"I assure you," she stated darkly, "I would have known. I've looked for it all my life." she cut off there, working her own sword in place at her narrow hip and raising a hand to her chin. Resolving to answer and face whatever verbal sparring surfaced during their brief training together. "Show me how you draw the blade. Not in attack, but draw the weapon and hold it out as if readily yourself for a possible battle. " she lowers her hands to her hips and waits for him to show her.

"Have you looked in different places?" He asked with curiosity, his hand unconsciously going to the sword again and holding it while he used his right to pull it from the scabbard in a less than fluid motion. It pulled at the belt and by the time he had it out, he knew it had been a terrible draw. Without waiting to hear from her, Rook placed the sword back into its sheath. "That was terrible. I know. It feels so long, I don't know if I can get it out quickly."

"Where I am allowed," she nods, watching him before she visibly winces at his action. "I remember," she murmurs, moving towards him. "Your first error is how stiff you are. " Ari knows only one way to teach him to feel the blade at his hip so she moves around the back of him and lines herself up against his body so that her head is over his shoulder so she can speaking in his ear. Lifting her gloved hand, she urges herself beneath his, "Feel my motion, and follow it, " she says softly, guiding his left hand, his off hand, to pull the sheath back so that the hilt and sword tip into a ready position. "Good, not pivot back with your left foot, " she indicates with a tap of her own bare left foot," stepping back to give your body balance while the right hand comes around and pulls the sword free. "

She snakes her hand around and across his belly, pulling the sword free even at her awkward angle. It's fluent, if not slow, and she returns the blade and slowly begins to withdraw.

"So you left the forests to go search for.." Rook paused as she moved behind him and pressed up against him. He wraps his hand around her glove and follows the movement to tip the weapon into position. "I'm stiff because it's all new. I don't have a motion that's like this I've done before, know what I mean?" The young man moves his foot backwards as instructed, a little wobbly due to a worry of stepping on the woman so close behind him. He makes a surprised sound when she pulls the blade free in a fluid motion that was no quiet his own. "What was it I was saying before all that?"

"Something about the forest," she murmurs in a low tone, moving around to stand in front of him. "Am I making you uncomfortable? You seem tense," she notes, tilting her head at him. "Here, I will stand here, so that you understand to keep your arm ready and not limp." She steps right up next to his chest, keeping both of her hands down so that she is standing tall and still. "Repeat what I showed you, and draw the blade from around me. I'll move as you move." she stated, waiting.

"Oh yes! You're from the forest? I wouldn't have guessed that. And you left looking for a man?" He kept his hands on his blade, gripping the handle lightly and moving it the first few inches and dropping it. Her question made him smile brightly. "Of course you're not. I just didn't do any of my stretches. My teacher ran off. Bit her lip and everything."

He straightens as she approaches and puts his arm around her. "Are you holding my arm or am I moving yours?" Rook took ahold of her right wrist and brought it across her body to try and grab his sword. "My sword's a little far back. Streeeetch." It was clear he was completely distracted and wasn't even close to following her instructions. Attempting to move head face from her right side to her left, he got a face full of hair and sputtered slightly. "Wait, hold on." He brought her right hand up from his hip to reach behind her and rub at his nose. "Itches."

Ari glared at him at the implication. "Are you implying I'm desperate?" she asked, ignoring any likelihood of an answer, but he spoke and she softened some in memory, "I-- didn't realize you had noticed, " she said quietly, regretting her decision of method, but she didn't move. That would be giving in and that was certainly not something she would do. She didn't appreciate the teasing, it felt more personal, but she allowed his attention to wander, felt her hair pull and pulled just as he tugged her hand to rub his neck. She pulled it back and glared at him. "Serves you right, it isn't nice to tease." she replied, turning her back against him again. "Again? Only this time, you do the reaching, not me. I'm here just provide a space"

"What? You--" He stopped, looking around as he searched for the words. "I asked a question, what implication did--how did I imply.." Rook trailed off, shaking his head. "I was just surprised. Because the way you looked," He brought a finger up to stop her immediate train of thought. "That had nothing to do with the color of your skin, but your armor and the sword doesn't make me think of someone from a forest. Like, how could you climb in that?"

