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Tweak says, "watch your language >:["

Skandra Tyullis (roll_the_bones) wrote in adusta,
@ 2010-09-15 15:54:00

Entry tags:

aeotha easaahae, singularity, skandra tyullis

prettiest little piece of nothing (aeotha)
Of course, talking and climbing proved a very difficult mix. Especially when the climb was sheer, with little in the way of handholds, and part of him worried that they were simply going to slide back down to the bottom of the basin. There was no reason to think that something like this occurred naturally any longer - Skandra doubted such precision could be achieved by nature, even if nature intended it that way. By the time they reached the top of the thing, his hands felt as tired and creaky as the rest of him. Dust covered him from head to toe, he was certain that he was bleeding in several places beneath his clothes, and the stench of... something he didn't recognize... was clinging to his every inch of skin. If this was an adventure, he wanted to go back to a tavern, where at least he knew all the smells and he had his choice of women. Aeotha was like a canker, lanced and bleeding him dry.

Of course, that wasn't really true.

Thinking of her that way helped.

What revealed itself at the top of the bowl, with those gray shapes now both closer and farther away, was something he hadn't thought possible. The landscape spreading out before them was an endless sea of silver-white dirt. It clung to his boots as much as the stone of a moment gone had. A fine, powdery dust. Almost like the fine flour they'd used in a bakery which he'd stolen from as a child. Skandra did not take his eyes from the sights unfolding before him, even as he sat on his heels to gather this dirt into a fist. Didn't feel like dirt. Or sand. Something else. But it was heavy, in a way he might not have credited had he not tried to pick some up. Didn't easily clear from his gloves. The Immortal stood up, and gave it a sharp kick. No cloud, as there should have been. It stirred beneath the toe of his boot. Only just so, and a great deal of that only clung to his boot.

Further away from the bowl, where he might have expected nothing, was a collection of tall glittering spikes that rose into the sky. Now that they were out of that place he could see quite clearly a sky of orange and pink and red bleeding together in bands of color. Beyond those, another body in the sky, seeming almost a moon. Only the body itself was blue, and difficult to make out among the faded light of the sky. Sunset on another world. He doubted he'd ever see it again, and yet here he was, peering at what seemed to be a massive collection of ... oddities, centered in one particular group of spikes.

Each spike was rounded, looking almost like fangs instead of towers, but they were polished to a mirror shine. If there had been more light, Skandra thought he might have been blinded by them. And a glance over his shoulder told him that the gray clouds still hovered over that bowl, where the gray shapes apparently made their home. Aeotha was already walking - she could probably see better than he - and her face was full of horror. Skandra could imagine. He had to jog to catch up to her, that fine dirt shifting dangerously beneath each plant of his boot. When he did, a part of him wished that he hadn't - they were close enough to see better what was happening here. And Skandra did not imagine that it was a good thing.

Pieces of Elvish village were clinging to the sides of these magnificent, alien things. Patches of Caeleste's fine earth were lodged inexplicably in that silver dirt. Skandra could see the closest patch of it from here. Brown dirt, clods of it upturned. Good green grass. He'd been gone only a short time and it looked beautiful to him. Maybe half an acre, maybe less. And unlike many of the other patches that Skandra could see, this one had a house on it. The sort of fine cottage that you expected to see in the country. Wooden exterior, whitewashed, cloudy glass windows. Thatched roof. Stone steps. He hesitated on the verge of it, before he looked again to the sky. There was something nagging at him about it, and about this place, but they weren't going to find the answers just standing around.

"Who are you?" a voice shouted from the house. "Name yourself, you curs, or die!"

It was Elvish that the voice was shouting in. A woman. Yet for a moment, the Immortal's attention was still beyond this lone house and to the prison seemingly formed by those spikes. They were not evenly spread. Maybe that was what grass looked like to ants, he thought, towers to be climbed only at great peril. Those buildings were sticking to the sides of the spikes, but more often than not he could catch glimpses of them down below, at the base of the spikes. Stopping at this house was probably a good idea, but part of him wanted to press on. It was only a few hundred yards away. And the spires looked plenty inviting to someone who suddenly didn't mind this sense of adventure.

