Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome to Imythess, the border between dreams and reality. We hope you enjoy your visit.

Imythess is a creative writing board where you narrate the story of a character in the medieval land of Imythess, on the planet Chaon. Each topic is an opportunity for your character to interact with the world and its peoples by cooperatively writing pieces of a story with other members, one post at a time. We call this role-playing, because you assume the identity of your character as if it were your own.

In order to play, you must register an account for each character you would like to write about, and begin their tale by filling out their basic profile information: Race (human, elf, demon, etc.), class (warrior, mage, etc.), physical appearance, and any other personal details you would like to describe. You are also encouraged to come up with some background history information for what your character's life has been like up to the point at which their story in Imythess begins.

There is no approval process or application required to join, so long as you follow the rules then you are free to write whatever character details you choose. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Create a character now!


If you're already a member, you can log into your account below:


Username:   Password:
Reply
[P] Run
Topic Started: Sat Oct 14, 2017 3:59 pm (628 Views)
Marion
Member Avatar


He smelled raw. Marion squinted as she looked at him, trying to find the source of the scent of rented flesh and dried blood. His neck and arms looked fine, and so did his face. Whatever wounds he sustained, they must have been under his clothes. If he’d had an accident, it must have been a terrible one, yet he didn’t seem too bothered.

Marion hopped off the table she’d been sitting on and made it to the door in a few long strides. The three boys who were joining them took their time, laughing together and not altogether as serious as they should have been. Under different circumstances Marion would have yelled at them to get serious, but she wanted to talk to Tinker alone.

“Hey,” she said. She walked beside him without looking at him. The purple-and-black bloom on her cheek faced him. “Are you okay?”
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Tinker
No Avatar


Eshan walked quickly, peering at her from the side as Mari caught up, walking ahead of the others. Her question confused him, trying to think of anything out of the ordinary that might have happened.

"I'm fine. Are you okay? You look like someon... kissed your cheek" His eyebrows were lifted, cheeks heating.

Moving his pack to cross the other shoulder, he hooked a thumb under the strap and hefted it. A grimace crossed his face as he felt the padding wet as one of the cuts opened under the leather's bite. It didn't spread to his shirt, mostly contained to the bandage. Suddenly realizing what she might be referring to, he paled a little. "Oh," he ducked his head. "Is it going to bother you?"

This entrance was much closer than their walk the previous night, the shed outside of the district proper this time. He brought out a pair of picks, having the door open in no time. He led the way down, following the now-familiar walkways along the canals, these outer edges of the sewers less mazelike than the interior beneath the estates. His gaze flicked across the tunnels, continually checking the water itself for signs of movement. He paused at intersections, taking turns and following unseen directions to their destination.

After roughly fifteen minutes of travel they came to the gate. Fresh scratches on the opposite walkway where the swamp drakes had scrambled up the side of the canal to snap up the dismantled service golem. Kneeling, he checked the golem's device. It was small, roughly palm-sized. Powered by a small spike with components wrapped around it, it was etched in spellforms and currents of conductive materials. based around the golem's metamana connection, its idle state allowed it to interact with checks such as the gate's magelock. Without a bismuth-lined shell to protect it, the device was fairly smaller than one might have thought, no larger than the hilt of a dagger.

Satisfied it was active, he pulled out the crossbow, unfolding and fixing the arms in place. Pulling a short magazine from his pack, he loaded the device and waved his companions forward.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Marion
Member Avatar


“My dad,” she said flatly. After telling him about the basement and the closets, she suspected Tinker could figure out the rest. It wasn’t a kiss. The bruise was shaped like a set of knuckles, where a closed fist might have collided with her face.

She shook her head. “I ate. It won’t bother me.” She turned her head to look at him and caught a glimpse of his grimace. Eyes flicking to the supplies he carried, Marion tilted her head a little bit to silently inquire further into what may have happened to him.

