For a moment, Fanilly was silent at Lilianna's words. But she knew it was the truth, nodding quietly after a brief pause.

"You're right," she began, "I was already questioning it before we set out. I couldn't understand how a raiding party of orcs could possibly have come so close to the capital. There's no way their movements would go unnoticed."

It didn't take deep expertise to know that orcs were not the most subtle of creatures. Their strengths were in their numbers and their ferocity, not their tactics. And certainly, absolutely not in magic. Orc magic was almost unheard of, not even the most cruelly intelligent minds among the barbaric, cannibalistic race were capable of feats of magical prowess. And that was because it was not a matter of intelligence. As a race, orcs were simply without the capability to do magic. The meager amounts of mana within them were simply that which was found within all living things. Which meant...

"... Is it possible that... if that mage is their ally, is it possible that they somehow helped the orcs reach Brennan?" Fanilly asked. She wasn't sure if Lilianna would be able to answer such a question, but she did not have a deep knowledge of magic herself. She had no idea if there was any kind of spells that would allow such a numbers to move covertly, but it was one of the only possibilities she could think of.

Of course, moments later that train of thought was interrupted when the town's defenders approached them. The first was a young man, handsome, with dark hair and blue eyes. His armor was fine, though not without splatters of blood here and there.

"On behalf of my father, Lord of Brennan, I offer my deepest gratitude to the Iron Roses," he said, planting his sword in the ground and getting down onto one knee. Ah? He was doing something so... Fanilly almost made to stop him, but he quickly rose again.

"There are those among our number who perished here, but your efforts have ensured their lives did not end in vain. May they rest in the moonlight," he continued, his voice taking a solemn tone. Fanilly lowered her hands. Ah... she wished they had received the news sooner, regardless. Or if they had made it with more speed, perhaps some of those guards who had died would still be alive...

The young man sighed.

"My father would like to speak with you, to thank you personally for coming to our aid."

He seemed a little uncomfortable. Not simply because of weariness from battle, but... why was it his father had not come personally? Was something wrong?

Had the Lord of Brennan not participated in the defense of the town...?

---

"... Ah-hah... I... guess you could say that," responded Sir Avlin, awkwardly, as he lay there. His leg exposed, Lyrie could now see the full extent of the damage. An ugly dark bruise had formed halfway down his shin, a deep purple blotch with a bulge in the center. It wasn't hard to guess what injury it was, but she needed to see exactly what the damage was.

"Sir Avlin, please remain still," she said, before placing her hand(now cleaned using the warm water Sir Tiral had provided) as lightly on the bruise as she could. She shut her eyes.

"I wish to see beyond flesh, to what lies beneath. Reveal it for me."

It was one of the earliest spells she had learned over the course of her lessons. It allowed her to see, within her mind, what was beneath the surface she was touching. To be honest, it was a modification of a spell made to perform this process on any solid object, but tailored to the process of seeing through flesh.

And in her mind, the girl could see it. Sir Avlin's leg had cracked, the bone breaking all the way through. On one hand, it was not a simple fracture and would be more difficult to fully mend, but on the other the bone had not pierced through the knight's flesh and jutted out of his body, which would have made realigning it more difficult. The lack of pain he felt was likely shock...

She could do this. She had practiced before. She had to do this for Sir Avlin.

Lyrie took a deep breath.

"Y-your... your leg is broken, but... I'll h-heal it!" she declared, trying to sound as confident as possible. She didn't want her patient to worry either.

---

Angeline lowered her shield. The exterior's glow was fading slowly, but it still felt like it was blazing hot in her hand. And yet she made no effort to drop it.

"... So it was a trap, then," she said, simply. That certainly seemed to be the case. Whatever magic had been involved here was entirely for the purpose of destroying anyone who had come to investigate. It was not only the tree that had been destroyed, there was a small crater at the epicenter of the explosion.

The moment Tiral arrived, however, well...

