What's In A Name?

[grantuseyes]

Micolash sits cross-legged on a table. Strewn all around him are ink pots (some overturned and spilled), parchment paper (in stacks and scattered alike), pens and nibs and a few sticks of charcoal. His fingers are stained with ink and there are a few splotches somehow on his face and on his pinstripe trousers, along with a dark handprint on the metal collar of his cage. The side of his left hand, the one he's currently holding a pen with, is smudged even worse with black.

There are discarded drawings all around him, some that look like false starts on some manner of monsters. Some are just pages crammed with drawings of eyes, or scrawls repeating phrases or rambling prose. Some are crumpled up into paper wads or have half-hearted attempts at scratching out or erasing the contents.

The parchment Micolash currently has in front of him is being scrutinized by the scholar. Looking over his handiwork and trying to determine if it passes whatever muster he's going for. It's certainly a drawing of SOMETHING.

Whatever verdict he's pondering, it doesn't prevent Micolash from looking up and addressing whatever person is wandering close to his work station.

"What does your name mean? Do you know? Do you care?"

Comments

[delphicbooksandbaubles]

She slightly twitches her nose and hums in an uncertain soft tone like she might wish to argue that point and a few others. But she debates internally as she listens to his words. Whether the point of trying such would be worth it. He might be open to discussion, or not he was a scholar after all. Though one who's been through quite the ringer since she met him. Let alone who knows what sorts of things before that.
"In your realms perhaps." She states in a soft but firm diplomatic tone.

Though there were several things she stuck to her own guns about. A part of her bristled at the insinuation. The hairs on the back of her neck went up on end. Subconsciously some instinct or another kicking it. Her ears went back at that, hmm. She tenses slightly a part of her ready to run, though she did lean back a bit. Already feeling more uncomfortable and tense about this whole thing as moments went on. "Pfft." She blows out a scoffing like breath. "Do I look like I'm foaming at the mouth to ya?" She asks half states wryly. Her accent coming out more.

She squints, raises an eyebrow and tilts her head at him, "Hardly, yer got the learned man physiology down to yer bones I'm sure." She remarks truthfully. Some folks we're just built for certain occupations and pursuits. She tilts her head left then right and then back again in a confused sort of puppyish way. A perplexed look on her face. "Tis just sometimes it's hard to find words to explain things and one learns to be careful about..who they tell what to." She states softly, trying one more time to reason with him.

Even as her face falls sadly and slightly. She then sighs and squares her shoulders slightly. She was afraid of this but she's surprised partly something hasn't happened with someone sooner. There are quite a few wolves hereabouts after all. Though she doubts it just the canine variety of creatures most folks would misunderstand etc.

"It's not just myself I need to protect ya know." She states firmly slightly frowning and looking at him sternly and disapprovingly in a den mother sort of way. "Early stages of what?" She asks soft but with an imperious raised eyebrow as she sits ramrod straight. An insulted indigent feeling comes over her and probably shows in her body language. Did he just compare?.. why yes yes he did. Her nose twitches. Oh heck no not this.. 'Hunter' like mindset nonsense again. Seriously.


"Being a Shifter is not a disease, Micolash." She states softly yet firm. Borrowing the teacher like tone she's heard one of her friends use before. It was worth a shot at least. "Besides I thought ya." She pauses and notches her head a bit higher. She was not gonna give into fear, there were places and people more important than her silly sometimes silly shy self.

Fine, he wanted to know..she'd tell him a thing or two. "Liked large and fuzzy things." She states looking him straight in the eye challenging him to deny it. Tensing her jaw.

[grantuseyes]

“No, not a disease,” he mutters. His fingers are restless, twitching, picking at the threads of his sleeves. His eyes are still flat, cold, glittering like ice. No warmth. “A curse. This is no ashen blood disease, as we first surmised. It is deeper. It is a blight of the mind. A stain upon the soul.”

Micolash puts on a smile, but it’s just as superficial as the look in his eyes. Leaning forward from his seat upon the table, ignoring whatever papers or pots he knocks over, resting his palms on the edge. Leaning in towards Ashlynn. He’s not blinked once since the change in his demeanor, since the revelation of his friend’s true nature.

