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[columns][center][item=crusty copper pot][/center][nextcol][color=transparent]..[/color][nextcol][color=#FA912B][font=garamond][size=7][size=4][b]the patient’s pilgrimage[/b][/size][/size][/font][/color]
[size=2]written by [url=http://www1.flightrising.com/forums/art/1707590]Tues[/url]
[color=#9494A9]3,349 words[/color][/size][/columns]
[color=#652127]It was all well and good of Telchor to give Kyuchan an enchanted mirror before his departure, but they only work if the master apothecary actually has his nearby. Judging by how infrequently he's answered Kyuchan's calls at this point, it's safe to assume that he tends to forget it exists. Or that he locks it in a cabinet where it can't be stolen, abraded, melted, or admired, and then promptly forgets about it. Or he's up to his eyeballs in work to do and idle chit-chat makes his blood boil, even with his one and only apprentice.
Really, any of these things are a possibility, or all of them. Telchor's work doesn't allow for a great deal of downtime.
Which means that as ever, paper and quill will have to do.
Of course, it's almost harder to put words on the page. At least under Telchor's stern gaze, Kyuchan knows he'll say what he means and get straight to the point. With a blank spread of parchment, though, there's a thousand directions he could go, and without his master's cool stare to guide him, he doesn't always know where to begin, or where he ought to go. It's not unlike the journey he's on, and not for the first time, Kyuchan wishes Telchor were here to guide him.
(That much, he'll leave out of the letter. His master has been all too clear about where he's placed his confidence, and he doesn't do coddling. Kyuchan can practically hear him now, grumbling about how he knew this was coming, how Kyuchan ought to quit babbling and keep traveling, like he's supposed to be doing. "Griping is for hatchlings and bad customers," says the shade of Telchor in the back of Kyuchan's mind.)
Which still leaves Kyuchan on a ship in the middle of the Sea of a Thousand Currents, a feather quill tapping against his snout and the salty sea breeze drying out his skin. The itch is particularly fierce along his forearms, where the pale patches of feathers are particularly sensitive. Two weeks abroad, and so far, Kyuchan has discovered no relief beyond hiding below-decks, which does him no good in his masters' studies.
The journal that exists in lieu of a formal exam is more fruitful than letters to Telchor, at least. As ordered, Kyuchan has filled a new page every day, detailing different marine species his couriers have hauled from the deep. Most of them make phenomenal snacks rather than potent ingredients, and the recipes he's drafted so far lean more towards dinner than dilutions, but it still counts. Half the battle of being an apothecary is knowing what ingredients can be used in which contexts, and staying well nourished allows Kyuchan to tend to patients and customers more effectively. No one thinks straight when they're hungry, not even Telchor.
Kyuchan sighs and tucks his writing utensils away. With the sun beating down and the salt-touched air whistling through his feathers, not to mention the endless stretch of blue in every direction, he can hardly think. Better, then, to simply do.
He'd roll up his sleeves if he were a different Coatl, a healthy one. But he keeps his jacket on, one claw scratching idly under the collar, and waves to the dragon perched up in the crow's nest. "How's the shoulder?" Kyuchan calls. He lifts a paw to shield his eyes from the sun, squints at the figure that leans over the railing in silhouette.
"Creakin' like a dinghy in a downpour!" comes the answer. "You got anything useful in that little knapsack, or just parlor tricks?"
Kyuchan sighs. In close quarters like this, he's beginning to understand why Telchor keeps client interaction to a minimum.[/color]
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[color=#652127]He arrives safe and sound on the shores of Churnscar Wharf.
This is not his destination.
"Look, [i]Master [/i]Apothecary," the captain sneers, his lanky Spiral coils blocking the way back up the gangplank. He emphasizes the title Kyuchan never once gave him with a particularly cruel twist of the tongue. "The Lightweaver's got all her little pearlies in a twist, and they're not lettin' anyone dock along their shores. Whatever your problem is, whatever you gotta find, you gotta find it another way. Ain't worth tangling with a blockade for a stranger."
"Name a price," Kyuchan counters, sweat beading up in his feathers. He can feel a cool line of it racing down his neck, scrambling to dive below the collar of his jacket before the sun scorches it away. "I'm not traveling for pleasure."
"Not my problem you're lookin' for pain, then. Save your coin and your breath, lad. You're gonna need 'em both goin' the long way round. Y'hear me?"
Kyuchan does.
It doesn't make it any less bitter to watch his home of the last two weeks bob off into the sunset without him, though.[/color]
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[color=#652127]He didn't really make friends while sailing the sea. Churnscar Wharf, though, is another story.
An elder of the wharf takes pity on him, invites him into her home for the first night and pushes a bowl of clam chowder into his claws. She's a tiny little Fae, barely bigger than Kyuchan's head, but she's more compassionate than dragons a hundred times her size. Kyuchan only stops thanking her for her hospitality when she reminds him his food is getting cold.
Her name is Whaleheart, on account of her good nature, and she does everything in her power to prepare him for a life on the seaside. To her, there's no grander thing than waking up with the smell of breeze and brine in the air, and a dragon hasn't lived, not really, until they've seen a proper summer sunset off the western edge of the settlement.
"Used to be even prettier before this place got turned topsy-turvy, but hey, we're still makin' do," she says with a shrug as she and Kyuchan wander the shoreline, plucking shells from the foamy sand. Most things she says are like that, like she has her head and heart still somewhere in the past, even though she's breathing and thriving in the here and now. It would be easier to leave if Kyuchan didn't like it so much, if that nostalgia didn't resonate with him.
Where Whaleheart sees long-gone sunsets, he sees late nights beside cauldrons, and early mornings milking scorpions, among a thousand other things. He sees Telchor, always scowling, but sometimes with approval.
He sees rich blue feathers, like an unclouded sky.
Whaleheart natters on, and Kyuchan makes no move to interrupt. It's nice to reminisce, and it's nice to have company while he searches for specimens worthy of his master log. It's nice not to worry about the future.[/color]
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[color=#652127]Kyuchan still worries. It's in his nature to do so, especially since the first white flecks started racing up his arms. Hard to call it paranoia when there's actually a problem at hand, he reasons, and after a few days of ignoring the mirror in his pack and the half-drafted letter to his master, he fishes them both out and makes himself comfortable on Whaleheart's fishnet hammock.
As expected, Telchor doesn't answer the mirror's summons, and he still hasn't set up his mirror to allow recordings (or hasn't figured it out, likely as not). There's nothing left but a letter to draft, and Kyuchan finally takes the plunge.
[i]Dear Master Telchor,[/i] he begins. [i]By the time this letter reaches you, I hope to be in the Sunbeam Ruins. Of course, if I continue to experience delays, that may not be the case.[/i]
He spares his master the fine details of his uneventful, unsuccessful voyage across the sea, focusing by and large on the route and the discoveries he has made. And because he knows Telchor cares, even if his master finds it hard to admit such a thing aloud, he spends a brief paragraph reassuring the old Guardian that yes, his condition is under control even if it is not yet improving.
Lying to Telchor puts an unpleasant twist in his gut, but it's easier to do through the written word than under his fierce stare.
In truth, the pale splotches along Kyuchan's arms have almost reached his shoulders, and patches of his underbelly have flecked white. He suspects the sea air as the culprit, but surrounded by it all the time, he hardly has the control environment for a proper experiment, for proof of contrast. It's all speculation. Early data gathering, if he wants to be scientific about it.
[i]Farther down the line, I wish to compare environmental factors and see if there is any difference in how this condition reacts.[/i]
And because Telchor will chide him if he does not mention it, Kyuchan promises his master journal is going well. He provides a tally of new species that in fact surpasses the number of days since his departure, a testament to his dedication, and copies his sketches of three new mollusks he has so far encountered, ones he suspects Telchor has not encountered any time recently in the Plaguebringer's inhospitable lands.
In the end, closing the letter proves difficult, and sealing it with postage even more so. There are so many things Kyuchan could add, but equally as many things that Telchor would brush aside in favor of pertinent information. Even as he drops the letter off with Churnscar Wharf's courier service, he continues to wonder if he has been direct enough, thorough enough for his master's standards.
He realizes three days after sending the letter that he forgot to remind Telchor about the mirrors.[/color]
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[color=#652127]Whaleheart sends Kyuchan on his way with a wanderer's blessing, something she claims to have picked up in her sailing days. "It might not do you much good on land, sonny, but what's the harm?" She flutters up and drapes a thin, braided loop of rope round his neck, adjusting it so that a tiny conch shell dangles from the front. Despite the fragile nature of the shell, Whaleheart has somehow pierced it and strung it along, made it into a precious ornament.
Kyuchan could hug her so hard he might break her. Instead, he dabs at the corners of his eyes and swears to write.
