bakerstreet | Gothic Romance

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Gothic Romance

Gothic Romance

Lightning streaks across the inky blackness. Somewhere far off in the deep woods, a single wolf howls. Go ahead, bring your meager candle close, no matter the danger that the flame presents to your luxurious satin clothing - you won't find any warmth to relieve you in this mansion built just as much of regret as it is of stone. But you have no other choice since you've been imprisoned here.

Or perhaps you're the one who's keeping a less-than-willing soul here to ease your own pain. Either way, you've found yourself the subject of an atmospheric, suspenseful gothic romance!

a type of novel that flourished in the late 18th and early 19th cent. in England. Gothic romances were mysteries, often involving the supernatural and heavily tinged with horror, and they were usually set against dark backgrounds of medieval ruins and haunted castles. The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole was the forerunner of the type, which included the works of Ann Radcliffe, Matthew Gregory Lewis, and Charles R. Maturin, and the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. Jane Austen's novel Northanger Abbey satirizes Gothic romances. The influence of the genre can be found in some works of Coleridge, Le Fanu, Poe, and the Brontës. During the 1960s so-called Gothic novels became enormously popular in England and the United States. Seemingly modeled on Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre and Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, these novels usually concern spirited young women, either governesses or new brides, who go to live in large gloomy mansions populated by peculiar servants and precocious children and presided over by darkly handsome men with mysterious pasts. Popular practitioners of this genre are Mary Stewart, Victoria Holt, Catherine Cookson, and Dorothy Eden.
( source )

HOW TO PLAY
1. Comment with your character, info, and preferred role/trope or even setting. Is your character a bright-eyed ingenue? A tortured soul with as many skeletons in their closet as their are rooms in the castle? Hired help who has fallen for the mansion's newest guest and wants to save them from a certain doomed fate? How about a vampire, werewolf, or ghost? The only limit is your imagination!
2. Reply to others. Hash things out or go with the flow. Just get your gothic, creepy shipping on.
3. RNG the prompts if you need to. Otherwise, have fun. Treat this as seriously or as irreverent as you'd like.

PROMPTS
( change the gender/pronouns out for appropriate ones! | source )

1. Powerful love. Heart-stirring, often sudden, emotions create a life or death commitment. Many times this love is the first the character has felt with this overwhelming power.

2. Uncertainty of reciprocation. What is the beloved thinking? Is the lover's love returned or not?

3. Unreturned love. Someone loves in vain (at least temporarily). Later, the love may be returned.

4. Tension between true love and father's control, disapproval, or choice. Most often, the father of the woman disapproves of the man she loves.

5. Lovers parted. Some obstacle arises and separates the lovers, geographically or in some other way. One of the lovers is banished, arrested, forced to flee, locked in a dungeon, or sometimes, disappears without explanation. Or, an explanation may be given (by the person opposing the lovers' being together) that later turns out to be false.

6. Illicit love or lust threatens the virtuous one. The young woman becomes a target of some evil man's desires and schemes.

7. Rival lovers or multiple suitors. One of the lovers (or even both) can have more than one person vying for affection.

8. Dark (and brooding?) At least one member of the pair has a tragic past or experiences that have left them closed off to the world.

9. Less than ideal beginnings. It's an age-old story: falling in love with the person who locked you in the dungeon. Or the attic, if they're a bit more hospitable.

10. Supernatural elements. Strange dreams about a shadowy place or a mysterious face. Blurry figures that linger just out of the line of sight. And the master of the house, always indisposed around the time of the full moon.

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[ooc: Open to discussion.]

[ she is canonically a ghost seeking retribution for her murder and takes out her fury and resentment for the world on her victims. i'd be happy to work with that angle, or play her as still living and fresh out on her own. i'm not very interested in 9, but i love to mix prompts, so feel free to do so. f/f, f/m and f/nb welcome. ]

( ota, and equally open to all prompts! more info/prefs on her journal. )

[slow-burns loved.]

