Xilanada - Descending Dark Of Past And Future/Part 15

The wind drifted through the halls of the School. The wind was sly and careful and it disturbed nothing in its passing. For the stray wanderer this late at night, the wind was something to wonder at and perhaps some windows were checked needlessly.

Being the wind was necessary, though. For Sen was hunting.

Even now, Xilanada lay in the infirmary and his failure to protect her gnawed at him. How many times would this sin come back and haunt him? How many times would his commitment be mocked by fate? The questions turned in his mind ceaselessly, even as he wandered the halls ceaselessly.

Realistically, he wasn't going to stumble over someone up to no good. The School was large and many plots could come and go without even his notice. Already, he'd learned much that he should have come upon sooner. Xilanada was distracting him. His duty to his House, to Father, gnawed at him too. There had never been a conflict before now but he was starting to realize that he could not love both woman and family equally.

Sen passed a teenage pair too deeply engrossed in each other to even remark on the wind. The sight might have once made him chuckle, bringing back welcome memories of the Blessed Isle and being among a people liberal enough to enjoy life. Once, Sen might have been annoyed yet again at the prudish ways of even a cosmopolitan yet dirty little city like Nexus.

Right now, all he could think about was Xilanada's blood and how much there'd been all over her.

Ava had a plan but she was still working on it, the last he'd heard. The truth was, he hadn't been able to stand idly by, waiting. It left him with nothing to do but to dwell on those thoughts. Even now, his once-betrothed was probably about her little plot and he was...out looking for a miracle. The sensible side of him told him that Ava's approach would work better but tonight was not a night to be sensible.

Crimson Laughter weighed his hand down but he couldn't put it aside or sheath it. A deep restlessness had stirred in him and he felt an energy he couldn't dispel. The need to do something, anything, was making a fool of him yet still he was the wind.

| From the looks of you, Sen, you're in a killing mood. What did I teach you about controlling your anger? |

For a moment, he thought it had been his own thought...but he didn't talk to himself in the third person. It seemed familiar, too, but he couldn't see the source. Who was that? It was someone Sen hadn't heard in a long time yet he knew that slightly rough sound, the brusque voice that sounded like it had been meant for shouting but instead laughed whenever possible.

He didn't pause to dwell further, instead slipping to a doorway to narrow down the avenues he could be approached.

| Good instincts, kid. You were good before you came to the Heptagram though. It didn't take much to draw out your skill. |

That voice! Was it a Hearthstone? Who was that? Why couldn't he remember?

| Enough play. We need to talk. |

A man stepped from thin air, just down the hall. If Sen hadn't been looking right at him, he would have sworn it impossible yet there he was. If that was invisibility, it was a type he'd never seen before.

The man was as young as any Exalt and he walked like a warrior. His face would have seemed grim, if not for the mirth on it. His lips twitched like he was having trouble not laughing.

Sen knew how that felt. The intruder wore something that could only be called fashion in the seedier circles of the Dynasty. A wide silver hat shaded his face, the same color of the overly embroidered vest and breeches he wore. A just darker-shade of silver made up the velvety cloak that trailed behind him. All that might have matched, if not for the fact that the man was wearing yellow boots.

Very bright, improbably yellow boots.

The man twirled about, flourishing his cloak and he took a deep courtly bow, doffing his hat. Long silver hair, just a shade lighter than the clothing, spilled about his shoulders. The total effect might have looked grand but it was just a little too overdone. Especially the boots.

"What do you think?" The intruder looked directly at him, despite his concealment.

"You must be joking," Sen said, emerging from the wind. "I'd cut you down right now, if I thought I could stop laughing long enough to make a clean hit." He was certainly laughing. Whatever powers the fop bore, it was hard to take someone dressed like that seriously.

"Oh, I'm hurt!" the intruder protested. "Or would be if you'd stop laughing, no? Come, Sen, what's a joke between friends? I hope you can still call me such. I certainly do you."

"Sorry, we've met before?" Sen asked, still chuckling. He kept Crimson Laughter out, the red-jade knife hot in his hand and ready to kill if it came to it. If the stranger thought Sen distracted, he might try an ambush and then this would be over that much sooner.

"Well, it depends on what you mean by 'we'. I've met you, it's true, even if you haven't met me. I'm E'lial, the present Officer of Imperial Security. Yes, that places me in charge of the Legion of Silence, among other things, and no, we don't know each other. But it wasn't too many decades ago that I was a teacher known as the Scarlet Rain."

Sen's mind reeled in memory. The Scarlet Rain, of course. One of his old Heptagram Professors. But, by Hesiesh, what was he doing here? And why did he look...so unfamiliar? No, come to think of it, Scarlet Rain had always had that silver hair and that face. Strange. Really strange.

