The Bottom Line.

[Faith Augustin]

15th Ymiden, 719

Faith was irritated. Irritated, tired, without any respite or rest and she was close - perilously close, she knew - to breaking point. The weight of responsibility on her - and the sheer size of what she was doing was so large that Faith felt she had no time to do anything. She barely ate ~ not a new situation, for her ~ and slept when she had to for as long as was strictly necessary. Padraig, Alissa, they fussed. But they also knew her. She'd done this at the docks relief effort in Scalvoris. But then, that was about something finite. Contained.

Not bloody dragons the size of mountains.

The last thing she'd needed was what had happened during the meeting. It had been a mistake, she knew, letting Maxine into this, but equally Faith knew that she would do it again. Sephira trusted the woman - and more and more Faith was growing to respect Sephira. Also, so did Kura. Max was Qit's friend, and Rey'na's too. Yet, there was no doubting what had happened. From the outset, things had been tense between her and Max ~ much moreso than in previous encounters they'd had. Faith genuinely didn't understand the woman's reasoning, but right now, that wasn't important.

For all that she was busy, tense and had entirely too much to do, Faith was who she was. The mark that she had placed on Maxine allowed her to hear snippets of the woman's thoughts, and Faith had - over the two days since Max had stormed out of the meeting, cursing and flinging around insults - grown concerned. And frankly, damn Maxine. Damn her. Damn her for taking time which Faith didn't have. But, that didn't matter, Faith could not let this go. Because Maxine was in pain, Faith could feel it.

So, she sought out Sephira Blackwood.

When she found the Special Assistant, Faith asked to speak to her alone and, then, spoke in soft tones. Alissa, Faith's bodyguard, was with her but not in earshot at Faith's insistence. "It's about our mutual associate," she said, her hand gesturing to the bracelet Sephira wore. Maxine had given it to Faith to pass on to Sephira when they'd been together in Zuudaria, and Faith had, of course, done so. Faith had told Sephira then what Maxine was doingHope it's ok to assume that, rather than do another thread! in Scalvoris. "As I said, I put a mark on her. I asked her first, and she agreed. But ... " Faith gestured. "Something's wrong. Her thoughts are .. jagged and unclear, not like. I think she's in some kind of distress." Faith said, seriously. Her gaze was earnest as she looked at Sephira. "So, what I suggest is this. I can bring her here. I told her that it would mean we shared snippets of thought, and that it would mean I always know where she is. She knows that I can teleport her to me, and she can pull me to her. So, I suggest I bring her here." To her home. Of course, Maxine already knew where Faith's home was, because Sephira had brought her here. But that wasn't something Faith mentioned right now.

"In doing that, the mark will be removed and I'll no longer be invading her privacy," Faith explained. "I'll also be able to stop her accessing Zuudaria, which I need to do. Those are done in the blink of an eye. At which point, I turn around and leave you and your friend to it." Faith was happy to do this and she added, quietly and sincerely. "I very much doubt that she wants it, or would accept it. But I can help her. If not me, I know others. I suspect, though, the best thing I can do is say nothing. So, if you think it best, I'll let you do the talking?" Max seemed hells-bent on taking whatever she said the way she chose, so Faith felt that saying nothing was best. "Either way, I'm happy to do what you think is best."

Assuming that Sephira agreed - that was exactly what Faith would do. Only once, and if, Sephira agreed of course. At which point, she'd let Sephira talk and she would negate the invitation to Zuudaria. There was no need, at that point, to do anything to the mark - calling Max to her used it up. Then, she'd leave them to it and get back on with what she was doing.

Off Topic

Aware of time constraints on us all - so posting this up to that point - however, ready to edit at any point if needed. Thanks.

[Sephira]

There was a quiet little study in the back of the Augustin’s residence where the Element had taken up hiding away whenever she had the chance. There was a stack of parchment on a wide dark oak desk Ethan had just dropped off with a counting of the forces and supplies being amassed back in Scalvoris. Sephira’s assistant vanished through the exit of the room just as Faith entered, casting a short lived glance back at the Rupturer.

