Eldritch Moms

Multimuse for muses who are mostly... what it says on the tin, really. Eldritch moms. Moms who are eldritch. Occasional coherent sentences by Ang.

[eldritchmoms]

I've got DnD OCs and I'm not afraid to use them.

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Carrd

[cuileandorcha]

@eldritchmoms || Liar's Night

Maledos slips into the apothecary as though there on an errand - and he supposes he was. There was no point skulking with what he was after, and he's never any intention of bringing trouble to Ren's door. As the door chimes, he makes a point of glancing up at the bell's mechanism as though he was surprised by it.

He lingers for just a moment, then steps inside, making sure the door doesn't catch his tail as it swings shut. He's delighted to find the space nearly empty - save for Ren himself, and a young woman who looked of only slightly better standing than himself. More delighted still that she was was already on her way to the door, though Maledos is not going to pass up the opportunity that her presence offers to poke a little fun.

"Apothecary," He starts as though Ren is a stranger, raising a hand in greeting as he passes the woman - he can smell the camphor as she gets near, and makes sure to side-step her as he approached the counter. "My Master is wanting for licorice pomfrey cakes, have you any?"

[eldritchmoms]

It's not the first time Mal has done this, and it won't be the last. Sometimes it was a deflection on the suspicion of being watched, though far less often once Maledos had learned that this particular tactic was paper thin under the slightest poking around. They might both be able to play the part in the moment, but any casual questioning around the bonedocks would quickly reveal that the two of them were well aquainted and that would only lead to questions about why the previous little performance was necessary.

This time, the glint in Mal's eye and the lilt in his tone was pure mischief. Well, if that was how he wanted to play things...

Ren gave him a cool look across the counter.

"I know perfectly well who your masters are. Tell them they can send someone more respectable. I don't serve hellspawn, or thieves, or thieving hellspawn."

[cuileandorcha]

The confusion melts away as Maledos's face breaks into a grin, listening to Renosos list the amounts for the hair cut. He puts his hard won coin in his lap, and makes an effort to check the math - almost more to prove he can than out of actual distrust of Ren.

If the haircut was worth a silver, that was ten copper - all ten fingers up, take away six copper for the work he was doing--

He gets five down before the focus on his fingers and counting them down was making his vision start to swim in a particularly nauseating kind of way, and he pulls a face before he's dropping his hands back to his lap, taking a deep breath to calm his stomach. He opens his coin purse and fishes out the coins by feel alone, the different cut on the coins easier to distinguish than they were to count.

The way he was pulling them out, setting them on his leg one at a time, made it seem almost as if he didn't want Ren to see what was inside - and he didn't. The two silver in that bag could buy much more important things than a hair cut, and copper was easier by far for him to replace.

He counts them all under his breath, an easier feat than doing the math involved, and when he's done, he quickly cinches the bag back up, gathers his coin, and holds it out to Ren in a grubby hand - "Six copper!"

[eldritchmoms]

Mal had made an attempt to confirm the numbers, and that was good enough in the circumstances. If you ended up with a habit, and worse a reputation, for not checking your sums where money was concerned, you ended up worse off very quickly.

Ren can see the way Mal feels for the different cuts of coin. He skips over at least two. He'd picked up more coin than he wanted to let on. Not a fortune, or he'd be having a hard time not letting on. But enough for caution.

He accepts the grubby coppers with a small smile. He wasn't about to complain about the state of Mal's hands in this case. All money was dirty one way or another.

"Deal then. See about getting some new clothes with the rest of it. That amount of blood on a tiefling gives folks the wrong impression."

[cuileandorcha]

📏 5'9" (Renosos), 6'11" (Abdul), 7'9" (Tsaexl) BONUS HARD MODE: Compare Tsaexl and Zum :3

maskarrans, book ended by a bimboy and himbo

Bonus Round:

no wonder he rides on her head

[eldritchmoms]

Reblogging to put this here and also to say teehee Mal is at tiddy height for Abdul.

[cuileandorcha]

YOU MIGHT MAKE YOUR WAY IN THE LIGHT — a low activity multimuse feat. several Original and Canon muses from a variety of media. Featured fandoms include Dungeons & Dragons, Marvel's X-Men, Kingdom Hearts, & Dead By Daylight. Both mun and blog are extremely fantasy oriented, with most muses having either a D&D or fantasy verse available for play — BUT YOU'LL NEED FRIENDS IN THE DARK

[cuileandorcha]

Maledos looks confused as he turns part way to face Ren again - not confused as if he didn't understand what Ren had said, but the way a child might scrunch up their face if they thought they were being misunderstood. After all, he was - despite all the life experience he had - still just a child.

