In These Colder Climes

[TB-705]

First Order Space,
Yalaran Sith Temple

Cold wind whipped at his mane, an icy bite that sank deep through skin and fur to the very bone. The harsh howl seemed a far cry from the lonely prison cell aboard the Mictlan. The chilling gale felt a living thing, like the cries of the planet itself. Whispered words amidst the constant scream. In the cell, he remembered only the stark isolation of the void and its empty chill. Bland. Tasteless. Like the food they fed him.

Nostrils flared as he took a deep breath. The frosty air burned his lungs. Perched atop the highest skybridge in the temple, he could see the lake out beyond, surface glassy. Frozen solid. Though bleak, there felt a vigor to this place. Here, in these mountains, none were simply handed life.

"It is good," he rumbled to the wind, but the wind gave no answer save its howl.

Thengil turned away from the vista below and strode back inside the temple. The Cathar moved with a predatory grace, all corded muscle beneath golden fur. He trod on, deeper inside the stonework, away from the cloying hands of the wind, until he reached the library.

Upon one of several wooden reading tables sat an open scroll beside a cup, from which steam gently curled.

Ri'shajirr straightened, stretched, and his mouth opened in a long, toothy yawn before his jaw snapped closed and he seated himself at the table.

Much to relearn.

 

[Blackthorne]

It reminded her of home. Vaguely. The way the fortress sprouted from the mountain as if stones grew of their own accord like trees. In a moment of silent introspection she found herself homesick and wanting for those familiar halls and chambers of Halcyon Citadel. Even the open skies called to her with their tease of open freedom.

Then the winds picked up again and ripped from her throat a most unsavory utterance.

"Feth this cold," the girl snatched at her hood, yanking it back over her head for the umpteenth time, "here of all places. She couldn't pick some place tropical."

Dahl had a new Master now, one that had sent her and her brother across the stars in search of a particular artifact on a particular snow-capped planet. Naturally she'd failed to mention the snow part. They'd left their ship back on the tundra, unsure of what sorts of defenses they might meet in the air. Best to approach on foot.

"Come on, Eor," she trudged down the sloping snowy trail towards the bridge that would take them across the river, "the sooner we find this thing, the sooner we can leave."

[member="Greyhide"]

 

[Lucianus Adair]

He felt the same, the undeniable reminder of from where they had come sketched into this place; any thought that tried to take root in his head, telling him that he could have stayed home and avoided all this, was dashed. He only felt less homesick because he was with her, a part of him that was more than just another limb.

"Tropical would have been nice," he chittered, would still be somewhere less frozen, if... but that thought trailed off, and he wrapped his arms tight around himself. He squared his jaw. Following had been his choice, and more besides, the experience of this sub-optimal clime would be good for him, as his convictions dictated. "So would a fresh slab of meat."

The wind reared up and tossed his hair about, leaving strands to beg at his lips for ingress; he blew out in vague irritation, sending them away. Of all the things he'd learned from his father, had there been any tool the old man could have given him to mitigate the frigid weather, if such a thing existed, then he would have learned it. As it was, the old man had never been sensitive to cold, but rather the opposite, thus having little need for such things.

"And the sooner," he groused, unfolding his arms for balance on the decline, trudging down alongside her, "the better. The thought of a Desicle holds little appeal for me."

He passed her a grim smile, and looked ahead to the bridge.

[member="Blackthorne"]

 

[Blackthorne]

Eventually snow-covered boots met the flattened stone surface of the bridge and did abruptly skid sideways over the ice. Dahl scrambled awkwardly with a yip, spinning off to the side to grab hold of the wall. She flushed violently with a glance to her brother, sniffed, and tugged the hood forward to conceal her embarrassment.

"Not a word..." the girl grumbled, tamping the snow off her boots before trying again. She was cold - ever so much more than in space. They'd chosen warm, heated garb for the trek knowing their own limits but Dahl wasn't so sure that the cold was causing the battery pack to wane. They didn't have the money for the good gear but their new Master promised rewards for every task completed. What sort of rewards had not been specified, but Dahl was going to insist on material things. Like armor upgrades. Credits only went so far.

Wind snatching at her robes, the girl braced herself against the gale and paused when they reached the halfway mark across the bridge. There were looming shadows up ahead but there was no scent that she could pick up. Statues maybe?

