Well... This is New (Hadrian)

[Kendall Saarinen]

86th of Autumn, 511 AV It seemed as though things were finally starting to fall into place, at least travel-wise. The group had a place to stay, Kendall had a job, and most of all, so far things seemed safe. Already, Kendall was starting to feel more at ease. They had left Sylira far behind and were now living in a completely different region. Although he was not back to normal, he was feeling much more content. Kendall had Hadrian back now and with him, a new state of mind had moved in. He may not have been in his rightful body but he had his lover back. He would not waste any more of his time with him. As the last threads of the past night's dream released Kendall, his eyes fluttered open to see Hadrian asleep before him. With a smile, Kendall pulled himself closer to his sleeping lover. He wanted to keep him warm, although having his body against his own was a wonderful perk of being a human space heater. As he pulled the blanket up around Hadrian his eye spotted something. There was a mark on Hadrian's back, a elaborate triangle. His fingers moved over the design, tracing it slowly. It could not be a tattoo. It was far too beautiful for that. Could it have been a gnosis mark? Kendall was sure that he would have noticed Hadrian being marked before this. "What is this?" His voice was low as he looked at it, comparing it to the flames on his wrist. With a small sigh, Kendall wrapped his arms around Hadrian, settling into the crook of his neck. He would ask when the mage woke up. There was no sense in waking him yet. It was not as though the mark would fade. For now he would ward off Morwen's cold until Hadrian woke up.

[Hadrian]

Apparently overnight, an inverted triangle had appeared on Hadrian's back behind his left shoulder. At Kendall's question, he mumbled sleepily, his hand reaching its exploratory way over to the mark to feel at it, scratch at it a bit, but eventually he rolled into Kendall, clinging to his heat under their furs. Avanthal was cold. Hours later, he began to wake, Kendall curled up atop his shoulder, he sweating underneath, limbs splayed out from under the furs to regulate his temperature, but to no avail. There was something different, but he couldn't put his finger on it, was still swimming in the siren bonds of sleep enough that there was just a niggling something in the back of his mind. He scratched at his shoulder again, yawning. He buried his face in Kendall's hair, but it was Kendall who eventually had to go to work. Hadrian had to compose a letter to Loren Dyres and send it back to Syliras via Ethan, and he had ideas for magical endeavors, but none of that was the same as an actual job. "Kenny," he murmured, kissing that blond head, "baby, it's time to get up, I think."

[Kendall Saarinen]

When Hadrian finally awoke Kendall found he had dozed off once more upon the mage's shoulder. His lover kissing his head lightly nudged him awake, mismatched eyes peering up at Hadrian. He smiled before kissing him back sleepily. "Good morning." The thought of the mark might have slipped the blond's mind in his drowsy state but something was nagging at him. He knew he wanted to ask Hadrian something but he just was not sure what. Maybe it had just been a dream. Kendall laid down on the bed looking up at Hadrian with a smile. "You should come by the barracks some time and see the cubs I work with. They are adorable." It was less that he wanted Hadrian to see the bears and more that he just wanted to see Hadrian. Slowly, he was becoming more awake and things were getting clearer. "They are a lot like human children in some ways. They are a lot more rowdy and rough. Plus, they always refuse to put clothing on." The children were kelvics so it was not as though they wanted to be dressed. Perhaps it was because Kendall was from Zeltiva where a large portion of the population was not Kelvic. "It's still nice though. It's a lot better than working at the stables, thats for sure." Kendall wrapped his fingers around Hadrian's wrist as the thought finally came to him. "Oh! There was something I have been meaning to ask you." He knew it was going to sound odd. How did one get marked by a God and not know? "I know this might sound odd but… were you marked recently?" He chuckled slightly as he looked at Hadrian. "I know it sounds weird but I saw this shape on your back earlier. It's a really beautiful triangle. I didn't want to wake you but… Excuse me…" He leaned over Hadrian, trying to get another look at his back. The mark was still there. The same elaborate pattern as before. Kendall tapped into his auristic vision as his fingers moved over it again, tracing the pattern on his lover's skin. The mark seemed to be surrounded by a bright but somewhat blurry aura. It seemed the Azenth could not really get a good focus on it no matter how hard he tried. "There is an aura around it but I can't really get a good feel on it. It's like the aura is there, but it isn't." Settling back down beside Hadrian he tried to make sense of it all. "Maybe you should look in the mirror. I can't really describe it."

