Aftermath.

Aftermath.

Postby Carnath-Emory » Wed May 25, 2005 4:22 am

Ariane Emory had never been a quiet sleeper, but even for her, this is excessive: she does not so much rouse herself as flail her way into consciousness, up onto her feet and colliding with a rough wall before her eye has fully blinked away the blurriness of sleep.

I will make a deal with you.

Thadius Dhrin. She'd made her deal with the devil a second time, had witnessed his unveiling...a second time. And once again there'd been the commotion to follow, the tangle of white robes and stamping horses, and --

That flood of memory is pushed aside as irrelevant. She lives, with but an aching skull to account for it: a quick examination of her skin shows no real wounds but that. A good thing, for her first fear had been poison; they'd used that on the Governor, after all. Her second thought is for the schiavona, which a scrambling search discovers lying on the stone floor several feet away; the slim-bladed dagger lays beside it. Both are strapped back into their places upon her body, as she examines her new surroundings: a den of cold stone, as empty as any room she's ever known. There's not so much as a blanket, which accounts for her shivering, and the whole of it is lit poorly by a single oil lamp.

Several minutes of tugging assure her that it's attached quite firmly to the wall; too firmly to, say, fling it at the first face that showed itself at her door. Several moments more show that the door itself is impassable, its tiny, barred window revealing little to her brief inspection.

We're watching...

This is how the first hour passes: an inspection of her imprisonment, almost clinical in its detachment -- but isn't that necessary? Oh, she could succumb to hysterical fear, and be butchered meat for the first madman who stepped into this room. She could give herself over to despair, and slit her throat with the weapons they've so kindly left for her. No: better by far to seat herself upon the cold stone floor, and let the rush of silver in her blood -- that subtle, churning body within her own -- be a reassurance. Better to stretch her legs out before her, and lay the slim sword across her lap, since they've left it with her.

That was a generous mercy. They'll have cause to regret it.
User avatar
Carnath-Emory
Member
 
Posts: 2531
Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2002 5:00 am
Location: Under your bed.

Postby Thadius Dhrin » Wed May 25, 2005 4:39 am

"I told you, she is to be left alone. No one is to be allowed entry, save for me."

"Yes, Brother Prime."

"Go! I've no need for you here."

There was a scurrying in the hallway just in front of the great metal door. The sound of a metal key and gears grinding, followed by the door pushing itself slowly inward. Outside there were two shadows, one of which entered slowly.

"Only you remain, Francis. If anyone else approaches, bid them leave."

Thadius Dhrin entered the large cell, his thin frame clothed only in a floor length platinum silk skirt, his rippling flesh left bare for the most part. His back turned away from her, the eyes were unseen, but obviously a haunting memory from the night previous.

"So curious, little Nightingale. See what your want for knowledge has gotten you? If you could only have left it alone, let us continue on our way without your curious eyes upon us, none of this would have been needed."

The smile which played on his lips was one of a smug dominance. He had her exactly where he wished her to be, and her own actions had brought her here. Right hand toyed with the soft material of the skirt, which shimmer gently in the singular light of the oil lamp.

"Do you see what I have suffered for you? Jaque thought it would make it more realistic if I suffered injury as well. Seems he was right. You almost believed me."

"You yet live because of me. You would be wise to remember that. Your knowledge of us is dangerous, others would see you dead."

"I..."

The smile curling his lips further, revealing white teeth in the relative darkness, sparkling in frosted malachite eyes. Mint and ozone.

"..believe you still owe me a kiss, Nightingale."

I can feel your heart beat
Can you keep on running
And your mind is on heat
As the world keeps burning
As she draws her last breath
Will you hear her calling
Look at her she's fading
Be a man and suffer tonight
User avatar
Thadius Dhrin
Member
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 3:52 pm

Postby Carnath-Emory » Wed May 25, 2005 5:14 am

For the first time since her awakening, there is sound other than her own breath. Will they expect heroics? They'll find none here: no clever messing about with standing behind the door to await them, none of that elven rubbish about clinging to the ceiling, to fall upon their heads when they stare with shock into the 'empty' room. There's a reason, she'd said to small Phlynn years ago, that those sorts of people only exist in fairy tales: because the ones who've tried it in the real world have died in the attempt. Brutally.

So she awaits them quietly, slouched against the far wall of her cell, the schiavona hanging loosely from one hand. There's no overt threat here, no movement whatsoever; the only reasonable response to overwhelming numbers and invulnerable walls is quiet compliance, and not a moment's hesitation, when an opening finally shows itself.

