[SWP] the waves can see

[Seraphina]

oh mothers tell your children
not to do what I have done

Tempus.

She wants to howl for him. Scream. Scream like a banshee, or like a child – like some wild thing. But Seraphina is quiet and dark. Quiet. Like a grave. Like the desert without wind, with only the heat and the sun. Quiet. Somewhere in her mind, she is still in a maze, with a monster at her heels; somewhere in her mind, he still has her trapped for the sake of crimes that were not her own; somewhere, in the back of her mind, she is still bleeding out on the Steppe, begging any god that might listen for more time.

(It was no god who came for her. It was a unicorn, and she is not sure that she loves her either, which – bitterly – tells Seraphina that she will not be happy no matter who comes to save her.)

With a pump of pale-and-dark wings, Ereshkigal lights on the shoulders of the statue while her bonded watches from several yards away, relaying information to the silver – but she is being as unfriendly as ever. “It seems that your godly-things are not as gone as you thought,” Ereshkigal observes, through their link. She stares at the gathered equines with her bizarre red eyes, her beak opening just far enough to show off her rows of razor-sharp teeth, then tilts her head at an odd angle, letting out a soft cackle, adding, verbally, “It seems that the little horse-things are confused, aren’t they? How sweet.”

Time is free. Time is here.

She looks at the great, dark stature of the unicorn, her lips curled into a frown – what could keep the god of time captive? Hadn’t she seen him once, in the maze? Hadn’t he been there, at the summit? Seraphina feels a coiling dread in her stomach, a distant sense of premonition. If he came to her again, with riddles and monsters and lies, she wouldn’t make the same mistake twice – she wouldn’t give him the wrong answer, or she wouldn’t trust him, because, gods knew, you couldn’t trust the gods. But she did have questions.

Seraphina knows that, even if she breaks and sobs and begs at his hooves, he won’t change the past. (She can hardly think of any good that what she would have changed would alter, but, if he would, could she really stop with Raum? There were so many horrible things she would undo, if she could – she isn’t sure that she could stop. And Tempus would know that. And it would be a horrible, slippery slope. She doubts that he can give her anything of the future, either; she will continue to see her people die in the streets or by her blade or by her poor decisions, and he won’t stop her.) But maybe, just maybe, if she can find him - maybe he can tell her why the gods are back. There must be some reason for it, not just divine will…and if something is coming, worse than those creatures, worse than the tests of his children, worse than his trials for the mortal kingdoms, to force them closer together…

She hopes that there is some grander reason. If there isn’t, Seraphina doesn’t know if what tattered remnants of her faith still remain can keep her from resenting her gods, and she isn’t sure if she can let herself resent anything more that she has loved.

She does not approach the statue, at first, or, at the very least, she lingers aside from the crowd that has gathered around it – Seraphina does not want to be seen. She listens, for a moment, to the conversation with her ears erect, and she debates whether or not she should step forward. If she does, they will know that she is alive. (Asterion, at least, will recognize her for who she is. And O.)

(The note flickers out-of-sight momentarily. She wonders if it is O’s doing; either way, this is enough to make Ereshkigal erupt into laughter, her raucous voice echoing across the shoreline.)

But she does step forward regardless, the golden fabric of her hood still falling over her face; it does not obscure her entirely, but it shadows the scar. “Don’t mind Ereshkigal. She’s trying to upset you; she doesn’t know any more than the rest of us.” The vulture bobs her head at Seraphina, flashing her a toothy grin – or a snarl.

“Are you sure?” She inquires, her tone saccharine.

Seraphina ignores her. “If it speaks of time, it likely speaks of the god Tempus…” She murmurs, her odd eyes lingering momentarily on Asterion, then the other figures that she recognizes – O and Maerys. “I haven’t seen Solis since the blizzard in Solterra. I suppose that Tempus never appeared in his mortal form, after the summit…but he has appeared in it before, or so I assumed, when his relic was still somewhere on Novus. The circumstances were…similar. It was a hedge maze, but it…did not make sense. It was full of strange creatures, and the geometry…and he is even stranger. Old and young, all at once.” Her eyes darken at the memory of the maze, the god, the summit – it hadn’t been that long, but it felt like another lifetime entirely. The memories weren’t good, but what she wouldn’t trade away to return to them, instead of this. “Tempus is…not like his children. He is older and stranger, and, if I had to guess, far more dangerous…though not necessarily more hostile. But he does like his riddles and his tests.” But Tempus did not see courts, or factions; he was a god for all the people of Novus, rather than just a selection of them. “Regardless – I don’t understand why he’d need to be freed…” That was what puzzled her. Could it refer to the relic? But it had disappeared…

“It doesn’t matter,” Ereshkigal proclaims, bouncing from the shoulders of the statue to Seraphina’s own shoulders with a single, loose leap. “Does it matter? No, no it’s doesn’t matter, not at all. You all came here – flies to honey! And now it’s too late. He has you, doesn’t he?” She giggles, ruffling her wings. “And – we have little birdies to catch. I’ll enjoy it.” Her tongue slides out of her mouth, curling across her beak. “I’m starving.”

Seraphina does not spare a glance at the demon. “Ereshkigal…” she cautions, her dark ears flicking back. “Raum is on the island, and at least one of his followers – I’ve seen them. Be careful; gods aren’t the only thing to be wary of here.”

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@/everyone || sera here to theorize and reveal her status I guess

"Speech!" || "Ereshkigal!"

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