[Hadrian]

"I will," he promised, not sure if it would be that day or the next, but certainly soon. He wondered if Ethan would get jealous of them spending time with adorable Kelvic cubs; there had been some tension when Jaiun had greeted them and guided them to Avanthal's gates. "You certainly smell better now than you did when you were working at the stables." He winked and rolled around to get more comfortable, but then Kendall was pawing at his back and making no sense. "What?" He tried to look over his shoulder, but could barely make it out with his bleary, sleepy eyes. When his attention shifted to it, however, there was a blaze of energy about his aura, something almost too powerful to behold, like the brightest of lights shining out through a keyhole. Elation rose within him as he scrabbled out of bed, naked and shivering, to look at it in the mirror despite the fact that what he sensed in his aura was more real, more true than what he could see with his eyes. But it was an inverted triangle, and like Kendall said, a work of art. "I... I was in Alvadas and... there was this man, a cruel hypnotist, who was hurting this boy to impress me... but I helped him... and I think he was Ionu. I mean, I thought he was, but now he must have been. I... I didn't know he had marked me." Bright eyes shone, stupefied, back at Kendall.

[Kendall Saarinen]

Kendall smiled up at Hadrian. "I just traded smelling like a horse to a bear. It's getting better though." He chuckled slightly. The bears definitely smelled better than the horses, although that could be chalked up to the fact that the bears were able to clean themselves. The blond followed Hadrian out of bed, dragging one of the fur blankets behind him. It was freezing and he didn't want the mage to be cold. He could not help trying to pick up the aura of the mark though. It was almost like a challenge. Trying to take it in felt as though he was almost grasping what it was and then completely losing it. Shaking his head, he let his auristics fade from sight. If it truly was a gnosis mark, trying to see it through auristics was not going to help much. "Wow… Congratulations." Kendall's fingers intertwined with Hadrian's as he took the mage's story in. He could not help but wonder what the mark did. If it was from Ionu he could only assume it had something to do with illusions. He looked up at Hadrian, trying to make sense of the situation. "Well… do you feel any different? I know when I was marked I felt a sense of calm, although I think it is because of the nature of my mark." He looked down at the flames with a small sigh. This was an amazing thing, it just was so sudden. "Do you know what it does? You should try it out… if you think it is safe."

[Hadrian]

"Thank you...?" he said, then laughed a little, quiet, disbelieving. He concentrated for a moment, turning the inner eye upon himself to ascertain what differences he might feel. "I suppose the lines separating things seem to blur a bit. Not... blur. I can still see perfectly well, but... I suppose I can see where they can be changed. If I concentrate, I can see the potential for change, that is. I don't know if this is making any sense." He glanced at the hearth with its embers glowing, squeezed Kendall's hand. After one last glance at his mark in the mirror, he slipped under the fur blanket to shiver against his human hearth. But then he stared at the embers again, concentrating. "Is anything happening?" he asked. He just wasn't sure how to invoke that grace granted by the mysterious deity. "How do you make yours work?"

[Kendall Saarinen]

Kendall smiled lightly as Hadrian spoke. His lover was intelligent, there was no doubt about that. He was more book smart than Kendall could ever hope to be but the blond did not mind. He knew he was skilled in other ways. Hadrian's words had completely lost him though and the blond knew better than to fake understanding. "Sadly, it isn't to me but as long as you understand it, that is all that matters. Right?" The newfound Gnosis was Hadrian's, not Kendall's. The Azenth could take all of the time in the world to try and figure out the mage's new gift. It was Hadrian who would be on a tighter schedule. The blond allowed Hadrian to lead him back to bed. He was sure the mage was figuring things out, or at least trying, in that analytical mind of his. Kendall snuggled into Hadrian in an attempt to warm him once more. "I don't know. What is supposed to be happening?" It would be hard to tell what was an illusion since illusions by nature, seemed to be reality. Hadrian could have been making an illusion since the moment he saw the mark and Kendall would not have been the wiser, although the auristics made him wonder. Could the mark affect his autistic sight as well? "I don't really make my Gnosis work, it just does." Kendall had never really given thought to how his Gnosis worked. He just had found fire no longer burned him and he now had the ability to weasel out the emotions people locked deep within them. The heat of his body was more of a side effect than a skill, although it came in handy in the freezing cold of Avanthal. "Mine is just always on. I don't think I have a fast enough reaction time to try and activate my Gnosis the moment I find myself becoming in danger of being set on fire." He chuckled slightly as he lifted his chin to look up at Hadrian. "The emotion pretty much comes to me without me trying to sense it too. I never really thought about it. I guess after all of this time it just started to feel normal for me. The Azenth looked at his wrist, his eyes running over the licks of the flame. The fire had become a part of him just as he supposed the Illusions would be for Hadrian after a while. "Maybe you just think of the illusion and it happens?" Kendall was not sure how else it could work. "Maybe start with something small to test it?"

