Scarlet Vengeance - Celina Zabinski - 15/09/22
Mar 20, 2023 23:03:08 GMT
Derthaad and Andy D like this
Post by Celina Zabinski on Mar 20, 2023 23:03:08 GMT
Time To Stab Your Attention
Written by Celina Zabinski and the wonderful Derthaad
Celina gets back to her shop in Port Ffirst quickly after her recent adventure. She feels very pleased with herself. She quickly goes in the door and makes her way to the front desk of her shop. She is holding the dragon's horn in her hand and she places it on the counter. She crosses her hands and places them on the table. She slowly brings her head down so she's resting her face on her arm and she stares at the horn lost in her own world.
She ponders, lost in the labyrinth of her own mind, until a bell finds her. It's the small jingle of the front door of her shop. As she looks up, she sees the oh so familiar visage of a blue dragonborn, standing in the entrance, not saying a word as the door closes behind him.
Celina changes her eyes towards the door and she grins “Derthaad, didn’t expect you to follow me here. You looking for apples?”
He hid his concern for her behind another one of his smiles, trying his best to match Celina's. "Maybe..." he picks up a singular golden apple, looking at it thoughtfully, "maybe just one..." his head then lifts, meeting her gaze, not yet taking a bite from the apple. "How you holding up after... all of that," he asks, waving his free hand in the air.
Celina smiles “I feel good. You know. We killed that freakin’ stupid good for nothing dragon. I killed it”. Celina points towards the horn, wrapped up in her own world.
"You did, but," he says with a smile that does not radiate over to his eyes, "you don't seem that convinced about it feeling... good."
Celina looks over confused “What makes you say that?”
"Just a hunch," he replies with a shrug. He looks at her and cannot help but feel sympathy for her, the same feeling he had when he first visited her after the war. Does revenge truly help with the void that has been left behind by a loved one's passing... or does it merely widen it? "So what now? What comes after the revenge?"
Celina is stunned but holds it back. After the dragon she killed she was running on the high of it. But suddenly cracks start to form hearing Derthaad’s words. Is that really what Sammy would have wanted? She shoves the answer to that aside. She looks up to Dethaad who always knows just the right words to get under her skin. How does he do that? She shrugs it off and looks over to Derthaad trying to remain somewhat calm
“We celebrate. You up for some drinks? I have a secret stash of booze in the corner here”.
Derthaad shakes his head in disbelief, a small sad smirk on his face as, again, Celina dances around the issue in front of her. For a second, he questions whether she is as great in an actual dance. Maybe one day the world will find out, but his mind is so pressed on the aftermath of what has transpired today that he has no time to continue down such research. Should he press forward about this vengeance quest, or should she give her this one moment of respite? "Let me guess, some special apple cider?" he asks finally, a tone of his usual self peeking up through the quiet.
Celina chuckles “Ha, you know I did have that idea once. But have yet to follow up with that”. Celina gets up and retrieves a bottle of red wine she had stashed behind a picture frame. “I got this though”.
Derthaad sighs, seemingly as if he was holding something in "Heh... of course it's wine," he says with a grin. "Is it at least good wine and not another cheap one?"
Celina grins “Hey, booze is booze. This stuff is the…”, she turns the bottle and stares at it questioningly “good stuff… sure”.
"Even you aren't able to hide how cheap and thus how horrible it may be, huh," says Derthaad with a small chuckle. "Alright... be right back," he finishes as he holds up his right hand, arcane energy build up in two of his fingers, jabs them in mid-air as if poking into space itself and tears open reality into a brief portal as it engulfs Derthaad and, in a blink, he disappears from the shop.
Celina blinks in shock and confusion. Damn how did Derthaad do that? Would be a handy spell to know. Celina sits in her chair thinking to herself for a few moments. After a few more minutes she gets bored and starts rearranging her apples with her mage hand. She starts making stripes with just the red ones along the green ones. Celina starts to get lost in her own thoughts with the apples.
Suddenly Derthaad appears out of thin air a few minute later, Celina gets startled and accidentally knocks some of the apples on the floor. “Dammit Derthaad! You made me knock everything. Jeesh”. Celina starts picking up the loose apples that fell quickly, a blue ethereal hand appearing near her, helping her. “Oop, sorry,” he replies.
