Chevalier de la Mort
The travelers went down the Street from Icarel for about an hour without an issue. The doctor continued to be awed by its presentation, almost constantly amazed by either the subtle shifts of the song, the glow of its stones, or the impressions of other worlds; an effect it still had on Dorian, if in smaller quantities and far more infrequently. The stones whisper-sang verses of the world ahead, producing mental impressions of a dark bog. A marsh world, a forest world. A world blanketed in thick vegetation like lively moss on a pebble. Mysteries concealed within the heart of the green, pulsating with strange allure but also the danger of careless wilds. Nature, green in tooth and claw.
Then suddenly their Way was disrupted. The Street's canticle hushed to a serene note, as a figure shimmered ahead into being.
A calm conversation about science stilled to silence as well, as both men looked towards the approaching wayfarer. Then froze in synchrony.
The mere hint of the stranger's appearance caused Dorian to experience a terror unlike anything he'd ever felt. Instant horripilations broke out across his entire body. He almost blacked out on the spot, so intense was this sensation; managing to only stay upright and conscious through an effort of titanic will.
It overwhelmed and paralyzed every inch of his body as if he'd been dumped whole into a container of glacial water and flash-frozen. Even maintaining a simple cycle of breathing was suddenly impossible, not conceivable to him, as every animal instinct only screamed uselessly to make himself small and unimportant, to appease the monster or else suffer its wrath. Like prey encountering an apex predator. Mindless, corrupting terror hammered into every oncoming thought. Like a tsunami colliding with a port, so mighty as to crash the vessels against the streets of the city; shattering each practical consideration as it formed.
It was terror, deafening and true, devouring every part of him in one instant.
The man loomed ahead of them, a grim reaper of pure black surrounded by fragmented opalescence, like an abyssal iris within an eye of refraction. Dorian's fingers felt nerveless, refusing commands. Even the distortion within seemed oddly silent, no more churning: a reality-bending impetus made as obediently tranquil as a windless pond.
Gaining back even a sliver of control was difficult, and allowed him only to breathe shallowly, every thought aimed towards empty, vain hopes the monster might somehow, miraculously, not notice either of them and decide to leave on its merry business.
Instead, the stranger rode forth and came closer to them, appearing fully within their section of reality, like a silhouette stepping out of a frigid murk.
Then Dorian realized it was no man at all.
Its visage was death incarnate astride a pale horse, a spear with a white banner. A knight, his armor like a sky of starless midnight, a crimson plume on his helmet.
He watched them, now, clearly not a dull-minded creature; made observations through the darkness of his helmet's visor.
"Run," pleaded a young woman's voice, rasped and enervated.
In a heartbeat of courage, Dorian dared to look behind the dark knight's frightful countenance.
There, on a long chain attached to the horse's saddle, and attired in nothing but tattered rags and manacles, was a procession of tormented men and women. Five of them in total. The one who spoke the warning was no older than eighteen; an adolescent girl, her skin pale and marbled with veins, as if sick with a terrible wasting disease.
A voice answered, shrill like death, filled with unnatural echoing reverb. It was calm and unperturbed nonetheless, like a cicada trilling away in the night. Its admonishment had an almost paternal tone, as if disappointed with a child's recalcitrance.
"Quiet, wretched girl. Learn swiftly the sacrament of silence, or you will learn the litany of screams."
The chain was tugged on by the knight in a single sharp movement, causing each of the chained to whine in pitiful pain, as something darker and invisible - a sliver of the knight's oppressive will - was thrust forcibly into their spirits, draining them of resistance and tormenting them. Most of them promptly fell to their knees in a cascade, following the motion of the chain, muttering immediate pleas for forgiveness or begging tearfully for death, sapped of stamina and the will to stand.
The monstrous knight dismounted his pale steed with a clunk of sabatons on stone. The terrible horse neighed like something from a nightmare, as its owner reached into a scabbard suspended from its saddle, drawing a sword with a hair-raising sound. Like a butcher casually reaching for the cleaver.
Even aware of the danger, Dorian still couldn't move, as if the force of terror possessed his limbs. He couldn't do anything beyond craning to look in a slightly different direction or forcing individual fingers to twitch uncontrolledly.
"You are fortunate," said the monster, assessing its blade with a cold surgical look. It turned and began to casually step towards them, not at all hurried. "Today, I am..."
As if re-assessing them suddenly, it stopped walking and speaking, and something deep inside Dorian's soul told him this wasn't a good omen.
A cold chuckle came from the knight.
"Nevermind. I have a better idea."
Abruptly, its influence on reality was released, as if with a flick of the wrist. Andrei beside Dorian drew a sharp breath, falling like an unstrung marionette, arms shaking as he hyperventilated in reaction. Dorian stood, now in control of his body, but still terrified enough to be unsure as to how to act.
"You are of noble blood, are you?" asked the knight, referring clearly to Dorian. His innards squeezed at its voice moving in his direction. "Does your world practice slavery? Well, that isn't relevant. Let us make a trade. I shall trade you two of the procession behind me. Give me two of your masks in return. They can be the blanks."
To Dorian's shame, the immediate consideration wasn't innate revulsion but a more pragmatic question.
"What if I refuse?"
