Closed Presence is Enough

(Raeyn) Elea meets a new face in the Trail, much fairer than the last one.

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The Diamond of Kalea is located on Kalea's extreme west coast and called as such because its completely made of a crystalline substance called Skyglass. Home of the Alvina of the Stars, cultural mecca of knowledge seekers, and rife with Ethaefal, this remote city shimmers with its own unique light.

Presence is Enough

Postby Eleutheria on August 2nd, 2018, 2:32 pm

80th Summer, 518 AV



Elea came for the Trail to relax, or at least try. Between the busy life trying to adjust to Lhavit, philtering work and pondering on when to buy out access to library, visits to the Trail of Waterfalls to meditate and rest came to be essential.

The waterfall roars and the water flows in a free and easy way. Elea stood up from the bench she chose and walked over to the stream, deliberately and with more grace than usual. She looked over to the stream, so as to see her reflection painted by the fluid mirror. A girl appeared before her, of bright skin but pink cheeks, calm, azure eyes, as if the portals to the deep sunny sea. With hair loose and fiery ginger, long enough to reach upper half of her back, nose tall and noble-looking and short, but smiling mouth, Elea was evidently becoming a different person than ten days ago.

Some people just need a bit of tranquil sights and nature around them to get better. Elea was given just that and was evidently benefitting, externally. There was still a conflict within her. How to proceed on with her life. How to gather more of what she lived for. How to not capsize her boat that was her stay in Lhavit: She was sure, that should a storm do so, the sea would not forgive her. Elea hungered knowledge: She knew she'll have to eventually head out to the library and stay there, day and night if need was, reading up all she could. She merely waited until she was accustomed to the Lhavit sleep pattern: Something she was still working on.

Elea took off her shoes, pulled up her pants and placed her legs in the stream. Below her knee, where her pants were not reaching, the water started to caress the pale, almost pink at places skin. Hardened by the running sessions, they retained their finer, almost charming shape, but still, cooling off was quite what they needed in summer's heat. Elea herself, started breathing deep, as if she sought to plunge herself into deep water. She closed her eyes, as if in anticipation for cold stream to encompass her face.

Instead, she pulled her arms horizontally across her flanks and lifted her head up, trying to contain her own waterfall of thoughts, as she did when she first arrived. Ten days ago, it felt like rushing right over to the real waterfall before Elea and trying to encompass it in her thin arms. Today, it felt like putting a barrel below the waterfall and letting it gather water: A temporary and weak measure, but way less awkward and still more effective than last one. Still, a learned meditator would be bound to scoff at her in contempt at worst, smile at her with pity at best.

Soon tired of the stance, Elea then turned around, lying on her rock upon her stomach, only to spot a man standing before her. A man of long red hair. Inarta? Probably.

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Presence is Enough

Postby Raeyn on August 3rd, 2018, 12:33 pm


Better days had seen the Alchemist. Far better, far more peaceful.

For a season now strange whispers ere a plague on his mind. Having started right at the beginning of summer, the voices had from from a single whisper in the dark to a shrieking cacophony that grated on him. He had begun to question his very reality. No safety, no corners of sanity could be found even in his own house. Raeyn had from frustrated and he had grown ill from the plague of over giving that had fallen upon him. A plague he had no cure for.

As gloomy as the foreboding mists that had enveloped the city and as severe as the fridge cold air, Raeyn sought solitude in that which his father had taught him so seek comfort in. Among the trees and the picturesque views of natural wonder, was perhaps the only place the alchemist could now find any semblance of clarity. To run from the voices. To find himself in a place where he could do no damage, just him, his thoughts and them. By his side the fierce lifelong companion and protector, Ruru, trotted along the trail of waterfalls, tale wagging, gleeful at being let out the house at last. A thick, cinnamon coat protected the dog from the occasional ghosts of icy wind.

The Inarta and his companion came to a familiar spring along the trails where they’d follow the wooden walkways. They weaved though the trees and looked to the misty skies when they came to the occasional clearing in the canopy. A casual walk, nothing less nothing more. But the feeling of cold air in his lungs helped to soothe Raeyn. Solitude brought him comfort.

He’d been dressed in far less than his usual fine attire. Instead, the hunter’s clothing graced his body. A simple shirt and pants, boots worn out by many years of tracking the unforgiving. A bow in hand. A quiver full of arrows on his back. Not that he was expecting the thrill of the hunt to take him not that he had in person seen to banishing the threat of the Zith earlier in the season. But a life in the Misty Peaks had taught him to watch his back.

