RP:And Only We can Set Ourselves Free

Part of the Lies Within Us Arc

This is a Mage's Guild RP.

Summary: Returning from Trist'Oth, Iintahquohae and Odhranos stumble upon the aftermath of the recent undead assault on the Xalious Tree. Incensed by what he finds, Odhranos travels to the Mage Tower to find Valrae, seeking answers for what has happened in his absence. What he finds there, only leaves him with more questions and despair. Valrae Barnes, better known as the soul within Provost Sarah Grace, has been sealed in a soul-cage, battling for survival with spirits of the coven long deceased within the emerald skull, while her body grows cold, dying with every passing moment. The clock to save Valrae's second life is ticking rapidly towards its end, and all the while, something sinister watches from the shadows.

Mountain Path

Odhranos trudges up the hill, tired, bedraggled, and a little bit fed up. He turns at the top of the pass and looks out westward, towards where the sun hangs high over the sparkling ocean beyond Cenril, which perches like an angular coral on the coast, belching smoke and steam into the sky with the thousand hearths of a million people going about their day. “Y’know, time and time again, I make this hike, and I hate every step of it between Kelay and here, but this view always makes it worthwhile.” The terramancer turns and offers a weary smile to his companion, Iintahquohae, as she strides alongside him, likely not suffering so much as a bead of sweat thanks to her vampiric constitution. He takes in the view a while longer, savouring the sight of the wind driving ripples across the canopy of the Sage, and the myriad of tiny details too small to make out, then the terramancer turns and climbs the rest of the way up the brow of the hill, where Xalious presents itself below. “Old-home, sweet - what in the name of the Gods is that!?” Odhranos’ voice suddenly rises in pitch, as he points eastward. Where the welcome azure glow of the Xalious Tree’s golden leaves once were, now blackened and desiccated patches intermingle with the sickly looking golden leaves. Something awful has happened here, so awful that a relic of the Gods itself has been harmed. Odhranos takes off at a sprint, the golden cage at his side ejecting a mass of gravel that coalesces into eight spidery limbs that lift the mage from his feet, propelling him down the slope in a chittering mass of skinny flailing arachnid legs. Inks is unfortunately left to catch up, as Odhranos’ panic overtakes his compassion, and he makes a beeline for the tree, scaling houses, walls and every other obstacle that finds its way into his path. There is no time for leisurely strolls anymore. Something unimaginably terrible has happened.

Iintahquohae outwardly looks okay, apart from being caked in dirt and viscera from the Underdark. Internally? It's a mix. The seamstress has done what she could to suppress the images and actions done down there, but Sacred's presence seems to bounce between assisting her with the suppression to keep her spirits high, then tease her with reminders of what occurred. It isn't great. In all, her primary frustration seems to be that she and her clothes need to be scrubbed, and after casting a sidelong glance at the terramancer, probably his as well. Her bag is gone, likely destroyed during the events in Trist'oth or on their way out, she can't recall, so she's empty handed. “Have you ever considered getting a horse?” She asks, recalling how much she used to hate walking from one place to the next before being sired. Her head cranes skyward, grateful for open air and wind again.“You're right, the view is nice up here. I remember the first time Mother and Father took me along wi-” She freezes, first at Odhranos' change in speech, then at the tree he points to. “What happened to the tree?” the question is a bit late, she realizes, as he has already left her side. She immediately follows suit, keeping up with him due to her often unused speed. It makes her stomach lurch a bit when the distance is quickly covered, and she stops in an awkward stumble at Odhranos' side when he's back on the ground again. Her hand reaches out to catch herself, briefly resting on his shoulder. A note is made to actually use her abilities outside of hunting instead of compartmentalizing them, in order to avoid feelings like this. Her question is repeated as she steps forward, noticing that the area around them looks very much like a battlefield or Trist'oth, but if someone pulled the city up to the surface, probably. She considers touching the tree, but hesitates, turning to Odhranos for guidance. Magic still felt somewhat outside of her grasp. “What happened? And what does this mean?”

The Xalious Tree

Odhranos skids to a halt after vaulting the last house as the desperate visage surrounding the tree is laid bare for his eyes to take in. Corpses, some dessicated and withered, others just recently slain, one and all laid in the trappings of their demise as they carpet the torn, scorched and blasted earth in a vast tract that stretches south from the tree towards the forests. “What in the name of the Gods happened here?” Odhranos whispers hoarsely, his spidery limbs falling to dust behind him as he stumbles through the wake of carnage, tripping over shattered weapons and bodies alike. In the midst of this field of death, Odhranos turns, looking around to find something, someone who can tell him what calamity had befallen the people of Xalious here. As he turns, he finds no answers, but only another horror to lay him low. At the nexus of this deathly parade, the Xalious tree looms, devoid of its once glorious presence, it now presides sickly over the putrefying affair, like some gaunt, haggard patient, not long for this world. Its crown lies in singed tatters, while a scorched rent tears its highest boughs, bearing the marks of lightning seared into its wood. Below, a vast open wound festers in the tree’s heart, where its bark has been peeled back, like some gory flower, now bedecked with pale flowers like pustules, that reek with the sweet stench of decay. Odhranos falls to his knees, heedless of the filth that stains his knees as he stares up in disbelief toward this affront to Xalious. His sole corporeal manifestation, now sickly, infected, dying. Odhranos’ breath comes quick and fast, this smell, bringing back horrifying visions of Trist’Oth. This field of death, bringing back the horrors of Venturil. Odhranos’ vision blurs, and a haze falls over his vision, a seething golden mist that dulls his sense and unveils something else within. Something else, something animal. Something saurian. Odhranos throws his head back and screams, a bone-chilling, heart wrenching howl, deep and alien, while around him, a corona of sand erupts from the cage. Swirling around the fury-lost terramancer, the sandstorm howls its own elemental fury to the skies, as the ground around him is scoured clean, sand-blasted with the depthless rage of the soul within Odhranos, which even now mixes with his own, unified through a horror-born wrath, which threatens with every guttural roar to burn this land of despoilers clean.

Iintahquohae scrunches her nose at the scents that surround them when she turns from the tree to survey their surroundings properly. It's a disaster, is about all she can sum up. Evil clearly won. But what did it mean? Yet again, she considers touching the tree. Maybe due to its arcane nature, she could get a feel of what happened to it, at least. She doesn't entirely understand what the destruction of the tree could mean for the Mage Guild or mages as a whole, but she couldn't place the distinct disconnect she felt from what little magic she was capable of. It felt like it had practically vanished. The thought of examining the tree is very quickly dashed when Odhranos, no, S'erok, howls. The sound itself is enough to make her involuntarily shiver. Accompanied with the eruption of sand, she instinctively raises her arms up to shield her face and staggers back. Her first instinct is to try calming the terramancer, but how could she possibly do that with the rage of a dragon accompanying him? “Odh,” she shouts over the roar, stepping toward him. “S'erok?” Frowning, she tries to grab at the terramancer by his shoulders, and hopes no more sand than necessary flies and hits her. “ODH. We have to go back to the tower. If anybody would know what happened, it would be someone there.”

Odhranos is torn apart within. Anguish, rage and horror battle like demons within his soul, while within his mind, Odhranos and S’erok roar in tandem, both consumed by the fury that boils from within, an amalgam of saurian and human wrath, blent in a maelstrom of uncontrollable agony. The sandstorm reaches a fever pitch, towering in a whirling column a league high in the sky, as the sands scour the battlefield, lifting corpses into the air, burning all traces of life or decay alike from the ground, leaving behind a barren, wind-scorched earth. At the eye of this storm, the Xalious tree whistles in the wind, shaking its limbs in a frenzy to match the storm. Odhranos opens his eyes and his visage is that of solid silver and gold, no pupil nor sclera to be seen, just the unforgiving sheen of burnished metal. “Theip ar na Maoir ina bhfaireachas gan am. Déanfaidh mé a dteipeanna a dhó, agus dófaidh mé cuimhne na teipe seo ina n-anamacha.” Odhranos intones in a two-toned voice, his own overlaid with S’erok’s in an otherworldly timbre that warns of retribution, aeons old. Odhranos turns to face Inks, his alien eyes reflecting the image of her face as she shouts for him, and as she grabs his shoulders, something in him recognises her, ripping him from his descent into mindless carnage. In a flash, the gold and silver withdraw, leaving Odhranos’ tear-filled eyes to stare into the seamstresses, while around him, the sandstorm abruptly halts. Bodies, stones, and sheets upon sheets of sand fall from the sky, peppering the battlefield with a gory terramantic rain as Odhranos slumps towards Inks. “The Tower. We need to...answers...Val will know...we need to know who did this. I need to know.” Odhranos’ head falls against Inks’ shoulder, all the strength has left him after this display of emotion, and he is drained both physically and mentally.

