End Game: Witch Hunt.

[Lucette]

They helped Suwor! Why? He had done this to her! To the baby! Yet it was him they spoke to! Him they helped! The Kelvic could not focus upon their words. She could not hear through the pain he had brought upon her… It was enough in her mind that they ignored her pathetic cries! For him! For- “AhhhhRHHGGH!” Lucette wailed; all concern for decorum and polite servitude gone since the prick of the needle had entered her womb. Writhing on the floor she grabbed at her throat, trying to release the heavy collar. Frantically she tugged upon it, as she twisted. Fighting herself, ugly, long scratches began to line her neck as her nails dug in, franticly. She would transform! She would run away from this torment! “Take it offffff!” She would- “OOOOghaahhhh!” But her stiff and trembling fingers flew to her belly once more as she curled in upon herself. The pain overwhelmed all thought, and all action. Her head lolled upon the floor and she struggled to breathe as each wave of terror and agony became worse and deeper, and more encompassing. A feeling of nausea settled upon her, and her skin took the deathly pallor of a corpse. But Caelum’s hand slid into hers, and his fingers entwined through her own. Lucette felt his strength and something more… Hazily and from far away she dreamed she heard a beat. Steady and rhythmic it pounded, over and again it thumped… yet it was distant and distinct from her. The Kelvic strained to hear it, whimpered pathetically to bring it close. But the sound of her own pounding heart grew louder, beating wildly and erratically. Louder it grew, to shut out all other sounds. Lucette felt lightheaded, disoriented in its entirety. There was only the beat… and the pain that followed. The Konti sat near her, beautiful and strange to Lucette’s weakened gaze. When had she come? Any other time, the Kelvic would have been intrigued by one of the Isle women – but not today. The baby moved… the baby convulsed! Ripples played across her abdomen. “OHHH Noooo! Noooo!” She moaned, “Don’t die! Please don’t die!” And her tears flowed - until she screamed loud and shrill, animalistic notes that echoed off the walls of Suwor’s hideaway, and Lucette thrashed helplessly, naked skin slick with perspiration. And she clutched Sondra’s hand with a grip that belied her usually passive demeanor.

[Caelum]

"Rock adder venom," the healer muttered. The rest of their words penetrated but failed buoy his attention. He was concentrated upon the writhing Lucette and the failing regard of the wizard who had poisoned her. As Siwa moved to stem the flow of her father's blood, he delivered the whole of his attentions to the kelvic and Sondra's strong, white hands holding her fast. Competent hands reached, sliding against the pulse in Lucette's wrist and timing its racing speed against the metronome of his own calm heart. It left the frown already on him to dig trenches in his face; and he seemed, maybe to the surprise of the others, to be altogether capable of blocking out the woman's anguished cries in favor of focusing on the source of them. Was there more time, he would have taken effort to soothe her, not truly being the heartless outlander he could occasionally seem. He knew no antidote for rock adder venom, knew next to nothing of poisons themselves; and it was faith rearing before him again, crinkling his nose. He knew well enough how to get the child out of her, swift and clean and hard, oh so hard. Only his arm was near incapacitated and the real problem was her, twisting and moaning and anything he gave her to still her might react in unforeseen and deadly ways with the venom already in her. It left him with no other choice, he realized, and dread crept up his painfully numb arm. It found his bloodstream, maybe, and spread like a contagion as images of all the broken heresies that had littered Denval in backfiring gnosis marks formed his mind. "Sweet Rak'keli," he murmured while gentle hands moved Lucette's, firm and certain, to flatten over her heart. "Don't forget us now."

[Sondra]

As Sondra held the Kelvic, her wild mind threw scenes across the Konti's eyes, spirited there by the mark and gifts Sondra clumsily bore. It was not a convenient time for powers to manifest, but they had never asked Sondra for permission. Her vision was doubled, tripled and she felt the fiery voice waver in her throat. "Petching useless," she branded herself. She was present, but touching someone so enflamed with feeling made her mind splinter. Would she see sins, the past, or coax an emotion to seething? It didn't matter, everything could overlay, gouging the inner eye. And not a damn bit of it was helpful. Caelum was pressing blessed hands over Lucette's heart, praying for grace. A substance too dear for mortals to have at will. Sondra's scaled hand felt Lucette's fingers dig into the skin and press against the bone. Whatever Sondra was earnestly saying to the Kelvic was lost on most, she had reverted to her mother tongue when faced with primal suffering: It's not fair, love. It's not fair. I'm sorry. She tried to touch the frightened Kelvic's brow in a motherly gesture, making an insistent soothing sound drawn from Kontinese. It was paltry comfort, but all she could manage. In the back of her head, another life thrummed mad refrains: the stone, the stone, the stone.

