PM to join Kip Drawlin, Afterglow [Wrenmae]

[Xavior Silhouette]

Winter 40th 512AV It had begun to snow again as Xavior departed the inn he had shut himself into for several days. The money didn't bother him a small price to pay compared to his possible life being lost in the harsh, Kalea winter. He dressed more casually than he did before. A leather jacket pulled over a leather vest, a pair of leather boots peeked from the bottom of his leather pants. His head exposed to the cold night's air felt as if it were about to freeze and fall off his shoulders. But he didn't mind it as the moon's light and orange glow of lamps guided him through the streets. He had a purpose as he made his journey to the cemetery that the ceremony had been held. His crossbow slung over his back, he hated he felt the need to carry it with him wherever he went in the town. Such educated people, yet they are blinded still by the possibilities that there is more to life than just black and white. True he inhabited a zith's body during the day, but that didn't mean he harbored a Zith's, primal, instinctual, ferocity. Soon he was greeted by the gates. Snow glowed a light blue color and contrasted the marble and stone of the gates and grounds. He felt like a specter, walking among the living yet dead and not the same as those around him. Crunch, the ice under his boots was deafening as the blue flakes drifted lazy onto headstones and plaques. Cautiously he moved in and felt at once more at ease. "The dead brings comfort, they can not harm me." He muttered as he took slow and calculated steps deeper into the hilly area. From what he had heard, not many of the guardsmen patrolled the area, which was both a gift sent from Leth, but a possible end of his journey set by Tanroa. Who knows what ill fate lurked just beyond the tree line, beyond the frozen bushes that will soon come back to life and sprout flowers in Spring. He explored the cemetery in search of a possible location where the ceremony for the man who met ill fate himself. But, the ceremony had been cleared and the dead buried. Xavior found it funny, "such strange ceremony for the dead Mourning the loss, creating a sermon, collecting those who were attached to the man during life. It seems to me a bit gratuitous of those who mourn the dead. The dead don't care, they are already being reborn never remembering any of the faces that they once knew in life." He leaned against a tombstone off the paved path and looked to the sky that glowed with moon's light through the grey clouds. "What of those less fortunate, those who can't afford such a ritual? Are they any less of a person because they can't afford Winter flowers, a box to protect their decaying body? Will those who have such ceremonies ultimately be remembered more than those who rot above the earth in a forest?" He mused over his thoughts enjoying the night regardless of who he may encounter.

[Wrenmae]

"The dead care not," came a voice from behind him, spoken softly, almost the wind in tone and weight, "But the ceremony is for the living." From around the tombstones, so neat and ordered in this part of the cemetary, Wrenmae stepped into the dappled moonlight. He wore simple clothes, and the black of his steelcloth cloak on his shoulders. The weapons at his hips glinted with the same opalescence that caught his pale face and scattered moonbeams into streaks of tattered starlight.

"In life we build the reputation they use to bury us at death. Those without coffins or plots or crowds to sing them to sleep failed. They did not make enough of themselves. As you say, the dead already know peace...and for the living, a body is just a body."

He nodded toward a grave with freshly turned earth, "Once, this was a man before I took his life. I thought to teach the city a lesson, but I feel now that perhaps they need a more thorough convincing."

Sighing, he slid back against the gravestone.

"Good to see you, Xavior. You came...and without the girl, I see." His face held no answers of approval nor denial. "What brings the forsaken of a god to a boneyard for men?" Taking a handful of earth, he let it sprinkle from his grip, vanish into the darkness at the foot of the grave, "Are you nostalgic for the life you may once have lived?"

[Xavior Silhouette]

"How could it be nostalgia if I don't remember the life I lived?" Xavior's eyebrow crooked as he stood. His tall form turned, the golden tips of his antler like horns shimmered in the moon's light. He knew at once who the voice was as the caught his face and parted his white hair that had fallen in front of his face. The snow had stopped, the quiet ever more so. Silence for a moment thick in his ears. He eyed his comrade something seemed different about him. "This is an unsettling feeling. Or perhaps I was just blind to it before, the attack only opening my eyes a little wider." "Hello Shroud or do you go by another name today?" Xavior lips curled into a small smile as he didn't make any steps to get closer to him. "Yes, unfortunately that Ethaefal chose to remain in the city. Perhaps I'll go back to find her, or not. You know just as well as I do that Sunberth is an excellent place to vanish. I wonder though, is simply vanishing the same as knowing a loved one had died? I would think the living would want some sort of closure." He spoke a bit sidetracked by his own thoughts. He didn't expect a reply as he fixed the strap of his crossbow. "Forsaken, no no you misunderstand. I am not forsaken, I'm full of Leth's energy right now. As long as I feel the bond, that I can not explain, but feel in my body I know he still watches." Xavior was a bit caught off guard by the initial comment. "More importantly however, you say you killed a man to make an example out of him?" Xavior paused as he caught his breath feeling a particularly sharp breeze cut through his clothing. "It would of been much easier to break a man and tease him with death. Make him beg for it and allow him to realize how weak he actually was. Mark his body with the words," Xavior thought back on what he had heard about Kip's death, "Weak on his body. A constant reminder of what he is and always will be. Less a man because of it. But death, death would of been too easy if I was in your shoes." Xavior mused. "That sounds like something a man I once ran into would do. He didn't seem to enjoy what others enjoyed. He enjoyed to set dominos up and then knock them down to watch everything crumbled. That is his life's fulfillment. I wonder though," Xavior paused and rubbed at a rib trying to get to an ich under bandage, "Are you like that now? Did you send me here with the intent of my death? It would seem Zeltiva has an execute on sight when faced with fear and death personified. Perhaps it was only a misunderstanding, I prey it was only a misunderstanding." "See?" Xavior's arms opened, "I pray to you Leth protector and lover of Syna, brother of Dira, governed by Tanroa, that this man shall tell me his true intentions. I ask that I bear no ill will against this man despite what answer is presented before me." He moved a hand to his mouth and kissed it. "You see now, I am bound by my word with the heavens and I hope you can feel the bond to be truthful to me now."

