RP:The Return of the Elder, Part 1

Part of the Rest in Pieces: Vailkrin! Arc

Summary: Daermon returns to Vailkrin, a shell of his former self. Desiccated and barely recognizable, the elder lurks in a darkened corner of the establishment. His desire to blend in and remain unnoticeable doesn't seem to work on the Lady of House Dragana though, and thus the two become caught between past and present as they discuss the banshee's current predicament.

This is Part 1 of the RP, which has been split into several parts for easier reading.

The Hanging Corpse

A presence moves into the Hanging Corpse, though that says little for a city inhabited by the dead. Nonetheless, there's a distinct change in the air, one not quite seen by the naked eye. Briefly sweeping the room with a mismatched gaze, the banshee spots a familiar presence - though the man is certainly worse for wear. With little spared for propriety, Larewen Dragana invites herself to sit beside Daermon, her eyes studying his desiccated frame and the darkness that envelops him. A ghastly hand reaches outward, a breath of cold air caressing the male's cheek with familiarity born of a shared bond. He is, after all, no matter how estranged, a member of House Dragana. Slowly, she materializes before him. The elf is in no better form, for her body is riddled with blackened scars. Even this image bears that, as well as the wounds that had delivered her into this state. Several gouges are visible in her flesh, the worst of them in her neck, where the flesh of her throat meets her left shoulder. There, it appears as if something attempted to behead her - and perhaps nearly succeeded for the hole is gaping and grotesque. "Daermon," her voice sings quietly, the notes a disembodied, ethereal lament. "Perhaps Death is a better mistress than this state you're in." Granted, she doesn't have room to speak.

Even in the city of the dead, there could still be those that others had no desire to be near. Daermon Nae’Baer has become one of them. He’d been back perhaps a day or so, back from only he knew where, but oh, he certainly looked like he’d been thru hell. His clothes were tattered, his glacial hues cold and bright, the only bright spot on his very pale form. They were sunken, rimmed in shadows, his short hair an unkempt mess. He seemed to radiate cold now, piercing and wicked as he sat alone in the corner, having managed to make sure none wanted to be near, like a leper. The shadows seemed deeper in his corner, so it was surprising when he felt a touch, so long since he’d felt a touch, and those bright eyes looked up to find at first something he didn’t recognize. That came though, the recognition, the familiarity as a bond that had frozen over, cracked just a hair. When he spoke, his voice was rough, as though it wasn’t used…or had been forgotten how for too long. “Larewen…” he says softly, a counter to the melody of song that was hers, deep and rough as his own hand found her cheek in much the same way. Yes, they were family, of a sort, though it had been so very long. Longer even than she might realize. “Does death put out?” he says, managing a cracked smile, his teeth still white and gleaming as the woman sat. “I’m not sure you have the leeway to speak to that though.” he says, eyes taking her in. “We look about a matched pair, give or take. Though I daresay that you look a bit worse for wear.”

His fleeting smile is mirrred in a faint quirk of the deathsinger's lips upward. The banshee's face tilts into his hand slightly, careful not to simply pass through the cold flesh. It's harder than it looks, remaining visible as she does. Her image becomes more translucent, threatening to fade and in response she draws upon the magicks within the Hanging Corpse, using them to help solidify her appearance for the moment. "Wouldn't you like to know?" comes her reply, a teasing lilt in those notes. Her eyes study him further, the left one now a deep emerald green as opposed to the silver it had been before. His words following seem to draw upon a deeply felt sadness, the very thing for which Larewen longed for her own cursed flesh. Feelings are the devil, after all. Gently she withdraws her hand from his cheek. "It seems fate is yet unkind to our ilk. My lover turned on me, without waiting to hear my side of things. Went on hearsay, and sought my end. Were it not for Khatja, I'd be in a more permanent state of death." Speaking her pet name for Khatherine, the banshee twitches and her expression darkens. In the time since he's been gone, Larewen and Khitti managed to accept their differences and return to the familial relationship they once had. To Larewen, Daermon's sireling had become a daughter and now... now... "She's gone."

