2017-09-07: Proof of Peace
- Log: Proof of Peace
- Cast: Riesenlied, Noeline, Cecilia Adlehyde, Jack van Burace
- Where: November City outskirts
- Date: 7th September 2017
- Summary: Riesenlied and Noeline catch up with Princess Cecilia and her retinue, but anger and hatred still runs high...
<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.
Cecilia, still on some level of alert from previous attempts on her life and/or physical presence, received the notice and decided it would be best to go accompanied. And so, as is the way of these things, she is arriving with the accompaniment of, one, her smartest advisor; and, two, her most openly murderous guardian.
Don't even worry about it.
Cecilia approaches in her favored traveling jacket, which it turns out is highly effective for the sands except maybe for the inadequate length of the skirt in keeping sand out of her leggings. She glances up to Jack as they get near the stop-off. "If they don't do anything, we don't," she reminds him. "There are already enough Demons who deserve your blade. I'd rather find out what they have to tell us."
And with this warning delivered, she steps acros the distance toward Noeline. The two certain seem rather more fragile than an average Demon, though Riesenlied's new changes are...
...not entirely noticed because Cecilia has a lot on her mind, honestly. She is as unnervingly not-quite-human as ever. Cecilia's eyes linger on her before they shift more toward Noeline. "I have come," she says, and approaches to a rather more conversational distance than the last few meetings. ...part of her wants to offer some conversational kindness.
The rest remembers that anything she wants to talk about involves their people trying to kill someone or something she cares about, so after a hesitant moment, she visibly decides not to, hands falling to her front, folded.
<Pose Tracker> Jack Van Burace has posed.
The fact that the smartest advisor comes riding on the shoulder of the murderous guardian is fairly normal really. The wind mouse has to be there, whispering something to Jack. Just to keep said Murderous Guardian from doing what he does best.
His sword is still held loosely in one hand, gently cradling the ancient blade.
The wrapping around the sheath has been left off for this occasion, the sigil of dead Arctica catching the light as its last knight stares at what he considers two of its murderers. He seems relaxed. A half smile on his face as he crosses his arms over his chest, standing slightly to the left and behind Cecilia.
Something in his eyes belays that lazy stance though, that hardly disguised hate. The emotion thinly veiled and only by the bare shreads of will kept in check. Something they should thank Hanpan for.
"Lets get this over with." He says, voice light but gaze unblinking. "I have bars to hit after this."
He hasn't dressed up for the occasion.
At all.
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
The troubled look that Noeline gives Riesenlied is obvious and genuine; she worries at her lips for a moment, not particularly sure what to make of the new growths. "You are fine. But we should..." she starts to say, but trails off uncertainly, genuinely unsure what to offer. The thought of returning to Photosphere as they are now, in the situation they're in, is... distasteful, not to mention extremely dangerous. All it would take is for Alhazred to get curious, and things become infinitely more complicated.
Besides, the Princess is here, and Noeline sucks in a breath that might be very human in the way it wavers. For a moment, her eyes glance towards Jack, brooding behind her - but then Noeline steps forward and into a respectful bow, which looks rather odd without the rest of her finery around her. "... thank you for coming," she says first and foremost, and: "I am-- glad to see you're alright. I can only begin to guess what that light was that shot out of the Temple, but... well, suffice it to say that I was concerned, especially when it was stopped."
She glances back at Riesenlied again, as if searching for permission to continue before she lets out a breath and firms up her expression. "We wished to inform you of what happened within the Temple - and the fact that none of the Guardian Statues will be at risk from the two of us, nor the Ebony Wings in general. We have sworn that much."
The statement's remarkably quick, for what it is and what it implies - but Noeline's decision is obviously to get the most important thing out of the way first, and let the blanks be filled in later.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied doesn't have her blade by her side, as she did when they last met -- the side-sword's been left somewhere, and there doesn't appear to be a weapon on her. Granted, these are Metal Demons, so the absence of a weapon does not necessarily mean the absence of a threat, yet...
The way she kind of quietly jitters, as she latches onto that ambient sensation of hate... well, it's not telling, but she does seem to be struggling, as she realises that her empathic senses just seem to be getting more and more sensitive lately. A small gem embedded onto a silver, tarnished brooch at her neck quietly emanates with a fluctuation of colours -- ending in a deep red that fluxes towards a grave purple.
