Post by Chrystal Kaleigh on Sept 30, 2008 22:03:25 GMT -5
A gasp forced itself sharply from the lips of the Sorceress of Elwynn as she fell to her hands and knees behind a giant, flame-scarred
boulder. Her robes were tattered, and her hair deshevelled - and darkened stains of ichor covered most of the young woman's form in one area or another. Crimson streaks accompanied said stains, and there was no sure signs of the blood being hers.
A sharp, hacking cough followed, and she spit blood into the snow before whimpering in pain. A shaky hand clutched tight at her side-bag as she drew it around before her, spilling the contents onto the ground.
She'd dispatched the entire group, they had to be gone... But they keep coming back. The same faces; the same walking dead.
She was too weak for this fight. Fighting the addiction for the past week had completely drained her, and the last two hours of chase and defend had put her to beyond the limits of her body. She had to survive though; she had to make it home. She promised.
Sorting through different array of fetishes and potions, her hand clutching desperately at a small, fiery-hued crystal, the object well known as her 'arcane-improved gnomebox'. She had to speak one last time - promise or not, she had to let them know. Just in case.
"Hello, whoever, hopefully my Rider family, but hopefully no one at all. Because if you've gotten this, it's the most dire of results in
my expedition into Northrend. Hehe, that's so cliche..."
A faint crackle behind her, and she gasped, quickly turning to see nothing more than a small critter of some sort chasing it's prey. For
a moment, she envied the thing, whiching it were her in that position.
"I've seen so little since my arrival here, but it's been nothing short of harsh. Already, I've been confronted thrice by a war band.
Forsaken and some sort of humanoid, led by what could only have been a death knight. I fought them once, and escaped with my life and many of them slain. The knight's too powerful, though, wields a sword the size of something Chrystal would swing, all the while drawing upon frost magicks near the skill of some lesser wizards."
They're on my trail, they never rest... I only fear the worst if I don't find a vantage point at which to take out that knight who commands them. I miss you all so much, and am beginning to regret this."
I..I only hope it makes you all think of me as you once did. As the brave, courageous young sorceress who fought with a passion that
blazed brighter than her magicks. Not as the aloof, flippant, absent-minded whore so many have called or suggested me as being in
the recent months. Light, I'm so cold... I..I just, never wanted any of you to dislike me. I always tried to make my family love me as much as I loved you all."
Please give Atera a hug for me? Tell her that mommy loves her, and that will never change, even in my death. And when she's old enough to understand... Please tell her that mommy was brave, and did what she did for the good of mankind. Tell her... That being a good person isn't accounted in personal worth; it's accounted in the worth those you love see in you."
They're coming closer now - I have to go. Ilarra, my partner in business, keep the Feather going, I suppose it's yours now. If this is the last you all hear of my voice, please know that I love every one of you, and that never changed, no matter how outcast I felt. I love you..."
Her words were suddenly cut short as she felt the grip of a talon-like hand on her shoulder. Jerking her back roughly, she dropped the stone, and her glasses. In her clawing resistance, she managed to grab a potion and a small chain fetish, crying out in pain. Quickly spinning to face her foe, she shoved her fist into its gut, unleashing a powerful fireblast that practically melted the animated golem, sending the remaining bones clattering and rolling down the hillside.
Cringing in pain, she spun back around to face the oncoming moans and wails of the walking dead. The same ones she had destroyed thrice already - limping and dragging along towards the young sorceress.
Whimpering, she popped the top from the potion and quickly quaffed it down, appearing slightly refreshed as several of the wounds across her body closed and disappeared.
"C'mon then," she cried out demandingly, ripping her sword from it's scabbard, and squeezing the off-hand fetish tight in the other.
The scourge beasts poured forward over the rocks and towards the sorceress, who swung her sword in a wide arc, flames rushing across the ground and sending the entire, burning first wave flying back into the rocks, destroyed and useless. Genise groanbed softly as more poured in her direction. Taking up the sword and fetish, she dropped to her knees, eyes clenched shut, and lips moving as she began chanting a very swift-spoken and fluid ritual.
The scourge closed in. She could feel their hands grabbing and clawing at her flesh. Undeterred, she continued to chant. Something blunt struck her in the head - but she didn't move. Even as the trickle of blood from the blow wetted her lips, she refused to stop. It was her last chance; there was no other escape now.