And one with recent head trauma, at that.

"Just said I was gon' work fer it too," he says, only a bit of a protesting whine slipping into his voice. "I'm wantin' a number fer on top of that."

Wanting a number was already far more specific than he would have been if this had happened a year ago - when Mal had been unable to do anything but trust other people to count out his coin, even if he'd kept keen eyes on them trying to intimidate them into not ripping him off.

But then, this time last year Maledos hadn't been able to acctually count his own fingers - only tell you with confidence that he still had all ten.

[eldritchmoms]

"Should never've taught you to count," Ren mutters, shaking his head, but his tone is one of weary exasperation not genuine regret. In truth, it was good that Mal was learning to hold people to specifics where coin was concerned. "Let's say the work's worth six coppers - assuming you do a good job - and the haircut's worth a silver. A decent meal will be two coppers on top of that. So six coppers on top of the work should do it."

It was highly unlikely that Mal would be able to mentally follow the calculation, even without the head injury, not reeled off so casually and without the exact steps he needed to follow to reach a conclusion. But the result was stated plainly. The fact that Ren could have adjusted it upwards by about half without raising Mal's suspicion could be a lesson for another day.

[cuileandorcha]

Maledos's lips purse for a moment, but he can't keep keep the grin off his face when he was still getting the opportunity to get all he'd wanted out of it. If he pushed his luck *too* hard haggling, he might not even get that - a lesson that he had learned mostly in other places.

"I'll take it," he says with no small amount of confidence, failing to keep the excitement out of his voice. He'd had a bad day, and there was no guarantee that when he'd left, he'd be having any sudden betterment of the hand today had dealt him... 

But there was very little that a hot meal couldn't improve by a drastic measure in his experience.

"How much coin y' want fer all three?"

[eldritchmoms]

Ren gives the purse an assessing look.

"More than you can afford," he says flatly. "You heard me the first time."

It didn't matter exactly how much there was, and if Maledos didn't know that after Ren's assessment he was missing something important.

"You can work for that haircut. But your coin might stretch to some clean dressings and a hot meal."

[cuileandorcha]

"Ow"

Mal's head certainly does ring, but it's hard to miss the tone of Ren's voice, even with it underscored by the sharp whine in his ears as the ringing fades.

He releases his tail properly for the first time since he's sat down, and he reaches for his pocket. The coin purse he's pulled out is a battered thing - the sort that was just repurposed fabric from clothes too tattered to be worn. It's also distinctly not the one Maledos carried his spare bits in - in better condition, though not by much, and a dusty green where Maledos's own was undyed. 

There was weight to it - though it was hardly the sorts of full that one would expect from any other purse he'd target. The grip he's got on it is tight - the too-tight excitement of a child with a hard won prize marking the way that he held the empty top of the bag.

He's got something caught in his teeth when he grins, a little shred of something pink that had lingered long after his spit had cleared away the blood in his mouth. His expression is lopsided - but no more than it usually is. Less so, even, with the pain tamping down on his willingness to make any big or sudden motions.

He still looks incredibly self satisfied. And sounds it, too, "An' if I said I won?"

[eldritchmoms]

Someone was down a coinpurse and, by the looks of it, a chunk out of them too. Likely another urchin from a rival gang, and in the worst case with a large open wound that could be a death sentence if it wasn't treated to stop infection setting in. They might end up wandering in to Ren's shop before long. They might not.

Ren gives Maledos an appraising look. "For that, you get two things: not being in the state you would have been had you lost, and enough coin to be considering asking for extras in the first place."

The greatest reward you ever gained for surviving another day was the opportunity to survive the next. It was a hard truth, and one that too many never even had to consider until it was too late.

He doubted his words would dampen Mal's triumphant enthusiasm too much. Not if he was eager to show it off to one of the few adults he knew who wasn't about to have words about getting in brawls in the streets and coming away with purses that weren't his.

[eldritchmoms]

You don't know how important it is to me that Ren as a Trickery Cleric of Mask isn't cleric, but make it rogue. He's a cleric for rogues. He is a full support caster who has the spells to enable your bullshit on just about every level without slowing you down with shiny plate and no stealth skills and moral stances about not taking other people's stuff or stabbing them over perfectly reasonable grievances like being in the way. Healing, buffing, distraction, concealment, divination, teleporting right into restricted areas, crowd control and area denial while you get behind a single target to do 200d6 damage with a letter opener, he has you covered.

He also deals with you people every damned day of his life and can spot your bullshit.

