#int. w/morgan.eterna

[princemordecai]

@morgansbond location: Mercury's Bazaar notes: little starter for our connect

The comforts of home, the people, the city, and the familiarity were nice. There were things that he'd taken for granted when he lived in Eterna; growing up here, it was easy to forget that life wasn't nearly as comfortable outside this city. He'd come and gone when he was a kid when he'd started down the Olympian path, but conflict to the south had opened his eyes to what he'd always taken for granted: freedom. People like Morgan were a reminder of how bad it was outside Lysaran borders and how, even in this Queendom, people use those with magic as scapegoats for all the world's troubles. It is as if all life's problems and conflicts could be traced back to some spell or accident of birth.

"It's been a long time." A few years, anyway. Morgan was one of the few Iskarans who had gotten out, a survivor of what could only be a burning house for someone like him. The bazaar was dark, but apart from the sky above, you wouldn't know how late it was. He missed the tangible electricity of the bazaar; people from all over Lysara congregated here, shopping, selling, and seeking. While the Tower of Olympia hung overhead, the world he'd known still felt so far away. Leander extended his hand towards the other, a sign of respect despite the gap between their stations. "Good to see you again."

[princemordecai]

The dark descended over the bazaar as the two put the commotion behind them. Death, the cards had said. Death. Death. Death. Were Leander a more superstitious man, then maybe he'd have taken it more ominously than it had felt in that moment. His understanding of tarot was equitable to someone of sub-novice awareness; senseless card garbage. Prince Ikaros of Avalon would guffaw when Leander said that there was no power in knowing your fate, no strength in working to gleam what lay beyond the esoteric. Realy power came from what you were passionate about, your ideals, and your emotions. Leander took every ounce of that and put it into his fists; courageous and stalwart. He didn't balk at the thought of coming face to face with the Iskarans or their witchers, he relished the day that it would inevitably come.

They were used to picking off young, defenseless witches; the stories of what they did to their children were enough to harden any heart. Leander liked to imagine that when met with an Olympian who was not some frightened, untrained supernatural raised to despise what they'd been born with, things would end differently. The Astorians were not so far off, they corralled witches that they pulled from farmsteads, out of galleys and ratways. They thrust them into a blaze and called it a holy act to burn the flesh from their skin. All that bravado, but call down a little lightning and most of them went crying home to their mothers.

"But not here." The cold air that rose off of the harbor was what took in his words; the swirling mist that sifted with the ripples of the tides. They'd carry them off to the distant vessels making their way in and out of the harbor, sailed ships and others with plumes of coal-powered towers rising from their midst. Every year the world evolved, but some things had yet to change. His gaze found his friend again as Leander's hand settled on Morgan's shoulder before the witch gave it an appraising squeeze, "Never here."

He could have run off. Spared Leander the upset that rattled him now. Yet, the experience had been shared. Morgan wasn't alone in the feeling of betrayal. Though he did take the apparent crime far more personally. Visions of torture, hangings, burnings and so much worse flickered behind the thief's eyelids. Made his pale skin crawl.

Matters of ethics that people here might consider injustices. The laws that protected mortals from magic in Iskaldrik. To toy with the very word was to put ones life at risk. Their families and communities too. The line was clear back on the farm, but traveling with Tobias illustrated how terribly endless both man and witcher cruelties could be.

He saw this bazaar overtaking the wench from her little shop in an instant. Tearing, cursing, chaining, bleeding. To make an example of her. Only, that didn't happen at all. Their surroundings remained peaceful as before. Even the commanding Prince spared her. An invisible, intangible, worthless threat in lieu of punishment.

So deep inside of himself, Morgan trudged forward with a troubled mind. His feet carried him wherever Leander still desired to lead them. Across a sturdy harbor, where most strangers backs were turned to face the tranquility only found at a watery edge. The less they looked the better. The more he could... reemerge. "You don't pretend..." Morgan still spoke gravely. "... I've seen so many killed for less. ... A mortal to toy with magic. I think of my brother's... 'yours. It's terribly insulting to me."

There was a cost. Those who did not earn it, but made fun should be shunned.

[princemordecai]

In the open air of the bazaar the night felt stale now, cured by the salt that lay over the exchange with the woman within. The reading had not gone the way that Leander had hoped and he could see how bothered Morgan was by the entire ordeal. Guilt settled over his chest but he didn't let it burden him, instead, he was consigned to finding something that the two of them could take to that had less room to turn foul. Without lingering, Leander set an unspoken course towards the harbor, headed towards the gate to put Mercury's Bazaar behind them.

