Fantasy 1 on 1 with Tiff the odd and Gloom. Darkness with darkness.

[Gloom]

"END the old ways! We must begin anew! An age of reason, an age of prosperity for those who wish to move forward and to never... look... back!"

The large crowed cheers! Everyone of the city of Hevlin gathered in the grand center to hear there new lord give is speech. Lord Veron of house Devlin. Who gain power though infiltration, treachery, deception and propaganda against The magic users and god worshipers.

In the crowed there was on man who didn't cheer. Who look upon the new lord not with admiration or fear. But pure hatred. A man of mid height wearing a cloaked hood of dark green. A long black and gray beard was the only thing you could see of the mans face.

He could see the true nature of the new lords heart. A heart for domination and control though any means. He new of the lords secret gathering and killing of the worshipers and mages, along with their families. He wanted to erase all trace of the old ways though any means.

The cloaked man turned from the grand stage, making his way from the city center and away from the crowd. He had to get away from the wretched sounds of thunderous applause for the city's new tyrant, and toward the filthy streets of Hevlin's poor district.

 

[Tiff the Odd]

Piper was getting tired, she felt like she had been running for hours but really it was only 15 minutes. She still couldn’t believe what was happening, she didn’t even have time to fully process what had just happened.

Her mother and older brother had been preparing for dinner. Her mother was a mage and they lived in the poorer district because those were the people her mother liked to help. Arteyu, her older brother, didn’t have any mana but Piper had a boat load of it. Her mother claimed that the small girl had more than her. Piper didn’t believe her.

The men had bursted into their home and before her mother could say anything, thrusts a sword through her neck. Piper sat there in shock, she was only 11 years old and had never seen that much blood before.

Arteyu seemed to know what was going on and he looked to his little sister. Their father died when she was only a baby so the 17 year old felt a responsibility to fill that roll for her.”Piper, run.”He whispered, kissing her forehead before he stood up and threw himself on the soldiers.

Piper stood up and ran out of the house, not knowing what became of her brother but she could guess. The magic users and their families were always hung in the city square the next day.

The small girl wasn’t partying attention to where she was going when she suddenly ran into a man. It knocked her down but when she looked up, she could sense his mana. Her blue eyes were wide and scared.”Please, the city soldiers are after me.”She begged, darting her eyes. She had lost them but it wouldn’t be long until they found her. There weren’t many who would harbor her.

“You are like me, you can use magic.”Piper said, her eyes were desperate.

 

[Gloom]

Kauldur gathered his footing after the child collided with him, but once he heard what she said he gathered himself at once. Bending slightly, flaring out his hands on, but they were different. His right hand hardened with white cracks leading from his wrist to his finger tips. The other... withered and slightly decomposing limb with vanes pulsing a sickly green magic. A flame of green bursts of flame engulfed the hand as a white flame forms around the other.

He stabs his gaze at the girl, eyes wild Like those of the a madman! Unblinking, black and hollow without light. He was certain the child was trap set by the new lords purgers. Reaching at the girls throat with his right hand, ready to squeeze the life from her eyes. But before he could touch her it flared with soft whit light. His demeanor calmed slightly, retraced his hand. Looking at her pensively.

Before he could speak A group 5 men turned from an ally and were heading towards them, bloody swards in hand. With eyes mad again, he Pushed the child behind him. Reciting in the old tongue. "Fromkkrip Galunfra SHALOK!' A Black and red slug shot from his un-dead hand covering the men. Then at the same time , flicking a small bright flame at them from his light hand. Once the flame touched the sluge, the men burt in a black and light flame, screaming in the most horrible of pain. Collapsing into ash.

A wicked grin crawled slow and wide over Kauldur's face with a slightly giddy chuckle accompanying it. "I love the sound a man makes when his soul burns!" He chuckled a little more before turning towards the girl, once again his entire attitude changing form maddeningly giddy to inattentively calm at the drop of a hat. "So, urchin. You see my soul flame, aye? No wonder they wanted to GUT you." Putting a little unsettling inflection on the word gut.