Following down the ladder and into the familiar sewer system, Marion watched as Tinker investigated the golem. She stood over his shoulder, watching him. When he motioned them forward, the three boys went eagerly in the direction of their destination, but Marion hesitated.

“Come on, Mari, what are you waiting for?” Griffin hissed.

“Don’t worry about what I’m waiting for,” Marion snapped. She gestured for him to press forward. “Keep a look out for service golems. Get to the gate. We’ll catch up.”

She looked back at Tinker, then into the sewage. Swamp drakes waited just under the surface, though she didn’t see any. She looked for the glint of an eye in the lantern light, but saw nothing. They were attracted to the release of a service golem’s energy—maybe they would swim toward the source when Tinker shot the crossbow.

“No swamp drakes,” she said quietly. “You’re safe to shoot.”
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Tinker
No Avatar


Crossbow assembled, he waved the group to follow. "Don't worry about that for now. This is a normal crossbow, for the most part. Left the accelerator at home. It isn't for drakes." He checked the slide reloader and headed for the gate.

While they walked up, he pulled the golem parts from the sack, holding it above his shoulder as they approached. The light of the gate turned blue and it opened for them. "Hurry, it'll close right away." He ducked and ran in, entering the dank stone room at the bottom of the estate's stairs.

Keeping by Mari's side as they ascended, he gave her a sidelong glance, seeming nervous about speaking. "I did things wrong yesterday. I had to learn better. Be better."

The stairs came into a supply room. It smelled of chemicals and soaps, with clean chamberpots in one corner and a number of cleaning tools neatly stored against another wall. An opening to crawlspaces was sealed off on one wall, with a door in the other.

Opening the door into one of the side halls, he let the group into the estate proper.

Walls were paneled in dark woods, with handwoven rugs and well-made furniture set up in every room like the empty set of some rich theater between acts. The home appeared to be empty.

"Split up, search the rooms. Grab whatever catches your eye. Mari, please come with me." Eshan spoke in a hushed whisper. He looked up the stairs to the single door above.

"We have to hurry. The servants are being serviced tonight." He whispered to her as he approached the door, hesitating at the handle.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Marion
Member Avatar


I did things wrong yesterday. I had to learn better. Be better.

Marion’s brows came together and her eyes narrowed as she looked at him. The expression didn’t last long, as she didn’t have the time to consider what he might have meant. Along with the others, she raced through the gate, up the stairs, and into the supply room, which smelled of soap and chemicals. It was enough to just barely cover the raw, aching scent of Eshan’s body.

“What’s Mari gotta go with him for? Maybe I wanted Mari to come with me,” said one of the boys.

“She’s probably just gonna help him smash some locks,” said another. Laughing quietly between themselves, they took off to search the house for whatever valuables they could make off with.

Marion climbed up the stairs after him. When he hesitated at the handle, she rolled her eyes and figured she would do it herself. Resting her hand on it, and finding that no shock of mana arrested her, she turned it and thrust the door open to reveal what lay on the other side.

It opened on a master bedroom whose ceiling was painted with depictions of Balefire mythology. A long mirror adorned one side of the room, while a hearth burned on the other. The carpet was plush, lavish. In the center of the room was a large canopy bed whose veils were pulled back to reveal delicately carved poles and the shape of a human body under the covers.

“Uh?” Marion shot Eshan a sharp, angry glance.
Edited by Marion, Thu Nov 2, 2017 7:28 pm.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Tinker
No Avatar


Eshan gave an emotionless look in the direction of the boys, but chose not to comment. The fewer that knew the job was a distraction the better. Dismissing the group, he walked close to Marion with crossbow tucked under his arm.

As she threw open the door, he ignored the angry look and walked into the room. The form in the bed didn't stir.

On a whim he turned, swinging the butt of the crossbow upward. It connected with the assailant's knife hand, following through and ripping his elbow back into the man's gut.

The knife clattered onto the floor. The man dove for it with the hand not clutching a generous gut. Spinning with the crossbow, Eshan brought it back to bear and pulled the trigger.

