Legend of Ransera

When the sun wasn't beating down too fiercely, Finn did rather enjoy walking through the Luxium. He could always vault, but it was his day off and so he ambled. His Sentinel blacks were at home, but he wore the less formal training greys because most of what the servi kept in his closets were too fine to walk the Sceptre-lit streets, and he preferred not to attract notice unless notice was what the situation required.

In any case, his fair skin and pale eyes marked him as peregrinus to most eyes. He had grown comfortable in his Sentinel weeds, veiled and anonymous. He could let his face show when he was among friends, or don an entirely different sort of costume for high social events.

With his aura and symphony safely contained behind Cithaera's charms, he found Sweet Remedies, and knocked before entering. He had become even more polite in those regards; here in Solunarium, the startle of a suddenly opened door was more likely to reveal peril than back home.

"Good day!" he sing-songed as he squinted, eyes adjusting to the relative gloom out of the Sceptre-light.

Today was the day he returned to the Realm of Light. At least, he hoped to. Finn knew the way, and was reasonably sure that Talon would let him return unless there was some reason to interdict - like some divine struggle with Shaeoth or similar. Of course, he hadn't asked specifically if he could ferry anyone other than Arvaelyn with him when he came.

But it was a plane of existence, not a vault. Hilana would meditate upon the Light until she could work it into her elemental weaves, and he would meditate upon the music he heard there. If everything went off without a hitch, he wouldn't have to pray to Talon for guidance. Even though it would be informal, merely a means of communication, he knew he would feel the judgmental glare of Avaerys all the same.

Talon was a friend. Avaerys was his God.

"Are we ready to slip the bonds of this material plane and become one with the Light?" Finn grinned.

"So far so good," he said, translating the Kalzasern idiom into Vastian with ease now. "Salve, Master Vasilei." He nodded in response. His nods were more respectful than those of other magnati; rather than embarrass people with equal bows, he tried to make it clear he saw them and acknowledged them with respect.

"Enjoy the respite, then," he said with a grin. "Assuming Dæmon allows me to bring a friend, we might be some time there."

Strong arms encircled his friend as she embraced him, careful not to crush like one of her more muscular serpents. They weren't visible, so he assumed she had them resting, otherwise they were wont to come out and seek his affection. Between his patience, good humor, and the occasional bit of Command, he had developed relationships with most of her pets. Sometimes that was a hindrance to getting out of there, though.

"The Light awaits," he proclaimed in sonorous tones, marred only by a boyish smile. But it faded and he stilled, concentrating on that connection he had learned from his friend. It was not his habit to leap from this plane to another, and it was a categorically different effort though he wasn't sure he could articulate it even with all his skill at composition.

A portal opening into blinding light might have been dramatic, but instead, Vasilei saw their bodies seem to flatten into a bright white silhouette, which then faded, leaving the negative of their shape burned temporarily into the backs of his eyelids.

Finn focused on the Aetherium in the only way he knew how - sensing aspects of it via his Cardinal Runes - and found that thread that led to a realm that "sounded" like Dæmon to him. He pulled and they traveled along that thread, not causing a rent in the Veil of Suffering, but passing through its weft and weave as a needle was wont to do. He didn't know how to shield Hilana from the Mists, from the Aetherium, but hoped that her own magical training would keep her sane. If he felt her slipping, he could shore her up with Command, though he wanted to focus on the interplanar travel as best he could. They had talked about this already, of course.

But the Mists didn't touch them on this golden path. The chaotic lighting sparking along, lighting up swathes of it like the most magnificent of storms merely served to give the mind some idea of what was transpiring, though their mortal minds were too small to hold it. The thread took them into the eye of a storm and within, there was Light.

When vision was restored, they were landing upon an alabaster platform skirting the palace or temple that was Dæmon's domain. Finn would not take her inside without express permission, of course, but she could attune to the elemental light from here. He wondered if she could hear the music he heard; he wasn't entirely sure he was hearing it with his ears. For a while, he was as rapt as she, but he didn't let go, not until she gathered herself. While she didn't worship Dæmon, any mortal soul would feel an atavistic awe here in this place. He didn't worship Dæmon either, but the place made his soul sing.

He looked down at Hilana, gauging her state. She was beautiful in the mortal realm, but she was even more beautiful here. In this place, there were no shadows. Nothing was left in darkness. He wondered what revelations they would have about each other here in this place.

While she took in the crystalline spires and the light-bound creatures floating and flying, he focused on her. When she seemed to come back to herself, he gave her shoulders a squeeze.

