middaeg | Event Log: April, Dream a Little Dream

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Event Log: April, Dream a Little Dream

Event Log: April, Dream a Little Dream (Of Me)

I. The Looking-Glass House

shared dreams

each other

Looking-Glass House

nothing is different

all lie within the hall of mirrors

Something has changed

hundreds of mirrors

yours is not the only one you can see signs of life in

the glass ripples

Welcome to April's event log, Dream a Little Dream! This event is a little more 'make your own fun' than others (since we are not currently in a place to be able to run a plot-heavy event this month), so feel free to play with the dream mechanics generally as you will. The main things to keep in mind are: memories are from the character's point of view however you choose to interpret that; memories cannot be altered or show a character something they could not have witnessed; please be considerate when using other people's characters in a memory, and visitors cannot directly interact with people/NPCs within a memory. Interacting with creatures/environment of a memory is fine. Otherwise, have fun! As always, feel free to use this log or make your own, and direct event-related questions here.

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[The longer Myr wanders the Looking-glass House (has he been wandering? Or standing beside his own mirror, or peering into others' memories...), the more he's put together about the nature of the mirrors as they appear in this dream--enough to understand that a decorated mirror belongs to someone he knows already. Though of all of those he has encountered, few of them signify their owners to him, knowing those owners as he does by voice, by touch, by physical presence and not by sight. So it is with this decaying mirror he's before: He does not know anyone who is ill or dying, so what's to be made of the rot? Juxtaposed with geometric signs as it is, it's evocative of the order-and-decay he's so familiar with in L's mind--but then from whence the butterflies?

He does not intend to touch the mirror, not wanting to intrude yet again on someone dear to him, but it's those bright-hued little creatures that prove the undoing of his resolve in the end. I could ask them, he thinks, extending a hand to the nearest of them... And brushing the mirror as he does.

Exasperation at himself hisses from between Myr's teeth as his hooves hit the floor of the study on the mirror's far side. You've done it again. At least the two men already present are insensate to his intrusion, which means he can grumble as much as he likes without worrying about interrupting what is--a conversation of immediate interest, given the familiar voice leading it off. As much as--or because--Myr cares about Viren, the other ex-mage is a subject of perennial interest to his curiosity, and now, here, is an opportunity to answer some of those questions he does not think he'd get answers to asked direct...

He doesn't look immediately for the memory-echo of his friend in the room, nor this "Harrow" that's Viren's interlocutor; instead, he studies the room itself with avid interest and no little homesickness. This would not have been out of place attached to the First Enchanter's quarters, he thinks, and it makes his heart ache a little to think of that. It's tempting to approach the bookshelves and see what's shelved there and whether there are further parallels to Thedas to be found... But his eye is drawn, inevitably, from its survey of the scenery to the real central figure of the room; and how could it not be, when the weight of so much positive regard invests this Harrow?

It's an effect Myr's familiar with from the Fade, where things the dreamer felt most strongly stood out strongest to the eye. The Maker's first children would have it no other way, crafting their illusions as they did to evoke mortal emotions.

Even knowing he's invisible, inaudible to the room's occupants, Myr approaches Viren and Harrow with cervine caution, eyes drawn now to one, now the other as each speaks. Something in Viren's manner, his evident intensity, has already got the Faun's fur on end; he has heard this before, and it worries him, that touch of the sinister about the other man. That Viren doesn't stoop from striking an obvious weak point even on someone so dear to him...

Myr throws a glance back over his shoulder, suddenly, looking for the mirror.

He doesn't know if he wants to watch this to its conclusion. Yet he also hasn't moved yet...]

[ Harrow stares out at the Kingdom's lands, barely noting his own reflection in the window's glass. And his eyes squeeze shut, Viren's words hitting their mark; tears begin to flow over his cheeks. It's not a reaction that causes alarm, but accepting of their presence, as someone would be for an inevitability.

"Yes... It's true."

He confirms, his head beginning to drop as he wraps himself in his sorrow.

"And what about them?" Viren presses, a spike of anger to his voice. He strides forward, tosses his freehand to the side to indicate the King's children -- wherever they may be: attending to their lessons, playing with each other in the gardens, or mournful in the quiet reflection of a lost loved one. Viren's voice hardens further, "They were robbed of a mother's love."

Harrow's eyes open then. He turns back toward Viren. While tears still streak his face, his expression has changed. ]

—You won't appreciate this one, Myrobalan.

