![[Note by Nemesis]](./images/note.png "[Note by Nemesis]")
Ahvani Ionio
Appearance
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: 22, as of Winter 514
Birthday: 8th of Winter, 492
Birthplace: Nyka
Current Location: Ravok
Appearance: Luminous, thick hair the color of raven's black hangs fully in a curtain of loose curls to just beneath his angular jawline, though he often sweeps it back into a knot at the base of his skull. A man of clean lines and lissome curves, Ahvani is possessed of a peculiar beautiful angularity: high cheekbones, long, expressively slender fingers, strikingly strong brows, and small feet. His skin, while not as dark as his hair, is dark, warm shade best described as dusky cinnamon. Beneath darkly arches--thick yet defined--are arguably Ahvani's least attractive feature: his eyes are a shade of grey, the same shade as a winter sea without any of the steely shimmer or depth and modulation of color. Flat and blunt, the grey of his eyes are flecked and rimmed in a dark, dark brown bordering on black.
As far as height is concerned, Ahvani is very middle of the road for human men: neither tall, nor short, he is remarkably unremarkable in that regard. Masculinely-shouldered, narrowly-waisted and with elegantly well-turned calves, Ahvani possesses the grace, poise, and build of long-practiced dancer. Years of training and performing have cultivated his physique and shaped his body to a tool of dance. Slim and athletic, Ahvani's body does not speak of strength, nor does it lie in this regard. Though he lacks brawn, he makes up for it with a certain amount of stamina. On his neck, trailing down the left side, are three, small birthmarks akin to well-defined freckles.
Ahvani is often called beautiful, something that, while naturally his, has also been honed and drawn out of his features.
Gender: Male
Age: 22, as of Winter 514
Birthday: 8th of Winter, 492
Birthplace: Nyka
Current Location: Ravok
Appearance: Luminous, thick hair the color of raven's black hangs fully in a curtain of loose curls to just beneath his angular jawline, though he often sweeps it back into a knot at the base of his skull. A man of clean lines and lissome curves, Ahvani is possessed of a peculiar beautiful angularity: high cheekbones, long, expressively slender fingers, strikingly strong brows, and small feet. His skin, while not as dark as his hair, is dark, warm shade best described as dusky cinnamon. Beneath darkly arches--thick yet defined--are arguably Ahvani's least attractive feature: his eyes are a shade of grey, the same shade as a winter sea without any of the steely shimmer or depth and modulation of color. Flat and blunt, the grey of his eyes are flecked and rimmed in a dark, dark brown bordering on black.
As far as height is concerned, Ahvani is very middle of the road for human men: neither tall, nor short, he is remarkably unremarkable in that regard. Masculinely-shouldered, narrowly-waisted and with elegantly well-turned calves, Ahvani possesses the grace, poise, and build of long-practiced dancer. Years of training and performing have cultivated his physique and shaped his body to a tool of dance. Slim and athletic, Ahvani's body does not speak of strength, nor does it lie in this regard. Though he lacks brawn, he makes up for it with a certain amount of stamina. On his neck, trailing down the left side, are three, small birthmarks akin to well-defined freckles.
Ahvani is often called beautiful, something that, while naturally his, has also been honed and drawn out of his features.
Character Concept
Character History: Memory was a strange and curious device. Something that one can only see by looking backwards and reflecting on what was but no longer is. It seemed to stretch back infinitely but, of course, there was a beginning to it. A tangled, messy beginning full of foggy, half-recallable, half-forgotten slices of moments in time and space, memory reaches. The flicker of a violently crimson piece of cloth, blowing in the wind, drying; the smell of baking bread and fresh flour, garlic, sharp onion, and ginger lingering on heavy, summer air; the sound of screaming—a child’s laugh or a wail of terror?—echoing down winding streets, dislocating it.
These were not all Ahvani remembered of his early childhood in Nyka, though they represented most of them. His childhood there was a short-lived thing.
What he could be sure of, what he was mostly sure of, was that his name had been Ahvani and that he had been born on the 8th Day of Winter in 492. That much had been in his paperwork. He knew his last name—Ionio—came later, of that there was no question. Ionio was of Ravok and, in many ways, Ahvani Ionio had been born not in Nyka but in Ravok. Nyka was a distant memory but the interlacing canals, dark glamour, and chill beauty and sophistication of Ravok was where he came to be.
Of his memories of Nyka, Ahvani had trouble untangling memories that were actually his from those that his mistress told him. Perhaps, there was no difference. If not in image, Ahvani remembered his father in a kaleidoscope of sensory memories: the strength of his arms, the smell of his skin, the tenor of his laugh and the shadows of the deep creases that tightened his eyes and mouth. Ahvani remembered his older sister and brother and of his mother, he remembered very little other than he bore her resemblance. She had died when he was still quite young. Reflecting back on it now, Ahvani thought a poorly placed babe and troubled delivery had claimed both his mother and young sibling. Monks in brown robes, stories of Alvina, warm hearth stones, and the pangs of an empty stomach numbered in what little Ahvani recalled of his first few years of life.
