Iridescent | Aedre & Aegis | Private

When she left the grim citadel of Savage Skull, the one that had bathed itself in a wispy sheet of darkness and stepped into the murderously silent trekked-roads of Spooky Forest, she could hear her own heart-beat pouringly reverberating into the thick air. A minute of ambling out of any human's sight and into the core of that sea of green, she'd pushed her feet against the sodden earth and disappeared into thin air in the span of time that one takes to blink. Her body was then a vision in one of dark alleys of Hargeon; having appeared there with a pulsating blink of red and the flutter of a jet-black cloak. A pallid hand peered out of the cloak for a second and pushed away the hood resting on her crown, revealing a fall of snow-white mane and then tugged the rest of the cloak closer to her lithe frame. A sigh parted the lady's lips, while her heels proceeded out of the ignorable corner and into the white-hot light that washed the pristine port-town of Hargeon.

Reflected in the pools of her blood-red irises, the summer sky was neon-blue and vibrant. The sun-crisped flowers on the windows of civilians were wilting and they gaped at the tufty clouds and begged for their parched petals to be given one more shot of insulin. A smirk graced her lips at that sight, vanishing as quickly as it showed up, only to be replaced by the usual image of nonchalance. Clacking against the paved footpath, the wedges of her foot walked into a dilapidated building that housed a century-old shop and as soon as her hand pushed open the thick, oak door - a baritone call sounded from within, "Ah, Miss Crawford-" The rest of the sentence was muffled out of existence as the door closed behind her.

An hour later, Miss Crawford walked out of the musty old shop, and the first person to notice her - a young boy at the other end of the road, pointed her out with a stubby finger to his mom, while burying his face into a fluff of cotton candy. The woman's vision trailed her toddler's lead-in and quickly slapped his hand down, while an apologetic grin danced into existence on her weary face. But not a muscle twitched on Miss Crawford's face, or shall we ditch the official note and address her as Aedre? Just plain, old Aedre.

She just happened to completely ignore the exchange and turn without another glance back at the mother-son duo. And at that moment, somewhere in the back of her mind, she heaved a sigh of relief at her decision to not hide the scar on her right eye with the lily - a usual accessory that she donned, but ditched while travelling into the bustling streets of Hargeon. She had an intuition that it would attract too many glances and stares that were purely uncalled for.

'Wonder how Serene Cliff looks now, its been a while since I last visited.' She mused within the confines of her mind, while dismissing the thoughts about civilians and their lack of necessary politeness.



Perhaps, the prayers of the flowers of Hargeon didn't go unheard, for the clouds obliged and rain descended in little gleam-drops of silver the moment Aedre walked into the very periphery of Serene Cliffs. A disappointed click of tongue mixed with the thum of the raindrops on dry soil and they felt as sparkly and effervescent as champagne bubbles hitting one's skin. The sound of that rain was a harmonic thrumming, nature’s white noise. Silver trickles of water that seeped into the soil, renewing the life-roots of the plants beneath. A homely, baked-earth smell rose from the land as it was washed and cleansed by the dewy tears of summer rain. Petrichor, the smell of the first rains after a dry spell, rose like a miasma and danced even on her tongue. It was a jasmine-and-gingerbread fragrance, warm and fresh, leaving that land with sweetness incarnate. A barely perceptible smile broke her facade, as the woman sighed pleasantly and pulled over the hood of her cloak - shading her face into darkness and walked forth with the wish of finding a temporary shelter.

Her heels no longer made clacking noises, instead they wedged into the soft earth, while her pace quickened when the shower beat down with a higher shade of mercilessness with each passing second. It was point where you could not see anything beyond a couple of meters; for sheets of silvery tears descended from the heavens themselves.

"Wh-" Breath hitched in the woman's throat, as her leg seemed to have hit something - she had almost tripped over. In an almost instinctive reaction, she turned back to notice a mess of stark blue and her first thought was, 'How did I miss that.... ugh... him?' As red pools observed for a split second, she noticed the person sitting against the rock--- she had apparently tripped over his leg in her hurry.

"Sorry for that, Mister. Its hard to see in this goddamned rain." Aedre apologized, while her hand pulled back the wet hood that threatened to stick to her eyes and close off vision every now and then.

