To Stroke Thy Frost

[Philomena]

Spring 2, 513 AV
The Flat of Dr. Philomena Lefting, Zeltiva
-----------------------------------------------

"And how is it then, today, Dr. Lefting."

"Well, thank you."

The voice of Minnie Lefting had decayed into something low, wet, and grating. "Well" was a lie as an answer, but it was what she gave. She breathed slowly. The night was still young, the first stars still fingerpricks in the velveteen of the spring-dusk sky.

The child who spoke to her was no fool. She was thirteen already, old enough that her breasts subtly swelled the front of her linens, and her hips filled the space below her bodice. And old enough that, as a worker at the Infirmary, she had seen death more than once. She was no doctor, but to her eyes, she couldn't see how the professor was still alive. A selfish part of her wished she simply would die, and she was ashamed of this. The smell of the dying woman was horrible, but the sight was worse, for her bandages had to be changed each night on the rotting carcass of her left forearm. That is all it was, now. She wondered what mystery made the healers not simply lop the thing off. She had heard Clara say that it would be too much of a shock now, that the old professor's body would fail under the pressure of it. But, the flesh was hardly flesh anymore, yielding sickly under the slightest touch, more a pudding of rotted tissues hung loosely in the wet-paper skin.

"Well, then! Lets get this taken care of!"

The girl was conscientious, but the sight and smell of rot repelled her. She had treated gangrene - this was something else, and it made her want to retch. She put the ointment on it as she had been ordered, but she could hardly bring herself to look at her own sun-kissed skin against the monstrosity she was touching. She felt somehow like the doctor's very death was drawing life from her.

"Very well," the old doctor tensed visibly and stared glassily at the wall, away from the girl. Her lips quivered. The girl knew that the process must be terribly painful. She stopped a moment and reached to squeeze gently at the old woman's good hand, her own fingers wrapping around the knots swollen to the size of acorns in the old doctor's knuckles. The woman smiled, wanly, a smile that spoke more misery and compliance than comfort. The girl wondered if the squeezing hurt the swollen joints. She drew back.

"Tell me, how is your research, doctor?"

In the early days, this had been her only way to get the old Doctor to talk.

"My eyes. They are too far gone, now. I cannot take notes anymore, the wax is too pale. I write my prayers, and sometimes, I read a little."

The sentence had a serene, tired hopelessness to it.

"Oh? What are you reading?"

"Old books. The Circumnavigation, of course. One can never read it too many times. Things... over my head."

She pointed to a book resting in her pillows, an old text on Summoning.

"Memories, mostly. That is what I read now. One wishes to think of the stories one will not see the end of, I suppose."

The girl smiled, uncomfortably, and nodded, the long pale honey-color of her hair, bobbing down the flushed skin of her back. Minnie smiled up at her wanly, her own cheeks rich red with fever blood, "And you, child? Do they have you reading anatomy, then, I suppose?"

The girl did not answer. She only continued to rub the ointment in, then drew a roll of linen out, to wrap the pulpy violet mass of dead flesh up again.x

[Evalin]

How long had it been? Years perhaps. In truth Evalin was not certain any more. She had almost forgotten about this woman, Dr. Lefting she was called now. Apparently she had quite established herself in the time that she had been gone. How curious, how interesting...

Nostalgic... No that perhaps was not the most appropriate way to describe this feeling that welled within her chest. Remembrance of the past was, for those whose lives stretched endlessly, little more than an absent practice to pass the time that ticked by. For now, though, Evalin let her mind wander back to that time far in the past.

I do wonder... might she remember me? Evalin thought, eyes glancing up at the blue orb that floated just at eye level, It would not be surprising. Surly she is quite grey now.

The blue orb floated lazily over Evalin's left shoulder, bobbing up and down as the world was reflected in its smooth surface, If you worry so, why visit at all? From rumors spread it seems Dira's servants be upon her very soon...

Evalin smiled as she began to climb the stairs to the flat where Minnie lay, "Because my dear Tsenrika... She holds within her possession something most dear to my heart. I wonder what she has done with it."

There she stood once more, just as she had those many years ago before the door that lead within what she knew would be a simple room. Raising her staff Evalin would knock three times, just as she had that night. When the door was opened she would lean upon her staff, looking up with those burning red eyes and speak loud enough for all to hear, "Good evening Ms. Lefting. Might I come in?"

[Philomena]

The girl wrapped slow circles of the linen. It was precise, tedious work, for the tension had to be kept just so, so as not to damage the tissue, while being tight enough not to grow loose in the ensuing day. And it involved close examination of the wound. She stopped, once, and her stomach lurched slightly - a few small, white maggots wriggles where once Minnie had had a wrist. She pulled them out carefully, and anointed the spot again, and wrapped over it, perhaps a touch more hastily than she shoud should have.

