Solo Ye Who Enter Here

[Razkar]

2nd Day of Spring, 514AV
The Courtyard
12th Bell

As the Citadel looked higher and darker ahead of them, Razkar had to fight harder to keep the tremor of panic from his limbs. It started as an inkling, but one he could keep chained inside his own imagination. Of course, he'd heard of Sahova; the Isle of the Dead Walkers. All the talk and ghost stories and whispered, drunken tales all seeking to outdo in each other (plenty a man will embellish when it'll mean he doesn't have to pay for a round). But hearing it all was different to being there.

Now it was real, tangible and getting more of both by the tick. Walls that looked impenetrable and decrepit all at once ringed the vast structure; noises rumbled and bubbled and barked from inside, but all of them were muted, like the stomach of a titan. The golem squeaked and rolled under a portcullis that the four visitors followed them into, and then the fog struck them like chilly, smoke trembling.

"Do... Do you hear that...?"

Razkar just nodded at the head of them. Moaning. Weeping. Sobbing. Muted screams, as if from behind gags. All around them he could hear it, and when the fog subsided or thinned, he could ake out shapes. Grave markers. Tombstones. Funeral cairns.

Specters.

"Please continue through the Courtyard and into the Gug Andjak."

The Myrian nearly flinched at the dry, emotionless tones of the golem when it spoke again. The last two words he assumed were a mistake in it's... training? Could you train a golem? Surely you just told it what to do, and how, and that was that. But before he could ask, Lesa's trembling voice spoke up from between her men.

"Th-That's wh-where all the experiments are done," she quavered, and he turned to see her huddling close into Franz's chest, who seemed heartened more by that than the fact he had Razkar in his employ. "I... I read it. In a book."

"And what of this place?"

"It... It's just the Courtyard." She said, voice the verbal equivalent of a shrug as she gazed around with wide, wet eyes, as unsure as the rest. "But it looks more like a-"

"-graveyard." Cenzo finished for her, voice more level but eyes no more calm. "There's hardly a spot without a marker."

Razkar felt that tremble come back to visit him, and with friends. Fuzzy and noxious shapes were moving around the stones and mist now; like the four of them had disturbed their sleep... or wet their appetites. As he gazed he saw heads and limbs detach from the swirling fog, come closer and circle them, chorus of whisper growing louder-

Not welcome. Not wanted.

Go away. Leave us alone.

Hate you. Hate you hate you HATEYOUHATEYOU.

Make it stop. Make it stop.

Come closer. Come closer, little ones...

The Myrian stepped back and spread his arms, though his blades stayed where they were. As the whirling figures approached he tried to move around the trio huddled together, protecting them as best he could. Razkar needed some impetus, some reason to face these shades, against whom his skill and strength was a joke.

They would do. They didn't deserve to be so maligned by these damned souls.

"Leave them be!"

The air vibrated with their angry wails and Razkar felt the wind blow harder through his hair, claws of smoke and animated mist reaching for them-

"Enough."

One word was enough; spoken through vocal chords that were beyond just "old". They seemed choked with the weight of decades. The syllables come fast enough but the way the last stretched hinted at a body unused to such... verbal displays.

And at the word, the shades receded like scolded children. Powerful as they were, intangible and eternal, they dared not face the figure that lurched and shuffled from the mist towards the group.

Mistress Wanda looked the Myrian up and down with eyes like black peas. Her gaze slid beyond him to the fresh and supple bodies beyond, and Razkar's skin crawled at the unmistakable flash of lust when he met Lesa's gaze.

Then she walked on. Spared them not a single glance and within moments, she was lost to the fog. Silence. Cold and airless, choked by the pea soup in front of them, all around them, save for-

-the sound of a wheel in desperate need on oiling.

"Follow the golem."

The Denvali didn't need to be told twice, and Razkar wasn't about to ask.

[Razkar]

"Visitors will be processed inside. Thank you, and be productive."

Razkar wanted to shiver and tell the golem that there were better and less unsettling words to use for welcoming guests than "process", like they were calculations or groceries to be solved without passion or assiduously disassembled and cataloged.

Part of him regretted the last analogy. These were Dead Walkers, after all...

He wanted to. The others may have felt the same, when the golem turned to them - it's head, anyway - inside the main building and ratted off the same thing it had said for centuries. But they... didn't, to put it simply.

