Witch Trials | Knights Obsidian & Mandragora (CIS)

[Alwine Daye]

For enough seconds to make it feel like an eternity, Alwine had been certain her death had come. The gods she had been raised to believe in, even if she did not, had drawn the time of her end, and this was it, killed during a battle for her freedom against the woman who had taken hers away and vanquished it as though the wolf had never existed. The scent of the blood in her snout, while containing some of her mother's, was mostly her own, and she knew the wetness she could feel nearly everywhere in her fur was her own blood as well.

She had barely noticed when the scents of her brothers became stronger, when they had arrived. More blood filled the room, causing a whimper of surprise from her mother. Alwine did not know that for all the woman's faults, she had loved the man that she had tortured along with their children as well. Had she known though, she would not have cared. Her mother should have been executed once she was done breeding, leaving a quick manual for her offspring behind. That had been her only duty in life, and while she had performed it, she had done so many other deeds that took from it, that hurt it, that ruined her own children.

Her brothers were in her field of vision now. Had she not been mid-battle with her mother, she would have wagged her tail in joy. The Lechner siblings, united, as it should be. The Lechner siblings, at last taking lives in order to gain their freedom, as it should be. The Lechner siblings, defeating the true monsters that had shaped their lives in ways that could never be forgiven, as it should be.

They broke her mother's legs. Varick taking the first two, and then Gerwald the other two. They both understood, without words, that it would be Alwine that would take the final kill, would be the one to yank the life out of her mother, end the life of the woman who had given life to the three of them. She saw the tears in Gerwald's eyes and wished to run to him and lick his face, but that would have to wait.

It was a shame that wolves could not spit. She would have loved to spit at their mother.

But the moment and the event was over. Without much ceremony, Alwine's jaw snapped shut around her mother's neck, her fangs ripping her jugular. She had heard Lord Falwitt once give a speech about the jugular. He had said that the moment it opened, a person had seven minutes to live. If they did not have sufficient bacta, the wound would never close itself, and the injured person would die of blood loss. It had sounded true enough to the ears of Alwine, who had been tasked with serving at that party. She had been only thirteen. And now she wondered if it was the same for a wolf, if wolves required less time than that on account of their smaller bodies.

But better not leave anything to chance. She ripped at her mother's throat again, removing meat, more flesh, vocal cords. There was no hope for the woman's survival. None at all.

Alwine moved over her mother, raising her broken leg into the air. By the gods, that movement hurt, but she had to do it. A warm stream erupted from her body as she let her urine cover the woman. Let her scent cover the woman's death. She deserved nothing better.

When Alwine was done she looked up. Varick was still with her, but Gerwald had gone. She ran to Varick, nuzzling his face before giving a single bark, and then moved as fast as her injured body allowed her, outside to Gerwald. She would not shift. She wanted to, she wanted to so badly now, just so that she could speak with him, but it would be days before she was in any shape to attempt it again. Wolves healed faster than humans. She had to hope it would only be days. There was so much at the tip of her tongue that she had to ask, had to know. And Varick... She and Varick had not had the oppertunity to truly discuss the situation, but she knew he was not lacking in words or questions either.

Alwine bumped her head into Gerwald's leg as soon as she found him. Her body hurt, and the pain was now increasing as the adrenaline began to subside. But as she had held on, kept her mind in tact in order to protect Varick, now she would keep her body from crashing, in order to be with Gerwald.

The Lechner siblings were united, and the were free. That was all that mattered.

---

[member="Gerwald Lechner"] [member="Varick Lechner"] [member="Katrine Van-Derveld"] [member="Maple Harte"]​

 

[Katrine Van-Derveld]

Like chess pieces, the soldiers had fallen, disarmed in their disbalance. The blonde Witch continued to watch as her head lowered. She had suspected but she hadn't felt what she did at that moment. Anger still coursed through her body but that wasn't all she was feeling in the moment. It danced through her blood, such a sweet sensation, calling, tempeting. Katrine knew she had to go let it go but right now, she needed that strength as her fists pressed tightly together as she gathered her energy once more and released as it built, arms extending foreard and palms spreading as she set out a wave of telekinetic energy, knocking the soldiers again as the back lines attempting to rise to their feet.

"Enough!" Katrine called out as she walked towards them. "This ends today. Your Lords have been defeated, the prisoners will all be set free. The actions committed against the innocents are against the laws of the Confederacy. Lay down your weapons and go home or you too will be held accountable for what has been done," she addressed them. Most of them drew back in fear from the Witch, a real Witch. Soemthing Stewjon was not used to at all but still feared the very idea.

Today, all of that had ended. As Katrine walked past those soldiers, medics were moving into the jail to tend to the prisoners. In other cities, KO was liberating other victims of the witch hunts, letting medics tend to them. The tyranny of the lords on the freeminded, on the innocent, on the Force Users and the women who were simply different ended today. Mandragora and the spirits would take special interest towards it to ensure new viceroyalty respected the laws of the Confederacy which had already once before saved them from the dark. Now, the Confederacy would look twice as hard to ensure those rules were respected.

Katrine just continued walking back to her ship, removing her mask as she did, her other hand running through her blonde hair as he let loose from behind the leather. She could still feel it inside her, like electricity surging beneath the skin. It made her think back on Avarisa, on what Pebble had said that day. If Avarisa still held a connection to the mortal realm now would have been the perfect time to begin corrupting her again. The sensation still needed to lessen and fade from her system.

