Welcome to The Edge...

Whose side are these adventurers on anyway? Expanding out on the plains, winged-ones have begun to emerge. Some are angels, some demons, some from the unknown. Elves, humans, dwarves, and all the creatures of this world are in peril, for chaotic war in the heavens has begun to emerge in the mortal realm. So pre-occupied with their own disputes, will the angels and demons in their fierce battles thoughtlessly destroy those "innocents" stuck in the middle? Is anyone willing to stand up for mortal kind? This selfish lot seems less than likely...

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OPEN AND ACTIVE WIKI! Come on and join!! Serious roleplay expected. We have just become active again and have lots of spots to fill, so come on!! (6/25/07)
New players should check out the Road to Hell for a condensed version of the back story here on The Edge and some interesting insight into its characters.

(Note: [Sheris Darkchyld] oversees The Edge and reserves the right to delete any text from this page. Serious RP is expected, but feel free to join in and add your character to the list! Questions? Message [Sheris Darkchyld].)

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Want to get a feel for the characters that have graced this place? Take a look at:
Echoes from The Edge

10-9-04 For some side-splitting comedy take a look in:
Edge Humor

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Current characters:
Sheris
Harikoras

Inactive or pending characters:
Ara (inactive)
Nyssa (inactive)
Derigoth (inactive)
Javan (inactive)
Emayuun (inactive)
Aram (Bedad) (inactive)
Grahaust Decivere (inactive)
Morhan Kersah (inactive)
Rime (inactive)
_Meridian_ (inactive)
Vanaja (pending)

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Read what has already passed in:
The Edge Part 1
The Edge Part 2
The Edge Part 3
The Edge Part 4
The Edge Part 5
The Edge Part 6
The Edge Part 7
The Edge Part 8
The Edge Part 9
The Edge Part 10

The Road to Hell is where you can see the short version of the long and winding road the characters have taken so far. You can also read a little about their motivations.

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Here in hell...

The dark-clad man on the throne smiles slowly to Sheris’ question. “So it’s Mordred you seek?” He sits up slowly and waves a hand toward Meridian. A small, elf-like creature only much uglier, with bigger ears and completely white comes scampering into the room holding a tray with a single glass on it filled with red liquid. The creature hurries over toward the requestor and leaves the glass and tray by his side, then turns to wander off. His master hesitates while the creature delivers the beverage, grinning at Sheris in his silence. He then leans back and stretches out as he looks to the ceiling and around the room. “Well now, that would be me.” He smiles fully and looks back to Sheris as his arms flop and hang over the arms of his throne. He then sits up and leans toward her, “And what can I do for you m’dear?”

At this, Sheris stiffens a bit and then answers plainly, “Yae have something fer me.” Mordred grins, “And you for me… You have the statue then?” Sheris blinks in surprise. Her hand curls over a pouch tied to her waist slowly. “…yes.” “Bring it.” Mordred extends his open hand toward Sheris. Sheris narrows her eyes toward him slowly in distrust and stays seated. Morderd sighs “more delays? Come now, aren’t you tired of all that.” He leans back in his throne “Here I am extending my help in your quest and here you are lacking trust in me.“ He shakes his head slowly in disappointment, then glances to Ara, then Harikoras, then back. “How convenient that his friends were here to guide you.” Mordred then looks back to Sheris and speaks plainly, “The statue for the scroll. Take it or leave it.”

Sheris remains unwavering, “I see tha scroll first…” Mordred sighs dramatically and then stands and begins to walk away to his left, beckoning with his hand, “follow me then.” Sheris keeps her sword in her grip as she moves forward, her eyes fixed on Mordred. She continues on, following him through the doorway whether the others follow or not. Her mind swims with what may soon be in her grasp. Could it be possible? Or was it all just another lie? Sheris had to take this chance. After all… what was this statue to her anyway? Sheris’s finger slowly curls around the small pouch at her side. She had seen the figurine in the snake demon’s dwelling. It will find you… you will know it he had said. And she had… Something in Sheris’s memory knew the object. And this object would change her fate... it had to.

