[ PERMANENT. ] a (k)atch-all log for kenos

[dawnlord]

WHO: Set ( redsoil ), Bondrewd ( dawnlord ), Drizzt ( twohand ), et. al
WHAT: i actually can't stand month-by-month logs so i'm gonna crush my boys into one perma-log for anything outside of events
WHERE & WHEN: Listed in comment headers, or under the cut.
WARNINGS: General warnings for violence, vulgarity and unethical science. Will update/comment with warnings!


I struggle so hard w/ month-by-month logs, so y'all have to deal with my weird organization...

— [MARCH | SET] GOT NO SHAME, GOT NO PRIDE

Comments

[redsoil]

[ Even if he is a former sect-mate, and he badly misses Liem for Meridian, the fact remains that he will not revoke the offering of friendship to anyone he has bestowed it upon. After all, he consorts readily with Zenites at all times. The pain associated with Liem, however, is that he feels he had failed him — to steady his heart, to find a way to encourage him to stay. If he could not hold faith in himself, then he should have been able to rest in someone else's embrace until the tide returned.

As Liem steps out of his closet, Set awaits him. A comb in one hand, and some of the best-smelling hair product held in his other; he brandishes them, with all the delicacy one might expect a war god to brandish a dagger, or other small blade, advancing upon his date without mercy. ( Call mercy, Liem. )

Standing behind him again, he tucks the back of the comb into Liem's hair, seeking his natural part wherever it might rest — before he lines a little product along it and begins to work down, and back. Surprisingly, he is not as incapable at hair as he might be with clothes; while his own hair is perfect all the time, he knows headdresses, wigs and the care taken by his sisters to affix their looks and change them. Isis had once spent hours trying to emulate Ma'at's powerful appearance while Set had been forced to comb and comb and comb her hair into a variety of styles.

It also means, as he sweeps Liem's hair into a handsome, but slightly roguish form — his bangs left loose and softly curled by the hook of a finger, his sides flattened to expose the lovely streaks of color... he can set the comb down, eventually. And his hand can find the man's left ear, to take off one of the earrings he wears. Again, Set stands close to the line of Liem's spine. Only this time, he reaches into the depths of his hair ( a flash of sunny-warm glow sits behind his ear, woven in by thread and metal; the strand itself as ink-black as a certain jinba's mane ) and takes out the hidden object.

The second earring, the melting star. ] My gift, to you.

[ Gently, he applies it to Liem's ear. There is a lightness to it, though it is long. The delicate etching in hieroglyph is different, than the etching upon the one in Set's own ear. ]

[redsoil]

"My fate is to die," [ he sneers at her, egged on by the hum of a ghost's words. All she wishes to do is find a good death. To live is beyond her, let her go before she breaks your heart, Osiris urges. ] I asked you to find a different way, in a land where you have that opportunity. You threw it in my face!

[ He comes to her, dark blade like a shadow and body pushing to the limit to greet her with the edge before she can bring her hooves down upon him. Incendiary pain tears through one of his collarbones, the other dipping back enough to avoid the rending downswing of her strength, her dangerous body. Like her, he is a weapon. Strong, even without his powers, and wily. Like this, with Meridian once again coursing through them, their strengths will meet one another, stagnating at a point that goes no higher than a particular limitation imposed upon them. Another collar around his throat, warning him that he must be smarter, more prepared, than others.

It is not his own strength of arm that makes him threatening, but his adaptability, his intellect.

She crushes half his collarbone, rends through flesh in a spray of blood and sand that collects to mitigate the worst of the pain and shed it from his mind. For at the last moment, he had turned his blade from the thrust that would carry it into the depths her body and sought a glancing slice instead. Because, he explodes. Under her as he is, he fades into a body of sand like a punch and aims to plunge blunt, up into her, and take her off all four of her feet. ]

Every hand I give to you, hoping to pull you from your misery — you are the one to reject it! Every life's line I cast, you disregard! I want you! It is you who have made it so clear that you do not want me!

[ In Communion, while his body is amorphous, it is clearer.

The voice tucked in the back of his head. The hand laced into his, urging him to push her harder, to demand she reveal herself — the melodious and calmly adoring voice of someone else: I know you care for her, but you are breaking yourself to pieces trying to save someone who does not want to be saved by you. Let her be. You are making things worse. A voice Hayame can hear, as Set's own breaks on a faint keen: Hayame, please — you have to want to live beyond this! ]

[redsoil]

Things made for the pursuit of wickedness do not get to want happy endings. We stand in the way of them.

[ An evil god can only languish in the delusion of happiness for so long, before their true nature is drawn to the surface. He had been happy, once. Distant as he had always felt, his wife had been happy when he returned home to her. His son had always heeded him, always sought him out. His sister was his best friend, his brother a fair and generous king who took his counsel. And that happiness had been a lie, so what was happiness — if not waiting for the other shoe to drop.

