A Different Fate

[Deleted]

Ísenwulfa could have ridden. Though a slave, she had enough position among the men to have asked for a horse and been given one, even had the earl not supplied her with one. But that presupposed that Ísenwulfa thought she deserved to ride. She knew she did not. After all, with all her varied sins and crimes against law and morality, walking instead of riding wasn't even a penance or punishment; it was just what she deserved. And so she walked in column with all the other foot soldiers in the earl's seolforscildas and did not notice the occasional admiring looks sent her way, or the way those around her cleaned up their language and did not mention their sexual conquests - imagined or otherwise.

Today would be a march of twenty miles. A long march for any army, but necessary in this case. Her column was one of three, and all three were aimed a single point, where the enemy would arrive soon after the army reformed. But, there had been a few days of bad weather, and the speed of the column had slowed sufficiently that they were now late. All that remained to them was to force march and make up for lost time. Fifteen mile days had been turned into twenty mile days, and the earl would not be best pleased if that failed to get them there in time. She could still win the battle - the earl did not lose battles - but it would be that much harder and she would lose that many more men. And so they all marched as hard as they could.

Between one step and another, Ísenwulfa found herself transported from a road of sand and cobblestones snaking through the countryside to a flat top of some kind of stone pier, an unfamiliar underground city laid out around it. Instinct took over even as the faintest hint of fear and uncertainty tinged her sunken, face. She dropped her bundled clothing and blankets to the ground, and took her axe off her shoulder. Only fools wore their helmets during the march, and she had been carrying it with the knotted laces looped over the beard of her axe. In a smooth and practiced motion, she removed the helmet from the axe and, axe resting against her shoulder, she untied the knotted laces while looking around her. The area still looked clear, but who knew how long that would take.

Helmet ready, she hurriedly donned it and laced it it on tight. Helmet on, Ísenwulfa shifted her shield around to cover her left side and, axe ready before her, began to slowly advance down one of the stairs, looking every which way for the slightest sign of danger. She had no idea where she was or what had happened, but one thing was clear: whichever god, elf, dwarf, giant or other supernatural creature had engineered this was going to release her one way or another. She had her death to look forward to, after all. 

Tag: Ruby Lidenbrooke

[Ruby Lidenbrooke]

Ruby had just recently entered this world herself. She hung around Gallows for the last day, getting the lay of the land and trying to find a time to try and jack one of these damned gemstones. But it seems every time she came in, something stopped her. She had just come from the equivalent of a fated hotel and was casually strolling past and SUPER casually looks inside the Alter room. Go figure, though. Another someone here, preventing her sticky little fingers coming into contact with those gems. This individual appeared ready to murder though. Did the....owner(?) become wise to her plot and send this axe equipped assassin to deal with her? Unlikely. And if so, they picked one of the worst weapons to fight her with. But let's face it. Any weapon is the worst possible weapon against Ruby and all her bravado.

WAIT! Wait wait wait. Random lady, standing near the exact spot Ruby found herself standing in a day before, and she appeared to be in combat mode due to the sudden transition between worlds. Ruby stupidly stood in the archway for a few moments, looking down the hallway to see if anyone more qualified; I.E. anyone, was nearby. Nope. Just her luck amirite? Ruby looked back and sighed. She had almost certainly been spotted by now, and decided to speak before LadyRambo here charged her. But what would she say? Would she start by explaining she's no longer where she was born? Would she lead with an introduction followed by detailing that some god randomly plucks people from their homes because he wants a collection? "H-hey!" Nope. She'll just shout and stumble over the one word.

She held her hands off to the side a bit, palms facing her, to indicate she was, by looks, unarmed. She left most of her stuff back at her room, including her leather vest and spear. Basically she's a modestly endowed child wearing a sports bra-like top. "So..." She started, still at a lost for where to start. "You're not in your world anymore. There's some god here named fate who's powerful enough to grab people from other worlds. Shit doesn't make sense but it seems to be true."

