Obscene Symphony

Court of Nuhl

The world was a blur as Roan hurtled through the air, but he finally caught his bearings when something else - no, someone else - caught him. Although “caught” was a strong word; rather, he bowled someone over, knees and elbows colliding unceremoniously on the threshold of the execution chamber. Roan’s first instinct was to flee, but whatever spell had sent him hurtling toward the ceiling and out the door had yet to release its hold, and he floated at a weird and nauseating angle just above the floor, unable to find purchase. Not that it would have mattered - he could get a fair distance with his arms behind his back, but his ankles were still shackled tight.

A hand gripped his shirt, stopping any further effort to escape, and for a moment panic shot through Roan again, thinking for sure it was a guard here to drag him back inside to his agonizing death. But when he finally got enough sense about him to see the person in front of him, she was missing the gaudy regalia of his usual tormentors. In fact, with the fighting inside and the patchwork assembly of strangers on the attack, it almost looked like a rescue party.

“Calm down and stay still.” A shield popped up in a cube around them as the girl pulled herself out from under Roan, and the noise outside grew muffled, making Roan once again mourn the loss of his magic. He couldn’t do much to fight, but he kept his guard squarely up nonetheless; it wouldn’t be the first time that his captors staged a rescue, getting their hopes up only to thrust them into a nightmare and make them regret ever begging for help.

He squirmed nervously as the girl maneuvered him around, focusing on the shackles around his ankles. Until then, a combination of hunger, exhaustion, confusion, and leftover drugs kept him too confused to form any proper words, but the girl’s stern warning - and the fire that came to life in her hands - was finally enough to help Roan break his silence.

“Oh, no no no--” he groaned weakly like a frightened child, shaking his head fervently but too scared to move anything else. He was reminded of his tormentors, who would only get more insistent the more he struggled, training their prisoners to accept and endure whatever torment awaited them. And, much like with them, his pleadings fell on deaf ears; his legs trembled in his shackles as the girl burned through the chain between them, heat radiating dangerously close to his skin. But while Roan fully expected her to lop off his feet along with the shackles, to his surprise, his legs were intact by the time the metal gave way. Roan didn’t notice until she was done that she seemed to have put some sort of shield around his legs. Was she really here to help him?

The girl wasted no time, whirling Roan around with disorienting ease, aided both by his continuing weightlessness and his awestruck stillness. No, he refused to believe it; nobody was coming for him, nobody even knew he was alive! And there was no way the lunatic that ran this asylum was letting any intruder into his compound - his fragile ego could never take it. It was a trick, a dirty trick played by dirty Sinnenodels who got tired of breaking his body and went for his spirit instead.

Roan squeezed his eyes shut, any fight long gone from him as he curled in on himself and waited for whatever horrific final blow would herald the end of this cruel illusion. His tormentors were smart, they knew this would spell the end for him. After however long he’d been down there, living in filth and hunger and pain and long having abandoned any dream of getting out alive, he couldn’t handle having his last tiny, resurrected spark of hope crushed again. As he drew what he was sure would be his final breath, he wondered if the world - even the small, miserable world his captors occupied - would be any different for his absence.

And then his hands came free, and the girl spoke.

“Okay, done. Careful, metal could still be hot.”

Roan’s eyes snapped open, his dumb, foolish heart leaping like an idiot at the concept that what he was experiencing might not actually be an illusion. Drawing his hands in front of him, he stared at them in mute disbelief, having fully expected to see a set of blackened stumps as punishment for his foolish hope. Briefly ignorant to his surroundings, he swung his arms at his sides, reveling in the sore, fantastic feeling of moving freely for the first time since… well, he couldn’t even remember.

But his celebration was short; the shield encapsulating them fell shortly after, and with it came rushing back the litany of chaos from inside the execution chamber.

Roan gasped, the reality of the situation finally dawning on him. This was real - this was a rescue! A party sent from Dawn Rising, right? Hadn’t someone just mentioned Lilie Luscin? A sharp contrast to his former despair, hope - real, genuine hope - sparked up in Roan for the first time in ages. He made a gamble: If this was still an illusion, it was too complex for him to crack, and if it was real, he’d be an idiot not to cooperate.

“Sun and stars, sun and stars,” he muttered dumbly, his brain moving slow as he tried to revive his long-rusted reconnaissance habits and actually assess the situation. Okay, execution chamber, two guards down, one fighting, the Inquisitor - two vampires and two-- three mages? Was that everyone? He couldn’t trust his senses, dulled as they were, and least of all his hearing, but there was no time to seek confirmation.

“Are there more of you?!” he asked urgently, grabbing the girl’s shoulder to steady himself as his weightlessness and sudden enthusiasm pitched him forward. “Quick, let me down!”