He can see how hard she’s working to maintain her presence. “Use a bit of mine. That I have plenty to spare.” he offers, allowing her if she wanted, to draw on the magicks of the shadow plane, the well that had been deep before, now seemed bottomless inside him. At her words, a sad smile split his once handsome face. “Yes, fate is very unkind it seems.” he says, looking her over as she withdrew her hand. “Your lover turned on you…mine as well, though I say I got the lesser end there. She only broke my heart, which drove me to end my life.” he admits, knowing there was a lot between the two old friends that would need to be said. As she speaks of Khitti, who had once been his, the pain that crossed his face was haunting. “I have no larger regret that what happened between her and I. None. She was lost to me before I left…I thought the cold of the bond was due to that. What do you mean, gone?” he asks softly, knowing in his heart what that word meant. The pain was written on his face. Yes, he knew.

Larewen dips her head slightly and that creeping chill of death would sink its fingers into the threads of Daermon's own magic. Through that substantial pool, the banshee would be come as close to whole as possible without her body. Tangible, at least. She seems happy enough to leave the subject of Emrith on that note, her dual-colored gaze moving toward the door. Were she in her body, she imagines she'd hear her heart thumbing against its blackened cage. That's something she means to show Daermon, but it can wait for the moment. Right now, she was delivering news that she knows pains the man, even without looking to him. Nonetheless, her gaze finds his once more, focusing on the bright blue of his irises. "She... Dead," the banshee says, and her voice shows the first hint of breaking. "I was supposed to help her, in the ritual to return her to the living. She wanted to be human again, to spend her life with Brand and age gracefully with him but... My state, my... My inability to be there... prevented me from it. Bradyn was likewise indisposed, and so they... progressed without us. Amarrah returned and... They're dead. Both she and Amarrah. Another child I've lost to this damned world!" Her voice raises to an almost shrill keening, divulging what she truly is and seemingly sucking the air from the room. The energy is expelled, punctuating her cry of frustration and blowing out every candle within the Hanging Corpse.

Her wail seems to have little effect on him, though it certainly seemed to worry the patrons, what few had stayed. His own anger was easily felt, palpable with the distress he felt. He’d always hoped, thought that maybe there’d be time to make up. To at least ask for forgiveness for his actions. Now it seemed there was no time. She was gone. He was breathing hard and fast and mixed with his anger there was a well of sadness, so much regret. He rose, his hands on the table shattering it like he’d hit it hard, only he’d pushed off. Perhaps his control of his strength was as weak as the rest of him. “I’m sorry.” And one would be hard to tell if he was apologizing to Larewen, sharing her grief, or apologizing to the dead, who couldn’t hear it anyway.

Larewen draws back from the table as it shatters from his sudden movement. The magicks of the tavern will undoubtedly see it whole once more. "I'd invite you to return home, to rest but..." she says, a frown weighing her lips. She is trying to regain her composure considering their subject at hand. "Perhaps it is best if I show you." They could mourn in their own ways, for the pain they felt is different in some ways and same in the others. She extends a ghastly hand to the male, offering to guide him should he accept the spectral appendage. "The way to House Dragana is barred. You will see."

Daermon regained control of himself with a large amount of effort. Having Khitti gone, but out there had always given him hope that they could rekindle something between them, even friendship. But with her gone, it was filled with grief and regret where that hope once lived. Her tone brought him concern as he looked to her, watching, then looking to the hand. “I have returned, and though we have not always seen eye to eye, like always, I would follow you anywhere.” We’re all mad here after all. He took her hand, gently, as he didn’t want to somehow hurt her with his unpredictable control of himself.