For he was only five years old when Mistress Ioa purchased Ahvani from his father. Because he was loved the least and times were hard enough without so many mouths to feed, or so his Mistress said. Ahvani had no reason to doubt her. A stately woman imperiously dressed and elegantly coiffed, Mistress Ioa was not a beauty but she was shrewd, calculating, and ruthless when it came to coin. Avarice maybe her sin, but lust, gluttony, and pride were her business.
The journey to Ravok was also something Ahvani remembered very little of other than he wore a tightly fitted metal collar around his neck that connected him by clinking chain to Mistress Ioa. In all the years since, Ahvani has never left Ravok and has not made that long journey across the lake again. Like all memories, the one that stood out was the one that came soon after he was brought to Ravok: the day he was marked as a slave. That day, among all days of his early years, he could recall in vivid, painful detail: the way the Ravosala pilot dipped his long, guiding pole into the cool waters of the canal; the smell of the air as it blew through the tangled dark curls atop his head, bearing the dank smells of water and city; and finally the searing, burning, retching pain of the flame-hot brand pressing into the tender and child-soft flesh on the back of his left hand. Then it had been a painful, angry wound but over the years it had settled into a black half-moon, marking him forever as a slave in Ravok.
The smell of searing flesh—his searing flesh—was still a vivid memory in his mind.
The years after that were not as full of darkness as one might image a slave’s life to be. He was not purchased to be a laborer, but for his beauty. He was to be an entertainer but due to his youth—and perhaps Mistress Ioa’s own cold, pragmatic negotiating skills—he had been fetched for a remarkably fair price. The training, though, and the expectations were high. Tenderness and patient were neither quality that described his mistress nor traits she had any patience with. She owned a handful of slaves and there was a strict hierarchy they maintained: and the younger children were at the bottom. They were all slaves, but those that danced, those that earned money, were the ones that Ioa was likely to turn a blind eye to. To a degree, anyways.
Thus, Ahvani’s life changed and his memories of childhood were forever warped. No longer and never again to be a free child, Ahvani was an owned child. His days started early at enormous cook pots, making the food that was to feed his mistress and the rest of the slaves. And then he cleaned the tavern that Ioa owned and everyone worked in and the rooms above. While exhausting, for Ahvani and all the others, those were the easy tasks. When those were done then he trained to become the skilled entertainer his mistress had purchased him to become. This was grueling, painful, and, at times, cruel. With ropes and knotted cords, older slaves pulled and stretched his limbs in opposite directions and held them there until he nearly blacked out from the pain. All for flexibility’s sake, of course. Under the direction of the older slaves, Ahvani spent long nights leaping in the alley with heavy stones tied to him, or strung up by his wrists, forcing him to balance on the tips of his toes. And for every misdeed, for every time he did not push himself to the brink of consciousness, and for every whim, Mistres Ioa was prepared to punish him. And she had not become successful for no reason: she knew how to punish without leaving a mark; she new how to punish in ways that only the mind was left scarred.
Painful, aching, exhausting, strenuous, Ahvani’s was hardly a childhood at all, but it was his.
But, as the gods and all knew, humans were adaptable. They learned to take their situations and, for whatever god-forsake reason, they learned to live with them. Despite all the pain, despite the grueling hours learning to pirouette with an elegant grace and to tumble with toes pointed and limbs extended, despite the tasteless food and the nights of very little sleep, Ahvani found a saving grace: Krissa. Krissa,, a young girl a few years older than Ahvani, was acquired by Mistress Ioa only about a year after Ahvani. Light where he was dark, fair where he was cinnamon-kissed, Krissa was in everyway his opposite but with limited options and forced to share a bed every night, they became fast friends. In Krissa, Ahvani found the sister he had lost, the friend he had never had, and, surprisingly, a mother figure. For Krissa, Ahvani offered the same. During the long days, they suffered their training and chores and at night they held each other in bed, smothering cries, and smoothing hair with as much tender as they could—it was the only tender they had.
As they grew and grew into themselves, it became clear that if Ahvani was a rare flower, then Krissa was a precious stone: a fire drop, opal, no, a cut diamond – brilliant and luminous. While Ahvani had that soft, yielding beauty of line and gentle form that was a pleasure to behold, Krissa was a devastating cacophony of sharp angles—a beauty that hurt and could be hurt. Krissa was the type of beauty that no poet would dare right about, for her type sunk ships and broke men.
At the age of sixteen, Ahvani’s training ended and he was ready to perform, entering the ranks of Mistress Ioa’s privileged slaves. If, as a child, he thought there lives were easier or better in any way, he was sorely mistaken and quickly disabused of any such notions. Broken toes from performing en pointe, aching limbs for night after night of dancing and acrobatics, and morning headaches from drinking too much wine – for Ioa liked her dancers to mingle after the dances, to drink with the patrons. Ahvani could not imagine why. While he drank the wine, life was good and full of unencumbered glee. But even the spell of wine fades and in its wake it leaves pain. Life returns after all respites. And his chores did not lessen. He still rose early to train, he still strained his body to stretch—he pulled Krissa’s limbs further and further as she did for him—and after the last patron left, all entertainer slaves cleaned the tavern.