"People will do anything to make a buck these days." Dirty tricks weren't appreciated,but he wouldn't begrudge someone trying to get a jab in at the prince. Leander only wished Morgan hadn't been a causality in what the prince was just chalking up to a practical joke. "My mother would turn her cheek, the threat of a repercussion is enough to make our point." Leander took a beat as he considered Morgan's disposition, he didn't play the Game, but he wouldn't leave his friend's mood to fester. "This looks like it cut deep."

A halfhearted read was provided before the fake-oracle turned her attention back to the duplicate issue. Leander reached out to perform her task anyway and Morgan forced himself to sit in place. None of this was Leander's fault, Morgan only felt protective of his guide turned friend. If he was taken advantage of, he would live, but this was no way to treat a great warrior. A true witch with real ability who used his powers for real change and influence. This dishonorable, mortal charlatan should be completely ashamed for presenting as anything magic.

At last, Mordecai made a straight accusation. Voice dripping with true disappointment. The makings of a warning or threat. It was taking everything in Morgan to not tell the wench off, but that was not his duty or place. The last thing he wanted to do was cause trouble for Leander. The last thing he needed was to betray Tobias. Again. With a huff from his nostrils, Morgan came to stand and deserted the sham of a shop. He was out, but it would take a moment to cool from this seething.

Morgan lived among the common folk all his life and had yet to face a mortal with such hubris to fake magic. Pure disgrace. "Someone like that... should be punished." These words didn't come to him easily. Morgan was deeply insulted and that was uncommon. What was just witnessed made him sick.

[princemordecai]

Tension filled the air around them as Morgan erupted, someone like him, whose story was written with so much blood, likely didn't need to be reminded of how much death was behind him, or ahead of him - while Leander expected the woman to ask them to leave, she appeared more empathetic than Leander might have been in her position. The card rarely meant a physical death, but instead a transformation - a great change was coming but why the card had presented itself three times had to be a prank one of the other shop attendants had pulled on her.

"I'll cut a different deck then," Leander said in an attempt to diffuse some of the aggression that had erupted in the air. He took a different deck that the soothsayer produced and cut it before offering it back. One at a time the same process repeated, the attendant turned one card over after another, and Death repeated itself three times. Leander scoffed in response, expecting some excuse before he reached towards the deck and turned the stack over, revealing nothing but the same card. "I expected tricks, but not like this."

For a moment the attendant was silent, then asked the two of them to leave before Leander tossed Morgan a glance. "We were just leaving. The watch will be by later to have a word." Leander looked towards his tense friend, and asked, "Don't give her any of your coin, I've had enough of these tricks."

Morgan watched the diviner expose the deck of cards. Ready to begin. With few words shared between the three after entering, she readily pulled and presented the first. Death. Naturally, Morgan didn't know what such a card would mean to a seasoned oracle. He could only consider his own meaning of the powerful word.

Death of the innocent, the diabolical, and his own mother were the nearest examples his mind could reflect upon. However, this reading was meant for his future. The future with Tobias. Without explanation, she moved on. There was more? Death, again. Morgan remained the man in the room who had yet to notice anything wrong, but he saw the reader freeze and felt Leander grow tense.

A squabble. Apparently, no duplicate cards were meant to fill the short deck. She scrambled and, perhaps against better judgment, pulled the third. Death. Without coming closer, Morgan's black eyes studied the duplicates. Three hooded dark entities stared back. Almost thief like. Filled with mysteries and secrets. All the while, Leander was presented with the deck. As if she found him, a prince, fit to take her place. Foolish. Pathetic.

It wasn't right.

Suddenly, the once stoic thief raised a fist that swiftly slammed upon the table. Rattling the surface and knocking anything near the edge clear off. "This is not his task!" Morgan spat with a freezing resolve. Why should this change anything? She had a duty to fulfill. "READ, crone."

[princemordecai]

"Things are predictable here." As the witch looked back towards the tower overhead, he ruminated on all those nights he'd wanted to be anywhere but. To be defined by something other than his last name: Prince Mordecai, Centurion Mordecai, the Lionhearted Mordecai. It did not matter what he was or where he went; Leander would remain the Queen's heirless son - one who had yet to provide anything that would guarantee stability for Arethusa to leave the Elysian Throne behind. "And a featherbed sure beats a cot in a tent any day."

