A Bad Mood (Seven)

[Laszlo]

Fall 33rd, 511AV Just past twenty bells Rushing into the Cubacious Inn's front lobby, Laszlo hastily shut the door behind him, leaving the rainstorm outside where it belonged. Some of it still clung to him, and now dripped profusely off his wool cloak and onto the floor around him, creating a dark, wet patch of poor weather in the carpet. Under his hood, at least, Laszlo remained relatively dry, but he was still freezing. He left a trail of wet bootprints as he made his way to the stairs, passing through the empty lobby. It wasn't all that late in the evening, but the storm was frightening and had everyone holed up in their rooms. Laszlo had heard something about Ionu being in a bad mood, but whether there was any merit to the statement was beyond him. It certainly didn't seem out of the question. Shaking off the autumn chill and welcoming the calm warmth of the Inn, the Ethaefal ascended the stairs, looking forward to passing the rest of his evening in his room. It had been a short while since Laszlo had seen rain; his last encounter with it was while traveling the Unforgiven from Kalinor. He could not possibly be more grateful that this time, he had a dry, safe, and warm place to find shelter. That had been one very pleasant thing about the Floating City, protection from the elements. Never mind that the Symenestra there all lived with a bottomless pit of death under their feet. A thin strip of light escaping from a door left slightly ajar caught his eye. It was the room next to Laszlo's. That was the room Seven Xu and Victor Lark were renting, a pair of friends who had very recently become Laszlo's acquaintances. He seemed to keep crossing paths with the both of them, which he didn't mind. Victor had a very unique perspective of the world, and carried an energy that was difficult to understand, but easy to feed on. Seven was a halfblooded Symenestra and human mix who seemed to be as frustrated with his existence as Laszlo was with his own. The Ethaefal found himself comfortably drawn to both them. Not one to intrude, Laszlo had at first intended to simply pass by and just go to his room, but he saw a patch of white hair through the open door. Seven was alone inside. It had been just a few days since Victor Lark's match at the Alvadas tournament, where Laszlo and Seven both witnessed the murder of a Symenestra woman during a scuffle in the stands. Seven had already been worried to death, watching his friend fight a savage winged animal in the pit, only to have a well-armed brute beat a woman to death while making scathing remarks about "spiders". Laszlo would have been a liar if he claimed that the entire ordeal hadn't left him deeply frightened for his own well-being. Laszlo rapped on Seven's door with the backs of his index and middle fingers, then nudged the door open further. Whether he'd decided to visit to comfort himself, or the little Symnestra, was a subject of quiet, internal debate. "It's just me," Laszlo greeted from under his dripping hood, his eyeshine glinting from the shadow of his face. As a gesture of cordiality, the Ethaefal flicked back his hood, revealing his slightly matted and damp silver hair underneath. "Got caught in the weather while I was trying to find my way back to the Inn. Took me two hours, with the way the streets shift. Then it starts raining." His violet eyes did a quick sweep of the room. "Is Victor out, on a night like this?" Suppose that would suit him. "How is he doing? Healing all right?" And what about you, Laszlo didn't ask, because I still can't get that woman's bashed-in face out of my head.

[Seven Xu]

Outside, the storm moaned and clawed at glass with wet fingers.

“Forty degrees from the southern horizon,” the halfblood murmured, stretching forward to press the graphite end of a worn pencil against a stretch of vellum. It was sectioned off in a grid, covered in small marks and scrawling astral coordinates he had gathered between trips to the Surya Plaza and a hydromancer within the Stormhold Citadel. Beside the new grey dot, he scribbled the word ‘Shoyden’, “Zero-zero-one-two-nine-two,” Seven trailed off, forfeiting the rest of the sequence to the relative quiet of his room.

Two oil lamps lit the space from either side, burning yellow-hot and fending off the darkness. Ever since their move from a windowless stone cell in the belly of Stormhold Citadel, neither Seven nor Victor was keen on leaving their new ‘home’ without ample light. There was no longer a need to paint a makeshift window, they had two—though both of which were currently closed and heavy curtains drawn, offering succor from the tumultuous wind and rain that battered the ‘Inn’s exterior.