He looks away from the girl and strokes his bead with his dead hand. "It seems the bastard-lord is using the gathering to keep the masses distracted while he cleans house. Dealing with his other scumdogs sounds like a real nuisance . It seems better that I move on again." He turns back to the girl. "If you want to keep on living what wretched life you still have. I'd do the same, urchin." He turns-heal, starting back down the street.

 

[Tiff the Odd]

Piper was beginning to think talking the man was a mistake, she whimpered as his hand changed. The aura that she was getting from him was something like she had never seen before. His magic wasn’t the warm, orange glow that she got off her mother. Her mother. If he kills her then maybe she would get to her with her again.

Piper closed her eyes and ready for the darkness to take her but it never came. The soldiers had found her and she didn’t know whose hands that she would rather die by but she didn’t have to choose. The man raised his hand and suddenly, the soldiers had bursted into flames.

The strange man seemed to enjoy watching the soldiers burn and Piper felt some strange satisfaction from the scream of the one who drove the sword through her mother.

Once they were taken of, the man addressed her. He told her that she should leave but where would she go? Piper stood up and followed after the man because she didn’t know what to do. She was scared and she was a child who had just lost her family.

The small girl moved her curly, red hair away from her forehead as she followed the man in silence. She didn’t know why she was following him.”My name is Piper Withers. My mother was Margo Withers. We are...she was...”She trailed off as she swallowed thickly.”I am a Druid.”She said.

 

[Gloom]

Kauldur Looked towards the girl, not stopping his stride. "Withers? That healer from poor side? Hmm, woman should have know better then to practice down here. One who lives in this filth would betray the kindest of souls for a warm meal and a pocket full of gold."

Eyeing the girl he could sense a deep pocket of hidden power within the child. He strokes his beard with his dead hand. "A Druid, huh?" He looks off thoughtfully, his face softening for a just moment before hardening again.

"I assume you fallow the path of the gods of nature? That's a shame, the druid gods are not as mighty but they are formidably in there own right." Stopping in his tracks, he turns to face the girl. He decided to give her a test "So, Piper... Answer me this. Where do you think you soul's path will lead? The path of the elements or the path of life and nature?" He kneels to her eye level, his cold black eyes staring though her pure blue ones.

"Focus and listen to your soul. Because that is where the magic within all users lie. It will tell you the path you should follow. Or maybe a hole different path." He shrugs his shoulder while waving his hands nonchalantly. "Who knows, maybe it's the path of darkness." His dark grin grew once again before dissipating.

 

[Tiff the Odd]

“Momma didn’t hide her abilities. We come from a long line. My Papa wasn’t a mage and she had to leave her coven to marry him. Arteyu, he was my older brother, wasn’t like us. Momma wanted to help people and that’s where she could help the most people.”Piper had the feeling that this man wasn’t in the habit of giving to the poor.

Piper stared at the man, not sure how to answer him.”I want to do both. Momma told me that my aura was stronger than any Druid that she had met. Most druids choose but she wanted me to train in both but I started with elements because those are easier. I started training last month.”She explained to him.

There was something about this man that was off, she wasn’t scared but it was definitely there.”What’s your name?”She asked with a tilt of her head. She wasn’t going to choose a path of darkness.”I don’t remember any necromancers in the city.”She added. Necromancy often was seen as the opposite of her magic. Druids celebrated nature and life but her mother believed that death wasn’t the enemy of them but it was part of nature and a part of life.

 

[Gloom]

The madman smirked. "I go by Kauldur, and open your mind child!" He grasps her shoulders, as in a mid flash his hands change from what they were into hands that looked completely normal. "Do you really think that those who choose the path of Necros want attention drawn to them?! I will not give you the answer. For it is you...!" He stands up while holding her, lifting her off the ground with out strain as he kept full eye contact, but away from her face.

