Trinity Chapters: A Serpent's Tale [Finished]

[Tanrria]

✦ Neresti ✦ Fairwinds ✦
The Resentful Mage

Location: In my Room With: Eovic and Knight Captain Huntsman (why is she dressed like that if she's a knight captain?)

It would seem that it was Huntsman's turn to speak up now, and unlike Eovic, she had a darker and more annoyed tone. Neresti's features mirrored that of the red-head's, a darkening that made her jewel-like eyes glint with hardness. "So the claws come out now? It's not my fault that you started off by asking redundant questions. Please, enlighten me to what it is you want if my answers are already so unsatisfactory."

Neresti was as composed as she usually was, even when Huntsman began to throw out a bunch of facts. As far as Neresti was concerned, Avathyn hadn't been twisted by the cult, he seemed very aware of the actions he was taking. The cult helped to cover things up, sure, and they have leverage, but that's hardly to say that they were poisoning Avathyn's mind. She was fishing. Neresti could see that much, and she was fishing hard, hoping to play on Neresti's sympathy and concern for Avathyn to get her to talk. Unfortunately for them, Neresti's emotions didn't run that deep, if they were ever brought to the forefront, she tended to suppress them because all it usually ended with for her was despair. Plus, the empathy for helping people that she'd shown as a child had long since been stifled by forced restrictions. "What is it that you want, exactly?" Neresti asked, the annoyance seeming to grow in her voice as she spoke.

"Do you want to know if Avathyn committed the murder of the Pale Vigilant the other day and these two people that you also say he killed? If that's what you're looking for then I can't help you because I don't know. You seem to overestimate just how much I interact with Avathyn. I see him in the Halls of Voices sometimes, I talk to him a little, maybe help him, and then we go our separate ways. We are as involved in the personal workings of each other's lives as you likely are to your coworkers. I don't know where he grew up, I don't know what his favorite things are, I don't know where he currently lives, and I certainly don't know what he does when he's not healing people or sitting in the Halls of Voices. Perhaps you want to know if I have useful information on the infamous cult? That's another area that I just can't help you with because I wasn't even aware that Avathyn might potentially have ties with them until I heard the rumors flying around about the Pale Vigilant's murder." Neresti paused for a moment, her eyes narrowing at the woman across from her before finishing "Were those your questions? If not, what are you hoping to glean by talking to me?"

Honestly? Neresti would love it if the cult got taken down; she certainly didn't think that a crime ring was a good thing to have lurking around, especially one that had a decent number of mages. But could Neresti really help them take down an organization that they weren't even sure of the size of? For all she knew, the cult had it's claws sunk deep, having infiltrated every institution in the city. They must to some degree to be able to stay hidden so often from the rumor-mill. To try and take them down just seemed like an unrealistic goal to Neresti, and even if she did have information to offer about them, she didn't think it would do much good in the long run.

[Skatora]

Neresti's responses were perfect: classic misdirected rage and throwing questions back to her. What was even more awesome was the fact that Neresti didn't outright reject the accusation that she had been with Avathyn in the burned district the other night. Instead, she kept repeating that she didn't know him, and that she was like his coworker. She had said something like that before, too... That they were like coworkers. What were they working on, then?

Scarlett glanced in Eovic's direction. His eyes seemed tired, like he didn't want to get in the middle of a catfight. Scarlett wasn't necessarily angry at Neresti... But this is the only way the military taught her to question people.

"...That's another area that I just can't help you with because I wasn't even aware that Avathyn might potentially have ties with them until I heard the rumors flying around about the Pale Vigilant's murder." Neresti briefly paused, her pink eyes narrowing in disgust, "Were those your questions? If not, what are you hoping to glean by talking to me?"

What... What was that? Scarlett looked at Neresti, then to Eovic and then back to Neresti. A bead of sweat formed on her brow. She was suddenly extraordinarily anxious, a strong sense of foreboding washed over her as she watched the delicate mage sitting across from them. Avathyn mentioned the Pale Vigilant, too. If fact, he wanted to murder her on the spot if she had been one, and if one were to only look at the occupation of the people he had killed... And Neresti was a mage... A mage that had been seen with a murderous "coworker" soon after and soon before the killings. Avathyn, Neresti's "coworker" was only killing members of the Pale Vigilant. And there was a Pale Vigliant sitting right across from her.

Scarlett felt sick. Her face went pale. With one flick on her wrist, Neresti could murder Eovic, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. Mages... Mages were so dangerous. There was a reason they had to be controlled like this. Scarlett had always been right to be afraid of magic-users!

Scarlett glanced back at Eovic again. His dark blue eyes met hers, and he seemed quizzical. She could almost hear him say with his expression, "Are you alright?.

No. She wasn't alright. She was angry at Neresti now. Angry at the the sheer, remote possibility that she may have even considered the death of anyone in the Pale Vigilant. Because "anyone" in the Pale Vigilant could have been Eovic...

