Welcome to Gaia! ::

Her smile became shy after her greeting, eyes beginning to look downcast until they perked up to Cerdik's point and exclamation. She was bewildered at first. Then other emotions rushed upon her, evident as her eyes widened and her hands clasped together excitedly. She couldn't believe it! His proud realization, he had to know...he could hear her when she spoke to Garren in his mind!! HE COULD HEAR HER! If she hadn't been a total fangirl of this marvelous wizard and thinker before, it was apparent in her sparkling eyes and by her gaping mouth now that his prestige became her idol. She wanted to approach him, to sing his experience sweet praises before she noted that his beautiful companion turned and raced from the manor in a fiery blaze. Terrified and awed by her flee, Isarelle's feet unconsciously followed as soon as Cerdik began to follow the mystical creature. She passed Khnui without a word in no means of disrespect, but far too dumbstruck by what she beheld and fearful that Aranai would try to take flight away. She....she couldn't! Isarelle could not let any cursed kindred who had come to her leave so suddenly, especially one with such, yes, majestic beauty. Picking up the skirt of her dress so she could hurry, the young maiden called out desperately to the firebird.

"Wait! Please! Please don't go!"

Missing a stone in the path, Isarelle tripped and fell onto the hard ground before even realizing she had lost her balance. Her face turned up slowly with a bruised chin and now she could see the illuminator at a more reverent angle, looking up to her with the respect her form deserved. The gold of the girl's eyes shined and brimmed as they were as large as saucers, a once stupid wonder replaced with simple honesty.

"...You're so pretty."

Her words were obvious, but undoubtedly innocent and sincere. It was as if a unicorn, beloved creature to her heart, appeared before her in the same fashion of splendor and she wanted only to drink the sight as long as she could. What could be said? Isarelle D'Amarante was a complete girl, barely out of childhood and only blossoming into the traits that defined a woman. But childhood's ideals would always stick with her, she knew, where this fascination she currently held would never be a stranger to.

Cerdik had heard Isarelle's cries of his knowledge, but saved them for another time. A more convenient time would come soon. He was sure of it. Listening to Aranai, he already felt confident she would stay. It was one of the few things he felt even the slightest bit of confidence in.

And then she dared a game of chase. Cerdik had a sudden boost of nerve and confronted her boldly, but his words retained their continuous fluidity as before. "Were we to even fail, what reason for has one wishes to leave? Giving one the opportunity to reclaim lost life-hours is most wonderous a proposition. Or is it not?" He paused briefly to let that sink in and dropped his gaze to the ground.

"If a game be of your wishing, I will play. Expect not the slightest hesitation from me. A Magiciery's hesitation be within the near-time of one's death. I be not a hesitant one." Upon speaking, Cerdik immediately felt selfish, but only used that to bolster his determination.

He didn't want Aranai to leave. He was comfortable with her around. Of course it was solely because of her curse, but didn't that say something? It was her curse that made Cerdik comfortable around Aranai and not normalcy or her beauty. Truly an interesting irony.

Even as Cerdik spoke, Aranai knew she could not keep it up much longer. The anger, the pretence of flight. It was all so foolish. She calmed, ever so slightly, and knew that his words were truth. What reason could she possibly have to leave?

To say the least, Aranai was surprised at the confrontation. She hadn't expected Cerdik to say what he had, and she felt a little sprig of guilt grow in her heart. Had she ruined any chance of civility and companionship with them, just so she could give way to her own irrational fears? She hardly knew if she was justified anymore. Of course, she was the one who had lived with the firebird inside of her.

She swallowed such thoughts. Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew that all the misery of her life had been brought by herself and her own selfish desires. Maybe she did deserve this curse.

Then the other, Khnui, limped forward. His words left her defeated, embarassed to give up this fight so quickly. This stupid game.

"Any hours that I have lost with my family, I do not care for..." She stared away, unable to look at any of the three. “Life there was never anything but misery. I don't wish to return.”

She was confident in this answer, and sure that she could never go back to that life again.

“But I do want to rid myself of this curse. Tears of pearls are only ashes, in the light of life without the firebird.” At this she would have smiled, had her beak allowed.

