RP:Deer Skull

Twisted Trees

Cesaria could not hear the shrieking forest over the sound of her own panic. She ran, fleet-footed, bare-footed and focused. Three steps, inhale; three steps, exhale. Her breath was loud, her heart beat louder still. Animal bones strung on twine hung from her hips and rattled behind her flight. A deer skull worn over her head obscured her vision. The haunted trees lifted their serpentine roots to ensnare Cesaria, but her feet shone silver and dissolved into wispy motes that bend around the roots like air bends around a bird’s wings, before resuming their natural shape. A few yards behind the girl, a silver coyote gave chase. Its paws never touched the ground, it made no sound, not even as it snarled. It did not drool, it did not breathe. As rays of moonlight pierced through the canopy and shone on the silver coyote, those moon-kissed patches turned translucent. Three steps, inhale, three steps, exhale. Her legs and lungs burned with exhaustion, and her breath devolved into erratic panting.

Haakon prowled through the dark night with all the arrogance and grace of an ancient predator, mist parting and swirling wildly around his boots with each silent step. The light of Lithrydel’s moons dappled over the man as he moved unhurried. Through the stirring of a forest filled with horrors his keen and unnatural hearing focused on the heady sound of blood pumping with fear. The nearer he came the sweeter the scent of sweat and panic laced over him. There was the rattling of bones, the rush of breath, but beyond it the vampire heard nothing that would have given the woman chase. When finally his path led him only a few yards ahead of her sprint, Haakon stood hipshot with his hands tucked away casually in his dark slacks. He was a tall, dark figure in a forest of shadow and danger. Nearly out of place in a casual black jacket and trousers with his hair neatly pulled back from the sharp angles of his face. In patches of moonlight he waited for the woman to notice him. The deer skull was an oddity, enough that he felt curiosity stirring with his amusement. He looked beyond her hoping to make out what had her running through the dark as if hell was snapping at her heels.

Cesaria noticed Haakon the moment he made himself known. His sudden appearance alarmed her, thought not as much as his handsome grooming did. Men like that had no good business this deep into the woods. Then again, neither did she. Her head turned towards him as she ran past him in her deer skull, black cat suit, and train of animal bones. He made it evidently clear — no, arrogantly clear — that he expected her to stop. She does not, handsome man, you know not what this is. Soon the silver coyote was within Haakon’s line of sight, its gaze transfixed on Cesaria, blind to the rest of the forest. But just as the coyote dashed past Haakon, its silvery eye slid into its periphery and locked onto him. Suddenly the vampire could hear its snarl, just once, as the beast changed its mark. Cesaria heard it too. “No!” Pivoting on her heel, she ran back towards Haakon and the coyote. “...Impossible,” she gasped as the coyote lept at Haakon, its teeth bared and reaching to rip out his throat.

Haakon :: In the shadow and moonlight the angles of his face were harsh, edging him away from the handsome man Cesaria was rightfully wary of and toward something closer to the monster that slept inside of his silent chest. His eyes were bright, collecting the stingy silver moons light and reflecting it back in frigid blue under the dark slash of his brow. His skin was olive paled in death, clear and smooth in his eternal youth and covered in the shadow of new growth from what could be a day or two of a missed shave. His tie was bold and bloody red, a slash of vibrant color on his chest. When he smiled, it was smug and filled with humor that didn’t quite meet his eyes. He had precious little time to linger in his arrogance though. The moment his eyes met the silver coyote the vampires demeanor changed. The lie of comfort dropped away from him like a curtain, replaced with the rigidness of hardly contained violence. The sword that had been at his back was drawn with blinding, vampiric speed. With the skill that came from centuries of practice, he took a dancing step back. It was enough to move him from the snapping teeth of the coyote. He followed with a savage downswing of his sword, aiming for the mysterious beast’s neck. Haakon’s voice filled the chilled air with a string of colorful curses, the words leaving with a foreign lilt. Pale light glinted from the amber that dangled from a single silver ring on his left ear as the vampire turned on his heel.

The coyote did not attempt to evade Haakon’s sword. The ethereal being had no fear of swords, so imagine its shock as Haakon’s blade found purchase in its neck and cut cleanly through its fur, sliced through a spine and throat that were not supposed to be fully in this plane of existence. Acrid blood sprayed from the wound and splashed onto the killer, defying the laws of physics in its arc to mark Haakon as the killer for those who in the future may yet want to avenge this ignoble beast. The coyote’s silver fur blackened as the body dropped to the floor with a thud. Cesaria stood opposite the corpse from the vampire, her body stiff and trembling through to her fists. “NO!” she shrieked at Haakon, the vowel formed behind her teeth in a foreign tongue. “How?!” she demanded. “WHY! Who sent you?” she shouted with equal parts accusation and realization that she was a fool to so quickly size him up. She was wrong about him. It was all so clear to her now. He must have known exactly who she was and come here for exactly this purpose. But his motives elude her still. “Why?” she asks again, softer this time as the confusion sets in.

