Other Hey there! I'll write a thing for you!

[St. Clover]

"C'mon! Do the thing!"

"No."

"Why not? It was fun!"

"You tore apart everything on the table trying to get away."

"That was fun!"

"No."

"Please?"

Gallan glared at the young vicar from across the campfire, meeting those huge yellow eyes with an unwavering gaze.

"The Eye... like the Voice is not a gift to be abused, young master."

"But I abuse my gifts all the time!"

"That doesn't make it right."

"What if I promised you one of those books you're always looking for?" Kalehar's eyes widened a bit, intense and wild.

"...the nearly priceless texts written by the Kerde'ha-fitz himself, you mean?" Gallan asked, frowning.

Kalehar nodded. "All yours, just do the thing."

Gallan went quiet, thinking about the offer. He swirled the wine in his glass and took a drink, wiped his mouth, then sighed.

"Do I have your word?"

"Swear it on my sister's reputation."

Gallan snorted. "Very well, just try not to destroy anything this time."

Kalehar bristled with anticipation.

Not filled with much confidence that his belongings would escape unscathed, Gallan sat his glass aside and pushed his pack away. He took a moment to compose himself, breathing deep to center the parts of his mind where the raw force needed to project the baleful gaze of his order resided. The seconds ticked by in near-silence, the only sound coming from the crackling of the campfire.

Then, without warning, every muscle in his neck and face tensed and twisted his expression into that of a demon. His eyes flashed with an intensity that was known to give the great wyrms pause, and send normal folks fleeing in terror.

On Kaehar, the results were immediate - every hair on his body stood on end, and the screech he made wasn't unlike a wild animal. He tore away from the man with haste, breaking for the treeline so quick he threw dirt and snow up onto his host. It was a matter of seconds before he vanished into the thicket and out of sight, tearing through branches and underbrush like his life depended on it.

He silly!

 

[St. Clover]

...him that, no, I can't let him talk to his dead aunt."

"Oh, what'd he say then?"

Tariel snorted. "You know what he told me? He said he'd get my status with the coven revoked."

Across the table, his brother choked on his tea. While he recovered, Tariel folded his legs and whipped his tail in the snow beneath his chair.

"Can he even do that?" Harper asked once he finally got his lungs free of the spiced brew. He coughed a few more times for good measure.

"Not a chance in Hes," Tariel answered confidently. "The Albaya are outside the usual politics of the gentry - no one in their right mind would try to follow up on such a threat."

"Wish the same could be said for my guild," Harper groused, "we're basically intertwined with the bluebloods. Right many bastards in their number, though I'm sure you know that already."

"From the six years wasted as a scribe, yeah."

"Ever hear back from your old patron?"

"Once, a few years ago."

"Oh? What'd he do?"

Tariel rolled his eyes. "Tried to see if I'd rejoin the estate as the in-house physician and occultist."

"But you said no."

"I didn't even respond to the telegram - just had Fredrick eat the slip and went about my day."

"How's he been doing, by the way?"

"Ask him yourself! Fredrick!"

Perched atop the nearby railing of the gazebo's edge, the albino vulture screeched at the mention of his name.

"Good as ever, I see!" Harper laughed.

The brothers Harper and Tariel are some of my more favorite characters in this setting - their dynamic of dedication to their community and personal interests is a fun thing to explore.

 

[St. Clover]

...credits for a Hound?"

"Don't even think about it."

Flee frowned, offended enough to shoot Gower a dirty look. He hadn't taken his eyes off his slagon since they got them ten minutes ago.

"What's this, now?" he asked, more demanding really.

"Said don't even think about it - you daft?"

"Daft'll be you when I put a hole in your skull."

"Friggin' try it you weasle."

"Podge off," Flee snarled.

Gower returned the sentiment with a rude gesture. "Y'know I'm right. No one touches them things and lives to tell about it. They're cursed."

"Curses is for them witch pricks, these is just some mangy mutts in tin!"

"Mutts who make even the Archon turn an eye when they show up at his doorstep."

"He's a jobber anyway!"

"Spot more of a man than you."

Flee once more looked up from the heavy pistol in his hands, ceased his polishing and leveled a narrow-eyed stare at his partner in crime.

"Really don't think we'd stand a chance?" he asked.

Gower thought about it, then said, "Seen one hit with a Lobber, once; when the wyrms got over the wall in 74. Back when I was a Picket. Most of the time a man caught in those flames is dead in seconds, boiled nothing in a few minutes. That Hound walked right through it and never flinched."

"Screw me, no lying?"

"Wish I could forget it," Gower admitted. "Never seen the like since, don't want to either."

"Hes..."

