http://thekohakuriver.livejournal.com/ ([identity profile] thekohakuriver.livejournal.com) wrote in [community profile] trans_92010-04-21 08:24 pm

The Long Sleep [Open]

[ This takes place after the exorcism of Haku thread. ]

Haku woke slowly, with an ache in his head that was like a deep bruise, tender and throbbing. For a long while, he simply stared at the ceiling, and remembered what it was like to breathe. In....out, the texture of the air in his mouth was strangely liberating. He affected a sigh, just to prove he could do so on command, a soft twitch that broke the spell of paralysis that sleep had cast on him. Real sleep, good sleep, not the forced, painful sleep he'd kept since the Nightmare King's corruption had taken hold.

It took a little effort to pull himself onto his elbows. Someone had covered him with a thick blanket and it was heavy enough to give him pause in pushing it back. His feet were bare when he swung them over the edge of the bed— his feet had always been bare, and thankfully he was dressed in his own Hakama and not the clinging plantsuit. Haku had had enough of close-clinging and constriction for a long while. The floor felt strange under his feet, and for a moment he staggered in trying to stand, as if the intervening days of sleeping had made him forget.


...and then he remembered what had happened, and between the revulsion and his own unsteadiness he had to sit. What had he done? What the must think of him.
on_errantry: (Thinking)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 01:33 am (UTC)(link)
In a way, Rhiow was glad Haku hadn't awoken yet. It had taken a good long while for her to build up enough of her strength to even wash properly, or to do anything but sleep, eat, and sleep again.

She stayed in the medbay - between Tycho and Haku she'd spent far too much time here recently - so she would know when he awoke. The sound of cloth stirring, the bed creaking reached her ears and she sat up and stretched.

"Good morning," she said softly. She wasn't really sure how she should address Haku - she'd spoken his full, true name twice, and through picking it apart and building the spell, she probably knew more about him than he had ever wanted anyone to know. "Are you feeling well again?"
on_errantry: (Default)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 01:46 am (UTC)(link)
"A pretty ticklish piece of wizardry," Rhiow said, hesitating only a moment before jumping up on the bed. She licked her nose - it still felt... strange to be this close to one of the Powers. "We got rid of the corruption. It took some doing, but I'm fairly certain it's gone if you are...?"

Her voice trailed off into a questioning tone. Of course she wanted to believe in the integrity of her own wizardry, but her own wizardry had not been one hundred percent functional on board for a long while.

"Oh, and the thing managed to break clear out of one of the cells in the brig. We have someone repairing it, but... the bars are fairly warped."
on_errantry: (Naptime)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 02:15 am (UTC)(link)
Rhiow sighed softly - thank Iau for that. She sat up, setting to work grooming herself. She paused mid-groom when she remembered - should she tell him now, or would it be better if she surprised him later?

Later, she thought. When he was well enough to walk around on his own power again. "I'm glad," she said. "Like I said, the wizardry was a little ticklish - I was worried I had forgotten a parameter or something..." her whiskers twitched. "And that was some awful black gunk you vomited all over Dh'aim'hon at the end of it."
on_errantry: (Thinking)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 02:30 am (UTC)(link)
Rhiow tensed as his hand tightened, her tail flipping from one side to the other. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking and Rhiow didn't even want to try.

"...Yes," she said simply. "One of the unfortunate side effects of working a wizardry that extensive on someone."

The People were very private creatures. It was more than fair to say that she understood.
on_errantry: (What was that)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 02:48 am (UTC)(link)
It was - a feeling like a tingle down her spine, like warmth, like being held in Huhuah's lap again and petted gently. She knew something had happened - something borne on Haku's well-wishes like the breath of a cool wind. She twitched her ears madly and the tip of her tail twitched - what had happened?

Thank him for the boon, fifth-lifer.

It had been a long time since she'd heard the echo of the Silent One's voice in her ears for anything but help with the variables of a spell - she had given up thinking that it would ever go back the way it used to be, where the Whisperer spoke just for the sake of speaking, but this...