She's... perhaps not used to Noeline taking the lead in a conversation, but-- she knows that she isn't necessarily in a state to speak at length and robustly. "I am myself relieved..." A pause. "The sudden outbreak of battle between Aveh and Kislev, and the appearance of the Golem Sado, certainly took everyone by surprise."
There's a rueful look from her for a moment, of someone who has quietly ruminated fears of successive Golem activations and the possibility of an all-out war amongst Golems... for perhaps a while now, and perhaps too much. "But... yes, as Noeline informs... that is where we stand."
<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.
Jack's anger is concerning. But he wouldn't be here if Cecilia did not believe in him.
Cecilia gives the two demons an appraising look. Jack's anger and bitterness aside, her own feelings are conflicted. She knows she should be encouraging this - Demons who seek to lay their arms aside! An incredible chance! And yet...
And yet somehow she feels her gut twisting when Noeline tries to offer her compliments. She finds herself remembering Lucia blasted clear off the roof of Adlehyde Castle; nearly dead, weeks later. Her father, shorn near in two.
Her hand rises to her chest, quietly breathing. "The Guardians attempted to transfer my party to the Photosphere to retrieve the Teardrop while your armies were engaged. Siegfried repelled the effort with his Dark Spear." It's nothing important to reveal now; it's not like they can try again. The Guardians used up so much power just attempting that...
But it says a lot to her. About how serious the Guardians are. The Guardians are definitionally passive; they do nearly nothing that humans witness as /being done/. For them to take such deeply aggressive action tells her much.
Her eyes travel from Noeline to Riesenlied, from mouthpiece to master(?) and back. "..." She sighs, some of the tenseness draining from her shoulders. "Deploying a Golem for something as petty as a turf war was monstrous. That is not what that power was for."
A small point of agreement, at least.
"It sounds like that was not the only thing they got up to down there," she says, shifting topics back slightly; eyes narrowing curiously.
<Pose Tracker> Jack Van Burace has posed.
"Those Golems were ments to destroy something far more dangerous, its true." Jack's voice once again is light. Controlled. But the way he looks at the pair of Metal Demons. Its obvious just what he was alluding too.
Hanpan murmurs something else in his ear as the swordsman attempts by force of will to unbend slightly. Ever so slightly. Like Cecilia he knows he should on some level encourage this. Its a good thing. Metal Demons coming around. Helping. Promising not to assault the Guardians.
In his minds eye though all he can see is fire and flame. His king dead. His friends dead. His love...
His eyes close as he looks down and away for a moment. Struggling with memory and emotion before turning his gaze back towards the pair of them.
"The princess can keep her own council on this." A twitch of a smile as he glances is Cecilia's direction. "And I know she will." Then that cold gaze snaps back to the pair of Demons. "But if you want me to be honest, and I have been taught to be honest, I will not believe a word that comes out of your forked tounges until its proven with action. I've delt with too many that use lies as weapons."
Well at least he is a man that speaks plainly.
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
Noeline returns back to Riesenlied's side soon enough, her lips pressed together at the sight of the other demon and the way she gently jitters; if they aren't master and mouthpiece they're at least very close, because the way in which she fusses over the other woman is unmistakably fond, and it takes a moment for her to speak again as she turns back to the pair of humans.
"... I am--" she tries to keep her words clipped, and then pauses as if to realize: what's the point? So instead she huffs suddenly, folding her arms as she dispenses with what formalities she had. "To be honest, the sheer scale of that melee and the speed at which it grew makes me wonder if it was someone's intention to pit the many sides together. Something felt off about it, but I don't begin to know what. Maybe it's just their mobility, but--..." she shakes her head as she trails off for a moment; it's a sidetrack.
"Either way, I'm afraid I don't know the results of whatever it was Alhazred was doing there. As far as I understand it, it was an attempt to locate other statues - but I have not exactly touched base in some time, and I'm more than happy to keep it that way."
She leaves the discussion of what exactly went on inside the Temple to Riesenlied - it feels right to do so, somehow. Instead, she turns to Jack, her expression drawn into a frown. "That is understandable - but it will be difficult to prove our inaction with action," she points out: not as a jest, but as a simple statement. "We've established a village - not a military base - and have both wounded and children. If we take a more active stance we risk Berserk rolling straight over both without a care."
