Xannivard

I sit in my cell. There are six bars to a narrow side, twelve to the longer. I’ve counted them to make sure.

They leave food three times daily, four hours apart, after daybreak.

There are now eight familiar faces in this room.

I’ve been here one week, more or less.

Not knowing is terrifying.

I am going to die here.

When I served the Marquis, I was blinded by his charms. He sought to turn me into a mewling pup, and in some ways he had succeeded.

And then my Arethzael was born.

My son, my beautiful son. With a heart and soul and hopes and dreams. As pure black as his half-sister had been utterly divine alabaster. They were complete opposites in all things. The blood in their veins had quickened growth, and I lost so much time with my son in a blink of an eye. What I would have given to keep Arethzael swaddled and safe, kept in the sanctum at my breast. His appetites grew, and he could not stay cloistered here. Xannivard tells me Arethzael took many thoughts and dreams from me to whet his appetite on the emotions there.

My son. My beautiful demon.

He wrote poetry. He painted like a master. He could smile and melt a lich's heart. When he was born, I was blinded by his beauty and the love a mother has for her child. Man'ari I may be now, but I am still mortal enough to feel such things. Love and betrayal. Loyalty and duty. These things are part of what makes me... alive.

And then my Arethzael was murdered.

((Over the years I have had various ideas and plot attempts, some more successful than others and most inter-related.  Some of them have been kept secret for various, nefarious reasons.  Also because I'm a jerk.

I was looking through an old storage drive when I found this little piece.  I am sorry to say that little came of it...at least little I can talk about now.  I am terribly flaky, and my partner-in-crime of the time Slade quit WoW not much further down the line.

So, partially because much of it is long-outdated, partially because Rethelia always badgers me ot write more, and partially as a birthday gloating gift to myself, I present the following.  I have left it in its original format, minus some editing out of OOC bits and slightly flow correcting.  I am too lazy to write it up in a more standardized format.  Enjoy!))

Up and down, in and out. Fyodora hummed softly to herself, needle threading carefully, deliberately through the square of embroidery as she sat on the cushions.  Such calming effects this place has, she thought, looking at the elves around her draining power greedily from the fel crystals.  She smiled, looking at one fallen to the ground, overwhelmed.  Weak, that one, he probably wouldn’t last too much longer.

“Ms. Weaver,” she heard a voice from behind her.  She stood, tucking the embroidery away, turning to face the speaker, a young elf woman, heavy armor bracing up a smooth face framed with red hair.  Next to her, a dark-armored elf man.  The two stern-looking Blood Knights stood with their weapons drawn, the young Lord Xannivard Ral’kas between them.  “Silvermoon calls upon your aid.”

"Another day, another candle...another hour of reflective contemplation..."

A familiarly soft female voice drifted through the small chamber, pensive in tone as a single candle flickered to life. Heavy drapes blocked out the dim light of the moon and the stars, the only illumination being the candle, a small, gently pulsing crimson orb, and a pair of faintly luminescent, Fel-distorted eyes that rested on a small lockbox on her table. Slender fingers gently traced over its contours, the rough edges snagging on thin silken gloves every now and again.

I felt trapped in my home, though it was by my choice and my choice alone.  The outside world had become little to me, I answered my summons to the Ebon Blade when they required my services or fullfillment of agreements, but other then that I had seen no one, called upon no one.  I was working after all, and this delicate procedure took all of my time.

Several paths lie before me, none of which are particularly pleasing to think about. Looking out over the waves in the dead of night for once offers no ease of this troubled mind. One path I see leading to darkness, one to light. A deceptive illusion, for the path leading into the familiar darkness also leads to the abyss. Utter oblivion for all I love.

These meditations have shown me much I did not wish to see, and some things I believe were necessary though no less painful. Much as I hate to admit it, Xannivard is right more often than he is wrong. My curiosity is greater than I thought, though that may simply be a product of my age.

"My dear, you cannot deny it. In the darkness of the night you so proudly claim as your own...I am there, that voice in the corner of your mind that whispers to you. What if...it says...what if you just try it...just once?"

It is the sixth month of the fourth year on my time here on Azeroth. The planet I now call home. The planet whose inhabitants destroyed me utterly; and forced my hand to take my own daughter's life that I might continue to serve my husband and protect our son despite his mistakes.