But Whaleheart can't read. She sends him on his way with a promise instead to visit instead, hopefully in the summer. She'd like to share a proper sunset with him, if he ain't too busy bein' a smartypants over in Light.[/color]
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[color=#652127]Light's territory does not lie especially close to Churnscar Wharf, and Kyuchan can't say he has the stomach to sail again. Instead, he barters for passage with another caravan, this one set to loop through the Ashfall Waste and then north into the Shifting Expanse. Their final destination should put him within a few days' travel of Light's borders, so long as he finds a reliable guide through the final stretch of desert.
He accepts, because that covers part of his journey, a significantly better amount than none of the journey at all. It takes only a couple days perched atop a rollicking wagon, though, for Kyuchan to realize this is not the kind of caravan he is used to.
Fellmoon's caravan was prestigious and well funded, capable of comforts beyond the reach of the average vendor. This caravan, however, is average at best, and somewhat down on their luck to be honest. They rumble along for long hours, and their cook (who doubles as their accountant) makes do with whatever ingredients are best suited to survive a scorching trip through the Flamecaller's lands.
Yet for all the inconvenience, Kyuchan is more comfortable than ever. He forages alongside the caravan, basking in the radiant warmth from nearby lava flows, and slowly but surely, he starts to pepper local wildlife into the caravan's diet. A dried flower here for spice, a lively little mammal there for protein, and so on. No one gets sick, the cook tosses out a couple gruff words of praise, and the pages of Kyuchan's journal fill up a little further.
Most encouraging, though, is the way the itch in his feathers eases. The paleness is still present, but as the caravan winds along the banks of lava rivers, he feels less itchy and more like himself than he has since before the Nosos virus made itself known in his body. The heat is a balm, soft and cozy against his prickly skin, and if it wouldn't set him aflame, both from the shame of his pale feathers and in a literal sense, he'd consider joining the caravan's Fire dragons for a dip in the magma baths they sometimes find.
Burnt feathers smell terrible, though. He settles for stirring the pot of soup beside the fire while the others enjoy a good scorching. It feels like peace. He's missed that.[/color]
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[color=#652127]The Shifting Expanse, while still hot, is not nearly as pleasant as the Ashfall Waste. Kyuchan's dry skin becomes still drier in the desert air, and when water must be rationed for a successful journey between outposts, he feels even worse. The cook takes pity on him and puts him to work chopping vegetables and steaming meats, and beside the caravan's cauldron, Kyuchan carves out a sliver of respite.
(The cook rarely intervenes at this point. In part because Kyuchan has proven himself a reliable chef with a nose for tasty additions, but maybe also in part because the cook is from the Southern Icefields, and has no desire to continue sitting beside an open flame. To each their own, Kyuchan decides, even though it forces him to allocate time away from his studies and towards keeping the caravan well fed.)
But it's not enough, especially because the virus is spreading again. There's no obvious trigger, but Kyuchan's legs have begun to bleach, as has the base of his tail. There's no way around the strange looks he gets from the caravan as his shorts turn to trousers despite the dry heat, and he doesn't doubt that there are whispers circulating behind his back. He's made friends, sure, but not family. At the end of the day, he is an outsider and a guest, and fair game for speculation as such. He'd rather endure whispers behind his back, though, than judgment and condemnation, accusations of bad luck and foul fortune. The thought of his illness exposed makes his skin crawl just as much as the blistering sun.
It's not the cook, though, who finally guesses his secret. It's the carpenter, the scrawny little Tundra who minds his own business until a wheel breaks or a wagon falters. After weeks on the road, he still hasn't given his name, and it's entirely a possibility that he's forgotten it, given the frailty of Tundra memory. He does, though, have a keen nose, and one night, he looks at Kyuchan over a lizard-based stew and says, "You smell sick."
No judgment. No malice. But it steals Kyuchan's breath away, and he drops his ladle into the pot.
Fish it out? With his feathers all white? Leave it there to grow scalding and add a metallic tang to dinner? He sits paralyzed by indecision, at least until the Tundra reaches in with a pair of tongs and fishes the ladle out, placing it on a nearby plate.
"Please get well," says the carpenter. He takes over serving dinner for the night without complaint.
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[color=#652127][i]Dear Master Telchor,
I'm afraid I have yet to reach the Sunbeam Ruins. Two days from now, I expect to depart from a trader's outpost in the Shifting Expanse, and I hope it will be the last leg of my journey. We are waiting for more supplies to arrive, a few more trades to be made. It is unwise to cross the desert under or oversupplied.
When I arrive, I hope to find scholars who have roots in the Ashfall Waste. My time there was remarkably pleasant because of the heat, not in spite of it, and it has occurred to me that some infections are bested by flame, or at least by heat. Is that not the basic concept behind fever? Perhaps this will aid me in treating my affliction. Or at least stabilizing it, if nothing else.
By the time you read this, I will have finished my master's journal as well. At least, what you provided. I will rebind it once I acquire the right tools, and I will add extra pages for specimens from Light. My hope is for you to examine these pages most closely, since you will be familiar with their contents, and able to judge the quality of my work all the better.
Stay well, and please consider adding an alarm to your mirror. Time permitting, I would enjoy a conversation with you some time soon.
Your faithful apprentice,
Kyuchan[/color]
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[color=#652127][i]Kyuchan,
Quit faffing around and send the book. I know you're ready.
Ask for Lady Terpsichore if you go to the Mirrorlight Promenade. She looks like she's all glitter, but she actually uses her head more than you think. Good place to start for Fire magic.
My mirror works just fine. Quit calling when I'm busy.
Telchor[/i][/color]
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[color=#652127]On the border of Light and Lightning, Kyuchan at last makes contact with his master. "I'm nearly there!" he announces, lifting the mirror to show Telchor hints of the Sunbeam Ruins on the horizon.
Telchor has little interest in the view. "You look like you've been dragged through a cactus patch, lad." It's hard to say whether the gruff edge to his voice is admonishment or affection. "Took you for a tidy fellow. You haven't let yourself go, have you?"
Back and forth, they chatter, Telchor's critiques a ready disguise for his concerns. Kyuchan humors him, patiently explains his escapades without diving too deep into the details. His master prefers the big picture, the ultimate goal. And right now, that goal is to enter the Sunbeam Ruins at last, to find a cure for the virus that courses through Kyuchan's veins.
"My escort has heard of Lady Terpsichore," Kyuchan says at last. "They say she works in glamours. Illusions. She's not an apothecary."
Telchor sniffs. "She's hardly my taste," he answers, "but it might do you good. Gets warm over there, and you know a proper shop's no better. You can sweat your feathers off forever, or you can see what she comes up with. Get that jacket patched up first, though. She can't save you from looking scruffy like that."
Kyuchan flattens his feathers against his neck. "I've been traveling. I'll clean up before visiting her."
"You'd best. I don't mind what anyone thinks of me, but you do. Don't give those stuck-up librarians anything but your smarts, you hear me?"
"Yes, Master."
"And if they offer you a research position, read all the fine print."
"Yes, Master."
"And if you don't send me that journal first courier you find, I'll climb through this mirror myself for it."
"Yes, Master!"
They don't talk long after that. Telchor has a brew ready to boil, and Kyuchan has a long walk still to finish. Neither one of them can afford to be caught in conversation until the sun goes down. But Kyuchan can ponder and plod along in the same breath, and ponder he does, wondering if he will find relief, or even a cure, to his illness. If Lady Terpsichore can teach him how to hide his greatest shame.
If there will be ready access to something other than fish that taste like they've been battered in sand.
"How much farther?" he asks his guide, a broad-backed Snapper.
"Couple days!" comes the cheery reply from up ahead.
Plenty of time to ponder indeed. But good ideas need time to brew, do they not? Kyuchan is content, then, to let his worries percolate. By the time he reaches his destination, it is entirely possible they will have cooked up a solution, or at least a direction.
The thought makes his stomach rumble. He sighs, and resigns himself to another strip of dried corycat. There's some other cooking he'd like to do soon too.[/color]
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the patient’s pilgrimage
written by Tues
3,349 words
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It was all well and good of Telchor to give Kyuchan an enchanted mirror before his departure, but they only work if the master apothecary actually has his nearby. Judging by how infrequently he's answered Kyuchan's calls at this point, it's safe to assume that he tends to forget it exists. Or that he locks it in a cabinet where it can't be stolen, abraded, melted, or admired, and then promptly forgets about it. Or he's up to his eyeballs in work to do and idle chit-chat makes his blood boil, even with his one and only apprentice.
Really, any of these things are a possibility, or all of them. Telchor's work doesn't allow for a great deal of downtime.
Which means that as ever, paper and quill will have to do.
Of course, it's almost harder to put words on the page. At least under Telchor's stern gaze, Kyuchan knows he'll say what he means and get straight to the point. With a blank spread of parchment, though, there's a thousand directions he could go, and without his master's cool stare to guide him, he doesn't always know where to begin, or where he ought to go. It's not unlike the journey he's on, and not for the first time, Kyuchan wishes Telchor were here to guide him.
