RP:Intervention
Summary: Josleen visits Kovl months after their fight. She finds the pixie high on sap in the meditation center at the Mage's Guild tower. Josleen realizes she'll have to help the pixie rid himself of this addiction, and it will take time and patience.
Meditation Room, Mage's Tower, Xalious
Kovl's tiny form is slouched atop a large pillow near the far edge of the room. All is quiet in the dimly-lit room meant for meditation except muffled voices which eminate from the students of magic which frequent the tower. The pixie's silhouette rises and falls, shrouded in the flickering shadow of a scented candle placed on a nearby tabletop. Darkness obscures the pixie's wide eyes as he looks past the wall in front of him. Dancing lights intensify the visions before Kovl's eyes, visions that only he can see. Sap dulls his thoughts while he watches dashes of green intertwining with red and violet, colors that have form and life. They hug the wall which bulges in Kovl's direction as they play and sway. The pixie is enraptured by the kalidoscope-like images which weave in and out of the wall and each other. It's a beautiful light show, and it's a shame no one can share with him in this sight. Kovl's drugged shoulders slump and body droops deeper into the pillow he sits on while he enjoys the elated emotions the colors give him.
Josleen has had many horrors and sorrows to contemplate and tend to throughout the course of this war. It wasn’t Josleen’s first war, but it certainly proved the hardest on her spirit and body. One of the many weights that drag on her heart is the recent-ish fight with Kovl. At first she was too angry to reach out to him. Then she was too prideful. Why should she reach out to him when he is in the wrong? Then she was too ashamed. Have I waited too long and expected too much? But now, post-war, the city of Frostmaw and its families find new ways to rebuild themselves, and so too does Josleen go on a quest for reparations. First she examines who she owes, and Kovl tops that list. She asked around the Guild and was pointed to the meditation chamber. Few outsiders are allowed such access to the tower, but Josleen has been racing through these halls since she was a child. Countless hours she spent reared on her father’s knee in his study, learning about nature and magic. She was destined to join the Guild, but chose against her own fate. In the meditation chamber she finds the pixie on a pillow and approaches cautiously. “Kovl?” Her voice lilts sweetly, a far cry from their last encounter many weeks ago.
Kovl's mind races as the colors shrink and grow to match the sound of Josleen's footfalls hitting the floor in her approach. The sounds Kovl's sensitive ears register are not footsteps. They are part of the show. As the pixie's name is spoken, the wall forms a mouth and begins to speak to him in Josleen's voice. The mage shudders and crabwalks backwards off of his pillow, eyes ever-staring at the wall in front of him. Gaining distance from the medium of his visions, he lets out a confused "Huh?". Whispers of his reasoning remind Kovl that this voice is all part of the high.
Josleen reaches out to touch Kovl, then thinks better of it. She circles him and stands before his gaze, hoping that her presence may disrupt his vision.”Kovl? It’s me. It’s Jos.” She waves a hand before his eyes and notices the darkness there. She lets loose a long sigh, then briefly wonders if he’s dangerous when high. Might he attack her. “Kovl?” she asks again, this time more fearfully.
Kovl stares blankly through Josleen as she circles to stand between him and the wall until finally his dark blue eyes focus on the bard's fearful face. Another moment passes as some reaches of reality grasp at him. The pixie blinks. Is this real? "What are you doing here?" Kovl could be talking to his hallucination or a real person. Everything is all-so-dreamlike in the moment. He swears he can see trails of Josleen's movement behind her. She fills the room.
Josleen sweeps her hand through her hair nervously. She glances off to the side before speaking. “I came to find you.” Now she looks at him again, unsure if he can really hear her, but it’s worth a shot. “I wanted to apologize for how things were left after the last time we met.” Although she told herself not to make excuses, she still can’t resist adding. “I was very scared. I wasn’t my best self. I’m sorry.” She watches his movements carefully to learn about this drug and his addiction.
Kovl watches Josleen as carefully as she watches him as if he is suspicious. And he is suspicious. The pixie does not know if he is speaking to himself or with a real living being. The bard's apology is lost in his reasoning. Kovl takes flight toward Josleen quickly and reaches out to touch her, any part of her, to decide if she exists. No reply is offered to Josleen's words. Only an attempt to assess reality.
Josleen holds out a hand for Kovl to touch. She briefly wonders how long it will take for Kovl to be sober again, and decides then and there to wait out this high and observe him, learn as much about it as she can.
Kovl touches Josleen's hand before jumping back. "What are you doing here, Josleen?" The pixie repeats. "Go home." Kovl's eyes pierce through Josleen's. "Leave before I put you at death's edge again. You don't want to have anything to do with me." Kovl takes a breath and darts to the alter at the other edge of the room, hiding himself behind a candle and staring again at the shadows it causes. "Go."
