Facade

Facade

Postby Jirai » Thu Oct 10, 2013 10:14 am

[Attention! Please read THIS post before replying.]

It was an ordinary day.

People went about their business. Tailors cut silken fabric, bakers worried over the future supply of flour while making their cakes, ladies drank tea while gentlemen flirted, children played in the streets without mussing their bows or cravats. A golden day in Rhaena's Golden Myrken.

But then things changed.

For those near or within Myrkentown, the sun leaped forward in the sky. Cakes that had only just been placed into the oven were suddenly cooling on windowsills. Teapots that had recently been refilled were abruptly empty. Children found themselves in a different part of town. And, in the building that was the Governor's home, a woman screamed.

The room was a lovely thing, Rhaena's pride and joy. Light and airy, it was a room for pleasure, for tea and cakes, but also a room for work. Rows of shelves held books and quills and ink - or, they should have. Now, though, some of the volumes lie carelessly on the floor, open and bent. Chairs are overturned, the legs of the small table splintered. The sun streamed in through the windows, sparkling on the shattered teacups - two - that lay on the beautiful woven rug which had long since absorbed their spilled contents, though the scent of mint lingered.

The rug was not enough to soak up the pool of blood spreading across the floor.

The screaming came from the well-dressed servant standing in the doorway, hands held before her. Those hands had gripped a tray covered with tiny sandwiches and other dainties, but those had fallen to the floor, unnoticed. As she shrieked, she extended one shaking hand to point at the body lying on the floor.

The Lady of Myrken was dead.
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Re: Facade

Postby catch » Thu Oct 10, 2013 11:54 am

The days between Jernoah and Myrken were a mystery. He remembered a night, and he remembered fire, and blood, and wept bitter white tears, blisters on his cheeks from the boiling Glass Sun.

-

laughter in his ears,
the cries of Demons. He burned,
he burned, and the world
burned
with him

-

Days passed as he walked. He did not remember riding again the white-capped crest of oceans. Weeks were days, months were days. Gloria grew from wide-eyed toddler to seamstress, poetess, a girl read for the birthing-pens herself, and still, he walked on, his feet made hard, calloused black from the raw dust. He walked for years, but time was ever slippery. Some days, the nights stretched on for eternities; some days, he did not remember nights, his eyes closing in a brief, fluttering blink, and coming open to a new dawn. Which dawn? The next? A dawn a hundred years from now?

That was beyond his capacity for understanding.


______________________

"What are you doing here," the bear asked. Catch stood in silence, watching the great, shaggy form, his eyes too wide with stars to properly answer. The bear asked again.

"I am going somewhere," Catch finally answered him, "But I don't know where."

The bear scrubbed his shoulder against a tree, long claws dragging furrows in the loam. He was fat, and sleepy, fish and berries and carrion crammed into his gut, causing rolls of fat to ripple and his temper to cool. "I have never seen one of you before," he said, slowly, thinking back to long-ago cubhood. "My mother told me stories about your kind."

"Do you know where I'm going?" Catch asked, not knowing what the bear spoke of. He was hungry, he thought. His hands were full of berries, blue-stained, and there was an acrid taste of them in his mouth, a sensation of burning.

"There is a town," the bear said. "Full of people. I'll show you where, if you'll put your hand on me. My mother said that was good."

_________________________


Catch held the cane in his hands. He opened his eye to blue skies and pretty houses, in the alleyway behind Rhaena and Glenn's fine house.. The Civil Constables and the Militia had passed by, left their cobbled boots all over the streets, blood from bodies and shit thrown at the Constables staining the perfect roads. He knew what this was, immediately. He knew that he had gone inside his head, as he had so many times before. He knew that he woke from his own, protective dream.

There was blood at his mouth, and he spat at the iron taste, the Iron core of the cane throbbing against his broken fingers. There was blood spattered on his naked body. There was blood on him up to the elbows, thick and clinging. In one, quick movement, Catch threw the cane from himself, let it bounce and rattle across the stone.

