RP: The Birth of the Vailkrin Slayer
This is a Necromancer's Guild RP.
Summary: With the aim of bringing about change in the city of Vailkrin, a disillusioned young girl dons the mask of Tragedy and becomes the Vailkrin Slayer, but a tough old lycan thwarts her plans before she can cause too much damage. The Vailkrin Slayer is subdued, but Quintessa avoids capture by the authorities and her identity remains a mystery to all but Mahri.
House Dragana
Towering over the abyssal forest, the dark mass of House Dragana is no less eerie than the vegetation, or lack thereof, in which it stands. The mansion's outer perimeters are flanked by the twisting trees and there are no gates to prevent the seemingly less desirable denizens of the forest from trespassing upon the property. A sleek, obsidian walkway runs from the house's entry to the path. The only source of light without comes form wrought-iron lanterns that are placed on either side of the walkway, spaced perfectly from one another. Within them, an eldritch glow of a deep, verdant hue flickers. Those brave enough to approach House Dragana's doors will be greeted with iron knockers bearing blackened skulls, their eyes set with emeralds that glow with the same light from the lanterns. Within the house's walls, there is no shortage of decadence. Only the most elegant of furniture is placed throughout its rooms. A grand staircase of blackened wood leads to the upper levels, where rooms for those that reside within the house can be found. Midway up, the stairs split to the left and right, spiraling upward. Here, there is a landing with a set of double doors that leads to a large ballroom. The lower level of the house plays host to a dining area and kitchen, though rarely used, a grandiose library filled with grimoires and tomes, and a small museum of artifacts collected by the house's residents. Though there appear to be no candles to light the way, an ethereal glow floods the innards of the house, providing ample reading light - undoubtedly arcane in origin. Dark magic is weaved into the house's existence as a measure of protection.
Things just would never be the same as they used to be. The world was a different place for Quintessa since she'd seen what she'd seen. Since she had to do the things she'd done. Life was an insignificant force to be snuffed out like all the rest, she saw that now. This was her grim truth. Freedom just meant that there would be more suffering and peace was a lie. The only way to achieve true peace was to rid the world of everything in it, even the things she cared about. It was painful, but deep down she felt that it was true. From her room in Dragana manor she turned over a porcelain mask in her hands. "Tragedy," she said to herself, her pale fingers tracing over the eyes and mouth. "I'll spread misfortune throughout all of Lithrydel, but first I'll finish what my Lady started." She brought the mask to her face, obscuring her identity before she pulled the hood of her invisibility cloak over her head. Tonight she would cause another massacre, this time in Vailkrin.
Vailkrin City Road
Hemlock Way has broadened to become a wide city road carrying locals, travellers and merchants through its bustling thoroughfare. The general air is one of cautious calm, probably due to staunch city guard patrols being particularly present here, ensuring that visitors and locals alike can stroll the dimly-lit blackstone streets under the glow of street lamps and silvery moons with relative safety. To the north is a well-fitted shop, its sign suggesting supplies fit for necromancy and other dark magics. A short southern street leads to the entrance of Vailkrin's most stylish -and notorious- tavern, The Hanging Corpse.
Things were pretty normal for the time being. The city of the dead was always a little rough around the edges, but not so much that the occasional visitor would be murdered in the back allies. The calm streets would soon flow with blood, however, unless Quintessa was stopped. There she stood, amidst the crowds of people in Vailkrin's main street, invisible to all who visited the shops and and world famous tavern, The Hanging Corpse. They couldn't see the katana that was already drawn, but some could feel the uneasy air that loomed around her as her maleficent aura felt around, silently judging those who walked around her. This would be easy. A cruel grin spread across her face as she stepped forward, her katana moving with a flash to slay her first victim, some dapper vampire with a top hat and three piece suit. The blade effortlessly cut through his neck, his undead blood spraying out of the wound like a garden hose as his body hit the cobblestone path. The crowd froze and grew silent, unsure what has happened, until the spell keeping the changeling invisible faded away and relieved the masked murder. Panic immediately ensues, but there would be no escape for them. "Tân yn llosgi ' n llachar! Troi ' r llyngyr hyn yn lludw!" She uttered, black flames of hated erupting from her body and immolating anyone standing three meters away her. Their screams filled the night air as they withered and burned, and the hex blade laughed her cruel laughter at them. Vampires weren't so tough after all. "Why are you running? Why are you running?" She yelled after the panicked crowd as they began to flee, her sword brought up to preform another attack, "I'm just getting started!" A group of three tried to escape down an alleyway but she saw them out of the corner of her eye. "Tân! Tân! Tân!" she roared as she swung her sword at each of them, an arc of fire launching from the blade each time she said her incantation, one for each of them. They got maybe a meter away before all three are consumed by Quintessa's inferno, the force of the attack already enough to kill them. Under her mask she smiled with content. This was already more fun than she expected.
