Bartimaeus Trilogy Roleplay (IC)

[K3ystone]

Bartimaeus Trilogy Roleplay (IC)

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The setting is Northern Ireland between 1970 and 1972. Protestants and Catholics are at war, practically in their own back gardens. Some are even resorting to employing other forces to carry out their sabotage.

[ReduxRed]

It was time. The book of her choice, The Eye of Ptolemy was set up to one side, page open on the summoning of mediocre level daemons. The room was devoid of anything else aside from left over ingredients. She'd made her friends wait outside to ensure their safety, despite their combination of skepticism, fear and curiousity, and was taking her time drawing each and every line of the pentacle on her hands and knees, lest she make a mistake. She had no experience with any of this, be it the summoning, the drawing or the magic. Certainly not the languages side. From the stories she had read from the books they'd taken, there were fearsome repercussions should even the slightest mistake be made. She could not risk failure.

It had been hard work getting the books, so she'd spent her time well delving into them, shutting herself away for hours, amassing an almost encyclopedic knowledge of the powers of magicians, and the creatures from The Other Place. The books couldn't be found in libraries; only in the homes of true-blue magicians, so some were slightly burned from less than successful raids. None the less she cherished each one for their unusual information. She needed to know all she could were she to challenge the magicians at their own game. As barely a woman, she knew she was at a large disadvantage in years of experience, but time was of the essence.

She stood up and dusted her knees off, chalk stains evident on her jeans. She'd been extremely careful, each line done with a ruler, the rest done as slowly and carefully as she could. The fear of what these things could do was constantly lingering in the back of her mind, telling her not to do this. Her stubbornness and sheer determination had won over in the end of course. This was now her life's obsession. She wanted more than anything the power that caused even herself to pause in fear. Even if it was at the cost of her life, it would be worth it. She'd make good use of her powers, if she survived.

All was ready now. She cracked her knuckles, stood in the summoner's pentacle and folded her arms over her chest. She glanced at the book to make sure all was in order, running through the list she already knew by heart, and, once certain all was prepared, began running over the Shrivelling Fire incantation in her head. Worst case scenario, she would destroy it before it destroyed her. She knew her silver cross necklace would only barely work as a protection, but she had faith in her own skills of survival too.

"Enough thinking, let's do this." She muttered to herself, and so Ruàn began the summoning of Frith, her first Daemon.

[K3ystone]

A single conscious entity, a torrent of life ebbing and flowing as if tugged by the force of some invisible moon. This was bliss, this mesmerising tide, this iridescent convergence of raw, untamed essence. True peace, happiness, free.........Ouch!! Oh Shattered! Recoiling! Torn! Hook after hook penetrated, pain at each turn. We must remember not to panic, not to pull. The hooks, they bite.

That was when I woke up. I'll say "woke up" for simplicities sake, though I had not been sleeping. It was that moment when some foul string of words finally began to cut out, to define, the piece of essence it wanted. So one minute you're in a perfect state of unity, in a careful balance of sentient minds, then pain and isolation strike and you're dragged kicking and screaming into their filthy world.  Magicians!

Time was not the same in the "Other Place", seconds were little infinities, moments were a lifetime. There was opportunity for thought before finding oneself in a cramped pentacle. This magician certainly had made an effort.....there were plenty of clauses in the be-damned summoning, but still the voice.......it was........young (and Irish if I wasn't mistaken, and I never am). The voice resonated through the planes, binding and cutting. Kids always make mistakes, their easy. You can scare 'em, taunt them, use bribes, anything. They falter and are swallowed, end of story. More hooks......this was getting old. Speaking of which I hadn't scared a kid in ages, but then nothing scares them like it used to. Ahhh but the Irish, the ever superstitious bunch, I knew exactly how to handle this.

The room began to materialise, pentacle, Kid, the lot. Flames shot out from the centre of the pentacle and skirted about licking its edges. (Yes okay I'll admit it, I was  rather hopeful I'd find some sort of break in the lines. No such luck though.) An oppressive heat began to fill the room along with a stench of sulphur (did I mention theatrics are my strong point?). Retracting most of the flame to the centre of the pentacle I shrouded myself in a thick smog. Within the glow I began to materialise. The smog became a little clearer and in the pentacle stood the Phouka (or my new and improved version at any rate. I'm entitled to some creative license here!). The black horse stood seventeen hands high (for the non-horse-enthusiast that translates as really BIG); tail, mane and hooves were ablaze; eyes glowed crimson and were set into a horse's skull with five curved horns protruding from the top and sides. I stepped forwards pressing against the pentacle boundaries. I towered over the girl; ablaze, gleaming and magnificent (man I'm good), I was the devil she feared, the nightmare she dreaded (did I mention that I love my "job"?).

