As Alexis made her way back down the stairs, the entire building shook from some impact outside the city. She held onto the side railing so he wouldn't fall down the rest of the stairs as she waited for the shaking to subside -which it did just a moment later. When she got to the bottom Soron was passing out some strange runes at the bar, and as she approached he handed her one too. She listened as he told them how to use the runes to summon him, and in the back of her mind she hoped it wouldn't come to that.
She put the rune into one of the hidden pockets on her dress, thinking that if she had to use it, it'd be easier to grab from there than from within one of her item bags. As Suleykaar and Soron left, Alexis looked around the few people left in the bar and then took one last second to check herself over. Her bow was already strung, currently being held comfortably on her right shoulder, and she could feel her dagger was still in its sheath hidden on her left leg. She had 32 arrows in good condition, and a handful that she still needed to repair, which she quickly bound together with some twine so she wouldn't grab any of those broken arrows during the fight. She knew she'd probably be able to get a few arrows from the other side during the fight if she ran out; it wasn't that hard to just take the ones that were shot at her for herself.
She was ready to go, or so she told herself as she stalled for just a second longer, deciding to tie her hair up so it would stay out of her face in the battle. She considered the Sunlight Energy orb in the bag tied to her belt, and thought for a second that maybe she should use it now, but shook her head as she decided against it. As she left the bar and began walking toward the edge of the tree, where there were a few openings where people could fly into and out of the city, she started weighing her options. She was low on energy, yes, but not to the point of collapse quite yet. She would have to use the orb before she could fight, but she didn't want to waste any energy because she knew once that orb was used, that's all she'd have for the rest of the battle.
As she passed a lone guard who'd given up trying to keep people off the balcony -onlookers who all were just trying to see what was happening- she reminded herself of her position in this fight. She was on Sunfire's side, but she wasn't
with them. She shouldn't expect anyone to be able to help her if she got into a bad situation, so she would need to keep an eye out for herself. She was alone, surrounded by temporary allies, yet ultimately alone. She climbed up onto the railing of the balcony after making her way through the small but dense crowd there. Standing tall as she looked out over the scene, she made up her mind on her plan of attack. Get down to the battlefield, use the energy orb, and then get to some kind of high ground where she could make the most difference as an archer.
If I get surrounded by those guys, I'm gonna want to be able to fall back to somewhere... She couldn't see a good place, and now she'd waited too long. She would just have to figure it out when she got to that point. Taking a deep breath, and ignoring her nerves and most of her basic instincts, she jumped off the balcony. A vine that had been climbing up the side of the tree caught her after a few seconds, and she used it to lower herself the rest of the way to the ground safely. As soon as her feet touched the ground she began to focus on what exactly was going on around her now, calculating where the nearest enemies were and what her next action should be, though she was still a ways behind the front line. She glanced at the moon in the sky as it shone coldly, high above the chaos around the city, and after a second she remembered her need for energy. Controlling that one vine hadn't been too much, but she didn't trust herself to remember the energy orb later when she would really need it.
She took the softly glowing orb out of its bag, holding it to her chest for a second as she released its energy into herself. There would be a bright flash of light as the energy that she couldn't absorb escaped, the shopkeeper from before being right about her not needing all of the energy contained within the orb. As a passing thought, she hoped she hadn't blinded anyone around her with that, but as there weren't too many people nearby she let the worry fade. The glass orb shattered and turned into dust as soon as the energy it had been holding captive was gone, its purpose served. Alexis let the dust fall through her fingers for a moment as she thought what to do next.
Maybe find someone in charge? But they'd all be busy fighting.. She shook her head at herself again. Alone, she was here alone. She didn't need to take any orders from anyone.
Alexis began making her way towards where the most of the fighting seemed to be, though it seemed like the battle was getting more spread out as the Vrondi soldiers cut through the oncoming cultists one after another. Though, there was a strange feeling to the fight, as if the cultists weren't fazed at all, maybe they were even happy about the fact that they were all dying so quickly... Alexis tried not to pay it any mind. She stopped in a spot where the ground was raised slightly in a small hill, and began picking off any of the cultists who got too close with her arrows, retrieving them handfuls at a time every so often so she wouldn't run out.
@Rai