Dancing Without Malice or Mercy

[Visla Eraclaire]

The sound of rain falling persisted long after the clouds had passed and the sky cleared. Drops fell from bough to bough, pattering against leaves. Rivulets flowed between the chipped bark of tree trunks and down Visla’s back. As winter’s chill lingered long into spring, the cold rain was inescapable, even beneath the thick weatherworn cloak. She had trusted it on the first rainy night and awoken to find her woolen garments soaked through. Only partially dried during a sunny reprieve from the otherwise constant deluge, they lay beneath her, bundled in the leather bag that was her only seat. Huddled and bare beneath a leaking cloak, this was Visla’s first taste of freedom.

Its flavor was surprisingly clean, like the water she scooped from the pool that had formed in a low moss bed beneath her feet. To look at it, one would expect it to be vile, tainted, and uncivilized. And yet it refreshed her all the same. Still, it was no way to live, not for long at least.

She had spent a week in the wood this way so far, running steadily through rations and all the while subtly waiting to be found. After all, she was scarcely out of sight from Uiria. She had imagined a dozen different scenarios as she sat silently in the sea of green. In one Aelva would come for her and pour out her honeyed words in an effort to win her back. In the light of day, she’d always refuse with a elegance bereft of spite, brushing her aside gently. Under an amber sunset, sometimes she would think to accept and run off again together as a freely chosen pair, meeting what challenges would come with open eyes.

Sometimes she would see Elenore push her way through the ferns and take a seat across from her with a carafe of tea. They would talk of Uiria’s troubles and Visla would commiserate with her as a sister. Sometimes the conversation would be a ruse and from behind, guardsmen would haul her off as a murderer to be torn to ribbons by a volley of Uirian bullets. The idea of her death was simply one of many possibilities and the fantasy of a firing squad remained preferable to the reality of starvation alone in the woods.

In the twilight she would be haunted by the spectre of Leonard. At times he appeared a grim ghost with only his snide words and prickling arrogance. When howling winds and driving rains joined the evening gloom he would take the form of a raging wraith and strike her down for her transgressions. Justly so, she thought, even as she shivered and clung to the fading warmth of her own body.

In the deepest part of night, she had no visitors. No conjured conversations or phantom persecutions gave her respite from the droning of her own thoughts. Hours lingered long enough to replay lifetimes in her mind, of what was and what could have been. The eyes of those that had perished around her, for her, by her hand, robbed of even illusory forms, drifted through her mind as mere memories and afterthoughts. To be tormented by them would be a relief, a just punishment. The razor edge of the headsman’s blade was preferable to doubt’s dull, rusty knife.

On this day, though, thought itself was deadened. Savages have no need for morality, purpose, or nobility. Visla felt such hunger and cold that there was no room for remorse. Her body drowned out her mind and she scraped the empty pouch for the barest crumbs of long-gone rations. Silence reclaimed the wood as the last drop of the storm’s remnants fell into a pool on the forest floor.

Visla uncurled herself and threw back the hood of her cloak. The tome she had pilfered from Leonard’s corpse sat on her empty belly, almost weightless. She had flipped through it in dry moments and found nothing but nonsense written with the curling tendrils of unfamiliar script. She pulled it open again, with no hope that things would be different. Her fingers glided over the pages simply for the sensation. And yet as it fell open to a chance page, in the midst of the chaos there was an image etched in charcoal, a mushroom.

Visla stared at it a moment before glancing up and seeing the very same specimen nestled beneath the tree across from her. The text of the page whirled like a tempest until the snaking sigils became rigid common letters.

“Goldencap Amanita: A prized edible mushroom among ancient empires, found in oak woodlands the world over.”

[Visla Eraclaire]

Visla lunged forward and snatched it with a swiftness and resolve not often seen. Inhibition was just another casualty of the pelting rain and burning hunger. She gave the orange fungus hardly a glance before taking a large bite. It remained in her mouth barely long enough for a musky flavor to register. Within a few moments the whole thing was gone and her eyes darted about for more.

The forest floor was littered with fallen limbs and tangles of what would elsewhere be weeds. A green and brown mottled carpet where the golden prizes would stand out readily, and yet there were none. After a few moments of frenzied head jerks and the false positives of discolored fallen leaves she relented and laid back against the tree trunk.

Her throat ached, for she had not spoken a word throughout the long woodland week. There were no words worth speaking and no ears to hear them. She imagined her sister speaking to the very trees with her easy grace and love of all things. Visla despised Nature, doubly so after spending this time as her unwanted guest. She did not deny the beauty of flowers, the wonder of the sea, or the majesty of mountains, but they were all best viewed from a fine upholstered chair through a picture window.

It took some time, but when the savory morsels in her gut had finally begun to register, she felt a haze lift from her mind just as the sun burns off the morning fog. Her eyes focused squarely on the tome in her hands, still displaying the illustration and text of the amanita. She turned the page, hoping at the least for another edible mushroom and perhaps that whatever she thought of would spring to life from the enchanted parchment.

Nonsense. The same indecipherable nonsense was scrawled all over the next page, and the page after that. She felt almost certain that it was no language at all, but merely an overwrought symbol for failure. The script turned in on itself and from one line to another in a maddening fashion that could serve only to frustrate any attempt at translation.

Perhaps hope was not good enough, she thought. When she found the mushroom she all but asked the book for food. She cobbled together the remnants of her will and focused it intently on a question, a simple one to which she knew the answer, at first.

“Where am I?” she even let those words be her first.

The text remained fixed in it’s coiled, useless tangle. She turned the page and found more of the same. Perhaps it did not like to be tested, she reasoned.

“Where is more food?”

The book stared back at her, unmoved. Maybe questions were no good after all.

