Considering that you are on pilgrimage, technically, you did not expect to be sitting through nearly this many awkward dinners, and yet here you are. Your traveling party is seated around one end of a long table, a dais at one end of the room for entertainment currently empty, and you’re joined by…
…three personages. How to describe them: they are all arresting of visage beyond earthly comprehension, though in different ways. Dilari of the Sea Foam could be the belle of any ball in Creation just by showing up; one has the manner of a shabby but distinguished wizard, and the third… keeps paying too much attention to you.
Coryado has already challenged you to a duel, which you keep gracefully declining-without-declining, but it seems tonight, two nights after your arrival here in the fiendishly-humid shrine of Fire, he has had enough of your excuses, and bids you join him in a match of steel atop the banquet table, with a glorious prize on the line if you win—and a favor to be owed to the fair folk if you lose. First blood, not to the death, but the terms—
You hate this.
The terrible thing is that—you’re hyper-aware, as you step very delicately onto the banquet table, that an easy way to avoid indebting yourself to the fair folk is to indebt yourself to something else—the patrons who already have their terrible threads wrapped around your neck from their dark graves at the bottom of the world. All you have to do is listen for a little bit. Open the door just a tiny bit.
But no: you’re doing this on your own terms. And as you look at his stance, examine how he holds himself—
…well, they want a show. You’re just going to give them a very different one than they expect.
The signal to start is given, and Coryado raises his sword with a flourish. And so do you, coming in with a sweeping blow that surely would look good in an illustration—
—except at the last moment you reverse your direction, swapping from the strike you telegraphed to sweep upwards instead, daiklave flashing to drive him back. You don’t wait to press the advantage, hauling your leg back to kick him in the midsection and send him toppling back onto one of the chairs, balancing tenuously as it threatens to fall backwards, and then slam your elbow into his nose for good measure, sending him down to the floor with a bloody nose and your sword at his throat.
“Yield,” you say, and the corner of your mouth curves just slightly upwards. Not a mote of essence expended.
There’s a silence, and then Coryado drops his sword to the stone floor with a clatter, and begins the applause.Notable:
Everyone looks SO DEEPLY ILL AT EASE except the three radiant individuals.
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softlyfalling) wrote2019-01-24 12:53 am
memory 027
…three personages. How to describe them: they are all arresting of visage beyond earthly comprehension, though in different ways. Dilari of the Sea Foam could be the belle of any ball in Creation just by showing up; one has the manner of a shabby but distinguished wizard, and the third… keeps paying too much attention to you.
Coryado has already challenged you to a duel, which you keep gracefully declining-without-declining, but it seems tonight, two nights after your arrival here in the fiendishly-humid shrine of Fire, he has had enough of your excuses, and bids you join him in a match of steel atop the banquet table, with a glorious prize on the line if you win—and a favor to be owed to the fair folk if you lose. First blood, not to the death, but the terms—
You hate this.
The terrible thing is that—you’re hyper-aware, as you step very delicately onto the banquet table, that an easy way to avoid indebting yourself to the fair folk is to indebt yourself to something else—the patrons who already have their terrible threads wrapped around your neck from their dark graves at the bottom of the world. All you have to do is listen for a little bit. Open the door just a tiny bit.
But no: you’re doing this on your own terms. And as you look at his stance, examine how he holds himself—
…well, they want a show. You’re just going to give them a very different one than they expect.
The signal to start is given, and Coryado raises his sword with a flourish. And so do you, coming in with a sweeping blow that surely would look good in an illustration—
—except at the last moment you reverse your direction, swapping from the strike you telegraphed to sweep upwards instead, daiklave flashing to drive him back. You don’t wait to press the advantage, hauling your leg back to kick him in the midsection and send him toppling back onto one of the chairs, balancing tenuously as it threatens to fall backwards, and then slam your elbow into his nose for good measure, sending him down to the floor with a bloody nose and your sword at his throat.
“Yield,” you say, and the corner of your mouth curves just slightly upwards. Not a mote of essence expended.
There’s a silence, and then Coryado drops his sword to the stone floor with a clatter, and begins the applause.
Notable: