The Temple: Of All Things Mystical (Victor Lark)

[Runas]

Sunset, Summer 35th, 511 AV


Religion, adoration for one's deities, was deeply ingrained into Tawna's psyche. It was why, every night, she faced Leth and said her prayers. It was why she once painted to honour the deities of her race and of herself. It was why she lived her new life dedicated to the three deities she'd loved since the beginning of her memories.

She sat in silent prayer in the currently empty church, reveling in the silence and tranquility afforded to her by the absence of mortals. Her raven hair, painted with varying slashes of violet and indigo, had been braided intricately by the skilled hands of a woman-whore in the Golden Dragon. The few mizas spent on the woman's company had been well-earned, for while she did not feel the calls of the flesh, she did indeed enjoy the company of mortals if only to pick apart their minds with every bit of skill she possessed.

Tawna knew that the sun was mere chimes from setting behind the horizon. She knew Syna's last glimpse of Tawna's face would be the same sight she'd always see. She somewhat regretted being unable to let Syna see the form Leth had given her, but that was the curse of falling; being stuck in perpetual change forever and eternity.

That was almost frustrating enough to make Tawna's dark green eyes glimmer faintly.

At the realization that she was making herself irritated, a small smile curled her lips. The smile never reached her eyes, which always were distant closing in on completely unfeeling. Amusement would be shown in her eyes only to those who could see deeply enough.

With a long sigh, the smile fled Tawna's lips and she turned her gaze to one of the vaulted windows of the temple, her green eyes narrowing as Syna's form dipped out of sight. She knew it would be less than another chime before Syna had fled completely and the transformation would take the Eypharian body.

[Victor Lark]

Religion had once been a foreign thing to Victor, only curses on angry tongues or distant chants in dark, far-off chambers. He had been raised to fear the gods, but he did not know which ones and for what reason. Fear did not suit him, nor did humility or quiet contemplation. And yet it was for a god that he had found the inspiration to leave the peculiar protection of Rhysol’s domain. It was for a god that he had begun to spend long hours reaching out into an empty plane of magic and divinity which might not even exist. It was for a god that he sat a few feet away from a striking woman with too many arms, and did not instantly approach her.

Time escaped him on those occasions when he put himself between the pews and tried to meditate or pray. He could have been sitting hours or minutes when an enchanting sigh broke the murmuring silence. He turned his head and found it stiff. When he finally caught sight of her, his straight lips broke smoothly into their usual grin. He beamed, but was not warm. Like the woman beside him, there was an unsettling absence of light in his eyes. Victor was drawn to hers, he who could never see deeply enough.

He took advantage of her distracted glance towards the window and slid over the polished bench at her. Her straight posture and meticulously painted skin suggested that she would not be flattered by a touch, so he restrained himself. Instead, he perched an elbow against the pew in front of them and leaned to try and catch her eye. There was a joke on his smile as he said, perhaps too loudly, “Hello, beautiful. What brings you here?” His tone swam in the irony of such a greeting in such a place. For some reason, he did not expect that she would be offended.

[Runas]

Tawna had not been ignorant of the man's presence near her; she just had no reason to take notice of him. Her green eyes were lit with the fires of Syna's few remaining rays, and her eyes gained an inch of melancholy. Soon Syna would be unseeing...

The man, or youth, or whatever age range could define him, inturrupted Tawna's view. She found herself staring into dark, curiously distant eyes, and an instant smile danced across her lips. She was unaccustom to people shoving their faces into hers, and her shock was swallowed by amusement. Unease flickered in her at the nearness of full sunset, but she paid no heed to it. Humans, among most races other than perhaps Akalak, could easily be coerced into the whims of a female. It was a rude conception, but almost always true.

His choice of greeting totally threw Tawna for a loop. She knew her appearance drew eyes, but people rarely used the word 'beautiful' to describe someone they saw as 'exotic'. She flushed just slightly, and real amusement began to leak visibly into her eyes. Slowly, she reclined next to the male, keeping her eyes on his. She turned her attention to him, keeping just a bit focused on the position of Syna.

