Drache

[Ebonfort] So Much White Hair

Once they were within the relative warmth and safety of the moon fey's tent, Rilana pulled her boots off and replaced them with the soft slippers she had picked up in Stone Crest. She busied herself trying to bring some water to a boil and making some tea in the travel-sturdy cups in her pack. Everything came to a stand-still when she tried to add the promised honey, discovering that the precious golden stuff had met with a similar fate as Alya's ink, refusing to budge from the bottom of the corked pot.

"...oh! Oh my. Well that's just unfortunate," Rilana pouted crossly. "Trix did not tell me that honey could freeze! I will definitely have to have a word with her about that when I get back to Ebonfort..."

If she ever got back. If their trip was succesful and if she was allowed to keep her position as Envoy. If nothing terrible happened to either destroy the world or make her seek a life of solitude in the wild north. Nothing was certain at all. With a sad sort of grin, Rilana stuffed the honey jar down the front of her shirt were it would be sure to warm up nestled in her cleavage. "There. That might work."

Glancing up at Alya, she noticed, not for the first time, that the young woman seemed particularly distracted by something. "You look about as miserable as I feel. Tell me what's bothering you? You sit there and write. I'm going to braid your hair. Give me something to do while this honey warms up."

By this point, especially with Ortha's shenanigans, the middle of Rilana's tent was more a nest of furs and blankets than any kind of organized bed + supplies arrangement. The druid tossed a stick of trail jerky to Echo and settled down within easy reach of the lantern, arranging Alya in her lap with the songweaver's back to her chest. All she would have to do is peak over the smaller woman's shoulder to see what she was writing and they could have a relatively normal conversation.

While she waited for other things, Rilana produced a soft-bristle hairbrush and began to stroke it gently through Alya's white hair. "It's very soft, your hair. And straight!" Her own had traces of faint pastel colours, but tended to run in wild tendrils if she wasn't careful. "It's a shame we aren't in Frigmount yet," the moon fey sighed. "I will have to get you some of the beautiful scrimshaw and silver pins they make in Krarik."

A Heart Frozen (Ebonfort)

Rilana was quick to tie the tent flap down, both to prevent it from letting out the warm air (it was such a strange new thing to be concerned about!) and to add another level of certainty onto their privacy. Turning back to the large male, the Moon Fey seemed nervous, crossing her arms over her slender torso.

For now, Ortha simply stirred enough to eyeball the furry creature that had suddenly appeared in her space, but as he didn't seem to be threatening at the moment, she resumed ner snooze.

When Chartrose spoke again, Rilana's expression turned knowing, sympathetic, and she nodded. A tendril of her silvery hair fell from behind her long, pointed ear. "I know. Trust me, I know." She gestured towards Ortha as an example and then tucked the little Effigy into her pocket, patting it fondly.

Her silvery brows furrowed at the charr's intense tone and his unspoken concern, but when she realized what he was saying, her face relaxed. "It's Frigmount, not Fridgemount, but no matter how you pronounce it you'll be happy to know that unlike anywhere in the south, the Frostfell never lost its magic. Druids are well-known and welcome among my kind, so you needn't worry about hiding Tricia from my kin. But you DO have to worry about her perishing before we ever make it there..."

Rilana knew she was rambling a bit, trying to work up the courage for what she was going to do next.

"Forgive me, but I am assuming that if you could send her away with an effigy you would have alreay done so to spare her from the cold. But I wanted you to know there is another way..." Rilana bit her lip in a hesitant pout.

"Effigies aren't the only thing... You can make a Mark out of Tricia too. On your body. You may already know this. I couldn't...I couldn't tell because of all your fur."

Not that you have anything against fur, Kona reminded her, and he was deliberately vague enough that she couldn't tell if her gryphon was talking about himself or Svarak. She could feel his arrogant pride building up, because he knew what she was thinking.

"I've only done it once, and I have no idea how to teach someone how to do it...but if you try you just might be able to...to help Tricia." Rilana tried to keep the warm-weather raptor's well-being in mind, focusing on helping Chartrose's Familiar as she slowly turned her back on the charr and fumbled with the front of her cloak.

The cold started biting at her as soon as she pulled the supple cloak off, but there were still several layers to go. First her reindeer hide vest, then the thick pale blue linen shirt under that. Finally, Rilana let the soft suede camisole slide down to her waist until her back was bare. Or it would have been bare, if not for Kona.

