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Suffer the great death
Sibatti
Mamba dur NayaAmidst vibrant flora and trees
It's been a long time coming! Enjoy
(TW: gore)
"I'm thinking about it," Lin admits. With her hair draping aroud your face, she nudges her head repeatedly into your hand, until the stimulation proves too much, necessitating a nip of the teeth on one of your fingers. "I want to go back to it," she says around your digit, letting go to invite your touch again. "Sometimes I want to try to wear my old skin, if only for a little while."
You have emoted: Sibatti's affections are plentiful and generous, and she'll move her claws lightly over your face and neck aimlessly as she listens and responds in kind, tracing foreign letters against skin. "What do you mean by your old skin? How would you do that?"
Lin dislodges an arm from the crowded huddle of your bodies, thoughtfully running her sharp-nailed thumb down its length, following the creases of musculature. The skin splits, and bloodlessly petals open, revealing layers of unnatural-looking flesh, striated with myriad veins. "I made this - all I have to do is take a little off the top."
You have emoted: "WHAT--" Sibatti's eyes go wide and she scrambles away from Lin's arm in surprise and shock, only really accomplishing a bumping of heads and a scratch of claws against in-the-way limbs.
Careful not to jostle her seemingly mutilated limb, Lin tries her best to pen you in, uttering a stiff-edged "Hrrk--" as she catches nails to the throat. "Esry, Esry, wait- wait- wait-- it's okay, look."
You have emoted: Doing as told, Sibatti freezes in place, her arms juxtaposed in an uncomfortable twisting away. Her eyes look in the direction of Lin's arm, still wide-eyed, only the pant of her breath moving her.
"Esrytesh, sweet demon..." Lin laughs over a layer of husky breath, her adrenaline shot up a level or two in light of your startled-cat act. With seemingly little effort on her part, she appears to will her flesh to knit together - fibrous spans of sinew and skin reach out like outstretched arms in miniature, pulling and reshaping. "You know what I am. I suffered the great death all of my kind go through. It is a journey with many advantages."
"So if I want to take a 'vacation' in my old body... that's but a few weeks of work," Lin hums, tapping your chin with her thumb.
You have emoted: Sibatti's palm glides over the resealed flesh of Lin's arm wondrously, spellbound. "I ... have only ever been given bodies by the Keepers," she confesses, her voice awed and a touch envious. "First Omei and then, Damariel. Part of me went into it, but They were the catalyst in either instance."
Lin goes for your neck, in a quite possessive spreaded-hand gesture, one that would be threatening were it not so sensuous, so gentle. "That they made you so carefully is a testament to Their benevolent sides," she says. "To touch you is to worship Them - one of the few avenues of worship I have left."
You have emoted: A few different emotions war visibly for dominance on Sibatti's countenance. She squirms a bit, her body writhing beneath yours and the muscles of her neck flexing instinctively. "But you can make yourself. Isn't that better?"
"It's better in every way," Lin whispers, putting on a smile dripping with pride. Perhaps she's showing off; perhaps she's trying to gross you out; perhaps she's simply forgotten to keep herself together in certain ways, but glancing at various regions of her body too long reveals the ghosts of seams, of joints come undone, or shapes like mouths where there shouldn't be mouths. "But I spent most of my life as putty for the Gods to mold. Now, no matter how much They might change me... They can't affect me down in my core."
You have emoted: Sibatti's eyes might as well be glowing with envy, lust, any and all related shades of emotion. They flit to the small parts of Lin reshaping themselves before her eyes - far from disgusted, she is. "That's.....how did you get it?"
Lin is stricken quiet for a while. Her tongue works around behind her lip, a classic tell: she's formulating a response. She laughs a little, then, just a puff or two through her nose, and cocks her head, as if weighing whether or not she should say it.
"Mmmm... I killed myself," Lin says.
You have emoted: Sibatti sits up abruptly, barely missing Lin's head as she gets to eye-level with you. Her brow has lowered into a frown - not one of concern, but ferocity and fervor. "Tell me," she says quietly. It's an order, not a plea.
Sibatti just thought:
[You can feel her heartbeat, you can smell the blood rushing through her wildly].
Lin has to sink back just to make room for you, not scared or cowed, but certainly given occasion to reframe you with a certain indefinable respect. "This isn't like you, Esry." For a while, all she does is stare at you at point-blank range, the side of her face sharp and bright in the sun's rising light. "It is the great death, the destruction of the self that all Idrethi are born from."
You have emoted: Sibatti follows your retreating form, both of her hands gripping either of your biceps firmly. She rises up onto her knees, her tail lashing violently in the small space she previously occupied. "But what does it -mean-?" she insists. "What is the great death?"
Lin is too big to jostle so easily; someone walking into the room might compare the scene to a tiger cub shaking her mother. But she treats your insistence with due respect and deference, setting aside the playful demeanor, and slipping into a lectorial role. "I died, deliberately and by my own hand, and I refused to let my soul be weighed. When I did it, I took with me a single directive. I willed it so hard, that in death, I remembered it."
"'Undo it,' I said to myself. And for what felt like -centuries-, I tried. I had to remember what it meant to see. I needed eyes, but those eyes needed to move. They needed lubricated bearings, they needed nerves. Nerves needed blood and protective tissue..." Lin continues.
You have emoted: Sibatti's frenetic energy is put on hold as she stares at Lin, listening. Her grip remains, but no further pressing or prodding comes from her hands. Her more animal-like features twitch and pull at various times, as if on high alert.
Sibatti just thought:
Am I... crazy for thinking about this?
Little by little, the rounded inner slope of the alcove does its work. Gradually Lin begins to sink, but it's almost too slow to notice. your weight on her arms helps things along. "Imagine it, Esrytesh," she bids, her eyes wide open, bled for a moment of emotion, as she puts herself in a mental state she must not have occupied for a long time. "Imagine what it takes to make a body. Imagine how many mechanisms exist just to hold my arms the way you're doing. Imagine what contrivances you would have to put together, in -just- the right way, for me to say these words to you."
"For you to hear them," Lin says. "I could perceive nothing else. I had all the time in the world."
You have emoted: "But you're free," Sibatti says, a question of sort asking for confirmation.
Lin just thought:
[As she is made to recall it, she analyzes herself, makes a quick critique. How on the next attempt, she might thin her thighs. Add a vertebrae. Give her heart more bloodflow...].
"It's... perhaps superficial," Lin answers, casting her eyes to the brilliant view outside. Presently there is an unusually outsized trade ship schoonering around the harbor, looking for a viable place to dock amidst crowded moorings. "It didn't keep me from Chakrasul's eyes. I am not immune to divine fire. But knowing that... knowing that ultimately, I can -undo- these things..."
Lin's eyes return to you, sharply.