He didn't even have to try and detect it. No, the sheer residual magical energy that hit him would be possible to detect even without any active attempts. The trap in the tree was something powerful, something beyond the work of a regular mage. The one who had done this was deeply, incredibly gifted in the magical arts. It perhaps was not unexpected. Not when the perpetrator had presumably also fired the beam of magic that had melted rock simply by passing close to it.

But still...

This level power would undeniably be disturbing.

As if to immediately shatter the mood, however, a certain set of new figures arrived on the scene.

Peering out from behind nearby trees, roughly a dozen tiny figures suddenly fluttered onto the scene. Each one was small enough to fit in the palm of someone's hand, uniformly they all resembled human female children.

Fairies. They were hardly uncommon in Thaln's forests, and soon they were scouring the area, peering at the blasted apart tree and the crater. One, however, fluttered up to the knights, her wings thrumming. Another swiftly followed her.

"Oh, oh! It's knights! There's knights here, Feeree!" said the one with shorter, lighter hair.

The longer-haired one with darker hair(presumably Feeree) looked thoughtful.

"Do you think that they're looking for the dark lady?" she asked, aloud.

@PKMNB0Y@Raineh Daze@Crusader Lord@TheFake@Noodles@Crimson Paladin

He shrugged and gestured to the woodchips and fragments of tree and smoking crater as Tiral asked his questions. There was little enough left of the tree and nothing at all of the sigil.

"I could draw you a copy of the sigil. It's a lucky thing that I was here instead of another knight."

With the arrival of the fairies he froze. In his homeland they were known to be mischievous troublemakers that could be slow to forgive a grudge or a debt. At first glance though these seemed to be more benevolent.

"If this dark lady did this, then yes. We would appreciate any aid you could give."

Tiral nodded his head quietly as Indrau spoke, quietly clenching his fists as he stepped away from the tree stump. Such power, concentrated in a sigil of all things... There was no way around it, to be frank. Though he was apt to deal with magic on his own, something of this caliber was far too insane to take on with a small group of knights, much less alone.

The arrival of the fairies made Tiral's eye twitch for a moment, but luckily enough the fairies were not able to catch a glimpse of that in the least. A nuisance though they could be, the young mage was not so foolish as to turn down any possible leads from them.

"I would appreciate a sketch of whatever was engraved on the tree, Sir Indrau," he commented before turning to face the fairies. "And... May I ask, little ones, what you mean by 'dark lady'? She did fairly... Dangerous things to my friends, so I would like to hear if you have any way of finding her."

Faries? Klaus halted her mount to a steady stop just before she was about to path her way back to Brennan. She sheathed her sword, knowing that those aren't very fond of the sight of a steel blade.

"Yes, we're looking for the dark lady, and her companions. May I know where they headed to?" Klaus, upon overhearing about a mention of the 'dark lady', asked the faes in a friendly demeanor.

The knight's fingers drummed a pattern on her sword blade, the paladin coming to the same conclusion reached elsewhere on the battlefield now that there was time to think--orcs should never have been able to get this close to the town, not on their own. In all her life, the only time they'd even had a chance of getting to the capital undetected was when a much larger threat had all the realm's forces out on campaign... with no external foes or internal rebellion to deal with, they should have been caught long before getting through the forest.

"Once he's healed, you should come find the captain; any wounded will have been moved together," she stated, walking towards the swelling group of knights and defenders.

---

His father hadn't come out... strange. From what she knew, the Lord Brennan was in excellent health, more than able to defend the town with the rest of them--and better suited to it by far than half the defenders, able to afford arms and armour as much as any lord. Could it be illness or injury that would explain his absence? It would be quite wrong for a noble to reject their duty and ignore the assault on their domain.

