RP:The Wicked Game
Background
Part II of The Darkness and Mister Black
Game On
Jolie was relaxing by the fire, in one of those big arm chairs, while the goblin hearth contentedly munched a fresh log, sending sparks dithering across the tavern.
Satoshi 's currently asking for poisoned blood wine. Well... not -literately- asking, but when one shoves a disgruntled calico in the face of an equally disgruntled, one-eyed barkeep, one tends to get spiked drinks as payment. Nonetheless, it's not stopping the kit from pressing Solace toward Steadman while trilling in seemingly blissful ignorance, "Look how big he's grown, Stead~. You're good at kitten-sitting, really~." Steadman looks all right, but his look reads more along the lines of 'Do cats or foxes make decent pies?"
Colton arrived. The stretch of his strides carried a rhythm to them, thud thud thud. Parting the crowd, stepping through groups of conversing patrons, the man known as Black was quick to the corner of the bar. He produced, from within his coat, a simple iron chisel. It is soaked in fresh blood that spreads around its notched blade when he sets it atop the bar.
Jolie poked her up from behind the chair's back, having swivelled about the kneel on its cushion, and snickered at the keep's expression. "Hello, Sato," the greeting accompanied by a wave as the necromancer reached for her drink. "Been a while. How's things?"
Jolie didn't greet Colton right away, but took a moment to study him and his chisel, before adding, "Mister Black.."
Satoshi abruptly ends her Steadman-harassment, cut off by the dual-interruption of greeting and... bloody chisel? Dropping Solace unceremoniously to the floor--to scamper off in search of undead mice--the foxkin glances sidelong at the stranger, quirks a brow, and promptly diverts her attention to a more familiar face. " 'allo, Lady~," the magus chirps, saluting with her good hand, "Things are as things always are. Good, bad, ugly, and curious. On your end?"
Colton said nothing, acknowledged no-one. A bottle was delivered by Steadman along with a solitary glass; he saw it filled right away. Before he could sample his usual, however, the man known as Black produced another trinket from within his coat. A hand, severed mid-forearm, with a ragged and blood-soddened stump. He laid it upon the bar beside the chisel, without a word, aware that the two patrons closest to him have gotten up from the bar to find seats elsewhere.
Jolie laughed, "Pretty much the same. Just got done with giving somebody a lesson in haruspex divination. Messy business. Entrails, and all..." she wouldn't go into detail. "I've missed the old place," she added, glancing around. "Good to be home, and all. You know, I was only thinking of Kasyr the other day - how is he?"
Jolie had been watching Colton's gruesome display, a faint smile curving her lips. "Mister Black," his lack of greeting didn't faze her a bit, she was used to it. "I have something to discuss with you, later. If you would spare me a little time out of your..." she glanced to the hand on the bar, which Steadman was glaring at with his single eye. "... busy day."
Satoshi can't resist throwing a curious glance at the forearm now joining the chisel, but she's learned a thing or two about diplomacy by now and refrains from a barrage of questions. Instead, she gives Jolie a wry smirk by way partial answer. "As destructive and foolhardy as always, and now armed with an equally destructive dragon for a partner in crime."
Satoshi adds, as an after thought while staring pointedly at the severed limb, "I like the new decor, Lady."
Jolie said to Satoshi, "My very next question was going to be about the Eyrie. I hear it's really taken off - pardon the pun."
Colton answered the woman they called Jolie silently with the lift of his glass and the muted, lazy salute he offered towards her. For now, however, it seemed his most pressing concern was the bottle before him and its emptying. He drank steadily. The dark cast of his features unmistakable.
Jolie snickered at the mage's additional comment. "Such are the Dark Lands, Sato. Never a dull moment."
Jolie slid off her chair and circumnavigated the room, now returned to its regular scatter of tables and chairs, after the ball. She'd end up at the bar, somewhere between Colton and the ice mage.
Satoshi flashes Jolie a grin that says she loves the Dark Lands for that very reason. "You've heard right. It's taken off and built itself a second nest in that frigid hellhole I call home. Draws in all sorts, just like here." The magus nods at that and claims a bottle of blood wine from Steadman's supply--gold dutifully exchanged, to avoid excess poisoning tonight.
Jolie said to Satoshi, "Actually, I wanted to speak with you concerning mounts. I have a means of producing a few... unusual.. creatures. Very sturdy, very obedient. Of course, they're dead, but that can have its advantages."
Colton said, "Cheaper to feed, for one."
Jolie slid a look aside to Colton Black. a slight frown perching on her brow, questions on her lips that didn't find their way to being voiced.
Satoshi lifts the bottle in salute to the woman before taking a sip. Mulling over the wine, the foxkin remains silent a moment, but eventually answers with that same quietly amused grin. "Like I said, it draws all sorts, so we take all sorts. I always preferred the obscene and unusual over the mundane." Satoshi cocks a brow then, as if to say 'why else would I be -here-?' and takes another swig.
Satoshi nods towards Colton. "He's got the right of it there, too."
Jolie's frown faded when she turned to face Satoshi, "Well. Should any of your applicants require such a steed, do send them my way. They would, of course, have to be bonded to their mount, if it's to obey them."
Satoshi nods in understanding. "But of course. It's what separates us from horsemen. These aren't pretty little ponies, and I'll boot anyone out on their tailfeathers if they think as much."
Jolie nodded in response, and offered, "Would you like to see an example of my work?"
