Live and Let Die (16/8) - Jaezred
Aug 18, 2022 11:50:04 GMT
Anthony, Velania Kalugina, and 4 more like this
Post by Jaezred Vandree on Aug 18, 2022 11:50:04 GMT
Content Warning: mentions of suicide
(Continued from The Woman In Blue.)
Three days ago.
In a dark, candlelit room, Jaezred Vandree shuffled his cards. The black-and-white tarot flowed off his palms almost like water as he cut, stripped, scrambled, and spread the cards around as the thick smoke of incense filled the air. All the while, he presented a single question to the spirits of the Witching Court in his mind.
How do I find the Pendarvis house within the Lurkwood?
The first card he drew depicted a grand stone castle and a smiling couple under a garland held up by wooden poles — the Four of Wands. Home. The spirits were showing that they understood his question.
The second card he laid on the table was upside-down, illustrating a young man holding a wooden staff, standing against a barren landscape — the Page of Wands. Jaezred frowned. Inverted, it represented a lack of direction, a feeling of lostness.
The final card was a great wheel of hermetic symbols, held aloft in the heavens by three mystical creatures — the Wheel of Fortune. Destiny, fate, inevitability.
The drow lord leaned back in his chair. Omens from the spirits were often cryptic in this way, but this time, he understood clearly what they were trying to tell him.
The Pendarvis house is not meant to be found. One does not happen upon it. Rather, if one is meant to find the house, it will find them.
Present.
“Majesty. I have returned from the Lurkwood.”
“Lord Jaezred, I trust your expedition was fruitful?”
“Very fruitful, my Queen. I have learned almost everything I wanted to know.”
“Almost?” Nicnevin raises a brow as she asks the question.
“Well, we still do not know who or what her conspirator is, though it is looking more likely that it’s a simulacrum.”
“That would track with the current presumptions made. What, pray tell, did you find then in the Lurkwood, Lord Jaezred?”
“We found the Pendarvis family house. Lady Novan was there, of course, waiting for me. The house, in reality, was a dilapidated ruin, but she wove some transmutation magic around it to provide us an…interactive storytelling experience, shall we say?
“The tale begins in Year 1134 of the Dalereckoning. The patriarch of the House of Pendarvis, Alistir, has manipulated his entire family into thinking that they needed to sacrifice themselves to help him become a lich. For the family. He’s one of those types; even found a patron in Orcus, the Demon Prince of Undeath. His son, Olyn, invented these purple crystals that harvested souls for the phylactery, and then the souls of his closest kin — son Olyn, wife Unn, brother Manus — were to power a ward on the door behind which the phylactery would be hidden. A door under the stairs in the house, leading down into a basement with an altar to Orcus.
“The final piece of the puzzle was his daughter, Novan. The ‘engine that would keep the family going’, as he so eloquently put it. Unfortunately for Lord Alistir, his two children weren’t as thrilled as the others about his schemes. However, Olyn died before he could stand up to his lord father. Thus it was just Alistir and Novan left. Alistir ordered Novan to kill herself for him and…she disintegrated him. Orcus was displeased and the phylactery was broken into two fragments.”
“I see. So from that we are to presume this woman is continuing the work of her brother, creating these creatures for harvesting? But harvesting despair and pain are different to harvesting souls, Lord Jaezred, have you learnt much of where or what this alteration serves?”
“Indeed. I cannot be sure at this point in time, but I believe the gems still serve the same ultimate purpose but are more efficient than the conventional method. It likely has something to do with the phylactery, at the very least.”
“As for the betrayal against her father, are you certain that is the series of events as they happened? According to the date you provided this was several hundred years ago. How accurate is this information?”
“There is not much reason to doubt the version of events she has shown us. We can operate under the assumption that it is accurate for the time being.”
“A more pressing question: why was she inviting you to show you this?”
“Oh, she wanted me to be the one who breaks the seal on the door. Either for fun, or because she’s still traumatised by it all. Or both.”
“Either way, this is a troubling concept. For someone who has evaded detection for so long and seems to take so many precautions, such flamboyancy seems out of character. Should we consider her to be far more reckless than we have so far, or was this a calculated act?”
