Queen_Dopplepopolis
First Post
The_Universe said:
You should be excited! I've read it... and it's GOOOOOD!
(ahhh the perks of being married to The_Universe - they're never ending!)
A Kingdom of Ashes (Zombies! Pirates! Giant Lizards! Intrigue!) UPDATED 07/01/05!!
You should be excited! I've read it... and it's GOOOOOD!
(ahhh the perks of being married to The_Universe - they're never ending!)
The_Universe
First Post
Kaereth of One Oak
There had been a flurry of motion in the cramped gunnery hold of the Exeter, reloading the unfamiliar weapon for a second try at sinking the floating inferno that crashed through the harbor toward them. The second try was more efficient than the first, but even Kaereth knew that his companions’ skills were hardly up to the task before them. They had failed once. They would probably fail again.
Breathlessly, the ugly girl with the pointy ears gasped, “We’re ready.” As she made ready to fire the metallic sulfur-stinking tube, Kaereth clamped his fists over his own tiny ears, shielding them from the inevitable thunderclap that accompanied the last blast.
She looked tired, weak – her face stained with soot and powder from the first blast, she could barely speak as her chest heaved with the effort of remaining standing. Kaereth watched as she risked a glance over her shoulder, toward the floating inferno that pressed over closer to the ship that held them. Even as he watched the Skyracer approach, he idly wondered how the pretty woman was faring. It couldn’t be much worse than this. All this trouble, and he still hadn’t smashed anything but what the others had called zombies.
The mid-elf drew him back out of his thoughts, to the situation at hand. She took her position behind the cannon, squinted her eyes closed, and flinched as she pulled back against the cannon’s mechanized action.
Beneath his fists, the metallic crash was transformed into a muffled whump as smoke and dust filled the crowded deck, stinging the monstrous green half-orc’s eyes. The ball whistled through the air for a fraction of a second, before the sound of splintering timber forced its way into Kaereth’s hearing. Another hit!
But where?
Kaereth darted forward, pressing his face into the empty porthole, heedless of the fact that if they had failed, he was about to look directly into the approaching inferno.
The hit had been solid.
The ball had crushed the hull of the Skyracer inward, and water flooded into the ships empty decks as the burning vessel’s hull began to descend into the water. Even as it continued its rush toward them, fair hands pulled at his shoulders. It would never reach them. It was sinking – and fast. It was almost as if whatever had kept the burning ship together as it hurtled toward the Thanesport docks had completely deserted it once the steeldrake shot connected.
He gave way to the mid-elf who had aimed the shot, resisting the urge to hug the soot-stained, ugly young woman. Kaereth knew he had to be careful when he hugged. Hugging too hard could hurt. He had learned that from Mother.
Her face replaced his own in the small porthole, and his silent rejoice was soon overpowered by her joyful whooping. “We did it!” she shouted! “It’s going down! It’s going to sink!” she continued, clumsily dancing through the crowded hold, stopping only long enough to embrace the startled dwarf.
The other mid-elf – the liar – did not look so pleased. As she moved to fold him into her celebratory embrace, his forbidding expression stopped her dead in her tracks. “Congratulations. You’ve done a…great…thing,” he managed to force out, his features twisted into a smile that lacked even the barest appearance of sincerity. For the first time, the girl seemed to notice what Kaereth already had – there was something wrong about the dwarf’s sallow companion.
* * *
Kharak of the Blackmarsh Isle
A second blast echoed somewhere behind him, but Kharak paid it little heed. Prey stood before him, curiously defiant after he has so quickly dispatched the honored dead that lay piled at his feet. Had his lips been capable of it, he would have smiled. It was a female – soft. Some fool had even given her a sword, a morbid joke like none Kharak had even seen.
