Adrammalech, A Sinister Saint
Story by Ramah on SoFurry
For Adrammalech, a character that runs around my head about as much as Ramah.
This is something I had been working on and off again to try and set some real material to the world I made to populate my characters into. This one is in particular for a character that isn't my first, but certainly a character that developed from a bout of time I had spent in forum RP back in high school. Enjoy the bit of writing, even if it isn't of a sexual nature. I am hoping to make more to this particular story as time goes by.
The wind blown across the rice fields flanking the dirt roadway, leaving little to keep cover behind as the autumn came to choke the warmth out of the land into winter. The single traveler that witnessed the swinging shoots sang a little tune to the rhythm of his footfalls into the packed dirt, lifting his voice to entertain the winds of nature and grant himself a boon of good fellowship with the Primary Aspect of Life. It was a rumor that all things said were weighed by the Primary Aspect that governed those winds, and it wasn't a good time to offer bad fortune. Especially when he heard by the messengers that bandits had been spotted among the rice fields picking off merchants for their goods.
But that wasn't his worry. The pack on his back was little more than all his possessions made light for his lifestyle. Flint and tinder, a couple pots, some changes of clothes, and his tools of the trade including inks, a couple pieces of hide, a violin and what seemed to be a small kit for puppetry and sewing. The brown mantle he used to keep the chill off seemed to have seen some of the sewing kit, where some spots were held together with red thread cross stitched into the holes. It was enough for now, but the winter was creeping closer by the day, and such holes mended or not would not be enough.
His green eyes set upon a small covered cart that sat on the side of the pathway, a wheel broken apart at the spokes, leaving the three men around it stranded. He heard the sounds of argument and the swinging of arms with two of the men. The third man off on the side of the broken wheel slapped one of the closer arguers, pointing to the traveler. He brought his eyes down and his hand through his black hair.
He passed by the men one by one, where he lowered his singing to a hum. While two of them looked to be wearing little more than leathers and a studded club each, the one who pointed him out wore the red armor of a Dragon Emperor warrior. He had no materials to help with a broken wheel, nor did he want to socialize with those that looked to be more heated in their words and actions... Especially if they were affiliated with the local warlords.
"You." A gruff voice pierced through the humming of the traveler. The heavy footfalls of armored boots crushed into the dirt pathway behind him alerted him of some proximity to the red armored man. "I do not see you with any caravan or merchants. What shall I call you, besides foolish, peasant?"
With his rhythm and his vocals broken, the traveler turned in place and bowed gracefully to the armored warrior. His arms were out and his eyes turned downwards in some respect to the man who addressed him. "Good day, my lord. I am merely a traveling entertainer in the midst of gathering stories for the locals to have a spring in their step during trying times and celebratory events... They call me Adram Stills." The smell of copper or iron assaulted his nose when the armored man approached and searched his waist for a weapon and turned up empty.
"Adram you say? I do not recognize your name. You don't carry guards or a weapon, yet you brave the roads as if you were blessed with divine protection." His search came close to the pouch on Adram's belt, where the traveler snapped up and grabbed the wandering hand as if in greeting.
"I do appreciate the concern, my lord, but they say that kind words and a smile can disarm the majority of enemies. I try to keep to that ideal instead of the rule of iron." Adram replied with a smile. The handshake made a rattle of the gauntlet the warrior wore. He didn't let go for several seconds, and stepped back from the warrior once he did. "Besides, the Dragon Emperor and his three sons do well with their armies to protect the lower class, even if they are fighting each other for the right to wear their father's honorable coat and own his land upon his passing..."
The warrior frowned and nodded at the entertainer. "Of course. But that protection costs gold from the coffers of the lordships. So in the name of Lord Herase, I require some contribution to the cause." He rubbed his thumb and index finger in expectation of a positive response.
"Ah... You catch me a bit short of any sort of currency, my lord." Adram said. His hand reached for the pouch and opened it to pour out a few measly copper coins and a single silver piece stamped with the local tender. He clenched the few coins in his hand and set them back into the pouch with a metal clink. "May I interest you in a song or excerpt to raise your spirits instead? Or a meal, since rice is quite plentiful at this time." He let his pack drop from his back, where the entertainer caught the bag at the last moment to prevent damage to its contents and opened up the flap to produce a small basket of preserved rice.
"An excerpt then. I have little time to deal with a poor man's dinner." The red warrior looked back at his two cohorts, who made their way to either side of the armored man and leaned on their great studded clubs. The small audience scowled at Adram for a moment as he put away his rice, as if they resented the choice of the red warrior.