With a crack and a ratcheting sound, a bolt dug firmly into the floorboard between the reaching hand and the knife. The man snapped his hand away and Eshan stepped on the knife, sliding it back to Mari.

The man was large, a good deal of weight on his tall frame. Sprawled back on the floor in his bedclothes, he wore a defiant expression without a trace of humiliation. "Go on then. Take what you want, gods-damned thieves. I'll have the sheriffs sniffing after you in moments." He looked away from the crossbow for a moment to Marion. "Who the hell are yo--"

"No."

For a second, the interrupting voice sounded remarkably similar. Close enough it might have been the man's on its own. "Look at me."

The man froze, leaning to look beyond the crossbow at the yound man behind it. Standing with the bow in hand he carried himself completely differently than normal. The anger on the boy's face was a mirror of the man's seconds before. His shoulders were relaxed, tone cold and flinty.

"Is that you, you little shit?" The lord's confusion turned to a sneer. "Pity you had to pay some gutter rat to come face me. Bet you couldn't find the balls to use that damned thing if you tried. You're soft." He shook his head, beginning to stand without regard for the bow.

Eshan pulled.

The bolt dug directly into the tendon beneath the kneecap, head protruding from the back of his leg. Eshan's father fell to his side, clutching at the leg. Gasping for air, he reassessed Eshan.

"Well. Maybe there's some hope for you y--"

Crack.

The bolt dug into the man's chest, finding its home between ribs and piercing his heart through. He snapped back, falling back on the head of the bolt. Several inches of bolt stuck up from his chest as he lay still.

Eshan didn't speak, lowering the crossbow and kneeling in front of the corpse. Prying the rings off his fingers, he calmly went around the room, pulling drawers out onto the floor and scattering items seemingly at random. He smashed the lid of the jewelry box rather than picking it, laying out a shirt and piling the valuables into it. Tying it off, he offered the sack to Marion.

"Here. Make sure the others take these. Let them fence it. I can send your share of the pay to you in coin. Let them take the fall if anyone comes looking." He looked at her eyes as he spoke, but not into them. He wasn't all there. His voice was dull, toneless. Eyes unfocused and lost.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Marion
Member Avatar


Marion stood there.

She just stood there.

She’d never seen a man killed before. Nor had she ever seen a man wounded. The smell of blood—luscious, velvet, intoxicating—permeated the room. Her eyes hooded. All her life she’d imagined what it might be like to kill her own father, to leap at him in the dark and sink her teeth into a sweet artery. Always imagined it, laying in that dank basement where they isolated her as punishmet—imagined surrendering to instinct, becoming the thing they’d always been afraid of.

How satisfying those fantasies were.

How terrible it was when it happened in front of her.

The soul had left that man’s body a long time ago, long before tonight, and so Marion did not see it exit the room. But she saw the last breath. Heard his heart stutter, then stop.

“You didn’t need me for this,” she said. Her voice wasn’t altogether there.

All that blood, wasted.

She tried to focus.

“What did you need me here for?”

There was no bite to her voice. No tone. It was hollow. She wasn’t with Tinker, not really—she was somewhere else, an alternate course of events where Tinker had told her the plan and then let her at him like a dog on the chase. A world where all that blood didn’t go to waste.

She stepped over to him, leaned down, and swiped a finger into the pool of blood on the carpet. She stuck it in her mouth. Still warm, still alive, but not what she wanted.

She wanted to tear someone apart.

Her fingers itched with the desire to hold someone down and rip them open.

Her fangs felt too large in her mouth.

She was horrified by it.

“Get out. Gods, Eshan, get out before I—”
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Tinker
No Avatar


Eshan lowered the sack of loot to the floorboards gently. He'd already made plenty of racket. Gently laying the crossbow on the sack, he stood and looked directly into her eyes.

"I needed you here because I can't do this myself." He waved a hand across the ransacked room. Bringing his hand back, he reached for her wrists, trying to match gazes and not show how much effort it was taking to touch her.