Satoshi 's in the midst of another drink when the question's presented, and damn near chokes in her eagerness to respond. Thankfully, vampires have this knack for not needing to breathe and the kit's able to nod hurriedly in time with her coughs, words eluding her along with breath for the moment.
Colton made clear, or at least certain, that the woman they called Jolie had no reason to fear. Another glass was produced from behind the bar as Colton Black paid no mind to Steadman's glare; he poured for her. And, leaning, he slid it across the table she'd rested against to come to a stop near her hand. It was not as elegant as her own little trick. The amber fluid sloshed over the brim and splashed the table's surface. Still, for a moment, he'd allow the amber-touched hazel of his eyes to find her own. And then, without a word, he went back to his drink.
Jolie laughed again, not an unusual thing to happen in the presence of the mage, who amused her to no end. The glass Colton was offered was accepted and sipped while she spent a quieter moment returning his gaze, those things unspoken thus communicated clearly. "I'd like you both to meet Maladroit…."
No further preamble was given before she tilted her face up, the line of her throat thus making vocalisation of the guttural words to follow - never designed for humanoid speech - a little easier. The air would chill slightly as they were intoned, not that Sato would notice that, likely. A few moments later, a heavy, leathern flapping would heard outside the door, a thud, a scrape of claws on timber. The thing which entered the tavern almost defied the eye's capacity to make sense of it.
The size of a small pony yet whippet-thin, almost skeletal were it not for its covering of black, rubbery-looking skin, the necromancer's familiar loped forward across the tavern's boards. Perhaps its most distinguishing feature was that it had none at all, facially - its head a smooth bullet of flesh with no eye, ear nor mouth to mar its oil-black surface. The thing had wings akin to those of a colossal bat, and walked on its knuckles like am ape, its forearms longer than its hind limbs, ropy muscle bulging as it moved, its barbed tail lashing to scar a table.
Jolie said to Satoshi, "Of course, you've met him before... in one or more of his other bodies. This is the latest, the prototype of the mounts I'm making."
Jolie said to Maladroit, "Please. Watch the furniture."
Satoshi 's coughs even fall silent at the appearance of the twisted familiar and eyes widen in wonder, with only a faint glimmer of wary fear visible in the amber flecks. When the kit opens her mouth to speak, only a shrill squeak escapes her. Grinning sheepishly, Satoshi clears her throat before trying again, words low but clear this time around, "Now that's quite a sight, Lady. I see a bit of his old self in the face, what with it lacking the usual odds and ends." The bottle is lifted in Maladroit's direction in a toast and a drink is taken. "Where'd you come up with that concoction, eh? Impressive, that is. And definitely not your typical dragon~."
Satoshi 's cat is quick to make himself scarce once Maladroit's occupied the room. No one ever said Solace was a brave feline, thus he has no images to maintain.
The necromancer beamed with pride, while the gaunt finished its journey somewhere not too far away, and hunkered into a predatory sort of crouch, its blind, blank head lifting to level first at Satoshi, then Colton, an eyeless stare of sorts. "Almost invulnerable," she boasted, "Of course, not entirely, but they're hard as hell to kill. If a bit gets lopped off…" she gave the mage an almost guilty look, "… well, I really have to speak to you about that. Anyway, they're terrifically strong, fire and cold resistant, and are not your typical undead in that they -do- require fuel, though they tend to take care of that themselves…" She paused there, realising that she could feasibly go on all day about this, her latest hobby. "Made from parts of things, reanimated. Some of those parts are.. hard to come by. Therefore, they aren't cheap. But very worth it, I hope." The familiar wibbled its long, many-jointed fingers and said nothing, having no means at all for speech nor much desire for it.
Satoshi studies Maladroit over the rim of the wine bottle while tails weave a thoughtful tempo, the mage obviously musing over the possibilities. It's only once her wine's been nearly polished off that she finds her voice again, albeit distant with plotting, "Riders brave enough for their sort will be hard to come by, but that will make them worthwhile. The resistance is a tenfold blessing, with so many winged sorts having an aversion to heat and cold..." A final swig is taken, emptying the bottle and forcing Satoshi to stop sidetracking herself. "Did you know Frostmaw has a unique graveyard~?" The look she gives Jolie then is as purely impish as only the vulpine wife of Kasyr can manage.
Jolie’s face fell, at mention of that locale, into something of a sombre look, which was instantly dispelled along with the thought that had caused it. She nodded. “Yes, I found it last I was.. up that way. I haven’t explored it fully. Only seen one small part, there was a shaman there, odd fellow…” She desperately wanted to change the subject, “I’d love a tour of the rest, if you manage to find time for such a venture. I have a feeling I’d find a lot of.. interest in the place.”
Colton had remained silent, his eyes sudden and sharp across the abomination that the girl they called Jolie had summoned. It was an unnatural thing. The movements jerky and fluid all at once; a consequence of her design foiling everything that evolution had deemed necessary. It was, in so many words, an impossible vision. The color familiar. The shape entirely otherwise. The man known as Black said nothing; he did not need to. She'd see it in his eyes. Not approval. Not appreciation. Just understanding and quiet, potent curiosity.
Jolie's familiar had sensed.. gods know how, and perhaps it didn't bear thinking about... the presence of Satoshi's cat, wherever it had hidden itself, and was inching his way, not at all unobtrusively given his size, toward the smaller creature's hidey-place.
