Charles
Belladonna of Taemar
Sorceresses lodge

The screams heard in the distance sent a shiver all over her body. *Too late, they had already arrived*

She halted the horse once she reached the place, seeing the chaos of the battle. Dead bodies sprawled across the floor, her sisters of the lodge beheaded, with arrows piercing their skin, their guts out of their bodies, their chests full of blood... It had been a carnage.

She got off the horse, watching the scene with tears in her eyes. The trees calmed down, the waters went limp, the winds and part of the fires died down... All of it bit by bit as the witches felt the life scape from their souls.

The scene gave her flashes, flashes of her past. Suddenly she was nothing but a little petrified girl seeing her neighbors murdered on the streets as the buildings burned to the ground.

The last one standing was the Head Sorceress, which had a paladin constricted under her best incantation. The elder's eyes went wide as her throath got a chunk ripped away, blood gushing out of the bite, her body and incantation falling to the floor to lie with the rest of lodge.

Bella fell to her knees, mouth agape and eyes open wide, tears streaming down her face. *Too late*, those words repeated again and again in her head as she froze there.
Kevin
Elsilie Buhle
A small hut in The Melsoh

The smell of fetid plant matter filled the air as the melsi witch brewed a handful of concoctions. The smell was horrid, like fire to piles of rotting corpses, the Melsi Deathweed used to make balms that help stave off the signs of aging had an all too familiar smell. The melsi witch didn't care, however, as she had made this particular balm too many times to count. The Melsoh was full of useful plants and animals, it was no wonder the place attracted witches and bandits. *Melsi Deathweed, Virgin Bloodroot, a Spider Lily bulb, a thickening agent...* The witch humed quietly to herself as the ingredients were mixed together, a bird fell to the ground with a thud outside the window from the stench alone. *"A hopper's dinner..."* She cooed to herself as she finished up mixing.

Upon setting the mixture into appropriate containers to set and thicken, the Fern Hoppers sat outside the building began to make their growling hiss noises, as if a trespasser were near. Heading out the front door, a Fern Hopper greeted her, growling and snapping with anxiety. "What is it girl?" Elsilie questioned as she patted the creatures head, stroking it to try and bring its nerves down. She pulled a knife from her side and grabbed a handful of one of its ferns to sever. The beast hissed and growled loud with obvious pain, but had no objection to the witch doing as she wished with it. "Oh stop it, it'll grow back." She said to the beast, "Go and find that bird that just fell to the ground" The beast hissed once more before turning and crawling off to find its meal.

Heading inside, the witch took the newly cut Hopper ferns, as well as a handful of other ingredients and began mixing them into a clean pot. Upon completion of the concoction, the witch moved to a small basement dug underneath the hut with a ritual circle and some other magic sites built in. She approached the ritual circle and painted eight runes evenly spaced around its circumference with the newly prepared mixture. Sitting legs crossed in the middle, eight candles ablaze outside the circle at the place of the runes and eight caged rats in front of her, she began a chant with eyes closed. As intended by the ritual, the witches sight changed, from the black of closed eyelids to wild and vivid colours, her mind soaring through the etherium until she was able to see once more; a Fern Hopper buried in the mud, watching from a distance. Through the eyes of the Melsi beast she saw a group of people, one ran forward before changing shape into a beast, others followed suit. She watched as carnage followed them, they slaughtered a gaggle of witches without mercy. Elsilie felt her gut churn as she watched, until the culprit came into view- *Paladins...* She thought before ending the incantation, returning the vision to her own. 

The eight rats eyes had all popped, blood and eye-liquids pooled around their lifeless bodies, the runes all burnt and reduced to nothing, the ritual used up.. Taking no notice of the rats, the witch took a moment to wipe blood dripping from her nose. "... I'd better leave.."
Kari
The Paladins and the Eclipse

"Sir Jax!" Aleks rushed forward from the brush holding a waterskin.

"Not me, boy! The Paladin!" Jax ran outside and fell to his stomach in front of one of the many bog patches around the cabin. With a cry that mixed both satisfaction and pain, he dunked his flaming arm into the murky water, using his free hand to shovel mud onto the appendage.

Aleks ran to the cabin, where the Paladin Ian had been flung against a wall, and held the waterskin to his lips. Ian spat and cough once the liquid reached his lips, expecting water but getting the sour taste of wine, he recovered just as quickly as he spat, downing a few gulps of the brew.

"My thanks, squire." He breathed out, and Aleks nodded meekly.

Vex was still in a bestial rage, his teeth coming free from the dying crone and he swallowed the junk of flesh he tore free. His nose picked up something else, another presence outside. He got to his feet and walked to the nearby window. Outside was a newcomer, a woman by the smell, on her knees outside. Vex hoisted himself through the window, wrenching his spear from the spot on the wall, and trotted over to the sobbing witch.

"The hex that caused the plague, I know it's here, if you wish your dead companions to have any respect in their burial I suggest you tell me before the shifter finishes her meal." It was painful to remain this calm under the effects of the potion, and Vex twitched from the pain.
Lawrence
Ser Wendel Sommerling van Spenglersbek
The Dark Crimson Rose Lodge of Sorceresses

The shifter responded to his attempt at coercion with a chilling pause. He couldn't see its eyes and predict its next move, for the stench of ruined viscera offended his senses and blurred his vision with tears. Never before had he felt such abject horror, and he'd seen his share of horrible things. This incursion wasn't his first battle. As the beast seemed to study his threat, he wondered if it would be his last.

His mind struggled to keep up with his surroundings. The creature was suddenly flying towards him with frightening power, the tip of his spear failing to meet its underbelly in time. Much to his shame, Wendel recoiled with a sharp groan. The two big paws landed upon his shoulders, and he wondered if the beast was about to bite off his head, helmet and all. Rather, he felt those limbs exert such a force upon his frame that he feared his spine would snap in two. As if by divine intervention, his body bent rather than broke, and he crashed against the floor and rolled. Had he ever been so overpowered? So helpless?

All was a red-brown haze for the moment after his tumble came to a stop. Whatever objects he'd landed on were two or three in number, hard and narrow. He could barely feel his limbs, but, with a glance, he appeared to be intact. Where had his spear gone? Where was he? Was it over? And ... Where was his spear?

He didn't hear the loud, awful sound so much as he noticed its sudden silencing. The shifter had fallen upon the witch he'd tried to rescue. With a sharp motion of its head, it discarded something pale to the ground. He saw the fiendish maw seize the woman's throat. *Crunch*. The worst sound in the world. That sound was the reason why he avoided blunt weapons. The sound of breaking bones always cut deep into his ears, caressing his mind with a feeling of vicarious death.

The woman's head lolled. Her face was red. No; it was only half-there! Her tongue hung loosely from a dark, wet, gaping orifice that the gods had surely never intended to be seen bare. What moral lapse had led to this travesty? He'd only known Paladins to be protectors, and yet they were the ones responsible for this. It was they who left this disgusting thing to indulge in its unnatural nature. Everything about this was perverse.

Both beast and victim fell to the floor, and the former began feasting on the contents of the witch's chest and the tender flesh of her neck. He could hear the snapping of ribs and the crunching of cartilage. He watched incredible back-muscles shift and tense beneath the monster's fur as it gorged itself on manmeat.

There was an absent look on his face as he slumped against the wall, staring silently with parted lips.