One for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

...bewilderment at the scruffy man sitting across from him. Nothing could've prepared him for this meeting - not even his sister's weird star-reading. Up and down he searched for any sign that this was the figure of myth, the living legend that birthed entire schools of spiritual and philosophical from his few short years in the limelight.

But he saw nothing. Not a scrap of evidence. And that made him believe the stranger's claim all the more.

"So... where've you been this whole time?" Kalehar found himself asking after the silence between them went on for nearly a minute.

Pausing from his meal of a cooked glub leg on a stick, the man whose left hand was a golden hook blinked once. Then twice. By the third blink, his expression eased into the early signs of a frown - not quite displeasure, but confusion. He seemed to think long and hard about the answer, brown eyes no doubt staring off into some far-off cosmic realm in search of some heavenly wisdom to convey.

What he wound up saying was the furthest thing from it, "Honestly? Couldn't tell you."

Now it was Kalehar's turn to blink. "What?"

"No clue, kid. One moment I was in some city talking to a few folks about... something? Then I was somewhere else, doing something important."

"Seriously?"

"Yep."

"Huh. That's... huh."

"Didn't expect your messiah to have a scrambled sense of time, eh?"

"That's one way of putting it, I guess."

Now the man took a bite of the glub leg. He chewed and swallowed his prize, then shrugged. "Could also be pulling your leg, too - when you've got as many enemies as I probably do, the less you say, the better."

Kalehar frowned. "So which is it?"

"What do you think?"

"I think you're being a big jerk."

That drew a laugh from behind the unkempt beard. "You speak your mind, I'll give you that."

"That's what you taught us to do, isn't it?"

"I think my exact words were to never trust things at face value," came the response.

"Except you never had exact words!" Kalehar pointed an accusing claw at the man, grinning. "You had a bunch of stuff paraphrased, but not one thing ever penned!"

"Got me there."

Kalehar snorted triumphantly. "Trust me, I've read that book of yours front to back. Like, three times. The stupid priests made me basically memorize the stupid thing, even though we don't exactly teach it."

That made the man smile. "See I'm talking to a big fan - gonna make me blush if you keep that up."

Trying my hand at the fella who founded most of the schools of esoteric thought and study!

 

[St. Clover]

...whiskers twitched at the unsettling feeling that'd come to hang in the air. Making sure she wasn't just imagining things, Dhalia glanced to her companion and waited for his input - he glanced down to the curious device about his wrist, studied the sceen, then gave a thumbs up. This was the place.

"Nice and easy, yeah?" she muttered through the darkness, hand falling to the holster at her waist.

"If you're capable of it."

She rolled her eyes. There was a snap and a smooth glide of leather on metal, and a second later her pistol was drawn from its cozy home.

"Try to keep quiet if anything sneaks up on us," she chided back, "last thing we need is you screaming like a little girl again."

Daniel, a wizened man despite being in his mid-30s, snorted and unslung his own weapon. Much like her pistol, the short carbine housed a flawless cyan-hued crystal that acted as both power source and foci for its lethal beams. He checked the containment field's integrity, then gave a nod.

Taking that as the sign to get things rolling, Dhalia turned her focus to their front and began creeping forward once again. All across the city there'd been weird, often hazardous, anomalies popping up for nearly a week now. The Arbiters weren't sure what was going on, only that the incidents had all shared a common thaumic return when probed by their scanning units. More than a few freelance teams had been called in to cover the ground they couldn't, moving across, above and below the narrow streets to try and find the cause. Dhalia's pack happened to get lucky, she thought, when they found a fresh trace of the arcane signature not far from their touchdown point on the southwestern side of the industrial quarter.

And now, as she crept forward with a determined-yet-nervous look on her snout, she wondered what would be around the corner. The corridor they'd found themselves in didn't offer much in the way of cover, and the room up ahead would be a maze of machinery and vines, if the rest of the building was anything to go by.

On reaching the end of the narrow would-be killzone, the whirring of something became apparent. The ratling paused and shot Daniel a hand gesture that told him everything he needed to know, 'Contact!'

They both froze and went as near silent as they could, listening to the noise continue. The air was heavier here, far more than even fifty feet away when they'd entered the hall. The little device Daniel wore was going berserk, clicking nonstop to indicate potentially hazardous amounts of ambient thaumic activity. Dhalia cursed their luck for actually finding the thing, or something just as bad. She looked at Daniel, gestured with her pistol, then went back to taking point for this wonderful little op.

With quiet paws she crept forward, bit by bit, until she reached the threshold. Finger on the trigger now, the ratkin kept herself steeled for the fight-yet-to-come, sucked in a breath, and took a peek around to sight up any potential targets. What she found was nothing she could've imagined on her own, not in a million years.

