Forum Index > Roleplaying > Chronologically Challenged
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Creativity
Level 72
Cutely Creative
Joined: 3/4/2013
Threads: 255
Posts: 5,904
Posted: 6/14/2021 at 9:31 PM
Post #1
NOT looking for new members, kay thanks
Creativity
Level 72
Cutely Creative
Joined: 3/4/2013
Threads: 255
Posts: 5,904
Posted: 6/14/2021 at 10:19 PM
Post #2
'Keep your chin up,' Spencer would say as she patted her calloused hand against Araceli's stump of a shoulder. 'There's a great big sky up there.'
Maybe it was corny, cheesy, all of the above, and super trope-y to boot, but it helped, in a way. It helped knowing that all of the possibilities were up, and she wouldn't ever fall further than the ground. Spencer was like that. She always knew just what to say to bring one back from the brink of destruction, the edge of the world where nothing mattered and there was no gravity to keep one centered.
However, this particular moment, Araceli's chin was decidedly down, nearly pressing to her chest as she scanned the pages of the worn old tome beneath her. A relic of a time long past, when a simple fever was fatal and someone like her would surely never survive the winter. She liked the relics, the artifacts. She liked reading the words that were scribed hundreds of years ago, thinking about how long they'd survived. She liked how she could hear the voices of those who could no longer speak.
His name was Cyneric. A well-renowned scholar at the aid of King Alfred. Cyneric wrote elegantly and cleanly, speaking of kingdom politics, a mystery woman known only as Esther, the death of young Alfred's father, and the subsequent warfare. It was the most thrilling story, though her job was not to learn and rewrite the history. No. Her job was to uncover whatever truths may be hidden. Her job was to analyze Cyneric's voice, and to learn more than perhaps he himself even knew about the events surrounding King Alfred's rule.
It was not an easy job, but Araceli vowed that she was never one to back down from a challenge.
Edited By Creativity on 6/14/2021 at 10:19 PM.
Britters
Level 72
The Eggstraordinaire
Joined: 8/25/2014
Threads: 167
Posts: 2,041
Posted: 6/19/2021 at 10:09 PM
Post #3
Ink was a precious commodity. In Cyneric's line of work, ink was just as valuable as gold or jewels. Its uses seemed endless when all the possibilities involving words and pictures were taken into consideration. On any normal day, he could be found in this room, with his brushes and his pigments, completely absorbed in his work. There might be a smudge of black smeared unnoticed upon one cheek, an artistic representation of his dedication as a scholar.
A great pity then, he thought bitterly to himself, that today is not a normal day...
The tarnished metal cup he held came up to meet Cyneric's lips as he sipped the wine within it, the tremor in his hand barely noticeable to anyone who might have seen him. Not that he expected to be disturbed in here, not for a few hours at least. Alfred...the King now, he reminded himself with a melancholy sigh, was retired to his chambers with the claim of a powerful headache. Whether or not the young monarch's head was really in pain was no matter, it was simply an excuse for the Lords and Ladies of the court that sounded more politically acceptable than simply grieving the loss of his father.
"Oh, Aethelwulf," he spoke aloud into the dusty silence of the room, his voice sounding heavy even to his own ears, "If only you were still here, my friend, I know not how to counsel Alfred through the death of his father as well as the running of this kingdom. Please, please help me..."
There was no answer, of course, and Cyneric knew he would never hear his friend's voice again. King Aethelwulf was dead, and his son now ruled in his place. The future was unclear, but he knew his duty was to the throne and to the young boy who now had to carry a weight that would break most men.
For now, however, Cyneric only planned on drinking his wine and remembering old times...
Creativity
Level 72
Cutely Creative
Joined: 3/4/2013
Threads: 255
Posts: 5,904
Posted: 6/19/2021 at 11:44 PM
Post #4
Araceli always had a knack for losing herself in her work, and it was only when she heard her phone buzz with a notification for a deal on the local Thai place's app that she sat up. Her back cracked in at least three different places and she groaned, hearing Spencer's teasing voice in her head, pointing out that she'd become the Hunchback of Notre Dame by the time she was forty if she kept that posture up.
She took her glasses off and wiped at her eyes, acclimating herself to the fact that oh yeah, there's a world outside of the worn old pages she'd study.
