke against the wooden scaffolding as Shira lifted me straight up into the air and plowing through wooden wall after wall.

 

***

 

Ba'el ducked and covered as Laven was sent flying backward and upwards above her. Ascia flinched at the sound of impact and covered her face with a of her wing as the gust of wind blew past. The two of them stood alone among a storm of dust and wooden debris which rained down on top of them soon after. Slowly, at the same time, as din of battle grew increasingly distant, the two regained their footing.

 

     “This is... unexpected,” Ascia said with her signature monotone despite the flurry of chaos around her.

 

Ba'el grinned mischievously, eagerly cracked her fuzzy little knuckles in anticipation. As suddenly as the tables had turned against them, the entire table had been flipped over. She clenched her paws into fists and as she slowly opened them back up tendrils of raw magic power danced between her palm like strings of electricity. It did not go unnoticed by Ascia's sharp eyes and she shifted from a calm neutral stance into a defensive one.

 

     “Well, would ya look at that!” Ba'el said with an evil grin as she straightened out her back. "It looks like that interference you were so smug about ain't here no more... The two of us can get back to business.”

 

Ascia found herself forced to examine her strategy on the fly. The swirling winds of magic were blowing once more. Spells could readily take form again as ambient magic fluttered about as barely visible particles of light, just as they had outside in the enchanted woods.

 

That gentle breeze began to kick dirt off the ground. It went so far as to begin deflecting dust and small wooden splinters as they continued to fall from above. Invisible winds of magic, reaching out not unlike magnetic fields, swirled around the owl lady as she began to accumulate the mana she needed.

 

     Good choice,” Ba'el grinned with newfound confidence.

 

     “Do not try bluffing with me, pseudo-demon,” Ascia replied coldly. “Your aura is damaged. You are incomplete. A far cry from the power you'd have me believe that you wield.”

 

Ba'el's smug expression was wiped in an instant and replaced with cold and level contempt. That remark had struck right to the core of it. Ba'el had violated a very powerful and ancient pact. Tearing apart that contract was like tearing off a good portion of the muscles of your arm. It could heal over time, but never fully. Not on their own. She could regain some strength, but never all of it. If it were not for Laven unwittingly forcing his own pact on her when he did, the baphomet would have faded away and been reduced to dust long ago. Keeping herself together relied on not merely that, but a significant portion of her magical ability that she was free to wield as she desired, not tied up maintaining her physical form on this material plane.

 

     “We are both on borrowed time and power, ain't we?” Ba'el snapped back. “Tell me, does Minerva still speak her wisdom to you, or are you flying blind?”

 

Ascia's chest heaved upward with a stifled gasp and then retreated backward slowly. There she showed no other signs of emotion. Any trace of it were barely visible beyond her thick cloak and mask of feathers obscuring her face. Ba'el's occult knowledge had hit home no less hard than Ascia's. The owl mages, in a another era, had been servants to the goddess of wisdom. Mundane beasts imbued with divine power. The eldest taking a humanoid form. In these past few centuries, the form of a beautiful woman, another breed of harpy. Regardless, the owl magi were blessed, but abandoned. Where that divine being is now unknown. Ba'el had violated demonic law, and paid the price, but Ascia is no more complete than her.

 

An occasional thunderous boom echoed off the cavern walls. Cracking and splintering of wood caused Ba'el's ear to twitch and her fingers to clench nervously every time. She didn't know why Laven was all of a sudden brimming with magic energy. All she knew is that it wasn't his own, nor was she supplying it either. Some third party had intervened. If that's too conspiratorial to believe, the possibly remained that all this ambient magic which flowing into the so called sails Ba'el had stappled onto my back which is doing all the work. Yet that didn't account for the why, or the who, only the how.

 

Besides all that, the two magic users were now facing one another in a standoff. Uttering spells under their breath, wordlessly mouthing the magic words, their fingers making subtle purposeful movements. Every minor movement part of some ritual to focus the mana around them into the magic they saw fit. A battle between wizards happened the same way every time. It started off slowly, then would happen all at once. Laven, if he were to witness it now, would compare it to pistols at high noon. A quick succession of spells in order. Whoever could cast them the fastest, whoever could cast the correct spells in sequence to trump the other, would be victorious.

