Jace sat in silence across the table; the reason for his childish, brooding sulk making her heart pang for his touch eluded her even now. He was immature, volatile, demanding. The notion that even after centuries of practising necromancy and inflicting suffering on the weak Lilliana may still have a nurturing 'tender' side made her stomach churn more than the stench of the dead who served her – she had gotten used to that a long time ago. When Lilliana sighed, Jace didn't have to ask why, he knew she yearned for him, he could read her thoughts, but still it wasn't good enough.
"I don't want your pity Lilliana, it is you who needs guidance and care, and raising the dead on a whim for your own selfish endeavours I would rather say you are the childish one". Jace scorned her inside her head, without even moving his lips, those supple, tender lips.
Lilliana's eyes flickered black as she held back a swell of anger, more at herself for letting the thought cross her mind, and exposing herself once again to the master of arrogance. Lilliana did not possess the ability to speak inside his mind, but she knew that concentrating on the right thought would get the message across, so she thought of touching herself. Pulling aside her top in her mind and caressing her breast. Getting carried away with her own thoughts, feeling the warmth pulse through her thighs she closed her eyes, when she opened them again Jace was stood beside her chair with that offensive, arrogant smirk plastered across his face.
Lilliana stole her thoughts away and stood, one hand grasping his throat and the other grasping his testicles, just hard enough that she could hear the sharp intake of breath, the scent of fear always made her lustful. She whispered in his ear with unmatched venom.
"Let's just see how much you want my pity tonight; and one comment about my age and I swear I'll bite it off and feed it to the cadavers" She felt his manhood swell and throb against her palm, and while he groaned with the anticipation of being dominated Lilliana flushed with satisfaction, so it took a mild threat, and selling her soul for eternal youth, but even at more centuries old than she cared to remember, this ripe young mind mage was hers for the taking, Sorin would be proud.
Jace closed his eyes as Lilliana dropped to her knees, and braced himself for the one drawback of sharing your bed with a necromancer. The necessary evil of her taking him out of his trousers with a hand as ice cold as her heart, even when Lili was in a rage it was cold anger, the only capacity for warmth that remained was at the mercy of her tongue and the yearning between her thighs. The fact that Jace could feel the warmth of her tongue and not the blades of her teeth reassured him that he had not called her Lili out loud, she never appreciated how calling her Lilliana made her look her age despite her commanding, sultry and austere beauty. Jace closed his eyes and enjoyed a rare moment of being able to relax enough around Lilliana to truly appreciate her womanly talents, unfortunately, it was short lived.
"Jace, seriously, she's old enough to be your mother! Ten times over but who's counting right?" This would have pained Jace as much as Lilliana had the chastising slap on the shoulder not given away her jealousy. The thoughts of a fire mage were invariably difficult to read, too volatile and sporadic, but the tremble in her touch did not have the confidence of her forked tongue.
As Lilliana rose her milk-like skin began to crawl with black tendrils, spreading across her skin like ornate tattoos ebbing a purple glow. A corpulent arm burst through the floorboards and gripped Chandra's thigh. To Lilliana's delight, being barely a teenager, Chandra was incurably squeamish and convulsed so severely as to make her look mentally retarded in front of Jace. As she contained herself she flicked her wrist and summoned a fireball above her palm, she knew better than to challenge Lilliana so instead she burned away the summoned corpse and settled for a scowl.
Lilliana however, was subdued entirely the instant she laid eyes on Chandra's companion, rarely is a woman some centuries old left without words, but even more seldom that anyone finds them when faced with the piercing red gaze of none other than Sorin Markov.
"Suck off someone your own age" he jested, giving her a knowing, tender stare. Lilliana melted.
"Eeewww pensioner porn!" Chandra cackled as she took Jace by the arm. Jace winced and wondered if she could be so naive not to realise that a Vampire as old as Sorin Markov could rend the flesh from her bones simply by parting his lips, but Chandra had stayed true to her word, she had let him to her after a lifetime apart, he had found his gothic beauty once more. Staggeringly he appeared not to notice.
