Livigosa the Blue

Time changes many things. In the space of several months since the wedding Livian had seen a great upheaval of the world around her. Her boss had died cruelly and been resurrected. Her child had grown at an exponential rate and her “family” had been scattered to the winds in the time of chaos. War had come once again to Azeroth, only this time...the war was for the precipice of life itself. The afterlife had been threatened- upheavals of the balance risking the cycle and the inherent way of things. Everything was now in danger, and so....the heroes of Azeroth had been called on once again to traverse the gap and try to set things right. To prevent disaster and the unraveling of the very world.

In the past Livian would have been an active participant in such things. She would have gone with the others to fight for and defend what mattered to her. Her friends and family each taking their place within the conflict. But....the child had changed everything. Alysa was....she was all the truly mattered now. Her and Vincent. She loved the family she had found in Stormwind and the bonds of blood she had made. And if they ever were to call for her she would always come to them. But...she also knew inherently that these people would endure on without her. As they had done before she had ever come along. In many ways Livian had served her purpose to Pulchra Morte...and now with the ever present danger looming about the edges, she understood that her most important task in this instance was to protect the child.

And so Livian had hidden Alysa away. Within the confines and safety of the pocket dimension Auric had given her. In the home Vincent had built for them both. Safe and far from all the the horrors of the current world. It was where she had been raising Alysa in secret. And while at times people had come to visit - Vittoria, Zoe, Rain and several others- to see Alysa and fill Livi in on the news of what was happening out there, it could be said that in many ways the dragon had returned to the isolation from whence she had started long ago. Back in a different time, when the young drake had honed her studies alone in an Azure glade. The memory almost like a far off dream now.

But she didn’t mind it- this quiet hidden separateness. It was familiar. A sort of setting apart of things. She did her best to be a good parent and advisor to Alysa, relying heavily on Vincent and the others to teach her the human way of things. She was thankful for the advice and assistance. And grateful that Rain especially was loving in a way she couldn’t be. For though Livian cared deeply there was always....something distant in her ways. A part of her true nature. As much as she tried to be human and as much as Vincent had pulled and changed her there was still the immutable truth that Livian would always be a bit aloof. It was...just who she was. She was sharp and beautiful like a star. But distant too. Her light warming but never fully reaching. And so she relied on the family and Vincent to give Alysa the full love she deserved.

In her isolation, in the dark of the night when the child was asleep and only the shadows were awake to keep her company her mind wandered to many things. Just what was her purpose now? She thought of Vittorias words before the world had opened up in chaos - about the academy she had wanted Livi to help her build. Could she really do that? Use what she had learned to guide others? And would such a thing ever come to pass? For the world was eternally changing. There was no way of knowing if this conflict would ever end. And IF the champions even managed to save things, would the world even be as it was before? She could hope but...in her mind she wasn’t sure.

Livian was an enigma. Both stationary and yet with a hint of restlessness. So much had happened in her time with mortals. And she imagined that there was still much more to come. It wasn’t just the outside world which was suffering. She had felt a change in her lover in the past few months of their quarantine. A sort of....anxious energy which pervaded his dreams. A thing he tried to hide from her. Vincent had gotten much better over time at shielding his thoughts from Livian through the mind connection. He had learned to build and cultivate the mental walls when needed, and the dragon loved and respected him too much to try and truly test them for weak links.

For each of us needs our own bit of sacred alone space inside our minds- she knew that. But...it was not like him to keep things from her. She had never had to use her strength as his master to command him, her sworn. Had never abused that bond. In truth she had only ever forged it to protect him in the first place. But she couldn’t deny that she had been tempted. Something was clearly wrong- weighing on his thoughts. She saw and felt it in his fitful sleep- in the way he clung to her even in rest. She wondered if the others were dealing with such darknesses, if what was happening in Azeroth was a part of all of this. She thought of each of their faces, and she realized...she missed them.

Livian took the familiar steps into the old building, her hands running along the grain of the wood as the rounded the corner into the main workshop of the mortuary. Her azure eyes flitting over the tables. She had asked Rainbrooke to give her the key so that she might visit and pay her respects to their fallen employer. And now here in the quiet, with the dim sunlight filtering through the rafters she felt the absence of the woman’s presence like an echo of negative space. The frame of the building supported still what should have been there, but was now lost.

Livian made her way into the back room where she knew the morticians body would be. She found the shrouded figure quickly enough, and when she pulled the thin pale fabric away, the face of Vittoria revealed itself to her.

Her face had been cleaned and meticulously repaired, no obvious evidence of the gruesome blunt force trauma she had endured. Her hair been swept up and carefully pinned to make an elegant updo, the raven locks arranged just so perfectly in a side bun so as to give the woman a hint of something distinguished and noble. When Livi peered carefully at the hair brooch, she saw a small crimson leaf crystallized and framed by the skulls of two corvidae. A final touch left by the Druid which made the elf smile softly to herself.

