Alfarell

A 362-post collection

Challenge #04870-M121: The Right Fulcrum

"You can have money or you can have Justice." - Which do you choose? -- Prompey

[AN: Very sorely tempted to do so many Leverage riffs]

The right to reign is often accepted to mean: anyone who reigns has all the rights. And when anyone is both rich and powerful, they can take what they want and make consequences happen to others. Naturally, the people on the wrong end of that exchange tend to get irritated by that attitude.

So rebellions rise in odd corners.

Five rogues gathered in an undisclosed location, each with their particular area of expertise. They didn't dress like rogues, which was the point. If anyone in authority found them, that authority would mistake them for Adventurers up to some nonsense.

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Challenge #04868-M119: Tested Not in Vein

Legend holds of a harsh God, who’s marked have the blood drained from their bodies until expiring, this life force fueling the God’s power. The God has no use for the souls of those who are not devotees. So what happens when Elizabeth is dragged into the body of a ghoulish divine and accidentally invokes the right rite to bind her soul to her blood and become a simple blood cell inside the sepulcher halls of Godly flesh? -- Deathshead419

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Challenge #04866-M117: Dredging Up Blessings

Eons ago, a temple with ten divine statues sank into the sea and then were pulled into the mantle of the planet itself. Now they have come to life, trapped below the crust of the world. Only Nalani and Vykoria can plunge down a lava plume and guide these divines into the light, though a path no human has ever walked will be treacherous and full of dangers unknown to mankind.

Sequel to: https://peakd.com/fiction/@internutter/challenge-04849-m100-stolen-mercy -- Deathshead419

Vykoria

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Challenge #04863 -M114: Love of Perfection

A skilled Sculptor has created a beauteous statue of a woman. It is so beauteous that the sculptor has fallen in love with her. And so the Sculptor implores the Gods to bring her to life so that she might become the Sculptor’s wife. Boons from the Gods always come with a price, especially ones reflecting love. And it may be that the Beauteous woman will wish to sculpt the Sculptor into her vision of an ideally aesthetic form… -- Deathshead419

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Challenge #04862-M113: Fearsome Hero Hunvug

In a Tavern on the outskirts of Pildile, four men gather around a table for drinking, dicing, and a night away from the troubles of the world. Only, all four saw a hero’s exploits first hand, yet, none of them have the same story of what really unfolded… -- Deathshead419

Three beers in, Vaelin muttered, "Bloody heroes..." He took another swig before taking his turn at the dice.

"Aye," rumbled Goran. "Breaking in where they don't barge in, sticking their noses

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Challenge #04861-M112: The Path to Fates

Deep in the vales of the Winderwrung Crags, legends speak of a beautiful figure whose serenade echoes across the range. Some say this singer leads climbers to their doom, others speak of surviving blizzards by that heavenly voice. One has at last set out to see if the legends hold any truth or are only traveler’s tales… -- Deathshead419

The valley is plentiful, and those who live there know well why every building stands on stilts or pillars. Even the horses

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Challenge #04860-M111: A Little Mercy

At the end of the siege of Kaldorn, when the walls fell, young Jrodha Nosin sought shelter from the invading armies. Jrodha found it in the temple of one of the city’s most prominent gods. Yet while the rage of the invaders faded with Jrodha safely behind the barricade, safety always comes at a price… -- Deathshead419

When the world ended, a child ran for the shelter of Boreas' temple. Her name, when she entered the stone structure, was Jrodha Nosin.

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Challenge #04859-M110: The Haunting of Stelgi Manor

Countess Vermyr Stelgi has inherited a substantial tract of land after the death of a distant cousin who had no other heirs. She moves quickly to spruce up the palace, hoping to make it into a summer home owing to the northerly quiet. That involves properly disposing of the departed cousin’s eclectic (some might say ghastly) collection, though some things in that palace might not appreciate being removed… -- Deathshead419

Like most buildings that had been in a family for generations,

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Challenge #04857-M108: Domesticity

Leave that for somebody else to do. They came, they saw and they left it. -- Prompty.

Some warlords operate on Veni, vedi, vici. The Harukh'ai approached the Elven settlements with, Veni, vidi, ruinam reliqui in mind. At least, they did when the Ormani got around to writing epic poems and studies around it. Several centuries after the the conflicts settled down into hardy perennial territory disputes.

The Harukh'ai had a reason. Taslanae had to wonder why Yinmanou approached the kitchen with

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Challenge #04856-M107: Second Chance for Stuff

Tip Shops. Everything from from over-ordered new clothing, 2nd hand furniture, building material and odds and ends. "One person's rubbish is another's treasure." -- Prompty.

Places like this had a Smell. Somewhere between dust, old makeup, and the Stygian depths of an Escherian book emporium. Regardless of whether the items for sale were new or recovered in one way or another, they all had the scent of too much time.

Maebe thought of it as the smell of second-hand dust. It made

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Challenge #04854-M105: Call of the Favour

1: "You are aware, of course, that where you are going is more than far beyond us?"/ 2: "Yes. There's no horse that will be able to make the journey." 1: "Then how do you plan to get there?"/ 2: "We'll need something more than a simple horse." 1: "What do 'we' have in mind?" -- Anon Guest

"It's ten thousand leagues, and we have to get there in a handful of days. We don't have horses for all of us. We

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Challenge #04853-M104: No Need to Fret

Let me tell you of a bard I once heard sing. The voice had a strength and depth that no magic in the world could recreate. I felt the desire to steal them away and keep them for myself, but I knew the world needed them more. And so I became their patron.

https://peakd.com/flashfiction/@internutter/challenge-04840-m091-fey-touched -- Anon Guest

Legends tell of a Bard who can charm savage beasts with the sound of hir voice. One who can make

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Challenge #04852-M103: Queen's Gambit

For 60 long years Queen Essarea has held her kingdom together through sheer force of will. But at long last her strength is flagging, old clans once subdued are preparing to open old feuds for power, and her heirs lack the careful combination of ruthlessness, charisma, and measured kindness which Essarea employed during her time on the throne. What will become of six decades of relative peace once her eyes close for the final time…? -- Deathshead419

It's not unprecedented, but there's

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Challenge #04851-M102: With Adequate Reason

Trudy enters her awkward teenage years with a new obsession. Haunted by dreams, she begs and cajoles her parents until they bring her to a lake in the middle of a swampy waste. Here she finds the source of her begging dreams, a human prince who had been turned into a swan. Just the sort who’s magic curse would reach a girl who used to be a goose…

https://peakd.com/fiction/@internutter/challenge-04708-l324-from-menace-to-midwife -- Deathshead419

The Will o' the Wild

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Challenge #04850-M101: Treasure Trouble

Menson V'lek has inherited a map where his father buried a pirate fortune. The story goes that after a shipwreck during a great sea chase, the old man buried the gold he could not carry and high tailed it out of there. But something doesn’t quite add up with the old man’s story or his map, leading Menson to travel to the isle to unravel the truth. -- Deathshead419

[AN: Had to change a little spelling because found a real

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