Iintahquohae visibly recoils from the sound of Odhranos and S'erok's voices speaking simultaneously. It didn't help that she couldn't understand a lick of what was said. There's an incredibly distant feeling of recognition, but she passes it off as something she likely heard as background noise in Cenril with how many different people live there. As the sandstorm wipes the earth around them clean, she shields her face with her arms again. Now caked in Trist'oth's remnants and sand, she frowns and prepares to attempt shaking it away even if she knows that won't be enough. Instead, she finds herself catching Odhranos when his head falls to her shoulder. As debris begin to fall, she cradles him and crouches a bit, using her back to shield his form from getting hit. “I'll take you to the tower,” the seamstress whispers, frowning. “Just stay with me please, Odhie?” Stones and fall on her back, along with what feels like a severed limb. She winces, recalling Vailkrin years ago. At least what's falling is dead. When it appears that most of the heavier bits of debris have found their homes on the ground again, she cautiously lifts her head to make sure, then stands, lifting the terramancer into her arms. “I swear, mages must be cursed,” she murmurs halfheartedly, looking down at his face with a wry smile. “We'll be there soon.” She walks at a human pace for Odhranos' sake, not wanting to jostle him.

The Mage Tower

Odhranos falls into Inks’ arms, weak as a child as he is cradled. He makes no move to respond as she whispers to him, and once the rain has fallen, he stares skyward with dead, blank eyes, that seem not to see Inks, nor anything else. He doesn’t respond when he is lifted, and not even so much a a grin emerges in response to her comment. When they are halfway to the Tower, he whispers something indistinct, that only Inks’ enhanced hearing could make out. “We made our own curse and now we are doomed to die for it. Gods have mercy on us” Still expressionless, Odhranos’ silver eye wells with tears, which stream down his cheek while his other cheek remains untouched, the golden impassive disk glaring outward like a blank coin. || When they reach the Tower’s front steps, Odhranos seems to revitalise, but only marginally, Motioning for Inks to put him down, he tosses a gesture toward the immense wooden doors, which split open with a groan at his brusque gesture. Odhranos stalks through the lobby with a mask of intense apathy, and whispers suddenly erupt from the mages that happen to be passing by. “That’s the Magister!” “What’s he doing back?” “Where has he been?” “He looks scary, look away.” One apprentice moves to intercept Odhranos as he heads for the central staircase. “Sir, its good to see you back, we were all worried that-” Charlie is abruptly cut off by a dismissive wave from Odhranos, who sweeps past him unheedingly. Moving to the centre of the great hall, where the atrium opens up and the immense spiral staircase reaches upward, Odhranos stops at the dead center, beneath the open space between the helical stairs. His hands are thrown outwards, and once again, long grasping limbs explode from the golden cage at his side. Odhranos is drawn upwards by the multitude of arms, which grasp the stair with a hundred hands, climbing like some multi-limbed eldritch horror as he bolts up the center of the atrium. Once he emerges in the open space of the student commons, his plethora of limbs change course, ferrying him sideways, grasping columns, arches and any viable handhold as he makes a beeline for the secondary stairs. Once he reaches these, half the limbs are shed, falling to a trail of sand that is abandoned in the mage's wake as he begins his clambering ascent of the middle floors. Classrooms pass by in flashes of timber panelled corridors and the coloured robes of a multitude of startled apprentices and staff, who only witness a flash of dirty grey and a flailing mass of limbs as the terramancer travels past. Finally, Odhranos arrives on the Provosts’ office level, where he retracts his sandy appendages and storms along the curved corridor on foot, his eyes trained on the polished brass plaque that reads “Provost Grace”. The door is immediately thrown open upon arrival and Odhranos looms in the doorway, like some vengeful grey wraith. However, what he sees within, is beyond anything he could have expected.

Iintahquohae ;; Once she and Odhranos reach the tower, she reluctantly obeys and sets him down. She enters in after him when the doors swing open, hovering close in case she needs to catch him again. Still a bit concerned after the meeting in Satoshi's library that she may not be welcome in the tower, her gaze primarily stays on the terramancer and doesn't stray too far from him. Her footsteps come to a halt when his do, and she steps back when more sandy limbs appear. Frowning when he bolts. Thankfully, the sand that is left behind acts as a trail for her to follow, and she takes the stairs two at a time in effort to catch up to him. “Odh!” she shouts. “Wait for me!” She shoves past apprentices in order to try keeping up with him, and as she breezes past classrooms she strongly considers taking a faster route by jumping out a window and climbing the rest of the way to wherever Odh intended to go. That option didn't seem necessary, she realizes, once her feet land on the level for Provosts' offices. If she felt out of place on the bottom floor, she definitely felt out of place here. The thought is quickly shoved away. If she can handle Trist'oth, she can handle mages. Probably. Once she has reached Odranos' side again, she stares at the terramancer, genuinely shocked at how quickly his behavior can snap from anguish to action in seconds, it seemed. A comment about this might've been fitting, but she kept her mouth shut, noting the name written on the plaque next to the door. Grace? Uncertain at what he is looking at within the doorway, she turns herself to peek in.

Valrae was dead. She’d known the feeling before and so understanding settled like the curtain of darkness that preceded it. For a fleeting moment, or perhaps the span of several lifetimes as time meant nothing to her now, Valrae pondered the meaning of death and consciousness. At first, it was only very lonely and very dark. As if she were alone in an empty room. The witch thought of her life, of her friends and family and her son. She thought of her mistakes and triumphs. Pain and longing, all the things she’d felt as a spectre before flashed through her quickly, glimpses from some unknown depth that she could not reach like fish darting through an endless lake. Slowly the darkness had come alive though. She was not alone in this cage. It started with movement that gave way to dark, flashing eyes and the gnashing of teeth. Outside of the skull, the picture of Grace’s office was one of chaos after a storm. Her things, while normally cluttered but neat, were tossed about. Several of her plants had been toppled over and were falling from their pots. The body that Valrae had once inhabited lay on the floor, the circle that once surrounded her now only smears of indistinguishable white, and she was still as the grave. Grace’s body, without Valrae’s soul, was without magic and no longer enchanted to appear as the small and mousey Provost. If Odhranos hadn’t known of the witch’s true identity she might have merely appeared as a questionable blonde stranger Iintahquohae might see. The aftermath of Valrae’s second death was quiet and cold but inside the emerald skull she screamed.

Odhranos stopped. Stunned. The calamity he had found in the village, splayed out in a field of destruction around the Xalious had been catastrophic, world-shattering, and horrifying. But what he saw right now, as Valrae lay still, dead as a corpse, in the whirlwind-torn mess of her office, this quiet calamity brought him terror. Icy hands claw at him as he drops to his knees with a painful crunch, hands falling limp at his sides. This is because he left, isn’t it? Odhranos stares wide-eyed at Val’s cold, quiet body, and he is silent, imprisoned in the icy chains of terror. A numb hand trails across the ground and Odhranos crawls forward a pace to take the Provost’s hand in his own. It is cold, lifeless, without the rosy hue nor the gentle warmth of life. Odhranos slowly lowers his head to the floorboards, prostrating himself before Valrae’s body, and a quiet sob shakes him. This, this kind wise woman is yet another death on Odhranos’ hands and all he can do is cry. “We truly are cursed.” Odhranos hisses through gritted teeth, as he curls in on himself, dragging his forehead against the floor, even as tears gather at the corners of his eyes, spilling upwards and dripping from his temples. After a moment of silent, heaving grief, Odhranos uncurls himself, settling onto his knees as he surveys the scene before him. He lifts his hand, rubbing the faint chalky remains that had been on the floor between his fingers, now staining his robes, hands and forehead, and as he slowly casts about in a daze for something, anything to make sense of this tragedy, he finds exactly what he is looking for. Exactly what he was meant to find. Carved from perfect emerald, the gaping eye sockets glare back at him balefully from where the emerald skull rests beside Val. Odhranos’ mind spins, this couldn’t be, no, no, no, surely not, please no, of all things, not this, but he reaches out nonetheless, leaning over the still body of the Provost to pick up the skull, cradling it in his arms as he reaches out his mind to the skull, just as living with S’erok had taught him.

