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Post by Deleted on Sept 11, 2019 18:47:14 GMT
Bella retorts, turning her ornate raven blade in her hand with it pointing at the lead man's chest, "Oh, you're all out for a very early morning constitutional, friend? Prowling around sober and fit in the middle of the night in a city of thieves? Well, then you'll have no problems dropping your weapons and throwing yourselves at my mercy, won't you?"
She smiled without any amusement, "Do it now, or your blood be on your own heads."
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Post by Admin on Sept 12, 2019 3:33:26 GMT
"Blimey!" the first one says in awe. "It is Jane the Ripper"
The second man stills his hand from moving to his weapon. He doesn't pull it back but just halts. "It is said that you have no mercy." he replies.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 12, 2019 4:49:11 GMT
Bella laughed hysterically for a long moment. Her golden eyes glinted, her long white fangs glistened, and she replied, "Mercy? Mercy is for the innocent. For the guilty... I am the hunter, and they are my prey..." She advanced, the point of her sword, rippling with the black energies within it, almost to the brigand's chest, "Now, drop your weapons and beg for my mercy..."
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Post by Admin on Sept 12, 2019 5:54:34 GMT
The first man drops the blackjack he was hiding up his sleeve. We smell of urine fills the air
"Drop it Kelly or she won't let us live."
The second man, Kelly by name doesn't drop his club.
"Why bother? She's already judged us as guilty and marked for death. She just enjoys savouring over the kill with a few words first.
"People don't just die but their bodies go missing. You a cannibal, lady?" He drawls.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 12, 2019 6:08:58 GMT
"Don't be silly. How could I be a cannibal..." she said, as she thrust her blade suddenly toward the man's chest closest to her, "...when I don't eat the flesh of demons?" She lunged toward them, cutting the men down, while still speaking conversationally, "And your bodies won't be going missing. I need them to send a message that even criminals can understand."
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Post by Admin on Sept 12, 2019 6:35:42 GMT
The information about their not being the main course at the night's banquet is of little consolation to the dead men. The alley is now silent even the city beyond seems unnaturally quiet.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 12, 2019 7:15:05 GMT
The feast was had, and Bella helped herself to the finer entrails, despite the aftertaste, though, she was loathe to admit, had begun to grow on her. She dragged a body to a wall and dipped into the blood pooling in his many wounds to write a message to the town of Bailey in Thari.
"Thus to the miscreant, the liar, and the thief.
Fear the night, o' wicked men of Bailey,
for the Harpy's come to feast."
Bella licked her fingers clean and admired her poetry, then called her ravens to her. When they'd all landed upon her, she cast her teleport spell and returned to the temporary safety of her roost in the Black Bank. She returned to her bedroom, climbing into bed, and slept through to the noon hour with a full and content belly.
In the morning (or afternoon), after a long rest, she'd turn her mind to the mysterious trumps and their dark implications.
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Post by Admin on Sept 13, 2019 5:19:32 GMT
Bella sleeps long, deep and well. dreams of ships sailing the wide seas sneak into her dreams many times during the night and she awakes with the sounds of ships ringing in her ears. Maybe from the port outside or perhaps from the card, or maybe from both.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 16, 2019 1:02:56 GMT
She awoke the next day with a plan bubbling up from the primordial caverns of her subconscious. The ship trump, at this point at least, seemed the more pressing threat of the two cards, so she decided to deal with it, but Bella wasn't a sorceress who believed in half measures. When a sorceress was going to do something, that sorceress should have every manner of spell ready to accomplish that task. Haste, after all, makes dead sorcerers.
Bella prepared a teleport spell, a health and healing spell, and a concealment spell, then an arena of flame spell, a fire trap spell, and an extinguish spell handy, just in case she needed to employ a scorched earth (or boat) policy. She did always love the irony of a good fire at sea. Once all her spells were ready, she pulled the ship trump from her bodice, and gathered the entire conspiracy to her, wrapping herself in layers of armor, and readying herself a sword.
