RP:A Little Bit of Madness
Summary: To assuage Emrith's concern over his friend Tylania's mental state, Larewen meets with her in the Kelay Tavern. When Emrith arrives, the two discover just how much Tylania has been affected by recent events.
Kelay Tavern
Built and rebuilt, torn apart and set like stubborn bone, this tavern is the pinnacle of Hollow's entirety, wrought around the premise of peace, equality, and consummate amity. And of course, the old place had seen all of the three, but so much more. Dire markings of claw and steel cut deep into wall panels and floorboards. Set against the land's usual motif of destruction are signs of comfort. Twisting shadows and smoothing out a careful blanket of light with soft, quaint fires, a candelabra dangles down by thick cords, gripping the circular holder. Each twists up, converging upon the center, where they snake about one another and form a thick, secure anchor to Kelay Tavern's high, accommodating ceiling. The candelabra rattle now and again from the inn patrons overhead, pouring down globs of wax to the center of the room, which is wide and unobstructed. Cheaply carpentered tables and chairs grow outward around the bare dancing area, keeping to the rounded theme, and also keeping to a dwarven barkeep's avariciously born taste for 'economical' furniture. Hardly any expense has been wasted on the actual upkeep of the public center, as can be garnered from the smell of deep pine, rich tobacco, and even richer spirits. Stairs twist away dimly near the high bar. And atop that side rests the inn logs, quill, and ink. This establishment's fine keeper, Mesthak, can be seen smiling out from his post at the bar, straight across to the room's always crackling stone-wrought hearth. Behind him, atop lofty shelves, sits an array of dark, amber, and clear liquids. Food smells waft from somewhere near at hand. A carefully printed and hung sign details the purchasable items here in the place of merriment, loss, laughter, and life. Also, tucked into a corner near one of two windows closest to the tavern doorway is a thickly papered bulletin board. A sign has been added next to the board that reads, 'The management requires patrons be fully inebriated at all times and that no curing spells be performed in this tavern-Thank you'.
Larewen sat in a corner of the establishment, a glass of wine in one hand and a tome splayed across the table in front of her. A painted nail ran across the symbols that were drawn onto the page and the necromancer's lips were pursed in thought. One leg was crossed over the other beneath the skirt of her simple, verdant gown and she paid little attention to those around her.
Tylania walked through the doors into the tavern, breathing deeply the dank odor of the place. "God i hate it here" she mumbled quietly under her breath. Tucking her large white wings against her body she traversed the crowd and made her way to the bar. Her eyes used to be full of life and vibrant, but now she looked around the tavern with dull, glazed eyes. Pain and anger burned deep within her, but she ordered a drink and scanned the crowd. Her eyes would glance over Larewen for now, seeing as how she didnt seem to recall her.
Larewen's head lifted at the distant mumble of a vaguely familiar voice. Her dark eyes swept over the establishment, settling on the winged girl with a brief thinning of lips. She recalled the avian quite well, just as she recalled the quarrel that took place when she'd sought to depart. The change in the other's demeanor was noted as well and Larewen seemed to recall Emrith mentioning that Tylania hadn't been right in sometime. Pressing her lips into a thin line, the necromancer finally called out to her with, "Join me, Tylania."
Tylania heard her name, and turned to look at the woman. She looked....familiar somehow, "Do i know you?" her words would be clipped, and short. She didnt come off as rude, so much as not interested in conversation. Her friends were all dropping dead like flies around her, she didnt have time to be talking, she had things to do, training to attend to, and then...people to eradicate.
Larewen arched a brow at Tylania. "You've tried to kill me," came the elf's reply, perhaps a bit more tartly than she intended. Her head tilted to a slight angle. "Emrith says that you are not right; that something is wrong with you, since that day."