Leander knew something of what it meant to stand at the ready, perpetually on guard; he hadn't been born in a burning house, but he knew what it felt like to be caught in a blaze. "There's a reason why poets ask what happens to a person who survived the war when they still have their whole life ahead of them." The conflict with Astoria had not ended. Instead, neither side had resolved to breathe in the space set before them. Leander didn't know how long it would last; it couldn't, not with the state of things; Arethusa would not abide witches brought to a pyre, and Lysarans would not stand behind a Queen who would. "The wheel weaves as the wheel wills, maybe your next turn at it will be in a world that doesn't treat your kind with such casual cruelty." Thousands of years and that had yet to come to pass, but all this was for the hope that maybe the next generation would have it better. "Can I ask you something?"

Initial surprise subsiding, Morgan turned his attention back to that pint. While Leander admired the merchant's wares, the mortal was draining the pint nearly to the bottom before he could be caught. Not the strongest stuff, but it would do for the time being. "Must be comforting, to be back home." Morgan offered while subtly clearing his throat, eyes darting upward. "Something about the Tower. ... Faithful, yet foreboding all at once."

Speaking of home; the honorable prince did mention what would be considered Morgan's for the time being. To call Marinus Bay home would coax a laugh out of the changeling entirely. "Uh... yes. I fear I arrived overdressed because of it." That was one excuse. An honest one at least. "It's hard to go anywhere unprepared... when you've been surviving for so long."

[princemordecai]

"We all find our way eventually." Leander's grip was firm and confident, denoting the ego indicative of the prince's rank and status within both Eterna and the Lysaran military. Morgan was not the shadow of a man who'd just undergone an arduous, two-year journey from Iskaldrik; the man had had his sympathies then, but with age came the maturity to know that what the changeling had deserved more was Leander's respect.

From Morgan to the merchant's stall, Leander looked towards a trinket and picked it up, turning it over as he inspected the bauble with only veiled interest. Clearly an Iskaran import, the gems and the runes etched upon it were of an undeniable design. "How is the Bay? I haven't been back in years. Does it still rain constantly this time of year?" Something about April showers, May flowers, tides, and the spawning season soon to come. Leander imagined the other would be busy in the months ahead. Still, between the conflict with Astoria and pirates, the seas beyond the Queenset isles were unsafe for anyone without proper protection.

Times when Morgan found himself in Eterna, a familiar itch would creep up. A far too optimistic idea to stay. The size of the city was wondrous and the people quite unique. Morgan could see himself studying both on a daily basis, never to be bored again. Though inspired, such wishful thoughts were still baseless and nothing Morgan would dare mention to Tobias. Who would undoubtedly label him a fool for the dangerous consideration.

No, lively cities like Eterna weren't built for Morgan's gentle heart. His deep desires. For immediate desires though (that Tobias would approve of) there was no better place to perform their pick-pocket talents. The day had turned dim, making the snatching easier but also signaling the more innocent shoppers to take their leave. Morgan knew when to stop, he wasn't much of a gambler unlike the changeling. Before the crowd grew thin, the craftsman in black spent a well earned coin for a pint.

Nobody, more-so in this busy city, Morgan was not expecting a large, worn hand to reach toward him in greeting. The hairs stood up on the back of his neck and dark eyes flicked up instinctively. To identify. This person had to be mistaken. That itch returned and Morgan forgot how to breathe while registering the other as familiar. Of course.

"Leander." His breath returned on that exhale of realization. He should be embarrassed for not addressing the Prince formally. Obsessed with faces, mainly from studying his own by touch and artist scribble, Morgan had a strong memory for others. "... you look... less lost these days."

The mortal joked, kind of, finally returning the handshake with his own bold, yet lingering one. That weighted touch, this familiar energy, memories of years spent in the wilderness with only Tobias came sweeping over him. This touch, however, brought Morgan to the present. A state of mind he hadn't filled for weeks now. Just a shadow going through the motions.

[princemordecai]

Morgan had gone rigid, stone face and all but unresponsive, Leander briefly wondered if this had been the best idea but at the moment his friend had come across as earnest to try.

"Death." The seer said before she turned another card over and repeated the same word. "Death." Perplexed, she muttered that there weren't any doubles in the deck before she reached a shaky hand towards the deck for another and drew a death card for the third time.

"Alright," Leander stood up suddenly, accusatory, "what is this?" The witch's eyes stayed fixed on the three cards that had been laid out in front of his friend. "If you're trying to scare us-" Given every assurance that wasn't the case, she said again there wasn't supposed to be any double before restacking the cards and offering them to Leander to cut. The prince instead looked towards Morgan, "Should I do it, or should we just get out of here?"

