RP:When throwing things in the Blood Fountain, be careful what you wish for

Part of the Venturil's Bane Arc

This is a Necromancer's Guild RP.

Blood Fountain, Vailkrin

Valentin tromped down the street, for all the world like a man out walking his dog. But this was Vailkrin, the butcher was a known member of the Necromancer's Guild, and his 'dog' was the known pet of the most unnerving bar owner the world had yet seen. Valentin leading Maladroit by a chain was sure to gather many glances in his direction, to which the Scleratus of the Necromancer's guild simply touched the brim of his bowler hat in silent greeting. He walked in a straight line to his goal: the blood fountain. The place was busy as always, and lousy with undead of all varieties, despite the recent calamities which had rocked the stability of the dark city. Young rebellious vampires were scandalising their families by drinking out of the fountain using tankards, zombies were shambling respectfully, and creatures which weren't quite definable as man nor beast lurked in the shadows, performing the tasks set to them by their masters. Valentin ceased his advance at the edge of the fountain, Maladroit presumably in tow, and boomed out "Alright you lot. Guild Business. Clear away from th'Fountain." Tenebrae may have been gone from Vailkrin for a small while now, but every local knew the Guild members had been handpicked by her Dread Contrary Crankiness' own will. Valentin waited a moment to see if he'd get to do this the easy way. Aetheric whispering started to build in the air around the butcher as he prepared for the 'hard' way, just in case.

Leifong is all a bubble in his twisted little heart of hearts. Nobody left to this world could know him well enough to tell, but to one who did it would have been written all over him. He flits to and fro among the shadows, intimidating passersby into making way with his sheer presence alone. Everything was coming together so perfectly well now that he could just burst from excitement, and the Haruspex could hardly wait for the one perfect moment he knew was coming. In a great swirl of blackness he bursts into corporeal existence beside his apprentice and without waiting for a response from the crowd jabs a withered arm at the first onlooker he deems 'in the way'. A sickening collaboration of cracks and squelching noises fills the air as Leifong's entire body contorts in the most impossible way, as though his bones themselves were being ripped apart from one another inside his body. The meager vestiges of his remaining fleshy bits tear in places while trying to remain connected to bones that are suddenly reordering themselves, and all in the blink of an eye a sharp spear of rot dripping bone explodes out of his wrist and impales a young vampire through the throat. Somewhere near 4 feet of Leifong's skeleton just hangs there in the air for what seems like an impossibly long moment, exposed and alien, the corresponding bits of his body turning into little more than a gelatinous blob on the ground. In another blink the Haruspex's body slides back down his bones, redevouring them as he moves terrifyingly fast through space to end up standing as normal before his victim, hoisting the comparable infant up with his radius and cackling wildly.

Vailkrin had seen horrors beyond horrors of late, and most of that activity had centered around the Blood Fountain. As Usual. So while most of the locals who'd tentatively returned to gathering around it had fled - or shambled - away after the first sign of trouble, there was always a few, you know? And as one of those slower-than's-good-for-a-body citizens became victims to the Haruspex, and doors slammed all along the street, and the sound of timber barring those closed doors scraped the air, Maladroit loifted and dropped its shoulders in the same mute resignation it had affected since its 'capture'. Nothing was horrible as its Mistress' vats, nothing. Except of course, what came out of them, things that made the monstrous Leifong and the Bloody Butcher of Cenril look like two little boys playing poke-the-dead-cat. Perhaps a tiny smidge of this smug thought would pervade its aura, while the gaunt rattled its chains pathetically and dead things dangled and dripped, and the fountain gurgled merrily.

Valentin grumbled to Leifong "I'll take care o'the stragglers, guv. Best we make sure as we can keep out th'real troublemakers, should they happen to show. You know barriers an' seals better than me, innit." Valentin cast a suspicious glance at Maladroit. Something still seemed a bit off to the butcher. A sense of 'this is going too damn easy' which set Valentin's hackles on edge. Still, it had to be done, despite the risks. Valentin began one of his favoured umbral cantata, dissonant syllables cascading from his lips in a horrendous clash of consonants and sussuration, and the shadows danced to his will. They whisked and cavorted into patterns on the ground in a large circle, forming a ritual array which Leifong would recognise as bearing a nasty coruscation of shadowfire. As the pyrumbral tides swelled, the sigils flared darkly as heat was generated, and a shockwave of necromantic flames erupted in the zone where he and Leifong would need the space to conduct the proper ritual to come. There was warning: the clever could still run, but the stupid would face a brief hellish inferno - or Valentin's horrendous cleaver if they tried to take cover in the fountain.

