The Calm at Sea
Summer 16, 514 A.V
Xen returns to The Red Room after a long nights rest in his cavern.
He reaches the center of his work place and was quick to organize the sheets on the massage benches. Xen has his hands glide across the smooth, silky surface in front of him and removes the wrinkles from the sheets. When he was finished with the sheets, he goes on to place fresh stones into the small, boiling pool of water—anticipating the day when a client would come in with severe muscle knots. Although, as he prepared the work place for customers, Xen hadn’t changed from the other day; his disposition was marked by misery and grief. One could say he was a dolorous person now: an individual who had lost his solace in love.
Xen found peace at work, in the jungle and when he ate or slept. These were things that would always bring him joy; he was an odd dhani but had simple pleasures and a strange outlook on life. Xen crouched near a hotspring and dips his finger into the water to check its temperature. Of course the waters temperature was perfect but one could never be too cautious. Xen then stands after checking the waters temperature and walks over the one of the vacant massage benches.
He climbs onto the massage bench sitting just a few meters in front of a boiling spring of water and faces the entrance of The Red Room.
Xen’s gaze falls upon the winding passage and stays there for fives chimes before falling elsewhere. He found his gaze returning to the passage and then leaving countless times before he realized that he was awaiting someone, someone’s return. Xen knew who he was waiting for: his beloved Aka and had yet to check her cavern to see if she had actually gone missing—assumptions from the mind were terrible, indeed. Despite this, his instincts were never wrong and never led him astray… entirely. He would go and search for his mate even if he had to scour the entire jungle for her.
Yet he was petrified by the truth...
The ticks turn to chimes as time graces him with its presence and soon Xen found loneliness with him in The Red Room. In all his time in Zinrah: where he had been alone for eight years, it was only during this moment did he truly feel as though he was standing at the pinnacle of solitude.