Heirot

Soran glanced at the relatively still waters, knowing that her point was a good one. But really, how bad could it be? "I won't swim far. If I get disoriented, I'll call for you, and your voice can guide me back. Like a lighthouse," he said, making sure to keep his tone optimistic.

Mizuki squirmed at the idea. She'd be alone on this, "shore", while he went swimming and potentially putting himself in danger. Again. This was becoming a bad habit.

"Your clothes will weigh you down." she started saying, knowing full well exactly what she was saying. She didn't care. That wasn't important. "It'll be too much since you're already not a strong swimmer." She flinched when she moved to sit better on the ledge.

Soran looked down at himself. He'd thrown his coat off in the water, his boots had gone toward Mizuki's cast, as had most of his shirt... He grudgingly pulled off what was left of his tunic and set the soaked fabric on the rock next to Mizuki. Then he looked at his black pants. They were all he really had left, although the idea of swimming around naked in a cave full of unknown challenges was rather unsettling. But they would drag him down, moreso than any of the others would have. He sighed and undid his fly, pulling the drenched fabric off his legs. It clung to him every step of the way, but after a lot of hopping and splashing, he managed to rid himself of the garment. That left him in the buff. Not that he was self conscious, but it did feel vulnerable and exposed without fabric over that area. He frowned as he gripped the pants with both hands and gave them a sound tug, ripping the pant leg off at the knee. He repeated the motion to wreck the other leg as well. Lamenting the destruction of the fabric, he pulled his newly created shorts back on and fastened the fly.

"I'll be back soon," he said to Mizuki, stepping back down into the deeper water. He began a very clumsy side stroke toward the point where the 'cove' they were in rounded a bend, hoping he could find some sort of exit along the edge of the cave. It was too dark to see much, especially with water in his eyes, but the dull blue luminescence of the mushrooms in the stone lent enough light for him to understand his surroundings as he paddled through the black water.

Mizuki watched him go. An odd mix of worry and calm knowing confusing her thoughts and nauseating her stomach. What had happened back there? Why were her powers so mute? Yes, smashing a man's skull into rock then later slicing a man's throat messed her psyche . But her powers becoming next to null? A side effect from that magic fog? She didn't know. There could even be something here that was blocking her powers into a dimness.

She closed her eyes and rolled her head back gently on the rock she leaned on. "Just relax," she told herself. "Everything may have addled you too much."

OOC: I'm sorry for disappearing! I bought a house : )


Soran swam clumsily away from Mizuki until her rock had grown tiny in the distance behind him. The elf stayed relatively close to the wall of the cavern, eventually following it around a bend that blocked off his view of Mizuki. He paused for a moment to tread water clumsily, studying this next cove. He saw no sign of a foothold or cave along its edge, and the next bend in the cavern wall was far ahead. It made him wonder if he should turn back, but what good would it do to return without finding anything? They could sit together on that rock and die of exposure, or he could keep swimming.

Making his choice, he took measure of the strength he thought he had left and continued swimming, abandoning the wall this time to make a straight line through deeper water toward the next cove and whatever was in it.

It was, if it was possible, farther than it looked. Soran's swimming never became graceful, but he did get the hand of an awkward sidestroke that at least kept him afloat and directed him where he intended to go. It was a huge waste of energy, though, and after the nearly twenty minutes it took him to reach his targeted location, his body was feeling it. He paddled to the rock wall and found a weak grip on it, pausing to catch his breath and regain the feeling in his arms.

He wondered if Mizuki was still safe. He had yet to see a sign of life in the cave, even underwater. Turning, he looked beyond into the shoreline that was revealed to him now. This time, he saw something of interest. A short, flat outcropping of rock jutted from the wall, and he saw what appeared to be a cave mouth behind it. That looked extremely promising. Ten minutes later, he'd made it to the spot and pulled himself up onto the mercifully dry rock. Panting, he staggered up onto his waterlogged legs and walked to inspect the cave.

The first thing he noticed when his eyes adjusted to the darked light in the cave was a canoe, and not a normal one. It sat along the cave wall just out of sight from the sea beyond, and it appeared to be carved out of an unfamiliar dark wood. The sides were extremely low, and the rogue mused that whatever used the craft had to be either extremely agile or freakishly lightweight.

The second thing he noticed was a damp rag being pulled over his face by someone standing behind him, a scent that reminded him of fruit and alcohol driving into his lungs as he instinctively gasped. Then he found himself blind before he felt the rest of his body go numb.