Being a womaniser and a whore, largely due to his stunning looks and only slightly owing to the manipulation his gift of mindspeak offered him, Jace settled on a new prize. Knowing now that Chandra yearned for him after all these years being locked from her mind almost made her a prize worth winning, a rarity to say the least. Using his gifts he lifted the memory of the past ten minutes from two of the most powerful women in the multiverse, but not before he had re-covered his modesty. Lilliana looked shocked all over again, Chandra looked lost and in her insecurity giggled like a school girl in front of the handsome young stud she admired.
Sorin gave him a gracious smile of understanding, Jace knew far better than to pull that sort of shit on him, and Sorin liked that he knew that.
"Now you have your end away with a beautiful young fire mage, politely fuck off"
"Whoa, mindspeak too? You really did get all the perks" then Jace was stricken with panic. "Sorry about Lili, truly" he murmured in his mind as he kissed Chandra so deep and passionate as to take her breath away.
Sorin could sense his fear but he admired his spirit and dared to think he saw some of his younger self in him, besides, wiping the last ten minutes from Lilliana's memory done him a favour he couldn't have done for himself. He respected the fact that monogamy was an impossibility when mortals had been born and died in the time he'd been away. He laughed and then pulled off a trick that every man since time began was jealous of, mindspeaking to Jace while reasoning away his apparently spontaneous bellowing laugh to the two women before him and being entirely believed by both of them!
Jace took "Fine, now fuck off and fuck Chandra before I decide not to forgive you" as his cue to leave, and with a sense of urgency Chandra put down to lust rather than a desire to avoid the imminent and permanent separation of his flesh from his bones, Jace led Chandra away into the next room.
As they entered Chandra flicked her fingers and lit the dozen candles in the room, though in her enthusiasm they somewhat burst into flame, narrowly sparing the curtains and the drape of the four poster bed. Jace barely had to undress Chandra at all, the modesty of her supple breasts saved only by a single iron clasp on her iron corset, laying her down on the bed Jace enjoyed the true warmth of a woman for the first time since last week, when he had returned to the 'thrice widowed by the same man' siren of the night.
He ran his tongue over Chandra's toned slender midriff, causing her to contort her muscles and arch her back with pleasure, slipping off his robe and removing his tunic, Chandra looked pleasantly surprised by his physique, mind mages were not known for brimming biceps, and Jace was no exception, but what muscles he did possess were shapely and firm. Chandra reached out a hand and ran it down his chest, mainly to ensure that as a master of Illusion, she wasn't being duped by him. She concealed it as an excuse to score her nails over his skin and make him whimper like her new favourite pet, of course.
Jace ran his fingers through her flame-red hair as he searched for the second and final iron clasp about her iron-link skirt. Once he had succeeded he grasped her buttock and pulled her into him, moving down to tease her nipple with his tongue and only slightly concerned that he needed no mind tricks to deduce she that she was nervous, an obstacle that needs no consideration when bedding Lilliana, not to say she was a whore, at least not as much as he was, but he respected that it must be a perpetual and lonely existence waiting for Sorin to disappear from plane to plane warring with entire worlds for years on end only to get himself killed on the way home and wait another several years for the inconvenience of re-ascension.
Meanwhile Sorin wasted no time in lifting Lilliana onto the table with his thick, brawny arms. Hey never knew how much time they had, so she was grateful that he didn't waste any, besides, she was never one for romance – too sentimental. She ripped open Sorin's black leather tunic and embraced his flesh without fear of chilling his marble-like skin. Smooth as glass, she often wondered if he retained any feeling at all, he always assured her he did, and he reacted to her touch well enough.
