BananaPhone
  Reign in Blood
Act 1: Shadows of Decay 
  
  I can remember my former life, but I cannot feel it. I know it ended in an evening of drunken revelry and a vain struggle to direct my own destiny. Foolish as I was, I believed I could cast off the hand of fate by hurling myself from a belltower and denying the lords of the night their prize. Parts of it I still recall. The velocity of the plunge tore at every sense I possessed, evoking an animal panic within me as my soul was plucked from my body at the moment of impact, as all was ended in a black shroud. But where had I then traveled? I punctured through the glass-pane that separates life and death, my mind and spirit detaching from my body and only the former returning, tainted by the touch of the void that lay beyond. Yanked back from the vacuum and forced into the skull of my reanimated form, a tide of pain was all I knew for days as my psyche was boiled and seeped across the nerves of this new, unchanging mimicry of flesh and bone. Forever merged as one, I would march forward into eternity, lest starvation, spell or blade end my existence. It left me searingly awake. And more revoltingly - alive.  
   Regine Von Carstein 


Her eyes opened. The song of a gentle night sky rolled in through an open window, framed with thick, red velvet drapes. The ceiling was furnished, wooden and beautiful. The bed, as she sat up, was fostered with crimson silk that was soft against her now pale skin. In times past she might have gasped, but no such fear or astonishment remained within her. The former thief peered curiously at both of her hands that she held out before her, the skin smooth but almost white as snow, her fingernails now sharp, black claws.

 "Mon lapin is finally conscious..."  a feminine, excited voice came from the other side of the room. Regine looked up to face it, her gaze taking in the plush finery of an aristocratic bedroom, with thick carpet, blood-red silks, gold ornamentations and furniture of rich mahogany, and upon one such seat was positioned the source of that voice -  her .

 "I remember you..."  Regine stammered, not afraid, but uncertain, as that figure stood up from her position and almost floated into the light of the candles. The warm illumination hugged her well-dressed figure, the court dress she wore bulging out at her waist to create an graceful bulb of black, red and silvers that drew up into her trim frame and shoulders, atop which was the smiling, angular face of a woman who could not be Regine's senior by more than five years. At least when she was alive.

 "You're the one who..." 
 "Oh mon lapin, I wanted something far more cordial, cheri,"  she spoke again, those honeyed words sliding gracefully from that smiling mouth as she floated closer to the bedside. Reaching forward with an elegantly gloved hand, the woman gently ran the back of her fingers across Regine's cheek, and the thief observed how cool her touch was. Not warm. Not cold. But just  there .

 "I always wanted a daughter - and here you are! Oh my little one, welcome, welcome! There is so much I would have you know, but first you must tell me: are you hungry, mon lapin?" 

Hunger? For food or water? Regine  felt  her innards almost shift at the very idea, as the cuisine of mortals no longer held any appeal. A full roast with golden potatoes, beef and red wine stew and mead could be before her, yet her greedy eyes would instead move upwards to the chef. Looking up at the other woman, Regine slowly shook her head.

This please her, as her laughter was soft, like a giggle.  "Oh mon cheri, I would hope not! When I returned you here you had only the faintest hint of life within you. Tsk tsk tsk,"  she clucked her tongue through an amused smile, drawing her right index finger up to sway it from side to side disapprovingly.  "I nurtured it. Cultivated it. I am the mother of your rebirth, little one, and you my childe - I could not have your time end so quickly, non non, it would not be right. Imagine my pride as I watched you recover - my daughter would live! I took you down beneath the earth of our fortress. My my, cheri, what a hungry babe you were! Hehehe,"  once again, her giggling mouth and staring eyes.

 "Any mother who loves their child; the first time their infant suckles upon their breast, they feel  love , a love of being and a love of effort and a gratitude for holding life in their arms that they created. To nurture it. To guide it. Watch it grow. Mmm. Mon lapin, you almost cleared out our remaining stock from the jail! It was beautiful to watch." 

Regine listened and found herself odd in a way. There was no burst of empathy, no deep seated horror stirring within her or shame - she felt nothing. No pity. No remorse.

The woman stood back up.

 "But where are my manners? I am Camile Von Carstein,"  she curtsied, always with that smile,  "But please, call me Maman. Do you remember your name?" 

The former thief thought for a second, dredging that little bit of identity up from her living memories.

 "Regine." 
 "And do you know your nature?" 

Regine flexed her fingers and looked at her claws. She ran her tongue along the inside of her mouth, over the two sharp incisors jutting down from the top row.

 "Of course." 
bramblefoot
Maman will lead regine past a row of battlements to a long table where three other vampires sit. on the table sits a sword, spear, and bow, along with some other trinkets. an old battered brass sea compass sits on the table along with a small jewelers loupe. also sitting there is a small wind-up clockwork spider.

camile will lead regine to the table, and point her to the trinkets  "pick one. It's a goodwill token from us to you. all have their uses, but youll have to figure out what they do"  she leans in  "look but do not touch" 

wdyd
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 

Camile assisted the newly risen vampire with everything once she departed the fine silks of her new, large, plush bed. It was a opulence that the thief could only once have dreamed. Regine bathed, able to withstand submersion in the warm waters prepared by the servants. Her 'mother' helped her dress, as no mirror would now cast her reflection. The clothing was well-made and of visible quality with her black, leather riding boots fitting with particularly snug comfort. But what particularly enchanted Regine was one of her new cloaks; a beautiful, blood-red woolen cloak with lanolin in the weave to render it waterproof in case she was caught in a storm. To call it fetching was an understatement, as she could only imagine its contrast with her fair skin and black hair and clothes underneath. Her vampiric mother, doting and reassuring, giggled and clapped gently at the sight, reassuring her what a  "Très belle!"  her little rabbit was.

Taken out across the battlements of the keep, Regine inhaled gently as the soft night air fully kissed the skin of her face; her eyes casting across the deep, blue fjord adjacent to the castle that ran between the beautiful tree-covered mountains resting peaceful beneath the silvery moonlight. It was a scene the vampire wanted to stop and savor, to stand in the crenels of her new home and peer out into an untouched ravine flanked by vegetated crags. Was this her new experience? Every sense she possessed was magnified compared to her living self; her eyes were like binoculars, her hearing superb and vigilant. Even the taste-buds across her tongue could siphon through the myriad flavours on the wind that crawled up from the sapphire surface of the wide running river below.

But Camile, Maman, would not dither.

 "Come along!"  she spoke happily over her shoulder, leading Regine back into a tower of the keep and down a flight of unlit stairs until they opened into what looked like a war-room. The room is bathed in a dim, flickering light cast by torches mounted on the stone walls, casting long shadows that dance across the stone tiled floors. At the center of the room stands a massive table, hewn from dark wood and polished to a glossy sheen, its surface covered with a large map of the surrounding area of Seigneurie de Bellecombe, marked with the six towns, one fortress-town, a castle and Forteresse von Carstein, their current location, in the top North-West, nestled within an enclave of mountains.

Along the walls, shelves are lined with ancient tomes, scrolls, and ornate tapestries decorating the walls, each carrying etched scenes of conquest, battle, and victory, their rich colors and intricate designs adding to the room's atmosphere of power and authority. Another, the largest, displayed a heraldry: a snarling, silver wolfs head upon a sable field with a crimson saltire beneath it.

In one corner of the room, a stone fireplace crackles with flames, its warmth providing a stark contrast to the cool, damp air of the castle's interior. Above the mantle hangs the head of a wyvren, its hideous head snarling in its death-throes and doubtless the creature to whom it belonged a long-since vanquished foe, forced to now stand in silent vigil to whatever preparations were being made by the vampires who likely slew it.

But, it was the three figures around the central table that silently demanded Regine's attention the most. The central figure was old, though no less fierce in appearance, his shortly styled silver hair and beat beard framing a face from which stared two intimidating eyes that gleamed with an inspecting intelligence. He was not a small man either, as he easily stood at an estimate six and three or six and three inches, his broad shoulders dressed in practical but clearly expensive dark clothing. To his right was an even taller, but much younger man; six and a half feet, if Regine had to guess, with a deep chest and arms flanking a V-shaped torso that was fighting trim, a helm of lengthy black hair drawn back into a loose ponytail behind a handsome, pale face. To the left was a less physically imposing male, a crest of white hair styled meticulously above features that were, if Regine had to describe them, would be boyish good looks, a slight smirk upon them as if he knew the answer to a joke only he was in on.

Should she bow? Should she curtsey? Should she look each in the eye and tell them it was about time? There was a time when three such figures would have evoked nothing but unease, perhaps terror, within her, like three wolves circling a lamb. But now? Now she felt more uncertain than fearful. Nevertheless, a deepseated animal instinct within the former thief cautioned her to be wary in recognition of being in the presence of figures more powerful than she, and thus, higher up in the food chain.


 
 Originally Posted by bramblefoot 
 "pick one. It's a goodwill token from us to you. all have their uses, but youll have to figure out what they do" she leans in "look but do not touch" 
 

It was now that the vampire noticed the array of weapons on the table, as well as the trinkets. Curious little items - but it was the compass that drew Regine's attention the most. After all, if one was lost in the world, they could never find their way home.

Suddenly the centre of attention before three blood-drinking vampires who regarded her with silent scrutiny, Regine held the lining of her lovely new cape in both hands and bent her knee's in a curtsy.

 "My lords, I greet you." 

A touch of the supplicant. But, Regine made sure to look them in their eyes as she said it, rather than away or at the floor. She was newly greeting, polite, uncertain, but they had not brought a groveling worm into the family.

Camile's warning was clear, however: look, but do not touch. Don't be a greedy little child and rush forward to seize a prize. One asked first.

 "Thank you for inclusion; if I may, I request the compass." 
bramblefoot
camille smiles, and will pass you the compass.  "it's an interesting trinket"  opening up the small compass, youd see the needle spin wildly, before settling on something in the room. tell me what it settles on, and what camiles response is.

meanwhile, the big vampire will merely watch, twiddling his thumbs absentmindedly. the bookish vamp will smile, and offer a small wave  "its good to have another interesting companion"  he says, before the patriarch lets out a cough.  "alright, settle down. please everyone give the condensed opening to our newest creature of the night" 
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 

Regine received the compass and watched as it's front was opened for her to behold the spinning needle within. When Camile's physical influence left it, the device's interfaced ceased swirling, at least for a moment, before the pointer slowly turned towards the adjacent walls upon which displayed the bookcases full of scrolls, books, small trophey's and the tapestries that visually told a story stretching back centuries, perhaps even millennia.

Maman smirked as she loomed next to Regine.

 "Knowledge? Discovery? Remembrance perhaps?"  she piques a lopsided smile.


 
 Originally Posted by bramblefoot 
 "alright, settle down. please everyone give the condensed opening to our newest creature of the night" 
 

Almost immediately, the others took their seats - and Regine quickly followed suit. Scooping her lovely new cape up behind her, she planted her rump upon the cushioned chair and overlooked the map before them.

 "We had planned something more hospitable for your debut, niece,"  the tall, dark-haired male said, his voice like silken thunder as he gave a little seated bow. He spoke with a clear foreign accent - the Empire? Bretonnian was not his native language, nor was it that of the bookish vampire, of that Regine was certain.

 "I am Wulf Von Carstein, this is Ulrich,"  he gestured to the bookish one, who gave a slightly more flamboyant bow.

 "And, the father of us all, Count Heinrich Von Carstein." 

There was little wonder to whom he was referring, as the older looking man managed to both sit upright but slightly lounged back in his chair, eyes fixed on the new arrival.

 "...but, due to your initial...theatrics, before inclusion into our family, our prison did not have the herd necessary to both satiate and celebrate you. Your admission to your family is a joyous occasion, one that requires a beautiful festivity. But one we believed had slightly more time in which to prepare."  Wulf spoke.

 "The herd can be replenished, we just need a few nights to ensure the drag-net doesn't take in anyone who'll have relatives that come looking for them!"  the bookish one grinned.

Like me? the former thief thought to herself.

 "My brother is correct and the point is not lost, I hope,"  Wulf reasserted himself with firm politeness, gesturing towards the map with a black steel-armored gloved hand.

 "This is not Sylvania. We have operated from here for almost two decades without detection, and our time in this keep will soon be coming to an end. The mortals do not fear a still lake, my niece." 
 "We ensure that our region of the mountains gives them no reason to venture into the woods. Would-be bandits or criminals quickly discover that the role of unseen menace has already been filled!"  the bookish one smiled again, almost as if he were about to laugh.

 "With Mousillon absorbing most of the attention, we are free to remain undetected, if we leave no footprints, mon lapin,"  Camile chimed in to Regine's side.

 "Do not attract attention. Our, and now your, servants are to obey you, but not with their blood. You were selected because our reliable sources claim you to be a woman of discretion. Extend that secrecy into our family and prove our decision a prudent one, niece,"  Wulf informed.

 "Is that understood?" 

Regine took it all in. This was her reality now. Just a few days ago - had it only been a few days? - she had been sitting around a table drinking with Bertelis, Wighard, Grimgoth, Jasmine, Bruno...where were they now?

 "Yes, your Lor - "  she cut herself off as Wulf perked an eyebrow. They all seemed to pique interest.

 "Yes, uncle." 

Though Regine could not see it, she could tell that beside her, Camile smiled.

 "Good. Camile and I will be the ones primarily responsible for fostering and imparting the required principles and traditions of our lineage and nature. There are almost thirty million people inhabiting the Kingdom of Bretonnia, and out of that number you, and you alone, have been chosen to ascend into a position of prominence, my niece, one that reigns above even the highest Royarch or Emperor of the Old World, of which you will see many come and many go. Of all the denizens of this continent only a few hundred carry aloft the banners of the name Von Carstein, and you are the newest such initiate. You have been granted eternal youth and membership into one of the worlds most powerful family's. Do not spend it unwisely." 

The pause hung in the air as Regine absorbed the words, the full breadth of the gravity settling upon her mind that was not even more than twenty years in being. Eternity...
 
"There are tasks to be done, Regine,"  Wulf stated, drawing his black-steel gloved hand over the map of the region,  "but for now, your education beneath Camile and I, begins." 
bramblefoot
alright, so gimme a montage of your training (call it a week) your welcome to learn from books, or talk to the servants or the other vamps. just gimme a day to day thing of what you wanna do

wulf is available for swordplay early monday and wednesday nights. He also will teach strategy and command presence on sunday with some of the retainers

ulrich has a small observation tower with custom glass lenses brought with him from the empire. He invites you Tuesday night for an interesting celestial phenomena should you be interested. Hes also testing a modified organ gun on saturday. ulrich also will show off his black powder marksman skills on Thursday

camile will be available tuesday night for you to learn the beginnings of the von carstein cipher. she'll also teach the basics of makeup to hide sallow skin when not in vampiric company Sunday

Heinrich is available Thursday and Friday for a brief vampiric history lesson about the von carsteins. Hes likely to provide anecdotes of his life through the centuries hes lives (you have to take both lessons. Heinrich does not like people who cut classes)

regine is welcome to do some, all or none of these.
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 
 
 Spoiler: With Wulf 
Swords clattered and rang in the courtyard of the restored castle, the inner stone walls absorbing the sounds of metal-against-metal and bearing witness to the teacher and student. In one corner, Wulf, towering and imposing, his size belied the speed and skill with which he moved, like some dark serpent that coiled its body out of harms way with graceful ease before striking with his sword-carrying hand.

In the other, was Regine. Though a thief by trade, she knew the rudiments of swordplay, as evidence by her parries and footwork. Though clearly the inferior combatant, the breadth between them was not so great that she were a helpless child.

 “Your style is eclectic,”  Wulf commented, circling slowly to the side, eyes on his opponent, sword at his side and pointing to the ground as if daring Regine to try her luck.

 “Who taught you?” 
 “Lots of different people…”  Regine replied, stepping forward and making her first thrust at his shoulder – sidestepped. Having predicted that, her dagger-wielding hand was waiting with a stab, but this too was evaded with comical ease by the towering vampiric fighter before her.

 “I can tell…”  he smiled, moving backwards, his sword still pointing down.

 “This makes you unpredictable and dangerous to most. But to one trained and schooled for years? A proper knight? Or veteran footman?”  that smile again,  “there are reasons, my niece, why none of the greatest fighters known have mastered the way of the random!” 

Regine stalked forward again, her blade coming out in a swipe towards Wulf’s legs. Since her transformation, the vampires felt  lighter  on her feet, the world seemed to carry less weight as she could move with a quickness not even she could have matched in her best living days. But again, she was frustrated, her swipe and feint was seen through by her vampiric ‘uncle’, whose centuries of experience had honed him into something she never wanted to face for real. He simply stepped backwards, turned himself half about and grabbed Regine by the arm. Using her momentum against her before she could react, he had spun around and brought his blade about in an arc and the vampiress suddenly stumbled forward with the cold kiss of steel in her.

