RP:Two Girls, One Sensei

From HollowWiki

Part of the Saurian Onslaught Arc


Summary: After the events of the Razurath Genocide in Trist'oth, Kasyr tends to Karasu's near fatal wounds. Quintessa arrives and offers a stronger remedy than what either of the other two have on hand. This remedy may contain alcohol.


Previously...

Karasu, or at least, the thing that walks in Karasu's skin, makes little effort out of the slaughter of the weakened Razurath in the area. The fluorite has taken residence in her free hand as the remnant of her swords drags behinds her. At the entrance to the dug tunnel, stragglers remain, frantically digging at the stone to finish their escape. Something within her registers Odhranos' voice, as there's a falter in her step. "Praise be to our lord and savior Vakmatharas." Her arm snaps upwards and the whip encircles the necks of the two soldiers. "Go join his sweet embrace." Her arm snaps back, and the heads roll at the childrens' feet, unaffected so far from being outside the radius of the curse. The soldiers had brought these in to save their own young, seeming to have thought of an exit strategy the others had not. The young begin to scream at the death of those that had tried to protect them. "Nonsense. I've finally won the fight." The whip cracks again, leaving the spell blade alone in the cave. Karasu gives a cough, and blood sputters out from her lips. The irises shift downwards and lift her shirt to reveal ribs snapped cleanly off that seem to have punctured a lung. "What a shame that it happened... at the end..." The being's grip is released and Karasu collapses onto the ground. The red chain disappears and the shards of the swords fall around her as well. A pained wheeze echoes through the beads. Karasu opens her eyes, the irises still stained pink, and looks upon the rotting Razurath trying to make their way to her. "....Help... me..." She pleads to the air before losing consciousness.

Quintessa turns to the last two warriors standing before her, her expression one of a deranged killer. "Fine. Allow me!" She slides down the boulders and takes a swing at both of them, yelling "Tân! Tân!" As violent arcs of of fire came crashing down on each one of them, the hex blade is completely absorbed by their painful screams and totally unaware that the new Razurath that approaches is actually tough. A general or something. Mismatched eyes flicker over just in time to see him zero in on her and she grins at him just until the moment a large pillar of ebon flame descends down upon her. "Oh shi-" She only has a split second to consider what to do here before Kasyr makes up her mind for her, snatching the fluorite crystal as her body is yanked away by the Kensai's actions. She cradles the crystal like a baby, trying her best not to focus on the immense pain she felt in her side. Was it a broken bone? She doesn't know, but it was better than being roasted alive, she wagered. "Well, I wouldn't exactly call that a monologue," she manages to get out, the pain in her chest getting close to being unbearable. Quintessa's mismatched eyes narrow at him and she shakes her head. "I don't know," she mouths, grabbing her beads to check up on everybody. "Hey," she says into the beads, "What's going on over there? Do you need assistance? I can have Kasyr help you if you need it," She does her best to hide the pain in her voice but it's pretty obvious. "Everything is fine on my end." And it was. She only had a minor injury and she was maintaining the curse with the remainder of her mystic energy. Had it been 45 minutes yet? Surely they should all be dead by now, she was getting exhausted. With her ear pressed up against the beads she can swear she can hear Karasu's strained voice pleading for help. Abject horror consumes Quintessa. Not Karasu. Anyone but her. Mismatched eyes widen as she holds up a single finger to Kasyr. "Go to her, or I will." This whole mission meant nothing to her compared to her fellow apprentice.

