(1874-08-06) Qatunax Prisoners
Qatunax Prisoners
Summary: The Raging Bulls bring in two Qatunax Prisoners.
Date: 6th August 2018
Related: Qatunax Stories
NPCs: Corporal Orosius of the Raging Bulls
Players:
Imogen  Lillian  Susanna  Ludovic  

The Great Hall, Daemon's Hall, Hellsmouth
Room Description
1874 Aout 6

There is a bit of a commotion outside the main hall, with the sound of footsteps rapidly increasing. At first there is a bit of an uproar, and then, a few moments later, the sound of laughing.

She would feel bad for susanna, in fact there'll probably be alot of apologising for this all later. But right now Dovi's being kind to her maid while being harsh with her, and how is she SUPPOSED to take that? "And i told you i was sorry, yet you were still distant and cold to me no matter what i did to try and make things right," she snaps, but then there's the sound of laughing and it's distracted her from her argument as she looks over at it cautiously.

An uproar? Ludovic turns his attention that was as well. His frown deepening as the sound continues before relaxing a little as it changes to laughter. "This I have to see." He says, breaking Imogen's grip on his forearm to grab her hand and drag them both along towards the sound.

Susanna lets herself be dragged. She's as curious as anyone, if a little apprehensive.

In the main hall are a section of Galenthians - at least that is what they are now. They wear good armour, brigandine vests, pauldrons and greaves with strong helmets and teardrop shaped shields slung over their backs. They're armed in the usual manner of men at arms, with swords or axes or both. Their armour is partially covered by sleeveless grey coloured tabards, with a blue bull charging. Soldiers of the Raging Bull Company, the mercenary force from Galenthia (though most are of Kentairish origin) that has been contracted by Ludovic.

One of them, wearing some kind of insignia that indicates he has a rank of sort, has in his hand a length of iron chain connected to a pair of unfortunate individuals in Qatunax garb. They're filthy, and slightly wounded, but it's clear that neither of them are of actual Qatunax origin. Instead, they look local. So. Turncoats. The man holding the chain laughs. Ludovic's soldiers are laughing too.

Imogen looks as though she might actually rip her hand from dovi when he first grabs it, but she ends up deciding she can live with it, as long as they're holding hands he's not running off. She's not exactly suprised at the sight, qutanux captives aren't new, but maybe these still have their tongues. "Can they talk?" she asks, no hi, how are you, straight to buisiness with her.

And this, this, immediately has the effect of buoying up Ludovic's mood. He grins and moves around to where he can get a good look at the scene presented before him "I'd heard word of locals in the field but this is the first time I've had such proof!" He releases Imogen's hand so that he can go over and give each of the captors a friendly, but somewhat over-exuberant, smack on the shoulder. "You'll be rewarded well for this my friends!"

The sound of commotion from the hall drew Lillian from the workroom which had been appointed for her, a place to prepare her medicament in a place where she could be uninterrupted. Until there was an interruption, and from the sound of it, a right mess of one. Quick eyes as she stepped out of the room, allowing the door to close behind her as she headed for the source of the noise. Oh, laughter…and yet, it doesn't sound at all jolly.

Many things at once! For one thing, Susanna is surprised and not exactly delighted to see what appears to be an army in the front hall of the place she now calls home. For another, she isn't exactly certaian what they're laughing about. Her attention quickly finds the captives, of course, who stick out like sore thumbs among it all, and of course she can't help but feel a measure of pity. And then someone else arrives, drawing her gaze away—Lillian! A wash of relief as Susanna makes sure to catch her eye and usher her near with as inviting an expression as she can muster through her discomfort.

"Killed a bunch of them." The man who speaks up is the same as he who is holding the chains, which he dully hands off to one of the other men. He's got a thick Kentairish accent stemming from the fact that Imperial is obviously his mother tongue, but he's still very easily understood. "Corporal Orosius. Yeah. They gots a bunch of locals, we see more and more of them. Think they can talk."

Out of the two of the prisoners, one looks more dejected and the other more defiant. The defiant looks up at Ludovic and sneers. "Fuck you and your false God, steel insect. We'll roast you alive." And then he bites down hard, so hard in fact that blood spurts from his mouth. He spits the majority of his tongue out at Ludovic, and the spray of blood coats his neck and face.

Orosius shrugs, before giving the now tongue-less captive a swift kick in the kidneys that causes him to double over. "Guess the one only can talk now." He laughs harshly, and draws a dagger out. "Want me to kill him right here? Or you do it in front of the town, maybe? Slow?"

