Death Cult

[Afkueen]

Nights air cooled the heated veins of the wandering killer, his breath shallow puffs of cut mist floating out into the rain. The wind howled over Tyr's fork, buffeting trees and grass in a cacophony of pounding showers and hissing leafs. The world around was a sea of blues and blacks, the barely visible sea green of the battered grass lit by the dancing flickers of a few lit lamps stumbling through the night.

He waited for what seemed like forever, they rounded another hill; something to obscure his approach. His feet fell heavy against the ground as his breaths picked up pace again. Rushing the space between he fell to his belly, then climbed the hill. The travelers had come to a halt, five men, three decorated in the armor of Blackwood, a man in robes, he appeared capable enough. And a pudgy merchant, dressed in cloth.

One of the armored knights stepped away from the group, to take a piss more then likely as he stalked off into the woods, his fellow calling after him with scornful mirth. The assassin saw his mark and moved to slay the young lord of Hellstrom. His hand reached for a yellow flask and lit the tip, before hurling it to the far side of the wagon. The white noise was broken by a burst of sound and fire as the flask detonated. Even as the remaining guard turned he screamed and charged down the hill.

---

Even as the assassin slashed into the merchant to get by to Byrun, Alyx was moving into position. "Rank, amateur." She said sweetly, her hand wrapped around his forearm and popped his elbow clean from its socket. The man looked to Alyx with a mix of pain and surprise, but before he could cry out her open hand jammed into his throat and cleared any attempt at such away.

"Who sent him?" Byrun questioned, though before Alyx even attempted to get an answer she popped each of the assassins lungs with a knife, then set him down to let him die. Alyx quietly searched the man over until she found a wet scrap of paper, then tossed it over to the now frustrated lord. "I'd rather not listen to lies for the next hour or so, we both know who likely sent him. And even if we don't, this sends a fairly clear message about attempts on Hellstrom does it not?"

"We should continue on, I don't like pressing Tymora's grace against more knives in the dark." She remarked as she glided the flat of her blade along the wet assassins garb, then slid it back into the wrist of her sleeve. Another reluctant nod from the young noble, and those still alive were on the move again.

[Afkueen]

Aqueduct;

It never would have spoken highly of the Nights Edge, even in the best of cases the gang was just large and cumbersome, a group of urchins and under privileged that banded together to scrape what they could from the sewer floors. It believed this spelled opportunity and desperation, but there was still just enough morality left in them, or fear. It didn't matter, really they would become the hands or the tools that served her.

Fear, was a common and easy enough emotion to take advantage of when you replaced urban myth with tangible evidence. A ghost story when told from a smiling face will at best startle you, but a tale told from the eyes of a shivering man huddled within a blanket in the security of a jail cell? It would creep its way into you, and if only for a few hours you'd watch your back carefully, maybe even disregard it entirely. Until you find a young girl, singing the same song, her eyes distant and flesh pale as a ghost. Even then, some more ignorant, foolish or courageous might continue on. But with all that preparation carefully laid into the mind of a doomed man, when he finally stumbled upon the faintest trace of that tale... His mind will forgo confusion and draw strait to the most logical conclusion; that he's discovered the ghost story has made its way into his home.


And so it passed, a shadow among the sewers, moving from place to place, always just out of sight. For days it wandered aimlessly, with no purpose. The flap of heavy leathers occasionally sounding in the windless tunnels, the glint of polished steel followed by darkness. The leap of great shadows and illusions concluded in peaceful silence. A child's, or perhaps a woman's laughter echoing through the halls, a prowling darkness within the darkness.

Coaxing,
teasing,
breathing,
kneading.

Disappearances began to happen in the place of violent outbreaks, it would approach and incapacitate, then drag them away to a hidden alcove, bury them beneath the murky waters to be forgotten.

All the while listening, carefully listening to each whispered phrase, each word uttered by the urchins. Here they were forgotten to the rest of the world but themselves, but now they would begin to forget even eachother. The game was on, to force them to look to something else, to fight, flee or surrender.

[[DM] Grinning Death]

The sewers hold death, the word is.

The recent attacks on the Night's Edge gang tucked away in the underbelly of the City have spread, and so too has word of the attacker. Rumors say it's a woman, some say a man. Some even say it's not human at all.

Whatever it is, the Night's Edge have sought outside assistance, and have received it. A gang thug will mark a passageway with a piece of chalk, and later on a hedgemage will come by with a protective group to cast some kind of spell on the wall. The Night's Edge have started to become more organized, to travel in packs, and to systematically cover the entire sewer system with these strange arcane symbols.

They are learning, and they are adapting.

[Afkueen]

Good, good... They learn, they grow, they change and they shift, their tactics become more prominent when they're the hunted, they seek aid, but how far will they go for it? In the first instances of the arcane symbols being erected it would avoid them, curve around them, find other paths through the sludge and murky waters. Though it found new lives, new innocent lives that had been pulled into this twisted game.

It stalked and learned, it shadowed and it smiled at these new developments, its form shifted to one of a mass of oily grey and violet feathers, a great beak and long clawed fingers. It wandered with this new visage, this new guise, this wingless abomination, a scrawny bird that walked like a man. This creature, this tainted creature found its newest prey, the men of magic who would usurp its rightful quarry, that would interfere with its game. No, the Nights Edge was alone, and this beast, this creature of entropy would assure the remainder of Sundren that this gang was not to be bartered with.