 

Ba'el and Ascia, without speaking a word to the other, had both come to the same conclusion. Two spells in quick succession would resolve the conflict. They dared not betray their intentions by letting a single hint of whatever cantrip the other was about let loose. As quickly as a duel with swords could be over with one flick of the wrist, the duel between wizards could be won with one correct incantation to counter the other. The two girls locked eyes, sweat starting to ooze down their brows, while the visible mana whorled around them both.

 

The first move was taken by Ba'el, who wove the mana to condense the air itself and materializing around her, like the eye of a hurricane, an opaque white mist. A cloud underneath the ground and obscuring the vision. Her first move had been to weave a defensive spell. Ascia was not terribly impressed. Although her casting took a couple seconds longer, the magic she wielded took the form of a barrier of light. A bubble of pure force that glimmered for an instant before it became perfectly translucent.

 

     "You insult me," the owl growled, "do you truly believe that you can hide from my sight?"

 

The cursed eyes of the owl mage shimmered and a strange light washed over her irises. From corner to corner they lit up as if candles burned in her eye-sockets. Her vision was augmented and gained the ability to see beyond mere light and could see the very aether of magic itself. Beyond the clouds of water vapor she saw the silhouette of Ba'el standing steadfast, immobile, dug in.

 

     "Your hubris shall be your downfall, beast," Ascia quietly murmured to herself as she prepared then quietly mouthed the incantations of her next and final spell.

 

Meanwhile, Ba'el stood tall, shoulders squared and chest puffed out. She brimmed with confidence. Her fingers moving in a series of gestures while her arms remained limp at her sides. A smile mutating into a massive cocky grin as time went by. She didn't need to see it, the little devil could feel the magic roiling around and beyond her instead. Her opponent had chosen to take the path of brute force while she had chosen obfuscation. Whether that gamble would pay off would soon be known.

 

Ascia's following spell was to light a spark and cause the air to be lit aflame. A fireball, burning and undulating with barely contained fury. The fog surrounding their battlefield quickly turned to steam instead. Ba'el's wall of mist underwent flash condensation and the field became slick and dew soaked. It did nothing to sate the ball of fire's thirst as it consumed the air around it. Ascia had a clear view of her opponent who stood as tall as before, unfazed. Except she had a single hoof raised off the ground, knee at waist height.

 

     "Let me show you something a friend of mine once taught me," Ba'el sneered, her hoof crackling with lightning.

 

Ascia would put together the pieces of the puzzle too late. Her fireball spell would take a moment too long to reach critical mass and be ready in time to be thrown. Ba'el stomped her foot down with a loud clack and the electricity radiated outward. It found its path of least resistance. It shot through the damp puddles along the stony floor toward where the talons of the owl mage. She herself soaking wet. Her magic barrier ill equipped to handle the attack from below as it shocked her for an unconscionable number of volts.

 

That once menacing ball of fire quickly tore itself to pieces as Ascia's concentration was obliterated in an instant. Immense pain surged through her entirely and it would continue for so long as Ba'el wished, or what magic she could muster. The protective barrier she had thrown up failed as she pulled everything back she could muster. Anything to reinforce her body and ensure the assault.

 

Ba'el curled her tiny little paw into a fist and to finish the duel once and for all raised it up high and slammed it into the ground. Another explosion of thunder and lightning as another renewed wave of electricity washed over her opponent. No longer able to bear the pain, the stoic and monotone mage cried out in agony while every muscle in her body quaked and shivered. It relented only upon losing consequences and she keeled over backwards. Exhausted herself, the baphomet cut off the surge of energy and nearly collapsed down onto the floor herself.

 

The little devil rose slowly to her feet and apprehensively cast her gaze over to her prone opponent. Smoke and steam were still rising up into the air all around her. The owl mage's extremities twitched involuntarily and pained gasps escaped from her lips, but she was out like a light.

 

 

***

 

Wood broke upon my back and I wasn't entirely sure if it wasn't also my spine shattering. For a moment I feared I had lost all sensation completely. A couple seconds of stupor and the two of us had flown a good fifty yards or so upwards and then through everything in our way. Debris scattered in every direction as it shattered. Utlimately, the griffon's momentum ran out, but my inertia did not. While she took off upwards I kept going solo straight into the granite wall. My body slid down a few feet onto the wooden platform below me.

