RP: A Redl Exception

From HollowWiki

Quintessa conflicted following a discussion regarding Razurath, meets one for the first time, and one who claims to be among a free colony in Cenril. Has fate revealed an exception?

Part of the Saurian Onslaught Arc


Npcing by Aetherclaw

Pebbly Shore

All about you there are coarse, gray pebbles within the soft sand, and as this particular sort of stone retains atmospheric temperature, they are quite cold from the chill sea breeze blowing past. How they were placed here is unknown and could be for a numerous amount of reasons. The moons lunar shift came earlier than nature's intentions placed it, pushing the tide as well as these pebbles to the shore is of course a possibility. Or, that old wives tale that pushes from the back of your mind- the one of heaven's essences raining to the realm of men and monsters. Whatever it may be, they are here and beset their textures, very comfortable. To your south, the rocks rise higher, protectively sealing off the wharf. At the moment, the shore is covered with soldiers. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The pebbly shore was peaceful and quiet, a large stone sat along the beach up against the cliffs to the south. There was just enough light about to enjoy the area as it was 2 hours till sundown. Facing with his back to the cliff. A razurath of a dark Blue and brown color worked with focus. His eyes green eyes focused, as he as the blue skinned anthro raptor worked with a tool in his left hand like that of a pen, a shaft of blue light emanating from it, as it carved lines and etchings into a small 2 inch by 2 inch tiles of stone and metal. He was about 6 1/2' tall, but sat on rock, his tail covered along with most of his body aside from his forearms and his calves exposed to the elements, a jumpsuit covering what else was left in the open, he worked tediously, but also slowly, his eyes were tired and there was a feeling of lonesomeness about him.

Quintessa had been wandering around Cenril for a while now, the conversation she had with the others in the tavern weighing heavy on her mind. She picked up a rock every now and then and tossed it into the ocean, the changeling watching his satisfaction as they splashed against the waves. The hexblade would stop here for a while to rest and enjoy the ocean view, not yet realizing that not too far away a razurath sat with his back to the cliffs. When she turned in Redlceth’s direction, it was the blue light from the tool she noticed first and then the anthropomorphic raptor that wielded it. "What the...?" she couldn't help but let slip. Was this a razurath? It definitely looked like what Zahrani described.

Redlceth looked up, hearing the voice uttered, and his focus momentarily away his left thumb clicking the pen abruptly so he didn't cut himself with the beam of light. He offered a tired smile, which on any other creature would have been hard to pull off, but for the razurath it was easy, as much expression could go with their faces. "Hello." He said in a mildly shy tone of voice, it was a small voice, not a particularly loud but not that deep either like one that either lacked self confidence, or had little self worth. Its skin would have looked a little leathery, at least up closer. "Beautiful sky isn't it?"

Quintessa didn't know what she expected, but with all the rumors going around and the sizable bounties out on their heads, she couldn't tell if she'd found a razurath or not. This didn't seem like a dangerous creature. "Er, um- Hi there." She gave him an awkward smile and wave. "Oh, yeah. It's amazing out here. I hear the sunrise is unlike anywhere else in the world." She giggled, "Guess we came out here at the wrong time." The strange changeling girl slowly approached Redlceth, partly to get a better look and partly because his soft voice was difficult to hear well.


Redlceth, made the motion to wave, "It is beautiful, though I do miss seeing it the valley, right where the sun sets between Mt. Vezim, and Picklik's cliff, the way the gases of the volcano mix with the air, and the way the sun becomes green in its final moments." he sighed as he gazed towards the sun beginning to set. Then his gaze returning to her, a small chuckle escaping his lips, only the tiniest slivers of teeth exposed, sharp from whatever brief look she might have gotten. The chuckle was light like his voice. He tried to take her in, trying to read her appearance.