You have emoted: Either of Sibatti's hands slide up to Lin's wrists, finding her hands, and she props one leg up as if getting ready to stand. "Come with me," she urges.
"What's gotten into you," Lin laughs, nonetheless letting you guide her, pushing, waiting for you to give her a way out of the alcove.
You have emoted: "Is Her lake still.... is it still...." Sibatti stops short, turning around to ask Lin a half-formed question.
"You've avoided the Morgun, haven't you," Lin says. "She still has a lake, but I doubt you'd recognize it."
You say, in Fae, "Then I supposed it doesn't matter, does it."
<<Moving>>
Lin follows you to the southeast.
Grotesque Shrine in Ithmia forest.
The sun shines down warmly from the cloudless sky, standing at the apex of its arc through the heavens. Carved from the blackened bole of a stunted and malformed tree before you is a leering shrine in which a grotesque little idol has been placed. The blackened and slimy tree bole is smeared with blood, which over the years has formed a caked rusted crust about the fanged idols gaping mouth which it laps up greedily. You stand aghast at this awful sight, amid the proliferation of twisted trees, and wonder as to what foul purpose this serves. An obsidian statue of a strange woman lies here. Sprawling lupin grows here, blanketing the area in feathered purple. New growth defiantly sprouts from long-dead earth, brilliant vines winding up the statue's span.
You see a single exit leading northwest.
Fully life-sized, this statue is formed entirely from a single piece of obsidian, carved into a human shape so lifelike as to be a trifle unsettling. A woman, bare-skinned and empty-handed, sits crumpled up with her eyes raised to the sky. Her hands curl close to her chest to clasp something there that has since been lost. Below her fingers, the statue is split open with terrible violence, her chest and abdomen ruined as if blown out from within. Her lips are parted, her eyes open, the look on her black, frozen face one of purest yearning - now only providing cups of eyes and mouth, which the sky fills with rain.
Lin begins to show signs of consternation when you lead her through the northern reaches of the Ithmia. As soon as she turns the right corner, passes the right tree, she grows downright worried. "Esry? Why are we--" Clearing her throat, she is made to stand face-to-face with the statue.
You have emoted: Sibatti's demeanor is calm, her walk sinuous and slow. She turns around again, this time with a look of rapture in her eyes, leaning in to intertwine all of the fingers of her hands into yours. "Here," she decides.
Lin just thought:
"Clear your mind. Trust her."
Sibatti just thought:
[Her mind is possessed with something - a singular notion].
Lin squeezes your hands, expressing just a hint of anxiousness in the way she makes your knuckles flex painfully. She devotes only a second or two to glancing around once more, seeming to accept that she doesn't need to know why the two of you are here. "I see you," she says, by way of conciliation.
You have emoted: Sibatti releases Lin's hands, retreating back into the nook where the shrine has occupied for countless years. Her ears are perked up into their highest point, nearly straight upwards, and her tail is resting perfectly in the center of her form, barely touching the forest floor. Not yet facing Lin, she asks, "See me this one last time?"
"One last--" Lin swallows. "Esry. Esry?" She starts after you, taking a step closer, expelling a loud breath through her nostrils. "Esry?"
Your telepathic efforts are successful, and the mind of Lin is locked with your own.
You use Telepathy Command on Lin.
[SND] You: HIT command Lin!
[SND] Equilibrium: 3.00s.
Lin sits down.
You have emoted: "Don't, Lin." An initial sharpness is in Sibatti's tone, glancing over her shoulder as you are suddenly impelled to sit down. From where you sit, you can only see that she has something in her hand - the flaring hilt of a green-gold blonze blade. "And don't let anyone bring me back."
Lin lands on her ass as if pushed down by an unseen God's hand. She could get up, could spring after you, but it is perhaps a sense of futility that keeps her rooted to the forest floor. "Esrytesh, you can't just..." Her tongue flickers as the words die on her lips. A pair of tears roll down her face, despite her struggling, encouraged expression. "Godspit and shit, you can. Are... are you going to be safe?"
Turning back away from you, you say, "Guard my body until I return."
(dur Naya): You say, "Don't be alarmed."
Grimacing at the task ahead, you raise the dagger up high before plunging it straight into your chest. A mad cackling immediately fills the air as the skeletal face upon the dagger leers at you and saps your essence. As your strength rapidly fails, you fall to the ground in a dying heap, your form reverting into a Tekal once more.
You have been slain by misadventure.
The Hall of the Underking.
The Soul Mirror looms forbiddingly, its oval surface bounded in pale alabaster.
You see exits leading north, east, south, and west.
You have set a new description. This is how you will now appear:
She is a resilient Tekal looking quite empty in the eyes. Her dove grey skin is smooth and dewy, shifting into warmer ruddiness where the skin is naturally thinner and lending color to her otherwise muted appearance. Several tattoos adorn her visible flesh, her inner thighs bedecked with Teshen scripture, and parallel formations in pointillism decorating the inside of both forearms. Hair of a muted, red-blonde hue adds a touch of warmth to her otherwise cold facial features, like the first tendrils of dawn on a cold morning. It's cropped at chin-length, thick and wavy and eternally messy. Angular and sharp, her mien boasts thin lips and almond-shaped eyes of grey. A black tattoo of curlicues and jagged lines outlines both eyes, further hardening her somber expression.
<<Moving>>
Grotesque Shrine in Ithmia forest.
The sun shines down warmly from the cloudless sky, standing at the apex of its arc through the heavens. Carved from the blackened bole of a stunted and malformed tree before you is a leering shrine in which a grotesque little idol has been placed. The blackened and slimy tree bole is smeared with blood, which over the years has formed a caked rusted crust about the fanged idols gaping mouth which it laps up greedily. You stand aghast at this awful sight, amid the proliferation of twisted trees, and wonder as to what foul purpose this serves. An obsidian statue of a strange woman lies here.Lin stands in the middle of the clearing, carrying a dead body in her arms. Sprawling lupin grows here, blanketing the area in feathered purple. New growth defiantly sprouts from long-dead earth, brilliant vines winding up the statue's span.
You see a single exit leading northwest.
You have emoted: Sibatti walks out from behind a tree in silence, devoid of armaments or clothing. She is as you've never seen her before.
Lin just thought:
[She knows what is happening. She has seen it countless times. But the matter of -who- it is happening to is what keeps her from moving her mouth.]
Lin drops her arms to her sides. To her credit, she doesn't freak out, nor dissolve into hysterics. She doesn't seem especially worried. She wears an unsteady smile and hopeful eyes, eyes which drip tears at a slow, endless pace. She tries to speak at first, but she can only creak, some form of deep emotion stilling her tongue.
Lin just thought:
"Why did you do it?"
You have emoted: Sibatti approaches Lin somberly, her eyes searching for something she expects to be on the ground. "Where is it?" she asks. There's no immediate reaction to the visible emotions on Lin's features.
