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[size=2]@FloatingInSpace @Cascabel @shattringmirrors[/size]
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[quote=tigressRising]
There's something in the water.
It lives at the very bottom of the Leviathan Trench. Down there the murk is so thick not even the Tidelord could see what lies on the floor. Water dragons don't dare go near It. No one knows what It looks like. No one knows why It's there. The few who try to find out never return.
But if you could brave the dark and the cold, if you survived the monsters and the Maren's traps, if you somehow made it to the bottom of the ocean floor without dying from the pressure or lack of air, oh! This is what you would see.
You would see only darkness at first. But not the same type of darkness that you would know. This darkness is not the absence of light. It is as if light had never existed. But you would feel an overwhelming sense of fear, of dread, of realizing [i]you should not be here[/i].
At first you think it's the Shade. But then suddenly you can see through the darkness and realize no, it's something far worse. Because the Shade does not have so many tentacles, so many eyes, so many sharp bloody teeth glistening in the light that is not there.
And the Shade does not speak. But It does.
It speaks to you, and its voice pierces you like the sound of a thousand forks screeching against glass times a million. And you scream, and water fills your lungs and you choke but you keep screaming because It's voice has broken your mind and all you can do is scream. And It is only [i]whispering[/i]. If It chose to speak at a normal volume, all life on Sorneith would die of madness. And if It ever screamed, It would kill off the entire galaxy.
By now your mind is in a million shattered pieces. But if it weren't, you would hear It speak to you in eldritch tongues ([i]so many tongues, so many eyes, so many teeth shining in no light[/i]). And It would say [b][i]Come, come to us. We will embrace you and take you and you will feel no pain.[/i][/b] And that’s when you realize:
It’s not alone.
Their tendrils of inky darkness reach for you, and some instinct of self-preservation makes you kick away from Them but They still grab you and where They touch you and it [i]burns [/i]like ice and fire and acid and [i]pain[/i] and it [i]burns[/i]
And as They pull you in They are whispering [i][b]come to us we love you let us embrace you join us you will feel no pain[/b][/i]
[i][b]JoIn Us wE lOVe yoU LeT Us eMbRaCE yOu COmE To US[/b][/i]
[b][i]jOIn US lEt Us EmBRaCe yOU[/i][/b]
[center][i][b]cOMe tO US LovE US We lOVe YOu[/b][/i][/center]
[right][i][b]YoU wIlL fEEl No PAiN[/b][/i][/right]
And you scream again though your lungs are full of water for it [i]burns [/i]and you fear Them and you scream for the gods to help you but not even the gods could save you from Them for if They ever rose up from the depths the gods would not even be able to save themselves.
And They watch you with Their many eyes in Their many faces as Their many tentacles pull you towards Their many beaks and Their many mouths with Their many sharp teeth
[i]oh gods their teeth[/i]
and then there is pain and you scream and all you see is darkness and all you feel is [i]pain[/i]
and then nothing.
.
.
.
.
.
There’s something in the water.
[/quote]
[quote=KaelaByte]
[b]The Bogeyman[/b]
The wind howls loud outside your door
it seems you'll never know,
the peace that comes with silence there
instead of heavy snow.
But loudly then it rages on
tearing past every home,
'till silently you lock the doors
and sit with an old tome.
The wind comes howling through the cracks
though you are safe inside,
and you tell yourself it's all okay
to save your fragile pride.
But as the evening tarries on
dark feelings seem to creep,
and merge with memories once seen there,
until you almost weep.
You shake yourself and laugh out loud
there's nothing there to fear,
yet quietly you wonder now
if a noise you just did hear.
Now curled up in your childhood bed
you bring the covers tight,
surely if they stay aloft
then all will be alright.
Your silent fears soon merge with sleep
and quickly then you fall
into dreams like honey, sweet,
with dancing china dolls.
While asleep you slow uncurl
until relaxed you lie
and never see the monster creep,
though you it soon does spy.
It's eyes are red, it's arms too long,
it's breath does smell of rot,
and slowly it crawls up to you
and your limbs combine and knot.
Then lying there atop your breast
the monster soon does feed
upon the dreams you hold so dear,
'till horrors it does breed.
Your blood runs cold
though slumber on you must,
for this creature's not yet done,
it's thoughts tinge yours like rust.
And so it stays till dawn unfurls
and at last it's forced to leave,
long limbs unwind their iron grasp
and a final breath it heaves.
Then just as light shows through the frame
it curls below your bed,
and stays there safe from sunlight's rays
leaving nothing there but dread.[/quote]
[quote=TheMimic1013]
[url=https://docs.google.com/document/d/11eX0jkgAtY-GZ0SJHLxK2EZ2xCzgWqJJNBo5tLEiX3s/edit]The Riot of Rot Scares[/url]
[/quote]
[quote=inkdragons]
I heard there’s an offer in the edges of the Abiding Boneyard, offered to win the Plaguebringer's favor. Find anything still living to feed to the Things that you see in the corners of your eyes. They say the hours are long but the pay is good. The Things never interact with the Workers directly, they communicate purely through cryptic glyphs scratched into skulls scattered everywhere and high pitched wailing, an unnatural sound. The Things do not like being seen by the Workers. They do not like seeing themselves. They do not like being seen. They are self conscious about their lack of weight. The Things will not harm the Workers unless a meal is missed. Hours are long, they say the pay is good. The Workers return home with gaunt looks, hollowed eye sockets, nothing but skin and bones. They say the pay is good. They urge you to work alongside them. They say the pay is good. They say the pay is good.
[/quote]
[quote=Marzi]
You start by swallowing your tongue. The little things you cannot say, the things looks should express, crash against indifference. Your teeth are gates and the noise that breathes through their cracks is too soft to be heard.
You've swallowed your tongue, and somehow their voices grow louder for its absence. The shouts that drown out the begging echo in your ears. Beratement and chastisement and guilt, guilt, guilt.
You press your palms against your ears and the world softens like you want it to. You cannot express how peaceful the drumming of the blood in your veins is. Skin on skin forcing the sound of You back into your body. It is a barrier they don't bother to break. They don't need you to hear them.
You see them, still. Your empty throat and your blocked ears do nothing to hide them, but you are quiet and cushioned. If you are still, you can watch the shadows pass. You will see the shadows pass and watch them grown long across the earth. Before they reach you, you close your eyes and you might as well be floating.
Or falling.
If you could just fall up, not down. The clouds and the heavens might still be there, but your eyes are shut. Someone may have once told you the clouds are cold, that the sky is vast and lonely, but you cannot hear them, even in a memory. You are lost to something else now. Lost somewhere.
Wherever you are, you can still feel them.
You do not have to see them to know of their approach, it shakes through the earth towards you. You do not have to hear them, to know they are pleased in finding you, if you were ever lost to them. You do not know where you are, but you are with Them.
You might not be alone, there may be someone else.
If someone could just see you--
--if someone could just hear you--
--but you've swallowed your tongue, and you cannot scream.
[/quote]
[quote=TheLOAD]
[b][i]Wights[/i][/b]
There are many dark things surrounding Sorienth, and I will tell you one of these tales now.
The brightest lights cast the darkest shadows, and one would think that after The Emperors everyone would be wary of The Lightweaver's creations. But surely Pearlcatcher cannot be that bad, right? Not as bad as what becomes of an Imperial if it dies?
Wrong.
It is believed that a Pearlcatcher's pearl is really nothing, just some superstition. The breed themselves teach that it is their soul, and why should anyone trust an outsider. The pearl is sacred, and it must be protected.
If a Pearlcatcher loses their pearl, they begin to die. Their body rots and decays, flesh falls from the bones. But the dragon doesn't die. It rots until it is a skeleton, with little more than a bit of its element where its heart would be. It is a Wight, a creature driven by a need to feed of the magic of others. The only way to kill a Wight it to reunite it with its Pearl, at which point the dragon passes peacefully.
But wait, it gets worse.
Emperors have been known to steal the pearls from defeated Pearlcatchers, swallowing the orbs so that they can raise an army of Wights to serve them. When the pearls dissolve in the stomachs of the Emperor who had stolen them hope is lost for the Wight. They will hunt and feed long after their maker is dead.
[/quote]
[quote=Zaranock]
The Watchers.
Scuttle, skitter, reminisce and shudder, stiffen, scratch, and hatch. The feelings of being watched you have are not opinion, they are fact.
In the mirror, the corner of your eye, the quiet footsteps following but never passing by, the Watchers Watch and only Watch, their purpose? I cannot say, I cannot lie.
Never seen, oft heard, as a crying keen, or a hidden bird, a shuffle of dust, or a scent of musk, forever Watching, as all turns to rust.
Do they die? I cannot say, I cannot lie, do they live? I cannot say, no lie can I give, do they rest? I cannot say, I know not of their nests, do they sleep? I cannot say, I only know them as the hidden wolf in the sheep.
Beware should the Watchers ever tire of their Watch, for dragonkind in entirety would be distraught, should the creatures ever-Watching finally step into the light, for how can you destroy an evil you cannot see to fight?
My piece is said, before the night’s end I will be dead, for the Watchers do not tolerate talk of their existence, and to my lair they will come hence, to wreak silent revenge, my death before me I see, my life forfeit to those who see me.
Beware, fair dragon, of the Watchers, never seen, always seeing, oft heard, never found, for no dragon’s eyes have seen those who see all dragons.
The Watchers hide, their time they bide, for maybe they’re just waiting, till someday we’re all dead, before they come a’slithering, out from ‘neath the bed?
[/quote]
[quote=RimeRind]
To awaken in a bed that is not your own is a terribly disconcerting experience. Even before your eyes are open you can feel the difference. This was not where you laid your weary head to rest the night before. Even the smell is wrong; bright citrus tickles your nose where once sweet, comforting lavender wafted. Your breath hitches in your throat. Where were you? How could this happen?
A queasiness in your stomach grows as you fight the urge to roll over and pull the unfamiliar blankets over your head. Perhaps this is a dream, or rather, that odd state of in-between where nothing feels truly real. You shift and the scratchy fabric dragging across your exposed skin dispels those thoughts immediately; you have only ever slept on smooth, slippery satin.
There’s no more denying it. You must open your eyes and face what awaits you. Just a crack at first, enough that light rushes up to meet you and you flinch back. No need to worry. That was a normal reaction. You try again and this time the room materializes around you as your pupils constrict and adjust. A sharp inhalation. This is nothing like what you remember.
Glossy gray walls, white lace curtains framing a small window, an oak desk in the corner piled high with markers and papers… It was lovely, all in all, and oh so very [i]wrong[/i]. Peeking over the edge, you note the hard wood floor in place of old, ragged carpeting. Something niggles at you; something telling and important. Then it hits you. Silence. The room was utterly quiet. No ticking clock or humming fan. No blaring sirens from the window as ambulances flew by. It felt like you were in the middle of nowhere.
The scuff of shoes against flooring whispers from under the door. Your head whips around and you stare, wide-eyed and helpless. Paralyzed, you listen as the shuffling grows closer and eventually watch as a pair of shadows indicate someone (or something) standing just outside. For a while nothing happens and you are alone with only the sound of your own short, shallow breaths.
[i]Click.[/i] Slowly, the gleaming brass doorknob turns. A flurry of images and thoughts jockey for position in your mind until they all bleed into one another and you’re left with nothing. Your heart beats an erratic tattoo against the inside of your ribs. All you can do is wait. Frightened fingers seek out the plush softness of a pillow and squeeze until your knuckles turn white. Then it happens. The door swings open on well-oiled hinges, almost lazily. A sick fascination prevents you from turning away from that which you have been dreading.
A choked laugh. How absurd! What had you been thinking?
