azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
Also kinda drunk at the moment.
The Gravid Maiden [Exalted/Znt]
- Thread starter greensun
- Start date
fair enough still kind of a bitch. actually how much wine has she even had? was she seriously so drunk that she couldn't think "oh hey maybe bringing up my sisters soul crushing failure isn't a good idea."
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
Well, Élénoire has always been a bitch, even in canon. Her having a bit too much to drink and saying something awful is entirely within reason.
Fragment off
The Sun Will come back
Éléanore
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
Up to 1300 words now. Will finish get it beta'd later today.
Here's a preview to keep you going.
====
'Creak'
This time it was closer, about halfway across the room if Louise had to guess. Gulping back the bile that crawled up her throat from the terror, Louise raised her bed off the bed in an agonisingly slow pace and turned around to face the intruder.
A dark figure stood before her bed; clad in a black cowl that covered all of its features from the head down. The… thing stood over six feet tall with its head stooped down to cast its features into shadow. Inhuman fingers poked out its sleeves, grey skin and iron black claw like finger nails wiggling unconsciously in ways that no human hand could ever do.
Louise felt the bile rise again when a glowing blue tongue-worm thing peaked out of its hood, casting the room in a dank cerulean light. She opened her mouth to scream for help and to articulate her absolute terror, but the thing was too fast.
The second she had opened her mouth to call out, it was upon her faster than she had ever thought possible.
=============#
Here's a preview to keep you going.
====
'Creak'
This time it was closer, about halfway across the room if Louise had to guess. Gulping back the bile that crawled up her throat from the terror, Louise raised her bed off the bed in an agonisingly slow pace and turned around to face the intruder.
A dark figure stood before her bed; clad in a black cowl that covered all of its features from the head down. The… thing stood over six feet tall with its head stooped down to cast its features into shadow. Inhuman fingers poked out its sleeves, grey skin and iron black claw like finger nails wiggling unconsciously in ways that no human hand could ever do.
Louise felt the bile rise again when a glowing blue tongue-worm thing peaked out of its hood, casting the room in a dank cerulean light. She opened her mouth to scream for help and to articulate her absolute terror, but the thing was too fast.
The second she had opened her mouth to call out, it was upon her faster than she had ever thought possible.
=============#
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azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
... That is a terrible first impression.
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
Well, yes. But on the whole getting hold of Louise and dragging her off somewhere where the Heavy wind isn't currently in residence is probably on the smarter end of the equation.
Vanargand
So tired.....
Demon- Kay kay stop screaming!
Good you stopped so uh I have an offer!
Wait wait! Listen me out it doesn't involve selling your soul
...Okay it does sorta but you get magic
Also Louise is kinda Cecelyne I think since she is so bent of the Honor of Nobles, A Noble should rule fairly and also looks down on everyone not noble/commoner so ms rule of the strong fits
Also fun fact! The elves in ZNT live in a Desert! Time for Dinner Bugs~!
Good you stopped so uh I have an offer!
Wait wait! Listen me out it doesn't involve selling your soul
...Okay it does sorta but you get magic
Also Louise is kinda Cecelyne I think since she is so bent of the Honor of Nobles, A Noble should rule fairly and also looks down on everyone not noble/commoner so ms rule of the strong fits
Also fun fact! The elves in ZNT live in a Desert! Time for Dinner Bugs~!
azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
Hey, getting an Infernal exaltation isn't selling your soul!
... Well, arguably. Anyway, you basically double how much soul you have by accepting!
... Well, arguably. Anyway, you basically double how much soul you have by accepting!
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
Well, technically you add a corrupted super-mote to your soul. Which counts as an extra, as well as the Coadjuter and potentially several third circle souls on top that. Meta-physically Infernals are an odd bunch in terms of what shape their souls are.
I'm not even going to talk about Adorjan's clone charm.
Vanargand
So tired.....
Double the soul Double the expostion to Eldritch Primordials! What could go wrong
Also Louise's torment will totally be her pride and if Cecelyne...
Hey zero
...funny she is just glaring
OH GOD THE BUGS
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
Chapter 1: Regrets
========#
Tears blurred Louise's sight as she ran down the halls of her family's estate, paying no heed to the startled servants that she passed as she threw open the doors to her room and tossed herself onto her bed. Burying her face in her pillows she sobbed messily, tears and snot staining the lacy fabric as the youngest Valliére vented her frustrations.
