Marisol stood on top of a three story building made of grey and pink stone.  The second and third level roofs were staggered, ziggurat style, the second level a ten foot wide patio that wrapped around just two sides of the building.  The top level was  made of huge paving stones, forming a square about forty feet across.  In the far corner was a wooden structure with a door that looked like it led to a stairwell back down into the building.  Laid out in front of her was a central town square with a broken statue in the middle, ruined carts and other debris that had been scattered by the aurochs stampede, and a large church with a belltower rising up from the far corner.  At the top of the belltower, just visible in the murky haze, was her sloop.

Throughout the town and the mist she continued to hear the chaos of the aurochs; their bellows echoing between buildings and their hooves clattering on the stone paved streets.  Dromm yelled enraged curses as well as bone chilling death rattles while getting gored, crushed, or trampled.  She watched a lone aurochs trot through the square. 

She breathed in deeply and settled herself.  The rest of the party was nowhere to be seen and she didn’t feel she could wait any longer.

From behind her came a chilling voice, sounding hollow like it was speaking from inside an empty crypt.  “The little moth is finally here.  Looking for your flame, are you?”

She turned quickly.  On the other side of the roof stood a huge humanoid figure, muscular and well over ten feet tall.  His face was thrust forward with a large pointed nose and sharply angular chin.  He had pale white skin and closely cut blue hair with an iron circlet resting on his forehead.  He wore a loose fitting dark blue tunic tied at the waist with a grey sash, black trousers with grey pinstriping down the sides, and large bare feet with blueish talons.  If he were holding a set of opera glasses he’d look like he was about to step out for the evening.

Marisol nodded.  “Shutan.”  

Shutan returned the nod.  “Sparkler.”

Marisol ignored the slur.  She hadn’t heard him come up the stairs or walk out onto the roof.  In all her time of tracking him she’d never actually fought him and wasn’t sure of all his powers.  “Your sons are dead.”

“I’ll make more.  Maybe even with you.”

Marisol decided not to wait until the Bad King had more bads beside him.  She raised her fist and let a radiant bolt fly.  Shutan didn’t bother to dodge or evade.  The bolt hit him dead center in the chest, leaving a scorch mark on his pale skin.  He smiled and started walking slowly forward.

The burned skin under his tunic shimmered and healed itself.

Marisol fired another bolt and it hit him the same.  He kept walking and his skin healed again.

She set her jaw and knelt.  Calling upon her inner Kii she raised both fists and fired two bolts.  This time Shutan was rocked back a half step and not all the damage healed.  The eldritch ogre leapt forward, moving fast despite his bulk, and swung an overhand smash at her.

Marisol rolled out of the way and kicked for his kneecap, she struck it hard but it didn’t fold back like Skhopit’s had.  Shutan flung a backhand blow at her and missed as she flipped aside.  She came up leaping, flicking a kick which connected to his ribs, and followed up with a closed fist to the same spot.  The damage from her radiant bolts was now completely healed.

She backed up, running through her options.  None of them were good.  The ogre sneered and she shot another bolt at him.  This one he dodged.  

Shutan advanced, moving her back into the corner of the roof above the square.  “This is like a dream I had, dancing with a Light Princess.  That is, before I tore off her head and slurped out all her innards.”

“Are you going to talk or are you going to fight?” asked Marisol.  “Because if you’re going to talk I have other things to do.”

“Yes, like get to your precious skyship and fly, fly away?  I knew you’d come for it eventually.  And now you’ve brought your friends.  More tender morsels for me to eat.”

“Right, more talking.  Good bye.”  Marisol turned to leap off the roof.

“I think you should pretty please stay here with me,” said Shutan, casting Charm Person.

Marisol staggered to a halt at the edge of the parapet.  She turned, mind dulled.  “But... I really should be going.”

“In a minute, in a minute.”  Shutan walked closer to her.  “I have a secret to tell you.  Come close, dear, come close.”

She stood patiently as he came up beside her, towering over her, twice her height.  He reached down and drew the back of a talon gently across her cheek.  She smiled and looked up at him, noticing that his iron circlet ‘crown’ was actually branded into place with corrupted skin bunching up around it.  He started to reach his hand around her neck and open his mouth wide.

An arrow flew out of the dark doorway leading down to the rest of the building.  It stuck into Shutan’s side with a wet, meaty thwack.  Another arrow followed it immediately and hit him as well.

Isiah stepped out of the doorway, nocking another arrow.  “She’s charmed,” he called out.

Miah stepped out next, shooting her ray of frost cantrip.  It also hit the ogre.  He reeled back and Marisol instinctively rolled out of the way.

Caelian came out and cast holy fire.  The flames appeared all around him.  She charged forward with her Mace of Holy Light ready.

Kaspar and Cley charged out next running hard to cross the forty feet to the other corner of the roof.

Shutan swung a hard backhand at Marisol.  She didn’t try to evade.  His mailed fist hit her full in the chest and she sprawled back, tripping over the parapet and falling to the second story.

Cley and Kaspar were raising their swords to attack when Shutan disappeared.  Kaspar staggered to a halt, swinging uselessly at the space the ogre had been in.

As a SkyKnight paladin of high enough rank, Cley had gained the ability to radiate an aura that would line invisible creatures with a soft glow.  He saw Shutan’s form sidestepping along the edge of the roof.  “He’s there!”  Cley pointed while jumping past Kaspar and swinging his longsword with two broad strokes.  One missed but the other bit into something and they heard the ogre grunt in pain.

