((This is a brief (okay, well, not so brief) intro into my character. Anyone who wishes may join in on this, and if there's enough interest,m I'll get around to starting an actual folder. I'm just looking for interesting, decent roleplayers to make a story to follow wherever it may lead.))
He pauses by a tree to regain his breath, a tall, old tree with thick branches and lush green foliage. Could it be too much to hope for that he's lost them this time? He straightens and looks around, but sees nothing. Still, he's not so easily fooled...closing his eyes, he waits for the thunder of his pulse to die away, his breathing to ease, and uses his animal senses to get a better read on the forest around him.
Just as he thought, they were still there. Six of them, all armed with crossbows and swords and knives...hoping, no doubt, to cash in on the bounty. Damn that slave girl for not telling him who she'd been on the run from! He'd assumed that she had some cruel, lowly master from the way she'd described him. On the first count he'd been right - he was cruel enough. But the overseer of the small kingdom he'd been in when he found her, he hadn't expected. He'd spent months getting her out of his reach, without ever knowing who she'd belonged to or why she was so coveted by him. He should have gone on the ship with her, but that this was his home, and he'd been loath to leave it. Still was, to tell the truth, despite the last year dodging hunters or leaving their bodies lying for the next party to find. If not for the fact that he was nearly immortal, he'd have gotten tired and given up well before now.
And now he was getting tired of running from this party. They should have given up the chase a week ago. The money must be getting good.
Opening his eyes, he looks around carefully. Still none in sight. Well, then, he thinks, let's turn the tables.
He looks up and judges the distance, then leaps for the lowest branch overhead, reaching it easily and pulling himself up. There is ample foliage here to hide himself, he notes, from even a careful observer, and he settles in to wait.
Sure enough, a short time later, they walk beneath him - still six of them, walking in a loose group. Morons, he thinks - the fact that you're so close together will be your last mistake. As they pass, he drops from the branch he's on, right onto the back of the last hunter, landing with both feet on his shoulders and knocking him forward, face-first into a rock. There is a satisfying crunch as his nasal cavities are driven into his brain from the force of the impact. One down.
The other five are surprised, and despite their quickness to recover - which he again notes with no small measure of respect - he is still much faster. He's been doing this for much longer than they, after all. Without pause, he lands and crouches, the springs for the nearest one in a single fluid motion, hands reach for the hunter's head and twisting cruelly. There is a sicking crackling of the neck bones breaking easily, and the man goes limp, dropping the crossbow. Lupinius reaches down and grabs it even as the man falls, bringing it to bear on the next in line and firing. His aim is flawless - the bolt springs from the crossbow and sinks into the forehead of the hunter even as he brings his own to aim at him. The man is thrown back from the force of the impact into the next one, making him stumble and accidentally fire his own crossbow.
The other two by this time have got their aim and fire nearly simultaneously. Both bolts speed toward Lupinius, and he twists out of the way - not fast enough. One misses, but the other strikes him in the chest, just missing his heart by inches. The pain isn't even registered by him as he draws his sword - a long, double-edged, sleek weapon of beauty, gleaming in the dull light filtered through the trees and looking sharp enough to hew the electrons from an atom. He charges the first one, slicing up and across. The man screams as the sword opens him from his groin to his throat, slicing through skin and muscle with barely a tug to mark its passing.
The second drops his own crossbow and reaches for his own sword - too late. Lupinius has been a master of this craft for too long, and in a single smooth motion, he whirls around from the slash to the first one and brings his sword around and up. There is a whistling sound as the blade parts the air, followed by a juicier sound as it passes through the man's neck and slices his head cleanly off. It falls to the ground with a meaty thud and rolls away, and a long, colorful streak of blood splashes the ground and nearby tree as it gouts from the man's neck. His body remains standing for a moment, unaware of its own death, before falling limply to the forest floor.
Lupinius turns to the sixth, and final, hunter, who by now has dropped his useless crossbow and drawn his own sword. Despite the fear in his eyes, he has it raised and now, seeing Lupinius turn his attention to him, charges. Lupinius swings an open hand at the man, and from the amulet at his neck there is a flash of brilliant amethyst light. The man, who is still nearly four feet away from being able to swing his blade, is suddenly flung from his feet and into the tree as suddenly as if he had been struck by a giant's cudgel. The impact knocks him senseless and flings his sword from his grasp. Lupinius moves so swiftly there is no time for the hunter to slump from the tree - in the blink of an eye he is being held against the tree by his neck, the tip of Lupinius' sword at his sternum.
