Penny

Tricksters and Theives: A Warhammer RP

"Ranald's bloody balls," Emmaline muttered again. This was why sensible people didn't stay out after dark on Hexennacht. Even in Altdorf itself people huddled in taverns or barred the doors to their houses. The whole Empire was rife with tales of dark riders that galloped the lonely roads, long dead shades let loose from whatever hells they inhabited, and the fell whispers of dark unclean voices. Emmaline held no ill will towards the bandits, but her impulse was to run for the Inn. Not that running there would do much good. No one would open a barred door tonight, not for anything, and they might fetch a few ounces of blessed led for their trouble if they tried. She glanced back over her shoulder at the rapidly darkening horizon, the golden light of day replaced with the sickly green of the Chaos moon as it rose in the sky. The thought of walking better than a mile into the gathering gloom was like ice water on her bones.

"Don't look so nervous," Neil encouraged, slinging his rifle over one shoulder.

"It is a night of witches, and you are a witch afterall," he jested.

"Es gibt Hexen und dann gibt es Hexen," Emmaline muttered in the ancient Unberogen tongue. It was a proverb familiar to ever initiate in the Imperial Colleges, even one as truant as her.

"What?" Neil asked, cocking an eyebrow at the ancient words.

"There are witches, and then there are witches," she repeated.

"Come on, we stand a better chance together!" Johann called. He seemed alive with energy, as though his fear were transmuted into adrenaline. Emmaline supposed there were worse traits in a leader than the stubborn refusal to leave a man behind, though she dearly wished they could do exactly that and find somewhere to weather the ill omened night.

_______

The coach was not difficult to follow. The strange road it had taken meandered through the fields, but was dusty enough that the track marks left by the wheels were obvious. Despite this there was something unnerving about the ruler strait lines in the dust. The road slipped over a hill and down along a chuckling stream before crossing a covered stone bridge into a section of woods. By now it was full dark though there was more than enough moonlight to see by. The putrescent green glow lent everything a sinister air and Emmaline clung close to Neil, her small dagger clutched in her hand.

"Why are you so nervous?" he whispered as they clattered across the bridge, Johann's hobnail boots echoing like drums on the timber cross beams.

"Other than following a cursed coach into the woods on Hexennacht?" Emmaline replied, a touch of acid tinging her voice. Neil chuckled, the sound almost sacrilegious in the gloom.

"Yes, other than that," he pressed on.

"I don't like the sounds," she replied curtly. Neil cocked an ear listening to the sound of wild birds and the chirruping call of small woodland animals. Owls hooted in the distance and insects buzzed in a low sursurence.

"Those are normal sounds for the woods at night," he replied.

"I'm a city girl," Emmaline told him huffily, "I make a point of not being in the woods at night."

"Wait.." Johan said, suddenly stopping in the roadway. The tracks of the coach turned from the road and forced themselves into a narrow gap between trees that led deeper into the forest. Just for a moment Emmaline thought she heard another sound, a distant booming sound like great drums being struck. In the distance there was a scream, like a horse being driven to despair by the spurs.

"They went into the woods... they cant plan to go much further," Neil commented. It was plain even to Emmaline that a coach would not be able to make its way too far without a better path than this to follow. Even this close to the road they could see where branches had been snapped by the coach's passage. They hung in a row like little flags off into the woods. Or like chickens hung by broken necks.

"The tracks..." Emmaline said after a moment. Johann and Neil turned to look at her while Kurt prayed in a low fervent voice.

"What about them?" the bandit chief demanded. Emmaline scraped a shoe along the line of the wheels.

"No hoof prints," she half whispered.

Tricksters and Theives: A Warhammer RP

Emmaline gave Neil a wicked look and giggled in a manner that made a nearby goodwife kick her wide eyed husband under the table.

"And how much sleep would I actually get then?" she teased in a tone which was definitely not a complaint. In truth she had been looking forward to a bath and following exactly such a course of action, though where they would fine privacy in such a crowded inn was an open question.

"If you two are quite finished," Johann hissed from the edge of the table.

"I haven't even had a chance to start yet!" Emmaline protested, "I had a whole thing with a sausage.." Johann made an impatient gesture with his knife hand and they both stood up reluctantly, Emmaline swallowing down the last of her mead. The bandits had a point that without coin it would be a difficult journey across an Empire in which every bed and scrap of food would soon be commandeered by soldiers. The wyrdstone they had stolen was valuable for certain, but only once they actually reached Altdorf and could find a wizard to sell it to. Out here in the rural marches it was more likely to lead to a pyre than a profit.

"Fine, fine," Neil acquiesced and they stood up and followed the bandit chief from the common room, depositing some of their few remaining coins to cover drinks and food. The locals stared at them in abject amazement, but no one moved to stop them as they headed out into the rapidly deepening twilight.

"So what is the plan boss?" Brandt asked once they were outside and passed the gate wardens.

"You are going to love this," Johann grinned.

_______

Emmaline did not love it. She crouched beside a stone wall a mile east of the Inn. Both moons were in the sky now, reflecting the greenish glow of Morslieb down onto her. It cast shadows in hard and unforgiving light without providing as much illumination as it should. The Winds of Magic, normally little more than a flicker at the edge of her vision, ebbed and flowed in pulsating unhealthy gusts. A lone wolf howled off in the distance making Emmaline shiver as she adjusted her position for the hundredth time.