Iintahquohae finds herself absolutely confused at what they have walked in upon. “That isn't Grace,” she murmurs, stating the obvious as she looks upon the body that lay on the floor. She walks in after Odhranos but at a distance, uncertainty apparent on her face. “Who was she?” The seamstress asks, gaze shifting from the terramancer to Val's body. Watching Odhranos weep over this woman makes her frown – not out of jealousy, as that only seemed to occur when she found out strangers were in her cabin without her knowledge, but out of some sort of understanding. She knew loss, but never on a scale that seemed to befall any member of the Mage's Guild, it seemed. An apology didn't seem like enough. Wondering if perhaps Valrae isn't actually dead, and maybe just unconscious, she falls silent to see if she can pick up the sound of a heartbeat separate from Odhranos'. Nothing comes. Frowning, and uncertain as to what he is doing with the emerald skull he held in his hands, she decides perhaps her place here is to keep an eye out by the door in case anyone may be coming. In case the terramancer wonders why she decides to stand near the doorway, she whispers, “I'll keep watch here.”

Valrae || While it might have only been a matter of minutes or days, to Valrae it had felt like a small eternity. She could remember, now more vividly than when she’d been living, what it was like the first time she’d died. Emotion ruled. Without the sensation of flesh and blood there were only feelings, thoughts, regrets. She drowned in them, as she had before, with the only relief coming from the terror that surrounded her. Odhranos’s reaching appeared as a daybreak, a sudden burst of slanting light in the endless darkness. If she had a body, she would have stumbled toward it desperately. Her mind answered, reaching out to his light like a lifeline, “I’m here! I’m here!” She screamed silently.

Odhranos reaches his mind out to the skull, like one would throw a hand desperately into the darkness, seeking someone lost. The sound of his own heartbeat in his head is deafening as he throws himself outward, projecting beyond himself, desperately hunting for another mind within this skull, clinging to the hope that he isn’t too late. The silence from the skull is unrelenting, and Odhranos squeezes his eyes shut, gritting his teeth and clenching his hands around the skull as he brings it up to his forehead. “Please!” he whispers. “Please, for whatever good there is left in this world, don’t let this be the end!” His quiet prayer seems to fall on deaf ears, until at the very edges of his consciousness, a voice, tiny and indistinct, yet brutally clear to Odhranos’ mental ears. He almost falls when the tension suddenly leaves his body, but he snaps back to tension nearly a moment later. “Val! Val! It’s me! I’m here!” Odhranos screams mentally, pushing out with his mind, trying to reach the Provost in this vast dark void. To Val, she would see the nebulous curtain of light wavering, like an aurora, growing to fill the empty sky of the void with a ghostly shimmering silver. As he makes contact, outside of the cage, Odhranos wheels around and turns to Inks with wide eyes. “She’s still alive! In the skull! I can’t understand it, it feels just like…” Odhranos’ voice trails off, and he now comprehends the chalky remains that marr the floorboards, painting out the messy remains of a circle. A runic circle. Odhranos stares at the skull in his hands, Val’s body beside it and the remnant of the circle and his blood runs cold. “...Just like S’erok’s soul cage.” Suddenly the wheels are turning in Odhranos’ mind and he looks down at Val’s corpse. “She’s not dead, she’s just comatose!” Odhranos springs to his feet, the emerald skull clutched carefully in his hands, while seemingly of its own will, S’erok’s cage begins producing sand, which swirls under and around Val’s body, bouying it up, enshrouding it in a protective shell, which sprouts legs, hoisting her from the floor. “We are going to Frostmaw. Now. To the cabin.” Odhranos faces Inks with an expression of intense drive. Fool that he is, Odhranos did not phrase his words as a request. In the heat of his realisation spurred drive, he is making an order.

Iintahquohae 's attention is split, half peeking outside of the office and half into it, unsure as to what exactly Odhranos is doing. Magic of some sort, she assumes, but she clearly doesn't understand. When she is looking out of the office again, she perks up at the sound of the terramancer's voice. Not dead. That's good, she thinks, refocusing her attention on Odh and Val's body. “That's great,” she says with a grin. “...But who is she? This is supposed to be Grace's office, righ- What?” Her expression sours at his order. That irrational feeling from before their departure with Kasyr appears again, and she tries to silence it. No luck, it seems, as her eyes dart from Val's now encased form to Odhranos with a frown. It's abundantly clear she wants to say no. “Why there? What needs to be done there?” The disarray of office they're in screams of foul play to her, and they're going to carry the body out? “What if we're followed? ...It's up the mountain,” she continues, though with his terramancy, that clearly wouldn't be a problem. Asking how they'd carry her up there as a way to wiggle out of this isn't a possibility, considering Odhranos had the answer to that ready to go. She wants to slap herself for her behavior. It feels childish, but she had her reasons. Selfish, she knew, but... “I want an explanation about all of this and who we're carrying back home,” she says, countering his order. “After that, we'll go.”

Valrae could feel relief rising up to meet her with the sound of Odhranos’s voice. “Odhranos.” If she could have, she might have smiled. The shimmering silver light sent the moving darkness to the recesses of the cage, hissing and snarling all the while. There was an awareness that took her then, that she might only need to brush her own soul against this new light to find some release from the endless darkness. And though the desperation returned and urged her forward, the witch fought it back bitterly, furthering the weakness that gripped her tightly. The darkness stirred then, it’s own awareness waking to the potential of the light. It had no moral objections to consuming it and it seemed to crouch, brushing against Valrae with a yawning hungry blackness that was familiar. Fear came and then Valrae acted, pressing against the dark and screaming with her efforts silently. The witch beat back the darkness with her own, wearily protecting the gateway of light. Inside the skull the battle raged, unaware of the turmoil outside of it.

Odhranos’ eyes grow stern when Inks protests. There’s no time, gods damn it, he can’t even guarantee that he can undo what has been done, but if he is to have any hope, he needs to leave now. “Inks, Valrae. Valrae, Inks. You’ve met before, Val is Grace, Grace - Val, same difference. Point is, her body is dying and if we don’t get her to Frostmaw as soon as humanly possible, then is will die. Properly. Permanantly. Then the Grace you know becomes the next S’erok, trapped in a cage for all of eternity.” Odhranos takes a step closer and the look in his eyes is feral and wild. “I’ve had to live with the sins of this gods-forsaken Guild in my mind for two years. I WILL NOT allow this to happen again! No one else dies when I can do something about it!” Odhranos’ voice has risen to a shout, and his eyes blaze with the same fury that had been present earlier. “Sven blast it, Inks, this woman is dying! I have the tools to save her, but only if I leave now. That’s as much of an explanation I can give you right now.” Odhranos moves towards the door, still blocked by Inks, and the terramancer faces her down with a stare of cold iron, daring her to challenge him in his righteous insanity or step aside and let him leave.

Iintahquohae considers adopting a defensive stance with her arms crossed over her chest once Odhranos starts shouting, but he's giving her answers. That's really all she wanted, though she still doesn't understand why it has to be her cabin that's used for bringing Valrae back to life. But if this Valrae is who Grace actually is, she'd prefer that woman alive. She's still upset about having someone else know the location of her hidden home, but time isn't on their side here. Quietly, she steps out of the door and out of the way, so the terramancer and Val can get moving. Her other questions would have to wait, she realizes, reluctantly. Now her concern shifts gears on the thought of potentially being followed, and more people knowing where her cabin is.“Go,” Iintahquohae says with some reluctance, meeting his gaze. She suppresses a frown. “...I'll meet you there.”

Valrae || If Odhranos was silver light, Valrae was ash and smoke. And the damned souls of the lost coven that made the cursed, hungry power of the crystal skull had all clawed together in inky, miasmic blackness. She understood now, locked in a battle of wills, what the hunger had meant when she’d harnessed the skull’s power in her life. She’d been playing with an endless darkness, brushing against the skulls of witches before her that had dived too deep into a lake of power and drowned in their own greed. Fear drove her, gave her the strength of will to keep them in place with her. The edges of her essence pained to touch them, screaming in agony like pressure on a raw, exposed nerve. “I’m not alone!” She attempted to push this awareness toward Odhranos in warning. “I’m holding them. I’m here. I’m not alone.” Her smoke molded to the black and she struggled against the urge to pull back, to yield to their ceaseless starvation and retreat. She saw visions of the witches before her, heard their names and felt the sorrow as if it were her own. There was nothing beyond her now. She knew nothing of Odhranos’s outward desperation or the discomfort of Iintahquohae.