Satoshi catches Jolie's expression, but such a reaction at mention of her frozen wasteland home is a regular occurence and she writes it off as merely the common dislike for cold. Instead, the magus shrugs in her one-armed fashion and reverts to the subject that had the necromancer eager a moment prior. "What sort of damage can he do like that? Is he a swift flyer, or the hulking brick wall in the sky sort? Gods~, the things that can be done with a creation like that."
Satoshi 's cat is quick to make himself scarce once Maladroit's occupied the room. No one ever said Solace was a brave feline, thus he has no images to maintain.
Jolie offered the conjurer a brief flicker of a smile, and then said to Satoshi, "The tail is a whip.. look at the scars on my table, for a small example of what it can do. The wings are sharp-edged, the finger-bones…" she paused, frowned at the gaunt. "Maladroit! Leave it. Come here." The creature lurched back, its head low. Jolie said, "Show her your claws." Obediently, or apparently so, the multi-jointed handlike paws of the thing flexed, and talons sheared through slits in its fingertips, horrid hooks of extruded bone. "That will do, thankyou, Maladroit. Also, Satoshi, it can lift many times its own weight, and suck the salts from any living creature, with a little life force thrown in. Leaves a husk.. rather horrid… There's other application, but as I said, I'm still experimenting. And this only one of my designs."
Jolie said, "And as for swift? It defies me, how quickly they can move. Almost as if..." she shook her head, ".. impossible.. but yes, very swift indeed."
Colton said, "The dead aren't particularly vulnerable to fatigue."
Jolie said to Colton, "Of course. Though these things are a little .. more than dead. Reanimated, conglomerates of flesh. The process gives it a rudimentary need for sustenance, which requires that they refuel now and then."
The door to the Hanging Corpse gradually opens with a haunting creak and silence ensues. Nothing indicates that the door had been closed, but were one to look, they'd find the door as if it had never been opened. Only Mark's presence would disillusion any doubts of whether or not the door had opened at all. Since his last appearance in the tavern, he had not returned since the day before, Mark's appearance had doubtlessly changed. In place of the ragged clothing and bandages, the man adorned casual black leather clothing, a black hood that cast a shadow over his facial features above his mouth, and a flowing ragged scarf that covers the man's nose and mouth. The only aspect left unchanged about the man was the rust-encrusted dagger strapped to his side.
Mark's head turns back, slowly swiveling forwards, as he silently walks towards the mistress of the tavern. Within that single motion, Mark had observed the whole of the tavern. From his peripherals Mark notes three congregated beings, Jolie included, by the hearth. The presence of an abominable creature of unknown origins is apparent. The location of the beast's barbed tail speaks for the imprint of a lashing on the edge of its chosen sitting spot. There seems to be no hostilities towards the creature by the others in the Tavern, Mark assumes its presence was not unwelcome, he walks by, keeping watch only out of the corners of his eyes. Marks takes his place on Jolie's left, he bows forwards, but the motion is obviously meant for Jolie. He does not speak, nor does he move afterwards, the faint scent of decaying flesh drifts from the man.
Satoshi resists the scholarly urge to lean in for a closer examination of those extended claws, opting to admire them from as safe a distance as her meager height can offer. "I can only imagine the damage those beauties can do to flesh and bone..." Somewhere, beneath a bit of furniture, a calico cat is breathing a sigh of relief at not being that bit of flesh and bone. "You make true monsters, Lady. I like it. We'll have to do a good deal of business in the near future, yes?"
Jolie jiggled a little, the mage’s question being precisely what she wanted to hear. “I truly hope so. It should be understood, however, that there’s limits… each type of creature can only be made three times, or… “ she wrinkled her nose, “…there are consequences. Right now, I only have the gaunts down pat, but I hope in future…” She paused, to note the entry of her latest hired man, offering Mark a nod and something a longer stare than she might’ve otherwise, her nostrils flaring a little as she noted his scent. Had he always smelled like that? She didn’t think so. “Hullo, Mark,” she offered, “How went your.. search? Was it fruitful?”
Jolie's familiar seemed to be amusing itself, drawing its claws in and out, its blank head swivelling to one patron, then another. That empty visage would settle, finally, on Mark.
Satoshi glances briefly at the newcomer even as she nods in response to Jolie. "Gotcha. Everything has its drawback, so I expected such here too. We'll have to go over more details soon. Eyrie can find a place for these beasties, no doubt. But for now," the kit sweeps forward in a swift bow, her good arm giving an added flourish, "you seem to have more company than time, so I'll relieve you of some of it. Was nice catching up again, Lady, I hope to do so again. I'll tell Kassy you send your greetings, if you'll tell your Cap'n Fangs the snow cat says hi, too." Satoshi winks then, performs another bow, and promptly ambles out the door--Solace hot on her heels and looking like a mottled hedgehog with his fur on end.
Jolie offered Satoshi a farewell wave, "And do.. take care of yourself, missy." She had noted that arm.
Jolie didn't correct Satoshi about the "Cap'n Fangs" thing. She might, at some later point. For now she only wore that slightly wooden smile that appeared when the topic was broached.
A familiar silence persists for a few moments before Mark reaches up to pull down the scarf covering his mouth, "No leads. The priest says the victim could not see the perpetrator, nothing new would be extracted from her. No corpses in or near Kelay Tavern. Searched Vailkrin, no signs of intelligent corpses…" Mark paused, completing his report, but continued onward to answer the unspoken questions, "I spent the night dead… Regular corpses are slow, brittle, and stupid, easily dispatched. They find prey by smell, eliminate or mask the smell, they can only rely on the traits of their living counterparts…" A report on his reconnaissance.
