Stormsheppard.(A Dragonstorm Short Fic)
Posted: 2005-12-07 06:31pm
"Wake up! You must wake up! A Dragonstorm comes!" "He's not moving!" "Grab his ears! I'll get his legs!"
And so began another joyful and rewarding day as this podunk village's shaman. The apprenticeship the old lady gave me on how to talk to the dead really didn't turn out to be worth the price, I suspect; now, whenever I'm not busy, I have to come back here and babysit the farmers and miners and their extended, dead, families. "What time is it..."
"An hour to dawn! We let you sleep as long as we could! The storm is coming! IT'LL EAT US ALL!" The horde of ghosts clamoured at once. A momentary spell to shift the rest of my senses into the spirit realm confirmed it; in the far distance, through the hazy, indistinct form of the house I was in, there was the unmistakable pull and tear of a Warp Storm ripping through the ream of the dead. It would be there in the living realm, and by my guess, a few hours away. Perhaps hitting around noon.
Which, sadly, meant the ghosts were right. I couldn't sleep any longer. There was too much work to be done. I threw on the least-obnoxious ceremonial robes I had(Long story. Shamans, as a rule, have no 'uniform', but wizards do. My cover story the past few years has been that I'm a wizard, so my 'uniform' for being the official shaman is wizard robes. At least they haven't tried to knit me another set...), and stalked out to try and find what passed for the brains of the local outfit, banging on doors and yelling at half-asleep people to start battening down the hatches and getting livestock in.
I suppose being a Shaman has a few perks. People listen when you scream incoherently at five AM. What passed for the town guard was assembled and clad in their beaten-metal armour and fine array of blunt objects and farm utensils. It was nearing noon, but the light wasn't any brighter as the farm animals were forced into buildings made for these things. The sky was a tainted, sickly shade of purple, and the storm itself could be seen careening down from the northern valley, to where it opened into plains. Right where this village was.
"Alright, everyone, listen to me. We've done this before, but we'll do it again. You seen any strangers loitering near the storm, you grab 'em, you knock 'em out real gentle, you drag them here. You see any kind of monsters, critters, whatever, you run and get me. No heros. Heros get killed. Guardsmen go home to their families. Go, let's get the job done." The ragged salute was enough; these were conscripted farmers who had once or twice beaten off a giant squirrel, or fought enough in barfights to prove their worth. They were shitty fighters and worse guards, but they were what I had.
Ask any peasant or farmer the worst part of a Dragonstorm and he'll tell you the terrible monsters it spits out: Madspawn from people it grabs, tainted beasts from livestock, and of course, the hellish Shapeshifters, awakened by the foul dragon-magic in the heart of these things. I knew what I feared worst about these storms: The Necromancer apprentices who follow'd them, snatched up the shapechangers for the diluted dragon's blood that ran in their veins. Why?
I'm a shapeshifter, of course. Pretty close to pure lineage, too; I transform into a dragon, not a pegasus or gargoyle. What's that? The Necro in your village told you dragons make the Storms, and send them to kill everyone else for some ancient insult? The Necro told you that we're evil, scheming monsters? Well, okay, the 'scheming' bit is probably true. But the rest? Eh, when has a Necromancer ever told the truth? You'll learn, kid, you'll learn.
As the storm bore down, all seemed to be going right for once. No monsters driven ahead of the storm, nor idiots in hooded robes thinking it'll be the best disguise ever! skulking around my town. The guard met up as trained with only one reported missing due to cider(Which are least confirmed he was indoors), and were sent to their families. To me fell the unhappy task of weathering the storm while holding watch. It fell to me, for I was the only person able to shield myself from it's body-and-soul twisting effects. Even the ghosts and apparitions had gone inside; a desperate attempt to avoid the storm's sucking hole in the Other Realm.
With the last window bolted, I knew what had to happen. Unlike the three 'conventional' paths of magic.. Power from the Earth Mother, Elethay, in the form of witchcraft, power from the realm of the dead, in the form of shamanism, and power from the elements themselves, in the form of wizardy, something darker was needed to affect such a huge, unnatural rent in the natural order. It required, in fact, the power of the lying bastards themselves.