It had begun as a whispering in the air. Now, it was akin to the mournful cry of a lonely fox, echoing through the usual vault-still silence of the the Serene Cliffs. The rising of a huffing wind had welcomed the dark-grey clouds looming overhead at the moment, and it had all started with the tinkling sound of pearly warter droplets. The sound had been like the glassy clinking of a champagne flute, lilting and clear. A sheet of rain had passed over her and the sound intensified. The noise on the leaves of the nearby trees was like the phut-phut-phut that ripened nuts made when they hit the ground. It wasn’t the soft, sodden, swollen drops of spring that one hears usually; it was like ball-bearings were hitting the canopy with force. There was an occasional ker-plunking sound, caused by the Adam's ale of heaven gathering on the foliage and then falling to the ground in a great swash of release. In the midst of nature's pleas, she heard a throaty groan issued by the man clad in blue; as he rose up to an impressive height - his azure clothing devoid of any muck. But in that messy downpour, the woman's eyes dismissed it like a whiff of air. There was a much important detail on her mind; finding shelter from the curtains of pouring water.

And ironic as it was, her thoughts found utterance in the man's words, "Ah. It's alright. Though I suppose shelter is in order..." For a second, she stood rooted to the ground, observing the cerulean figure walking off to a thick grove nearby. In that short period, the only thing that captured her generally fluttering attention, other than all the stark blue that made him stand in contrast to the silver background of the rain, was the piece of cloth covering his eyes, 'A blindfold?' The woman raised an eyebrow to a high arch, a bemused curve dancing upon her lips.

For a moment, she contemplated walking off deeper into the frigid blur, finding her own shelter and her feet did find the strength to turn away into another direction - but as it happens in cliched movies, she followed the soggy stranger's trail.

Fate isn't as paltry as one would like to believe.

Speaking of this stranger, Aedre really didn't pick much about him, except that there was a pulsating magical ambience that wafted about him - a mage it was. Oh, also that he had a queer fashion sense. However, more than him, the white-haired lady was more amused by her own decision to shadow him - she generally wasn't comfortable with the idea of being around strangers. This man had only sputtered two sentences.... Perhaps, the doctrine of necessity; the need to find a sanctuary, was stronger than ever today.

Sauntering at a soft pace behind him, the female tugged at the string that tightened the cloak around her and whipped it off with a single pull - revealing the white, full-sleeved, top and the pair of pale-blue jeans that she wore. The upper garment hung loose on her frame, and the only skin it exposed was around her neck and shoulders; where diagonal cuts had been made. Regardless, in that rain, the detail never mattered, for they no longer looked clean and crispy; just soggingly wet. If anything would catch an onlooker's attention, then it was her left hand - for it was made of the deepest black metal; a prosthetic.

Hanging the cloak on her dominant arm's shoulder, Aedre quickened her pace, only enough to catch up to a foot behind the blindfolded male and couldn't help but notice how he could make a perfect path to the coppice without even a hint of doubt about where he was headed, 'A peculiar mage indeed.

She knew she wouldn't be able to hold back the curiosity bubbling within her, if anything, it was her greatest fragility ever - one that would hit her way below the belt at some point in life. But in that moment, she was aware that it was least likely to be a suicidal move to question the man about it, "They say a person's eyes are a gateway to his soul...." A pause, as she momentarily regretted the idea of making small talk - she'd always seen it as a puny exertion, but had now committed it and added it to her list of blunders. A white breath left her lips in compunction, but decided to give her statement a period anyways, ".... Quite a shrewd decision it is; to hide them like that."

By then, the sky was as black as the devil’s soul - the world; cellar-dark, while the buckling, heaving sky looked fit to collapse down on earth. The light puffs of water were pregnant with malice, churning and roiling mercilessly. In the glassy, red irises of the woman they were as vaporous as mist and as fleecy as black wool.

"... So they say." He replied, turning back ever so slightly - a sign of acknowledgement, and Aedre's eyes zoned in on the standing man, instinctively weighing where his eyes would be.

A clanking sound could be heard from the sky, as if a huge anvil was being dragged across the vault of heaven against its will. Branched lightning lit up that Stygian sky. Buzzing and hissing, they trembled with the anger of being shackled to the sky since time began. Lightning is the megawatt smile of nature, but there was nothing friendly about the terrawatts of violence it unleashed. She could almost smell the sweet, sickly smell of singed grass; and it did make her insides churn - shelter was definitely in order.