Jolie said, slowly, "You spent the... Dead? Explain." There was no introduction offered between conjurer and Mark.
Mark said to Jolie, "Corpses cannot detect life without an apparent smell or apparent heart beat..."
Jolie said, "Yes..but.. I meant the meant the part about you.. spending the night .. being dead?”
Colton offered nothing to the exchange. He paid it no mind. His back had turned to the pair, and the crowd, so that the bottle that he was emptying could seemingly indulge his every attention. A drink was measured. Another. The room's light and bustle unable to compete with the indulgence of his thirst. Beside him, on the bar, remained that bloodied chisel and the adjacent hand. A grim thing, with fingers stiffened in death, that had been severed at mid-forearm and ceased dripping upon the counter. Now, dried, it had grown visibly paler and cold.
Mark said to Jolie, "With the graves... No attacks after disguising smell and lowering heart beat... Must have mistaken me for a corpse..."
Jolie sipped from the glass Colton had offered her. The necromancer would turn to him then, "I have a job for you, too. Mister Black." Her tone was casual, airy, before she returned her attention to the pale man adjacent. Nearby, the gaunt kept its eerie, apparently insensate vigil.
Colton said, "I'm not the working sort."
Jolie nodded to Mark, "Impressive. And what a handy skill to have. I practised a similar thing, once. Of course, I had no need for breath, back then..: She did not elaborate. "You're just full of surprises, aren't you?" Her lips quirked, her smile brief. "I suppose we can only wait for it to strike again, see if we can't ferret something more useful from the next victim."
Jolie said to Colton, "Who said anything about work?"
Colton looked to the woman they called Jolie, then. His eyes cut over the broad stretch of his shoulder and onto her delicately featured face. His manner suddenly, entirely accusatory. "A job implies work."
Jolie lifted a brow. "Perhaps a little work, then."
Mark silently stood beside Jolie, like a sentinel, motionless and silent. Jolie gave only statements and rhetorical questions, no need to speak. He simply stood, listening and observing until called upon.
Colton answered her briefly, then, already looking back to his drink. "A little is discouraging enough."
Jolie said to Colton, "You've not minded it, before."
Colton said, "I've never worked for you, Tenebrae."
Colton looked back to Jolie then. His eyes narrow some, turn to dark slits, focus intently upon her elegant features. "Never."
Jolie turned to Mark, then. "I have need of men, here. An organised group. If you have nothing pressing to do, I would ask you to seek likely types for the job, test their skills. I want a small, well-trained squad, to begin with. Is this beyond your capacity?"
Jolie snapped her attention back to the conjurer, "You can be a bit thick, sometimes, you know that?" But it wasn't an admonition. "I'd just like some of your time, for.. a discussion."
Mark remained motionless as always as he spoke, "I am able to begin immediately should you so wish..."
Jolie's mild irritation fled when she replied to the pale man. "Yes, I'd like that very much. Try not to damage them too much? You may say you're recruiting for a small guard contingent, if asked."
Mark said to Jolie, ""No worries... corpses would not be viable..." Silence as Mark brings his hand up to remove the hood shadowing the man's facial features. He turns slowly to the Mistress of the tavern, giving a elaborate gentleman's bow, his right hand moving to his torso, his left to his back. As Mark returns from the bow, there is a notable difference, dull emerald hues that had never seemed to reflect light had transfigured into lively forest green gems. The grim, stern expression had disappeared without a trace, replaced by a warm and gentle smile, bringing forth the comely aspects of his facial features, "My name is Aaron, I am searching for skilled individuals to form a small guard for my lord…," the words may not have made sense spoken to Jolie, but it was obviously an example of his skill and ploy…"
Jolie corrected him, quietly, "Lady. The Lady Tenebrae." But she smiled, as she did so. "I think you'll do marvellously. I really do."
Jolie would offer Colton something of a sere look, before adding, "I suppose I ought to get about some business. If you'll -both- excuse me?"
Colton regarded Jolie flatly. His eyes tracking across her features as his hand fell with glass within it, placing it to rest upon the counter.
Mark raised an eyebrow questioningly, bringing his hand close to Jolie's cheek, close enough for the woman to feel the heat of his hand, but was careful not to make contact. Mark's hand moves deftly and gently, moving it as though he were caressing Jolie's cheek lovingly, "If you so wish your identity not to remain incognito, my lady." His expression and voice matches the simulated caress of his feigned endearing action. His hand straightens and Mark gradually brings it to himself, simulating it as though he were reluctantly sliding his hand of Jolie's cheek. With that, Mark turns to proceed towards the exit of the tavern.
Nemisis kicks open the door and walks in the hanging corpse with a cocky grin upon his face. Cracking his knuckles and he heads towards a seat before tossing an upward nod to Jolie in greetings, "Sup!" Twisting around he plops down with a grunt of relaxtion.
Nemisis said to Mark, "Problem grumpy?"
Jolie stared after Mark, blinking. She'd look to Nemisis. "Just on my way out, actually."
Colton suddenly and inexplicably whirls, taking up the near-empty shape of the bottle before him and hurling it towards the door. It would explode against the wall beside it, either in front of or after Mark depending upon his pace.
Nemisis said to Jolie, "Looks like we missed all the fun eh?"