Neatly as always, Raeyn’s hair of flame was tied up in a bun to keep rogue strands off his face. A singular streak of white right at his forehead tore though the hairdo like lightning tore though the stormy skies at sunset. Galaxies of star like freckles graced sun kissed skin of golden alabaster, pinched and reddened now by the frosty air. A white crescent like discolouration sat snugly beneath his right eye. Add looking, perhaps, but the hunter was handsome. Incredibly handsome for a man in whom anxiety and stress began to take a visible toll.

As he walked, the Inarta cleared his mind, letting the scenery take him. He focused on the sound of the birds in branches, the trickling of water in the streams. He allowed his mind to stand by idly as thoughts flew past idly. The let the voices speak without acknowledgement. And the calmer he became the quiver they’d get. Engaging his every sense, the Alchemist focused on the landscape, feeling himself become part of it. But the sweet sweet solitude was short lived. It seemed another presence had chosen this gloomy day to venture this far out into nature.

Raeyn’s eyes came to lay on a young woman of fiery locks and eyes as blue as they water in which she was standing. ‘So odd.’ He thought to himself. ‘The water must be painfully cold.” But he paid her no mind. Little more than a silent nod of acknowledgement to her presence was granted. Truly the hunter wasn’t in the mood for striking conversations with stranger. Not now not ever. He figured his own company far more worthy of his person.

But the dog had other ideas. For however much the Inarta abhorred the company of others, Ruru craved it. Like thunder he bolted towards the girl, barking in jubilation and wagging the furry tail to high heavens. Paws plunged into water sending droplets into the air.

“Gods damn it. Come back here!” Raeyn’s voice boomed, horrified at his pet’s disobedience. But of course the dog was far too busy trying to smell the woman and frolicking about in the water like a mad animal to listen.

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Presence is Enough

Postby Eleutheria on August 3rd, 2018, 7:58 pm



Elea enjoyed the cold, while it lasted. Summer, even early Fall, was quite warm for her, even as the storm clouds gathered over Lhavit. She only recently got a job here and here the storm comes. She'd have to inquire when will she be unable to reach work.

When she spotted the handsome, but seemingly troubled man, she nodded back. He was looking at her as one would look at an odd occurence. The locals must have been less inclined to cold than Elea, who soon accepted that she'd be an anomaly in this place for quite a while. Then, she noticed a dog that the Inarta near her had. The dog took much greater interest in her than the man: With typical dog enthousiasm, it was smelling Elea's legs.

Elea was good with animals, or at least tolerant of them. More so than people, some would say. She giggled in a girly manner, keeping her eyes on the dog, letting him smell the legs, even lick them. "It's all right, sir!" - she responded at the man's commands. - "He's just after a new smell in the city, right?" - she looked at the hound before proceeding to pull out her legs out of water, lest they catch a cold. - "What's his name?" - she asked.

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Last edited by Eleutheria on August 3rd, 2018, 11:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Presence is Enough

Postby Raeyn on August 3rd, 2018, 9:38 pm


There was always a buffer between Raeyn and other people. Granted, usually it was Mara but Ruru too was a welcome creature to take all the attention and bask in it like the friendly hound that he was. Raeyn... not so much. Friendliness was not something he could ever be accused of. At least not at first meeting.

"Ruru." he replied to the girl's enquiry. "And what's yours? Or should I just call you wet feet?" He scratched the back of his head awkwardly. Inside his head the alchemist was trying his hardest to move the damned dog with his very mind, metaphorically speaking, else he'd have to suffer yet another awkward encounter with a complete stranger. Coming off rather prickly and certainly cynical was what Raeyn did best after all.

"With so many bath house facilities... heck, even the damned hot springs are a better bath than here in this weather. But hey your business is your business."

Tapping his foot impatiently, the alchemist whistled at his dog once more so was doing just about anything but listening to his master. Playfully the animal jumped though the water and onto the dry bank of the stream before spreading it's feet side and shaking off the exquisitely long coat. Grouchy Raeyn took a few steps back to miss the flinging of water in all directions. Unlike the girl he wasn't quite in the mood for getting wet on a frigid summer's day.

'Kill in the woods and no one will see. No one will see what hides in the woods, beneath the water, down in the depths. No one will see.' a little voice audible only to him chimed in the alchemist's ear.