Leifong stares into the eyes of his victim, the vampire staring back despite the intense pain, too shocked to move. Leifong twists his head slightly, cocks a wry grin, and places his free hand on the poor creature's forehead. Lines quickly spread away from the contact point in complex spiraling patterns, sacred geometry glowing like embers as the Haruspex burns the Sigil needed for the barrier into his victim's flesh, integrating him into the spellwork to act as a source of energy. As the final arcs connect a great bubble of energy explodes away from the vampire turned battery that would hit anyone but the three who were meant to be there like a ton of bricks and keep anyone else from approaching more than thirty paces.

Zzzzzzzappp! Ah, that was inevitable. The acrid stench of electrified.. whatever-it-used-to-be.. rose from the perimeter of that accursed space, which bothered not the gaunt as it had no nose, but the reek may cause a redoubling of window-seals throughout the city's nearest streets. Maladroit itself observed all the ritual goings-on with extreme passivity. After all, no rift existed here, now, since its own return had 'sealed' the vacuum created in the last debacle regarding interdimensional beings. In truth, it was reserving its energy, for these meddlers, if indeed they did manage to open a rift, would likely find the meet-and-greet crowd less friendly than say... a rabid wharg. Maladroit's major hope was that they'd both be eaten while simultaneously providing it a passage back to its true Mistress, though it would, in its secret innardy space that passed for a heart, miss the Little One a bit. The gaunt had seen the threads of Time and Fate, and as malleable as those were, as unreliable as they were to remain accurate, it knew it must go home. For it had seen what might happen, if it did not... and while it didn't care much for the existence of anyone barring a scant handful of beings and itself, survival of all concerned was its primary motivation. Home.. to the Shadow Realm. Where Tenebrae might finish punishing it for scuffing her parquet. It had thought to avoid this by remaining here long enough for her to forget, but those visions... the presages... Maladroit was resigned to its Fate, now, knowing that it was all for the best.

Valentin and the Haruspex had worked long and hard on the necromantic array of sigils which would weaken once more the fabric between dimensions just long enough to perform the necessary banishment. A lot of it was well beyond the butcher's comprehension, reaching deep into the areas of knowledge known only to Leifong and others with his depth of learning and power. But Valentin had become adept at inscribing ritual arrays - he had to be, as the consequences of failure weren't necessarily going to be at the hands of the horrendous liches and lunatics he called teachers. With the grounds cleared, Scleratus Valentin prepared the ritual circle, chanting its fabric into a pattern of shadowice-formed gutters and runnels within which the blood from the fountain would be diverted to maintain the power flow throughout the array. Leifong would add the finishing touches and permutations, as he would be the one to activate the array: for manipulating the complex mass of contrasting energies this circle would summon was no task for a mere Scleratus to attempt. Only Leifong could make the final stage of the ritual work effectively - but Valentin would show his progress with the focus and care he takes in the creation of the physical array, ensuring the cryumbral formation's integrity lasted for the entire ritual. "It's ready, Haruspex. The rest is up to you."

Passers-by would see a 60 foot diameter spherical barrier of coruscating energy patterned in lines and sigils sacred to Vakmatharas - within may be seen The Magister Letum of the Necromancer's guild, his apprentice the Scleratus Valentin, and the abomination Maladroit. A large ritual array formed of complex necromantic sigils would be visible, understandable only to necromancers of higher rank, but which mages would recognise as related to banishment and exorcism rituals.

Leifong drops his victim like a sack of potatoes the moment that his barrier is active, his bones retracting back to their proper places as though nothing had happened at all as he walks calmly around the perimeter of the bubble, probing it for weak spots as his apprentice begins lays the groundwork. If he weren't such twisted, hateful creature, he might have noticed the degree to which Valentin had improved. As the butcher finishes, Leifong gives his full focus to the array, taking several moments to walk about and inspect the work done, only once does he make a correction, but he was apparently too wrapped up in the work to bother berating his student. "Bring the creature." he states dryly, moving to the central-most point and with a wave of his hand raises a squat pedestal of stone from the ground. As he waits for his will to be done, the Haruspex begins the final preparations, adding a lattice of secondary transfer lines over the first in a pattern hardly seen in the current age.

The 'creature' - Maladroit would have eyed Leifong, were it at all able to do such a thing - was beginning to sense that the energies so far summoned were nothing at all like the energies that had first spilled itself and its Mistress into the Shadow Realm, nor like those which had transferred the gaunt back, alone. Perhaps its edginess was apparent in the dry rustling of its wings, the mad wibble of fingers as sigils and patterns and black fire and perimeter horrors spat, hissed, crackled and generally heralded something.. different.. happening. But surely, these men knew what they were doing? After all, were they not instructed by Tenebrae herself? Maladroit thought about that a bit more deeply, and that's about when it began to struggle against its bonds of iron and shadow - for it was only now and upon seeing that flat-topped stone in particular beginning to suspect that its survival was not nearly as important to Leifong and Valentin's ritual chicanery as Maladroit had expected.