Bearing his fangs, she cocked her head and pushed her veins to the surface of her skin, revealing two small scars made for the first time centuries ago, and they were lost in the bloodlust. Sorin was the only one who could truly make her feel helpless in his arms, vulnerability was a feeling she usually detested, but knowing he would travel across the multiverse and endure conversing with juveniles such as Chandra Nalaar to find his way back to her, she could forgive him. Rather than the sheer brutal dominance she so effortlessly inflicted on other men, he fought her back and forth in an endless power struggle to be the one to satisfy the other, Sorin usually won, but the competition made sex exciting in a way nothing else could. Indeed her penchant to dominate men often came from boredom of repetition, but not now. Not pinned down by his vicious strength and intoxicated by his blood red gaze, now she felt like she would succumb to climax once again. She hit him for having the audacity to pleasure her, hard; he licked the blood from his lip and smiled.
"Is that all you've got?"
Chandra being on edge threw Jace off; he was giving her himself, his affection, his body, and getting nothing back for himself. To make matters worse, her unease with the whole situation made her body tense and frigid. Jace tried to overcome it and shrug it off, but the animal moans from the next room made him feel cheated, after a few more minutes of determined caresses and anything he could do to evoke some reciprocation he finally gave in as Lilliana gave out.
"Look, what's your problem? Why are you so nervous?" he snapped, nearly drowned out by Lilliana's climax and the smashing of whatever had been flung from the table in the heat of the moment. Chandra recoiled put out a finger to silence him.
"My problem and why I'm nervous are two different things" she whispered, the flames on the candles drew inwards towards them, as though a breeze blew from all directions toward the center of the room. "My problem is that your talents stop inside your mind, I'm nervous because I'm about to destroy a six millennia old Vampire and his bitch. The question you need to be asking yourself is are you going to help me or burn with them". Chandra's eyes turned blood red and her hair burst into flames, burning Jace's hand as he started back off of her.
"What? What makes you think a child like you is a match for Sorin and Lilliana? When you fail, he will murder us both!"
Chandra rose from the bed still stark naked, her skin impervious to the flames they spread down her arms and into her hands, separating once again so that only her hair and hands remained aflame. She smiled wryly at Jace and flexed her neck.
"Well you really are all talk and no trousers aren't you Jace Beleren? The price on Sorin's head is the highest on the plane, and I hear vampires burn real good, especially when they're distracted in the throes of lust…"
"You are insane, fucking fire mages!" Jace exclaimed as his mind reached for mana to soothe his hand. Chandra looked straight through him in a world of her own, and continued speaking more to herself than to him.
"…but you are right, if I fail we're both finished, so I suggest you throw in to help me succeed and stand to make a cut, otherwise I'm sure you'll burn just as easily as he'll rend your flesh, and it would be a shame to cremate such a pretty face."
By the time she'd finished talking she was walking past him and to the door, naked and wielding fire and clearly assuming Jace was about to watch her back. The moans from the dining room were continuing, Jace made a snap decision and snarled behind her, he would far sooner make an enemy of a jumped up fire mage than of Sorin Markov.
Chandra swung open the door with a flick of her foot and walked calmly into the room before unleashing a primal scream and a volley of flame that set the entire place alight. The walls, the ceiling, the floors, doused in rage and hellfire. Smoke bellowed through the room in seconds concealing everything from sight. Chandra twirled in a sadistic dance of death, hurling fireballs and cackling with delight, until an arm from beyond the grave ripped through the floor and knocked her to the ground. She glared back towards the bedroom to see Jace standing in the doorway, with Lilliana suspended surrounded in a purple aura, black tendrils emblazoned on her skin.
Jace had never seen Lilliana utilise her magic unclothed, and it satisfied his puerile curiosity to confirm that her tendrils did in fact caress every inch of her flesh. Casually lifting an arm he threw up a sheet of ice to deflect Chandra's blow, but then something happened for which he was entirely unprepared. A damning chant began behind him. He had warned Sorin and Lilliana both, surely that was worthy of sparing his life! Surely Sorin's love was worthy of sparing Lilliana's life! She shuddered and dropped to the floor, he imagined on the other side of the sheet ice Chandra too would be clutching her ears, trying to resist as the disease spread through them like a million ravenous scute bugs gnawing their inners.