Kasyr can't hear Quintessa's refutal to his statement, but he can at least recognize the expression on her face, dismissively waving a hand to the statement. In that moment, he's altogether quite cat-like, perched adjacent to the rapidly mouldering form of what had been his adversary, all but unblinking in the manner in which he appraises his pupil. Ears perked up, he's waiting for the moment she gives him an ok sign, and he can finally relax- and yet what he gets instead is a single finger held up, eliciting a brief look of distress, and then a sharp hiss of breath as he rises to his feet, despite his churning innards. "Can't. Hear. Going." And he really is, forcing himself to move with as much reckless abandon as he can muster, trusting his recollection of the city, the maps he'd been studying on the walls of his office, and the faint pull of Karasu's empathic thread to find the quickest path there. There's a part of the former revenants mind chiding him for this moment- the simple whisper that things could have been so much easier if he hadn't allowed what was his to be stolen away, and yet it's forced down beneath the surface as he navigates over the oozing carcasses that marked where the interloping forces had perished. The Kensai actually manages to make it to the arena in good time, despite the pounding his temples, and the way his vision swims, but for the life of him, he can't see Karasu. Not at first. Not until he follows that layered sense of familiarity, staggering his way towards her body, if only to settle onto his knees and place his hands on her. Whether or not it had been Daedria disapproving of his hand in a slaughter on this scale, or simply his own inability while pressed as he was- Kasyr's focus is not on restoring himself in this moment. And certainly, given the stakes he was not apt to feel overly contrite about the manner- yet all the same, he still tries to tap into that divine link, though not for his own benefit. Now the question was, whether he'd get an adequate answer back before internal bloodloss caught up with him.


Trist’oth Arena

Karasu jolts back to consciousness under Kasyr's touch with a garbled scream, his hands inadvertently pressing against the broken rib. Her eyes open and the sclera swirls with black as it fixes on him. Malevolent energy swirls around her tiny frame, intent on striking the Kensai, but it seems to withdraw as he prays. Suddenly, she's shaking, grabbing desperately onto Kasyr's burnt arm to turn herself onto her side despite the obvious pain. Karasu coughs violently, blood splattering across her master's legs and onto the filthy floor. Whatever it was that possessed her seems to have withdrawn now that she has come to some relative safety. Her body falls back onto the bloody ground, groaning as the snapped rib moves itself out of the delicate tissue of her lung and it begins to repair itself. It would seem that Kasyr's prayer has paid off after all, if only too keep Karasu out of mortal danger. She manages to throw her arm out to fumble with the pockets of the cloak, and withdraws a crystal flask filled with green liquid. The edge of the flask is cracked, and part of the potion drips out. With a wheeze, she holds her arm up to his face and presses the flask against his mouth, too weak still to even sit herself up. "Drink..." It would seem this is her repayment for saving her life. "Tessa... Where's Tessa...?"

Kasyr nearly loses his focus when she takes hold of his arm, an agonized growl oozing out from between thinly pressed lips, along a fresh trickle of blood. It wasn't the burns that were the worst of it, but the patches of raw flesh, and exposed musle that wreathed the scorch marks which plagued the swordsman most, turning his already tenuous grasp on lucidity into something far spottier, vertigo starting to take hold of him. When her lips move, his still ruptured ears twitch forward, as though trying to pick out the words, yet nothing save the wretched tinnitus drone reaches his ears. The intention behind the offered ..remnants of the potion is at least readily discernible- the Kensai pressing his hand to the cracked portion of the flask to prevent even more spilling out as he greedily chugs a fair portion of what remains, only pausing to consider that it would probably make his life easier if he let her polish the rest of it off. "Mwop?" ...Nope. Still can't hear. Whether or not Karasu can figure out that from the fact that his ears are basically stained red, is something else entirely. Still, Kas at least has enough sense to be able to guess roughly what Karasu's asking about, "We, uh, We won. Everyone's fine." I mean, Gevurah isn't. But that's more like, spiritual and mental anguish than mortal danger, right? So she's fine. She'll walk it off. Anyways, Kasyr doesn't know he's in mortal peril from that source, yet.

Karasu rolls onto her back with a grunt, trying to fight the urge to fall asleep. She almost certainly has a concussion, she can tell that much at least. At the curious noise he makes, a raspy laugh leaves her, though it makes her wince. Poor Kasyr! "We won." She echoes, a smile tugging at the edges of her face, still discernible through the layers of blood-mud caked on her face. Another wheeze and a thumbs up from her are given before she starts forcing herself to sit up. She unclasps the brooch holding the cloak together and uses her good arm to swing it around so it falls in her lap, proceeding to pat down all the pockets in search of more potions. A similar flask is withdrawn and she takes a swig herself, making an exaggerated face as the potion burns down her throat. Karasu looks around the carnage, of all the rotted corpses of Razurath and fae alike. "Now what..." She asks, though more to herself than to Kasyr.