Sheris ascends a small staircase and follows around a corner into a large room filled with books and scrolls of all sorts. Mordred wiggles his fingers, hmming as he looks around. “Ahh!” he plucks an inconspicuous looking scroll off of a shelf and holds it up. “Here it is! Now then...” He turns with a grin and holds his hand out toward Sheris. “The statue?” Sheris glances to the scroll “How do I know tha' is the one?” Mordred rolls his eyes and sighs again, slumping his sholders, he looks at the scroll and then looks at her. “Fine” Mordred holds the scroll out to Sheris. She glances at him then at the scroll warily. “Take it!!” He says loudly and Sheris inwardly jumps. She reaches out and takes the scroll slowly. The parchment is old and yellowed, crinkling slightly as she takes it. Sheris slowly unrolls the parchment and looks over the odd lettering... the same type that adorns her sword. She immediately looks up to Mordred, “And how is this tae be any use to me? I can’t even read it!” Mordred smirks. “Maybe you can’t, but your friend can. Now then... the statue.”

"I don't know what supposed friend more-dread-but-less-style here is referring to," Harikoras says with a sneer as he comes up behind Sheris, "but I can read that well enough to know it is is a poor offer. I would like to believe it is the worst deal you will ever make, but then I would have to believe you incapable of making even more stupid, foolish, childish decisions."

Sheris glances sideways back toward Harikoras and tightens her grip on the scroll slightly, she also flexes her hand around the sword hilt she still carries. Looking to Mordrid, “yae have one chance tae tell me tha meaning of this nonsense.” Sheris holds the scroll forward toward their host. Mordred glares slightly in Harikoras’s direction and then smirks at Sheris, “What does he know of your purposes… have you even told him?” He hesitates, then raises an eyebrow slowly, “Oh come on! .....Hmph, fool child. Here you hold your answer and you listen to the impudent…” Mordred stops and smirks. “Alright look… have him look more closely at the useless trade and realize that it is incomplete before he deems it rubbish.” Sheris narrows her eyes, “Incomplete? Wha’ use is it then?!” Mordred puts up his hands “Hold on now… no decent spell is of any worth without it’s needed components.” He folds his arms, “I can tell you where they are. Now then, why don’t you go rest and inform your comrades of your purposes before you ruin this pleasant encounter and lose what little aid you’ve managed to gather.” Mordred glances toward Harikoras, regarding him with a grin. “Interesting choice in this one.” It is not clear to whom he speaks, but he does not hesitate long. “I’ll show you to a private area where you might plan, sleep, ..whatever.” He glances between the two and giggles, shaking his head and mumbling something to himself and he turns to leave.

"I do not want to see any private areas," Harikoras mutters, and glares at Mordred. "Do not take too long in gathering your thoughts. My sword itches, and the only thing keeping it from slicing you from finger to toe is the fact that we have already dragged ourselves far enough to this frozen hell-hole, and if this worthless scrap is all we have to show for it then I do not wish to repeat it merely for the brief pleasure that slaughtering you would give me." He snarls and turns, then looks back at Sheris. "That goes for you too." He turns again, and stomps off in the direction they had come from.

Mordred glances back and shrugs “Suit yourself.” He glances to Sheris, “And don’t even think to try to leave with that statue. The scroll is useless without its counterparts… and you won’t find them without my help.” He grins, then continues on down the hall.

Sheris watches as he goes and then turns to Harikoras, following him. “What does tha scroll say Harikoras… Harikoras!” She hurries to catch up with him, “I was told tha’ this scroll can break any attunement tae myself... namely Azazel, or any other fiend trying to keep me under watch. My ring scrambles anyone or anything’s connection tae me… making it unclear, but I want to be rid of it,… completely. …So I can move on and be done with this!” Sheris raises her hand, fingering her ring. “Don’t you get it...” She steps forward and physically cuts him off, facing him. Her eyes are clear and harsh with more feeling than suits her cold exterior, “…how would yae like it… tae be watched always,.. hounded, shadows foldin’ over yae, feeling as if someone is in yer very skin. Unable tae escape it… I’m finished with it. I just want it tae let me be, so I can choose my own battles.” She hesitates, watching his eyes, “…Are yae tellin’ me this won’ work?”