[ and there -- is present Viren, dragonic changes and all. perhaps he'd arrived later, perhaps he'd waited to say something, the moment being when myr looks back to the mirror. ]

[ he stands near to the table. on which its surface lies what appears to be an empty jar, but also a spear. his claws trace gently over its handle, where someone might have once gripped to wield it themselves.

he looks up from it, toward his memory's guest. ]

For that reason, you should stay.

[Caught--

And for all of that what Myr feels is not guilt but a certain quiet dread at intruding, perhaps exactly because Viren invites him to stay with those words: You won't appreciate this one.

Well, and, there were many things Myr had not appreciated but believed it his duty to witness anyway, and if this is another, so be it. He lifts his chin to meet the present Viren's gaze steadily, before dipping his head in acknowledgment.]

With your permission, then. [Having said that--being who and what he is, a creature of the Circle and the herd--he takes the few paces from where he had been to join the other man by the table. His gaze falls briefly to the objects arrayed upon it, before he turns his attention to Harrow and past-Viren once more.]

[ present viren says nothing, but nods his agreement. he retracts his touch from the spear. from their vantage point at a side of the table, to peer over at the two men, the scene continues, ]

[ The King comes to a halt before his closest advisor, best and oldest of friends. In Viren's right hand, he holds the horn. In his left, he opens his fist to reveal, resting upon a cut of cloth, a sharp, steel needle. With a hand that hesitates, shakes, and finally takes the item, Harrow accepts it.

It's a sharp turn. Gone is the man's sadness, to be overtaken by a more violent emotion; what was once an empathetic, kind visage is ruined by deep scowl, his eyes dark with anger.

"I do hate him."

He pricks his finger with such force that the resulting pierce is audible. He lifts his hand, a drop of blood clinging to his fingertip; it falls to catch against the peak of the horn. The blood runs along the horn's valleys until its quantity thins enough that it fades, and the mage turns back to his table of spell components, setting the horn neatly adjacent to the spear. By this point, readying himself to begin the enchantment, Viren wears a smile. ]

[Myr stills completely as the Viren of the past unveils the needle, the fur on his neck prickling in atavistic alarm. There's something breath-stealing in how swiftly Harrow goes from grief to rage; the latter emotion seems so ill-suited to this man Myr has only known a matter of minutes.

And that needle...]

Oh, don't, [the Faun breathes, even knowing he's helpless to stop the bloodletting. Knowing, also, that this is what Viren of the present had wanted him to see--and to what end?

He watches as the blood soaks into the horn, thinking on that; one hand rests on the empty hilt at his hip, for steadiness more than anything. He'd suspected this--but. But it makes it no easier to watch, to understand, to empathize with.

And the look on Harrow's face--]

Tell me, [Myr says softly,] he came to that of his own accord.

[Blood magic stole men's minds. He hates he would suspect Viren of that at all, with someone who carries such resonance for the Dragon... But the thought gnaws at him with sharp and insistent teeth.]

Edited 2020-04-20 07:40 (UTC)

Of course not. [ viren, once he'd piece together the implication of myr's words, answers immediately. there's indignation to his tone, that he would use that sort of sorcery on the man. ] For ten years, my King had suffered, grieved the loss of his Queen; more quietly, but no less vehemently, cursed the name of her killer in private.

[ the emotion doesn't leave his voice, and the dragon's teeth clench, a bite of his own anger glimpsing through. it wouldn't rival harrow's ire, no, but viren role was very different to the king's. viren mostly holds -- regret for how things transpired, the day of her death. for now, he keeps that to himself. he raises a hand, gesturing toward the table. ]

But this is one of my greatest spells, Myrobalan! For its capability; together, my King and I would bring down that terrible, godly creature: the King of the Dragons.

[ The spell components in proper place, past Viren begins his incantation,

𝐸𝑇𝐴𝐸 𝐹𝑂 𝑁𝑂𝑃𝐴𝐸𝑊 𝐴 𝐻𝑇𝐼𝑊 𝐸𝐹𝐼𝐿 𝑁𝐼𝐴𝑅𝐷 𝑂𝑇, 𝑆𝑆𝑂𝐿 𝐷𝑁𝐴 𝐸𝑉𝑂𝐿 𝐹𝑂 𝑇𝑂𝑁𝐾 𝐷𝐸𝐿𝐺𝑁𝐴𝑇 𝐴 𝑇𝑆𝐼𝑊𝑇.

