[Closed] Away, Away

[Nkemi pezre Nkese]

Late Afternoon, 34 Dentis, 2719
Heading towards the Church of the Moon

Nkemi’s eyes were bright and curious at Ezrah’s question about ibu’vaqem. It reminded her very much of his questions from during her presentation: it was surprisingly, tangible practical. ”I do not know,” she said, as unafraid to admit to a lack of knowledge here as she had been during her instruction in his course. ”Does it matter if the spirits are waiting here or in the afterlife for their reincarnation?”

The ground crunched lightly underneath; the snow from that morning seemed to mostly have melted during the day, but there were pockets where shadow had once been, bits of gravel where the coldness had clung, and patches further away on some of the dry grass. Nkemi was very glad of her sturdy boots. Ezrah led her with an unerring singleness of purpose, and Nkemi followed with an equal curiosity, more interested in what the student wished to show her than all the rest.

Half-bare branches lined the trees on the sides of the walkway; leaves were tumbling free in each gust of wind, little flashes of gold and yellow and orange and red caught and drifting. There was a little scattering on the cold ground, although Nkemi thought they would not be allowed to remain long.

Nkemi smiled at Ezrah, warm and friendly,
nodding agreeably at the parallels he offered. ”Kejeka,” she attempted, and made a little face; she could not find all the sounds on her tongue. ”Kezejka,” Nkemi tried again, all the consonants as strong as she knew how to make them. She grinned, suddenly. ”It is not a pilgrimage from Dkanat to Serkaih,” Nkemi said, ”but a descent. Dkanat is on the surface of the desert, at the top of the cliffs. Serkaih - our valley of ghosts - is reached with a journey down the winding, narrow paths of the cliff side, lantern lit even during the day. It is less than an hour’s walk.”

Much less, Nkemi remembered, even for a small girl, if she runs to and from. Even a small girl can scramble down the rocky paths in a scatter of gravel and dust, descending through the first layer of red to the brilliant striped colors beneath, pale pink and orange and yellow and red flowing together and apart, until she reaches the bright red dirt of the valley floor, scattered with pale gray-green clinging weeds outside of the broad, groomed paths. Even a small girl can make the journey back up, beneath a sky of brilliant blue or sand-choked gray or glittering with stars like a thousand lanterns above.

”There are small mules as well,” Nkemi added, eyes bright. ”And a platform sling, a little way down the valley. But it is better to walk, if you are able.”

They had stopped their walk now; Nkemi tucked cold hands into the pocket of the student’s green coat, looking up at the intent young Hejos. There had been a smile on his face when he spoke of his home, warm and longing rather than amused. There was another now, a quick flash of a defiant grin that lit his dark eyes and quirked up the edges of his mouth.

Nkemi followed him once more. ”What possibilities are there?” The subprefect asked, curious about what her guide would say. She smiled at Ezrah, freely meeting his gaze; she did not pretend not to understand the significance of the question. He had been touching on it again and again, Nkemi thought; he had not been shy to brush his tattooed hand against it, and more deliberately each time. She pushed; she did not think it would take much for him to reach out and seize the point.

Nkemi understood very well by now that Ezrah was a practical sort of person; his interests were not in history or theory or philosophy. The crypts beneath the Church of the Moon, she remembered; this was the destination in which he had been most interested. Nkemi felt a little shiver; it was not only the cold, she knew.

[Ezre Vks]

Brunnhold Campus

Late Afternoon on the 34th of Dentis, 2719

"Ihave been taught that it indeed matters, that the cycle of life and death is meant to flow in a specific current instead of many. Deviation, I have been told, means that reincarnation is unattainable by those who fall off the path. I admit my mind is open to change should there be proof of alternative viewpoints. I have left my home to find them." Ezre spoke quietly, dark eyes watching his breath more than looking directly at Nkemi at first, though it wasn't because he was self-conscious so much as he realized he'd grown so accustomed to disbelief and resistance.

"I like walking." He chuckled softly in a cloud of breath once he began leading them again, suddenly distractingly aware of the asceticism of his people. Shyly, he added, "But I am not sure how I will fare in the Mugrobi climate."

The Hoxian gave her grace for the pronunciation of his home as she'd given him grace for all the pronunciations of her words, Mugrobi too soft where Deftung was clearly too rough. It was a curious difference, and one where no offense was intended. He listened to Nkemi's description of Dkanat's relationship to Serkaih. Valley of Ghosts, the subprefect repeated, and his delicate eyebrows drew together as if running through all the phasmonia locations he knew scattered across the Kingdoms,

"Are the people of Dchh-anat responsible for caring for the dead as well? Are those who have passed buried nearby or is Serkaih just a place where restless spirits have been rumored to appear over the centuries?"

These were not the idle questions of someone who considered any of this information new or even particularly strange, Ezre too aware of the supernatural, too biased in his own personal studies, too comfortable with what others considered hearsay because he'd seen and he'd touched. Because he'd even been possessed. Not that he was ready to announce these things, ever-cautious with the weight of his words no matter how bright and eager the cheerful Mugrobi woman's smile may have been. As Hexxos, his secrets were important not just because they were dangerous but because his family life was so entwined with it all that he dare not put them at risk.