[Deleted]

Ísenwulfa had not expected for the first person she saw to be a half nakedbchild. As she had begun to walk down the stairs, the child had walked past the entrance to...wherever this was and stopped, staring. Frowning behind her helmet, Ísenwulfa shrugged her shield back around behind her and took a less aggressive stance with her axe, though she kept it ready. She had been expecting any number of hostile supernatural creatures, yet if one of them was in the form of a child they might be testing her. It would not do to anger a god or spirit.

"H-hey!"

The voice was unsteady, unsure, and it did not speak in a language Ísenwulfa knew. Yet, she understood what had been said perfectly. This only confirmed her belief that she had been taken by the supernatural and that this was some sort of test. Grounding the butt of her axe, Ísenwulfa bowed and returned the greeting.

"Greetings."

The child continued, turning her palms outwards to show she held no weapons, words uncertain even if her tone was less so than when she had first spoken.

"So...You're not in your world anymore. There's some god here named fate who's powerful enough to grab people from other worlds. Shit doesn't make sense but it seems to be true."

This elicited another frown from Ísenwulfa, though it was hidden behind her helmet. A god named "Fate"? She knew no god by that name, though there were many gods in her world she had no name for. Still, most gods were just named differently among other peoples or shared an aspect with one of her own. She had never heard of any god being responsible for Fate itself. That was the domain of the Weavers. Everyone knew that.

Trying to be respectful, though her voice remained an almost flat monotone, she decided to probe a little and see how things stood. There was still the chance this was a trap, not a test.

"I have not heard of a god named "Fate". Is he connected to the Weavers?"

Looking around at the cavern, she quickly added, "And which of the seven worlds are we in? Is it the realm of the Dweorh?"

[Deleted]

There would be footfalls that could be heard through the temple as someone was approaching rather fast. As Kail had stopped by and as he got closer as there were two voices speaking up. He was lightly armed and was wearing some of his fated clothes although the major tip off was the fact that the blond was wearing glasses. At his side was a bastard sword and nothing else for a weapon, and after some more steps he finds two people.  One was a short looking woman dressed for at least adventuring and the other was set up for a battle. It seemed that the shorter woman was doing her best to explain things to the new comer. "Perhaps I can explain things better, I've been in this world for awhile now" he said and walked closer to the two. Ruby might have heard from word of mouth about a blond haired male who had been a major caretaker for the fated. As well as owning one of the major workshops within Gallows Bane.

"And I will try and do my best to answer your questions. I'm Killian Lancaster, you can call me Kail if you like" he said trying his best to be friendly. As most had been ok coming over to this world, but there would always be a chance that someone might be more violent. Due to them not understanding or being afriad, none the less though, Kail would be really careful.

[Ruby Lidenbrooke]

Ruby didn't quite know who, or what, the "weavers" were, so she shrugged and said sure. This place was weird, maybe it was. Or maybe it wasn't. It probably wasn't gonna cause her any problems in the future regardless. "This is the Realm of Teair Nova. It's not very well known." She added, smiling, as footsteps began to draw close, a blond man appearing suddenly and basically said he was taking over the conversation.

Ruby shrugged and took a few child sized steps to the side. "Probably could. But i get to take her on the tour."

[Deleted]

The girl seemed to indicate that the god Fate was connected to the Weavers, though her shrug and voice was a little uncertain. Ísenwulfa tilted her head slightly to one side as she tried to work out the cosmological implications of that statement. A god she had never heard of, but still connected to the Weavers? She must be very far from home indeed. What did this for want with her, and why had he not sent a servant to instruct her? Unless...unless the child was his servant and also a test.

"This is the Realm of Teair Nova. It's not very well known."

