[The Opal Clinic] Bloody butterflies (Cian Noc)

[Louie Wein]

43rd day of Fall 511 AV

Louie had learned a lot from his interview with Veldrys about the prophecy the symenestra had gotten from Viratas. One of the leads from it brought him to another interesting individual who is not from Denval but marked by the gods himself. Cian Noc of the Opal Order and as all those marked by Rak'keli, should be pretty capable in the arts of healing. This only made it a lot more interesting because from what Louie had learned, the man himself got sick recently in a bad way. There were any reasons put out. A disease of some sort? Sickened with finding the scene of a child's murder? His own gnosis mark making him a target for the butterfly painter? But the child did not have a gnosis mark did he...? Then why was he outside the Chapterhouse? Too many questions here and hopefully Louie will find out all the answers by the time the day is up because it was the closest to entropy's taint that he could think of. If the prophecy from Viratas is to be trusted, someone has to find the root of it all before it was too late so why not him?

Hopefully by now Cian Noc has recovered enough for Louie to visit especially when it is just out of nowhere. A complete stranger who is potentially drawing out old trauma to satisfy himself. Louie stood outside the doors for a while thinking if he should just go in and ask the questions he wanted or come back another time. Not that Theo person since it will be exactly the same dilemma but maybe Talen since he already knew the man for some time already. Before he could leave, someone was already behind him asking if he was going to go in or block the way for people who really needed the clinic. That got Louie a little bit embarrassed and "sorry, I will go in right now madam" quickly stepping in through the doors before realizing what it is he was already doing. Looks like the decision is already made for him and regaining his calm Louie walked towards the office to see if he would be able to meet his target today.

Before the one at the station could ask what was wrong, the very healthy looking Louie told him that "I'm sorry. I am not sick today but I do have to see Cian Noc." Would Louie be enough to interrupt the man from his larger issues today? Maybe he will make an exception today when Louie lets him know that "it is about some blood. Blood which becomes butterflies and writings." It was rather cryptic but Louie did not want anyone else to know why he is here unless they knew what was going on and can tell him anything he had missed. He already knew the best person for it here but "if he is not free today I can come another time. When do you think is good?"

[Caelum]

Guest ModeratingDuh. "Bloody and butterflies?" A little girl popped up from behind the grey haired man volunteering this particular afternoon to man the desk. Hazel eyes widened to the size of saucers as she took in Louie. He was familiar to the little girl as were all Denvali, most especially for his height. "What's that? I want a butterfly for a pet. Do you know someone who can catch one for me? I saw you in the Raster Market last week," she rambled on while the elderly gentleman finished adding up a row of numbers to help the clinic's priest from going broke. Cian was always broke, however, but that was because his clinic was free. "Good timing, Louie," Thorton wheezed before rolling back still sturdy shoulders to gain a better look at the young man. "Noc's finished up for the day. All that's left is people picking up medicines," and he nodded toward the crate of painstakingly labeled glass jars. "Mister Wein," Haddy interrupted. "What's a bloody butterfly?" "Hush, child," Thorton patted her shoulder. "Louie, Noc's in the back garden. Just go through the kitchen. That's the second door on your left. Go on now," and Thorton waved a wrinkled hand while Haddy pouted.

[Louie Wein]

As he was talking to the grey haired volunteer a girl suddenly popped up asking about what Louie had just described. Louie could not bear to expose her to the horrors of what he had learned from Veldrys so he gave a fake smile telling her that "those are crimson red butterflies" which is a beautiful color even when it was in blood and he would leave it at that because the way it was found was atrocious even if he only heard it. It was one of the reasons he came today, to confirm more details about it from one of the men who made the discovery.

Louie was still smiling though the fakeness turned into a pained one because that was one butterfly that Haddy would not want even if she did not know it yet. "Maybe you can try buying one from the Raster Market. Catching one of those butterflies for yourself...would not be nice at all" because is it a murder or a disease? This will go down in the history books along with things like black plagues. The Crimson Butterfly or Bloodied Butterfly would be a nice name though. If Louie would write a book about these incidents, one of those would probably be the title. "Just make sure that someone else is with you when you do alright?" He would not want her to get caught by the murderer of the boy at the Chapterhouse. Another visit that he would have to make soon.

"Thank you" he told Thorton. "I believe someone out there really wants me to have this meeting." Louie would spit at the prophecies of the gods if he could but too many of the recent incidents has just shown that it all has been right so far. "So the back garden is through the second door to the left?" he asked to confirm before Louie just waved at Haddy as he continued on muttering about how much "I hope you will never have to find out..." and went according to the directions through the kitchen and into the back garden.

What would a free clinic need with a back garden unless...could it be that one of the ways they cut costs with making their own medicine. Louie would assume that was what Thorton meant when he nodded at the glass jars which seem to have been labeled strangely. Ignoring that thought, Louie headed straight over to "Mister Cian Noc? It is me, Louie. I hope that you have already recovered from what happened last season?" Louie will not be able to confirm the source until he is able to talk more which is why he did not say it was a sickness or an attack. If Cian Noc did not know yet, "I am here to talk about the incidents with the butterflies in precious pai- I mean the bloody butterflies you experienced with Theo if it is not too much trouble..." Not only the one involving the both of them and not just the one about the child's murder. Louie wanted to know about "...both of them.