The only "happy" ending he knows, is to suffer his atonement, return to Heliopolis, and serve to eternity aboard Ra's barque. Isolated, alone. ]

— I no longer have the imagination, for such things. My happy ending died long before I was thrust from my world to arrive here, where there is a "Heliopolis" that is not my Heliopolis.

[redsoil]

[ It feels better, that even Quetzalcoatl cannot find a reason why Nut would not weep for his treatment. It means it is as mysterious to her as it would be to any other soul, and that Set can continue to accept that his mother's ignorance ( apathy / dislike / hatred ) of him is built not upon something he did, that he could have amended, but some fundamental wrongness about him. At least in his wrongness, the foreign god still finds him something she can embrace; to think that Quetzalcoatl might have her limit would — it would be too painful, following hot on the heels of what he murmurs to her.



As he tucks his head under her chin, close to the little green gem that is both piercing and the soul of another god he had held within him ( returned carefully to the tree, tucking her deep below a beautiful patch of moss to rest and recover — ), pulling his fingers through her hair as if trying to use it to blanket himself: ] I did my best, to help the Tree. When it was Blighted, I took that poison into myself and the Tree — warned me.

[ There is a little fresh pain, as he holds a hand to his chest. As he cards his soul through the flowers that bloom there, to the single dark one that resides with one last petal upon it. ]

It showed me someone from my world, arriving. How he was embraced by Yima, given the same graces I was [ the flower ] and I realized — she would not love me any more than the one who haunts me. She would likely not protect me from him, nor condemn him for what he did. In her love, we are all present — and we are all invisible. And it would just be the same as Nut, who did not see me at all.

[ He seeks the warmth of Meridian in Quetzalcoatl, among the warmth of her divinity.

There are still things he would compromise himself for, but for now? He turns to the sun. ]

I still see 'the warning', watching me in the dark. I want him to go away.

[redsoil]

[ Everyone is someone's child.

Even a god, who ought not to fixated upon human bonds — for they do not hold natural sway over the interactions of divinity. Technically, the moment that he ascended he was ungoverned by heritage, untethered from parents and siblings, perfectly independent and equal among all the gods of Egypt. Yet, he still felt isolated. Alone. They ought to have no concept of alone, among the collective — but, he did. Some small need, unmet, has left him injured for years.

He sinks. Folding slowly to his knees before Vash, elegant even while caught in the undertow of punchy shock and hostile misery. There is no other way to be. His hands trail up from the place he had grabbed, following the line of Vash's shoulder, his arm, until he can fold one over the place he has been touched. ]

I cannot trust that. [ Protection will always be conditional, when offered to him. Or, it will be a mocking thing. A god? Needing protection? Hah! ]

It is too late, anyways. What he wanted, he had from me. Now, all he must do is wait — either I will go to him, in despair, or he will destroy everything in his way to get to me.

[ sound familiar vash???

Still, despite the futility in Set's words, he holds fast to that hand. Even as he pries it from his bare skin, feeling the coil of skin-sickness within his belly, he holds it between his own. Idly examining his fingers, the glove, the feeling of it. ]

— how can you be like this? [ And he flicks Communion toward Vash. The ghostly impression of Set's acute sense of smell, which can pick up the uniqueness of divinity itself, treasure below earth, blood spilled in the far corners of Egypt's lands — and the pain, in Vash. ] Gentle, but so far away.

[warmare]

Just because it's my fate doesn't mean that I want it!

[She denies it to defy him even though she has always been torn between her innate desire to live and her inability to see any way to cleanse her dishonor but a glorious warrior's death. In Kenos, alone without a single friend or way out that she could see, she had tried to shatter her own shard beneath her hoof. In Horos, she had thought more than once that the more enemies she made... the higher the chance that she might end up killed so well she actually stayed dead, and then she would be free of the insanity of it all, of the fact that perhaps even the Oracles and the attempts at going home were just failures waiting to happen...

But she cannot allow him to claim she did not want to live, if things were different. That a part of her locked away in the icy cold caves of the mountain that was her field of communion didn't scream and wail and beg to have not made the mistake in the first place that had ruined everything, taking away any chance she might have had to learn what it was like to be free and to love and to know a family and peace. Set's blade cuts along the line of her lower ribs and pulls a line of crimson to spill over her dun coat and she hisses in pain even as she feels his bone crack beneath the force of her hooves.]

What I do in this world doesn't change anything in mi-- !