"Her Holiness Aeotha Easaahae," Skandra jerked his thumb at Aeotha, and spoke before she could. "Skandra Tyullis. Who the hell are you?"

"That is none of your business, strangers!" the voice called back. "Begone from here, or I'll-"

"What?" Skandra took one long, aggressive step forward. "You'll fucking what!"

The snap of a crossbow and a curse right on its heels. Only quick hands allowed him to snatch it out of the air. Quick hands, and a desire not to see Aeotha's pretty face ruined by a quarrel from a crossbow. As it turned out, Skandra had two hands, and the second was pointing the Vel in the direction of the house. But now the elves came pouring out of it, weeping and crying and clinging to each other while they collapsed at Aeotha's feet. Plainly dressed. A woman, and two small children. They might have been eighty. Skandra made himself laugh with that one, so he took a moment to congratulate himself on it.

"I'm so sorry," the woman was whispering feverishly against Aeotha's legs, which she was hugging with all her might. "I've never used one before, and..."

"Pretty good aim for a first timer," Skandra used his heel to push the elf away from Aeotha.

With a hard sigh, the bedraggled woman sat on the grass with legs folded beneath her. One child was clinging to either arm, looking up at Skandra with fear in their eyes. Not that the Immortal blamed them. The quarrel he'd cast aside, but the Vel was still clutched in his fist, and he was still considering using it. Who knew what the hell was going on here or why? They might look tired and hungry, but they might be dangerous creatures wearing the skins of elves. After a few wild nights and a job or two with Leironuoth, Skandra didn't trust anything he heard and only half of what he saw.

A good policy.

"What do you want to do with 'em?" Skandra asked her, instead of immediately shooting as he'd planned.

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the_holy_path
2010-09-15 09:47 pm UTC (link)

Aeotha barely had time to breath before Skandra snatched the quarrel out of the air, Aeotha finished that gasp and one lone tear ran down her cheek before the footfalls and sudden arms of a woman were slung around her legs. Aeotha wavered there for a moment, face pale, mouth dry, and eyes wide. It had happened so fast. Her hands came down instinctively and both hands rested on the woman's head even as she sat down. Out of Aeotha's mouth came a strangled sort of prayer, one that seemed to calm the children as much as the woman there. But the ease was only there for a moment, all of them were still frightened when she finished because Skandra was asking her what she wanted to do with them.

"You're already forgiven."

Aeotha didn't know what she wanted to do with any of this. Were they real? The elven woman felt real enough, Aeotha dropped down to her knees there in front of them and reached out a hand to reach child. She set her hands on their shoulders and looked the woman in the eye. She could not tell the difference, but she did not know this woman so it could not simply be her imagination playing tricks on her. For one brief moment Aeotha had thought it was her mother and her two brothers when they were so young. One moment. They were not them.

They didn't even look remotely like them.

"I want to help you." She whispered, her eyes shining then. She hadn't known what she'd find here, or if everyone would be dead. But here, they were alive. Three of them. Two of them children. Aeotha thought of unshouldering her pack and giving them all the contents, but she could not move. They could not be figments of her imagination.

"But I need to know what happened to your village. To your home.. and how long you've been here. What have you seen?" She chose her words carefully. She did not want to ask how many were dead, or dying. Such thoughts could be so jarring and could keep one from speaking for weeks. "And your names.. I'd like to know your names."

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roll_the_bones
2010-09-16 02:00 am UTC (link)

The words came out of Aeotha as if dragged, but they did provoke at least one reaction in Skandra. The Vel was shoved back into place on his belt, hiding in the small of his back and under that black coat of his. It seemed strange that they would still be here, and still hiding in the house, when another body had been found. It was a man, wasn't it? What if that had been... Skandra swallowed hard. Easy to be glib and also to think about the wonders of the world, but now that he was thinking about it, it seemed like all of the nightmares this family could have conjured had been rolled into one and visited upon them. Skandra grimaced over his shoulder, toward the bowl, where no doubt the dead body was soon to be eaten by mouthless, eyeless creatures that floated in the sky. If that's what they were.