And in the meanwhile, as he speaks, the air within the jar appears to take on a new life. He pries the lid ajar, and the captured air itself seems to have become of pure essence, of a bright violet. The magic leaps toward the horn, enveloping it in a crackle of energy. The unicorn's horn shines, bright at first, how its meant to, before darkening to a deep, smoky black; cracks of dark magic shine from within its depths, and from these depths spring oily tendrils.

The tendrils, gifted with a new purpose, drag the horn with it as they crawl towards the golden spear. If Myr listens closely, he might hear something like a woman's whispers, or the high-pitched chittering of something inhuman. The tendrils lock the horn into place at the head of the spear's blade, becoming one with it, and subsiding to a smoky, unmovable stone.

—And, the last of his dark magic drained from his body, Viren's left without his revitalizing charm. His skin has been drained of color, marred by cracks and patternings of dark grays and violets. His eyes, too, have gone black.

Viren replaces the lid on his jar. He heaves a heavy sigh, to address his King,

"I will leave you with your grief." ]

[It's a relief to hear, indignation and all; it wasn't a worthy implication, Myr thinks, but he'll own his own guilt for the suspicion. Whatever else Viren's pragmatism led him to, that particular sin couldn't be held against him. (Consider the incident of the mistletoe, after all.) The Faun ducks his head in acknowledgment, agreement, even as his eyes are drawn in the direction Viren gestures.

His attention to the spell isn't all an exercise in grim determination; he's enough a scholar of magic himself to want to see this, even if he finds the method of casting abhorrent. This isn't Thedas, he reminds himself. Blood magic's no crime against their gods. --Which is as much to assuage his own feelings of sinful guilt at being interested in the details of the spell at all, as it is a rebuke of his own judgmental nature.

He watches--though he's got rapid cause to wish he wasn't as the spell takes hold. The devouring blackness--the reverse scintillation and creeping, clutching tendrils as something murmurs just on the edge of hearing--remind him far too much of Entropy's workings for comfort. The slow swish of his tail stills; his hands knot into fists at his sides. Run, something in him whispers. Run before it's completed, before it comes for you, again, and who knows what you'll do to yourself this time...

Then it's over, before the creeping anxiety can make Myr break and flee, and the Faun lets out a breath he'd unknowingly held. He looks up from the spear blade as past-Viren speaks and starts visibly at the mage's change in appearance, eyes widening and an oath on his lips.]

Maker's love--!

[The look on his face might almost be comical if it weren't for the obvious concern as he glances between Virens past and present, searching the Dragon's form and face for similar evidence of supernatural damage.]

Are you--is this--that's the price you paid for magic?

[ the scene and the figures within have come to a still, now, as the memory comes to its conclusion; past viren has taken his leave from the room, jar in hand, leaving his king to contemplate the aftermath of the spell. myr's reaction is something to be anticipated; even at home, even if others seem to at least instantly recognize the cause, likewise tend to recoil. ]

[ present viren, as he stands, seems to be fortunate -- well. dreamwise, he's traded his marks of dark magic use for monstrous features, so to each their own as to that equivalency. ]

[ he hesitates. ]

That's... part of the price, yes.

[ but not all of it. ]

My appearance notwithstanding... [ he turns more fully to myr, then, eyebrows pinching together. his tail swishes, hands curled lightly at his side. the expression he wears is intensely fixated upon the faun. ] This is something that I had wanted to make known to you.

[To Myr's eye, the dragonish features were definitely to be preferred; a Faun's instincts had softened and broadened his preferences enough to make his fellow-Monsters exotic and fascinating. Yet cast in the knowledge it came through self-sacrifice, past-Viren's ravaged features had a certain appealing tragedy to them.

And like any good tragedy, it's freighted with an awful sense of waste and loss, with a creeping feeling of dread that digs fingers into Myr's heart. So too with the idea this is only part of the price--and Viren wanting him to know of it.

He reaches for the objects on the table, to touch and verify what the spell had done. Not a flashy display, no, but it had achieved something a student of Creation could appreciate as powerful, to fuse a new weapon so.

Then he lifts his chin and his gaze to meet the other man's, turning away from the static frame of the completed memory. Being the target of such a hungry look--even from a friend, a safe predator--still ruffles his fur with unease.]

The breadth of your magic-- And what you paid for it?

That was something beyond my own skill. [He is impressed by that, student of magic that he is.] Even leaving aside enchanting it to kill a dragon.

[More quietly,] What else did it cost?