Valentin had been keeping a close eye on the creepy critter. He'd been damn suspicious of its docility, and had been expecting some kind of last-minute attempt for freedom. The butcher had prepared for the eventuality, and had been practising the next binding diligently since he'd first decided on this course of action. Around the butcher shadows elongated and rose up to a chorus of aetheric whispers as Valentin let the sussurations of the cantata of umbral binding gloop from his tongue in sibillants so thick as to be almost viscous in quality. Their dissonant and entropic foundation gave the cantatus a grimy feel to it as the sounds carried around the plaza. Maladroit would find tendrils of ice and shadow arising from the centre of the ritual circle, activated by Valentin's chant, and those tendrils of hellish restraint would draw Maladroit to its allotted place in the ritual with an unearthly and flesh-freezing strength. Blood from the fountain would start to be funnelled through manifested tubes of sorcerous shadow, preparing the way for Leifong's diabolic ministrations. The light inside the barrier would seem darker than Vailkrin's normal gloom to those watching from outside. Valentin chanted, the shadowbindings pulled, and only time would see how things turned out. Valentin was certainly going to be glad to see the last of the abomination. It could damn well stay with its mistress forever, as far as he was concerned.

Maggie was typically not inclined to explore Vailkrin, and the few times she'd visited had been unfortunate misdirection by her familiar. This time was no different, only now her cat was forcefully leading her there by running away into what could be a dangerous situation. The woman had run through a couple of cities and an entire graveyard before catching up to the creature, and with the territories they passed through getting darker and her foray with a carnivorous hummingbird coming to mind only minutes earlier, she was more inclined to have her eyes on the animal than trust him to his own devices. So it is that a white, furry feline streaks through the streets of Vailkrin City Proper into view of the fountain and the strange ritual, and his freckled master lumbers after him with her braid in a mess and her dress even more dirtied than usual. She was seriously considering donning that new article she'd recently gotten from Rynvale, when she lays eyes on the strange symbols--which mean nothing to her nature-oriented mind or senses--and the even strange individuals gathered about them. It is the sight of the gaunt, bound by gods know what and wriggling for dear life, that really gets her heart racing. Her cat, with pupils dilated to nearly encompass the entire iris, is mesmerized by the strange ritual and gradually creeps towards it as he might a rogue mouse… This did not please his master in the slightest as she rushes to retrieve him. Luckily they are still on the outer reaches of the square, away from the range of the ritual, and the cat has quite a distance to go until he comes into contact with the barrier.

Leifong took a moment to widen several of the more crucial disperser bands as Maladroit was tugged into position, the troughs digging themselves deeper into the ground to accommodate a larger volume of the blood which was now coursing into them from the fountain. Calmly he stalked from place to place, stopping at main intersections to add modifying sets of runes and in places entirely new miniature arrays, the purpose of which even Valentin could only guess at. With the creature finally secured to it's pedestal, Leifong moves to stand above it, staring with greedy, lustful eyes, one of which was not his own. "Butcher." he barks suddenly, a dangerous edge to his voice. "Leave us now." Expecting nothing less than obedience, the Haruspex wastes no more time, his arms rising up on either side to usher in the first influx of power. Leifong begins the chant, quietly at first, barely audible from beyond the barrier he'd erected to keep meddlers at bay, strange and broken syllables from a language uttered on the lips of only a handful in recorded history. Every new verse grows in volume, and as the priest chants he circles round and round the central point, forever staring at Maladroit. His withered hand reaches forward, fingertips trailing over that tough skin, and in the moment of contact between himself and the creature a great crack of deep red light splits into existence traveling from maladroit to the ground. Another comes moments later, then another, and another, until a veritable lightning storm is raging within the array, leaving a scorched stench in the air. The blood running through all of the individual lines course around on it's own, flowing like a river with ever growing ferocity trying to escape the array and yet tied down to it, faster and faster it surges through the patterns, and with each strike of energy from the gaunt it glows brighter and brighter, until the light is nearly blinding for those accustomed to the darkness of Vailkrin.

The privilege of having no nerve endings to speak of and with which to experience pain was never more acutely apparent to the once-goblin that it was in this moment. Having lashed out as violently as its bonds allowed, with the only appendages left unbound, at Valentin - who might suffer the consequential circular rings of divotted flesh as feeder-pseudeopods shot out from Maladroit's midriff in a vain attempt to cling to something- anything - rather than find itself dragged to that waiting stone... Nevertheless when the bloody hued lightning strikes, the creature would wish it had a mouth to scream with - there were, it had suddenly discovered, far worse thing than the agony of the flesh. As the fell sigils powering the travesty of a spell discharged their foul magics, a horrendous ripping sound shattered the windows for a mile around. Twisting in the midst of it all, the gaunt clawed in vain at its own dark skin, its flesh visibly -unraveling - with each blast of that sanguine, unholy light. But amid its struggles, those tentacular appendages found purchase on the only solid thing it had left to hang to - the sacrificial stone - and Maladroit hung on indeed. For grim death, one might say, so it was hard to tell whether it was this unaccounted for stubbornness and unwillingness to perish in the process of being banished, or something Leifong had done to the necromantic runes.. hard to say -precisely - what might have caused the events that twisted Time and Space, and splattered them willy nilly throughout that magical sphere - and splattered Maladroit too, whose body exploded in a black rain of alchemically-altered meat.. Hard to say what, in all of that, went wrong...