She suddenly stood from her chair, causing it to tip over. She stood protectively in between Neresti and Eovic. "What were you speaking about with Avathyn in the burned district?!" She nearly yelled in her most enraged, authoritative voice she could muster. It was worse than when her drill sergeant chewed her out for making mistakes, "Why is Avathyn only targeting the Pale Vigilant?!"

[Tanrria]

✦ Neresti ✦ Fairwinds ✦
The Resentful Mage

Location: In my Room With: Eovic and Knight Captain Huntsman (why is she dressed like that if she's a knight captain?)

Scarlett was quiet as she spoke, though once Neresti finished, she leapt up from her chair and stood in between her and Eovic. Raising an eyebrow at the woman, Neresti wasn't at all sure what this knight-captain was doing. Generally that was a protective act, but it didn't look like Scarlett had any weapons on her. Not to mention that if Neresti decided to suddenly attack, magic or no, Eovic was better equipped to handle it. Though, it's not like Neresti was ever naturally inclined towards that magic. All she'd ever been able to do in the primal school was conjure small amounts of water and create small fires to start fireplaces or candles.

Now that the red-head was up, the woman seemed to flare up, as if she was fire incarnate as she practically yelled at Neresti. Still, Neresti's face did not waver. She had seen this kind of strictness, this anger before. The previous people that had interrogated her had tried different tactics to get her to talk, and the professors at the school weren't exactly kind and empathetic in their dealings with their pupils. "He's only targeting the Pale Vigilant? I thought that you said he killed two other people? Or were you lying to try and get a rise out of me?" She asked, already poking holes in Scarlett's logic. In Neresti's experience, the best way to win an argument was to keep your head and patiently wait. A hole would emerge sooner or later in that case. Much like it had now.

Neresti did address Scarlett's first question though, probably to her surprise. "To answer your first question though, I went with Avathyn to talk in the burnt district because I wanted to express my concerns about the rumors that were floating around town. I told him that I wanted to talk about this sensitive thing and he brought me there so that we could talk. All he told me though was not to worry and that I should trust him. He seems very adamant to say that he wasn't involved, so I'm choosing to trust him. I must've separated from him before you arrived, since I never saw you." Inwardly, she was proud of herself. Even if there was a mage that was sitting nearby that would have her only saying truth, all of what she'd just said was completely true.

Now that Neresti was quiet, she couldn't help thinking about the second question again. Why target the Pale Vigilant...? Wasn't it obvious? Neresti was hard pressed to think of a mage that didn't hate the Pale Vigilant, they were effectively jailers for them. While the higher mages kept order in the council, it was the Pale Vigilant that made sure order was enforced. Should something out of turn happen, the Vigilant's members would be brought in. Add to the fact that it was the Pale Vigilant who permanently took away Avathyn's power and it creates the perfect recipe for pure unadulterated hatred. Neresti wasn't going to say that though, if the rest of society didn't even bother to learn about the citizens that live in it, mages included, then they didn't deserve to know. As she thought, Neresti had turned to gaze out her window once more. Perhaps Scarlett would find that even more infuriating, but it's not like she could do anything physical in her room.

Slowly turning her gaze back towards the bristling woman, Neresti gave her a level gaze before saying "I don't think I have any information that could possibly help you, knight-captain." Neresti then paused for a moment, slowly standing up and adjusting her robes to make sure they were all in order. Moving away from the two of them, making it very clear what she was doing so that Scarlett didn't think she was trying to attack, Neresti resettled herself on the window seat. "Is there anything else? Because if not, I'd prefer to be left alone before I'm called in to work."

[pieceful]

EOVIC GARDHEDT

Well, this was not going as well as he had hoped. Eovic's intended tactic was to be as friendly as possible with Neresti, who had been questioned already so many time to the point she probably found it absolutely annoying. That way, she could feel a bit more comfortable with speaking to them, and maybe even share something she usually would not tell anyone else about Avathyn Poe and the Sightless Eye. It might have even worked; he obviously took her by surprise by telling her about Avathyn's arrest and escape, and he could have used that brief moment of emotional instability to extract answers out of her.

But Scarlett had other ideas, it seemed; she went on to force questions out of her just a couple of levels shy of violence. While such an approach might have been effective towards someone who was not used to interrogations, Neresti had been on the Vigilant's spotlight for quite a long time. Still, the Knight-Captain managed to frustrate her into letting out a couple of interesting information, and Eovic was not against that.

Neresti, with her patience stretched thin, stood up after Red and distanced herself from them. Eovic took that as the cue for them to leave. "Ah... Um," he spoke up, "Yes, it's probably best if we take off now." He stood up from his own chair and placed a hand on Red's shoulder to calm her down. Her acting angry was clearly not an act any longer, and it was probably best if he stepped in and separated the two women from murdering each other. "Let's go," he whispered to Red and urged her towards the door, careful not to piss her off even more.

