Something must have gone wrong, because this mark doesn't wait until the plant monster crosses the boundary to have an effect. The redheaded young woman with two sets of iridescent bug-like wings that appears is another clue in that direction. Her initial smile quickly disappears as she looks around at the battle into which she's been summoned.

"Um. What?"

...the Marshal doesn't recognise her. He thought he knew everyone in the Pact. Maybe a new recruit? Mesmer by the looks of it. "Look out!" he calls out at her just as an ugly plant humanoid tries to hit her with a huge sword.

And the airship is still falling.

She totally fails to acknowledge that she just got hit by a sword as she hovers slightly above the deck, craning her neck to get a look around. Her wings flutter but don't seem to be the primary source of her lifting power.

The airship is indeed falling. She's not what you might call familiar with the technical details of how an airship is supposed to work, but she's pretty sure it involves not careening out of the sky. So. Now it's not doing that anymore. Also that ugly plant person that hit her should learn some respect for personal space. He can do that from over there.

There are all those other ships all around also falling and/or being actively pushed down onto the jungle floor by huge thorny vines...

Well. She has no idea what's going on here. This is normal for neither Fairyland nor Earth, so far as she knows. If she's ruining some demon's theater performance they can take it up with her summoner, but first she's going to collect all the vines and move them away from the airships and hold them down in a big bundle like so and then the falling airships can stop doing that, please.

If it's a demon play it's a damn realistic one, what with all the people being impaled by swords and bleeding to death.

Well, there's no accounting for taste. Where'd her summoner get off to, is he still right there...?

Yes, right there, fighting for his life, using some sort of—weird magic. There are a few creatures made of flesh and bone without any skin surrounding him and he seems to be able to control them with his thoughts, and they're helping fight off two plant attackers.

Okay she officially has no idea what the fuck is happening anymore.

"Hey!" she calls. "Do you have a preference for where I put these ships down? I assume away from the murdervines."

"Away from the murdervines sounds good! Away from these horrendous creatures would also be a tremendous idea!" he calls, then rolls to dodge an axe swing that almost cuts his head off.

"Try to not die, summoner."

This is going to take a bit of concentration, so she runs over the sequence of actions in her mind, then- Murdervines released and focus on airships, then before the vines can snap back up the fleet and the people and the air around them are up and they are moving and then they're three miles eastward with nary a hair out of place because she is just that good. Well, no hairs that she can see, anyway. And no one slammed through a hull and started plunging to their doom so it's probably fine.

And then she can spare the attention to send those two things attacking her summoner plunging to their doom. And all those trees in the way of a clear landing zone get pushed over and she can set the ships down.

People are... confused.

Also some plant people that do not look monstrous—look, in fact, quite a bit like her summoner—seem to also be fighting other people. Most others are trying to merely subdue them but that's not always successful.

Better confused than dead! She flits over to her summoner. Wow, he really is made out of leaves, huh. Like some sort of... salad... person.

Anyway.

"Hi!" she chirps. "Do you mind pointing out which are the bad guys and which are the good guys? Also, do you want them dead or gone or captured?"

"I don't know which in particular are good or bad, but if you could just make them not be fighting anymore that would be sufficient."

Oookay then. She'll just judge these salad books by the covers, and everyone who looks like her summoner she'll pull over here, and all the big'n'ugly guys can go in a pile on the other side of the clearing.

Some of the salad people that look like her summoner are also trying to stabbity-stab other people, though...

Siiiigggghhhhh.

They can get their own pile.

And now all the fighting has stopped.

Good! Okay.

...She's not sure what to do next.

Well the salad person who summoned her is looking at her with something akin to awe. "What sort of magic is this?"

"The best kind!" She bounces in the air a bit.

Then pauses. "-You don't have the word. What language is this? Where are we?"

"Tyrian, or Common Language. You're speaking it, aren't you?"

"Apparently! I'm Evanathe, by the way. What's your name?"

"I'm Trahearne, Marshal of the Pact. You just—saved our lives."

"You're welcome! Um, from what, though?"