"Perhaps I have no eyes to show. Or perhaps they have no soul left to uncover." A statement that lit up the woman's face with what was a half-smirk, half-smile. Something told her that there was more to come, that the man clad in accoutre as bright as Zues' eyes - would bend.

"Do I unsettle you?" The question elicited a curve of glee on her visage and a chuckle escaped her throat, parting her lips, "Of course. Every stranger does. There's zeal in inking a blank page, but there's also apprehension - the fear of screwing things up. What if the ink does not suit the parchment, mister?"

A gash of liquid light appeared from the breach above, a lesion in its seething surface. The sky still steamed like a witch’s cauldron as pronged lightning spit and hissed like sizzling pulsar-whips. The white-haired female watched wordlessly as the man untied the piece of cloth and whipped it away, revealing a set of mauve pools that seemed to lack the flicker. It was devoid of the spark that she enjoyed observing in others; lacking the depth that made the eyes the entrance to the soul. In the case of this bloke, she knew she'd need to crack another way in.

"I have laid my soul bare, but are you sure you want to look? Eyes are only burned if they peer too close into the fire." Only the question in his monologue writhed into her consciousness, then etched itself - demanding for an answer. Before she could utter it though, he turned away, making his way to the cluster of trees that stood in short distance.

An explosion of lightning-flame emblazoned the deep-black sky, scarring its darkness. It writhed in its fleeting agony before illuminating into sorcerous sheet-lightning. It skewered through the sky and a single vein arrowed towards azure stranger - but a sword had flickered into existence by then and it directed the rupturing and fracturing bolt into the ground. A thoguht roused into the mind of the observer, 'Impressive that he didn't get his heart tasered out.'

Her steps picked up speed, reaching to the man's side, then overtaking him in a heartbeat - a quick spin on the tip of her toes and Aedre was facing the blue sword-wielder with no break on her legs. She was pacing backwards.

"You wish it was that simple. The eyes are the gateway... but who said there can't be roads and rocks after you cross an entrance? To grasp a soul, you need to know the heart - the highest point of its elation, the deepest of its melancholy, the darkest of its desires and the brightest of its prayers. Conclusively, its a hella lengthy process." The woman ended her dialogue, a vexaious smile dancing upon her lips as she turned her back to him and raised up her dominant arm into the air - bending and coalescing Space around the low-hanging branches of the coppice. Her fingers clenched into a fist a moment later, followed by a swift downward pull of her wrist and a good part of the offshoots had been torn from the trees - levitating in the air. In the very next heartbeat, it had made a sodden mess on the wet ground.

"I do suppose an introduction can succeed shelter, though."

By the time she reached under the gracious shelter of the grove, the clouds were damnation-black, glaring down balefully at every inch of living soul on earth.  Like a tightening noose, the sky seemed to be coiling in on itself, purring with a suppressed rage. Shivering, every two seconds or so with rolls of thunder that echoed in the air like the distant rumbling of an avalanche. For some reason, the woman connected that visual of nature with a pissed off cat.

The red orbs of her eyes fixed and tightened on the man who made his way into the coppice a few seconds after her; and she watched his line of vision fidget on the twig-laden ground for a few moments, before he finally chose to take seat right there - no uneasiness lacing his physique at all. She averted her gaze back into the sky though, a barely perceptible smile dancing on her lips. It seemed as if she'd found a person who loved to feel the benevolence of nature on his skin.

However, the battering drops weren't the nectar-of-the-gods type rain beloved of all those wandering adventurers lost in the desert. It was icy, stinging nails of rain that was well capable of stripping its victim's skin away and and shrink their soul. But still, in the midst of that rain while splotchy thoughts prevailed in her mind, she couldn't help but sense the presence of something kindred to her, even in a scene which she was accustomed to call wild and dreary; a feeling that gave her the idea that no place could ever be strange to her again. The cosmos was enchanting in that matter; almost a grifter, letting you live under the pretense that it was your greatest friend.

She was standing with her back against a thick tree trunk, her hands crossed below her chest and the right foot pressed against the stock. For some reason, she felt queasy about taking a seat beside the man - maybe it was because of him being a stranger, or maybe it was just the strange stubbornness she was born with. Her thoughts were still rambling about this dilemma, when the white-haired female heard her company speak, "My name is Aegis. And yours..." Her gaze turned back on him, and just as she was about to give her own name; having taken the pause as a welcoming question, she perceived a continuation, "... is Aedre."