(That much, he'll leave out of the letter. His master has been all too clear about where he's placed his confidence, and he doesn't do coddling. Kyuchan can practically hear him now, grumbling about how he knew this was coming, how Kyuchan ought to quit babbling and keep traveling, like he's supposed to be doing. "Griping is for hatchlings and bad customers," says the shade of Telchor in the back of Kyuchan's mind.)
Which still leaves Kyuchan on a ship in the middle of the Sea of a Thousand Currents, a feather quill tapping against his snout and the salty sea breeze drying out his skin. The itch is particularly fierce along his forearms, where the pale patches of feathers are particularly sensitive. Two weeks abroad, and so far, Kyuchan has discovered no relief beyond hiding below-decks, which does him no good in his masters' studies.
The journal that exists in lieu of a formal exam is more fruitful than letters to Telchor, at least. As ordered, Kyuchan has filled a new page every day, detailing different marine species his couriers have hauled from the deep. Most of them make phenomenal snacks rather than potent ingredients, and the recipes he's drafted so far lean more towards dinner than dilutions, but it still counts. Half the battle of being an apothecary is knowing what ingredients can be used in which contexts, and staying well nourished allows Kyuchan to tend to patients and customers more effectively. No one thinks straight when they're hungry, not even Telchor.
Kyuchan sighs and tucks his writing utensils away. With the sun beating down and the salt-touched air whistling through his feathers, not to mention the endless stretch of blue in every direction, he can hardly think. Better, then, to simply do.
He'd roll up his sleeves if he were a different Coatl, a healthy one. But he keeps his jacket on, one claw scratching idly under the collar, and waves to the dragon perched up in the crow's nest. "How's the shoulder?" Kyuchan calls. He lifts a paw to shield his eyes from the sun, squints at the figure that leans over the railing in silhouette.
"Creakin' like a dinghy in a downpour!" comes the answer. "You got anything useful in that little knapsack, or just parlor tricks?"
Kyuchan sighs. In close quarters like this, he's beginning to understand why Telchor keeps client interaction to a minimum.
He arrives safe and sound on the shores of Churnscar Wharf.
This is not his destination.
"Look, Master Apothecary," the captain sneers, his lanky Spiral coils blocking the way back up the gangplank. He emphasizes the title Kyuchan never once gave him with a particularly cruel twist of the tongue. "The Lightweaver's got all her little pearlies in a twist, and they're not lettin' anyone dock along their shores. Whatever your problem is, whatever you gotta find, you gotta find it another way. Ain't worth tangling with a blockade for a stranger."
"Name a price," Kyuchan counters, sweat beading up in his feathers. He can feel a cool line of it racing down his neck, scrambling to dive below the collar of his jacket before the sun scorches it away. "I'm not traveling for pleasure."
"Not my problem you're lookin' for pain, then. Save your coin and your breath, lad. You're gonna need 'em both goin' the long way round. Y'hear me?"
Kyuchan does.
It doesn't make it any less bitter to watch his home of the last two weeks bob off into the sunset without him, though.
He didn't really make friends while sailing the sea. Churnscar Wharf, though, is another story.
An elder of the wharf takes pity on him, invites him into her home for the first night and pushes a bowl of clam chowder into his claws. She's a tiny little Fae, barely bigger than Kyuchan's head, but she's more compassionate than dragons a hundred times her size. Kyuchan only stops thanking her for her hospitality when she reminds him his food is getting cold.
Her name is Whaleheart, on account of her good nature, and she does everything in her power to prepare him for a life on the seaside. To her, there's no grander thing than waking up with the smell of breeze and brine in the air, and a dragon hasn't lived, not really, until they've seen a proper summer sunset off the western edge of the settlement.
"Used to be even prettier before this place got turned topsy-turvy, but hey, we're still makin' do," she says with a shrug as she and Kyuchan wander the shoreline, plucking shells from the foamy sand. Most things she says are like that, like she has her head and heart still somewhere in the past, even though she's breathing and thriving in the here and now. It would be easier to leave if Kyuchan didn't like it so much, if that nostalgia didn't resonate with him.
Where Whaleheart sees long-gone sunsets, he sees late nights beside cauldrons, and early mornings milking scorpions, among a thousand other things. He sees Telchor, always scowling, but sometimes with approval.
He sees rich blue feathers, like an unclouded sky.
Whaleheart natters on, and Kyuchan makes no move to interrupt. It's nice to reminisce, and it's nice to have company while he searches for specimens worthy of his master log. It's nice not to worry about the future.
Kyuchan still worries. It's in his nature to do so, especially since the first white flecks started racing up his arms. Hard to call it paranoia when there's actually a problem at hand, he reasons, and after a few days of ignoring the mirror in his pack and the half-drafted letter to his master, he fishes them both out and makes himself comfortable on Whaleheart's fishnet hammock.
As expected, Telchor doesn't answer the mirror's summons, and he still hasn't set up his mirror to allow recordings (or hasn't figured it out, likely as not). There's nothing left but a letter to draft, and Kyuchan finally takes the plunge.
Dear Master Telchor, he begins. By the time this letter reaches you, I hope to be in the Sunbeam Ruins. Of course, if I continue to experience delays, that may not be the case.
He spares his master the fine details of his uneventful, unsuccessful voyage across the sea, focusing by and large on the route and the discoveries he has made. And because he knows Telchor cares, even if his master finds it hard to admit such a thing aloud, he spends a brief paragraph reassuring the old Guardian that yes, his condition is under control even if it is not yet improving.
Lying to Telchor puts an unpleasant twist in his gut, but it's easier to do through the written word than under his fierce stare.
In truth, the pale splotches along Kyuchan's arms have almost reached his shoulders, and patches of his underbelly have flecked white. He suspects the sea air as the culprit, but surrounded by it all the time, he hardly has the control environment for a proper experiment, for proof of contrast. It's all speculation. Early data gathering, if he wants to be scientific about it.
Farther down the line, I wish to compare environmental factors and see if there is any difference in how this condition reacts.
And because Telchor will chide him if he does not mention it, Kyuchan promises his master journal is going well. He provides a tally of new species that in fact surpasses the number of days since his departure, a testament to his dedication, and copies his sketches of three new mollusks he has so far encountered, ones he suspects Telchor has not encountered any time recently in the Plaguebringer's inhospitable lands.
In the end, closing the letter proves difficult, and sealing it with postage even more so. There are so many things Kyuchan could add, but equally as many things that Telchor would brush aside in favor of pertinent information. Even as he drops the letter off with Churnscar Wharf's courier service, he continues to wonder if he has been direct enough, thorough enough for his master's standards.
He realizes three days after sending the letter that he forgot to remind Telchor about the mirrors.
Whaleheart sends Kyuchan on his way with a wanderer's blessing, something she claims to have picked up in her sailing days. "It might not do you much good on land, sonny, but what's the harm?" She flutters up and drapes a thin, braided loop of rope round his neck, adjusting it so that a tiny conch shell dangles from the front. Despite the fragile nature of the shell, Whaleheart has somehow pierced it and strung it along, made it into a precious ornament.
Kyuchan could hug her so hard he might break her. Instead, he dabs at the corners of his eyes and swears to write.
But Whaleheart can't read. She sends him on his way with a promise instead to visit instead, hopefully in the summer. She'd like to share a proper sunset with him, if he ain't too busy bein' a smartypants over in Light.
Light's territory does not lie especially close to Churnscar Wharf, and Kyuchan can't say he has the stomach to sail again. Instead, he barters for passage with another caravan, this one set to loop through the Ashfall Waste and then north into the Shifting Expanse. Their final destination should put him within a few days' travel of Light's borders, so long as he finds a reliable guide through the final stretch of desert.
He accepts, because that covers part of his journey, a significantly better amount than none of the journey at all. It takes only a couple days perched atop a rollicking wagon, though, for Kyuchan to realize this is not the kind of caravan he is used to.
Fellmoon's caravan was prestigious and well funded, capable of comforts beyond the reach of the average vendor. This caravan, however, is average at best, and somewhat down on their luck to be honest. They rumble along for long hours, and their cook (who doubles as their accountant) makes do with whatever ingredients are best suited to survive a scorching trip through the Flamecaller's lands.
Yet for all the inconvenience, Kyuchan is more comfortable than ever. He forages alongside the caravan, basking in the radiant warmth from nearby lava flows, and slowly but surely, he starts to pepper local wildlife into the caravan's diet. A dried flower here for spice, a lively little mammal there for protein, and so on. No one gets sick, the cook tosses out a couple gruff words of praise, and the pages of Kyuchan's journal fill up a little further.
