Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

An off-shoot task from the over run infirmary finds its way into Altaira's orders- Report on the death and destruction of the Djed Academy

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Center of scholarly knowledge and shipwrighting, Zeltiva is a port city unlike any other in Mizahar. [Lore]

Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Altaira Readva on January 22nd, 2015, 2:18 am

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Common | Vani | Others | 8th Winter, 514 AV
It was the morning after a Gods forsaken night.

The blast had come as many would lay their heads to rest, and from what the kelvic woman heard in passing and in whispers, she was lucky she’d be out that eve, and not at the Djed Academy. Either fate or chance was with her, and unlike so many of her evening class peers, she was able to draw breath at the next light. The academy was destroyed, many were dead, and even more were injured – guilt had stricken her when she realised that her aid at the infirmary was sorely needed, with she herself too far away and preoccupied to find herself aiding where it would have proved most useful.

A knot was quickly tying itself in her gut, and a shiver that riveted her spine. She was known among those within the infirmary to lack a single squirm or discomfort at the sight of the dead, almost to a point of infamy, so she supposed it was little wonder that it was was she who was sent out as a dispatch to give an account of the dead and damaged.

She was, as well as she could understand of the muddled orders that were thrown to her, to report back to Mistress Claira so the woman could gain a better understanding of the havoc that was wrecked and the state of the bodies that remained – she herself so overworked in the infirmary only Tanroa knew when, or if, she’d have the opportunity to survey the damage herself.

‘Dira, I hope not too many have come to you before their time – I pray they’ve come to you in peace, and that I may press any who haven’t to follow quite soon enough.’

The prayer kept her mind and heart at bay, she pressed through the crumbled halls, destroyed courts and ways as she approached what little remained of the academy, mind flitting through how many peers and teachers that she’d yet heard a single word of, and another bout of prayer slipped her lips. Coercing a stranger to return to Dira was one thing, however to do so to one that you’ve drawn breath with was another account entirely. When chance was the only thing that separated the existence of one life from another, hypocrisy was quite strongly felt when Altaira attempted to press them to join Dira.

She rolled her shoulders and pressed on, catching sight and smell of smoke and burned flesh as Zulrav’s breezes turned her way, and another deep breath rushed from her lungs. Syna’s light had only just broken, and yet the day was as grim as undeath.

Without a moment’s warning, voices erupted, words and whispers, and rushes and worries. The sizzle of wetted fire cut through the brisk morning silence, and another bout of smoke rushed through the sky. A few more steps saw several stone-faced men gave her stern looks, folded arms and tired gazes hinting that perhaps they’d spent the night, their attempts at an air of authority aided naught by the shadows of torch and candlelight. “What’s your purpose here- we need not any dawdlers to hinder our efforts to recover the dead and survey damage-If you wish to volunteer aid, then please-” Altaira could hear the anger in him, though it was much overcast by weariness, and although such was understandable, she took not too kind to being spoken to in such a manner.

“Mistress Claira sent me,” her words were terse, and her expression stone itself, pressing her lips as she raised a brow. “I am to survey the dead and the damage- she’d come herself if she had the time,” The man gave her a look up and down, before shooting a look to his considerably more dazed companion, and the kelvic pressed her words to allow a greater point of urgency. “If their condition is poor,” she dropped her tone slightly, a sigh rolling from her lungs. “Then Tanroa is no friend in aiding us determine their identities. Nor will it be any goodness to health.” She considered pressing her words further, but knowing how wild her own hair was, and the bags that sat beneath her burning amber eyes, she thought it best not to pretend to be the greater party when looks told a very different, very obvious story. Everyone had gone through Hai last night.
“Very well.”

With a nod and a semblance of a smile, Altaira slid passed the men and took in the sight of the growing destruction. In some places, there was little damage – a pillar would stand tall and firm next to a pile of ashes and rubble, a hallway would progressively give way to more and more damage. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Death was in the air, and her breath came almost disturbingly easy. She felt for it- for them. She’d come with the expectation of a dozen ghosts and ethereal forms, but it was silent. Instead what rocked her was the abysmal sights before her. The semblances of charred bodies and the bellowing of smoke some bounds of rubble over, the lack of the tower and structure where the Asylum should have stood not too far away, and the stillness of the air. It'd been three seasons since she'd felt so strong a presence of death.

