The Seeds of Unrest: the Iconoclast Oracle

[beleos]

RUNNING OUT THE CLOCK

The situation is bleak.

The Blight - and the massive labyrinth of roots tearing both cities asunder, spreading deadly flowers wherever they penetrate - have progressed to a point beyond catastrophe. People are dying in rapid numbers. Bearers are having difficulty keeping up with the spread of infection - even among one another. The collapse of Kenos seems inevitable; a cure will not come in time. You can do nothing but watch as each new day brings further disaster, ticking down the seconds until it all falls apart.

And then, you feel something seize your Shard. As if physical fingers have wrapped around it, as if it is being clutched through you by invisible hands, you feel invaded. You feel wronged. But before you can panic, a voice enters your mind through Communion.

“Excuse the dramatics, but there isn’t much time for pleasantries. The Trees are about to hit the point of no return. But there's still work to be done. The Tree of Life will take you where you can find it: the Oracle and the creature causing all this mess. Fix this when you find them. However you'd like.”

Have you heard Aetos’ voice before? Perhaps it is the first time; perhaps it is familiar to you. Either way, the last thing you will remember is a confusing jumble: a spell of immense and incredible power, one utilizing the Tree’s strength to shelter you. The sensation of every cell in your body coming alive, yet seeming to break apart and render you into billions and billions of tiny pieces, all hovering in different times and places across all the different iterations, timelines, and realities in which you have ever existed. A voice that speaks not through words asking your forgiveness, unspeakably sad.

And then, there is nothing.

AWAKENING

Your eyes open, gritty with the feeling of a long, deep slumber.

Perhaps it takes a moment to shake off the heavy veil of exhaustion, to recollect what you were doing before you fell into this state of hibernation - but as soon as you do, you feel an immediate sense of foreboding around you. It is thick in the air, oppressive and pervasive, and you aren’t left long to wonder at its source. You lay beneath the branches of the Tree of Life, but as your bleary eyes focus… you see it. The Tree is all but bereft of life. Its bark has withered down to gnarled wood, the soft lichen dried up, and the grass that should be alive beneath you is long dead and gone. There is not so much as a single leaf on its decaying branches.

It has been this way for a long, long time... you realize this with a feeling of intense dread as you see it - the beautiful expanse of stars, of the cosmos, of universes scattered like starlight above the tree's boughs, gone. In its place hangs a sickly, ominously low-hanging, and dying sun ready to sing the end of everything.

You can't help but wonder how long Kenos has been in this state, but a sense of gratitude fills you as you realize that the Tree expended the last of its energies to protect you, the Bearers, during your state of rest. Had Aetos worked with the tree to see you sent here?

The next question comes quickly: how much time do you have left…? And can you find the Oracle before that time expires?

ABANDON HOPE (DAYS 1 & 2)

The cornerstones are still active and will take you to whichever city you wish to see.

Highstorm and Springstar sit like empty monuments to the cities that were once filled with life - yet the first thing you will notice is they are strangely absent the signs of the Tree’s overgrown roots, the Blight, the catastrophic damage that you can recall all too easily. Instead, each city sits as those they were summarily abandoned overnight, leaving nothing but their shells behind. There is a stillness in the air that is unnatural and unsettling. Despite the lack of any sign of the citizens of either city, you cannot help but feel… watched.

Something terrible happened here. Best you find the Oracle before something terrible finds you, instead.

The burning of a dying sun beats down on you wherever you go, unbearable heat sending waves off the aged cobblestone streets. Perhaps it is your instinct to seek refuge in the shade - but linger too long about the shadows and that feeling of eyes on your back, of being unable to breathe, of your world closing in around you will grow untenable and drive you back into the light. If you hope to explore the ghostly shell of your city in search of the Oracle - or to sate your curiosity, some problem-solving might be in order.

And while you acclimate yourself to your circumstances, you cannot help but note you feel wrong inside, somehow…

EXPLORATION

• If your characters choose to explore previously unreachable areas, please use THIS TOPLEVEL to report when they get there in the thread! We will get back to you with what is discoverable in that location.
• The following areas are off limits for exploration: below Yima’s Manor; below the Church of Heliopolis; Alenroux; Kowloon.
• The Great Trees of both Highstorm and Springstar are in a similar state to the Tree of Life and will not respond to Communion.
• Generally speaking, items will be of poor quality. Most will look as though they’ve aged thousands of years. Others will be in half-decent shape, but sparingly so. Oddly enough, it doesn’t seem like the whole city has aged at the same rate, so especially diligent rummagers can find worthwhile supplies. Please consider this should be rare and don’t go overboard!

NOTES

Here are some prompt reminders - see the full thing at the OOC Summary!

• Characters will have a diluted connection to the Zenith or Meridian.
• There will be periods powers are weakened or non-functional during days 1-2 (up to player discretion).
• The sunlight results in scorching; the shadows cause claustrophobia and fear while outdoors.

THE RITUAL (DAYS 2+)

The place you started your journey to Kenos is also where it seems it will end. As soon as the first Bearer makes contact with the Iconoclast effigy, you are collectively drawn to the roots beneath the Tree - like a pang sent through your Shard. Your objective has been found. The Oracle awaits.

Trusting Aetos seems like a fool's errand, but you must put your hope in the Tree. What choice do you have left? It's time to find what lies at the end of this.