"Oh, a line, a line!" Adram clapped his hands and put away his rice to stand in front of the three onlookers, a small paper fan in each hand. "What elaborate elegy can protect the people of audacious audiences when sliced of setting and neutered of narration? I know of one that would be of use..." The fans snapped open when he finished. He shifted them to hide his face lower than his eyes and direct attention to the waving left hand. "Beware of the bard who seeks an ear, and travels the roads without horse or gear. His shadow's form is queer, and his burden something to fear." He shifted the fans together and hidden his entire face from the view of his audience. His mantle shifted slightly, as if disturbed by a gust, but no such breaths of wind had come since the meeting of the traveler. "If passing by chance, avoid his passing glance. Lest he places you in trance... And orders you to dance." The fans snapped shut to reveal the face of the bard, who stared at his audience with a smile. "So, what do you think?"
"I think it shows why you are so poor." One of the unarmored men commented. The disdainful glare of the other two given their opinions in less words. "What have we to fear from a man who asks people to dance?"
"Well, everyone is a critic now days..." Adram scratched his chin with one of the closed fans. "More about the form than the meaning. Why, I bet you would be more insulted if I directly told you of a danger because it wouldn't rhyme." The entertainer gave a bow and turned to his pack to put away the fans.
"That didn't answer my question, bard." The unarmored man sounded more upset that his question wasn't answered in short order.
"Really, sirs, it is very much the same game that you have been playing with so many others. Look nice enough to approach and mean enough to not be asked questions." Adram stepped up to the cart and reached over the side to yank off the white sheet. Red stains were obviously spread across much of its surface. He held up the large sheet as if it were a trophy and peeked inside to see three bodies, two barely bound and a third, younger girl more tightly bound and decidedly less bloody. "Two dead, and they looked so healthy before too. Were their possessions worth their lives?"
"The farce is up, boys." The whispering sound of metal coming from its resting place added to a heavy sigh. The armored man pointed his curved blade towards Adram, even as the bard turned his head to smile at the three who now armed themselves against him. Those teeth were formed in a set not familiar to a normal human, pointed and sharp for tearing flesh from bone. The sight of which stayed his hand a moment as he pieced together what was in front of him.
"Oh, is it time to dance, then?" Adram dropped the cloth, the skin on his face and hands shimmering until their color and shape taken their obsidian scaled form. His mantle rose to reveal the wings underneath, fluttering to the ground as well when a clawed hand unbound the neck button. The snout taken the longest of the bard's transformation, his bones giving a slight popping noise to provide room to the fangs he sported in his maw. "Then let us dance, puppet."
The armored man shivered in place, his body felt heavy as he stared into the emerald green eyes of the dragon in front of him. The obsidian around that face looked shaped into a mask with thicker places to provide detail in its black, polished surface, yet it moved fluidly enough as he spoke to be nothing else but a part of his scales. He wanted to look away, to drop his sword and run from the creature in front of him, anything to keep from provoking the bard. Instead, his blade rose in both hands, slowly pointing to one of the club men to his side.
"Now, puppet, make the sides of this coin even." His voice growled with his line, parsed as if it were an order. A red, glowing thread shimmered into existance from one claw, connecting the dragon to the armored man in the same place he had shaken his hand earlier. "Two dead, one spared."
The man's blade came up and down in practiced precision, cutting downward into and through his henchman's shoulder, his first victim barely getting a bubbling breath out before falling onto the roadside limp. In the next moments, his other partner in crime crumpled in half when he spun the blade to his right and cut into the unprotected middle just above his hips. It was a demonstration with power he was not known for, a breath calm and collected and stance perfected. He tried to scream as he taken in what his body had done without his own permission, until with a buzz in his ears he could feel his body again, including the blood that had spilled onto his hand. That was when he heard himself finally make a dull, quiet moan, what remained of his need to scream.
"Good show, puppet. Perfect stance and execution from 'The Gold Coin.' Maybe you should go into something a bit less bandit oriented." Adram said with some applause of his scaled hands. The red thread snapped and disintegrated into black dust, indistinguishable from the dark dirt of the roadside. He padded to the shocked man, helping him sheath the blade after cleaning it off. "I bet if you head to the palace fort in Wyvern Port and told them Adram sent you that he would be willing to train you into something more."