The Dark Forest

In that regard, fortune favors Daermon for the ways in which an ethereal being such as herself could be harmed are suprisingly few. In exchange for such a twisted sort of immortality, strength is sacrificed. The necromancer says nothing, cool fingers still tangible within his grip as she feeds off his mana, as she uses his own magical essence to keep herself in that state of visibility. A few they pass glance their way, some flinching and glancing around with unease. Larewen Dragana's sacrifice for Vailkrin has reached their ears, and in this moment it appears the banshee has regained her body. For the denizens of this city, that births concern. Concern regarding the barrier and what it holds back, what it protects Lithrydel from. Others dip there head semi-reverently while some yet scowl. The Dragana matron has certainly cemented her place within the city. Eventually, they are outside its gates, moving into its further limits and twisting northwawrd to the forest, to House Dragana. Just as the path forks, the banshee slows to a stop. The hum of magic in this area is a dark miasma, poisoning the very perimeter. The source of such power kneels before the pair, oozing corrupted blood. Mirroring the banshee's wounds, there is no doubt that in a sense, she still lives - for lack of a better word. Faintly, Daermon will hear something unexpected: the steady thumping of a heart despite Larewen's body being the only one nearby. Odd it must be, hearing a vampire with a beating heart. The barrier cuts off the northern portion of the forest. More specifically, House Dragana's vicinity. Beyond it, a golem of immense proportions heaves itself against the bearier, trying its best to weaken it. Something glimmers within the creature that is not of this world. Something far darker that, if unleashed, would bring ruin upon Lithrydel. "Emrith almost killed us all."

The man held her ghostly had as they walked and it was almost like a date, like the kind of flirting and teasing he’d done their whole relationship. Now though, there were no words, yet, it was a comfortable silence. Daer was still sharp, so the looks were noticed and catalogued. They were not looking at him. He let the silence continue though, correctly guessing that their looks had to do with whatever she was going to show him. He could feel the wrong as soon as they set foot in the familiar forest. When they got to her body, the barrier, the golem, he let go of her hand, but left the connection. Yes, the heartbeat puzzled him, but there were more pressing questions. “I feel like I have missed a lot in my missing year.” he says dryly. “Perhaps you could tell me a story to go along with the images.” he suggests, looking to the woman.

"This creature is Corruption. The entity that has resided in Jarith for so very long... I took it, imprisoned it, and bound it. The spell held as long as my magic remained available for it." She pauses, a hard and unneeded swallow interrupting their exchange. Here, the subject became far more difficult. "When we went to the Haathian ruins, to the island near Rynvale, I sustained injuries. The latter gave cause for Emrith and I to rebind the creature. I imagine that, in his foolish rage, he forgot what I bound to my magic. When he tried to kill me, he freed it. I sacrificed my body, my being to keep the creature at bay. He used a sword that sapped magic, and so I fed off the curse Trajek carved into my flesh, upon the ruined trees of this wood. I made it so the curse could not be undone, so that once I am returned to my body my emotions will be forever lessened by the Shade's work, so that Vailkrin would be safe."

The vampire walked around the fallen form, his eyes shifting from each as he listened, taking it all in. Some of the names were not ones he recognized, some were. The mention of the sword that fed on magic, that struck a chord. That had been his. Where had it gone? It took him a moment to remember that he had gifted it to Pilar. “What will happen to you?” he asks, turning sad eyes to the banshee, the fear there obvious. He thought he was witnessing the slow death of another friend.

"Hopefully, I'll have my body back with time," Larewen answers, a shoulder lifting upward into a shrug. "It was later revealed that Pilar gave him the blade to use against me, citing the corpses of two slaves in my room as my 'being beyond help.' Emrith took it to heart, refused to listen to reason, just like she did. The fact that I spared the girls from a slow, torturous death at Trajek's hand, or that they would feed several of my people, meant little to either one." The younger vampire's name is nearly spat as it crosses her tongue. "Lord Mahara said it was weak of me to simply exile her from these lands, but should she step foot on Vailkrinian soil ever again, I will personally see to it that Pilar dies for her crimes. My blood is on her hands, and she is well aware of this. I make certain to remind her of it from time to time, too. It's rather amusing, what a disembodied spirit strikes into a creature like her."