[She tries to force him to understand, to see that the offers were torture to her. Even if she became stronger here, more magical here, more able to channel Meridian spells or her shard's power, none of that would matter once she returned to a world with no magic, no shards, and no Tree. She would be just a jinba again, a single jinba against an entire war party--

But the sand hits her first. Hayame nearly bites off her own tongue from the sudden force of it, digging her back hooves in to try and fight it... but she can't. It throws her off balance and the heavy weight of her body becomes a disadvantage instead of a strength, and she begins to topple backward in a dangerous flail of hooves and powerful legs. Intent on dragging him with her, unwilling to give up the chance to grapple and bring her weight back into play in her favor, she twists and reaches for him-

And her fingers grab sand. They scramble for purchase in a god that had temporarily thrown away solid flesh, but their minds collide instead and within it... That man. That same shade she had seen lurking behind him in the desert, the one with the flowers, the one who made her hackles rise in instinctive rejection, sensing something possessive and all consuming in the eyes and voice that made her want to strike, burn, ruin before his claws sunk any deeper into the god she had sworn her service to, before his whispers took further root in a man she-]

If I did not want you, I would cast you from my hearts! I would rip your hair from my head! I would let you fall to Zenith without a single care- !

[She hits the ground with a loud, bruising sound, twisting and kicking in a frenzy to try and roll over and get back up, but all of it is instinct only- her mind is in Communion, and if she cannot get a hold on Set's form when he is sand... she lashes out at that man's instead, kicking, biting, trying to grab his hand and twist it, rip it from Set's so that she might crush him underhoof like she had the flowers in the field-]

You do not know anything, shade!

[sterngaze]

[Although the way that Set advances on him once he's emerged from the closet does make a small thrill of apprehension slide down to Liem's stomach, he manages to maintain the appearance of unconcern as the comb moves through his hair. Unlike a true vampire, he has no difficulty seeing Set's progress on his hair as he fixes his tie in the mirror. The god goes about the task with surprising competence, and Liem is lulled from his uncertainty by the smooth, deliberate stroke of comb and fingers guided by someone other than him.

The result is somewhat less reputable than his usual style, a little less severe, but he is nonetheless forced to admit — it does look good.

Liem still needs to finish dressing; he has the garments yet lying on his bed to put on. But Set is not yet done with him, and he pauses instead as Set unclasps the jewelled stud from his left earlobe and retrieves something from within the glossy curtain of his own red hair: another earring, just as long and glimmering gold as the one he wears. Liem regards it intently, surprised and unexpectedly pleased, as Set replaces the removed earring with this one.

Liem's original earrings do not really match this long, elegant piece of jewellery. He removes his right as well, placing it beside the other, then tilts his head curiously to regard the golden earring dangling from his ear.]

What is that design etched upon it?

[He does not recognize it, though the style is vaguely familiar, reminiscent of Set and his pantheon. The jewellery is, Liem thinks, better suited to someone possessed of more beauty than himself, but it looks well enough on him for the time being, a matched set with his partner for the evening.]

[fishfearme]

[Byleth tilted his head fractionally. There was something guileless about his expression, something so earnestly sincere in his eyes as he gazed at Set's hopeless, dejected expression. He didn't understand why being wicked was such an important fact - why one happy ending's death meant that that was the end of things. Existence was limitless in its evolution and potential, and as stagnant as the gods could be, even they had to eventually move with the current of change and growth. Their pace was just... glacial, compared to the far more fleeting humans that were all but swept down the river of existence.]

I see. You've given up on such hopes.

[Blunt as always, Byleth.]

But humans are stubbornly defiant, Set, and the more you tell them that something is impossible or shouldn't be, the more they'll dig in their heels. If you've lost hope, then I'll do it for you.

[So, you know what that means?]

I'm blessed with a human soul and a god's lifespan. [Assuming he had the same longevity as Jeralt.] I'd say eternity is long enough for me to figure out a way to grant you a happy ending you'll be satisfied with.

[intervener]

[ trust isn't something Vash demands - or even asks - from others. whether it's because he doesn't believe himself deserving of it or that it is too presumptuous a request is inconsequential, he doesn't need it. actions speak louder than words, and regardless of faith - or a decided lack thereof - he won't let himself let Set down.

he's lost enough. he suspects Set has, too; losing any more pieces of himself can't be acceptable, either.

Vash permits Set to take his hand, lets the god examine each of his fingers as if they were mysterious, curious things. the gentility of the gesture is at distinct odds with the eerieness of the words that follow - and yes. the cold, hollowing tendril of frigidity and familiarity that curls through his insides to hear Set lament his fate...

the quiet feeling of Communion - Set's Communion, nostalgic for the way it brings Vash back to warm, sun-baked sands beneath clear, blue skies - manages to banish that temporary cold, even if the sensation that unfolds between them is not precisely comforting. it is more comforting than what preceded it. (why are the similarities he finds between himself and this man ones that fill him with grief, with the ache of empathy, and fear, and loss, and--)

Vash remains still where Set has crouched before him, but through the space of Communion - a place he is comfortable, a place he is used to after so many years reaching out to his sisters in an unspoken bond - he is a bright red beacon on the horizon of desert sands, seated among the stretch of undisturbed dunes that have soaked up much suffering. Vash has tugged the glove off his scarred hand, running the fine, coarse grains through his fingers as if he can see and count each and every one, finds something important in their number. ]

That isn't true.

