RP:Should I Stay Or Should I Go?

Part of the Dissonance Theory Arc

Part of the Through The Looking-Glass: Return To Wonderland Arc

Part of the On Stranger Tides Arc

This is a Warrior's Guild RP.

Summary: Khitti stops by the druid tree on her way home from the Devout's Guild headquarters in Kelay and, unfortunately for her, runs into Krice.

Temple Entrance, Kelay

At the end of the work day, Khitti left her office in the Devout’s Guild headquarters in Kelay and headed eastward down the street, in the direction of Cenril. Not long after, she’d be greeted by her tikifhlee, the eight foot sabrecat shrinking down to its housecat size. With a leap, it landed on Khitti’s shoulder and perched there, like a parrot, to which Khitti gave it a pat on its head. As the two got to a certain point down the road, they stopped--or, rather, Khitti stopped. They’d come to the part of the path where the entrance to the druid’s tree lay and… well… Khitti suddenly felt the need to check up on the place. Quintessa wasn’t here, of course. Khitti knew that. The girl had been seriously talked to by her, Brand, and Lionel, and now? Now she was dealing with other matters pertaining to the Mage’s Guild. Didn’t matter though. The redhead still decided to go over to the entrance… but she couldn’t quite make it past the doorway. Instead, she just stared into the building from her spot. The smell of the honeysuckle that enveloped the building invaded her nose and she responded in kind with a wrinkle of her nose. Something’s could be too sweet--that wasn’t something Khitti would say lightly--and honeysuckle had never agreed with her. It wasn’t the flowers that kept her out, however. It was the same feeling she’d had some time ago when she met Kailani here to speak about the Shadow Plane. The feeling that she’d taint the whole place by just being there. It was a ridiculous thought. It certainly hadn’t happened with Quintessa’s mere existence, all that tree-poisoning nonsense aside, and the girl was just as weird magic-wise as Khitti was. Ridiculous or not though, it stopped Khitti and her cat companion entirely in their tracks. It felt wrong for her to be here. She did nothing but destroy, whether it was intentional or not. Someone like her shouldn’t be in a place like this. Not when death clung to her like her shadows did.

Krice emerged from the thicket to the north just as Khitti reached the peak of her angst, a shadowed figure clad in his usual black attire with that ever-present katana strapped to his back. As sunlight passed over the chiseled lines of his face, he locked his gilded stare upon the familiar female. A hint of surprise underlined his expression, though it remained mostly relaxed in its typical guarded state. " Hey," he said to the female, briefly regarding the feline perched on her shoulder. Pausing with the thicket at his back, he remained shy of Khitti's reach and seemed expectant of her response - perhaps more specifically, of an explanation as to what she was doing here. He had been coming to the Eternal Tree at least every second day for the last several weeks and hadn't once seen the vampire-turned-human. In fact, they hadn't crossed paths since their battle against the undead dragon months earlier.

The shadow that meandered in from the area with the tree itself and then from the hallway used for ritual sacrifices just beyond the entrance did not go unnoticed by Khitti. The redhead took a few steps back until she was back outside in the “safety” of Kelay’s main road. “Hi.” She knew well why Krice was here--Lionel had told her after all. Khitti chose not to give the grey-haired warrior an explanation for her being here. Just the fact that he still was there annoyed her a bit. Perhaps Lionel had not passed on the word that help was going to be given to Quintessa, to help rid herself of that pesky bug problem. “If you’re still here because of what I think you’re still here for, it’s pointless now. She has far more important things to deal with at the moment--Larket things. If she does return to this spot, it won’t be to poison this tree. She’s asked for help to get rid of this insect that’s plaguing her and she will not be denied it.” Khitti’s tone was stern, her crimson brows knitted together in irritation and concern as she eyed Krice. Her attention didn’t linger on him for long, however. It trailed away, looking into the building behind Krice, as the barest hint of a frown decided to show itself.

