Leth-Faces (Seven)

[Runas]

Runas was, in short, much more complex than the half-Symenestra thought. She felt that the Harvest was a necessary evil for a dying race to continue to flourish, and she truly felt pity for the women that fell into death and became only food for their murderous children. She was willing though, even if she wasn't so in the beginning. As Seven had earlier, Runas' mortal form in her life had succumb to the Hypnotism of a Symenestra's amethyst eyes. He'd convinced her to come with him and she had, but the journey from Eyktol to Kalea was not a short one, and so they had grown closer and closer as they days melded together.

Tawna and the Symenestra were supposed to wait for the confines of the web-city of Kalinor before conceiving, but it didn't go that way. Tawna became pregnant as they neared the coast of the Suvan Sea, and she convinced her mate to stay with her in Sylira until she died. And they would have. But nothing turned out the way she wanted, and she died while still pregnant, and her Symenestra was left alone while she became something else and forgot.

Could Runas confide this in Seven? No. Why? Because he was a narrow-minded mortal that just wouldn't understand. She could explain, but he wouldn't hear her. He would be disgusted at her for feeling so glad to have the killer child of the Widower she loved, and she knew that if they traded lives she'd probably feel exactly the same. There was so much negativity around that spidery race, so much misunderstanding and darkness. So, Runas deflected her musings about what she remembered being Tawna re Sirall, the Eypharian painter, and focused only on this moment between her and the half-blood.

"It is, as far as I've been told. Those Familiars are always looking for a way off their planet, but they need Djed for survival, and so they know they must attach to a wizard. Which isn't safe. So if you plan on getting a Familiar, let me dissuade you now. That is a branch of magic that you do not want to get involved with." Her voice had grown solemn, serious. One of her friends had a Familiar, not the Sarawanki though. She couldn't help her, but she could at least convince Seven to not follow that path.

The heavy, warm, chilling drops only made her smile even more. She loved rain, but this brought up an almost forgotten memory of Markus telling her about what rain on water meant. A sad memory, seeing how Markus died not long after it, but one that still stirred every so often.

"I was told once that when rain began on a body of water that Leth or Syna was weeping for the loss of one of their children." Her statement sounded random, even to herself. She didn't know why she had even found it important to say something like this. Maybe to help him understand her? She just didn't know.

The narrowing of his ruby eyes in response to her habitual attempt at hypnotizing him into submission completely amused her as well as mortified her. She was surprised he hadn't yet stomped off in pursuit of more amicable companionship. His statement, as well as his demand for her to stop, had another faint smile tugging at the corner of her lips. He was truly an interesting person.

"Your life is but a flicker in the storm that is mine, Seven," she said airily, relaxing again and allowing the rain to soak her thoroughly. "Can you blame me for trying to keep you longer?" Her silver eyes half closed in the lazy contentment of a sun-bathing lizard as rain doused her body and made her horns and skin even more shimmery and glassy. "In this form, I do not eat. We live off our patron's light as Ethaefal. I was only being considerate of your needs. I'm happy in the rain as well, Seven. Like the snow of Winter, rain is a magical expression of the sky. It's the only thing that stays the same in my world."

She grinned fully this time, tasting the rain among the bite of the fermented fruit she'd consumed. The wine lay forgotten at her side, another form of sustenance she didn't require as an Ethaefal.

"Did you want to know anything else?"

[Seven Xu]

Seven’s gaze had traveled downwards to eyeball the violet swirl of djed on his lifted forearm; the awkward and uneven shield was starting to fall apart in its disuse and his upper lip tightened as he clicked his tongue in disappointment. Rain fell innocently through it and left his exposed skin as wet as his other arm – of course, the thing had not been tasked to keep out rain. His opposite hand pressed light to the barrier, allowing it to shimmer briefly into the Ethaefal’s view before disappearing again. As Runas spoke, Seven found himself hard-pressed to make sense of the woman’s words as his fingers worked to extrude djed and fortify his small shield. He wondered how long he could keep it up – then he heard a word of warning that snapped him out of his concentration and two points of deep crimson lifted to eye Runas again. “A familiar? Why would I want a familiar?”