His skin was starting to crawl.

"I am Eavra," the lady elf whispered. "My children are Duca and Luca. I do not know what happened, priestess. There was a man - a beggar - and it has been hard since my husband died - and the man knew much about a great many things, and I thought... I let him stay with me, m'lady, and - it has been hard since my husband died - and he had money, though I don't know where a beggar obtained money. He was a tinkerer by trade - his smile was so lovely - and I thought that it would be all right to let him tinker-"

"Tinker," Skandra said harshly. "With what?"

"N-n-nothing especial, my lord," and her eyes rolled hard to look at him; she was still pointed directly at Aeotha. "M-my lord, please believe, if I had known-"

"Don't call me that," the Immortal snapped. "Who was he? What was he tinkering with?"

"He gave his name as K-K-Kay. Potions and powders, in the main, my lord," she was gathering herself quickly, but the telling of her tale was still a chore. "He had a great many small fires burning, controlled fires, and the smells were delightful. Strange and delightful. He would set me in his lap while he worked, and tickle my chin, and - it has been hard since my husband died, my lord."

Skandra was barely listening to her. The red of her cheeks did not register as it should. There was only one feeling rising in his throat. A further dread. No, that, and anger. Pure anger of the sort he could not control. Skandra wanted the Vel in his hand once again, in case the story was true, but how could it not be true? An alchemist had visited her. This was done with alchemy, wasn't it? There was no other explanation he could immediately credit. And while it was possible, it betrayed every notion of what Skandra thought one could do with potions and powders and the like. What was the theory behind opening such a doorway? And who-

"What," Skandra dropped to his heels, very close to her face, his voice low. "Did he look like?"

"L-l-like you, but older, m'lord," she stammered. "Eyes like yours, m'lord, but k-k-k-kinde..."

"Shantar," Aeotha's gasp was small, but audible. "She's talking about Shantar."

"No," Skandra retorted immediately, his voice still low. "No, she is not."

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the_holy_path
2010-09-16 02:41 am UTC (link)

Aeotha thought she already knew this story before the woman even got to the bottom of it with them. An Alchemist had come, a kind one, and the woman being so lost without her husband had taken him into her home without thinking. There was a time in Aeotha's life where such a thing could have happened should she have stopped walking for longer than a week or two. She never stayed anywhere long, but there had been a kind face here and there that would have eagerly welcomed her in for however long Aeotha wished. Her mouth twisted and she looked at Skandra when the woman began to describe the man to him.

Her first guess was Shantar. An eager, hopeful one, even. If it wasn't Shantar, and it wasn't Skandra, that only left one person that Aeotha knew about. Her finger slid off the children's arms and she stood up quickly. She was standing awkwardly, almost completely on her toes and looking, searching for the immortal that certainly couldn't have been here. Poised and almost ready to strike out at the very idea that.. that the man could be here. Could have been here, at all.

No. It certainly couldn't have been..

When she looked down, Skandra was looking at the woman still, and not at her. Aeotha let out a breath.

"She can't mean Gershul." Aeotha said it so softly, as if the name itself would draw the man to them.

Aeotha searched her mind for what she knew about the man. She'd only heard stories. Had she ever actually set her eyes on him? She remembered Skandra telling her about his father, but not in any mystified son sort of way, it was that Skandra hated his father. Shantar almost always avoided obvious questions. She tried not to pry too much into their history, she liked them both too much. She loved Skandra too much to... upset him. More than she already did every time her temper got out of hand, or his. Aeotha was trying to think of someone else. Anyone else that reminded her of Skandra. But there were scarce few alchemists she knew. She knew two, personally, and one only by name. Alchemy was forbidden by the temples and Aeotha still felt..

She felt like she was walking with danger when she dealt with it too much. Amazing though it could be. Her entire life she'd been told it was unnatural.

"He wouldn't have.. No. No it's Shantar. It has to be Shantar. Much older, right? But kind, and.. strange." The woman was looking between them now. Aeotha was searching the ground, the sky, her eyes frantically darting around.