---

Seeing the captain safe as the enemy forces routed, Cymbeline rushed over to where the attack from the woods had occurred. As much as she wanted to see if Fannily was ok on a personal level, as a mage herself she was more than a little desirous to go and see what the nature of the other magic was. Others had already visibly gone over there during the fight, as it were, and as she herself arrived a searing, brilliant shade of purple erupted from tree before she could see where it came from. However, one of the other knights had at least stepped in to protect the others from this obviously magical trap of...surprising power at that. A small crater was all that remained in the end where a tree had probably once stood, and even the talented half-Nem mage felt a chill go down her spine about it all.

Whomever this was, whatever this had been, it was from someone whose magical power and skill was leagues above the average. It was more than a little concerning, in more ways then one beyond simply this mage having tried to kill the Captain. No, for trying to kill the Captain whomever this mage was would pay, but at the same time Cymbeline wanted to...understand this mage as well. This unspoken desire as a magic user to understand and learn about this mage's power, as it were, was a thing that resonated with her as a magic user despite her feelings as a knight differing from this in part.

However, as the others spoke to the faeries, she herself stayed silent, hoping not to anger them whilst the others asked a bit of questions to them. No need to try to overwhelm the powerful little things with too much at once.

---

---

After having approached the commander, to make sure herself and the others around here were at least safe after the enemy was finally routed, the stoic Elissa listened to what was initially said by their rather young commander. Between the show of magic, and the lack of magic ability among the orcs proper as a race, the sword and shield user had already managed to get some guesses at the matter. Or at least, ideas about what could have been the case. Lilianna's words, educated and wise as they were, seemed to finally hit Fannily in the face, in Elissa's mind anyways.

"Indeed, it would seem that the orcs had help coming here from whomever that mage was. Considering the power of their attack, though, perhaps the orcs and trolls were in part fodder to give said mage an opening at killing our Captain here," the half-Nem girl said, internally rolling her eyes at Fannily even as she facially appeared to be serious in tone and nature outwardly, "Mmm?"

As the town's bloodied defenders finally approached them, Elissa calmly shut her mouth as the handsome young man came up and introduced himself, after thanking the knights for helping. However, as he spoke of his father, the look of discomfort coming onto his face, Elissa felt a twang of suspicion rise into her chest for a moment. Perhaps it was unwanted suspicion, but to be sure...

"If i may ask in this instance- was your father harmed in the fighting?" Elissa asked, taking advantage of the momentary silence to ask a question of the boy, taking care to use a polite tone of voice in the process to try to avoid making a faux pas at this point.

Fleuri Jodeau

Fleuri didn't have to go far to find his horse. It had withdrawn from the scene of the battle, but had not nearly as far from it as it could have gone. A side effect of the creature's training, most likely, he thought as he approached it. Fleuri briefly examined the horse to ensure it was uninjured from the battle. Fortunately, it seemed none of the bloodstains on the animal's scarlet caparison were its own blood. Satisfied with its condition, he sheathed his zweihander and climbed onto his mount. He wasn't sure how long it'd last in this dangerous line of work, but it had proven itself today.

As he returned, he noticed several knights, including Klaus clustered near the trees. Curious as to what they were doing, he took his reins and trotted his horse toward the knights' location.

The son of the Earl of Brennan averted his eyes in silence for a few moments. It was clear the subject of his father was making him grow increasingly uncomfortable, but why? What had happened? Fanilly frowned to herself. This wasn't normal. She had once met the Lord of Brennan, when she was younger. Edoric Achter was a large, serious man, highly intelligent and knowledgeable about military history, but also kind and fond of relaying said military history in the form of interesting stories to children. Well, until he partook of her father's finest spirits a little too much, and then his speech became rather slurred and he'd eventually nodded off in his seat. But Fanilly knew he was not the sort of man to balk at the defense of his own town, and at the same time he was in good health. The last she had heard of the Lord of Brennan was that he was well enough to lead the guards of the town in training exercises, and that had only been a few months ago. What had changed so quickly that it was only now anyone outside of the town had heard of it.

"Is your father well, Lord Achter?" she asked, stepping towards the young man. Once again, however, he averted his eyes uncomfortably.