An old woman, bent-backed and wizened stands before you. In her hand, a cane carved in the likeness of a dove. With great care and dignity, she hobbles towards you. Your tremulous, hysterical smile slips and disappears. There are others and they file in after her, their expressions a unified steel mask. Ah, but their eyes, [i]their eyes[/i]- They are dull and dark and dead. Air fills their lungs and red blood must run through their veins but they are not [i]alive[/i].
You shy away, press back; anything to get away, to be in your own house again with your mother and father. The old woman smiles. It is a mechanical gesture, barely human. “Welcome home,” she says in a voice like dried leaves. Behind her, they echo as one, “Welcome home.”
[/quote]
[quote=CosmicCoelacanth]
[url=https://docs.google.com/document/d/103cNfb_BuyGHenaCZeDMkOHbXctuprcr6Qv1EE5hqtI/edit]The Empty Lair and the Doctor's Journal[/url]
Note: All spelling and capitalization errors are intentional.
[/quote]
[quote=CasualTea96]
You love to sail. You love it for the salty air, the rocking waves, the freedom. You have a loyal crew. Well loyal to your pirating at least. They don't understand how the sea calls you. They don't understand the joy of it. But you respect them and they respect you.
During one sail a storm hits and when it dissipates you are far beyond lost. The air tastes weird, the waves are rocking all wrong, you feel trapped. But your instruments are failing, which means you cannot leave until night so you wait. Your crew doesn't notice your concerns and bunks up to avoid the sun while you pace.
Twilight falls and you can't wait to leave the wrong-sea. You kick your crew into action harsher than usual and squint upwards, looking for the first stars to lead you home. That's when you hear the singing. From the first soft note you are entranced, hardly noting members of your crew are sliding overboard.
The singing swells and you are filled with rapture. It's the sea calling you, it must be. You swing your legs over the edge and push. You are falling. You do not care. The water is cold. You ignore it. You see an alien face approaching fast. You smile and close your eyes. The sea is calling you.
[/quote]
[quote=shanncrafter]
The pearlcatcher in front of you wants a tale.
[i]A tale.[/i]
It's ridiculous, really, so much so in fact, that a small bubble of hysterical laughter threatens to work its way towards the surface, but you suppress it. Starting off a story like this doesn't seem very appropriate.
(A quick glance around the room reassures you that this is not the case though. You are in the company of [i]Plague dragons[/i], for Plaguebringer's sake. They are not as easily frightened by the things that go bump in the night. They have seen far worse.)
So you begin.
It's not as terrible as you thought it would be. You do not stutter, or falter, or hesitate. The words you utter seem to take control of you, weaving themselves into the story effortlessly. The pearlcatcher tilts her head, listening patiently.
The story you tell is not so much a story as a myth is a fairy tale. It's a message, one that you desperately need to tell (to someone, anyone). No sane dragon will ever believe you, so you don't have much of a choice. They need to know.
The Wyrmwound is alive.
It is exactly the sort of thing that the Plaguebringer would create, the sort of twisted, decaying pit of rot at the heart of her domain, the very epitome of disease and pestilence.
You had done it out of curiosity, you said. Standing on the very edge of the Wyrmwound didn’t seem like a very good idea then. You did not know why you had done so. But you had waited and watched the bubbling cesspool patiently and you had stood between the two tallest “teeth” of the Wound and allowed yourself to listen, and it had whispered to you. The Wyrmwound likes telling secrets. It always has. A scarce few know it. Fewer will actually listen, because they claim that the Wyrmwound lies.
It speaks of many things.
The Plaguebringer does not live in the Wyrmwound, oh no. She lives below it. In between the huge, twisting tendrils and roots of the Wyrmwound, past the bubbling, stinking pit, the Plaguebringer lies. The Filthy One concocts her brews from there, coming up with new sicknesses and diseases. The tendrils of the Wyrmwound hover curiously by her shoulder; she does not care. She sends her gifts to the world and to her acolytes through the very roots of the Wyrmwound itself, as she watches appraisingly.
The Wyrmwound tells you this and more.
It doesn’t come to you as a surprise, because you’ve always known that there was something strange about the Wyrmwound and its counterpart, the Behemoth. But what you did not expect was that it had a mind of its own. You were not worried, at first. You thought that the Plaguebringer was the one who created the Wyrmwound, and that she had complete control over it.
The stinking cesspool laughs at your ignorance, at your naivety.
[i]It was I who gave her life.[/i]
The truth is not easy to accept. You have your doubts, of course, but the Wyrmwound speaks with conviction. It knows what It is talking about. The Wound does not really have a voice, of course, but Its thoughts worm their way into your head, convincing you of the truth.
[i]The Plaguebringer is a figurehead, nothing more.[/i]
Before the Plaguemother, before the Filthy One, there was the Wyrmwound. And the Wyrmwound does not care. It never has.
It would watch as the Plague swept over all of Sorineth, and it would not lift a finger to prevent the destruction. The deities do not hold the real power. They are merely puppets, and the elements themselves pull the strings. Of course, they do have much more power than the average dragon and a greater affinity to their element, but they have always been used.
And one more thing.
[i]They are everywhere. [/i]
The Wyrmwound is the heart of the Scarred Wasteland, and although dragons brush off the constant heaving of the dry ground as the movement of Shattered Serpents, you now know better. The Wyrmwound breathes. It is alive.
The truth is enough to drive you mad, but the Wyrmwound does not lie.
So you howl and screech to get the voice out of your ears and you flee. You have to spread the word; you have to let everyone know.
You have reached the end of your tale. The pearlcatcher scribbles the last of your words on a piece of dry parchment. She looks up and nods, folding the parchment away neatly. There is nothing in her eyes. This is your cue to leave, so you do. You can already see the long line of dragons waiting to tell their own stories behind you.
There is nothing to do but to wait.
Even if this story is not made known to the masses, even if it is hidden away in the archives, at least you know the truth.
At least you can tell it to others, and even if they do not believe you, it makes for a fantastic story to tell other dragons and young hatchlings.
That even if the Shade returns and the deities stop it yet again, they do not hold the real power and the elements pull the strings. They always have. But it never hurts to remember, because now you know that the Wyrmwound is alive.
[/quote]
[quote=FWD]
"Evolution," said Father Vrarix to the creature. "I believed that evolution was the invisible hand of our Holy Mother, constantly guiding Her children towards perfection."
The creature gazed up at him, unblinking. He shivered. Because of the cold. You wouldn't imagine the air was so cold on the banks of the Wyrmwound, just seeing the brew bubble and steam.
"I had faith. That whatever grief life gave us, the future would be. Better." He had to struggle to stay upright. Nausea rolled though his jellified flesh. "And it was my duty to share that faith with my clan. I had to show them… I had to show them the future that waited for them."
The creature was expressionless. It was slithering toward him now, eyes always fixed on him even as its body lurched. It moved as if it still, in some way, expected legs to carry it.
"For you, I should have known. You're a coatl, an ancient breed. We see coatls' distant descendants every day… the snakes. Perfect creatures stripped of everything unnecessary."
Fangs bared, the creature's entire body was poised to strike.
"Legs. Wings. Voice. Dreams. Everything but the raw need to survive."
Father Vrarix shut his eyes.
He had Seen during his dive in the Wyrmwound. Seen quivering primordial slime and clumsy eyeless fish. Worms with too many legs crawling from the ocean. Mutants throwing themselves into the claws of life and being recycled into maggots.
Seen planetwide eruptions, freezes, mass extinction. Complex life was always the first to break. Seen the future of dragonkind- night falls, earth shatters- the last dragons starving on a barren planet. Collapsing under their own size and might.
He thought he could hear Her voice. And feel Her, with heavy heart, reject that future, and cast the dice on life yet again. And then Her worshippers became what they would become.
"…But if that's perfection, then perfection is worthless to a creature like me." Father Vrarix's voice had fallen to a whisper. He knew he couldn't run. His body felt twisted, like a reflection in water.
The creature that had been his closest friend and disciple lunged at him. That single moment, as its fangs closed in, seemed to last forever.
[/quote]
[quote=Pennifeather]
Let me tell you all a tale from another land. Plague dragons think they corner the market on all that is monstrous and wrong in this world, but they do not understand the things that can be found in the strangest corners of Sornieth. Our clan has loads of stories, collected from these many corners, that would scare the scales off Mother Plaguebringer herself.
You all know of the Cloudscape Crags, yes? Bitter, terrible place, and with its own... peculiar history. Dragons have lost toes and tails venturing into those mountains. The Beastclans have long resided there as well, Longnecks stripping the tough bark from the trees for food. But they only stay for so long. In the scant days of "summer," they migrate up, harvesting extra scrub and bark. Then they return to the Snowsquall Tundra below. These days, dragons do the same. They climb the peaks in great strong packs, hunting and foraging, battling the Beastclans, but they always return to the Tundra before the first winter storm. Those who believe themselves strong enough to survive the winter are never seen again.
The first dragon clans to climb the Crags for territory were unaware of the Longnecks' migratory habits. They stormed into the mountains and settled, satisfied that their territory was free of competition, thinking the Beastclans too weak to handle the gales and blizzards in the mountains. Little did they know that more than Beastclans resided there. Little did they know that they were not the first.
For a time, the clans were satisfied, if chilly. The Icefield is a harsh place, and the Crags are one of the hardest places to eke out a living, but they succeeded, and they thought themselves masters of the mountains. The blizzards swept in, but the dragons burrowed within their lairs, relying on food stores on the worst days. As any dragon will tell you, food stores run out swiftly in the cold, and soon the clans were forced to venture out in search of new food, lest their families begin to starve. But not all clan members returned.
The clans grew concerned with their missing members and sent out search parties, but did not find their missing members. Days went by, searching, gathering, fighting through the hideous snowstorms, with no trace of the dragons. With sorrow in their hearts, they accepted the loss and were grateful for the cessation of the storms and the return of the sun.
The next year, when the winter returned, it was even harsher than the last. The clans held out as long as possible, struggling with their hunger, until the bravest left in search of sustenance for their families, their hatchlings. Once again, some failed to return. Their clans hunted for them in vain, digging through the packed snow during breaks in the weather, fighting through blinding snow. They poured out their sorrows to the howling winds and gave up their clan members as lost.
The following winter was far more desperate. More dragons vanished than ever before, and fearful of losing more gatherers, some clans were forced to move down the mountains for the winter, leaving their territories abandoned. The remaining clans selfishly warred over the new resources, settling into an uneasy peace as the weather thawed. Each clan resolved to use their summer wisely, and crammed as much food into their hoards as possible. Confident that they had packed their larders sufficiently, the clans settled in for a long but secure winter.
During the first of the storms, all was well. But during the second, a strange phenomenon occurred. Voices could be heard on the winds. Dragon voices. The wind often lies in the mountains, so they were ignored as tricks of sound. Later, they became more distinctive. Dragons who moved to their lair's entrance would hear cries for help, sobbing hatchlings, even their own family members screaming their names. Those who followed the voices into the storm disappeared.
This time, when the search parties went out after their lost members, they found them. Desiccated dragon corpses hung from the twisted trees beyond their lairs, opened from throat to tail, nothing left inside. All kinds of dragons, from the tiniest Faes to the mightiest Guardians, had been treated the same. The clans questioned, was this what had become of all their missing members over the years, their bodies never found? Had some thing been taking them?
The four remaining clans in the Crags, too stubborn to be scared away, convened a moot that summer. They resolved to find this threat and rid their territories of it, for the safety of all their members. The strongest, most skilled warriors from each clan were chosen to hunt the beast, or beasts. That winter, the clans waited anxiously for the storms to hit, and when the voices once more called through the mountains, the group of twelve warriors set out to follow them, tracking the unseen monster. A single warrior returned. What he described to his clan was... Well.