Before they left, however, Eovic turned back to Neresti. "For just an acquaintance, you took a very large risk to seek Avathyn out even after hearing about the rumors that he was involved with the cult, and even a greater risk after learning that he was wanted for murder. Courage? Foolishness? I don't know, and it isn't my place to judge." His face grew stern. "Maybe you see something of yourself in him, Miss Fairwinds. I know I didn't say, but I'm not oblivious to your past. Because of his loss of magic, arguably his life, you think that is not so unlike the way you lost your own when you were forced to come to the council." His expression softened, but he looked at her with regret. Regret that the Pale Vigilant's necessary strictness towards mages was interpreted as hostility on both sides. "But you are not like him, Miss Fairwinds. At least, not anymore. He is a cultist; he is no longer the same man you once knew, no matter what he may appear to be, or say. He is a criminal, a murderer, a threat to Lucenia and all of her people. Say that I'm wrong, and that you don't actually think you are similar to Avathyn. Even so, involving yourself with a cultist is involving yourself with the cult. I don't need to remind you how dangerous the Sightless Eye is." He opened the door and waited for Red to step outside. "I believe you when you say that you don't know any more than what you have told us already, but if you remember anything - anything at all - or learn something new, please... For the sake of innocent lives, if not for yourself, please come let either of us know." He flashed her a smiled and added, "Good day, Miss Fairwinds." And with that, Eovic followed after Red and gently closed the door behind him.

Eovic looked at Red and chuckled. "So, are you okay?"

[Skatora]

"So, are you okay?" Eovic asked as they quietly strolled down the dormitory's elaborate hallway.

Scarlett sighed deeply, slumping her shoulders in defeat. "Qavah have mercy; that was bad." She nearly whispered, her voice filled with regret. Now that she was distanced from the mage, she was able to think clearly and realized her questioning tactics were a bit extreme, all things considered. She felt childish and foolish for losing her cool like that, and, even worse, becoming actually angry in front of Eovic.

Shame, disgrace, regret.

She looked at her feet; she couldn't seem to raise her head. "I'm okay, I'm just--" She paused as a student mage passed them, walking the opposite direction. The student had a concerned look on her face and was holding a piece of paper in one hand, and was flipping two coins around each other in her other hand. Skittishly, Scarlett moved closer to Eovic, gingerly clutching onto a a loose bit of fabric on his shirt. She clenced her eyes together, "...Just get me out of her here."

The moment the words left her mouth, she instantly knew how scared and weak she sounded. Gods, I hate mages...! She thought, leaning closer to Eovic, but it was no excuse to behave no irresponsibly. Light a sparking a match, Scarlett's demeanor changed instantly. She straightened up and squared her shoulders confidentially.

She smiled at Eovic, but it didn't reach her eyes, "Sorry, I meant something completely different." She cleared her throat and tried again, "I'm okay, but I'm just hungry. I'm really, really hungry. I'm getting to the point where I'm starting to feel sick because I haven't had anything to eat in so long. Would you like to go to lunch with me and debrief what happened?"

[pieceful]

EOVIC GARDHEDT

So Red agreed that the questioning could have gone better. She sounded like she regretted what happened, to the point where she couldn't even seem to look at him properly. In fact, she even seemed almost apologetic. Eovic raised a brow. "Wait, is she.... is she taking blame for that? Oh, no." Eovic shook his head and put an arm around her. "Hey, don't feel bad! We got information from that! And thanks to you, she let a thing or two slip. Who knows if she would have told us anything if we spent the entire time being nice." He did not realize that the reason she got so worked up towards the end was because she was feeling protective of him. "Look, it's okay, alright? It happens to the best of us." He gave her a reassuring smile, which quickly turned into more of a smirk. "At least we know who's the good cop and who's the bad cop, now." He shook his head at his own joke immediately afterwards. "Sorry, sorry," he muttered and returned his arm to his side. He was expecting a disapproving glare from Red at the jest, but her eyes were fixed on the ground before them, busy regretting what had happened. He couldn't even tell if she was listening to him at all.

A mage brushed passed them while performing some magical coin flipping with one hand, which seemed to scare the the benesos out of Red; she immediately inched closer to Eovic and held on to his shirt wit her eyes tightly shut, skittishly asking him to lead her out of the tower as quickly as possible. Well, that only made Eovic's already pooling guilt about her injured arm flood over. He did not say anything, but just nodded slowly. It was his turn to sigh deeply with regret. He was not entirely sure if her fear of magic was always there; and if it had developed after her encounter with the cultists in the alley, then he was responsible for pretty much mentally scarring someone he cared about... Right?

Well, apparently not. As if she had just remembered that she was the Knight-Captain of an entire division of the majestic defenders of the empire, she suddenly lit up and straightened herself confidently. Eovic felt a little less guilty now that she claimed that her little strange act was due to her hunger making her ill. He beamed at her offer and replied, "Thank the heavens, I thought you were never going to ask! I'm actually dying here. I think my stomach is eating itself."

The two were out of the tower, and were now sitting across from each other in a local tavern. Like most other taverns, it was a center for gossip, drinking, dining, sleep, and pretty much anything else. In other words, it was loud and crowded - hardly a place a couple like Eovic and Red pretended to be would go to on a date. "Wouldn't it be great if sometime in the future, there would be places people could go to just to eat and do nothing else? Hahaha! Yeah, imagine that. How would they stay open for business?"

