Mother Death, Bearer of New Life Having shoved her down into the hole, Rigwyn gave his fellow rogues a nod, then climbed in after her as the smell of roasted porg fill the air. Guile and Pilfer cackled as he climbed in, perhaps thinking that she was the latest Outlaw. They couldn't be more wrong.
With promise of a feast, Rigwyn lead Cezote deep into the underground fort to a balcony over looking the main room. At the far end was an altar that was hastily prepared. Attached to it were a set of manacles, and to the right sat a small wooden table lines with an array of crude metallic tools: Small sharp knives, tools for grabbing, pinching, and tearing, clamps and long, sharp slivers of steel. Trying not to look too anxious, he whispered,
"Come now dear, I have a table set for you; a feast has been planned for the two of us."
Cezote grinned with a yellow smile as she practically sauntered down the stairs, taking them two at a time in her eagerness, nearly stumbling over her own two feet. She snickered to herself as she moved, her wild hair askew and flying, her cracked lips glistened with drool and a manic glint in her eye.
"I'm so sorry it appears to be just us two. I expected a full house. It seems this shall be a very ... intimate meal ... should you want to call it that."
Cezote ran her tongue across her lips and turned her head, squinting her eyes, sucking in her cheeks so that the circles beneath them grew more pronounced. "Eh," she said. "I suppose you're cute enough for that," she said, the jest in her tone clear. She sashayed up to Rigwyn and moved her hand to pat him on the breastplate.
Placing his hand over Cezote's, he let out a most insincere smile, then pointed to the table before the podium. "You still want the meat now, do you? Be a good girl and face the podium."
Cezote's smile took on a fierceness of its own. There was something knowing about it, something eerie and off. Her tone dipped low, grating and gravelly, so odd coming from her frail and feeble form. "A trickster trickster is he, the man with angry eyes and hollow heart. What plans he has, what webs he weaves, a dark and devious art. Believe him? I don't. But care do I? No. We will play his game," she wheezed now, as though it was difficult to breathe. "We will plaaaaaay his gaaaaammmmeeee." With that, she turned, and faced the podium as instructed, her head jerking back and forth and her body following suit in a twitching motion.
Rigwyn walked to the wall and lifted a sturdy wooden club from it. Feeling its weight in his hands, he looked back at Cezote and began to chant out loud, "You who call us into darkness, hear my prayer."
Cezote heard the club as it came down from the wall. She was aware, at least vaguely of Rigwyn's plans. Her lips formed into a soft 'O' and she began to sing to herself again, high-pitched, probably pretty irritating. "Summoning the darkness is he now? Plans for Cezote, does he have? Bad ones for poor little Cezote, heeheheee!"
Rigwyn took the edge of the club and raised it as if about to strike her head, then stopped in thought. Seeing how she had complied, he began to wonder if any force would be needed at all. After a moment or two, he said calmly, "Lay down up on the altar and prepare yourself. You have been chosen for greater things. You shall bring about my master's plan."
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A knock echoed though the underground fort. Annoyed, Rigwyn turned sharply, then barked, "Lay down! I'll be right back!" Withins seconds he had returned with a fenki by his side. She was the only other guest who had shown up for the ritual, but it would have to do.
As they returned to the altar, Cezote continued to giggle to herself. "Oh, oh, important!" She said, her head bowed slightly, her knees wobbling at the very thought. "Cezote is important. The master's plan he says! A dark master he follows, dark deeds he has planned?" She coughed, the sound rustling like old dead leaves, as she moved towards the table Rigwyn indicated. She shifted to her knees, and then to her hands, finally lying flat against the hard surface and curling up in a fetal position. "Dark things," she whispered. "Cezote knows about the dark things. Oh yes, yes she does. Cezote knows."
Thidin crosses her arms "What is this?"
Rigwyn knelt down and grabbed a thick, steel shackle that dangled from a long, thick chain connected to the altar. He placed the clamp against her ankle, then clamped it shut as he asked Cezote with a darkly affectionate tone, "Is that so deary? You know of dark things? Do you know of he who whispers in the ears of the enlightened? Of he who is all powerful and who will bring this world to its final stage?"
Thidin's words stuck in Rigwyn's head. He looked over his shoulder at her and replied to Thidin with a grin, "This young lady has been called to serve. I received instructions to perform a ritual. I need your help. We have ALL been called to serve this very night."
Thidin stayed in her place. "I'm not really a helper."
