City of IF

[Ravenwing]

The story continues in this next segment of Truthseeker. Desmond is now far from where he had begun.
Incited to vengeance after being the sole survivor of the massacre in his home village, he has traveled to the capital; the only place he thought would be the best place to continue his search for his half-brother Icrius and the truth behind the legendary Astarte's Gift. Along the way he meets Skadu, whom he later learns is a wanted man, when he meets the mysterious Lord Renef, who becomes his mentor. Although he finally arrives in the capital, a stable fire marks his first night as a page in the imperial palace. First day of classes, Desmond meets friends and foes; while at thesame time learns pieces of some of the truth he seeks. Meanwhile, someone is playing with his mind by tricking his eyes, and whispering sweet incentives into his ear. Mystery now floats in the castle. It would seem that there is a murderer or two wandering the halls of the castle. And to make events even worse, curious classmates pester him to tell them about his past.

Last Decision: Secure a promise.



"I thought I told you two to report to me immediately should there be any changes." Icrius glared at the two men kneeling
before him, their heads bowed. Although they could not see the master's face, Mac and Beren shivered as the cold voice
reached their ears. The stone floor underneath them felt warmer than the voice of the man, who stood before them, his hands
clasped behind his back as he stared at the dark abyss that was his domain. "I hope neither of you are trying to kill him,
for I want him alive...so I can do the honors."

Taking that as a cue to leave, Mac and Beren bowed, and stayed in that position until they were completely out in the hall. It
wasn't until the shutting of the heavy doors did they both move.

"I told ya we shoulda told him about that flower," Mac whined. "Now we in big trouble, probably."

"Ah, quit regretting it. Ya don't have any scars do you?" Beren glanced at his chubby lout of a partner, who was huffing and
puffing a few paces behind as they headed for the mithral gate that would allow them to return to the capital in time for the
evening meal. "And besides, I think we got off pretty easy, I mean look we got out of the castle without a scratch.
Now hurry it up." Putting his hands behind his head, he leaned back, and started whistling an offbeat tune.

"Did ya hear that?" Mac whispered into Beren's ear.

"You're hearing things. And let go of my shirt, you're going to tear this delicate material." Tugging himself free of Mac's
tight grasp, Beren began to regret that he had wished that his partner had caught up to him at all. Maybe it would be better if he found
a length of rope and tied it around the man's thick neck and pulled it taut. Then leave him hanging among the birds.
Sighting their destination in the distance, Beren quickened his pace.

Mac tugged on Beren' shirt again, tearing the fabric this time. "Look ahead of you."

Angrily pulling away, Beren turned to glare at Mac as he tore off the ripped piece of cloth "What? Am I going to die or something? And look what you have done?" He shook the torn fabric in Mac's ashen face.

Mac could only point and stare as a shadow rose behind Beren, completely blocking the harsh rays of the sun. Where the two
men stood, the air became cooler like when the moon rose into the eastern sky to mark the end of day. "Mac, I hope this isn't
a joke." Beren muttered as he turned around. Fangs met him.

"Did not I tell ya to tell about that flower?" Mac reminded Beren shakily. Meeting the golden eyes of the beast, Mac started to quiver violently. "I think we're going to be punished." Beren just stared unable to respond as the fangs just came closer toward them.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________


"No talking while in the hall," Madame Melham ordered as she ushered Desmond, Cyrus, and Joran out.

"Was this part of your plan, Cyrus?" Joran snapped. "Not all of us would like to
earn some demerits."

"How else were we going to get the opportunity to talk? During midafternoon meal? Lighten up a bit," Cyrus said as he patted Joran confidently. "Besides there was a purpose to this. Right, Desmond?"

"But you did this during Melham's class," Desmond protested. "I can't do this now."

Morning classes kept the corridors scarce of traffic. Birds called out to each other in front of the blazing sun. Joran had a wisp of brown hair covering his sullen face while standing not far from him, Cyrus' blue eyes had a look of determination in them.