*knock-knock-knock*

Minnie started, and with a grating slowness, with a rough pressure of joint plates, began to pull herself to fully sit. Her good hand pressed her spectacles up over her failing eyes, and searched beside the palette-bed for the knobbed head of her gnarled black walking stick.

"Sit, Dr. Lefting! Stay here, I will get it. The Mistress says you must rest!"

The girl stood, wiped her blood-and-rot stained fingers across her apron, and took the doorknob, opening it wide. Minnie looked up, and through it, though her eyes were so faint now, she say only a child-sized smudge. But the voice, the child-soprano whisper-voice, with its eerily adult intonations made her mind stir.

The nurse frowned at the appearance of the child, and muttered, "Who is this? Child, the doctor is not well, you must--"

Minnie interrupted, "No... no. Who is it? Let them in, Lendra. Let them in. You shall have to come close, little one, I cannot see well, now."

Her voice was hoarse, husky, cracked, but still had a certain thrill to it. It was so much the same. So much the same as before. A strange person coming in the night. Who was this child?

She rested the the rotten flesh on her bed-sheet. It stained the sheet a muddy burgundy, and sent a long jab of pain up her arm at the unprotected contact of the last shreds of half-rotten nerve tissue bare against the rough linens, making her inhale sharply.

"Yes, come close. Let me see you, little one, you sound... familiar."
x

[Evalin]

A small smile lit pale lips, though it did not quite reach her eyes as she quickly stepped past the girl who blocked her way, casting her immortal gaze over the child as she whispered just loud enough for Lendra to hear, "A child calling I a child... Such shall be paid for soon enough." before turning her full attention upon the sickly woman who lay withered upon the bed.

The sound of her staff upon the floor filled the room, the rustle of the dark cloak stirring up dust that followed in the witch's wake. Quickly Evalin found the woman's hand, grasping it in her own, and smiling wider, eyes of red gazing deep into the faded depths that once held such life and passion, "My my, dear Ms. Lefting. How time has ravaged you and brought you low. I wonder, can you even see me now as I stand mere inches from you." She leaned over the bed, lips inches from the woman's ear, "Have you forgotten what you owe me, the memory lost in the years that have been to me but mere moment in existance?" She leaned back once more, chuckling, "Has my scribe forgotten the promise made to me some years ago?"

The blue orb bobbed slowly over one shoulder, reflecting the room int its surface as the voice whispered soft enough for Minnie to hear, "Perhaps I was wrong. It seems the Jackals circle as we speak..."

[Philomena]

The Evalin's face was different, her body different. But it was not these that would call her to the mind of Minnie Lefting, so her blindness was as much an asset as a detriment in knowing the woman. It was her ears, still keen, even now in the face of death, that echoed in her memory - the tapping of the staff on her floorboards, the swishing of her cloak against the flesh of her legs.

Minnie Lefting's face curled into a sort of smile: a ghastly blend of papery skin and wasted flesh, clinging tight to the bones of her cheeks, her jaw, the deep sockets of her weak eyes, still dark and deep even as they fade into obscurity, the whites still mere shadows around the great animal irises.

"The Evalin. You come."

Her voice gasps, a certain animal yearning bubbling gutturally through the crevices of her collapsing throat. The Nuit's face, now close, with its black tongue and hollow, burning eyes, is simply the flag raised last above the host recognized across the field: the final standard that proclaims a coming struggle.

"I am many weak and foolish things, Lady, but I do not forget my promises."

She leans forward from where she sits, now. Even when standing she would not tower over the witch-child, and sitting in a palette-bed, just at ground level, her body bent with decay, their faces were on a level. Her eyes, though foggy, burned intensely into those of the child, the fever flush of her cheeks thickened and spread, her breath grew fast and shallow, and she leaned forward, until her mouth was so close their breath intermixed in the alchemy of the air. She stopped though, and a bitter smile crept across her face.

"You come," she murmurs in the hissing rattle of death, "You come, in time that I can give you what I have kept aside from you. But too late, perhaps, too late, that I can ask what I would have asked in return, Lady-mine. Too late for me, perhaps."

Her breath, warm and wet, and thick with infection, with the sweetness of the charnel-house, rolls over the child's pale, perfect skin, her own rough and sallow, and heavy with fever.

"But take your book. Take it, Lady of the Bloody Way. So lonely, so lonely, that way, so lonely. Only a book for a companion! A Book, and perhaps, a slave or two."