The warriors had discovered the beast waiting for them in the trees. They had tried to surround it, but it surrounded them. Its movements were too fast to track, its strength unparalleled. Even the strongest jaws and claws were unable to to stop it. It had hunted them and picked them off, one by one, dragging them into the wilds and cutting of their desperate cries for help, for mercy. But the surviving warrior had seen the monster. As it had tracked him, it called to him with the voices of his lost comrades, then laughed a screeching, hollow laugh as it trapped him, taunted him. It was a dragon, he told the clans, unlike any dragon he had ever seen before. Its breed was unidentifiable, its form twisted, with rough, scaled skin stretched taut over long, jagged bones. Its claws were long, curved like hooks, stained with the remains of its previous meals. Its eyes were sunken into its head, leaving nothing but light-sucking black pits behind. Its nostrils gaped, and its tattered lips pulled back over rows of uncannily white thorn-sharp teeth, made for shredding. Each breath it took exhaled the scent of rot and death and wrong, crystallizing on the warrior's hide, and frost formed on the ground beneath its crackling, warped feet. He prepared himself to die, to be gutted and drained like his fellows, but as rapidly as it had appeared beside him, the monstrous thing vanished into the forest.
The clans never returned to those peaks of the Cloudscape Crags. To this day, Ice dragons avoid them, even if they don't know why. Every time I tell this tale, at least one dragon will ask, why did the monster let that warrior live? It seems counter to its nature. It feeds on its own kind, or what was once its own kind, one of the greatest taboos among all dragon cultures. It gave them a choice, you see. They could leave, or they could stay in its territory, but each year, it would exact its tribute of sorts, returning during the most dire months to feed and retreating when the sun thawed the clouds.
Let this tale be a warning to you, whether you live in the Southern Icefield or elsewhere. Eating the flesh of another dragon can grant you great power. Strength, speed, invulnerability. But it also brings with it a curse, one of unending hunger, perpetual starvation without death, and you will never be sated, no matter how many dragons you devour. Your own kin would be prey to you, and their flesh would only increase your need for more, until the hunger consumes you as well.
[/quote]
[quote=shortkeike]
She invited me to sit with her. I was at such a distance and angle, that her pretty face seemed distorted, and her stare strange and lopsided. Nevertheless, her charisma, her energy, some quality unknown had drawn me towards her and away from the other artworks.
The gallery was void of any individual but myself and the woman before my eyes. With a static expression on her lips - a straight line - she stared outwards of the frame and into mine eyes, mine soul. Impasto lined her silken gown and brought her to life. The light fabric seemed to gently rest on her skin, hugging her like a spirit. Her beauty milked me of sorrow, and yet it seemed, that the longer I viewed her, the less I wanted to close my eyes. As I quietly observed her, I blinked but only occasionally, so little often that my face soon reddened and my eyes came to be sore and heavy. I rested them momentarily and when I opened them again, it seemed as if she had moved. Her clothing seemed to be tauter, as if she had briefly fidgeted and caused a cascading of the folds in her garment. As I inspected her for any other changes, I came to realise that she had never ceased the hold of our gazes, from when I had crossed the hall, and to where I stood directly in front. Her bright eyes precisely and dart-like watched my own dancing pupils. They were such a lovely shade of hazel, speckled with an earthen green and light chocolate. Transfixed, I looked into them. I saw each stroke as it culminated to become the window to her soul.
When light shone through the window behind me, the white paint in her eyes glimmered, and my shadow was cast onto her. Her face was dark, where my body eclipsed the sunlight. The brightness in her eyes disappeared, and her cheeks, almost angular, conjured up sharp shadows, a fractal of darkness. Her hazel eyes seemed almost black and without illumination, were hollow, as if she had suddenly deteriorated into a malnourished version of herself. I became apprehensive and stepped aside, so that once again the sun would light up her face, and lift my spirits. When the rays of sunlight hit her face however, I was not pleased. Blindingly, her pale skin was lit up and set ablaze. As if she could feel the heat, the paint of her face peeled away in flakes of pink and white. Her smile disappeared and soon there was no mouth where the sun had scorched away her features. Her white gown quickly caught fire too, and before I could comprehend the happenings before me, the background, foreground, and she, were all lit in an angry orange blaze. The tendrils of flame licked and flailed uncontrolled. They reached out and tried to attack me, but I stepped back. They engulfed her wooden frame, and a smell of ashes and rotting bark washed over me. The smoke danced in my nostrils like evil spirits and spiralled deeper within me, filling my lungs with a heavy atmosphere. I could hardly breathe, and silently, the woman in the painting screamed as she melted away. I closed my eyes as dust and soot threatened to invade. I tried to rub any debris out with my hand, and when I opened one eye warily, she was all but gone. A charred black stain was all that was left. It had not occurred to me to call for the gallery workers, in search of help, but fear wracked me now and as a deer would from a forest-fire, I fled whilst yelling with incomprehensible words.
[/quote]
[quote=Renzokuken]
"It starts with the whispers. With voices that crave for a soul to leech. Voices that are rife with malice; that slowly feed on your will and drain your strength. Whispers; that's all you hear as you pass, unguarded and unsuspecting. And they remain, unseen and unnoticed. It starts with the whispers, but it does not end.
"Because then you feel them. A shiver of air, a trace of breath, murmurs fanning your neck. You feel them skulking on the brink of your mind, slinking, stealing. You might even taste their rotting breath. But this part never lasts long. The numbness settles long before you realise it's there; the silence is drilling, your ears are caving, your breath is leaking less and less.
"But your eyes stay open. [i]Wide[/i] open.
"Gaunt faces. Hollow eyes. Matted skin. Split tongues.
"Your blood [i]thrums[/i] through your veins. Your heart [i]strives[/i] to escape. And you think -[i]hope[/i]- it might just succeed.
"But then the darkness spills, like a dream. Slowly at first -[i]you teeter[/i] - and then all at once, the shadows are pummelling, puncturing, piercing, dragging you along with their hostile touch. And by that point, it's too late to scream. For their fingers have already clogged your throat and split your tongue, and you are suffocating on the echoes, again and again and again.
"It starts with the whispers, but it does not end.
"It does not end. And I should know," he echoed, his voice muted as my eardrums began to shift out of focus. He jerked a mottled finger toward my chest, curling back his lip to reveal a gaping cavity. "[i]You[/i] should know."
Then the gaunt face, with hollow eyes and matted skin and a split tongue, vanished. A fragment of air that I could not feel.
Leaving my heart striving to escape.
[/quote]
[quote=Drakenhart]
The Female Fae hovers above the flames of the fire, highlighted from the bottom and sending shadows flickering everywhere with each flip-flap-snap of her wings. Her monotone voice fit perfectly for such a tale as she was about to tell. It shed no light on any emotion that may be tied to the telling of the story.
She fluttered higher and wrapped her tail around a branch above the fire. Grabbing it with her hind feet, she turned herself upside down. She settled her fins and flaps firmly against her body so that even her fellow fae and those who understood fae body language also got the "monotone" treatment.
So she began......
' There are some scary stories that people tell to teach lessons. There are other scary stories that are told for the 'jump' factor. But the most frightening of stories are the ones that hold possibility... of bad things that can happen even now... this very night. Those are the stories of nightmares.....
The worst nightmares are the ones that happen to children. The innocent. The delicate. The unhatched......
Those who have never nested may not understand the simple horror parents feel even when offspring not their own is harmed... but loss is understood by all.
There is a clan territory that has never kept the same clan-members for more then a few breeding cycles. Every so many years, about 20 or so, on the longest and darkest night of the year, something creeps out of the shadows. Some who have experienced this thing whisper that is it part of the Shade. Others laugh, and blame Shadow Flight for it's creations. Still others blame the Arcanist for an experiment gone horribly wrong.
However, whenever they try to warn the dragons of this territory of this creeping horror they are laughed at and chased off - because really... such stories are for campfires and the Riot of Rot. Right? Such terrible things cannot be real.
Right? '
She extended her frill in a questioning manner. Looking to each in turn with a long, slow look that peered past eyes and into the soul - or so it seemed. A few others twitched and shifted uncomfortably.
She folded her frills flat against her head once more and continued softly, urging others to lean in closer to hear her voice.
' Deep from the darkest places that even Shadow Flight dare not tred something arises. From the cracks between boulders buried deep underground, and from the crevices of tree roots in the deepest forest wilds, something awakens. Bubbling up from the depths of the darkest trenches, and from those areas within the libraries of the were the lights of knowledge do not reach.... it grows into something more.....
It waits until all are asleep. Making sure that even the watch dragons and their companions find the pull of sleep too powerful. Those that remain alert.... often are never seen again. A bloody smear here, bits of scale there, are the only things left of those who's duty was more powerful then their fear or need to rest.
The companions of others that dare try to protect the clan's nest meet a similar fate..... some even become bloody and horrible decorations strung along in pieces all around the nesting areas. A sign that something dared... and succeeded... in violating the most secure of places. The nest itself.
The first thing seen upon waking? Empty nests. No eggs. No Hatchlings. Only those who just reached maturity seemed spared.... unless they too woke up to see what this nightmare thing was that came into their homes and took their siblings and cousins who just barely lost their egg-tooth. They too were either gone with but a smear of blood, or left in pieces as a warning. '
The fae flashed open her wings and fins in a snap.
' Alarms are raised. Warnings sounds. Keening parents and family call out for the missing. No scrap of cloth, or smear of blood is left of those taken. Nothing to investigate. Nothing left behind of them....'
She folds her fins and wings back against her body and head, again a small dark figure hanging upside down above the fire.
' The clan searches day and night. The ones scoffed at before are sought for answers... but there are no answers. There is Nothing.
Nothing...... they are just.... gone.
Days turn to weeks, weeks turn to months, months turn to years and still no trace. Still no answers come and the clan suffers as a whole. Slowly the darkness in their hearts drives some to despair. Others turn to the deities and find solace fighting beside them, just to forget. Others pack up what belongings they have and move somewhere else in fear of this.. horror... happening again to them and their families.
Years pass and the creeping dark that steals doesn't come again. Hope arises as other hatchlings arrive, but those who have been there before remind them....it will happen again. Fear drives the families out, and soon the territory is empty again.
But a rich territory is always sought after. One that had been settled with perfectly groomed nests does not stay empty forever. Even the beast clans fall victim to this thing that takes, so the territory stays empty until another clan finds it and settles.
Wanderers that once called this place home, will come and warn them.....
But such stories are for nights during the Riot of Rot.... right? Silly, terror-filled stories meant to make you look over your wings, and check behind you when the nights grow long and dark. They aren't real.
Right? '
She pauses again, opening her fins in the same way as before, and leaves the questioning look on her features for a little bit longer this time. Looking past them now, behind them, and into the darkness.
She suddenly flares her wings, lets go of the branch and falls towards the fire in one swift motion. Just as she is about to topple into the flames, she gives several powerful downward swipes of her large wings. The gust snuffs the fire, gutters it to glowing coals, and her dark forms fades suddenly into the night and dark canopy above. She settles back into the branches further up in the tree this time and says once more..
'Right? '
[/quote]
[quote=RottingFlesh]
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dU38yqw5W-XxLTDl8NjpmdGmwTXeX2wf9OqZkyyXATA/edit?usp=sharing[/quote]
[quote=SaturdayLemon]
"Drake's not dead while his words are still spoken."
It was a Nocturne who said it first, I think. You'll hear it anywhere there's been Nocs around for more than two generations.
I never really believed it. Dead is dead, and that's the end of it.