Odhranos scowls, ready for the fight that he expects to come from Inks, so he is surprised when she steps aside. Suddenly, the fight leaves the terramancer, and his expression grows saddened as he and Val’s stretcher start out the door. “I’m sorry.” he mutters on his way past. “I’ll explain when I have more time. Just...I’m sorry.” With that, Odhranos is gone from the doorway, shrouded in a cloud of sand that whisks himself and Val through the corridor, down the staircases of the tower past bewildered apprentices, and out of Xalious, due northward into the mountains. As he travels, Val’s cries reach him from within the soul-cage. Odhranos grits his teeth at the prospect. More souls can mean only one thing. Interviewing Kasyr had taught him that much. Souls are instinctual creatures, free of their vessels, they only know how to survive. When limited space is offered to them, they fight, and they consume. To lose, is to experience true death. If Val is not alone in the skull, then her time is limited. “More time, I need more time.” Odhranos hisses as he charges through the forest. Suddenly, a sheer cliff rears itself from beyond the treeline, which Odhranos continues to sprint towards. The cliff face is treated with a rough gesture, and is torn apart, consuming the sandstorm whole as Odhranos changes trajectory, slowly pulling into a vertical climb, as he hones in on the cabin, far to the snowy north. “Hold on Val, please, hold on.” he pleads, as he cradles the skull like an infant in his arms.

Iintahquohae’s Cabin

Odhranos || The ground outside Inks’ cabin is largely undisturbed. The patch of cleared dirt has been covered in a fresh layer of snow since they departed for Trist’oth, which seems like a lifetime ago now. Quiet white serenity blankets the scene, as a light dusting of snow descends from the ashen sky. Suddenly, with the violent tearing of earth, a roughly triangular prow of stone bursts from the ground, breaching like a land-whale. The stone breaching wedge splits in three, revealing Odhranos, with Val ensconced in a sand stretcher at his side, while the emerald skull is cradled in his hands. Wasting no time, Odhranos runs to the cabin door, throwing it open, while Val’s body trails behind. Once inside, Odhranos flings handfuls of sand to the four corners of the room, which sets about pushing aside the various stacks of books, the small table and the two armchairs. The fire has long since gone out, and the room is cold and dim, lit only by the small shaft of moonlight slipping through the windows of the cabin. “More time, more time, more time.” Odhranos mutters to himself, as Val’s body is laid down in the midst of the cleared space. Suddenly, there is a lull, and Odhranos finds fear washing over him. What can he possibly do in this situation? How can he hope to fix this, when he has spent so long trying to solve this problem with - “Calm down, Odhranos. This time it’s different. Her body still lives, there’s still a chance for her to escape my fate. Just calm yourself, take this one step at a time, alright?” Odhranos nods by himself in the dim room. Right, first things first, what do we know? Some kind of circle, a runic circle was used to tear Val’s soul from her body and install it in the skull. If he knew the runes it used, hell, if he even know the layout of the damned thing, he could possibly reverse engineer it with the knowledge his research had given him. But the circle in Val’s office had been scrubbed into incomprehensible dust, and the only people who had been around to witness it prior to its destruction were… Odhranos stares down at the skull in his hands, realisation dawning on him. “Val! Val, are you there?!” He calls out mentally, terrified by the silence he might find. “I need to know, the circle that was used to cage you, I need to know how to construct it, and you’re the only person who has seen what it looks like. Val, I need your help.”

Valrae can hear Odhranos again, can feel the anxiety and worry in them. “I’m here. I’m holding them. It will be alright. I’m here.” Her soul sent this reassurance, repeating them like a prayer as much for herself as they were for him. Revelations came in Valrae’s struggle. As the origins of the skull passed by her in flashes she soon understood the history of her own people. Ancient witches, the first, had sought power to defend themselves. The threat was nameless, timeless. The fear and the hatred born of it, not dissimilar to what had threatened her own way of life in Larket. They were driven by the same desire she had been, an all consuming need to defend the life and magic they held sacred. They would stop at nothing, do whatever it took, succeed by any means necessary. But they had gone too far, dove too deep. No magic comes without sacrifice and the price was too high. They were lost, trapped in the emerald skull to suffer eternally for their crimes. There was blood, always blood, and fire. The flash of a blade, the screams of children. The birth of the emerald skull. She knew, though in her life she had never seen his face, that the flash of the coven’s leader was of her blood. The new awareness shook her, the threads of fate suddenly becoming clear in a way that inspired fear and helplessness. It was always meant to find her, would always have called to her. Blood of her blood, the emerald skull had been born from her own ancestral crimes. It was the perfect cage for her eternally damned soul. She battles with the darkness for an unknown amount of time as the terramancer makes the journey to Frostmaw. It felt like centuries inside the skull. Odranos’s voice comes back to her then, from somewhere in the light. “I’m here!” A pause. In her struggle to recall the memory she loses some ground, her own soul brushes against his light. “I remember…” Words wouldn’t do now. She pushed the image from her own consciousness to his. The flashes that she saw as she fell. The runes, the placement of them. The sigil that had been drawn in the center of it all. “Can you see? Please see…”

Odhranos is nearly shaking himself to pieces with worry when Val’s voice finally breaks through. “Val! I can-” Odhranos voice cuts off as he tries to comprehend the images being shared across the faint mental link. Floorboards, chalk, a...sign, a rune maybe? “Dammit!” Odhranos roars, slamming his fist against the floor of the cabin in frustration. The images were just too unclear! The idea was there, but the definition, the clarity, it was impossible, in such a short time, for Val to have accustomed herself to the alien means of communication that the cage forced upon her, not to mention the strain placed upon her as the multitude of others that occupy the skull try desperately to overcome her soul, to dissolve her in the abyss and make her a shapeless, formless soul-wraith like them. “S’erok! I need more time! How! How do I do this!? I can’t understand the images Val sends, but she’s the only one who’s seen the circle! This is hopeless!” The terramancer cries out in anguish. Silence pervades the room, before S’erok’s low growl echoes through the mage’s mind. “Think, Odhranos. We experienced this, before we could properly communicate. Think how long it took us to get to terms with sharing minds.” “IT TOOK MONTHS! And we don’t have that luxury here, S’erok! Val has hours, minutes left, before she is trapped in that cage forever. I don’t have the time for her to learn.” Odhranos’ hand raises and slaps himself, leaving the terramancer reeling, as S’erok takes a hold of his body. “Then remember! How we overcame this hurdle!” Odhranos rubs his cheek, blinking tears of pain and confusion, casting his mind backwards, until it dawns on him what S’erok meant. “We need her in a physical body. To free her movements, so she can draw the sigil herself. Yes, yes! That’s it!” Odhranos is about to jump to his feet, then he freezes. “S’erok, if Val isn’t accustomed to her cage, she hasn’t a hope of managing to possess someone, that would take even longer. This isn’t going to work…” Odhranos screws his face up in concern, his ever present despair returning. “Then I’ll just have to give her a hand.” S’erok intones gravely. “How, S’erok? You’re in separate cages, you’re not even aware oif eachother without me as a go-between.” Another hand is raised to smack Odhranos, but he manages to stay it by retaking control. “Then figure it out! Use this head of yours, if it’s not empty space! You’ve researched this magic within an inch of its life, now is the time to use what you’ve learned. Turn theory into discovery, Odhranos, or are you a failure of a researcher as well as a leader?” Odhranos grits his teeth at that insult, and in response, he extends his mind out to Val. “Val! We’re going to have to try something new. I need you to hold on for as long as you can, I’m going to have to try something… untested before. Okay?”

Valrae fought back the darkness but could feel herself tiring. The edges that separated herself, smoke gray and curling, were beginning to fade into the black. She could feel the excitement, the hunger of the cursed souls as they waited for her to slip. “I can do this.” Resolve came with her message. “I’m here. I’m ready.” She would not be so easily beaten. Sheer will and an unrelenting stubbornness drove her on.