Rilana's skin was as moon-white as the rest of her, almost statuesque with the alabaster hue, the barest hint of pink proving that she was alive and not some animated marble thing. And it would have been flawless, except for the massive tattoo that nearly covered her back. A proud gryphon peering up haughtily at Chartrose, all black and white like a creature of the forever-winter, only piercing yellow eyes that watching him, catlike and predatory. Even as Rilana gave the man a chance to look, Kona lashed his tail and flared his wings until it almost seemed they would burst from the Moon Fey's skin. As her fellow Druid, only Chartrose would be able to instantly recognize the Mark for a Familiar.

"His name is Kona. I Marked him half a year ago when I first left my home. I don't know exactly how I did it, I just felt him, knew that I didn't want to be apart, and the magic in our Bond made it happen. I wanted to show you because I know how much it would hurt if something happened to my Kona and I didn't want that for you." She was glancing over her shoulder, her cheekbone flushed pink, and she quickly pulled her shirt up.

[Ebonfort] So Much White Hair

Starting Date and Time: Ceruleo 52nd 300DM, nightfall

Starting Location: Frostfell, somewhere in the Indiga Mountains

CS URLs: Alya Eloen & Rilana Aurorime'

The wind had been picking up all day, the icy gusts seeming to blow right through Rilana as though she were made of cheesecloth. When she looked out across the mountains all she could see was the roiling white wall of winter stormclouds, and she suspected that the next few days were going to be rough indeed. Not only that, but she was haunted by her conversation with Svarak, the joy of celebrating her birthday drastically muted by the sheer weight of knowledge pressing down on her mind like a heavy stone. This mission was no longer about getting home, nor was it about bringing strangers to her beautiful, fair city. It had become a sort of fell trudge towards misery and terrible powers she knew nothing about. Her dreams were fulling of laughing feline jaws and crystal swords and dark, terrible things suffocating her and dragging her down into a crimson darkness.

The Moon Fey lit a lantern in her tent, both to provide warmth and light. Ortha was gnawing at one of her own bony plates, and Rilana guessed that it was itching as it continued to grow. Emerging from the tent flap, doing her best to keep the hole as small as possible, Rilana went to look for Alya. Pausing only to make sure that Bruin was grazing happily in his nosebag, the druid trod lightly through the snow until she found the half-elf.

"Hey Alya. Want to come visit with me? I have honey for tea!" She probably didn't need to coax the mute, but it was fun to try luring her out with promises of the yummy treat she picked up in Green Falls. "I'm restless and I have to stand watch in a few hours anyways. Bring Echo with you and it will be warmer with all four of us."

Five. Six, if you invite him.

The snide suggestion might have made Rilana blush once, but now it only made her feel hollow.

A Heart Frozen (Ebonfort)

Camping out in the tunnels wasn't too terribly terrible for Rilana. Much of Frigmount was carved directly into the glacial ice and down into the ground as well, and it was all cold. But she was sensitive to the distress of the rams and the horse and it was the waiting and not knowing that ate at her. She spent most of her time either tending the animals as though she were personally responsible for their well-being, and worked up the nerve to talk to Warden Drisceya and learn from her about the nature and habits of the Underdark beasts in the region. The veteran drow was pleasantly forthcoming, but Rilana was still cautious around any Ebon Knights.

And that included Svarak, who she followed with her eyes but largely avoided, speaking to him only when necessary.

It was Ortha who spotted the other half of the party first, uncoiling herself from Rilana's lap and bounding off into the stalagmite forest, her black shape disappearing rapidly into the gloom, both heads making growling chirps that Rilana knew meant either friends or food.

As soon as Rilana saw Alya's face she felt a wave of relief wash over her, her boots loud against the stone as the tall, slender woman ran to meet her friend. "Alya! Alya! You're alright, thank goodness. What happened? Where were you?" Her questions were mostly useless, as the mute half-elf couldn't answer them easily, but Rilana's genuine gladness to see Alya again was openly apparent. While she did a quick head-count, eyeing the rest of the returning travelers and their mounts to look for signs of injury and finding none, she managed to get a cobbled-together version of the story from the other knights and Chartrose. Something about a house full of food and a naked elf woman? "I promise we'll find time to talk later. For now we all need to rest and prepare to head out in the morning."

--

When the group finally emerged onto the bright but frigid surface, Rilana breathed easier. Even Kona, safe and snug inside her head, appreciated life a little more with the open sky above them and the Druid could feel his need to fly free much more strongly than ever before.

But the wind was a concern, especially at night when temperatures continued to plummet so that even the wooly rams were uncomfortable and needed the extra protection of blankets and wind-screens. Rilana found Chartrose one evening while everyone was setting up camp and shyly but determinedly pulled the charr aside.