Josleen doesn’t chase Kovl when he’s in this state. He can hear her clearly from where he stands by the altar. Although she has little experience in dealing with addicted people, instinct tells her to take it slow. “Kovl, I want to fix things and help you. You’re a good friend. You have been for many many years.” She gestures towards his slight body, even if he isn’t looking at her. “This isn’t you. Let me help you.”
Kovl feels a growing rage at Josleen's words. If any sense of reason is in Kovl now, he'd take another breath and talk. Pieces of the bards words are chosen to fume over, and context is not in any sense of the pixie's priority. No, the pixie is angry. And for some reason his mind screams at him to get her out. To cut her off. "Am I someone to fix, Josleen? You need your little pixie pal fixed so you can walk how you want about the world, risking your life at every turn to get things done that you want. And then when your little pixie pal is 'broken' you go storming off without any sense to talk for nearly a month. Go away and fix yourself. I'm not a puzzle to be solved."
Josleen‘s lips form a flat line. She takes a moment to compose herself. Before she came, the bard prepared herself for something like this. Constantly she reminds herself this isn’t the true Kovl. Her patience needs to hold fast. She tries again, speaking patiently. “You’re not being fair. I am here because I care. I want to help you, because we are friends. You have always helped me. I want to help you too.”
Kovl tastes the bitterness in his own words to Josleen. It is all a proof that his mind has been to dark places since he left Frostmaw. In that moment, Kovl felt rage against the bard for trusting him so much. The pixie, in his twisted thinking finds a pattern of himself and his abilities used, not only by her, to influence the tides of the political world. This pattern has led the pixie to fountains of blood on his hands, and the fact that Josleen's near-death almost contributed to the mass of blood intensifies his feelings. The root of Kovl's drug use is veiled in his spiteful words to the bard. Josleen introduced the pixie to Skylei, someone who led Kovl to make actions which directly resulted in civil war and the death of many children. "I'm a killer. I'm not worth your help." Another ball of frustration swells in his chest. Is that self-hatred? Is that wanting to get out of his skin? Is that wanting to be alone and never bothered again. The pixie wants to hide forever.
Josleen has no idea about the dark past that haunts Kovl. He’s always been secretive about it, and Skylei never told Josleen either. Her face scrunches up in confusion. Her head cocks to the side. “What? What do you mean? You’re a killer?” She eyes him and remains unconvinced. “How? What happened?”
Kovl feels the rise of paranoia now. Did he tell her that he killed someone? The pixie closes his eyes and lays flat on his back, looking at the ceiling. The colors emerge from the corners of the room, and while they made dancing motions earlier, they are not making sharp, aggressive movements. Another moment. The pixie jumps up immediately and his wings carry him before Josleen's face. "I killed you in the fortress. Only luck helped me save you again." Kovl's thoughts are disjointed and hard to understand. One moment, the blame is on Josleen. The next moment, the blame is on himself. Blame the colors too, he thinks.
Josleen sighs with relief as she believes that’s all Kovl meant. “You didn’t kill me, Kovl. I’m right here.” The idea that Kovl has killed in cold blood is so antithetical to what she knows of him that she can’t even imagine it. “Kovl, do you want to get sober?”
Kovl closes his eyes. "I can't talk about this now, Josleen." The room begins to spin, and Kovl places his hands on his head to stop it. The pounding in his head begins to sound and is deafening now. The pixie returns to his pillow and buries his head under it to avoid the candles. The dim light is already more than he can handle. "I don't feel good."
Josleen nods when Kovl says he can’t talk about this. Take it slow, Josleen. She sits on the floor near Kovl’s pillow and waits. She came here armed with patience. “Is there anything that would make you feel better right now? Water? A certain medicine?”
Kovl crawls farther under the pillow so that it covers his entire body. He groans in response to Josleen and offers no reply. The pixie's attempt to make sense of Josleen being present after a month of absence is interrupted by his symptoms.
Josleen gently pats the pillow over where she assumes the pixie’s back to be. “I’m going to fetch water. You’re probably thirsty.” She rises and leaves for only a moment. When she returns, she hopes he’s still there. If he is, she sets a small tea cup of water down beside his pillow.
Kovl doesn't move from his position when Josleen leaves, and as she sets the tea cup at Kovl's side, no hint of acknowledgement is given to Josleen. Instead, Kovl is still, unconscious in his own foolishness.
Josleen lifts the pillow a little and peeks beneath to make sure Kovl is still breathing. If he is, she lets him be. There’s no point in rushing this. She’ll have to wait. If he is unconscious but breathing, she lays back on the hard floor and stares up at the ceiling, loses herself in her own sober thoughts. Time passes quickly that way. She wishes she had brought a book.