Odhranos grits his teeth, he can hear the strain in Val's voice. "Give me ten minutes, Val, I'll have you out of there, I promise." With that, he scrambles from his seated position, and grabs a pile of sheets from one of the stacks nearby, along with his satchel. Okay, Odh, put that brain to work. We know how soul-cages function independently, now you need to figure out how to make them work in tandem. With paper and pencil. Retro. Odhranos tugs S’erok’s soulcage from where its strap lies across his shoulder, and he sets it down on the ground beside Val’s emerald skull. “Right, okay, okay, I know this system. I know this. I know this better than anyone alive this era, time to prove that research isn't useless!” Odhranos spills the satchel’s contents out and a torrent of notes spread across the floor. Notes scrawled in runes, covering every page, in a hundred different shapes and forms. An entire language, plucked from the dusty relics left over by a civilisation long dead, pieced together over the course of four years research. All culminating to this single moment. The next few minutes are consumed in tense silence, as Odhranos rapidly scrawls rune after rune on sheets of paper, rushing about the cabin to fix them to walls with nails conjured from shards of stone Odhranos has left around the cabin. When the final sigil is nailed to the centre of the roof, Odhranos scrambles back to the center. He looks about at his handiwork, and gulps. Now or never, Odhranos. He picks up the emerald skull, and reaches his mind into it, hopefully for the last time. "Val? In a moment, I'm going to activate the runic net. You are going to have a matter of seconds to transfer yourself from the skull, before the gate closes. Don't let anyone follow you, and don't let anyone stop you." A moment of silence follows, before Odhranos' voice creeps over the link once more, unintentionally. "Please, please, for all that the Gods holds dear, let this work." Odhranos places the emerald skull down upon the centremost of the runes, then he places his hands on either side of it. "Xalious be with you, Val." He whispers, then lets loose a pulse of magic that kick-starts the runic net into life. Each of the pages around the room suddenly light up, as the runes scrawled on them blaze into life, with such an intensity that the very paper they are written on burns away in an instant, leaving only the incandescent rune behind. The emerald skull rises from the ground, sympathetic runes blinking into life across its verdant facets, slowly shifting across its surface to align with the new runes sliding like quicksilver across the walls of the cabin. The runes slowly fall into alignment, then with an eruption of light, bars of incandescence burst from the runes, linking each one to another, forming an infinitely intricate web, dancing and shifting as the runes themselves swirl and pirouette. Val would find a violent nova of light suddenly erupts where Odhranos' gently shimmering presence had previously been, and the souls around her all howl in exultation as this new light bathes them in its glory, promising new life for the one bold enough to take it. The nova gleams with the intensity of an exploding star, then just as soon as it had burst into existence, it collapses, leaving only the blackness of the void behind to greet the despairing wails of the fallen souls within the skull. The shimmering web of light dims, leaving only the glowing runes behind, and Odhranos falls to his knees. Had it worked? Had he succeeded? Or had he failed? Only time would tell.

Valrae heard Odhranos and answered him wordlessly. She was ready. She could hold on. The struggle tired her, a deep sense of exhaustion that caressed temptingly against her. She could rest. Just rest. And the souls that waited to drag her down rejoiced, sensing the end was near. They would devour her, she knew, and so she held on tightly with everything she had left. When the silver light exploded they were pushed back screaming. The force was a violence like nothing she’d ever known before. The light burned through her, threatened to tear the whispering smoke of her soul asunder, but she gathered herself. And it burned. It was like no fire she’d ever felt before, it reached the depths of her in a way not even her first death had allowed. But she reached out toward it, burst through it with force and fury. The empty, dark room was suddenly more clear. The other souls waited but could no longer slink from the shadows to reach her. She could see, or sense the delicate, finely woven runic cage around her with stunning clarity. It was breathtaking, beautiful and abstract in a way that could never be defined in words or conventional understanding. And she could sense something new, something more ancient than even the souls of the coven that had created her emerald skull. “Hello?” She reached out hesitantly. “Hello, Phoenix,” Came the reply. Visions of sand and gold surrounded her and her soul nearly trembled. “Phoenix?” If she could have laughed, she would have. The witch extends herself out tentatively, reaching to understand the new presence. What would come next was communicated without words. It was almost intimate, the way information was shared between the nebulous souls moved to bring action to what came next. There was the rise of power first, palpable outside of the emerald cage, and then there was sand and smoke. It moved, knitted together to form a new, temporary vessel for Valrae within the shining cabin. Interestingly, it resembled the waifish form of her first life. "I'm here," She said again, this time in wonder and relief. The witch moved quickly, reached with an awkward and inhuman movement to request pencil and paper of the terramancer. She made short work of drawing it out, the circle and the lines within. The runes that marked it, the sigil that had been the center of it all. Though she was careful, the lines were messy and shaken. "It was here," She said, pointing to the center. "They placed me here, the skull on my stomach,"

Odhranos holds his breath with anxious expectation, while the nexus of light slowly dims, leaving only the runes behind. An age seems to pass, as the slowly shifting runes cast ghostly light about the cabin. Odhranos is on the verge of despair, when movement catches his eyes. From S'erok's cage, sand rises, unbidden. It lifts hesitantly, then coalesces into the form of a woman, a face familiar to Odhranos, so wonderfully familiar. The terramancer slowly climbs to his feet, takes a step forward, then runs headlong towards the figure, throwing his arms around them as he sobs desperately. "Thank the Gods! It worked! Oh blessed Xalious, it actually worked!" Odhranos' voice is delighted despite his tears, as he takes a step back and studies Valrae's new form with teary eyes at arm's length, relief flooding through his body. "I can't believe it…" he whispers hoarsely, then pauses when Val reaches out to ask for paper and a pencil, her new inhuman body distorting strangely as she does so. The tools are swiftly supplied, and Odhranos looks on over Sandrae's shoulder as the circle slowly takes shape before his eyes, each rune eliciting a quiet hiss from Odhranos, who moves closer to study this revelation, til his nose is nearly pressed against the sheet. When her drawing is complete, Odhranos turns the page to examine it, and an incredulous laugh slips past his lips. "Of course! How could I have been so blind! Of course that's how it works, Sven curse my senile mind, I should have figured that out years ago." Odhranos holds the sheet like it is made of pressed gold, and as he gathers more sheets to place alongside it, he looks up towards Val. "This is going to take a little time. But… it's time we now have. Your new cage is stable, and we have a few hours before your original body will start suffering the beginnings of soul-loss. I'll set to work immediately, would you mind… taking care of yourself? S'erok can help you with fine motor control and whatnot, all you need is to keep your body alive for another few hours at most. We...we actually have a chance here." Odhranos wipes his eyes with his sleeve and looks up at Val with a face full of relief and hope. For the first time in months, Odhranos has felt like he made a difference. The feeling is cathartic in the extreme.

Valrae laughs when Odhranos’s arms surround her. The sound was as clear as a bell and she startled herself with it. If her sand body could have produced tears, it would have. “Thank you…” She whispers. It was fascinating to watch him work too. She was stunned and grateful to have been released from the cage, no matter how short the time might be, and watched with an almost childlike wonderment in the dim light of the cabin as he studied the symbols on the page. And she laughs again. “You are a marvel, Odh,” She says in reply to his self chastising. “I could spend a lifetime trying to understand what's happening right now and I would have no firmer of a grasp on it than I do now… And you think you should have already understood it?” Her mouth moves slowly into a smile. “S’erok,” She tests the name on her tongue carefully, moving back toward her own cage and out of the terramancer’s way so that he may work. “He called me Phoenix,” She tells Odhranos, humor and a touch of pleasure in her voice. Moving slowly, testing her control of her makeshift body, Valrae leans down to touch the emerald skull. She shudders, remembering the darkness that waited. “Thank you... “ The witch says suddenly, looking toward him again. “Thank you both… I-” She shakes her head. “I owe you a great debt. If this last bit of time is all I have, well… I’m grateful for it.” Valrae moves to sit on the floor next to her skull, pulling her legs up to rest her chin on her knees. “I’ve made arrangements if this is to be my fate,” A sand finger taps the skull. “My son will be taken care of, it will be alright. I was lucky to have the time I did,” A melancholy has settled over her now. “It feels impossible that I would be so lucky again… But if it is to be, you’ll find a way. I believe that much,” Her absolute faith carried in her tone. If there was a way, Odhranos would be the one to find it.

Odhranos laughs heartily when he hears the nickname S'erok dubbed Val with. "That insensitive ass! I can't believe him!" Odhranos shakes his head, but he cannot help the grin that spreads across his face. "Two years, he's been stuck in my head and he never thought to pick up some manners." It feels good to joke again, Odhranos can feel the wave of positive emotion rushing through him like wildfire, but he dampens it down to focus on the task. A series of circles are scrawled on sheets, with trial layouts of runes around them, each considered, then changed slightly, replaced with a new sheet and another slight iteration on the last. He raises his eyes from the page with a gentle smile when Val thanks him and S'erok. "Don't write yourself off just yet. What we just managed was arguably the more difficult task than what I'm trying now. I was basically writing the harmony to a tune I'd never heard of before, now I'm just transposing something already written into a new key. I'm just glad my ear for the music was good enough for the job. Sven knows, it was a huge risk. But one I am immensely glad paid off. Not to mention-" Odhranos raises an eyebrow as he glances at Val, a small smirk tugging at his lips, "-you are technically immortal right now. Your current body needs no food, no sleep, and yet, it will last forever." Odh leans back and gestures up towards the runes that dance across the roof of the cabin. "If we give those a material to transfer to, and organise them in such a way that you can transport them yourself, you'd have the means of travelling anywhere. So, even if it takes me forever, I will find a solution. We have the time, and I don't plan on squandering it." Odhranos turns back to his drawing, then pauses to add one more comment "Though, finding a solution sooner rather than later would be ideal. I can't imagine how your son would react when he finds out I turned his mother into a sandcastle. No one will trust terramancers ever again."

