Reborn (Party 5): Truth

Inspiration: Apologize, Location, and Nothing to Lose. 

Standing, she found herself in a silk robe. Slowly the human woman would walk towards the sound of an infant’s cries. Staring, she saw the San’layn holding a child in his arms and gently rocking it. Her heart began to thump loudly in her ear as she felt herself pulled towards the child.

“This is Illya.” The man spoke, “This is my daughter that you will guard with your life.”

“Where is her mother?” Charlotte asked softly as she peered into the dull amber hues of the baby.

“Dead.. Killed by huntsmen long ago.” He spoke, a faint frown tugging on the corner of his lips.

“My condolences.” She murmured quietly.

“Soon she will be yours as well, I hope you will treat her as such.” The man gave a nod to Charlotte, slipping the child into her arms.

“I will look after her as if my own.” She smiled as she stared down into the little girl’s pudgy face.

Back in present day…

Charlotte quickly sat up, peering around and moving to the crib side. “They’re coming, we don’t have much time.” She muttered to herself, pausing to slip the bracelet onto the infant before scooping her up.

She would begin to draw a portal rune in the air when the Lord arrived. “Another has shown himself. You two must leave, you remember where I told you to go?” He wiped ash from his eyes.

“Yes, and you promise to meet us there?” Charlotte spoke with panic in her voice.

“I promised, didn’t I?” He planted a kiss on each of their foreheads before turning to begin casting a seal on the door, “That should slow them.”

He then melded into the shadows to head to his next location.

Aayan kept down the hallway where he detected the magic of the bracelets. “Hold on Charlotte, I’m going to get you out of here…” Aayan said dragging himself along the wall, his hands dripping blood from where the necrotic spell had wafted over him. Aayan reached the door. “I don’t have much magic left in me...anymore and I won’t be able to cast another spell. But I have to risk it all.” Aayan began to work on dismantling the seal on the door with the last of his magical stores in the runes.

Charlotte was still drawing an arcane portal rune in the air when she sensed the spell on the door breaking down. She spoke in Thalassian, summoning an arcane guardian to watch her back as she worked.

A runeblade would appear through the door and Aayan kicked it open looking more than worse for wear. “Charlotte! Please, you’ve got to come back to us!” Aayan pulled his blade from the door and entered into the room. “You’re being controlled and I really don’t want to do this next thing to you! The effects of it take weeks to wear off!”

The infant began to cry, Charlotte trying to hush it as she shot a glare towards Aayan, “You just want to keep me from my family!” She growled towards him.

“Family!? That man kidnapped you! You’ve been turned into a San’layn against your will! That family you have are a bunch of bodies! You’re still alive and I’ll make you see it!” Aayan quickened his pace inside with his sword drawn ready to strike her. A cut is all that may be needed.

The arcane guardian would move between Aayan and Charlotte, her eyes glowing with power as she continued her teleportation runes. They were nearing finish.

“Damn fool!” Aayan began to charge into the Arcane Guardian. “Charlotte! I won’t let you get away!” Aayan began to swing his runeblade against the arcane guardian, his hands screaming in agony from the rot, blood dripping as he gripped the sword. “Fight it, FIGHT IT! Don’t be controlled! Look into my eyes, Charlotte! Don’t you dare turn away!”

The scent of his blood caused her to stop, the burning in her throat becoming more present. Her fingers tremble and begin to lose focus on the rune, still clutching Illya close. She tries to shake her head, remembering her purpose but finding it hard. She turns to scowl at him, watching the guardian get sliced in two.

“Come back to me! No, come back to us! You’re our friend and leader!” Aayan took out a knife and stabbed himself in the arm to entice her with more blood. “Don’t leave!” Aayan started to try and concentrate as much mana as he could, what little remained, maybe it would be enough to disrupt the portal, he hoped he had time.

The burning of her throat caused her to drop the spell, rubbing at her neck as she keeps shaking her head violently. She holds the infant with both hands and begins backing up against a wall. Her guardian and teleportation failing from her loss of concentration.

