Completed Strange Bird (Cisel, Valo)

[Cisel]

~ Cisel ~ ~ Timestamp 9th of Spring 513 AV , between sunset and midnight ~ * Gold and read, with violet streaks, faded into paler blue and grey shades, when the coulors of dusk slowly bled in to the colors of sunset on the sky over Zeltiva. Soon the sun would go down and darkness would fall. The evening wind from the sea was cold and Cisel was happy that she had her sheepskin coat. Settle down, find a job, live an ordinary life – if ordinary lives exist at all ? Yet. I’m already 33 years old and what have I achieved so far? Not much. The glass ? I could have done more. But I became a drifter, straying through the world. Like a bird that lost it’s abitlity to find the way back home I travel on and on and on and on - Cisel had been in Zeltiva a few days and she had started to feel a wee bit familiar with the surface of the town but she knew no people there. It was like it had been in other places. She was a stranger, looking at the life around her passing by. She touched the surface of the town - but she didn't know anything yet about it's depths ... Her long red hair glowed in the fading light of the sunset. The wind moved in her hair with multicoloured scarf in the brain on the left side of her pale face and the loosely flowing trousers, the bryda, fluttered around her legs. She had kept to the traditional Inarta way of dressing. The more expensive clothes she had been wearing once upon a time in Wind Reach had been sold long time ago. Today her clothes were cheap and simple, the kind of quality a restless drifter like her could afford. This town. Zeltiva. Perhaps. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps … This is perhaps a place where someone like me can want to stay for good. There’s so few restrictions here, so open and so free, it’s perhaps a place where other things outside the ordinary could exist and be – Ata chirped and moved on the falconer glove on Cisel's left hand and the sound jerked her out of her inner stream of thoughts. She had been an Inarta without a bird, for all these years. But recently she had purchased the impossibly ugly litte falcon chick. It was a very small chick and it would become a very small falcon when it matured. She stroked the small birds fluffy dawn with the fingertips of her right hand and in a somewhat disctraced voice she spoke softly to it, clicking and birdlike. *

[Valo]

This place I remember well. A memory as vivid as drops of ink upon virginal paper. Etched into my memory with the blades of eternity. This is where I died. Upon these cobbles, my body lay limp, bathed in my own blood. This is where eternity had began for me. This is where Hound, though his senseless cruelty, had gifted me with eternity at my fingertips. What was the reason? I don't yet know.But that hate for the man will never dissipate from my stone still heart. He will not go unpunished. For the glory of my god, this man shall surrender his very life, as he had taken mine and others will fallow him. I am but a puppet in this greater creation.

An artist... Beloved... He did not join Dira.

He had avoided this place meticulously for the past days. In fact ever since the 91st of Winter 512AV he had not stepped his foot into this particular alley that branched from East Street. Indeed there were two places he avoided as if protective circles of salt and red brick powder had been cast about them to ward off evil spirits such as him. This was one of them. The one he feared less. Perhaps this lesser state of fear was precisely what had brought the undead artist, alas facing his fear, as the hue of the sky had become that of his eyes. Eyes as red as hate. Eyes that surveyed the world around them with an unfathomable quality to them. A constant state of animation within him whose very eyes belonged to Uldr himself. A puppet. A Chained one.

He had been on the prowl at this late hour, tactfully avoiding the Wave Guard as he weaved though the smallest of alleys, cut the darkest of short cuts. And was there a reason for it. Not quite. For when the ordinary people would retreat into their homes in preparation for the darkening of the sky above and the awaiting of blissful slumber, he would emerge from the world of art. The Nocturnal artist would melt into the fabric of the city, to blissful unawareness of the citizens, yet somehow he was not a native thread to all of this. He was beyond it all. A man suspended in gel, time having been lost to him. Yet none the less, those simple things seemed to matter so much more to him now. The early light of street lamps. The bone snapper hollering though the streets. He was so very in love with it all as if within his condition, he had found a wonderful new world to live in.

