As to be expected, Grisly arrived before them, and Rain’s angry voice reached their ears even before they could step into their cave-like home.
“You’re such a silly man! Really! What did you expect to accomplish? At least go and warm yourself! I won’t care for you if you get sick!”
They heard him grumble something unintelligible and, the moment they opened the door, the big man quickly made his exit through a dark-gray curtain.
Rain released an exasperated sigh, still on full scolding mode, but managed to replace her frown with a smile before she turned to welcome them.
“Come in, come in. Don’t stand out in the cold.”
ZaiWin1Literally zai (blade) + win (chaos). waited until Snow entered and then he too stepped into the warm room, closing the door behind him.
“I have readied our guest room but, as you know, we only have one. So you will have to share. I have also heated water for your bath.”
“You didn’t have to …” ZaiWin started in an uncharacteristic protest, but she quickly waved her hand dismissively.
“Nonsense! You both look positively tired. You especially, little lord. Just make sure you warm yourselves up and that you have a good night’s rest. Around here it gets especially cold, during the late hours,” she added for Snow’s sake. “I believe you still remember the way?”
ZaiWin nodded and she quickly waved a hand, shooing them away.
“Get going, then. We will talk more in the morning.”
“Thank you, Rain,” ZaiWin replied in what Snow felt it was a rare, pure and honest, reply, and she shooed them again towards the same gray curtain.
On the other side, unexpectedly, was a narrow flight of stairs, equally cut from the harsh rock of the mountain. As he climbed them, Snow couldn’t help wonder how long it must have taken them to carve them, not to mention to build that entire house, and all the other dwelling surrounding it. Even with the help of people bearing markings, it looked like slow and arduous work.
ZaiWin led him across a stone corridor illuminated by two of those flame holders, all the way to the third and farthest door.
Even though the door was obviously made of wood, it wasn’t made from a single type of plank, much less from one single piece of wood. It looked more like someone had collected whatever pieces of wood they could find and then had nailed them together the best they could.
Inside, the bedroom was relatively small and clearly windowless, but comfortably warm, a fresh scent Snow couldn’t name filling the air. The bed was considerably large and basically consisted of a higher platform cut from the stone floor itself, over which a mattress had been placed, covered by white sheets and warm-looking blankets. Everything in there was made from rock, Snow realized taking a look around. The small table placed against the wall to his right and the stool that accompanied it, inviting to silent moments of studying or reading. The hangers for clothes had been cut from the wall itself. And, to his left, a fire pit where more flames silently burned, right next to what looked a lot like a stone tank, also cut from the wall and floor, now filled with fuming, sweet-scented water.
Closing the door behind him, ZaiWin crossed the small compartment and promptly sat heavily on the bed releasing a deep sigh.
Snow, on the other hand, took his time taking off his cloak and hanging it on the hangers. He couldn’t deny that it felt warm and comfortable in there, but he was still more inclined to prefer sleeping outside, under the open sky, than in such small, closed quarters.
The sound of movement made him reluctantly peek back but, once he had done so, he just couldn’t avert his gaze again. ZaiWin had untied his hair and was now scratching his head, but the way that mass of darkness spilled over his shoulders and chest pooling over the bed was just … eerie. It made him look a lot younger but, at the same time, it also made him look much colder and detached, as if he couldn’t care less if the world around him simply exploded.
Noticing the boy’s petrified gaze, ZaiWin quickly gathered his hair and skilfully knotted it at the back of his head. Even ZenTar2Literally zen (silent) + tar (wind). complained when he let down his hair, saying that he looked like some ghostly figure from the netherworld.
“You can use the bathtub first,” he told the boy and Snow blinked as if he’d just woken from some strange dream, his pale cheeks blushing slightly when he finally averted his gaze.
“Rain left some clean clothes for us,” ZaiWin went on, indicating the pair of plain, clean tunics carefully folded at his side with a tilt of his chin, and the boy silently followed his gesture with his gaze.
“Come here,” he told him with a second thought, gesturing him to come closer, and Snow hesitated for a moment before he ended up obeying. “Let me see your back.”
Snow immediately froze at the sound of those words.
Slowly lowering his hand, ZaiWin just sat there, patiently waiting for him to come to terms with his request.
Snow just stood there, his heart beating faster inside his chest, anxiety turning his insides out. Of course ZaiWin had seen his back plenty of times, so it wasn’t as if that was anything new or embarrassing in any way. But he hadn’t seen it again after what had happened, and he couldn’t help feeling afraid that something might be … wrong with him. He already was what one could only call a defective product. Now he just wished he hadn’t made things even worse. On the other hand, there was no point in postponing the inevitable. And so he nervously started to take off his tunic as he closed the small space between them. Turning around he pulled the soft fabric over his head and waited, feeling a lot like a prisoner waiting to hear his sentence.
ZaiWin held his breath at the sight of all those shimmering markings. He couldn’t help it. No matter how many times he had seen them, they still amazed and awed him. They were all pearly white again, he noticed releasing a silent sigh of relief. Even the ones that looked a lot like a feimao3Literally fei (raging / furious) + mao (beast / monster). Raving beasts that appear in unbalanced, ungoverned lands. They possess destructive markings that in turn corrupt the land even further. Hard to explain in just 2 lines -_-; Anyway. Bad, vicious things that need to be killed.’s markings. Due to their darker, deadlier nature, added to the fact that Snow still couldn’t control them, he had feared they would be harder to cleanse. But they all shimmered alike, collectively drawing what looked like a beautiful pair of silvery wings on the boy’s pale back.
Raising his hand, he touched the tips of his fingers to one of his ice markings and immediately felt him get tense, the muscles of his shoulders contracting. But the marking itself hummed exactly the same way he remembered, from when he’d poured his energy into it to activate it. They all felt the same, he noticed, sliding his fingers across the boy’s cool skin, their different natures vibrating in different ways as they recognized his touch, trying to entice him to share some of his energy again, so that they could come alive on their own, free from having to obey their master’s commands.
He had always felt that markings were a lot like selfish, living creatures, that one had to carefully care for and tend to. If you raised them right, they would become powerful allies, trained to obey their masters’ every command. But if you treat them poorly, they would rebel against you to the point that they could even kill someone, or drive them completely insane. And they were always hungry. Hungry for more energy, hungry for more power. Regardless if that power would be beneficial or not to them and their host. And so, even when fed with dark, destructive energy, like the one Snow had fed them, they would still devour it eagerly, even if that led to their complete destruction. Thankfully Snow’s markings had recognized him, since he too had fed them some of his own energy before, and they had innocently opened themselves to him, probably thinking he was there to feed them some more. Instead he had stolen from them, feeding his own markings with the dark energy they had consumed, depleting the dark, destructive, chaotic monsters they had become and reducing them to their mild initial size and nature. His only fear had been that Snow’s other markings, the ones he still hadn’t touched, wouldn’t completely open to him, holding on to some of that destructive energy.
“They look fine,” he finally stated and Snow seemed to relax a bit, even though the way he kept shifting his weight from one foot to the other told him that he still wasn’t completely reassured.
Thank you for the chapter!
You're welcome