"Who most think the thoughts that no other has thought! But I understand, you have only been taught the most basic of craft." A light green magic aura lowers her slowly back to the ground, "And your mother was more right then the thought. You're filled with oodles and oodles of magic potency. But do you have potential? That remains not yet to be seen."

He steps a few feet away from her. "One more question child. Do you want my help in finding your mothers coven. Where I'm sure they will take you in and teach you your mothers single minded but foolishly noble path." As he said this his right hand shines a soft yellow light. Forming into a small ball of light, hovering a few inches off the ground.

"You will heal the weak, ease the suffering of others while at the same time putting yourself in a box and accepting limitation. Or you could follow me..." He lifts his left hand, his dark green mana seethes from within him outwards. Kauldur brings forth a sphere shaped object completely void of light. like that of a miniature black-hole.

" Where I will teach you all I know. From healing to killing. From summoning to conjuring and onward to ever expanding knowledge of countless disciplines." He gives a smile and slowly pulls back his hood. As he did the masking spell fades as he revealed his true self. The left side of his body starts to decompose slightly, withering. Turning a cadaver gray, his long hair turns from jet black to a old gray.

Last his left eye glows a black and green pinpoint within a white and vainy blue iris like that of the dead... it blinks at her. "Though... you may go mad... " His mouth turned from a concerned line to a crazed grin filled with gray and black dead teeth. "But that's the fun part! Ha HA HAAA!"

 

[Tiff the Odd]

Piper was annoyed, she was surprised that she had the energy to be annoyed in the emotional state that she was in. He kept lifting her up like she was some pup and it wasn’t really appreciated by the young girl. She glared a little at the man as he spoke. He had a lot of nerve talking about her mother after the young girl had just watched her her slaughtered.

Still, she could sense the magic coming from this man. She squirmed free from Kauldur’s grasp when he showed her the decayed half of his face. She opened her mouth to speak but saw soldiers making their way down the street with their bodies slumped over their shoulders. A woman whose red hair and freckles were the same as Piper’s and a boy who couldn’t be older then 17.”Mama...Arteyu...”She said softly.

Piper stared after the men, watching them disappear into the crowd. She felt numb, she couldn’t cry or scream like she wanted to.”I want to be strong enough to free this place from Lord Vernon.”She turned to Kauldur.

“Teach me but I’m not going to go mad or whatever. I don’t want to learn to kill because no matter how bad that man is, I don’t have the right to kill him. I’m not the only one whose had suffer because of him.”Piper said as she stared up at the man.”Besides, you aren’t nearly as creepy as you try to be. You try way too hard.”She added with a small smirk though the smirk was forced to her face. This man didn’t want a blubbering child, she would find some time alone to cry and scream.

 

[Gloom]

Kauldur smiled back. "Oh, we got a spitfire, hu? I like that! And you be right. The bastard-lord will keep killing those who don't deserve death." While pulling his hood back over his head, his masking spell was replaced. "Though... I wouldn't close my mind to the killing of the lord. For when you find yourself in a situation where it's your life or theirs... you might hesitate and the other might take your life instead. Think on what I said. But for now we have to get out of the city."

While lifting his right hand, Kauldur said a sew hush words of a incantation and a wisp of magic appeared and started circling both him and Piper. "This is a guiding wisp. It'll protect us from the guards. Masking us as normal non-magic using citizens. " He leads Piper down a dark, smelly ally. The stench of human waste and rancid garbage was potent. Though it did keep foot traffic pretty much non-existent.

Though the ally he led her, when thy finally reached the end. Opening up to the main street towards the city gates. Kauldur pulls Piper behind a building when he say another group of guards heading in their direction. As they walked past, Kauldur snarled. "Wretched scumdogs. They reek of blood and malice." Kauldur Looked to Piper again. "Here's our story; I'm your grand father. I'm taking you to live with me in my home in the forest outside the city. Your mother had took ill and past the night before. If anyone asks, you have no other family but I, Understand?" He said, with a stern serious look.