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Post by Ninmast on Nov 4, 2012 21:09:30 GMT -5
Mairsile hardly heard her. Her mind was still on the child. That sweet, beautiful child. Immediately, she had understood completely Sedna's determination. But the future was fluid. If the match was thrown and the outcome was not as it should have been, that child could cease to exist. Worse ...
Worse ... the child had teal eyes. None in Moon Scale had teal eyes. The only clan that had children with teal eyes was ...
When Sedna turned to look down on Mairsile, the Tide Water maiden didn't hear her at all. She threw her arms around the Moon Scale woman and wept with such bitter sorrow. Her grasp was like an anguished barnacle. Sedna must have known. She couldn't have missed it. But it was simultaneously her only hope. Sedna loved that little girl so dearly, yet must have known that it wasn't to be hers. She must have. It was no wonder she had hated and despised Mairsile from the moment she laid eyes on her.
Mairsile couldn't bring words to express all these things, the comprehension of them so wrung her heart. She could only cling to Sedna's neck and cry.
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Alex-065
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Post by Alex-065 on Nov 24, 2012 0:29:48 GMT -5
Sedna had easily anticipated that Mairsile would be shocked. The girl was a powerful mage but still young, sensitive, and a poor control of her emotions that kindled the embers of Sedna's contempt. Yet it was Sedna who was taken aback by the embrace of her presumed inferior. Mairsile wept tears of brine, briefly visible as ghostly white streaks that sparkled in the moonlight before vanishing. She wept as she clung to Sedna in deepest sympathy.
The elder maid's body bristled with energies that threatened a building spell. It rose, crackled across her skin, and then... Subsided.
There was a change in Sedna as her body relaxed. Mairsile's emotions were strong, and mirrored the feelings Sedna was determined but now failing to hide. Her mind opened, and the two maid's emotions mixed like the waters of an estuary. Sedna's arms closed around her rival and she too began to cry as their hearts melded. In this way, the two mermaids came to understand one another like sisters. Their telepathic nature established an intimacy that humans and elves required years, not moments.
Senda, being older and longer of body, wrapped her tail around Mairsile as if she were her daughter: Something they both knew she would never have...
"You see, now," Sedna said. "Here I am... A Fool. A barren fool."
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Post by Ninmast on Nov 24, 2012 1:34:42 GMT -5
It was a long moment even after that before Mairsile, sobbing wreck that she was with her emotions so much closer to the surface, was able to speak. "Maybe ..." she started. "... Maybe not ... I'm ... I still have fertility. A lot of it, they say. If there is magic that can give some of it to Oylandra, surely we can use it to give some to you and get your own systems active again, right? Can we do that? After the contest, of course. We need our strength for that and there's no time to do it now, but ..."
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Alex-065
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Post by Alex-065 on Nov 24, 2012 18:40:49 GMT -5
"Yes," Sedna intoned. "Yes we do..." She briefly nuzzled Mairsile, cheek to cheek, then pulled herself away, floating just out of reach. "If I am to conceive, with or without your help, it will be after our time in the ring. Not before. If our Mistress can..." Sedna took a deep breath through her gills, and held her thoughts. Tense, she gazed into Mairsile's eyes and focused on the bought that was by now minutes away.
"No. No, more talk of fertility... I will fight you with everything I am and I expect you to do the same. Surpass me, if you can, and live on to the future I've shown you tonight."
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Post by Ninmast on Nov 24, 2012 21:55:49 GMT -5
Mairsile nodded in solemn agreement. She would do her best, no matter what. There would be time to tend to such personal matters later, afterward. For now, it was important to take care of the present.
As if on queue, the horns sounded for the five minute (or so Ian had described the time frame in his perception) warning, designed to warn the audience to return from getting snacks or stretching their fins in time for the match. Mairsile gave one more determined, but reassuring nod to Sedna and hurried back toward the Convergence.