Then I killed Miran. Now, I - I'd better go back.
Everyone knew Miran. Everyone could talk to Miran, he would always listen, and I mean really listen. He would just look at you like he saw everything you wanted to be and say, "And then [i]what[/i]?"
Just like that.
I couldn't say why I killed him, now. I don't know if I could have then. But I did it, and then I thought things were[/i] better[/i].
I was wrong about that.
After he died, Nira didn't stop talking for days. Not to anyone, just trying to fill the void. I could sympathize, a little, but mostly I didn't understand what had happened.
She started hearing people again a couple weeks later, started talking to the hatchlings. She hadn't dealt in the present before Miran died, not as the archivist to his chronicler, but she learned quickly enough when she needed to.
One day Skimmer came up to her on his clumsy little paws, said Kuhta was framing him for the ruined painting. (Don't ask me about Kuhta's side, I never heard it.)
Nira just sat there and heard him out, listened to his side of the story, and then asked "And then[i]what[/i]?"
I ran like a rabbit.
Didn't help. The whole clan would ask that question when someone finished their story, and I ran every time. Eventually just packed up and left.
We're a clan of messengers. Anywhere I went, I would eventually have come back and heard it again. And again.
Drake's not dead while his words are still spoken.
He isn't dead.
He isn't dead.
[/quote]
[quote=KIMJA][i]Trigger(Mental disorder mention) I read through the ToS but I hope this isn't too graphic, let me know if it is and I'll make the appropriate changes , thank you![/i]
Now, I won’t start off by saying I don’t believe in ghosts and that sort of thing. Because paranormal occurrences are a real thing. At least here in the tangled wood. We shadow flight believe both the physical and physical realm coexist, and sometimes beings from either realms can cross over. Paranormal is the normal here.
Growing up here I’ve had my fair share of hauntings and creepy occurrences. Run ins with ghosts and monsters happen on a regular basis, and some aren’t too friendly either. But I’ve made it through relatively unscathed. Recently there have been rumours of something quite gruesome. Dragons’ and Beastclans’ bodies alike have been found absolutely mutilated, sliced open from top to bottom. Their carcasses pinned to trees and rocks on display. A few clans, including mine, did some investigations but could not find any solid leads to a culprit. A message was issued for all dragons to avoid venturing too far from their clans, just to be safe. Another report had just come in. Four bodies were found in that same horrid state of disembowelment on a tree. 2 Faes, a pearlcatcher and surprisingly, a guardian. Well, half of a guardian...gross… I got dragged along by my clan leaders who were part of the investigation team, because I was a doctor. I was requested to do an autopsy. I’ve performed numerous surgeries in my career, but nothing prepared me for what I saw. The report barely scratched the surface of how awful the victims looked. Their bodies were spread open like blankets, the ends pinned on the tree trunk like morbid decorations. Their insides spilled onto the ground….I’d rather not describe the rest.
“L-let me take a closer look…” I stammered.
I took a shaky step forward, willing myself to stare at the horror in front of me without throwing out. The killer seemed to have a lot of precision in their work. Their bodies were arranged side by side, the 2 poor faes flanking the two bigger dragons. The cuts looked almost surgical in nature, as if the killer carefully cut them, not haphazard in the slightest. Honestly, the entire scene looked like some freakshow biology class, and that was really unsettling.
“It looks to precise to be the work of any madman,” I turned around, “Most likely someone with medical experience.” I tried to put on my most diplomatic tone, but everyone could see I looked really pale. They called it a day and we returned to our respective clans.
I really couldn’t get those gorey images out of my head, try as I might. I mean, I have seen some nasty cases as a doctor, but who would do such a thing? I wanted to forget about it, but those poor dragons continued to plague me for nights to come. And it didn’t help that a few more reports of those murders had come in again. As much as I didn’t want any involvement in this, I would not rest until the team had gotten at least a solid lead. So I continued investigating. The most we came up with was that the killer had no set pattern, and was not biased to any breed or beastclans.
“Perhaps we should keep watch over each clan’s doctors and healers, since they’re most likely suspects. If the killings subside then we’ll know it’s likely one of them.” I spoke up.
My clan leaders were taken aback.
“Yes, that means locking me up or something. But if it lets the investigation progress, then I am fine with it.” My suggestion was passed, and I found myself in a comfy enclosure or sorts. An imperial was my guard, and I pored over medical books through the nights, hoping to do something productive with my limited mobility.
Paranormal is the normal here, and we shadow dragons always get to the bottom of a case without fail. Finally a new report came in. The killer had been identified as a skydancer. Part of the investigation team had witnessed a skydancer...committing the murder...I shuddered hearing the report. It took off before the team could get a proper look at it. Naturally all skydancer medics were heavily guarded and interrogated. I was no exception, but I was written off as mentally sane. I gulped, I felt slightly insulted knowing I was a skydancer as well, being associated with that psychotic killer. But I’m glad we’re getting somewhere with this. I settled back down on the floor of my enclosure, writing up a report for the investigation team. I made small talk with my imperial guard, he was very kind. I fell into a restless sleep in the wee hours of the morning. I awoke with a start, feeling slightly sticky. It was still dark. I looked around and gasped. My guard was sprawled in front of my enclosure that had been broken down, his body cut open with his own sword. I rubbed my trembling hands together. The felt wet with cold sweat. I looked down. That wasn’t sweat. Sweat isn’t red. Blood. No, I must be dreaming, this is all a nightmare. I wanted to scream, but no sound came out. It wasn’t me who murdered him right? No, it couldn’t have been. The killer must have come by our clan and labeled me as the culprit, to put us off the trail, right? Something kept me from calling for help. I wanted to solve this crazy thing myself. It’s me and you, psycho. With trembling bloodied claws, I gathered up my books and took off into the forest.
The night felt especially cold, the dark gnarled branches of the tangled wood seemed to curl in on me. The crime scene, I must get there. I must find out. I have to. I must get rid of this blood on my hands. I was so motivated to see that freakshow of a murder again it was creepy. But I had to. I reached the clearing. This had only one dragon. A lone skydancer. Her lifeless eyes seemed to stare me down, beckoning me to some closer. I felt weak. My medical books dropped to the ground. I frantically flipped through the pages. this killer had some form of mental disorder, I’m sure of it. I don’t know why, but I kept turning back to the chapter of split personality disorders. I felt my stomach churn. The killer might be completely unaware that they’re the culprit! I gripped the edges of my book. I looked up at the skydancer, meeting her eerie gaze.
“Who did this to you?” I whispered, “Who?...”
I felt really sick now. Something came over me, my body moved of its own accord. My claws rifled through the insides of the skydancer. No, stop. Stop this. Stop this, what are you doing? Stop, stop, stop. My body was trembling even harder now, my breaths came out laboured and shaky. My already bloodied hands becoming further stained. I was searching, no, a part of me was searching for something, I don’t know what it was. Then I found it. I found a small neat doctor’s signature written in blood. It was my signature. I reeled back, clawing at my face. The scream I had bottled up inside me was released, coming out in a series of anguished, twisted yells. Everything clicked into place. I remember being diagnosed with split personality disorder at a young age. But my other side had not manifested itself for years, and when it does, my current personality is unaware. I was the murderer. Rather, my other self was the murderer. The precision in the murderous display, the doctor, the skydancer, the murder, the signature, my other self...All the puzzle pieces had fallen into place, creating a devilish nightmare orchestrated by myself. It was me, I was the murderer, all evidence points to me. No, no, I wouldn’t do such a thing, that’s impossible. I’m the murderer… no I’m not. I killed them, no, no… I battled with myself, my cries echoing into the night, heard only by me and the bodies I had pinned up.
28/10/15
To: Head of Operations
Investigation team Beta
Crime scene F(Lone Skydancer)
Culprit discovered:
The suspect was found at the scene dead. Evidence found at the scene and from previous reports have labeled him as the killer. Killer has history of being diagnosed with split personality disorder. Suspected of having committed suicide. Case has been closed. Signing off with the motto, “Paranormal is the normal”.[/quote]
[quote=Azure]
What strength she'd had to struggle had faded some time ago. Every now and again, she'd give a try, but it was feeble, pitiful. She was exhausted.
The two dragons holding her had no such troubles... if, indeed, one could call the creatures that. Their hollow stares, their eyes devoid of light, seemed to look more through her than at her as their cracked claws pressed her down into the soil. They stank, almost overpoweringly – but not of death and decay, as she expected they would. No, these creatures were alive still. They reeked of long-unwashed scale and flesh – their unnervingly even breath smelled of rot from kills, and tendrils of flesh clung to their deteriorating teeth, decomposing and blackened. The fetid scent of sickness and parasites swirled all about her, making her head spin. Whenever she tried to fight off her captors, to wiggle free, they snarled – all of them, at once, in perfect unison.
It wasn't just the two holding her, either. Even prone as she was, she could see more of the shambling things, all still and gazing blankly, the vibrancy of their eyes' elemental power faded to a dull, dead sheen. Their faces contorted to mirror exactly the anger of the two keeping her still whenever she tried to free herself.
He was there, too.
He'd been her mate, once. It's him she'd flown here to seek. He hadn't recognized her... and truth be told, she wasn't certain she knew him, either. The luster of his scales, a point of pride for him, was gone – they were dulled, chipped, their shining color gone for lack of grooming. Some had broken off, and beneath, she could see ticks feasting on exposed flesh. Once the best fliers of the clan, the young spiral's aerial acrobatics were a thing of tales. He almost never left the sky, not for long – yet here he was, filthy, wallowing on the ground like some obscene serpent.
"Who are you?! What do you want?!" she shrieked, her voice cracking embarrassingly, hoarse from the screaming she'd done during the combat not long before. It had been over quickly. She'd punished them, certainly – but her assailants did not seem to care much for the bleeding gashes she'd left on them. Their blood was still lazily oozing in thin rivulets, dripping, staining their scales and the earth beneath in crimson.
"We are many."
She started. They'd spoken. All of them. They'd spoken at once, their multitude of voices synchronized perfectly into a chilling chorus. She could feel herself begin to shiver.
One of them was approaching her with purpose. His legs moved haphazardly, like a puppet being controlled by strings. The dull glint of his deadened eyes where they caught what little light there was was profoundly disturbing beneath the tattered hood that concealed his features.
"What do you want with me?!" she cried, twisting her neck to look at him, her movement eliciting another series of perfectly uniform snarls from the dragons surrounding her.
"You are one. We are many." the dead-voiced chorus erupted around her. "Many eyes see many things. Many minds, as one. If we are to grow, the one must become part of the many."
Her mind reeled trying to decipher their words, her body shaking with fear. The hooded one had approached. Hidden in the darkness of the cloth, she could see him open his mouth. Things were writhing inside his gaping maw... things of nightmares.
She screamed. He lunged.
There was a sharp pain in her skull. She plunged into darkness.
After a while, she woke. For a brief moment, she felt a desperation, a profound sense of confusion and loss. She couldn't remember where she was. Who she was. What was her name?
And then, abruptly, she remembered. No... they remembered.
The body of the female who was once One stood, now part of Many.
For that's who they were. They were Many. And they hungered.[/quote]
[quote=surfingpikachu]
You have to keep running.
Run, run, duck. Avoid the tree stump, wince in pain when that vine barely touches your shredded arm and don't try to fly. Try to hold your ragged breath, because he’ll find you if you don’t.
Your friend, clanmate, your lov- no.
Keep running.
For the lust in his eyes is not one of love. You can still see it in the back of your mind, where your childhood fears are still strong. The hunger, the darkness, the pain…
Keep running.