The Special Assistant thumbed idly through the pages in her hand from where she sat at the desk, her dark eyes flickering up as Faith entered the modest room. To the back a small fire crackled in the hearth, casting the study into a warm amber glow. The soldier’s expression shifted darkly as the healer’s bodyguard stepped into place just outside the door, clearly ensuring that Faith was protected even in Sephira’s presence.

For a moment the Special Assistant’s mind went back to what she had said only trials before in Zuudaria.

‘It seems more and more we are forced to conceal ourselves from our own allies.............But I suppose we should not be surprised.’

The soldier silently set aside the sheaf of papers in her hands, resettling them neatly on the desk as Faith spoke. As she moved the kindred bracelet that Max had given her jangled lightly on her wrist. When the ex-con had asked Faith to pass on the token the Element had not questioned the gesture. While many considered Maxine to be a force of chaos and uncertainty, Sephira had always seen the woman as rather...consistent. True she was chaos incarnate but there was a comfort in knowing what and who you were dealing with, and in the end Max had always been at her back. Through the worst of times especially. It was on the good trials that the ex-inhabitant of Slags Deep enjoyed making Sephira’s life miserable. It was a small price to pay in the end.

“Max?” Sephira scoffed with a smirk. “Distressed?” A laugh escaped her thin lips.

“There isn’t a trial that goes by that she isn’t.” The mage reached over dismissively, the fingers of her right hand trembling slightly as she picked up a fountain pen and began making notations on one of the pages she had been reading earlier. The mage had little signs here and there of the stress of her role and her lack of ether wearing on her. Little twitches and quirks that were slowly building up over time.

The soldier was well aware that Faith had sent Max back to Scalvoris with a mission to upturn any intelligence or resources on her end that might be otherwise unreachable like someone like Faith or Sephira. They both had fairly staunch morals, although Sephira’s own had grown more and more flexible over time. Likely no thanks to the ex-convict herself. But Max could reach people and places that were beyond the ilk of a world famous healer and an Element soldier. It was a good role for Max, at least on the surface.

However as Faith began to speak, explaining things in more detail and the Special Assistant’s features fell. Slowly she dropped the pen to the table that she had been writing with and turned back toward the Champion with a grim expression.

Closing her eyes Sephira pressed her fingertips to the bridge of her nose.

“So you put a mark on Maxine that tied you to her.” The Rupturer said heavily with a weary sigh.

“Allowing you to sense her thoughts, to teleport her to you.” Her voice had grown slightly tense as she opened her eyes again. Faith hadn’t known Max well enough to know that the women abhorred leashes. She hated any amount of control, no matter how benign the force being exerted over her was. It was bad enough that Sephira herself used her magic to keep an eye on Max from time to time. However after what happened to Rey’na the mage had considered any and all spying on her part to be fair game.

But this had been foolish. Though Faith had not known any better and the Special Assistant herself had been distracted enough that it had been allowed to happen under her nose. If Max was actually unraveling then the best thing to do would be to cut her lose of any and all ties Faith had placed on her.

You didn’t stop a wild animal from rampaging by trying to tie it down in a corner, you cut it free and let it tire itself out, and you hoped it did not maim or kill anyone on it’s way out the door.

The brunette woman came to her feet, her Spark marred eyes meeting Faith’s own.

“You did what you thought was best. I know that...you were trying to help...to win this war” she said wearily before her eyes narrowed faintly and her voice grew a subtle razor edge.

“But a word to the wise, the next time you think it’s a good idea to do something like this ...especially with Maxine. Don’t. ” Sephira said coldly before allowed a tired sigh to escape her lips as she strode across the room to where a decanter of whiskey was sitting on a shelf. She plucked down and sniffed the bottle experimentally before stoppering it again with a slightly disgusted face.

“I hope you have rum, and lots of it. Let’s get this over with.”

With that several bottles of the Augustins cheapest rum was brought into the study and Faith’s bodyguard was instructed to secure the room itself. It was in all honesty a terrible idea to bring Max here suddenly with almost zero notice but what had been done needed to be undone.

