inquisitor

A crook of a fang greeted the mage, an inevitable that would cause this to be rather unceremonious, but Casimir realized he wasn't starved for blood in this moment, no matter how dry his throat perpetually felt, he was starved for the affection neither could look directly at. "I didn't think you'd know how to kiss," its ruefully stated, as though this was some experiment, but the dhampir would be no better on the front, as he dipped his head upward again to press his gelid lips to the daemon's.

Pliant in his descent, greeting the dhampir's cool mouth with the heat of his own. He had not expected the sensation to linger, nor the pulse that came with it - the faintest reminder that beneath the armor of daemon and magister alike, there was still something that reached, that wanted. Desire was such a lesser concept, but here Nikandros was, beholden to it - Casimir proving, once again, that change was possible even for a thing like him. 

Nikandros’s hand didn’t withdraw after its correction of Casimir’s jaw. Instead, his thumb swept a slow line over the sharp angle of it, his own claiming gesture he  disguised as idle touch. He let the kiss linger, unhurried, more deliberate the second time - less surprise, more choice. When he pulled back, it was only far enough to catch Casimir’s expression with that molten stare. “Knowledge isn’t the same as indulgence,” he murmured, low and timbrous, the words curled with arrogance and a concession that tasted perilously like truth. “but both parts of me enjoy them, with you, equally.” 

He pressed in again, firmer this time, decisive.

Before even Casimir could allow himself the sense to abstain, he dipped forward, up to press his lips to Nikandros' for the first time, perhaps even the last time. It was fleeting but firm, this strangle jumble of feeling Casimir couldn't quite explain and would only ever dread doing so, and thus the dhampir had done only what he felt as the end of everything seemed to encroach all the more. "Maybe this time the Wheel will break," it didn't quite feel so bleak as Casimir stated this when pulling away, crimson eyes peering up at Nikandros almost curiously.

Which was to say, he'd been thinking about it for some time now. 

Shock lingered a beat before Nikandros moved to touch his lips, the sensation of Casimir's cooler pair still lingering. Out of habit the inquisitor's brows narrowed reflexively, not out of coarseness, but from his natural curiosity. There'd been tension between them before, it wasn't as if he was inept, but that didn't stop the action from taking him by surprise. Regardless of what they'd seen or what affection had set up a habitation in his chest, the fact remained that Nikandros was a daemon - and unkind by any standard. He avoided Casimir's question, holding the space between them, a finger to tip Casimir's jaw, “So quick, is that how the creature's of this age kiss?” Another beat, “Remind me again: I'm out of practice.”

where: anywhere you'd like in lysara

when: current timeline

note: surprise, kiss kiss and a gold chain for you

He'd never needed breath in these dead lungs, but speaking his fears aloud, seemingly putting an end for them only for such fears to grow wings and manifest in reality had completely stilled Casimir. If he'd a beating heart, it would have been beating wildly out of his chest, but the dhampir had grown tired of running and he turned to the inquisitor with this accepting look in his eyes as though the turning of his own Wheel had finally rusted and worn out. "Do you think Avalon will be turned to blighted ash before he crawls from it's moongate?"

"Without Nikandros you would not be here, without Nikandros you would have to find someone else to grant you headway into this world," Casimir stood, even as the daemon's eyes were upon him with such calculation and lethality, even if it felt as though such gaze was meant to wilt him beneath Pride's glare. Smoke and soot clouded where Pride walked, this indelible touch upon the world as claws trailed through blackened soot and tarnished grass, "Does Pride no longer carry the wisdom to be wary where they trample?" Not many of this soil could be potent enough nor wise enough to face the daemon, but Pride had already offered Casimir his name and there was so much one could do with a simple name.

"INSOLENT!" The daemon bellowed, a pair of dark, velvety wings erupting suddenly from his back - fanning out - and drenching the dhampir beneath him in shadow. Violet energy crackled in a hue, arcing across the ground and dancing along the surface of the daemon's skin as his eyes blazed violently. Energy building, flooding the ozone like lightning before it struck. 

"The boy was always a means to an end: a vessel, nothing more. The clay - the book. I am the truth, I am perfection- the beginning and the end. Out of respect for our ancient pact, I permitted your offense." 