Bearers descend, your steps echoing in the dark, cavernous space. Once brimming with life and vitality, the roots are now dried and brittle like the bones of some ancient leviathan that died long ago. As you make their way deeper into the earth, the deadened roots twist, leading you to a vast chamber deep within it; the air here is thick with the smell of decay, and the faint glow of luminescent fungi and mosses barely illuminates the space.

To your left, the Bearers will notice what has drawn them here - and the object of their search.

An effigy sits on the ground between two darkened tunnels. The effigy is made of gnarled, dead branches woven together in a humanoid shape; its hollow, empty eyes are sightless, yet you cannot help but feel it is watching your every move. Branded on its forehead is the Iconoclast symbol carved into the rough wood.

Once all Bearers are present, the Ritual will begin. Your means of exit have been sealed off, and you are trapped, slowly deteriorating together…

NOTES

• Bearers will have access to the Ritual Chamber which is a very wide, open space with the effigy situated against the far wall from the entrance. Several smaller tunnels off-shoot from the Ritual Chamber. They all run to dead ends; some are very small or narrow. This may afford you meager privacy away from the group.
• Once a Bearer steps into the Chamber, they can no longer head back out the way they came. They’ll find themselves automatically walking back into the Chamber as if of their own volition.
• For brevity’s sake we won’t list them out again here, but the complete description of effects Bearers will experience days 2+ is available in the OOC Summary.
• The effigy is impervious to damage.
• It Is Watching You.
• In a dead-end root tunnel attached to the Iconoclast’s Chamber is the Blighted statue of an Otter that may be familiar to some… Please see THIS TOPLEVEL for more information!

THE PURGE (DAYS 5+)

The sap has festered in your veins for what feels like days. It’s impossible to tell how much time has passed; this place has no sunlight. The effigy watches as you remain trapped, huddled together around it, unable to leave as you find yourself sick with the affliction of the Meridian, Zenith - or both.

And then… something finally gives.

Though it does not move and speaks no words, you feel the effigy offering you guidance. Knowledge. Much like the Tree speaks to you in impressions and feelings, you are conveyed wisdom you did not have before: a way to take what you want and rid yourself of what you do not. A way to make your convictions known to all who would hear them. A way to be known. To write your path in blood, be it yours… or theirs.

When all is said and done, only one force - Zenith or Meridian - will gain its favor.

Show it who you are. Show it what resolve looks like to you - and what you are willing to do to attain it.

NOTES

Here are some prompt reminders - see the full thing at the OOC Summary!

• You can Purge your alignment through various methods: Trading, Corrupting, or using the Effigy itself.
• All characters will understand the end goal is for everyone to Harmonize; the alignment with the higher rate of Harmonized Bearers alive when time’s up wins the Oracle’s favor.

NOTES

• A reminder that the Harmonization tally will take place on Friday, the 19th and be open through Monday, the 29th. The results will be released on Wednesday, the 31st OOCly.
• Don’t forget to submit any deaths to the Death Tracker, with a gentle reminder characters will remain dead until the event conclusion!
• Reminder to fill out the SETTING POLL ASAP if you haven't already!
• Have some MUSIC if you'd like. LYRICS here!
• HAVE FUN!!

CODING

Comments

[warmare]

[It is the last thing she expects him to say. How does he even know? They had given each other the unwanted energies of their respective factions deep in the tunnels where only the soft glow of bio-luminescent plants had witnessed them, and yet-

Set is lurking always in this corner of her mind. Or perhaps Amos' touch was still lingering on her soul even now, like he had lingered in her thoughts since that day the pollen had been so thick in the warm air. Still-]

I did not make a deal with Amos Burton!

[Hayame snaps, a flush of color blooming beneath the anger on her face.]

I'm telling you to put down the wolves that you yourself brought into Meridian, not throwing out random names for sport.

[redsoil]

[ Set does not blind himself to his own Faction, simply because they are aligned in goal. There will come a day when he must use Meridian, too. If they stand in his way, they will be massacred as Zenith will be — without mercy, without hesitation. He watches over Hayame, and sees whom she consorts with as well. ]

No, you simply snuck off into the dark with him. You got what you needed from him, Hayame — why does he live? He is a Zenith who will never heed the call of Meridian. In his own words, he will only care for his people. Loyal Zenites are his people, not you. He is as much a danger to Meridian as Silco and Sebastian are.

[ Finally, his anger seems to heat. To stretch towards her as Set manifests within a storm, a scattering of sharp grit and burning heat. ]

You allowed him to live. Why?

[warmare]

[The phrasing, snuck off into the dark with him makes her stiffen with insult, her mane and tail whipping in the whirl of wind where the hot, dry air of desert collides with the cold howl of icy mountain wind. Why does he still live, when she could have killed him easily before his Zenith powers fully returned to him?]

I did not invite him into Meridian to whisper and manipulate as he pleases. He is with Zenith and he will stay with Zenith.

[She had told Amos Burton already, her lips still swollen from kisses they had unknowingly shared, that she would kill him if he ever stood directly between her and a return to her world. She knew well enough he would try to do the same to her if that Yima woman demanded it. If he even thought for a moment, perhaps, that she would wish it. But beneath that... there had been a single precious day that she had felt understood. There had been things forced into the light between them that made it clear that... they came from situations far more similar than she would have ever imagined she might share with a human man.

But she cannot say that. She had sworn she would not tell the things she had found out about him, and even though he had (hurt her) alluded to her own secrets in the debate over Manon's shard... She is not an oathbreaker.

Hayame's sharp teeth bite into her lip, her fingers curl tighter into fists.]