Soon, though, Ahvani found out that dancing and drink pouring was not the only entertainment Mistress Ioa provided to her clientele. There were more reasons why she sought beautiful slaves.
It happened one night, later in his 16th year, on a night that he was dancing with Krissa. It was not a particularly complicated dance, as neither was yet very skilled at the dance. But it was a beautiful one. Light fingers intertwined with his slender, dark ones; neither Krissa nor Ahvani led this dance, but the lead seemed to pass from one to the other. Ahvani dropped his hands lower, resting them at the small of Krissa’s waist, and lifted her as she jumped—arms akimbo, legs elegantly bent, toes pointed—guiding her inertia into a gliding arch before setting her down. Now she clasped the small of his back and hand; Ahvani lifted onto his toes, his feet curved sharply at the arches, and leaned back until the audience swung into few.
Ahvani swallowed and almost fell, but Krissa caught his weight.
Eyes were staring back at him in a way he hand never known before: hungry, hunting, mean and gentle. They belonged to a human man, well into his middle years, with dark curls touched by the iron frost of grey. And strong – a mixture of fear and… somewhat else, too. With Krissa’s firm and strong guidance, Ahvani was able to finish he dance without much stumbling. At the conclusion, Mistress cast him one of those dark looks that promised being locked in a closet and a beating and nodded her head over to the man. Ahvani swallowed again. He was to entertain that man.
Filling a ceramic jug with dark red wine, Ahvani brought two cups and the jug over to the man’s table, who suddenly seemed disinterested. Silently, eyes down cast, Ahvani filled the man’s glass first and then his own, “I am Ahvani, please let me know how I may serve you.”
Taking the glass without looking at him, the man raised it to his lips, slowly, and took a full sip. Gently pulling it away, “I shall have you tonight, but for now, be silent.” Still not looking at Ahvani he barked another command in a voice that was brusque, hoarse, and deep. “Drink with me. Do not let my glass be empty.” And that was all he said. Ahvani refilled his glass again and again, drinking as well. At least twice, he had to refill the ceramic pitcher and with each trip his practiced gait lost somewhat of that dancer’s grace. He stumbled. His head swirled. His mouth was full of the taste of wine.
“Come.” With a singly syllable, the man, still nameless, cut into his thoughts. Wordlessly, soundlessly, Ahvani rose as did the man, who, with strong, large hands, gripped him firmly on his upper arm, half leading Ahvani half carrying him across the tavern. They paused at Mistress Ioa and the two exchanged murmured words and then they headed upstairs. Head reeling, feet stumbling, the nameless man guided him upstairs to a private guest room. It was a blur, both from the mind and because Ahvani’s mind was overwhelmed: clothes were stripped off, sliding to the floor in whispers of wool and linen; hands danced, circled, and touched; teeth, weight, lips, and tongue; and then the man pushed him to the bed.
An hour later it was all over and the man left. Ahvani grabbing his clothes made it to his own pallet. It was late.
Krissa was already there and wordlessly, for there were no words needed between them, Ahvani collapsed down beside her. Immediately, Krissa wound her armsa round his neck and pulled him to her. Not knowing what had happened, why it happened, Ahvani buried his face in her luminous, fair hair and was racked by silent tears. Between his tremors, though, he felt her cheeks were wet, as well. And she smelled of somewhat else. Of man, another person, and something further. Ahvani needed to explanation and offered none in return. The hours of the night seemed to fade by, melting into the darkness that only, finally, came to claim them in sleep.
Both were forever changed.
That, though, was the only change. Their lives did not change as much. During the mornings they trained, then they performed, and then, at least every few nights, they entertained. This was the real calling of Ioa’s tavern, which Ahvani now knew was a brothel. She paid the taxes to Ravok handsomely for the privilege, but she had an eye for buds that would bloom into breath-taking flowers. Ioa earned her money well. Men, women, young, old, rough, and gentle, all had a turn and all had a preference. Once the shock wore off, Ahvani was left with a dull numbness and a body that ached in places he had never known existed. For the most part, Krissa and Ahvani never discussed it but one night Krissa came to their shared pallet later than him, her face puffy and welts rippling across her back. Ahvani’s heart broke and he traced them delicately with the tips of his fingers. Krissa trembled but pressed a hand to his mouth before he could talk, “Do not think of it Ahvani. Some people have sharper tastes. I can give as good as I get.”
Ahvani was not sure what she meant, but he made to comment.
While Krissa seemed resigned, perhaps even inclined to their life, Ahvani was not. His body ached, his feet were tender and sore, his eyes were weary from lack of sleep, too much wine, and a mind full of worry. By day he danced, by dusk he tumbled, and by night he cried silently until he fell asleep, wordlessly cursing the black crescent moon on his hand. Ahvani, too, prayed, but his words fell deafly or mutely on the gods’ ears. Rhysol, The Father, made to intervention and The Mother of Ravok must deem it well, good, and just, for Ahvani knew his plight was not singular in Ravok. Nysel granted him as many boons with pleasant dreams as he did nightmares that made him wake soaked through with terror and trembling. Sivah must not be able to hear him and Deddra’s wine allowed him escape, but only for a moment. The older slaves told him, some with scorn others blandly with boredom, that his prayers were best directed at Nikali. His Djed was hers, in her hands, and his only hope for respite. Not, though, for escape. And so, thusly, every night, every day, he prayed to Nikali.