The book on summoning rested, still in her bedclothes, and she took it gently, in a shaking, pale hand, to give it to The Evalin. It is beautiful, almost unrecognizable from the battered volume she had been left. The cover was rich, smooth calfskin, soft and neatly tanned in black, and inlaid with a silver sigil - one that Minnie did not understand from in the book, but found beautiful for its own merits - A focused circle, with the a silver star engraved at its focus point. The pages had been edged in silver, to protect them, and were buffed to a pale, moon-like sheen, kept clean and shining through the many years since last Minnie finished them. And in the inside, Evalin's name was painted in her own, delicate hand, in a silver filigree.

The nurse mewled uncomfortably at the turn of the conversation, and began to edge slowly toward the door.
x

[Evalin]

A small intake of air, eyes widened and cold fingers brushed the truly beautiful work, "You have... Done exceptionally well child. Far better than I had thought possible." A single finger traced the symbol on the front, the smallest of smiles lighting child lips as no smile had in such a long time. Gently, as if she were handling the most delicate of flowers, Evalin opened the front cover to inspect her own name drawn with such fine lines. If ever there was a time that Evalin could feel a human thought, a human emotion known as happiness, this might have been one of those times. Closing the cover she laid one hand fully over the tome, closing her eyes to whisper, "Radjud, dala abase..." That which was broken, made anew."

Is this what you sought in coming here? Tsenrika inquired.

Yes... With this I am now complete.

The sounds of the nurse drew Evalin's attention away from the book, and she glanced over her shoulder. Within her stirred that inner power, her djed coursing and pressing against the underneath of her skin to pour out in the form of res. With a will of iron Evalin called this res to form itself into a see through ball, about the size of Tsenrika, over her left shoulder. It would appear like heat waves, and with a hiss Evalin willed the mass of power forward, shooting past the nurse to wedge itself behind the still open door. Then Evalin called forth images. Strong gusts, gale force winds, swirling energy and pressed the imagery into the res so that it began to spin, fast and faster until, with rap of her staff upon the floor the rest was transformed into air which expanded out with sudden force enough to slam the door shut with a resounding bang.

With a flurry of cloak Evalin stood, leaving the tome where it lay next to Lefting, and raised her free hand. Once more she called that power within her, yet this time she let the rage, the anger of her life and existence, fill her mind and djed as the res was pushed forth from her palm. With an exaggerated shove of her hand, palm out, the res flew forward, a serpentine shape forming as it wrapped around the child, though stayed well out of arms length.

"Hakin."

The res igniting, the outer layer bursting into flame while the inner fueled the fire as it twisted and wrapped around the child. She would feel the heat, yet it would not burn her from the distance.

Eyes of red flared with anger, hatred and loathing from centuries past filling their depths and transforming that child's face into the mask of a gargoyle, demonic and vengeful. When she spoke her voice was low, deep and threatening that was all the more heightened by the child pitch of it, "Move not a muscle more lest you feel the flames of my hatred. I care not to make a mess of Ms. Lefting's home when she so generously allowed me passage, now do you?"

Without waiting for an answer Evalin would turn around to Minnie once more, bending down to gently stroke the diseased arm, "Now then... what has taken from my scribe her ability to write?"

[Philomena]

Minnie, even with her glasses, now, could hardly see across the room. And so, she heard the work of the witch-child, more than saw it. Her ears, drawn raw in the nerves by the illness heard the subtle scrape of the woman's skin across the calf-skin, across the pages, the echo of the tongue she did not know, it's words sweet and limpid, and ancient. She smelled the crackle of fear, and felt the slow acceleration of air, and murmured soft, "My books... my books... be gentle to my books, fair one..."

And the door slammed into her brain, and the heat of the fire pricked at her skin, even from the distance. She gasped, very softly, and gave in, stopped trying to peer after, closed her eyes, and lay her head back, drawing a deep shuddering, painful breath.

She felt the girl's terror - or she thought she did. She felt, on her white hand, the pulling of the ring, the subtle pull of Gypa drawing farther, farther on. Farther, farther on. She felt the dull low emptiness of her failed black hand. She felt the wet swamp of her lungs, slowly filling to devour her breath. And over all, over all, she felt the whirling nexus of the witch's fury, closed her eyes and breathed deep of it, her hand going up unconsciously to touch the tender flesh of her throat.

And then the storm stayed high and still above her, and the presence of the child form drew close, the cold of her intermixing with the fevered warmth of Minnie's own skin. Her face turned toward the girl, her broken lips drawing in the faint smell, the scent of ash and death and fair skin and dark hair.

The hand touched her arm, so soft, ever so soft, and the voice resonated in the queer mixture of a low, rich heart and light, pale child-voice.

And Minnie opened her eyes now, close to the child, the shining pupils dilating visibly in fits and starts to try to focus on the features.

"If it were a man, or even a simple ailment, Lady of Blood, I would surrender it to thee. But this is no work of men - this is the work of a God. I have been stricken. For my sins perhaps. Or my virtues."