"Beautiful? You flatter me, sir." She flashed her teeth at him in a bright smile, even though the brightness didn't disturb her eyes. "On the other hand, it is very rare to find such a charming gentleman in a church. You aren't as old as most acolytes."

Her use of Djed was very light at this point. She used it only because he already interested her. She figured he wasn't an acolyte or priest, but she'd asked to see if he'd find amusement with her words. She was trying to charm him, which was a goal she believed possible since he'd already found her beautiful. Most of her words were true, too, for she had no use in lying unless pressed into it. Flattery was easier when truthful.

[Victor Lark]

What was that? Color on her cheeks, a flash of something in her eyes. It was not the girlish discomposure of an easily impressed virgin, but neither did she remain as stoic as he had expected. He thought it might be amusement, and so he would amuse her more to see if anything came of it. To Victor, who had never quite grown out of the racism of his youth, the exotic was inherently beautiful. At the same time, he was incapable of appreciating beauty as anything but curious. It was a thing to be compromised, to be picked apart and examined, not to be admired or respected. He glanced down at her arms, swallowing his own questions in order to answer hers.

“Young minds are better attuned to the divine,” he replied. He tried to place his words somewhere between truth and sarcasm, so that she might not know if she had guessed right. As for the statement itself, he had no idea whether or not it was true; he knew so little about the gods that some might argue he did not belong at the temple. “What can I say?”

While he hardly noticed the manipulation in the passing compliment, he did see how her eyes glanced towards the window every few seconds. He wished he was on the other side of her, so he might block her view from that which distracted her. She was conscious of the time, he presumed. He wanted her to look at him, because he wanted to read her mysterious eyes. “But don’t let this little old priest keep you from your engagements.” He added, leaning even closer so that it would be difficult not to look at him. “Do you need to be somewhere? Let me escort you there.”

[Runas]

Tawna's smile flashed across her lips again and she lifted one of her left hands to tilt his chin slightly. Her green eyes flared with dark intent before she pulled back again. Her eyes remained locked on to his now.

"I suppose that is true... What is the name of the god you serve? I'll pray to him for you if you give me a good reason to." She leaned towards him. She had lost her time race against Syna because this man was speaking to her, so when he moved closer until their foreheads almost touched, she didn't bother to even glance around. "I can give you something to ask Leth for, should you ever meet him."

She lifted her hand again to slide her fingers through his hair idly. Despite the intimacy of her touch, the warmth of her voice, her eyes were cool to it all. If she felt anything, she hid it. As she played with his hair, her skin began to shimmer and fade into a paler shade. The henna remained, but it looked almost black against her skin. Two of her arms on each side receded, leaving her ribs exposed where the limbs had extended from her skin and her shift. Her hair remained raven black, but her eyes flashed and became silver, like two moon's glimmering out of her pale face. Last were her horns to be revealed. Deep green, the colour of Tawna's eyes, they curled from her temples in slender twin spirals. She was the epitome of exotic in this form, for mortals rarely ever beheld the members of this race that were born of Leth.

Tawna's transformation from Eypharian to Ethaefal was complete. She was Runas now, since Tawna went to sleep with Syna.

Runas smiled at the man, the same smile she'd given as Eypharian, and slid her fingers from his hair to run them along his cheek. She withdrew from him after that.

"I have no need to leave your refreshing presence, priest," Runas laced just a bit of sarcasm into her voice, which had also changed with her appearance. She now spoke with a voice of surreal calm and beauty, even though it was just a shadow of her former voice in Leth's realm. [b]"I am in no hurry to leave, and I bid you to stay and keep me company, priest." Now Runas' silver eyes literally glowed as she stared into her new companion's.

[Victor Lark]

Victor peered at her helplessly. In his attempts to seek out any sort of sparkle from her dark, flat eyes, he became wholly wrapped in mere tendrils of djed. He did not understand most of her talk of gods, so he mumbled an unintelligible something and ignored it in favor of investigation. They touched: chin, brow, hair. Not one to be outdone in intimacy, Victor even rose against her, kneeling one leg against the bench and leaning over the painted, gilded woman. Their noses were almost touching, when everything changed.