"Mordremoth's surprise attack, and his minions."

"Who's Mordremoth?"

"The dragon—are you from another world?"

"I'm from Fairyland. You summoned me here."

"I'm not sure how I could have done that." He looks around, then points at the monstrous plant things. "Is your magic enough to dispose of those?"

"I could burn them. Or dump them in the ocean. Or launch them out past the moon."

"Go with burning, I wouldn't put it past them to return from the ocean or—did you just say past the moon?"

"Assuming you have one, I guess."

"We do. Stick with the fire, please."

"Okay."

So the trick is that if you rub two things together fast enough, they'll catch on fire. This is easier if it's, y'know, flammable stuff. Fortunately, there's a lot of spare wood around these parts. She flits around looking for a couple suitable pieces of debris. Once she finds a workable pair of sticks, she pops over near the burn pile and the sticks blur into motion against each other until with a soft fwoosh they ignite. She introduces the flame to the pile at several points until it catches.

"And can you keep those people constrained while releasing the others?" he asks, pointing at the group with the more violent plant people.

"Yep!" Behold your sudden freedom of movement, good guys. Bad guys, you need to stay down still.

He nods. "Thank you."

A very, very tall woman with purple tattoos on her face and exposed left thigh walks over to them. "Marshal—what in Bear's name happened?"

Evanathe cranes her neck, then floats upwards until their heads are level. "Your fleet was getting attacked by murderplants and murdertentacles, and then I got summoned and I moved the fleet away from the murdertentacles and burned the murderplants."

She looks at Evanathe. "And who's this?"

"I don't actually know. This is Eir Stegalkin," the Marshal introduces the tall woman. "And I am Trahearne."

"Nice to meet you! I'm Evanathe. I'm pretty sure I said that already."

Trahearne pauses, then nods. "So you did. I apologise, I've been having a day."

    "Haven't we all," says Eir, shaking her head. She turns to Evanathe. "May the spirits of the wild protect you. How did you come to be here, and what magic is this?"

"She says I summoned her somehow," Trahearne explains, "but that is as much as I know. Eir, could you take over? I need to reorganise the Pact."

    "Of course, Marshal."

"If you'll excuse me?" he asks of Evanathe.

She waves. "Have fun."

"So, what's the story?" asks Eir. "You don't look like a regular summons."

"I don't think I am a regular summons. Your language doesn't, uh, have a word for what I am. Also, I've never seen a plant person before."

"A sylvari? They've only been around for about twenty-five years."

"Pretty sure I've taken a summons more recently than that. There weren't any sylvari, nice word. Or dragons. Or people with swords, really, those went out of fashion a while ago. Kind of a shame, I thought they were neat. Anyway, all that plus the Marshal's confusion about summoning me makes me think that something went wrong and this is not the world I'm used to."

"So you are from another world. That was very powerful magic, we owe you our lives."

"You're welcome! I take payment in cookies."

"—cookies?"

"It's okay if you don't have any. I don't think an airship is really a good cookie-making environment."

"We probably don't have any on board but I'm sure some can be cooked," she says uncertainly.

"Score!"

"Uh, but it's not like we did a proper deal or anything and it looks like you might have some other stuff going on? So cookies are probably not, like, absolutely necessary."

"Do you have any time constraints? We do have 'other stuff' going on."

"I'm here until my summoner dies or dismisses me. Can I help?"

"Yes! We need those sylvari contained until we can figure out why in Bear's name they were all acting like this. And we might need to mount a different kind of offensive, using the airships is apparently not going to work a second time."

"I could make a cage for them."

"That would be very good, we had not expected to keep prisoners, only put Mordremoth's servants to rest."

"Okay!"

Hello big tree how would you like to split lengthwise into a bunch of beams and then get replanted in the ground? Doesn't matter, you're gonna do it anyway. And then one of your friends can join your dismembered corpse going crossways and now she needs some rope, oh there's some that doesn't seem like it's being useful anymore so that can go ahead and knot the bars together.

She flies around to be able to see all the knots she's tying before touching back down.

The sylvari who look ready for a fight are all there!