He tried to imagine cliffs in the desert, but all he could see in his minds eye were waterfalls of sand instead of rock, his knowledge of the landscape of Mugroba mostly made from airship views and sandstorm layovers, sweating and huddled for shelter in the Thul'ka terminals. An hour seemed like such a short walk to the Hexxos Guide who'd made the three-day pilgrimage from Kzecka to Xerxes with bodies before, who'd climbed for hours in the high mountains around his home to the tsvat scattered there, lighting fires and burning incense, praying to the gods and celebrating the passage of Hox's two seasons.

The dark-haired student tilted his head in Nkemi's direction at her question, having half-expected her to give an answer instead of ask for one. He blinked, unsure if her further probing was meant as humor or whether she was simply attempting to pry deeper, to figure out of the foundation of their otherwise unorthodox conversation was firm enough for her to stand on with him.

It was neither quicksand nor lava fields, Ezre quite confident in his basic understanding,

"Oh—ah—well, the possibility that ghosts and strange spiritual phenomenon are not just mere myths and stories, but that they are true, of course." Ezre spoke evenly, his face calm even as the looming presence of the Church of the Moon filled the sky above them, blocking the cold sun. The shift in temperature in the shade was tangible, though the Hoxian didn't find it unpleasant, even without his coat.

If he'd noticed the attention of others on them while they walked, he didn't acknowledge it. He paused at the foot of the stone steps, statues carved in red stone of Alioe and the moons, of the rest of the Circle gods smaller, lesser, told old stories and parables with stained glass windows casting colorful accents over it all,

"You have listened, but you have not rebuked me. This is not idle curiosity for you, is it?"

[Nkemi pezre Nkese]

Late Afternoon, 34 Dentis, 2719
Outside the Church of the Moon

Nkemi’s breath clouded in the air, little puffs of white-gray that spread out from her words and dissipated, slowly; Ezrah’s did the same, drifting like smoke against the edges of her words, mixing slowly at the edges with the same comfortable ease as their belike fields.

“I do not know much of such things,” Nkemi said, freely, honestly, looking at Ezrah. “I have never known anyone who knew enough to speak on such matters,” her gaze flicked down for a moment, her smile faltering faintly. “I do not see, I think, why it should matter,” Nkemi said, softly, “if one waits here a little extra time before moving to the Otherlife.”

Nkemi’s eyebrows lifted, curiously, at Ezrah’s questions about Dkanat and Serkaih. “There are some in Dkanat who work in Serkaih,” Nkemi explained. “It is an old custom to bury the dead there; it is not done so much, anymore, except by those who are from such parts. For many centuries, when more tribes wandered the deserts and made their homes among the sand and stone, it was a place of ritual. It was not customary to bring the entire body of one who had passed there, but after the celebrations had ended, one or two members of the tribe would take something of the one who had passed and carry it with them, through the desert storms, to find the valley of ghosts.”

Nkemi paused, looking at Ezrah, waiting a moment before she continued. “Although sandstorms sweep the grounds above and the canyons nearby, Serkaih has felt their touch but rarely,” Nkemi continued. “My ancestors, when they visited, would leave the piece of the one who had moved on in this place, and would carve a tsan’ehew for them,” Nkemi wrinkled her nose, thinking through the Mugrobi word. “A memory home,” she translated, carefully.

“Today it is a place of memory and worship,” Nkemi explained, “but not burial, very often.” She thought of the small carved replica of her home tucked along a quiet stretch of path, the one that Nkese, Nkanzi and their mother had made long before Nkemi had been reborn into the world, to honor the death of her grandfather.

Nkemi had nudged Ezrah a little further; she was not ashamed of it. She listened, intently, and she searched his face as he did so. His rhakor was even and smooth; it was not in the least perturbed by the quiet, solemn words he offered. The possibilities, he had called them, as careful as any Mugrobi.

They stopped in the shade; Nkemi shivered at the change in temperature, even wrapped up in Ezrah’s student coat over hers. She looked up at the red stone above them, at Alioe and her moon; her eyes drifted to Hulali, with his fishhead thrown back, pouting lips gaping wide, and the ribbon of blue glass which glinted behind him in the pale winter light.

Nkemi’s gaze lowered back to Ezrah, and she grinned at him, bright and even and friendly. “No,” Nkemi said, cheerfully. “It has been my custom for the last years to ask and listen, rather than to speak, where uncertain matters are concerned.” She tucked her hands in the pockets of Ezrah’s warm, comfortable coat.

“This is a story,” Nkemi said, softly, her voice warm and friendly, “but it is a story of my memories. When I was a child, no more than seven or eight years old, I would sometimes pass the days playing among the tsan’ehew of Serkaih. There are paths which wind through them, and in some places they are straight and in some places they curved, and always they are lined with lanterns, lit long before the last of the sun drops from the horizon.”

Nkemi paused; she did not look around, although she knew without needing to do so that they were alone. She smiled at Ezrah, still. “It was a warm day,” Nkemi said with a little grin, “even by our standards, but the warmth of the day does not last, in the desert, and when night comes it can grow very cold. I had chased a lizard into a distant twist of the canyon, and was beginning to find my way back to the path.”

“I saw a woman in the distance,” Nkemi said, “and she glowed as if the moon had already risen; the lantern light shone through her skin, and when she turned I could see the bones underneath. She smiled at me, and I was not afraid.” Nkemi was quiet, a little solemn edge to her smile. “She told me that she had come looking for her daughter; she told me not to be afraid.”

“I felt,” Nkemi said, slowly, shivering again in the shade, “something very cold behind me. She told me not to look; she reached out her hand, and I took it, and she led me back to the path. We talked,” Nkemi grinned, “all the while. I told her about my favorite goat. I could hear something behind us, like a breeze but not a breeze, but when I tried to turn she cupped my head in her other hand, and would not let me look.”