Kasyr coughs, though this time, the amount of bloody in it is less immediately alarming, and more- find a doctor soon, please. It's a fine difference, really. More importantly, the sense of dizziness and nausea has stopped growing, and even slightly abated, allowing the swordsman to get a bit more comfortable by falling back against the arena wall. Karasu retrieving another potion from her cloak also means that he can finish off what he'd started, "I can't. Hear right now." A pause, and the Kensai starts to rummage through the shoddy pack he was still carrying- which was now apt to be the most intact part of his slave disguise, given the generally scorched nature of his clothes. He's not looking for Casper- who made an admirable job of escaping from the scene yet again- but rather for the map he'd been scribbling notes on, which he gestures over towards Karasu, alongside a quill. "Use the back. Something to focus on." That done, he lets out a shaky breath and stares up at the ceiling, trying to get it together to figure out that most essential question. "Now what?"

Karasu moves to write what she had just said when he unknowingly echoes her. The halfling lets out another laugh, holding onto her side. "Ow ow ow ow ow." Once it passes, she writes down, 'Now what?' After a pause, she adds, 'I wonder who winds up having to throw out all these carcasses.'

Kasyrs' doing that thing where you sort of sidle over to someone scribbling and casually look over their shoulder. Cat face doodles unseen? Check. As for the content, well "That's my question. ..Er." He turns his head to cough, wiping at his mouth with the back of his hand before he adds, "Well, what to do. Pretty sure 'Slaves' es the answer to most of the questions about clean up et repairs here." And food. "Gevurah's estate may work to recuperate- but, I'd prefer -not- to be there in this state." Really, it's less the vulnerability, and more the fact that running with that whole 'still a revenant' thing would be a little bit harder right now. She needs him to deal with Calice, right? ...Riiight? "Rather not go to Vailkrin. ..S'far es Cenril?" He's having a bit of Geography fail internally right now.

Karasu shakes her head and uncrosses her legs so she can lean back on the Kensai. "Cenril is too far... There's... probably a healer in Craughmoyle or something, but that's a helluva climb. We probably should have brought someone who can heal... or teleport. Man, I can't believe Dyraxdiin missed out on this." She laments. Realizing after a few beats of silence that Kasyr has no way of hearing her talk except for the tiny vibrations of her voice rumbling against him, she writes down, 'no teleporting for us.' She takes a swig of the potion and offers him the flask again. Her wounds were at the point of barely pressing up against her lungs, he needed the heals way more than she did right now.

Kasyr almost bristles for a moment, his ears standing up with the contact, but Karasu doesn't shuffle further, and so he settles anew, now with the added bonus of a bit more flask for his potions. "I'm going to guess that your private supply es running low? ...Yeah. No teleporting" He closes his eyes as he speaks, the flask being set down adjacent to his student, before he simply moves to fumble with the slave collar he's been sporting, to shed the least comfortable portion of his disguise. "The estate is an option." He sounds reticent, really, and disconcerted as well.

Karasu notes the reluctance in the way he brings up the estate. "Unless you plan on carrying me, we're going to make it to the estate any time soon. I don't think I can stand yet." She flips the empty flask over, where directions have been carved in the dragon language. "Tezzavallia says this takes up to three hours to take full restorative effect. Its obviously not going to--" Wait a minute. She puts down the flask and picks up the quill. 'Three hours until we're well enough for travel.'

Kasyr should probably learn to lip read, given the amount of times he ends up blowing out his own ear drums. Thought, it likely wouldn't be helpful, all the same, given he only bothers to crack an eye open to peek over when he feels Karasu shuffle a bit. The parchments eyed for a few moments, before he adds, "Short travel, or long? I'd like to know my options." The kensai pauses for a few moments, fumbling at his chest for a moment, before it dawns on him that he's not wearing his jacket, and there's no spare cigarettes to be found. Instead, he adds, "If we have time on our hands, may as well ask questions. If you have any. I promise no pop quizzes."

Karasu looks out at the sea of saurian corpses and thinks for a moment. 'Who's cuter, me or Quintessa?' Strange, strange child.

