The Black Veil

Elizabeth eyed the dark spot on Aethel's forehead.

"Something got you in the noggin." she pulled a bandage from a side pack, poured some water on it then handed it to her.
"Shut up." grunted Aethel, accepting the bandage anyway and pressing it gratefully to the throbbing wound. Elizabeth nodded vaguely and moved the veil around her neck up to her nose and re-tied it, blocking the incense.
"Myrrh and camphor. Disgusting " muttered Elizabeth. "And there's something else in there that stings the eyes."

"Chokeweed." murmured Aethel, turning over the bandage to press the cool side to the wound. Elizabeth sighed heavily.

"Of course...chokeweed. I ruled that out because it's banned by the government. But that means that the culprit has a lot of money in his hands or is threatening someone of high stature."

"Hmm. Or both."

"In any case, we'd better rejoin with the others. Can you stand, or were you legs injured too?" the slight tone of her voice annoyed Aethel.

"Yes. I can. Perfectly well."

"Good.Hold on a second and stay here." Elizabeth dodged between the trees and was gone for a minute or two.

"What was that?"

"I made it appear if a battle had taken place."

"Why?"

"So if they have any scouts in the area, they'll think we're dead or heavily injured and won't be expecting us or will be underestimating us to a great degree." Aethel sighed.

"I have to hand it to you...Thief. That's a new nickname for you. Thief."

"Don't call me that."

"Okay. Leaf, then." Elizabeth-Leaf- turned a stony glare on Aethel, who was smirking at her.
"There's no use." she sighed, and vanished into the trees, barely stirring the leaves.

Alex and Cassie were consulting the map when Aethel and Elizabeth joined them.

"What happened to you?" Alex asked.

"You know, dark wood and all that."

"I don't want to alarm you, but things have changed. Here,"

Aethel and Elizabeth were given a chance to look at the map. New lines had be scrawled in, making no sense to Aethel who squinted until Cassie handed over the lantern.

"Doesn't that look like - um - that circle with a star?"

"A what?" Aethel asked. "You all right, Leaf?"

Elizabeth drew in a few new lines, showing the ladies her addition.

"Pentacle!" Cassie said. "But that's a sign of the Devil, isn't it?"

Alex shrugged. "Different cults have different ideas. Some say it's used by witches for protection.

Aethel snorted. "Look, I'm not feeling too well. How about we get to the safehouse for now?"

"There's blood there," Elizabeth replied.

"Home, then."

"Come on, get some rest before we go any further." Alex and Cassie lead the way. Leaving the other two to follow. Elizabeth was becoming quite irritated by her new nickname, but she didn't mind. Aethel made her laugh by telling jokes.

"So, Leaf," said Aethel, jovially putting a hand on Leaf's head, which made a perfect armrest. "There were two muffins in an oven..." Leaf groaned.

"Don't call me that and don't tell me that godforsaken joke."

"Oh, come on! Everybody loves the muffin joke! Here, I'll tell it to you to make you smile. There were two muffins in an oven, and one screamed, 'Ohmygod, we're in an oven!', and-"
Leaf ran ahead.

"HEY! You didn't hear the end of the best joke in the world!" called Aethel, catching up to Leaf, who was staring at her compass and a map thoughtfully.

"Pentacle, hm?"
"Yeah, uh, so?" Leaf turned a gray eye on her searchingly.

"You don't know about pentacles, huh?"

"Why should I?" Leaf sat down on a stump.

"Let me explain to you a little bit about them, then. A pentacle is a star within a circle within a triangle of power, and is sometimes called a trigram or a hexagram. Four points of the star refer to the four directions- north, south, east, west. The north symbolizes the sword, west, death, east, life and south, spiritual energy. The last point of the star is the one a altar is built in, to gather spirits.This is all mythology I've picked up. Follow me?"

"Yeah." Leaf pointed at the map.
"There is a building in the fifth point of the star on this map." Aethel sucked in her breath.

"No way."

Leaf looked up at her, eyes now dark gray.

"Yes. Way."

((Sorry. I'm homeschooled and get up extremely early so I have the entire day off ))

sheesh! I was writing an entry (while doing homework), and then I get the little message, click over here, and there are five more entries. *shakes head* I'll wait for cloudyhead to post.

"Alex! Cassie!"

The two young women stopped in their tracks and raced back to Aethel and Leaf, thinking they were in trouble. Alex nearly collided into a tree trying to avoid a particularly large root, skidding to a stop in front of Aethel, who was now holding the map.

