[ well, he might be right about that. there's no guarantee the king's the only person to have bargained with the orb, especially with it gone missing this long. the stories they've collected have been contradictory, confused. either no one's clear on what's happened, or someone's lying, and rand isn't sure what's worse. ]
Back to the forests, [ he admits, breathing out. looking up only gives him a view of slatted wood and tendrils of sunlight, but he does it anyway as he continues. ] It's the only place I've found any worthwhile information.
[ even if he doesn't find the great mulgrowe again, there could be โ he doesn't know, something. ]
And Elindes and Harsby remind me too much of home.
[ he admits slowly, quietly, after a long moment. he hasn't really had enough to drink to blame the confession on, for all that this is the first time he's said this to anyone. and itachi already knows how home is a sore spot for him, doesn't he? rand had made it so clear, a month or so ago. ]
๏ผ he gives the man a sidelong glance, and takes another drink. he does it languidly, every motion still graceful and controlled. standing might be harder, but control has never been an issue of his. ๏ผ
I'm sorry, ๏ผ he says finally. there is something very much like sorrow in his voice, pitched soft and low. ๏ผ for the circumstances that caused you to leave.
๏ผ it's a cruel thing, to be bereft of one's home. ๏ผ
[ itachi has to be the last person he'd ever expect to give him sympathy. the surprise plays across his face: the way his eyebrows furrow, the way he looks, sideways, at the other man, and then in how he averts his gaze again, jaw working. a portrait painted clear to the discerning, and itachi is surely discerning: a study in grief, in watercolor brushstrokes.
control, you see, doesn't come to him easily.
he could say, i am too, or he could say, it's better this way, or he could say, it was my fault. there are other sentiments he doesn't waste breath on; wishing things otherwise has never made them so. in the end, he speaks politely, a soft, ]
[ would he have ever expected such gentle kindness from the man who's instructed him, more than once, on ways to avoid showing weakness? if he had, he might not have said anything at all.
because what he remembers now, even as itachi asks that question, himself unmoving in the face of that supportive touch โ what he remembers is the sharp dread he'd felt at seeing his father's wound, at stumbling through the forest all night as tam al'thor grew more feverish and more delirious, the taste of terror in his mouth like bile, is the hopes that the village would be safe and nynaeve would heal his dad and everything would be fine, all of which fell to dust the moment emond's field came to view, still smoldering and filled with piles of the dead and cries of the wounded. is moiraine saying, they came here for you.
is moiraine, who cannot lie, speaking a bare affirmation to the question of what channeling will do to him. overlapping reasons why he can't go home, as if one weren't enough.
๏ผ there's no indication of offense. he accepts that with a nod, fingers now curling loosely around the neck of the bottle, his thumb wiping at the condensation just below the lip of the glass. ๏ผ
I come from the Country of Fire — named as such for its many volcanic mountains. But my home... ๏ผ the label is peeling. absently, he smoothes it back down. ๏ผ is called 'Konohagakure'. 'The Village Hidden in the Leaves'. It is a beautiful place. It was the first of the shinobi villages founded, a little less than a century ago now.
๏ผ destroyed, kakashi had said. a crater. given what he knows of the timeline, it seems that madara did not even wait until his body was cooling to enact his revenge. ๏ผ
[ he visibly relaxes when itachi nods and starts speaking of his own home, so much had he tensed at the mere suggestion of questions. breathes out, turns his head to listen. he's struck, as always, at how recently so many things have happened in itachi's world โ his village, one of the first, barely a century old. ]
Hidden in the leaves, [ he echoes softly. ] Is it near a forest?
Yes. It is bracketed on its north face by an immense cliff. If you stand at its peak you can see for kilometers — a lush canopy of ceaseless green, with the occasional ribbon of a blue river or gray road is the only thing that exists beyond the village gates.
( it almost feels a little like a genetic memory, that if he closes his eyes he can imagine what it might have looked like when madara and hashirama stood on the monument cliff and decided on a better future than what they had been raised for. )
Our founder could create and manipulate wood. The stories say he built the village in a single night.
[ manipulate wood. that's like the ogier, he thinks. he remembers loial telling him of how they make things, not by cutting down trees but beseeching them with treesinging. sung wood is rare and highly prized, especially among humans, so much so that rand had used to think it merely the stuff of gleeman's tales. ]
Your village sounds beautiful.
[ he says, and means it. itachi paints a vivid enough picture for him to imagine; and the shape of it is so familiar that it's easy for him to see it as a place not very unlike two rivers, in his mind's eye. beautiful, indeed. ]
I can show you, if you'd like. I have built a replica of it in the simulation room.
