Discord

[Seven Xu]

“So in a hundred years when I’m a bad memory and you’re milling about another port city speaking with another pale bastard, they’ll be here,” he reached to push the ethaefal’s hand with the tips of bone-thin fingers. “Maybe Pash’nar will have brightened then, earned a star or two—or maybe it’ll fade.”

Seven fell away and curled into himself, unfocused gaze drifting back to the cask and past it. The Stallion’s Rear still surged with the merriment of drunken men, and somewhere amid the sea of heads was his bird, as content to imbibe the drink as he was to serve it.

Something like revelation gripped him and snapped him out of his stupor. He straightened as he pressed his palms into greying wood, legs kicking out and toes curling against the soles of his boots. “You’ll show me this painting, then? Tell me names of the stars the sky snuffed out?”

A trip back through Alvadas’ winding streets to the docks was a daunting thought, proposed by a man whose eagerness had gotten away from him. There was a pause, then Seven seemed to deflate, brows crumpling in their attempt to meet. “Or you could draw them,” he offered, without a chance for the gilded man to respond to his first choice, “If you remember.”

He favored Pash’nar with a thin smile.

[Pash'nar]

The ethaefal smiled at Seven's quiet encouragement, chuckling with a roll of his tide pool eyes. It felt like flattery, which was one thing Pash'nar wasn't very used to. Even if it wasn't, kindness often caught the navigator off-guard. If he had been capable of having any real shade of color in his moonlit form, a hint may have risen to his cheeks. However, he seemingly was not. He exhaled slowly, blinking at the concern over the extent of his memory of the stars, "I ain't sure I can forget. Th'stars ain't gonna go anywhere, but they'll jus' look diff'rent a century from now an' a century after that." The shard of moonlight considered the paler man's comment one more time, about his namesake growing brighter. At first, he still considered it with a more analytical, cartographer's mind before drifting into deeper, more personal waters. Even while the cluster of stars he'd named himself after hung low and dull on the horizon now, they had been brighter and higher when he fell from the sky so long ago. Now, did he think they'd brighten again? No, probably not for many centuries once their sphere movements returned to the beginning again. Pash'nar on the other hand? Well, he had no petching clue what to think about himself. Forsaken now, having walked so far away from his god and fallen so far from where he still considered his home, was there really any way to shine again? He doubted it, no matter how much the aching hole in his chest longed for another chance at changing this truth. He sighed, not looking up right away, "There'll be some new stars, but old ones hardly ever grow brighter … only rarely." Instead of furthering the presented metaphor, especially about himself, Pash'nar shifted in his seat, reaching to dig at the pouches at his belts. He produced a roll of wrapped leather, containing his drawing utensils. He scowled then, pale fingers of one hand searching one last time for even a scrap of paper and finding none. He set the leather wrap on the tabletop, looking back up at the halfbreed with a roll of his shoulders, a sheepish expression of helplessness creasing its way into his aquiline features. "I ain't brought any paper, but I'm guessin' I shouldn't be drawin' on your table, eh? You got any around?"

[Seven Xu]

Stars grew brighter, that he knew—they had to—rare, yes, but possible. Seven’s views on the stars had become muddled, though he wasn’t sure the lines were ever clearly drawn, or if they ever could have been. He knew that the sky and his charts were his passion; he could stare up until hungry dawn swallowed up the brightest star. He also knew the whims of gods could change what research and formula had set in stone. It was done every year on Lhavit’s five peaks, when the Star Lady emerged and the sky blazed with points of hot white fire.

Seven’s eyes had glazed over; he nearly missed Pash’nar’s response.

“I ... oh, yes.” He rose. “I’ll be right back.”

Small, quick strides ate up the narrow path to a locked door. The halfblood produced a key from his hip pocket and jammed it in the lock; the door swung open enough to let his small frame slip though, and he was gone.

He returned some time later, after a distant shuffling of feet above the ethaefal’s head and the muted thump of a door opening and shutting beyond the reach of his gaze. Clutched between pale hands was a weathered book no thicker than a thumb’s width and a freshly sharpened pencil. The book slapped feebly against the table—made of no more than soft leather binding crimped yellow pages—and Seven claimed the seat at Pash’nar’s side over the body-warm chair he’d previously occupied on the opposite end of the small table.

The book was flipped open and pages of notes and figures were skimmed until he happened upon one mostly blank, save for the name of a merchant and his ship written in a meticulous and sweeping scrawl that did not seem to match any before it.

“Oh,” blinking distraction from his face, he thumbed back two pages. There sat a crude map of the sky, the stars and clusters and their names. Attached to a handful were longwinded astral coordinates. “Here. It’s not my best, but it’s from last spring; the first time I crossed the sea.”