“I think it’s best if we let her walk this off, once you remove the mark.” The Element noted mildly with a frown when Faith offered to try and help Max through whatever she was going through. Sephira took up a position near the hearth with a glass of notably terrible smelling rum in her hand before pouring another and setting it on a stool in front of her for the woman that would soon be unceremoniously teleported there.

A peace offering as it were.

Once the room was secure and copious amounts of alcohol had been procured, Sephira nodded to Faith giving her the signal to bring Max to them while downing half her own glass with a gasp.

Immortals, the stuff was terrible.

Dialogue|Thoughts

[Max]

She was scrubbing at an invisible mark on her palm while her bewildered employees looked on. Blood soaked the rag and colored the lines of her skin. Nothing was reaching her. The words of concern and coaxings back toward rational thinking were discarded. She could focus on nothing else but the task at hand. Or so it seemed. It was in the middle of her labor that she felt the tug. The ex-convict froze. Her eyes widened.

"No," Max murmured, head snapping up but staring past Jeremy and Victoria in the doorway. "She knows. She knows what I'm doing." The bloody rag slipped from her grasp and slapped against the wooden floor. She could feel the pull beckoning her somewhere else. She tried to resist it, to stay present right where she was in the comfort of her lounge, far from another's influence. "No, no, no. I won't go! You can't make me!" But she could. And she did.

The marked woman had come to a stand when she was wrenched from The Red Hand, and forced to the last place in Idalos she wanted to be. In the blink of an eye she was standing in Faith Augustin's house. In her study, to be exact. Plenty of times she'd stumbled through the various rooms in search of alcohol. She knew this one at first glance. It wasn't the Champion of Famula she found in her immediate field of view though. Instead she was greeted with a warm hearth, pre-poured liquor, and a cross Special Assistant waiting with a half-finished drink in her hand.

"You didn't do this," Max responded after she'd taken a trill to recognize where she was. Her voice was matter-of-fact albeit uncertain. A portal hadn't brought her here. She had a different suspicion about who and what had. The persecutory delusions of her paranoid thoughts raced anyways. "But did you know? You're a part of this?"

The summoned woman didn't go for the glass waiting for her consumption. Instead she immediately turned her back toward a wall, rotating swiftly to search the rest of the room with wild, seeking eyes. Her fists were clenched, lifted just above waist-level to rise at a moment's notice. Blood streamed from her palm, running down her forearm toward her elbow. She innately knew the Zuuda was close. Max finally found Faith where she stood in the study. She paused.

"You!" a snarl ripped from her before she lunged forward at the woman, glowing fist cocked back with every intention of driving it home toward the Champion's face at maximum force. There were two options at play: either she would be stopped, or those punishing shots would keep going in rage-filled succession.

!

Message from: Aegis

I’ve been called in to monitor the PVP of this thread. Rules 1. One post per round. These posts must take place over the exact same course of time as one another. There is no posting order. This post by Maxine constitutes the first post of the round. 2. All actions from this point forward should be made clear that they are attempts. Do not use conditionals. Once all attempts are made, I will modnote the final post in the round with results, and the next round can begin. 3. Any threads timestamped after this one involving anyone in this thread are now subject to possible retconning and such should not be continued or created until this is finished. 4. Round 1 time span - The time from when Maxine appeared to one second after she began her charge toward Faith.

[Sephira]

To say she hadn’t expected this sort of reaction would have been a lie. During their preparations in the bits before the Element had drunk deeply from one of the spare Emean Wells, refilling her ether just in case this entire situation went south. If Faith’s substantial abilities and her own instincts were telling her that the ex-convict was spiraling out of control then Sephira would have been a fool not to believe her.

The moment the ex-convict appeared Sephira caught the wild look in her eye and the glass of rum instantly dropped from her hand, utterly forgotten as instincts kicked in. She knew that look, she had seen it before. On the trial of the riot, and even for the briefest moment back in Rynmere in that foul smelling tavern.

Every muscle in the Special Assistant’s body tensed as she stepped between Faith and Maxine, her right hand reaching out just as the glass shattered, wasting good rum on one of the Augustin’s rather nice rugs. Ether sang into her grasp as her Spark flared in kind, her eyes alrighting with a flare of crimson.