Truth be told, they were all wondering if papers should talk. Or fire. Were chickens meant to be that color? Or if a spindly old creature that came to Razkar's chest should be capable of manipulating three tables of experiments like a man conducting an orchestra... without touching any of them.

"I... I've heard of this place." Lesa managed to quaver out, still amazed by all these saw in every direction, "I forget the name, but... this is just one laboratory where they experiment! They have many more, floors of them, whole rooms... buildings, even!"

"And this is just the normal djed!" Cenzo chipped in, licking his lips somewhere between overawed and uttery absorbed, mind straining at the leash to gorge on all it surveyed. "There are other places, they say where they-"

"They say much," Razkar said bluntly, turning on the trio as he craned his neck around, looking for someone, anyone to help him. Nuits walked here and there, and servants. Even golem lumbered to and fro, but no-one so much as spared them a glance. "But they are never around to prove what they say. Now wait here while I-"

"What do you want?"

He whirled and like magic Spindly Man was before him. A face like a peanut covered in a dead cat's scalp glared up at him suspiciously, moving closer and blinking obstinate cataracts away.

"Myrian... heh. Haven't seen one of you savages around for a while."

"Mores the pity," Razkar muttered back, unwilling to be baited. The longer he waited, the more his concern for Edreina grew, but he had a job to do and he'd been well-paid to do it. "These three wish to join you here, learn from the De... the Nuit. I was hired to bring... wait, you were experimenting."

"Yes, I am."

"Then what about your-"

"Like I said," the old man said with a quick jerk of his chin back over his shoulder, where the tables were as busy as ever, "I am."

"Oh... you are a Nuit?"

"I am not. Not yet, anyway."

Razkar quelled the disgust at someone wishing to become like the cold, rotting creatures he'd met before and stuck to the mission at hand. Gliding figures in robes that stank of mold and corruption. The physical kind, he thought, mind as repulsed as his body, but the kind that gnaws the soul... yes, plenty of that here, too.

"Oh... well..." The Myrian was growing tired of not knowing what to say, but this was far from his area of expertise. The three kids behind him were more acquitted to this domain of djed. "What would you suggest?"

"Regarding what?"

"... what they should do?"

"What's in it for me?"

And in a sentence, Razkar's understanding of Sahova changed. His images of the foreboding, brooding hulk of stone and lifeless toil rippled and were somehow... weakened, but also made more grotesque to him. He'd always assumed the creatures here served some higher cause or interest, even if it were one he'd never agree with.

You were wrong. These islanders, this place... it serves power only. No god, no knowledge, no loyalty. Just pure self-interest and aggrandizement. Everything else is either a tool or an obstacle.

"No surprise Everto came from here."

"Eh?"

"My pardon, Honored Elder," Razkar said with a slight bow. Those greedy for power ofter thought flattery was part and parcel of their hunger. They were often wrong, and Razkar had no problem exploiting it. "Just a prayer for assistance. "Who should they serve? They are young, strong and keen to learn, but I am sure others would be able to help them..."

It was a vain and foolish try; Razkar doubted the old mage would buy his ruse for a moment... but he did think the man would find some purpose for the youths. He didn't know whether that relieved or terrified him, but eventually the old dog looked over the trio of Denvali like a man about to buy some fresh stud and nodded.

"I can... put 'em to work." His gnarled old finger jerked out and his addressed them directly now, voice sliding fast back to the lowborn Syliran he'd spoke decades before. "And no whining about mizas, y'hear?Y'don't need that here! Food, shelter and guidance: that's what you need, that's what you'll get. Ol' Balthus doesn't need any bloody workshy fops thinking they're a Cloak. Any complaints?"

Three shaking heads answered him and Razkar exhaled. Well... perhaps this would work better. The mage would be a vicious old taskmaster, but as long as they learned, right? A quick voice whispered the obvious fear, however.

And if he can curry favor with the Dead Walkers with the "gift" of a nice, soft, supple, youthful body? How long would these duplicitous scum take to make that calculation, and doom these younglings?

"May I speak with them for a moment?" He said with a crestfallen expression and a hand over his chest, playing it up for all it was worth. "We have traveled far together..."

"Yeah, sure, sure," Bathus said, eyes gleaming like shards of glass as he imagined all the chores he'd have the new blood's doing for him elsewhere on the island. His Projection only went so far, after all. "Don't take too long, eh?"

"Of course not, Honored Elder..."

