RP:This Hollow World

This is a Warrior's Guild RP.

Synopsis: Mulgrew, a wise sage from a fiercely religious tribe of Frost Giants, comes to Frostmaw to attend Rorin's wounds. Her results are a mixed blessing, but the truth behind her identity -- and her mysterious connection to the elf, Esche -- leave Lionel and Rorin oblivious but wiki readers confounded.

Fort Frostmaw Medical Ward

Lionel remains blank-faced as he watches five royal guardsmen redecorate the oaken antechamber to his special guest's precise specifications. Truth be told, he is skeptical that switching candles to an eerie reddish glow and garnishing every fifth inch of wood with rosemary and thyme will do anything to aid Rorin. But that's just it: there's nothing Lionel won't do to help his friend, and if it means appeasing an old woman who seems to equate healing with seasoning, then so be it. By the time the lacquer furnishings are removed in favor of a simple cedar work table, the Catalian is barely paying attention. "Ser, it's time," one of the guards informs him. Snapping out of his worried stupor, Lionel nods. "Alright. Bring her in." The guards depart to fetch the guest and either time passes slowly or the guest herself is slow. It almost feels like an eternity before she arrives, an elderly Frost Giant whose steep stoop still towers over any man, lithe Lionel unequivocally included. She's garbed in deep purple robes which seem to shimmer as she moves -- a curiosity, considering they seem to be made only of dyed lambswool. Her eyes are a fierce silver and she hears a warrior's scar above her right eyelid. Her hair is like strands of coarse string. She seems only marginally appeased. "This will do," the shaman mumbles offhandedly, but her face betrays unknown irritation. Her name is Mulgrew, and she will either save Rorin or she won't. Lionel is not the praying sort, but seeing all the baubles of Aramoth that Mulgrew has brought, he considers praying, anyway. As Mulgrew sets up her trinkets, Lionel awaits his friend's arrival.

Rorin was quite familiar with this type of decor. Such was the surroundings of any gypsy, or fancy restuarant, and only the face of the winter worn giant comforts whispering doubts as he enters. The guards and servants are dismissed and the door is closed before Rorin takes a deep breath from behind his closed helm. He isn't certain what to say quite yet. He looked at Lionel, hoping really anyone might speak first, feeling a sort of tension thicken the air. Or perhaps it was only his own nerves both excited and worried. Anything could happen. He had to remind himself of that.

Lionel senses his friend’s apprehension and decides to say something clever. “You’ll need to be removing that helm, my twice-destined young friend,” Mulgrew mumbles, interrupting whatever clever thing Lionel might have said. Lionel’s face contorts into a wry confusion. He almost asks the woman what she means, calling Rorin ‘twice-destined’, but he refrains. It’s a symptom of maturity, perhaps, but Lionel O’Connor isn’t -quite- as inclined to snark back at every prophetic line of dialogue he hears. Or maybe it’s just the weight of the moment holding him back. Mulgrew, meanwhile, eyes Rorin up and down and wiggles her wrinkly neck toward the table. “And once you’ve done so, I’ll be needing you to lay prone upon this bed. I’ve numerous instruments beyond whatever sham your city’s shaman thinks to utilize. All of which will be needed today.”

Rorin shuffles and smirks for a moment inside his armor. He would take a deep breath before fully removing the helm in one smooth motion. "I suppose you'll be wanting me to take the rest of it off?" He set his armor aside quietly and even removed his tunic to expose the arm at the curses source. He looked as bad as Lionel had last seen him though perhaps a bit more veinous on the left side. He sighed as he lay on the bed and put a pouch of the serum he had been given so far beside him. What answers could he recieve? He tried not to think too hard about it and waited for her evaluation.

Lionel keeps levity, smirking when Rorin smirks and then crossing his arms in mock-protest. “Aw, hell, Rorin. It adds character.” Yet even the master of emotional masks cannot hide the strain in his voice. There’s enough hint his remark is forced that Rorin won’t be fooled for an instant. Mulgrew leans over, picking up a pair of soft-tipped pincers and a bottled liquid which, once released, turns into a fine, odorless mist that coats the area surrounding the paladin. “The worst of it is stymied,” she says offhandedly as she takes the pincers to Rorin’s arm; he won’t feel much more than a dull tapping, no matter how painful his condition may be. The mist becalms the nerves. As she works, Mulgrew switches between a wide array of medical utensils, poking and prodding very gently. Dried rags become wet with the filth of the infection, but the filth seems to shimmer like the shaman’s robes in a kind of magical aura. Severely damaged tissue is removed after a sudden, stern warning: “grit your teeth, lad; the mist can only hide so much hardship.” Indeed, Rorin will feel this part. Lionel winces at this, but maintains his casual composure as best he can muster. Soon enough, a pile of rags has formed, and Mulgrew eyes her patient candidly. The fierce silver of those eyes seems to judge him. “It is a cliche not befitting my station, but it simply must be said: I have good news and I have bad news. Do not tell me you wish the good news first, because it will only postpone the dread of your awaiting the bad news. Merely tell me you are ready to hear both, and I shall speak.”