Rap-rap-rap. For a baffling instant, a pair of wide eyes scrutinized the sound at the ajar door, wondering where Victor had found the courtesy to knock.

When the door swung open and revealed the willowy figure of Syna’s fallen Symenestra, Seven crooked his neck and managed a wan smile. He was sprawled across the worn hardwood floor not occupied by a single bed or an unkempt desk. Pages were scattered about him and there was a bottle of wine at his side. The sour red made him shudder when he let it sit on his tongue too long, but it had a welcome burn and he had trudged through half the bottle already—it was getting better.

“He’s alive.” Seven’s hand traveled to the glass of cherry at his side, fingering the stem before drawing it close. “And you? You look … wet.”

Seven wasn’t exactly in a rightful position to judge appearance. He’d spent the night before tossing and turning in the grasp of endless nightmares, and dark grey circles hung from his glassy eyes. Whenever he closed them, everything was stained red with blood, that woman’s blood, and in the middle of it all, her mutilated face. Though, whenever she turned her empty sockets on him, her face was rough, squared, and stern. Worst of all, it was familiar. He woke several times find the sheets thrown off and his pillow soaked, and even now the images clung to the backs of his eyelids, taunting him.

His free hand pressed against the cold floor and he hoisted his small frame from its repose to stand, dismissing his work. It had been little more than an idle distraction, anyway. The sour, hot tendrils had coursed through his blood and had done their work; he stumbled.

[Laszlo]

A wry little smile formed at Seven's reply, but slowly faded when the halfblood faltered as he got to his feet. Laszlo observed his obvious inebriation with a quirked eyebrow and the slight cant of his head, then gave his acquaintance a thoughtful onceover from head to toe. Though he immediately felt an automatic concern for Seven's well-being, there was also a stray selfish plume of relief which he kept to himself. Looked like Laszlo wasn't the only one who needed company. The false Symenestra's keen eyes passively scanned the room, allowing him the opportunity to absorb the personal effects and belongings arranged in this small space, which created a tiny excerpt of someone else's life. A cumulative of forty years (roughly) could be seen here in all the small details, a cross-section of lives well established and still in progress. Laszlo wondered in how many lifetimes he had resided in rooms like this. That thought train however was sidetracked when he suddenly noticed that in a room shared by two men, there was only one bed. "Do you usually drink alone?" Laszlo's gaze made its way to the well-drained wine bottle on the floor, then wandered across the sheets of vellum laid across the floorboards. They looked like drawings and haphazard notes at first, but then there was a spark of familiarity. He didn't know a thing about navigation, but he'd seen designs like that before during his caravans. "Is that a map? Are you drinking as you draw maps?" The Ethaefal managed a soft, amused chuckle, in an attempt to mask his concern. He was looking for a segue in favor of seeming too forward. It wasn't going well. "I doubt that's good idea. It's probably how Alvadas happened in the first place." Petch it. So much for a smooth transition. Laszlo was rubbish at providing consolation, even if his sympathy was genuine. His expression became more solemn. "Seven, are you all right?" he asked earnestly, stepping inside the room and closing the door behind him. Laszlo began unfastening his cloak, his black nails clicking against the silver chain clasp. The heavy wool melted off his shoulders, and he gathered the wet heap of fabric and hung it over his arm. Laszlo's tall, slender Symenestra form looked starkly different without the cloak to give him the illusion of bulk. "You look a little… worse for wear. I'm sorry, you know, I never did ask. Did you know that woman? At the arena? I saw her talking to you before…"

[Seven Xu]

Seven caught his footing before his face had a chance to meet the floor. Wine sloshed angrily in the glass he managed to hold on to and a few drops of the crimson splattered at his bare feet. He thought to apologize for the mess, for his clear intoxication, but Laszlo immediately sunk his black claws into the conversation and hauled it away from an ultimately insincere gesture of remorse.

The halfblood appeared to have a grasp on his balance again in his careful approach to an aged desk propped against a wall. He surrendered his glass to the disheveled surface with an audible thud.

