Post by ch00beh on Jan 12, 2011 18:56:51 GMT -5
Collida, 412th midsummer of the new era. Imprisoned.
A man whose thick, groomed beard indicated he was in an age range neither young nor old, sat on a dirt floor behind iron bars. His head was bowed as if in prayer, but his eyes were open and staring at a leather-bound and silver-gilded book. Every page was filled with neat handwritten script, though as he turned the page, it appeared as though the writer took a turn for the hurried and decided to sacrifice some legibility for speed.
The man cracked a smile briefly. Could have been a lot worse if they took my book as well as my sword. And at least I have a small window. Ha.
He couldn't believe that he had made such a mistake coming here. It wasn't so much the act of coming to a almost tyrannical matriarchal society; it was the fact that he decided to tell a story that was considered romantic elsewhere, but subjugating here. A minstrel's life is so dependent on the fickleness of audience.
I suppose the worst that could happen is slavery; though I also suppose the lawbook I read about this place is outdated. Ah, well, we will see.
He had just been placed in the cell. There were a few other sorry men in the jail, but no one said a word. He hadn't seen a guard pacing and keeping watch, but he supposed that was due to the lack of any possible exits except the front door.
Suddenly, heavy thumps and jingling keys sounded from the sole staircase leading into the dungeon, removing the man from his reverie. He looked toward the stone steps, and soon a silhouette turned into a tall woman wearing loose silk garments under a breastplate and helmet. On her hip was a sword and in her hand was a spear. Her other hand held a torch, despite the sunlight streaming in from small barred windows.
Behind the guard was a procession of men with their hands tied together. Two more (rather pretty) guards flanked the line.
“Prisoners, go to the back of your cells.”
The man complied. The other inmates reluctantly followed suit.
One of the side guards took a key ring from her belt then slipped the metal piece into the man's cell door. She opened it, then the other side guard forcefully shoved a dark skinned man inside before slamming the door shut. They repeated the process with several others.
“We will decide what to do with all of you tomorrow,” the lead guard said when they were done incarcerating the new batch. Her voice was rougher than her face let on.
“Sakt mel fatéldu!” the man spat as the three women filed up the stairs.
The dark skinned man stayed at the bars for a moment before turning around to face the bearded man. The telaenian slumped to the ground, then reached into the side of his pants. A moment later, he pulled out a hip flask and took a drink. He eyed the bearded man carefully, then held the metal container out.
“Troels Nevenlaj,” the bearded man said as he leaned forward and took the flask. He uncapped it and took a small sip. Pure, distilled alcohol. It burned his tongue and his throat.
“Sote Anufalu qun Cor,” the telaenian responded, his speech heavy with accent.
“What brings you to this lovely part of town?”
Sote reached forward and took the flask back. He held it up in response. “Runner. You?”
Troels held up the book and cracked a smile. “Minstrel with the wrong tale. Sounds like your story is better than mine.”
The telaenian let out a laugh. “Nah. I just got drunk during a delivery and got here when the entire faté country was having its period, but at least I was doing things that are illegal. What story you tell to get them mad enough to put you in jail?”
“Ha, I don't think I'll be repeating it any time soon.”
“Fair enough.” The telaenian sighed. There was silence in the jail cells again. The dark skinned man took another sip from his flask.
Troels leaned his head back on the roughly masoned walls. His eyes drifted to the similarly constructed ceiling then fell on the crack of sunlight cast on the rock. The man closed his eyes, then looked back down at his book. “You have any Telaenian stories? I collect tales, and my times with your people have always been unfortunately brief.”
“Telaenian stories? No, it been too long since I went through the Rite and left Cor. I don't remember any good ones.”
“But you went through the Rite! Do you have anything from the Alurile?”
“It was a normal Rite, you know? Wild animal attacks, hunting, foraging, grinlek swarms, hiding from heldyn. The only difference was that our group found its way to Tal-Hydor on accident, and I decided to make my way in that country rather than go back.”
Troels thought for a minute, then looked through his storybook. “I don't think I've heard of the grinlek swarms.”
“I see.”
“Would you mind telling me about them?”