"I told you," Johan grinned, also for the hundredth time. The bandit had claimed that the coach they had passed earlier would soon realize that it could not make safety in the beast man ravaged east and would be forced to turn back. It seemed he had been right, and Emmaline had the impression that he would not tire of reminding them any time soon. Johann moved on along the wall to whisper the same thing to the rest of the band as they awaited the arrival of the coach. A slight wind had come up, and the willow trees above them rustled unnervingly. Emmaline swallowed back the bitter copper taste of fear as she remembered her earlier impressions of the coach. She couldn't deny that hijacking the coach would not only provide them with gold but with transportation, but her skin prickled and she had to fight the urge to run. Neil reached out and squeezed her thigh in comfort before returning his grip to his rifle. She had whispered her spell as she had loaded it, and hoped that the small infusion of magic to powder and ball might be worth something on a night like tonight.

In the distance the coach came into view, the curvature of the road making it seem to slowly drift towards them despite the fact that the steeds were being driven at a fearful pace. Spurts of dirt flew from the hooves of the unwholesome looking steeds, and sparks flew where steel shood hooves struck flint in the roads metaling. The wolf howled again, but suddenly chocked off as though in pain and the only sounds were the clatter of wheels and the crack of the coachman's whip. Emmaline was assailed by the sudden urge to run. She had no business being out in the cold trying to rob a coach, she was terrible with weapons, and her paltry magical skills had to be kept secret. She tried to balance that feeling of helplessness with the thought that if they pulled this off, she might be back in Altdorf within a fortnight.

With eerie smoothness the coach began to slow as it approached the fallen log which Johann and the others had dragged across the road to impede passage. The coppery taste grew sharper in Emmaline's mouth as the coach came to a stop with the unearthly smoothness of a beer stein being slid across a polished bar. The great black horses pawed and snorted, their breath forming jets of steam in the cooling air. No one emerged from the carriage. Emmaline could see the moons reflected in the polished ebony of its timbers, and in the immaculately oil black coats of the steeds. The dread grew all but unbearable and she prayed for a scream, or a shot, or something to break the tension. With a groan, Gert and Brandt stumbled from their concealment, rushing forward with weapons raised. Their faces were dawn, and Brandt was clearly struggling hard to shout a challenge of a command, Emmaline could see his throat constricting with the effort, but he couldn't make his vocal cords work. The coachman, a figure in black robes turned to regard the approaching bandits without comment.

"Ge..Get...Getttt," Brandt stammered, unable to master what by now was a tension so acute it bordered on terror. Emmaline's hand hurt and she realized she was gripping the hilt of her little knife so had that her knuckles were pale and bloodless. The door of the coach opened, revealing a smooth feminine arm. There was a soft chuckle that curdled the blood and a smell of cinnamon and metal which tickled the sinuses and watered the eyes. The arm made a gesture to the two thieves, an beckoning crook of the finger. Both Gert and Brandt groaned oddly, then slowly lowered their weapons. The figure gestured again, imperious and commanding. Their weapons fell to the ground as both thieves stumbled, as though befuddled, to the coach. They climbed up and vanished into the interior, obscured by the closing door and the heavy red velvet drapes a moment later. Emmaline worked her mouth trying to make a sound but without success. She thought she heard Johann whimper. The coachman raised his whip and cracked it, the sound, louder than a gunshot, made Emmaline flinch and the coach turned and rolled up over a gap in the low wall. Crows exploded from the trees, as though fleeing the awful presence of the coach as it began to pick up speed. Emmaline's breathing came deep and rapid as she realized that it as on a dirt lane heading towards a low hill. She was sure it hadn't been there when they placed the tree across the road. She was pretty sure.

"Ran... Ranald's bloody balls," she gasped finally forcing her paralyzed mouth to speak with a tingling surge of effort.

Tricksters and Theives: A Warhammer RP

"What in the seven Hells Johann?!" Kurt demanded, the disappointment curdling his voice into a snarl. The leader of their little band turned to face his subordinate, lifting himself out of the undergrowth with a drizzle of little leaves. The rest of the band also looked irritated, imagining an easy score, and an end to their walking, racing away.

"Something was wrong," Johann declared, his hand drifting to the horse pistol at his belt as he faced the glares of his men. Emmaline was sitting on a log, resting her feet.

"What is wrong is you chickened out!" Brandt declared, taking a threatening step forward. Johann gripped his pistol and snarled in anger, temper frayed by days on the road.

"No!" Emmaline called out, stilling the impending fight as effectively as throwing cold water over a fire. Of course, that didnt mean it wouldn't flare up again later.

"He is right, there was something... odd about it," she added a little lamely. The thieves rolled their eyes, grumbling about Johann losing his nerve and letting good coin slip through his fingers.

"Well it is out of reach now," Neil declared, "and those horses looked fresh, maybe its not far to a town." Emmaline gave him a sidelong glance, clearly impressed at this new revelation of his skills.

"Maybe we can make it before nightfall?" he suggested, shouldering his pack. Emmaline sighed and stood up. She thrust out her hands towards Neil, the thief sighed and hoisted her up onto his back.

The Buggered Priest was the definition of the word disreputable. The coaching inn stood on a low rise surrounded by a half dozen small hovels that must have served as housing for the owner and staff. All three of its stories, seemed to lean at contrary angles and argue against its continued existence. The plaster of the upper two was discolored and badly in need of painting, the stonework of the lower story so overwhelmed with moss and fungus as to appear organic. Its ancient slate roof looked poxed where tar had replaced the grey stone that wind and lack of maintenance had carried away. A man high wall of stone encircled the whole complex with a wooden gate house large enough to admit such coaches as were desperate or unfortunate enough to have to make use of it. Harvest was over and the stubble covered fields which surrounded it were a lusterless and unhealthy yellow that gave little confidence as to the quality of the horse feed piled in drafty half collapsing barns.

"Did I mention that I had my own Tower before we left Nuln?" Emmaline complained though she was as happy to see rest and a semblance of safety as the rest of them.