[ a stretch of silence greets myr's inquiries, initially, almost as if viren himself had stilled along with the memory. he shouldn't leave myr to guess at his intentions, no, not when misunderstandings themselves can be so costly. despite the praise ('beyond my own skill'), the elation he would normally feel at dark magic's potential recognized? it doesn't cause him to smile. ]

For this spell: the dying breath of the Queen, the blood of one who loved her, and the horn of a unicorn. [ but this is also, not without proper acknowledgement, skillful as the casting of the spell had been itself: ] But acquiring that final, necessary component... I could have never done it without my daughter's help.

[ he would always feel excitement at the prospect of these spells, but that emotion's dimmed. there's a minute shake of his head. ]

You are the only mage I've encountered, here, to have such an inherent... revulsion, to using parts of beings as a means for their magic.

[ he could acknowledge this is nothing new. here, most certainly, people have also grown wary through experience. ]

That is why, if we are to truly know one another [ as friends, he doesn't vocalize ], then you should know this about my magic.

Edited 2020-05-05 01:57 (UTC)

[That's a list of spell ingredients to send a chill down the spine, even leaving aside the blood. Unicorns were almost completely disproven on Thedas, but Myr knows Talam's native sort enough to feel a frisson of sacrilege at the thought of killing one for its horn. And the Queen's dying breath...certainly implies something of Viren planning, of him knowing from the instant her fate was clear, what he must do to get revenge for her.

It is of a piece with what he knows of the man, but what a strange and darksome piece to have discovered. Especially alongside another mention of Viren's daughter-- Though that's something to think on at another time, heartening as it is to hear. Myr knows himself well enough to know his urge to fixate on that revealed detail is an urge to distract himself from the fraught discomfort of this moment, and that is an unworthy thing to do when offered a truth.]

Blood, largely, [he replies, slow and thoughtful. Gently, now, because Viren is his friend and sought understanding in showing him this.] Because we're forbidden it, though using any part of a thinking being for magic holds its horrors. [As they'd seen.]

Creatures without minds, [and here he hesitates, because as a Faun that's suddenly a much more nebulous category; even his bees have minds, albeit small ones,] are another matter; while there's Loyalists who'll argue the ban on blood magic extends to animal blood, they'll use wyvern hearts or dragon teeth as it suits them. The Maker gave us animals to use as needed.

But those are Thedas' laws, and Talam's--but for the blood.

Is it the blood, the breath, or the horn that's the greatest offense back home?

[Or all of them taken together--a human doing magic at all, in defiance of what nature decreed for him? Myr wonders.]

[ which part is the greatest offense? viren ponders for a moment, whether it matters or not, but this is a more cynical inclination weighing on his mind. he doesn't lament the ingredients. he laments that dark magic is scorned for their use. ]

All of it.

[ he answers, eventually, somber in that. slaying one of the purest creatures that his world would know was certainly frowned upon, using the king's blood had been disfavored, and keeping his best friend's wife's dying breath on a shelf for nine years, in secret, was discomforting. ]

[ but it was necessary. ]

It would also use creatures with minds, Myrbolan. Blood, yes, or parts of anything with "magic running through its veins." Your kind.

[ his expression becomes more solemn. ]

And I don't regret any of its use. Would you understand that?

All of it, [Myr echoes, hushed, as if he's caught Everett's nervous tic. (And who knew--perhaps he has?)]

My kind-- [In a sudden, horrid instant he finds Xadia recast: It is no more excusable that they should have ground humans underfoot for a dearth of magic, but their fear of being used for fuel... So must the elvhen have felt, were the old tales true, when they found themselves withering and dying from mere contact with the shem'len. No wonder, then, no wonder at war and exile as their response. They had seen more clearly than Arlathan had--or acted faster.

And Viren...

Myr's expression flattens as he struggles with what the dragon--with what his friend--has said, admitted to, shown him in a borrowed first hand. He wants desperately to understand, as bid. He thinks he can understand it, but--it begs more knowledge of the situation.

Of the lengths Viren's pragmatism would take him to.]

Did you hunt them for their magic, then? [From the way he takes two quick, clicking steps toward Viren and tips his head up to study the dragon's somber face.] Xadia's elves--or only make use of the wreckage war left you?

[Is an elf a person to you, yet?

It would not be near so hideous were it the latter; Entropy made a similar use of battlefield corpses, to say nothing of necromancers. The Chant did not condemn it... And even if Myr finds it personally distasteful it's better than the alternative.

