Fx M or F The Ninth House

[Sensualist]

It was all too easy to laugh it off. La Neuvième Maison. The house where your darkest desires come true, they whispered behind their hands, they winked, they waggled their eyebrows, they giggled. One part brothel, one part hell house – but instead of scaring guests with hellfire and damnation themed haunted house attractions designed to spook you back to church, it indulged visitors with the depths of their sinful perversions. And all it would cost you is your sooouuul. Cue the theatrical evil cackle.

It was all too easy to laugh it off – until you started walking towards the door.

The well-kept but somehow decrepit house on the edge of the city you didn't quite remember being their last week. The wrought iron fence that looked like it should have Vlad Drakul's dinner guests impaled on it. The winding garden of night-blooming jasmine and heartsblood roses, somehow flourishing despite the late October weather. The towering, crumbling garrets, the eaves encrusted with intricate wooden carvings. Drooling gargoyles; green men with vines crawling through their eyesockets, mouths, other orifices; buxom dancers that looked like they belonged on the temples of some decadent Indian sect, writhing in positions forbidden even in the Kama Sutra. The doormat that read Peccavi.

The door swung open of its own accord after the first knock. The vestibule within lit by candlelight and the pale moon through tall windows. Cloaked in shadow and dusty velvet, draped with cobwebs – real cobwebs, not the plastic stuff. The furniture ornate, gothic, speaking of decadence and desuetude. A large wooden door, locked, the frame carved with frolicking nymphs and satyrs, and carved above it: Abandon Virtue, All Ye Who Enter Here.

And her.

She looked like sin and temptation given carnal form. Tall, dusky skinned, with a model's poise, a predator's gait and a prey's allure she walked forward. Her hair, thick and silky stormy waves tossed about her sculpted shoulders, deep mahogany with a maroon glint in the dim light. Eyes so pale and piercing it was hard to tell their base colour – silver, lavender? Lips as red as the apple Eve offered Adam, firm, almost stern, but with the hint of a knowing smile. A heavy collar or necklace of tarnished silver, with matching earrings, about her throat, depicting Ouroborous, a serpent devouring its own tail. Her figure lithe, but with curves to die for, to kill for. Sheathed in a little midnight dress cut deep in her cleavage, high on her toned thighs, fringed with a hint of black lace, as if that would take the point off a stiletto. A large silver key hung from the necklace between her ripe, round breasts.

If not for everything else about her, the fact that a massive python with burnished gold and jet scales was draped about her neck would be the most striking thing.

"Welcome to la Neuvième Maison," she purred, her voice husky, sensual, amused. "My name is Mina. This is Cerberus." Hearing its name, the constrictor lifted its head, flicking out a curious, forked tongue. Mina kissed it on the top of its head and it dropped heavily from her shoulders to the plush carpeted floor. It slithered towards you, lazily coiling itself into a circle more than five feet across around your feet.

"So, tell me your sins. The ones you have committed... and more to the point, the ones you wish to commit." The temptress' pale eyes glittered as if she already had the answers jotted down in a little midnight book somewhere. "And I will tell you which circle of hell you belong in, and open the way. You just have to step through."

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In honour of the spookiest of seasons, la Neuvième Maison, the Ninth House, is open. It is a framing device and venue for private vignettes and short stories about sin and dark, gothic, supernatural and Halloween themes.

If you're interested in exploring the depraved and delightful depths of la Neuvième Maison, send me a private message (Preferably with a title like "The Ninth House – <insert character name>". Try and begin IC, using the above introduction as a starter. Describe your character, how they arrive, what drew them to the house, and the sinful desires they confess to Mina. You can also include an OOC section if you have questions or comments.

What are the nine circles, the nine chambers, floors, levels or dimensions of la Neuvième Maison?

• The Vestibule of Desire: The entrance, Mina's audience chamber.
• The First Circle – Limbo: Sins of denial, teasing, voyeurism.
• The Second Circle – Lust: Sins of excess wantonness and mutual indulgence. In the Ninth House, this can also include desires related to particular acts, costumes or supernatural entities.
• The Third Circle – Gluttony: Sins of insatiable desires, group sex, orgies, self-indulgence. Plus food play if you'd like a snack with your sins.
• The Fourth Circle – Greed: Sins of taking from and denying others, those who wish to dominate.
• The Fifth Circle – Sloth: Sins of being taken from and serving others, those who wish to submit.
• The Sixth Circle – Heresy: Sins of breaking convention, subversion of roles and expectations.
• The Seventh Circle – Violence: Sins of pain, roughnesss, BDSM.
• The Eighth Circle – Fraud: Secret vices, kinks and desires.
• The Ninth Circle – Treachery: Sins of adultery, betrayal, taboo power dynamics.

(In Inferno the fifth circle is Wrath, but I couldn't find a way to differentiate that from Violence, so swapped it out).

Things I'm not interested in exploring: nonconsent, severe bodily harm, bodily waste, incest, characters under 18... and probably a lot of other things, because if I've learned nothing else on the internet it's that one person's 'unfathomable perversion' is another person's 'Tuesday'.

Come on in. Much like that sultry place down below, the doors to La Neuvième Maison are always open.