Most encouraging, though, is the way the itch in his feathers eases. The paleness is still present, but as the caravan winds along the banks of lava rivers, he feels less itchy and more like himself than he has since before the Nosos virus made itself known in his body. The heat is a balm, soft and cozy against his prickly skin, and if it wouldn't set him aflame, both from the shame of his pale feathers and in a literal sense, he'd consider joining the caravan's Fire dragons for a dip in the magma baths they sometimes find.
Burnt feathers smell terrible, though. He settles for stirring the pot of soup beside the fire while the others enjoy a good scorching. It feels like peace. He's missed that.
The Shifting Expanse, while still hot, is not nearly as pleasant as the Ashfall Waste. Kyuchan's dry skin becomes still drier in the desert air, and when water must be rationed for a successful journey between outposts, he feels even worse. The cook takes pity on him and puts him to work chopping vegetables and steaming meats, and beside the caravan's cauldron, Kyuchan carves out a sliver of respite.
(The cook rarely intervenes at this point. In part because Kyuchan has proven himself a reliable chef with a nose for tasty additions, but maybe also in part because the cook is from the Southern Icefields, and has no desire to continue sitting beside an open flame. To each their own, Kyuchan decides, even though it forces him to allocate time away from his studies and towards keeping the caravan well fed.)
But it's not enough, especially because the virus is spreading again. There's no obvious trigger, but Kyuchan's legs have begun to bleach, as has the base of his tail. There's no way around the strange looks he gets from the caravan as his shorts turn to trousers despite the dry heat, and he doesn't doubt that there are whispers circulating behind his back. He's made friends, sure, but not family. At the end of the day, he is an outsider and a guest, and fair game for speculation as such. He'd rather endure whispers behind his back, though, than judgment and condemnation, accusations of bad luck and foul fortune. The thought of his illness exposed makes his skin crawl just as much as the blistering sun.
It's not the cook, though, who finally guesses his secret. It's the carpenter, the scrawny little Tundra who minds his own business until a wheel breaks or a wagon falters. After weeks on the road, he still hasn't given his name, and it's entirely a possibility that he's forgotten it, given the frailty of Tundra memory. He does, though, have a keen nose, and one night, he looks at Kyuchan over a lizard-based stew and says, "You smell sick."
No judgment. No malice. But it steals Kyuchan's breath away, and he drops his ladle into the pot.
Fish it out? With his feathers all white? Leave it there to grow scalding and add a metallic tang to dinner? He sits paralyzed by indecision, at least until the Tundra reaches in with a pair of tongs and fishes the ladle out, placing it on a nearby plate.
"Please get well," says the carpenter. He takes over serving dinner for the night without complaint.
Dear Master Telchor,
I'm afraid I have yet to reach the Sunbeam Ruins. Two days from now, I expect to depart from a trader's outpost in the Shifting Expanse, and I hope it will be the last leg of my journey. We are waiting for more supplies to arrive, a few more trades to be made. It is unwise to cross the desert under or oversupplied.
When I arrive, I hope to find scholars who have roots in the Ashfall Waste. My time there was remarkably pleasant because of the heat, not in spite of it, and it has occurred to me that some infections are bested by flame, or at least by heat. Is that not the basic concept behind fever? Perhaps this will aid me in treating my affliction. Or at least stabilizing it, if nothing else.
By the time you read this, I will have finished my master's journal as well. At least, what you provided. I will rebind it once I acquire the right tools, and I will add extra pages for specimens from Light. My hope is for you to examine these pages most closely, since you will be familiar with their contents, and able to judge the quality of my work all the better.
Stay well, and please consider adding an alarm to your mirror. Time permitting, I would enjoy a conversation with you some time soon.
Your faithful apprentice,
Kyuchan
Kyuchan,
Quit faffing around and send the book. I know you're ready.
Ask for Lady Terpsichore if you go to the Mirrorlight Promenade. She looks like she's all glitter, but she actually uses her head more than you think. Good place to start for Fire magic.
My mirror works just fine. Quit calling when I'm busy.
Telchor
On the border of Light and Lightning, Kyuchan at last makes contact with his master. "I'm nearly there!" he announces, lifting the mirror to show Telchor hints of the Sunbeam Ruins on the horizon.
Telchor has little interest in the view. "You look like you've been dragged through a cactus patch, lad." It's hard to say whether the gruff edge to his voice is admonishment or affection. "Took you for a tidy fellow. You haven't let yourself go, have you?"
Back and forth, they chatter, Telchor's critiques a ready disguise for his concerns. Kyuchan humors him, patiently explains his escapades without diving too deep into the details. His master prefers the big picture, the ultimate goal. And right now, that goal is to enter the Sunbeam Ruins at last, to find a cure for the virus that courses through Kyuchan's veins.
"My escort has heard of Lady Terpsichore," Kyuchan says at last. "They say she works in glamours. Illusions. She's not an apothecary."
Telchor sniffs. "She's hardly my taste," he answers, "but it might do you good. Gets warm over there, and you know a proper shop's no better. You can sweat your feathers off forever, or you can see what she comes up with. Get that jacket patched up first, though. She can't save you from looking scruffy like that."
Kyuchan flattens his feathers against his neck. "I've been traveling. I'll clean up before visiting her."
"You'd best. I don't mind what anyone thinks of me, but you do. Don't give those stuck-up librarians anything but your smarts, you hear me?"
"Yes, Master."
"And if they offer you a research position, read all the fine print."
"Yes, Master."
"And if you don't send me that journal first courier you find, I'll climb through this mirror myself for it."
"Yes, Master!"
They don't talk long after that. Telchor has a brew ready to boil, and Kyuchan has a long walk still to finish. Neither one of them can afford to be caught in conversation until the sun goes down. But Kyuchan can ponder and plod along in the same breath, and ponder he does, wondering if he will find relief, or even a cure, to his illness. If Lady Terpsichore can teach him how to hide his greatest shame.
If there will be ready access to something other than fish that taste like they've been battered in sand.
"How much farther?" he asks his guide, a broad-backed Snapper.
"Couple days!" comes the cheery reply from up ahead.
Plenty of time to ponder indeed. But good ideas need time to brew, do they not? Kyuchan is content, then, to let his worries percolate. By the time he reaches his destination, it is entirely possible they will have cooked up a solution, or at least a direction.
The thought makes his stomach rumble. He sighs, and resigns himself to another strip of dried corycat. There's some other cooking he'd like to do soon too.
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[columns][center][item=cerdae sparkle][/center][nextcol][color=transparent]..[/color][nextcol][color=#FA912B][font=garamond][size=7][size=4][b]a trick of the light[/b][/size][/size][/font][/color]
[size=2]written by [url=http://www1.flightrising.com/forums/art/1707590]Tues[/url]
[color=#9494A9]3,833 words[/color][/size][/columns]
[color=#652127]It takes Kyuchan three weeks to gain an audience with Lady Terpsichore. The first week, she is out on business, as her shop door declares in swirling script. Kyuchan could do without the glitter effects; it starts to strain his eyes, deciphering each line while it shimmers.
The second week is much the same. While the notice about Lady Terpsichore’s absence is gone, a splendid closed sign hangs in the window instead, promising a return of the shop’s mistress quite soon. Deterred again, Kyuchan spends the rest of the week preparing himself to meet the fabled enchantress, tidying up all the loose ends he can find.
But that tidying takes him another week, as suddenly his jacket doesn’t quite cover his white patches and his tail has begun another molt, leaving snowy feathers strewn across the hotel room floor. He teeters on the brink of forcing himself out the door, and settles instead for a string of room service orders that will surely bankrupt him if he cannot steel his spine. Paella after filet after fried delicacy, he turns over his options just as much as he turns over and over in his sleep.
Go, and face the world with the truth of his disease written all over his bleached scales? Or keep to himself, surrender to the inevitable cruelty of the virus?
He misses a mirror summons from Telchor while he broods, and somehow, that alone is more frightening than anything else Kyuchan could face. What is he supposed to say after coming so far, only for his courage to leave him high and dry?
The following morning, he sets out for Lady Terpsichore’s shop once again, more afraid to return to his mentor empty-handed than hopeful that a solution is at hand.[/color]
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[color=#652127]As it happens, the shop is a rather tight squeeze. Bits and baubles line the shelves, and their thousand facets glimmer in the alchemical lights strung from the ceiling. Kyuchan squints against the glare as he steps over the threshold, lifting an arm to shield his eyes only to lower it as he feels his shirt and jacket hike up at the hip, exposing a flaking patch of scales.
“Kindly watch your step,” says a prim voice somewhere below. Then, a puff of smoke obscures the shop, fading as quickly as it came to reveal a Skydancer draped in what strikes Kyuchan as a truly hazardous amount of silks. She steps out of his path, antennae aglow, and swirls a claw in the air.
