04-10-2023, 05:49 PM
There was nothing he could say to remedy the insult she saw in him, which made him reluctant to say anything at all. Sören had the knowledge he wanted. Kemala’s offence at his method ought to be easily cast aside, and it annoyed him that it wasn’t. Those hooks of hers dug through his skin still, and he resented how the flash of her accusation made him want to defend himself. She hadn’t been hurt. He hadn’t intended to allow her to be hurt. And she certainly wouldn’t have come if he had explained bluntly his intentions. She acted like bait and something else were mutually exclusive rather than an efficiency he took advantage of for both reasons. His presumption of her capability was a compliment, and one so rarely bestowed he was stung that she did not accept it like the golden offering it was.
Sören watched her suddenly refuse to look at him in surprise. He suffered no such weak affliction in return, for Kemala held the entirety of his attention now. She did not reach for the flask, and so he placed it on the boards by his feet. Despite himself he was not unmoved. She infuriated and allured in such equal measure he was unsure of navigation.
“Providence spoke, I only listened; she does not always reveal to us the question when she provides the answer. We are rarely only one thing or the other, Kemala. Bait, or something else. King or servant. You tell me which you are.”
But he answered her other question without further coercion. His forearms settled onto his knees as he spoke, hands lightly laced, seeking the captivation of attention that tried to allude him. “I went to the lake at Roopkund because a friend asked for my help. The creature there had killed an entire expedition already, and he was convinced there was a secret to discover – that it guarded something,” he said. If Kemala was searching for nobility, she would find little to her liking. But passion in Sören was like deepest flames; nurtured deep, a furnace. It held the cadence of his voice now, measured and poured like nectar. He did not soothe her injured feelings, but did offer truth in its stead; to him, perhaps they amounted to the same value. “The creature attacked me specifically. I told you the truth at the hostel, that the scale you touched belonged to the creature that took my eye, and I thought my sight was the payment owed for the talisman procured. Together, we discovered a tomb beneath the blanket of bones afterwards. It did not belong to this world, Kemala. I have never seen anything like it. Runes whispered there; objects imbued with the gifts we wield. I would describe it for you if you asked me, but words make a poor man’s reflection. Easier to describe paradise.
“I thought my eye was the sacrifice demanded. I was wrong. My friend lingered when he should not have, and I let my attention lapse when I should not have. We were nearly at the surface again when the final price was paid.” He did not take a blink from her attention, but neither relinquished the privacy of his own guilt and grief; those were not secrets of his soul he deigned to share with anyone, even Declan’s widow. Her judgements would not scathe his armour. Like as not she would be unable to keep them to herself, he thought sourly. But neither did he lack emotion. “When I was approached for the job of uncovering a second creature guarding a second treasure, I accepted. To ignore the mystery is to make a mockery of his death and my role in it. That is why I am here.”
He had expected her to impart some wisdom on the steering of the boat, not her understanding of the power itself. If it was just a case of nudging, it seemed an easy enough task. He offered no clarification though, accepting the knowledge in open interest. In reciprocity he reached for the back of his thick sweater and pulled it over his head. Cold bit his skin, a chill that made him grunt. The shirt beneath was similarly damp, but it was the ink on his forearm he shared with her. A depiction of runes. “I read it in patterns,” he told her. “If I remained as still as you say and allowed it to embrace me, the runes would consume me to cinders. To command it is a battle. It is life and struggle and ferocity. Such is the reason I believe the creature here was lured to attack you and not me. Such is why you cannot see the weaves as I make them, nor I yours.”
Fist softly closed, the runes threaded a gentle path as he spoke, but not yet to move the boat. Instead it warmed the air around them, burrowing faint heat into the shawl clasped about her shoulders. He would be gratified to witness a measure of surprise once she noticed, he realised. It was not a comfortable acknowledgement, yet he did not find himself able to look away from searching her face. “We bargained as equals, Kemala. You cautioned me to judge you a goddess. If you think I have used you unkindly, then you are owed in kind. What would you have of me?”
Sören watched her suddenly refuse to look at him in surprise. He suffered no such weak affliction in return, for Kemala held the entirety of his attention now. She did not reach for the flask, and so he placed it on the boards by his feet. Despite himself he was not unmoved. She infuriated and allured in such equal measure he was unsure of navigation.
“Providence spoke, I only listened; she does not always reveal to us the question when she provides the answer. We are rarely only one thing or the other, Kemala. Bait, or something else. King or servant. You tell me which you are.”
But he answered her other question without further coercion. His forearms settled onto his knees as he spoke, hands lightly laced, seeking the captivation of attention that tried to allude him. “I went to the lake at Roopkund because a friend asked for my help. The creature there had killed an entire expedition already, and he was convinced there was a secret to discover – that it guarded something,” he said. If Kemala was searching for nobility, she would find little to her liking. But passion in Sören was like deepest flames; nurtured deep, a furnace. It held the cadence of his voice now, measured and poured like nectar. He did not soothe her injured feelings, but did offer truth in its stead; to him, perhaps they amounted to the same value. “The creature attacked me specifically. I told you the truth at the hostel, that the scale you touched belonged to the creature that took my eye, and I thought my sight was the payment owed for the talisman procured. Together, we discovered a tomb beneath the blanket of bones afterwards. It did not belong to this world, Kemala. I have never seen anything like it. Runes whispered there; objects imbued with the gifts we wield. I would describe it for you if you asked me, but words make a poor man’s reflection. Easier to describe paradise.
“I thought my eye was the sacrifice demanded. I was wrong. My friend lingered when he should not have, and I let my attention lapse when I should not have. We were nearly at the surface again when the final price was paid.” He did not take a blink from her attention, but neither relinquished the privacy of his own guilt and grief; those were not secrets of his soul he deigned to share with anyone, even Declan’s widow. Her judgements would not scathe his armour. Like as not she would be unable to keep them to herself, he thought sourly. But neither did he lack emotion. “When I was approached for the job of uncovering a second creature guarding a second treasure, I accepted. To ignore the mystery is to make a mockery of his death and my role in it. That is why I am here.”
He had expected her to impart some wisdom on the steering of the boat, not her understanding of the power itself. If it was just a case of nudging, it seemed an easy enough task. He offered no clarification though, accepting the knowledge in open interest. In reciprocity he reached for the back of his thick sweater and pulled it over his head. Cold bit his skin, a chill that made him grunt. The shirt beneath was similarly damp, but it was the ink on his forearm he shared with her. A depiction of runes. “I read it in patterns,” he told her. “If I remained as still as you say and allowed it to embrace me, the runes would consume me to cinders. To command it is a battle. It is life and struggle and ferocity. Such is the reason I believe the creature here was lured to attack you and not me. Such is why you cannot see the weaves as I make them, nor I yours.”
Fist softly closed, the runes threaded a gentle path as he spoke, but not yet to move the boat. Instead it warmed the air around them, burrowing faint heat into the shawl clasped about her shoulders. He would be gratified to witness a measure of surprise once she noticed, he realised. It was not a comfortable acknowledgement, yet he did not find himself able to look away from searching her face. “We bargained as equals, Kemala. You cautioned me to judge you a goddess. If you think I have used you unkindly, then you are owed in kind. What would you have of me?”
![[Image: odinraven.png]](http://thefirstage.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/odinraven.png)