[Tabarnac]

Something in the web of gnosis and empathy linked those three together: Lucette, Caelum, Sondra. They all felt the child twist and die, its alien Symenestra instincts flaring in their minds and then snuffed like a candle. They felt Lucette's reaction as their own, and Caelum's and Sondra's too. For the moment, they were as one person, feeling Nikali's Chain tighten within Caelum, heavy links clanking and setting their teeth on edge. Sweet Rak'keli, he had begged into the ether. She came. But oh, too late. "Too late," came her pragmatic, but compassionate voice. She was standing there above them while Cryos and the others scavenged and Zagary watched, strung tight like a bowstring, ready to release. But it was only the strange trinity that attracted Her. "I felt you struggling against what was beyond your skill, beyond your time,[b]" She said to Her horned son. A hand fell upon his shoulder, making his mark burn with holy gnosis. She filled him. "[b]We have been watching, and now I will join you in this battle. Do what must be done." The air felt heavy for Her Presence, though not nearly so unbearable as the public apparitions of Sun and Moon at their festival. Suwor groaned, reacting poorly to the Presence. "If I can't have it..." he muttered to himself, then giggled, or whimpered, and Siwa wept for him, who had fallen so low. In Lucette's mind, she heard, "Embrace the pain, child. Then We can take it away." In Sondra's mind, she heard, "Open your inner eye, niece. My sister wants to show you something." As for Caelum, he knew what he had to do, and She was providing the sheer power to do it.

[Lucette]

The healer’s hand pressed against her pounding heart, its energy so vastly different than her own frantic and addled spirit. Immediately the touch soothed, but Lucette refused to accept it. She would allow herself no compassion while the baby struggled to live. Vainly, the Kelvic fought the relief he offered, afraid of what might happen if she were to suddenly relax. She had to fight through! “Not there! Lower!” the distraught Kelvic begged, not understanding, as she tried to move Caelum’s gentle hand with her smaller one. “The pain,” she panted, “it is lower… in the belly. Where the baby is…” It was true her heart ached, but not in a physical way. Not like her abdomen that knotted with horrible, torturous violence. The baby could die… Lucette knew this, but pretended it might be otherwise, for to think of the loss – loudly, the Kelvic yowled. She would gladly exchange places and die instead. Almost she willed it, to trade. Veldrys would have his child then, a family. But the agony to be without the little cub… she could not… “Arghghgh!” Veldrys would- “OHHHghhh!” She could not even raise her voice as the next wave hit her. Lucette’s back arched as she struggled to bring her knees to chest to stop the assault within. Hands clasped her tightly, to hold her, yet it was difficult not to struggle against them. She was so frightened! The touch upon her brow drew her eyes upwards. In the heat of hell, it was a cool drink. The Konti’s words seemed magical… and for a moment Lucette’s mind wandered, perhaps in delirium as the pain became too much to bear. And Lucette remembered… Stolen pieces of meat taken from a serving platter without permission, the times she had shifted into Cheetah form unasked. Once she had not wished to lie with a man that had scared her… These were her sins, the transgressions of a willful, young Kelvic slave. And her sins ended with the heavy swing of Roland’s leather belt, as she sobbed to admit her guilt, and cried, “I’ll be good! I swear… please, I’ll be good!” The baby twisted and Lucette was sucked back into torment. Her entire abdomen shifted with unnatural, spastic movement. The little life tried to fight against the contents of the needle, but it was such a small thing. One moment the baby was fine, and in the next… Lucette felt her connection to the baby, stretched to impossible thinness. Hot pain grew to unbearable agony, and the Kelvic screamed, her body shuddering as she thrashed on the floor. Yet as horrible as this was, she would take more of it, if only to bring the baby back close to her. Yet the fight was already over, the animal within sensed it, and for a moment Lucette lay still, listening and hoping, panting loudly. With a growing frown, and labored breath, the shock of realization stole over her features. The baby was dying… And… a woman Lucette had never seen, stood before her. She was beautiful, and she spoke not unkindly, saying, “Embrace the pain.” For a brief time, their gazes met, and Lucette listened transfixed. There was compassion in her presence, and such was the magnitude of it, that the Kelvic’s ordeal was lifted in that moment. But, when the pain came again, harder and more terrible than before, Lucette held onto it tightly. As if it would allow her to hold onto the child longer. She tried not to cry, or scream… and she choked on the breath that came from her lungs, as if she might vomit everything within. Through gritted teeth she whispered, “Please don’t take it… please…” She wanted to die too, and go where the baby would. Pain wracked her body, as already it knew instinctually what it needed to do to abort the child. It was continuous now and Lucette cries turned to whimpers. But she could not sustain the sounds, as strength rapidly deserted her. Almost Lucette was glad for it… the hurt would gone soon… and she would follow the baby. It did not seem so very far away, and her eyes began to close.