And now they're in the cage and one last knot gets booped.

"All done."

Eir has been helping Trahearne with everyone but when she notices Evanathe is done she turns to that again. "Excellent job. Thank you very much. I'm sure we'll be able to bake you cookies."

"Yeah. Uh. Do you want me to take everyone somewhere that's not the middle of the jungle?"

"We should check with the Marshal, he's the one in charge here, but he'll probably want us to return to Camp Resolve in the Silverwastes."

"I have no idea where that is."

"Farther east. Can you fly and find the Marshal? He will know better."

"Yep." Flutter flutter. Where are you, Marshal?

He's giving lots of people instructions on what to do. Go there, find this person, check this bit of equipment, go question those evil sylvari. When he spots her he waves her over. "Evanathe. Are the sylvari secured?"

"Yeah they're in a cage. Uh, I just put us down here because it was away from the murderdragon and I didn't know where to go, do you want to move somewhere else? The tall lady said something about a Camp Resolve?"

"Oh, yes, going to Camp Resolve would be ideal. Our engines are all busted by the vines. I can show you a map there, although I don't know where exactly in the jungle we currently are."

"I could take you high enough to recognize the shape of the land, probably."

"That would be useful. Let me recall the scouts I sent and we will be ready in a few minutes."

He goes off to do that.

And when he's back, she and he and a pile of air can go up up up until he can see where they are.

And he can point at where they are on the map. They still have a few miles to go east, towards what looks in the distance like mostly barren wastelands.

"Do you want to bring the airships? And the uh, murdersylvari?"

"Yes, please."

"Okay. It'll be easier if everyone gets back on the airships, then. And I can just bring the cage along."

So they can get everyone on the airships and go, then.

East towards the barren wastelands wheeee!

She has the best magic.

She certainly has very useful magic.

"There," the Marshal says, pointing at a group of techy-looking buildings amidst rocks.

And there's a big enough space clear of those rock formations over there, so down go the ships.

Several people approach from Camp Resolve when she lands, spearheaded by a person in rather interesting robes. "Marshal!" he calls out.

"Ah, the Commander is here. Thank you, Evanathe, this has been great help."

Spooky. Horns. Nice.

"I like your. Uh. Fire thingies."

"Thanks! They're really cool, aren't they?"

"Commander, what's the status here?"

"I came as soon as I heard about the attack. I was mounting a rescue party, but it seems like it will not be necessary."

"Yes, thanks to our new friend, here."

"You're welcome!" Flutter flutter.

"But how? The scouts saw you being torn from the sky by giant vines."

"She's from another world, and her magic permits her to move things with her mind. I have not inquired into the limitations of this, but I think you can see how useful this could be in a fight against the dragons and their minions."

A stone robot catches up to them. "And what's up with all those arrested sylvari?"

"They were trying to kill everyone else," she explains.

"...oh no."

"Mordremoth..."

"We know," the Commander says. "Sylvari were originally meant to be the Jungle Dragon's minions."

There are gasps from some people, especially non-sylvari, and everyone staring at the Marshal is very nonsurreptitious.

He nods. "I... can hear his voice. In my head."

Uh. What.

Clearly she's gotten here in the middle of the story.

"Marshal, I believe the Pact may need you. I will leave you to it and welcome our unexpected guest."

"Thank you, Commander." He turns to Evanathe. "And thank you, too." He nods politely then saunters off.

The robot walks over to Evanathe. "Sooo... you look human but you have wings... What gives?"

"I'm not human. That's what gives."

"What are you?"

"Taimi, that's not very polite," says a very tall and muscular dude, with long red hair and wearing what look like actual skins.

Wow, another tall buff person. Wonder if they have a club.

"I'm a fairy!"

"Huh. Never heard that word before. Guess you must really be from another world."