Part of her wondered what Cyneric would have been like in person. She knew him from the pages of his journal, far better than some he met in his life might've known him. Of course, she wondered that for everyone whose work she'd studied in the past, as well. Cyneric was no different than Alistair or Theobald or Everard - it was a sad commentary on the time period that they were all straight, able-bodied, white males. But that was a whole other issue that she didn't have time to go into.
With her glasses back on her face and her beanie adjusted, she turned her attention back to the journal. She frowned as she thought about Esther, and who she could've possibly been. She flipped back to only a few dozen pages into the journal, when the mysterious woman was first mentioned.
It was a little tough to hold the book open with her one hand, so she placed a bookmark and went searching in the drawers of her colleague's desk for anything she could use as a paperweight. What she found was a small but heavy sand dollar of sorts, likely a fossil. It would do.
She didn't notice the blue light glowing on the bottom.
It happened nearly the moment the journal was in her hand again. She didn't even have time to put the paperweight on the open journal before the room was filled with blinding light, and she felt her muscles spasm involuntarily.
She didn't even have time to scream or react before she was collapsing onto an unfamiliar stone floor, journal clutched tightly in her hand like a lifeline. Her mind was in overdrive within seconds, trying to discern a) where she was, b) what in the world just occurred, and c) where she was. Because she certainly didn't recognize the rough stone around her or the banners hanging from the walls.
Before she even got fully to her feet, breathing heavily from shock, there were shouts from down the hall that sounded mostly like white noise, and then three heavily-armored men were storming towards her. She yelped as they grabbed hold of her, and all she could think was oh god please tell me I fell asleep.
"Let me go, you thick-headed culeros!"
Britters
Level 72
The Eggstraordinaire
Joined: 8/25/2014
Threads: 167
Posts: 2,041
Posted: 6/28/2021 at 8:44 AM
Post #5
Take care of him, Cyneric...
Of course, Your Majesty, I will...
Guide him well...my friend...
A fog had settled over Cyneric after his second cup of wine, something in which he rarely indulged to such excess. At what point he finally dozed off in his chair was anyone's guess, and his soft snores echoed around the room. His dreams started out full of images of King Aethelwulf, smiling and laughing with his family, but soon the images changed.
"What is it?" Cyneric exclaimed, jolting out of sleep in a most undignified fashion, staring wildly around the room. He was still alone.
Slowly, almost sluggish with how much he'd had to drink, Cyneric became aware of loud shouting happening outside the room in the corridor. He rubbed his brown eyes vigorously, both to try and make himself feel more alert and in hopes of banishing the swollen, misshapen face from his mind. His hands ran over the front of his tunic to straighten it out, hoping he looked better than he felt.
"What is the meaning of this?" he asked with authority as soon as he opened his door and saw several guards escorting what appeared to be a young woman down the hall, "Who is she?"
"We don't know, my Lord," said on of the guards, strengthening his grip on her as they stopped to talk, "She seemed to just appear out of nowhere in the great hall. We were taking her to King Alfred."
"No," said Cyneric, his tone more snapping than usual as he rubbed his temples to try and finish clearing his head, brown eyes silently assessing the woman, "The king is...the king...is..." His sentence trailed off when he saw it, the book she clutched in her hands as though it were a cup of water in a drought.
It was his journal. Impossibly, yet unmistakably his journal...
"Where...did you get that?"
Creativity
Level 72
Cutely Creative
Joined: 3/4/2013
Threads: 255
Posts: 5,904
Posted: 6/28/2021 at 9:12 PM
Post #6
It certainly wasn't the first time that Araceli had been detained by smelly old men, though she reminisced briefly that the last time, she was being handcuffed and tossed carelessly into the back of a patrol car. Now, being two quarters and an arm down, all she could think was that she was in far more trouble now than she was then - she swore she hadn't had any alcohol in weeks, so whatever this strange trance was, it probably wasn't a whiskey-induced fever dream.
And she might need to start considering that it might not be a trance.
The guard on her right was struggling to restrain her with no arm to hold onto, and she was trying to figure out how she could use that to her advantage. Maybe she could kick him where it counts, and while he's incapacitated, she could try to wrest her arm free of the other one, biting and kicking when necessary. She could make a break for it, just run until her legs gave out on her and hope that she was in a safe place where she could make sense of where she was.