Drawing in breath out of reflex, Regine looked down at her chest to see a foot of bladed steel protruding through her stomach, its sheen only marginally polished red from her own humours.

Stunned, staring, eyes open, the vampires felt a slight panic gnawing at her nerves, and were she still alive she would have screamed out and collapsed. But instead…she stood there, astonished, her mouth in a rictus of horror and gaze locked on the weapon.

Wulf approached from behind, hand around the hilt and unceremoniously yanked it free. The pain was hot and harsh, but Regine kept it in as she merely gasped and staggered forward another step. Once more, still-present muscle memory made her breathe and inhale, swallowing and gulping nearly useless air as she watched that red slit across her flat belly begin to stich itself back together and close over in only a matter of seconds.

 “Ah, wunderbar…”  Wulf’s words drifted to her as he circled around to her front, using the tip of his sword to hold aside her clothing and witness the rapid rehabilitation of her wound.

 “We are not all the same in our…capabilities. We can all heal almost any injury, but you are far more expedient in doing so. Do you know what that means?” 

Her ‘breathing’ under control, her panic subsiding, Regine felt her animal panic rescinding and returning back into the seat of her soul where it belonged.

 “I’m lucky?” 

Wulf snickered,  “Very, meine nichte…it means I don’t have to go easy on you!” 

His dark laughter filled Regine’s ears, the morose humor pulling at her own mirth until she smirked in bashful acceptance and laughed along.

Retaining that amused smirk as he strode over to the weapons rack in the courtyard, the vampire knight ran his gloved hand along a variety of shelved weapons.

 “You are tall for a girl, meine nichte. Well, you’re tall in general. What are you? One eighty?” 
 “One seventy eight centimeters, last I checked.” 
 “You’re taller than most men, this gives you reach. Camile informed me of her observations: you are quite the gymnast, ja? Jumping and tumbling about. Your physique too, quick, strong, lower centre of gravity from a womans hips. I can educate you on a variety of weapons, meine nichte,”  he continued, walking along the rack of available implements,  “but I fear the man who has practiced a sword stab ten thousand times more than I do the man who practices a stab once with ten thousand different weapons; practice and perfection. Know your weapon, make it an extension of yourself. You could be an excellent swordswoman, mein nichte, but I think this would suit you well under optimal circumstances…”  he stopped at a long, oaken-looking pole, approximately a foot of sharp, bladed steel affixed to the stop. Wrapping his hand around it, he turned and tossed it to the vampires, who caught it with ease.

 “A spear?” 
 “Ja, meine nichte, a spear!” 
 “Aren’t these used in formation? I’m not an infantryman.” 
 “Pay attention, young one; optimal circumstances. When you were plying your trade through thievery, would you use a sword when a dagger would do?” 

Regine pursed her lips as she felt the weight of the weapon in her hands, spinning it around a few times, watching the dark circle created by its beam and the silvery outlier of its steel. Conceding the point, the vampires shrugged.

 “Of course not. There are times when the sword will be better. Other times, the dagger. Other times…”  he gestured to the weapon in her hand, before drawing himself back up into the beginning of another spar.

Gripping the spear with both hands, Regine pointed the bladed end towards her uncle, and immediately noticed why he was smiling – the reach.

 “Hullo over there!”  Wulf snickered, the distance between them now almost nine or so feet apart.

Then he moved forward, sword coming up to strike – but Regine moved back, steel-tip still pointing at her uncle. The extra distance bought her the precious milliseconds to recognize and react. Had she been armed wither sword, he would have had her.

Wulf smiled.

He did it again, the opposite side this time, but once more, Regine was able to dart backwards, the steel-blade of her spear menacing Wulf’s neck and face region.

 “See the options now available to you, meine nichte, by simply holding a pointy stick?” 

High above, peering through one of the windows of the castle, Camile watched, smirking.
 

 
 Spoiler: With Camile 
 “How does it taste, my little rabbit?”  Camile asked, watching Regine with a keen interest.

The former thief drank deep and low, the warm, sweet, red nectar of blood running down her throat from the wine glass she held to her lips. Gasping gently as she lowered the goblet, Regine breathed deeply, her mouth stained with the crimson of her new food, her reddened eyes open and dilating from the sensation, as all she could do to answer was moan softly as if touched by a lover.

 “Hehehe, magnifique, isn’t it, mon lapin? This vintage is derived from particularly good cattle. He was a minor noble, exiled or some such, taken to banditry in our mountains…” 

Camile’s smile took on a more sinister arc, as she clucked her lips in a soft  tsk, tsk tsk !

 “His gaggle of followers got away, but Wulf brought him back last night to help replenish our herd in the jail. We will be ensuring to feed him well; we simply must retain the flavour! Luck has smiled on us twice in a week – once to deliver you, and again to deliver this delicious supply!” 
  “Do we…I mean,  they ,”  Regine asked, quickly correcting her mistake,  “all taste like this...nice?” 

Her dark mother shook her head,  “Non, childe. What they themselves consume, their environment, their stress, their health. These and more all contribute to the flavour. For our cuisine we can add spices or gelatin; but when taken straight from the source? Mmmm, my childe, you will learn in time,”  before she leaned forward to whisper,  “few things are as satisfying.” 

Mother and daughter were in Regine’s room, the rich reds, crimson silks, the dark mahogany and gold ornaments still present. She had not awoken in some holding house – no, quite the opposite. She was a Van Carstein; her name demanded suitable accommodations, as Camile had informed her. Sleeping on hay and rough linen? For peasants! This beautiful room and all its black and red splendor was hers, and it was where they sat: Camile on the bed, and Regine by her small bed-side desk.

Suddenly, Camile clapped once, twice. On command, the door to Regine’s room opened and in entered one of the servant girls; likely around Regine’s age, though lacking the former thief’s athleticism and height. Instead, her pleasing features were more traditionally feminine, with her soft and gentle curves and attractive face garbed in fine clothing befitting a supplicant for such a family. They couldn’t have their representatives looking plebian, after all.

However, Regine’s attention snapped towards the serving girl almost immediately for a different reason: she could  feel  her mortal warmth, she could  smell  the enticement of her humours. A force like nothing Regine had ever known compelled her, urged her almost, to launch across the room and sink her fangs into the beautiful neck of the pretty girl and drink deep the warm contents within. But the vampiress resisted, barely, she held herself at bay, but she could not stop herself from staring at the girl with hungry, red eyes. Camile had predicted such a response from her childe, knowing that bringing the human girl in so soon after Regine had awakened was like dangling raw meat before a starving dog. But, this all had a purpose.

 “This is Claire,”  Camile introduced with her chipper attitude, standing up and moving over to the serving girl, the bell of her court dress marked with black and beautiful golden yellow silk.

 “And Claire, is one of our servants; aren’t you Claire?” 

Camile had drawn herself close to the mortal girl, putting both of her gloved hands upon her shoulders and looking sideways at her face with a reassuring smile; the pale vampire next to the warm pallor of her employee.

Claire nodded,  “Yes. I am honored to be of service to Count Heinrich Von Carstein and his family. One day, I hope to have children to carry on my duties – just as my father did with me, and his mother before him, and her mother before her.” 

This pleased Camile, who smiled as if she had just heard something funny.

 “Yes; and we do not hesitate to reward such loyal devotion. Soon, we will find you a very handsome husband. Just the way we found your mother for your father - and from that happy union, you arrived!” 

The girl was terrified. Regine could smell it. She could hear it, her heartbeat accelerating to a rapid impact against her ribcage. But it wasn’t Camile the girl was frightened of – it was her. Once more, Camile sensed this, her eyes moving from Claire to Regine.

 “Claire, this is Regine von Carstein; my daughter.” 
 “It’s a p-pleasure to meet and serve, my Lady…”  the girl curtsied.

 “Oh don’t be humble, you have met her before!”  Camile grinned, and now Regine understood the girls terror: she had seen her during her transformation, when she had been let loose in the jail cells to feed. It is likely Claire had to clean up the mess.

 “But I understand your trepidation, my sweet Claire…”  Camile’s sweet smile lingered as she stepped to the other side of the serving girl, her eyes on her neck as if even she was tempted to take just a little sample.

 “You have not witnessed an expansion of our family. I imagine it was quite a new spectacle for you, my dear, sweet Claire. Do not worry, Regine is learning. Isn’t that right, my childe?” 

Regine had to snap herself back to reality, as she realized she had been staring at the girl; her blood-red eyes almost boring holes into her as her senses drunk in every hint of the sweet, red nectar encased within that pretty bag of flesh.

Camile came around to stand a bit ahead of Claire, her body angled to take both her and Regine into her sight.

 “Ahem, yes, sorry; yes, I am learning, still. You have nothing to fear from me…”  Regine answered, less-than-convincingly.

Camile glared, her voice becoming firm and stern as she brought her hand up to almost stab the words at her childe,  “these are our servants. They are not. For. Eating. Say it.” 

Regine swallowed, eyes still locked on Claire. She went to speak, but her mouth was dry, and licking her lips…

 “They are…our…” 
  Delicious pets  , she thought.

 “Say it!”  Camile barked.

 “T-t-they are our servants. They are not for eating.” 
 “Again.” 
 “Th…they are our servants. They are not for eating.” 
 “Once more, mon lapin.” 
 “They are our servants. We value their service and reward it dutifully. They are not for eating.” 

Camile smiled,  “There, you see Claire? Nothing to worry about!”  she reassured her as best she could, while reaching for her purse upon her hip and withdrawing a single, golden  ecu .

 “Thank you for your time, my dear, sweet Claire. Go to the kitchen and have a sweet of your choice,”  Camile said, while placing the  ecu  in the serving girls hand and closing her fingers over it.

 “Oh – t-t-thank, you, mi’lady, I graciously thank you for your kindess!”  Claire curtsied as best she could, backing up towards the door, before, once out of sight, audibly dashing off down the hall.

 “Reginald!”  Camile barked out the door, the sudden shuffling sound of feed on stone flooring coming closer.

 “Really, my childe, control is of the utmost importance. You will be expected to be among the cattle in their cities for years at a time; you cannot afford to lose control. And please, no dining on the servants, my child, I will be  very  cross if you do so, mon lapin – ah!” 

Camile’s attention was drawn to two figures entering Regine’s room: one was a man in mail armor that hung neatly from his tall and broad form, upon which was a black and red tabard displaying a grey wolfs head. Before him he held one of the prisoners from the jail, a young looking man of only mid twenty or so, his arms behind his back, his image cleaned up and bathed, fear in his eyes turning into terror when he spotted Regine.

 “N – no no, not her! Please! I saw what she did! I-I-I won’t make any more ruckus, I accept my role, please I beg you not h – “ 
 “Ssssh ssh sh sh…”  Camile quietened the man, a finger over his lips, that smile still on hers.

 “You are not going to die, my handsome young man. Probably. Regine?” 

Camile didn’t have to ask twice – the new vampiress was on her feet and shadowing her mother in an instant, staring at the held and struggling man in Reginalds clinching grasp.

 “Now, my childe, remember what we discussed: take only what you need. Self-control. Do not over-indulge. Do not attract attention by leaving a trail of corpses. Here, drink, from the source, and count down from five, then release. Ready?” 
 “Yes!”  Regine stepped forward, her eyes alive and happy, her hands before her and clawed fingers splayed as if to grip her prey.

What she had  not  been expecting, was the heavy, decorated rod that Camile swiftly produced from the bulb of her court dress. The implement came down sharply with a loud  Whack!  across the vampiress’s knuckles, as Regine hissed and stepped back, mewling as if she were a cat that had just been whacked on the nose.

 “I said: self, con-trol! Mon lapin. My beautiful little rabbit, I know you’re hungry and it’s hard, but you must learn this. Now, are you ready?” 

Regine swallowed, inhaled, exhaled, her hands lowering, her blood-red eyes moving between her mother and her discipline, and to that delicious, warm mortal; no, the man, the human, the self-aware, young fellow in a spot of bother, who was going to go back to the jail cells after this, because she was going to control herself.

Regine nodded,  “yes mother.” 

Camile smiled.

 “Good! Let’s begin…” 
 

 
 Spoiler: With Heinrich 

The hefty, iron-lock bouned leather tome was deposited heavily before the young vampiress, the man who had delivered it looming over her with his aged eyes peering down with expectation.

 "The Vampire Wars..."  Regine read the title, drawing her pale finger across its scripture,  "Three Centuries of Humanity's War against the Vampirus nocturii of Sylvannia...by Theogonist Karl Hubreck." 
 "Three centuries,"  Heinrichs commanding voice repeated, the tall, well-dressed vampire drawing himself away from his seated grand-daughter and crossing towards the hearth of the war-room and its crackling flame within painting his tall, broad-shouldered figure in a dark silhouette.

 "Three centuries our family utilised the resources of our homeland, Sylvannia, and almost conquered the entirety of the Empire. Vlad. Konrad. Mannfred. Three of our relatives, and one of them almost became the Emperor." 

Regine couldn't even begin to think of such a conflict. Over three centuries of war?!

 "How did they lose?" 

Heinrich snorted lightly in amusement.  "They didn't lose. The Empire won. Although, in the case of Konrad your statement would be accurate. A lunatic who dedicated his eternity to being a mad butcher, hewing apart foe and friend, until the latter abandoned him and the former to defeated him."  

There was something in his composure that Regine noted, something in his words. She watched as Heinrich peered into the fire disapprovingly with a subtle shake of his head and flick of his lips.

 "How would you have done it?"  he asked suddenly, the depth of his voice and stature carrying its ancient authority.

Regine blinked, slightly startled at even considering such an option. Her? Run a war?

 "I...don't even know what the Empire's capabilities are. I have never been. I don't know the people, the land, how they fight." 

It might not have been the answer Heinrich wanted to hear, but he seemed to appreciate it the honesty, the admission of ones limits. He wore the smallest of smirks as he half-peered over his shoulder.  "Caution. Reconnaissance. Learning their strengths and vulnerabilities,"  he seemingly explained Regine's own approach to her.

He nodded.

 "It's a good start. Do you know anything about mustering soldiers or peasants? Planning how to feed twenty thousand men on the move? Logistics? Allies and diplomacy?" 

Regine wanted to nod. A burning desire within her demanded that she not appear ignorant, but she could tell that he could see through any lie she might use in a weak attempt to sound smarter than she actually was.

 "No..." 

Again, her grandfather seemed pleased with her honesty.

 "Of course not. You have doubtless needed to maneuver through the underworld of that snake pit, L'Anguille, but those aren't recruitment efforts, training schedules or weighing reconnaissance from scouts and predicting enemy movements."
 

A few moments of pause lingered as Heinrich peered into that fire, before drawing his tall figure away and back towards the large table at which Regine sat.

 "Here,"  he gestured to another large book, the size of a horses head,  "The Great Field Victories of Bretonnia, by Sir Giles Le Bon, famed historian from Castle Lyonesse. The wisest know what they know, and what they don't know, and they learn from the mistakes of others,"  Heinrich tapped the front of the book, looking down at Regine with the hint of approval.

 "And the very wisest, continue to learn long after." 

Regine couldn't help but smile.
 

 
 Spoiler: With Ulrich 


A resounding string of cracks echoed across the valley and off the castle walls as the organ gun detonated its front rank, spewing a hail of lead cannon balls across a wide area that gashed the ground and splintered thick trees.

 "Haha!"  Regine laughed uproariously, hands over her sensitive ears as she had watched, her lovely cape blowing back a little from the gust of the detonation.

Cannon fuse still in hand, Ulrich turned himself at the waist to peer over at his little vampiric niece, a half-wild smile across his boyishly handsome face.

 "I don't think it's quite loud enough - what do you think?"  he laughed, Regine's grin remaining as she hurried over and ran her hand against the hot metal and inspected the machine.

 "I had heard of gunpowder's use as a directed weapon, like guns - but never seen this, uncle!"  she beamed, blood-red eyes fixed on the weapon. To this her uncle shrugged and twirled the lighting fuse about in his gloved hand before precisely tossing it to land among the others.

 "Cannons, guns. It's all an alchemical reaction to produce work - the work of shoving these cannon balls into orcs and ogres!" 
 "I'm glad to see you're helping us to remain conspicuous,"  a voice came across the pair, as Regine turned to spot Wulf approaching, flanked by two horses, reins in each of his hands.

