Fell is going to Fukeru Ukuure.
Feres is going to Darkling Dawn
Vaesai is standing at Lantessama.
And room it was. Tables and chairs were scattered about the stone room almost at random, and thick, plush rugs separated feet from cold stone.
The woman let go of the lamp and walked across the room, bare feet sinking silently into the thick rugs, to sink into a well padded chair with a sigh of content. Her platinum blond hair fell down her back in a long, straight cascade that easily reached past her thighs, and she tossed it all to one side before sitting. Milk white skin looked almost out of place in the room of warm, somewhat bright colors. Emerald eyes were the only spark of vibrant color on her, as even her clothes were pale, a pale sky blue in fact.
But her silent relaxation did not last long, as she knew it would not. Two pairs of footfalls on the stairs that lead down into her domain broke the relative silence.
“Vaesai? Are you there?”
The woman, Vaesai, smiled at the slightly tentative call, Fell always seemed to her so… childlike… so in need of protection, and yet she was a healer that none could rival, and she had faced down hundreds of angry men and women without flinching, “Yes, Fell, I am.”
The childlike healer trotted swiftly into the cozy den, shaking herself almost like a dog and sending drops of water scattering everywhere, “It’s raining out there!” she huffed, one hand running through her black diamond hair, combing it back into relative neatness, “It wasn’t raining before!”
Vaesai laughed, “Our weather does tend to be a bit odd out here. It comes from the Teeth being so close to us, I suppose.”
“Among other things.”
She looked up sharply at the odd voice, so much like Fell’s, yet at the same time so different. Its whispery, almost echoing quality sent chills up and down her back, and made her sure that, whatever the speaker looked like, he couldn’t be human.
“What do you mean by that?” Vaesai made herself speak, as her eyes scanned the shadows of the stairs, searching for who had spoken.
The man that emerged from the darkness, like a legendary demon, made her frown at the… -wrongness- about him. He moved like nothing real, with a simple, understated grace that at once drew the eye and turned it aside. And with hair like that… so brilliantly crystalline bright, and of a color that should have turned the shadows aside… there was no way that he could have hidden so well in the shadows.
And yet he had.
“I mean,” his voice was still whispery soft, and the sense of barely-heard echoes nagged at her mind, “that there is more to this city than meets the eye.”
“Hmm? Oh!” Fell glanced up from attempting to wring her clothes dry while they were on her, “Sorry, Vaesai, I should have said. This is my brother, Feres.”
“A… pleasure to meet you,” Vaesai inclined her head slightly to the tall Feres, “I did not know that Fell had any siblings.”
Feres shrugged, “It’s not your fault. Not many suspect us of being related, much less siblings.”
A frown flickered across Vaesai’s face, yet she smoothed it out almost before it had appeared, “Forgive me for being an ungracious host,” she spoke as she rose, a flick of a pale hand sending her platinum blond hair cascading down her back once more, “Let me show you to some rooms, so that you two can get dried off and change clothes if you wish.”
Fell grinned, “Thanks, Vaes! I honestly didn’t mean to be out in the rain like that, but I wasn’t expecting it to start so suddenly.”
Vaesai smiled gently as she turned, picking up a lantern as she did and lighting it swiftly, “Come, follow me.”
Fell trotted up next to Vaesai, while her brother trailed behind them in silence. With a small gesture, Vaesai indicated two rooms, one on either side of the corridor, “You may use these for now. Fell, your clothes are in the bottom drawer,” Blue eyes flickered over to look Feres over once more, “As for you… I’m not sure I have anything that will be long enough for your legs, but let me see what I can find.”
Feres nodded, “Don’t worry if you cannot, lady Vaesai. I have worn clothes that don’t fit perfectly before.”
She nodded in thought, pausing only long enough to see them both enter the rooms she had indicated, before she swept off deeper into the complex, lost in mentally listing what she did and did not have.
________________________________________________________________________________________________
Selesst pulled the hood of his cloak down farther over his face as he strode, unconcerned, through the mostly empty streets. It wasn’t quite noon yet, and still the rain came down steadily, as if it would never let up until everything was washed clean. Far off in the distance, the mournful sound of a lone flute drifted up, the dirge-like quality of the notes tempting him to turn aside and see who it was playing, and why.
And so, he hesitated for a second at a corner, before altering his course and following the sound. Winding streets grew progressively more disused looking as he walked, until the paving bricks were buckled and dislodged, with weeds growing up between them. Selesst frowned slightly, as he slowed yet more, sensing that his goal was close.
And it was. The disused plaza that he stepped into was filled almost to the brim with people, some standing, some sitting, some leaning, yet all silent and intent on the lone man that sat upon a massive stone block in the very center of the plaza, flute to his lips. It was from him that the music came, this lone, black clothed man that seemed unconcerned about those that watched him.
Silver eyes switched from the man to the ghostly image that lay behind him. A tree, seemingly growing out of the solid rock, yet it shimmered and flickered, and a single loose feather drifted through it without resistance, though the man’s cloak seemed to touch the tree as if it was real, and moved to a wind that none could feel..