Wordlessly, Lin steps aside, her head bowed, held seemingly under a ritualistic sway. There is the corpse of Sibatti, right where the deed would have been done.
A giant bull eland's nose goes to the ground, picking up the noticeable differences in scent between the Yeleni body on the ground and the living Tekal before you both.
You have emoted: Nodding at Lin once, Sibatti goes to the corpse of her former self and crouches next to it, one knee raised. She contains all of her former grace, but none of the feral parts of before: the entire movement feels abnormally normal, and lacking in extravagance.
Lin sniffs repeatedly at the air, beginning to back away, slowly. Her ears cantilever forward, and though she is careful not to snarl, she frequently shows her teeth. Her tail bristles thickly, proving pathologically unable to lie. The enormity of the situation is beginning to really sink in. She hasn't said a word, rendered mute and animalistic, reacting as if a stranger were showing too much interest in her beloved mate's corpse.
You have emoted: "Really is a beautiful body," Sibatti comments wistfully. Her hand, nails trimmed neatly and short, runs over the dusky bronze skin of the Yeleni body reverentially. Her eyes finally flick to Lin, seeking her eyes to lock in on.
"Nnngh-- rrrgh," Lin growls aloud, the first sound she's made in minutes. The instant you makes eye contact, she starts forward, seemingly prepared for violence, but bobs backward before she can commit to anything regretful. This plays out again and again. She is like a dog who cannot decide whether to seek affection or to harm, her instincts all muddled.
Lin just thought:
[Her thoughts are distressingly blank of syntax or inherent meaning, given over completely to lower instincts. And these instincts are going completely haywire - she emanates feelings of utmost distress.]
You have emoted: The eyes that look up from Sibatti's face are empty and hollow, which makes the wry half-smile she wears next all the more eerie. Slowly, she picks up the dropped bronze dagger and rises back to her full height, holding it meaningfully within both hands.
<<Me realizing I can't decap with a dagger
>>
You have emoted: Sibatti frowns at something, holding out her hand to Lin. "Axe."
Through what seems like tremendous mental effort, complete with grit teeth and a bead of sweat on her brow, Lin recovers some semblance of control. As if afraid that she could somehow hurt you, she approaches, but lowers herself to her knees, trying to keep her hands planted on the ground. "Axe," she repeats, in a breathless voice.
Lin gives a throwing axe to you.
You start to wield a throwing axe in your right hand.
You begin chopping away at the corpse of Sibatti with a throwing axe.
You finally manage to sever the head from the body, leaving only a pool of blood where the head had been.
You have emoted: Without another word, Sibatti brings the axe down on her former body, right on the neck. It's done with shockingly quick efficiency, the cleanness of the act shoring up any revulsion that might come from the shock of doing it.
You quickly toss a throwing axe to Lin, who catches it nimbly.
Lin retches, her back heaving, valiantly keeping in her lunch, but not without considerable effort. "It isn't you any longer," she hisses, spreading her hand across her mouth, speaking through the gaps between her fingers. And again: "It isn't you. It isn't you. It isn't you..."
You have emoted: Kneeling back down, Sibatti cradles the head between both hands gently, fingers spreading over the lower mandible and staring into her own countenance. Hunched over as she is, hands and skin splattered with blood, staring into a face that is hers-and-not-hers, an onlooker might think they've stumbled onto a madwoman. She exhales loudly through her nostrils and says, at long last, "Skulls need time to dry out." A token fact spoken with no further explanation.
Through a mask of nigh-perpetual queasiness, Lin brings her eyes back to the tableau before her. you is right there, in the flesh, but she can't stop looking into the dead and frozen face she was kissing, not too long ago. "It-- it needs a place th- that sees much... much sunlight," she stammers, her tears coming faster and faster, but failing to alter her face, making no apparent effect on her expression. "Please... let me keep the rest of the body in-- in my crypt."
You have emoted: "Why?" Sibatti's head turns toward Lin, the only part of her body that moves aside from her fingers. They continue to toy with the skin of the decapitated head, stretching and pulling at it, testing elasticity.
"I can't-- nnf-- I--" Lin startles, impatiently wiping her nose clear, apparently surprised to find herself crying. "C- can't just... l- let it lie there, it isn't right." Skulking on her hands and knees, she comes inches closer, but something about the intensity of your gaze, the newness and uncertainty of you as a creature, keeps her from simply taking what she wants.
Lin just thought:
[Grief. Grief. Immediate. Overwhelming. Too much. Pushing against a closed door.]
You have emoted: Sibatti holds the decapitated head of herself under one arm, like one would carry a basket, and crouch-walks a step or two closer to Lin to meet her halfway. "Of course we will not leave it. It will be buried in my temple, properly. Would you like to go?" The tone of her voice is nigh-jovial.
You pick up the decapitated head of Sibatti.
"This is cruel," Lin croaks, her voice breaking, her eyes filling profusely. She reaches past you, lurching over the body, her hands venturing over curves and contours that have long since encoded themselves into her muscle memory. Openly she weeps as she lifts the lifeless and headless corpse, holding it against her chest, fighting her way blindly to her feet.
Lin picks up a headless corpse.
Lin begins to follow you.
You say, in Mhun, "Mheribus."
You raise your lantern as a ghostly fog creeps in, its light illuminating the thick cloud. With a
slow, careful sway of the beacon, the fog melds with your surroundings and disperses shortly
afterward to reveal a different environ.
Lin follows you to the ether.
Ruined temple within a lush rainforest.
You find the weather around you imperceptible. A small cacao tree flourishes here, bearing many ripened cacao pods.
You see exits leading north, northeast, east, southeast, south, southwest, west, northwest, up, down, in, and out.
Lin just thought:
"Should be celebrating. Should feel overjoyed."
You have emoted: "I am sorry, my love." It's the first sign of warmth and caring exhibited from Sibatti all evening, but it's impossible to read the emotion in her empty gaze. "I did not anticipate this reaction." You both exit the fog into a familiar landscape - dead ahead is the soft earth of the mound in the center of the temple grounds, swollen with overgrowth and bodies buried ritualistically over the years. "Please do me this one favor, and I will not ask of you any more." She stares at the burial mound, falling silent.
Lin follows behind, carrying the corpse flush to her chest, a grim swathe of blood waterfalling down the left side of her body. She weeps in silence, partially in embarrassment, partially in a purely physical grief. She lays the body down to the earth, cradling what is left of its neck, her claws stuck in the leotard clinging to its skin. There she remains, on her knees in the dirt and grass, existing more or less in a state of shock.
You have emoted: You hear Sibatti's footsteps come up behind you, soft and nearly soundless against the soft earth. She waits, affording Lin whatever space and time she needs to complete the task.
Softly, like a reminder, you say, in Mhun, "Entesh, untesh."