A storm would have ended lives, Katrine thought on as she moved. A storm would have burned down the flesh of those who struck at the innocents over and over. Both women she had healed looked nearly as bad as Alwine had, they obviously hadn't been locked up as long as she had. Chances were, they would have suffered the same fate as the Lupine or perhaps they wouldn't have the strength she possessed. Whatever they'd been forced into believing by their idiot Mother throughout their lives, it didn't diminish the strength they naturally possessed. Alwine hated her already, Varick was probably not far from it even though he seemed to be more focused on his brother at the moment. That was the current trend it seemed. Even the most random stranger who knew nothing about her walked into her life already forming an oppinion on her so why wouldn't two Lupines whose brother had abandoned them for her. It made sense, no? It made her sigh. Those thoughts made the current inside her slowly weaken, lessen, as she continued walking back to the Nocte Aranea.

Here ends the main plot of the thread. Any personal stories can still be wrapped up if necessary.

[member="Gerwald Lechner"] [member="Varick Lechner"] [member="Alwine Lechner"] [member="Maple Harte"] [member="Cezar Alexandrescu"] [member="Anya Malvern"] [member="Kalee Bladesworn"] [member="Isarn Apis"] [member="Minerva Vessia"] [member="Daxton Bane"] [member="Katria Vekarr"]​

 

[Varick Lechner]

It was done.

Everything they had endured in their lives, everything they had been through, was over. Their mother lay dead, a victim of the way she had tormented her children, their father the same for standing by and allowing it all to simply happen. There had been little tenderness in their lives, save for that which came from each of the siblings themselves, and had they not had each other to rely upon in their most formative years, this outcome would have been vastly different.

Varick stood looming over the bloody scene in their family home, a hand pressed to the shoulder that now began to protest against the barbed arrowhead and shaft buried within. Rage had sustained him, but alongside the finality of death came the crash behind the crest of emotion. Pausing briefly as he moved, he ensured his sword was sheathed on his back once more, and then permitted his feet to carry him through the doorway and out into the fresh air of evening.

Perfumed in smoke, the air was nonetheless fresher than anything he’d breathed in his nearly thirty years of life. He shifted briefly and leaned down to stroke a hand through Alwine’s fur before regarding Gerwald carefully. There was much to be said, a fact he kept returning to, but the fury had subsided and left the logical, thoughtful oldest Lechner sibling shrouded in simple, bittersweet peace.

Voices still filtered through the air, but even he could hear that the furor of the last few hours had begun to subside. He remembered Gerwald’s mention of ship and returned briefly to the broken house to gather a few things. There was little he wished to keep to remind him of the pain of his life so far, but some few trinkets and mementos of their childhoods spent running in the forests together he refused to leave behind. The bag he emerged with was pitifully small, containing those few precious things and a bit of clothing to tide both he and Alwine over until arrangements could be made to retrieve the family’s finances.

He came to stand at Gerwald’s side once more, Alwine tucked contentedly between them, when an achingly familiar scent reached Varick’s senses. His head snapped up, blue-green eyes searching the empty street almost frantically until they lit upon a familiar, welcome sight. Striding down the center of the worn street was a broad-shouldered form clad in a uniform akin to his own, jet black hair in haphazard curls falling across a handsome brow and framing eyes of the brightest blue.

He stopped a few feet away, his expression flat and cold in a manner Varick had never seen before. That cerulean gaze slipped from sibling to sibling, to the broken house behind them, and back to the trio that stood united. There was a sneer that formed as the eldest Lechner took a half step forward, hand outstretched in spite of the pain of his injured shoulder.

“Davon-“ his breath caught in his throat as the man bristled and turned his face towards Varick, fear and loathing in equal measure warring across his features.

“Not. A. Word.” Davon spat, taking a step back and staring for a moment at the outstretched hand as if it were a viper about to strike. “You’ve done enough. I’m only disappointed I couldn’t do enough to undo the mess you and your family have wrought.”

“Davon, I trusted you. With what I was, with who I was. You stood at my side, the only thing I had left to hold on to these last few months, the-“ Varick’s voice, a deep rumble in his chest was rife with pain and confusion, falling suddenly silent as the younger man stepped forward.

Revulsion was clearly writ across his features and he stopped a scant few feet away from Varick. “Someone had to keep an eye on you. To ensure your perversions didn’t influence anyone else. Granted, none of us knew your filth spread quite this far and deep, but it doesn’t matter. There will be a cleansing…” the hatred seethed from every fiber of Davon’s being, twisting his features into an unrecognizable mask that made Varick’s heart slowly shatter apart in his chest with each word.

Davon shifted to step around him, the glint of durasteel in his hand as a slender flechette slipped out of his sleeve. Even as his mind faltered, his body was still able to react, thanks to decades of training that had drilled proper movement into his muscle memory. The blade buried itself in Varick’s side instead of into Alwine, and the man stumbled back, raging at him for getting in the way.

His hand was unsteady as it withdrew the blade and tossed it to the ground, pressing a hand to the wound as he struggled to find his voice. “After everything…you would…you…”

“It meant nothing. You meant nothing.”

Varick blinked slowly and before Davon could continue, he had reached up and violently wrenched his head to the side, snapping his neck. His hands shook as he let the body hit the ground, finding it difficult to breathe as he stared down at Davon. Every moment they’d spent together flashed across his mind’s eye, every tenderness shared, every word spoken echoing in his ears.

None of it real. A simple ruse he had not seen through. He’d wanted to much to believe he’d found one good thing on this cesspool of a planet that he’d been blind to what was likely a dozen little things that should have told him it wasn’t as it seemed.

“You meant nothing.”

His shoulders slumped as he picked up his bag and wordlessly walked away, his free hand pressed to the bleeding wound in his side.

The siblings were together, and they had survived. That was what mattered.