“I want more food.”

And yet as she said it, the bits of mushroom filled her shrunken stomach. The book gave no answer.

“I just want a warm bed and a roof over my head.”

She half-expected it to show her a picture of Uiria and mock her flight from that place of comfort. Perhaps it would even show Aelva beside her, and yet as she watched the lines of ink contort themselves, something else entirely appeared:

Wizard’s Sanctum

A favored spell of itinerant practitioners of the magic arts, this useful spell conjures an extradimensional home for the wizard without one

Below it outlined in intricate detail the methodology of casting it in terms that Visla found familiar enough from her time at the Academy. She snatched up a twig, brushed the detritus from the ground before her, and set to work.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Every few minutes through the arduous copying and correcting of her sigil Visla would stare up at the sky as if to warn it against interrupting her. Even a few drops of rain could wash away hours of work. Somehow, it obeyed, or else was all rained out from having pelted her weeklong with its soggy spittle. The sun set and rose again and all the while Visla toiled.

She finished the ritual at last when the forest as once again cast in a dreamy orange by waning sunlight of late afternoon. The diagram stretched the breadth of the clearing and was interlaced with marker stones and coiled troughs of dirt. As the final step, Visla snatched a smooth pebble from beneath the roots of a nearby tree. It was small enough to fit in her pocket but large enough that its weight could be felt within, and thus not become lost too easily.

She clutched the focal stone and said a single word, “Home.”

With a flash of brilliant arcane light, the intricate drawing in the clearing vanished in a swirl of wind and leaves. The spellcaster vanished along with her work, falling, floating, drifting through a featureless abyss. The space around her was devoid even of darkness, appearing as a grey so neutral it could scarcely be perceived as anything at all. When at last she came to rest, she found the book open in front of her.

It sat on what she could feel as a floor, and yet to her eyes it appeared no different than the bland uniformity all around. The only things visible where herself, the book, and soon with the slightest thought of rest appeared a bed. A stately four post mahogany piece, just like the one she slept through her youth.

Visla’s mind struggled to question what it perceived, but it was laden with exhaustion, hunger, and sleeplessness. Without even realizing it, she soon found herself beneath the covers of the bed, sleeping for an untold number of hours.

[Visla Eraclaire]

When Visla awoke, her mind was once again active, racing with thoughts and expectations. The grey world around her obliged her whims and formed itself into a faithful replica of the room where the old wood bed had once stood. The fields of the Eraclaire estate stretched out beyond a window and a sweet summer breeze drifted through the air. A service of tea and pastries sat by her bedside, drawn straight from a dream she cradled in her mind while she slept.

She wondered if it were all real and looked to her tome for answers, now sitting on a reading desk in the corner. Its pages remained filled with gibberish, leaving her to experiment and find the truth for herself. She pulled out a chair from the desk and concentrated on the pile of rumpled bedsheets she had left when she arose.

Within moments they pulled themselves back into neatly tucked order. Next, they changed from a deep crimson to a soft chartreuse and then back again. Visla stood and glanced at the window as her thoughts turned the wheel of seasons from summer to fall, leaving harvested fields and colorful trees in their wake. She glanced at her own empty hand and conjured a brush for her hair from nothing at all.

Inside this realm, she was nothing short of a god. And yet it still remained to be seen whether any of it was real. Illusions of power were easy enough for any mage, yet she wondered whether anything she made here could leave, most especially the food. Finished with her grooming, she pocketed the brush and quickly ate a pastry from the platter by her bed.

Reading into her pocket, she snatched the pebble and willed herself back to the forest. The keystone obliged and she arrived back in the clearing with a flash. Patting her pocket, she found the brush gone, but her hunger satisfied. Still, something of the sweetness and rush of the pastry was absent. It was a narrow distinction that she felt was not worth pondering further, at least for the moment.

“Home,” she declared, and arrived thus.

The possibilities swirled through her mind of the many things she could bring about. Almost anyone would be content to live in the little corner of existence for the rest of eternity, and yet something tugged her back from feelings of true elation. The sanctum was comfortable, perfect even, but it was in essence no different from hiding. She had hidden away in her room most of her life till she attended the Academy. It would be all too easy to fall into old habits, and so she resolved that she would not become a hermit.

That didn’t mean she was forbidden to enjoy the benefits of her own private world, but she was determined to put the place to use. She stared out the window once again and attempted to imagine Uiria. She wished to see Elenore safe and happy and wondered if her window might allow her a glimpse into the world outside.

True to her desires, she saw the woman standing outside her house, content and looking down the old path to Uiria. Her dark hair fluttered in a slight breeze and her eyes showed a youthful gleam that had always been absent in the Visla’s interactions with her. Just as she was ready to sigh, satisfied, another figure entered view. He was a tall, robust man with graying hair, holding his left hand behind his back in a domineering posture. Elenore’s grin blossomed into a smile as she met eyes with him. She ran up to greet him with an embrace and the two turned so that Visla could see the man’s face. Harsh, austere, with sunken eyes and a sallow expression, it was a distinctive countenance that Visla remembered well.

The late Arius Mephisto’s portrait hung in Elenore’s den, and with that Visla realized that the visions she saw where merely hopes, untethered from reality. She turned away with a sullen disappointment and drew back the curtains. The former warlock slumped into the desk chair and stared furiously at the tome, hoping to rouse it to action.

[Visla Eraclaire]

The old book sat defiant, the inane symbols firmly fixed on its pages. Visla prodded it words, thoughts, and feelings. She scoured it with contempt and heaped it with praise. Assuagement, bargain, command, desire, and entreaty all yielded nothing. Her very surroundings darkened as her mind focused solely on the tome. As words failed her, she tried the laying of hands, ritual gestures, and all manner of pseudo-magical manifestations. She flailed about until her feeble arms grew weary and could do no more.

