Ebb Tide — Rio's game log
Rio - Ebb Tide Summary
© 2006 Leslie Lightfoot
The Adventures of Rio - Stranded by the Ebb Tide
Rio was running through the halls of the distorted Amber Castle in a panic. Her cousin, Andrew, who knew her ways and thought he loved her had been possessed by the power of the Unicorn and had struck at her. Her father, Bleys, had been laid low after an attack by that same Unicorn. (Granted the Unicorn had a right to be a little pissy, as she and Bleys had just attacked it, but still.) Her brother, Blade, was not answering the several frantic Trumps she had attempted. And the rest of her family was involved in their own little panics or maudlin self-pity fests respectively. It was up to Rio to get herself and her unconscious father out of Amber pronto.
Rio dashed past the new addition of several Bedouin guards without interference. Slamming through the door into Bleys' room, Rio gathered her limp father into her arms and riffled through the Trump deck he had entrusted to her. (Her own Trump deck, as usual, had been left in the secret hiding place in Torveth, Blade's personal Shadow.) Finding a Trump of that same Torveth in Bleys' deck, Rio desperately concentrated on the image of her brother's home.
Never the steadiest of Trump users and in more than a little bit of an agitated state, Rio was nevertheless surprised to find her father and herself transported to just outside of the main gates of Amber Castle.
With a yowl of frustration, Rio tried again figuring that she must have done it wrong. The second experiment yielded the same result. Another riffling through Bleys' deck and another attempt with a different place Trump dumped them right back at the Gates.
Damn, damn, damn! Rio wasn't sure if it was the Unicorn and Andrew that were trying to trap her, or the effects of someone's else panic/plan/defense, but whatever it was, it was obvious that she couldn't Trump to a different place under her own concentration from Amber Castle.
With low expectations, Rio choose her brother's card and *called* out to him. Nothing. Big surprise. Men! Reluctantly, she tried again with her cousin Brent's card. Brent wasn't exactly on the same track as Rio, but he also had never tried to push her down his own agenda road, so... But no answer. Rio started figuring that people Trumps weren't working any better than place Trumps.
Snarling under her breath, Rio decided to do it the hard way. Carrying her father back into the courtyard of the Castle, Rio procured a horse in the time-honored Amber way. She stole it.
With her father seated before her, the girl rode out of Amber Castle hell bent for leather. Rio avoided the city and headed down the south coast, the whole time the pale limp and slightly bleeding figure of Bleys' never made a sound or returned to consciousness.
Eventually, the horse reached its limits and Rio stopped at a fisherman's hut that decided to remain unoccupied while the two of them were there. Rio re-bandaged her father's hands, cleaned him up a little and fretted in his general direction. The girl had no medical skills to speak of but she knew that Bleys was in a bad way. His hands were only slowly seeping blood at this point, but the damage from his being thrown against the altar by the Unicorn - *that* was all on the inside and something that Rio couldn't smell or see.
Rio also knew that they were still well within the Unicorn's realm and that she wouldn't be able to leave it via horseback. Not having any other bright ideas, Rio started trying Bleys' Trump cards again. Blade, nothing. Damn! Brent, nothing. Shit! Who else? Who else could she call?!?
After several frantic moments, the girl came to the hope that perhaps Brand and Dartmouth had escaped Andrew's attack even as she had. Rio was aware that human men sometimes had... difficulty with her after she had left them in life or death situations, but she needed help and Brand was her best chance still untried. Calling to Brand achieved nothing. But Dartmouth? At last, at long last an answer.
"Rio?"
"You're alive!" Okay. Even Rio had to admit that that was a dumb statement. So she moved on quickly. "Are you safe?"
"Yes, Rio. But what happened..." blah, blah, blah. Dartmouth started in immediately with the talking. Rio listened to his voice, though not his words, long enough to determine that he didn't seem to be harboring any immediate desire to harm her. And then forcibly interrupted him.
"ARE YOU SAFE? Are you not in Amber?"
It seemed to take a moment for Dartmouth to understand the question. Men! "Yes. We are somewhere else. Somewhere that Brand brought us to. It was amazing..." more words that Rio didn't listen to. Her cousins certainly seemed devoted to speaking. Or maybe it was just Andrew and Dartmouth.
"Can you... will you bring us through?" She interrupted again with gritted teeth.
"Oh, okay."
Finally!
Rio gathered up Bleys' form, took Dartmouth's extended hand and vanished from Amber.
