The airship sailed lazily over the mountains, Ardaris, Scetto and Tzaqor all stood on the observation deck, watching Morrslieb stray across the sky, just as Jekal’s creation had predicted. Silence hung between them, as they cast their minds ahead. Tzaqor glanced at his friends, Scetto looked back, but Ardaris just stood still, head hanging low. “So, what are you two going to do when we get back?” Scetto ventured, drawing Tzaqor’s attention to him, “Shock everyone with my Riekspiel.” He answered jovially, and Scetto chuckled. “Thrikth is probably going to skin me, considering the way I disappeared.” Tzaqor looked back to Ardaris, “And what about you?” He asked the vampire, she looked up at him, eyes shuttered. “I’m not going back.” she whispered huskily, Scetto span to look at her, “What?! Why not? Jekal said he’s coming with us, where are you going?!” She didn’t meet his eyes, “I’m being dropped off in the Empire, I heard there were some upheavals in the Church when I passed through with Norimia and Eliara, figured I might be able to do some good.” Her voice was barely audible. “Oh, come on! We can’t just let you go alone! Besides, you can do good in Cu-” Scetto started “I can’t go back because to them I am dead! All right? Happy now? You got your answer, so stop asking! And you aren’t coming with me!” The sudden outburst shocking the other two into silence. “There, I said it, you can go back to watching that stupid moon.” She stormed out, pulling the door off its hinges when she yanked it open. Scetto and Tzaqor stared after her, stunned. They were crossing into the countryside when Ardaris was lowered to the ground. They sailed off, and her figure disappeared into the darkness of the night. There were no goodbyes, only a heavy silence, even Jekal was subdued and he looked at the other two after she was gone. “Tehara and I looked at the model’s prediction of a few weeks, and I think it will be best for you to hear this from me.” Ardaris watched as the airship disappeared into the distance, until it passed over the horizon, and looked up at the malevolent green orb floating through the sky, “Stupid moon.” she walked west all night, and it wasn’t until the sun was starting to peer over the horizon that a settlement came into view. Realizing how odd it would be to have a stranger, in black armour appear at dawn, she stopped, and changed into some different clothes, and sat to watch the dawn. She got suspicious, sidelong glances from the townsfolk as she walked in, taking care to look like an exhausted traveller. A man in armour, decorated with red and gold trims, and a Sigmarite Hammer emblazoned on his chest blocked her path. “Who are you, and what business do you have here?” he demanded. She looked up at him, wide eyed, “I- I’m here fer work, ser.” Ardaris said. The churchman muttered something under his breath, “And what work would that be?” “I’ll take any work I can find, ser.” She proclaimed, trying to look and sound as earnest as she could. The Sigmarite groaned, and glared down at her, “Head to the church, tell one of the brethren your name and what you want, they’ll sort you out.” She nodded vigourously, “Yessir!” she said in an excited tone, and started off, mentally kicking herself for overplaying the ‘simple commoner’ act. As she went further into town she saw more and more church symbols, all with the red and gold colouration, which was odd. She made it to the church without incident, and an older priest stopped her. He was bald, as they all were, with red, white and gold robes. “Who’re you?” He growled, Ardaris stopped and turned to face him “I was told by a one churchman ta come ‘here fer work.” She gushed in an excited voice. The priest narrowed his eyes at her, “I asked who you were, not why yer here, learn to listen woman.” “Yes ser, sorry ser, I’m Rose, ser.” The priest grimaced, and was about to say something when another priest interrupted him. He sent the other one off to do something and turned to face her. “Alright, Rose, stay in town for the day, we’ll talk here tomorrow morning.” She nodded vigorously, thanked him, and walked off. She found the inn easily enough,and hired a room, earning multiple glares from the locals, and was exploring the town, when the alley she was in had both sides cut off by men from the village. “Is something wrong?” She asked politely, putting an edge of worry into her voice, and they closed in around her. “Yeah, what’s wrong is outsiders in our town, ‘specially one wit’ elvish blood.” One growled. She looked around at the people who surrounded her, “The March says what to do wit’ such as ‘er, don’t it?” Another sneered, and another chimed in, reaching out for her, “Yeah, but I think we should do summat else to teach the stupid whore a lesson, after all, the March only does killin’ there are other ways ta show what happens ta outsiders tha’ don’t belong!” The men around her all laughed the first speaker looked at her, “Well what’ll it be, men? Purge, or-” “Neither, none of you are going to touch her.” They all turned to the speaker, the Sigmarite