Krice hadn't been told anything about Quintessa's change of heart; likely if he had, he would have done something more interesting with his time. His expression was a mix of indifference toward Khitti's annoyance--wasn't she always annoyed with him?--and surprise that the youth had heeded his advice - in whatever way she chose to whether by him directly or the reiteration of his message by someone else. Quintessa had asked for help and that was good enough for him. Still... " Good to know. Maybe I want to be here regardless," he said to the vampire-turned-human woman standing before him, his gilded eyes fixed on her face in subdued scrutiny of her expressions - and more broadly, her overall demeanor.

Druid's Eternal Tree

Screaming internally, that’s what Khitti was doing right now as Krice continued to stand in her way, staring at her. While he may not have actually been doing so, it felt like Krice was taunting her. ‘Yeah, so what? Maybe I want to be here. What are you gonna do about it?’ At least, that’s how the grey-haired warrior’s response sounded to her. Her attention finally shifted back to him and she resisted the urge to say ‘you make a better door than a window’. Instead, she sighed exasperatedly and shadow-stepped past him to continue on into the temple. In an instant, the redhead disappeared into a cloud of shadows and smoke, the ability’s ‘bamf’ sound accompanying it. The sound happened again, as she reappeared behind him, another small cloud of darkness left in her wake. There was no attack of course. Khitti might be endlessly annoyed at Krice, but she wasn’t stupid--nor did she want to attack him in the first place. She carried on instead and headed further into the building, stopping once again to linger at the doorway that officially led into the area with the tree itself. The whole place was brimming with life, just the way Krice had left it. Bees were buzzing about on flowers; faeries were flying around, going about their business. Khitti just stopped to watch it all and did nothing else, taking in the tree, the creatures, and the rainbow fountain.

Krice could feel the venom wafting off of Khitti, but he had no idea -why-. He hadn't done anything to encourage her ire - unless she was still hung up on their last conversation some... three or four years ago. Damn, that was a long time to hold a grudge. When she shadow-stepped past him, he turned casually with a brow arched, bemused more than surprised. Naturally silent, the enigmatic swordsman trailed after Khitti until he was standing a metre and a half behind her at the entrance to the Eternal Tree's shrine. There, he mused, " You could've just -walked- past me." His tone was devoid of aggression, lest he unwittingly incur her wrath in some other form.

Khitti’s olive-green line of sight shifted back and forth between all the things that made up the open room with the tree in it. Krice approached her yet again, but it seemed now that she was staring at this place, her rage had diminished somewhat. Though her intentions were not at all like what Quintessa’s had been the night Krice had found the changeling, Khitti still hadn’t wanted people to know she was lingering around this place. “I could have, but would you have moved? Or would you still have stood there staring at me like that?” She sighed, her tone somewhat defeatist-sounding. Regardless of if he responded, Khitti would not say anything for some time. And even if he’d ask something or said something that would prompt a response from her, it would go unheard for the moment. “Do you ever feel like you’re not supposed to be somewhere…? Or… don’t deserve to be there?” Her attention briefly settled on him again as she turned her head to acknowledge him, but it only returned to the tree and its surroundings as she leaned against the threshold that separated the darkness where they stood, to the light where nature thrived, her arms crossing over her chest.

Krice squinted thoughtfully at Khitti. Never before had he been so misread by someone. " Didn't think I was in your way - but I would've moved, yeah." He stood quietly in the silence that followed, lifting his arms into a loose fold across his chest. In the dim light of the shrine and temple, the gold of his eyes wasn't as easy to discern amid the dominant crimson, but they still appeared warm despite his stoic nature, particularly when Khitti glanced his way. Despite her frustration with him, he harboured no ill will toward her. The subsequent question gave him pause and his overall demeanor softened before he shored it up, reluctant to allow any negative emotions to the fore. " Yes," was his truthful answer. " But not anymore. What's going on?"

