"That has to do with my dick," he retorted coarsely.
The door sprang inward with a good, firm kick. Skandra didn't know what to expect on the other side. He certainly hadn't thought he'd be interrupting a strategy session among six or seven Immortals. They were all there, in their varied clothes - one had the square-cut collar of a lord on his green wool coat, while another wore tattered burlap rags beneath an overcoat in slightly better condition. Their faces were all muddied. And to a man they were hats, of varying shapes and sizes. Yet it was the hat which mirrored Skandra's own that caught his eye. Gershul's eyes always gave him away. There was malevolence in those eyes which could not be believed. Skandra had no trouble believing it, and yet.
And yet.
"You finally came," Gershul laughed abruptly.
The room looked to be a receiving area, which was an oddity on the second level of any structure. A ball room, perhaps? This was no ordinary manor. All of the furniture had been cleared away. Only chipped marble floors coated with a thin layer of that silver dust from below, columns half-removed and with their metal wire frames exposed, and windows that were either shattered or cracked. Everything held a gray light here that Skandra did not recognize. It was artificial, whatever it was, as the sun - suns? - had long since made their departure. Yet he could still see it, on the far wall, beneath one of several banners still hanging in the hall. One of them looked like an emblem he'd seen before. Astarii?
The thing that he saw was a collection of moving pieces so jumbled and strange that he dared not credit it. They'd had something like that in Illos, once, and he didn't think he was going to miss much if he didn't get to toy with it. Wheels were turning, which in turn was pulling chain belts. These operated valves which were letting steam escape from long metal tubes arranged in a circle at the top. Front and center was a bubbling vat of liquid - red, he thought - being held up by a pair of twin beams. Skandra was willing to bet that this was the machine.
His eyes could not tear themselves away.
"You've got a lot to answer for," Skandra replied quietly.
"And you intend to ask?" Gershul's eyes moved from Skandra, to Aeotha; it was the only part of his body that moved despite the distance between them. "With whom? Her?"