The snow melted around her knees. The scourge attempted to take and pull the mage away from her position, but she didn't move. Her chant finished, and she suddenly screamed.
It wasn't a shrill, mousy shriek. It was really more like a roar.
One after one, the scourge began to ignite and crumble, ashes upon the rock beneath them that was now lined with cracks, glowing with molten heat, like the waves of a paladin's divine consecration.
Desperation is a powerful motivator...
Three Days Earlier...
"Indulge me," the dockhouse clerk said, "You don't seem like someone who'd typically come out to a place like this. What's so important that someone of your obvious breeding would want, or even need, to plant yourself in the middle of a hellhole like Northrend?"
Genise paused in her steps and slowly turned to face the voice of the woman who had escorted her from the docks of the tiny port settlement, away from the chaos that was the port. She wasn't really in the mood to talk - the weather was worse than Dun Morogh's, and the cravings of her addiction were weakening her further with every passing day. She just wanted to get this done, return home, and go back to her dearly missed family.
A pleasant smile forced it's way across her lips as she turned back to the woman, glancing her over. She had a friendly though manicured look; her bearing was that of a harried quartermaster, and when she had greeted Genise earlier, she had been scrawling on a tablet, making occasional jerks of her head across the dock traffic, and back to her writing, as if her frenzied shorthand was sorting out the near-pandemonium.
"Oh, um..." Genise stammered, "I'm here with the Scarlet Envoy," The woman adjusted the fur cloak upon her shoulders as she shifted on heeled feet. (Author Note: Yes, even Genise's boots have heels.)
The woman nodded, though she eyed the red-haired sorceress with a clinical expression.
"I'd advise keeping a low profile around here," she said, "your people talk a good game about setting differences aside, but agreements with the Dawn notwithstanding," She gestured across the port, "Everyone is still watching their backs around the Scarlets. But, since you're here, I can see about getting you whatever information it is you need so that you can be on your way."
Genise smiled, hair whipping wildly amidst a gust of wind. "Oh, heh. I'm not really here to poke around much or anything." She shrugged, "I'm just... well, a diplomat of a sort, a...good will ambassador, you know?" A soft laugh passed by her lips, "Probably won't even notice that I'm here!"
The woman smiled good-naturedly, though it didn't quite reach her eyes, nodding her head. "Glad to hear they've the consideration to send someone decent, then." She grimaced, "If you ever tire of their...unique...brew of overzealous dogmatism and adolescent bullying, you ought to try a few of the noisier establishments in town. Your friends have a noted aversion to good company."
Genise bit into her lip, watching the woman pensively. The sorceress was usually very good at reading people, but there didn't seem to be much to her, really--if anything, given her harried and slightly flushed appearance, and the cheery attitude that seemed only somewhat forced, she seemed eager to be conversing with someone other than a sweaty dockworker or a military adjutant; a few minutes away from the noise below.
She decided; she might as well say something. She wouldn't last another week at this rate, and needed to find the Dragonblight.
"Well, to be perfectly honest," she slipped a hand into her robe, drawing out a rolled-up map. "I'm not a Scarlet myself."
The woman's thin brow perked with interest, and her lips tugged upward slightly at the corners, "Naturally. They can't stand on their own feet. What're you helping them with?"
"I'm more or less... Well, eye-candy, I suppose." She laughed softly, hips shifting in a slight pose - perhaps overdoing her attempt to be friendly, but Genise was Genise. "I'm actually on a personal mission for myself, and decided to help them along the way here, in exchange for a reliable ship to this land."
The woman gave a slight chuckle, eyeing Genise and folding her arms. "Your business is your own, but what is it you're after?" She tilted her head slightly, flicking her gaze in something not entirely unlike a wink. "Trying to make contact with Dalaran?"
Pegging Genise immediately as a spellcaster was nothing unusual. The gilded spellbook and the highly ornate sword on her hip was a good enough indication for a guess.
Genise's brow perked in interest, making a mental note; she hadn't known that Dalaran had any interests here at all, but that might be handy to know now.
"Oh, no, um..." She unrolled the small map and handed it over to the woman, tapping at the surface with a long nail. "Could you show me the quickest road to the Dragonblight?"