Two chairs leap to the gesture, one sliding demurely to her side, and the other scooting up behind Kyuchan with just enough force to seat him with an oomph. Its velvet cushion is welcoming, despite the force of its arrival, as is the cup of tea that leaps to his claws, waiting ever so patiently for him to take its handle.
“You want a glamor,” says the Skydancer as she commands the chairs back to their place at a low tea table. Kindly enough, she refrains from commenting on the way Kyuchan’s tail nearly topples a display of jewelry as he is whisked to the table, though she does summon a handkerchief for the tea that sloshes over his front with the motion.
Kyuchan mumbles his thanks, blots at the stain on his nice jacket with a wince, and then summons all his courage. Telchor’s brusque nature he can navigate without pause, but the world of tailored manners and coy negotiation is altogether foreign to him, and he hopes his teacup doesn’t shake as he declares, “I don’t want a glamor. I want to learn Fire magic from Lady Terpsichore.”
The Skydancer hums. It’s only a short note, neither assent nor dismissal, and she takes a dainty sip of her tea. “You’re molting,” she points out. Heat surges to Kyuchan’s face. “Your jacket is patched. You have white scales on your wrists.
“And,” she finishes, producing a folded piece of parchment from nowhere, twirling it between her claws, “Telchor already wrote to me. Don’t look so surprised, Kyuchan. We’re going to have you looking like a new dragon when we’re done.”[/color]
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[color=#652127]Lady Terpsichore invites protest. Revels in it, apparently, because no matter what Kyuchan tells her his objectives are, she insists with starting on glamors. Light magic. Completely unrelated to the matter at hand, and maybe it’s the strain of being polite, and maybe it’s his illness growing worse, but Kyuchan finds himself on the verge of a full-blown molt before their first meeting is over.
He sees why Telchor knows about her. She’s brilliant at her craft, weaving light into form with almost careless gestures. There’s a natural ease to her magic that suggests born talent, but probably comes from intense study, something Kyuchan’s master offers great respect.
But Kyuchan also sees why Telchor doesn’t associate closely with her. She plays by her own rules, tugging at strings only she can see, and explanations are few and far between, replaced instead of anecdotes of great length. Some of them even feature Telchor, and from the clues Kyuchan teases out, the two were once academic peers.
“Rivals, even,” Lady Terpsichore says while she peers through a crystal at Kyuchan’s palms. She glances up at him and a wry grin flashes on her face. “Lovers, for a time, though I like him better from a distance now.”
(Kyuchan chooses to forget that fact, which means it remains lodged firmly in his head. Telchor and Terpsichore seem diametrically opposed in every way. Surely the enchantress is lying? Twisting tales to her own benefit?
But why else would Telchor write ahead, give her the courtesy of explaining the travel-worn Coatl on her doorstep?
[i]Don’t think about it, [/i]Kyuchan keeps telling himself.)
Somewhere in between Lady Terpsichore’s unfathomable inspections and casual revelations, Kyuchan occasionally puts up a fight. A little color doesn’t change the fact that his scales are flaking, and a little glow doesn’t make him look healthier. It just highlights the circles under his eyes and the missing feathers along his crest.
To which, of course, Lady Terpsichore waves him off and teaches him the first steps of Light magic.
“You put scorpion venom in some of your serums, do you not?” she asks. Without waiting for a reply, she adjusts the way Kyuchan’s claws cradle a small, glowing haze, and the fog’s edges start to sharpen. “Better, concentrate on the center now. This is just like all the poison you turn into potions. It doesn’t look like the final product, but without it, you won’t heal anyone.”
“It’s one ingredient,” Kyuchan replies through gritted teeth. In his foggy conjuration, a solid shape begins to form, its edges creeping into focus. For a moment, it could really be his master journal, soft leather cover and uneven pages almost as familiar as his own claws.
He loses the image, though, when Lady Terpsichore takes her hands away. “You need focus,” she declares, “and these.”
Three thick tomes drop into Kyuchan’s upturned palms, appearing from the ether as things are apparently wont to do in this shop. One covers the basics of Light magic, another the basics of Shadow, and the third is a primer on Fire magic for hatchlings, its thickness owing to the board-book style of its pages, and the pop-out paper inclusions inside.
Studying from a hatchlings’ book leaves a bitter taste in Kyuchan’s mouth, but no more bitter than trying to puzzle out meaning from the layers of Lady Terpsichore’s chatter. He takes the books with what little strained gratitude he can muster, and returns to his lodgings with a promise to return once he finishes his reading.
He also orders the shrimp scampi again, because it settles his anxious stomach, and it is utensil food. Better for not staining the pages of borrowed books.[/color]
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[color=#652127]The shop is a different world entirely when Kyuchan returns three days later, books tucked under his arm (board-book closest to his body, where no one can judge his apparent literary taste). Where it was wall-to-wall trinkets, everything glittering with the faintest ray of sun, it now luxuriates in a warm haze, more like a lounge than any store. Everything is muted and velvet, softened and dim, and Kyuchan almost steps back over the threshold to be certain he hasn’t made a wrong turn.
The chair from before scoops him up just the same, though, proving him to be in the right place. It scoots over to the same spot it first deposited him, at the same table with the same tea set. Anchors in a wildly changed space.
And yet there is no sign of Lady Terpsichore. Her own seat is empty, and the tea has yet to be poured (though it could probably pour itself with the barest command). Kyuchan calls her name softly at first, unable to shake the feeling that the shop demands quiet, just as a library, but finally louder when the sun starts to shine through the front window, inviting sweat to pool in the small of his back.
“Consider this an exercise in Light magic.” Lady Terpsichore’s voice suddenly splits the shop open. Head on a swivel, Kyuchan cannot find her, but equally cannot doubt the sudden weight of her presence. “Find three glamors. Dispel them if you can. I’ll even give you a hint, since I’m feeling generous: I’m wearing one of them.
“Another hint, so you don’t give me that sad, gawking look. Yes, you gawk. This is how the shop really looks between redecorations. Does that help?”
Kyuchan wants to tell her it most certainly does not. Just because the enchantress keeps her shop decorated this way in truth doesn’t mean she hasn’t altered something subtle, like the color of a curtain or the shape of a vase on the counter.
But he looks again at the tea set, ceramic with whorls of gold flickering across its surfaces. Amongst the warm, dark atmosphere, it’s almost comically bright.
When he lifts the teapot, a ripple passes over its surface. White and gold flutter against a matte black base, which vanishes just as quickly as it came, and Kyuchan’s heart leaps at the sight. Maybe he’s seeing things.
Or maybe seeing things is the point.
This is hardly an exact science, nor is it his calling. He’d much rather toil away above a bubbling cauldron for hours on end than devote his life to ephemeral magics like this. But he cannot deny the eagerness burgeoning in him, the excitement as he finds the edges of the glamor and pulls it away.
It’s only a single layer, but it is a layer nonetheless, and the true shape and shade of the teapot sits tidily on the table, much more harmonious with the decor.
There are still two illusions left to find, but Kyuchan frowns, peers into the teapot and finds it empty. “Aren’t illusions Shadow magic?” he asks.
“And glamors are Light magic, yes.” Lady Terpsichore’s answer comes from somewhere near the back of the store, where soft darkness blankets the details. “But what is a glamor but an illusion? And what would Light be without Shadow?
“Some matters call for details, and others for the greater picture,” she continues, her voice bobbing off behind Kyuchan. “Do you need to know every ingredient to understand that a dish is pleasing to the tongue, or every note to appreciate a song?”
“I must know every component to know a medicine will work,” he counters after a moment’s thought.
“There you have it. The difference between a novice and a master. Start, please, with the novice end of things.” And though Lady Terpsichore offers him no more hints after that, he swears the air is saturated with her satisfaction, that it is starting to seep into his skin.[/color]
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[color=#652127]He practices making fires with his breath, and spinning new colors from his claws. He needs words to draw upon the magic, to focus it into place, but better that to aid him than struggling without result. Really, it barely vexes him, the fact that his magic needs a support. He is from the Plaguebringer’s lands, so [i]of course [/i]these elements elude him at a natural level. That much is to be expected.
What continues to nag at him, though, is the fact that he has not seen Lady Terpsichore since the first day at her shop. Days turn to weeks turn to a month and some, but he has yet to catch hide nor hair of her glamor, let alone expose it, tear it down. She still expects it of him, reminds him of the task daily, but she never chides him for his failure to do so.
At least Telchor always pointed out Kyuchan’s mistakes, gruff to the last. He had no qualms with explaining what Kyuchan did wrong (and still doesn’t; next time they share a cauldron, surely the old Guardian will have a reprimand or two ready to go).
But Lady Terpsichore is evasive, always nudging her student toward the answer but never revealing it herself. Her cryptic feedback has as many layers as her illusions, and for all Kyuchan’s advances under her tutelage, he has yet to unravel the key to fully understanding her aims.