[Pash'nar]

If the ethaefal heard anything above the din of the tavern, he wouldn't have known the difference. Voices, mugs, chairs. Seven's trip upstairs gave him time to observe the crowd, stare at the strange, mesmerizing ceiling, and trace pale fingers across gashes in the tabletop. Regardless of what port city he seemed to wash ashore to, it seemed as though certain places ended up resembling each other in certain ways. A tavern was a tavern was a tavern, even if no one looked or talked the same. This particular tavern just had fancy tiles that pretended to show the stars, only Alvadas was a petch-poor place to see those at anyway. The halfblood returned with an old book. The pages were wrinkled and yellow and Pash settled more into his seat once it was placed in front of him, trying to catch a glimpse of everything the thing contained, curious about the little pieces of things written in it. He shifted his chair to make room for his equally pale acquaintance, happy to share the proximity over something they both found interesting, settling in a bit as he held his drawing utensils in their leather case in his hands. He couldn't quite remember the last time anyone petching cared about stars and maps—on ships, most folks just cared about where they were going and if they got there fast enough. It was a rare treat to be appreciated in a more aesthetic and thoughtful sense. He would not waste taking advantage of the moment. He smiled at Seven's drawing of the sky, recognizing the locations of celestial things, though he was slow to entirely place the geography. He supposed it was crude, but it would have worked well enough in a pinch at sea, "Where'd ya sail from? This side o'the Suvan'r elsewhere?" The shard of moonlight squinted, attempting to make more accurate discernments with a chuckle, though he hardly meant his question as an insult to the work. He was most familiar with the central Suvan and the sea around Zeltiva. Everywhere else was a bit fuzzy, though he tended to somehow manage on his own. "You've only been 'ere a season?" He added, curiously, untying the cord that kept his drawing bits secure in their case and spreading them out on the table without bothering to hide any excitement. He enjoyed the stars and the maps and the charting. It was, in its own way, relaxing. It was consuming enough of his thoughts that he worried about little else, and escaping from his thoughts was often petching necessary. Pash'nar didn't reach to turn the page, interested in Seven's response before he was given permission to draw in the old book, interested in whatever sailing stories he could enjoy from others instead of repeating his own.

[Seven Xu]

“A season? No, no,” Seven’s head shook, “I’ve been here longer. Since last fall, actually. I’ve crossed the Suvan twice, to Sylira and back again.”

He’d settled quite comfortably at Pash’nar’s side, having forgotten his partialities in favour of their common passion. His stomach was warm and wanting for more wine, though his head felt light on his shoulders. Seven looked at the ethaefal again as he spoke with an unabashed smile.

“This was finished about a half day after I left the port here in Alvadas,” he explained. The halfblood propped his elbows on the table and leaned forward, letting his legs curl beneath him. “I was headed for Stormhold Citadel a year ago with a couple of sailors on a trade route. Stopped at a few more little ports along the way to get water or check the ship for repairs. They hardly looked hospitable; little run down shacks half eaten by nature at the ends of docks I refused to walk on.

“I’d stay below deck and sleep during the day—unless something was asked of me—and I’d draw my stars at night.” He’d learned his lesson early that fair skin and sun on open sea did not get along. Even the water could burn him with its blinding glare. Seven preferred the calm of night, rolling across the shallows, always in sight of land. They’d hugged the Cyphrus coastline for over half their voyage; he assumed because the ship was so old, but never ventured to ask.

Seven finally dipped his gaze and turned the page.

“I drew this on the other side, in Syliras. It wasn’t much different; in fact, it was very similar to the Lhavitian sky, though not so bright, and the stars had shifted a bit in relation to time.” His hands rose to gesture. “I cannot imagine traveling far enough in my lifetime to ever see an entirely new sky.”

[Pash'nar]

“Only twice?” Taunted the opalescent shard of moonlight, grinning lopsidedly as he refused to even attempt to calculate just how many times he’d traveled the breadth of just the inland Suvan alone, “Well, then.” Pash’nar chuckled, but turned his attention to Seven without judgement while he offered descriptions for his own drawings. Tide pool gaze took in the small shift in star positions the halfblood had captured in ink on paper, attempting to visualize the position at sea from which the image had been recorded. He could guess at the date, he supposed, but could only really be accurate if he had his own charts on hand. Instead, he kept his grin, expression growing only slightly distant at the thought of an entirely new sky. It was never entirely new. Just different. Some things, from Leth’s petching face to the motions of each individual point of lesser light, still kept to a predictable, unavoidable course, regardless of their shifting with the procession of inescapable time. “Ain’t ever seen nothin’ entirely new, though I s’pose if’n there’s more out there past land an’ what we call the Suvan, there may be a few new sights to see’n the sky. Even inna century’r’so, some things have changed but then drifted back to where they were … like they missed it or somethin’.” He reached to turn the pages of Seven’s book to a blank one, “Here, I’ll show ya.” Pale hands fumbled for a pencil from his worn case, and he began to lightly sketch the hints of recognizable constellations and clusters and other heavenly bodies without bothering with being technically precise so much as generally correct. He drew from memory the sky he stared at in disbelief after slipping from the Ukalas to leave them far out of reach. Leaning back for a moment once he was satisfied with the basics, he offered the rough chart for examination, “This is more’r’less what’d you’d see, ah, ‘bout a hundred’n’sixteen years ‘go.” Pash’nar gave the other man some time to look over the historical sky, allowing him to explore his quickly-made drawing for as long as he desired, finding himself wishing it was daylight and he could actually enjoy drinking more of anything, “You can see some’f the same sights now, eh?” He swept a finger over the nearly unchanged courses of a few stars, some almost in identical positions, moving along to point out other celestial differences as he talked, “An’ yet, there’s some things that ain’t even ‘round anymore. Only one’r’two’ve come back. The rest may jus’ be gone.”