The woman's brow furrowed slightly as she eyed the young sorceress, and, calmly unfolding her arms, she placed her finger on the map, tracing a path as she spoke, "You're here, the Dragonblight is there..." She grimaced, "but the place you want to be is still probably right where you're standing...relatively speaking. I can't recommend a trip there, unless your reason is that dire."
Genise eyed the woman, who looked upon her with a worried expression, her lower lip tugging back as she bit into it. "I can promise you that I wouldn't be going if I didn't have to, miss."
The clerk eyed her for a second, narrowing her gaze and tilting her head to the side, as if attempting to read her, before smiling ruefully and shrugging. "Your funeral," she finally said, "In any case. Is it something special you're looking for? ...other than death by a variety of novel means?"
Genise laughed nervously, "Just a certain herb that grows there, and only there." She rolled up the map, and began organizing her gear, securing things in place with visibly trembling hands, mumbling, "making a special potion, heh..." She stopped fidgeting, and looked up. "I should be on my way now, though, miss... Miss, uhh, I'm sorry, I didn't get your name. I'm Genise."
"Mary." She gave Genise's hand, after proferring her own, a firm, friendly shake, and clapped her on the shoulder. "No stopping you. Best of luck, Genise."
Genise smiled, and turned to leave, but Mary spoke up, "Before you walk out there, you might want to stop by the barracks near the gates and get a chart showing you a waystation or three." She glanced over across the port, where a transport of Alliance-liveried men was disembarking. "You should probably get a bit of rest before you go, too."
Back to the Battle
[/i]There hadn't been any rest.
A sudden rush of brute force knocked Genise from her feet, sending her sprawling across the rock with a loud grunt. Opening her eyes, she barely had time to groan, before having to roll away from the smashing maul of the giant...the vrykul?...above her. She rolled away twice, then thrice to escape the blows, and expended a fireblast into the giant man's chest, sending him sprawling, but he shook himself off as if completely unfazed.
Getting to her knees, Genise's eyes went wide. Not because of the way the vyrkul shrugged off her spell, and was dusting snow off of himself as he glared at the smaller woman - but at the dark figure that loomed over the melee.
The death knight gazed straight down at her, mounted as it was on a decrepit steed who's eyes alit with a frigid blue, a black shape against a swollen moon, reached up with a gauntleted hand and pulled back the rune-enscribed cowl that concealed her face. Genise thought she was hallucinating.
It was Mary. The clerk from the port.
The pleasant conversation, the helpful advice - what had that been about? A ruse? What had she possibly let slip? Was she somehow set up for this?
Genise Crownsilver was angry.
"That...that's IT!"
Genise cried out with all the fury her mousey voice could muster, ripping her sword from it's sheathe - perfectly in time with a
powerful gust of wind that sent her hair and tattered robes whipping into the air.
"Well, I'm impressed," The knight's voice was blithely conversational. "Shame you couldn't just lie down earlier--this could have gone much more cleanly." The death knight glanced at the fuming vrykul, and then cast her gaze about the scattered tide of carrion. "Take her. Alive." With that, the skeletal steed reared up with a hollow whinny, and both beast and rider were gone from the hilltop.
The hulking vrykul, alongside a trio of staggering ghouls, advanced.
"Take me, then!" Genise shouted in retort, and swung the sword upwards, gripping the blade with one hand, a faint trickle of blood oozing over the blade as she began to chant - the broken, sharp-tongued words of the ignan language.
"Reth tu maga Zoern! Sunep'kosach gi os Mastrosum - Toro Ra... Torrath'unt!"
A wave of heat washed over the area as Genise's sword erupted into flames, as did the mage herself. It quickly subsumed however, in it's wale an imposing figure, skin tinted red, streaked with dark veins, muscles showing at every curve, and her eyes aflame. The vyrkul himself stalled, unsure about the situation now, and the unfamiliar invocation of the sorceress.
Strength of the Firelord.
All mana is drained, as is a fragment of the caster's psyche.
The caster of this ritual abandons their sorcerous ways, trading them for the prowess of a warrior of equal strength. The caster's might and dexterity are increased to match their wizardly intellect, and they become a warrior of the same prowess. All blows can ignite the target, searing flesh and bone as quickly as any spell. This lasts for five minutes.
