A Lonely Impulse of Delight

by **Fia Eaven** on November 5th, 2012, 2:29 am

It took Laszlo's beckoning to draw Fia to the balcony. She flickered between smiles and caution until both her hands wrapped around the damp railing. A sweetly toned gasp was her first praise for the view. Lhavit was shrunk to a cobble of pastels ridged with fine details. Silken lilac, rose and young greens bloomed undying the mountains' pewter crags. Each peak was beaded together by bridges that vanished and reappeared with the glare. Over it all a drifted a fulgid phantom, growing broader with every rising mote of light.
Fia's hand floated upward to rest just above her sternum, and she beheld the mountains with a hard won peace. There was a frightening symmetry to living. The same forces that dazzled and blessed would char and tear. Not unlike the creature beside her gesturing to the various peaks: he was broken between heaven breathed and gorge born.
Nearer than usual, Fia could see the fine quartz dust that made Ethaefal seem more marble than flesh. What a wondrous world... Afraid she was caught in her admiration, she flung her eyes quickly outward.
Fia said nothing for a long while, feeling the sweet ache the view brought her. Eventually, she leaned forward so she could rest her bent arms and chin on the railing.
"Things can be so lovely, they hurt. I sometimes think I'm sad because I know they're not going to last forever, and other days because I want to just take them into myself," she was rummaging through her heartstrings to see if a more refined version of the thought was tied there. "But there's a valley... It's not wanting to be pretty," she explained, "That seems meager. It's-- it's wanting to be be able to bring delight, to make a mind grateful." A chime of quiet pealed, in which she longed for a learned tongue, one that could sing the desires haloing the sublime.
"Maybe two bells," she commented, dispelling her dreamy airs, "For the rain to reach us." The wet winds were bundling clouds from the west and pushing them steadily toward the city. "Thank you for coming with me, Laszlo," she said softly. Her gratitude allowed an involuntary glimpse at the loneliness she had clinking round her throat. Diverting inspection, she smiled for a tease, "While we're here, don't forget to move around some. They might claim you for a bit a statuary with all that lustre and glass you've got."

by **Laszlo** on November 5th, 2012, 8:37 am

While Fia spoke, appreciating the beauty of the city in a way the Ethaefal presumed only a mortal could, Laszlo adopted some of her posture and leaned on the railing with his elbows. His attention gradually drifted from sparkling Lhavit to Fia, quietly fascinated to see how deeply a high view could move her. Or perhaps she had just been waiting for the right inspiration to unburden some of the weight from her shoulders.

Her remark about his skin drew a halfway smile out of him. Molten amber dipped to look at his hands, loosely clasped together in front of him. "It's a bit obnoxious, isn't it?"

Laszlo looked upward, gazing beyond the city and over the mountain range. There was no discernible horizon; the sky just seemed to melt into the earth, or vice versa. At the very furthest edge of the world, the mist became so thick that it blended seamlessly with the sky. Beyond that, it was difficult to tell whether faint shadows were the faces of peaks or folds in the clouds.

"Thank you for bringing me out," he replied in his own time, glancing sidelong to Fia. "I am a bit of a hermit, I admit. But I grow wretched on my own. I'm glad you wanted to endure my company."

Something about the grand landscape before them was dislodging stubborn thoughts from Laszlo's mind as well. He almost felt as if he could tell her anything, and nearly wanted to. Her sadness was seeping past her smiling front, and Laszlo nearly told her that she wasn't alone in loss. Abalia's name visited the end of his tongue, but gradually retreated. There was too much weight behind it. It wasn't time.

Avalyon's name was still locked somewhere deep. It would take a sturdy spade to dig that one out.

"If it's any comfort," he continued upon further thought, "you've made me grateful. Not just for the outing, but the city does seem to enchant you with all its niceties. I usually tend to overlook the little things. It's pleasant to see delight in a person."