Rook tried to remember then how they had arrived on climbing. Then she spoke and he focused on her words. The last sentence she said moved the right piece of the puzzle into place in his head. "Oh! Oh, okay! I'm doing the motion around you." He tried drawing the sword again, still moving slowly but giving each movement his full attention.

Even as careful as she knew Rook was being, she pressed herself as flush against him as she could to avoid injuring herself on the sword, lest he slip. She should have paid more attention to his form, for his did well and deserved praise. She should have paid more attention to his positioning, so she could tell him to turn his foot back more, but what she heard, what she focused on, was the sentence he spoke only a moment ago. "It doesn't bother you at all, does it?" she said, turning the conversation back. She tilted her head back and narrowed her eyes at him. "It's just a different color, that's all." her voice filled with disbelief. A tremor shifted through her.'How cruel. How utterly and entirely cruel.' Instead, she opted to attempt shifting the topic again. "Armor is easily removed, in the open I am more a target." she says, using the color as a shield.

The cleric was indeed being extra cautious so as not to cause any harm to himself or her. While still repeating the motions she taught him, he moved with slow determination. It didn't seem like he would ever speed up, but each repetition added fluidity to his movements. "Why would your color bother me? It's just skin. Ain't like you chose it. What matters is what you do, not what you are. You need to focus on that." He said with assured finality as he returned the weapon to its sheath a final time. Still he didn't move away.

"Okay, I learned how to pull it out. Now I need to know what to do with it afterwards/"

"For some, it means a great deal, " she stood still for a moment more, and peeled herself away. "Never make the first move unless you must, if gives the other the advantage. You see their direction, and can either move and strike, or defend if necessary. When you strike first, you lose that. " she narrowed her eyes at him, watching him carefully. "You are unlike any one I've met before, you drive me mad, and you don't even realize it. Don't even do it intentionally." she says honestly, pulling her sword and re-thinking her decision before letting it fall back in place.

"Yeah, I seen that. For different reasons, too. All different people out in the world. Can't focus on the bad ones. Just like a potato harvest. You pick out the ones that are rotten, but you toss them out and forget about them. Your main concern is those good potatoes."

He began working on his hand placement while looking at her to memorize with his hands and not his eyes. "You lose the advantage because you're committed to an attack instead of having open options." Rook tried to continue the line of thinking as best he could.

"What? I drive you mad?" He asks in amused disbelief.

"Yes, you," she affirmed, reaching out to correct his lines as she spoke, "you drive me mad. If this God of yours does truly exist, he must have a very dark humor." She straightens his wrist, nodding. "It isn't right. I lived fine alone. I was fine. Three days with you and suddenly..." she stops, pursing her lips and rubbing her eyes.

"And then earlier..." she rubs her eyes with her gloved hand. "Of course fate would have a sense of humor at my expense."

"Now, see, that's what gets me. That's three or so different thoughts you didn't never finish. So I'm trying to follow along and I just get left hanging in the wind." Rook replied, stopping the practice to gesture with the handle of the sword. He steps closer to her, putting the blade away again. "What makes you think fate is considering you at all? Fate is a river after rain. You don't have any power. All you can do is follow the current and keep your eyes open for something on shore you can grab onto."

He jumped back, throwing his feet apart and hunkering down while trying to pull the sword. The motion wasn't terrible, but it wasn't good either. "Is this a chop or a stab type weapon?"

She stares at him, her jaw dropped open a fraction of an inch. "Well, Thank you. I'm not sure fate itself could have made my existence less important." She quickly raises a hand to wave away any response he may have on that. At least if she believed cared enough about her existence to make her miserable, it showed enough concern of interest. His comment implied she suffered for no reason, and that sat wrong.

"It's not a toy. Style will come later, for now, keeping it in your hand enough to protect yourself from damage, that's a good accomplishment. Hack and slash," she indicates the weapon in his hand, "comes later. Right now, even I could cut you down, and I am no master."