On the prowl for a victim. Perhaps a prostitute to persecute in Ignotus' instruction. An innocent soul to slay in the name of his god. A fanaticism. "You have a job to do now. Channel that hate. Channel that fear. One day you will all shed the mortal coils you have been burdened with. You are my Returned now. You have tasted death. Savour it, Valo." the words still sounded in his ears, as if that speech had never ended. Those sweet words too had been etched into his very core. Uldr calling him by the name. It was everything now. The artist's very purpose in existence. It seemed that the fulfilment of that bidding would come so much easier to him than he'd have thunk. A mouse of a man whom he was during last season, had so quickly changed into... well... this. An avant garde expressionism of what lingered beforehand. How had this happened? Was it the rage and hate that had been ignited within him? Was is the death and suffering that came to simplicity in his eyes in the duration of the plague? Was it perhaps divinity? The answer was not yet clear, nor did he presume it would ever be.

He was art now. He was surrealism and he was beauty within grotesque. A savage beauty. A darker beauty. That's how he viewed himself. A creation of perfection, destined for servitude in which he was freed from previous gentlemanly inhibition. And with every passing day he grew a little more eccentric and he loved the man he was slowly becoming more and more.

This place was his deathbed. Cold cobble, a rapier that pierced his chest. A reminder, a scar that lingered in it's place. A scar he was strangely somewhat fond of. He stood alone in the dark alley, a figure made solely of darkness for the cloak that obscured his feature was pitch black and nothing but stray strands of red peered out from beneath it. He had not been as meticulous to hide them. Not a twitch of muscle, for there was no need for such. Not an elevation of his chest with the tide of breath, for too that was not required. Still as a statue, he was Valo, the red haired artist of Zeltiva. A man of a name that bore a simple meaning: "light". With hose flaming eyes of his he looked upon the cobbled in procrastination. Yet the fog of fear, for those elevated to eternity had not the liberty to shed the emotion that bound them, retained and, as if nervously, every so often he would look about himself, ears constantly listening out for the ghost. That ghost of Hound, a residual presence who once gain would hunger for him very precious life.

[Cisel]

~ Cisel ~ * When daylight faded, street lights took over and lit up the main street in the eastern part of Zeltiva reasonably well, but the side alleys that opened now and than between the buildings lay in darkness. This didn’t seem to be the best quarters in the town, yet Zeltiva’s wealth was visible here too. Heading towards the Docks, Cisel followed this main street. She saw cobbled streets and houses that weren’t as well maintained as in the western side of the town but still not too bad. There were street lights to guide you in the night and there were no beggars in rags around. A wealthy town with a proper reputation and standards to maintain. Law and order. No vagabonds littering the clean,cobbled streets with their dirty,ragged existences. Maybe the kind of town where you are expected to be somewhat better and above the kind of bad behaviour, lawlessness and corruption you find in a few other cities that could be mentioned? Or so the good citizens would like to think. Light, bright laughter, shouts and music - the noise of Zeltiva’s nightlife reached her from the numerous pleasure establishments that lined the street, a hectic, strained excitement in the air. It was like the town had come more alive around her then it had been in daylight, but it was another kind of life, nocturnal, secretive, theatrical. The population and the atmosphere on the street had slowly changed. The numbers of plain, “average citizen” looking people had dwindled and a night crew of considerably less plain looking citizens had appeared. Well groomed, elegant men with striking good looks, and attractive, elaborately rouged women in startling dresses walked slowly along the street, seemingly on their way to nowhere, some of them lingering by the street lights, enclosed in the dim circles of light. Constant inviting smiles adorned their faces like they could never stop smiling. In spite of the bitingly cold wind they wore no coats. Cisel felt no doubt that all sorts of things were going on at full tilt in the bars and various other establishment. Oh,well. It was like this it used to be when inebriated people full of desperate needs for entertainment and excitement, diversion and oblivion gather after dark to desperately devote themselves to illusions of happiness and fun. The vistors were going to get drunk and do silly things, and the people that were working here some way or another would profit on it. Many things could happen, but only one thing was guaranteed: Money and valuables would be spent on too expensive drinks and services, gambled away, or stolen. Visitors went in and out trough the doors along the street. Some of them were looking like experienced sailors, others had young, smooth faces with the kind of overly delighted expressions that only those of limited experience will show – students from the university on dangerous adventures, perhaps. Now and then a few people went into those black gaps of darkness that were side alleys leading from the loud, gaudy façade of the main street into secret places beyond. It was easy enough to guess a few of the things that could happen there in the darkness. Suddenly a young dark haired woman wearing a brightly rose dress with a sensational neckline and obviously in great hurry, crossed the road right in front of Cisel. She went over the street and into one of those gaps of darkness where she disappeared out of sight. Why was the unknown darkhaired woman in such a hurry, what was her errand, and towards which place and fate was she heading in that dark alley? Cisel had stopped to let the woman pass. While she still stood there and followed the rose-colored one with her gaze and speculated about her fate, a very inebriated young man approached Cisel with what could only be called a shameful proposal. Very forward, given that he seemed to be no more than a member Youth caste in terms of Inatra social standing. At most a Chiet, a plain commoner. But perhaps just a Dek, a lowly drudge. Cisel gazed at him in utter surprise. Ata chirped. *

