Rage was the only thing keeping her conscious right now. Her blood boiled as he dismissed their rebellion as<i>treason</i>. As if you could be a traitor to a false ruler. She wanted to spit in his eye. She wanted to tell him to go to hell. She wanted to fight him until she gasped out her last spiteful breath, more a wild, unbroken beast than any werewolf could ever hope to be.<br/><br/>And yet, at his ultimatum...something in her seemed to finally give. She knew she was lost, that there was no chance of her walking away from this with her freedom. The rebellion had been broken, the serpent's head severed from its body. All that mattered now was keeping her people alive. She swallowed shakily, a trickle of blood running from the corner of her mouth as she tried to gather enough breath to speak. When she finally did, the words were quivering with pain and exhaustion, but pitched so that everyone gathered could hear.<br/><br/>"<i>Your.</i>..angel."<br/><br/>She slumped on the cross, head dropping, as he hovered backwards. Her warriors had gone silent, staring mutely at the broken tiefling. Her stubborn pride was notorious among them. To see her brought to heel was deeply disturbing, almost moreso than seeing her hanging there.<br/><br/>At the wolfman's snarl of defiance, however, she raised her head, peering through disheveled locks. Aryel could only squirm with a desperate, broken whimper as Dradiro advanced on the werewolf, openly taunting him into a duel that could only have one outcome. "Don't--" she tried to croak out as the wolf deftly caught the weapons offered to him, wielding them both with an ease that seemed out-of-place with his wiry stature. "I don't need the wolf to tear you apart," he growled lowly, stepping to the side, slowly beginning to circle the tyrant as he waited for an opening. He knew he couldn't win this fight, but at the moment, he simply didn't care. Few things could induce a werewolf's rage more than a threat to the "pack", whether that was as small as a family or as large as a faction. Dradiro was going to pay for what he had done--to his commander, to the victims of the ambush, to this whole damn country.<br/><br/>A bestial snarl rippled through him as he tensed in preparation to spring upon his foe, but before he could seal his own fate, there came a single word from the winged woman hanging on the cross:<i> "Enough." </i>The wolf froze, yellow eyes flicking up to her in confusion. "Aryel, you can't be--"<br/>"I said<i>enough</i>, Vehran." she growled hoarsely. Despite being half-dead, broken in both body and spirit, there was a tone to her voice that forced the wolf to stand down. This wasn't the companionable, extroverted woman who joked with them and broke bread with them as if they were equals, rather than a knight and commoners. This was the born-and-bred warrior who had stood against a god's wrath, as fierce and unwavering as the sun's fire. She was their commander, and she<i>would</i>be obeyed. "I'm not losing any more of my people today." Even so, Vehran hesitated, gaze briefly landing back on Dradiro, a fury rekindling in his eyes. Sensing this, Aryel leaned forward on the cross, iron expression briefly becoming something more pained, more beseeching. "<i>Please</i>. Live to fight another day."<br/><br/>There was a tense moment where it seemed he was going to charge Dradiro anyway, but with another look at her, it passed. With a disgusted huff, the werewolf threw the weapons down, a globule of spit following them. "You're no god," he pressed again as the guards dragged him back into the gaggle of prisoners, "just a walking corpse on a power trip."<br/><br/>"You've got what you wanted," Aryel spoke again, this time addressing Dradiro in the hopes of getting his attention off the lippy wolf before he decided to kill him anyway. She could feel herself ebbing--adrenaline and pain could only keep one conscious for so long--and wasn't sure how much longer she could last. "The rebellion's broken. You win."