Ísenwulfa frowned. "Teair Nova"? She had never heard any of the seven worlds called that, and the name offered her no clues as to which it was. Perhaps this was a wild branch of the World Tree, in between the worlds but not in itself a world? She looked around, frowning behind her helmet, she looked around the cavern. It could be a giant's skull, she supposed, hung on the branch as a trophy. Just as Ísenwulfa was about to ask the child if her summation was correct - not that she really expected a proper answer from the child - when she heard rapid footsteps approaching.

For an instant, instinct took over and Ísenwulfa turned halfway towards the steps, axe lifting off the ground and left shoulder dipping to allow her shield to be brought forward, but she stopped herself as she remembered where she was and moved back into a resting position, now facing the footsteps. Perhaps this would be Fate's servant.

The young man who approached was not what Ísenwulfa had expected. His clothes were utterly alien, and his hair so long as to make him seem earg, but he also carried a strange sword with long blade and hilt, and watched her carefully, as though ready to go on the offensive. She didn't know what to make of him, but his offer to take over the explanation of where this was and what had happened to her, in addition to his appearance, suggested he might be a priest of some kind. At least, she thought with the bare semblance of humour, he was trying to be friendly.

"Are you the priest of the god Fate this child has been telling me about?" She asked in a flat voice with just the hint of question. Perhaps he would have better answers.

[Deleted]

"Er....sorry I did not mean to be rude there miss. I will pay for the drinks at the tavern as a appology" Kail said to Ruby as the blond rubbed the back of his head. But he had been around for a lot longer and then turned to the warrior that was weilding a mean looking axe and shield. "Kinda....but the thing is, I have been in this world for for I think two and half years now. So I try and come by here to help people get adjusted, when I can" he said explaining himself a bit more. "So anyway......for our purpose here within this world can be mired. But we were brought here to change the destiny of this world. To what end, though I am still trying to figure that shit out. We all know gods and goddesses are assholes to mortals half the damn time. This is assuming she said that Fate brought you here. If you got some more questions you can ask them. Why don't we go to the tavern here and get somewhere to sit down" he said. As Kail offered a different venu then the temple. Since the new commer might have wanted to have a drink or something to ease some of the stress of coming from this world.

[Ruby Lidenbrooke]

Ruby shuts her mouth and kinda shakes her head. "Not really rude. I barely know shit 'bout this place." She stated, making a small fistpump at the mention of free booze. "Wait, all of my drinks? Or just the first round?" She asked. She's a cheap date. Not because she couldn't hold her alcohol, but because she is so small that a little bit would effect her quite a bit more than those who are larger. Not to say that she wouldn't pound down a few drinks and need to be carried around because her feet stopped working.

She began to giggle. She basically fed a bit of random information haphazardly to this new arrival. She wanted to see how Kail undid her 'handiwork'.

"I can tell you how I'm going to alter the destiny. By getting into trouble with everyone until i stumble across some world-changing plot and stopping it!" She exclaimed excitedly, her eyes lighting up as she spoke. Or rather, shouted. "Now come on, let's go to that tavern!"

[Deleted]

Ísenwulfa was becoming progressively confused but, conversely, was coming down from her combat high and was showing her emotions less and less. The priest, it seemed, had been seized by Fate as well, and had little more idea why she had been taken from her world than she did. Ísenwulfa rested her axe in the crook of her arm and began unlacing her helmet. While her voice had had a hint of question before, it was now an entirely dead monotone.

"I do not drink, but if you would be more comfortable sitting, I would not object to the tavern."

Helmet unlaced, Ísenwulfa pulled it off, tied the laces together and hung it on the head of her axe. Her face, the only obviously feminine aspect of her body, was not as drawn and hollow as at the end of a campaign, but still did not look healthy. In the right light, when her eyes were in shadow, her sunken cheek and high cheekbones made her face look skeletal.

This was the face she turned to face the child, who had expressed great joy at the idea of someone paying for all her drinks and whose plan seemed to be to scamper from one disaster to another until everything was fixed. Ísenwulfa did not alter her expression, just stared at the child with a blank expression, and then looked back to Kail. She did not begrudge children watered ale or wine, but she suspected from the child's reaction that watered alcohol was not what she had in mind, and Ísenwulfa did not approve.