Lin employs her claws to the task. They are long, sharp, made for slashing flesh, wholly unsuited for digging; it is not a task made easier by her constant, obstinate weeping. Beneath the shade trees, in the cool air, she marks out a hole for what was once your body, working until she has been made short of breath, until the time comes to fill it. And with that same delicate care, she lifts the corpse in filthied hands, setting it gently into its resting place.
Lin the Rojalli hisses something in an arcane tongue, sparks crackling between their teeth.
You have emoted: Sibatti drops onto her knees next to Lin, not sitting back on her legs just yet. She surveys the scene, listening to Lin's prayer without seeming to comprehend any of it.
Sibatti just thought:
You are strong, my love. You can do this.
Lin pulls back great armfuls of earth over a headless corpse, ensuring it is covered completely, then spends a little while tamping the soil down with the broad, flat planes of her palms. She continues on in that language in the midst of her labors, and you do not need to speak it to recognize the finality in her voice, a portent of affairs settled, of something done and set to rest.
It is like a switch has turned off in Lin's head. Now that she no longer has to -see- the remembered shape of her lover, her mate, she can steady herself with a thick, deep breath, clearing her nose with a powerful snort.
You have emoted: You feel a hand on your shoulder. Sibatti's touch is warm, her squeeze gentle. "You honor me," she says under her breath.
"I-- I'm overjoyed," Lin gasps, reaching up to cover your hand, and inevitably dirtying it with an unlovely mixture of fresh dirt and fresh blood. "This is a momentuous occasion for you. I just-- I just couldn't bear..."
You have emoted: Sibatti rises to her feet while holding Lin's hand, helping her up as well, if you so choose. "There is just one thing left to do..." She will keep your hand as long as you let her, and close her eyes.
Lin just thought:
[At least she can think.] "My sweet demon..."
Lin pushes her way to her feet, dwarfing your hand in her own - that much has not changed. Looking like the accomplice to a murder, she clears her nose once more, gazing down at the fresh burial at her feet. No questions, no interruptions from her. She shoots you a sidelong glance.
Sibatti just thought:
Undo it. Make the eyes. Protect the flesh. Remember the form.
Sibatti just thought:
Suffer the great death.
"There is terror in this," Lin says. She squeezes your hand once, but leaves it to you to let go. "It is not enjoyable."
You have emoted: There's a quiet sigh that finally escapes from Sibatti, a long and soulful sigh that seems to come up from her stomach, sinking her grey form down as if crumpling in on itself. Her hand slips away from yours and she continues to sink down, down to the earth like a deflating balloon.
Sibatti just thought:
Remember the form.
Sibatti just thought:
Suffer the great death.
(dur Naya): You say, "Same thing."
Lin backs away once, twice, then thrice, in slow and careful steps. This time she does not avert her eyes.
Inhaling sharply, you raise your arms beside you, bringing them up above your head as if conducting an orchestra. Cocking your head to the side, you close your eyes and begin to concentrate upon a distant, focal point within yourself. Completely unbeknownst to you, the shadow cast by your frame suddenly jerks to life, slithering from your connecting feet upwards, seemingly guided by a mind of its own. Inky tendrils that form the insubstantial hands of your shadow sink deep into your chest, causing your eyelids to flicker open as you gasp at the sharp pain that resonates from the very fibres of your being. Completely ignorant of you, the formless figment continues its relentless motions, before finally fading away into nothingness. For a moment or two, nothing seems to happen, before agonizing pain ripples through your body. You feel your chest being torn apart, then reformed and re-molded with your plentiful reserves of essence deep within. As the pain ebbs, you are assailed with the realization that you have embraced your new, destructive form as Azudim.
The skies darken momentarily as tendrils of shadow creep across the firmament to form the terrible visage of the Azudim, Sibatti.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Esrytesh Sibatti dur Naya
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
She shrived away her restraints and forever chases death amidst the Wild Hunt.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
She is a resilient Azudim of Mhun heritage giving off an aura of inertia and rationed energy, her mannerisms plotted out and deliberate. Her dove grey skin is smooth and dewy, shifting into warmer ruddiness where the skin is naturally thinner and lending color to her otherwise muted appearance. Several tattoos adorn her visible flesh, her inner thighs bedecked with Teshen scripture, and parallel formations in pointillism decorating the inside of both forearms. A snakelike tail follows her at a great and trailing length, ending in a riot of colored quetzal feathers sweeping out in a dramatic fin shape. Small feet and fists end in wicked dark claws, and a black stain against her flesh travels inward to ankles and wrists before ghosting into ash. Slender and willowy, her height is supplemented by a pair of great charcoal horns, spiraling out from the crown of her head like an eland's and decorated with dangling fetishes and hallowed charms. Thick, loose waves of hair are woven together into a messy, unkempt side braid trailing down to her hip, dotted with mint green phosphorescent flowers. The blend of hues in her hair is reminiscent of skysilver, uniformly silver while being nuanced with traces of cool pastels. The same nuances are present in her exotic almond-shaped eyes, the color of a storm with slits of blue and green speckling them. They are made somewhat alien and hardened by the addition of black-inked tattoos, forming sweeping curlicues and jagged lines. A third eye, vertically slit, sits between her angled brows, pale and pupilless and suffused with otherworldly insight.
You have emoted: Still crouching on the ground, Sibatti carefully unfurls her limbs like a flower speeding into bloom. Long, lean limbs and an even longer tail spread out, giving breadth and height to a willowy and slender form heightened by a pair of spiraling eland's horns.
(dur Naya): Aisling says, "What is happening?"
A giant bull eland snorts, unimpressed.
(dur Naya): You say, "Change."
(dur Naya): Aisling says, "Are you okay?"
(dur Naya): You say, "Think so."
Lin swallows thickly once more, bidden to come closer, sniffing at the air in your direction. Her tail snaps to and fro, betraying an emotional state that has run roughshod from one end of the spectrum to the other. "Look at you..." she whispers. "You didn't-- it wasn't the same, you're not--" Stooping over at the waist, she whirls around you, loping in a circle. "You're not what I am. What-- what did you do?"
Lin just thought:
"Like a beautiful dagger..."
Lin just thought:
[The urge to feel those claws on her skin is overwhelming.]
You tense your muscles, extending your claws to their full, fearsome length.
You have emoted: "I don't know," Sibatti answers genuinely. Her voice is unchanged - containing that same, sandpaper-like quality as ever. Her eyes are on you, gauging your reaction, rather than looking at herself. "I thought I was... doing it right. I did what you told me to do...."
So fascinated is she with your transformation, you could think Lin had forgotten she is trampling her mate's own grave. The tears have etched deep red lines into her face, but she's too filled with wonder to look miserable. At last she closes the distance, never once letting her eyes stray from your, not until she's close enough to smell you, which she does in a long, drawn-out inhalation.
