RP:A Short Smoke Break

Summary: Quintessa needs some fresh air so she heads to the top floor of the Mage Tower. Kasyr finds her up there and they have a heart to heart conversation.

Mage Tower

This room is huge, and the entire place is covered in blue and white marble, with many torches and eight pillars reaching up to the ceiling to reinforce the room above, and keep the tower standing. The columns are covered in mystical runes, probably magic to keep the pillars strong, making them able to withstand pressure that normally wouldn't be possible. In the center of the room, there is a spiraling staircase made of glass, and also inscribed with the same type of runes as the pillars, leading to the higher levels of this magical tower. Next to the stairs there is a small desk here with a sign on it. At the top the sign reads... directions for all new mages. There is a door to the south, and you now notice that it too, is covered in the strength giving runes, that leads outside and a door to the west leading to the dormitory, a place for young mages to rest after their studies here.

Quintessa had never felt so low. She was an awful excuse for a person. Failing missions. Murdering people. -Almost- killing Laharl. And now? The things she had said and tried to do to Karasu... The changeling's chest felt like a blackhole, sucking everything up inside of it until she felt like she was imploding. "I need some fresh air," she said to the mages charged with looking after her and they look up from their newspapers to give her and nod as she exits the room. She was feeling better, physically, but she was emotionally exhausted. Like a zombie, she shuffles around the different floors of Mage Tower until she found herself on the upper floor. Mismatched eyes stare out across Xalious and Kelay. It had been out there that Karasu and Quintessa had their second offical mission. She sighs deeply. They never went on assignment again after that day. "She'll never love someone like me..." she says, before climbing up to sit in the window seal, her bare feet dangling a few stories from the ground. A fall from this high would kill her, wouldn't it?

Kasyr s' return to the mage tower had been notably uneventful- summarized by him placing his bag of notes into his office, petting Casper, and fetching a pack of smokes, to replace the ones he'd exhausted during his note taking and travels. With that sorted, he makes his way towards the room that Quintessa had been in following the sparring match- intent on seeing if she was conscious, or inclined to guests. In fact, the swordsmans initially heartened by the news he hears, the mage attending the room clues him the fact that she's at least well enough to walk - what he takes to be a small blessing in an otherwise long day. But as he draws his hands up behind his head, and starts to follow in the changelings wake, he's left with a palpable sense of something else- an almost infectious sinking of his guts, which only solidifies as he tries to place what he's going to say, or explain. "Hah. Well. Never meet your heroes, maybe?" There's something acrid on his tongue, that blends so well with the words, but feels so foreign at the same time, and he can feel the pace of his footsteps picking up, as he does his best to wind his way after her.

Quintessa reaches into her pocket to pull out a broken cigarette, and she does her best to repair it before placing it between her lips. Her lithe form presses against the frame of the window, her fingers gripped tightly to the window seal. "What's the point of all of this?" She was talking about living. She felt so empty, so hopeless. Was is going to always be like this? She begrudgingly lights her clove cig with a snap of her fingers before taking a drag. Smoking used to be fun and cool, now it felt like a chore. Idly, the hex blade kicks her feet before flicking the ashes out of the window she sat upon. She knows she not allowed to smoke in the tower, but right now she doesn't care. "F--- everything..." she mutters before sticking the cigarette back into her mouth.

Kasyr feels something roil in his stomach and the back of his head, but it's tempered by the scent of smoke on the air. There's a weird sort of reassurance to be found there, even if it does precipitate him into searching for a freshly pilfered smoke as he winds his way further up the stairs, only pausing when he heres the tail end of -something-. His pace slows, as he briefly attempts to sort through what it was he intended to say, or ask her- before he finally rolls his eyes at himself, gingerly taps against the wall and finishes stepping forward, "..Evening." Kasyr doubtlessly looks worse than before, as while the walk may have been sobering, the exhaustion lingers-- that long running streak of obsessiveness working to keep him awake, even though he no longer has undeath to help support that habit.