Mark passes by Nemesis, giving only a nod of acknowledgment in response to the other's question. He captures the door just before it closes and lets himself out quickly and quietly. The sound of shattering glass was apparent just on the other side of the closed door.
Nemisis raises a brow at Jolie, "You've got him trained."
Jolie jumped at the sudden crash of glass, and turned abruptly to the source. "Colton..."
Colton reclaimed the chisel upon the bar and stowed it in an instant within his coats. There is no reply to the woman they call Jolie save a muted, harsh curse. The tumbler in hand, emptied now within an instant, is flipped upside down atop the bar and abandoned there.
Nemisis said to Colton, "We can assume he got on your nerves too?"
Her smirk was slight, and vanished by the time she turned to Nemisis. "I have a meeting, in the Black Library. With Colton, here..." The expression re-appeared, and stayed. "I'll be back in a while. Perhaps meantime, you could help me think of a means to some rapid fundraising?" Without another glance to the dark man, she headed for the door, heels crunching on bits of broken bottle.
Nemisis said, "Hmm? Rapid furnishing?"
Jolie paused at the door, "Making money." She was already on her way out, the door closing behind her.
Colton lifted the collar of his coat and bound it by means its belt. He passed in Tenebrae's wake, his features veiled, expression otherwise impossible to decipher.
Jolie walked on, and whether Colton caught her side or trailed behind for a time, she said nothing until they'd reach the blood fountain, where she halted, her gaze set on the cemetary gates to the south. "Well. Did he?"
Colton does not answer. He follows. A tension exists in him, visible and palpable, that would inspire gritted teeth and stewing rage. It is a strange thing for him to wear. Strange but stranger still, not unnatural. It exists as surely as he does, long-striding some distance behind her. Silent. Displeased.
Jolie didn't insist on any reply, but took that southern path, entering through the rusted gates to the boneyard and its broken, pillaged monuments.
--The Black Library--
Jolie led the way to the Library, keeping her silence, her nape prickling a little perhaps in response to the man stalking behind her, an instinct of her lycanthropic nature. She opened the reading room door, entered and would stroll toward one of the dusty shelves, her fingers trailing over the spines of moth-riddled tomes. "Something bothering you, Mister Black?"
Colton loosed the belt upon his coat and let it fly open, a sudden flurry of movement as he descended upon her. There was a violence beneath the surface of his manner, tumultuous and dark. It glinted in his eyes as they cut to her own. The words simple. Explaining everything. Prefacing a jerk of his hands to bring her body against his. "He touched your face."
Jolie's eyes turned to where his hands pressed upon her, indented her skin below the leather she wore. When she returned it to settle on his own blackened stare, she wore that soft smirk again. "That he did."
She Rides
It wasn't any horse. That was plain to see, the massive stallion a monument of muscle, his deep red coat flecked with grey, only beginning to roan in the prime of his youth. His great neck arced, mane reaching his past his shoulder, and new-shod fore hooves the size of dinnerplates stamped up clods of damp earth. Tethered to the animal by a flimsy-looking lead attached to a thin headstall was a very small necromancer dressed for riding, who was wondering whether - you know, just for once - she might've gotten in over her head. In a literal sense, this was entirely true, her crown of dark hair reaching barely to the stallion's shoulder, where she stood, speaking soothing words. "I'm not really a wolf. Have a sniff. That's vanilla, silly horse." And such nonsense - the words mattered less than the tone, while the percheron-bred listened nervously, his ears flicking back and forth.
Hooded Cultist walks in from the east, "All hail the Lich Queen!"
Jolie said to the Hooded Cultist, "I'm not buying your damn pamphlets."
She was a tiny thing against its side, all sleekly built and gently curved. For a moment Colton Black lingered, suited to let the milling crowd conceal his place amongst them, and watched her as she set out her introductions and the seductive soothing of an otherwise uncooperative companion. The light lingered in the sky, more west now than east, and its light betrayed the grey and filth of Vailkrin.
It pleased him, though, to be amidst the city's decrepit buildings and desperate dwellers. It pleased him that as he cut his way through the shifting bodies and neared the girl and her mount she was not quick to discover him. The only greeting he offered was the press of a large hand to the small of her back, the warmth of his touch spreading across that distinctly feminine place while the animal claimed the rest of his attentions. "You seem to make a habit of riding things far larger than you."
Jolie turned a half-grin to the voice she knew - that she knew the feel of that particular broad hand on her back, as well, was evidenced by her tolerating it, even before he spoke - and said, "What can I say? I live for danger." She canted her head toward the stallion. "Anyway, he isn't mine." She let that hang, smoothing her palm across the velvet sheen of the roan's ribs, "Do you like him?"
The stallion had certainly drawn attention, finely bred, larger than most mounts but not so thickset as suggest he'd be best employed hitched to a wagon. This was a warhorse, a steed fit for armoured charges rather than the speed of his finer-boned desert-bred cousins.
Colton inclined his head though the woman could not see it. Despite the warmth of her, the way she stretched naturally under his palm, the hand did not remain. It drifted down, over soft swell, before withdrawing from her entirely and seeking out the warmth of the horse's side. "I do." He said. And he watched her then, unable to see her eyes through the curtain of dark hair that veiled her face from his position. The Corpse had a new ornament upon the sign, mounted upside down this time. It had bleed out through the night and run dry. He had not a spot of the mess on him.