who had directed her to the church earlier. “None of you are going to touch her, because Father Benjamin is going to speak with her in the morning, and if you kill her or drive her off, he won’t be happy about the waste of his time.” The men all backed away from her, “W- We don’t want any trouble from Father Benjamin, ah… We were just givin’ tha lady a scare is all.” The man who he had interrupted stammered, and they all hastily left the alley. “Thank you ser! If you hadn’t come along I don’t know what I would’ve done.” The man looked at her, “First, my name is James, use it, and second, I’m not a knight, I’m a Templar, so stop calling me Sir.” “Yessi- Yes James” It seemed wrong to call him by his first name, “I’m Rose, and could you explain some things to me?” He nodded his assent, “What’s ‘The March of Sigmar’?” The templar froze, and looked at her, his eyes wide with disbelief. “How do you not know what The March is?” The words were a harsh whisper, and Ardaris realized just how badly she’d screwed up, with a question like that, and her mind raced for an excuse. “Ah, well me an’ my Pa lived in a small cottage in the foothills, you see, and he was the only way for me to get news from outside, but a few months ago he stopped tellin’ me anything!” James exhaled a sigh of relief and looked at her. “Alright, in two hours I’ll be off of watch and can tell you what you want to know. Wait in your room in the inn until I come back.” She nodded and went to the inn. True to his word, James knocked on the door, and sat down to tell her what had happened. “A few months ago, a man named Aren rose to prominence in the church, claiming visions from Sigmar, and acquiring a large power base in the church, he launched a coup that gained him the Empire, any priests, officers or even nobles who didn’t submit were branded heretics, and put to death.” Ardaris didn’t know how to take this news, it was far different from what she had been expecting. “But what about the Emperor? Surely he couldn’t have allowed this?” “He didn’t, Aren declared that the throne was for Sigmar alone, and had it vacated. Karl Franz is leading the resistance against The March, along with the Legion.” She had a sinking feeling as to which legion he meant “You mean the Legion of the Ulv?” “Yeah, apparently about a quarter of their members are off elsewhere, but the rest are here, fighting us.” “Why would they fight The March?” “Aren declared that everyone must obey Church orders, they refused. Stupid move to try fight them, they have the staying power of Chaos Warriors, the stubbornness of Dwarves, and the ‘fuck your church’ attitude of Bretonnians.” Ardaris barely suppressed her laughter, but her mirth quickly faded, “Most people would try to fight back against someone claiming authority over them like that, surely there’s more fighting back.” She said it as a fact. “There is, but they’re not too scary compared to the guys who hunt Blood Dragons for the kicks.” “Yes, but there are a lot less of the Legion then there would be others.” “There are, and I honestly hope that the March loses.” The conflict in his voice confused her, “Why wouldn’t you want your side to win?” He chuckled, but there was no humour in the sound. “Because after The March is done with the civil war, they are planning on trying to force everyone outside the Empire to worship Sigmar.” Ardaris took a moment to realise what he just said, he’d said it so flatly, like it was nothing. She reached out for the wall for support, as her mind replayed the carnage of all the wars she’d been through, and tried to expand it to the scope he’d described. “Hey, Rose. Rose?” She looked at him, mind returning slowly returning to the present. “Hmm? Yes, James?” She couldn’t think straight still, he was standing really close to her, a dagger in his hand. “How about, you answer my questions now. Fair?” She nodded, mind recovering from the shock. “Good. Now, be honest here, who are you, and why are you here?” She looked at him, then down at the dagger “What do you mean by that? I told you I’m here for wor-” “Bullshit, you aren’t here for work. First, you would have had a job in mind, no one who looks like a nobleman’s pet would ‘take any work I can find’. Second, absolutely no normal commoner would have stayed in town, or been that collected after they nearly got raped and murdered, and you sure as anything would have let me into your room two hours afterwards.” He paused to breath, and she went to start defending herself from his accusations, but he interrupted her, “Also, no common girl who had lived in the foothills, in a cottage, with her father who a few months ago cut off all of her news from the outside would have been able to raise points like that during our conversation. Finally, while your accent was convincing, you’ve dropped it entirely since our conversation began.” She blinked, and realized he was right. Kicking herself, she met his eyes, which were gleaming with triumph, and decided to let him in on some truths, but also come up with a new cover story that wouldn’t be as bad as ‘I’m