"Of course it won't! Have you never examined yourself? A fine puppet you must make, unwilling to use your inner eye! Questing for the very thing Azazel expects you to! Look inwards you foolish, foolish child - if you have not broken that link already, the scroll will do nothing for you. Scripts and runes! This," Harikoras gropes for his sword, taking a half-step back, "is a rune," he stabs at the floor between them, shouting as he chips away, "and it will not break your bond either!"

Sheris stares as Harikoras for an unblinking moment. Her hands slowly clenching at her sides as her whole body tenses in anger, fighting his words. She watches his exertion, and when he slows his hacking at the ice floor beneath them, she still remains watching. As the energy charging through her nerves slows, a tingling comes over her, numbing the anger and her brain quiets. Sheris’s hand holding the scroll opens and the crumpled parchment falls to the floor. She turns abruptly, continuing with heavy footfalls back toward the throne room.

As she enters the room, Sheris takes the pouch from her side, plucks the small figurine out of it, and looks to the small angel in her hand. It appears to be nothing significant, but Sheris channels her energy through it as she continues to walk through the room and back down the hall they entered through. She pays no heed to who follows. Something is changing in Sheris as her being mingles with the hidden power in the figurine before her. The broken one’s words still linger in her mind. Finally, Sheris emerges into the entrance hall of the palace and holds the figure up in front of her. Her eyes narrow as her fist clenches tightly around it. Hairline cracks begin to form over its surface.

Harikoras stands a moment, shoulders drooped, looking at his handiwork. The rune glows for a moment. "Hell's blood," Harikoras mutters as he sheathes his sword and follows Sheris into the throne room. He looks at her holding the figurine, and speaks to no-one in particular: "All hell will soon decide we have outstayed our welcome after this. Demons do not make easy friends, but they still object when misplaced bands of vagrants run around destroying everyone's homes." He raises his voice. "Everyone who does not want to see what an avalanche looks like from the inside, leave! You do not want to die here!" He walks with a long stride, past Sheris, not looking back as the room catches his words, sending echoes bouncing around the ice: "die here.... die here... die here..."

As the cracks form in the angel figurine’s surface, Mordred emerges from a separate doorway to the entrance hall. “Stop it!” He hurries down a staircase, “What are you doing?!” Sheris’s eyes turn to him slowly, “this” and with that, she crushes the angel in her grasp. “NO!” Mordred leaps at her as the palace all around them shakes to its very foundations. Sheris shoves Mordred out of the way as she dodges, he stumbles, and she points her sword, still unsheathed, toward him. She backs away as the walls begin to crumble around her, shards of ice breaking loose. She turns and flees out the doorway. Emerging, Sheris is nearly blinded by the light she encounters reflecting off the landscape. She does not stop as the ground continues to shake beneath her feet violently. Only when she crosses the bridge leading away from the castle does she turn back and her eyes begin to clear. The sky swirls like a vortex above the majestic sculpture of ice before her as it shudders and crumbles. The ice realm itself seems to scream in anguish and the frozen land rumbles its discontent. Sheris still holds what remains of the angel in her grasp, white dust falling to gather with the frost at her feet as it slips between her fingers. She waits, watching the entrance.

Sheris stares, her blood rushing through her veins. She waits only a few seconds before running back toward the quickly disintegrating structure. Can they get out? She nears the entrance. The doorway threatens to collapse any second as Sheris reaches out with her mind, searching for familiar auras. She finds one, but it is not what she is looking for. Mordred is nearby, but he is not moving… nor is he where she left him. Where are the others? Suddenly, the doorway breaks above her but Sheris reaches out and supports the beam with her own mind, holding it firmly… her body quickly beings to shake with effort as her teeth clench. Her eyes flare out brilliant crimson as she calls all her power to her, but it feels not enough. “Harikoras!! Ara!! Nyssa!!” she yells. She wavers… threatening to break. Sheris makes a desperate move and flings the ring from her finger. It disappears into the rubble as wings shimmer into existance at her back and she calls to her spirit to hold the structure... just a little longer. Open the way. Let them through! Her mind screams... Where are they?