Eovic, halfway finished with his wheat bread and corn soup, glanced at Red digging into her own meal. "I thought I would like corn soup. I guess not," he said as he devoured everything, still making sure not to speak with his mouth full. "Too hungry to not eat it, though!" After scraping his bowl clean, he leaned back in to his chair and rubbed his tummy in satisfaction.

Now for the reason why they were even there. "So, what do you think? Fairwinds is not telling us everything, I think. I mean, you don't trespass into a sanctioned part of a city illegally just to express your concern to an acquaintance." He would have asked Neresti about that, but considering the circumstances that they were in... "I told her that I believed that she was telling us the truth, but... I'm not so sure."

[Tanrria]

✦ Neresti ✦ Fairwinds ✦
The Resentful Mage

Location: Just outside of the Hrenic Council With: Avathyn, perhaps?

It seemed like Neresti was only able to stare out her window for a couple minutes before another knock sounded on her door. Turning her gaze away from her window, she frowned at it before getting up once again. Did Eovic and Huntsman forget to ask her something? She couldn't imagine so, Neresti had no real knowledge that was useful to them. There was nothing that she'd said to Eovic and Scarlett that she hadn't planned to be saying to them. It was all effectively useless information. They could draw whatever assumptions they wanted from it, but they probably weren't going to be true. She had no intentions to associate with the cult, but she was going to keep contact with Avathyn. She could even argue that she's trying to get him away from the cult, and it's not like she ever asked Avathyn what the cult's plans were, so she shouldn't be a particular target for them.

Putting those thoughts down in her mind, she opened her door, only to find that it was another mage from the school based on the clothes. Neresti wasn't sure what the woman's name was, but that wasn't uncommon with how many people were in the Council's tower. The woman at Neresti's door seemed to pocket something before saying "There's someone outside the building that wants to see you. He's dressed in grey and white." Neresti nodded her thanks, and the woman nodded in return before heading off. Someone was outside that wanted to meet with her? That meant that they weren't a mage and they weren't on official business. Could this be Avathyn then?

Slipping on a simply grey cloak this time to mix it up from her brown cloak, she exited her room and headed downstairs to fill out the correct paperwork to be allowed out onto the town. She still had time before work, after all, so she was going to use it for all that it was worth. In time, she was walking through the gates to the Hrenic Council's tower and looked around, trying to find the white and grey dressed man. She didn't see him, and she had to wonder if perhaps he'd stepped out of sight briefly to prevent looking like he was loitering suspiciously around the building.

Wrapping her cloak a bit tighter around herself to protect from the cold of winter, she moved to sit down on a nearby bench, looking down at the ground. Any other season than winter and this little area would be filled with birds looking for a bit of grain or bread. Now the area was still. It was peaceful in a dead sort of way.

[pieceful]

AVATHYN POE

Seemingly out of thin air, Avathyn approached the lone Neresti and sat beside her. His face was still covered under his scarf, and the hood of his cloak stopped just above his eyelids. For a moment he just sat there with his hands together on his lap, leaning forward and watching the sea of people walking by.

"... The Vigilant and the soldier we met at the burnt district were with you, weren't they?," he finally said in a low voice so only she could hear, with his dimly golden eyes still scanning the crowd. "I saw them coming and going," he explained, then glanced at her. He trusted her enough to know that she wouldn't sell him out; she hadn't already done so even after countless interrogators knocking at her door, so there was no worry in his mind. The only thing on his mind after each questioning was how sorry he felt for putting her through all of that.

He was half-expecting her to scold him again about how tired she was about having to meet with the authorities all the time because of him. Or maybe, this time, she was going to tell him off about getting arrested the previous night and blowing the cell up. That was why the Vigilant and the soldier were there in the first place, right? Well, whatever Neresti might say, he had no choice but to understand. Even if he told her that he had no intention of escaping the prison - hell, he wasn't sure how he even managed to - it was still his own fault for being careless enough to get caught in the first place.

But whatever she needed to say to him was not the reason why he was there to meet her; there was something urgent he needed to say. "Something is happening to me, Neresti. The cult... they did something to me the night I lost my magic." His gaze fell to the cobblestones before them and he fell silent again, as if in deep thought.

"I joined the cult mindlessly at the time. I was... so angry at everything. I didn't care what happened to myself or anyone else, so long as I acquired the means to getting my revenge. I still am, but... emotions were... stronger back then," he spoke up after a while, then let out a heavy sigh. "I'm not here to give you a biography, and I doubt you've the time nor the interest to listen to one. So let me get to the point." He picked up his head and resumed observing the civilians. "I still don't completely understand what the outcome of their experiment is going to be, but I understand enough to know that it won't be safe for any mage to be around me after it happens."

He looked back at Neresti and gave her something that was almost half of a smile, the first one that formed on his face since before the night of his arrest in the Hall of Voices. It was a beaten, despair-ridden attempt of one, but one nonetheless. If only it was in good context.
"You're smart enough to understand what that means, don't you...? You've always been the smarter one."

