Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn From: hutch@ibeam.intel.com (Steve Hutchison) Subject: [BDAY] [MG] And In the End We're Back Where We Started Message-ID: References: Date: Mon, 24 May 1993 17:02:37 GMT [ADMIN] Thanks to all the folks whose characters appear herein for the permission to use them and for help with dialogue and actions. Anyone wanting to know who goes with what character - read the Admin postings... --00-- The Dragon's Inn was still focus for celebration for the majority of the adventurers, though the crowd had dropped off a little as a more distant party attracted some of the casual wanderers-by. ar'Elya grunted. Holding this barbarian-hero form was beginning to be boring, it was more appropriate for action, and 'Raelf was in no particular mood for action. The demons were fastidiously avoiding their area, after their earlier defeats, and after the leaders had drawn them off in pursuit of that damned elf, so the earlier disruptions and fights had been replaced by a more lighthearted mood. The dances in the Plaza of Glittering Steel were beginning again as Listener returned from his break, and the 'kan barbarian had half-decided to shift to some other body and go off to the dance. "'Lo!" A teenage girl with eyes the color of a spring shower looked up at the BIG barbarian. She smiled at him, "Couldja tell me how I kin find the person who owns these?" She held out in her hand two silver and two copper coins. "I wanted to give 'em back to her..." "No idea, but my mate over here might know," he said, leading her to the table where 'Raelf was sitting with Krupp Faraway, trading bad puns in Orcish. 'Raelf looked up blearily. "I know you. You tried to rob my friend Kardia. Howcome you're a goddess now?" "'sa long story. I want to give her money back. Hey, you look awful," she said, tilting her head to one side while she stared at him. "Yeah, I know," 'Raelf said, and finished another mug of the Catamount Porter. "I'm losing the battle." "Oh. Well, don't give up." She kissed him on the forehead, and stuck a paper pinwheel behind his ear. He smiled slowly. "Thanks, Joy. I never have." He grinned and chugged another mugful. Meanwhile, the girl sat down next to Krupp with her hands clasped in her lap, impishly looking away whenever he tried to catch her eye. 'Raelf looked at his empty mug. "Rowan? Any more?" The innkeeper walked over with a tray filled with pitchers. "'Raelf, you drink too much." Rowan scowled. "How many times have you seen me drunk?" 'Raelf stood up, caught four of the empty pitchers off the table, and began to juggle them in a crossover pattern. Rowan raised a brow and settled four full pitchers on the table, then answered. "Just the once, when Zia died. OK. What's up?" "Stokin' for a big fight comin' tomorrow." "Well. Do us proud, mage." He caught the pitchers one at a time in his free hand, settling them on the tray. "Right. Hey, Krupp, stop playing footsie with the goddess, she's gotta go find Kardia. The coins belong to her, Joy. She's off dancing with Kadrys, over by the town square." "'kay. Could you show me?" she asked the barbarian. "Only if we get to dance first." "Deal. Bye, Krupp." She kissed him on the top of his head and skipped away, hand in hand with the grinning redhaired barbarian. He was saying something about "absolutely no disco" while she fastened pinwheels to the sword-sheath slung across his back. Krupp felt his eyes uncrossing - that burst of sheer happiness had been almost more than he could handle. Then he saw Luthor Anside dancing overhead, with a bad-news woman out of the bottom of a bottle of really bad Orcish vodka. He jammed his fedora on and rushed off, muttering something about all these people who dance with anything. 0 - - - 0 + Some of the dancers who had been looking at him when he had + pulled Kadrys in, they were also looking stunned, but then the music + picked up again and they rejoined the dancing. 'Raelf raised himself + up on his elbows and looked around, sadly, at the panorama of bestial + transformed figures. Half animal people, totally submerged in their + celebration to the point that they had abandoned all pretense of + rational thought, just bodies coupling with other bodies. He frowned. + None of them had consented to his otherself's tampering, fantasy or + not. He hadn't bothered to ask them. + "Wow. Hieronymous Bosch, eat your heart out!" he muttered + bleakly to himself, before turning a dismayed look at Kadrys and Kardia. + He climbed to his hooves, leaned closer to murmur to Kadrys, + "I owe you one, friend." + "Nonsense. I still owe you, and Maribel, more than I can ever + hope to repay." He grinned whitely, dispelling the sombre mood. + "Some ... ah, interesting mental defenses you have there." + "Yah, bit of the old 'I waaant my MTV' never goes astray..." + 'Raelf looked at the live equivalent of a music video around them, + or maybe a beer commercial gone horribly wrong, and far beyond the + limits of prime time TV. + "Now how am I gonna clean up this mess?" Kardia grinned crookedly and unfurled her shawl. "Would this help?" 