Swordplay [Aurin]

[Imogen]

Frost 13

Sharp's Edge Manor

The manor in which Imogen had taken up residence was several hours north of Zaichaer, though one could get there quickly by horse or cab. It was a few miles off the northern highway, marked but not well-marked by an ancient wooden sign, and utterly surrounded by the famous gothic woods which had once been the region's foremost resource and expert, before the revolution of New Atheism and the technologies it had brought.

Once one had made it through the travails of travel, however, the destination was worth the walk. Sharp's Edge was a hilltop manor which had once served as a refuge of last resort for a wider farming community; over time, as the farms had receded and the forest moved back in, it had been remodeled in the style of old Gelerand, with aesthetically-arranged timber and a profusion of small towers marring an otherwise-clean roofline. It was a beautiful old house, and if it had been a little closer to Zaichaer it would have been the crown jewel of some ancient and wealthy lineage.

It was also absolutely goddamn enormous.



This particular Frost day was unseasonably warm, with snow yet a distant threat on the northern horizon, and so Imogen had taken the opportunity to take breakfast out on the manor's large stone veranda. It was a modest affair; food wasn't really Imogen's vice, and several weeks of careful review of the manor's finances had made her acutely aware of just how expensive it could be to arrange and stock larger meals. Nevertheless, she was grateful for a chance to escape Ansel's stuffy study--well, her study, now, she supposed, but it felt very wrong to say that--and she wasn't about to miss what might well be the last proper opportunity to work outside without freezing to death for months.

"You know, Kitty, no amount of poor treatment at the Pfenning, nor even the Order could make me leave Zaichaer..." Imogen scratched the enormous shadow cat behind the ears, "But Frost... it can't be that the gods wanted people to spend winters this far north. It's a defiance of nature, is what it is. We shall come to regret our insult to great Aedrin."

Kitty yawned, having heard this particular opinion many times before in his short life. Orkhan did not like the cold, the ice and the wind and the snow. No surprises there, after all, they were sort of lizards.

Well, not that Imogen had that excuse right now. Though there were only a handful of staff on the grounds right now (and only three on shift), and there was no reason to believe that any strangers were going to swing by today, the witch had been careful in how often she dropped her human disguise. As a result, she was currently missing more than a full foot of height, and a great deal of weight, inhabiting the body of a short, slim human girl. She could have been Carina's sister, with her slight build, fair skin and raven-black hair, except for the violet eyes she'd seen no reason to alter.

(That and the white lemur tail, but it was easy enough to hide that in a dress.)

Thinking of Carina, whose totem she bore, always brought a hot blush to her cheeks, so she pushed that thought aside. Her eyes wandered back to the book sitting open on the table next to her empty plate, filled with figures and dates, and little descriptions written in Linus' neat, steady hand. Below it were new entries, penned in her looping scrawl. The contrast annoyed her, just a bit, but it was hard to adjust to writing with hands this small and delicate, fingers this nimble and clever and-

"Enough, enough." the witch chided herself, shifting on the bench and peering towards the woods. It felt like she'd been reading financials for months, now. Part of her was tempted to take a jaunt to Ailos, the sunkissed southern island always tempting with its tropical climate, always calling at the back of her mind. They were far enough from Zaichaer here that the Order was unlikely to notice the magic it would take to Traverse that distance, but she'd have a devil of a time getting back. No, that would have to wait for some other day. Perhaps once the winter snows had really set in, she would take some of the staff there, as a holiday? It was a nice thought...

"Thinking isn't going well right now, Kitty. Let's take a little walk."

The disguised witch put down her fork and knife, setting the plate to the side of the table where Luce would get to it in time, then closed the ledger and tucked it under one arm. The day wasn't nearly bright enough to bother her, but she put her sunhat back on nevertheless. She liked wearing them, and had never been able to find one large enough to fit her head in Zaichaer. One might as well enjoy the little things, in times like these.

[Aurin]

Aurin didn't exactly weaponize his ignorance, but he said the right words to the right Railrunner and they let him scan their surface thoughts—provided willingly—so he could mark Sharp's Edge in the slipspace. Valencia had taught him more about magic than anyone else because he was ignorant, but powerful, and she felt that was a dangerous combination. He could only agree and soak up the knowledge and the lore—he wouldn't call it wisdom because while he recognized that she was wise, he was not.

"Cool, cool, cool," he said. "Cool, cool." The slang he picked up from the youngest coven, the Whispers, was funny even in his own ears. "Aye, I'll definitely buy you a drink when I get back," he told her, his fellow Railrunner, and then he blipped away. It was the Rune for those who feared commitment.

