Zion - LotNM Character Prologue (Majh Blackpaw)
Zion - Path of the Moon Mother Prologue, Majh Blackpaw
Majh Blackpaw, priestess of Tah'aveen and loyal soldier of Shrad stood outside what appeared to be an abandoned building. At least, that's what it would have looked like to a less skilled eye. The scuffs in the road in front of the door indicated foot traffic within the last day; the subtle creak of the window shutters denoted that they had been opened within the hour; the--
"Hmmm... looks like they cleared out." offered one of the guards, a rat.
Majh turned back to regard him. His name was Doyren, she recalled. "Guardsmen Doyren..." she offered, trying to sound less than disgusted with him, "Why would you conjecture such a thing?"
"Uh..." he stuck a finger up underneath his helm, scratching his head and asked dumbly, "Con-what?"
The hyena priestess repeated her question, failing further to disguise her frustration, "Why do you think there's no one home?" she somehow managed to offer a sugary-sweet smile to him, even batting her eyes at his infuriating stupidity.
"He assumes that nobody would dare stay anywhere with the mark of Majh Blackpaw upon the door." another guard spoke up, an otter named Sten. Majh smiled to herself; she liked Sten's answer... not that she would let it show.
"I did not ask you, Guardsman." she spoke coldly.
"Then that was your second fault." Sten replied with barely a moment's hesitation, "Your first fault was in asking a moron."
Although it only took a half of a second for the hyena to compose herself, it was a half of a second longer than it would normally have required; she wasn't certain whether she wanted to laugh at the otter or tear out his liver for questioning her. In the end, she opted for the third option, "And you believe that Guardman Doyren is correct? You believe that they have fled?"
Sten shook his head, "No, Priestess... I smell smoke."
"So?" Majh inquired, having noticed it herself. She knew what it meant, but wasn't about to let the guard off without a test.
"They curbed a fire and clogged the chimney to hide the building's use." the otter responded, "The people inside didn't leave but they want us to think they have."
"Then why have a fire in the first place?" Majh questioned.
"The same reason they thought they could escape you, Mistress--" the otter offered, "they are as stupid as Doyren." he motioned to the rat, who was picking his ear. That time, Majh couldn't hide her laugh.
Her laugh picked up in volume as it turned from one of condescending mockery into that of a predator counting the last minutes of its prey's life. Regarding the door, Majh drew out a two-handed axe and, with a prayer to Tah'aveen for strength and fortitude, proceeded to 'knock'.
The door flew apart and shredded splinters of pine showered the interior of the small hovel. With practiced precision, Majh nimbly passed through the doorway and side-stepped, quickly providing room for the guardsmen to enter behind her; Sten the otter, Doyren the rat, and a rough-looking human whose name Majh hadn't heard spoken. "Search the main floor." she directed, moving to stand in the doorway once her men were inside, "If we find nothing then jam access to the basement-- the apothecary should be here shortly to set up a vat of Graymist to handle any 'vermin' in the basement."
The comment, as planned, saved time for her men. A closet door opened and three armed men poured out into the main room. Four more criminals ascended from a small trap door tucked away in the back of the closet, likewise armed. While the three in the front had hand axes, two of the others had swords and two had bows-- it was the final two that caught the hyena's attention. "I am Majh Blackpaw, Priestess of the Temple of Tah'aveen." she announced, turning to face them. "You are hereby found guilty of--" and there were no words left to speak as an arrow shot across the room, streaking right into her chest.
Majh picked herself up off the floor as her guardsmen quickly engaged in combat with the fugitives. She retained hold of her great axe with one paw while the other reached up and pulled the crumpled arrow out from between two layers of her breastplate. She locked gazes with the human still cowering in the closet; he had foolishly dared to attack her, "Leave the one in the back alive." she spoke aloud, eyes never leaving him, "We'll need information and I want to get it from HIM."
"You end here, Blackpaw!" came a shout from the side and one of the swordsmen, having successfully worked his way through her guard, came at her, charging. She could tell by his gait alone that the wolf was not a skilled combatant. An almost imperceptibly faint shift of weight later the hyena was resting on the tips of her toes and, right as the man struck, she twisted her body, shoving her shoulder right into his neck; her shoulder guard did the rest of the work and the wolf dropped his sword, gripping at his smashed wind-pipe.