"I can't do the whole house by myself. I needed a group. I'm not the help. I'm the client." Looking for something in her eyes, a frown creased his brow. He looked concerned, one of the few times in the last day he'd shown anything but discomfort.

"I trust you. Friends, right? You don't have to do things alone either." He scooped the sack and crossbow up in one hand, reaching to rest a hand on her shoulderblade. "We should leave the room. I'll make it up to you, but there's somewhere I want to visit before we leave."

He tried to look supportive, but there was a tension to him. A readiness to act if she broke control. He trusted her to not to mean him harm, but he was ready to stop her doing something she would regret.

"We can get you food if you're too hungry, but you can't feed on him now. They'll look for vampires if they find marks."
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Marion
Member Avatar


She could hear his heart beating.

"You should have let me tear him apart."

Marion could feel each of her teeth humming with desire.

"Should have tied him up and let me—"

She exhaled a shivering breath.

"I'd have ruined him for you."

For me. Oh, gods, I would have loved to—

Something in her spirit snapped. Maybe it was her resistance to killing, or what little goodness lay inside her heart. Marion felt something extinguish in her, like a candle snuffed between two spit-slick fingers. Despite this—or perhaps because of it—she found herself finally able to meet Eshan's concerned eyes. He hadn't looked her in the eyes before. Not like this, not for this long. Her gaze flicked down to her wrists, which she only now realized he held firmly in his hands.

They'll look for vampires if they find marks.

He was trying to protect her. Telling her to come back to herself. But what self was there to return to? When they left this room, what would she be?

"You need to tell me before you do shit like this," Marion snapped. "You don't get to drag me into your plans without telling me what's going to happen. You did it in the sewer last night and you did it again just now. You put fresh blood in front of me knowing—knowing how hungry I've been—"

Marion's hands clenched to fists. Yanking herself away from him, she stumbled back to the doorway and leaned against its frame with her back to him. She needed to leave, but the blood tempted her to stay. What did she care, if the constables came looking for vampires? Would they really find her, of all the monsters in Balefire?

He'd wanted to visit some place.

A promise made the previous night emerged through the haze of her hunger.

"The garden." She nodded. She took a deep breath. "Lead the way. I'll cover your back."
Edited by Marion, Fri Nov 3, 2017 4:04 am.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Tinker
No Avatar


Eshan kept eye contact until she told him off, trying to keep it but unable to stop his eyes from darting to the side. As she agreed to leave with him, he let himself look away and released her hands as if he'd been holding embers.

"Thank you." He muttered, bending to pick up sack and crossbow and walking out of the room without looking back at the cooling body of his closest relative.

Dropping the sack in the hall by the service door, he waved Marion toward a pair of doors at the house's rear. They passed family paintings, his father and mother standing beside each other alone. He resembled his mother more than his father, features finer and thinner of frame. She was slender and beautiful, skin pale and smooth with blue eyes and silvery-blonde hair pulled up into a tight bun.

Eshan didn't look as they walked past, ignoring the boys ransacking the kitchen and dining rooms. Throwing the bolt, he hunched against the cool breeze as they stepped into the garden.

It was a small space, a square surrounded by a tall hedge with long planters running the sides. The hedges were spotted with small flowers, baby-blue petals pulled into bulbs in the dark. Eshan walked to each of the four lampposts, pinching each wick and sending a current through until the fire took. The flames were blue, casting a flickering light over the space that highlighted each of the flowers. Bulbs opened, extending long, lily-like petals.

Lmps lit, he took a deep breath and turned to the center of the garden.

The gravestone was simple and unremarkable. It sat in the center of a square of grass, the light of the lanterns making the engraving dance.

Ceri Coher. Dreamers and soaring birds could never have flown so high without your guiding hand.

Eshan knelt down in front of the stone, brushing his fingers across the inscription.