“That’s enough.” she whispered grimly just as a portal snapped open just behind Maxine with a rumbling boom. Her fist closed as she contracted the fabric of reality around the portal to execute a Pull to force the unhinged ex-convict off her feet and out of that house. There was a sudden and intense gravitational pull that wrapped around Max and Sephira both, the mage sprinting forward as she and the unhinged woman were towed through. A split trill later the Ingress portal sealed behind them with a hiss, leaving the study a little worse for wear but Faith and Max now far far away from each other.

The Egress of the portal the Rupturer had opened snapped into being miles and miles away in an abandoned barn far on the edge of Rharne in the Dust Quarter. They were many trials walk from Faith’s estate now, putting a comfortable distance between the two women.

The barn was old, and somewhere that Sephira had been once before during their journey to Rynmere. A stray portal jump with Finn had dumped them here when she and the boy had been escaping the Lightning Knight stronghold with Max in tow. The irony of this moment was not lost on Sephira.

Above them the setting light of the sunset drifted down from cobweb strung rafters. Dust rained down in a cloud as the boom of the portal reverberated throughout the structure. They were both at least outside the city walls and hopefully far from anyone who would care enough to come running at what sounded like the distant sound of thunder.

Max was dumped unceremoniously through the portal and into a pile of molding straw as Sephira followed through with her face twisted with anger.

“What the hell is wrong with you!?” The mage snarled hotly just as she dismissed her magic and rounded on the other woman with solid black eyes bearing down on her. It was rare to see the Special Assistant lose her temper. Always she kept her emotions under tight control. It’s what had allowed her to manage for so long as a mage. However in recent trials that carefully woven mask of control had worn dangerously thin. With the weight of this war on her shoulders, managing thousands of soldiers on her plate rather than dozens, and the fallout of Emea’s demise and her limited access to ether the woman was at the end of her proverbial rope.

It didn’t help that right in that moment she felt the weight of that damn book alight in her pocket, having manifested itself again after tossing it into the lake following Nir’wei’s death.

The woman paced across the dimly lit interior of the barn, her fists clenched before she crossed her arms tightly against her all too slender frame and looked down at Maxine with the barest hint of worry flickering in her eyes.

“Stay down and start talking. Now.”

Dialogue|Thoughts

[Max]

Maxine saw nothing but her target in her sights. It was all a very instinctual thing. Attack first to take the advantage, don't give them the opportunity to make the first move. The most base impulses of her mind were in the driving seat now. She'd made herself clear when she walked out of the Zuudaria. She was out. Within the context of what her unstable mind thought it grasped, being forced back here meant nothing good for her. Sometimes offense was the best defense. This was self-preservation.

Suddenly, the Special Assistant was in her field of vision, blocking her vengeful path. Her lunge stopped dead in its tracks and her fist pause where it was loaded by her ear. Glass shattered. The base-level brain of hers reeled. She could shove past her. She could take a bigger risk and stop her advance altogether. Dark brown eyes caught the crimson flare in Sephira's eyes. She knew it was a precursor to use of her Rupturing. By the looks of it, she was the obvious target. That added a new branch in her choice tree. To continue her assault, she'd have to go through the Element first, and quickly to prevent the use of gathered ether against her. It wouldn't have been the first time.

It felt like forever, but Maxine had probably only hesitated for a trill or so where she'd frozen. It was just long enough for decisions to be made for her. A portal tore open behind her and another tug ripped her off her feet, plunging her backward into the tear in reality. Faith and her study were gone. In the next moment she suffered a rough landing inside what appeared to be a neglected barn. Her back hit the straw pile, head snapping about in an attempt to gather where'd she'd been forced to now. Where the stupid barn was became a lesser detail. Sephira's red-hot ire demanded her attention.

Max had seen the Element mad. Back in Rynmere in that musty tavern, she'd been furious and nearly unhinged. The look on her face and the snarl of her tone wasn't so unlike that experience. The ex-convict's brow furrowed as she tried to grasp the question. She propped herself up in the straw pile on her elbows. Her bloodshot eyes locked to the opaque glare of the mage.