It was a breath of relief that then left her, and she almost hated herself for it.

Her passion was Dira's work, though she'd be outright lying if the thought of dozens of lost souls did not sadden or challenge her, refusing to allow such hopeful thought that perhaps they may have all found peace and Dira - even more so since there was one certain undeath more demanding of her attention.

Last edited by Altaira Readva on November 16th, 2015, 2:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Ignotus Everto on January 24th, 2015, 9:50 am

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Altaira would see him on the far end of the hall. Ignotus had no slick magic tricks or epic fanfare this time; no guards or glittering uniforms; just a hooded black cloak and like-colored suit. Trembling hands left pale streaks on a soot stained wall as he shifted shakily through the corridor like a blind man. He looked through cracked doorways to broken, burning classrooms, and saw them as they once were; pristine and filled with eager wizards to be. He saw a scared boy with hair the color of straw learn he had a soul. He felt the thrill that raced down his spine when he was told it could be drawn upon to transform the world. He watched a woman with laugh lines and graying brown hair in a tight bun explain the fundamental rules of Djed to dozens of riveted students. He saw a young ginger man with the beginnings of a beard and glinting blue eyes offer the boy his hand. He smelled lavender on the wealthy girl sitting on the second seat of the third row.

Ignotus smelled charcoal and rotting flesh. The Nuit hastened forward. Even in ruins, he still remembered what was taught in every room he passed. On the fifth door to the right Professor Malvorich ran introductory Auristics. The third door around the corner was where the beginning Projectionists gathered. Opposite that and two doors down the Maledictors shared samples. Ignotus still remembered when all classes were canceled because an intermediate Summoner- a fat, blond bastard named Benton- accidentally unleashed a Glassbeak in an attempt to impress a senior girl. He and two other beginner Reimancers were caught in the college at the time, and barricaded themselves in a study hall with two chairs and a filing cabinet. They held a spark-throwing contest to pass the time, nearly burning the room down on three separate occasions before faculty contained the beast.

For five years, this was Ignotus' world. For half a decade, these halls were home. Here he first felt like a future awaited him. Here he felt not only valued, but exceptional. Now his home was broken bricks and cinders.
The wizard stopped inside the doorway a half-collapsed classroom covered in ash and rubble; a broken blackboard with the words "Reimancy 101" scratched onto it hung morosely on a wall whose entire right half had caved in. For a half-dozen ticks, Ignotus surveyed the shattered space with absent eyes and a loose jaw. Then he sank silently to his knees and wept tearlessly for his dead sanctuary.
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Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Altaira Readva on January 26th, 2015, 7:08 am

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It was always a strange feeling for her - the sight of a thin, horrid, cloaked man catching her sharp gaze, too distant and too shadowed for any real feature of note to strike any real familiarity with her - the feeling of seeing someone who appeared to be so utterly torn apart. It was almost a quiet curiosity that struck her during such sights, a wonder of what kind of grief struck them- if it was related to the dealings of Dira or not.

Altaira couldn't make out much of a face given the early morning shadows, the candles close to their wicks and the torches burning low as Syna became more present doing little to aid lighting the blackened hall – not that she’d have cared to pay much mind, she was, afterall, there for the dead, not the living. Though, there was something that struck the slightest tune off about the gaunt man, and the kelvic gave him a harsh look as he staggered about, his out stretched hands - feeling the walls as though he were blind - trawling through soot and charcoal.

Was it a life that he so freely mourned? Or was it the halls of the building itself?

Her gaze fell to the floor, and she scanned for any sight of charred bone or body. She'd have to ask the man to remove himself if she thought it was one's ashes that he so blindly tread on. She took several steps closer, gaze sweeping all in her sights - the pungent smell of burnt flesh and wood making it perhaps too clear how recently the particular section of the building had been ablaze.

'And they say that some buildings have been levelled in totality. What were those... things. The things that they said did this? The obelisks?'