[Wrenmae]

At first, he didn't answer. Instead he paced through crooked tombstones, like granite teeth in misshapen angles. Pausing in front of one, he knelt. Lighthouse was the name chiseled through stone, and the grave showed some sign of visitation. Grey flowers, the last of the season, hung against the stone like miniature corpse heralds. Placing a hand against the stone, Wrenmae neither spoke to Xavior nor to the grave.

Instead, he closed his eyes for a moment. Once upon a time, this grave was a plot of dirt and its owner spoiled him with sweets and theatrics. Perhaps it was best she had perished, before he could bring the devastation of his powers to the city. But he could not help but feel a stab of longing, a fundamental sorrow to lose yet another he had once held close.

"Save me your vows," Wrenmae said dully, "If Leth was listening, would he not have spirited you home by now?" Glancing back over his shoulder, the storyteller dared not sneer...but his eyes glittered in bitter mirth.

"You are Zith sometimes," he said at last with a shrug, "You should have expected a civil welcome for your uncivilized brood. Humans do not have the same prejudice against them...I did not think to warn you of the probable change in opinion."

Sighing, he stood from the stone and stalked to the Lethaeful.

"You've come, and I will require much of you. Know that my involvement in this city is limited, but I expect you to stay for the season after my departure...set some things in order."

A thought seemed to strike him and he rubbed his chin with a frown.

"Perhaps...perhaps there could be use of you elsewhere, but I cannot be sure of that now. While I have you here in Zeltiva, keep your ear to the ground and find a niche in this society. If you can only move at night, be a voice in the night."

He nodded that Xavior should follow him, their tracks fading under the falling snow. "Tell me of your journey," he said as they walked, "Was it difficult?"

[Xavior Silhouette]

Xavior followed close behind as he looked to the sky some and noticed the depressing, grey, clouds had begun to thin. Snow had long since stopped as the sky began to clear and expose the many different stars and constellations of figures that watched over the world below. Xavior wasn’t sure what he saw, flickers of thin streamers that glowed in his sight and seemed to dangle from the sky like tentacles of a jellyfish. There was a moment of shock as he looked down at Wren who studied a tombstone, as a bit of this blue streamer was attached to him as well. It only lasted moments as the entire world seemed to be aglow with a strange light, like a net, like a spider’s web. Call it as you will it was shocking as it appeared everything was connected to something else in some way. But as his eyes moved to focus on Wren’s words, the glow seemed to vanished and once more the surrealness gave way to gritty, grungy, life. “I’ve told you before, there is a reason he has put me on this world.” He chuckled and walked over to Wren. The reply wasn’t exactly what he wanted to hear something felt off as Xavior grew closer to Wren. His feet stopped and he stood at a distance from him, “but is it really so hard to believe a zith that does not snarl, speak in decent common, and offer gestures of peace that maybe the world isn’t really out to get them?” He eyed Wren some more, he felt something very off about his comrade, something he hadn’t sensed before. “How human does something have to be before it is considered human?” He stroked his chin for a moment before he continued with a bit of suggestive tone in his voice, “or would the better question be, what is the line that separates humanity from monstrosity?” Xavior began to follow Wren, still he kept his distance, “you’ll be departing once again?” He questioned, “but you’ve only just arrived, the city isn’t on their knees yet.” He teased with a bit of sarcasm. His ears listened to Wren, but they did not consider the tone as he spoke. “Thank you for the advice, but I only plan to stay in Zeltiva a season. If I recall Kalea, a distant land, is not exactly the fairest of land masses to cross during winter. Blinding snow that conceals jagged mountain peaks, quite a treacherous place to take flight in.” He paused once more in his speech as his mind wandered to other things. ”Why did I see those strange webs? Am I going crazy?” he thought momentarily as Wren’s words sunk into his mind. “But I’m curious, what exactly do you have planned for me? You sound so sure of yourself, I may have the piece of mind to think I was a puppet in some game.” He chuckled to conceal his seriousness. “But that is far from the truth right?” That seriousness cut through his tone this time round. “The flight across the sea was uneventful. Though that isn’t a negative. Gave me plenty of time to think, reflect back on the course that has passed through my travels.” Xavior looked out to the woods for a moment as if to look for something that wasn’t there for all anyone knew. “Got a little choppy though, had a bit more luggage than usual. Not only physically, but emotionally. Are you alright Wren, something seems different about you I can sense it. What have you been doing since Fall?” Xavior questioned back as his boots crunched through the snow.