As Celina straightens back up, she notices a different bottle of what seems to be red wine. “Like it?” he asks teasingly. “Got it from the Flourished Hook, so hopefully this meets their reputation."
“Oh you got fancy stuff?”. She grins as she grabs a couple of glasses.
"Or stuff that actually tastes well and not something people use to just get drunk," he finishes with a smirk as he pulls the cork, releasing the pressure inside with a satisfying pop. "Also," he continues, reaching for one of the glasses and starts pouring, "better tasting wine makes for more enjoyable stories."
“Are you mocking my alcohol choices?”, Celina does a fake shocked look and smirks afterwards. “You know me well enough at this stage to know booze is booze”.
"I am judging your alcohol choices," he corrects, returning her smirk. "And one should not have a secret stash with cheap stuff. What's the point of it when you can just get more cheap booze just around the corner? Plus, it's good to go for something different when on special occasions," Derthaad finishes, leaning his glass towards hers. As much as he tries to fully enjoy this moment of peace, his mind cannot help but with worry for her. He knows how it feels to wander aimlessly, to feel like you've got no purpose in life, to have the reason why you kept going to be stripped away. He doesn't want to have the same happen to someone else. For now though, he holds on to the smirk on his face. She, like anyone else, deserves moments of peace and happiness.
Celina laughs “Hey you can get just as drunk off the cheap stuff as the dear stuff. I don’t see the problem”. Celina grins. She knows that sometimes the dear booze tastes better. But she won’t admit that just yet… she reaches for a glass Derthaad poured for her. She stares at it and then she tastes a sip. She is immediately hit with a more decanted range of flavours, which she very much enjoys. She tries to not let her face show she’s enjoying the drink. After another sip she finally says, “I mean this stuff is only alright”.
"Alright?" Derthaad scoffs. "I would say it is better than just 'only alright'," he says, imitating her.
Celina sighs theatrically “I mean I might be stretched to say this is tolerable”.
"Oh no, what a tragedy," he replies even more theatrically, "it has been downgraded from 'alright' to 'tolerable'. I will have to file a formal complaint to the Flourished Hook first thing in the morning."
Celina smirks “Yeah, you should do that Mr Citywatch. You need to save people from the terrible taste of course. I say you’re doing the world a service”. She takes another sip and grins more. As she grins, she realises she is actually enjoying the banter between the two of them. Derthaad always knew what to say back to her. It was different to other people she knew.
"You said that now 'we celebrate', yet we haven't toasted for anything." He eyes her again as he extends his glass forward. "What would you say this toast goes to?"
Celina thinks for a moment and grins “Here’s to us slaying that dragon”. She holds out her glass to cheer against Derthaad’s.
"To us slaying that dragon," he repeats after her and downs his glass of wine. After lowering his glass, he sits for a moment, gaze upwards, taking in the full taste of the wine. He lowers his gaze back down at Celina as she just downed her glass and, for a moment, his mind cannot help but wonder how well the red of the wine matches the red of her skin.
He looks down at his glass, then back at her and with the same grin... "If you go back to the cheap shit after this, I am definitely judging your taste in alcohol."
Celina laughs “Mr Citywatch… so judgy… tut tut tut”. Celina lends back and relaxes. She was having a good time and enjoying Derthaads company. She reaches for the bottle to fill their glasses again.
He chuckles slightly. "Well, at least one of us has to. Shall we make this toast to the future," he asks as Celina is refilling his glass. "Any great plans that the Apple Princess may have for her small little shop?"
Celina laughs “Ha, of course. I want to make this place big. More places… more locations. That would be good”. Celina’s eyes shifts to Derthaad “Want you think? Smart huh?”. She grins
He sighs in slight disappointment. "Really? No apple cider business... no apple pies... just... expand the shop? I thought you were more creative than that," he ends tauntingly as he takes another sip of his wine with a very slight smirk.
“Hey… I am smart…”, Celina grumbles but adds a grin behind it. “All those sound… hard work… but… you know if I was to do something… Oh wait… for this I have this amazing idea, just thought of it there... I might look into starting a… cider business”. Celina grins.
"In which case," he continues a bit more pleased at her foresight into the cider branch, "to... the day we shall share a glass of your fine cider." A small clink can be heard from the glasses as he toasts and then down the whole glass. "And it better be fine and not some cheap cider, you'll need to give these apples the justice they deserve."