Is that a dragon moving in the shadows, or perhaps a? Is it just the wind moving some vines? You can’t be sure, and that paralyzes you more than anything. Should you move, when he could hear you? Should you stay and be found?
Keep running.
Eventually you’ll reach Dragonhome, your safety. Eventually you’ll find a cave, and hide. The glowing insects will be your campfire as you tend to your broken wing. You fear what will happen if you dare to think of light. You’ll hiss to exorcise the sharp knife of pain. You’ll moan trying not to think about the dragon that caused those wounds.
Your friend, clanmate, your lover.
And as you spill burning tears of sorrow, you’ll fail to notice something moving behind you, coming out of the depths of the cave. You won’t see the mad grin spreading, the cold dead eyes, the rotting decay. You won’t see your lover’s insides pouring from the large gash that you caused while frantically trying to escape his embrace. You won’t see anything, but you’ll smell it and look up in devastated recognition.
For it will be too late.
[i]The Shade is here.[/i][/quote]
tigressRising wrote:
There's something in the water.
It lives at the very bottom of the Leviathan Trench. Down there the murk is so thick not even the Tidelord could see what lies on the floor. Water dragons don't dare go near It. No one knows what It looks like. No one knows why It's there. The few who try to find out never return.
But if you could brave the dark and the cold, if you survived the monsters and the Maren's traps, if you somehow made it to the bottom of the ocean floor without dying from the pressure or lack of air, oh! This is what you would see.
You would see only darkness at first. But not the same type of darkness that you would know. This darkness is not the absence of light. It is as if light had never existed. But you would feel an overwhelming sense of fear, of dread, of realizing
you should not be here.
At first you think it's the Shade. But then suddenly you can see through the darkness and realize no, it's something far worse. Because the Shade does not have so many tentacles, so many eyes, so many sharp bloody teeth glistening in the light that is not there.
And the Shade does not speak. But It does.
It speaks to you, and its voice pierces you like the sound of a thousand forks screeching against glass times a million. And you scream, and water fills your lungs and you choke but you keep screaming because It's voice has broken your mind and all you can do is scream. And It is only
whispering. If It chose to speak at a normal volume, all life on Sorneith would die of madness. And if It ever screamed, It would kill off the entire galaxy.
By now your mind is in a million shattered pieces. But if it weren't, you would hear It speak to you in eldritch tongues (
so many tongues, so many eyes, so many teeth shining in no light). And It would say
Come, come to us. We will embrace you and take you and you will feel no pain. And that’s when you realize:
It’s not alone.
Their tendrils of inky darkness reach for you, and some instinct of self-preservation makes you kick away from Them but They still grab you and where They touch you and it
burns like ice and fire and acid and
pain and it
burns
And as They pull you in They are whispering
come to us we love you let us embrace you join us you will feel no pain
JoIn Us wE lOVe yoU LeT Us eMbRaCE yOu COmE To US
jOIn US lEt Us EmBRaCe yOU
cOMe tO US LovE US We lOVe YOu
YoU wIlL fEEl No PAiN
And you scream again though your lungs are full of water for it
burns and you fear Them and you scream for the gods to help you but not even the gods could save you from Them for if They ever rose up from the depths the gods would not even be able to save themselves.
And They watch you with Their many eyes in Their many faces as Their many tentacles pull you towards Their many beaks and Their many mouths with Their many sharp teeth
oh gods their teeth
and then there is pain and you scream and all you see is darkness and all you feel is
pain
and then nothing.
.
.
.
.
.
There’s something in the water.
KaelaByte wrote:
The Bogeyman
The wind howls loud outside your door
it seems you'll never know,
the peace that comes with silence there
instead of heavy snow.
But loudly then it rages on
tearing past every home,
'till silently you lock the doors
and sit with an old tome.
The wind comes howling through the cracks
though you are safe inside,
and you tell yourself it's all okay
to save your fragile pride.
But as the evening tarries on
dark feelings seem to creep,
and merge with memories once seen there,
until you almost weep.
You shake yourself and laugh out loud
there's nothing there to fear,
yet quietly you wonder now
if a noise you just did hear.
Now curled up in your childhood bed
you bring the covers tight,
surely if they stay aloft
then all will be alright.
Your silent fears soon merge with sleep
and quickly then you fall
into dreams like honey, sweet,
with dancing china dolls.
While asleep you slow uncurl
until relaxed you lie
and never see the monster creep,
though you it soon does spy.
It's eyes are red, it's arms too long,
it's breath does smell of rot,
and slowly it crawls up to you
and your limbs combine and knot.
Then lying there atop your breast
the monster soon does feed
upon the dreams you hold so dear,
'till horrors it does breed.
Your blood runs cold
though slumber on you must,
for this creature's not yet done,
it's thoughts tinge yours like rust.
And so it stays till dawn unfurls
and at last it's forced to leave,
long limbs unwind their iron grasp
and a final breath it heaves.
Then just as light shows through the frame
it curls below your bed,
and stays there safe from sunlight's rays
leaving nothing there but dread.
inkdragons wrote:
I heard there’s an offer in the edges of the Abiding Boneyard, offered to win the Plaguebringer's favor. Find anything still living to feed to the Things that you see in the corners of your eyes. They say the hours are long but the pay is good. The Things never interact with the Workers directly, they communicate purely through cryptic glyphs scratched into skulls scattered everywhere and high pitched wailing, an unnatural sound. The Things do not like being seen by the Workers. They do not like seeing themselves. They do not like being seen. They are self conscious about their lack of weight. The Things will not harm the Workers unless a meal is missed. Hours are long, they say the pay is good. The Workers return home with gaunt looks, hollowed eye sockets, nothing but skin and bones. They say the pay is good. They urge you to work alongside them. They say the pay is good. They say the pay is good.
Marzi wrote:
You start by swallowing your tongue. The little things you cannot say, the things looks should express, crash against indifference. Your teeth are gates and the noise that breathes through their cracks is too soft to be heard.
You've swallowed your tongue, and somehow their voices grow louder for its absence. The shouts that drown out the begging echo in your ears. Beratement and chastisement and guilt, guilt, guilt.
You press your palms against your ears and the world softens like you want it to. You cannot express how peaceful the drumming of the blood in your veins is. Skin on skin forcing the sound of You back into your body. It is a barrier they don't bother to break. They don't need you to hear them.
You see them, still. Your empty throat and your blocked ears do nothing to hide them, but you are quiet and cushioned. If you are still, you can watch the shadows pass. You will see the shadows pass and watch them grown long across the earth. Before they reach you, you close your eyes and you might as well be floating.
Or falling.
If you could just fall up, not down. The clouds and the heavens might still be there, but your eyes are shut. Someone may have once told you the clouds are cold, that the sky is vast and lonely, but you cannot hear them, even in a memory. You are lost to something else now. Lost somewhere.
Wherever you are, you can still feel them.
You do not have to see them to know of their approach, it shakes through the earth towards you. You do not have to hear them, to know they are pleased in finding you, if you were ever lost to them. You do not know where you are, but you are with Them.
You might not be alone, there may be someone else.
If someone could just see you--
--if someone could just hear you--
--but you've swallowed your tongue, and you cannot scream.
TheLOAD wrote:
Wights
There are many dark things surrounding Sorienth, and I will tell you one of these tales now.
The brightest lights cast the darkest shadows, and one would think that after The Emperors everyone would be wary of The Lightweaver's creations. But surely Pearlcatcher cannot be that bad, right? Not as bad as what becomes of an Imperial if it dies?
Wrong.
It is believed that a Pearlcatcher's pearl is really nothing, just some superstition. The breed themselves teach that it is their soul, and why should anyone trust an outsider. The pearl is sacred, and it must be protected.
If a Pearlcatcher loses their pearl, they begin to die. Their body rots and decays, flesh falls from the bones. But the dragon doesn't die. It rots until it is a skeleton, with little more than a bit of its element where its heart would be. It is a Wight, a creature driven by a need to feed of the magic of others. The only way to kill a Wight it to reunite it with its Pearl, at which point the dragon passes peacefully.
But wait, it gets worse.
Emperors have been known to steal the pearls from defeated Pearlcatchers, swallowing the orbs so that they can raise an army of Wights to serve them. When the pearls dissolve in the stomachs of the Emperor who had stolen them hope is lost for the Wight. They will hunt and feed long after their maker is dead.
Zaranock wrote:
The Watchers.
Scuttle, skitter, reminisce and shudder, stiffen, scratch, and hatch. The feelings of being watched you have are not opinion, they are fact.
In the mirror, the corner of your eye, the quiet footsteps following but never passing by, the Watchers Watch and only Watch, their purpose? I cannot say, I cannot lie.
Never seen, oft heard, as a crying keen, or a hidden bird, a shuffle of dust, or a scent of musk, forever Watching, as all turns to rust.
Do they die? I cannot say, I cannot lie, do they live? I cannot say, no lie can I give, do they rest? I cannot say, I know not of their nests, do they sleep? I cannot say, I only know them as the hidden wolf in the sheep.
Beware should the Watchers ever tire of their Watch, for dragonkind in entirety would be distraught, should the creatures ever-Watching finally step into the light, for how can you destroy an evil you cannot see to fight?
My piece is said, before the night’s end I will be dead, for the Watchers do not tolerate talk of their existence, and to my lair they will come hence, to wreak silent revenge, my death before me I see, my life forfeit to those who see me.
Beware, fair dragon, of the Watchers, never seen, always seeing, oft heard, never found, for no dragon’s eyes have seen those who see all dragons.
The Watchers hide, their time they bide, for maybe they’re just waiting, till someday we’re all dead, before they come a’slithering, out from ‘neath the bed?
RimeRind wrote:
To awaken in a bed that is not your own is a terribly disconcerting experience. Even before your eyes are open you can feel the difference. This was not where you laid your weary head to rest the night before. Even the smell is wrong; bright citrus tickles your nose where once sweet, comforting lavender wafted. Your breath hitches in your throat. Where were you? How could this happen?
A queasiness in your stomach grows as you fight the urge to roll over and pull the unfamiliar blankets over your head. Perhaps this is a dream, or rather, that odd state of in-between where nothing feels truly real. You shift and the scratchy fabric dragging across your exposed skin dispels those thoughts immediately; you have only ever slept on smooth, slippery satin.
There’s no more denying it. You must open your eyes and face what awaits you. Just a crack at first, enough that light rushes up to meet you and you flinch back. No need to worry. That was a normal reaction. You try again and this time the room materializes around you as your pupils constrict and adjust. A sharp inhalation. This is nothing like what you remember.
Glossy gray walls, white lace curtains framing a small window, an oak desk in the corner piled high with markers and papers… It was lovely, all in all, and oh so very wrong. Peeking over the edge, you note the hard wood floor in place of old, ragged carpeting. Something niggles at you; something telling and important. Then it hits you. Silence. The room was utterly quiet. No ticking clock or humming fan. No blaring sirens from the window as ambulances flew by. It felt like you were in the middle of nowhere.
The scuff of shoes against flooring whispers from under the door. Your head whips around and you stare, wide-eyed and helpless. Paralyzed, you listen as the shuffling grows closer and eventually watch as a pair of shadows indicate someone (or something) standing just outside. For a while nothing happens and you are alone with only the sound of your own short, shallow breaths.
Click. Slowly, the gleaming brass doorknob turns. A flurry of images and thoughts jockey for position in your mind until they all bleed into one another and you’re left with nothing. Your heart beats an erratic tattoo against the inside of your ribs. All you can do is wait. Frightened fingers seek out the plush softness of a pillow and squeeze until your knuckles turn white. Then it happens. The door swings open on well-oiled hinges, almost lazily. A sick fascination prevents you from turning away from that which you have been dreading.