 

     Shira's bobbed up and down in the air, her wings beating, “How do you like that?”

 

Honestly, I should be dead. My mind tried wrapping itself around the forces involved. No human body could come out of an exchange like that and not be a bloody pulp. Yet this wasn't a human body I'm merely piloting it. My essense balled up and cramed up inside the head. I planted a hoof into the solid wooden plank, paw on my knee, and pushed myself upright. Sawdust and dirt cascaded off me while I stood upright. After shaking some debris out of my hair and patting myself down I cast my eyes upward. There I spied the griffon's eyes widen with shock.

 

     “What in all the Hell's are you?” Shira growled, face contorting with disbelief.

 

     “That didn't hurt at all,” I said in disbelief as well.

 

She must have assumed I was taunting her rather than stating that as a matter of fact. Her disbelief gave way to rage as she let out a battle cry, like a screaming eagle. As if the air were just water, and she a fish, Shira reeled upwards, turned on a dime, then came swooping down upon me with the force of the furies. I had my wits about me this time and had mustered the audacity to stand my ground. I matched her rending talons with my own claws and caught them. I clenched them into fists squeezed down as hard as I could muster. The full weight of her charge shoved me back several feet, but we stopped short of the wall and she was dead in her tracks.

 

Shira and I's hands formed a bridge between us and any slip would throw the other off balance. With all the newfound strength I could muster, I began to pull her out stretched talons apart. An arm wrestling contest with both limbs on the line. With the way clear, I suddenly pulled her in, catching her off balance and slamming a knee into her bare exposed stomach. The unmistakable croak of someone being winded broke the monotony of our growling and grunts. I followed through and flipped the girl over my shoulder and slammed her back against the ground.

 

I raised one leg up to slam it back down to devastating effect, but the griffon-lady once more defied how a human-like body ought to behave. She deftly rolled out of the way as my foot—hoof—actually shattered the floor to pieces at the site of impact. A quick scramble on her part, a few beats of her wings, and the woman was once again airborne. We exchanged hostile glares and refilled our lungs with heaving breaths, but her face was refurbished with confidence long before I was back to being steady on my feet.

 

     “Heh, what's the matter?” Shira gloated.

 

It was no longer avoidable, these polymorph wings attached to my shoulder-blades were all for show. They provided me a phantom sensation, sometimes getting caught on things and causing pain bumping into things, but nothing more. Shira appeared to have the same idea I had if I were in her position. My heart sunk and all the courage I had mustered began to dry up. Wasting no time she was gone in a flash and left nothing but the gust of wind from her powerful wings. I turn every which way in anticipation of her attack, but I realized too late I wouldn't be her target.

 

The floor beneath me shuddered and shook violently without warning. A massive crash and splitting of wood echoed off the walls of the massive pit surrounding the massive ancient tree looming in the middle. A moment later it buckled and listed to one side. Debris and all manner of furniture not bolted down slid by while I swayed to and fro in an effort to keep my own footing.

 

     “She's taking out the damn supports!” I cried out in vain a few seconds too late.

 

One more crash and an even more cacophonous clatter coincided with the entire wooden structure cascading into the abyss. Shria had flown away to crash the entire wood structure back down to the bottom of the pit below. What force she could not hurt me with, she planned on leaving to gravity. Everything around me came apart as splinters, frayed rope and iron nails swirled all around me like a blizzard raking across my exposed skin. I was bucked off solid ground and sent into a free fall.

 

I wouldn't hit terminal velocity, but the impact would certainly kill me in human form. It was a bit odd that I dreaded it more not knowing it would likely wouldn't kill me outright as I am now and that it would hurt a lot more than it ever could naturally. There's nothing to grab hold of and for certain the griffon could swoop in at any time to deal a blow I could do nothing against. Perhaps she would only fit me after I hit the ground as a coup de grâce. Yet as I thought nothing more could be done but open my eyes and accept fate, a pain far worse than any leg cramp shot up thought my spine and I felt the excruciating phantom pain in the foreign limbs attached to my back.