Floating above the ground, roughly ten feet above the ground by Dhalia's estimate, was something that she could only describe as an obsidian plumb-bob lined with glowing arcane circuitry. It was near some piece of defunct machinery, currently blasting it with a screen of sickly green light. Whenever the strange device was active, the air became rich with the pungent stench of bad magic. What the hell was this thing?

Dhalia felt Daniel put a hand on her shoulder, looked to see him peeking past her at the strange thing. He looked just as confused as she did, even more unnerved when the room was plunged into a rave-gone-wrong by the mysterious construct. She glanced down at his wrist, noting that the thing went berserk whenever the field was active. Sure as shit, this was their culprit. Now the real question became how the hell they were going to deal with it...

Here's something for Anon!

 

[St. Clover]

...watched as the woman scribbled away at the layer of wax set into the curious device between them. To Tariel, the words she wrote were both foreign and familiar at the same time. He could make out the occasional deity or spirit whose name was to be invoked, but the rest was nothing but gibberish to his untrained eye. Still, he admired the way her stylus deftly moved through the motions of laying down a bit of arcane retribution on whoever had hired her.

"Can you tell me anything about what's going to happen when you're finished?" he asked.

The waxwright continued her work for a few more words, then paused. She frowned, seemed to think for a moment. Then she said, "Might lose a few teeth, could get some bad breath or even just a cavity."

Mild, as far as the typical curses went, Tariel thought.

"Nothing that'd broach into getting the Pickets after you, huh?"

She nodded. "Wanted to real mess 'em up, be using lead."

"RIght, where the real power lies."

"See you're familiar with the arts?"

Now Tariel nodded, said, "Enough to know how to identify the results, and how to deal with them."

"Witch pricks don't just stand around lookin' pretty afterall - color me surprised."

"We've got a few things to our name besides creeping people out, you know."

"Like pestering a girl on the clock?"

Tariel snorted. "You're one to talk; you asked to meet up for lunch!"

"Yeah, and now I'm trying to concentrate! Pass me the rubies, yeah? Need to make sure this next line gets nice and heated if this is gonna work."

Here's a little something for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

...frowned at the flickering display before his eyes. Even with the damage he'd sustained from the grocery store encounter, there was no way his in-house chrome was this faulty. Kaiser refused to believe it. There had to be something going on, and he made that known by saying, "Whatever you're doing, cut it out."

Across from him, the young man in the flowing mantilla --Tariel-- glanced up from the cards he'd laid out. "What's that?" he asked.

"Whatever you're doing to that's interfering with my scans - stop it."

"Scans?"

"Information gathering? Come on, I know your people aren't at the level of the auspex yet, but you've got to have something to collect that sort of stuff that's not just your eyes."

"You mean like what I'm doing right now?"

Tariel gestured to his cards.

"No, I don't mean that." Kaiser frowned.

"Then what?"

"You!"

Now Tariel frowned.

"What about me?" he asked.

"What are you doing?"

"Divining how to get you home."

"And you're sure you're not just trying some trick to throw me off?"

Tariel shrugged. "No more than I would anyone else trying to pry into places they don't belong."

"So you are doing something."

"What do you think I'm doing?"

Kaiser reassessed the data collected from his augury relays in the last few minutes. He went quiet for nearly a minute before forming some sort of hypothesis: "A proxy of some kind - far as my rig can tell, there's not just one of you. There's a half-dozen auric spores occupying the same space, all of them with at least a bit in common."

"That's a keen machine you've got, to pick that up."

"So I'm right?"

"Not entirely, but close enough."

"Close only matters when you're throwing hand grenades."

Tariel looked up again. "Or when you're trying to pry where you don't belong."

"Cut the crap."

"When you stop trying to-"

"Okay! Okay; I get it."

"Good." Tariel grinned beneath his veil. "They thank you for your cooperation."

"Who?"

"The spirits - that's what your machine picked up."

"Mean to tell me you're possessed or something?"

"We like to think of it as... communion, but you could think of it like that."

"So which one of you am I talking to right now?"

"The only one with a voice most of the time, me."

"And who is me?"

"The one talking to you."

"Oh sod off with that mystic crap."

Tariel's grin widened.

One for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

...at the papers before him with complete befuddlement.

"You can't be serious."

Across from him, the vicar -- his face obscured by the cowl that swallowed his head and horns both -- grinned once more. For James, the pointed teeth of the boy-chimera were unsettling in kind words. He was a middling clerk for the Ailing Church's accounting sector. He shouldn't have been put in a situation like this.

"What if I told you I already got it started?" the vicar, Kalehar, asked.