Even inside the Hanging Corpse the screams outside could be heard. Mahri and Steadman glanced at each other before the wolf headed out the door. Vampires and humans seemed to be in a panic which drew the lycan’s curiosity because, quite frankly, very little could send a vampire no matter how young into a tizzy. Ushering the fearful inside, Mahri closes the door behind her and wanders down the road to find out what the commotion is all about. And then she hears it, that voice she knew so well but..not the tone she knew. Frowning, Mahri sweeps a silvery gaze over the streets and lucky her, finds the girl with katana in hand stalking down her way. “Tess?” she calls, clearly confused by the actions of the other. Her keen sense of smell confirms it’s who she thinks it is. Pushing fleeing residents behind her, the wolf readies herself and her magics to stop the rampage of the girl she had called friend. “Tess, stop.” The once alpha is used to being obeyed and her tone conveys that, in no uncertain terms, she expected the girl to do as told. She can’t see behind that mask covering the changling’s face, but she can bet she’s been where the girl is now a time or two. “I don’t want to hurt you, Tess. Put down the katanas and come with me.” She had a nice, quiet safe place to put Tess if she needed to be separated from the general population. In fact, she knew the perfect spot and it was just under the Hanging Corpse.
By the time Mahri steps outside Quintessa has already taken a new victim. A human girl, a slave most likely, one around the same age as the changeling. The hex blade grips her by her long brown hair to keep her from running while she runs her through, her katana piecing through the slave-girl with ease. Before she is even finished dying, Quintessa pushes her off her sword and onto the street, letting her crawl away as she bleeds out. She is about to take a step after her when she hears a familiar voice calling her name.
She freezes in her tracks, her head slowly turning back to look at Mahri. Her identity was compromised. No matter. Her slender digits rise to take the mask off her face but the expression that lies beneath it was one twisted in anger. Nobody takes an alpha tone with her.
"Why should I?" She snaps, her body pivoting to face her as she flicks the blood from her katana, leaving a splatter on the walls around her. "Why do they deserve mercy and others do not?" She begins to step towards the lycan, the hand gripping her sword shaking in rage while the hand holding the porcelain masks smashes it on the ground. "I already have enough people giving me orders without you telling me what to do!" As she finishes her last sentence her aura expands to engulf the whole street, causing an oppressive gloom to hang over the two that were left standing on it. "If you want to fight me, I hope you are prepared. I'm not the little girl you met two months ago."
The lycan braces herself for the hit of Quintessa’s power. She’d suspected there was something about her and though it hit her, she gritted her teeth against the feeling of despair. She would not let it take her. “I don’t want to fight you, Tess. I want to help you.” Even as she said it, the wolf was closing the distance once step at a time, her own magic gathering within turning her aura a pale green to any who could see it, concentrated in her hands – hands held in a placating gesture to her sides. Beneath the ground something stirs, readying for the druid’s will should it be needed. Along the buildings, small creatures scurried – beetles, rats, spiders – all gathering in wait. “Why do they deserve mercy? Because they haven’t done anything. Talk to me, Tess. I’m your friend.”
