What is this place?

[Roxilicious]

the 29th day of Consido, 1593 – around 9:00 AM
15 miles northeast of Acerbus Umbra

A desolate, barren wasteland. Hope was lost in the grey skies and black earth. Even the most delicate footstep raised waves of ash that slowly settled back down to the lifeless ground. It was a dreary, cloudy morning, even for Pertinax. Any rays of replenishing sunlight that typically reached the cold, unwelcoming soil of the the ashlands were completely absent today.

Darcy Nightingale, so close to what she once called home, aimlessly wandered the open expanse of ashen despair. She walked with a lost gait, as if her mind were not fully connected to her body. Her steps were off-beat and entirely random, and she stumbled a bit like a drunk. Inconveniently adding to her external appearance as an intoxicated lunatic, she was mostly muttering to herself, though no set volume existed in her words. The only thing that appeared to be in sync on her person was the way she talked and the way she walked.

"I miss you I miss you I miss you," she whispered quickly, swinging a bit as she walked. And then she stopped dead in her tracks, turned around with wide eyes, and shouted, "Why?!"

It's not like anyone was listening.

The shapeshifting Nightingale returned on her path in the general direction of Acerbus Umbra and continued to talk to herself. She was mostly hunched over and looking at the ground with frantic eyes, fiddling with the ends of her hair to give her hands something to do.

"Is your daddy home?" Darcy asked aloud. Her voice was kept low, but she stammered and it sounded like she was trying to talk while trying not to cry.

She wasn't crying, though.

A sudden shriek escaped her throat, and she stopped on a dime yet again. "There can't be more than two of you!" she exclaimed loudly, unblinking as she stared straight at the nothingness ahead of her.

And then she looked left and right for a second, lowered her head, and leaned in, as if whispering a secret to someone. "Who are you?" she asked, her breathing interrupted and broken from its regular pattern.

There was a moment's silence as she daren't say another word or even take a small breath. Then she shrieked again, turned around, and a lightning bolt exploded into the sky from her hand. It illuminated the dark, empty morning for a mere second, casting shadows upon her sunken, depraved face. It looked genuinely sad, as if gravity were pulling her mouth into a frown.

"Oh, it has an idea!" Darcy said suddenly, her face lighting up as bright as her electric dance in the sky. A blue light glowed around both of her open hands, and when she put her hands together, the blue light intensified. It wasn't long before the same blue light appeared next to her, about six feet off the ground, and created a figure from top to bottom. She had conjured up a friend.

"Hello."

It was a ghost. A ghost that could not talk. He stared at her blankly, a face so devoid of emotion that it made King Falkor himself look like a hormonal widow.

Upon receiving no response, Darcy grew angry. Her face twisted with rage, and it eerily reflected the faces of her two older siblings quite well. She was growing impatient. "Am I drowning to you?! Answer me!"

[Holly]

Dia yawned, kicking a rock across the barren land. Aria was dead and it was time for her next move, she just had to wait for the perfect moment to strike. She wanted to wait until Holly had recovered from her precious mentor's death. Then she could kill her, make Falkor feel even more horrible, then kill him too. The only problem with waiting is that it took soooo long! She needed a way to speed things along. Maybe she could trick someone?

Just as she thought of returning to the castle and finding her way back to one of those empty guestrooms, a lightning bolt jumped into the air and she heard someone. Interesting.

Without hesitation, she ran toward the location.

"Oh dear, you're completely insane," Her laugh echoed around Darcy, cruel and cold. Standing about fifteen feet behind the crazy Nightingale was a Dia in a pitch black, sleeveless cloak. Her hood was up, hiding most of her face save for the sinister smirk that creeped into her features. A waist-long pink braid blew in what little wind there was and in her right hand was a large scythe with a recently sharpened end. Just for her next victim.

"And just what is your name?" She asked in what seemed like a polite voice.

[Roxilicious]

Bliss swelled in Darcy's imperfect face. She opened her eyes even wider with joy and smiled, her mouth open as if she were about to laugh. Her back was still to Dia, but she faced her conjured ghost friend.