Jace could only hope that Chandra would anticipate his next move, in far too much pain to speak to her mind he lunged and grabbed Lilliana, throwing them both away from the doorway. He threw down the sheet ice and prayed to Titania that she had the foresight and endurance to react. She did, through the clouds of billowing smoke a ball of flame burst through the doorway and exploded in a flash of heat. The chanting subsided to choking and agonising growls and gurgles, as the three united by their new common enemy charged into the room Sorin was lit like a bonfire, writhing and cursing as his silver hair and porcelain skin began to char filthy black.
Lilliana burst into tears, Chandra was exhausted from exertion and her hair began to fade, it was up to Jace to finish the job, but then a horrendous crack overwhelmed them all and a whole section of the roof caved inwards, no time to finish the job, they had to leave before the mansion collapsed ending them all. Sorin gathered his senses, shut out the pain, closed his eyes. Only his millennia of experience and practise wielding his powers could bring him back from death now, with his enemies prevented from delivering the fatal blow in his weakened state, he focussed his entire mind on the seas of Ravnica. As he and Jace began to planeswalk away, Jace realised Chandra was far too exhausted and Lilliana far too distraught to gather their focus. So Lilli really did have a heart after all, Chandra had expected his protection, Lilliana had taken him in, just as surprising to him that Lilliana could love, Jace realised in that moment he had a conscience too.
Mustering all of his strength Jace abandoned planeswalking and directed his efforts to a more tangible means of escape, the women, he was certain, would sooner settle their differences in this life than the next, and with that he pulled at the fabric of reality, shaping a phantom doorway in the wall. The open air rushed in and the flames roared. Beams and timber cracked all around them. Jace moved them the fastest way he knew how, whipping the wind around behind them and using it to send them flying through the opening on the air and into the night. As Jace hit the ground his concentration broke, like a tendon snapping his mind recoiled in pain as the doorway began to close. His last vision before he blacked out was of Sorin phasing out into the Blind Eternities. He had left the plane alive, whether he would be able on deaths door to navigate the Eternities and find salvation was uncertain, but Jace feared if anyone had the power to do so it was Sorin only.
With Jace unconscious and Chandra barely, Lilliana gathered herself on the grass just in time to register the whole outer wall of the house begin to topple out towards them, part of her wished to let it fall if only for the satisfaction of knowing Chandra would perish. The demons would restore her while her debt was outstanding. Burned away, mind dis-assembled, flesh rendered from bone; this the demons could not mend, a crushed body was simple. Unfortunately they would not exert themselves to restore Jace and though it pained her to admit it, he had saved her life tonight, twice.
Lilliana let out an inhuman howl as she curried favour with the dead, and moments before the wall crashed down the earth opened up and embraced them, swallowing them under. The crash above was barely a thud and no sooner had it come and gone than the earth opened back up, leaving three exhausted mages naked and disorientated in the debris. Which of them would survive would depend entirely on who would recover first.
For a being who had endured countless millennia, the following three minutes felt longer by far, as Sorin staggered desperately through the Blind Eternities he could only hope no more of his enemies would intercept him. The vivid colours of Aether stretched out before him, swilling and writhing on the featureless landscape, on the horizon he could see it; the translucent curtain shimmered, taunting him in the distance. By the time he arrived there he realised he had no memory of the journey, he was so close to death that all his senses had shut down, Sorin blacked out and fell, and only blind fortune guided him through the curtain as he did so, struggled to open his eyes, the melted flesh sticking the left shut. He noticed his arm consisted only of bone and ash as he fell through the sky, then he noticed nothing but the consuming chill as he plunged through the surface of the water and into the depths.
When he finally came to his senses, he thanked Chandra from the bottom of his rotten heart for burning him so severely that the elves had not recognised he was a vampire when they set about his dressings. Washed up on the shore of the Tangle, Sorin was deep in the forest, his flesh had reformed under his bandages and a young elf was bending over setting down some Wumpus meat on a table beside him. Perfect, he was starving, he licked his lips and sunk his teeth into her neck, and as he fed, he plotted his vengeance.