"Why are you waiting for some outside force to give your existence importance? That's up to you. You can't be so passive. You're still going to get hurt being passive. At least being active you can take control of what happens." Rook continues without regard to her hand waving. "You know what you want. I've heard it. But you're not trying to make it happen, you're just going along with the flow of the river." He put the weapon to the side and walked over to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "Find that piece of shore you want and swim towards it. Reach out for something to grab. Don't let yourself be swept away."

"I wasn't ever really concerned about style. You could cut me down regardless of my skill. I wouldn't raise a blade to you." He holds up the handle towards her.

She lifted her chin, looking up at him defiantly, but the look wavered. She was losing her touch. "When you have lived as nothing for as long as I have lived, you would not find what you are asking as simple as you speak it" she took a step closer, "Self inflicted pain hurts less than the pain others cause." She subconsciously leans towards his touch, catches herself and looks back at him.

"You fail to see I am as incapable of harming you, as you are me. So I can't just.. reach out, and grab what I want, " she lays her bare hand on his chest. "It hurts too much already to be this close to it." Her eyes no longer rest on his face, downcast to hide the pain there.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:38, Tue 14 June 2016.

"What?" Rook boggled at her statement. "You're not nothing. You have feelings, desires, fears. You're a person, the same as me. Regardless of what anyone says. That's something you have to know and never forget. Nothing worth doing is simple or easy. Existing isn't simple or easy. We struggle from our first breath to our last. The key is to finding people to share your struggles with, to help you with them."

He sighed heavily, the hand on her shoulder sliding down her back and pulling her in. He put his other arm around her still holding the sword. ""Oh, Erastil." Rook whispered. Then he spoke up. "Whoever convinced you that everyone around you will be hurt simply because of your presence was wrong in that belief and wrong to teach you that. The pain you inflict on yourself is worse because you can stop it. You can't control how anyone else behaves except yourself. What have you done to deserve any of what you're feeling? Just existing?"

Ari closes her eyes and listens to his words,, she sighs "Even if that were true, he meant well, Rook. The world is not a kind place to my kind. We are looked unfavorably by our own race. Most like me don't make it past infancy, let alone to adulthood. " She falls silent as he draws her in, unfamiliar with such close contact in a vulnerable setting. It makes her knees shake, lock and she's not sure why.

Undeniably, she feels safe and calm. Calmer than she has felt for a very long time. The hand on his chest curls slightly and she allows her eyes to close, to enjoy the sensation, rather than the bleakness beyond it. The warmth from his hand at the base of her spine is soothing, but when she opens her eyes and tilts her head up to look at him. Reluctantly, she pushes back, but not enough that he would be forced to relinquish his hold if he didn't want to. Lifting her gloved hand, she makes short work of removing her slender fingers from the tight fit, letting the article fall to the floor as she rubs the back of her hand before lifting it slightly to see what had lain hidden beneath.

"My father's people give this mark to slaves and half-breeds as a way of marking property. I was given mine as an infant, likely shortly after my birth. My mother had one as well, I have been told. It is an insult that I even exist. To have a human parent is one thing, but my mother was Elven, so the insult was considered even deeper. My human father tried as he could to protect me, but those who saw the mark were easily angered at my presence. I rarely went to town unless it was necessary and even then, I kept out of sight. My place was made very clear to me in this world. " Without a clear place to put her hands, regretting dropping the glove so that she could hide the mark there away, she placed them lightly back to his chest.

"My father tried to prepare me for the lonely life I would lead, marked perhaps by the occasional companion or... " she doesn't say the next word, but her cheeks darken as an indication. "But it was made clear a normal life is not something to expect. My kind do not settle into families, we don't marry and have children. " she closes her eyes, a pained expression on her face. "It's not even likely I could."

She winces as she bites her lips, marking the sensitive spot in the middle barely healed from morning.

"And look at where well-meaning has gotten you, Aris'ta. You're out in the world alone and you haven't even fully developed yet." Still embracing her with one arm, he reached around her with his other and put the sword in his sheath in what was probably the most natural attempt the entire time. He looks down, giving her room to finally unglove her hand. It was something he'd noticed several times, but he hadn't really ever paid close attention to it. Now that his other hand was free, he took the overly warm hand and pulled it close to his eyes to look at the mark closely. Rook released her hand to shake his head.