[Hadrian]

When they were back in bed, at least he could borrow Kendall's natural heat, but he was too excited to recline and rest. With the fur flung about them like a shared cloak, he continued to concentrate on the fire, trying to change its color. He made a concerted effort to damp out his Auristic senses, which always seemed to be sampling the world around him, so used to receiving the added information was his mind these days. The fire is green, he told himself. The fire is green. "Watch the fire," he urged. "I'm trying to... something." Finally he closed his eyes, shutting out that constant reminder that the fire was just a fire. He wasn't sure if he had to convince himself that the fire really was green for it to work; none of the illusionists he had met had been very forthcoming. If only he had been a hypnotist when he had Curn at his mercy. But perhaps he merely had to imagine it. With his eyes closed it was no difficult matter picturing a green flame. He had seen real green fire in certain magical experiments, after all. While he struggled to reach out and hold Ionu's gift, the fire in the hearth began to change a bit. Still burning just the same, the reds and oranges and yellows began to take on a sickly hue, not exactly green, but perhaps a bit green around the gills were the flames something that could become nauseated.

[Kendall Saarinen]

Turning over, Kendall looked forward to the fire burning in it's hearth. It seemed like just another ordinary flame dancing in the fireplace. He kept watching though. Mostly, he was watching the aura of the flame. If there was a difference in the fire it would show in the aura. Slowly the color of the flame was changing. At first it was nearly impossible to tell. It just had a slight green tint. The fire kept gaining more color, although it did not exactly turn a shade of green. It looked almost sickly. The Azenth knew it was all just an illusion but he could not help but look at the flame with a concerned look. "It looks… ill." Kendall moved out of the bed, grabbing a pair of his pants off of a chair and pulling them on. "It is just an illusion…" He tried to keep this in mind as he looked at the flame. Dropping to a knee before the sickly flames, he held his hand out to it. It was still as warm as before it was just… green. "Wow…" He was not sure what else to say. He sat down before the fire, watching it roar and lick at the stones that contained it in the hearth. "I know it's not sick… It looks like it though." Kendall knew Hadrian was doing this but it was all so hard to believe. "You're doing this?" Kendall wanted to try something. If he pulled some of the fire in the fireplace into his own fire, what would happen? Would his fire turn green? Would the ill colored flame turn back to normal? He could not imagine it would be dangerous. The fire had just changed color slightly, it wasn't any different from any other flame. Breathing out, Kendall calmed his mind. He found that he did not really need to meditate to produce Res that much anymore but it was still nice to have a clear mind for magic use. He focused on the sound of the crackling flame and let it feed into his own flames once his Res was starting to ignite. He watched the flame carefully, ready to snuff it out if anything went awry. OOCFeel free to say what happens to Kendall's flame since you are in charge of the greenish flame's color.

[Hadrian]

"I think so," he said dubiously, pulling the fur blanket close. It wasn't quite fair that imprisoned Ivak kept his lover warm at all times. He might have sighed, but was too excited and too engaged in working this new magic loaned to him by that mysterious deity he had known as Isaac. To his own senses, the fire's aura changed not at all, though there was a taste of something to the energy in the room, which he assumed was just a sloppy use of this power, something that the more skilled illusionists he had met were not prone to show. He concentrated on keeping the illusion going, strengthening it. Perhaps it did grow a bit greener as time went on. "Who said you could put pants on?" he demanded. But even crouched down and partially covered, Hadrian admired Kenny. For a moment he wondered if they had seen the last of Alander Jin, but the distraction made his illusion falter so he pushed that thought away instead. The growing green began to creep through Kendall's flame too.