“Ack,” a boy, somewhere in his mid teens, spat. He and eight others were gathered around a fire and a boar's skeleton. “Shana. What did you season this with? It's disgusting!”
“Hey, I can't find any of the herbs that grow on Cor,” one of the other girls responded. “The one I used looked close enough, though.”
“Wekalat,” the boy muttered.
“It's not that bad.”
“Shut up for a minute. You hear something?” another girl asked.
“Probably,” one of the boys replied. He was wrapping some of the meat in thick leaves and placing them in his pack.
“Who checked last time? An?”
“Balu's turn,” one of the other girls, An, said while casting a glance at the boy next to her.
“Fine. Hold this.” The one called Balu handed his dinner to the girl.
There was silence but the crackling of fire and the shuffling of leaves. Several of the teens seemed to have finished and were also wrapping their leftovers. Most the meat had been taken off the beast's bones by the time they heard loud rustling and footsteps. Two of the boys picked up their spears while Sote readied his machete.
“Grinlek! Big swarm! Run!”
As if to punctuate that, as soon as Balu burst from the foliage into the group's clearing, something behind him shrieked in pain. They all knew what it was: some poor animal being eaten alive by a swarm of grinlek, creatures that resembled large geckos covered in termites. Both of these symbiotic creatures didn't even leave bones when they tore something apart.
Everyone picked up their packs and ran. Sote sprinted as fast as he could ahead of the group into the darkness, slicing small branches and foliage out of his way. The cool, moist air was unwelcome on his skin or in his lungs. Behind, he could hear something that was like a cross between chirping and gnashing teeth as well the sound of hundreds of creatures rustling through the foliage. Fear told him to not look back, but his concern for the others forced him to.
The other eight were close, but behind them by only a few dozen meters were at least one hundred white crescent smiles catching the moonlight, jumping from tree to tree and crawling along the ground. Every plant that Sote had cut down, and many others that were still planted had a group of grinlek tearing it apart.
This was a large swarm. The telaen oil the group had rubbed on their skin would not keep this number away. So they ran.
Sote looked up. The treetops were also crawling with grinlek. The boy looked away and sprinted harder.
Suddenly, some fist sized silhouettes fell from the trees in front of the group. One landed heavily on Sote's pumping arm, its glistening teeth sinking into his flesh. The boy screamed in pain and almost lost his footing while ripping the creature from his body, tearing out a small piece of his own arm in the process. He could feel the termite-like creatures that lived on the grinlek's skin crawling onto his hand and spitting their powerful acid. Before he could feel anything more than a slight burn, he threw the creature into a tree then quickly batted his arm against his pants. The grinlek hit with a light thump and a screech.
Someone screamed behind the boy. He turned around to see An had fallen to the ground.
“Help!”
Sote came to a stop and started running back. Most everyone else continued running forward, but Balu, who was right behind Sote, also stopped to turn back.
An faced the incoming swarm, shuffling as fast as she could backwards. Maybe a move of desperation, but before either of the boys could come to her aid, she threw her bag at the mass of smiling teeth. A group of grinlek crawled over the bag, and within moments, they dispersed and nothing was left save for a few strips of leather. However, as soon as they finished, the surge of grinlek stopped moving forward. The creatures all pulled back then began congregating in a single spot. They swarmed over each other, a lump of writhing black and grinning smiles growing out of the ground. The pillar bent slightly at the top; if it was a humanoid, it would have seemed like a craning head.
Sote reached the girl and pulled her to her feet. “Let's go!”
“Wait, no, Sote, give me your bag...”
“What? We don't have time for this!”
“No, look, they've stopped. Give me your bag.”
Sote looked at the pillar of grinlek. His heart pounded with adrenaline, and his mind was blank with fear. Confused, he complied with An's request and gave her his bag.
“Here!” the girl tossed the bag at the foot of the swarm. “You want this? We have more, but leave us alone after!”
The grinlek swarm shifted and moved forward over the bag, completely encasing it within the mass. It seemed to regard the teenagers, but it didn't move from its spot.
“Balu, your bag?” An asked. Balu, who was just as awestricken as the others, managed to toss his bag at the mass without blinking or closing his mouth.
