RP:A Door for Mahri

Background

This is part of the Kurgan's Run story arc.

Mahri has her first meeting with the shattered illusionist Kurgan, who after his meeting with 'Lola' experiences a period of not-quite-sanity and offers Mahri a way through the Maze.

In Another Part of the Fortress

Mahri lay on the cold..or was it warm?..stone floor of the Fortress. It'd heaved and she'd fell, hitting her head and knocking her knocked-up self out. When she finally opened her eyes it was to another roll of the walls and floor which made her stomach do strange things. Given she'd never even been sea sick, had never felt the slightest twinge of morning sickness, this was not a comfortable feeling. Somewhere she could hear the sounds of boots on stone. Somewhere, she could still hear her mother's voice fortelling her sixteen-year-old-self the future she'd have. Gods. It wasn't real. It couldn't have been. This place was kin to the Labyrinth, showing the wolf what she'd most wanted to see. Shaking her head, and regretting it near immediately, Mahri rolls to her side and then to her knees only to pause and suck in gulps of air until nausea passed. "You won't get rid of me that godsdamned easily," she growls between clenched teeth. Forcing herself to look up and get to her feet, Mahri will, once again start in the direction she thinks will lead to the Obsidian Pool.

A man came barrelling around the corner – his clothing would have been deemed fashionable several millennia ago – in an apparent and roaring hurry, not watching at all where he was going, and so was forced to skid to a halt as he came parallel to Mahri. Well. Not exactly –parallel- since he was walking sideways on the wall, moreso crossways, then. “Excuse me, Miss.” His eyes were inky, blacker than night, and his skin the pale of a creature forever hidden from the sun. Untidy brown hair could have almost deliberately have been twisted into those clumps sticking out all over his head, over a face too thin for its bones. “I really must be getting along… Were you saying something?” Mahri might notice how those walls had stopped heaving. Mahri is only too glad that the walls are staying still. Moreso the floor. She was, however, surprised to see a man walking on the wall, his head perpendicular to her own. Blinking, she comes to a stop. Why was she surprised? This was the Fortress that housed the Pool. Mahri made the mistake of looking into those liquid-black eyes. Nausea returned and she swallows down the rise of bile while the infant within rolled, causing her billowing over-sized shirt to ripple over her stomach. "I was sayin' you won't get rid of me so easily. I am ~not~ leaving." Why she had said 'you' instead of referencing that miasma of black sludge surrounded by stone, Mahri can't quite explain even to herself. Instinct brought her hands to cover the swell of her stomach protectively and one step is taken back just before the wolf broke eye contact, if he didn't break it first.

Kurgan was very still, but for the lowering of his brows into a pensive and concerned expression. “Leaving? Get rid of…” Though he had little but a vague and shivery feeing that he’d seen her somewhere before. The illusionist shook his head. “You shouldn’t be here. Nobody should. Nobody at all. But I…” He halted, staring at the mound of her belly. “Oh, I say. An infant? Here?” Mahri would not be able to discern clearly whether he was extremely surprised or rather horrified. “No, no you shouldn’t be here at all. That said…” He backed up a little and trod down off the wall to stand a short distance from the lycaness, his head tilting as a bird’s might on spying an early worm. “.. why –are- you here?”

Mahri grits her teeth, grinding them when the man talks and mentions her child. Her son. "No, not leaving and you leave my child alone." Since he had retreated, Mahri raises her chin and walks forward again. "I am here for my sister. Where is she? Because," the feral smile that pulls lips away from her teeth fails to reach hard silver-gray eyes and Mahri keeps coming putting aside any fear or discomfort to confront this being she is coming to believe is of the Pool itself, " Tenebrae is not staying. Joliette Thorne is coming home. To her family." The use of both names is entirely deliberate: a reference to the past and a promise of the future.