[Valo]

Footsteps startled him, for perhaps he was an easy man to startle these days. So overly protective of his second chance. A woman appeared from the darkness and into the halo of street light about. A sudden halt, as her eyes of molten amber came to rest on the solitary darkness within this halo. And the darkness glared back. Two sparkling red gems from beneath the heavy hood. The very essence of eternity within them. An aura of unease about this stranger. Not only for his most adamant of clothing, or that deathly stillness, there was something more. An aura so very inorganic.

Fingers gripped at his clothing, teeth clenched. The mind of the darkness began to spin in a whirlwind of almost blinding fog. But only almost. For moment he glared at the woman as if she was but a chunk of flesh - beautiful beautiful flesh - and he was the dog of hunger. The very conscience slipping from him, alas caught barely by the desperation of self control. It was not time yet. Not yet time.

Shaking his head for a moment, Valo did his best to cast that fog from himself. That deep craving, that lust for the woman which had such power over the poor puppet, he was. An inhaling, fallowed abruptly by exhaling; not for necessity but the motion which it brought. A calming tidal movement of intercostal muscles between the ribs. Like the sea, it brought peace to the frazzled. Again he looked to the dark haired woman before him. The sausage curls that adorned the porcelain of her neck, the rich jewellery upon that rosy breast of her's. If he had been the youthful Valo, the gentleman, the silver tongue; if that had been him, she'd be his by now. She would fall prey tot he exotic charm, the witty dialogue. However he had no interest in such now. A renaissance of perhaps more than just art.

A billion insects buzzed in his head. Their little annoying wings obstructed his sight, his mind. Moment by moment the craving perpetuated. Moment by moment he'd put flames tot hose insects, yet more were born. So beautiful was the woman. A pale complexion, feature of symmetry. Her lips whimsical, like a doll. Her figure, enclosed by corsets beneath, that of a figurine. Her stupidity however, apparent. Why would she simply linger, gawking in awe and fear at the darkness before her? Why would she gaze into those red eyes when no doubt, every fibre of her being was beckoning her to run? Flee little creature. Your time had not come.

Those moment lasted so very long. The very languishing of time at work. Each chime elongated, dragging on hopelessly. Alas he faced her and as a step was taken, so did she take a step back. Whatever business she had, had been rid from her mind. Whatever business was that of Valo's in this eerie place, it was smeared by the tar of his craving. Yet another step. She however remained in her foolishness, failing to retreat. Yet another step.

The darkness walked towards her gracefully until from beneath his hood, a face of bone white peered. Fingers grasped round his wrist knife beneath his cloak. "Do forgive me sir." she mumbled. An attempt to back away. But it was too late now. He had surrendered to that craving of his. Surrendered to the gift of his deity. Had the woman even half a brain, she'd have fled before this moment where her eyes spied the carefully chiselled handsomeness of his feature. Foolishness seemed a disease however.

A moment was all it took. Blood spilled upon the cobbles...

A haunting scream of despair filled the air.

After that very moment, Valo fled. The hunger satisfied yet he would not be so foolish. He wouldn't allow himself to be discovered as the monster of East Street. A swift retreat into the shadows in wake of near by Wave Guard who would rush, beckoned by the hollering of the woman's screaming. And she would scream in fear and pain, sprawled across the floor. Hands desperately clenching at her face which now bore deep gashes that extended the length of her, once perfect, porcelain skin. An eye ruined. Blood poring freely. A pitiful sight. Confusion, fear. And in her vanity, the woman cursed in the most foul of language. Hate filling her breast. Hate for that darkness which scared her in unprovoked cruelty. Little did she know that it was nothing more that her beauty which provoked him so.

