The Price (Open)

[Skorn Draclau]

Sweat lined across his brow, his eyes closed, brows furrowed in concentration. He sat within a large circle painted across the stone floor. Runes marked the circle, runes in the ancient tongue of the Sith.

They had allowed him access to the inner sanctum. The temples and their hall of records. He had read their scrolls, analyzed their spellwork. He had not been satisfied.

"Will you not be sated?"

He hissed under his breath. Without opening his eyes his arm shot out and yanked the girl into the circle, she whimpered softly, bound and gagged as she was there was little else the child could do. He had not wanted to do this. Not wanted to waste another life to these hungry ghosts. Ghosts who clung to their scraps of knowledge with greed.

"Will you not give me what I want."

A vision, his visions had stopped. Once they had guided him across the universe. Once he could see his sister from anywhere in the galaxy. Once he had been gifted with glimpses of the future. Once, no more. Golden eyes snapped open and stared into the girl's own. She was frightened, fear concentrated enough to be palpable. He smiled softly, a finger on his right hand morphed into a claw. Without a word he slid it across the child's throat. Opening it.

"I give you life. Give me what I want."

The child jerked once and then her eyes glazed over. But her body did not fall, nor did a drop of blood hit the floor. She rose up into the air, controlled as if by a puppeteer's strings. The blood flowed out from her and danced around her in a stream of red. Forming patterns in the air. Runes. With every passing second it boiled away into nothingness. Consumed by the spirits he had called upon. At last the girl looked at Skorn, with those dead green eyes. She spoke in a harsh, broken voice, her vocal chords now severed.

"You have no name. You have no mark. You are denied. The price must be paid."

And it was done. The corpse of the child fell onto the stone floor. Another husk to add to the mound.

 

[Darth Isolda]

@[member="Skorn Draclau"]


“A̧ ̢pr͜i̛ce ̸mu̵s̷t͘ ̛a͢l͏wąys ̧be̕ pa҉id,”̢ came the low hush from the shadows, standing behind the Draclau, power rolling out of her in near tangible waves, a gift and blessing of the Dark Lord.


Ever so slowly, long alabaster legs gracefully led the woman in the black cowl into the light, revealing the lithe figure under the thin vine-silk. Black inky tattoo’s were curling round her limbs, intricate detailing that almost seemed to writhe with the pulse of her heart, like dancing shadows over the purest bed of snow.

“̕Yo̕ur̸ ́longin͘g̴ l͞in̶ger̴s͠ ́li͡ke ͟a st͟en͡ch̨ abo̡ut ҉yo͏u̢…” her voice went pouring over him like thick honey, sickly sweet as the lower half of her face shone under the light. Her bright crimson lips did not move, no instead she spoke through the Force, her voice echoing in polyphonic layers augmented by His power.

Her head gave a slight shift to the right, studying him, as if listening to the whispers of the million voices the Goddess had so deemed to use as her vessel to grant the Eye of the Dark Lord her visions.

“...W͟hat ͡i̛s̸ ̛ìt t͞ha͏t̡ y͜óu c͜ra͟v̨e? ̸Whąt͟ ̸i҉s it ́t͡h̕at͜ y̨o̴u s̡e͢e̡ķ?҉” they were not actual questions, but more musings, as if searching for the answer within the Force.

A picture came to the Oracle. Green eyes akin to that of the dead child’s that now lay in a bloody pool upon the mound of the dead.

“.͏.. ̷F͏le̕sh ͢o͟f ҉m͝y ͞f̢l̴es͏h̡,̢ b̵loo̷d̕ o̕f ̀m͘y ̶b̧l̷ood͟,”͝ came the echoing voice of Darth Isolda throughout the inner chamber,“͝.҉.̧.B͢e̢love͠d͟ ҉b͢r͠ot̵h̀er̕ e͞verm͠or̶e̸…”

 

[Skorn Draclau]

[member="Darth Isolda"]

He rose up and stared at her with cold eyes of gold and red. This new shadow in this realm of darkness. He had been drawn to the power in this new order. Yet he had not anticipated it to be so absolute, he had not expected it to be so binding. How could this Dark Lord exert such influence over his own capabilities. Could it be, was he truly what he claimed to be?

When she spoke, it was as someone who knows, As someone who can see. Her voice was a singsong melody of melhancholy and madness. Her eyes, unfocussed and glazed over for a moment, yet glaring fierce in the next. She held power in this place. This was certain. But then she spoke the words she ought to not have uttered. And something deep and dark within Skorn rose up in a black tide.

"HOW"

He snarled at her, fangs shining in the dim light of the globes. His skin rippled and almost on instinct he began to shift shape, transform...into a more lupine form. Yet he was not a child anymore to let his transformations rule him, he checked himself. Coalesced back into his human form.

"You...who are you...you should not know those words."

His voice was back to it's soft tenor. Back in control. At least for now.

 

[Darth Isolda]

[member="Skorn Draclau"]

There was pleasure emanating from the Eye of the Dark Lord at the Shi’ido’s emotional response. This could be used against him… or used as a tool to forge him into the image befit of the Dark Lord.

“I am the Eye of the Dark Lord.” she said simply.

Liquid pools of mirrors that were Darth Isolda’s eyes went drifting over Skorn, as her hand rose slightly at his direction. Inky tipped fingers pulsed with the dark shadows of the Dark Lord’s Mark, swirling under her skin like a living tattoo in response to her power.

“You seek her.” came her comment, her voice a polyphonic aria that went dancing over his form. “...yes….wonder if she lives.” her gaze went over him yet did not truly see him; no her attention was elsewhere, deep in the throes of her farsight meditation.

“The Dark Lord can grant you all of this and more. Allow you to truly see.” long limber legs brought the willowy Darth closer to Skorn, her petite figure a paradox to the power that came rolling out of the Oracle.
“But do you believe it? To you believe in his Vision? Are you worthy of it?”