Author's Note: I'll be wrapping this up with a bonus chapter, and then moving into a second part of the fanfic with modded characters. Also, I don't know if I will make Ebony a modded character. I may just repost the basic idea for her, abilities, camping skills, special interactions, and unique yelps and speeches. If I do try my hand at modding her, she will likely be like The Fool modded character.
I've never modded a character, but I have been looking into it. I think it would be fun to play with this character.
It had been a number of days since they departed for their journey into the old courtyard to rid the hamlet of its bug problem, but, when they returned, dragging their bruised and beaten bodies from the stagecoach, they spoke little before locking themselves in their own choice dwellings.
Alexander, befitting of his rank in the church, retired to the Penace Hall, and remained there as he beat the memories from his blood. Wallace and Jericho took to the tavern; the occultist wetting his tongue with ale while the bounty hunter paid off a harem of his personal pick from the brothel.
Dismas, however, went to his office in the mansion and remained there, allowing no one into his room.
The first day, Alexander and Wallace were difficult to talk to, Lord Dismas was impossible to coax more than a few angry words from, and Jericho gave blank stares before the times he was not passed out drunk.
A feeling of uneasy hung in the air, the dread of new horrors unknown taking hold of the people and heroes alike, and those that knew of what to expect had locked themselves away from their fellows.
There was one that did not seem bothered, but, then again, something else was bothering her. Ebony had noticed that the lord of the estate had not eaten all day, despite the meals having been delivered to his door and knock announcing their arrival.
She had tried looking for the servant boy that Dismas employed to clean his office, but, as it seemed, the only information she could gather was that he had fled the hamlet during the afternoon.
"If you're looking for him, I'd say ask the survivalist. She sets up traps to catch monsters such as you, after all." The builder told her.
"You're not afraid of me?" Ebony asked. This was one of those that had seen her when that minister had tried to burn her at the stake. She had noticed that most of the people did not seem as frightened of her, but they were still hesitant, if anything.
"The way my mates and I see it, as long as you're not against us, it doesn't matter so much if you're with us or not. Besides, that meat last night was really tasty. What was it called? You served it off the coals and chopped it up into slices." He asked.
"It was brisket cooked barbarian style. I learned it from a warlord during one of his sieges of a walled city. They had to forgo their grills to make more arrow heads, and so I was introduced to a new part of their culture." She answered.
Being an ageless creature of the abyss as she was, Ebony had knowledge from wars long forgotten or unknown. However, that knowledge was focused in the culinary arts rather than warfare... and a few cutting, hacking, and slicing techniques.
The builder rubbed his chin in thought. "Could you come by later tonight to prepare something like that again? The boss has said we'll be working through the night to finish this here Granary, and the farmers' have offered two of their finest cows for the occasion."
This made Ebony smile and her eyes grow wide. "Tell them not to slaughter them! I'll take of that in time to cook them! I'll only need thirty minutes to cook the meat if you'll have a large fire going for me."
"Will do. What kind of fuel would you recommend?" He asked.
"Charcoal! And hard wood like oak to keep it hot. The meat is treated and seasoned before and after on the embers." She explained. "Have those ready for me, and I'll make sure you and your mates eat like the barbarians after pillaging the great city." She added before making her way toward the survivalist's tent overlooking the hamlet.
She found herself at the cliff-like camp overlooking the rest of the hamlet; the home of the survivalist of the hamlet that taught camping skills to the heroes.
Along the way, and to cut time, she had found that the woman was not as trusting as others.
She was positioned over a vantage point to watch those coming and going, her tent faced toward the pathway leading to her, the cliff allowed for very difficult climbing, and, finally, she came with two bear traps stuck in both her legs.
"Hello! Survivalist! Are you here?" She called out, ignoring the minor disturbances around her legs. They did little to hinder her movement, and it did not seem her place to remove someone else's tools of the trade... despite her getting caught in them and moving them.
Her answer came in the form of an arrow in her left breast, the protective having come from inside the tent.
Ebony waved and smiled in greeting to her hidden attacker. "Hi there! I'm looking for Lord Dismas's-" a second shot at her, only this one embedded itself in her forehead; right between her eyes.
Her head recoiled back, but then tilted it back down to look at the towns-person.
Her smile was gone, replaced with a frown, and she tilted her head at the figure. "Is this a bad time? I'm sorry, but I do need to know if you've seen the Lord's runaway servant boy." A third arrow hit her in the head, close to the second, and, before she could speak, a fourth lodged itself in her throat.
