Just a sketch, nothing to see here!
Going to try to do some more sketching here, 2Draw is really good for that!

SEE THIS FIRST - http://2draw.net/view/105056/
This is a companion piece and story to that one.

The crowds cheer, a head rolls, as yet another perpetrator of the law is exterminated. No, not exterminated... executed. Day in & day out, he slaves away in his pastry shop. The masses scurrying to the town square to bare witness to the morning executions to be had. Men, women, and even children, all banding together in unison to wave their fists into the air & cheer as the vermin are dispatched. He doesn't get to see much of it though... Before the crack of dawn's light, Pietre has to be heating the ovens, making the dough, organizing fillings and preparing confections for his days' work.

Running in and out of the back room, where the blasts of heat forge sugary baked cookies & treats, stocking his pastry shop throughout the day, Pietre is oddly feared and the locals seem to be wary of his deliciously displayed foods. It's not that they're not edible, not by any means. In fact, he's quite good at what he does. He's won prizes and has gotten recognition throughout the kingdom for his craft. No, it was the way in which he decorated his cakes & pastries. A gorey gourmet of deadly but delicious, tasty but terrible, hunger-enticing but horrible decorative designs of gelatinous disembowelments (with sprinkles of course), baked beheadings, fragrant crimson fluids (usually of a cherry or strawberry variety), morbidly arranged marshmallows, and chocolate dipped gingermen, sometimes with bits missing and often with big helpings of coconut shavings strewn about them. Or what about the lil figures made of yummy licorice, stretched over a rack made of graham crackers? And muffins that were shaped to appear like heads in a basket? Though, admittedly, the tart cherry/ raspberry/ strawberry preserve filling in these was particularly nice! Regardless of how irresistible his morbidly mouthwatering creations were to the sense of smell & taste... to the eyes, they were simply atrocious!

Oh sure, it was one thing to go to the town square and watch Edmund the Executioner at work, that was just fine! But to eat delicious baked goods & pastries that even mildly resembled the same... that was disturbing and despicable? What an insult! What an outrage! As a matter of fact, he was so good at the art he created & shared via his bakery, that if more folks were willing to give these deadly looking desserts a try, they would more than likely become hooked and surely come back for more! And then, at the very least, he would be able to take consolation in seeing his creations being appreciated by every sweet toothed clientelle, from near & far, critic & connoisseur alike!

But no, each time the crowds' hollering and rooting echoed through the town's streets, he was awfully reminded that the appreciation was being spent elsewhere. Somewhere he should have been performing instead!

The thing is... Pietre the Pastry maker actually wanted to be an executioner. To experience the dealing out of death and justice with a sharpened weapon, to master the nuances to a clean kill, the singing duet between Executioner & axe as swift swipes sever limbs and heads with surgical coordination; as a roaring crowd roots you on... That is where he was meant to be, not stuck behind a counter making pastries and cakes far from the action! But alas, poor Pietre, here he was, limited to expressing his fantasy career and true vocation through his kitchen craft.

So, as the days pass, and the excited cheers of approval at the murderous spectacle boom from the execution grounds, Pietre resentfully continues his work, muttering under his breath how Edmund is so lucky to have his spot as Executioner of these parts.

But every now and then, at the end of the day when he's wrapped up his shop for the evening, he steps outside onto the cobblestone path, and wistfully takes a look down the road, towards the execution grounds - wielding his crimson spattered spatula, inhaling deeply & closing his eyes.

With a sigh, he takes in the inspiration for the terribly tempting treats that will be created for tomorrow's day, to repeat the routine again.

And this is the story of Pietre the Pastry Maker.

The crowds cheer, a head rolls, the self righteous nobility & judges shrink their noses at the disposed of criminal - very much like how some folks toss out dead poisoned vermin, in fact. Day in and day out, he wields the axe that deals out so called justice. He strolls ominously onto the stage, where his silent demeanor instills fear in the audience, as well as awe in some amongst it. His towering presence a brutal reminder to any would be perpetrators of the law.

His trusty axe, Tina, ever so faithful now for almost 10 years, has accompanied him from the start. He's long since lost count of how many souls they have sent to meet their respective makers together. Oddly enough, he does have a certain fondness for Tina the Axe. As for being an Executioner? Many would love to hold his position, the enigmatic seat of the executioner. Yet many more wonder how he does it. Does he have a clear conscience? Does he have a heart? Perhaps he is a demon-spawn of some sort, unable to pity the plethora of lives he has taken. Or worse yet, he could even be cruelly enjoying what he does with an unsettling passion & glee.

But underneath that mask, there is not a gleeful expression to be found.

No... Day in and day out, he drags Tina out for another thrill for the crowd, another kill for the governing body, or a convenient disposal for the ruling class, but alas; it's just another chore for him. You see, he's not very happy being the executioner. It's not entirely bad, for example he likes the rewards of privacy his job has bestowed upon him. Throw in the fact that none of the locals dare bother him and the situation almost sounds ideal (because he is never seen in public without his mask)! But, at other times, he'd rather be someone in the crowd, watching himself from a distance instead. Sometimes in a flash of rebellious mischief - when he's sure none will take notice - just before he swings his axe, he rolls his eyes with exasperation at the pompous arrogance the authorities display, as if they're doing such a fantastic job, so full of themselves. And when he's feeling really daring? Well, he even makes faces and sticks his tongue out at them.

The thing is, he actually resents this position. Being an executioner is not what he wanted to do, nor what he aspired to be, in the years of his naive youth!
Serving Death, and humoring whatever bastardized version of 'justice' happened to be fashionable at the time, for the approval of a compulsively bloodthirsty & roaring crowd was the farthest thing from any of his ambitions at the time...

All he ever wanted was to be a Pastry maker.

Yes, that's right. A Pastry maker.

A maker of cakes, not death.

In fact, sometimes as the lifeless corpses of his dispatch slump over, spurting their life essence from head and neck stump - he envisions a bun or a pie, filled with a sweet cherry filling or maybe even a tart strawberry preserve. Even as he swings Tina the Axe, as she sings, there is a moment where he dreams that she's being used to chop fruits & confections, for the pastries of the day. When he could almost smell the irresistible smells of a delicious baked treat!

The illusion is shattered however, each & every time Tina makes her crimson spattering thud, and an unseen scornful grimace soon washes over his face.
And once the deed of death is done, he sulks off, muttering and cursing under his breath, often times near tempted to drive Tina's sharp edge into an onlooker's face. But no... off he goes, back to his hidden den, where he reads up on the latest baking & dessert trends... you know, just in case.

This is the story of Edmund the Executioner.

Was trying this out on my Tablet PC, but unfortunately the Input Panel kept popping up and it really killed my mood.
Does anybody out there know how to disable that feature momentarily? I do use it for some things, but would rather have the option to disable it when I'm about to do some artwork or sketching, especially on things like this...

Maybe I'll pick this drawing back up again, but likely I will start the idea from skratch. Sorry to leave it unfinished!

This is a stylized and 'inspired by' version of a tiki mask I have sitting over my work area at my PC. It's a hand carved wooden crazy mask thing, and I scored it in some corner of a 'world's largest garage sale' fundraising event, it was actually sitting behind a few items by a wall, almost out of sight, and we happened to look up and there he was. As soon as I saw it (it literally looked like it was facing me as I did), I felt I needed to rescue it, so he's been my creative tiki demon ever since! Not sure what it's story is, and I've never seen one quite like it... perhaps it's a one of a kind deal, maybe?

Anyways... so here's my first 2Draw image!