Scion - Petro Campaign - Session 74
So, our quest to consolidate our power block among the vampires in Night Haven continues. In the past couple of hours, we secured the allegiance of the last of our potential allies and executed an evil little sneak attack against Suchette's chief rival, Ishalam. *evil laugh* (Don't worry, we're still the good guys! ^_^ )
So, having brought the Daimyo and Fuguhime to our side, we only needed to convince one more vampire to join us: the Doge of Venice. So, leaving T-Bone and Elisa to entertain Fuguhime, we made our way to his estate via the secret tunnels and emerged in a neighboring house, where we were greeted by several manes that looked like ghostly Roman soldiers. They stiffly asked us to wait while they summoned a fascinating ghost woman clad in a long gown of skin and wearing clawed slave bracelets made of the teeth of notorious gossips. I was impressed. She didn't reveal her name, sadly, but she's apparently the household god ghost of a long-standing Roman family who still worship her, and she serves as something of a senschal for the Doge's ghosts. I gotta tell ya, if anything ever happens to the Doge, I'm going to see if I can't convince her to work for me! ^_^
Anyway, she was quite polite and took us to the Doge's manor, where another woman, a striking Vrykolakas whose skin was covered in serpentine scales and who had long, sinuous serpents for hair, like the popular renditions of Medusa (her snake-hair was hidden under an illusion, though, so only I could see it, thanks to the lock of svartalfar hair I got when we were in Glastonbury). Also, unlike many vampires, she wasn't cold and corpse-like, but rather warm like she was alive. Her name was Amelia, and she seemed to be one of the Doge's most trusted servants.
Amelia could communicate telepathically by touch, and as she welcomed us to the manor and escorted us to a parlor to await the Doge, she used that ability to softly and privately whisper her desire for me. I was a bit taken aback at first. I mean, I'm used to people immediately falling for me, but Amelia was very forward about it, more so than most people. Still, I kinda liked the attention and couldn't help but flirt back and forth with her while we were the Doge's guests. I know. I'm bad, right? ^_^ Well, I guess it's just in my nature to be a bit flirtatious. A quick look through my journals proves that. ^_^ Seriously, though, aside from being a bit forward, Amelia was rather nice, particularly as vampires go, so I found myself liking her almost immediately.
We waited while Amelia went to fetch the Doge, and in the meantime, a ghostly maidservant brought us a rare wine distilled from some ghostly source. It seemed to be some form of distilled emotion, and one cup was enough for me. Any more and I feared I might lose my inhibitions. Still, it was a delicious treat, and I later inquired about purchasing some for Echo and Oiwa (Echo because she's a bit of a hedonist and Oiwa because the wine is supposed to appeal especially to ghosts ^_^). They didn't want to talk about how the wine was made, though. In retrospect, I have a sneaking suspicion that it's distilled from ghosts themselves...which is a bit off-putting, if only because I cherish the dead so much.
The Doge soon appeared, clad in elaborate spiked armor and an iron face mask and wrapped in a deep green cloak and hood. He was an intimidating presence, especially since it was obvious that a far more frightening visage lay underneath the armor. But despite his appearance, the Doge was courteous and respectful.
After we assisted Suchette in explaining our goals, he admitted that he agreed with us. He did not wish to become a pawn of the titans, but he asked one thing in return for helping us. You see, his home in Venice is hidden beneath the waters of the city, and beneath his lair is the sleeping form of the Vrykolakas Founder, whom he would just as soon remain asleep. Unfortunately, several groups of scions have decided to try and invade his home over the past few years, and he's getting sick of it. So far he has been pretty forgiving, because he doesn't want to make outright enemies of the children of the gods. He's mostly just rendered the invaders unconscious and kicked them out of his home. But he doesn't want the situation to escalate.
So he has asked us to do what we can to make sure other scions leave him alone. In particular, it seems our old friend (>_<) Benton and his crew of sons and daughters of Loki and Dionysus have been a thorn in his side, so we'll have to have a talk with them. Why do I have a feeling that's not going to go so well? I don't trust Benton's crew (none of my group do), but maybe my pull with Persephone and Dionysus will mean something. And I know that T-Bone, at least, can speak their language.