* * * *

About half an hour later, a dark canoe with two lithe, pitch-skinned passengers glided with absolute stealth through the waters toward Mizuki's location. They made careful note of the apparently resting girl, cutting through the black water like unseen ghosts until they were mere yards away. One passenger gave the other a signal and lifted a spear with an obsidian head quietly from the base of the canoe. He stood up in the craft and stepped nimbly up onto the rock behind Mizuki, making faint patters on the stone with his bare feet. Dropping all measures of stealth, he ran the rest of the way to her and stopped several feet away. Standing about Soran's height, the dark-skinned man pointed his spear at the woman's head.

"Arai pith sun nael bek!" he demanded of her. He voice was low and clear.

He frightened her. So much. Being so weak in power she had barely sensed him in time, and she fell backwards while turning to face him. She landed on her broken wrist.

"Ahhhg!!" She cried, trying to stifle it unsuccessfully. She panted. So much pain.

"Arai pith sun nael bek!" he demanded of her. He voice was low and clear. 'What?' she thought. She didn't understand that. How was she supposed to? Finally, she looked at him. Really looked at him. Dark skinned, pointed ears, a physic like an elf's... Her vision from before popped back into her mind. She just had no idea what they were exactly.

"I... Don't know, what did you say?" she helplessly tried to communicate. She had never heard this dialect before, who were these people? It seemed to aggravate the man before and she flinched back, afraid of a strike.

The man frowned and raised an eyebrow at her. "Yael gin be som nae shen," he said loudly without taking his eyes off of her, apparently talking to his partner in the boat.

The other figure, whose shock white hair was pulled back into a complicated series of braids along his scalp, gave what sounded like a quiet agreement and raised his hands up and together. His lips moved silently, and when he stopped whatever he was doing, he lowered his hands to his sides. "Gei," he prompted the man in front of Mizuki.

He narrowed his eyes, which were a deep purple against the blackness of his fine-boned face. "We found your Arai'sith. This is our Matron's territory. You are trespassing," he said firmly with an unidentifiable accent. He shook his head slightly to throw a stray lock of long white hair back behind his shoulder. It drifted back stubbornly, and he didn't fuss with it further. He seemed almost nervous.

"My... what? Arai...?" She attempted to pronounce it but failed, miserably actually. Then it hit her. 'Soran!' "What did you do to him! I have no idea who your Matron is! We just fell." She pointed towards the hole in what would be the cave's ceiling. "Fell." She said again, trying to make them understand. She winced again as her wrist throbbed from the overuse.

The man looked up where she pointed, very quickly, as if wary of taking his eyes off her for too long. He studied her for a long moment. "Now that you are here, it is the same. You will come," he said, not seeming to like the feel of Ighten's language on his lips. He gestured toward the boat.

No power in which to even attempt to manipulate their minds, wounded and in a precarious situation with Soran having been captured, Mizuki complied. She got up to her feet, rather difficultly, then walked submissively to the boat. She couldn't even begin to know exactly how dangerous these people were. She didn't even know who they were. Had no inkling of how to deal with them.

How dependent she had become on her seer power.

The canoe was somewhat precarious, and the two men waited almost respectfully for her to find her seat and balance herself. They didn't move to push or rush her; in fact, they didn't touch her at all. When she was settled, they both sat down, the long-haired one who had spoken to her sitting behind her. The spear had been returned to the base of the boat and she sat in relative safety between them as they began rowing across the still water. Either they didn't expect to need a weapon against her, or they weren't willing to use one.

Mizuki was silent for a long while. Just letting them take her to whatever it was that awaited her now. She listened to the splash of the water as the boat moved. Even without her power, she could sense the men's hesitant behavior. Had she been in a better state, she could've taken advantage of it.

"Where... is the, my Arai'sith...?" She attempted the word to the best of her ability. She believed that the word meant Soran, hopefully she was right.

"Our Matron keeps him, until your meeting," the man behind her spoke. "It would be best to offer him to her," he added, cautiously, as if this was something he was not supposed to say.

A spark of fury ignited. "No! He is mine!" The response was automatic, like she knew it was what she should say. If Soran heard that...

She sneered at the two men taking her to their 'Matron', cradling her injured wrist. She needed to get her powers back, now. This was getting worse by the moment. She could already tell that a fight was in order to keep Soran safe. She was in no condition for that. She prayed that her son and the others had made it to safety. This was going to be... a long delay for them.

The man seemed to draw back at the severity of her voice, but he looked disapproving. "You seem to be injured. You are unlikely to survive a Partekh in your state. It is customary for the weaker matron to make an offering in exchange for the stronger's protection."