"You smell like death," Lin whispers.
(TW: gore)
"I'm thinking about it," Lin admits. With her hair draping aroud your face, she nudges her head repeatedly into your hand, until the stimulation proves too much, necessitating a nip of the teeth on one of your fingers. "I want to go back to it," she says around your digit, letting go to invite your touch again. "Sometimes I want to try to wear my old skin, if only for a little while."
You have emoted: Sibatti's affections are plentiful and generous, and she'll move her claws lightly over your face and neck aimlessly as she listens and responds in kind, tracing foreign letters against skin. "What do you mean by your old skin? How would you do that?"
Lin dislodges an arm from the crowded huddle of your bodies, thoughtfully running her sharp-nailed thumb down its length, following the creases of musculature. The skin splits, and bloodlessly petals open, revealing layers of unnatural-looking flesh, striated with myriad veins. "I made this - all I have to do is take a little off the top."
You have emoted: "WHAT--" Sibatti's eyes go wide and she scrambles away from Lin's arm in surprise and shock, only really accomplishing a bumping of heads and a scratch of claws against in-the-way limbs.
Careful not to jostle her seemingly mutilated limb, Lin tries her best to pen you in, uttering a stiff-edged "Hrrk--" as she catches nails to the throat. "Esry, Esry, wait- wait- wait-- it's okay, look."
You have emoted: Doing as told, Sibatti freezes in place, her arms juxtaposed in an uncomfortable twisting away. Her eyes look in the direction of Lin's arm, still wide-eyed, only the pant of her breath moving her.
"Esrytesh, sweet demon..." Lin laughs over a layer of husky breath, her adrenaline shot up a level or two in light of your startled-cat act. With seemingly little effort on her part, she appears to will her flesh to knit together - fibrous spans of sinew and skin reach out like outstretched arms in miniature, pulling and reshaping. "You know what I am. I suffered the great death all of my kind go through. It is a journey with many advantages."
"So if I want to take a 'vacation' in my old body... that's but a few weeks of work," Lin hums, tapping your chin with her thumb.
You have emoted: Sibatti's palm glides over the resealed flesh of Lin's arm wondrously, spellbound. "I ... have only ever been given bodies by the Keepers," she confesses, her voice awed and a touch envious. "First Omei and then, Damariel. Part of me went into it, but They were the catalyst in either instance."
Lin goes for your neck, in a quite possessive spreaded-hand gesture, one that would be threatening were it not so sensuous, so gentle. "That they made you so carefully is a testament to Their benevolent sides," she says. "To touch you is to worship Them - one of the few avenues of worship I have left."
You have emoted: A few different emotions war visibly for dominance on Sibatti's countenance. She squirms a bit, her body writhing beneath yours and the muscles of her neck flexing instinctively. "But you can make yourself. Isn't that better?"
"It's better in every way," Lin whispers, putting on a smile dripping with pride. Perhaps she's showing off; perhaps she's trying to gross you out; perhaps she's simply forgotten to keep herself together in certain ways, but glancing at various regions of her body too long reveals the ghosts of seams, of joints come undone, or shapes like mouths where there shouldn't be mouths. "But I spent most of my life as putty for the Gods to mold. Now, no matter how much They might change me... They can't affect me down in my core."
You have emoted: Sibatti's eyes might as well be glowing with envy, lust, any and all related shades of emotion. They flit to the small parts of Lin reshaping themselves before her eyes - far from disgusted, she is. "That's.....how did you get it?"
Lin is stricken quiet for a while. Her tongue works around behind her lip, a classic tell: she's formulating a response. She laughs a little, then, just a puff or two through her nose, and cocks her head, as if weighing whether or not she should say it.
"Mmmm... I killed myself," Lin says.
You have emoted: Sibatti sits up abruptly, barely missing Lin's head as she gets to eye-level with you. Her brow has lowered into a frown - not one of concern, but ferocity and fervor. "Tell me," she says quietly. It's an order, not a plea.
Sibatti just thought:
[You can feel her heartbeat, you can smell the blood rushing through her wildly].
Lin has to sink back just to make room for you, not scared or cowed, but certainly given occasion to reframe you with a certain indefinable respect. "This isn't like you, Esry." For a while, all she does is stare at you at point-blank range, the side of her face sharp and bright in the sun's rising light. "It is the great death, the destruction of the self that all Idrethi are born from."
You have emoted: Sibatti follows your retreating form, both of her hands gripping either of your biceps firmly. She rises up onto her knees, her tail lashing violently in the small space she previously occupied. "But what does it -mean-?" she insists. "What is the great death?"
Lin is too big to jostle so easily; someone walking into the room might compare the scene to a tiger cub shaking her mother. But she treats your insistence with due respect and deference, setting aside the playful demeanor, and slipping into a lectorial role. "I died, deliberately and by my own hand, and I refused to let my soul be weighed. When I did it, I took with me a single directive. I willed it so hard, that in death, I remembered it."
"'Undo it,' I said to myself. And for what felt like -centuries-, I tried. I had to remember what it meant to see. I needed eyes, but those eyes needed to move. They needed lubricated bearings, they needed nerves. Nerves needed blood and protective tissue..." Lin continues.
You have emoted: Sibatti's frenetic energy is put on hold as she stares at Lin, listening. Her grip remains, but no further pressing or prodding comes from her hands. Her more animal-like features twitch and pull at various times, as if on high alert.
Sibatti just thought:
Am I... crazy for thinking about this?
Little by little, the rounded inner slope of the alcove does its work. Gradually Lin begins to sink, but it's almost too slow to notice. your weight on her arms helps things along. "Imagine it, Esrytesh," she bids, her eyes wide open, bled for a moment of emotion, as she puts herself in a mental state she must not have occupied for a long time. "Imagine what it takes to make a body. Imagine how many mechanisms exist just to hold my arms the way you're doing. Imagine what contrivances you would have to put together, in -just- the right way, for me to say these words to you."
"For you to hear them," Lin says. "I could perceive nothing else. I had all the time in the world."
You have emoted: "But you're free," Sibatti says, a question of sort asking for confirmation.
Lin just thought:
[As she is made to recall it, she analyzes herself, makes a quick critique. How on the next attempt, she might thin her thighs. Add a vertebrae. Give her heart more bloodflow...].
"It's... perhaps superficial," Lin answers, casting her eyes to the brilliant view outside. Presently there is an unusually outsized trade ship schoonering around the harbor, looking for a viable place to dock amidst crowded moorings. "It didn't keep me from Chakrasul's eyes. I am not immune to divine fire. But knowing that... knowing that ultimately, I can -undo- these things..."
Lin's eyes return to you, sharply.
You have emoted: Either of Sibatti's hands slide up to Lin's wrists, finding her hands, and she props one leg up as if getting ready to stand. "Come with me," she urges.