Even if it's an alternative he's halfway braced to hear.]

[ viren's posture straightens as myr encroaches, his chin raising as if to instinctively better look down at the other man. he's aware of the fist held at his side curling and curling, his clawtips digging into the toughened skin. ]

Both.

[ he answers, unflinching in that. of course, with distance, the heavily guarded border -- it would always be an easier matter to salvage the parts of those fallen in battle. viren, for a moment, feels like he's dug this proverbial grave deeper than necessary: alas, it's something no longer wants to honey for the sake of myr's listening. ]

[ there are some of his kind—he had said that, to sharply draw attention to it: myrobalan's kind, even if they've both neatly established the differences—that he detests more than others. those are vile, and he would relish their injury. ]

If needed, [ there's a little breath, here, like a sigh, ] I would hate to have those parts go to waste.

Maker's breath, Viren.

[There's something leaden in Myr's tone, in how he drops his gaze and his ears and looks away. It--

hurts, like a mutilation of a part of himself to have his understanding of a friend reconfigured so instantly and brutally. He admired Viren--he admits to himself. That the other once-mage was prickly, was prejudiced, was often difficult to get along with was all true, but he could not be faulted in his determination or devotion to cause. That he had changed, as they'd all changed under Talam's influence, and seemed to be growing in his own way, had been heartening to the Faun. That Everett loved him--

He turns away from Viren, abruptly; his spine is rigid, his tail still as he stalks across the room to the far bookshelves. The temptation is there to turn what he's feeling right now outward, against the world and the man he'd trusted; you lied to me! he'd shout, and I trusted you, I thought you a good man!

Thought being the operative word here, of course, because he had taken what Viren had--carefully? deliberately?--given him and crafted his own noble story of the other man. Who was to blame for Myr's overactive imagination?

He stops before a shelf picked entirely at random, staring at the spines of the books without really seeing them.]

Maker's breath, [he repeats, with more inflection, and scrubs the heel of one hand across his eyes. Both. He cannot get his mind around that both.

Of course, what Viren means by both in a world where elves seemed the dominant and fearsome force, and what Myr heard in both are perhaps discontiguous. Yet it is difficult--impossible--maybe for the elf to shake the lessons of his childhood, to get beyond the idea of elves being hunted for sport because they hadn't any more recourse to defend themselves than rabbits.] I'd thought--

[Myr tips his head back to study the ceiling, shoulders gone suddenly slack. Maker, what do I do?

He does care about Viren. Loves him as a friend. It is not in Myr's nature to cast aside those he loves, though they've blackened themselves time and again with heinous sins. He hadn't thrown L away, had he?

But L had some idea what he'd done was wrong.]

I understand, [he says, at length.] I understand the rules and usages of war. I understand, I think, what it is to hate your enemies that thoroughly. [Some Dalish, it was said, took killing humans to an art form.] And that a soldier cannot regret what he does or it will eat him hollow.

But Maker's blood and living breath, Viren-- [He rounds on the dragon, expression agonized, accusing.] You say your people and it's my People I see, bled out on Tevinter altars for a magister's caprice. You avow you'd hunt them down and I see my father dying in a gutter because a shem accused him of theft. My People have done nothing but live and die at human whims for Ages and that is what I see when you speak of elves, and I think--are you really saying you would do that to us, too, given the chance? That's what I should understand?

[Softer, much softer,] I don't want to believe that of you. I care for you too much.

[ viren feels his face flush hot as myr turns away from him, directly away from him, won't look at him for several oments, and he has to remind himself that he had anticipated this. of course, hoped for something to the contrary (anything to the contrary) but this -- is something he knew would happen. it twists his heart, painfully so, but no amount of artful justifications could bend the fact that he had chosen this reveal. ]

Don't--

[ he edges out, frustration breaching his tone, like he doesn't want to hear how myr's to paint a picture. but he doesn't try to stall it further, waiting until every word's spoken before he speaks again, ]

I said -- that I don't regret its use. Dark magic. [ his teeth grit, all sharp teeth clicking into place, like repeating this should explain everything fully, that dark magic is what he would love most of all here. it's all technicalities that he's twisted themselves up in, but ultimately, it's true: he hadn't been truthful. he still wants to think of himself as the noble man that he had presented. i am doing what's best, he would counter.

he almost wants to whisper an apology for that fact. he doesn't. ] Circumstances, are different here, and I don't want to hurt you.