[ReduxRed]

While she'd prepared and trained and done all the research she could, nothing could have readied her for this. She'd expected some form of manipulation, maybe at most a weird creature from a book. A flaming horse demon thing was far out of her spectrum of thought. None the less, she didn't move. There'd been no attack and no concern, even if there was an abhorable stench in the room. There was nothing to fear but the creature itself, which had done nothing but flaunt it's looks like some peacock. It made it seem weak, trying to over compensate.

"You know, my friend owns some horses. They may be huge and all but they sure as hell don't intimidate me!" A blatant lie; as a child when visiting a farm the size of them had upset her, especially when she was nearly stepped on. She stretched her arms above her, arching her back as she did. "And you've warmed up the room too, lovely! This dank old place was going to give me pneumonia!" She resumed her stance, hands on hips, feet apart, grinning up at the feral creature. She had to move, to stretch. How else could she conceal the trembles? The sheer power the creature eminated was terrifying, but also exciting. That she had summoned it, and that it was hers to control was giving her a power trip.

"You may be all that, creature,  but you will do my bidding. I summoned you and as your master I expect nothing less than obedience." She commanded. It wasn't too bad, even if she'd not really practiced this side of it. It grabbed her attention, making her recall what she'd read. Demon's could and almost always would twist anything you say to them. Commands must be word and grammatically perfect to avoid potential mishaps. And with these things, a mere mishap could mean death. She'd have to actually think before talking, which was in all honesty a contradiction with her personality. She smiled to herself; it was a small price to pay.

On top of that she just hoped the boys would stay out of the room, no matter the noise and disgusting smells. They'd been warned, and the door had been locked, but she wouldn't put it past them to open it if they thought she were in danger. Which could possibly put everyone in danger. They really did have no idea what to do, something she felt rather bad about. She'd neglected to teach them anything she'd learned. They couldn't defend themselves from magic. It was selfish but she loved it, being able to control something of which only a select few knew. 

[K3ystone]

It's enjoyable watching a little pipsqueak shift, squirm and stretch in attempted bravado; as if I couldn't tell she wasn't used to this. Pathetic. She was definitely terrified, how could she not be?  I'd waited patiently for her orders (yes I can do manners, surprised?) and listened to her jabber on with excuses....(yup don't care....get on with it already).....blah, blah, blah...then the usual....all that crap magicians spew about bidding, masters, obedience (don't it just make you sick?!). They all just stand there oh so smug after that bit. It was that self-importance they were so full of that always got me riled up. So was I going to take it like a pro and wait all regal-like for some pathetic "go see if my boyfriend is cheating" order? HELL NO! GET AN IMP TO DO YOU'RE GROVELLING WENCH! (Okay so I was a little irked by this kid, so what? My last few centuries, no millennia even of summonings hadn't exactly been all peaches 'n cream alright! I mean give a djinn a break! After my essence barely having time to heal up, some upstart amateur decides to drag me to this god-forsaken world and expects me to listen to a rant? Someone was going to be eaten alive, if not this runt then maybe her boyfriend…….and her dog…….or someone’s dog……….ANYONE'S BLOODY DOG!!)

The horse pawed at the ground in rage before rising unto its hind legs and letting out an ear-splitting screech. Sparks flew out of the pentacle as flaming hooves struck the ground once more. Head lowered and nostrils flared, it spewed smoke into the air inches before the girls face. "Do not think you fool me girl! I smell your sweat! I hear your heart falter!" It was snarling viciously, spitting flames at each rasping breath.  The creature seemed to slowly increase in size, its shadows dancing about the room, swallowing everything they touched. "Fool! I am your Phouka, your Banshee, your Kelpie and your Balor of old! Do not speak to me as if you were all-powerful! Do not presume for a second that knowing a few words makes you a magician or anyone’s MASTER for that matter!" At this point the creature had straightened and puffed out its chest as if quite proud of itself.* "This pentacle and your drivel bind us both to a contract, nothing more!" Without the breath to continue I shrunk slightly and began pacing back and forth in the pentacle. Normally a stunt like that made the inexperienced hop out of the pentacle, clearly this kid was better than I’d given her credit for. (Oh come on! Don’t tell me you really believed an act like that? Do you honestly think a spirit such as myself would throw a tantrum over a mere kid?.…..err well……moving on…)

*This is still me by the way. Dún. I'd almost lost track of myself it seems. (I'd just come from the "Other Place", what do you expect?)