"It isn't not fair!" she wailed to herself. "I-I tried my b-best; I studied harder than anyone else, I knew the history and theory of m-magic better than anyone else, I p-prayed every day to G-god and the F-Founder for magic. I-I begged them for it, p-pleaded for it"
All of those long nights in the library studying, all of the effort and time she had put into her classes. She had weathered her classmate's ridicule, at being called the Zero, had endured the pitying looks from her teachers, people who believed her to be nothing but the runt of Valliére household that would never amount to anything but fodder for an arranged marriage.
"I-It was for nothing!" She hissed as tears streamed down her face, her grip on her pillow beginning to rip and tear at the strength of her grip, goose feathers and fluff spilling out of the rents in the fabric.
Screaming a god awful sound into her pillow, filled with rage and frustration, Louise held the scream for a long moment as she gave voice to her sorrows.
Eventually she began to run out of breath and her scream trailed off, the poor child going limp on her bed as the fight drained out of her.
"It's not fair." Louise lamented, snuffling her nose. "I tried my best, I just… I j-just wish… " She began plead, before she sighed, "What's the point, not like anyone would listen." Louise mumbled as she began to drift off.
Snuggling deeper into the warmth of her bed, Louise fell into the fugue state in-between wakefulness and sleep. The last of her strength fading as the weight of her eyelids becoming unbearable.
Soon enough she fell into a light slumber, the occasional sound of distress leaving her as she tossed and turned in her bed.
'Creak.'
The sound of a creaking floorboard woke Louise from her half-slumber; pink eyes snapping open at the intrusion.
'W-What was that?" Louise thought rapidly, 'I-Is there someone in my r-room!?'
Her heart beating like a sledge hammer against her rib cage as adrenaline flooded her system. What were they doing here? There could have been a multitude of reasons; from political assassination from her family's rivals, to kidnaping so that they could use her as leverage for their machinations.
Slowly as she could possibly go, Louise reached under her pillow for where she had stashed her wand. Even if she was barely a mage an explosion to the face generally speaking put pave to an attack, back in the Academy she'd stopped more than one of the more physical kind of bully with the disasters that she called her magic.
'Oh. Darn.' She thought as a chunk of ice lodged itself into her stomach, her hand feeling around the empty space where her wand should have been.
It wasn't there. Her, wand, the only form of defence that she had, wasn't in its place. It wasn't there underneath her pillow because she had, in a bout of self-loathing fury, tossed it out of the carriage on the way home and into the Amer River.
'Creak'
This time it was closer, about halfway across the room if Louise had to guess. Gulping back the bile that crawled up her throat from the terror, Louise raised herself off the bed at an agonisingly slow pace and turned around to face the intruder.
A dark figure stood before her bed; clad in a black cowl that covered all of its features from the head down. The… thing stood over six feet tall with its head stooped down to cast its features into shadow. Inhuman fingers poked out its sleeves, grey skin and iron black claw like finger nails, the digits wiggling unconsciously in ways that no human hand could ever do.
Louise felt the bile rise again when a glowing blue tongue-worm thing peaked out of its hood, casting the room in a dank cerulean light. She opened her mouth to scream for help and to articulate her absolute terror, but the thing was too fast.
The second she had opened her mouth to call out, it was upon her faster than she had ever thought possible. It shoved her onto the bed, pinning her to the sheets with its mass as it pushed a cloth soaked in some sickly sweet smelling concoction over her nose and mouth. She struggled; kicking and clawing at the thing's pallid flesh to no avail. Her gorge came again and this time she wasn't able to keep it down. She bucked and squirmed, her vision fading as she choked on her own vomit and the effects of the Founder knew what it was using on her stripped the strength from her like a torch to ice.
As the poison did its work, Louise's struggles ceased. The only sound in the suddenly quiet room was the sound of pitiful gurgles as the contents of her own stomach smothered her to death.
'N-no… Not like this…' She thought dazedly
The thing noticed her distress, however, and moved off of her and with surprising care pushed her onto her side. Retching messily, Louise ruined her sheets as she voided her stomach onto the bed, the foul stuff sliding easily out of her throat. With exceptional care, the creature reached into her mouth with a clawed finger and cleared the rest of the sick from her mouth and throat.
Making a pleased sound, the creature rubbed her gently on the back for a few seconds to clear out the last of her regurgitated dinner, before it picked her up by the middle and slung her over its gangly shoulders like a sack of potatoes.
The last thing the youngest Valliére saw before her vision turned black was the window to her room falling away from her as the monstrous thing leapt out it.
================#
'Click Clack.' Went Karin's heels as she stomped through the halls of her home, a thunderous look on her face.
