laurs # PStory

So I have a story that's going to span across... many... pet pages. I've been mentioning it on and off for a long while, but I have finally managed to sit down and type up the first pet, and the first story. I'd like some input.

When The Inquisitor had gained power, I had tried to help my fellow Agents of Balance to correct and check his attempts to oppress the Dark. Agents started dying in accidents. Some were "no longer with the Agency." We had been infiltrated, and the few of us that had remained had fled. We had been forced to scatter. Surely they couldn't catch us all... But we never met up at the rendezvous point. I was the only one who made it.

Now, the wind blew gently though Sanctuary, my name for a vibrant glen that I had tended to for a very long time. It was my secret garden, a magnificent clearing big enough for a small army to rest comfortably. The air was sweet with the scent of rich soil, green things and the perfume of flowers.

This was my last bastion. My magic was woven into the borders of my glen, preventing everyone from finding it. Everyone... except for myself. But I couldn't stay hidden here for the rest of my life. As an Agent of Balance, I had to right the wrongs committed by the Light Agency.

I knew there were rogues out there; Light, Dark and Balance Agents who had refused to become a part of the war that raged between those who had once been neighbors. It was time to open the border to them. It was time... to restore the Balance. And I needed to start gathering the sympathizers to my cause.

There was one; a contact from the Dark. A terrible, deadly, and cunning Incarnation of Retribution; Nerrow. If he could be persuaded... a shiver rolled through my body.

Nothing could stop him once he set his sights on a victim. There was no bargaining, no trade, no deal that could be made to stave off his terrible black claws. Some say he devoured their soul. Some say he tormented it unending. Rumors whispered that the soul was used up somehow, the very essence of the living being it had once been extinguishing like a candle being blown out.

Today, I was deliberately drawing his attention. I could only pray that my status as an Agent Of Balance would keep him from immediately killing me. It was a risk, but one I needed to take.

I could hear a patrol of Light Agents nearby. They were searching the forest for anyone they could get their hands on. It no longer mattered if you were guilty; if you were in Shadowglen forest, you were beheaded and your severed head would be turned in to see if it had a bounty on it. If there wasn’t one? Oh well. Better luck next time for the Light Agents.

Stepping beyond the borders of my glen, I gathered my magic and began to sketch a Summon glyph in the soil. The magic surged, and the Light Agents began to shout. Damn… beyond my Sanctuary, spells could be detected. I needed to be quick, and pray that he responded just as quickly. Over the waving foliage, an Agent pointed his sword directly at me.

"By Light, by Dark, by Balance ever cycling, I call thee. Nerrow, Incarnation of Retribution, I seek an audience. Dark Predator; cold claw in the night, hear me and come forth!"

My magic, a dazzling blue-silver light that flowed and rippled along the lines of the symbol I drew, abruptly changed. As though an eclipse had engulfed the sun, the magic darkened to a black of the deepest night, rimmed in a shimmering purple.

The scent of my glade flooded over me. My flowers, precious and delicate in full bloom. Sweet nectar. The sharp green smell of plants being butchered by machetes as the Light Agents shouted threats and jeering plans to end my life. I took another deep breath and froze, fur and feathers prickling.

Nerrow normally followed paths that were not quite entirely of this world; slipping through shadows and across great distances in the blink of an eye. If a path led to a person, he could touch them... kill them... rip their souls out of their still gurgling bodies. No path, no soul taking. By summoning him directly, I had forced a path to be created that led to myself. He was coming.

The shouts of the approaching Light Agents faded. And there was nothing. No smell. The scent of the flowers was gone. The bruised plants were gone. Tree sap. The mulch beneath my feet. I could smell nothing. The breeze was gone. The frightened twittering of the birds in the branches above had been silenced. I couldn't even hear my own breathing.

There was a pulse from the symbol before me, and a flash of blackness surged outward. The first Light Agent stepped into sight, but in total silence. He leered at me, and something on his face that twisted my gut into knots. His mouth moved, but no sound came out. The black flash hit him, and he froze in the process of pointing his blade at me. He stopped moving. Stopped breathing. Frozen in time. I had been drawn out of the world, and into a little bubble of separated time.