We traded only that which was needed, and then our business was done. Unlike some people, I would not suffer that Zenith stain to stay inside of me any longer.

cw sorry rizu but mild osiris themes

[redsoil]

No, but he will count towards their victory. You hypocrite.

[ Finally, he comes to her. Unbound and streaming vibrant red, the chasm between them threatening to deepen, to tear away like flesh from bone. He still comes to her, incandescent with resentment towards her, and feverish with what could only be some sort of sickly, desperate affection. Such things are not mutually exclusive, not to a god; their minds do not keep to the black and white of morality, but to the parameters of their divinity. ]

He will kill Meridians, he will convert them just as readily as the ones you command I kill. If you wish to make me responsible for my relationships with them, you will need to be responsible for your relation to him! I did not stop you, from killing Sebastian Michaelis. He is yours, and I have never stood in the way of that, no matter how I dally with him — but, if you dare demand that I betray Silco in this place, I will show you what happens when you give an ultimatum to someone who thinks better of you. Are we not,

friends?

[ He spits the word, baring his own fangs at her. One hand beckons to her, finger thrust forth accusingly. Calling her, on her own softness towards a Zenith Shard-bearer. One more dangerous, he thinks, than Silco is. At least Silco is honest about whom he will work with and whom he will spurn. Amos, he fears, will kill Hayame one day and shatter her heart. He will break her heart, and Set does not wish that for her at all. ]

I am not! a traitor! I was the one they turned from —

[ He falters, then.

And the flowers stream past his ankles, vines climbing his limbs. Seeking to possess him, to turn him away from her. Worse than Meridian's power, more dangerous still than Zenith's, is the ghostly image of another god — dark, cold eyes that look upon her with deep disdain and infinite patience. The sonorous quality of an adoring voice that whispers from corpse-green, life-bearing-green, mouth: It will never matter to her, Osiris laments. She will never truly hear you. I know you had hoped. ]

He understands me. [ Unfortunately. And maybe it will not matter to Silco, in the end, but for now? ] Is that not what you see in Amos Burton, too?

Eew there he is

[warmare]

[He comes to her, fierce and storming, but Hayame does not give ground or waver, her insulted expression only growing more twisted and vicious on her face as he insults her, calls her a hypocrite, threatens to show her what an ultimatum does… but she is just desperately on edge as he is, and she can storm with the gods if she must.]

You made yourself responsible for them the minute you made a deal behind everyone’s backs to bring them into our ranks! Do not try to pretend they are the same when I have never volunteered to be Amos Burton’s keeper!

[She lashes back out in defense, convinced in this that she is right. The fact that they are all Zenites and all threats in their own way is true, but he is the one who brought those dogs into their house, and so he is the one who must take them back out and shoot them. It’s fair, it’s sensible-]

And you shut your mouth! You aren’t welcome here!

[She doesn’t know what god (what shadowy vision of a god) she addresses, but Hayame snarls in Osiris’ direction anyway, the snow-heavy wind of the mountain howling along with her, cold and chilling to the bone. (Even if she didn’t want to be, even if she missed warmth-)]

How can that gaki understand you? You are stronger than him, you are better than him!

[She wants him to be better. She needs him to be better. Isn’t he? That rat contracted with a demon of his own volition, he had nothing in him but spite, so why-

It only occurs to her then, in the midst of her howling rage, that Set had called them friends. Questioned it, yes, but in doing so implying that they were, that they had been, but… what does that even mean? How can they be friends, if he insists on fraternizing with every enemy that she makes? If he constantly seems poised to abandon the only possible way back to their worlds for the embrace of some cobbled together new one? How-]

How are we friends?

[She doesn’t even know what that’s like. She’s never had one. All her pathetic, accursed life-]

How, Set?

[Why does she sound so desperate to know?]

thank god

[redsoil]

I am helping! Just because it is not in the way that you would, does not mean my efforts are wrong.

[ Why? What is that so hard for her to understand? ]

I am not the one coming to your Communion to belittle and berate you, when I do not agree with your ways. And mark me, I do not always agree with you Hayame, but I know your heart is in the right place. I know you are a warrior who I see has the potential to become truly peerless, but not if you insist on remaining upon this narrow path. It will break you, and I cannot bear to see that happen to you.

[ How can the two of them be friends? Because he wills it so. Because Set is not the kind of individual who accepts companionship readily, he does not know how to make friends. His best friend was his own sister, and Isis and he have injured one another too deeply to ever recover; will that be how it is with Hayame? How does he convey the depth of feeling that he experiences, as foreign and vast as it is? Certainly, the emotions resemble those of mortals, but they are richer, deeper, often wilder than can be described by language alone. She snaps at the ghost of his brother and, maybe,

it isn't that he's had enough, but that he needs her to understand. They are friends, why? Because ]

Because —

Even now, like this. We will not leave one another, right? I would never leave you, just because I think you are frustrating, and because you hate the people I hang out with. I would never even think of abandoning you!

[warmare]

[She wants to scream at him. She could scream at him. She could berate him further by insisting he be grateful for how long she had held her tongue trying to respect his ridiculous scheme until she’d been unable to bear it any longer, she could furiously demand he retract the insult of implying she might break, when she has been hard and cold for years and years without-

Without breaking.

But something breaks then, something small and pathetic that she never wanted to acknowledge, like a rock frozen so cold that the cracks inside of it suddenly split it from within.

She hasn’t left. She hasn’t tried to find a spell or rite to cast him from her head since the dryad had bound them together, even though she had excised Sebastian like a surgeon with a knife, removing every single trace of that demon’s influence.