Tylania felt her pulse quicken. "is something wrong with me" Her words were rueful, and a harsh laugh forced its way out of her throat. "Oh dear. And how would HE know anything about me? I havent hardly seen hide nor hair of him!" She couldnt help but laugh, it was just too funny. "As for me not being right...." She giggled darkly "He doesnt know the half of it"
Larewen arched a brow at the avian, shifting upon her chair and removing her hand from her book. A moment later, she raised her glass of wine to her lips and sipped it. When it was lowered, the elf's dark eyes fixed coldly upon the other. "Of course you haven't. He was busy helping the elves win the war," Larewen said. "He knows enough to give him cause to worry. His concern is not something to be amused about. He felt that he might be partially at fault for it, given the quarrel."
Tylania let out a real laugh "Help the elves win the war...." seeing as how she was currently talking to an elf she kept her current plans to herself. "He can kiss it for all i care. He can also shove his worry where it belongs, you got me? It was entirely his fault about what was wrong with me, but tell him to not worry anymore. My condition has greatly improved and i am fine now." shaking her head roughly she downed a drink and tapped the bar for another. "I have no use for his pity, or anyone elses anymore."
Larewen narrowed her eyes slightly. "He does not pity you, but rather accepts his fault and wishes to seek a remedy. However, if this is your attitude regarding it, then perhaps I ought to convince him that it would be a lost cause." Unlike her lover, Larewen had no patience for those in Tylania's situation,.
Tylania smiled as another glass was set in front of her, then raised it in the womans directions as she spoke those last words. "Do tell him that, and tell him to do his best to stay away from me. I have no use for someone who betrays their friends"
Larewen responded with a lift of her shoulders. That was that, as far as she was concerned. As long as Tylania made no attempts to harm Emrith, anyway. The cold stare that the avian received in lieu of her words was unwavering.
Tylania 's curiosity was piqued anyways and wanting to taunt even if only a little the elf in front of her, "What ever happened between Talyara and emrith? They were so close for so long"
Larewen's lip curled and her glass of wine was raised to her lip in lieu of the query. "What business is it of yours, hm?" came her reply, a cold echo of the woman she'd been only recently. "If you've no use for friends like him, then certainly you've no use for knowledge of his relationships." Her grip tightened around the bowl of the wine glass and webs began to slowly unfurl across it.
Tylania smirked agaisnt her own glass "Did i hit a nerve, dear?" another rough laugh forced its way out of her throat. "I was just curious is all. I mean, last time i seen him those two were quite close to one another. All over each other actually"
Emrith breezes into Kelay Tavern and lets the doors clap shut behind him. He looks around, sees Larewen and smiles to himself. It is a distinctly satisfied expression, though far from smug. A moment later, his eyes find Tylania, a figure he has not seen in some time, and the wood-elf favours her with a slightly more reserved quirk of the lips...a smile, to be sure, but one far more polite and somewhat less fond. "Good evening," he says to the room at large, before making his way toward Larewen with an unhurried stride.
You opened her mouth to reply, and it was at that precise moment that the devil himself graced the pair with his presence. Emrith's approach was met with a somewhat relieved expression, a genuine smile turned up toward him. "Good evening, my love," the necromancer greeted in return, the chair beside her moving seemingly of its own accord - a magical invitation for the other to join elf and avian. Her gaze returned to Tylania and in the dark, depths of those brown eyes a sort of hatred smoldered.
Tylania smirked at the mans entrance "Ahh, speak of the devil, and he himself shall appear. How have you been, friend?" She spat at him, adding venom to the word friend, as if even speaking it caused her discomfort. "Come to see me to the grave as well? Or maybe to rub it in my face how utterly alone i am now?" Her eyes, which recently had seemed so dull and dusty, now burned brightly. Anger forthcoming in her eyes, the only emotion she seemed to hold anymore, anger and hate.
