you can always come back, but you can't come back all the way

((RP MODE))

Long before the monk left last night, I grew tired of hiding. I'd been in the sithen all day, feeling his presence come forward and withdraw, and I had grown profoundly sick of my own weakness. The next time he departed, I made to go, opening the sithen rock and striding forward to my home, to see if he had the courage to face me openly after all that had happened. But I was waylaid in my quest by the odd half-demon in Lumindor who'd taken it upon himself to "save" my Raven lover from himself, when my lover had succumbed to the demonic side of his nature...which was patently inappropriate, no demon is ever "saved"...as I'm learning to my detriment.

Unbeknownst to me, the Court's resident mage of night had come across someone who pervaded the air with magics, and wondered at him....and he had the gall to admit to her what he'd done to me. At that point, the Queen's called hunt came into play, and the chase was on.

She trapped him in ice, rock and snow, all of which he dispelled; she trapped him in a cage of thought, and crushed the walls of it around him; he crawled from that and she dropped meteors on his head. One must be grateful for the small matter of his healing factor, which was news to me, when later I heard. Or perhaps the only wounds that last are wounds dealt by another demon.

Perhaps my wounds to him, will last some time.

She finally brought him to his knees, whimpering, and he surrendered to her...but in the last moments, as she knelt over him to bind him, he spun her away into grey limbo, the temporal space I know so well, and despair of seeing. She managed to shackle him, but not bind his powers, and he, arms behind his back, crept off into the woods.

My demon lover's warrior pet found him, seized him, fought him to a halt--which truly did not take much--and bound his powers with charged straps across his upper arms. She brought him to the sithen, but lost him in a thicket of trees.

At that point, however, I'd returned to the sithen myself, brooding in my demon's quarters, and recklessly, I reached out with my growing powers, pulling the monk through the very sithen rock, binding him in place and letting him hang. I had to leave, and spent some time with the young Hunter, free of complication, for my spirit needed such renewal.

Later, I was contacted by the warrior pet, and summoned back to the room, telling the girl of a charge I'd received from the lady Raven. Her Queen, our Queen, wished the monk to be brought to the Hall of Mortality, for further...exploration. Between us, we half-carried, half-dragged him upstairs, and tied him to one of the impaling spikes.

He taunted us both, tried to seduce the girl, sending that long tongue I well remembered across the floor, o'erconfident of his abilities. I told him I'd cut it off, were it to touch the girl or I. The girl seized on this, and cut the first six inches of his tongue away, presenting it to me as a trophy. I secured it with spell and craft, and hid it away in time, clotted-cream eyes narrowing as I watched him.

Blood poured from his wound, yet still he taunted us. The girl had to rest, and I sent her away, she warning me all the while on touching him....but I had my own plan. After all, the other thing the lady Raven had requested, was that the source of his power...at least, that physical manifestation of it...be removed.

This, I thought, I could now do.

Fear grew in his eyes, and he did all that his changeable body could to protect himself. I pulled my favorite throwing dagger, tapping the hilt against my lips, and set one hand on him, drawing on my growing powers, sending pulse after pulse of sheer, unadulterated pleasure into him. Directly into his heart--or what passes for such--at first, but then...body-wide, making me shudder with the backlash.

He reacted. Of course he reacted. And I neatly bisected the manhood from the man.

I sent that part, as well, to wait in preservation space, and when next he looked at me, his eyes were not tender in the least. Now he bled from twin wounds, shrieking, and I soaked in his screams like sweet wine. I told him, since he'd nigh to cost me all I cared for, mayhap lost me my last chance with my love, I should remove some chances from him.

He scoffed at this and I stepped close once more, sliding one inch of my dagger into his belly, twisting the blade. He gasped, but continued his taunting, and I slid the blade deeper. He nigh passed out from the sudden pain, and I offered him a choice--remain bound to the spike, or be impaled upon it.

He pretended to think, and then shot out his tongue, wrapping it about my throat. And any other day, any other moment, I might have been felled by this, the consciousness squeezed from me....but he forgot I was armed.

I did not.

I slashed at the blunt muscle, writhing in my grasp, until it fell with a wet thunk to the floor and he withdrew the remainder. I picked up the section of tongue, sending it away to wait, and secured him tightly to the post. As I did, he bucked against me, covering the front of me with blood, and bade me drink.

"I trust no gifts from your hands," I said, "now or ever," and turned to leave. He just watched me. I cleaned his blood from my blade, sliding it into its thigh sheath, and opened the door of the Hall. For a moment, I forgot his words, and licked my lips....but, such a small amount of his blood, t'would make no difference, would it? I'd drunk so much before, attempting to fight him off...if there was taint in it, I would have been tainted afore now.

I made my way, breathing hard, to the bathing pool, and thoroughly washed every speck of blood from my skin, my hair, my gown. Then I sought my bed.

This morning, when I rose, I went on a search for items to complete my gift for the Queen of Air and Darkness. My search took me to many odd parts of the world, I'd never gone before. Spell ingredients are so scarce, at times...



I crept carefully by the oddly-noted Death Turkey enclosure...



...entered the wrong tavern, where they threw me on stage to sing...



...and found a lovely place that understood the true decorative value of a jar of eyes.

It took many hours. It took longer still, enchanting what I had to give. But finally, the work was done.



You'll have to forgive me, I'm...not myself, today....

::giggles insanely, dances off into the woods::