Board Thread:Roleplaying/@comment-5583506-20150404005102/@comment-5583506-20150409022717

Borgus took note of the white-haired man. "Is there... anything I can help you with?"

-

Sibern stepped softly amongst the corridors of the brothel. It seemed like an entire different place, now when there there was no fornicating people around. In fact, the atmosphere felt rather... unsettling. The prostitutes were all quiet and observed the Investigator under silence as he carefully examined the walls.

Mi'Siri, the proprietress, seemed unnerved. He guessed that she wasn't used to have lawmen invading her business, but then again she probably believed it was for the best.

As Sibern got closer to Sybil's room he could hear someone from the room next door.

There she sat.... Embla... A stunningly beautiful Breton woman with long hair of chestnut brown. Her blind, dead eyes positively sparked with a mysterious kindness.

"Do you need any help, Investigator?" asked the woman.

Sibern immediately presumed that she had meant it as an invitation. "Uhm, no thanks", he said as he entered her chambers, looking for a secret passageway. "Just... sit there. I am looking for something."

"Like what? Maybe I can help? I tend to see the little details."

Sibern looked into her blind eyes and raised an eyebrow. "Is that so?"

She gave him a sweet smile.

"Sorry", he said. "I don't mean to be rude, but I can't see how your... defect can be of any aid to me."

"You seek the Pale Man", she replied as he was about to exit her chambers.

He turned around, shocked to hear her utter the name. ''She knows? This woman knows!''

He put his arms to the side. "Maybe I am? How can you tell?"

"There are many things I see... and again many things I wish I hadn't seen. The Pale Man is a character with a long memory and a long history, stretching far back in time, old as sin."

"Skip the riddles. If you know anything, please, tell me."

"I don't know any more than you do now, Investigator", answered the Breton enigmatically. "I know for a fact that the Pale Man is the one killing people in this town, but I do not know what it is he seeks. But in the end... we will both find out."

Sibern lowered his eyebrows. It was clear to him that this woman, this prostitute, knew more than she let out, which was strange considering her youth and the fact that she was blind. Somehow it reminded him of someone...

"Come here", she said reached out her hand for him to take.

He was reluctant at first, seeing her dressed in nothing but a pink, transparent nightgown which left little to imagination. He didn't want others to think that he was there for anything else than his duty. But eventually he took her hand.

"Kneel, Investigator", she said tenderly, her voice as soft as rolling clouds on a dusky sky.

His muscles obeyed her words when his mind didn't and he knelt before her as he felt a warm surge course through his body, providing him with an even better experience than the moon sugar could do. She took his head between her hands and gently touched his temples.

"You are Sibern Cold-Castle", she said. "Investigator... A man of the law through and through..."

"What has this to do with the Pale...?"

"Hush", she interrupted. "Don't talk." She then closed her eyes and began to tell him everything about himself, things that no one but he knew. "You are Sibern Cold-Castle", she repeated. "Lord Sibern Cold-Castle. You hate injustice and crime. You want to make the world a better place... yet there is darkness in you as well, Investigator. A darkness which runs through your veins like a poison. It will devour you eventually if you don't get yourself rid of it. This darkness manifests itself as a contempt for mankind in general... a cynical belief that the world would be a better place if there were no mankind... Is that true, Investigator?"

Sibern was in shock. He didn't know why she was telling him all this, but everything she had said was correct. It felt as if she had known him his entire life. Who was this woman?

"Y-yes", he stuttered, sounding slightly ashamed.

"This darkness took hold of you some years ago, I understand. You witnessed an act of a most evil deed. This image has been burnt into your eyes, into your blood... It has become a part of what you loathe and who you are. This particular image or this darkness, call it what you wish, feeds upon your continuous thoughts that all of mankind are created from the same common misery and will be shaped thereafter. It will eventually grow stronger, and in the end it will make you become the very thing you seem to loathe so much, unless you fight it."

He didn't care how she knew, but he wanted to know what he could do about it. "What should I do?"

She looked into his eyes, still smiling. "In the end, you will know what to do, Investigator. You will be tested. The Pale Man will be your test. He will test your courage and your ideals, and when he does... you mustn't give in... If you do value your ideals that pure evil must be stopped... then you must first defeat your own weaknesses..."

She then took his head and guided it to her lips, placing a firm kiss on his lips. It felt good for him, yet wrong at the same time. He couldn't. It wouldn't be right. Besides, she was a prostitute. This was not by the book.

"Let her go, Sibern", she whispered in his ear. "You have to let her go. That's the only way..."

''Let go of who? ''He actually knew who, but he kept denying himself that it was the same person he assumed that Embla was referring to. But maybe that was just what Embla had meant? The mental image that had scarred his soul, the darkness that made him question the boundaries between good and evil in mankind had been the gruesome murder scene of his own sister.

''Let go of her? Why couldn't I save her?''

"The only way you can save her, Sibern, is by defeating the evil that has come to this town. The Pale Man will be your test. Pass the test and you will be clean, purged from any sense of guilt, granting a peace of mind to both yourself and your sister. Defeat the darkness within yourself and you will find the strength to overcome the shadow of the Pale Man, Sibern. Let go of her and live again."

He had no idea as to why she was kissing him. For fun? For the sake of pity? Because she saw a potential client? He didn't want it to end though.

She kissed him again, this time more passionately. "This is a farewell, Investigator. After this I doubt that we will be seeing each other again..."

''Why? Are you going somewhere?''

He wanted to ask her, but he was completely intoxicated by her touching and kissing. He had just met her, but for some reason she felt as if she had been his lover and romantic interest for years. He cared little for why he felt this way...

As she started to undo her nightgown she made a nod towards the door. "Close the doors, Sibern. Let me help to ease that mind of yours if for but a brief moment. Let me chase your shadows away. There are many things I need to share with you..."

He did as she said and locked the doors from the inside, not wanting to be disturbed. He somehow felt disgusted by himself, but he believed that this was not what Embla wanted him to think of himself. Those hateful thoughts were all but a part of that horrid shadow that had been looming over him since the day when his sister was killed. The sense of guilt and helplessness had latched itself to his shoulders ever since.

As he tossed his clothes on the floor and crawled on top of her in her soft bed she looked up at him and touched his cheek. "Kiss me goodbye, Investigator", she sighed as they embraced.