The screams were real, the death of my Amani as they bought me time… bought me the moment needed to get Dante to safety.. Gelis would take her, he would see her safe.  They shouldn’t have been dying, no screams into the night.  They were supposed to be a warning system not a defense mechanism.  I couldn’t bare the sound.  They were dying for me, and the priest at my heels.  Our feet hit the blood soaked earth of the front garden, death and the after burn of fel… demons… Amani…

“Ixinane?”

I had just returned home when I found yet another of those irksome pieces of post which no man in his right mind cares to be handed. I'd aided in escorting the priestess Lirriel Meterein to the wilds of Feralas to there save from certain death one Melidane, a human in the employ of my own vassal Lady Ixinane Stormcren.

Such formal thoughts.

Yet as well to consider formality with all things considered. My dear Theryl and I guided Lirriel to the destroyed home - the demon Xannivard had evidently attempted to take some sort of asinine vengeance for Ixinane's research into his own grimoire - a gift from me to her. In the process I finally met the elusive Blackmarrow, who had the astonishingly silly name 'Pukebile'. I must take him up his offer to discern more of his past than that. I privately promise myself that I will never address him by that silly and repulsive epithet.

The events of the past few days had lead to this.  I had reached my limit.  Torn through emotionally, beaten down physically…. What was left in the aftermath was the ruin of the gates to my home.  The spattering of battle and bodies along the smoldering ground of a once healthy garden.

The hills overlooking the small town of Brill never looked so enticing. at once this place used to be home. But many trials have led the elder forsaken away from the lands for quite some time. Rezitar sits on his skeletal horse Jackal and watches the forsakens work deligently.

"If you could get rid of a paladin...much fun...do with her as you please..."

Rezitar grins to himself, replaying the earlier conversation in his head over and over again. Yet he couldnt get it outta his mind that he would be following an order.

"Of course its not an order... just a friendly gesture...your kind of bussiness"

"If anyone has ever gone into a coma before they know what its like to wander aimlessly through the dark void that would be the mere seeming of your existence.

Now Make that void your own worst hell and stretch it over a hundred years."

A few guards are passing by in the sewers of the undercity, only to see this forsaken chatting with a fellow forsaken, or so it would seem. They didnt know that Rezitar had this one bind by his fel and that his demonic grip was wrapped around the only thing still left beating in him.

"The Nether, was fun, to say the least. And know that Ish has given me total control im going to do what was ment to be done for such a long time ago."

The other forsakens face was mauled, jaw bone ripped from his face, along with all other nasty scratch and bite marks, peices of his flesh missing from his body, and yet all he could do was stare with horror read in his eye.

What the hell have I gotten myself into…?

“You were not dying, you were changing.”

  He spoke to me with his fingers laced in my hair, my wrist caught in his hand and the warmth of his breath on my lips.  There was distance between us, a hair’s length that brushed fabric and speech, but nothing more. 

  I had lead this dance, taken the steps that assured one solid truth, our skirmishes were over. We had been circling each other for years, part of the same intrigue, the same games.   Each time we brushed past one another, always on opposite sides and something keeping the distance between.  It was only a matter of time..and we both had seen it coming, a demon such as he and a warlock such as I cannot coexist without the inevitable heading of a balanced overturned.

There are tests we each are given, twisted paths and lines written with warning signs.  I was never good with rules, with limitation or with a set of standards to follow.  But there are some lines never meant to be crossed, ones where the civilized gives way to carnal beasts and base reactions.  That line was so far from me I couldn’t even see its horizon.  I had crossed deep and so fast its realization was a brick wall to my brain.  Not even healed from my last dance I already found myself treading into another two.  One with a demon who always was lucky enough to be a few steps ahead, and the other with a beast who drove syllables into my soul.

"Dreams reveal our deepest desires..." -Ysera The Dreamer

Xannivard locked eyes with her as he dropped Mairead's body to the floor, slowly he sunk into the floor and vanished. Laughter echoed in Tess' head. That was the last memory she had of him.

When you’re outside the jungle and someone asks you to describe it, you’re likely to say “hot.” When you’re in the jungle and you want to describe it, suddenly your words get a bit more descriptive: “suffocatin,” “swelterin,” “blisterin,” “stiflin,” “mucky.” Un-bloody-bearable. 