_@Hero

The Shattering of Aegis

_{✧ Location: Snakeburrow Woods ✧ Purse: 12 copper ✧ @McMolly @Hero ✧}

The wolf was only on top of him for a moment, if that, but to Kyreth it felt like an eternity. His hands burned as he struggled to free himself from the flaming creature, but the pain didn’t register immediately; instead, he thrust his hands into the flaming mass above him, pushing with hands and feet to get the writhing monster off of him.

Finally, the wolf was yanked aside; Kyreth couldn’t tell by what, but he didn’t care. He scrambled back on reflex, eager to put as much distance as possible between him and the beast, but his senses finally returned to him and he fell onto his back as pain in his hands finally dawned on him.

“Ah!” he hissed, gritting his teeth as prickly waves of searing pain coursed through his trembling hands. They looked bad - angry white blisters were already popping up out of his reddened flesh, and dirt from the road mingled with the wounds from his mad scramble. His cheek didn’t feel much better, and his clothes were singed black - for a mercy, they weren’t burned completely, but he could only imagine what a sight he was, looking like he just stumbled out of a burning building.

With a painful grunt of effort, Kyreth pulled himself up into a sitting position, cradling his ruined hands in his lap as he finally caught his bearings. The others were dispatching the last wolf, if the sickening sound of hacking at bones was any indication, but more importantly, Lilann was still in one piece. Her hands were red as well, though fortunately not as much of a mess as his own - she must have pulled the thing off him!

“Are y--” he began to ask, interrupted by a fit of deep, rattling coughs that doubled him over. His mouth filled with a foul taste, probably whatever was left of the acrid smoke he’d breathed in while fighting the wolf, and when the coughs finally subsided, he spat a mass of black sludge into the dirt beside him. Yikes, that couldn’t be good. On reflex, he searched for the waterskin at his hip, only to remember with a painful hiss that it was both empty and torn apart, and that his hands were in no shape to be searching for anything anyway.

Eila approached then, offering healing. “Yes please,” Kyreth croaked, voice still gravely from the smoke and too humbled by his pain to deny the help. He held up his hands, which already looked worse than a moment ago. “Oh, but check Lilann first,” he remembered, looking to his Tainted friend with obvious concern. “Did it bite you?”

Court of Nuhl

Roan shrunk from the Inquisitor’s hand like a frightened animal, any fight long tormented out of him. Instead of struggling, he searched Dylan for signs of life, the Inquisitor’s voice fading behind the rushing of his own blood in his ears as he observed with great horror how much Dylan’s empty gaze resembled Marie’s, who was still staring up blindly from the floor.

But the jolt to Dylan made Roan jump with a yelp, and the Inquisitor’s words came rushing back to him as if delayed: it took a few tries for his drug-addled brain to turn the information over, but Roan eventually realized with horror that Hasgad would torture Dylan before his very eyes, and the torment would end only when Roan begged for his friend to be killed. A wave of horrible nausea washed over Roan as the Inquisitor zapped Dylan again, the room filling with screaming until Dylan was left silent but for the heaving of his breath.

“Should I kill him yet, traitor?”

Roan had no words; his breathing came out in pitiful sobs, the once-proud rebel looking like a lost child as his eyes darted between the Inquisitor, the guards, and his broken friend, burning through the very last of his hope as he searched for a way out of this horrible reality and found none. Sun and stars, he was horrified enough by what he thought was going to happen! He thought - well, feared, actually - that Hasgad brought them down here for a fight to the death where Roan would stand no chance against the much burlier Dylan, even in this sorry state, and would thus bear no guilt when he embraced his only true escape from this cesspit. But this… what kind of fucked up trolley problem was this? Did Hasgad pull this out of a shitty Stephen King novel or something?!

Evidently his hesitation displeased the Inquisitor, because before Roan knew it, the room lit up with the sinister crackling of electricity once again. Dylan was quieter this time; he didn’t scream so much as he groaned and gurgled, even though by the end of this round, the top of his head was beginning to blacken from the heat. Soon his brain would fry from sheer temperature, if the electricity didn’t stop his heart first. But no, oh no, Hasgad was too clever for that; Roan knew his ways better than he ever wanted to. The Inquisitor ran a tight ship, and nobody died without his permission.

“Please…” Roan croaked out, barely above a murmur as the Inquisitor gave Dylan another shock, his friend even quieter than before. Did he even feel the pain? His body twitched and spasmed, but his face was so empty… not dead, but not really there. Roan hoped so, anyway. Would he even notice if Roan called for his end? Maybe he’d call it a mercy. Surely by now the man was beyond help, even if he was swept from Hasgad’s clutches right this second--

BANG!

All of a sudden, the door - those massive iron doors Roan thought were immovable - burst inwards, and the room exploded with action. Noise, light, flurries of movement - figures flooding in the door and the guards and Inquisitor whirling around to meet them. Was he hallucinating?

There wasn’t much time to think - the room was falling over.