Adencia paced back in forth in her wolf form. The wolf was stressed and wanted to get out of the dark room, exactly what Adencia didn’t want it to do. The wolf lunged at the door with frustration leaving another set of deep scratches in it. Adencia hoped that the door would hold out and that she wouldn’t be able to punch through. Things would really be dangerous then.

The wolf sat down, finally giving Adencia’s body rest. She concentrated more on transforming back to herself, on being able to control the form she was in. As she practiced this more she was able to get the beast to lie down, but as soon as she lost concentration it would no longer comply to her will. She thought more and more of her figure as an elf, concentrating on what it was like to be in her true form.
As she tried more and more she became increasingly tired. The wolf however was not affected by her mental fatigue. It kept lunging at the walls and doors, causing pain to itself, or in other words, Adencia. Its paws and face were bloodied by the splinters from the door and its shoulders bruised by slamming into it.

Just as Adencia thought there was no way to ever control this beast she felt herself transforming. Her body relaxed as she shrank in size and returned back to her Elvin frame. The next time she opened her eyes she was sitting on her hands and knees on the cold stone floor. She pushed herself back to lean on a wall and pulled her hands into her sight.

As she knew they would be the tips of her fingers were bloodied from the door and she could feel all the other stings and pains on her cut face and bruised shoulders from the actions of the wolf.

“Bloody burden.” She said to herself as she wiggled her fingers and felt the pain.

She stood weakly and looked at the splintered and scratched door, trying to figure a way out. She saw a small space between the floor and the bottom of the door and she bent low to look at it. It was just big enough for her fingers to wiggle through but that wouldn’t do her any good…unless…

She closed her eyes, willing herself to transform again, but into something she could control. A snake. Un serpent petit et rusé, she thought, repeating this in her mind. As soon as she felt her transformation complete she opened her eyes to see a much larger world. She slithered to the door and the crack below it. She panicked, she might not fit through.

Giving herself words of encouragement, Adencia sucked it up and just barely squeezed through the small crack. Thoroughly overjoyed, though not able to show it in her snake form, she continued on. If she had changed back into her human form the journey to the main door probably wouldn’t have taken so long, but in her weakened state she probably wouldn’t have been able to transform back into a snake.

When she reached the metal entry she saw that this time there were no openings for her to squirm through. She searched along the walls and corners until she found a little mouse hole and slithered through it. This was the beginning to yet another long journey, but this time through a labyrinth of mouse tunnels. It seemed impossible that mice had the memory to know where they were going through these tunnels.

Adencia turned a sharp corner almost running directly into a mouse. It squeaked and turned around as quickly as it could running the other way. She followed it in hopes of finding a way out of there and that is exactly what the mouse brought her to. She slithered out through another mouse hole and found herself back in the main entryway where she had seemed to be not too long ago.

Adencia relaxed and melted back into her normal self, leaning against a wall. She was too tired to do anything but sit there and wait for someone. She could hear their conversations outside but didn’t even have the strength to stand and join them. The moment she touched her fingers to the ground the open cuts stung and oozed more blood. She took her shirt and held her fingers tight in it, and it wasn’t long before she had passed out from exhaustion.

Cerdik stood and merely nodded. "Much luck to you, Lady. Come a time where a need for assistance exist, I b-b-be only a call aw-aw..." He sighed. "Call, please." Then he skittered off, glancing briefly at Khnui with a wane smile. "Mayhaps we can talk magicks in future hours." And then he disappeared into the house where-upon he saw the snake and froze in fear.

He trembled erratically and clutched the book with all his might. Had he not been so surprised, Cerdik might have mustered the courage for magic, but he did not. He merely stood in place, shaking like an unstable bridge.

Aranai saw the torches in the trees and knew that it was her fault. They had seen the firelight, still saw the light, for she was shining much too bright for the source to be natural. Natural she was not. "No, no, no, no, no." she muttered repeatedly under her breath. Her doing... all hers.

Isarelle knew aswell. As she stammered her instructions, Aranai opened her wings, painfully aware that it would only make the light extend farther. Well, darn. It was much too slow to hop up the stairs, and not to mention rather humiliating. Flapping fluidly into the air above, she gliding over the two. Cerdik was already inside, and she nearly collided with him in the entryway as he stopped rather suddenly.