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Cecilia's story brings a lot of expression to Riesenlied's face, one of plain surprise. For the Guardians to try something so... aggressive and direct, yes... that was certainly not something she would have guessed they'd try. And for Lord Siegfried to... dispel such an attempt, plain as that... it was just proof of his remarkable power -- not even the Dark Spear's, but of the immense kind of prowess that he had developed over the thousand years since the Metal Demon Wars.
And she seeks to oppose him, however heavy it makes her heart.
Perhaps someone else would call her foolish, to turn and try to consort with people whose naked hate and lingering regret are so palpable that it currently makes her falter-- and cough, suddenly, as the stirring within her mind starts to intensify. Her vision blurs. It's uncomfortable.
But where Cecilia and Jack are hung up with their own issues, with their own misgivings, which are entirely reasonable -- she thinks of the dozens of other people they /have/ met who were more willing to parley with them, to think of their viewpoint as anything other than a foolish fantasy. She thinks of -- Gwen, as they spoke under the stars and dreamed big; of Hiro and the Vile Fiends, as they empathised over their situation alike; of Jay and Ethius, and how this all began in a particular desperate situation in Linga; of Avril and how they both seek to try to find truth in rejection; the list seems to go on and on, in her mind. She thinks of Ambrosius and Kaguya, and how they've managed to empathise with each other's plights; She thinks of Leon and Lily, who they've managed to work with despite their differences; She thinks of Fei, who even has a strange kinship with Siegfried; She thinks of Ragnell, who questions whether she'd give up.
Individual moments like that, that keep her flicker of hope alive.
Eventually, she slides a small wooden emblem, of a matching design from her cloak, across the table.
"This is the symbol of the Fereshte, the tribe I once belonged to a long, long time ago," she speaks. "At the neck of the mountain ranges on the way to the Badlands, you can find this crest etched upon a rock concealing a winding way down to a valley nestled between two crested hills."
Riesenlied's head lifts up, her eyes regaining the glimmer of her resolve.
"You will find Wayside there. A village of my Tainted brethren, of those that have been cast aside by war and misfortune alike. Wayside is the proof of our actions, and of our contract with Equites, Guardian of the Sword. Everyone is welcome there, as they have been, so soon after the wake of the war at our doorstep."
She lulls her head as she finds her hands trembling, as the intensity stirs within her mind further.
"And you are welcome there too, of course."
<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.
In a way, Cecilia wanted to see how they would handle what the Guardians did, and in Riesenlied she gets an interesting answer. Noeline's suspicion is...odd, to her, because the whole melee doesn't make sense in such an elemental way for the Princess. Far more than anything suspicious, the thought of bringing arms to bear at the Temple at all is a sign of utter sacrilege of a despicable order.
Well, Aveh and Kislev being jerks isn't news. She grimaces, but she just shakes her head at Noeline a little. "Aveh and Kiselv picking a fight for no reason is entirely normal," she mutters. Jack has the rest of it. Cecilia doesn't rebuke him. They are for fighting enemies of Filgaia, and that means Demons. That's just a fact.
And as Jack goes off...Cecilia, though she grimaces, does not actually disapprove of that, either. "I wouldn't put it that way," she mutters, and then louder, "But Jack is right. I can't..."
She breaks off eye contact, as the pale face of her dying father fills her mind. She draws in a long, slow breath. "...we all have a long road to walk," she says, quietly.
But as Riesenlied reveals the depths of her treason, Cecilia steps forward toward the emblem Riesenlied presents. She is used to receiving mystic tokens by now, though this one uses a different magic. "...I see. Then you truly are committed," she murmurs.
She plucks it up. "I will honor this," she says, and seeks Riesenlied's eyes. ....She wants to be kind. But she can only loosen her shoulders a fraction even now. "To we who follow the Guardians, the greatest is Zephyr, Lord of Hope, the Great West Wind. Even more than the others, it is said that his power is diminished in these dried-out sands. That the Guardian Lord of Hope is gone."
She finds herself looking down at Riesenlied's emblem, and then quietly reaches to tuck it away.
"Still...as a Shaman and a human," She looks up, "I wish you western winds."
<Pose Tracker> Jack Van Burace has posed.