Morgan was pleased that Leander was so comfortable. That he could direct this entirely new interaction. While the pair swapped formalities and set up the premise, Morgan made further observations of the woman and room. Here and there, the make up and props became more clear. By the time he'd catalogued five to six discrepancies, Morgan went into a dissociative state. Dark eyes came to rest on the table top rather than stare at empty space of a corner or the searching gaze of this supposed diviner.

Get on with it, he might say, out of a desire to escape the small space and silly situation. Again, the mortal stayed put for Leander. As a friend.

[princemordecai]

"Evening, Augur." Leander said with a ready, disarming grin on his lips as he nodded towards the elder sat at the table. It was all smoke and mirrors, but magic was magic, showmanship aside there was a mysticism that hung about. It was part of the charm that came with places like this, it was an institution for a reason. Well-established and well-trafficked, the woman who ran this shop knew how to make a buck off of someone and leave them wondering with more questions than they'd had to start with.

Morgan was intent on going first, it seemed, so he stood behind the changeling as the woman greeted the both of them with some familiarity. "You'll forgive my friend, it's his first time." Leander pointed out, quickly picking up on the quite stoicism that took to radiating off of the changeling when Morgan took a seat. Idly, he wondered what it was that the man was worried about, then again, it wasn't hard to deduce that for someone with a history like Morgan's, there'd be a good deal that he wished to keep hidden.

After a beat, Leander opted to take the seat beside Morgan, he'd go next - vaguely interested in what the oracle would say. She'd spouted a few random lines of diatribe over the years, but for someone like Leander whose life had been pre-planned for years, he liked hearing what someone else said the wheel was turning out. Even if it was nothing but a show. "So, what do the Fates have in store for my friend here?"

Morgan wasn't sure what to expect. Standing in the opening, he found the smell overpowering, but the dim lighting soothing. A darkness that welcomed visitors inside. Compact, safe, unlike an endless void found in empty rooms or the forest. The strange looking fortune teller was sat and at the ready. Surely she recognized Mordecai.

The leather strapped across Morgan's waist gave a soft stretching sound as he finally pressed the veil aside and stood, almost, beside the prince. It felt wrong to have Leander pay. Considering Morgan had plenty of coin. Much stolen moments ago from visitors or locals of the witch's own country. Still, there seemed no way to remedy the situation now.

He's hesitant to speak to the teller. Not the sort to volunteer his name to a stranger. For a real oracle, that shouldn't prove to be an issue. Holding a breath inside of his chest, Morgan tries to look more like an interested customer (for Mordecai) by taking a seat at her table. "I'd like a reading." His face appears colder in front of the stranger. Out of place, he feels vulnerable. A stretch for Morgan to be here, asking, "Of the future."

[princemordecai]

Leander roughly clapped Morgan on the shoulder and gave his friend a light shake. "No time like the present then, c'mon, I'll even pay. Maybe knowing you're about to win a lottery will life your spirits." Leander led the way as he brought them towards the fortune teller's place of business. This shop was an institution that probably made a good buck on misleading Eterna's tourists. Still, it was fun.

They slipped into the fortune teller's den and there she sat, crooked and bent while a musky, foreboding aroma hung about the air. There was an inherent mysticism to the flickering candles that cast obscure shapes upon the wall, something that made the aesthetic of the room ominous and foreboding - as if the seer could tell them anything and it would just have to be true.

The truth was that Leander knew those gray eyes were coloured lenses, that smell was just a couple kinds of incense stacked on top of each other and the candles were subtle weaves meant to flicker dramatically. Any second now they'd probably start changing colour, same old same old tricks. Even the hunch was fake, smoke and mirrors for travelers through the bizarre, but what she might say could still hold value.

"I suppose that is the only other answer." Who could be absolutely sure of anything? Tobias had been certain his life with Agatha in Hrafnfjall, supportive brother at his side would last till their deaths. A time and place where they agreed and found fulfillment. The veil drawn, but only for those who didn't matter. Yet, here they ended up. So far that the memories felt more like cruel dreams. Tricks of the mind. Too precious and fleeting for either brother to reminisce long.

Certainty would only ever be found in their bond, the cold and a path leading to an always unknown destination. "I'm... glad you're here too." Morgan admits, still pleased by their chance run-in. Hopefully Leander would understand.