Roan yelped as he felt his balance suddenly shift, and for a moment, he thought he must have passed out. But the movement didn’t stop there; the room tilted further backwards, and soon he was sliding up the wall, his arms wrenched painfully behind his back as he eventually dangled from his shackles toward - the ceiling??

Everything moved too fast for Roan’s sluggish brain to keep up, but the panic rising in his chest kept track of it all for him; suddenly, he was falling, and someone was screaming, and though he tried to reach out and grab something to break his fall, his shackles still held his wrists together behind his back…

The Shattering of Aegis

_{✧ Location: Shit Creek ✧ Purse: No Paddle ✧ @McMolly ✧}

Kyreth tried to avoid fights. He wasn’t good at them. He had always been skinny and weaker than the other kids, they always had more friends than he did to back them up, and he learned pretty quickly that the momentary shame of acquiescing to whatever they wanted – usually a scrap of food or a spot to sleep – was less painful than putting up a fight. Missing a meal or sleeping on the floor were a pittance compared to nursing cuts and bruises for the next week, and he got enough of those without taking fights he didn’t need. Besides, it was always just him paying the price; there was nobody else he needed to worry about.

Not anymore.

Kyreth’s mind went blank as he watched Lilann pin the creature, though its writhing made clear it wouldn’t be held for long. Heart pounding in his ears, he struggled to undo his cloak, dropping the pin the blacksmith had given him into the dirt with shaking hands as he let the fabric slide from his shoulders. His feet moved without command, eyes never leaving the putrid creature as it struggled. It got one leg under itself, then the other, and soon, having little purchase against the soft rotting flesh of the beast, the knife plunged straight through it with all the force of Lilann’s will and into the ground. Freed of its captor, the wolf lunged toward Lilann—

—And caught Kyreth’s foot in the cheek.

Kyreth was as surprised as the beast; it was like he woke up from a dream, with no plan, no idea when he moved, and now off balance from the kick. The wolf staggered sideways, but recovered in an instant, far faster than Kyreth. It turned its pale, dead gaze to him, lunging in his direction with a snarl. Defensively, Kyreth put his hands out, stretching his cloak in front of him like a net.

The beast hit its mark, but by nothing more than Selene’s divine mercy, its teeth were caught in the strong wool, staining the green fabric black as it tried to gnaw its teeth free. But its momentum continued, tumbling them both backwards, the wolf fighting like a demon against the fabric as Kyreth struggled to wind it tighter. They rolled, the wolf tearing long gashes in the cloak with its claws as it struggled to escape, until they came to a stop, Kyreth pinned to the ground with a snarling mass of green wool and black death on top of him.

Then, all he saw was fire.

The Shattering of Aegis

_{✧ Location: Snakeburrow Woods ✧ Purse: 12 copper ✧ @McMolly ✧}

The tension in the air was almost as palpable as the aether; Eila loosed her arrow, and everyone held their breath, watching the crippled wolf for any sign of life. The tingling in Kyreth’s fingers advanced to full-on buzzing, and he gripped his pack and knife with white knuckles, as if he could somehow squeeze the magic out of his hands.

Then, all at once, action; the crashing of foliage and a great, horrible snarling, guttural and wrong, accompanied two more wolves as they burst out of the woods shouldering the path toward the caravan.

Kyreth jumped back without thinking, taking shelter behind the wagon. While his companions were set upon, for the moment no wolf came for him; meanwhile, his fingertips buzzed a warning, magic thrumming under his skin with a primordial heat that seared him in pulses timed with the racing of his heart. In his urgency to cut off another catastrophe before it began, Kyreth grasped blindly at his belt, watching to his left and right as he untied his waterskin with trembling fingers and poured it out over his hands.

He emptied the entire thing in his haste, coating his hands and arms and soaking his tunic sleeves. The water did little to soothe the burning thrum in his fingers, and had he been thinking clearly, Kyreth would have remembered what Lord Mystralath taught him about aether and realized that wetting his hands wouldn’t stop him from producing fire. But he wasn’t thinking clearly, and he didn’t know what to do – this way, at least, if he did have a mishap, he might not set himself on fire.

His strongest instinct was to run, but doubt was quick behind it; run where? Into the woods, where more wolves were probably waiting? Down the road, where he’d only single himself out for attack?

Wait—

“Lilann!” Kyreth cried, whipping around to find Lilann just where he left her – on the edge of the group, singled out and with a snarling, rotted wolf hot on her tail.

There was no time – Kyreth was too far away and the wolf was faster than he was. So he did the first thing that came to mind: there was something in his hand (a now-empty waterskin), so he threw it in the wolf’s direction, with absolutely no plan beyond that.

Court of Nuhl

---

“AA-mmh—!”