Finally, in defeat and exhaustion she lay her head down on the desk and abandoned the project. The room grew dark and she slept once more for untold hours. It was a habit that her sanctum readily encouraged and one that Visla would come to staunchly resist in time, but for the moment she knew no better. Her slumber was dreamless and when she awoke, her eyes darted to the book immediately.

Sure enough its contents had changed, but not to anything she had willed from it. The pages spelled out various incantations, all admittedly useful, but none that bore any relation to her present purposes. Visla scowled and poured over the contents all the time.

“Whatever wry sense of humor you were enchanted with, you’re lucky I’m more bored than I am spiteful,” she said. She was by no means certain that the object was intelligent, but the situation seemed to warrant some comment, even if it was futile.

She studied dutifully, conjuring what sustenance she required with a mere thought, falling over and sleeping at unmarked intervals. The days, if they could even be called as such, bled one into the other. Even in moments of exhaustion she feared stopping. Her capricious tutor might abandon her at any moment, and so she continued to learn for as long as the tome was willing to teach.

Even as it had seemed to become reliable, the knowledge it imparted was anything but. The curriculum showed no mark of design, more like the ramblings of a madman than any sane course of instruction. As soon as Visla mastered some bit of esoteric arcane, the books next page would contain a spell of a wholly different nature, or no spell at all, but rather an alchemical formula.

Soon, she had learned to fly, to teleport, to conjure the elements, to ward herself, to brew potions and poisons. Some of the knowledge seemed duplicative, the ability to bring forth a gout of flames or frost seemed sufficient to harm someone, and yet some days later she was instructed on focusing her anger into bolts of magic energy. Other bits were similar to spells she had already mastered before she surrendered her infernal abilities, like the invocation of darkness. As familiar as the results were, these were the most difficult to master, as the methods bore no resemblance to those she had known and her lips and fingertips seemed to rebel against her at every opportunity and fall into the old ways.

After a number of days Visla made no effort to count, having completed a flask that would ameliorate the frailty that had haunted her since childhood, she turned the page and found what she could only interpret as a reward for her dogged determination.

Scrying Senor

One of the most common forms of divination, the Scrying Senor is a sympathetic spell that draws on the connection between the caster, a focal object, and the target. It allows the caster to observe the unwitting subject for as long as concentration is maintained. Willful subjects can resist but any attempt is made more difficult by the presence at the time of casting of some object of emotional significance to the target. If a piece of the target’s own body is used, such as a lock of hair or a vial of blood, the observation is almost impossible to prevent.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Visla skimmed over the details and determined that she could prepare the ritual in a matter of minutes if she had the proper focus. She glanced toward the corner where her meager belongings sat. Each one could be a thread that would link her with someone, but as she stood and rummaged through them, she found little of interest. None of the items had come from Elenore… or, Aelva, she admitted to herself reluctantly.

The curiosity at what had become of her companion was an unwanted intrusion. It lead her mind down a winding path of doubts and questions that she had trod too many times before. The fact that she had no mementos was the only thing that allowed her a detour from the descent into regret. She turned to her belongings and focused instead of Elenore. Visla had abandoned her just the same. While she did not know what troubled the woman, it was more than certain that the murder of Leonard, the former owner of the very tome before her, had done little to help. And that was only her most recent transgression.

This bloodstained relationship was still a refuge by comparison, and Visla felt that whatever mistakes she had made could be mended. She rummaged through her belongings and found nothing. The books she had borrowed from Uiria’s library were long since returned and even if she had them she doubted the connection would be strong enough. Her bone cane, her cloak, the satchel itself were connected to no one but the merchants that had sold them. Similarly the cane that belonged to her mother and her steel dagger would show only the graves of their former owners.

Her mind lingered on the grave marker that sat outside her manor. It was no great sepulcher befitting the lady of a noble house. Her mother’s only monument was a slab of stone with a simple engraving of name and years. She had always taken pride in the austerity of it. She had seen so many graves heaped with the hoarded riches of an empty life, and yet a pair of similarly understated plots stood out, making her brief mental diversion a worthwhile one.

Outside Elenore’s house, on the little hill facing Uiria were two pieces of granite, the solemn graves of her parents. Visla grabbed a piece of chalk from the desk and began drawing the necessary diagram on the floor to teleport herself back to the outskirts of town.

[Visla Eraclaire]

The preparations seemed to take little time at all after the many unwanted lessons and Visla soon found herself kneeling in the foliage at the edge of the wood at the very spot she had fled to not so long ago. On reflection, she thought, perhaps it was long ago. She stared up at the night sky and saw a waning crescent moon. It the shortest, it had been two weeks since she escaped the scene of her crime and taken shelter in the forest under the light of a waxing gibbous moon. But for all she knew, the lunar procession could have gone on for a dozen cycles without her knowledge.

She abandoned the trivial accounting of time and crept forward into the open. She slunk through high grasses toward the hill where the little house stood. Candlelight shone from within and the silhouette of more than one occupant had been cast upon the curtained windows by the time Visla drew close.

As she neared the graves, she pondered briefly the idea of walking up and knocking. She imagined Elenore coming to the door and ushering her in for tea. Her fantasy quickly turned grim as she considered the alternative. The other figure in the window was Leonard, having recovered somehow from the wretched fate she had cursed him to. As she weighed the possibilities, she realized that even if the other occupant was not the man she stabbed in the back, any resident of Uiria was likely to want her dead. Even Elenore had been reluctant to harbor her for more than a night or two.

