Young Writers Society

(You know what Gaius looks like so I won't make a fuss with a description)

The old Keep in the middle of Fangholm was dark save for a single light gleaming in one of the former bed chambers. It was a cold night, and Sashka Ivan had stoked up the fire until it was blazing with an anger she could not quite bring herself to express. Instead, she watched the flames lick at the green cloak with the silver trimming and flicked wood shavings onto the hearth.
"I want you to go down tonight," she said absently, addressing the other person in the room. "He needs to know I've got reinforcements. Slippery old bastard might try something otherwise, and he's too valuable to hurt badly right now." Her eyes flickered to the wood carving in her hand, and she scraped the knife gently across a rough patch. "Spook him a bit, if you can. I want him scared."

((I'd be so severely disappointed in myself if I didn't))

The white was far-reaching. Eternal. Tolled off by steady ticking of his watch, the tick-tick-tick into forever, never ending, never beginning. The second hand spinning in infinite circles before him. He stood, tall and silent, against the wall, some distance from the flame as it churned. Here, he was human; here, not yet a monster; here, a mere man from a place far away. A place overseas. Not a place beyond the great blackness, another world, through the abyss that still had its eyes on him.

He wore the clothes most here did. A long-sleeved shirt, a cloak over his shoulders, knee-high boots and a fur-lined jerkin. He bore no weapons, not even a dagger, for, in a fight, it would be useless to him. He wasn't any good with anything but a gun. His fists, the winter: these were better weapons to him.

"Yes, ma'm," he agreed, shifting his weight from the stone wall and stepping forward. Lord Gaius Ash, now their prisoner. The man intimidated him from what little Cornyx had seen, though the young man would never speak of it. He wasn't particularly good at scaring, either. But Sashka had been kind to him. Better than most. He owed her for that much, if nothing else, though he'd admittedly a dim suspicion that his life would be a thing of the past if not for her shelter.

He dipped his head to her, then slid out the door to do as bidden. To the kitchens, thanking the others quietly as they passed him the prisoner's food, and then down to the cells. The dark, perpetually-icy place, where the cold began to encroach upon even his comfort. Low temperatures rarely bothered him--a side effect of what he was, he supposed--but there was an ambient fear that clung to the place and made his hackles rise down his back. He retrieved the key from one of the guards, then made his way down the hall, coming to a stop before the barred wall containing the Lord himself.

The old man was little more than a sack of bones huddled in the corner, shivering violently in the cold. The cell wasn't particularly insulated, and the cruel winter bit into his very bones with the spite of a scorned friend. His leg was playing up, too, probably from that knock he'd gotten when Sashka had first taken him. She'd taken his cloak that morning, and that only made it worse. Did she realize he'd die before she got what she wanted? He couldn't survive in this temperature, however much he prided himself on being a native of the Northern Realm.

The light at the end of the hall made him raise his head and squint. Dinner? That was the only way he really kept track of time in this place--that and the growth of his beard. It was nearly four inches long, now, so he judged he'd been there for the better part of a month. Mattathias was taking his sweet time finding him, that much was certain.

Cornyx cast a tentative glance towards him to note his position, but he didn't meet his eyes as he shuffled about for the key and slid it into the lock. He almost made an intimidating figure, with his impressive height, but as much as that lent to his portrayal as one to be feared, his lack of presence and direct interaction robbed him of any potential power gained. Sashka's words rang in his ears.

I want him scared.

Scaring people shouldn't have been a problem. People feared him. A lot of people did. He could see their widened eyes, hear their short breaths, sense the paralysis that overtook them because something deep in their instinct knew that he was different. That his skin was the same but the creature inside was not. Perhaps that was his aversion to being seen: not fear of others so much as fear of himself and what he might do to them.

He slid the door open, then set the tray down, eyeing Gaius out of the corner of his gaze. He didn't open his mouth to speak, nor did he opt to otherwise interact, only here to do his duty without making the situation worse. How was he to relay the information Sashka had told him to? How was he to make a man afraid when he, himself, could hardly speak a word when directly spoken to?

Gaius watched the boy carefully, pale blue eyes darting to the meal and then back to the boy's face. The food was tempting, but the serpent in him couldn't help but wonder what this one's story was.
"You're new," he ventured, edging toward the tray. "You wouldn't happen to know where my walking stick is, would you?" His teeth chattered badly, and his stiff fingers reached the rim of the tray, bending painfully to drag it towards him. Looked like it would be gruel again. Oh, well. It was something, at least.

Gaius fixed his eyes back on the boy. His features were so odd. What was that chain dangling from his coat?

His voice was almost punctuated by the chattering of his teeth from the sheer cold that permeated this place. It almost surprised him that the man wasn't dead already from it, with his cloak currently kissed by fire, and he pulled back as Gaius approached. The chain of his watch shifted with his weight, visible between his pocket and his belt, and he stepped back outside of the cage to press it shut. The clang echoed in his ears, the remnant of a tone he'd heard and come to terms with long ago; the finality of condemnation, of liberty seized and freedom harnessed.

