RP:Karasu's Prayer
Summary: Karasu follows Kanna to Cenril, where she takes a stop at the largest Cathedral in Lithrydel. Upon praying to Sven, Jahren appears to speak as the answer to her prayers. After some discussion, Karasu hestitantly agrees to lead the drow to the place where her mark originated, to gain clarity on whether the God of Death is directly involved, and whether His influence resulted in the God of Undeath's mark on Kanna.
Cathedral of the Divine Three
As you enter one of the single holiest places in Hollow you are immediately awestruck by its size and scope. Gigantic pillars of carved stone rise majestically to a high domed ceiling that seems to hang suspended in mid air purely of its own volition. The monolithic sized pillars are engraved with gold leaf relieves showcasing a myriad of ancient runes as well as forms and shapes that are simply pleasing to the eye. Below the beautiful pillars is a large simple blue carpet with golden inlaid thread at the edges that leads up through the middle of the cathedral, flanked at either side by row after row of simple wooden pews. At the end of the carpet raised upon a milky white dais is the altar of the divine three. This holy sanctum, placed upon an altar created from a single piece of statuario venato marble with a single cobalt stone place in the exact center of the facing side of this ornate table, is epitomized by the mystical torch of eternal sacrifice that sits upon the dais. This large brilliantly red pyre burns night and day all year round and has done so since the divine three Sven, Lore, and Hind ascended to Godhood for their sacrifice in holding back the forces of darkness. All around the torch are priests whose job it is to, three times a day burn the prayers of the faithful in this holy flame in the hope that the holy smoke that rises up through the cathedral will take the thoughts of the faithful to the powers that be. As you take it all in the thick heady aroma of incense fills your nose as the sound of soft relaxing music and the chanting of the monks softly enters your thoughts. This truly is a palace of peace and tranquility.
Karasu enters the cathedral hesitantly, spinel eyes darting every which way. She has only heard of this place before, but had never traveled to Cenril to see it before. Part of her marvels at the grandiose pillars and the altars to the three Gods, but part of her feels like a fraud for standing in such a holy place. Tentatively, she walks down the aisle, black cloak pulled around her head and a featureless black mask obscuring her face. Ideally, she would have walked this aisle only once in her life, but the torment of her pursuers have dashed those dreams away. The halfling kneels before the altar of Sven and silently removes her cloak, folding it into a neat square before her, followed by the mask. She is a small woman with only her joint covered in dark steel armor, presumably to lighten her carried weight and allow for movement. Karasu bows her head forward once she is content that the priests are not around to see her. A disfigured marking on the back of her neck is revealed as her hair parts so it falls on either side of her head. "Why didn't you save us?" She quietly asks of the God.
The cathedral was pristine. The cathedral was pure. The columns, impeccably crafted, their geometry as perfect as the lines they made across the floor. To say nothing for the floor! Immaculately kept, with every blemish a boot, foot, hoof, or paw could make quickly washed, quickly wiped, quickly discarded, as though the life it signified was...disregarded. Jahren met that disregard with his head high; his dusky-colored flesh bespoke of a darker race, a darker time, though he was shorter than his history would suggest, and his features were more mannish, less refined, than a pure blood had any right, or want, to admit. As dirty, as unclean, as disregarded as his steps, which left a perfect imprint of his boot from the mud and grime they left. The careful syncopation of song, the reverent silence of the believing, were jarred by the sharp cracks of his walking stick against the polished stone floor, where combated by his coughs, his snorts, and his hawks. Little was left of the pleasurable incense when he strode by; he bore the rankness of a beast, the foulness of unwashed fur and warmed gore stained on the muzzle. Only those inclined to see the soul, to see power, would see that his shadow, his aura, was far from man. He walked on two feet; his aura on four. He stood relatively tall, his mass thin and fraught; his aura bore the immensity of a beast's weight and matted fur. He walked to the statue of Hind and stood, whereas the bear of his soul remained on all four, its unseen eyes swiveling from patron and prayer, from monk to the masked female by another of the Three. His approach was announced by his smell, and it was trumpeted by his words. "You stand before the Highest God...masked. An interesting dichotomy to his drow's eye."