"Every chance you get," Brandt remarked, but his heart wasn't in it as they limped up the road towards the Inn. Both sides of the road were flanked with apple orchards, though wild and overgrown they had clearly been harvested recently. If the few surviving apples which hung on the tree were any indication, the crop had not been spectacular. Little poppets made of corn and small sculptures made of browning apple flesh topped the low stones which marked the edge of the road. Night hadn't fallen yet, but light blazed in every window as the approached, the smell of wood and peat fires soothing their noses. A pair of men sat in the gate house drinking ale from a small barrel, they gave the group, and particularly Emmaline, a shifty look as they approached, but they neither greeted them or attempted to bar their passage. Both had coach guns within easy reach.

The interior of the Buggered Priest was in somewhat better repair, and to Emmaline's surprise rather full. Men, women, and children sat around the four long tables which dominated the tap room, chattering and eating meagre meals of stew and dark rye bread. Emmaline felt her stomach rumble at the thought of real food for the first time in days. The walls were covered with decorations of woven wheat and barely. Apples were piled up too and several little cornucopias had been set up on the mantles of the three stone fireplaces which warmed the hall. Around the fringes of the common room were smaller more private tables where what Emmaline presumed to be travelers sat, drinking ale and talking in low hushed voices. They seemed to be mostly merchants or artisans, though Emmaline saw more than one sell sword hunched over an ale tankard. There was even a dwarf sitting alone in the corner, his eyes illuminated by the bowl of a pipe that he was smoking.

"Doing a brisk business for all it looks like its about to fall into the Stir," Johann observed.

"It ain't like this every night, its for Hexennacht," a tired looking barmaid declared, sizing up the party as she passed, her eyes lingering on their weapons.

"You gents just made it, they'll be sealing the door in a few minutes, nervous times with the trouble out east," she confided.

Death and Desire: A Warhammer Fantasy RP

Calliope felt a degree of agitation leave her as they entered the chamber. Unfortunately this also tanked her adrenaline and she felt herself sag. The bruises and cuts she had sustained in the fight, previously dull, flared up to demand her attention. Cursing, she tore off most of her left sleeve and began to wind the fabric around the claw marks in her arm, stemming the bleeding.

It took her a moment to fit her few Araybian phrases together with the pigeon of Imperial an Tilean to decipher his meaning. A surge of anger darkened her face, but she made a dismissive gesture to let Bahadir know it was not directed at him. Instead she took hold of his chains and turned them over in her hands as she considered.

"It wasn't really the Sultan," she explained, "It was his bloody... you know bloody? thrice damned? Vizier." She paused in her words and pulled down the front of her tunic exposing the corseted breasts beneath. Bahadir's eyes widened at such immodesty as her hands traveled down to the corseting and began tugging and pulling. A seam came apart and t he wire frame inside pulled free. She pinched it in place and rotated it rapidly till it broke and she held in her hand a length of wire half a foot in length. She snapped that in two and then inserted both pieces into the lock of his cup.

"I had hoped they would give me ships to drive away the pirates that plague the coasts," she explained, her brow furrowed and intent, "Unfortunately... they found a cheaper...way to be ride of... me." The shackles sprang open and fell to the floor with a musical clang.

"There you go," she told him, tucking the wire back into the lining of her corset and pulling the tunic back up to restore her modesty.

The Pavonis Campaign - Warhammer 40000

"Well," Katia asked, "what is your plan?" They were walking back to their requisitioned offices, the firing party spread out ahead and behind to give them some privacy. Maybe more than just privacy, it was an open secret that many Commissars were killed by enemy fire a surprisingly long way from the front. Katia didn't think she had aquired that much animus yes but she had been handing out disciplinary actions to Catachans, an activity not likely to extend ones life.

"My plan?" Zeb asked as they crossed what had once been the scrumball pitch, weaving their way between a nest of cabling and vox gear that had been set up in the open space.

"I'm a morale officer," Katia pointed out, "it isn't the roll of the Commisariat to be leading troops." Zeb grinned slightly at that, given that was most of what she had done since they had met back on Pavonis. They entered the principals office. The rest of the firing party stacked gear and stat down at a table in the waiting room and began to play cards. Rikkard and another man opted to rack out, curling up in the corner against shelves stuffed with copies of the encyclopedia Imperialis. Katia and Zeb went into the main office and the Commissar unbuckled her sword and pistol and hung it off a corner of the desk. Zeb went to the corner and took a carafe of caffeine from the burner and poured them both a cup. Katia sipped at it, controling the instinctive grimace that Astra Millitarum caffeine induced in anyone with a body temperature above ambient.

"Well," Zeb responded thoughtfully, "We have shuttles, if we could knock out the greenskin AA for long enough, maybe with smoke..." Katia was already shaking her head.

"They'd rush us if we occluded our fields of fire like that. I know the colonel wants to get the civies out of here, but better they stay here and die than we rout and then they die, or go to the ork slave labor force." They were hard words, but she had no doubt her scholam tutors would approve of her priorities. Zeb nodded, his face a little tight at her casual condemnation of a two thousand or so civilians.

"Well spiking Orc anti-air is out of the question, even if it could be done, wed lose to many in the sally and we'd break," he pondered.

"What we really need is some kind of a corridor..." Katia trailed off, peering down into her cup.

"What?" Zeb demanded, pausing with his caffeine halfway to his lips.

"I have an idea."

Zeb and Katia lay on the roof of a local bulk distribution store, peering out over the ork lines through an ampliviser. It was a seething mass of rice paddies and ork field positions, a muddy hell of seething green skins. In the distance Katia could make out crude seige guns being constructed, another testament to the creatures barbarous and inexplicable ingenuity. At the precise moment they had arranged, a pair of Imperial thunderbolts dived from the low scudding cloud, howling down on angled turbofans, their exhaust cutting bright white contrails in the sky. The orks opened fire at once and the sky blossomed with dirty black smoke and the distant boom of detonating anti aircraft shells. Like stooping eagles the thunderbolts came down, plunging towards the earth at an incredible speed until, when collision seemed inevitable, they yanked on their sticks and vectored their engines, seeming to leap upward like seedpods over an air vent. The range was too far to see the bombs fall, but there were suddenly two great geyzers of flame, water and mud shooting skyward like the muzzle flash of vast guns. Katia tuned the ampliviser to observe the effect, clods of dirt were falling into the patties like rain, as were piece of greenskins unlucky enough to be close by. Water was already rushing over ruptured dykes from the higher patties.