'Raelf blinked. "Not a good idea this time, I think. They're really into it, and breaking the spell would be major shock." Kardia nodded. "Yeah, that makes sense." Her eyes widened as the air behind 'Raelf whirled and the male-hero facet of ar'Elya's multiple-self spun into being, on roller-blades, carrying a laughing young girl in his arms. She was no more than fifteen, and she laughed delightedly and then looked around, frowning slightly at what she saw. "Wow. Interesting party," the barbarian drawled, setting the girl on the stone dias as he skated forward and behind the satyr, resting his hands on the broad shoulders. "You really got into this one." "More than shows," the golden satyr replied. "Those guys in the band have quite a bit of power now." "Not to mention a lot of off-world music," Kardia said drily. Kadrys placed a hand across her shoulder, avoiding the scarf. "So how we gonna let them down easy?" 'Raelf asked. "Wow, can I help?" The young girl had walked around the raised stone of the dias. 'Raelf stared at her, astonished. "Joy cometh in the morning," he muttered cryptically. "No, I come around whenever I feel like it," she replied. "How do you want to help?" 'Raelf looked at himself, frowned, pulling at the golden fur on the goats-legs, and FLICK his surfer-form returned, then FLICK he reverted, a satyr again. She laughed, a tinkling bell sound that the band took up with enthusiasm, blending it with their current improvisation. "Oh bummer." 'Raelf looked ruefully at himself. "I think," ar'Elya said, "you're stuck with that body until you untangle yourself in time." He clicked his boots together and the blades dissolved in a wash of fire, leaving him standing on the ground. "So you're a satyr until after the fight." "Or until I get rid of this stupid gift." Kadrys head turned towards them from where he'd been speaking quietly with Kardia. "Fight? Gift? What's going on?" "I can't safely tell you much about it. The gift - I can see the deepest desire in someone's heart, and grant it. If it's out of my usual reach, the gift _pushes_ and extends my reach. But it's tied into my more, well, animal side. That's why people are all being changed out there. But I don't want the gift." "I knew people back in Seattle," Kardia said, frowning, "who chose to be changed surgically, to resemble animals. But it was all explained by the `experts' as the desire of the city-dwellers for some connection to the animal side, to return to nature. They called it a `fetish inspired by an overreaction to the oppressive technological societal matrix'. This," she gestured to the party crowd, "is hardly an oppressive technological societal matrix." 'Raelf laughed. "No, but it isn't exactly Noble Savages," and ar'Elya shook him gently by the horns and said "I resemble that. And right now, so do you." "Your gift grants their heart's desire?" Kardia mused. "You mean that inside they want to be like this?" "No, no, desire is a lot more complex than that. They're gradually changing into what turns them on. It builds on itself. If we could change the tone of the party, then they'd at least get their reasoning back." The music shifted, becoming a subtle, more upbeat song. [Don't you know that I'm still standing better than I ever did Looking like a true survivor, feeling like a little kid...] "Wow. Kardia, did you see that?" 