"Tell me!"

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roll_the_bones
2010-09-17 04:30 am UTC (link)

Skandra noticed what Aeotha did not, but only because he was looking for it and she was looking for a phantom. In the tangle of spires not far from here - those great silver obelisks reaching toward the sky - a cloud of dust had appeared. It didn't look like a cloud of dust one would see from horses. Which was why he knew that it had to be horses. The density and propensity of the fine silver-white dust they'd walked upon to get here would be flung into the air by nothing else that Skandra knew of and probably few things that he did. Someone must have seen visitors coming out of the bowl. Someone who was watching. If this was Gershul's doing, he would have been watching. Couldn't have interlopers ruining your plan.

"She means Gershul," Skandra answered the priestess. "Keep calm, and we might just live through this. Eavra, take your children and go inside."

There was no argument from the woman. She simply went, rushing along as fast as she could, her children weeping as quietly as they could while they followed. Too far away yet to see how many riders there were. Maybe four minutes, maybe five, before they arrived. Skandra stripped off his coat, revealing the collection of leather straps and harnesses that secured his knives to his body. The coat was flung to the ground. Next he took off his hat and dropped it on top of the coat. Last but not least the gloves were removed. Wadded together, deposited on his hat, freeing up his hands - which felt as though they'd been sweating inside of an actual dead cow. That old snap and creak of leather, too familiar to suit him, and yet somehow necessary.

At least there was a breeze.

The clasp and hitch on his side sword was undone. It hung loose and free at his waist, now. The Vel he moved from the small of his back to an oversized pouch of leather against his right shoulder. It nearly missed a good fit, but it would stay where it was until he needed it, and it was easier to draw and fire from the shoulder than the back. A shuffling of boots. Keep 'em on. And then he was ready, standing with his arms down at his sides.

"Be ready," Skandra warned her quietly. "They're gonna try and shoot first, but they'll come sideways and see if they can do it without a fight. I'm gonna try and get information out of them, Aeotha, but if that doesn't work I'm going to put them in the dirt. Good chance they're Immortals. Don't know if that means a fucking thing here or not. Don't know if alchemy works here or not. So keep that staff close, you hear?"

Two minutes.

The last time he'd felt this way had been... when? In the ruins of yet another city, staring down the creature that had brought him into this world. It was then Shantar had asked him, once again, what it meant to him that Gershul was still alive. What it meant to him that every time he'd confronted Gershul, the old man had nearly killed Skandra. It wasn't a question of pride. Better men than Gershul had left Skandra for dead. And it wasn't a question of weakness, either. It was a question of... Gershul didn't deserve to live, for the things he'd done. And Skandra wanted nothing more than to watch the old-timer die.

One and one half minutes.

Skandra's knuckles folded together, and cracked beneath the pressure.

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the_holy_path
2010-09-17 04:46 pm UTC (link)

Aeotha's mouth was incredibly dry. It was Gershul. The name itself was frightening, and not in the sort of way a man's name from myth was. He was as real as Skandra was, and Skandra had done some things with Alchemy that made Aeotha uncomfortable, she had no idea what to except from someone who did not seem to have limits. If he created this place, or the doorway to it, it meant he'd killed Uaine. He could have killed all of them. There were more dead, there had to be. No just Uaine and the elf they'd seen back there. There had to be more than that. An entire village. All the scouts. What about Shantar and Líobhan? She was trying to calm down, like he asked, but she felt as if she was made by taunt springs.. ready to snap at any moment.

It was without thought that she unstrapped her staff from her back and pulled it up against her side. He was discarding his gloves, his coat, his hat, and preparing for a fight. For the fight coming for them. Aeotha's mind felt absolutely blank. She had no idea what use she'd be in a fight against immortals. She'd only ever just struck Skandra with her staff, albeit less to actually harm him and more to dissuade him from doing foolish things. It didn't always work, but most of the time he stopped what he was doing at least to curse at her. But she could do worse to a man when she had reason to.

Her heart thudded to a stop when he told her to keep her staff close. It reminded her of..