It was obvious now that he had not been listening; pink bled onto his pale face and he forced an amicable smile as his words turned smooth and apologetic. “I did not mean to doze off, there. Don’t worry; I have no interest in familiars, only the world they come from.” An abrupt shake of his head punctuated the statement before his arms dropped to the wet ground again and he squinted to peer at the cloudy sky through the rain. The weather had sufficiently doused his clothing now, clinging tight and transparent to his shoulders and knees and chest and dark where the overlap of undergarments kept what clothing intended to hide, hidden.

Nostrils flared beneath the sweet smell of rain and a hand went back to again push his unruly hair from his face. “I suppose that could make sense,” was the only thing he mentioned regarding Runas’ beliefs that Leth or Syna were crying for their lost ones when rain fell on water. Seven had never been a follower of legend, and growing up in a city where your patron Alvina walked among the living as a tangible being; it was hard to wrap his deprived mind around most mythology.

Being dismissed as a flicker in her lift left him withdrawn, and he forced his words into something that sounded warm and sincere, rather than lashing out for a second time. “I always want to know something else,” the grin was forced at first, and then softened in a moment of self-depreciation. “It’s who I am.”

Seven grew quiet again, unsure of what to ask the woman that sat so patient and aloof at his side. With a heave, the trunk of his small frame lifted from the sand and arms bent back to brush off sand from his back. His outline remained for moments in the earth, dry from his small body shielding it from the rain. It was slowly filling in now, speckled with dark droplets. The inevitable itch of the sand trapped in his hair, along the back of his neck and at the small of his back all came at once and he wrinkled his nose, dipping both hands into the silvery tresses on the back of his head to scratch away at the annoyance.

“Why don’t you tell me about where you came from? The Ukalas, is that what it’s called?” He recalled a blue-eyed mage’s short explanation of the heavenly realm. “Tell me what you know of that place.”

[Runas]

Runas felt a sigh bubble past her lips at the silence coming from the half blood. She felt she was boring him, and she didn't like that. She wanted his attention, and while the thought of hurting him to gather it did flicker past her mind, she knew she wouldn't get good attention by that method. It was the odd flicker on Seven's arm that drew her attention to his form. It was odd, and it disappeared rather quickly after he moved his hand away. She wondered for a moment if his arm had some magical property. But that was foolishness. She wasn't aware of any magic that could put out light when bothered.

She sat up slowly, reaching to slide strands of soaked onyx hair out of her face. The paint she'd so laboriously decorated herself with had run and made unsightly streaks along her skin. They rinsed away in the rain, leaving her skin unmarked but for the henna that always decorated it. Where she had lain, water began to colour the sand a darker shade of tan.

His question made her furrow her brow and forget what she'd been about to ask. Her head tilted and she eyed the pinkening of his cheeks coolly. "Many wizards are coerced into Familiary by Familiars. I'm warning you against it, Seven. You don't want to be a slave to something like that." Her eyes narrowed at him. He was lying about dozing off. How could a sane person begin to fall asleep in the rain? She deigned it unimportant though, even if his ignorance of her words rankled.

"I did not ask for you to believe or understand it. If it makes sense to you, that is all fine and well. It was a musing passed along to me by another one night years ago. I would have forgotten it had we not been in the midst of a lovely storm." Her voice softened slowly and her eyes became wholly distant, just as cold as the far moon that had hidden behind the front of clouds. With her statement about the way his life was to hers she had meant not to upset him. She'd only meant to state her unwillingness to forget him. But she couldn't say so, for she didn't know that he had withdrawn.

She smiled again abruptly at the way he regarded himself and his curiousity. She was curious by nature as well, but she just found very little to pique that curiousity now. She reached over and patted the hand on the sand in what she hoped was an encouraging way. A secret smile formed on her lips as she also did what only her race could to a living being. She aged his hand, just a day, with that smallest of touches. She didn't inform him of this, though. Some people found insult to being aged without consent. "Curiousity is only a natural occurrence. Ask any questions you may desire, and eventually I'll find the desire to ask you some in return. I'm not going anywhere any time soon." A soft laugh floated past her lips, doused by the falling of heavy water pebbles.