Valrae chucked again. “Hmm… I kind of liked it,” Then her eyebrows wing up. “Two years? I had no idea…” Odhranos’s positivity battles back her sudden melancholy, prompting her to smile again. It was a nice, hopeful feeling. She nods along with his explanation and listens carefully, enjoying her small crash course on… Well, whatever was happening to her. She was still shaky on all the specifics. She was clear on her own death though, that she had lived through before. The sensation of being bound to an immortal body was new though. When Odhranos points this newfound immortality out to her she is frowning again. Immortality was preferred by very few witches. In fact, seeking it often led witches down the dark path of becoming a warlock, something deeply feared and looked down upon in her community. Witches believed that the life cycle served a greater purpose. That the circle of life was always meant to have a natural, if sometimes violent, ending. Removing yourself from that cycle could diminish a witches talent for magic and her connection to the god and goddess. Her own rebirth had been a struggle, but this new position was more alarming. For the same reason she feared vampirism, she feared the fate of being trapped in an immortal sand shell. No matter how intrigued she’d been by S’erok, who she would very much like to speak with again in the future. She voices none of these deep, personal fears aloud though. When she laughs at Odhranos’s joke it's a bit forced. “Fynn might not appreciate sandcastle mommy,” She agrees, attempting to push her fears aside. There was nothing to be done now but wait and trust Odhranos.

Odhranos notes Val's expression of concern and wordlessly, he reaches across to pat her knee, a gesture that everything will be alright. "I can't imagine that would go down well at all. Though, it might be a novelty at first, you never know. Kids like sandpits, right?" Odhranos Kerrigan, able to rewrite an ancient language from piecemeal information scrounged from relics scattered the length of the world, but capable of understanding children and how their strange little minds work? Not a chance in hell. Odhranos sets his mind back to the task of drafting and redrafting rune circles, slowly honing on the final iteration with every successive drawing. While he does so, something uncurls itself from the darkness of the trees outside. A malevolence so epic in proportions, that the light seems to shy back from it's presence. Stealing across the slow without leaving so much as a footprint, the wisp of pure abyssal darkness curls around the eaves of the house, before seeping through the cracks and gaps in the woodwork, slowly pervading the house. What it finds inside, is truly delightful, and had this shadowy form teeth with which to bare, they would be displayed in a ravenous grin. Dancing like a wraith beyond the bounds of Val's sensory net, the dark presence broods, laying in wait like a predator, preparing for the right moment to strike. An hour passes, and Odhranos holds a sheet aloft with an exclamation. "This is it! The reverse caging circle!" Odhranos slaps the sheet down with a grin, and holds his hand out towards his satchel. From within, a stick of white chalk shoots out and into his hand, and he gets to his feet, easing the aches from his limbs and neck from sitting hunched over for so long. "If you want to lift yourself into the middle, I'll lay out the circle around you. You don't need to move the skull either, I'll place the circle centred on where your new cage's conflux is, so it will be able to ferry you straight into your body again, no problems. Well, I hope. The maths all checks out." A concerned but determined expression greets Val, which rallies Odhranos' resolve when he reminds himself that this is a person, no, a friend that he is working to save. "This will work. I'll make sure of it." He states, in a voice that bears steel within it. Up in the rafters, the dark presence smirks. Everything is proceeding perfectly.

Valrae smiles gently at Odhranos, comforted momentarily by his joking and wordless reassurance. And she laughs. “You might be right. It would probably entertain him.” Wildly fluctuating between relief, happiness, fear, anger… It had all left her exhausted. She wondered distantly how long she’d been trapped in the emerald skull and how long it had taken Odh and S’erok to draw her out. With old habit, Valrae pushed at her hair. The feeling was strange, as her body was only an imitation of her former self. Suddenly, the witch reaches for her own power. She hesitated first, suddenly afraid it might not come to her, but when she finds it there the joy it brings warms her. With a murmur, she casts a glamor about herself. It was vanity and a reach for the familiar, but with the pulse of power and a hint of smoke, the illusion settled over her clearly. Now she was the image of her former self, what she considered her true self. Waifish, golden haired, wide of eye. The body that had been taken from her in Larket. With a sigh, she leans away from the skull and stretches her legs away from her and looks about the room. She contented herself to studying the runes around her as the terramancer worked, unwilling to break the comfortable silence or his concentration. She wondered idly if S’erok would make another appearance but the time passed uneventful. The witch laughs along with Odh’s excitement for having completed the reversal. The darkness that came went unnoticed as it danced outside of her awareness. When it was finally time, a prickle of unease came but was easily pushed away as worry for what would come next. Valrae moves as instructed, trusting Odhranos completely and happy to comply. “I think I understand,” She probably didn’t, but she placed herself where she had been instructed and waited. “I’m ready…” Probably. “And Odh? Thank you, again…”

Odhranos begins by inscribing a single large sigil in the centre of the floor, a circle, riven in two, with the Robelous rune for body and mind beginning at the edge, then flowing smoothly into the rune for soul at the centre. Odhranos pauses to inspect his handiwork before Val's body is placed on top of it, then he turns to face Val, now glamoured to appear like her true original self. The terramancer smiles and nods stoicly. "It is an honour to work alongside you, and I hope that honour will continue for years to come. This much is the least I could do." Odhranos bows deeply towards Val, then taking his chalk, he begins inscribing the circle around her body. First, a single sweeping circle that encompasses most of the floorspace. Within that, a pentagon is chalked, crisp straight lines that are each a perfect measure, with Val's body aligned with the middle axis of the shape. Beginning at the middle of each strike, the point of a smaller, inverted pentagon is marked, which is then inscribed with quick, smooth lines. Odhranos then moves back to the outer circumference, adding a smaller nodal circle at each intersection of pentagon and arc. These circles each house a series of Robelous runes, each one contributing to the nexus of power that will free Val's soul from its current vessel, and guide it safely into it's new host. Finally, five last lines are drawn, beginning at the nodal point and travelling parallel to the second inverse pentagon. Each line terminates with a final runic node, and the reverse caging circle is completed. "Done." Odhranos intones quietly, not meeting Val's eyes. He steps out of the circle, ensuring not to smudge so much as a single line, and he inspects the entire array with a critical gaze. "Right. Here goes." Odhranos fixes Val with a small smile, then he crouches, placing his hands within the edges of the circle, and he lets the circle reach out with hungry intent for his magic, sapping it away as fuel to catalyse the arcane ritual that is already on the verge of ignition. With a flash of light, the chalk circle illuminates, casting a vibrant azure glow up towards the rafters, causing the shadowy spectre to hiss quietly and shrink from view. Unaware of the silent observer, Odhranos lets the ritual take the magic tithe it demands, and then he turns his gaze upwards. "It's up to you now Val. The cage can't be dismantled by me, you need to take it apart yourself! Let yourself slip away from the runes, Val!" As an unseen wind whips the cabin into a frenzy, Odhranos shouts into the penumbra of the rafters. "You have to let go!"

Valrae watches Odhranos work again, lapsing back into the comfortable quiet, broken only by the sound of his work. Her eyes watched intently as he painstakingly drew the lines and rune work, silently nodding along. It reminded her of the alchemy she’d seen Hudson perform, though when he’d used his own skill it was usually to commit or cover up a crime. This was more intricate, more serious as it involved souls. When he stops, Valrae again feels that she might have shed tears if they would come. “The honor is mine,” She replies simply, returning his bow with a demure dip of her own. The formality of it was quaint, but it felt right and made her smile again. When the time comes, the witch braces herself. She watches as the magica comes to life, tension and fear rolling through her suddenly. As Odhranos shows her the way, she focuses her intentions on unweaving the intricate rune work that allowed her the sandcastle body. The darkness watched, again unnoticed. The fear was a tether, one she struggled with now. Slowly, she unbond the ties of the cage but stalled. The magic coalesced, nearly peaked and broke free but for the fear that kept her bound. Light and sound fell away, the frenzy of the cabin outside of her senses now. Finally, slowly, the final seal was broken and she let go. With the sound of a thunderclap Valrae released herself to the magic. Ripped from the sand, her soul poured into the circle in the wisp of smoke. The darkness rose up to greet her again. And then there was light, just behind her eyes. The sensation of air moving in and out of her lungs. The smell of the cabin, the cold beyond its walls… And sand. Like her first return to the mortal coil, the sensations were overwhelming, nearly too much after the separation. The floor was hard and cold beneath her. Slowly, she opened her eyes.