[ what he's refuting might not be immediately obvious, but at least he thinks to clarify as each small, precious grain filters through his hand. ]

Things are different now. I don't think they'll ever be the same as they were, either.

[ Set's divinity has been altered. and that means his brother's would be, too; this is something Vash has given a great deal of thought, a great deal of sleepless nights contemplating for reasons Set would understand.

that familiarity. ]

He can't take what you don't give him. We're right here to stop you if you try, you know?

[ the last grains of sand trickle from his fingers; the Vash seated among the scent of fresh soil and earth joins the Vash seated among the vast stretch of desert. a gloved hand squeezes Set's; a naked hand presses into the land in unison. ]

[redsoil]

[ It doesn't change anything in mine, she is nearly able to say. Part of him hears it, and fishes around for it. That single mote of desperation in her that he keeps trying to find and bring to her surface, so that they can truly look upon it and find a different way for her. In the shapeless bulk of him, he cannot speak to her with his voice, calling instead with soundless image and emotion, so much emotion. He is wild with feelings, beyond which a mortal could bear — apocalyptic emotions, spilling like dark blood from a wound, water from a stone, sand giving way below her weight to become a catastrophic wave that would bury her.

It stills, when her mind collides with the phantasm that haunts him, egging him on.

Truthfully, it is but a ghost. Nothing that could harm anyone other than the mind of the one who remembers it, but the eyes of Osiris are pitiless and cold. Unfathomably divine, looking upon her as though she is an insect, looking through her as though to say he thinks naught of her soundless fury — that he only must wait, for she will die. And when she dies, the one she called to her will be alone again. ( You will go back to your world and forget me, had she not said, once? Thought, once? As if their friendship were a thing already dying from the moment they had vowed themselves to one another, warrior and god. Their friendship was viewed through eyes like those of Zenith; as a sad, pathetic little madness that had no place in reality. )

In his mind, Hayame's onslaught is something that can push back the shade. It draws him to it, pushing the shape of his mind against her, his hand reaching for hers — the same as he does in reality, folding his hand around her real wrist as he emerges from the sands. As he clutches at her, and tries to shake them free of one another. Like her, he moves his true form on instinct. He rolls, feeling ungainly and off-kilter as his body seeks familiar shape and finds only the connection with her, her hooves, her power. By the time they emerge, he is half-collapsed on the ground.

In mimicry of her body, sandy-beige with soft, red socks upon his twitching hooves. A full grown adult, with the weakness of a newborn colt — he has always been a changer of forms, but this? Comes at the price of a scattering mind, and he heaves for breath on the ground before her, holding fast to her wrist, her hand. ]

— it does not change, [ he trembles, under the memory of her lashing out at his brother. At the idea that, if Osiris were ( here / real ) tangible, she would be eradicated and he would lose her ( he does not want to lose her ). ] Your world. But, it could change you enough, so that you do not go home the same person you were. You could go back better and ready.

[redsoil]

[ The comb is set down upon the dressing table with a soft clatter, while Set rubs his fingertips together to disperse the rest of the product and finishes stroking it into Liem's hair. He toys with the ends of his bangs to ensure they look disheveled enough, some sort of imperfection that blends well with the heaviness of his brow. Set, too, has a stern brow. For someone who cavorts, his idle expressions are far more severe than they are possessed of the fits and bursts of mania that possess him ( especially in public Communion, as if he has multiple faces and masks he wears ).

As he strokes his thumbs across the line of hair he has laid, he tucks the rest of the product along the nape of Liem's neck, to hold the smaller, stray hairs there in place. And then he touches the dangling earring with the back of a crooked finger, to turn it so that the man can see the delicate hieroglyps etched upon it. It must be custom-made, for Set's ancient language is either dead with their worlds, or dies in the future. And to him, his world has to have a future, as he has not seen the day when the kingdoms of his land are naught but dusty tombs and forgotten peoples.

Sebastian would tell the truth, even if it was cruel or obscured in some ways. And Set's own research had concluded it.

To Liem, he says: ] It is a saying, from my lands. Long before a nation called "Greece" takes over my Egypt, we effectively warded our borders with spoken prayer and song. My duties included the defense of these edges, from those who would seek to leave us with our precious things, or those who would seek to enter with wicked intentions.

[ His other hand cups Liem's shoulder, follows the line of his bicep to his forearm. Spreads, warm across his palm. ]

There is no direct translation I can give, but it is a wish akin to those they would give to those who defended those edges, and were thus far from home. Like you. We will draw fresh waters, mine says. And yours says, we will dampen the altars. It was a promise, between those who went and those who stayed. That together, we would wash all uncleanliness from our hands, under the same roof.

[redsoil]

[ "Given up".

He cannot think of a different happy ending than the one he had already possessed, before it was revealed to be a lie — a thing shaped by the hand of an overbearing brother who had sought to tether his freedoms and shackle him. It had been everything he'd ever wanted, more than even his natural inclination to fully embody war. He would have given up being a god, being incarnate to protect it. He nearly had, fighting to die and rob his own kin of whatever prize he sought to make of Set's mind and body.