"Chartrose, I need to talk to you about Tricia." Like most of her people, the moon fey was annoyingly resistant to the coldness, tending to wear far less than what looked comfortable to those who could feel the breath of ice down to their bones. But even Rilana had started bundling up in wolverine fur and reindeer hides, her dove-grey cashmere cloak almost obscuring her leggy frame.

"It's going to get colder by the day, but this weather it's...not normal. I've never been able to feel the chill like this before, and I'm worried about her." She gestured towards the thin-skinned raptor swaddled in her blankets. "She's not going to survive if you don't do something more for her."

Rilana, tall by most standards but still short enough to look up into Chartrose's face, turned her pretty blue eyes on him, pleading. "Please, I want to show you something." She lifted her palm and showed him a small statuette of the two-headed balauradon that traveled with her. To anyone else, it would have seemed simply like a very skilled carving and nothing more. But to Chartrose the likeness to the creature it was tied to would be uncanny, not just a figurine, but an Effigy like the one he carried.

"I saw yours the other day and I knew you were like me." Taking his paw, if he let her, Rilana pulled him into the privacy of her tent, where Ortha was already snoozing on top of Rilana's pack. The creature was nearly bigger than Echo now.

[Ebonfort] Heat

Watching the stiff, uncomfortable way that Baofeng moved piqued Drache's curiosity, and she wondered if his nervousness was because he hadn't met another half-dragon before, or if it was something about herself that made him so tense. Eyeing his blue scales, her gaze skating along his bare chest, she knew that he wasn't a half-Ixen. Her scales were always feverish with warmth but his were not. Nor were they corpse-cold like a frost-drake's should be. That narrowed things down somewhat. Not that she would have cared.

Drache gave a slow shimmy, straightening her dress as her snout turned, following the point of Boafeng's clawed fingertip to the north of the city. In the failing light she could just make out the tiny building. It wouldn't have taken her long to get there what with her resplendant wings hanging loose and shifting behind her back, but the walk was many hours through the jungle-drenched mountains, at least.

Taking advantage of his opening, the female half-dragon sidled in close, her shapely leg pressed against the half-Shochra. It was this movement partly that lead to the grazing of his hand across her chest, and a tiny noise of excitement escaping her nostrils as she let out a smokey breath. "Of course it was...but I don't mind."

"Just for one day?" That didn't give her much time. A look of deep disappointment flicked across her features and she sighed. "Students?" That made him sound so responsible. "What style is it that you teach?" Starting at his forearm, she finger-walked her claws up his arm to his shoulder, blazing a trail of heat along his scales.

[Ebonfort] Heat

The half-Ixen's interest couldn't have been more obvious, or more genuine. Her molten amber eyes traced Baofeng up and down, watching the way his larger frame bent smoothly into a bow that she did not return but observed with a little smile of amusement. Her tail weaved slowly back and forth behind her, and without asking for his permission she slipped her arm in Baofeng's and moved beside him, guiding the other hybrid away from the crowd so that they could talk, delighting in the way their scales brushed together.

"The pleasure's all mine," she assured him, her smile turning a bit impish before she answered his question. "I suppose that depends on your definition of 'long'," she replied vaguely, mentally preparing to cancel all of her plans if it meant getting to know this one better. "I live here most of the time, when I'm not traveling. And yourself? I thought I knew most of the half-dragons in the city but I definitely would have remembered..." she took a breath, and let it out with her next words, her tone smooth and seductive, "...someone like you."

She was the smaller of the pair, though neither of them were small, but she lead Baofeng to one of the stone railings that overlooked not just the street below but also a large swath of the sloping city down to the harbour. The sun had set, though the sky was still a fading riot of colour, orange and red where the ocean below was blue and green.

"I want to know all about you." There was eagerness in her eyes and the set of her ear-frills, the way she leaned towards him even though she had relinquished his arm by now.

[Ebonfort] Four Little Orclings, Mean and Green

The scavanger's yellow eyes flicked back and forth between the two orc sisters, watching them warily as he tried to keep both of them in his line of sight. Rather than circling away from them, he continued to back up, his hind paws edging backwards on what might have been called a path. Slade bared his teeth in a grimace, his canid face full of fear and desperation.

Just as Bula charged, Slade's paw came down on an especially thick strand of silvery cobweb. Using his now-bare foot, he kicked at it, hard, and there was a sound like rope creaking and branches cracking. A huge white snare sprang up from the gloomy forest floor, covering Pasho in sticky webbing. Cursing through his teeth, the Were tried to back up further from the huge powerful Orc barreling towards him. He tripped and fell back, lifting his hand as though the limb could stop the huge axe, but Bula's aim was true, even though Slade had moved.

