Lore of Leyuna RPG (FRPG)

[C S]

Natalie was a different beast when out of a trance. She was giggling to herself, as though Andruil and Viho knowing of her idol was a well told joke, and she wanted to control her manic laughter for a change. It did seem like Viho knew a different side to the Snake than what Andruil was familiar with, and that made things all the more funny.

"Getting warmer," Natalie snickered, taking in the features on the two men's faces, "but still off-base."

Johnathon tilted his head. "Do you know why you're here?" He asked her the question earlier in the day. Under hypnosis, she claimed self-defense. 'I was attacked by a cat'. However, at present, the woman looked completely wicked, a knowing glint in her eye.

"Why, you said it yourself. There will be a party one of these days, mister. Everyone needs a mask. Everyone needs a knife."

"Chaos and discord all over Aster," Johnathon said flatly. "Isn't that exactly on point?"

Natalie smiled benignly. "Why, no silly. Chaos and disorder cannot exist without harmony and peace. The Snake knew that there had to be balance in all things. Aster is out of balance. Too many laws. Too many cities. We've trampled all the things that make us wild. We're too far away from our origins." She shrugged a torn shoulder purposefully, drawing attention to her wounds and mocking the redhead in the process. "What happened with me and the cat is what life should be everyday. Predators striving not to be prey. Cats and snakes."

[The Kingpin]

It was Andruil's turn to laugh; a harsh bark of a sound, something that mocked the girl as though she had just said the most preposterous thing he'd ever heard.

"Girl, You have been fooled into thinking him a more complex person than he really is," he stated, his hands settling behind his back. "I spent enough time with Xilo to learn his reasons. He was a very simple man, unorthodox though his approach was. So much so that I could summarise him with a single word. Greed. He could not have cared less what kind of balance this world had. He could not have cared less for the state of affairs outside his own damned pickle jar! As far as he was concerned, everything existed for him to take, the more valuable, the better. And he would take whatever he could. The only reason he would want a world of chaos would be so that he could steal what he liked without anyone noticing."

[Hopeflower]

Viho took a deliberate step closer, but no more, clasping his hands behind his back and leaning forward as though intrigued. The motion was as much practical as it was to give Natalie the illusion that he was listening closely. His hands were beginning to shake, bottled fury threatening to make itself known in more ways than one.

"He thought himself a villain," Viho said, glancing at Andruil before pinning Natalie with a cold gray gaze. Gently, he compelled her to keep talking, sensing that she wasn't unwilling. She just needed an audience that she thought she could convince. "Isn't that right? Played the part to perfection, too, from the sound of it. Is that what you and your friends are doing?"

[C S]

"We don't want his vision to die with him." Natalie looked to Andruil and pouted. "He looked up to you, really. Sang his praises about the man whose inner monster was so thoroughly captivated. He always knew you'd betray him, though. 'It is always the ones closest to you that tear you down'. He didn't hold you accountable for it." Natalie started giggling again. The punchline to another joke. "Everyone is a monster on the inside. Some are scarier than others. Some are more obvious than others. It is the normal state of things for them to be clawing at each other's throats."

Johnathon rumbled a tone in his throat. He doubted Natalie would even care if she were to be informed that the cat she fought was actually a person. This talk of monsters on the inside. It would most likely validate her delusions.

[The Kingpin]

"He was stark-raving mad," stated Andruil flatly. "He would have been blind not to suspect. I am an agent of Valenhad, and he took pleasure out of killing and stealing. All it took was for him to attempt that while in my company," he stated.

He took a deep breath, letting it slip free of his lips slowly, calming himself. "As it stands, you have created a Xilo that never existed. Glorified ideals he never had."

[Hopeflower]

"So you go out and get yourself mauled in the name of your Snake's vision?" Viho drawled, glancing pointedly at Natalie's injuries. No, he decided, she didn't know that she'd attacked a shapeshifter - nor did she need to know. "Or did you have something more specific in mind, last night?" He tilted his head toward her, pitched his voice low and smooth, layering the question with hints of I'm listening and you want to tell me. Pulling the strings, walking the line, and ever so slightly stroking her ego. This was her chance to be heard - after all, she had someone who had listened to Xilo right in front of her...

[C S]

Natalie looked back to Viho and said, "Snake wasn't an animal person, but no, killing a cat wasn't my goal. I don't necessarily mind it, though. Apparently that's enough for you to take someone into jail."

"You're not in jail yet," Johnathon replied without opening his mouth. It would just complicate things, make it more difficult on the mind-reader. Natalie's eyes found their way to him all the same. He supposed she did not have much favor for him, no matter his civility. Him or his watch.