Haakon didn’t seem stunned when his aim rang true and his sword found its mark, cleaved cleanly through. The surprise came a heartbeat later, his brow winging at the stench of blood that now ruined his fine clothing. A frown quickly turned his lips downward. With a careless flick of his wrist, the vampire shook the blood from his blade and slipped it back into its scabbard on his back. Cesaria’s shout surprised him further, pulled his eyes from the blackened body of the coyote and to the strange woman in the deer skull. Anger dropped over him, his moods moving through him as quickly and viciously as a storm at sea. It was a sudden annoyance that rolled black through him as he watched her now. With the same vampiric speed he used to cut down the stinking, headless beast, Haakon stepped over the body and moved swiftly toward the stranger. On a growl, he moved to push her savagely. “And what the hell was this then?” He spoke with cold anger, nearly at the same time as she screamed and demanded again why he would cut down a bloody coyote that had been lunging for his throat. “Some kind of trick then? A lure?” He moves toward her again, hoping to edge her back. “You’ve made a serious mistake thinking something like that could take on the likes of me,” With narrowing eyes, he scowls. “I hope you have a better trick,” His voice was low, laced with warning. “Or you might find yourself on the same end of my sword as your friend there… And that’s if you’re lucky.” With the sound of her heart beating like a war drum in his ears, he thought he might like to use his teeth.

Cesaria choked as Haakon snapped across the distance between them and shoved her. Her arms lifted defensively, her entire posture that of prey. He had no trouble edging her back and pre-seasoning his next meal with a little extra fear and a quickened heartbeat. Twice now she was wrong about this man. “Take on the likes of you? I do not know you.” She hops back on one foot then the next in fluid steps that trace a long abandoned dance. “You made it attack you!” she shot back with an edge of incredulity in her voice. She wanted to flee, but already knew she could not outrun him, not even on her enchanted feet. Changing tact, she pulled the deer skull off her head to reveal thick, loose black curls, rich tawny skin with hints of peach, and a youthfulness made all the more vibrant by her realization that of predators who sought to eat her tonight, this was the more dangerous of the two. “It only attacks those who invite it, who offer themselves as prey. Why am I explaining this to you? You know that, it is the only way it would have attacked you.” She swallowed hard, took two more steps back. “I summoned it to chase me, not you. How did you make it change its mark? How...Why?” Her defeated and agonized tone belies some long-suffering ache. “Are you trying to lift your curse?” she asked simply. “So am I. And you ruined that. Why.”

Haakon felt the annoyance snap, wilt into confusion that burned away the sharper edges of his anger. It still simmered under the surface, in the depths of his eyes. Her fear called to him, would have quickened his heartbeat if it hadn’t sat cold as stone in his chest. The vampire watched her dance back and continued to frown. “Made it attack me?” His tone was incredulous but the scoff that would have followed died in his burning throat as she removed the skull and those dark curls fell around her face. His pushing advance halted, faltered. “I didn’t invite anything,” Haakon insists, impatience flickering across his face. “Are you simple? Daft?” He seemed to struggle for the correct words, his tongue suddenly clumsy. “You summoned a beast to chase you?” The dubious tone returned, his head tilting to assess her anew. But she wasn’t answering any of his questions only tossing her own at him like stones. His face closes off when she mentions a curse. And he laughed but the sound chilled the air between them. A sudden stillness takes him, his spine straightening as he shoves his hands back into his pockets. “Is that what you think I am? Cursed?” When he moves again it is in a flash, a blink, and he’s closer to her. Close enough that she might feel the feather of his breath on her skin as he leans over her to look into her eyes. A long, quiet moment follows. “I find my patience with this game is slipping. Whatever you were doing, summoning creatures in a forest filled with horrors is your business but take care.” His tone sweetened, turned to condescension and black humor. “The next beast you cross might not leave you alive.” Haakon slipped back as quickly as he’d moved forward. He turned on his heel, leaving his back to the strange woman. Confusion clouded him, unsure of why he was walking away even as the scent of her blood surrounded him.

Cesaria shivered beneath the whisper of his breath and the intensity of his gaze. Something shifted within her, burned warm and sunk low in her body, burning through the fear and replacing it with something difficult to name. She should have fled as soon as Haakon turned his back, but something kept her rooted among the twisted trees, a stone’s throw away from a man who had threatened her more than once. “I know you are cursed because the hex hound marked you,” she explained coyly, shifting the conversation away from Haakon’s ancient burden to something freshly acquired. “I don’t know how or why it attacked you, and I don’t know why your sword cut it. They are not of this world. Others will come for you, and I would not be so certain that your sword will strike true twice.” She gestured at the malignantly enchanted forest around them by way of explanation. Maybe some mysterious magic had acted on his behalf, she could not say. “The next time, you may not be so lucky.” She took a tentative step forward. Her lips parted but she thought better of saying anything else. He had his answers. She had more questions that he could not answer. As her adrenaline depletes, the reality of her loss sets in. Seven months she had spent researching, planning, saving money, paying witches, buying information. All of that work had disappeared the moment the hex hound turned its ire on a man who did not make the sacrifices she made to access its power. And now it’s dead. She turned partially away from Haakon and buried her face in her hands, standing there at a total loss in perfect stillness, her back straight like a dancer, neck bent like a saint painted on a chapel’s window.