[eldritchmoms]

put your "on repeat" playlist on shuffle, list the first 10 songs, and tag 10 people to do the same

Resurrection - Aviators

Fake Your Death - My Chemical Romance

Robin Hood and the Beggar Knight - Ken Theriot

New Age Messiah - Edguy

You Want It Darker - Leonard Cohen

Beast In Black - Beast In Black

Writing On The Wall - Aviators

Fly With The Black Swan - Sonata Arctica

The Throne - Blind Guardian

Vulture - Bear Ghost

Tagged by: @cuileandorcha Tagging: You!

[eldritchmoms]

Hot take BG3 did some accidental scatter damage in assuming that the game would only be played by BG1&2 / D&D fans and therefore certain gods didn't need explaining because it was assumed that the player knows that they're bad news.

[cuileandorcha]

Maledos considers his options for a moment. He didn't mind working for Ren - had dust the rafters a few times with little trouble, and he no doubt would be doing it again in the future. At least that was a job that didn't require him scrubbed to the elbows.

He turns his head a little - the suddenness of the movement makes him feel like he's got water behind his eyes and it's sloshing about. So he stills again, his ear rotating towards Ren instead.

"'Ssumin' I'm dustin' the rafters..." He starts slowly - His voice doesn't waver, but there was a level of deliberateness in his voice that said he had an idea, "'at'll get me patched up real good, yea?" He doesn't stop long enough to actually want an answer, "Gonna want any coin on top of it fer some food?" He was used to the gnawing of hunger at his gut - even eating as well as he did, getting more food was a constant concern for him - and he could smell there was something cooking in the next room over.

"An' a haircut?" He adds the question on at the end, his ear giving an extra little twitch, trying to make sure he can hear Ren past the pounding of his own head and the low ringing that had been there since he hit the cobblestones.

[eldritchmoms]

Mal's response is a poke in the back of the head, not close enough to the wound to be malicious but sharp enough to make his head ring.

"Don't push it," Ren said, but with no attempt to hide the wry smile colouring the words. Good to see Maledos negotiating for his worth rather than meekly taking whatever scraps were offered. "I've told you before, I'm not a damn soup kitchen. Or a barber. Dusting the rafters will get you patched up. The food'll depend on your coin. A haircut will depend on more coin, and you doing a good job up there, and you sweeping up after yourself."

[cuileandorcha]

Squirm, of course, is a relative thing. 

Ren's fingers feeling through tight coils wasn't enough to make him pull away on it's own, even when his scalp was radiating pain with every heart beat. Even with the knotting in his hair that never really seemed to be enough to go away for more than a few moments at a time. He'd never been allowed to grace to be tender headed.

But when Ren's fingers touch the gash at the center of the pain, he's surprised by how intensely he wants to jerk away from the prodding. He doesn't jerk away so hard he leaves the chair, but he does duck and twist in a manner that seems like he hoped to escape the prodding fingers, not have them follow him. 

They do, of course. He's not escaped Ren prodding at injuries yet - he's several years now past it being anything more than reflex to try.

Ren's words as he lets him go brings an odd sense of comfort to Maledos. There is lack of urgency that makes things feel normal. Like the back of his head wasn't anything worse than the sprains that he usually came in with. The gnawing fear at his gut lessens a little with the knowledge.

He leans back again, pressing his back to the chair and giving his feet a little kick - only to sweep them back again, tucking his feet around the wooden legs of the chair. His toes splay and the opposable dew claw on the insides of his feet tucks to grab at the legs themselves. A loose hold that he hopes will just make it harder for him to jerk away again.

"Y' want work or coin?" There is a distinct absence of his preferred way to pay in his offer - but it was hard to get any good information when the day had start the way his had.

[eldritchmoms]

A distinct absence of Ren's preferred form of compensation as well, but that by its nature from any individual came in irregular trickles punctuated by the occasional deluge. But combined across enough informants, it became effective.

"I've no work for you in that state," he snorts, "Not today. But come back late tomorrow and you can use that grip to clean out the rafters. Far more dust and spiders up there than I'd prefer."

Other things too, most likely, but nothing that wasn't small and likely to skitter off into the shadows before most registered anything more than an uncomfortable feeling of being watched. Certain places, certain people, simply radiated an influence that warped what was around them. Or in this case, more of an ooze and slick slide of power, like tar oil or coagulating blood.

"Otherwise, that leaves you with coin."

[memesforcreators]

If my OC was Canon what God Awful Fandom Hot Takes would their be for them?

[eldritchmoms]

It's Sunday.

Send filth.

[cuileandorcha]

Maledos hurries inside with a bit of oddness to his walk. He knew too well that lingering outside was just asking for trouble to find him, whether it came from the same source or not.