Roan was screaming before he was even fully awake. It was only a short yelp, cut off in the middle and muffled as the shock slammed his jaw shut, his mouth flooding with the taste of copper as he inadvertently took a chunk out of the inside of his cheek. Eyes flying open, he jolted upright – or tried to, anyway. Plenty conscious now, he was still sluggish and clumsy, and only really managed to push his back up against the wall, away from the white boots he recognized too well. As soon as his eyes opened, he squeezed them shut again, shrinking on the floor as his sudden spike in blood pressure brought the pain of a million wounds, new and old, flooding back.

It washed over him like a wave, and nausea along with it; as he struggled blindly into a sitting position, Roan was sure he’d throw up, if only there was anything in his stomach in the first place. The room had a putrid smell to it, burning his nostrils, though it was soon mercifully replaced with the heady scent of copper as a small trickle of blood started to drip from his nose – probably from the shock, although Roan didn’t notice it.

What he did notice, when he finally dared to open his eyes a second time, turned his stomach once again: it was Marie, his friend and comrade, with her face agonizingly twisted beyond recognition. She lay there lifeless on the floor, bruised and contorted, with smoke curling up lazily from a burn on her temple, and her dull, lifeless eyes locked with his.

“Ah!” Roan screamed again at the sight, recoiling back only to smack the back of his head on the stone wall behind him. His scream morphed into a groan, the gaunt and beaten man curling up on himself and straining against his shackles to clutch his head, hissing with the special sort of frustration that came with insult added to injury.

“Fuck!” he cursed, specks of blood flying from his mouth as he threw his hands down with a clatter in bleak, hopeless frustration. Another one gone. Poor Marie didn’t deserve that. She’d suffered enough indignity and torment already. And yet, Roan was so selfish as to wish he’d met her fate himself a little earlier, if only because at long last, she could rest now, and he was still stuck in the thick of it.

Quiet clinking to his right alerted him of the second prisoner in the room. It was Dylan, another comrade of his (and to Roan’s knowledge, the only other prisoner in the building now), shackled right alongside him. Damn, he looked worse than the last time he saw him – but of course, Dylan could probably say the same about him.

But the sight of his friend wasn’t reassuring, setting Roan even further on edge than the chilling stare of the lunatic Inquisitor eyeing him up. Aside from the two of them, a cursory glance confirmed that the only other people in the room were the bored-looking guards and the Inquisitor himself, all looking expectantly at Roan. Roan racked his brain; all he remembered was a silhouette in the doorway, hands he was too weak and indifferent to resist, and then a welcome release…

And then a shock, and he was here. But he knew enough to know this wasn’t an ordinary torture session. If their captors only brought them down here to watch their comrade die, as they did so many times before, they would have woken Roan up before the action started. No, there was only one other thing they brought more than one prisoner down here for.

“Oh no, no, no… fuck!” he repeated, his shouts sounding more like sobs as the reality of the situation slowly dawned on him. “Dammit, you freak!” he spat at the Inquisitor, who Roan was only just now remembering was supposed to be gone, “Aren’t you tired of us yet?!”

---

@Achronum

Username Origins

Took it (with permission) from a friend when she found a better one

i've never been good at naming things

The Shattering of Aegis

_{✧ Location: Snakeburrow Woods ✧ Purse: 12 copper ✧ [@Scribne of Thoth] @Trainerblue192 @Hero @McMolly ✧}

Fortunately, the night passed without incident. Kyreth managed to get through his candle practice without setting the forest on fire, and seemed to be improving besides. He was still more timid with the flame than he knew he should be, but Lord Mystralath spoke true - improvement came fast. Once focus overcame fear, Kyreth could already feel his control growing smoother, even if only by degrees.

But aether training was exhausting, even on such a small scale, and so Kyreth was grateful to be excused from night watches, even if their reasons for excluding him were probably less than pure. Sleep was sleep, even if interrupted more than once by the unfamiliar sounds of six other bodies plus a horse, and when day finally broke again and he saw the grogginess on everyone else’s faces, Kyreth counted himself lucky to get as much as he had.

The rain still threatened, but the next half day was calm enough that Kyreth could sneak a moment here and there to scope out the ambient aether. As promised, the forest was rife with changing environments, currents that twisted and melted into one another, sometimes thick enough to touch, and sometimes barely there. The idle strumming of Lilann’s lyre made for a nice backdrop to his scouting, but Kyreth didn’t miss the noted lack of song. He was concerned to hear Lilann go quiet, although he couldn’t really justify why. Despite how close they’d quickly grown, he really hadn’t known her any longer than anyone else; for all he knew, it was just tiring to sing two days in a row, especially on whatever precious little sleep she managed to sneak between watches. But even as he chided himself for jumping to conclusions, Kyreth wasn’t entirely convinced. Lilann looked a little too distracted for it to just be fatigue.