His surprised and scrambling body broke her hold on his head. The whites of his eyes shone in the light of her change. Before it was even complete, his fingertips reached out to touch her bare sides, where insectoid arms had once wandered over his clothes; they moved without hesitance to her head, where brilliant viridian horns had emerged, and the fold of her eye, where the smallest color change might have revealed another tell-tale glimmer of emotion. But it was gone before he could identify it, if it was even there. His other hand removed itself from the pew’s wood with the astonished smacking of sweat and, with it, he grasped the fingers that tried to pull away from his face. He held her hand firmly at his side, as if letting go would relinquish her to some further, incomprehensible transformation.

She spoke again, but he did not hear. His eyes were lost to her piercing gaze, glancing distractedly over her body as he tried to make sense of it all. “How did you do that?” He said, his childish tone commanding a thorough answer. In those moments he was too mesmerized to be concerned with the intricacies of subtle flirtation. “Won’t you do it again?”

A darkness had settled over the main hall. The real priests had lit lanterns and torches, but they only served as a rhythm for which the shadows could dance, throwing light on the newly pale woman and casting Victor’s countenance in black. He rose again, pulling his eyes above hers as he pressed a finger onto a sharp cheekbone and then the smooth horn again. Maybe if he pushed hard enough, he could break the illusion, and discover how it was she had created it.

[Runas]

A brighter glimmer flashed from her silver, cool, distant eyes at what he did, even though a shiver trickled along her spine when his warm fingers brushed over her ribs. She felt more exposed in this moment than ever before, but that was unimportant. Her attention was divided between her discomfort of his touch along her pale skin and exhilaration that he did not recoil from her. Of course, his demanding questions left something to be desired in means of controlling one's curiousity, but that could have been an unlooked for side affect of her hypnotism. He had seemed to be hers before she'd unfortunately transformed, and now she'd have to start working on that connection again.

When he'd caught her hand and held it, she took the advantage of that contact to lace her fingers through his. The action was one she had not completed in several years, and the last time it had been completely necessary or else she would have been lost in the city she was visiting. Doing it again now, for no reason other than to try and reassure the man for whatever fear had made him take her hand in the first place, was almost calming.

"I can't change again on a whim, you know... I did it now because Leth told me to as he rose." She spoke with a childish incredulity that bordered on indignation. She'd not used that tone in a while either. Today was certainly a day for reviving old habits. "Stay with me all night and I can show you me changing back, if you wish."

Another one of her smiles curved her lips as she leaned in again, her discomfort from earlier fading away as she found his eyes with her own in the darkness. She didn't think he was afraid of her, but either way she tried to express that he had no reason to fear in her hypnotism. It wasn't like she would turn into a Dhani and bite him or have any thought of eating him alive.

"I can tell you all about it if you want, but you must promise me something..." She leaned even closer and brought her free hand to tilt his face to the side so her lips could be a breath away from his ear. She would whisper to him, and her cool breath would fan in his hair softly. "You can't tell anyone what I look like."

[Victor Lark]

Her secret efforts bounced from Victor’s subconscious, but not for any force of will. He was not afraid. In fact, there had always been a dangerous lack of fear in him. If he had any sense, he might have kept his head and interrogated her politely, discovered easy answers and made a friend out of her. If he had any sense, he would not have prodded this beautiful and mysterious creature until she lost any semblance of trust for him.

But whether for his own innate insolence or for the thin threads of hypnotism that still groped at the back of his mind, Victor was not sensible. He laughed openly at her conditions without withdrawing from her persistent hold on his face. He would not sit back, or even look at her, until her hand released him, hovering over her in a half-crouch. “Why?” He asked, mocking, “What if I do? I’ll bet you there is another priest in the shadows who saw. I donnot see why you would want to hide such a thing. Unless...”

The old naïve wonder had escaped him, falling slowly into wavering skepticism. His voice was low as he asked without shame, “Are you a goddess? Why do you do what Leth tells you?”