Above the Heavy Wind her husband's ancestors looked down upon her. Judging her, sneering at her weak bloodline and wane children that she had borne. It was rather comforting in a strangely aggravating way, Karin thought with a sigh, that she still retained some of the insecurities that had plagued her since her youth.
The old Valliére family was dead for the most part and she remained hersels they could no longer disapprove her or her marriage to the Duke, they could not insult and demean her and her children unless the pompous fools decided to return to the world of the living as ghosts.
And Karin had made a point of developing and learning spells that would affect the incorporeal bodies of the dead, just in case.(1)
Of course her living family were not as easily removed, Karin thought glumly as she looked over her shoulder to give Cattelya a glare.
Her middle child was standing at the end of the hallway with her arms crossed with a hard look in her eyes and a glare that mirrored her own.
It was because of her that she was down here, approaching her youngest daughter's sleeping chamber so that they could talk about recent events in a more composed manner than Éléonore's tactless prodding.
Just the thought of her eldest's vulgar bullying made her grit her teeth hard enough that she could nearly hear them creak with the strain. She had had a word with Éléonore in her private study, to chastise her daughter intimately. For the next hour.
Once that was done and Éléonore had been sent to her room without supper (Founder, she had no idea that such a punishment would be viable on her twenty year old daughter.), Catt had of course come into her study and dragged, literally dragged her, out by her arm and had told in no small words that she was going to apologise to Louise for being an 'insensitive brute with the emotional range of an inbred turnip.'
So here she was, standing outside of her daughter's bedroom, immobilized by the familiar feeling of complete and utter bafflement at just what she was supposed to bloody well do in these situations! She had always left these sort of things to her husband or Cattelya, she was better at instilling discipline and duty onto her children, which for she had succeeded quite well in her own opinion, then she was at comforting them.
Staring at Louise's door for a few uncomfortably long seconds, Karin sucked in a bracing breath before she rapped her knuckles smartly on the door.
"Louise, may I come in?" She asked through the door, wincing at the harshness of her tone. She hadn't meant to be that loud… "I wish to speak to you."
When there was no answer Karin nervously glanced back to Cattelya, who made a keep going gesture to her with an annoyed look on her face.
"Very well." Karin said as she stepped forward and turned the doorknob. "I am coming in now young lady and had better be decent."
Swinging the door open, Karin stepped through the threshold and into her daughter's room. Gaze sweeping through the room, Karin noticed the disheveled state of the room; Louise's scattered bed sheets and the small pool of vomit laying in the middle of the mess, its stench premating room, and the velvet curtains billowing from the open window with its frame scratched from a forced opening.
"Louise!?" She called out vainly, her voice uncharacteristically high, "Are you here, answer me!?"
"Mother, what is?" Cattelya shouted as she ran into the room, face flush dashing down the hall.
"Louise is gone!" Karin said, a ball of ice settling in her heart. "Someone has taken her!"
'She believed that I hated her.' Karin thought in a strange serenity that was in complete odds with her rising panic. 'I haven't even spoken to her since she got home and she thought I had hated her. And I may never see her again. Not alive at least.'
"We… We need to mobilize the Bondsmen. Go to your Father and get a search party organised and try and narrow down the escape routes!" She ordered, marching out of the room with Catt on her heels.
"Where are you going Mother, what are you doing!?" Catt demanded as her frail constitution struggled to keep pace with her timorous mother.
"I'm going get Mr. Fluffles and get into the air." She shouted, not looking at her puffing daughter as she did away with dignity and broke into a run. "I'm going to find the son of a bitch that had the gall to take my daughter from and make him beg for death!"
=========#
(1) Yeah, turns out the Valliére weren't all that fond of their daughter in law for the most part. Save for the crazy Aunt who lives up north.
========#
Tears blurred Louise's sight as she ran down the halls of her family's estate, paying no heed to the startled servants that she passed as she threw open the doors to her room and tossed herself onto her bed. Burying her face in her pillows she sobbed messily, tears and snot staining the lacy fabric as the youngest Valliére vented her frustrations.
"It isn't not fair!" she wailed to herself. "I-I tried my b-best; I studied harder than anyone else, I knew the history and theory of m-magic better than anyone else, I p-prayed every day to G-god and the F-Founder for magic. I-I begged them for it, p-pleaded for it"
All of those long nights in the library studying, all of the effort and time she had put into her classes. She had weathered her classmate's ridicule, at being called the Zero, had endured the pitying looks from her teachers, people who believed her to be nothing but the runt of Valliére household that would never amount to anything but fodder for an arranged marriage.