"What's gotten into you," Lin laughs, nonetheless letting you guide her, pushing, waiting for you to give her a way out of the alcove.
You have emoted: "Is Her lake still.... is it still...." Sibatti stops short, turning around to ask Lin a half-formed question.
"You've avoided the Morgun, haven't you," Lin says. "She still has a lake, but I doubt you'd recognize it."
You say, in Fae, "Then I supposed it doesn't matter, does it."
<<Moving>>
Lin follows you to the southeast.
Grotesque Shrine in Ithmia forest.
The sun shines down warmly from the cloudless sky, standing at the apex of its arc through the heavens. Carved from the blackened bole of a stunted and malformed tree before you is a leering shrine in which a grotesque little idol has been placed. The blackened and slimy tree bole is smeared with blood, which over the years has formed a caked rusted crust about the fanged idols gaping mouth which it laps up greedily. You stand aghast at this awful sight, amid the proliferation of twisted trees, and wonder as to what foul purpose this serves. An obsidian statue of a strange woman lies here. Sprawling lupin grows here, blanketing the area in feathered purple. New growth defiantly sprouts from long-dead earth, brilliant vines winding up the statue's span.
You see a single exit leading northwest.
Fully life-sized, this statue is formed entirely from a single piece of obsidian, carved into a human shape so lifelike as to be a trifle unsettling. A woman, bare-skinned and empty-handed, sits crumpled up with her eyes raised to the sky. Her hands curl close to her chest to clasp something there that has since been lost. Below her fingers, the statue is split open with terrible violence, her chest and abdomen ruined as if blown out from within. Her lips are parted, her eyes open, the look on her black, frozen face one of purest yearning - now only providing cups of eyes and mouth, which the sky fills with rain.
Lin begins to show signs of consternation when you lead her through the northern reaches of the Ithmia. As soon as she turns the right corner, passes the right tree, she grows downright worried. "Esry? Why are we--" Clearing her throat, she is made to stand face-to-face with the statue.
You have emoted: Sibatti's demeanor is calm, her walk sinuous and slow. She turns around again, this time with a look of rapture in her eyes, leaning in to intertwine all of the fingers of her hands into yours. "Here," she decides.
Lin just thought:
"Clear your mind. Trust her."
Sibatti just thought:
[Her mind is possessed with something - a singular notion].
Lin squeezes your hands, expressing just a hint of anxiousness in the way she makes your knuckles flex painfully. She devotes only a second or two to glancing around once more, seeming to accept that she doesn't need to know why the two of you are here. "I see you," she says, by way of conciliation.
You have emoted: Sibatti releases Lin's hands, retreating back into the nook where the shrine has occupied for countless years. Her ears are perked up into their highest point, nearly straight upwards, and her tail is resting perfectly in the center of her form, barely touching the forest floor. Not yet facing Lin, she asks, "See me this one last time?"
"One last--" Lin swallows. "Esry. Esry?" She starts after you, taking a step closer, expelling a loud breath through her nostrils. "Esry?"
Your telepathic efforts are successful, and the mind of Lin is locked with your own.
You use Telepathy Command on Lin.
[SND] You: HIT command Lin!
[SND] Equilibrium: 3.00s.
Lin sits down.
You have emoted: "Don't, Lin." An initial sharpness is in Sibatti's tone, glancing over her shoulder as you are suddenly impelled to sit down. From where you sit, you can only see that she has something in her hand - the flaring hilt of a green-gold blonze blade. "And don't let anyone bring me back."
Lin lands on her ass as if pushed down by an unseen God's hand. She could get up, could spring after you, but it is perhaps a sense of futility that keeps her rooted to the forest floor. "Esrytesh, you can't just..." Her tongue flickers as the words die on her lips. A pair of tears roll down her face, despite her struggling, encouraged expression. "Godspit and shit, you can. Are... are you going to be safe?"
Turning back away from you, you say, "Guard my body until I return."
(dur Naya): You say, "Don't be alarmed."
Grimacing at the task ahead, you raise the dagger up high before plunging it straight into your chest. A mad cackling immediately fills the air as the skeletal face upon the dagger leers at you and saps your essence. As your strength rapidly fails, you fall to the ground in a dying heap, your form reverting into a Tekal once more.
You have been slain by misadventure.
The Hall of the Underking.
The Soul Mirror looms forbiddingly, its oval surface bounded in pale alabaster.
You see exits leading north, east, south, and west.
You have set a new description. This is how you will now appear:
She is a resilient Tekal looking quite empty in the eyes. Her dove grey skin is smooth and dewy, shifting into warmer ruddiness where the skin is naturally thinner and lending color to her otherwise muted appearance. Several tattoos adorn her visible flesh, her inner thighs bedecked with Teshen scripture, and parallel formations in pointillism decorating the inside of both forearms. Hair of a muted, red-blonde hue adds a touch of warmth to her otherwise cold facial features, like the first tendrils of dawn on a cold morning. It's cropped at chin-length, thick and wavy and eternally messy. Angular and sharp, her mien boasts thin lips and almond-shaped eyes of grey. A black tattoo of curlicues and jagged lines outlines both eyes, further hardening her somber expression.
<<Moving>>
Grotesque Shrine in Ithmia forest.
The sun shines down warmly from the cloudless sky, standing at the apex of its arc through the heavens. Carved from the blackened bole of a stunted and malformed tree before you is a leering shrine in which a grotesque little idol has been placed. The blackened and slimy tree bole is smeared with blood, which over the years has formed a caked rusted crust about the fanged idols gaping mouth which it laps up greedily. You stand aghast at this awful sight, amid the proliferation of twisted trees, and wonder as to what foul purpose this serves. An obsidian statue of a strange woman lies here.Lin stands in the middle of the clearing, carrying a dead body in her arms. Sprawling lupin grows here, blanketing the area in feathered purple. New growth defiantly sprouts from long-dead earth, brilliant vines winding up the statue's span.
You see a single exit leading northwest.
You have emoted: Sibatti walks out from behind a tree in silence, devoid of armaments or clothing. She is as you've never seen her before.
Lin just thought:
[She knows what is happening. She has seen it countless times. But the matter of -who- it is happening to is what keeps her from moving her mouth.]
Lin drops her arms to her sides. To her credit, she doesn't freak out, nor dissolve into hysterics. She doesn't seem especially worried. She wears an unsteady smile and hopeful eyes, eyes which drip tears at a slow, endless pace. She tries to speak at first, but she can only creak, some form of deep emotion stilling her tongue.
Lin just thought:
"Why did you do it?"
You have emoted: Sibatti approaches Lin somberly, her eyes searching for something she expects to be on the ground. "Where is it?" she asks. There's no immediate reaction to the visible emotions on Lin's features.
Wordlessly, Lin steps aside, her head bowed, held seemingly under a ritualistic sway. There is the corpse of Sibatti, right where the deed would have been done.