"Two hits," Katia observed, thousands of gallons of water were rushing from the higher field filling the lower ones that bordered the town. A few hours and they would have nearly six feet of water in a few of the fields. She wriggled backwards and looked down into the ferocrete parking lot of the store. Enginessers were hard at work, welding empty promethium drums to thin metal outriggers. Dozens of boats had already been constructed. They were painfully simple, two pontoons and a powerful fan, mostly industrial cooling units with their limiters stripped out by the few tech adepts Katia had been able to scrounge up.

"It is still going to be tight, even if it works," Zeb observed, "But I think we might just pull this off."

De Trop Disgrace: Warhammer Fantasy RP

Emmaline wondered if there were philosophical implications to a con being too successful. She had been pretending to be a Brettonian damsel in distress for months, and now here she was imprisoned in a tower, or at least a remote villa, while a power mad noble schemed to have her married against her will. Never let it be said that Ranald lacked a sense of humor .

In fairness she was not actually locked in a tower. This was clearly a summer retreat for Schroder, more of an extravagant hunting lodge than a mansion and she had the run of the place. A score or so of guards and half that many servants staffed the place under the direction of Jan. As prisons went it really wasn’t so bad. The food was simple but filling and she was allowed to walk around the valley provided she took an escort with her. Guards were placed outside her chambers at night and it was clear that Colditz wanted to take no chances of her escaping. Not that there was much chance of that. Even if she ditched her guards and made a run for it, there was nearly a hundred miles of primeval forest between here and civilization. Emmaline was many things but woodswise was not one of them, even if you discounted the very real possibility of beastmen and other dark things that dwelled in the deep forest.

Paradoxically she also found it harder to play the Brettonian noblewoman here than had in Middenheim. She knew, in a general sense, what a noble did at court, she was less sure about how they spent their leisure in the country. Colditz politely refused to allow her to ride, stating that the valley was very steep and she might be hurt, a polite fiction that seemed to almost stick in the man's throat. Instead she took to taking long walks through the valley, picking flowers, gathering wild strawberries and other activities that a Brettonian might waste their time with. Each day she was sure to visit the stream that ran along the bottom of the valley, introducing herself to the smooth river polished rocks that glittered just below the cool mountain stream.

Four days after her arrival a coach enamel in the red and buff livery of the Schroder family rattled down the path to the house. Emmaline was not summoned to meet it, but she went anyway wondering if this was the husband that Schroder was planning for her. Colditz and three guards were there as well, as were all the servants, immaculately turned out. The door opened to reveal a pimply man of perhaps eighteen summers, he bore a marked resemblance to Lucien though the frizz of red hair and wispy ill advised beard. His skin was drawn and he looked tired.

“Master Schroder,” Colditz bowed, leading a ripple of bows and curtsies from the staff. He smiled at them as he stepped down from the coach, a servant moving around to begin unloading his baggage of which there seemed quite a bit.

“For the last ime Colditz you can call me Jullian.It is good to see you all, I suspect I shall be here until father sees fit to let me return to civili… hello…” he trailed off as his eyes fell on Emmaline.

“Who have we here?” he asked crossing over to her.

“I iz Eleanor de Abberville and Yur fathair 'as imprisoned me hair,” she declared crossing her arms beneath her breasts.

“Oh well that… wait he has done what to your hair?”

Death and Desire: A Warhammer Fantasy RP

Calliope had been in some tight places before, there had been that boarding action of Remus, the gallows in Marienburg, and that night in the Drakwald that still woke her up in cold sweats, but this was the worst she could remember. Her face throbbed where the door had struck her, and her ribs ached from the subsequent booting she had taken from the Mamluks, the sword in her hand was crude and poorly balanced. She would have been dead already if it wasn't for the slave she has seen earlier with the Sultan. He was doing his best to grip the beast as it snapped alternately at his face and the chains he had around its neck, its feline spine pivoted and the slave had to twist to match it to avoid its raking claws. A second cat leaped at her and she flung herself sideways, rolling across the dirt and stone floor to the cheers of unseen prisoners. Another one lunged at her, jaws wide and yellowed fangs flashing in the torch light. Calliope kicked it hard in the snot, her boot snapping the jaws shut, she used the momentum to spin towards the fourth cat. It was clumsy to use the edge, Old Heinrick would be ashamed of her, assuming he hadn't drunk himself to death yet. The edge was for cutting, the point was for killing he had told her more times than she could remember. Still you used what you could. The wild slash caught the leaping beast at the top of the thigh. Flesh tore and bones cracked, but not cleanly, the cat yowled like a demon but its weight took the scimitar, too dull to cleanly sever the limb, spinning from her hand.

"Shiz," she cursed in Reikspiel and then a great weight hit her from behind. She threw herself forward with it, feeling claws at her back and the feral stink of the beast as it bore her to the ground. If it pinned her, even for a few seconds it was over. Desperately, she grabbed its head with both hands and heaved, using all her might and the momentum of the fall to lever it into a throw. The panther scrabbled almost comically at the air, trying to twist about before it crashed into the low wall that surrounded the old forum with a shower of dust and hissing cries.