The sun was beating down on us so ‘ard I’m pretty sure me forehead was developing a bruise. More likely it was the fairly nasty beginning to a sunburn that would end up in even more freckles for Kharris to count when I got back. She’d be having a field day with me shoulders and the tip of me ears as well. I felt a bit like a wee peach that had been shoved in a wet, muggy oven – my soft skin heating beyond its tolerance and bubbling up. I’d be cracked and oozing in a few days, without a good spell or healing potion.  

We were ambling along through enormous rubber plant leaves and swinging vines that brushed past our legs and shoulders as the raptor under us swayed through the jungle brush. I wiped the back of me hand over my forehead for likely the hundredth time that hour and it felt like I’d conquered Mount Hyjal in that single raise and fall of an arm. I bit back on the complaint about the heat that I wanted to pointlessly whine at my riding companion. I silently applauded my manliness in refusing to complain and then, as wantonly as any tartlette with a case of the vapors, leaned back against the enormous black Gurubashi pressed to me back. Balla’s skin felt cool and hard against mine and he smelled pungent – we both did – but it was somehow comforting. He smelled like the jungle; he smelled like sweat and sex and sun-drenched skin; he smelled a bit coppery and dirty from the grit of the ride and it was like laying against an enormous shadow panther. There were all sorts of nasties that could jump out at us at a moments notice and I should have had me guard up, but with him behind me, his arms circling to hold the reigns and his huge, bone tusks brushing affectionately against me shoulder as we rode towards Zul’Gurub… I embraced me inner dandy and laid back into his safety as me mind wandered over the exhausting events of the past few days. 

(This blog dosen’t take place in one single moment but is a composite of the haze of a crazy week of roleplay. From somewhere last week to when Daenyra succeeded in her task. This entire blog represents his POV and opinions. They are not absolute facts.)

The Blond Devil cuts across the skies like the scissors of a well trained tailor through a starry cloth.

At night I give the fog machine a break and push the engines to higher speeds.

It’s the greatest feeling, to feel yourself advancing while not moving a single muscle. With no mind of its own, the ship feels like part of me now. I truly feel connected to it, like an assassin to his shadows, a warrior to his weapon.

Daenyra succeeded in her task. She connected the dots I could not. I’d made a deal. No living soul could undo the agreement. But like all contracts done in hell, there are always ways to circumvent them. Daenyra was such a way.

She asked me before, why her.

Aktarin Shadowsong eyed the closed door. The Sin'dorei had left to struggle through the snow likely to Everlook. One long white finger toyed with her earthenware mug as she stared at the inoffensive wood. Her thoughts raged behind her eyes like maddened birds, and with the reflexive discipline of ten thousand years, the warden coldly lined them into order and examined each.

The Sin'dorei Iloam Blacksong had acquired a saber and Kal'dorei gear enough to fool her into not killing him. Wise on his part, deeply unwise on the part of whomever gave him those things. The cat's harness where it lay dead in the snow would reveal the seller, and if not, its tattoo would reveal the breeder. She made a mental note to ensure the strictest punishment. She'd been lax, anu'dura, but someone had been a traitor. With a purely mental flag on that thought to attend to it, she turned to the next.

This life of mine is not what I had bargained for.

Take my love, take my land
Take me where I cannot stand

Everyday, someone new is threatening my life. Throwing me about like I’m nothing.

Trying to kill me, hurt me, break what little pride I have. Despite the fact that I’m trying to help them, they all feel the need to make sure

I don't care, I'm still free
You can't take the sky from me

The club works well, but it is not mine, no matter what the title says. I can feel him around. The club, my oasis, is drowned in Ythgar.

I can’t attune myself to this place like I had planned, either it’s because I don’t have enough juice, or he has too much of it.

Take me out to the black
Tell them I ain't comin' back

 There is something I've noticed about a lot of people, they don't like Shryn'dael. I can understand that to a point, but as mean as they are when they talk about her, that just seems to go a bit far. Of course I've only seen one side of the fence. Maybe those people who talk about her behind her back should look at Shryn'dael the way I look at her. She's nice to me, to some extent, and I think she really tries to be nice to everybody. I remember the first day I met her. I was just some gangly little girl in the streets of Silvermoon, rusty armor, dull blade, awkward footing, and a bad habit to pry into peoples business. The tall bronze haired elf named Xannivard standing only a few feet from me, neither of us aware that in some ways we were father and daughter. Shryn'dael sitting at the head of the table surrounded by all manner of people, Tauren in alien armor, a undead pirate, a hunter who stood by her faithfully, a shadow of a rogue flitting around the room.