She was just about to execute her plan, too, when a door nearby opened, and the guards straightened up, his hand tightening around her arm as he did so. She grunted with pain and struggled a little more, but they held fast as they turned to talk to the newcomer.
There was something about the way they spoke. 'My Lord' and 'King Alfred' and... oh crap.
King Alfred.
She snapped back to reality as brown eyes sharpened on her - specifically, on the journal clutched in her hand. She grit her teeth and struggled against her captors, attempting to hold the book closer to her. "It's mine," she said, her tongue feeling unusually heavy in her mouth. "My boss entrusted me with it. I am not to let any thugs take it."
Araceli attempted to spit afterwards, right at the man's feet, but as soon as she threw her weight forwards to do so, she was being hauled back and the guard on her right hit her jaw. She clenched her teeth again and lowered her head slightly in submission.
Britters
Level 72
The Eggstraordinaire
Joined: 8/25/2014
Threads: 167
Posts: 2,041
Posted: 7/12/2021 at 6:59 PM
Post #7
Too much to take in, too little time, and too much alcohol. At least, for the average man, perhaps. Thankfully, Cyneric was not an average man. His fingers were working overtime massaging his right temple as he stared at the scene before him. While his heart was beating wildly in his chest his face remained calm, his demeanor collected. His eyes tried to focus on the details, but they seemed beyond measure.
The strange woman being held by the guards was giving them a good fight considering she only had one arm, and that was frankly the least concerning thing about her appearance. Her clothes were...well, the word vulgar came to mind, but Cyneric was more perplexed by the material than he was worried about propriety. Her voice sounded strangely accented, but again it was the way she was spoke that made his curiosity burn.
Then, of course, there was the matter of the journal in her hands. It was his, of that Cyneric was most certain, but he could clearly see that it looked very different to the one he had written in only that morning. There were signs of age and cracking on the leather covers, it looked ancient if he was being honest with himself. Yet, it was unmistakably his, so...
"Thugs...," he muttered to himself, brows furrowing as he repeated the foreign word, and the desire to understand its meaning was almost immediate, "Wha-Enough!" He blinked his hazel eyes rapidly, the last wisps wine drunk haze leaving him in a flash when the girl lunged and the guard struck her.
Too many things were happening in this corridor, too many potential eyes and ears ready to come around the corners, and too many questions to be asked as well as answered.
"Give her to me," he said very suddenly, drawing himself up straight and letting the authority of his station color the tone of his voice, "The king will need information before she is presented to him. I will question her." He stepped forward, looked pointedly at the guard who had hit her, and then grabbed her firmly by both shoulders and moved with her back into his study.
Creativity
Level 72
Cutely Creative
Joined: 3/4/2013
Threads: 255
Posts: 5,904
Posted: 7/12/2021 at 8:29 PM
Post #8
King Alfred. Guards. Tapestries on the wall. Either Araceli was in an alternate-reality coma like that episode in Bones that Spencer loved, or... She was struck by the sudden disappointment in herself for having fallen asleep halfway through Back to the Future. Not that something like this could possibly be predicted, whatever 'this' was.
It couldn't be possible. She knew that it was true, but she refused to believe it. No way was she in medieval England.
She was broken out of her mind when the newcomer instructed the guards to hand her over to him. She felt almost like a doll being tossed around, even though the hazel-eyed man was actually quite gentle in disposition. He still held her firmly enough as he directed her into a room that she couldn't escape, no matter how much she wiggled and made vain attempts at escape.
Her heart was hammering in her chest, far too loud and far too fast. She needed everything to just slow down.
"I'll start screaming if you don't release me," she growled at him, even as he indicated a seat and did release her shoulders. "You can't have the journal, nderevi. I'd rather burn it and be executed."
But then she had a moment to calm down, even as she refused to sit. "King Alfred. His father just died, didn't he?"
Because she couldn't outright ask what year it was. If Alfred was king already, then surely Aethulwulf had already passed, and if he had already been king for a while, she could pass it off as being foreign and not up-to-date on the current events in the kingdom... It would be okay. Absolutely okay. She could handle whatever this was - accidental time travel or a coma or whatever. Tranquilopa. Everything was fine.
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