Legend of Ransera

Kala had only enjoyed part of a good night's sleep. No rest for the wicked, they said. No rest for the divine, perhaps

It was later in the day than he anticipated her when she did arrive. Perhaps intuiting what this was all about, she followed the line of his prayer to him, not even needing to utilize Indric's rune to find Stardew Valley. The stars weren't yet visible upon the horizon, and yet the sun was a star. Perhaps she rode that light as well as prayer. Both were patterns of aether, and both resonated with her. She didn't know yet. She only knew a ghost's prayer had allowed her to translocate from Starfall to Zaichaer instantaneously, and she managed it again now. She couldn't vault as Indric did or as Torin's lover did, but she could answer prayers. Omnipresence was not her power, but it seemed as though she had a workaround for the time being.

Suddenly she was there, platinum hair, pale skin, white feathers with a golden patina, and clothed in layers of white, which was an odd choice for her. A fringe of seed pearls dangled across her brow, the idea of a veil. Her eyes were shadowed with weariness; she looked wan, but no less powerful nor herself for it.

"Good morrow, Torin," she said, perhaps surprising him as her sudden presence wasn't one his Semblance had warned him of. "I apologize for my tardiness. I was awoken before dawn for an emergency in Zaichaer. But on the matter of discovery, it does appear as though I am able to answer prayers."

She stepped up as if she were light as anything and kissed his cheek.

If she was weary, at least she seemed comfortable here, the goddess of stars in Stardew Valley. There was a joke in there somewhere.

"I trust the party went well in our absence? Thank you again for always inviting us."

The young woman before him was still Kala. Perhaps she was more Kala than she had been before, and Kala was more than Kala was before. Or perhaps she had always been this; perhaps the seed of this had always been there and Naori merely quickened it within her. There were some things that were truly a mystery to mortal minds, some things beyond full understanding.

For her, it felt as though a part of her always existed there beside Torin, and a part of her existed always within Torin, as if she was also the resonance of affection that had grown up between them as friends. Perhaps that was part of everyone, but a young goddess could inhabit that more fully. And so her appearance there was less akin to Traversion magic and more that her consciousness and her form flowed from where she had been to where she was needed--first Zaichaer and now Stardew Valley. When the need subsided, she would return from whence she came because that was natural and right, not because she made a conscious choice about it.

Her Semblance, too, was the same, although she dimmed herself lest she overwhelm. Her aura was more powerful, more complex, more intense, while strangely still much the same as it had always been. She shared just as he shared, and she indicated without words that kneeling wouldn't bother her, and that she would just pull him back to his feet if she wished it. Whatever the case, permission was granted to be fully Torin when in her presence. Perhaps that was part of divinity, as well, becoming more fully herself and inviting others to do the same in their own way.

"An Avialae was born to unsuspecting parents," she said, keeping the Dornkirks' name a secret if not the trouble. "They are, of course, Atheists, but their souls called out to me all the same and I answered. I think all will be well in the end."

The weariness in her smile faded a bit to hear that her gifts had been well received. Perhaps someday she would cease to eat and drink and subsist on worship instead, but even she didn't know about that yet. But she was quiet through his explanation, eyes wide and interested as they always were when he was sharing his latest wonders with her. That she inspired them was touching, as well. Was that worship of a sort?

"Lord Torin Kilvin," she said with mock formal surprise, as if clutching a necklace of pearls to her chest. A playful smile flashed, then softened. "I do believe you've made a muse of me. But, in all seriousness, I think this is how it is supposed to be. And, theoretically, only the most legendary of runesmiths--as you will surely be--can change the enchantments of another, but I think even now... my new nature has changed those gifts you have given me. They are more awake in the sense that you describe, and they grow and evolve a bit to better become mine. I think that will only become more true in the future."

She paused, glanced at the beautiful box on the desk and then back at him. Power notwithstanding, she had chosen not to endart her senses deeper than the surface of the box, allowing him his surprises.

"Show me?"

It felt like life had coalesced into a painting around her: a young lord on his knees, holding magical gloves up to a goddess. With the chest opened, she looked and Looked, sensing the fine metal, the finer enchantments. The Negation resonated of Aurin, though all of it sang Torin's song, as well as her own. The gloves were alive in that strange way they had discussed, and she could feel them recognizing her with a sort of joy that was not at all like human joy.