Naked and bloody, his hobbling step labored, yet easy, as if bloodshed had soothed the growing, feral part of him, Catch went away from the sounds of fighting, from frustrated, rag-clad masses howling and smashing those who had wronged them, the Militia's orders, the Civil Constable's demands.

He had gone inside his head, as Niall had bid him.

He felt a Glass Sun pulsing at his shoulders.
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Re: Facade

Postby Carnath-Emory » Thu Oct 10, 2013 12:01 pm

Outside these walls, bewilderment is giving way to pandemonium. Three hundred and eighty militiamen are hours ahead of their position. Or hours behind. Or perhaps they are precisely where they ought to be and their cadence was wrong; perhaps this is all some confusion brought on by the summer heat, black-dyed uniforms under the merciless sun; everyone knows what comes of that...

A horn sounds, whole districts away: not a call to arms but a question tapering slowly into silence.

High upon the roofs, a flag-bearer who'd been hurrying across the shingles finds himself obliged to suddenly leap, when the rooftop he'd been traversing turns into an alleyway break beneath his very feet. He makes the jump but only barely, hitting the other side with a telltale crunch of bones that has an uneasy archer hastening all the same to his aid.

Questions everywhere: often whispered, sometimes shouted, by men too sure of themselves to think their confusion shameful. Whole detachments grind to a stumbling halt; men labour at propping barricades against walls, having found them falling free of hands that had never reached for them in the first place. One of these, wedged between a narrow wall and a half-opened door, blocks the street so thoroughly that in the end they must take to it with their godendags, pulling apart the very timber they'd assembled themselves this week.

Or was it yesterday? Yesterday, it seems to be, yesterday with axes and woodsaws and Faith blast it, just get the thing down -

In the ruined Perfection of Rhaena's lovely home, a woman screams.

Another, blood-stained and staring, takes a slow step back from the pooling crimson that was threatening to reach her boots.
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Re: Facade

Postby Cherny » Thu Oct 10, 2013 1:31 pm

Cherny stands, as he has so often in recent weeks, at the side of the parlour; an elegant, spacious room - tasteful, well-appointed without straying into vulgarity. He has learned stillness in that time, learned how to stand without fidgeting. He refrains from tugging at the starched linen at his throat and cuffs; he takes care not to crease or rumple the expensive fabric of his doublet or britches, supple silk and stiff brocade in the Lady's colours, an outfit of Sera Atrahasis' design that he had come to call his clown suit. Not quite the bold red-and-gold of Sir Elliot's garb; more muted, subdued so as not to challenge his master's glory while still making clear by cut and style that they are a matched set - a Lady must have her Knight, and a Knight must have his Squire.

The room is quiet, nothing louder than a genteel laugh or the chime of fine porcelain as a teacup is returned to its saucer; the Lady holds court, surrounded by a select few of her most favoured - the prettiest birds in her aviary, chosen for their charming speech or refined features, the grace with which they wear the clothes their Lady has gifted them; they sip fragrant tea and nibble upon dainty pastries, they discuss airy matters of clothing, of dining, subjects befitting ladies of their station; ever and again they turn admiring eyes to their Lady, seeking her smile, her approval, or merely her attention - a glance, a nod, an acknowledgement that they are pleasing to her.

The squire has taken a place beside the window, where the glare of daylight has him half-lost among the rich draperies (red-and-gold, of course), easily missed, easily forgotten. He stands quietly, imagining himself no more than a piece of furniture, while other sounds leak through the windowpanes, distant sounds from the streets outside. Voices raised, rough and ill-formed, at first distant but closer by the minute; now and then a sharper cry, a man's outraged yell or a woman's dismayed shriek; horn blasts rolling across the rooftops from poorer districts; urgent conversation from the street as squads of Civil Constables cross paths in front of the Lady's residence; frantic reports of districts contested and lost, yet of all those in the parlour, only the boy near the window receives such news - the Lady is at tea, and not to be disturbed.

