maledictionouroboros

[maledictionouroboros]

The Players:

Lady Lillandyr Shadowglade: A noble woman, head of House Shadowglade. Lillandyr has many terrible secrets and is not who she claims to be. She comes across as a vapid, empty socialite, but under the silk and beauty lies the face of a ruthless monster, capable of any atrocity to see her revenge through. Played by: @lillandyrshadowglade

Dr. Heathcliff Endal Dracone VII: The Dracone family name has a strange, fabled history and carries even wilder rumors. Old, old money. So old that many of their coins aren't even accepted into circulation anymore. Their coffers were overflowing, their armories feared and their sons and daughters coveted. The Dracone Castle remains a huge menace of foreboding danger in the southern mountains of the Ghostlands. Some say the castle itself is sentient, haunted by something dark and evil. Travelers beware! Played by: @wraheathcliff

Count Aronsen Dracone: It was too much, to be released from the scourge link, plunged into awareness. The hunger was still there, but now with horror and shame. And there is no worthy soul to save, the voice inside his head whispered. His family was almost all massacred back home. His existence was shame, a perversion of honor. The first-born son should have been there to protect them. This catastrophic failure ripped into him so viciously he let the thing left underneath to blink alone, abandoned and hungry. Rejected by nearly every living and unliving thing, his loneliness transformed into bitter mania over years of isolation and hostility. Played by: @wraaronsen

Anya Silverbough: Lillandyr’s true identity. Daughter of a spurned courtesan named Emaleth. Emaleth was Lord Shadowglade’s lover. At the end of her life, she was fleeing his wrath. Anya believes Astalon Shadowglade killed her mother. The truth is far more complicated. Played by: @lillandyrshadowglade

Lord Varistan Veyne Sunmourne: Sixth bastard son of Astalon Shadowglade. A man with all the gifts: charm, grace, luck and beauty. We meet him as he’s destroyed his life with vice to mute the grief of losing his father and half sisters. He is unmoored, adrift and without coin. A vain, superficial mess, he seeks to get back what he believes is rightfully his, even at the cost of the meager scraps he has left. Played by: @varistanveynesunmourne

Elirtache Kuvaeth: A refugee from Suramar, former vintner. Tache is Lillandyr’s hapless, besotted personal assistant. He stumbles into fate quite by accident, as is often the case in such tales. Played by: @lillandyrshadowglade

Lady Seralah Bloodhaven: A young, orphaned noble woman who has let her House fall into obscurity in the pursuit of conquering death once and for all. Addled by drugs and poisons, Seralah attempts to get as close to death as one can while still living. Her sanity is questionable and she speaks to spirits. She goes to work for Heathcliff Dracone as his personal lab assistant and expert alchemist. Played by: @seralahbloodhaven

Trivelino, The Red Harlequin: Like a comet, every so often, the Red Harlequin takes flesh to caper and delight…and menace. Something has brought him here again. Trivelino comes precisely when he is supposed to for reasons only the stars whisper about to each other. Played by: @trivelino

Ms. Nubbin: Heathcliff Dracone’s lawyer. She makes problems disappear. Murders swept under the rug. She is quick and clever, a Forsaken as ruthless as you’d expect one to be. All the same, she has her work cut out for her. Played by: @wranubbin

The Mentioned Dead: Astalon Shadowglade, Lady Shadowglade, Eramyn Shadowglade, Nycassia Shadowglade, the five bastard sons of Lord Shadowglade, Lady Dracone (Heathcliff’s first wife), Emaleth Silverbough, Lord and Lady Bloodhaven, Tache’s dignity

The Story (that happened off screen):

Lillandyr befriended Heathcliff at a card game at a seedy tavern. She cheated. He knew she cheated. And thus began a strange, years long friendship where Heathcliff allowed Lillandyr to continually scam him out of gems and money until finally, she concocted a proper con where she invented a criminal husband, Arothir Brackwater, and using illusion and simple lies, forged a business deal between Heathcliff and Arothir.

After an outing that offends Lillandyr, she bewitches Heathcliff into thinking they’ve started a torrid affair. Which turns into a real affair where her intentions turn from mischief to something far more sinister. Her efforts to seduce Heathcliff nearly go awry when his brother Aronsen thinks to meddle.

The Man That Didn’t Exist:

Arothir Brackwater does not exist. He is the hero of a famous romance novel. All the same, like most men, real or imaginary, he is causing problems. He has become this story’s Kaiser Soze, I guess.

The Revenge:

Anya Silverbough swore revenge on House Shadowglade and even after the House fell to the Scourage Invasion, she was not satisfied. Assuming the identity of Lillandyr Shadowglade, she means to raise the House to glory once more…but to what end? And will she be satisfied when she gets everything she wants? Or will she let her rage destroy her?

The Con:

A very traditional con. Anya poses as a noblewoman to land her a noble husband to increase her wealth. Said noble husband doesn’t need to live that long. Just long enough to say I do and write a proper will.

But things are never that simple.

The Castle:

The Dracone Castle is alive. And hungry. It has its own motivations and keeps what furthers its ends close. And in line.

The Curse:

A devastating example of magic gone awry. Lillandyr manipulated Aronsen’s dreams to torment him with her shadow magic. Neglecting to close the connection, either out of hubris or simple forgetting, has wrought horrific consequences. Now linked mind to mind with Lillandyr, Aronsen knows all her secrets. And she knows he knows. Will she kill him to guard her ill deeds? If she does, she will be destroying the only chance to have her one, secret wish come true: To be known. Just as she is. And to be loved anyway. But can you love someone if you know what a monster they truly are? There are boundaries between minds for a reason. This is no gentle, fated romance. This is an unending feedback loop of madness, obsession and death.

The Soundtrack: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/69MhRXlTqfnVuFVtfxVDZr?si=fNorvurxS122LVRXbBPlcg