Others Before You [closed]

Lips parted and eyebrows knitted as the Half-Elf asked her questions, compassion made Idina's light grow warmer, yellow tones being brought out in the green. She almost wanted to reach out to her and hold her gently, but she herself knew that touch from strangers when one felt at their most vulnerable wasn't always the best. So she waited until Jennis had asked her final question, then gave honest answers:

"She has spoken of you more to me as we have come to know each other. She became something like a sister to me in the year that I have known her - not nearly as much time as I would have liked! - and she would speak of you to me in nostalgia and in respect. Sometimes she would use her experiences with you to offer advice in my own, ah, romantic endeavours. Goodness, Jennis, the stories I could tell you of her escapades in helping me propose..." The girl chuckled a little nervously at that, then quickly went to tackle another question. "Sarea has been making an effort to remain celibate, although she has told me that has not come as much of a challenge. Forgive me if this seems out-of-place for me to say," - she glanced at Jennis' mortal wound, pouring out light of orange rich with red - "but her heart is still very much yours."

"It certainly sounded to me like she would," Idina commented. "Even when she and I had only just met, and she was explaining what I needed to know to make the cuff meaningful, I was very nearly blown away by her devotion."

With a chuckle, she added in hopes of lightening the mood: "The thing with my commissions, however, is that even in a piece meant to express grief, I never let that be the only emotion. Even in arrangements of flowers meant for funerals, I always tried to fit in happy flowers with the rest. There are good things to be seen in death, I believe! Granted, I did use asphodel, which is certainly a grievance flower, but tht was not all. Asphodel for mourning" - specifically, 'my regrets follow you to the grave', but the girl decided to omit that detail - "poppies for eternal and peaceful slumber, and a pair of red chrysanthemums for everlasting love.

"She would not let me use roses, but red roses and 'mums have the same meaning, so all was well. And she wore the band on her bicep, close to her heart!"

The sudden shift of focus to her own love life caught Idina off-guard, and though she giggled nervously at first, she quickly regained her composure. "I cannot answer that question," she replied simply, waiting for the confused and slightly disappointed reaction on the warrior's face before elaborating. "You see, my fiancée just so happens to be a girl. And my, what a lovely girl she is..." From the middle of her chest expanded a change in colour of her spirit, the green being dyed gold. The warmth of colour wasn't overpowering, but it would be evident to those who looked closely, especially to look at where her heart would be.

As gradually as the gold had come in, it faded from her person as her expression turned from dreamlike to nervous. "Well, um... Truth be told..." Darker green flush appeared on her cheeks; after having heard of the love Jennis and Sarea shared, surely one of the strongest and purest forces the world had ever known, the girl felt almost ashamed to not be able to tell a similar story. "I am... admittedly uncertain of whether I can call Lila my fiancée at the moment..." She began speaking with her hands, wisps of light floating away from her fingertips after particularly quick movements. "Over the weeks leading up to my death, she and I had begun to fight. It started during the week where the entire city was plagued by nightmares: neither of us had been able to sleep very well, if at all, so we were more irritable and were shorter with one another, um, as one might expect. But even after the nightmares had been gone for weeks, we were still bickering, and lately those had been turning into full-out fights... It got to the point where last week - er, the week before I died - she and I were sleeping completely separately. The fight that had lead up to that was particularly harsh, and... And I had thought that she would not speak with me because she needed time alone to cool down.

"What did nothing to help the situation were the rumours that were being passed around just before I died. The first was that I had killed someone out of cold blood, and the second was that I... had been disloyal to Lila... That made her quite upset, as... as you could probably imagine." A sigh of defeat passed through her lips, and she shook her head slowly. "Of course, both seem far from the truth now, but at the time, a combination of stress and a hangover clouded my judgement. I believed the rumours myself, for I could not remember a thing from the previous night. As well, a reliable source initially confirmed them for me, so of course I went along with it! After all, why would..." The girl's words trailed off, her mind lost in sudden and deep thought, until her final sentence was no more than a whisper: "Why would Sarea lie to me...?"

When one is raised in the forest, much of one's childhood is spent in private thought, and perhaps it was being surrounded by an image of her childhood home that primed Idina's mind for thinking and analyzing what she knew up to that point. Why indeed would the bard lie to her? The rumour that Idina had killed the Church guard was proven false by Ashen, despite her friend's deeply upset claim, and in retrospect, the other rumour seemed staged as well. But why... What would bring her to do something like that? Sisterly bonds aside, Sarea loved love, and it seemed so unlike her to deliberately sabotage an engagement. Something very grave would have had to sway her actions in that direction, but what--

The image of a silver ring popped into her head. 'She would do anything for me,' Jennis had said.

Though she held her pensive position, her fists were now clenched tight, and the green spirit's eyes had gone wide. The light emanating from the wound in her neck danced wildly, and her eyes seemed white-hot, as though like everlasting and all-consuming fire wielded by ancient demigods, usually kept in a clay jar but now contained within the spirit of a girl who had always had too much love and loyalty to give. She felt disgusted and violated, but above all, wrathful. "Jennis," she muttered, her tone abysmal, "you will not like the realization I just made."

She tried to speak as soon as she was spoken to, but a worry pricked at her mind that if she tied to talk, her anger would get out of control. This was not an emotion she got used to in life, and it felt alien within her. Forcing herself to breathe deeply, her light began to soothe, and she blinked hard until the white blaze in her eyes was gone.

