Valley of Aram

TRIGGER WARNING: Blood, freaky voice shit

The hooded figure shuffled slowly. He looked every bit the part of an old man-felt like it too, at least physically. His mind however, was seared painfully awake and ached at the edges. He kept his head low. The sun was setting, yes, but the last golden light of day was at eye level and painful to look at.

He navigated with his staff- now, more of a cane. Under the heavy black robes and the heavy hot sun, he still felt cold and sluggish. He was lucky he wasn't noticed at his task, or he may have been followed, and he was in no shape to run away.

Finally he groped into the room he'd called a home, dragging himself inside and falling unceremoniously down to the floor.

Zaany wasn't often startled by things. In fact, Andrei's entry was barely paid attention, for a second. But then there was the clatters and thump of his collapse, and the demon slipped from their room. Claws clicked in their approach, tail slightly stiff behind, a frown at the corner of their mouth. The door closed on its own.

A toe poked into the cloaked apprentice's side. And again. Then the master finally leaned down, tugged off the hood, quietly huffing in a taste of the creature at their feet. Stared, frowned more.

"Not my favourite taste." There was a sneer on their face, and a few claws peeled one of his eyes open.

Andrei stared emptily back at the master, his eye wide and nearly black. He struggled slightly to get the uncomfortable hand away from his face. "Don-... I don't feel well." He waved the master back, but then, as if remembering something very important, grabbed the elf by the cloak.

"I SAW IT!"

Zaany was persistent in their plucking and poking at the frazzled being, almost to the point of cruelty. But it was very sudden that they wanted to be away, finding the neck of their clothing grabbed and their face way too close to Andrei's. A soft growl came, not wanting to 'poof' in an area like this for very good reason.

"Saw what?" Their fingers worked to undo his.

Andrei didn't let go. In fact, he seemed oddly stiff, as if he couldn't let go. "I saw the vulture! I saw it! I heard their voice! It was the face of Cil Raasv! I SAW IT!" He called out in a too-loud tone, lacking control over his own voice, and seemingly, his own thoughts.

"I saw their face and I wanted.. I wanted to be there." He wasn't making much sense, and he seemed to realize it. His curled hands detached and bunched up to his chest. His head rolled on his shoulders. "The... ritual... the one... in the book. It works. It works. I burned him. It works." He repeated mindlessly.

"...I'm hungry."

If he hadn't let go, himself, the elf would simply have wrenched his fingers away, breaking them if need be. Either way, the beast scrambled back and away once free, staring down at their delirious apprentice, nose curling.

"What have you done to yourself? Your magic has changed. You taste entirely different." There was a sneer in the wizard's voice as they backed up, perched on a chair across the room, far from their floor-bound apprentice.

Andrei didn't seem to notice any disdain. His head slumped down to his chest, and then slowly rose up again, eyes wide to meet the former master. His voice rasped, and somehow echoed- as if there were more than one mouth.

"I have become the priest of Cil Raasv, and all the powers of death are mine." His lips curled away from his teeth in a false, painful smile. "Cil Raasv does not speak... to the living. And that means that I am DEAD." He shook as he spoke, and began to laugh stupidly. "I am all at once dead and alive. I have died and I walk the earth. I am... miraculous. I am resurrection." He grabbed his staff and stood up, looking less drunken, more like he had a sense of decorum about his new 'position.'

"I have a new master now."

"You are little more than a puppet and a walking corpse." The words were condemning, annoyed, disgusted. The creature's tail was stiff, though, as was their body.

"I have not released you." Well, it had to be given to Zaany that they were quite capable of keeping a steady, controlled voice; the widening to their eyes likely would have scared most, but any who knew the beast would see the fear.

"Shut up." The too-many-voices rasped darkly in return. "What does a parasite know of miracles? Or did you think we didn't know?"

His head tilted as the question was asked- too far- his neck creaked painfully. His stare did not break. "You would know all about living corpses though, wouldn't you MASTER zaany? Hah! Leaving so many souls loose and wandering, away from bodies with beating hearts? Cleaving the mind painfully from the frame?" His voice grew slowly louder.

"You wretched, miserable dogs deprive the vultures of their right, deprive the dead of their rest, deprive the hungry thousand mouths of the corpse grinders of their meals! You have not released me?"

He took a step forward, loudly thumping his staff against the floor. "It is I who will not release YOU. No secret is hidden from the dead, Lownoise. We see eeeeveryyyythiiiiiiiiiiing. Including what will happen to you, if you dare to disobey me."

"I serve no master. No Godling, certainly no puppet of one."

And yet the elf didn't move, as if glued to the seat. Glued in terror. "You corpse, you think this city will allow you to walk it? If you beg it, my kindness will persist and I will allow you to continue hiding your dirty secrets behind my magic."

"Your magic can't help you, vaasa. Fool. I will teach you to speak this way to a god."

He opened his mouth, the too many voices crawled out of it like ants. Quietly, at first, but quickly building. All of them at once may be hard to decipher, but the elf would realize their theme, should they care to listen. They echoed and repeated over and over.

"Help! Help me! Get away! Help! Vaasa! Vaasa! Kill it! Please!" The floor began to shake with their volume. The walls vibrated. "All of them are in here, Master Lownoise. Every single one. They want a word with you. Do you care to JOIN THEM!"

Andrei lobbed a fireball towards the elf. No doubt, it would miss, but he lobbed another, indiscriminate, threatening to send the room and the building up in flame.

The demon was easy to break, to send to the floor, curled, as if disabled from their own magic by fear, by the sheer power of the being. Oh, they felt no remorse, no guilt for their endless murders, for everything they'd ever eaten the mind out of. But the power of the voices, the assault on the elf's mind and body, left them powerless, nails clasping palms against blood-trickling ears.

Really, the fireballs were overkill. ...Overkill that was quickly eaten away by some magical dweomer in the rooms, apparently in place for other such destructive accidents of the wizard's work.

As suddenly as they had come, the voices stopped. Andrei trembled a bit. Mouthpiece of a god or no, his body was still physical. Still had its limitations. This one needed rest. It needed sustenance.

"Tonight you will leave the Inn and feed. When you do, you will quietly kill your victim and bring the remains to me. I suggest that this be done sooner rather than later." He took a stately, yet shaky step to the couch and sat staring, like an owl. Like a bird of prey.

"After you have brought the corpse you may do as you wish, for the evening. I need a night of introspection. I need a night to plan." He looked at his hands, they felt as if they didn't belong to him. In a way, they didn't. They were starting to shake too. "I am sure you do not need to ask what will happen if I am disappointed. If I do not find you, the guards will."

Zaany was crumpled on the floor, and unmoving for a period of time after the order had been given. When they finally moved, it was shaky, quivering, but trying to masquerade the same dignity as before. The blood was wiped from their cheeks and jaw, from their hands, and their claws clicked as they slid away into their room. Out walked a duntra - not quite the one usually seen - and the apparent young man quietly slipped away, either refusing or not daring to look over at the eyes piercing his skull.