All mana is drained, as is a fragment of the caster's psyche.
The caster of this ritual abandons their sorcerous ways, trading them for the prowess of a warrior of equal strength. The caster's might and dexterity are increased to match their wizardly intellect, and they become a warrior of the same prowess. All blows can ignite the target, searing flesh and bone as quickly as any spell. This lasts for five minutes.
Someone had obviously indulged in the essence of fallen Ragnaros, even after warned against it. Nobody tell Tarquin, he won't be happy!
"Oh, wonderful..." the death knight's voice, over the inferno, rasped at the reeling vrykul and cowering ghouls, "Stop simpering! Take her down or I'll end you myself, cowards! You don't want that!"
The vrykul steeled itself, lowered it's gaze upon the humanoid inferno that was Genise, and charged.
The ensuing fury would have given the likes of Chrystal Kaleigh reason to be proud.
Again and again the Vrykul lashed out with a massive, heavy axe, aiming for some part, any part of the flaming sorceress. Again and again the weapon passed harmlessly through the flames, and warranted a white-hot slash from the molten blade it wielded.
It is a testament to vrykul stamina that the giant still stood after being pyroclastically vivisected.
Before it fell to steaming pieces.
Of the surrounding ghouls, nothing remained at all, the moldering flesh ignited simply by proximity to the inferno.
Genise Crownsilver collapsed with a groan. That was it. Her last resort.
And the death knight stood over her. In blackened, baroque armor, gazing down with passionless eyes set in deceptively soft features, now twisted sardonically.
"That was impressive, if melodramatic. I'm afraid, though, that you're coming with me now." The sardonic twist fell away from her lips, "We have a need for you."
Genise whimpered. Even if she didn't want to give up, she really had no choice. It couldn't end this way, it was too soon. Imperfect. The heroes in the novels never went down this way. They excelled, and succeeded, no matter the situation.
"Don't try to play the heroine, girl," came the biting, almost-too-insightful remark, "It's only going to make you look petulant. You're played out."
Petulance be damned.
Genise Crownsilver was the heroine.
With a half-mad cry, Genise swung the sword upward - but it was caught and forced down by the death knight's massive blade. Undeterred, she forced herself to her feet, against the down-thrust blade, and staggered backwards, nearly tripping, reared back, and brought her still-steaming weapon down towards her enemy's skull.
The death knight caught it again with her massive blade, moving with contemptible ease, holding her own weapon almost negligently in only one hand.
Genise dropped to her knee once more, gasping desperately, clutching her sword in both hands. Mary leaned down, mockingly, and stroked a metal-encased finger through Genise's desheveled hair.
"You're just going to ruin yourself, you know."
Genise snarled in protest, and flung the sword up again with sudden force. A thin line of blood drew itself across the knight's cheek.
With almost exaggerated astonishment, the woman reached upon to touch the otherwise-negligible cut, the blood barely visible on the black metal of her gauntlet. She scowled, it was the same sort of scowl you might see on someone who's just been asked to fill out a bit of extra paperwork, or has been sent to bed without dessert. She scowled, and placed her other hand on the hilt of her sword.
It's strange when an obvious course of direction is interrupted, say in this instance - the lady death knight had Genise beat - it's obvious. Or perhaps not, as the simplest of arcane trickeries can sometimes turn the tables.
Genise cried out an incantation as she gathered herself, a wave of cold blasting outward and encasing her foe's feet in ice. The sorceress exhaled sharply, staring dead into the stunned death knight's eyes, as she attempted to move her frozen feet with little luck.
The fiery mage whispered, "this isn't over," and turned away and blinked across the terrain.
But no sooner than Genise could realize that her bag and hearthstone had been ripped away in the recent battle, she felt a sudden whoosh of air.
The death knight stood a good thirty paces away, empty hand extended towards her. The giant sword, hurled with amazing force, smashed blade-first into the ice beneath the sorceress' feet.
And the world went white.
The death knight, stomping the clinging ice from her greaves, trudged forward, and almost tenderly extracted her runeblade from the ground before the frost-encased sorceress, who's expression was as shocked as it was frozen.
"Game."