"I fear that I have left my life behind at a very bad time," she said, testing her voice. Pleased by how smooth she was able to keep it, she pressed on. "There is a man where I come from, the man who killed me, who owns a silver tongue... and a black heart. He distributes rings as a symbol of his Church - he is a minister, you see - and these rings allow connection to another sinister man. In fact, this other man is a version of himself that he only allows out when he wears a mask to hide his true identity. He hides in plain sight within Wildgard city, unsuspected from anyone."

Despite herself, she could feel her light warming again, and almost painfully thick tears were beginning to threaten, but she had to continue her tale. "I knew those rings were untrustworthy the moment I saw them, as did my Lila. But he swore that these rings would let us see the beasts that were causing the nightmares that had plagued us. Even so, she and I refused to take them, until he looked her in the eyes and told her that the deity he worshiped, Her... He said that She wished to banish the world of demons. And you must understand, demons had been making a game of hunting Lila, for sport and... and for food! She was already a skittish creature, being a Kintu, but they made it so much worse! And you should have seen her face when he told her that he would rid the world of them..." The tears had escaped her eyes, feeling cool yet heavy as they trailed down her cheeks.

"But it is not just Lila that I fear was charmed by that cottonmouth," she warned, spitting her final word; a curse from her birth village to signify someone who spoke soft words behind sharp teeth. "Sarea had a ring on her finger, too, last I saw her. The Raven, the Minister's crueler side, has direct contact with anyone who wears a ring. And Jennis, if what I have heard from her is true, she would not have taken one of those unless she believed was offered something she could not refuse." The light in Idina's eyes seemed almost liquid now, desperate and upset. "That man has a stone that he claims can revive the dead. Though I believe that to be falsehood, I fear that he used the stone to promise that... that you could return to her, in exchange for her services."

Idina felt her own energy nearly match with the warrior's, both women furious at the events that had transpired by the Minister's hand. She agreed near-wholeheartedly with every word Jennis spoke. For all the manipulation he was exercising, for all the hearts upon which he was causing pain and suffering, he needed to pay. For Faljere, for Sarea, for Idina herself, he needed to pay. She was fully and completely ready to make him do it, too.

And yet she felt as though there were a wall between her and that goal in her mind.

Though her light was growing brighter again, she remained fixed on the spot, lips pressed tightly together and jaw set firm. She might have seemed like a statue were it not for the openings where her spirit could float out of her, animated even when the rest of her was still, and the thick tears building up in her eyes. She fixed Jennis with an intent stare for a minute, wanting to call out her agreement to the warrior and charge with her into the world of the living again. Then, wordlessly and abruptly, she turned her head away from her companion and blinked hard, letting the dark green wax in her eyes fall free.

"He... He needs justice served to him before he can die," she muttered angrily, seeming as though the very words put her in grievous pain. "Simply killing him to break even benefits no one in the end. Damage has been done, and though I have a number of bones to pick with him... I am so, so sorry, but... I cannot..." Her words trailed off, but after a cough or two as though she had something stuck in her throat, she went on:

"I cannot be of use to you now. He needs justice, and I want vengeance." The human girl's words were heavy and dark, a great burden on her heart. "I do not trust myself to keep a steady and just hand if I let myself act. Please, forgive me..."

Idina drew back a little with Jennis' comment of "Have it that way", feeling a little wounded. She shared he warrior's rage and frustration, but her credo kept her from acting upon it. That was one of the few drawbacks of practicing pacifism: the hotheaded ones who knew how to use weapons would often look down on your opinions, and by proxy, on you. At least, that's how it usually felt, and now wasn't much different.

She listened attentively to what the orange spirit had to say next. Upon her first question, the girl scrunched her lips to one side of her face, thinking. "I know not for sure," she murmured. "I know not even if Sarea and the others the Minister keeps as lackeys know. People had suspicions a little while ago, especially the Kintu and those who noted the Minister's absence while the Raven ran amok, but he did a good job at throwing people off of that trail with the ruse with The--"

The expression she now wore was not unlike that of someone who'd just realized a brick was about to smack their face.

"Perhaps he does not know of the twin identities," she began, "but I know of someone who deserves a day in the Minister's demise. He was a dear friend of mine, another Wood Elf as well. He was brainwashed into believing that he was the Raven; I have reason to believe he even tried to order the death of myself or someone else I cared about under that influence. And the Minister even tried to convince everyone that this man, my friend, was a convict guilty of atrocious deeds. That could only have been the Minister's doing, something he only did to throw the city off of his scent!" She paused for breath, another thought dawning on her as she did so. "My friend hated Her religion. He used to own a library, and when he found a book about the Church of Her, he threw it in disgust. And I think he may have known of the Raven at that time as well... To have been made to believe he was a man he hated... That is little more than a vile joke for kicks!"

Subconsciously, as she spoke, blue colouring seeped into her spirit's light until she matched the shade of green in the tattoos of the Elderbaden Clan.

Idina paused, giving herself time to weigh the warrior's words. "Perhaps I am jumping to conclusions... Perhaps he has not much more right than you or I to decide the Minister's fate." Her words were uncertain now, sheepish at the idea of potentially having been wrong. The last time she'd judged unfairly, after all, she had wound up with a slit in her neck. "I know not of every detail, but from what I do know from Faljere's behaviour and words - Faljere? Clanless? Ugh, I really have no idea at this point..." She shook her head. "I digress. For what I do know, he had something personal against the Church of Her. In my opinion, to make someone who loathes the Church impersonate a representative of it against his will seems cruel on a personal level."