Quintessa looks back at him lazily, but the presence of her childhood hero does little to lift the cloud that hangs over her. Even her oppressive aura feels weaker. "Oh, hey, Kasyr... Wow you look like s***e. Have you even slept yet?" She knows vampires don't need sleep but Kasyr definitely looks like he needs it. Her mismatched eyes drift away from him to stare at the landscape once more. After a last drag she flicks the butt away and watches it fall to the ground. For a moment she wonders what it would be like. You'd fall for a bit and then -blamo- it would all be over. Another sigh escapes her lips as she exhales smoke. "So, the spar yesterday. I messed up again, huh? It's getting to be a normal thing for me to screw things up."

Kasyr manages the ghost of a grin, before his gaze flicks down to the cigarette he's twiddling between his fingers. "Eventually." He finishes stepping the rest of the way forward, settling to the wall adjacent to the window, before he offhandedly gestures towards her, "That wasn't your mistake. " Whatever ghost of humour he'd found ebbs away, pooling at his feet with the rest of his mood, "Really, if anything, you're the one who has the right to be angry." He doesn't add anything else to the statement, yet, instead drawing the cigarette to his lips and taking a deep drag.

Quintessa actually manages to laugh at that last part. "Angry? Angry at myself, maybe. I shouldn't have taken it easy on her. The moment she started using offensive magic I should have annihilated her." She turns to face Kasyr, bringing a leg back into the room while the other one still dangles out. "But... She's my weakness. Karasu just... completes me. I can't explain it." Her sadness is obvious on her face. "I'm such a fool for falling in love with her." Ordinarily she wouldn't be talking like this, but she didn't care anymore. She didn't know if she wanted to stick around much longer anyway.

Kasyr let's out a slow breath, a swish of cigarette smoke trailing in front of his face as pushes his hair up, "I should have intervened sooner. She stabbed you with my Fu- " He exhales shakily, his hair falling back in his face as he takes in another drag and curtly adds, "With my sword." The cigarette hangs at the corner of his mouth now, "Love's a pretty goddamn unreasonable thing. Part of why I left in the first place." There's that acridness on his tongue again, but this time, it's not a toxic tang that he can taste on the air, but something all his own, "Doesn't make you a fool for it, though."

Quintessa brings her leg up to fold against her chest and she rests her head against her knee, the cool autumn air blowing the long, raven locks that fell down her back in and out of the window. "Yeah, Satoshi, right? Queen of Frostmaw... I had a crush on both of you when I was 10," she gives him a smile, "I'm starting to find that crushes and heroes and stuff like that are just for kids. Real life is different. Messier..." She blows the hair from her face, "Awful." The smile fades as her eyes drift to the floor, "I thought after I killed my father my life would get better, but it's just disappointment after disappointment and disappointment..."

Kasyr can't help but offer a sort of sad one right back, " She probably woulda been pleased as punch. But yeah, you aren't wrong in saying things are messier. Legends, and rumours glaze over the messy bits." The swordsman peels himself away from te wall, if only so he can settled at the window, propping his elbows on the sill so he can stare outside, "Make the ones in the story less a person, and more an ideal. Wipes away the parts that don't fit the narrative, for whose telling the story." That said, he finds himself turning his attention towards her, to ask, "So, what led to that? People mutter things, but I was making a point of picking your brain at some point. Just figured it would be over food or fencing, then. . . " He makes a hapless gesture, before he resumes starting at the window, "This. ...Has it all been disappointments?"

Quintessa tilts her head at him. She knows that people talk about her behind her back. "My father? Oh, I killed him because he used to beat me. And when he wasn't beating me, he was off somewhere, hunting or drinking or whoring. Maybe even a combination of those. I don't know what happened between him and my mother, but my existence was enough for him to resent me and make my life a living hell." She had never talked about this with anybody except Larewen Dragana before. She pauses for a long moment, thinking about all the people she had met and the new and interesting things she had learned. A spark of hope appeared, but it was more bittersweet than happy. "It hasn't all been bad." She smiles, her eyes flickering up. "I got to meet you... And Mahri, and Ohdranos... I learned how to harness the magic that dwells within me. I finally got to own my own katana. I went from being some dirty street urchin to becoming an actual spellcaster." She turned her body all the around the face Kasyr, her other leg slipping back into the room. "So no, it hasn't all been disappointing."