"I'd say you..." James caught himself.

This wasn't a whelp of a scribe or other menial he was talking to - he had to remind himself of that, and keep it in mind, he thought.

"You should have consulted with your advisors before putting forth such a proposal."

Kalehar's grin widened. "I did - they said the same thing you wanted to say, too."

James wanted to blanch, but he kept his cool. Or tried his best, anyway. "It's a gross misuse of Church resources, young Master."

"See, that's where I say you're wrong." Kalehar sat up, enough to meet the eyes of the clerk. Goat's eyes stared out from beneath the cowl. "We've got the witches looking after the dead when we get them, right? But what about when someone goes missing? They can't be everywhere, you know - trust me, I've gave that one the slip enough to know! So what's it going to hurt to have a... few dozen people out looking? Huh?"

"The fact it would take a non-insignificant amount of time to find, train and equip these people?"

"That's why we go with the Ratters as a base!"

"Have you met them before, young Master? The Ratters aren't known for being the most accomodating of sorts."

Kalehar's grin somehow found a way to widen further. James felt his stomach flip - just what was about to transpire, he wasn't sure, but he felt the gears of fate turning in the back of his mind. And there was a goat-shaped wrench wedged in-between each and every one of them.

One for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

...and forth he went, his pace never once slowing despite the frequent pivots he made on the balls of his feet. Gathered before the frost-covered man whose height dwarfed the tallest orthisi present, the crowd listened in awe at the stranger's raving. His voice was booming and filled the space of the throughway like thunder - the language he spoke was alien, yet the meaning behind the words was crystal clear. He was angry. Angry at the fools of paradise, the ones whose trivial squabbles had resulted in the world's broken state. Nothing would be the same again, he insisted, the delicate gears were chipped and some removed entirely.

Whenever he came to a rare moment of silence, he stopped and looked out on his audience. His face was a mask of polished copper or bronze, bright--almost glowing--eyes peering out at them, alert and inflamed.

Nothing would be the same, he would repeat before launching into another fit of curses towards the culprits of this series of events. But he would not let their actions be the death of this world. By his own hands, he would drag the future back to the present would it make a difference.

Something for uhhh Ashvaliaen

 

[St. Clover]

...hoof and recoiled almost immediately, horrified at the burp that was issued forth from the steaming muck.

"No doubt about it," Tariel groused. "Corpse Soup - probably too many bodies in this one little plot over the years."

Behind him, the gathered physickers-in-training exchanted glanced and murmured among themselves.

Their instructor, an elderly orthisi by the name of Heckle, shook his head. "Told them time and again, they've got to spread the folks out. We've got rules for this sort of thing for a reason."

Tariel nodded. "Lucky you caught it when you did; a few more seasons and you'd be dealing with a full-on incursion. Then you'd never hear the end of it."

"From my superiors, or yours?"

"Anyone that lost their... apples? To this hiccup." Tariel answered, squinting and failing to identify what the gnarled tree nearby once produced.

"Pears," Heckle said, "but you're right - I'll get word sent out to the appropriate parties. You wouldn't happen to know a good Vounu, would you?"

"The Albaya frown on untested weirding, you know that, right?" Tariel glanced sidelong at the man.

"And the Ratters've been known to sell their sabers for a few extra ration credits. So do you, or not?"

"...I can give you the line for someone that's fairly trustworthy, but that's it."

"Old-fashioned bartering can do the rest. Thank you."

"Thank me when you've got this cleaned up." Tariel moved away from the thrice-damned plot, pulling his mantilla close. "I'll tell Olega to keep an eye out, but she'll have to get someone else to come out if you need further assistance. Grey Consort or not, I'm not sticking my neck out for someone else's clerical error."

Heckle laughed. "And here I thought you corpsers were just here to serve! Looks like you've got a spine in that gown after-all!"

Here's a little funni.

 

[St. Clover]

...shook with the force of the roiling waves of sunlight-force overhead, making Tariel wonder if the cave would collapse on them yet.

"How long did you say these things last?" he asked, looking at the expedition lead.

Crouched near the mouth of their underground nook, illuminated by the orange flashes of the Sunburst's emissions, a rugged mar named Remlof stood watch. He had one the nomad clans' signature long guns clutched in his hands, and one of his hooves was braced on a tilted rock for what Tariel figured was support in the event he needed to use the lethal implement. Dressed in the same snug survival suit and snow-cloak as the rest of his kin, he made for a striking figure.

"About five to ten minutes, usually," he answered coolly.

"We've been down here for at least that long already."

One of the other people crowded into the cave, another nomad by the name of Helen, spoke up, "And we would've been boiled to death if we'd waited even a minute sooner."

