Lovejoy

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

@vietmyke Thank you for the wonderful post/collab. My condolences to your family. <3

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

@shylarah Here's your reply!

I originally had a much more antagonistic opening line for Rose, but decided to change it. Think it flows much better this way.

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

@Mercenary Lord I've been wanting to play that! Too bad my PC can't run it. :(

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

The Ruins of Iddin-Mar, Old Omestris

---

As the inquisitor spoke, Rose could feel the familiar stinging in her hands. Every word that came out of the woman's mouth held some truth to it, the girl conceded, but still, the inquisitor could not know the severity of it all. The years, torment, the raping, the goodbyes, the punishments. The inquisitor had experienced no small measure of suffering as well, Rose understood.

But there was an off-handedness to the woman's words that picked away at Rose's calm facade. The woman smiled as she spoke, as if Rose's experiences, the House, the escape, the journey-- had all been some entry in a ledger she had read somewhere. This was unacceptable. All her suffering, her truth, to be reduced to a few words in a trifling lesson. No, this couldn't stand. Rose had been taught of the Seminary, of Warbands and warsiblings. Surely the woman understood in some deeper way that there was no plateauing in becoming stronger. No rest. No giving up. Not when it came to protecting family.

"Choose death?" Rose asked, an incredulous look flaring in her golden eyes.

"You say that as if I have a choice. As if you have a choice. This world doesn't offer us the luxury to choose. I have no path set in front of me but the one that leads to my brother and sister's safety. And you, you can't stray from your path either. You must kill for your Lord, do his bidding, follow the creed of his rapist clerics. But you must also fight for your warsiblings."

Rose dropped the steel box unceremoniously at her feet and kicked it under the bed with her heel. She got up and without fear or reservation, marched to where Rose stood.

"What would happen if your strength failed you in battle? If you made a mistake and your warsiblings had to pay the price? Could you bare to think of what your death would mean to those closest to you? The consequences it would have? I wouldn't even entertain the thought, because such a thing coming to pass is unacceptable. When the lives of the ones I care about are on the line, nothing else matters."

Rose's eyes focused on the inquisitor's hair, vibrant even in the half-darkness. She then turned away, a mixture of sorrow and anger gleaming in her eyes.

"I heard you speaking to your companion earlier. You claimed that your Omestrian heritage was a curse. That you weren't one of us."

Rose was quiet for a moment.

"Why?" she asked the inquisitor in a low voice.

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

Finally have the weekend off, so I'm going to try and move along as many stories as I can. Will probably also have a Rodion post as well as write some character profiles for some of the new characters that were introduced. So uh, look forward to that!

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

@Scout Aw, we'll miss you! Keep us updated on everything if you can!

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

@CollectorOfMyst@shylarah

Great posts!

Myst, I don't think I have anything else for you at the moment, since Fie would do as Oren says and leave him alone (for now, anyway). Do you want Oren to just chill for a bit until Ziotea and Rose's conversation is over?

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

@shylarah Whoops. I'll edit the post once I'm home from work.

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

@shylarah@CollectorOfMyst

Sorry for the wait!

Myst, I kinda answered for Oren there, just to save some time. If there's anything you want me to change let me know!

The Last Embers (Dark Steampunk/Fantasy)

The Ruins of Iddin-Mar, Old Omestris

---

He had been patiently waiting in the shadowed hallway leading to the back rooms of the aquarium, trying to keep himself from listening to the two inquisitors as they spoke. But now the ashen-haired one with the sad eyes and the scary women had finished their conversation, and thus his lifelong lessons in obedience and servitude kicked in. Vahn approached the red-haired woman and tried his best to smile, just like the masters at the Scarlet House had taught him.

"My Lady, if I could show you to your room," Vahn said to the red-haired inquisitor. He had spoken those words countless times to the patrons in the salon of the House, but never to a woman before, and never without the fear piercing through his insides. He was still scared now, but Vahn didn't believe that this woman would beat him for stuttering or for spilling a bottle of virika, and thus for once, he felt a strange sort of pride in his young heart. The two strangers looked tired to him, and it would be nice to show them to a room where they could rest.

Vahn led the woman back through the darkly lit hallways, passed the kitchen and the room where he and Fie slept, to a small chamber that Lady Essa-- or Grandma, as she wanted them to call her-- had told him was once called a "break room". Vahn didn't know why there needed to be a specific room to break things, but Lady Essa had turned the small chamber into a comfortable bedroom with three cots and a nice etherlamp within it to ward off the cold.

