Curing my Curse [Caelum]

[Talen Stirling]

Talen looked attentively at the healer as he was about to speak, a mild frown crossing his brow when he turned away without words. The healer's uncanny silence was met with nothing but the steady, although very careful, footsteps of the guardsman. Talen still followed the healer closely, shifting his eyes between the supports, the ground and the shadows as if he expected something to appear out of the forsaken darkness at any moment. Droplets falling on his head almost made him jump, and the strength of his wooden torch was tested by strained fingers. “Allri--“ The breath of air hit Talen like a slap to the face, and he almost spun a complete circle around himself as he reached for a non-existant longsword before he regained his temper. A thud echoed in the darkness. "Shyke!" The hiss was low, and followed up by a grunting noise. Talen hobbled through the sudden, clingly darkness 'till he came into physical contact with the healer. His breath was heavy, as he looked and spoke to the man he couldn't see. "Can you relight the torches...? Y'think Semele's gone mad 'cause we're invading her house?" Even with his apparent stress, there was a calm, cheerful trust in his voice as he hunched with his healer in the bowels of the earth.

[Caelum]

"Not Semele," the healer replied with an iron tongue. A hand grasped Talen's elbow with the intent to steady to younger man, sliding up his arm to the strong curve of his shoulder. It was an effort to re-figure the shape of him in the pitch while the cave groaned around them. His fingers clenched as the tunnel floor seemed to yawn beneath their feet. He rocked with the motion without thought, a man who had spent many days in the sunlight of a ship's deck. His hand fell away from Talen's shoulder and he swallowed thickly, muttering beneath his breath, "I was worried this might happen." Flint sparked, sparkling swift dying light, and again. At length the torch caught with a runnel of smoldering fire, but when the shadow the healer made in the visible dark bowed its head to fan it to greater life with his breath, the cave seemed to do it for him. It was with a fist of wind that chomped at the debris at the statue's feet, thrown into sudden, gasping relief by the flare of the torch light. "Here," Cian said after a minute of gazing with wide eyes at his companion. He thrust the torch at Talen and ducked down, stirring through the rocks at their feet until until coming up with a decent size chunk of time pitted marble. It was tossed once as he straightened and he nodded again to the path verging to the right. "Maybe the cave likes us after all. Let's keep going."

[Talen Stirling]

The healer's iron voice pierced Talen's attempt at mirth, and as a dozen worried questions flew through his mind he was forced to steel himself against the sudden movements of the bowels of the earth. Talen tried to stand fast against the movements, forcing him to take a halfstep to his left before he fell in the moving darkness. A strong hand shot out and grappled briefly at the healer's shoulder and robe, before he stood dead still. Talen's heavy breath could be heard and felt by Cian, as unseeing eyes darted to and fro in the darkness while he spoke his fears. "Let's shed some light on your worry...?" He handed his torch to the healer hesitantly, and his companion went to work at lighting it. Talen huddled closely, the cave feeling deceitfully normal as they stood still in the darkness. Talen crouched, covering himself with one hand and instinctively reaching out to support the healer. Another unnatural gust of wind tore it's way through the cave, illuminating it's violent path as it moved rocks that had most likely been still for centuries. He mirrored Cian's brown eyed stare with his own gray skies, letting out the likeness of a nervous chuckle before he took the torch and resumed a serious appearance. He bounced to his feet with a grunt, raising the torch high and outwards to light their surroundings. He glanced curiously at the healer's play with rocks, but nodded agreeably at his command. "Yes sir., But if not Semele, then who...?" He stepped forward with a questioning glance at the healer, before starting out on the right path. His footfall was swift and steady, yet the torch in his hand swayed constantly as his eyes darted into the gloom retreating before their advance.