Maladroit vanished before your eyes, perhaps never to be seen again.

Tenebrae appears out of nowhere, spontaneously generating in this area.

But one could be sure, the small and green-eyed, monstrously-armoured, fork-tongued, spike-gauntleted and extremely confused woman who appeared in a deafening CRACK the moment her familiar exploded, the woman currently gape-mouthed and blinking as she sprawled on that stone... was probably the last one who had any idea what the hell just happened.

Tenebrae shouted, "Send the war-beasts to the outskirts! We're under attack!.. We're.. "

Tenebrae blinked.

Tenebrae looked at Valentin.

Tenebrae said, "Oh, no way. This isn't happening."

Leifong finds the corners of his mouth twisting upward as he stares at the product of Valentin's hard work.

Svilfon is sitting in Frostmaw watching over Emiur's brood with none of his usually casual nature. He is focused, ready to defend them with his life if such things are required... yet even here, tucked far away in the depths of Frostmaw, separated by space and even dimension... even here he senses upon the air the stirring of necromantic energy emanating from the undead city. A flicker of fear flows through Svilfon, before he shakes his head, trying to clear it from the feeling of death that permeates the wizard's mind. Eventually he does, and with a new thought to ponder amongst many others in his hat-covered head, he resumes his careful watch over the precious remnants of the missing couatl while he tries in vain to stop looking in the direction of Vailkrin every now and again with a slight frown.

Tenebrae , meanwhile, was pinching herself in the arm. Really, really hard.

Valentin had never particularly liked the tentaclefaced pigeongrubber - and now even less so as the damn thing tore holes out of his face. But that was nothing compared to the horror he experienced when, after being buffeted by sorcerous energies far beyond his capacity to control, he witnessed the result of the ritual. Alright, exploding gaunt he could deal with. However, the green-eyed devilwoman, seated where the damn abomination had been, was not. It was a rare thing, to see Valentin deflate, let alone look defeated, but today was the lucky day for any there to see it. The burly butcher muttered "I am right an' proper fecked now." and rests his uneasy gaze on the foul harridan who ran the Necromancer's Guild. No, not Leifong. Tenebrae. "Uh, mistress Joliette. Good t'see you." Bravo to the butcher for keeping his calm - not a hint of his nerves made it into his voice. "I trust yer holiday went well?" Small talk was the very devil. "This, uh, wasn't quite what was intended, mam'selle." Valentin, reaching the point of floundering and covered in oozing bits of gaunt, gave up on talking and stood there silently, waiting for the worst.

Tenebrae just stared at Valentin. Then she quit pinching herself, and began pinching him. Really, really hard.

Valentin endures the pinching in stoic silence. Maybe if she thought he wasn't real, she'd elect not to turn him into somethin'... unnatural.

Maggie looks up to toward the ritual, making sure her cat wasn't going to near it as slow as he creeps. Then she sees the blood, the fountain spurting it. This garish, alien sight, her stomach flips and she has to place her hand over her mouth to keep from retching in the street right there at the blood running through the trenches and sigils. When the light brightens, her cat stops in his tracks and bounds toward his master, leaping to her shoulders to observe from a distance. Maggie turns to leave, shielding her eyes with her hand, despite that she was accustomed to the day, but an insistent tug from her cat's mouth on her hair and a whispered request in her ear makes the witch hesitate. And then the boom happens. Her hands shoot to her ears and she winces as that did little to muffle the sudden noise. Her cat was worse off, and he rubs at the poor ears atop his head with his paw, almost obsessively. Maggie squints toward the ritual, her own morbid curiosity aroused by the display. Was that really a shouting, armored woman that emerged from that mess? She bites her lip, wondering if the area was even safe to enter and offer assistance...

Leifong hadn't done anything in the moment's following the achievement of his true goal here tonight. No, he was going to relish the feeling of that moment, that one perfect moment that he'd envisioned all the way here tonight. Such a poor sentimental puppy he was. So alone. So violently misunderstood since she'd left. What a silly and horrendous fool. All the knowledge and power at his disposal, and he used it to make a girl appear out of thin air. Well... to be fair Tenebrae was not what any smart man would call a 'girl'. She was an evil, twisted, maniacal, terrifyingly clever demon of a woman. But what other sort of girl would someone like the Haruspex summon through time, space, and several other things? For the moment Leifong remains quiet, calm, not moving a single muscle as he stands there pretending he'd done nothing spectacular and couldn't care less that she was actually here right now.