'Raelf leaned back, tipping his head to look up into ar'Elya's eyes. "Did you see that?" "The lines are still there, running from you into the band." Kardia looked further. "They run into the crowd from them, and... hmm... they're reflecting your emotions." Kardia blinked away when Joy pulled a pinhweel out of the air and handed it to 'Raelf, then stretched up and kissed the big barbarian on the cheek. He smiled and murmured, "Thanks for the dance." She curtsied, smiling with in a calculatedly demure way, and danced over to Kardia and Kadrys. "Here." said the teenage girl to Kardia. "These are yours." Kardia was still blinking from the power flash, but she held out her hand in responce to the girl's outstretched fist. Four coins fell into her hand. Kardia said, "Oh." as she looked at them. "Thanks for returning them. I'm... I'm sorry I kicked you... and glad that it wasn't as bad as it felt from my end." For the first time since she'd approached the group, the teenage girl's eyes were grave. She nodded and then laughed. "Yeah. I'm glad I got better, too." "Oh." said Kardia and frowned. "Huh... uhm... I don't quite know how to say this, but... I was thinking after that, that you could probably use the money more than I could. And... if you'll take it as a gift, as... well... thanks for returning what you stole..." Kardia pulled out the one gold and five silver she'd carried with her for just the party, when she hadn't known that everything was going to be paid for by the city. She pooled all the coins and handed them back to the teenage girl. "Ohhhhh..." said the girl, her eyes wide at the gold. "Wow... I could live on this for..." Then she laughed a sound that had Kardia looking at her in astonishment. "Kardia, look at me." said the teenaged girl. "I know you can." So Kardia looked. "Oh, my..." was all she said. "Thanks for the gift." said the goddess and cartwheeled over to the band. Kardia just stared after her. [I'm still standing, YEah yeah yeah] A line of dancers kicked by, an impromptu dance halfway between a chorus line and a lambada. "Oh great, so I have to get sex off my mind in THIS body," 'Raelf said, then leaned back into ar'Elya's hands as they kneaded on his shoulders. "You have about ten years to stop doing that." He blew on the pinwheel, then tucked it between his left horn and his left ear. "Actually," Kadrys observed, "When you came to your senses, the, ahem, _insistent_ qualities of the music began to recede. Though they're not entirely absent, even now." "Oh yeah. Sorry about that," 'Raelf said, trying to release the threads that had found their way into Kadrys. They faded but returned the moment he stopped concentrating. "This is not good," he observed. "Kardia, please, your shawl?" He concentrated, making the threads to Kadrys fade again, then touched the shawl. There was a hot surge, and the connection broke. "Ow, that hurts." Kadrys nodded. "Most unpleasant." "I don't think it's a very good way to break the contacts," ar'Elya drawled. "You'll hurt yourself, or burn out her talent, with all the Power woven through this crowd." He looked around them, eyes a silvery whirl. "In fact," and his copper-red hair turned silver, though the massive warrior frame did not diminish, "The threads are coming back anyway." Kadrys felt the warmth growing in his chest, the music was starting to reach into him again. "Don't worry, I can handle this. It's rather invigorating, actually." He looked out over the crowd. The compulsive frenzy of the coupling had mostly faded, except for a few groups, but it had been replaced by a desire in some of the dancers for a more private setting for their play. "You'd best do something, 'Raelf, they're starting to leave." "Oh merde. Karl!" 'Raelf said, and the red-haired satyr who was the leader of the band looked across, not breaking his rhythm. "Segue into Lionel Ritchie, `All night long' - we gotta keep the people here." Karl nodded, and counted - 2, 3, 5, and the music changed. The little goddess Joy handed him a pinwheel and he traded it for the pipes, and she began improvising around the tune. "Lionel Ritchey?" Kardia frowned. "That's awfully shallow." "True, but not as bad as playing `Venus' would have been." 'Raelf jumped down off the stage and disappeared into the crowd. While he was gone, the silver-haired barbarian reached for the handle protruding from the sheath behind his back, and drew, not the black rune-crusted sword that Kardia and Kadrys had seen there before, but an equally black rune-carved staff, with a little colored pinwheel on one end. "How'd that get on there," he muttered, as 'Raelf returned with a couple from the crowd. The man was lithe, a lean well muscled dancer's body, but covered with tiny rainbow iridescent scales that glittered in the light of the wizard torches. He wore only a thong providing not much in the way of modesty, and the plush but muscled woman with him (completely human and utterly mammalian) wore a fur bikini that had no analogue in local costume. "Parsifal Lucas, right?" The man smiled, gold slitted eyes glittering below short sparkling brows. The gold eyes of the satyr met and held his gaze. "You were the first, the linchpin. Listen to me." "Happy to. This is one great party. What else can I do ya for, boss man?" 