"It would not be wise to give the child anything but small ale."

[Deleted]

"Eh whatever you want but do watch it, you look like a super light weight" said Kail as he was going to err on the side of caution. It seemed for the blond that the shorter one seemed like more of a child height then a shorter person. "Also how are you miss" he asked Ruby since the blond was curious now. But then his vision shifted to the warrior and raised his eyebrow as the helmet came off. It was a woman and she looked pretty worse for wear as she looked like she hadn't had a good nights rest or any rest at all. "I understand, there are some bevrages that are not alchoholic. I don't drink a lot myself only maybe a glass of wine or maybe a pint of ale. I've made a few bad choices. So I don't heavily drink to the point I blackout" he said and lead them to the Drunken Kray. It was one of the few places where they could get some food as well. Especially the warrior woman since it looked like she needed something to recover. He found a comfortable place for the three of them to sit down at and made an order for some food and some drinks.

"So tell me your story, like what you were doing before you were summoned here. It might help me out to try and give you some advice. And get a better understanding of you" Kail asked Ísenwulfa. As right now, he was not sure on how to help this woman. It was always a challenge to help the newly fated that came into this world.

[Ruby Lidenbrooke]

"Pbbbbbt" Ruby blew a razzberry when the male said something about not drinking too much. "I know how much i can and can't drink." She was only half lying. "I'm not...too bad. Until this one," she gestures towards Isenwulfa, "showed up, and now you're buying me drinks. Now come onnnnn! Let's get!"

She looked over at Isenwulfa and couldn't help but notice the sunken features. Boy was she not eating well.
She reached over and grabbed Isen's clothing and began tugging. "Let's go get you something to eat. And to get my drinks!" She was pretty stoked to be able to pound some mead and maybe force feed this giant a sausage.

Having finally made it to the tavern, Ruby practically pushed Isen to whatever table with Kail and climbed herself up onto the seat, her feet kicking out under the table. She was so small, just her head and shoulders would be seen sticking up over the table.

[Deleted]

The child seemed desperate for alcohol, which indicated an even bigger problem than Ísenwulfa had initially anticipated. She wondered why Kail would be feeding the addiction and, inevitably, came to the conclusion that he, or others like him, were getting the poor girl drunk and taking advantage of her. Ísenwulfa's grip on her axe tightened and she turned dead eyes on Kail, pondering how she would rescue the child. She decided she would need to catch him in the act in order to justify his death,and resolved to stay close to the girl.

As Kail explained that he didn't drink much on account of being a stupid drunk, the child began tugging on Ísenwulfa's mail in her eagerness for alcohol. Feeling sympathetic for the girl but unsure how to comfort or deal with her, Ísenwulfa awkwardly patted the child on the head and gently pried her hand from her mail. Then nodding politely at Kail, she said,

"A moment, please."

With long, efficient strides, Ísenwulfa quickly returned to the top of the platform, picked up her bundle of belongings and returned, indicating that Kail should lead the way. She followed the two to the tavern - what was a Kray anyway? - and left her axe and shield outside the door, but kept her sword, helmet and bundle with her. The axe and shield were not truly tempting targets, but the others were. Manners only went so far.

Inside, she sat down at the table with Kail and the girl and, when Kail ordered, told him she didn't​ want much food and only water to drink, but didn't press on the issue of the child being given unwatered alcohol. It was a risk to the girl, but the risk was the only way she could ultimately protect the child, so she took it without hesitation. When Kail asked about what she had done before being chosen by the god Fate, Ísenwulfa rubbed a thumb across the gold and silver inlay at the top of her sword, fixed emotionless eyes on Kail and spoke without any feeling.

"I am a thrall of Earl Hildelíþ, but she graciously allows me to fight with her Silver-Shields. I lead a wedge in combat and am the first up the ladders in an assault. I lead the war song, bless those who fight with me and sing the death songs for those who did."

