RP:Undeath and Madness

Synopsis: Damien gets a taste of the bizarre when he meets an off-the-hinges assassin.

Characters: Damien, Orphyn

Location: Hanging Corpse Tavern, Vailkrin

Date: Feb. 9th, 2016

Damien looked at Orphyn.

Orphyn looked at Damien.

Damien drank. It wasn't something he prided himself in, and he could easily drink from the cellars of House Dragana, though most of it was blood wine, but instead he came to a more public venue to drink, away from the eyes of curious vampires and fledgling necromancers. Larewen had raised him from the dead, and he was now her dutiful servant... but he had a measure of his own will, and would fight with all his being to retain it if he must, lest he fail to fulfill certain duties that would ensure his next passing skipped over the purgatory that awaited him once more beyond the grave. This was a different purgatory, of sorts... yet he did not want to return. Skin as pallid as maggots, his nipples an icy blue, his eyes a sinister yellow, his hair white as a mans ripened with age. He was a walking corpse, yet... he wasn't. He didn't even bleed red, anymore, but a sickly greenish substance, that given the chance, his body simply re absorbed. He wore the showy clothing of his time, allowing all to see the magical symbols from a lost age etched down his torso, but in the motif of Vailkrin, where once he'd worn gaudy colors when not armored. He carried no weapons, but had a guard of skeletons, five in all, surrounding him, wielding various armaments that were once magical and profoundly powerful... now given to rust and the ravages of time, as had the flesh of his elite guard. He drank, and he wondered why alcohol could still affect him, dead as he was. Perhaps he'd leave his servants behind, and go to see if the land beyond all this death still held life. Was all the world like this... Vailkrin?

Orphyn had been seated quite quietly for some time. She sat, so eerily still, like some sort of puppet without its puppeteer. Greyish-blue peered out from behind a crudely made smiley-face mask resting upon her face; Dingy and yellow with orange stains dotting along its surface. Dried blood? "Hmm?" she said, finally breaking silence. "Oh. Really?" There was no one around for her to be answering. Suddenly she began to shift, that veiled face turning toward Damien to get a good look at the undead man and his troupe of bony warriors. "One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six." she called out in a sing-song manner. "Do you all forget you should be sleeping?"

Damien turned towards the voice. He heard insanity in it, something he'd not heard much of in life. It took him aback, set him to staring, while trying to formulate a response. "Rest is for the living, and the deserving." His guard deserved their rest... he did not. They had followed him, even when he was cast from the kingdom, abandoning everything. It had been good they'd taken no spouses, born no children. They'd not left families behind. Her mask hid her features, but he wore a sort of mask of his own, his face blank of expression. It was an easy thing to accomplish, when breath was only needed to speak, not to continue living. When every movement was born from his will, not from the needs of fleshly life. "Pray tell, what keeps you from your own rest?"

Damien looked at Orphyn.

Orphyn shrugs her shoulders with a bit of a child-like manner, voice echoing this action. "Not tired. Hunting." Suddenly she looks to the chair at her left and giggles. "Noooo. Shh." From her hip she retrieves a single dagger, its blade unlike that of a normal craft. The ore it was made from was dark, blackened, a viridian haze trailing its edges. She spins it idly on the table with one finger. "Everyone deserves something, but no one deserves anything. Wishy washy world, hmm?" Another giggle. "Why do you walk from where you were put?"

Damien wondered if a spirit of sorts accompanied this woman. In such a world as this, lunacy might well give birth to its own very real abominations. His own unlife was... well. He rested his elbows on the counter, folding his hands under his chin, where he rested it. "Wishy washy indeed." Her next question brought something of a frown to his face, as he thought about it with perhaps a tad more intensity than he should have. What wisdom had a madwoman to share? She was playing with quite a deadly looking knife, at that. She might be worse than mad... she might be as lethal as she was unpredictable. "I suppose 'tis because I know naught else to do." Would that he could simply take flight, or aught else... but he was tethered to the ground, in a manner of speaking. As surely as if he'd had wings, and they'd been clipped... or simply torn asunder.