'Raelf winced. "I tampered with you. Without your permission. Will you let me fix it?" "Sure thing, boss." Pars looked sideways at the big white-haired barbarian standing behind 'Raelf, and licked his lips nervously. "Look closely," the barbarian-wizard said, and the runes on the staff began flickering with an impossible color. Parsifal stood entranced, while the satyr kissed him on his forehead. <> The staff flickered blue and the rainbow man blinked. The music had changed, a ballad of some kind. He realized he'd gone to sleep for a second, things had changed around him. [ .. no I won't shed a tear, just as long, as you stand, stand by me...] There were more people lined up, standing with an entranced look: several of them Pars remembered, he'd partnered with that evening. The party was quieter, the frenzied orgy in the dark corners of the street had gone. Most of the more insistent participants were standing entranced; others were kneeling and swaying or singing along with the band. He looked at the band and returned the happy smile of the young girl who was miming an instrument along with Anna. Anna, he mused, looked even better as a satyr than she did before. He wondered how they stayed up like that, without a bustier. He'd only seen her from a distance, but he was sure she wasn't built that well before. Another hunger hit him as he smelled the waft of roasting sausage - the street vendor was back. He passed by the couple that he'd seen earlier, talking with the big gold satyr. They were slow-dancing, elegant and graceful and almost alone, now that the band was doing a rest-set. He made his way to the vendor cart. [ ROOOOCK! LOBSTER ] 'Raelf jumped. "Karl?" The red-furred satyr grinned at him, rapped out a complicated pattern, and Anna started playing Air guitar again to accompany, while the twins each picked up a partner from the audience and started them dancing. [We gotta PAR-DEE on the BEACH] Karl sang, hands hitting the bongo set. Kadria broke into giggles and Kadrys winced at the sudden raucous change in mood. 'Raelf sighed, and, holding a fox-woman by the shoulders, kissed her on the muzzle. She blinked, and shook her head, coming out of the trance. "Thank you," she said, touching the fur on her arms with quiet wonder. "OK, Ray," 'Raelf said, "we need your wild side." "That's hardly the" flick "way to look at it," the voice changed from a basso growl to a glittering alto in mid-sentence, as the giant barbarian changed in an eyeblink to a voluptuous blond woman with a jet streak in her waist-length hair. A blue dragonet the size of a kitten popped up from around her neck, carrying a pinwheel in its jaws. It launched itself into the air, and was followed by an explosion of others, each settling around the neck of one of the people who remained in the trance. A complex gesture from the sorceress, and a pulse of power flared the wizard-lit torches that lined the plaza. *Beta team to Urcohea. Class two hazard located, it seems to be locking down without intervention. - What's the deets? *Satyr band, but some high-power transformations being thrown around by the band leader. That wild-magic babe with the technicolor dragons seems to be helping them clean up. Band leader looks kind of like that guy you had hired for consult work, 'Raelf whatever-it-was, but he's human and this clown's a satyr to all readings. Besides, power levels are higher than a Journeyman could rig. - That wild-magic babe is a fully rated visiting archmage, so watch your language to her face. All right. You're recalled, Beta, return to station and get some rest, you're too tired, you're about to start making some bad judgements. *Yes sir. Uh oh. Incoming - the Wyvern is gating in. -(bloody grife) Yes, I see her. I'll vector in, you get back on station. Gwaliostrok, come on, we've got a political situation forming. The air split open beside the dias, and a tall redhaired woman stepped through the gap. She scowled at the band, frowned at the girl playing with them, and faced the golden haired woman standing with the golden-furred satyr. "It is you. I wasn't sure at first." "Acting Supreme Archmage Dasham," ar'Elya said, deadpan, "How good of you to make an appearance at our party." She ignored the sorceress, and gave an up-and-down glance at 'Raelf, one eyebrow raised. "This is a new look for you, isn't it? I like it, but isn't it a bit flagrant?" "Nothing special, just an old body I had lying around, I hardly ever have an occasion to take it out. Should you be out and around? Isn't there something Supreme-ish you're supposed to be doing?" "Oh please. 