"Evanathe," says the Commander, before removing his mask and revealing a rather handsome if also rather pale face. "Let me introduce everyone. I am James Orland, Commander of the Pact. This is Taimi, asura progeny¹—"

¹ Progeny: term used to refer to younger asura and has different cultural connotations than the standard English meaning. In particular, an asura progeny typically has never been part of a krewe² and has not finished their first degree in the university. It is not an insulting term.
² Krewe: the basic unit of organisation in asura society, consists of a (typically but not always) temporary group of (usually) asura working on a single project or meta-project over an extended span of time.

"That's 'incredibly brilliant genius progeny' for you!"

He laughs and shakes his head. "And this is Braham Eirsson," he continues, gesturing at tall muscular guy.

"It's nice to meet you all!"

"I'm afraid you caught us all in a rather tense moment. You may have noticed. And you must be very confused."

"A little."

"How can we help?"

"Murdervines attacking an airship convoy seems like, the middle-to-end of a story? So if you could go back to the beginning and catch me up with why airships and plant people and so forth, that would be nice."

"You're from another world, right? So you won't know about the dragons, either. Or asura or norn or charr or any other races?"

"I know humans and fairies and demons and angels."

"What are 'demons' and 'angels'?"

"Magic people. We all have different kinds. If my magic is 'moving stuff', demon magic is 'making stuff' and angel magic is 'changing stuff'."

"Do they all look like humans and norn?"

"Yeah. Well. We have wings." Flutter flutter. "Demons have bat wings and angels have feather wings."

"Okay, it's decided. All the multiverse's racist."

"Now, come on, Taimi, don't be like that."

"I'll be like that! Well, let's show our fairy friend some variety." The glass panel of the robot opens to reveal...

...a very tiny gremlin. "Hi! This is what asura look like."

Awwww she's so cute!

"Hiiiii~"

"Oh wow I think you might have blown Scruffy's microphone's pitch register."

"Taimi."

"Scruffy is her golem," James explains.

"That's a cute name for a golem."

"He's also the most advanced piece of machinery you have ever seen," Taimi brags. "...or so I assume, I don't know what kind of tech you guys might have."

"There's like, electronics and stuff? Small computers? I don't know if that counts as machinery."

"What's a computer?"

"Uh. It's... a machine that thinks by doing math?"

"Oh! Like a golem! Or like data consoles."

"More like data consoles than a golem, usually."

"And you have small ones? How small? Smaller than me?"

"The smallest ones are about as big as my hand. I think that's mostly because if the display is smaller it's hard to use."

"The whole computer is that size? It's not just connected to an external network?"

"Well, it is also connected to a network usually, but that's, uh, separate. This is pushing the limits of my technical competence."

"I knew it. Do you have one? Can I take it apart?"

"Taimi..."

"Let's not destroy the helpful person's tech on their first day here."

"I don't have one, anyway."

"Why not?"

"Didn't have it on me when I got summoned."

"Can you go fetch it?"

"Taimi," Braham sighs again.

"What! Do you understand the scientific opportunities available here? It's another world! Completely different magic! Completely different technology! Eeeeeee!"

"No, I can't go back and forth. I'd have to be dismissed and resummoned."

"I'm sure Evanathe will explain everything about her magic when the situation's less hectic," James preempts Taimi. "Now, I believe I had a history lesson to teach. From the start... the world is being threatened by dragons. There used to be six, but we killed one of them recently. They're powerful enough to be threatening to destroy us all. Mordremoth, the jungle dragon, is the one responsible for the attack on the airships. And sylvari," he gestures in the general direction the Pact Marshal walked to, "are a race that awakened from a tree twenty-six years ago who, it turns out, were meant to have been Mordremoth's minions. Now he's awakened, and is exerting mental pressure on all of them."

"Ooh, dragons. Evil dragons are, uh, less cool but then that means you get to kill them so maybe it balances out? I've always wanted to be a dragonslayer." She hums a brief riff under her breath. "Too bad about the sylvari, though. Is there a way to fix them?"

"Our current best guess is killing Mordremoth," James says cheerfully. "We don't yet know how to do it, though, since the strategy that did it for Zhaitan, well," he gestures around at the wreckage, "has evidently failed, if not as badly as it could have. And on a more immediate note, I am... looking for someone who has stolen an artefact that Mordremoth seems to be very interested in, so I very much would like to prevent him from getting it."

