Much had changed in Sebastian Black since he was very young. One detail of him remained constant, however: his persona, like his very soul, was always a storm beneath a deceptively calm surface. Sometimes it was only a tropical anomaly, his mind focused on some nebulous and lofty goal while working on a difficult project. Other times, in the realm of emotion, he could be a natural disaster of epic proportions. He laughed and smiled good-naturedly, and genuinely when he was with Bryony. Still, what she wanted, in the end, still made him harbor hidden doubts. The fact that he would have walked out of the temple were it not for the Oracle's life being in danger weighed heavily in his mind and heart.

In truth, his soul was tired. So very tired. The thought of a prolonged life of happiness was appealing in its own way, but he could not help but feel the want of true and final rest after the end of his human-allotted years. He had seen many lives before this one. He'd had many lovers, too. Every one was more interesting than the last, on all counts.

Was this love? Everything had happened so quickly. Feelings were present, without a doubt…but how deeply did they run, really?

He felt horribly awkward for only being able to offer a small smile to her declaration.
As long as you love me…


Sebastian had managed to not appear distracted as he and Bryony walked as one through the temple. As much as he could manage, at least. The temple robes he was given were a rightly uncomfortable replacement for his usual attire. He found himself constantly having to shift and adjust himself as they walked. His demeanor was casual, as he smiled and took the bouquet from Angela. He even offered the Goddess an elated congratulations, embracing her in a heartfelt hug upon hearing the news Iva had given her.

By the time he and Bryony had walked through the doors of the room they were to share, Sebastian had long decided he may have been overthinking things a bit, as he often tended to do. He would enjoy things as they were now, and take things a day at a time.

Though his moments of intense quiet had been brief, Bryony, like himself, was very observant. She wasn't a fool. He could feel her eyes on his back as he calmly laid out his jacket on a table, and sat to go through his backpack for a needle and thread. She probably thought his silence to be unnerving, since, despite his divulging that quiet was his natural state starting from when he was young, she only knew the side of him that was outspoken, and, frankly, a little ridiculous. He pulled her by the hand towards him as she passed by, and kissed her reassuringly.

"How long can you stay here?" he asked, as he went about threading the needle, and expertly giving the mending process a start. He thoughtfully ran his hand over some of the stains. The blood soaked in deeply, but with a little work, and the right products from an apothecary, his coat would end up looking good as new.

Maybe it wasn’t love now but it would be, as long as they worked at it. They had that hard connection from when their minds met. It was beautiful in a way that she never understood. However, if she wasn’t willing to give one hundred percent what good was it? She hoped he felt the same way and even in his silence she felt okay.

They traveled together through the temple and found the lady of the temple. Sebastian was happy  when Angela gave them their news. Bryony smiled a bit at the interaction and the sound of a new baby was promising for the house. It would keep the goddess on her toes and that alone perked her interests.

He was not as energetic as he had been and while he had told her he was quiet… it felt wrong. Blue eyes wandered over him as they moved down to hall and into their room. She was taken a back by his pull and smirked as he kissed her. “For as long as possible.” It was vague but perhaps she should enlighten him. “I move when the spirits tell me too. It could be in the next few moments, it could be in the few days.” She sat down on the bed and watched him work.

She folded her robe up and piled it on the chair next to the bed. “I bet Angela has something for that stain. She is very good with her apothecary.” She fell back on the bed and took a deep breath. “Are you always that quiet or did my words bother you?” She wanted to know and she figured talking about it would be best. “We have an end product. I don’t want it to be just that. I’m going to give this my all because holding back would just make me run away. I’m sorry if that is intimidating.”

Moving the needle dexterously, but methodically through the fabric, Sebastian made sure the weave was tight, so it would show up little, if at all when finished. "She may need some concoctions for those sheets, soon enough," he jested, looking Byony up and down suggestively as she sat on the bed. He stopped in his work when she mentioned his quiet. The words that followed increased the weight of the guilt he already felt exponentially. Sighing heavily, he set his coat down on the table, and joined her on the bed.
"Forgive me, if you ever had that impression at all," he assured her, taking her hands in his. He played with her fingers betwixt his thoughtfully. "This all came very suddenly for me, I'll admit…but don't think for one second my heart isn't in this. That we aren't looking in the same direction."

Sebastian kissed her, then pulled away suddenly. "I need a moment," he said, as he rummaged through his bag. Pausing, he turned on his heel to face her, and put his hands up. "Not that sort of moment, love. I'm not going anywhere, I promise."
To illustrate this further, he held up what he was looking for - his straight razor. "It has been months. You've made no mention about minding it, but I mind. Birds shall soon roost in it if nothing is done." He took this, a small bottle of oil, and a cloth with him, kissing Bryony once more before leaving.

Being accustomed to life on the road, Sebastian chose not to use any of the fountains or other temple facilities. Instead, he wandered outside for his source of water. Finding a small stream off the road on a hillside, he knelt and liberally rubbed the oil past his beard into his skin. Carefully, bit by bit, the hair came off with each stroke of the razor. He walked upstream some, finding a still spot, and dunked his head in, wiping away loose hairs and oil, and then catching any spots that needed more attention. Waiting for the surface of the water to settle, he could not help but laugh aloud when he finally saw his reflection. He looked younger than his thirty years as it was, but now freshly shaven, the youth in his features was stark. One of the elder clergy members nearby tending some flowers was given quite a start by his sudden mirthful outburst, and gave him a look of confusion as he went jogging back into the temple.

He paused outside of his and Bryony's room after opening the door, peaking in so she could only see the top of his head and his eyes. "Ready to feel like you're robbing the cradle?" he asked, a laugh still hanging in his tone.

