RP:The Shriveled Starfish

This is a Necromancer's Guild RP.

Summary: Daermon watches on and offers what help he can while Celaeno practices, and struggles, with the art of corpse reanimation.

Stone Wharf

“Much the same as what you have observed recently in the nearby scenery, the large rocks and passing waves, most of which are pounding the southern surface of the rock's faces, eroding them into clean, smooth stones, age envisioned within their textures. The only notable difference from the western area is the crowded lot of clinging sea creatures actually adhered to the facades of the granite boulders. Mussels, few breeds of crab, urchins just above the water level, their tentacles writhing with the splash of moisture now and then. Of course, sea stars of six, seven, even up to eleven appendages at times, and of colors from pink to brown. Every so often, a gull will be daring enough to approach and attempt to steal away one of the appetizers before the waves come unto the rocks, but is usually not successful. To your west and east is near exact continuance of this.”

Celaeno had been spending more time near the ocean recently, for the most part to appease the new presence she found in her mind that no one else could hear--and usually tried keeping to herself, despite its lectures becoming tiresome after awhile. Attempting to find a relatively calm place to study was the rest of it as she sat upon a boulder clear of sea critters, except for an unfortunate starfish skeleton that had hardened upon the shore. With her Minor Book of the Dead open and propped on a lower rock, and the bleached creature’s shape resting in the middle of the flatter one in front of her, she bit her lower lip and began brushing sigils onto the stone from a nearby inkwell she’d set up. This was delicate work after all.

Daermon always made frequent visits to the ocean. He knew of private places to swim that were away from the crowds. He'd glimpsed Celaeno a different day, but had decided not to say hello. This day though, he changed that thought and decided to say hi. He was swimming, having left his things off in a more private part of the area, and swam up near her, picking a spot out that was devoid of critters and hoisting himself from the waves. He was bare save a pair of swim trunks and moved towards her. Seeing her working, he stopped, not near enough to distract her, hopefully, but watching and waiting for the right moment to say hi.

The half-elf’s ears did perk at the splashing of water, assuming the former assassin wasn’t attempting to mask his presence. Regardless, despite her intense concentration on copying those sigils, when she finished painting her circle of them around the starfish, she spotted him out of the corner of her eye. She takes a deep breath and pauses, setting the brush aside on an untouched section of the rock with the inkwell. Her gauntlets go to her folded lap as she turns toward the vampire with a grin and a nod of her head. “Good day to you, Mister Daermon. It’s different to see you on this side of the continent. You were at that ball in Xalious recently, correct?”

The vampire smiled back to her, nodding as well. Water still trickled from his bared form, the hard peaks and valleys of his muscles as he moved closer, no longer worried about distracting her. "I was indeed. I think I saw you as well." he says, smiling. "I had to duck out for a moment during unfortunately, but closed it out once back." he says, looking down at what she was doing. "What are you working on?" he asks, curiously, his scholarly side showing.

“Indeed. I don’t mind that. You missed most of my humiliation at the hands of that silly game I unwittingly volunteered for.” Her nose wrinkles at the memory as her friendly grin turns to a petulant frown. “Oh well, at least Miss Lana seemed to be enjoying herself well enough and Miss Qindrephyss was interesting enough that I didn’t step all over her toes.” Her attention turns back down to the starfish, seven-legged at that! A lucky find for anyone who collected shells. “My information says that this is equivalent to a corpse. It seems...small enough, so I’m hoping I can try to raise it with what knowledge and ability I have. The faster I pick these skills up, the better.” She gulps and her mouth presses into a line. “But to improve takes practice, so there we have it.”

Daermon moved closer, looking over her work. "I'm sure it wasn't nearly so bad as all that." he says, in regards to the ball. "And it had a nice ending." he admitted, thinking back to the end of the night, which was personal and private of course! "I did catch a bit of your game though. I think you did a good job covering how uncomfortable you were." he goes back to studying the starfish. "Hmm...it's smart of you to pick here." he says, straightening. "The water will ground out any necromantic energies that run rampant, and you only have the one critter likely that will be touched. I once saw a new necromancer try to raise something near a graveyard...it did not turn out well." he says. "Please, continue, I'd like to watch and will be quiet." he says.

“Oh my...I imagine if not properly contained, that would certainly run amok. Too draining for me just yet. I’m not even sure my energies will allow me to successfully raise this thing, as they are.” Her pensive expression turns to stubborn determination as she sets her hands against her folded knees. She lets them hover over the starfish for a long moment, her gauntlets rattling a moment before she wills them to still. Another bit lip during the pause. She glances back toward Daermon. “You don’t...happen to know anything of field medicine among your repertoire of tricks, do you?”