A choked laugh. How absurd! What had you been thinking?
An old woman, bent-backed and wizened stands before you. In her hand, a cane carved in the likeness of a dove. With great care and dignity, she hobbles towards you. Your tremulous, hysterical smile slips and disappears. There are others and they file in after her, their expressions a unified steel mask. Ah, but their eyes, their eyes- They are dull and dark and dead. Air fills their lungs and red blood must run through their veins but they are not alive.
You shy away, press back; anything to get away, to be in your own house again with your mother and father. The old woman smiles. It is a mechanical gesture, barely human. “Welcome home,” she says in a voice like dried leaves. Behind her, they echo as one, “Welcome home.”
CasualTea96 wrote:
You love to sail. You love it for the salty air, the rocking waves, the freedom. You have a loyal crew. Well loyal to your pirating at least. They don't understand how the sea calls you. They don't understand the joy of it. But you respect them and they respect you.
During one sail a storm hits and when it dissipates you are far beyond lost. The air tastes weird, the waves are rocking all wrong, you feel trapped. But your instruments are failing, which means you cannot leave until night so you wait. Your crew doesn't notice your concerns and bunks up to avoid the sun while you pace.
Twilight falls and you can't wait to leave the wrong-sea. You kick your crew into action harsher than usual and squint upwards, looking for the first stars to lead you home. That's when you hear the singing. From the first soft note you are entranced, hardly noting members of your crew are sliding overboard.
The singing swells and you are filled with rapture. It's the sea calling you, it must be. You swing your legs over the edge and push. You are falling. You do not care. The water is cold. You ignore it. You see an alien face approaching fast. You smile and close your eyes. The sea is calling you.
shanncrafter wrote:
The pearlcatcher in front of you wants a tale.
A tale.
It's ridiculous, really, so much so in fact, that a small bubble of hysterical laughter threatens to work its way towards the surface, but you suppress it. Starting off a story like this doesn't seem very appropriate.
(A quick glance around the room reassures you that this is not the case though. You are in the company of Plague dragons, for Plaguebringer's sake. They are not as easily frightened by the things that go bump in the night. They have seen far worse.)
So you begin.
It's not as terrible as you thought it would be. You do not stutter, or falter, or hesitate. The words you utter seem to take control of you, weaving themselves into the story effortlessly. The pearlcatcher tilts her head, listening patiently.
The story you tell is not so much a story as a myth is a fairy tale. It's a message, one that you desperately need to tell (to someone, anyone). No sane dragon will ever believe you, so you don't have much of a choice. They need to know.
The Wyrmwound is alive.
It is exactly the sort of thing that the Plaguebringer would create, the sort of twisted, decaying pit of rot at the heart of her domain, the very epitome of disease and pestilence.
You had done it out of curiosity, you said. Standing on the very edge of the Wyrmwound didn’t seem like a very good idea then. You did not know why you had done so. But you had waited and watched the bubbling cesspool patiently and you had stood between the two tallest “teeth” of the Wound and allowed yourself to listen, and it had whispered to you. The Wyrmwound likes telling secrets. It always has. A scarce few know it. Fewer will actually listen, because they claim that the Wyrmwound lies.
It speaks of many things.
The Plaguebringer does not live in the Wyrmwound, oh no. She lives below it. In between the huge, twisting tendrils and roots of the Wyrmwound, past the bubbling, stinking pit, the Plaguebringer lies. The Filthy One concocts her brews from there, coming up with new sicknesses and diseases. The tendrils of the Wyrmwound hover curiously by her shoulder; she does not care. She sends her gifts to the world and to her acolytes through the very roots of the Wyrmwound itself, as she watches appraisingly.
The Wyrmwound tells you this and more.
It doesn’t come to you as a surprise, because you’ve always known that there was something strange about the Wyrmwound and its counterpart, the Behemoth. But what you did not expect was that it had a mind of its own. You were not worried, at first. You thought that the Plaguebringer was the one who created the Wyrmwound, and that she had complete control over it.
The stinking cesspool laughs at your ignorance, at your naivety.
It was I who gave her life.
The truth is not easy to accept. You have your doubts, of course, but the Wyrmwound speaks with conviction. It knows what It is talking about. The Wound does not really have a voice, of course, but Its thoughts worm their way into your head, convincing you of the truth.
The Plaguebringer is a figurehead, nothing more.
Before the Plaguemother, before the Filthy One, there was the Wyrmwound. And the Wyrmwound does not care. It never has.
It would watch as the Plague swept over all of Sorineth, and it would not lift a finger to prevent the destruction. The deities do not hold the real power. They are merely puppets, and the elements themselves pull the strings. Of course, they do have much more power than the average dragon and a greater affinity to their element, but they have always been used.
And one more thing.
They are everywhere.
The Wyrmwound is the heart of the Scarred Wasteland, and although dragons brush off the constant heaving of the dry ground as the movement of Shattered Serpents, you now know better. The Wyrmwound breathes. It is alive.
The truth is enough to drive you mad, but the Wyrmwound does not lie.
So you howl and screech to get the voice out of your ears and you flee. You have to spread the word; you have to let everyone know.
You have reached the end of your tale. The pearlcatcher scribbles the last of your words on a piece of dry parchment. She looks up and nods, folding the parchment away neatly. There is nothing in her eyes. This is your cue to leave, so you do. You can already see the long line of dragons waiting to tell their own stories behind you.
There is nothing to do but to wait.
Even if this story is not made known to the masses, even if it is hidden away in the archives, at least you know the truth.
At least you can tell it to others, and even if they do not believe you, it makes for a fantastic story to tell other dragons and young hatchlings.
That even if the Shade returns and the deities stop it yet again, they do not hold the real power and the elements pull the strings. They always have. But it never hurts to remember, because now you know that the Wyrmwound is alive.
FWD wrote:
"Evolution," said Father Vrarix to the creature. "I believed that evolution was the invisible hand of our Holy Mother, constantly guiding Her children towards perfection."
The creature gazed up at him, unblinking. He shivered. Because of the cold. You wouldn't imagine the air was so cold on the banks of the Wyrmwound, just seeing the brew bubble and steam.
"I had faith. That whatever grief life gave us, the future would be. Better." He had to struggle to stay upright. Nausea rolled though his jellified flesh. "And it was my duty to share that faith with my clan. I had to show them… I had to show them the future that waited for them."
The creature was expressionless. It was slithering toward him now, eyes always fixed on him even as its body lurched. It moved as if it still, in some way, expected legs to carry it.
"For you, I should have known. You're a coatl, an ancient breed. We see coatls' distant descendants every day… the snakes. Perfect creatures stripped of everything unnecessary."
Fangs bared, the creature's entire body was poised to strike.
"Legs. Wings. Voice. Dreams. Everything but the raw need to survive."
Father Vrarix shut his eyes.
He had Seen during his dive in the Wyrmwound. Seen quivering primordial slime and clumsy eyeless fish. Worms with too many legs crawling from the ocean. Mutants throwing themselves into the claws of life and being recycled into maggots.
Seen planetwide eruptions, freezes, mass extinction. Complex life was always the first to break. Seen the future of dragonkind- night falls, earth shatters- the last dragons starving on a barren planet. Collapsing under their own size and might.
He thought he could hear Her voice. And feel Her, with heavy heart, reject that future, and cast the dice on life yet again. And then Her worshippers became what they would become.
"…But if that's perfection, then perfection is worthless to a creature like me." Father Vrarix's voice had fallen to a whisper. He knew he couldn't run. His body felt twisted, like a reflection in water.
The creature that had been his closest friend and disciple lunged at him. That single moment, as its fangs closed in, seemed to last forever.
Pennifeather wrote:
Let me tell you all a tale from another land. Plague dragons think they corner the market on all that is monstrous and wrong in this world, but they do not understand the things that can be found in the strangest corners of Sornieth. Our clan has loads of stories, collected from these many corners, that would scare the scales off Mother Plaguebringer herself.
You all know of the Cloudscape Crags, yes? Bitter, terrible place, and with its own... peculiar history. Dragons have lost toes and tails venturing into those mountains. The Beastclans have long resided there as well, Longnecks stripping the tough bark from the trees for food. But they only stay for so long. In the scant days of "summer," they migrate up, harvesting extra scrub and bark. Then they return to the Snowsquall Tundra below. These days, dragons do the same. They climb the peaks in great strong packs, hunting and foraging, battling the Beastclans, but they always return to the Tundra before the first winter storm. Those who believe themselves strong enough to survive the winter are never seen again.
The first dragon clans to climb the Crags for territory were unaware of the Longnecks' migratory habits. They stormed into the mountains and settled, satisfied that their territory was free of competition, thinking the Beastclans too weak to handle the gales and blizzards in the mountains. Little did they know that more than Beastclans resided there. Little did they know that they were not the first.
For a time, the clans were satisfied, if chilly. The Icefield is a harsh place, and the Crags are one of the hardest places to eke out a living, but they succeeded, and they thought themselves masters of the mountains. The blizzards swept in, but the dragons burrowed within their lairs, relying on food stores on the worst days. As any dragon will tell you, food stores run out swiftly in the cold, and soon the clans were forced to venture out in search of new food, lest their families begin to starve. But not all clan members returned.
The clans grew concerned with their missing members and sent out search parties, but did not find their missing members. Days went by, searching, gathering, fighting through the hideous snowstorms, with no trace of the dragons. With sorrow in their hearts, they accepted the loss and were grateful for the cessation of the storms and the return of the sun.
The next year, when the winter returned, it was even harsher than the last. The clans held out as long as possible, struggling with their hunger, until the bravest left in search of sustenance for their families, their hatchlings. Once again, some failed to return. Their clans hunted for them in vain, digging through the packed snow during breaks in the weather, fighting through blinding snow. They poured out their sorrows to the howling winds and gave up their clan members as lost.
The following winter was far more desperate. More dragons vanished than ever before, and fearful of losing more gatherers, some clans were forced to move down the mountains for the winter, leaving their territories abandoned. The remaining clans selfishly warred over the new resources, settling into an uneasy peace as the weather thawed. Each clan resolved to use their summer wisely, and crammed as much food into their hoards as possible. Confident that they had packed their larders sufficiently, the clans settled in for a long but secure winter.
During the first of the storms, all was well. But during the second, a strange phenomenon occurred. Voices could be heard on the winds. Dragon voices. The wind often lies in the mountains, so they were ignored as tricks of sound. Later, they became more distinctive. Dragons who moved to their lair's entrance would hear cries for help, sobbing hatchlings, even their own family members screaming their names. Those who followed the voices into the storm disappeared.
This time, when the search parties went out after their lost members, they found them. Desiccated dragon corpses hung from the twisted trees beyond their lairs, opened from throat to tail, nothing left inside. All kinds of dragons, from the tiniest Faes to the mightiest Guardians, had been treated the same. The clans questioned, was this what had become of all their missing members over the years, their bodies never found? Had some thing been taking them?
The four remaining clans in the Crags, too stubborn to be scared away, convened a moot that summer. They resolved to find this threat and rid their territories of it, for the safety of all their members. The strongest, most skilled warriors from each clan were chosen to hunt the beast, or beasts. That winter, the clans waited anxiously for the storms to hit, and when the voices once more called through the mountains, the group of twelve warriors set out to follow them, tracking the unseen monster. A single warrior returned. What he described to his clan was... Well.