“I’m fine,” though his voice was measured, the lines that gathered between Seven’s pale brows told another story. It was obvious the jape had fallen on deaf ears. “She wasn’t a friend, if that’s what you’re asking. I didn’t even know her name.” He swiveled to draw back a window’s heavy curtain and peer into the darkness, though he could manage to see no further than his own reflection and that of the sword-thin figure behind him. With a sigh, he dismissed his futile distraction to fix almond-wrapped pools of scarlet on his guest. “I’ve just never seen anything like that. Her body was defiled, Laszlo. She wasn’t even a person when he was done with her, just some eyeless husk in a pool of blood and his piss.

“I had a dream last night that it was my fault; that the face was blaming me, but it wasn’t her face. I mean, it was on her body, but it didn’t belong to her.” Seven’s white fingertips released the curtain as he crossed the floor to the bed. He sat among the unmade sheets and drew his legs beneath him, colorless knuckles gripping at the soft fabric of his trousers. Even the familiar scent that lingered among tousled linens did little to sway the rising tempo of his heart, drumming away a beat for the howling wind that still imposed on the thick walls of the ‘Inn.

“It was judging me.”

Seven’s troubled gaze drifted between the man standing in the middle of his floor and his lap. Had he been sober, he would have taken hold of the conversation, steered it from his own problems. Despite their acquaintance, Seven was still leery of Ethaefal, through no fault of Laszlo; a duplicitous Lethborn was still a scab on his memory. Alcohol, however, had a tendency to make his tongue loose.

“I think it was my father’s face.” That round marble countenance twisted further. “No, I’m sure of it. But he isn’t even dead; why would I dream of that?”

[Laszlo]