Quintessa can feel the stirring of creatures all around her and she growls lowly, perceiving some kind of ploy. Mismatched eyes remain locked on the wolf in front of her however, and although she can't see Mahri's aura, she can certainly feel it. "Help me? I'm beyond anybody's help." Her anger becomes a more crazy glee than anything as she grins at the Lycan, her sharp teeth gleaming in the light of the moons. "I'm simply embracing what I am, a horrible monster that crawled out of the Dark Forest. A weapon to be used to slaughter anything in my path." She brings her katana to her side and she utters the phrase "Mellt a streipen" causing electricity to arc down her sword. "And right now, you're in my way." Without wasting any more time she swings her sword wide calling out the word "Mellt!" Sending a lightning bolt racing down the street aimed right for her chest. However, this attack was only a ruse meant to mask her charge. Quicken steps bring the hex blade in on the tale of her lightning, waiting for Mahri to dodge her original attack before she swung her electrified blade at her. If the wolf decided not to dodge she would simply follow through with her charge, aiming to impale Mahri much like she had he slave girl earlier.
“No, you’re not.” Mahri stayed right where she was letting the girl come to her. “This isn’t you, Tess. This is not the girl I met or came to think of as my friend.” She readied herself for the attack she knew was coming. Electricity reflects in eyes so gray they’re silver in color, catching a feral gleam in their depths. Ebony tresses stir in a breeze only she can feel. “And, my friend that you are, I’ll remain in your way so long as I think you’re going to hurt yourself.” Did she really care about the people here? Maybe, a little, but not nearly as much as she cared about the girl with pointy teeth and mismatched eyes. The girl who had so forcefully cheered her on during the tournament. The lightening bolt streaked down the road and the word of invoking was her only warning. “No!” she yelled and threw her hands up. But, with the motion a slab or stone rose up as well, blocking the bolt from reaching her and thus the charge would have to circumvent the stone but Mahri’s already moving and the earth beneath the street churning with all manner of life. Bugs and rats mostly to swarm over the changling’s feet and up her legs. The weight of them gaining meant to slow her down if she didn’t rid herself of them quickly. Beneath that, something else stirred should Quintessa close the distance faster than Mahri can keep it. “You’re not a weapon, Tess. You can be more than that. You ~are~ more than that. Listen to me, hear my voice, Tess and know that I speak the truth. I have never lied to you. Not once.” She hadn’t. Mahri had a policy to never lie, no matter how the truth might hurt. “What you saw, what you did. I have been there, Tess. I told you, war is not pretty. War is not glamorous. The history is written by the winners. Do you remember me telling you that Tess? But, you can be more than what you’ve seen or done. I can help you.” Gods, she prayed, let the girl listen.
The mismatched eyes of the changeling narrowed as Mahri summoned a pillar of stone to absorb the blast of her lightning, but her charge wasn't dampened until her legs and feet were covered in small critters. This sudden invasion of vermin angered Quintessa and she sneered at them as her pace is slowed, bringing her electrified katana down to clear a large swath of them away, but it wouldn't be enough. "Damned vermin!" she screamed, coming to a halt halfway through her charge. "Tân yn llosgi ' n llachar! Troi ' r llyngyr hyn yn lludw!" came next to escape her lips, her body covered in shadowy flames again, vaporizing all of the insects and most of the rats. The creatures lucky enough to avoid the fire scatter, possibly to regroup. For the time being the wolf had her momentarily pacified, but who knows for how long? "You don't know what I am!" She screamed, ashes from the dead bugs drifting off her like snow, "I'm not worth your friendship... I'm not worth anything!" She had no idea something stirred beneath the earth when she spoke. "You don't understand, Mahri, I enjoyed killing those people. Something deep down clicked when I slaughtered the Cenril Razurath. This is my calling!"
Mahri felt a heaviness in her chest and realized she was sad. She’d lost so many friends and family already and it looked like she was about to lose another. The vermin scattered, waited for the druid’s call again but didn’t move they only watched. “I’m sorry, Tess. This is for your own good.”