๏ผ it is not a publicly available file. it's private, locked to his earpiece ID. but there have been a select few he has been willing to share it with. sometimes, he spends time simply wandering its streets. his memory is a perfect creature — the village that exists in code synaptic response is pitch-perfect to the last day he spent there. the sounds, the ambient temperature, the smell of the food stalls in the air.
he has never been able to bring himself to add the uchiha compound, sequestered to the south. he likely never will. instead, he overlaid the area with a forest.
he takes another drink, finishing the bottle. he gestures for rand to retrieve another, being now nearer to the neatly woven bag than he himself. ๏ผ
[ he does go to reach for another bottle, cracks it open after a moment and takes the first sip of it. which is perhaps not entirely as polite as he might normally want to be, but, well. he passes it to itachi after a swallow. ]
I'd like to see that, [ he says, slow, ] if you really would.
[ for such a proficient liar, itachi rarely seems to say things he doesn't mean. but even rand can sense that this would be a private thing to him โ who wouldn't think this a private thing? โ and offers the out. ]
๏ผ it's said with a modest reprimand, doled out between one moment of the next. itachi's hand ghosts over rand's as he takes the bottle, and he takes drink that echoes his own. ๏ผ
I take no issue with your seeing it. You are one of the few, I think, that would understand what it means.
[ rand's reactions can so resemble a spooked, wounded animal at times. but it's a testament to itachi that right now, he doesn't. he stills as he listens, then slowly moves to lean back against the wall, lets a slant of sunlight shine too brightly in his eyes. ]
No, [ he says, feathersoft, suddenly weary. ] You're not wrong.
[ he lets the silence stretch, before asking, ]
Will you tell me what happened? If I ask.
[ spoken in the same way itachi had, only moments ago: neither a plea nor a push, merely a yes or no question. ]
Are you asking because you wish to know, or because you think I require commiseration?
๏ผ he has never considered himself one who needed to talk. his sense of interiority is strong, and his walls are high. what wounds him is kept and played closely to the heart, and he has spent his life with those burdens pinioned there. ๏ผ
[ the look he shoots itach is wry. a touch of why would i expect anything else? writ across his expression. ]
I'm asking because I'm worried about you. If talking would make you feel better, I'm here. And if it wouldn't, [ he shrugs, ] I'm still here. So long as you know.
You needn't worry. Nothing has occurred I am not equipped to tolerate.
๏ผ he takes another slow drink, lips lingering briefly on the bottle, and then he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. ๏ผ
But I would not say no to your company. You are — ๏ผ a slight flash of amusement, there and gone in his dark eyes. mischief plays about the uptick of his mouth, and he follows with: ๏ผ agreeable enough. The only thing I find offensive is your smell. Have you bathed recently?
๏ผ this is teasing, clearly, said demonstrably as he leans in to mock-sniff at him.
he is just tipsy that this is acceptable behaviour to his usual strait-laced self. ๏ผ
[ it's hard to imagine what itachi, cool, stoic, strong wouldn't be equipped to tolerate, so rand is inclined to believe him. resorting to the bottle still seems to suggest something might've happened, but without any other reason to believe so, he lets it go.
and though he gets some brief warning from the humor that dances across itachi's face โ that actually surprises a laugh out of him, bright and full of mirth. he makes a face even as he does, trying and failing to look offended, and swats a hand towards the offending faux sniff. ]
Like you can talk! Light, you're a prick when when you're in your cups.
I'm recently come from a pleasant river bath. Isn't it obvious?
๏ผ his hair is still obnoxiously damp and will be for hours to come — but at least he had a change of clothing. he wouldn't put it past this weakened body not to catch pneumonia here. ๏ผ
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Back to the forests, [ he admits, breathing out. looking up only gives him a view of slatted wood and tendrils of sunlight, but he does it anyway as he continues. ] It's the only place I've found any worthwhile information.
[ even if he doesn't find the great mulgrowe again, there could be โ he doesn't know, something. ]
And Elindes and Harsby remind me too much of home.
[ he admits slowly, quietly, after a long moment. he hasn't really had enough to drink to blame the confession on, for all that this is the first time he's said this to anyone. and itachi already knows how home is a sore spot for him, doesn't he? rand had made it so clear, a month or so ago. ]
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I'm sorry, ๏ผ he says finally. there is something very much like sorrow in his voice, pitched soft and low. ๏ผ for the circumstances that caused you to leave.
๏ผ it's a cruel thing, to be bereft of one's home. ๏ผ
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control, you see, doesn't come to him easily.
he could say, i am too, or he could say, it's better this way, or he could say, it was my fault. there are other sentiments he doesn't waste breath on; wishing things otherwise has never made them so. in the end, he speaks politely, a soft, ]
Thank you.
[ for saying so, for caring. ]
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Will you tell me about it, if I ask?
