The shapeshifter is cunning; he’d allow her that much, and despite her crude roars and agitating boyishness perhaps he even liked her a little. Still, how could someone so young fight so fiercely? There were scars that scorned the most precious skin around her eyes, a mark that he would expect to see on only the most seasoned warrior, but no - it was a half-grown nordling. It appeared that Toulouse should come to expect this from the north; it’s people gave to the land and were only given half back, and yet, while Toulouse had not met the wizard deity of time, he already hated him.
Why anyone on this continent turned to the gods for salvation was completely beyond him. It was these wretches down below who did the working, the fighting, the dying.  Perhaps he was thinking of Nyx and how that decaying monster threw her aside like a rag-doll, but truly - the gods? They never got their feet wet.
Though perhaps he even found comfort in the fact that he had for the first time in what could possibly be years, he had witnessed another drink from the life of another. While he felt a similar kind of disgust, the kind he had first felt when witnessing the vile act, he also felt a blossoming sense of brotherhood and camaraderie towards the gargoyle. Was her magic only sustained on the blood of others? And to be so… open about it. He wondered what someone such as Oizys would think about a creature who sustained not only their magic on plasma and blood cells but their every shard and being too.

The thundering of impact that escaped from under his hoof was enough to cause his eye to roll back, lurking upon the enemy for confirmation of his escape. Was he out of her midst? If he was watching the fight, Toulouse would be telling himself to just run and not look back until he was sure the beast wasn’t an inch from his hocks. Instead, the gelding twisted before the lamenting gargoyle, aiming to put as much distance between them as was possible. Once again, he was not expecting what would come next.

As if her life force was leaching into the air, the buzzing and hiss of the atmosphere began to overwhelm the gelding with fear. If a light bulb hung in the vicinity it would surely explode, and Toulouse might even attest to the fact that the air pressure dropped; though truthfully, it was possibly just the blood rushing from his limbs to supply his furiously trembling heart. The creature roamed forth, a roar and brontide charging with it as it bounded its way toward him. Toulouse, who by now had turned to face the apparition had lowered his chest and spread his legs in anticipation for impact, with a plan to leap from the electric figure’s midst at the last moment available. It wasn’t that simple though because what the thief did not know was that once a current had a hold of you, it did not let go.

It approached.
The gelding leapt.
ZAP!
Like a snare he was caught by the apparition, landing first upon his feet to the ground and then stumbling to his knees with a mighty thud. “AAH!” he shrieked against the burning, heart-killing pain that radiated from the snag against his hind-left leg. A shock; deep and to his core, the kind that would leave him breathless, woozy and disoriented for the fight to come. Not a moment to pass and the daring eagle had made her move, swooping down with a vengeance to breathe a foul vapour upon him. Shielding his face within his own chest, the gelding attempted to rise from the ground, a groan escaping his maw as he reached through the extensive pain the shock had left him. The vapour was the kind he could only assume was toxic, so as he glanced around he made a point to hold his breath.
Stumbling forward once again he was met with the claws of the raptor, the talons gripping upon his whither and digging into his flesh. A cry, one so foul it caused anger to boil within him, Toulouse’s gaze searched for the perpetrator, seeking her gaze. “GO!” He bellowed to the snake upon his crown, allowing the constrictor to descend his post-like legs and slither forward across the ground as the thief aimed to grasp his opponent’s eye contact. Relying on the woman’s eye contact that he so desperately sought, Toulouse demanded she feel the paralysing pain he had just felt… only worse. Much much worse. The green snake aimed to slither up her own leg and coil around her neck, tightening, choking, suffocating.