"I apologize, but you must be mistaken." she announced toward the wolf, gaze still focused entirely on the bowman. The human's hands shook as he tried to knock another arrow and Majh's eyes narrowed, "You aren't still shooting, are you?" she questioned flatly.
The bowman raised his bow. "That would not be advisable." Majh announced. The human, of course, did not take her words to heart-- they never did; he loosed the arrow. With a quick sweeping spin of her axe, Majh had her blade vertical and in front of her. She heard and felt the resounding impact of the arrow as it struck mid-center against the flat of her axe blade.
"You have no idea how much you are going to regret these actions." she announced, stalking toward him. If the human had not been fearful before he was overflowing with terror at that point and did one of the stupidest things possible: he went back down the trapdoor. It was expected, of course, and Majh had no problem following him down into the basement. She hadn't however, expected the trap.
A huge, resounding explosion sent the hyena across the basement room. Smoke flowed from the edges of her cloak as she slowly sat up. Dusting herself off, the priestess paused for just a moment to examine the broken bricks where she had impacted against the wall. Brushing her paws across the edge of her singed robe she was thankful that the collision had apparently put out any lingering flames; she valued her bear-fur cloak. Seeing what appeared to be an overturned wash basin slowly right itself drew Majh's attention.
The bowman left his bow on the ground as he used both hands to lift the heavy metal tub, "So much for Majh Black--" the human's mouth froze in abject horror as she locked gazes with him once again.
"Oh, you poor dear boy..." she said, rising to her feet as she stalked toward him, "You have SO much to answer for."
The still-kneeling human quickly reached for his bow, leaving only one hand holding the wash basin up. With a quick one-handed chop, Majh slammed the flat of her blade against the tub, forcing the man to bring his second hand up to keep it from falling onto him. Majh quickly followed-up with lifting a leg upward and pressed a foot against his cover. The human let out a cry of alarm, and fell beneath the combined weight. Only his head stuck out from beneath the metal. He gasped for air, pinned.
Majh was perfectly happy to leave him like that and it was only a matter of time before the rest of her guards joined her in the basement. They brought three prisoners with them. She nodded to the guards, the only compliment they would get for their success, and she turned back to the pinned human.
"Quinn Harolds, I presume?" she questioned, having recognized him from the poster handed to her earlier in the week. The human didn't reply; Majh leaned a little harder on the tub.
"Ow... my neck!" he responded, "Yes! YES, DAMN IT! OW! YES!"
"It is impolite to shout profanities in front of a lady." she responded.
"Good thing there aren't any around." Majh didn't need to turn around to recognize Sten's voice. The comment gathered a few chuckles from the rest of her guard.
"Good thing indeed." the hyena replied, issuing another one of her species' intimidating laughs; the prisoners cowered. "So, Quinn..." she got to the point, "I'm looking for Yaron... you know where he is, I assume."
"I... I'm not telling you shit." the human huffed.
Majh nodded, "Fair enough... I suppose we'll have to resort to torture." she responded casually.
"I can take anything you can dish out." Quinn countered with a sneer, followed quickly by another round of grunts and exclamations as she leaned more firmly on the tub that pinned him.
"I'm not torturing YOU, stupid man..." she explained, "Not YET anyway... until you see what I have planned." she looked to Sten, who held a young buck, "Guardsmen Sten... divaricate him, please."
The otter nodded and planted a foot in the small of the stag's back. Looking down at the human, Majh realized that the word held no meaning for him-- just as she desired. "Do you know what 'divaricate' means?" she asked the human.
"I hope you burn in the eighth level of the hells." he countered.
"I will take that as a no." she casually responded to his verbal jab. By the time she looked back at the otter, she saw that Sten had one of the stag's legs tied to a metal pipe that was jutting out from the wall. The guardsman looked back to her and she nodded.
Grabbing hold of the stag's free leg, the otter planted his feet firmly against the ground and began pulling. The young deer started screaming immediately, voice growing in volume and pitch until he was choked off by the sound of both of his legs popping out of joint. Sten released the hold of the leg and looked back to Majh."
"Admirable, Guardsman Sten... but you will have to do better... blessings of Tah'aveen grant you might in your appointed task." she offered, feeling the divine right given unto her imbue her guardsman with what he needed to do as she demanded.
The buck was screaming again, crying out, pleading for mercy. Majh did not permit the otter to grant any, and he did as she demanded. Drawing the squirming buck off the ground, he grabbed hold of either of the deer's legs, turned him upside down, and planted him antlers-first against the ground. With a grunt and a shove, Sten pushed downward on either leg until the deer's hooves touched the floor.