How badly, right now, he wants to drive Byleth away. ( Keep him safe. Don't let Sothis glean anything about the one who might be kin to her, don't let her see the falsity in the god before Byleth. ) ]

If you want me to be happy, then why did you write all those things about my relationships? Crushes I do not have, illicit affairs I would never partake in — I do not understand this, and sometimes it makes me unhappy to think... that you view me as a harlot.

[fishfearme]

That was never my intention. I wanted to write stories where you can love and be loved in turn. Perhaps that was naïve of me, though, to assume the love you'd want would be romantic in nature...

[It did make him sad that his attempts had made Set unhappy instead, but he didn't let it distract him from the path before him. Most books always had romantic love as the main component as a happy ending, but Byleth knew that such things would never factor into his own, so why would it for Set?]

I apologise for that. I didn't mean to upset you or give you the wrong impression of yourself.

[redsoil]

I had a wife.

[ Nephthys. For Byleth, he reveals her image. The slender curve of her neck, the strong line of her smile; though the goddess of peace and harmony, she was not a wilting flower, but a strong-armed force who fought to do all in her power to gentle hearts, to calm minds and urge people to speak, grow, heal one another.

Set thinks of her with the utmost care, cradling the image of her between them as he reveals her to Byleth carefully. ] I loved her since we were young.

[ He can tuck the promise that romance had existed for him, once, into Byleth's palms. The soft-eyed woman and her long hair, her peerless intensity and open arms, always waiting for him to come home and let him rest. ]

We were separated before I ever came here. Married for centuries before that. Romance is — all that I had was for her. What I have now is... I would not make a very good story for you to enj—

[ He turns his head sharply, as if someone has whispered something into his ear, a full-bodied flinch carrying him away from Byleth for the moment. Snared in their Communion, he might drag the specter of Osiris into view before Byleth's mind, as green fingers card through the memory of Nephthys mournfully, the image of a great god shaking his head with regret. I should never have assigned her to you, she put such fantastical notions in your head — it was cruel, it whispers to Set, who covers his ears in life and shakes his head. ]

1/2

[fishfearme]

[Nephthys. Byleth memorised every millimetre of her, the care Set showed to this manifestation... 'loved', he said, but Byleth could feel that love beat still in this echo, the sharp edges of it as cutting as hidden rocks beneath rushing water.

He was transfixed, feeling a strange, unidentifiable emotion as he observed the way Set cupped her memory between them, the wistful longing radiating from him... a possibility, if Byleth succeeded in the impossible. If he could manage to reignite that love, somehow, by bringing back to life Nephthys, even if only in words-]

2/2

[fishfearme]

[-but the scene to soured. Nephythys crumbled into dust as an interloper invaded, raking green claws through her visage, and the gentle, fragile love that Set had nursed in that moment ruptured into fear.

It was instinct.

There was no discernible pause between Byleth recognising the threat to his ally and acting on it. He barely caught sight of the interloper - only did the quick calculation of distance and height - before he lashed out at the invader's face with raking claws, flames spluttering around his palm. In the Communion, Byleth's presence flipped from docilely calm to jagged and molten, like a beast bursting from a caldera with fangs bared and fire in its throat.

In short: Byleth tried to blind Osiris with a fistful of flame.]

[warmare]

[If he searches for that mote in her hearts and her mind then he will find it, clearer than she has ever admitted to or explained in words now that the desperate thrash of bodies and the press of communions is ruled by fighting instinct. That village of orphans hidden in the mountains. Hordes of hunters gathering at the base. Her mistake laid bare, too late, far too late. An offer, a promise to pay with her life because it was all she had.

What can improving herself in this world do to change those circumstances? Once the magic in her body is gone with her shard, what can one woman do against those odds? There is nowhere to run. Jinba were stronger than humans, but humans had numbers. She and Matsukaze... they could kill so many. But they would be brought down eventually, and then that village would lose it's only two adults of fighting strength, the only ones capable of defending an Armless, a woman rounding with child, and orphans all less than thirteen years of age. She just can't see it, any future she might have had ruined by her own mistakes, and so to be told to just... just better herself somehow, just fix it, just hope, just find a different way...

The emotions of a god are overwhelming, spilling into her and threatening to drown her senses in his until she is gone, until she is nothing in the face of him, but Hayame's clash and claw and fight not to be lost. She turns the force of her desperation on the foreign power in Set's mind, she rips and she tears and she despises those Zenith eyes that want to make her nothing after she has fought so hard to be something, to be a warrior worthy of a god's blessing, to be Set's-

Set's friend.

She doesn't know what that means, she doesn't know how to do it, but once she is done turning her rage on the hand of that possessive shade, once she has pried those fingers loose and cast them aside with a snarl, don'ttouchhimletgogetback all rolled up into a single hateful, protective outburst, reminded all too clearly of the sick way Lord Miyatsuta had run his hands over Kohibari in the stables...