She smirked. "All you all have on me is a mask, a knife, some unfortunate plans and a dead cat. Maybe you're afraid of us and the Snake. He did say that should any of us come across Andruil, he would try to discredit his message. So be it. I haven't committed a crime yet." The word choice was also purposeful. As were the thoughts she conjured up while speaking, abiding by her ego. Viho could toss her around on the mental plane, so it stood to reason he'd be searching for the threads she happily provided.

Sneaking around under the moonlit sky, the sun just recently set. Thoughts of fire amending to a more visceral terror. Attempting to open a window. The dash of yellow and black fur...

[The Kingpin]

"Ah, but we have the most viable witness of them all. You," stated the Knight simply, a hand raising in a gesture of emphasis.. "You are, after all, going to tell us oh so much about Xilo that we did not know, are you not? Your companions too. Surely you would not forget them". While he worded it as a question, he knew that she had no choice but to answer. Viho was thankfully there to guarantee that. It was a satisfying sensation, being able to pry information out of a suspect at will and be certain of its truthfulness. It was a power he reminded himself he needed to refine. Such capabilities would go a long way to preventing a lapse in just judgements on the part of those trying to uphold them.

[Hopeflower]

While Andruil spoke, Viho made his way through the memories Natalie gave up so easily. There would be time later, to look back over them and take vicious pride in every blow Dahnae landed. For now, he sought out thoughts related to others, tangled up in those memories, and started tracing them to their root. The numbers and the names, faces if she knew them - he sought them out while he kept talking.

"Your cause has been quite...successful in its aims so far, has it not?" he tacked onto Andruil's questions, prodding her towards thoughts of the group's actions to make things that much smoother for them. Any crimes that she could confirm had been committed by them would only make their case that much tighter.

[C S]

"Snake," Natalie was irritated by the disrespect, that these men would not use his real name, "worked out of Freyr-Lunge for a time. He said he was just like us underlings in the muck. He had been promised greatness, and had it stolen from him. Maybe greatness of a tangible sort, but no one could rob him of his destiny. And that's how we all got to know him. We, who had nothing, were given his gift. He accepted us. Gave us things to do. Before we knew it, we had coin lining our pockets." The woman's eyes began to water, though she did not let her tears break the maddened ecstasy. She chuckled and snickered with every pause in her words. "Then the collapse happened. Civil war, is what they describe it as nowadays. Hey, wolf. You said it was a Daavenian agent that killed Snake, hmm? One with a personal grudge?"

Natalie's expression darkened abruptly. "She wouldn't happen to be the same ***** who put bolts into Immanis' eyes?" A question though it was, it was one that the woman did not need an answer for. "She was in the city to hunt Snake down, but she was too busy satisfying the bloodlust elsewhere, so he escaped to Grayrock. We followed."

[The Kingpin]

"His eyes, eh? I'll have to make sure not to test her patience when she has that slingbow," mused Andruil off-handedly. "The way my informants tell it, She managed to shut down the uprising that killed the Kingdom. Too little too late, but it was better than having a monster around that could organise a dangerous force," he responded coolly. He was over the anger he felt towards Xilo. Now he just wanted to find his flock and eliminate them.

[Hopeflower]

"That's some loyalty, to have you all follow where he led," Viho murmured, as though impressed. He tugged just a little harder, the right shade of you have my interest and almost coaxing - all while he dug, dug at those oh so important details. There was a sour taste in his mouth that he suspected was born of holding a somewhat civil conversation with this would-be murderer. He clung to it, using his disgust to keep himself grounded and focused on his task. As sure as Natalie was of herself, the deeper Viho went, the more care he needed to take not to get caught up in her convictions.

[C S]

"Not that you would know of loyalty." The words were directed past Viho to Andruil. Slowly, the accusing hatred dissolved back into that veneer of jovial madness. Snickering and bouts of high pitched laughter. "You were his closest friend, and you carry on with his killer. Shameful, wolf. No pack for your likes." Natalie waved a finger disapprovingly at the knight. Viho was given flashes of memories. Meeting places. People sitting around tables in studies and campfires in the woods alike. A dozen or more. After those, disjointed imagery appeared to his mind's eye. Bodies, legs bound together by an arrow-mounted snare. Bolts sticking out of backs, bloodied clothing. A sense of loathing accompanying glimpses of the woman in red that had killed off Natalie's friends in her search for the Snake.

"If you were more loyal, maybe we wouldn't be here. But rest assured, we would have been somewhere."