Quintessa was genuinely curious, and though she had no plans hostility she couldn't hide the caution that lingered in ever one of her steps. She was always like that. Part of the reason she was so over-the-top and outgoing was to hide that she was always waiting for something to attack her, but someone who knew what to look for could tell she was nervous. "Green sun?" She grinned at the razurath, "That sounds AMAZING! I love the color green." The changeling's mixed matched eyes focused in on his teeth when he chuckled, even if she could only she a tiny bit. "So-" she quickly changed subjects, "I know this sounds rude, but are you one of those razuraths I've been hearing about?" She hoped this sudden question wouldn't startle him, but she wasn't exactly a subtle person.

Redlceth nodded, "Yes its true, I am." He said, "We came as a colony looking for a new home as well we didn't like the political shift that was happening back home almost a year ago, at the time we were going to settle in larket, but circumstances, we moved here to cenril, and now with well the danger that lurks, we might find ourselves soon having to flee to Rhynvale. Or the selen islands." He wasn't exactly subtle either, but then he was also more socially awkward, mainly because he didn't fit in, at least not with cenril, much less his own people." He paused, setting his utensil down. "Um, yeah, so yeah, we have that bad vibe." he stammered equally nervous, but mostly not because their were bounties out, and at this rate no one would care if it was a civilian killed or soldier, but because, well he failed the great mating ceremony six times in a row and that, well that destroys a razurath's self worth pretty quickly and any confidence they might have had.

Quintessa touched her lip thoughtfully as she listened to him tell his story. Everything seemed to make sense based on what she already knew. "Bad vibe?" she snickered at that. "That's one way to put it, although from what I hear Rynvale isn't that bad of a place to have to hide out in, not to make light of the situation your people are in." The hexblade didn't seem to mind Redlceth's lack of confidence. On the contrary, it actually put her mind at ease. "So you lot came out here about a year ago cause of changes back home? It's always monarchs and warlords, isn't it?" she spat on the ground in contempt for all governing bodies. "Sorry to hear that, friend. I'm guessing all of your peaceful kin left with you and the violent folk stayed behind." That must have been the reason they had such a bad reputation, a lot of bad eggs in once clutch.

Redlceth shook his head, "Not exactly," he said starting to rock a bit on his tail. "We.. we came here about a year ago, or as far as I am told, see i wasn't born yet, Razurath go from egg stage to young adulthood in matter of eight months." he paused to let that sink in, almost every person he ever told that found it odd, but he would usually add, "Well, I guess cause everyone thinks its weird it is then?" He tried to make a smile, at that raising a brow in his slightly sheepish tone. "Anyway it wasn't a monarch we never had monarchs, we had councils, or representatives, each representative supporting a tribe, and well, about a three years ago, a gray was born, the first ever, since we arrived in the valley, through the portal. "Thats when I am told changes started happening, the tribe system was replaced by a union of the tribes, and we began to mix. My clan we, we umm, left because we didn't want to support a Strategist hell bent on conquering the world, and my parents told me, that every part of them wanted to be part the unification and the war, that is until we came over the mountains, it took time, but within a month that drive was gone, we felt free again, and well, here I am second generation, mother a Blue, and my father a brown, and me a patterned mix." He said kind of holding his hands together. "We are open books, if people would lend us time to listen."

Quintessa didn't think it was odd, she thought it was fascinating. "Wow, that's fast," she said, "It took me waaaay longer to reach adulthood. I'm nearly 18 years!" Any hint of nervousness was gone by now. "So how long do you live? Eight months is a quick time to grow up, are you left with any time to, you know, live?" She frowned to herself, thinking about the tragedy of all of this. "It's sad, really. Your people are so interesting, and have spread so far, but because of the actions of a lone strategist there are forces in all the realms that threaten to crash down on all of you, even the ones that escaped. Even the ones that never knew any of that."