He was ready for more than a fight. Aeotha had never seen him look as serious as this. It was because she was always beside him during a fight, or because she was always too busy being ready for the fight herself. He looked.. grim. He looked as though he could move a mountain with those eyes and in the same breath curse the heavens. She didn't feel nearly as confident, or look as intimidating.

She doubted she ever looked that intimidating. Maybe to a Drow, but certainly not to most people. She could do some amazing things with magic, but without the confidence in the magic even working she felt naked. She felt.. powerless in a way she hadn't felt in what could easily have been a lifetime. The last time she'd stood looking upon a battle which she was unsure if she could do anything about she'd been but a girl with a half-dead knight laying behind her recovering from his wounds. They still sang that song in the south of Astarii. Sang it in hopes that their daughters would grow to be as brave as that priestess or marry men like that knight.

Aeotha took a deep breath. There was only so much she could do against an immortal either way, her magic simply wouldn't have helped her in this, except for protection. She suddenly wished she had at least that.

"You don't think we could possibly try to talk this out..?" When he looked at her from the corner of his eye she found it in her to smile.

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roll_the_bones
2010-09-18 02:21 am UTC (link)

Skandra was not smiling.

There they were, all three of them, dusty fellows with ill intent atop stone-gray horses. They were dressed as oddly as a party of swordsmen had ever been dressed. Their apparent leader had a tattered undershirt, thick riding gloves, and a crossbow. His face was narrow and pinched. Surly, even. His two fellows had severe swords and severe brows, fat necks that rested upon broad shoulders. They were wearing coats, at least, though those coats were stained and unbuttoned. Sneering ensued; for a moment, Skandra wondered if they were going to sneer him to death. Blue eyes. The eyes always told the truth, even if nothing else did, and their eyes were just that sort of cruel.

"Evening," their leader said; the crossbow was settled against the pommel of his saddle, and pointed at Skandra.

"Is it?" Skandra retorted; he was getting an eyeful of that aged black wood.

One of the big fellows laughed. The laugh was short and bitter. Then there was silence and wind. No sound from a breeze, of course, just the whisper of it against your skin to let you know it was there. Skandra said nothing to follow the laugh. For her part, Aeotha was doing well to keep quiet. There was no information to get out of them. This was the decision that Skandra made. They wouldn't talk under pain of death. Maybe it was the look, and maybe not. Maybe it was just knowing what men - and Immortals - were like, working for his father. A man with a plan and resources to pay you for your trouble.

That was really all they cared about, wasn't it? The money. There was hypocrisy in that thought. He pushed it back, and away.

"This here is private property," the leader told them baldly, shifting the crossbow ever-so-slightly.

"And isn't it a pretty little piece of nothing," Skandra smiled thinly.

"The prettiest."

What happened next was fast. Fast enough that Skandra didn't try to follow what they were doing so much as what he expected them to do. The first knife took the crossbow-wielding embodiment of sneer in the throat. Still sneering, even in death, the fellow's weapon dipped. A terrible shriek came from the horse as it took a quarrel through the neck. One of the big men was reaching into his coat. The other charged forward, closer to Aeotha than to Skandra, with that vicious sword raised high. He was going to be Aeotha's problem. Skandra charged as the coat-reacher pulled a vial free.

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the_holy_path
2010-09-18 03:47 am UTC (link)

Aeotha's face was blank after the men were close enough to them to be fully seen. They all had blue eyes like Skandra did, but they were nothing like his at the same time. Only at first glance, Skandra had all the goodness in his, where theirs did not, as if they'd never laughed truly a day in their lives. Aeotha stood there watching, listening, and trying her best to stay calm. She could not use magic, it wouldn't do anything and none of them knew if it would work at all. It still made her feel naked, even more so now.

Skandra moved so fast she barely had time to see what he was doing before the man with the crossbow was dead. Aeotha jumped backwards because she was so startled by it, but it only took a second for her to gather her footing and twist her staff. The man with the sword was charging straight at her with his horse, sword held high in the air. Aeotha whipped the staff forward and crashed the end of it across the horse's face, it wasn't what she wanted to do, but when the beast reared back and threw off his rider, it had the effect she wanted.

