The Tides of War (Umbral and Salice)
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		<h2 id="linktree">Play-By-Post: Bondage, D/s, S&amp;M =&gt; Bondage: Exotic Solos =&gt; Topic started by: Umbral Sanguinus on 09-09-2009, 06:11:18</h2>
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				Title: <strong>The Tides of War (Umbral and Salice)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Umbral Sanguinus</strong> on <strong>09-09-2009, 06:11:18</strong>
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				<div align="center"><strong>Part I: The Return</strong></div>
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				Title: <strong>Re: The Tides of War (Umbral and Salice)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Beautiful Poison</strong> on <strong>09-09-2009, 08:50:23</strong>
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				The broad, main road leading out of the massive stone gates of the Thulenmar kingdom was deserted save for one person casually strolling away from the torch lit towers. As the sounds of the great city faded behind her, Salice was left to wander the familiar cobblestone street alone in near silence. <br><br>She had remained untouched by the passage of time, her beauty unblemished by age or hardship. Only her eyes betrayed the weary, weathered soul that remained hidden inside her immortal shell. Deep crimson and always watchful, they glared intensely out from under sterling lashes. Once flickering with life, they seemed dull and listless, resembling a grand garnet that had now lost it's shimmer. Her silvery tresses were pulled out of her face this evening. Two braids looped lazily from her temples, tied togeher loosely at the back of her head. The moonlight ricocheting off of her sheet of mirror like hair, sending prisms dancing about the surrounding trees. <br><br>A cool breeze caring whispers of the harvest seasons danced across the exposed skin of her shoulders and neck. She paused in her stride, taking in a deep breath, savoring the hints of the crisp fragrances that autumn would soon bring to the land. So she stood for a moment, eyes shut, head tilted back with her arms lifted as if welcoming the season with an embrace like an old friend. <br><br>She was dressed casually this eve, wearing a silken tunic of deep blue that clung to the outsides of her shoulders. A thick corset made from smooth black leather claimed her torso, hugging it protectively within it's rigid confines. The soft swells of her breasts perched delicately atop the ridge of leather, bouncing tauntingly with her every step. Her breeches were also black leather, but these were no doubt made from a younger animal. It yielded to her movements, snugly fitted to the curve of her broad hips and moulding perfectly to her firm, round backside. It's laces broke the velvety landcape, criss crossing their way up from mid thigh to her belt. On her feet she wore the thick, armored boots of the guards. Large leather scales held in place with small ropes of chain mail over the laces running up the shin that made faint rattling noises as she walked. <br><br>A peculiar set of weapons adorned her person. Across her back two perfectly cylindrical poles of metal were strapped forming an "X" across her shoulders. One a shiny silver polished to a mirror shine. The other a deep steel gray, nearly black. Each pole reached about two and a half feet in length. She also carried two swords. Sheathed over the back of her hips, the broad curved blades mimicked the curves of her bottom, accentuating their natural sway. <br><br>Pausing only a moment longer to tighten the strings on her right, fingerless glove, she set back out again at a slow pace. Only the sound of the leaves being caressed by the breeze accompanied the jingling melody of her boot steps. <br><br>She hated nights like tonight. When there was nothing to distract her from the thoughts that had haunted her for the last hundred and fifty years. The letter she had received begging for aid. The agreement to meet him once the issues had been settled, only to have him called away shortly after. They were only supposed to be a part for a months time. <br><br>Salice spat on the ground in disgust, now having nothing left to protect her mind from the memories that sprang back all to willingly. She had received the letter from Sunsol Thulenmar, the ruleling king of a land threatened by the massive dwarven stronghold in the northern mountains. He had pressed her to depart at once, leaving her precious little time to gather her things and set out on her journey. <br><br>She could still picture him, standing by the massive marble staircase. The look in his piercing green gaze had lingered with her for ages. The mixture of dislike and longing at her departure. The way he held onto her before she'd turned to walk out the door. <br><br>With a groan, Salice shook her head, as if trying to remove the images from her mind. Picking up the pace, she stuffed her hands back into her pockets, recounting the war that had followed shortly after that. Sunsol and his generals had planned to attack first, staging a series of sieges on the massive stone keep. It was risky to be sure and many called it a suicide run. So sure of a sneak attack that the king had been completely unprepared for saboteurs within his own armies. Traitors