Tenebrae said, "This. Is not. Happening." Matter-of-factly, as she pinched the vampire, and then went on to offer Leifong a few sharp pinches as well. "Not. It's just..." green gaze swivelling about her, she shook her head, "Cant be. That's that. Okay? Are we all on board with that?" Less than ten seconds ago she'd been on the back of her swiftest warbeast, soaring over the site of a rumoured Barbarian insurrection. Less than ten seconds ago, Tenebrae Sunseer, Queen of Shadows, has been in a world she'd come to call her own. Happy. Married to a King. A good-looking one. Now, in a blink of ... mistake... she was here. Back in Lithrydel. Hollow. What. The. Hell. She hissed, forked tongue flickering, in Leifong's face. Her razor-and-spike studded wargauntlet rose, poised to flense the shreds of what remained of the Haruspex's face off. Except, there was Valentin. She wheeled about, unsure of whom it were best to maim first. Fortunately for the pair of them, the Necromancer was in a deep state of shock, as well as undecided."

Leifong said to Tenebrae, "This is most definitely happening."

Tenebrae said to Leifong, "No. It is not."

Tenebrae said to Valentin, "Is it? It can't be."

Valentin was quick at thinking in some situations "It was th'blimmin Gaunt, mistress. It was runnin' round, usin' visions to try an' tell us we had t'send him back t'help you out. Turns out, he was bein' somewhat devious with the whole thing. We thought he wanted to go back to you. Seems maybe it was th'opposite. He certainly resisted returnin' to your side, which is likely what caused the whole sorry bollocksup, innit." Maybe the sucker holes in his face would help give truth to the lie. "Somethin' interfered wi'the array, an' it weren't m'self nor Haruspex - we ain't so stupid as t'risk annoyin' you, mistress." The butcher had some talent for surviving lunatic superiors. He hoped that talent wouldn't run dry now.

Leifong looses a sickly squelch of laughter. "Oh no, that's not quite how I seem to remember it."

Maggie continues watching, still at a distance, as the three seemed to be…bickering amongst each other? That meant the horrible parts were over, right? The woman's curiosity, with all that business done with and her stomach settled as a result, is a burning thing now. And ever the nosy one, much to her own detriment many times, chooses to cup her hand to her mouth and shout to the three strangers an offer of aid. After all, she was a healer, and she did enjoy being useful… "Oi! You lot alright over there? Need any help? That whole thing didn't look particularly pleasant!"

Valentin grunts "Energies must ha'knocked you silly then, Haruspex. Those ain't sigil arrays I'm capable of. It's your fingerprints all over them. If it weren't the gaunt, then it were you, stands t'reason"

Tenebrae snapped her face toward Valentin, her mawful of needle-fangs opening as she might say something in reply. Or you know, bite him. But then Leifong chimed in, and that visage of twisted fury next snapped his way. Her face was visibly changing in this process, from unholy, perfect beauty to a snarling, wrinkle-snouted, conch-eared travesty of itself as rage took her over almost completely. But it was Maggie's shout that saved them. The Queen of Shadows stared at the woman, her shoulders lowering, her armour somehow actually bristling. The alchemically-altered vampire had just come through a dimensional rift, and she... oh, she was starving.

Valentin almost, -almost-, facepalmed when the lass called out to them. All that stopped him was being unwilling to attract Tenebrae's unwanted attention. But, he still had a duty to fulfil as Scleratus, now the situation had changed. "On the bright side, mam'selle, you're right by the fountain. I 'spect you're hungry from the, uh, trip." Valentin pointed helpfully at the brimming pool of viscous vitae. He called out to the crazy cat lady "Yeah, have you got a blimmin' wineglass or goblet? If not, send someone down with one from th'Corpse. Tell 'em it's for th'Mistress, an' make sure it's blimmin' clean." Crazy cat lady Valentin though her, because she was here, with a cat, and was not running in self-preserving terror. Hell, he wanted to, but decorum demanded he stay right there. "I see you changed your look a bit, Mistress. It suits you." Honest truth, that. She was now a crazy twisted hellion on outside and inside. It seemed more honest, really.

Leifong gives a wry grin from beneath his hood. "Well, i have a date. Control the situation, apprentice. I'll return to check on your progress." and without another sound the Haruspex disappears into a puff of shadow.