FYISeven gave me permission to move his character in this post. Just an FYI for anyone who reads this and thinks "wtf." :3 Laszlo had to stop himself from indignantly interjecting as Seven described the woman's death to him, wanting despite his own feelings to allow the man to say his piece. Wasn't even a person. Some eyeless husk. The Ethaefal felt a familiar mix of revulsion and horror surge from the pit of his stomach into the back of his his throat, ungrateful for the alarming and graphic memory so accurately painted by Seven's words. He didn’t need to hear this. He had been there, right alongside Seven, when it happened. He remembered it just as vividly, the sound of her ribs snapping as her chest caved in, the furious and desperate howl that had been her last breath, the spray of thick blood that covered both her murderer and any bystander unfortunate enough to be on the edge of the crowd. An involuntary shudder went through the Ethaefal's wispy form as he laid his wet cloak across the arms of a chair. He lingered there for a telling moment, his violet eyes staring dully as flashes of the scene flickered through his memory. Exhaling through his teeth, Laszlo gently shook the images out of his head. "Judging you?" He turned to look at the diminished frame seated on the edge of his bed, catching an anxious and inebriated gaze of scarlet peering upward from behind a curtain of thin white hair. Laszlo grimaced, unable to entirely understand what Seven meant. There were a lot of things a terrified mind could have interpreted from that woman's nightmarish, eyeless stare; fear, desperation, accusation, anger, emptiness, even blame… but judgment? Silencing himself, he harkened to hear the halfblood explain it further. This was something that Laszlo in his limited experience could not draw a connection to. When Seven mentioned his father, Laszlo only became more confused. "Dreams can be strange. Mine are," Laszlo paused to utter a mild huff of astonishment, "mine are often graphic, but for me it's mostly past lives. Things half remembered that I can never recall when I'm awake. For you, though…" Laszlo crossed the room, careful not to step on Seven's array of sketches and measurements on the floor. A silent flash of lightning bled through the curtains and briefly illuminated the tall figure, causing a spidery shadow to appear and then disappear upon the far wall. He knelt down in front Seven at the bedside, now having to look up slightly to make eye contact with halfblood. Slant, faded eyebrows sat above his amethyst pools, which after sunset always looked a little sunken in and tired. If he wanted to, Laszlo could look perfectly menacing with those eyes, and in another life, he probably did. A modest roll of thunder sounded outside before he spoke. "Seven, what happened is not your fault. You have no reason to feel guilty. She picked her own fight, and paid the consequences. You did nothing wrong." It offered Laszlo some solace, knowing that Seven felt even worse about that day than he did. Being able to comfort someone else about it brought him a sense of peace and relief after days of silence. Something of a recluse, Laszlo hadn't had the opportunity to talk to anyone about the Symenestra's murder and sort out his thoughts about it. The few people who confessed to remembering it would say something derisive and unhelpful about the Spider, and sometimes even laugh. Thinking on it, however, it seemed likely that Victor was Seven's only friend. Laszlo wasn't very well acquainted with the Ravokian, but he didn't seem like the talkative type. Seven probably never had much opportunity to have an actual conversation either. Victor might have even just been disappointed that he missed seeing it. "Look, maybe I can help." Laszlo rose to his feet, keeping his eyes trained on the halfblood. "There's a trick I know for situations like this. A sort of… relaxation technique that I picked up in Kalinor. Physicians sometimes use it to calm their patients at the Place of Purging. That's the city's infirmary," he added to clarify, wondering if Seven had enough sense to know who those patients were and why they needed to be calmed. "I use it sometimes to keep myself level. It might help you, if you let me." An ashen, black-nailed hand reached forward and placed itself upon Seven's shoulder. Laszlo felt his fingertips tingle warmly with djed as he touched him. "It'll be easier if you're lying down and comfortable." With the gentle tilt of his head, he offered a thin, reassuring smile. "Don't worry, it won't hurt a bit. Trust me." The last two words were spoken in accented Symenos, as a gesture of good will between Symenestra, even if Laszlo wasn't truly a member of the race. Neither was Seven, really, if you got down to it. As Seven reclined back on the bed, Laszlo straightened and moved to the nearby wall, leaning against it. Folding his arms over his chest, he stared down at Seven's thin form, the expression his face becoming solemn as he examined for signs of stress and resistance. This would only work if the halfblood was willing. "Close your eyes. Just listen to the sound of my voice." The thunder hummed. "Take a deep breath, in… Slowly… Then out. Just like that. Clear your head, forget your worries, just focus on your breathing. You're safe, Seven. No one is going to harm you." Laszlo remained silent for the next few moments, allowing Seven's hypnotic trance to set in. The Ethaefal's violet eyes drifted away hovered over some vague spot on the far wall, listening to the rain pattering on the window. The backs of his eyes tingled now, but it was a familiar sensation. It happened whenever this magic was used on someone, or himself. By now it was almost pleasant. "Still with me, Seven? Haven't fallen asleep, have you?" That had happened once before. Utterly embarrassing. "I'm going to ask you a few questions. It might be hard to answer, but just remember that you're here at the Cubacious Inn, safe in your room, and nothing that you might see is real, or can hurt you in any way. You're completely protected here in the present, in reality." Laszlo's eyes remained on the far wall, using the dead space to focus on his hypnotism. "I want you to think about your dream. It was your father's face that you saw. Can you describe it? What does he look like? Is he angry with you?" Out of his own, selfish curiosity, Laszlo's eyes flickered down to the halfblood. A father's resentment was not uncommon among the Symenestra, for obvious reasons, but he was naïve to whatever sort of family life Seven once had. "Does he resent you for what happened to your mother?"

[Seven Xu]

Trust me.

Stillness settled over Seven’s face when Laszlo’s fingertips skimmed the curve of his shoulder; a creeping calm washed through his blood like a summer tide beneath the pretension of burning alcohol. The drink had made the hypnotist’s job easy; Seven’s nostrils flared in a deep exhale and he surrendered to Laszlo’s djed-laden suggestion. The Ethaefal parted, and Seven sank into the comfort of his sheets and a well-worn pillow that smelled of musk and goose down.

No one is going to harm you.

He breathed in. Thunder rolled heavy across the roof of the ‘Inn. Seven’s bare toes curled into rumpled linen and his hands gathered across his stomach. Amidst the comforts of a warm room, a droning storm, and a soothing voice, he succumbed to the illusion of safety. Another flash of lightning responded to its rumbling kin, sharpening the contrast in the room for an instant and painting every surface blue-white before fading back into the muted gold of oil-burning lamps.

