"She is more commonly known as the sculptor of wolves, for her preferred ghouls are wolves and she crafts bizarre deformities for them, often combining the skeletons and organs of several at once. Lupine kinfolk are treasured above all, for the torment of transformation instills the taint of corruption in them.
She began her life as a Danislav revenant in northeastern Transylvania. She was a skilled manipulator and advisor, taking great pleasure in pitting the local knezi against one another and thriving in political strife. She was eventually invited to Radu's court to advise him concerning a dispute with a Gangrel.
Wolves served this Gangrel beast as bodyguards, and they had begun to prey on the humans not far from Bistritz. Many infants were stolen away in the night, and some daring packs would run through the streets of the city, causing mayhem. Soon they began to seek out Radu's havens.
Roused from his daily slumber by the troublesome lupines, the Count took this offense as a declaration of war.
Marelle stalked this Gangrel in the forest outside Bistritz to ascertain the cause of his grievance. What she discovered alarmed her. The Cainite was found conferring with Arnulf - He is a powerful Inconnu known for his hatred of the larger cities of Transylvania and the Cainites who encourage their growth.The situation became obvious: The wolves were scouts for some larger campaign against the city. Wise to the threat, Radu Embraced Marelle as his childe. Certain that she would be a staunch ally against the enemies of his domain, he set her against the Inconnu's servant. Her ruthless response to the Gangrel assault was impressive. Marelle was fanatical about destroying the Gangrel that threatened her sire from the moment she clawed her way from the grave.
She began with simple warnings: Canine servants were found grafted together in twos and threes around towering pine trees. As the warnings continued, her "messages" became grislier. The Gangrel relented, but Marelle did not.
When she at last hunted down the Gangrel, she fleshcrafted him into a monster and caused him to be devoured by his own Lupine servants. Marelle became so bestial that Radu could no longer stand the sight of her. She enjoyed tormenting other living things and when she abducted a human infant for one of her studies, Radu, perhaps the most diplomatic of my already so courteous clan, captured his childe, informing her that he had disowned her and that she would be banished from his lands. Were she to ever return, he would destroy her.
This might not be unacceptable in and of itself, save for where Radu banished her. Marelle was sacrificed to the Cathedral of Flesh."
"The what?" Ennius asks, perhaps a little too loudly, in confusion.
Every other Cainite in the room knows of the Cathedral - a massive monument of living and unliving ghouled and blood bound flesh constructed by the primeval methuselah Yorak, current Vovoide of Vovoides among the Tzimisce.
---
As Anton speaks the wolves begin to wake - but it is too late for them, the tendrils have already wrapped around their legs and chests, holding them in place, crushing them. Their howls are muffled by the shadows.
Daniel moves forward and tears one of the wolves to pieces, Andreas does much the same, seemingly trying to beat Daniel at his own game in how horribly they could execute the dread beasts.
Joseph walks slowly and silently to one of the wolves, cowed in the dark, and closes his eyes. He makes two strikes with his longsword - with a precision and degree of efficiency that greatly surprises Anton - and another wolf dies.
There remains only one of the fleshcrafted beasts.
Worry gnaws at the back of Heldric's mind. This feels too easy.
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Topic: Chapter 1: Dark Tides Rising (Read 632552 times)