Which, eventually, it will.

Words, from this man -- this monster. Words, and yet more words, and the memory of what horror patterns his skin. She needn't see those marks, anymore than she must feel the silver in her blood to know of its presence. That violet ink is seared into her mind.

"You led me here."

Words are almost meaningless at this juncture; her world is not one of speech, but of endless assessments. She must determine, after all, if she has any chance of fighting her way past the horde of them -- or just satisfy herself with slaughtering this one, before they finally overcome her. Meaningless words. But they give her time to think.

"You might have denied me that first journey." Which had cost him a finger, and her some blood. "You might have fled, afterwards." When he'd become capable of it, and that had required but a day's rest. "You might have ... shown ... me nothing, and said not a word." Her grey eye makes a slow inspection of him: let it be he who knows, just for a moment, what it is to be meat beneath another's gaze.

"The knowledge was yours. The choice was yours."

Let him think for a little on those words, although they surely matter little. For he advances upon her now, cold in every angle, in every motion. There's ice in his eyes, and silver in her own. His smile is a repugnant delirium.

"So come." Silver, threatening to choke the words in her throat; iron beneath the flesh, flooding her senses with the memory of mint and blood. The dream hadn't been prescient. And yet, and yet... "Come. Take what you want." And discover what befalls those who know only how to take. It would be something, to savage the lips from his mouth.

It would be only the beginning.
User avatar
Carnath-Emory
Member
 
Posts: 2531
Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2002 5:00 am
Location: Under your bed.

Postby Thadius Dhrin » Wed May 25, 2005 6:44 am

"If it had not already become apparent to you, lovely little wren, I do not take what is not freely given. At least when it comes to matters such as these. If such were the case do you not think I would have thrown you down and had my way with you that night in the Rememdium? It certainly would have been simple, and you would have known no differently. But you know now, don't you? You know nothing like that happened."

Thadius was many things, a passionate man, a learned man, a gentle man. He was not, a foolish man. There was murder in her eyes, as well there should be.

"I know that I gave you that information, Nightingale. I gave it freely because I trusted you, I had hoped you would learn to trust me. Sadly, your curiosity outweighed what little trust you might have had, and here we are."

He would turn from her then, presenting his back, though such was not the reason he turned. The eyes stared back at her, as they had that night in the Rememdium. Scars, intricate blackwork tattoos, small, almost gently colored ones...and then the horror carved into the small of his back. When healed the scars would rise easily an half inch from his flesh. The iris of the eye inked a vivid amethyst.

The form before her moved with an easy grace, very reminiscent of a young governor she knew. Though there was something different about Dhrin, something akin to shadow in his movement. Almost something warring within.

"I had hoped to ease you into the beauty that we understand here, Nightingale. To help you see, as we do. To help you see with His eyes. There is still hope of that. I want you to come with me, to understand. Will you come with me, willingly? Keep you blade, and know that none of mine will harm you. But come with me...see..."

Turning to face her once more, the motion swirling the lovely, delicate skirt around him, swishing softly as it slowed, then stopped. He was a beautiful man, if one removed the current circumstance. A beautiful man, with beautiful eyes, who smelled of mint and ozone.

I can feel your heart beat
Can you keep on running
And your mind is on heat
As the world keeps burning
As she draws her last breath
Will you hear her calling
Look at her she's fading
Be a man and suffer tonight
User avatar
Thadius Dhrin
Member
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 3:52 pm

Postby Carnath-Emory » Wed May 25, 2005 7:26 am

"I know."

And that, of course, is the problem at the heart of this all. Her over-developed instinct to protect has worked with Dhrin's meddling to impart too much knowledge to a woman who rightly should have lived out her life in relative ignorance of such things. There was no reason whatsoever that a common sellsword -- a Councilor's retainer, at best! -- should have made such discoveries. I know, she says, and in unrepentant sincerity. Each step of the way, there'd been choices; most of them had been repugnant at best.

"But I do not understand. Why him? Is it just the colour?"

Because violet is emblazoned bright and furious upon Dhrin's back, and he needn't have turned to remind her of that. The recollection was vivid, that sight having accounted for her horrified flight from the Rememdium, so many nights ago, for every moment of panic that had followed it. Guard him, she'd gasped at Mikhail, at Proxenus, at anyone who'd spare a moment to listen. Guard him, and never quite knowing the reason why, never quite understanding her own fear, until this night.

Until now, when the threat has become greater than she'd thought to imagine.