Kurgan said, “Oh.” He tugged at his lower lip. “Oh. I see. Of course. Her family.” Mahri was studied, as the man paced the short breadth of the corridor. “Family. Yes, I had a… Tenebrae… sister, you say?” His footsteps stopped, and the once-man wheeled upon Mahri, wearing a grin that wasn’t –exactly- maniacal. “Quite the spitfire, wot? Gave old crankypants a run for his … Oh dear. Oh dear me. I must get back… He’s almost finished the tea, you see. Bergamot. Hard to get in this…” There was sudden silence, and the walls quaked again, during which the man seemed to ripple in a manner beings made of flesh simply do not. When the rumble ceased, he looked paler then even before, and it seemed his forehead was leaking a drop of ink. With one palm planted to the wall –somehow, sunken a little into it – he shook his head violently. “Oh. Dear. Me.” And then those black eyes were again on Mahri. “You don’t look well, Miss.”

Mahri is trying to follow this..thing's reasoning and thought patterns. It's worse than a fecking maze. She has to blink several times even though she keeps walking. That is, until the walls and floor decide to start moving again. With a gasp, she puts a hand out to steady herself. Looking down for just a moment, to ease the vertigo making her head spin which probably isn't the best idea, Mahri snaps her gaze up once again to Kurgan (not that she knows his name..), "I feel fine." It's a lie, her stomach churns with it. "Where is she then?" Mahri isn't at all concerned with anyone who happens to be drinking bergamot tea.

Kurgan looked terribly confused. “I don’t know. She was here… but she goes away, you know. Always, just up and goes.” His hand made a fly-away flipping gesture. “It’s worse when she’s not dead. I mean… not that I mean it’s better when she is. You know. Just that it’s easier, when she goes that way and not…” he peered at Mahri, her expression. “Oh. You mean Tenebrae. Yes, she’s in the well. With a man.” He stopped, “Well, a kind of man. Ehm, I meant, he’s a sort-of man, in the well, not that the well…” he stopped again. “Nothing is, you know. Quite well.” He flinched, as though the walls might start moving again. “You ought to have some tea. Because really, you don’t look… you know. And it could be a long way. Though I –could- make a door…”

Mahri draws in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. Through her nose. She is struggling to keep her temper. "Yes. I mean Tenebrae." Shaking her head, Mahri starts forward again. The man Kurgan speaks of can only be one person, "Colton. Shoulda fecking known... I'll take my chances, no doors needed." She did not, under any circumstances, trust this 'person'. "No tea either. I'll get there on my own." Squaring her shoulders stubbornly, Mahri keeps going along the corridor. She might look a touch paler than normal. In fact, any color she'd had is now gone. A tiny foot jabs at the confines of her womb and Mahri winces from it.

“Miss? I say, Miss…” His forefinger raised, the shattered being stepped lively after Mahri, and would mutter, “Up and go. Blasted women… Miss!” His long strides would catch her up shortly after, and Kurgan paced beside the lycaness, his hands folded behind his back. “You might reconsider. It’s not difficult, you know. Making a door. Most of the time. And it could be a very long way and you… Oh, I say - a boy, eh?” The man glanced aside to her stomach. “Stout little chappie. Reminds me of…” He went pale again, and staggered against the wall. “…miss him, really. I used to see things…feel things.. Miss….?” Kurgan was shaking again, and his tremors seemed to blur him as if he shook at a rate of oscillation that would have killed any living man. When it stopped, his pale skin almost glowed for its whiteness. “… soon. She’ll do it soon, unless I find… but she up and went, and I can’t… and there’s that blasted monk, after you. He’s close… closer… he smells us. Like cheese.” He blinked those great, dark eyes. “You know, rats. In a maze. Only…” Pushing off the wall, for a brief moment the man seemed more –normal- and less entirely odd. His breath was ragged, and he spoke through huffs of it, his voice dropping an octave, taking a surer cadence. “… I –am- the maze. And I make the doors.”

