• Closed • Follow the Glow

[Devin]

5th of Ymiden, Arc 718

Devin Thorn, despicable criminal by day and respectable musician by night, sat on the floor of his living room on the white plush carpet, unlocked the large wooden chest that stood in front of him and opened it. He was taking stock, just like every season – because he didn’t only want to get rich, he also wanted to know how rich exactly he was and what kind of treasures he owned. First came the cloak that he had acquired during the adventure with the magical tree that had nearly cost him his life and turned his eyes blue and violet. He actually didn’t mind that – not the mortal danger of course, but the eye color because it sure attracted a lot of attention, and Devin was a vain man and loved to attract attention wherever he went.

He draped the cloak around his shoulders and then he removed the next item, a gold circlet, and put it on his head because such a beauty needed to be shown off in his opinion and not lie in his personal treasure chest all the time. There was also a peculiar small rock that was bright red. He looked at it thoughtfully for a moment, and then he shrugged his shoulders and placed it on the floor next to the chest because it didn’t look particularly interesting and didn’t seem to possess any special properties either. Next, he pulled a short sword that was quite well-made out and swung it a couple of times before he laid it on the floor. The following item was a small crystal cut into the shape of a bird. He quite liked birds, but it didn’t look particularly valuable, so he put it aside as well – or rather he was about to, when he noticed that it had suddenly started to glow.

He paused, furrowed his brow and carried it over to the window where the lighting was better so that he would be able to take a closer look at it – only to find that it stopped glowing, as abruptly as it had started to glow. He furrowed his brow some more and walked back towards his treasure chest. It suddenly started to glow again. Maybe it was some kind of magical compass? He pondered that question for a moment and came to the conclusion that such was highly likely – either that or it led to a treasure.

Since you could never have enough treasure in his opinion, he closed the chest, grabbed his sword and walked out of the door in order to follow the glow. He was still wearing his Cavani’s Cloak and the circlet so that he looked almost like some kind of noble lord rather than the thief and con man that he really was, and there was a huge smile on his face because he couldn’t stop thinking of all the riches he would find that trial.

[Pegasus]

Devin Thorn.

An interesting little bug if ever there had been one. Over confident, no doubt and with a sometimes tendency towards helping other people which would have to be quelled. But equally, might be useful if it was taken and tapped. Utilized for the powers of good ~ good for him that was. Yes, Devin Thorn could be a wonderful little pet if molded correctly - shaped and made beautiful to be worn like a jewel. And how they would envy him for being the first to see this.

Yes.

The wind itself had whispered to him that his sister's covetous eyes had begun to turn towards this little morsel and that, too, was reason to watch, to smile and then, when the opportunity arose, to drop a small item, a trinket, into a pocket and from there?

To see what happened.
Devin was taking account of his possessions, looking at them, appraising the worth both financially and usefully when he noticed that a small glass bird was glowing. This was unusual behaviour for the item and so he experimented. Yes, sometimes it would glow - other times it was just a pretty little crystal bird.

Which led him to walking out of his door, gold circlet on his head and cloak over his shoulders, smiling benevolently at those he passed. The small item continued glowing while pointing in one specific direction - as the bird flew so to speak - and Devin not being a bird meant that he had a few detours to make, moving around objects like houses, city walls, etc. But still, eventually, he was outside of Scalvoris Town itself and the little crystal bird led him to a small area. Nestled against the city walls (such as they were), in an area which seemed to get a lot of foot traffic, judging by state of the ground, there was a small, dilapidated, abandoned shrine.

As he arrived there, the bird in his hand suddenly look flight, crystal wings glittering as it flapped it's wings twice and then majestically soared over to the shrine and landed there. Where it sat, glowing, and was once more just a glass bird.

Devin might notice that people seemed to not notice. In fact, they seemed to not notice the shrine at all. Except for one old man, sitting and smoking a pipe who watched with amusement in his watery blue eyes.