“You’re not one of them!” Aayan lowered his sword. “I can’t leave here without our leader, after all that’s happened, I won’t leave here without you.” Aayan walked over and held out a hand. “Let’s go back to base, Leader.”

“You’re crazy.” She spoke, though a tear escaping her right eye as she keeps pressed against the wall, “I’m a monster, not your leader. I’m best left here.”

“Charlotte…” Aayan sat down beside her. “Long ago, with the Argent Crusade, I lost my sister. She dedicated her life to saving people who many thought were beyond hope. She brought so many people back...Death Knights, Forsaken...but in the end she couldn’t save herself. She became a monster too, you’re not all gone yet…And I refuse to give up, you’ll find me rather persistent...after all I am your Quartermaster.”

“Your people.. Your leaders.. They hunt and kill us. I am not risking my daughter’s life on such falsehoods you speak.” There was confusion in her eyes as they glowed red, her hunger still fighting her.

“Your daughter? You’ve not been away for enough time to have a child. That one isn’t yours...you’re being controlled to become a nanny.” Aayan leaned back, still bleeding. “Fine, cut yourself with my Runeblade, if you still think the same way, I will let you go….willingly.” Aayan was looking pretty pale.

“Why should I cut myself upon your blade?” She stares him down, noting his paleness. She reached her free hand out towards him to begin using blood magic to mend his wounds so he can speak.

“Solace...has a very particular enchantment on it...when I made the Runeblade, part of my soul was entrapped in the blade. It took my will and made it manifest...the ability to let others see what I see. Solace is a weapon of pacifism. I often used it to stop fighting...tried to stop as many of the Horde as I could with it…” Aayan looked at Charlotte. “If I strike you, or if anyone makes contact with it, they will see my thoughts to avoid conflict. It may give you the right state of mind.”

“Sounds like you are the one trying to control my mind.” She scowled once more at him, moving to plant a foot on his chest and force him on his back.

Aayan grabbed her foot and was forced onto his back. “There is no control...only a reflection. Those who have strong wills can choose to not be affected.” Aayan tried to lift her foot off.

She kept her foot pressed against him, “How do I know you speak the truth, human? You’re a mage and could merely be casting a trick to imprison me.”

“I can assure you...I’m really out of mana right now. Also, Human? Charlotte my name is Aayan.” Aayan sighed and put pressure against her foot to make sure she didn’t break ribs.

“Magi always have a trick or two.” She mutters but pauses to look at the blade, then shakes her head, “How’s about I simply bite you instead?”
“If that would make me prove my point...After all I’ve got no elf blood in me…Well, you shouldn’t do that, because the truth is One point seven litres….That’s how much holy water a person needs to drink to give their blood the same effect.” Aayan didn’t like the thought of being bitten. “If you do bite me, I must warn you of something I also put into place.”

She presses her foot into his hand that was fighting her, “So you would poison your blood to stop me?” She leaned down, close enough he could probably cut her himself.

“If I wanted to stop you, would I have bothered to tell you my precautions? Or does trying to appeal to your reason not work when you get forcibly changed?” Aayan quickly pulled up on his blade, trying to cut her, with a small cut. Seems that logic aspect and appealing to emotion has failed.

She was cut! Her eyes went wide as she stumbled off of him.

“Sorry about that...you were behaving a little crazy, have to get another will into your head.” The feelings that would be hitting her as the blue energy seemed to flow into her was that of defense, caring, and a deep rooted sadness. The thoughts of Aayan were determined to bring her back, the experiences they had driving him to come to her aid. Flashes of memories and beratings that were funny and troublesome. “What you’re seeing is me to you, completely unblemish and unhidden.”

She was dazed as the memories come flooding back, she gripped Illya for dear life as she fell back against the wall and slid down into sitting. Her mouth agape as she found no words to speak.

“Really sorry about that...You might keep feeling like that from anywhere to a few hours to a few weeks. I had to get you to see what I saw. And why I can’t just let it go.” Aayan said, almost using Solace as a cane.