Daermon nodded. "I would imagine not. And it gets messy, when the one who raised them, doesn't know how to put them back down." he says.The elder vampire had been watching, thinking she was going to start, but as she looked up, asking him, he gave her a warm smile. "I do, yes. And elder vampire blood has a good deal of healing properties, if things get serious. I have your back." he assures, leaning against the rock as he continues to stare on at her experiment.

“It does? Even for living folk? That seems awfully unhealthy…” At least from what bits she knew of conventional medical practices. She sucks in another breath and the unheard presence in her mind started to chatter, more than likely sensing her hesitation. That only steels her resolve as she opens her pack and digs through it a moment. She had bought a health potion earlier, hadn’t she? More than likely it had become buried under her tea kettle. “Alright, enough procrastinating.” She pulls her hands out of her pack and lets them hover over the starfish. A quick glance toward her book, turning the page to the section on incantations, and she traces the tip of her finger toward the right phrase. Good, she remembered it right… She begins to chant, closing her eyes and pouring her energies into the sigil circle as she had with other attempts at different spells, as she did with runes. “Corporis animati. Corporis animati.” The chant continued under her breath for a few minutes as the skin of her face began to pale some and her cheeks appeared more defined. A cough threatened to rise in her throat but she paused, holding it down as the sigils sucked at her power. The way she arranged them, they should channel into the starfish, right? Doubt crept in the longer she chanted. Yet the starfish didn’t move, stayed as still within the glowing circle as when she’d first placed it there. After a few more minutes, however, the power licking at the dead creature’s legs began to rot it, the hard remains crumbling inch by inch. She grits her teeth as another cough rises up and Daermon would notice the blood dribbling from her nose. As the chanting subsides, the spell cuts off, leaving nothing but a crumbles husk of shell inside the charred circle. Celaeno holds her stomach as she dry heaves and the coughing fit erupts. Blood spatters the little ritual, this time spewing from her mouth.

"Yes, it does. I'm not the normal vampire. It's a long story Cela." he says, smiling. "Just trust that I will help if I can, and I won't use my blood without your permission, or if you were going to die." he says, then quiets again. She was procrastinating, he could tell, even saying as much herself. Then she started. Daer had been around a handful of necromancers, but he'd never seen one start this way. He watched, eyes darting between her and the starfish. It didn't seem to be working though. Perhaps it was too long dead for someone of her skill level. Then he noticed she was bleeding. Ok that was never a good sign, and he'd never seen a necromancer bleed as they attempted a raising. Finally she stopped and coughed up blood. He was there beside her in an instant, holding her steady. He could hear her heart hammering inside her chest as he turned to her bag, worry creasing his face. He didn't want to go through her things, but she looked rough, and if she did have a healing potion...he certainly didn't in his swim trunks. He decided that he'd wait, see if she improved on her own, only moments though. He held her, watching, to see if she came back under control. From the looks of things, raising corpses weren’t this particular aspiring necromancer’s strong suit. Her body was racked with a few more coughing fits before she steadied herself against the rock, her gauntlets grinding against the stone as she glared at the starfish. Still, her skin had sallowed to a sickly shade and her shoulders shook trying to hold herself upright. “Vile, conniving bastard...” The glare in her typically neutral face, friendly in recent times, seemed capable of searing what was left of the starfish where it sat. Another coughing fit racked through her, another splatter of blood staining the rock under her. “My...bag please. There’s a..potion somewhere there.” It seemed it was taking a great deal of her energy to keep from throwing up at the moment as her stomach tenses. Her bag would have a mixture of books, blankets, a couple sets of clothes, a cooking pot, a small tea kettle, and odds and ends for enchanting tucked away in there. A small pocket to the side would have the vial she sought earlier with the healing potion inside, should Daer choose to search it out.

Daermon did indeed search out the potion. He pulled her bag over, looking through her things, concern on his face, and trying to ignore the growing smell of blood. Thankfully for Cela, he was not a young pup of a vampire, or that much blood might have driven him to hunger. He finally found the potion, cracking the seal and handing it to her, then, seeing her state, he took her into his arms. One arm steadied her, upright, the other took the potion and pressed to her lips, his icy gaze finding her eyes, likely she was startled at the contact. "Drink slowly. Relax. Breathe." he says in a quiet voice that demanded calm, using a hint of the natural hypnosis that vampires sometimes excerted on mortals. Just enough to hopefully get her to drink. Her blood was all over the lower half of her face, on her robes, and now, on his chest and arms as well.