Between one heartbeat and the next, he went from the Market ruled by the Railrunners to a sizeable manor due north.

It wasn't far enough away from Zaichaer to be entirely safe from the Order, so he found himself squinting around. One might thought him overwhelmed by the size of the place, but he was marking the glamours, the aural inversions, and thinking about how he would have to bolster them as well as the wards against scrying and such. This place could house quite a few witches and if things went south, this would be an excellent place to send those who couldn't travel directly to him at the Golden Peacock Theater in Kalzasi. Of course, those who had come through previously often felt they owed him a debt. He hadn't cashed in on a single one, saving them up for critical mass so he could make a play for the unworn crown of a witch-king.

Perhaps because he was actively sembling when he saw her, he saw through her glamour—or was that animism like Sivan used to change his appearance?

"Imogen," he said. "What the fuck are you wearing?"

[Imogen]

Well, it seemed that life had at least one constant- Aurin Kavafis turning up at the strangest times.

She'd expected to see him sometime this month, but she'd expected to see him coming up the road, meeting Linus at the door, being sat in the parlor, sort of thing- not simply materializing on the west lawn, looking for all the world like a scraggly alley cat who'd been dumped there by some great cosmic hand. Sure, she knew he had gotten quite keen with Traversion, but how the devil had he found his way here? Surely you had to have been to a place to find your way through the Slipspace? She filed that one away as another Railrunner trick she'd have to investigate.

"You recognize me, eh?" That had to be Semblance, though she did not know how good he was with that particular rune "Well, this is a travel hat- isn't it nice? I can never find one in my size, so... oh, you mean the body."

The witch spread her arms and did a little twirl, the green dress spinning, then stopped facing Aurin and performed a curtsey, lifting its edges. "I took the totem off Carina, of course.
You might have thought my human form would be big, but--if you can believe it--I'm pretty small for an Ork, so that leaves me comically small as a human."

Imogen sounded a bit put out by this, but it wasn't really true by any objective standards; she still stood a bit taller than five foot. It certainly had her lemur form beat, but then again one sort of understood what they were getting into when they transformed into a lemur. Truly, the psychology of Animus was a rich and vibrant area of study, presumably, somewhere. Perhaps some lone researcher in Sol'Valen had written treatises on the matter?

"Well, it won't trick a Sembler, obviously, but the patrols who stop by from time to time don't even have aura glasses, let alone mages. Figured I'd be borrowing trouble I don't need if the neighbors noticed that an Ork had moved in and taken over the place, you know? Last thing I want to do is have to kill an Order investigator and tell the coven I lost their property."

Her words were lighthearted and casual, but there wasn't a trace of dissembling in her aura. The Sunsinger was not even remotely concerned about the threat the Order might pose to her own safety, but only to the integrity and property of the coven. It had been much the same some months prior, when Imogen had described evading capture in the Atraxian sands and told Aurin she was relieved that she hadn't been forced to kill the patrol sent after her.

"Anyway, welcome- welcome to Sharp's Edge manor, Aurin. What's your fancy, a drink and a smoke, or a spar in the field?"

[Aurin]

It was, perhaps, a testament to the amount of trust he put in the strange Orkhan warrior that he ran his mouth rather than keep things to himself, though he was generally less restrictive with his power around witches given, well, he tended to have more clout for all the tricks he had mastered and that had seemed more worthwhile than having more tricks up his sleeve. He had those, too, mostly runeforged by Torin or similar.

But aye, he appeared right where he was meant to be, and aye, he sensed the telltale distortions of her aura that led him to observe more closely and realize that Imogen was wearing a sort of Carina suit rather than being a young human woman herself. He wondered—briefly—whether she would like him better if he acquired the shapeshifting trick so he could fuck her with a proper Orkhan endowment. Of course, his seeming trick could persuade her mind and her body that he had any size or shape endowment either of them might desire. He wondered—less briefly—whether she fancied little Carina because she could, in fact, change sex and liked a more petite...

Anyway.

"It's a very nice hat," he said, smirking. "I'll be sure to call you all sorts of diminutives when you're taller than me again."

He looked around a bit. Aurin had always been a shoe made for city streets, but he could appreciate the place. Torin had his magically protected valley far from many of the dangers Aurin feared, though there were, of course, other dangers in the Astralars. If he had a manor like this, he would want it remote and hidden, accessible only via Traversion, possibly. With lots and lots of traps.

He was, he knew, paranoid.

"Ahh... well... spar first, sex later? I mean... that is... drink and a smoke later? Wouldn't want our senses dulled for the sparring, of course."