“Early stages of what?” he echoes. “Of the curse, Ashlynn! Of your impending beasthood! I could try to fix you. I could try to reverse it. Don’t you want to be human again? Don’t you want to halt your degeneracy? I could try. I want to try.”

A plasma sample to start, he thinks. A hank of hair next. Infusions of untainted blood and purified quicksilver. Tests for blood drunkenness. Locked in a room with a small, tempting prey animal would be ideal. What else is she hiding if she hides the ears? Tail? Fur? Mutations unseen? Amputations would fix that. What if they grew back? Wouldn’t that be funny? How many times would he have to remove things before they stopped trying? Before the scar tissue was too thick and too gnarled that recovery is stunted?

Micolash’s mind is racing with horrible things. Wretched ideas.

[delphicbooksandbaubles]

She blinks several times, as the lack of him doing so subconsciously and consciously making her uncomfortable. People did such things for very good reasons. She tilts her head toward the right and then the other way and rolls her left shoulder like she's physically trying to fix a discomfort as well as mentally. She shudders a bit as she gets goosebumps. Her hairs all going up on end some of her fur threads into the back of her hair.

She leans back as he does so twitching her nose. Even before she was a teenager and learned how to shift/change. She didn't like having people all randomly up in her space. Some Canine's could be overly friendly though but even she had her limits. She didn't tend to stick in her nose up in people's businesses..well that way at least. She did rather like the scent of leather though.

Her right eye twitches a little as her expression goes a bit flat and she slightly grinds her teeth as her jaw clamps a bit more. She probably looks about ready to spit nails, Her nostrils flaring. That's strike two. But that word halts her natural response for a moment...try? try and help or understand? She raises an eyebrow searching his face his tone for any other signs of insincerity or hope.

Her eyes still narrowed slightly suspicious and wary. "Some very mean spirited and hearted people call it that, Micolash." She informs him firmly but her tone not completely unkind. Perhaps more tired and hurt than anything she's trying very very hard to make him understand. Canine's and Wolves especially, after all, are very loyal once you win them over. But betray that trust and well once bitten twice shy.

The light in her eyes dims a little, but she's still on edge. "If I was cursed..most are unable to change back..even if they want to or try..unless it gets broken." She tries to explain things a little more. Though there were other sorts as well and heck most of the town had been in some way or another for twenty-eight plus years.

She smirks wryly as she glances slightly aside for a moment as if remembering something but still tensed ready to bolt but deeply wishing not to have too. "Fairy tale is a very apt way to put it. Many of us have to go through trials and challenges of various sorts to..get to our heart's desires and happiness." She explains through her shoulders sag a little. It was so bloody tiring sometimes. But she couldn't no wouldn't give up.

[grantuseyes]

Every betrayal of her nature through mannerisms, things he wrote off before as quirks, now brings him manic delight. Twitching of the nose. Baring and clenching of the teeth. The tension in her posture, like a cornered predator prepared to spring away at a moment’s notice. That or try to bite him. Wouldn’t that be funny too? Micolash thinks so, enough that when the notion crosses his mind, he giggles to himself.

“Mean-spirited? You think me to be cruel? Ashlynn, Ashlynn, Ashlynn.” He shakes his head as though her words are naive. “Cruelty would be to leave you in your ignoble state! To not attempt expunging the foul curse from your blood would be an unkindness! Oh, it is so true, that humanity in and of itself is a curse. But beasthood, ah! That is the worst outcome a human can arrive at!

“I have seen it, over and over.” Micolash’s voice is low, oily, languid. “I watched Old Yhanam as it burned, the only solution left to a city overrun with the beast plague. A blight of corruption. The profligacy of the Old Blood. Only those with not enough eyes to see would consider such a travesty as something natural, as something benign.

“Come now, Ashlynn. Enough foolishness.” He reaches a pale, open hand towards her now. Not one held out as a friend. His fingers are claw-like, ready to grab rather than offer.