[Devin]

As he walked through the streets of Scalvoris Town, Devin smiled benevolently at the people that he passed by, and he even waved at them, as he imagined King Cassander of Rynmere would if he ever decided to leave the confines of his palace and mingle with his subjects. He was completely in his element. He had always wanted to be rich and famous, and he had always wanted to be admired, since the time he had been a little boy in the worst and poorest part of Andaris. There were, of course, also a few people that gave him strange looks due to his walking around with a magnificent cloak and a gold circlet on his head, but he ignored them completely. They were not worthy of his time!

He was so busy showing off, that he nearly forget to watch where he was going and pay attention to the crystal bird a couple of times which resulted in him almost running into a tree, among other things. His near-accident didn’t discourage him in the least though. He just looked at the tree for a moment, shrugged his shoulders and continued to strut down the street like a peacock – until he encountered another obstacle, a fence this time. Apparently, he realized, the crystal bird had decided to take the most direct path and overlooked the fact that he couldn’t fly!

He checked if anybody was watching, and then he simply climbed across the fence that fortunately wasn’t very high – and rounded a house and then other one, and then he was suddenly somewhere outside the city walls and secretly wondered if he would have to traverse the entire island in order to get to his treasure. He didn’t even consider that there might be anything special about the small, abandoned shrine until – until the bird suddenly took flight and landed right on it. He rubbed his eyes because he wasn’t sure if he what he was seeing was real and just stared at it for a moment before he came closer.

Maybe the treasure was hidden in the shrine!

He was about to inspect it when he noticed the old man sitting there and watching him. He abruptly turned around and came closer. “Do you know anything about this place?” he asked and casually pointed at the shrine behind him. “What kind of shrine is it?” As he waited for the old man’s answer, he noticed something else that was strange as well. Before, when he had walked through Scalvoris Town, people had stared at him, but nobody was paying attention to him anymore. That was really weird!

Had he suddenly become invisible to everybody but the old man?

[Pegasus]

Devin climbed the fence and then made his way to the shrine. The bird taking flight and then, of course, landing on the shrine told him that the shrine itself was important, even though it didn't seem to be. Therefore, Devin made his way over to it and looked.

Whilst he was examining it, Devin noticed a few things. One was that the shrine was in a dreadful state of disrepair - but once it had been beautiful, he could tell, although it was a long, long time ago. The shrine had been left to fall to ruin and ransacked, it seemed, over what had probably been arcs. But then, Devin spoke to the man who was watching and he smiled at the young chap in front of him. Two teeth sat in the middle of his smile, but he had no more gnashers than that.

Then, he spoke. "It was once a shrine to the Immortal of Wealth and Birds," he said, and his watery blue eyes looked at Devin with sadness in them. "I was the priest but then, I grew old and weak and I could no longer serve him." The old man gestured to his legs which, should Devin notice such things were shriveled and thin, far too weak to be walked on. The correct medical term was atrophy, should he know it. "So, I made it so that no one sees it, for it is too ugly for people to see. The Lord of Vanity and Gold should be worshiped with beauty and a shrine to him should be beautiful in it's glory and glorious in its stature." He seemed rather flowery in his speech but his accent sounded educated.

He pointed the end of his pipe then at Devin and he considered the young man in front of him thoughtfully.

After a moment, he asked what seemed to be quite an important question to him. "Yet you can see me, and the shrine. What makes you different? Come to that, where did you get that bird?" He asked Devin suddenly something which had seemed to just now occur to him."Are you in some way connected to, or do you worship and give praise to His Great Lord Delroth, He of Vanity, Birds and the most Glorious of the Immortals?" Old eyes they may be but they shone with delight at the prospect of his next words.

"Have you come to restore the shrine in Delroth's name?"

[Devin]

The shrine was in a dreadful state of disrepair, Devin noticed, and what more, there wasn’t any treasure anywhere, no golden nels, no silver, no gemstones and no rings and necklaces that he would be able to stuff into his pockets which he found disappointing to say the least. He could tell that the shrine had been beautiful once though which made the sight in front of him all the more depressing. Beautiful things should be taken care of and cherished in his opinion, and not neglected and allowed to fall into a state of disrepair. It was an absolute sacrilege!