Then I began to notice something else... It seemed so gradual that I wasn't sure it was really happening. Everything green... the grass, the plants, the tree leaves, the buds and the berries on the bushes were losing their color. Everything was turning a uniform, stormy gray. And as the green seeped away, the blue sky became affected: turning a milky white like the eyes of a boiled fish. Then the sky darkened, took on a much more frightening color. The world was suddenly bathed in a tide of red, the color of freshly spilled blood, edged in a blackness so solid and sharp edged that I wanted to shrink from it.

But I couldn't move. I dared not move.

Then the sound reached me. Low at first, almost a hum. But there was something malignant in that hum. Intelligent and knowing, the hum deepened into a low rumbling that grew louder and louder until it solidified into a deep, deadly snarl.

I strangled the shriek of terror down to a whimper as hot breath ruffled the feathers at the back of my neck. He was behind me. Looming and threatening. He was waiting for me to turn around. Daring me to try to flee. Waiting, and wanting that expression of terror before the teeth tore into me. As much as I wanted to flee, I knew it would do me no good.

"Nerrow, Dark Incarnation." My voice hitched only briefly before I managed to squeak out, "Welcome."

I could hear him inhale, feel the pull of air as he drew in his breath and the moving air made my feathers quiver. "Bold, brave and foolish young Agent Of Balance."

"With respect, my Lord, I disagree." I sat, rigid as a statue, but speaking a bit steadier, if a bit breathless.

"Oh? Do you." An exhale of breath on my left ear, making it twitch. Something slithered over my shoulder, light and whispery, like satin trailed across fur. A tentacle made of black mist slid across my neck. A rope, a noose, or, if he pleased, a lethal blade that would send my life's blood gushing out.

"I do, sir. These days, the foolish are dead. And I am not. Not yet anyway."

There was a pause and then a throaty chuckle. "For a female, as they say, you've got balls." The tentacle slid away from my throat and I could breathe easier.

"Ovaries." I corrected, feeling my insides turn to water with relief as I sensed him move farther away, allowing me space. "May I turn to face you now?"

"It hardly matters whether or not you see me, but by all means, speak to me face to face, if you dare."

I rose to my paws slowly, turned and sat.

He was a Nightmare Archan; a black leonine body marked by thick, even blacker stripes. A dark mist seemed to radiate from his body; a mist he could harden into a blade so fine that flesh and bone would simply part before it. Muscles flexed beneath fur that seemed gray and ratty, as though the fur he wore was ancient and rotting. It seemed as though the wrong move would cause it to dissolve like old lace to reveal the true creature lurking beneath. But it was his eyes that riveted my attention. Or to be more precise, the lack of eyes. It looked as though someone had scooped them out with a melon-baller, leaving deep wells with a tiny pinpoint of light far into their depths. Those lights seemed to look right through me, and suddenly I felt like I was at the bottom of a well, staring up at the sky far, far above me.

He caught my gaze and smiled, mouth stretching wide to bare every gleaming, white tooth in his jaws.

"Let us begin." He reached out with a large claw and raked a line in the earth. "Very few have ever dared to contact me deliberately since I came into power. Only one has thus far lived, and I took a part of her soul away as payment. The 'why' of your calling is apparent," he gestured at the Light Agent, stone gray and just as immobile beyond out little pocket of time and space. "The only two questions left are; 'what is the extent of your need,' and 'what will my payment be?'"

I shook off slightly, trying to shake my feathers into a more relaxed position. "I was an Agent of Balance before the war. It is still what I am trying to do; bring balance and by extension, end the war. By extension, it would benefit you by decreasing your workload."

His paw began to tap the ground rhythmically and a cold trill raced through my chest. Was I boring him? Did he like all the blood he had spilled?

"What I ask of you is no more than what you normally do, only that you do it in the defense of the glade. We have refugees desperate for sanctuary. At least, I'm sure most of them are. My worries are that sooner or later spies will be sent to betray us from within. I need your help. Innocents need protection when they flee, and need to be tested in order to be allowed into the glade. As for reward... I can offer you very little. I can offer the hope that this terrible war ends. I can offer you the promise that your people will not be hunted any more. I have no money, and currently, no authority." My heart sank as his expression did not change. No satisfaction flickered in those deep pits.