"All right?"

Finn didn't say much as she took it all in. He was a bard, but he understood that some things were ineffable. She spoke to shadows, and it hadn't occurred to him how that might change here. While he was neither an elementalist nor a summoner, the Vigilia Argenti had given him some magical education, the better to counter such things for the most part.

Traversion had made something of a cartographer of him, so he observed her map magically exploring the realm for later study. Someday, he supposed, Talon might show him around the place. So far, he had only taken in these vasty vistas and gone into his palace to speak.

"I'll stay," he said. "I don't think it to be perilous here, exactly, but you can focus on your meditations with me watching over you, and anyway, I just want to be inspired by the view and play." His smile was earnest. And he could always come back at the drop of a hat; she was the one who had a goal and needed the ride. But Finn could stand sentinel—pun intended—and be present should Talon or any of his spirits who dwelt in the realm of light come to investigate their presence.

"Anyway," he said, sitting down and getting comfortable, "I don't want to miss lunch."

With a wink and a flourish, he pulled his lute down and around from where it was slung across his back and began to tune it. The instrument already sounded perfect, but his ear was trained for it and his hands were deft with strings and pegs and such. The place itself had a symphony, a blending of those light-bound souls who dwelt here as well as echoes of Arcas. Talon was less himself here, and more Arcas. He supposed there was some religious truth hidden in there, but Finn was not a wise man.

Finn smiled in answer and settled down even as she did. He spent time learning bits and pieces of the symphony of Light, but it was too much for his merely mortal mind to comprehend in whole or at least in one sitting, so eventually, he let his mind relax with more whimsical fare. Hilana seemed absent from the world, though from what he knew of meditation exercises learned from the Sentinels, it was more that she was highly present, but also letting the impressions around her pass over and through her rather than reacting to them at all.

A mote of light hovered near him, seeming almost to dance to the rhythm of his song. He smiled up at it and sang to it, not knowing whether it was some soul freed from its body by death or some spirit of light native to this realm.

"And if I die today, I'll be the happy phantom
And I'll go chasing the nuns out in the yard
And I'll run naked through the streets without my mask on
And I will never need umbrellas in the rain..."

He laughed with pure delight as other, similar motes gathered and danced like Searing fireflies before him. His fingers pulled forth melody, and even the odd percussion when he slapped the body of his lute.

"Ooh, the time is getting closer
Ooh, the time to be a ghost
Ooh, every day we're getting closer
The sun is getting dim
Will I pay for who I've been...?

"Yeah." He chuckled and let the lute rest in his lap, his hands coming up to interact with them. He didn't seek to touch them; he didn't even know if they existed as material or were pure energy. But they hovered and danced over his palms as if they were the floor of Noctis Æternæ.

And that was how Hilana would find him whenever she came to.

A delighted smile made him look positively boyish when he turned to see her coming out of her trance. He didn't think he could live here in this place that was all Light, but it was certainly full of wonders.

"I think they're just bored," he assured her. "All light all the time must get boring."

He looked back at them and they seemed a bit less interested now that the music had stopped, but they hovered nearby like fireflies in summer. Finn missed the summers of Kalzasi, where heat was a precious thing and he would lay out in the sun like a cat and just soak it all up.

"I don't know about that, though," he added, more thoughtful. "The light. I mean, I've always been cheerful, I suppose. I'm still not sure why Aværys chose me, you know? I know we grew up in very different places and Arcas' name is only now being rehabilitated in Solunarium, but if I had known he was alive again... I would have imagined being his, perhaps. A bard following around knights pledged to justice and noble things. Or, you know, I used to leave offerings for Suion, but the Dragon Gods don't seem to meddle in human affairs.

"Aværys is light in some ways. He's not the Sun, and Varvara isn't the Moon, but as they are the Gods of Solunarium, they do seem almost like a solar and lunar pair..." He frowned, not trying to trod upon her orthodoxy, but trying to work through religious things that weren't truly his bailiwick.

"I never thought of myself as ambitious. I mean, sure, I wanted everyone to love my music. I wanted to be famous, but not... I don't know. Not for me. To make my parents proud, sure. To... have a wider audience to share with. I don't even know if I would have caught his attention if it weren't for Arry. Arvælyn." He was still making an effort to think of his beloved as prince rather than how he had known him before. Sometimes it was easier than others.

"I feel the hunger now, though. The desire for power. Is it mine, though? Or did Aværys put it there?"

Blue eyes peered at her, brighter for all the Light around them. It seemed like he thought she might have the answer.