Redlceth nodded, "Yeah, its fast, but its full of love, bonds go deep, sometimes so deep that a sudden loss of family can strip the sanity from one's mind," He said. "Well we only know our upper possible limits from four individuals, who guard the citadel in the valley, its ancient structure built entirely out of metal, and as far as we know magically runicly, you name it, we can't get a sample, its indestructible, but, ummm, we have four red guards who guard each is about 800 years old, and 100 meters tall, though they are reds and reds never stop growing, we do, not reds." He looked at her, with a smile, "Every Razurath who has a mate looks forward to raising a family, and the raising an orphan who isn't a Razurath is something many strive to have, because the years it take to raise one to adulthood is longer and those bonds will grow far deeper. Of course how we care for infants and children is awkward." he chuckled extremely nervously, 'Most people think we eat our children, we don't." We just we have a different method." He was really nervous, mostly because of well things.

Quintessa was doing her best to follow all of this. "Wooow. 800? That's amazing." Her finger returned to her lip once more, "Reds, browns, blues? So I guess even among other Razurath you have different ethnicities." She took a moment to look over his patterns. "You said you had a blue parent and a brown parent? Your coloration is very pretty."

Redlceth smiled. “Thank you, and i guess you could say ethnicity, but each color has a basic color coded expertise, so blues are biologically able to enter science and rune making fields, while browns have expertise in being engineers, i mean we welcome anyone to be what they want to be, but Razurath colors tend to always assume there typical expertise, mixes will get benefits from both of their parents, but the detriments can be a bit of wild card.” He said possibly referencing why he was telling her everything so freely browns and blues might well be information dispensers sometimes not knowing when to be silent.

Quintessa nodded her head as Redlceth fed her more and more information. Her mind was like a sponge, sucking up all that juicy intel. "Sooo, it's more like a caste? Just you are born a certain way to fit a certain mold." She snickered, "At least they allow you to try new things, but I can't imagine a blue trying to fill a red's position or vis versa. It's probably just easier to stick with what you are naturally good at. That's what I decided. I can either spend my life running away form my mother's dark magic or I can just embrace it's power and use it for my own reasons."

Redlceth nodded “ precisely.” “ in some way your lucky you can use magic, I cannot no razurath can we rely pn others to jumpstart the runes, from there we can keep it looped.”

Quintessa was shocked. "You can't use magic?!" The changeling couldn't imagine living without magic. "Oh, but at least you can use runes. I'm not great at them but I can at least remember a few." Quintessa thought back to the events a couple of months ago when she was wondering Kelay. Weren't spellcasters coming up missing? She had avoided getting involved back then, not yet trusting her abilities. "Do you have many spellcasting allies? I don't know if I can help you but I'd be willing to jumpstart your runes for you if you are ever in need."

Redlceth nodded, we, the colony have children we adopted who can activate the runes, yours are welcome to, last word i was told was the the valley was now kidnapping magic users, which is appalling, I cannot imagine what went down to cause that.” He realized that maybe he admitted something wrong so he said hastily, “ i know the mages guild wants our heads but given the chance i would help, i would go against the valley in a heartbeat, trouble is they likely only see a dumb animal to be killed”

Quintessa nodded her head again, her neck starting to strain from all the nodding she had been doing. "That was literally what I was thinking about a second ago. If the Mage's Guild wants you dead, I might be able to speak to them on your behalf. I'll let everyone know that there are some Razurath who aren't bad like the mage-stealers. Like you!" She spoke with such conviction. "I've been sat here talking to you for a while and you haven't tried to eat me OR enslave me. You've just been educating me, which I consider a good act. So as far as I'm concerned, your clan of separatists out here in Cinril are okay. I would fight on your side should something really bad happen."

Redlceth shivered at the thought but he understood the need, and she did seem convicted and sincere. “ If you, and they ask of me, we meet in kelay in the sanctum of the divine, if i am killed by them it will be the gods wrath upon them,” he said, “ but convincing them may lead some to attack and murder the colony, if it ends this bloodshed so be it.”