[Caelum]

Had he not been a healer baptized in the blood of man’s post-apocalyptic battlefields, the empathetic link locking together with the loose ribbons of Nikali’s mirror mask would have overwhelmed and destroyed. Yet he was a healer, capable of incredible focus on the most portent of matters while all the rest was left to flicker at the edges of his awareness, rendering these people-shaped geysers of need and emotion little more than pale moths struggling toward the flames of a strange fate. Too late, Rak’keli spoke Dira’s claim. His eyes rolled up, swamped by sunlight that had never known this cave, and he found he was already on his knees to his goddess. He thought he heard Syna brightly singing to Leth’s wild tunes, Nikali’s throaty chuckle rolling like a great cat through Nysel’s technicolored fields. Tanroa’s white, white teeth set on edge and a proud smile was evident in sideways look delivered from Yahal’s stern eyes. The great weight of a pantheon’s attention to one small stone busted upon them. It became clear all that he had ever been was still here, lingering in this hallowed dark. A windmarked Sunsinger smiled while a woman with rain colored eyes leaned on her sword. He exploded beneath Rak’keli’s hand, gulping down the impossible force of Her grace and make of himself little more and nothing less than a conduit. Yes, he knew what to do. Grace rushed through the cheetah’s human seeming, filling up starving cells and flushing resurrection through poison strangled organs. It, at his direction, transmuted venom to harmless waste and restored the amniotic fluids with verdure. Pain was sloughed aside and then metaphorical fingertips of his borrowed divinity brushed the wracked limbs of the unborn.

[Sondra]

She had never felt large enough for everything that wanted to possess her. Sondra faded, whatever she was, and the world washed through her. Sins with no malice, only shame and on its heels monstrous want. It opened and shut its desperate mouth, knowing the life that flared and sputtered was beyond sparing. Lucette wanted, Caelum wanted and Sondra was all and nothing. Bright, twisting life raised its head to see, only to be struck immediately blind. Spark and ashes with no light between. Divinity had come to them wise and dreadful after circling the earth. The Konti lifted her head. It half lolled, like a Nuit newly born. The kind sister had been sent with a message. What was one more? How long until her fingertips began to rot, and leprous bits of her began to fall? All the parts would be replaced in time, by everyone else that had the power to overwhelm the pale girl who cried for days when her gift was understood. Yes mother, she said. Better to be broken with use than whole and never filled. K'Sondra closed her eyes and opened another, waiting for sharp revelation.

[Tabarnac]

OOCWell, Lucette has retired and it doesn't look like anyone else is going to post, so I will wrap it up for those of you remaining and grade it soon.

Dira was already dancing with the unborn soul, whirling and twirling it into the flow of soul that was taken and reshaped by Lhex, returned to the mortal coil. Kihala had ceded it to her counterpart. It was gone, and Lucette felt that ineffable aspect flee. For all that the punch of a lightning bolt was passing from Rak'keli to Caelum to the bereaved mother, a cooling sensation spread from his hand, calming her as if she were falling asleep under the gentlest of rains. It was Caelum who felt like a live D-wire. So much power coursed through him that there was little else he could hold onto save scraps of terrible compassion as the Kelvic's body cannibalized the lifeless thing within, and much more efficiently for the goddess' intervention than would the child itself have done to its mother. K'Sondra too was blind. Lady Avalis didn't show herself or, if she did, the Konti could not see. But she manifest within, and for an eternal instant, the warrior was the goddess indwelt. For a moment she knew peace with nary a sin to trouble her soul. But she remembered herself finally, remembered the reality in which she lived. Her blood burned with Azenth fire, another seer's lily blooming from her first, as she felt the weight of wordless doom from the west, a doom that made this mewling sorcerer but a biting gnat. Things got confusing for everyone then, but Zagary and his soldiers put things to right, collecting evidence and artifacts, as well as their incapacitated cohorts. After Rak'keli had gone, some of her power remained behind in Caelum, and the one marked hand matched the other. Sondra's daze gradually faded and her sight returned, though her revelation was burned into her as if she had stared too long at the sun. And Lucette slept. But they had all done a service to Denval, and Denval would reward them.

end.

[Magpie]

e

Talen :

XP:
Observation +3
Running +1

Notes:
Sorry, I'm afraid there wasn't much to award here.

Lucette :

XP:
Observation +4
Running +2
Hunting +1
Seduction +1

Lores:
Trust in Your Keeper
No Hiding a Human Pregnancy
The Feel of a Bondmate
Protect the Baby at all Costs
The Overwhelming Crush of Pain
Painful Memories

Caelum :

XP:
Observation +3
Running +1
Projection +1
Medicine +2

Lores:
A Healer, Not a Fighter
Ignoring Nikali's Call
Lost in Translation
Pushing Past Painful Memories
The Magic is In the Stone
The Cold Grip of Fear
Enduring a God's Regard

Notes :

Galio, Lysander, Syllke, Sondra, and Cryos: If any of you decide to return to Mizahar, just PM me and I’ll add your grades here.

An exciting read, all, very glad we got to see it to the end.

If you have any questions or concerns about what was awarded, please don't hesitate to PM me.
e