Aeotha tore across the space as the man got up and his horse galloped aside. The sword and staff clashed together. He seemed surprised that her staff held up so well, and Aeotha was surprised she could still stand after her arm took the blunt shaking it just had. She had to leap backwards to miss the next strike and pivoted on one foot to bring her staff up and crashed it across his face with a wide swing. He staggered back and only howled in pain for a moment. Blood dotted the ground beneath them from his shattered nose. He brought his sword back and instead of crashing against her staff it slid down it and cut into her hand.

Aeotha moaned in pain, but bought her staff back again despite the biting pain in her hand. The man was laughing, laughing. Aeotha swung the staff over her head and clocked him across the head with it, once, twice, then three times. He doubled back and groaned at the pain of it.

"Not so funny now, are you?"

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roll_the_bones
2010-09-19 03:52 am UTC (link)

Skandra seized a handful of the reins and tugged, as hard as he could manage, throwing the rider off-balance. The man had a vial in his hand. A serious look was on his face, now, and panic was starting to take both horse and rider. The burly fellow atop the horse was giving commands with his heels, but Skandra was wildly countermanding them with the reins, and all the while fishing for a knife. He couldn't quite seem to pull one as he artfully avoided the stamping, manic hooves that were seeking only by proximity to crush him. Nor could the fellow on the horse get a firm grip on that vial.

When the horse broke away it flung Skandra to the ground, hard, forcing the air out of his chest. Must have knocked his ribs on a stone. A hard grunt escaped the Immortal's lips as he struggled to his feet, wheezing while his opponent laughed in triumph. The horse turned, the vial was held high. Red liquid with spots of orange, solid spots that did not seem to want to mix with the red. Skandra had never seen anything like it. Must have been alchemy, and that meant it must have been one of Gershul's creations. The bastard laughed again, and then threw it.

Skandra's hands closed not on a knife, but on the hat at his feet. A two-handed swing of the hat, sweeping it like a fan, rebounded the potion at the laughing burly bastard sitting atop his stupid horse. Shrill was the scream that erupted from the saddle when it broke upon his face.

Light seemed to be sucked out of the air around them; grass flattened in a wide circle around the man who sat atop his horse. Skandra could feel the force before it actually hit, but when it did, everything was knocked from its feet. One of the horses screamed, too, as its leg was simply snapped by the pressure. It felt as though some distant and ancient god had slapped his hand down upon the grass. Skandra, from his side, watched as the fireball consumed both horse and rider. Whatever that alchemy was, it was not meant to be pleasant, and it was not. Flesh and fabric were stripped away from the little Skandra could see of the fellow's body.

And as they wafted away on the wind, they were disintegrated.

Despite himself, Skandra laughed, wild and sinister as the light began to fade.

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the_holy_path
2010-09-19 07:50 am UTC (link)

Aeotha knew there was only so much she could do armed with only her staff, especially against a much stronger man armed with a sword. When he came at her again she slapped the staff against his hands and his sword fell into the grass. She whipped the staff around and met his temple with the brass capped end of her quarterstaff. He fell into the grass and was trying to gather himself when it happened. The light, the noise of it was enough to turn both of their heads. Aeotha's mouth fell open at the sight, and the man gave a yell. Both of them were pinned there watching, but once it was over it was Aeotha who moved first. She slapped the blade down again, even as the man tried to get to his feet. No time. Her hand was slick on the staff now, slicked with her own blood, but she had fought in worse conditions.

A terrible desert. The nightmares of the underdark. In the pouring rain on the hot plains. Blood didn't matter. It splattered across the grass when she swung this time, but instead of hitting him across the head again she brought it down and with one fluid butting action forward she slammed the end of it to his throat. The choked gasp was enough for her. She knocked him across the chest with it and down he went. Grasping his throat. It was vile. Aeotha turned to look at Skandra, who had been laughing when the light had faded. She turned again and brought the staff down hard against the man's throat, she couldn't listen to him choke and gasp for air that would never come again.