Next time he brought her food or drink, he was really going to have to dose it with an aphrodisiac. She would retain her will, of course; he wasn't a monster. But if she got a little hot and bothered whenever he was around, well, what could go wrong?

[Imogen]

Damn, was sex really the only thing ever on Aurin's mind? Well, sex and power, she supposed, though some would say those were the same.

Unbelievable for a man who, if you could trust Carina's stories, had been under every skirt in Kalzasi, and inside half the breeches too. Wouldn't it get boring, eventually? Then again, there had been people in Ecith who'd propositioned her, and they had new bedmates every single night. Maybe some souls just couldn't drink too deeply of that particular well.

It wasn't as though the man were bad looking, he was quite handsome. She placed one finger against her cheek, looking him up and down in frank appraisal. Tall enough for a human, arms and legs corded with lithe muscle, a fast mind and lots of money. Easy to see how men and women both got a little obsessed. But...

"Tell you what, Aurin, let's make a game of it." Imogen turned her back on the man, then raised a hand above her shoulder to beckon him as she set off towards the empty field behind the manor "I promised you I'd share some of the secrets of the Sunsingers, and that's what I'm going to do. The first of those secrets? A little cultural import from Ecith- what gets a Sunsinger's attention is skill and strength. I'm going to give you a little lecture, and if you want to see me get hot and bothered instead... then you must make me shut up."

✧══════════•❁❀❁•══════════✧

Once the pair had reached the field, Imogen turned to face Aurin, then backed a few paces away. At this point, he might have expected her to set out the rules of the fight, or perhaps to summon a pact weapon, or at least take some sort of martial stance. She did not. In fact, her stance was absolutely casual, completely undefended.

Instead, the ork-cum-human crossed both of her arms beneath her (sadly diminished) breasts and closed her eyes, breathing deeply. Nothing could possibly have prepared Aurin for what would come next:

"In the days after the fall of the houses of the sons of Aileor," the witch began, her voice the boring monotone of a particularly uninspired TA, "The Cult of Mending rose in these lands, and the covens rose in opposition. In Zaichaer, there had long been a tradition of witches; these were men and women who had secret knowledge, that the suffering people of the land could come to with strange and intractable problems, and they would devise some solution. That is the heart of all witchcraft, knowing some way to remedy any ill. That is what sets us apart from the useless scholars of the Circle."

"When the Menders came, the witches were the first to recognize their 'help' for what it was. Those witches who had long worked together came to be called covens, and the leader of the covens came to be called the Witch-King, the one best able to see the truth of the threat and devise the appropriate responses to banish them from the lands. With this new unity of witches, a new power arose in Zaichaer, to rival and eclipse even the old dynasties."

Imogen lifted a single finger, her arms still nestled under her breasts, and focused. The air warped about her hand, and erupted into a fist-sized ball of crimson fire, positioned above her raised index finger. The witch Sculpted the flame, compressing and contracting the flame until it was a single, brilliant point of light. She pointed it at Aurin, telegraphing her attack well in advance.

"And the people came to know fear, for what was a Witch-King but the worst kind of tyrant, the like of which had long enthralled the distant realms of their foes? Fear and suspicion coalesced into determination, and the Order rose in these lands. Wielding the power of Negation, the first Rune made by man, they began to slaughter the covens."

The Sunsinger opened her hand, launching the compressed ball of fire at Aurin. Elementalism was by far the weakest of Imogen's arts, but she was still competent, and so the projectile was not particularly fast, but it contained enough power that the explosion would surely catch the slow or unwary opponent. It was the sort of attack she'd seen men claiming the mantle of pyromancer use a half-dozen times, and she considered it appropriately insulting to get Aurin's dander up.

[Aurin]

Aurin smirked, but replied with perfect candor: "I find you attractive, Imogen. I will not apologize for it. But while I may joke and remind you of that desire, I want you to want me. If you don't, then nothing will happen. If you want me to stop, say so and I will. Or just preen under my admiration..."

She didn't really seem bothered or he would have stopped long ago with the innuendos and such. Instead, he followed her to what would be their battlefield.

He listened to her story, whether it had come to her via the Sunsingers or elsewhere, he was well aware that the stories people told held power even if they were works of creative fiction sometimes. In any case, it was good to know what people thought, and he thought it would be good to be Witch-King. He knew that safety was an illusion, but he knew that power gave him more tools to evade or combat perils that came skulking for him in the dark. And for all that he claimed to be a bad man, he had used his power to succor the weak until they could be strong. He lied about himself, and to himself.