He breathed out. The room seemed to wobble in his peripherals, but the voice at his side was steady. It kept him in reality, fended off the shadows that plagued his memory. “My father’s face was always stern. He never seemed happy with me. I did everything right, but I was … I mean, I wasn’t,” Seven’s lips were sluggish, and he stumbled on his words. “I was not what he expected.”

He breathed in. “Resented … no, my mother, she was diluted too, a Dra,” black wool tugged at Seven’s heavy eyelids, splayed across thin and unfocused pools of red, “She survived me, insofar as I know. Loved me? Maybe. She didn’t raise me. I never knew her.”

He breathed out. Seven’s knees straightened and shoulders sagged as he loosened, sinking further into the warmth of his bed, further into a djed-induced stupor, and further away from the room. Laszlo had him now, though it hadn’t taken more than a few words of encouragement where wine had leeched his wits. “None of that matters, now.” Barely lucid, Seven’s matter-of-fact tone seemed profoundly out of place. His fingers knit together and his head lolled sideways, fixing his stare in Laszlo’s direction. They looked beyond him, aimless, unseeing, and entirely unnerving as incarnadine irises devoured shrinking blackness.

“Forgive me.”

[Laszlo]

"Your mother was halfblooded?" Laszlo raised his eyebrows, gazing down at the dead calm on Seven's face. His sightless stare was wide and unsettling, his contracted pupils so small that his eyes looked nearly pure red. The Ethaefal felt a whisper of guilt seeing his young friend in a state of such emptiness and obedience, but reminded himself that that expression meant that the hypnotism was working. He was succeeding, and he was doing it for the sake of Seven Xu, for the greater good, and not for Laszlo's own personal fascination. Mostly. "So you're not even… Hn, Symenestra blood is strong." Unfolding his arms, Laszlo took a step forward and knelt down in front of Seven again. This time his amethyst gaze was harder and more determined, spurred by his confusion and desire to understand. Seven had shared his personal information freely, but there was something else at the core of his guilt. Something Laszlo would need to dig harder for. His face was only inches from the halfblood's as he bored into those blood red windows to his soul. The Ethaefal in Laszlo nearly shuddered. Nothing should be that red. "Forgive you for what?" he whispered, the tingling behind his eyes becoming a dull pressure. Laszlo placed a hand on the side of Seven's face, trying to strengthen his hold on the halfblood's thoughts. The flesh of his palm was cold; without his cloak to keep warm, the autumn chill that had crept into the room had begun to pull the warmth from Laszlo's thin frame. He hoped to use it to his advantage, to apply shock to Seven's frail, halfway opened mind and shake loose the truth beneath the truth. With the long, sharpened nail of his thumb, Laszlo brushed a tuft of alabaster from Seven's eye. "Why doesn't it matter? Your mother is alive. Your father is alive. That's more than a Symenestra could hope for. Of course that matters." Seven had mentioned not being what his father expected. Because he was a quarter Symenestra? That shouldn't have been much of a surprise, if he'd bedded a Dra to start with. Briefly, Laszlo averted his eyes and glanced at the bedding on the single mattress. His eyes narrowed, then returned to Seven's. "Why would you need forgiveness, Seven? There is nothing wrong with you. Whatever your father disapproved of doesn’t matter." No, that didn't seem right. None of that matters, now. What changed? Did Seven's father turn him out? Did he leave home to forget his family issues? There was a sensation in the pit of Laszlo's stomach as he navigated this train of thought. He wasn't sure if it was a hunch, or just nausea. Something about Seven's stone-faced stare was… terrifying. "You came to Alvadas after leaving Lhavit." Laszlo paused to swallow, pressing his eyebrows together. "You left home, so where is your father now?"

[Seven Xu]

Seven’s fingers knotted into his shirt. The voice mused and commented on arbitrary things—irksome—but it was there, keeping him grounded in the chaos, the blackness that was his mind’s eye. His physical eyes were pried open, unseeing, the white oceans floating their red rings that would twitch and un-focus and re-focus but refused to perceive. Cold pressure locked against his flushed cheek and seemed to push him even deeper into the blackness and the sweet-smelling pillow. Questions, more questions, the dam that held them back had broken and the words came pouring out.