Kasyr has to look over Karasu's shoulder when he's checking out what she's scribbled, which gives her the perfect view of him going paler than he already looked, and then flushing. "Right for the Jugular. " A well-timed cough helps buy him a few extra moments, before he manages to focus himself. "You know I'm your teacher, right? ...Anyways, So, -Cute-, huh?" He adds a dramatic pause there, before casually offering up, "I'd say out of the two of you, asofar, I think you'd be more likely to earn headpats, which I think answers that question." Kasyr is internally giving a thumbs up to Coreliant for all the hours spent learning technicalities. "If we're going personal, though. Do you think you could fight Quintessa? ..Without holding back?"

Quintessa crawls through the debris, not minding in the slightest when she squishes the occasional melted head under her boot. "Su-suuuuu!" She calls, "Kassy! Where are you two?" With the battle over she finally feels like she is allowed to leave her post, her arms arms wrapped around her broken ribs. She has no idea that they are talking about her right now, but her ears are really burning for some strange reason.

Karasu seems to be content with this answer, as evidenced by an obnoxious grin and a happy swish of her tail around Kasyr's midsection. "Yes, but you're also one of my childhood crushes. Lucky for you, my heart belongs to another now." She says this knowing damn well he can't hear it. Still unaware of the pink stain on her irises, she looks back and grins at Kasyr before turning back. Her expression turns serious as she writes down, 'Quintessa could probably kill me without lifting a finger. It's why I keep dodging her asking her requests to spar me.' She looks up and turns white. The second Kasyr finishes reading the note, she stuffs the map down her shirt.

Kasyr can't hear anything, though he's at least able to read the emotional cues and the less subtle bit of tail swishing. He's going to make a wry comment, when he catches wind of what she's writing, causing his expression to grow a bit more serious, "A lot of natural talent, et ability. Not much in the way of restrai- " Kasyr is now looking at the wall. The wall is -very- interesting. "'-t. 1 Finger up if it's an enemy. 2 if it's Gevurah, 3 if someone else." Whilst Kasyr had been intent on reading the responses and prying further, the state of alarm was even harder to miss than the prior bit.

Quintessa is distracted splashing in a blood puddle for a moment before she resumes looking for her primary and secondary target love interests. How convenient it would be to find them in the same spot, both of them injured. She finally make her way into the arena, her mismatched eyes still scanning the area looking for them. "Okay, this isn't funny anymore!" A hint of panic is in her voice as she strains against the pain of her broken bones. Quintessa has no idea if Karasu has survived or not yet, and is starting to assume the worst.

Karasu holds up a three, relieved that Quintessa didn't see the paper. "Over--" A wheeze. "Over here!" Karasu raises her hand as much as she can without wincing. "You wouldn't happen to have any non-smashed potions on you?" She shakes her coat, the sopping pockets of which jingle with broken glass. "Real talk, who decided potions had to be transported in glass bottles?"

Kasyr relaxes noticeably, and resumes leaning back against the wall, a less haggard cough coming from him, "Then why..?" See, Kas might not be able to hear Quintessa, but he's becoming acutely more familiar with her presence, especially after yesterday "Oh. Ohhhh. That. Makes. Sense." And he's dodged 20 questions with Quintessa, because he's too sober for that right now. What he wouldn't give for a whiskey. "Well, uh, tell me if. Er, tap me? if you need me, oui." Kasyr's just going to be twiddling his thumbs right now.

Karasu leans forward to catch his eye, her brows furrowed and yet one raised as Quintessa walks or runs over. The poor thing still has no idea what happened. "What? What’s wrong with you?"

Quintessa hurries over to the two of them, the happiest changeling in the world right now. "Karasu! Kasyr! You're both alright!" she settles in next to them and giggles. "Yeah, glass is the worst. I've been meaning to ask Tezza if we can put potions in waterskins or not." Reaching into her cloak to find what she brought with her, she produces three vials with light blue liquid inside and hands one to each of them before knocking back her own. "That feels better," she says, her minor healing potion already stitching her broken bones back together. "I totally forgot about these." She tosses the empty glass behind her and pulls out a silver flask and unscrews the top. "So wow, that was quite a battle." She grins at each of them, already forgetting Kasyr's deftness. "I had a lot of fun."

Kasyr shrugs as a generalized reply to Karasu, "Later?" Because, to be fair, he's not really sure what it is she's trying to communicate, but hey, as long as he remembers. In the meantime, He's entirely not going to turn around the opportunity of drinking another potion, even if it is making his brain poke at him due to something pertaining to arcane mixology. Anyways, it's fine. More potions, less internal damage, amirite? "Thanks. Thank you, enfin." He quiets down after that, glancing between Karasu and Quintessa, though when a flask appears he can't help but ask, "Booze?" He sounds -so- hopeful right now.