"... Please, come with me, he will speak to you personally," he replied, turning to lead the knights into town. Concerned about the state of the Earl of Brennan, Fanilly swiftly followed.

Within the town, there were a fair number of injured men in the care of the local healers, both those with magical capabilities and those without. As they progressed further, it was soon clear that the townsfolk were leaving their homes, a number of them cheering as the knights proceeded past.

An assortment of children were following them through the town excitedly, but the fact that some of the townsfolk were showing such support...

There were some who did not. Some turning towards the walls of the town.

'If they had gotten here earlier, then...'

The blonde knight couldn't hear their thoughts, but her mind created its own assumptions.

Soon enough, however, the knights had arrived at the home of the Earl of Brennan. Castle Achter was a stately structure, respectable and tall and made of dark stone. The great, dark wooden doors swung slowly open to permit their entrance, and what Fanilly saw ahead...

"Father, the Iron Rose knights have come to speak with you," the son of the Earl began.

Edoric Achter had changed little since Fanilly had last seen him. His hair had grayed, his face perhaps become more lined, but he still appeared in excellent health. And yet... something about his expression...

"... Ah, good!" the Earl said, "I wished to thank them for... for..."

His son averted his eyes.

"The town was under attack, Father. They helped repel the raiders."

"... Was it?" the Earl asked, confused, "No, it couldn't have been."

He chuckled.

"I know you are proud of your armor, my son, but there is no way you could have cleaned it so swiftly after a battle! And had there been such a threat, I would not simply be sitting here!"

Fanilly stared. But there were still specs of orcish blood splattered across the younger Achter's armor. There still was on her own armor. How could it be possible that the Earl of Brennan had no idea a battle had taken place?

---

"Ah, I... yes, Sir Radistirin," Lyrie replied, swiftly, before returning her focus to the man's wounded leg. By now she had begun to wrap it, force the bone back into place. She had already cast a spell to dull feeling further, so Sir Avlin wouldn't feel anything from the realignment of the bone. She knew, of course, that such a sensation would undoubtedly be unpleasant if nothing else. As soon as the bone was realigned, she could begin mending it. Of course, the knight would still need some rest, ideally, but he would be able to walk again.

That was what was important.

---

"Ah? She did bad things to your friends?!" cried Feeree.

"I knew she was bad, Feeree!" the other fairy said, folding her arms and nodding sagely, "I could just feel it!"

"I'm sorry I didn't believe you, Kopuro..." Feeree said, sagging, "It felt weird being around her but she didn't seem too bad! She didn't hurt anyone, did she? She didn't get anybody right?! She didn't-"

Feeree was cut off when Kopuro rapidly prodded her in the side with two of her figures.

"Uwaaaah! Waaah!" the fairy squirmed, nearly falling out of the air for a moment before catching herself. "Kopuroooo, why?!"

"They were asking you questions! If you feel bad for anything you should answer them!" responded the lighter-haired of the two.

"Um... um... Right! The dark lady had this black dress and really long hair and she was talking to one of those ugly orcs!" Feeree said, "And I thought that was weird and bad but then she saw me and I got a little scared! But she just smiled and asked me if I knew where a good view of the human town nearby was, so I told her right here!"

More people seemed to be gathering. He hoped that these fairies weren't the shy type. Their answers could prove to be their only lead to whoever this Dark Lady was. He put out of his mind that these two had pointed this hilltop out to her as being such a vantage point but...

"Was this before the battle? Or before we had shown up down there?"

Such a working of magic should have taken some time. The knights mmight not have been the initial target. Perhaps she had intended to use it to blast though the defenses of the town, giving the orcs and trolls the chance they needed to break in and take the fighting to the streets.

Other parts of his mind churned slowly. That this magic had enough power to still have destructive force left over after coming into contact with Silence was astounding. Many mages would be unable to to draw upon anything while even close to the blade. To come into contact with it should have annihilated the spell totally.