[Skatora]

"So, what do you th--k?" Scarlett narrowed her eyes. Because of the noise of the tavern around them, she was having a hard time clearly hearing all of the Eovic's words. "Fairwinds -- not telling us eve---ing, -- think. I mean, you don't tre--ss into a sanctioned par---- city illegally js-- -- express your concern to an acquaintance. I told her that I believed --- she was telling us the truth, but... I'm not so sure."

Scarlett was sitting across from Eovic. They had been seated in a booth next to a window. Her bright green eyes looked Eovic over. He seemed to be deep in thought as he spoke. Deep with concern as well. She glanced around the busy hall. All different kinds of people were gathered here. Perhaps spies being among them?

"I can't hear you, but I don't want you to speak up. I'm going to sit next to you so we don't need to raise our voices." She said as a half-explanation, half-warning as she scooted out of her bench seat and rounded the table. Shyly, she slid herself onto the bench next to Eovic, adjusting her skirts as she went. Because she was selfish, she purposefully positioned herself she that she ended up very close to Eovic's side.

"Story time," She prefaced, taking a deep breath, "When I was nineteen, I just finished basic, but needed to complete a combat op before starting Officer's Academy. My father pulled some strings to send me to the small island of Kablut. I don't know if you remember, but there was civil unrest because Kablut wanted to be independent, but it was too much of an important port for Treitia, so we were called in to help 'keep the peace,' But really it was a witch-hunt for anyone associating with revolutionaries. When my team arrived, the civil unrest was all but extinguished."

She sighed deeply, her eyes downtrodden as she continued, "There was a foreigner there that was acting suspicious. Locals reported seeing him with one of the still at-large revolutionary leaders, so when we caught him, we thought we could um... coax the information from him. My C.O. was in leading the interrogation."

Scarlett leaned in closer to Eovic, the memory was obviously painful, "The man acted a lot like Neresti. He kept denying he had any association with the revolutionaries, besides the fact that he had met with them. Half-truths; half-lies. My C.O. started to use... more forceful questioning. And that's when it happened..."

She folded her arms around herself protectively, "My C.O. ignited like dry wood. Boom! he was engulfed in flames. There was nothing I could've done to stop it from happening.... The man was rouge mage, and he killed my C.O. right in front of me. As it turns out, the mage was working with the revolutionary leader not because he wanted freedom for Kablut, but because he wanted false identity documents. He wanted to start a new life. It was just a coincidence the man he was working with was also a revolutionary leader."

Scarlett finally looked up at Eovic, "Like I was saying before, Neresti answered our questions the same as that rouge mage... Half-truths. I don't believe she's working for the Cult, but I don't believe she's not up to something, either. However, what she's working on with Avathyn probably has nothing to do with anything we're investigating. That's what I think, anyway. I just don't know what to do with her."

[Tanrria]

✦ Neresti ✦ Fairwinds ✦
The Resentful Mage

Location: Just Outside the Hrenic Council With: Avathyn

It didn't take long for a figure to approach Neresti, and when it did, she looked up from the ground and leaned back on the bench to study who it was. All that was visible were of this man were his eyes, but his eyes were certainly distinct enough to be able to identify him. Here was Avathyn come to pay her a visit, no doubt he was either going to spirit her away again or just give her a brief message before leaving.

"It is to be expected when I choose to associate with a person that society considers a criminal." Neresti responded, basically telling him to put it out of his mind. Neresti honestly didn't know enough about Avathyn to really be able to sell him out, that was certainly the truth. All she could really say was where she tended to see him, but she imagined that wasn't the information that they were looking for. Neresti gave him a sidelong glance for a moment then, and while she had been speaking only loud enough to hear, her voice dropped even lower with her next sentence. "I didn't think you actually were though until I saw the blood on your hand." Her expression was rather flat as she said this. She clearly wasn't making much of a value judgment when she said this, but still, she couldn't help but wonder why he'd chosen to join up with the cult.

"Did you get locked up last night? Eovic said something about that, but I'm not sure how much is true and how much was just them trying to get a rise out of me. It's impossible to tell with those people." She wasn't hugely expecting Avathyn to answer her, since he probably came to see her for his own reasons.

Sure enough, he immediately started to talk, mostly about the cult and about him joining it. She wasn't entirely sure that she wanted to know this information, and she shifted a little uncomfortably under her cloak. If he told her too much about the cult, then she wouldn't have plausible deniability anymore. If an entropy mage came in to make sure she was telling the truth, it'd be much hard if he said too much to her about it. She'd be sure to stop him if he got too informative. She furrowed her brow at him when he stated that the cult did something to him the night he lost his magic. "What do you mean they did something...? Are you saying that the cult is the reason why you don't have your magic anymore?" Despite herself, she could feel more hope bubbling up inside of her. If the cult had done it, then it really WAS possible for a mage to be able to cancel out magic. Perhaps it didn't actually need the Vigilant. Or, perhaps it needed the initial canceling and then a mage would just lock it. "What did they do? And how did they do it?"

