NOVEL NEXT Chapter 52: Fatal melodies. Part 1.
Hey! Hey!
Welcome back to the gates of Enverdolmal my friends and new visitors alike!
I have a new character for you all today, one that is based on a good friend of mine who I've been waiting to work into the stories in one fashion or another lol
The time has come for his arrival! I hope you all take to him as you have to all the others, and his protagonist as well, she is one for the books, maybe even worse than Zandara -and you'll have yet to see her in action- which is saying a lot!
I hope you all have been well since last we met.
The world has been in a strange and scary place as of late. I hope that all of you who read along, and even those who don't, are as safe as possible. You and your loved ones!
I hope that in these trying times, these stories can be a small light in the dark for you all. Something that you can look forward to every week or every handful of days.
I will try to post as often and as consistently as my life and full-time job allow!
I won't keep you all, I know what you are here for lol
But one last thing!
Nearly 16. K Views!
and nearly 8. K Views on the Spanish end!
Everyone means the world to me.
You all have no idea...
I will let you be lol
I will see you all back here soon enough!
So without further ado,
I present to you:
Fatal melodies. Part 1.
Enjoy!
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Lucasa sat at the edge of the small, cobbled-together stage.
His robes lose about him.
His toned right arm exposed to the warm and balmy air of the tavern.
His left arm gently caressing his long beautiful Kora guitar.
The crowd before him sat in respectful silence, simply waiting for the show to began.
Hints of smoke floated through the air, reefer and tobacco alike mixed and coated nearly every surface with a fine layer of stimulant.
Lucasa rocked gently from left to right, adjusting his feet beneath him as he sat crossed-legged on the provided plush pillow.
He rolled his muscled shoulders, his long and pitch-black hair hung in a single braided tail over his right one, the thin cloth of his sapphire blue robe flowed freely over his left.
Straightening his back, he brought the hand-carved instrument to the ready position.
It sat notched between his folded legs, its long, straight neck extended outward towards the anxious crowd.
He took hold of its handles, One on either side of its neck.
Twenty two strings stood taught before him, all tuned and perfectly positioned.
He took a slow, deep breath, steadying himself.
Calming himself before the storm that was to come.
He had performed in worse places.
Under more stressful circumstances.
This was nothing he couldn't handle.
The tavern was silent.
The myriad of candles flickered and swayed.
His hands sprang into action.
Slow at first, then increasing in both speed and theatric flare.
The light, airy notes of his kora leapt from the intricate instrument.
His Aether fused with the notes, bringing them to life in a physical form right above the astonished heads of the gathered people.
Bright and shifting reds and blues.
vivid greens, yellows, and oranges.
All flowing and seemingly merging with the smoke that permeated the place.
The notes flowed from the strings of the elegant guitar like the silk of a Nan-Spider's web, each "note" a translucent thread.
Each "thread" a different, vivid color.
As his hands danced nimbly over the strings, plucking and pulling, the threads that floated high above the crowd began to weave themselves together, taking on the shape of a man and a woman, each dressed in some strange and foreign attire.
The crowd began to gasp and clap and cheer.
Lucasa smiled softly.
Humbly.
He nodded back toward the notes, gently pushing the attention from himself and back to his beloved craft.
The pair locked hands and started to dance along to the melody of the very same notes that gave them life.
As the notes rose and fell, Lucasa skillfully alternated his hands between the strings and the drum-like body of his Kora.
Softly he sang.
His voice was smooth yet singed.
Tinged with a barely perceptible smokers rasp.
-His fingers plucked.-
"This is the story
Of a lad and a lass..."
-His steel-grey eyes entranced those in the crowd who had turned to gaze once again upon the source of the voice.-
"Of a love long lost.
Of a spring long past.."
-His hands drummed.-
The crowd began to clap out the rhythm.
Following along to the catchy melody.
Their heads bobbed along.
Their feet tapped to his beat.
Above them, the man and woman spun and leapt, their colors filled the room with Aetheral light.
-His fingers plucked at high notes.-
"Theirs was a unity
That could not last...
One made of rubber,
The other of brass..."
He drummed an intricate pattern of pats and taps.
The dancing figures of Aether twirled and dipped, the tails of the mans long coat whipped about, the glowing ladies dress seemed to float on the wafts of some invisible breeze, bouncing softly as it did.
Her hair fanned out behind her as the male twirled her with his right hand, faster and faster as Lucasa summoned the bass from within his Kora with each tap and drum.
The smoke that still filled the air began to form tiny twisters as the dancers flew about, making them seem that much more corporal.
