[quote=@Tatterdemalion]
SECOND PLACE
WEREWOLF MAGNET
1 XP

The thing that looms out of the mist of the showers is the sort of thing that emerges from the bottom of bogs in order to fight heroes. It is the sort of thing that is dredged up by children who scream and see it in their nightmares for the rest of their lives. Its eyes are dull, chipped jade, darting and low; its face and body are caked with wet earth, and it smells like the underside of a rotting log. It trembles when it moves, losing circulation in its limbs from the wicked shadow claws of its assailant. Its triangles twitch.

When it moves, it is not with any practiced coquettishness. It peels away the last remnants of its ruined clothing with the single-minded purpose of a snake shedding its skin, and underneath is more clotted mud. The tatters slough to the wet tiles. It stands before Margot, its body heaving with every breath, then squatting suddenly. It cocks its head like a bird, before reaching out and stroking Margot’s cheek, as if trying to understand what a face is, what a person is. Its fingers leave smeared, trailing earth along Margot’s fine, downy cheek.

“Wash me,” it hisses. “Work me clean. Hold me fast.” Reward is only implicated. This is not how these stories go. Only once the monster has been transformed do we speak about dates or kisses or worship. The first thing that must be done is to obey the cryptic commands, or else you will be eaten, or cursed, or the like.

[Turned a 6 into a [b]7[/b] on turning Margot on by stealing [i]The Wild Hunt[/i] from the Fae. Gaia is at 2 Strings.][/quote]

You've always wondered, Elodie, what it must be like to have a wish granted. What surreal sensation must occur when the world shifts the wind whispers and everything is different in the way that you wanted it to be. When you're not treated as a failure or a monster or as a trainee for a job you hate but instead as something...

The shower runs hot, as do the hands against what's on top of your skin, and then upon your skin. Mud tears like silk, sloughing off like a cocoon, taking everything wrong and broken away from you with each rush of water and thrilling brush of claws against neck and collarbone. Fur brushes fur and hot water catches in your devilishly pointed ears filling you with a swirling, warming, cleansing deafness. It is a complex thing to go through a transformation but it is a divine thing to be worshiped during the transition. Every branch and leaf removed an act of worship, every inch of your new form revealed and cleaned another misty shock of colour in the fogged mirror. Soon you stand alight in colour and wrapped around with silver white and muscle like iron.

When the mists fade, who is it now in the mirror?


[Healing applied by someone else, with intimate subtext: heal two harm]

[quote=@Anarion]
[Keep cool 4+4+2=10]

Annalee, impatient with luxuriating on Elodie's bed, pulls the door open. Out jumps the pig and Annalee catches her in her arms and gives her a little noogie. "Who's a cute little pig, Carmen? Is it you? It is you! You're very cute." She lifts Carmen up and holds her, then gives her a hug because she is a cute little piggy and she deserves hugs. This is probably not going the way that Carmen expected, but Annalee is practically aglow so good is she feeling. 

That does leave the little matter of Timothy Oglevee Crompton though. "Timmy dear" she says, turning Carmen around in her arms so that Timmy can look at the pig. "I asked you to watch this little fellow and what do I find when I open the door? She's running around loose and jumping all over the place. I appreciate your patience, you're welcome to come in now, but I think you need to explain yourself or you're going to be in a great deal of trouble."

[Question to the MC (from the 10+ cool roll): How could Annalee get Carmen to like her (and stop trying to kill her)?]
[/quote]

There are very pure motives behind the demon hunter's attacks: courage, honour, defense of the weak and vulnerable and hot. Corrupting motives that pure are trivial. You've got the very clear sense that if you played the part of a vulnerable and benevolent sorceress who'd cure her curse and said the words 'honour' and 'oh no, we Mustn't' a lot then you'd wrap her heart up in a little bow and have a deadly assassin at your beck and call. Curing the curse isn't a complicated thing either, it's been going for a while and a lot of the magic has worn off, so you'd just be speeding it along to its conclusion.