 "Only if you let the bandits go, brother!"  Ulrich teasingly jabbed, wearing that devilish smirk upon his face.  "The mighty Wulf, feller of ogres, minotaurs, the minions of chaos and a giant - out-ran by a group of thugs in the woods! Haha!" 

Wulf retained his composure with just a knowing, arched eyebrow, but Regine gasped gently, turning to look at the larger man.  "You've fought and killed a giant?! Tell me about it please!"  she beamed.

 "No need, I will,"  Ulrich interjected,  "you see, divorce is illegal in the Empire, so he had to get rid of his wife  somehow !" 

To think Wulf took a telegraphed swing, one the trimmer Ulrich darted out of the way of just in time, showing dexterous foot-work as Wulf threw a few more punches his way that ate only air, and left Regine giggling as she watched.
 
"Mind yourself, Ulrich. You can play with your toys later, but I'm taking Regine for a ride, she needs to learn how." 
  "You must learn how,"   Ulrich mimicked his brothers deeper voice, wagging his finger at Regine as the vampiress smiled cheekily.

Wulf lead Regine over to the two horses he had brought over, assisting her with mounting the dark one with soft, white spots across its neck. When both were mounted, Wulf directed her how to signal to the horse to go at just a gentle cantor.

 "We'll be back in a few hours Ulrich, make sure you've brought your toys back into the castle, and do remember mein brudder: we are trying to keep a low profile." 

Ulrich slunk one foot forward and gave a flamboyant little bow, offering Regine a small wave as she smiled and returned the curtsey, as both she and Wulf departed on their ride.
 
bramblefoot
wulf will teach regine how to ride a horse. Hes a skilled horseman, and will teach regine a few tricks, namely how to use a horse as a shield when under fire. He stops the horse  "try swinging into the saddle. ill ride by, and you swing up behind me. use the bridle and momentum" 

wulf will ride back about twenty paces  "you ready little sister?"  he asks.

gimme an agility roll to swing into the saddle
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


Regine had been getting used to the cantor of the horse, its gait, the way the world seemed more distant as she was elevated into the saddle. She had never really been around horses that much, but had always thought they were beautiful animals - and now that she was this upclose and riding one? Her affection was growing. Periodically she'd reach down and affectionately rub the broad, muscular neck of the beast atop whom she rode.


 
 Originally Posted by bramblefoot 
 wulf will teach regine how to ride a horse. Hes a skilled horseman, and will teach regine a few tricks, namely how to use a horse as a shield when under fire. He stops the horse  "try swinging into the saddle. ill ride by, and you swing up behind me. use the bridle and momentum" 

wulf will ride back about twenty paces  "you ready little sister?"  he asks.

gimme an agility roll to swing into the saddle 
 

Staying in position, nodding out and waving at Wulf as he rode twenty yards away.

 "Yes!"  she'd yell out; staying focused, her body coiled and ready and then - she swung to the side of the saddle. She withdrew her right foot from the stirrup and brought her leg up and over the back of the horse, half-crouching behind the best. Awkward and unpractised in her efforts, she seemed to pull off the maneuverer.
bramblefoot
wulf smiles appreciatively  "good job"  he says, and will put the horse into a full gallop  "just hang on little sister"  he calls as the night air flies past your face. wulf easily puts the horse through its paces, and will return it to the stable panting and lathered in sweat  "caspars a good beast"  he says, rubbing down caspar with a curry comb.  "still in the prime of his life, accustomed to vampires, and surly around other people that arent his owner"  caspar nickers, and rubs his face against wulfs.  "when we part ways, i want you to have caspar. He's a free spirit, and i cant give him that anymore"  wulf turns to you  "i want your oath to take care of caspar. i know your life is more important than his, but give him a treat on sundays, and curry comb him daily. He's vain about his appearance" 

wulf offers a massive mitt  "do we have an accord?" 
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


The vampiress's eyes widened at the offering, her mouth gaping gently as she stood adjacent to the dark-furred equine beast that had just become hers.

 "He...Casper is...mine?"  she stammered, eyes open, unable to believe what she was being given. Even in her undead state she was not so far-gone from her emotions that being granted a creature as beautiful as a warhorse could not rouse the stirring passions of gratitude and anticipation. The expense alone was astounding, no normal commoner could afford such an animal - yet here one was, all hers.

If she could exhale, she would have. Instead she smiled and half-curtsied to Wulf, turning and wrapping her arms around the beautiful animals broad, thick neck and granting him an affectionate hug. Given Regine's newly amplified and terrifying levels of physical prowess, she made sure to 'pull her punches', so to speak, and not break the poor things neck as she applied her grip and admiration.

 "Thank you, Uncle!"  Regine beamed, her lips arching in a broad smile as her previously-numb emotions roiled to the surface and expressed themselves in sincere gratitude.
bramblefoot
wulf grins  "caspers good stock. He can run like the wind, and still be ready for battle. He's iron-shod, so a kick will likely break someones bones. did i mention he also bites people"  he walks away and whispers  "if you want casper to go off the chain, exsolvo will make him frenzy. revincio will snap him out of it. use it sparingly." 

ooc: i think we can cut ahead to the goodbye if you want, as i have nothing planned
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

The Vampiress was still smiling, her eyes focused on the beautiful animal before her. Her pale hands, capable of incredible violence, gently stroked and brushed the equine pet with sincere affection.

 "Thank you, uncle! Thank you!"  she beamed, kissing Casper on his deep neck once again and hugging him.

 "I will take best of him as best I can!" 

OOC:
______

Yup, fine by me!
bramblefoot
the vampiric coven gathers to wish their newest vamp leave to explore the world. wulf will lead casper out to you, clasp your hand and click his heels together in a sign of respect. Ulrich will stand and salute, saying  "i had fun testing the organ gun with you"  camile will bring two ravens out and hook their cages to caspers tack  "in case you wish to exchange correspondence, mon lapin"  she will hug you tight and and youd feel a tear drip onto your cloak. camile composes herself, and will walk away. you can tell she doesnt want to, but is bound by duty. Heinrich appears last, and will pass a writing kit in an oaken box, and a small neatly folded up piece of paper  "go well daughter"  he says with the barest hint of a smile.  "open that paper out before you go. im testing out an unfoldable map. wherever you go, ye never shall be lost" 

where to first bloodsucker?

ooc:

the unfoldable map starts out as a 2x2 square of paper. where you travel, the map will sketch itself onto the paper and expand. you can never run out of room on said map, and you can always fold it down to the original 2x2 paper, where it will seem blank
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

For a former thief who had no one to rely on after she was 12 years old, just a week with a group who wanted to see her succeed felt like a triumph in and of itself. Tutored and guided, Regine felt the tug of gratitude within her as she stood before them all, her hand gripping the reins to her new mount and steed.

Dressed in her clothes, weapons present, the former thief gives a curtsey to her present 'family'; having brought her into a whole new world, granted her a prestigious last name and unlife eternal.

 "Thank you all...grandfather..."  she spoke first to Heinrich, once more curtsying to the most senior of the family,  "uncles,"  she directed towards Wulf and Ulrich,  "and mother,"  finally she gave to Camile.

Drawing herself up onto her new horse, Regine gave a mounted bow, her right arm down across her abomen.

 "I will not bring shame to our name, nor will I forget where my new home and blood resides." 



OOC:
_______

Let's head South-West into the mountains, towards the abandon mine.
bramblefoot
alright, so a few hours of riding, casper stops, and sniffs the air. He turns his head to the south, and then back to you. You'd smell wet dog on the wind, coming this way in a hurry. casper looks at you with an unspoken question  fight or flight 

wdyd
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

Regine felt oddly happy as her figure moved back and forth in conjunction with the movement of her horse beneath her, the beautiful fjord to her side, the forest to her other and the mountains all around them, with the starry night above.

Suddenly, hearing the approaching 'things' ahead, her incredibly acute sense of smell delivering the scent of...wet dogs? Wolves?

The Vampire’s eyes widened a touch with curiousity. Reaching down and stroking Caspers broad neck for reassurance, Regine leaned over and plucked her spear from its stirrup holster and urged her mount forward slowly out of inspection and preparation, one hand on the reins the ither gripping her weapon.

OOC:
______
 Concealment Roll:  (1d100)[ 6 ]  vs TN 113 

Changed her actions, roll not necessary.
bramblefoot
alright, so riding towards the smell of wet dog, youd spot a trio of what appear to be augmented wolves. one has two green eyes, one has two yellow eyes, and one has a singular lone red eye. they stop, and size you up.  you get the feeling theyd take you, but its too costly for them

 "felicitations malefactors"  the one-eyed wolf gravels in fragmented brettonian  "we are searching for an escapee from our master. if you have seen him let us know please"  the wolf will proceed to describe someone expert at woodcraft, prolly a herrimault by his description of a long black cloak with a hood. they seem reluctant to say more

wdyd?
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


Regine's eyes fell upon the bestial wolves, their glowing eyes clear indication of abnormalities at play. In months past her first instinct would have been to flee the scene and hide. But now, a vampire and undead, possessed of few mortal fears, she found the beasts more curious than frightening.

Until they spoke.

 Speaking  wolves? What trickery was this?!

Seated atop her steed, spear in hand and dark clothes upon her, the vampire looked like a dark rider of the night, her fair skin kissed by the pale moon-light.

 "To what master do you refer, beasts?!"  she called out to them, her free hand upon Casper's reins to steady her mount.

 "Who else resides in these mountains that could command the allegiance of ones such as you?" 
bramblefoot
The red eyed wolf speaks again  "we have a security pact with the von carsteins."  it turns to reveal a brand on its hindquarters of the von carstein sigil.  "unfortunately, we were unaware of a new von carstien. please accept our sincerest apologies"  the green eyed wolf lets out a cough  "unfortunately on page 310 subsection 2, it says we are not required to discuss business except to the count hisself"  it offers a apologetic grin  "if there is nothing else, we have prey to hunt" 
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

Regine narrowed her eyes into suspicious slits while offering a small  mod. It made sense that her grandfather would use various beasts to maintain eyes and influence over the mountain passes.

 "Apology accepted, loyal beasts. I will hinder you no further in the pursuit of your quarry. May you serve my grandfather well." 

The vampire would then offer a small bow from atop her horse, weapon in hand, eyes on the wolves.

With the matter seemingly resolved, Regine would continue along the path adjacent to the fjord through the mountains. She was leery of approaching the human settlements yet, but she was intrigued by the markings of a mine in the North-West of the region.
bramblefoot
alright, so arriving at ze mine, it looks abandoned. Nothing out of ze ordinary. the cave is big, tall enough to ride casper through. regine smells a weird ozone-like scent permeating around the cave
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

Regine held the reins with one hand and her spear with the other, the soft cantor of Casper beneath her allowing the vampire to truly enjoy her surroundings. Being born and raised a city girl, she had never been alone in the forests as she was now, with the fjord adjacent to one side and the woods to the other, large crags of mountains drawing themselves up into jagged shapes of stone and minerals beneath a broad moon and stars.

She could get used to this.

Encountering no one else upon the road, the vampire made her way south of the van Carstein fortress, then east - or west from the maps perspective - towards the abandoned mine, its rusting archs soon coming into view as its once carved beauty now sat upon a yawning, dark entrance. Already Regine could smell something foul in the air, her ultra-sensitive nose sniffing several times before drawing up to within fifty yards the foreboding portal.

   


In weeks past, Regine wouldn't have dared enter such a place. But now? Now the halting, timid fear of mortality had lost most of its grip over her apprehensions - now she went forward!

Dismounting Casper and gently kissing the beast on the side of his large head, the vampire took him into the woods and tethered his reins to a tree, tight enough to keep him but loose enough that he could pull away and flee if panicked. The next step was to ensure he had proper fodder, before kissing him once more upon his beautiful, long face, and drawing a saddle bag from him to hang it over her own shoulder.

Returning to the mine, Regine peered into the darkness, her well-adjusted eyes picking out the details and her nose collecting a plethora of information about whatever lay within.

Smiling, the vampire entered, keeping to the shadows.


OOC;
______________________________

Perception roll Visual:  (1d100)[ 45 ]  vs 97, 5 successes.

Perception roll Scent:  (1d100)[ 65 ]  vs 97, 3 successes.

Concealment roll:  (1d100)[ 86 ]  vs TN 113, 3 successes.
bramblefoot
alright, so entering ze mine, youd spot signs of habitation. a small shrine to nurgle has been placed, and bedrolls are placed around a strange device, all finely worked crystal and metal. a small spark flickers out as if to gently sniff you, and then will retreat back to the device

there is the stench of disease inside, albeit covered by the ozone outside

anything to do inside bloodsucker?
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

Regine stalked into the mine with caution, though such apprehension was not born from fear. Instead, old habits died hard, and she was not so arrogant as to now let her new-found vampiric capabilities get to her head.

Spear grasped in both hands, body crouched low, the vampire stuck to the ever expanding shadows, the scene of ozone and old air assaulting her nostrils, until she came upon a small, curious shrine - one that she was, unfortunately, familiar with. The triple circles of Nurgle had become known to Regine since she and the others had been transported to that island, and the basics of the Chaos deities were taught to her by Wighard.

That would explain the foul, fetid stench emanating from deeper within the mine. If these cultists were here, she knew they had to be cleaned out and defeated. The longer they were able to stay and entrench themselves, the more human attention it would gather...and that is something her new family would  very  much like to avoid.

Quietly, Regine pressed onwards and deeper into the mine...


OOC;
______________________________

Perception roll Visual:  (1d100)[ 14 ]  vs 97 - 9 successes.

Perception roll Scent:  (1d100)[ 61 ]  vs 97 - 3 successes.

Concealment roll:  (1d100)[ 3 ]  vs TN 113 - 11 successes.
bramblefoot
going deeper into the mine, youd see a couple norse warriors sitting around a fire with an old shaman passing a steaming bowl around. The warriors seem agitated after the bowl, very jittery and pacing around, eyes pinging, but staying within visual distance of each other. the shaman will mutter something, and dump the bowl into the fire, and a thick purple smoke will billow up. it seems to have a will of its own, and will float towards regine.

You got two options. fight or flight

what'll it be?
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


The vampire narrows her eyes as she watches the procession - some shaman-looking Norscan conjuring his vapour and providing edible within a both to two warriors at his side, which only seemed to make them irritable and jittery.

Seeing the smoke slowly drifting towards her, Regine flicked her lips. She wasn't about to be driven from this mine by some scruffy old man and his two mortal goons.

Sticking to the shadows and moving as silent as death, the vampire crept around the small encampment, setting her spear aside and drawing her blade and dagger as she did so. Also, her typically angular, pleasing human features seemed to... shift , alter, as if she were relaxing a muscle as her real form emerged across her face - that of the undead predator, sharper angles, fangs visible. She finally came to a halt - right behind the shame, where her sword was aimed right at his back.
bramblefoot
The norscan shaman will let you keep the sword at his back  "you can kill me, but i dont think youll like the outcome. its your call"  he sits calmly, as if unafraid of death. The norscans swivel, but the shaman waves them back.  "i dont fear death, old jormung has been a constant companion through my years. if it's my time, it's my time" 

the smoke will circle around, and wait.

your call
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


The vampire held the beautifully sharp edge of her knife to the Shamans throat, her predatory, vampiric face peering over his shoulder and at other two Norscans, and whatever the purpleish-pink vapor was.

 "You're a long way from home, outlander,"  Regine hissed, gesturing up with her sword and pointing the tip at the two drugged-out marauders.
bramblefoot
The shaman grunts noncommittally  "we are a long way from home. but if you wished to trade, im sure i can pull something out of my hat"  he stops himself from laughing  "what would it cost to keep my skin  unruptured? im sure i can come up with summat " 
 "so tell me bloodsucker, what's your price? " 
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 

Regine kept the sharp blade of her knife against the shamans throat, while her sword was pointed at his companion that was not paralysed with fear, as if predicting an attack.

 "You're trespassing on my family's lands, outlander,"  Regine spoke, her voice carrying a sonorous quality.

 " Who  are you - and  why  are you taking up residence in my mine?" 
bramblefoot
the shaman lets out a noncommittal noise.  "i think the term salvage rights applies to this"  he says calmly  "also i believe the term turf applies. you're welcome to reach into my right pocket. i believe youll find a mining rights claim signed by a signor vincenzo in the fortress-town. take it up with him, and dont shoot the messenger." 

if you reach into his pocket you would indeed find said mining rights claim.
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 
 "Yes, a Bretonnian of standing grants mining rights to those most famed of miners: Norscan raiders." 

The vampire laughed mockingly.

 "Don't bull**** a bull****ter..." 