“That,” Nkemi said, wide-eyed, “is the last I remember. My father found me on the path, in the pooled light of two lanterns; he carried me home. I was very sick, as if with a fever, for the better part of a week. I told my mother this story when I awoke; she held me close, and did not call me a liar. A priest came, not long after, and I saw her cry with relief when he left.”

“It is curiosity,” Nkemi confessed, cheerful once more; even during the worst of the story, she had not quite lost the bright light which shone through her smile, “but not idle, I think.”

[Ezre Vks]

Brunnhold Campus

Late Afternoon on the 34th of Dentis, 2719

Ezre's face tightened in thought. It was not a scowl of disapproval or objection so much as an obvious processing of Nkemi's opinion, a weighing of her words. He wanted to make sure his response was just as articulate, was measured against what had been discovered over the centuries as well as what he'd experienced in his short life. He nodded first, a firm acknowledgement that Nkemi pezre Nkese was welcome to her own opinion, that her thoughts on lingering souls were valid, but his lips formed a thinner line, pressing against the ink that trailed downward from the bottom curve,

"If it is not meant to happen—if the flow of souls was not meant to be broken, then it matters because it is a sign something is wrong." A tattooed hand came to rest over the thinner, paler green wool of his Brunnhold uniform shirt, fingers brushing over those damn uncomfortable suspenders when he pressed his palm to his heart, "Blood flows in a cycle, too, and when that flow is interrupted, is that not a sign of injury? So, in the same way my Order believes restless spirits and supernatural phenomena represent some kind of wound, but of Vita itself. That does not mean those who end up where they do not belong are the problem, however. They are unfortunate victims."

The Hoxian looked away as if to hide both the emotions such admission brought to the surface of his thoughts like steam rising above the magma-warmed waters of a hot spring pool in the snow and the truth that there was more to the world of the supernatural than just mere ghosts. His mother was not a ghost, after all. The edges of his eyes narrowed and he exhaled a long, slow breath through his teeth, far too aware that the young Mugrobi woman shivering next to him was a member of law enforcement and probably far better trained at reading the expressions of those around her than the Hexxos Guide could ever hope to be. His inhale was a little frayed at the edges, the airy particles of his field drawing closer but not in a reflex of shame or fear so much as just a momentary need for comfort.

Gently, he shifted the subject for a moment, attempting to dam the stream so that his mind would settle, so that he could be careful not to let the words inside spill over. There were still secrets to be kept, secrets that he had shared before but ones he still knew he needed to be a proper guardian of in spite of his enthusiasm, in spite of the very cheerful encouragement Nkemi seemed to be.

He listened to her description of the relationship between her home of Dkanat and the phasmonia of Serkaih, appreciating the distracting imagery of it all. He didn't smile, but his expression softened, loosened, and warmed, the Carrier of the Dead quite comforted by the ideas of memories kept and offered, of family members passing those memories from one generation to the next. The child of a raen perhaps appreciated that the most, though he was doing his best not to give all of himself away so easily to a stranger, no matter how belike some parts of their lives may have been.

Although, if he thought he'd found his resolution there, if he thought he'd found some safe place to stand, he'd not been prepared for her shared story.

Dark eyes wide, unaware that he held his breath through parts of it all until a puffed cloud of heat blurred his vision in a sudden exhale, Ezre listened again, listened deeper, weaving together the unspoken parts of Nkemi's story that it seemed as though she herself perhaps wasn't entirely aware of. At least, from his now experienced perspective, the truth that was left unsaid sounded very much like possession.

She smiled at me, the Mugrobi prefect said so brightly, and I was not afraid.

Ezre understood in a way that the Hoxian felt incapable of articulating, unable to entirely contain the hues of curiosity and shades of empathy from staining through his rhakor into their mingled fields. He hummed a few consonants again, sounds of thought and interest, and nodded expressively, quiet voice full of far more warmth than the long stretch of shadows they'd paused in. The young Guide reached into his scratchy green trouser pocket with one hand while he indicated toward the Church doors with the other, inked fingers digging for a particular silver watch he'd had restored and leading the pair of them up the stairs,

"I have seen ghosts and other restless spirits more than once in my life with my own eyes, perhaps far too many times for the comfort of most. Some even here on Brunnhold's campus. I have talked to them, too, though not all of them make the same sense as they probably did in life, if any, and not all of them are interested in coexisting with those who live in their stead. It sounds as though you met one yourself, Nkemi." He opened the door with all the expected manners of a native Anaxi, holding one of the heavy, engraved and gilded things open against the wind to allow Nkemi to enter before him, passing to her the drowned man's watch from Ghost Town that day in Bethas, from that first day he met Tom Cooke in the most appropriate of places and gave him the gift of a name for what he was.

"Possession is a very strange, and probably varies from ghost to ghost and person to person. You were very young, and while I could be wrong, it sounds as though you made such contact. I have only experienced it once myself, last spring, when I met the restless spirit and his watch—" Ezre indicated the item, voice hushed in the decorated antechamber with its soft candles and sunlight streaming through stained glass, its iconic paintings and statues. He spoke without hesitation about things he knew as fact, but after passing on the pocket watch as if it was evidence of his own story, he paused, there in the entrance, to pay his quiet respects.

Prayer was easy, comfortable conversation, and he made it in his mind instead of with his lips. Did the gods hear? Did the mona? Surely, if they were part of all things, if zkratas was true, then of course they did.