[member="Greyhide"]

 

[Lucianus Adair]

He surged forward, only to come to a snow-spraying stop when his sister caught on to the wall. Ice - the way it made the surface of the bridge nigh-frictionless meant solid, measured, careful steps to remain upright. Dahn set foot on the crossing while Dahl still clung to the wall, and waited a moment for her to regain her footing.

"Never saw a thing," he said, devoid of the schadenfreude he would normally experience in most other situations. He couldn't claim to be able to fare any better in this place than her; they were made of the same stuff. The promise of reward, the ever-present desire for recognition, and the need to become so much more than he was urged him on with minimal complaint, one step at a time until the middle, where he went a step or two ahead before noticing that Dahl had stopped, in the face of the surge of wind.

"Des?" He looked over his shoulder at her, then seeing her attention pulled towards a thing, turned forward, and saw it too. He sniffed at the air, which only invited the non-scent of bitter freeze in. There was nothing that had no scent that was amongst the living, to his knowledge; he came to the same conclusion, and looked over his shoulder at her, again. "Let's keep on. Whatever that is... it could be nothing, but whatever it is, we... we don't have other options."

[member="Blackthorne"]

 

[Blackthorne]

We don't have other options.

Dahl frowned, flexing her left hand beneath the many layers. She could still feel it, from time to time, a sudden twinge of fire on her flesh. A breach into her conscious mind. Darkside corruption quite unlike the powers employed by their mother and father. Something far more sinister than their cold-hearted methods. Something much more malicious. Dahl felt her skin squirm and she did not for an instant mistaken it for goosepimples from the cold.

Boots began to trudge once more, continuing at the side of her brother across the remaining expanse of the bridge and the blistering winds across it.

Nearing the great silhouettes finally Dahl could see that her first instincts had been correct. Statues greeted them - effigies of a race and people with which she was unfamiliar. The Yalarans, she might learn later--or not--had built this temple eons ago, their purpose here as much a mystery as their own people.

"There's no guards," she said into the wind, scowling up at the massive entrance doors. Indeed, nothing but the cold was providing protection here, and even that was questionable. With a surge of deep curiosity fed by the abrasive nature bred into her on that wily jungle world, Dahl stepped forward and heaved the right door open just enough for herself and her brother to fit through before the wind slammed it shut again.

Once inside her breath fogged before her face and she silently lamented the absence of heat. At the very least the wind was no longer ripping the air from her lungs and clawing at her skin. Dahl took a moment of reprieve against the door, one hand kneading at the right side of her chest.

"Eor, I think my heat cell battery died."

[member="Greyhide"]

 

[TB-705]

Thengil cocked his head to one side and a round ear twitched in that flicking manner unique to felines. He remained that way for several seconds, then carefully lipped to the next page in a sorceror's grimoire. The ancient parchment felt stiff beneath his paws, as if the slightest mishandling might rip it from the spine. He sniffed the vellum. Odd, but he thought he detected the odor of human beneath the mustiness. Could this be written on the skin of homosapiens?

The Cathar read on for several lines before pausing again.

No, no the smell most certainly did not emanate from the book. And he'd thought he'd heard...

"Hmm," he growled lightly.

He slammed the book shut, but did not rise from his seat.

"You've interrupted my reading," he said to the darkest corner of the room.

[member="Blackthorne"] | [member="Greyhide"]

 

[Blackthorne]

She'd been perusing the stacks of books in a distant corner of the study, a darker corner where the few lights did not reach. It was not the lack of light that drew here there, nor had she been hiding, happenstance made for good assumptions. She'd also been aware of a person of larger stature off reading further in and made a tangible effort to be quiet at the insistence of her brother. He, of the two of them, had far more care for others. Eor was the civility to her brawn.

On any normal day she would have ignored him, but today she could not shake the cold and her energy stores were running low.

The sound of the book slamming shut made her jerk. Dahl cast a glance back over her shoulder towards the origins of the voice that followed, predatory green eyes honing in on the very large beast of a being before quickly moving to look for her brother. Where had he gotten to?

Ah well.

She turned and made for the cat-creature, a tenuous curiosity on the face within the hood as she stopped a dozen or so feet away, "and you've interrupted my searching. I suppose that means we're even."

[member="Thengil Ri'Shajirr"]

 

[TB-705]

As she came into the light he could make out the raven hair and ruddy features of a lithe human female, nearly hidden beneath a hood. She gave him a challenging stare to match her words. She smelled strange, almost like dried blood, and not at all the familiar musk of a homosapien.