"Watch your back, child," Harikoras says. He stands on a mound of packed snow some distance from the crumbling ice castle, watching Sheris. As she spends her power keeping the fragile doorway open, he strolls towards her, unsheathing his sword. "Even when you can least afford to spare your concentration - especially when you can least afford to spare your concentration." He stretches out his arm and sword, until the point is a hand-width from Sheris's newly visible wings. "If it is not in their own power to save themselves, they are dead already. Say your goodbyes, or you will join them."

Sheris’s wing twitches as Harikoras nears her. Nothing in her stature conveys her relief as his voice confirms his presence. Her twisted features loosen and her eyes narrow at his words. The shaking of her body calms. Sheris backs away slowly, and looks over her shoulder at Harikoras, tucking her wings close. Suddenly, she releases, turning in the same instant and runs away from what remains of the castle. The doorway cracks loudly and moans under the pressure as the structure continues to its final decent. Sheris’s breathing comes heavy and thick with the pressure her body has endured. But her mind is focused, and her wings snap open; she takes off on the unstable air. Her eyes sweep the land around her… something is coming. She can feel it. She looks down to Harikoras. Angrily she curses her other companions for not being in sight as she swoops back down and lands beside her remaining comrade, falling in step with him. She does not look his way, “Company nears,… we are too few. We mus’ get away from here!” She looks to the ice wall, “Is there a way through?”

Harikoras looks in the same direction as Sheris, his eyes starting to see what her senses are telling her. Gradually, the distance is turning grey as the white of the landscape is clouded by the pepper specks of black-winged creatures - still distant, but approaching fast. "Too few indeed," he mutters. "Someone important did not like what we have done with the place." Just then, there is a crack and a deep bass grinding sound. Fissures appear from under the ruins of the castle, a black spiderweb against the white snow. Harikoras looks all around: at the new cracks in the ground, at the approaching horde, at the wall of ice in the distance. He sheathes his sword. "If there is no way through, we make one. If it resists us, at least we can fight with a wall at our backs. For now, though - we run." He crouches as the ground shakes; after each rumble the cracks have grown, carving the land to pieces. Then he launches into a run, leaping over a crack on his way to the wall.

Sheris shifts and falls in behind Harikoras, sheathing her sword. She hovers on the unstable air over growing crevices that open under their feet. As they finally start closing distance to the wall, one particularly violent rumble splits the land wide beneath their feet and Sheris takes off, grabbing Harikoras under his arms from behind. She can feel the winged men closing fast… Sheris attempts to climb on the winds, but the air becomes quickly thin and unstable as she nears the glacial wall. She calls to the wind but is forced to land, dropping Harikoras and immediately drawing energy to her. Sheris stays hovering low as she releases it, blasting the impossibly thick ice before them. Ice shatters, but it barely leaves a dent. Sheris lands and draws her sword. She shouts over the din, “Something protects what lies beyond this wall… unless we can scale it…” Sheris thinks quick, looks to the coming horde… and puts her hand out, calling to the land that lies between them. The ground shudders violently as Sheris pulls at it. Another vortex begins to form before them, wrapping the wind, ice, and snow around itself as it quickly grows, howling her discontent… Sheris opens her burning eyes as the first winged man lands. “We fight…”

Harikoras rolls and gets to his feet, little bruised other than his sizable ego. He glares at Sheris as he rips his sword from its scabbard, dusts snow from his shoulder with his free hand, and stomps towards an approaching black-winged man. The man holds his sword high, screaming a wordless challenge through the din of roars, the tempest of earth and air about them - but Harikoras swings his sword with all the finesse of a landslide, cutting the man's cry short in a mess of blood and feathers. "Yes, we fight!" He shouts, leaping to attack another black-winged minion finding its footing.