While the Church of the Moon was built by Anaxi hands, it was still a tsvat to the Circle gods and he had a personal and spiritual duty to honor that.

Lifting his head again, he finished his thoughts easily, letting the warmth of the church seep into inked flesh so used to the chill outside, "—and it was definitely an exhausting experience. Even if it only lasted for an hour or less, even if I was forced to expel the ghost instead of have it leave my body willingly, I was unwell for sometime afterward."

The Hoxian's rhakor was stretched to its limits, for the young Guide left out whole sections of his story. Where Subprefect pezre Nkese had bared her whole memory of her supernatural moment, Ezre skillfully and delicately left out any mention of the not-Incumbent, of Tom Cooke, aware that there was no reason to explain raen, to implicate the not-galdor, to someone who didn't need to know of the existence of such things.

Unless she did.

Did she?

"The truth is always a good object of curiosity, and I can only respect the active seeking of it."

The Hexxos Guide was not yet sure, and so he led them both into the church proper, looking around for the veiled forms of Everine and breathing in the hints of incense and candlewax for the familiar comforts they were. Offering to take their time meandering alcoves, he did not rush them toward the various entrances to the Crypts nor make any particular choice about direction,

"I have heard that when Brunnhold was first built, so, too, was this Church of the Moon. Or, at least, its foundations. War and conflict around the red-walled fortress-turned-school most likely led to the destruction of the church many times, but the catacombs beneath are perhaps just as old. Like Serkaih, many Anaxi galdori memories are buried in mausoleums, though most of the time, it is with their bodies. Sometimes, lost souls linger. Much of their knowledge left behind is difficult to access, but I suppose I see that as a worthy challenge."

[Nkemi pezre Nkese]

Late Afternoon, 34 Dentis, 2719
Outside the Church of the Moon

Ezrah had listened with keen interest; Nkemi could read it well enough in the faint widening of his eyes, and easier still in the deeper caprise of his field against hers, the slow belike feeling that stretched between them and hung, intangible, in the air.

Nkemi followed her guide up the stairs; he opened the door for her, and she stepped inside. Ezrah handed her a silver watch; Nkemi’s eyebrows lifted, curiously, and she took it, glancing down as he spoke.

Possession, Ezrah said, naming it.

Nkemi shivered a little, standing in the awning of the Church of the Moon, as the heavy gilded door closed behind them, blowing a last gust of crisp, cold air over her. Her fingers curled lightly around the watch. A restless spirit, Ezrah said, and his watch. Nkemi looked down at it, curiously, turning it carefully over in her hand, and looked back up at Ezrah. Last spring, he said, and have only experienced it once myself.

Nkemi glanced around, then, lifting her gaze to the stained glass above. Pale shades of winter sunlight streamed through; they darkened, then lightened once more, and the glass seemed almost to glow, reds, greens, blues, yellows, purples all mingled together, with thin little borders traced between them, set off even more by the stark white marble of the walls. It was beautiful; it took Nkemi’s breath away.

Down, below, near them, the low light of candle flames flickered; the white carpet underneath was crisp and clean despite the wet, muddy day outside, with trims of gold that seemed to flicker and catch whatever light drifted in.

Ezrah had fallen silent as well. Nkemi traced the patterns above, and turned, slowly, finding her fish-headed god. He hovered in the skies over a river; a small red-headed boy knelt on the banks, no more than the shape of a man with arms clasped in prayer. A blue fish lay on yellow sand next to him; wavy lines designated the shape of a river beyond, and six stars glinted in the sky overhead. Nkemi knew the parable – the ten gifts, the story of a galdor who had wandered the world and been blessed over and over by the gods – but the pale skin and red hair of the figure at the center were decidedly new.

The Mugrobi bowed her head, then, lips moving silently, fingers curled over Ezrah’s watch. Though I am a long way from Your Turga, Nkemi offered, silently, let me never forget Your benevolence; let me never hunger for fish when I need but ask to receive.

Ezrah began again, and Nkemi lifted her gaze to him with a smile. Her eyebrows lifted, curiously. “Expel the ghost?” She asked, wide-eyed. She extended the watch back to the Hoxian with a little smile; it was clear that it was precious to him, a memento of sorts, although Nkemi wasn’t entirely sure it was one she would have kept.

Nkemi followed Ezrah deeper into the church. There was a low hum of distant chanting, voices raised together in prayer-song. Nkemi glanced around, curious, eyes lingering on pale blue light shaded against the alcoves carved into the walls. The painted glass stories ran all around the edges of the ceiling, and the dome in the center took her breath away; Nkemi’s head tilted back, and her eyes widened.

“We do not have such places as this at home,” Nkemi said, freely; she smiled at Ezrah. “It is…” tentatively, she settled bare fingertips on one of the worship benches, glancing around. “We have many priests, of course, and temples too, but… worship is found there in one’s connection to the Gods, not one’s surroundings,” Nkemi was quiet, gaze flickering over the beautiful room once more. It was lovely, she decided, but strange too.

“Is it the ones left here that you seek to reach?” Nkemi asked, softly. She thought, with a little frown, of blood dripping from a cut, the flow of the body disrupted. “Or those who have gone where they were meant to go?”