There was an urgency in her voice as she rifled around in her robe pockets to pull out a small notebook. In it she'd been recording a number of observations; ever since Avathyn had lost his magic, she'd been pouring over the Council's library to see what she could glean of research into anti-magic. There hadn't been much, and what she'd found was entirely inconclusive, but she'd noted it down nonetheless. She'd also spent some time observing the Pale Vigilant, especially when they were actively trying to take down a mage. This was harder to do while being inconspicuous, but she had seen it a couple times, enough times to be able to have some notes on it. She'd even observed Avathyn after getting initially thrown out of jail, and his attempts to call up his magic to see how that worked. He just couldn't call up the magical energy anymore, it's not that the magic failed to do what he wanted or that he was bringing it up but not using it right, it was just like he was a regular every day person. She herself was trying to see if she could just develop anti-magic if she worked at it like any other magic type, but so far those efforts had been fruitless, which wasn't too surprising considering how long it took to learn magic. She felt like an answer was right within her grasp, and she was impatient to get to it.

Neresti listened as Avathyn spoke, leaning towards him a little as if that would get the information to her faster while her hands were poised to write something down in her notebook with the charcoal she carried with her. He said a couple more cryptic things to her, then looked to her and actually smiled, which caused Neresti to blink in surprise. It took her a moment to register his next words, and she glanced down at her notebook, the page still blank. Avathyn hadn't really told her anything. He was just trying to give her a warning. "I'm afraid I can't understand if you don't explain it to me. I get that I'm on a time limit now, but I still want to try and unravel the mystery of what happened to your magic. If you tell me what they've done, perhaps I can help undo it." She said before moving her arm a little bit out of her cloak to show him the notebook and how the blank page she was turned to was over halfway into it. "I've dedicated a lot of time to this, I'm not just going to give up now." Still waiting for him to answer her, she looked up at him, her eyes seeming to be imploring.

OOC: If anything about the magic information sounds off, please let me know and I'll edit my post xD.

[pieceful]

EOVIC GARDHEDT

Eovic listened to her every word carefully and with great empathy. The way she held herself as she told him about her past told him that this was obviously not easy for her. "Thank you... for telling me," he said quietly, but still audible over the loud chatter of the crowded tavern. He honestly was not expecting her to say anything like that to him, but he was definitely glad that she did; not only did it help him understand why she was so uncomfortable around mages, but it also eased the great amount of guilt he had been feeling about her wound from the alley. Plus, it also explained why she had been so hostile and worked up towards Neresti. His eyes were downcast that anyone had to go through watching a close alley burn alive, permanently scarring her, but a little smile played on his lips to try to cheer the shaken Knight-Captain beside him. He placed an arm around her, who was sitting very close to him anyway, and said, "Hey, it's a good thing you met me, yeah? So long as I live, I'll make sure nothing like that ever happens to you again. I swear it."

So, then, about Neresti. "You're right, she didn't really seem like a cultist. I can sort of tell if someone is after all the experience I had dealing with them; they've got a strange air about them. But, then again, I like to think that I'm only human, so I could be wrong. She would be smart to appear as un-cultist-like as possible." Eovic let out a sigh. "So, if we're to believe that she's not tied to the Sightless Eye except through Avathyn, then she's obviously still up to no good. That Avathyn person is a walking magnet for trouble." He shook his head and fell quiet for a moment in deep thought. "My order pretty much locked me out of chasing Avathyn officially, so Neresti is the only chance we have to tracking him down..," he said, almost more to himself than to Red, "Hm... But it also doesn't seem like she really knows how to even contact him..." He looked at Red. "Honestly, I feel like the only chance we have of finding him is by shadowing Neresti discreetly." As soon as he said that, he rubbed his face with his free hand in frustration and looked back at Red apologetically and snickered. "You know... I really should have let you chase him down back at the burnt district, yeah? Gods... Screw my damned insistence on following protocols. I'm sorry. Once we get him, I'll make sure to make it up to you."

[pieceful]

AVATHYN POE

This would have been the time the old Avathyn laughed at Neresti's enthusiasm and eagerness to learn, but this Avathyn only stared back at her with soulless eyes. His half-smile faded away as suddenly as it had come. So, it looked like Neresti was more concerned with obsessing over the details of how he lost his magic more than anything else. If that's what she wanted, then he was going to help. After all, it was the least he could do for her... But sadly, that was pretty much the extent of what he knew, too.

Avathyn drew a deep breath and continued, "The details of that night are still hazy at best, but I'm certain the Pale Vigilant were responsible for my loss of magic. So, no; the cult had nothing to do with that. What I'm saying is that the cult used the fact that I lost my magic as the foundation for an experiment." He shook his head. "That's... all. I'm sorry. Believe me, this is my magic we are talking about. If I knew more that could help you undo what happened to me, I would tell you without a thought." He could almost feel the disappointment welling up inside her. He only had more bad news to give. "I need to tell you that I somehow blew up a prison cell and a human being while I was unconscious. I didn't have any explosives on me at the time, being stripped of all my possessions and all. You realize what that might imply, no?" It didn't take a genius to figure it out. "If my magic is returning... it means all your work so far on me becomes useless."

