User:Tari
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Tári Cerise Elensar
So I let you go
And I watch you leave
And I hold my breath
So you don't hear me scream
When you walk away
But the words are only in my head
It's not what I said
It's what I didn't say
Her mother wore that tattoo as a proud branding of her glory days, a dark reminder of deeds done for freedom and for truth. And that tattoo, the symbol of some clan she knew nothing of save for that mark, was now burned into Tari's memory, and is all she has left of her mother.
Secrets told in the pictures on your skin
Hours fade into days that never end
I see myself reflected in your eyes
And I hate the way I'm wearing all these lies
Born outside of wedlock, Tari was left at a foster home with not much more than a note with her name scribbled on it. She was taken in, albeit reluctantly, and was raised as a servant girl for the House of Torridon. At the age of sixteen she was gifted to the House of Lineau to be married off to their eldest son in repayment of a debt. None too happy about the matter, but unable to refuse such a thing, she held her tongue and did as she was told. Her marriage to Jasper William Lineau was nothing short of spectacular. And after a time, she grew rather fond of the man, and she fell in love. Her love, however, was unrequited. For by the age of twenty when she had still not been able to conceive and bare him a child, he had begun to take others to his bed, and she stood his wife only for purposes of state. At twenty-one, their marriage was enulled on the grounds that Tari had been unfaithful to her vows, and that she had been unclean before her marriage night. Having no right to stand against a charge of the church, she was released from the bonds of marriage and was dismissed from the House of Lineau with orders to never return.
Is she everything you wanted her to be?
Yeah, I bet she never breaks your heart like me
So it's one more night I cover up with you
And I hate myself for what I didn't do
For years she traveled across the land, searching for something to fill her life, for a purpose outside of mere existence. She studied the arts of illusion, dabbled with various masters until she was twenty-four. And it was on her birthday that she was offered the chance to study table magics as an apprentice to the great Dai Verner*. Not wanting to miss such an oppurtunity, she went straight away to audition for the man, and she was given her apprenticeship, along with two others (neither of which hold any significance in Tari's story). She worked diligently for Dai, long days and longer nights, going days without sleep in the perfection of their work. But it was only months later that Dai passed away, old in his time, leaving the three apprentices to find new work on their own. So, with little more than the clothes on her back, she joined a fellow practotioner, Liam Elensar, in his travels.
Maybe I was never as smart as I thought
Maybe we can never be as good as we want
Maybe you just didn't need me enough
Maybe we're too clever to be falling in love like this
It was under the watchful eye of Liam that Tari truly fell in love with her craft. She was taught to broaden her horizons past simple parlor tricks, to reach new heights, to create the impossible - the tangible. She learned the arts of realism and deception alongside one another, as if they were one and the same. And somewhere along the line, the two meshed in her mind. It was months she traveled with Liam, never straying far from his side as they went from town to town, collected their dues, and traveled onto the next. There was no time to take root in any one place, but there was room enough to spread her wings, make a name for herself. And so she adopted his name, becoming Tari Cerise Elensar, the Creator. It was a title she carried proudly in all those travels. And it was weeks before she was twenty-five that Liam would call her into his room, draw her close, and steal the innocence she still held left...
Should've known better
Now all I have left is a permanant stain
The only part of you I get to keep forever
To prove I lived this pain
It was weeks before she'd fully awaken, the change not taken well into her body, a poison inflicted that couldn't be stolen. But he had wanted to keep her, forever his own, forever his pet. And in years to follow, he taught her to enjoy that immortality, to be able to taste life's sweetness in everyday, even as a creature of the night. From Liam she learned how to thirst and never kill, how to love and never thirst. But every year on February sixteenth, she mourns the loss of yet another birthday she'll never see. She stayed with Liam for just under a century, always adopting new disguises, always learning the ways of new lands, new peoples, never able to keep the same name in two cities, it was far too complicated. But she could never bear to part with the name Tari, one of two things she holds from her true parents.
Secrets told in the silence of my sin
And I'm the one who loses in the end
It's not what I said
It's what I didn't say
It's in this new land of Hollow that she's once more struck truth into the Elensar name, resurrecting it from a century of olde, bringing it back to life once more. She's found friendship in few, love in a number less than that. And she knows good, though ask her and she'll admit it's not as much fun as her glory days back with Liam. A friendly, often childlike soul, she can usually be found about Cenril, conversing with the song offered by the water to her soul.
- for more information on Dai Verner, who was an actual table magic practotioner:
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dai_Vernon
lyrics (in italics) are from 'What I Didn't Say' by Saving Jane