With that agreement made, the Doge completed our power block. Suchette, the Doge, Darga Arpad, the Daimyo, and Fuguhime are all solidly on our side, which accounts for half the official vampire representatives and puts two entire clans (the Jikininki and the Vrykolakas) squarely in our corner. ^_^
But before we left, the Doge had other visitors. The Apepnu, Qetu the Evil-Doer and Hau Hra of the Backward Face, showed up to meet with the Doge. He wasn't happy about that. The Doge asked us to wait while he went to see what the Apepnu wanted. Amelia waited with us at first. She wouldn't tell me what was wrong, but I think we could all tell that she knew and was terrified. She warned me specifically to be careful around Qetu because of Qetu's hatred of beautiful women. When Amelia was summoned to join the Doge in his meeting, we all knew that something bad was going to happen.
I summoned the house kami to tell us what was going on below. Since we were worried about the Doge's safety, we weren't content to just wait in the parlor for his meeting with the Apepnu to end. Adam said that he'd go get a closer look and transformed into a spider while Charles, and I waited. Pierre used Cheval to ride along in both Adam's head and mine to keep us updated.
In a room below, the Doge met with the Apepnu, both of whom were grotesque, mummy-like horrors that reeked of evil. They had come to take Amelia. She had spied on them on the Doge's behalf, but they offered to forgive the transgression if the Doge would hand over Amelia to them. If he did not, then they would take her by force and destroy the Doge was well.
When Pierre conveyed this to us, I was horrified. There's no telling what sort of horrors the Apepnu would visit on Amelia, so there was no way I was going to let them take her. And we had to defend our ally too. Amelia, faithfully loyal to her sire the Doge, even offered to go with the Apepnu willingly if it would appease them, but that was NOT an acceptable solution as far as I was concerned, and the rest of the group, Adam, Charles, and Pierre, all agreed. So we did what needed to be done.
Charles used his understanding of the house's architecture to figure out where he could phase through the floor with me to drop into the room where the Apepnu and the Doge were conversing below. Knowing that I might draw Qetu's ire especially, I transformed into my zombie form, and on Adam's signal, Charles and I crashed the Apepnu's party. Adam returned to his human form and in an instant his gun was in his hand, while Pierre emerged from Adam's head, coalescing as smoke from Adam's mouth. I immediately grabbed Amelia's arm, pulling her behind me so that I could defend her using my horrific, undead appearance to deter any attackers, but fortunately it never came to that.
The Apepnu weren't interesting in sticking around. As soon as we arrived, they both began to fade into shadows and darkness. Charles used a Taiyi trick to keep one of them from fading completely, but before the fight even began it was over, and we let the Apepnu go. After all, protecting the Doge and Amelia was our first priority. Those damn Apepnu did hit us with a khaibit trap, though, which sucked. >_< Dammit, I gotta bathe in some gyuki blood, because I'm running into way too many situations where attacks against my shadow are becoming an issue! >_<
Anyway, everyone was more-or-less okay in then end after Adam dispelled the khaibit trap. Amelia was smitten with me all over again, and didn't really care that I looked like a half-skeletal zombie (or that I had a wife, which I'd already managed to slip into an earlier conversation). She called me her hero. ^_^ And then she kissed me as I transformed back into my normal appearance. I guess my shikome side took over a bit there, because I couldn't help myself. I kissed her neck and then bit her where her neck met her shoulder, lapping up a bit of her blood, and since she was still hurt from the khaibit trap, I offered her some of mine in return so that she could more easily heal herself. It was a bit of a sensual moment...but I didn't let it go too far. Being flirtatious is one thing. Being unfaithful is another, and I've already been bad enough this trip. >_<. Not to mention the fact that Adam and the Doge and everyone were right there...something that Amelia seemed to have forgotten. I couldn't help but sense the Doge's perplexed look or hear Adam just tell him, "This happens all the time. That's Erika." I felt a little bad about that, but also kinda proud. I guess I AM a bad girl. ^_^
Then again, that's one thing Echo says she likes about me. ^___^ And I think Yi likes it too. ^_^
Anyway, we spent several hours afterward arranging to consolidate Suchette, the Doge and Darga's households into one place in the secret tunnels beneath the city. We chose a large, open area where they could be comfortable, and poor Adam nearly bled himself dry anointing the vampires and their servants with blood so that they could safely move through the traps and flaming passages. But now Darga and the Doge should be safe until the meeting and hopefully afterward. We'll leave someone to watch over them, of course, but our enemies shouldn't be able to get to them, especially with Darga's werewolves and the Doge's manes. Which leaves us with fewer people to worry about, namely the households of the Daimyo and Fuguhime.