A solid 'thud' pressed her back to the world of smoldering walls and bellowing smoke, and her eyes stung as Zulrav's winds blew the smoke of not-so-far-off blazes in her direction, blurred gaze taking sight of the man she'd seen earlier now slumped in a ruined hall, and a pang of familiarity ripped through her. She'd only studied at the university for a mere half season, but the time was more than enough to know the attachment that could be brought - there were even medical students who'd turned up for shifts with swollen eyes and far off gazes, mumbles of friends or teachers or some distant relation.

"Excuse me," she called, keeping her voice soft.

She needed to ward off her useless little thoughts. There was a job that needed to be done, and a service to Dira that was yet to be completed. "Should you be here?" She kept a kind tenderness to her voice, as though approaching some timid bird or child, though her gaze and thoughts were on other things- not the sobbing wreck of a figure.

Loss could make a man wild, but that was not her most pressing concern.

Her knowledge of medicine was not nearly the best, but she wasn't a fool. There were dozens of pieces of common knowledge that called for limited exposure to the place - and she'd not let some stranger's lungs blacken and cause later worry due to the frailty of his emotion, assuming that she was indeed correct in the assumption of the gaunt figure's gender. "It would not do well to dwell in such a place," she kept all tenderness that could be with increasing tone, not entirely sure how such came out, before once more dropping her gaze from the scorched roof remnants, and continued to seek sight of the dearly departed. She thought that, perhaps, whoever the griever was, would take kinder should she not seek his face.

Her mind, then, returned to the duties due, a soft sigh leaving her lips as she contemplated a place to begin. 'Perhaps I should not try too hard in seeking sight of dead bodies," she wondered, reminding herself perhaps too bitterly of the little gifts that Dira's marking had given her. 'Dira's given gaze will tell me when I am upon death.' The fact that she'd yet struck a place that bestowed upon herself that... the feeling that came with being able to view one's death meant that she'd yet come across one - though the sublime serenity she felt made pointed case that death - and a lot of it - was quite near.
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Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Ignotus Everto on March 2nd, 2015, 9:08 am

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The sobbing stopped with preternatural speed and Ignotus' entire body tensed up. "What's she doing here?"

For someone who seemed to despise Nuit so much, she seemed awfully compassionate as well. This confused Ignotus for a tick before he remembered that his cloak's hood was up- clearly she hadn't seen him. The Nuit slowly relaxed and stood, brushing the dirt off his clothes with short, smooth motions. Briefly, he considered convincing her to leave, but something Ignotus could not identify tugged at his innards and compelled him to keep Altaira near. "Now is an ideal time to change her attitude." his rational mind said, trampling on the alien feeling in his gut. His mind made, the Lord of Council spoke in a tone both wary and reassuring. "I came because I can without danger. This place was dear to me."

Faint threads of Djed tugged at Altaira's subconsciousness, urging her to see him as a man and gently pushing her emotional color to a sort of maudlin compassion. "Was it dear to you as well?"
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Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Altaira Readva on March 19th, 2015, 12:38 am

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Common | Vani | Others |
Altaira near began to tap her foot as her gaze sought any other sight than what was the man that heaped before her, keeping her distance well enough that she could either lodge a counter attack or escape, if need be. She did not underestimate the power of grief, and although she couldn't shake the quiet curiosity that had settled within her, more sober thought made point and case that she'd much rather lack another that her eyes unconsciously looked for in the streets, and her efforts to avoid recognizing the man were at once doubled.

It was then, as she feared, that familiarity finally struck, and all her best efforts to deafened her eyes and blind her eyes were cast aside, and her mind flipped and shuddered as the voice was put to name.

'Dira, take it.'

Hatred then took her, herself. Hatred of the vile creature who attempted to sway her. Hatred of herself for being so blind, so daft and so deaf that she 'd let such a thing pass her by, and she felt a sickness that bore straight to her gut at her own misadventures. She'd make up for such a mistake, she had no choice but to. The words that he spoke then bore into her mind, they churned and turned and the sickness of her mistake steeled her with a cold sweat.

"Dear?" she near spat the word. How could one so vile as the thing - Ignotus? Was that what it called itself? - before her know a single thing about holding something so precious? "Dear," the repetition of the word let her nerve calm slightly, and her mind rattled as she steeled her thoughts. Composure, she needed to keep her wits. "No," Her gaze was then, ever so breifly, clawed from the site of the creature and shot down, towards the hall.