A furtive glance to the world outside shows him precious little; a slice of an affluent street, all pristine cobbles and new-painted woodwork, windowboxes that had been riots of colour until the locusts had swept through town. Occasionally a figure passes by, a well-to-do citizen or a harried-looking Civil Constable. More of the latter, as the day progresses. Slanted columns of smoke here or there above the rooftops, darker and thicker than chimney plumes.

From these meager clues he strives to guess at what goes on outside; at what progress the Militia makes against the beleagured Civil Constables. He can imagine how it's going. Trained, drilled men, organised and coordinated, retaking Myrkentown under the Marshall's command. Civil patrols who've never been taught how to work together, how to act together, who've been given sashes and cudgels and pamphlets of sartorial standards, but little more than that. The end result is hardly in doubt, the only uncertainty being when. When will they reach the Lady's house? When will they gather outside, and demand that she surrender herself to their justice? Will they wait, or will they just break down the doors?

His thoughts are drawn away from such matters by movement in the parlour, Sir Elliot moving to stand, the Lady's pretty birds fluttering in mock-petulant dismay- Must he leave? But they have so enjoyed his company, and there's yet tea in his cup. Cherny straightens, draws in a steadying breath, looking to his Knight to see if he should

* * *

leap and crackle merrily in their black iron prison, hungrily devouring the twists and scraps of paper as he pokes them into the stove's glowing belly, and he can't help a hoarse and breathless laugh at the sight. The narrow sticks of kindling have begun to catch, and he sits back on his heels as he waits for the fire to grow hotter, lungs still aching, the autumn air provoking a now-familiar twinge from the scar where he'd caught a bad case of arrow. A wary glance for the tavern where the Vice-Governor's posters have been torn from the walls for fuel, before he returns his attention to the stove, the stove that warms Ser Catch's shack, which he now goads back to life. He has...

A blink. A frown of confusion as his gaze lowers to hands that tremble with nerves, with excitement. Chilly and raw-feeling as if scrubbed in cold water, and fingertips lift to his cheek, his brow and note the same. He stands, and his limbs are weak, unsteady as after urgent exertion, and he tugs at the black wool of his doublet and the linen beneath where it sticks to the skin of his chest.

He turns with unsteady steps, disoriented as if waking abruptly from a dream; his shoe catches and tangles on something, and he staggers a moment before he can regain his balance. Fiery autumn colours pool untidily in the dirt, supple silk and stiff brocade in muted red-and-gold trampled beneath his boots. He clutches at his head in dismay at what Sir Elliot will say, what the Lady will say, but in the moment after he is laughing again, but he doesn't know why, only that something about that thought is ridiculous, absurd. He laughs even more at the sticky sting beneath his fingers as they encounter an inches-long cut in his scalp, and when he realises that the fine fabric at his feet has too much red in it, stiffening the silk and darkening the damask, he collapses to his knees and laughs until he's gasping, blind and breathless. An eruption, an outpouring of something built up over weeks and months and only now, only now released, and he doesn't even know why.

He's still laughing as he takes his iron knife to the ruined livery, as he tears it into scraps, as he feeds livid rags into the stove's hot little mouth.
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Re: Facade

Postby Treadwell » Thu Oct 10, 2013 1:45 pm

An hour of missing time had upset most of the folks from Myrken Wood, many who cared and many who didn't.

Leave it to Aloisius Treadwell to remain wonderfully, blissfully ignorant of the affair, asleep and snoring soundly, clad in pink pajamas, the matching suit and hat and gloves and boots all folded atop a borrowed bedside table.

The Acting Governor had much on his mind, and none of it had aught to do with mortal life in Myrken Wood. It's a maxim among the divine that The Glutton would have what He wanted. At this hour, The Glutton had wanted a good, long nap for a ball of a mortal shell, and The Glutton had wanted to indulge in His endless, insatiable feasting.

