RPC has moved! These pages have been kept for historical purposes

Twinflame · **05-06-2014, 02:28 AM**

((Mature content warning on this post))

Year 1 of the 8th Astral Era
Two weeks go

The anonymous person writhed briefly beneath the thin sheet, and then bolted upright so suddenly that Lyrique Midichante was brought fully awake, eyes alert. She didn't recognize the woman who was in bed next to her, though that had been introduced. The woman was Maelys, a gift that Anaelle had escorted into her room well after midnight, and after affixing a blindfold over Lyrique's eyes. The red blindfold still hung limply from the Lady Midichante's thin neck, almost lost in the long hair that lay over her naked skin.

It was impossible to miss the air of distress around Maelys. The muscles beneath the thin woman's dusky skin were stretched tight; Lyrique had never seen those shoulders before, but she had felt them. The shoulders of the anonymous, silent woman had been soft and controlled, but now tense, strong muscles stood out against the tips of the woman's dark hair. Her small fists clutched the sheets where they pulled about her lap, the exposed line of her spine a straight line from her haunches to her neck.

Lyrique Midichante sat up slowly, sheet sliding from her body, green eyes wide open to take in Maelys' face for the first time. The dark woman's eyes were wide and awake, but looking at nothing. They were pale in color, murky, blind. She ground her jaw, teeth audible, as her body almost shivered in readiness to move. She spoke suddenly, her voice surprisingly small, little more than a breath. "Anaelle. Lock the chamber door."

In a sudden snap of movement, Anaelle burst from the bed to Lyrique's opposite side. The woman went from repose to fast motion in an instant, tearing the sheet from both of the other women in the process. Anaelle's tall, pale body was as white as the ice that lined the massive windows of the room, the snow drifting against them. Her her was red like blood in the snow, shifting about her angular shoulderblades. As Anaelle moved, the padding of her barefeet was audible in the large stone room. It could be hear just over the shuff of the falling sheet, over the held breath of the two women on the bed.

Lyrique shook herself from her half-asleep daze. "What's-?"

A grey palm slapped her leg, thin fingers curling over Lyrique's thigh. The touch was familiar, shivering similarly to how it had last night, bu now Maelys' gesture was unmistakable warning. Lyrique's brow dropped, watching the hard lines of Maelys' tendons, the way the wrinkling on her hand gave away the woman's advancing age.

When she reached the chamber door, Anaelle threw the bolt. No sooner had the mechanism clicked into place then the mass of the door crashed against it, pushed by some external weight. The wood slammed against the metal, but held fast. The sound echoed in the room, shook the window, shocked Lyrique to her feet where she stood wide-eyed in a broad stance, hands open. Anaelle flinched away from the door, retreating backwards. She looked over her shoulder, her blue eyes catching Lyrique's and showing the same sense of shock. Anaelle crossed her arms tied around her body. She must've felt just as exposed in her nudity as Lyrique did.

The only one of the three women to maintain her composure was Maelys, who remained sitting on the bed, staring at nothing. "There are soldiers outside. I can hear-"

There was another slam against the door, louder than before, heavier. The metal of the bolt and hinges groaned. That slam was followed by another, and then another. The sound shook the room, making the window and the light coming through it shiver. Anaelle turned from the door and ran back to the bed, taking up the fallen sheet in her hand and throwing it around Maelys.

Lyrique turned from the bed and took several quick steps towards her wardrobes, throwing open a large cabinet door. She didn't bother with hiding her body, instead sliding her hands immediately into the armored gauntlets of her dragoon armor. The soulstone concealed in her right gauntlet pressed reassuringly against her skin, the power contained within filling her.

A shadow flashed across the floor an instant before the window burst inward, throwing shards of glass, snow and ice, and frigid air into the room. A human body hit the floor of the room, landing in a crouch so forcefully that the stone beneath him cracked. He wore the armor of the dragoons, shining in the white light. Two more dragoons landed near him an instant later, slightly behind him, all with lances drawn.

The glass falling everywhere, brilliant snow and reflected light dancing through the air, the room seemed for an instant to be made of light. Anaelle, perfectly pale and seeming to glow, wrapped the white sheet around Maelys' shadowy form and bent over her protectively. Lyrique required no such protection, and would have rejected it. She took her lance from where it was stored and turned to face the intruders. Reflected light danced over her form like flying diamonds, but Lyrique was as pale as the light, her hair as brilliantly red as rubies cascading over her shoulders, her eyes like inset sapphires glowing with challenge. She took a single step forward and stopped at the feeling of broken glass beneath her feet. There was no pain, but a glance down revealed blood trickling from beneath her toes.

For several seconds, the falling glass made the sound of a hailstorm, and then it died into silence. The pounding on the door had stopped. Gradually, the wind blowing through the window began to howl. It carried in snow that settled in Lyrique's hair and eyelashes, lay itself over Anaelle's body. Maelys didn't move, sitting limp and blind where Anaelle shivered around her. Lyrique shivered in the cold as well, though she tried to keep it in her fingertips only.

The three dragoons that were suddenly in her room stood with the clattering of armor. Two Elezen and a Hyur, faces hidden behind dark metal plates, all men. She didn't need to see their eyes. It didn't matter to her. Lyrique Midichante presented her lance in front of her, decorated with gold and gemstones but no less threatening as she held its point towards the men. If they didn't give the weapon due attention, it was to their own detriment.

One of the dragoons turned and paced nonchalantly to the chamber door, throwing the bolt and pulling it open. It swung with a heavier groan, hanging from damaged hinges and scrapping the floor. The outer finish of it, once bearing the carved seal of the House Midichante, had been defaced by the pounding of armored fists and feet. Two more dragoons entered, both as anonymous as the first, along with a man in a rich blue robe and relatively humble ornamentation. This robed man walked with the poise of a priest and the business-like coldness of a politician.