"I don't care whether or not you can or cannot do this," Cyrus replied, "I want to know the truth. You look like hell."

"I don't care that I look like hell. If you had watched what I watched, you would feel the exact same way," Desmond said as he began to fall apart; the wall he had built was crumbling, but Desmond held on to the keystone of the foundation. He only hoped that he would not have to reveal it quite yet.

"And what would I have seen?" Cyrus asked quietly. He sat against the wall next to Desmond, unsure how he should act. Joran, not wanting to be the odd one out, joined them by sitting on the other side of Desmond.

Desmond answered shortly, "Death." Like a deluge, the memory returned to him. Hundreds of bodies, so battered, that identifying any of them was nearly impossible. Each person that had died had been doing something before they left the living world. The meat seller had had his cleaver in one hand, and the head of a chicken in the other. His killer had finished the job for him, and had left the body of the chicken right on the table.

The saddest vision of all was seeing his cousins and friends dead together near the river, where each afternoon they would escape from their parents' watchful eyes to frolic in the cool water and skip pebbles. Sometimes they would find twigs in the forest and tie to it, a string with a stolen pieced of meat, and then cast it into the water, hoping to trick a fish. But was it not that day he was late coming? All because his mother had sent him to find herbs in the surrounding forest to season their meal that evening. Only she never had the opportunity to do that because she was already dying. He could hear his mother, calling from the world above. "Don't do this to yourself."

"Promise you won't tell," Desmond said fiercely as he gripped both boys' hands tightly. "If neither of you can't promise that, go now."

"And miss the opportunity to hear the heartfelt secret of Desmond," Cyrus said jokingly.

Sighing, Joran turned to Cyrus and said reproachfully, "Not the time." Both turned to the one between them, and nodded their heads. Any noise would have broken the severity of the oath.

Cyrus stood up. "We best not do it here. Somewhere else but here would be a better choice."

"Class ends soon," Desmond reminded them when he sighted people entering the hallway. "And we have to serve tonight."

"Doesn't matter," Cyrus argued. "It would be best for you." He moved aside to allow for more space. Grouped close together made them look very conspicuous, and Desmond cringed under the scrutiny of passing people.

"Room tonight," Joran interrupted. "We can choose a quiet corner somewhere. Anytime after that, we won't have much time since we start shadowing tomorrow. "

"I'm game," Cyrus agreed with a nod. Desmond, seeing that the odds were against him, acquiesced. Even as he turned to go to his last class, which neither Joran or Cyrus were in, Desmond still had the unsettling feeling that he had chosen the wrong path.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

"Page, you're late," Corin said gruffly. Desmond bowed his head with a sigh. "Starting tonight, ya'll help in the kitchen evening. Perhaps that will help teach you promptness. Straighten your uniform."

Desmond lined up with all the other pages along wall parallel to the length of the table as they listened to the opening remarks. He tugged at the uncomfortable white collar of his jacket as he listened to the man. Similar in build and perhaps also in age, he and the emperor could have been brothers, twins even, but they were not the same. With the emperor there was always a smile, but the man here, had a grim countenance.

"Who is he?" Desmond whispered to Joran, who happened to be beside him.

"I think he is a cousin or something. Apparently the emperor is away, and has requested this man to take his place. But why hold a banquet? Most people go away from the capital at this time of year," Joran answered with a puzzled expression. Desmond, too, had noticed the scarcity of people in the hall.

Unbidden thoughts entered his mind. His breathing halted for only a moment. The 'what if' questions cycled raced around in his head.

A slight shake on the shoulder broke him from his thoughts. "Nothing," he replied to Joran's concerned countenance. Desmond shrugged. "Excuse me." His wish for a distraction was answered when he sighted an adamant hand waving for assistance. "And tell Cyrus we can't meet tonight, I have kitchen duty tonight," called back as walked up to served the guest.