that had escaped to the dwarves had soon spilled all the secrets the King had at his disposal. They had been waiting for the company that Salice had been assigned to. Most died in the first wave and they had been the lucky ones. Those that survived were quickly captured and tortured without mercy. Most managed to kill themselves before divulging any more of the Kings secrets. It was only a matter of time before her weakness to magics was discovered. <br><br>Two weeks of fruitless attempts to retake her troops ended when she had been overwhelmed by a pair of rogues armed with magically charmed poisoned arrows. The rest was mostly a fuzzy memory of various methods of pain and tortures. Even two beheading attempts. All of which the dwarves found useless. Disgusted, they kept her locked away, diligently keeping her drugged and subdued. How many years had she been locked up? Forty? Sixty? She couldn't be sure, as the days and nights blended into one horrendous nightmare. Within the walls of the hold, buried deep within the bosom of the great northern peaks, there was no moon and no sun to judge the changing of the seasons. The guards would come and go, adjusting the doses of toxins long enough to allow her to eat and drink. <br><br>Weak enough to stay restrained, but not skinny enough to be unattractive, several of the guards would violate her during her countless hours of unconsciousness. Her clouded mind seethed with a hatred she had only known in the early years of her life. But it would become her salvation. A new guard had taken over her doses and was a regular visitor at her cell. Remarking frequently how the drugs made her look disgusting, he began cutting back on the injections for his own enjoyment. Feeling her mind sharpen with each passing day, she sat propped up against the wall of her cell, plotting. He came in on time per usual. A grin in place for the activities soon to follow. It had happened far to quickly and easily than Salice had wished for the dwarf. She had not moved quickly, but the fact the moved at all had been enough to shock him into stillness. With a sharp twist of the neck, he had fallen lifelessly to the floor with a thud, leaving the door to her cell wide open. <br><br>Sneaking out into the deserted hallway, Salice found her means to escape. A cart loaded with the bodies of expired prisoners, on their way outside to be burned. She lay hidden within the corpses for days, feeling herself grow stronger around those that had not. Once outside, she managed to overpower the soldiers in charge of the cremations, stealing some clothing from their bodies, she prepared for the decent down the mountain. <br><br>Following the trail that had once lead her into battle, Salice carefully picked her way through the forests. Catching rabbits and squirrels where she could to regain her strength. It was a grueling month long journey back down from the foot hills into the forests of Thulenmar. She passed several villages along the outskirts. Poor farmers offering her food and shelter and proper clothing. It was here that Salice learned of the kings victory, managing to suppress the threat to his land, but unable to overthrow the mountain fortress. After the treachery he had suffered, the King threw his armies into the heated battle, fueled by his rage. Sunsols eldest son, Serunsol,&nbsp; now sits upon the throne, and Salice set off to speak with him.<br><br>Sending a letter ahead, the young King welcomed her into the castle graciously offering her whatever means she required. After agreeing to allow the healers a proper look at her wounds, Salice eventually recovered fully from the ordeal and was eager to return to her home. Serunsol had given her his fastest horse and all the supplies he could carry. Before she took to the road, he had offered her a place and work in his Kingdom should she ever need to accept. <br><br>Not even wasting a single night more, Salice took off for Drache. The two of them had shared his home on the outskirts of the large city and returning there was the only thing that had kept her strong. Stopping long enough to give the horse rest and water, she had made it in record time, a little under eight days. Thinking nothing of the empty look to the mansion, she pushed past the front gate that groaned in rusted protest. After fumbling with the massive aged door, she managed to shoulder it open. <br><br>She stood in the doorway looking in at the once grand manor. The afternoon light filtered in green through the grime encrusted windows, illuminating what must have been eighty years worth of dust. She knew it was useless to even hope that he was here, but she called out for him regardless and was greeted with her own hopeless sounding voice as it echoed off of the high ceilings. She went in, looking in all the spots she could think of, hoping to find a note or letter to his whereabouts. The house was empty, save for her.