Seeming as if in pain, Raeyn gritted his teeth and brought a hand to his forehead. On the outside he must have looked like he had faced a sudden onset of migraine or other such pain. For just a moment he forgot the girl was there, so focused was he on banishing the terrible thought. How could he even consider it!? So innocent was she, a creature who had dome nothing terrible to his person other than perhaps banished his sweet solitude with her presence. But it was a sin hardly worth an execution. Having grown up a hunter, Raeyn hunted beasts, pests and Zith, not the very people he had almost lost his life protecting.

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Presence is Enough

Postby Eleutheria on August 3rd, 2018, 11:24 pm




"They call me Elea. Whether you'll call me by my name, or by my feet, is up to you. But, I say we do keep it at Elea, for simplicity's sake, maybe?" - she nodded with a smile. "And, it's not quite a bath, unless you count moisturing my legs. I do use the baths when needed, but, in the end, as you say.." - she chuckled a bit - "I do me." When the dog was finished sniffing her, she took to wipe the most of water off her legs, rolled her trousers back to their previous state and putting on the boots, all while hoping for Ruru not to try designate her as his territory, like she often saw Ravok dogs do.

The slightly prickly speech of the stranger bore no joy unto her, but when Elea took to look at him on the occasion, she spotted tension in his face, even a hand before it, as if he did not felt well. Such speech could have bore the roots in whatever it is that the Inarta to Elea's right countermeasured with.

Elea walked over to the bench nearby, sitting down and looking over at the skies. Was the weather here much different than Ravok? It should be, considering the height and completely different country. Maybe the man before her knew more.

"I do wonder... you'll have to excuse me, me having arrived only yesterday might make a comedy out of me sooner than later again.. but does Lhavit get a weather like that more often than not?" - she queried, raising her hand to point the storm clouds gathering. Did she had to bother him, though? It seemed, that he didn't felt so well, though maybe that was just change of weather. Or, reaction at the dog disobeying again. Elea couldn't quite relate, for sure. Her parents only owned a cat, who wasn't supposed to obey orders anyways. "The clouds sure gather quick, as if to greet my arrival.." - she spoke. I suppose i can't choose what the skies of this place will greet me with. I took what they gave me before arriving here and I doubt I'll change that attitude here - she thought.

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Presence is Enough

Postby Raeyn on August 4th, 2018, 10:00 am


The red haired alchemist rubbed his white eye socket with the ball of his palm for a little. Against the assault of disembodied voices he put up mental walls, cleared his mind. A deep breath that drew cold air into his lungs, feeling every frosty pin prick that calmed him from the inside. He felt his heart beat in his chest, prompted by the sudden influx of oxygen. It's how he had learned to regain his grasp on reality whenever they hit mercilessly against the gates of his frazzled mind. A heart beat was as sure a fact of life as anything for a man of flesh and blood. It grounded him, helped him to clear his mind. Soon enough he'd look back to Elea and give her a weak smile, hoping she wouldn't notice his odd behaviour. It seemed Raeyn had done a lot of hoping as of late.

"Raeyn." he dignified her reply with a name though for such she did not ask. But such was the nature of an egoist. He reckoned that such a thing as his name should be known to everybody who meets him, for one day perhaps when he becomes somebody truly of note in the star of Kalea, as he hoped, the recognition of a thousand eyes would be greatly appreciated. In his own head, after all, the redhead was already the crimson sun that the rest of the universe revolved around.

By the time he looked back to her the girl managed to get herself out of the water and dried off by the nearest bench. All in a space of a moment when he wasn't really paying attention. It surprised him a little, just how distracted he seemed to have gotten. A bad trait for a man who makes his living in the Unforgiving.

"Only yesterday?" surprise underlined every word. Truly his home city was a city of emigrants. Raeyn's own family was an example of such. But too coincidental it seemed to have run into him on barely her second day in the city. What an unfortunate girl. "By all means, welcome to Lhavit. Where is it you came from, if you don't mind me asking that is?"

In spite of the red hair he was fairly certain Wind Reach could not have been Elea's place of origin. Having grown up displaced from his homeland, with a heart yearning to return one day to the volcanic dust of which his kin came to be, Raeyn had grown a certain acute sense of recognising full blood Inarta. Like a somewhat useless third eye, it was. They were a'plenty in the Sky Glass city. But she seemed not one of them. Although, it was possible he could be wrong.