The knight laughed darkly as if amused by Dorian's bravery in asking this. His answer carried no hints of a threat, it did not attempt overt intimidation. The knight was simply stating facts, as it said: "Then I will kill you, do the same to your companion, seize your masks, and proceed further with my armory enriched. Your corpses, I will spear onto the end of my chain and drag along with me as mementos of this encounter. Your legacy on this Street will be a crimson trail of blood down its whole length."
"Can I trade more masks for more... people?"
Once more, the knight released a dark laugh.
"No." He returned to the convoy and sheathed his sword. "Two masks, two victims."
It was Andrei who asked the next question, regaining breath on the ground, "What are you?"
"Sir Goremont," said the knight - and drew out the next two words with a harsh, almost hostile sibilance, "of Logres, a knight of the realm. Once of the Third Expeditionary Force, now simply a lone traveler of the Brotherhood of Surcease. Does that answer it, or shall I regale you with tales of my deeds?"
"We'll take your deal," Dorian decided, even as sweat beaded over his forehead.
"Are you insane?" asked Andrei, giving him a stupefied stare. "This creature isn't trustworthy!"
"We don't have a choice. It's better to save some than die here meaninglessly," came a whisper back from Dorian. "I don't think we can fight whatever this is. If we don't comply we'll die. Make the most of our circumstances... I think it means to abuse our decision in some manner. Focus on figuring out what it might be."
Andrei didn't look happy. If anything, his eyes flashed with a miserable admission of weakness. Dorian understood the feeling tacitly, without an exchange of words. They were equally powerless here, no more meaningful than ash before this dark monster that called itself a knight of the realm. Its aura alone could quash them to total uselessness; Dorian couldn't conceive what it might achieve with its spear or sword. Likely hitherto unimagined annihilation and death.
"Why?" asked Dorian finally - a final inkling of suspicion at the one aspect of this deal that made no sense. "If you could take our masks through force, why trade?"
The knight laughed at him once again. Its well of amusement seemed endless.
"Because," it started, with a voice that hinted at a smile underneath that helmet, "I'll kill more people by letting you go unharmed."
The sickening revelation didn't have a bone of deception within. It was a bare cruel truth, spoken without aimed hurtful sentiment. Just a cold statement, a fact forced down their throat: this entity believed they would ultimately cause destruction and chaos, if left alive.
How could its judgment be any worse than his own?
"Remember what you said," the doctor whispered. "Focus on the details."
Dorian nodded with slow and tired motions. Trying to reassure himself that its words were nothing more than attempted demoralization. He fished out a pair of blank masks from one of the bags. The knight accepted them wordlessly and invited Dorian to take stock of the chained victims with a sweep of the arm.
"The finest mortal servants of the many worlds," it said with an edge of humor.
Each of them was carrying a sickness inside them, an incubating affliction ever on the precipice of evolving into a second stage of malevolence; awaiting some unclear trigger to activate and spread out from host to host. Dorian could feel the virulence inside them with his organic senses; a coursing supernatural malady that'd resist a healer's touch. That was the deathknight's gambit. Transform the fellow Streetwalkers into vessels who'd carry the disease across countless worlds, dangling faint hope of curing their carriers in front of them. He'd most likely realized Dorian was a Visceralist or had a healer's power and decided to make a sadistic game out of the situation.
Dorian wasn't optimistic about the odds of winning.
The most he could do was choose wisely whom he'd extract.
---
[ ] Liberate - Choose 2 of the chained victims to free:
-[ ] Warning Girl - A late adolescent girl, looks determined. Focused on breathing and not coughing her lungs out. The disease has gestated deep inside her.
-[ ] Elderly Man - A man who looks ancient, skin wrinkled like weathered parchment. Approached, he calmly asks you to free someone else.
-[ ] Draconic Alien - A sturdy seven-foot-tall humanoid on digitigrade feet, as intelligent-seeming as a man, but covered in black scales. Stares at you with unclear emotion.
-[ ] Young Man - A muscled man covered in scars. Claims to have a magic useful to you, asks to be picked alongside the young girl; claims this gives the best odds.
-[ ] Old Woman - An old woman, too weak to even speak to you or show any overt reaction. Half-conscious.
Alternatively, you can do one of the following:
[ ] Try to Run Away - Either with or without the captives. Good luck outrunning the presumably supernatural horse. Naturally, trying to take people with you lowers your odds. But maybe the Street will be merciful and try to help you?
-[ ] With
-[ ] Without
[ ] Talk to the Deathknight -
-[ ] ...To Play For Time - And hope the Street spits out another wayfarer who can help you, instead of another victim.
-[ ] ...To Learn His Motives - And then persuade him to either part with more victims, or change his mind about the situation. How actually likely is this to work, though?
-[ ] ...To Do Both
[ ] Fight Valiantly - Try to defeat the deathknight in a sudden ambush of violence.
*Careful planning might help your odds, even if they are poor to start with. As a QM, I will fairly state in all honesty: you do have the tools to theoretically overcome this foe, even if your odds are astronomically low. First and foremost, you must figure out a way to not get stunlocked by his aura. Gamaliel, if carefully used, is your friend here.
*For those who are hesitant: imagine the loot from this guy.
*Plus the glory of killing a deathknight. There are only, like, less than a thousand of these across the Hierarchy.
[ ] Write-in