"You do care!" she yelped, leaping into the intangible conjuration. She would've fallen flat on her face, but her reaction time was quick. The magical essence disappeared when she went through him. And instead of stumbling and falling or tripping and slamming her face into a inch-thick layer of volcanic ash, she gasped, put her hands in front of her, and did a cartwheel.

When she stood, her body was lowered to the ground as if she were about to sneak around. She still did not face Dia. Darcy glanced all over, eyes still wide with insanity. And then she turned her head as left as it would go, and her eyes were as far left in their sockets as possible such that she could still see, and she looked at Dia, right at her smirk, and she smiled.

Slowly but surely, Darcy recovered from her startling maneuver. Very slowly, in fact. She moved as if time itself had been slowed, standing at her full height and turning to face Dia with her crazy, electric gaze. It almost looked like she had fangs when she smiled. Her canines were so prominent.

Instead of answering Dia right away, however, Darcy looked down at her palms. They were black from the ash. "Looks like it's going to be a slushy winter," she muttered, cocking her head to the right. She then smiled slowly and looked up quickly at Dia with an almost proud, satisfied face.

"I'm Darcy," she said, followed by a hyperactive, rapid laugh. "I think. Darcy Something? Nightly-Hail I think. Perhaps. It must've hailed nightly at the beginnings of my family's history. Pity. Hail hits hard. Yor'gis-Mar hits hard. Salt in the wounds. Hello."


ooc.
* yor-GIZ-mar pronunciation

[Holly]

Her mix-matched eyes narrowed, though Darcy wasn't able to see them. Nightly-Hail sounded awfully familiar. Of course, thinking about it quickly, there was absolutely no way this woman was related to the Nightingales. The Nightingales were crazy, but not as mentally messed up as Darcy. And she looked nothing like them. Falkor was extremely handsome and Roxanna had an elegance about her that seemed almost wild. Darcy, however, looked nothing of royalty.

"Nightly-Hail sounds like an interesting last name. And it fits you so well," Dia complimented in her pretend friendly voice. Why in the world would she compliment a lunatic.

Dia rethought her main ideas of this girl. If she was so infact a Nightingale, she might be able to give her some valuable information about the others. Weaknesses. It wouldn't be of any harm to just ask, would it?

The olisthir fiddled with her scythe, swinging it about without caution. Nonchalantly, she resumed talking, "But while it sounds all fine and dandy, I wonder if Nightingale sounds any better, hmm? Ringing any bells, Darcy?"

[Roxilicious]

Darcy smiled with her lips, eyes still wide. She had not blinked since the encounter. Perhaps she had never once blinked at all. It could be believable.

She cocked her head to the side very slowly, and then went the other way. Back and forth she waved her head slowly. Her smile was one of pleasure and content, the kind a king might have after a great feast. She almost started drooling.

Ringing any bells, Darcy?

It took a moment, but the Nightingale registered the words. Bells? Bells! Yes, yes, fabulous, lovely bells! Darcy's face lit up. Her effervescence was enough to illuminate the entire land and rid the brooding reputation it held.

"Bells!" she exclaimed, her big eyes mimicking the eyes of an innocent child. It hardly worked. Her pupils were too small and the black rings around them make her look like a possessed demon.

Gold and black light swirled around her right hand. She moved her gaze from Dia to her hand with the speed of flowing molasses, bewitched by the magic and eager for her conjuration. It was a classic bell, ornate in features.

Darcy rang the bell, still smiling with glee. "Bells, bells, bells!" she cried, creating more and more, even independent ones that rang in midair. The ashlands were full of ringing bells that sang at different pitches.

"Wait," she said suddenly, halting her magic. Every single bell fell to the ground, muted and lifeless. Darcy bent her knees and looked around, taking cautious steps. "Did you hear that?"

She dodge rolled on her side around Dia, standing up behind her, but facing the opposite direction. Her hawklike eyes scanned the open expanse of nothingness, and lo and behold, there was nothing. So, a fan of magic, Darcy teleported herself back in front of Dia, a short distance easily covered by an amateur of auxiliary magic.