Reisland might can feel it. That sudden spike of anger from Jack. Hate. Fear. A swirling darkness. Whirling dark and deadly emotions that threaten to sufficate him. They whip up and lash round as Noeline says one specific name.
Alhazred.
He grinds his teeth, closes his eyes. Tries to fight back that black tide that swirls up and Hanpan gently touches the side of his neck. Trying to calm the furious swordsman. He says little, but that brooding hate is obvious in the set of his shoulders and the sudden grip on his sword.
His eyes narrow slightly towards Noeline. "So you hide behind refugees now, instead of behind masks." He finaly manages to spit out. "Grow a spine and stand up to them, if you truly mean to do so. Stand for something. Or burn for nothing." A pause. "I have seen Beserk burn my entire kingdom to the ground. I have seen him burn her's as well. And still, at the Temple. Before you went in and met with the Guardians, you stood with him. With Sigfried. With /Alhazred/."
That last is who he saves his special venom for.
His eyes turn back towards Cecilia and Riesenlied. Some of that black swirl fades slightly as he fights against it, but enough remains that he has to close his eyes for a long moment.
"You don't want me there." Is all he says about the invitation.
"Come on then Princess. If we're done here. I think I need a drink to wash this all out of my mouth."
Hope. Cecilia speaks of Hope.
He's watched that die and has little enough left to spare for something like this. All he can find hope for is to find something. Anything. That will let him end the Quarter Knights.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied tucks her head, ever so gently. She watches Cecilia take the token, which emanates with a soft little warmth in it -- a curious warmth, something that kindles at the touch in an appeal to emotion. It is a little part of her, in some way.
"I remember," she expresses. "For the Fereshte once espoused life in the frozen wastes, under the auspices of Odoryuk."
Well, that's a surprise.
Her eyes start to waver and unfocus as that malice starts to touch upon her, and she can't help but buckle in turn.
"... but, I am sorry that you cannot see what it is I stand for," she expresses gently. "Because to turn battle upon battle... is truly how a bloody and vengeful cycle is turned, again and again. I am truly sorry I could not do anything more for you... but it does not change what I have committed myself to do -- to bring life and meaning beyond war to those who have known nothing but. To seek the new world, where all may flourish."
She quietly rises out of her chair, and... starts to head out of the stop -- she's unsteady and weak on her knees, and may need Noeline's assistance before long.
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
Noeline bows her head towards Cecilia's acceptance of the trinket in something like courtly manners, or at least someone who's read courtly manners from a book but never exactly gotten to apply them.
When she straightens, though, her brow is furrowed - and she looks towards Jack with her mouth set in a line. "... we do not intend to hide behind anyone. Equites told us to prove we are more than beings of war - so that is exactly what we will do. Wayside is a village, not a military base, for exactly that reason. ... but I will see what aid I can provide, as myself."
She pauses, watching Riesenlied turn away, and continues without looking back to the pair of humans. "... I fought my own kind in your kingdom, Princess. I bled to get your people out. We are trying our best, here," she adds with a soft huff, her voice low enough to avoid Riesenlied hearing - and then she's hurried forwards towards the commander anyway, catching the other woman before she can stumble to lead her away.
<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.
Cecilia...doesn't move. Actually, she seems to be dazed; standing there with one hand come to her forehead, like a headache stirring up within her.
And when Noeline and Riesenlied and Jack all seem content to leave, still she remains. Until, finally: "...your work has the blessing of the Sword Guardian," she says, weakly; she sways a little but keeps her feet, her eyes slowly refocusing on the duo of demons. She says it like it were new information; like she knows by more than merely Noeline and Riesenlied's word. "Uncommon that she would ask for proof of peace, but...I am not her acolyte." She draws in a breath.
"You have," she answers Noeline. "You have done more than I ever expected the Demons could or would. I..."
Her hand rises up, curling against the black undershirt where the Teardrop should be. "Do not think I do not see the importance of your acts," she murmurs. "If your people saw you say to me what you have, you would be dead before sundown, I'm sure. Do not put the lives of the people in your charge at risk for the sake of our anger." Her eyes remain on Noeline. "...do not feel that you have to fight. That..."
Her fist slowly balls against her chest. "...that is my burden," she says. "So that nothing else burns like Adlehyde..."
After a second she turns, moving to follow Jack. "Safe travels," she murmurs.