Desmond did not recognize the man as one of the castle residents. Dressed in flowing black robes, he could have been easily mistaken as one of the magic-wielders. Not that he ever had much experience with one, Desmond thought ruefully. The swordmaster had a deep inkling that magic was a cheap way to battle that any of the pages could recite his lecture back to him with ease.

"You're an odd among evens." The casual observation made Desmond pause for a second from his duty, which was to take the remnants of the meal back to the kitchen. "How so?"

The stranger did not face him, and instead leaned back in his chair as he sipped his wine. "The eyes especially separate you from most of them," and he nodded to the people seated around the table and Desmond's contemporaries, who were helping to clear the table the same as him.

Desmond allowed the dishes in his arms to clatter back on to the table and asked quavering, "What do you want?"

The man turned to face him, "I can't really say. Fame would be nice. A women to warm my bed would be even better, but alas none will have me." A side of his mouth quirked upward as he continued. "The best would be power. Power over all."

Strangely, a cold breeze blew through making Desmond shiver, even though the windows were covered. An expression of fear overcame the man's glee, and Desmond heard a deep voice intone, The message. Tell him...now. The force of the command made Desmond shiver. The animated look that had once covered the man's face was gone. With a sullen expression, the man obeyed.

"You are to meet Master two hours after Luna has risen a few days hence. A note will inform you of the details the before night."

Grabbing the man by the shoulders, Desmond demanded, "What will I find out?"

"I do not know, I only give the message," the man replied arrogantly, the fear he had, gone. "Now clear the dishes."

Walking back, dishes in hand, Desmond pondered the message. Who was this Master? Suddenly he heard the ominous tolling of the bell.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

"I wish Nera wouldn't bite so hard," Mac whined as he held his bleeding arm. Behind him, Beren hobbled up the path, groaning whenever his injured leg was jostled.

"The bloody beast was only following orders, what'd you expect? A kiss?"

"You two, where have you been?" Beren and Mac looked up to see the captain of the guard walking toward them.

"Well, you see, sir, we..." Mac began.

"No excuses," the captain interrupted. "Do you not hear the bell?"

"Yes, but..." Beren tried to chip in.

"That bell means someone is dead or dying," the captain continued, ignoring the pitiful responses coming from the two men before him. "A guard's duty is to keep that person from an untimely death. And by the sounds of that bell, someone has reached that time. Now go."

Saluting the captain, Beren and Mac hurried off. As they passed through one of the arches, past the courtyard, something glimmered brightly catching their eyes. Greed possessed them and they grinned gleefully as the walked toward the light, totally forgetting the tolling of the bell earlier. Under the glare of Luna, sitting on top of a pedestal, lied a flower of the bluest of blues.

"We can make riches off of this," Mac said in awe as he circled the pedestal.

Bored, and uninterested, Beren replied, "It's just a flower."

Startled by the indifferent reply, Mac grabbed Beren and led him closer to the flower. "Siphrius, it's blue siphrius! Worth a whole kingdom. People die for this flower."

Perked by the mention of people dying for the flower, Beren eyed the flower with an interested eye. "It worth that much?"

Mac nodded. "Then we should take it and get rich off of it. And then we don't have to work for that bastard," Beren continued as his mind filled with fantasies of a rich man. He grabbed the flower, and called to Mac, "For once you used your head, now let's go."

A hand halted his movement. He tried to step forward, but his body seemed to refuse to move. His eyes moved wildly, looking for the source of his paralysis. He sited a girl, kneeled before him, her eyes closed in concentration as her hands rested on the ground. Beren felt a light breeze pass by them, ruffling the girl's dark hair, but she did not even move. Her motionlessness began to scare him. To avoid staring forward at the woman, he found Mac, whose eyes were filled with fright.

"I trust you enjoy your position," the girl drawled as she stood up to brush off her robes. "You should not take things that are not yours to take," and she took the flower from his still hand.

At first glance, he had mistaken her as a young girl, but as now that she moved closer, Beren saw she was much older. "I would asked if I had known such a beautiful women owned it," Beren joked.