[delphicbooksandbaubles]

She raises an eyebrow at him. She huffs out a breath through her nose. In a harrumphing manner. "Cruelty can take many forms..Especially when someone thinks they're doing things for the right reasons. " She murmurs simply but firmly back. Crossing her arms. The ends shouldn't justify the means but a good bunch of folk tended to think so. She tried her best to be a student of history in any realm she traveled or stayed in. Macheivillan examples there were aplenty.

Her ear we're firmly back now as she squinty/glowers. She makes a scoffing disbelieving sound. "People don't need fur or scales to be beastly." She retorts twitching her nose again. True giving into baser instincts of certain kinds we're bad. But there were instances of other sorts that were why any race could survive. Fight or flight, nurturing, making nests and dens, bonding and courting rituals. Sharing a meal. Her eyes soften slightly as an old memory or two niggles at the back of her mind.


Before rolling her left shoulder and then squaring both of them. She sighs softly, stubborn much? She half wryly thought, though another part of her understood somewhat of what such events and traumas could do to a person. Ok perhaps talking wasn't gonna cut it? She half thinks as she tries to ponder perhaps another tactic.

She squints and frowns at him again, oh that just rubbed her the wrong way her hairs went up and bristled along with the sudden goosebumps again. She looks down at the hand. Her arms still crossed but.. the fingers of her left-hand curl slightly. Before looking up at him again. Trying to do so straight on, as she debates trying something through her eyes start to go a bit golden. The color of molten coins or honey. The shade of which some of the poets might compare or equate to the moon at it's fullest.

Which was when the sunlight was reflected brightest by the moon. As well as for were kind has an extra pull. In the beliefs of some of her ancestors. The divine twins who represented or ruled both heavenly bodies were two sides of one coin. And even though Apollo was one of the patrons of wolf kind, there were called children of the moon and well most thought that to be Selene. But Artemis was guardian and lover of the wild places, creatures, and the hunt. Among other things.

She smirks wryly and wolfishly, and a little bit sorrowful. As she reaches for the small parcel in her bag. As she replies, "I think ya need to do your homework, Professor. " Before aiming to put the pocket-sized wrapped gift into his palm instead keeping her fingers to the edges of it.

[grantuseyes]

His own eyes, dark-ringed without sleep, ice blue without warmth or kindness, widen with amazement at the shift in his friend's eyes. (To think he still considers her a friend, despite all he's said!) He wishes he could examine them closer! Pry them open with a pair of fingers, examine the pupil for collapse, another telltale sign of beasthood and blood-drunkenness. Recollection of such examinations makes him recall the countless, countless times he's plucked eyes from heads to fill jars, to populate slide plates, to dissect. If he just had his tools again...

Micolash's smile has been plastered into a wide rictus this whole time, fixed and forced. Manic. It doesn't falter, but the corners of his mouth twitch when she deposits something into his hand, his eyes flicking down to look at that instead. He's confused, but the confusion seems enough of a distraction that Micolash sits back once more, pulling his arm back in to peer down at the parcel instead now. Might be the best chance to make a run for it if she cares to. Micolash isn't in his right mind, but when is he ever?

[delphicbooksandbaubles]

Her own eyebrows go up in ah more wry sort of 'oh gee like I'm so scary, not.' sort of way. Well least right now she wasn't trying to be that wouldn't help nothing. The healer side of her notes the signs of lack of sleep..but the other makes her steel her nerves and temper her compassion with caution.

They would likely look healthy except for whatever faults in them that necessitate the need for glasses/specs in her human form. Her Long range still had blurriness to it at a certain point.

Her nostrils flare a mite, her instincts kicking in at the show of unloving muscles. Most Canines took the bearing of teeth as a sign of aggression. She blinks though when he does the latter though. She takes a step back still keeping her eyes on him. A part of her torn..She couldn't just let him cause trouble for others..but mhhm..perhaps she should try and find or contact Micolash's host. Yes that would perhaps be the best course. She thought as she chances another step or two.

The parcel would be silvery and blues, with some ribbon and rectangle shaped. Though with some squishy parts on top, and a hardback book like feeling on the bottom.