The knife remained against the shamans throat, its razor edge needing only the slightest of movements to be lethal. Meanwhile, Regine lowered her other hand, the one carrying her sword, and used it to retrieve a length of rope and tossed it to the active Norscan. She then retrieved her sword again.

 "Tie your hands together and to his,"  she gestured to the other Norscan,  "then tie them to your leader here. Do it, or he dies. I won't tell you twice." 

To emphasise her point, Regine turned the blade upwards a degree, doubtless eliciting a grunt from the man she held hostage as his life was just millimeters away from being slit.

 "Translate if you have to. I haven't got all night." 
bramblefoot
the shaman scoffs  "sweetness, the only reason you aint dead is cause im still breathing"  he smirks.  "do not test old jormung. He's in a bad mood"  he smiles at you  "go on, slit my throat. i guarantee your out of options once you do" 
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 


Retrieving the deed from the mans pocket and acquiring it herself, Regine hissed softly.

 "You bring your dark magics to our land? As if your pillaging and raiding weren't scourge enough? You had your chance, dark wizard!" 

Regine's knifepoint entered the shaman's neck from the side, lodging deep into the tissue, puncturing the internal vein and windpipe. Pushing the weapon forward, she cut his entire front jugular open in a splatter of crimson and cleaved flesh.

Wasting no time, the vampire standing-leapt forward and into a rolling tumble, between the two Norscans, beneath the cloud ring and coming up in the entrance to which she entered the small cavern, both weapons in hand, her knife slick with gore.
bramblefoot
the shaman will grin as your knife enters his windpipe. He'll fall in the fire, which will rise like an avenging angel in man-shaped form, ready to wreak its vengeance on the vampire who so rudely killed its creator. the fire will laugh cruelly  "told you you were messing with forces beyond your ken!"  it croons, flame fingers wiggling.  "no more mr nice guy!" 

norscan 2 will do a full run giving you a free standard attack on it, while the firey spirit will spend its turn coalescing. the cloud will make a feint and a standard attack, getting a feel for you. norscan one will make a guarded attack
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 

The vampire's blood red eyes narrowed as she watched the shaman tumble into the fire where his fleshly vessel was consumed by the flames...only for something  else  to rise from the ashes. Its voice was like a crackling flame, its intention and malice clear - the shaman had transformed himself into a living ember!

It was at that moment Regine was snapped back to reality by one of the Norscans trying to flee the scene, running past her as he did so. Predatory instincts guided the vampire's hand, as she lashed out with her blade as he galloped in a panic - the steel of her weapon slashing deeply against his face in a fountain of gore that sent the foreign invader collapsing to the ground in a screaming, bloody heap.

But she couldn't rest yet. Regine spun her attention back to the Norscan before her, her other dagger coming about with a slash towards the mans throat, but she only hit air. Knowing she wanted to avoid a three vs one scenario, the vampire fell backwards into a roll; coming up several yards away from the Norscan and putting him between herself and the cloud, and the fire.
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

Steel rang in the broken shafts of the abandoned mine as Regine was fighting a withdrawing battle - her attention split between the advancing, hacking norseman before her, bellowing and swiping with his axe, and the magenta particles of fog that crawled forward ominously through the air towards her. Behind them still was the fiery man-sized pillar of the former shaman, the bores in its face glaring at the vampire as if studying her.

The mist neared close enough, its vaporous make-up materialising into an almost spear-like protrusion that stabbed forward at the vampire's body, but Regine darted to the side - her own weapon brought up and parrying the Norscans over-head axe-blow. Making the opening she needed, the thief twirled on the spot and brought her sword about in an arc, the sharp blade connecting with the right thigh of the raider and, compelled by the vampire's strength, sliced through and severed the limb from the mans body. The roar of pain filled the mine-shaft as the Norscan toppled diagonally, landing on his back and gripping uselessly at his wild, pivoting, gory stump, bellowing and screaming as blood spouted from the hideous wound and across the compacted earth floor.

The scent of the crimson filled the air and worked its way into Regine's nostrils, threatening to distract her from the moment. Cat-quick and agile, the vampire turned her body on the side and jumped backwards, drawing her arms together to half twirl once, twice, three times, landing on one foot each time to bridge the distance, her mind wracked with how she was going to fight the air itself -

The box.

Regine's eyes widened as she remembered the small device she had first encountered when entering the cave, its blasphemous inscriptions and runes marking it as a toy of the followers of chaos. Pulling herself back again and again, her body twisting to avoid the lancing extensions of the vapor, Regine finally opened the distance to spring back towards the entrance barely a dozen yards behind her, the Norscans gargling screams melting away to nothing as she did so.

There! The small, ugly contraption was still there, but she had barely a second to spare. Already she could hear the cold, hissing drawing closer from a foe she could not cleave and the crackles of flames behind it. Trusting her intuition, Regine somersaulted forward and came up on her knee's, snatching the steel box in both hands and spinning about to face the inexorable mist where she held it up as if in presentation, before switching open that latch.

Nothing happened.

For a moment.

Then a deafening roar gouged its way through the caverns of the mine as if the mountain itself was inhaling the atmosphere with a great intake. Regine felt her clothes whip around her body and her hair flail against her features as she could see the vapor, trying in desperation as if conscious of itself, dematerialising to stretch itself further, to clung to any surface that could offer the salvation of friction to halt its flight, but there was none. A cold shriek like a thousand screaming worms ripped through Regine's ears as the magenta cloud was drawn into the box she clasped in her hand, its obscuring haze rescinding from the mine shaft to reveal something even more curious - the burning shaman. The white, melted orbs that were his eyes no longer possessed the smug confidence of merely a minute ago. Instead they had widened, molten mouth gaping open in a silent scream as the crackling, orange flames were ripped from his body, stretching across the air and into the device the vampire gripped until finally his roar became the audible screech of a man in flesh.

Snapping the latch shut, the box now warm to the touch, Regine stumped forward, her guise a mess and her own black hair tangled about her face. But that wasn't all: the shaman was still present. His form was like cooked flesh as steam wisped from his split and charcoaled body, his agonized groans mixing with the cracking of burned tissue scraping against adjacent meat as he tried to move.

Spotting the spear she had dropped earlier, the vampire picked the weapon up, drew it back over her shoulder and hurled it at the Shaman, watching with a satisfying eye as it lanced through the air, struck him clean between the pectoral muscles and punctured right through to protrude two feet behind him. There was no gasp, no audible scream, just open, burned eyes, a mouth in gaping, silent agony, then he toppled forward, dead.

Collecting herself and composing her attire, Regine rolled her shoulders and retrieved her things.

 "Give my regards to your gods, outlander,"  she hissed to the dead shaman, before approaching the now-dead Norscan whose leg she had cleaved off earlier. Unceremoniously, she reached down and grabbed him by the scruff of the collar and hoisted him off the ground as if he weighed nothing, and sunk her fangs into his neck and drank deep what hadn't yet bled out. Moaning gently, feeling that warm, sweet nectar of life flowing down her throat until it was dry, Regine tossed the corpse away as it landed in a broken heap on the floor, her mouth and jaw smeared with the red blood of her food and fangs glittering in the dim of the cave.

Cleaning her sword off on the mans clothes, the vampire proceeded deeper into the mine, the rancid scent of decay wafting from deep within...
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


Regine pressed forward into the dank crypt-like labyrinthe of the abandoned silver mine, the stale air thick with damp earth and the strengthening scent of decay. Gripping her weapons tightly and moving with the quiet grace of a hunting cat, the vampire narrowed her blood-red eyes in the dark, her predatory senses able to discern details unavailable to mortal perception. But it was her ears that detected them first: low grunts. Snuffling. Bestial snorting. Deep, guttural groans and primitive speech to accompany the scent of damp fur and unwashed, matted fur.

Beastmen.

It did not take long until the vampire came upon the hulking figures, their brawny, braying bodies clamoured around a make-shift camp in what looked like a central transport hub of the mine. The smooth walls and rotten tents and hammocks clinging to the peripherals of the small cavern suggested a communal area of rest for miners, as well as a central location through which the trolley's carrying unprocessed ore and earth would be hauled. What had once been a point of industrial intersection had instead been turned into a fetid cave of primitive celebration, as dried blood smeared the walls and splattered the floor in hack-and-slash symbols arrayed in a pattern that only the insane or inhuman would find appealing and spoke of ancient rituals and macabre forces.

Though not yet calibrated to the magic that sustained her unliving body, Regine knew enough from Ulrich that what she saw before her was a ritualistic pit into which the beastmen had gathered the quarry and rocks to form the ring around a herdstone...but there was something off about this arrangement, something rotten and foul. Even from her position near the entrance, Regine could  smell  the disease in the air, an odiferous melange of bodily humours, sweat and rotten flesh as if something had crawled into the centre of the room and perished to whatever affliction ate away at its body. The former thief could not recall a time when she had been presented with something that offended her nostrils so! And for a few moments the vampire wished, prayed even to whatever bleak gods would listen, that she could be remiss of her powerful senses so that she need not inhale whatever fetid malaise choked the air.

Yet the beastmen continued. Able to see them now, Regine narrowed her eyes in morbid curiosity as she watched their hulking forms huddle around their crude altar fashioned from chunks of raw stone and twisted metal, their malformed bodies contorted in twisted reverence as they grunted and groaned whatever prayers they could conjure from deep within their animal throats. They seemed unaffected by the miasma of the cavern. Indeed, they seemed energised by it, as finally the vampire was able to watch in greater detail as the disgusting beasts would move their hideous, ram-like heads down to behold their own rotting flesh, only to slide their own tongues over the pustules and decaying tissues.

The vampire had had enough.

Stepping forth from the shadows, Regine's cloaked figure immediately seized the attention of the man-animals: their hefty forms all turning about on cloven hooves towards the newcomer. Eyes wide, muzzles open, almost all in unison garbled a sloshing, braying whine that seemed to stick to the wall as fear of the vampires predatory form seized their limited brains and ripped through their nervous system.

Wasting no time, Regine surged forward, sword and dagger in hand. She crossed the distance swiftly, her crimson eyes shimmering in the gloom as she smashed into the first and only one of the children of chaos who could gather his wits about him, her blade coming through in a skewering stab that speared the steel of her weapon right through the beastmans belly. The thing let out a wet howl, the humidity of its stinking breath clinging to Regine's features as she felt its hot blood spill across her gloved hand when she wrenched her weapon free and stabbed upwards with her dagger, the blade silencing the braying beastman through the bottom of its jaw out beyond the top of its muzzle, those vertical-slitted eyes rolling and the body spasming as it toppled backwards in a spreading pool of black-red blood.

The others started to bellow as one by one they were drawn out of their mind-numbing fear, seizing crude weapons of rusted axes, primitive spears and poorly made swords, their monstrous images lurching forward, hooves against the stone floor as swipes and stabs shot in towards Regine's figure. The vampire side-stepped, withdrew backwards, parried, drew herself back in a twirl - she kept herself at arms reach. Alone against five, the vampire played her footwork and kept herself at the maximum distance possible with her cat-like grace, her own weapons slashing out methodically at open exposures and deliberate targets while ensuring to remain on the move, never allowing them to swarm her, always keeping them running and shoving each other aside for the chance to take their swing at her.

The spear-wielder rushed her. She side-stepped, battered the spearhead away, then withdrew again, tumbling backwards. The one with the axe bellowed, its shoulder half covered in white-bloated boils that poked out from its thick, matted fur, weapon drawn up in a downward swing that the vampire re-directed with her dagger-hand, rewarding the beastmans effort with a slash of her blade across its diseased spaulder and splattering a slick of pus-and-blood across the ground with an accompanying guttural bellow of pain.

The heavy, rapid hoof-falls of a charge and a snorting growl were the only warning Regine received. Turning about on her feet and readying herself to side-step, the vampire was caught flat-footed as the shoulder of one of the beasts slammed into her flat stomach, blasting hot, dull pain across her body before weightlessness overcame her when it immediately drew its shoulders to its height and hoisted her off her feet and into the air, powerful arms wrapping around her mid-section and crushing in like two vice-prongs. Grimmacing and flashing fangs, Regine stabbed downwards with her dagger, the blade penetrating the back of the Gor's big, ram-like head with the crack of splintering bone and a gout of red-and-pink foamy film, but she was too slow. The world blacked out for half a second as a third beastman had rounded its axe-wielding compatriot and brought its crude, mace-like club around in a batters arc, only missing a sickening blow by centimetres and instead grazing off Regine's skull with a pranging impact that opened a bloody graze across the vampire's head. For a brief moment, the world sung for the former thief; her eyes crossing, her mouth gaping, everything moving so slowly, until rapidly escalating.

The swing from the Gor, though powerful, had overextended the beasts thick, fur-covered arms. Still moving to bring its weapon back for another swing, it squealed out in pain as Regine turned and swiftly drew her sword across its belly, spilling a noodle-like mass of steaming entrails to hang from its midsection as it toppled over onto its side, roaring and mewling and clutching at its opened centre. Still in the death-clutch of the Gor that had charged her, the vampire used her grip on her dagger that she had planted in its skull to throw herself backwards, the stony earth slamming into her back as a sword stab missed her by mere inches. On her back, gritting her fangs and using her left hand to push and heave the beastman off from her body, enough to pry its dead, locked arms from about her figure so that she could wriggle away, Regine pulled her head and shoulders aside at the last milli-second to avoid a spear thrust down at her face, then a hoof-stomp, the last two active beastmen seized the opportunity to expunge their undead opponent for good. Another hoof, another spearhead swipe that Regine parried - then she ceased trying to wrest away the Gor from about her, her long, black claws of her free hand sliding out for action. She shot her hand up and grabbed one of the beastmans knee's and sank her natural weapons into that join, the screeching howl from the child of chaos filling the air as reflexes caused it to try and wrench its goat-like leg free, but its flailing only tore more inner tendons and sinews against those sharp talons, wrecking and mutilating the connection until Regine let go, the Gor stumbling back and bestial squealing and gripping at its destroyed leg. Free for half a second, the vampire drove her sword upwards at the last beastman, the blade finding a sheath between the rusted plates of the creatures crude armor and sinking into the tissue beneath, blood hissing out from the wound as its body was seized, weapon falling from its grip, eyes wide, a gargling bray bubbling up from its throat in a frothing film across its lips, before toppling backwards onto its rear, then over onto its side, dead.

Laying there for a moment, glaring up at the ceiling, her head-wound sealing itself over, the vampire sneered and pushed her apprehending beastman off and away, standing upright and staring down at the squalling Gor behind her still clutching at its ruined knee, tissue and flesh curling away in ribbons as blood-loss was draining its features. Drawing her sword up, Regine stepped forward and slashed, the beasts ugly head flying from its shoulders and tumbling wetly across the stone floor behind it.

They were dead. All of them. Strew about her in broken, opened, bloody heaps. For several long moments the only sound in that cavern was the  click! click! click! click!  of one of the slain beastman's hooves tapping against the stone floor as the creatures nervous system played out its final spasms, the Gor's empty eyes staring at the ceiling with no further life while the last bubbles of red-tinged spittle frothed from its lips.

Then silence.

If she required breath, Regine would have been panting. Swallowing, inhaling, exhaling, she looked down at the mess of her clothes, then back at the carnage about her, standing amidst the broken, mutilated bodies of the children of chaos. Limbs severed. One decapitation. Another disembowelled. The stench of innards and bloody, raw flesh exposed to the dank air of the cave mixed with the already putrid edifice of their worship to thoroughly disgust the woman. Retrieving her sword and dagger, cleaning them, then acquiring her spear, the vampire inspected the makeshift herdstone and tattered tents, but she found little of value among the decaying remains of such forgone barbarians.

Swallowing, rolling her shoulders, her wound regenerated over, the vampire sniffed the air and listened to the corridors and chambers. Discerning the one that was most foul, she knew that is where she would get to the bottom of this, and so she pressed forth, further into the dark, deeper into the mine.
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

Regine left the makeshift herdstone and dead beastmen behind, their images fading into the gloom of the mine as she pressed forward. Was she ascending higher into the crag? Or was she on a descent, slowly traveling deeper and deeper into the earth where the dark things lay? She would be hard-pressed to guess. There were stretches where the vampire had to test and carefully navigate down wooden ladders, old, stale water dripping down from stalactites above, before she would have to round several corners and push herself up internal ramps. But whether up or down or sideways, always was the aroma of decay ever present, inhaled with each breath and like sandpaper against her extra-sensitive olfactory. Nevertheless, she continued, her crimson eyes flickering in the dim light, scanning the shadows for any sign of movement.

