My first Fanfiction ever... Mind you this originally started out as an assignment, write a narrative from the perspective of a guest in attendance at Prince Prospero's ball in Edgar Allen Poe's Masque of the Red Death... When I heard that my eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. So many ideas just came to me and it was a bit over whelming.
xD Mind you a lot of the characters that I put in this story are from Rp's that I part took in. Most of them are MY original characters that no matter what you think I did come up with on my own. The characters that are not mine are Vincent, Gilgamesh and Prince Prospero.
You "might" recognize Gilgamesh from the Anime Fate/Stay Night, but that isn't where I got him from. I've never seen Fate, I only ever RP with persons who decided to make their own Gilgamesh. So yeah, that's where he came from.
There will probably be a few grammatical errors in the story. Don't get me wrong, I try like hell to spell things correctly, but they tend to slip from my notice. I'm trying to fix my problem of making ridiculously long paragraphs (which may result in even more problems). But nonetheless I hope you enjoy this story, I don't think I've ever dedicated so much time to a piece of writing in my LIFE O_o
Deaths Temptress
Chapter 1 Entrance
A single strand of blonde hair blew into my face; I frowned and tucked the hair behind my ear. My long blond hair was hidden beneath a cloak, to protect it from the wind that was whipping around like mad. My red eyes stayed fixed to the ground staring at the shoes that my sister had so painstakingly picked out. They then moved up her white dress to look at her face.
My sister is beautiful, like I am, but in a slightly different way. Her hair is a silvery almost white blonde where mine glows as a vibrant gold; I often think that it should be the other way around based upon out varied dispositions.
Her eyes are a lighter red than mine, and always sparkle with innocence, while mine are a deep maroon that shimmers with an eternal longing. Her voice which always rings out high and full of energy snapped me out of my daze, and I sighed after hearing the brash comment that escaped her lips.
"Prince Prospero is such a strange man. His house is so bizarre!" I turned to my sister throwing her a harsh glare, hissing my response.
"Sh, don't be so rude! If he hears you he might be insulted and throw you out to suffer the Red Death!" At my reprimand she clamped her mouth shut, I sighed again.
My sister Leben has always been a very impulsive young thing, with an un-yielding determination and innocence that is rivaled by no other. Our brother Laune whom was standing right behind us was in contrast, calm and usually the one keeping Leben from insulting the wrong person and as a result being hung from a chandelier.
Laune being the good brother that he is, set his hand on Leben's head using the nickname that he had lovingly given the silver-haired girl a long time ago. "Don't worry Nachgiebig(un-yeilding); Liebe is just worried for you." He smiled gently at me and my nerves calmed.
I wanted to be mad at Laune for calming me like he's always been able to do, but I couldn't do it. My brother had a way about him, a calming, alluring air that you couldn't help but be drawn to. He looked so smug with his platinum blond hair and calming dark red eyes, I wanted to wipe that smirk off his face, but there was no besting this one.
...
With the turn of my head and one look up at the duke's home of which we stood in front of, I was reminded that we; the Tod's were invited to Prince Prospero's party. A masked ball that was sure to be wonderful, bizarre and even horrifying. The Prince had invited us to his party because of our close friendship with him, or in other words, he wanted three of his bizarre trinkets to be present at his ball.
Most people knew us as the "Death triplets" a name given to us in correspondence with our names. My name, Liebe Von Tod quite literally translates into "Love of Death"; Laune's translates into "Whim of Death", while Leben's translates into "Life from Death". Why our parent's named us such is beyond me, the names have brought us mostly grief, and not at all a little of it.
However our names somehow suit us perfectly, for example: I am always drawn to the end of things, mostly to places like cemeteries, hospitals, and funeral homes. It's a love of the end, the desire to be close to it, a morbid curiosity that baffles most.
My sister Leben however is always drawn to the beginnings of things, like the nursery wings of hospitals, the brand new buildings constructed, and to the neighbor's houses to play with their babies. She loves the brand new, the fresh, and because of that love she seemed to be eternally young. Among the Tod's the family of death, she emerges as life, "Life from Death" exactly as her name suggests.
Then there is Laune, he is something else entirely, mostly calm, never wants much, he enjoys the present and lives in the moment. However, his decisions hold much weight and if he wishes for something to happen, then we must follow his whim. He does not have a certain place that he is drawn to; however, he always avoids babies, the new, the fresh, the dead, and the exceedingly old.
The door of the duke's home suddenly swung open and Prince Prospero himself stood there in his bizarre splendor, staring down at the three trinkets he had invited to his party. He grinned and walked over with a stride to greet us. We bowed our heads deeply in respect. The prince took my hand kissing it lightly, then did the same to Leben, and shook Laune's hand.