Karasu knocks back the shot and makes an exaggerated face as she forces it down. "This is just enchanted curacao!" She whines, handing the vial back to the fellow apprentice. With what little Kasyr knows about Karasu, her reaction should be enough to tell him that yes, it is in fact booze. The enchantment works far more quickly than the green potion Karasu had obtained from the alchemist, and her face contorts in pain as the magic mends her ribcage. "I almost died out there!" She complains, looking up at Quintessa. The eyes of the half feline are no longer hazel, but rather a bright pink, similar to the skin of a dragon's fruit.

Quintessa takes a long swig of the whiskey Mahri gave her before passing it to Kasyr. "Yeah, but you didn't die! Isn't a brush with death EXCITING?!" The hex blade feels like she's on top of the world. "You must have been having fun, you were saying all those cool lines like 'Praise be to our lord and savior Vakmatharas' in that creepy voice. You've been taking pointers from me, haven't you? You cheeky feline, you." She giggles again, reaching for her tin cigarettes case before flipping it open and placing a clove cig between her lips. She reaches for her flask again before she lights it with a simple cantrip, snapping her fingers to produce a small flame.

Kasyr blinks at Karasu's reaction, shrugs, and then downs the shot like she did, albeit with a bit less in the theatrics department. Still, It -is- wince inducing, though less from any sort of alcoholic sting, and more from what it feels like to have tender tissue creeping itself back together. Bright side though, Kasyr's now got a sort of cute lop-sided ear thing going on, since his right ears all perked up. Still smeared in blood but. "Mwop?" Yeah, Kasyr's going to take that as a win, a partial one anyways, and one that comes with a side benefit of whiskey. He takes a long swig, his eyes flickering between the two students before he passes the flask back over to Quintessa. it's only after that he thinks to ask, "Do you drink?" to Karasu- before making a thumbs down or thumbs up gesture.

Karasu will never admit alcohol is icky. She will also never mention that two of the three here are technically not -allowed- to be drinking! She would rather die. "Of course I drink." A bold-faced lie told as she crosses her arms over her chest. Everyone believed that. A raised eyebrow is given to Quintessa as she sits before them. "What? I didn't say--" Karasu snatches the cigarette case from Quintessa's hands, though not to scold her for smoking, but to stare at her murky reflection and the unusual eyes that stare back at her. Thankfully the battle was over, because if any Razurath had miraculously lived through the death curse, they would absolutely be alerted to the sudden screaming coming from the arena. "What's wrong with my eyes?! What's wrong with my eyes?!" Full-blown panic mode has ensued.

Quintessa blinks a few times at Karasu before her mouth drops open, her cigarette hanging to her bottom lip, "Your eyes! They aren't hazel anymore!" How did she not notice that before. She passes the flask back to Kasyr after taking a sip. She would definitely be needing more booze later. "But... why pink?" She would let it slide that she'd never seen Karasu drink before, but it was perfectly fine for her to do so. The legal drinking age was a lot younger than she might be thinking. She catches her clove cigarette before it falls out of her mouth and takes a slow drag from it. "Does this have anything to do with your birthmark?" She exhales before suddenly gasping, "That voice! You didn't get possessed again did you?" Quintessa is low key disappointed that she didn't see it with her own eyes, "I missed it again! Vakmatharas has chosen you for an important task, I just know it! You're so lucky."

Kasyr would have been able to pick up on Karasu's sharp burst of alarm by posture and emotions alone, but the fact that he'd managed to regain hearing in one ear just in time for this is less than ideal. Unsure what to make of it, he simply accepts the flask, takes a swig, and then helpfully passes it off to Karasu. She seems like she could do with something for the frayed nerves, anyways. "Possessed?" That helpful request for clarification aside, the kensai pokes at his less perky ear, to see if it wants to join the party too. Spoilers: Not currently.