Daermon cringed as she spoke of what Pilar had done, what she did to Pilar to remind her. “That too perhaps lays on my head.” he says, turning from the wraith to stare at her body and the golem. “I should have been her for her…for you…” for Khitti hung in the air, unsaid, but she had always known him well. His eyes turn back to Larewen. “Perhaps you should banish me as well, for that failure, for speaking ill of your actions in the past. I’m not, or wasn’t, immune to doubt. I thought you quite mad, unhinged, ready to kill us all once.” he says, regret filling his words.

Larewen responds with a quiet nod, and this time the tug on his magic is a little more. Something almost... desperate? No, not quite. She reaches out, pale and scarred fingers seeking to draw his attention back to her body. "I am quite that, and I cannot promise not to be that. But I do not kill without reason. I am not so indiscriminate as people might believe." As she speaks, the appearance of her form shifts, seemingly becoming hollow. Pale flesh disappates, revealing her heart and the system of veins and arteries that run through her body. Her heart, black with corruption, beats a slow, steady drum, fueling that black ichor and pushing it through every vein. Beneath that, her skeleton shows the mirror image of the dark scars that traverse her skin. The curse, once able to be cured, is now wrought into her very bones. She will never be free of the darkness within her body. "All that I loved failed me, Daermon. My generosity was rewarded with pain and betrayal. It is not enough to open your home to others; it is not enough to bestow on others the ability to live comfortably. The only one that has wished to see me truly myself once more is Shishi, but even he has betrayed me. Trajek, my damnation, my salvation, has in his own twisted way blessed me with this, with a version of me that is not so easily pained by petty emotions."

He met her gaze unflinching. “Yes. We were poor guests in your house. Poor members of it as well. All of us had more failings than what we brought. I’m sorry. I failed perhaps worst of all, simply for being the oldest of the lot and yet, being as blind as the rest.” he says. “Why show me?” he asks, feeling the pull to his power. It didn’t worry him, there was so much, so steeped in the plane of shadows and the worlds between. He was brimming with power that he couldn’t even touch just now. “Is there anything I can do to make things right between us?” he asks, sincere in his question, if a little quiet and hesitant. "I still don't believe emotions to be petty, even with how mine have led me so far astray. They also help to make us have the conviction to do what we must." he says, sweeping a hand at her body. "Like your sacrifice."

"Did your emotions not betray your nature?" she retorts, becoming tangible once more. With this query, the specter steps nearer to Daermon, mismatched eyes once more finding his. "Everyone is blind until they are not," she says pointed. Her hand lifts, cool, deathly fingers curling under his chin. "I trusted you the most, to keep your word and to remain here with me, to help realize what I wanted for Vailkrin. I want nothing more than what our kind deserve, and those I wished at my side failed to see the forest for the trees of my darkness. My sacrifice was for my city. I am growing ever closer to taking the throne, and what would there be for me to rule over if Corruption were to destroy Vailkrin? What undead would I show a new life to, a new pride and reason for their existance to? I may be selfish, just as I may be ruthless, but I am not so much a fool as many would have be believe. In the wake of my betrayal, I have found new allies among the Houses, among the dead, among other lands. I refuse to allow myself to be weakened any more by emotion, and once I have returned to my cursed shell, then I will be just as cold yet again."

Her touch was ice even to his cold flesh, yet his eyes stayed on hers. “Yes, you did. And I failed as badly as the rest. Your plans, your distractions…I lost sight. I thought that you had abandoned your aspirations. I was wrong. I can admit such. My emotions…perhaps they make me weak, perhaps without them I wouldn’t miss something I can never have. But they are mine, and I will shoulder them. I don’t want to die. So I ask again Larewen, what would you have of me? What could I give, what could I promise that you would even remotely believe?” he asks, his gaze seeming to have regained some of himself, not so broken, mad, or lost. “Banishment, death, something else?” he asks, smiling softly. “I’m not afraid anymore.”