"You're not going to move," the woman replied as she glanced at the two of them, "nor will your friend, if you are implying you want me to release you both."

"Why us?" Beren asked hastily, hoping it will buy him some time from whatever the woman had in store for he and Mac. "It was open and free for us to take."

Pain registered into his brain when hand met cheek. "It wasn't yours to take," the woman replied shortly. "But I have a request," Beren quirked an eyebrow(he tried to at least, but the paralysis kept him from doing so), "which includes both of you."

As the woman explained, Beren tried to identify her. His mind kept insisting she was familiar to him. One of the female pages came to mind, but the complexity of such a plan did not match with the behavior of the girl herself. But as her explanation continued, it threw away most of his theories as to whom she was. Who was this woman?

"Who are 'ya?" He asked once she finished elaborating on her plan.

She smiled mysteriously and answered, "Someone just helping another through other means. I am closer than you think."

"We can't betray Master like this, Beren," Mac called out.

"Why not?" Beren shot back. "We get beaten for such little mistakes, it's no wonder Skadu left. I do wonder where he went off to sometimes."

"You will listen to me," the woman demanded as she faced Mac. "Or face death instead, and there won't be any bells ringing for you."

"I still can't do this," Mac stammered. Beren rolled his eyes in disgust. As always Mac was being his cowardly self.

Under his disguise, Skadu smiled, he had expected as much that Mac would be the hardest one to persuade. Although he had an eye for something's worth, Mac had no motivation to follow through and take it. That was what made him worthless.

Skadu had quit his servitude with Icrius after that last disastrous mission with the fire only a few months hence. On his own now, he sought to gather followers behind him. For now, he joined the front to search for the most sought after treasure: Astarte's Gift. No one knew what it looked like, but it was from a stranger that Skadu heard that the Gift could be a renowned blade known for its beauty and swiftness. But he couldn't be too sure, and that was why he was in the capital, to verify whether or not it was true. He knew that Icrius had sent these two thugs as spies, and he hoped they would have any information concerning it.

"Your decision is made, I assume?" Skadu stared at the pudgy man before him, still frozen in his shadow trap, his eyes glinting gleefully. Another fresh kill to add to his stash. Only a few nights earlier he had stolen two knives from the kitchen, and assassinated the heir. Only no one knew he was dead yet for his shadow duplicate took the real one's place. "Join the shadows then."

Closing his eyes, Skadu allowed his hands to form the different characters for the spell. Beren, who watched the woman with amazement, gasped because in Mac's place stood a pig. " What'd 'ya do exactly?"

The woman opened her eyes. And as she admired her work, replied, "Separation. His spirit self, I sent to the next world over. He will stay like this until his body begins to deteriorate. Less than a month, maybe more. Once the ghost half is gone, the other half loses the will to live."

The pig looked up sadly to Beren, and shook its head regretfully. Beren watched it stumble away into the shadows, wondering if he had made the right choice. But it was probably too late, he was already promised to this woman.

"It would seem they have noticed the change," the woman commented, cocking her head as the sound of heels running across the hard floor echoed against the walls. "Don't want to be seen here."

"Wait!" Beren stretched out his hand to keep her from going, but his hand touched only air with the resonance of a sweet laughter ringing in his ears.

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“This night has only gotten weirder,” Desmond muttered to himself as he and everyone else in the hall listened to the captain of the guard.

“It has been verified that our lord emperor is dead, along with his heir. We do not know the motivation,…” the captain spoke to his startled audience.

When the captain finished, silence hung in the air. Everyone was afraid to make the first noise to break the solemn atmosphere in the room. Suddenly a voice from the doors broke the silent air. “I know who did it.”

Heads, along with Desmond’s, swerved to the source of the silence breaker. He gasped. For with a knife to her neck was Sanae, and she was staring sadly at him. Tearing his eyes away from the girl, he observed the profile of the man that held her captive. When the man turned, his gleeful eyes, stared straight into Desmond’s. His green orbs widened as recognition hit him. “Ladies and gentleman, the one whom I know is standing there.”