"Welcome my friends, to the Masked Ball! Come, come! Do come inside, out of the cold!" The three of us were shuffled inside, to a borderline horrifying display, as the door slammed behind us I attempted to keep myself from balking at the sight.
There was blue everywhere in varying shades and hues. A magnificent tripod hearth caught my attention immediately, as the effect of its light gave everything a ghastly sight. I looked around at everything noting the oddity of it all, how bizarre.
My attention was soon drawn to all the masks, the arrays of different colors; blue, red, gold, silver, and even stained glass. The nobles in attendance hadn't been shy about showing their importance. I too felt a sense of pride, I had a crescent moon mask that was dotted with flecks of gold, and golden stars hanging from the tips of the crescent. Half of my mask covered my face, covering one eye and half of my mouth, the other side of my face bare.
Of course, this mask was in contrast with my sister's. A golden sun that shone with a radiance that could not be ignored. I had noted that as her nose and forehead were covered her mouth was uncovered, so that everyone could hear her speak. I giggled a little at the thought, Leben always had to talk.
My brother however, chose to don a simple black mask, one that covered only his eyes. Leben had tried to convince him to wear a mask that resembled a knight's helmet, but he shook his head and chose the simple mask.
...
I was a bit alarmed when I heard the door lock, and turned sharply to see that the Prince had locked the door. I frowned as he explained that he was protecting us, I was skeptical of his words, but nonetheless I still understood. Even my love of death would not compel me to leave the compounds of these walls; the red death was a painful grotesque death. I found it strangely alluring but I did not dare to touch it. I did not wish to die, which was rather ironic all things considered.
Letting those thoughts pass me by my attention turned back to the room, I looked at each odd ornament and the awkward pieces of furniture; all of which were varying shades of blue. It all oddly reminded me of Leben, how she loved beginnings. I concluded that Leben would be spending much of her time in this room. With one look in her direction I knew that I was right; she had already begun to dance gaily with a man of brown hair. I smiled gently, and began to wander around. I wanted to explore.
...
"Liebe, over here!"
I stopped to turn my head, Laune was gesturing for me to come with him into the next room. I stood still for a while staring at Laune, not for any particular reason then nodded at him and proceeded towards the door.
After stepping through the door I looked down the hall and frowned, it was very strange and had the quality of a maze. My head began to spin as I walked down the hall, but I found that it wasn't as maze like as I had come to believe, it was simply a sort of illusion.
Laune and I walked into the next room, and were assaulted by purple, an amazing amount of purple. I blinked hard, and looked again to see that my eyes were not playing tricks on me. At first glance it seemed as if very few were present in the room, but if you looked harder you would see that there was an amazing amount of people, in cloths that somehow matched the color of the walls and furniture.
Laune grinned at this room, enjoying the strange effect, while I grimaced. My eyes hurt, it looked to me as if the walls were shifting and rustling. I gripped Laune's hand and hurriedly began searching for the way out, bumping into a quite a few bodies along the way; it was extremely hard to navigate through this sea of bodies.
After stumbling past a purple elephant fountain I found myself by the door. It too had been painted the same shade of purple as the wall, which made it difficult to find. I breathed in an exasperated sigh of relief that I had finally located the door, and quickly shuffled myself as well as a reluctant Laune through it.
The two of us rushed a room of green, and I felt myself relax instantly. It felt almost as if someone had tailored a room for me, or more specifically for people my age. I looked over at Laune and could simply tell that he too felt the same sense of belonging to the room as I did. I smiled brightly and spun around happily, grabbing Laune's hands, and began dancing with him.
We danced for a while before we were taken away by different partners; Laune had been taken away by Whitney Farreh a silver-haired beauty (one of the many children that were in the Farreh family). The Farreh's were very close acquaintance of the Tod's. So close that we were often invited to family gatherings. At one time I had heard that our families were planning to join, but the talk had all dissolved into rumors, but by the adoring look in my brother's eyes as he danced with Whitney, I could tell how those rumors had started.
I on the other hand found myself being taken away by the second son of the Farreh family, a notorious and devilishly handsome playboy by the name Lexington Farreh (Lex for short). I knew Lex well; I had been one of the first girls he had charmed. In fact after charming me in the way that he did, he soon found that he enjoyed what he called "the sport" of courting. I had been so angry with him when he told me this, that I slapped him across the face and told him he was a pompous pig. However we made up soon after, as he is too good a friend for me to stay mad at him for long.
When he grasped my hand and spirited me away to dance he did so with a smile that would make most swoon, all the while making witty comments to make me laugh. We danced until the end of the song then broke apart, moving to go and mingle with the rest at the party. I moved to the wall, catching my breath from dancing so gaily, and smiled up at the ceiling. The green walls seemed to smile back at me and the chairs placed around the room offered to hold me up. But I didn't take those offers because I saw a dear friend, Lea Farreh, or as some of us still called her, Billy.