The first click of the stranger's walking stick made the young halfling snap to attention. Had she been found?! An inhuman growl escapes her throat despite her human appearance as she keeps a hand on the hilt of her weapon. The light that seeps through the stained windows illuminates the shaken figure, highlighting the contradictions in every part of her. She had the attentiveness and reflexes of a soldier, yet her stance when startled remained slightly pigeon-toed; Her glare threatened attack even in the holiest of grounds, but trembled like someone who had seen their fist fight. It is not long before the stench hits her, and her lip curls up in revulsion. An aura of those who walk on four legs circles Karasu as well, though the wildcat that protects her moves slower, tainted by an unseen force. "Mask or not, the Gods will know whose prayer this belongs to." Karasu looks the drow over, still wary. "Have you been sent to kill us as well?" Despite her slip of 'us', it is evident that whoever else she is referring to is not anywhere near the cathedral's grounds.
Jahren looked upon the mass of contradictions, noting what needed to be noted, seeing what needed to be seen. he watched her more than he listened to her, giving little thought to propriety or kindness. From toe to top, from shoulder to shoulder, from hip to hiarline, there was nothing upon her he did not lay his light-colored gaze. But where he looked, the beast within his aura searched; its muzzle to the ground and to the air, its gaze swiveling from what the two mortals saw and what -it- saw. It saw strength and it saw fear; it saw predator and it saw prey. His stick cracked a peel against the stone again, and the bear let its posture relax. "'the gods will know whose prayer this belongs to,'" He mimes her words if not her voice, as much of a retort as it is a mock. "And you think Sven is here? You think It resides in that stone? What wisdom is found in a finished product? If you want to speak to your God, find an artist who has made an unfixable fault. Perhaps a rock strike of the stone made the naked woman a naked man. In understanding his error, you will find It." he bowed his head to the statue, as did the carved bear's head on the end of his walking stick. "The only thing I seek to kill are the Gods themselves. Poetically, metaphorically, of course. I am but a humble servant of Hind, a seeker of knowledge the Gods. They hide; I illuminate."
Karasu grits her teeth at the mockery of her desperate prayer. As a woman built for brute force over knowledge, the gears in Karasu's mind turned as she tried to understand the metaphors made; this only served to annoy, rather to enlighten. "The first Archmage is found wherever he is needed to be. What difference does it make to you where people choose to look to their Gods for respite?" The threatening stance relaxes so that the Arcane Stewardess stands straight, arms crossing over her chest. "A seeker of knowledge. Tell me, what would possess a dryad to give their powers, their very life force, to a human to use? How does a circle of powerful mages not know a creature of pure malice seeking to usurp them by weaponizing their own children is among them?" Karasu clicks her tongue, "Tch." and stoops to retrieve her cloak and mask. "A seeker of knowledge. Only a God is capable of knowing all. What purpose does such a role serve if you use your knowledge to mock others?"
Jahren listened now more than he watched, and what he heard had him bowing his head. The deference continued lower; he shifted his weight upon the stick, both hands holding length carved in the likeness of a bear's body, his entire frame bowing as low as he could. But was it to brash female, or was it to the statue? "You were right," He said, his eyes rising to the statue away from the female. "She is in great need of Your wisdom. I feel I am not up to the task." Lower did he bend, lower did his voice go, until his hand move from the stick to the stone, his head from its lofty height to his brow pressed against the stone. "Your humor never ceases to amaze, Sven. How am I to help her now she thinks I am a jackass? You do not make it easy for the Devout." Penitent and pious, what rose to his full height was not the mockery he had portrayed. "You prayed to Sven before I arrived, yes? I was drawn to the Temple because of it. Your prayer has been answered. As for your question." He unfurled a hand upon his stick and offered for the other to take. "I am a seeker. I must find knowledge. And I would find answer to your question. My name is Jahren, Fawn of Hind, of the Devout's Guild."
Karasu stood in silence, looking from the man's bowed posture up to the statues of Sven, Hind, and Lore. Was this truly Sven's way of answering her prayers? Unseen to the mortals, the wild cat that surrounded the spell blade stepped out towards the bear that disappears once Jahren’s hand leaves the stick, seeming to gauge intent closer now. Her eyes trail down to the outstretched hand before her. "I am not an academic, much as I tried to be. I can only see a problem before me and seek a way to fix it." Essentially admitting her own folly, Karasu shifted so the accessories were held in one arm as she takes the drow's hand. "Karasu. One of two daughters of the Tsuji line, one of two survivors of the Swiftclaw extermination. Arcane Stewardess for the Mage's Guild. And I am sorry to say, but you may need a chair if you truly wish to answer all my questions." This last part is said with a hint of a smile.