"I-It was for nothing!" She hissed as tears streamed down her face, her grip on her pillow beginning to rip and tear at the strength of her grip, goose feathers and fluff spilling out of the rents in the fabric.
Screaming a god awful sound into her pillow, filled with rage and frustration, Louise held the scream for a long moment as she gave voice to her sorrows.
Eventually she began to run out of breath and her scream trailed off, the poor child going limp on her bed as the fight drained out of her.
"It's not fair." Louise lamented, snuffling her nose. "I tried my best, I just… I j-just wish… " She began plead, before she sighed, "What's the point, not like anyone would listen." Louise mumbled as she began to drift off.
Snuggling deeper into the warmth of her bed, Louise fell into the fugue state in-between wakefulness and sleep. The last of her strength fading as the weight of her eyelids becoming unbearable.
Soon enough she fell into a light slumber, the occasional sound of distress leaving her as she tossed and turned in her bed.
'Creak.'
The sound of a creaking floorboard woke Louise from her half-slumber; pink eyes snapping open at the intrusion.
'W-What was that?" Louise thought rapidly, 'I-Is there someone in my r-room!?'
Her heart beating like a sledge hammer against her rib cage as adrenaline flooded her system. What were they doing here? There could have been a multitude of reasons; from political assassination from her family's rivals, to kidnaping so that they could use her as leverage for their machinations.
Slowly as she could possibly go, Louise reached under her pillow for where she had stashed her wand. Even if she was barely a mage an explosion to the face generally speaking put pave to an attack, back in the Academy she'd stopped more than one of the more physical kind of bully with the disasters that she called her magic.
'Oh. Darn.' She thought as a chunk of ice lodged itself into her stomach, her hand feeling around the empty space where her wand should have been.
It wasn't there. Her, wand, the only form of defence that she had, wasn't in its place. It wasn't there underneath her pillow because she had, in a bout of self-loathing fury, tossed it out of the carriage on the way home and into the Amer River.
'Creak'
This time it was closer, about halfway across the room if Louise had to guess. Gulping back the bile that crawled up her throat from the terror, Louise raised herself off the bed at an agonisingly slow pace and turned around to face the intruder.
A dark figure stood before her bed; clad in a black cowl that covered all of its features from the head down. The… thing stood over six feet tall with its head stooped down to cast its features into shadow. Inhuman fingers poked out its sleeves, grey skin and iron black claw like finger nails, the digits wiggling unconsciously in ways that no human hand could ever do.
Louise felt the bile rise again when a glowing blue tongue-worm thing peaked out of its hood, casting the room in a dank cerulean light. She opened her mouth to scream for help and to articulate her absolute terror, but the thing was too fast.
The second she had opened her mouth to call out, it was upon her faster than she had ever thought possible. It shoved her onto the bed, pinning her to the sheets with its mass as it pushed a cloth soaked in some sickly sweet smelling concoction over her nose and mouth. She struggled; kicking and clawing at the thing's pallid flesh to no avail. Her gorge came again and this time she wasn't able to keep it down. She bucked and squirmed, her vision fading as she choked on her own vomit and the effects of the Founder knew what it was using on her stripped the strength from her like a torch to ice.
As the poison did its work, Louise's struggles ceased. The only sound in the suddenly quiet room was the sound of pitiful gurgles as the contents of her own stomach smothered her to death.
'N-no… Not like this…' She thought dazedly
The thing noticed her distress, however, and moved off of her and with surprising care pushed her onto her side. Retching messily, Louise ruined her sheets as she voided her stomach onto the bed, the foul stuff sliding easily out of her throat. With exceptional care, the creature reached into her mouth with a clawed finger and cleared the rest of the sick from her mouth and throat.
Making a pleased sound, the creature rubbed her gently on the back for a few seconds to clear out the last of her regurgitated dinner, before it picked her up by the middle and slung her over its gangly shoulders like a sack of potatoes.
The last thing the youngest Valliére saw before her vision turned black was the window to her room falling away from her as the monstrous thing leapt out it.
================#
'Click Clack.' Went Karin's heels as she stomped through the halls of her home, a thunderous look on her face.
Above the Heavy Wind her husband's ancestors looked down upon her. Judging her, sneering at her weak bloodline and wane children that she had borne. It was rather comforting in a strangely aggravating way, Karin thought with a sigh, that she still retained some of the insecurities that had plagued her since her youth.
The old Valliére family was dead for the most part and she remained hersels they could no longer disapprove her or her marriage to the Duke, they could not insult and demean her and her children unless the pompous fools decided to return to the world of the living as ghosts.