Actually, he thought she was rather remarkable. Denval was lost, her grandfather drowned, family separated, fiancé gone… but here she was, continuing onward, enjoying the grand view of Kalea's most resplendent city. Barely a crack in her veneer. Aside from Laszlo, who was a bit of serendipity, he did rather get the impression that she was quite reserved and kept to herself out of quiet lamentation—much like himself. But considering what she had lost, and the things she had been through (he had not forgotten Mikendril), she was better put together than most who had less to complain about.

A thought possessed him to draw her closer and under his arm, but in the next moment he wondered where it had come from. In Alvadas it had been easy to draw any brand of comfort from the company of others, but here it was… Abalia hadn't even been dead for a full season. What was he thinking?

Realizing he must have been staring, he lowered his attention to a piece of railing.

"It has an unattainable quality." Laszlo severed away his unwanted thoughts and began pulling on a different, harmless string. "The city. There's an entire culture here, Ethaefal settling near the sky, politics governed by the divine, families raising children high in the mountains. Skyglass is mundane to them. The city guard seem more like disciplined temple monks."

There were traditions here that Laszlo knew a little of, particularly surrounding the city politics and the inheritance of trades. While all earthly cultures were foreign to Laszlo, there were cultural laws he had become aware of that he wasn't sure he would ever want to abide by. This didn't seem like a place to raise a family, if he ever somehow acquired one.

Such a thing had tentatively been on his mind since Abalia began asking him to raise the child himself.

"I don't know how long I'll live here. But I know I'm not going to stay for centuries. If I survive that long. Maybe it's something about Syna and my earthly form's connection to Semele's depths, but… I want to be closer to the earth. Someday."

by **Fia Eaven** on November 6th, 2012, 1:22 am

"Someday," Fia echoed warmly, turning the word into a hope.
A sudden fall of yellow light through the diaphanous clouds made her uncurl so her skin could catch the passing heat. She clutched the railing and closed her eyes ever so briefly. The moment ended with a gust a frigid air, returning her to the borders of winter again.
Her shoulders turned so she could look plainly at Laszlo. "I think you know I am not 'enduring' anything. Not been long, but I like you." It was honest enough to be strange, but her open expression didn't alter. She saw nothing to be ashamed of in the words. "All things proper-like, course. But the more I think about me Da, the more I wish I just told people the good I held for them." Her temporary smile said she was proud of herself for being true, "So there we have it: you're grateful to get out and I like you here." Despite Fia's folksy cadence, her tone was almost dogmatic in its clarity. She was going to give Laszlo a compliment whether he liked it or not. Something of the determined blacksmith was coming out: if she could bend iron, she could bend an ear. "You've done me a few good turns. Like not sending me to the library when you could've. Would've been easier for you, dreadful for me." Though the phrase ended, the conversation did not. Her eyes tried to tell what her voice ran from: even come sunset, she had preferred him and his home to the library steps. It would not be true most evenings, but it was then.
"You can part dross and gold quickly by putting it in the fire," she finally reasoned aloud, "People are like that too."

by **Laszlo** on November 6th, 2012, 10:41 am

"Maybe." Laszlo mulled over Fia's metaphors, appreciating the artfulness of a woman who claimed to be illiterate. He wondered if she'd be cross were he to copy some of her pithy musings onto paper for the Bharani library.

Already Laszlo had been through a handful of fiery trials, and the person who emerged at the other end was not always someone he could be proud of. Yet, comparing his first year or two to the present, he could see that some of his tarnish had been scrubbed away. It was interesting to consider how things might have gone differently if he were to restart his short life from this point. That year in Kalinor could have gone much smoother.

He lifted one hand and rubbed at his chin while he pressed his eyebrows together. Abalia's death had been something so wrong to him, but she had taken care to coddle Laszlo in her last days. Nothing felt particularly unfinished, or unsaid. It was all just hastily done, and then it taken away. He couldn't think of what he'd say if she were still here, about how he truly felt about her. He would be happy enough if he could just tell her that it was going to rain.