"Cerdik! What is it?" even as she said this, her eyes twitched to the small snake on the floor. She sighed and lighted on the floor past them. Well, if that's all it is... but that wasn't all. As she did this, the snake was no longer a snake, but the woman from before... who had been carried off by Garren. Ahh, so that was it. No time to ponder, she was still extremely visible.

"Quickly, someone help me find a blanket! A big, heavy blanket." she asked as she fluttered down the hall and darted through a door that was ajar. She found herself in a very large sitting area, with old couches and armchairs placed delicately about the room. Maybe there would be a blanket about here somewhere. She needed to cover herself, for all their sakes. If anything, she'd nearly blind them if they all clustered in a room with her.

Upon lifting her head again, she was surprised to have Khnui so valiantly offer himself to the nearing crowd. Taking his dagger securely, Isarelle looked to him with touched eyes and slightly nodded. Perhaps he was right-- his theory sounded stable. Thus beginning to turn and trail after the others who had gone inside, she bade the volunteer a word of warning.

"Yes, and thank you Khnui. Just be careful. It looks that Mr. Barley is leading them, and he can be a rather aggressive man when it comes to protecting his town. Show them how you mean no harm!"

Barely after the last words left her lips she began to rush forward, and at reaching the threshold discreetly side-stepped against the nearest wall inside. Looking upwards at the lighting of her home she worried that the villagers might be attracted to it curiously, especially noticing that the door was knocked in. Thusly recalling as quick and simple a spell as she could, Isarelle lifted her fingers with a soft few words and upon closing the digits into her palm the illumination followed into a stale darkness. She could not allow herself time to notice the conditions of the others as her hand would need to remain closed and concentrated for this work. Remembering the dagger and its needs, though, she gingerly tossed it onto the nearest lounging couch that decorated the hall before pressing herself to the wall again. Faint moonlight barely reached the steps to her home's door, but it was the only lighting that she felt was safe to be allowed. She knew that these townsfolk would most likely not bother with further exploration if the house seemed dark and unoccupied, or at least hoped. Turning her head to see the open space, she tried for allowance to hear of the proceedings from even this distance. And though knowing Aranai was indoors somewhere....she was not brightly shining? That would be good, until this moment of panic was done.


Manuevering his torch to avoid the branches of the trees, Mr. Barley rubbed at his beard in dismay at thinking of what they could find down this way. Though he was a large and formidable looking man, the town's butcher even, this path made him uneasy by its unkempt nature and the fears of what lie at the end of it. That devil-house, some called it now....with the cursed children of that fiend refusing to budge from it to let the town feel peaceful again. Every town has its own little secret, but this was one, for such good-natured and simple people as they were, was too much. So many rumors surrounded Rosewood now, that Barley hardly remembered what used to be true. Even though he used to know those kids so well.... Now though, the womenfolk and young ones were scared of the supernatural light that just flashed, so it was up to this fine group to investigate. Only about four other men with their leader, but all had the build to be in the same guild. Upon turning the last corner to the clearing of the manor, Mr. Barley thought he caught the last glimpse of dimming lights coming from the structure just as a gimp approached with the looks of being near a blast. The rest holding their fires near grim faces, Barley stepped forward and sized up the fellow with a cautious and distrusting eye.

"Wha' say you to be ne'r these parts, strange-ah? Most dun't come thi' whey. Wha' 'xactly were you doin'?"


[My butchered attempt at dialect! Yay! *Dies* -.-;;]

Adencia opened her eyes cautiously. The entire fortress was covered in darkness and there was no one to be seen. Where has everyone gone?

She looked to her right to see Isarelle standing in the shelter of the wall just to the side the pushed in door. She was not expecting to see her there so she had given Adencia quite a scare.

“Ahh!” She shouted as she fell over. She landed on her bruised shoulders and groaned as pains shot through her injuries. She carefully withdrew her fingers from her shirt to see that most of the bleeding had stopped, but they still seemed pretty useless at the moment. She managed to prop herself up on her elbows and look to Isarelle.

“What the bloody hell is going on?”