Keeping low to the ground and quiet as she could be, she made her way to the two gravestones. The bore the names Arius and Linnea Mephisto and dates from a calendar for which Visla had no reference. She could only determine, as she already knew, that the wife had died later. The ground before the stones was still earth, well tended but barren. Visla dug her hand into the dirt and felt the chill of the ground.

She remembered the words of respect that Elenore had for the man whose grave she was defiling. She remembered his stern eyes in the portrait above the mantle. Visla was never sure what she had intended to take when she set out that night, but she returned to her sanctum with merely a handful of soil and the hope that it would be enough.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Visla’s hand still trembled as she prepared the ritual back in her sanctum. Fortunately the procedure for scrying was as easy at it had appeared. Visla wrote the name of her intended target on the sill of her window and sprinkled the grave dust over it. A few moments concentration later, Visla peered through the glass as if she were looking straight through Elenore’s own window.

The thought occurred to her that she could have simply done that, but she satisfied herself that the method was more befitting her than skulking outside someone’s house like a burglar. In truth, she knew that magical spying was no less ignominious, but it was at least less likely to get her caught.

“Do you really think you’ve found him? I have only enough resources to make one attempt at securing his return.”

The voice was unmistakably Elenore’s, though it was heavy with trepidation, qualities that Visla found uncommon in Uiria’s lady. She stood before the fireplace with her hands clasped, staring at a man dressed in finely tailored black attire.

“My scout is quite certain. You may speak to her yourself, if you wish, but I assure you, it is not in my nature to give false hopes.”

The man’s voice was confident and crisp. He gave Elenore deference with his tone, but his posture made it clear that he was by no means her servant.

“I do not doubt you, but I would like to speak with the woman all the same. Can you bring her here tomorrow?”

A smile crossed the man’s lips and his snapped his fingers. A pillar of flames, not the standard range of oranges, reds, and yellows, but the deepest bloody crimson appeared next to him. It dissipated as quickly as it came but left in its wake a slender woman with an emotionless expression. Her face was beautiful, angelic even, had she not appeared in a flash of fire. She was dressed modestly, but not so much so that her figure was indistinguishable. Everything about her was a stark off-white, accented with strips of red. Her pale face ringed by curling red locks and her ivory robe emblazoned with runes along the cuffs.

“Tell Lady Elenore what you saw.”

The man commanded her and she turned to him and nodded assent before facing Elenore.

“I witnessed a man matching the provided description of Belial Mephisto in the company of a woman matching the provided description of Andrea Carmichael. I made this observation at a coastal cave sixteen miles south of this location.”

Her words were bone dry, a sterile recitation, but the tone she spoke them in was vibrant, almost lyrical. The dissonance was jarring to Visla, and she could see Elenore look at the woman with a quizzical expression before continuing the conversation.

“Very well. Thank you for your assistance. I will deal with him tomorrow.”

She seemed more dejected than anything else, and Visla still had little sense of what was going on. Elenore’s brother Belial had left the city some time ago after participating in a battle royale that Visla was party to. She could only guess that he took something with him that Elenore and her city could not do without.

“Your gratitude is unnecessary. I am pleased to provide my services to anyone who has been betrayed. I must renew my offer to apprehend your brother. My methods would be—“

“No.”

Elenore’s refusal was firm enough to make Visla question the plan that she had already halfway formulated. As the man and his servitor bowed and departed, the Eudaemonian lady sat before the fire and stared up at the portrait of her father.

“There can be no doubt that boy is your son.”

Visla brushed the name away and allowed the image to vanish, leaving Elenore to her solitude.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Visla looked at her bed and considered sleeping before she decided on any course of action. Still, she feared that by the time she awoke, it would be too late to do anything. That was perhaps the most appealing aspect of such a plan. It was tempting, perhaps even prudent, to let Elenore tend to her own. Unfortunately, prudence was all but a foreign concept to Visla.

She quickly wiped away the remnants of Elenore’s name on the wood and wrote her brother’s in its place. Another application of grave dirt and the sea cave the strange woman had spoken of came into view through the window. Visla could hear the soft rhythm of waves echoing through the cramped space. Belial was huddled next to some metallic construct that likely only he understood. A faint blue glow, typical of the devices Visla had seen in the hands of Uirians, cast his sharp features in silhouette.

She watched him work silently for a long stretch of time without the vaguest hint of understanding. Visla fancied herself well-educated, but even with the time she spent in Uiria she had never questioned its many marvels. From the histories she had read, she knew them to be otherworldly but not magical. Still, the line between technology so advanced and matters arcane was a hazy one at best.

Visla’s eyelids began to droop as she watched him perform one meaningless action after another. Wires were fused, one thing bolted to another, and various things were adjusted in ways that defied description. The sound that finally broke the tedium was a call from Andrea, whose voice Visla still recognized from her brief acquaintance with the woman.

“I can’t believe I’m still here with you.”

She sounded exasperated and Visla could easily identify, imagining watching him work in such a manner for weeks or longer. Andrea, when last Visla had seen her, was hardly on good terms with Belial. The two were former lovers, from what she could gather from overheard conversations and the occasional anecdote from Elenore. Whether they had patched things up or were in a relationship of convenience remained to be seen.

“Believe it or leave.”

Belial’s response suggested the latter, though Visla recalled that she and Aelva had often been curt with one another even in their better moments.

“I doubt Elenore would have me back at this point. No, she surely would, but I suspect my men wouldn’t follow me. Killing your former subordinates does have a way of engendering some distrust.”

“Do you have to talk?”

“You realize I could kill you too.”

“You won’t.”

Without a moment’s hesitation she drew a blade from her hip and held it to the back of his head. He didn’t even bother to turn and face her even as the glowing energy sheath around the blade singed the hair from his neck.