"H-Here is where you and your companion will be staying, My Lady. The Break Room. Usually, Rose sleeps in here, but tonight you and your friend can make use of it," Vahn told her with a deep bow before stepping into the room and straightening out the wrinkled corner of an otherwise tidy bedsheet.

"I was in a hurry making your beds, s-so..."

Vahn didn't seem to know how to finish that sentence, so instead, he bowed once more and hastily left the room, his eyes still glued to the floor. As he exited the room, he nearly bumped into Rose, who placed a firm hand on the boy's shoulder, stopping him.

"What did I tell you about always looking where you're going?"

"R-Right. I'm sorry."

"Go tend to Lady Essa."

Vahn nodded, and went on his way. Rose watched him scurry down the hallway, making certain that the boy's eyes were facing forward. When he disappeared into the solar, Rose turned to gaze at the inquisitor standing within the room, and found the woman's eyes staring back.

Rose broke her gaze from the inquisitor and stepped foot in the room. She made her way to one of the beds and sat down, where she unstrapped her gauntlets and absent-mindedly threw them on the cot, as if this was a routine she had done countless times. From wrist to fingerstip, Rose's hands where covered in tightly wrapped bandages-- clean but frayed and beginning to yellow.

Rose opened and closed her fingers repeatedly, bringing them inward and then stretching them outward again. As she did this, her brow furrowed in controlled discomfort. When she was done, she reached down to the space beneath the bedframe and brought out an old steel box, which she then opened and began to carefully remove the bandages from her hands, placing each strip into the box.

As Rose peeled apart the bandages, the deep orange light from the etherlamp hanging on the wall rippled over the black glass-like appendages that had replaced every finger on both of her hands. The appendages were not like most prosthetics the scarlet-haired inquisitor had seen, for the strange black stubs didn't look like functional fingers, but were instead small curved pillars of a dark glass-like material. The skin was marred by old scars where the appendages connected to the rest of her hands, as if the black artificial fingers had been forcibly inserted or bolted onto her palms without much care placed into the procedure.

When Rose finished placing each of her bandages into the box, her eyes flitted upward to meet the inquisitor's, but only for a brief second before Rose lowered her gaze to the floor.

"I am sorry about challenging you earlier," the girl said suddenly, an odd sheepishness coming over her voice that hadn't been present before.

"I know I wouldn't have had any chance of beating you. It was a distraction, to keep you away from Vahn and Fie. If you had attacked me, Lady Essa would have heard it and she would have taken them to a safe place. I never would've imagined she would come into that tunnel..."

As Rose spoke, she softly clacked her fingers together absent-mindedly, the strange glass-like material making them slide against each other in a strange, unnatural way.

"It was dangerous of her to do that, and I still don't quite understand why you are here, or why she tbelieves you two are so important... but, thank you for listening to what she had to say. I don't know what her plans are, but she has kept us safe and I will do anything to repay our debt to her."

The girl's eyes, burning like sunset, focused on the crimson circle adorning the scarlet haired inquisitor's breastplate.

"Even if it means helping the ones who killed our friends."

***

Fie watched him

Well, she had been watching him since he stepped foot into the aquarium. Rose called it spying, and it wasn't good to spy.

The master used to order her to spy on the rich men at the salon, to record every word that left their lips. Spying was a good thing then, especially when she did a great job of it, but Rose had to remind her time and time again. The House was in the past, they were in the present.

But still, she couldn't help it. She found him endlessly fascinating, sitting there by the upturned pillar, the rays of light from the open ceiling shining down on him. He was like a prince-- a sad, sleepy prince. When he suddenly called out to her, Fie's heart jumped to her throat.

He told her to come to him and then asked what she was doing.

"Watching you," she told him. "I mean! Spying on you," she corrected herself.

When he only stared at her in response, she could see the mist in his eyes. Her mother had once told her about the Elder Mountain in Lanostre, and how it was the only place in all the world where once could see the sun in all its glory, hanging high above the clouds. The inquisitor's eyes must've looked like that sun, Fie decided in that moment.

Suddenly, she remembered. Spying was bad.

"I mean! I was spying on you for a good reason! You looked really tired, and if you fall asleep out here on the cold stone floor, you won't be comfortable. And so, I was going to wake you up and ask if you wanted me to show you to your room."

Fie suddenly scrunched her nose.

"That thing you put in your arm. It smells like Lady Essa's special herbs. Is it medicine? Are you sick?"