Rorin became a bit suprised she went to work so quickly. Truly she had a great deal more experience with this type of cursed affliction than any of the other doctors he had seen. Lionels bluff was as dark as they both knew it was as Rorin remained calm under the mists effects. The curse had been progressing day by day, he watched it do so, and he thought little as she worked on the various tissues of his twisted appendage. He bit down and groaned out as something was taken from him. The inhuman righ eye swiveled madly in its socket seemingly looking for escape. Soon he is able to breathe deeply again. "Tell me your truths, wintered one," Rorin croaked out as he tried not to move. It only be as worse than he expected for certainly he had admitted the truth to himself months ago.

Lionel steels himself as if readying for a blow even he cannot dodge. Whatever words this woman has, her gritty determination isn’t putting him at ease. Better if she were a jester, maybe. Better if she weren’t so damned glum. “I cannot cure this,” Mulgrew declares, and Lionel’s face immediately immolates into anger. A single spindly finger is raised to prevent his verbal outburst. “I won’t blame you for seeking aid elsewhere. Who could? You don’t like what I have said. No one would. But true healing will not come through medicine. It will come from within.” Lionel has had enough of this. “What kind of dogmatic crap is that?” Mulgrew chuckles mirthlessly, waving her hand once and watching the mist dissipate. “There is no cure,” she firmly rebukes. “Not in the conventional sense. This is not the end. Only a new beginning. Rorin will become what he is destined to be; Rorin will complete the transformation, and even then he shall have taken a single step on a staircase to his destination. His first destiny comes with every draconian cell within his body. His second destiny is what lies beyond. You can call it death, if you like. I’d sooner call it fate.” Lionel shakes his head fervently. “I’d sooner call it-fatalism.- You cured sixteen people in Frostmaw just this past week, five of which were alleged terminal. I expected you to make it to seventeen. I expected you to…” His voice chokes. His eyes water. “I expected you to heal the only one that -truly- mattered to me,” he admits. It’s not lordly, but it’s human.

Rorin grumbled a hum as if he simply agreed. To him it simply felt like rubbing salt onto a lump in someomes brain. It barely hurt or helped him. He glared at Lioneld out burst. This was not the kind of man the commander was. Her words only cemented what he already knew. Somewhere in a slowly changing part of his brain he felt... anticipation. Rorin moved as Lionel spoke, swinging his legs, his arm already closing on its own. He wanted to be angry because Lionel was angry. He wanted to see him stand up, not cry before the funeral, "no you did not, Lionel." Rorin began softly, "you did not seek her out expecting anything. You hid a quiet hope away that you had stumbled upon a miracle cure. But you expected things to just go back the way they were? No. The Lionel I know has accepted that some things cannot be changed. And then works his entire life making up for them. Not everything is your fault, my friend. I know you will still search for the solution when you can but in the mean time," he sighed and smiled quite desparingly, tearing up as he shrugged, "you will accept me as I am." He turned towards the shaman, bowing his head, "thank you. You have brought us towards the next stone of our path. I would know more of this fate from you, another time." He looked to Lionel to see what effect his words had had. In such a state he doubt the man would be hard to read if anything.

Lionel takes a deep breath and then lets it out slowly. Rorin’s rebuttal washes over him, reinvigorating him, but he still feels hurt, raw, and selfishly denied. He wanted better news. Yet Rorin is not wrong. “I will,” he replies with a nod. He grinds his teeth so heavily, the tears in his eyes slink back behind the sockets, leaving two blue pools of dried, depressed azure. He smiles back. “I apologize,” the Hero of Hellfire confesses to the shaman. Mulgrew waves her hand again, this time dismissively. “Think nothing of it. Yours is quite the path, as well. I have watched with great interest from afar for more years than I care to remember. Know this: were your friend to have followed any other path, it would not have been the right one. This happened because he is just and true. This will reach its inevitable conclusion because there is justice in truth.” Mulgrew regards Rorin once more. “We will meet again, el’adan. This, I know.” Collecting her supplies, the Frost Giant hunches her way out of the room, leaving Lionel to peer after her in quiet contemplation.

Lionel | Esche is so silent, so thin, he has become like a wispy extension of Fort Frostmaw’s solid walls. Many guards and citizens of the realm pass him by without so much as noticing him. Mulgrew is different. She chuckles at his attempt at subterfuge, shaking her head. “A’vel duran, world wanderer. The Veltharn Truth greets you. What strange sets of circumstances we always seem to meet upon. When was the last time our paths crossed? How many decades has it been?” Esche’s emerald eyes narrow accusingly. “A’vel -xen,- pretender. Is it Veltharn now? How many ‘truths’ have you feigned to believe? Ever the trickster, hidden behind baubles. Blanketing Lithrydel in nature? You surround yourself with cults. You think nothing of the people whose lives you would destroy.” Mulgrew grimaces. Her fierce silver eyes cast a glare upon the elf. All pretense is abandoned. “As if your own ambitions for these people would be any better. Your world is gone. This Hollow one is all that remains. Cling to your fantasies, wanderer, but do not cast the dice of justice upon me. You are no judge. You are the greatest hypocrite the lands have ever known.” Mulgrew disappears before Esche can counter her claims.