As she pressed on, the sound of running water reached her ears, a distant murmur cutting through the silence of the mine. Freezing on the spot, her figure hunching quietly as if she were a great cat on a hunt through the plains, Regine strained her senses to feed her more information, but only the tell-tale signs of the guttural Dark Tongue could be discerned. Sniffing the air, the vampire recognized a scent she would now never forget: more beastmen. But there was something off about this odour, something unusual that the Gor's lacked.

Intrigued, Regine quickened her pace, moving through abandoned mine equipment, dolley's and carved stone until until she emerged into a vast cavern. The space had once served as a communal area for the former miners, as wooden stalls lay tattered on its perimeter while on the opposite side of the enormous room was a yawning, jagged opening to the outside world, in all its night-time starry glory and promises of fresh air. Now, however, the beastmen had made their mark, degrading and utilizing the abandoned amenities in the best way their limited, primitive minds could conjure, and the result was little better than a stoney-floored pig sty that was arranged around a central dais upon which sat a jagged, stone-crafted emblem to the dark gods. Though Regine was unfamiliar with the chaos worshipers, she could detect the presence of magic well enough, and the hulking, carved stone seemed to pulse with a bleak, rotting energy that emanated from its central symbol of three circles banded together. Whatever deity claimed such a sigil the vampire did not know, and nor did she care, for it was the two figures adjacent to the alter that caught her attention.

Both were beastmen, but different. Bigger. Tougher. One possessed the gleam of intelligence in his eyes and would be her most dangerous threat, were he not visibly sickened, wounded and hunched next to his precious alter, hand gripping a deep, bloody gash upon his side and his breath coming in ragged inhalations. Armor of steel and leather banded across the beasts powerful body, its already impressive shoulders expanded by the spiked, dark-metal spaulders and its thick neck protruding from a primitive gorget. But the beastman to his side had no such infirmity, its massive proportions of nine feet expanded out to enormous shoulders and a hulking chest, all draped in dull-copper colored scalemail - a minotaur.

Spotting the direction of its masters attention, the great man-bull turned on the spot, its face covered by the veil of metal scale sheets that hung from its huge head, through which only a single, bright orange eye stared with visible malice. Atop its crown were a pair of horns that curled upwards into vicious points, while even its physical frame emanated pure natural power and brutal savagery, for the axe it gripped would have been the size of Regine herself and capable of cleaving her in two should it catch her in its arc.

The beast snorted, puffs of vapor exhaled through its nostrils to disappear into the night air.

 "Out..."  the Beastlord croaked besides the minotaur, his voice rising like thunder out of his haggard breathing while pointing an armored finger in Regine's direction.

 "Out...outlander! Traitor!"  his broken Breton barked.

 "W...we will...send you back to...Sul Konarr...broken...!"  

The vampire narrowed her eyes at the suggestion. Sul Konarr - who?

A memory of the name flickered in her mind. Something long buried...

 "Break her!"  the Beastlord snarled at its lone remaining champion.

Unhooking her cloak from her shoulders and undoing her weapons belt, Regine stepped forward with minimal drag and spear in hand as the Minotaur bellowed in challenge - its massive arms held up in in the air, grasping its weapon and roaring in defiance, its deafening animalistic barrage echoing off the caverns.

Then in charged.

Regine  felt  its momentum through her feet as the ground impacted with each hoof-fall from the massive creature. A ton of muscle, beast and steel barreled down upon her like an avalanche with its axe drawn back and ready to cleave her from shoulder to waist. Her vision shook as thunder and storm rushed forward, her side-step barely managing to evade the swing of the beasts weapon, the passage of air parting with such force that she felt the wake upon her face as he drew herself away, eight foot spear drawn up and ready, where it was immediately tested.

The minotaur was no ponderous, dumb animal. Halting its charge, it spun itself around on one hoof, its weapon coming about in a wide arc that outreached her own weapon. Regine ducked, drawn low to the ground, springing up and stabbing at the beast. The spearhead screamed off of the scalemail, unable to find a softer place to penetrate, as the minotaur's arms were drawing its huge axe in a backswing and stepping forward, its enormous mass filling her vision. Regine immediately saw what it was doing - it was locking her close. With her spear unable to be used to parry and too long to make another attack on an enemy so closely adjacent to her, the vampire would have met her end had she not leapt up and somersaulted backwards, the minotaurs greatweapon passing just inches beneath her body as she did so. Relentlessly, the minotaur surged forward again, swinging widely, then over-head then stabbing with the point atop its axe, constantly putting Regine on the defensive. She ducked, weaved and sidestepped, her cat-hunter like grace saving her each time as she stabbed her weapon against the mountain of iron and muscle before her, searching for any opening. She aimed under the arms, underneath the gorgot, against the throat, even at the furious, single orange eye that focused a herds rage solely upon her, but no opening was available. The clatter and shriek of steel against steel filled the cavern as the massive man-beast constantly advanced, its copper-colored scalemail brandishing more and more silvered streaks where the vampires spear-head was grazed instead of finding penetration.

  The thing was relentless!   Regine could only think for a second. On and on it surged, that huge axe seemingly a cross-like brandish of razorsharp steel that constantly pushed her back.

Another swing across her midsection. This time Regine gambled and skipped back half a step, the crest of the axe slicing through the front of her clothes as it passed by with the slimmest of margins. Acting quickly, the vampire leapt to the side, away from the swinging axe, landing on the flank of the monster and shooting her spear up like an arrow to catch the beast in the shoulder. The minotaur snarled in anger and Regine could smell blood, but a small win turned to horror as she tried yanking her weapon free, only to see it locked against a steel plate of the beast's armor. The minotaur reacted quicker. Its closest arm let go of the handle of its weapon and swung back with mighty force, catching Regine in the stomach and blasting her off her feet to sail a dozen feet across the room and impact agonizingly against a wall of the cavern. Her head rung, her midsection ached like fire devouring her guts - but at least her spear was free.

But the monster charged again. Bellowing its bestial rage, shaking the floor with its weight, the minotaur slammed forward and the vampire was barely able to duck beneath its unearthly swing. Once again, she leapt up, to somersault back -

The minotaur's huge, armored paw was waiting. Having learned from the prior escape, it had predicted this move. Its massive grip halted Regine's escape and  Slammed!  her back down onto the ground. All unlife seemed to leave the vampire as her body impressed into the ground an outline of her silhouette, the world ringing and slowing down as stars dotted across her vision.

Its massive hoof compressed came down on her chest, compressing her against the floor, pinning in place as it rose its axe above its head for the swinging decapitation.

Barely able to move, Regine only had one option. She dropped her spear. Her claws slide from all ten of her fingers and she punctured each of them into the knee of the arresting hoof, each black talon piercing the tissue, bone, ligaments and tendons as if they weren't even there. And then she gripped and pulled apart.

Thick, blackish blood splattered down and across the vampires face. The minotaur roared above, a pained, agonized bellow whose power reverberated through Regine's entire body as it stumbled back, barely able to stand. Drawing herself up to her rump, seizing her spear, Regine drew her weapon about, aimed and thrusted upwards - the steel spearhead of her weapon slicing right into the exposed underside of the minotaurs throat.

 "Gllrrr...ghhrrr.....ggrrrhhgghll!!"  the monster gargled, its lone eye wide, robbed of all fury and power, now only open and helpless as it stumbled forward onto its one good knee. Its other hung in bloody ribbons.

Back on her feet, Regine retrieved her sword and returned to face the armored beast, what muscular flesh that was visible beneath its armored scale-mail quickly paling as its lifeforce bled out from two fatal wounds. For the last time, monster and vampire locked eyes: its one and her two, staring, considering, the once fire of hatred now just an ember, before Regine held her sword in both hands and brought it down on the creatures broad neck, cleaving through the heavy bone and thick meat and cutting the huge head from the monsters massive shoulders.

Were she a mortal, Regine would likely soon join the minotaur in death, as doubtless internal hemoraghing would finish her off where a broken spine and bones had started. Instead, she felt all her tissues, soft and hard, knitting back together in her body as the adrenaline of combat slowly wore off, until she was whole again, staring at the enormous, fallen foe before her.

 "Ou...outlander...!"  the sickened voice croaked from behind. Turning to face it, Regine spotted the Beastlord and approached, her blood slick blade in hand, her image dishevelled and clothing mauled - but she was cold-eyed and murderous.

 "T..r...traitor...all of you...ma...may the Gr...Great Beast...take you as...slave, whore! M...may you ne...never cea...cease giving...him sons....! Beh-heh-heh-heh.."  the bloodied, wet cackling heaved up crimson mucous from deep within. Through as he was, the Beastlord tried picking up a battered cleaver next to his position, but Regine easily intercepted the effort, plucking it from his larger hand and tossing it away, bringing her own weapon up against its throat.

 "Who are you? What are you doing here? Who is Sul Konarr?"  she demanded simply.

The Beastlord glared back with tired eyes at the centre of a sick, muzzled face.

 "Heh heh heh...human bitch lies...you know who...you his mate...heh heh...we dri...drive out your weak herd...from here...sow...ours now...but this..." 

The beastman glared up at the jagged pillar beside them, that triangular arrangement of three circles having overseen the entire ordeal like some delighted, silent spectator. Beneath its image had blood been shed, and few things could have made it happier.

 "I...go to...the Great Beast...I...Rakath Blackmane!!"  the Beastlord summoned the last of his strength, beating at his chest to announce his name to some unseen arbiter,  "I...heh heh...I send....Great Beast many human wives...many human skulls...from Lyonesse to Bourdelex I take - " 

A flash of steel decapitated the Beastlord, silencing him forever as his great, ugly head wetly slapped and rolled across the floor.

Regine looked at the dead creature, then up at that pillar, then over at the running stream of water against a side of the cave, its current flowing into the mountain, into the mine. She sniffed the air. Unseen particles told her many stories. The beastmen. The miners. The fresh scent of water hiding something within...the Norscans. They had been here.

The vampire cleaned her sword and retrieved her weapons and cloak. Moving over to the cavern opening, the scent of fresh, pine air washing over her skin in the pale moonlight, Regine cast her gaze across the forested valley and a beautiful fjord that reflected beautiful Luna. But there was something else her binocular vision could detect, something small and hidden and unnoticeable had she not the keen senses she now possessed: the white sheet of a tent. Two miles away. Within a crevice adjacent to the fjord.

Sniffing the air.

The faintest scent of cooking meat.

Norscans.

They were here.

Looking back over at the cave, then back down to the fjord with the small valley offshoot, Regine willed a transformation over herself. Her legs drew in, her body grew longer as she hunched forward onto all fours. Bones creaked and fur sprouted, all tools and clothes made by mortal hands melding into her very flesh only to be covered by a sheet of glistening, blue-black pelt of her wolf form. Huge, but fast, the wolf darted forward on all fours and down the path and into the forest. The night was not yet over.
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 


The forests of the fjord pillared around the wolfen-shaped vampire as she sped down the ravine, her paws soft against the soft forest floor and the stars above blocked shielded by the wooden canopy. The crisp night air pressed against her lupine face as the vampire drank and inhaled in the sweet, cool breeze that was no longer stricken with the endless scent of decay that had so choked her in the mines. Focusing on her descent down the valley, her nose remaining alert to guide her direction towards the Norscan camp, the former thief wondered to herself exactly  how  she would approach this, how she would accomplish the removal of -

Ten Norscan Marauders.

The lupine vampire had descended far enough that her hulking, pony-sized form was able to hide among the shrubbery of the forest floor while peering across the hidden camp before her. One tent. Two. Three. Four. Five. And a sixth, larger than the others, with a seventh one adjacent and close-by with only the signs of internal storage serving as its purpose. The centre of the camp held a fire-pit above which were arrayed numerous skewers with flanks of meat shoved across their lengths, while closer to the tree's behind the clearing and away from any passing, casual observer, Regine spotted the squat, long forms of the ship the Norscans had used to travel this deep into Bretonnian soil, its sails doubtlessly folded away to further conceal it from stray eyes.

Remaining hidden in the shrubbery, crouched low and peering, Regine counted the outlanders, her eyes narrowed at the sight of them. These weren't like the Norscans she'd encountered in the mine, no no, these men were  bigger , more savage and violent in appearance, their shoulders seemingly carved from stone, their forms towering and imposing and born from a harsh wasteland that produced nothing but harsh men. Though shy of armor, what they had was practically arranged to protect against melee weapons in a duel, while the shields scattered about the camp would afford them cover from missile fire.

The thiefs mind worked like a set of gears and cogs, mentally deducing the best way to approach almost a dozen men visibly capable of extraordinary violence. The beastmen had been savage animals, uncoordinated in their attacks and clumsy, but they had wounded her all the same. The minotaur had been a monster with more wits and cunning that one would grant him upon visual inspection, yet he had almost taken her head off. It did not count to be over-confident, or underestimating.

Narrowing her eyes, Regine remained low and slunk through the shrubbery and foliage of the forest and around the perimeter of the camp. Mustering her skills to remain quiet and unseen, the vampire-in-wolfs form moved, paused, moved, paused, moved paused, in a tediously necessary masking of her locomotion, before eventually making her way to the other side of the camp, past the hidden longship and behind the storage tent. Her eyes pried and alert, the vampire returned to her humanoid form, Regine's mortal image taking shape once again from her prior lupine form, and crouched low to approach the tent, draw its rear sheets up and slide herself inside. Alas, there was no treasure. No mountains of gold or captives upon which to feed or gather information. Instead, there was simply weapons, food and provisions one might expect for a raiding party so far from home. But of the implements of death that were available, one type in particular caught the vampires attention: the javelins. There were many, many javelins.

Reaching out and picking up one of the almost short-spear like weapons, feeling its weight and inspecting its sharpened steel tip, Regine perked an eyebrow and spun it around easily between her long, dextrous fingers. Suddenly, Regine smiled. She considered the woods outside, then the Norscans chattering in the camp with their guttural, harsh tongue.

The vampire wrapped her hand around half a dozen of the thin, aerially-designed spears and left the tent to depart back into the woods.

Gathering her newly acquired javelins, the vampire moved amidst the tree's and deposited the weapons in groups of two strategically behind the trunks.

Then, she moved closed to the camp, away from her temporarily cache'ed weapons, drew her bow and peered back at the Norscan camp. Bringing her ranged weapon about before her and up to aim down the length of an arrow, the vampire pulled the drawstring back, aimed and waited...
BananaPhone
   Regine Von Carstein 

The vampire drew back the drawstring on her bow, aiming down the length of the arrow, picking a target among the circle of Norscans gathered around the central-fire of the hidden camp, and loosed.

The arrow knifed through the night air, its hissing whistle ending with a slicing  Thud!  through the side of a Norscans neck. Not through the centre, not penetrating the vertebrate or jugular, but through the side, blood immediately running from both wounds as the raider roared in pain and shot his hand up to his neck out of reflex.

The others reacted slowly, mead having slowed their wits, but they gathered themselves soon enough; standing up, eyes scanning the tree's and shouts to alert the others as weapons and shields were picked up. The one with the arrow through his neck toppled over onto his side, before another arrow whistled from the dark bed of tree's and thudded into another Norscans chest. Another bellow of pain and fury, the reavers quickly coming together and bringing their shields up to form a protective wall as others emerged from their tents, dazed and confused by gathering their wits and joining the others.

Shouts and yells filled the camp, eyes scanning the trees, before a third arrow hissed in its entry and slammed against one of their shields, embedding into the black-painted wood.

 "Från åsen - där uppe! Ni två huvuden till vänster, vi kommer fram i centrum och distraherar, det är bara en!"  the biggest among them shouted in his harsh language, gesturing with his axe as the main group started to run toward Regine's hidden position, shields up, while a couple broke off from the body to wrap around the flank.

They were going to pin her down then flank her against the river, Regine could tell, her bow coming up one more time and loosing an arrow - but all it found was another shield-front into which it dully buried itself into with a  Thud! 
 "Där är dem! Cormac, Asavar, runt till höger, klipp av dem från andra sidan!" 

Once again, two men broke off from the main group and headed to their right, crossing the barrier between the woods and the camp and joining Regine in the forest. Meanwhile, the other two roughly fifty yards from her, had disappeared from sight into their section of the forest, but the vampire could hear their heavy footsteps crushing grass and twig underfoot; the main body would hold her in position while the two smaller groups would flank her. Time to move.