Some thread in Kyuchan finally wears thin. It doesn’t snap so much as fray down to its thinnest, then disintegrate. He comes in one morning and allows the velvet chair to sweep him away, sagging into its cushion.
“I’m not getting any better,” he announces to the apparently empty shop. Shucking his jacket, he reveals the white blotches that have spread further across his arms and shoulders, as well as the spots where feathers from his crest have fallen out and refused to grow back in. At this point, the only patch of color that remains is the seashell strung around his neck, hanging there since the day Whaleheart placed it, a deep swirl of blue against the ever-spreading white.
“I appreciate all your knowledge,” he goes on, “but it hasn’t changed things. I can make lights flash in different colors, and I can hide a napkin in someone’s shadow, but I can’t get better. I’m molting in your shop again, for rot’s sake.”
And it’s true. There’s already feathers on the floor, and he hasn’t been there more than a few minutes. Kyuchan allows his head to fall back, neck braced by the back of the chair.
“Maybe it’s selfish, but I don’t want to look like this. Feel like this. I want to do something to help myself, and this isn’t it.”
The shop swallows his words, folding them into the velvety shadows before they can echo and linger and start to sting. Kyuchan closes his eyes in the quiet, sinking into it much the same way he sometimes allows potions and poultices to sit and simmer.
With no answer forthcoming from Lady Terpsichore, and the same hazy warmth enfolding the shop as ever, he allows himself to drift off. It's not proper rest, slouched in a chair with a tea saucer perched precariously in his lap, but maybe he needs as much rest as he can get.
A small set of claws lifts the saucer away before it can tumble to the floor, then lifts Kyuchan's jacket from where he discarded it on the floor, draping it over him as a blanket.
"You have to know what you want before the glamor seems real," Lady Terpsichore says as she sets to work gathering loose feathers from the floor. "The secret to a convincing lie is to feed it the truth, after all."[/color]
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[color=#652127]When he wakes, sunset casts its glow through the front windows, and his scales are pleasantly warmed. Even the palest regions of his body feel as if they've been granted a balm, and for a moment, Kyuchan does not move save for the rise and fall of his chest. He does not itch or fidget or fret in his chair, even though his neck aches and his back cries out for relief. He simply breathes, soaking in the fading sunlight and the aroma of fresh oranges.
Oranges. The citrus pulls him out of his reverie, throwing him a line to the here and now with its sharp, tangy scent.
Kyuchan at last stretches all the way down to his toes before craning his stiff neck toward the counter, where a candle flickers. It has one of the wicks that crackles as it burns, little bursts of noise that enhance the sundown haze of the shop rather than interrupting it.
And curled around that candle is a tiny Veilspun, antlers dripping with silken adornments that must weigh nearly as much as the dragon themself.
"Hello?" Kyuchan ventures, wincing at the way his joints protest his exit from the chair. "Can I help you?"
A silly question, given that he is no employee here, and only a fledgling student of the shopkeeper beyond that. But the Veilspun picks up their head and yawns, showing off a neat row of spindly, pointy teeth in their pink maw. "Tasking you with unraveling my glamor was hardly fair, I suppose. I think you'll learn more from knowing the facts rather than the theory."
Another yawn, and Lady Terpsichore unwinds herself from the candle, though not before breathing deeply of its smoke. Her amber eyes glimmer with the sinking sun, and she allows a luxurious stretch before coming to the counter's edge, barely at Kyuchan's chest.
"Other dragons," she says, a hint of disdain coloring her words, "seem to correlate size with competency. Hiding this form was the first step in being taken seriously by my peers. Never mind that Veilspuns are born tricksters; I was too [i]small [/i]to have much power."
She must see the question in Kyuchan's eyes, because she holds up a claw to hush him. "They were wrong, of course. Power and magic are hardly proportional to size, and their narrow minds couldn't comprehend that. While they struggled with their studies, I reinvented myself, took a shape they might respect. I was young. Desperate for approval. For recognition.
"Now I can't keep them off my doorstep some days. I don't want to be another dragon anymore as much as I want them to leave me in peace." Lady Terpsichore laughs, a puff of smoke rising from her snout. "Makes it hatchling's play to convince them they're looking at another shop entirely. Sometimes we're closed, sometimes we're selling mature goods, sometimes we're selling coffee so bitter you can smell it down the street in time to turn the other way."
"I thought dragons here liked coffee?" Kyuchan ventures.
"They like [i]quality [/i]coffee. Not coffee with rambra manure in its grounds. But not the point!" Lady Terpsichore flutters her wings until she can look her pupil in the eye. "The point is that to make someone else believe the illusion, you have to want to believe it as well. Whatever details you add, whatever little lies you sprinkle on top, they don't matter. It's all in the desire of the caster."
Kyuchan's seashell necklace wobbles as Lady Terpsichore prods it with one spindly claw, and looking down, he can barely see the top of her head past his nose. "What do you want?" she asks him. "What are you trying to make the world believe?"
The smell of citrus flares with her words. Maybe it's real. Maybe it's a glamor to catch his attention. But he reaches out to cradle the candle in his claws all the same, allows the warmth to seep beneath his scales.
"I want to be healthy," he says to the flame. "I want color in my scales, and I want my feathers to grow in. I want to stop scratching at every new itch, and I want to be warm."
"It's not a bad thing to want," Lady Terpsichore answers, floating back and settling herself on the shop counter once more. She waves her claws, the very same motion she greeted him with on his first day in her shop, and a mirror appears beside her. While it offers her a full body view, it only captures the candle flame still cupped in Kyuchan's claws.
Except he sets the candle down, and the wavering firelight remains where it was, its glow only interrupted by the silhouette of a seashell on a string.
"Excellent choice," Lady Terpsichore purrs. "Nothing says warmth like fire. Now, the tricky part is to maintain the image you wish to present. How long can you do so?"
Kyuchan wants to hold it forever. To bask in the heat flowing beneath his skin, to revel in the rich red scales bordering that flickering fire racing up his belly and chest. Color and warmth and relief all at once, but the moment he starts to question how it works, how he has fooled his own body with a product of his own mind, the veneer cracks, exposing the paleness beneath.
He breathes deeply of citrus and furrows his brow until the glamor mends itself. This is the first step, he tells himself, and if he has done it once, he can do it a thousand times over.[/color]
[center][url=https://www1.flightrising.com/forums/cc/2257922][img]https://i.imgur.com/EzyY3AD.png[/img][/url][/center]
[color=#652127]"Kyuchan, lad, you look like a new dragon! Can't be too mad at you for not talking to your old master if you've been working hard, eh?" Telchor adjusts his mirror, until all Kyuchan can see is his stern golden eye. Judging by the skewed frame, he hasn't done so on purpose. "So tell me, you ready to come back to the shop yet?"
Kyuchan grins, flicking his crests and relishing the soft snap of embers in the movement. "Careful, or dragons might start to think you miss my company."
"Bah! To rot with what they think. Two sets of claws is just more efficient than one. Even fools should be able to see that. Now, are you coming back to the Rim, or do I need to find some scamp to do the cleaning for a while longer?"
To be fair, it's a good question. And now that Kyuchan can breathe easy, can breathe unashamed, it comes hand in hand with another: what does he want to do?
He hasn't wanted anything but his health for so long. What comes after that?
"I'll have to think about it," he eventually says, idly picking at a loose thread on the rolled up sleeve of his jacket. "There's more I want to learn out here.
"Speaking of learning, why didn't you say you were classmates with Lady Terpsichore when you recommended her? Is it because—"
"No, don't you dodge the question by bringing up that witch!"
"She's very insistent that—"
"I sent you to her to learn something useful!"
"—you should meet again, for old—"
"Mention her again and see if I let you back in this shop, lad."
"—time's sake, if you're not too crotchety to travel. Her words, of course."
Come to think of it, Kyuchan wants to see that happen.[/color]
[right][font=Copperplate Gothic Light][color=#FA912B][size=5][b]~ The End[/b][/color][/size][/font][/right]
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a trick of the light
written by Tues
3,833 words
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It takes Kyuchan three weeks to gain an audience with Lady Terpsichore. The first week, she is out on business, as her shop door declares in swirling script. Kyuchan could do without the glitter effects; it starts to strain his eyes, deciphering each line while it shimmers.
The second week is much the same. While the notice about Lady Terpsichore’s absence is gone, a splendid closed sign hangs in the window instead, promising a return of the shop’s mistress quite soon. Deterred again, Kyuchan spends the rest of the week preparing himself to meet the fabled enchantress, tidying up all the loose ends he can find.
But that tidying takes him another week, as suddenly his jacket doesn’t quite cover his white patches and his tail has begun another molt, leaving snowy feathers strewn across the hotel room floor. He teeters on the brink of forcing himself out the door, and settles instead for a string of room service orders that will surely bankrupt him if he cannot steel his spine. Paella after filet after fried delicacy, he turns over his options just as much as he turns over and over in his sleep.