Tariel frowned. "So they're really closer to twenty minutes."

"In all? Yes - but the worst only lasts briefly by comparison. With the right gear, you could survive the first wave of exposure. But once the party gets underway, your only hope is to be underground or behind something thick and sturdy." Remlof took a moment to survey his crew, and their would-be travelling companions.

Across from Tariel sat three nomads, Helen included, and beside him was his mentor and coven-lead, the Numen Sister Elega. For all the chaos going on around them, as usual, the senior Albaya kept her outward composure and serene demeanor. Tariel knew better, though: the subtle motions in her cheeks and occasional cock of the head told him she was in the middle of a very intense debate with her ego-companions. Part of him wondered what the imprints thought of the Sunburst - his own band of merry remnants was meager by comparison, but the traces of the dead that lingered in the back of his mind weren't happy about this. Not one bit.

Being caught out in the wilds between furnace cities can be bad news bears if the sky decides to rain fire on you!

 

[St. Clover]

...his hammer down with all the weight afforded to him by the hydraulics of his suit - brasteel rang and the bent section of the metal rectangle was smoothed out, good as new. James smiled beneath the boxy helmet protecting him from the sounds of industry all around him. This was the third section of outer-wall paneling he'd been given today, and he could see another six being finished before the shift was over.

He motioned to the workers to claim their prize and moved back to clear the space. In his mechanical harness, he was easily twice the bulk of an average orthisi laborer and many times heavier.

"Think we're going to get a good bonus for the day?" he oracled out to one of the women nearby, another orthisi in a suit much like his own.

"That all you think about?" she returned over the tiny speaker in his helmet. He could see her shake her head with deliberate care.

"When I'm trying to move on up in the dorms? Hes yeah it is."

"Worry less about what cell you'll get, and more about that hammer of yours! Think I saw a chip go flying off thanks to that loose hold you call a swinging grip!"

James waved her off.

"Got the next one ready for you, sir!"

Turning his attention back to the designated working space, James sized up his next victim: another section of wall paneling, this one from one of the spires if the petina was anything to go by. Gentry bastards really were the salt of the earth, huh? To have their precious sky-homes fixed by a humble Iron Lord and his peacetime endeavors. Or it was cheaper.

"Thanks, Smith! Clear the line, people! Hammer's coming down!"

He raised his hammer one more, ready to continue the work that kept the city, and everyone within its heated walls, alive and well in the snowy realm they called home.

Woooooo here's another!

 

[St. Clover]

...as it turned out, dealing with it was much harder than expected.

Dhalia just hit the ground when the flash of green burned the top layer of rust and moss away from the machine she'd hauled herself over.

Quick on her feet, the ratkin scuttled her way down the length of the inert metal beast, smelling the rank odor of the plumb-bob in close pursuit. She dove under a conveyor belt when the next screen-attack hit where she'd been just moments before, burning away any detritis or anything that wasn't broken tile.

"Anyday now!" she howled through clenched teeth, weasling her way through the maze of supports and whatnot.

"You try doing this magic shit without a degree!" Daniel yelled back.

Cursing her luck and everything that led her to this point, Dhalia came out from the conveyor and took a second to reorient herself. About twenty feet away was the floating construct, humming eerily and presenting a very open target. She snapped off a shot from her pistol, the purple bolt doing little more than sparking off the polished-obsidian surface. That got its attention, though, and in an instant she was back on the move. One lucky hit was all it'd take to... what would it do, if it hit her? She tried not to think about what happened to the rust, the debris and living things she'd seen it vaporize so far.

"Hurry up!"
Here's a continuance for the Anon from before, with their guns-for-hire facing down the nefarious cleaner!

 

[St. Clover]

...emerged from shadows of the niche with the quickness, closing the distance to him in seconds. James barely had time to register the fact he was under attack before the air was filled with a sickly-sweet smell that clung to the back of his throat when he gasped in shock. He tried and failed to flee the would-be assailant, but found no such luck as he stumbled a few clumsy steps before falling over.

Everything from his neck down became numb, with only the smallest of prickling sensations still felt in his body.

His attacker wasted no time in rolling him over, a gloved hand deftly relieving him of the credit book in his left pocket. He saw they wore a rubber suit with a cowl and mantle around the shoulders, their face obscured by an industrial mask hooked to a box on their waist. A small case with a hose and holstered wand was clutched in their other hand.

And then, just like that, they were gone. Not even thirty seconds had passed before James found himself alone on the side street near his dormitory. It wouldn't be for another hour before someone found him there. The thief, one of the Briston Gassers, was never caught.