“Not tonight.”

She admitted it and put the weapon away.

“Lialy, why are we doing this? You get more like your father every day. I respected him, and I respected Lady Linnea, but I don’t want us to share their fate. There isn’t going to be anyone to bury me next to you when you work yourself into an early grave. I don’t want us to die for nothing.”

Belial spun around in an instant and stared straight into Andrea’s eyes. The machine behind him spat sparks and let out a mournful wail. The woman had the build of a warrior and yet she flailed like a rag doll as she was lifted toward the low ceiling of the cave by some unseen force.

“He didn’t die for nothing! He saved us both. Uiria is a prison and he set us free from it.”

“Lialy, you aren’t making any sense.”

Andrea struggled to choke out the words. She seemed surprisingly accustomed to her assailant’s madness. Visla hoped she had never been so blind to another’s vice.

“This world of yours is corrupt, sick with fantasies and superstitions. Eudaemonia is the light of reason. I have already excised one tumor from this world and I will continue to treat my patient until it is cured or dead.”

An arc of electricity surged along one of the metal panels and Andrea fell to the ground with an unceremonious thump. Whatever force had restrained her dissipated as a trail of smoke rose from the machine.

“I’ve had enough, Belial. I’ve had enough of your pronouncements and I’ve had enough of being the test subject for that thing. What ever happened to the boy who invited me to dinner and held my hand under the table as his father scowled? Take on the world if you want, but do it alone.”

She got to her feet and started to walk out of the cave. Belial simply reached for his belt with a blank expression for what Visla figured was another tool. Instead produced a pistol and shot Andrea in the back.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Visla watched a few moments in disbelief as the man turned back to his work. She could hear Andrea’s shallow breathing echoing off the wet stone of the cave. He seemed to be in no hurry to finish her off, tinkering as if the sound were no different than the continual crash of waves.

Turning away in disgust, Visla looked to her teleportation diagram. It could not take her to some unknown hollow somewhere along the island’s coast. Even if it could, this would be a dire situation in which to test whether her healing droughts would work when they were made of materials conjured within her sanctum. Still, she felt compelled to try.

The sense of loyalty was misplaced, as Andrea would likely have cut her down without hesitation, but after seeing what she had seen, Visla knew she couldn’t simply drift off to sleep. She grabbed a vial from the desk and called the necessary components into being from the ether. Every few seconds, she heard another labored breath from the window.

Mixture in hand she stepped onto the sigil and appeared back in the forest. She hesitated there for a moment, no longer urged on by dying gasps. There were still lights in Elenore’s windows. Visla felt certain that all her exertion would be for nothing. Soon, she’d be shot down just the same as Andrea and Elenore’s face would bear the same cold expression that her brother’s had.

She forced her legs forward, hobbling up the hill and standing in the doorway. Her hand trembled as she reached for the knob. Gritting her teeth, she grabbed hold and swung the door open. Elenore turned to look at her as she walked into the foyer.

“I have no time for—“

“Your brother’s gone mad.”

“I assure you, he’s been that way for some—“

“Andrea’s been shot.”

Elenore’s composure shattered at the words and she rose from her seat by the fire.

“I’ll explain later. She’s still alive. I have a potion to save her,” Visla lifted the vial only to see that its former crimson contents were replaced with a clear liquid, most likely inert. The threw the thing to the ground with disgust. “Worthless.”

By the time she looked up, Elenore had already left the room and returned with another piece of strange technology. Visla could only hope it was useful, as Elenore offered no explanation before grabbing her by the shoulder. She felt the same brief disorientation that accompanied her teleportation spell and heard the sound of the sea.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Andrea’s hand extended from the maw of the cave. The briny water that had carved the hollow over centuries rushed over her still twitching fingertips. This was the first sight that greeted Visla as she felt her body shunting back into the material plane. Elenore was already rushing ahead of her, running to her former guardian’s side.

The wound in her back was bloodless, cauterized by the same bolt of energy that formed it. Still, it had burned deep and as Visla crept closer she could see the extent of the damage. Elenore grabbed the trembling hand in her own and sighed.

Visla could only hope that Uirian technology could mend the wounds that it could make. Somehow, she doubted it. Men learned to cut each other open with a ruthless dedication that was never applied to the healing arts. The sword existed for centuries before the surgeon’s blade. Looking down at her own shaking knees, she remembered that even the self-righteous power of clerics could not mend all wounds.

“Sister.”

Belial’s sickening voice came from inside the cave and soon he came forth into the faint moonlight. Elenore gave him a wide berth as he stepped over Andrea’s body without a second thought, still carrying the weapon that had wounded her.

“Father wanted you to be happy, Belial. His last words were congratulating you on finding her. What could be so important that you’d betray his memory like this?”

He leveled his weapon at her and fingered the trigger.

“I don’t care how he died. I care how he lived. He taught us to be proud and he taught us to be strong. Your constant prattling diplomacy sickened him. He was a man of action. He was the kind of man that could change the world. I am his heir.”

Elenore sighed, even as she stared down what could be the instrument of her death.

“Father lived a risky life. He didn’t set out to change the world. He just did what he had to do to save himself, to save Mother, and to save us. When he finally had a choice, he chose peace. He settled down here and instead of raising an army, he raised us. For all your posturing, I don’t think you knew him at all.”

Visla stared at Belial’s hand, shaking with rage, twitching over the trigger.

[Visla Eraclaire]

“You won’t kill me, Belial,” Elenore said calmly, staring into her brother’s eyes with a frightful certainty.

“Perhaps not,” the young man shrugged, tilting his weapon to the side as he did so.

Visla started to jump at the brief hesitation, but soon found the barrel of the gleaming silver plasma pistol leveled at her chest.