Slim on the point of being too slender, aching from his head to his toes, and still smelling of his evening’s patron, Ahvani collapsed onto his bed in tears. Krissa had not yet returned. Laying there, dark grey eyes rimmed with red and stained with tears, Ahvani froze as he heard the door open and close quietly. Blinking, he could make out a silhouette of a person—a woman—making her way to his bed. “Krissa?” He asked hoarsely, breathlessly, knowing that it was not Krissa. The woman, though, made no comment and climbed languidly into his bed;her movements were as elegant and as fluid as silk whispering along polished stone but her touch was as sensuous and warm—no, hot!—as nothing he had ever felt before. He seemed to melt in this touch that was all too feminine, all too human, all too something he had never felt before. Reaching up in the dark, Ahvani found her face and lightly rested his finger tips on it. She wore a mask he could not see in the dark.
And then, she kissed him and Ahvani kissed her back. As if jolted, burned, saved, and killed all in a moment, the kiss was a moment of pleasure he had never known could be had in the flesh. His shoulders shook and he pulled himself closer to the woman who was not a woman but also all together too woman and she acquiesced, her sensual touch trailing down to his hips, her fingers curving around. Breaking away, the woman withdrew.
Nikali. It was Her. Suddenly, wrapped in divine terror and rapture, Ahvani knew. Not his goddess, but The Goddess that presided over him through pleasure and all its entanglements. It was Nikali and Ahvani knew.
Laughing, Nikali knew that he knew. Her subject. The room was full of her scent: of woman divine, of flowers, of heat, and of want. Overwhelming, suffocating, and intoxicating, Ahvani breathed deep and she spoke, her voice as commanding as naught he had heard before, as filling as honey and cake, as rich as wine, and leaden with want that he wanted and never had ever known before. “You are mine and thus I mark you. Find pleasure in what you do. You have served me well and served me poorly thus far.” With another laugh, Nikali silenced the protests Ahvani could not even yet bring to his lips, “Serve me well now – find pleasure in not being Ahvani for Ahvani, but Ahvani for others.” And then she rose, turning without looking back, and gleamed as if a moon in the darkness. Her beauty burned, it seared, and left him aching for more. But she left, as silently, as proudly as a queen, as she had entered. Ahvani was left shaking, shaking, crying, trembling, laughing, and sliding his hands where her hands had touched him. He was not sure when sleep came, but suddenly moring came.
And again as before, Ahvani was changed. Changed for the better.
The wine stain mark shaped in a chain that graced his dusky cinnamon flesh just right of his pubic region did not escape the notice of the other slaves. The Ranuri. Nikali’s Blessing. Mistress Ioa learned of it soon, too, and smiled with delight. A smile from her was worth a season of nightmares in an of itself, but strangely, Ahvani felt glee. He shared the pleasure of hisMistress, his lovely, mortal mistress. He wished to please her, to serve her. Never before had he danced so well, never before had the aches, throbs, and movements brought him such pleasure. And the brothel’s patrons swelled. He ached to please, he did things he had never done before, had not known to do before, with authentic pleasure. Toes curled, gods’ names called out, nails clawed flesh, and Ioa’s coffers filled. And, Ahvani knew, for the first time since Nyka, pleasure.
It did not come without a price. Krissa noticed it more than Ahvani. Increasingly, he ceased to be Ahvani for Ahvani’s sake, but became Ioa’s best slave. People were drawn to him, Krissa, as well. His fingers knew where to touch, his wrists ached to fill wine glasses, he lived to serve and through serving he found pleasure. But Ahvani found other things. He found wine harder than he had ever found wine before. He drank deeply and, on nights with no patrons and no callers, he oft drank so deeply that darkness met unconsciousness and he would wake in his bed with a pounding headache. Wine was less an escape as it was… a passion of his. A pleasure; an addiction. But Mistress Ioa did not care, she knew what Nikali’s gift did, for never had she been so rich.
For years, they lived like this. Ahvani’s life, nor that of any of the other slaves, did not change. It was the same as when he was sixteen. Only Ahvani changed. But Mistress Ioa got greedy and Ravok is a dangerous place; though all places are dangerous places to jealously possess a slave bearing a Ranuri. Men and women spoke, and greed overwhelmed them.
It did not happen like he had heard in stories or wild men’s tales. Mistress Ioa was killed silently one night, her throat slit. Nor was it as simple as that when they found her. Everything exposed to her windpipe, blood soaked her dress, caked in black rivulets on her flesh. Ioa did not look as if she were asleep, or resting peaceful; she was retched. Ahvani vomited, and he heard other people wailing and the splash of those being sick. But as his vision came back into focus he realized the slaves were not numbered as fully as normal. Ystall? Ivan? Memoraea? Krissa? Where were they? Terror racked him and when the first slave bolted, so did he. Moving swiftly and deftly on his feet. His mistress was dead. Were they free? Was he? As he ran, his fingers brushed the inside of his hip. The Ranuri.