Beauty. Trust. Curiosity. His eyes -- all things that she scarcely understands, and likes even less. He speaks of things which are anathema to her, things from which she should rightly turn away, things that she would flee if the chance presented itself. Destroy, if the opening for it appeared. But he almost dances before her, this thing with its lovely skirts and entrancing eyes; there is an uncertainty within his very flesh, a tremor there as if the truths she'd always sensed in him lurked there, waiting, just waiting...

"Show me."

Spoken quietly, as if it were actually that simple. And perhaps, in the end, it is. They have come to the strangest of impasses, these two; their journey ends with but two choices left to them. Murder. Revelation.

Or perhaps, if she has her way, both.
User avatar
Carnath-Emory
Member
 
Posts: 2531
Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2002 5:00 am
Location: Under your bed.

Postby Thadius Dhrin » Wed May 25, 2005 8:30 am

"Why him?"

There was laughter then, soft, joyous, as if it were the simplest of things. A shake of his head, tumbling platinum tresses around his glistening flesh.

"If only it were so easy as to tell you. I would have to pass back in time a great long way for you to understand. We simply do not have that kind of time. They wait for us."

A slender hand, short a digit, would reach for her. He truely meant no harm, only wishing to show her the light. His light.

"Come, I will not hurt you. Truth be told you could run me through, if you wished to. However, you should know, that you would be allowed to live. Your governor, on the other hand, would pay for my life, with his."

Wether she took his hand or not, he would move through the door, and down the hallway. As the approached a larger opening, lit with many oil lamps, two robed men approached, slipping the platinum robe over his head.

"She waits for you, Brother Prime."

"Thank you Gorje. He thanks you for you devotion."

As he slipped through the entry way to the great hall, hopefully with Ariane in tow, they were greeted by the vision of a great sea of silvery white. As a hundred, perhaps more, members of the Order of the All knelt before the great altar.

I can feel your heart beat
Can you keep on running
And your mind is on heat
As the world keeps burning
As she draws her last breath
Will you hear her calling
Look at her she's fading
Be a man and suffer tonight
User avatar
Thadius Dhrin
Member
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 3:52 pm

Postby Carnath-Emory » Wed May 25, 2005 8:53 am

His laughter is a mockery, a knife to the heart. Silver rushes and churns to fill that wound.

And all that time, his hand reaches across a distance that is vast as the world itself. There have been moments like this before: Vornheim, plunging down into unfathomable darkness, his wrist in her grasp; the Governor, reaching from some lofty, impossible height; her sister, oh, ever Quincy, the one always-welcome touch. This touch is an obscenity that cannot be avoided, and the breath stills in her lungs as she winds her fingers about his mutilated own. She has a hand left still for the sword. Its fingers flex loosely at her side, ready, ready for that moment, when it comes...

She walks with him. Over broken glass and burning coals, she walks.

Their numbers are vast. She wastes several moments on counting them, head after hooded head, blending into a silvery, blinding mass. They are a gleaming ocean of bodies, with the altar for an island at their heart, and is there some sympathy for the one who waits there? She's a pretty thing, hair as dark as Ariane's own, and here is fresh horror: now and then, a cowled head lifts; now and then, she catches sight of a familiar face, a smile from a market-stall, just weeks ago. She'd known some of these. They'd been here all along...

It's then that realisation strikes her like a slap to the cheek, for it's to be murder and revelation after all. After showing her so much, after unveling their Belief, their slayings, their faces... they cannot possibly permit her to leave this place alive.
User avatar
Carnath-Emory
Member
 
Posts: 2531
Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2002 5:00 am
Location: Under your bed.

Postby Thadius Dhrin » Wed May 25, 2005 11:31 am

"Brothers and Sisters, we are honored to have a guest with us this evening. We have the lovely Ariane Emory in our very midst tonight."

There was a stunned silence, interrupting the murmured prayers which had filled the room upon their entry. A few brave faces lifted to look upon the woman who held Prime's hand. There was Sasha, Miheas' the flour merchant's daughter. Phinneas, the man who bore a shovel with Proxenus in the militia the very evening before. Kastra, the rope maker. Faces seen in market and square, tavern and stable.

A squeeze was given Ari's hand, a look of peace from Thadius.

"Hold her."

Simple words barked coldly to the six that flanked either side of the Brother. The would converge on her, taking hold of her, somehow gently, as if afraid of angering Prime. He knew she would not be able to stand by and watch what was about to happen, no matter how willing the participants.