The snap was loud enough for all of them to hear, and then the man was silent there. Silent as the light faded from his blue eyes.

Aeotha tugged the arm of her robe down and over her hand and covered the wound. Blood was soaking through it now, but it would stop. The wound couldn't have been so deep. She backed away from the body, and turned to meet Skandra. Her face was drenched in sweat, and her staff had bloody hand prints all over it, but the deed was done. She used her own robes to start wiping the blood from the staff. The only possession she had that Eibhear had given her, at least, the only really important one.

"Are you hurt?"

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roll_the_bones
2010-09-19 08:10 pm UTC (link)

Skandra slapped all of his vital parts in quick succession, short angry things that were more a play to discover pain than anything else. The laughing had died down, now that he had a good look at the circle of scorched earth that remained behind. If it were possible, Skandra would have brought them back to life so that they could be killed again. Immortals, probably. Working for Gershul, definitely. And now that they knew Gershul was here, it seemed obvious that the Immortal had something to do with this. Either he'd caused it or he was taking advantage of it, and Skandra would not have put either one past his dear old father.

"No," Skandra rolled onto his stomach, and then pushed to his feet with a grunt. "Looks like he winged you."

There were three anxious faces peering out of a cloudy glass window. One was slightly larger than the other two, of course. He wanted to tell them that they were going to be all right. That in the end, this would fade as a memory to be replaced by something happier. Skandra couldn't do it, for the same reason that he couldn't wait to kill Gershul's followers. Instinct was a pure driving force. You answered when it called or you were relegated to the realm of reasoned persons, somewhere outside of this hell hole and probably growing crops. Skandra never wanted to take a single ear of corn to market.

It was a short walk to retrieve his knife. The fellow's eyes were still wide open. Hadn't had time to register what was happening. Skandra seized the hilt of the thing and yanked it out with a gout of blood to follow. There was nothing in Skandra's possession on which he wanted to clean the knife, so he dragged the naked steel along the fellow's shirt. Once, twice, three times. Bleeding was stopping quickly - no more heart to make it go. When he stood up straight, knife tucked safely into his sleeve, Skandra's foot came back. Elbows lifted. He delivered a vicious kick to the back of the dead man's head. The a second, and a third, until he was raining kicks down on the dead man's unprotected skull.

"Fuck!" he shouted. "Fuck, fuck, fuck!"

That never would have worked on Gershul.

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the_holy_path
2010-09-19 11:53 pm UTC (link)

"Yes.. he winged me." She whispered, she was trying to tear part of her sleeve off, and it took two good pulls before she had enough of it to tie around her wounded hand. It would do. She'd ask the woman if she had any bandages with her once she could move again. When she felt it was safe for any of them to go near each other again. She was looking again, just to make sure there was no one else coming when he shouted and she turned to see him kicking the corpse, over and over again. Aeotha dropped her staff and ran over to him. She grabbed onto his arm and tried to pull him away from the body.

"Skandra!" She shook her head fiercely. "He's already dead. I know. I know. It's.. It'll be fine. I'm sorry I brought you here, I am. I didn't mean for.. I didn't think it'd be this." She bit her lip and tried to think of something that might.. How would she have felt? If she'd been facing Eiron doing something like this. Skandra hated his father, even more than she thought she hated Lord Eiron'aith. She didn't think anything she could tell him would make this any easier. She didn't know what she would do if it were her, at all. Aeotha took a deep breath and caught him under the arm, got a good hold of his shirt and pulled herself against him.

"I'm sorry. I don't know.." Her body ached, she was tried. Her mind was full of too much. What if Gershul had Shantar? Or the Priestess? What if he was watching them, even now?

"Lets go inside. Maybe she knows where he went, or what he was.. maybe she has something he was working on?" Was there anything she could tell him? She was always running from her past as much as she was wishing it wasn't just her past. What did Skandra feel? How many times would he have to meet his father and see.. what he'd become. What he'd done to these people, to all of them?