[Ezre Vks]

Brunnhold Campus

Late Afternoon on the 34th of Dentis, 2719

"Zjai—yes. Ghosts can enter a living mind, longing for a physical body because they remember that was who they once were—because some are at least vaguely aware that is not what they are any more, what they cannot be again this side of the Afterlife. They are not meant to stay there; a living soul cannot share existence with even a piece of another. Incomplete, broken shards, ghosts cannot coexist for long in a body—those they possess becoming ill is perhaps the mildest of consequences. There are a few cases of possession lasting quite some time, but that is unusual." Inked fingers turned the watch over a few times against his scarred palm once Nkemi handed it back while Ezre's dark eyes wandered over the same stained glass windows—all of them not quite the right story, all of them shifted to fit an Anaxi perspective instead of necessarily ringing true to the original manuscripts, crumbling but clinging still to life in the libraries of Kzecka.

The Hexxos Guide spoke of possession and ghosts with an eerie level of comfort, the lack of emotion in his voice softened only by how quietly he said the words. He tucked the watch away into a pocket, leading the pair of galdori with a comfortable familiarity and an almost peaceful grace—any tsvat reminded him of home in some abstract, nostalgic way. He chose not to expand upon what else existed in addition to hungry ghosts, to restless spirits—at least unless he was asked directly, quite aware of what secrets were his to keep. He would not lie to the Subprefect, but he wasn't about to volunteer what most people just didn't need to live their lives knowing anything about. Not everyone needed to know about raen. Not when most people hardly believed in ghosts at all, let alone their whole-souled counterparts.

Thankfully, the Mugrobi woman spoke of her home, specifically of worship there and the Hoxian nodded, "The Sister Kingdoms seem to focus on the location one finds themselves in for connection instead of the individual's connection to the gods themselves. This shift in responsibility from the personal to the impersonal speaks much to the Kingdom of Anaxas' problems, if you ask me." She hadn't asked, but the dark-haired Guide wasn't entirely without opinions on the world around himself outside of the spiritual and supernatural. He agreed with her perspective, however,

"Hox has many religious organizations, many directions, many possibilities for spiritual fulfillment as well as plenty of temples and shrines, but ultimately the responsibility for relating to the gods is always on the heart of each person. We are similar, your people and mine, in that sense."

The hint of a smile passed over Ezre's face like a shadow cast by the flickering candles, and he quietly watched Nkemi's visual interest in the beautiful but aloof sense of space that the Church of the Moon seemed to impose on visitors. There was always some kind of singing that filled the space, musical prayer that held a particularly special place in the Hexxos Guide's respect for the Everine, considering so much of his own peoples' worship also included song.

He knew the hallways and alcoves after nearly three years' time in Brunnhold, and he was sure some of the veiled priesthood knew him by face and name as well—even if he could never know them in the same way—so frequent had his visits to the graves and mausoleums beneath the Church of the Moon become. The Hoxian took a quiet side passage, tracing inked fingers over the obvious sign that spoke of the Student and Faculty entrance to the Crypts (the so-called Safe and Public entrance to be used for academic research or personal mourning, only, read the sign in careful writing). He'd only made it a few steps when Nkemi breathed her question, gentle words smooth and sharp like the edge of a well-honed blade so that there was no pain in them, just the familiar warm, red blossoming.

He let the color tint his words without shame, returning in almost a whisper, pausing in front of a stairwell, wide and well-lit—the vestibule, it was called, and the term was familiar to any Clairvoyant,

"Must I seek only one path in the Cycle of life and death and everything in between? What if I want to travel as many as I can? There are those left here who need peace, who need guidance. That is my duty. There are those who have left who may have wisdom yet to know. That is my curiosity, magically speaking. I cannot choose one or the other, though I am not yet convinced it is possible to reach into the Afterlife itself when pieces of the Afterlife already end up like flotsam after a storm here on Vita." Ezre was not afraid of blood, let alone the dead, the living, or those who were stuck in between.

The alcove they stood in had several lanterns on hooks, a shelf of crued, very limited maps mostly leading to historical anecdotes and famous graves, as well as a tin of candles, a box of matches, and several other various accouterments, from clothing left behind to various items (books, food, spells, clothing, etc.) left in abstract, esoteric offering to the buried bodies of Brunnhold's long history interred beneath the Church. The Hexxos Guide didn't need a map, as he didn't entirely intend to spend long in the Crypts, unsure of even what to show Nkemi other than that they existed.

There was also a book for visitors to record their name in, and the Hoxian set about writing his name with a careful hand. While the story went that this was simply for record-keeping and curfew purposes, he was quite sure that keeping track of who was beneath the Church was also a warning: if anyone became lost where hungry ghosts wandered below, then someone would have to find them eventually. Stepping aside to allow the woman who was his responsibility to record her own name instead of embarrassing himself with its spelling, he added with comparable softness,

"I am willing to try, however—to try and see what my limitations of communication are while I am alive." His near-deadpan expression somehow still managed to border on the youthfully mischievous, and instead of reaching for a lantern or a candle, he gathered the burgeoning, airy particles of his field, mingled as they'd become with the Mugrobi woman's belike aura, and spoke a ball of light into existence with all the care of tending to some cook fire, "What about yourself, Nchemi pezjre Nchezeh? Do you believe in all that I have spoken of? Surely, you are not just humoring a student for your own entertainment."

Dark eyes twinkled with curiosity and challenge before the tattooed student turned to unbar and open the door, faint orange glow hovering between them.

