2021-11-21: Für Elise
- Log: Für Elise
- Cast: Elise Riesdale, Seraph Harmaus
- Where: Dragon Fossil Mine
- Date: November 21, 2021
- Summary: Emerging from the shadows of Elise's domain, Harmaus makes himself known to her. He offers his assistance in what is to come and Elise accepts, if on conditional grounds until the Seraph can prove himself true to his words.
<Pose Tracker> Elise Riesdale has posed.
Life is relatively quiet under the enclosed geodesic dome of glass, the structure acting as much a wall against the outside world as if it were a simple wall of stone. As quiet as it could be, for a tiny kingdom of Hellions.
There were Hellions who acted out of turn, who disturbed the peace, but their expulsion depended on how their acting out struck against the certain bits of trauma wedged in Elise's soul, like pebbles deeply embedded in a horse's hoof. Those who threatened to violently rip the peace she nurtured in this garden of roses were usually quickly thrust out if their energies couldn't be simply sated by being assigned to hunting and patrolling. Some never can appreciate the safety of these stone walls on a level that would impel them to find their own rule.
Not every bud will contribute to the garden. Some must be cast off.
And some will simply be visiting faces, Hellion or no, providing their assistance so that the Rose Queen may provide her own.
A potential ally had been seen in the fortress, perhaps in the garden castle at the top, or sliding between the more chaotic floors below.
Elise sits at the edge of a gazing pool, her silk gown draped over her legs as she waves a hand over the water's edge.
She focuses her eyes, red irises widening as she casts her gold taloned fingers over the water.
Jagged stalks, like gold-veined obsidian, pierce the placid surface, rippling out until she waves her hand again, expelling them.
Lightning flashes in the far off distance, the rumble registering through the glass. Rain will soon fall, but it will not reach the garden. ".... Not a day for venturing outside..."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
The presence that stalks now through the walled garden is no Hellion. Nor, for the matter, is it any mortal being.
"What seeks it?" rumbles a voice from not far off at all, its immediate source hidden, perhaps, from Elise. "Knows I the pain of seeking. And pleasure," continues the speaker. "Is a wonder, yes? A long, worthy quest. A prize long-sought! Like rainbow after storms."
Is someone hiding behind a hedgerow, perhaps? There is no sign of anyone nearby. In fact, the only signal that anyone is physically here -- that someone isn't speaking to her over some long distance in fact -- is that, other than the nearness of the voice, there is the soft sound of rustling plants.
"It wonders me. Feels it the same?"
Softly now, there is the sound of a bell. An announcement.
For then the figure makes itself known: a grey and white cat emerges from the flowers, its long-furred tail twitching in anticipation.
"At last we meets... Lady Elise," says the cat.
It is no easy feat for a Seraph to plunge into a Domain. Even a body would have afforded Harmaus more protection.
But the body he has simply wouldn't do, for the acquaintance he is at last about to meet properly.
"I has watches it a long time, now. Watches, waiting! Waiting for right time of introduction. It calls me... Harmaus."
<Pose Tracker> Elise Riesdale has posed.
Fingers flex and another exercise in melding forms from the water, this time of a cube, made of the same transparent obsidian glass material, with gold lines on each edge, which she begins to shift to an octahedron, slowly attempting to increase the sharpness and perfection of each edge she adds.
The rumble of Harmaus's voice causes the formation to collapse into the water as fine dust, dispersing to the bottom.
As unmoved by the world as Elise may seem outside of the realm of the arts, the form that approaches her is pleasing enough to count. A delicate feline with lilac grey fur long enough to sway with each movement of his tail, the size, the natural ease that she attributes to him easing out of the bushes like he had always been there.
She stands likes a puppet rising up to her feet on strings, removing the human image of rising up to her knees and possibly ruining the fine silk of her bottom dress. "You are a... Seraph, am I correct?" She tilts her head, red eyes unblinking, curious.
For all the rough unneccesary sides of humanity Elise tries to file off in favor of others she deems worthy, Harmaus already has her attention by simply being in a form of a cat.
"So Seraphs come in shapes that are not humanoid. Very curious. Are you affected by my... domain, I believe it is called?"
She could be seen as innocent now, without Ruth there to focus on or an audience to be a queen in front of. "Indeed, it is I, Lady Elise."
Her name had not been uttered in a public audience, but getting it was not too difficult a matter for someone like Harmaus. "Welcome, Grey Visitor Harmaus. What is the title you wish to have?" She courtesies, one hand slighting lifting the side of her dress, dipping her head briefly. "I did not wish to assume. Have you come to find sanctuary here?"
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
"Yes," Harmaus responds simply to her question, ears flicking the once. "Knows it my kind?"
No doubt, she does. He has kept an eye on her and her doings, as much as he has been able. Malevolence is a rare flower upon Filgaia's surface, and already, one of these frail growths has been plucked. Unless something is done, the others will be torn from their soils as well.
He has yet to receive his own seed, though he has found the long-promised sower. For now, all that he can do is cultivate what has managed to find root.