Finally, observant eyes pulled off of Leander who held his entire focus for a breath. "An oracle?" Morgan spoke with an uncommon sense of cynicism. Inklings adopted from his brother who almost always spoke disdainfully. Another smile, short laugh and he gives his head a half shake. "I've never..."

[princemordecai]

"Maybe. There's no way to know for sure." Admittedly, Leander didn't know much about Tobias beyond what Morgan had told him, but long ago, Elvhen's parents made a decision that shaped the rest of Morgan and Tobias's lives. Now, here they stood. Fate wasn't kind; if nothing else, it was cruel; trying to apply sense or reason to the pattern would only drive a person mad. "I only asked because I was curious; I'm not sure where I would have ended up if things had been different." It didn't cost anything to admit as much, but he wouldn't expect anyone to shed a tear for the pampered prince - not when so many had it far worse. "In Astoria all I wanted was to win the war, and then come home. The war isn't over, but I'm still glad to be home. At least for now."

Fate's Fortune Telling loomed not far from where the pair stood, and Leander gestured towards it on a whim. "Maybe we should ask a professional?"

"Something would be nice..." Morgan agreed, trying his best to not defuse Leander's spirit. A world where some believed in a bright future was far better off than that of Morgan's past. Iskaldrik was far, far away and Lysara as a Queendom did symbolize hope for the changeling once. Security. Still, the potential of this new life betraying him and his brother would be far too damaging. To pretend. "What have you to look forward to these days, Leander?"

Such a question was one Morgan didn't dwell on at all. Those green fields, a bed of hay, smell of iron, the color red, and destructive blaze etched in stone. A finality. The guilt and shame, some anger far encompassing any small memory of warmth or affection. Even while he knew, clung to the evidence that the latter had existed. Once. "It was... my intention. Yes."

"I imagine we both would have been happy." The words fell heavy from his throat. Happiness earned out of ignorance, but his life with family had been enough. Before.

[princemordecai]

Leander grinned. He'd give Morgan that. "Yeah, or a stale wood floor." He remembered when things were as simple as learning to tie knots or feeling the salt air rush over his skin. Now, it was hard to look at the bay without thinking about the Astorian ships just south of Juno's Reach, waiting to breach and make way to the Queenset Isles. Or the raiders lurking across the Gulf of Taravell; at least Leander had his youth; he couldn't imagine a childhood framed by persecution and isolation. The result of what that did to a person stood in front of him now.

Goodnaturedly, Leander shrugged as he rolled his shoulders and nudged Morgan with his elbow. "Something to look forward to then, right?" Until that day - hopefully - someday came, there were the simple joys of the present. Good wine, good company, a reprieve from the war, and the night ahead of them.

"Had the Iskarans been kinder to you, would you have stayed?" A question of fate and its prospects, Leander grew up in a life of privilege, but now there was danger waiting around every turn. Some new threat ready to meet him on the battlefield, or some bard playing a gambit of nations hoping to turn the world on its axis. If Astoria had not put their kind to the pyre, would he have still become a centurion? Would there be a need? Had he been born the son of a cabbage salesman, could the lionheart have been content working a stall at the side of the road? Leander knew it was a useless question to ask; a person didn't get to change the past, and the wheel did not care if you were afraid.

"Or a stale wood floor." Morgan offered, feeling a genuine smile tug at his lips. That's where he had kept himself and his brother in Marinus Bay. A place otherwise considered abandoned by locals. Hidden above, where the windows framed that constant grey sky. Writings to no one and empty bottles littered the planks beyond a pair of thick wool blankets and lone folded pillow. Home. His gaze still wandered, unable to stick to Leander very long. It was a conflict roaring deep inside of his chest, to trust this familiar face or simply feel undeserving of its presence. Company. Unworthiness masking pure discomfort.

Leander's words were filled with a secret understanding and Morgan's ears hung to each as a sign that this was no trick. A chance meeting turned friendship from years ago remained in tact. Only if Morgan had the courage to believe... but the fear of disappointment that always followed often had greater control of the mortal. Leander could cling to that belief for both of them. As he apparently dared to try. With such promise... of Eterna.

"That could be... lifetimes from us." Was all Morgan could say, almost a whisper. He didn't have lifetimes to see freedom, a life without rules that in a way had protected him. And because of Morgan, the elvish half wouldn't see another lifetime which would have otherwise been Tobias' natural birthright.

Morgan lifts his chin to take in Leander's presence in full once more. Secretly studying the prince's face that had changed in subtle ways. A constant while the crowd swirled beyond. He felt that discomfort softly wane. "Of course."