< And So It Begins | Vault Of The Drow | The Weakest Link >
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> Izzdaer finds Alba's house without too much difficulty, other than a close call with a street full of Manes (minor demons), who had escaped from a merchant whose cage full of the things had broken open.
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> He and Aurora got away with only a few small scratches.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "Do you always need help taking prisoners to prison?" Aurora asks Izzdaer
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> "..I.. I have never escorted a prisoner before..."
⚠ <p> * Izzdaer frowns, like he's calculating something in his head that won't come out right.
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> A half-elven woman sees them approach, apparently, and comes out on to the street to confront Izzdaer. "Wait there you!" she says. "My mistress buys at the Green Square bizarre when she needs new girls. Take that one away from here."
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> Aurora, quite sensitive, can tell that the woman is actually more worried about her livelihood than with pleasing her mistress.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> She considers this information, and works her claws on the webs again.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "I am not a girl," she says, staring the half-elven woman down.
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> "This one is for the cells." offers Izzdaer, uncertainly.
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> The woman is intimidated by Aurora, and backs off, but not so far that she doesn't hear what Izzdaer is saying.
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> "I'll get my mistress, and she'll sort you out!" she says, before darting back inside.
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> Aurora and Izzdaer stand before the facade of the building to which they've been directed. It is three stories in height, and the windows peek out from holes in the facade. The facade itself is truly out in front of the building itself like a mask, and made of interwoven vines, something like grapevines.
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> Whoever put it together must have spent a long time getting it all together correctly, because it creates an aesthetic of an huge piece of patterned art of exquisite beauty.
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> Several motifs are repeated over and over, including a web motif.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "Where do you take me?" she asks. "This is no prison."
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> "Yet it has cells."
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> In some of the second-story windows, females of various races call down from above, tempting pedestrians to come up, and see what they have to offer. A few males, as well.
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> "Of a sort. So I understand."
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "And why do you take me? You do not want to."
⚠ <p> * Alba appears at the doorway, flanked by guards. She is draped in spidersilk. Her scultped figure is in plain outline through the dress.
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> "I do many things I do not want to."
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> "Mistress Alba! I humbly present you with this offering; for the cell nearest your Pit."
⚠ <p> * Izzdaer attempts to look suitably deferential.
⚠ <p> * aurora_ attempts to look suitably non-offerable
⚠ <p> <Alba> Alba strides toward Aurora, grasping her by the chin and turning her face this way and that. "A shifter? I have always desired one."
⚠ <p> <Alba> "Such beautiful feline features. Exqusite. Show me your claws."
⚠ <p> <Mike_Holmes> Izzdaer notes the Half-elven woman looking out of the door again, her face angry.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> Surprised to find someone who actually knows of her breed, Aurora is nonetheless not inclined to cooperate. She grits her teeth and stares at Alba, curling her hands into fists.
⚠ <p> * Alba frowns and pouts. "There, there, pretty kitty. If we're angry, well, we can find a use for those claws." She licks Aurora's face.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> Surprised, Aurora takes a step back. "Leave me be," she says in imperfect but clear grow.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> drow*
⚠ <p> <aurora_> She itches to clean her face off, her ears flattening slightly against her head.
⚠ <p> <Alba> "But that wouldn't be any fun. I could make you come, you know. But I'd like us to be friends."
⚠ <p> <Alba> "Now, inside, all of you. I want to show you your new home."
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "Let me go," Aurora says, "And then we can be friends."
⚠ <p> * Izzdaer is never sure what to do with himself when women argue.
⚠ <p> <Alba> "She can either come inside, or she can be sealed in a barrel and left to drown. I could wear her as a scarf. But she should decide swiftly."
⚠ <p> * aurora_ scowls briefly, and then walks inside, striding past her captors.
⚠ <p> * Izzdaer follows meekly, because, well, what choice does he have?
⚠ <p> <Alba> "She can either come inside, or she can be sealed in a barrel and left to drown. I could wear her as a scarf. But she should decide swiftly."
⚠ <p> * aurora_ scowls briefly, and then walks inside, striding past her captors.
⚠ <p> * Izzdaer follows meekly, because, well, what choice does he have?
⚠ <p> * Alba leads the little group into a world of crimson velvet, peephole doors, and ambiguous screaming.
⚠ <p> * Izzdaer looks around, maintaining a composed expression of detatched, scholarly interest.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> Once inside, Aurora looks around, awkwardly working at the bottom edge of her bonds again with her claws. She is having a hard time keeping up her confident facade now, as they go deeper into the velvet lair.
⚠ <p> <Alba> People part respectfully before Alba as she leads the group to a winding stair. S He? seems not to notice the stares (lustful? fearful?) of her patrons.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "What do you want with me?" Aurora asks,
⚠ <p> <aurora_> she slows a little, sensing the impending end to their journey, and not wanting to find out what is at the other end.
⚠ <p> <Alba> "I've never had one of you before."
⚠ <p> <Alba> "...and those claws, well, the imagination trembles, dear kitty."
⚠ <p> <Alba> "My mother never let me have any pets and now I have a dungeon full of them. But until now, nothing so.... furry."
⚠ <p> <Alba> "I love the feel of scales, but they lack a certain... softness, is it not so?"
⚠ <p> * Alba tickles Aurora under the chin.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "I thought I was to be taken to a prison, not a… whatever this is?" Aurora says, clearly even less happy with this idea.
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> "There are many kinds of prison." Izzdaer opines, to the air.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> She jerks her chin away in disgust
⚠ <p> <aurora_> "I won't be your slave," she says with a little hiss.
⚠ <p> <Alba> Alba laughs. "I already have plenty of slaves. I have something sweeter in mind for you."
⚠ <p> <aurora_> The shifter scowls. "I won't be…that either."
⚠ <p> <Alba> "They all say that in the beginning. In my experience, that which we most profess to hate is the gateway to our deepest desires."
⚠ <p> <Alba> A particularly piercing scream punctuates this last remark. Alba smiles again. "I have tested this most thoroughly"
⚠ <p> * aurora_ finds her hatred for Alba growing with every second. "I don't /profess/ to hate you," She looks to Izzdaer for help or at least sympathy, since he seems to not be of the same stripe as Alba
⚠ <p> <Izzdaer> Izzdaer can't bring himself to meet her eyes.
⚠ <p> <aurora_> *
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