Private Healing Below The Surface

[Reina Daival]

Location: Temple Courtyard
Tags: Issar Rae’Velis
Lightsaber - Pequod
Leg - Anchor

Reina focused on her own breathing, ignoring the pain still stinging away at her face. The pain that was throbbing away from laying in an uncomfortable position for an extended period of time. Instead she was knelt down in the gardens, letting herself stay rooted to where she was. It was also her way of purifying herself. Reina had spent an extended period of time down in the Dark, fighting and she had to make sure that she wasn't going to go through any other issues. The Force still felt ever so sluggish to her after the Affliction that had ran through her, and the fear...The fear was gone at least for now. But there was still a sense of shame in her chest.

That hadn't been a victory for her. Yes, she survived which was her main goal, but that was because Serina let her go. Let her live. In any other fight, Reina wouldn't have escaped like this. She'd have been captured, killed or worse. But there had been a heart in Serina. A heart that laid inside of a Sith. A heart that Reina was sure would be ripped out when Serina had the change. Reina understood that. Serina wanted power and strength. Her heart held her back from that. So that was another way Reina had failed. She had wanted to save Serina in some way, but instead it was Serina who had saved her, had spared Reina.

Her anger should have been bubbling, her frustration should have been erupting out of her in yells, screams or her typical frustrations. Instead, Reina was just...tired. She couldn't bring herself to get angry. To want to fight against something. For once, Reina just wanted to sit here and meditate. Taking in steady breaths through her mouth, since well...Reina still hadn't went to get her split lip or her broken nose healed. It would lead to questions. Questions that Reina wasn't ready to answer...though unfortunately for her, she was going to have to answer to someone sooner or later.​

 

[Issar Rae’Velis]

Tag: Reina Daival


The wind in the courtyard shifted, but only slightly. Just enough for the petals in the fountain pool to stir — not scatter, not flee, just tremble at the edges.

Issar Rae'Velis had been walking without aim. Not lost, but unhurried. He had not needed to search. The moment he stepped into the space, the weight of something unspoken brushed against him like the tail of a deep current. Not pain. Not even rage. But exhaustion — old in feeling, young in origin.

He moved without sound, his coils gliding over the stone paths, each movement respectful of the silence Reina had claimed. His robes, adorned with the Spiral's softened sigils, barely whispered as he came to a slow stop some distance behind her. He said nothing at first. Merely stood, four arms resting in stillness, his breath as calm as the breeze threading through the leaves above.

And then, after several moments — not to disturb, but to acknowledge — his voice came, low and quiet, as if it had been waiting patiently in the air.

"Forgive the interruption."

A pause, gentle and unassuming.

"May I sit with you?"

He did not offer comfort. He did not prod with questions. He offered presence — a shape beside hers in the spiral, should she allow it.

 

[Reina Daival]

Location: Temple Courtyard
Tags: Issar Rae’Velis
Lightsaber - Pequod
Leg - Anchor

"Yes. I...was going to need to speak to you anyway."

Reina could trust Issar not to...flip if Reina told him what had happened. She needed to practice it over with someone else before she thought of bringing it up to Everest. For now, she let silence fill the courtyard, as she opened her eyes to focus. What was the first thing to say?

"...I trusted a Sith. They were...my friend. They still are my friend."

Yes. Serina was still Reina's friend. Even though all of this. Even as the fact that Reina had probably failed Serina was evident in her mind, the woman still saw the Sith as a friend of hers.

"But...they attacked me. Last night. They wanted to meet with them...and I did. We talked. But...I was too stubborn for my own good."

Her eyes stayed focused ahead of herself. Gazing directly ahead of herself, as if Reina was in her own world, in her thoughts before she shook her head to bring herself back to reality, looking over and up towards Issar for a moment.

"...I am a Fool. Even now, I still want to believe in her. I still want to support her Master. Even though I know it's a fruitless endeavour."​

 

[Issar Rae’Velis]

Tag: Reina Daival

Issar did not speak at once. The silence lingered; not the silence of judgment, but of listening, of space. The kind a teacher gives a student not to be corrected, but heard. He let her words settle like dust in sunlight, undisturbed, real.

Only when her voice had fully faded did he move, a slight shift of his weight, one lower hand bracing against the stone seat, the others still open in his lap. He looked to her, his dark eyes steady, unreadable to many, but not unkind.

Then, softly — not with softness of uncertainty, but of care — his voice came, each syllable accented by his unusual and slow dialect.

"You are no fool, Padawan."

He let the words breathe, unhurried.

"To believe in the light within another... even as they themselves sink into shadow... That is not foolishness. That is a risk we take when we choose to love."

One clawed hand moved gently, not to grasp, but to gesture — the slow drawing of a curve in the air between them.

"But love without boundary becomes fire without hearth. It burns both giver and receiver."

He tilted his head, voice still low, touched faintly by the rhythm of his Hysalrian tongue.

"You are not wrong to feel. You are not wrong to hope. But hope... must be tethered, or it drifts... and pulls us with it."

A pause. His eyes softened — not in pity, but rather understanding.

"You wish to support her. Perhaps, one day, you still may. But you must not trade your footing for hers. Your roots... must hold."

He looked forward then, toward the rest of the courtyard, where the wind stirred the leaves.

"But there is sorrow in such a situation... and that sorrow is yours to feel. But not alone."

And he turned his head back toward her, one arm resting on the stone beside them, close, but not imposing. A quiet presence. A steady anchor.

Issar did not offer easy absolution, but he did offer presence.

 

[Reina Daival]

Location: Temple Courtyard
Tags: Issar Rae’Velis
Lightsaber - Pequod
Leg - Anchor

"Hey. Hey. Hey. I love no-one, okay?"

That was not a word Reina believed in. Nor did she like to use it. Love made you more vulnerable. A vulnerability that Reina would not admit. Though her eyes focused on Issar's gesture, Watching the curve for a moment as it made Reina wonder to herself...Was life like a circle? No. That would imply that you can end up where you started and Reina didn't want to believe that she could go back to who she used to be. She was...enjoying the Jedi she was becoming now.

"I've failed her. I know she'll...give into the Darkness. She does not care for weakness. Sparing me would be a sign of weakness to her. I should...have tried to bring her back here. I should have done something. But I just left her..."

Reina was not worried about her footing. She was firm in her beliefs. Of who she was. She was a Jedi. Maybe a poor example of a Jedi, but she was one all the same. She'd fight to protect people from the Darkness, even if it thraetened to swallow them whole. It was the Role she had chosen for herself. The persona she had taken. She took in a shaky breath, grateful for at least some kind of presence. Reassurance that she had survived. That she had made it out of that situation. Because there was still a part of Reina that thought this was a dream. Some form of nightmare...but it was real.​