"Ukalas? I've never heard the mortal name for the place. I'm glad someone named it, though. I can't state it's real name, for the place is lovelier than the word you've given allows for..." Silver eyes dimmed with the swirl of memories from her time in that divine realm before her fall. How could she explain? It was going to be hard to do so. If he were Ethaefal, he would understand the difficulty of speaking of the realm without demeaning some aspect of it. She could only offer him pale comparisons; he would have to see the realm when he died and if he was one of the chosen. "You've lived in Lhavit, yes..? Lhavit is the closest to the realm I come from. Crossed with the ephemeral beauty of Mura and it's white rock, of course. 'Ukalas'... No mortal can understand it's beauty and perfection. If it wasn't for the unsightly tear, it would be the purest of all places to dwell. I lived in Leth's part, though, Seven, and I never crossed to Syna's realm although some of my kind have gone between both..."

Silence followed as she furrowed her brow again, thinking, deciding, trying to pick out words to illustrate the beauty. She had to assume Seven hadn't been to Kalinor yet, and she couldn't say that the world shimmered like the webs of that ghostly city. Zintila's glass was present, for Leth enjoyed sharing the sky with the goddess.

"It's... Utterly beautiful... And being here, on Mizahar, is heartbreaking when one thinks of that place..."

[Seven Xu]

Seven watched as the woman’s pale skin and the sand around her ran bright with the colors she had labored over. He could only imagine it was something akin to the powders and paints women felt the need to press on their faces to make their eyes look large and lips look bloodied and skin look pale as the face of the moon. The alternative decoration was more appealing to the eyes in its damaged state than it had been before, he decided. “I have never seen a familiar before, but I will take your advice and do my best not to be lured into whatever it is they do,” he replied with a hint of uncertainty in his voice – her warning was certainly foreboding.

When he noticed her eyes on his forearm, his fingers twitched and receded from his skin to tuck beneath the wet folds of linen that gathered at his knees. Magic was not something one could just freely go about using – it was a fearsome power, and it was well known that many that dabbled too carelessly in magic easily had their wits ripped from their skulls and they all found their painful, but inevitable demise.

The rain had been addressed and passed off as a God crying for the fallen Ethaefal beside him. It seemed juvenile – mothers and fathers crying for their lost children was as comforting as it was likely – Seven hoped his mother had cried when she lost him. Was that wrong? Runas’ habit of sharing information and then snapping back in offense at Seven’s retorts seemed just as narrow-minded as her beliefs regarding something as inane as rain. Cantankerous woman, the halfblood’s gaze drew her in again as he decided behind the insincerity of another smile. “All I said was that it made sense.”

Their hands touched, though his eyes did not drop to pay it any mind in fear of that hypnosis drawing him in, breaking down the wall he had built around himself; a veritable mental shielding process that he had begun some weeks before and he had only let it down for one – no, two. The Azenth was long gone now, though, with his traveling party on the same arduous journey that was done alone - or in a pair - he was never sure, by the Ravokian that pulled the sheets too far in his favor despite having to sleep so close in their small bed. A bittersweet trade, but not one he would argue the Gods over.

“It sounds wonderful,” he exhaled, “I’m sorry that you no longer live there.” Seven thought he could relate, until he noted her despair in no longer being within the realm of the divine. When Runas had likened the Ukalas to Lhavit, he thought of the city he once wanted to return to – but no more; no, he could care less now if he ever saw the peaks of Lhavit beyond the clouds again. He did not want to look into the eyes of a man that had lied to him, sent him into The Unforgiving with no more than a gaggle of strangers without some modicum of regret and a cowardly letter hidden in the back of a book that was no less than his most prized possession. The anger was quelled in his stomach before it was drawn in thin lines on his face.

“If you’re ever unfortunate, or fortunate enough to find yourself there again, I hope that fate will leave you well alone within your father’s realm.” If it was dismissive, he had not meant for it to be. Standing, Seven brushed wet sand from the back of his thighs and plucked at the shirt that had grown too cold to be comfortable. Runas may not have needed the warmth of a hearth to keep from catching her death of cold, but he was beginning to feel his fingers and toes grow numb.

“Do you like tea?”

[Runas]

Runas watched him hide his hand away in fascination. She wondered if he was shy. What an amusing notion, a shy Symenestra. She wondered why he felt it necessary to hide himself from her. He must not trust her, that was her only conclusion.