"That is slim pickings indeed, little Balance Agent. I am already in the process of ending this war. I am carving a bloody path through the Light Agent ranks, and eventually, I will get to the Inquisitor myself. There is no weapon... no wall, no obstacle that can stop me. There is no benefit to me to join your resistance." He started to turn away from me.

“W-wait!" I cried desperately, "What if you joined us? Our one and only goal is the Inquisitor. It would take time, but would save you the need to take so many lives. Isn't there something we can offer?"

"I doubt it. Your fight will result in many lives lost, for one side or the other. It will not lighten my workload." His tail was sweeping slowly from side to side, but he was watching me narrowly.

"I can offer you acceptance. Companionship. And... and in the end... a part of myself; a part my soul."

He blinked, appeared to be taken off guard. The slowly sweeping tail went still. "A part of your soul? Willingly?"

"Isn't that what you do? Take souls? Does it matter whether it's willing?" My insides quivered in protest to my offer, but I did not take it back.

Nerrow rose to his paws and the black mist rising from his fur took on that same strange purple sheen that the rune had taken. "It matters a great deal. Every soul I have taken has been unwilling. Every murderer, every violent criminal; they all go down the same. Every one of them dies, choking and fighting against me, even as I drag them free of their twitching bodies. The dust from the corpses of those I have slain could block out the sun. There will always be more. The rumors are true, you know. I feed upon them, and they add to my strength... temporarily."

He began to circle me slowly, a line of purple energy forming behind his paws until I was sealed within a ring of black energy, tipped with purple light. "But a soul given willingly? Never before. Even if it is only partial, it holds a great deal of power. Power beyond the souls I consume; the paltry energy that dissipates after a single use. If I carve out a portion of your soul, it will be a permanent boost to my power." He gave a soft feline rumble then, and the eagerness in that sound made me swallow uneasily. "You offer me this? Know this; I do not need to kill if I take only part of the soul. But when I tear a part of your soul out, the rest of it will be damaged in such a way that you might never recover? I don't have to"

"Yes. In exchange for your aid. You help me by assisting refugees and test them to ensure that they are not spies. In return, at the end of this war, I willingly give you a part of my soul."

"Interesting. I wish a test. Before I accept, I wish to know whether your soul is worth the bargain you are offering to me."

"I understand. And I accept your test."

"You may be sorry that those words crossed your beak, Irion. But it is too late to change your mind." He thrust his muzzle into my face, and for a single heartbeat, our eyes connected.

I felt as though I had been sucked down the holes the made up his eyes. I could actually feel him inside my skull; massive meat-hook claws sorting and shifting through thoughts and ideas and parts of my personality with cool efficiency. Eventually, he passed everything and settled around the very core of myself. For an instant, I felt as if he clutched my very existence in his deadly claws and inspected me the way a child observes an unusual bug. I quivered in his grasp, but did not fight him. Instead, I tried to quell the gibbering terror that screamed at me to thrust him out and keep him out, to not let him do

movie-move melon baller- melon-baller

A soul seems a high price to pay in an age of uncertainty. Presumably she needs the help of light agents, and at least as powerful as this dark one because of balance of power, yet she would be betraying the light by not being able to offer them anything near as great- you only get one soul. A reader who is just being introduced to this world and this character might feel like I do and think she's just too fucking damn dumb to succeed. At that point where you made it clear that souls are a real good that could be seen and used and not some story metaphor? I really didn't care about her or her goals anymore.

Interesting. Where does it go from here? What else could be required of Nerrow that he would be obligated to fulfill, as she paid already for his favour with herself. She has nothing greater to offer.

Whoa! I wish I could write like that! I got so caught up in the story I didn't even notice the spelling errors that spotted.
The shift from third person narration, to first person story was slightly jarring, but the story itself made up for it very quickly. Perhaps a small piece of art to separate narration and story in the final piece would help.

Very curious to see more!

This is a very interesting story you started. And a huge thing, if you want to end a war. I like your style of writing and I am interested in how you continue on other pet pages, maybe with different points of view?

A problem I see is that a long story needs to be told long, so the reader starts to care for the characters. Starts to like and hate them. Your introduction explains a lot and gives a brief overview of how the whole thing started. But it did not give me a feeling for the figures.

And Terentia seems to be very powerful. Stopping time, creating hidden places. Why did she have to hide so long? I'd her task was to restore balance, why don't she gather her agent colleagues in the beginning and stop the Director of light? Shouldn't all of the agents of balance have powers like her? And how did he become director anyway? Shouldn't there be some council or something choosing someone capable?