"She's been in my head," Maxine growled, an index finger coming up to jab itself repeatedly against her temple. "She said the mark would just let me read. She said she would know some of my thoughts and that we could summon each other. What she didn't say was that it could manipulate me. It tries to make me like her. It wants me to serve." Her words were coming out rapidly, so fast it almost looked like she wasn't taking much of a breath between her racing sentences. "I've been trying to get it off. I won't. I can't see it, no one can see it, but I know it's there." Max uncurled her fist to reveal the raw palm she'd scrubbed relentlessly at. "It just won't come off. I can't get it off. And she knows. She can read my thoughts so she knows that I know. I walked away. She knows I'm trying to get free. That's why she summoned me. To stop me. Control me. I just. Need. It. Off."

Max plucked straw from her hair and tossed it. She slowly rose to a sitting position, drawing her knees up while she carefully watched the Element. Her head tilted, face contorting with anger and suspicions. Wheels turned behind her bloodshot eyes.

"You were there waiting for me with her," she observed, voice growing tight with betrayal. Her mind became acutely aware of the weapons strapped to her belt. "You knew? You're in on it!" Using a wooden beam in the barn, she slowly found her way to her feet. It was a defiance of the soldier's order. A test. "You want to take your shot then? Go ahead and take it! You said you wanted another round. Here it is!"

As soon as the accusations flew, she ran her hands through her raven hair. Her head bumped back against the beam she leaned against. She could feel the blood drying on her forearm. Her eyes pinched closed and her fingertips rubbed at her temples.

She wouldn't do that.

Everyone will betray anyone.

Maybe not everyone.

"The only threats that can't hurt you are the threats removed. Better safe than sorry."

"My mind's not right," Max admitted with an apologetic, softer gaze. Caramel eyes opened and her hands dropped heavily to her sides. Her head felt like it was going to implode. "I just...I need it off. And I need something to take the edge off. Just a little bit. That's all I need and I'll be good." An addict's lie she'd told a hundred times. It rolled off the tongue now. "You should've left me in Scalvoris. I've got it. I'm fine."

[Sephira]

Maxine’s words washed over the dark eyed woman confirming much of her suspicions and worries. When Faith told her of the mark she had placed on the other woman Sephira had instantly seen it for what it had really been. A mistake, but not one that she expected that Faith had made knowingly. The healer was desperate to win this war against Ellasin and the Coven, that had meant using every advantage presented to her.

Of course that had meant attempting to utilize Maxine, and no matter her good intentions or desires you couldn’t just ‘use’ Max. But Faith hadn’t known that.

The Rusalkis was a force you pointed toward a target, and hoped for the best. Kura had known that well enough when she sent them to Rynmere on their mission. You didn’t guide her, you didn’t try to even help her unless she wanted it. Max was a storm, and storms are not to be tamed or controlled.

Sephira reached up to her face and rubbed at her temples, pinching her eyes closed in frustration.

“Alright, alright.” The soldier said tensely, trying her very damnedest to keep her voice as steady and calm as was possible in that moment. It took everything Sephira had left to steel herself for this conversation. Her pallid features tensed as she listened to amber eyed woman’s jumbled ramblings.

“She told me what she did, she explained just before she brought you here.” Sephira said stoically, her sharp voice cutting through Maxine’s own when the woman turned on her accusingly. For perhaps only a split trill Sephira wondered if the caramel eyed woman was incensed enough to throw a punch, but neither did she flinch away.

Thankfully in that moment the cracked veneer of the soldier held together, but only barely. The weight of the little book in her pocket tugged at her almost out of irony.

“I shouldn’t have allowed this to happen.” she finally said grimly, her voice was worn and bearing the weight of the last several trials. It had all been too much for her, and clearly to much for Max as well. It had been a mistake bringing her to Rharne. To be quite honest, when she had offered to bring her they hadn’t quite known what they were in for with the Coven. This had been about slaying a Lich in the beginning, not engaging in a massive global campaign against a web of talented and resourceful mages.