Regine pulled back from the tree and retreated ten or so yards deeper up the ravine hill, shouts coming from below as her figure was completely spotted and tracked. Making it behind the next trunk, the vampire reached down and picked up one of the javelins she had planted earlier, drew it up ready to throw, then rounded the other side of the tree, spotted the main group, drew her hand back and hurled it towards them with all of her strength. The short-spear missile knifed through the air, propelled by the vampires inhuman strength as it was sliced down like a thunderbolt and struck one of the Norscans in the shoulder, where his pectoral moved towards his trap muscle, the length of the weapon puncturing clean through and evoke a roar of pain as the man toppled backwards, struggling on the ground as blood seeped from his wound. The rest surged forward, their momentum only broken briefly by entering the thickets of the forest, but their shields remained forward and blocking most blows - as Regine learned when she hurled her next javelin, only for it to embed itself deeply into another shield.

The vampire retreated again, breaking from her cover and darting further up the ravine hillside, leaping over a fallen log, landing on her feet, dashing towards - a bolt of hot pain spread out from her back as she felt a penetrating spearhead lodge itself in a shoulder blade. Hissing loudly, getting behind cover, Regine felt the awkward weight swaying behind her, the steel head half-embedded into her body as she had to pivot her whole centre and 'whack' the spear from her flesh by catching it with the rough bark of a tree. The hot sensation of pain was rescinding, but the action had cost her precious seconds and distracted her, as a warcry and heavy footsteps thundered in from her left - the two that had split off from earlier had found her.

The first to come at her was big, but then again, they all were. Regine was herself a tall figure, but this one was half a foot again above her, his big shoulders carrying his battleaxe in one hand and shield in the other, the bearded, ferocious face staring hate at her as his weapon came down for what would have been a head-splitting killing blow. The vampire sidestepped at the last moment, drawing her own sword out, stabbing out towards his arm, but the warrior brought his shield up and  angled  it, causing her to deflect, then shoved that same shoulder at her to push her off balance, which she only avoided by stepping backwards. That was when his partner arrived, spear in hand, the weapons length granting him a skewering charge that the vampire was only able to turn aside with her sword at the last moment, but now the axe-and-shield was on her again, roaring ferociously as he beat at her with his axe, swinging down-wards chops, side-ways cleaves, forcing her backwards while his companion with the spear stabbed at her from behind his companion. The two offered a mixture of defense and relentless offensive that Regine struggled to protect herself from, let alone overcome.

Knowing she did not have the experience for this, the vampire stepped turned and jumped, taking a diving somersault and coming up near another one of her trees, pivoting around it, drawing up one of the javelins and turning around the other side, hurling the short-spear with a vicious force that planted it right into the spearman's chest; the man shouting loudly in death-pain as he was taken off his feet and stumbled backwards. The axe-and-shield bellowed as he surged forward again, axe up to strike - but Regine was quicker. She darted in as close as she could go, her dagger coming up to block his swing near the hilt, while her fangs went straight into his neck and drank deep. The Norscan's eyes went wide, his axe falling from his grip as all strength and life fled his body, pushed out by the vampires hunger as Regine sheathed her dagger and used that hand to grab the raiders shield instead, using it for her own purposes as the remaining central group of three raiders finally caught up - their shock quickly transforming into anger as all three charged forward with shouts of bloody murder.

The two in the centre surged up the hill towards her, while the third in the group broke off and came at Regine from the side, a spear in his hands stabbing out at her from a distance. Outnumbered three to one, Regine kept was constantly on the back foot. Her sword turned aside the spear-thrusts, while her shield and cat-like grace deflected or side-stepped from those before her. The sound of steel deflected from wood and the grunts and shouts of Norscan raiders echoed off the surrounding trees and into the starry night. As before, Regine was too much on the defensive to mount an offense; the three men before her stabbing, swinging and thrusting with their weapons while the two occupying her centre made good use of her shields. Even more seriously, she could detect further heavy foot-falls incoming from her left - the other two sent around to help flank the main group. They couldn't be more than forty yards away and closing fast.

Regine side-stepped to the left ducking beneath a powerful swing. Deliberately putting the two before her between herself and the spearman, she bought herself precious seconds. Shooting her sword up and catching the axe-wielder upon the shoulder, his scream gargled as her weapon passed through the tissue and join and into his neck, flashing a red spray as she swiftly withdrew it and kicked the Norscan forward with enough strength to crash him into his compatriot - and she stabbed him again in the back with her sword, the tip sliding through the tissue of one Norscan and into the chest of the one behind him.

But the spearman came on swiftly. Having rounded his now two-dead compatriots, his longer reach weapon in hand, he stabbed out towards the vampire, shortening his weapons longer-reach quickly to easily reposition it whenever Regine used her agility to side-step, or extending it when she backtracked. The armored Norscan knew what he was doing, the vampire could tell much, and she could hear the rapid approach of his final two companions and a sharp, sudden whistle...

Ducking just too late by half a second, Regine felt the red-hot puncture of a javelin pierce her back and penetrate through her body to protrude above her right breast, the spearhead slick with streaks of her dark blood. Hissing in pain and gritting her fangs, the vampire drew her left hand back and hurled her new-found shield against the spearman before her, the warrior's clear lack of experience in such an unorthodox maneuver as it struck him hard in his chest, blood coughing out form his lips as he stumbled backwards with shattered ribs and punctured lungs.

That bought her time. Quickly, the vampire reached up and grabbed the javelin sticking out of her body and, with a pained whined, yanked it through the rest of her torso, turning around just in time as the other two were barely half a dozen yards away - the javelin being hurled back in gratitude and striking one in the stomach. He garbled blood and spun about on the spot from the force of the impact, before the vampire lunged forward to meet the remaining Norscan bellowing hot fury and swinging his enormous axe. He swung, she stepped backwards. He came forward again, momentum and power in a broad stroke. She ducked then sprung forward, gaining entrance to his personal space and within his weapon, driving her sword through his chest and latching her fangs onto his neck from which she drank and drank, and drank. All strength and vigour draining away, the mans ferocity bleeding into the maw of a voracious predator, the Norscan paled and lost composure, slipping down and going limp, only to be held up long enough by the vampire for her to finish feeding, before she tossed him back onto the bloodied earth, gasping in deeply as the moon cash its silvery light over her pale features and blood-slick, fanged maw.
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


In the wake of the fight, Regine had retrieved each fallen Norscan and dragged them to one central location from which she fed. Pierced, stabbed, drained and broken, their bodies lay in a crumpled pile at her feet as the vampire held the final, limp body to her mouth from which she greedily drank every drop of life.

The Norscans were morally corrupt. Their spirits were rotten and tainted with the delusions of the Chaos Gods and service to malign powers. But their physical forms? Those were healthy. The red nectar that pulsed through each vein was like sweet wine to the vampire, a delicious edible that washed through her body as a warm pleasure that satisfied every nerve-ending and recharged her love of unlife. Drawing her face away to face the stars, Regine’s fangs glinted with their red polish as the Norscans blood was smeared across mouth, chin and jaw, before she let the limp dead warrior drop from her hand to crumple uselessly upon the forest floor.

But she was not alone.

Surrounded by the woods as she was, standing atop a blood-slick ground and a pile of corpses, Regine stared down at a towering figure that had silently made its way up the hill of the ravine to stand in waiting some ten yards from her. To describe him as a large man would be an understatement, as she did not think that even Wulf could match the man for height, nor brawn, as the man as closer to seven feet at the helm and covered from head to toe in black-steel plate armor that carried the marks of countless battles. Her wore no tabard, no identifying marks of allegiance, only brandished steel and brutal power, and a wedge-like helm from which two eyes stared from behind a visor.

  “And who are you to claim my flock as your own?”   he asked, a voice like calm thunder, lined with a harsh accent from somewhere far to the north where men should not reside.

  “Theirs was a task of purpose; to spread the gift of the Father. Not to feed a parasite in stasis. You are no longer a canvas for the Father’s blessing. Why have you interrupted our work?”  

Their work? The Father? A canvas – parasite in stasis? Regine knew nothing of what the man, or creature, spoke of. Taking several steps forward through the dead bodies of the Norscans, the vampire considered the towering man of steel before her.

 “A parasite? Those are strong words for the leader of glorified pirates that sack and pillage.” 
  “Transient and inconsequential. They do not matter any more than grains of wheat that are pulverised to produce flour in a mill that feeds a million. The Fathers blessings are for all to receive, each dedication a rung on the ladder to ascend into the divinity of his grace.”  
 “The beastmen did not look particularly ‘divine’.” 

The figure chuckled. Sardonic and mocking.

  “Blackmane was given the opportunity to be something more, even if he lacked the constitution to seize the moment. The Children of Chaos are a wayward experiment, fit only to clear the way for the heralds of something greater.”  
 “You used them then?” 
  “I extended them a curtsey. The could rise above meandering beasts squatting in a cave and licking their wounds, and could instead become instruments to spread the Fathers blessings.”  

Things aligned in Regine’s mind: running water within the mine, the ever-present scent of decay and disease, the putrefied state of the beastmen she had fought so fraught with plague and illness. Then she thought deeper for a second: the shaman and the tri-circle stone that had dominated the final cavern with Rakath and the Minotaur.

 “How?” 

The figure chuckled once again with the same mirth.

  “You possess no soul, vampire. You are dead flesh without rot or purpose. You are outside the circle of Father’s blessings. A wolf kept at bay on the perimeter, forever staring with hunger at the works of others. The day will come when this world joins in unity with the Father. Without sustenance, you will wither and decay.”  
 “So I  am  capable of change?” 

Once more the figure laughed slowly, that mocking tone remaining. Only this time he reached over to the scabbard on his hip and gripped the hilt of his weapon, which Regine now noticed sported a snakes-head pommel with two small rubies for eyes. Withdrawing a blade of glimmering beauty and simplicity, the steel like nothing the vampire had seen before.
 
 “Indeed; allow me to show you how malleable you are.”  
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

The Chaos Champion looked as if he were poured out from the forges of steel and iron. Towering, imposing, unmoving. The only hints that a living man wore that armor, however twisted by the ruinous power, was the pair of dull, grey eyes staring at her through the slit-visor of his forward wedge-shaped helmet. Grasping that sword in his hand and bringing it about to grip it in two, the warrior advanced slowly up the hill, his dark-steel armor catching the moonlight as the first swing came in swift and fast.

The vampire slid sideways, spear in hand and coming about in a double grip like a staff, battering away one, two, three blows as the champion swung and stabbed. Inexorable and filled with power, the minion of chaos was no stupid brute: Regine saw in his size and movements that of her uncle, Wulf, deliberate precision and utilising his strengths to overwhelm her.

Regine ducked, side-stepped, parry away away a blow. She darted towards a flank and stabbed with her weapon, but the spearhead screeched off the thick chaos armor of the giant, his sword coming about and the tip finding her right shoulder. The blow drew blood as the vampire felt the cold steel bite an inch into her flesh, as the material of her clothing turned pink and then red as the wound bled, before the rehabilitation began.

  "You had a soul and a body,"   the champion mocked, coming forward with an over-head blow that Regine parried down and away, countering with a slash across his chest that scraped harmless off his plate.

  "You could have been a favoured daughter of the Father!"  

Another swing, that gleaming blade hissing past her face. Regine stepped back and then to the side, but she could feel the ground growing soft beneath her boots. The pillars of pine formed a lattice around the two combatants, shrubbery and foliage boxing them into a makeshift arena with veritable patterns and terrain that would hinder and grasp at either unfortunate, or clumsy, enough to ensnare themselves for what would be even a single, fatal moment. Furthermore, she could  smell  the blood of the Norscan corpses saturating into the earth, mixing with the dirt and festering the area with the smell of iron and water.

Spinning her spear about in her hands, Regine darted further along her own flank, drawing herself further around the mountain of steel as he attempted, but failed, to match the Regine's advantage in speed, that spearhead jabbing out again and gain, the distance between them and the cat-hunter agility of the vampire visibly beginning to frustrate the champion as he pondered forward in a heavy charge.

  "You celebrate your eternal life? Your perpetual youth?! You are a walking corpse on a doomed planet! Your blessings were stolen and you thank your thieves!"  

That sword streaked in once more as the champion corrected himself, swing, stab, slash, his enormous, armored bulk filled the vampires vision as he pushed her back with each stride he took and the vampire could feel the power behind each blow she parried with the blade of her spear.

Regine was not a knight. She was not a trained soldier or veteran of a hundred battles. She had skill with the blade, but her experience was limited and so her mind went back to Wulf for the briefest of moments. His words in the fortress court-yard, teaching and educating her, which weapon to use when, how to read an opponent, but more than that it was he had  not  verbally instructed, but rather the simple act of just  fighting  her that had taught her by making her  learn  and improve herself.

The visor! Regine thought immediately, unable to believe she had not seen it until now, and how though all the Chaos Champion had before his eyes was a narrow slit it had in fact been herself that could not see: she was playing to his strength. He advanced upon her and she allowed him to set the rules of engagement. She stayed within his extremely limited field of vision and played his parry-thrust game in the search for an opening within the nearly impenetrable mass of steel that bedecked him.

Regine darted to the side to avoid a charge - and then she circled further. Quick, fast and pulling herself out of the Champions field of vision entirely, Regine used the foliage of the forest floor to her advantage, crouching low, almost half-hiding as the huge man tried turning about to match her speed - but he couldn't. He had lost visual sight of her which made him vulnerable when she emerged from behind, her spearhead thrusting at the back of his neck. The chaos-warped plate was resistant to her attack, but the steel point grazed and slid along the armor and underneath his left spaulder, finding vulnerability and tissue - Regine could smell blood.

The Champion yanked himself around, eyes wild with fury.

  "You predate and parastize, vampire! With no soul the Father's inevitability consigns you to oblivion!"  

Sword-swipe. Side-step. Slash at the Champions face, her spear tip grazing the front of the vertical wedge-like beat and leaving a silver streak.

 "You sold your soul for  nothing  but empty promises! Mine rests with Morr!" 

The Champion roared and barreled towards her once again, but the vampire circled about, out of his vision, twirling off gracefully and ducking under his advance, spinning and stabbing like a loosed arrow - the blade of her spear penetrating the back of the Champions knee with a sickening  Squelch!  and the vampire could smell more blood. She with drew, her spearhead smeared with crimson as she twirled back and withdrew, watching as the huge Chaos Champion lumbered about to face her, his movements slow, his limp heavy. He visibly could not raise his sword as high as he had before, the eyes staring at her with a wading fury within the visor as one more charge came forward.

But the vampire had chosen her position specifically: the Champion rushed, gritting through the pain of his knee, but lost his stability on the blood-saturated ground of his fallen comrades. Slippery and slick, the soft earth was treacherous beneath the enormous mans steel greaves, his balance swaying enough that his swing was fatally off-balance, as Regine smacked his weapon aside with the blade of her spear, spun its length around and struck the champion on the back of his armored head, sending him face-forward onto the forest floor, the earth turning a darker shade beneath his knee and shoulder.

He tried to rise. The vampire leapt upon his back, her spear flashing like silvered lightning with her strength and speed to drive it into and through the lobster-tail plates that protected the Champions neck, the  crunch!  of severed vertebrate and punctured armor splattering up with a geyser of gore as the minion of chaos fell back face down onto the bloodied forest floor.

Holding the shaft of her long weapon as if it were a riverboat control, Regine turned it to the right, the sound of cutting fleshand tortured steel emanating from below. Then she turned it to the left. Then the right. Then the left. Finally, the Champions head toppled from his shoulders, the stump ragged and bloody as Regine reached down to retrieve it. Half-expecting it to fall out of its helm now that it had been cut free the vampire was astonished to to discover, on closer inspection, that the barrier between flesh and steel was not as distinct as it should be, as if the two had fused to become one, the steel just another epidermis.

 "What the hell are you?"  Regine uttered to herself, eyes narrowed in suspicion.

She had fought the minions of Chaos before, on many occasions. But she had never acquired the chance to perform an autopsy, of sorts. The idea that their champions received armor that was fused to their bodies was...perhaps she was still too vain, but to lose her image behind cold steel? That was some devotion.

It also meant she could not pry the armor off him and either have it remade to fit herself or sell it to one who would make better use of it. In Bretonnia there were always young, wealthy would-be knights in desperate need for armor, and she knew how much a full suit was worth. But speaking of souvenirs'...

Regine's eyes tracked over to the sword the Champion had wielded, reaching down to his steel-armored hands and prying his fingers open from the hilt. Picking the weapon up, she was surprised at how light it actually was, though that could be because of her vampiric strength. The hilt was long for one to wield it one or two handed if they wished, while the blade was beautiful in its craftsmanship and yet so simple: just a straight rectangle of glimmering steel ending in a sharp point, the fuller perfectly smooth. But it was the pommel that drew particular attention from the former thief, not-least-of-which because of the rubies, but the entire motif. The snakes head had its jaws open, as if it were hissing and readying itself to strike, the crimson shimmer of its ruby eyes almost enchanting the vampire as she held it aloft and stared at it as if hypnotized.

