for Essek (dunamagic)

[ausgebrannt]

[Caleb Widogast had given up on the idea of a soulmate. He hadn't wanted to, but his life had taken turns that something so precious as love with the person his soul was fated to complete, he couldn't possibly deserve it. And whatever poor soul had been matched to his, they didn't deserve the mess that he was. Wherever they were, he hoped that somehow they'd found another, even if he knew that wasn't how these things worked. But he did know the silence and that locked away space was empty. So empty.

It hadn't always been.

When he had been young, when he had been Bren, his soulmate had always been there, a familiar shadow he could meet in his mind, in dreams that weren't really dreams, visions that came when he was waking. There was comfort in his soulmate's presence, even if he was only a soft violet shape. He remembers that voice, soft and lilting. A constant presence in his life. They shared each other's distress, and times like that slipping into that shared space to offer what comfort he could, to take what comfort his shadowy soulmate offers, it's the safest he'd ever felt.

Then his entire life had shattered. He'd been drawn into the web of the vicious, plotting spider that was Trent Ikithon and fell apart in his final test of devotion. His psyche and his sanity had shattered. A decade passed before he surfaced once more, fleeing out into the night in desperation.

It's not long before he feels the ache of the lack of his soulmate, and he rties to find that mental space. It's hard, and he can't find his way in easily, and when he finally manages it, it's empty. Worse than empty. It's cold and vacant, like no one has set foot there for years. Ages. But why would they? He's been broken, gone. Hells, he's still broken.

So he concentrates on surviving, not sure if his soulmate is even still alive, and eventually is so swept up in the trouble that the Mighty Nein has stumbled across that he doesn't have much time to think about that ache. The friends he's made help, finding people who genuinely care for him, who he genuinely cares about. He starts living rather than simply surviving, broken though he may be. He starts to think he can make a difference perhaps, and is so caught up in everything that is going on that it nearly knocks him off his feet when all at once, that long-forgotten link lights up with the sudden burst of utter distress.

The fact that it happens as he's standing in the middle of the Bright Queen's palace, holding the Luxon Beacon aloft and offering it back to the Dynasty that it was stolen from. For a moment he forgets to breathe, reaches desperately for that mind space and is denied it once more. No. If the link is still there, then that means. Oh gods that means.

Caleb only hopes that the people around him think the near stupefied expression on his face has to do with the weight of what is going on around them, as the Mighty Nein are released from being held and are welcomed as heroes rather than prisoners.]

Comments

[dunamagic]

[Essek knew what an empty shared space was like - it wasn't entirely uncommon for an elf to have a soulmate who was yet to be born, to live decades with that hollow ache. As a new soul he was not gifted the comfort of knowing and waiting for the other half of his soul. No, it was just.. empty. A void that pressed against him until he learned to shut it away, leave it in an unused corner of his mind. He let the cold seep into him, for ambition to push him, for his goals to outweigh any morals-

And then a few years short of his ninth decade, he felt it - the first spark of distress, unbridled and confused.

Like a flame, it flared to brilliant life and left him breathless. It was unpleasant - he's long since convinced himself he didn't ever want to feel another's distress pushed upon him, to have such a connection - yet, he feels unimaginable relief. As if the world was cold and he's feeling warmth for the first time.

So he opens the door he's long barred shut and brings life to their shared space. It's small things: making it more welcoming, lived in, bringing the warmth of a comfort he never had. To not leave his soulmate as cold and devastatingly alone as he was. The compassion surprised him -- he was far from moral or ethical, his ambitions driving him forward relentlessly -- but there was some soft, neglected part of him that he pushed down, hid, that came to life when his soulmate did. Like a fragile moth coaxed out by a flame.

An apt description for the burnt orange shadow that flickered in their shared space. Getting to listen to that accented voice become deeper with age, how his flame's distress became more frequent along with it. Essek would not hesitate to stop his research when he felt his flame's distress, to be there to give comfort.

And then there was distress so intense it took him to his knees, his vision whited out, ears buzzing. It overwhelmed him to the point that Essek could not slip into the their space - could only clutch his chest as the air was stolen from his lungs. It felt like hours, days, before it just--

Stopped.

And it was over. His flame was snuffed out, gone. It took two years for him to realize his soulmate wasn't coming back, the space empty and cold -- colder than it had been before. At times, he would feel a short flare of panic that wasn't his, but the room was still vacant - phantom distress the clerics called it. It took another five for him to finally bar shut that part of his mind and focus instead on his goals -- there was nothing to lose, whatever his soulmate had nurtured in him was a only a hinderance in his absence.

Every flare of distress went ignored, even as they became more frequent -- he would not give into a ghost. Essek pushed and pushed, until he was lofty in his ambition. Until.. it was threatened.

So used to ignoring the phantom distress, he wasn't nearly used enough to his own. It took effort to school his expression in the face of a beacon held aloft by some unknown man - it almost became overwhelming when he felt a flare of that phantom distress alongside his own. Why did it almost feel as if someone was banging on the door of a place he rather not remember--

The polite smile is difficult when he's tasked to see this group to the Dungeon of Penance, but he will not let himself slip. Essek only has his ambitions now, he cannot lose them too.]

Come, follow me.

[dunamagic]

[Despair once again that was not his. It made trancing impossible -- every meditative thought brought him back to the door, made him want to open it, whispered of false hope and of someone he could not have.

Days passed and the ache in his chest did not ever fully fade, the emotional wound reopened in many ways. He kept tabs on these Mighty Nein, though it was odd to realize that the one he was most interested in was shielded from his scrying. Curious. Even when he took a look at him when giving them their new home in Rosohna, he could not see the amulet - hidden then?

Soon, he found himself outside their.. modified home, looking at what could only be described as uniquely unKryn floral choices. Even it could not stop his normally enigmatic smile from shifting towards something more.. genuine, if even for a moment.

His eyes turn to the returning portion of the Mighty Nein and with them was Essek's primary interest - a man that somehow haunted his mind yet was unavailable to his scrying eye. And looking rather dashing at that -- so why did that make his heart squeeze?

Exchanging some greetings, his eyes fall to Caleb.] I see you have embraced Xhorhasian fashion. It suits you.