 

Far less traumatizing than hitting the ground, a pain which never came, because the next sensation felt like meat hooks wrenching at flesh as I went from 80 miles per hour to a dead stop instantaneously. A whorl of dust kicked off the ground below me as the deafening sound of beating leather against the wind caused a maelstrom all around me.

 

     “Ha-ha! No way,” I laughed manically and could not hold back the smile. “I'm flying!”

 

Hovering more like it, but there I was bobbing up and down right above the ground. Without a conscious thought toward it, the bone, sinew and muscle behind me kicked in by instinct alone. I dreaded to think about it too much, what with the biology and aerodynamics most likely defying physics, and I wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

 

The next all important question would be if they obeyed my commands. I thought about going up and with the strain not unlike an out of shape pull up on a high bar, my feet slowly put more distance between them and ground. With each passing second the exorcise became easier as the atrophy melted away. The wings on my back were burning hot, coursing with fresh blood, and felt as if they were swelling in size and strength with each passing moment. My desperate flailing to keep myself afloat suddenly reversed when I quietly thunk to myself, up.

 

Up like a rocket burning a million pounds of thrust I broke through malaise of dust beneath and emerged back into the fresh air picking up speed and rising far faster than I had fallen. Those next few seconds went by in slow motion. I had not thought where I was going other than up, and put no thought in what would be in my way. What had not yet come crashing into the ground, a few tons of wood scrap which once made all the scaffolding was still coming down. There's no chance in hell I could avoid it, so I shielded my head with my arms and blasted through.

 

     “Wha—” is the high pitched sequel I heard after the splintering of wood.

 

Through a crack in my defenses I saw the next obstacle, and thing which I would impact, Shira herself, floating there above all the crashing debris. And there was myself, a humanoid javelin rocketing upward to the sky. A full force frontal tackle. In the very next instant, after the bone shattering impact, the two of us were a tumbling mass of flesh shooting further upwards and through the next upper layer of wood which was obliterated as we careened through it.

 

Eventually we managed to untangle from each other and scrambled to put something solid underneath us. I flailed and found a wooden post to plant my hooves on and the griffon sunk her one of her claws into the bark of the giant tree trunk and anchored herself. We then squared off face-to-face heaving our chests struggling to catch our breath. The two of us were already covered in bruises and a couple dozen minor scratches. Despite our accumulating wounds our muscles tensed, coiled and prepared for the next clash, but I had another idea.

 

Shira took the initiative, kicked off the tree and came barreling toward me, talons raised. At the last moment I took a dive. My victory condition was never to win this fight, but to get past her and find the others. It appeared my opponent had gotten so worked up into the fight she had forgotten that and had let me out of the corner she had trapped me in. We were rather high up the subterranean tree trunk, about half-way, and I took my chance to slip past her. I turned my free fall into a glide and commanding my wings to propel me I swooped back down toward the ground. I'd fly right on through down the tunnel to this cavern's catacombs.

 

     “Where do you think you are going?” I heard a voice bellow behind me.

 

Rocketing toward me with the speed of a falcon, the griffon got me by a death-grip around my ankle before I could react. Despite my forward momentum, I found myself flying sideways and then backward at a breakneck speed before coming to a sudden stop. My back broke against the nearby massive ancient oak and knocked the wind right out of me. Without missing a beat, Shira followed suit by pinning me there, against the wishes of gravity, with some well placed balled talon punches to the abdomen and sternum. Each impact letting out a thunderous blow, because the bone and flesh refused to yield.

 

     “Enough!” I howled in rage as I lost my composure.

 

Rather than defend myself, I raised both hands, clasped together, and brought them down together as a hammer on top of her head and sent her spiraling downward back toward the ground. She had me in her grasp still, however, so I followed along unwillingly as we grappled and spun together in the air before one first story wooden walkway broke our fall.

 

I did not land favorably and had Shira slam me into the ground with me on my stomach. She wasted no time positioning herself to put me into a blood choke. With one arm wrapped around my throat and another with its talons digging into my cranium. I felt my spine creak and crack as she pulled back my head and it took all my strength to try and pry whatever meager vice grip she had on my throat. Tinnitus filled my ears and my vision started to go blurry and darken at the edges.