It's Set's hand she grabs, in their minds and without. Fierce and powerful and desperate and angry, she wrestles with him when he is half-formed, she struggles to come out on top, to pin him beneath her once he becomes solid, but not- not to conquer him. To stop him from hurting himself, to shield him from those cold, dead eyes-

The only one she has left widens in shock when she realizes what has happened. When she sees four more hooves and long legs and a sandy coat and feathery red socks and the way his human-like torso transitions seamlessly into equine shoulders.]

Tell me, then!

[His form had just changed, he looked just like a jinba, her voice breaks on the force of her words and cracks in his face. Her hold on his hand is tight and shaking and near breaking, her heavy body half-straddling his in a tangle of limbs and hair and tails-]

Return to me and come up with real ways that only the god of war can fathom! Show me how that strategic, diabolical mind that vexes me so will come up with a strategy to save a village from a hunting party without my sacrifice!

[And if he could do that... If he could stop listening to that thorny, dead-eyed ghost, if he could be better...

Maybe she could be better, too.]

[sterngaze]

[Liem cannot miss the meaning behind Set's gift; behind the inscription, and the hand sliding warm against his palm. It is so terribly, heartbreakingly sentimental, this promise of togetherness, although the distance Liem has put between them has nothing to do with defending the home of anyone yet living. He has done so little to deserve such sentiment; it makes denial threaten to well up in him again, to cast off this temporary thing and its hidden barbs. Even as he tries to accept it instead, to let the feeling settle within him, it feels slippery, as if it will slide loose and disappear at the first opportunity.

For just a brief moment, he squeezes Set's hand.]

I don't know how long I will be away for.

[From home, as Set puts it. He does not know that he is going to return at all. There are too many evil truths jumbled up in his head, ones that had lunged up from the depths to assail him when he'd thought them long since put to rest. He cannot return with them haunting him like this.

But it is a painful thing, to begin to put down roots, only to be plucked and called elsewhere.]

Thank you, Set. It is a lovely gift.

[He does not expect to wear the piece often, considering its departure from his usual style, but… perhaps now and then, if the occasion demands. After a moment's thought, Liem strips the rings from his hands one by one, until the only one left is an engraved golden band. The discarded rings and earrings he puts in another drawer, one that fairly glitters with the jewellery he's collected in the half-year he's spent in Kenos. The man clearly likes his sparkle — but tonight he is content to go mostly without. The only thing he takes out of the drawer before closing it is a pair of simple golden stud earrings, the same glossy gold as the one dangling from his left ear.]

Would you like one?

[Liem knows he at least will feel naked without something in his other ear.]

[muchalucha]

…You know, that sort of thing, that’s why I don’t think of myself as a mother to humanity, even if I’m the one that made them. A mother’s love is supposed to be unconditional, right? But siblings, it’s different.

[ It’s coincidental that it’s a comparison that works so well in this case. The world of the Aztecs and the ancient Egyptians are separated by vast time and space, and so all of her knowledge comes from what the Throne grants her as a Servant. In that, it’s also incomplete, because the Throne doesn’t deem it necessary. She can recognize a name, the legends that go with it, but an appearance, especially of a god? That’s too esoteric for the Throne to grant to a Servant (and maybe even unfair, considering how much of an advantage just knowing a name was). ]

My older brother and I, we’ve always warred bitterly, you know? We’re fated to, probably, because if I’m the light of the sun, then he’s the obsidian mirror that eats up light. We can make truces, put aside our pasts to work together if we need to, but we’ll also never get along. I wouldn’t give my brother the kind of love that a mother goddess would, and so even if I can love a lot, there are still limits. That’s what I mean.

[ She gives Set a squeeze, and this time it’s distinctly protective more than simply affectionate. ]

So, your enemies are my enemies, Set. If Yima embraces him, then I’ll burn him away. Not because he’s Zenith either, yes? Because he’s haunting you, and you’re my dear friend.

[ She means it too, probably more than Set realizes. If Osiris were to show up in Kenos, it’s a situation where Quetzalcoatl would consider unleashing her full, destructive power if it was needed. She was a protector and someone that put value in self-sacrifice and how it could be used to help others find a better life. So, it wouldn’t even be a question. ]

But for now… [ She makes a thoughtful noise, then gently nestles her head against his as her hug relaxes. Not completely, of course, but it’s simply not so tight. ] If he’s in the dark, then stay in my light, yes? The dark is strong, but it still has to flee from the dawn. Whatever he says, whatever he does, let it get blinded and deafened so it can’t reach you.

[redsoil]

[ He might think to say something about the presence of one's home; about how, like the signpost Liem thinks that he resembles, it is never something that leaves its people. It exists as a point, for them to always look to for reference in the grand scheme of things. He also thinks such words would be painful, this evening, as Liem struggles with the weight of his heart and the things in his mind that Set seeks to draw from him — not like a healing salve, but like a glancing blow meant to gouge and bleed someone.

