What Makes Us Mortal

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nymaya: What Makes Us Mortal
To: New_Thalos Fastia Baruch Mladen Anastormia ( RP Necrucifer Imm )
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'We are born to feel, Nymaya. It is what makes us mortal, and not Gods.'

The context of the words, the time in which they had been spoken by Fastia,
had leant some comfort, and even now they stood as a reminder, long after
the fact.

But the pain lingered.

She sat in the dust-swept shrine all night, staring at her left hand as she
flexed it open and closed, again and again. Her ring, the band of onyx that
had bound his vow to hers, glimmered in whatever faint light the moons and
stars shed, displaying its faint silver etching of the Kayen sigil.

Mladen had given her too much to consider, but she had asked the hard
questions - the ones that had kept her up in the night - and then she had
turned her anger on him. Perhaps it had been petty of her but she could
find no forgiveness, no gentled understanding in herself to give to the man.
Not for his deceased daughter, not for any pain or regret that might still
linger in him.

He had had a choice, even as Reklah had had a choice, even as she had had a choice.

Perhaps they had all chosen wrong.

..did he go into the arena knowing he was outmatched..

...many told him so...

She closed her eyes against the words, what they seemed to mean, and for
perhaps the first time since she had come to love the man, she felt a
tendril of wavering anger ignite at what Reklah Kayen had done.

"Lord, forgive me."

Sparring

Just a brief side track; Shadow Knight, Reklah Kayen, sparring with his wife, Nymaya Kayen, a ranger (long before his death).

Their eyes met and held; dark blue and luminous brown. From inches away
they stared at each other while bared steel held them at bay.

They had never sparred quite like this before but it brought back to her a
sense of driving youth, the energy in her soul that had taken her so far
among the elves of Shalonesti.

He was stronger but she was agile and no stranger to battle so, when he
forced her back she moved with graceful speed. He followed of course and a
series of metallic strikes rang out and echoed through the chamber as she
parried and struck back skillfully.

The training came back to her, as it always did. It wasn't something she
could entirely forget and she used as much of it as she could to advantage.
She was certain that he surpassed her, she could see it and feel it in
the speed and strength of his sword strokes, but she had been successful so
far in keeping up with him.

Too much thinking. She growled softly to herself and abruptly took the
offensive, battling him back a few steps. There was a clear look of
concentration upon his features that only deepened as their spar slowly
became more violent. He put into it as much, if not more, then she did and
there came a point when she briefly wondered if either of them would stop
before a sword pierced something vital.

At some point, the spar had become less an exercise and more like an
explosion of built up aggression. She could feel impotent frustration and
anger like a weight on her shoulders and clearly noted the shift in his
appearance as his brow creased and his gaze intensified.

There simply came a point when there was no real grace to their movements,
just an outward passion that saw them exerting brutal force against each
other with each clash of their weapons. It didn't last though. His strength,
his skill, was simply greater then hers and with efficient mastery he sent one
of her blades clattering to the ground, let fall his own blade and abruptly
grabbed her upper arms to press her none too gently against the wall.

Holding her there, gazes inches apart again, she became aware that each
labored breath she took sounded more like a feral growl. Heat rolled off
his body, only adding to her own as she shook with exertion and abruptly their lips met in a torrid kiss that lasted only seconds before he drew back and said in a winded tone. "Calm down."

He then released her just as abruptly and turned to pace away. She let her
second blade clatter to the ground along with the first and brushed her
hands over her face and back through her hair.

"I have to work on that." She whispered apologetically, to which he
answered, "We will."

No Rest on the Brink ( Kwars )

She stood to the right of the large iron gate, leaning idly against the
tower itself. The late day shadows had stretched across the sandy ground,
lending a much needed break from the dry heat that wafted up from the
ground.

The Bakali were out there in the distance, but it was beyond them that she
found her gaze settled. She had walked the paths out there time and again
to reach Storm Keep and had watched, time and again, as Reklah disappeared
into the blistering heat and sands as he returned.

An abrupt ache began to throb through her left hand at the thought,
following the line of the scar that had torn a ragged path from the palm to
mid-wrist. She had sustained the wound for Arinas Schwartz, in Necrucifer's
name. It struck her as appropriate. She had shed blood willingly for
Shalonesti to prove herself, it stood to reason that, for the duty she oft
found herself employed in, it be the same elsewhere.

She had also been an exiled elf of Shalonesti about to walk into a world
ruled by humans of the dark pantheon then. She hadn't been prepared for
that, no matter how many of them she had come to know throughout her
lifetime.

Setting the memories aside as best she could, she tore her eyes from the
dunes to gaze down at her left hand. The pain was increasing with each
throb, a thing it had never done before. It creased her brow and with
growing concern, she uncoiled her arms from across her chest and slowly
peeled her leather glove off.

...to find that the white gash of the scar had reopened.

Blood spilled down her arm and her hand, dripping from her fingers to pool
on the sand below, and pain coursed up through the rest of her arm as if the
blade were ripping its ragged path into her flesh again.

* * *

She awoke with the nails of her left hand dug painfully deep into her palm
and a dull ache coursing through each of her scars. Confusion held her in
thrall for a handful of moments before she managed to push herself up from
the bed. She hadn't bothered to dress for sleep, not with war so close on
the horizon, and she was paying the price for that now.

Sore through and through, she rubbed her right hand back along her neck and looked to the window. A gentle, cool breeze was ruffling the curtains and the faint light without told her that she'd only gotten two, maybe three hours of rest at most.

Sighing heavily, she arose, grimacing at the shallow crack along her spine
when she straightened and grabbed up her weapons and baldric.

