[Official NPC]

"And then what happened, Misha?"

"And then it exploded!" A chorus of shrieks erupted from the boys clustered around his feet. Their little hands had been grabbing and plucking at his buckskin trousers, but when he made a boom noise in the back of his throat and threw out his arms, they released him and threw themselves almost as one entity behind the bulk of the tree they were sitting beneath.

One particularly brave young boy peeped out at him. "And then what happened, Misha?"

A foreign voice intruded before he could finish his story: "And then all the little boys went back to their respective fathers while Nimisha did what he came for."

"Awwwww." Misha smirked as the group of boys, pouting and digging in their heels, were pushed toward the stairs that would take them up to the main level.

"No need to look so sour, Erin, they're not doing any harm." Misha stood and leaned on the railing, looking out over Athendíl's lower levels. The commune was fairly small but split into two parts. The Sidhe defended from the lower levels, with the Nymphs above them and a communal layer sandwiched between for festivals and rituals. The trees were thick here on the border between the Fae and the Chandric forests, striking that elusive balance between the almost mystical atmosphere common across the Sylvan Territories and the dark, foreboding atmosphere of the northern woodlands. As dangerous as it was to cross into Chandric, Misha made the trip often enough to be known to the youngsters of the commune.

"It's not them I'm worried about." Erin sighed, attempting to dredge up a glare as he came to lean on the railing next to Misha. Misha returned the glare with a grin. "You're incorrigible. Stop filling their heads with nonsense."

"It's not nonsense. Isn't the point of the Rite to expand our horizons and open our minds to new possibilities? You have no sense of adventure."

"And you have no idea what it means to be a Sidhe of Athendíl." They glared at one another for long, muted minutes, each too stubborn to admit that they both had their points. In the end, it was a noise in the forest below that drew their gazes apart. A call went up from platform to platform, Sigil to Sigil. "Intruders! Attack! Intruders!" Misha straightened, about to join in the defence, but Erin tapped his shoulder. "You're a visitor here. Stay out of it." The Sidhe didn't stick around to hear Misha's huff or the ensuing argument, chasing across the platform to the Shaped branches that served as bridges connecting their tree to four others.

"Well, fine then. I know when I'm not wanted." With another huff, Misha leaned back on the railing, unconcerned. Athendíl was accustomed to predatory attacks, though not, he thought, the intrusion of other humanoids. He was one of very few people to visit the commune on a regular basis, if at all, and only then because he was what the Anyeli might call an ambassador between his Naneth and theirs.

But then he got a proper look at the intruders. Details were still hard to make out through the foliage, but they had to be over seven feet tall. They looked a little like upright bulls. Some had four thick horns splaying out from a thick skull, while others had six such horns that branched into thinner antlers. They were covered in long fur so he might have thought they were some previously unknown creature that had been driven out of the darker reaches of the forest, but they were wearing loin cloths and carrying huge war axes and spears.

With throaty roars, several of the creatures leaped easily into the air to land on one of the lower platforms, a good ten feet off the ground. They threw their spears with such power that the primitive weapons pierced right through the chests of the slender Sidhe sent to meet them, their attack so sudden and ferocious that the group, some twenty strong, easily swarmed up the stairs. The Sigils barely had a chance to begin their elemental bombardment before the creatures were thudding heavily across the bridges into the more vulnerable areas of the commune.

Misha didn't think twice. He shot up the stairs to look for the boys.