And that split in the rocks that were her hearts grows, expanding in painful splinters as she stares at him over the border of snow and sand, her tail whipping in the wind. Her fingers curl into impotent, useless fists. Her face is flush with anger and shame both, with the memories of violence and the memories of… of something else, of rousing, pleasing touch. She had her “how”, but-]

Why?

[Why couldn’t they quit one another? And more importantly… why did she care? Even as she condemned him, truly hated who he chose to court, why-]

[redsoil]

[ All he wants, is to be himself and not lose someone. Not twist them into a stranger he cannot recognize, wearing the face of someone he once loved and was loved by. Hayame reminds him of Isis. His sister, beautiful and angry, whom he had always had trouble communicating with but whom had never turned her back on him no matter how many disagreements they had, no matter how many times he raised his voice to her or she pummeled her fists against his head.

Until the day she had. ]

— we need one another.

[ He will probably never live up to the things she desires from him, because it is not who he is. She will never concede to lower herself to his level, ever-proud and stalwart. But, they are both necessary. To Meridian, to their homes. ]

No matter what others think of you, or who turns away, or even if you despise me. I decided to give you my ear that day, not because I would always be a good listener to you, but because I would always listen for you.

[warmare]

[Hayame had spent her entire life trying to make sure that she didn't need anyone. There was no room for weakness in the breeding stable, and as a woman she'd had to be twice as strong, twice as loyal, and twice as cold as any man to earn respect. She could not bring herself to be close to anyone, because even the hint that she might have relied on someone else would immediately invalidate her efforts, no matter how great.

So to be told that she needs someone... that they need each other...]

... Is that how pathetic we truly are?

[Not "him", as all her accusations and beratings have been in the past. "We". Because even as she rebels against the idea she cannot say it was not true. She hadn't abandoned him, no matter how many times she felt slighted by his company or enraged by his choices. If she truly wished to be rid of him she would turn her back and engage only when Meridian required it, yet-

As if they stood now in the eye of the storm, the howling of the snow grows distant, the wind stills only where they are. Hayame's expression is pained, despite herself, warring still with rage, humiliation, and desire.]

Will I cleave to you still no matter how many times you embrace my enemies? Will you answer my call no matter how many times I condemn you for your schemes?

[And if he did... Would she truly have someone who would never turn away from her?]

[redsoil]

[ The shadow of his fellow god still lingers. It will linger always, until the day he can extricate himself from Osiris's words, until he can create something without his permission — a desert, a flower, his world. It holds fast to him, even as he steps towards Hayame; a weight that Set drags with him, whispering soft, cruel things directly to the seat of his soul. A thing he cannot easily shake, but he can ignore a little, when in the company of people like Hayame.

The chasm that had threatened to grow between them begins to narrow, slow and painfully shy, as he lifts his foot from the desert sand and steps into the snows of her mind. Where he steps, it warms. Melts, and a finger of sand dares cross the strict boundary between them, as if to hook deeper into her and hold fast, steady and true. Carefully, he reaches up for her. For the crumpled look upon her face, to stroke his fingers along the underside of the eye that had been torn from her. Her bold, powerful scar. ]

Yes, I will. I always would have.

[ It was why he was still here, yelling at her instead of washing his hands of her. To be hated and needed are not exclusive, to him. ]

The only thing that could turn me away from you, is your own word. No other could rob us of our [ suddenly, a little shy ] friendship.

[warmare]

[Osiris might be a god, but the thing attached to Set is only a shade... and that shade isn't welcome in Hayame's territory. The minute he steps into the snows it is quieter, fainter in the face of a mind that did not believe in him- that, though she had sworn her service and her violence for the god of war's blessing, barely believed in gods at all. Certainly not ones she had not exchanged blood with.

Hayame flinches away instinctively from a hand approaching her wounded eye, the eyepatch flickering in and out of existence and flashing hints of what lay beneath- what she found so disgusting and shameful, that dark, empty eye socket with perfect eyelids, as if the eye had been removed by a surgeon and not a demon's fingers. And though she flinches first... the conflict twists her facial expression, her lips, she wants so badly to just-

To tilt her head so that she might wordlessly beg for his fingers to stroke along her cheek, to find some place for it to rest in his palm. On that day when the pollen had been so heavy in the air she had felt Amos' hand there, as they found themselves accidentally sharing similarities in their pasts, and ever since... she has craved the warm comfort of that sort of touch. (Craved a lewder sort of touch, ever since that night after the masquerade.) But when she touched herself... it didn't do anything at all...]

I hate so much of what you do...

[Her voice whispers out, a shudder working it's way down her long spine. (But it's worth noting, even if she doesn't notice... that she says what he does and not what he is.)]

I know how to be a warrior-

[She swallows, her eyes (one eye and one empty lid) fluttering closed. It feels like a lie-]

Not how to be a friend-

[What is she supposed to do? Is she supposed to overlook his plans? Because she cannot. Is she supposed to calm her rage? She does not know if she can. Is she supposed to overlook how he fraternizes with all her enemies? Impossible.

So how?]

cw brief sa mention

[redsoil]

You always will.

[ There is no illusion he could cast upon himself to think that Hayame will ever be remotely okay with the things he does, that he must do, to be able to gain the power he needs to ensure victory.