See, here's something the Necromancers don't tell anyone. Their power, rather ironically, comes from those shapeshifters they've been telling you are so bad. S'why anyone who manages to bag one lives like a prince the rest of his life off the spoils; they'll pay through the nose.. Well, if they can't get away with just taking it. Lovely little circle of fucked-upness: Storm awakens shapeshifter, necros bag shifter, drain shifter of soul for necromancy.. and then use variations of the trick I'm about to use.
What's that? Did I drain a shifter? Fuck no! I'm no shiny good guy, but I'm not that fucked up. I just use my own blood. It feels kind of like bits of me are on fire(Technically, they are), but vaporizing some of my own energies from my bastard-ancestor empowers the necromancy. But the effect is well worth it; by tainting parts of my own energies temporarily, I can seize the storm and.. Yes.. Shove it aside.
And that, my lad, is how it always goes. Except this time.
Don't look so surprised. The universe hates me. I once ran into a Madspawn whose cock had been mutated into a thing that fired spikes and corrosive goo. It bukkake'd death, lad. Compared to that, this was merely going to be life-threatening, not disgusting.
A familiar woman, Warp-Elf by species, walked through the deserted village. She carried what a more stupid individual would think was a walking stick. Even at a distance, even with the Dragonstorm threatening to overwhelm my sense of it, she stank of Warp energies. Her very body exuded them; she, like all of her breed of elf, had been tainted by the Storms and the Tox. Batwings, worn like a cloak, wrapped around her body. But worse, she was chanting words similar to mine, holding a crystal. It was glowing, but dimmed somewhat as she did so.
"Why... Hello, little one. It's been so long since I've seen you, but I've heard so much about you. But I'm afraid, even after disposing of my little sister and my old teacher, you're... Out of usefulness."
The storm was reversing direction, bearing down on the village. And the Necro-Bitch lunged at me, spells at her fingertips.
I told you, the universe hates me.
(More will follow if folks liked it.)
And so began another joyful and rewarding day as this podunk village's shaman. The apprenticeship the old lady gave me on how to talk to the dead really didn't turn out to be worth the price, I suspect; now, whenever I'm not busy, I have to come back here and babysit the farmers and miners and their extended, dead, families. "What time is it..."
"An hour to dawn! We let you sleep as long as we could! The storm is coming! IT'LL EAT US ALL!" The horde of ghosts clamoured at once. A momentary spell to shift the rest of my senses into the spirit realm confirmed it; in the far distance, through the hazy, indistinct form of the house I was in, there was the unmistakable pull and tear of a Warp Storm ripping through the ream of the dead. It would be there in the living realm, and by my guess, a few hours away. Perhaps hitting around noon.
Which, sadly, meant the ghosts were right. I couldn't sleep any longer. There was too much work to be done. I threw on the least-obnoxious ceremonial robes I had(Long story. Shamans, as a rule, have no 'uniform', but wizards do. My cover story the past few years has been that I'm a wizard, so my 'uniform' for being the official shaman is wizard robes. At least they haven't tried to knit me another set...), and stalked out to try and find what passed for the brains of the local outfit, banging on doors and yelling at half-asleep people to start battening down the hatches and getting livestock in.
I suppose being a Shaman has a few perks. People listen when you scream incoherently at five AM. What passed for the town guard was assembled and clad in their beaten-metal armour and fine array of blunt objects and farm utensils. It was nearing noon, but the light wasn't any brighter as the farm animals were forced into buildings made for these things. The sky was a tainted, sickly shade of purple, and the storm itself could be seen careening down from the northern valley, to where it opened into plains. Right where this village was.