Odhranos is on edge with trepidation, not for the first time tonight either. Once the light of the runes tracing the walls flash out of existence, only the dim glow of the circle remains which in turn fades to black, leaving Odh blinking at shadows while his eyesight acclimatise to the darkness. For a moment, silence pervades the cabin, and Odhranos heart leaps into his throat at the thought that after everything that has happened, he has failed at the last hurdle. Then, like a roar to the terramancer's ears, the silence is split at Valrae heaves in her first breath in her newly reclaimed body. "Yes!" Odhranos cries, throwing his hands skyward as Val's eyes slowly open. "It worked! Ahaaaaa!!!" Odhranos jumps to his feet, scrambling about the cabin in his frenzy. A pillow is fetched and tucked under Val's head, a blanket laid over her likewise to help rid her body of the cold chill of near-death. A glass of water is fetched from the pitcher and when she has the strength to move, will be handed to her gingerly. "It worked, Xalious bless, I'm so relieved." Odhranos sinks to his knees, allowing himself a moment of arguably well deserved pride. Years of research, finally coming together to save a life. This is what truly makes the work worthwhile. Odhranos lets loose a ragged breath as for the first time in hours, he relaxes and he closes his eyes for a moment. Only for them to snap back open again at the sound of slow clapping. Odhranos wheels about, turning to face the loft, where a pair of muscled and shapely legs dangle from the dark shadows of the roof. "Who's there!? Show yourself!?" Odhranos cries, stumbling a step backwards as he reaches for S'erok's cage, unable to find it in the dark. The pair of legs swing forwards, and a vision of an angel falls from the loft, landing to the ground with a solid crunch that elicits creaks of protest from the floorboards. The figure straightens, and seven foot of gloriously sculpted avian body squares off against Odhranos, towering over him as this uninvited stranger looms from the darkness. "Veeery impressive, Odhranos. Very impressive indeed. You've proven to be such a useful pawn, so versatile, so adaptable. Yes, you've been a terrific help, despite your innate ineptitudes. I was right to drive you away when I did." The avian looms forward out of the darkness and two glowing eyes of holy golden-white cast an unearthly light on the terramancer, while around the avian's throat, a large amber amulet hangs, bouncing heavily against its bronzed and oiled abs. Odhranos stares back at this vision of pure perfection with abject confusion, as the worn out gears spin in his head. "Who are you? You, sent me away? No, Brenwyn sent me away… who… Brenwyn sent you!?" Odhranos spits the previous administrator's name like a curse, still entirely unaware of the unfortunate demise that befell the man. "Oh, Odh. Your ignorance is adorable. You pride yourself for your depth of knowledge and yet, when it truly counts, you have the intellect of insect. I suppose it's endemic of your kind. So small minded. Always missing the bigger picture." The avian looms closer, filling Odhranos' vision with those two hypnotising ethereal eyes. "Brenwyn was merely my puppet also. As was Lanlan. Everything that has happened, happened because I willed it to. I am the cause to your effect. I am the author of your story, the playwright to your act. I am one who would be God." The avian snickered insidiously, then raises his head back up into the shadows again, where the two points of light stare disturbingly at Odhranos, piercing him to his very soul. "But you simple creatures can't understand anything unless it's laid out for them in plain. So simplistic. But yet, the anguish in your face will be so delectable, I feel it worth my divine effort." The avian chuckles deeply, then announces in a voice that slithers in one's ear like a snake, sensual and venomous with every syllable. "I am Haladavar, Lord of all Magic. And you, dear stupid Odhranos, have just made yourself…. Useful."

Valrae is slow to move. She can feel, and is grateful for, the assistance Odhranos provides. The pillow was a comfort, the blanket too. Without opening her eyes she says, “You did it,” By way of congratulation. Her body ached in a way that was unfamiliar and had been missing when she’d been reborn to fire. With her eyes closed, she considered this and thought it might be a residual effect of her battle against the darkness of the emerald skull. When the terramancer returned with water the witch struggled weakly to right herself. Her body protested and she only managed to prop herself up on an elbow before pulling the glass to her lips with trembling hands. “Thank you,” Her smile was weak but beaming from her emerald eyes. She was tired, weary to the bone, but full of joy. As all things surely do, perhaps especially for the pair that sat together now, the moment came to an abrupt and unpleasant end. The mysterious man’s voice shattered the moment. Valrae became very still as fear crawled over her skin. The longer his introduction went though, and the more he insulted Odhranos, the hotter her temper rose to burn away her fear. The strange avian claims himself and god and in a show of defiance the witch snorts. Pushing aside her water, she struggles to sit up right. Her whole body protested. With great effort and the clenching of her jaws, Val pushed herself into a seated position. “My magic knows no lord,” She hisses, chin tilted upward proudly. Will and stubbornness won the day for the witch again as she moved shakily to her knees and called forth her magic. It came quickly, emerald flame dancing at her fingertips with hungry glee. “And you are not welcome here,” It was a bluff, a useless one likely, but she would die again defending Odhranos if she must.

Odhranos gapes confusedly up at this strange intruder, and unlike Val, his only reaction to the unrelenting barrage of insults is to shrink further and further away from the avian, as each harsh bladed comment cuts deeper into his already damaged sense of self worth. Haladavar raises his chin imperiously, then a wide smile spreads across his face when Val slowly rises to her knees in defiance. "Hoh? So the finch has grown bold now that the door to her cage has been opened? I hope your residency was enlightening, Valrae. You served your purpose delightfully." Haladavar takes a step closer and crouches slowly, his toga hugging the carved curves of his muscle-bound form as he does so. Reaching out lazily, Haladavar presses his hand into the flames, grinning only more ferally as the hissing sound of burning flesh fills the air, as he clamps his fist around Val's hand, squeezing until either the flames are put out, or Val's hand is crushed in his grasp. "You have done me a service, and as such, you can live out the rest of your insignificant life as you see fit. You are of no importance anymore. Bask in the glory of my enlightenment and you will see that I have truly done you a kindness. Let it not be said that Haladavar is without mercy." He releases his grasp and stands, turning his palm to inspect the bubbling blisters that the fire has raised, and he runs his tongue along the cracked and scorched skin with a sickly perverse smile. "Ah, pain, the spice of mortality. How I will miss this feeling. But like all things, it must be shed in order to achieve my destiny. Regrettable." Haladavar turns and rests his holy gaze on the terramancer, who shrinks back from that piercing light. "As for you, Odhranos. Well, you have use to me still. Use that cannot wait any longer" With that, Haladavar reaches out with his uninjured hand and grasps Odhranos' head, the avian's colossal hand clamping the terramancer's cranium like a vice. In the centre of Odhranos' forehead, a rune sparks into existence, and just as suddenly, black smoke begins pouring from Odhranos' mouth and nose, and he shudders violently as Haladavar's borrowed magic takes hold, rolling his eyes back into his head. Haladavar releases him, and he collapses to the floor, lifeless and immobile. Haladavar hoists Odhranos body and tosses it over one shoulder, then turns towards the door. It is kicked open with a negligent flick, and Haladavar steps out into the snow. "The Promised Day is almost at hand. See to it that you ready yourself for Enlightenment." Haladavar tosses back over his shoulder at Val, before colossal white wings unfold and with a crack like thunder, the avian and terramancer take off into the iron-tinged night sky.

Valrae , defiant and filled with indignation, does not flinch or look away from Haladavar as he grasps her hand and the sickly sweet smell of burning flesh rises to meet her. It was only when the pain became too much that the emerald fire sputtered and died. Frustration and fury rolled off of her, a cry of pain hissing beyond her lips before she could stop it. Helplessness bound her tongue. The witch trembled and fell forward as the avain moved away, catching herself weakly on the cold floor. “Leave him alone…” She says, impossibly useless as she watched him corner Odhranos. “Leave him alone!” But her screaming changed nothing. Valrae watched as Haladavar’s power took over the terramancer and she stumbled again, struggled and fought bitterly to stand. Crawled when her legs would not hold her. But she was too slow, too weak, too tired. It happened too quickly. The avian spoke to her but she heard him as if her head was underwater. The cold of Frostmaw slammed into her as the door opened. The witch hurled all manner of insults and promises toward the retreating man as she followed him. Finally and painfully she found her feet. It was a moment too late that she fell into the snow behind him. The thunderclap of his wings pushed her golden hair back, sent the curled ends snapping wildy behind her. Her ears rang as she sat in the snow, powerless as she watched him carry away the man who had just saved her. A finch, rather than the phoenix.