Thengil's right ear swiveled back, then forward. Interest piqued, his gaze lingered on her face for a moment before glancing past to the bookshelves beyond.

"Perhaps."

The capricious feline wondered if she came alone. He thought he had heard another. My powers are not the only thing I must recover. Years in prison had dulled his senses in some ways, sharpened them in others.

"I am Thengil. What are you called, and for what do you search?"

[member="Blackthorne"]

 

[Blackthorne]

Expecting more dramatic and threatening rebuttal, Dahl bit back the scathing reply sitting just behind her fangs.

"Blackthorne," she said after a momentary pause of reconsideration. Green eyes looked Thengil over, incapable of placing his kind. There were many felinoids of the galaxy and those that she knew of did not quite fit his description. Smaller than a Togorian, she thought, but larger than a Cathar. Too beastly to be a Felacat. Fanalis, maybe? But what would a Fanalis be doing here in a Sith Temple.

It likely didn't matter.

"There's something in the collection here that belonged to my mother," Blackthorne took another step forward, unabashed, "A journal she kept. I have been sent to retrieve it."

[member="Thengil Ri'Shajirr"]

 

[TB-705]

"Blackthorne," repeated the leonine Sith, his half-smile flashing off-white fangs

Prickly indeed.

His gaze ran across the library shelves. The musty scent of scrolls hung heavy in the air: old velum and dust. Many texts lay hidden here, sorcerer's tomes, alchemist's lab notes, and the journals of mothers... apparently.

Thengil raised a furry brow.

"And what work," he rumbled, standing and padding over to the shelves, "did the mother of Blackthorne conduct?"

[member="Blackthorne"]

 

[Blackthorne]

"She is the Queen of the wilds of Onderon and Dxun, leader of the beast tribes and Master of the Beasts."

Despite the fury, the resentment in her mind, Dahl could not recite those words without pride in her tone. Speaking of her home brought a well of nostalgia and a resurgence of purpose. She might have been cast aside as the chosen heir, she might not have been capable of besting [member="Sunblade"] in single combat, but she'd be damned if she wasn't the better Beast Tamer. Arathul would never admit to it, but she was certain he knew it to be true.

"The journal contains her exploits during the 400 year darkness following the Gulag Plague."

[member="Thengil Ri'Shajirr"]

 

[TB-705]

Both brows lofted.

"I see."

Thengil, back to the woman, ran his paw along the shelves, and poked a few scrolls.

Studies of Sarapin Species? No. Tuk'ata, Terentateks, and Other Household Pets? How comedic. Leviathan Diets: A Tragedy of the Commons. None of these.

He thought he might have read of this Queen, prior to his imprisonment. His paw passed over an old book bound in some leather. He picked it up and sniffed the cover. Not nerf leather. Thengil eyed the spine. Silence? No... Quiet?

The Cathar extended the journal toward [member="Blackthorne"] and watched her reaction with interest.

 

[Blackthorne]

She took the proffered journal with what might've appeared as a cautionary pause to any other, but to a predator was only that short moment of consideration towards the other hunter. Dahl did not let her gaze linger on his fangs nor his claws and instead turned her attention to the book now in her possession. Green eyes studied it within her hands, nostrils flaring as she took in its scent just as the lion had.

Her smell was there, though not immediately present. Overcome by the ages of its years and the musk of an old archive, it found its way in through pathways of sensory memory. Like the grips of nostalgia to overcome the mind, enhancing what vital minutiae of her mother was there, Dahl could smell the earth of Onderon, the rain on the jungles, the musk of the beasts, the blood of the hunt. All these things in a book.

"Quietus," she said as she unwound a string of leather from a knob on the cover and pulled it open. Its pages were parched and brittle yet somehow maintained their integrity. Alchemy, she thought as she turned a few, scrutinizing the contents. The handwriting was hers. Several passages had been written in the native Garhallan language, some in the dialect of the various Onderonian Tribes. The former she barely recognized, the the latter could be read with ease.

Snap. The book shut abruptly and Dahl turned it over in her hands, glancing over the leather cover for the telltale signs of the authentic item. She found it then in the form of a raised ring at the back corner. Dahl ran her thumb over it - yes, still there.

"This is it," the girl blinked and turned it over once more, "It must have been here since..."