He is too indelicate for more than he already offers. ] Well, you are not alone or adrift, even while you are away. You have me here in these trying times, with you.

[ He dips his head, a wash of red hair falling across Liem's shoulder as he bows to inspect the golden earring he's been offered in turn — agreeably taking it between his fingers once he's inspected it for detail, to hook it into the empty lobe of his other ear. Like Liem, he feels a little lopsided with even one ear bare, and plenty 'off' as he's forgone most of his native jewelry for the evening. Besides, the two wrist cuffs from his home are gone now — one given to a teenage boy to pawn, and the other given to another teenage boy as a token of his attentions. A reminder he was present for him.

He straightens, once he has the earring in. ] I hope you do not expect this to be returned to you. I am likely going to treat it as the full set from now on.

[ The question is wry, as he pulls a segment of his hair back to examine the asymmetry of the earrings — before shaking his head to straighten himself back out. Away from the mirror he stepped, to instead pace in a little semicircle, as if taking a proper look at the man he'd selected as his partner for the evening, deeming him suitable company — dressed sharply, bearing his token, artfully disheveled... excellent! ]

How do you feel? Prepared? Have you any other preparations you would like to make? I think you look quite dashing, it almost makes up for your lacking presence at the masquerade.

[ he's never going to let liem live down that he AVOIDED IT ]

[redsoil]

[ In the midst of the stirring of Communion between them, he glimpses a desert that is both familiar and not. He can identify it by structure, he can feel the ghostly impression of hundreds upon thousands of grains of sand being lifted from the ground and poured through a scarred hand. He can feel each mote of earth as if it were the fullness of his body, being laced across scars and the grooves of palm and fingers, falling through the air to reconnect with the vast sprawl of the rest of him.

( I have stolen it from you, he had cried to the ghost looming in the dark corners of his mind; fingers at the nape of his neck, like the weight of a collar, a hand working itself to be held by his own. The red lands had prevailed, and the black lands had fallen under Set's dominion — arable lands now flourished at his touch. An impossibility that horrifies him, even as he utilizes that power. I create, now. Without you. Except, is Osiris not creating through him?

The mind of a god is a tangled thing, secure and unsure in a single dizzying swoop. )

Vash is a red thing, against tawny sands. As Set has always been, too. Red-upon-gold, a fleck of crimson stain — ever-wandering, outcast from people and kindred like, a vagrant existence. As Vash leads his hand, real and unreal, to the land, he slips his fingers into ( sand / soil ) and dips his palm low, hooking it as if to gather a palmful of earth into it. Among the fields of Alenroux, he brings Vash's hand with his own, buried in dark, freshly-watered soil that begins to prickle with Meridian's energy. A delicate green sprout emerging, a second, a third. A blossom springing to life.

In Communion, that hand scoops the man himself from the desert sands — a palmful of sand dune and solitary man-of-red, cradled easily in the hand of a being that knows itself to be infinite, bound into a uniformity of flesh and limitation of ability. He is the desert, sunlit and burning, inhospitable, and he could easily imagine himself as the boundless thing upon which Vash walks. So, as he grows something in reality, he reaches his other hand down and presses a finger to the horizon that Vash might look into. Spreads heat-haze and savagery at that boundary, beyond which the delicate, tenuous green-and-blue of an oasis would be found for the weary.

Once, he had been a god of oases for weary, lost humans. A wild creature that would toss them headlong into waters they desperately needed, abandon them under shade to cool them. That, in the end, is the place where he tucks the mental impression he holds of Vash. We're right here to stop him, Set barely hears, over the rushing sound of his own flinching heart. ]

— it is hard, [ he admits, ] to think that I could be first in anyone's mind or heart. You would never be held to that promise. I cannot ask people to not form their own opinions, or hold off on seeking their own conclusions. Even for me. It might prove safer, to turn from me in favor of better gods.

[ He would like to be something people could find themselves looking to, in hard times. It would not be so bad, to be the force that others placed their faith in, amidst the unsureness of the world. Perhaps that is in his nature, too. ]

Still. I am not strong enough on my own, to conquer my doubts. So, I hope you mean what you say, and hold my promises and vows against me like weapons.

[sterngaze]

[Liem is not sure how to feel about the reassurance that Set offers. He does not feel as though he deserves it, as though he has been living up to his side of their covenant of friendship — one that grows more tenuous by his own actions, as the other man attempts to shore up the weaknesses between them. And yet, despite the god's words, he feels rudderless; he does not know how he could turn around to meet him, even if he were resolved to.

But it does make him smile to see Set wear his earring, small and unassuming though it is. Liem clasps the remaining stud into his own ear, pleased by the wry warning that he receives as the god is examining the new "pair."]

Please do. I think it suits you very well.