[Caelum]

"More like what," Cian remarked laconically while shifting the standard pace of his gait to make a match with Talen's. Their firelight chased its own tail along the cut and worn walls of the tunnel, catching on snaking veins of false treasure that yet glimmered brighter, Cian knew, than the real thing. An off key glance was tossed Talen right before he ducked his chin. It was just in time to take note of the lay of their light across a fresh scattering of ancient debris. He hitched himself over it, tossing the torch lightly into his free hand and waited for Talen to do the same. "Why does it have to be a who? Expand your observations, my friend. And don't call me sir. I am not even a citizen," and here he smirked, a lynx expression that seemed to brighten the gloom surrounding them. "Just around the bend," he added with an up tilt of his chin, sparks flagging the air as he swept out the torch in demonstration. It was in that same moment where Talen settled a foot back onto solid ground that the mine coughed again. Wind fanned clouds of dust up from that bend the healer had indicated and the soil beneath Talen this time did more than merely heave. It collapsed. Rock and noise, wind and black took over as Talen dropped, toes sliding, hands slipping, all of everything too fast. Including, most fortunately, Cian Noc's reflexes. A long fingered hand caught the guard's wrist in a bone shattering grip, the snap and strength of momentum nearly yanking his arm out of the socket. As the dust rained down and began to clear, it revealed Cian on his belly on the jagged ends of the remaining floor and Talen hanging by the fingertips, nothing but a black drop and the dim, distant shades of rubble somewhere below. "Fuck," Cian breathed, muscles straining, and lifted his head to steal a peek at the man whom he was going to have to try and haul up in another handful of heartbeats.

[Talen Stirling]

Gray eyes looked incredulously on Cian at his words as well as his glance, the flickering torch light failing to reveal any hidden meaning or intention of it to Talen. Eyes darted to the sparkle of ore veins, like blood vessels for the cave itself. It had no friendly feeling to it now though, after what it had already spat and breathed at the pair of dungeon delvers. Talen came to a sudden halt at the debris, and he observed as Cian surmounted the obstacle swiftly. He followed the healer's path, placing a hand on a rock for support and holding his torch high. He looked up at the healer's words and matched his smile with a curious one of his own. "To me y--" His words were cut short by the sound of rocks moving, air rushing and the feeling of suddenly being suspended in air for that brief instant before falling down into the darkness in utter confusion and disbelief. His hands instinctively flailing for grip on rocks and edges, and suddenly being caught in the strong, safely human grip of another. Talen coughed, and blinked a couple times at the dust, his own fingers curling around Cian's wrist in a desperate, thankful grip. His eyes fell briefly to the abyss and darted away, painfully aware of how close he had been to death. Slowly he lifted his free hand, seeking purchase on the rocks and perhaps the edge above him. Little was to be had, but the cliff-face was surdently not smooth after a collapse like this. Without looking up at the healer or speaking, he sought tentatively on the cliff wall with his feet. A trickle of sweat crawled it's way over his brow, and the healer's wrist felt slippery as if coated in it as well. His left foot stumbled upon half a rock popping out of the cliff, and he prepared to push on that from below whenever his twice-saviour might attempt to heave him up.

[Talen Stirling]

Gray eyes looked incredulously on Cian at his words as well as his glance, the flickering torch light failing to reveal any hidden meaning or intention of it to Talen. Eyes darted to the sparkle of ore veins, like blood vessels for the cave itself. It had no friendly feeling to it now though, after what it had already spat and breathed at the pair of dungeon delvers. Talen came to a sudden halt at the debris, and he observed as Cian surmounted the obstacle swiftly. He followed the healer's path, placing a hand on a rock for support and holding his torch high. He looked up at the healer's words and matched his smile with a curious one of his own. "To me y--" His words were cut short by the sound of rocks moving, air rushing and the feeling of suddenly being suspended in air for that brief instant before falling down into the darkness in utter confusion and disbelief. His hands instinctively flailing for grip on rocks and edges, and suddenly being caught in the strong, safely human grip of another. Talen coughed, and blinked a couple times at the dust, his own fingers curling around Cian's wrist in a desperate, thankful grip. His eyes fell briefly to the abyss and darted away, painfully aware of how close he had been to death. Slowly he lifted his free hand, seeking purchase on the rocks and perhaps the edge above him. Little was to be had, but the cliff-face was surdently not smooth after a collapse like this. Without looking up at the healer or speaking, he sought tentatively on the cliff wall with his feet. A trickle of sweat crawled it's way over his brow, and the healer's wrist felt slippery as if coated in it as well. His left foot stumbled upon half a rock popping out of the cliff, and he prepared to push on that from below whenever his twice-saviour might attempt to heave him up.