“But I will kill her,” he smirked.

Visla stared at him and then glanced over at Elenore for guidance. He had the same features as his sister and father, a sharp jaw, narrow eyes, and dark hair. They were all innocuous enough on their own but coupled with his devious smirk and proud posture, he was the very image of the devil.

“So, you’ve made your threat. Now what is your demand?” Elenore’s voice hinted at a growing anxiety beneath her practiced platitudes.

“Ever the negotiator. What do you have to offer me? This isn’t extortion. It’s an execution.”

His haughty pronouncement gave Visla time enough to extend a hand before the shot came. What looked to her assailant like a simple fearful reflex proved to be much more as she raised a shield of force in front of her with a simple gesture. The brilliant bolt of plasma crashed against a barrier, annihilating both and wiping the grin from Belial’s face.

Visla smiled, confident in her newfound powers, then five more shots followed.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Visla fell to her knees. She could feel the uncontrolled energy tearing apart flesh and bone. Pain surged through her body and she stared down to glimpse the wound that would end her short life, a massive hole like the one in Andrea’s back, replacing heart and lungs with a blackened husk.

Instead she took a breath, she felt her heart thump, and she stared at a series of five holes no larger than a coin. She wanted to laugh at their triviality and yet they seared still, reducing her to a hacking wheeze before she fell face-first in the sand.

A piercing whine, like the shriek of the most tormented beast.

Sand shifting underfoot, bits falling in Visla’s hair.

The grunts of a struggle, brother and sister both.

The squeal of the weapon, ready once more.

Visla finally managed to pull her head up from the sand to see Elenore and Belial, arms entangled. Belial’s finger remained over the pistol’s trigger with his sister gripping his arm with both of hers, forcing it up at his own head. His other arm tried feebly to push her back.

“Congratulations.”

His finger depressed the trigger and a bolt shot straight through the soft flesh of his neck. It still flickered with energy as it emerged from the back of his skull and sailed into the sky like a grim flare, burning out in the night sky as he fell to the ground lifeless.

Visla struggled to her feet and shambled to Elenore’s side, one arm still clutching her blast-riddled chest. The last Mephisto tossed the pistol onto the ground and grabbed Visla around the shoulders, pulling her close. Tthe warm droplets of Elenore’s tears were the last things Visla felt before she succumb to her wounds.

[Visla Eraclaire]

Waking up in the empty room of Elenore’s house was becoming horribly familiar to Visla. She grasped reflexively at her chest and found it bound tightly in bandages. As she took her first deep breath, she felt a stringing pain, like a great claw digging into her lungs. Taking a shallow breath through her nose, she could smell tea brewing downstairs, the same as ever.

She tossed the sheets aside and found herself clothed in an over-long dressing gown, one of Elenore’s own, no doubt. Her traveling clothes sat in a heap in the corner and still smelled of burnt wool. Grasping the cane left by her bedside, she forced herself up and out of the eerily vacant room.

Making her way down the stairs, she heard a chair slide on the wood floor. By the time she had hobbled the rest of the way down, Elenore was waiting for her in the foyer. Her expression was neither sad nor joyful, but a regretful alchemy of the two. It was an emotion she understood well.

The two women stared at one another for what seemed like forever before Elenore finally spoke.

“Father’s arrogance finally saved a life instead of ending one,” she said, extending a hand to Visla and helping her into the kitchen where the two sat down. “That pistol was his and he always allocated the energy unevenly, saying he’d only ever need one shot.”

Visla couldn’t bear small talk or wistful remembrances. She looked Elenore straight in her deep brown eyes. Her half-smile and steady tone couldn’t hide the red lines and dark circles of nights spent awake crying.

“This is my fault,” she confessed and looked down at the dark-stained wood of the table.

“Maybe it is.”

Visla darted back up, almost indignant. She had expected forgiveness, mercy, a detailed explanation of all the other forces that had conspired to bring about the misfortune. Instead Elenore stared back at her with that same sorrowless ambivalence.

“You are the raven that has lurked in my house, the harbinger of death. Your father gave mine this land that has been a cemetery for my family. You showed up on our doorstep just before mother died. You were there when Belial left the city. You returned on the anniversary of my father’s death and killed a man who could have given me the answers I needed to save this town. You brought me to the site of my brother’s suicide. You are a curse, Visla Eraclaire.”

The young woman swallowed hard and felt her lip quivering. Tears welled up in her eyes as she listened to the condemnation, but they gave Elenore no pause.

“That’s what my father would say. My mother would say you have a good heart. She would say that you fought on our side the day that Belial abandoned us. She would say you almost laid down your life for us more than once. She would say that you were a good person beset by frightful circumstances, just like her dear husband.”

Elenore let her teacup fall onto its saucer with a clank.

“Black and white, right and wrong, sinners and saints, this is the kind of thinking that drove my father and brother into early graves. People aren’t good or evil and you’re no different. My decisions about you have never been a moral judgment, or even a pragmatist’s calculation. The simple fact of the matter is, I see too much of myself in you to behave rationally.”

Elenore took a breath and Visla managed a brief interjection in an attempt to show that she understood. She chose to paraphrase a line from a book Elenore had let her borrow from the city’s library.

“One who despises herself still respects herself as one who despises.”

In reply, she received a look that commanded silence once more.

“Visla, you are the younger sister I should never have had. When you first appeared here, I wanted to know everything about you, about this girl from somewhere else and her life outside this cloistered city. Everything I uncovered just wiped dust from the mirror until all I saw was myself, a lonely sad little girl overshadowed by a noble father and a sibling ever eager to please him. I knew better than to pity you, but I didn’t know what to tell you.”