[Deleted]

Kail understood with Ísenwulfa's request and was not going to push it either, since it seemed that his genorosity was a bit too much for this woman. He had to laugh a bit at Ruby and her antics and it made the blond realise that he was in a fantasy world then his own. He had gotten use to this place that somethings were just normal to him. A few things now made sense to him with there shortist member in there small group here. More then likely she was a halfling or maybe a hobbit, although it was the later. But that was out of his mind, when Ísenwulfa started to speak. She was using several terms that he was not even use to. So the blond was trying to prosess everything this warrior woman had said to him. "Forgive me Ísenwulfa,
a lot of your words that you used are things I normally don't hear being used. But the jist that I could understand though,
is this. Your a leader of a vanguard unit for your lord or master. As well as priestess or something akin to that, for war.
If I got any of this wrong, again I appologise" said the blond and thought of what Ísenwulfa could do now while in Nova.

"Anyway Ísenwulfa, if your looking for something to do with your life while here in Teair Nova. You could go to the kingdom of Nova and join there guard. There always looking for good warriors for there military. I don't know if they fully recovered from that event a year ago with that massive undead attack" said the blond as he reflect that major event in his life. It was one of the major events in his life while in Teair Nova. "And what about you miss?
Do you need any guidance or anything" he said to Ruby as he wanted to keep the halfling in the conversation.

[Ruby Lidenbrooke]

Ruby sat on her chair, swinging her little child-sized legs under the table and more or less spacing out, waiting for her chance to order her drinks. She heard what was said but none of it really....stuck. But of course her attention wasn't on the conversation between the two adults, but rather flagging down someone to place her orders, being *sure* to tell her repeatedly that the blonde man was paying for her. Eventually her drink was brought around and she picked up the "massive" cup in both hands and took a long chug before turning her focus to the others.

She caught the tail end of Kail's bit and then his question directed at her.
"Uhhh...." she paused for a moment as she felt like she had a burp brewing,but continued as it turned out to be false, "Not...really?" She sounded as confused as you'd assume, "I...I don't really have any goals when it comes to things. I just kinda stumble into things and go from there. I like to think I'm finding this whole world changing event to be pretty easy."

Honestly, this wasn't her first rodeo when it comes to finding yourself in a new world or plane of existence. It's something she has done a few times, most of them being unwillingly.

[Deleted]

"Forgive me Ísenwulfa, a lot of your words that you used are things I normally don't hear being used. But the jist that I could understand though, is this. Your a leader of a vanguard unit for your lord or master. As well as priestess or something akin to that, for war. If I got any of this wrong, again I appologise"

Ísenwulfa shook her head, firmly, once. Apparently, even though she could speak this strange language, some of her use of the language was still foreign to Kail. She couldn't tell if the girl was confused or had understood it all, because she seemed distracted. That seemed pretty typical of what she knew of children. She'd always thought they'd had short attention spans.

"I do not lead. Thralls - slaves, I think you might say - do not command. I am merely at the point of the wedge or am the first up the ladder. And I am no priestess. Men just think I am blessed by the gods."

"Anyway Ísenwulfa, if your looking for something to do with your life while here in Teair Nova. You could go to the kingdom of Nova and join there guard. There always looking for good warriors for there military. I don't know if they fully recovered from that event a year ago with that massive undead attack"

The mask shattered and Ísenwulfa, for a full three seconds, looked a combination of shocked and horrified. She even recoiled slightly from Kail. Serve another lord? Betray the Earl? Betray the woman who had saved her life and given her a chance to reclaim her honour? How could anyone suggest such a horrible thing? It would be an enormous betrayal of her lord's trust and would destroy what little honour Ísenwulfa had left.

Then, after the three seconds had passed, Ísenwulfa's face blanked again, but her voice held the faintest edge of ice and danger.

"No. I will not betray my lord!"