In the cold of her mind, he feels the hands of the god of verdant life and the denial of death itself cast from where they hold to him; Osiris cannot have him, if he lives in this place with her. Perhaps that is why he keeps her so close, because he thinks — Hayame, with her abject horror at the sounds of agonized jinba women and the merciless force of other bodies upon them — will not find him disgusting. She will not think of him as a failure of a man and husband, whom doubts he will ever be worth her. ( For if he could not be worth his wife's confidences and trust, not be worth his sister and best friend's protection and allegiance? how could he expect anything more than what this foreign warrior deigns to give him? )

She will hate what he does. If she does not hate him, he can survive. ]

I do not like the things you do, either. We bring what we know from our lives before, and we must adapt them to a situation that seems impossible. We must continue to grow and learn... you would not fight in a swamp the same way as you would upon a plain, right? [ Why fight in Kenos solely as they know? ] I want power. I will seek power, so that I may return us both home.

[ And he pushes away the image of her eyepatch. He looks to the pit where her eye had been, before it was removed by the demon they share in common. There is no revulsion in him, only a faint appreciation for her. A faint flush that crawls across his throat, when he looks upon her face. ]

We can learn what friendship means to us. I will not abandon you.

[warmare]

[Hayame had never in her life imagined having a friend. She'd had a half-brother, who if she had allowed it (if she could have allowed it) would have been that for her, but a "friend"? When she imagined her life in the breeding stables, a future that was the best she could hope for in the confines of that life... she had perhaps hoped to have reliable allies. A master that a warrior (enslaved jinba) could be proud to serve. Friends-

Is that really something that she could stand? Continuing on hating so many of the things that this god chose to do- ? Dishonorable things, things that to her seemed so foolish and risky, things that brought him into the shadows more to the light- She hated it. Why wouldn't he just choose honor- ?

But she knows he isn't wrong. What he says about adapting. She has always known in a deep part of herself that she made her own life in Horos in Kenos harder by resisting the need to change. She was stubborn, she was medieval in her upbringing and thinking, and change... change felt too much like giving in. Like accepting that this truly was her life now, she was well and truly trapped.

If this was the outside world, if she was face to face with him... this wouldn't be happening. Her rage couldn't be tamed from without, her prejudices and bitterness were far too strong, but in here... her hearts are laid bare. He speaks to a soul and not to a woman, and that soul, beneath the anger and the ice and the violence... yearns to be accepted. He pushes away the patch that she uses to hide her injury even from herself in her own mind and she cannot- She cannot stop him. When she had demanded his blessing as a god of war in order to assure Meridian's victory, she had never imagined that they might come here. That he might be demanding instead that they be friends.

But if they were going to be that-

Her hand reaches out to brush into his crimson mane- the same locks that she brushed her violence through when she offered him the worship she had promised. She still owes him the demon, but first... her fingers curl around a streak of his hair, much like he had when he had claimed her as his. She had assumed that it would continue like that- he would be a god, and she would be his avatar, a weapon, but-]

Then you are mine.

[As much as she hates, she will not abandon him. If he is her "friend", whatever the hell that meant...

Then she will not let go of his hair until a few of the strands have turned jet black.]

1/2

[redsoil]

[ To be friend to a god was not a simple mantle to bear. To him, to befriend a mortal life was — equally difficult. There was the issue of their minds, the vast discrepancy between how they thought and perceived the world; there was the issue of their methodology, wherein she saw the path forward as one where she was stalwart and honorable and he viewed it as one where he would do anything, everything. Power, for power's sake and power, for the sake of those like her — he wants her to shine, and as badly as she wants the same for him... it is not a thing he can easily attain. Restrictions exit for him, if he wishes to use his power fully and accurately.

But for her, he can vow to be at her side in the face of it all. Even their own inner difficulties will not tear him away from her.

Rather than tear up their connection and cast it to the cold wind, she slips her fingers into his hair and stains him in turn. The dark streak falls just alongside the strands of hair bound in golden thread and metal coil, a braid that he hides in the depths upon which his sunbeam rests. It is an installation more permanent, for he cannot bear to take it out and look into his world — but he carries its murmuration alongside his ear, the same ear he had given up to her in the roots, the same one that he turns to her as she leaves her mark upon him. Upon his soul.

It is a better mark, than the other one that has long withstood his pitiful resistances. ]

We are one another's.

[redsoil]

[ — is that, then, why he calls to her among the roots?

A plaintive sound, the wordless shrill of a hunting bird far overhead, that pours the image of his location directly into their bond. They may not be of the same aspect, but there is something forged and tightly woven between the two of them, one that allows him to test her mental boundary and peer into it like a child poking holes in the shoji dividers of a wealthy man's home. If they are to be friends — if he is to ask she accept him — then, he must reveal to her where he is. When he needs. When stability begins to fail him and the cold shiver of Zenith's energy threatens to darken him, to leave him as pure as an unblooded blade awaiting use.

Zenith will take the edges from him, and leave him sleek and deadly. It will serve his goals, perfectly well. That is the threat of it. But, he has promised Hayame, promised Liem. He has even promised the Lady Yima, that he will fight his own desires, the nature of his soul; the Lady exists in his heart, patient and loving, where Hayame has probably perceived her. But their promise is simple. She will wait ( Anubis will wait ) and has encouraged him to fight on. Hayame's heart is a flinching thing, but is also encourages him in his times of exceptional weakness. ]

Hayame, [ he hopes she will come. ] Why is your mind a mountain?