Mahri wasn't looking at Kurgan, keeping her eyes straight ahead. She was listening though. "The monk can go f...he can just keep following me if he wants. Doesn't matter." Pressing against the odd rise in her stomach that is in actuality that foot, Mahri barely pauses in her determined walk to the Pool. It wasn't until Kurgan announced just what it was he is that Mahri stops. "How do I know you'll send me through the right one? If you ~are~ the maze, you could send me outside or somewhere completely different. I can't trust you." Now she looks at him. In the eyes. All those ramblings..she'll put them together eventually. She knew, by now, he used to be mortal. Again, she refuses to talk about her son. "What I want is for you to take me to where my sister is." Another sharp jab from inside and Mahri gasps, clutching at her stomach. "Now."

The illusionist was staring at her, as though he could see through her clothing – to her child, a faint smile curving his wide mouth. “Stout little chap. He’ll keep you busy.” His voice had lost that slightly hysterical edge, and he seemed altogether more.. together. Which was wasn’t at all far from the truth. “Please listen. I don’t have long, the things she’s doing are stirring everything up, gluing things together, tearing them apart again. Your sister… I can’t take you there. I’m sorry, but I’m just not.. very stable at the moment. And that would only make it easier for her to kill me.” He spoke hurriedly now, glancing off into some non-existent distance beyond the wall. “I can make you a door, but where it goes is up to you. I don’t recommend you go directly to the well, the monk is… You know who sees through –his- eyes, don’t you? .. he’s headed that way. And there’s others who aren’t so…” He smiled again, abashed, and gestured. “…indisposed. Who could stop her. Killing me. Which would be –great- because you know, well, the being dead thing. No fun at all.. heh. That, and..” He seemed more nervous now. “:… the end of everything. Miss, you can’t keep making yourself tired. Worn out. The child.. tea is what you need. Peppermint, I believe. And some rest. Let me make you a door.” He did not sound at all as if he was willing to be argued with.

Mahri wonders if she has a choice at this point. She was exhausted. Her head hurt, throbbed, and she felt like she was going to be ill. She listened. Carefully. He sounded..sane. Or as sane as anything in this place could be. "Make a door, Maze. I'll get where I need to be." Which is the well if that's where her sister is godsdamn it. "If this door will get me where I want to go, then make it because it's going to take me to the well whether you like it or not." And it is entirely possible he can be lying. Mahri has to take her chances. The stubborn set of her jaw says she will not be argued with either. As for the monk? She'll deal with him when or if the time comes. "Also. My friends who were with me, can you tell me where they are before you make this door?"

Kurgan pinched his lip again, frowning. “Not very stable. I told you that, didn’t I? Your friends.. Wee all have our dark side. Like a moon. I remember the moons….” His head blurred, abruptly, as it shook. “No time. You have to go. Now. And I must get back, I’ll be just in time for…” He looked blankly at Mahri. “Time. He never did like me. Now .. if you would, please? Just stand over there a bit. Nono, more to the left. Right there, yes. Close your eyes, it’ll stop things going round.” Any reply Mahri might have to make would be moot; she was suddenly engulfed in an utter, terrifying blackness so thick she might fancy it carried weight.

Mahri would do as directed, even going so far as to close her eyes though every instinct screamed not to. Opening her mouth to say something scathing, the only thing that comes out, and would not be heard, is a scream as an oppressive blackness settles over her. Her mind goes blank and for a moment or longer she cannot remember where it is she wanted to go. It would take her anywhere she wanted he'd said. So. Where..Oh, yes. The panic that had nearly set in comes down a few notches to mere terror and she'll think about that room which housed the pool. And her sister. She thinks of Tenebrae/Jolie, hoping that is enough to get her where she wants to be.

Alone in the corridor, the once-man sighed. “Good luck. Now, a door for me.” The walls trembled violently and his black eyes rolled in his head, and his voice would sound as echoes down the endless, twisty corridors of his own soiled soul, “Time... for... teeeeaaaa.....”