And with that appropriate phrase, Elenore seemed to wind down, uncertain of what else to say. It was as if she had written a speech while Visla slept and suddenly reached the end of her prepared remarks.

“You’ve given me more than I deserve. I’ve always looked up to you. You were calm, evenhanded, and always in control. People depend on you, and more than anything else they can depend on you”

“Not anymore,” Elenore sighed and took another sip of her tea.

[Visla Eraclaire]

The words sounded so dire and Visla sniffed, wiping away her tears. As she took in the air of the kitchen, something smelled strange. The scent of the tea was not the same soft rum-vanilla that it had always been. It smelled of almonds and Visla’s eyes widened as Elenore started to lift her cup again.

A flash of fire erupted at Visla’s command and singed her host’s hand. Elenore drew back reflexively and cradled the burned limb, letting the cup fall to the table and crack, pouring its contents in her lap.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing!?” Elenore shouted.

“I’m not going to let you die!” Visla yelled back and rose to her feet.

She snatched the tea service from the table and threw it to the ground. The two women stared at each other in the heavy silence after the porcelain shattered. The dark brown liquid pooled at their feet and dropped down from the table. The stain spread across the clean linen fabric of Elenore’s dress.

The last Mephisto shook her head and went to the sink to get a rag. She began to laugh, nervously at first, as she wiped the sticky residue from her hands.

“It’s amaretto.”

Visla’s eyes grew even wider than the moment she had hatched her brilliant plan and knelt to pick some of the pieces from the ground.

“I’m sorry, with what you said… I thought…”

“Cyanide smells like bitter almonds, for the record, though I appreciate your concern. Given my family’s track record, I suppose my choice of words was unfortunate,” she said as she poured cool water over her hand. “Just leave the mess for now. It’ll be your problem soon enough.”

“What?” Visla replied, letting a fragment clatter to the ground.

“As I was trying to say, there’s no one left in this town to depend on me. At first, they trusted me, even after Belial left. Then we started running out of power cells. Without the device he stole, there was no way to recharge them. I sent out word for help. A few people came, but none had any promising suggestions. Leonard, the man you decided to plunge a dagger into, had proposed an interesting solution grounded in magic.”

Visla looked down shamefully again.

“Obviously, that didn’t turn out. Over the next couple of weeks, people simply gave up. The town’s deserted and there’s no reason for me to remain here anymore.”

She walked to the living room and opened the small door under the stairs that led to the basement. It had been the first place Visla awoke, when she was still being hidden by Elenore’s mother. More recently, it was the scene of her murder of Leonard, Uiria’s prospective savior. The whole place had been rearranged since then and when Visla followed her host down, she found a ring of gleaming metal.

“I’m going to go back where we came from. I think perhaps my people have been as much a curse upon your world as you have been on my family,” Elenore said with a wry smile.

[Visla Eraclaire]

“I suppose there’s no point in asking you to take me with you.”

Elenore smiled. “I’m not going to let my sister run away from her problems. Your father gave Uiria to us in a grant almost forty years ago. It seems only fair that I give it back to his heir. That should be punishment enough for you.”

The device started to hum as Elenore stepped closer to it. Lights flickered to life one each of its segments and soon the high pitched screech of Eudaemonian power cells filled the confines of the room. It would have drowned out any attempt Visla might make to reply and so she simply stepped up to Elenore and embraced her without argument.

Barely above to peer over the woman’s shoulder, she saw the portal come to life. A whorl of twisting blue that seemed to tear apart the very air around it. Though the details were beyond her understanding, the implications were clear. Visla knew she would likely never see Elenore again. She tried to force a smile as they stepped apart, but tears still fell down her cheeks.

Staring at the closest thing she had to family, Elenore took her final step back into the maw of the gate and was tugged within. As she vanished, the lights all around the device flickered and seized up. Sparks flew like a great fanfare and the whine died down to a murmur and then silence. The blue light faded and Visla stared through the ring at the simple wall beyond.

She turned and walked back upstairs to clean up the kitchen.

[Visla Eraclaire]

After the sink was full of sticky shards of shattered porcelain, Visla had nothing else to distract her from the gravity of what had come to pass. She walked up to the second floor and walked into Elenore’s room. She found nothing packed, the bed still unmade from the night before, and a scrap of parchment sitting on a little desk.

It was covered with gold-flecked ink in elaborate scroll lines and emblazoned with the same seal that was cut into the ring on Visla’s right hand. The text itself was florid calligraphy spelling out the archaic pronouncements that naturally abide such a formal document. At the end, a final phrase contained the whole substance of the thing in a single overwrought line.

In witness whereof, therefore, so shall it be noted by all that His Lordship Baron Xavir Eraclaire does hereby gift, transfer, and cede the lands described hereinbefore and all rights of rulership and peerage thereto attached to one who should henceforth be addressed as Baronet Arius Otani Mephisto, Sovreign of Uiria, to be his to have and hold in perpetuity through his heirs and assigns.

The signature and seal of the late Baron was affixed at the bottom. Below, just beneath the sweep of a great gold border, in neat and modest handwriting was added:

“Transferred to Visla Eraclaire

/s/ Elenore Mephisto”

She took the paper in hand and walked to the window, staring out toward the little town that was nominally hers. No smoke rose from the line of brick chimneys and no candles flickered in the windows even as the sun had begun to droop beneath the horizon.

Nothing bound her to accept, she thought as she walked back into the empty room where she had slept. She retrieved the stone from the pile of her ruined clothes, the key to her sanctum and easy escape. Clutching it tightly, she walked down the stairs and out the front door. As she stood on the hill, still dressed in bandages and a nightgown, she glanced over at a pair of fresh grave markers beside the house.