The warriors had discovered the beast waiting for them in the trees. They had tried to surround it, but it surrounded them. Its movements were too fast to track, its strength unparalleled. Even the strongest jaws and claws were unable to to stop it. It had hunted them and picked them off, one by one, dragging them into the wilds and cutting of their desperate cries for help, for mercy. But the surviving warrior had seen the monster. As it had tracked him, it called to him with the voices of his lost comrades, then laughed a screeching, hollow laugh as it trapped him, taunted him. It was a dragon, he told the clans, unlike any dragon he had ever seen before. Its breed was unidentifiable, its form twisted, with rough, scaled skin stretched taut over long, jagged bones. Its claws were long, curved like hooks, stained with the remains of its previous meals. Its eyes were sunken into its head, leaving nothing but light-sucking black pits behind. Its nostrils gaped, and its tattered lips pulled back over rows of uncannily white thorn-sharp teeth, made for shredding. Each breath it took exhaled the scent of rot and death and wrong, crystallizing on the warrior's hide, and frost formed on the ground beneath its crackling, warped feet. He prepared himself to die, to be gutted and drained like his fellows, but as rapidly as it had appeared beside him, the monstrous thing vanished into the forest.
The clans never returned to those peaks of the Cloudscape Crags. To this day, Ice dragons avoid them, even if they don't know why. Every time I tell this tale, at least one dragon will ask, why did the monster let that warrior live? It seems counter to its nature. It feeds on its own kind, or what was once its own kind, one of the greatest taboos among all dragon cultures. It gave them a choice, you see. They could leave, or they could stay in its territory, but each year, it would exact its tribute of sorts, returning during the most dire months to feed and retreating when the sun thawed the clouds.
Let this tale be a warning to you, whether you live in the Southern Icefield or elsewhere. Eating the flesh of another dragon can grant you great power. Strength, speed, invulnerability. But it also brings with it a curse, one of unending hunger, perpetual starvation without death, and you will never be sated, no matter how many dragons you devour. Your own kin would be prey to you, and their flesh would only increase your need for more, until the hunger consumes you as well.
shortkeike wrote:
She invited me to sit with her. I was at such a distance and angle, that her pretty face seemed distorted, and her stare strange and lopsided. Nevertheless, her charisma, her energy, some quality unknown had drawn me towards her and away from the other artworks.
The gallery was void of any individual but myself and the woman before my eyes. With a static expression on her lips - a straight line - she stared outwards of the frame and into mine eyes, mine soul. Impasto lined her silken gown and brought her to life. The light fabric seemed to gently rest on her skin, hugging her like a spirit. Her beauty milked me of sorrow, and yet it seemed, that the longer I viewed her, the less I wanted to close my eyes. As I quietly observed her, I blinked but only occasionally, so little often that my face soon reddened and my eyes came to be sore and heavy. I rested them momentarily and when I opened them again, it seemed as if she had moved. Her clothing seemed to be tauter, as if she had briefly fidgeted and caused a cascading of the folds in her garment. As I inspected her for any other changes, I came to realise that she had never ceased the hold of our gazes, from when I had crossed the hall, and to where I stood directly in front. Her bright eyes precisely and dart-like watched my own dancing pupils. They were such a lovely shade of hazel, speckled with an earthen green and light chocolate. Transfixed, I looked into them. I saw each stroke as it culminated to become the window to her soul.
When light shone through the window behind me, the white paint in her eyes glimmered, and my shadow was cast onto her. Her face was dark, where my body eclipsed the sunlight. The brightness in her eyes disappeared, and her cheeks, almost angular, conjured up sharp shadows, a fractal of darkness. Her hazel eyes seemed almost black and without illumination, were hollow, as if she had suddenly deteriorated into a malnourished version of herself. I became apprehensive and stepped aside, so that once again the sun would light up her face, and lift my spirits. When the rays of sunlight hit her face however, I was not pleased. Blindingly, her pale skin was lit up and set ablaze. As if she could feel the heat, the paint of her face peeled away in flakes of pink and white. Her smile disappeared and soon there was no mouth where the sun had scorched away her features. Her white gown quickly caught fire too, and before I could comprehend the happenings before me, the background, foreground, and she, were all lit in an angry orange blaze. The tendrils of flame licked and flailed uncontrolled. They reached out and tried to attack me, but I stepped back. They engulfed her wooden frame, and a smell of ashes and rotting bark washed over me. The smoke danced in my nostrils like evil spirits and spiralled deeper within me, filling my lungs with a heavy atmosphere. I could hardly breathe, and silently, the woman in the painting screamed as she melted away. I closed my eyes as dust and soot threatened to invade. I tried to rub any debris out with my hand, and when I opened one eye warily, she was all but gone. A charred black stain was all that was left. It had not occurred to me to call for the gallery workers, in search of help, but fear wracked me now and as a deer would from a forest-fire, I fled whilst yelling with incomprehensible words.
Renzokuken wrote:
"It starts with the whispers. With voices that crave for a soul to leech. Voices that are rife with malice; that slowly feed on your will and drain your strength. Whispers; that's all you hear as you pass, unguarded and unsuspecting. And they remain, unseen and unnoticed. It starts with the whispers, but it does not end.
"Because then you feel them. A shiver of air, a trace of breath, murmurs fanning your neck. You feel them skulking on the brink of your mind, slinking, stealing. You might even taste their rotting breath. But this part never lasts long. The numbness settles long before you realise it's there; the silence is drilling, your ears are caving, your breath is leaking less and less.
"But your eyes stay open. Wide open.
"Gaunt faces. Hollow eyes. Matted skin. Split tongues.
"Your blood thrums through your veins. Your heart strives to escape. And you think -hope- it might just succeed.
"But then the darkness spills, like a dream. Slowly at first -you teeter - and then all at once, the shadows are pummelling, puncturing, piercing, dragging you along with their hostile touch. And by that point, it's too late to scream. For their fingers have already clogged your throat and split your tongue, and you are suffocating on the echoes, again and again and again.
"It starts with the whispers, but it does not end.
"It does not end. And I should know," he echoed, his voice muted as my eardrums began to shift out of focus. He jerked a mottled finger toward my chest, curling back his lip to reveal a gaping cavity. "You should know."
Then the gaunt face, with hollow eyes and matted skin and a split tongue, vanished. A fragment of air that I could not feel.
Leaving my heart striving to escape.
Drakenhart wrote:
The Female Fae hovers above the flames of the fire, highlighted from the bottom and sending shadows flickering everywhere with each flip-flap-snap of her wings. Her monotone voice fit perfectly for such a tale as she was about to tell. It shed no light on any emotion that may be tied to the telling of the story.
She fluttered higher and wrapped her tail around a branch above the fire. Grabbing it with her hind feet, she turned herself upside down. She settled her fins and flaps firmly against her body so that even her fellow fae and those who understood fae body language also got the "monotone" treatment.
So she began......
' There are some scary stories that people tell to teach lessons. There are other scary stories that are told for the 'jump' factor. But the most frightening of stories are the ones that hold possibility... of bad things that can happen even now... this very night. Those are the stories of nightmares.....
The worst nightmares are the ones that happen to children. The innocent. The delicate. The unhatched......
Those who have never nested may not understand the simple horror parents feel even when offspring not their own is harmed... but loss is understood by all.
There is a clan territory that has never kept the same clan-members for more then a few breeding cycles. Every so many years, about 20 or so, on the longest and darkest night of the year, something creeps out of the shadows. Some who have experienced this thing whisper that is it part of the Shade. Others laugh, and blame Shadow Flight for it's creations. Still others blame the Arcanist for an experiment gone horribly wrong.
However, whenever they try to warn the dragons of this territory of this creeping horror they are laughed at and chased off - because really... such stories are for campfires and the Riot of Rot. Right? Such terrible things cannot be real.
Right? '
She extended her frill in a questioning manner. Looking to each in turn with a long, slow look that peered past eyes and into the soul - or so it seemed. A few others twitched and shifted uncomfortably.
She folded her frills flat against her head once more and continued softly, urging others to lean in closer to hear her voice.
' Deep from the darkest places that even Shadow Flight dare not tred something arises. From the cracks between boulders buried deep underground, and from the crevices of tree roots in the deepest forest wilds, something awakens. Bubbling up from the depths of the darkest trenches, and from those areas within the libraries of the were the lights of knowledge do not reach.... it grows into something more.....
It waits until all are asleep. Making sure that even the watch dragons and their companions find the pull of sleep too powerful. Those that remain alert.... often are never seen again. A bloody smear here, bits of scale there, are the only things left of those who's duty was more powerful then their fear or need to rest.
The companions of others that dare try to protect the clan's nest meet a similar fate..... some even become bloody and horrible decorations strung along in pieces all around the nesting areas. A sign that something dared... and succeeded... in violating the most secure of places. The nest itself.
The first thing seen upon waking? Empty nests. No eggs. No Hatchlings. Only those who just reached maturity seemed spared.... unless they too woke up to see what this nightmare thing was that came into their homes and took their siblings and cousins who just barely lost their egg-tooth. They too were either gone with but a smear of blood, or left in pieces as a warning. '
The fae flashed open her wings and fins in a snap.
' Alarms are raised. Warnings sounds. Keening parents and family call out for the missing. No scrap of cloth, or smear of blood is left of those taken. Nothing to investigate. Nothing left behind of them....'
She folds her fins and wings back against her body and head, again a small dark figure hanging upside down above the fire.
' The clan searches day and night. The ones scoffed at before are sought for answers... but there are no answers. There is Nothing.
Nothing...... they are just.... gone.
Days turn to weeks, weeks turn to months, months turn to years and still no trace. Still no answers come and the clan suffers as a whole. Slowly the darkness in their hearts drives some to despair. Others turn to the deities and find solace fighting beside them, just to forget. Others pack up what belongings they have and move somewhere else in fear of this.. horror... happening again to them and their families.
Years pass and the creeping dark that steals doesn't come again. Hope arises as other hatchlings arrive, but those who have been there before remind them....it will happen again. Fear drives the families out, and soon the territory is empty again.
But a rich territory is always sought after. One that had been settled with perfectly groomed nests does not stay empty forever. Even the beast clans fall victim to this thing that takes, so the territory stays empty until another clan finds it and settles.
Wanderers that once called this place home, will come and warn them.....
But such stories are for nights during the Riot of Rot.... right? Silly, terror-filled stories meant to make you look over your wings, and check behind you when the nights grow long and dark. They aren't real.
Right? '
She pauses again, opening her fins in the same way as before, and leaves the questioning look on her features for a little bit longer this time. Looking past them now, behind them, and into the darkness.
She suddenly flares her wings, lets go of the branch and falls towards the fire in one swift motion. Just as she is about to topple into the flames, she gives several powerful downward swipes of her large wings. The gust snuffs the fire, gutters it to glowing coals, and her dark forms fades suddenly into the night and dark canopy above. She settles back into the branches further up in the tree this time and says once more..
'Right? '
SaturdayLemon wrote:
"Drake's not dead while his words are still spoken."
It was a Nocturne who said it first, I think. You'll hear it anywhere there's been Nocs around for more than two generations.
I never really believed it. Dead is dead, and that's the end of it.
Then I killed Miran. Now, I - I'd better go back.
Everyone knew Miran. Everyone could talk to Miran, he would always listen, and I mean really listen. He would just look at you like he saw everything you wanted to be and say, "And then what?"
Just like that.
I couldn't say why I killed him, now. I don't know if I could have then. But I did it, and then I thought things were[/i] better[/i].
I was wrong about that.
After he died, Nira didn't stop talking for days. Not to anyone, just trying to fill the void. I could sympathize, a little, but mostly I didn't understand what had happened.
She started hearing people again a couple weeks later, started talking to the hatchlings. She hadn't dealt in the present before Miran died, not as the archivist to his chronicler, but she learned quickly enough when she needed to.
One day Skimmer came up to her on his clumsy little paws, said Kuhta was framing him for the ruined painting. (Don't ask me about Kuhta's side, I never heard it.)