Eyebrows arched up in a bemused expression, as Aedre captured another trick of the mage before her and nodded in acknowledgement of her name. Not like the azure-clad male seemed to ask for it, but still, an ingrained reaction. "I..." The one who identified himself as Aegis uttered, another break colliding into his speech, leaving the woman grappling for a hint of what the sideways-glance that he gave her then meant, "... Hph, it's been a while since I shared a company of your likeness."

An inch of a smile broke her constant expression of nonchalance, as she pushed herself off the support of the trunk behind her and steadied her dominant foot firmly on the ground, "Well, the experience is mutual, then." The woman's hands wove behind her back, as she watched him conjure up a tea-set, well-decorated with a steaming pot of the sweet-brown beverage.

"If I am to be honest, I call mages like you circus masters - due to the diversity of the tricks up your sleeves. So, if I am to excuse you that title, mind telling me where your expertise lies? Brewing up tea or figuring out people's names?" Aedre questioned, a smirk gracing her lips as she considered the set-up of the tea tray a welcoming notion of company. A wave of her hand swept away all the twigs that carpeted the floor to one side, leaving the earth bare. She assumed a seat, her legs resting folded on one side, her back against the stock of a tree.

"Mind pouring your guest a drink, Aegis?"

Resting beneath the frail shelter of the grove, watching the floody onslaught of nature waging a war against its gale forces; a terrifying scene - but nontheless giving off the idea that there was indeed, a sweet and beneficent side to it all as well. For without the beating drops of Adam's ale, there would be no inch of life to speak of. And shouldn't the sustainer of life have the right to throw a tantrum once in a while? If it was paid attention to, Aedre could sense the pouring benevolence behind the harsh exterior; in the very pattering of the drops, and in every sound and sight around the paltry coppice, an infinite and unaccountable friendliness all at once like an atmosphere sustaining the duo. It was capable of making the fancied advantages of human neighborhood insignificant, and the realization of its existence could drown her to a point where she on longer wished for company. The damp air was camaraderie enough. Every little pine needle will expand and swell with sympathy and befriend her. She just knew it - a fluttering intuition.

But that wasn't the only impression muddling her thoughts, for the white-haired woman could feel the weight of a lilac gaze on her; the same one she'd influenced out of the shield of a blindfold. In a usual scenario, it would render her in a state of utter fluster - which would proceed to a stage where she'd snap at the keen observer, and if it suited best; rudely too. She truly was the worst victim of attention. However, in Aegis' case, it failed to unnerve her, perhaps due to the fact that he seemed like the kind of person she wouldn't mind associating with - taking first impressions into consideration that is. Or because his gaze seemed to be bubbling in a turmoil of its own, a question; to look or not to look? And if she were to be honest, she felt as choked as he did, 'Or maybe even more.'

The reason to her interest, however, wasn't his appearance, granted as it was that the man would vie for attention with that physique in the opposite gender any day. It wasn't his powers either - but the idea that he was a puzzle. His existence intriuged her in a way that not many people's did - similar to new-born experiencing the rain for the first time. How is it so? Why is it so? What is that? - in this case, what is he? A kind of person she'd never come across before. Hopefully, it wouldn't be condescending if she called him a rare specimen that she'd like to explore and know, 'Now that I think about it this way.... its almost creepy of me.'

The thought bought a slip to her calm poise and the woman bit her lower lip, shaking her head slightly and turning around to face Aegis, just in time to hear him answering. While he spoke, the red orbs of her eyes studied him carefully, almost amused at the way he chose to explain. It was descriptive, to say the least, but riddling in a way that she knew she'd have to see him in action to actually ever figure out. The woman almost smiled at his last statement though, but shadowed her expression, no reason why, by lowering her gaze to the steaming cup of tea that the man had filled. Picking it up, the woman turned her attention back to the raging fit of nature, "Neither, I would say. The value of anything, is determined by how it is used - and not just by its existence. So, illusion or real, Aegis, the title of greater is conditional - how do you put the real or illusionary to use, is the question. And if we think about it, its similar to the line that separates the ordinary from extraordinary, isn't it? In your words, an inconsequential line in the sand."

The hot beverage burned her throat on a pleasant note, its taste etched onto her memory, inducing a small smile on the pink line of her mouth, "In this illusion's case, its pretty great. Perfectly brewed." She complimented in an earnest fashion, raising the cup slightly to emphasize what she was speaking about.