Emrith takes the offered chair, then reaches out and gently puts a hand over Larewen's near wrist; she has no doubt heard him sit, and had been able to guess his location by the sound of his voice and footsteps, but he does not wish to startle her by sudden unexpected contact. For the moment saying nothing to Larewen, he turns instead toward Tylania; his keen eyes do not miss the avian's tortured expression, and his tapered ears hear well the tones of hatred in her voice. "I have no idea what angers you so, Tylania," Emrith says evenly, "but at the moment you sound very much like a child. If you would care to discuss your grievances, I am ready enough to hear them. I know I have done you great ill in the past, and I mean to undo it somehow, if I can. But if Larewen's face tells me truth - and it usually does - these aren't the first bitter words to fall from your tongue this evening."
Larewen furrowed her brow at Emrith's words, and then reached toward her book again, though it was of little use to her. Opening it, she again ran her fingers over the symbols written upon its page, and it was, perhaps at that moment, and the method in which Emrith approached, that it would be determined that Larewen actually could not see the avian that sat across from her at the table. It must have been smell and the habit of looking about the room that had somewhat accurately drawn her attention to the other. "Emrith..." Larewen began quietly, as if intending to dissuade him from it. Her own features became somewhat troubled, an expression that would not dare cross her features in the past - she was unaware of it. The elf's head turned, dark eyes staring just past the elf's ear. The necromancer was blind.
Tylania giggled to herself. "i find myself lacking the will to speak to you at all honestly, i do not wish to be found in a grave anytime soon because of your treachery. How many of your friends have you watched die now emrith? How many more? Will your sweet larewen be next? Or will it be Talyara?"
Emrith narrows his eyes and peers more shrewdly at the avian seated across from him. His voice has lost most of its easy joviality when he responds. "Ah, another one who leaps before she looks. I had expected better." An elegant little shrug of his narrow shoulders conveys contempt. "As yet, you have been the only lamentable harm to happen directly at my hands which has not, as yet, been balanced out somehow. Laezila took harm from me, it is true, but I have worked mightily to redress it. Talyara repaid me for my trust in her by bedding another, so she loses the right to hold most claims you may be thinking of; besides, if you were to speak to her or her sister, you might come to realize that we, as adults so often do, have made our peace with the wrongs we have done one another...largely, anyway. Neither of those two women dislikes me, much less hates nor has reason to fear me. And as for Larewen..." He gives her wrist a little squeeze. "I suppose I have done her some small harms, but whatever grievances we may have, or find, between one another are our business, not yours. Now, what was this list of crimes you were laying at my feet? Because I am frankly unsure at this point." Emrith has not lost his composure, but a weariness sits in his heart like a lead ball; Tylania, of all people, he had not expected to embody this sort of behaviour.
Larewen felt the squeeze of his hand around her wrist and twisted her own so that his hand would fall into her palm. A moment later, the elf's fingers sought to intertwine with his, returning the squeeze a little more roughly than she had intended. She hadn't expected him to arrive while they were still speaking, though she was certainly glad for his nearness. While the woman, when seen in public, seemed to be quite alright, she was still adjusting to the loss of her sight. That, coupled with her still healing leg really made travel far more difficult than it had to be. To the words that are being exchanged, the necromancer said nothing whilst a fang dug into her own cheek.
Tylania kept her sinister smile through his speech. Her once clean white soul was now stained black with a vow for vengence, she used to be sweet and kind, but her attitude towards people had taken a dramatic shift. "I cant help but get sick of hearing you talk. I dont know how but it seems as though all the people i have ever truly loved have gone and died lately, and the only link they seem to have is you. The man i fell in love with, and the man i thought the world of....they're both gone and your hands are at least partially painted in their blood!" Tears welled at the corners of her eyes, and her voice was filled with an unimaginable pain. "I spent two months mourning over him, it came in bouts. Seizure, then crippling saddness, and repeat. As soon as i started to heal, i find Nymh has also passed..." She refused to let the tears in her eyes fall to her cheeks. Her whole body shook violently with tearless sobs. "They're both gone, but me....i am still here. I watched as they ripped Zendors lungs through his back and splayed them out like a pair of grotesque wings. I watched as the light slowly left his eyes, as he bit the inside of his cheek to keep from screaming out. I watched nymh sit in a bed, a giant wound in his stomach which you refused to let people heal, i watched you force him to suffer until Hildegarde intervened. Would he have died then by your neglect had she not stepped in?" Her voice had steadily raised, not to a shout, but she had gone from talking quietly, to being loud enough to grab other patrons attention. Pain and anger rolled off her in waves, and it wouldnt take an empath to realize the amount of pain she was in. Even she could feel her sanity slowly slipping away from her grasp....
