Lord Van Sol

A figure in the shadows. An unknown enigma. A silent ruler with a hidden agenda.

[armads]

BARRICADE // Sue + Hector + Elincia + Marisa

[armads]

Hector did not like the guy.

A couple of words, and he already thought it was all mouth and no action. What’s up with shutting himself in this room anyway? And he was so calm, so eerily calm about all this… Calm people just got on his nerves, he couldn’t help it. In short, he hadn’t seen much of him yet, and what he saw didn’t please him.

“Hey! Cut out the fancy talk!” he snarled, addressing him. “You the one who brought us in this land? Dunno how you have, but I’ll make you send us back… And how do you know our names? Answer, you smooth-talking—”

Hector took a step forward, but the growing chaos behind him reminded of the weakening barricade. Damn…! Not now! Sue was right, they should reinforce the door, but… How much longer could that barricade hold anyway? They were better off preparing for the worst. Hector looked around: he had to find a weapon. Now. Unable to find any bladed or spiked thing, he got hold of a sturdy-looking, heavy hardwood chair: if he couldn’t axe through them, he’d resort to bludgeoning them.

[hiddenmachinations-blog]

“Me, the one who brought you here?” If anything, there might have just been a tinge of surprise in his tone. “I suppose I can see why you would think so… but I assure you, that is far beyond my power to control. Whether you arrive or leave is not something that I can command, and I myself do not know of what exactly has brought you here.”

At the sounds of the trembling doors, he got up out of his chair, taking several steps until he was next to the fireplace. From this angle, the fire cast a large shadow in front of him, and his face was completely shrouded in darkness. His posture was still casual, almost lazy…

“It would seem that there are quite a few people who would very much like to see you,” he said, the smile on his face very evident through his voice. “Well, I shall not keep you from seeing them, then. Have a wonderful evening, ladies and gentleman… oh, and Lord Hector. I would suggest saving your rage for those people behind that door.”

And in an instant, the fire was put out, covering the entire room in darkness.

[armads]

BARRICADE // Sue + Hector + Elincia + Marisa

[tagerrrrr-deactivated20131120]

Too many questions ran through her mind now. Tension brimming through her chest, the loud thump from the barricaded doors sent her heart almost bursting in agitation. This was the man who’d invited her here, along with these people, their unfamiliar faces coming to light by the fire. The situation demanded for a fight, but here she stood in the man’s room with assailants after them for whatever reason -  still unarmed. She quickly scanned the area for weapons…anything she could use at all to defend herself. The walls, the tables… But there was nothing.

“…Why did you invite me here?”

She enunciated her words clearly. Her voice was ringing with curiosity, losing what was left of the supposed edge in her usual tone. Fear was not entirely absent from her being, but she would ask now, despite her lack of weapons to back up her next demand. 

“You invite guests but choose to lock yourself up in here. Explain yourself.”

But the loud thumping of the doors continued, unable to escape her ears. Just how much time did they have left before the door would burst open with these assailants coming after them, only too soon slaughtering them to life’s end? At some point in her life she remembered thinking of death resulting from a stupid mistake. A mistake in battle, perhaps, but not a mistake to respond to a noble’s invitation and die in his castle—in his room completely unarmed. It was a mistake to come here—she kept telling herself that, but the thought was naught but a useless reprimand that gave her no answers. She made her mistake. How was she supposed to come out of this alive now?

[hiddenmachinations-blog]

"Oh, I'm just a rather antisocial individual," he said with a wave of his hand and a light laugh, the first motion he made since their entrance. "Would it not be bad form if the lord was found to be someone who couldn't hold up a decent conversation with other people? Why, it would be a most unfortunate smear on the reputation of the ruler." 

Again, the man laughed, as if to shrug off everything he had just said. He remained seated, although by the firelight it could be seen that his attention turned away from the four 'unexpected' guests back towards the flames in the fireplace. 

"As for why you were invited, dear Marisa - because I do know of you - I was simply curious. Like you are now, I suppose. Just as you are curious as to why you were invited here, or even perhaps what made you choose to come, I am curious about you, just like with the other guests I have asked to come." The doors continued to shake, the sounds of yelling outside penetrating into the relative silence of the room. "And those people are curious, too. They're curious as to what's stopping them from coming in, and who is actually in here."

[armads]

BARRICADE // Sue + Hector + Elincia + Marisa

[armads]

Aye, the Sacae girl it was: he could even see her clearly now. But… another figure? And the voice— It was too high pitched not to be a woman’s. But he couldn’t recognize any of his friends’—

But Sue’s aloud question made him stop all his thinking and moving: it was clear she wasn’t referring to any of them. He had been too busy, too caught up in barricading the door and stuffing it with objects that he didn’t notice the presence spying on him. But now he was very aware of it.

There was someone else in that room.

He turned, silently, giving his back to the door: he could see him now, sitting on a chair in the dark, the light of the fire enveloping him in a red, almost unearthly glow.

“You… Who are—”

But something in his gut stopped him. His fingers instinctly reached for an axe that wasn’t there. Damn…

“You’re… Van Sol?”

[hiddenmachinations-blog]

The figure remained still, the light of the fire flickering past his face, barely illuminating his features. Only the slight turn of the lip could be seen, as it formed into something one could vaguely call a smile. Was he simply being amused? Or did he have something else on his mind? 

“Why yes, I am,” he said, with a tone best described as uncomfortably light. “I must say that I had not intended for company to have joined me tonight, but it seems that you have simply taken it upon yourselves to stay with me rather… forcibly.” He turned his head slightly, in the direction of the now barricaded door.