OBJECTIVE: 1
LOCATION: Brosi (Somewhere along the base of the World Tree)
APPEARANCE: XoXo
SO ALLIES:
Madrona A’Mia
[/USER] |
Taeli Raaf
|
Gerwald Lechner
|
Darth Carnifex
|
Reina Daival
|
Mercy
|
Darth Caedes
|
Lysander von Ascania
|
Spencer Varanin
|
Darth Prazutis
|
Eira Dyn
TIC ENEMY: TBA
____________________________________________________
It was the same thing that she had heard repeatedly, though it surprised her that
Mercy
would hold the same philosophy. It was not in Srina’s nature to allow an imminent threat to make the first move. It was the main reason she had joined the Covenant on Coruscant in the first place. The Faithless had come for her children. The Faithless had dared to touch the Blackwall in an effort to destroy it, and now, more of their wretched cousins had returned from the ashes to desecrate Brosi once more.
The pale woman remained still while Mercy bounded toward her drake with the exuberance of a child. It was a strange thing to observe, her laughter, ringing in the low boughs of Psilofyr with such merriment that it felt out of place. Her wintry expression softened. They were on the precipice of war, and it was the last thing she’d expected to hear. She looked away when the Warlord looked toward her, erasing emotion, as if it had never been.
“You’re a terrible student…”
Willful and cocky, argumentative. But…She envied the ease that the red-haired woman held, the way she met the world head-on, fists-first, questions later. It was simple—a luxury that Srina hadn’t had in decades.
“So, you’ll have to forgive the repetition…It will happen again.”
That laugh again. So out of place…
So earnest.
The Covenant would be horrified.
"There is little shame in staying behind. If you are not ready yet. Coruscant was hard on you, even if you refuse to let anyone see it." You don’t have to show me… I know. "I will use my strength to defend this place just as I used it to conquer Coruscant. Why not rest?"
“I’ve rested long enough.”
The words fell from her lips like rain, cooled, until the drops pricked the skin when it fell. There was no fury in her rebuke, but it was obvious that she rejected the notion of being anywhere but with her people. What did bother her to some degree was the fact that the tragically unobservant
Mercy
had noticed something was amiss. Yellow-gold eyes lifted when a familiar presence touched her senses, surprising, but not unwelcome.
“You know as well as I do…This is where I belong.”
"Asking the child to respect something is like asking her to wear a dress…" Spencer wrinkled her nose in the same fashion as Quinn often would when she knew she was teasing.
"Impossible."
Srina’s head tilted when she looked back at
Mercy
, perhaps, placing her hulking form in a gown in her mind’s eye. Humor rose in her chest against her will, dry, but present all the same.
“Nothing is impossible…”, the counter was light, though, her head inclined respectfully toward
Spencer Varanin
. It wasn’t quite a bow, but it was as close to it as Srina would get. Those who knew her would recognize the significance.
The white-haired Echani bowed for no one.
She could see the question in her former Queen’s eyes, in her expression, but it was something Srina did not know how to answer. They held a conversation in seconds, in silence, without any use of the Force at all…Because it was their nature. It was an expression of exhaustion and annoyance coupled with a singular truth she had been avoiding. She had never needed more power. Never looked for it…But now?
I was not enough.
That would never happen again.
The conversation would have to be cut short because, in that moment, the storm she predicted seemed to be coming down. Her eyes closed, and she reached through the Force to see more than what should have been possible.
Psilofyr amplified her sight, her senses, and a heavy sigh pulled from her lungs. The Confederation had arrived, lacking subtlety, with mass planetary landings and battalions that all seemed to be advancing on the World Tree.
The roots near her boots shifted, apprehensive, and she could feel understanding dawn on the World Tree as if someone had turned on a light switch. Intruders were coming to destroy it. Her head tilted to the side when she noticed something else, and metaphysical fingers crawled toward one that the Empress recognized twice over.
She saw him.
“It seems that our old friend has returned.”
Friend was not spoken in a way that denoted warmth, but, almost as a word of curse. He was always scheming beneath the guise of aiding whatever nation he served, when truly, his only loyalty belonged to ambition.
The Lord of Hunger
had tried to impose his will during the development of Psilofyr and it made sense that he would try and do so again. It wasn’t even a moment more when she felt something strange in the World Tree…
Hunger.
She remembered the last battle more as a sensation than a scene. Force twisted into consumption, the taste of despair, while weaving sentience into something that didn’t naturally have it. Each one of her companions had given Psilofyr a gift. She had offered sorrow and memory so that it could learn and grow.
Revna Marr
had given an offering that was not so gentle.
Srina’s eyes narrowed slightly as she tracked the way this Sith Lord’s awareness moved. Spreading, prying, and searching. Psilofyr might feel something scraping across his outer network, the lesser roots, the “easy” pathways, like a hand clumsily rifling through pockets.
The World Tree did not feel amused with any of this.
So much of him was walked on, broken, burned, and ripped from the ground.
Her focus snapped back and she reached for
Revna Marr
in that space of silence. Psilofyr was born with hunger. If the Confederate Sith Lord provoked it…The seedling was a seedling no more. It would undoubtedly bite back.
<<We have an uninvited guest.>>
Revna would hear her and in a flash of insight…Would know exactly whom she referred to.
The pale woman turned and walked toward her drake and the great beast roared before dropping it low enough that she could touch the black scales along its jaw. Srina didn’t hesitate when she glanced back at
Spencer Varanin
and
Mercy
, though, she knew that the latter wouldn’t be far behind.
“…They are here, destroying what is mine.”
Her eternally beautiful expression morphed into something fearsome, switch gears, while taking one solid leap to land lightly on the back of Vaelcryx.
“Time to die.”
Velran Kilran
took an interest in these trees. From what Amni understood, the Sith summoning these World Trees had deep connections to the Force and they were using this as a way to amplify their power. 
