westwhere | [OPEN] words engraved in the sand

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[OPEN] words engraved in the sand

WHO: Eleven and every OPEN
WHEN: Travel month
WHERE: On the road to Taravast~
WHAT: All the things
WARNINGS: blood rain, and mention of sickness (thanks Xie Lian)

1. Riding Tips?

Eleven doesn't consider himself an expert on many things, but having won a few notable horse races, he feels somewhat obligated to approach anyone looking out of their depth when it comes to their mounts.

"Hey." He does his best to temper the amusement in his eyes and tone. "I might be able to help you, if you'd like."

2. Sick

Whatever enjoyment he'd gleaned from that first day of travel was swiftly lost that evening over dinner, and through the course of the day immediately following. Face pale and his expression tight with discomfort, Eleven fought down bouts of queasiness with the singular focus of not getting sick all over his horse.

Later, as the sun began to set, he brought his horse up to the nearest person he recognized and pitched his voice to a low almost-whisper lacking all usual vigor.

"..Have you heard when we're stopping?"

3. Camp

Once he's more or less recovered from his bout of illness, Eleven sets about camp with a familiar smile and eagerness to help. Setting up tents, supply distribution, relaying messages and with the self-appointed task of helping look after their collection of elk, horses, and donkeys.

Then with his non-toxic dinner in hand, he seeks out a familiar face to settle next to.

"Mind if I join you?"

4. Watch

He'd been forced to opt out of shifts for the nights he spent recovering from his illness, but determined to make up for it, Eleven signed himself up for every night thereafter.

Between the mists and the harpies, accompanied by the occasional voice on the wind, there is plenty to be watchful of.

"The horses are getting nervous," he observes with a frown and a will to go to them. Their ears twitch, hooves pawing at the ground on occasion.

"Do you think we should check...?"

5. Tar Collection

It isn't pleasant work, shoveling tar into barrels. Stepping in it, getting it all over his gloves and boots; black, stuck ink that enjoys staining everything it touches. He takes to wearing his cloak to cover his travel wear while he works, at peace at least with the idea that every ounce of muck they pried out of the waters would help the nearby plants and wildlife.

And well, after turning all his leftover coin to Wei Wuxian for supplies again, Eleven is looking forward to possibly having coin enough to treat himself to a good meal once they finally reach the city.

Sometimes, he thinks he sees something in the murk; an odd latticework of shadow reflecting back at him. After a few occasions of this over the days, he finally dredges up the nerve to ask:

"Is there... something in there, you think?"

6. First blood rain

The rain came unexpected, late into the night. He'd been certain there weren't clouds enough for rain. The wetness was expected, but then after, the smell and odd warmth, the thickness of it-

Eleven lifted a hand and smeared it like ink between his fingers, then called up a brief flame to examine it by.

"This can't really be-"

Heart in his throat, he snuffed the flicker of fire and let a new chill soak through him as he glanced wildly about for a source while it soaked into his hair and slid down his scalp. He couldn't suppress a grimace, or the shudder that accompanied it as the nausea from his previous illness threatened to resurface. His voice, taking a turn for distress as nothing seems to stand out.

"What is happening?"

7. Wildcard!

[ooc: hmu with anything adjacent to these prompts, or anything else that suits this travel time! feel free to pm/plurk if you'd like to work out anything in particular]

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He gave a half-shrug, unable to offer much more in way of insight but through his discomfort, resolved to try and help the god feel a little lighter.

"You have an iron stomach, I guess." Which, after thousands of years of existence, he supposed that made sense, too. "I promise I don't hold it against you."

"...Thank you, that's kind of you."

he still feels terrible about so many people and ghosts falling sick, but well... there's not much he can do about that.

"I've known times where I didn't have much choice in what I had to eat. It was whatever I could scrounge up or nothing at all. I guess I sort of got used to it after a while."

Eleven hummed shortly, then regretted it as the vibrations tickled a sensitive throat. He grimaced and shuddered in short order. At least talking helped keep his mind off it some.

"Do you need to eat?" he queried aloud, only to instantly regret it. "I mean, you must, if- I just.. sorry."

It's okay, he gets what you are asking, Eleven.

"I won't die if I don't eat... but I do get hungry, and no food is not good for my energy levels in general. I've done it a few times, during hard times. Oh, and that one time when I stayed in that coffin for about a hundred years. It's not terrible, but it's better if I can have regular food."

He winced just short of a cringe, still feeling bad about what sounds largely insensitive. And, well, Xie Lian's response wasn't terribly encouraging.

"That sounds awful," he lamented. Starving to death already sounded like a terrible fate, but to be immortal and suffer starvation while not dying from it seemed in some ways worse.

"So you are similar to mortals, just.. you won't die from things like not eating, sleeping and such?"

"Something like that, yes."

It's still not fun, overall, and he doesn't like feeling hungry, but he is also sort of used to it, quite unfortunately.

"I didn't want to be a burden, that's why I figured i'd cook a bit, but now that I've been banned from it... I guess I'll have to rely on everyone."