( m/f )

[ A: she's a doctor at the asylum, B: she's an inmate at the asylum, C: oh no i am but a poor defenseless maiden alone on the street at night i sure hope no sexy mad doctors drag me into this alley ]

[ Oh the choices. Lol, how about A and C. Do you want a generic vamp or a Masquerade? This matters on levels of madness, I tend to play Malkavians on Masquerade types. ]

[It's half past midnight, and the Mayfair townhouse is quiet. Victor is the only person left stirring within, and the man has long since retreated to the house's lowest quarters to begin setting up what Dorian will need upon waking the following morning. A few candles are still lit around the house, but for the most part the hallways are dark, silent, and devoid of motion. Occasional flickering candle lights fall upon the eyes of the various portraits in the house, including one particularly fresh and remarkable one hanging in the entrance hall, giving the hallways and rooms a strange sense of being filled with watchful eyes.

In the master bedroom, Dorian sleeps soundly after an evening at White's with friends. It's been a strange series of weeks ever since that encounter, and the oddities that have filled his life since haunt his dreams.

Still, being young, disturbing dreams about men in top hats with pointed teeth aren't enough to pull the young immortal from sleep. He rests soundly, with only the occasional light breeze from the open window causing the sheets and hanging tapestries in the room to flutter.]

Edited 2021-11-07 21:05 (UTC)

[ I don't know a dang thing about Masquerade so follow your heart??? ]

He had been watching her for some time now. How could he not? Female doctors were so rare, and one who served the mad? Even rarer. Most knew of her brilliance, even if it was mainly credited to the men around her. It was one of his last retainers driven utterly mad that had been her previous patient. He died mysteriously in the cell after speaking of his 'master.'

One doesn't share the gifts they have been given. That is betrayal, and betrayal is death. The only problem was now he needed a new servant, and he had a new fixation. The smell of her had been all over the cell when he had let himself in. And that scent was now all he could think of. So close and yet so far away.

The sun had set some time ago, and he was following her silently through the busy streets. A fine suit and a cloak flowing, the appearance of a gentleman just as any other that might be out this time of year, and yet his reasons were more nefarious than not. Following the brilliant young doctor, his red eyes under smoked lenses so none would see the color.

[The eyes of the house see nothing as a tall man approaches the dark and quiet manor in Mayfair.

Tobias had figured out a week ago where the incorrigible young man who thought he saw the vampire feeding in an alley lived. Despite all of his attempts to dissuade the man - child, really - that it had been a trick of his imagination, Dorian kept after him. It was annoying, but as the boy wasn't spreading rumors or doing much other than following and asking after him, it wasn't really a problem. Or, at least, it wasn't until their last run in.

Finding out the man had written down his thoughts in a diary had been the final nail in Dorian's coffin. He'd gone out of way to suggest the error in the younger man's memory rather than put him under his thrall, and apparently that had been a mistake. The diary entry had shaken Dorian loose from the vampire's hold, and now it would be the thing to put him in a grave.

Making his way around the outside house to the open master bedroom window, Toby follows the all too familiar scent of the idiot who would be his meal tonight. He'd caught the butler a few nights ago while Dorian was out and gotten permission to enter the house, allowing for this evening's surprise meeting. There will be no house bell to announce him tonight; The master of the house isn't allowed to know he's coming.

A grin tugs at his lips as he scales the side of the house and slips in through the window. He's not the most coordinated of people, but no one could possibly hear the quiet scraping or soft cursing that come from the act over Dorian's rather loud snoring. It's funny - and very helpful - to know his prey's a loud sleeper. All the better to avoid detection until he's ready.

Once inside the master bedroom, the vampire takes a moment to smooth the wrinkles from his coat before settling next to Dorian's prone figure on the bed. He is exquisite, Toby will give him that much, but no pretty face can give him as much trouble as Dorian has and live. If the man is going to keep coming after him with questions and suspicions, now's the time to end this. A pity, but even his most beautiful patrons come to this same, inevitable end with time. It would have been fun to get more than a visceral taste of this one before they got to this moment, but such is the way things go.

After a few moments of watching the young man's chest rise and fall, he loosens his collar and leans over Dorian. He waits for a round of snoring to subside, then grins as he murmurs to his sleeping prey.] Wake up, Mr. Gray. I'm here to bring those nightmares you wrote about to life.

[In Dorian's dreams, the top-hatted men with sharp teeth are speaking quietly to him, and the disturbance makes him mumble nonsense in his sleep, his brow creasing. The moment passes soon and, with a short snore, the immortal rolls over slightly in his sleep to get into a more favorable position.

It

may take a more than a few softly-spoken words to wake this particular man up, especially one as deep in sleep as Dorian is.]

