Regaining Power

[Ariana]

She looked around and then smiled .

"Tell you what. You wake me up and we can discuss this over a meal. I know you eat souls but I on the other hand eat solid food and drink water. As much as the dream world is relaxing I know out side of here I need to wake up and get moving. Then perhaps once you are finished telling me about how someone nearly succeeded in, from, what I gather, killing you, you might be able to show me around your realm."

[Ceverus]

Ceverus nods, his smile widening some. "That sounds like a phenomenal idea. Excuse me a moment." he says as he absorbs the sythe back into his arm, the energy replacing itself within the tattoo on his right arm. Once complete he sinks down into the shadows of her dream, rising again in the waking world of the living, his form crouched next to Ariana's sleeping form. He reaches out, hand resting on her shoulder and shaking her gently to attempt at waking her.

[Ariana]

The dream vanished as quickly as it has arrived. Her eyes fluttered open and she needed to blink a few times before completely being able to realize that she was finally awake. Putting her arms up above her head to stretch. The bones along her back popping and she sighed happily. As she looked up at Ceverus she could not help but smile at him.

"Thank you for an easy wake up call. I prefer that over my hand being nipped at."

She referred to the peregrine falcon that had startled awake in the tree above her. The fox had moved from her side when Ceverus arrived, taking to hiding out beyond another tree nearby.

[Ceverus]

Ceverus smiled to her, extending his hand to help her to stand up. "It's my pleasure." he says as he lights a cigarette with his free hand, the smell of incense emitting from the cigarette. "So tell me, would you like to walk as I share my tale? Or rather sit under a tree?" he asks, a certain light to his eye that gave away his contented state.

[Ariana]

She accepted his hand and raised to her feet with his help. Thinking for a moment about what he had asked.

"I believe we agreed on getting food. Since you said it was a long story perhaps you should start now. The only thing is.."

Ariana looked around and realized that she had traveled a long way from the Coven. Infact she had no clue where she was or where she was going to go.

"You will have to lead the way to a place for me to eat. I have no idea where I am right now.."

[Ceverus]

Giving a chuckle he nods and motions for her to walk with him. "Come, then. There is a place that yet stands in the city wher mortals go. I've tried it, though it does nothing to sustain me, and I can honestly say that I understand why mortals enjoy it so." he says with a laugh.

As he leads the way he thinks on where to start. "When this realm was not even an idea in the Christian God's head there was Heaven, Hell, and the Shadow Realm. Me and my nine probers watched over the shadows and everything was perfect...u tip of course the mortal realm came to exist. Shortening this part, since Hell couldn't touch the mortal realm it set its sights to my realm to be met with its ten guardians. Me and my brothers fought with such a ferocity it had the demons cowering in our wake. Until Archimonde made his appearance. One by one my brothers fell...with each that did fall his power was divided among his remaining brothers until only I stood defiant against the demon...empowered by my brother's power I managed to defeat the demon and cast him into the abyss where he belonged." he pauses there in case any question was brought up since he had given the brief version of this part of the story.

[Ariana]

Ariana followed him towards the small city that he had spoken of. Listening as he spoke of the time when Hell tried to take over his Realm. She figured it was only natural for the ruler of Hell to try and conquer any other place. As he spoke of his brothers she watched him, or tried to so she did not fall and trip over something. Keeping an eye on her surroundings so she knew where she was going and how to get back.

"Do all of your brothers essences live in the scythe and in your tattoo where the energies are kept?"

[Ceverus]

"In a sense, yes. The power they held is resting within the sythe and a small part of their life's essence formed my tattoos. As I said each design is the symbol that they chose to represent them." he says as they walk. In the distance the lights of the city could be seen the closer they came.

"So the aftermath of Archimonde's campaign through my land left the realm destroyed and I found myself with unbelievable power. So I did the only thing I could think of, rebuild. It took me two weeks to reconstruct the terrain and another week to create a multitude of creatures to inhabit the forests. Some were more intelligent and began to build cities and the like. The final three days of rebuilding were spent erecting ten Ziggurat temples. One for each of my nine brothers and one for myself to live in." He continues through the story. He pauses for a moment as though gathering his thoughts and furthering his story. "Eons go by in peace, I found the coven and appeared to find something that I felt my existance was missing. That's when I met Aliyah who I got married to and had a child with...but she wasn't here when I went away on some business with my realm...that's a whole nother story though." He adds before breaking to once again allow any questions Ariana might have.

[Ariana]

Ariana had taken a few minutes to take in all that he had told her. Trying to imagine what it was like and what he had to go through to know that his brothers had fallen but a part of them were in turn placed into him. It was something she had never heard of happening but what he could do and what she could do were on completely different ends of the spectrum.