Mage hunting was something that Max and regrettably Sephira herself were both rather practiced in. Their skill sets for simply pursuing Ellasin may have worked ideally but neither the ex-inhabitant of Slags Deep or the Special Assistant had known what they were stumbling into. This had become far more than either of them had imagined, and Sephira had become so entrenched in her role that....this...had transpired.

“The mark is gone now Max. Her bringing you here, its removed it. That’s why this was done.” Sephira’s opened her eyes, and her narrow shoulders slouched as she looked down on the other woman. Wordlessly the Rupturer reached out to her left and a small flicker of scarlet light flashed around her wrist as the small porthole opened. Back in Faith’s study the Egress to the same rift in reality flickered open just long enough for a hand to slip through and grab the bottom of rum that Sephira had been pouring earlier and left on the shelf.

This had to be handled delicately, and there was no better way to handle the Rusalkis than to offer her copious amounts of drink. The miniature portal sealed as the bottle was thrust roughly toward the other woman.

Sephira stepped over a stack of clutter and slid down against a nearby beam a few feet away from the other brunette. In the dim lighting of the barn she looked weathered, and not so different from the last time they had talked over a bottle of terrible rum.

“I am out of my depth Max.” she admitted with a ragged sigh. “We are out of our depth.”

The words were all she had to offer. They were the truth. This was beyond anything they had ever faced before. Perhaps even Orrick. At least that man seemed to play by rules that Sephira could understand. He had motivations that she could even sometimes grasp. Perhaps it was because this war with the Coven was something far larger than just a Scalvoris problem. This wasn’t something that could be solved with a single kill or a single mission. It was won with time, intelligence, planning, and likely the loss of many lives. She and Max were ill suited for it, as were many of their allies more than likely.

Nir’wei was gone, even if they knew that he had been rescued by Vri. Sephira truly didn’t care about that. The fact that he had died and the risk of going to save him had been foolish on her part. Faith and her husband could have been killed.

They needed their edge back. This war had to change. She, Max, and Kura they had done impossible...practically insane things before. The cult attack they had interceded on, the invasion of the Black Ships, the portal stone mission...

“I know you probably aren’t in this to stop the Coven.” The onyx eyed woman said distantly, her gaze now fixed on the dingy wall opposite her. “But they are a threat, and they can’t be ignored. Faith is our best chance to stop them. And regardless of what happened with her, I don’t think she meant for any of...whatever this is to happen.” Sephira uttered with a flippant almost rude gesture toward the frayed and bloodied mess of a woman next to her. She didn't prod further into asking questions about Max's sanity right now. That may have been like poking a wounded bear with a pointy stick, and Sephira was smart enough to know better.

“I don’t expect you two to work together...ever again. Since clearly that was the worst idea ever conceived.” The soldier said with a dry coughing laugh, gesturing for a sip from whatever remained of the rum. She'd have to figure out how to smooth things over with Faith after tonight, but that was a problem for another trial.

“But, I need your help. I need someone I can trust in Scalvoris. Try and get yourself pulled together. We are both going to need our edges back if we are going to stop this Lich, and I may need someone who isn't afraid to break a few rules in order to do it.”

Dialogue|Thoughts

[Max]

Though she managed to keep her doubtful thoughts tamed and offered the Diri's temptation no attention, there was still suspicion she hadn't shaken from her gaze. When the Element claimed the mark was gone and intentions had been benign, Max's eyes narrowed. She carefully studied the woman's face and body language in search for a tell that it was a lie. Instead she just saw...exhaustion. She turned her hand over to look at her palm. A thumb brushed along the edge of the self-inflicted injury. She could never see the mark. For all she knew, it still lingered. She also never knew the Element to deceive her. She adjusted her jaw. She would just have to believe her.

"Fuck," she murmured. She dipped her head, burying the heels of her hands against her brow. Reality was muddled. It was hard to tell what was real and what her suffering mind had conjured. Everything, even the fallacies, felt as genuine as the aches and pains that came without apparent reason. It wasn't all that inexplicable. Now that she was beginning to become aware of her own delusions, she knew the cause. She was hurting. She needed her fix. This was like the riot all over again. What was wrong had felt right, and even now, her brain didn't want to accept the truth of what the past trials had been.