No. Never free.
These were not all Ahvani remembered of his early childhood in Nyka, though they represented most of them. His childhood there was a short-lived thing.
What he could be sure of, what he was mostly sure of, was that his name had been Ahvani and that he had been born on the 8th Day of Winter in 492. That much had been in his paperwork. He knew his last name—Ionio—came later, of that there was no question. Ionio was of Ravok and, in many ways, Ahvani Ionio had been born not in Nyka but in Ravok. Nyka was a distant memory but the interlacing canals, dark glamour, and chill beauty and sophistication of Ravok was where he came to be.
Of his memories of Nyka, Ahvani had trouble untangling memories that were actually his from those that his mistress told him. Perhaps, there was no difference. If not in image, Ahvani remembered his father in a kaleidoscope of sensory memories: the strength of his arms, the smell of his skin, the tenor of his laugh and the shadows of the deep creases that tightened his eyes and mouth. Ahvani remembered his older sister and brother and of his mother, he remembered very little other than he bore her resemblance. She had died when he was still quite young. Reflecting back on it now, Ahvani thought a poorly placed babe and troubled delivery had claimed both his mother and young sibling. Monks in brown robes, stories of Alvina, warm hearth stones, and the pangs of an empty stomach numbered in what little Ahvani recalled of his first few years of life.
For he was only five years old when Mistress Ioa purchased Ahvani from his father. Because he was loved the least and times were hard enough without so many mouths to feed, or so his Mistress said. Ahvani had no reason to doubt her. A stately woman imperiously dressed and elegantly coiffed, Mistress Ioa was not a beauty but she was shrewd, calculating, and ruthless when it came to coin. Avarice maybe her sin, but lust, gluttony, and pride were her business.
The journey to Ravok was also something Ahvani remembered very little of other than he wore a tightly fitted metal collar around his neck that connected him by clinking chain to Mistress Ioa. In all the years since, Ahvani has never left Ravok and has not made that long journey across the lake again. Like all memories, the one that stood out was the one that came soon after he was brought to Ravok: the day he was marked as a slave. That day, among all days of his early years, he could recall in vivid, painful detail: the way the Ravosala pilot dipped his long, guiding pole into the cool waters of the canal; the smell of the air as it blew through the tangled dark curls atop his head, bearing the dank smells of water and city; and finally the searing, burning, retching pain of the flame-hot brand pressing into the tender and child-soft flesh on the back of his left hand. Then it had been a painful, angry wound but over the years it had settled into a black half-moon, marking him forever as a slave in Ravok.
The smell of searing flesh—his searing flesh—was still a vivid memory in his mind.
The years after that were not as full of darkness as one might image a slave’s life to be. He was not purchased to be a laborer, but for his beauty. He was to be an entertainer but due to his youth—and perhaps Mistress Ioa’s own cold, pragmatic negotiating skills—he had been fetched for a remarkably fair price. The training, though, and the expectations were high. Tenderness and patient were neither quality that described his mistress nor traits she had any patience with. She owned a handful of slaves and there was a strict hierarchy they maintained: and the younger children were at the bottom. They were all slaves, but those that danced, those that earned money, were the ones that Ioa was likely to turn a blind eye to. To a degree, anyways.
Thus, Ahvani’s life changed and his memories of childhood were forever warped. No longer and never again to be a free child, Ahvani was an owned child. His days started early at enormous cook pots, making the food that was to feed his mistress and the rest of the slaves. And then he cleaned the tavern that Ioa owned and everyone worked in and the rooms above. While exhausting, for Ahvani and all the others, those were the easy tasks. When those were done then he trained to become the skilled entertainer his mistress had purchased him to become. This was grueling, painful, and, at times, cruel. With ropes and knotted cords, older slaves pulled and stretched his limbs in opposite directions and held them there until he nearly blacked out from the pain. All for flexibility’s sake, of course. Under the direction of the older slaves, Ahvani spent long nights leaping in the alley with heavy stones tied to him, or strung up by his wrists, forcing him to balance on the tips of his toes. And for every misdeed, for every time he did not push himself to the brink of consciousness, and for every whim, Mistres Ioa was prepared to punish him. And she had not become successful for no reason: she knew how to punish without leaving a mark; she new how to punish in ways that only the mind was left scarred.
Painful, aching, exhausting, strenuous, Ahvani’s was hardly a childhood at all, but it was his.
But, as the gods and all knew, humans were adaptable. They learned to take their situations and, for whatever god-forsake reason, they learned to live with them. Despite all the pain, despite the grueling hours learning to pirouette with an elegant grace and to tumble with toes pointed and limbs extended, despite the tasteless food and the nights of very little sleep, Ahvani found a saving grace: Krissa. Krissa,, a young girl a few years older than Ahvani, was acquired by Mistress Ioa only about a year after Ahvani. Light where he was dark, fair where he was cinnamon-kissed, Krissa was in everyway his opposite but with limited options and forced to share a bed every night, they became fast friends. In Krissa, Ahvani found the sister he had lost, the friend he had never had, and, surprisingly, a mother figure. For Krissa, Ahvani offered the same. During the long days, they suffered their training and chores and at night they held each other in bed, smothering cries, and smoothing hair with as much tender as they could—it was the only tender they had.