Soon after the Wave Guard, civilians would flock to the sight. Horror painted upon each and every face. Doctors were called to dress the woman's wounds. Perhaps not fatal, yet infection alone would be the end of her if not treated properly. A certain efficiency in the ordeal, yet panic in the crowds. Little did they know that before the day was out, a life would be taken in a very similar way at the hands of the darkness.

That darkness however, Valo proceeded in the direction of that safe haven he had been granted by Ignotus. That building he had been instructed to stay in. Perhaps not to hide within the interior but simply to dodge the crowds. His entire body trembled, not for the hormonal surge which would appear in his blood if he had any; but for the momentary handicap which the act branded upon him. On one hand the craving was eased, almost to the point where his head had been cleared completely. Of the other was the horror of his own action. Just a season ago, Valo would not even be able to fathom such cruelty. Now he had been the cause of it. Had he become the very man he despised so? Was he Hound now? No! Of course not! Such a preposterous thought. This different. Hound was a cut throat. Valo was a divine disciple. Whatever sin would sprout from his action was merely for the furthering of Divine purpose. No selfishness in the act. No superfluousness. Simply a calling of Uldr himself.

[Cisel]

~ Cisel ~ * Cisel had been on her way to push past the young man that was so drunken that he made a pass at a nearly 6 feet tall Inarta woman past her prime, with a quite aloof and fierce facial expression, wearing practical knee high boots and a sheepskin coat and with an ugly falcon chick sitting on her glowed hand, ready to chirp. She was over 30 and it wasn’t like she was wearing one of those startling dresses with low neckline that seemed to be the standard on this street. So how had he been thinking, that young person that could likely be considered a mere Dek? She didn’t really want to know what or why. Some things are best left un-pondered, sometimes. The sudden scream from the dark alley cut through all other sounds and for a few seconds it went totally silent on the main street nearby. Fragments of music and laugheter could still be heard from the houses further away. But where Cisel stood a huge silence seemed to descend and mute everything except the sound of the wind. Why did she stay and wait to find out what had happened? Why was she part of the curious crowd that flocked to gawk and get to know what it was they had heard? She didn’t know. City guards had come rushing. What were they called, Wave Guards? They went into the alley and the civilians had followed. They stood there, expressions of horror, fear and nausea on their faces.The womans now horrificly injured face matched the foul and repulsive way she cursed, her voice brimming with hate. Whatever had happened to her seemed to not only have cut up her physical face, but also the façade of her soul and mind. And just like the blood was pouring out of her body, a foul mental and emotional darkness was pouring out from her. The guards asked their questions: albeit the woman had been injured, the fact that she had been cursing so passionately had told the guards that she was able to speak. The woman gave them a first hand information about how she had rushed into the alley alone, to hide in the dark after having being caught redhanded when she tried to cut the purse of a “person she had been involved with”. In a voice thick with hate and desire for revenge she described her attacker: a man with unnatural, glowing red eyes set in a very pale face, with beautifully chiselled handsome features. He was tall, and albeit he had been dressed in a dark cloak she had seen that his movements were strikingly graceful. But there had been something alien and strange, a rare and intriguing strangeness emanating from him, something very strange indeed, a strange and unnerving stillness. She had seen a glimpse of beauty in that face and in his movements, but it had been like the eerie beauty of an evil predator flower. When he finally moved he had approached slowly at first, but then he had suddenly attacked mindlessly, like he was insane, then turned around and fled equally suddenly. One of the guards had a quill and took notes of all this. They had a good description and assured the spectators that from now on the attacker would be a hunted man! Several guards were already moving on, in the direction the woman had pointed out. The Wave Guard was going to comb every inch of the town and find him! Afterwards the curious and terrified crowd that clearly didn’t know anything at all, was ordered to disperse and go back to whatever they might have been doing. They were shooed off and the woman was taken care of and carried away. Cisel resumed her walk towards the Docks and the Worlds End Grotto. Eventually she could discern the fish market at a distance. Was it the destruction of the woman’s face that had transformed her whole being into something else, something new and disgusting? Or had the destruction of the face just been a revelation, similar to a mask torn away, a veil ripped apart, displaying things that had been hidden behind it all the time? The memory of the bleeding, cursing woman on the street lingered with her, like a picture painted on her mind. The beauty ravaged, the face scarred, one eye lost. A mystical picture. It could have been a painting. Or an art installation. Beauty turned monstrous. *