He might have asked if a sudden, much more significant concern didn’t arise to distract him, too. Without warning, Kyreth felt a storm whip up around them, whirling both inside and out; his hands shook, the ground shook with them, and the wind whipped up such a frenzy Kyreth couldn’t believe his cloak was still around his shoulders. The maelstrom stopped him in his tracks, overwhelming his senses; he quickly fell behind the caravan, feet rooted to the ground and knuckles white around his rucksack, clinging on for dear life until the storm at last subsided.

It took Kyreth a moment to catch his breath, another to wonder why no one else seemed bothered, and one more for him to realize that it was the aether stirring mad, not the earth and sky themselves. For a second, he wondered if he’d gone crazy, and breathed deep, checking the aether himself to confirm. Sure enough, he wasn’t dreaming; while the storm was gone, the aftershocks were still there, the aether around them still churning restlessly like the sea after a gale. In a real storm, the immediate danger was past, but the waves could still grind him on the rocks if he wasn’t careful; Kyreth chose to assume the same here.

When he finally came back to his senses, he had to sprint to catch back up with the caravan, panting more from the aetheric disturbance than the run. But when he did catch up, he found the caravan halted, and the company staring suspiciously at something ahead in the road.

“That is not a wolf.”

Ceolfric’s warning was so in sync with Kyreth’s first impression of the roadblock that for a second, he thought the brigand was in his head again. Was that what caused that huge disturbance, then? With all that ruckus, Kyreth would have expected the Rancor itself to fly out of the woods, not some injured dog. A trick?

His hands were still trembling when he put one on Lilann’s shoulder, partly to stop her from approaching the thing if she had a mind to, but mostly to steady himself. A wave of dizziness washed over him, his body still trying to keep up as it adjusted from “way too much aether” to what felt like not nearly enough. He didn’t have the mind or the knowledge to make much sense of what he felt and what laid before them now, but that didn’t mean nobody else did.

“Be careful, something is wrong,” he murmured to Lilann, gesturing for her to stay close to the caravan. He didn’t know what the threat was, but surely it would be safer with the group than out on the fringes.

“Be careful!” Kyreth repeated, this time calling out so the whole group could hear him. He approached the front of the caravan, coming up next to the wagon near Ceolfric and Ermes, although he kept a little further away.

“I don’t know what it means, but right before that thing appeared, the aether around here went crazy,” he explained breathlessly, mostly to Ceolfric. “It’s calmer now, but… I don’t know, I can only imagine whatever caused that must have been pretty significant.”

Even as he spoke, he kept his head on a swivel, pulling his knife from his belt if only to occupy his hands. His fingers tingled forebodingly, which only set him more on edge; they were in a precarious enough position as it was, the last thing they needed now was one of his little mishaps.

The Shattering of Aegis

_{✧ Location: Snakeburrow Woods ✧ Purse: 12 copper ✧ @Achronum ✧}

Cerric’s response was… strange. Or rather, perhaps it was how Kyreth took it that was strange. It started out comforting; he wasn’t burdening Cerric with his presence on this trip, that was good, right? But as he went on, Kyreth’s gaze grew harder, his old shell crawling back up over him as Cerric criticized him for his efforts at politeness.

It wasn’t much of a slight, but Kyreth felt that familiar flame of anger rise in him at Cerric’s words nonetheless. Was that really necessary? It seemed there was no pleasing these people; he did his best to conform to the world outside of his little Tainted bubble, worked so hard to be polite, considerate, not to frighten or make anyone uncomfortable, and Cerric called those efforts ‘sniveling’? Was there nothing that would make these people happy? Why even fucking bother then?

His fingers tingled, and a flicker of the fire behind Cerric brought Kyreth back to his senses, the very flammable trees surrounding them and the very malleable fire in the camp replacing Kyreth’s anger with a touch of healthy fear. Right, he was making mountains out of mole hills anyway - no need to go seeing conflict where none existed. Surely Cerric meant well. He was hard to read, but Lord Mystralath was genuine and he trusted the man, so Kyreth would trust in his new master’s judgement, if not Cerric himself just yet.

“...Right, good to know,” Kyreth finally replied, consciously stopping himself from apologizing again. He opened his mouth to add something more, but was stopped in his tracks by a whisper in his ear. This time, at least, he didn’t jump.

‘Hello again. Storyborn claims she’s seen the beast, following Cerric’s directions. He may be setting us up, but that’s just speculation. Stay on your guard anyway and keep your conversations about this out of earshot - or don’t, but don’t expect me to save you. Oh, and apparently it’s got a hide like armor, so plan accordingly.’

He glanced around the camp at the message’s end, seeing Lilann and Ceolfric emerge from the woods behind Cerric, apparently having gone off somewhere while he was talking. Fortunately, Ceolfric wasn’t telling him anything he didn’t already know; Lilann must have taken him into the woods to tell him the same story she shared last night. If the brigand had any more insight on the matter, he didn’t share it. A shame; he seemed worldly, and Kyreth had been naively hoping he’d be a little more prepared to deal with a monster than the rest of them were.