By now her eyes were growing accustomed to the gloom. She could see other slaves up in the tiers. She could run for saftey, but there wasn't a woman alive that could outrun a pouncing tiger. The largest of the beasts was at the end of the space, charging towards her with shoulder blades scissoring. Calliope opened her mouth and screamed in wordless rage and charged to meet it. The move through the beast off for a moment but it lunged for her. Calliope threw herself over it, feeling the slap of its tail as she cleared the monster, she hit the ground and rolled as it turned whip quick and lunged again. Scrabbling fingers found the hilt of the scimitar and whipped it up. The beast crashed into her driving its full weight onto the sword point and knocking the pommel back against the stone like an anti-cavalry pike. It impaled the creature up to the hilt. It screamed a spray of blood and saliva into Calliope's face then sagged like a deflated wineskin.

Calliope got to her feet, gripping the blood slicked hilt and trying to drag it free. It was stuck fast, suctioned into the flesh. Something struck her and send her staggering sideways, a rain of rocks and boos from some of the slaves pelting her. She tried to ignore the barrage, gripping the hilt of the sword and planting a foot against the beasts chest to pull it free. There was a crack as the slave with the chains broke the neck of the beast he had been struggling with and threw it to the ground. There was blood on his forearms but he raised his hands and shouted a warning. Calliope spun as the last tiger hit her and sent her spinning to the ground. It was on her instantly, jaws gaping, she slammed her forearm into its mouth, wedging it back far enough that it couldn't snap its jaws. Its rank breath made her queasy as she drove a punch into its ribs. Pain exploded along her arms as it swiped at her with it's claws. She screamed in rage and frustration and felt a jolt of magic. The cat screamed and flinched back, momentarily overcome with unease. She kicked it hard in the snout then bounded to her feet and followed up, it bounded away, leaping up towards the waiting slaves. A half dozen of them were armed and a pale looking man smashed a mace into it's mouth, dropping it bonelessly to the floor. Aching and blowing hard Calliope stumbled over to her sword. With a heave she pulled it free, shaking the blood from it as she turned to the crippled cat, it was on the floor, licking at its wounded leg, it cowered as she approached. She looked down at the beast for a second, then let out a sigh.

"To hell with it," she muttered, and turned and hobbled away, pulling herself up into the relative safety of the seats. The slaves that had thrown things at her gave her a wary look and she felt blood dripping from deep scratches in her left arm.

"Thank you," she said to the slave who had saved her.

Death and Desire: A Warhammer Fantasy RP

Calliope looked out over the harbor of Copher. At night, and from the Sultan's palace it was a dazzling spectacle. the waterfront was illuminated by hundreds of lanterns, running for a mile and a half around the semicircular anchorage. The lanterns ran down the jetties to merge with lights aboard the ships, making them look like shining fruit sketched out but not filled in. The water shone in rippling blue gold as moonlight and lantern light converged on the soft lapping waves. She could make out sleek corsair xebecs, tubby merchantmen from the Empire, even a few Brettonian ships with their massive fore and aft castles and simple square sails painted with their ludicrous heraldry. The most common of course were the Araybian dhows, single sailed vessels with a bank of oars, hauling spices, slaves, brass, salt and every other commodity from here to Marienburg. It made Calliope literally hungry to look at and she imagined the ships she would take once the Sultan put her afloat once more.

The apartment was a fine one, built into the side of the palace with thick braided rugs and colorful mosaics of court and hunting scenes. The balcony was shielded from the main rooms by a lattice of fragrant teak wood wrought into an elaborate arabesque. Potted lemon trees grew along the walls, attracting a few insects but handsomely repaying it with their citrus scent. Earthenware pots filled with water hung in nets from the ceiling, radiating cool that was the only refuge from the heat even for the Sultan. Calliope ran a jeweled brush through her hair, combing it out. She had let it grow past her shoulders in these months on land, but she still kept it bound up much of the time to keep it from her eyes. Strangely the thought of all the slaves in the city came to her. The Imperial harem girl, the strong fighter, the countless rowers shackled to oars out in the harbor. Slave uprisings weren't common, little wonder when they were put down with such unrestrained savagery, but she wondered if a day would come when the slaves would over whelm their masters in an orgy of blood and destruction. Part of her hoped so, slavery offended her, even though as the bastard daughter of an Averland noble she had never shared those kind of privations. Rise up and burn it all, she thought grimly, just do it when I'm somewhere else.

The door flew open under the booted kick of a Mamluk soldier. Calliope spun, leaping to her feet with the instincts of a mariner who had spent years on ships where seconds counted. Three soldiers rushed into the room, long scimitars drawn. They saw her silhouetted against the moon and moved in, weapons low.

"Throw down your weapons!" Azim commanded, trailing the guards by what he probably thought was a safe distance. Calliope had produced a knife that she kept in her boot and was judging a run for her pistol and sword. They were in her weapons belt, hanging uselessly from a chair in the main room. The guards were already passed them.

"What in the Seven Hells is going on?" Calliope demanded, backing a few steps towards the balcony. The Vizier grinned, his teeth very white in the semi darkness. He plucked her pistol from her weapons belt and turned it over in his hands idly. Calliope willed it to misfire but he merely set the weapon down on the table.

"The Sultan found you amusing, but at the end of the day he is a wise man... when properly advised," Azim smirked. Calliope backed another step and felt the railing of the balcony behind her. No escape there, it was thirty feet down to the next balcony even if she timed the jump right.

"And you advised him..." Calliope prompted.

"It seems Bernaro of Sartosa is happy to leave the lands of the Sultan in peace.... provided that we get rid of you," Azim explained. Calliope wanted to feel rage, but she had been a fool to trust these Arabs, of course they would rather backstab than fight.

"He will never keep his word," Calliope tried, eyes darting around. Azim chuckled.