There was no real ill will on Khitti’s end. She just… was not very good with people most days. Nor was she great at covering up her emotions. Anger was almost always a cover for things. For being hurt or depressed or even confused about other emotions that had been bottled up and simmering for a while. Of course, that’s not what she’d tell people. There were only so many she’d let know that sort of thing. Instead, she was mostly content to let people think she was just filled with rage all the time. It took less explaining--or rather, it took no explaining at all. “Nothing, I guess,” she said at length with a sigh. “I had to come here a few weeks ago. I’d never been here at all, though I knew what was here. I give tribute to all the gods, not just the ones I work with, but neither Hind nor Lauria’s shrine is here so there was never a reason. I’ve lived in and around forests of all sorts all my life, but all of that life and nature in those forests isn’t quite as contained as it is here. I guess it’d really never hit me until I’d had to come here to meet with someone. It felt wrong for me to be here. It still feels wrong for me to even be standing right where I am right now.” Crimson brows furrowed as she still watched the goings on in the other room, unpainted lips twisting into a frown. “I have known darkness and death for longer in my life than I’ve known the light and its warmth. I -do- feel it sometimes. I feel the warmth when I’m with Brand. I feel it when I’m with my family. I feel it around Quintessa and my son, Dominic. I felt that light and warmth around his predecessor too before things fell apart and he faded away.” Khitti smirked somewhat at the thought because… Krice had known about Khitti being pregnant, but had he known what her and Brand named their kid? “And apparently someone somewhere thinks I’m destined to walk both paths, of light and darkness.” A small amount of holy fire lit in her hand, as if to show Krice that it was more than just whatever power Tenbatsu Kaji had. “That’s what they’ve started calling me in the Shadow Plane now, besides ‘Harbinger’: ‘She Who Walks Both Paths’. But I don’t know the light and life and warmth as much as they think I do and to be perfectly honest, it kind of frightens me. It’s there just enough throughout my days that it doesn’t feel too good to be true. There’s just enough good mixed in with the bad. Enough light mingled with the darkness. But that--” Khitti pointed at the tree and the other room in general. “--I don’t know that. I know full well about nature in the way the witches see it. I’ve talked for hours on end with Lanara about it. I know the balance. I know it’s neither good nor bad. But that’s not what this place looks like on the surface. It looks good and pure and full of life and light and it’s everything that I am not.” Well, besides the whole ‘life’ part, anyway. She was definitely living and there wasn’t going to be anything that was going to change that any time soon.

Krice hadn't expected Khitti to launch into so lengthy and detailed a response, particularly since they were still practically strangers to each other. But she knew, at least, that she could trust him to defend her life if she was in danger - and perhaps that extended to... whatever this session was. The warrior was silent as he listened, attentive to the answer she provided, though perplexed at her use of the name 'Dominic'. It had to have been years since he last heard it, and certainly not in relation to a child. He contemplated that revelation only briefly, because the bulk of Khitti's reply harboured much more important things than the sentimentality of a familiar name. The woman's magical flame drew his gaze next, reflecting across the gold in his eyes, accentuating his sympathy for her. Mention of the Shadow Plane affected him enough that his expression turned somber, apologetic. He dropped his gaze to the swords strapped on her body, a distant thought reaching in the opposite direction to the katana on his back. What he gathered from Khitti's monologue was that she perhaps still lived in the shadow of her formerly-vampiric identity. When he spoke, it was in a tone of understanding. " I don't know how old you were, as a vampire"--and therefore he did not know how long she had spent in that darkness--"but I think what you're feeling is normal - to a degree. With enough time, the shadows will probably fade and you'll feel more... -affinity- with the light of the living." He lifted his shoulders in a brief shrug, uncertain as to whether or not he had been successful in communicating his thoughts. Regarding the Eternal Tree before them, the warrior mused, " I think it's unfair to yourself to think that you're not capable of light--or, of life. Especially if it bothers you that you're 'not'." Or rather, that she thought she wasn't.