[warmare]

[She had been so sure that she would not leave their shared Communion without Set's blood on her hands, and instead... she leaves it one another's. He vexes her so. She hates what he did still. And yet somehow... she had been told she was a friend. Told somewhere in their minds, where they cannot truly lie to one another, and she could not accuse him of deceit.

And so something has changed.

When the call comes, she hears it with the same ear she had once let him slice from her skull to offer the dryad. She turns to it... and much as if she was on a hunt, her sharp senses seem to spot a bird wheeling in the sky, marking where she ought to go...

Where she goes, turning her hooves onto the path through the roots towards the beacon she has been called to. But along the way... Why is it a mountain? "Why should it not be a mountain?", she thinks to ask, or perhaps a "What does it matter if it is a mountain"-]

I do not know.

[Yet, that is not entirely true. A beat later,]

They feel more free. The mountains.

[Not like the stable she'd been bred and raised in. That village in the mountain forests, that place where she had begun to form the barest hint of a thought that she might could have a different future... But that village was doomed because of her. She cannot imagine it green and warm anymore. In her mind, everything has grown so cold and treacherous. Only the deep caves were capable of sustaining light and fire now.]

cw nail trauma

[redsoil]

In Egypt, the dunes gather to such heights that they resemble your mountains. The earth burns in the day, and freezes at night.

[ Is it any wonder, then, that the god of the desert straddles the line between Meridian and Zenith?

It is almost as if he can feel her coming, were he to press his cheek to the humid, sticky root floor of the caverns they are all trapped in. If he pushes his ear to the ground, he can hear the patter of her hooves and the strength of her body as she carves a path through the world. Coming, because he has asked. The shame fills him, acute and poignant, for even though they are now friends, there is something distinctively emasculating about calling for aid. Why? Because he is bursting with energy that he needs to shed?

He ought to call a Zenith loyalist to do such a thing. He resolves that he will not offload such moonlit energy upon her, in that moment; he does not need to shed it, he only needs her near while he recovers. Injury has left him addled, after all. The taste of his own blood between his teeth and the throbbing ache in his fingertips where he'd torn his nails clean from their beds while clawing at Amos Burton's fist clenched in his hair — he is tired. ]

If your mind remains free, nothing will tether you. You truly are a woman who will be peerless, Hayame.

I regret having to show you such a sight, [ as she is almost upon him, his bruised and fight-broken body. ]

But, you are the only one I could trust not to take advantage of such a situation.

[warmare]

I had never seen sand. Or a dune.

[Maybe it still wouldn’t count, really, when she had not seen them out in the world and saw them only as conjured impression and enshrined memories of a god of war that had crept into part of her mind… But she would never have the chance to see the true thing. There was no chance to travel to the coast and see with her own eyes the wide ocean and bright sands there… not when she would die the day after she returned to her world. So she will take what she gets.

She will cleave her path through those gathered in the main ritual chamber, her aggressive stance and foul expression enough to avoid questions or hails, and she will find the right tunnel through the roots and enter, hooves echoing softly every now and then on harder patches of earth as she grows closer. She should correct him, she should admit that her mind wasn’t free… that even now she found herself falling back on the ways of the breeding stables or how she had always thought, because the shackles… they were familiar. Until a month before her arrival in Horos, they were all she’d ever known- like the fetters had been on her ankles so long that she’d started to think that the weight of them was just natural.

It is not so easily undone. But she says nothing to it. Instead, as she grows closer, as she comes to sense his presence with senses beyond just Communion—]

You came to me in the Hall of Mirrors.

[As much as she hates the reminder of her own weakness, how bruised and exhausted she had been then, unable to rise from the ice or do much more than shift to assist as he bandaged the cut across her chest… she reminds him. He could have taken advantage then… but he did not. So-]

Set.

[She can see him in the dark now, battered and bowed. Her voice sounds loud even though it is a whisper.]

What do you require of me?

[She is no healer. He knows that.]

[redsoil]

— Oh, I did? I did.

[ The Hall of Mirrors? When was that, where was that? Oh. Right. Right, the Scorching Isles. It feels so long ago now that he had laid claim to portions of that forgotten land, before being so thoroughly robbed of what he was owed. Someone had suggested commanded he let it go, sunk cost fallacy sunk cost fallacy sunk cost fallacy ( save what you can, destroy the rest; you are not a blessed hero ), and he could still feel their skin tearing under his teeth. The taste of blood makes him sick to the stomach.

( Men gather before him, gleaming eyes and sour mouths. Don't worry. She hasn't been dead for long, so her ib should still be fresh. / Don't you want the souls of women and children? / Our mission, the very reason we exist, is to help you consume souls. ) Hayame can never know. Hayame can never know these things about him; he does not, he would not! but others thought he would. The opinion of others had always informed how they looked upon him.

What will he see, when he looks up to her? Contempt? Pity? ]

I d, do not want to become trapped in my own mind.

[ She is not here for him to burden himself upon her, but the opposite.

He does not have to think of his own painfully, vibrantly 'human' existence if he can be of aid to her. Stripped of his divinity, it makes everything more disorienting. He fears things he should not fear, he is concerned for things that otherwise would have no hold upon him, he feels pain that ought not to affect him in the least. It is insanity, to him. ( The impression of it may feel like a jinba upon her own hooves, standing upon ice with no land in sight. Of treading water, of a crack running through her bow while endless enemies continue to surround her. ) ]

Sit, and talk with me. [ Though, the uptick at the end makes a mild command into a question. ] Or, rest. It is hard to find rest here, when one must worry about someone forcing themselves upon you.

[warmare]

[He did.