Nira just sat there and heard him out, listened to his side of the story, and then asked "And thenwhat?"
I ran like a rabbit.
Didn't help. The whole clan would ask that question when someone finished their story, and I ran every time. Eventually just packed up and left.
We're a clan of messengers. Anywhere I went, I would eventually have come back and heard it again. And again.
Drake's not dead while his words are still spoken.
He isn't dead.
He isn't dead.
KIMJA wrote:
Trigger(Mental disorder mention) I read through the ToS but I hope this isn't too graphic, let me know if it is and I'll make the appropriate changes , thank you!
Now, I won’t start off by saying I don’t believe in ghosts and that sort of thing. Because paranormal occurrences are a real thing. At least here in the tangled wood. We shadow flight believe both the physical and physical realm coexist, and sometimes beings from either realms can cross over. Paranormal is the normal here.
Growing up here I’ve had my fair share of hauntings and creepy occurrences. Run ins with ghosts and monsters happen on a regular basis, and some aren’t too friendly either. But I’ve made it through relatively unscathed. Recently there have been rumours of something quite gruesome. Dragons’ and Beastclans’ bodies alike have been found absolutely mutilated, sliced open from top to bottom. Their carcasses pinned to trees and rocks on display. A few clans, including mine, did some investigations but could not find any solid leads to a culprit. A message was issued for all dragons to avoid venturing too far from their clans, just to be safe. Another report had just come in. Four bodies were found in that same horrid state of disembowelment on a tree. 2 Faes, a pearlcatcher and surprisingly, a guardian. Well, half of a guardian...gross… I got dragged along by my clan leaders who were part of the investigation team, because I was a doctor. I was requested to do an autopsy. I’ve performed numerous surgeries in my career, but nothing prepared me for what I saw. The report barely scratched the surface of how awful the victims looked. Their bodies were spread open like blankets, the ends pinned on the tree trunk like morbid decorations. Their insides spilled onto the ground….I’d rather not describe the rest.
“L-let me take a closer look…” I stammered.
I took a shaky step forward, willing myself to stare at the horror in front of me without throwing out. The killer seemed to have a lot of precision in their work. Their bodies were arranged side by side, the 2 poor faes flanking the two bigger dragons. The cuts looked almost surgical in nature, as if the killer carefully cut them, not haphazard in the slightest. Honestly, the entire scene looked like some freakshow biology class, and that was really unsettling.
“It looks to precise to be the work of any madman,” I turned around, “Most likely someone with medical experience.” I tried to put on my most diplomatic tone, but everyone could see I looked really pale. They called it a day and we returned to our respective clans.
I really couldn’t get those gorey images out of my head, try as I might. I mean, I have seen some nasty cases as a doctor, but who would do such a thing? I wanted to forget about it, but those poor dragons continued to plague me for nights to come. And it didn’t help that a few more reports of those murders had come in again. As much as I didn’t want any involvement in this, I would not rest until the team had gotten at least a solid lead. So I continued investigating. The most we came up with was that the killer had no set pattern, and was not biased to any breed or beastclans.
“Perhaps we should keep watch over each clan’s doctors and healers, since they’re most likely suspects. If the killings subside then we’ll know it’s likely one of them.” I spoke up.
My clan leaders were taken aback.
“Yes, that means locking me up or something. But if it lets the investigation progress, then I am fine with it.” My suggestion was passed, and I found myself in a comfy enclosure or sorts. An imperial was my guard, and I pored over medical books through the nights, hoping to do something productive with my limited mobility.
Paranormal is the normal here, and we shadow dragons always get to the bottom of a case without fail. Finally a new report came in. The killer had been identified as a skydancer. Part of the investigation team had witnessed a skydancer...committing the murder...I shuddered hearing the report. It took off before the team could get a proper look at it. Naturally all skydancer medics were heavily guarded and interrogated. I was no exception, but I was written off as mentally sane. I gulped, I felt slightly insulted knowing I was a skydancer as well, being associated with that psychotic killer. But I’m glad we’re getting somewhere with this. I settled back down on the floor of my enclosure, writing up a report for the investigation team. I made small talk with my imperial guard, he was very kind. I fell into a restless sleep in the wee hours of the morning. I awoke with a start, feeling slightly sticky. It was still dark. I looked around and gasped. My guard was sprawled in front of my enclosure that had been broken down, his body cut open with his own sword. I rubbed my trembling hands together. The felt wet with cold sweat. I looked down. That wasn’t sweat. Sweat isn’t red. Blood. No, I must be dreaming, this is all a nightmare. I wanted to scream, but no sound came out. It wasn’t me who murdered him right? No, it couldn’t have been. The killer must have come by our clan and labeled me as the culprit, to put us off the trail, right? Something kept me from calling for help. I wanted to solve this crazy thing myself. It’s me and you, psycho. With trembling bloodied claws, I gathered up my books and took off into the forest.
The night felt especially cold, the dark gnarled branches of the tangled wood seemed to curl in on me. The crime scene, I must get there. I must find out. I have to. I must get rid of this blood on my hands. I was so motivated to see that freakshow of a murder again it was creepy. But I had to. I reached the clearing. This had only one dragon. A lone skydancer. Her lifeless eyes seemed to stare me down, beckoning me to some closer. I felt weak. My medical books dropped to the ground. I frantically flipped through the pages. this killer had some form of mental disorder, I’m sure of it. I don’t know why, but I kept turning back to the chapter of split personality disorders. I felt my stomach churn. The killer might be completely unaware that they’re the culprit! I gripped the edges of my book. I looked up at the skydancer, meeting her eerie gaze.
“Who did this to you?” I whispered, “Who?...”
I felt really sick now. Something came over me, my body moved of its own accord. My claws rifled through the insides of the skydancer. No, stop. Stop this. Stop this, what are you doing? Stop, stop, stop. My body was trembling even harder now, my breaths came out laboured and shaky. My already bloodied hands becoming further stained. I was searching, no, a part of me was searching for something, I don’t know what it was. Then I found it. I found a small neat doctor’s signature written in blood. It was my signature. I reeled back, clawing at my face. The scream I had bottled up inside me was released, coming out in a series of anguished, twisted yells. Everything clicked into place. I remember being diagnosed with split personality disorder at a young age. But my other side had not manifested itself for years, and when it does, my current personality is unaware. I was the murderer. Rather, my other self was the murderer. The precision in the murderous display, the doctor, the skydancer, the murder, the signature, my other self...All the puzzle pieces had fallen into place, creating a devilish nightmare orchestrated by myself. It was me, I was the murderer, all evidence points to me. No, no, I wouldn’t do such a thing, that’s impossible. I’m the murderer… no I’m not. I killed them, no, no… I battled with myself, my cries echoing into the night, heard only by me and the bodies I had pinned up.
28/10/15
To: Head of Operations
Investigation team Beta
Crime scene F(Lone Skydancer)
Culprit discovered:
The suspect was found at the scene dead. Evidence found at the scene and from previous reports have labeled him as the killer. Killer has history of being diagnosed with split personality disorder. Suspected of having committed suicide. Case has been closed. Signing off with the motto, “Paranormal is the normal”.
Azure wrote:
What strength she'd had to struggle had faded some time ago. Every now and again, she'd give a try, but it was feeble, pitiful. She was exhausted.
The two dragons holding her had no such troubles... if, indeed, one could call the creatures that. Their hollow stares, their eyes devoid of light, seemed to look more through her than at her as their cracked claws pressed her down into the soil. They stank, almost overpoweringly – but not of death and decay, as she expected they would. No, these creatures were alive still. They reeked of long-unwashed scale and flesh – their unnervingly even breath smelled of rot from kills, and tendrils of flesh clung to their deteriorating teeth, decomposing and blackened. The fetid scent of sickness and parasites swirled all about her, making her head spin. Whenever she tried to fight off her captors, to wiggle free, they snarled – all of them, at once, in perfect unison.
It wasn't just the two holding her, either. Even prone as she was, she could see more of the shambling things, all still and gazing blankly, the vibrancy of their eyes' elemental power faded to a dull, dead sheen. Their faces contorted to mirror exactly the anger of the two keeping her still whenever she tried to free herself.
He was there, too.
He'd been her mate, once. It's him she'd flown here to seek. He hadn't recognized her... and truth be told, she wasn't certain she knew him, either. The luster of his scales, a point of pride for him, was gone – they were dulled, chipped, their shining color gone for lack of grooming. Some had broken off, and beneath, she could see ticks feasting on exposed flesh. Once the best fliers of the clan, the young spiral's aerial acrobatics were a thing of tales. He almost never left the sky, not for long – yet here he was, filthy, wallowing on the ground like some obscene serpent.
"Who are you?! What do you want?!" she shrieked, her voice cracking embarrassingly, hoarse from the screaming she'd done during the combat not long before. It had been over quickly. She'd punished them, certainly – but her assailants did not seem to care much for the bleeding gashes she'd left on them. Their blood was still lazily oozing in thin rivulets, dripping, staining their scales and the earth beneath in crimson.
"We are many."
She started. They'd spoken. All of them. They'd spoken at once, their multitude of voices synchronized perfectly into a chilling chorus. She could feel herself begin to shiver.
One of them was approaching her with purpose. His legs moved haphazardly, like a puppet being controlled by strings. The dull glint of his deadened eyes where they caught what little light there was was profoundly disturbing beneath the tattered hood that concealed his features.
"What do you want with me?!" she cried, twisting her neck to look at him, her movement eliciting another series of perfectly uniform snarls from the dragons surrounding her.
"You are one. We are many." the dead-voiced chorus erupted around her. "Many eyes see many things. Many minds, as one. If we are to grow, the one must become part of the many."
Her mind reeled trying to decipher their words, her body shaking with fear. The hooded one had approached. Hidden in the darkness of the cloth, she could see him open his mouth. Things were writhing inside his gaping maw... things of nightmares.
She screamed. He lunged.
There was a sharp pain in her skull. She plunged into darkness.
After a while, she woke. For a brief moment, she felt a desperation, a profound sense of confusion and loss. She couldn't remember where she was. Who she was. What was her name?
And then, abruptly, she remembered. No... they remembered.
The body of the female who was once One stood, now part of Many.
For that's who they were. They were Many. And they hungered.
surfingpikachu wrote:
You have to keep running.
Run, run, duck. Avoid the tree stump, wince in pain when that vine barely touches your shredded arm and don't try to fly. Try to hold your ragged breath, because he’ll find you if you don’t.
Your friend, clanmate, your lov- no.
Keep running.
For the lust in his eyes is not one of love. You can still see it in the back of your mind, where your childhood fears are still strong. The hunger, the darkness, the pain…
Keep running.
Is that a dragon moving in the shadows, or perhaps a? Is it just the wind moving some vines? You can’t be sure, and that paralyzes you more than anything. Should you move, when he could hear you? Should you stay and be found?
Keep running.
Eventually you’ll reach Dragonhome, your safety. Eventually you’ll find a cave, and hide. The glowing insects will be your campfire as you tend to your broken wing. You fear what will happen if you dare to think of light. You’ll hiss to exorcise the sharp knife of pain. You’ll moan trying not to think about the dragon that caused those wounds.
Your friend, clanmate, your lover.
And as you spill burning tears of sorrow, you’ll fail to notice something moving behind you, coming out of the depths of the cave. You won’t see the mad grin spreading, the cold dead eyes, the rotting decay. You won’t see your lover’s insides pouring from the large gash that you caused while frantically trying to escape his embrace. You won’t see anything, but you’ll smell it and look up in devastated recognition.
For it will be too late.
The Shade is here.