[He is not used to seeing studs on Set, just as he is not used to wearing long earrings on his own ears, but the asymmetry of the earrings is reminiscent, in a way, of their own strange relationship. They are two companions who are very unalike; but, together, they are not as asynchronous as might be supposed.

Abandoning his mirror for the moment, Liem scoops his waistcoat up from the bed to button it over his shirt and tie. He feels, in this ensemble, about as ready as he ever will to find out what a theatre date with Set entails. A little nervousness does nip at the back of his neck, but as he well knows by now, looking good goes a long way to instilling confidence. He just needs a nice pair of shoes and some sunglasses to hide his eyes, and he will be golden.]

You flatter me, Set. Were you so grieved, that you didn't get the chance to dance with me?

Everything else I need is downstairs, on the way out, so we need not linger here much longer.

[redsoil]

[ It comes as a shock, actually. Not Byleth wielding flames — for he has seen, and survived, the connection of Ragnarok's fire with the incendiary gasses within the Beyond. Not that, but the fact that he so immediately reaches between them in Communion, in the manifestation of their joined minds, and attacks the memory-specter of Set's own making. Barely a moment is wasted, between Byleth's posture changing and the nigh-instinctive assault — which leaves Set a little shaken, not by the violence ( never by the violence ) but by how unquestioning the motion was.

As if Byleth didn't care to hear anything from Osiris's mouth, words spoken in a voice intimately familiar to Set, but ultimately born from within him. There is no true Osiris in Kenos, only a memory, and that memory is so lively and realistic — turning over Set's own vulnerabilities and doubts with practiced ease. It is, all the same, his own mind turned against him, in the shape of the one who frightens him beyond measure.

He holds onto Byleth's arm, feeling terrible in one distant corner of his mind for seeking the point of contact as he watches flames spark in the joining of their mind. ] Ah.

[ A startled, strangled sound. What can he say, before such a display? ]

— he's, not real.

[ He knows that, but. It still feels horrible enough. Set reaches out to Byleth's outstretched arm, the one he cast those flames from, and touches into the crook of his elbow. ]

You couldn't get rid of him if you tried.

[fishfearme]

[Byleth realised that only when there was no impact from his strike - it was a spectre haunting the Communion, not some sudden, tangible threat taking advantage of their distraction. Set's fear had spurred him unthinkingly, but Byleth didn't feel embarrassed or sheepish for his reaction. He felt a little frustrated that he didn't have the power to dispel threats of the imaginative kind, and just levelled a harsh glare where the spectre had been before refocusing on Set with a considerably gentler expression.]

...I'm sorry.

[Byleth lowered his arm, the only sign of his failed attack being the thin layer of ash clinging to his gloves - ash that immediately stained Set's forearm when Byleth abruptly grasped it: gently, more at an attempt at reassurance, his hand as warm as the sand beneath the desert's stone and leaving streaks of dull grey.]

We may not be rid of him, but I'm sure we can drown him out. I can sing to you, if you'd like, or perhaps I can show you a battle from one of my memories? He may not be able to haunt us there...

[redsoil]

[ While he struggles to make sense of the way his body has so roughly twisted in on itself, flesh-become-sand-become flesh that touched deep into her mind where their corners are joined and sought the familiar intimacy of her body — the strength of it, the speed of it, the beauty of her design and how safe, how easily he could feel safe with her — he knows he will come out of the fluidity of his own form changed by her. And he does, writhing in a heap of red tail and hooves as he tries to roll himself onto new legs, to find his feet and be ready for another attack —

she encages him skillfully, bearing down upon him with her own body and wild eyes and silky hair. Protective and clutching at him as tightly as he seeks to grab her, rolling under her to seize her hand fully, plunging his free hand forth to seize her by the bandages she ties tight across her chest to wrench her down. If he put more strength into it, he could rip them in two and find her Shard, find that thing between her breasts where she'd carried ( their loss / the one they loved ) their friend, safe. ]

I will!

[ He snaps it at her, pale underbelly and dark hooves twisted below her as she leans over him. Like this, he can look up — and find his face close to hers, his own hair wild and tangled in her own like they were in the roots of the tree. Like something molten. ]

You will tell me everything about your skill, the skill of anyone with you, the ability of the hunting party, the terrain, everything! And I will show you how to attain victory without dying, Hayame. You will walk home with your hearts confident and unflinching, knowing you will win. You will save them all and atone for the rest of your life in their company!

[ Somewhere across the ground, red flowers spill still, growing from the press of his body even as he holds fast to her and fixes his eyes on her. Keeps his mind from wandering by sheer titanic force, while murmurs try to drag him from her. She is one of the few he has, that could validate his entire existence, and so, he works hard not to wither under her gaze and instead

wrenches his hands free of her

to throw them around her neck and drag her down to the earth, to the tangle of new limbs and the thrum of his own heart(s?) and hold her head to his chest, cradling her even as she forms a barricade around him. ]

I am not going to let you live as someone who can only see your honor recovered in death. You will find it in a full life, a good life.