PBEM Game: Yarnspinners 2 (Running)

[Sedna]

Pashsa Tzu,

I would like to apologize for the mistaken declaration of war you received. In fact, we wished to declare war upon your UNholy nation*. The scribe responsible has, as always, been burnt to death. An announcement regarding this shall shortly be posted in the public square.

Father Muszinger

*The same correction applies to other declarations of war which may or may not have gone forth this month.

[PashaDawg]

Beware! You've awoken the Sleeping Tien Chi Dragon!

[Sedna]

Muszinger

Muszinger climbed the stair.

At the top, the pulpit where he would give his Carrofactum homily. In his pouch, a sealed letter from Afti-el to be opened at the end of the world, about half an hour from now when the great cathedral bells tolled midnight.

Muszinger was tired as he climbed. Nine years as head of the inquisition, and four of those during this last period of upheaval, which some heretic scribes called the Ascension Wars, reflecting various fools' recent claims to Godhood. The priests of Marignon knew better. God alone conquers. These tribulations were but preparing this drab world for the LORD's triumphant return.

'God', and it was both a prayer and a sigh. The end couldn't come soon enough. Muszinger was not as sure as when he'd started. Not as sure about the righteousness of the inquisition. He had tortured to death his last child only hours before, and good riddance to be done with that messy business. Tired, so tired.

Muszinger reached the pulpit and gazed out into the cavernous cathedral, filled with the Southern Army-- 'My army', thought Muszinger, 'My support through the Archbishop Marignon's grab for power'. They were all in battle garb of course, the knights' golden armor particularly stunning. The candles reflected off every metal weapon and bathed in every red-orange uniform. It looked like the sun itself was squeezed into the stone walls.

Muszinger began to speak.

He told the faithful the oldest story, the only story. Of a creator whose creation went awry, and of a God who came down to fix it. Then it was time for the traditional Carrofactum reading. 'How many times,' he asked himself, 'have you read or heard this passage?'

In the soft light he looked at the beautiful ornaments on the huge leather tome. His fingers turned easily to the passage...

"But the LORD did not leave us alone, nor did He foresake His people. For even as He ascended into the clouds He spoke one final time unto mortal ears and his command was seared upon their hearts and written on their minds: 'Keep though, the month of my coming sacred, and when you have remembered me two thousand times, there suddenly I shall be among you again.' "

And now Muszinger was reciting completely by heart:


I am the Alpha, the Iota, the Omega

I am the deathless roar of the pounding surf...

I am the still, small voice in the wilderness...

I am every new born infant's cry-- every last death rattle.

I am the Alone. One before numbers had meaning...

I am the indwelling soul of everyone...

I am beyond the other side of everything.

I am Faithful, and Pure and Holy.


Muszinger's voice trembled in awe as he finished the chant. Did he hear another voice taking us his words? Was that God, here now in the room, speaking alongside him? Muszinger's hand seemed to be glowing and slightly translucent, and it shook slightly as he closed the great book one last time.

"Tonight, we celebrate Carrofactum as we have celebrated it for two thousand years since the LORD's coming. Tonight the length of the world is measured in minutes and we shall all be lifted up, far beyond the sky. In the the twinkling of an eye we shall all be brought home, and the LORD will walk among us again, and wipe away every tear from our eye."

Muszinger paused. He felt some great magic rushing through the room. For a moment he thought... but, no... it was too soon. And Muszinger remembered that in the depths of the old broken tower Polgrave was struggling to bring a great magical being into the world: Catharsis, the spirit of cleansing fire. Afti-el had approved the project, but Muszinger was not easy. What need was there to bring some great warrior spirit into a world so much on the brink?

Turning back to the crowd, Muszinger spoke of the dead, the martyrs and saints who had sustained the Church through all the long dark years.

"Soon, very soon, we shall be reunited with them. What will that be like? To sit at the LORD's table with the greatest heroes of a forgotten age?"

A bell tolled

Suddenly it was all too much. This was it, the end.

A bell tolled.

Muszinger ripped open the letter in his pouch. What instructions did the LORD's right-hand servant have for him? Confused, Muszinger saw they were the attack plans he had laid out for fighting Marignon's enemies.

A bell tolled.

But, by the grace of God, an uneasy truce had been maintained for the last final months of the world, so... so...

A bell tolled.