The light in the ritual chamber dims briefly as the glow of the moon reflected in the large, suspended crystal on the ceiling is temporarily obscured by a passing cloud.
“No matter,” says Nicnevin. “Either case would require we utilise caution. What of this split phylactery?”
“She was in possession of one fragment. Now she has both.”
Once again, the archfey raises an inquisitive eyebrow. “I would be most interested to hear the details of how that came to be.”
“No doubt my decision would be seen as controversial, Majesty, but I let her walk away with it in peace. By the time we reached the basement, two members of my party had refused to continue exploring the house as they were too shaken by what they’d seen and experienced. With only the three of us, I knew we couldn’t have won that fight. However, even if we did take the fragment away from her or killed her there, it is my sincere belief that we would merely be delaying the same, inevitable result.”
What he has not stated but trusts Nicnevin can infer is that Novan must have a contingent clone hidden away somewhere. The spell must also be how she has stayed alive for this long despite being human. At least, that is his guess.
Nicnevin nods slowly. “Quite an astute assessment. I am intrigued now, however — what had exactly shaken your team so much as to cause them to leave? I understand the adventuring community of the Dawnlands are quite the robust type.”
“Some personal and general trauma. There are a lot in the adventuring community who have had bad experiences with parental figures, myself included. One of them also did not believe that we should open the door.”
“I trust they have come to no significant permanent harm?”
“Nothing to worry about, Your Majesty. And they have all been compensated for their work.”
“And what remains? This woman has the phylactery but I presume we do not know where she has taken it or exactly what her intentions are?”
“For now, we have to proceed under the assumption that she, like her father before her, intends to achieve lichdom. If that is right, then she has hastened her own doom.”
“You sound rather sure of that claim.”
Jaezred smiles up at his queen. Where she has previously seen uncertainty and anxiety in him regarding the matter of the woman in blue, there is now only assuredness. “She would attain magnificent power, that much is true. But power is a burden — one has to be strong enough to carry what one has taken for oneself, and Novan Pendarvis would be crushed under it by the weight of a thousand adventurers raring to destroy a lich.”
Nicnevin smiles a knowing smile. “Another bold statement. One that, while no doubt has some weight to it, is oblivious to the many who are currently not being crushed by their weight. Often, in fact, manipulating that weight to suit their own agenda… I have no doubt we shall see soon enough the sort she will prove to be, given her proclivity for wandering activity, but for now, Lord Jaezred, what exactly do you plan to do? Is there anything else you have come upon?”
“There is, Majesty.” He extends his left hand out to her, showing her the P-shaped mark on the palm. “I have discovered what the mark does. When I am in the vicinity of Novan Pendarvis, spells that I cast may sometimes fail, and when that happens, she is rejuvenated by it.”
Her eyes narrow at this news, a frown settling over her mossy-green eyes. “Anything else?”
“I have also collected the gemstones that held Olyn’s, Manus’s, and Unn’s souls. They are inert now, but perhaps Star on the Horizon can find out something about them.” One by one, he fishes out three gemstones — red, green, and pink — from his coat pocket and lays them on his right palm.
Nicnevin waves a hand in a small, circular gesture and the three gems slowly float off his hand, gently beginning to tumble and rotate in the air between them as she watches them. “Perhaps. If your account is to be believed, however, they are a few centuries behind on whatever developments this woman has achieved already. But we shall see what secrets they may reveal.”
With another small gesture, the gemstones float to a few feet away from her, where they hang in gently tumbling stasis. She turns her gaze back to the warlock before her.
“Show me this mark again.”
He obeys her command. She studies the symbol with scrutiny from the dais where she stands. The frown does not leave her face, creating a beautiful picture of frustration towering over his outstretched hand.
A few moments pass in silence before she finally speaks again. “Vulgar. An abhorrent malformation of the gift I bestow. I should scour its influence and would take great pleasure in doing so if I did not think there might be more to learn from this.”
This display of anger from her surprises Jaezred slightly. She is visibly pissed off — his pact magic was her gift to give; she cannot tolerate the idea of someone else taking it away or leeching from it.