And the time to cease merely watching and act has at last come.
He has chosen to reveal himself to Elise.
"Many shapes, many forms come we," he tells her, settling down on his haunches. "Here? Eh... this space is... uncomfortable. But is only fleeting, temporary. I attunes in time. Adjusts. Acclimates," he tells her. "With enough exposure." Something in his eyes glimmers. "Yes. Is matter of adjustment, only."
For someone as adept at creeping about in the dark corners of the world as he, it was a 'simple' matter to uncover her name. Her real name -- not the names or titles she might affect now. In fact, Harmaus has found out that she...
"Most gracious," he replies to her, whatever goes behind those eyes of his well-veiled behind his feliform mask. "Ah. Titles, now? Titles has I... but 'Harmaus the Seeker' suffices, now. Perhaps another day, I speaks my eternal truth." He pauses, tilting that head to one side.
"But today... today I speaks to 'Lady Elise'. I speaks of danger. Those who seeks threaten... her."
Those amber-yellow eyes of his blink slowly.
"Knows it has many enemies? Foes, waiting to destroy this garden. I would prevents it. Protects it. This place... is rare, here."
His tail has begun to lash, as if he were getting excited on some level. "Rare. Too rare. And necessary. Necessary, to heal the 'Blue Star'!"
<Pose Tracker> Elise Riesdale has posed.
"Somewhat," Elise admits, slowly smiling. "I am slowly learning about your kind. Mayhaps you have heard of the knight named K.K.? ... Or the Seraph known as Lady Ragnell." The one who callously sat across that couch.
Harmaus explains, in his own way, and Elise gestures outwards, vines wrapping around a couch and a padded stool nearby, in an open space close to a patch of lavender. With gentle tugging, the furniture is pulled over, the vines unwrapping and retreating into the bushes once their job is over. "Please sit." Elise indicates the padded stool, with its soft cushion and carved legs, and sits in her own chair, her hands on her knees. "You adjust? I see... Perhaps, they were the same."
"Harmaus the Seeker, then." Elise tilts her chin downwards, the jewels in her hair spilling forward with the slightest motion. "And you..."
Danger. Harmaus plays the instrument most able to tighten the strings of Elise's heart. "I see... you have come to warn me of those who may threaten this garden of mine."
Necessary, to heal... the blue star?
".... The Blue Star...? What manner of star is this?"
Like the beginning of a fable.
Harmaus has studied the Rose Queen well. "If my powers could... heal, I would be interested in this matter. Yes... Perhaps this is what I felt was missing, all this time."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
Has Harmaus heard of a knight called K.K.?
"The Trial Knight? Yes, I knows it. Knows it quite well!" The tip of that tail does twitch once, twice, thrice though at mention of Ragnell.
"Not well-acquainted, no," Harmaus says to that, flicking an ear. "Knows I not all Seraphim! We are many, many... but not so many."
Whereupon his host, using the powers she has mastered, retrieves for him a seat. Regarding it a moment, Harmaus hops up onto it, perching atop the padding and beginning to briefly wash his face and ears. "Yes," he says to her. "Is... difficult, adjusting. But managable, if one is knowing secrets! And knows I many secrets. Secrets, such as Malevolence's truth!"
He comes bearing many things, this Seraph.
"Yes. Many those who would wish tear this garden down. Eh... what is saying? Burn fields, salt earth? Never again will it produce such splendors!"
Indeed, while again there may be fertile soil for a particular dark seed, it will not come about too quickly, once 'purified'. And what's more...
"This star. Filgaia, is other name." Cats don't smile, but this one is doing a good job of it: whiskers flared, eyes squinted, ears forward. "Beautiful blue star, hanging in darkness. Sees it nightly, on Lunar... the Silver Star. My home. Your moon."
<Pose Tracker> Elise Riesdale has posed.
"They are an interesting sort. The image of a knight and their lady the two are not, they seemed as equals, united in their cause." Red eyes glance downwards, veiled by pale eyelashes. "The Trial Knight... I wonder their history." The sight of her flowers gained a response in them; what story would she be able to glean from different flowers?
"As many as Hellions, for lack of a better term? What forms you?" She taps a golden claw to her chin. "Are you all the true forms of former humans, or something more mystical? I have seen a dragon turn into something more human, which is what I have heard to be a result of Malevolence. Is this your particular desire, and why you have lurked in my halls? I find your current form more pleasing, I admit."
The seat and its padding are not the stuff of illusions, but the real thing. A sharp eye could see the mended upholstery and smoothed scratches; it is a restored antique, as is likely Elise's own matching seat. Sitting primly in her seat with her hands on her knees. "I see. You have come to offer aid."
"It has happened already at least once," Elise muses, with a small smile. "As it stands, I imagine there will be new dangers in the future. As for your flattery: this land has already been salted once, by war. Even now, if the water pumps are not engaged, orange discharge is liable to spill out and poison the grounds below anew. What you see is a work in process. My hold on it is only one part. But I realize I am letting the topic get away from me; the visitors I get here aren't usually interested in such matters, a group you very well many be a part of."