"As ever, we come here to honor Him. Delia has reached the age of acension. She has chosen to go to Him, to be one with Him. To please Him with her selfless sacrifice."

A hand was extended toward the beautiful young girl. Just sixteen at dawn this morning, Delia had come to Prime and asked that she be allowed to go to Him. It was with joy in her heart that she stepped to the Brother, her angelic face turned upward toward him.

"What is your heart's desire, Delia May?"

"To be one with Him, Brother Prime."

"Do you go to Him, give Him your gift with a joyous heart?"

"I do this for Him Brother."

"Then let it be so, child."

Eyes of glittering amber looked upon the Brother, as a silver dagger slipped from the confines of his robe. With practiced ease, a glitter of metal in the flickering light of the oil lamps, the knife was raised. In less than it would take to breath deep and begin to scream, it was over.

The shell of the girl once known as Delia, slumped to the floor, beautiful eyes resting in the undamaged hand of Brother Prime. From her empty sockets trickled the last of her life blood, most of it spilling rapidly to the cold stone floor from the crimson slit across her neck.

Prime was not a cruel man. He would not let her suffer, for long. The practice of slitting the throats of the sacrifice had become a necessary one long ago. It brought them peace much more quickly. Delia showed no signs of pain, there was, in fact, a smile on the beautiful girls lips as the light faded from her.

"We honor Him with this gift!"

From the mass of silver clad bodies below came the echoed reply.

"We honor Him with this gift."

"With this sacrifice as we remade, completed, by His love."

"Completed by His love."

"In Him do we place our faith. In Him we believe."

"We believe"

"Go now, to your families, hold them close and love them always."

With this, Prime was turning away from the gathered mass. Watching, searching, the face of Ariane. Delia's eyes seemed to be watching her too.

I can feel your heart beat
Can you keep on running
And your mind is on heat
As the world keeps burning
As she draws her last breath
Will you hear her calling
Look at her she's fading
Be a man and suffer tonight
User avatar
Thadius Dhrin
Member
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 3:52 pm

Postby Carnath-Emory » Wed May 25, 2005 12:02 pm

She'd spit in their faces, if she could. Slit their throats as due justice for this madness. Familiar faces, the rot and corruption that they'd always sensed festering in the heart of this place --

Her hand is limp in his grasp. Her body isn't, when they come for her; what, another in this long succession of lies? But Dhrin is a deft ringmaster, turning one's attention nimbly from one horror to the next, and she falls silent soon enough.

This might have been simpler for her, had Nothern Dauntless any real sort of religion of its own. But they were born to cold winters and hostile land, to hopelessness and grudges. They were too stubborn for gods, and too hateful as well, atheists to the core -- just like Ariane herself. So much of this is wasted on her, the lovely ritual of chant and reply, the poetic set of the words upon their lips: her eyes are only for the pretty thing who joins Dhrin at that cold altar, and her ears make sense of little but the gathering race of her own furious heart.

Selfless.
Sacrifice.
Ascension.


All these pretty words as if they meant something, as if they could alleviate the horror which awaits. The faithful see an offering: she sees butchery, and there's a gasp half-born upon her lips as that knife lifts, glittering and horrible in the dim-lit cavern. That it might fall is an impossibility, is beyond her capacity to understand, for so many stand here who might somehow prevent this. So many who could just lift a hand to stop it, stop this slaughter of one of their own --

It's as well that they have her held. The first spray of blood tears a hoarse cry from her throat, and she's dragged them two full steps across the stone floor before they can still her.

She quietens, slowly. It is a lifetime's effort, condensed into the few moments that she has to spare. But: "Gift," she spits; the twist of her lips makes the word a blasphemy. And "Gift!" she breathes like a prayer, as Dhrin turns towards her; quietly now, as she slumps against the hands which hold her at bay. Her head bows, unable to look upon the girl's dead, staring eyes.

Hers leaks fractured silver from its edge.
User avatar
Carnath-Emory
Member
 
Posts: 2531
Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2002 5:00 am
Location: Under your bed.

Postby Thadius Dhrin » Wed May 25, 2005 12:53 pm

It had saddened him deeply to see her response to all of it. It was a kicking, biting, spitting mess as they drug her back to the cell. It was mostly likely a good thing that she merely felt angry and sickened, not threatened, else she may well have killed them all. Thadius lingered behind them as they took her back, placing the offering on the private altar.