The accent of the now tongue-less man was decidedly local, and more cultivated than most commoners. Perhaps he was of better origin, a burgher of some sort.

Imogen watches wide eyed as one of the captives bites of their own one-damned tongue. Well that's not going to get them any information. She ignores the commander and kneels down next to the dejected one with a small smile. "hey, i know these men scare you, but you can talk to me alright? I won't let them hurt you," she whispers softly. "Are you in agreement with your friend? Or did you turn because you had to, because they would have killed you otherwise?" she asks, it's a sudden and rather suprising change, but the countess is shockingly gentle when she wants to be.

Ludovic rubs a hand over his beard as he contemplates the question. He grimaces at what he decides and then says "We'll make a spectacle of it. Let the people get a tiny measure of revenge for what happened." His gaze turns to the more dejected one then. Waiting.

Susanna gasps almost inaudibly, looking at the now tongueless man in horror as realization seems to spread through her body, fingers shaking slightly. They would have tortured him for information, and now they can't. But as for the other… Susanna suddenly feels sick, like a cold sort hatred, resignation, and betrayal rolled up into a mound in her gut. It's disgust, is what it is. All of it's disgusting. The army, the Hall, the world—disgusting and irredeemable.

"Wha' happened ta his mouth?" a little voice asks beside her, and Susanna nearly has a heart attack realizing Violet is right beside her. "Violet, this ent th' place fa ya righ' now," she hisses. "Bu' th' whole army's here!" "An' you ent no soldier, are ya?" Violet gives Susanna an angry pout.

Lillian moved swiftly towards the sound of the commotion, the source of that mirthless laugher coming into sharp focus. Just in time, as it happened, to see the first of the prisoners spit out his tongue, and to hear Ludovic's command. Whatever gentleness was in the woman, more to the fore was the knight she had been at Fort Benide, when she had fought and won her spurs. And that woman was far and away less kind than the healer she had become. "Hold him still," her tone was hard, looking to the mend still keeping the man captive, "Knock him unconscious if you have to." She was already reaching for her bag of supplies. She spared the small girl a look, "Violet Blue, go, up to the study, now. No arguments."

The one who's still got a tongue looks up at Imogen, his eyes suddenly angry. But not like his friend. "No. They are better than we were. Their ways are better than our ways. We are weak. Our God is weak. They destroyed the greatest Empire in the world. And we joined them. We did good service and joined." He sniffs harshly, a sort of laugh, maybe. "We joined them." He repeats. "We conquered. We'll take this place. We don't have any limits."

Corporal Orosius sheaths his dagger and shrugs, crossing his arms. "Alright. We'll give you him, then, do what you want, right?"

The tongue-less one recovers a bit and sits up. He spits more blood now, mostly at Ludovic. One of the Raging Bull soldiers steps forward and cracks him in the jaw with a strong punch, which puts him down on the ground again. He yells at him in Imperial, "You stupid scum, stay down or we'll cut your balls off and stick them in your mouth!"

This gets a disapproving look from Orosius, who shakes his head and tells him in Imperial to, 'control himself.' Orosius turns back to Ludovic. "And this one? What 'bout him?" He says to Lillian, "Guess he's holding still now, lady." The soldier who cracked tongue-less wonder nods, saying in an even thicker accent to Lillian, "Why heal him? He going to get killt."

Well she tried, she was going to go the reasonable route but it's clear this one doesn't need a gentle touch, he probably needs the opposite. So she stands and frees up her attention to focus on violet with narrowed eyes. "Susanna, i don't care if you pass her off to a servant or take her yourself, but get that child out of here, this is no place for her, not now," she states in a no nonsense tone before going to stand with dovi and listen to his side of the conversation.

"Questioning." Ludovic says about that. "All those things he mentioned - we'd like to know about them." He shifts to look down at the talkative captive. "Why dont you tell us all about your God eh?" He makes no effort to interfere with the treatment of the man thats bleeding out from his act of self-mutilation. In fact he's not even looking that way.

Lillian takes a knee, her face showing no expression at all, as one of the men took care of the problem of spitting and fighting that she would have otherwise. She withdraws a small bundle of bloodmoss and a parchment envelope of powder from her bag, as well as a slender bit of wood, which she used to pry open the now unconscious man's mouth. With the man's mouth held open, she began working on stopping the bleeding, the moss pushed in against the remaining bit of his tongue, the powder sprinkled on afterwards. "I am not healing him."

