Welcome to Gaia! ::

Veiris looked past Kira at the new person. He hadn't caught her name, having been focused on Claudette. He also didn't know what they were talking about, if they were still discussing slavery or have moved on, so he wasn't sure how to answer the question now directed at him. "I'm a concerned bystander," he finally settled on.

He glanced at his wing next, having briefly forgotten about the fire. The feathers on the outside of the wing were singed, but little else. "Its no concern. My wing will heal once I shift. Benefit of the magic," he replied, not wanting to cause her guilt. And because it was the truth. This was not the worst he had experienced.

Before he could assure her that she was not a hypocrite simply for reacting to a perceived thread, Kira had grabbed her arm. He didn't feel he owed Kira any sort of answer, but he did owe Claudette. He was still convinced part of Kira's recent outburst was his fault.

He knocked Kira's hand away, letting his lightning brush against her and give another minor shock. At the same time, he moved a wing to wrap around her. Griffins wings were large- not practical for the indoors, but useful for offering a warm cover. "I don't care she's a slave. I'd rather defend a slave like her than a slave owner like you," he said, nearly growling even without the benefit of an animal shift. He pulled open the buttons on his shirt, revealing more knotwork tattoos that covered his torso. The only blank spot was a fist-sized patch of skin directly over his heart.

"My tattoos mark the forms I can take," he explained, directing his speech to Claudette, not Kira. "But in Cleric regions, they are a warrant for my capture and execution. In the west, they mark me as a slave. There are no free Shifters in the western lands," he finished, not knowing how to explain beyond that. He didn't answer Kira's question about his reasons. He would only tell Claudette that. Kira didn't deserve to learn about his past.

Claudette was happy his magic would take care of his singed feathers. It was a beautiful shift, and she couldn't help but feel enamored by it. She was trying to keep that expression out of her eyes though. "I'm glad," she said. "Kira can be a pain sometimes, and she's not worth being scarred over."

Kira was offended. He shocked her! He. Shocked. Her. Literally! She was irritated, but she had never particularly been strong with lightening. From the point where he shocked her, her skin swelled a little, turning red with little lightening patterns in it. It was beginning to blister. "You. Little. s**t," she snarled. But her skin was itching, the shock continued to electrocute her arm.
"I'm allergic to that kind of magic!" She yelled, before thinking about what she was saying.

Claudette felt genuinely bad for Veiris. It was one thing to already be a captive slave, but it was entirely different to be on the run from those who would kill you without giving it another thought. "Are you scared?" She asked. She knew if she had to watch out for those Cleric people, she would be scared. She resisted the urge to hug him.

Kira was desperately trying to heal the allergic reaction on her arm where Veiris shocked her. What was she to do? It was barely working.

"I keep her alive because it suits me. I have no choice but to keep her alive until she can be turned into an Immortal. Into one of us," Kira said lazily. "I'd rather kill her, but I don't have a choice. Superiors and whatnot. Plus my fiancé is quite taken to her." That last part was angry.

Claudette felt judged by Mynoris. She laid her head on the table, tears flowing out of her eyes. She was a hypocrite after all. And that sickened her. After how kind Veiris has been to her, and she was awful to him. She put her burned arm in front of her face, so no one would see her emotion.

"The sort of Clerics that are driven by religious belief and aren't too concerned with collateral damage," Veiris responded to Mynoris. He was checking over Claudette, still worried about her injuries. He liked that he could easily heal, but he sometimes wished his magic could impact others.

He was confused by Kira's reaction. He had great control over the griffin's magic and knew that he hadn't put enough power in the small shock to amount much beyond a light slap. He watched the lightning patterns form and her skin blister. "Allergic?" he responded as if asking for clarification. "Good to know," his glare darkened and his voice took on a warning tone. Lightning danced around the fingers of his other hand.

"Scared?" Claudette's question drew him back to her and her injuries. He'd been dealing with the Clerics and slavers for so long. "I guess. But if it becomes too dangerous, I could travel to the north. Shifters are considered great warriors there. Or I could take a ship out of Sol Tier. I've never been to the isles. Maybe a visit there would be nice," he said. He wanted to offer her a smile or suggest she leave too. A Cleric could remove his tattoos. Perhaps they could remove hers or Kira's as well.

Mynoris makes a small sound of impatience, but it's directed at herself. "I said to not take it to heart," she says, repeating herself. "Look, no one's perfect. Even most gods aren't perfect, those many of them would like to believe they are."