Kasyr mutters something that sounds remarkably akin to 'good riddance to bad rubbish', when Quintessa finishes detailing her dad but otherwise, allows her to set the pace. It's only when she's turned to face him that he offers a small smile, "Well, glad I didn't make for a completely terrible memory, then. Somehow." He's staring out the window again, this time a bit more fixedly at the sky, "I was serious when I said you should have been angry at me. I'm used to teaching, ou training people as though I were preparing for the next great disaster, " That quirk of his lips, too, with the awareness that there was two just -lurking- , " But you're not Coterie, ou Coven. Et putting you through that, or those expectations es hardly fair." The Kensai looks poised to take another drag, but instead ends up wiggling his hand and flicking the cigarette out the window as it burns too low, "Part of why I needed to talk to you. To try et figure this out so I can be a better teacher."

Quintessa shrugs and hops out of the window, her bare feet standing on her tiptoes as she stretches her arms above her head, her shirt lifting to expose her midriff. "Honestly, I'm not mad at anyone. I learned a very valuable lessen in Trist'oth. I can't just kill someone, even if they are then enemy. There's a long, linking chain, and breaking the wrong link at the wrong time can really backfire on you." Her arms relax at her side and she rotates her neck, it letting out a soft -pop-. "And that spar? I never fought without offensive magic like that, not since I learned it. It was a real challenge trying to catch Karasu. I didn't realize felines were so quick." She offers the Kensai a soft smile. One of rare, genuine thankfulness. "So, thank you for being my teacher. I know with your guidance you'll temper the raw steel that is my power into a sharp blade. You're doing great."

Kasyr gives Quintessa a small smile in return, his ears cropping up a bit at the comment, before he redirects his attention towards the couryard, his arms folding across the sill "I'm ..grateful, honetement. It's hard for me to know at times. I, well, improvise a lot. I think because I learned -by- improvising." He can't help but roll his eyes a bit there, "-Really- turns out well sometimes." That bit of self-deprecation aside, he finds himself adding, "I, am going to need your help, though. You seemed to know a bit about what was going on, before. When you're up to it, I'd appreciate it if tu could tell moi what you know. I'll let you pick my brain about any questions you have in return. Maybe fill in the blanks of what heroic tales don't tell you, ou quoi ce soits, unless there's other bits and pieces you felt you wanted or needed to know."

Quintessa nods her head, "Oh yeah, anytime. I try to keep track of everything," she smiles sheepishly, "Well, to the best of my abilities, anyway. And sometimes I learn things I wish I hadn't..." She begins to walk over to the door and hand lingers just above the doorknob as her mismatched eyes flicker back to him. "But I assume you mean about Karasu and her... Um, dark blessing?" She was starting to have doubts about that birthmark of hers. "Her father doesn't want me talking about it, but once we have a chance to meet far away from the tower, I'll fill you in on everything I know. I promise." She offers a wary smile before she turns the knob of the door and allows it to creep open. "I should get back to bed. The medical officers still haven't cleared me to leave, I don't want them getting cross with me for being gone too long. I'll talk to you later, Kasyr."

Kasyr s' expression shifts slightly, between shades of curiosity, suspicion, and ultimately concern at the mention of the 'Dark Blessing', and the ensuing bit of clarification definitely factors into how long it took for things to settle onto concern. Ultimately, however, he just finds himself nodding his head, "Yeah. Later.Don't overtax yourself, s'il te plait. In the meantime, feel better, please. Et have a good evening, Quintessa." Kasyr, for his part, just intends to stay there, being decidely less, but still somewhat mopey, until exhaustion coaxes him to crashing in his office for some long overdue sleep.