Sheris concentrates, pulling at the air currents high in the realm. Coaxing them to obey her will. The winds pull violently toward the spiral’s center, and as the winged demons begin to land, those caught on the winds find it difficult to descend. The closest to the vortex are sucked into its punishing winds and are stabbed and stung by thousands of ice shards streaming past. Sheris raises her sword and meets a blow from an approaching foe. Her will does not waver with the distraction, and neither do the winds. She does not have time to think where the power comes from as she slashes down and deflects the blade away. The realm itself seems to bend to her, feeding her desire… and right now… her desire is to rid this land of those before her. Another stroke and the arm holding the sword drops off. She finishes him with a blade to his gut and leaves him lying behind as she moves forward to her next opponent.

Harikoras runs at a minion and crouches just as it swings at him. He rams his sword into his opponent's gut as his momentum carries him past, sliding on the snow and ice. He grabs the sword from his former opponent before it falls from his hand, and swings upward into the groin of one of the creatures as it attempts to fly over him. He turns, leapfrogs the slumped figure of the creature he killed earlier, and retrieves his sword from its body in time to parry a strike from another as it lands. It gets a footing and lunges at Harikoras again, as a black bolt hits the ice and clatters away. He looks up and sees a group of the winged ones circling above, trying to stay clear of the vortex while still having a clear shot at Sheris and Harikoras with their crossbows. Harikoras snarls as the enemy in front of him swings again and comes perilously close to striking true; Harikoras knocks the swords aside at the last moment with his own and punches the blade into the enemy's neck. He swings back, striking the ground and knocking off a shard of ice. Retreating from the blows of more black-winged men landing before him, he dashes back, picks up the shard and hurls it at a crossbowman. He hits a glancing blow, only enough to distract his foe; that is enough, though, as the winged man veers off-course and into the vortex.

Sheris meets her next foe with a slash to his mid-section, but he leaps back and brings his blade down, skimming her arm as she dodges. Blood trickles from the shallow wound as Sheris bring her arm back down and slices across the demons shoulder. He staggers back as a bolt comes down between them. Sheris looks to the sky and watches another bolt fly toward her. She deflects it with her blade and watches it bury into the chest of the nearest demon. Sheris looks to the circle of flying men and narrows her eyes as she urges the vortex closer. Her body lightens, as does everyones around as the winds tug insistantly at the very earth, threatening to swallow all that is near. Sheris’s senses awaken as one demon comes around her back and she ducks and grabs his wrist, flinging him over her back and into an open chasm in front of her. The crevices are nearing them now, growing wider and longer with the violent shaking of the ground. Sheris looks to Harikoras as what’s left of the horde swarms toward them… she runs to him and slashes off a wing in her path. The ice wall at their backs suddenly shudders and begins to crack.

Harikoras snarls and stops hacking at what is left of the black-winged man in front of him long enough to turn and see the wall sundered as the cracks in the ground reach it. Whole sections of the wall tumble into the unfathomable depths beneath this realm and pull the wall nearby into fractured pieces. Another shake of the ground and the pieces shift and collapse, leaving wide gaps between the mammoth chunks of ice. Harikoras turns back and chops at his foe a couple more times for good measure before shouting to Sheris: "It is no rabbit hole, but it may hold long enough for us to see the other side. I always intended to die by the blade, not crushed by a slab of ice; and I say, the ice will hold! Have you seen enough blood yet this hour?" Harikoras looks at Sheris with a slight, mad grin as he backs towards the wall - then he turns and runs for one of the passageways now opened up.

