Hello again. (Isikais & Hadrian)

[Isikais]

A casual chuckle, and Isikais began the process of drawing his bath, drawing out the tub, pumping water, and setting a portion to boil. The slow ritual of removing the layers of clothing followed its normal course, fabric neatly hung on the back of a chair. From his bag Isikais produced the usual colorful array of bottles, fragrances seeping from the containers even before they were opened. Shirtless, and down to his undergarments, Isikais tossed a look to Hadiran, a devious grin creeping across his face as he did. "Would you mind getting the shutters? I don't want word getting around to Dahlia that I take my clothes off for just anyone." He chuckled and poured the bubbling water into the cold bath. Removing the last bit of cloth that covered his skin, Isikais continued the practiced ceremony of cleansing and maintaining himself. It was only when he felt the warm watter against the sewn seam of his dagger-torn flesh that he even remembered it was there. No doubt Hadrian had seen it. No doubt there would be inquiries. He submerged himself entirely for just a moment, stalling for that crucial time to conjure a believable lie. When he rose again from the water, he was prepared, though he would not offer an explanation unless one was demanded. Instead, he decided to turn the tables a bit, distracting the boy with a quick volley of his own questions as he rubbed soap and salves along wet flesh. "Tell me of your family Hadrian. Who were your parents? Do you have any siblings? From where do you come?" He kept going, pushing the inquiry further and further from himself. "Do they miss you?"

[Hadrian]

"Just as long as it's covertcy rather than modesty," he drawled, tacking up spare bedding over the windows. It hadn't occurred to him that anyone would ever want to spy on him, but perhaps he should have thought of that. Perhaps he could persuade Torc to put up shutters; Hadrian himself was crap at home improvement. "My father's a merchant in Syliras, married mother for money and connections. Siblings work in the family business or have been married off for further networking, or are in line to do so. I'm the black sheep of the family, and I think they're finally content to have me here if I'm not going to be normal. Here is better than there where they would have to deal with me. It works well for everyone. "What about you? Original family? Living descendants? Undead fraternity of Sahova?" He smirked a little as he went about tidying up shop. It only occurred to him then that he should probably react to the dagger-wound, even though he had watched it happen. "Is that... new?" he asked, pointing at the line of slightly puckered flesh.

[Isikais]

Isikais smirked at the rapid turn around, and knew where the questions would land. Hadrian's eyes would come to the mark eventually, and Isikais knew it. Better, though to be done with it quickly. "All of my family is long dead. We were once nobles of the Eyktol. We lived outside of Ahnatep and owned a large swath of land near...the city." Even the thought of the land by the Great River gave a shudder to his mind, so he barreled on. "I had no children." Again the pang of regret, but he would not stop. "Sahova is about as fraternal a society as a den of Dhani assassins." As he bounded into the recent past he shook off the mental barriers, landing firmly on the last question, a simple, pointed, and entirely fictitious discomfort that he let subsume the two syllables. "And yes." Isikais knelt down and poured a wash of water over his head, cleansing the soap from it and slicking it back as he did. Rising again, and stepping from the tub with towel in hand, he patted himself dry, towel tossed over the chair. Slow steps brought him menacingly close to Hadrian, until he stood only a fraction of an inch from the young man, skin still slightly glossed with the sheen of bathwater, tiny droplets draining down sharp facial features and trailing one single drop from his chin as he spoke. "Would you like to examine it?" Almost a whisper, and lips pressed into a wicked grin as he spoke.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian began to wonder if the jest about being lovers hadn't been a bit of foolishness. Even before he had managed to get such a rise out of Isikais, the other had always seemed to be toying with him, trying to incite some reaction. "Let me know if I damage you," he said wryly. There was little opportunity not to examine the dagger-tear in the animated flesh, but he steeled himself not to give Isikais the reaction he wanted. He imagined that their friendship, if that was the word, might always be thus -- the type of relationship one sharpened themselves upon rather than the type one fell back on for comfort. His fingertips began to brush the dead flesh around the wound, the surface heated by the bath, but with an abiding chill within. Any seepage of ichor had been washed away, and the wound looked, for the most part, clean. Still, he imagined it would not remain so, else Isikais would have morphed it away. "Have you thought about cauterizing it? Make it look like a brand rather than a tear?" He prodded the flesh to see if it would break open or if he had closed it. "Tell me more about Sahovan society. You know, so I can take it over."