"Well, now you have me. I'm a strategy all by myself." Flutter flutter.

He laughs. "You'll probably help, but we're not certain Mordremoth has an actual body, now."

"That would make things a little complicated."

"It would. On the other hand you will be very helpful in finding the sylvari who stole the artefact. If you're willing to help, of course."

"Ooh, yes!"

"-Uh, is the Marshal going to be okay though? He's my summoner so I should make sure he stays safe."

"He should be fine, he's a very capable man."

"What happens if he's not, though?"

"If he dies, I get sent back."

"Oh. And can we fetch you back?"

"Maybe? If you draw a summoning circle and it works again. I'd never heard of anyone getting summoned to a place like this before and circles aren't that hard to draw, so I dunno if this time was just a random fluke or whatever."

"Circle? Was he drawing circles? That's not very good for fights."

"I, uh, didn't get a very good look at what exactly he was doing. There was a lot going on."

James nods. "Well, we'll need to regroup, now. Do you need anything to stay comfortable?"

"If you have any food, that'd be nice. I'm pretty sure I've missed lunch by now."

"We should have some. Camp rations, I'm afraid, but it's nutritionally balanced."

"Nutritional balance! Exciting!"

He laughs. "I'll show you to our camps."

Onwards.

Flutter flutter.

There are various hastily but sturdily constructed structures arranged between cliffwalls a bit farther to the east. Metal balconies sticking out of rock with grating stairs leading up to them serve as makeshift war rooms, and tents line the walls for supplies and housing.

James leads Evanathe to a particularly large tent, followed by Taimi (who returned to her golem) and Braham, and once inside there is a food court of sorts, with various tables and benches spread around. There are some people there already—humans, asura, sylvari, norn, and some big horned felines share the space and a meal.

This place just gets stranger and stranger. No, actually the plant people are probably still the strangest. The horny cats are at least made of meat like she's used to people being. This place continues at approximately the same level of strange.

Anyway. What's the dining etiquette? Is it serve yourself or what?

The others are serving themselves, so probably that. The food is alienish but still recognisably edible.

She will try... let's seeeee. Some of everything sounds good. And if this requires multiple plates, being casually telekinetic means that balance isn't really an issue.

"So uh. Are all these people here to fight the dragon? With that Pact thingy?"

"To help with the fight, one way or another. Many of them are support operations rather than getting into the line of fire."

"And boy, let me tell you what woulda happened to our 'operations' if you hadn't shown up," says Taimi from her golem, which then proceeds to produce the sound of an explosion. It's not loud, but it's sudden enough that several Pact members are startled by it and look around for the source of the sound, one of the big felines even standing up from its (his? her?) seat in alarm. "Oops! Sorry guys, that was me, carry on." Big feline grumbles and sits back down.

Hee. "Well, I'm happy to help."

"It might not be very straightforward, it's not clear where the dragon is or... whether he even has an actual body."

"That... could be awkward."

"We know woefully little about Mordremoth, I fear, compared to the other dragons who have been around for much longer."

"What are the other dragons like?"

"Zhaitan's dead in all senses of the word."

"He was the undead dragon. Had a skeletal appearance and rose the dead as his minions."

"Spooky."

"I have never seen Jormag the ice dragon or Primordus the fire dragon but they're appropriately named. Jormag corrupts people into his minions, while Primordus creates his from magma.

"They're not active, and the dwarves are almost all underground fighting Primordus's destroyers while the Norn nation mostly takes care of the influx of Jormag's icebrood."

"So they've all got a theme. Fire, ice, undead, plants. There's probably like one more. Five's a better number than four."

"Six. There's Kralkatorrik, the Crystal dragon..."

"That's such a weird thing, though, what's it got to do with all the others?"

"Kralkatorrik is a very... crystal-y name."

"Yeah, right? There's also the deep sea dragon, I never remember its name, starts with an S..."

"Weird set of elements..." she mutters.