[Valo]

Valo tucked himself away in the cavernous decay of his safe haven. The desolate abandonment of it to keep him company. So very simply he crouched down by the wall, the cloak being ripped from his figure to reveal the finest of silk clothing upon him. Bone white hands entwined into the ridiculously red hair. Face hidden. Thoughts rambling though his hair in an attempt to make sense of it all. Last time he merely chose to simply not think of it all. Last time he cast the thought aside. The reality that he took the life of another innocent. This time it would not be so simple.

How was it that this evil came to him with such simplicity? How could he have turned into this? For beneath the fear of the act, the self doubt of the validity of his morality, it felt all felt strangely good. A power that he wielded against the woman, momentary perhaps but none the less made him powerful. The satisfaction of craving. And the aftermath was such that all that troubled the undead artist, would leave him as if swept clean by the means of some magical cloth. The hate within him dissipated. The hate, that hate that first granted him the mark of returning. It was not only for his executor but too for strangers who withheld some arrogantly symmetric beauty. An inability to contain himself thus soon, in selfishness, Valo did not feel quite as terrible about it as he should have. Each act was easier. Unknowingly, each murder became less horrifying. Why was this? Could the answer really be so simple? Could this be Uldr's doing. Or had be been this all along, unknowingly, suppressed between layers of gentlemanly attire. Valo had always been so very prone to reckless behaviour, whether adventurous or sexual or even alcohol or drug abuse. Thus was a different addiction all together.

Keen ears picked at the speech of nearby Wave Guard. Two of then had stumbled into these darker parts of town, pointed by the victim. No doubt others too were on patrol. They conversed morosely upon the retrospect of the past few moment. A conversation filled with detail thus, naturally, Valo's curiosity beckoned him towards the stained and spider webbed window. Hidden from sight within the dark interior. Eyes observed the unfolding conversation. Ears listening though the poorly glazed window frames though which shards of the bone snapper picked at his fingers. There was no way the pair of Wave Guards would notice him. The undead artist however was now the observer.

"Red eyes you say? That's impossible. No man has red eyes. Not even those Vantha who's eyes shift colour with mood." said the first. A flower, well past his prime. A man of stark build yet gentle naivety on his feature. Two black gems for eyes, just a little small upon his face. From his hiding Valo took notice of his impeccable navy uniform, a sword at his side upon which meaty fingers tapped a rhythms of nervousness in wake of the renegade which had been roaming the ducky alleyways. The monster of East Street, they had nicknamed him after his first murder just a few days back. "I tell you, the lady must 'ave been hallucinating or something. Such a terror breeds ghosts in the mind."

"Oh I don't doubt her description to be false Richard." agreed the other. "But the red eyes is all the lead we have. Indeed I would not be surprised if the cut throat was Vantha. Those who live in the ice and snow develop hearts of ice and snow." When he spoke, he spoke with bitterness in his voice. A desperation to place blame upon something. Notes of abrubt racism in his speech and too an uneducated mind.

"But think it for a moment." replied Richard. "Deathly still. Perhaps it was one of 'em nuits."

"Every murderer is a nuit in the eyes of his victim. There is no real lead there either."

"Oh pish posh! We are chasing ghosts now. He wasn't found the first time and we probably won't find him now either. And if we do find 'im, we won't even recognise the petch! Because of that blasted plague, everyone in Zeltiva in now overdressed in fear of it's abrupt returning." Richard gave out a whistle of frustration. "Oh I should be home with the kiddies now. Don't want to end up like 'im Kipp Drawlins now. Papa left his wife and boy for another world, for a casket. I don't want to share his fate. My missus needs me with 'em twins."

"So you think it's the same petch who slew Drawlins, Rich?"

"Course. Who else would it be?"

"You know, now that you mention it there was red at Drawlin's murder too. Bit it was not red eyes. It was red hair and the man was of Inarta blood. I wasn't there of course but others told me." spoke the other Wave Guard as his companion's eyes were not thrust into him with interest. "I did see him at the funeral however and his hair was as red as they described. A local artist I believe. But he seemed so very distraught at the funeral, tearful as if Drawlins was his very own best friend."

