Bloodletter
Part of a Series on the Barmies who reside in the Gatehouse of the Bleak Cabal
(Prime vampire priest of Oghma [she/her] / CE)
That ain’t her real name, mind. Fact is, we don’t know what she’s really called, and nor do I volunteer to be the unlucky sod to find out. Aye, there’s a story behind this barmy and all. Ain’t there always?
Well, the chant goes that Bloodletter’s not been in Sigil all that long. She arrived here a year ago or so, fresh faced from the Prime. Back then she was a priestess of Oghma from some world called Toril. (For some strange reason, they think the Oghma they’ve got there is different from the Oghma who makes his case just out-of-town in Tir na Og. And you still reckon there’s a point to the multiverse?) Anyway, that ain’t important, not now at least.
Like most of the leatherheaded Clueless who blunder their way into the Cage, this one was pretty impressed by our Serene Lady of Pain. Trouble is, once she learned that the Lady don’t speak, the barmy priestess decided she’d lend Oghma’s helping hand.
Firstly the addle-cove found a way to summon the Lady out from whatever dark corner she hides in. She drew great big symbols and runes bearing the Lady’s name in chalk on the walls of buildings and the streets of the Clerks’ Ward. Then she stood on a pile of boxes and began to call out prayers to Our Lady. Well, the priestess got the attention she was seeking, sort of.
A great crowd of Cagers gathered, realised what the barmy prime was up to, and dispersed as quick as they could run. Most of ’em, peering out from nearby doorways across the deserted street, couldn’t believe their eyes at what they saw next.
The Lady’s shadow drifted down from the skies, and her blades swept along the street towards the hapless priestess. As the Lady grew close, the prime let loose her final plan: she cast the ‘tongues’ spell so the Lady would be able to converse with her.
I’d rather not describe what happened next.
The upshot was the Lady passed by and drifted back into the clouds, while the priestess was left in a hideous, flayed mess in the street. The Collectors, having heard the rather unpleasant noises, arrived rapidly to pick up the pieces, but they found the priestess had already risen. Thing is, she wasn’t exactly alive, neither.
The Clerks’ Ward was terrorised for a week or so until the Dustmen finally managed to catch the vampire (as we later learned she was). It wasn’t just that she was undead; it seemed she was completely unstoppable. She took to draining the lives of mortal, celestial and fiend alike in a fearsome orgy of bloodlust (if fiends have blood, that is), but she was finally tracked down to the cellars of the Mortuary. The Dustmen brought her straight to us. Nice of ’em, eh?
Seems the Lady had a few more tricks up her sleeve. Bloodletter (as we affectionately call her) isn’t able to speak any more, though judging by her appetite, there’s nothing wrong with her throat. Nor is she able to write, at least, not with a pen or paper. For a former priestess of a power of speech and writing, that’s quite an apt punishment. You know, sometimes the Lady really does us proud.
Bloodletter is able to communicate, however. Trouble is, it’s in a particularly horrible way. She can only write using the blood of a freshly killed creature, although sometimes she prefers to form words from their entrails. As I said, it’s really not worth asking her questions.
At least, we thought it wasn’t, until the chant started up that the Lady had actually said something to Bloodletter. Some baatezu high-flyer smuggled several bubbers into the Madhouse, and tried to force the barmy to spill the dark on the Lady’s little talk. Well, the vampire obliged, but must’ve run out of guts, ’cause she tore up the amnizu too. We’d cleaned up the mess before we realised what it could’ve been. Maybe some darks are best lest unspoken, eh?
Until we decide what to do with her, we’re keeping her in the ‘Wing along with the rest of the barmies. I can’t see her staying there for long; her diet is a bit “special” for the kitchens to cope with. As it is, we feed her on cranium rats, unlucky kobolds, and for a special treat, Signers! No, only jokin’ berk! I love ’em really, every bleedin’ last one of ’em. (And the more they bleed, the better.)
Source: Jon Winter-Holt, mimir.net
