(no subject)

[marcato]

WELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE CHANNEL, SATURNSCHILD. FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION, USE 001.00.653.90 *** SATURNSCHILD has joined 001.00.653.90 <saturnschild> Hello. <saturnschild> I'm listening.

Comments

murder art - forward dated to 7/23, cw: graphic corpse details

[baisunas]

[ On Thursday, Aunamee will find an unusual sight on his way in to open his shop. It's located too far away for anyone to suspect that it's associated with him or Luxury of Time, on a small plot of undeveloped land. One might even think it's happenstance that he comes upon it.

The scene is carefully arranged so that half of it is in shadow and half of it is in the light.

In the light stands a human skeleton, its bones bleached to a pristine white and perfectly assembled with a fine silver wire that looks more like an artistic embellishment of filigree than something that serves an actual, practical purpose. The wire catches the sunlight, making the whole skeleton shine. Around its neck is a silver chain, from which hangs one perfectly shaped eagle feather. Behind it, a small grove of young, living oak trees, healthy and vibrant.

At the boundary where sunlight meets shadow is a spotless pane of glass.

In the shadows, mirroring the skeleton's stance, is a brown-haired man of the same height. He's wearing a dull, drab suit of an unflattering shade of brown. A cursory glance may not reveal the truth, but a longer one will: thin lines that look an awful lot like seams run along the edges of what's visible of his skin. Behind the man, in the same number and configuration as the living trees, are withered, dead stumps. They're charred and broken, almost as if they've been hit by lightning.

(A thorough examination of the body will reveal that the skin, muscles and viscera adorn a plastic life-sized skeleton. Whoever killed the man extracted his real skeleton and then reassembled him on a fake one. The real skeleton is, of course, the one that stands on the other side of the makeshift mirror. It will take almost no effort to identify the man as one of the poachers. Any passerby who sees it might simply assume that it's a warning meant for the humans to never take harmful action against the monsters again.

But the real message is for Aunamee alone, written in the symbols of Jupiter, the choice of the one type of metal that can cause a vampire harm, and the time and painstaking care it took to construct the tableau. Coming to Ryslig and undergoing the transformation into a lich hasn't diminished him. The transformation, the decay, all of it only elements undergoing change to fuel his radiance.) ]

[marcato]

[When Aunamee sees the grotesque display, no one else is around. He circles it carefully, taking in the silver wire, the flashes of sunlight, the pristine eagle feather dangling from the skeleton's neck.

Hannibal. Hannibal did this.

He swallows a breath even though he doesn't need to breathe, his phantom heart rolling in his chest. When he saw Hannibal's art in the dreamscape, he was overcome with wonder. This is something different. Anticipation? Affection?

Later on, Hannibal will receive a perfectly penned letter thanking him for his gift. Instead of his usual sign off ('sincerely,' or 'with the utmost respect'), he uses the word 'love.']