"You mean Valo, the red haired artist?" replied Richard. "Oh no he could not have done anything like this. My missus had'im paint some stuff for us and I tell you, he is a golden man. There is simply no way he could be the monster of East Street." for a moment he halted. A finger on his chin, scratching gently, eyes cast off into the distance in deep pondering. "Now that ya' mention, the man's rumoured missing. No one's seen him round since last season. Could it be that he too was killed by this monster? If so than how many other innocent civilians have lost their lives?"

Alas the men were out of ear shot. From what it seemed, no one truly believed in this red eyed murderer. Eyes as red as hate seemed but a myth. A with hunt was at hand but no one really knew how to recognise that witch. Carelessness! What a fool he had been, to simply give into the craving the way he did. Not enough care was taken. He should have killed the woman in cold blood. A fool! Foolish! Completely and abominably foolish! One thing was for certain now, he though as his fists clenched, he had to flee Zeltiva and do it soon.

The sky overhead grew black and in this blackness, Valo peered from the house once more, clad by darkness. His mission had not yet been finished. He had not yet taken the life of another. But midnight was not yet at hand, thus plenty of time was allowed for the impeccable choosing of another victim. This time however he would not let that victim see his face and he would not let the victim live. His hair, now a complete mess, tucked safely beneath the cloak, he ventured into the midnight air in search of another equally pretty lady.

The streets were vacant now. Not a living soul, safe for the groups of Wave Guard on patrol. The artist would listen out for those round every corner, listened out for footsteps and nervous conversation. His own footsteps kept quiet, like a cat on the prowl tonight. But before it would all begin again, he needed a moment of just him and the sea and the bone snapper in the distance. Be longed for the rolling waves. Thus, making his way towards the dock, being perhaps little more than an unlucky twist of fate, he stumbled upon one of his own kind, if she could be named such. A solitary figure. A woman perhaps a whole decade older than he was, but that red hair was a clear indication of her ethnicity. Another Inarta in Zeltiva.

"Quite a dangerous time to be out tonight, all my your lonesome." he called to her from a safe distance. The distance where his feature would be completely obscured by clothing and he'd be nothing more than darkness. The speech however was so very distinguishable, for it was no longer common he spoke but his native tongue; Nari. The twists and filigree of accent so prominent in well rounded words. "I hear a lady was attacked earlier. Quite a fearful time indeed."

In his chest, Valo's heart pounded. For once any thought of his death or Ignotus nor his god, no art, no thought at all - for once all thought was banished. The slate of his mind wiped clean by this encounter. For as long as he lived in this part of Mizahar, which would very soon amount to a complete year, Valo had never met another kinsman or woman. She however was Inarta flesh and bone before him. More Inarta than himself perhaps. A sudden longing for him home, for the tradition and the city of Wind Reach. The memories of his mother and sisters and even that of his traitorous first lover flooded back to him. If only they had known what happened to him.

[Cisel]