The swarm moved to take that bag, but then it shifted again, shrinking down then splitting into eight pillars. Two of the eight held the packs that had just been offered, one held the scraps of leather that were given first, and the other five held nothing but rocked back and forth.
“I... I think it wants one from each of us?”
“So they eat everything, and they're intelligent?” Troels asked, writing notes with the pencil he kept in his boot.
“We don't know if they smart. Sometimes they seem to understand reason, and most of the time they don't. Some of the older telaen tell us that they share their minds, so big swarms can think for the group.”
“You mean older telaenians?”
“No, the telaen themselves communicate with our Speakers, and only Speakers know how to interpret the creatures' words.”
“Fascinating,” the man punctuated his words with his pencil on the page. “Here, tell me how this sounds.”
Wrapped feet crunch through foliage.
Several breathing breaths.
Eight more follow closely,
And none await their death.
A sound like insects laughing.
A mass of grinning eyes.
Behind, above, and to the left,
The pitch black darkness smiles.
Some fall from a tree above.
These lizards dipped in 'mites.
Sote throws the thing away,
While An screams at the night.
Take this instead, we'll give you more.
She drops her pack of food.
Swarm settles on the cooked meat,
Children are not pursued.
A deal is struck, bargains made,
Though only one side speaks.
Hunted meat dropped every night,
And lives are spared that week.
“I like it,” Sote said with a smile. “You got a pretty good thing.”
“Still needs some work, though.”
“So what you planning on doing with it? We're stuck here.”
“It's not the first time I've been behind bars, and it's not the first time I'll get out,” Troels said. He grinned.
“Ha, good luck with that,” Sote said. “So, I told you my story. You got any of your own? We got nothing to do until tomorrow anyway.”
“That's true. Can't make an escape until they let us out!” Troels laughed. He flipped his book to a random page. “Ever heard the story of the first Fall?”
Still as stone, the Gray Prince stands,
Unto destruction Olrïk Aunsé comes.
Below beasts roam, the Gray City barren,
A crater carved within walls cracked.
Before chaos and carnage, the city was covered with wealth.
Viggrid's lands lay at war with itself, tribes vying for glory,
But none dared defile the Gray City of Ingdor,
Pinnacle of wealth, trade, and power,
The city stood with wall and army, the image of strength itself.
But on that day, the Gray City was destroyed,
The Prince not present until too late, his prestige forsaken.
From soot and smoke, amidst the snarls,
A poor peasant flees, and a beast does follow.
Claws grab and capture, the beast takes without killing.
Before the worst, the Gray and his guard jump to gory action,
The peasant's life in limbo saved from losing.
The formidable beast falls slain, head fissured by hammer,
Its thrashing tails cut off with swords,
And Aunsé's blade bore through exposed beating heart.
“What happened here?” Aunsé asked, hurried.
“It came from the sky, a large flaming rock,
And with its laden landing, beasts spilled fourth,
Like locusts on fields, our city was lost.
Those who fought were felled, without effort,
And those who fled were found, taken by force without killing.”
The Gray's anger boiled and burned, it would not abate.
“We take the city from the fallen or else our lives are forfeit,
Come my men, we fight and triumph!”
The ten guards gave their harshest cries, following the Gray into the Gray.
Ten would enter with swords raised, though in the end just one would remain.
Each lost soul took dozens with their life,
And by dawn and day, the Gray City had no more for death to take.
Still as stone, Aunsé stands,
The beasts are banished, though no other body breathes.
Morning comes, but before he can mourn,
Aunsé sees another fireball rain from the sky.
And so he rode through divided lands,
Uniting tribes with his own two hands.
To drive away and kill the beasts,
And failing that, to sail to the east.
Troels looked up from his book and noticed some of the other inmates were looking at him. Some had looks of disdain, others interest. Most just had looks of apathy.
“How about any of you? Anyone got a good story to tell?” he grinned. Maybe a prison wasn't the worst thing that could happen this week.