If she wasn't going to be allowed much rest, the least she could do was make
herself useful by walking the escape routes again. She knew them
blindfolded now - but her archers could always use the refresher.

One Duty ( Kwars )

Perhaps they knew her name.

Perhaps they knew some reputation she may have gleaned during her tenure in Shalonesti, in Verminasia.

Or perhaps someone had told them who she had been and what she had become, for when she stepped up to the line of archers, all dressed and arrayed in armor befitting New Thalosian troops, not one held her gaze. Not one moved beyond what it took to breathe air into their lungs and expel it.

There was a time when she might have been chastened by such behavior, set
aback even, but the storm was coming and fear was her ally. Leniency had
proven a tactic to be used sparingly and in her case, had led to the most
profound betrayal she couldn't have conceived of.

There would be no mercy for any of these men and women if they failed. She
had one duty; to protect the royal family. Their failure would be her
failure - and that was unacceptable.

She did little more then walk through their tight formation, taking in their
armor, their expressions. She spoke no words, she told them at a glance
what her intentions were, what they were there to do until she deemed
otherwise.

And when she was certain that the tension had strung itself tight enough to
break, she stopped at the head of the columns to face the men and women of
the Fourth Thalosian Archers.

"You have one duty." She said in a quiet tone, devoid of any warmth,
gazing hard over the archers before her. "One. Duty. Tell me what it is."

"To protect the royal family."

The cacophony of their voices rising together to proclaim the only thing she
had asked to hear, was pleasing.

"Good." She whispered softly, falling silent in the wake of remembered
words she had already spoken to the Sultana.

..I won't fail you..

Tilting her head back to gaze up at the night's canopy and the myriad stars
that dotted the sky like tiny diamonds, she could only pray that she was
truly up to the task. That these men and women could take their task as
seriously as they needed to, should the worst befall the Desert Jewel.

'Lord...let it be so.'

Dissonance

The chessboard was crystal and set on either side with clear and white frosted pieces. The board itself mirrored the crystal of its pieces and sat upon a pedestal of black and white, stark and clearly out of place in the middle of the sands that stretched for countless miles in either direction.

So bright was the sun that she could barely see beyond the chess board. It became the focal point of her world and she approached it with all the uncertainty that had long ago taken over who she was, that had smothered who she had been.

She looked to the frosted pieces, but she knew that that was not her side of the board. Not anymore.

She looked to the clear pieces and found the direction she desired, but her gaze inevitably turned to the center of the board. No move had yet been made, the pawns lined up pristine and waiting upon their individual squares. It seemed right that it be thus, though she could remember the last time she had seen this chessboard.

The pieces had been lying upon the ground, scattered in an apparent rage.

She blinked, her eyes stinging in the light, and beheld again the chessboard as it sat before her, its pieces arrayed and prepared for battle. She reached forward, impulsively, for the clear Knight nearest her but when her fingers closed on nothing she drew her hand back.

There was no clear Knight.

...though the opposing white Knight had drawn forward, to sit alone in the middle of the board.

* * *

She awoke with a start, though it did not hold the same sort of violence that accompanied her typical nightmares. She had long gotten used to them, used to waking in such a manner, though it never became any easier to find herself alone at such times.

The difference, this time, seemed to lie in the air.

The desert was there, dry and warm, instead of the empty hallways. There was no rain pattering upon her window, no forest scent, and though the chill that had long ago set its claws in her remained an ever present sensation, she dared to hope that the desert might help banish it. That it might return color and life to her world.

She slid from the bed and padded across the room, grabbing up a light robe to drape around herself as she did so, and listened at the window without surprise to the sounds of a kingdom at war - even in the dead of night.

It was one thing to witness it in Verminasia, the dark city never seemed to sleep even when war was not on the horizon, but in New Thalos, it struck her as out of place.

A dissonance in paradise.

It was no wonder she was dreaming of chessboards, though the connotations of her dream left her feeling restless.

Change

The creak of rough leather being crushed and stretched was a soft counterpart to the low crackle of a fire and the patter of rain against a window pane.

Nymaya sat hunched upon the edge of her window seat, the soggy lands of Iagothal stretching out in a mist-shrouded view from beyond the clear glass, slowly flexing her hand around the frayed remnants of her glove. The leather had lasted a good long while but, like to everything in her life of late, it needed to change. She needed new gloves, she needed new armor. New weapons, new everything.

She closed her blue gaze to the sight before slowly peeling the gloves off and casually tossing them into the hearth that blazed off to her right. Her hair was a curtain of silver that veiled her face as she lowered her head to run her hand back through the straight strands, so many questions racing through her mind.

There were only three people in all the world who had answers for her, and two of them were dead. The third, and she gave this one great consideration, would have what she was seeking but she could admit to herself that she feared the answer. There were not many people left who understood her so well...

"Countess."

The voice was soft, just this side of timid, and she lifted her head to affix the servant with a questioning gaze. A delicate hand held a fluted glass of deep red wine out to her. It was not a normal occurrence and red wine had never been her drink of choice. Against all this, she found herself reaching out to take the thin crystal stem.

The servant took hold of her black skirts and, after a practiced curtsy, departed the room. Nymaya watched her long black hair disappear around the door to the parlor and upon her first sip of the dry-tasting liquid, the soft notes of a piano drifted to her from down the hall.

She had never touched the expensive, beautiful instrument - and should have been angry that one of her staff would so boldly do so without permission - but she couldn't be angry at the grace she heard in the melody. At the depth of heartache and power that rose and fell with the flow of the music.

Turning away from the door, she set her faraway gaze on the sodden land outside the window while balancing the wine glass on her knee, and touched her fingers to the cooled glass, feeling the weight of her wedding band. Shewould find the burial site of her husband first, all else could wait.