As they grew and grew into themselves, it became clear that if Ahvani was a rare flower, then Krissa was a precious stone: a fire drop, opal, no, a cut diamond – brilliant and luminous. While Ahvani had that soft, yielding beauty of line and gentle form that was a pleasure to behold, Krissa was a devastating cacophony of sharp angles—a beauty that hurt and could be hurt. Krissa was the type of beauty that no poet would dare right about, for her type sunk ships and broke men.
At the age of sixteen, Ahvani’s training ended and he was ready to perform, entering the ranks of Mistress Ioa’s privileged slaves. If, as a child, he thought there lives were easier or better in any way, he was sorely mistaken and quickly disabused of any such notions. Broken toes from performing en pointe, aching limbs for night after night of dancing and acrobatics, and morning headaches from drinking too much wine – for Ioa liked her dancers to mingle after the dances, to drink with the patrons. Ahvani could not imagine why. While he drank the wine, life was good and full of unencumbered glee. But even the spell of wine fades and in its wake it leaves pain. Life returns after all respites. And his chores did not lessen. He still rose early to train, he still strained his body to stretch—he pulled Krissa’s limbs further and further as she did for him—and after the last patron left, all entertainer slaves cleaned the tavern.
Soon, though, Ahvani found out that dancing and drink pouring was not the only entertainment Mistress Ioa provided to her clientele. There were more reasons why she sought beautiful slaves.
It happened one night, later in his 16th year, on a night that he was dancing with Krissa. It was not a particularly complicated dance, as neither was yet very skilled at the dance. But it was a beautiful one. Light fingers intertwined with his slender, dark ones; neither Krissa nor Ahvani led this dance, but the lead seemed to pass from one to the other. Ahvani dropped his hands lower, resting them at the small of Krissa’s waist, and lifted her as she jumped—arms akimbo, legs elegantly bent, toes pointed—guiding her inertia into a gliding arch before setting her down. Now she clasped the small of his back and hand; Ahvani lifted onto his toes, his feet curved sharply at the arches, and leaned back until the audience swung into few.
Ahvani swallowed and almost fell, but Krissa caught his weight.
Eyes were staring back at him in a way he hand never known before: hungry, hunting, mean and gentle. They belonged to a human man, well into his middle years, with dark curls touched by the iron frost of grey. And strong – a mixture of fear and… somewhat else, too. With Krissa’s firm and strong guidance, Ahvani was able to finish he dance without much stumbling. At the conclusion, Mistress cast him one of those dark looks that promised being locked in a closet and a beating and nodded her head over to the man. Ahvani swallowed again. He was to entertain that man.
Filling a ceramic jug with dark red wine, Ahvani brought two cups and the jug over to the man’s table, who suddenly seemed disinterested. Silently, eyes down cast, Ahvani filled the man’s glass first and then his own, “I am Ahvani, please let me know how I may serve you.”
Taking the glass without looking at him, the man raised it to his lips, slowly, and took a full sip. Gently pulling it away, “I shall have you tonight, but for now, be silent.” Still not looking at Ahvani he barked another command in a voice that was brusque, hoarse, and deep. “Drink with me. Do not let my glass be empty.” And that was all he said. Ahvani refilled his glass again and again, drinking as well. At least twice, he had to refill the ceramic pitcher and with each trip his practiced gait lost somewhat of that dancer’s grace. He stumbled. His head swirled. His mouth was full of the taste of wine.
“Come.” With a singly syllable, the man, still nameless, cut into his thoughts. Wordlessly, soundlessly, Ahvani rose as did the man, who, with strong, large hands, gripped him firmly on his upper arm, half leading Ahvani half carrying him across the tavern. They paused at Mistress Ioa and the two exchanged murmured words and then they headed upstairs. Head reeling, feet stumbling, the nameless man guided him upstairs to a private guest room. It was a blur, both from the mind and because Ahvani’s mind was overwhelmed: clothes were stripped off, sliding to the floor in whispers of wool and linen; hands danced, circled, and touched; teeth, weight, lips, and tongue; and then the man pushed him to the bed.
An hour later it was all over and the man left. Ahvani grabbing his clothes made it to his own pallet. It was late.
Krissa was already there and wordlessly, for there were no words needed between them, Ahvani collapsed down beside her. Immediately, Krissa wound her armsa round his neck and pulled him to her. Not knowing what had happened, why it happened, Ahvani buried his face in her luminous, fair hair and was racked by silent tears. Between his tremors, though, he felt her cheeks were wet, as well. And she smelled of somewhat else. Of man, another person, and something further. Ahvani needed to explanation and offered none in return. The hours of the night seemed to fade by, melting into the darkness that only, finally, came to claim them in sleep.
Both were forever changed.