"Must've been the wind," she said, smiling creepily, again with only her lips. "Do you have any... Strawberries?" This time, Darcy showed her teeth in her smile, and a flash of composed evil sparked in her eyes. That spark was perhaps one of the very few times when Darcy seemed to be thinking ahead of the moment, as if she had a plan and were not completely and totally insane.

[Holly]

Dia twitched as Darcy conjured up more and more bells. How she hated the sound of bells. It reminded her too much of the past. Without thinking much about it (mainly because she was having a hard time thinking with all the damn bells), she swatted the ones close to her away. And when they fell to the ground, she crushed one under her boot, pushing away the final thought of life when she actually lived with her mother. Gods, what did she care?

She rubbed her temples, watching Darcy carefully. The olisthir wasn't truly convinced that this girl was harmless. There was something wrong with her. Mentally, of course. Or, who knows? Maybe Darcy was a better actress than her and she was an assassin. If anyone in Acerbus Umbra were to actually figure out that she was the one that killed Aria, she would imagine someone would be sent after her.

The Olisthir gripped her scythe a bit tighter as Darcy started moving around and teleporting, a bit more on edge with her paranoid thoughts.

Dia didn't reply to hearing anything. Her ears were still ringing from the bells before. However, when Darcy asked about strawberries, she shrugged, swirling her hand in the air. From thin air, a bag fell into her hand. "Sure, I have strawberries," She took one out of the bag and ate it. "There's a price for them, though."

[Roxilicious]

A price.

The misguided cheer on Darcy's face slowly faded away. Her smile dipped down into a frown, one not of sadness, but extreme discontent. A price? She paid for nothing. She made a living on murder, so how would she pay for the strawberries in Dia's hands? This was really quite the enigma for her.

Expertly, Darcy conjured up a five items. A floating puddle of grease, a floating ball of flames, and three silver daggers. She tossed them into the air in a circular pattern, first into the grease and second into the flames. Her midair conjurations then disappeared, and Darcy began to juggle her flaming daggers.

The smile returned to her face, and she looked at Dia with her wide, electric-yellow stare, continuing her random juggling spree, which she performed with surprising excellence.

"Perhaps, Miss Stranger, it will be you who pays a price?" she suggested casually, returning her eyes to the flaming daggers. "I wonder what Raemar has in his crystal ball for you?"

Darcy began to hum an eerie tune to herself. Just a second later, she allowed all three daggers to consecutively fall into the earth below her, blade into the soil, before they disappeared from thin air.

"Sometimes I question the purpose of two moons," she said aloud, grabbing her arms with her opposite hands. She shivered. "I often question the concept of family, too. What is family? Do you have family? Being alone is much better. It's not like you're ever truly alone, anyway."

Darcy leaned in close to Dia and looked straight into her eyes. "They ... are everywhere..." she whispered. "And so are you!" It didn't take long for her to quickly perk up again and raise the volume of her voice, as well as its tone.

[Holly]

The Olisthir was quick to throw up a barrier just incase some of Darcy's daggers were to stray too far from the juggling act. She was still having a hard time determining if the girl was a threat or not. She had decent magical skills, but she still had yet to prove if she could use them properly. For all she knew, Darcy could just be making random things appear and working with what she got.

Once Darcy dropped her knives, she dropped her defenses slightly. While she wanted to keep her shield up, she didn't want to waste magical power.

Something bitter stabbed deep in Dia's heart when Darcy mentioned something about family. Did she have family? Did she ever have family? Maybe once, when her mother actually wanted her instead of some stupid, blonde airhead. And she never had a father. He was dead in the ground. So, thinking about it some more, she never truly had a family. Not a full one. For once, in Dia's mind, Darcy's sentence made sense.

Who needed a family? Being alone is much better.

"I believe I misworded that. I don't want money, don't need it and I don't care about it. All I want is a favor," Dia stepped closer to Darcy. Her braided, pink hair fell away into locks of golden blonde, her mix-matched eyes melted into light blue, and her clothes changed to much more casual attire. Her scythe disappeared as she handed the bag of strawberries to Darcy.

"All you have to do is come with me," She grinned as she fully shifted into her Acerbus Umbra disguise. Dia placed her index finger on Darcy's forehead, teleporting them to Castle Umbra.