And before Desmond could respond, all attention was turned on him. Cyrus and Joran mimicked everyone else’s expression. Wide eyes, open mouths, even hands over beating hearts. Shock.



You have just finished reading the fifth installment of Truthseeker. I advise clicking on the Post a Reply button, and giving a comment and suggestion. All comments are welcome as long as they're constructive criticism and do not belittle any other members' posts here. Everyone is welcome to there own opinions. Other than comments, do not forgot to give ideas for poll options.

A/N: Sorry this took so long. I am doing so much this summer that I rarely have time to sit in front of a computer and write. Well, enough of my excuses. Depending on how many suggestions I receive, poll would be up soon enough. Cheers.

[ethereal_fauna]

Wonderful to have a new chapter up! I haven't finished reading it all yet, and will comment more later. I believe the lines you have breaking the sections are preventing all the text from fitting neatly onto my screen, and I missed quite a few words at the edge of the screen in the beginning, and was wondering why the blamed paragraphs weren't making any sense. :oops: Now that I have that sorted it's all coming together nicely! I hope to have an IC response soon.

[ethereal_fauna]

The eyes continued to stare as a heavy silence bore down on my shoulders. I sputtered a denial, and a counter-accusation slipped to the tip of my tongue. I held it in check, and then in panic fled the banquet hall. I ran without knowing why, or where to run to, unmindful of any pursuit.

[yoda]

hello :D :grin: :smile: :smile: :grin: :D :D :grin: :smile:

[Ravenwing]

Hi welcome to City of IF, yoda. It would be nice if you would read my storgame, and leave a comment in this forum since it is the most recent chapter up. Us authors love to hear comments, and leaving a post is one of the many ways to get to know people on the site. Hope to see you around.

[Guest]

;) dummy

[GODOFTHUNDER]

Hi i have been in this camphaign b4 but was wonderin if i could get a double bladed samuri sword fer my char :twisted:

[KING OF THE SMILYS]

:cool: :( :shock: ;) :-) :smile: :) :-( :sad: :grin: :D :-D :P :lol: :-o :? :mad: :-x







Close Window
:x :twisted: :cool: :sad:

[YODA DECAPITATER]

I was wonderin if i could be a part of this RPG :-x :twisted: :-D :grin: :smile: :-( :) :shock:

[Reiso]

See, now this is why I'm not a big fan of in character responses between storypoints: It confuses people who can't tell the difference (or don't know the difference) between a Storygame and an RP.

Great Chapter Ravenwing! Good to see it back on it's feet. I need a while to think on what to do next, but I will post again when I make up my mind.

[Ravenwing]

But you gotta admit that it is amusing to read a response from someone who makes the mistake. I mean look at the post asking for a double-edged sword. LOL. Real confused minds.

[ethereal_fauna]

I doubt it's the manner in which responses are given that confuses people. It's due to people registering without knowing fully what the site is about, or really even having a tiny little idea what the site is about.

[Ravenwing]

Well when you do a google search for City of IF, you don't get anything really. But if you use the original name Interfable, this is the first description you see:

"Interfable: Free online [color=red]rpg games
Free online rpg games and free online interactive games, fiction, and fantasy storytelling."

I think that is what confuses people. This is more of a text RP site. More about full blown story writing then simple sentences describing the actions of one character (that is what I have experienced with other text RPs I have joined.)[/color]

[edgar]

:smile: hi

[Guest]

Hey great story i hope you get chapter 6 up soon :P :sad: i also wanted to know if i could post your story on my site for people to read ;) i'll make sure to give you credit though

site: s13.invisionfree.com/anime_doom

[Ravenwing]

Welcome guest. Are you a registered member? I saw that you posted my first chapter on another site. I am actually amazed you think it is that well-written, but thanks for doing that. Chapter 6 is up!