His concern for her fades as she starts to talk about her plans for the future. It is relieving to know that this revenge did not consume her fully and that she will have enough strength to push forward.
Celina laughs “Ha, of course it’ll be of the fiiiiiinest quality. I’m sure I’ll have to get some testers to try”.
Derthaad paused, his gaze unfocused, soon after followed by a wide yawn. "Well..." he continues, shaking off the drowsiness and placing the glass on the counter, "I best be going. It's getting late and our little escapade *did* ended up filling our day to the brim."
He gives Celina another fond look, "Take care and until we meet again... your highness."
Celina gives a big grin after Derthaad calls her your highness. But suddenly, as Derthaad looks like he’s going to leave, Celina doesn’t want him too. She reaches for his arms and puts her hand on his. “Leaving so soon? We haven’t even finished this wine…“. Celina holds up the bottle.
He opens his mouth to speak and excuse himself, but upon hearing Celina’s plea he thinks better of it. He looks at her, staring into her eyes, gold meets silver and suddenly all reasons that he may have had to leave for the night seemingly vanish. There is something about the way she asked him to stay, about the way they parted during their last talk, that seemed truthful. He sighs in surrender as he picks up his glass from before but, with a wry smile and without any warning, he disappears from right in front of her, the same tear in reality just like before.
Celina looks stunned for a moment. Then a thought comes to her head angrily “Did he just leave without saying goodbye”. She crosses her arms and sits back. She stares at where he left.
After a minute, Derthaad appears once again with yet another bottle. “Alright then,” he continues, as he plops himself on the ground, back resting against a basket filled with striped gold and red apples, popping the cork of this new bottle. “If I am goin’ to be sticking around for a while longer, you’ll have to start yapping,” he says, smiling, inviting her to share more stories.
Celina laughs and relief washes over her. She is happy he’s back. She grins a bit more and begins telling more elaborate stories.
As the sun rises on the following morning, its rays land on the entrance to the Appley Ever After, stepping inside through the glass, stopping just shy of a basket with striped gold and red apples. Resting their backs against the basket are two figures, fallen asleep, heads resting on each other's shoulders. Asleep after a night of shared wine and stories.
Written by Celina Zabinski and the wonderful Derthaad
Celina gets back to her shop in Port Ffirst quickly after her recent adventure. She feels very pleased with herself. She quickly goes in the door and makes her way to the front desk of her shop. She is holding the dragon's horn in her hand and she places it on the counter. She crosses her hands and places them on the table. She slowly brings her head down so she's resting her face on her arm and she stares at the horn lost in her own world.
She ponders, lost in the labyrinth of her own mind, until a bell finds her. It's the small jingle of the front door of her shop. As she looks up, she sees the oh so familiar visage of a blue dragonborn, standing in the entrance, not saying a word as the door closes behind him.
Celina changes her eyes towards the door and she grins “Derthaad, didn’t expect you to follow me here. You looking for apples?”
He hid his concern for her behind another one of his smiles, trying his best to match Celina's. "Maybe..." he picks up a singular golden apple, looking at it thoughtfully, "maybe just one..." his head then lifts, meeting her gaze, not yet taking a bite from the apple. "How you holding up after... all of that," he asks, waving his free hand in the air.
Celina smiles “I feel good. You know. We killed that freakin’ stupid good for nothing dragon. I killed it”. Celina points towards the horn, wrapped up in her own world.
"You did, but," he says with a smile that does not radiate over to his eyes, "you don't seem that convinced about it feeling... good."
Celina looks over confused “What makes you say that?”
"Just a hunch," he replies with a shrug. He looks at her and cannot help but feel sympathy for her, the same feeling he had when he first visited her after the war. Does revenge truly help with the void that has been left behind by a loved one's passing... or does it merely widen it? "So what now? What comes after the revenge?"
Celina is stunned but holds it back. After the dragon she killed she was running on the high of it. But suddenly cracks start to form hearing Derthaad’s words. Is that really what Sammy would have wanted? She shoves the answer to that aside. She looks up to Dethaad who always knows just the right words to get under her skin. How does he do that? She shrugs it off and looks over to Derthaad trying to remain somewhat calm
“We celebrate. You up for some drinks? I have a secret stash of booze in the corner here”.