The bear, the ever present figure within his shadow and upon his soul, was gone. It's presence left as soon as the half-drow's hand left his walking stick. It returned once the handshake had ended, when the hand returned to the stick, though it was as much a ghost of a ghost, a shadow of a shadow, as the grip upon his stick from both hands was loose. "We would need more than a chair, it would seem. We would need a fire, a mammoth haunch, and enough wood to make sure both we and the fire remained fed." Whereas her smile was merely a hint, his was broad and bright. "You are not an academic; I am. I am not a fighter; you are. If you do not see Sven's hand in bringing us together..." He tsked softly, a playful reprimand that returned to a smile. "Your history is a sad one, Karasu, and I can understand your want to hide your face and quickness to rip off mine. How long have you petitioned Sven with your mask?"
Karasu considers this for a moment. "The patron God I have been raised to worship is Xalious, but circumstances continued to worsen as my prayers went unanswered. I have only begun to pray to Sven while in this city, as he is the only figure above Xalious that hears the prayers of mages." Turning her gaze back up at the statues, she asks, "How much do you know of the Gods of death and undeath? Particularly, why they would cast their powers unto two relatively weak persons?"
Jahren turned his ear to Karasu, his gaze looking into the distance as she spoke. He hummed softly as she spoke, as he thought, as he seemed to listen to the beyond as much as he did to the mage. "So your prayers went unanswered, and you began to hide yourself from the world? Oh, I know what you will say, 'I hide because I am one of the two daughters of the Tsuji line, one of two survivors as an extermination. I must protect myself from others if I am to survive.'" It was spoken with care as much as it was admonishment, with understanding as much as it was to mock. "Or, that is what I believe you will say. I do not know your story yet, of course. But that is not the reason. It is never the reason." He shook his head, and only then did he acknowledge her second question. "The Gods of death and undeath are a very misunderstood pair. Nothing you will hear from their practitioners, nothing you read from holy texts written by practitioners' hands, will tell you the truth of Them. So, if we are to answer your question, we must know what -you- think of the Gods of death and undeath."
Karasu shakes her head. "I only realized my prayers had gone unanswered when I discovered I was to be a sacrifice for the return of the God of Death. My sister was similarly touched and sacrificed for the God of Undeath upon his return. If they wish to return and disrupt the balance between life, death, and undeath, then the only misunderstanding that exists is as to why they were not sealed away with more power." Karasu says, her bitterness towards them evident.
Jahren huffed softly as her tale ended, as she showed her enmity towards the Gods. "Much of what is done in a God's name is done for a mortal's reason. When someone says they speak for a God, you hear -their- voice, do you not? What the Gods do, and what we mortals do, very rarely are in line. So," He tapped his stick against the floor again, though it was a thud instead of the intimidating crack. "We must find out what was the case. Did the Gods of death and undeath touch the Tsuji sisters to be sacrificed to return them? Or, where their sacrifice to be used by mortals to further their own plans. We have a mystery to unravel."
Karasu furrows her brows. "In the case of the God of Death, it was done for the God's sake, but I have no information on whether the God Himself is involved. For the Undeath, she was touched directly by the God Himself, which seemed to contradict the plans--" She hesitated at listing her father or giving his rank. "--of the mortal who intended to use my sister also for the God of Undeath. So one and one. Do you believe those Gods are at odds?"
Jahren waved his hand at the question, his answer coming soon after. "Too soon to say. Before we take to the ethereal, let's stay with the physical, yes? There is one way to learn if Death was involved more than tertiary." he sat his chin in the carved bear's mouth, his words considered carefully if not spoken so. "We must go to where this sacrifice was made. How long will it take for you to prepare for the journey?"
Karasu looked down at the floor as she considered her options. "The mark inflicted on me has been with me since I was about six years old. There are many places where it could have first been inflicted, since I don't remember when it started, but visiting those areas requires leaving Kanna by herself. Those are all areas our pursuers frequent, save one. I don't doubt her ability to fend for herself." Remembering something, she reaches into one of the many hidden pockets of her attire, from which a compass is produced. When opened, the compass points due East, slowly moving South. "So long as I have this, it should not be a problem." Karasu is visibly unsettled by the prospect, but determination flares in her eyes. "At dawn, then. Lets hope you are truly the answer to my prayers."
Jahren lifted his head from the stick to give the floor beneath it another light tap. "At dawn. I suggest you spend your night preparing yourself." He smirked as he turned, as he began his slow walk towards the Temple's entrance. "There are many Gods to pray to!" He called out, loudly and boldly, his walking stick held high in the air as he walked away.