That, though, was the only change. Their lives did not change as much. During the mornings they trained, then they performed, and then, at least every few nights, they entertained. This was the real calling of Ioa’s tavern, which Ahvani now knew was a brothel. She paid the taxes to Ravok handsomely for the privilege, but she had an eye for buds that would bloom into breath-taking flowers. Ioa earned her money well. Men, women, young, old, rough, and gentle, all had a turn and all had a preference. Once the shock wore off, Ahvani was left with a dull numbness and a body that ached in places he had never known existed. For the most part, Krissa and Ahvani never discussed it but one night Krissa came to their shared pallet later than him, her face puffy and welts rippling across her back. Ahvani’s heart broke and he traced them delicately with the tips of his fingers. Krissa trembled but pressed a hand to his mouth before he could talk, “Do not think of it Ahvani. Some people have sharper tastes. I can give as good as I get.”
Ahvani was not sure what she meant, but he made to comment.
While Krissa seemed resigned, perhaps even inclined to their life, Ahvani was not. His body ached, his feet were tender and sore, his eyes were weary from lack of sleep, too much wine, and a mind full of worry. By day he danced, by dusk he tumbled, and by night he cried silently until he fell asleep, wordlessly cursing the black crescent moon on his hand. Ahvani, too, prayed, but his words fell deafly or mutely on the gods’ ears. Rhysol, The Father, made to intervention and The Mother of Ravok must deem it well, good, and just, for Ahvani knew his plight was not singular in Ravok. Nysel granted him as many boons with pleasant dreams as he did nightmares that made him wake soaked through with terror and trembling. Sivah must not be able to hear him and Deddra’s wine allowed him escape, but only for a moment. The older slaves told him, some with scorn others blandly with boredom, that his prayers were best directed at Nikali. His Djed was hers, in her hands, and his only hope for respite. Not, though, for escape. And so, thusly, every night, every day, he prayed to Nikali.
Slim on the point of being too slender, aching from his head to his toes, and still smelling of his evening’s patron, Ahvani collapsed onto his bed in tears. Krissa had not yet returned. Laying there, dark grey eyes rimmed with red and stained with tears, Ahvani froze as he heard the door open and close quietly. Blinking, he could make out a silhouette of a person—a woman—making her way to his bed. “Krissa?” He asked hoarsely, breathlessly, knowing that it was not Krissa. The woman, though, made no comment and climbed languidly into his bed;her movements were as elegant and as fluid as silk whispering along polished stone but her touch was as sensuous and warm—no, hot!—as nothing he had ever felt before. He seemed to melt in this touch that was all too feminine, all too human, all too something he had never felt before. Reaching up in the dark, Ahvani found her face and lightly rested his finger tips on it. She wore a mask he could not see in the dark.
And then, she kissed him and Ahvani kissed her back. As if jolted, burned, saved, and killed all in a moment, the kiss was a moment of pleasure he had never known could be had in the flesh. His shoulders shook and he pulled himself closer to the woman who was not a woman but also all together too woman and she acquiesced, her sensual touch trailing down to his hips, her fingers curving around. Breaking away, the woman withdrew.
Nikali. It was Her. Suddenly, wrapped in divine terror and rapture, Ahvani knew. Not his goddess, but The Goddess that presided over him through pleasure and all its entanglements. It was Nikali and Ahvani knew.
Laughing, Nikali knew that he knew. Her subject. The room was full of her scent: of woman divine, of flowers, of heat, and of want. Overwhelming, suffocating, and intoxicating, Ahvani breathed deep and she spoke, her voice as commanding as naught he had heard before, as filling as honey and cake, as rich as wine, and leaden with want that he wanted and never had ever known before. “You are mine and thus I mark you. Find pleasure in what you do. You have served me well and served me poorly thus far.” With another laugh, Nikali silenced the protests Ahvani could not even yet bring to his lips, “Serve me well now – find pleasure in not being Ahvani for Ahvani, but Ahvani for others.” And then she rose, turning without looking back, and gleamed as if a moon in the darkness. Her beauty burned, it seared, and left him aching for more. But she left, as silently, as proudly as a queen, as she had entered. Ahvani was left shaking, shaking, crying, trembling, laughing, and sliding his hands where her hands had touched him. He was not sure when sleep came, but suddenly moring came.
And again as before, Ahvani was changed. Changed for the better.
The wine stain mark shaped in a chain that graced his dusky cinnamon flesh just right of his pubic region did not escape the notice of the other slaves. The Ranuri. Nikali’s Blessing. Mistress Ioa learned of it soon, too, and smiled with delight. A smile from her was worth a season of nightmares in an of itself, but strangely, Ahvani felt glee. He shared the pleasure of hisMistress, his lovely, mortal mistress. He wished to please her, to serve her. Never before had he danced so well, never before had the aches, throbs, and movements brought him such pleasure. And the brothel’s patrons swelled. He ached to please, he did things he had never done before, had not known to do before, with authentic pleasure. Toes curled, gods’ names called out, nails clawed flesh, and Ioa’s coffers filled. And, Ahvani knew, for the first time since Nyka, pleasure.