~ Cisel ~ * “Chirp”. Ata promptly responded to the male voice speaking in nari. The falcon chick’s yellow bird eyes peered into the evening darkness in the direction that the voice had come from. It moved on the falconer glove it sat on, the small but sharp talons digging into the leather. Cisel looked at the clumsy little being and once again she stroked the soft dawn with her fingers and spoke soothing words of nari in a low, kind voice. It wasn’t a cute little chick that would become a cute cage-bird. It was an ugly predator chick that would become a beautiful predator bird. For now she would just take care of it, keep it safe and feed it, shelter it while it grew to be what it was meant to be. When it was time she would train it. She would teach it to hunt and send it to kill, because that was the double nature of the bird : a fragile soft-feathered being to be handled with care, but also a deadly beautiful winged killer. For years she had abstained from thinking of how bonding with a bird of prey can be a complicated process. But now when she had Ata she thought of it every now and then. The most complicated birds to bond with are the wind eagles, perhaps because they are not really birds at all, but something else. In essence they are souls of dead Inarta, returned to exist in a new form. Never did they fail to bond with a living human partner, no, yet they could be incredibly choosy. If the gaze of such a bird fell on you and singled you out, this didn’t mean things were settled. No way. It wasn’t easy case: it was more like just a permission to court the bird and try to gain it’s approval and agreement to a permanent bonding. And it took great effort and dedication to court such a bird. This could be dangerous as well – if they were annoyed they could kill you in the process, or they could turn on you and kill you later on, for reasons only they would know. Or they could just leave you. She had failed to court her eagle intensely enough, or had it been something else that made the bird reject her at the end? How could she know. She had the capacity. The eagle’s gaze had fallen on her. It’s predator mind of death and beauty alike had touched hers, and her soul had soared like on eagle wings. Like a dream it hadn’t lasted, but the dream that hadn’t come true had still been a beautiful dream. The memory stayed with her like an etching in glass, an imprint that wasn’t possible to erase from her somewhat inarta-telepathic mind. During the trial period she had joined her mind to the living death that was the great winged predator. She had seen what could have been, and become aware that she was but an uncomplete being, walking in darkness, chained to the earth. She would never be the same again. One experience had been enough to leave her with a hole in her mind, an unending longing to get a new chance to be one with a great predator once again, and the knowledge that she wouldn’t find it. But she had fallen back on the comfort of art - It was easy to understand why the Inarta wanted to bond with the eagles. But why did they do it, the eagles? Why would a soul like that, sacrificed in blood and death, take on to share its new existence with a wingless, earthbound being? Perhaps it just amused them. Perhaps it was just more interesting and entertaining than simply killing the humans like the easy prey they were? Perhaps they had other reasons, far more complex than a human mind would be able to understand. Only the eagles themselves would know. Ata chirped again. Albeit Cisel felt wary she gave in to the temptation to speak her native language again, after all these years. The man had spoken in nari so fluent and perfect that she felt convinced he must be inarta, just like her. The language was extremely hard for others to learn and master. “Yes, it’s strange” she said. “I take it you are from Wind Reach? What are you doing here, so far away from Skyinarta?” *

[Valo]

Valo found himself wandering what possible purpose would the woman have with such a scrawny little thing as the chick that perched itself upon her arm. No doubt a bird of prey that chirped nervously at his presence. No doubt it too could sense that ominous aura.

"It is a strange time we live in." he spoke without really looking at her, as if dazed. A certain dreamy mystique to his tone. "Besides, I could ask you the same question." the artist stepped from the shrouds of the shadows yet maintained the clothing that obscured his feature. This time he would not be so careless. This time she may not see his face and he truly didn't want to look upon her's. Anything but that seemed infinitely more consubstantial with priority. A desperation to control himself. This area was too public to slip into the craving again.

The wind and the sea is what he longed for. Peace in solitude, serenity in the howling of the bone snapper. The rays of the moon upon his face. That's here he was proceeding to, thus nonchalantly Valo walked past the woman, averting his eyes from her face at all cost. Somehow kin bore a greater value in terms of existence than the poor and the promiscuous, the students of the university, the thieving. She would not become his prey tonight for the simple identity of her race. Another one would suffice. She would not do.

Just before he disappeared into the shadows on the opposite side of the road that lead down to the coast, Valo halted for just a moment. A warning on his lip, yet this one was genuine. "Keep safe ma'am." he spoke, yet this time in common. "I hear the monster of East Street has a taste for pretty ladies. T'would be a shame for you to meet the same fate as that poor girl tonight. It is a dangerous time we live in. Do not waste your life for it is the only one you have." he was about to turn around and resume his journey before just the last, final thing escaped from his lips. "There is another of Inarta blood in the city. Valo, the artist. Go seek him out for I am sure he'd be delighted to meet a kind kinswoman."

With those words he was gone as if it was a vision, perhaps a black ghost not a man that had just spoken to her. Valo however would keep this one in his thought. A joy in the stillness of his chest at an encounter of another child of the fire god.