Sometimes the young mage’s penchant toward secrecy came back to bite her, and this was one of those times. She proved receptive to the mind-numbing magic at first, the odd effect to his voice as she took the first sip from the vial. Unfortunately, it proved to set off a deep seated panic as memories flash of a different voice with the same soothing tone. A knife hovering over her bound hands, dimly registering the searing pain as they were lopped off… She hadn’t spoken of such specifics before, how would he have known? Her trance breaks as she pushes at him, shoving with all of the force her adrenaline spiked weakness can afford her. The gauntlets might prove somewhat of a challenge, their edges not sharp enough to cut but certainly enough to scrape like a good steel edge. She didn’t seem quite there, lost in a struggle for survival with a threat he didn’t necessarily pose.

Always a danger to invoke any kind of trance. Even one to help. As she roughly shoved him, catching him entirely off guard, he has time to make a noise, then was vanishing over the side of the cliff. Not hard enough to make it past the rough rock face. He hit and scraped and when he finally found the water, the spot he'd dropped into tinged red with blood. It wasn't her fault, not really. The vial had fallen, managing not to break, but rolled lazily side to side a bit of the potion left inside it's glass form. Many moments pass, and the vampire did not surface.

Celaeno was bewildered. Finally snapped back to her senses, her lungs working better from what little of the potion made it down her throat. Breathing came easier, albeit her chest still ached from the sea air that came in with every inhale. She glanced around, eyes widening when the panic subsided and she realized the absence of the vampire. Her nose filled with the coppery scent of her own blood, and thinking the worst, she darts for the gliff, clinging to the cliff edge by her elbows rather than her gauntlets--no way of feeling well enough to keep her balance that way. She glances over the surf below, noting the splotch of red on the rocks. She cups her palm to her mouth. “Mister Daermon?” A small cough interrupted it, no blood this time at least. Still she persisted, guilt gnawing at her gut. “Call back if you’re not dead...please?”

Daermon didn't need to breath, but the fall and surf had taken him deep into the water. He was dazed. He came back to himself and slowly swam for the surface. He'd surface in her field of vision, managing with slow movements to pull himself over to the beach head and drag himself up, flopping over to bleed on the sand weakly. He was concerned for Cela more than himself, but his body had to repair before he could check on the woman, not noticing that she was in better shape than him just then. He coughed up a lungful of salty seawater, which hurt like bloody hell.

“Are you...alright? Do you need...help of some kind?” Given the vampire’s blood had better healing properties than her own, and most of her enchanted healing supplies were made for living flesh rather than his particular brand, she wasn’t sure quite how to help as he flopped back onto the stone bed. Her gauntlets open and close before she ultimately huffs and retrieves the potion that had fallen away. It takes a moment of crawling around before she manages to snatch the vial and down it much as she’d seen sailors downing small glasses of hard liquor. She attempts to relax her shoulders and take deeper breaths once she swallows, trying to wait for the potion to take effect. Her newly developing senses managed to pick up the necrotic energy coating a few of her organs reacting to the potion’s magic, adding a dose of resistance as she covers her mouth with her forearm and holds her stomach again. The salty taste makes her cringe, but at least the coughing fits subsided entirely and she didn’t feel as if she would hurl at the slightest movement anymore. “I’m sorry about that. Things set off flashbacks at times if they remind me of...what took my hands. Potions, mind altering spells, infernal presences, among other things. It’s mark hasn’t healed entirely yet.”

His flesh was rent all over, but was slowly knitting back together. When he could talk, his voice was a harsh rasp. "It's...not your....fault." he manages, then, as his lungs repaired the damage the salt water had quickly done, he spoke again, "Nothing you can help with, no. I will be hungry when I have finished healing. It will burn through what little store I have." he says, turning his gaze to find her, which might be kind of gross just then, as his eye had taken a beating on the rocks and was...well...gross. It healed with a soft pop, the icy gaze begining a subtle glow as a bit of his mask of humanity slipped away. "It's my fault, really Cela, I should not have done that..." he says, using the nickname without even thinking about it. "Really." he says, finding her gaze and holding it. "And I am sorry about your hands...I would ask...but surely it is very personal and we do not know each other well. So instead, I'll ask...what happened with your spell?"

“It’s no one’s fault. Accidents happen.” Having dealt with corpses in the past, his garish appearance doesn’t seem to affect her as she watches the process with a somewhat morbid appreciation, a flash one might think resembling a scientist dissecting an animal for study. Considering his body was doing the work itself, knitting back together into the mundane mask, she sits with her hands folded in her lap in patient wait as he put himself back together (pun entirely intended). Since most people had been giving her nicknames without her prompting, this land seemingly obsessed with casual address, she doesn’t flinch at the slip. “It’s not a deep dark secret.” Not the bare bones of it anyways. “My old mentor needed them for a ritual he told me little about, so he drugged me and took them. I took my leave of him after that and ended up in Lithrydel. As for the spell…” A half-hearted growl comes to her voice as she speaks through gritted teeth. “Miss Pilar...found something wrong with me. When I do serious magic, not my little fire tricks, but spells that drain me, some energy from botched soul magic attacks my organs. Leftover mess from said mentor. And...this happens. Since I started trying Necromancy myself, it’s gotten worse.” She casts a dismissive wave toward the disappointment of a starfish husk. “That is me having trouble grasping reanimation. It’s more intuitive than I’m used to. I keep missing something. But I’m sure with more practice, I’ll puzzle it out.” She blinks, suddenly registering his comment about using up his stores. "Whenever you need to take your leave to find...sustinence, do feel free. Your health is far more important than indulging me with small talk."