His eyes were not set upon Myrken Wood. They were set upon the morass of sludge and ale and slop in which He merrily rolled and wobbled and waded and ate and drank.

Thus, upon Treadwell's awakening to Myrkeners in chaos, Aloisius knows only a vague, uncertain state of "off-ness" about the air, a magical creepiness crawling at his rolls of skin.

On goes the pink suit, from floppy hat up top to heavy boots below.

Even after this splendid nap and delightful other consciousness, this horrid disturbance quite simply puts him off his merry, jolly day. It is with a frown that he stands at a window in his borrowed bedroom in the poorer part of Myrken, rocking on his flat feet, hands atop his cane before him.

"By my great, quivering gut, what went wrong here, mmph mmph?"
"Looks like a table to me. Do you think it could hold up someone as bulbous as Treadwell?" -- Dr. Brennan, Myrken Wood Rememdium Edificium
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Re: Facade

Postby channe » Thu Oct 10, 2013 4:52 pm

"What --"

To her right, against the wall near the door, comes a painful coughing; it'll take a moment for anyone else in the room to realize exactly who it is, because for a few moments the culprit herself looks like a corpse. But no; this particular version of Agnieszka is very much alive, although covered in blood herself. Much of it may be her own, as there are nasty-looking blade-wounds to her torso and wounds to her arm, to her leg, and her sword is clatter-lost and dead-looking a meter from the hand that clutches at the pretty wooden floor, but not so much blood like the pool across the floor, no; that was butchery --

The fight is the first thing she thinks about as she comes to, confusion setting in, knowing she'd been fighting but not knowing who, not knowing why, knowing only confusion.

But she hadn't been here.

She'd been outside.

Fighting.

Fighting with --

-- with whom?!

So she'll be forgiven if it takes a few moments for Agnieszka's blurry mind to realize that the woman laying on the floor is Rhaena, and that Rhaena isn't breathing.

"Rhaena," she says, and the words are a whisper, followed by a horrible choking sob, and her eyes work from the servant in the doorway to Ariane standing there to the dead woman on the floor, and her name ripped from her throat once again in clear mourning -- "No,," she calls, and tries to get up, her voice an anguished scream. "Rhaena, get up --"

-- and only then does the pain hit her in a drowning wave. "Ariane," she says, her eyes moving from the corpse to the swordswoman. "What did you do," she coughs out. "What --"

There's not much else the woman can say through her own stabbing pain; her shoulders square, and she makes an attempt to get up.
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Re: Facade

Postby Shobits » Fri Oct 11, 2013 3:59 am

He was afraid.

That in itself frightened Endymion all the more.

Fear was not something that Endymion normally experienced, and when he did it was fear for another. Not fear of another, nor fear of himself. But right now, he was thinking of that latter and so much more. Just what had the creature from the Ether so frightened?

Missing time.

He just did not forget things! He was not some human to lose track of the time - at least not whilst he dwelt on the mortal plane time was objective here! It wasn't the Ether where a second could be a century and a day five minutes. All Endymion knew was that he had been at the Smith working on a masterpiece of a sword that he was even focusing on imbuing with a touch of his Protection Powers, and then found himself in his True Form by the lake of all things, cleaning his tail blade and hands of blood too diluted by that point to recognize the origin.

What had he done?

Aside from there being a gap in his mind, Endymion did not feel any different. He did not look any different. His wings were still their 50/50 angel/demon configuration, his tail was still slim and supple, bladed end still elegant. There was nothing to signify that he had crossed his code and done an evil deed. Whatever he had done was justified to those otherworldly Rules he was bound by. No change. No punishment. This did not appease or reassure Endymion in the least.

Someone had messed with his head.
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Re: Facade

Postby Carnath-Emory » Fri Oct 11, 2013 6:44 am

Here. Narrow and tall, a fencer's even posture described in lines of pallid grey. Shock-white cheeks, all the more stark against the dark of her tousled hair. Fastened to the chin, long across the knuckles, the off-white garments seem almost to consume the swordswoman beneath. But they wear their stains well: the fine crimson patina that adorns one arm from elbow to wrist, the thick splash of red at her hip. A thin spray of the stuff has struck her chest, climbs the shoulder, threatening the integrity of her throat -

Inert upon the floor, her schiavona has fared no better.