"Maybe, maybe not, but at least we will be rid of scheming foreign pirates here at court. Of course we aren't wasteful, you might even survive a few days in the pits. Take her." Azim commanded, tiring of the game. Calliope whipped her hand back and threw the knife. It full high, cutting the rope to one of the pukas with a twang. The heavy pot crashed to the ground, scattering the soldiers. Azim screamed as it struck his leg with an audible crack. The Vizier went down in a heap, screaming and clutching at protruding blood slicked bone. She snatched up her sword belt and leaped for the door. It flew open as another guard, responding to the commotion, barged through the door. Stars exploded across Calliope's vision as the edge of the door hit her across the face. A moment later she was somehow on the floor, her hand scrabbling for her sword. The Mamluk soldier put his boot on her wrist and pressed his sword to her throat.

"Take her to the pits," Azim hissed, his voice black with a hatred hotter than the desert sands.

Death and Desire: A Warhammer Fantasy RP

The air stank of blood and shit. The sun beat down like a hammer that half boiled your brain. Poverty was everywhere, made all the worse by the incredible opulence of the Sultan. Life was cheap and a murder could be purchased for a handful of coins or a cup of half spoiled wine. Calliope Blackwood loved it.

The crowd below was cheering itself hoarse as the surviving slave prostrated himself and then walked back into the pens beneath the ancient arena. The smell of roasted meat and spices wafted up as vendors carried tray laden with chunks of goat grilled on sticks, or rice mixed with milk and cinnamon to refresh the festival goers. Refresh their stomachs anyway, their bloodlust needed no stoking. Already four men, black skinned giants from the Southlands, were being lead into the arena. Each man was dressed in animal skins, lion, tiger, and two patterns Calliope didn’t recognise, and carried wooden shields and long spears with axe-like blades. Their faces were concealed with strange helmets, which Calliope realized must be the skulls of whatever animals had donated the skin.

The Sultan was laughing as a buxom blonde Imperial girl struggled out of his lap. The girl’s stunning northern figure was too much for the Araybyian silks that tried mightily to contain it. The fat potentate didn’t seem offended by her lack of enthusiasm, nor did he pursue her as she scrambled away from him. Calliope frowned inwardly. She was no patriot, in fact she bore a death mark back in the Empire, but it bothered her to see a fellow Imperial so mistreated.

“Does it disturb you to see a woman in her proper place Pirate?” Azim Abbasi, the Sultan’s vizer asked with the perpetual sneer that covered his skull like face whenever he was talking to anyone other than his master. Calliope’s hand rested on her hip, though her pistol and sword had been taken when she came into the Sultan’s presence. There was always magic, but the few spells she knew were both unreliable and not really applicable. Even if she tried it the court magician Nasir bin Jaffa would swat her like a bug. Instead, she picked up a grape and bit into it, deliberately spraying juice to make Azim start backwards to avoid soiling his fine green and gold robes.

“Does it disturb you to see a woman, you know, with your partiality to camels and all,” she replied in a sweetly reasonable tone. Azim glared at her, then spat onto the floor beside her booted foot.

“Pirate, I would speak with you!” the Sultan called, apparently tiring of grabbing for the Blonde. Calliope bowed and stepped towards the Sultan. She grabbed the other Imperial girl and shoved her aside theatrically. Only a very keen eye would pick out the fact that one of the broaches Calliope wore was gone, palmed to the harem girl as she thrust her aside. It was a thin sliver of metal, an enameled dragon, just the sort of thing an enterprising prisoner might sharpen to a fine edge.

“I have given your words some thought,” the fat ruler of Copher declared portentously. It might have been a little more impressive if his fingers hadn’t been sticky with date preserves. Calliope held herself straight, the pose she would have employed if she were standing behind the wheel of a ship that was going into heavy weather.

“You say that with three ships you will be able to drive the corsair Benaro from our shores?” he asked, a trifle skeptically. Calliope felt the hot coppery taste of hate in her throat. Benaro of Savilla had been her first mate once, before he led a mutiny and marooned her on a Manan benighted sandspit to die. He had spent the past two years raiding the rich shores of Araby and so she had come to the Sultan with an offer to help, for a reasonable price of course.

“Easily my lord,” she replied confidently. The roar of the crowd behind her and the blast of brassy trumpets let her know that games were starting up again. The Sultan’s eyes were already sliding past her and she had to stop herself from grinding her teeth in frustration, the little toad just couldn’t follow a thought from beginning to end.

“Very well, I shall consider the matter and give you an answer after consulting with my advisors,” he said, all but shooing her out of the way.

@POOHEAD189

Tricksters and Theives: A Warhammer RP

Emmaline whispered her spell as she allowed the coarse gunpowder to slide through her fingers and down into the barrel of Neil's rifle. She had the thing gripped between her thighs as she lay back on a couch that had been pulled into the drawing room. A barely perceptible shimmer spread across the powder as it trickled in, the spell improving and transmuting it. Once the charge was in Emmaline spat the lead ball, into the barrel, quickly enough that its golden sheen wasn't visible, then stuffed the cartridge paper in after it and plied the rammer to drive it all down to the base.

"That's downright distracting," Brandt, a grizzled looking Middenlander muttered, pulling his eyes away from Emmaline to resume his vigil. The loading completed, Emmaline passed the rifle to Neil who took it from her without taking his eyes from the tree line. He eased the hammer back to full cock with a soft click of oiled metal.

They were in an upstairs drawing room, disheveled and ransacked by the thieves earlier attentions. fine books carpeted the floor where they had been scattered, pages flapping in the breeze that came through the open windows. A portrait of a portly scowling woman hung askew on one wall, the cuts made by throwing knives disfiguring her face. Johann and the majority of the men were downstairs, trying to keep an eye on all the entrances at once, now they had piled enough furniture against the cellar doors that the Skaven couldn't come through without considerable noise and effort.