From beneath the girl’s feet, the vines would break through then and silver eyes glowed eerily in the waning light. She was concentrating rather hard on this, the stalks thick and mithril hard, the spines that sprung from them razor sharp and dripping with some sort of venom. They undulated and rolled, unfurling platter sized leaves with serrated edges as they moved swiftly towards Quintessa in a thick swarm of dark sickly green and black. Their goal, which is Mahri’s, is simply to restrain by winding around Tess from feet up and they would seem endless. If Tess were even nicked by one of the thorns her blood would be injected with a sedative. Yes, something to knock her out but not kill or harm. The serrated foliage was only a back up if the girl proved too difficult to subdue. Hurting her is the last thing the lycan wanted to do, ever.
"You bitch!" Quintessa roared, mismatched eyes filling with rage once more as her legs were snared, the thorns leaking their venom into her blood stream as they easily penetrated her unarmored flesh. From the burning sensation filling her veins, she knew she had been poisoned, but the effects wouldn't be immediate, her hag-born constitution helping her resist. With panicked swings, the changeling girl hacks away at the vines, only to watch them regrow and twist around her again. "Let go of me!" Her voice was shrill, like a wounded animal. She finally ripped herself away from the vines, stumbling backwards and away from the serrated, dinner-plate sized leaves. "You're just like the rest," she sobbed, her world growing heavy and distorted, "Always... Seeking to control me..." She turned to run, but could only trot away, her sword hanging loosely from her pale fingers as her free hand pressed against the stone building at her side. Quintessa could feel her consciousness fading, and she assumed death would come next if she didn't do something. With her mind still hazy, she stabbed herself in her thigh, the sudden pain lighting up her world once more, enough to keep her from succumbing to the venom. With a deep breath, the hex blade pushed herself from the wall, pivoting back around to stare daggers into Mahri. "What are you waiting for?" She asked, her shaky arm lifting her katana up to point at her. "Kill me... It's what I deserve... Kill me!" Even in her delirious state her aura was as potent as ever, even more so now that she couldn't control it, and it tried to crush the lycan under its force, the oppressive gloom becoming more of a heavy pressure now that her mind was feral.
Mahri waited for the tranquilizer to take affect, not counting on the oppressive aura bearing down on her. “Tess,” she grits out between clenched teeth, “I’m not going to kill you. I want to help you.” She hoped soon the toxin would take affect. She wouldn’t be able to do what she needed otherwise. “I don’t want to control you, Tess. I’m your friend. You don’t see it now, but I hope you will some day.” The lycan pressed on, despite the heaviness of the aura bringing her to her knees. Even then she’d crawl, clawing her way towards Tess. “Stop this Tess, please.” There’s a word she didn’t say very often, please. The wolf had lived through much worse circumstances and doubted she’d die in this one.
The hex blade's katana fell to the ground, her strength abandoning her. "Why?" she asked, dropping to her knees, tears forming in her mismatched eyes. Her aura begins to fade away as her willpower wanes as well. Something deep inside of her desperately wanted to be punished, she could feel it, but she didn't understand why. Quintessa was crying soft, quiet, tears now, her vison completely obscured by them plus the distortion of the plant venom. She knew she was done fighting today, she couldn't even lift her arms. It was a miracle she could even remain conscious with the poison running through her like it was. "I don't wanna do this anymore," she finally admitted to Mahri, her charcoal makeup streaking down her face as she helpless sat in the street. If the lycan was waiting for an opportunity to subdue her, this was it. "I'm such a failure..."
Cellar
This cavernous room has been excavated from the softer earth beyond the rock-hewn steps, faced in sturdy bluestone blocks and lit with flickering torches. A light draught blows from narrow vertical slots along the lower part of the southern wall, providing stale, if breathable, air and suggesting the presence of a space beyond. Void of wine racks, barrels, or any item to suggest the purpose of this cellar is to store liquors and ales, the only outstanding features are the two caged areas, one measuring ten yards by ten in the Western corner taking almost a third of the room, another of half that size in the Eastern corner. Both are barred in adamantine steel, reinforced with mesh of the same material. The only entrance to either is a small hatch with a dozen gnomish locking mechanisms. Spells have been imbued in the bars and mesh to prevent errant spills of magic leaking toward any gathered crowd. Along each side of the larger cage hang one each of timber club, hand-axe, short spear and long knife. Rust-coloured splotches have clearly defied attempts at cleaning, and stain the cage floors, spattering too the cellar floor beyond. Sundry rough tables are here and there, furnished each with a thin candle jammed to an empty wine bottle.
