RP:Undead Creatures and Altered Features
Part of the Thy Kingdom Come Arc
Summary: Amabella pays Orikahn a brief visit, the latter being imprisoned and awaiting sentence. After pressing the feline for a few answers, the undead departs, her curiosity apparently satisfied.
Prisoner Cages
Orikahn isn't difficult to find. The massive cat is laying underneath his prized cloak, concealed from head to toe. Nothing pokes out but the fluffy tip of his stripey tail. Scarcely stirring, the felonious feline seems to be serenely snoozing (or at least sulking) in his confinement, a cage just barely big enough for him to lay curled on its floor. The guards don't seem at all concerned with him; he's hardly moved since his arrival.
Amabella wasn't in any sort of high graces that would allow her to just waltz past the guards-- if anything, they would be tempted to throw her back into one of the cells if being here wasn't offense enough for it. Another approach was taken; the silhouette of a robed figure rose out of the darkness, using the cage and its occupant to block line of sight from any of the guards bothering to look over at such an hour. The familiar scent of death came with it, with only the remnants of previous attempts at masking it with flora. "I heard that Yule party was to -die- for, but sadly I wasn't around to participate," Amabella lamented quietly, waiting for signs of the beast stirring before trying to do something like actually prodding it or the like.
Orikahn stirs gently beneath the cloak, and his tail pulls beneath, vanishing from sight. "I know your voice." A deep, hoarse basso rattles out. "You're that ... witherling creature." He sniffs a few times to confirm his guess. "Am I dead?" In sincere curiosity, he pulls back the cloak to peek his head out, turning to face Amabella. There's an aberrant addition to his facial features--a third eye in the center of his brow. As his gaze settles and focusses on the undead alchemist, that same supernumerary eye flickers and begins to dimly glow, perhaps giving Amabella the sensation of being watched, even despite seeing the cat there observing her. "Back to where ever you came from, is that where we're going?"
Amabella 's own 'eyes' sparked dimly to life in reaction to Kahn's new oculary implant. Violet orbs of fool's fire spun about within the undead's sockets, which would impart a similar sensation as the catman's alien organ. Amabella's visage was that of death (at least more literal in this case), as what little wasn't concealed of her body by pitch-black robe was practically completely skeletal. She brought up her fleshless right hand to trace its index back and forth through the air between them. "No. I have no interest in taking you anywhere, be it for my purposes or otherwise. Not now, at least..." Amabella teased, allowing herself a quiet chuckle before continuing. "I'm just curious about the heretical nonsense you were involved with. There was quite the commotion, and it seems like the Steward will be 'asleep' for quite some time. Anything you could offer would be appreciated... maybe enough to change how I feel about you being behind bars-- unless you prefer your penance?"
Orikahn blinks in gentle confusion as Amabella begins explaining herself, and his neutral expression gradually falls into the sour look of one who has been unnecessarily bothered. With a groan, the sabercat slumps back under his cover and vanishes from sight. "You curious about my Goddess... and my agony in her absence." There's a little bit of rustling and he figures out how to get comfortable again, something that apparently requires effort in his cramped quarters. "My masters on earth and beyond are both slain, Goddess and steward alike, and I am inconsolable. If you have grasped divinity incarnate, and if you have felt such presence torn from the same grasp, then you will begin to fathom my agony." A snort rattles out of him. "I will be no more content beyond a cage than within, for I am confined to a world bereft of sacred purpose."
Amabella nodded slowly at his words. "I could partially understand it, but from the other end. There is the service my consciousness is bound to, and there is the service I devote myself to otherwise. Without it I'd be not much different than the mindless servants of other soul defilers. As far as your earthen master is concerned, I have heard whisperings that she has not departed yet to whatever afterlife beckons her. Sacred purpose, no, but perhaps you might find something else with time." The focus of those ghastly flames narrowed upon the beastman lamenting with his entire existence. "I normally would consider offering guidance and servitude of the natural order of things, but I'm not entirely sure that how we see 'life' and 'death' are close enough for such a thing..."
Orikahn gives a low, rumbling grunt in answer to Amabella's words. He offers her no gratitude for the insight, but he doesn't offer any refutation or disdain either. Even the news of Hildegarde's possible survival earns no perceptible response from the cat. Amabella is likely correct that the two of them, twisted creatures though they both may be, will have a difficult time seeing eye to eye on a base philosophical level. "I am in no state to accept guidance." The cat honestly, flatly admits. "I... no," he leaves off, not even bothering to finish his thought.
Amabella began to meld back into the writhing blackness beneath her when it was clear there wasn't going to be much progression here. "When you are more collected, then," spoken with uncertainty of the situation ever changing for the better. "For one who did their part to feed death, I would not be opposed to turn an... eye... away from our differences. Bonsoir," Amabella gave a short bow before being consumed by her familiar, vanishing from sight.
Orikahn stirs no further. As Amabella departs into the darkness, the imprisoned hunter lays in his cage precisely as he was when the undead apothecary had arrived.