Please, Myrobalan. [ these are statements accompanied by a vigorous shake of his head, his tone brimming with sincerity. but, what would be more accurate? :"i don't want to have to hurt you?" myr's turned to face him again, and viren uproots himself from where he'd frozen. he advances closer, and palm upward, he extends a hand, ] I care for you, too.

[Myr looks down to the palm extended toward him, then up to Viren's face. The fur about his neck and shoulders still stands on end, his ears are still held low, but there is something softer in his expression. There's something wanting in that look: He is not immune to reasons and explanations that put this awful knowledge in better context.

Viren's precise restatement--helps, in its way; reminds him that circumstances do differ, and Viren had been unsettled--to say the least--by Myr's own accounting of the People's treatment. And yet--]

Oh, dear friend, [he breathes,] don't you see how all the threads tie up in your ends? Even if you don't regret the act itself.

[In the end, he cannot resist the appeal; he takes a halting step closer, and stops again.]

You would have done anything for your king. [It is not, precisely, a non-sequitur.] For your people?

[ virens appears baffled, for approximately a second, before his expression hardens. the second question is much more simple to answer, and one he doesn't need to supplant with any lies.

so his answer is firm, resolute, a sharp contrast to the uncertainty in which he had approached myr with moments before. ]

Of course.

[ he doesn't lower his hand, either, the gesture remaining a visual imploring towards acceptance. ]

I would've done anything for my King, [ he confirms. he almost allows a grimace to slip onto his features. he's reminded that it's such a shame that harrow—his foolish, stubborn, dear friend—had taken that for granted. so it's with renewed conviction that he concludes, ] and I would do anything for my people.

[Unquestionable loyalty, as ever; that remains a grounding truth about Viren. A needed reminder he sought the good for those dear to him--and therefore might be persuaded for their sake.

Myr dips his chin toward his chest, acknowledgement, before crossing the remaining distance to the dragon with a deer's delicate care. He reaches to lay his palm against Viren's: Acceptance, but not without caveat.]

Then I truly do understand, even if I cannot embrace the method and wish you had found another. Wish you would find another, should we succeed in getting you home. For your own sake as much as anything.

[There is something held back in his tone; this is a fragile acceptance, especially for him. It is something that requires more testing and thought, to see where the boundaries of it lie. Dark magic itself and all it means--still distresses him viscerally.

But Viren is his friend, and Viren might yet be saved from the black consequences of his choices.

(If only Myr knew.)

He tips his head back, ears flicking to and fro, to study Viren's face.] Thank you for giving me the truth of the matter.

[It hurts, yet, that he was misdirected. That will require time and too, to consider his own trusting nature.]

[ that's not unfamiliar for viren to hear, in the least -- that others wish for another means for him to achieve his ends. his understanding of it may be shallow (especially, when there is always so much to be gained!), although in myr's case, it's blatant as to his reasoning. there was nothing to be gained. ]

I have tried, and tried again. There is no other way.

[ viren's aware of how that sounds. like he's just not trying hard enough to find some alternate means. he feels defensiveness curdling in the pit of his stomach. there is no other way. ]

[ but myr takes his hand, and he feels some semblance of relief wash over him; the faun certainly could have stormed through the mirror, without another word or look his way, he knows. he had been -- hopeful, even if the odds hadn't seemed in his favor. ]

[ myr is just... that type, he knows. what that sort is, he couldn't quite articulate. empathetic, perhaps gracious in his views of others. he'd wanted this outcome. ]

[ he draws his thumb across myr's knuckles, just once, before letting his hand fall away. ]

I'm appreciative. [ he doesn't echo the regards of thank you here in quite the same way, but the sentiment remains nonetheless. ] Shall we take our leave, then?

[There's a moment, there, when it looks as if Myr would protest that there must be another way--

But he does not know that of a surety. He has not lived Viren's life, has not seen what avenues have closed before the other man, nor how often he's tried, and tried again.

It is not his place to say any of that until he knows better and perhaps, even then, it is not his place to say it. It would not be kind--

His thoughts are derailed from that line by Viren's thumb across the back of his hand; it is gesture he'd not expected, for all it's welcomed, and his ears twitch in surprise. (How much should he have liked that, given the givens? Is what he feels too much?)]

Let's, [he says, after a moment's hitch in his thoughts. Then, lighter:] Though I'd gladly hear more about the library you're keeping here.

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Event Log: April, Dream a Little Dream

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