He looked at her silently for a moment again and stood up. "What I meant was that... I... really can't afford being anywhere near you from now on..." Avathyn knew that would only disappoint Neresti because she wouldn't be able to study him any longer. But to him, he would be losing the closest thing he had to a friend for years. His eyes darted around before finally ending up just staring at the ground sullenly. "Look, if I learn anything more about this, I'll make sure to tell you. But if not..." He looked at her again for another moment, unable to finish the sentence. Then turned to disappear back into the sea of people.

[Skatora]

Scarlett started a bit when Eovic wrapped an arm around her shoulders. It was a gesture of warmth and camaraderie, "Hey, it's a good thing you met me, yeah? So long as I live, I'll make sure nothing like that ever happens to you again. I swear it."

She wrinkled her nose, but leaned into his embrace, "How are you supposed to do that? Follow me around for the rest of your days to make sure I don't get into trouble?" She laughed, but in a more serious tone she clarified, "It makes me happy you care enough to protect me, but I told that story to give relevant context to my assumption concerning Neresti. Yes, it was a painful thing to go through, but I'm glad I went through it. I was able to reach this point in my life because of it. If anything, I want to protect people like you more." She shrugged; a quite elegant way to conclude her daily philosophy.

Eovic sighed and agreed that he also didn't think Neresti was involved with the Cult, but her continued involvement with Avathyn was definitely a cause for concern. He suggested that they trail Neresti to see if it would lead them to Avathyn, which, Scarlett thought, in turn, would lead them to the Cult... and they may even get the bonus whatever-Avathyn-and-Neresti-were-up-to.

Eovic locked gazes with Scarlett, and a small blush dusted her cheeks, Gods, he's so tall and gorgeous... she irrationally thought, but then forced herself to focus on his words. "You know... I really should have let you chase him down back at the burnt district, yeah? Gods... Screw my damned insistence on following protocols. I'm sorry. Once we get him, I'll make sure to make it up to you."

Scarlett sat up straight. Two things instantly went through her mind: Oh, Qavah have mercy! Did I really only meet Eovic yesterday?? The stinging in her arms told her it was true. Was it normal to be so smitten by someone so fast? She wasn't in love with Eovic. She was attracted to him. She was, as one of her friends put it, "in lust" with him; and lusting can happen instantaneously. And, oh, how she was totally and completely lusting after him. Her evil brain had her recall the steamy scene this morning when she walked in on him half naked. She started to blush more deeply as she recalled his teeth raking against the sensitive flesh of her neck.... She was turning herself on! She moaned softly to herself in frustration.

She spoke the second thing aloud to try to still her racing heart and cool the heat building inside her, "I don't believe you. You don't insistently follow protocol. If that were the case, you wouldn't be speaking to me. And even if we did catch Avathyn, your protocol would probably deem that I couldn't touch him. So what would you do then, huh?" She playfully poked him in the ribs. "How would you make it up to me?"

[Tanrria]

✦ Neresti ✦ Fairwinds ✦
The Resentful Mage

Location: Just Outside of the Hrenic Council With: Avathyn

Avathyn's smile soon faded, and for a moment a pang of regret went through Neresti's mind. It had been such a long time that she'd ever seen a smile on his face, and she didn't realize just how much his depression bothered her. Perhaps she should've smiled back at him? Well, what was done was done, and Neresti certainly couldn't turn back time. It was certainly true that she was more interested in Avathyn as a subject, but that didn't mean that she was completely devoid of emotion when it came to him himself.

Unfortunately, Avathyn didn't really have much information, and it turned out that her hope that a mage had caused Avathyn to lose his magic was completely unfounded. There was immense disappointment, but she tried to keep that out of her eyes. No need to lessen what potential hope that Avathyn might have about the situation. Just because a mage hadn't been the one who initially got rid of Avathyn's magic didn't mean that a mage couldn't fix him. Neresti had decided to devote her life to trying, because it was the only thing that gave her specific purpose anymore. Otherwise she'd still be going about her life like a mindless creature, someone who just did what they were told and didn't have any ambitions for herself in the future. Honestly, before Avathyn lost her magic, she'd been toying with the idea of whether it'd be better if she was dead. The world really wasn't offering anything for her anymore. Neresti wouldn't be surprised if a lot of mages showed up as dead by their own hand, but if it happened, the information was harshly covered up and hidden from the rest of them.

"An experiment...? But what could they possibly want to do with someone who'd lost their magic? What do they know that I don't..." That last bit was mostly muttered to herself as she wrote down in her book that the cult had done some sort of experiment on Avathyn, one that apparently had him spontaneously combusting massive amount of magic energy. Did it only happen when he was unconscious? Or was there some kind of trigger? Avathyn's concern for her just seemed to pass right over Neresti's head, but when he stated that if his magic was returning then her work became useless. This prompted her to look at him a little funny. "Useless? On the contrary. The cult must know a bit more about magic and how it works than I do; without whatever they did to you, I don't imagine that your magic would've come back on its own. If this even is your magic. It may be that they want to infuse you with magic of their own, to see if they could make an effective puppet on a string out of you. People that aren't born with magic can't pick it up like that, it may be that since you were born with it and it was just shut off, that they're trying to replace it with something of their own. I don't really know, this is all conjecture, but they must know more than me if they were able to have you magically explode somehow." As Neresti pondered his dilemma, she brought the hand holding the charcoal up to her chin, unknowingly dusting a bit of the charcoal there. This wasn't too uncommon, Neresti tended to have charcoal dustings all over by day's end.