She does not move. As the breath falters in her throat, as her mind struggles to reconcile memory with reality; she does not move, except that staring eyes fix hard upon the rousing Agnieszka, search her out and stay there as the girl struggles towards her feet.

Ariane.
A swallow of her throat; slow, dry. Eyes that take in everything, everything: a mounting crescendo of tiny, bloodsoaked details.

What did you do.
Stark wide eyes, fixed back upon the girl. Upon a dozen small features, crimson and ruinous, beginning with the cough and concluding at the difficulty with which she tries to stand, and the schiavona had lain by her feet a moment ago but now it is in her hand -

"Is."

- blood-soaked, and gleaming yet, keen edges and narrow lines -

"Is she dead."

- and at the doorway some girl, some nameless girl who'd screamed -

"You're done." Eyes swung back towards Agnieszka now. Staring, even so; staring, even though what's key is to function, and nevermind that she'd been on the streets just now, there on the streets and they are miles yet from the Meetinghouse. It doesn't matter. It doesn't have to matter. What's key is to function, and her function is to -

"Done, Vice-Governor. This is over." A subtle tremor in her fingertips. Adrenaline. Something else. Knew it when she lifted her weapon: her body primed for violence, swift and conclusive. She knew it, and it is the one and only certainty in all of her world. "This - "

A subtle tremor, running the length of a weapon she's pointed towards everything, towards nothing at all.
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Re: Facade

Postby Glenn » Fri Oct 11, 2013 9:21 am

Elliot

He knew who he was.

There were memories in his head not at all his own, false memories. His mouth tasted of iron and blood. The room he was in was sparse. The bed he was upon was lumpy, barely a bed at all. His body ached. The world was blurry. He remembered untruths and truths side by side. He was fevered and his mind was the more so. There were gaps. How did he get here? Where was he? How long had passed? He knew none of these things.

Yet he knew who he was.

He could see the image of himself, smiling, sheepish, assured and tall, younger than he should have been, dressed strangely. He saw himself caring for another, looking after him. He saw himself awash in his own ignorance but with a good heart, reassuring another, defending another from those who would hurt him. Good heroic things. It was wrong though. It was impossible. He knew it.

For he knew who he was.

There was armor upon the floor of the room, battered, tarnished, some of it outright broken. Where it was broken, he was as well. Ribs, lacerations, one wound that was worse than that. Something had changed. He knew it. It wasn't just the fever. It wasn't just the wound. It wasn't just the unconsciousness, the blankness of his memory, the strange, unknown room in this decrepit house, worn down but still fill of warmth; someone had been tending to him, but who? He heard voices in an adjacent room, whispers. He tried to balance himself, tried to sit up but the whispers only became worse, more inwardly focused. A fence. A mule. Magic. A unicorn. He saw himself speaking of all of this. Teahouses and safety. Errands and those who would harm him. Harm another. Harm everyone? He saw himself through inhuman eyes, through a lens that no human should ever look through, and it threatened to drive him mad, then and there, on this bed, as his bleeding was held back only by bandages and compassion.

But still he knew who he was.

He was Sir Elliot Gahald. It was his armor upon the floor. It was his resolve that would drive him to sit up now. He let out a yelp of muffled pain as his body rebelled against his foolish commands. The memories assaulted him once more, biting and pulling, twisting and squeezing. Mind and body railed against the assaults upon him and blackness descended once again.
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Re: Facade

Postby Guppy » Fri Oct 11, 2013 9:38 am

The creature sat astride a small hill overlooking the town. Niall's lithe form had scrambled up into the branches of a strong, stalwart oak like she was born to do so. Her back rested against the thick trunk. Her backside rested on a sturdy branch, one leg outstretched and one allowed to hang down. They ached from the frantic sprint away from town. Nonetheless, one dangled. Flirting with the fall. Black eyes ghosted over the chaos that erupted within the town below. Fighting, shouts of alarm. Music to her ears. There was still smoke coming from the stocks, burned to a pile of ash and fury. It could not vanquish the vibrant grin upon her face, nostrils flaring wide to take in the scents of blood and flame on the wind. Pupils dilated and adrenaline coursed.