Iintahquohae took the decidedly much slower route home on foot. Granted, the speed due to her vampirism made the trek shorter than if she were still human, but she wanted that time to clear her head. Her attitude lately frustrated her, and she couldn't imagine how frustrating it must've been for Odhranos having to live with her like this. She knew she had to apologize to him and Valrae, she believed, if the woman was back in her body and awake. Still unwashed from their adventure with Kasyr in Trist'oth and lightly dusted with sand, she begins to emerge from the treeline and into the clearing near the cabin. The shouting and thunderous noise gives her pause however. The door's hanging open. Why? She jumps back a bit, into the cover of the trees, and glances upward. She isn't quick enough to catch that Odhranos is being carried off, but she sees great white wings. An avian? Her hope is that maybe Valrae is secretly an avian, the terramancer did what he had to do to patch her up, and she had flown home, presumably, but something felt off. She considers calling for her couatl to give her some idea of what has gone on during her absence, but she doesn't feel the winged green serpent's presence nearby. She sprints for the cabin, stopping short of the door when she sees Valrae in the snow. She's alive, and very distinctly not avian. Dammit. The “Leave him alone!” came from her. Him being Odhranos. She hears one heartbeat outside, that heart belonging to Valrae, and nothing in the cabin. He's gone. Whatever calm she regained during her trek back home is fading very, very quickly. Without a word, she bends to scoop up Val and carry her into the cabin. Carefully, the seamstress sets her down in one of the armchairs, making a point of not taking note of the disarray of the cabin's interior for now. Once it looks like her guest is as comfortable as possible, given the circumstances, she moves to slam the cabin's door shut to keep the cold out, then whirls around to face Valrae. “WHAT HAPPENED?!” Not a great way to greet a woman who has just come back to life, she realizes, and repeats the question in a softer tone, exhaling a breath first. “What happened? Where is he?” The avian, Iintahquohae guesses. For a very rare instance, she feels a pang of regret and her face falls. She should have left with them. Maybe she could have prevented this.. Her hands rake through her braids as she leans against the door, sinking a bit to a near crouch. “This is my fault...I shouldn't have been so stubborn...”

Valrae , sitting in the snow banks and a pool of her own cerulean skirts, was a terrible and tragic sight. Her hair was loose of its pins, mostly unbound and falling about in a mess of twisted, tangled curls. The kohl she had lined her eyes with so many days ago left dark, dramatic tear streaks down her harrowingly pale face. Her hands were holding her up, clenched uselessly in the snow. The skin had turned pink, then red as the cold crept into her bones. The pain was astonishing and still the witch did not move, her head tilted toward the sky where Odhranos had disappeared. And this is how Iintahquohae would find her. Valrae hardly processes that she’s being carried away from the biting cold before she’s suddenly sitting in a decidedly more comfortable and blessedly warm chair. Her skirts drip on the cabin floor. Dazedly, her eyes find the cup of water she’d drank from only moments ago. It was on it’s side, the water a shining pool of moonlight on the floor. Tears fell from her eyes anew as she turned her face toward Iintahquohae. “I’m sorry,” She says softly, her voice filled with the weary hopelessness that consumed her. “He saved me. And I failed him,” The emerald skull gleamed darkly across the room, it’s empty eyes mocking. “He appeared out of nowhere, I-” Her breath hitches. Valrae exhales and brushes the heel of her hand against her cheek. “I’m too weak, I wasn’t able to stop it. Odhranos had only just brought me back when a man calling himself Haladavar came from nowhere. He said something, it’s foggy but he made me angry.” Her brows knitted together. “He was insulting Odh but he needs him I think… He said he was the lord of magic,” A snort then, but Valrae trembled and leaned back weakly against the chair. “I couldn’t stop him. He took Odhranos.” And then the witch looked away, hanging her head in defeat. “I’m sorry,”

Iintahquohae 's arms fall limp to her sides as her slide down to the floor finishes, and she is awkwardly seated. Valrae's apologies are given a dismissive wave. It isn't her fault. Inks shouldn't have left them. While Valrae recounts what happened, the seamstress's gaze falls to the floorboards while she scrambles for a plan. She can't just stay here. Whoever Haladavar, lord of magic or whatever he was is, he's got Odh. That isn't good. The thumb on her left hand rubs at the ring finger on the same hand, and she scans the room. Spying the golden cage without Odh near it elicits a frown, but spurs her into action. Back on her feet again, she starts silently hatching a likely questionable plan, if you could even call it a plan. Figuring she'll likely need to use magic, she attempts to light a flame in her hands, which for some reason seems to have become her means of testing her abilities as of late. Frowning when nothing appears, her shoulders sag. Whatever happened to the Xalious Tree likely had something to do with her magic being snuffed out. No matter. She'd handle this the Cenril way. The mammoth pelt on the floor is given a shove with her boot, revealing a trapdoor for storing food. She crouches to open it, and reaches in for something hidden beneath the wooden stairs that lead down into the small cellar. A bat is revealed, not hollow and carved with runes like the bats she brought with her to Larket's tournament, but a solid, weighty thing made entirely of iron with a bit of fraying muslin wrapped around the handle for a grip. Head turns to Valrae, who she regards with a mixture of familiarity due to talking to her as Grace, and an apologetic expression because this is just...not a great way to wake up, she believes.“This isn't your fault,” she begins, “I...I imagine coming back to life this way isn't pleasant. You can stay here, rest up, eat something,” she points the bat down into the cellar and continues talking, walking to S'erok's golden cage to carry it under an arm. “I'm going to Xalious to find him. I'll rip the tower from its foundations if I have to and smash in our friend Hal's skull for taking Odh away from me.” And rip off his wings, and rend him to pieces – her fists clench. The serpent tattoo coiled around her throat seems to briefly shimmer until she suppresses it.

Valrae stares down and her hands, upturned and still pink from the cold in her lap, and struggles with the helplessness that she feels. The defeat. The witch turns her head, looking up at the sound of Iintahquohae moving. She watches the other woman curiously, a silent and dripping observer. When she reappears with a bat she’s almost smiling. What would she be using that for? It doesn't take terribly wrong for her to explain though. Valrae shakes her head softly, denying that her weakness was not to blame for Odhranos’s kidnapping, but she doesn’t interrupt her. “I’m coming too,” She says suddenly, pushing herself to stand from the chair. Her skirts were soaked, chilled and heavy. The added weight of them pulled her down like stones but she stood against the weariness stubbornly. A frown tugs at the corners of her lips. She would only slow Iintahquohae down trying to travel with her. It took her only a moment to consider her options and come up with an alternate means of travel. “I won’t slow you down,” She offers, before the other woman can object. “I’ll find my own way to Xalious.” Valrae begins a slow but surely more steady walk toward the emerald skull, collecting it before she heads back toward the door. She winced upon returning to the cold. With a simple thought and the warm rush of her seemingly unaffected magic, the witch summoned Fury from the shadows that slanted from the surrounding forest. The stallion gleamed handsomely underneath the moonlight, his wide hooves hissing with heat in the snow. Valrae looks toward Inks, offering another messy and apologetic smile. “My ride,” She offers lamely in explanation. There was a heartbeat of heavy silence. “Iintahquohae… I’m sorry. For Odh, for the mess in the cabin.. I’m just sorry,” Her eyes gleamed with more unshed tears and bone deep sorrow. “I’ll do whatever it takes to find him, get him back…”

Iintahquohae is wrestling with her belt in effort to try tying the golden cage to her hip, similarly to how Odhranos might do it. It doesn't look right and she doesn't feel like she should have the cage, but it would have to do for now. Valrae's announcement that she'd come along is met with a wide-eyed look. “Are you sure?” A beat. She didn't want to discourage the other woman from coming. The more the merrier in this case, but... “I mean...are you up for it? Didn't you just come back?” Falling silent, she watches Valrae reach collect the emerald skull and walk out the door, following after her with bat in hand. She shuts the door behind her, and turns around to see Fury. Her assumption that Valrae might need some time to recover is immediately dashed. She grins. “Now that's incredible – and unexpected.” A sigh leaves her when Valrae apologizes, the seamstress once again wanting to lift her hand to dismiss it. She keeps her free hand resting atop the cage at her hip instead, and nods. Having a very clear focus took her frustration about the cabin's mess away. Getting the terramancer back is priority number one. “It'll be fine. Cabins can be cleaned. We just have to find Odhranos. Alive, and hopefully in one piece.” Her free hand reaches to her lips, and she gives three sharp whistles into the air. In the distance, a hiss can be heard. Pinquettki, her bright green, red-winged couatl. “My ride,”she explains sheepishly, though they'd meet further south to fly the rest of the way to Xalious. “I'll see you soon, Valrae. Stay safe. We'll find him.” Her last words are more of a reassurance to herself than anything, and she softly repeats them to herself, hand falling back to rest on the cage as she breaks into a run for the trees. “We'll find him.”