Private Tales Elbion by Sundown

[Lilette Blackbriar]

Spoiler: Music

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It pleaseth me thouest agree to my request that we meet.
I shall arrive by carriage in three weeks time,
come sundown, should my estimate prove true.
The items we didst discuss art with me, ready for thine appraisal.

With blessings of Astra,
—Lilette
​

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Vaezhasar Drakspae​

Eyes—silver pale—peered through the carriage window, painted in silvers of red and orange that crept between the curtains.

Sundown, just as she'd suspected! A breathless sigh relieved the tension in her shoulders even as the carriage jerked on an uneven wheel. In stark contrast to the cheap ride, They passed into the shadow of a grand building that looked more castle than school. Her brows furrowed, and she clambered slowly to the front of the carriage, thankful that the other passengers had long since departed.

She knocked on the grated front window, to which the old driver turned confusedly.

"Excuseth my intrusion Ser, Where art we headed?"

"The college...?" he pointed toward the castle-ish building ahead, "Like ye asked."

"Oh! oh, I see."

Only a few minutes passed before the carriage stopped, Lilette spilling half haphazardly from the door with her luggage in tow. It was a large backpack, though she seemed to struggle with the size more than weight of it, rattling like kitchen clutter. But still she managed, hoisting the thing over her shoulders as she waved off the driver, and turned in search of the man that drew her here.

 

[Vaezhasar Drakspae]

Lilette Blackbriar
From the cobbled courtyard's dimmer recesses, something drifted forth, not walked, not crawled, but rather propelled itself through some unnatural buoyancy that defied the pedestrian laws of locomotion.

The thing resembled nothing so much as a philosopher's delirium given corporeal form. Its bulbous cranium bore the wrinkled aspect of some prodigious cerebrum preserved in mottled purples and browns, as though Intelligence itself had sprouted a body and found the arrangement disagreeable. Where one might expect sensory organs, there existed instead a curved protrusion of horn or beak, chitinous, yellowed, and wickedly hooked.

Most unsettling were the appendages: elongated tendrils of sinewy flesh, each bristling with barbs like some angler's most pessimistic conception of what might lurk in oceanic abysses. These limbs undulated through the air mere fingerwidths above the stonework, neither touching ground nor requiring it, moving with the languid confidence of a creature to whom gravity represented merely a suggestion rather than an imperative.

The entity approached with deliberate intent, positioning itself before the newcomer. Though bereft of any visible ocular apparatus, it nonetheless conveyed the unmistakable impression of scrutiny, as though examining Lilette through senses more exotic than mere vision. The beak-structure gaped wide, revealing an interior of distressing pinkness.

What emerged was speech, after a fashion, though rendered in tones that suggested a particularly garrulous corvid had been tutored in the phonemes of human discourse without quite grasping their proper execution. The result possessed a metallic, avian quality, each syllable emerging with the piercing clarity of bronze scraped across slate.

"Guest guest guest!" it proclaimed, its enthusiasm evident despite the unnerving timbre.

"I'll take you to the master, yes yes." Two tendrils detached themselves from their aerial perambulations, extending toward her cumbersome baggage with appendages that terminated in points perhaps too sharp for comfort.

"If heavy, I carry."

The creature maintained its position, awaiting her response with what might charitably be interpreted as patience, though how one discerned patience in a being whose every visible aspect suggested it had been assembled from nightmares remained an open question.

 

[Lilette Blackbriar]

Vaezhasar Drakspae​

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Lilette froze like frightened animal. for all immortality had lavished upon her the girl still knew primal instinct, and to say this...thing...triggered nothing so primal as fear would be a lie.

This lasted right up until the moment it uttered—or squawked—the word "Guest."

"Uhm. salutations...?" she said confusedly.

The girl stayed quiet while her greeter hovered nearer, rubbing her hands nervously and never taking her eyes of the homunculus, not once.

It's tendrils were met with a half-step back and a nervous glances, though with but a moment's hesitance, she concluded it may be rude to refuse. And so she reluctantly slipped her shoulders free of the bag, offering it up to the avian... thing.

"Prithee handle with care, It bareth contents of great import."

She looked at the beast almost pleadingly, though her eyes thinned almost assertively.

 

[Vaezhasar Drakspae]

Lilette Blackbriar
The homunculus accepted its burden with mechanical efficiency, dual appendages enfolding the rucksack as though weight were merely theoretical. Thus laden, it commenced a circuitous journey through the collegiate precincts, across the courtyard where evening shadows pooled, through the main portal with its archaic pretensions, down corridors whose architects had apparently favored arches over straight lines.