He hadn't approached to sit on the bench beside her. Instead Raeyn leant against the little banister that lined the wooden platform, simply glad to still be on his feet after all the season had brought him. But when he spoke he was calm, somber somehow, with a voice smooth like honey. "It may be hard to believe but I don't remember the last time we had a summer quite this grim. For twenty seven years I've seen summers come and go and I can tell you this much. It never truly gets hot so high up in the mountains but such an ominous fog, as this season had brought, is something else entirely. And judging by the state of things it's most likely..." There his words were cut by a silence of thoughtfulness.

Truly the alchemist had no definitive answer. Suspicions a'plenty he was armed with, however. And it seemed somewhere down the line he had began to blame all the odd things that happened on the wild djed he had come to learn about. The maddened Zith, the voices, the fog, the rain. But they were just suspicions. What sense would there be to fill the head of a youngling with such fearful things. By the gods, she looked no older than Haneht. What kind of a man would he be to scare her with such things?

What kind of a man? He'd be a Raeyn.

"Seeing as you're new in the city, let me fill you in on some history of the place. The Dawn, Dusk and Twilight towers are pillars of knowledge in the city. But earlier in the season their doors closed to all but the families who inhabit them. This isn't a thing that happens often. So whatever this strange fog is, I wouldn't bet my life on it being a simple weather phenomenon. No, I'm almost certain that it's origin is supernatural in nature."

If she thought him mad, so be it. Many did.

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Presence is Enough

Postby Eleutheria on August 12th, 2018, 8:25 pm




“Ravok. The city on top of a lake. Perhaps you heard of it.” – Elea replied, in a voice that is neither fearful, nor enthusiastic. Fear of revealing her birthplace was no longer with her. She could divulge it to a Nuit, she might as well divulge it to Raeyn. “I spent her my whole life. If you spot a custom that is… out of place here, it’s probably quite in place there. Perhaps my hair indicate me an Inarta, but that I’m not. At least… not as far as I know. My mother has same hair color. Maybe her ancestry lies there, but… I fear I never bothered to ask of that.”

“Twenty-seven, eh? This is my first summer here. I had eighteen spent in Ravok, where weather was different indeed. Somewhat warmer indeed. Sometimes dark, but we were taught to never fear the dark, so to speak.” She then proceeded to hear out the rest of what Raeyn had to say. He was, after all, Elea’s sole source on the usual weather of this place. While, listening, Elea laid back on the bench, taking deep breath, as if to collect herself. The man before her spoke in voice of cinnamon and honey, she thought and upon closer look, Elea found his face and hair to match the voice. It would seem that Raeyn took great care to look like that.

Then he mentioned the goals of Elea: The Towers. They were closed down at the time. For all who but inhabitants. Pity. Elea hoped to learn more of them, if she wanted to ultimately join them. Better yet, the foggy weather was unusual for the season. Raeyn’s voice was still like a honey… almost marked with vanity, Elea sensed. Or was it melancholy? The tone was teetering between sounding vain and melancholic, as if it was by a man who thought himself a center of the universe and mourned the “lesser” parts that would not orbit around him. Elea remembered her thoughts about it, but it was far from the time to cast judgements upon Raeyn. He had to be studied like a book, if Elea was ever to judge him.

“The fog does not seem ominous to me, it just seems… like a fog. But, if it’s not usual sight here, I’ll be sure to take heed.” – she mentioned. But Raeyn suspected it to be supernatural, she heard from him. If Elea was anywhere home: Ravok, place nearby, whatever: She’d call him out on paranoia and refer him to Ravok’s patron.

But this was no Ravok and Elea knew next to nothing of this place. If she wasn’t so stubborn and set to fit in the city, she’d probably fear Raeyn’s words. She was ready to accept this weirdness as a custom: This was a city of magic, after all. Yet, from all Elea could see of the city, she’d spot a carefree and cultured populace. In their faces, there were no symptoms of rugged strife or reserved faces that would mark down a troubled populace. Either those anomalies were a recent occurrence, or they are not as dangerous as it would seem, once properly handled.

That or the populace has achieved eerie zen, stoicism, in face of calamities. Elea knew of no magics that could so profoundly alter entire peoples, but she knew that greater things still, were done in this world.
“I’ll be sure to take care of myself, should that fog prove to be as… foreboding as you make it out to be. But I fear I know next to nothing of the weather here, or how to deal with it and I have only you to tell me about it. I thank you in advance for all what you may tell me about this place. You mentioned the Towers, though. Would you like to elaborate on them? How do they work, what are they about?” – Elea asked, ready for any and all words to reply. If she was being too inquisitive, so be it. The moment her brain caught on to memory of the Towers, she could not let go of the notion of asking for more information, not without sleeping badly at night. Or, later on, at the Lhavit rest periods.