We still had a few hours until the big meeting, so we shifted from defense to offense. After discussing the situation with the Doge, Darga, and Suchette, we decided to strike first. After all, our enemies had already tried to do SOMETHING to Suchette, what with Ishalam's magical trap in her bedroom (still don't know exactly what that does). And Adam suspects that had we not been using the secret passages to move around, we would have faced at least one or two ambushes.
The Camazotz are represented by both the Tallyman and their Founder, so they were off-limits at the time. And the Jiang Shi probably have the buddy-system going on, so they weren't very appealing targets either. On the other hand, Ishalam is Suchette's rival and is pretty much alone despite the presence of his Founder (whose location we don't even know right now). So we decided to eliminate Suchette's most dedicated enemy before the meeting, thus strengthening our position once the meeting rolls around.
I wonder if Storm's crew would have done something underhanded like this. Hmmm. Cesar maybe. I'm not sure about the others. I doubt Ray would have been up for it, but then again he was surprisingly open to surprise attacks. I mean, just look at the time we killed that svartalfar in Glastonbury!
I hope Ray's doing okay. I miss him. Even the gruff and grumbly parts.
Anyway, T-Bone and Elisa were still busy helping the Daimyo and Fuguhime consolidate their households and keeping watch to make sure nothing happened to them in the meantime, so the the Ishalam Assassination Squad consisted of just Adam, Charles, Pierre and me (we left Suchette safely with the Doge and Darga. The Doge also sent along his elegant manes seneschal, the one with the skin gown and toothed rings. She offered to gently possess one of us, allowing her host to use the terrible power of her clawed rings to inflict grievous damage on our target. The others weren't interested, but I sure was ^_^. Her tooth-encrusted slave bracelet-rings appeared on my hands, and I couldn't help making a flirty little cat paw gesture at Adam. It was so creepadorable. Hmmm. I like that. I'll have to use that word again. ^_^
Adam was able to extrapolate the location of Ishalam's manor from his understanding of the layout of the city, and we arrived in secret via the tunnels. I summoned the house's kami to tell us what Ishalam's defense looked like. The kami was a little resistant at first since it was basically betraying it's home's occupant, but I managed to charm it into cooperating. ^_^ The first two floors of the house where loaded with zombies and macout - not something we wanted to deal with. I hate macout! They are so grabby! >_< Pervs.
But we decided to avoid most of Ishalam's defenses and go straight to our target, who was defended by only two macout. the manor's walls and floor were made of thick slabs of stone, easily thick enough to contain a human body, so Pierre and I used our ability to earth travel in conjunction with a little psychopomp to swim with Charles and Adam through the walls themselves and into Ishalam's bedchamber, where he was quietly engaged in reading a book.
Ishalam was pretty handsome, but that didn't really matter. As soon as we popped up out of the floor, I smiled and winked, compelling him to stare at my divine beauty. Then Charles, Adam and I all attacked almost simultaneously. I stepped forward and took a vicious swipe at his throat with my clawed rings, and fortunately I had just enough martial arts training to connect, letting the power of the manes' bracelets do the rest. Blood sprayed from Ishalam's slit throat, but the wound immediately disappeared thanks to his solipsistic well-being. Then Adam put a bullet through Ishalam's chest, but the vampire's skin flayed off and disintegrated (you know, a little like my corpse-shedding technique) leaving him unharmed.
But then Charles put shot right between Ishalam's eyes, and the vampire didn't have anything for that. A few moments later Ishalam was nothing but a pile of ash on the ground.
In the seconds that followed, we quickly dismantled the two macout that had been in the room with Ishalam. Pierre did most of the work on those guys, and I just tried not to get grabbed. Then we withdrew the same way we'd entered and returned to check on on our allies.