Jolie had ducked said ornament, some time ago, before it had quite finished dripping its ichors. She wouldn't mention it yet, however, more intent on the matter of the moment. "Good. I'm glad you do. He's yours." Swivelling, her hand still grasping the lead, she'd face Colton Black, without adding any distance between them. Horse at her back, and all. "And don't refuse him. I can't really take him back for a refund that won't include an arrow in my ass."
Colton said, "Thank you, Tene." Her name softened, shortened. It rolled from him as he leaned into her, nearly trapping her against the animal's side and his broad chest. Instead, he reached, laying his hand on the muscled creature's flank just beside her face. The delicate skin of her cheek nearly pressed to the warmth of his wrist. "Thank you."
Jolie tilted a swift brush of cheek against his skin, by way of a 'you're welcome' and ducked under his arm, two short steps back taken to allow Colton the space to inspect his gift. "I left Bonnie at the stables. He's not used to her kind, it'd just make him nervous. He's young, but trained well enough in the basics. You -can- ride, can't you?" The question was a hurried addition, a sudden and dismayed concern.
Colton inclined his head again. He could ride. A man of nobility was groomed to ride, and to fence, and to many less practical hobbies and actions. Though, the ease to which he'd come by horses had not been entirely instilled in him by his parents. She would find, as he suddenly and deftly pulled himself atop the animal and fisted its mane as it rose up in protest, that his manner atop a horse was far more common than the stuffy, posting carry of privilege. He rode with low, rolling hips. A peasant's comfortable gate. The lolling, easy cadence akin to someone whose education came from the road. This strange and distinct dichotomy had a story to it. A lengthy one. For now, however, he was busy bracing himself as the animal expressed its protest before finally it settled, abandoned its rearing and sharp angry twists, and he could relax some atop it.
Jolie watched from the roadside, barely able to stop jiggling on the balls of her feet when great hooves rose from the earth and the stallion's neck became a plumed arch, Colton keeping perfect balance atop. She watched the way his calves and thighs soothed the animal into surety and trust, and that easy seat on the broad, muscle-padded back did not escape her attention. Her smile was a child's sheer delight when she stepped forward again, tipping her face up to get a better view of the conjurer, at that now much increased height. "I guess that's a yes."
Colton did not fight the animal. He measured it beneath him, coaxed it with his legs to stop its restless turns and allow it others when it felt as though the powerful animal's tension had slipped some and it had tired into the realm of complacence. This, in riding, was the thing he enjoyed most. The quiet stretch of wills and silent, scarcely perceptible communications that defined the experience. The animal was spirited. It was disgruntled. It suited him. Colton Black reached then, offering the woman the sinuously-muscled stretch of his forearm. His silent invitation clear.
Jolie's response was as smooth as if she'd anticipated that hand up, her own stretched forth even as his came down to meet hers. And it was odd, she'd think later, how time can seem to slow down in certain moments, not always grand ones of obvious import or dire danger, but in small, seemingly insignificant ones. She watched his large hand easily enclose her slender arm, her own smaller fingers seeking purchase on masculine muscle, and this was this exchange of touch that seemed to echo on and on before her eyes. And then, as though a very large bubble surrounding them suddenly broke, the moment was gone and the Darkness was aloft - and almost breathless, with it.
She weighed nothing, it seemed, as he took hold of her and tightened the rugged stretch of his body. For a moment she was simply ascending, lifting off her feet and alongside the powerful animal beside her, before he'd drawn her up and settled her in place atop his mount and with him. The animal did not protest this additional weight. It, in fact, seemed to soothe it some. The round of her backside was crushed suddenly to his hips, her lean back given the breadth of his chest to lean against. The scent of her hair, the warmth of her, a distraction to which he fought admirably as he looked past her and turned the animal for the roadside. It took little encouragement for the young beast to find its legs, stretching them all at once as it built quickly to a rumbling gallop that tore them down the road and past the city proper.
NOTE: Further adventures in this timeline are logged under: Arc:Kurgan's Run
The Surprise
Colton Black has been absent for some time. Concurrently, Jolie has been observed at the Hanging Corpse, setting out a bottle of whiskey daily on a bloodstained part of the counter in front of the bar's end-most seat. And observed too, as days have passed and that whiskey has remained untouched, to have grown increasingly irritable. It's said she's even started grumbling at those daily bottles...
The Hanging Corpse Tavern
Dromar trudges out of the frigid night air and into the familiar warmth of the Hanging Corpse. One would think that, having lived in the deep dank darkness of Darkiln all his life, he would be accustomed to the cold. Should one ask Dromar, however, he would tell them that nobody pays them to think and to keep their ridiculous opinions of his homeland to their selves. "Stick a thousand breathing gnomes in a cramped space miles underground," he would say, "And it becomes hot as hell down there!" Ahem… Back to the story at hand. The shadow gnome shuffles across the hardwood floor and climbs atop a barstool both ordering his drink and gypping the bartender the same as the night before.
Mahri was coming out of the kitchen when Dromar settles himself on the bar stool. Not being the recipient of the illusion Steadman is victim of, the poor guy, the lycan raises both brows with incredulity and stalks over slow like Lan'teus on her hip. Smiling tightly at the gnome, silver eyes lock on him with a coldness that would rival the frigid temperatures of Frostmaw, "That was a neat little trick there, but I wouldn't try it again if I were you, Dromar. Not if you enjoy what stature you have now."
