Yes! Heroes!
malachai & hwolf....enough of your jibba-jabba!
the post takes its inspiration and is in honor of Sepulchrave!
21-22 Ches, 1373 Year of Rogue Dragons: The Darkest Hour, part II
The Painmistress was livid and broke another mirror scaring the acolytes outside her door who listened to yet another tantrum. They bowed their heads and muttered prayers to the god of Suffering to ease her sorrow.
Shaunnra's death must still be effecting her, thought Gwyneth as she hurried away from her mistress's door to attend to other duties in the temple.
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Andress Nagheson strode from her room, composed but seething inside.
"I am not to be disturbed!" she yelled to the nearest guard.
Dupes! Little fools and half-wits...If you only knew.... she smirked and imagined blissful suffering, but not hers. No, these ungrateful townsfolk would be under her lash soon enough. First, though she had to take care of these meddling adventurers. How could they have survived yet another attack?
The High Priestess of Ilmater closed and locked her door, retiring to her inner sanctum. After an appropriate pause, she muttered a prayer and stepped through the wall. She ran down the staircase into the catacombs beneath the town.
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Farrouk al-Sudin ibn-Yussef, Slayer of Ten-Thousand, the Whirlwind of Flame, Wearer of the Black Ash surveyed his underlings from the balcony that overlooked his courtyard. They were good, but needed work. He looked out upon the City of Brass, took a deep breath and smelled the smoke and soot. He looked "north"--for direction was relative here in the Land of Eternal Fire--and eyed the Charcol Palace with ambition. He rubbed his goatee.
Soon, cousin. Soon there will be a reckoning....
That was when he felt the tug.
NO! It cannot be. I will not go!
He tried to resist, but the vision of favors left ungiven tore through his skull. He was compelled. Aaaaargh! He hated Toril, but that was where in his youth he had made deals that he had hoped were long forgotten. Gods...or in this case goddesses did not forget.
An almost inaudible pop sounded, and where the Slayer had once stood, only a rising column of smoke remained. The efreeti in the courtyard practicing with whirling blades of fire and metal did not even pause to notice...
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"No! I will not make deals with devils!" shouted the Painmistress
The xill crackled and hissed in its infernal language arguing his case yet again to summon and ally with denizens of the Nine Hells.
"You know they would make require payment that we would not be willing to give."
She ignored him and in front of the Altar of Agony cried out to the Lady of the Lash to send her an worthy ally to destroy these Heroes from the South.
Bhell, her priest lieutenant shuddered while Quell (what the Painmistress had named the xill) responded with clicks and wheezes as if in glee. Whatever, his Ultimate Mistress sent would judge this paltry human unworthy, it believed. Then he and his hive could write their own contract.
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It was always dark in the Barrens of Doom and Despair. A castle bristling with spikes and surrounded by the wails of thousands of torture victims dominated the blasted plain. Their screams echoed all across Mungoth, and to the Maiden of Pain the sound was the most exquisite aria....
Her contemplations upon her Throne of Torture were interupted by a tug from Toril. Another ally!. She half-raised her eyelids and appraised the host of devils that ran torture exhibtions in the Grand Hall---especially the kytons and barbed ones, they were her favorite. However, her patience had been tested enough, and while the deceit and irony that her servant on Faerun worked brought her pleasure, the use of elemental resources was becoming expensive. The Grand Torturer calculated and examined her host,then heard the request--the gall and the cowardice to not ask for her best servants, the exiles of Baator. She had already lined up a cornugon or two, now this mortal wanted someting else.
Loviatar searched her archive of contracts and cruel acts...and implemented it. Even better, Bhaal was dead. There would be no return favor. She reached into the elemental plane of fire and commanded. She grinned as the efreet resisted. Time to answer for the whims of youth, assassin! He was compelled.
Then she went back to her music....
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Benito awoke with a start and instictively grabbed Mano de la Justicia.
"Salazar, did you feel that? Something...I can't place it."
Yes, 'Nito. I sense someone has opened something best left closed. There is a presence here that reeks of evil and should not be in this world.
"Grim, are you there?"
Stop making so much noise! replied the ghostwise halfling in his head.
Benito sat for a few minutes holding his longsword, but then the feeling of apprehension left. He dozed off once again....
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Somwhere underneath Twilight Hollow, heated negotiations were ongoing. The Painmistress was frustrated as she yelled at the efreet. He wanted a contract drawn up for the assassinations and in return for his services, for her to be part of his harem! She screamed. They re-negotiated. She settled for less.
"I ask you," she gritted her teeth, "to slay two of the five."
It had at one time been all of them! But even after supplication and begging by her and refusal by the outsider, her inital task had dwindled. She should have asked for devils!
"And yes, you may choose those which will offer the least resistance."
In return, the efreeti assassin asked to be an advisor for the House of Torment. He agreed.
Quell whistled...that could help him a great deal. Bhell was busy making preparations for an inevitable assault by these meddlers if the planar ally failed. Hopefully, he would not and soon, with the firelord's help, they would bring more pain to these weak primes.
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Pain! Ellysidell felt like he was on fire and was yanked from his reverie.
Souliess dreamed that he was baking in an oven and woke with a start. Their room was on fire, the door was no where to be seen, and the heat was intense. Dense smoke began to form. However, there was no crackling sound and he could not even here his scream. He shouted at Ellysidell, but the elf looked at him strange. No Sound had come out! Quickly, he manifested a mindlink with Ell. Then before he could converse with his companion he sent out feelers to detect any other minds in the room.
That was when the whirling, white-hot blades appeared and tore through the wolverine. Boiling blood hissed as it hit the walls of fire and steamed as they hit the ground. It was his blood and no one heard his yells of pain. He looked up and saw only a ripple in the heat as the blades quickly disappeared. He felt the alien and cruel mind. Death was here and it projected his demise willingly!
Ellysidell saw scimitars lash out at his roommate and struck where he thought they had originated. His blade cut only through air. Souliess reached out to the mind of the enemy and tried to wipe his mind. He could not tell the ripples of power from the shimmers of heat. He hurt badly. Somewhere in their minds a ripping and tearing of cloth echoed. Souliess felt the stong will of the assassin shrug off the attack and reward him with two more cuts of the blazing scimitars. Souliess toppled to the ground. A heap of steaming guts burst forth from his sundered belly.
Then the attacker switched to Ellysidell. The elf yelled and raged and redoubled his effort. He thought about fleeing with the body of his fallen comrade, but only fleetingly. The flaming falchion and the semi-visible blades met each other and sparks flew. Ellysidell felt that he even hit one or two times, but the trade off was four, maybe five slashes that criss-crossed his body. Then two more slices formed a bloody, smoky "X" across his chest and abdomen. Stunned and left exposed, he saw the swirl of red robes and red skin and horns and sharp teeth briefly before he fell. The enemy sliced deeply into his abdomen spilling way too much blood onto the floor. Ellysidell stared in disbelief, sank to his knees, then collapsed face first into the pool of his steaming blood.
Farrouk thought to himself as his wounds began to close, All too easy., and began wiping his blades on the fur of the dead, hairy psion to prevent them from tarnishing...