[Nkemi pezre Nkese]

Late Afternoon, 34 Dentis, 2719
The Church of the Moon

Nkemi listened, intent and curious, to Ezrah’s explanation of supernatural things. It was his confidence she noticed; he spoke as simply and clearly as if he were explaining arithmetic to her, or the basics of a scrying spell, with a deep seriousness that she could hear even through the still mask of his rhakor. Incomplete, broken shards, Ezrah said, and Nkemi thought of an odd, cool hand nestled in hers, and gleaming lamplight on a smile that gleamed white through skin.

Nkemi had not been afraid, then; she was not afraid, still, now. She had been an outgoing, friendly child; she had befriended goats and historians alike, given the chance. And, too, she had had a sense – as she understood, now, most children did – of who was worth befriending. Something had happened in the phasmonia; something had happened that had left her lying on the path; something must have. But Nkemi would not have spoken any guesses aloud, even hesitant; she still did not know what to guess.

This shift of responsibility, Ezrah said, from the personal to the impersonal. Nkemi glanced around at the beautiful hall, awash in lights of all shades, and up once more at the impossibly high dome. She smiled back at Ezrah, and offered no opinions of her own; she was a visitor to Anaxas, and a new one at that, and to offer disagreement seemed to much a lie; to offer agreement, though, felt oddly presumptuous.

“I should be curious to see such temples,” Nkemi offered, cheerfully, against a backdrop of haunting song. “But only if they are not covered in snow,” she grinned at Ezrah, brightly. The other student painted a pleasant, vivid picture of the idea of worship in Hox; Nkemi agreed that it seemed to resemble more closely the temples and worship of her own people. She missed them, still; she poured the Haras’turga, sometimes, to herself, whispering quiet prayers as water from a sink faucet overflowed her hands, cupping it and letting it tumble to the earth, splashing differently every time. She reminded herself that Hulali flowed through all waters, that His kindness and mercy were here in Anaxas every bit as much as at home.

“It is not the place,” Nkemi agreed, very quietly, a little delayed. “But the person,” she smiled at Ezrah.

There was fervor in Ezrah’s voice when he answered her question; there was something intent. My duty, he called it; my curiosity, too. Nkemi looked around the little alcove, listening; she went to the maps, studying the shape of the crypts, settling it into her head to fill in later. There were crude paths drawn across them, tracing intended shapes and journeys through the darkness below.

Nkemi, too, bent carefully over the record-keeping. Ezre Vks, she read, carefully, and grinned. Nkemi pezre Nkese, she wrote, just as carefully.

Nkemi rose back up, smiling at Ezrah; the light cast a pale orange glow over his skin, and hers too; she felt the warmth and the light against her face. Do you believe, Ezrah asked.

Nkemi’s eyebrows lifted, curiously. “I do not think you a liar,” Nkemi said, looking at Ezrah, thoughtful, and then through the door down into the darkness below.

“I would no sooner claim to know the sands of the desert,” Nkemi said, following Ezrah down the first of the steps; the light between them glowed, twined in the midst of their comfortably mingled fields, “than to know all the mysteries of Vita. And I have long wished to make sense of that which I experienced as a girl, however impossible it might be; there are things which cannot be explained, but – perhaps – not all things are so.”

"I would like to know more," Nkemi said, over the sound of their footsteps against the stone steps, "however much I can hold between my hands."

[Ezre Vks]

Brunnhold Campus

Late Afternoon on the 34th of Dentis, 2719

"Iregret to inform you that Hox, especially the mountain cities like Kzecka, is under snow for most of the year. We have a short, cold summer, but sometimes, it still snows." He replied in returned amusement, unable to apologize for the frigid weather of his homeland. In places where the hot magma blood of Bash ran closest to the surface or where one was nestled in the taiga forests, the frozen layers didn't last as long as when one climbed higher into the spine of the world, into the rugged black-rock mountains.

Nkemi agreed at least in sentiment, though whether she agreed in full or not was hardly an issue to the Hexxos Guide. There were many spiritual paths that seemed to somehow converge in the end, and he simply could not bring himself to follow each one back to its source and sift through its validity. The Mugrobi woman certainly seemed to have her heart in the right place, and so he had no interest in dissuading her otherwise.

Dark eyes watched the subprefect examine the map with the kind of studiousness he'd expect after her demonstration, "That is but a part of the whole. There are many parts of the Crypts that have been closed, whether by the passage of time or on purpose to keep curious bodies far away from their contents." He spoke with that level tone of experience, admitting without saying so directly that he'd explored places he wasn't allowed to go and seen things he most likely shouldn't have seen.

Kindling magical light to life and leading them down a set of well-kept steps, Ezre couldn't help but chuckle at Nkemi's way of saying yes. He understood, vaguely, how much emphasis her people put on honor and honesty, and so he smiled, warm and accepting, at her declaration that he most likely not a liar.

He wasn't.

This was all very personal truth for the temple-raised, raen-born Hoxian, and yet instead of sharing untruths, he simply chose the path with less detail to keep himself from the temptation to share too much, too soon.

"Without being there and with so little to go on, I cannot tell your whole story with a definite conclusion. I can only venture a guess." He admitted, an edge of curiosity in the quiet spaces left between sharply accented consonants of his words, "You were either nearly possessed and in your innocent way resisted or you were actually possessed and the ghost left your consciousness of its own accord. Both are rare, but some ghosts seem to maintain a level of sentience and parts of their personality when others do not. Individuals, even in unlife. It is a mystery, and definitely a jar full of sand all its own."