And Karin had made a point of developing and learning spells that would affect the incorporeal bodies of the dead, just in case.(1)
Of course her living family were not as easily removed, Karin thought glumly as she looked over her shoulder to give Cattelya a glare.
Her middle child was standing at the end of the hallway with her arms crossed with a hard look in her eyes and a glare that mirrored her own.
It was because of her that she was down here, approaching her youngest daughter's sleeping chamber so that they could talk about recent events in a more composed manner than Éléonore's tactless prodding.
Just the thought of her eldest's vulgar bullying made her grit her teeth hard enough that she could nearly hear them creak with the strain. She had had a word with Éléonore in her private study, to chastise her daughter intimately. For the next hour.
Once that was done and Éléonore had been sent to her room without supper (Founder, she had no idea that such a punishment would be viable on her twenty year old daughter.), Catt had of course come into her study and dragged, literally dragged her, out by her arm and had told in no small words that she was going to apologise to Louise for being an 'insensitive brute with the emotional range of an inbred turnip.'
So here she was, standing outside of her daughter's bedroom, immobilized by the familiar feeling of complete and utter bafflement at just what she was supposed to bloody well do in these situations! She had always left these sort of things to her husband or Cattelya, she was better at instilling discipline and duty onto her children, which for she had succeeded quite well in her own opinion, then she was at comforting them.
Staring at Louise's door for a few uncomfortably long seconds, Karin sucked in a bracing breath before she rapped her knuckles smartly on the door.
"Louise, may I come in?" She asked through the door, wincing at the harshness of her tone. She hadn't meant to be that loud… "I wish to speak to you."
When there was no answer Karin nervously glanced back to Cattelya, who made a keep going gesture to her with an annoyed look on her face.
"Very well." Karin said as she stepped forward and turned the doorknob. "I am coming in now young lady and had better be decent."
Swinging the door open, Karin stepped through the threshold and into her daughter's room. Gaze sweeping through the room, Karin noticed the disheveled state of the room; Louise's scattered bed sheets and the small pool of vomit laying in the middle of the mess, its stench premating room, and the velvet curtains billowing from the open window with its frame scratched from a forced opening.
"Louise!?" She called out vainly, her voice uncharacteristically high, "Are you here, answer me!?"
"Mother, what is?" Cattelya shouted as she ran into the room, face flush dashing down the hall.
"Louise is gone!" Karin said, a ball of ice settling in her heart. "Someone has taken her!"
'She believed that I hated her.' Karin thought in a strange serenity that was in complete odds with her rising panic. 'I haven't even spoken to her since she got home and she thought I had hated her. And I may never see her again. Not alive at least.'
"We… We need to mobilize the Bondsmen. Go to your Father and get a search party organised and try and narrow down the escape routes!" She ordered, marching out of the room with Catt on her heels.
"Where are you going Mother, what are you doing!?" Catt demanded as her frail constitution struggled to keep pace with her timorous mother.
"I'm going get Mr. Fluffles and get into the air." She shouted, not looking at her puffing daughter as she did away with dignity and broke into a run. "I'm going to find the son of a bitch that had the gall to take my daughter from and make him beg for death!"
=========#
(1) Yeah, turns out the Valliére weren't all that fond of their daughter in law for the most part. Save for the crazy Aunt who lives up north.
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Xomniac
Clockwork Purveyor of Prose and Originality
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.
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Well, there goes any and all fear I had of the Heavy Wind.
Also...
Looks like it would sound like "L.A. Noire".I dunno, "Élénoire" rolls off the tongue nicely.
It's actually "Eleonore" (maybe with accents on one or both E's, I'm not sure. Plenty of google results for all configurations.) by the way.
Valliere is "Vallière", not "Valliére".
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greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
D'oh! Fixed it.
azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
I say again: terrible first impression.
I find it odd that Karin immediately jumps to the conclusion that she was taken, not that she ran away. I don't doubt she could reach that conclusion, but it just feels somewhat artificial in this scene.
Typos (some of which seem to have been noted while I read/wrote/fetched dinner ingredients):
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
Yeah, I've added some stuff about the window being forced open to make her reaction more visceral.
azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
Definitely seems more natural now.
greensun
You shall all burn beneath my light!!!
Mmm, shoulda put it in first. Anyway, next chapter will meet Faust for the first time. Should be interesting meeting, he's a clever son of a bitch after all.
Noctum
Dual Paradox
- Location
- Under the Skies Above
Frakir's brother
Goodbye.
- Location
- The Sea of Trees
Well, this should be interesting.
Right. Good a time as any to start drinking I guess.