[Caelum]

"Don't look down," Cian suggested, the words muffled through a grit of teeth. Maybe he was advising himself more than he was the courageous Denvali. A breath escaped, tight and beneath a great deal of pressure, when Talen coughed and shifted. His fingers slipped a precious centimeter. There came a long, hollow sigh of the cave walls surround them and a skitter and grunt from the floor by the way they had come. Within heartbeats, Cian sprung into action, further flattening his body against the cave floor and worming his other arm down. A second hand, that with Yahal's dark scrawl of gnosis inked into its back, clamped just below Talen's elbow and he began to pull. "C'mon," Cian grunted. Muscles strained, but progress was being made. The real concern was the mounting cacophony of spilling rocks back toward the entrance. It added a definite note of haste to the healer's efforts.

[Talen Stirling]

The fear that Talen should be feeling didn't really register as such, determination and blind terror causing him to act without thinking of the abysmal drop and blind darkness that lay just a slip of hand or crack of rock away. As he slipped a deadly inch he exhaled impotently and his eyes darted in a moment of conscious fear at the sound of the cave moving behind them. The healer's blessed hand came down to bring strength and resolve to his salvation, and slowly he came closer to the relative safety above. The sudden sense of urgency the thundering rocks brought to their efforts did not escape Talen, and he eyed the cliff edge with the desperation normally reserved for those drowning. As he came within distance to stretch up and touch the surface, Talen pushed off blindly on the rocks at his feet and lunged his free hand up to grasp at the edge of his doom. His entire body stretched to the full of it's length as his fingers clawed at the cliffside for purchase. In that moment he was aware of nothing but the physical effort, the scars and bruises earned through it easily forgotten in the adrenaline and desperation of the moment.

[Caelum]

It felt an aeon dangling over that pit. muscles straining, grit and shadows stinging the eyes. Yet through the combination of their dire efforts, the Denvali found himself hauled upon his belly to what was trembling but yet solid ground. The moment Talen was stable, Cian shoved up, taking a fistful of the back of the guard's jacket to jerk him farther away from the ledge. He panted with the exertion and their shadows smacked wildly against the tunneled walls from where their last remaining torch had been dropped and struggled against extinguishing. "Petch," Cian breathed. There was no time left for the voicing of all the curses stored up in him as from the other side of the black hole the rumble and boom of splintering beams and collapsing ceiling grew louder, grew close. "Run!" Was the only wisdom left. The healer snatched up his pack and the guttering torch to lead by example.

[Talen Stirling]

Talen stumbled as Cian pulled him away from the ledge and onto wobbling feet, coughing momentarily and blinking against the dust. He cast a wild glance in the direction of the rumbling collapse. His eyes wavered to Cian and then his feet were in movement just as the healer yelled, scars, scabs and bruises forgotten as he ran into the darkness with the torchlight struggling to illuminate the path before him. He staggered constantly, staying just behind Cian as they raced through the darkness. His breath was ragged, but fatigue did not seem to have much of an effect as long as the cavewalls were coming down on top of them. Stopping or slowing down for rest was not an option. He cursed this blasted cave, it was as if the place itself had decided to kill them, opening pitfalls under their feet and taking every possible chance to obstruct them. Fallen debris and puddles of trapped water constantly made him stumble and slip, hands grasping onto the ground and propelling him forward into the darkness illuminated before him by his healer's lead.