And weighing heavily upon her death, of course, was one of his darkest sins.

Quietly he thought on Fia's appreciation for reading her letter. The conversation revolving around the profound and philosophical, he thought, had been growing a little airy. It took him a few moments to come up with a practical reply.

"It was a kindness someone paid me, when I was still new," Laszlo said carefully, after some thought. "I was alone in a city, with no one and nowhere to stay. A man offered me his home and a bit of his time, merely because I was alone." He wondered how pale Fia would get if he told her who he was talking about. "I think his charity was more out of piety to his god rather than his own inclination toward generosity." Or perhaps not. Duvalyon was an enigmatic figure. There was still much Laszlo could only guess at. "But I rather think that's the point of piety, to believe in something greater than ourselves. Otherwise we might forget how to stop focusing inward."

He cleared his throat. Finally, he'd managed something resembling a decent segue. Laszlo decided it was as smooth a transition as he was going to come by. "By the way, I've been meaning to offer. If you do need somewhere to stay that's not an inn, I have a spare room at my flat. Still wouldn't be your place per se, and it'd only be temporary. A few days, or weeks I suppose. But you could redecorate if you wanted and make the place suit you. I'm not particularly attached to the current arrangement. No one demanding rent or waiting for you to vacate your room."

At least not anymore. He thought of Duvalyon's odd furniture arrangement in his room and the quaint sentimentality Laszlo held for it. As the days passed, the feeling had begun to wear off. Perhaps it was healing, or the persistence of friendly company, but finally he decided he could put the furniture back where it was meant to be without wallowing in grief.

by **Fia Eaven** on November 11th, 2012, 1:33 am

"We'd be miserable if we were the borders to our whole world," Fia remarked with soft conviction. She would have said more, but Laszlo's offer swayed her internal balance, tumbling her stack of thoughts into a messy splay.
"That's very kind of you, Laszlo," she managed. She was looking at her fingers dangling over the railing. They were raw from the brisk air and speckled with coal dust where she had failed to scrub hard enough. She folded them inward, unsure if she should be embarrassed by them.
"Let me think on it a spell," she said plainly. Her first impulse was to lay hold of the offer with both hands and pull it to her chest, but she remembered steadying sense despite the dizzy reel grief spun her through. It might be taking improper advantage of a good heart moved by her difficulties. What would her Aunts say if she shared a fellow's roof? There didn't seem anything crass to it. Fia and the Eaven brood would merrily and roundly laugh at the idea of anything but friendliness betwixt her and an Ethaefal. Lastly, her unreasonable fears whispered panicked warnings: he would not always be so celestial born. The gold and colored glass now illuminated by the entire sky would be desiccated to something wraithlike with long shadows and corpse colored skin. Would she lock herself in her room come sunset and daily shame him for existing?
"If'n I am turned to it, I'll pay in barter 'til I get enough kinas. I don't want to spoil your generosity, but I like feeling clean in me debts when I can."
She looked at him with wary hope. "Will anyone be coming back for the room? I'd perish from blushing if they did while I was about."

by **Laszlo** on November 11th, 2012, 2:03 am

"I understand that," Laszlo replied with a nod, not looking at Fia but instead keeping his focus on the glimmering city. His attention kept shifting between Lhavit and the darker clouds that loomed slowly closer. It was impossible not to see the metaphor. He blamed Fia's artful wording.

Debt was a terrible thing. He owed Duvalyon much more than he could ever repay, a man who conversely refused any return of his generosity, monetary or otherwise. Asking Fia to indebt herself to him could be considered unreasonable. It was also unreasonable to offer suggestions for payment, though he had almost given voice to the thought, There's always laundry. Since Duvalyon had gone, there was no one to care about the state of his apartment since. Laszlo was not in the market for a housemaid, but he understood a balance of conscience. Past experience however told him there was no way for him to politely word a compromise.