For a long moment, he is held there, stunned but awake, and he stares into Lupinius' brilliant blue eyes, which glow with an amethyst light of their own. Then he is let go to fall to his own feet.
"Go back to Patrian with this message," Lupinius says. "And while you're at it, deliver a message to the rest of the hunters as well. Tell them that this" - he gestures to the carnage - "is all they have to look forward to if he keeps sending you hunters after me." The hunter is recovering from his daze, and he looks somewhere between shocked and angry. "You should be glad. You're the first one I've let live, out of the fifty or so that have come after me. Leave, before I change my mind. Go back to wherever you come from, and maybe take up something safer. Have a wife, have children, become a farmer. All you have in this profession to look forward to is death."
The man stays there for a moment, as Lupinius backs away, then stands up, seeming to think for a moment, before nodding slightly, and, without a word, retreats into the forest. Lupinius watches him walk away, until he is out of sight and hearing, before reaching up to pull the bolt out of his shoulder with a sharp tug. There is again a flicker of amethyst light from the amulet, and where a hole had been, there is only unmarked skin.
He looks around and gets his bearings again. He can smell the faint odors of a town - fire, cooking, alcohol, people - somewhere nearby. Hoping he'll find some rest there, he heads towards it.
It takes him longer to get to the town than he realized - his senses picked up the tavern from quite a distance, and when he finally gets out of the forest, he sees why - the town is huge, particularly for someplace that is in essence the middle of nowhere. In the distance, he sees a castle on the side of a tall cliff, well up on a mountain, an elegant - if foreboding and somewhat imposing - structure. Another time, he thinks. He heads into town, looking for a tavern. He sees one, and as he approaches, his senses tingle - there is a nebulous, magical feel to the place, as if it were not only a tavern and the heart of the town, but a gateway of some sort - the feeling is stronger thanb anything he has experienced yet. At some point, he thinsk to himself, he'll have to find someplace high enough to view the town from - he suspects it will look as if the town sprang up around the tavern. He approaches the tavern, pushes the door open, and walks in.
There are a great many people here, he sees, and as he enters many of them stop and stare at him. For good reason - after all, he is a stranger here, and he gets the feeling that while this is a place that welcomes lone travellers, they are not seen often. They watch him a moment more, seeing a tall, darkly handsome stranger, dressed in dark clothing, a cowled cloak hanging over his back and open from the throat down, displaying a well-muscled body that the clothing fails to hide. At his waist the sword hangs, in a sheath wrapped in silvery-grey wolf's fur, the handle meticulously shaped from silver in the form of a howling wolf's head, a silver rope chain around his neck from which dangles a teardrop-shaped amulet of black stone, marred by a single amethyst flaw in the center. He looks around from the doorway for a moment more, before deciding that there is no immediate or obvious danger that awaits him here, and makes his way to the bar and leans against the blue marble bartop, waving one of the bartenders over.
"What is this place?" he asks the tender.
The bartender is a tallish fellow, towering over Lupinius by several inches, and broader as well. He looks to be a well-traveled warrior himself, but gone slightly to seed, as if he settled here long ago to lead a more peaceful life. Still, Lupinius would bet he can handle himself fine. "This here is the Red Dragon Inn, stranger," he replies in a booming, deep voice. "You'll find no trouble here that you don't bring with you...and be careful not to cause any while you're here." The bartender says this with an air of great cheer, but with the underlying cautionary tone can be heard clearly anyway. "What'll you be having?"
"If at all possible, something resembling a steak - just the meat. Just have the cook breath on it to warm it up before you bring it to me. And a pint of your darkest beer with it, brought over to the hearth when it's ready, if you please." He reaches under the cloak and comes out with an emerald, quite large enough to cover the cost of the food and drink, and a healthy tip besides. "Will this do to pay?"
The tender takes it, examines it with a critical eye, then nods as if satisfied and tucks it away out of sight. "That will do quite nicely. Just let me know if you'll be needing anything else, mister...?"
Lupinius waves off the unspoken inquiry. "Do you require me to leave my sword with you?"
The bartender merely shakes his head and smiles. Apparently, people witholding their names is something he's familiar with. "Nah. As long as it's not used offensively, you can keep it."
Lupinius nods and thanks the man, then pushes away from the bar and heads to the hearth, threading his way carefully between customers, tables and chairs before finding his seat at the hearth, right in front of the fire, removing his cloak and letting it fall in folds beside him, the detaching the sword from his hip and laying it on the hearthstones before sitting. He takes the time to look around the room again as the serving-girl arrives with his food and presents it to him, along with a cold pint of beer as black as tar. He gives her a small handful of silver coins - a generous tip - and smiles at her dismissively, then begins to eat, keeping his eyes open and senses alert for whatever may happen next.