She had no idea. No idea at all. A hundred years maybe. How it got here was a bigger mystery yet.

[member="Thengil Ri'Shajirr"]

 

[TB-705]

"Not since the last several years," Thengil growled. "The temple is newly built. These books are imported from Sith worlds. Saved from destruction at the hands of the Jedi."


Quietus? Yes, he thought he remembered that name, vaguely. Time before his imprisonment seemed lost in a haze. Time before the Sith even more so. Yet the Mictlan's cold walls returned every night in fever dreams. A weakness in the mind. Thengil hated himself for it.

He grimaced, letting the half-memory slide away. She did not seem to lie, for what that was worth. The surprise on her face, as if she didn't really expect to find it here. Something else in those features... awe? Reverence?

"Dxun and Onderon are distant worlds, a far journey for a few dusty pages. The book ... what is it to you?"

[member="Blackthorne"]

 

[Blackthorne]

The growl could be felt within her chest, reverberating through the enclosed study area as it did. It was a sensation of deep familiarity and only fed the sickness of nostalgia within. The girl furrowed her brow against the feeling, lips thinning. It wasn't anger that drove her expression this time, though. Simply - it was determination to stay the course.

"A way back," she said after a moment, moving to stuff the book into the bag beneath her cloak before yanking the hem more tightly around her. Dahl released a breath caught with shivers and shot a frigid green glance back at the beastly man, "what are you reading?" she indicated the book he'd set down on the table with a nod of her head.

[member="Thengil Ri'Shajirr"]

 

[TB-705]

Secrets. Thengil chuffed. Secrets, like balls of yarn, were meant to be unraveled.

The Cathar glanced back toward the table and waved his paw in a gesture of dismissal. "Bah. Simple spells and sorcery."

He sniffed irritably. "Relearning what I have unlearned."

Loath to reveal anything further, the Cathar fell silent. The humiliation of being a mere acolyte once more left a simmering anger in his gut, heightened to rage if any dared to bring up the embarrassment.

Ten years in a cellblock isolated from the galaxy honed some skills, let others rot away. Performance of the more mystical arts of the Sith could hardly be studied in the confines of a windowless prison, absent any connection to the Force. He doubted the female cared for rubbing her nose in old scrolls. She had the smell of one who preferred action.

[member="Blackthorne"]

 

[Blackthorne]

Intrigued, a faint brow lofted, eyes canted towards the discarded tome. It was true, Dahl was not nearly so scholarly as her brother [member="Greyhide"], but for spells and sorcery she had an innate curiosity. Call it genetic, she supposed - the predisposition for the art was in her blood. Generations of spell weavers and sorcerers didn't disappear with one single child.

Then there was her newest Master - rife with powers and abilities to spare. If Dahl hadn't been interested before, the possession by the Dreadlady certainly had cemented the curiosity.

"My mother is an Elementalist," she began, "among other things. Like the Dathomirian Witches and Nightsisters." Might've been a bit of hunger there in her gaze for the lore contained in his book, "I would have liked to learn more." Then a tick of expression, confusion in the youthful face as her eyes peeled from the pages and back to the Cathar's face, "Why do you have to relearn it? Does it go away?"

[member="Thengil Ri'Shajirr"]

 

[Lucianus Adair]

He had, of course, wandered off into the stacks. Places such as this were a drug of sorts for his intellect, but his ear was with [member="Blackthorne"], always monitoring. Just in case, though he had stopped his slow move-about, when [member="Thengil Ri'Shajirr"] and his sister had started interacting, diverting attention away from the book he had taken into his hands, and snaking around the corner of a stack to observe at a distance. He remained there until the book came into play, until it was confirmed that what they were looking for had been found.

Then... then, Dahn wound his wound his way back around, through the stacks, to reappear at Dahl's side, at some point leaving the book he held on a shelf, on his way. He said nothing when he emerged from the stacks, interested instead in hearing his sister be civil, and putting eyes on the Cathar, observing as he always did, after they drifted over the body of the found book. He effected a lean against a table, but kept tabs on his twin in the back of his mind. She was without the protection a heat cell provided, and the concern clung to what stood as a conscience in his psyche.

Even with his heat cell still functioning, he wasn't enamoured with the idea of remaining on this frigid iceball any longer than necessary, now that they had what they were after, but... well, this was interesting to watch.