"Alright, everyone, listen to me. We've done this before, but we'll do it again. You seen any strangers loitering near the storm, you grab 'em, you knock 'em out real gentle, you drag them here. You see any kind of monsters, critters, whatever, you run and get me. No heros. Heros get killed. Guardsmen go home to their families. Go, let's get the job done." The ragged salute was enough; these were conscripted farmers who had once or twice beaten off a giant squirrel, or fought enough in barfights to prove their worth. They were shitty fighters and worse guards, but they were what I had.
Ask any peasant or farmer the worst part of a Dragonstorm and he'll tell you the terrible monsters it spits out: Madspawn from people it grabs, tainted beasts from livestock, and of course, the hellish Shapeshifters, awakened by the foul dragon-magic in the heart of these things. I knew what I feared worst about these storms: The Necromancer apprentices who follow'd them, snatched up the shapechangers for the diluted dragon's blood that ran in their veins. Why?
I'm a shapeshifter, of course. Pretty close to pure lineage, too; I transform into a dragon, not a pegasus or gargoyle. What's that? The Necro in your village told you dragons make the Storms, and send them to kill everyone else for some ancient insult? The Necro told you that we're evil, scheming monsters? Well, okay, the 'scheming' bit is probably true. But the rest? Eh, when has a Necromancer ever told the truth? You'll learn, kid, you'll learn.
As the storm bore down, all seemed to be going right for once. No monsters driven ahead of the storm, nor idiots in hooded robes thinking it'll be the best disguise ever! skulking around my town. The guard met up as trained with only one reported missing due to cider(Which are least confirmed he was indoors), and were sent to their families. To me fell the unhappy task of weathering the storm while holding watch. It fell to me, for I was the only person able to shield myself from it's body-and-soul twisting effects. Even the ghosts and apparitions had gone inside; a desperate attempt to avoid the storm's sucking hole in the Other Realm.
With the last window bolted, I knew what had to happen. Unlike the three 'conventional' paths of magic.. Power from the Earth Mother, Elethay, in the form of witchcraft, power from the realm of the dead, in the form of shamanism, and power from the elements themselves, in the form of wizardy, something darker was needed to affect such a huge, unnatural rent in the natural order. It required, in fact, the power of the lying bastards themselves.
See, here's something the Necromancers don't tell anyone. Their power, rather ironically, comes from those shapeshifters they've been telling you are so bad. S'why anyone who manages to bag one lives like a prince the rest of his life off the spoils; they'll pay through the nose.. Well, if they can't get away with just taking it. Lovely little circle of fucked-upness: Storm awakens shapeshifter, necros bag shifter, drain shifter of soul for necromancy.. and then use variations of the trick I'm about to use.
What's that? Did I drain a shifter? Fuck no! I'm no shiny good guy, but I'm not that fucked up. I just use my own blood. It feels kind of like bits of me are on fire(Technically, they are), but vaporizing some of my own energies from my bastard-ancestor empowers the necromancy. But the effect is well worth it; by tainting parts of my own energies temporarily, I can seize the storm and.. Yes.. Shove it aside.
And that, my lad, is how it always goes. Except this time.
Don't look so surprised. The universe hates me. I once ran into a Madspawn whose cock had been mutated into a thing that fired spikes and corrosive goo. It bukkake'd death, lad. Compared to that, this was merely going to be life-threatening, not disgusting.
A familiar woman, Warp-Elf by species, walked through the deserted village. She carried what a more stupid individual would think was a walking stick. Even at a distance, even with the Dragonstorm threatening to overwhelm my sense of it, she stank of Warp energies. Her very body exuded them; she, like all of her breed of elf, had been tainted by the Storms and the Tox. Batwings, worn like a cloak, wrapped around her body. But worse, she was chanting words similar to mine, holding a crystal. It was glowing, but dimmed somewhat as she did so.
"Why... Hello, little one. It's been so long since I've seen you, but I've heard so much about you. But I'm afraid, even after disposing of my little sister and my old teacher, you're... Out of usefulness."
The storm was reversing direction, bearing down on the village. And the Necro-Bitch lunged at me, spells at her fingertips.
I told you, the universe hates me.
(More will follow if folks liked it.)