"W-what in the hells did you do...?" The man shivered as he was guided to putting his weapon away. He felt numb, cold even as he was turned toward the road that the bard dragon had come from. He tried to reach for his blade again, yet something kept his hand from obeying him.
"Just some insurance, sir. Death looks down on his servants killing those healthy enough to live on, and you didn't faint from losing connection to Fate's Thread so you have something strong inside of you, even if it isn't your willpower." The black dragon guided him several paces before letting go, where the bandit's legs kept going for a few more before he had the will to look back. Black scaled hands pointed down the road expectantly, slowly changing back to the slightly tanned skin color of the entertainer's previous guise. "Now, go find a better life with Regna the Warlord, because if I find you out again in your current profession of greed, fate won't be so nice."
In his numb state, he didn't want to tempt what this dragon was calling fate, instead grabbing on to the bag at his side that held some of the ill-gotten coins he had amassed. He watched the bard walk over to those he used to call comrades and sifted through some of their pockets, setting aside the useful items from their belts into a pile. He hadn't stolen what was on his person, however, leaving the man with strange questions as to the entertainer's motives as he walked away. His footsteps were dragging heavily, resisting his curiosity, a little voice in his head telling him that he shouldn't question the affairs of such creatures...
Adram sifted through each bag and pocket of the two dead men left behind, separating them into two piles as he emptied them. First of them were coins and valuables, the other comprising the less valuable, but necessary items for daily living. Once he had finished pulling together everything, his attention turned to the bodies.
"Oh Life, I apologize for snuffing out two living humans in their prime, whose actions brought the weight of Justice upon them. It wasn't my place to turn them to execution until their blades turned against me." He spoke to the wind, shifting the bodies to a more proper laying position next to each other. Their clothing and weapons were the only things left on them, where the bard crossed their arms over their chests with weapons held against their side. "Perhaps I shouldn't have called out their lie. It would have saved two lives of bandits instead of one traumatized victim... Or perhaps I saved more than I know on this popular road, but that is not my place to ask."
The bard stood up and muttered some lines under his breath, where the grinding sound of stone and dirt answered as the roadside slowly swallowed up the two dead bandits. In minutes the only signs left of their existance was the items Adram had piled up nearby. "In Death's edict, ownership of worldly possessions is lost with one's life. Gold and silver have no value to those unable to spend it." He turned to the pile of valuables and picked through it one last time, where he tossed away several gold items, then pocketed a gold coin, several silver and a few copper coins before coming across a necklace with a small dragon holding a pearl.
"Interesting. One doesnt make something like this without some respect or admiration." He examined it closely, as if he were trying to find some telling details as to who it was modeled after. Those emerald eyes focused on its minute features for a moment, then looked at the cart again, considering the brown haired girl still bound. There was still that loose end.
The bard left the rest of the items untouched to look over the side of the cart's sanded exterior, likely the same mode of transport the three humans were using. Her features were bloodied from the collection of red inside, but the fair color of her skin and well trimmed brown hair gave away some sort of money where she was from. He untied the girl's hands and considered the marks on the knuckles and the bruise on one arm, setting them down softly to check under her shirt for other signs of bleeding. No response save a flinch of her leg, likely from the pain of his hard presses around her flat belly.
"Hmm... survivable injuries, yet now cut off from most support and by the looks has never wanted of food or shelter while growing up. Lucky lady cast down by those greedy for what they did not have. Such chances seem fifty fifty for succumbing to Death without help." He turned away from the cart, looking down the road in both directions. The remaining bandit had finally disappeared from sight around one rice covered steppe towards Wyvern Port and wouldn't likely tell of this location out of fear for being hung as a thief. The gold coin was reproduced from his sack, looking at the tender of his region. "Death would say leave her, but wisdom from Life says to help those who birth the next generation. So Heads will save those provisions for you, and Tails will have them serve me on my way to see Lord Herase."
The coin rang out in its curses for being struck into the air, toppling end over end in its upward, then downward momentum into the dirt of the road. Adram watched its Icarian flight until it struck the ground, bouncing from one rocky spot and into a bit of sand. The bard rose a brow, sinking down to the coin's level to examine its gold surface, stuck on its edge in the soft earth.
"Ah... Chaos is making a fool of me. What am I supposed to do with a choice on its side?" He frowned at the coin's failure to decide for him and stood up to look into the cart, where hazel eyes were now open and darting around the girl's wooden cell and the two dead parents she shared it with until she locked eyes with Adram, who's features turned upwards into a smile.
"Ah... Hi."