“Okay, well… I think I’ll go practice, then,” he decided, giving Cerric a nod before disengaging. Might as well do what he came here for; he didn’t have the brain or the constitution for unraveling the mysteries of fairytale beasts.

He found a spot just past the edge of the clearing, out of sight of the fire pit but still cleared away enough that Kyreth didn’t worry about his candle catching the brush on fire. On its own, anyway - the undergrowth was already damp with dew, and if something went really wrong, he was close enough for Cerric to notice. It was just nice to be away from prying eyes, not to mention the fire.

Court of Nuhl

Henry Starag

________________________________________ Henry Starag Male | 23 | Sound _______________________________________________ "You were prettier with your mouth closed." ________________________________________ Likes Competent competition Useful gossip Manipulating people Coffee Chances for advancement (aka chances to show off) Dislikes Tattletails (why waste a perfectly good secret?) Bluntness (unless it's fun) Incompetent competition Alcohol - clouds the mind, very dangerous People he can't read Habits Flexing his status just to fluster people Checking his reflection Messing with people/pushing their buttons Eavesdropping Misc. Two words: ego problem Henry has been training in mental magic with the realm's finest teachers for three years. Opera singer No martial training but his skill with magic makes up for it While he still has the Sinnenodel distaste for violence (because it's crude and messy and for peasants), Henry can't deny a morbid fascination with it. His focus is a small titanium earring. Theme You're not such an easy target One minute I know you then I don't I know you then I don't

"Legacies are made to be surpassed." Appearance In many ways, Henry is the spitting image of his father; fair-skinned, blue-eyed, and sporting a head of thick, golden blond hair, always well looked-after. Standing a bit shorter than his father at around 5'9, his body strikes a fine balance between a lithe frame and practical musculature, just as Lady Sinnenodel prefers. Dressing in whatever style the Lady fancies that year, Henry is always sure to be put together to the letter of her command and keeps himself meticulously clean and cared for. Conventionally handsome, Henry usually sports an eerie, masklike expression utterly devoid of emotion, having long since learned to keep such silly mortal trappings to himself - or, better yet, expunge them completely. Despite this, his eyes have a chilling sharpness to them, always searching for traps, weaknesses, and opportunities. Personality Henry was raised to be the ideal Sinnenodel mage, and he would like to think he’s very close to achieving it. Cold and ruthless, there are no lengths to which he won’t go—or levels he won’t stoop to—to accomplish his goals, be they simply following orders or tipping the scales of fate in his favour. It cannot be overstated that his interests begin and end with himself, and to that end, he is zealously ambitious—a passion that currently manifests in the enthusiastic service of his Lady. Make no mistake, though; his loyalty does not stem from love, or gratitude, tradition, or any supposedly higher calling. No, Henry’s fierce loyalty stems squarely from his own desire to succeed, and there can be no success higher in this world than earning the favour of the Empress herself. Having learned from a young age that mortal emotions are nothing but an obstacle in his path, he’s learned to suppress them, smother them somewhere safe and out of the way to be dealt with later - or preferably, never. However, that isn’t to say that he doesn’t entertain the occasional human urge. Quite the contrary; Henry has come to see the game of words and daggers the Sinnenodels play as quite the pastime indeed, and finds great entertainment in all the myriad ways he can pull the strings of his social fabric. He likes to have fun; it just so happens that his idea of fun is invoking the misfortune of others. Above all, though, it bears repeating that Henry’s sole purpose is his own self interest. He will do, take, and endure absolutely anything to secure his own future, and Fate help anything—or anyone—that stands in his way. Bio No matter one’s status, it is impossible to completely escape the clutches of war; Henry Starag was no exception. Born in the year 507, Henry was a toddler when Lycans attacked his childhood home, forcing his father Aaron, his mother Eloise, and their cadre of allies to pull out every possible stop to defend themselves. If not for his father’s Lycan breakthrough and Max Alderman’s sheer magical might, Henry’s life would have been a short one. But the only thing that ended that night was Henry’s direct involvement in the war; on an agreement that it was best to keep him safe, three-year-old Henry was sent to none other than Sybil Sinnenodel’s household, where he’d be protected from any and every possible threat excepting the Empress herself. There, safely tucked away in the heart of Sinnenodel territory and far from the war, Henry grew to forget most of that night, and lived in relative normalcy. Instead, Henry grew up under the harsh and exacting tutelage of Sybil Sinnenodel and her household, and there was molded into the very finest example of what a Sinnenodel mage - and a Starag, for that matter - should be. But it wasn’t just the Empress’ creative methods or the competence of the mages under her employ that were responsible for Henry’s success. On the contrary; even as a child, Henry proved the perfect receptacle for their teaching, driven to excel and eager to use any method, no matter how underhanded, to do so. By personality alone, there was nothing of his father in him. Where Aaron was kind, Henry was cunning; where Aaron was gentle, Henry was ruthless; where Aaron was duty-bound, Henry was motivated only by the prospect of his own achievement. Not that there was anyone around to recognize the difference - Aaron was long since a changed man by the time Henry's personality started to show. Growing up largely apart from his parents, who were usually busy with the war, Henry enjoyed every luxury and endured every hardship a proper Sinnenodel mage was expected to, as if there was no war at all - more or less. From a young age he learned to keep his ‘human’ side carefully concealed, to tolerate Sybil’s frequent invasions into his psyche, and even to keep his very thoughts in check, lest he attract his Mistress’ ire. As he grew and learned more about his family, the Sinnenodels, and his place between the two, Henry came to recognize the gravity of the same lofty Starag lineage that inspired such zealous awe in his father. However, Henry wasn’t struck by admiration; rather, he was taken by the sheer scale of the achievements he’d have to someday outpace in order to finally step out from under their shadow. And his ancestors weren’t his only competition, either. Aside from his own father and the other handful of accomplished mages who joined him in the war, Henry had Lena. Lena, the insufferable pile of perfect looks and feminine curves and infuriating talent. Lena, the ice mage he’d been engaged to marry since before either of them could walk, who had been his chief competitor for Sybil’s good graces throughout their entire shared upbringing. Lena, who matched Henry for every accomplishment without fail, who he hated and loved, who was probably the closest thing to an equal he had in the world’s entire population of mages. Lena, who he’d strangle if he could and whose company he resented so much and yearned for so dearly the second she was gone. Yeah, that bitch. Let it never be said that Henry Starag didn’t enjoy a good challenge, because if ever there was one, Lena was it. However, as of late, Henry has gotten an edge. New intel has come in on some potential to stir up Dawn Rising, the foremost band of terrorists currently acting the thorn in the Empress’ side, and it just so happens, it’s finally time for Henry to show his Lady what he’s capable of. True, he has very big shoes to fill, and very long shadows to overtake if he wants to truly make a name for himself beyond his father’s reputation. Fortunately, single-handedly toppling Dawn Rising from the inside should prove an excellent start.