“Why didn’t you try to find a new priest?” he asked the old man, briefly casting a glance at his shriveled legs before he turned away, shuddering slightly. They were rather ugly in his opinion. “I’m sure that there are lots of people that would like to take care of your shrine out there!” he pointed out, momentarily wondering if priests had to be chaste (if they had to, it might explain the lack of willing successors) before he realized just what the man had said. Wealth? Birds? Vanity? Gold? That was basically him!

“Wait! You made the shrine disappear?” he asked incredulously a moment later. “Are you a mage? I’ve always wondered what it would be like to have magic!” he admitted, having come to the decision that the old man might be more than a handicapped priest that would probably die before long after all. And then the priest asked where he had gotten the bird, and the thief furrowed his brow. “I just found it in my pocket when I returned from an adventure in the Sweetwine Woods”, he replied.

The man wanted to know if he worshipped Delroth and had come to restore the shrine though, and Devin thought about it for a moment before he beamed at him and replied, “Of course I do! I’m vain, I like gold, and I even saved a parrot from certain death once! As for the shrine”, he continued, deciding that a shrine would be better than nothing at all. Perhaps he would indeed make it look nice again so that people would come and admire it again – and him, the shrine’s wise and benevolent (and handsome!) caretaker!

“Sure. I’ll restore your shrine. But I won’t give up my love life!” he added and glowered at him in order to let him know that this matter was not up for debate. He was too young to spend the rest of his life alone!

[Pegasus]

The man looked at Devin as he asked why he hadn't tried to find a new priest and he shrugged. "How do you know I didn't? Hmmm?" He asked that as though it were the cleverest question in the world, and he chuckled to himself, obviously delighted with his own smartness. Devin's next question challenged that a little, though, and he frowned slightly. "Well, no, not exactly," he said with a surly and rather sulky expression on his face. "It was more that I prayed and Delroth did it for me. I mean, that still means... no, I'm not a mage. Are you?!" It was a rather accusatory pointing of his pipe at that point.

But when Devin spoke about his love life, the old priest roared with laughter. "Being a priest of Delroth means that you are surrounded by wealth and beauty, it means that you have power and prestige! Women love that!" Chuckling now, rather than laughing from his belly, as he had been, the man asked Devin, with a wicked glint and a mischievous wink, "Why is it you think I can't walk any more, lad? All the ladies love a priest." And so, it seemed, was very true for him. When Devin said that he would look after the shrine, though, the man nodded. "Not mine, lad. Delroth's. His shrine, his glory. You, as the priest here, will bask in that glory, but never forget that it's his." He was serious and stern for a moment and then he sighed, leaning back in his chair and his eyes drooping.

"My daughter will come soon. I'll tell her." What it was, Devin would have to work out for himself as the old priest seemed to literally fall immediately asleep within a few trill of finishing his words. This gave Devin a few moments to explore the shrine, to see what he had to work with. Then, as he was doing that (or whatever he did), along came a woman. She was tall, bronze skinned and with long hair the colour of honey and vivid green eyes. She was exquisitely put together and she smiled at Devin in greeting.

"Hello," she said with a low, soft and sultry tone. "My name is Raine, I'm here to pick up my father." Looking Devin up and down with an unashamed expression of appraisal on her face, she more or less purred. "And who are you?"

[Devin]

The old man had already found a priest? Devin looked around, but he couldn’t see anybody besides the two of them. Shrugging his shoulders, he turned to face his strange new acquaintance again, thinking that he was probably a bit senile. His great-grandmother in Andaris had been senile. She had believed that she was an important noble lady and that King Cassander would come to dinner soon. She had constantly insisted that she needed to start preparing the meal right now and gotten mad and tried to fight his mother when she had refused to let her cook, even though the king had never come.

The old man wanted to know if he was a mage though. Devin had the impression that he didn’t like mages particularly, so he put on the most indignant expression that he was capable of and firmly told him, “No, of course not! I was just wondering if you were one. I’m sorry about my question though. So Delroth made the shrine disappear?” he wanted to know. He was mostly trying to distract the man from a topic that he apparently didn’t approve of. Devin had no such prejudices. He treated everybody the same – as potential lovers or potential victims. Sometimes they were both to him.