Here was a note from Afti-el. But his hands were trembling too hard.

A bell tolled.

'You are immediately to implement the enclosed attack plans.'

A bell tolled.

That was it. That was all. No word about the end of the world. No news about the LORD's return.

A bell tolled.

The crowd was growing frantic now, hanging on each reverberation.

A bell tolled.

These were long range plans, for a war of many months at least. A hard strike against Man and C'tis, the two most dangerous. Force them to defend their turf for a few months.

A bell tolled.

And then... pull back and fight hard for every piece of land. The overwhelming numbers would force the defenders of Marignon back, and back further, scorching and burning the lands they had spent so long gaining, but always delaying the advance, protecting the great cathedral at Marignon.

A bell tolled.

It was not a plan to win. Only a plan to delay. Only a plan to hold off foes until this moment.

A bell tolled.

Maybe, it was all some mistake. But Muszinger knew that Afti-el did not make such mistakes.

A bell tolled.




Later, as he marched east, at the head of a fey army beyond hope and faith, he looked back to the broken tower and saw it shimmering in a sickly green light.

[djo]

Vanheim turn 51: not too many more to go!

In which Pherios's dinner is interrupted, and Vethru regards the rubble.


Pherios

Finally, a guard pushes my dinner through the slot at the bottom of my cell door. I don't see it, I hear it. I've been in a dark dungeon for a couple months now, deep underground.

"Do you know why you're being fed so late?" the guard asks. This is strange. Vethru's guards don't talk to me.

I clear my throat and rasp, "No." My throat works as well as it's ever going to, but I still sound like a strangled warthog.

"Because it begins now," he says, and he leaves, ignoring my questions trailing him down the long, empty hall.

I have no idea what that means. I tear hungrily into my bread, the only food I've had down here. It's left me weak, very weak. At least I don't have to fight the rats for it. They're scared of me.

Then my tooth hits something hard, and the universe accelerates.

It's a single gem, clear as mountain air, infused with power.

Somebody's got a plan. And they've just told me the only thing I need to know.

It begins now.

I don't waste time. I summon an air elemental, and I'm so drained I nearly pass out. And it's only a small one. But it blows down the cell door, and the one at the end of the hall.

I stagger after it, and in the guardroom one flight up, I stun a handful of guards with thunder. One of them comes for me, sword swinging. I block it with my left arm. I don't feel the cut. Then I touch him, and he crumbles to dust.

That's never happened before, but I don't have time to ponder it. The alarm has been sounded, but not by the men fighting my air elemental. It's coming from somewhere above me.

My elemental occupies the guards, and I head upstairs alone. I meet three men coming down. Damn. I forgot to pick up a sword off the man I killed below. They didn't forget theirs. They descend incautiously, attacking.

I cast another unfamiliar spell, and bolts of dark energy take out the first two. I stumble on the stairs, my legs weakened with fatigue. As a result, the third man's blow doesn't land with full force. But it still bites deeply into my right shoulder.

I scramble for a sword, find one, and swing it against his. It rides down his blade and jumps the hilt. Its tip grazes his chest, drawing a red line of blood. His eyes widen. He howls. He triples the ferocity of his blows, attacking in a berserk fury. I parry a few thrusts, but it's only a moment before his sword is stuck in my left side.

It's a curious sensation. There's no pain. No blood, really, not as much as there should be. It's just...inconvenient. Clumsy.

I touch him, and he crumbles to ash. I pull the sword out, and things start to go bad. My guts shift unpleasantly. I think I'm in trouble. I don't understand what, exactly, keeps me going anymore, but it's failing.

I drag myself up two flights of stairs and through an empty guardroom. One of the doors leads me outside, to chaos--shouting, howling, the clash of arms. I try to make sense of it. It's night, and dark forms run across the courtyard to a tower on the opposite wall. Most of the noise is up on walls, I think. I see flashes from silver-polished scale armor reflecting moonlight.

Then I'm knocked over by something low and fast-moving. An instant later, its teeth are in my leg. A second wolf takes the opposite arm, and a third jumps on my chest, snapping at my throat. I see two more fast approaching. I don't have the strength to fight them off.

Then someone, a woman's voice, shouts, "There he is!"

The wolf sinks its teeth into my throat.

I almost laugh. But then I remember how long it took to heal last time, so I struggle to free my arm, to touch him and wither him. But they're stronger than I am.