"You're getting it all wrong. Those people, the things they told you were part of their lives, not yours. Your hand might mean something to them, but to everyone else it's nothing. You give it meaning, not the rest of the world. Your father did wrong by you. Even if he was trying to do what he thought best, it wasn't. What would he know of your 'kind'? What does anyone know? You were a foundling, so it's not like he had any clear idea on where you came from. It was horseshit and he should've consulted someone. As many people as he could have." He leaned back, taking both of her shoulders in his hands and bending to enter her field of view. "It was his duty as your father to protect you. And instead he's hurt you. And he's still hurting you because you willingly hurt yourself."

The look she gave him reflected her reluctance to believe what he was saying, but it was hard to deny the evidence she had seen from the others they had traveled with. His gaze was too intense, she looked away, looking back and closed her eyes. The worry had been there, the fear, but aside from a very brief look of concern from the bartender when they first met with De La Maistre, she'd experienced none of it from the others.

The aloofness of her first companions had been tied entirely to her own insecurity. The same as it had been when she had first joined in the conversations with others. Was it really so cut and dry? No. Surely not, she remembered the names as a child, the glares. They were real, but things had changed and so had she. "You're right," she said sadly, "I never even noticed before." Turning her head, she lifted her hands and placed one on either side of his face before pulling him forward so she could rest her forehead to him, closing her eyes.

"I'm sorry," she said closely, slowly opening her eyes to meet his.

With his forehead against hers, he moved his hands up her shoulders to the sides of her neck. "It's okay." He whispered at first. "Not your fault. A child is grown from the seeds of its parents. You're what your parents made you. Or you were. But you can still grow. We all grow. Who you were when you woke up isn't who you are now. Withdrawing is the easy way to handle things you don't like. But the real strength comes from facing those things head-on." He grinned briefly at his pun, twisting his forehead against hers briefly.

"Tomorrow can be a new day. You can wake and view everyone, everything differently. Everyone doesn't want to hurt you, they don't even know you. When they get to know you, they'll want you in their life. And that's who we have to be. People who add value to the lives of everyone around us. And doing that will add value to our own lives. Value you've been sorely lacking."

Ari watched him, something flickering in her eyes a moment. A shiver ran down her spine when he moved his hands to her neck. She parted her lips slightly, her gaze falling to his lips just a moment before "Rook,..." left her own. A fraction of an inch more and she would have kissed him, but fear is a hard thing to overcome and though what she wanted was already in her grasp, she pulled back just before she connected. "You, uh, sheathed the sword really well. " She shook her head, inwardly groaning at the words as she lowered a hand and tugged at the belt as a way of breaking the sudden tension and tremor that went through her. "Guess the belt, uhm, helped. When tightened right, I mean." She still rested a hand on him, though it had moved down his neck a bit and was excessively warm.

"I did!" He chuckled, leaning back to nod his head without hitting hers. "Good instruction, practice, and a weak arm. It was getting heavy, holding it like that. Plus, if someone saw they might think I was trying to, uh." Rook paused and looked up as he tried to remember. "Something about your chastity. That's what you said, right?"

"Oop, careful. That's not tightening, that's loosening. Pull the other way. I still need suspenders, I think." His hands were rough against her neck and they slid down her back, again pulling her in. "Sorry if I was a little coarse. Don't feel like you have to change overnight. You can't, no one can. But every step forward takes you closer and closer. Keep stepping. Fall down, but get back up."

"You did," she repeated, a sort of half-hearted lopsided grin filled tilted her lips at his excitement. "If you ever have to use it for real, you won't drop it. Something in the blood will keep it raised until the danger has passed, it will give you strength." With a blink of her large arms, she gave a knowing nod and searched for the latch with her other hand, eventually succeeding in pulling the belt the correct direction. "You don't need suspenders, you just need, she is pulled closer and makes a short noise before completing her sentence. "practice." She ponders something, looking at him.

"You said what needed saying, as did I. We're both the better for it, in company and spirit," she laughs suddenly, and shakes her head, she answers before he could even question. "I'm sorry for a moment, it sounded like you might even be there to help me if I fell," she lifted her eyes and tilted her smile. "I wonder..."