"Wait, she can talk to orcs... A human...?" Klaus gulped. She wasn't sure whether she was feeling puzzled or surprised. A human and orcs aren't supposed to be able to get along like that. Reon... Orcs being controlled are just gleeman's tales!

Having pushed her way to the front, Tyaethe was one of the most baffled by the lord's response. For someone to be so blind to what was right in front of them was... simply wrong. The lord wasn't that old, either, and to simply be blind to the conflict seemed all too explicit a denial. But was he still going to be able to refute its existence when confronted with something other than a visual indication?

Moving fast, so that hopefully she could get it done before any guards fulfilled their duties and did their best to cut her down, the paladin grabbed Brennan's arm--and planted his hand straight on her breastplate. A breastpltae coated from top to bottom in a thick layer of tacky, still-wet troll blood.

---

Senile...? No, the younger Lord Brennan would have been taking over his father's duties in general if that was the case. But if the Earl was otherwise fit for command, then a delay in the defences would give the orcs a better chance at achieving... whatever inscrutable goal it was that orcs said out to do. Or rather, the goal that whatever magic user was with them had set? Perhaps a curse of some sort that had failed to weaken the town's defences to the point they could be broken before reinforcements had arrived.

... though that idiot had some strange idea about how to address magical befuddlement.

Fleuri Jodeau

As Fleuri drew closer to the other knights, he was able to discern what they were doing- they were speaking with fairies. From what he knew, they were beings of magic, native to Thaln's forests, childlike and perpetually immature by human standards but not malevolent. Depending on how long they had been watching, they may have some information regarding whatever was going on, he hoped. Assuming, of course, that they were feeling cooperative and had not been offended in some way.

He brought his horse to a stop as he reached the group. "Klaus, it's good to see you no worse for wear," he said as he rode up alongside her, raising his visor. "I'm afraid I am a bit out of the loop at the moment. What happened out there? What was that beam?"

Tiral quietly massaged his forehead as he listened to the fairy's comments, trying to resist the urge to flick the fairy's forehead as she continued on. It was astounding how ignorant such beings were, and though they had done nothing wrong, the mage-knight had hoped that whatever had brought them into existence would be so apt as to give them a little more than pure naivety.

Of course, that self-restraint soon burnt out as soon as he heard that the fairy was won over by a smile.

A smile.

And so he gave a calm smile towards the offending fairy before flicking her square in the forehead.

"Understand now, then, that people who talk with orcs are the kind of people who would hurt other, more well-intentioned people. Because of that lady, our Captain almost got killed by a blast of energy multiple times this one in scale," he stated, taking a deep breath before shaking his head. He was never one to associate with fairies, as they always ended up causing some problem or another no matter what happened. Indrau's line of questioning would undoubtedly be useful in the long run, but the mage was fairly certain that the culprit had begun talks of this matter long before today.

"Well, the past is the past. That flick should be enough punishment, and hopefully you listen to your friend next time. In any case, I'm going to go see if I can't obtain any information about the spellcaster who caused all of this," he stated, picking up a piece of still-smoldering debris before carefully looking at Indrau's sword. "When's the earliest you can get me a copy of that sigil on paper? While we've seen what this person can do firsthand, we need to understand what they're doing so we can counteract it on a larger scale. If possible, an idea of what it seemed to be composed of would also be quite useful. Catalysts are just as important in this scenario."

After all, a battle was often decided before it even began more often than not.

---

Did. Tiral. Just. Flick. A. Fairy?

The fay were not bad creatures at heart, being small, female, playful, mischievous, not actually a threatening presence to wipe out a town or something unless you managed to bumble into pissing a lot of them off at once. But powerful in their magic as it were, the one fairy had seemed to help the "bad lady" who had nearly vaporized the commander with magic in an innocent manner, not knowing the vantage point would be crucial to a battle or even attacking the town potentially at that. Even her two compatriots were prodding her about helping the bad lady, having had more of an idea as faeries than the one they were fussing at. But flicking a fairy on the forehead? It wasn't the worst thing ever if the fairy and its companions took it well. But if they even got so much as enough pissy to lash back...ugh. The potential was a headache and a half already.