This part bothers me a lot. It seems that Nerrow is so mighty. Why does he not just take the soul he wants? And in our balanced world, shouldn't there be a creature to balance Nerrow? Someone forgiving and saving the rotten souls of murders, turning them good?

I think there are even more unanswered questions in my head, but since this is a story still under construction, maybe things will become clear later.

So far I like the idea of a big story with many pets. I wish for more action and less explaining.

Greetings, Kassy

Thanks for catching those. Sometimes you just miss a word or two even on a re-read through.

Hmm. A bit harshly put, but I take your meaning. I've tried to correct that oversight and explain the soul bit more, and change the cost to make it a bit more like there's more at stake.

Updates made, the story changed a bit based on your feedback.

More will be revealed over time. :)

I like this better, it now feels like she has a plan and is thinking about the future.

So the question remains, do Balance battle-irions have anything to bring to the table in terms of wiping out or just plain mazing/confuser or translocating intrusive Light agents? Because right now it seems that after the bargain she just sits there like a nerk and lets Nerrow take agency in addition to her soul-piece. If I were an agent of Balance I'd attempt to wipe their minds or something I would not necessarily be interested in their death because their help could be useful later if only they had time to listen/be converted/be subverted, but death well that's what she lets happen.

Does she feel to wiped out, even though she tried? Is the spell she cast so complicated that any additional effort will result in failure? Right now the readers don't know. She still may not be firing on all of her heroic-cylinders yet.

I like your changes. Now Terentia seems to be a... deeper character (can you say that in English? I'm not sure.) Now I'm curious how this continues and who's the next introduced character :)

Greetings and keep writing! Kassy

I'm somewhat struggling with that part.

On one hand, there's a very dark route that her power could go; namely those who caused harm would relive that harm, but as the victim. So if you murder five people, you are murdered five times in exactly the same way, revived each time to suffer through the next. (sick and twisted, but extremely scary and intimidating; a way of ensuring --until the Inquisitor-- that the other elements are kept in check and don't try to grab for too much power.)

A secondary, only slightly less dark way is that you relive it in your mind; so you experience it but it doesn't actually physically happen, even though the mental version is as vivid and painful as reality. (not as sick and twisted, but still terrifyingly effective.)

The third is much lighter and happier, but is no less terrifying for what it could be used to do. Namely a Balance Agent gets a hold of you and basically rearranges your brain. On the plus side, it could clear up your schizophrenia. On the minus side it could be used so that you were enslaved to an agent. In the war, it would force them to face the atrocities they're committing simply by following orders.

I'm trying to decide which would work best. I don't mind the dark routes, as it could explain why she resists using the powers. My reluctance with the third power circles around the fact that basically a "superhero" with only mental powers is useless in a fight where everyone else is throwing elemental magic around and has to rely on everyone else to keep them physically safe while they try to use their mental powers.

You're right, she's deeper character. It translated across just fine. :)

I disagree that "only mental powers" is necessarily useless in a fight, so if it is in your world, you'd need to specify why it is to your readers sometime along in the story. These mental powers wouldn't necessarily rearrange your brain, because many facets of what we call intelligence are emergent features.

One mental power that would work is to make people think you are 10 feet to the left of where you are. While making yourself directly invisible might not work, you could walk behind a tree/wall/whatever and come out with a camouflage glammer on when you emerge on the other side. They'd have an expectation of object permanence and would not expect to see you there you are still behind the wall/tree/whatever, especially if it's "obviously" in their line of fire.

There is a concept of "fog of war" at the time of war too many things are going on at once for anyone to be sure of exactly how the battlefield is laid out and how folks are moving. This is why in Real Life military intel and drones and satellites are so valuable. Another mental power that would work would be to make the combatants forget someone was even there.

Whether or not she could stop Nesser by force majeure, she has words and can say "stop!" or afterwards "as a condition of our alliance and by the price you have been paid (maybe even the contract is automagically enforced?) you will refrain from doing that unless directed." If only she has to obey this compact, then she's an idiot.

I like the third option; I like the image of the "superhero" being surrounded by other forces of Good to protect her while she does the one thing she came to do. It's like quidditch.