Ebony smiled and straightened herself. She blinked her eyes, her hands going behind her back, and spoke to the figure inside the tent. "I did not touch that minister when he ruined my stew and tried to burn me at the stake, nor did I flee until after Chris was in trouble. Are you upset that I've been killing the hamlet's invaders? Do you feel as though you cannot contribute to hamlet by protecting it with your traps?"
There was silence as she looked into the tent, waiting for a response or another attack, and then the tent opened and the survivalist stepped out. She held her bow at the ready, an arrow notched, and pointed at the Ebony, ready to be drawn and loosed at a moment's notice.
"Why are you concerned about him?" The survivalist questioned.
"He was the last one in contact with Lord Dismas, and now my contract is not being fulfilled. I want to know what happened, what is happening, and if my contract can be re-instated." Ebony answered.
"You have an agreement with the heir?" The huntress asked.
Ebony shook her head. "I do, but his is not the one I am after at the moment. I am concerned with the one that has left my domain, if he can be persuaded to return, and what drove him away."
"And why is a monster like you concerned with a human?"
"He fed me once. My hope is that he'll do it again, but first he needs to not be dead or being eaten alive by wild dogs that followed me from the Weald." Ebony answered.
The survivalist stared at her for a moment. "Those are yours?"
Ebony's smile grew a little and she nodded her head once. "Humans aren't the only ones I can make contracts with, but they are the ones I prefer." She answered. "So, did you see him?" She asked again.
He took a deep breath and gripped his shaking hand as he breathed a sigh of relief.
He sat at his desk, a note on the surface and several crumbled ones in the waste bin beside it. His skin was pale, it felt like it was stretched taut over his body, and his throat was dry with a great thirst.
During their incursion into the courtyard, he had been infect with whatever disease made the former nobles the insectoid, bloodthirsty, and drinking, monsters they are. He and the rest knew this because he had succumbed to the thirst and drank a vial of the tainted blood...
Well, he had drank a vial and a bottle, the latter being a mistake when he had realized it was a fine vintage. He had nearly drank the whole thing before Wallace snatched the bottle away and discovered it was blood.
The bounty hunter had spat out the vile substance in disgust.
The worst part was that he had tried to sneak a second vial, but Wallace, behind him in the line up, had stopped him.
Now, with his will written, he looked to his pistol, loaded with one shot, and waited for his hand to stop shaking.
He was a monster once without realizing it, and he did not want to be a monster again. It was why he had come to the estate, why he accepted the letter to claim his inheritance and fix the mistakes his ancestor had made. He could turn a profit, redeem himself, if only in his eyes, and live out the rest of his days as the lord of this place.
Now, having nearly killed his servant boy, there was no denying that his humanity was slipping away like sand in an open palm.
He felt his hand stop shaking, and so he reached for his pistol, one bullet loaded...
"Lord Dismas!"
He jumped with a start when he heard a voice in the room, and then looked up to see the cook, Ebony was her name, approached with a tray of food in her hands.
"What!? You! How did you-!" He began to ask, but found himself silent when the aroma whatever was under the tray's lid seeped out. The scent was delightful, catching him off guard.
"You've not eaten in nearly two days. So, I brought you a specialty dish." She said with a large grin as she partially climbed up the desk to place the tray on its surface. "I wasn't sure what to get you for a drink, so I over-saturated your food with a special ingredient." She informed.
Seduced by the aroma as he was, his mind ticked back to the questions and resolve he had before, and, before she could lift up the lid, he put his hand over hers. "No. Get out of here!" He said as he furiously rose from his seat. "Get out and leave me alone-"
"I killed three of my patrons to save the one you drove away." She interrupted, speaking in a monotone voice as she looked at his hand over hers. "He's back now, hurt but alive, and I apologize for not realizing your change in taste."
He tried to lift her hand off the lid, pry her fingers from the handle without lifting it, but he could not; it was like her fingers were melded into the steel.
"He said you attacked him, baring fangs like a wolf biting his arm before he hit you with a vase and ran away." She said, retelling the memory he did not want to relive.
"Be quiet..." He muttered.
"No." She answered simply. "You are going to eat so I can feed, and then, when you are sated, we will talk about the difference between human and monster."
"You're fired. Get out." He said in a commanding tone.
"I will make you eat, and then, if you still feel that way, I will go. First, eat, sat the thirst, let me feed." Her tone and mannerism did not change, and, by the way she resisted him, he could tell she would not be moved in this.
"For the main dish, I've prepared a pig's organ soup, nasher canine organs substituted for the pig's, and the blood used a thickener. Blood sausages and pudding were made from the innards and leftovers." Ebony explained, naming the dishes and how she had prepared.
Dismas, after she had lifted the lid, had to keep himself from tearing into the food and shoving it down. Ebony had intervened, grabbing his hands and holding them back before saying, in a stern and commanding tone, "Savor it," and slowly released him.