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Post by Alex-065 on Nov 26, 2012 23:17:19 GMT -5
All were gathered to witness the final bout and many cheers resounded for Mairsile when she was spotted returning to the ring. Among the many faces watching her were those she had defeated to come this far. Kiki and Mimi were in attendance and well rested, regarding their little cousin with enthusiastic and identical smiles from there place in the congregation. With them was Tutume, another Tide Water mage, whom Sedna had painfully routed. She seemed much better as well, and waved to Mairsile with one hand while holding her pet urchin, Prickles, in the other. Not far away from them, among her Sea Fire sisters, was Koha. Her intense gaze fell on Mairsile and lingered heavily on her before the Amazon-like mermaid gave an affirming nod. Meanwhile, the masked Tassita had assumed her usual place beside her heavily pregnant sister, Matriarch Oylandra, along with the other clan mothers. Curiously, Flower was nowhere to be seen.
Mairsile's chance at glory was very near now, what would become a defining moment along her path of self-dicovery and ascendancy.
Sedna appeared soon after, to similar acclamations, though it seemed to have little affect on her as she swam to and briefly consulted with several young Moon Scale maids Mairsile did not recognize. Unheard words passed between them before Sedna, turned and stared up at Oylandra.
Oylandra smiled back, feeling all of the maid's warring emotions of hate and gratitude as Moonscale's High Priestess invoked a final blessing before the commencement of the match, now only moments away.
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Post by Ninmast on Dec 1, 2012 15:53:41 GMT -5
Mairsile noticed only after she had gathered the support of her friends and acquaintances that she had been sweeping the surrounding waters for the inevitable Flower Torpedo, but it wasn't forthcoming. Someone must have restrained the girl or convinced her of the importance of the match. In any case, Mairsile found her way into her side of the ring without harassment. She mentally readied herself for the match. It wouldn't be easy, but Oylandra's advice rang in her ears and ideas formed in her mind.
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Post by Alex-065 on Dec 1, 2012 19:05:27 GMT -5
With the final blessing spoken the priestess exited as all in the audience intoned a word of spiritual affirmation that was swiftly followed by a new riptide of cheers and eager shouts. The honor of the century was now in the balance between the best the Moon Scale and Tide Water had to offer; a stoic veteran sorceress and a bright eyed prodigy that would soon shape the destiny of her entire species. Fate's pendulum swung into the final moment before the match would begin. The guardian mages resumed their enchanting hold on the standing magical stones, erecting the ring's protective barrier with redoubled resilience in anticipation of the mighty spells that might be ignited within. Once in place, Mairsile was sealed inside with Sedna. Though bitter and barren, Sedna smiled as she began to reshape herself. Mairsile knew a spell of transformation when she saw it, felt it, and this was not. It was reversion. This was Sedna's true form reasserting it's self! Layers of illusionary flesh Mairsile hadn't even perceived unraveled and vanished into the aether. Sedna's eyes glowed bloody red as a ragged black cloak appeared around her neck and shoulders. Floating spikes of ebony metal materialized in her hair, all this black and red matched the ruby jeweled crown now adorning her head. Her body continued to change as her hands stretched and her fingers fused together as they lengthened into stiff fins. Sedna's tail, once so long and sleek, grew shorter and split apart magically, lengthwise. The audience gasped, fearing for an instant the the forces being conjured by Moon Scale's champion had gone out of control and that she'd been bisected by them. But the halves of her tail gained new contours as they formed a shapely pair of human legs. This, more than any other part of her metamorphosis, shocked and awed all who saw. The same amazement would have seized a human audience if a female gladiatrix had suddenly sprouted wings. Both sets of limbs were the connection and means of conveyance to a loftier realm. Sedna's body now radiated intense magical power that beat against Mairsile's skin, stinging and warming her. So there before her, exposed and frighteningly resplendent, was proof that Sedna was true to her word. She was holding nothing back, not caring to hide what her pact with Oylandra had really done to her.
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Post by Ninmast on Dec 1, 2012 19:33:44 GMT -5
Respectfully, Mairsile lowered her head and steepled her fingers before her, a deep sign of utter respect and humility. In the tumultuous rush of Sedna's magical power, Mairsile seemed a candle caught in the beam of a lighthouse. She had even forgone the formation of a defensive shield, in concern that the more experienced Sedna may have simply crushed her within it.