But he could not indulge his curiosity. He had been given a mission, been told to ensure that no alarm sounded on the Thanesport harbor, as a ship of flames crashed into its crowded docks. There would be blood and ash tonight, as long as he did his part. But, before he could move forward to dispatch the female, his eyes slid around her trembling shoulders to the figure behind her. A pale face and dark eyes were framed by midnight hair, the swing of her arms and her hips as she walked the tell-tale sign of her origin. A Mordredin! Here!
Shock lit in Kharak’s narrow eyes, his fanged maw opened to call out to the mordredin before him – why had she come to him in the company of an un-chosen female who looked so young she could not have been long hatched from her egg? His question remained unanswered, for the absurd parody of a warrior chose that moment to strike.
Her muscles tensed as she hurtled toward him, her shoulder lowering to take the brunt of the impact, even as she raised her sword to strike. His eyes widened as she came on, barely able to raise his massive clawed hands before she arrived: a screaming ball of flesh, leather, and steel. Impact was harder than he would have expected.
He felt the air rush out of his own lungs—he could only imagine that she was similarly breathless as the force of the blow carried the human hatchling and the dahaka warrior to the dusty floorboards. Though well armed and armored, she was still far too light to keep one of the Emperor’s greatest warriors pinned to the earth for long. Before he could claw her insolent eyes from her soft scaleless face, she was off him, rolling to her feet just to his right.
Her curved sword pivoted in her grip, driving down toward him. Steel parted the wooden floor as he rolled toward her, sweeping at her still unstable feet with his long, muscular arms. The hatchling proved faster than he had expected, bounding back and over the clumsy but powerful sweep. His warriors stood back, well aware that their leaders prowess could not – would not – be challenged by the forsaken female. But why was the Mordredin hanging back, as well? Unless she was of the priesthood (and indeed, he had not seen the marks of Mother Shadow upon her), she should have been willing to sacrifice herself for his wellbeing – he was dahaka, and she was mordredin. Ending the life of this pitiful excuse for a human warrior would be little sacrifice for the woman, indeed.
He put the confusing mordredin from his thoughts – he would deal with her once he had put an end to the threat before him. Her sword flashed toward the soft scales of his throat as he rolled to his own clawed feet. He felt the cold metal dig into his naturally tough hide. Black blood trickled from the shallow wound. He brought his hand to the gash in shock, startled to see his own blood upon the taloned tips of his fingers. She had cut him! The hatchling would pay.
He pressed forward, his powerful hands grasping for a hint of soft flesh, ready to tear her limb from limb. But her sword was quick, darting in to protect her body from his every murderous advance. Heedless of the flashing steel, he waited for her strike back, and then grabbed at the bloody blade with his hand, roaring in triumph as cut deeply into his palm, caught in his powerful grip. The false talon of a soft people could no longer protect this weakling. Had his lips been capable of it, he would have smiled. As it was, his forked tongue could taste the victory in the air.
Her weapon trapped and useless, he drew the back of his fist across face, splitting her unprotected cheek. He was pleased – she still held the blade. He struck her again, this time with his clawed hand open, rending the flesh of her face.
Her head snapped back from the second impact, and as it returned forward, a new kind of fire burned in the hatchlings eyes, her flawed face twisting into something that, had Kharak been a student of his enemy, he could have easily identified as zealous rage.
The curved sword jerked suddenly in his grip and was suddenly free, taking flesh and bone (and most of his hand, unbeknownst to Kharak) with it. Words rushed from the hatchling’s mouth, invoking a warrior’s creed that Kharak could not understand, let alone appreciate. The blade flashed, suddenly illuminated from within, as if the sun itself had become a sword in the inky darkness of midnight. It flashed, and struck forth, hunting Kharak’s heart.
Kharak felt heat searing through him as the blade pierced his armored chest, and then cold – very cold. The pain departed with the heat – Kharak needed to close his eyes. To sleep.
And then, with more of his black blood welling out of the hole in his chest, Kharak died.
