Discussion in Dungeon

never a normal time for they

If one were to ask Laios how he though the day had been going before that very moment, he would have thought it had been a lot of fun, they had made good ground in the Dungeon and came across a cool silvery blue moth-like monster that he could oh so easily imagine riding. Even Marcille, who did not have quite the same glowing opinion of it all, would have had to agree that things had been going as well as they could be down there. Why, even Chilchuck was not too displeased with it all, so by all rights it was a good day. Good days, however, were unfortunately not made to last so deep beneath the earth, in a Dungeon designed specifically to hate them, and where there had been good moods and easy conversation, there was only the bitter taste of quickly rotted happiness stinging at their tongues. 

"I'm sure that you could keep up whatever it is that you think you're doing right now, but I cannot ensure the prolonged well-being of your poor sister if you do so." 

The voice, dry and heavy with a healthy amount of patronising mockery, belonged to none other than the Lord of the Dungeon, the Mad Mage, Thistle, who at that particular moment in time was trapped under Laios knee, pinned to the ground like a large beetle pinned to a display board. Even in a position of a clear disadvantage, the elf had still managed to find a way to play around with the dynamics to land him in an advantageous place. After all, not only was he careful to phase it in a way that would hurt as much as he could make it, poking at the loss of the tall-man's sister for the sake of Thistle allowing his dragon to continue its work, he also made it clear that he was more aware of what they were doing there than they were of, well, pretty much anything to do with him.
Admittedly, pinned to the ground by a man in armour, rocks digging uncomfortably into his back as they were, he was more than prepared to say anything outrageous with the intention of shaking the man enough to be able to escape. 

Nowhere along the way had any of them expected to come across the Lord of the Dungeon, let alone have a member of their little party sit on him so that he couldn't escape them.

"You're bluffing." came the challenge Laios had intended to make, but the uncertainty was all too obvious in his voice. If this had not been enough, he did actually shift his weight slightly, lessening at least some of the pressure of his knee on his present captive's chest. 

"Not at all," came the flippant reply, "After all, things might have recognised my dragon and so left it alone, but after what you've done," a pointed glance to Marcille, "To it, I cannot say that remains the same now. It has a job to do, so I'd rather it not be killed but there are others that can fill the gap if need be."

The idea of Falin, whatever might have been left of her, mind, body or soul, being attacked by something when she was left all by herself down there because of something they were unintentionally involved in was enough to tug at something in Laios' heart, so he relented a little. He shuffled awkwardly back, giving the cause of all their present misfortunes the space to sit up and make himself a little more comfortable. It was a comfort that lasted for a handful of heartbeats at the very most as the extraordinarily old teenaged elf barely had the time to straighten himself up before a fuming Marcille jabbed the business end of Ambrosia mere inches from his face. Clearly the nerve he had struck in the tall-man had also hit something a little more volatile in the half-elf.

"How dare you use her as a bartering chip?" Marcille snapped, "After everything you've done to her, how do you not care? Haven't you done enough? You turned her into a monster!"

Thistle mumbled something that sounded alarmingly close to 'you were the one to do that, don't project your guilt onto me', pointedly looking anywhere but towards the person talking to him. 

"You turned the love of my life into a dragon," snapped she, "If you so much as touch a hair on her head again, I swear I will kill you." There was nothing in her tone that could suggest this was anything less than a somber promise.