[Runas]

Runas felt a stirring of something angry at the insolence she detected in the man. He had such curious reactions, and while she felt the need to lay his mind out for her to examine and discard, she could hardly find the desire to do so when she was growing tired of The mocking tone he'd just employed. Was he so brash to not do as she asked? She needed to connect her hypnotism again, but what would be an adequate enough threat to have him promise?

She leaned back from him, removing her hand from gripping his chin to place her palm over his mouth and stretching her pale, thin fingers over his cheek. It was the best way to occupy his mouth other than kissing him. She didn't think of that though, her attention sent out to the priest she'd known was watching. A secret she felt she should bestow upon this simple-minded mortal was that most of these priests knew her. The eldest had been here the first time she'd come to pray and had convinced her against dying, and the youngest would have undoubtly been informed of her desire for secrecy. Unlike most of her race, she desired to disappear in the world as a rather unusual traveler. They were much more open about their origins, and while Runas had no problems with people seeing her in either form, she had an issue with people knowing she possessed both forms.

The priest was one she'd met about six years previously, when she was in Syliras for the Spring. He was probably watching to make sure she and this man didn't procreate on the pews, which wasn't something she planned on anyway. Some of these mortals were suspicious anyway.

Her attention returned back to her muted companion and a small smile curved her lips again, almost sinister. "I know the majority of these priests, my friend. They know what I am, and that is not a Goddess." Silver eyes flashed at the absence of respect in his voice. The emotions in her eyes would now be a mixture of amusement, indignation, and anger. Not the best combination for her. "I am Ethaefal. I possess two forms but once I only had this form, and that was when I lived in Leth's realm. I have brothers and sisters from both Leth's and Syna's realm on this mortal-run world. They are more open about duality. I am not. Do you respect that?"

A small thought trickled into her head. She knew a way to keep his promise that he wouldn't tell. The only problem would be hypnotism. She was running out of djed, she could feel it. She should have enough to hold him again to get his information and use it.

"Do you live with anyone in Syliras, friend?" She smiled at him, removing her hand to brush her fingers over his cheek almost wistfully. Djed began to swirl in her silver eyes lazily as she spoke, urging him to tell her what she wanted. "What's your name, also? I didn't catch it... Mine is Runas." Laughter flashed her eyes again.

[Victor Lark]

Some semblance of embarrassment sank into the corners of his countenance when she admitted that she was not divine. Then, immediately distracted by the peculiar emotion that had moved into her eyes, he returned to the old inquisitiveness. She seemed to resent his words, but was not entirely offended by him; the notion that he had charmed her rose as pride in his chest. It did not matter that his assumptions had been wrong, because she was an ethaefal, whatever it was. Her family knew the gods, and she spoke in cryptic, unfamiliar answers that hardly dissuaded his mounting questions.

He almost asked them through the pale digits that restrained his mouth, but then he noticed a spark of something in her eye. He paused. There was a smiling kindness in the depths of those sterling-lined pupils that put her questions before his own. As her hand freed him to speak, the moon drew his eyes upward. Ever since he had met the half-spider, that moon always reminded him of Seven. In that moment, his inimitable Leth-face seemed to smile down on the human through the temple window, inviting him to think of home and return to their bed.

“Victor Lark,” he answered, mumbling as if it were a single word. His gaze returned to hers. His tongue was peppered with jest as he added, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Runas!”

He leaned sideward against the back of the pew, propping his elbow against it and pulling the edge of his jaw to rest on his hand. It was an appropriate distance for a pair of people who were less than strangers, but it seemed a mile compared to their previous immediacy. “And yes, I do not live alone,” he answered with his usual playful elusiveness, but some itch at the back of his mind inspired him to elaborate. “His name is Seven. Just Seven.” A beat passed with a distant sigh. He skimmed her shoulder with an idle finger. “I am sorry to disappoint you! But what of your home? Where in this big city do you live?”

Only then did it feel right to turn the conversation back to her. Before she could answer the meaningless inquiry, he interjected, “But what do you mean when you say duality? The two faces, I suppose. Do you have more? Do all of your brothers and sisters change when the sun sets? And where is Leth’s realm?” The respect she so required seemed to be lost on him as he finished with, “Can I go there?”