"I will be well enough for a time." he says, the last bits of ragged holes closing. Though, the blood along his form still had him looking a bit messy here and there. He sat up, stretching. "No need to cut our conversation short. I'll just be a little hungry." he says, giving a small smile, then a frown. "Your mentor sounds...questionable at best. But I have to ask...if you know that this happens when you use serious magics...then why do it?" he asks bluntly, finding her gaze with his own. "There are many noble pursuits and plenty of skills to master. Why chose one that physically causes you harm even in it's practice?" he asks, legitimately curious as to why. "And please, do not keep calling me Mister Daermon. You make me feel my age." he says, and gives a soft smile. "That was a joke." he says, elbowing her a little, trying to break through a little, to see if he can earn a smile out of her.

“Hence why he’s a former mentor. I grew up with him and helped him do quite a few dubious things, but his priorities toward me became clear when this happened.” She wiggles the fingers of her right gauntlet, a grin breaking out but more wry than anything. “I can be dense, but I draw the line at amputation against my will.” She turns her gauntlet over in the light, looking over the glowing runes she’d pain-stakingly slaved over for months, without any prostheses to help her at the time. She could have found a way to go without, mucked out a life as something else and died in obscurity. Yet she’d found a way to recover. “As for my why… All my life I’ve been told what I can’t do. I wasn’t allowed to study magic because I was born to gypsies. So I taught myself runes. My mentor refused to teach me anything of Necromancy, despite my interest, so I’m learning it now. Now his manipulation threatens to keep me from pursuing any magical study whatsoever. I refuse to accept that. No one decides my limits but me.” She huffs, worked up into a tizzy now as she folds her hands in her lap, not the neatest site with her robe and shirt collar covered in drying blood. “Better than Mister Nae’Baer as I shouId be calling you isn’t it?” Her lighter tone more than her demeanor hinted at her attempt at a return quip. “I will endeavor to remember not to include an address in the future and mind your preference…” Her nose wrinkles with the effort, just his name rolling oddly on her tongue. “...Daermon.”

"Or Daer, miss Celaeno." he says, returning the way she'd been speaking to him. "And perhaps you should do what you are most comfortable with. I am merely telling you that you need not give me the extra courtesy. I don't require it. I have never been one to enjoy being sired or mistered or such. Especially not from a friend." he says, and perhaps he was being facetious, or perhaps he really did think of the woman as a friend already. Either might shock her. "I'm glad you broke ties with him then. Sorry for your loss and equally impressed with your will. You're a fighter, that I can tell, from that first moment we met in the forest. Though I seem to spend more time shirtless around you than not." he says, teasing, the thought making him smile as he plucked at his lack of a shirt. "I think that will, that drive will take you very far." he admits, giving her an actual sincere smile with the compliment.

“Calling you Daermon will be odd enough to get used to, but it’s an accommodation I’m fine making. Lithrydel is so much more casual. Most everyone I’ve met, aside from Lady Dragana, have insisted on very familiar addresses. I’m used to first names and nicknames being restricted to family.” He finally earned that smile he’d been looking for as she stands. She throws a final sigh down at that husk of a starfish before glancing at her robes. The blood would be sticky and cause stains if not taken care of soon, and she didn’t own many other sets. “I should get these cleaned up before they stain. I appreciate the kind words and...well the company, despite the injuries. I wish you luck finding someone for dinner.” She gives him a small wave in farewell, less stiff than her usual, at least.

Daermon returned the smile, warmth there, and a bit of fondness already for the interesting woman. She was one of the few he hadn't really flirted with, as she would only get uncomfortable if he did. He rises with her, then smiles a bit wider at her words. "You can call me what you like. You don't have to bend to my will. After all, being friends is a give and take. You call me whatever you're most comfortable with, and I shall call you whatever you would prefer. So you need only tell me." he raised a hand though. "Next time though. An excuse to get together again. And thank you for the luck. But I never have a hard time finding dinner." he says truthfully. "I am sorry though, about your spell and after." he says, then, waves as she sets to leave. "Now..." he mutters to himself, "How to get back to my clothes?" he says, neither noticing the slight twitch of the starfish.