Roan Alserda

________________________________________ Roan Levi Alserda Male | 22 | Sound _______________________________________________ "The next thing that bites me is getting a bite back." ________________________________________ Likes Anything with cinnamon Listening to stories Meals with loved ones Music Dislikes People who think they're better than others (vampires included) Authority in general Being objectified Long silences Life magic Telling people bad news Habits Drumming on whatever's around (tables, chairs, his legs, etc) Whistling, singing, otherwise making noise music Talking about deep, yet completely irrelevant topics Not taking serious things seriously enough Interrupting silences Misc His focus is a little metal rock with the word "Hope" inscribed into it. He has a long scar on the left side of his face. He's pretty sure it's from his vampire scratching him when he attacked her, but he can't quite remember. Roan has no combat training of any kind. Similarly, since he escaped his vampire so early in his education, he also has not had any arcane training. Fortunately, his skill for subtle reconnaissance means he still has something to offer a team. Theme Pullin' me back into my body I'm just a dead man walking I'm just a pawn But nothing hurts better than you

"A caged bird's gotta stop singing." Appearance With dark olive skin, deep green eyes, and graceful features, Roan always had something of a delicate look about him; something his vampire must have noticed, since she had those features enhanced with life magic treatments and plastic surgery until Roan took on the sort of refined, ethereal mien that served nicely as an attractive show piece. Always having hated being looked at like a decorative sculpture, Roan has since done his best to downplay his looks, letting his eyebrows grow back a little thicker, his skin get a little rougher, and dyeing his hair from its former glossy black to a very obviously bleached, out-of-the-bottle blue. A long scar mars his left cheek down to the jawline, further breaking up his formerly symmetrical face, and he hides his lithe, willowy build with oversized tees and zip hoodies. Personality Roan is famously easy to get along with. Easygoing to a fault, Roan has always been perfectly happy to go with the flow, preferring to follow the leader rather than striking out himself. He’s very forgiving of slights against him, preferring to err on the side of grace, and usually assumes (for better or for worse) that people don’t mean to be as harsh as they sometimes come across. But everyone has their limits, and if someone does manage to get on his bad side, he can grow immature, stubborn, and snarky. Of course, getting Roan to the point of spitting back is a feat in itself; in his personal life as well as in battle, Roan would much rather flee than fight. Growing up with two bickering older sisters taught Roan to be an effective mediator, and since tension drives him crazy, he will often be found trying to help people work out their differences - whether his efforts are welcome or not. Averse to conflict and discomforted by seriousness, Roan does his best to keep the mood light, usually trying to diffuse tense situations with a joke or a change of subject. His discomfort with silence, especially, is even more notable these days; the longer people are around him, the more they will notice that his constant attempts at levity may be less of a personality quirk and more of a protective measure. This is most evident in his relatively new aversion to being alone, a discomfort so encompassing it’s probably better described as a fear. So Roan does his best to keep people around, keep them talking, and keep them smiling - after all, too much time alone with his thoughts is bad news when there’s so much in his head he’d rather not think about. Bio Hailing from an orbital Eve territory, Roan’s upbringing was pleasant enough. Born to a single mother with two older sisters, it’s true that they weren’t the model of the nuclear family, and without a second income, they also struggled financially for a while until his oldest sister started working. But they were happy; Roan’s house was always full, be it with the people who lived there or friends and loved ones who stopped in. Even after his oldest sister married and started a family of her own, she was always over with her husband and children, filling the house with the happy noise Roan grew so fond of. It was a happy childhood, the memories of which Roan still treasures to this day. But he couldn’t stay a child forever, and that fact was underscored the year he turned eighteen, when his Awakening crystal lit up and changed his life forever. Truth be told, while he was sad to leave home, Roan was a little excited at the prospect of serving a vampire; it was a chance to step out of the modest