Jolie was on the stairs, dressed in scarlet. Well, on the banister of the stairs, taking the easy slide down on the shining timber rail by the time Mahri emerged from the kitchens. Her boot-heels clacked on the stone, her landing as graceful as such an activity allows for, and she'd head straight for the bar and a bottle of something pale and green. The gnome was eyed narrowly as she passed. Her sister not quite so narrowly.
Jolie would send a bottle of whiskey sailing across the counter, timed with practise to come to a halt dead-center before the last seat at the bar's end. As ever, a clean glass was upended over the cork.
Jolie said to the bottle, "Bastard."
Mahri looks over at her sister, a warmer expression on her face. Jiggling Lan to hitch him higher on her hip, she inclines her head towards Tenebrae then flicks a glance towards the bottle. A stand in for Colton? Arching a brow, Mahri sends her sister a half-grin. "Hello to you too."
Jolie sniffed. "I didn't say hello. I might've forgotten what you looked like." Sulking, much? She eyed that held bundle of joy. "How's my nephew?"
Mahri shrugs at Jolie's sniff. "Bullshyte." Said nephew has his fist shoved into his mouth at the moment, drooling copiously. Oh yes, the boy was growing much much faster than the normal child.
Dromar turns toward Mahri, briefly noting her tight smile and frigid stare, before insisting, "I don't know what you're talking about." He lifts the glass to his dry old lips and draws deep. "That's the problem with surface dwellers, well… One of the problems. Always in everybody's business but their own." He lifts his glass again in time for Jolie's bottle to pass smoothly by.
Colton arrived. The strides that take him towards the corner of the bar measured steadily. He is, distinctly, sans coat. The flowing wool that has long concealed the mans crisp shirt and complicated array of belts and harnesses that are now clearly displayed. It is a grizzly assortment that adorns his waist and the harnesses along his chest and back. Tools, of all manner, mostly garnished with dried blood are now curiously unwet. He sits and claims the bottle there, measuring himself a drink with one hand while the other sets a saw upon the counter. It clatters noisily covered not in blood, but sawdust. The sleeves of his shirt have been rolled and neatly cuffed above the elbow.
Jolie took a seat on one of the stools behind the business end of the counter. "Till was short last night," she said casually, and just as casually reached for a large kitchen-knife left beside said till the evening prior. This was left conspicuously on the bar, while she waved to Lan. "Hello, nephew." Mahri got a frosty look. "We need bar staff. I might have to... dig some up, the way we're...." And then Colton arrived. She glanced to him, then the saw. Then to him. Her lips were of string. She said nothing, for the moment.
Mahri is distracted from the enigma that is Dromar by the appearance and arrival of Colton. No blood? Curious. Sawdust? Even curiouser. She'll ask later. To Jolie she asks sweetly, "Do you want to hold Lan, Auntie Tene?"
Jolie lofted a brow as if to make it clear she thought Mahri would never ask. "Of course." He wasn't so tiny now, and she reached for him less awkwardly.
Colton was busied with the task of drinking. It was a mechanical expression of movement. Pour, lift, tip. His cadence was brisk and without indulgence. The cut of his eyes did not stray, even for a moment, from his bottle.
Mahri easily hands Lan off to Jolie and shakes out an arm that had gone numb from the baby's weight. "Welcome." Mahri is pretty sure as well she knew why the till was short the night before, "Yeah. I'll make sure that doesn't happen again." As far as bar staff, the lycan shrugs carelessly, "You do know we aren't going to get competent servers unless we let them whore themselves out." There is everyone's favorite word again. Glaring momentarily at Dromar, to emphasize that there will be no more till shortages, she flicks a glance towards Colton. "Are you hanging wood over the door now?"
Jolie had a sudden, squirming child to occupy her thoughts and hands, and considered it best to prop the child's behind on the bar and hold him under the arms while she studied him. "Lan," she said, very seriously. "You are a handsome devil. And, clearly, take after my side of the family." The baby grinned, toothlessly, and drooled, as babies do. Jolie used an elbow to nudge that saw's latter end out of Lan's way.
Dromar feels slighted, quite frankly. He leans back in his chair, as best as a gnome can lean back in a chair intended for being twice it's size, to get a better look at the man currently gulping liquor and stealing lime lights at the end of the bar. He quickly and efficiently returns Mahri's glare, to emphasize that he didn't give a damn about her till and it's shortages before turning his attention back towards his glass. This he raises and finishes off as he sulks.
Jolie swivelled Lan around to face the gnome and helped the child raise one small hand to wave floppily. "Hello, gnome," she said, in the baby's stead. He was swivelled toward Colton, then. "About time you showed up, you whoremongering sonuvabitch." The little hand waved at the conjurer, too.
Dromar pulls his glass closer towards himself after, of course, it is refilled by the blindly oblivious Steadman making it quite obvious that, though he's safely seated several seats away from Lan, the nasty drooling thing was -way- too close to his drink.
Colton rose to leave the corpse of a bottle behind. It falls in the process, nudged by an errant elbow, to land upon its side against the bar. The rolling glass comes safely to a stop upon the bar but it is clear that its assailant could not have cared less. He is gathering his saw and on his way out the door. Not a word, or acknowledgement, is paid to anyone.
Jolie's eyes were two green slits.
Dromar thinks, to himself of course, that there might be something wrong with Jolie's eyes.
Jolie might be considering putting 'gnome' on the menu.
Mahri would recommend 'gnome in currant sauce with a side of asparagus'
Jolie slid Lan on his padded little behind toward her sister. "I've a surprise for you, kiddo," she said to him, "But... later." That kitchen knife would replace the child in her grasp, a moment or so after Mahri reclaimed her son.