Vittoria has been dressed in a simple yet graceful robe, her hands placed gently on her abdomen. To anyone that would look at her, it could almost be assumed by the care in the presentation that Vittoria wasn’t dead at all, merely sleeping. And Livian almost had the compulsion to check for a pulse just in case.

But instead the dragoness sat by the woman’s side, her eyes scanning over the morticians body, their depths pensive. She rested there quietly for several moments, the silence around the room seeming to stretch on for hours until finally her voice broke the stillness.

“There was a time when our roles were reversed Hale. Do you remember? I was cold and far away, just as you are now. And you were by my side speaking to me, caring for me as your voice tried to gently guide me home. And so...I thought maybe I might could do the same for you...” Livian looked down at her hands and continued, her words quiet “I am sorry if my words and actions lately have seemed... distant...cold. I...it is hard to explain, but I will try my best to make sense of it so that you might understand I am not the monster everyone sees me to be.”

Livian reached forward and gently took Vi’s cold hand, her slender fingers resting it in her palm as she looked up at her “You see... I never really knew what it was to feel anything. For so long- centuries- I locked away my pain and my grief at my sisters passing. I told myself to be like a stone. Unfeeling. Apathetic... it was...easier that way. I was able to compartmentalize everything down. To see it all in terms of logic and reason. Facts and the pursuit of knowledge is what led me for many long years...nothing else mattered...”

She gripped the woman’s hand, a small soft shaky exhale escaping her. “But then...one day I met a human...and he led me to other strange humans. Infuriating creatures that didn’t follow the logic I had detailed out for myself. I was baffled and frustrated by you all immensely. I rather hated every minute of the way I was made to feel around you- for no matter what move I tried to anticipate, your patterns and your reasonings always threw me for a loop.” she laughed a little breathily. “God I hated it so much...”

Livian looked to the rafters, the corners of her mouth turning down in a little frown, as if she was almost angry. “But...in time you all began to work your way into me, whittling yourself inside so that I found myself begrudgingly curious about you. Why is it that humans will endure when everything in life is telling them to give up? How it is that despite everything they still find a way to hold on admist the misery? It...it makes no sense. And yet...you all were here. And you Hale...you were the biggest puzzle. I never knew where I stood with you. Not until THAT day...the day I heard your voice in the darkness leading me out...”

The dragon would lean her head down against the edge of the table then, her face masked by the veil of her indigo hair. And yet there was something distinctly gravelly and rough in her voice as she spoke her next words. “You brought me back. We had always been at odds with one another- we still are in some ways- and yet...you didn’t leave me there. And I ...I can’t shake it. The feeling like I’ve failed you. I was supposed to find a solution that didn’t lead to this. A grand proud creature and all I could do was stand there and watch you die. I was cold...so cold. Because I knew that’s what you wanted me to be. I had to be for the others. It is...what I am made to do. Something you and I share in common. And yet..” Livian looked up and there were tears in her eyes. “What If we were wrong Vi? What if...you can’t come back? And this is all that is left for you...a brutal death and a shallow grave...”

A small strangled sound escaped the dragons throat “I don’t know if I can accept that...we are all so scattered now. Rain has gone off to battles unknown. Alex...and Badba..” A tear rolled down her face, her voice cracking. “And Zoe...they don’t need me anymore. Everyone is moving forward and for the first time in my existence I feel like I am standing still. Time never seemed to bother me before. But now minutes drag by like a raw angry wound. I feel it keenly, the weight of things, and I...I don’t know what to do anymore Hale. You asked me to lead but...look at what good that has done? She looked at the woman’s dead body strickenly. “You are here...savaged. Not even allowed the peaceful death you so deserved.. Goddamn you Hale. You stupid mortals...you made me give a damn and now there’s just...this. This empty space left behind that haunts with the absence of your presence. And a weight on my soul I fear I will never escape from...”

Livian rose, two small tears dripping from her chin to land on the morticians cheek as the Dragon leaned over to look at her. The elf’s face was completely twisted up and tormented, eyes simmering with a deep weighted grief as she looked at her. Slowly Livian leaned down and in an uncharacteristic act of tenderness kissed the morticians forehead. She leaned back and looked at the woman’s serene face and she whispered. “Come back alright? It doesn’t matter what you are just...come back. You are needed here. I have a daughter who needs to learn from you. And there’s Zalara who” and at this next part a sort of brokenness would enter the dragons words. “...well...who you have helped where I couldn’t. Where I once again failed. I am not needed here Hale...you are. And so...you have to return, you hear me? Otherwise I’ll be forced to come find you...just as you once did for me.”