"For what it is worth," she spoke to the transmogrified woman before her, aware such a shift was practically horrific deformities, "your beauty is quite breathtaking to behold." And it was. It was a horrific, profane, obscene beauty that both entranced the eyes and set the heart to trembling. The Moon Scale maiden did not even possess hands! To those in the audience unfamiliar with multiple limbs, it must have seemed as if her fin and hands had twisted about and exchanged places. To Mairsile, who often split her fin into legs, and who had seen her mistress' false fin fray and split into a plethora of tentacles, however, she was able to look upon what the average mermaid would see as grotesque and horrific and see the darkly enchanting beauty it actually held.
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Post by Alex-065 on Jan 23, 2013 15:31:50 GMT -5
Oylandra smiled. This was her doing, though Sedna had brought it upon herself. The totality of her fertility had not been enough, certainly not the catalyst that Mairsile had been, but the power Oylandra had granted Senda in exchange exceeded what she had asked for, mutations notwithstanding. The Dark Fathom matriarch felt one of her children move inside her as she studied Sedna, aloof to the tension in the water. Now, she thought, we both have what we wanted, don't we?
Sedna's transformation had shocked and appalled all onlookers. The telepathic clamor that ensued had no sound, but was deafening to Ian's feeble perception. Like trying to drink from a firehouse, it was simply too much, too fast; all of it discordant and impossible to shut out. He could barely make out the feelings that came to him from the mermaids in the crowd: Fear, confusion, suspicion, pity… Admiration?
There was no way of tracing these feelings in such an uproar. All Ian could say for sure was that all gathered had never seen anything like what Sedna had become. Or felt it for that matter. A novice in magic, though he was, Ian could feel how much more powerful the illustrious mermaid had suddenly become, even though the barrier. Ian winced with the onset of a terrible headache. His teeth itched. How much more afflicted, he wondered, are those with sharper senses? No one else near him seemed overtly affected. Maybe it was simply a side effect of being human, but he feared for young Mairsile.
Despite the barrier, the water temperature all around them began to plummet. Ice shards appeared and orbited Sedna's new form like a school of singing glass knifes. She glared at her opponent with balefulness but also newfound respect.
"Don't flatter me," Sedna warned. She spread her finned arms and told her, "This could have been you." Her melodic voice was stern and touched with melancholy. "The goddesses willed that by sacrificing my fertility, your's would be preserved to ensure your ascension… That you would be spared being twisted into a barren monster, such as I…" Her voice trailed off, but she soon spoke again with renewed strength. She was above self pity.
"You were born for what is to come. You are worthy of a new beginning, but here you must prove it to all who will be the founding generation of our resurgence… If you succeed."
The ice shards around her sung and whirled. The look on Sedna's face offered no more explanation for her cryptic remarks.
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Post by Ninmast on Feb 6, 2013 14:43:11 GMT -5
But Mairsile shook her head, her blue hair trailing behind the motion in melancholy waves. "You are not a monster, Sedna. You are not twisted. And that is not flattery. I respect you too much to give you empty words." The song of the ice knives seemed to be ignored by her, as intimidating and beautiful a show as it was. Her attention was on Sedna alone. But was that still a bead of brine at the corner of her wide, compassionate, sorrowful gaze?
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Post by Alex-065 on Apr 10, 2013 21:52:09 GMT -5
Moonscale's champion thought herself no less of a monstrosity, despite Mairsile's words. Sedna scowled at her, hating that she envied the younger mermaid's kindness and nobility. Was that what she lacked? Sedna didn't think she should feel in anyway inferior to Mairsile, but she did. Again, Sedna asked herself: Why? Why of all the mermaids who could have surpassed her amassed power (and there were none left, she'd been sure) did it have to be this girl still too young to yield a daughter?
Sedna grimaced. Painfully.
Fertility was no longer of value to her, she reminded herself. She had given it all up in exchange for a wealth of the real stock of destiny, and that was power. Not fertility. Not kindness.
Mairsile may have had a gentle heart and a womb that was still fertile, but she was not more powerful. Sedna would prove it. Her pride, a stubborn cancer of the spirit, seethed in defiance of the visions the goddesses had shown her. They had chosen Mairsile, it seemed. Even the color of the girl's tail was a sign of things to come. Maybe so... But Sedna would not relent.