Derthaad shakes his head in disbelief, a small sad smirk on his face as, again, Celina dances around the issue in front of her. For a second, he questions whether she is as great in an actual dance. Maybe one day the world will find out, but his mind is so pressed on the aftermath of what has transpired today that he has no time to continue down such research. Should he press forward about this vengeance quest, or should she give her this one moment of respite? "Let me guess, some special apple cider?" he asks finally, a tone of his usual self peeking up through the quiet.
Celina chuckles “Ha, you know I did have that idea once. But have yet to follow up with that”. Celina gets up and retrieves a bottle of red wine she had stashed behind a picture frame. “I got this though”.
Derthaad sighs, seemingly as if he was holding something in "Heh... of course it's wine," he says with a grin. "Is it at least good wine and not another cheap one?"
Celina grins “Hey, booze is booze. This stuff is the…”, she turns the bottle and stares at it questioningly “good stuff… sure”.
"Even you aren't able to hide how cheap and thus how horrible it may be, huh," says Derthaad with a small chuckle. "Alright... be right back," he finishes as he holds up his right hand, arcane energy build up in two of his fingers, jabs them in mid-air as if poking into space itself and tears open reality into a brief portal as it engulfs Derthaad and, in a blink, he disappears from the shop.
Celina blinks in shock and confusion. Damn how did Derthaad do that? Would be a handy spell to know. Celina sits in her chair thinking to herself for a few moments. After a few more minutes she gets bored and starts rearranging her apples with her mage hand. She starts making stripes with just the red ones along the green ones. Celina starts to get lost in her own thoughts with the apples.
Suddenly Derthaad appears out of thin air a few minute later, Celina gets startled and accidentally knocks some of the apples on the floor. “Dammit Derthaad! You made me knock everything. Jeesh”. Celina starts picking up the loose apples that fell quickly, a blue ethereal hand appearing near her, helping her. “Oop, sorry,” he replies.
As Celina straightens back up, she notices a different bottle of what seems to be red wine. “Like it?” he asks teasingly. “Got it from the Flourished Hook, so hopefully this meets their reputation."
“Oh you got fancy stuff?”. She grins as she grabs a couple of glasses.
"Or stuff that actually tastes well and not something people use to just get drunk," he finishes with a smirk as he pulls the cork, releasing the pressure inside with a satisfying pop. "Also," he continues, reaching for one of the glasses and starts pouring, "better tasting wine makes for more enjoyable stories."
“Are you mocking my alcohol choices?”, Celina does a fake shocked look and smirks afterwards. “You know me well enough at this stage to know booze is booze”.
"I am judging your alcohol choices," he corrects, returning her smirk. "And one should not have a secret stash with cheap stuff. What's the point of it when you can just get more cheap booze just around the corner? Plus, it's good to go for something different when on special occasions," Derthaad finishes, leaning his glass towards hers. As much as he tries to fully enjoy this moment of peace, his mind cannot help but with worry for her. He knows how it feels to wander aimlessly, to feel like you've got no purpose in life, to have the reason why you kept going to be stripped away. He doesn't want to have the same happen to someone else. For now though, he holds on to the smirk on his face. She, like anyone else, deserves moments of peace and happiness.
Celina laughs “Hey you can get just as drunk off the cheap stuff as the dear stuff. I don’t see the problem”. Celina grins. She knows that sometimes the dear booze tastes better. But she won’t admit that just yet… she reaches for a glass Derthaad poured for her. She stares at it and then she tastes a sip. She is immediately hit with a more decanted range of flavours, which she very much enjoys. She tries to not let her face show she’s enjoying the drink. After another sip she finally says, “I mean this stuff is only alright”.
"Alright?" Derthaad scoffs. "I would say it is better than just 'only alright'," he says, imitating her.
Celina sighs theatrically “I mean I might be stretched to say this is tolerable”.
"Oh no, what a tragedy," he replies even more theatrically, "it has been downgraded from 'alright' to 'tolerable'. I will have to file a formal complaint to the Flourished Hook first thing in the morning."