He nodded in acknowledgement of her metaphor, hardly able to argue with the idea that Vita was full of things that were strange, unknown, and as-yet unseen. Even though some of what was known was still poorly documented, he felt the burden of not knowing keenly. It weighed heavily on him like a fur mantle worn in Ophus against the breath-stealing temperatures of his home or like the near-immovable force of a corpse no longer filled with a soul, rigid and still.

Ezre paused at the bottom of the steps, the change in temperature one he was used to, and attempted to decide where, exactly, he was even leading them on this unconventional tour.

He was quite sure none of his Clairvoyant professors would be pleased.

"Some things cannot be held by mortal hands, no matter how willing, but our hands can always hold a candle to illuminate the path for others to follow with greater understanding." The Hexxos Guide murmured thoughtfully, dark eyes drifting to his tattooed digits before he raised one hand and swept it across the hallway they stood in, decorated with relief carvings of the history of Brunnhold,

"There are great works of past Scryers buried in mausoleums, as well as works of sorcerers of all disciplines of study, some of which are actually built like libraries meant to be visited in strange Anaxi fashion. Deeper still, whispering in the dark beyond the better-traveled paths in these Crypts, are a few restless spirits. I have, without much empirical success, attempted to make magical contact with them before, though I am not sure they are capable of being a proper witness. I have, admittedly, also met a few in person. Spells like your map-making one would be most interesting down here."

Palms open, the always-fading scars on them visible in the ruddy glow of his light spell, the upkeep of which hummed in the back of his thoughts like a fistful of flies, Ezre arched a delicate brow,

"What sand can I pour into your cupped hands during this unauthorized exploration of Brunnhold's most unseen, Nkchemi?"

[Nkemi pezre Nkese]

Late Afternoon, 34 Dentis, 2719
The Church of the Moon

Nkemi let out a tiny, horrified gasp at Ezrah’s description of Hoxian summers, wide-eyed, but still grinning. She shivered, as unable to fathom it as she guessed the Hoxian must be the long, dry heat of Mugrobi summers, the days when the world itself seemed to be hot enough to melt, and heat shimmered from every surface smooth enough to reflect. Just now, bundled up inside the surprisingly cold church, Nkemi thought of such miserable days with a deep and fervent longing.

“It is hard to imagine,” Nkemi conceded. “I suppose it is very lovely,” she offered, although there was the faintest hint of skepticism in her voice, as if to say she was doubtful that any loveliness could be worth the price.

Nkemi was well aware of the implications in Ezrah’s carefully even tone. But she was a prefect of Thul Ka, and not an administrator of Brunnhold nor the Church of the Moon. Nkemi weighed her obligations carefully, thoughtfully, and decided even if Ezrah had spoken more directly, she would have no obligation to chastise or reprimand. She did not wish to, in any case, and she did not quite see how she could have done so honestly.

“I do not…” Nkemi’s words were a careful breath. “I cannot say I understand even the tiniest part of what I experienced,” Nkemi said, honestly, quiet. “I am hesitant even to speculate, for it implies much that…” she had stopped on the cold steps; her breath clouded the air. Slowly, Nkemi began again, her footsteps careful on the well-kept stairs.

“I understand that the experience harmed me,” Nkemi said, carefully. She felt the sharpness of the cold damp air of the crypts, tingling against her cheeks; she followed Ezrah to the bottom, and stood beside him, looking up at him with the light tingling against her cheeks, the darkness pressing in close all around. “I understand that there was something in that place which wished me ill, or else which harmed me in the seeking of its own desires, as you say such fragments may do,”

“I can only say that I was never afraid of her,” Nkemi said, solemnly, “and that I am not now. That I – I struggle to believe she would have harmed me. Perhaps you will tell me ghosts are known to be so; perhaps this is common. I cannot speak to anything but what I experienced – what I remembered, what I felt and what I still feel.”

Ezrah spoke, again, in time; he lifted his hand and the light and it washed over the relief carvings. Nkemi’s breath caught, softly; the hidden beauty in the darkness struck her even more deeply than the brilliant windowpanes above. She went to the wall; she ran the edges of her fingertips over the stone with the lightest possible touch, tracing the erecting of the enormous wall which ran around the outside of the campus. It was cool, and a little soft beneath her fingertips, worn down by the passage of time, the draft of cool air and - perhaps, Nkemi thought, the questing of other curious fingers, over the years.

Nkemi was smiling, brilliant and wide, as she turned back to Ezrah and closed the space to him once more, listening intently. Restless spirits, he said, and Nkemi thought the glint in his eye was not only the lantern light. He lifted his palms, and Nkemi noticed again the smooth raised lines that crossed them, and understood, for the first time, what led to such shapes.

Ezrah asked where she wanted to go. Nkemi grinned at him, the light glinting off the hopeful arch of his eyebrow. She weighed the cool dark and her own curiosities, and the dangers which she understood. “Perhaps we may visit the crypts of the Scryers, Ezrah-shi?” Nkemi asked. “But you know better than I the mysteries of this place; I would not like to tell you how best to guide me.” She grinned a little more, fully aware of the sort of encouragement the enthusiastic young student of the dead might have hoped for, and not yet quite decided whether or not to grant it.

[Ezre Vks]

Brunnhold Campus

Late Afternoon on the 34th of Dentis, 2719

"The views from the spine of the world are unrivaled on clear nights, in my opinion, of course: the stars, the auroras, and the moons. I am sure they are lovely from the desert, too." Ezre smirked at the Mugrobi woman's mockery of horror, aware that the thought of so much snow and ice was indeed intimidating to most who weren't born in the high-altitude, volcano-crafted cradle of Hox. Perhaps a few Giorans understood, but who wanted to ask the reclusive, dark-dwelling barbarians anyway?

