#voryn is a very precocious 13 here and nerevar is 15

[iosaturnalia]

I'm procrastinating on processing grief by being CREATIVE so I sat down at my laptop for like four hours last night and cranked out over 1500 words of a new Nerevoryn fic. I'm not sure how I want to break up the chapters yet but I wanted to share a little bit of my first draft! Read the whole thing here:

No, Voryn didn’t like parties. But he loved a holiday, the solemnity and drama of it all. Tonight was Born Anew, the end of one year and the beginning of another, which was unmatched in its spectacle. Nothing filled him with more contentment than seeing the entire hillside outside of Kogoruhn filled with people who were prepared to follow the same rules and rituals, no matter how varied the origins of the congregants. From the constituent noble families of House Dagoth, dressed in their finest regalia, to the mostly-Urshilaku horde of Ashlanders who had set up their most festive bazaar of the year, there was an unspoken but comfortable peace in the late afternoon air. Everyone was here to celebrate. For once, the space around him was buzzing with something other than thinly-veiled animosity. 

As dusk settled upon the land, the stoneflower blue of the sky burst into fire as Magnus melted against the horizon. A roar of songs and cheers dissipated into a hum of murmured prayers, and the hillside grew silent in reverence to the Lady of Twilight. 

Landed mer and ashlander alike fell to their knees; some devout worshippers lent a corner of their prayer mat to those more agnostic few who had none. Voryn and his family took a ceremonial bow on the grand Dagoth rug, decorated with hundreds of intricately woven scarabs and nearly the size of a dining hall. There was more than enough room to share, as was the case with everything in Kogoruhn. But Voryn was still surprised to find that a stranger had prostrated himself in front of him, with the ends of his shaggy white hair spilling forward, braided and woven with colorful beads. What surprised Voryn more was the fact that this boy, perhaps a little older than he, was neither Dagoth nor ashfolk, but dressed in the somewhat ostentatious garb of a mainlander. He prayed with a quick and passionate rhythm, his voice rising and falling as if overcome by emotion. 

“Psst!” Voryn hissed, trying not to be heard, although most people had finished praying and the din of chatter was on a steady crescendo. “...may I be guarded by Your -” The boy looked up with pearl-colored eyes, full of cold fire, like a wild animal that was deciding whether to flee or to attack. He raised a finger to his lips and hissed out a shhhh before bowing his head again. 

Voryn should have been praying, himself; instead he listened. 

“May I be guarded by Your foreknowledge, that I might be led to glorify and adore You, in my actions and in my deeds. Lead me safely through this night and into the light of Your splendorous dawn, but let me never rest while Your work is to be done. Sut ohm khamir edur yim sha.” 

For your will is mine also. There was that sizzle again, that flicker of secret knowledge that pricked at Voryn’s palms whenever he witnessed something that was perhaps not meant for him. He didn’t know if he’d ever heard a prayer spoken so reverently, in a tongue that sounded familiar yet impossibly ancient. The young zealot sat up and Voryn could swear he was glowing. He looked indescribably beautiful, with hair the color of fresh Baan Malur snow, falling around the severe angles of his bronze cheekbones. Tears streamed down his cheeks as a faint silver aura of magicka illuminated the tips of his ears, his hair, his lips. 

Then, suddenly, the boy exhaled loudly, wiped his cheeks, and opened his eyes. In his voyeurism, Voryn didn’t realize his mouth had fallen open until a wide, crooked grin cracked open on the boy’s face. He bolted upwards from his own kneeling position, folding his legs beneath him so he wouldn’t fall over, his face flushed a dark sienna. 

“Um. Where did you learn that?” Voryn asked. 

“Learn what?” 

“The… that. Um. The prayer.” 

The boy laughed, and the sound made Voryn’s heart palpitate. “I made it up.” He laughed again, at Voryn’s bewildered expression a little louder this time, and explained. “I make it up every time! It does no good to memorize the words of some old dead priest when you talk to Her. It’s a personal relationship, see. You want to be a friend, you speak as a friend.” 

He was so unbelievably earnest in saying all of this. Voryn wanted to ask a multitude of questions; firstly, if this boy actually believed he was speaking to Azura herself. 

(Maybe he was. Maybe he was a daedra, a spirit of Moonshadow. The myths all said it was the most beautiful place in all the Aurbis; it would stand to reason that its residents would be just as beautiful.)