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Presence is Enough

Postby Raeyn on August 17th, 2018, 1:12 pm


Ravok? He’d read of the place from books and manuscripts but never had he met someone that would have travelled all that way. A world away, it was. What on earth would possess one to linger so far from home? Raeyn was certainly a man who liked to hear himself talk. Others, not so much? But as she spoke of Ravok he found himself somewhat almost interested. And so perhaps it didn’t bother him as much that she was talking his hears off.

She saw no danger in the fog. “Oh don’t misunderstand me. The Misty Peaks have their name for a reason, after all. But it seems this season I’ve seen less of the goddess Syna’s rays than any other summer before.” He said.

But soon enough her attention went straight to the Towers, as did that of many prospective mages. And suddenly Raeyn found himself regretting he made any mention of such. Often did he get round, naive alchemists come to him and ask for favours which he never granted. But it seemed he had put his foot in his mouth yet again. And so with a sigh he focussed to recall all information it would have been appropriate to divulge.

“As I said. They’re pillars of knowledge.” He said softly, as if telling a tale not engaging in conversation. “One upon a time, long long ago, before either of us were born and the city had not been what it is now, there were three families that rose to prominence. The towers are theirs. We’re just visitors. But they care for the preservation and perpetuation of knowledge which is perhaps what makes Lhavit such a utopia to live in if one has any scholarly inclinations. Knowledge flows though the veins of this city like blood.”

He cast his gaze up the path, where from between the tendrils of thick, smoggy mists, naked free stumps poked out like graves. “If you know where to look that is. Not that I expect you Ravokians to keep your eyes peeled. “
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Presence is Enough

Postby Eleutheria on August 26th, 2018, 11:51 pm




„Right sorry” – Elea mumbled shyly, before fully processing Raeyn clarifying what he said of the fog. “It’s not the first time weather, or climate as a whole, changes. I just hope it will change with no sudden movements, or storms like this one” – she elaborated, fairly more confident than before. She tended to switch to confidence from lack thereof on the occasion, especially when with people of opposite sex and comparable age. The man before her, accused of vainglory and reclusiveness (as if Elea wasn’t a definition of reclusive) and of having an occasional sharp tounge, was still something to look at. As he continued on about the Towers, Elea snapped out of studying his shape.
Raeyn’s “elaboration” about the Towers was a bittersweet bowl to sit in. Nothing Elea did not knew already or heard before. Raeyn wasn’t likely to help her anytime soon. It was still a solace to remember that Lhavit knowledge fountains trickle down to the veins of the city. Library, people around here… Not all knowledge you seek, you find and not all knowledge you find, you expect, they told her at the Institute. She thought it fiddlesticks, boasting silently before herself of her will in to learn answers for the world’s works and find them if need be. But now it was more and more clear before her.
Even as Elea wondered about Raeyn’s vanity, her own pride manifested in herself, revealing itself before her. In here, with all the great masters of magics, she was, what exactly? A washup from the sea, capable of a bit of potion chemistry and nothing more? If you are what your actions are, that would be true.
Elea had to take a deep breath. She identified her own vainglory, her entitlement to know things. “I am entitled to nothing” – she thought before herself, trying to multitask listening and meditating.
But then Raeyn just had to make his tounge sharp again. The sea of Elea’s pride swallowed her up whole, drove her underneath it. She was more observant than that! In Ravok, you did had to keep your eyes open, lest a power struggle cuts you down.
She focused in thought once again, trying to think of a comeback.
“You read something about Ravok and that makes you think you can expect things about it?” – she said, then almost widening her eyes as she realized how bookish she was herself. Social barking at one another was indeed not for her at all.
“We do have a lot in common indeed, in that case” – she replied with a smile. She was not looking for a shouting match. And, an opportunity to jest, to humor, to humble herself, appeared, allowing her to diffuse the situation, cut her pride down to manageable size and come across as more confident than she was. She could almost feel rising up from the sea of her pride. “What do you read of Ravok, exactly, if I may ask?” – she added. It hurt a bit to humble herself, sure, but it also hurt to run for long distance, or stumble as she walked. The flame of Elea’s youthful energy and perseverance was still behind her seemingly frail shape. If you are what your deeds are, her worth was yet to be established anyways.


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