"And ah, no. There's no one." Laszlo lifted one hand from the railing and began fidgeting with his hair. Kalea's high winds were determined to sabotage his ponytail. "I used to live with others but they're… gone. Left. It's just me." He wondered how much Fia might hear from other local tenants at the Solar Winds. Most were students too preoccupied with their own lives and studies to care about someone else's. Many had already moved since Abalia had died.

He wasn't sure how long a "spell" was, but he hoped that if Fia did accept, he would have time to dissemble Duvalyon's domestic masterpiece before she saw where he'd be sleeping. He also reminded himself to avoid mentioning that room belonged to a Widow. "It gets quiet. It's why I've taken to reading. The silence can be very loud, if that makes any sense." And yet he preferred to keep to himself. Laszlo was hardly a proper hermit.

When Laszlo finally managed to give Fia his eyes, he was wearing a slightly embarrassed smile. "I've thought of getting a different place with only one room. But all my things are in my current apartment anyway."

by **Fia Eaven** on November 11th, 2012, 4:51 am

"Aye," she said in a soft breath, "It does." Her brief reply was pulled low by the weight of complete understanding. The oppressive silence was part of why she dreaded moving into a new room, separate from the comforting din of the inn. Ambient noise was a dear distraction, at least in this season of mourning. She'd have the stomach for quiet soon enough.
Fia thought to ask where the others had gone. There was a wistful vagueness in Laszlo's narrative. If he had wanted to share the details of their departure, he would have, she concluded. The opportunity had presented itself and he had agilely stepped over it.
She smiled delicately and looked to the glowing and uneven horizons again, encouraging Laszlo to escape for a time. They were going to share this small serenity; too near the sky for earthly concerns to pull them back into the small graves they had made beside large ones.
Fia simply breathed and made dreamy shapes with the clouds and brilliance. There were no rules or words. All she wanted about them was a mist of forgetfulness, so the anvil on her chest might be set elsewhere for an enchanted moment. The tranquil reverie lasted until their eyes were numb to the city's glory. Chimes were formless as light, so she didn't know how many had touched her. The sky was closing on itself with the promise of rain and sunset. Their incandescent spell born of Syna and forgetfulness could no longer hold. Fia sighed and shouldered her ghosts again.

She turned from the view like she was leaving a dance partner. It had been splendid, but she could not keep the pace anymore.
"Thank you for letting us up here," she said to the astronomer. Good manners had made her bolder.

by **Laszlo** on November 12th, 2012, 4:48 am

It was nice. The quiet, as much as the view. Silence could become choking when Laszlo was alone with a crackling fire in his small, empty apartment. But here, with the entire city in view, cradled by the mist and the rocky peaks, and with someone else to appreciate it with, the quiet wore a different face. It was peaceful, instead of haunting, to be here looking down at thousands of people moving through their lives, but hearing only the wind in his ears.

For a moment, Laszlo thought that perhaps he could forget everything. It was just the Etheafal and the Denvali leaning on the railing—and the quiet astronomer working nearby—as cool mountain zephyrs rippled across at their clothing and sent Laszlo's cloak fluttering against his legs. The chill in the air had begun to feel more like a companion, throwing its arms around both him and Fia. For once he wasn't thinking of anything, just staring at the view.

Finally, the moment drifted away as if the wind had taken hold of it. They turned from the city and gave polite, grateful tidings to the astronomer who let them up. Laszlo was quiet as they descended the stairs and crossed the lower level again, until they finally stepped back outside, returning to solid earth like everyone else.

"That was refreshing," Laszlo said, craning his neck to look up at the sky and searching for the dark clouds that he knew would soon bring rain. "Thank you, Fia. I need a reason to get out of my own world. Syna knows how easily I forget to leave." He silently reviewed his offer to allow Fia to stay in Duvalyon's old room. He tried not to dwell too much on the weight of Fia's answer, but the idea of having someone else in the flat again made him ache with relief.