He knows well the procedure from here - he's been to Ren's plenty after he land on the streets, and he's often come out of it better than he went in. Or, at the very least with a way to get there. He starts making his way for the chair he had sat in to get his foot wrapped more than once, giving up on trying to hide the bit of a limp that he currently had. He figures that Ren will redirect him if he doesn't want him there.

"Back 'a my head, mostly." When he speaks, his voice isn't quite what it normally is, even to his own ears. Not slurred, exactly, but like he was fighting his way through being dazed. Slowed in the way one might expect from a particularly terrible headache. The kind of slow he was more used to hearing from the beggars that smell more like drink than dirt.

His face scrunches up, and even that makes his head hurt a little more. The throbbing is a steady thing, in time with his pulse, but every time his head moved it spiked a little. The ache of his chest is less than the pain in his head, everything else he felt was - but it was all a steady reminder of how he'd gotten here.

"Got in a fight." He looks mad about it as a sits down hard on the chair, his ears pinned back and eyes fixated on a knot in the wood pattern of the floor as he tried to piece together where all of the aches had come from. He gives them in order of the hurt, worst ones first. "Got m' head slam 'gainst the ground. Knee to the chest. Kicked my hip..."

His tail doesn't slide around to hang out the back of the chair, instead he's got it curled over his lap, his hands - blood under his claws and bruises along his knuckles - finding it and the tip wrapping around one fore arm.

"Think he was try'na get my tail with'at one..."

[eldritchmoms]

Ren specifically hadn't asked what happened. People tended to supply that on their own, and it prompted a distracting lie from those who really didn't want you to know. Maledos had been here enough times - usually with twists and sprains to his joints that seemed a little too frequent - to know that he wouldn't push for it either.

The head injury was the priority. He couldn't check Mal's pupils or focus easily with the solid colour, so he went straight for trying to find the source of the blood in his hair. Back of the head, somewhere it could catch the cobbles without his horns being what hit first. He knew he had the right spot, even before he could part the dense dark hair to take a look, when Mal hissed and squirmed at the touch.

A small, shallow gash, bleeding freely but in the way head wounds had a habit of doing rather than in a way that looked like a serious concern.

"If you managed to walk here and didn't get lost or throw up on the way," he said, letting go of Mal's head to fetch a clean cloth from the water basin, "odds are you'll live. So beyond cleaning that up, what you get depends on what you can afford."

[cuileandorcha]

@eldritchmoms // Maledos & Renosos

Every throb of the back of his head reminds him of a number of things. How they'd been lucky, this time, managing to defend their little bit of turf from another group of Urchins. How they'd just not been lucky enough to make it out unscathed. Most of them only had a bump or a bruise to tend to. Most of them had only left bumps and bruises in kind.

Maledos hadn't been so fortunate as most of the others - or so forgiving.

The boy who'd come after him had been a problem for a few months now, and given the opportunity to come after Maledos one on one? He'd taken it. Maledos's head had hit the ground, hard enough his vision went white for just a minute, and from there it was something of a blur - kicking feet and clawing hands. The boy had tried to cover his mouth, and that had been where he'd made his mistake. Maledos's head jerked, his hand slipped, and sharp little teeth had sunken into a dirty arm. He'd screamed, startled, and tried pushing him off. Maledos just hadn't been willing to let go.

He's bitten off fingers a few times before. But that didn't really compare to the feeling of the flesh of the other boy's forearm ripping away between his teeth as he bit down and the other boy pulled back.

He doesn't know, exactly, if he's bleeding. There was a lot of blood involved in general. He's had to take the entire back route to prevent risk of getting cornered by the guard for how much of it's around his mouth. On his shirt. He doesn't know who's is soaking the back of his head. Mixed with mud and gutter gunk. All it would have taken is one sharp edge to split his skin open, and the tight curls of his hair wouldn't have saved him from that.

He looks twitchy still, when he knocks on Ren's back door. His tail was lashing back and forth, ears pointing every which way like he's worried that he'd been followed by more than just Rhall, who'd only wanted to make damn sure that he didn't get jumped on the way.

[eldritchmoms]

Most people would have more of a reaction to a bloodsoaked tiefling child showing up at their doorstep looking suspiciously like they had recently and messily eaten something, maybe even someone, alive.

Renosos had seen considerably worse, on several fronts.

The difference between someone being covered in their own blood and being covered in someone else's was a subtle but important one. Maledos' front was covered in it in a way that suggested the latter, splattered and dripped down from the mouth rather than soaked through his thin rags. But the bright red mixed in with thick street grime in his hair had every chance of not having come from the same source.

"Type of injury and what caused it," he asked flatly, motioning Maledos inside. In the street, anyone who saw a horned and fanged child soaked in blood dripping from their mouth could easily think monster. In here, the perspective was all too easily shifted to patient.