A man whose thick, groomed beard indicated he was in an age range neither young nor old, sat on a dirt floor behind iron bars. His head was bowed as if in prayer, but his eyes were open and staring at a leather-bound and silver-gilded book. Every page was filled with neat handwritten script, though as he turned the page, it appeared as though the writer took a turn for the hurried and decided to sacrifice some legibility for speed.
The man cracked a smile briefly. Could have been a lot worse if they took my book as well as my sword. And at least I have a small window. Ha.
He couldn't believe that he had made such a mistake coming here. It wasn't so much the act of coming to a almost tyrannical matriarchal society; it was the fact that he decided to tell a story that was considered romantic elsewhere, but subjugating here. A minstrel's life is so dependent on the fickleness of audience.
I suppose the worst that could happen is slavery; though I also suppose the lawbook I read about this place is outdated. Ah, well, we will see.
He had just been placed in the cell. There were a few other sorry men in the jail, but no one said a word. He hadn't seen a guard pacing and keeping watch, but he supposed that was due to the lack of any possible exits except the front door.
Suddenly, heavy thumps and jingling keys sounded from the sole staircase leading into the dungeon, removing the man from his reverie. He looked toward the stone steps, and soon a silhouette turned into a tall woman wearing loose silk garments under a breastplate and helmet. On her hip was a sword and in her hand was a spear. Her other hand held a torch, despite the sunlight streaming in from small barred windows.
Behind the guard was a procession of men with their hands tied together. Two more (rather pretty) guards flanked the line.
“Prisoners, go to the back of your cells.”
The man complied. The other inmates reluctantly followed suit.
One of the side guards took a key ring from her belt then slipped the metal piece into the man's cell door. She opened it, then the other side guard forcefully shoved a dark skinned man inside before slamming the door shut. They repeated the process with several others.
“We will decide what to do with all of you tomorrow,” the lead guard said when they were done incarcerating the new batch. Her voice was rougher than her face let on.
“Sakt mel fatéldu!” the man spat as the three women filed up the stairs.
The dark skinned man stayed at the bars for a moment before turning around to face the bearded man. The telaenian slumped to the ground, then reached into the side of his pants. A moment later, he pulled out a hip flask and took a drink. He eyed the bearded man carefully, then held the metal container out.
“Troels Nevenlaj,” the bearded man said as he leaned forward and took the flask. He uncapped it and took a small sip. Pure, distilled alcohol. It burned his tongue and his throat.
“Sote Anufalu qun Cor,” the telaenian responded, his speech heavy with accent.
“What brings you to this lovely part of town?”
Sote reached forward and took the flask back. He held it up in response. “Runner. You?”
Troels held up the book and cracked a smile. “Minstrel with the wrong tale. Sounds like your story is better than mine.”
The telaenian let out a laugh. “Nah. I just got drunk during a delivery and got here when the entire faté country was having its period, but at least I was doing things that are illegal. What story you tell to get them mad enough to put you in jail?”
“Ha, I don't think I'll be repeating it any time soon.”
“Fair enough.” The telaenian sighed. There was silence in the jail cells again. The dark skinned man took another sip from his flask.
Troels leaned his head back on the roughly masoned walls. His eyes drifted to the similarly constructed ceiling then fell on the crack of sunlight cast on the rock. The man closed his eyes, then looked back down at his book. “You have any Telaenian stories? I collect tales, and my times with your people have always been unfortunately brief.”
“Telaenian stories? No, it been too long since I went through the Rite and left Cor. I don't remember any good ones.”
“But you went through the Rite! Do you have anything from the Alurile?”
“It was a normal Rite, you know? Wild animal attacks, hunting, foraging, grinlek swarms, hiding from heldyn. The only difference was that our group found its way to Tal-Hydor on accident, and I decided to make my way in that country rather than go back.”
Troels thought for a minute, then looked through his storybook. “I don't think I've heard of the grinlek swarms.”
“I see.”
“Would you mind telling me about them?”
“Ack,” a boy, somewhere in his mid teens, spat. He and eight others were gathered around a fire and a boar's skeleton. “Shana. What did you season this with? It's disgusting!”
“Hey, I can't find any of the herbs that grow on Cor,” one of the other girls responded. “The one I used looked close enough, though.”
“Wekalat,” the boy muttered.
