6
The sorceress has taken the shape of a bird of prey, scanning the endless forest for any sign of her associates, the Princess, anything but this! She is careful not to fly too high, lest the eye in the sky pay it too much attention.
Something catches her eye - something on the ground, walking through the forest. It's the Princess. She swoops down in desperate relief, progress at last!
Her wings recede into her cloak and her beak becomes merely an aquiline face as she lands in front of the girl. She's given them quite a chase, she says! Across the sea and into this heathen realm, right down into hell itself! Does she know what kind of trouble she has got herself into?
Er, um, the Princess begins uncertainly. She's, well, really sorry about-
Silence, the sorceress says and points at the Princess, who finds herself go suddenly very stiff. There will be no more explanations - she will come along this instant! Her eyes flash and the Princess levitates off her feet. She strains to form words as she hangs in the air paralyzed - she's sorry, sorry about-
She has not even begun to be sorry, the sorceress declares. There will be a reckoning! There will be consequences! Her gaze threatens to set fire to a nearby pine, and with an errant glance the Princess' voice stops in her throat.
She's sorry about this, the Princess mouths as you smash a sackful of lead against the sorceress' skull, which cracks satisfyingly as she falls forward stunned. You are on top of her in a moment, smashing her head against a tree root. Parts of her shift, developing feathers and scales as she twists around, and you narrowly duck as the canopy of a pine above you bursts into flame. You stomp on her head until she moves no more, and her shape becomes a grisly mess of mismatched animal parts as her transformation never quite finishes.
You set fire to the remnants just to be safe, and consider your next move as the Princess shudders, the enchantment slowly wearing off. After she's done vomiting, she proceeds to curse at the corpse in front of her. Never bloody liked that bloody sorceress! Like Mother, except with ungodly magical powers, she tells you! Good bloody riddance!
A) Next comes the ranger, wherever he may be.
B) Sir Ludovic may be useful to you somehow first, if only as bait.