It brought back such memories. Memories that left the being feeling quite wistful.

Still no sign of her fallen little whelp, but she was alive. Somewhere. Healing, being cared for. She could not stir any further concern, for she was well-fed and happy. Unsteady, drunk on violence and gore. A soft almost-purr sounded as she glanced down at the blood upon her hands. One rose and she licked at the lifeblood, curling fingers like talons. The metal of blood bloomed upon her tongue and fed her senses.

She crowed, she howled her triumph. Calling for the forgotten, for the fallen. Her joy was infectious.

Calling for the wild things to come so that she could eat them up. It made flocks of birds explode from the treetop to escape the predator. It made small mammals find their burrows and hunker down for the night.

Today, she would enjoy this, better than she felt in months.

Tomorrow, she would find Giuseppe.

For the Lady was dead.
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Re: Facade

Postby Jirai » Fri Oct 11, 2013 10:17 am

Stay out of town, they said. Stay safe with Solena, they said.

No. Way.

No way would Cat be left out. No way would Cat wait around with no idea what was...

...

...going on?

Blue eyes stared down at bloodied hands, at bloodied knife hovering above a trough, swaying unsteadily on feet.

What?

The child wasn't thinking straight, wasn't seeing straight. All Cat could think of was one thing: wash off the blood before anyone saw.

Of course, knife blades could be cleaned easier than bloodstained clothes.
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Re: Facade

Postby channe » Fri Oct 11, 2013 10:49 am

One hand -- decorated with five pretty gold-and-bloodstained rings -- clutches at her gut; she winces, and it comes back touched with red. Her own eyes raise to meet Ariane's. "Done. Thank hell," she whispers.

She pauses, blinks, and looks down where Rhaena lies, more still then she'd ever been. "When I find... when I find the person who made her do this, changed her" she says, quietly, "there'll be no fucking quarter. I'll split 'em down the middle an' lay 'em out in the town square, I'll squeeze out their heart, I'll --"

She sways.

"I think I've lost a lot of blood," she says, her eyes flickering once again to the schiavona. "So finish it."
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Re: Facade

Postby Carnath-Emory » Fri Oct 11, 2013 11:53 am

Just like that, unspoken questions answered; hopes, as well, inherently dangerous and so nothing to which the swordswoman had ever given voice. A single what-if had underscored her thoughts for hours: if she dies. Percussive within her mind: if she dies and her death does not restore them, and Agnieszka Kaczmarek banished its frenetic rattle with a single, invaluable word.

A sword should not tremble so in the hand of a woman who's lived and died by such steel.

"Both we shall." The voice is thin in her throat; it is hardly hers at all. It is not, all the same, without some strength. Slowly now, the breath which follows it, slowly and then again, as if to fill her nerves with calm. This is the most stillness she's known in hours, and it is every inch the paralysis of a woman whose body threatens to lunge out of her control, quick to savage and eager to kill -

There is no reason for it.
No possible reason, save for one.

Quiet, quiet eyes for Rhaena Olwak, for a flow of blood that's becoming sluggish as the body begins to cool. The words scatter and fail, and how could it be otherwise? She is what she is, after all: a northern-born brute, a weapon masquerading as a thing of flesh and blood, and ultimately more suited to actions than to words. She will not desecrate the moment with clumsy syllables, brute, crude phrases.