Violence was this intricate part of him, a Child of the Night, he was nothing without the reminder of such sanguinary resolve. The perpetual itch in the back of his throat, the fangs which fell forth even when he tried best to control it - violence was something he was intimately aware of, but on some people, some creatures, it could almost surprise him.

For each little secret shared between him and the inquisitor, there was a mountain more of them still shrouded behind vague words and petty stares. The Vanguard were attempting to grab hold in Southreach, as the Astorian border was overwhelmed with darkspawn, the Vanguard were near parasitic; leeching off those weak enough to hear their message.

Zaknafein’s claws flexed at the sound of that name as this creature dared to speak it in the presence of Pride unbound. Vanguard blood clung to his skin, still warm in the veins he had torn open, and the daemon's form shimmered faintly with that abyssal brilliance and horns gleaming black as a void-star. Zaknafein’s head tilted - slowly. A ripple passed through him as a sliver of something pressed against the surface of his ego. His molten eyes found Casimir, narrowing with a cold, calculating curiosity.

where: one of the many holding cells me thinks

notes: "you're tacky and i hate you" froy to nik

The guards shoved Froy into the cell hard enough that his shoulder clipped the metal frame. He straightened, brushing blood off his lip, only to freeze when he saw who else was already inside.

Nikandros.

For a moment, he just stared, taking in the familiar scowl, having not seen him since the Feywilds. It was clear then how little he cared for Froy and the others. He never needed to say it out loud— it clung to every word, every glance. Everything about him implied he was keeping score, waiting for the moment they became more burden than ally.

Yet here he was, in chains. Again.

“Even you, huh,” Froy muttered as he crossed to the far side of the cell, dropping into a crouch. “That's too bad.”

"Right. Cabbages." Though Wisdom the daemon had once been, not all information was worth committing to memory. He shifted his position slightly, eyeing the druid with greater consideration than he’d afforded him previously. There was little malice in the spirit toward the elvhen descendants, more indifference than anything else. “I was an obvious target.” A brow raised, “I’m surprised to see you here. How did they capture you?”

"So magic heals it," he restated it in simpler terms, like it would help him brainstorm what to do next. Eivor finally looked up, his gaze following Nik's as he had another thought. "You kept that thing I gave you safe, right?" He should've kept it on his hoard. He'd have to riot if he had to steal a piece back from the Kossith at the end of all this. He looked at the rahaat, tilting his head, "Anything."

Not everyone here had magic, but the weave threaded its way through every soul - and yet - some of the collared didn't have a soul, at least not one that was still their own. Darkfriends, undead, and more. Still, a working theory was a working theory. There was a connection to the braces that the Kossith were wearing, threads that the daemon could see connecting the sul'dams to their rahaats - but were they all connected? Was there a way to differentiate between them?

"Fight her." It was Celaya that he was looking at, one of the witchers that had ended up on this vessel. "However you can, better if you can get her to throw the first punch." Eivor was hostile by nature and while they could not harm their sul'dams they could still do harm. Success of fail, his friend would be punished for it. But the request was clear: antagonize the witcher and try to get into a scuffle without the intention being obvious.

The dragon had managed not to shift, to pull on the mutilated Elvhen ability that mimicked what he could actually do, but he'd done it without any sort of free will once more. The two of them were not meant to be chained; they were free spirits – had been, once. A bond that was silent felt like it was just a whisper. Vaeros had promised that no one would capture the daemon again – and he'd failed just the same.

"I don't fucking know," he muttered, his head in his hands. Vaeros hadn't even gotten the chance to be free. Not like he wanted to be. He would spread his wings after this, take the demon if he wished, and fly somewhere with Anthin's throat in his jaws. Just so they could watch her body crumple and fall. "I'm going to pull them apart, limb from limb. Mount one of their fucking horns on the wall. Or all of them. Every horn." He waited a few more moments, his outburst settling. "Have you figured out what magic this is?"

“It’s a binding, albeit reinterpreted.” New enough that neither Nikandros or Zaknafein, with the weight of Aetherian and elvhen history behind the altus and spirit couldn’t instantly recognize it. The nature of this particular ter’angreal was carefully designed, perfected, but all magic could be undone and every seal had some form of loophole.  

“It’s… made broken, like it can only be healed when placed on someone.” He had a theory, but ruminating and postulating would take time. Cerulean eyes wandered through the dark before they landed on another rahaat resting in the distance, “I need you to test something for me.”