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because what he remembers now, even as itachi asks that question, himself unmoving in the face of that supportive touch โ what he remembers is the sharp dread he'd felt at seeing his father's wound, at stumbling through the forest all night as tam al'thor grew more feverish and more delirious, the taste of terror in his mouth like bile, is the hopes that the village would be safe and nynaeve would heal his dad and everything would be fine, all of which fell to dust the moment emond's field came to view, still smoldering and filled with piles of the dead and cries of the wounded. is moiraine saying, they came here for you.
is moiraine, who cannot lie, speaking a bare affirmation to the question of what channeling will do to him. overlapping reasons why he can't go home, as if one weren't enough.
he shakes his head. ]
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I come from the Country of Fire — named as such for its many volcanic mountains. But my home... ๏ผ the label is peeling. absently, he smoothes it back down. ๏ผ is called 'Konohagakure'. 'The Village Hidden in the Leaves'. It is a beautiful place. It was the first of the shinobi villages founded, a little less than a century ago now.
๏ผ destroyed, kakashi had said. a crater. given what he knows of the timeline, it seems that madara did not even wait until his body was cooling to enact his revenge. ๏ผ
no subject
Hidden in the leaves, [ he echoes softly. ] Is it near a forest?
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( it almost feels a little like a genetic memory, that if he closes his eyes he can imagine what it might have looked like when madara and hashirama stood on the monument cliff and decided on a better future than what they had been raised for. )
Our founder could create and manipulate wood. The stories say he built the village in a single night.
no subject
Your village sounds beautiful.
[ he says, and means it. itachi paints a vivid enough picture for him to imagine; and the shape of it is so familiar that it's easy for him to see it as a place not very unlike two rivers, in his mind's eye. beautiful, indeed. ]
no subject
๏ผ it is not a publicly available file. it's private, locked to his earpiece ID. but there have been a select few he has been willing to share it with. sometimes, he spends time simply wandering its streets. his memory is a perfect creature — the village that exists in code synaptic response is pitch-perfect to the last day he spent there. the sounds, the ambient temperature, the smell of the food stalls in the air.
he has never been able to bring himself to add the uchiha compound, sequestered to the south. he likely never will. instead, he overlaid the area with a forest.
he takes another drink, finishing the bottle. he gestures for rand to retrieve another, being now nearer to the neatly woven bag than he himself. ๏ผ
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I'd like to see that, [ he says, slow, ] if you really would.
[ for such a proficient liar, itachi rarely seems to say things he doesn't mean. but even rand can sense that this would be a private thing to him โ who wouldn't think this a private thing? โ and offers the out. ]
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๏ผ it's said with a modest reprimand, doled out between one moment of the next. itachi's hand ghosts over rand's as he takes the bottle, and he takes drink that echoes his own. ๏ผ
I take no issue with your seeing it. You are one of the few, I think, that would understand what it means.
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You're right, you're not.
[ yes, he should've known better. itachi is ruthless, relentless in all things: even interactions with other people, even showing kindness.
his eyebrows furrow, and he turns to look at itachi as he asks, ]
What it means?
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๏ผ his eyes close briefly. he breathes out, slow. ๏ผ
Am I wrong?
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No, [ he says, feathersoft, suddenly weary. ] You're not wrong.
[ he lets the silence stretch, before asking, ]
Will you tell me what happened? If I ask.
[ spoken in the same way itachi had, only moments ago: neither a plea nor a push, merely a yes or no question. ]
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๏ผ he has never considered himself one who needed to talk. his sense of interiority is strong, and his walls are high. what wounds him is kept and played closely to the heart, and he has spent his life with those burdens pinioned there. ๏ผ
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I'm asking because I'm worried about you. If talking would make you feel better, I'm here. And if it wouldn't, [ he shrugs, ] I'm still here. So long as you know.
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๏ผ he takes another slow drink, lips lingering briefly on the bottle, and then he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. ๏ผ
But I would not say no to your company. You are — ๏ผ a slight flash of amusement, there and gone in his dark eyes. mischief plays about the uptick of his mouth, and he follows with: ๏ผ agreeable enough. The only thing I find offensive is your smell. Have you bathed recently?
๏ผ this is teasing, clearly, said demonstrably as he leans in to mock-sniff at him.
he is just tipsy that this is acceptable behaviour to his usual strait-laced self. ๏ผ
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and though he gets some brief warning from the humor that dances across itachi's face โ that actually surprises a laugh out of him, bright and full of mirth. he makes a face even as he does, trying and failing to look offended, and swats a hand towards the offending faux sniff. ]
Like you can talk! Light, you're a prick when when you're in your cups.
[ without an ounce of heat. ]
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๏ผ his hair is still obnoxiously damp and will be for hours to come — but at least he had a change of clothing. he wouldn't put it past this weakened body not to catch pneumonia here. ๏ผ