To appear in the dusty, mildew-y and very far from anything, Keep of the Four Worlds. Dartmouth led Rio, carrying the still unconscious Bleys to a chamber. He indicated that his own father had been smacked by the Andrew-thing and wasn't doing to well right now either.
As Rio and Dartmouth settled Bleys, he awoke briefly and murmured something that seemed mostly lover-oriented so Rio ignored it.
Dartmouth gave Rio a tour of the Keep. As the place *terminally* BORING, not wild enough to be any fun, not civilized enough to be entertaining, Rio became quickly restless. Dartmouth, in an attempt to impress the pretty girl, showed her the Font. He seemed fascinated by it. He hypothesized a lot of blah-blah concerning power vs. risk etc, etc that Rio mostly blew off. Either he was going to go in it or he wasn't. Duh.
Tiring of Dartmouth's endless philosophical-semantic loop, Rio laid it out for him. If you don't know, *ask* your damn father instead of playing the 'what if' game. (Quietly, Rio was curious too. Having never taken the Pattern, she was going to be... awfully reliant on the kindness of others in the upcoming days. And Others seemed not to be answering their Trumps! She was figuring that she might want to do something about that.)
The next day, Brand was still somewhat shaky and, in Rio's opinion, covering his weakness by being all enigmatic. Whatever. Rio and Dartmouth drag... assisted Brand to the chamber with the Font in it, where Dartmouth asked a lot of stupid questions regarding it. Early on, Rio figured out that it wouldn't help her move through Shadow, so she lost interest in it. She *especially* wasn't interested in it after Brand made the point that he couldn't (i.e. wouldn't) make any recommendations, that the choice to enter was up to them and that power had it's Cost.
Rio definitely heard the capital C and decided not to enter the Font. Dartmouth talked and philosophized and theorized and was generally boring enough that Rio wanted to tear his skin off. She settled for dragging Dartmouth for a very rough fuck.
Afterward, as the far wimpier Dartmouth slept, Rio went back and unslung Brand from the statue of Sharrib Garul that he had been 'leaning' on and escorted him to bed. Brand didn't seem to have anything to say about being left or Rio and Dartmouth's activities but there was definitely a hint of patronizing humor in his eyes. Whatever.
The next day, Brand was feeling better enough to look in on the still unconscious Bleys. He didn't seem to be harboring any grudges but Rio still wasn't about to tell him what she and Bleys had been up to and why Bleys was in such bad shape. However, Rio was also pretty sure that Brand had *some* idea what was up because he only administered the lightest of medical aid and told her that Bleys needed to sleep it off.
Bleys came briefly to consciousness and he and Brand spoke briefly in enigmatic red-headed brother talk, which Rio mostly didn't care to follow.
(Note - I truly do not remember if Dartmouth ever entered the Font during this time or not.)
The next few days were boring, boring, boring. Yackity Dartmouth was good for an occasional romp but didn't have enough endurance and thought too much for it to be really interesting. Bleys was in and out of nappy time. Brand was all smirky. Rio was going nuts.
So she went out to the rampart overlooking the Water Shadow, took off her clothes, changed into a condor and flew off to do some exploring. Originally her intention was to stay close to the Keep, but she was having too much fun with the air currents and the freedom.
Soon however, she noticed a change in the winds. Something wild, powerful and male was nearby. Rio's heart screamed with the thrill. Now *that!* was what she needed/wanted.
Diving out of the sun, it came at her - a glorious male Quetzalcoatl-style dragon. Rio screamed out her challenge and was answered. The two began to tangle in an erotic battle. But Rio soon found that she was outmatched, when the Quezt scored her back with a massive claw strike. This only drove her to more fury/lust. Near maddened, her shapeshifting began to respond in interesting ways and she was able to wound her opponent/lover with flame-arrows that flew from her pinions. In retaliation, the Quetz bound her in its coils and the two began to fall.
It was as they fell, that Rio noticed they were no longer in some glorious shadow or other, but falling toward the forest of Arden. Rio's battlelust turned to terror instantly. This was the land of the Unicorn.
(This next bit is hazy for me, Simone, you might want to check with Ian. I believe that Rio and the Quetz did hit the ground in Arden. I *think* they shifted to human form and that the Dragon/Quetz said something about loosing the power within her. But Rio was in full panic and pulled a Trump of Dartmouth and bamphed out of there. I *think*...)
Rio arrived back at the Font; injured, tousled and flustered. Dartmouth took charge of her and dressed her wounds and then, since this was Rio, there was more fucking. Dartmouth seemed to be getting a little... tender towards her but as he wasn't showing any of Andrew's possessiveness, Rio didn't feel like hitting him yet. But she was definitely getting a little concerned regarding what Dartmouth might think was going on.