There is something dark and chaotic in the communion between them, something he will not allow her to see, and Hayame... does not pry. Perhaps she could. The way the borders between minds and hearts blurred here beneath the Great Tree it likely would have been somewhat easy to force her way in... but she will not. Just as she had only traded for Meridian's energy back, she will not brook with manipulating the mind of anyone- even if they were an enemy. She would kill them... she has killed them. There are shards on her person that do not belong to her. But she will not manipulate a person like that, dishonorable and cowardly. Let alone... a "friend".]

You will not be trapped or forced when I am here.

[She is possibly the most powerful shard-bearer now, in this place where magics and powers have become unreliable and they had only their bodies and their physical capabilities to rely on. Even if she isn't confident in anything but that, even if she has no idea what is going on... she speaks as if she is completely sure, because she knows only success or failure... and this cannot be a failure. What is she, if it is? Meridian has lost once before, and she is supposed to stomach another? Set may not view things so black and white... but she does.

There is no one else in this tunnel but them. The only good thing about this infuriating bleed of communion is that it was easier to tell where people were... and they are alone (for now). That allows her to slowly lumber down to her belly beside the bruised god, tired herself but unable to easily admit it. She wants to rest, (she wants to return home), but it as he said. It was hard to relax when an enemy might try and slip into your mind at any moment.

But here it is just them now. There is silence as she arranges herself, heavy and thick, but... he wishes her to talk?]

- Why did you fight so pointlessly with Amos Burton?

[They had argued over the man not too long past. She had heard the chaotic impressions of the discussion over the Blighted creature in the roots... but she had ignored the specifics as much as she was able, interested in far different matters. ... Was it really over a demented river otter?]

[redsoil]

I suppose you would see it as pointless.

[ The response is bitter, a little defensive. Of course she would; while Hayame begrudges him for dallying with those she calls 'enemies', he begrudges her a little for bothering with men like that one. The resounding, acrid thing that he feels when he thinks of Amos is akin to someone utterly revolted by a substance, so much so that he must either step away from it — or remove it from existence. ( It probably is not a great feeling for Hayame, as close to the man as she is. But, it echoes the hatred she feels for Sebastian, to a slightly lesser degree — one tinged with bitterness, and more frustration than anything else. ) ]

I cannot stand him. He is the antithesis of what it means to be human — no curiosity, no wonder, no questions that he wishes to have asked. He throws away his right to choose, and yields everything he is and could be, just to be a mindless extension of someone else's will.

[ A shudder rips through him. Nausea builds in his throat.

As Hayame rests besides him, he thinks to go to her and draw her into his arms. To hold her across him, and stroke her hair. But. She is close to the man she asks him about, and he expects her to take offense to his anger; he cannot understand Amos, and the two of them willfully ignore the terrible, horrible thing waiting below the surface that could bring them to empathize with one another. ]

He pretends to want to be alive, but purposefully turns away from everything that would make him so.

[ The past. Pain. Anguish. Grief. He just, throws them away and pretends like he wants to actually be a good person. ]

[warmare]

If you did not kill each other, it is a little pointless. Come now.

[That is what she means by "pointless", reacting to that bitter, defensive tone she hears in his voice that sounds so much like her own. The Zenith was still at their numbers, and Meridian was still at theirs. Nothing had been resolved to do with that talking animal. All that had happened was two men had scratched, bit, and punched each other until they both walked away bruised and limping.

But she does not defend Amos Burton, even though she had reacted so viciously to the suggestion that she kill him just because she demanded Set put down the two rabid dogs he'd brought into Meridian's fold. The things Set says about the man... are not exactly wrong. What she hated most about that man... is something that the war god says more eloquently than she ever could. The way he was so willing to cede everything to Yima without question, the way his trust was unshakable in someone who should be doubted and examined...

His hand, though, had been gentle and warm when it had pressed to her cheek that day, when she had first discovered that she had more in common than she'd ever thought to had with a human. The impression of it seeps into Communion whether she likes it or not- how important it had been that someone heard what she'd been and simply understood it. His eyes had been like her eyes, when she had found him pinned beneath the weight of his icy doppelganger, saying that. ... They had feared the same things, when they had been small and weak. She still had feared them, grown and strong, because those were the threats a jinba mare lived under. Amos had become free, in some ways... but she never had.

She cannot defend Amos Burton in words with those truths, though, not just because he is a grown man who can defend himself, but because she had sworn to him never to reveal them. He nearly had, in that debate over Manon's shard... but she hadn't. She thought she wouldn't. Unlike him... she has honor. But that same honor, the dedication to it...]

... Perhaps you would not have been able to stand me, not so long ago.

[She had dedicated herself to the path of the obedient warrior. To survive and avoid being rendered Armless or made into a broodmare, she had been willing to obey and not ask questions, to simply dedicate herself to whoever purchased her and desperately prove her worth to them...

Shifting on the ground, she curls her forelegs in mimicry of how those with two legs might arrange themselves, creating a sort of dun-coated "lap" of powerful equine muscles that is empty and now made into an invitation with a pat of one hand.]

Here. Your hair needs tending.

[All of him needed tending. But she has no herbs, no healing magic, no doctoring skills. - His hair she can manage.]

[redsoil]

No, but I left a lasting impression.