Well, if the worst happened she would sigil her best defenses up on the others and try to help get the group out of there if needed.

But at least it seemed that Sir Tiral had made a point to explain things, with hopefully the faeries otherwise supporting the action against their ditzy comrade as a reminder. And as he turned to Indrau and asked for a drawing of that sigil to boot...

"I can help with studying the sigil, being specialized in sigils myself, and help in determining its nature and counteractions for it," the half-Nem piped up to Tiral and Indrau, her brain switching from worry over faeries back to the collected mindset of wanting to both understand this magic as a mage and the personal desire to seriously want to help counteract this stuff in the future in case the captain was targeted again.

She...couldn't imagine the captain being put in danger again by this. And if Tiral wasn't around to protect her to boot the next time, it would potentially be a terrible situation. Orcs were another thing too, but if this magic could surpass the normal spectrum of it...jeez. But she was a more formal mage than many here, perhaps at least, and that would be of at least some help in this situation. Hell, being a sigil user of note within this group was already a thing she could use to try to assist with this as part of the Knights proper in this aspect of things in general. At least, that was her mindset.

Hopefully, though, the two elder knights wouldn't shove her away due to age alone.

@PKMNB0Y@TheFake

---

---

The lord seemed as knowledgeable that orcs had attacked his town as a basic peasant would be about matters of state and political affairs. Which is to say, not at all. To him, his son saying there had been a battle was as silly and nonsensical as saying he say a unicorn flying overhead with a troll riding on its back singing to a pretty tune. It made absolutely no sense that a lord would not know of the state of his domain being under attack, even though the townsfolk and others were more than fully aware. The one person who should have been conscious of this was not, and his son seemed to be hiding something about this. How long had this been going on? The boy hadn't answered her earlier question even, which had already been a sign of something amiss.

Heavens, even Sir Radistirin had jumped past the guards to place the lord's hand on their own blood-soaked breastplate to try to drive the point home. And that itself was a risk considering the guards, but hell if she didn't feel it was a fitting action considering the situation. If the Lord might get some sense in him, then it could be a lesser issue than it potentially was for him.

But if the blood failed to get him to recognize a damned thing....blast, she wished her twin sister was here to cast some dispelling sigil in case a magic of some sort had sway over this man's mind.

The half-Nem then began to glance about the scene with a subtle, furtive gaze, noting the guards, the lord, and anyone in the current proximity of things to try to look for any suspicious figures or things that might stand out.

She could at least do this much, keeping her cool as the others took some action or another.

@Raineh Daze@VitaVitaAR

"Ah... the Immortal Knight!" The Earl of Brennan exclaimed, "Now this is quite a surprise! Why ever have you come to my fair town?"

He paused for a moment, his expression one of befuddlement as Tyaethe placed his hand directly onto her blood-soaked breastplate.

"... If you believe your armor is in need of cleaning, I would be happy to provided the services of my Servants," he declared, with a good-natured smile(though not without confusion, he didn't seem to understand just why Tyaethe had placed his hand upon her armor). As Fanilly recalled, none of this behavior was particularly strange for the Earl Edoric, save for the fact that it was completely out of place in this situation. And yet he looked fully aware of his surroundings, and he was rather young for his mind to be faded already. He was by no means a young man, but he was also not of an especially advanced age either.

"Of course, if you take my offer, perhaps you can ask them where my sword is? I haven't seen it in two weeks, and they insist it is by the side of my throne," Edoric Achter added, "I would have docked their earnings, if not for the fact they seem adamant about it. Perhaps they have been subject to some kind of magic spell?"

Fanilly paused for a moment. Indeed, sheathed and leaning against the throne, was the sword of Edoric Achter. It was an enormous blade, and from what the girl could recall the Earl of Brennan preferred to have it by his side at all times. "... Earl Achter, your blade is by the side of your throne."