Colton departs.
Jolie follows, quietly, knife in hand.
At the site of the future Thorne Estate
The lot has been cleared, the ground leveled. It is a feat of labor. A stack of prepared lumber lies upon the lots edge, planed as though by an experts hand. The man they call Black kneels now across a massive beam with a plane between his hands, sinuous arms working to prepare the timber for use.
Jolie had stalked him along that stretch of road which led to the vacant lot, as silent as the shadows she was named for and armed with the cook's best knife. Her gaze was set upon his back the entire time, except when the conjurer's long strides took him into the spaces undipped in the twin moons' silvery illumination, and she had to rely on sound to track the passage of his boots on stone. The necromancer watched him enter lot, and drew to a halt. The knife lowered to her side. She stood there for some time, observing the state of the lot and the stacked lumber, before tucking the blade into her belt and stepping less quietly in the direction of the sound of a man at work.
Jolie's steps led her to a place only a few feet from the conjurer. "I thought you were gone."
Colton ignored her. She was given, as she had been many times before, the broad stretch of his back. This was not work to be neglected and he was captured with an artist's intensity in seeing it completed. Again, and again, his arms stretch out to lay the plane in place. Again, and again, he pulls it back to drag the blade across the beam. Wood peels free in curled, paper-thin sheets. Sweat beads upon the man they call Black's brow, running down the sharp angles of his face. He speaks only when the sounds of her strides loom close behind him. "You're impatient."
Jolie said, "You were absent." There was a pile of timber nearby. She sat on it. "It's a natural assumption. Seeing as you left no word. At all." The waspishness was still present in her tone, though not quite so acutely now. Her gaze lifted from that broad back to sweep once more across the site. "You've been busy."
Colton said nothing to this. There was nothing simple in this place. It stretched beyond the lot and encompassed them always, shadowed. Murky waters. He was not inclined to navigate. He drifted. And so, even as the warmth of her proximity departed and she formed herself into an audience at his back, he allowed the natural course of things to lead him on. The board was finished and he rose, muscled haunches flexing beneath his rugged frame, to refix that tool in place within his harness. It was his hands, then, that set to work with the beam. Massive. A stretch of timber that should have been well-beyond a man's means to move, was partially lifted and steadily dragged aside. It should have been impossible. He managed with a grit of teeth and the rippled, extreme effort visible in the rangy stretch of his arms.
Jolie watched him. Watched him work on the beginnings of her home, her breath catching when he succeeded in lifting that heavy beam. Cold anger would glitter faintly still in her gaze for a time – she was never one to release that emotion easily – but it had faded by the time he’d moved the timber. Every bit as impatient as he’d proclaimed her to be, the necromancer cleared her throat loudly, an obvious bid to capture Colton's attention.
Colton released the beam in a movement not unlike a cord's breaking. His arms swept up once free of the weight and the massive timber fell that short foot to the ground. Still, despite little distance, the sound of its weight settling was a substantial and telling "thud" that displaced dried earth in a fine cloud near it. The man in Black moved quickly then, rounding, his neck corded and strained. His jaw clenched. A flicker of darkness in his eyes lingers, inspiring a fury in his features, as he rapidly crossed the distance between. There was nothing passive in this. The squared nature of his shoulders and the stalk inherent in his movements, predatory. Angry. It would not be uncalled for if the dark-haired woman drew down on him. She'd have little time, though, for a hesitation would allow his hand to lash out with that inhuman quickness to snag a fistful of her ebon mane. Enough, by far, to allow him to drag her up to her dainty little toes so that his mouth could roughly crush to her own. This kiss would be stolen. A trespass made.
Jolie had harboured every intention of committing that same trespass if he’d deigned to lay down his work and greet her, if not in the manner she’d desired, then at least in some acceptable form. This.. his hand in her hair, the salt tang of his sweat… this was acceptable. This had been her precise wish - once her desire to cause him grievous wounds had faded - and she would reward that boon with acquiescence under his hands and lips, her own grasp seeking the back of his neck to pull his mouth more firmly to hers, so hard that her spine arced back against the pressure of it. He’d feel, perhaps, a week of chagrin in the tension her frame held even now, which was quickly translating back to its source – which wasn’t so terribly complicated; he generally pleased her, and she’d missed him.
These affections were worthy of envy. A molten, sudden revelation played out across a series of slowed moments. Time, and tension, ticked slowly from play as the pair made the most of this ferocious instant. They did not kiss for the faint of heart. Her body was not cradled in the way so many fawning girls hoped to find themselves when bent beneath a man's lips. This was as hot as freshly drawn steel. It was as potentially lethal. Colton Black kissed the Lady Tenebrae hard enough to bruise her full lips and leave the heated brush of his stubbled features a reminder on her softer skin. She'd be loosed from him them, his head lifting, neck taut beneath her slender fingers. "This will take me some time. You will like it when it is finished."
Jolie, quite breathless, offered him a grin at that, having mistaken the topic entirely. “Oh,” she’d say, once it dawned on her what he’d meant, the back of fingers which had abandoned his nape tracing the sandpapery jaw that had reddened her own, an unadulterated gleam of wickedness dimming somewhat in her eyes. “I really didn’t.. I mean…” She tipped up again and nipped the underside of his chin faintly, soothing the nearly nonexistent hurt of it with a press of soft, bruised lips. “Well. Thank you.”