A Gray Future [Private]

[Eraisuithon Gil'dae]

Pontius 13

Ilista please, more people welcome.. PM for invite

Eraisuithon knew it was foolish to dawdle given the circumstances but yet he couldn't quite muster up the resolve to pull himself away. The elf stood fully erect on the harbor pier, hands clasped behind his back and his sapphire eyes as tumultuous as the churning waters that he examined. The bay roared with life below him and the tides lapped against the quayside viciously cold and irreverent. Further down the pier and sitting motionless on the adjacent cobblestone road a black carriage awaited his return, the horses idly shifting in spot while the driver had resorted to reading the latest Herald article to pass the time, while clutching his jacket closer to his body to keep warm. Angry gray clouds blotted out the suns as chill winds swept the city and a drop of rain fell from the gloomy sky as if to warn of the impending rain.

The Thane had found that among his chief duties, thinking was one of the most important and the most engaged in. The mantle of leadership, so quickly thrust upon him had been so heavy for the first few cycles, but alike his early cycles as senior aedile he had fallen into a rhythm when it came to the doing the brightening-to-brightening duties of a Thane. But thinking, calculating the big moves and discerning the big things, that was where great amounts of time went. Plotting the future was his greatest and certainly most challenging duty, and seeing that Imperia meet the future strong and capable for anything that it could throw at him was paramount.

Coordinating his private and public duties and goals was challenging as Lord Protector, but the gap between the two things was closing. The elf could not help but feel as if the gray city that he had inherited was destined to be his home, not just a stop on the trip to political success before he stepped up to do something else. Everything he could ever want could be obtained in Imperia with a fight. It could be his kingdom, it could be his fief. He had been left with more than the average Thane to accomplish his goals and dreams, and he would not squander it. Telath was changing and he had found a niche to cling to, to survive what was happening, ride out the storm and flourish.

Imperia was his city. His bastion of power and influence, and he would either see it succeed or die, because he and the city were one, he would become Imperia and Imperia would become him. Imperia would be his.

[Ilista]

There was at least one soul, if any in the entire city of Imperia that loved the dark cast days, the chill in the air, the bite of the wind, and the thrashing of the waves. It was the promise of the storm that sped the teleras’ steps as she left the Blessed Icons, not toward home with the safety, and warmth there, but to the sea, to see the grey waters churning, and the blue sky darkening. If she had but one truly selfish indulgence that was all her own, it would be this.

Ilista swam near the surface, she wanted to feel the tug and pushing of the waves, they were growing, but still weak below the surface, but here, she was carried, tossed and cradled, one with each wave that swelled up beneath her, and returned to the sea with every crash. She had no power but her vessel, she had no magic, no coin, not even her own name if others willed it so, had not her own life if one found it no longer served use. Yet the sea elf accepted that, understood that, was empowered by it, she lived her life as she lived with the sea, its crashing waves did not harm her, its strength and rage did not distress her, she was one with it, flowing with it, harnessing its power for her own.

She accepted her Mistress and her Keeper, lived with them very much like as she did the churning waters, to her delight and dismay. Their crushing hungers did not harm her, she looked to their strengths and rages like the calm, and yielding springs, accepting, as she moved with their moods like through the waters she was immersed. It was as likely that Ilista could lead the pair from the darkness they dwelt, as much as she could lead them to the bottom of the sea floor. She would not simply survive in the darkness that in which they dwelt, but be of it and blossom. But would she be but a bright, gentle flower in the cave of night, delicate and meek, or poisonous to taste.

Her thoughts flowed and changed with the waters, as her body rose and fell with each growing wave, her body ached in some corner of her mind, but every tired muscle was looked upon with affection as one might do from a lovers’ amorous embrace. The waves brought the Ilista back to the docks, to a place she did not recall before. Yet this is where the waves pushed her, and who was she to argue yet?

Hands the color of warm sands reached out from the churning sea, and gripped wooden planks of the pier. Followed by a head covered with waves that floated still in the waters grip of charcoal and streaking sea greens. Ilista began to pull her form for the waters embrace; the sea seemed so reluctant to release its child even as it pushed at her form like an urging mother. As Ilista raised half in and half out and above the churning sea a form caught her eyes, and the gaze of gold upon black orbs were curious. For upon the harbor pier a lone elf stood looking back out at the sea, hair and eyes, as dark as pitch and blue as deep waters. Yet despite being alone or on the pier, this elf did not have the look of a sailor she had seen on these waters, Ilista was not exactly like many others, the woman had a way of thinking both complex yet simple. Justly put, it seemed the more clothing a person wore, the higher their wealth and status was in many causes.

To see, to speak to another elf had once been something to take delight in, a distant cousin far from the world she lived. Yet after so long, so much, the telera allowed the sea to pull her back. She was curious this was true for most air breathers fled at the thought of a storm, yet this one stood there, as if challenging it. The sea elfs’ soaked form sank back into the water leaving but her head and hands upon the pier in sight, it would be no hardship to swim to another, or to even out wait the male elf until the rains came pouring from the sky, or simply slip back beneath the water and its waves.

Ah, but still… she was curious.

"Vendu..." Her voice floated, lilting as it was carried even with the quickening wind.