Aurin was used to reacting in a fight. He was not used to attacks coming so slowly that he could consider his options: blink out of the way was the easiest, though he could just as easily side-step it without magic; ward against fire, but it would be a waste of power. While he had power in spades now, he had survived long enough to build that power by being economical in its use. Tricks were better kept as secrets up one's sleeve, anyway.

He side-stepped the fireball.

He raised a dark red eyebrow.

A few years ago, he might have made a snide comment. Since then, Valencia Grey had actually taken the time to teach him something valuable, and now he had a bit more patience being taught. There had to have been a point to the slow-moving missile. His sembling trick was wide open, of course, in case it had merely been a distraction and a real threat was imminent.

[Imogen]

"Just checking to see if you're paying attention."

What did she know about Aurin's fighting style? Semblance, for certain, and he was very, very good at Traversion. He could do illusions as well, she remembered that very well from their ill-fated journey into Zaichaer after the catastrophe. Three Runes for sure, and she couldn't for the life of her recall if he'd ever revealed any others. Not an ideal situation for a fight, obviously- in a real mage's duel, you made sure you knew every magic your foe possessed, runes and runeforged items too, or you were apt to be decapitated by something totally unexpected. Thankfully, a spar wasn't that serious... and anyway, she doubted Aurin knew all that much about her powers.

"As you doubtless know, the bane of the Menders in many lands were the Dawnmartyrs, and it was as true here in Zaichaer as anywhere else. Even when they returned to Ailos, there were those in the northern lands who remembered the knights fondly. In time, however, the order was destroyed upon the command of the Emperor, who desperately sought to invade Ailos under whatever pretext he could muster. Though the order was devastated, they kept many of their great treasures from falling into the Imperium's hands by sending them north, to those families of Karnor who still honored their old allegiances."

The witch hooked a thumb behind her shoulder, gesturing at Sharp's Edge. "They ended up places like here, only to find the Order newly ascendant, on the cusp of annihilating the Covens entirely. So it was that they brought the teachings of Ailos north, to train a new generation of warriors. Though they did not have the power of the God of Light, they bore his sword, and the blessing of Raxen. This, they forged into a new weapon."

Imogen finally uncrossed her arms, and snapped her fingers. A small battalion's worth of swords faded into existence in the air around her. She seemed pretty chuffed about that.



The witch reached out and seized one of the floating swords, a huge featureless zweihander which Aurin had seen her use before, though never when she was so ill-proportioned to it; nevertheless, she held it easily at her side. Apparently she hadn't seen fit to actually give herself Carina's upper body strength when she made her disguise. Imogen raised the sword, pointing it at Aurin, and all of the other floating swords turned to mirror it.

Then she started hurling them at him.

► Show Spoiler

This is a relatively small-scale use of Arsenal, which creates many aetheric duplicates of a single Pact Weapon. These copies are launched as projectiles with about the same speed as arrows, and will track Aurin imperfectly- they will disappear shortly after impact. Three of the weapons, however, are Pact weapons, which will pursue Aurin at approximately the speed of a fast-moving man unless he shakes or otherwise disables them. Imogen is holding a fourth Pact weapon.

[Aurin]

Aurin scoffed. Perhaps he had inhabited his role too well if even the people who knew him didn't see through it.

He listened. He wondered if she had an emblem from Raxen as well the way she was talking. Perhaps her time in Ecith had been spent cozying up with the Orkhan trinity; he had heard stories that they lived among their people. That might explain why she was uninterested in him; Raxen was purportedly huge, probably in more ways than one.

"Oh, you're not going to tell me what the new weapon is? All right."

That she could manage a zweihander didn't impress him that much. He had seen masters wield them, knew they were lighter than they looked and built to be arrayed more like a spear than a sword in some ways. But that didn't matter when they were suddenly flung through the air like missiles shot from a ballista. His eyes widened as his body was pierced by swords. He coughed up blood as he tried to speak, hazel eyes full of pain and betrayal.

Clutching ineffectually at one of the blades, he fell to his knees, then teetered to fall on his side. Breath puffing in the dirt, making leaves of grass dance. He died.

Behind Imogen, there came applause. Aurin was smug, at least for a moment, before he realized...

"Oh, shit, they're coming back!"

And then he blinked several times, seeming at random. In part, it was to confuse those homing blades. But he was also attempting to see how well she could track him as he moved. When he calmed his mind, he could sense other people Traversing without engaging his sembling trick. He didn't know if she could do the same.

It might have been rude to semble her, but he had. He knew she couldn't semble him back, at least. There were a lot of magical mysteries attached to her, though. Of course, he had his fair share too.