Sheris stops to slash at an approaching foe. She hears the cracking and fall of the wall before turning. As Harikoras runs through the opened passage, Sheris finishes off her attacker and follows. She pulls the vortex along behind her and hopes it will finish off any who remain to follow before it dissipates. The massive ice wall is thicker than she’d realized. She looks ahead, where fog obscures their path. Another shudder punishes the land as the walls shake and crack around them. Just as they are emerging, the walls begin to cave in, and kicked up snow follows Sheris out of the passage as the way back is block by massive chunks of ice. Sheris looks around, squinting through the fog. She feels heat nearby and realizes that it is not fog, but steam that obscures her vision. She looks for Harikoras, “Any idea where we are?” She moves toward him, feeling his prescence. Emerging from the haze, laughter can be heard before a booming voice stirs the air and answers her. “not likely…” The haze slowly begins to lift as a shadowed, winged figure can be seen ahead. “Welcome! Did you enjoy the escort service?” The ice walls behind them shudder and seal themselves shut.

Harikoras skids to a stop on the wet surface of the ice, and peers ahead. "No, I did not," he says. "Who are you? Show yourself!"

"I could well ask you to show yourself," the voice booms, "you make a fine pair, trying to hide yourselves in this place. I can see, you, though, I can see you."

"I don't have time for another demon's petty games," Harikoras growls. "Stand aside or feel the bite of my blade!"

"My bite is worse than your bark, broken one!" The shadowy figure roars, and grows larger as it charges. A scaled foot cleaves its way out of the steam, showering shards of ice at the pair as it digs in and scrapes to a stop. The steam pulls away in wreathes, revealing a giant, tattered body. Old, dried meat hangs in rags from a skeletal frame, and even where the scaled skin still clings to the creature the flesh is sunken and the body hollow. A serpentine head sits atop a long neck, waving from side to side through the wisps of steam, its many-fanged mouth curled into a permanent smile. It flaps the dusty rags of its wings for balance, and fixes its single eye on Sheris and Harikoras - the other eye being no more than an empty socket. "Petty games indeed, little ones. Petty games for petty peoples."

Sheris stops in her tracks as the beast approaches. Her hand clutches the hilt of her sword tightly and her wings pull back, the feathers perking. Her eyes hold a violet tinge as she faces the undead dragon. Her eyes lock on its single orb for a moment before flicking about in an attempt to see through the haze. She lets her feelers out tentatively, searching for some orientation before she speaks, “I fer one have nae desire fer games…” Her eyes then flick to Harikoras and back to the beast, lowering her blade slowly but keeping a fierce grip. “Let us pass or name yer payment… but if it be in flesh, then play t’will have tae be.”

"Let you pass? Payment?" The dragon takes a step forward and swings its head low. No breath comes from the huge mouth, big enough to swallow a human whole, but the moist air behind the dragon carries the faint rotten smell of its flesh to Sheris and Harikoras. It carries on in a haughty tone, at odds with the smile fixed on its face. "You would both do well to have a little more... tact... when dealing with beings such as me. Payment! As though I am some maggoty troll guarding a dinky mountain pass! No, beings of little consequence, I am here to make an offer. I give you a chance that ones such as you only dream of - the chance to help me."

"If dreams are made of these, I would as soon not sleep," Harikoras sneers. "Stand aside! We tread in no-one's chances."

After quick contemplation, Sheris answers bluntly after Harikoras, ignoring his dismissal, “If help be payment, my question was one of no fool. And if hell be capable of spitting anything but foul venom from its lips...” Sheris slowly narrows her now glowing eyes, becoming impatient. “name this help dragon.”

"You would parley with this foul creature!" Harikoras bares his teeth and glares at Sheris. "Remember what aid hell has brought you recently! Remember what aid it has brought you since we have been here!"

The dragon's voice thunders over top of his protests. "I am no more of hell than you are, wretch, and I tire of this place. The help I want from you - in return for which, I will allow you to go unhindered - is to free me from this place." It flaps its wings, once, sending scraps of wing-leather adrift to flutter away. The dragon's voice rises in volume, from a quiet roar to a not-so-quiet roar. "This is no place for a dragon! This is no place for me, prince among my kind! Set me free, if you have any light left in you. Hell has rotted my flesh and dulled my claws. I would revenge myself on it. You have no love of hell! Get me out of here!"