The Ethaefal huffed out a sigh of discontent. The male disliked her and she found that utterly entrancing. She was shoving him away with her personality while trying to pull him in with her words. It was so hard to figure out how to be amicable as well as herself. How had she done it before? How did she convince Kye she was an okay being? She wasn't sure, but she wished she was. Seven's forced smile showed his impatience -or was it irritation? - with her and what she said. She didn't know how to convince him to trust her. Would she have to cut out her heart and put it into the hands of someone who would inevitably die one day? Would that show he could trust her? Most likely not. A bloody organ would be the worst way to earn someone's faith.

"I realize that..." She said quietly in response to his words, her voice subdued by thoughts too dark for releasing as words. Her eyes had diverted again to look out over the Sea as she withdrew into herself for a few moments. After his words regarding the Ukalas she spoke again, in that same subdued voice. "Some of us kill ourselves to escape this existence." The statement was as abrupt as it was emotionless. She'd once considered the same thing. "I do not know if you have ever felt the loss of something so great before, of sharing a kinship with so many wonderful people and then being ripped from it and thrown into water, but I wish that you never have to. If you ever end up in the Ukalas, I hope you stay there."

A small smile once again glimmered in her eyes at the wish he made, and she shook her head to deny the wish. "Thank you, Seven... But I do not believe I will ever go there again. If I held even an ounce of belief that I could return, I would have made my best attempt to do so. If I die, I believe I will stay dead. My soul was removed from the cycle of rebirth yours dwells in, Seven, to belong to a realm it was then cast from. I envy you your soul."

When he stood, she followed suit like a little lamb following it's shepherd. The paint she'd decorated her skin and hair with in the Eypharian fashion had made little rainbows on the sand before being consumed and left to stain the ground. She smiled at that, finding laughter in half a bell of work gone down in rain. Seven's invitation to tea quelled that smile and she looked at him with a real frown.

"You are inviting me to tea, Seven? Excuse me if I am mistaken, but it has been my impression that you do not like me. You do not need to ask me in for tea in that case. The gesture is well received, but I have already forced my company upon you. I will go if you mean the invitation, but I will not be upset if it was not meant. After all, you have interested me this evening, and I will be looking for you again before I leave Syliras." Another fleeting smile was offered to him. Her words were more promise than anything.

[Seven Xu]

“I hope I still have plenty of time left here,” Seven’s expression grew distant as Runas wished him the best of luck in being chosen to live within the realm of the Gods. “There is much I still want to accomplish.”

Runas’ insincere accusations were wearing thin on his patience. Seven was a very patient man – in fact, there were opportunists that delighted in his passive and polite nature and their ability to easily take advantage of it. Maybe he was tired; a lack of sleep would explain his relatively short fuse and cold detachment from the impertinent woman. He could only imagine what she looked like during the day – some haughty race, a Konti, an Eypharian, or a sheltered human sub race like a Drykas, or an Inarta. Seven wracked his mind attempting to rationalize the utter contempt he felt towards this woman behind the mask of his polite smile.

“Do Ethaefal get cold? Tea would remedy that, I know that I would like some.” His fingers dipped into his pockets, but they were just as cold and wet as the rest of him. Seven could feel the skin on his thighs tingling, growing cold and numb as his greedy trunk sucked the warmth from his extremities. While he insisted on the invitation, Seven did little to sway her further in his direction or even dignify her accusation with an explanation. “Do you like honey? I think I have honey at home.”

Whether she followed him or not, he did not check over his shoulder as he continued to speak. He could have very well been talking to himself as he continued down the beach as the sky churned and thundered overhead. Storms in the summertime were rare, and the amusing thought that this woman had brought it on with some unknown power over weather Ethaefal may have made his persistent smile grow. Seven lifted both hands to run them backwards through his hair, from the nape of his neck to the crown atop his head and flecks of water shimmered as they fell from white strands and mingled with the rest of the offending wet layer on his shoulders.

Finally, curiosity got the best of him. As his hands fell to his sides again he turned his head briefly to see if Runas was still behind him.

[Runas]

Runas was growing exhausted with her attempts to interest Seven enough to play with her. She couldn't be bothered now to wonder what he thought. Like most fools, his heart was on his sleeve for the taking. She'd get him involved in a far more insincere game. Time was all that was required, and sadly he didn't have as much as she did.