Sometime, thereafter, Rio was out pacing around in the Firelands - this time close to the Keep when Dartmouth frantically waved her back in. He indicated that he had been in Trump contact with Flora and that Flora had warned him that while no one else knew where they were, people were heading toward the Font.
Rio almost did hit him then. He let Flora know where she and her father were!?! Idiot!!!
Quickly the four them - Rio, Dartmouth, Brand and the still weak but now fully conscious Bleys - bundled themselves together and fled the Keep of the Four Worlds. Neither Rio nor Dartmouth could shift shadow. (And for some reason I can't remember, neither Brand nor Bleys could either.)
The four set out over the Firelands, where Rio's shapeshifting made things less uncomfortable for herself than the others. They hadn't gone very far or very fast at *all!* when it became apparent that Bleys was still too weak to go on. So Rio started carrying him. Shortly thereafter it became apparent that Brand was almost completely fagged and Dartmouth wasn't that much better. *Wimps!*
Well, after all the enigmatic smugness from Brand, the imperious tone of the Quetz and -- yuck -- some of Dartmouth's meanderings, Rio decided to get experimental. She discovered that by letting go, becoming all wild and just Being, she could practically fly over the arid, hostile terrain. Happy raptor screams.
Unfortunately, she couldn't carry all three of them. Dartmouth tried to imitate what Rio was doing but was completely unsuccessful. Rio rolled her eyes and explained that *of course* he couldn't do what she did, he was Dartmouth, not Rio. Honestly! Men.
A little experimentation ensued and Rio was able to snatch Brand and Dartmouth into her "wake" and they finally began to make some time and distance from the Keep.
However, their coarse remained through arid deserts and all of Rio's wishing for a luxury casino didn't seem to be having any effect in terms of shifting Shadow. Brand was no help on the theoretical end either. :-P
At another pause, Dartmouth did some of his own experimenting. Rio, of course, didn't understand it. And didn't particularly care. But Dartmouth was able to do something with paths or connections or probability or something like that.
So they next time they took to 'flying,' Dartmouth tried to affect their path. Which brought them all to a crashing halt. Dartmouth was lucky that Rio's arms were full of Bleys or she would have kicked him then. It was Brand who suggested that if Rio would allow Dartmouth to show her the paths, she could then follow them. Of course, this would entail Rio allowing Dartmouth into her mind. And oh was he smirky when he said it.
Rio said no. Unconditionally no.
So they all sat around in the desert for a bit, while Rio decided whether or not to abandon Brand and Dartmouth.
Eventually Dartmouth told Rio that he could go in just shallowly enough to only give her a visual, no deeper. Rio didn't believe him at all, but allowed herself to be talked into it.
Off they went, and via Dartmouth, Rio became aware of paths/currents/thermals where she was running/flying. She couldn't really tell where any of them led, but she did know that some 'felt' better to her then others. So, while concentrating on somewhere safe and comfortable, Rio began to follow the good feeling paths.
Eventually, the four of them ended up somewhere that Rio definitely felt was good and safe - the Green Hell of an enormous tropical rainforest. Rio got the boys settled in a cave/overhang, then indicated that she was going hunting. Alone. (Frankly she was getting *really tired!* of all these helpless men around her all the time. :-P)
Rio slipped off into the jungle as a jaguar and had herself a good time; rolling in the grass, climbing trees, etc. Shortly, after she left she felt Dartmouth 'following' her somehow. But he didn't seem to be stalking, just experimenting and curious about what she was doing and how she did it. Men.
Rio left him in the dust in short order and went off on her lonesome for a while. Eventually she brought home a still warm and bleeding peccary. Since she had killed it, she figured the rest was up to the guys and she left them to it.
Exhausted and with her belly full, Rio rested -- still in jaguar form -- on a tree limb near the cave mouth, her tail slowly swaying while she guarded. From her perch, she could hear Brand and Bleys' voices raised in argument about something or other, but since it didn't seem like violence was imminent, Rio just yawned and paid it no mind.
The game ended with Rio resting on the tree limb, Dartmouth somewhere around that I don't remember, and Brand and Bleys deciding what to do about the situation.
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other writings: Background, Quiz, "Rio and Andrew", "Rio and Blade", "Rio and Dartmouth", "Rio and Duncan", Undertow log, "Blade and not Rio", Ebb Tide log