Kneels here, instead; in the blood spreading thinly from Rhaena's side.
Lays her weapon to rest. Arranges the girl's limbs into peaceful accord, and this is surely all the kindness she'd never shown the trader while she lived.
It was three of them, once. Three young bodies laid side by side, alike in their youth and their desperate friendship. Make it quick for her, Agnieszka had pleaded, and Rhaena Olwak had died in the arms of a swordswoman who could not bear to leave her alone with all that death. Died with all the warmth, all the gentleness that could be accomplished by a weapon which was sometimes more than just steel.

"Y'sozhaleyu," she murmurs, quiet by the dead girl's ear. "Chto vy byli zabyty tak dolgo," now as then, and lifts her eyes towards Agnieszka, wide and pale -

Wider, when she realises.

A shout for that girl who'd stumbled at the doorway, but the screaming fool is already gone. To tell the news, perhaps; to shout it upon the streets to a town slipping into disarray. No help from that quarter, and that knowledge has her to her feet, quick to Agnieszka's side; there's something wrong with her leg, she discovers when she uses it, something wrong and it hardly matters, for: "The Rememdium, for you. As swiftly as we can manage it."
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Re: Facade

Postby Maxwell » Sat Oct 12, 2013 3:36 am

His hands, covered with red. His clothes in tatters. His nice white shirt red as well. His face. All over his face. Maxwell was a composed, brilliant man, the finest of his age certainly, but he was ultimately only human. When he rubbed those red hands against his face and only made them more red in the process, he screamed.

What had happened? He had gone to bring order to Myrken Wood. Oh, the blackouts had been so frequent since he had last encountered Catch, or was it the time before. Everything became so mottled and twisted when Catch was involved. Poor creature; only Maxwell understood him. Only Maxwell could save Myrken from him. Here, though he had gone to stop the mob, to stop both sides. He would declare Maxwell Law and as Governor would bring this entire conflict to a stop. Cummerbunds could coexist with socks with holes in them. It was a wide, broad world! If he could see that, why couldn't the others?

He had written a speech and ah! It was on the ground beside him. It was covered in red! He screamed again. His poor work. It was really more of a scroll, but now it was a red-stained mess, just like the rest of him.

Really, now, that deserved two screams. This time, some of the blood from his face dripped down towards his mouth, a thick, gooey mess, It rolled down ever-closer as time seemed to stop. He could feel it but could do nothing to stop it. His hands were frozen. His eyes were clenched shut in horrified anticipation.

Maxwell screamed again as the fluid slipped over his tongue. "Oh no. No, no. This cannot be. Foul magic! Foul magic!" What else could soil the blood soul? What else could rot and transmogrify it? What else could make blood taste like the juice of tomatoes. Maxwell fell to the ground in horror. What had befallen Myrken Wood now!
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Re: Facade

Postby channe » Sat Oct 12, 2013 3:46 am

"No," she says, quietly -- "no, not after you --"

She pauses, closes her eyes for a moment, attempts to banish the pain. "No. I don't remember -- I don't remember everything, but I remember that I wanted to stop you. Stop you from coming in here. You were going to kill Rhaena. And now she's --"

She wheels, as best she can, and she leans over to retrieve the Rodel-run crystal sword, to hold it by her side but not raise it, not threaten -- "Now she's dead." Ariane will see Agnieszka swallow; that hand tremble. "You were right. She had to be stopped. It had to end. You were gone. I was -- trying to resolve it all without any more people getting killed, but that's all bullshit now that you've killed her. Which is what you do. I understand." There are tears at the corner of her eyes. "And today there's going to be people dancing in the streets, because we failed. You an' I. We didn't see what was going on. I couldn't even defend myself or Myrken from it. You may have been the hand that did it but it's just as much my fault."

She swallows a sob. "Okay. We'll need to get Constables in here. Trusted men. Nobody touches her. I --" A pause. "I need to get Aleksei back here. He needs to look at her body. Figure out if she was magicked, if he can."

Her eyes move back down to Ariane's leg. "... you need to go, too."
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channe
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