'Raelf, you've been holding out on me." "Not at all, Dash." "Don't LIE to me," she snarled. "I know several of these people. I knew Hector when he was a boy." She pointed to a white haired man who looked no more than twenty, dancing between two women with absolutely perfect bodies. "He was a boy eighty years ago. Does that look like a ninety year old to you?" "Well preserved, eh?" 'Raelf said, shrugging. "He was born deaf. He's hearing just fine. He's _singing_." "Ah. Why wasn't he ever cured before? There's priests all over the place, this is a magic realm." "His father was cursed by Issek. All his children were born with some sort of truly incurable deformity." "Bummer. Unfair," 'Raelf smiled and pulled the pinwheel from behind his left horn and blew on it. Three of the dragonets collected around him, chirruping; they copied his movements, three tiny jets of flame wrapping around their pinwheels, shooting out the sides as they spun like little fireworks. Dasham frowned, and shooed at the one which snuffled at her. "'Raelf, you were contracted to find me a rejuvenation and life extension technique that would fit my requirements. So far, you've offered me nothing I can use, and vague ominous warnings that my predecessor in Research might still be alive somewhere. It's obvious you have a method that can overcome the strongest curses, so I want you to fill your part of the bargain, NOW. Give me what I want." "Oh no." 'Raelf hunkered down on his haunches. "You didn't just ask me to grant your hearts' desire, right?" "I believe you could call it that." "Are you sure you know what it is? You really want it?" "Positive. Right now." "Oh hell. Raye, please stand by, this will be nasty." He went over to the band, whispered something to Karl and to the young goddess of Joy, and picked up his panpipes. He stalked back, light playing across his golden fur as he faced the Archmage. The band stopped playing. "You asked for this. Last chance. I warn you. The Gift means I have to grant your heart's deepest most true desire, and it makes sure I can do it. Do you really want this?" "Get on with it." He nodded, and raised the pipes to his lips. A shrill and painful sound rang out, reaching, calling. Dasham staggered towards him, her wards shredded in an instant by a force utterly outside her experience. He grasped her head, pulled her towards him, drew his tongue lasciviously around her face, across her forehead. She flinched away, and fell into the waiting arms of the sorceress, who caught her before she could fall. "I've got you," ar'Elya said, and with a gasp Dasham felt her wards being re-formed around her. She heard the pipes and felt a hard dark painful somethng embedded in the heart of her focus, the core from which she drew her magical power, it caught, then she felt it being dragged on. Each pull brought images to her and she began to sweat, but the sorceress would not allow her to escape. "Stay with it, Dasham. Self-knowledge is necessary in a supreme archmage." The pipes continued, and words came clear in the music. <> A scream came from the ether. "Noooooo" and a body fell smoking to the ground, a man appearing to be in his late twenties, fit but scarred by extensive tortures, and giving off a stench of burning after being dragged across the planes. Ichor and ectoplasm ran off him, pooling on the raised stone of the stage. Flames danced around the edges of the liquid. Dasham shuddered, shaking her head to try to clear away the memories as they came to the surface. Hours spent bent across the racks as her Master tried out new spells of exaction and coercion, spells that would leave no traces in body, that once cast and endured would be forgotten only to be recalled by a recasting of the spells. Days spent frozen immobile while Verthax gave her body to be used by the foul things he called up from Inferno, in exchange for secrets of magic which were long forbidden. Weeks, years spent with her soul as a toy for the mad selfish careless children of a chaos being, keeping them occupied while Verthax (damn him thrice and may he be ever impotent) rifled through their toyboxes for new secrets. The images blurred, only one or two in a long train hideous enough to stand out. The last one: her body, crabbed with age and arthritis, old, wizened, while Verthax walked young and beautiful in stolen flesh, HER flesh, leaving no part of her unviolated. Then