a three thousand year old vampire’ “You’re right, I’m not a commoner, and I wasn’t here for work, I’m a member of the Legion, I’d been out of the country for a while on personal business, and hadn’t been able to make contact with anyone, so I came in incognito to find out what had happened.” He smiled down at her. “No you’re not.” She raised an eyebrow in question. “I know because no member ofthe Legion would have caved so easily in admitting their allegiance to an enemy.” “And how would you know? Legionnaires may be stubborn, but Norimia at least couldn’t form a lie like I did to save his hide!” The Templar suddenly stopped smiling. “You know Norimia? Like, from the Legion? Shit, I didn’t even think…” James’ eyes clapped onto her semi pointed ears, and his eyes filled with dawning realisation. “How did I miss that? Black hair, elven blood, green eyes, you two could be fucking twins you look so alike! We need to get you to one of the camps before someone with more between their ears than I do recognises you. Follow me.” Ardaris was entirely bewildered at this sudden outburst. She was way out of her element. She grabbed her bag and followed, unable to think of anything else to do. “What the hell is going on?” she muttered under her breath. No answers revealed themselves to her. Important Characters Tzaqor- Was the highest ranking Skink Chief of Cuaqtla, rode a Ripperdactyl, taken by Ruagahnn whilst heading to Lustria, currently on Jekal's Airship headed for Cuaqtla Jekal Narkel- An eccentric mage-engineer, many of his inventions are volatile, but he tends to try make them safer. James- A member of the Legion of the Ulv who was undercover amongst the March of Sigmar, currently in the Empire with Ardaris Scetto- Master Assassin, he was 'The Black Terror of Mordheim' but later hid with Thrikth's clan, Skritchvit. He is rapidly mutating and is the current wielder of the Fellblade that was used to destroy Nagash Ardaris- A powerful vampire who allied with the lizardmen of Cuaqtla, and left to find allies, died fighting an overwhelming force of Orcs, resurrected by very strong magic.
Hello? Anyone else? Also, Bowser, please stop reading my mind, it's rude, and you won't get any surprises from my next pieces.
- click - 24 hours and 10 minutes before feedback fishing. That's a new record Things are moving mysteriously forward - which is good. You blew it somewhat with putting unreleased details into James's bio. Given that Ardaris will need to find these things out for herself, we could have waited. The March is a very big deal - unseating the Emperor? Whoa. I like that the threat of destabilising everything is actually quite plausible. Getting that big threat down to individual-character-influencible levels and telling your lovely individual-character-level stories with that backdrop will be an interesting challenge for you. Looking forward to more, for all the usual reasons, but mostly because I have no idea where this is going. Technical note - some of your paragraph spacing to make clear who is speaking what could do with another tweak.
Turning my psychic powers off. Oh wait that was the wrong one. I forgot how to math. And how to English.
Hey, @Kcibrihp-Esurc It's kinda deus ex machina that this one small town just so happens to have an undercover member of The Legion of the Ulv, isn't it? Also, why did he not realise that they look alike, when during the entire original saga, people went 'Hey, Norimia and Ardaris losok alike!' It's not like black haired, part-elves would be everywhere. Still a good read though.
I'll admit it @RoseThorn is right, it was kind of an out of nowhere thing, but it was so the story could continue. The other options where; They accuse her of heresy for not supporting the March, and subsequently for being a vampire, and either she destroys the town, or they kill her, she respawns in her armor, and destroys the town. Or, a convenient attack occurs, and kills everyone in the town, because otherwise the survivors would be like 'Ah! A vampire!', and it would cycle back to the first scenario. Also James wasn't exactly looking for random folks who looked like Norimia, and his family. He might of gone 'She seems familiar.' but that's about all.
I'll admit that it was for storytelling purposes, but it's odd that you've been so willing to give your characters hell before, but not now. I expect to see something good at the Legion camp!
Yeah, how about, no one other than Alxebren and Norimia know they're related. It's going to be awkward.
Hey, @Kcibrihp-Esurc do you mind if I set my pieces in your world? I wouldn't touch your characters without your permission, although events might be mentioned, but it would be nice to have an established universe, and it would be a nightmare coming up with a way to break the status quo with the character I've planned, without losing the focus.
No problem, but it might be best to set your pieces slightly before my more recent ones or talk to me in private about planned events, because otherwise I'm worried you might strangle me for ruining your plans.