“I was only a vampire for about a year and half, I think. Maybe 2? Something like that. I’m as old as I look,” Khitti said with a faint smirk. “It’s nothing like most of the other vampires around here. I’m not several hundred years old. It’s probably why the cure worked as well as it did.” She sighed. “The darkness has always been there, Krice. At this point, I’m so used to it that it feels like I’m home sometimes. I don’t particularly -want- the shadows to go away. I just don’t know how to handle the light anymore. I’m probably capable of it… but the darkness is just far more appealing. I don’t know. Forget I said anything. It’s rather complicated and I may just take the Brand route of things and try not to think about it.” That wasn’t true. She was still going to think about it. Why did she even spew all of that at Krice in the first place? She hadn’t expected to get a truthful answer, really. “Sorry. I think it’s probably above your paygrade to listen to me go on about this stuff.”

Krice's immediate response was a natural, " I don't get paid to help friends." He considered Khitti at the very least an acquaintance, but he would protect her as he would any others more closely connected to him. A shake of the head precipitated his next reply, which hit at the meat of her concerns. " I'm not one of these people who believes that everyone is capable of light. There are -truly- evil beings in the world, who hurt innocent people for no reason. There is -no- light in -them-. But you're saying that the light -is- there within you, almost alongside the darkness. It's up to you which way that goes. It may be hard to fight the darkness but eventually you'll arrive at whatever outcome you want to - succumbing to the darkness or arriving at the light." He shook his head, scanning the tree as he diverted his gaze to the woman beside him. " The very fact that you're concerned about it means that you still have a choice." After a moment of silence, the warrior added, " Don't try to ignore it. That'll just make it worse."

“There are evil people. I’ve seen plenty of them. But none of them are born that way,” Khitti said eventually, “Amarrah… I’m sure you remember her, she wasn’t always the way she was after I got here. Both her and her father were evil when they died, but that was thrust onto them. People don’t always have a choice. Besides… if something had happened to Talyara, wouldn’t you do anything possible to help her? Even if it was not something inherently good? Because if anything happened to the people I care about? If something happened to Brand? I would rip this continent apart if need be until I found him again and killed the people that deserved it.” She almost had destroyed part of the Shadow Plane last year when Brand was kidnapped. If that damned Jessamine had not given up answers so quickly, the entire place would be in flames even now. Khitti sighed and shook her head, thinking over her own words. Maybe she -was- bad, even if she could wield light itself. She was starting to wonder if she should even care anymore, “Anyone considered evil or bad… they were likely frakked over by fate and a whole hell of a lot of bad luck.” The redhead took one last look at the druid tree and its surroundings before pivoting on a bootheel and turning back the way she had come from. “Brand’s waiting for me. Be careful, Krice.” Khitti would linger for a moment, then head on out the door to her waiting tikifhlee so the two of them could head home.

Krice wasn't completely in agreement with Khitti. While some people did in fact only behave evilly later in life, it was something that -he- believed those certain people harboured within him. The argument could be made that evildoers were born evil and simply needed a trigger to act upon their more sinister instincts. When Khitti placed -him- into the role of 'doing anything possible' relating to Talyara, the warrior's expression visibly shifted from thoughtful and relaxed to pensive and impassioned. He had been there too recently, just once, tapping into his darker nature to exact revenge upon the people who had tortured the witch; but doing whatever it took to save loved ones was a little different from hurting innocent people for the sake of it. Still, the conversation was winding down, he could tell by the mage's body language, and his own relaxed in preparation to bid her farewell. The enigma adopted a thougthful frown following her concluding words, but he opted to extend the same sentiment to Khitti rather than delaying her to ask if 'be careful' harboured any deeper meaning than a simple well-wishing. " You too. Take it easy." After observing his ally's departure, Krice would turn to enter the temple in search of the elf guardians' report about their shift watching over the tree.