Avathyn stood up then, and Neresti blinked in surprise before looking up at him. Finally his concern for her was registering, and she wrinkled her face at that. "Avathyn--" She started, but once it became clear that Avathyn was starting to walk away, Neresti's hand darted out from the protection of her cloak and yanked on his arm, strong enough to probably jerk him back into the bench unless he had immediately tensed. The expression on her face was a mix between a pout and mild anger as she said "Don't just walk away!" She huffed. Though once she'd done that, her expression softened and she set her charcoal and notebook down in her lap before taking both of Avathyn's hands in hers. "Look... Whether you like it or not, our fates are entwined. I want to help you figure out what happened to you. Is what I'm doing an entirely selfless act? No, but that doesn't mean that helping you isn't one of the motivators for me doing this. I understand that you're dangerous, and I'll be sure to be careful, but I knew from the get go that if I started this research, I would probably quickly get into dangerous territory sooner or later. If we work together, perhaps we can learn more about what's happening with you, and potentially more about the origin of magic itself." After a bit of a pause, Neresti let her hands slip from his and said almost inaudibly "This is the only thing keeping me going anymore. If I lose my life to these efforts, then so be it. I will have died as content as I'll ever be in the current world."

[pieceful]

EOVIC GARDHEDT

Eovic heard the frustrated moaning and raised his brows. Was it something he had said? Was she irritated that he had brought up the events that had taken place at the burnt district? Or... No. Oh, no.
Eovic was just one other arm away from being in an embracing position with her; so could feel Red's body temperature rising through her dress, her heart beat quickening. Unless he had seriously pissed her off, she was feeling something else entirely. "Well, then..."

Red then argued that if he really were insistent, he would not even be speaking to her right now, and that he wouldn't let her get anywhere near Avathyn once they finally caught him. She playfully poked his side and asked how he would actually repay her for letting him get away.

Eovic laughed and faced forward to take a sip of his water. "Well, Knight-Captain, I'm thinking that you like the fact that I'm breaking a load of protocols," he said as he looked at the crowd before them. "Now, if you insist that I keep this up, then Avathyn might actually be all yours. That'll be the end of it. But see, I like being the good guy and sticking to the rules as much as I can." His dark blue eyes met hers again and winked. "That being said, I'm going to apologize right now and tell you that your hands won't be anywhere on Avathyn anytime soon." His hand that was on her upper arm slid down to her waist. "But you don't want to leave you hands with nothing, I'm sure." His gaze wandered down all over her dress bits before returning to her emerald eyes. He leaned in so that he could almost taste the flesh of her ear, and his voice fell to a breathy whisper that was still audible amidst the growing noise of everyone around them. "Maybe I'll give it something to hold on to, then. We'll call it even after that, yeah?"

Eovic pulled away and grinned childishly and looked around. He could see snow falling again outside of the windows. "Or, you know, I could share with you some restricted files that the order has on subjects that the imperial army have had its eyes on for a long time. Maybe send you off on an all-expenses paid vacation to the Sunburst Isles. Or something. Your call."

Just then, a man dressed similarly as Eovic burst through the tavern doors looked around, then rushed over to the two of them as soon as he spotted them. He was sweating profusely and trembling all over. "Eovic! Eovic-..." He paused to give Red a curious look. "What are you two-..." He shook his head and grabbed Eovic out of his chair. "Never mind, doesn't matter. We need you. NOW!" Eovic knew what such an urgent call from the order could only mean. His face grew sullen. The things falling outside were not snow. There was a reason why the noise outside was getting louder. He looked at Red apologetically and exclaimed, "Sorry! I really need to go! Sorry! I'll explain later!," as he ran out of the tavern with the other Vigilant.

"How bad is it?!," Eovic asked as the two of them darted through the crowd outside, heading directly for the southernmost district. The other Vigilant replied, "Same scale as Zone Four!" "s**t. Please, no." People were getting more and more frantic as they approached the district, yelling and screaming as they pointed at the smoke rising from behind a row of buildings. "Please. Not again. No. Please." Eovic parted from his brother-in-arms and parkour'd to the rooftop of one of them. "This can't be happening. Not again. No... NO!"

Zone Four was the site of a violent mage rebellion. An entire squad of the Pale Vigilant were called in to handle the situation, but everything that could have gone wrong did. An entire district was wiped out, taking down every single Vigilant present. Except one. Zone Four, or more commonly known as the "burnt district."

Eovic immediately froze at the sight before him. The other Vigilant was right; the area was not yet all burnt down, but if they did not act quickly, it was going to be another Zone Four. He drew his sword and leap down, into the ash, smoke, and fire.