Quintessa paused for a long moment. She hadn't considered all that. "I'll be careful about what I tell them. I won't let them know where you are until I am sure I can trust them. This might be difficult, but I don't see any reason you be mindlessly killed when you can help us."

Redlceth also added maybe oddly, "And um yeah, I um would never eat you, or enslave you, and um, thank you." He said, though the word swallow did have numerous words for that in razurath tongue, and meanings. But she didn't ask so he didn't say.

Quintessa frowned, "I'm not going to lie. The bounty is the reason I starting asking about the razurath in the first place, but I would never dream of killing you for it. It was my idea to kill the leader of the aggressive razurath. Some folks are saying his name is Aetherclaw."

Redlceth was surprised. "Aetheclaw? The way my mom talked about him, was that he was not the type of person to seek war, but would do so if called to do it, family man, gods i hope he never loses them."

Quintessa shook her head, "It's only talk. Nobody really knows the truth. Folks are scared and looking to put blame on anyone. I also heard from the same conversation that Aetherclaw fancies himself a 'traveling artist' so who really knows. They said he was the one giving the orders, so they assume he's in charge."

Redlceth nodded slowly, "Okay," He said breathing a little hard, he tried packing up his tiles and runes. one of which spiraled out his hand and landed admist the rocks. "Um that be solar spire rune, basically projects sunlight, just tens of times more powerful, um, here." He bent down, reached into his bag, and pulled out a polar ice metal square, then he took his utensil and sealed them together. Rising from his position and walking towards her, his body not walking entirely upright but, close enough, just at a very slight angle left over from the saurian ancestry. "Here, this way you don't drain yourself, as the rune requires alot of magic, to function properly, use it as a way to get in, if you can, and whatever you do don't hold it with your bare hands if you use it. It gets very hot very quickly." He said. He might have been close to her, or maybe she backed up, regardless, it might have been intidimdating, and he tried to back up to try end any nervousness she might begin to have.

Quintessa watched Redlceth mess with the runes, not sure what he was planning to do with them. When he began to approach her, she back down or shrug away. She reached out, but curled her fingers away when he said not to touch it with her bare hands. "Will it be okay to touch until I use it?" She asked, not wishing to be burned. "So, you're just giving me these? To use?" She had never been gifted a magic object before. "I hope I don't mess it up." She muttered, not one-hundred percent on her knowledge of runes. She would have to do a bit of reading on them again. "Thank you very much, er, what was your name? I don't think we've been properly introduced."

Redlceth nodded is timid gaze at her lengthening, “yes it will be safe to handle until you use it,” he paused. “Our runic language is different opposed to ancients and dwarves, if i live long enough i can try to teach you the basics,” he paused nervously. Poor razurath could have used a hug. “ my name is Redlceth,” he pronounced it as ‘riddle keth’ he’d bit on his lip so very nervous. But he tried to keep it together.

Quintessa reached out to touch his arm, "Redlceth," she repeated, "You don't have to be so on guard. We're friends now." She held the rune in her hand and smiled a bit. "I'm Quintessa, although people usually don't say the whole name."

Redlceth might have overstepped his bounds because as soon as she touched his arm, he pulled her into a hug his snout resting against her back, very affectionately which ceased his shivers, “thank you.” He stepped away his skin would have looked like leather but felt like silk, and stretchy like rubber. “ thank you quintessa, you can call me redl for short” he stepped a bit away from the hug, “ if you need to fond me again, you can find me here”

Quintessa gave an "Eep!" when she was pulled into a hug but she didn't push away. She had to admit that his skin had an interesting texture to it. When he finally put her down she snickered at him. "I think I'm starting to see what Scandal meant..." she muttered. Mixed matched eyes beam up at him, the changeling truly intrigued by his behavior. "You're welcome, Redl. When I get the chance to test out your runes I'll return and give you the feedback." She glanced northward, "Well," she began, about to make one of her quick exits, "I need to get going. It was nice meeting you."