Even as he walked away, talking to her... or the air... Runas fought with herself. She wanted to follow, to see what she could take and break, to get what she had been promised and leave him to break him another way. The other part, the more altruistic part, wanted to let him go in peace tonight. She'd worn on his patience long enough, and no matter what he assumed of her words, she had meant them. He did not like her. And being the vain Ethaefal she was, she resented him his dislike.

Her eternal struggle raging as turbulently as the Suvan in its righteous rage, Runas began to trail after Seven. She didn't know what to do, hard to act now. She was being herself and the little spider hated her for it. Was she supposed to be some meek human, or calm Konti? Well, she was once a half-blood too once, and one would have assumed this one would have learned how to be appreciative of someone who wasn't racist towards him. But no. He was discontent with her, and despite everything she'd tried to change that, she'd only alienated him further.

"I hope you live a long, long time, Seven." She hissed the words out, her anger betraying her in only that instant before it was reigned in and bottled for later use. "Ethaefal do feel the cold, but unlike mortals we do not succumb to weaknesses like the flu." Despite her attempt to hide her anger, she still spoke coldly, dispassionately, in a bitter voice that was all she'd had when she came to Mizahar in the first place. She was the best when it came to chasing people away, to leading them to death, to having herself be alone, and one conversation with a Squire in an inn wasn't going to change that. She had been a fool to think she could keep a half-blood for anything other than a memory.

"Honey tastes fine..." She said quietly again, and when he looked back as though to check on her she donned a false smile and erased everything from her eyes. She took advantage of that to reach out and seize his hand, sliding her fingers through his and pulling him close. They could have looked like a couple to an outsider, but she would not allow that illusion to be theirs. Instead she brought her face close to whisper her most idle threat into the pale ear of this half-blood..

"I have nothing more to say to someone such as you tonight, Dra-Seven. I want you to remember that you do owe me answers, though, and one day I will come and collect them. I don't forget an insult, and I shall not forget yours, and I hope you don't forget mine. For tonight, I wish you a goodnight. Watch out for the cold." She brought her other hand up to slide a smooth stone she'd slid off the soaked sand into the hand she held before releasing his hand and slipping off, turning to return back to the Sea and the beach she had first been on.

[Seven Xu]

A wry smirk graced curled his lips as she hissed her response. The provocation of such an emotion was his prize in their short exchange. Why he wanted to make her angry was no fault of hers; in fact, the conversation’s sour turn was on his shoulders alone. A desperate need for control had been planted in the halfblood’s mind since he had discovered the true whereabouts of his mother and the extent of his father’s oppressive hand in his life; he felt little more than contempt towards the woman that tried so hard to sway him with her djed-laden snake tongue. However interesting she found him mattered little to Seven. The smirk was short-lived, however; when Runas snatched his hand and pulled him close it was replaced by a frown stretched over grit teeth.

“It’s Seven,” he glared daggers into the woman that shared his height as his retort came out just as venomous as her idle threat. “Just Seven. And I owe you nothing.” He nearly spat on her. Gods, he wanted to; to humiliate the woman in front of her father Leth, oh wondrous night. Unfortunately, he knew little of what Ethaefal were capable of. She may have been able to crush his bones and leave him in a pile for the tide to wash away – he didn’t know. He seemed to flounder in the rising hubris that had frozen his pink-white lips and made him hesitant to speak further. Before he knew it, she had turned, leaving a smooth wet stone between his fingers as she started her journey back towards the spot where he had found her.

Where she had coerced him to sit and not the other way around. Was it his fault that she could not appreciate simple courtesies? He was merely returning the offer; a choice, unlike what she had afforded him. Seven turned towards the ocean and flung the stone back into the depths of cold salt water with a frustrated grunt before continuing his path home, sans Ethaefal.

End

[Growl]

Appreciation Time! Name: Seven Experience: +2 Shielding, +4 Rhetoric, +3 Philosophy, +1 Interrogation Lore: Being Drawn to an Ethaefal, Fyrden (Basic), Ethaefal (Basic), Familiars (Very Basic) Additional Notes: PM with questions or concerns.