Karasu is visibly shaking as she tries to come to terms with this change. "My eyes... Daddy said I had my mom's eyes..." More in shock than anything else, Karasu takes the flask. "But I don't worship Vakmatharas!" She opens her mouth to take a (sip? swig? she never bothered to learn how to drink, assuming she would just be given a rundown when she reached age) from the flask, when another voice emerges. "But I could."

Quintessa watches in silence as Karasu comes to terms with her new eye color, smoking her cigarette slowly. When the second voice comes out she looks over to Kasyr with a wary frown. "Well," she begins, flicking her ashes into the empty eye socket of a nearby razurath corpse, "We must all once day accept the cold embrace of our dark lord. It's best to come to terms with it sooner than later." She rolls her cig in between her finger as she exhales a large cloud of smoke above the three of them, "But Delisha and Daedria are also good choices. I have built shines to all three in House Dragana." She had also began construction on another shrine but she's not going to bring that up.

Kasyr isn't really sure what's seeing here. For one thing, pink eyes are fairly unique in the realm of 'possible signs of possession or magical influence'. "..Wait, es there anything that has Pink as it's mark. Like, most things are actually pretty accurately color coded." FOR EVIL. But really, the amount of red eyes, usually makes it a dead giveaway. "Anyways, I think it's -entirely- possible to respectfully acknowledge you're going to die, " Probably. Maybe. " But. Buuut. Devoting your life to... well, " There's a broad gesture towards the bits of dino goo everywhere, "This. Might be a bit early. You're in school. Go experiment and make some other mistakes first." This is like the worst pep talk. "Wait, shrines?"

Karasu scowls, her face reddening. "For the last time, I'm not riding your statue of Delisha like its--." As she snarks, a hand flies up to cover a mark on her neck. She realizes something a hair too late and jumps away from Kasyr. "He can hear us!"

Quintessa suddenly coughs on the smoke that was in her lungs, her cigarette lost somewhere during the fit. "Uh-what?" she can't believe Karasu has said that. "H-hey, that statue is quite tasteful, actually. And who do you think I modeled the 'figurehead' after? It's not like I've seen many of them!" Her mismatched eyes flicker over to Kasyr and she blushes. "I-I've never seen one before," she lies, hands reaching to snatch the flash from Karasu so she can drown her embarrassment.

Kasyr isn't sure if Karasu's alcohol tolerance is abysmal, or she just had gotten used to him being insensate to the world around him, or some combination of the two. But that was definitely a TMI moment. "It's, eh, really not my business if you're a trio, or swapping, ou quoi-ce-soit. I'm not going to judge." I mean, he had been seeing Laurelle once upon a time. Cripes. "But, er, still not drunk enough for this." Kasyrs newly found space is put to use , as he pushes against the wall and staggers up to his feet, a combination of freshly knit and burnt tissue making some unpleasant creaks. It's doable, at least, even if he feels exhausted enough that just leaning against the wall seems the most pragmatic use of his efforts in the moment. "If you two are about to have a moment, we can call this meeting adjourned, et I'll head back to the est...you two have a place to stay right?" The swordsman squints, "By that I mean, not squatting here."

Karasu frowns, her face red. "Shhhut up." The woman-child slurs. That's some good alcohol. Karasu latches onto Kasyr to get up, but quickly abandons the effort, rolling an inch away from the rotting dino goo. "We can just...." A snore escapes her. Soldier down!

Quintessa shakes her head at Karasu, "Poor dear," With a few quick pats at her sides to test how her ribs were healing, the changeling stands and bends down to scoop the feline up and cradles her in her arms. Mismatched eyes flicker to Kasyr and she gives him a nod. "I have a few places I can take her. I -am- the caretaker of a mansion after all." The idea of taking Karasu back to House Dragana makes her smile a soft, genuine smile. "Don't worry, I'll take good care of her."

Kasyr might normally be a bit concerned given Quintessa's prior inclinations, but both the changelings demeanour, and the current accommodations available lead the Kensai to acquiescing, "Well, that's one less thing to worry about, enfin." He let's out a hissed breath as he peels away from the wall, if only to add, "When you've recovered, find me at the Mage Tower. There's some lesson work pertaining to both of tu, that ought to be done." Kasyr is about to walk away, but he pauses to waggle a finger at Quin, "With a bit extra in store for you." Yeeeeah, he didn't forget. Though the whiskey and healing probably mellowed him out a little.