"Bu' I wanna help—" Violet says, eager to see Lillian, and then the terrible sound the bloody captive's jaw makes as he's beaten down startles her into a proper scare. "This look like a fun time ta ya?" Susanna tells Violet sternly, who shakes her head. "Go." Violet goes.

Susanna turns back to Imogen, curtsies with a, "Taken care of, Yer Excellence," and then asks Lillian, "…What are ya doin', then?"

"Which God? The Sun? The Sun comes up every day, you know him. Without him, no food. No slaves. Death? You know him too." The captive laughs, though it's not harsh, but rather resigned to his fate. "War? We brought him to you. And with Death. Summer and Winter Moon. Why, you want to come to our side? They'll make you a warrior, a noble. Not a Malki, the King, that's a God, but noble's almost a God. You can be a God." The man raises his chained hands to Ludovic. "Let me free and I'll bring you to the nobles. Tavat, I hear he likes you."

The Raging Bull soldiers watch Lillian with half interest, though the one who knocked out tongue-less wonder seems ready to kill the man if he wakes up and starts acting out. He echoes Susanna with, "What you are doing, then?" Fortunately, tongue-less doesn't wake. Corporal Orosius looks at Ludovic squarely. "A reward for this, I hope? Not coming here out of good will. Well, a bit."

Lillian moved swiftly, as she always did when she was on the battefield, which, like or no, this hall had become, after a fashion. Having done what she can for the man, and after packing some bandages into his mouth to absorb whateve blood might still be pooling there, she looked first, to Susanna and then to the soldiers, "I am doing what I can to ensure that he is fit to have the Viscount's justice rendered onto him."

Imogen lays a hand against ludovics arm, if he's paying attention he can feel the slight tremor in it, it's not the blood, or the shouting, or tongueless wonder who's got her concerned though, it's the talking one. Still as much as she disagrees with the savage and wants to put him in his place, she knows dovi is more experienced with the savages than her and lets him respond to the mans rambling.

Ludovic frowns at what the captive says about their Gods. "Tavat?" He struggles to place that name before realising. "The champion? With the Axe and Dagger?" He struggles to manage the rest of the words "Tavat Erakakoo sal Dovin was a name? Huh." First thing learned. Imogen's hand gets a distracted pat. "What about this empire they destroyed?"

Ludovic gives a single nod of thanks to Lillian and then looks to the Raging Bulls. "A Promise is a promise Orosius." He waves for one of the servants to come forward. "Put aside fifty crowns for Orosius and his men."

Listening to the captive's talk of his gods is an almost surreal experience while watching Lillian stem off his comrade's bloodflow. Her face is pale and her eyes drift out of focus before snapping to Lillian again, trying to find an anchor.

Lillian rose to her feet, using a clean bit of cloth to wipe her hands. It did little to remove the stain of blood, and certainly even less was likely to save her the apron she wore over her dress, but she did rise, catching the glance Susanna sent in her direction and moving to step around the gathered mass to settle beside the other woman, attempting to place a hand on her arm.

The soldier who'd been kneeling with Lillian gets up, smiling crookedly. That's probably just the way he smiles; there's no malice in it. "Ah! You, I like!" He exclaims. Once they hear that fifty crowns will be put aside for the little band, the mercenaries don't whoop, but they all smile. Corporal Orosius bows his head. "Thank you, sir." When there's money involved, they can be professional.

The conscious captive shrugs. "What? You know them. The same ones who hold Paras now. They'll die, too. They will kill many of us, but we will keep coming over. The High Malku has willed it. More are coming. Lots of ones born under the Empire. They joined, too. I saw the capital. Rubble. Ruins. Greatest city in the world, made this look like the pile of shit that it is. Burnt to the ground. Everyone sacrificed for the glory of the Gods. Each one of you we kill, flay alive, cut heart out or pull their guts out, we gain more power. More blood. Blood is the food of the Gods."

"Is that the name of the man who gave you the axe dovi?" she asks when he speaks the name of the savage, indulging in a small smile at the touch. Sh knows he's distracted but she still appreciates the effort. "So the savages actually have a culture…co.lor me suprised, maybe there's more to this than i thought," she muses with a shrug, her eyes still on the rambler.

Ludovic thought that much would be enough to gain smiles from even such mercenary types and he smiles in turn when he sees there response. "The least I could do Corporal. You and your men have been much appreciated here during the last few months." To Imogen he says "Maybe. He said a bunch of things. That stuck out though." To the captive Ludovic asks. "And what happens for each one of you WE kill?"