[Isikais]

A moment too long he stood there, eyes locked on the hand that traced the edges of flesh and thread. Hadrian's wonder had become a catharsis, a refutation of millennia of fear and ignorance. Physical contact always led to suspicion. Time always betrayed his true nature. Invariably revelation led to violent rejection. Not so with Hadrian, his insatiable thirst for novelty subsuming that all too human terror of the unknown. Cold fingers guided the young mans hand to the knot in the thread, pressed fingers around the loose end, and and pulled it until the knot was undone. Fabric wound through skin and muscle as the seam was unraveled. Dead flesh did not heal as living flesh would, no clotting or scabs, no new growth or swelling marred the site of the wound. Only the tiny needlepoint holes lining the thin slit of separated flesh marked any change in his wound since it was made. Without warning Isikais marched toward the fireplace with the quick fluid steps of a determined man. Not a glance was spared elsewhere as he reached for the poker that hung near the fire. He held the iron rod into the flames unflinching and patient as dark black metal began to glow a bright red, and finally satisfied that it was time, turned, and again encroached on Hadrian's personal space. He had no words this time, only that silent expectant expression, inviting Hadrian to take the poker, already beginning to dim slightly as the heat radiated from it.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian thought perhaps he was starting to become accustomed to Isikais' flair for the dramatic, a trait typical of highborn Eypharians if his reading was to be trusted. Isikais was dangerous, to be sure, but Hadrian was gambling that he could remain useful long enough to learn what he needed to learn, and if they weren't friends by the time his usefulness ran out, then he would have to be sure there was nothing Isikais wanted of him that he wouldn't give. Every day spent together was a learning experience. His soft fingertips grazed the wound in the dead flesh, information traveling up his arm and into his brain to compare and contrast with all the other information he had gathered in his life. The problem-solving Hadrian wondered if some sort of magic might temporarily grant life-like healing powers to a Nuit's host, or if an especially favored servant of Rak'keli might not lay on hands and perform a miracle even upon the dead. The intimacy of the gesture confused another part of him, too much of his analytic prowess focused on more banal issues than interaction between sentient beings. He felt the tiny holes, just sitting there and trying to decipher what was written in braille upon his skin. And then his suggestion prompted Isikais to follow his hypothesis that a brand might be preferable to an eternal wound. A part of him thrilled at innovating the thinking of a millennia-old wizard, giving him a teasing taste of future greatness if he survived sweet whispers and prejudice long enough... He gave a slow blink at the glowing metal offered to him, less out of shock as he had had time to figure it out while Isikais heated up the metal, than to engage his auristic Sight to see how natural extremes of heat affected a Nuit's body and djed-aura. Reaching out, he took the poker, his warm, slightly damp hand touching cool flesh, an inadvertently tender, brief caress as if a human instinct to prepare a body for pain with compassion. Ivak in one hand, he called Morwen into the other, pushing djed out of himself, through his hand, manifesting res that glowed and gleamed an icy blue. If water was the unimpressive element which answered his call always, he would merely have to learn to use it effectively. Chlorine blue eyes shot up to meet Isikais' dark gaze, a question posed, an answer received. Nodding to the face haloed by its aura of djed, he looked down and carefully pressed the hot poker along the dagger-slit, counting: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. And then he pulled it away, covering the burn with his other hand, and calling the ice fully into being to prevent the cure from doing more damage then damage control, making more permanent his mark. He had erased the traces of the whore in the ruins from Isikais' garment and replaced it with his own. Hadrian was here, written in cauterized flesh along the Nuit's rib. Something to remember Hadrian by until a new body was found.

[Kelpie]

Isikais: +1 Interrogation, +1 Socializing, +1 Persuasion Lore: Branding Skin Hadrian: +1 Interrogation, +1 Socializing,+1 Magecraft Lore: Disadvantages of a Nuit’s Body Lore: Branding Skin