He was drowning.

Lungs gasped desperately for air and for the first time in too long, he blinked back a film of tears. “It wasn’t supposed to be,” there was weight in his voice, “but it happened.” His small frame rolled to the edge of the bed and toed off the sheets, knees curling to his chest, but his hands remained fixed on his stomach as if the weight of the room would crash down on them if he released himself.

“You made me do it, you and that woman. I should have liked to see her face when she found you.” It was obvious now that Seven was not addressing Laszlo or his myriad of questions, despite the ghastly lock on his gaze. The halfblood made a noise that almost sounded like laughter, but then he shuddered in a choking sob. When his lips flattened, spots of red grew from where he’d bitten too hard, soft flesh pierced by fangs his father had more than once tried to painfully file away. He’d achieved that goal once, one knee bracing a kicking and screaming child; but with all children, those fell out, replaced on the journey to adulthood. “Stop looking at me like that.”

Blood wicked across pale lips. Rage came in like a hot tide and Seven’s grip on his shirt tightened. “I should have done to you what the Oaf did to that Widow. You wouldn’t look at me if your face was pulp. No, you couldn’t. Stop it!” He would have nearly spat in Laszlo’s face, had the Symenestra not had the sense to back off. “Fuck your forgiveness. I’d do it again, if you looked at me like that. Like I’m nothing. Who ended up with their blood on the wall?” Seven had steadily regained his ability to speak in the mounting anger, white-knuckled and glaring at Laszlo’s shocked countenance. “Fuck you. Stop it! Fuck you! STOP!”

Eyes wide open, Seven screamed.

[Laszlo]

Laszlo stared at Seven, his mouth agape and his eyes round as amethyst saucers. His forehead wrinkled in disbelief as this creature of anguish writhed in front of him. Under Seven's twitching eyebrows, in his wild, panicked eyes, there was a scarlet shadow play of violent and terrible things happening. It was real for the halfblood, but even Laszlo could almost see it just by looking at him, taken hostage by his friend's fear and anger and desperation. The emotions were palpable, and blood red. As Seven screamed, Laszlo cringed and shrank back, keeping his balance with a hand flat on the wooden floor. He knocked over a vial of ink, which spilled over a sheet of vellum and pooled onto the floor. The cold liquid pressed into Laszlo's fingertips, and he immediately withdrew his hand, fearing it to be some other viscous fluid. Suddenly he was pulled back to reality, and the larger picture of things became clear. He was in Seven's inn suite, bathed in warm lanternlight, some three or four bells past sunset. A storm pounded at the window, pouring a steady hum of rain over the building and punctuated by bright flashes and growling thunder. There was a man in a daze just a few feet away, lying helplessly in his bed and caught in some nightmare between sleep and consciousness. And he was a killer. Goddess. Laszlo stared at Seven Xu for the first time with a new image in his head of the diminutive halfblood. Under that head of thin, wispy white hair and behind those reluctant, slightly misaligned eyes, something slept that Laszlo would have never imagined was there. He'd offered him a nectarine, bought him a drink, had light conversation, and comforted him at the tournament. Seven had seemed so innocent. "You killed him," Laszlo murmured, watching Seven as he remembered that he was still trapped in his trance, imprisoned there by the Ethaefal himself. "Your own father…" Seven's hands twisted in the fabric of his shirt, two nails darkly discolored by his mixed blood. They were the hands of a killer. That usually light, airy, and modest voice was the voice of a killer. That face belonged to a killer. Those eyes… Laszlo slowly rose to his feet, staring down at him. "And you don't even remember." Whatever he thought about Seven's actions could be mulled over later. This had to end now. Renewing his ambition, Laszlo stepped forward and roughly took Seven by his upper arms, putting him on his back and forcing him to stare upward. Laszlo was there in Seven's line of sight, violet met with crimson as two Symenestra stared into each other, regardless of how fake either of them were. Despite Laszlo's own fear and shock, he forced himself to be calm, and made his eyes warm. "Seven," he said loudly, his tone stern and commanding, but with a note of caring. "Seven, listen to me. Hear my voice. I want you to imagine a door, Seven. Everything that you're seeing now, everything that you're feeling is through this door. You're not there, Seven. That's already happened, it's over. You're on the other side of the wall. All you have to do is close the door. Do you hear me? Close the door, Seven." Cautiously, Laszlo slowly let go of Seven's shoulders, one of his nails having snagged the fabric of his sleeve. He took a step backward as a shaky breath escaped his gray lips. Wiping a hand over his face and fingering through his silver hair, Laszlo sent an exasperated glance across the room, no longer desiring to look at Seven's pale face. That laugh, Goddess, that mad laugh that ended with a sob. He could still hear it. "Are you with me, Seven? Do you remember me? Laszlo, the Ethaefal? Syna-face?" Laszlo wasn't sure if Seven could lose his mind just from being put in a trance, but if something happened to his sanity now, he wasn't sure what he'd do. Feeling helpless, he sighed and turned away, facing one of the oil lanterns set upon a nearby shelf. The flame was growing dim, and Laszlo didn't know what else to do with Seven. He numbly approached the lantern, grasping the turnkey with clawed fingertips and renewing the gauze wick. The orange light that painted the Ethaefal's thin frame grew brighter. I'd do it again, if you looked at me like that. Like I'm nothing. I'd do it again.