This man was not a stranger. He stepped into Lyrique's personal chamber, letting his eyes peruse the nudity of the Lady Midichante and the women in her bed. His lips parted like a bloated corpse splitting open. "Lyrique. I say, this is an interesting state to find you in. Not exactly a chaste woman, are you?"

Lyrique tightened her grip on her lance, the clawed fingers of her gauntlets clicking against it. "You will answer for this disrespect, inquisitor. You will answer for everything."

"Tut," he said. His eyes lingered on Anaelle's shivering back. Lyrique wanted to cut them out, but withheld her anger with great effort. The inquisitor continued his idle meandering into the room, the eyes of the dragoons watching him for some cue. "We have reason to believe you are working with the dragons. You are required to submit to trial."

"Are you insane? I am the head of House Midichante!" She cut the air with her lance. Two of the dragoons, the smart ones, took this gesture as a threat and reached for their own lances. The others, the idiots, had yet to look away from her body. "You already judged my father, and he passed! He was innocent and is now dead for that!"

"Yet by your own admission it was your brother who betrayed your House's keep to the dragons." He lifted a hand and pushed aside a predicted objection, though he still wasn't looking at Lyrique. "Yes, I know, you didn't want us to find out about that, but we did. You can't prove you were not working with him. The only witness to your supposedly valiant defense was a Miqo'te, and he disappeared mysteriously, didn't he? Rather incriminating."

"I'm not going to submit," Lyrique snapped. "If I die, who will lead the House? My cousin is just a child! She-"

"The cousin you speak of," the inquisitor observed, finally turning his dead-looking gray eyes on Lyrique, "The little girl? She underwent judgement yesterday. She did not pass."

"What?" Lyrique shivered, something even colder than the ice and frigid wind sliding through her belly. "You... judged a child...?"

He spread his arms, "We threw her from the cliffs. She summoned dragons and they saved her from the fall, but the dragoons took care of the lot of them. We believe that your father may have been working for the dragons as well, and merely allowed himself to fall to his death to throw off the investigation."

"You... killed her?" Lyrique moved her lance closer to her body, wrung her hands upon it. This was not an outwardly threatening gesture, but the two intelligent dragoons recognized the shift in stance and glanced at one another.

"Lyrique," the inquisitor walked towards her. "You are the last of the original bloodline of House Midichante. You are the only one who can ensure that whatever new bloodline takes over from you, will be able to do so with honor. And the only way to do that is to be judged and found innocent."

"To let you murder me, you mean."

Lyrique turned her eyes to the bed, where Anaelle had now fully concealed the darker woman from view. Maelys was bent forward with her head in Anaelle's lap, and the pale, lanky Elezen was folded over Maelys with the sheet swaddling the woman completely. The shrouding was complete. It was not completely necessary; after all, it was not as though Maelys were a Duskwight or anything like that. But with the way Anaelle kept her face against Maelys back, and her pale hands held the woman face, made it obvious how precious the blind woman was to Anaelle. The blue-eyed woman on the bed watched Lyrique carefully, not afraid, and did not seem to request any extra consideration or protection.

Exhaling, Lyrique recalled the touch of Anaelle's cheek upon her own the night before, as her attendant had tied that blindfold about her head and purred, "I've brought you a present." It had been a good present. Lyrique had made gestures of affection for Anaelle that no other had ever warranted.

The Lady Midichante turned back to the inquisitor, raising her head high. The wind caught her hair and pulled it out behind her, a ruby veil behind her naked form. Her armored hands lifted the dark lance in front of her. "I once asked you, inquisitor, how many of my family you would have to throw from those cliffs before you were satisfied. I now have my answer. But the heinous actions you have taken this morning endangered not only myself, but those under the protection of House Midichante. Your manners need work."

The inquisitor's pale lips smirked, and he showed her the palms of his hands. "I stand chided and will make due recompense to your harem for their humiliation."

"I do not believe that you will."

The man's smile vanished. "Will you submit or not?"

The wardrobes next to Lyrique were reduced to splinters, the ground beneath her cracked, as she launched herself with incredible power towards the open window. In an instant, she was sailing through the white air, snow pelting her face, the bones and flesh of her body crying out in pain from the suddenness of the movement. Purple dots lay over her vision for a moment, shadows darkening the edges, and she felt incredibly dizzy as she flew. It was all she could do to hold onto her lance.Â

Lyrique had hoped her body would be able to handle the strain, that her senses would come back, but they continued to fade. Of course, she hadn't predicted just how cold it would be. Even as she fell from the tower she had been in, she felt like her hair was freezing against her scalp and face, and her senses darkened all the more. One of the cruxes of the use of her soulstone was making sure that she did not take action that would exceed the limits of her body. This jump was powerful enough, sudden enough, insane enough that it should have taken her well away from the reach of any pursuers, well outside of civilization, at the sacrifice of her health.

But she hadn't had a choice. If she had tried to fight, the inquisitor might have hurt Anaelle and Maelys. At any rate, the end result was the same: the church would say that Lyrique had fled her trial, and declare her a traitor. If she evaded suspicion, Anaelle would be placed in temporary control of the House. If nothing happened to her and to Maelys.

Lyrique closed her eyes and prayed. Her eyes remained closed when she was done. Her body went limp and still, pale and icy. By the time she reached the snow-covered ground, she was unconscious.

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The Orphan and the Lady Midichant [story, Ishgard pre-ARR, ooc welcome]

RPC has moved! These pages have been kept for historical purposes