"Why don't they just rush us?" Brandt muttered, his knuckles tight on the stock of his crossbow. Emmaline risked raising herself on her elbows to take a look at the woods. She could see movement as the skaven skuttled about in the shadows at the limit of visibility. Neil edged his rifle up onto the coffee table he was using as a rest and sighted down the long length of the weapon, mouthing something to himself.

"They don't know how many of us there are?" Emmaline supposed. They had driven back the Skaven twice, though it had been luck and firearms that had turned the tide.

"They are probably waiting for dark," Neil suggested, "rats always prefer to play..." The rifle cracked, crack physically painful to the ears, vomiting a lance of flame that light the late afternoon gloom like a lantern for a half second. There was a thrashing in the trees and then an armored rat staggered out, clutching at a fist sized hole in it's chest. It fell to it's knees, crawled a half pace towards the manor, then expired with a a final thrash of it's tail.

"..at night," Neil concluded, handing the weapon back to Emmaline who bit the top off a fresh cartridge and began to reload again. Brandt looked at Neil's rifle in surprise.

"Never known a gun to make so little smoke," he admitted.

"Nuln powder," Neil explained, pointedly not looking at where Emmaline was once again muttering silently over his weapon.

"Besides, there are more of them now. I think they are just gathering their strength..."

_______________________

'Charge-charge!" Quagar Gutgnawer squeaked, kicking and shoving the clan rats forward as he took the place of honor at the rear. It was an hour after sundown now and the pink things would have trouble seeing. The remaining jezail teams fired, lighting the darkened woodlands with the sickly green flashes of their weapons as they hammered the windows the pink things had been firing from. There were nearly fifty clan rats with him now. More had been trickling in over the last few hours, eager to for the kill and to claim some of the warptokens that the Grey Seer was offering in reward for these particular pink things. Quagar would have liked to have waited for more, but each passing hour increased the likely hood that a more formidable champion would arrive and take over his small war paw. The clan rats lashed their tails and charged, leaping out of the trees and over the small stone wall as they rushed towards the house.

Muzzle flash and powder smoke erupted from the pink thing burrow and a half dozen clan rats went down under the churning feet of their fellows. The air was suddenly thick with the musk of fear but Quagar lashed at the back of his clan rats with his halberd, making sure they realised what would happen to them if they grew more afraid of the pink things than they were of him. All of those warp tokens were going to be his.. assuming no one betrayed him of coarse.

_______________________

Emmaline felt her stomach tighten as the rats reached the house. Glass shattered and wood boomed as the creatures hit the side of the house in a frenzy, trampling the flower beds and thrusting their weapons through the windows. Johann fired his coach gun into them at point blank range killing two and wounding a half dozen more. The other bandits fired their pistols or hacked at their attackers with their weapons. Steel scraped on steel and rats and men screamed and cursed in their own languages. The air was filled with an acrid stink like rotten urine that made Emmaline gag as she furiously tried to reload Neil's rifle.

"No time babe," Neil replied, his voice tight but calm as he took the gun from her hands and slung it, half loaded. As she watched one of the bandits took the point of a spear in the chest, he screamed in pain and staggered back as one of his fellows thrust a pistol into the Skaven's jaw and pulled the trigger. The wounded man staggered back, clutching the bloody rent and swinging an axe one handed.

"They are coming through the back!" Gert, a stocky Rieklander with an evil scar across his face piped in a surprisingly high and panicked voice. The crash of shattered windows and broken doors sounded behind them. Neil shoved her backwards, ducked under a cut from a rusty sword, and thrust upwards through the chest of a rat with his shortsword, backpedaling all the while. Emmaline felt an icy chill wash over her.

"We have to make a run for it!" she whispered to Neil.

"Back! Back!" Johann roared, clubbing one of the rat things with the butt of his coach gun and stumbling backwards. Rats were coming through the windows now, slithering with all the abhorrent grace of their smaller brethren. Emmaline turned and ran, running into the black and white tiled parlor. A pair of massive rats with long rusted swords were coming in from the other side. Screaming in terror she snatched up a bottled of brandy and hurled it at them. One of them cut at it in mid air and the bottle shattered into a thousand pieces spraying a cloud of liquor and glass. Emmaline snapped her fingers and the cloud exploded with a dull whoomph sending both rats to the ground battering at the flames that suddenly engulfed them. The air stank of brandy and burning fur as well as the acrid stink that had assailed her nostrils earlier. Neil grabbed her and dragged her back as more rats charged into the parlor. They fell back, with the remaining bandits forced up the large marble staircase to the second floor by the oncoming tide of rats. The surviving bandits, bloodied and terrified formed a plug, holding off the rats until they got behind the massive wooden doors at the top of the stairs. The doors swung shut with a boom as the bandits closed them in the face of the surging rats, throwing their shoulders against them as impacts from the other side rattled them. Brandt was muscling a heavy book case against the doors and several other bandits were furiously piling furniture up in a makeshift barricade.

"You'll have to go out the window and run for the woods," Neil said, his face grave and spattered with blood. He mopped at his handsome face with his shirt sleeve and grinned at her with confidence he certainly didn't feel.

"What about you?!" Emmaline demanded. Neil's grin grew wider but somehow frozen on his face.

"Well we can't all make it," he pointed out. Emmaline grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him, but he merely kissed her and shoved her away.

"Get going, while they are distracted," he advised.

"Neil, this is no time to be struck with a bad case of nobility," she snapped, her voice wild and desperate. Axes were hammering in the doors now, and the bandits were furiously reloading their firearms.

"Caught between an army of skaven and an army of beastmen? Why, it is the text book time for it. It is something right out of a play," he quipped. Emmaline opened her mouth to snap a response then her eyes suddenly went wide.

"Babe you are wasting...."