The Ethaefal spoke again after a moment of thought. "I think you have the impression that you're some sort of burden on me." He crossed his arms behind his back. As they passed onto the bridge, Laszlo met eyes with a young woman who smiled at him. He faintly returned it. "You're not, I hope you know. I'm glad that you showed up at my door and forced me outside. It was good. I have some idea of… of what you're going through and… well, I don't want to be alone either. So."

He cleared his throat. "I'll walk you back to your room. Which inn are you staying at again?"

by **Fia Eaven** on November 13th, 2012, 7:53 am

Fia read the ground when Laszlo pulled her apprehension into the light, a flush swept up her cheeks to her temples. It turned from bashfulness to pleasure before fading. She said nothing. The flitting corners of her mouth and downturned eyes made a mosaic of happy relief and that was enough for him to know what bloomed in her head. Laszlo's admission of personal understanding made her turn her head, the brighter tones gone. The knowledge settled into her sad suspicions, another line in the thoughtful sketch she was making of the Ethaefal.

His question prompted her to answer a bit sheepishly the name of an Inn that wasn't the choice of upper and, sometimes, middle class.
"I moved from the last Inn," the slightly finer one he had accompanied her to. She laughed to distract, "It's the cheapest Inn where I don't have to worry about having me shoes stolen. Good fire at night downstairs."
She was about to tell Laszlo he didn't have to walk her anywhere, but her voice dropped back down her throat.
Accept the kindness, Fia, it is freely given. To refuse was to rob both the giver and the gifted of good feeling.

They walked in the same incorporeal push and pull that brought them to the Observatory. Fia pulling them into small tangents by drifting quietly towards cloistered little beauties, and Laszlo subtly pushing her towards right paths by pausing in crossroads or looking casually in a particular direction.
When the Inn was in sight, Fia spun towards Laszlo, thinking to part ways in the street, but he didn't slow under her cue. He took her straight through the door. She stifled the instinct to apologize when they came in, as if she had dragged a his coat through mud. It wasn't an awful place by any means, but one would be wise to be mindful of their satchels and avoid the stew.

by **Laszlo** on November 13th, 2012, 8:37 am

"Well, it could be worse." Laszlo regarded the inn as it passed around them, with Fia leading him to her room. He would have been content to part with her on the street, but he wasn't sure how serious she was about having to protect her shoes. It wasn't as bad as she made it sound, but he had smelled better places. "I once slept in a tavern cellar." Better not to elaborate exactly why he'd ended up there.

His escort ended at her door, where Laszlo stood a polite distance away so Fia could make her exit. Standing the hall, Laszlo's brow creased while his eyes fell under the weight of thought. Hesitation filled the air and made her wait. "Think on my offer." Perhaps it had been hastily made. Fia still hadn't made peace with Laszlo's Symenestra half. In his defense, he was not overly fond of humans either. Abalia had been a happy exception, but he was willing to make another. "I know there are… caveats to consider, but however I might look, I promise never to steal your shoes."

Laszlo nodded curtly. After making a final, sincere goodbye, he turned sharply and left.

It was the edge of sunset when the Ethaefal finally breached Duvalyon's old room later that day. The rain had been going for some time, pulling warmth from the air and replacing it with a damp chill. It turned Laszlo absolutely restless, putting him in the appropriate mood to extinguish ghosts from his home. Abalia's memory was presence enough.

The room was absolutely pristine. Not a trace of the medic, not even a lingering scent. And yet it still seemed to hold his air. Duvalyon did have a certain clinical quality to him.

"That's enough of you, haunting the place," he muttered—in Symenos, for old time's sake. He began the painstaking process of moving the furniture back the way it was meant to be. With only a few minutes of effort, the room could go back to being a room, rather than a relic. "Should have done this weeks ago. I swear, you're smug all the way in Kalinor and you don't even know why."

Closed A Lonely Impulse of Delight