 

     “This will be... enough!” She growled as she began to pull tight enough to have tore my head off if this form suddenly decided to dispel and I went back to normal.

 

There was nothing else I could do other than count the final seconds till I'd be out like a light, but that didn't mean I had been rendered totally helpless. Acting of its own accord, the snake at the end of my tail came to life. I could feel it wriggle, writhe and coil before I could taste the scent of blood in my mouth other than my own swelling and discoloring tongue.

 

Shira howled in pain as the fangs of my—the—snake tail sunk deep into her shoulder. From those fangs a venom pumped into the surrounding flesh which deadened the nerves and the griffon's grip involuntarily slackened. I managed to wrap my own claws underneath her grip and release the blood choke and liberate my airway. With renewed vigor, and a weakening opposition, I pushed myself back onto my knees, dug my hooves into the ground, pushed up off the ground with the griffon still clinging to my back. With one more mighty roar and grabbed hold of her and slammed her hard onto the floor... which gave way, sending the both of us tumbling back down toward the ground where we had started. Only this time I managed to stick the landing while she hit it full force, bounced off it and rolled away in agony.

 

Not that I was faring much better, although I managed to not crash land for once, my throat still felt like a folded accordion and my knees were failing to keep myself off the ground. Where I could feel the wings sewn onto my back before, now they felt numb. Where I felt like there was another living, and thinking, thing attached to the end of my spine it had gone silent and still.

 

     “I am sorry,” came an ethereal voice sounding as if it were impossibly far away.

 

My eyes were drawn off my prone and staggering opponent for a moment as I craned my aching neck back and forth to locate where the hell that voice came from.

 

     “My ability to aid you has gone far beyond my limits,” the voice spoke again, now clearly feminine, but its origin no more certain than it was before.”

 

That warning fell upon my own deaf ears, because the next moment I felt as if I had been unplugged and all the strength left my body at once. I collapsed back down onto my knees and it took everything I had to keep my body upright, even as my arms fell limp against my sides. Gravity pulled at me with renewed vigor and with vengeance after I had so brazenly defied it earlier. These massive foreign bodies loaded onto my chest not making it any easier.

 

My courage began to wane as I watched the griffon catch her breath and rise back onto her feet. She didn't have the stamina to straighten out her back when she whipped her hanging head in my direction and I saw the unbridled fury in her eyes. Without the usual cat-like grace of her lion-like paws, she staggered her way toward me at first, but quickly got her balance back as she menaced her way toward me. Feathers flew in every direction as they unfurled and aided in her balance and struck my caveman brain with fear as it made her appear three times her size. I fell over backwards onto my ass when I tried to put some more distance and lay there helplessly on my back, exhausted.

 

     “This game is over, outsider,” Shira growled as she raised one of her talons high up into the air.

 

What little sunlight far above us, and the magical lights flickering nearby in the shadow, caused the steely glint to shine in my eyes like daring to stare into the sun itself. No one needed to tell me, certainly not that mysterious voice, that all that strength I had commanded before was now gone. If those talons were to connect, they'd tear me apart. There's no magic to hold me together any more. I closed my eyes and prayed for mercy.

 

Yet the coup de grace did not come.

 

     “You'll not mind if I tag in then?” Came a voice sweeter to me than ambrosia.

 

I pried my eyes open and saw Shira's hand locked down. A red scaled gauntlet holding it in place up high. The griffon's eyes wide eyed, almost feral, staring in disbelief at the red maned woman grinning without a hint of fear behind amber eyes.

 

With feline quickness, Shira took a swipe with her free paw. Whatever damage she had accumulated appeared to have evaporated and I likely would have taken the blow head on a couple minutes ago. Yet she hit nothing but air. Rose ducked and pulled the griffon's trapped hand behind her back. Her unfurled wings were then encased in golden halos which cinched shut and held them in place. Shira howled like a stuck cat at being pinned not only with one arm painfully behind her back, but wings pinned like a butterfly on display. Following up the one-two punch, the debris littering the floor was kicked up as something came up with lightning speed. A green shadow crouched beneath the griffon's nose. A five finger and one inch death punch straight to the diaphragm. Every last mote of breath in her lungs was expelled all at once and the griffon's body went out like a candle in a hurricane.