[Caelum]

The healer was sitting on the ground with his back against the garden wall and long legs stretched out in front of him. In his lap was the spread of a burlap sack and an overflowing riot of queer, clustered flowers from their petal tips right down to the curling, hairy roots. A flask was nestled in the jut of a stone from the wall and a second cloth spread over the grass beside him, just without the shade of the peach tree overhanging its boughs against the wall from the orchard. He lifted his eyes if not his face to watch Louie approach, picking his way amid the terrifyingly organized rows of medicinal plants and with the spill of the vegetable garden half harvested behind him. A strange smile caught Cian's mouth as Louie greeted him and launched into explanation of why he had come. His fingers worked, plucking petals to drop them by handfuls onto the cloth beside him. It was speckling purple stains across calloused palms. "I am recovered, thank you," he drawled at length. The corners of his eyes crinkled as if he were laughing silently at something. It was probably himself. "Mm," and how swift that humor was pinched out by the mention of bloody butterflies. He pulled a face, raised an eyebrow and at last gave a jerk of his chin. There was a stump nearby upon which Louie could take his rest if he preferred it over the ground. "You want to know about Mihai," he murmured.

[Louie Wein]

Louie expected that Cian Noc would be doing more...cleaner jobs being a healer but here he was harvesting what Louie could only see as flowers. He knew that those could not be gotten from the farm because that place is for food just as these flowers are not going to be used for decorations looking at the roots because it would be a lot more easier to just cut them out. Why would Louie actually care about this? It was because he will never know when will this information come in handy but the information that he had come for today was the one about the bloody butterflies.

"I can see that" from how happy Cian Noc looked "but I just wanted to make sure. Courtesy and all that" to ask someone about their well being even if it was related to a very disturbing event. A disturbing event which shows its effect when a word can mean different things to the innocent Haddy who loved the idea of bloody butterflies and the experienced Cian Noc. Louie could see that his face had changed to show that he did not know what to make of the reveal. Even the mention of sickness was taken as a joke and why not? The man was a healer and sickness even on himself was something of an everyday matter and a murder was not.

At least the stump was offered as a seat after a while. It was a good sign that the healer was willing to talk about "Mihai? Who is that?" It was a name that Louie had not encountered yet because "the only people I know related to the bloody butterflies are you and Theo. Has there been more discoveries recently?" If that is the case then Mihai is another witness to talk to "unless he is the victim?" The only other party to the incident that Louie could think of because if it was the murderer himself, the matter would have been resolved already.

[Caelum]

The suggestion of happiness snuffed out like a candle. Shadows pitched themselves in sharp, typically gentle eyes and the healer ducked his head over the riot of blooms littering his lap. The tip of one finger traced along the jagged edge of a leaf, leaving it trembling. "Mihai was the victim, Louie," Cian answered quietly. He had stooped in this very garden the evening following the discovery of the boy's body. "The boy who was butchered by whatever madman lurks among us." He looked up again, familiar features set in an expression of reservation. It was not a stranger, that look, to those Denvali who were in the habit of paying their Opal Order Healer more than the average allotment of attention. As friendly and cheerfully eccentric as he was, as often as he laid his hands upon the body of Denval, there was yet a distance that never quite vanished in the back of his eyes. "Theo and I fell sick," he confessed at length, seeming to have come to a conclusion that was ultimately in Louie's favor. "Unrelated. Entirely removed from the murder of that boy. Or," and his mouth twisted. "One would think. It's madness talking, but blood makes patterns. Viratas knows it. And when Rak'keli's power failed in me, backfired even, Mihai was the first thing to come to my mind." There came a pause, eyes coming back, this time to bore against the younger man's. "I don't believe in coincidence. Do you?"

[Louie Wein]

Looks like Louie had hit the mark in his guess when he saw the Cian Noc which quietened down trembling on the leaf. This forced Louie to lean towards him just to be able to hear properly what he was talking. "I did not hear anything about this Mihai being butchered, only about how his blood was used to paint a butterfly." The description and implications of butcher would be very strong and it was probably the strange way the body was found which made people talk about it less. "Just how bad was it?" Louie found himself asking his voice a little bit hoarse as he forced the words out once he heard madman, another strong and descriptive word to use for just another murder.

The expression of reservation was actually quite lost on Louie since he was not one of those who gave more than the average opting only to pay a visit on those occasions that he needed to normally relating to his health or in this case to find out about current affairs in Denval. It was a little bit unnerving that only moments ago this man greeted Louie with a smile. At least today he learned a valuable lesson to never remind a person of their failings in their specialties like Cian Noc's failing health while he is a healer but Louie could take comfort that it brought back to what he hinted at the beginning when he came in.