Go, and face the world with the truth of his disease written all over his bleached scales? Or keep to himself, surrender to the inevitable cruelty of the virus?
He misses a mirror summons from Telchor while he broods, and somehow, that alone is more frightening than anything else Kyuchan could face. What is he supposed to say after coming so far, only for his courage to leave him high and dry?
The following morning, he sets out for Lady Terpsichore’s shop once again, more afraid to return to his mentor empty-handed than hopeful that a solution is at hand.
As it happens, the shop is a rather tight squeeze. Bits and baubles line the shelves, and their thousand facets glimmer in the alchemical lights strung from the ceiling. Kyuchan squints against the glare as he steps over the threshold, lifting an arm to shield his eyes only to lower it as he feels his shirt and jacket hike up at the hip, exposing a flaking patch of scales.
“Kindly watch your step,” says a prim voice somewhere below. Then, a puff of smoke obscures the shop, fading as quickly as it came to reveal a Skydancer draped in what strikes Kyuchan as a truly hazardous amount of silks. She steps out of his path, antennae aglow, and swirls a claw in the air.
Two chairs leap to the gesture, one sliding demurely to her side, and the other scooting up behind Kyuchan with just enough force to seat him with an oomph. Its velvet cushion is welcoming, despite the force of its arrival, as is the cup of tea that leaps to his claws, waiting ever so patiently for him to take its handle.
“You want a glamor,” says the Skydancer as she commands the chairs back to their place at a low tea table. Kindly enough, she refrains from commenting on the way Kyuchan’s tail nearly topples a display of jewelry as he is whisked to the table, though she does summon a handkerchief for the tea that sloshes over his front with the motion.
Kyuchan mumbles his thanks, blots at the stain on his nice jacket with a wince, and then summons all his courage. Telchor’s brusque nature he can navigate without pause, but the world of tailored manners and coy negotiation is altogether foreign to him, and he hopes his teacup doesn’t shake as he declares, “I don’t want a glamor. I want to learn Fire magic from Lady Terpsichore.”
The Skydancer hums. It’s only a short note, neither assent nor dismissal, and she takes a dainty sip of her tea. “You’re molting,” she points out. Heat surges to Kyuchan’s face. “Your jacket is patched. You have white scales on your wrists.
“And,” she finishes, producing a folded piece of parchment from nowhere, twirling it between her claws, “Telchor already wrote to me. Don’t look so surprised, Kyuchan. We’re going to have you looking like a new dragon when we’re done.”
Lady Terpsichore invites protest. Revels in it, apparently, because no matter what Kyuchan tells her his objectives are, she insists with starting on glamors. Light magic. Completely unrelated to the matter at hand, and maybe it’s the strain of being polite, and maybe it’s his illness growing worse, but Kyuchan finds himself on the verge of a full-blown molt before their first meeting is over.
He sees why Telchor knows about her. She’s brilliant at her craft, weaving light into form with almost careless gestures. There’s a natural ease to her magic that suggests born talent, but probably comes from intense study, something Kyuchan’s master offers great respect.
But Kyuchan also sees why Telchor doesn’t associate closely with her. She plays by her own rules, tugging at strings only she can see, and explanations are few and far between, replaced instead of anecdotes of great length. Some of them even feature Telchor, and from the clues Kyuchan teases out, the two were once academic peers.
“Rivals, even,” Lady Terpsichore says while she peers through a crystal at Kyuchan’s palms. She glances up at him and a wry grin flashes on her face. “Lovers, for a time, though I like him better from a distance now.”
(Kyuchan chooses to forget that fact, which means it remains lodged firmly in his head. Telchor and Terpsichore seem diametrically opposed in every way. Surely the enchantress is lying? Twisting tales to her own benefit?
But why else would Telchor write ahead, give her the courtesy of explaining the travel-worn Coatl on her doorstep?
Don’t think about it, Kyuchan keeps telling himself.)
Somewhere in between Lady Terpsichore’s unfathomable inspections and casual revelations, Kyuchan occasionally puts up a fight. A little color doesn’t change the fact that his scales are flaking, and a little glow doesn’t make him look healthier. It just highlights the circles under his eyes and the missing feathers along his crest.
To which, of course, Lady Terpsichore waves him off and teaches him the first steps of Light magic.
“You put scorpion venom in some of your serums, do you not?” she asks. Without waiting for a reply, she adjusts the way Kyuchan’s claws cradle a small, glowing haze, and the fog’s edges start to sharpen. “Better, concentrate on the center now. This is just like all the poison you turn into potions. It doesn’t look like the final product, but without it, you won’t heal anyone.”
“It’s one ingredient,” Kyuchan replies through gritted teeth. In his foggy conjuration, a solid shape begins to form, its edges creeping into focus. For a moment, it could really be his master journal, soft leather cover and uneven pages almost as familiar as his own claws.
He loses the image, though, when Lady Terpsichore takes her hands away. “You need focus,” she declares, “and these.”
Three thick tomes drop into Kyuchan’s upturned palms, appearing from the ether as things are apparently wont to do in this shop. One covers the basics of Light magic, another the basics of Shadow, and the third is a primer on Fire magic for hatchlings, its thickness owing to the board-book style of its pages, and the pop-out paper inclusions inside.
Studying from a hatchlings’ book leaves a bitter taste in Kyuchan’s mouth, but no more bitter than trying to puzzle out meaning from the layers of Lady Terpsichore’s chatter. He takes the books with what little strained gratitude he can muster, and returns to his lodgings with a promise to return once he finishes his reading.
He also orders the shrimp scampi again, because it settles his anxious stomach, and it is utensil food. Better for not staining the pages of borrowed books.
The shop is a different world entirely when Kyuchan returns three days later, books tucked under his arm (board-book closest to his body, where no one can judge his apparent literary taste). Where it was wall-to-wall trinkets, everything glittering with the faintest ray of sun, it now luxuriates in a warm haze, more like a lounge than any store. Everything is muted and velvet, softened and dim, and Kyuchan almost steps back over the threshold to be certain he hasn’t made a wrong turn.
The chair from before scoops him up just the same, though, proving him to be in the right place. It scoots over to the same spot it first deposited him, at the same table with the same tea set. Anchors in a wildly changed space.
And yet there is no sign of Lady Terpsichore. Her own seat is empty, and the tea has yet to be poured (though it could probably pour itself with the barest command). Kyuchan calls her name softly at first, unable to shake the feeling that the shop demands quiet, just as a library, but finally louder when the sun starts to shine through the front window, inviting sweat to pool in the small of his back.
“Consider this an exercise in Light magic.” Lady Terpsichore’s voice suddenly splits the shop open. Head on a swivel, Kyuchan cannot find her, but equally cannot doubt the sudden weight of her presence. “Find three glamors. Dispel them if you can. I’ll even give you a hint, since I’m feeling generous: I’m wearing one of them.
“Another hint, so you don’t give me that sad, gawking look. Yes, you gawk. This is how the shop really looks between redecorations. Does that help?”
Kyuchan wants to tell her it most certainly does not. Just because the enchantress keeps her shop decorated this way in truth doesn’t mean she hasn’t altered something subtle, like the color of a curtain or the shape of a vase on the counter.
But he looks again at the tea set, ceramic with whorls of gold flickering across its surfaces. Amongst the warm, dark atmosphere, it’s almost comically bright.
When he lifts the teapot, a ripple passes over its surface. White and gold flutter against a matte black base, which vanishes just as quickly as it came, and Kyuchan’s heart leaps at the sight. Maybe he’s seeing things.
Or maybe seeing things is the point.
This is hardly an exact science, nor is it his calling. He’d much rather toil away above a bubbling cauldron for hours on end than devote his life to ephemeral magics like this. But he cannot deny the eagerness burgeoning in him, the excitement as he finds the edges of the glamor and pulls it away.
It’s only a single layer, but it is a layer nonetheless, and the true shape and shade of the teapot sits tidily on the table, much more harmonious with the decor.
There are still two illusions left to find, but Kyuchan frowns, peers into the teapot and finds it empty. “Aren’t illusions Shadow magic?” he asks.
“And glamors are Light magic, yes.” Lady Terpsichore’s answer comes from somewhere near the back of the store, where soft darkness blankets the details. “But what is a glamor but an illusion? And what would Light be without Shadow?
“Some matters call for details, and others for the greater picture,” she continues, her voice bobbing off behind Kyuchan. “Do you need to know every ingredient to understand that a dish is pleasing to the tongue, or every note to appreciate a song?”
“I must know every component to know a medicine will work,” he counters after a moment’s thought.