The time for the big meeting is almost here. I still need to change my appearance to look like Jenny again and figure out what I'm going to wear to the event. Decisions, decisions. ^_^.
So, having brought the Daimyo and Fuguhime to our side, we only needed to convince one more vampire to join us: the Doge of Venice. So, leaving T-Bone and Elisa to entertain Fuguhime, we made our way to his estate via the secret tunnels and emerged in a neighboring house, where we were greeted by several manes that looked like ghostly Roman soldiers. They stiffly asked us to wait while they summoned a fascinating ghost woman clad in a long gown of skin and wearing clawed slave bracelets made of the teeth of notorious gossips. I was impressed. She didn't reveal her name, sadly, but she's apparently the household god ghost of a long-standing Roman family who still worship her, and she serves as something of a senschal for the Doge's ghosts. I gotta tell ya, if anything ever happens to the Doge, I'm going to see if I can't convince her to work for me! ^_^
Anyway, she was quite polite and took us to the Doge's manor, where another woman, a striking Vrykolakas whose skin was covered in serpentine scales and who had long, sinuous serpents for hair, like the popular renditions of Medusa (her snake-hair was hidden under an illusion, though, so only I could see it, thanks to the lock of svartalfar hair I got when we were in Glastonbury). Also, unlike many vampires, she wasn't cold and corpse-like, but rather warm like she was alive. Her name was Amelia, and she seemed to be one of the Doge's most trusted servants.
Amelia could communicate telepathically by touch, and as she welcomed us to the manor and escorted us to a parlor to await the Doge, she used that ability to softly and privately whisper her desire for me. I was a bit taken aback at first. I mean, I'm used to people immediately falling for me, but Amelia was very forward about it, more so than most people. Still, I kinda liked the attention and couldn't help but flirt back and forth with her while we were the Doge's guests. I know. I'm bad, right? ^_^ Well, I guess it's just in my nature to be a bit flirtatious. A quick look through my journals proves that. ^_^ Seriously, though, aside from being a bit forward, Amelia was rather nice, particularly as vampires go, so I found myself liking her almost immediately.
We waited while Amelia went to fetch the Doge, and in the meantime, a ghostly maidservant brought us a rare wine distilled from some ghostly source. It seemed to be some form of distilled emotion, and one cup was enough for me. Any more and I feared I might lose my inhibitions. Still, it was a delicious treat, and I later inquired about purchasing some for Echo and Oiwa (Echo because she's a bit of a hedonist and Oiwa because the wine is supposed to appeal especially to ghosts ^_^). They didn't want to talk about how the wine was made, though. In retrospect, I have a sneaking suspicion that it's distilled from ghosts themselves...which is a bit off-putting, if only because I cherish the dead so much.
The Doge soon appeared, clad in elaborate spiked armor and an iron face mask and wrapped in a deep green cloak and hood. He was an intimidating presence, especially since it was obvious that a far more frightening visage lay underneath the armor. But despite his appearance, the Doge was courteous and respectful.
After we assisted Suchette in explaining our goals, he admitted that he agreed with us. He did not wish to become a pawn of the titans, but he asked one thing in return for helping us. You see, his home in Venice is hidden beneath the waters of the city, and beneath his lair is the sleeping form of the Vrykolakas Founder, whom he would just as soon remain asleep. Unfortunately, several groups of scions have decided to try and invade his home over the past few years, and he's getting sick of it. So far he has been pretty forgiving, because he doesn't want to make outright enemies of the children of the gods. He's mostly just rendered the invaders unconscious and kicked them out of his home. But he doesn't want the situation to escalate.
So he has asked us to do what we can to make sure other scions leave him alone. In particular, it seems our old friend (>_<) Benton and his crew of sons and daughters of Loki and Dionysus have been a thorn in his side, so we'll have to have a talk with them. Why do I have a feeling that's not going to go so well? I don't trust Benton's crew (none of my group do), but maybe my pull with Persephone and Dionysus will mean something. And I know that T-Bone, at least, can speak their language.