Orphyn turned her head to the empty chair to the left. "Shhhhhhhh! I'm talking! I'll do it! You know I will!" The woman was obviously beginning to get angry with whomever it was she conversed with. Reaching down and into her pocket, she pulled out a small little pouch, quickly to open it. From inside a small bit of sparkling powder was dusted upon the webbing of her hand. Leaning forward, Orphyn lifted her mask and gave that dash of powder a quick snort! "Mmm. There. Peace and quiet!" Those grey-blues then looked over in Damien's direction, first to hit the floor where she spied a puddle of a shadow formed by his little gathering. In the blink of an eye, she would swiftly appear, face to face with the undead male. How she moved so quickly without alerting even those guards was anyone's guess. At least he could see her face; One that looked to be in its early twenties, light peaches and cream skin, almost flawless. "That is sad. Very sad." She frowned. "There is just so much do to!"

Orphyn used 1 pixie dust, depleting 1 stamina.

Damien watched her erratic behavior with growing interest... the snort, then the disappearing, re appearing act, though... he'd seen the shadow, but even still could hardly believe what she'd accomplished. His knee jerk reaction had him jerking his head back, blinking, while looking at her suddenly near face, and his skeleton guards seemed to half jerk into readiness, only to relax once more, startled as he. "Ah... so much of what to do?" Was all of the response he could muster? This girl was capable... and quite beautiful, now that he could see her face. "This land of death holds few surprises for one who's spent so long in purgatory. I must say, though... you... are one of them."

Orphyn grinned maniacally as she pulled back to give Damien his space, that one dagger still in hand with a firm white knuckled grasp. She obviously meant no harm, for as it had been retrieved so too would it be re-housed into the sheathe upon the right side of her hip. She spun toward the direction of her table, the action revealing more about the girl; Upon the left hip she bore another sheathe, seemingly with a dagger of the same make, given its matching hilt. Her arms, as the cloak fastened at her neck billowed with rotation, were revealed to both be heavily inked in bright and colorful pieces of artwork. It was a momentary reveal, perhaps not enough to showcase any sort of prominent design. " I like surprises! And I really love to surprise people! Surprises make life fun!" A giggle set her motion to go reclaim her drink, her form turning then to face Damien when she spoke again. "So. Why are you walking, silly? What brings you back from this puuuurrrrrgatory?"

Damien watched as she sheathed her dagger, and twirled. In retrospect, he should probably take care to recognize what danger even such a small blade might bring to his... unusual body. There were magics at play here he scarce comprehended, as well mental workings he wasn't sure he wanted to comprehend. Those tattoos were a flash of color in a world with so little of it, What had this girl snorted? He'd guess from her skin that she was yet living, yet she walked among the dead, carefree, in her lunacy. "I am walking... because I was brought back, by one Larewen Dragana. A vampire, and necromancer. I am bound to her service. I am... driven to see to it that I do not return to that purgatory." Or stripped of his free will, which would be much the same.

Orphyn tipped her head and and tossed down whatever it was she had been drinking. Given that no face were made, it was most likely just water. Without hesitation she threw the glass in Steadman's direction then, a sheepish grin as the bartender actually caught it. "YAY! You finally got it!" Obviously the pair had been through this before, and given how the one-eyed man looked at her, he had already spoken with her about this a few times. "La...la..la-Laaaaarewen. Dragana." she enunciated for no reason in particular. "Nope never met her. I think." Those stone cold blues looked to Damien. "Ew. You're a living dolly. Those necromancers. Always such jerkish oafs. Take take take take. Never give. Well. They give you some sort of life. But it isn't of much good, now is it?"

Damien watched the toss display, and the reticence of Steadman with what shouldn't have been surprise any longer. Well, it seemed this one was the gift that just kept on giving. "Eww, indeed. That... I am. But not of flesh, and bone." He wasn't sure what he was, save that he had his own mind, his own soul. "Not much of a gift at all. Necromancers have always been like that, to my experience. Still, I am glad to be here, rather than... there."

Orphyn grins wide. "I am glad you are here too. I like you deadsy things! Always with such tragic stories. I want to know your story, dolly." Suddenly she peers over her shoulder toward the door. "Ugh. But I'm taaal-" she started, quick to catch herself. "OH! Oh oh oh! I almost forgot! I'm sorry!" she spoke once again to no one in particular. With the flick of her neck that twisted mask snapped down over her features, one hand flapping toward Damien. "I have something need doing. Things need deadening. I love Vailkrin! So. Maybe we see each other again. Okay? Bye, dolly!" With those odd parting words, she turned toward the door and darted off. "Wait up SiN!"