Air responded to her will, lifting the gloves out of their setting. She held her hands up and they seemed to melt over her like a second skin. They fit to perfection already, and the fine mail soon began to warm from the thrum of the blood under her skin. From the look in Torin's eyes, he could sense the strange meeting between demigoddess and masterwork of runeforging. His work neared the level of the gods, perhaps, and so it only made sense it would be strange and unusual, though it also felt entirely right.

Her eyes shone with unshed tears. Gifts like these given by men like Torin made her new life feel more real, especially given it was a secret to most. Torin, her quiet, dependable, wondrous friend, saw her in ways perhaps nobody else did.

Without thinking it through, she stepped forward, placing her magic-sheathed hands lightly upon his cheeks. For once taller than him, she leaned down and kissed him gently on the mouth.

Kala had no emblem to offer. She didn't even know how a demigod went about fashioning such a thing. For those who followed her, she had offered a rare gift made divine by her own divine nature. She offered him a tenuous Bond. He wanted to worship her, and she wanted to be worshiped. She had been his liege lady's daughter and his friend. Now she was also his muse and the goddess for whom he crafted wonders. She had given him gifts of asterium, but now she offered him her Unity, a gentle unity with her, spiritually intimate.

If he pulled away, she would not force it upon him, but she thought that he would not, that he would welcome it, perhaps even be awed by it in a way that was good for both of them.

Even from the box, the other pair of gloves sang of Kaus. They were not for her, and so she would be present when Torin offered them to her twin. But for now, there was something else that needed doing, saying, deciding.

Pale blue eyes peered at him, wide and limpid as the sky, but rather than being empty of thought, they held an infinite vastness. There was a flicker of something like fear, but no, it was merely cautiousness. She was new to this, and she wanted to do right by her friend even if her evolution would require an evolution of that friendship. A friendship, or any relationship, would evolve that way. If one piece changed, the whole was changed.

She smiled, her quiet smile that contained a multitude of things.

Holding one hand between her breasts, she placed the other over his chest. She could feel his heart hammer against her palm and, strangely, he could feel the pulse of her heartbeat through the radial artery of her index finger. Perhaps it was Semblance; perhaps what was happening brought their consciousnesses to new levels of focus.

Torin could sense the aether responding to her will, creating a resonance akin to that between her and Kaus, albeit more tenuous. Those things had to be nurtured to grow. But it was something more than that, as well. The familiar was overlaid by something that was now familiar to him as well--divinity. He had learned to channel it somewhat with his work, but divine magic was--in addition to being merely powerful--so densely complicated that it could take lifetimes to suss out the simplest bit of it.

He could sense the foci of her aura as well as his own, the wheels, the whorls at crown and brow and throat and... His heart bloomed like a flower, as did hers. And then he could feel her thoughts, her feelings, but they weren't patterns he sensed without. Rather, she was in him, and he was in her.

Mine.

Or perhaps it was Yours.

Though she had initiated bonds with her Silver Wings, with Marda Ahtivan, this was still new for her, being a goddess. It was a religious experience for the both of them, and quite a bit of it was ineffable even for her.

"Who can say?"

Her smile might have been coy, except she didn't rightly know if her chosen were marked in some way that could be seen. As he got to his feet, she regarded him, remembering The Smith he had been in the Aetherium when struggling back to himself.

The Starsmith. sounded in his mind or, perhaps, his soul. She had changed him, though perhaps they wouldn't know exactly how for some time. But her glow dimmed in the light he conjured, and then she was just the diminutive, winged lady he knew.

Kala considered him still. A part of him had responded to her feminine nature, and it had made her consider him and his masculine nature. Her lips pursed slightly, but whatever she was thinking, she kept to herself for the time being.

Her hand slipped into the crook of his elbow, and she admired the glitter of her glove, which became a mere shine on seeming satin. She laughed.

"It could look like an opera glove and if I struck someone it would still feel like a hammer blow." She rested her cheek against his arm. "Thank you, Torin. I have always valued your friendship, and while the idea of worship is still strange, this feels correct and gives me hope that perhaps I won't fail as a goddess. Oh, and... I think you should offer those to Kaus yourself. I would like to be there, of course. But for now, let's see what Timon is cooking...?"