Edoric Achter immediately looked disbelieving, before looking to the side of his throne.

"... I'm certain your mind has not been magically addled as well, young Captain Danbalion, but don't you think playing tricks is unbecoming of your position?" he began, with a hearty laugh. "... For that matter, you have all come here unarmed! How ever could there have been a battle?"

There was no mistaking it. Fanilly was certain, now, that there had been some sort of magical interference in the Earl of Achter's mind. It was the only explanation.

---

"Uwah!"

Feeree was sent reeling through the air, only to be caught by Kopuro. The fairy quickly held her forehead, wincing.

"Ow ow ow ow ow..."she winced, as her friend stroked at her hair with a frown. Moments later, Kopuro was glaring at the perpetrator.

"Hey! I know Feeree is in idiot, but was that really necessary?!" she called, one arm around her friend's waist as if supporting her(even though they were both still very much in the air, rendering such support largely unecessary). "It's not like she didn't already get it was stupid after she learned that lady was bad!"

For a few moments, Feeree was silent.

"... I-I'm not sure I really want you defending me, Kopuro..." she mumbled, before responding to the question that had been asked of her. "Um... there was a lot of commotion afterwards, so if it was a battle that must have been after she asked me about a good spot."

Meanwhile, a few of the fairies had been scared off by the new arrivals, but for the most part they were rather inquisitively flittering around, investigating the knights who had arrived. A few of them were, perhaps, getting a little too close to pockets and pouches.

@Crusader Lord@PKMNB0Y@Crimson Paladin@Raineh Daze@Noodles@TheFake

He nodded slowly, thinking things through. If she had been there before the battle it was all either staged to draw out the knights or she had intended to support the attack and possibly use the spell to breach the wall. As things stood the paranoid part of his mind leaned towards the former.

"Lockhart. I'll sketch the symbol when we return to Candaeln. It was a tremendously powerful spell, all the more impressive considering how destructive the initial beam was."

If he had been able to he might have bent down to put himself on a level with the diminutive things but instead held out his hand for one of them to land on.

"And might one of you have seen which direction this Dark lady left in? Perhaps you could ask some of your friends to help us. I might be motivated to offer you a gift in return for your cooperation."

Seeing that Indrau was more apt to dealing with the fairies (who at this point seemed to not have anything else of note in mind), Tiral quietly began to gather some of the less-vaporized chunks of the tree into a small bag. As soon as more fairies started flitting around, though, the mage made the decision to quietly chant an incantation and generate a bunch of ice crystals around himself. They weren't there for self defense by any means, but the temperature around him did drop drastically in the process. It made handling the burnt wood a little less painful aside from that, at least, but the primary focus was on not having anything on him looted out of nowhere.

"I'll go focus on these chunks, then. I leave it to you two to handle the sigil. Notify me if there's anything you don't recognize; we've far more resources at our disposal than our minds along, after all," he stated, calmly picking up one final chunk and tying up on his belt. "I deign that punishment when the life of someone important is at stake is rather necessary, all problems aside; what would you have done if you were in my position? What if she had died from your negligence? What if not having that information in the first place would've changed the outcome and not placed her in so much danger?"

There was really nothing else to be said regarding the matter; after all, it wasn't as if these fairies would actually take anything meaningful away from this. The others could handle the rest from here, after all.

"I have no idea Fleuri. Blasts of magic casted by a lady in black dress. I don't know how, but orcs seemed to have obeyed a human. I've slain quite a lot of goblins, and I've never heard of something like this before..." Klaus hissed, tying up her ponytail with a sharp tug. She held back her temper, she wouldn't want to frighten the faeries, not especially after a Knight flicked its forehead. Only her tight grasp on the halter and her slight frown on her face have gave away her feeling of frustrations.