"It's not even a set of elements! Elementalists get fire, water, earth, and wind! Those make sense, kinda, if you squint, except for how they don't, but Crystal?!"

She sounds positively distressed.

"Has anyone tried asking a dragon what's up?"

Braham snorts. "Most people who have seen a dragon up close are not around to tell the tale."

"Well, Zhaitan could speak through his minions, right?" She directs this question to the Commander.

"It... wasn't quite clear."

"What do you mean?"

"Zhaitan had minions with suggestive names like 'eye of Zhaitan' or 'mouth of Zhaitan' and it was never very clear to what extent they were parts of his body and to what extent they were independent beings."

"Did they tell you those names?"

"They were somewhat prone to grandiosity and theatrics."

"Not exactly impartial and unbiased, then."

"No. But they did perform relevant strategic roles—the Mouths consumed magic and he was much weakened when we killed all of them."

"Do the others have anything like that?"

"Ooh! Ooh! I can answer that one! Pick me, pick me!"

"Okay, tell me."

"Right! So, we don't know about all dragons, but we do know about Jormag and Primordus and Kralkatorrik. So they have these sort of lieutenants? They're super powerful minions that are smarter and better and stuff. So Kralky has the Shatterer—Rox killed it a while ago, it was so cool you should've seen it—anyway, and Primordus has the Great Destroyer who got killed like two hundred and fifty years ago by a bunch of people plus the dwarves, and Jormag has the Claw of Jormag! So they don't really have stuff quite like that with mouths and eyes and stuff but they do have The Most Powerful Minions and those are like super different and smarter and do more things."

"So they're probably not like literally parts of the dragons. Maybe like cultists, or something. They still might know stuff."

"They're not really cultists, since the dragons do make them..."

She waggles a hand. "Mmyeh, more or less."

"I think Caithe once mentioned something about Kralkatorrik trying to mind-control Snaff, and the sylvari here..." He looks in the vague direction of the prison Evanathe made for them.

"Has anyone tried talking to them yet?"

"Define 'try talking'. Most occasions when we meet them is when either side tries to go crush the other in a skirmish."

"Soooo that'd be a no?"

"They haven't responded to our attempts at parlay nor offered their own, no."

"Rude of them."

"Personally I think the murders and enslavement are worse."

"There can be multiple reasons to hate them!"

"And we have aaaalllll of them."

"Right. So besides talking, is there any way to learn more about Murderwhatsit? Lost ancient vault that needs excavating or something?"

"We can study their magic?"

"We're... kinda flying blind, here, when it comes to the dragons."

"I'm not the best person ever for basic research. More of an action sort of girl, you know?"

"You'll get along with the Commander just fine, then," Braham snorts.

"Yep! He does all the field missions."

She makes fingerguns at James and winks.

"The Pact leadership will probably have a meeting to discuss next steps after we're all done eating and taking stock of everything that's happened. We will want your company, if you're interested in joining us."

"Sure!"

So they finish eating and after that James leads the way to a different tent.

Anna flutters along after.

There are a few people in the tent already. "Commander. Evanathe," the Pact Marshal greets them.

"Hi, Marshal."

"Commander, is Rytlock still missing?"

"Yes, I th—"

And that's when a bright purple-blue portal appears out of thin air, and a charr wearing a blindfold emerges from it.

"—never mind. Good timing, Rytlock!"

Fancy way to get around.

"Heya."

"Hope you don't mind me joining your meeting without RSVPing, Commander."

"How are you alive? You were in the Mists."

"We'll have time for that later. Who's the butterfly?"

"I'm Evanathe. And not a butterfly."

He snorts. "Fancy costume, then. The Pact command been hiring?"

"Maybe! But that doesn't really be anything to do with me. What's with the-" she waves her hand in front of her eyes, then realizes she might have to also say words, even if he can tell she has wings who knows how he's actually seeing, "-blindfold?"

He grunts and turns to the Commander. "What's the status?"

"Well, we were significantly less prepared than we could have been to Mordremoth's power, and would be dead or worse if it weren't for Evanathe here."

"That's me, heroic rescuer."