But that wasn’t what had drawn his eyes. It was the body.
Selesst bit back a curse as he finally managed to focus on the ghostly image to the point where he could make out the details. Small, delicate, yet beautiful all the same, the child-like woman hung from a noose, swaying gently in a breeze that none could feel. Her eyes were closed, face peaceful, almost triumphant, despite the obvious slow end that she had met.
Feather. By all the gods, it’s Feather! How many others here can see this ghost from the distant past? How many know what it means? Here died one of the most famous assassins of the Guild, here marked the starting point of our prosecution, of the division in the Guilds.
Here began a civil war between what should have been family… I wonder if she knew how many events were triggered because of her, and how she made a mockery of numerous sorcerers by casting her powers away from her right before her death, binding them to her true friend so that no sorcerer could get a hold of them.
I wonder… Selesst pulled his eyes away from the ghostly body, to look back at the man once more. This time, though, silver eyes met glowing aquamarine, and the feeling of time pressed heavily upon Selesst’s mind. Slowly, without interrupting his playing in the slightest, the man nodded once, before his eyes slid closed and he withdrew into his own world once more.
A shiver slid down his back. He knew the implications of that nod, and didn’t even pause to consider how the other could have known his thoughts.
Some things required no explanation.
Turning sharply on his heel, he strode back the way he had come, intent on doing what he had ventured out for.
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Vaesai leaned back in her chair, watching Fell in silence as the other woman walked back into the sitting room and flopped down into a chair.
“There will be another, soon.”
Fell glanced up, frowning, “Who?”
“One I know. He won’t bother you, Fell, nor your brother.” Vaesai’s head turned to the side, her eyes focused on the stairs that led up to the entrance, “Come, Selesst, you know you need not be afraid of surprising me.”
“Maybe not you, Vaesai, but your company?” Selesst smiled faintly as he shed his cloak and hung it upon a hook, before walking further into the room and taking a seat in another chair, “Besides, you know I do not like dropping formality so completely.”
She smiled, “You should learn to adapt, Selesst, not everyone enjoys formality, you know.”
Fell eyed the newcomer out of the corner of her eye, wanting to feel wary around this man that spoke with a faint accent, yet she could not. His face was lined faintly, but the lines were of laughter and smiling, not frowning, even though his odd silver eyes reflected an almost disturbing, core-deep sadness.
::He is god-touched, my sister. See his hair? See his eyes? I do not know where he comes from, but he’s god-touched.::
::Like us?::
The feeling that she received was one of faint amusement, intertwined with a strong negative, ::No, little one, not like us. Don’t believe the bull that the elders of our people teach, we are no more god-touched than Velst is an honest, upright man. We are sorcerer-touched, sorcerer-created… no more natural than those mage-beasts in the legends.::
::But we look so similar!::
Feres calmly walked into the common room and took a seat next to Fell, listening with half an ear as Selesst and Vaesai spoke, ::Similar in appearance, perhaps, but not any more than that. He is human, little sister, deeply, purely human in his core, no matter how god-touched he is, that is all he is, touched, not molded. His life will be longer than that of a normal human, of course, but not as long as our lives.::
Fell sighed softly, but nodded as one of her hands came up to rub at her temple. The effort of mindspeaking even someone as closely related as her brother was tremendous… sometimes she wondered if there was anything wrong with her. Others of the clan could do it so easily, especially her brother…
With a jerk, her attention snapped back to what Selesst and Vaesai were speaking about, her attention caught and held by their topic.
“Vaesai, if I may ask… do you know anything about that man that is playing in an old plaza today?”
“Yes,” she ran a hand absently through a few strands of her hair, before her fingers began to braid and unbraid a few inches of hair, “He’s known as the Piper around here… there are numerous legends and the like that circulate about his past and who, exactly, he is, but I doubt any of them are true. Suffice to say that he’s always in that plaza on this day, and never once takes a break from sunup till sundown.”
“I see…” Selesst’s eyes grew distant for a minute, before he shrugged, “Well, that is neither here nor there. My lord has given me several days off, and I wish to return to my home. So, if I may…” he rose, bowing to her slightly, “I do remember the way, Vaesai,” a smile, “Unless, of course, you moved everything on me?”
“No, no,” she smiled as well, “I did not touch any of your things, Selesst.”
He laughed softly, “Unlike the last time.”
To her indignant, and rather unladylike, snort, he merely flashed her another smile, before wending his way through the common room and down the corridor, not even bothering to take a lantern with him.
Vaesai leaned back in her chair with a sigh, shaking her head as she did.
“What was that about?” Fell glanced from Vaesai to where Selesst had vanished.
“Nothing you should concern yourself with, Fell,” Vaesai smiled to take the sting from her words, “Now, I believe there was a reason that you wanted to speak with me?”
Fell nodded, leaning forward as she did, “It’s like this…”