[The Kingpin]

An amused look was Andruil's response to the chastising remarks. "Loyalty must be earned. He did not earn it. He did not earn my mercy, either." He took a few steps to one side, leaning against the wall, all the while fixing the woman with his unnatural gaze. "That said, I am nothing if not understanding. But you will have to explain to me just what it is you and your friends wish to do. How do you suppose you will achieve this... vision, that you mention? And how would your friends be qualified to reach those ends?"

[Hopeflower]

Viho took special interest in the number of people he was seeing, the faces visible to him and their most prominent features. That was how many they had been - how they'd been whittled down. But were they still missing members, or had the group come to accept new people in the meantime? Which of these friends of hers had survived, if any? More importantly...where were they meeting now?

He prepared to give a sign that he'd found all that he was likely to, and went looking for his answers.

Another appeal to Natalie's pride - clever people that you are - honeyed the already velvet-smooth words. "Snake must have taught you all well, yes?"

[C S]

"Sadly, the Snake's Snicker was beaten by a cat. Its life is a small prize to hold, but I am here, unable to do much but waste your time." Natalie grinned at that. "The ***** killed a lot of us to find Snake. I'm sure plenty took their silence to the death, but someone caved in. I don't know who. Even the traitor got a bolt through the back, after getting tied up like a hog. Might have been Eric; he was the last one we had to drag off of the street, but there's no certainty there. Equal in the end though, back to the dirt to slither."

The woman feigned a yawn and eased herself onto her back, arms tucked behind her head. "I say all of this, because you'll have to do the same to me. I have showered the legacy with glory. The five that are free. What their machinations are, are theirs alone. The only thing left for me, is a return to balance. Finish me off, wolf! End another part of the Snake!"

[The Kingpin]

"I'm afraid this time it is not my place to do so. Your life is spoken for," said the Knight simply as he pushed off the wall, his hands clasping behind his back as he gave the woman a sidelong glance. "As are the lives of your friends."

[Hopeflower]

Viho cocked his head, straightening. "Hardly a waste of my time. You've been far more helpful than I dared hope," he informed her. Far better to let Natalie rot down here, he thought. If she wasn't a fan of the dark, she could sit in it and contemplate having her wish denied to her for reasons she couldn't and wouldn't know.

But first...

The energy in the room sharpened, took on dangerous intent. This was what Andruil had been curious to see - all air of polite inquiry dropped, and in its wake a psychomancer dead set on taking what he wanted from the woman's mind. It was not going to be pleasant for her. His hooks were already set deeply. He knew what he wanted and he had a foothold to work from. Names, faces, plans, a confirmation of their numbers, where they met if they met at all - anything and everything he could get, he was going to.

With that in mind, Viho gave her a sharp smile, and he pulled, introducing her to the sensation of having information torn from her without there being a single thing she could do to hide it from him. Let her laugh - let her try to cover everything up with insanity. It would get her nowhere.

He had it.

[C S]

And Natalie did laugh.

It was no sound of amusement. It was the contorted throes of a kind of suffering Johnathon had not seen before. Screaming truncated and divided as to match the rhythm of raving laughter. The woman's body lifted off the floor as she arched her back painfully, fingernails digging into her scalp. Red streamed out of her nose.

But it was a conscious effort to turn her screams into a mockery of laughter. Even when outmaneuvered and just about abused, the dedication to the act remained, true to any showman. Natalie was not insane when she was put into the cell, Johnathon knew. Misguided, most definitely. Cruel, without contest. Deplorably devoid of morals? The hardships of her life ruined any semblance of good within her soul.

What Viho did to her broke her in the mind. A final push that shattered Natalie's cognizance. There was no act, no grand display of madness. Her body jittered, wracked with agony. She had a bloodshot eye to go with her nosebleed. Despite it all, she continued her anguished laughter.

"There is no coming back from this," Johnathon observed clinically. He turned his back on Natalie. "She cannot be tried. She cannot be released. She can only be euthanized."

[Hopeflower]

A full-body shudder gripped Viho when he pulled back, and he had to close his eyes and take a moment to compose himself before he spoke. However cruel it looked from the outside, there was no avoiding feeling that snap when her mind had given in. He'd felt very clearly what he'd done, the loss of everything that made Natalie who she was. The taste in the back of his throat was strikingly reminiscent of bile, now.

Viho licked his dry lips and swallowed thickly, willing himself not to be sick. He hated needing to resort to that - but he didn't regret it. "I got everything she knew. I'd be more than happy to write it all down for you."

Well, at least his voice was still steady.