She smiled, a hideous, broken corpse of a smile, and her voice croaked hoarsely, "I did not know if I would be glad you have returned, now that I know the truth of things. Now that I know that it is you that would have taken me so many years ago. But you are beautiful like this, Lady. I feel I could take you in my arms, and almost we would understand each other, my fair one. In the end, I am a shell of an old woman. And you, you are grown into a child."
x

[Evalin]

Evalin looked down at this pitiful carcus of humanity, this withered shell that was little more than a faint shadow of what Evalin once saw in her. It was a sorry sight, a disappointing sight. One that Eva wished she had never seen. For a moment Evalin considered putting this woman out of her misery, to snuff out her life as it was now. Toss out the now useless tool to be swapped for another... yet still something stilled her hand. Perhaps it was some faint sense of humanity that still flickered in her heart, or a nostalgic musing that stilled her hand. Whatever the case, Evalin simply looked down at her in silence.

She let the stillness rain for a time longer, the sounds of the girl's whimpering a distant annoyance at the moment. Finally, after a chime or two, Evalin spoke softly, "Tis a shame... for if you could give unto me a name, or a face, I would stricken them from this world with so little thought as one might swat a fly. For your sins or not, were you to perish from Godly hands I shall see them burned to ash along with the rest of their tyrant reign." her thumb brushed across the thin knuckles of the scribe, her eyes never leaving the woman's face even as she smiled, a smile that seemed so out of place in such misery, "Your words are elegant as always dear Miss Lefting, though again you speak such utter foolishness. This black soled witch may never be called beautiful, and never could we ever come to understand one another."

She fell silent once more, simply stroking Lefting's knuckles and gazing at her nearly blind eyes. It seemed such a waste, such an utter and foolish waste to let this child go, to free her to that cruelty of Fate's hands...

"If you wish it... I can offer you a chance to live. A chance to stand at my side for all of eternity." Evalin said, her words far softer than she would normally allow.

[Philomena]

Minnie listened to the woman, and her unfocused eyes grew soft, sad, compassionate at the same time that her lips curled into a quiet, broken smile. She reached a hand up, and touched the child's neck, made slow, palsied circuits of her fingers over the cold flesh, then let her hand drift down to rest flat palmed against the delicate breastbone, not yet grown into the rigidity of full maturity, and now, never to grow into it. She pressed against it with the heel of her horned and shriveled hand, probed the skin, the collarbones, with her fingertips, stained richly with a thousand, thousand washes of ink.

"Grown a child, my little one, and yet not yet grown young, hmm? Not yet, not yet so young. I would ... have liked to be your mother, once, before my end time came, lonely child of shadows, raging against the unjustness of the grown world. I would... have liked, the way we said before. I have waited though, as long as I can. I will wait on as long as Dira will wait, as well. I would have liked my wait to have been long enough, my beauty, my fair child, my Dark Lady-mistress. Could you have imagined? If my Lanie came home, we would take you close, we would make of you a daughter, perhaps. A daughter and mother all at once, for you would be both, wouldn't you, fair one? I would have liked..."

Her voice drifts and rambles, and gurgles as she speaks, and finally melts so far into her throat, it excites the ravaged flesh of her windpipe, and she begins to cough, gasping lividly for air, streaks of crimson-laced phlegm flying into filigrees across her hands, as her body fought desperately for breath.
x

[Evalin]

Evalin's cheek turned away from the woman's touch, but she did not move from the other contact. For every time she came upon this woman, Evalin found herself strangely at odds. Feelings of unknown origin plagued her mind as she passed words between herself and the dying woman. It had been just as it was so many years ago. Evalin had come, ready to take charge and rule the hour, yet even so this foolish mortal always managed to make her stumble, if only slightly.

Eva took that stained hand with her own, turning it over to see the red of life stained upon it as she stood, "It seems you have succumbed to delusions in your final hours Miss Lefting. What you speak of is nothing more than a dream that only a fool, or a human, could ever dream." she slowly stepped back, letting Minnie's hand slip from her own one finger at a time, "What you speak of could never be for one such as I." There was the smallest hint of sadness that leaked through the crack in Evalin's mask, but quickly she turned toward the door, putting her back to the dying woman as she pulled her hood up once more, "If you should live... Then I still would hold you to our contract. You belong to me, body and soul. Thus, if you find the need, send for me in Nyka where my current path leads. I shall await your word, or let your silence be my answer."

Evalin looked at the frightened woman still surrounded by flame, but suddenly her intense urge for blood had subsided. Glaring, Evalin snapped her fingers, dispersing the res and ending the spell as she grabbed the doors latch, "How I wish you had taken my offer to stand at my side. I fear I should never find another so deserving as you again."