means he was so accustomed to, to make something of himself he probably couldn’t have as a mundane man. He considered himself pretty lucky, too. He ended up with a vampiress named Bellamira Deale, part of some distant branch of the Eve family on the low end of the social hierarchy - still plenty rich, but largely uninvolved with the political machine. On top of that, she was decently kind to him. A bit of a diva, she liked things a certain way, of course, but she took a particular interest in Roan, doting on him like an exotic pet and grooming him to become a show mage. She was a great fan of his talent for music, hiring magic tutors to teach him how to enhance his natural ability with Sound magic, and she loved showing him off to friends at parties. It wasn’t always the most comfortable thing to be poked and prodded by rich vampires and looked at like more of a toy than a person - especially when they got a little more handsy - but Roan counted his blessings, and he was more or less content. He spent two reasonably good years with Bellamira, but the novelty wore off when she decided that it was time for the ‘training wheels’ to come off and to induct him into service as a proper show mage. See, in her eyes, becoming a “proper” show mage meant changes; she told him they were simple ‘enhancements’, meant to play on his existing features, highlight his best qualities and minimize the bad ones, and that he’d be happier for them. But it wasn’t until he finally awoke from a whole host of surgical and magical procedures that Roan realized just how dramatic of a change Bellamira wanted to make. He couldn’t deny that he looked “better”, in a way; his features were smoother, his flaws tucked away, his assets exaggerated, just as she said. But it went way beyond ‘enhancement’; his eyes were green instead of hazel, he had an entirely different nose, and all the other features he was used to - even the flaws he never expected to miss - were gone. He looked more like a sculpture freshly carved than a real person, lacking the story of his life he didn’t realize was written in his features until they were gone. He barely recognized himself in the mirror. It was jarring, but for a while, Roan tried to convince himself that he was okay with it. After all, Bellamira was pleased, he was turning more heads than ever, and he seemed to be on his way to a promising ‘career’ as a show mage; he should have been happy, right? Moon only knew most mages weren’t nearly that lucky, especially these days. But something still didn’t sit right with him. Deny or distract all he wanted, the changes still ate away at him. He no longer had his mother’s nose or his sister’s eyes. His home wasn’t full of life or laughter, just schedules and meetings and glorified busywork to keep the mages looking busy. He barely recognized himself anymore, inside or out, and he didn’t realize until it was too late how much he’d miss those faint echoes of his mom and sisters in the mirror. When he could no longer bear the feeling of separation, he went to his mistress, all but begging her to turn him back, or at least to let him dial back the changes to something more subtle. But to his surprise, Bellamira, who had always been more or less amicable with him, was not pleased. She denied him fervently, insulted by his brazen rejection of her ‘gift’ to him, and made it clear who made the decisions in her house and who he really belonged to. Crestfallen and hurt, Roan accepted her decision, but fell into a numbing sadness. Apparently Bellamira noticed how her decision was weighing on him, and surprisingly, attempted to make things right. But a vampire’s interpretation of making amends was much different than a mage’s. She approached him late one morning, where he was moping in his room, and tried to comfort him - he didn’t need to be sad anymore, because now he didn’t need to compare himself to anybody. He could ‘be his own person’, free from the burden of some petty family resemblance weighing down on him, because she’d seen to it that everyone in his ‘old family’ was gone. Roan doesn’t remember much about what happened next. It must have been dramatic, though, because the result was an open curtain, a pile of ash on his floor, and him running for his life. The next few weeks were a blur, but at some point he joined up with a small local rebellion cell that had merged into a distant limb of Dawn Rising, less than ten people in number. He spent about a year with his small band of comrades, conducting small-scale operations that ultimately didn’t accomplish much more than soothing Roan’s burning need to do something, anything to make sure what happened to him never happened to anyone ever again. Now, his cell finally has the chance to carry out a mission that will actually make a difference in the lives of those under the Empire's thumb...