“Ah, I had planned to cut off this hand and regrow it. Perhaps I should delay that, then?” he asks.
After a moment’s consideration, her expression relaxes. “I shall leave that to your discretion for now, Lord Jaezred. I trust you will act with the interest of the Court in mind.”
He withdraws his hand and bows deeply to her. “Of course, Majesty. I am ever at your service.”
Later that night, he attempts casting dream in both the Material Plane and the Feywild, but the spell is unable to reach his intended target. Pouting, he climbs back into bed next to Imryll.
“Nothing. If she’s becoming a lich soon, then the window of time in which I am able to contact her with dream is narrowing rapidly. I might have missed my chance to bed her,” he complains.
“Well now… That’s not strictly true,” the spring eladrin replies. “Probably frowned upon at least, of course, but I’d wager it’s still possible.”
He makes a disgusted face. “What, you mean physically, in the real world? After she’s become undead? Surely that is some form of necrophilia.”
“It definitely is, darling.”
“Hey, if I don’t touch the rotting, desiccating parts of her, it doesn’t count as necrophilia, right?”
“Well, to be fair, I have met a few undead now who definitely maintained their libido after death. Maybe we can find her a lovely shambling corpse to love?”
“With extra-sagging tits and parts constantly about to fall off? Ugh, no thank you.” He grins and lays a hand on her knee. “Do you know why I am attracted to her? Aside from being a beautiful, petite redhead, of course. It’s because she reminds me of you.”
“Well now I am intrigued! Does she have my measurements?”
“She’s an enigmatic tease just like you, with a big ego to match,” he says with a chuckle.
She sighs. “Perhaps it’s best we don’t meet, then… There simply won’t be enough room left for you, dear.”
“Au contraire, my lady, that prospect sounds terribly enticing to me. Needless to say, however, you are infinitely better than her in every way.”
“Naturally.” She smiles before planting a kiss on his lips.
The hand on her knee slowly travels up her body, tracing the curve of her svelte figure, feeling the soft silk of her nightgown on his skin, and he pulls her close for a second kiss, then a third, then a fourth. A physical reminder of who and what he is fighting to protect.
“I love you. More than anything in the world.”
(Continued in The Woman In Blue 6.)
Co-written with the magnificent Anthony.
(Continued from The Woman In Blue.)
Three days ago.
In a dark, candlelit room, Jaezred Vandree shuffled his cards. The black-and-white tarot flowed off his palms almost like water as he cut, stripped, scrambled, and spread the cards around as the thick smoke of incense filled the air. All the while, he presented a single question to the spirits of the Witching Court in his mind.
How do I find the Pendarvis house within the Lurkwood?
The first card he drew depicted a grand stone castle and a smiling couple under a garland held up by wooden poles — the Four of Wands. Home. The spirits were showing that they understood his question.
The second card he laid on the table was upside-down, illustrating a young man holding a wooden staff, standing against a barren landscape — the Page of Wands. Jaezred frowned. Inverted, it represented a lack of direction, a feeling of lostness.
The final card was a great wheel of hermetic symbols, held aloft in the heavens by three mystical creatures — the Wheel of Fortune. Destiny, fate, inevitability.
The drow lord leaned back in his chair. Omens from the spirits were often cryptic in this way, but this time, he understood clearly what they were trying to tell him.
The Pendarvis house is not meant to be found. One does not happen upon it. Rather, if one is meant to find the house, it will find them.
Present.
“Majesty. I have returned from the Lurkwood.”
“Lord Jaezred, I trust your expedition was fruitful?”
“Very fruitful, my Queen. I have learned almost everything I wanted to know.”
“Almost?” Nicnevin raises a brow as she asks the question.
“Well, we still do not know who or what her conspirator is, though it is looking more likely that it’s a simulacrum.”
“That would track with the current presumptions made. What, pray tell, did you find then in the Lurkwood, Lord Jaezred?”
“We found the Pendarvis family house. Lady Novan was there, of course, waiting for me. The house, in reality, was a dilapidated ruin, but she wove some transmutation magic around it to provide us an…interactive storytelling experience, shall we say?