Adding to the consuming and convincing illusion.
He sang softly as the pair entangled themselves in a frolic of passion.
HIs voice echoed, gently amplified by his Aether and the hollowed core of the enchanted guitar.
"And off we'll go
-go, go-
To a place I know
-know, know-
To a wondrous land
-land, land-
We can call our own
-own, own.-"
Lucasa's voice cadence rose and fell.
The dancers hugged and spun.
The man lifted the women from her feet as they embraced, ribbons of vibrant light traced a path above the heads of the stunned crowd as she flared her legs out, brilliant colors bleed from the the tips of her toes.
The people watching clapped and tapped and drummed along, pounding the tables and stomping their feet.
"Oooh I know a place
-place, place-
We can lay our heads
-heads, heads-
Till we make it back
-back, back-
To our lovers bed
-beds, beds-
Ooooooh and off we'll go!"
The crowd began to clammer to the dancefloor as the chorus took them, as the rhythm and rhyme wrapped its melodic arms around their minds and hearts.
They clapped and danced and sang along as Lucasa sang, repeating the chorus several times just for them.
He reveled in the people's glee.
"And off we'll go
-go, go-
To a place I know
-know, know-
To a wondrous land
-land, land-
We can call our own
-own, own.-"
"Oooh I know a place
-place, place-
We can lay our heads
-heads, heads-
Till we make it back
-back, back-
To our lovers bed
-beds, beds-
Ooooooh and off we'll go!"
The people jumped and spun with abandon.
The beer and mead and reefer made their blood hot and their bodies cold.
The venue was alive and kicking, not a single revelers ass was in their seat.
The pair of Aetheral dancers kept up the pace that they had set, drawing in the crown with a choreographed dance routine that they could easily take to.
Just as Lucasa had planned.
He plucked and played, rocking along to his own metronome.
Lifting the spirits of the patrons higher and higher before the inevitable fall of one in particular.
Lucasa was a wandering, nomadic, enigmatic, and rather effective Mercenary, Assassin, and Bard.
Three jobs that rarely -if ever- crossed over into something lucrative.
The first of the three titles was not so uncommon of a thing in certain regions of Enverdolmal, but Lucasa was a unique case.
His trade and passion was music first and foremost.
It kept his belly full and his coin purse all the more full.
He had learned from a very young age the power of his words, and not in the ways that one might imagine.
Not only could he captivate people with his amazing Aetheral light shows, his words could quite literally kill if they where applied to music and amplified with a bit more of his Aether and intention.
Someone in this little tavern would die this evening.
He would do his best to make it as swift and as painless as possible.
He knew that one of the revelers before him was the target that he had come for.
He just had to lure this one out.
He strummed the strings and patted the body of his lethal lover.
His killer kora.
The song went on.
It would be quite the night.
-------------------------
From the back of the dim-lit, smog-filled room, the loan black-robed figure stood in unison with the galvanized crowd.
Keeping to the darkest of the shadows cast by the plethora of candles, and the Aetheral light that flooded the room from above.
The melody was indeed entrancing...
Captivating even.
But the ears of the woman beneath the deep, dark hood were not so easily drawn by the Bards magic.
Not like they once were all those years ago.
Those long, lonely years ago.
Back when she had loved him...
When he had loved her...
Steletha uttered a quick spell, summoning a bit of her Aether to cloak herself in a veil of disguise.
Her bold black robe faded nearly instantly into a simple brown and beige garb, something that would help her blend with the dancing locals.
She shifted her hair from coal-black to a clean, gleaming rose-blond.
Her eyes, from evergreen to a mild and hazy hazel-grey.
Hiding her identity was simple enough.
Her illusionary spells could fool a changeling.
She just needed them to fool a human. This particular human...
He was far from the average human.
So much so, that the woman questioned if the man was something more then just.
Oh how he had loved her...
How he had touched her body.
Her heart.
Her very soul...
Bah...
The memories became a bitter taste in her mouth.
Oh how he had left her...
How alone and vulnerable she had been.
How cold.
How very cold...
Luzu was no place for a lone woman.
Hellz, the Crater Coast Collective was no place for women in general it seemed.
Not ordinary women at least...
Assassins, Brothel house workers, degenerate Queen Pins, thieves and... well, anyone medically trained.
Sure! Those sort of women were welcomed to Luzu.
They were valuable...
Sought after.
Rarely free to live as they pleased.
-----
She slipped into the crowd with ease, taking the arm of a simple and handsome man in passing.
He glowed, his eyes widening at her beauty.
He did not mind at all.