"Nkemi, I cannot say that every ghost or displaced spirit or other spiritual anomaly's intentions are always malicious. They are lost, confused, and broken, but even as echoes of their former selves, they were once whole people. They remember bits and pieces of who they were but are often stuck reliving one defining moment. They are lonely, I think. They long for the warmth of their body, hence why they become hungry for others' bodies instead. They may not always want to harm the living, but they also may grow jealous, angry, and bitter. They may wish to seek revenge on what they can no longer have. I do not think that possessions are documented as truth often enough to be able to separate the legends from the facts. That is to say: sometimes established literature is overthrown by the actual experience. At least, in my personal reference I find this to be the case." The Hexxos Guide replied gently, insisting that perhaps there were plenty of reasons that the subprefect was not necessarily as injured or ill as she could have been. He shrugged, narrow shoulders rising and falling in the shadows cast by his glowing orb, looking away to the walls while Nkemi slipped away to touch them. He watched her hands run over stone, sifting through his thoughts, weighing just how revealing he could be about all he knew.

"I am not afraid of ghosts, either, regardless of my contact with them. This summer after my possession, some friends and I confronted powerful lingering spirits in Brunnhold's East Garden, and while there was an element of healthy fear at the dangers they presented in their wish to cause harm, I was not alone in facing them. There are—"

He paused, glancing upward into the dark, glancing toward the reliefs of the building of great red walls even while he tried to decide which of his own he could tear down in the Mugrobi woman's company,

"—there are a variety of displaced spiritual entities with a variety of sapience, sentience, and abilities. I cannot tell you why, I can only say that while all present a danger in different ways, only some are truly dangerous."

Even raen were dangerous.

He knew this truth, but he could not bring himself to say it out loud.

"Even so, it is possible to keep ghosts at bay with Clairvoyant warding. The long memory of the mona as well as its strange objection to unlife allows the manipulation of monic behavior around paranormal entities of all kinds. It does not always go as planned, however." Ezre added, quietly. There may have even been the flicker of a smirk there on his delicate features. It could have been a trick of the warm, dull glow of his light spell, also, as if for a moment he'd broken his own concentration on the upkeep. The dark-haired guide chuckled softly before he began walking,

"Once you have made contact with a ghost, the connection is always there unless the ghost is destroyed. That connection is two-way: the ghost can seek out the living it has met."

He paused, clearing his throat because his voice wavered—not with worry, but with experience. He'd been responsible for such destruction before without knowing whether the spirits he brought his Order's brand of mercy to were ever granted the peace of returning to the Cycle or the nothingness of no longer even existing at all. One inked hand rubbed a tattooed wrist, remembering clearly the grip of a ghost through his aquamancy equipment in the East Garden, "The mona, regardless of how they object to the existence of things not meant to be outside the Cycle, still maintain that signature of contact. It could be the ghost you met still exists, though they are entropic creatures, worn away by the mona. Have you never—have you tried—did you ever visit the same place in Serkaih?"

The Hoxian nodded at Nkemi's suggestion, ruminating on her choice of words and considering this now very off-track sort of tour. If it could even be called a tour at all, really. This was not exactly the kind of Guidance he'd been raised into the expectations of, but the joke wasn't lost on the Hexxos, regardless of whether or not amusement warmed his otherwise deadpan, tattooed face. His thoughts might have even drifted back to her demonstration in the classroom, mingling like their belike fields in his mind as he considered all he knew about what—or who—existed in the Crypts.

"That is a good place to start, zjai, but I have an idea." Something glimmered in his dark eyes before he turned down a mausoleum-lined hall, something both mischievous and curious. It was Ezre's turn to run inked fingers over well-kept plaques with the names of long-dead Magisters and famous Brunnholdian legends, their likenesses in busts or their fame forever etched into barred doors containing their remains. In his ninth year of study, the mortuary sciences student knew how bodies were interred in Anaxas, knew their corpses had been carefully embalmed and dressed, knew the cold Crypt temperatures kept their bodies often far more covered in flesh than most realized. He knew how their hair kept growing and their nails. He knew how down here, with only a rare pest or two, centuries of death still looked much like it did in life, just a little more sallow, a little more sunken in, rotting so slowly alongside libraries of their memoirs and most influential works, favorite personal items and family heirlooms.

He sighed, watching a cloud of his own breath disappear in the light of his spell, having memorized much of the route—through an archway, down half a flight of stairs, into an antechamber with four branches, to the left, and into a wide, circular with an actually usable large stone cauldron in the middle, filled perhaps from carefully laid pipes or an underground spring: the Clairvoyant Crypts. It was empty. Other equipment graced the walls in stone alcoves, labeled as if ready for class. The oculus-like ceiling, domed above them, was decorated in fresco scenes of peeling reference to various methods of scrying and warding. The floor was tiled by hand and the faded marks of spell circles for centuries could still be seen on them.

Others had cast here before.

Others would after them.

"I know of at least one ghost in the less-traveled Crypts a far walk from here. I am sure it is still down there, but, unfortunately, I have left my notebook of maps copied from the Library in my dormitory." Ezre smiled, bright and warm, glancing into the old stone aquamancy cauldron with a mockery of a studious gaze,

"Maybe the tour you did not know you needed is more experimental than previously assumed?"