"What's wrong, we thought you were hurt!" Cassie said breathlessly.

"Nothing, we-" Aethel stopped, noticing Alex's intense blue eyes glaring at her. "Sorry." She added, smiling apologetically.

"Next time i'm going to almost crash into a tree, make sure it's for a good reason." Alex seethed. She took a deep breath to calm herself and picked her hat up from the ground, meticulously brushing off leaves and dirt. "Okay, now what did you call us back over here for?"

"The next constellation, well, sort of." Leaf said, handing her the map, "It's a pentagram, and we think we know where they'll be tomorrow night."

Cassie and Alex scanned the map for a moment before Cassie said, "That's not far from here, it will only take us a few hours. If we're lucky, we can catch them before they have the chance to kill again."

Alex leaned against a tree, suddenly aware of how tired she was. "We'll have to get back to headquarters and arrange a ride there. We may be able to get a bit of sleep in the carriage, I hope."

Aethel nodded, also remembering the absense of sleep they had all had during the past few days. Leaf got up from the tree stump and started back in the direction Alex and Cassie had come from. "Come on, we should hurry back. We'll have to get going by morning if we want to get there before these....things. Whatever they are."

The other girls mumbled an agreement and followed her out of the dense forest, glad to be back in the open and eager for a few hours sleep.

And thank you Baroness and chocolatechipmuffin for understanding and waiting for me to post. I really appreciate it.

[Should we have a list of who posts? Like Cloudy first, someone else second and so on? That way we know when it is our turn to continue.]

Is it too late for me to join. I have a great idea for your things.

Of couse not blackwings_angel. We need someone to play the villan(s). You're welcome to join anytime you want.

And to answer Myth's question, I don't really think it matters if there is a particular order to who posts as long as you wait for the other authors to post (or when a day is up) before you post again. Too much organization is bad for you.

Amen to that, sister

Organization is the bane of my existence.

Lol ok here goes.

Name:Lunor

Age:unknown but looks like he's around 21

Gender:male

Appearance

In the day:
Dark brown hair, quite shagy and unkept.Quite pale complexion. Very outlined body. Muscular, but not grotusquely. Usually dresses in black with a top hat. Usually has a wicked smile on his face. Carries around a cane with a skull as the head.

At night: You'll have to find out for yourelf.


