[FIC] House Caedes
Aug. 8th, 2020 03:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alaterdateTitle : House Caedes [AO3]
Series: Dragon Age
Characters: Original Character(s)
Rating: Teen+
Word Count: 500
Content Notes: Vampirism, Slavery
Summary: Blood magic is second nature for Magisters. This is how one uses it to stay young.
A/N: I don’t have a character for this. So it’s just some random Magister.
The halls of the Magisterium run red with exorbitant carpets imported from Antiva. They muffle the sounds of the Magisters’ heeled boots and dress shoes. The Archon could not concentrate surrounded by the incessant clacking throughout the building and it was one of few things he could command to be done without the approval of the Magisters. It didn’t stop them from complaining about the unsightly decor, but silently they know the true purpose is to hide the stains of assassinations and so they relent to the Archon’s abysmal taste.
Our mistress walks the halls of the Magisterium without care for what lies beneath her. Out in the open, in broad daylight, she laughs and argues and schemes. Her lustrous skin, darkened further by her days in the sun, draws eyes to her. None darker than her own, pitch black. Her red lips curve in pinched and rounded shapes as she speaks. The weaker Magisters hang on her every word. She commands attention.
Her home, mansion, palace, is immaculately white. It is unlike the Archon’s cowardly floors. It stands daringly against the sky and the streets shouting “stain me and see what happens.” We swear we have never felt a drop of rain in this place, but the plants in the garden grow tall as she commands it. Because she demands obedience from all in this stead. All five hundred odd of us who walk, walked, and will walk her halls.
Our mistress meanders between the rooms of her mansion without care for what lies beneath or above her. Not the portraits of her onerous and jealous ancestors who bid her continue their legacy, yet pale in contiguity to her. Not the surfaces of her walls and floors deceptively unblemished by the violence that Magisters incur. Because we know it intimately. The corners where spiders attempt to snare their meals. Which tiles are hardest to clean the sticky grime from through tears. When to prune her chaenomeles. Our mistress notices nothing and that is how we prefer it.
In the comfort of her heavily draped quarters she lounges and laughs and rules. Her voice discordant with the songs she makes her birds sing for her. When she has the time she occupies herself by playing games that she cannot lose. In all this she exudes her splendor. Pointed, painted, and jeweled fingers conducting by whim. Her grandeur is however unnatural. Her beauty a result of the pains she takes. And she takes them daily.
When the sun sets she rises. We disrobe her, unveiling the evidence of her authority. She calls one or two or three more of us to her rooms. She plucks our chords with sugar sweet teeth to make us sing as she seeks to quench her voracious appetite with our voices. Drained to fill her. Silently we know the true purpose is to hide the stains of age from her body and so we succumb to her not with cries of protest, but with abysmal taste.
no subject
Date: 2020-08-10 05:07 am (UTC)oooh, lovely line
and i really love what you're doing with the imagery here—her bright white walls versus the red carpet elsewhere—makes for a delicious mood for this intriguing little read. thanks for sharing!
no subject
Date: 2020-08-12 02:58 pm (UTC)I tried to connect the separate paragraphs with imagery and I'm glad it stood out there! Thanks for taking the time to read it!!