Oh, how much she wishes she could act without consequence.

"People are dear, memories and experiences." She didn't hide her disdain, in fact it would be far more accurate that she did the exact opposite. "Life is dear. It is dear and precious because it ends."
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Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Ignotus Everto on April 2nd, 2015, 8:41 pm

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Ignotus whipped around to face Altaira at that, lipped pulled back in disgust, glare lancing paralyzing fear into Altaira like an arrow through a rabbit. "Why?! So you can feel better for your failure to achieve? So you can wallow in the meager, vindictive pleasure of knowing your superiors will have even some of their potential wasted just like you?" The edge of his mouth twisted into a sneer and his chin jerked slightly causing the hood to fall off.

"Of course people like you love ending life." At this he began to advance on Altaira. If she attempted to back away or leave, she would be met with a blast of Hypnotic force compelling her to stay put coupled with a very angry wizard growling "No. You don't get to back out now." For better or for worse, Altaira had managed to strike a nerve and shatter Ignotus' normally impermeable mask. "People like you. Selfish, hateful, shallow, cowardly, weak, miserable parasites!" He was bearing down on her now, head bowed to keep eye contact, teeth bared. "You curse and injure your fellow creatures, and relish it, and you have the arrogance, the sheer gall, to tell me what is and isn't dear?" A taunting glare mixed into the Nuit's snarl, daring Altaira to respond.

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A thousand thanks to Phoenix for the gorgeous blue frame, and a thousand more to Edreina for her beautiful magic-themed one!

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Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Altaira Readva on November 20th, 2015, 12:53 am

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Common | Vani | Others | 8th Winter, 514 AV
Revolt was thick in her gut, and her mouth dried as the nuit set a piercing gaze upon her, lips pressing into a fine line as she softened her stiff form. Altaira hadn’t come prepared for a fight that morning, that grim early morning, with Syna’s creeping light becoming more pronounced with each passing chime, and she could feel the slightest sway rock her as she rolled her shoulders back, flexing her hands and relaxing her tired muscles as she considered the possibility for a scuffle.

'Not an idea what this thing is capable of. Think before I speak.'

She had expected actions over the words that were quickly thrown, and for all the menace and palpable loathe that the man himself brought forward, it did not shake the polarity of the situation – form his damning words, the place that they stood was most certainly his, once. But now it was ash and the remains of the dead, what caused the nuit before her to have been crumpled just a flitting moment ago filled her with all the calm and serenity of cemetery. It was Dira’s place now. Perhaps places could be dear.

Even with all the comfort of a place of the dead, the sting of failure and achievement still etched into her, and her knuckles whitened as it proved to be the singular line that her mind snagged on as the creature went about his rants and ravings. The next point that jarred her was an accusation that she was not foreign to. The silly little assumption that she, her brothers, and her sisters in Dira, took no greater joy in the destruction of life - as though Kihala herself had some issue with the notion of balance. She ground her teeth and kept murder from her mind, any consideration of a step back to give a sliver of space to the gap that the nuit had so quickly closed slipping from her mind, gaze shifting only to check the location of the other bone pickers before flitting once more to Ignotus.

When his raving had finally closed to a pointed dare, the kelvic woman fell silent. Selfish, yes. Shallow, perhaps. Hateful? Cowardly? Weak? Miserable?

She had never experienced life so freely as she had after being marked by Dira.

"The only lives that I have ever ended, where those that were already dead." She wet her lips, and did not let her gaze for even the shortest of moments falter, matching the nuit's previous advance as she too crept forward, pressing from mind the filth that was to once more be so close to rotten flesh bound to walk again. "Low lived, bottom feeders, who had to steal skin to walk among the living." She tilted her head as her own gaze narrowed. "What was your excuse? What warped validation have you bound your wounds with? You do not chase ghosts. You wear fancy uniforms and play official."

She reclined her head, slightly, and searched the skull before her. The nuits that had so far fell to her blade were not of their own. This one, however, seemed to be his own ruler. No Chaon, no chain of command- and yet once more he'd weaseled his way into power.
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Bone Pickers (Ignotus)

Postby Anuk on March 3rd, 2018, 5:23 pm

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Ignotus Everto

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Altaira Readva

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