"Make sure I'm not distracted!" Emmaline shouted as she bolted for the parlor as fast as her legs would carry her. Johann shook his head in wonder as he clapped Neil on the shoulder.

"Make sure she isn't distracted she says," he muttered in wonder.

______

Emmaline ran into the parlor and pulled open the case in which the warpstone was shielded. She could feel the magical energy radiating off it in an instant. The howl of the Skaven outside seemed to intensify though that might just have been her imagination. She gingerly kicked a piece of the faintly glowing green rock free of the case then squatted over it and began to mutter a spell. She worked the words over and over again, racking her brain to remember her spotty lessons on spell craft as she did so. All she had to do was...

Above the manor, out of sight of the battling men and skaven, a giant golden disc exploded into being. It shone like a small sun above the manor house, turning in slow lazy circles. It cast a radiance down on the manor that those inside could see and the Skaven recoiled for a moment, falling back from their attack on the second story as this strange light appeared in the sky.

Quagar Gutgnawer howled in fury, desperately trying to drive his clan rats to finish the attack, the pink skin were trapped, and enough warpstone to start his own clan would soon be his. His stomach growled with hunger and his mouth filled with saliva at the idea of feasting on soft pinkskin flesh. Just a few more minutes...

War horns sounded in the forest. Not the noble brassy sounds of Imperial horns, but the crude bone things that marked the coming of beastmen. Emmaline ran to the window and risked a peek out. As she watched horned figures burst from the woods, shaking their own weapons as they rushed towards the manor. As she watched a gor cut down a skaven, pausing over its body to bray and howl at the golden light above. More and more of the creatures rushed from the forest, and the skaven recoiled, trapped in the manor as the beastman came rushing to the strange beacon.

"What is happening," Neil demanded as Emmaline reemerged, her pack slung on her back and her eyes bright in the odd gold illumination.

"Beastmen, attacking the Skaven," she reported breathlessly.

"And this helps us how?" Neil demanded, he was taking advantage of the slackening fight to reload his rifle once again.

"The first rule of any con is to make them look in the wrong direction," Emmaline explained. The doors were barely holding together, hacked and crazed with blows from axes and polearms. The bandits looked bloodied, terrified, and exhausted. Emmaline could only hope they had enough left in them.

"Heroic last stands are for fools and heroes!" she called out in a loud theatrical voice.

"I for one intend to die fat, happy, and far from here!" Several of the bandits yelled in agreement.

"Ranald would be ashamed of me if I let myself get cut to dog meat in a place that I didn't even get to rob!" she went on, earning chuckles and half hearted cheers from the surviving bandits.

"So what's say we stop playing soldier and get the hell out of here!"

"How are we going to get passed two bloody armies?" Gert demanded, crossing his blood spattered arms. Emmaline's smile lit the room.

"I'm so glad you asked.."

_______

The doors flew open while the Skaven below grappled with the beastmen. Liquor bottles sailed down the stairwell, hunks of burning petticoats stuffed into their necks. They struck the marble floors below and exploded in flames as the bandits came charging down the stairs, forming a tight wedge around Emmaline. Neil fired his rifle at the run, the bullet punching through two Skaven and sending them both spinning to the ground. Pistols cracked and Brandt's crossbow thrummed as they cut their way through the distracted Skaven.

"Kill-kill!" A large skaven was shouting as he decapitated a roaring elkheaded beastman with a swipe of his sword. The Skaven tried to react hacking at the humans as they passed, but the chaos was too complete to allow them to focus their efforts. Emmaline reached the cellar door and touched it, reversing her spell. The doors fell open and the humans half fell half ran down the narrow stairwell into the darkness. Skaven surged after them but the narrow gap hindered their pursuit. They descended into the underground wine cellar, racing past man sized oaken barrels filled with wine and ale.

"There!" Neil yelled pointing to the old drain that the Skaven had used when they first tried to infiltrate the manor. The bandits ran for it, all save Clause, Emmaline and Neil. Clause was furiously swinging his axe, staving in barrel after barrel in sprays of splintered wood. Liquor poured free, spilling onto the floor of the cellar in shining pools. Skaven were pouring down after them now, as much to flee the beastmen as in pursuit, their beady eyes glowing in the darkness.

"That's enough!" Emmaline shouted and Neil grabbed the dim witted Clause and thrust him into the tunnel that the others were already using to flee the manor.

"Come on babe!" he shouted, but Emmaline pulled against him.

"Not quite yet... not quite.."

___________________________________________

Quagar Gutgnawer had been betrayed. Somehow the man-things were in league with the beast things. He lead the retreat from the front, following the humans down into the grape burrow below the building. He could still run them down, perhaps this would even be better. He could kill them himself and claim every single warptoken! The genius of his plan buoyed him, even as he squirted the musk of fear at the sound of what was happening to his warband above him. His feet were splashing through fluid as he pursued the man-things. The fluid stank, its pungent reek burning his nostrils like the aftermath of a gas attack. No matter, he could see one of them now just ahead of the old drainage tunnel. He was no expert but by its long fur it must have been a breeder. Foolish man-things to bring a breeder here. No matter, he would kill her and take the warpstone for himself and then... She raised her hand and made a strange gesture.....

___________________________________________

Emmaline blew a kiss at the onrushing Skaven, her lips pulled back in a grin every bit as savage as the onrushing rats. It checked for a moment in confusion. The spell ignited the spilled brandy that Clause had freed with his axe and a wall of blue flame rushed outwards like a breaking wave. Rats screamed and the smell of burning fur blasted back, overwhelming the sweet alcohol stench of brandy and the musty smell of the tunnel behind them.

"Ranald's balls," she marveled.

"Run now, pray later," Neil advised but he was grinning, even as he half dragged her into the old drain and up towards the surface.