[Imogen]

The illusion didn't ruffle Imogen's smirk, not even for a second. Neither did she turn around, looking for Aurin- she appeared to have no interest at all in figuring out where he was.

"Very nice showmanship- you do parties?" she called into the field, "Let's talk about Reaving for just a moment."

The witch's Pact weapons continued to seek out Aurin- they seemed to be quite good at figuring out where he was, though there was a noticeable lag between each blink and their re-orientation. In truth, Imogen wasn't terribly good at tracking the disruptions in Slipspace. Instead, she was relying on a different magical sense, listening for the whispering of the elementals within Aurin's own weapons. This took time, of course, since she couldn't hear them across the veil, but it gave her an excellent impression of his progression as he blinked from one place to another.

"A lot of people think of Reaving as a magic which is both simple and not particularly useful. You get a sword, you hide it inside your soul, you yank it out when you need armed. Good for the odd scrape, but probably not as useful as something like Elementalism, eh? I mean, fuck, I could just use that to make a sword if I wanted."

"But that's a misunderstanding. The Pact Weapon isn't stored in your soul, it's sublimated. What I materialize is an aspect of me, imposed upon the world in the shape of a weapon. The reason the Dawnmartyrs and Sunsingers focus on teaching it isn't that it's nice to have a sword whenever you want, it's that the Rune expands your understanding of how you relate to the world. A swordsman grabs a sword and swings it to cut- for a Sunsinger, there is no distinction between the act of will and the physical consequences. And that brings us back around to that secret weapon- the Sunsinger magic, Nova."

Imogen removed the hat she'd been gushing over and tossed it lightly into the wind, letting it float back across the field towards the manor, then drew her Pact spear out of the ether. It was suspiciously similar to Ansel Gerhard's spear, all bright and brassy, and featuring a little more decoration than most of the witch's pact weapons. Her gaze lingered on it a moment, then she reached down and touched the spearhead, causing the entire weapon to erupt into flame.



"Nova-fire is based upon the fire of Novuril, and contains the aspects of truth and light. It burns away illusion, burns through shields, wardings and charms, and it destroys all forms of corruption or impurity. It can destroy poisons and curses, and it can even burn the Dread Mists. A powerful Reaver can apply it to several swords at once, and take out whole a squadron of the Order's witch-hunters. But still, it's a limited tool; there were never many Sunsingers, and the Order could go after witches all across Zaichaer. How could they fight them?"

The witch ran a hand over the pact spear, which shimmered as it absorbed the shape and aether of a simple Traversion spell. The disguised ork drew the spear back and threw it directly upwards- where it shimmered, flickered, and vanished into Slipspace, blinking away.

"That's right- the Railrunners!"

The spear emerged out of Slipspace behind Aurin's head, point darting towards his shoulder.

[Aurin]

He talked a lot of shit, but he was paying attention. His hackles were raised, all senses on alert so as not to die. It wasn't that he thought Imogen would try to harm him, but when two witches were exercising power like this, a little mistake could have grave consequences. Then again, Aurin had never learned to fight with dulled blades. It was kill or be killed, and if he was all sex jokes an innuendos now, perhaps it was a glimmer of that spirit of survival, the same that made warriors hard as anything after surviving a battle, bodies wanting to procreate, to ensure life after a brush with death.

"You know me," he said from hither and thither, "manager of a fancy brothel." Blink. "Impresario of a theater." Blink. "All-around confidence man."

But he was learning about the magic of the Sunsingers from one of their more powerful, if not highest ranked. And he was beginning to see that he couldn't win a test of arms, nor of battle magic. He could either flee with his traveling trick, or make her stop fighting. Her dawnfire, borrowed from her hypocritical godling, could cut through his wards apparently, so even pure defense couldn't stop her.

All Aurin could do was...

He didn't so much sense where she projected her spear as intuited that if it disappeared, he ought to move and move now.

If she were an enemy to be eliminated, he would have blinked behind her, stabbed as many times as he could in a heartbeat, and then blink away again. Instead, he blinked in close enough to grapple, but he wasn't really trying to overpower her Carina-esque form, but only to get into close contact so it was easier to pull another one of his tricks: that of the Myshalarai.

He sank her senses into an illusion of the Void from which she had slithered to his protection, only this time, there was no Aurin, no Kitty, only a trail of her own blood as the voidspawn chased her. As soon as the illusion had her, he blinked away again, lest she lash out at him from the mind prison. She might call her spear to cut through an illusory Aurin, but this was all in her mind. She would have to cut into her skull with dawnfire to burn through it.