With a ragged scream, Slade howled his pain into the forest. The axe bit a wide gash down his torso, and his right arm landed in the soil with a wet thud. Blood bubbled down his furry chest and the threadbare garments he wore and spurted from the stump of his arm. He lay moaning in the dirt.

"No...! You've killed her! You killed her, you bitch! You killed my Flora!"

Pasho was thrashing around in the net, succeeding in getting herself tangled, though she wasn't in any immediate danger. Morka had passed out by this point from both the poison and blood loss. Leshy was still some distance away, but making her way quickly towards the sounds of fighting.

And then someone began to scream. It was the sound of either a little girl or a young woman, horrified and shrill, but far off and weak. It was not the little girl Slade had been dragging along, but was coming from the depths of the black, dilapidated house.

Another noise started, a sort of rustling clicking sound that started soft but quickly grew, drowning out both Slade's moaning and the sound of the faint, tortured scream. The cobwebs along the ground began to twitch and wiggle, vibrating like the plucked strings of a harp, the movement emanating from the house.

A pale purple-white creature emerged from a gaping hole in one of the walls, moving slowly but steadily, lidless black eyes focused on Bula as it came, mandibles working silently with insectlike abandon, massive claws clicking. Slade, growing paler and weaker by the second, holding his ruined stump to his bleeding chest, heard the noise and moaned. "No...they're coming..."

Ebonfort

Name: Finnras Duskarynn
Race: Drow
Gender: Male
Age: 211
Birthday: Unknown
Birthplace: Underdark near Stone Crest
Resides in: Underdark near Stone Crest
Occupation: Adventurer/Mercenary 5gp/day

Appearance:

Pic Almost NSFW

Stands 5'6". Lean and athletic. Black skin, blue eyes, long white hair. A very charming and personable psychopath.

Personality:
Will reveal through RP.

History:
Will reveal through RP.

Skills:
Necromancy: 30
Stealth: 30
Weapon (scimitar): 30
Wilderness Survival (Underdark): 10
Interrogation: 5
Subterfuge: 10
Music (Violin/Fiddle): 5

Total 90 + 30 (racial)

Special Abilities:
Heat Infravision

Knowledge

n/a

Possessions:

Item | Acquired | Value
Explorer's Outfit x2 | Starting | 20GP
Courtier's Outfit | Starting | 30GP
Entertainer's Outfit (silk) | Starting | 75GP
Traveler's Cloak (spider silk) | Starting | 25GP
Studded Leather Armour | Starting | 25GP
Scimitar | Starting | 50GP?
Dagger, Ivory | Starting | 8GP
Poison | Starting | 45GP
Antitoxin Vial | Starting | 50GP
Chain (10ft) | Starting | 30GP
Rope (10ft) | Starting | 1GP
Rucksack | Starting | 1GP
Manacles, Master | Starting | 50GP
Bone Fiddle | Starting | ???
Sapphire Jewelry | Starting | ??

Ledger:
Cost | Item | Subtotal

+200 | Starting | 200
+1000 | No house | 1200
-410 | Starting Purchases | 790

Other:
N/A

Story List:
Date - URL - Characters involved
n/a

[Ebonfort] Heat

The music would last for days, so there never really came a point when the tune slowed or stopped, a cue for Drache to stop. But there did come a point when her breath was dry in her throat and her heart was pounding that she knew it was time to think about getting off the ride. A single sour note drew her attention back to the fiddler, who had missed his note on purpose and was looking at her with intent. One of her brows twitched up questioningly, slowing the steps of her clawed feet across the wooden stage. The musician tilted his head towards the crowd and Drache looked over, spotting a scaled face that was at least a head over most of the rest of the crowd. The frills on the side of her face fluffed out with interest, her pupils widening as she took in the tall half-breed. It had been so long since she had seen one of her kind.

With a grin at the musicians, she bowed and took her leave, hopping down off the stage and disappearing amongst so many other bodies for a moment before she managed to weave her way through. When she finally approached Baofeng she seemed cautious, her tail twitching back and forth almost nervously, as if she half-expected him to bristle and challenge her. She noticed that he didn't have wings, she noticed that he looked strong and fit. She noticed that her mouth watered a little.

"Hello stranger," she said in Draconic, a puff of smoke threading excitedly through her teeth. "My name is Drachiathoryx. And you are...?" Her voice was low, smooth but with a bit of a purr.

[Ebonfort] Heat

@Wild Alyssa