When the man told him that being a priest of Delroth meant that you had power and prestige and that women loved that and proceeded to ask him why he thought he couldn’t walk anymore, the thief just looked at him in confusion for a moment before his eyes lit up. His gaze went to the man’s legs again. All of a sudden, they didn’t look ugly at all anymore. In fact, they were absolutely beautiful, and he couldn’t help but wonder how many women the man had been with in order for him to permanently lose the ability to walk.

A hundred? A thousand? A million?

“I want to be a priest as well!” Devin exclaimed and added, “And I will of course never forget that the shrine is really Delroth’s!” Having an Immortal be mad at you, he decided, was probably not particularly pleasant. Besides, he’d still get the power and the prestige and the women. That would be enough. He’d curb his greed - in that regard at least.

“You have a daughter?” he asked, secretly wondering if she had trouble walking as well because she had had so many lovers, but the man never answered. He never told him what he would tell her either. He just fell asleep. Devin had never seen somebody fall asleep so quickly. For a moment he was worried that he’d actually died because his work in this world was done or something (it had sometimes happened that way in the stories that he had read). He walked over to him in order to poke him and see if he would react in any way, but it was just then that she showed up, that beautiful, beautiful woman.

Devin instantly stopped looking at the old man and the shrine and focused all of his attention on her instead. This was the old man’s daughter? He really liked what he was seeing, he decided, and he put on the most brilliant smile that he was capable of, bowed in a somewhat exaggerated fashion and told her, “Devin Thorn, master bard and future priest of Delroth. At your service! Shall I help you with your father?” he asked, thinking that she might like him better if he did something nice for her. “He seems to be pretty tired!”

[Pegasus]

The priest chuckled to himself as Devin looked around to see who the new priest was, but he said nothing. The boy would work it out or he would not, either way it was nothing to do with him - the boy would learn. "Good, I don't like mages. Troublesome, they are. Thinking they're more powerful than everyone else, and all about themselves. They should all be burned alive, or so someone told me they think off in Rynmere!" He seemed to find this more than a little amusing, it must be said. Chortling to himself, he looked at Devin with a cheery grin.

"One of the things that I've found best is to not question how or why Delroth does anything." He replied to Devin's question about how the shrine was invisible. Whatever Devin said, the older man seemed to find it very funny but then, literally, just fell asleep where he sat. It wasn't an unreasonable thing that Devin checked him, in fairness as he seemed to more slip out of consciousness than fall asleep, but asleep he was.

The woman who approached, though, who looked Devin up and down with unashamed desire in her eyes simply smiled at him. "So very helpful, Devin Thorn. Are you always this helpful?" She seemed amused by him and his eagerness to assist her. Maybe she recognised that he would not be quite so keen to jump forward and be chivalrous if she'd looked less like her mother and more like her father. "He's fine there for a while."

Looking around at the shrine, she moved over and trailed one finger over it, her nose crinkling in disgust at the dust and mess.

"So, you're the new priest? The one to replace Pappy?" She asked and she looked back at Devin with interest. "If you're going to be a priest of Delroth, how will you worship him?" She moved over next to him and trailed the same finger down his chest. "What are you going to do in his name to bring worship and glory?"

With a sudden snort and a rather loud grunt, her father woke up and looked at Devin with suddenly sharp and interested eyes.

"Yes, boy," he said, his tone not at all amused or anything other than sharp, intrigued questioning. "What are you going to do and how will you worship him?"

[Devin]

When he realized that the old man wasn’t dead, but only sleeping – or rather slipping in and out of consciousness, although he wasn’t entirely sure what the difference between that and sleeping was – Devin breathed a huge sigh of relief. Normally he liked dead people because they didn’t complain and call the guards when you took their stuff, but he didn’t want the old man to die. He was nice and useful, and he had told him about Delroth, the gold, the birds and the women and all those other amazing things!