the compulsions, laid again and masked and overlaid again with the pristine imprint of the lost innocence of her younger soul. And Verthax, dead in a horrible accident in his lab. <> A moaning noise, a final scream from the burning man and he spasmed and lay still, not breathing. A hole opened in nothing, and the man who crawled out was incredibly ancient, decayed and frail. He hobbled forward spitting out curses, which fell to the ground and scuttled around - the dragonets pounced, ripping each into small gory pieces that they devoured, then they looked around eagerly for more. The piping continued, and the old body began dancing a frantic jig, as the old wizard gasped for breath. The music did not relent, and Dasham watched with a kind of unholy ecstasy, as the jig turned into a tarantella followed by a series of grand jete's and deep plie's. Old dry bones cracked, dust flew from the ancient skin. "More, make him do more," she demanded. "This isn't enough." "What do you want, Archmage?" ar'Elya asked, still holding Dasham from falling. The archmage looked the sorceress in the eye and did not flinch from what she saw there. "I want him to feel the suffering he inflicted on me and on his other apprentices." She spat. "He has to KNOW." "He does. He's an empath, can't you see it in his aura?" "The unspeakable vileness. He enjoyed it, then, what he did to us, the pain we endured at his hands." "It seems likely." The sorceress sighed. "Don't play with him, Rafe, he's been eaten long ago. The demons must have got him well before he made Archmage. Let him die." <> Dasham felt a sort of hollow victory that fell apart in loss before she could savor it. "Do it," she said dully. The piping went fast, then stopped on a single note. The old wizard shrieked, and collapsed, crumbling into dust where he fell. Dasham felt something dark and hungry moving back along the line that was tied to her, but then something happened, the satyr got in its way. She heard something distantly like wings, and shuddered. "Dasham? You ok?" She tried to answer and couldn't speak, could barely move her hand to signal him closer. "segurty" she gasped. Darkness started creeping in around the edges of her vision. <> he replied, and she felt air washing through her, pushing back the dark and restoring feeling to her limbs. She gasped, pulling in the air hungrily. Another door opened in the air. The figure that came through was male, his head covered by a helmet, dark eyes flashing when he found Dasham lying back against ar'Elya, who supported her, unconcerned, dragonets swirling around them protectively. He gathered the scene in one glance: the band, the goddess, 'Raelf in an outrageous satyr's guise, the corpse of a man he had seen in the records, and the dusty relict of the old wizard. Urcohea signaled through the door, and Gwaliostrok came through behind him. Urcohea then turned to 'Raelf with menace in his eye. "What have you done to her?" "Granted her wish. She gave me no choice." Urcohea pondered for just long enough to blink. "Fine. Get her into the guild hall. We mustn't let Thorn hear about this until she's recovered." The sorceress smiled conspiratorially, and helped Urcohea to carry Dasham through the doorway. Gwaliostrok followed, the two corpses floating in front of him on glowing disks of light. The door in the air closed behind them. "Now what," 'Raelf muttered, looking around. The entranced people were no longer looking quite like something out of a beer commercial, and the few who had been given animal features were no longer what they seemed - a complex layering of illusion supplied the changes they'd chosen, and the illusion would fade with the light of morning. The band started playing a gentle folksong he recalled hearing from his travels on Earth, Joy playing the pipe as Anna's clear voice called down the melody. [Tis the gift to be simple, tis the gift to be free tis the gift to go down where you want to be And when you find yourself in the place just right you will be in the garden of love and delight. When true simplicity is gained, to bow and to bend we will not be ashamed. To turn and to turn, it will be our delight, till by turning, turning, we come round right.] There was a short appreciative silence, then Karl grinned manically, and shouted - [Watch Out Here I Come] [You spin me right round baby right round Like a record honey round round right round...] 'Raelf laughed and did two backflips towards the band, picking up the abandoned pipes, and joined in. This was a party, right?