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roll_the_bones
2010-09-20 02:09 pm UTC (link)

There was a fog behind every lash of his foot. Strange hands on his arm did not disturb him. There was something vicious about what he was doing, and how he was doing it, but that viciousness did not extend to Aeotha. Her face was a mixture of horror and pity. At first, he was eased somewhat by that. Until he realized that her pity belonged to him. She felt sorry for him. She was overcome with it, spreading across her face even while she talked. Go inside. Talk to the people. Maybe they knew something. She was afraid of him, afraid for him, and most of all afraid because of where they were. Wouldn't have brought him?

He was seething, sweat rolling into his eyes.

The gloves were the first thing he settled back into place. This was followed by his coat, with all of its folded creases and mended tears, as much a part of him as the fingers he valued so much. Skandra grimaced sourly at the sounds it made when it rasped against his neck. There was not a breath of chill in the air; not even a whisper of a frost to come. He felt cooler with the coat on, in any case.

"You wouldn't have brought me here?" Skandra spat. "What are you, my mother?"

If Gershul was here, if Gershul had something to do with all of this, then Skandra was going to find him and put an end to it. Nothing was going to stop Skandra this time. Not voices in his head, not memories of his mother, not even a strange sort of sympathy for the man who'd fathered him into this world. Gershul was going to die. Gershul had to die. This was going to be put right. If Aeotha understood, she would have said nothing. As it was, Skandra had to question whether or not she'd ever been confronted by something like this. She wasn't a fool. She was just naive, hopelessly naive.

His hat was tugged onto his head.

"Leave 'em here. We're going to find out where these fellows came from."

"Leave us?" came a shout from the door of the Elvish house. "You cannot leave us here! Please!"

"Come on," Skandra was grinding his teeth together. "This is about to get pathetic."

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the_holy_path
2010-09-20 07:12 pm UTC (link)

Aeotha stood there watching him as he pulled his gloves and then his coat. It felt like such things took a long time, when really it couldn't have been more than a minute or two, but she stood there watching him all the same. She wanted to.. how could she hope to understand what it was like when she'd only ever once faced her past in the face and there's been a Knight and the Champion of the Lion standing between her and revenge. Iluvatar and Leironuoth would never have allowed her to spill Eiron's blood on the day of Eibhear's funeral. No matter if her friend would have loved such a thing. Aeotha took a deep breath. She hadn't been back since then. Back to Astarii, yes, but back in Eiron's presence? He'd won. He had everything he wanted now. Eibhear was dead, Aeotha was out of the country. How many Knights were behind him now?

Was the King looking at him like a favored son? Like a friend? Aeotha bent down and collected her staff and her pack from the ground and settled both back where they belonged. She hesitated there looking between the house and Skandra.

"Skandra." She began, but he didn't want to hear her explanation, anymore than Aeotha wanted to explain what she meant to him. She didn't want to cause him harm, she had wanted to hit him before, and had, but not this kind of harm. Not the kind that felt like a fire in one's chest. You wanted to right the world when faced with something like this. She'd wanted to spill Eiron's blood on the ground and take down every one of his banners with her own bare hands. They would have murdered her, it would have caused a great shift between her friends, and between those that believed in Aeotha without knowing her. She was ready to die on that dark day.

That she might have been laid beside him was a cruel fantasy. They would have buried her beside her father, or somewhere in the darkness under a temple. If she'd actually managed to kill Eiron first then they would have left her somewhere to not be buried, or worse. There were worse things they could do.

Aeotha did not want him to feel that desire, or to run after it. She didn't know how she'd feel if she actually managed to get revenge for her friend, her father, and her brother, nor did she know how he'd feel if he killed his father.

Aeotha stared at the house, but then turned and moved to stand beside Skandra again. The part of her that wanted to take his arm was the quieter voice in her head now. She understood the desire. If there was a way to find Eiron, and a way to kill him, she would have gone after it without thinking. Still, Aeotha reached out briefly, before her hand fell back at her side. She closed her eyes and started walking when she heard him start walking. When she opened her eyes again she was determined not to look back at the house.

It was growing pathetic, and most of the time that was enough to turn Aeotha back. But she would not. She'd brought Skandra into this, and she'd see him through, somehow. With or without magic.

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