"Unrelated...I see..." Louie repeated quietly disappointed until he heard the "but". Louie started to think about what he heard from Veldrys and what he is hearing now, about blood, patterns and Viratas who gave the prophecy. "Viratas knows it..." Louie repeated to himself quietly as if affirming this fact, wondering if Cian Noc knows about the prophecy he heard from Veldrys that started him on all of this as well. He looked at the middle aged man to try and gauge exactly what sort of knowledge he might have and saw that his eyes were right on him as he asked the question.

If they were talking about coincidences then what exactly did Cian Noc want to hear? That "everything has been determined from the start? We are all playing out a story from a book already written? If that is the case then maybe it is possible that we flip to the end to find out the ending" as in through a prophecy that Louie would keep unless it looked like he needed to reveal it. Since Cian Noc has been at Mura he might not be a stranger to the concept but for Louie who has only been in Denval he has never seen it in effect and he does not want to believe in it now since he knows it spoke of the fall of Denval.

He decided that he will only look at the ending when it comes but that would not mean he will stop looking into whatever he could now to be better prepared for it. With that in mind Louie went back to the now and asked Cian Noc about "what relation would there be between Mihai and your power backfiring? I do not really see any connection there. This Mihai is but a child, his murderer unknown and at large. The body was found at the Chapterhouse which is for those who follow Priskil and your power comes from Rak'keli. These things are so distinct from one another how could this incident be anything but a coincidence?" Speaking of Mihai and the backfiring of "your power. If the child was already dead then why did you try to use it?"

[Caelum]

"There were deliberate lacerations on his body," Cian spoke with the steadiness and control of a surgeon, a physician and a scientist as he continued to remove the petals from the boughs one by one. Everything was exact, his motions precise. "They appeared ritualistic. The entire scenario. Glyphs," he explained, "Such as those magic users employ in their arts. In the lay of them, Louie, were holy words from old texts. I," he frowned, the steady countenance disturbed and hands pausing in their work. "I don't know," he admitted finally. "But Theo is in agreement with me. There is too much stench wafting through our town, Louie." The corners of the cloth in his lap were folded in, aligned carefully over the pile of petals he had harvested for medicinal purposes. There were potions to brew, teas to steep and soaps to mill. Good work, healthy work. He folded his legs beneath him, moving to stand. "The gods themselves have begun to pay heed."

[Louie Wein]

"Deliberate?" but there was no sense in arguing about that fact with the town healer. However, since he was a healer there was that perfect question of "how can you be so sure that it is one of those magical glyphs?" Granted, "I don't know anything about them" but he could still look up on it later based on whatever it is that Cian might tell him. Maybe, just maybe "you know what is the ritual for?" Louie's wish just like everything else was that it could be something nice and good for all of Denval but to brutalize a young boy in Louie's mind was anything but dark and sinister. That could be the stench that Cian was talking about.

Louie did not want to make any assumptions but there was also that remark about the gods which was very foreboding. When would the divine actually want to play a role in the affairs of mortals unless they really wanted to like the Valterrian? A topic which came out in Louie's historical studies which bad a very sad ending. It looked like Cian did not know anything about the prophecy or he was better at keeping it to himself than Louie was. That can always be looked into later but the more important question was "what do you mean by the gods themselves? I thought that you" and every other marked person who acted for them like Veldrys and Theo "experience problems with your powers" unless that was the reason that they are paying heed now.

Yes, all this smelt funny and it was not the herbs. Even if Cian already admitted that he did not know, Louie had to ask again if "there is a connection with that ritual?" That was the only thing that he had to work with now and reminding it again was not only because Louie was at a loss but also thought that it was important. "Do you remember what it looked like? Maybe draw it here?" on the piece of paper Louie somehow always produced from him and gave to Cian.

[Caelum]

“We have been suffering beneath a strange plague of our divine granted powers,” Cian volleyed evenly. The make shift cloth bag of foraged petals was set on the garden hedge, nestled amid brambles and time worn stones as he stepped forward to accept the paper proffered. It was twisted absently about green stained fingers before he rummaged through his own pocket and came up with a sharpened little stub of charcoal. “But don’t you think that such a phenomenon would draw the attention of our gods, Louie?” He raised an eyebrow was settling back down to the grass, heedless of the dust, to prop the paper against the bend of a knee and after a long minute of consideration begin to sketch. He continued to remark while drawing. “While not a wizard myself, I’ve been witness to a great many magical practices over the years. This was absolutely glyphing, that found on poor Mihai, but it was for no purpose I’ve ever seen before. The switches and connections, they made no sense. I had Camlach take a gander at it too, and still nothing. There was an aura, apparently, but the best he was able to describe it to me was,” he looked up, bewildered. “Burnt. Singed. Driven. Does that mean anything to you?” He could hope. “Here,” and he completed the sketch, twisting it about and offering the paper back to the Denvali. It was a series of sigils like those found on a magic scroll, the runes as expertly defined but near impossible to narrate as any others. “See if that does you any good.” When Louie touched the paper, it would be hot as fire. The sensation would swiftly fade.