Eleven frowned, able to share part of Xie Lian's sentiment as one he's internalized every day since well, discovering his destiny.

"You aren't a burden," he assured, heartfelt. "You're strong, wise, generous, and have worked in everyone's interest, even in things you could have ignored because they were below you. None of that has changed."

"I... really am not that wise. It's easy to appear so, but really I've just been around a long time, that's all."

Xie Lian makes a resolved face.

"And there is nothing that is below anyone. You can have all the principles in the world, when comes the time to survive, you will do whatever it takes for it. I learned the hard way."

Eleven nodded, expression easing.

"And modest," he remarked with a hint of a smile. But the whole of it was lost in the implications therein: that of a long, difficult life spanning centuries. He quieted for a short while, mulling that over while his stomach settled.

"It doesn't sound like.. there is much appeal to divinity or immortality, after all."

"It's easier on some people than others. I guess it also depends of what you ascended for or what people will pray to you for. One of my Martial God friends ended up being worshipped as a god of fertility because a King made a spelling mistake in his name once, so now he mostly has female worshippers."

Which is honestly pretty funny.

"Honestly, I'm not a role model for life in the heavens. I broke a lot of rules pretty early on."

Ascended. That's right; Xie Lian had mentioned that before. Mortals ascending to divinity rang as an odd concept, but he supposed gods may not be born from the ether- or at least, not all of them. The thought perturbed him more than he'd like. Erdwin had ascended to the skies as a star to watch over Erdrea once his duty had been fulfilled. Not a god, so far as anyone knew, but-

Eleven gripped the reigns as he fought off another wave of nausea. At least Xie Lian's story gave him something else to think about.

"..I wouldn't have guessed," he said after a moment, earnest. "What sort of rules..?"

"Mostly, those about not getting too tangled up in human affairs."

He'd been young then, and naive, and he'd wanted to help his people. He also hadn't known that their suffering was a plot enacted precisely to make him react exactly the way that he had, and bring him to the exact breaking point he had reached and almost given into.

But that was the past.

"My country suffered a lot of trouble soon after I ascended and I tried to help them. They were my believers, after all. But fate is not something you can fight again, not even if you're a god. Sometimes, countries will fall, and people will die, and nothing you can do will change that.

"I was young, and I thought I was powerful enough, and that I could save all of them. But I couldn't. Instead, I only brought more suffering to them. Everything I did to try and make things better only made them worse. In hindsight, I can't really blame them for rejecting me. I was arrogant, and overconfident, and I thought I could solve every problems. I thought I could take care of everyone, when I was barely able to take care of myself."

He doesn't really like thinking about those times again, even when so much has come to light to show him there was nothing he could have done as most of it was a plot against him to start with. But he did let go of his resentment long ago. He was pulled back from that brink of despair, and he promised himself he wouldn't fall into it again.

"I don't like to see people get hurt, and if I see bad things happening in front of me, I will intervene. But some things, sometimes, you have to let people sort out on their own."

Eleven listened quietly, frown gradually deepening. Pains of sympathy echoed through his chest, understanding a touch too keen for comfort. Kingdoms fell, people died, and darkness descended.

"I guess so," he accepted softly, uneasy with it as a general rule even while understanding the reason for its caution. "But if people are asking for your help and relying on you, what else can you do?"

"That's what I thought too. Eight hundred years later, I still wonder. Was it really so wrong of me to try my hardest for the people who needed me? I still don't have the answer to that. So you see, I really am not that wise."

So now he just tries to be kind and helpful, within reason.

Eleven hummed thoughtfully.

"I don't know enough to say. If I'd been there, I think that even though you failed, it meant something that you tried. I know the divine must have grander priorities that mortals may not be able to easily understand, but.. I'm not sure I would have been able to forgive anyone- least of all a God- for refusing to help people who needed them."

"You know, I think that's what I thought too, at the time."

Xie Lian gives a small smile.

"In the end, they couldn't forgive me because I failed. How hard I tried didn't really matter, because the results were worse."

Eleven heaved a sigh, shrugging.

"I understand why they'd blame you, but.."

Would it matter, if he failed in the end? The thought made him feel more ill than he already was. At least he wouldn't live beyond that failure to watch the world twist his goddess-given title into the shadowed phantom he'd tried so hard to shake off. But Xie Lian had.

He shuddered and swallowed hard. "Surely not everyone could hate you for it.."

"It felt like that at the time. And so in turn, I ended up resenting them too, because how could they not see I was trying as hard as I can? It was..."

Another deep breath.

"It was a long time ago. My country doesn't even exist anymore. The people from that time have been dead for a long time, and their descendants have assimilated elsewhere. Even if there was someone to still be resentful towards, what would be the point? All I needed to come back from there was the proof that just one person could be kind, and I got that. I don't need anything else."

Eleven's chest hollowed to a dull ache that didn't have much to do with his illness. To live so long to see your homeland decline until it no longer existed- immortality surely was a curse for anyone with ties to a mortal realm.

"I'm glad you found some kindness," he said quietly, subdued. "That all must have been difficult to live through."

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[OPEN] words engraved in the sand

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