Winning Vote
Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
- Start date
- Crossover Fantasy
Arc 10 Interlude 2: The Bastard and the Lady
The Bastard and the Lady
10th of December 2006 A.D.
A long time ago in a land far away, as old tales were told, Augustus FitzClarence had been raised for command, he had been groomed to rule as one might groom a horse by a bitter old man with no sons untainted by common blood who had come in the end to a bitter end, denying his place in paradise. Then his bastard had gone where so many has wished him to, hell, but hell had been on earth and he has stood at the side of greater devils, those who bore his mother's blood so much more than common and he had been content in wickedness for a span of centuries. Alas that he had not read Dante in many years and so forgot the truth that all devils must keep close to their heart, hell has circles, there is always lower to fall.
He had seen his world torn like silk, like flesh from bone with a white hot knife, he had seen the horror beyond and he had been ready to die, but in that din he had recalled the lessons of his mortal days, delivered by an aging Florentine swordsmaster whose creaking joints he still recalled even as the face of the man had faded into memory. 'Always know when lay down your sword. The minstrel's voice, be is so sweet does not carry ten feet under the ground.'
So he made the deal and so he lived where others died and so he now was here among a gaggle of feral children, broken runaways and what have to be the luckiest mortals in a thousand leagues. There were worse things to be than a dog after all.
In a sense he could have just taken over, he only one who might have come near contesting him was the Syliga girl and she was frightfully young for all her demon shone as bright as his, but Augustus understood that his new liege was not like the old, she was a child of this age, of heeding the voice of the mob and lavish spending upon their needs so instead of ruling the Augustus advised, that was another task for which he had been trained so long ago and while he had forgotten much he had spent the intervening years with swirling rumors ever in his ear, of this war and that duel. Neither of the two elder ghouls were minded to argue with him, followers not leaders and in any case aware of their own ignorance
That is how when his liege walked in she found everyone minded to meet with them dressed up business casual with little steel name tags on their shirts, like the ones they used at restaurants these days, a means to avoid the awkwardness of a formal introduction which he did not think many of the youngsters would be able to deal with. But it was also just the names, not vampire ghoul and mortal, all equal at least under the rules that governed them. He was quite pleased with the way Sarah squared her shoulders and approached the least intimidating of the wizards, which by Augustus' estimation would be the second most dangerous of them in this setting, but not to Sarah since she did not know anything their common liege did not wish shared with the whole company anyway.
"You look like you are trying to drill holes in the back of that warden's head you know," a soft voice noted from his right. He did not need to turn to know it was the .
"Good thing he does not have eyes there then," Augustus fired back. After a moment he relented. "The security system would be more secure if she did not reveal it to outsiders."
"Just the gist of it, you know for marketing. I think we are going into arms trading, isn't that exciting?" the Syliga girl said, obviously trying to get a rise out of him.
How she had lived to her First Hunt in the courts with that habit Augustus still wasn't sure, but he was not about to rise to the bait. "That is not going to do much, the real weapon is the oath, the tamed hunger. See how the Warden is on that like a dog with a bone? He is trying to figure out if that implies some deeper connection, some hunger that our lady is hiding, mark my words. Concern over the mortals is a ploy."
"Oh," the girl's eyes gleamed silver for a moment in the shifting light. "It is a ploy alright but not the way you mean, you are meant to notice that one so you miss the lady over there sipping her tea on auto-pilot as she tries to get in touch with the stone dragon. He's seen a lot more stuff 'round here than most of us. I'm going to tell Molly."
As he gave her a small nod Augustus adjusted his opinion of the girl upwards a notch.
Wu Min is trying to take the opportunity of the meet and greet to have a private conversation with Porter. What do you do?
[] Leave it be, there is nothing Porter knows that you mind sharing with the council
[] 'Coincidentally' come up to her and break her trance
[] Call the elemental up to say hello, there is no need for her to strain herself.
[] Write in
OOC: A look at what your vassals are doing and a bit about what is in their heads.
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[X] Call the elemental up to say hello, there is no need for her to strain herself.