The food was wonderful. Juicy, flavorful, the meat melting in his mouth, and his thirst being sated with each spoonful or bite of the sausages and pudding.
"Blood is the main ingredient in these dishes, taking from animals that followed me from the Weald. I fed while we were hunting the hag, they helped keep you and the others safe as you slept, but, when they turned their fangs on the one you chased away, they were no longer patrons in my eyes." She spoke as he ate. "I savaged the good meat, drained their blood, and turned them into ingredients for food; which you're eating now. Don't worry, none of it is tainted or diseased."
He barely heard her as he ate, savoring every bite, every spoonful, greedily drank the broth of his soup.
"I see patrons to feed, crops and meat to prepare, and ingredients and cookery for use. I still think of myself as human, most that look at me call me something like a monster, a demon, or something else, but I only care if other other people are my patrons and if others try to harm them. The act of eating has lost all luster to me, only feeding by feeding others will sate my hunger." Her words fell upon death ears; the only thing he heard was the crunching and grinding of the sausages in his mouth.
"I won't deny that I am a monster by anatomy and abilities, but I am human by mind. I am bound by the contract that makes it possible for me to feed on others that I feed; a monstrous statement to be sure, and yet it does not benefit me unless it benefits others. I could force feed those around me, feed on them as I fed them, but then that would make me the monster they say I look like." She continued, and then looked up at him when he sat down his fork and knife.
He put his head in his hands, his complexion as normal, but he was breathing slightly irregularly. "I killed a mother and her child in a wagon. I knew them... I knew they would be traveling... but I had to... I had to..."
"I serve all kinds of dishes, my lord. Forgive me for this, but I searched you for an idea of what what to make for you." Ebony replied. "She liked mushroom soup, but you enjoyed a thicker brother, and the boy loved pudding; he took care of the chickens so there was the option of him helping to make them." She added.
Dismas nodded. "They never knew where I went. I told them I had a job in our neighboring town... I told them I'd be gone for a week, and they said..."
"People die when they are forgotten, my lord. I can recite the names of every patron I have served, every one of their favorite meals. Their bodies are gone, their lives have expired, but I still have to fight the urge, every second, to prepare a place for them at whatever table I can find. People die, in my opinion, when they are forgotten. I refuse to forget any of them. I refuse to let the ones that have fed me feed the abyss, and so I keep them alive."
"They were my life..." He said.
"The ones I remember vividly are the ones I've killed for breaking their contracts, the ones that turned on my other patrons and hurt them. I'm bond to it, each one of them. Death is brief, but the pain is eternal; only the living hurt."
"I'm a monster... I should have turned myself in and died on the noose." He said, tearing up as his voice shook.
"Why did you run then?"
"... I was afraid to die..." He muttered.
"And?"
"And they deserve to be remembered... even if it is only in a forgotten estate on paintings and busts." He said.
"There's work to do then, my lord. Feed me, and I will follow you to hell and back. More so, I will ensure your army, if you have one, is fed and strong." She said before reaching for and gathering the dishes. "You're tastes have changed, my lord, but that does not mean you cannot still eat. I'll have provisions made for your diet." She added as she walked toward the door, unlocked it, and opened it.
"Wait!" He called, and she stopped and turned to face him. It was at this moment that he saw she was without her armor, exposing the monstrous appearance she had.
A mouth nearly split her half, going down between her shoulders from the front to the back, her breasts like eyes, closed and the lids shut like drawn drapes, and the jaws of the mouth like those of a great maw from a giant beast.
She was a terrifying sight to behold indeed, yet she did not give off the aura of a monster, but of a servant as she smiled and waited patiently for him to speak.
It took him a moment to find his words, and then he spoke. "Is the boy... is Josh alright?" He asked.
Ebony nodded her head. "He's at the sanitarium now with a cast on his left leg. He's sleeping right now." She answered.
He slowly sank into his chair again and dried his tears with the sleeve of his coat. "I see. Thank you." He said.
"You're welcome, my lord. Would you like me to bring you your breakfast here tomorrow?" She asked.
There was a moment of thought, and he shook his head. "I will go to tavern in the morning. Thank you."
She bowed, and then left the room, closing the door behind herself as she did and leaving her newly invigorated master to think about the next day.
He looked back at his pistol, picked the weapon up, and loaded it with bullets before putting it into the holster on his belt.
It was not time for him to die, not until he made some attempt to forgive himself.
He went to the window of his office and moved to open it, finding it locked, he undid the latches and raised it.
As the cool air hit him, realization joined in.
"How did she get in without a sound?"