The sound of a small portal coaxed her head up from her hands. Her eyes found the offered bottle. A lifeless half smirk appeared briefly as she took it, and slid down against her beam to sit. She said nothing at first. She just drank heavily from the bottle. It was all could do, hoping it would be some sort of mind-altering substitute that would medicate her just enough that her body and brain quieted. She put the bottle down between them. Uncharacteristic silence persisted until she heard Sephira's confession.

"I know," she agreed. She drew her knees up and rested her elbows on top. Her head rocked to the side, a thin smirk on her face as she regarded the melancholy Element. "You look like shit." Her head rolled back to stare straight ahead at the completely uninteresting wall ahead. This was always the part she hated: recognizing another one of her own fuck-ups. It was like she couldn't help herself. Perhaps the do-good role she'd half-donned had finally dried up. It was bolder to suggest it was ever there to begin with.

She went back to being quiet again. Her forward stare might've appeared disconcertingly blank, but she was listening. The world between her ears had grown just a little bit quieter for the moment. The rum helped. It wouldn't last forever. Much like old truces.

"I think I might've made my opinions too loud to ever be welcomed by your army with anything but a sword," Max pointed out with a mirthless laugh. She shook a hand through her hair again, visibly peeved to find another strand of straw to discard. "I haven't been right the past couple trials. I fucked up. I know that." Her heel tapped irritably on the ground. "But I meant what I said in that meeting. I know they'll sacrifice to win. That’s how this shit goes. That makes me the asshole." Max dropped her head back against the beam to stare up at the cobwebs that plastered the long-forgotten ceiling. She picked up the rum bottle and dumped what little remained onto her opened wound. Instant regret washed over her when the sting came, but she took it in tense silence. Finally, the next words came out begrudgingly. "Because it turns out I do care. Whether you live or die."

It bothered her, especially then, what Kura had said on her way out of the meeting after verbally burning it down. The Councilor had calmly looked up from her papers and watched the tirade. The ex-convict didn't even remember noticing a single slip in the woman's calm, stoic demeanor while she listened. What she really remembered was the response Kura had when Max suggested she wasn't interested in staying to watch her and Sephira killed in someone else's stupid war.

"Easiest way to avoid that is to make sure we don't, Max."

Those words had weighed on her. They weighed heavily, and more so with time. Part of her hated the woman for it. Damn her.

"Breaking rules was never the problem," Max admitted smugly, putting the empty bottle down and rising to her feet. "Following them was. I'll be where you need me to be. When the time is right, just tell me what you need me to do." She wandered to the great barn doors and shoved one of them back. Bright sunlight streamed in, harassing eyes. She blinked through the change in lighting. From the looks of outside, it looked like she was probably still somewhere in Rharne.

It would be a long way back. Sore feet was an easy punishment compared to what the withdrawing addict probably deserved. She didn't need to be told. Even with two functioning brain cells she could've gathered that she had severely worn out her welcome. Her exit back to Scalvoris would be swift. With luck she'd score something on the way, something good, and try to get her shit together like she was asked. Max leaned to cross the threshold. She paused with a hand on the side door frame, half glancing back into the barn.

"Don't die."

And she left.

[Tempest]

Name: Faith Augustine

Knowledge:
Leadership: 1
Tactics: 1

Loot: none
Injuries: none
Renown:none
Magic XP: none

Points: 15

- - -

Comments: Poor Faith, it couldn’t have been easy to hear other people’s thoughts.

Name: Sephira

Knowledges:
Intelligence: 2
Tactics: 1
Rupturing: 1

Loot: none
Injuries: none
Renown: none
Magic XP: yes

Points:15

Comments: Impressive timing Sephira, not sure I have seen her move that fast before. I can’t wait to see what else she does.

Name: Max

Knowledges:
Combat: 1
Intelligence: 2

Loot: none
Injuries: none
Renown: none
Magic XP: none

Points:15

Comments: My my, Max was having it out with someone. I am very impressed by how you play her every time. I can’t wait to see what else she does.

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