<br><br>The next week was spent meticulously cleaning the interior. Dusting and scrubbing the floors and furnature. The one room she had been dreading all week was the one she had saved for last. Standing in the doorway, she gazed in at their once grand bed chambers. Half hearted, she set about the restoration, trying to keep her eyes from the bed where the sheets still held the shape from their last morning together. But finally it was finished and she dropped exhausted into the freshly made sheets of the massive bed. <br><br>She tried to get back to the life she had known before the war, but it was just a hollow shell of her past. With each passing year she grew less and less hopeful. Having set out many times to uncover his location, to find any news of him. Most of the towns people that had remembered him had passed away by now, leaving his manor and his presence little more than a ghost story in which to frighten their children with at night. Returning each time to the mansion with no word or whispers of him. <br><br>Twenty years of this would pass by, almost as if she had never left the cell at all. Salice would have welcomed the mind numbing poisons to help her escape her mounting fears that she would never see him again. It grew unbearable for her until she finally had more than she could take. Leaving a long message for him on the pillow he slept on, Salice told him of what had happened but spared some of the details, leaving him with her location and her love, begging him to come find her when he finally came home. <br><br>She returned to the land of Thulenmar, greeted warmly by an aging Serunsol and his Queen. She was offered a large manor on an estate just outside of the city walls and Salice accepted it graciously, grateful for the seclusion and quiet. <br><br>It was here she had remained for the last fifty two years. The lands were now ruled by a new King with bold new visions for his people. He invited Salice to his court often, delighting in her tales of his grandfather and the great battles with the dwarves. Salice was able to mask her dislike for the story well, keeping the King believing it was a proud war story she would gladly retell a thousand times. <br><br>In the beginning she had taken the journey to Drache every few years to check up on her old home, to see if any signs of life were visible. And each time she left, leaving a new note on the pillows for him to find. The visits were growing few and far between, the last having been nearly ten years ago. <br><br>Salice sighed, realizing she needed to make the pilgrimage yet again, unwilling to give up all her hope that he was still out there, somewhere. She kicked a stone on the road unenthusiastically, mumbling to herself as it skipped off into the grass. A lit street light up ahead signaled her turn off towards her home that was still a good two miles away. <br><br>Throwing her head back to rest between the cross of her two polearms, she whispered to the evening breeze. <br><br>"Vincent, I miss you." 
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				Title: <strong>Re: The Tides of War (Umbral and Salice)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Beautiful Poison</strong> on <strong>05-12-2009, 06:24:25</strong>
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				"Bah!" she scowled at herself in the night, kicking a stray stone with the side of her booted foot. "Still weak." <br><br>Salice shook her silvery braided head and smirked, eyes suddenly becoming sharp and refined, glimmering with a bit of the old life they had once held. Taking off at a decent run, she streaked down the road with elvish speed, moving soundlessly through the night air like a large cat chasing unaware prey. She leaped off the road, now moving through the underbrush and low hanging trees, hurdling shrubs and startling birds from their evening slumber. <br><br>"Still too slow." She growled out to the listening forest. Her graceful, powerful form gained speed, head ducking and body twisting to avoid making contact with various branches and rocks. She could almost make out the torches that lit the way to her manor up ahead. <br><br><br>She was reminded of one of the last afternoons she had spent with him. Spring had just graced the land, and they had spent an evening running through the forests. She had been like a silver deer, naked and laughing as she danced with a carefree swiftness. He had been the ebony wolf, stalking an animal with a hunger in his belly.<br><br>The memory caused an excited laugh to slip from between her pink lips as she felt the old giddy energy seep into her body, as though he chased her still. 
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				Title: <strong>Re: The Tides of War (Umbral and Salice)</strong><br>
				Post by: <strong>Beautiful Poison</strong> on <strong>27-12-2009, 01:29:12</strong>
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				The tall, iron fence that surrounded her house was growing closer and closer, she could see it up ahead in the pale light of the moon. Springing into the air, her well trained hands caught a low hanging branch, and with a wide swing, she vaulted over the fences many tall spikes. Booted feet hit the ground hard, digging into the earth as she lunged forward again. <br><br>Off to the side, she spotted a large buck, grazing happily on the bushes near by. Brow narrowed as she changed her course, veering off to the right in pursuit of her prey. Swiftly, she yanked a worn looking dagger from her hip, holding it carefully to the side of her body, out of her way. <br><br>Lifting his great horned head, he spotted his attacker, and with a snort, bounded away, with Salice on his heels. 
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