Haakon, not for the first time this night, was struck with genuine surprise again. He’d expected, even wanted, to sense more of the fear that had previously beat through her as richly as the blood that was just underneath her tawny skin. More than surprise, interest had peaked as well. He pauses, glancing over his shoulder after a moment of consideration. “Hex hound,” His lilting voice repeats as he turns again to face her. A vampire, at least one of his age, was bound to collect a certain amount of knowledge as they waded through endless time. In fact, if asked, Haakon would say only a fool would waste eternal youth ignorant. And the ignorant weren’t likely to survive even with the vampiric curse of being incredibly hard to put down. He knew of witches, had his share of plenty in his bed and worse, so the words seemed familiar. There was a healthy amount of skepticism towards such things, even in a world where the magical reigned supreme and the dead walked trapped in bodies of eternally beautiful, endlessly yearning stone. This skepticism marked the sharp lines of his face as Cesaria claimed his steps might now be haunted with hounds impervious to his sword. “Is this the moment you tell me you could rid me of these hounds? But for a small fee, of course.” He laughs again, without humor. “I’ve no fear of hounds, witch. You’ll have to do better than that to make a mark of me.” But something in the way she stood now struck something that had died within him long ago. It ached like a sore tooth, suddenly, to watch her standing there with her face hidden in her hands. His accusation hung in the air between them unanswered. Awkwardly, and Haakon was not accustomed to awkwardness, the vampire stepped forward. “Come now, I wasn’t being cute when I said darker things than I hunt in this place. The city is safer this hour,” The sound of concern that leaked into the mask of boredom he’d draped over his tone annoyed and bewildered him..

Cesaria glanced at Haakon askance as he accuses her of hustling him and common witchery. Her gaze hardened a little at his joke. Her own meager purse had been raided by witches in the last 7 months in her quest to rid herself of her curse. They shared a common grievance there, but she said nothing. Instead, when he offered to take her back to Vailkrin, she said, “Is this the moment you tell me you’ll escort me back for a fee, swordsman?” She grinned a little at her own joke. For a moment that smile twists hideously. Perhaps it’s just the forest and the moons playing tricks, but for a split second her jaw grew wide on one side, lips desiccated, teeth rotted, skin looked coarse with pockmarks. It couldn’t have actually happened, of course. Looking at her now, Haakon would find her no longer smiling, but looking as she did when she first doffed the skull. She jogs a few paces to the deer skull and puts it back on, regretting that she felt the need to do so. She’d have preferred to observe him face to face, a tiny moment of normalcy in her abnormal existence, but that’s not available to her anymore. It hasn’t been for a while and it won’t be for a while more. Tonight made sure of that.

Haakon ’s laugh was sudden and genuine. “I didn’t come to this place for coin-” He begins to warn, stubbornly looking to regain some of his arrogance. The words die in his throat as the smile twists, darkens. He blinks. Once, twice. But his eyes were keen, even in this light. He stiffens again, more wary than disturbed. Trick of the light or a warning of darker things, the man takes the sight as a reminder that however small or beautiful, he was in the company of a stranger. Haakon waits, hands never moving from his pockets, for her to collect her skull and walk toward him. A moment of disappointment moves through him when she places it on her head again, as he would have preferred to continue looking at her. Even still, with humans it was easy enough to glean what they were about without the help of facial cues. He waits for her to move just ahead of him before he falls in step behind her. “Do you have a name then, or shall I just call you a bone witch?” He asks after a while of traveling in silence.

His laugh thrilled her unexpectedly. Grateful she was for the fact that her back was to him as he laughed, her face hidden from his gaze which seemed determined to eat her figuratively as a small recompense for having given up his meal. “Cesaria. And I’m no witch. What should I call you?” Beneath her skull she smiled a little. She could feel the hidden smile in the way her jaw fractured, her lips thinned, her teeth vanished, her cheeks hollowed. The sensation quickly put an end to her joy and she resolved then and there to forget Haakon the moment they parted ways in Vailkrin. He was already in her past, along with everyone else.

Haakon considered, “Cesaria,” He repeated her name, tested it on his tongue. He turned it over in his head, how she might not be a witch but was spending her hours summoning demons to chase her through dangerous woods in the dark. She had to be touched in the head, for sure. But what was the rest of it? He wanted to know, wanted to pick her apart and figure it all out. His annoyance returned as he realized it. “Haakon. Haakon Adalstein,” He replies, suddenly curt. He sensed, before the lights even appeared through the line of trees, that they were near civilization. As soon as he was sure her human eyes could make them out, the vampire drifted toward the shadows. “Cesaria,” He uses her name again, his tone warning. “Next time you decide to run through these parts, mind you’re sure I’m not hunting in them. I might not be feeling as gracious.” And before she can reply, the vampire steps back and lets the darkness swallow him.