Maggie couldn't quite see all the finer features of the gathered people from that distance, but she knew a monster in the making when she saw it, and its eyes were locked on her. She should have known better by now, she really should. "I didn't raise you to be that stupid," the cat says, happy to remark on that fact. The witch gulps and nods her agreement to the familiar. "Just…meet me in Cenril, will you?" she says. The beast's hackles raise and he nuzzles his master's cheek for good measure before leaping off her shoulders and darting as fast as his legs could take him in the opposite direction as the necromancers. The butcher, whom she vaguely remembered from the tavern in Kelay, had some good advice. Maggie nods, her face going smooth. She does not turn around, however, but walks backwards--with decent haste for a human--toward said tavern, not daring to take her eyes off the lady-creature.

Tenebrae slashed at Leifong with that horror of a gauntlet attached to her right arm, its razors rusted with alien blood still from the battle she had so recently been summoned from. . And shredded, into mince, only... shadow. Her howl of rage echoed the emptied streets, and she wheeled upon the Scleratus like some kind of rabid.. wharg. Fortunately, his blithering had distracted her from Maggie. And the cat, wherever that had gone. "Maladroit!" It was question and a curse, all at the same time, hissed through that maw of acutely-tipped teeth.

Ranok chose that exact moment to land, in a swirl of metal, leather, and fury. Draeta had told him. Another rift. In Vailkrin. Again? But this one...this one was controlled. The influx of energies lit up the sky to the belighted intelligence. Few others, if at all, saw the world in quite the same way it did. A beacon, a sign...and surely, trouble. A long debate had been had with himself. To go or not? It took him the realization that if he didn't at least look, it'd bother him basically forever. Or bite him in the ass when it blew up later. That was why he launched himself into the night. All patience was lost, all vestiges of subtlety discarded. Kasyr and Redhale could stuff it. Standing from the crouch he'd landed in, electricity sheets off parts of his body as the magnetization he'd used to jump was kept handy. A single step forward, the metal baton drawn from its holster and morphing into a stave, growing to its full size. No words are said, but his expression said it all. What the hell was he looking at, here?

Tenebrae stared at Ranok, and suspected, in that moment, that she had actually and long ast died. And gone to the nethermost pits of hell. Her head shuddered interiorly with the beginning of a mind-numbing headache.

Valentin had a strong streak of cunning in his makeup. Cunning as a fox who'd earned his doctorate for Advanced Deviousness at Really Sneaky University. "Aye, mistress. Maladroit. I don't think he quite realised th'stupidity o'tryin' to pull you through when we was tryin' to send him t'you. He's kind of strewn around the area." Valentin demonstrated by brushing a bit of Maladroit off his apron. "It got a bit messy. I mean, you'd have t'ask the Haruspex how it worked. I just set down the sigil array based on his directions" The butcher hadn't appreciated Leifong's humorous attempts to drop him in the deep end, and this was his payback. "Leifong'll know what went wrong. He doublechecked my sigils an' all." A little extra twist of the dagger, there, and Valentin was satisfied.

Tenebrae said nothing, for the moment. She heard Valentin. Dragged her eyes off Ranok. And stared at the still-twitching remnants of the once-goblin's latest physical shell. It was real, she had to admit to herself. This nightmare was actually happening. Her head throbbed a little more as one of Maladroit's hands, severed at the wrist, wibbled its fingers at her. "I don't feel well, Scleratus." The horrendous and bestial cast her features had taken a moment prior now softened, and the necromancer seemed a little smaller for it. "I don't feel well, at all."

Maggie had enough scares for one night, and Ranok's abrupt appearance into the square is what tips her balance from competent to tripping over her own feet and landing smack dab on her rear. The woman mutters a curse and hurries into standing before the gods' favor turns on her again. "A little earlier would have been perfect timing," Maggie says offhand, always eager to fill a silence no matter how tense. "You know each other?" Always full of questions, even as she scoots back another step.

Valentin handed Tenebrae a flask of one of her horrendous remedies for magical hangovers. He'd expected to have to use it himself, but circumstances had been favourable. Mostly. She'd recognise the beverage no doubt. Let her enjoy the taste of her own medicine. "Your special recipe, mistress." The butcher looked at Ranok "Evenin' guv. What brings you out to such a lovely picnic spot a'this time o'night?" He noted that crazy cat lady was still sans goblet or wineglass. Maybe she was lucky, and his mistress had forgotten about her amidst the hell of her magical migraine.

Ranok kicks something twitching out of his way, stalking forward. "Zumddink tells me dat demable tink vill be seen again." How many other black wibbly things with leathern wings were connected to Jolie? Enough to be troublesome, but such as it was. There was no fear in Ranok's eyes or frame. He'd come quite a bit a ways since he'd last stalked through Vailkrin. A glance towards Maggie, who'd actually retreated to a sensible distance. "Aye. Hy know de bitch. Jolie. Hy knev hyu'd be back. Pity dat de distance vas not hall de longer."