With that agreement made, the Doge completed our power block. Suchette, the Doge, Darga Arpad, the Daimyo, and Fuguhime are all solidly on our side, which accounts for half the official vampire representatives and puts two entire clans (the Jikininki and the Vrykolakas) squarely in our corner. ^_^
But before we left, the Doge had other visitors. The Apepnu, Qetu the Evil-Doer and Hau Hra of the Backward Face, showed up to meet with the Doge. He wasn't happy about that. The Doge asked us to wait while he went to see what the Apepnu wanted. Amelia waited with us at first. She wouldn't tell me what was wrong, but I think we could all tell that she knew and was terrified. She warned me specifically to be careful around Qetu because of Qetu's hatred of beautiful women. When Amelia was summoned to join the Doge in his meeting, we all knew that something bad was going to happen.
I summoned the house kami to tell us what was going on below. Since we were worried about the Doge's safety, we weren't content to just wait in the parlor for his meeting with the Apepnu to end. Adam said that he'd go get a closer look and transformed into a spider while Charles, and I waited. Pierre used Cheval to ride along in both Adam's head and mine to keep us updated.
In a room below, the Doge met with the Apepnu, both of whom were grotesque, mummy-like horrors that reeked of evil. They had come to take Amelia. She had spied on them on the Doge's behalf, but they offered to forgive the transgression if the Doge would hand over Amelia to them. If he did not, then they would take her by force and destroy the Doge was well.
When Pierre conveyed this to us, I was horrified. There's no telling what sort of horrors the Apepnu would visit on Amelia, so there was no way I was going to let them take her. And we had to defend our ally too. Amelia, faithfully loyal to her sire the Doge, even offered to go with the Apepnu willingly if it would appease them, but that was NOT an acceptable solution as far as I was concerned, and the rest of the group, Adam, Charles, and Pierre, all agreed. So we did what needed to be done.
Charles used his understanding of the house's architecture to figure out where he could phase through the floor with me to drop into the room where the Apepnu and the Doge were conversing below. Knowing that I might draw Qetu's ire especially, I transformed into my zombie form, and on Adam's signal, Charles and I crashed the Apepnu's party. Adam returned to his human form and in an instant his gun was in his hand, while Pierre emerged from Adam's head, coalescing as smoke from Adam's mouth. I immediately grabbed Amelia's arm, pulling her behind me so that I could defend her using my horrific, undead appearance to deter any attackers, but fortunately it never came to that.
The Apepnu weren't interesting in sticking around. As soon as we arrived, they both began to fade into shadows and darkness. Charles used a Taiyi trick to keep one of them from fading completely, but before the fight even began it was over, and we let the Apepnu go. After all, protecting the Doge and Amelia was our first priority. Those damn Apepnu did hit us with a khaibit trap, though, which sucked. >_< Dammit, I gotta bathe in some gyuki blood, because I'm running into way too many situations where attacks against my shadow are becoming an issue! >_<
Anyway, everyone was more-or-less okay in then end after Adam dispelled the khaibit trap. Amelia was smitten with me all over again, and didn't really care that I looked like a half-skeletal zombie (or that I had a wife, which I'd already managed to slip into an earlier conversation). She called me her hero. ^_^ And then she kissed me as I transformed back into my normal appearance. I guess my shikome side took over a bit there, because I couldn't help myself. I kissed her neck and then bit her where her neck met her shoulder, lapping up a bit of her blood, and since she was still hurt from the khaibit trap, I offered her some of mine in return so that she could more easily heal herself. It was a bit of a sensual moment...but I didn't let it go too far. Being flirtatious is one thing. Being unfaithful is another, and I've already been bad enough this trip. >_<. Not to mention the fact that Adam and the Doge and everyone were right there...something that Amelia seemed to have forgotten. I couldn't help but sense the Doge's perplexed look or hear Adam just tell him, "This happens all the time. That's Erika." I felt a little bad about that, but also kinda proud. I guess I AM a bad girl. ^_^
Then again, that's one thing Echo says she likes about me. ^___^ And I think Yi likes it too. ^_^
Anyway, we spent several hours afterward arranging to consolidate Suchette, the Doge and Darga's households into one place in the secret tunnels beneath the city. We chose a large, open area where they could be comfortable, and poor Adam nearly bled himself dry anointing the vampires and their servants with blood so that they could safely move through the traps and flaming passages. But now Darga and the Doge should be safe until the meeting and hopefully afterward. We'll leave someone to watch over them, of course, but our enemies shouldn't be able to get to them, especially with Darga's werewolves and the Doge's manes. Which leaves us with fewer people to worry about, namely the households of the Daimyo and Fuguhime.