[ Of his teeth, on Amos's flesh. It will definitely scar, Ari said. ♡

As Set does not seek to defend his choice of companions from her ( only his use of them ), he is relieve to know that Hayame does not leap to the defense of the man who had driven him to such wild combat. Set wields a multitude of styles, a flexible and frighteningly adaptive fighter whom cares not if he must engage in a battle that is unseemly — he and Amos had certainly traded their fair share of cheap and opportunistic blows. Long, long before they had finally fallen into calm. Satisfying their anger upon one another, and quickly turning their eyes askance. Willfully ignoring the thing between them that could bring them deeper understanding, because what they represent is anathema to the other.

But, not to Hayame. He knows she must find something in the man that suits her. He's definitely going to break her hearts, though. Mentally, Set cocks the shotgun in his nasty little hypocrite hands, in defense of his companion!! He cannot stand Amos. ]

It is worse in Communion, between he and I. I think that we are fine as long as we are not forced to interact within our minds.

[ He can hardly stand, physically exhausted and injured as he is, but stubborn as a mule. Hayame, he knows, is a woman who has stood for Meridian in her own way. It is a lonely, isolating way, but a way that she embodies without failure, without hesitation. ( She must be suffering, to have no one like her in that regard. ) Climbing to his feet, he drags his battered body to her — forcing himself steady, to not tremble or make sound as he draws himself into the cradle of her legs and leans himself into her. Without hesitation. Her body has never frightened him, nor given him any reason to pause in his regard of her as a woman, a warrior, or a friend. ]

I do not think you would have liked me, either.

[ Before. Long before.

He leans into her. Freely, closing his eyes with the trust of someone who knows she will not treat him unkindly. ]

It is a good thing we met now, then. This world causes us pain, but I cannot discount that without the circumstances, I would not have met you.

[warmare]

On all the shard-bearers who had to watch you two rolling around in the dirt like monkeys, maybe…

[A lasting impression… Tch! But though Hayame chastised and grumbles, it’s not as if her hearts are in it. She almost fought Amos herself in the midst of the Manon shard debate, she would have if it hadn’t been for Claude’s disrespectful interruption and the frustrating truth that no matter how much she wished to solve things simply by right or by smite that this accursed world and these complicated people refused to allow it.

She focuses instead on watching as Set rises and closes the scant distance between them to refold himself into the cradle of her “lap”. She’d asked him to move on purpose, to see how he moved, and it makes her lips purse to note how much he seems to be concealing. She can’t tell how bad it truly is, not when he’s being so stubborn, but she is a warrior herself… and one who would do the exact same thing rather than show weakness. She can read his cover for the effort required.

Ahh… If only they never had to deal with Communion or parlays of the mind. Her distaste of the medium has always been plain… and it has worsened over time, for every attempt she has made to engage the team at large using it seems to have only ended in condemnation or bickering. That, or in Voryn Dagoth crowing about his illustrious, slave-owning lineage while those who claimed to call her a friend stayed conspicuously silent.

Hayame loathes communion and what it reveals to her. So she doesn’t say anything at all. More damning silence.

Her hands gather Set’s hair, careful to the point that it’s almost odd how she avoids brushing against his flesh. Not only is he bruised but the skin of his shoulders, back, and chest is lewd and bare and warm as always, and she- the vibrant red strands and how they shift will have to signal the movements of her fingers.]

… As if meeting me offsets any of this?

[No one has ever been glad to make Hayame’s acquaintance, she’s pretty sure. Call it a hunch. With a nip into her bottom lip, sharp and unsettled and cornered and desperate for what she had to do in order to claim that godsdamned Oracle—

She begins carefully untangling the mess that Set’s long hair had become in his brawl with Amos, gathering strands to cover for the patch ripped out in the struggle, looking… no, decidedly not looking for a streak of black as if to confirm whether she’d just imagined it or not.

Or maybe it was faded already. Dun forelegs shift just slightly, fetlocks curling and brushing hooves along his thighs.]

[redsoil]

[ The injuries he sustains now will be worsened, in time. Another round of combat awaits him, and the illness he will accrue from acting in antithesis to his desire — but, for now, he holds his aches and pains at bay and marches to her with his head held high. To flinch and act an invalid before her would be the greatest of insults, both to his pride as a man and god, as well as a show of how undeserving he is of her prayers. To her, he can be nothing less than something unstoppable, something indomitable.

In the cradle of her legs, he sits. His skin warm, but the energy within him dark. Zenith wars strongly for purchase, seeking to find the point within him that will draw him in — against her, Meridian's light takes courage, and continues to resist with its kitten teeth and claws. While naturally a warm body, it is obvious in the purposeful drape of his limb and loll of his head into her hands, that she is warmer still. Below her hands, his hair is heavy and dense; a sheet of red, pure red, root to ragged ends, but along the left of his head, away from the torn patch he had clawed apart, her fingers will find the weight of his sunbeam.

It is woven into a lock of hair by string and metal charm, warm and kept close to the same ear he had sacrificed to her and the Dryad. Easy to hide behind the curtain of his hair, easy to tuck behind his ear to keep it from swinging wildly while he is in motion. It is that streak, the one bound irrevocably to the idea of his world, that is black as night. The proof of the hold that she has on him, manifest as the red in her own hair. Small acts of fealty and promise, made true by the magic of the world.

He leans back into her, lifting his chin in order to find her face, her expression. Battered hands rise, stretching the line of him into a sinuous strip of trembling, pain-ripe skin. He takes her face into his palms, fingers light along the edge of her jaw. ]

Yes, [ he smiles, despite the split in his lip. ] That you frustrate and dazzle me are not mutually exclusive, nothing about you is something I would desire at the expense of the rest of you.