Cezote looked towards Rigwyn, her face tilting as the shackle clicked into place like the final warning before a coming threat. She smiled, that face-splitting smile, blood stains present on her teeth as though she had been biting her tongue. "Ohhh," she said. "Yes yes yesssss, you follow the darkness, is that it?" Her pupils fully dilated, her eyes gave the illusion that they have turned totally black at the corneas. "Important things for dark masters, is it? The games we play, the games we weave, the darkness, the fire, yes, yes!" She burst into a fit of laughter that caused her to convulse.
Hearing Thidin's unenthusiastic response, Rigwyn shouted, "Two must perform the ritual, I cannot do this alone! This is extremely important!" He turned back to Cezote and grabbed her other ankle as her body convulsed and jerked. Almost fighting her, he strained to clamp on another cold steel shackle.
Unmoved, Thidin replied, "I'm not amused yet Rig. tell me more."
Cezote stopped her seizure-like twitching and stills, her chest rising and falling, her stupid grin pointed at the ceiling as though she didn't have a care in the world. Her hand flashed out as if to grab one of the Diaboli's dreadlocks as she lifted herself closer as if to intimate some kind of secret. "You need better friends in crime," she said, before laughing loudly once more.
Concerned with Thidin's unwillingness, he continued to try to persuade her: "The work that our master started in Kadakaios needs to be resumed. The bearer has been called, she lays here in waiting. She will spread new life to all of Yliakum, she will be the very mother of what is yet to come." Affectionately, he stroked Cezote's face as he felt her pull against his hair.
Thidin looked concerned. "Her?"
Cezote made a face at Rigwyn's proclamation. It quickly dissapeared at the touch of his hand, and she gave a puzzled blink at it, not used to contact that doesn't come with a slap, a hit, with pain. She squinted her eyes in mild suspicion even as she smiled hesitantly, and gave another raspy chortle, her fist still locked in Rigwyn's hair. "Not mommy material, no no," she joked.
Thidin stepped forward to gain a better look at Cezote.
Rigwyn cackled as he stared coldly into Cezote's darkened eyes, "Oh yes, her. She has been called to be the mother of the new life. She who will chew and gnaw upon the sick, and spit upon the rich. " Feeling her tug, he yanked his dread from her hand and muttered, "Worry not."
Thidin laughed a bit at Rigwyn "And what? Are you the seed to bring this new life forth?"
Rigwyn reached for Cezote's hands and began to guide them towards the manacles behind her head as he looked at Thidin and sneered, "No, the seed so to speak is not within me. Please, dim the lights now, and you shall see."
Cezote pulled her hand back against her chest and frowned up at Rigwyn. "Not worried," she replied, and her tone, strangely, indicated a truth in the statement. "Cezote knows about the dark things, she knows. Sick he says. He wants to spread sickness." Her eyes turned to steel, her lips formed silent words, until her tone dipped low again, as if to intone prophesy rather than ramble incoherently. "Wants to see the rot in himself come out in others, he does. Wants to see it form, wants to see it everywhere. All he can see, isn't it? The darkness."
Cezote's arms stretch upwards, as even if she wanted to resist, she couldn't. Rigwyn's strength far outmatched her own. Soon she laid completely immobilized, and looked around with wide-eyed wonder. "Wants to see it," she repeats. "Wants to see it everywhere, he does."
Thidin sat in chair nearby, rather reluctant to help out.
Consumed with the mother of new life, Rigwyn said in a cooing, nurturing tone, "Thats right my dear. I want to see you flourish - to blossom with the Whisper's greatness. Give me your hands now."
Cezote cackled. "Ooooh, the flame he follows. Does he feel the darkness burning him, can he see the light leaving him? Does it tear at him, tear at his insides, tear at his mind?" She gave Rigwyn her hands, and as she moved closer again. "You want to know a secret about fire?"
Rigwyn took Cezote's hands and clamped them into the manacles, then whispered, "Yes, tell me a secret."
Cezote put her lips by Rigwyn's ear, her breath no doubt a rather unpleasant stench to tolerate. "It likes to leave ashes," she whispered. "From dust to dust. Ashes you will be, as I am. See your future now, Diaboli. The time will come for you." A wheeze from lungs already infected with something, and she fell back on the table, gleefully laughing even as tears begin to congeal in her eyes and trickle down her face.
Rigwyn stroked Cezote's face once more, then slapped it harshly! "Enough! Its time prepare you!"
Thidin rolled her eyes at the girls words as she watched Rigwyn.
Cezote's head shifted to the side as a result of the blow. Ah, this is what she is used to, and it phased her about as much as water would a fish. "Oh oh, going to pretty up Cezote are you? How kind of you."
Rigwyn drew a staff from his sack, then raised it. From it a thick black cloud raced. It resembled a wraith with sickle in hand at first, then rapidly spread and dissipated choking out all but the faintest trace of light.