He had to admit, his daughter was even nicer though. When she asked him if he was always this helpful, the thief put on the brightest smile that he was capable of and assured her, “Of course I am, my lady. I’m the most helpful man in all of Idalos and beyond, although I’m not sure what exactly is beyond Idalos, apart from the land of dreams.” He noticed the look on her face, and he approved of it. Devin liked to be looked at and admired, especially when the person that was doing the looking and admiring was so appealing!

As she trailed a finger over the shrine, he did so as well. His finger came back grey. It really was quite dirty. Somebody would have to do something about it, and judging by the looks of it, he realized, that somebody would be him. He didn’t even mind, at least not as much as he normally would, because she was here and would watch him, and he'd get a chance to show off.

“First, I’ll clean this place up of course!” he told her and paused briefly as she moved over next to him and trailed a finger down his chest. “And then”, he continued, hoping that she would approve and that it sounded sufficiently impressive and looked directly into her eyes. “I’ll decorate it with gold and jewels and silk and velvet so that it will become the most beautiful shrine in the entire world, and I’ll collect all kinds of treasures in his name. What do you think?”

“Will Delroth like that?” he asked her, and his lips curved in a flirtatious smile. He was about to ask her something else as well – and reach out towards her – but it was just than that the old man woke up. It was really quite an inconvenient time for him to wake up, and Devin narrowed his eyes in mild irritation for a moment before he smiled at him because this was really not the right time to incur his wrath even though he'd wanted to have a few more bits alone with Raine.

“As I just told your lovely daughter, good sir”, he informed him. “I will start by making this place look nice again, and then I will fill it with treasures and all kinds of exotic birds – because Delroth is the Immortal of Birds as well – and I will of course strive to always look good for him!” he added since he liked looking good, and it seemed as if Delroth wanted servants that took care of their appearance, too!

“When I’m done, people from all around Idalos will come here to admire the shrine, and they will all want to have a shrine exactly like that!” he told him with utter conviction, wondering if he was already a priest or if he still had to do something. He wanted to get started already and create something that was worthy of being admired – and gather a few admirers of his own of course because you could never have enough of those in his opinion.

“And I’ll tell everybody how amazing Delroth is! Everywhere I go, I will spread his word!” he added, thinking that Delroth would probably like that. He was the Immortal of Vanity after all!

[Pegasus]

When Devin spoke of what he would do, she smiled at him and her honey hair fell back from her face as she lifted her head towards him. Just leaning in, just a little closer, her emerald eyes were focused entirely, completely and only on him. "That sounds wonderful," she whispered, just for his ears. "Do you think you might need the help of a priestess?" There was no shame, no doubt in her expression - if he was going to do what he seemed to be promising, then she wanted part of it. It would please Delroth and there were a hundred other reasons, too, only some of which were explained by the way her body swayed against his, just a little closer. Her mouth was inches from his, her gaze intent upon him and when he smiled, she returned the expression.

Her father awoke, though and he asked his question. Raine smiled at him adoringly as he did, showing none of the irritation Devin felt at the priest's interruption. She turned to look at Devin as he answered, though, and he chuckled. Except, he seemed to be some kind of a ventriloquist for he chuckled both where he was and from the shrine too. Maybe he or his daughter could throw their voices.

Except, of course, for the fact that there was a man standing there. Holding the very same small bird which had led Devin here, except the crystal creature fluttered and flew around him. Devin might notice that there were more than a few birds in the vicinity, too, sitting on the shrine, perching around. Not usual city birds, either, but beautiful avian creatures with bright plumage. The man who stood there looked at Devin with his bright, piercing blue eyes as both the priest, and his daughter, fell to their knees. Holding out his hand to them, the daughter took it and, nestling his hand in hers, she leaned forward and placed a slow and lingering kiss on the Immortal's, her eyes gazing adoringly upon him as the wind whispered around her, causing her hair to sway and her clothes to ripple. The slightest smile lifted his lips as he gazed upon the woman and then, in front of him but next to her, he held out his other hand. It wasn't for the father, he was on the other side of Raine, kneeling in obvious and deep respect.

Delroth turned to Devin, expectantly.