Rolls
Augustus rolls politics to see how much a foundation he has in this... a bit rusty, but serviceable
Quality of the event... actually very good for someone whose main job was busting heads until recently
Sarah Courage... she's enjoying this confirmation that yes she is a person to talk to not just a monster to be hunter
Augustus to read the room... damn, just damn, the power of being White Court
...but the trained diplomat with magic support still stonewalls him...
...unlike Morgan who has no subterfuge
Isabela rolls her Auspex which is enough to see spellcasting and guess what is is for
This spellcasting in particular
Augustus rolls politics to see how much a foundation he has in this... a bit rusty, but serviceable
Quality of the event... actually very good for someone whose main job was busting heads until recently
Sarah Courage... she's enjoying this confirmation that yes she is a person to talk to not just a monster to be hunter
Augustus to read the room... damn, just damn, the power of being White Court
...but the trained diplomat with magic support still stonewalls him...
...unlike Morgan who has no subterfuge
Isabela rolls her Auspex which is enough to see spellcasting and guess what is is for
This spellcasting in particular
Wasn't that mostly because few if any of the core oaths they were bound by applied to the "upstart" dragonblooded? The problem was that the sun gave the Mandate of Heaven to the Solars and never moved it or was himself displaced so that someone else could take his admin account.
They had to relitigate their authority with every spirit they worked with, and whatever personal oaths they did get could occasionally be wiggled out of if the spirit in question pulled a "you're not my real
It's like if a province had an internal coup, but the national level government refused to acknowledge it happened and continued to work through defunct offices held by dead politicians.
For whatever reason the province can't break off to be its own thing, or directly impersonate the people killed in the revolution, so you suddenly find yourself doing a lot of strange nonsense to bridge practical reality and the system you have to rely on to access the resources of the higher levels of government.
[X] Call the elemental up to say hello, there is no need for her to strain herself.
Not necessarily. If her conversation is approved then she also has to assume it's vetted.
That concern she's showing about a potential hunger on our part is serious business. Reading our charms the wrong way now or in the future could play right into that.
- Location
- Germany
We are drawing in ambient magic and refining it into Essence constantly.
Luckily there's enough around in the world, otherwise that hunger might have consequences, like a Wan Kuei overdrawing on ambient Chi.
While we respire motes, it was my understanding that we were a net producer of essence, not a net consumer.
- Location
- Germany
Of Essence yes, but not of the type of free-floating magic mortals can use, I think.
Dmol8
The Undead Unhinged Lunatic of the Web
- Location
- Belgrade,Serbia
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
The bolded part of the underlined text is a punctuation you left out.
"You look like you are trying to drill holes in the back of that warden's head you know," and the sentence doesn't have a proper ending.
Also am I getting this right that we have this Augustus FitzClarence as one of our servants because of that fight in which we killed a Walker?
No, its well worth it if we are at the top. It will allow us massive levrage on the world.
Yep, that is the Skavis guard who surrendered, you guys brought him on board and as both a properly trained white court vampire and an adult he has taken it upon himself to dust off some very old skills to make sure that this goes well. If he had botched that first roll things would have gone... less well, but he is the only one with politics who lives at the station.
Modus_Tollens
SCREAMING AT THE APOCALYPSE
- Location
- ALSO SCREAMING.
[X] Call the elemental up to say hello, there is no need for her to strain herself.
- Location
- Australia
[X] Call the elemental up to say hello, there is no need for her to strain herself.
Pretty confident this will come off as the right balance of assertiveness, protecting our interests while being as helpful as we can, and seeing as it would allow her to consolidate her strength for the coming tour/trip she only stands to benefit - unless their some kind of insight that can be derived from participating in the summoning she's counting on, in which case we could always compromise with something like fuelling her current ritual/technique.
Pretty confident this will come off as the right balance of assertiveness, protecting our interests while being as helpful as we can, and seeing as it would allow her to consolidate her strength for the coming tour/trip she only stands to benefit - unless their some kind of insight that can be derived from participating in the summoning she's counting on, in which case we could always compromise with something like fuelling her current ritual/technique.