As soon as the mage was back at his temple, he drew them close, voice low so their words would not carry. Not, he thought with a chill, that it would help. The very ground you walk on could be listening and relaying every word you say.

"This is as far as I go, young ones. But before I do, I want you to answer me something. What do all these people, living and dead, want more than anything."

"Knowledge."

"Enlightenment."

"Power."

Razkar's head snapped to Franz. Oldest brother and while Cenzo had the searing intellect of the two, the ability to retain and apply knowledge, Razkar saw that Franz fretted over the consequences of those applications. He had a sense of right and wrong, more than one so young should have. The Myrian assumed the young Denvali had seen some hardship in his life, and fretted over the protection of his brother and definitely-not-female almost as much as their paid bodyguard did.

He wasn't surprised it was from him. Hoping for it, actually.

"Exactly. Djed is just their means to get it. They do not care for those who aid them, or admire them. They don't care to educate you or see you rise above them, like a teacher or parent would. They will use you as much as they can, and when your backs break or your resolve fades, they will end you."

Lesa nearly changed color. Franz just frowned. Cenzo outright glared, and once again Razkar cursed Yahal and himself in that order, as he usually did when his mark came into play. The curse from the God of Faith and Purity had made him as untrustworthy as a plague-carrying beggar to most; only their experience with him made the Denvali stay around him. Out of habut he scratched the mark, as if doing so would make it vanish, and plowed on.

"I know you do not trust me, but trust my words, if you can. Trust the sense behind them." His hands reached out and grabbed their gently, putting them all together before taking his own away. "The three of you. That is who you trust from now on. That is who you protect. I am not Edreina, who would inspire anyone, and... always has the right words."

The Myrian sighed and shook his head, noticing with a quick look that impatient Balthus starting to pace.

"Watch out for each other, and remember: nothing is free, and favors come with prices. Especially among mages. Go to your new master... and watch him carefully."

One by one, they went. Lesa slowly, not wanting to leave Franz's side. Cenzo was off like a shot, eager to gawk over the tables and foolishly thinking he'd be starting there right away (not if Balthus had any say in it, which he did: he wanted the pigeon crap out of his robes). Franz lingered and paused to stare the Myrian in the eye.

"I will protect them."

Razkar sighed again; a weariness far beyond that of any man his age entered and permeated his gaze... and he gave the young man a quick, firm squeeze on the shoulder.

"If it gets too bad, leave this place, male. These are not men, or barbarians. They walk hand in hand with infinity. Do not expect them to feel and regret as you do."

Franz nodded. Not the jerky, eager action of one jostling to get away from the crusty elder holding him back from his fun, but the short, slow nod of a man listening, retaining and not breaking eye contact as he did.

"Goodbye, Razkar."

"Until that day, Franz..."

He watched them go. He watched Balthus shepherd with barks and his walking stick like a hoary old sheep dog. The Myrian watched them vanish... and felt alone in the vast, cold room with it's chilly inhabitants in their blue flesh. He didn't even know if Myri's Light had ever been known in Sahova, but regardless...

No. Not to her. The Goddess of War and Victory? She cares not for prayers in her name: blood and triumph are her tributes, not words. No... the other one.

"Blessed... Yahal," he managed to grind out in his own language, voice a mere whisper as he walked towards the door, marching feet beating a firm beat onto the stone, "Watch over those Children. They seek only to learn the wonder of the world, and while they have ambition, they have no evil in them. They are pure, and they are loyal to each other, Yahal. These two things you value. So reward those who hold fast to them..."

Razkar did not mention himself. He wanted nothing from Yahal save the ink on his chest scourged away forever, and He would decide when that happened in his own sweet time. But Myri would not help them, he had done all he could and he had no friends on Sahova to ensure their safety.

When the proven and the tangible fails, you turn wherever you find the relief... even if it doesn't actually help.

"You better," he snarled to himself as he got back into the "fresh" air of the Courtyard, eyes turning upward for a moment in silent challenge, "You've proven you can lay a man low. Now prove you can protect them, too..."

[Mirage]

Razkar

Experience

• N/A

Lore

• Courtyard: More like a Graveyard
• Gug Andjak: Filled with Magical Labs
• Sahova: Ever in the pursuit of power
• The End of a Journey: Is it the end of old companions?

I really enjoyed this thread. Actually I REALLY enjoyed this thread, and I think you will be getting a thread from me later on. Send me a PM when you get the chance! If you have any questions feel free to PM as well