Fleuri Jodeau

Fleuri cringed as he watched Tiral flicked the fairy on the forehead, knocking the tiny creature back. To a human, it might not seem like much, but to a fairy, he thought, it must be like getting struck by the end of a trebuchet arm. He hadn't caught why Tiral was angry or what the fairy had done to warrant a response, but it seemed to be an out of place act regardless, especially for an Iron Rose. The fairies' response to this act only seemed to make it look even less justifiable.

"Tiral, was that necessary? What could she have possibly done to you to justify that?" he piped in after Klaus filled him in, slightly upset.

Even if the fairy did somehow have it coming, it was prudent that the Iron Roses not antagonize them. If these fairies saw anything related to this attack, the knights would need to know, even if it meant walking on eggshells as to not displease these childish beings. I suppose it's up to me to try and mend things, Fleuri thought to himself as he removed his helmet and carefully plucked a single scarlet feather from the plume.

"Thank you Feeree, you've been most helpful. It's not much, but here's a little something for your trouble," he said as he rode forward, offering the feather to the fairy. "Sorry about my friend's behavior."

Regarding this information, it was quite disturbing if it was true. A human sorceress of some sort, leading orcs? It'd explain how they got into Thaln while simultaneously unable to actually accomplish anything. Surely, he reasoned, sorceress or witch capable of getting orcs to do their bidding must be extremely powerful, and likely very influential as well. I wonder if Tyaethe might know anything relevant about this, he wondered. If this person's true target was the Iron Roses, then perhaps the Immortal Knight- having battled the order's enemies since its inception- could be able to recognize this mysterious foe's description or handiwork.

---

The mage ran her magic into a sigil placed on her cloak, a minor protective sigil that was meant for things like guarding against pickpockets and their ilk. It wouldn't harm any faeries who tried to get close, but would rebuff them and physical keep them from getting to her things. It was the most passive she could think to guard them off with, as she didn't want to take more severe actions as Sir Tiral had. Sure, she had the idea of where he was coming from, but at the same time didn't want to risk things too much in regards to these things. Couldn't be too careful then.

She then looked over at Sir Indrau, giving a nod as she watched him try to negotiate with the smaller beings. Hopefully they would be receptive, at least since the older knight hadn't flicked them and such, since such information might be able to help them out. Though seeing Tiral also moved about to collect pieces of bunrt wood chunks left over from the blast of whatever sigil was on that tree, Cymbeline furrowed her brows in thought. If naught else, she could begin an investigation with one of the remaining chunks around here, whilst Tiral perhaps had the time to do no in-depth methods on the amount he had taken.

Leaning down, the mage inspected one of the larger chunks closest to her, the steam and smoke from the heat of the blast seemingly still trailing off of it and into the air. Though she didn't touch it, she used her finger to draw a sigil around it on the cooled-down spot of dirt around it. It was a sigil commonly used by her teachers at the Mage's College in her hometown to do initial analysis on new substances or experiments. Something used to help gague the level of magical energy involved in something affected by a spell, as well as assist in determining the general, base nature of a given spell. Nothing of detail for sure, but a very basic means of investigation.

"Time to see what this thing has to tell us...at least on the fly," Cymbeline noted, running her magic into the sigil in order to activate its effects, the information going to be fed directly into her mind by the magic of the sigil in question.

---

---

The lord's mind was addled beyond what she had initially thought, it seemed, and there was no doubt at this point that magic was involved for sure. Unable to perceive weapons or such, perhaps this was a curse that had been placed on the lord to keep him from commanding the defense of his town? It seemed rather likely, to be sure, that such an idea would be tactically notable. But she herself had no means of really determining the nature of this stuff, unlike her sister whom was absent and perhaps with some of the others who had gone towards the forest. What a bother.

"The man can't perceive weapons, it seems," the more serious twin noted aloud, for the other knights and others in their immediate vicinity to hear, "Not even his own sword. No wonder he didn't know a battle was going on here, he's been addled himself to be blinded from the truth."