Isiah dashed behind both of them and slid up against the parapet.  He looked down.  Marisol was getting to her feet, steaming with fury.  Beyond her, down in the square, were a couple dozen Dromm coming in from different directions.   “We’ve got to wrap this up!  Visitors inbound!”  He began launching arrows into the nearest Dromm warriors.

Caelian and Miah kept behind the others.  The cleric thought she saw Shutan’s outline well enough to cast her holy fire cantrip but wasn’t sure how close she was.  Miah followed suit with a ray of frost with the same result.

Shutan shimmered into view just as he stepped in close to Kaspar, roaring and swinging a glowing fist.  It connected with the fighter’s chainmail and there was a flash of green eldritch energy.  Kaspar was lifted up off his feet and knocked back twenty feet.  He flew straight over the parapet and landed, stunned and confused, next to Marisol.

The ogre was now too close to Caelian.  She swung her mace at his towering form but he dodged out of the way.

Cley swung again, missing once and barely scratching him on the backswing.  Miah’s ray of frost hit him square in the chest.

Cley, Caelian, and Miah fanned out and circled him.  Shutan glanced each way and jumped over towards Miah, who was nearest to the other edge of the roof. He swung his mailed fist in an attack and missed as she ducked and spun to the side.  Shutan pressed in closer and punched down with his other fist, grazing her shoulder and driving her to her knees.  She rolled, but instead of rolling away she rolled in close and slapped his shin while casting her shocking grasp cantrip.  There was a snap and a flash of light.  The ogre pulled his foot back, off balance.

Across the roof, Isiah dodged a poorly thrown javelin and shot two more Dromm, killing one and wounding the other.  They were starting to make it into the building and Isiah knew he’d be out of arrows soon.

Marisol leapt onto a window sill and launched herself up towards the roof.  With a bound off the side of a support column she grabbed the parapet and swung herself up and over, kneeling next to Isiah. “He regenerates.  We’ve got to keep hitting him.”

He could easily see the fury in her eyes.  “Marisol, we’ve got to get off this roof.  The sloop is right there!”

Cley ran in and stabbed Shutan in the waist.  Caelian swung her mace and connected with his thigh, holy light flashing.  The paladin slashed downward and cut the ogre along the back of his leg.  They were both seeing the previous wounds heal over and shared a quick worried glance.

Shutan kicked Miah, forcing her into a roll that took her to the back edge of the building.  She looked down over the parapet and saw the alley behind the building was filled with racks of spears pointing up, invitingly asking for a large target to be thrown onto them. 

The ogre swung twice at Cley and the paladin could only dodge one of them. He was staggered back with a fist to the face.

Miah shouted Caelian's name and made a quick hand signal for spears while pointing over the roof.  The cleric nodded.  “Cley, push him back!”  She ducked under a backhand and surged forward, grabbing the ogre around the knee and lifting up.  

Cley followed, not knowing the plan but getting the idea.  They both lifted and pushed.  

Shutan was enormously heavy and did not fall back willingly.  He shuffled his feet awkwardly and windmilled his arms, roaring with rage.

Marisol sprinted across the roof and leapt feet first into the ogre’s chest while firing a radiant blast into his face. 

Miah jabbed upward with her quarterstaff into the back of Shutan’s knee.

The eldritch ogre lost his balance and started to fall back.  He reached down and clawed at Caelian and Cley‘s backs, grabbing his huge hands around their backpacks as he toppled over the edge.

They both shrugged them off.  Shutan, packs in his hands and a furious look on his face, fell off the building towards the waiting racks of spears below.

Isiah had his bow and shot his last two arrows into the doorway they’d come up out of.  “The square is clear!  Let’s go!”

Cley, Caelian, Marisol, and Miah scrambled to their feet, Cley clearly wounded badly.  “Go for the sloop!”

One dead Dromm warrior fell out of the doorway and onto the roof with two arrows in him.

“Go for the sloop!” shouted Cley again.  Then he raised a hand and cast Flaming Sphere into the doorway.  A ball of fire appeared, spinning and flashing, just inside the stairwell.  Screams of frying Dromm came out of the brilliance.  

Caelian and Marisol ran for the corner.  Isiah jumped down onto the second story.  Kaspar hauled himself up onto the top of the roof through sheer strength and willpower.  He crawled over the parapet only to see everyone else dash into the corner and leap down to where he’d just been.  He muttered a curse and rolled back, dropping down to the second level.

Cley was limping and holding his hand up, maintaining the spell and pushing the flaming ball down deeper into the building.  Miah stopped at his side.  “You are coming with us, aren’t you?”

The paladin’s face was bruised and bloodied, his sweaty blond hair was plastered to the side of his head, and his armor was covered in black blood and viscera.  He winked at her.  

Miah ran for the edge and jumped down to the others.  Isiah had torn a rope out of his pack and looped a quick knot around a stout looking cornice piece.  One by one they started sliding down the twenty foot drop to the square below.

Isiah reached out to his sister.  They were the last two kneeling at the corner and she was looking back up.

Cley came over the roof and landed next to them with a hard roll and a grunt.

Miah reached out a hand to help him up.  “Let’s get out of here.”