As they all began to make plans on what to do and began to mount up and go the creatures ran right after them, the beasts growling and snarling at the thought of a fresh kill, their rotting smell very evident. One of them went straight for Lyrisa, who had her whip at the ready, which wasn't really a good weapon for parrying at all, but it seemed to work if she held it taught and used it sort of like a makeshift quarterstaff in terms of blocking. Unfortunately, Lyrisa's combative abilities were much weaker compared to these creatures. The beast easily got past her poor attempt at a parry, its claws raking in very deep across Lyrisa's torso, leaving a couple of nasty, bloody gashes. Needless to say, she was in pretty bad shape after that blow. 

The next one went after Leifr on his horse, a poor target choice since Leifr was a much more skilled combatant than Lyrisa, and was also mounted upon his powerful looking warhorse. Fortunately, despite its rather quick claws, Leifr's shield was able to block the blow completely, the creature not able to sink its claws into Leifr. However, it didn't seem like it was trying to claw Leifr, but instead looked like it was trying to latch onto him, as if attempting to grab him, something that probably wasn't a good thing. Thankfully, this attempt was prevented as Leifr was easily able to push away its "hands" with his sword and shield. 

The third one also charged at Leifr, but had a different target. It tried to aim for Leifr's horse instead, aiming to sink its claws into Leifr's mighty beast of burden. Despite how fast these creatures were, and Leifr's horse's track record of dodging, the blow missed completely. Now the heroes could begin a counterattack, if it wasn't for the Ugling chanting something in some strange language while its 'pets' were attacking. 

The markings on one of the skulls, the leftmost one, began to glow an eerie, blackish-red color as Lyrisa would be able to sense a foul, twisted power coming form the staff now thanks to her more mystical sixth sense. The Ugling brushed a hand over the skull before aiming it at Leifr and his horse. 

Leifr would feel a familiar sensation, much like the feeling of when Honor bit into him, only it was a much deeper bite that seemed to hit into his very being. At first it just felt like some painful bite, and Leifr felt as though he could fight off the feeling. Moments later though it began to barely manage to overtake him, his body becoming unable to move as he felt, saw, smelled, heard, and even tasted nothing but pain, as if all of his senses were feeling and observing nothing but pain. As hard as he tried, whatever dark power this Ugling was using on him seemed stronger than Leifr's body. Fortunately Leifr was able to stay atop his horse, but couldn't do much of anything without suffering through detrimental pain. He still felt able to act, but to do so through the pain would be difficult. 

Suddenly though, out of nowhere, the Ugling let out a loud, guttural curse of pain in its horrid language as something hit it right in the back, the creature turning around quickly now, what looked like a small throwing knife imbeded into the creatures back, its dark greenish, reddish blood dripping from the wound. Standing there now was a strange cloaked and hooded figure, a veil in the hood of the cloak obscuring the figure's face for the most part. The figure seemed somewhat short and was completely silent as he stood there, a [url=http://www.milesteves.com/gallery/d/2349-2/Repeating+Crossbow_001.jpg]very well crafted looking, yet strangely designed, crossbow[/url] in one of his hands. 

"You handle those monsters... ill handle this one..." His voice was quiet and still. Not disinterested like Vialesa's was, but sort of... soft and mysterious. A male voice, but at the same time just quieter. It seemed that whoever this person was, from the fact that he just put a knife in the Ugling's back probably indicated that he was friendly, despite how he just suddenly seemed to be there, probably having been very quiet in his approach.