Shaper Master Diwaniya (
sans_harmony) wrote in
faderift2017-05-08 12:55 pm
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[OPEN] no such winds blow hither
WHO: Diwaniya and anyone who'd be in the vicinity of the garden.
WHAT: Plants vs. Rifters
WHEN: At...some point after Di's arrival.
WHERE: The Gallows herb garden
NOTES: None atm.
WHAT: Plants vs. Rifters
WHEN: At...some point after Di's arrival.
WHERE: The Gallows herb garden
NOTES: None atm.
It's been a long time since Diwaniya last stood under the shade of a real live tree. It's been a long time, come to think of it, since he even saw any sunlight strong enough to produce shade. Or flowers, or stone buildings, or people who looked at him with anything but mingled fear and loathing.
It's nowhere near enough to make up for the way this place has crippled him. He can't shake the feeling that no matter how green the garden blooms, it's all a facade, a sterile simulacrum of life and health, frozen and unalterable and doomed to stagnate with no Shapers to tend it. But it's something, if a very small something.
The herbs are all distressingly foreign to him. He could identify any one of the eighty-seven plant species unique to the Ashen Isles from across a room, fresh or dried, but even something as ubiquitous as elfroot looks utterly alien to him. He reaches for a plant growing in a pot, meaning to pluck a leaf for further examination. It doesn't occur to him that he might not be perfectly entitled to manhandle the flora.
no subject
Perhaps he can forgive himself for doubling over with a singularly undignified noise, still breathless from that blindsiding pain when she pulls him down. But he's not at such a loss that he can't eventually catch his bearings, fueled by seething fury and a lifetime of training to keep his wits about him. He has had enough of being flung around like a leaf in a whirlpool, enough manhandling and abuse for things both his fault and not, and it's painful enough to think that he's been forced to surrender his own world to the common rabble and their chaos--he refuses to give in here and now.
Her grip on his collar is tight, unexpectedly strong, but she's left his hands free. He calls fire to them with a burning thought, holding one flaming palm perilously close to the underside of her arm, and raising the other as a promise of more to come.
"Take your filthy hand off me," he snarls, "before I burn it off at the wrist."
no subject
See, this kind of thing? This is why no one likes mages. When they’re on your side, it’s one thing, it’s a damn sight useful then. But how often are they ever on your side? The world doesn’t stack up that lucky that often. Not with the past few years spent loading the dice.
The flicker of fear across her face is instant, obvious — can’t be entirely swallowed by the fury that follows. She shoves him back free with a snarl, beating the heat from her sleeve with the dangling ends of the other.
"Think you’d be the first one they killed here?" Melys hisses, draws a sharp line across her neck. "Go on, keep it up."
But it’s plain from the angle of her stance (drawn rough now, defensive): She wants no such thing. Perhaps it's not so difficult, to guess what she might fear. Not so difficult, but he's found it all the same.
no subject
But they are at an impasse. He's thought of his arrival here as a reprieve, on some level, even if he hates it, because his odds of survival here are still a hell of a lot better than what he'd been looking at there--but he's learned just enough about Thedosian magic to know that the shoe is on the other foot now. He's the outsider here, the stranger who could be swiftly and justifiably put to death for being too free with his magic, the way his own people would undoubtedly have done to an alien mage dropped into Terrestia. Whether Melys means to imply that they've done that to reckless rifters before, he doesn't know--but it's not a chance he wants to take. He knows too well the bloody price of keeping magic under control. It's the same everywhere.
But very little of that trepidation shows on his face, even as he lets the flames die down and holds up his empty hands as if to prove himself disarmed. Don't show fear. Never show fear, or you have nothing.
"Then I suggest you save the aggression for when witnesses are around to keep you safe," he says. (His groin seems to cringe preemptively in anticipation of another assault. He pretends it doesn't.) "You don't look like someone whose word people would take on faith."
http://catbearding.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/cat-hate-it.gif
Her eyes are still shot too wide for it to come off properly vicious. The solidity of the Gallows around her, the weight of all that history and stone — it's a silent promise: This fucker won't last, not forever, not like this,
But he could last plenty long enough to be a problem. Loathe as she is to retreat, time's past-due for an exit; if she need do that, best to make a petty little point of it.
Melys reaches out for the pot of elfroot, smacks it deliberately aside from its perch. Ceramic shatters out on the ground below, sends earth and stem sprawling. She holds his gaze, squares her jaw,
"But I guess we'll find out."
And turn, and prepare to flounce —