Suddenly, the air around me is filled with reflections. Scale armor jangles, a spear strikes, and another. The wolves die with great gobs of my flesh in their mouths. Many hands pull their bodies away, prying their jaws from my body.

The courtyard is quiet again. The lead Valkyrie jerks her spear out of a wolf's gut, its intestines coming with it. She drops her weapon, and she kneels and lifts my head in her hands. "My poor baby," she says. "Are you alive? Pherios?"

I look up at the dozen of them, and I recognize them all. Petema, Aunt Sennei, Mirima, Irulia--they're all here. House Alteion's Valkyries. Galameteia's mother, Thumestia of Lunetellerion, is there, too, and behind them all, with them yet standing apart, I see a lonely figure with a slightly crooked neck.

My eyes return to the beautiful warrior woman who rescued me. "Thanks, Mom," I manage to croak before I black out.


Vethru

The pile of rubble is impressively high. Usually when buildings fall down, it doesn't amount to much. Buildings are mostly empty space. The Lady's tower was solid. The pile of stones rises almost two stories high, and they're stained black by the still billowing smoke pouring out of the basements where the forges are still burning.

"Wow," says Quellian Ji. "She went and did it. First Pherios, then this. A real bad night, huh, boss?"

Ji can be so naive sometimes. Once is chance, twice, coincidence--but I sensed the third was already on its way: enemy action.

On cue, Hallixene rides up. Ji starts--he doesn't have the magical talent to pierce Hallixene's glamour. "My Lord!" he cries. "They've left! They're all gone!"

I'd sent him to find Anteirios and Petema. Damn.

"All who?" asks Ji.

"All of House Alteion! And others, too!"

"Who?" I ask.

"Lunetellerion, most of Zinos. At least part of House Pellena. I dared not seek further without bringing you the news. I have ordered the city to be searched."

"Any news from the army?" And Belletennares.

"No, sire."

Well. House Alteion hit the trifecta last night. No surprise, really. The locks on Pherios's cell weren't for show, and Anteirios pitched a fit when I sent the lizard ambassador home without speaking to him. He ranted about Vanheim's honoring its treaties. I knew I was pissing them off. But the Lady...I had hopes. I liked her. I thought we were simpatico.

It's the same old story. God comes to world, god begins to raise up downtrodden nation, god meets nice not-alive girl, and then it ends in heartbreak. Nation rejects god, girl runs back to her family, and god is left to fight fanatically religious neighbors all by himself. It's so clichéd, it should be on network TV.

No matter. She took her gnomes with her, but all of our new forces were loyal to me: spectral mages, necromancers, and the dragon-men. And what was House Alteion going to do? All their forces were in the north. They'd have no choice but to fight when Marignon comes over the border. They might betray me, but they'd never let Vanheim fall.

It wasn't exactly the plan, but it'd do. I only needed a little more time. The prize was close.

[The Panther]

I posted Yarn 48 on the Yarn site. It is not being repeated here because of the embedded images.

[The Panther]

Ralph, Prophet of the fine nation of Man, has posted a new proclimation entitled:
"The Inquisition Practices Death Magic"

[Sedna]

Gawain

"Well, this is the forest of Idun."

"Indeed, sire."

"Seems like a strong province defense."

"Indeed, sire."

"How, exactly, does one, ah... kill one of these lizard things."

"I believe skewering it with a lance is traditional."

"Very good." Gawain looked out over the cohort of knights. There would be death before this was all over. Death, and lizard blood, which stains frightfully, or so Gawain had heard.

Muszinger

Wic,

I will not be able to coordinate the war plans very well from out here in the field, and I'm afraid I don't trust Polgrave as much as I once did. Thus, you must take charge of the unfolding situation. I must confess I do not understand Afti-el, or why the LORD's return did not come as the scribes had predicted, but we must trust in Him and in Her too.

The war plans are sound. Gawain and I will seize the fort at Pythium. Try to lure Manish forces into our dominion where we can defeat them more easily. I hope we will kill some lizards here in the south, but we must be prepared to absorb great loss of territory in the north. The inquisition must be out in force to prevent the peasants from losing faith. We will hold the lizards at Marignon and Camelot. Hopefully, our attacks on Man will give Pangaea a chance to regroup and distract Man so that we will be able to turn our attention on the scaly ones and beat them back.