A giant bull eland's nose goes to the ground, picking up the noticeable differences in scent between the Yeleni body on the ground and the living Tekal before you both.
You have emoted: Nodding at Lin once, Sibatti goes to the corpse of her former self and crouches next to it, one knee raised. She contains all of her former grace, but none of the feral parts of before: the entire movement feels abnormally normal, and lacking in extravagance.
Lin sniffs repeatedly at the air, beginning to back away, slowly. Her ears cantilever forward, and though she is careful not to snarl, she frequently shows her teeth. Her tail bristles thickly, proving pathologically unable to lie. The enormity of the situation is beginning to really sink in. She hasn't said a word, rendered mute and animalistic, reacting as if a stranger were showing too much interest in her beloved mate's corpse.
You have emoted: "Really is a beautiful body," Sibatti comments wistfully. Her hand, nails trimmed neatly and short, runs over the dusky bronze skin of the Yeleni body reverentially. Her eyes finally flick to Lin, seeking her eyes to lock in on.
"Nnngh-- rrrgh," Lin growls aloud, the first sound she's made in minutes. The instant you makes eye contact, she starts forward, seemingly prepared for violence, but bobs backward before she can commit to anything regretful. This plays out again and again. She is like a dog who cannot decide whether to seek affection or to harm, her instincts all muddled.
Lin just thought:
[Her thoughts are distressingly blank of syntax or inherent meaning, given over completely to lower instincts. And these instincts are going completely haywire - she emanates feelings of utmost distress.]
You have emoted: The eyes that look up from Sibatti's face are empty and hollow, which makes the wry half-smile she wears next all the more eerie. Slowly, she picks up the dropped bronze dagger and rises back to her full height, holding it meaningfully within both hands.
<<Me realizing I can't decap with a dagger
>>You have emoted: Sibatti frowns at something, holding out her hand to Lin. "Axe."
Through what seems like tremendous mental effort, complete with grit teeth and a bead of sweat on her brow, Lin recovers some semblance of control. As if afraid that she could somehow hurt you, she approaches, but lowers herself to her knees, trying to keep her hands planted on the ground. "Axe," she repeats, in a breathless voice.
Lin gives a throwing axe to you.
You start to wield a throwing axe in your right hand.
You begin chopping away at the corpse of Sibatti with a throwing axe.
You finally manage to sever the head from the body, leaving only a pool of blood where the head had been.
You have emoted: Without another word, Sibatti brings the axe down on her former body, right on the neck. It's done with shockingly quick efficiency, the cleanness of the act shoring up any revulsion that might come from the shock of doing it.
You quickly toss a throwing axe to Lin, who catches it nimbly.
Lin retches, her back heaving, valiantly keeping in her lunch, but not without considerable effort. "It isn't you any longer," she hisses, spreading her hand across her mouth, speaking through the gaps between her fingers. And again: "It isn't you. It isn't you. It isn't you..."
You have emoted: Kneeling back down, Sibatti cradles the head between both hands gently, fingers spreading over the lower mandible and staring into her own countenance. Hunched over as she is, hands and skin splattered with blood, staring into a face that is hers-and-not-hers, an onlooker might think they've stumbled onto a madwoman. She exhales loudly through her nostrils and says, at long last, "Skulls need time to dry out." A token fact spoken with no further explanation.
Through a mask of nigh-perpetual queasiness, Lin brings her eyes back to the tableau before her. you is right there, in the flesh, but she can't stop looking into the dead and frozen face she was kissing, not too long ago. "It-- it needs a place th- that sees much... much sunlight," she stammers, her tears coming faster and faster, but failing to alter her face, making no apparent effect on her expression. "Please... let me keep the rest of the body in-- in my crypt."
You have emoted: "Why?" Sibatti's head turns toward Lin, the only part of her body that moves aside from her fingers. They continue to toy with the skin of the decapitated head, stretching and pulling at it, testing elasticity.
"I can't-- nnf-- I--" Lin startles, impatiently wiping her nose clear, apparently surprised to find herself crying. "C- can't just... l- let it lie there, it isn't right." Skulking on her hands and knees, she comes inches closer, but something about the intensity of your gaze, the newness and uncertainty of you as a creature, keeps her from simply taking what she wants.
Lin just thought:
[Grief. Grief. Immediate. Overwhelming. Too much. Pushing against a closed door.]
You have emoted: Sibatti holds the decapitated head of herself under one arm, like one would carry a basket, and crouch-walks a step or two closer to Lin to meet her halfway. "Of course we will not leave it. It will be buried in my temple, properly. Would you like to go?" The tone of her voice is nigh-jovial.
You pick up the decapitated head of Sibatti.
"This is cruel," Lin croaks, her voice breaking, her eyes filling profusely. She reaches past you, lurching over the body, her hands venturing over curves and contours that have long since encoded themselves into her muscle memory. Openly she weeps as she lifts the lifeless and headless corpse, holding it against her chest, fighting her way blindly to her feet.
Lin picks up a headless corpse.
Lin begins to follow you.
You say, in Mhun, "Mheribus."
You raise your lantern as a ghostly fog creeps in, its light illuminating the thick cloud. With a
slow, careful sway of the beacon, the fog melds with your surroundings and disperses shortly
afterward to reveal a different environ.
Lin follows you to the ether.
Ruined temple within a lush rainforest.
You find the weather around you imperceptible. A small cacao tree flourishes here, bearing many ripened cacao pods.
You see exits leading north, northeast, east, southeast, south, southwest, west, northwest, up, down, in, and out.
Lin just thought:
"Should be celebrating. Should feel overjoyed."
You have emoted: "I am sorry, my love." It's the first sign of warmth and caring exhibited from Sibatti all evening, but it's impossible to read the emotion in her empty gaze. "I did not anticipate this reaction." You both exit the fog into a familiar landscape - dead ahead is the soft earth of the mound in the center of the temple grounds, swollen with overgrowth and bodies buried ritualistically over the years. "Please do me this one favor, and I will not ask of you any more." She stares at the burial mound, falling silent.
Lin follows behind, carrying the corpse flush to her chest, a grim swathe of blood waterfalling down the left side of her body. She weeps in silence, partially in embarrassment, partially in a purely physical grief. She lays the body down to the earth, cradling what is left of its neck, her claws stuck in the leotard clinging to its skin. There she remains, on her knees in the dirt and grass, existing more or less in a state of shock.
You have emoted: You hear Sibatti's footsteps come up behind you, soft and nearly soundless against the soft earth. She waits, affording Lin whatever space and time she needs to complete the task.
Softly, like a reminder, you say, in Mhun, "Entesh, untesh."