Emrith clutches Larewen's hand as if for strength, his own grip perhaps rougher than it would otherwise be. In that way, the tightness is reciprocated. "Tylania, I have a few things to tell you. First of all, Zendor was a traitor. Did you know that he and Gevurah nearly conspired to have me killed, long before he himself was unmasked for what he was?" He pauses for a beat, to let the news sink in. "I fled, and barely escaped with my life. And as for Nymh...his loss is unfortunate, but here again, your facts fail you. Nymh gave himself that wound in his stomach by his own hand; that accursed blade he possessed was largely responsible. He went mad, and it was largely through my own intervention that Nymh survived. I had to break his wrists to stop himself doing further harm. And here, Tylania, is why I wanted to refuse him healing. I came to know Nymh well. He was brave, and headstrong, and was so devoted to his ends that he threw caution to the winds. Against orders from Hildegarde, Nymh attacked Gevurah, was captured and killed. I meant to keep him from battle, to keep him alive but unable to hurt himself. In effect, I tried once again to save his life. Zendor's death was, from all accounts, far more brutal than he deserved; I would have delivered him one swift blow, head split from shoulders, no pain. He chose his path." Now the wood-elf's voice drops lower, grows angry. "So pray you learn sense. I was not responsible for the deaths of either man. Your grief I understand, but they are not my crimes. Perhaps you would have better luck with living friends if you knew better how to choose the ones that were worth your attention." Now he does nothing except glare. It is still in place when he turns toward Larewen, but now the spell-blade attempts to moderate his voice. "Was this ongoing when I arrived, love?" he asks, his voice still obviously full of emotion. "Has she been regaling you with how monstrous I am?"
Larewen listened quietly to the exchange, her cracked glass lifting to her lips as she sipped the carmine fluid. She was intrigued, certainly, yet remained quiet still until she was addressed. "Negative," the elf replied, her head turning in Tylania's direction. Dark eyes sought the other's face, but focused just above her head instead. "She was using Talyara to taunt me." Larewen was unaware of the glass being cracked as she pulled it away from her lips, and as she spoke that answer, her fingers tightened reflexively around it one more time. This time, the webbed bowl shattered, the glass embedding itself in the palm of her hand whilst stem and wine fell to her lap, staining her gown.
Tylania grinned at the mans words, but was immediatly drawn by the thick smell of blood as the woman had glass stuck through her hand. Instinctively she reached towards the womans hands, remembering emriths half decent job on her wounds and her wings. She however had been studying healing runes, and tending to her own wounds for ages now. "I can quickly pull the glass out of her hand and put a rune on it to speed the healing up quite a lot" her gaze was empty as she turned to emrith. She held no urgency to help the woman, nor did she hold any mal-intent towards her, she simply felt the need to keep her from bleeding everywhere. "As for what you said of Zendor, i learned of his traitorous actions long ago, but i do not choose sides in this war, so they mean nothing to me. The attempt on your life, however...well..." she paused something strange, a mix of anger and amusement flashed through her eyes "I remember when you almost killed me. As for the deal with Nymh if your memory will serve you well i was there that night, helping to stop him, trying to keep him from dying. You however, stood in my way Once Scatterscourge had been secured to his side he wouldve been safe for healing...but you stopped us from doing so" The interuption of Larewen breaking the glass seemed to have set her loss of sanity back, bringing her back around. Her eyes were dry and rather emotionless now, and she held no facial expression.