[Cisel]

~ Cisel ~ * Ata had chirped and chirped, and disturbed the brief conversation. But now the small bird had fallen silent again. The enigmatic unknown inatra – for inatra he must be the fluent way he had spoken in nari – had appeared, spoken, brushed past her like a ghost in the darkness and disappeared again without waiting for an answer. He had not answered her question about what he was doing so far away from Skyinarta. He had just passed her by, not looking at her and she had not seen his face. And the tone in his voice when he spoke in nari had been like a voice in a dream. Cisel stood immovable on the street, confused, puzzled and perplexed. The meeting had been so unexpected and the shrouded man had been so mystical She didn’t know what to think. Had this even happened or was it her own imagination and her thoughts about the eagles and of Wind Reach and her Inarta kin that had made her see a vision, an illusion, a mirage? But when he had halted for a moment and switched to common to warn her for the what he called “The monster of East Street” he had seemed completely real and not at all like an hallucination. His voice had sounded very sincere, like he was truly worried about her life being at risk for real and cared for her safety. The words had sent a sudden fear through her body. Beneath the town's surface were other layers. Dangerous layers, with dangerous people, death as present as life was. But why was she surprised? Why would Zeltiva be different from other places ? Was it not dangerous wherever she went ? And there was another of Inarta blood in the city. Valo, the artist. An artist ? And Inarta? This information had sounded as real as the warning and the concern. Perhaps she ought to seek this artist out, like she had been adviced, and find out if he wanted to cooperate with her. Not once had the shrouded man turned towards her to and met her gaze, the way people normally do, if only for a fraction of a second. It had been so unusual that it had seemed like he had been unnaturally, consequently turning away. It had made her feel a weird feeling that he was deliberately averting his gaze from her, holding her away from himself, avoiding to look at her, refusing to see her. The wind was cold, but she liked the fresh air and the silence. In the in it would be stifling and boisterous. She hesitated where she stood on the street, torn between the insight that the hour was late and she ought to seek safety indoors, and an impulse to take a walk by the sea. Sea or inn, inn or sea ? That was the question. Sea ? Sea. Just a short while, just some more of fresh air, before - She heard the sounds of the wind and the waves, and in her mind and echo of the strange Inatra’s words. Do not waste your life, not waste your life, waste your life, your life life *

[Talen Stirling]

Old habits die hard. He'd been going home late, the darkness no longer unfamiliar after a few months living in the city, holding little fear for someone used to nighttime patrols in the empty and cold streets of Denval. When he heard a scream tear the "stillness" of the city night he ran towards it's source. Why did it have no end? He sidestepped a startled old crone, and lowered his pace when he saw guards and civilians alike crowding around a person upon the cobblestones. A feeling of calm had been replaced with an all too familiar dread. The memory of murders in the night, invisible killers and unknown dangers whispered threats and warning. Talen shoved past a young dandy who was looking with apalled fascination on the scene. Blood splattered the cobblestones and the dress of the young woman who had been disfigured. A man crouched over her attempting to tend her wound while guards asked questions and others yelled into the night for doctors and a pursuit of the perpetrator. His fists clenched and brows knitted as he listened and watched. It was happening again, the murders, the ominous signs and the dark spellwork. The woman was calmed and questioned, and Talen listened attentively upon her words. Glowing red eyes? Immediately he thought of the Vantha, one of the few people who had somewhat regular dealings with the Denvali. Their eyes could, probably, shift to red. Yet he'd never seen one with pale skin, although the glowing could probably be attributed to the terror of the moment. He looked around the area thoughtfully, trying to remember what little he'd seen during their resupply in Avanthal. He noticed the Wave Guard with the notes and approached the man with a military posture well practiced in his lost home town. "Could you repeat the description to me, Sir?" The question was asked with a calm intensity. He remembered the bloodied monstrosity that had become of the child of one of his kin to murderous sorcery, and the dark memory lent an urgency to his demeanour that he might otherwise not have been able to portray. Then it had been the same mysterious opponent, forever seeming to elude their grasp as if they were fighting with shadows. A tall, pale man, handsome and sharp features. And glowing red eyes. It added up to nothing Talen knew of, but he was fairly sure now it could not be a Vantha. He felt a chill down his spine, the same kind of ominous fear he'd felt in the seasons before the utter annihilation of everything he'd ever known. Perhaps their doom had followed them to this place, with it's blood and darkness. He nodded a thank you to the guard, and they parted ways as the crowd dispersed into the suddenly much more threatening darkness. Wave guards had disappeared in large numbers in the direction they'd been told the assailant had fled, and there seemed no purpose to follow them. He tightened the scarf around his neck and set upon his way home, to report what he'd heard and seen. Despite his best attempts, it felt impossible not to look around every street corner for pale men with blood red eyes.