Visla stared at the four granite slabs, all in a row, casting long shadows in the late afternoon light. The ground before Arius’ grave was still disturbed from her nocturnal theft. She tossed the stone from her hand into the earthen crevice and walked back inside.

As she crossed the threshold, glanced across at the portrait over the mantle

“Home.”

[Visla Eraclaire]

Spoils Request:

Uiria ~ Visla is now nominal sovereign of an empty town. What she does with it will be discussed in a further thread.

Scrying Senor ~ Visla learned this spell, which will follow the rules as described in the thread and will be detailed in a future level update.

[Duffy]

Dancing Without Malice or Mercy Judgement

I must admit I’m a little bit of a fan of Visla, her character, her environment, her sardonic wit. I have followed most, in fact every thread featuring her since I joined. I am in no position to comment or help improve your writing as far as technique or mechanics are concerned, your writing is solid, concise, witty and observant, but I have included one or two observations regarding character, pacing and atmosphere as requested. If you have any questions regarding the judgement or comments, or a complaint against anything raised therein, please do not hesitate to contact me via AIM, or PM a member of staff.

Story (22/30)

Continuity (7) – a few very minor but awkward transitions between scenes caused double checks, but they were permissible given the nature of the time or events that cause them. Sleep, long-distance travel and the like. Each part of Visla’s history is almost flawlessly referenced and the NPC’s you draw upon felt as if they were totally and utterly familiar. Often people cite recollection and explanation as a reason for a low score, but it is clear you grasp the concept of continuality and know when to explain events to bolster your point.

Setting (8) – Superfluous, crystal clear and wonderfully described. You do not go overboard with the metaphor, colour of detail and it conjures the environment in the mind beautifully.

Pacing (7) – Quick witted dialogue matches quick-witted and well thought out pacing. The thread settled in very nicely with a brisk scene setter and kept that same momentum throughout. You have balanced post brevity with content and the only area this could be improved as it stands is to consider the action sequences more carefully. Dialogue is mastered in your writing, but the pacing during conflict (of the physical sort at least) is a little too quicksilver.

Character (25/30)

Dialogue (9) – it feels not only as if Visla were in a fantasy setting, but also as if she wasn’t a character. She feels real, she speaks naturally, and she speaks her mind. The rhetorical exchanges and the contempt between Elenore and Visla in the latter half of the thread is diabolically clever, and the under current is present in the thread, as well as a nod to previous work. Two small imperfections prevented a score of 10; the first is the rather formulaic exchange of threats in post 12. I felt somewhat let down by the archaic portrayal.

Action (7) – you do not need swordplay, guns and magic to score well in action. Where others gain provenance from complex and life-like battles, you gained this score from keeping the motions of your characters dynamic. From the little movements and transportations of Visla between realms, to the stirring of a spoon in a cup or the wry hand gestures and movements of the characters that surround her, the thread moved, the thread breathed, the thread thrived. As with dialogue, a formulaic action sequence between Belial and Visla felt contrived and without substance. Something as hammer blow as onomatopoeia the gun shots or a slightly more thought out pacing in 12 and 13 could’ve improved this.

Persona (9) – Visla is her own self now. I would not have thought it possible, having read your previous threads with Aelva. Her sombre anger and stone-faced duality towards her family is elegantly wrought and written superbly. We are beginning to see the wall fall down, and Visla’s emotions, her true feelings are shining through. Whilst it’s easy to get carried away with a vindictive streak, or overplay one particular aspect of a character to the point where it becomes clichéd, part of the woodwork, you have taken all that Visla was, turned it on its head (whilst leaving enough there for her to be one and the same) and given her a new lease. I was especially touched by the cyanide/amaretto exchange in post 15, and yet after Elenore departs, she leaves to ‘clean the kitchen.’ You’re showing us little hints of a persona, without giving away too much, and that is a brilliant gambit that has utterly paid off. Well done.

Writing (25/30)

Technique (8) I don’t even want to begin to tell you how to write, Visla. Your technique is perfectly balanced between Victorian-a, and deeply embedded in an intimate knowledge of what makes steam punk and the high fantasy setting work. Metaphor, simple sentences and technical terms roll together into a wave of amazement. Perhaps consider more blunt techniques, as noted in action/dialogue, and perhaps give more of a dynamic role or pun based role to the devices she uses. Humour doesn’t need to be slapstick, and it could work well with Visla’s tone.

Mechanics (8) One or two minor uses of elision outside of speech, sloppy editing in the second half of post 17 and awkward descriptive couplets in post 13 are the only things to detract from your score. Even at your brisk writing pace you have mastered proof-reading, picking up typos and correcting your work.

Clarity (9) – I read this as you were writing it, and I read it again before judgement, and not once did I have to double check myself or think about character placement or continuity. Fantastic.

Wild Card (8/10)

Excellent thread and something I am very glad I read. I am looking forwards to watching Visla’s ascent to power over her new domain and her continued evolution from the shadows of Aelva – more already, more! I am especially fond of your dialogue and tone; more science and steam punk damnit!

Total Score = 80/100


Experience & Spoils:

Visla Eraclaire gains 4789 experience and 272 gold.

Of Science, Tea & Sorcery: Uiria is approved both as Visla's new carnarium, and it's presence is dully noted in the chronicles of Althanas. If you continue to establish it in such fantastic fashion, perhaps more than just Visla will learn to find solace in it's hallowed halls.

Scrying Senor: Discuss this with the Realm of Greeting moderators on your next level up, approved for solo usage outside of that.


This thread will be moved pending Judge's Choice nomination.

[Taskmienster]

Exp and GP added.

Visla gains level 8!

Move pending JC approval.