“It's not that bad.”
“Shut up for a minute. You hear something?” another girl asked.
“Probably,” one of the boys replied. He was wrapping some of the meat in thick leaves and placing them in his pack.
“Who checked last time? An?”
“Balu's turn,” one of the other girls, An, said while casting a glance at the boy next to her.
“Fine. Hold this.” The one called Balu handed his dinner to the girl.
There was silence but the crackling of fire and the shuffling of leaves. Several of the teens seemed to have finished and were also wrapping their leftovers. Most the meat had been taken off the beast's bones by the time they heard loud rustling and footsteps. Two of the boys picked up their spears while Sote readied his machete.
“Grinlek! Big swarm! Run!”
As if to punctuate that, as soon as Balu burst from the foliage into the group's clearing, something behind him shrieked in pain. They all knew what it was: some poor animal being eaten alive by a swarm of grinlek, creatures that resembled large geckos covered in termites. Both of these symbiotic creatures didn't even leave bones when they tore something apart.
Everyone picked up their packs and ran. Sote sprinted as fast as he could ahead of the group into the darkness, slicing small branches and foliage out of his way. The cool, moist air was unwelcome on his skin or in his lungs. Behind, he could hear something that was like a cross between chirping and gnashing teeth as well the sound of hundreds of creatures rustling through the foliage. Fear told him to not look back, but his concern for the others forced him to.
The other eight were close, but behind them by only a few dozen meters were at least one hundred white crescent smiles catching the moonlight, jumping from tree to tree and crawling along the ground. Every plant that Sote had cut down, and many others that were still planted had a group of grinlek tearing it apart.
This was a large swarm. The telaen oil the group had rubbed on their skin would not keep this number away. So they ran.
Sote looked up. The treetops were also crawling with grinlek. The boy looked away and sprinted harder.
Suddenly, some fist sized silhouettes fell from the trees in front of the group. One landed heavily on Sote's pumping arm, its glistening teeth sinking into his flesh. The boy screamed in pain and almost lost his footing while ripping the creature from his body, tearing out a small piece of his own arm in the process. He could feel the termite-like creatures that lived on the grinlek's skin crawling onto his hand and spitting their powerful acid. Before he could feel anything more than a slight burn, he threw the creature into a tree then quickly batted his arm against his pants. The grinlek hit with a light thump and a screech.
Someone screamed behind the boy. He turned around to see An had fallen to the ground.
“Help!”
Sote came to a stop and started running back. Most everyone else continued running forward, but Balu, who was right behind Sote, also stopped to turn back.
An faced the incoming swarm, shuffling as fast as she could backwards. Maybe a move of desperation, but before either of the boys could come to her aid, she threw her bag at the mass of smiling teeth. A group of grinlek crawled over the bag, and within moments, they dispersed and nothing was left save for a few strips of leather. However, as soon as they finished, the surge of grinlek stopped moving forward. The creatures all pulled back then began congregating in a single spot. They swarmed over each other, a lump of writhing black and grinning smiles growing out of the ground. The pillar bent slightly at the top; if it was a humanoid, it would have seemed like a craning head.
Sote reached the girl and pulled her to her feet. “Let's go!”
“Wait, no, Sote, give me your bag...”
“What? We don't have time for this!”
“No, look, they've stopped. Give me your bag.”
Sote looked at the pillar of grinlek. His heart pounded with adrenaline, and his mind was blank with fear. Confused, he complied with An's request and gave her his bag.
“Here!” the girl tossed the bag at the foot of the swarm. “You want this? We have more, but leave us alone after!”
The grinlek swarm shifted and moved forward over the bag, completely encasing it within the mass. It seemed to regard the teenagers, but it didn't move from its spot.
“Balu, your bag?” An asked. Balu, who was just as awestricken as the others, managed to toss his bag at the mass without blinking or closing his mouth.
The swarm moved to take that bag, but then it shifted again, shrinking down then splitting into eight pillars. Two of the eight held the packs that had just been offered, one held the scraps of leather that were given first, and the other five held nothing but rocked back and forth.
“I... I think it wants one from each of us?”