He pauses by a tree to regain his breath, a tall, old tree with thick branches and lush green foliage. Could it be too much to hope for that he's lost them this time? He straightens and looks around, but sees nothing. Still, he's not so easily fooled...closing his eyes, he waits for the thunder of his pulse to die away, his breathing to ease, and uses his animal senses to get a better read on the forest around him.
Just as he thought, they were still there. Six of them, all armed with crossbows and swords and knives...hoping, no doubt, to cash in on the bounty. Damn that slave girl for not telling him who she'd been on the run from! He'd assumed that she had some cruel, lowly master from the way she'd described him. On the first count he'd been right - he was cruel enough. But the overseer of the small kingdom he'd been in when he found her, he hadn't expected. He'd spent months getting her out of his reach, without ever knowing who she'd belonged to or why she was so coveted by him. He should have gone on the ship with her, but that this was his home, and he'd been loath to leave it. Still was, to tell the truth, despite the last year dodging hunters or leaving their bodies lying for the next party to find. If not for the fact that he was nearly immortal, he'd have gotten tired and given up well before now.
And now he was getting tired of running from this party. They should have given up the chase a week ago. The money must be getting good.
Opening his eyes, he looks around carefully. Still none in sight. Well, then, he thinks, let's turn the tables.
He looks up and judges the distance, then leaps for the lowest branch overhead, reaching it easily and pulling himself up. There is ample foliage here to hide himself, he notes, from even a careful observer, and he settles in to wait.
Sure enough, a short time later, they walk beneath him - still six of them, walking in a loose group. Morons, he thinks - the fact that you're so close together will be your last mistake. As they pass, he drops from the branch he's on, right onto the back of the last hunter, landing with both feet on his shoulders and knocking him forward, face-first into a rock. There is a satisfying crunch as his nasal cavities are driven into his brain from the force of the impact. One down.
The other five are surprised, and despite their quickness to recover - which he again notes with no small measure of respect - he is still much faster. He's been doing this for much longer than they, after all. Without pause, he lands and crouches, the springs for the nearest one in a single fluid motion, hands reach for the hunter's head and twisting cruelly. There is a sicking crackling of the neck bones breaking easily, and the man goes limp, dropping the crossbow. Lupinius reaches down and grabs it even as the man falls, bringing it to bear on the next in line and firing. His aim is flawless - the bolt springs from the crossbow and sinks into the forehead of the hunter even as he brings his own to aim at him. The man is thrown back from the force of the impact into the next one, making him stumble and accidentally fire his own crossbow.
The other two by this time have got their aim and fire nearly simultaneously. Both bolts speed toward Lupinius, and he twists out of the way - not fast enough. One misses, but the other strikes him in the chest, just missing his heart by inches. The pain isn't even registered by him as he draws his sword - a long, double-edged, sleek weapon of beauty, gleaming in the dull light filtered through the trees and looking sharp enough to hew the electrons from an atom. He charges the first one, slicing up and across. The man screams as the sword opens him from his groin to his throat, slicing through skin and muscle with barely a tug to mark its passing.
The second drops his own crossbow and reaches for his own sword - too late. Lupinius has been a master of this craft for too long, and in a single smooth motion, he whirls around from the slash to the first one and brings his sword around and up. There is a whistling sound as the blade parts the air, followed by a juicier sound as it passes through the man's neck and slices his head cleanly off. It falls to the ground with a meaty thud and rolls away, and a long, colorful streak of blood splashes the ground and nearby tree as it gouts from the man's neck. His body remains standing for a moment, unaware of its own death, before falling limply to the forest floor.
Lupinius turns to the sixth, and final, hunter, who by now has dropped his useless crossbow and drawn his own sword. Despite the fear in his eyes, he has it raised and now, seeing Lupinius turn his attention to him, charges. Lupinius swings an open hand at the man, and from the amulet at his neck there is a flash of brilliant amethyst light. The man, who is still nearly four feet away from being able to swing his blade, is suddenly flung from his feet and into the tree as suddenly as if he had been struck by a giant's cudgel. The impact knocks him senseless and flings his sword from his grasp. Lupinius moves so swiftly there is no time for the hunter to slump from the tree - in the blink of an eye he is being held against the tree by his neck, the tip of Lupinius' sword at his sternum.
For a long moment, he is held there, stunned but awake, and he stares into Lupinius' brilliant blue eyes, which glow with an amethyst light of their own. Then he is let go to fall to his own feet.