Wait.

Fifth-lifer?

"You..." she said, her eyes growing round in surprise. She had given that life to buy the energy she needed to battle the Tearer the last time she had faced Her. She had settled into the thought that she was now into her sixth... had he really given it back?

A growling laugh at the back of her mind made her remember the rest of the Silent One's words. "Thank you," she said, still stunned.
on_errantry: (Default)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 03:43 am (UTC)(link)
Rhiow slowly lowered her head down on her paws, letting him pet her while she thought.

It was something she had already come to accept, the fact that laying down her life - or lives - in the line of duty was likely to happen to her... was expected, usually. Wizards sometimes lived long and happy lives, but they were most frequently the exception rather than the rule.

She flipped her tail back and forth. "No more than I would have done for anyone," she said. "The Oath is to preserve life, wherever possible." Had it cost him something to do this for her?
on_errantry: (Thinking)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 03:53 am (UTC)(link)
"You're a friend," Rhiow said firmly. "I would have done everything to help you even without the Oath."

She ducked her head, her ears going out sideways. Wizards on Earth didn't generally get thanked - for anything. Feline wizards were like Manhattan's subway workers; desperately needed, keeping things running smoothly, but completely invisible nine times out of ten. And if commuting wizards did notice them, it was probably because something had gone wrong that they needed to fix.

"I didn't do it for the thanks, is what I'm trying to say," she muttered. "Or for any kind of reward. Not that I'm ungrateful."
on_errantry: (Default)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 05:03 am (UTC)(link)
"It wasn't you," Rhiow said simply. It was true - it hadn't been him. "If we blamed you for what you did under the influence, we would have to blame everyone whose actions didn't become them during that time."

She began licking her paw and washing her face, staring off into space, pensive. "That One rides us all sometimes, and sometimes we can't get out of it on our own. There's no shame in that."
on_errantry: (Default)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-22 10:59 pm (UTC)(link)
"If you would like to tell it, I'll listen - but I already know more than you probably want me to, so if you would like to still keep a couple of secrets I'm not going to push." Rhiow's soft purr faded away as she began to groom herself in earnest - and then decided that now was as good a time as ever to tell him.

"The spell was only part of the solution. Ha-t'hara and I talked to Stacy and... she's built you a river."
on_errantry: (lecturing)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-23 06:01 pm (UTC)(link)
There were times when Rhiow took a lot of satisfaction in her work - seeing the blindsided look on Haku's face made her put her whiskers forward and make a small noise of amusement.

"In the city," she said by way of confirmation. "We haven't started running water through it yet, but it starts in Escherville and runs all the way back behind the Garou temple, where the water gets recycled into Stacy's pipes and comes back out of the wellspring."

Her voice got soft and quiet for a moment as she studied her paws. "I saw it in your name," she said. "That you were without... I thought, if we could help with that, it would make something like the corruption less likely to happen in the future?"
on_errantry: (Naptime)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-28 01:02 am (UTC)(link)
Rhiow purred in the back of her throat - to say that she hadn't expected this reaction would have meant she was lying through her teeth. She'd seen his Name, after all, and she'd seen how the physical river was literally half of his being.

"I couldn't do anything less, kami-sama," she said. "I don't leave things half-finished."
on_errantry: (lecturing)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-04-28 04:41 am (UTC)(link)
"In the City," she said simply, the purr coloring her voice with an odd hum. "We can go, if you'd like. We'll have to go the long way, though, I don't have the energy for even a long-jump transit like that in me."
on_errantry: (You are dumb)

[personal profile] on_errantry 2010-05-01 04:51 am (UTC)(link)
"Haku," Rhiow said, her tone bordering on scolding. "The riverbed is not going to go anywhere. You can wait until you're recovered, or at least until I'm recovered enough to jump us." Hopefully a long-jump transit wouldn't drain her just because it had Haku's name in it.

She switched her tail, feeling a little strange scolding a Power - a Power that had just granted her the gift of another life.

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