 "Oh yes...I think you're coming with me..."  Regine uttered gently, her eyes drinking the weapon in as if it were a handsome man. Turning around and facing the Champion again, she reached down to retrieve the scabbard for her own use, fastening it around her hip and sliding her new, large sword into and wrapping her right hand around the snakes-head pommel.

Looking back at the carnage across the forest floor, the vampire smiled, before turning back to their camp and proceeding back down towards it. As Regine further went through their things, but she found nothing of value.

 "What kind of Norscan raiders have  no  plunder to show for their efforts?!"  the vampire exasperated out-loud in confusion, until laying her eyes on the beached and hidden longship.

Smiling in the belief that she'd hit the motherload, Regine easily cleared the standing jump from the earth floor, over the railing of the longship and onto its deck. But if she was expecting a bounty of gold, or racks of finely crafted weapons she could plunder or even bags of jewels, instead she was greeted with barrels.

Lots of empty barrels.

And the stench!

Now that she was up here, the vampire narrowed her eyes and thanked Morr that she no longer needed to breath, for having such a putrid odor become inescapable to her would have cruel fate indeed. Moving through the discarded containers, brow furrowed in curiosity, Regine picked one up at random and inspected its insides: the remnants of viscous and unnatural colored liquid festering in the bottom of the barrels.

More gears in Regine's head worked. From her position, she looked back up towards the yawning entrance to the mine she had already cleared of the beastmen, their sick and putrefied bodies returning to her thoughts. That stone in the centre of the cavern, the three triangle-arranged circles, the Champions words of the Beastmen missing their chance to 'spread the blessings of the father'.

What if the Norscans weren't here to pillage and steal, but instead to disseminate something throughout the region? To 'spread the Fathers blessings', and the Beastmen had been the first victims? Were did that river through the mine end up - how close to the human towns?

Her family had to be warned about this!

Not only could it bring unwanted attention, unwanted prying eyes wandering through the mountains and dangerously close to their fortress, it could jeopardize the human herds! The last thing anyone wanted was some plague ripping through Seigneurie de Bellecombe is one of the last things they needed! They could lose thousands of cattle to disease, let along the possibility of transmission of Chaos-born diseases into their food supply!

The knot of worry twisted in Regine's stomach, knowing her family must be warned.

Before she left, Regine retrieved logs from the camp-fire and set them about the longship, having removed one of the barrels and its remaining contents. With the fire spreading across the ship to dispose of the plague carrier, the vampire threw the rest of the Norscans garbage onto the ship and watched it all burn. She left the bodies out for the crows and the animals, before returning to the silver mine. Not sure yet how to deal with the magical emanating pillar, Regine instead collected the Minotaurs head before making her way back through the mountain and out the other side, relieved to see that Casper was had rested himself within the grass and gone to sleep.

Waking her new steed and affectionately petting and kissing his long neck, before granting him a firm, warm hug, Regine drew herself up in the saddle and set at a canter back to the fortress. With only an hour before sunrise, Regine knew she'd make it, yet the urgency of her findings gave her wings.
BananaPhone
 Regine von Carstein 
   



The travel back to Forteresse de Carstein had been, thankfully, uneventful. With the roads regularly patrolled by her uncles there was no need to fear the hidden dwellings of pick-pockets, bandits or worse, greenskins. Instead, the vampire was treated to a pleasant journey through the mountainous ravine of her family's temporary home, the fjord to her left and the forested crags to her right. Regine watched as Luna's silvery disc slowly descended behind the crests of the ridges, a smile upon her face, her blood-red eyes drinking in the natural beauty of her new world. She could stare at the gentle fjord passing her by all night if she wanted to, and who knew, now that eternity stretched out before her, maybe one time she would do just that.

Arriving back to the fortress with ten to fifteen minutes to spare, Regine entered through the large gate of the towering walkways and battle ramparts, one prize on her hip and another bulging out a sack she carried over one shoulder. Dismounting Casper and placing him in the stable, handing him over to the, admittedly handsome stable boy with a sly smile, Regine moved into the interior of her family's castle where the thick, sturdy walls afforded her fantastic protection against the incoming sun, particularly with the heavy drapes drawn across every window on the premises.

Moving through the large banquet hall and courtroom, through the corridors and rooms, the first of her family Regine encountered was, surprisingly, Ulrich, who seemed to be busying himself in one of his research laboratories. Regine could hear him chuckling while talking to himself as she passed by the entrance way, the curiosity prompting her to pause her advance and peer into her one of her uncles workshops.

 "Uncle Ulrich?"  she called out, entering the large, neatly ordered space approxiamtely twenty yards by twenty yards in size, with several support pillars arranged down the centre to help bear the load of the stone above them, as well as serve as convenient places to hang shelves and racks.

 "Oh - little niece, is that you?"  that familiar voice returned, Regine smiling as she heard it and entering deeper.

 
 Spoiler 
   
 


She moved deeper into the workshop, noticing the red-steel grates that composed the central section of the workshop and leading down to a type of drainage system beneath them. Flanking that arrangement was what looked like six beds, or at least man-sized platforms for people to be placed upon, their maneuverability on display as they were tilted upright at 45 degree angles so that Ulrich could doubtlessly inspect whatever unfortunate soul found themselves strapped into place. Speaking of which...

 "Little niece!"  Ulrichs had emerged near the end of the workshop, that white hair of his neatly combed and his cloak discarded. Wearing black pantaloons, a white top and a dark vest over it, he looked every bit the man of learned science he was.

 "Uncle!"  Regine smiled, picking up her pace into a stride as she approached.

 "I must admit, I had not expected you to return for a few days. You were supposed to explore the region, familiarise yourself with it...something important must have compelled your return." 

The former thief nodded, her black top-knot moving behind her head slightly as she did so. Coming to a stop before the older vampire, Regine easily unslung the head bag that from her shoulder and sat it upon the ground before her. It was now that Ulrich perked an eyebrow when he noticed the disheveled and damaged state of Regine's clothes; the torn segments of her cloak, ripped and cut segments of her outfit, the puncture marks and penetrations that had destroyed zones of her chainmail.

 "You look like you fought a clan of orcs..." 
 "I went to the mine - the one on the map? I thought - " 
 "You went there?"  Ulrich asked with surprising inquisition, " hmm, we should have warned you: we heard that that place was being eyed by the humans for revival. There were rumors that the deed had been granted to a party whose identity we had not yet learned." 
 "This deed?" 

Regine reached into her back pocket and produced the crumpled, but functional roll of parchment. Ulrich received it, opened it and ready it, his eyes widening as he did so.

 "How did you get this..." 
 "There's more, uncle. I think the region is in great peril. I went through the mine and - " 
 "You went through it?!" 

Regine nodded, reaching into her large bag once again and withdrawing the barrel sample she had retrieved.

 "Beastmen. They were all sick, like they were diseased. They had this stone in their communal area, I could  feel  magic within its make and it bore a symbol the likes of which I have never seen nor heard.  There was this leader among them who said that I was a traitor, or some such? That I was in league with Sul Konarr...? Or some foreign name as that. I breached the mine, went through it, and I discovered a group of Norscans, led by this giant of a man, clad all in armor that had fused to his skin!"  Regine's eyes were wide with excitement, Ulrich listening with quiet solemnity.

 "I slew him, I took,  this  sword from him,"  she reached over and withdrew her new weapon several inches to display the gleaming steel, before pressing it back into its scabbard.

 "But they had no loot...no plunder. He said that the Beastmen were too weak to 'spread the fathers blessings', or something? He claimed that we are soulless, outside of the Father's circle. On their ship I found many of these..." 

Now Regine held up the barrel for Ulrich to take, the learned vampire's nose twitching as he was now brought close to the fetid stench emaneating from within the container, as he turned it over in his hands for inspection.

 "I burned the ship and their camp and I brought this here. I don't know what it is, but I'm worried, uncle: what if the the Norscans used it to infect the beastmen? There was a small, but deep river running through the mine, it passaged out into the water networks that move down to the human towns. What if they were pouring this into them?" 

It was clear that this was a lot for the older vampire to take on, his current surroundings seemingly forgotten for several moments as he thought in silence, peering at the evidence in his hands.

 "What did you say the symbol on the stone was?"  he asked cautiously, all humour drained from his visage.

 "It was three circles, arranged like this,"  Regine formed a triangle by pressing the tips of her index fingers and thumbs together in an upward facing triangle.

Ulrich shook his head.

 "They've reached out this far?  Damn  that blasted city. If only Manaan would smite and drown it with one great tidal wave..."  he uttered, shaking his head before placing the canister upon the nearest bench and starting to pace.

 "Who are  they ? What city?"  Regine asked, almost like a child hoping for a parents attention.

Again, Ulrich held his silence for several long seconds, pacing back and forth and thinking to himself, before suddenly remembering that she was still in the room.

 "Oh...I'm sorry, my niece. The geographical politics we occupy is...tenuous. The Norscans you encountered, I believe, were either worshipers of or employed agents of a particularly... gifted  emissary of Nurgle, who resides within Mousillon." 

Regine blinked; Mousillon! That was where they were going...a string of knots slithered into her stomach, an echo of the past tugging at her heart when she recalled her former companions, Bertelis among them.

 "Nur-gull...what's that?" 

Ulrich smiled patiently, putting his hand on Regine's shoulder almost affectionately.

 "You have entered a much larger world than you realise, my niece. You know of the ruinous powers, yes? The four mightiest among them are Khorne, the god of slaughter and war, Slaanesh, the god of lust and corruption, Tzeentch, the god of magic and ceaseless change and finally, Nurgle, the god of disease and decay. He is often called Father Nurgle, or Grandfather Nurgle, due to his followers foolish attempts to anthropomorphize an entity beyond their comprehension." 

Regine thought back to her encounter with the Norscans, the referral to 'the Fathers blessings'.

Taking his hand off her shoulder, Ulrich moved over to the canister once more, picking it up in his hands.

 "It seems that the Beastmen believed you to be in league with the Norscans; you are, ostensibly human in appearance, after all, and they cannot particularly distinguish between us. The Norscans who spread  this  among their number and the water supply..."  he gave the barrel a small, gesturing shake.

 "I saw what the effect of this...concoction had on the beastmen. If this got into the water streams from that mine, those currents run right down through past Marmande, Bellefontaine, Chateau Sable and Tour-en-Bois! That's tens of thousands of humans, our herd could be devastated, and they'd look for things to blame - they would come looking for monsters in the mountains! We can't let our cattle perish in such a way!" 

Ulrich nodded solemnly,  "you are absolutely right, my niece." 
 "And Sul Konarr?" 

Ulrich pursed his lips and nodded, turning to face her and then move to her side, silently beckoning her to follow him.

 "Come, my dear niece, we must inform father of this."  and she dutifully fell in alongside him as they moved from the workshop and into the castle interior at large.

 "So...you slew beastmen and Norscans? I've never dined on the northerners, believe it or not. What do they taste like?" 

Beside him, Regine smiled,  "Salted pork." 

Ulrich snickered, his sense of humor returning,  "how many did you say there were? A dozen? I'd have to sleep off such a large meal." 

The former thief's smile turned into a grin as they rounded a corner and started upon some stairs, a black banner of their family coat-of-rams hanging from a stone wall. She shrugged to his words, her grin almost bashful,  "Waste not." 

Ulrich laughed, nodding in amusement as he reached out to clap his niece on the shoulder humorously, both vampires snickering among themselves as they sought out their father.
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 



The entire family had gathered in the meeting room of the tower, a small but well-decorated chamber whose walls were covered with paintings and marble busts of long-deceased icons of admiration. Two large, arching windows were placed into the stone walls, but the onset of the rising dawn had quickly prompted them to be coved with long, thick emerald green velvet curtains. To the east of the entry-way sat a fireplace, though its hearth consumed no wood nor harbored any flame, for soon the family would be going to bed and such luxuries were no longer needed to warm a room of seldom, if important use. However, it was the middle of the hall that was dominated by a large, polished walnut wood table that took up almost the entire centre. Circular in shape, solid and sturdy, the surface was polished and its frame surrounded by five large chairs neatly arranged in a pentacle pattern on its perimeter, and within each sat a member of the household: Camile, Ulrich, Wulf and the Count himself, Heinrich.

That left the fifth chair empty.

Standing before the table, the eyes of her family upon her, Regine had spared a moment to consider her surroundings, her mind wandering to barely a few weeks ago where she was a thief with a traveling band of vagrants, nary with two coppers to rub together. Though a part of her still wished her former companions were fine and well and had not befallen some ghastly fate in Mousillon, it was hard not to look her where she was now, the beautiful charm and lovingly crafted luster and wonder if, perhaps, her prior fretting had been for naught. No one had ever given her anything, every meal had been a fight and more than once she could well have died in the back-alleys of L'Anguille with a knife in her back, or worse. Yet now...here she was. Out of all the millions of Bretons, she alone had been elevated. It was an exclusive family, and she was in it.

  
 Spoiler 
 
 
 
 "And you are sure this...Beastlord believed you in league with the Norscans?"  Heinrich asked, the power in his voice bringing Regine back to the present, the newest von Carstein nodding.

 "Perhaps not the Norscans I encountered, Grandfather, but he said that he would send me back to someone named  Sol Kunarr . He seemed surprised to even see me. He called me a traitor and when I pursued the trail further down the ravine and encountered the Norscans, their leader spoke of the Beastmen as if they were tools. Allies of convenience at best, but only a handful of the beasts seemed taken by whatever new spiritual force the Norscans had introduced to them, which seemed very recent." 

Wulf and Heinrich looked at each other, centuries of camaraderie allowing a quiet exchange of expressions that only they understood, while murmuring quietly between themselves. Beside Wulf, dressed in her typical fashion, Camile smiled fondly towards Regine, almost maternally, doubtless feeling rather vindicated in her selection for ascension into the von Carstein ranks.

 "Regine, sit,"  Heinrichs rich voice once again grabbed Regine's attention, her notice going to the empty seat at the table: it was for her. A swarm of butterflies pushedaround in her stomach at the implications and consequences, an honor gifted upon her that  she , the youngest and newest member of the family, should be permitted to sit at the decision table, if not to offer opinions then at least to be present when they drew conclusions.

Curtsying,  "yes, Grandfather, thank you!"  she spoke, two steps forward and lowering herself into that leather chair, the thick stuffing within cushioning her rump and back in the embrace of a cloud. Regine noticed a small smile from Ulrich, her trimmer uncle that shot her a subtly perked eyebrow and arched corner of his lips: well done, kid.

 "Sol Kunarr, the one you refer to, is a Chaos Lord of Nurgle. He resides in that damned city, Mousillon, several hundred miles from here. Have you heard of it?"  Heinrich spoke, to which Regine nodded,  "I have, Grandfather." 
 "It has long been a haven for the grotesquery of mankinds intersection with both the infernal powers and necromantic amateurs. It is theorised that this springs from a deep-seated curse within the land, but nothing has been definitively proven. In such a theatre of rot and misery, that it would become a haven for such an emissary is sadly all too predictable." 

A pregnant pause lingered in the air. Once enough time had passed to respectfully take over from Heinrich, it was Wulf who offered the next words.

 "Unfortunately, one of our kind has also taken up residence within Mousillon. He - " 
 "The Red Knight." 

Wulf blinked, the others curious,  "you have heard of him?" 

Regine felt four sets of vampiric eyes turn to settle upon her, almost pinning her in place; over a collective millennia of actions and thoughts waiting in scrutiny. She knew she had to choose her words carefully.

 "Before I was honored with rebirth into the family, my companions and I were set to travel to Mousillon, to face this Red Knight. A Knight I travelled with, Sir Bertelis Roche, with whom I drew close, confessed to me a familial tie with this vampire, whomever he is. We went to a seer in Turris Vigilans who confirmed it, and divulged further that the Red Knight and Sol Kunarr are locked in a stalemate, as the Red Knight uses necromancy to replenish his ranks and Sol Kunarr, in such a benighted and plagued land, has no shortage of new cultists. He wields a spear with magical properties, the  Spear of Manaan , and he is able to entrance foes with a gaze." 
 "That doesn't sound like a Blood Dragon,"  Ulrich spoke up, the sense of peer scrutiny immediately lifted from the former thief.

 "The Lahmians wouldn't dare let one of their own out of their control to such an extent,"  Wulf added.