By Fire and Faith and the Sword,

Muszinger

Esclave

I find it hard to concentrate on my work. We hear that Man has employed large number of magical creatures in their invasion. There is a weapon, the Elf-bane, that could come in handy against these unnatural things, but ever since the Archbishop of Amiridon disappeared, I am the only one in the kingdom with the skills to forge these things for the paladins who clamor for them. And I am distracted.

All my life I knew the world was coming to an end, and suddenly it stretched out before me, all my mistake and all my fear. And just as suddenly, my source seems to restricted. Surely our enemies will pour in from every side, and we will all be killed. I have received hints that the Archbishop of Elkland is holding onto my son while Afti-el flies around killing things. But I cannot journey to Camelot. The Plains of Eternal Peril will be the primary battleground in this war.

Is it any wonder that I cannot properly sharpen a blade?

Gawain

The second before his lance hit home, Gawain saw giant feathery wings rising from the back of a huge snake. Then, with an awesome force, his lance splintered as it ground a strange undead creature with a hundred vines into dust. He was off his horse, surrounded by monsters. Lizards the size of men who walked upright, and huge 10-foot snakes who struck with blinding speed. But the solid wall of charging knights prevailed quickly, and Gawain himself escaped without a scratch. The animals were running, and Gawain let out a mighty roar, chasing after one in fancy black robes and hacking it down in a burst of cold flame.

Muszinger

My lord,

Great news from the north. Sir Balide has killed one of the "Queens" of the Air. Also, the mercenary Tempestus has seized the rich farmlands of Solian in the heart of Man. The fort at Iron Range is under siege, by the lizards, but can hold out for many months. The dragon and his armies march into the north. As planned, we put up no resistance.

Wic

Foen

Tvinto, a druid I knew back in the sunlit days, has died in the foolhardy invasion of T'ien Ch'i. They say that the heathens have great demons of fire and water and that our little band never stood a chance. Closer to home, the forces of Ulm, luckily few in number, surround the dead city on every side, but have not yet tried to put us under siege. God knows we are too weak to repel such an attempt. What few living men remain in this desolate land have long since gone mad, and the only defenders left are a few dying vine men and the strange fiery snakes which crawl out of the Archbishop Marignon's mouth.

Meanwhile, fell tidings come from the utter west. On a dark field, and surrounded by a horde of the undead at her command, Afti-el fell upon a host of heavenly angels and slaughtered them with her fell blade. The blood of these innocent creatures spilt upon the ground and cried to the heavens -- blasphemy! blasphemy!

Is there war in heaven? Has the LORD forsaken us?

Esclave

I believe Wic truly enjoys this war and being in charge of it. He seems healthier and more full by the day, and by night, a steady stream of new maidens comes to his chamber. But I suppose sexual immorality is the least or our worries now. The inquisition patrols everywhere, and saying a word against the war is punishable by a swift death.

Polgrave has fallen utterly. The broken tower to the south glows with evil death magic, and Wic says that Polgrave, who tried to learn too much of the dark side, now summons foul creatures from the crypt. If the propagandists from Man are to be believed, a Wraith Lord, most feared of all undead warriors, lurks the plains just north of here, preying on invaders and townsfolk alike. Wic has informed Muszinger, and I can only hope he will leave the foolish siege of Pythium to return here and root out this infection. Muszinger is a fool, but just because he refuses to see the evil in Afti-el, I cannot believe he will refuse to see the devastating change in his old friend.

Muszinger

Wic,

I was pleased to have your letter. I am sorry your home in Wic Forest was burnt down. I approve your plan to reclaim it, but do be careful. The enemy may be reading this communication, so I shall say no more.

The news from Umidor is excellent. Two more battles won by Sir Balide and the trolls! We'll build a wall out of the heathens' dead bodies. Also, I want the friar who single-handedly turned back that pack of wolves made a saint. Philippe, I believe you said his name was. See to it.

What news from Polgrave? I trust he still holds the tower and temple in good faith?

Ah, I sense our enemies' alliance may be cracking. No attack from Vanheim yet, and surely Man will grow swiftly tired of taking the brunt of the casualties while Lizard armies make unopposed gains. Let's see how they react to our next move...

By Fire and Faith and the Sword,

Muszinger