The Palebloodied

[Okor]

Darkshire bore its scars with spite, rather than pride. The assault had broken the walls, shattered the earth, but failed to scratch the spirit of its people. Werewolves reduced to twisted skeletons and ragged cloaks of fur hung from chains upon the battered masonry, a reminder to all those that would challenge its right to exist of the fate that awaited them. Grim men donning gorgets, silver trinkets, and garlands of garlic patrolled the walls, crossbows clutched tight in gloved hands, peering out into the mist, watching the erratic dances of Will O’ The Wisps in the mire.

Beneath the surface though, its wounds festered. While the devilish drilling machine had long since been dismantled and melted down into fresh blades for those that still stood against the monstrous menace, the tunnels it left in its wake still honeycombed Darkshire beneath the surface. Sewers and derelict basements fed into the twisted passageways, wandering ghouls and starved beasts patrolling its depths.

Unfortunately, they were not the worst thing lurking beneath the gaze of the good people of Darkshire.

The cultist’s blade sank into the ghoul’s neck, gnarled fangs gnashing at the robe-swaddled arm wrapped around its throat. Diseased blood spilled from the wound as its emaciated, twisted form sank to the stone floor, accursed body spasming as the necromantic energy that infused its being was no longer able to sustain its blighted existence. Shaking her head, she stowed the black-drenched blade within her robes, her veins white against her brown skin.

She let out a sigh, remembering when life was different. She couldn’t call it better. Years of her life whiled away in the shining spires of Coruscant, clad in gaudy finery, drunk on the finest wines the hanging gardens of the city could produce, nerves set alight by the latest chemical concoction.

It was different. She did not dare say it was better. One wrong word saw her cast down, parroting her latest companion’s affection for Darkshire. He disappeared not long after. She ran before the net could close around her, friends forgetting her face as quickly as they possibly could. She fled across the nexus, what few possessions she could carry on her person clutched tight.

Within a month, she was just another face in Darkshire’s slums, spending her nights cold and starving beneath a sickly green moon, looming overhead, groaning in torment as the chem-hunger bit deep into her bones, writhing, twisting, tormenting. Every instant was agony, her body betraying her in favour of the alchemical ambrosia she had left behind in the shimmering spires. Just one drop, a single drop, and everything would be alright, she had lied to herself.

She didn’t feel it, now. Disease wracked her frame, cancerous tumours building within her slight figure. It was much the same, except without the false hope: There was nothing she could do to rid herself of it, no magical elixir that would wipe her corruption clean.

“Jess, are you gonna stand around all day, or are you going to get moving?” Keith stood further ahead of her, two gnarled claws topping arms like blighted tree trunks, piggy, red eyes staring out at her from beneath a thoroughly scarred brow. The plagues had eased her pain, but for him, it had given him purpose. A rusted iron maul was slung across his back, stained with the brains and blood of the beasts in their path, a puckered mass of burnt flesh adorning his chest. He was stripped of his strength, his honour, and his hand, and tossed into the ghettos: only the touch of their new lord had given him that which he had lost. Power and pride were his once more, at the simple cost of pestilence.

A shade slid past her, sallow skin over an emaciated frame cloaked by sable cloth, a well-used crossbow slung over slim shoulders. If rumours held true, Damien was the cursed scion of a Noble house from Camelot, a witch’s curse driving him to madness, and into Darkshire. His babbling had ceased since he drunk the bubonic blood of gods, his broken mind stitched together by a thousand parasitical jaws.

Flickering flames beckoned them forth, the trio slipping through a crack in the stone, a seismic scar from the last attempt on Darkshire’s sovereignty. Keith grunted as he struggled to fit his muscled frame through the crack, a scrap of skin scraping away on the jagged rock as he did so. They emerged into a cavern lit with crude braziers, burning charcoal serving precious little purpose but to emphasize the shadows obscuring the faces within jaundiced hoods. There were dozens of others within the grotto, the anonymity granted by their cloaks a mere formality: they each shared the same blood, the same blessing, the same burden, the same back-alley shanties.

The First Among Equals left the incoming trio, Keith’s partially Orcish blood allowing him to stand tall before the assemblage, throwing his arms wide as he stood before them, a smouldering brazier serving to display his scars, infections, blisters, and buboes. “Brothers! Sisters!” He called out, his guttural voice echoing around the cavern, smoke tinged with noxious herbs gathering, rising upwards through cracks, abandoned tunnels, and sewer grates. ”We stand beneath a city! A city, unbroken by the lost and the damned that skulk in the mist outside its walls! A city, bloodied, but unbowed! A city that has cast us down, and exiled us outside of their sight!”

“And it is our city!” He howled, his fellow cultists wordlessly chanting, slamming the hilts of their blades against the cavern floor. ”They are unenlightened, and unscarred! They suffer through this world, and have yet to learn how to harness their pain, and be freed from it!” He raised a twisted blade, using it to tear through his forearm, silent as pale blood seeped from shredded veins, raising it in the air, cursed once-crimson blood flowing down his scarred skin. ”We are the Palebloodied! Strength courses through our veins! Our breath is death, and our touch brings life! With every step, we spread our disease, and our blessing!”

The cultists gave a roar of approval, breathing in the thick atmosphere of brotherhood, toxic fumes, and pestilence one final time before slinking off into the tunnels and sewers, working their way back to what passed for homes: shanties, shacks, and back alley lean-tos.

Only the trio remained in the subterranean temple, each standing around the central brazier, its flame now a dull green, its flickering scarcely illuminating the first three to take up the curse.

”A nice speech,” Jess said, her once-constant twitching reduced to a wary look in her eyes, her nerves now soothed and numbed by her infections.

Keith shrugged, his bloodied wound already starting to seal over, the flow of blood already staunched. ”They need purpose. They need strength. They need a vision.” The half-orc licked his tusked lips, deep in thought.

”Blood,” whispered Damien, breaking his silence, his voice deep despite its volume, pervading the place of worship. ”The blood of gods. We tasted it once before,  and it gave us this. We supped on the flesh of The Vector, and the stuff of Primes only served to strengthen us.”

Keith nodded, turning to his former socialite sister-in-faith. ”Jess, gather a few of the stronger brothers, and keep an eye out for any primes. Take what you can before Omni reclaims their bodies, and bring it to us. Nurgleth knows we'll get more use out of it than they will.”

He leaned forward, gnarled fingers stained with his own blood gripping the edge of the brazier, tusks tainted with disease forming into a grin. ”Tonight, we shall feast on Godling’s flesh.”

The three nodded to each other, going their separate ways. Damien had his own gangrenous gang to run, their eyes and ears spreading throughout darkshire and the swamplands beyond, Keith had a shrine to the Plagued God they had sworn their souls to, his newfound purpose in this life.

And Jess…

She had to kill a Prime.