Some weird thing that came to mind after reading about the Mad Gasser of Mattoon!

 

[St. Clover]

Tariel leaned closer to the wall. He pressed his ear against the aged metal and closed his eyes. He listened. There was a light hum from the pipes that snaked through every passageway in the city, but something else too. Every few seconds it happened: a quiet ringing, like a wind chime.

Perfect. He opened his eyes and took a step back, looking around the room. Nothing occupied the space beyond the standard living affair common to the mid-level hab bunks - a desk and chair, small bed and locker for storing personal effects. It was a few steps down from the personal quarters afforded to guild-affiliated adepts like himself, but he wouldn't have been ashamed to call it home.

"Got a live one!" he called out through the open door.

Out in the corridor there was a shuffling, then a figure loomed in the entryway. Largely hidden beneath the plush coat she wore, Asalee made for a curious sight.

"What are we thinking?" she asked, leaning in to inspect the room.

"Dinner Bell," Tariel answered.

He tapped the wall where he'd just been listening, said: "Lines up with what we were taught, and it's pretty consistent. Maybe two, three seconds each ring."

"Sounds about right - weird they'd get that here of all places, though." Asalee spoke as she entered the room, closing the door behind her.

"Yeah; these things usually pop up where there's more..." Tariel trailed off.

"Harmonics," Asalee finished for him.

"That's what I was going to say."

The look she gave him before rolling her eyes made Tariel snort a bit. She ignored his antics and went over to the desk, where she removed her coat and hung it from the chair.

"How long you think it'll take to clear this place out?" he asked.

Now free of the coat she detested with no equal, Asalee turned her glowing eyes to the spot Tariel had indicated. She walked over and pressed her ear to the wall, listening. When she was satisfied, she looked at her client and flashed three deathly pale fingers.

"Shifts?" Tariel asked with unfound hope.

"Days," Asalee corrected.

Tariel groaned.

"Working around a lot of machinery, here. Going to need to be careful I don't muck something up and get the Pickets on both our asses."

"You said you knew what you were doing."

Asalee frowned. "Think you could do any better?"

Tariel said nothing.

"That's what I thought; now stop moping around and make yourself useful. There's some chalk in my pack outside, bring it over here and make a couple marks where I point."

"Whatever you say, boss."

"Keep talking like that and you're buying dinner next time - upper-spire stuff, too!"

The door squealed as it was opened.

Tariel's voice echoed into the room: "How the hes did I end up like this?"

"You've got a thing for magic and being told what to do; now quit the gabbing and get in here! Sooner we can get this done, the sooner I can get back to my heat lamp."

The cast of characters grows with the introduction of the Whisper* Asalee!

*Whispers are strange folk formed when a Will-O-Wisp enters an area with enough lingering psychic energy that it gaslights itself into thinking it's a person, and actually becomes one. They're rare in the furnace-city of Telmora, but infrequently seen among the nomad clans of the taiga.

 

[St. Clover]

Tariel frowned and opened his eyes just enough to peek around the room.

Lit by only the usual candles he kept burning on his desk, his single-occupant abode was otherwise bathed in a sea of shadow. Years of living with the long nights made his low-light vision better than his ancestors, so he was able to make out the sparse furniture and shelves he'd been provided on joining the Albaya. Sometimes he wondered if he'd have ever been able to afford such a room without the ration-credit rate allotted to members of the civic guilds. He doubted it.

"I can hear you out there," he called out into the darkness by the door.

"Good, you should've been up twenty minutes ago." The muffled voice was followed with another bang on too-thin buttersteel door.

A groan escaped his lips as Tariel sat up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

"What happened to the dead needing their rest?" he joked.

"Not dead yet - come on, Olega wanted us in the chapel before daybreak."

"They move the funeral up?"

"What do you think?"

Tariel thought the Numen were trying to save time and putting the Consorts into crunch-time, if he were being honest. But he kept those thoughts to himself as he pushed the blankets away and swung his legs out over the side of the bed.

"Fine, give me... ten minutes?"

"You've got five."

He'd need three, but those extra two were a nice bonus.

"Want I should meet you there?" he asked, rising to his hooves with a little wobble.

"Think I'd wait up for you to fall back asleep? Hes no; I'm just here to say I tried to get your furry butt out of bed."

Tariel rolled his eyes. "Yeah, well some of us have more to do than send hex-mail to people for a few extra credits."

"Keeps me fed, don't it?"

It did, he had to admit. Not just the hex-mail, most of the spellwork the Vounu did was crucial to keeping the clan alive in more ways than most cared to admit. Thirty years did little to soften people's views on the arcane when it was responsible for the fall of the City, but it was too useful to just abandon entirely. Better to be reborn with these new pioneers than shackled by tradition, was a common take on the subject.