"N-no, sir," he said, and the slight flinch was visible on his face at his own stutter. Yes. Absolutely horrifying. A man with no evident muscle to speak of, a stammer, little eye contact, and no weapons. Intimidating indeed, just as Sashka required.

"I wonder if you could find it for me." Gaius pulled the tray closer and watched his breath puff out in an agonizingly warm cloud for a moment. "An old man needs comfort in such trying times, you know." A timid little fellow, this one. Malleable, he was almost sure of it. He had the body of a man, but the look in his eyes was still that of a child learning.

Allowing himself a small flicker of satisfaction, Gaius abandoned the tray and dragged himself nearer to the bars, reaching up to grasp the frigid metal. Sashka had sent this little bird right to the snake's jaws. "Or even a blanket would do. Something to make this cell feel a bit more like home, hm?" Or a lockpick for his shackles--perhaps a dagger for him to drive through the Ivan girl's heart.

He was shy, but he wasn't stupid. He'd done enough manipulation and seen enough of it not to fall for something so blatant. He might've been young, not even quite twenty years old yet, but he wasn't naïve or blind. He looked up sharply, looking at the man rather than meeting his eyes.

"You've no reason for a walking stick in a cage," he reminded him, some of his ice creeping into his tone. The faintest edges of silver flickered around the edges of his irises for the most fleeting of moments. "If you find the accommodations insufficient, you may take it up with the landlady."

He delivered the line, then glanced down again, shifting his weight almost anxiously. He didn't fidget but his discomfort was obvious in spite of the words and the second of confidence it'd taken to utter them without tripping over his own tongue.

"She doesn't like me very much." Gaius tightened his grip around the bars, and his joints creaked. "I'm sure you already knew that. You look like a smart lad, though. Too smart to be bribed with such material things as money. But you must want something. Bring me a blanket or two and I'll owe you a favor."

There was something off about this boy; Gaius could almost smell it. Something wrong with his eyes, the angles of his features were a bit too sharp for his liking. The very demeanor of the lad simply screamed "Ash," but Gaius knew he was not an Ash, and that unnerved him.

((tfw our characters incidentally bear familial resemblance in spite of being from entirely different worlds))

What could a man in a cell possibly have to offer him? The way the man stepped forward, closing his fingers around the bars, leaning forward with intentions that were anything but good. Malicious. Beguiling. A real-life Slytherin as far as Cornyx was concerned, and he had no intention of dealing with those who were likely to fuck him over and backstab him and ultimately leave him bleeding in the snow.

He'd been betrayed one too many times to make a deal with the devil so easily.

"An old man trapped by his own powerlust has nothing to offer me, and it is as you say; I'm not fool enough to feed my avarice over utilizing proper sense," he asserted. "You'd do well to watch your tongue. There are more men here than you think, more than enough to keep you in and whoever comes for you out--and every word your slit tongue utters will return to Sashka, be assured of that."

(Absolute mood)
(Also, the image that you picked for the rp is absolutely amazing. Your drawing and the serpent and crow both.)

"Powerlust," Gaius scoffed. "Is that what she told you? This is a personal vendetta between her family and mine, dear boy. There's nothing lustful about it." Unless one counted her father's nocturnal habits. "As for your numbers, I'm well aware that I'm quite trapped. However, I seriously doubt Sashka Ivan has scrounged together enough rabble to fight off a full-fledged army." In fact, he was almost certain. He'd seen the guards she'd brought in, and they were far from fit for battle against General Bay's troops, let alone in the Northern Realm. These men were Southern, born and raised in the scorching deserts of the Taralli empire. They stood little chance against the full force of the Ash army.

((Thanks! I found that picture in a google search lmao
((also apparently I can't do hair texture for but I'm glad you like it, I've been trying to get better at my artsing haha))
((also I appreciate Gaius' internal monologue roast of Sashka's father there lmao))

Nothing lustful about it. He didn't believe that for a second. Men in power always had some amount of want for it, some ambition that drove them to it. It was like a fly to shit: unavoidable, unpleasant, and the simple truth of the matter.

The lack of belief was probably evident on his face, though he didn't speak it. "Sashka has my loyalty through trust. Not fear," he said simply. "Take matters up with one of the guards if you're so desperate to avoid her."

He stepped back slightly, plainly intending to end the conversation there and go back down the hall to return to her. Better to leave while he still had the upper hand, after all.

(Sashka's pop was a total drag.)

"And what did she do to earn that?" Gaius pressed his face to the bars, fixing his eyes intently on Cornyx. "Did she save your life? Rescue you from slavery? Something equally noble?" The other nobles could say what they liked about his tight-lipped lurking; he enjoyed some good gossip. It could be used for countless things. This was no different; he just had to nudge the lad along. It truly was unsettling how like an Ash the boy was.

She'd taken him in. That was all it'd taken. Rescued him, though she wasn't aware of how much, because she still thought he was of this world. She didn't know the truth of him. Of what he was.

Monster.

But she was the reason he was alive. So far un-hunted. Not much more, not much else, but it was enough for him. It was more than anyone else had done.

"You could say that." His tone was flat, unrevealing, unwilling to tell this man details. He was the sort to twist words.