Emrith gives Tylania a single, withering look, then sets about trying to remove splinters of glass from Larewen's palm with his other hand. It's an awkward task, but Emrith works slowly and methodically; his mostly-healed left arm twinges only occasionally. "Just be still a moment," he murmurs in elvish, seizing on a particularly large splinter and teasing it out. Emrith knows that Larewen will heal in fairly short order. "Yes, Tylania, I remember," he says, now reverting to common and going back to his formerly cold tone. "I refused him healing because I knew that to do anything else would likely have meant his death. Frankly, I was trying to keep him weak so that he could not hurt himself. In that, I failed. He is dead, so I failed. And...you say you do not choose sides in the war? That is fine, on the surface of things. But I tend to have problems when I have done nothing to provoke someone's ire and they repay me by betrayal. Zendor did it, and in a different way, Talyara did it as well. The former has paid for his treachery with his life. The latter I have made peace with. You, Tylania, would do well to seek better friends, as I have said before. The only harm I have done which I regret not being able to undo is that which I did to you. But let us also remember - I am certain that Larewen will, much as it would pain her - that I told you more than once to stay out of my business. You put yourself into harm's way, and were hurt. I am more sorry for that than you will probably ever believe, but you facilitated it. Remember this, woman, the next time you spit spite. My patience for it is growing thinner by the word." He pulls the last of the slivers of glass that his eyes can catch free on this last word, moving with perhaps too much force. It jabs his own finger before falling free. Again speaking in elvish, addressing Larewen, he asks, in a voice barely above a whisper, "What upsets you that you would crush a wine-glass?"
Larewen inhaled sharply as the shards were withdrawn one at a time. She could have saved him the trouble and drawn them out magically, but Tylania's words distracted her and Emrith's touch upon her hand was welcomed, even if it was pained by the glass. "Perhaps I have begun to feel too much," the elf mused aloud, her gaze lowering to the table, but instead focusing on her lap. It was out of habit that she moved, and perhaps she thought she was closer to the table than she actually was. "It matters not," she said finally and then moved to rise to her feet, her lips pressing into a thin line. "I ought to return to Vailkrin; I have matters to attend to with the other Houses, and I ought to get my thoughts together before hand. Emrith?" Her voice became a bit unsure as she spoke his name. "Will you be careful?"
Tylania just watched as he pulled the shards from the womans hand, she knew how bad such things hurt, and had she been allowed to do it she couldve numbed it, and disinfected it before she set off. She waited until after he was done pulling the glass from Larewens hand before she spoke, not wishing to have distracted him. "I wish not for your patience. In the end i wish simply to forget myself. My brain has been healed, so scrub that from your conscious, you need not feel bad for what happened in the slightest. As you said, its my fault." Her voice was soft and calm, only a little clipped towards the end. "I was trying, however, that day to repay a favor. You had saved my life before, and i was trying to keep you out of trouble, seems that no matter how noble or kind the intention, good deeds do not go unpunished." Standing up to stretch her legs and wings, she downed another glass of liquor and sat back in her stool.
Emrith stands when Larewen does, tugged to do so by the hand he still clutches. "I will go with you, at least a little way, Larewen," Emrith says coolly. "I find myself not particularly charmed by the other company." He shoots Tylania a haughty look. "Think, Tylania. You have a brain, so use it. I have done many things in my life of which I am not proud, and who among us can say else? I am no monster. The only one who seems to think otherwise is yourself. Your lover is gone, your friend is dead, and these things are sad. But in one case I tried to save him, and in the other, a traitor was given rough justice by those who exposed him. I bear you no ill will, but I pray that you cease speaking so ill of me to others. Word gets around, and I do have friends...friends whose restraint is not equal to my own. Speak to me as sharply and cruelly as you wish, but do not visit that vile tongue on others if the words concern me. I want it from the source, or not at all." Another frosty glare, and then he turns, easily slipping his arm into Larewen's own. He trusts that she knows the way to Vailkrin well enough that it will not be he leading the way...but nevertheless, he is there in case any difficulties arise.