Valentin grunted "Seems lots o'folks have no manners these days." He couldn't argue with the content of what Ranok said. The butcher felt the same way. But there was ways and means. "This is the mistress o'the Necromancer's guild, boyo. Have some respect for th'title even if you ain't got it for the person."

Maggie had temporarily forgotten all about the wine glass with Ranok's arrival, and it came flooding back to her in a rush. "Well, I'll let you three catch up while I fetch the lady her cup, shall I?" the witch says. Now that there was someone else between her flesh and the disgruntled creature on the slab, she turns tail and runs for that tavern. It was close, and she was never above potentially getting brownie points with things that could kill her…which seems to be everything these days.

Tenebrae groped for the flask, the migraine reaching cellular level. She drank. Winced. "I hate you," she said, to Valentin, and in that moment truly meant it. But he was right (all the more reason to hate him..) in that the foul-tasting liquid she'd concocted to torture him with did work, so she took another sip and tried not to let Ranok annoy her into another head-splitting bout of rage. Licking the horrid flavour off her pointed teeth with her bifurcated tongue, the Shadow Queen lowered herself slowly to the fountain's stianed and gaunt-smattered edge. "Call me Tenebrae." Was her reply to the sole aspect of Ranok's commentary she found at all important.

Ranok had a great many things he could say. Above all, he was tired. More shenanigans. He selected the most obvious, "Hefn' changed a bit, hef ve." The remark was devoid of any and all humor. He was within a few paces of the slab and the fountain by then. Metal meets stone gently as the butt of the weapon is placed onto the cobbles. New, not old. This entire area would have been rebuilt - twice, after all the destruction.

Valentin was secretly pleased at how little Tenebrae was enjoying the vile beverage. He never thought he'd have the opportunity to feed her the horrid brew, but fate was kind sometimes, or at least had a suitably perverse sense of humour. He made a note as to the change in name, and a few other pieces of an old jigsaw fit into place. So, she was Jolie when vaguely waspish and housewifish, and Tenebrae when she was a raging hellbitch with a temper. Valentin guessed he'd just stick to calling her the latter, to be on the safe side "I trust you enjoy your beverage, Mistress Tenebrae" the butcher uttered. "I've found it t'be quite refreshing over the months. I believe a glass will be arriving soon so that you can wash it down with somethin' less... gourmet in flavour." Valentin hoped the glass didn't arrive. He enjoyed the sour expression she gave him.

Out of all the places in Vailkrin she'd been, the Hanging Corpse was Maggie's favorite, if only because it appeared the least macabre, let her believe she wasn't in imminent danger every time she came to that city. She made her way in, muttered the strange butcher's words near verbatim to the one-eyed barkeep, even emphasizing the need for the goblet to be clean. She wasn't surprised that he showed recognition in his good eye and soon enough she was presented with an empty, and spotless, goblet fit for the woman's evident position. With a quick word of thanks, the witch trots at a slower pace toward the morbid fountain once more, with the container cupped between her hands. As if on cue she arrives, her pace slowing as she comes alongside Ranok and holds out the item in question toward either the butcher or the lady, whoever would take it first. "My apologies on the delay. Circumstances being what they are and all…"

Ranok said to Valentin, "Alright, hyu hed a goot party trick. Put her back in de het, eh? "

Tenebrae stared at the glass. Then at Maggie. What world was it, where the food delivered itself, and a vessel to hold it? Her wargauntlet flexed, its shearing razors and spiked extrusions spining outward. But that hideous potion wasn't working fast enough, it seemed, for the agonies of interdimensional magical snafus to allow her to feed as she preferred. In short, her head hurt, and her mouth tasted bad, and she had not the energy to kill. Instead she uttered, faintly, "Well. Fill it, girl." to Maggie. Then to Valentin scowled, "I must get back." She winced, because canting her head toward Ranok sent a shiver of pain through the backs of those angry, peridot-green eyes of hers. "What's he gibbering about?"

Valentin really wished he -could- grab Tenebrae by the ears, stuff her in a tophat, and never see her again. That would indeed be a damnably good party trick. But since her presence here was not part of the plan in the first place, and only Leifong would know what had caused the necromantic array to go awry, Valentin was at a loss to alter the current status quo. Instead, he responds to Ranok with a taciturn "You're johnny on the spot, guv. You try it." The butcher turned to Tenebrae "You're right. Your flying wotsits an' armies obviously need you. You jus' tell me what t'inscribe on the ground t'have you sent back t'wherever in hell it was, an' I'll get crackin' Mistress"

Ranok leans on his stave. "It'd be easier to dig a hole und schtuff her in it. Hy know a fev places." He was less then alarmed by this point. The sun sets, the moon rises. Water is wet, fire is hot. Tenebrae was a bitch and also harder to get rid of then a bad case of foot fungus. About as appealing, too, but he wasn't going to tell that to the woman just now. He wasn't in the mood to sweet talk her, after all. "Hain't dis about de most amusink tink Hy've seen hall night. Hy tink it might be goot to let hyu tvo kids put de kat back into de bag."