[Seven Xu]

There were many things he recognised, though it was hard to tell whether the inky account was Pash’s inaccuracy with the stars themselves or actual movements of the sky. “Some will move,” he murmured, gesturing to one of the larger splotches of black that could have been the same fiery Swalden that flew close to the horizon nights before. “Other things come and go, never to be seen again.

“Maybe I’ll see something new, someday; if not me, maybe you.”

The night was growing long and Seven’s enthusiasm thin. He suppressed a yawn behind his fist and sank back into his chair, shoulders sagging and head hanging over the end to stare bleary-eyed at the ceiling. Two knees rose to the table’s edge, and the halfblood seemed to draw into himself again as he internalised his thoughts. The man fidgeted something awful.

“I’ll cross the Suvan again,” he promised, breaking their short-lived silence. “I certainly don’t want to stay in Alvadas forever, and there’s nothing west of here. Syliras wasn’t so bad. It smelled of offal and it was too crowded, but at least the streets were the same every day. There’s a university further still. I remember my father telling me of it as a child, and I’d met travellers who backed his claims. Sometimes I wish I’d gone there, instead of coming here on account of …”

Seven trailed off, but he straightened to search through the meagre crowd to the laughing head of black at the tavern’s back end. His red stare softened. “He’s so happy here.” Distracted would have been a better word. “That’s enough.”

[Pash'nar]

Pash'nar watched the pale halfblood, ornamented head not quite so heavy considering how his body refused to metabolize under Leth's sway. The shard of breathing moonlight stared at his sketch while Seven spoke, arching an aquiline brow at the mention of Syliras and the hint at Zeltiva. He knew them both, but his dislike of the fortress city was far stronger than his shorter companion. The city with the university he knew too well, and as much as he'd sometimes like to, he could never bring himself to hate it. He hated himself more, too much, really, to hate some place full of so much—both joy and pain. Tide pool orbs shifted to try and catch a glimpse of whoever the other man referred to, though his height advantage offered no recognition. It could have been anyone else in the crowd for all the statuesque sailor knew, "I fell'n Zeltiva. Mathew's bay." He offered quietly, fingers smudging his own fresh work with bitter purpose as he remembered that day in Fall of 396, "Could say'm from there, but I ain't. Ain't from anywhere save th'Suvan, I s'pose. Never really been to th'fancy university. Though, I s'pose I should've sometime." He smirked, looking back down to Seven when he'd given up sighting the man the pale thing blamed for being in Alvadas for, if that's what he was even implying. He remembered such feelings, such willingness to surrender to even the greatest of discomforts to assuage the ache of one's own heart. It left a bitter taste in his mouth. "If y'ain't on a ship that sails," Pash'nar dragged his words through the undertow of his own hurts, decades old as they were, "then what's th'point of catchin' a breeze?" Not that he'd never been guilty of such things. It was obvious in the tone he took, turning to put away his drawing tools instead of holding the halfbreed's blood-colored eyes with his own. He'd once thought he'd found the right current. He had been wrong. Or so he'd told himself over the decades. With a stretch of long, opalescent limbs, he slumped against the table, curling fingers into sea-foam hair as an elbow planted itself against worn, sticky wood, offering his casinor should their paths cross again. "It's petchin' far to Zeltiva from 'ere. Closer t'ead from Syliras, though that place ain't the kindest port. I'm 'attaway oft'nough, should y'ever feel it's time to haul anchor an' shove off."

[Seven Xu]

“That’s a generous offer.” Seven said through a smile. He had entertained thoughts of mentioning the university to his bird countless times, but each failed attempt had proved him a coward. Stay here and go mad then, he’d chide himself; better sooner than later.

Seven’s gaze fell to the stretch of parchment sky between them. “My friend was sick the entire trip, last fall.” He snorted a laugh, and his fingers began to trace small, invisible circles around the edges of familiar stars. “You’d think for growing up in a city on a lake he’d be more used to water. As soon as land disappeared …”

The yawn finally caught him.

He tucked his chin against his shoulder and excused himself. Bone-pale digits pried themselves from the moon-fallen’s century-old map. Certainly the beautiful, fickle things couldn’t all be as dreadful as he’d painted them in his mind’s eye; though Seven hadn’t the patience or the resolve to wait until sunrise to see the sailor’s other half, he’d grown comfortable in his presence. Earlier he surmised that it was their shared interest in the Lady’s sky, but maybe it was the drink, still warm in his belly, that had dissolved his impudence.

“We’d have to have proper drinks then,” he offered, his smile a bit too eager. “Though I imagine you’d outdo me on land, let alone open water.” Seven nodded toward the crowd and the assumed friend, “I wasn’t much better than him, to be honest. My stomach flip-flopped the entire way to Alvadas, though I managed to keep everything down.”

His smile split into a fanged grin. “Few things I can brag about. Never being sick on the sea is high on a short list.”