As Ulrich, Wulf and even Heinrich discussed the possibility of these categories, of which Regine knew almost nothing, it was only Camile that still looked at her, a glimmer in her eye and residual smile upon her lips as she alone detected the true meaning behind the former thiefs phrase, 'drew close'.

As for the discussion? Blood Dragon. Lahmians. Even the term Necrach was employed. Regine knew none of what these words meant, or why they would be significant to the deliberations. Instead, they only served as a reminder that she still had much more to learn about her new existence.

Finally, Heinrich silenced the chatter with a raised, open palm, and silence descended immediately.

 "There is troublingly little that we know of the Red Knight, my granddaughter,"  he said, those aged eyes looking at her, centuries of thoughts and experience behind them,  "our family lineage is not the only faction of our kind that exists and operates within the lands of the kine. They offer further challenges to our long-term goals, and should you encounter any other vampires in the world, even if they bare our last name, tread lightly, for they are not your friends. As for Sol Kunarr, that he would have the resources to spare to initiate the dissemination of plagues in adjacent lands suggests that he is either winning or toying with the Red Knight, or holding him at bay while mustering fresh power to bare against him. In either case, his intrusion into our domain cannot be tolerated for reasons that should be all too obvious." 

Once more, a pregnant pause lingered in the air.

 "He is no longer a curiosity hundreds of miles away. He is now a threat to this region. To  our  family. I should not have to elaborate on why we do not wish to watch our human herds disappear beneath a tide of disease and chaos." 

Regine could see where this was going.

 "Your former occupation has furnished you with the skills and mind necessary to do what must be done, granddaughter. Sol Kunarr and his cultists. The Red Knight and his minions. Travel to Mousillon, infiltrate the city and ensure that our family achieves a favorable outcome."
 
 "Define favorable outcome." 
 "They all die." 
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 
 "There was one other matter, father"  Ulrich's voice chimed in.

 "The abandoned silver mine where Regine uncovered this plot, she also found the deed in possession of the Norscans second-in-command, a shaman."
 
The vampiric scholar then produced the rolled up vellum, placing it upon the table before him and unfurling it to reveal rows of scribed black ink and a small, weighted coat-of-arms system tethered to its base.  "I thought perhaps it might have been a fraud, but as far as I can discern it is genuine." 

Heinrich snorted lightly in dismissal.

 "That arrogant fop in Tour-en-Bois,"  he shook his head, his neatly trimmed silvery beard seemingly accentuated in the gloom of their surroundings.

 "His father was a brave man, but he is a greedy one. This suggests that Sul Kunnar's influence is deeper than anticipated. That a band of Norscans could acquire the deed to a delipidated industry in the mountains? Camile." 
 "Oui, mon père?" 
 "Have any of your agents reported on new ventures commissioned by that stupid boy?" 

Regine's mother shook her head, evidently sincere,  "Non, papa. He is an eccentric, but his advisors keep a short leash on his expenditures." 

Heinrich thought for several long moments, and Regine could almost see the gears turning within the elder vampire's mind.

 "Either he's not as foolish as he appears and gave a local courts gossips the slip, he's in secret league with Sul Kunnar, or your agents are losing their edge. Determine which is which and act accordingly." 

Camile bowed her head in a seated curtsey,  "Oui, mon pap." 

Mother has agents? Regine thought to herself, the surprise perhaps not particularly that shocking, but the confirmation nonetheless was another reminder that she had much to learn in this new family and unlife. Afterall, Camile mentioned 'watching her' since LA'guille, perhaps that was how?

 "I could edit the deed, father,"  Ulrich offered, tapping a gloved finger against the seemingly priceless vellum.

 "Place it within the stewardship of one of our servants, or one of Camile's agents, whichever proves worthy. The humans can operate it and we will be silent owners." 

Heinrich pursed his lips and thought, leaning back in consideration.

 "They will also keep their fellow mortals in line, ensure they don't stray from their duties and wander into the mountains." 

Whatever pro's and con's Heinrich was weighing it soon became clear her was coming down in favour of the proposition.

 "We will require twenty percent of final net income,"  he decreed, Ulrich nodding in agreement,  "five percent of which is received by the one who made this possible." 

All eyes turned back to Regine, who had almost melted into the background in silence. Eyes widened slightly, mouth parting, she could see the small, approving looks from her uncles and her mother beside her.

 "Er, grandfa...me? I was just invest..." 
 "You showed initiative and risk life and limb. You have brought to our attention happenings within the region that escaped our notice, as well as signals from Mousillon that demand a remedy. You have also initiated the entrance of future revenue into the family coffers. Consider yourself rewarded, grand-daughter." 

Were Regine still alive, she would have blushed with the pulse of her heart beating against her ribcage. Yet, despite the cessation of bodily functions, the youngest vampire at the table felt a swell of bashful pride as she followed her mothers example and performed a seated curtsey.

 "Thank you grandfather! And thank you all,"  she she cast her gaze across the others, Ulrich, Wulf and Camile.

 "Without what you taught me I doubt I would have returned." 

Though she could not see inside Camile's mind, this was particularly pleasing to hear. Curtsey and manners were a sign of good breeding, and though her selection for daughter had had come from low stock, she was learning. On the other side of the table, Heinrich apparently possessed similar thoughts, as he nodded once and then reached forward for the red-filled glass each of them had before them. Holding the goblet at the neck beneath the bulb, he held it aloft in gesture to the others, where Ulrich, Wulf, Camile and, lastly, Regine did likewise, her hand around the bottom of the transparent orb as if she were holding up a sphere of blood in her palm.

No toast was proposed, no grand speech rolled from Heinrichs lips. Instead, that gesture of respect and consideration was prompt enough, as all five vampires drank and Regine felt that sweet, cool nectar electrify her taste-buds before moving smoothly down her throat. She remembered it as well! When Camile was teaching her the finer points of mental conditioning to master her ravenous desires, she had mentioned that an exiled noble had turned to banditry in the woods, only for Wulf to have captured him instead and returning him to the castle where he was now well fed, but regularly bled for a fine refreshment.

With the glass to her lips, Regine looked over to Camile, who quickly noticed and returned her glance, as mother and daughter shared a small smile, before finishing their drink.
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 


Regine arose from her sleep the following night, her prior lethargy having washed away completely and replaced with a fresh vitality for a new night! However, though the prior evening had been filled with exploration, violence and excitement, tonight, the vampire knew, would be taken at a slower pace.

Drawing herself out of plush bed, the crimson silk sheets soft against her pale skin, the vampire was immediately alert and ready. The rich mahogany nightstand and drawers stood in silent attention about her room, the thick, blood-red velvet drapes already withdrawn by the servants after the sun went down so that Lady Regine could be greeted with the beautiful view the surrounding valley and fjord through her window upon her awakening.

The vampire inhaled. She didn't have to. She wanted to. Just for the fun of it. Just to feel the cool air rush down her throat and across her lungs as she stepped forward to the window, her eyes staring out across the verdant green forests and the silver moon dressing the sapphire current of the fjord.

Regine smiled. What a lovely night!

 
 Spoiler 
   
 

  The Weapon -   

Wulf's eyes widened as he viewed the weapon, drawing his free hand over and rubbing his palm down the breadth and steel of the beautiful and simple sword.

 "Gromril,"  he answered, finally.

 "And not just any gromril sword - this is  Midnight ." 

Regine blinked her eyes, mouth parting gently,  "How can you tell? The sword has a name?" 
 "Oh yes..."  Wulf answered, handing the weapon back to his niece and turning to the bookshelves arrayed on his western wall. He moved his hand contemplatively across the spines before selecting one and withdrawing it, parting it open tenderly before turning page after page. He muttered to himself as he reading through the text, Regine catching words such as 'dwarves' and 'orcs, until finally he  "Ah!"  and turned the book about, presenting its contents to his niece.

There, brandished on the page, was a sketched replica of the weapon she held in her hands.

 "The snakes head pommel sparked a memory,"  Wulf stated as Regine read.

 "...belonged to...House DuBois...granted to Baron DuBois...friendship between man and dwarf...gratitude for Bretonnian charged that saved the Chief of Clan Diamondbeard...passed onto his son...and his son...and his son..."  Regine furrowed her brow,  "what happened to it? How did it end up in the hands of a minion of chaos?" 

Wulf shrugged,  "but eventually the House fell into ruin, the weapon was captured and never seen again...until now, three hundred years later." 

Regine's eyes widened,  "it's over three  hundred  years old?"  she gasped, her uncle smirking and nodding.

 "It's older than both you and I combined. Gromril is made from a fallen star. Ulrich knows more about it, but only the dwarves have access to the stuff, and only they know how to forge arms and armor from it. As you can imagine, it is quite rare, and  very  valuable."
 
Regine drew the weapon up, holding its long hilt in her hand, the ruby eyes of the snakes-head pommel glimmering as she did so. Peering down the simple straight length of the blade and giving it a safe swing, the vampire nodded.

 "Do you want it? It would be better used in your hands, Uncle, you're a far better swordsman." 

The older vampire closed his eyes briefly and shook his head,  "Keep it, niece. From where you're going, you'll need it more than I." 
  The Blood -   
 "I understand your former companions are in Mousilln, child?"  Heinrich asked, standing by the fireplace in the war room, the crackling flame casting an orange hue over his aged and imposing features.

Regine felt a knot forming in her stomach, her grandfathers deep and sonorous voice dredging up numerously awful predictions.  "I believe they are, father." 
 "You may not be agreeable to your former allies, and they may prove unreliable in extinguishing both the Red Knight and Sul Kanarr." 

Regine was silent for several moments, unsure of what to say. The thought had crossed her mind: Bertelis, Wighard, Jasmine, Grimgoth, Bruno, particularly Bertelis. A part of her wanted to see him again, to assure him that she was fine, things were alright now, she was safe and happy, and that she'd meant everything she'd told him.

 "Your age and inexperience grants you leniency from me, and the others, but it will not stay the hand of the mortals that will see you as monster and predator." 

Heinrich turned away from the from the fire, his silvery hair neatly styled back, that short beard of his well-groomed. He returned to the central table at which Regine sat, placing himself down on a seat opposite her and continuing.

 "If you decide to recruit their assistance, you must be prepared to abandon the alliance and flee at the first sign of betrayal. I understand you are likely to still retain sympathy, perhaps even affection for them, but they are mice and you are the hawk. They will react accordingly." 

It was a lot to consider. The vampire swallowed out of reflex, even though she didn't need to.
 
"Father, I've been meaning to ask...why was I chosen? Why me?" 
 "Camile saw your clear skill and ability. You are quite accomplished in your line of work for someone of only twenty years." 
 "But she required your approval: why did you say yes? Wulf is a knight and brilliant swordsman. Ulrich knows the arcane, alchemy and gunpowder. Camile maintains a network of agents. What's my purpose? Why me?" 

Heinrich smiled.

 "We will be within this fortress for another few years. Five, I predict. Our ultimate destination is the Border Princes, where each of you will be given positions of prominence and responsibility. Camile understands the pomp and intrigue of court. You, my granddaughter, know the criminal underworld. In Kislev there are a hidden, but known, brotherhood called the Chekist, whom answer solely to the Tsarina. They do not spread terror, but they are the eyes, ears and knife in the dark for the hidden enemies of the Kislev Tsardom." 
 "You want me to form...some type of Secret Police?" 

Heinrich grunted softly in amusement,  "I want you to exercise discretion, restraint and sound judgement, child." 

The Vampire Count stood up and moved towards the door. However, he paused beside his granddaughter and put a hand on her shoulder.

 "If your former companions tolerate your presence, I imagine that this will be the last night you are among us for some years. I cannot imagine tests greater than the path you will take, with them by your side. However much your affections for them may return, remember that they are mortal, and you are eternal. In three hundred years all of them will simply be a memory, while you will be at my side and that of your mother, building something new and magnificent. Do not get too attached to any one mortal, they do not last long. We are your family, never forget that." 

Regnie swallowed. She brought her hand over her chest and put it on her grandfathers, looking up at him looming above her, his neatly bearded face filling her vision.

 "I won't grandfather. You rose me from nothing and granted me the honor of our last name. I am a von Carstein, and my gratitude will never cease." 

Heinrich smirked slightly and nodded once. It was the barest of gestures, but from him, it might as well have been abject praise, as Regine felt a warmth spread in her body where she received the approval of a grandparent she had always wanted.

 "Do not get over-confident. Do not forget your nature. Should an emergency arise, we will send riders. Return to us in safety." 
BananaPhone
   Regine von Carstein 

The courtyard of Forteresse de Carstein had likely seen many triumphs, warmths and tragedies, but never had it bore witness to a heartfelt departure.

Perhaps deep down all of those assembled wondered if they would ever see each other again, for it wasn't impossible that Regine would meet her end in the fire of some made-eyed vampire hunter or upon the claws of some mighty beast even a vampire could not overcome. And her relative 'crash course' in the ways of their kind had been regrettably short, cut as such by the immediacy of the threat that Sul Kunar and the Red Knight posed, and Regine being the only one who could travel to Mousillon unnoticed and without attraction further attention and enemies to the banner of these two enemies. And so, Wulf, Camile, Ulrich and Heinrich, stood at the base of the castle entrance within the courtyard of Forteresse de Castein as they watched their newest member packed her final things and tethered them to her horse.

Pulling a strap tight and fastening the metal buckle against the leather, Regine stepped back to give  Blood  a once over visual inspection, the saddle bags neatly packed, but visibly thick with contents, while further items of clothing were packed, rolled and sealed within further bags that were tied to the horses saddle and gear. There was one sack in particular what was fat with prize, its contents a trophy few mortal men would claim in their short lives, a single long, bovine horn protruding from the tied opening as a hint of what lay within. Finally satisfied with her mount and property, Regine turned back to the others, meeting all of their gazes and drawing herself down to offer a curtsey of farewell. Of course, it was her mother that stepped forward.

Camile put her arms around her daughter, drawing her in for a close, tight hug, her lips soon coming to kiss her on the cheek in sincere farewell.  "Be safe mon lapin! You owe the mortals nothing; come back to us. Otherwise, I may need to visit!"  the smile on her face hinting at something in the future, something cheeky and playful, teasing a potential comedy of Regine and some boyfriend dreading the arrival of her mother.

 "I will mother, and thank you again. For everything,"  she focused upon Camile's smiling face. To think that the vampire before her was only a few decades 'older' than Regine herself was a stark reminder for the former thief. Camile's image looked little older than Regine's, perhaps five years or so into her twenties, yet the several decades of unlife had further sculpted her personality, perhaps even teased and accentuated her inner desire to indulge in her maternal impulses, if even for a moment.

The Aspiring Champions words echoed in her head, the belief she was an unchanging corpse walking a doomed earth. Ridiculous and ignorant.

 "Thank you  all , for everything. Whether it is a few months, a few years or a few decades. I will be at your side again." 

The four of them stood and bid her farewell. Camile, Heinrich, Ulrich and Wulf. Four beings she didn't even know existed a month ago, yet whom she knew felt closer to than anyone, for they all shared blood. Regine knew not who her mother was, nor father, nor if she had any siblings out there in the greater world. But she knew she had these four, and beyond Bretonnia in the lands of Sylvania, she had further von Carsteins, all united in blood and name.

Holding  Blood  by his reigns and drawing herself up into the saddle, Regine offered a farewell wave that was returned by all.

 "Au revoir, à la prochaine!"  she bid them, as  Blood  turned himself about and took her peacefully through the castle gates and back out into the banks of the fjord and surrounding mountains. Stealing a look over her shoulder, Regine noticed that it was Camile who was the last to turn back to the house, catching her daughters look and blowing her a kiss.

The fjord and mountains soon gave way to just a forest, before it too submitted to the open, verdant plains for which Bretonnia was famous. Regine rode alone,  Blood  gently galloping beneath her as she rose and descended her hips in motion with the animal to ease the strain upon its strong back, the wind sweeping off the fields and catching her black hair to billow it behind her and kiss her bare face with its rushing pass. The present and the past surrounded her, green and beautiful, the stars of the night a sea of diamonds within which sat the beautiful disc of Luna, and far in the distance, miles away yet, Regine could se the deep river crossing that separated Bordeleaux from Mousillon.

A cursed, blighted region that no man of innocent heart should venture, lest it be plucked from his chest by a passing ghoul, goblin or monster. Yet there was her destination. Tasked by her grandfather, lured by promises and free to pursue them how she wished.

The vampire smiled and rode across the field and beneath the stars. Onwards, to Mousillon!


 &gt;&gt;&gt; Thread Likely Closed as Character Moving to Another Game &lt;&lt;&lt; 