“So they eat everything, and they're intelligent?” Troels asked, writing notes with the pencil he kept in his boot.
“We don't know if they smart. Sometimes they seem to understand reason, and most of the time they don't. Some of the older telaen tell us that they share their minds, so big swarms can think for the group.”
“You mean older telaenians?”
“No, the telaen themselves communicate with our Speakers, and only Speakers know how to interpret the creatures' words.”
“Fascinating,” the man punctuated his words with his pencil on the page. “Here, tell me how this sounds.”
Wrapped feet crunch through foliage.
Several breathing breaths.
Eight more follow closely,
And none await their death.
A sound like insects laughing.
A mass of grinning eyes.
Behind, above, and to the left,
The pitch black darkness smiles.
Some fall from a tree above.
These lizards dipped in 'mites.
Sote throws the thing away,
While An screams at the night.
Take this instead, we'll give you more.
She drops her pack of food.
Swarm settles on the cooked meat,
Children are not pursued.
A deal is struck, bargains made,
Though only one side speaks.
Hunted meat dropped every night,
And lives are spared that week.
“I like it,” Sote said with a smile. “You got a pretty good thing.”
“Still needs some work, though.”
“So what you planning on doing with it? We're stuck here.”
“It's not the first time I've been behind bars, and it's not the first time I'll get out,” Troels said. He grinned.
“Ha, good luck with that,” Sote said. “So, I told you my story. You got any of your own? We got nothing to do until tomorrow anyway.”
“That's true. Can't make an escape until they let us out!” Troels laughed. He flipped his book to a random page. “Ever heard the story of the first Fall?”
Still as stone, the Gray Prince stands,
Unto destruction Olrïk Aunsé comes.
Below beasts roam, the Gray City barren,
A crater carved within walls cracked.
Before chaos and carnage, the city was covered with wealth.
Viggrid's lands lay at war with itself, tribes vying for glory,
But none dared defile the Gray City of Ingdor,
Pinnacle of wealth, trade, and power,
The city stood with wall and army, the image of strength itself.
But on that day, the Gray City was destroyed,
The Prince not present until too late, his prestige forsaken.
From soot and smoke, amidst the snarls,
A poor peasant flees, and a beast does follow.
Claws grab and capture, the beast takes without killing.
Before the worst, the Gray and his guard jump to gory action,
The peasant's life in limbo saved from losing.
The formidable beast falls slain, head fissured by hammer,
Its thrashing tails cut off with swords,
And Aunsé's blade bore through exposed beating heart.
“What happened here?” Aunsé asked, hurried.
“It came from the sky, a large flaming rock,
And with its laden landing, beasts spilled fourth,
Like locusts on fields, our city was lost.
Those who fought were felled, without effort,
And those who fled were found, taken by force without killing.”
The Gray's anger boiled and burned, it would not abate.
“We take the city from the fallen or else our lives are forfeit,
Come my men, we fight and triumph!”
The ten guards gave their harshest cries, following the Gray into the Gray.
Ten would enter with swords raised, though in the end just one would remain.
Each lost soul took dozens with their life,
And by dawn and day, the Gray City had no more for death to take.
Still as stone, Aunsé stands,
The beasts are banished, though no other body breathes.
Morning comes, but before he can mourn,
Aunsé sees another fireball rain from the sky.
And so he rode through divided lands,
Uniting tribes with his own two hands.
To drive away and kill the beasts,
And failing that, to sail to the east.
Troels looked up from his book and noticed some of the other inmates were looking at him. Some had looks of disdain, others interest. Most just had looks of apathy.
“How about any of you? Anyone got a good story to tell?” he grinned. Maybe a prison wasn't the worst thing that could happen this week.
OOC: So i've PM'd some people about just chillin and telling stories about their respective races and infodumping and stuff. Even if you have nothing to infodump about, please feel free to jump in on the jail time and enjoy a hearty time around the table. Also, don't infodump in verse or I will stab you for making things hard to interpret and read.
PS. i TOO can hit just north of 14,000 characters while parties keep happening. how do you like that, various people who type too much
PS. i TOO can hit just north of 14,000 characters while parties keep happening. how do you like that, various people who type too much