Lin employs her claws to the task. They are long, sharp, made for slashing flesh, wholly unsuited for digging; it is not a task made easier by her constant, obstinate weeping. Beneath the shade trees, in the cool air, she marks out a hole for what was once your body, working until she has been made short of breath, until the time comes to fill it. And with that same delicate care, she lifts the corpse in filthied hands, setting it gently into its resting place.
Lin the Rojalli hisses something in an arcane tongue, sparks crackling between their teeth.
You have emoted: Sibatti drops onto her knees next to Lin, not sitting back on her legs just yet. She surveys the scene, listening to Lin's prayer without seeming to comprehend any of it.
Sibatti just thought:
You are strong, my love. You can do this.
Lin pulls back great armfuls of earth over a headless corpse, ensuring it is covered completely, then spends a little while tamping the soil down with the broad, flat planes of her palms. She continues on in that language in the midst of her labors, and you do not need to speak it to recognize the finality in her voice, a portent of affairs settled, of something done and set to rest.
It is like a switch has turned off in Lin's head. Now that she no longer has to -see- the remembered shape of her lover, her mate, she can steady herself with a thick, deep breath, clearing her nose with a powerful snort.
You have emoted: You feel a hand on your shoulder. Sibatti's touch is warm, her squeeze gentle. "You honor me," she says under her breath.
"I-- I'm overjoyed," Lin gasps, reaching up to cover your hand, and inevitably dirtying it with an unlovely mixture of fresh dirt and fresh blood. "This is a momentuous occasion for you. I just-- I just couldn't bear..."
You have emoted: Sibatti rises to her feet while holding Lin's hand, helping her up as well, if you so choose. "There is just one thing left to do..." She will keep your hand as long as you let her, and close her eyes.
Lin just thought:
[At least she can think.] "My sweet demon..."
Lin pushes her way to her feet, dwarfing your hand in her own - that much has not changed. Looking like the accomplice to a murder, she clears her nose once more, gazing down at the fresh burial at her feet. No questions, no interruptions from her. She shoots you a sidelong glance.
Sibatti just thought:
Undo it. Make the eyes. Protect the flesh. Remember the form.
Sibatti just thought:
Suffer the great death.
"There is terror in this," Lin says. She squeezes your hand once, but leaves it to you to let go. "It is not enjoyable."
You have emoted: There's a quiet sigh that finally escapes from Sibatti, a long and soulful sigh that seems to come up from her stomach, sinking her grey form down as if crumpling in on itself. Her hand slips away from yours and she continues to sink down, down to the earth like a deflating balloon.
Sibatti just thought:
Remember the form.
Sibatti just thought:
Suffer the great death.
(dur Naya): You say, "Same thing."
Lin backs away once, twice, then thrice, in slow and careful steps. This time she does not avert her eyes.
Inhaling sharply, you raise your arms beside you, bringing them up above your head as if conducting an orchestra. Cocking your head to the side, you close your eyes and begin to concentrate upon a distant, focal point within yourself. Completely unbeknownst to you, the shadow cast by your frame suddenly jerks to life, slithering from your connecting feet upwards, seemingly guided by a mind of its own. Inky tendrils that form the insubstantial hands of your shadow sink deep into your chest, causing your eyelids to flicker open as you gasp at the sharp pain that resonates from the very fibres of your being. Completely ignorant of you, the formless figment continues its relentless motions, before finally fading away into nothingness. For a moment or two, nothing seems to happen, before agonizing pain ripples through your body. You feel your chest being torn apart, then reformed and re-molded with your plentiful reserves of essence deep within. As the pain ebbs, you are assailed with the realization that you have embraced your new, destructive form as Azudim.
The skies darken momentarily as tendrils of shadow creep across the firmament to form the terrible visage of the Azudim, Sibatti.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Esrytesh Sibatti dur Naya
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
She shrived away her restraints and forever chases death amidst the Wild Hunt.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
She is a resilient Azudim of Mhun heritage giving off an aura of inertia and rationed energy, her mannerisms plotted out and deliberate. Her dove grey skin is smooth and dewy, shifting into warmer ruddiness where the skin is naturally thinner and lending color to her otherwise muted appearance. Several tattoos adorn her visible flesh, her inner thighs bedecked with Teshen scripture, and parallel formations in pointillism decorating the inside of both forearms. A snakelike tail follows her at a great and trailing length, ending in a riot of colored quetzal feathers sweeping out in a dramatic fin shape. Small feet and fists end in wicked dark claws, and a black stain against her flesh travels inward to ankles and wrists before ghosting into ash. Slender and willowy, her height is supplemented by a pair of great charcoal horns, spiraling out from the crown of her head like an eland's and decorated with dangling fetishes and hallowed charms. Thick, loose waves of hair are woven together into a messy, unkempt side braid trailing down to her hip, dotted with mint green phosphorescent flowers. The blend of hues in her hair is reminiscent of skysilver, uniformly silver while being nuanced with traces of cool pastels. The same nuances are present in her exotic almond-shaped eyes, the color of a storm with slits of blue and green speckling them. They are made somewhat alien and hardened by the addition of black-inked tattoos, forming sweeping curlicues and jagged lines. A third eye, vertically slit, sits between her angled brows, pale and pupilless and suffused with otherworldly insight.
You have emoted: Still crouching on the ground, Sibatti carefully unfurls her limbs like a flower speeding into bloom. Long, lean limbs and an even longer tail spread out, giving breadth and height to a willowy and slender form heightened by a pair of spiraling eland's horns.
(dur Naya): Aisling says, "What is happening?"
A giant bull eland snorts, unimpressed.
(dur Naya): You say, "Change."
(dur Naya): Aisling says, "Are you okay?"
(dur Naya): You say, "Think so."
Lin swallows thickly once more, bidden to come closer, sniffing at the air in your direction. Her tail snaps to and fro, betraying an emotional state that has run roughshod from one end of the spectrum to the other. "Look at you..." she whispers. "You didn't-- it wasn't the same, you're not--" Stooping over at the waist, she whirls around you, loping in a circle. "You're not what I am. What-- what did you do?"
Lin just thought:
"Like a beautiful dagger..."
Lin just thought:
[The urge to feel those claws on her skin is overwhelming.]
You tense your muscles, extending your claws to their full, fearsome length.
You have emoted: "I don't know," Sibatti answers genuinely. Her voice is unchanged - containing that same, sandpaper-like quality as ever. Her eyes are on you, gauging your reaction, rather than looking at herself. "I thought I was... doing it right. I did what you told me to do...."
So fascinated is she with your transformation, you could think Lin had forgotten she is trampling her mate's own grave. The tears have etched deep red lines into her face, but she's too filled with wonder to look miserable. At last she closes the distance, never once letting her eyes stray from your, not until she's close enough to smell you, which she does in a long, drawn-out inhalation.
"You smell like death," Lin whispers.
7
Comments
Thank you for letting me be part of it.
She was saying "Be not," an oath of Heva's.