Gesturing to Veiris, she says, "You, go get her some sweets or something." No, she isn't trying to be rude; she just never got the man's name. "Actually, I was more curious about the sorts of Gods they worshiped...or claimed to worship." A very important distinction for her.

Looking at Kira, she purses her lips. "Would it work if you cut out the infected part and then healed the area back up? I'm not sure how your magic works, but that's how mundane poison would be healed," she suggests. As much as the woman doesn't like her, she doesn't share that ill will.

She nods to Baldur. "That sounds like a pretty good bargaining chip to me," she notes. "So with all that happened to your people, why is Larus more inclined to being reasonable?"

Baldur, keeping out of the drama around them, shook his head and spread his hands. "Maybe because he doesn't have a five hundred year old grudge to fuel his motivations? He's young. Very young. But I don't think it works against him. He's more apt to listen to advice." Svana could hardly wrap her head around collaborating with someone she viewed as a child, much less an outsider.

Svana drank her coffee sullenly, far removed from the arguments and action, deeply seeded in her own pouting. She didn't need to be messing with magic on top of everything. It was not her area of expertise.

Noticing Claudette's reaction, Mynoris shifts her vision briefly again. "All right, scratch that. Get her a cool cloth. If they have ice, that would be even better. See if they have some ginger; get them to grind it up and seep it in boiling water." Or, if the staff is smart enough, maybe they can suggest a ginger ale if they have such things. Mynoris, however, doesn't know about that wonderful invention.

"Fair enough," she says to Kira, letting the woman deal with her magical allergy. "You know your body better than I do." She snerks briefly. "But if your 'higher ups' want the girl alive, you might want to let her champion get her some ice."

"I was trying to gauge her reaction," Mynoris explains to Veiris. "I was checking to see how much of her tearing up had to do with guilt and how much was actual pain and injury. Her response told me everything I needed to know." She smiles grimly. "And if I've learned anything, it's that there's no such thing as a pointless fight. There's always a point. It may be hidden, and it may be a bad or trivial point, but it's always there."

Then she makes a small noise of derision. "Creator gods are, nine times out of ten, completely full of themselves. I have little patience for them. Do you follow a God?" she asks, curious. Her tone is not pressing though; she sounds patient, if nothing else, in case he would much rather attend to Claudette instead of answering her.

"I follow Tagin of the Ink," he began but was interrupted when small rocks began to fall around him and Claudette. "Seriously?" he said, not to anyone in particular. This woman had a Ice Snakes temper and no cool down period to speak of. "Enough!" he growled, finally letting the lightning escape. Lightning struck the ground all around them, coming close but not actually touching Kira's skin. "Back in your home, you may be allowed to attack whenever and whatever, but this is not your home. And this establishment has rules against fighting. So stop, or leave," he ordered. "And I'm not a birdman," he said after a pause, "I'm a Shifter."

Hie ignored the exchange going on between Kira and Mynoris. Something about a champion, but he didn't catch anything else.

"Something to fight for. A place to fight for is all some people would ask for. Perspective, I think, is what matters. I am free, and I run where I will. But I can not think of a place I would fight for," he continued his talk with Claudette. He'd said he could travel to the north, but he also knew it was more painful to go back there than to face an army of Clerics. He checked out the burn on her arm, "do you have any more of that medicine you gave the Feineil (Svana)?"

Veiris couldn't help but smirk when Kira went to sulk at another table; though, he made sure to hide it thinking it would be enough of an ego-blow to set her off again.

He pushed the vial back to Claudette. "Its for you, not me. Use some, heal up. No need to sit around with burns when you can heal them," he said.

As he spoke, he thought about her questions. He had refused to answer Kira. It wasn't her business. For Claudette, he could easily spin a lie. He'd pretended to be from hundreds of place. Convincingly. He'd even tricked people from the same city. But Claudette had been through a lot, and he couldn't get past the ghost he kept seeing.

"I'm from the north," he finally answered, "past the Barren." He didn't specify beyond that. He didn't want to draw Kira or any of her like to his old home.

"I protected you because...because..." he shifted his gaze, dropping his eyes to the table. At the same time, his wings started to shift and shrink, disappearing first into the folds of his coat than vanishing completely. his eyes became human once more. Being in griffin form hurt too much when he thought of his sister.

"I protected you because you remind me of my sister," he finally managed to finish.