Tears began to brim from her eyes, her mind twisted and tugging in multiple directions and it showed as she appeared to be fighting herself. Wanting to both stand yet sit, legs twitching and body shaking, her eyes kept changing between anger, confusion, sadness, and joy.

Meanwhile…

Deep inside the fortress, the Lord of the Manor was busying himself with setting up a large, complex rune made of charcoal on the cobblestone floor. His ears twitching to listen for anything though not paying too great amount of attention as he began to sprinkle enchanting dust over the rune.


The stone wall made a sound of it being bashed open, he turned around to see an outstretched hand reach out for him, the arm wrapped around the San’layn’s neck to pin him onto the wall. A familiar voice was heard muffled on the other side of the wall “Did you miss me?”. The San’layn’s robes were coated in dust and rubble as another hole was punched in through the wall. Grant’s head poked out of it, his collar lowered to reveal his long white beard, with his jaw wide open to bite down hard on the neck of the San’layn, much to his surprise.

He struggled to break free but that only make it easier for Grant to bite down harder on his neck, he felt Light magic pouring into his body at an alarming rate, making the part of the neck that was bitten visually glow and crack. Grant finally let go of the San’layn and retreat back into the wall, the elf falling down and quickly back up away from the wall and holding onto the bite mark with much surprise.

Grant on the other side of the wall could be heard coughing and spitted on the other side of the wall, “By the Light, your blood tastes foul! It tastes like someone left fish to rot in the sun for a month.”

“What the ever-loving fuck is wrong with you?!” The Lord screeched, staring down the clearly insane man.

Grant began to kick down the stone walls in his way between him and the San’layn, speaking out as he did such, “You tell me, you’re the one that does this for a living.”

“Why would a MORTAL bite a San’layn?!” He scowls in bewilderment.

Grant managed to make a big enough hole in the wall so he could get closer to the San’layn, his collar lowered to reveal a devilish grin on his lips. Grant taps on his own neck as he speaks, “Holy magic is painful for someone like you, deadly even. I injected a fair bit of holy magic into your body, enough to cause your body to betray you and wither away. The process will be excruciatingly painful.” He chuckled softly, placing a hand on his hip, “I figured it would be a poetic way to kill you.”

The Lord’s eyes went wide as he began channeling magic. Time to zoinks out!

Grant’s hand extended out to summon a brief flicker of shadow magic to silence the San’layn, causing his magic to no longer answer him for the duration of the spell. “Oh, the horror on your face is sweet, finally feeling the sting of mortality again?” Grant began to remove his gloves to reveal his skin to be cracked by the Light, the cracks glowing gold from the magic within it. “You have a week, and there's no creature in this world and the next one to save you, it'd sure be a shame to have you just process the horror and not be here long enough to see it come through fully.”


Grant’s hand went up to grasp onto his hat “You may have escaped death, but there is nothing you can try to escape me. I know for certain I am much more sadistic when it comes to my victims than death.” He tossed his hat to the side to reveal a pair of pure golden eyes staring down at the San’layn, a wolf staring down its prey before the kill. “The fear in your heart is sinking in, but I want it to erupt into a spectacle. I'm going to crash down everything you’ve ever built, and there is nothing you can do but run. A fate more merciful than the thousands of lives you’ve brought to ruin due to your gluttony and pride.”

His body flared up in vibrant golden light, the earth began to quake and rumble under the powers he began to command, the mansion they stood upon bursted into holy fire, the quakes of the earth signaling the doom of the building. Its fate to crack down into rubble.

He stood, moving his hand from his neck that was flaking and blackening from the light turning on him. He tried to make his way for the door, clearly concerned about something other then his impending doom.

Grant began to follow behind, walking forward as the mansion begins to crack and crumble slowly under the pressure of the power he was channeling, “Not used to running it seems, you should learn fast.”

“Madman.” He mutters as he rushed through the hallways.