“The tale begins in Year 1134 of the Dalereckoning. The patriarch of the House of Pendarvis, Alistir, has manipulated his entire family into thinking that they needed to sacrifice themselves to help him become a lich. For the family. He’s one of those types; even found a patron in Orcus, the Demon Prince of Undeath. His son, Olyn, invented these purple crystals that harvested souls for the phylactery, and then the souls of his closest kin — son Olyn, wife Unn, brother Manus — were to power a ward on the door behind which the phylactery would be hidden. A door under the stairs in the house, leading down into a basement with an altar to Orcus.
“The final piece of the puzzle was his daughter, Novan. The ‘engine that would keep the family going’, as he so eloquently put it. Unfortunately for Lord Alistir, his two children weren’t as thrilled as the others about his schemes. However, Olyn died before he could stand up to his lord father. Thus it was just Alistir and Novan left. Alistir ordered Novan to kill herself for him and…she disintegrated him. Orcus was displeased and the phylactery was broken into two fragments.”
“I see. So from that we are to presume this woman is continuing the work of her brother, creating these creatures for harvesting? But harvesting despair and pain are different to harvesting souls, Lord Jaezred, have you learnt much of where or what this alteration serves?”
“Indeed. I cannot be sure at this point in time, but I believe the gems still serve the same ultimate purpose but are more efficient than the conventional method. It likely has something to do with the phylactery, at the very least.”
“As for the betrayal against her father, are you certain that is the series of events as they happened? According to the date you provided this was several hundred years ago. How accurate is this information?”
“There is not much reason to doubt the version of events she has shown us. We can operate under the assumption that it is accurate for the time being.”
“A more pressing question: why was she inviting you to show you this?”
“Oh, she wanted me to be the one who breaks the seal on the door. Either for fun, or because she’s still traumatised by it all. Or both.”
“Either way, this is a troubling concept. For someone who has evaded detection for so long and seems to take so many precautions, such flamboyancy seems out of character. Should we consider her to be far more reckless than we have so far, or was this a calculated act?”
The light in the ritual chamber dims briefly as the glow of the moon reflected in the large, suspended crystal on the ceiling is temporarily obscured by a passing cloud.
“No matter,” says Nicnevin. “Either case would require we utilise caution. What of this split phylactery?”
“She was in possession of one fragment. Now she has both.”
Once again, the archfey raises an inquisitive eyebrow. “I would be most interested to hear the details of how that came to be.”
“No doubt my decision would be seen as controversial, Majesty, but I let her walk away with it in peace. By the time we reached the basement, two members of my party had refused to continue exploring the house as they were too shaken by what they’d seen and experienced. With only the three of us, I knew we couldn’t have won that fight. However, even if we did take the fragment away from her or killed her there, it is my sincere belief that we would merely be delaying the same, inevitable result.”
What he has not stated but trusts Nicnevin can infer is that Novan must have a contingent clone hidden away somewhere. The spell must also be how she has stayed alive for this long despite being human. At least, that is his guess.
Nicnevin nods slowly. “Quite an astute assessment. I am intrigued now, however — what had exactly shaken your team so much as to cause them to leave? I understand the adventuring community of the Dawnlands are quite the robust type.”
“Some personal and general trauma. There are a lot in the adventuring community who have had bad experiences with parental figures, myself included. One of them also did not believe that we should open the door.”
“I trust they have come to no significant permanent harm?”
“Nothing to worry about, Your Majesty. And they have all been compensated for their work.”
“And what remains? This woman has the phylactery but I presume we do not know where she has taken it or exactly what her intentions are?”
“For now, we have to proceed under the assumption that she, like her father before her, intends to achieve lichdom. If that is right, then she has hastened her own doom.”
“You sound rather sure of that claim.”
Jaezred smiles up at his queen. Where she has previously seen uncertainty and anxiety in him regarding the matter of the woman in blue, there is now only assuredness. “She would attain magnificent power, that much is true. But power is a burden — one has to be strong enough to carry what one has taken for oneself, and Novan Pendarvis would be crushed under it by the weight of a thousand adventurers raring to destroy a lich.”
