[hr][hr][center][img]https://i.imgur.com/OPAnOZN.png[/img][/center][hr][hr][color=848484][center][h2]T E N E B R O U S   T O W E R S   ||   [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BHVr3FQZc4][color=848484]♫[/color][/url][/h2][/center][hr][hr]
The Castle Mandelein stood before Edyta in all of its aged vainglory, tenebrous towers rising into the moonlit sky in some echo of her homeland, spires reaching through a mourning haze of clouds to skewer the frosty white sphere of Juni and impale the blood red orb of Larus. There came, then, a soft rain, pitter-pattering on the aged stones and plinking against the copper-coated shingles. The smell of damp pine and muddy Stresian puddles mingled with the cold of the air and she paused to thank Ipte for the haunting beauty of the scene before her. These were [i]her[/i] hours, after all.

A blanket of clouds blotted out the stars as the young nun paused and knelt off-path some thirty yards from the outer guardhouse. She made the sign of the Pentad, closed her eyes, and let herself be vulnerable, trusting the Gods - as always - to either protect or to claim her.
 
[color=6ecff6][i]Ipte, to whom the world owes its beauty and love, I humbly ask for thy blessing, that I might remember what it is that I fight for and what it is that I forsake in the name of a grander good.[/i][/color]
She pressed her right hand to her left shoulder.

[color=f26522][i]Shune, from whom all knowledge and magic rings forth, I humbly ask for thy blessing, that I might act with wisdom, prudence, and keenness of mind in pursuit of the flourishing of all.[/i][/color]
She pressed her left hand to her right shoulder.

[color=6ecff6][i]Oraff, giver and guardian of life, I humbly ask for thy blessing, that I might act in the sacred interest of life's preservation wherever possible, even to the point of laying down mine own.[/i][/color]
She pressed her left hand to her right hip.

[color=f26522][i]Eshiran, bringer of war and destruction, I beseech thee to look upon thy humble servant and bestow upon her the tripartite blessings of courage, conviction, and power which are thine alone to govern. I ask this of thee so that she might act as your instrument in ridding the world of pestilence, wickedness, and cruelty.[/i][/color]
She pressed her right hand to her left hip.

[color=6ecff6][i]Dami, who sits upon the thrones of choice and judgment, I humbly ask for thy blessing, that I might know more truly good from evil and walk always in the light to deliver thy justice.[/i][/color]
She brought her hands together, bowed her head, and opened her eyes.

It was a simple matter to slip by the guards. Such was the Gift that Edyta Laska had been given. Dorothea Hohnstein was neither so blessed or cursed. The two of them had agreed that each would find her own way inside. They would try, as stalwartly as possible, to stay within sensing range of each other, at least as long as the Rezaindian occupied the same plane as her counterpart.

[hr][hr][center][h2]T H E   R O T T E N   H E A R T   ||   [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QR28G204z5k][color=848484]♫[/color][/url][/h2][/center][hr][hr]
Sister Laska materialized inside of the great hall, where greyed ancient timbers one hundred feet across held up a roof that she could scarce make out and frayed banners and tapestries hung along the walls. Upon crossbeams, corbels, and rafters clung long ghostlike tendrils of cobweb, stirring, half-animated, by the persistent draft in the cavernous room. What grabbed her attention most was none of these things, however. Beneath a faded portrait of some former Graf Kapperstel, the hearth was cold. Even in the dead of night, in no grand castle such as this would the fire that was the beating heart of any occupied structure be allowed to go dark. Something was not right and she did not remain there long.

Curiosity piqued, she ventured next through the hallways, reaching out with her magic ahead of any encounters as she explored. There were... perhaps three people in the entire vast structure and, when she sensed the only one awake busy walking up the stairs, she ducked around a corner, waited, and followed the woman up from a discreet distance. Up they both went, into the second-highest tower, and there were the lord's chambers. Edyta faded into greyborn space and appeared only once the servant was gone.

She knew even before she returned to reality: it was all a lie. There was no lord - nobody to govern Mandelein. The nun's heart beat a good deal faster and there was scant little she could do to calm it. [color=f26522][i]A rot,[/i][/color] she decided, [color=f26522][i]Deep and deceptive, at the very heart of this town![/i][/color] 

Edyta was relentless after that. Like some sort of frantic, vengeful shade, she picked through the room and found yet more. [color=f26522][i]Scratches on the wall! Powerful enough to carve right into stone!? Is that... evidence of a burn in the corner of the ceiling!?[/i][/color] 

She slithered and slunk, then, about the castle grounds, investigating the library next and its records of the House Kapperstel, up until shortly after the accession of the young Graf Anselm, some century or more previous. There, they abruptly ended. There were other bedrooms, similarly maintained in a semi-living state, but none yielded such treasures as the first. The exterior gardens were maintained in a state of shabby grandeur, at least, but those of the interior had gone wild and thorny. [color=6ecff6][i]A façade![/i][/color] Sister Laska realized, [color=6ecff6][i]They're maintaining a façade![/i][/color] The greater question now became, 'why', and the one that logically followed it was, 'what in the five hells are they [i]hiding[/i]!?' 

The answers to these questions were ones that she did not know, however. It was with this notion squarely in mind that she gazed out from the parapets as the glow on the horizon began to build toward an inevitable grey and dreary Stresian sunrise. Edyta fixed upon the dungeon. Surely, a place like this had one. She would find what she was looking for there, and so she set off once again, into the depths of Castle Mandelein, sensing Dorothea within her range.

The other two servants had risen and, much as she'd been careful not to leave any traces, worry nibbled at the edges of her confidence nonetheless. Such a grand ruse, this was! Surely, they would be cautious. Surely, they would be protective! 

Such things mean little against a greyborn.

This, then, was a deserted place in truth: dark and dank and utterly without hope. It had gone so long disused that one could not even call the present stench one of death and decay. There was only mould and lime eating away at the castle's foundations, a fitting metaphor, perhaps, the nun considered. That was when she came upon the first cell. Dory was drawing near and, suddenly, Edyta would welcome her presence. She did not want to be alone. There were scrawlings on the wall - [color=6ecff6][i]csaudecep?[/i][/color] - but they were not what had shaken her so. It was the bones. They were not those of a dragon. They were not human bones either, but they... had once been. 

It was the skeleton of a wildblood.[/color]
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