Celina smirks “Yeah, you should do that Mr Citywatch. You need to save people from the terrible taste of course. I say you’re doing the world a service”. She takes another sip and grins more. As she grins, she realises she is actually enjoying the banter between the two of them. Derthaad always knew what to say back to her. It was different to other people she knew.
"You said that now 'we celebrate', yet we haven't toasted for anything." He eyes her again as he extends his glass forward. "What would you say this toast goes to?"
Celina thinks for a moment and grins “Here’s to us slaying that dragon”. She holds out her glass to cheer against Derthaad’s.
"To us slaying that dragon," he repeats after her and downs his glass of wine. After lowering his glass, he sits for a moment, gaze upwards, taking in the full taste of the wine. He lowers his gaze back down at Celina as she just downed her glass and, for a moment, his mind cannot help but wonder how well the red of the wine matches the red of her skin.
He looks down at his glass, then back at her and with the same grin... "If you go back to the cheap shit after this, I am definitely judging your taste in alcohol."
Celina laughs “Mr Citywatch… so judgy… tut tut tut”. Celina lends back and relaxes. She was having a good time and enjoying Derthaads company. She reaches for the bottle to fill their glasses again.
He chuckles slightly. "Well, at least one of us has to. Shall we make this toast to the future," he asks as Celina is refilling his glass. "Any great plans that the Apple Princess may have for her small little shop?"
Celina laughs “Ha, of course. I want to make this place big. More places… more locations. That would be good”. Celina’s eyes shifts to Derthaad “Want you think? Smart huh?”. She grins
He sighs in slight disappointment. "Really? No apple cider business... no apple pies... just... expand the shop? I thought you were more creative than that," he ends tauntingly as he takes another sip of his wine with a very slight smirk.
“Hey… I am smart…”, Celina grumbles but adds a grin behind it. “All those sound… hard work… but… you know if I was to do something… Oh wait… for this I have this amazing idea, just thought of it there... I might look into starting a… cider business”. Celina grins.
"In which case," he continues a bit more pleased at her foresight into the cider branch, "to... the day we shall share a glass of your fine cider." A small clink can be heard from the glasses as he toasts and then down the whole glass. "And it better be fine and not some cheap cider, you'll need to give these apples the justice they deserve."
His concern for her fades as she starts to talk about her plans for the future. It is relieving to know that this revenge did not consume her fully and that she will have enough strength to push forward.
Celina laughs “Ha, of course it’ll be of the fiiiiiinest quality. I’m sure I’ll have to get some testers to try”.
Derthaad paused, his gaze unfocused, soon after followed by a wide yawn. "Well..." he continues, shaking off the drowsiness and placing the glass on the counter, "I best be going. It's getting late and our little escapade *did* ended up filling our day to the brim."
He gives Celina another fond look, "Take care and until we meet again... your highness."
Celina gives a big grin after Derthaad calls her your highness. But suddenly, as Derthaad looks like he’s going to leave, Celina doesn’t want him too. She reaches for his arms and puts her hand on his. “Leaving so soon? We haven’t even finished this wine…“. Celina holds up the bottle.
He opens his mouth to speak and excuse himself, but upon hearing Celina’s plea he thinks better of it. He looks at her, staring into her eyes, gold meets silver and suddenly all reasons that he may have had to leave for the night seemingly vanish. There is something about the way she asked him to stay, about the way they parted during their last talk, that seemed truthful. He sighs in surrender as he picks up his glass from before but, with a wry smile and without any warning, he disappears from right in front of her, the same tear in reality just like before.
Celina looks stunned for a moment. Then a thought comes to her head angrily “Did he just leave without saying goodbye”. She crosses her arms and sits back. She stares at where he left.
After a minute, Derthaad appears once again with yet another bottle. “Alright then,” he continues, as he plops himself on the ground, back resting against a basket filled with striped gold and red apples, popping the cork of this new bottle. “If I am goin’ to be sticking around for a while longer, you’ll have to start yapping,” he says, smiling, inviting her to share more stories.
Celina laughs and relief washes over her. She is happy he’s back. She grins a bit more and begins telling more elaborate stories.
As the sun rises on the following morning, its rays land on the entrance to the Appley Ever After, stepping inside through the glass, stopping just shy of a basket with striped gold and red apples. Resting their backs against the basket are two figures, fallen asleep, heads resting on each other's shoulders. Asleep after a night of shared wine and stories.