He could still hear her cursing, as he made his way from the private sanctuary back toward the large cell they had kept her in. A single vial balanced in his undamaged left hand. The liquid within sparkled a cool silver, something akin to the liquid he had seen dancing in her eye minutes before.

"Open it"

The door to the cell ratcheted open, allowing Prime entry into the dimmly lit space.

"I must apologize, Ariane. I thought you were ready, but you are not. I misjudged. Not you, but the timing. It will be alright, you'll see, soon enough."

"I poisoned you last night. Preparation for what I feared would happen. I was correct, in my assumptions, it would seem. However, I have decided that I wish not to kill you. As I said, I do nto take such things as this from those unwilling. If I were to let you die, it would be no better than what Jaque did to you."

With those words he is rolling the vial across the floor toward her.

"Drink it. You must trust me one last time. If you ever wish to see your governor alive again."

It was no idle threat, the meaning of his words quite clear. If she refused the vial, it would not be only her life she sacrificed, but his as well.

"Do not think for an instant I wouldn't see him dead, his blood thick upon my hands. I am merely giving you the chance to have a long goodbye with him. For he will be ours. He will be His. But I wish you to have your time with him...so that in the end you will understand. It is too soon to take him, but I will, if you defy me."

The vial rocked on the floor until Ariane would pick it up. The silver liquid within gently gliding back and forth in its glass chamber.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dhrin continued to speak, after she had said her piece and sipped the vial like a good girl. It would not take long for the drug to take effect, he had to work quickly. Standing before her once more, in naught but that glittering silk skirt. He began pacing before her, as he spoke, his damaged hand drawing the skirt back and forth slowly, allowing the shiny fabric to catch the light.

"I wanted you to trust me, Ariane."

There was no use of the pet names now, no he needed her to pay attention in these few minutes, know that he was speaking these words to her and that they were important.

"I need you to trust me. I've always been good to you. Didn't I kill the man who hurt you? I certainly did. It was horrible fo him to do such a thing to you."

"I've always looked out for you. Always protected you. Always had your best interest at heart."

Back and forth he paced, the silk fluttering rhthymically as he passed her.

"I am your friend, Ariane. YOu trust me, you always have. I saved your governor. I brought medicine and gave you information about those awful white robes."

"You trust me, don't you, Ari?"

He would kneel down, as her eye began to close, a soft smile on his angelic features and it would be the last thing she saw.

I can feel your heart beat
Can you keep on running
And your mind is on heat
As the world keeps burning
As she draws her last breath
Will you hear her calling
Look at her she's fading
Be a man and suffer tonight
User avatar
Thadius Dhrin
Member
 
Posts: 54
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 3:52 pm

Postby Carnath-Emory » Wed May 25, 2005 1:20 pm

This one will not flee, dearling. He will die.

The words that Ariane had forgotten until recently, whispered by her ear as she'd staggered and ached in a Rememdium cell. They'd horrified her then, in some dim and uncertain way -- but now they serve only to provoke. Silver erupts from her pores in a great, churning tide, hardening beneath her keepers' very hands; they suffer for their diligence, suffer for their Belief, for the rising armour is a thing of cruel curves and keen edges, and such is the fury of her struggles that they must half-carry her back to that cell. One stumbles, near the door; one has too much attention for his torn flesh, and she's on him before they can restrain her.

By the time they've pushed her inside, there's not enough left of him to mend.

What faces Dhrin, as the door slams closed, stands tall and impregnable. Blood drips freely from the bristling barbs of its gauntlets, and she greets him with a sword instead of words.

He speaks the only words which could have restrained her.

Poison is meaningless, to a woman who loves life, but had never expected to have this much of it. Meaningless, to a woman who yearns so dearly to strip the skin from Dhrin's bones. But he echoes the threat that had hung over her for weeks, speaks some of the truth she'd always demanded of him, and it erases the last of her choices. The mercurial brew is accepted --

gauntleted fingers could crush this, shatter the glass and then his bones


-- and swallowed down through the space her helm permits for breath. She is slow in succumbing to its virtues, even now. Slow, in sagging against the wall, as knees begin to fail her. Flesh is weak as ever. But Dhrin leans over her as she drops, whispering the truths she'd once dreamed of tearing from his skin with her teeth. Such words. Devotion. Murder. Vigilance. Terrible, beautiful words, and her world is malachite and frost, is milky jade...

And then nothing at all.
User avatar
Carnath-Emory
Member
 
Posts: 2531
Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2002 5:00 am
Location: Under your bed.


Return to The Forest & Lake



Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 13 guests

cron