[Seven Xu]

The ephemeral screech was enough to rouse the ‘Inn, turning it into a writhing, living creature. Muffled voices resonated from beneath the floorboards. One voice was closer than the rest, not as obscure, and it nagged from the endless dark in an imposing pitch. Listen to me. Hear my voice. Glinting gold phased out of abysmal black and an instinctual set of bony fingers snatched out to grab it. The doorknob was smooth, polished, and unnaturally warm for something made of metal. Close the door. With a hiss, a creak and a nauseating shudder the latch caught; it shut out the voiceless judgment and grave reminiscence of a dead man’s face.

Seven made a strangled noise in his throat. His dry lips floundered. He came back in fragments. Recognition eventually poured back onto a sheet-white canvas. A thin layer of sweat made his bangs stick stubbornly to his forehead and caught the resurrected orange glow of the oil lamp. One hand groped blindly at clammy skin, a teary eye, a throbbing, bleeding lip. When it fell to his side, he bent his elbows, lifting the dead weight of his small outline from the confusion of rumpled linen and fresh sweat. Laszlo’s query ultimately grounded him, and he swiveled his head to leer at the Ethaefal.

“Of course I remember you,” there was a twinge of aggravation between slurred syllables. Seven wobbled as he sat up, but managed to swing his legs over the side of the bed, fingers clutching the edge of the mattress. “Was I that far gone? Wine’s never had that effect on me before.” He thought to apologize for the candid remark, being as he had been the one to fall asleep in the company of his guest, but he never found the resolve. Guilt aside, it was a positively stupid question.

The ‘Inn settled back into its slumber again despite the raging storm; rain and wind clawed at the window and the beast growled in a chorus of deep rumbling thunder, but its threats went unheeded. They were safe in that room; he knew that now better than he had the night before. A calm smile crept across Seven’s face, washing him of his inexplicable bleary-eyed look of exasperation.

Toes met the cool surface of polished hardwood. Then, they discovered wet blackness. A gasp caught in Seven’s throat. His eyes fell to a creeping, inexorable puddle, bleeding through vellum and staining everything its lightless tendrils could reach. Knees followed feet as he dropped to the floor in a heap, lurching forward and salvaging what he could of his work. He swore. Vellum was crumpled in his hands and ink painted sallow fingers all variations of flesh and grey. “Leave it to me, to leave ink lying around and use a pencil,” he muttered.

Seven’s eyes caught Laszlo again. Moments before they had been nothing short of startling; now they sat placid, smiling, watery garnets beneath crooked eyelids. A halfhearted snort bordered on the self-depreciative. He managed to find his feet again, and crossed the stained floor to lay down what was left of the evening’s work on his desk. Seven’s chin bent upwards again and he cocked his head, offering his taller counterpart a gauche half-smile. Rain continued to slap the rooftop, keeping time with percussive thunder.

“It’s calming, isn’t it? The storm, that is. Listen.”