001 ✶ video

[scarletcast]

[ username reads: wanda ]

​​​​[ Having had time to recover from the fight, Wanda looks no worse for wear. She's outside in the abandoned village, out of the glare of sunlight, moving her fingers slowly. Thin red wisps of hex energy weave around her fingers. A small rock, part of a doorframe, and a water bottle are moving in a slow, lazy circle like they're being turned on an invisible Ferris wheel. ]

​​​​[ She's quiet at first, concentrating. Then, she pulls the water bottle into one hand. The other two objects keep circling. ]

What is this called, where you are from?

​​​​[ Her mouth curves in dry amusement. ]

Is it magic?

Comments

[scarletcast]

What else do you do with magic?

[respired]

Any number of things. Magic is will given form.

[scarletcast]

[ That's too broad, ]

Can you give me an example?

[respired]

[ He shrugs. ]

Life, death.

[ He lifts his hand, and icy energy coalesces into a crackling, shimmering sphere just above his open palm. ]

Things in-between.

[ Still unforgivably broad, but to Koltira's experience, magic is capable of literally anything. ]

[scarletcast]

[ Unforgivably broad, but she's distracted from that. Wanda's eyes widen with recognition. She can't sense the energy from this distance, but it looks so similar. ]

You were born able to do this?

[respired]

[ He shakes his head. Other energy laces through the frost--blood red, sickly green. The magic curls around his armored fingers, shimmers bright against his dark armor. ]

My people all have an affinity for the arcane. But I was a simple warrior in life. In undeath, however ...

[ He curls his fingers into a fist. ]

Things changed.

[scarletcast]

[ She's entranced. Eventually, she'll remember her manners and not stare. ]

How long ago was this?

[respired]

[ He doesn't mind the stare. It's better than outright revulsion, which is what he's used to. ]

Nearly twenty years ago.

[ Somewhere in there. His sense of time is not great. ]

[scarletcast]

[ To say sorry for his situation is pity for a stranger, and Wanda does not offer pity. ]

I would like to speak with you further. Where can I find you?

[respired]

Oska's forge.

[ He adjusts the view so that she can see it more clearly -- a dimly lit space with an anvil, a burning furnace, racks of weapons and armor. ]

[scarletcast]

How long will you remain there?

[ ooc: skip to action or log? ]

[respired]

Through the night.

[ And beyond that, probably, since he doesn't sleep. ]

[ ooc: action is good!! ]

action;

[scarletcast]

I will see you there.

[ She comes by after dinner, peering into the forge. Wanda has no idea what an undead will be like to her senses, and she's prepared for something cold, perhaps, or something that might move like a machine to her. ]

[ When she sees him, she smiles. ]

I realised I did not ask your name.

[respired]

[ The forge is warm enough from the heat of the furnace, but Koltira himself is a pillar of winter. He radiates cold, from his ice lantern eyes to his slate-colored skin. He has an otherworldly beauty to him, like all elves do, but there's something smeared about it, something cracked and strange. He watches her come in with an inscrutable expression. His voice is low and smooth, almost breathy, but there's an echoing quality to it, as though he's constantly attended by a chorus of spirits. ]

My name is Koltira. Koltira Deathweaver.

[ He leans against the anvil, his gaze fixed to her. ]

And you?

[scarletcast]

[ He is a biting winter in the room, that everyone who feels it knows the sting on bare skin, and the danger if they stay out too long. It's not something to inherently fear, however, is why Wanda isn't afraid. She regards him with plain curiosity. ]

My name is Wanda. I am also known as the Scarlet Witch.

[respired]

[ He quirks a long eyebrow. ]

Such an epithet suggests magic. Yet you have questions.

[scarletcast]

Magic is uncommon where I am from. I do not know anyone else who uses it.

[respired]

[ He leans over the anvil in front of him, his icy eyes bright. ]

Does that leave you lonely?

[ Despite his strange countenance, despite the otherworldly echo, there is still a smooth lilt to his voice, a silkiness that belies his former life. ]

[scarletcast]

[ Wanda shakes her head. She was never lonely, there was Pietro, he was all she ever had or needed. ]

It will not be the case for long. I am human, and something more. There will be others.

[respired]

[ He nods. ]

Most of these people fit that description. If they are not human, they still look it. You will have no shortage of companions.

[ Maybe he sounds a little bitter. ]

[scarletcast]

[ Wanda eyes him. Quietly, ]

Are you lonely, Koltira Deathweaver?

[respired]

I am alone.

[ There's nobody here like him. That's just plain fact. Not elf, not undead. ]

[scarletcast]

[ It's a subtle difference. Loneliness is a standard package, it rends, or it eats away like slow-acting poison. Anyone can manage being alone if they know how. ]

What happened to you?

[respired]

[ Bluntly. ]

I died. As did nearly all of my people.

[ He lifts his hand, and the same icy power as before swirls around his fingers. ]

Many of them are at rest, buried beneath the old ruins of my homeland. But some of us were not allowed such peace.

[scarletcast]

[ It's best he's blunt. Wanda wouldn't flinch from brusqueness, nor from the cold he lives in. ]

[ It is a curse to be alone, through no fault of his. ]

And there is no way to end your — undeath?

[ This is mercy to her — if he's suffering, end it swiftly. ]