She didn't plan on returning to the Black Bank if everything went to plan. While it had served well as a base of operations for her first few nights in Bailey, it was probably time to move on, before too many knew it had changed hands and became more trouble than it was worth. Regardless, she'd only return to it if there were absolutely unavoidable. Bella looked into the trump of the ship's hold, focused on it, and projected herself there.
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Post by Admin on Sept 16, 2019 7:31:08 GMT
The detailed image of a ship's hold...frozen by the painting of the unknown artist, cold in her hand...still no longer, the ropes and netting swing to the rhythm of the waves...gull shrieks and water noises and a sudden change from painting to reality...the solidity of connection and a step forward...
Bella finds herself in the depicted ship. Light streams from gaps in the hatch above illuminating a typical hold of a trading caravel ( assuming Bella had learned of such things in the Courts or on her journeying). Open portholes show endless ocean on either side, no sounds of a crew, and no hint of wind.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 16, 2019 7:57:30 GMT
Bella released her ravens, keeping four as armor and gauntlets, leggings and boots, veiled habit and cloak, and her sword. She concentrated on bringing up the Logrus as she deployed the other eight ravens about her, "Kill only when I kill. If I do not want someone dead, I will mark them out. Now, let's get out of this hold." She tucked the trump back into her bodice and looked at the hatch, hopefully with the aid of the Logrus Lens.
If it's not locked, she'll climb onto the deck of the ship and search it...
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Post by Admin on Sept 16, 2019 8:13:15 GMT
It is easy to climb out of the hold. On the deck she finds the ship deserted and becalmed, a dark blue cloudless sky is filled with a large pink sun which blasts the ship with blistering heat. Her Logrus sight reveals no hint of magical effects. The sea beyond is empty of land or other ships only a faint fug of evaporation from the heat. A score of seagulls fly around listlessly searching for food but wary of the ravens.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 16, 2019 8:31:46 GMT
"A mystery," Bella says to no one in particular. "No magic. No crew. No reason." Based on the pink sun, she surmised that she's no longer in Bailey, a fact that annoyed her, but she had no reason to believe, at least for the moment, that she couldn't remedy this should she need to. The birds indicated that there was food source, or, at least, they thought so, and, worse come to worse, they could serve as a food source for a time. Bella knew that birds could't roost on the water, so there must be land not too distant.
As far as the heat, it didn't bother her. Her body adjusted lazily to the heat. At home, she had to make a dozen such changes, often far more drastic, just to navigate to the kitchen in Jesby Ways. Her clothing shifted to keep the worst of the heat away from her body. In the mean time, she searched the ship for the captain's quarters, thinking that she might find some clue as to where between Amber and Chaos she was as well as some clue as to the nature or origin of this ship...
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Post by Admin on Sept 16, 2019 8:46:48 GMT
The captains quarters are impeccably neat, clean, and devoid of anything that would give a clue to the nature or habits of the occupant. Suspiciously this place seems not to have been abandoned but never occupied in the first place. In the hold the barrels for water are empty, no food stored in the galley or elsewhere. Stored supplies are for mundane nautical usage and therefore useless to Bella. A common shadow person sent to this ship would be trapped on the high seas with no hope for escape before starvation or dehydration did them in.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 16, 2019 8:59:56 GMT
Bella was not amused. Even if it had not purposefully targeted her, some fool had managed to try to kill her. She made a mental note to find this person and feast on their entrails while they watched, as she walked along the deck considering what she would do next. After some time, it occurred to her that there was a chance, however minute, that the two trumps tucked into her bodice were related. Was the mysterious "pilgrim" behind this clumsy trap?
She had nothing better to do, so she made her way back to the captain's quarters and pulled the curtains down to darken the room, then she found a chair to sit on, with the windows behind her, so her face would be cast in silhouette. She kept her veil over her face, exposing only her eyes and pulled the card of the Pilgrim from her bodice. She held it before her, studying it carefully, testing it for the power.
If it were, in fact, a trump, she would attempt to make contact with it.
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