We still had a few hours until the big meeting, so we shifted from defense to offense. After discussing the situation with the Doge, Darga, and Suchette, we decided to strike first. After all, our enemies had already tried to do SOMETHING to Suchette, what with Ishalam's magical trap in her bedroom (still don't know exactly what that does). And Adam suspects that had we not been using the secret passages to move around, we would have faced at least one or two ambushes.
The Camazotz are represented by both the Tallyman and their Founder, so they were off-limits at the time. And the Jiang Shi probably have the buddy-system going on, so they weren't very appealing targets either. On the other hand, Ishalam is Suchette's rival and is pretty much alone despite the presence of his Founder (whose location we don't even know right now). So we decided to eliminate Suchette's most dedicated enemy before the meeting, thus strengthening our position once the meeting rolls around.
I wonder if Storm's crew would have done something underhanded like this. Hmmm. Cesar maybe. I'm not sure about the others. I doubt Ray would have been up for it, but then again he was surprisingly open to surprise attacks. I mean, just look at the time we killed that svartalfar in Glastonbury!
I hope Ray's doing okay. I miss him. Even the gruff and grumbly parts.
Anyway, T-Bone and Elisa were still busy helping the Daimyo and Fuguhime consolidate their households and keeping watch to make sure nothing happened to them in the meantime, so the the Ishalam Assassination Squad consisted of just Adam, Charles, Pierre and me (we left Suchette safely with the Doge and Darga. The Doge also sent along his elegant manes seneschal, the one with the skin gown and toothed rings. She offered to gently possess one of us, allowing her host to use the terrible power of her clawed rings to inflict grievous damage on our target. The others weren't interested, but I sure was ^_^. Her tooth-encrusted slave bracelet-rings appeared on my hands, and I couldn't help making a flirty little cat paw gesture at Adam. It was so creepadorable. Hmmm. I like that. I'll have to use that word again. ^_^
Adam was able to extrapolate the location of Ishalam's manor from his understanding of the layout of the city, and we arrived in secret via the tunnels. I summoned the house's kami to tell us what Ishalam's defense looked like. The kami was a little resistant at first since it was basically betraying it's home's occupant, but I managed to charm it into cooperating. ^_^ The first two floors of the house where loaded with zombies and macout - not something we wanted to deal with. I hate macout! They are so grabby! >_< Pervs.
But we decided to avoid most of Ishalam's defenses and go straight to our target, who was defended by only two macout. the manor's walls and floor were made of thick slabs of stone, easily thick enough to contain a human body, so Pierre and I used our ability to earth travel in conjunction with a little psychopomp to swim with Charles and Adam through the walls themselves and into Ishalam's bedchamber, where he was quietly engaged in reading a book.
Ishalam was pretty handsome, but that didn't really matter. As soon as we popped up out of the floor, I smiled and winked, compelling him to stare at my divine beauty. Then Charles, Adam and I all attacked almost simultaneously. I stepped forward and took a vicious swipe at his throat with my clawed rings, and fortunately I had just enough martial arts training to connect, letting the power of the manes' bracelets do the rest. Blood sprayed from Ishalam's slit throat, but the wound immediately disappeared thanks to his solipsistic well-being. Then Adam put a bullet through Ishalam's chest, but the vampire's skin flayed off and disintegrated (you know, a little like my corpse-shedding technique) leaving him unharmed.
But then Charles put shot right between Ishalam's eyes, and the vampire didn't have anything for that. A few moments later Ishalam was nothing but a pile of ash on the ground.
In the seconds that followed, we quickly dismantled the two macout that had been in the room with Ishalam. Pierre did most of the work on those guys, and I just tried not to get grabbed. Then we withdrew the same way we'd entered and returned to check on on our allies.
The time for the big meeting is almost here. I still need to change my appearance to look like Jenny again and figure out what I'm going to wear to the event. Decisions, decisions. ^_^.