 

The last thing up off the ground of hers was Rose holding Shira by the wrist. When she let go, the body followed and collapsed into a heap. Minte's silhouette emerged as the body fell. I watched as the two exchanged a quick bumping of fists.

 

A third familiar voice let out a sigh, “I had hoped your exaggerations were merely yet another product of your aversion for responsibility.”

 

     “I told you once I told you a hundred times,” came Ba'el's exhausted voice, “This was HIS idea, not mine.”

 

     “Taking it upon yourself to execute in a mischievous manner, no doubt” Susan struck back in a lecturing tone.

 

The whole while I was stuck laying there, back plastered to the floor. It took far too much time for any of them to realize I could hardly move at all. Rose eventually figured it after studying me for a moment and finally offered me her hand with a beaming smile. I had no words for how much I had missed that reassuring face. My last scraps of strength I mustered together to raise my hand, the dragon claw, so she could help me up. I didn't have the strength to stay on my own two feet—hooves—and had to wrap one arm around her shoulder as she held up.

 

There would be no time for celebration, however, Minte's antenna twitched, swiveled behind her and she spun around on the spot and sliced an arrow shrieking in from the darkness. Nothing else had to be said, Susan stamped her paw on the ground and with some gestures from her hands lifted up a wall with a golden sheen that a few more arrows deflected off.

 

     “Laven, look out!” Rose cried out as she enveloped me and exposed her back to the barrage.

 

Seconds went by agonizingly slow, a trickle of blood dripped down onto my nose and the spell of copper coins filled my sinus. No less than three arrows were sticking out of Rose's back and another on her thigh. Had I enough air in my lungs to cry out, I would have. Only to waste it, because a couple seconds later I saw the arrow shafts ignite in flames and disintegrate into ash.

 

     “I forgot about that,” I wheezed quietly to myself.

 

My eyes readjusted to the darkness and forming a circle around us, and above us, dozens of monster girls were slowly encroaching in. Drawing their bow strings with notched arrows. Perched in high places. Hovering there with their wings. Armed with bow, sword and spear. Many of them trembling, but clearly with the upper hard. Rose was unarmed, Shoshanah without her staff and Ba'el nearly exhausted as I am. That left Minte agains the world, but there's no way she could fend off from that many attackers who could attack from so many angles. She did have a blind spot, however narrow it may be. To say nothing of the unorthodox and sorcerers attacks which were inevitable. The four of them formed a circle around me to defend the best we could, but death or recapture seemed certain.

 

     “No more!” A voice like thunder shook the very walls themselves.

 

Everyone gathered covered their ears, or closest equivalent, because if that had been any louder and we'd all be bleeding from the closest applicable orifice. A commanding voice which coursed with magic and had been amplified by it. Everyone's eyes looked upwards and there we saw two figures descending from up high. The first I recognized immediately, Chris. The other, clinging onto her back and wrapped around her tail and legs, I did not. She had a long tail herself, and upon a double take, the tail was her body. A good twenty or more feet in length at that. Chris appeared to be struggling to descend as gracefully as she could with cheeks puffed and red with effort.

 

This snake giant snake with a woman's torso attached to it had a tint of indigo to her skin which made her look otherworldly. Her scales were a pattern of tan and red, like an enormous coral snake. Crowning her human half was long black hair adorned with gold and silver jewelry and ribbons to braid her hair. Her sense of fashion is certainly classy, but well antiquated. I'd pin it as classical Roman if I had to make an approximation As her face came into view, although she radiated a powerful magical aura, she had the look of a middle-schooler and the lack of curves to match.

 

     “Sister,” Shira groaned on the ground nearby. “It's not safe here—”

 

     “Don't you 'sister' me, Shira,” the snake woman hissed.

 

The end of her tail gracefully coiled itself onto the ground as it came into range and she quickly lightened the load off of Chris who came down the last few feet with a crash as the journey from topside had exhausted her completely.

 

     “Thank you, Christophaclies,” the girl said turning ever so briefly to give the wyvern a polite courtesy.