Maggie raises a brow toward Tenebrae before actually getting a good look at the woman. Pale skin, pointy teeth…oh a vampire. Joy. She gives Tenebrae a friendly smile, the kind reserved for just about anyone she was meeting for the first time. She does not, however, pull out her dagger and slit her wrist, but walks around the two, favoring to have the butcher between herself and the lady, and scoops up a nice cup-full of nutritious life-blood from the fountain. She impresses herself by repressing the urge to wretch once again at the abundance of the coppery smell as she makes her way back the same way she came and holds out the goblet for Tenebrae. "I'd do it myself, really, but I've been told I taste like dirt and you can't ever get that out of your mouth," Maggie says, only meaning the latter half of her statement about the taste of dirt--unfortunate childhood experience involving mudpies. She raises a brow toward Ranok and his...almost humorous manner, something unseen by the woman up till now. "You actually have a sense of humor?"

Tenebrae took the glass and lolled her sorely abused tongue in it a moment before drinking the whole contents in a few swift gulps, which had the effect of both making her a tad more nauseous and reducing by an iota her urge to rip Ranok's arms from his sockets and slap him with both of them. "The Nyctalopean Dirge, in retrograde..." she began, as a reply to Valentin, but stopped. That spell might not work on this plane.. and required months of preparation. "Never mind. I'll think of something. Meantime. I need shelter. Food." Her nose wrinkled at the bland fountain-blood. "And several large vats." To Maggie then, her green attention turned. "Dirt. Well, then." The rest went unsaid, but her gaze on the healer was a little less voracious. Then back to Valentin, "Do, please. I beg you. Have him killed?" Her blink was wide and full of suffering, the question's subject eyed as she shifted a blithe look to Ranok.

Valentin grunted "I'd be happy to Guv'ness, but if we're goin' t'get you all set up, I don't have th'time t'be harin' off after every twit what gives insult. I'd be at it for years, innit." Valentin wondered why people went out of their way to invite trouble, then remembered he was invariably surrounded by lunatics "So which first: Vats or Residence? An' don't y'have the ol' mansion nearby which might take care o'half the equation?" The butcher nodded to Maggie "Good work, lass. Refill is in order, eh?" Valentin wanted the damn mistress sated and hopefully sleepy as soon as possible.

Ranok reaches out, giving Maggie's sleeve a tug, "Kome along, den. De livink don' do so vell in de lund uf de dead, lass. Hy'll valk hyu out. Und hyu, Hy imagine, Hy'll be seeink far sooner den Hy'd like." Fingers flick at Tenebrae. When one attracted as much trouble as Ranok did, and got into on his own, one rather stopped caring. "Onless hyu veesh to donate. De fountain hain't vell known for its tastiness." he adds to Maggie. Either way, a short squeeze of the hand and the stave turns into the baton again, which is hooked into the belt loop, and he was off, out of the Darklands.

Maggie 's lips purse at Valentin's request, but she is saved by the tug at her sleeve. "As wonderful as that sounds, as you can see, I do have to get going. Pleasant meeting the both of you. Sir, M'lady." she says in the sweetest voice she could muster at that moment with a small bow of her head. And for once she does not give her name or a handshake. The witch turns tail and trots after Ranok, her pace only a fraction faster than it would be usually.

Tenebrae said to Valentin, "Rest. I must rest, first. Then..." she faded off, turning a shade paler than even a Shadowside vampire ought to be. As Maggie and Ranok make their exits: "That girl has gumption. Are you sure, though, you can't have the smith killed...not even a little bit?"

Valentin grunted. It was so hard to find good help these days. People were all so blimmin' squeamish. "An' take all th'fun away from yourself? It can wait, innit. More important things need doin'" Item the first: ditch her at her mansion. Item the second: complete the repairs to his shop. Item the third: evaluate how to get her the hell home. "I reckon we'll drop you off at your old estate, Mistress. I'll 'ave Steadman supply a few bottles o'blood from the top shelf. An' I'll look into the, uh, vats. You need 'em made out o'wood, metal, or somethin' more finicky?"

Tenebrae nodded approval at all of the above, and to the butcher's last question stated, "Metal. To begin with.." She'd need other materials, too, unless a way to get her back to where she belonged happened sooner rather than later. She did not thank Valentin, for she was a Noble and gratitude was unseemly. Plus, she suspected he'd more than a little to do with her being here in the first place. "I'll make my own way, Valentin. Meet you there, later."

Valentin touched the brim of his bowler hat "As y'will. Until then." The butcher tromps off to achieve those goals, as well as his own.