Armina Dalmar Ghedi: Night Raid
Beautiful Armina, she is the one who asked me to silence the night watch.
I cross yards at a time, gleeful as I am bounding. Full clear, she demanded - Not a soul standing in the estate. I stalked even the shadows themselves, though I only had until full moon’s midnight to complete my order. The guards who patrol these walls are few, and I am a studied archer. I miss the way Aadila used to congratulate me on my work, but the young master is so estranged from zirs delightful sister.The Ghedi family is complicated, and relationships are muddied by political issues. Shadows swallow the corpses as they fall, a silver glint is the only mark that is left Something of a token, the magic cannot consume the silver, but it is boiled to a lump like some kind of forge slag.. I return to the rooftops and my heart shreds my voice through anxiety. She is so beautiful, but keeping her distance from the estate. Her enemies are clever, and no so clever as this duke. The last patrol is removed by my final arrow, the shadow explodes from the glass charm at the broad tip, and, though he screams, i cannot hear him. The other he was courting, a fellow guard, stout and wide as a handsome hammer, is easily doomed from proximity. I turned to her, all the lovely gifts she gave me have been dispatched to the guards, and i raise my bow with a candle to alert Armina that I have completed the route. She is a fire-branded beauty, even as she collects the folds of her hood to hide her face. Several others approached with her, though surely one is rival for her heart, I expect I am soon her favorite acolyte. While we are gathered together, the call to arms for the second phase is made. our teams are set. Armina stared into my eyes before she spoke: “When you find the rooftop weakened, exploit that and take us through the great manor. I trust you won’t lead me to harm, but my preparations are complete. All here play a roll. This strike will announce my distaste for the Duke’s poor judgement.” Of course, Armina’s eyes are hidden behind her veil, but the auburn lips of rapturous beauty, glistening in the candle-light, entice the very essence of each dying ember of justice left in this world. When she spoke to us, my heart held each breath like a bouquet on my wedding day. This obsession often drives me to wish i had the willpower to fully embrace the fairer side of my genes.. Armina leads us through each hall, and we burst through each door until we have become guests in the ball room. Almost none of the service is awake so late at night, and those that stir, Armina’s blades rush from her side and treat the interloper to a silent, peaceful embrace. Though i know not if they die in this process, i know there is no blood. Armina is armed, but she does not raise her hands to combat. It is beneath her. She is of higher purpose, and greater feats. In the ball room she brandishes her sword, a silver saber to rival her sibling’s rapier. She begins her ritual, writing in black and red dust upon the floor in a spiral, before setting it blazed with some solution. Like a mystic legend, the trail of dust consumed the floor and spat such smoke that we all though surely she was endangered, but when the short flames settled, and the spiral was cut into the dance floor, Armina gestured to me. Finally was my part to play, certainly a pivot in my career among these radicals. Armina, in such grace and swift motion, drew her blade across my chest, and I fell to the warm embers of the floor. She removed the pendant and my eyes were so .. dark now. I could feel pain, finally. Armina’s magic spells bound to my mind, drew back like great tendrils of a deadly vine. Her vile works enraptured me, and i followed every word to the final breath until this moment. “Do not fret, child.” Armina whispered to me, her voice as gentle and soft as ever, but my ears now suffer as she speaks, my captor, my warden of a prison within my mind. I suffer here because of the witchery of a vile corruptor. I tried to speak, but my tongue flapped not at all, and a blank nub ground against my teeth, barely i was able to even utter a curse upon her. Pitiful as it would be, and without affect upon the fated witch of the Ghedi family. Armina put a finger to my lips, and i could not bite her because my teeth were so far gone. Now seemingly removed, but when? She stood over me, and quickly drove a sword to my chest.
That is what came of me, as i lay here now. Nothing but anger and deceit - the embers below me will have me by the morrow, and she will leave me. My blood is so corrupted by her ways that it faintly sizzled into glittering dust around me, following the spiral along the floor. they left me, and my hands are changing. My blood is stiffening. I have lost my perspective and now i am looking out from within a glass bottle inside a writhing corpse. Does she even know my name? Armina Dalmar Ghedi, a banshee like no other, enchantress of the northern seas and sister to a blood starved lunatic. Why would anyone trust her, if not for the jewel of her love? A love so deep that it’s wrath still shivers my soul from within this prison that will no doubt haunt my resting-place long after her departure into the guiltless night.
