Thread: Oaths Twice Writ, Thrice Sworn (Umbrale & Erit)

He did, naturally, follow suit three steps behind and one aside, as was proper and at this point safest, and permitting himself a bemused smile at her reaction to his latter suggestion perhaps he could take to sheltering in the young bard's room when he needed peace from his mistress. I have already taken my meal for this morning, my Lady, He explained, And it will be a few hours yet before the servants begin taking their lunch shifts. It was more efficient for the servant House to operate on block schedules and take staggered breaks they were numerous enough that the flux in manpower meant little, but if everyone went at once it would be too chaotic and leave the Memoiri unattended. He excused himself at the kitchen, finding his tease of an elder cousin still at work with some of the others under her purview, and in the minute it took him to explain what Alisia wanted she had already assembled the required ingredients and sent some of the younger ones off to prepare the grounds in question for the impromptu picnic. Thankfully, since nearly everything with Alisia was impromptu they had much in the way of practice with accommodating her whims never let it be said the house of Cadence took their duties lightly. It was after only a few brief moments Chase rejoined his heiress at one of the various doors leading out of the manor, a polite smile on his slender lips as he offered her a pair of sandals for the walk through the gardens to the carefully tended man-made forest, each vibrant with colorful flora and even spots of small game having an extended subordinate family of mages to tend to it, the Memoiri estate was both expansive and very well cared for, much of the grounds practically abuzz with life and magic from generations of care. They passed the threshold and into the outdoors, a rustic stone footpath providing the way from the abundant estate to the flower beds proper, with Chase just a little bit closer that normal in Alisia's wake. A tiny little smile adorned his face not polite, but rather a quirk of the lips worn by one whose eyes stared at a pleasant past. How long had it been since he walked her through these gardens? Longer than the months of his instability, he knew schooling had demanded much time and attention the last few years, at least from him. The morning was warm and dry, absent even birdsong as they strolled with the leisure of two with all the time in the world, and his silver-blue eyes softened and unfocused as he appreciated the peace of the moment. Alis! Alis, look! Silas planted yellow roses! This... Will be our last summer together, won't it? He mused, just loudly enough for her to hear him but soft enough she could pretend not to. After this, you'll be off to university, and if my magic has stabilized I'll be off to train with Road Camelot. And if you haven't picked a suitor by the time you've returned, the House will surely arrange one for you. It would mean they would have to distance themselves from each other being too friendly with a servant of the opposite sex would strain whatever union Alisia was placed in. He didn't want to dwell on such thoughts, really didn't want to waste what time was left before these moments between them would be all but impossible. And the amaryllis are in bloom, too! I can only imagine how much mischief you'll get up to without me. Surely whatever college she was bound for would spin legends of her tenure for generations after her departure. Alisia was... Singular, in that way a point around which things revolved, rather than simply unfolded. He liked to imagine his presence wasn't necessary to keep her from going too far, that she wouldn't end up in over her head without him there to sink or swim beside her. Actually, I don't know if I can even imagine it. Even if I don't have magic, I'd still like to stay with you. He sighed, sliding his eyes nearly shut behind long, heavy lashes, and his smile turned ever so subtly bittersweet as he murmured, only to himself... ... I'll miss you, Alis... ... I wish we could stay with these flowers, even just a moment more. He should have known better, however, than to let his thoughts run away from him for magic yet untamed is a fickle yet attentive force, driven by the desires and instincts of the mage. Totems existed to prevent them working magic without meaning, and without them Akasha hearkened to every wish and whim and put forth efforts to make it so. It began with a stiff breeze, a sudden gust of warm summer air that blew his dust-colored hair in front of his eyes and made him flinch. A sinking feeling in his stomach told him something was about to happen, the uncanny instincts of the primal mind warning him of a nebulous something he did not truly know. And when the fields began to stir he knew exactly what it was as flowersorchids and hyacinths and amaranths and carnationssprang up to gargantuan size around them in the blink of an eye, he cursed his condition and his foolishness. Alis! He cried, reflexively using that old nickname he hadn't spoken since they were twelve, diving towards her in futility as she looked back at him with that damnable smug little smile and a chrysanthemum engulfed her, swallowing the winged fox whole with a bud the size of a minivan. He knew she was perfectly capable of breaking out herself he also knew she wouldn't, even if there was some unforeseen danger to her in there. No, she'd wait for him to do something, brash fool she so often was with him. A glove-clad fist beat against the overgrown flower, Chase's teeth grit as his mind wheeled and spun along a dozen different threads of thought. Cursing his out-of-control power, cursing Alisia's fondness for screwing around, cursing himself and Akasha and this stupid. Fucking. Plant! Being a late bloomer sucked. Very much. His hand struck home on a crease between the petals and found purchase within, and for just a moment Chase Cadence had the gall to think he'd won. The flower, of course, was quick to disabuse him of the notion some kind of force attempting to pull him in rather than let him pull Alisia out. Let! Go! You son of a-! Within the next few seconds, a great many things happened, not all of which were immediately apparent to Chase and Alisia. He was dragged, tumbling, into the flower bud deposited straight into her arms, in fact. A vague impression of a spark passed through them as their hands brushed together. His eyes changed in the darkness of the enclosure, and a sense of clarity overcame him as a new sense awakened in his mind the sense he imagined all mages had, indescribable and ethereal but oh so very there. The sense of the Will, of Magic . What neither knew, in that moment at least, was that Chase had done something utterly unheard of. He was not, in truth, sensing Akasha, for no mage did they were given Totems precisely to separate and demarcate them from the Will. Rather, he was brought into tune with what some more esoteric scholars called the Weave, but which really had no name to mages the primal, natural energy if the World rather than the focused, ordered magic of the Will. In becoming aware of this more raw and volatile energy, he had become insulated to Akasha not severed, for he had in that moment been granted a Totem, but tapping into it now required the use of a metaphorical line through the wall rather than an envoy along the road. Alisia, similarly, had been gifted the inverse in addition to her sense of, living and breathing connection to, the World, she had been granted a subtle, muted connection to the Will a Totem of her own, a link to power subtle and unsensed by the conscious mind and closed off to her spirit save by intentionally reaching for it. Their souls had been intertwined in a fashion not understandable in three dimensions, for each fully encapsulated, and was in turn encapsulated by, the other, yet remained separate and distinct at every level. He did not know the nature of his power, of course only that he had it, and it was his . And with it, he decided his first act as a proper mage would be smiting the ever-living crap out if that damn plant. He flexed, not his body but his spirit a metaphysical stretch and heave against the confines of the bud, and when it did not give he sharpened his gaze and gave his spirit edges and points, blades and spikes to rip and tear at this meddlesome piece of greenery that had been all too eager to obey when he hadn't meant it, but now that he had control it suddenly had to be this whole big show of obstinace. He didn't wish to be trapped anymore he wanted to be free, to be out in the light, to be rid of this wretched chrysanthemum and And just like that, the mutant flower bud rippled, then burst, exploding not into plant matter but throngs upon throngs of scintillating motes, embers of pure magic shining iridescent silver and sovreign blue. Then he was tired. So very tired, knowing not why but contenting himself in the knowledge that he'd done it served his purpose as her servant and companion, as a Cadence. He caught one look in her eyes like mischievous, troublemaking sapphires, and then exhaled and closed his own the left turned timeworn iron's grey, the right a shallow river's blue. And then he slept not quite snoring, but clearly deeply unconscious. And he dreamed. Of the white void, and the roar. Only this time, it was different. Last edited Jun 7, 2018