"Go back to Patrian with this message," Lupinius says. "And while you're at it, deliver a message to the rest of the hunters as well. Tell them that this" - he gestures to the carnage - "is all they have to look forward to if he keeps sending you hunters after me." The hunter is recovering from his daze, and he looks somewhere between shocked and angry. "You should be glad. You're the first one I've let live, out of the fifty or so that have come after me. Leave, before I change my mind. Go back to wherever you come from, and maybe take up something safer. Have a wife, have children, become a farmer. All you have in this profession to look forward to is death."
The man stays there for a moment, as Lupinius backs away, then stands up, seeming to think for a moment, before nodding slightly, and, without a word, retreats into the forest. Lupinius watches him walk away, until he is out of sight and hearing, before reaching up to pull the bolt out of his shoulder with a sharp tug. There is again a flicker of amethyst light from the amulet, and where a hole had been, there is only unmarked skin.
He looks around and gets his bearings again. He can smell the faint odors of a town - fire, cooking, alcohol, people - somewhere nearby. Hoping he'll find some rest there, he heads towards it.
It takes him longer to get to the town than he realized - his senses picked up the tavern from quite a distance, and when he finally gets out of the forest, he sees why - the town is huge, particularly for someplace that is in essence the middle of nowhere. In the distance, he sees a castle on the side of a tall cliff, well up on a mountain, an elegant - if foreboding and somewhat imposing - structure. Another time, he thinks. He heads into town, looking for a tavern. He sees one, and as he approaches, his senses tingle - there is a nebulous, magical feel to the place, as if it were not only a tavern and the heart of the town, but a gateway of some sort - the feeling is stronger thanb anything he has experienced yet. At some point, he thinsk to himself, he'll have to find someplace high enough to view the town from - he suspects it will look as if the town sprang up around the tavern. He approaches the tavern, pushes the door open, and walks in.
There are a great many people here, he sees, and as he enters many of them stop and stare at him. For good reason - after all, he is a stranger here, and he gets the feeling that while this is a place that welcomes lone travellers, they are not seen often. They watch him a moment more, seeing a tall, darkly handsome stranger, dressed in dark clothing, a cowled cloak hanging over his back and open from the throat down, displaying a well-muscled body that the clothing fails to hide. At his waist the sword hangs, in a sheath wrapped in silvery-grey wolf's fur, the handle meticulously shaped from silver in the form of a howling wolf's head, a silver rope chain around his neck from which dangles a teardrop-shaped amulet of black stone, marred by a single amethyst flaw in the center. He looks around from the doorway for a moment more, before deciding that there is no immediate or obvious danger that awaits him here, and makes his way to the bar and leans against the blue marble bartop, waving one of the bartenders over.
"What is this place?" he asks the tender.
The bartender is a tallish fellow, towering over Lupinius by several inches, and broader as well. He looks to be a well-traveled warrior himself, but gone slightly to seed, as if he settled here long ago to lead a more peaceful life. Still, Lupinius would bet he can handle himself fine. "This here is the Red Dragon Inn, stranger," he replies in a booming, deep voice. "You'll find no trouble here that you don't bring with you...and be careful not to cause any while you're here." The bartender says this with an air of great cheer, but with the underlying cautionary tone can be heard clearly anyway. "What'll you be having?"
"If at all possible, something resembling a steak - just the meat. Just have the cook breath on it to warm it up before you bring it to me. And a pint of your darkest beer with it, brought over to the hearth when it's ready, if you please." He reaches under the cloak and comes out with an emerald, quite large enough to cover the cost of the food and drink, and a healthy tip besides. "Will this do to pay?"
The tender takes it, examines it with a critical eye, then nods as if satisfied and tucks it away out of sight. "That will do quite nicely. Just let me know if you'll be needing anything else, mister...?"
Lupinius waves off the unspoken inquiry. "Do you require me to leave my sword with you?"
The bartender merely shakes his head and smiles. Apparently, people witholding their names is something he's familiar with. "Nah. As long as it's not used offensively, you can keep it."
Lupinius nods and thanks the man, then pushes away from the bar and heads to the hearth, threading his way carefully between customers, tables and chairs before finding his seat at the hearth, right in front of the fire, removing his cloak and letting it fall in folds beside him, the detaching the sword from his hip and laying it on the hearthstones before sitting. He takes the time to look around the room again as the serving-girl arrives with his food and presents it to him, along with a cold pint of beer as black as tar. He gives her a small handful of silver coins - a generous tip - and smiles at her dismissively, then begins to eat, keeping his eyes open and senses alert for whatever may happen next.