"He always thought he was clever." He said, dipping a hand into his pocket. One of the rings he'd taken from his father's hand lay where he set it atop the stone, a silver band with a chip of sapphire. The bottom of the ring was smeared with blood.

Resting his hands against either side of the stone, he rested his forehead against the stone. "She wasn't strong. She never stood up to him. Always talked about how much he loved her." He brushed his thumb against the edge of the stone, a drop wetting the grass under his head.

"She cared though. She came to see me at the shop. She always wore sleeves." His knuckles went white where he clenched the gravestone. "We didn't talk about it."

After a moment he let go of the stone to press a finger into the grass, opening a space.Taking the ring, he brushed it against his lips and buried it.

Kneeling in front of the gravestone, he sat hunched with head lowered, hands splayed on the grass in front of him.

"Wha's goin' on out 'ere? Havin' a romantic moment with th' halfwit while the men do all the work, Mari? Not robbin' no graves." The thin, greasy boy that had accompanied Griffin to his shop the day before was leaning out the back door, sneering at the both of them.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Marion
Member Avatar


“She deserved better,” Marion said. A better husband. A better life. A better death. While Eshan kneeled, Marion remained standing behind him, looking down at him and his grief. It wasn’t a loud, wailing sort of sorrow, but a quiet and factual one instead. The kind of grief that lead a boy to rest his head on a stone, because that was as close as he could get to his mother now.

“You gave her justice.” The constables wouldn’t have given it to her. Even if they believed that his father had done it—which was a stretch of the imagination and faith in the law—he never would have received punishment, Marion was sure of that. Men like Eshan’s father didn’t get in trouble, no matter what they did.

But boys like the oily little weasel who leaned against the back door, sneering? Boys like him were bound to get a beating.

“You little shit,” Marion said, turning rapidly on her heel and careening toward the door, “you greasy little pig[removed]er,” she grabbed the boy by the front of his shirt and thrust him against the wall, “I’m so sick of you.”

She was a good few inches taller than him, and at least matched him in stature. None of them were particularly muscled or healthy-looking, and Marion had caught him by surprise.

For good measure, she pulled him away from the wall and then thrust him back into it, hoping he’d hit his head on the stone. Not enough to kill him, or even knock him unconscious—just enough to scrape him up and hurt him.

It happened without thinking. Without realizing what she was doing.

It happened by instinct.

It was utterly primal. Marion’s brain had shut off.

She pushed her head into his neck and sank her teeth in.
Edited by Marion, Fri Nov 3, 2017 6:25 pm.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Tinker
No Avatar


Eshan's hand twitched for the crossbow lying beside him, but he restrained himself. It wasn't the boy's time.

Not yet.

The evening's tensions seemed to have driven Mari beyond her limits, however.

"Mari!" Eshan snapped, darting forward to grab for her. She moved faster than he could, however. She bit in. Panic took over, knowing how worked up she must have been after starving so long and being around all of the blood upstairs.

Clenching his eyes shut, Eshan reached out to seize her. Not with his hands as he had before, but in the way his mother had taught him years ago. The same way that let him know the boy was still alive. That let him know exactly where everyone within fifty feet was.

She was technically dead, but there had to still be some of the same functionality that drove a human. She felt. She moved.

A wave warped the air between them and clamped down on Marion, an electromagnetic field targeting her nervous system. "Stop!" he hissed, head suddenly light. "We need him."

Moving forward, he reached to pull her off him, wiry body showing a surprising iron-like strength. "We'll deal with it later. We need to get moving."

Abilities
Edited by Tinker, Fri Nov 3, 2017 6:41 pm.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Marion
Member Avatar


There was nothing in her world but blood. It didn’t just fill her mouth: it filled her head, her thoughts, her body. Viscous and warm, it flooded down her throat and through her arms and legs, to the very tips of her fingers and toes. Like a beacon of light, like a string singing its highest note—she felt radiant, powerful, unstoppable.

Until Eshan stopped her.