"That is a lot to take in. But you did say that the story was going to be long.. I am sorry that you lost your brothers. At least they are still with you in some way. It is better than knowing they died and not having any connection with them after they have died."

She sighed and looked down. Honey amber eyes watching her feet as the ground had changed. It went from being hard as stone to being softer as though it had rained just the day before.

"Your wife and child? Both missing..I'm sorry that is terrible."

[Ceverus]

Ceverus nods slowly, thinking back to them. "Yes...it was long ago though...I try not to keep focused on the past." he says with a light shrug. He could play that it didn't affect him for days, however he still caught himself thinking about his wife and child and missing them terribly.

He takes a slight breath in before continuing on with the story. "I stayed at the coven for a while longer until the shadows became restless once again. They had done it constantly but this time was different. I had never heard such frantic pleas from them, not since one of my high priests, the more powerful beings of my realm, decided to go on a rampage. He was easily delt with though. I returned within a week of their cries being heard to find a rip in the barrier between the abyss and my realm and demons of the like that I had never seen before. I repelled the invading demons back to the rip and upon looking inside, I saw Archimonde there. He had not yet opened the rift enough so he could enter, but he was close. He reached towards me, red lightning shooting forth from his fingertips. It was more powerful than I had imagined and weakened me significantly. He tried to grab my sythe as I was trying to call to my harvesters for souls to replenish my strength. I forced him back and finally, used what little I had left to finally destroy him and re-seal the barrier...I died shortly thereafter. Some year later I was born again within an above ground monolith, thatks to my brothers' will to keep their family alive. And now, here I am."

[Ariana]

"So what happened to you when you died? Did the scythe go with you or remain elsewhere? Also who took care of your realm while you were gone? Did anything happen there while you were away?"

She felt like a sponge, soaking up all the information that he was telling her. All of the past that he was willing to tell her. As she thought some more she wondered what happened to Archimonde. If he was able to be rebirthed the way that Ceverus was and if he was then could he, in turn, come here and still take on Ceverus in order to rule his realm.

"Can Archimonde be reborn the way you were?"

[Ceverus]

"When I died I went to the void...real boring there, not a damn thing to do. Sure the quiet's nice for the first couple of months, but it just gets irritating. As for as the sythe goes, it stayed in my Ziggurat, kept in plain sight however, heavily guarded by two of my most trusted High Priests as well as a handful of the soldiers dedicated to me that go by the name of Stalkers. Skilled warriors who have a tendancy to creep up on you in hundreds. By the time you notice them you're probably on the pointy end of their spears....the priests who guarded my sythe also tended to the affairs of the realm as they usually do when I'm absent, and they usually do a pretty good job. No incidents have been reported other than the usual crimes in the cities...nothing my priests are concerned with anyway" He says, indulging Ariana's curiosity as best he could.

When she asks about Archimonde being reborn he pauses to think. "I'm not sure. I doubt he had any family that left a peice of them within his being. So no, I don't think he can." he says after a moment as the ground changes from soft earth to asphalt as the near their destination.

[Ariana]

Ariana listened to him as he answered each and every one of her questions. For a moment she thought that she might have overwhelmed him with the questions that she asked but he seemed to cover each of them with no problem other than having to take a breath or think about what the answer would have been before he answered. She nodded her head as he finished answering everything. Absentmindedly she began to toy with her hunting knife, having taken it out of the sheath while Ceverus was talking. Since she no longer had her bow, her knife was the next object that she would toy with as she thought.

"Hmm...are all 'Gods' from your realm able to transfer a part of them to their relative after they die?"

[Ceverus]

"There is but one god in my realm. That is myself. There are some with the power to do as my brothers did when they pass, but no more that fragment of their being and even then to a direct relative, the recipient of which replaces the fallen as my priest. These select few serve as my priests, not only because of their ability to grant a small peice of their being to surviving family members but because of a commanding presence amongst the rest of my creation." he explains casually as they enter the small city. "Just a few blocks up and it's off to the left" he says, his slight smile widening at the thought of the food they were about to enjoy. True it did nothing to satisfy his hunger, but he had always enjoyed the taste of mortal foods.

[Ariana]

As they moved into the small town she put the hunting knife away so not to appear as someone who was ready to slice the next person's gut wide open. In reality she might have wanted to do such a thing depending on the circumstances, but right now was not one of those times.

"So no goddeses then? All male gods..Hmm. Must be quiet and boring at times."

She smiled and followed his instructions to where the eatery was. Ready to get down to eat. Long since forgetting what it was like to fight for days on end without any rest to eat.