* * *
Justice Fairweather
The light from her sword died, the power of her smite fading – its energy spent on the dead creature before her. But she was not alone.
She turned her feral smile to the two others, bringing her sword to the ready, preparing to meet the next alien creature that dared challenge a Paladin of the Apectan Order. She had brought the Light itself to bear against the greatest of these twisted beings, and she would not spare the others from the wrath that their crimes had wrought. For this moment, she was not merely Justice, but justice for the fallen men who lay at the arrogant beasts’ feet.
But none of them came – turning quickly on their strange three-toed (and seemingly heelless) feet, they darted toward the door, the larger of the two slowing only long enough to stoop and sweep up his fallen companion. Justice nearly dropped her sword. They were running? What in the name of the Light was going on?
She quickly regained her nerves and then started out after them, hopeful but not confident that the bard would slow their escape. They had much to answer for, and if her blade could not be the instrument of the Light’s vengeance, than she at least prayed that they would not escape punishment entirely.
As she ran out the door, she allowed the power that the Light had given her to flow through her once more – though this time not to destroy its enemies. She had been badly hurt, and if she did not soon give attention to her wounds, she would have scars that an Aesirinn barbarian would have been proud to call his own. She concentrated, feeling the wounds close, a momentary burning sting replaced by a soothing absence of pain. She turned her eyes to the heavens for a moment, thanking the Light for its many gifts to her. Then, she smirked. For all the bard would know, Justice might have taken the monstrous lizard-creature without a single injury to herself. The priests had always told her that pride was a sin - but Justice allowed herself to wallow in it, just this once. She had been tested, and she had done well.
The bard stood outside, still brandishing a bloodied dagger as Justice trotted back out into the moonlight. The creatures – whatever they had been – had disappeared back into the night from whence they had came. “Where did they go?” Justice asked of the other woman, disappointment at their absence bleeding into her tone.
The darker woman motioned out at the harbor with the dagger. “There,” she said, “out into the harbor somewhere. I think I got one as they ran by me, but they must not have thought me a threat…they splashed into the water behind me, but I can’t see where they went.”
For a moment, the bard looked frightened, but shook her long black hair, as if to dispel the dread had suddenly overcome her. Looking back to Justice, she said, “They can’t have swam all that way, can they? I mean – I didn’t see a boat, or anything. They disappeared…disappeared as if…”
Justice prodded, “As if…?”
“As if they had never been – like they were nothing more than a nightmare. A shadow given form.”
Justice snorted derisively, grabbing the other woman’s arms to draw her into the watch post, sliding her saber back into its long sheath. The bard paled as she saw the carnage the creatures had left behind. “Nightmares can’t do that…uh…?” she continued, fishing for the bard’s name.
“Selura,” the bard answered absently, obviously fighting a rising sense of nausea at the site of the fallen guard.
“Selura,” Justice continued with finality, committing the bard’s name to her memory. Kneeling where the body of the creature she had fought had fallen; she ran her gloved fingers through the thickening black blood that the monster had left behind. “Most importantly, Selura, nightmares don’t bleed. This thing did.”
“How many more could there be?” Selura asked, her shallow breath deepening as she won out over her rising bile.
Justice grimaced. “I don’t know. We need to get out a warning. Ring the bell – Thanesport is under attack.”
Justice turned back toward the night, satisfied that help would soon be on its way. With her back to the bard, Justice never saw her smile as she rang the alarm – never saw her soft brown eyes flash a sickly yellow in the faded starlight.
“Panic…” Selura breathed, too low for the Paladin to hear. And then the bells rang, and the panic began.
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The_Universe
First Post
Glad you enjoyed it.
Queen_Dopplepopolis
First Post
*does the 'hey everyone come read this story hour!!' dance*
The_Universe
First Post
Thanks!nakia said:WOW! This is good stuff! Very well written, with interesting characters. Normally, I am not too sure about guns in my D&D, but this setting seems way cool.
nakia = fan
