[OPEN] Dark dream world / all alone.

[minrathousian]

WHO: [OPEN] Atticus Vedici + Anyone!; [CLOSED] Petrana de Cedoux, Sina Dahlasanor
WHAT: After being attacked by his apprentice, Atticus is alone in the Gallows now.
WHEN: Spanning the middle of August, after this thread. (Petra's thread is set the same afternoon of the attack.)
WHERE: The Gallows dungeon; the library.
NOTES: None currently, will update as needed.

I.  [SINA]


The black sand, murky sea, and green sky of Sina's dream is familiar to Atticus now, though it is strange to reconcile the sight of the glowing spectre in the water with the young girl he'd seen in the dungeon.

This visit, he doesn't bother to shroud himself from her view; she knows who he is. He comes to stand just beyond the reach of the tarn-like surf.

He has no pleasantries for her, or sympathy:  "How much time," he begins, straight to the point, "do you believe you have left?"



II. [PETRANA DE CEDOUX]


It has been some hours since Benedict's ill-fated attempt at hexing his mentor, and the violent fall-out that occurred shortly thereafter--enough time for a Tranquil mage to see to the angry gash in Atticus' eyebrow rendered by Ser Coupe's knife. In a different cell now, Atticus stands with his back to the cell bars, fingers gently inspecting the proud flesh rising up around his sutures; a scar will be inevitable without magical intervention, and he has few expectations of receiving that here.

Decorously arranged on the meagre workstation that has been provided to him, his books and parchment are open, quill in an inkwell. It seems he has paused his work only to pace his cell, grimacing with discomfort both at the state of his injury, and the shackles that continue to rub his wrists raw.



III. THE LIBRARY


Research without the aid of an assistant is tedious business, but it isn't as though there is a great deal else at his disposal at the moment to occupy his time. (At least, not in the waking world.) If he is occasionally pensive or distracted as he works, the root cause could be anything: the disruption to what little routine he's been able to establish, now that Benedict is no longer tethered to him; some question he is toying with answering.

At some point he gets up to stretch his legs--a bit difficult, with the shackles on, but he tries.
 

Comments

[minrathousian]

This blatant display of combined anguish and relief is obscenely uncomfortable for him to bear witness to. He grimaces and waits in impassive silence for her to get whatever this is out of her system; almost as an afterthought, he looks to the water, and suddenly small fish flit through it, weaving in and amongst the marshy grass.

When he can't tolerate her tears anymore, he interrupts her coolly. "I'm willing to assist you, if you're prepared to begin."

[eolasemah]

It has turned into Home, over the past few moments: towering trees, greenery, the swamp leading into a small stream that trickles toward a distant Dalish camp. Smoke rises from their campfire, and the peaceful sound of lowing halla periodically interrupts the far-away chatter of a busy clan. Sina is entranced by them for a time, tears still streaming openly from her eyes, even a second or two after Atticus speaks again.

Not standing yet, she looks up at him, still wary as before, but so happy she can't find her aggression. "How?"

[minrathousian]

Distractedly, Atticus gathers up the hem of his cloak and gives it a shake, dispersing of the excess water; it floats away as bits of dandelion fluff on the wind.

"How?" Sina asks him, and he assumes she can't possibly be asking about his ability to shape the Fade. Surely she has pieced together what he is by now; his gift is one that is shared with her people.

"By attempting to touch it," he says instead, gesturing to the green glow still emanating from her chest. "With magic. I would like to determine for myself the extent of my ability to affect your shard here in the Fade."

[eolasemah]

At his gesture, Sina looks down at the shard, almost as though she wasn't expecting to see it still there. It looks more the way it does in her waking life: still very uncomfortable, but hardly taking up half her torso as it does in her dreams.

She stands with a small nod and takes a step toward Atticus, facing him squarely, arms at her sides and undefensive. There is gratitude in her face, for taking the sea away, however temporarily.

[minrathousian]

Atticus doesn't know what to do with her gratitude in this place, and so he tables his awareness of it--for now, at least. It will be something to evaluate, once this experiment is complete. What is this new dream worth to her, he wonders? What will she give him in order to keep it?

When she steadies herself, he fixates his attention on that shard; the raw power there is intoxicating to him, even as it is slowly, steadily killing its host. He extends his hand out towards her, letting the very tips of his fingers interfere with the green, glowing tendrils that extend outward from the shard's site. Like changing a dream, he tries to change her anchor; he thinks, ease, and apart, and let go, but with extreme, surgical gentleness.

It would not do to cause her unnecessary pain or anguish; she may not let him proceed in that case.

[eolasemah]

Although the sleeping Sina wants very much to cooperate, the shard thinks little of this. It does seem to loosen within the dream, but only reveals more of itself, the cloth and skin around it peeling back as their combined imagining wills it to. It crackles ominously, and Sina gives a small jolt, seeming to lose herself for a moment. The dream flickers around them-- it's having an effect on the actual shard, whether or not it's what Atticus intended.

[minrathousian]

His jaw tightens with displeasure, and he ceases the casting of his spell with an abrupt closing of his fingers into a fist; already he can feel the beginnings of a splitting headache taking root in his temples, at the place where his spine meets his skull. Damn.

“If I proceed, I expect I will kill you,” he tells her neutrally and lowers his hand to his side. “Already I imagine you’ll feel some--” hah, “--discomfort when you wake in the morning.”

As will he, no doubt. (Where he sleeps, already there is a trickle of blood from his nose. He will need to be more careful.)

[eolasemah]

Once awakened, the shard doesn't go back down easily. The dream shifts almost imperceptibly with each flicker, a greenish tint filtering in, the pastoral grass and trees giving way to rocky cliffs and black sand, the repetitive rush of waves in the backs of their minds. Even a somniari can't keep this at bay.
Sina, at least doesn't change to how she was when they first met. Instead she looks around with a grim expression, her eyes beginning to glow green as they had before, but this seems only to magnify her disappointment rather than make her frightening.
After a moment's thought, she turns to meet Atticus' eyes directly, her gaze penetrating for a split second before they both wake up. In her case, there's coughing and wheezing, and likely a trip to the infirmary.

[minrathousian]

He can't keep it at bay yet.

His displeasure evaporates as he witnesses the shard's efforts to preserve itself in its host, turning some where they both stand to regard with dark appreciation how the waves wash in again, the sand a gritty presence under his heel. How marvellous this object is, even as it saps the life out of the girl who holds it.

Atticus turns back to her in time to catch her penetrating gaze--and then he, too, wakes up to early morning sunlight that he cannot stand to look at. He stumbles out of his cot and over to the wash basin in his cell, catching himself on it roughly, and wills himself not to be violently ill. While he succeeds in that, the steady drip, drip, drip of blood from his nose takes some time to abate.