Board Thread:Roleplay/@comment-26288702-20161008211047/@comment-28358106-20161101034949

(Okay...Just asking...)

I look to the cage. It isn't what I thought it was going to be. It was worse. Far beyond mere healing. It isn't within the mortal coil to survive such gaping wounds...

She shouldn't be alive. She isn't dead, or undead. But some wretched necromancy is keeping her alive, even in that state...I had not seen such sorcery since...

Out of instinct, Hound reaches for the cage. I don't blame him. But...something...

Then I sense it. Several things happen at once. The words only make it to my throat. They never make it to my mouth.

Marcus don't touch it its a tra - 

My mind is much faster than my mouth. It reacts, slowing time.

The flash in the air is long, blinding, and the orange fireball from thetrap grows slowly, to the size of a man, between Marcus and the cage. It slows, then stops, hanging, a brilliant ball of light. Marcus and Jorge remain still, frozen in the ten thousandth of a second between the fireball trap going off and all of us, and likely a sizable portion of the castle, become flash incinerated by the invisible rune that trapped the floor around the cage.

I have to maintain concentration like nothing else. The air shimmers, struggling against me as I keep time itself from moving forward by sheer will. I can move it backwards, but the trap will still be there, and I still won't be able to help her. If I remove her from the sorcery that keeps her alive, she'll die before I can do anything...

Let her show you.

I pause. Show me where?

'Yes. Where. '

But I'll have to use the Mori.

'No. I will bring you there, to the place in her past, shown by her memory. Let me use the True Glyph within you, brother. But I will have my cost...'

''...Fine. ''

I step forward and place my hand on Ayona's head. I close my eyes. I look deep inside her...and find where she was, who did this to her. I step back.

The True Glyph rips reality, and I step into the recent past.

-

A tower, not far from where we are, on some forgotten corner of the castle. Forgotten to all, but Armata. This is a special place he has set aside for one reason.

In a specific room, bookshelves, lined with medical knowledge and jars of unspeakable fluid. A table of tools, perfectly sharpened. All are small and precise. And they are about to be wielded by a small and precise man, who has been recruited by Armata for his precise methods. He reeks of death magic and many hours of experience.

He turns to Ayona, who is hanging by her wings, so far untouched, but the building terror of the last three days has worn her out. She winces as her muscles strain, whimpering as he draws close, her tears streaming.

"Now then, my dear, there is a specific trick," the man says, turning. "With the right cuts in the right places, one need not cut everything.  You will find over time that gravity will quite sufficiently pull the - "

He hears it before he sees it. He turns, just in time to see the air split.

And explode.

Fire and splinters fly as the True Glyph shreds the wall of the bookshelves, flaming paper fluttering through the air like dying butterflies. The little man rises, coughing, as he shields his eyes from the smoke. Telekinesis throws the tables in front of him to one side. I step forward, my hands thrumming.

"Put her down, you son of a bitch."

(To be continued)