Edited 2021-11-07 23:03 (UTC)

[The murmuring seems a good sign, and Toby places a hand on either side of Dorian's chest in preparation of him waking and--

rolling over? Wait, what?! No, he's supposed to wake up, not fall into a deeper sleep!

It's been a long time since the vampire encountered someone who was so unaware of what was happening around them while they slept. Even deep sleepers seem to have some amount of sense when someone is suddenly next to them. But apparently not Dorian? God, how absolutely frustrating.]

Hey! [Toby sits up and pokes at Dorian's ribs decisively a few times.] Will you bloody listen to me and wake up? I can't very well kill you if you sleep through it. [He frowns harder and pokes the young man a few more times, including once or twice on his face for good measure. If this doesn't work, he's going to put this child under his thrall at a bar tomorrow and do all of this again so he gets the chance to do this right.]

[The poking is enough to do the trick. Sharp prods to his ribs and... face??? are annoying when he's resting so comfortably in his warm bed. Dorian rouses with a groan, and flaps a bit at the hand near his face. This isn't the kind of wakeup he wants from his man when it's still pitch dark inside the manor.]

Mm... hmm? [Dorian blinks his eyes open blearily, only for them to immediately widen in surprise at the sight of the man settled not more than a foot from him. Confused, Dorian sits up with a start.]

Mr. Matthews? [Oh fuck. He may be suspicious of Tobias, and have even pursued him enough to try and get answers about what he was, but this seems... bad. They've never met in private before, and that alone without an invitation is highly irregular, even if he wasn't meeting some kind of creature.] What on Earth are you doing here? How did Victor... [Dorian stumbles a bit over his words as his sleepy brain-to-mouth communication continues to catch up.] -how did you get in?

[A better reaction, if still a bit less exciting than Toby had hoped for.]

Your man let me in the other night to tour the place. I helped myself in through the window tonight. [He frowns softly.] You're a difficult man to wake, Mr. Gray, and I'm very disappointed in you.

[Well, not really, but he's just... so annoyed by Dorian ignoring his first attempt to wake a man. Well, that, and...

Look, this is a very un-sexy entrance, but apparently this is where they're at and Toby's just going to have to make the best of it. Sigh. Child, you are more of a problem than Toby was ever going to be ready for.

Setting all that aside, Toby crosses his legs primly as he rests a hand on the bed and leans closer to Dorian.] It's time you learned the truth about all your inquires tonight - and why you should never write down any of your thoughts where others can find them. [A slow grin spreads across his face, his fangs hanging over the corners of his lips long enough for even a sleep-addled brain to understand what's going on before they disappear.

Welcome to your nightmares, Dorian.]

[So his man either allowed this to happen, or Tobias has done something to Victor tonight. Fuck. This is the worst news Dorian could have gotten in this moment.

The immortal's heart knocks hard in his chest with dread as he watches Tobias' fangs extend. The vampire doesn't have to say anything further for Dorian to understand what's happening. Tobias has come here tonight to kill him. A sharp and chilling shock of fear races through Dorian's entire body at the realization, and he quickly pushes himself away from the other man. It's difficult to maneuver in his sleep clothes, but somehow he manages to struggle his way over to the edge of the bed close to his bedside table, all but falling off the edge of it as he tries to find the floor.]

Victor! [It's probably pointless to call for his man at this point, but he can't help it.] Someone!

[He steps away from the edge of the bed, trying to put distance between Tobias and himself.]

I haven't done anything to you! [Shouldn't that be worth something? Some people would have found out what Toby was and immediately told the police, or tried to have someone from the church destroy him.] Or told anyone about what you are!

( she's a nurse for a rich family who own a ridiculously large estate, it's already kind of gothic. )

Edited 2021-11-08 00:03 (UTC)

Your man's fast asleep, Mr. Gray. I told him to have a very strict bedtime tonight. [The addition of earplugs to the routine was probably unnecessary, but Toby will stand for no interruptions tonight.

He rises to his feet as Dorian shifts and scampers away from him, his grin pulling wider.] No, but you've left behind evidence and would not get the hint when I told you to drop it. You've become a liability, and I can't have that in my life.

[He allows Dorian to get some distance from him before he starts a slow advance. The man will die one way or another, so no reason not to draw this out a little.] Have you any last words? Things you want the world to know when I've seen you out of it? I'll allow you that much, at least, but you'll forgive me if any of them are smearing my name or sharing my secret.

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