This star. Filgaia. The blue star.
Lunar. The Silver Star. The moon. "You are... from the moon?" She cocks her head to the side, leaning forward. "Even I find the idea a little too fantastic, but please, tell me more."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
"Yes, yes," agrees the cat, tip of the tail twitching once again. His ears have tilted back. "Unusual, those two. Strange... ah, what is word? Sleepers? Sharing bed... bedmates! Strange bedmates," says Harmaus, who has almost gotten the saying right. "Long history, has Trial Knight."
Of Ragnell, he does not speak further without prompting.
"Many, many forms!" says the Seraph. "Some, like me. Others, smaller yet. Others... shaped like my lady." Is this an attempt at flattery? He tilts his head, as if to showcase his good side (and he does indeed have that better angle available) as he gazes at Elise. "But, not a mortal body! My body... should I chooses, even this seat is my home! Or dwells I like this. Or borrows body of another. Many choices, yes? More than mortals! But your form... your choices. More and more interesting, yet."
He has come to offer aid?
"Yes," he says, squinting winningly up at her.
The tail twitches. "Is merely truth, my lady," Harmaus says, one ear again flicking. "But it learns me this... Heard I of war and destruction, but the extent! So my lady is, ah... what is word..."
It comes to him after a moment more.
"...Keystone. Bulwark. Against war's scars. It learns me more and more, how much danger the Blue Star suffers! Soon, soon, a turning point is reached. I prepares for this day... but I manages only so much!"
A day of reckoning. A day of rage.
Harmaus flares his whiskers as if pleased. "Yes. I comes from 'Silver Star'. Lunar, the moon. So comes all Seraphim. Silver Star is green, bright. Healthy! But cursed. Goddess Althena has locked its lands under her control... but ah, here, down here on 'the Blue Star'... lies great secret. Perhaps, key to freeing Lunar? But, first, must save Filgaia."
He sits up, looks her right in the eyes.
"Will you accept, my lady? My servitude. I guides you."
<Pose Tracker> Elise Riesdale has posed.
"Bedmates, yes. That is a way of putting it." Elise dips her chin once in agreement. "Soulmates, I would like to think. Unlikely souls, paired by a common goal. But this may be my own bias, perhaps."
Harmaus's flattery does not fall completely flat; it's akin to a pleasing melody as he serves the delicious bits of information as to how the Seraphs exist. "So a Seraph could use an object as an anchor? Even a being such as I am held to my form, though I suppose there are advantages to both modes of existence. If only this world was one I knew about at another day and time... it is sad such magic dwells beyond the understanding of the mundane laborer."
A magic that could have made that grey, dead life have some vain hope of it being more than what the eyes could see.
"So you wish to come to the aid of your homeland. As noble a cause as any. You must tell me more tales about your land, and perhaps, I may confirm this sight for myself, rather than feel the fool for believing the words of a velvety feline that crossed paths with me." But it is a lovely feline, one Elise would be glad to pet, if she did not know that Harmaus was no ordinary cat.
As if a cat like him was ever one she would have crossed paths with, in another lifetime.
Elise's lips curl in a small smile. "Well then, Seraph Harmaus. It would be terrible of me to refuse such gracious help, especially after accepting the aid of beings such as the Trial Knight and the Seraph Ragnell." She sits forward in her seat, extending her hand out for the Seraph to dip his paw on, if he decides to. "I believe we may have a deal, for now. My loyal bodyguard may be more cautious than I, but I hope you are able to at least regale her with stories. Your help will be much appreciated in the coming days. And perhaps... we shall give you aid in return, should our deal bear fruit. Until then, be secure that you have shelter in my kingdom. If my subjects bear you ill will..." Elise snaps a finger, conjuring a small gold medallion on a red silk cord. "Wear this, should you feel the need."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
To this Harmaus says nothing. His tail twitches, again.
"Needs right object," Harmaus clarifies. "If using long. Otherwise, becomes difficult, yet. But for short time? Many will suit!" He doesn't, notably, clarify the sort of object necessary -- at least, not without prompting. "For now, yes. But you may become more." Again, he is cryptic -- woefully so.
"Yes," he answers Elise. "Travels long distance searching aid! But finds little. Finds many woeful things, on Filgaia. So I makes my decision. We solves problems here, first, then return, solving own problems. This is what thinks me." He pauses, then tilts his head to regard Elise. "Mmm. Passage to my home not... easy. But not difficult. Can show you route, if you desires it."
It would be merely a matter of braving the way through the forest... and then the passage through Arado. One of these obstacles is worse than the other.
"It has bodyguard? ...Ah, yes. I sees it before. I might sees it again soon." He dips his head, as if in a nod, nearly. "Most gracious, is my lady. These terms... I accept! My aid has you, and perhaps, your aid has I." He bows his head further as she conjures the medallion, as if awaiting her to slip if over his neck to join the bell there.
The bell, which has remained silent, as if its clapper were stilled by Harmaus' will.
"Together, we protects this precious land. For Filgaia."