RP:Lahk helps Robert find a instant of palliation from his terror

Setting

The Soph Shop 18th Sept 2011

A monstrous wolf-like man

Lahk ducks his head to enter the doorway of the shop, standing again as a towering ebon pillar of fur. He swivels his monstrous wolf-like head around the wares of the store until his gaze lights on Sophie. His maw opens, and thick words spill out around his fangs, bestial in their cant, but not their diction, "Good shopkeep. Perhaps you might help me find a special item I seek?"

Sophie is a little startled by the man's lupine appearance, but she is after all a lycan herself, although she, always becomes a full wolf. Her patient the ex-slave who is still wearng a magically attached slave collar is filled with terror at the sight of the unnatural overworld monster. He jumps to his feet from where he had been curled up submissively at Sophie's feet and runs to hide in the back room. Sophie speaks sympathetically, explaining. "His cruel owner had a rune tatooed on the unfortunate man, to greatly magnify any fear he suffers. I have yet to fine a way to neutralise the effect or -safely - remove said rune." She sniifs the air curiously at the wolf-man, though herself still in elf form."How can I help you sir?"

Cold rationality may be as great a burden as abject fear

Lahk lopes over to a counter with its array of goods, eyes following the slave that scrambles to be out of his presence. Leaning upon it with his broad palms, his cruel claws clack down on the wood as he leans in close to inspect the treasures. He speaks quietly, "Fear disorders the mind. Rather than try, perhaps in vain, to remove his curse, it may be possible to set his mind aright." Looking up at Sophie, "But yet, cold rationality may be as great a burden as abject fear." He points with a broad and black haired finger at some jewelry, "I seek a gemstone, or crystal. It need not be fine-cut, or rare. But the larger the better, and with as few flaws as possible. Say, a shard of quartz, big enough to cover my palm?"

Sophie nods "You speak wisdom, sir. I am trying to set his mind more at ease, by treating him with much kindness and gentleness. His healing is a slow process, but my efforts are definately having an effect, he hardly flinches away from me in terror anymore, though strangers still fill the poor man with a nameless dread." She fishes in her purse for her safe key as all her gemstones are safely locked away. "As you say, cold rationality may be as great a burden as abject fear. But this wretched drow was so terribly abused when he was a slave, that I feel sure that if I can get him to rationally understand his new condition, it will be a great comfort to his fear-addled mind." She opens the wall safe and brings out a small velvet pouch full of various gems, which she lays out on the counter for the wolf to examine. "Might any of these suit your purpose sir?"

His road is long to traverse, but it may grant him a moment's peace

Lahk watches the cold facets of the stones spill from the soft darkness of the pouch. Forsaking the cold brilliance of diamonds and the winking eyes of emeralds, he plucks up a spire of yellow topaz, rough-hewn and rounded as a small bird's egg. "This will do," he murmurs, holding the gem between his eye and the sun, peering through it even as his face is swathed in color. Looking to Sophie, "If you can drag that poor wretch from his hiding, I can try to calm his mind. It will not heal him, his road is long to traverse, but it may grant him a moment's peace, through which healing may begin."

Sophie nods her understanding. "My thanks sir. I shall try to bring the poor man out here." She hesitates..."Is it possible for you to change you form please sir? I believe you wolfness is one of the many strange things that terrifies him. I have tried to give him a name Robert, since all people, I believe deserve the dignity of a name, but he still says. 'I am a wortless slave. I do not deserve the honour of a name.'..I hope that in time, with healing he may perhaps be able to select a name of his own choosing for himself. " She will wait to see if Lahk can turn himslef into a less Robert-frightening form before trying to fetch the former drow slave,

Darkness may be more comforting than I

Lahk turns the jewel he has selected in his brutish hand, grasping it between thumb and forefinger. Bringing his other palm up to steady the stone, he pinches, the topaz resisting, then flowing beneath his grasp in a flare of uncolor that twists along his claws. When he brings his hand away, the topaz has been cut a smooth furrow, and an amber liquid, with the consistency and sheen of honey, coats the pads of his fingers. He shakes his head slowly and sadly to the shopkeeper, "He must face me as I am now. If it is too much for his shattered mind, then bind his eyes." He grins widely, showing massive teeth, "Darkness may be more comforting than I."

Sophie, though no warrior, does not find Lahk frightening at all, even in this condition, she instintively feels she can trust the man. The healer heads into the back room, and returns about ten minutes later leading Robert by the hand. She has bandaged his eyes. The drow probably assumes his mistress, (or so the insane man believes Sophie to be) intends to take him up to the surface in daylight, she always covers his sensitive eyes when she does so. However he has other, far more terrible memories of being blindfolded. His former owner would sometimes use such a piece of cloth to make torture all the more terrifing for the pitiful wretch. Since while unable to see, he would be completely unaware of when, how, or where the next terrible torture would be inflicted on his helpless form. The ex-slave is shaking with fear, and as soon as Sophie stops leading him, he prostrtaes herself at his feet, begging pitifully. pathetically for mercy, not to be tortured anymore. The gentle healer has, of course, never tortured her patient, but he is so confused that he may truly believe that she like all his previous owners regularly does so.

For a bare moment or three, the underelf's mind is clear and unhindered by paralyzing fear

Lahk moves silently on padded feet to the side of the trembling and blinded drow. Dropping to one knee, he reaches to the blubbering man's face with his dripping fingers, pressing his hand there and drawing two stripes of amber paint across the slave's brow before the hapless creature can flinch back. The liquid flows, then freezes to a halt, stopping, then beginning to flake away in scraps of powdery ash. The fine ordered structure that Lahk has coaxed from the stone surrenders itself to the random winds, sacrificing its predictability to stem the tide of the slave's growing madness. For a bare moment or three, the underelf's mind may clear and be unhindered by paralyzing fear.

Robert's imagination goes wild as that damp, clawed hand is pressed against his face. He thinks that he has indeed been blindfolded in readiness for torture, that the wetness he feels is blood from the pain-artiste's previous victim. Then, something very strange happens, for the first time in many, many years, his tortured, twisted, fractured mind actally clears so he can, for a few moments think rationally and without fear. The drow speaks to Lahk in his heavily-accented version of the common tongue. "Thank you, for this...this miracle." His voice is filled with wonder. All too soon, however the torture-induced madness takes him over once more, and he begins to whimper pathetically, cowering away from 'the torturer' and pleading desparately for mercy. Sophie tries to reassure him with gentle patient words, but seems at this time to be having little effect.

An instant of palliation from his terror

Lahk rises lithely to standing and fingers the topaz absently in his paws. "There. It is not a cure, but an instant of palliation from his terror. With time, and more bouts of calm, his mind may strengthen against horror." Stepping back from the dark elf who is even now again dissolving to a quivering mass, he asks, "What do I owe for the stone?"

Sophie waves away his offer of payment. "Sir, the moment of peace that you gave my sorely troubled patient is worth more than any riches. It is I who am in your debt." Robert has prostrated himself whimpering wretchedly at Sophie's feet now, but at least, when she gently strokes his bald head, he does not flinch away from the kind-hearted healer this time.

Lahk nods once, slowly, and slips the stone into a pouch, drawing the strings taut. He retreats from the pair, leaving them to their moment of consolation, and slips out in a gust of street air and scent.