Torn away from the boy, Marion gasped, mouth open, searching for a wound. When her eyes opened they were unfocused, searching. Her body felt numb and loose, like she couldn’t quite move. She grunted, trying to speak, but couldn’t find words.

“N-No,” she said finally, finding that syllable. But her thoughts could go no further. She wanted the boy. She wanted the blood. She didn’t want to kill. She looked down at her hands, which were clean of blood until she wiped her wrist over her mouth. She made a small, horrified sound, then began to laugh.

There was place between terror and delight, and Marion found herself there now. If Eshan didn’t hold her back, she would have dived for that boy immediately.

“Th’ [removed] is happening’ t’her?” The greasy boy clapped a hand over his neck where she’d bit him. He stumbled a bit, woozy from blood loss and surprise. Eshan had saved his life before Marion could hurt him too badly, at least.

When he spoke, Marion snarled up at him. “Do we really need him, Tinker?” she asked. “I don’t think the world would miss him.”
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Tinker
No Avatar


Holding her shoulders in a vice grip, Eshan made himself nod. Even in the rush of adrenaline he was shaking lightly like a beaten puppy at the contact. But he knew what would happen if he let her go before talking her down.

"We do. He s-s-still has his part to play. When we're d-done I don't c-care what happens to him." He looked in the boy's direction, glaring just over his shoulder. "Go put something on that before you leave your blood everywhere for the Sheriffs to find." His lips pulled back in a snarl.

"See the job through and you'll get your share." He looked away, dismissing the boy.

Cursing, the lanky lowlife held a hand over the bleeding bite mark and walked off to find something to cover the wound with.

Reaching to take Mari's bloody hand, Eshan shakily clasped it.

The contact lasted just long enough to get his hand dirty before he pulled it away and let her go, standing between her and the door. If she couldn't keep control, he'd have to stop her.

If she couldn't control it she might as well hand the stake to the Sheriffs who came after her. The girl was his only friend, and he couldn't afford to leave her to the tender mercies of Balefire's constabulary.

"Come on. It'll wear off faster if you keep moving." He bit his lip and scooped up the crossbow with his clean hand, turning it to check the magazine's spring indicator. He still had two shots left.

"E-everyone back downstairs. R-rounds are starting again soon and the golems will be back. We run into them and it's t-too late for all of us." He held the crossbow in his left hand, waiting to walk in the back of the group with Mari.

The wounded boy kept shooting them dirty looks, but when he entered the door in front of them Eshan palmed the doorknob, leaving a bloody smear oin the service door.

"Don't t-touch anything." He whispered almost inaudibly, hoping Mari would pick it up. Moving to the stairwell, he left another smear on the door to the sewers.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
Marion
Member Avatar


Once the boy disappeared inside, and took the glory of his bleeding wound with him, the cloud in Marion’s mind lifted somewhat. She looked at Eshan with eyes that were able to focus on more than his beating heart. Nodding slowly, she came back to herself bit by bit, and began to shake as adrenaline coursed through her system.

She’d attacked someone.

She hadn’t even been able to stop it.

It just happened.

“This wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t killed your dad in front of me,” she gasped. Her voice was breathy, shaking with anger and blame and guilt. She wasn’t sure if the accusation was true, but she didn’t want to think that she was capable of this on her own.

Following him back into the house, they gathered around the other boys. This time she could control herself; the wound was covered and she had returned to her senses, anyway. Down through the service door, down the stairwell—Marion hadn’t even thought of touching anything until Eshan whispered behind her. She turned to look at him, then saw the streak of blood on the wall.

Her eyes widened.

What are you doing?” she whispered harshly.
Offline Profile Quote To Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
ZetaBoards - Free Forum Hosting
Free Forums. Reliable service with over 8 years of experience.
Learn More · Register Now
Go to Next Page
« Previous Topic · Balefire, the City of Lanterns · Next Topic »
Reply

Top RP SitesVote for Imythess at Top Site List Planet
Top Site Lists
Misty Woods created by Helena & Cory of ZNR