Nicnevin smiles a knowing smile. “Another bold statement. One that, while no doubt has some weight to it, is oblivious to the many who are currently not being crushed by their weight. Often, in fact, manipulating that weight to suit their own agenda… I have no doubt we shall see soon enough the sort she will prove to be, given her proclivity for wandering activity, but for now, Lord Jaezred, what exactly do you plan to do? Is there anything else you have come upon?”
“There is, Majesty.” He extends his left hand out to her, showing her the P-shaped mark on the palm. “I have discovered what the mark does. When I am in the vicinity of Novan Pendarvis, spells that I cast may sometimes fail, and when that happens, she is rejuvenated by it.”
Her eyes narrow at this news, a frown settling over her mossy-green eyes. “Anything else?”
“I have also collected the gemstones that held Olyn’s, Manus’s, and Unn’s souls. They are inert now, but perhaps Star on the Horizon can find out something about them.” One by one, he fishes out three gemstones — red, green, and pink — from his coat pocket and lays them on his right palm.
Nicnevin waves a hand in a small, circular gesture and the three gems slowly float off his hand, gently beginning to tumble and rotate in the air between them as she watches them. “Perhaps. If your account is to be believed, however, they are a few centuries behind on whatever developments this woman has achieved already. But we shall see what secrets they may reveal.”
With another small gesture, the gemstones float to a few feet away from her, where they hang in gently tumbling stasis. She turns her gaze back to the warlock before her.
“Show me this mark again.”
He obeys her command. She studies the symbol with scrutiny from the dais where she stands. The frown does not leave her face, creating a beautiful picture of frustration towering over his outstretched hand.
A few moments pass in silence before she finally speaks again. “Vulgar. An abhorrent malformation of the gift I bestow. I should scour its influence and would take great pleasure in doing so if I did not think there might be more to learn from this.”
This display of anger from her surprises Jaezred slightly. She is visibly pissed off — his pact magic was her gift to give; she cannot tolerate the idea of someone else taking it away or leeching from it.
“Ah, I had planned to cut off this hand and regrow it. Perhaps I should delay that, then?” he asks.
After a moment’s consideration, her expression relaxes. “I shall leave that to your discretion for now, Lord Jaezred. I trust you will act with the interest of the Court in mind.”
He withdraws his hand and bows deeply to her. “Of course, Majesty. I am ever at your service.”
Later that night, he attempts casting dream in both the Material Plane and the Feywild, but the spell is unable to reach his intended target. Pouting, he climbs back into bed next to Imryll.
“Nothing. If she’s becoming a lich soon, then the window of time in which I am able to contact her with dream is narrowing rapidly. I might have missed my chance to bed her,” he complains.
“Well now… That’s not strictly true,” the spring eladrin replies. “Probably frowned upon at least, of course, but I’d wager it’s still possible.”
He makes a disgusted face. “What, you mean physically, in the real world? After she’s become undead? Surely that is some form of necrophilia.”
“It definitely is, darling.”
“Hey, if I don’t touch the rotting, desiccating parts of her, it doesn’t count as necrophilia, right?”
“Well, to be fair, I have met a few undead now who definitely maintained their libido after death. Maybe we can find her a lovely shambling corpse to love?”
“With extra-sagging tits and parts constantly about to fall off? Ugh, no thank you.” He grins and lays a hand on her knee. “Do you know why I am attracted to her? Aside from being a beautiful, petite redhead, of course. It’s because she reminds me of you.”
“Well now I am intrigued! Does she have my measurements?”
“She’s an enigmatic tease just like you, with a big ego to match,” he says with a chuckle.
She sighs. “Perhaps it’s best we don’t meet, then… There simply won’t be enough room left for you, dear.”
“Au contraire, my lady, that prospect sounds terribly enticing to me. Needless to say, however, you are infinitely better than her in every way.”
“Naturally.” She smiles before planting a kiss on his lips.
The hand on her knee slowly travels up her body, tracing the curve of her svelte figure, feeling the soft silk of her nightgown on his skin, and he pulls her close for a second kiss, then a third, then a fourth. A physical reminder of who and what he is fighting to protect.
“I love you. More than anything in the world.”
(Continued in The Woman In Blue 6.)
Co-written with the magnificent Anthony.