"What, not even a hug? A hello? Too busy laughing I suppose. Well, that's alright, I'll let you laugh. I'm sure you don't do it much, what with what passes for entertainment in this dismal vice-ridden city."

E'lial grinned and held out his hand. Sen stepped forward and shook it eagerly, finding himself still smiling. The Scarlet Rain! He hadn't expected to see any of his old teachers again.

"So what brings you to it?" Sen chuckled. "You can't tell me you traveled thousands of miles just to pay a call on an old student. Or are you so desperate for practice? I'll wager a jade bar that I can take you in a knife fight now."

"No, no," E'lial said, waving dismissively. "No, that's alright, no need to beat up on your old teacher. ...I'm rich enough anyway but tell me, kid, this is a nice School, how long have you been here?"

"Oh, about 7 years," Sen said absently, glancing about the hall. "We started having the place built about 10 years ago, of course, but it was finished enough to open 7 years ago and here I've been ever since. When I'm here, that is."

E'lial gave him a knowing grin and an exaggerated wink. The Professor had always been eccentric, Sen remembered. Why had recalling him been so difficult?

"Never marked you for a teacher, Sen. Not bad, though. Good institution. Not the Heptagram but what is?"

"Wherever you learned your Sorcery," Sen retorted at once, smiling when E'lial's cheery face frowned. "I'm not prying, old man. Didn't do any good before, did it?"

"Ah, Sen. You are good. So tell me, are you going to leave the only one who could thump sense into your head standing out here in the hall or are you going to invite me to what passes for a civilized lounge in this barbaric city? I could stand a stiff drink and so could you."

"I'm fine, E'lial," Sen said, remembering what he'd been doing up until now. Strangely, that frantic mood was gone. "I'm in the middle of something, though. Where are you staying? Or can I put you up here for the night?"

"Sen, what you're up to can wait. Do you know how I know? It's very simple. You've got women trouble." E'lial theatrically sprawled against a wall and yawned at what must have been bafflement on Sen's face. Annoyed, Sen sheathed Crimson Laughter up his sleeve.

"It's more than trouble with women, old man. A Professor was almost killed earlier tonight."

"I know," E'lial said. The matter-of-fact tone almost caused Sen to pass over what he'd just said, until its implications struck him. "Yes, I knew it'd happen too. And yes, it had to happen. Just put that out of your mind, kid."

Sen's knuckles went white as he made fists. The forgotten frustration stung him like a hot ember. He glared at his old teacher.

"Just like everything else I saw at the Heptagram? Everything else I'm supposed to forget? Even you, it seems. I almost didn't remember you at all. How many remember the Scarlet Rain? Is that more star-magic?"

"Can't say," E'lial said, shrugging nonchalantly. "Wouldn't do you any good if I did. Eventually, you'd forget or you'd die and the knowledge would die with you. So what does it matter, really? I know what I know. What I know was good enough for you back on the Blessed Isle. It's not anymore?"

"I'm older than I was then," Sen said quietly. "I'm not the undisciplined boy you taught to fight. I'm not even the Sorcerer you trained in battle magics. I'm Tepet Ajalat Sen, Sorcerer-Assassin of House Tepet. I've been on indefinite loan to Father for the past few years but I had a place and will have one again when I return. I'm older."

"Yes you are," E'lial chuckled. "I wish I'd brought my apprentice. Runic Isolation needs to learn a lot of what you already know. Ah, it wasn't meant to be. Maybe you two will meet later. Probably make you feel better to see a Sidereal just learning to walk. You're stronger than you know, Sen."

"I know my strength," Sen snapped. "And this conversation is a distraction. For all I resent those Oaths and the Bindings placed on me, I do like you. Scarlet Rain is someone I've always looked up to and I would love a chance to catch up with him. But I have people to find tonight."

"You're not going to," E'lial said, yawning again and looking bored. "Take my word for it. I mean it."

"Did the stars tell you that too?" Sen said with ire.

"Something better, something you'll get eventually too. It's called experience." E'lial tapped the side of his head and grinned in that stupidly endearing way he always had. "I know you're not a boy anymore, Sen, but all of us are foolish when it comes to love. It makes us do crazy things. Like wander the halls of our own School, on the incredibly remote chance of running across something suspicious. You've got quite an education and you're very good at subterfuge. Tell me professionally, Sen. Is this the way a spy and assassin finds information?"

"No, it's not," Sen sighed. It would have helped if he'd been able to keep his temper but it seemed impossible to stay angry around the silly teacher. Even knowing that the man was one of a secret band of Anathema with its fingers in every level of Dynastic politics.

"So, how about that drink?" E'lial wagged his eyebrows, looking desperately interested at the idea of some liquor. Sen reluctantly smiled and cocked his head behind him.

"Follow me, old man."