Several staircases later they arrived at a section bearing the unmistakable aura of isolation, as though certain pursuits benefited from geographical quarantine. Here the creature halted before brass portals engraved with an eight-rayed star suggesting either astronomical enthusiasm or occult pretension. A single tendril applied pressure. The doors yielded.

Beyond lay chambers proclaiming their owner's hermetic dedication with cathedral-like lack of subtlety. Somber granite walls, flooring polished to liquid-dark perfection, and crowning all, a prismatic dome scattering sundown's radiance in chromatic display across the interior.

Towering shelves dominated the periphery, their burden of volumes suggesting either comprehensive erudition or bibliographic hoarding. Between these literary monoliths sprawled a Kalitian carpet, and centrally positioned stood a circular table resembling less a workspace than a mad scientist's estate sale. Scrolls lay scattered alongside ritual implements, gem-encrusted skulls, and preserved specimens floating in glass cylinders with the placidity of things pickled beyond complaint.

Amidst this erudite chaos, suspended a dozen feet aloft, reclined the master himself. His throne, for no lesser term sufficed, combined purple upholstery with elaborate bone-work, the entire construction adorned with cranial motifs suggesting firm opinions about mortality frequently expressed.

The sorcerer's panoply matched his furniture in theatrical excess. Burnished segments of metalwork in deep blues and tarnished golds fitted together with jeweler's precision, the breastplate bearing a grinning, toothy visage of an open maw.

Pauldrons rose in elaborate sweeps of etched metal, while segmented guards encased his limbs in articulated splendor. Most arresting was the helm, curved from materials unknown, adorned with paired horns spiraling upward in magnificent symmetry, their ridged surfaces catching prismatic light.

An open tome rested in his grasp, its dimensions and apparent mass suggesting it must've weighted as much as a young child.

 

[Lilette Blackbriar]

Vaezhasar Drakspae​

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So many portals and stairs, Lilette had to wonder if it were an intentionally labyrinthine defense or confusing happenstance.

Though she didn't tire so easily as humans, she greeted her destination with a triumphant sigh. Oh and what a sight it was! Her pale features reflected beautifully off polished floors while books and oddities arrested her gaze with no end.

She took slow, mystified steps, till awareness of the suspended figure elicited a gasp of wonder.

"O-oh!"

The comparatively smaller girl was quick to curtsy for her host

The former noble had been raised polite and proper of course, but the man's hulking stature and warrior-helm—stylized in the image of occult imagery of a goat, she suspected—doubled her desire to be on respectful terms with the sorcerer.

"Sir enchanter," she greeted.

"I am Sister Lilette of Ragash, once of the Falwood. A pleasure to make thine acquaintance at last."

 

[Vaezhasar Drakspae]

Lilette Blackbriar
The suspended figure stirred, a motion suggesting he'd registered her arrival despite the tome commanding his immediate attention. The volume shut with a percussive finality that echoed off granite walls like a judicial gavel. His aerial throne commenced its descent with the stately deliberation of celestial bodies obeying unfamiliar physics, settling upon the carpet with surprising delicacy given its macabre ornamentation.

Rising from his seat, the sorcerer achieved verticality that reduced their relative proportions to something approaching adult and adolescent. Beneath the metallic carapace, one could begin to discern the barest glimpses of the peculiar texture of synthetic musculature, some alchemical substitute for mortal flesh that clung to his frame with the sheen of rubberized leather. This artificial anatomy rippled and contracted as he approached, pneumatic systems translating intention into locomotion whilst simultaneously propelling a dozen stone's worth of ornamental armor.

"Ah! Ragash. I would recognize that particular dialectical inflection anywhere, Sister Lilette, faint though time may have rendered it."

His gaze manifested as twin azure luminosities behind the helm's ocular apertures, their intensity suggesting either thaumaturgic augmentation or uncommonly vigorous health. The horns crowning his headpiece, whether goat-inspired or merely coincidentally caprine, lent him the aspect of some primitive nature deity who'd traded trees for practical metallurgy.

"A most fortuitous coincidence, for I claim that esteemed city as my birthplace. Now then, your correspondence, whilst delightfully formal, proved somewhat... shall we say, economical with specifics regarding the PURPOSE of this visit. Tell me, do you seek to procure some manner of mystical service? Some thaumaturgical undertaking, perhaps? I confess myself VERY curious."