"Demons! You're fucking demons!" screamed the human, but Majh silenced him with another shift of more weight onto the bath.
"Oh come come, Ouinn... surely you can be reasonable. "We've only just begun. If you like, I'd be happy to hear where Yaron is... or we can discuss the meaning of the word 'vivisect'."
"Go swallow muzzle-full of Blood Beast shit." the human sneered.
"Guardsman." she addressed the human she didn't know by name, "Please proceed with the vivisection."
The human grabbed his captive, a wet-eyed fox around the throat, "Please! Please! No! Don't!" she cried, "I'll tell you! I'll tell you! I know where Yaron is! I know!" she pleaded.
"I was not asking you." Majh replied in a casual tone to the fox, "I'm asking Quinn." she motioned to the human.
"Quinn! Quinn! Please, for the goddess' sake! Tell her!" she cried.
"Coward..." the human growled toward the vixen.
"QUINN!" she screeched as the guard holding her pulled out an enormous hooked knife, "I thought you loved me! QQQQUUUUUUIIIINNNNNN!" Once the guardsman began cutting the rest of her words were incomprehensible and, after nearly five minutes of his blade rooting through her innards, she finally stopped talking.
Majh looked down at the human, whose face was buried in the floor; he was sobbing. She casually 'tsk'ed at him, "You didn't really care about her, did you?"
"I loved her! I fucking loved her!" he cried up at the hyena.
"Interesting way to show it." Majh shrugged, "Now... our third and final demonstration..." she looked at Guardsman Doyren who had a firm grasp on an attractive-looking male house cat, "Well..." she smiled, "I can't help but find this somehow humorous... a rat with a cat... shouldn't it be the other way around?" she laughed.
"I don't get it..." Doyren responded.
Majh sighed, "Never mind... just show Quinn here how we bifurcate those who aren't willing to speak."
"Uh..." the rat paused, loosing his hold on the prisoner, "I don't know what b--" he was thrown against the wall as the cat elbowed him in the chin. The prisoner made it half-way to the stairs when Guardsman Sten swung a disembodied deer leg and caught the cat in the face. The fleeing prisoner fell to the ground, dazed.
"Stand on the bath and do NOT move." Majh grabbed the rat and sat him atop the wash basin pinning Quinn to the ground. The hyena moved to the prone cat and hauled him to his feet with one paw. She shoved him back against a wall and pulled a stiletto out from its sheath at her thigh and, without hesitation jammed it right beneath the prisoner's collar bone, effectively nailing his shoulder to the wall.
The cat screeched at the top of his lungs but Majh was not finished. Taking out a second blade she repeated the action with his other shoulder. The cat screamed again, whimpering as the hyena left him hanging by the two knives. She looked back at Quinn, who was facing the floor again. Majh motioned with her head and Guardsman Sten moved over and pulled the human's face up off the floor, forcing him to watch.
"Bifurcation, Mr Harolds, means to forcefully separate into two." she explained, undoing the cat's belt with one paw. She pulled out a short sword. The cat began struggling feebly as she slid her left paw around his member; he was crying and pleading, "Bifurcation, Mr Harolds." she repeated, and, after a quick swipe with her right paw, she opened her left, letting the lump of bloody flesh fall to the ground amidst the screams of thrashing agony from the cat.
"I will ask you again, Quinn..." Majh stalked over to the prone human, "Where is Yaron?"
The human sobbed from his place beneath the tub, "You... you don't know what... what he'd do to me if I told you..."
"Hmm... I hadn't thought of that." the hyena stood up, casually wiping her paw off on Guardsman Doyren's tabbard, "Irrelevant though... because we BOTH know what I'D do to you if you don't tell me..." she glanced at Sten, "Guardsman Sten... we'll start with vivisection."
With that, the otter pushed the rat off of the tub and grabbed hold of the human.
"Uh..." Doyren called attention, "Won't that kill him?"
Majh grinned widely, "Of course not, dear Doyren... I am a priestess, remember? He'll be healed well enough that there will be plenty of time for any number of wonderful vocabulary lessons... isn't that right, Mr Harolds?" she leveled her predatory gaze on the human, their eyes meeting. She winked even as his filled with tears. It didn't take long before she got all the information she required.