Lunor woke up in his bed, fully dressed. He had fallen asleep again. He rubbed his eyes, sitting up in bed, went to his bathroom. He hated having to pretend that he slept every night. He had gotten nearly 7 hours of sleep in three days. Far too much. But then again, those people. He shuddered. Those people with the veils made him sleep. They were too much of a threat. They figured out what he was doing. They almost beat him to that little village. He was lucky he had the cover of the forest. He showered and went outside. His twisted smile, skull cane and tilted tophat matching his personality perfectly. He left his small brick house, out into a dark alley, in the city of london. He went onto the street, the light hurting his eyes terriblely. Why did they like it so bright? He called for a carriage, and gave the driver Morios' address. Lunor took a nap along the way. To keep him up through the day. Sleeping at night was very tiring. He cart came to an abrupt stop.
"Sir your stop." The driver said. His british accent was so fake.
"Thank you." Lunor stepped out of the Carriage and started off in the rain. It always seemed to be raining at Morios' house. He loved it.
"Sir my payment!" THe driver yelled out after him.
Lunor chuckled. How could he be so rude. He'd give him his payment. HE reapproached the cart cane in hand. "I'm sorry. I almost forgot." He threw a bag of schillings at the driver. Is that enough?" THe driver smiled, and poured the coins into his hand. While th edriver counted his coins, Lunor took the cane and with inhuman strength he swung the skull at the driver, breaking through his skull, blood spraying everywhere. Lunor sat him up and cracked the reins, the horses taking off in a strong gallop. He got his payment. Lunor took a white hankerchief out of his black suit, and wiped off the head of his cane. He then pulled outhis black leather gloves and put them on. He never liked blood on his hands. He knocked on the black door, waiting for Morios to go through his suspisious actions. The door slid open a crack, and a bloodshot eye poked out. "Lunor. Are you alone?"
"Do you honestly have to ask." Morios opened the door, and hurried Lunor in. He was not like teh others. NOt accepting the fact he was nearly immortal. He lived in fear, of anyone, and anything. But Morios was the best off before the incident. He had the largest house, it was here that they held their meetings. Lunor was early and not many of them had arrived yet. So far it was Morios, Ariel, Sherlock, and himself.
"Have you seen them?" Sherlock asked Ariel, pushing his pure white hair out of his face and behind his ear. His hair draped down to his shoulders, and was extremely straight.
"Oh I've seen them. How badly i want to just-" Ariel made a furious ripping motion with her hands, a growl crawling out of her throat. "I doubt they are even properly armed."
"I don't know, they seem-" Morios paused, petting his hand, mainly stroking a few scars on his hand. They looked like they were made by claws. "They seem experienced."
Lunor laughed."They don't seem nearly as skilled as us. By the time we've gathered enough souls, they will just be realising what we're up to. THey don't even know who or what we are."
The group sent out an anomious nod. "True, true." There was a loud knock at the door. Lunor sat down in one of the armchairs, oppostie Ariel and Sherlock, hanging his dripping top hat on one of Morios' three hat racks. He was extremely weird, having at least three of everything. He had one of those obbseive disorders.Morios bowed lowly as he opened the door. "Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you sir Lucifer."
Lunor chuckled. "Last time I checked we weren't very gentle."
Lucifer chuckled. "True. Now let's get down to business. He walked into the den with Lunor, Ariel, and Sherlock, Morios following close behind him. His tailflaps bobbed up and down behind him, taking off his top hat, and talently tossing it onto the hat rack. He took his seat in frnt of the empty fire place, Morios sitting next to Lunor, closest to Lucifer.
"Men, tommorrow night is our night. We need only seven more souls before we can open one of gates to hell and set my father loose on this world. And then," A broad smile crossed his face, revealing his extremely large canine teeth. "We will unleash hell."
Morios decided to be the poor fool to pipe up.
"Sir, what will happen if we don't gather nine souls by tommorrow, those veiled people are-"
"Shut up!" Lucifer did not like speaking of defeat. The fireplace behind him broke out in flames, so hot that Lunor felt it singing his eyebrows. "We will gather those seven souls by tommorrow before midnight, and open the gate." The fire calmed down, into a normal fire. "I know we will."

Okay, since only blackwings_angel has done their bit and the days about up since I last posted, i'll go ahead and post again. Loved your post by the way blackwings_angel. It was CREEPY.

"Alex, wake up!"

Alexandria woke slowly out of a restless sleep to find Cassie skaking her. She groaned and brushed Cassie's hand away irritably. "I'm up." she murmured, closing her eyes and covering her face with her hat.

Cassie rolled her eyes and dragged Alex by the arm out of the overstuffed leather armchair. "Come on, the carriage is here and we've got to go, now!"

Alex gave in and let Cassie drag her out of the room, down the hall, and out the heavy oak door while mumbling under her breath about how she may never get a decent nights sleep. They nearly stumbled down the path leading to the carriage, momentarily blinded by the intense sunlight.

"You can let go now." Alex snapped, twisting her arm out of Cassie's grip. She adjusted her hat and veil and straightened her black skirts before stepping into the elegantly decorated carriage drawn by four black horses. She slid onto an unusually comfortable leather seat next to Cassie, across from where Aethel and Leaf were already sitting, looking just as tired as she was. The driver flicked the reins and they rode in silence for several minutes before Aethel spoke.

"We'd better get there before these things. I'm getting tired of chasing them around." she said, rubbing sleep out of her eyes.

Alex nodded, still half asleep. "If we don't, there'll be hell to pay when we do catch 'em."

Despite being tired, Aethel could not sleep while the coach rumbled. She looked from Alex to Cassie, both staring into nothingness. Elizabeth gazed out the windows.

"I'm hungry," she said.

"I don't think we have time to stop," Cassie replied.

"Another ten minutes or so and we'll be there." Alex stifled a yawn. "Eat later."

The coach shook and Aethel was first to get off. Rubbing her neck and stretching she waited for the others.

Elizabeth brought out the map, confirming their current location was the midpoint of the pentagram. "Doesn't look like much,"

"It's only a bandstand. Did you expect something else?" Aethel asked.

Cassie and Alex, looking over Elizabeth's shoulder, scanned the map. "This doesn't seem right," Cassie said. "It's too—"

"Ordinary," Alex finished. "Maybe there's something underneath, like a tunnel somewhere."