Able to breath easily again, Mahri gains her feet and walks the final distance to Tess, crouching and reaching a hand towards the girl. “Because I see a lot of me in you, Tess. You don’t have to do this anymore, ever again.” If Tess was weakened and helpless as she looks, the wolf will pick her up, cradled like a child, and carry her to the Hanging Corpse. In the basement there are cells; for what purpose she’d only seen once, but also a cot. If Quintessa thinks she’ll be caged, she’ll be pleasantly surprised to find herself settled gently on one of those cots inside an open cell, the door left that way after covering the girl with a blanket. “Rest, friend. I’ll be here when you wake up.” To prove her point, the woman settles her back against the wall next to the cot, drawing her knees up and resting her head back against the stone. Though it may look as though she’s sleeping, she isn’t, silver-gray eyes kept at half mast keeping watch over Quintessa.
Unable to move, Quintessa was helpless lifted up and taken to the cot were she continued to sob until she lost consciousness, only to wake up a few moments later unsure where she was. Everything was hazy, including her memories of what had just happened. "Mahri?" She remembered attacking her, and felt terrible about it now, "Forgive me..." She didn't feel bad about killing all those people but Mahri was special to her, the closest thing she had ever had to a mother. "I never wanted things to be this way..." Her eyelids fluttered, still heavy from the sedative, but she was forcing herself to stay awake again. "I just want people to respect me."
Mahri turned her head slightly at the sound of her name. "There's nothing to forgive," she assured softly. She stayed quiet then, giving Tess a chance to just talk, something she wished she had once upon a time
Quintessa smiled, happy that Mahri wasn't mad at her for trying to kill her. Mismatched eyes stared at the ceiling and she wondered when everything would stop spinning. "Why are people so mean to me?" she wondered, "Is it because people found out I murdered my father? No, that can't be it. Karasu get's the same kind of discrimination. They probably don't respect us because we are women..." She didn't have a filter for the things she said anymore, the plant toxin acting as a truth serum.
"It's not because you're female," the wolf says. "It's not because you say you killed your father" she had her doubts about that. "They fear you. Fear makes people do strange things, treat people differently." Mahri wasn't afraid. Even if she was she wouldn't show it. "Go to sleep, Tess. You'll feel better in the morning."
"Fear?" her voice cracked a bit. "That must be it," That was the confirmation she needed. Her sinister appearance. Her unnatural talent for magic. Her willingness to cast aside established rules for the sake of progress. Everyone feared her for these reasons, and she would always be alone because of it. "I wish I had never been born..." Was the last thing she muttered before she lost consciousness again. This time she wouldn't wake up until the poison had run its course. Quintessa trusted deep down that Mahri would protect her, that she wouldn't betray her when the Vailkrin authorities began asking questions. Hopefully, with all the trouble that Larewen had caused in the past, they would assume it was her again, despite this not being her modus operandi. For now, all those worries faded away as a calm, dreamless sleep took hold.
No one could ever accuse Mahri of being good with words, or choosing them wisely. Tess had completely misconstrued what she had been saying and turned it to the opposite.She's too tired, had expended too much energy to try and correct the girl yet. And though her mind and body demanded sleep, the lycanness forced herself to stay awake. Upstairs, she heard footsteps and the sound of very official voices along with Steadman's. She knew he'd never give her or her charge away and was comfortable enough then to drift. Somewhere in the night, something came over her - an urge to go somewhere she had not been in a very long time; a place she had hoped never to have to venture into again so that when Tessa awoke, she'd find a note beside her:
Tess, Authorities were here wondering if anyone had witnessed the killings last night. Don't worry, you're safe. I have to go somewhere but I will be back. Steadman will get you anything you need. He's the guy with the eyepatch upstairs. Feel free to stay here, I have a proposition for you and your particular set of skills, which I am sure have been honed over years of use. If you are not here when I return then I wish you the best of luck and a reminder that I am not afraid of you, because I know your heart. If I do not return; then know that my life, for what it was worth, was better for having known you. Regards, ~M