[Eraisuithon Gil'dae]

The Sylrosian who stood stoically on the pier above the breaking of the waves on the quayside was certainly no sailor. He was the lord protector of a seaport city, the owner of a shipyard, and the steward of a handful of sea related businesses but he was not a sailor by any means at all. His proud demeanor would of taken certain offense if anyone ever implied that he even came close to resembling one. However most people who he ever came in contact with knew exactly who he was, and for good reason. He was Eraisuithon Nan'tathren, a figure rapidly becoming a discernible face in a city with few light elves and even fewer who held top offices. And he was the one who held the top office now.

The winds raged, splaying soft tendrils of obsidian hair wildly in a dance around Eraisuithon's face.. But the elf was unaffected by the rising currents of air and the pounding of the waves against the stone barrier holding back the sea. It was quite evident that the weather was growing worse by each minute, the skies were no longer merely gray now but turning a shade closer to black. The churning waters were picking up frightening intensity, slamming themselves against the harbor and spraying the pier with water over and over again. And yet he was consumed by thought, the storm growing comically around the elf caught unaware who was ensnared by his own mind.

His eyes momentarily conveyed his startle. He was as unmoving as before and he did not shift an inch, but his pupils dilated and his eyes widened at the greeting for a fraction of a second. The elf kin did not move for a moment, but after a second he carefully turned to look down upon what was a distant relative of his own kind, for an instance thinking it was a human swimming in the tumultuous currents but realizing the elven presence to Ilista's features. She was an oddity to him and for a while he merely gazed upon the foreign visitor, recalling the only other time he had met an elf of the sea.

"Vendui, my friend." Eraisuithon eventually replied, shifting his gaze once more to regard the sea. He was comfortable with the light skinned elf. There were few of that color that dwelt in Imperia.. very few. They stuck together in a city where most elves were the color of the night or the untrusted pale ones. Appearances were ever deceiving he knew and preconceived notions of a person simply by their race very foolish, but it was a risk he would have to take. If the sea elf was here to kill him, he was already dead. His guard was thirty feet away in the carriage.

[Ilista]

The tall one was so quiet, just standing there on the pier in the wind and the rain, with the ocean arms reaching for the males’ form. For a moment it seemed the elf did not hear her, her voice lost in the strong winds that began to howl. He might have appeared to be most strange to others, oblivious to the world that moved with such dynamics around him, yet Ilista was use to silent men in thought. Every Teleris thought with care on the situation and what words and actions to take next, even her Keeper rarely spoke without a reason.

Yet as the sea elf began to think better the leave the light one alone to his thoughts the contemplative elf looked down to her, taking note of her presence. There was yet another moment of silence, elf taking stock of elf. Maybe he was a tad odd after all, seeming to be lost in his thoughts once more. Eventually his reply was made, Ilistas eyes widened as sapphire eyes rose to again look out at the sea.

Friend?

It was amusing, very much so, how the word lifted her spirits, it wasn’t far from her own greeting, but aside from that, she was acknowledged. It was funny indeed, she existed, she knew she existed, others knew she existed. But it was a nice feeling inside, a gentle warmth. The telera slipped below the thrashing waves, swam lazily mostly letting the powerful waves push her body through to the other side where she resurfaced, her eyes rose, still the contemplative elf had his eyes upon the sea. What you could see in the sea, learn from it, was better found within it, especially now. But that suggestion was kept to herself, as slender hands reached out once more and took hold of the pier and drew her body half up.

Ilista was closer to the strange elf, that greeted her, and called her friend, her arms anchored her body to the wooden surface, her soaked shift and hair added unseen amounts of sea water to the water sprayed ledge, and while she could not see as far, her golden eyes looked out at the raging sea, perhaps to see what elves of land could only see, only half of a much greater picture.

[Eraisuithon Gil'dae]

The murky clouds rumbled darkly, belting out their somber rumbling over the gray city. A drop of rain plunked itself upon the quiet Syl'rosians face, rolling down his cheek and dripping onto pier and into insignificance. Another drop followed. And another more quickly after the last than prior. The rain started. Lightly it showered the city, each icy drop culminating to the prelude to a grand theme.

"What is your name, oh lady of the sea? How shall I address you?"

He was watching the creature now, stealing a long glimpse of the majestic features of his water inclined cousin. The races of elves were many and varied, but there were qualities that each race possessed in common plentifully. Beauty, intelligence, grace.. An inherent nobility that spoke of a grand birthright. Phedos had blessed the race he had created, a far more superior race than any other that ventured the planes of Telath. It could not be argued that any other people have been gifted wisdom or longevity greater than the elves. Eraisuithon did not seem to realize the pelting rain, or rather he did not seem to hasten his time on the pier and escape.

But yet he shivered. The chill rain was beginning to soak through his fine attire, melting through silk and linen and turning his sensitive skin to goose flesh with each gust of angry wind. Some feet a way the coach shifted in place, a figure materializing in the door to peer out at the exchange. The Lord Protector did not turn to regard the stirring, but he knew the young human blond would begin to worry for his master if he remained too long exposed to the elements. It was clear the elf did not seem to worry about such things however.

"Is the sea as constraining as this world I live in, strange siren?"