"Got me there."

"Good. Now get dressed, I'll see you there."

Tariel waited until the footsteps retreated down the hall before moving over to the old cabinet where he stored his less ceremonial gowns and veils. This wasn't going to be a formal event, so he saw no need to root through the nearby chest for one of the more traditional outfits of the corpse guild. This was going to be a simple meeting, and he was going to be back asleep in no time. He repeated that as he cracked the cabinet open, and reached inside for the first thing he saw...

More of Tariel and Asalee! This was for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

Tariel eased his way down the narrow corridor, taking care where his hooves went. To the casual observer it must've looked like the young man was playing a game of some sort - the way he would take a step, pause, take another step and repeat, sometimes in a different direction than before.

But to Tariel, it was no game. He knew the entire space was filled with a dangerous, invisible enemy that'd claimed its share of victims over the years. He did his best to recall the outline he'd seen when Asalee had thrown the copper nugget. The Albaya had something of a trained photographic memory, but the stress of the situation made it difficult to get the focus he needed. He'd have to rely on his own talents of observation to-

A sharp pain cut into his hip. Every muscle in his body went stiff as a board in an instant - he knew he'd made a mistake, and now he was paying for it.

Looking down, he saw a clean cut through the dark spidersilk gown he wore. Blood welled up through the sheer fabric, telling him all he needed to know about the threat he faced; even the blade-turning weird that guarded him offered no real safety from the anomaly.

He focused his witch-force on the wound, willing it staunched and numbed. His body would begin to heal itself shortly - he was thankful for the quickened metabolism that came from the psychic talents afforded to him by the corpse guild. Staying alive was the only way to care for the dead, after all.

Now he had to see if he could make it through this winding maze of unseen razorwire and its scalpels without joining them.

Got one for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

Tariel stared into the depths of the foul-smelling puddle. "This what you were talking about?"

Asalee nodded. "Yep; prime specimin, too."

"It's just some water mixed with oil - how the hes is this supposed to be dangerous?"

"Never been topside much, have you?"

Tariel winced.

"A few times," he admitted. "The Albaya don't tend to stray far from home, much less go roaming."

"First time for everything, then."

Asalee took out a stone from her pack and tossed it into the puddle. Almost instantly the fire sprang up, starting from where the rock had landed and spreading outward. It took a few seconds for the entire thing to go up, burning a horrid yellow-green flame.

Tariel nearly fell over trying to put some distance between himself and the anomaly.

"Fire Water!" Asalee explained, crouching by the small lake of fire. "Gets riled up real easy-like; just one ripple's enough to start it going."

"And these can be any old puddle?!" Tariel found it possible to get paler than he already was.

Asalee nodded. "Only way to tell's if you can smell it first, or catch the sheen."

"But it'll just burn itself out after a while, right?"

"Not lucky enough for that luxury, nope."

Tariel blanched. "Do they at least stay this small...?"

"Biggest one recorded was a stream - ran down the side of a mountain, stayed alight up until a Sunburst reset everything."

"Goddess," Tariel said, horrified.

Asalee grinned. "Think she'd like to knock back a glass sometime? Sure seems like her style."

And one more for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

Tariel moved down the hallway with the slowness of a glacier. He made sure his hooves went exactly where he intended them, knowing what awaited him if he made even a single misstep. He was sure he looked strange to the casual observer: the way he took a step, paused, considered his surroundings and repeated every couple of seconds. It might've even been a game of some sort - he certainly wished it was.

Though he couldn't see it, an invisible killer was in the passageway with him - Asalee had called it the Bramble, and he'd caught a glimpse of it when she'd thrown a copper nut down the way: rows of coiling barbs and razors that hung suspended in the air, ready to shred anything unlucky enough to brush up against them, all sparking and humming with energy from contact with the lure.

And Goddess they were sharp.

In just the first stretch of his journey through the treacherous maze, he'd made a wrong move and brushed against one of the thorns. The cut had been so fine, so painless that he'd only noticed it when the blood from the wound seeped through his fur and into the spidersilk of his gown. The sheer fabric had clung to him and given him a moment of pause, prompting him to look down and notice the dark splotch on his hip. It'd been sobering to see firsthand that the witch-force that usually protected him was worthless here, even as he redirected its power to staunch the wound.

That had been nearly ten minutes ago, and he'd added a few more marks to the collection.

"How you doing in there?"

"Been better!" he called back.

Not more than a few meters ahead, where the open door at the end of the passage stood, Asalee poked her head out.

"Having fun?" she asked.

"Real fun!"