Sedna sighed as the voice of her matriarch cried out to her above the ongoing din of the crowd. "Sedna, what has become of you? I command you to-" She shut her out of her mind and glowered at the hesitating priestess above the ring. She was still too stunned by Sedna's transformation to commence the final bout.
"Begin the match," she said. The priestess still hesitated.
"I won't tell you again," Sedna warned.
The priestess found her nerve. "Sedna of Moonscale, your Matriarch has told you to-"
Senda turned her head and shot a look of intense determination at Mairsile. A beam of red hot energy immediately followed. It missed Mairsile cleanly, no doubt deliberately, and burned a hole through the left shoulder of the unprepared shield mage standing behind her. The crowd cried out in terror. The stricken mermaid uttered a short scream, but joined her well-disiplined sisters in hastily recasting the barrier with redoubled strength.
The fight was on.
The blood red jewel in Sedna's crown, the source of the first beam, glowed hot and fired again without wasting a moment after Mairsile was sparred from the first demonstration. Not this time.
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Post by Ninmast on Apr 19, 2013 16:48:18 GMT -5
The mistake was perhaps the use of the move prior to using it on Mairsile. Were she without the opportunity to witness it in action, she might have been as surprised by the projection as the priestess was. Certainly the near "miss" initially was surprising. Some sort of enchanted stone, perhaps? Or was it actually a power of Sedna, herself?
At this point, it didn't matter. It was simply a beam of heat energy. The younger maiden raised her hand toward it and the beam ricocheted off of its energy like a laser striking a mirror. Minimal effort as she had planned to be sure, but it went further than that. The ice that had encrusted the surroundings from the drops in temperature were similarly reflective, and her bounce had been to aim it, without giving the intent away, toward those crystals, which would in turn bounce it right back to Sedna. This flanking return of her own attack might even catch the mighty mermaid off-guard.
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Post by Alex-065 on May 5, 2013 5:00:41 GMT -5
The crowd cheered as Sedna’s lance of searing mana shot back at her. Then it stopped, as if the goddess of magic herself had commanded it to be still. Poised and humming before her opponent’s bare chest Marsile’s reversal was a hand-span short of a finishing blow, inspite of piercing Sedna’s icy shield with ease. It should have worked. Tide Water’s greatest daughter had looked nigh untouchable throughout the tournament; a nubile and teal-eyed juggernaut.
Oylandra would have smiled at her, if this had been one of the many magic lessons that inevitably ended with a smarting zap from Marsile’s unquestionably sadistic teacher. This was not, however, and Oylandra was not smiling. She was worrying, though she pretend to be aloof. She had not given Sedna this much power, and for good reason. The girl was too greedy.
Sedan’s expression was passive as her eyes took on a hellish glow. The bolt of energy she had caught thrummed and burned brighter with increasing power until it burst! A cone of white-hot needles flew at Mairsile like a meteor shower. Thousands of projectiles, too many to stop!
She was actually trying to kill her!
Matriarch Aloli cried out, “Sedna, stop!”
Too late.
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Post by Ninmast on May 10, 2013 18:36:39 GMT -5
There were far too many to attempt to block or redirect. Her previous strategy was not an option. There was only one way to avoid the alpha strike.
Mairsile took a deep breath ... and then seemed to disperse into the surrounding water like countless bubbles that popped and faded moments before the countless bolts would have impaled her, colliding with the barrier behind where she had been and popping like the surface corn snack.
The water inside the shields fell silent in the wake of the attack. It must have seemed as if Sedna was alone in the ring. But before the priestesses could even puzzle out the possibility of calling a forfeit, bubbles again formed in the water, as if the water was boiling or some air vent was expelling, and in a moment, Mairsile was again there in the water. Was she truly advanced enough to have manipulated her own density to such a degree?
She exhaled as she resolidified as if she had held that breath the entire time, then raised her hand, catching the breath in her hand as it circled back into an orb, then tossed it into the "air" and spiked it like a volleyball toward Sedna, fully expecting the other witch would attempt to prematurely detonate it somehow.
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