It did not come without a price. Krissa noticed it more than Ahvani. Increasingly, he ceased to be Ahvani for Ahvani’s sake, but became Ioa’s best slave. People were drawn to him, Krissa, as well. His fingers knew where to touch, his wrists ached to fill wine glasses, he lived to serve and through serving he found pleasure. But Ahvani found other things. He found wine harder than he had ever found wine before. He drank deeply and, on nights with no patrons and no callers, he oft drank so deeply that darkness met unconsciousness and he would wake in his bed with a pounding headache. Wine was less an escape as it was… a passion of his. A pleasure; an addiction. But Mistress Ioa did not care, she knew what Nikali’s gift did, for never had she been so rich.
For years, they lived like this. Ahvani’s life, nor that of any of the other slaves, did not change. It was the same as when he was sixteen. Only Ahvani changed. But Mistress Ioa got greedy and Ravok is a dangerous place; though all places are dangerous places to jealously possess a slave bearing a Ranuri. Men and women spoke, and greed overwhelmed them.
It did not happen like he had heard in stories or wild men’s tales. Mistress Ioa was killed silently one night, her throat slit. Nor was it as simple as that when they found her. Everything exposed to her windpipe, blood soaked her dress, caked in black rivulets on her flesh. Ioa did not look as if she were asleep, or resting peaceful; she was retched. Ahvani vomited, and he heard other people wailing and the splash of those being sick. But as his vision came back into focus he realized the slaves were not numbered as fully as normal. Ystall? Ivan? Memoraea? Krissa? Where were they? Terror racked him and when the first slave bolted, so did he. Moving swiftly and deftly on his feet. His mistress was dead. Were they free? Was he? As he ran, his fingers brushed the inside of his hip. The Ranuri.
No. Never free.
Language
Fluent Language: Common
Basic: Fratava
Poor: Vani
Basic: Fratava
Poor: Vani
Skills
| Skill | EXP | Total | Proficiency |
| Dance | +10 SP, +15 RB | 25 | Competent |
| Seduction | +15 SP | 10 | Novice |
| Flexibility | +10 SP | 10 | Novice |
| Acrobatics | +10 SP | 10 | Novice |
| Massage | +5 SP | 5 | Novice |
Lores
- Pleasure Points of the Human Anatomy
- Religion: Nikali
Gnosis
Gnosis of Nikali: Ranuri
"A person marked by Nikali is granted the first level of Ranuri. This gnosis gives them a unique appeal or allure that people (of either sex) are drawn to inexplicably. They tend to be trusted more easily than others would be. People find them good listeners, while they have the ability to pick out the actual ‘trouble’ when someone confides a problem to them. Their gift, Ranuri, allows them to have a sense what the other person needs are regardless of what sort of need it is. This can be something as simple as a few hours of helping an elderly woman plant her spring flowers to knowing exactly what a partner’s preference is in a physical relationship. Above that, they can augment the pleasure a person feels in preforming a needed task, be it the same planting or mutual physical contact. Ranuri have a knack for being excellent salesmen because they tend to know immediately upon a handshake what a customer is looking for (whether the customer knows it or not). And they have a knack for making mutually profitable trades and arrangements of all kinds. At this level, Ranuri only works when the mark bearer is in direct contact (as in touching skin to skin) with the person who’s needs they seek to know. Casual contact, such as being brushed accidentally in a crowded market can be agony to a Ranuri because they are hit with wave upon wave of needs they feel compelled to preform. A Ranuri can resist these urges, but it takes a strong mental capacity. A Ranuri who is marked is restricted to providing for the needs of one individual at a time."
"A person marked by Nikali is granted the first level of Ranuri. This gnosis gives them a unique appeal or allure that people (of either sex) are drawn to inexplicably. They tend to be trusted more easily than others would be. People find them good listeners, while they have the ability to pick out the actual ‘trouble’ when someone confides a problem to them. Their gift, Ranuri, allows them to have a sense what the other person needs are regardless of what sort of need it is. This can be something as simple as a few hours of helping an elderly woman plant her spring flowers to knowing exactly what a partner’s preference is in a physical relationship. Above that, they can augment the pleasure a person feels in preforming a needed task, be it the same planting or mutual physical contact. Ranuri have a knack for being excellent salesmen because they tend to know immediately upon a handshake what a customer is looking for (whether the customer knows it or not). And they have a knack for making mutually profitable trades and arrangements of all kinds. At this level, Ranuri only works when the mark bearer is in direct contact (as in touching skin to skin) with the person who’s needs they seek to know. Casual contact, such as being brushed accidentally in a crowded market can be agony to a Ranuri because they are hit with wave upon wave of needs they feel compelled to preform. A Ranuri can resist these urges, but it takes a strong mental capacity. A Ranuri who is marked is restricted to providing for the needs of one individual at a time."
- Mark One: Starting Package -- Approval
Possessions
- Set of Clothing:
- Flaxen Shirt
- Flaxen Pants
- Simple Undergarments
- Flaxen Cloak or Coat
- Simple Boots
Heirloom: None.
Housing
Ahvani does not own a house or tent.
Ledger
| Occurence | Cost | Total |
| Starting | +0 GM | 0 GM |
Thread List
None yet.