"Looks it - think I was joking about the surface now?"

Tariel snorted. He kept his tail close and his arms at his sides; the last thing he wanted was to be a carved up Frostival Dinned-worthy faun.

"This is just a small patch of the stuff, by the way," Asalee said and gestured to the deceptively empty air. "Most of the old towns and roads are littered with the stuff."

"Hes," Tariel cursed, "how do people even live up here!"

"Lots of trial and error!"

Asalee squinted at his progress. "Having a Vounu helps, too - we know all the ins and outs of how these things work."

"Got any helpful advice for now?"

"Stop thinking your fancy blood magic's going to save you from everything under the sun." She frowned. "Right now you're one slip away from getting minced; Hes, I doubt even Olega could stop all the blood she'd lose if she ran into one of these things."

"That bad?" Tariel winced, pausing when Asalee motioned.

"Seen someone lose an arm to one before," she said. "And he was in one of those machine-suits."

Tariel was thankful to the Goddess and every other spirit he was freed of the maze just a few steps later. The mental image of one of the legendary Armigers losing a limb to some invisible hate-wire did wonders for his confidence of staying alive for the next few months.

Did a rewrite of a recent post! Once more for Ashvaliaen !

 

[St. Clover]

Charles leaned against the rail, listening to the rain and thunder as he often did when it stormed. The usual sounds of the bustling town were quiet now, most people sheltering in from the warm and wet downpour.

"Going to be out here all night, old man?"

Charles looked back.

Topaz stood at the doorway, eyeing him with her usual skepticism. She held an umbrella in her hand.

"Long as it takes to avoid hitting the showers," he joked.

The way she frowned made him smile. He turned his attention back to the harbor across the way and the ships that filled it. Dozens of lights -- red and green mostly -- flashed and burned in the night. Some swayed while others remained resolute, braving the waves tossed up from the wind. He thought he saw a faint hint of gold towards the far wall that separated the sea from the cove. Was that the local catfish deity, Otis (the Destroyer of Lesser Sardines) or something else, he wondered?

"Gross."

He looked back, still smiling.

Her nostrils flared. "Sure you don't want me to throw that bucket of Everclean on you? Enchanted it myself, y'know."

Charles snorted. "And risk ruining the polish on my chrome? Please."

"Doubt anything'd ruin those gaudy implants," Topaz said, venturing out into the downpour.

True to her nature as a Vounu, one gesture kept the rain from touching her. Fat, heavy drops hit an invisible oval and splashed down around her. A few seconds later and she was leaning against the rail beside him, tail swaying idly in the warm summer breeze.

"My mane gets soaked, you're paying for it."

"Your fault for not keeping it trimmed."

She frowned. "Seen the styles the caravans have going on right now? Please - I try to keep a bit more stylish than that."

Charles gestured with a chrome finger at the boxer's locks she kept in vogue, a trend that died out around the time he retired ten years ago. "That include the little surprise you keep in there?"

Topaz blinked, seemingly surprised he remembered the one faux length of her mane she kept folded over, banded and laced with broken glass for those barfights that got out of control. "How'd you-?"

"C'mon, Scales." Now it was his turn to give a little sass, rolling his eyes dramatically. "Third one down on the left side, got about a cup's worth of the stuff glued in with magic or something."

"Bastard."

"Got more than just a pretty face - how you think I made it pro?"

"Cheating?"

"In those circuits? Please; everyone was doing something to get a little edge up."

"Totally - everyone was going out and spending enough guild sterling to stitch sky-metal to their arms and punch people with it!" Topaz's tail-mane bristled. "Just like they were also jamming bits of shiverstone in their heads to keep the high going after downing Alisa knows what!"

Charles said nothing.

"You know I hate it when you say that crap, old man."

"I know."

"Then why don't you do something? I keep telling you, weirding's come a long way since those days. There might be something that can-"

"Not happening."

"Charles, please."

"Nope." Charles shook his head. "Made my decision, going to pay the price of it. Was that paranormal stuff that got me into this mess, not going to let it screw me over again. Even said it yourself, this stuff's not an exact science."

Now it was Topaz's turn to stay silent, ears folded back.

"Besides, the headaches are getting better." Charles found it in himself to shrug.

"Have you at least been taking the pills that cleric gave you?"

"The ones from the Abbey?"

"Yeah."

"Why you think I'm out here in the middle of the night, arguing with my niece?"

"Too stubborn to kick the bucket just yet?"

"Not happening anytime soon, kid."

"Better not; I know a guy and he'd get your ghost back here so I could kick your ass if you did."

"I'd like to see you try, Scales. I'd like to see you try."

One for... St. Clover ! Scandalous!