Susanna's stomach tightens as the captive speaks again. She doesn't know why, but her voice comes out easily with the terrible mood she's found herelf in: "Does your blood feed them as well?" She stares at the captive, her gaze mournful. "Do you kill us so you do not have to kill yourselves?"

Lillian had done what was needed and no more, and now, she left discussion to the other three in the room. These were not her lands and it was not her place, having no more place in the household than what Ludovic allowed her. But she remained, off to Susanna's side, watching the still conscious captive, ready if she should be needed again.

The captive shakes his head. "Nothing, but our souls go to feed the war machines of the Sun, and War, and Death, depending who we are devoted to. I like War." He motions to his unconscious comrade. "He liked Death." The captive says, "We won't stop. They told me that the mountain peoples will be coming. We'll probably fight them at first. That's the way. And then we'll join and fight you."

Corporal Orosius just nods. He and the Raging Bulls remain in place, holding the chains in case the captives try to do anything stupid, but they've taken the route of passive observers as well.

"Take him to the dungeon." Ludovic says to one of his own men. "Make sure he gets some food and water and we'll take this up again in the morning." he looks to someone else. "Send moongazers out to Xavier, Darius and Cervantes asking for a meeting." He looks to the rest of the raging bulls then. "You're welcome to take advantage of my hospitality tonight."

Imogen sighs quietly as things seem to be winding down, she's not moving from dovi's side though. But this clinging seems less fear induced and more. 'I'm just gonna be here till you give in and agree to talk to me'. "Susanna, go check on your siblings and get some rest," she offers quietly to the poor, nearly fainted girl.

As Ludovic gives his orders, Lillian offered a final pat to Susanna's arm, stepping up to join the mercenaries, "I will accompany both prisoners and ensure that they remain capable of seeing the morning." There was no telling what the second man might attempt to do." Before she moved, she looked towards Ludovic to ensure that she had his permission to go with the men down to the dungeon.

Susanna is weak at the knees, her hands balled into fists. She doesn't seem to have heard anything the others have said, just the captive and his promise of war. Promise. Of war. "Yer souls will all be dragged down inta Eternal Cold an' ya will suffer, suffer forever fa wha' you'll do! Whether it be in battle or of old age, ya will all die one day and ya'll know it by the chains that burn ya flesh!" She's never been seen this angry before, shaking, eyes alight with rage.

The two prisoners are handed off with gladness by the Raging Bulls; and a night in town on the Viscount's dime? A treat. The Corporal dips his head. "Hail to you and thank you. They'll be on best behaviour." He glances over to Susanna, eyebrows arched, but the Kentarish-cum-Galenthian mercenary has the tact to not say anything.

The captive laughs as he's dragged away, laughing at Susanna. "Actions speak louder than words, Galenthian insect! We're on the wax and you're on the wane!" They disappear as the guards take them out.

Ludovic also glances over to Susanna with mild surprise. "I'd no idea you'd lost anyone Susanna."

Imogen just stares at her handmaid, what is she /supposed/ to say to such a declaration after all? She just opts to be silent and watch from where she stands.

Ludovic gives Lillian a nod of permission. Imogen he tells "Give me a few minutes Imogen."

Imogen looks at him a long moment when he asks for a few minutes, but she knows it's probably got to do with this….situation. "I need to speak with you after, but of course, do what you need to do, i'll get susanna back to her room," she murmurs in reply before heading over to susanna and attempting to wrap an arm around her to guide the woman away.

Susanna looks up at Ludovic as if noticing his presence for the first time in a while. "N-na ta th' Qatunax," she says, still shaking. She squeezes her eyes shut and presses her fingers over them. "I don'…I don' wanna lose no more." Full out war, here at Hellsmouth. She'd thought she'd escaped that. She'd thought her sisters were going to be safe. But there's no escaping War, is there? Not really. War is always there, returning every chance he gets. Her shaking has worsened by the time Imogen goes to try and collect her.

Ludovic nods at what Susanna says. "I've got to write letters and sort out some things but we can talk /briefly/ before I sleep Imogen." To Susanna he says "I'm sorry you've faced losses. We've all had to face that here in the last years." A shake of his head and he turns to one of the servants. "I need you for a few minutes please." And the pair head off towards the war-room or study.

Imogen nods tiredly at what dovi says, honestly she doesn't have much energy for a long talk, all the arguing and fighting, plus now this, has drained her, she just wraps her arms around susanna and takes her away to her room to get settled in for the night.

Susanna speechlessly lets Imogen do so, too distracted by dread to say goodnight before retreating into her room. Nightmares soon accompany her sleep, or at least the little she manages tonight.

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