They spun and danced.
He would make the perfect vessel with which she would make her way across the dancefloor without notice.
Closer to her target.
-----
What about a soft, loving, innocent woman like her?
No.
She didn't deserve to be left there...here.
Abandon to the traffickers and drug lords.
Lucasa would pay.
He would die for loving her and leaving her to die.
For leaving her at all!
For not taking her away and out of this Hellz hole...
For daring to return in the first place!
She had found her way back from death itself to see to that.
Steletha was a woman scorned.
A woman relinquished.
She would have his heart.
One way or another.
Her blade was just as hungry for blood as she was for revenge.
Not even death would stop her.
Not even death could stop her.
She was a newly empowered Necromancer.
Death would bend to her will, not the other way around...
-----
The pair of Aetheral dancers whirled overhead, quite the spectacle if one had never witnessed it...
Steletha had... far more intimately then she cared to admit.
She blushed at the memories.
The fool she danced with beamed, mistaking her blushing as a compliment.
She let him.
She subtly guided his movements, circling slower and closer to the stage with each spin and step.
-----
Lucasa had been the last thing on her mind as she breathed her last breath all those years ago...
As she lay at the center of her crudely drawn blood-smear pentagram.
As she slipped her ebony knife over each of her wrist, opening wounds so deep that the bone of her wrist shown.
As she chanted her final chant, the dark and twisted sentence dripping with anguish.
As she drank deeply the foul contents from the jeweled golden bowl, bitter lumps of reagents passing her cracked and yellowed teeth.
As she collapsed and spasmed and squirmed on the cold, damp wooden floor, the magical poisons wreaking her body and soul...
He had been the first thing on her mind as she sucked in her very first newly-born, ragged breath six nights later.
As she let it out in a blaring, window-shattering, bone-chilling scream, tearing her rotten vocal cords.
As she levitated off of the blood-soaked floor, fighting against the rigor mortis that taken her body days and days before.
As she promised her soul to some dark deity in exchange for power, just enough to rip Lucasa's heart from his chest.
As she dawned her new Black robe and started her new, more empowered life.
A life that could only truly start after her death.
-----
Closer still Steletha and her pawn grew to Lucasa in his performative sitting position on the rickety little stage.
The man wasn't half-bad at the dance, she thought to herself.
A sign of both balance and martial rhythm.
She would have to see if his movements were half as impressive once he was converted into one of her zombie thralls...
-----
With every step taken, every twirl, Steletha had spoken a word, a term, a spell.
She had cast half a dozen of them by the time she had taken a dozen steps.
In her wake, thin and translucent tentacles of a rank, toxic, necro-miasma began to softly wrap themselves around the ancles and calf's of the gathered dancing folk, the already existing odors of reefer, tobacco, and sweat working to mask the newest scent.
The entirety of the tavern would be at her beck and call by the end of the song.
The patrons who now danced, the waitstaff who served them, the barkeep who tended the staff, the Watchmen at the door who kept them all safe...
Her potent Necromantic spells were already slowly taking over the bodies and minds of everyone around her.
Everyone but Lucasa.
She would relish his death.
Make it slow and painful.
And then she would take his heart, once and for all.
In every way possible.
She would cradle it as it beat its last beat.
As the warmth of life faded into the cold embrace of death.
He would be here greatest thrall.
Her long-lost lover returned.
-------------------------
From his position on the stage Lucasa scanned the crowd slowly, never letting up with the magical barrage of Aether that he had infused into his song.
It was a subtle amount really.
Nothing that would tax him unduly before the confrontation, yet just enough to amplify the emotional effect that the song would naturally have on the people before him.
Save for the trained individuals among them.
There were no more than thirty bodies in total here he surmised.
He knew that at least six of them would be hostile once he launched his attack, no matter how stealthily he managed to carry it out.
He was a special sort of Mercenary this man.
An Assassin of Assassins.
A killer of killers.
He knew that his target would not be alone, he just had no idea how very 'not alone' the person would be.
Had he known, he would have brought his fancy kora on this mission.
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Welcome back to the gates folks!
I hope you all have enjoyed this latest instalment!
I look forward to progressing the story with you all, and branching out into AUDIO media soon enough!
I have the One Last Knight Youtube up!
I just need to swallow my reservations about the sound of my voice and give you all the narration that you deserve!
Soon enough, you have my word.
I thank you all again for your constant loyalty to my strange and varied tales lol.
I love you all, I mean it.
Until next time folks, safe travels.
And as always,
Stay safe.
Stay healthy.
Stay vigilant.
-Redd.