 

Chris mustered a quick salute before doubling over, knees shaking, heaving heavily. She raised her head long enough to give me a subtle wink and her best effort at a clumsy thumbs up to tell me everything is under control. I should hope so, because her swooping in at the exact moment she did carrying a VIP who everyone deffered to as their leader gave rise to a pinch of suspicion if it were anyone else other than Chris doing it. Being surprised at what she gets up to next and understanding what goes on inside that head of hers will merely shorten your lifespan.

 

     “You should be hibernating,” Ascia spoke, body lifting off the ground like Nosferatu from his coffin, feathered ruffled, head of hair singed and puffed up in a comical Afro.

 

     “You were causing enough noise to wake the dead!” the snake lady huffed, pouting with puffed cheeks as she slithered forward and beyond the battle lines of all the other monster girls.

 

A cacophony of voices all mingled together as everyone was clearly distressed at this snake girl boldly making her way toward us. Her features came more clearly into view, including her striking eyes, with black sclera and orange glowing snake slated irises. I too noticed that her hair was actually alive. Much like how I had a snake coming out just above my ass, the girl had a pair of black mamba like snakes rocking back and forth, tongues forking out into the air, in front of her.

 

     “Besides... Kal'Rien warned me you were all up to no good, again.” the snake girl shrugged her shoulders, irritated. “You lot best remember that mother put me in charge... And not you.”

 

Shira had appeared absolutely fearless, and Ascia unflappably stoic, until now. One single you from her lips and they had looked as if they had seen the face of death itself. Both of them found the energy to place themselves prostrate on the ground groveling.

 

     “Little sisters are always all the same,” she shook her head and lost interest in the two.

 

     “Little?” Rose dared to speak out of turn first.

 

     “You say something?” the snake's attention and piercing eyes locked onto Rose with fury burning behind them.

 

     “You're the older sister those two talked about all the time?”

 

     “What of it?” she replied, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

 

     “Never would have guessed it from—”

 

     “—Please, pay her no mind, ahaha,” Shoshanah cackled meekly while quickly slapping a paw in front of Rose's mouth. “I do not believe we've been afforded the pleasure of making your acquaintance, not formally, miss?”

 

     “Juniper,” the snake girl announced rising up high into the air, using her snake tail as a makeshift step ladder. “I am the daughter of Lydia of the Great Sulfur Mire, High Priestess and Guardian of Kal'Rien'da'Furr... And you are the uninvited guests to this garden, this temple of the lost long past.”

 

     “Well... Ahem,” Susan cleared her throat and attempted to calm her nerves, “We meant no harm, nor did we intend to trespass. We—”

 

     “I know who you are,” Juniper rudely interjected and cut Shoshanah off.

 

I could hear the Anubis' knuckles crack, her back stiffen and jackal tail bristle. After such a magnanimous timed and angelic entrance, the true bratty nature of this sanctimonious child became apparent. This was not something our own high priestess had the character to deal with diplomatically.

 

     “Bring him out!” She commanded.

 

Him was the last word which needed to be said right about now. The mere word set off a cascade of whispers in the gallery and balconies. I cringed, because I experienced first hand what a bunch of desperate stuck in the backwater woods monster girls do when they know there's a man around. That thought alone in the back of my head gave me the heart to deal with this embarrassing form in the first place.

 

     “Well? I'm not going to ask again!” She yelled and actually let out a shockwave not unlike the first time she yelled out high above us.

 

I steeled myself and let drop my arm around Rose's shoulder and found my footing again. The brief respite had allowed me to put some strength back into my thighs and hold myself upright. Hopefully for long enough. I slipped by the human shield of my companions and took center stage.

 

She cocked and eyebrow and studied me from head to toe before saying, “Kal must be playing tricks on me, she must.”

 

I took a deep breath and decided to take a risk, “The voice form the tree?”

 

Every pair of eyes were suddenly bore straight into me. It was enough pressure to nearly knock me off my feet again. My heart skipped a few beats. The most intense glare of all came from Juniper herself. Her eyes looked as if they were seeing right through me. Beyond the disguise, the polymorph, and right into the depths of my soul.

 

 

     “You did hear her too... Didn't you?”

 

I couldn't muster anything other than a timid nod. Juniper came back down to the ground, now looking up at me instead of downward with her eyes. Her next words were a departure from her character up until now. Her wry smile, her bratty confidence, was now stiff and serious.

 

     “You have a lot of explaining to do.”