“There you have it. The difference between a novice and a master. Start, please, with the novice end of things.” And though Lady Terpsichore offers him no more hints after that, he swears the air is saturated with her satisfaction, that it is starting to seep into his skin.
He practices making fires with his breath, and spinning new colors from his claws. He needs words to draw upon the magic, to focus it into place, but better that to aid him than struggling without result. Really, it barely vexes him, the fact that his magic needs a support. He is from the Plaguebringer’s lands, so of course these elements elude him at a natural level. That much is to be expected.
What continues to nag at him, though, is the fact that he has not seen Lady Terpsichore since the first day at her shop. Days turn to weeks turn to a month and some, but he has yet to catch hide nor hair of her glamor, let alone expose it, tear it down. She still expects it of him, reminds him of the task daily, but she never chides him for his failure to do so.
At least Telchor always pointed out Kyuchan’s mistakes, gruff to the last. He had no qualms with explaining what Kyuchan did wrong (and still doesn’t; next time they share a cauldron, surely the old Guardian will have a reprimand or two ready to go).
But Lady Terpsichore is evasive, always nudging her student toward the answer but never revealing it herself. Her cryptic feedback has as many layers as her illusions, and for all Kyuchan’s advances under her tutelage, he has yet to unravel the key to fully understanding her aims.
Some thread in Kyuchan finally wears thin. It doesn’t snap so much as fray down to its thinnest, then disintegrate. He comes in one morning and allows the velvet chair to sweep him away, sagging into its cushion.
“I’m not getting any better,” he announces to the apparently empty shop. Shucking his jacket, he reveals the white blotches that have spread further across his arms and shoulders, as well as the spots where feathers from his crest have fallen out and refused to grow back in. At this point, the only patch of color that remains is the seashell strung around his neck, hanging there since the day Whaleheart placed it, a deep swirl of blue against the ever-spreading white.
“I appreciate all your knowledge,” he goes on, “but it hasn’t changed things. I can make lights flash in different colors, and I can hide a napkin in someone’s shadow, but I can’t get better. I’m molting in your shop again, for rot’s sake.”
And it’s true. There’s already feathers on the floor, and he hasn’t been there more than a few minutes. Kyuchan allows his head to fall back, neck braced by the back of the chair.
“Maybe it’s selfish, but I don’t want to look like this. Feel like this. I want to do something to help myself, and this isn’t it.”
The shop swallows his words, folding them into the velvety shadows before they can echo and linger and start to sting. Kyuchan closes his eyes in the quiet, sinking into it much the same way he sometimes allows potions and poultices to sit and simmer.
With no answer forthcoming from Lady Terpsichore, and the same hazy warmth enfolding the shop as ever, he allows himself to drift off. It's not proper rest, slouched in a chair with a tea saucer perched precariously in his lap, but maybe he needs as much rest as he can get.
A small set of claws lifts the saucer away before it can tumble to the floor, then lifts Kyuchan's jacket from where he discarded it on the floor, draping it over him as a blanket.
"You have to know what you want before the glamor seems real," Lady Terpsichore says as she sets to work gathering loose feathers from the floor. "The secret to a convincing lie is to feed it the truth, after all."
When he wakes, sunset casts its glow through the front windows, and his scales are pleasantly warmed. Even the palest regions of his body feel as if they've been granted a balm, and for a moment, Kyuchan does not move save for the rise and fall of his chest. He does not itch or fidget or fret in his chair, even though his neck aches and his back cries out for relief. He simply breathes, soaking in the fading sunlight and the aroma of fresh oranges.
Oranges. The citrus pulls him out of his reverie, throwing him a line to the here and now with its sharp, tangy scent.
Kyuchan at last stretches all the way down to his toes before craning his stiff neck toward the counter, where a candle flickers. It has one of the wicks that crackles as it burns, little bursts of noise that enhance the sundown haze of the shop rather than interrupting it.
And curled around that candle is a tiny Veilspun, antlers dripping with silken adornments that must weigh nearly as much as the dragon themself.
"Hello?" Kyuchan ventures, wincing at the way his joints protest his exit from the chair. "Can I help you?"
A silly question, given that he is no employee here, and only a fledgling student of the shopkeeper beyond that. But the Veilspun picks up their head and yawns, showing off a neat row of spindly, pointy teeth in their pink maw. "Tasking you with unraveling my glamor was hardly fair, I suppose. I think you'll learn more from knowing the facts rather than the theory."
Another yawn, and Lady Terpsichore unwinds herself from the candle, though not before breathing deeply of its smoke. Her amber eyes glimmer with the sinking sun, and she allows a luxurious stretch before coming to the counter's edge, barely at Kyuchan's chest.
"Other dragons," she says, a hint of disdain coloring her words, "seem to correlate size with competency. Hiding this form was the first step in being taken seriously by my peers. Never mind that Veilspuns are born tricksters; I was too small to have much power."
She must see the question in Kyuchan's eyes, because she holds up a claw to hush him. "They were wrong, of course. Power and magic are hardly proportional to size, and their narrow minds couldn't comprehend that. While they struggled with their studies, I reinvented myself, took a shape they might respect. I was young. Desperate for approval. For recognition.
"Now I can't keep them off my doorstep some days. I don't want to be another dragon anymore as much as I want them to leave me in peace." Lady Terpsichore laughs, a puff of smoke rising from her snout. "Makes it hatchling's play to convince them they're looking at another shop entirely. Sometimes we're closed, sometimes we're selling mature goods, sometimes we're selling coffee so bitter you can smell it down the street in time to turn the other way."
"I thought dragons here liked coffee?" Kyuchan ventures.
"They like quality coffee. Not coffee with rambra manure in its grounds. But not the point!" Lady Terpsichore flutters her wings until she can look her pupil in the eye. "The point is that to make someone else believe the illusion, you have to want to believe it as well. Whatever details you add, whatever little lies you sprinkle on top, they don't matter. It's all in the desire of the caster."
Kyuchan's seashell necklace wobbles as Lady Terpsichore prods it with one spindly claw, and looking down, he can barely see the top of her head past his nose. "What do you want?" she asks him. "What are you trying to make the world believe?"
The smell of citrus flares with her words. Maybe it's real. Maybe it's a glamor to catch his attention. But he reaches out to cradle the candle in his claws all the same, allows the warmth to seep beneath his scales.
"I want to be healthy," he says to the flame. "I want color in my scales, and I want my feathers to grow in. I want to stop scratching at every new itch, and I want to be warm."
"It's not a bad thing to want," Lady Terpsichore answers, floating back and settling herself on the shop counter once more. She waves her claws, the very same motion she greeted him with on his first day in her shop, and a mirror appears beside her. While it offers her a full body view, it only captures the candle flame still cupped in Kyuchan's claws.
Except he sets the candle down, and the wavering firelight remains where it was, its glow only interrupted by the silhouette of a seashell on a string.
"Excellent choice," Lady Terpsichore purrs. "Nothing says warmth like fire. Now, the tricky part is to maintain the image you wish to present. How long can you do so?"
Kyuchan wants to hold it forever. To bask in the heat flowing beneath his skin, to revel in the rich red scales bordering that flickering fire racing up his belly and chest. Color and warmth and relief all at once, but the moment he starts to question how it works, how he has fooled his own body with a product of his own mind, the veneer cracks, exposing the paleness beneath.
He breathes deeply of citrus and furrows his brow until the glamor mends itself. This is the first step, he tells himself, and if he has done it once, he can do it a thousand times over.
"Kyuchan, lad, you look like a new dragon! Can't be too mad at you for not talking to your old master if you've been working hard, eh?" Telchor adjusts his mirror, until all Kyuchan can see is his stern golden eye. Judging by the skewed frame, he hasn't done so on purpose. "So tell me, you ready to come back to the shop yet?"
Kyuchan grins, flicking his crests and relishing the soft snap of embers in the movement. "Careful, or dragons might start to think you miss my company."
"Bah! To rot with what they think. Two sets of claws is just more efficient than one. Even fools should be able to see that. Now, are you coming back to the Rim, or do I need to find some scamp to do the cleaning for a while longer?"
To be fair, it's a good question. And now that Kyuchan can breathe easy, can breathe unashamed, it comes hand in hand with another: what does he want to do?
He hasn't wanted anything but his health for so long. What comes after that?
"I'll have to think about it," he eventually says, idly picking at a loose thread on the rolled up sleeve of his jacket. "There's more I want to learn out here.
"Speaking of learning, why didn't you say you were classmates with Lady Terpsichore when you recommended her? Is it because—"
"No, don't you dodge the question by bringing up that witch!"
"She's very insistent that—"
"I sent you to her to learn something useful!"
"—you should meet again, for old—"
"Mention her again and see if I let you back in this shop, lad."
"—time's sake, if you're not too crotchety to travel. Her words, of course."
Come to think of it, Kyuchan wants to see that happen.
~ The End