He stepped in, and quietly shut the door behind him. After it had clicked shut, his hands went about undoing the robe. He tossed it into the chair in front of the table where his coat lay, and crawled into bed next to Bryony, his face now matching the youthful vim and vigor with which he assaulted her with. His lips went from her own, and down every inch of her body. He pressed his body against hers, and his hands caressed independently of his enraptured oral attentions, fingertips pressing ever so slightly into her flesh as they explored. He growled lowly as he bit her hip suddenly, to give her a startle. He smirked up at her, his autumn eyes playful and mischievous.

Bryony laughed a bit hard at his comment towards the bed sheets. “Fuck her bed sheets. She can get some more.” The words left her lips with a laugh before things went a somber. She held his hands and smiled towards him. “I won’t lie and tell you that it didn’t cross my mind.”

Kissing him back with a disappointed look on her face she began to laugh as he reassured her. “Well good, I think I would miss you if you suddenly disappeared on me.” Tilting her head at his razor she began to giggle, “I don’t mind it.” She pulled a bit on his beard and laughed. “I wish it was a bit longer. Oh the things I would do.” She chuckled before he kissed her and ran out to take care of the hair on his face.

Jumping off the bed, she went over to the door and called one of the clerics over. She whispered a plan of action. It would happen when they were ready of course, and it was the perfect plan. She waited by the door as a bottle of  Angela’s finest wine came with a pair of glasses. She took them carefully and laid out on the bed waiting for him. 

Tilting her head at his moment she put the wine aside and laughed as he came in. “I sure am. Just don’t tell on me.” She kissed him back with the same youthful energy he had. It had been a while but she still had that energy and aura to her, and well it hadn’t been that long since she last been with him of course. 

She had been contemplating everything until he bit her and she gave him a smirk worth noting. “No way, not this time.” She about flipped him onto his back and pinned him to the edge of the edge. “NOW.” There was knocks about the room for a moment or two as the room and bed changed with them. There was a fire in her eyes as a rain forest sprung and a heavy rain began to come down. A canopy was on the bed keeping them dry but she didn’t mind it either way.

She playful bit from his lip and his neck. Taking the same route he did she chuckled and nipped back at his hip now. Except for one tiny difference she didn’t offer him the chance to flip her back. It was good to know she didn’t lose her touch with her sexual ways. She paid him back for the mouth favor at Apoy Island and made sure the man enjoyed it as well. 

From there their night or evening progressed rather well. They had been about everywhere the limits of the room let them. The trees had been helpful with many things and they were soaked. She swore she had a burn against her back from how hard she rubbed against the tree as they laid back down in the bed. Still though, they gentle kissed and she laughed. “I got us wine if it matters at all now.”

Bryony had forcefully taken the lead, flipping Sebastian about and pinning his hips to the bedside. Gasping and squirming, his expressive eyes met hers. While before, his gaze held the presence of an everlasting fire, the autumn shades faded to softer tones as he let himself be drowned, or rather boiled in the smoldering deep oceans to her soul. As she pleased him, the room opened and sensually contorted. Trees sprung up all around the bed, and an impossibly vast sky replaced the temple ceiling above them. Rain fell in wild torrents, a small canopy the only thing keeping them from being touched by the storm.

The room's sudden transformation did not seem to stop at the wilderness itself. By magic, the storm, and every living thing around them seemed to writhe and rage as if in response to their passion. Sebastian was quick to repay her domination in kind, taking her into the rain. Their bodies moved as one, and ebbed and flowed in tonality - one overtaking the other, until there was no tone at all. Only raw, uninhibited emotion. Lightning silently flashed through the darkened woods. Hands evolved from a lewd groping or pulling, to tenderly interlacing with each other as they wound themselves down, and made their way back to the bed.

Light rain still fell on the canopy as they both lay there, breathless. "Wine? Dangerous stuff, that," he jested. "One moment we'll be talking and giggling, then the evening will evolve with the room. Why, we'll have had each other in every locale there is to know. Then, one of us will get some wild idea, like pot-holing in a carriage in the dunes of Abed."

Chuckling as he turned over and went through his effects by the bed, he pulled out the small oak box which held his pipe and herbs, and took a glass when it was offered. He gave her a cheers after the wine was poured, and lit up, using the habitual pyrokinetic spark with his fingers. He inhaled fully, and then drank deeply from the glass, reclining back with a look of poor, decadent bliss. He let the already sweet-scented, now wine-tinged smoke to slowly huff from his lips, then took another sip. He looked Bryony, in the eyes, then every inch of her again. The eloquence and intensity with which his eyes showed his feelings was tangible as ever. He touched her, and devoured her with his stare. He shook his head. "I've never read nor heard any stories of appendages falling off from excessive love-making. There is always a first for everything, though…and, lass, you make me afraid of being one such case."

Sinking further back onto the bed, Sebastian heaved a deep sigh. "I have to be off to Egjora when we part. I'm not particularly looking forward to it. I would much rather come with you. I've been winding up there much more often than I would like. The same could be said for the city guard there."
He did not even have to glance at her to know this would elicit at least a mildly inquiring look. "It's not a matter of law. That much I can assure you of. I tend to be…well, let's say just as vocal of my distaste for people as I am with my approvals. I tend to be blind to rank too, unfortunately."

A laugh left her lips as she stared at her beloved Psionic. “Oh please, like we have the damn energy to leave this place and take over a damn carriage in Abed.” She rolled on her side and watched him for a moment or two before popping the cork and pouring the wine. “Wine aged and made by the Goddess herself. You don’t even want to know the number of favors I owe her just for this bottle alone.” She lifted his glass and ran it under his nose so he could smell the sweet berries mixed into it.

She was quick to steal the pipe from him after his first few puffs, he had little say in the matter not that mind her taking it. She drew in heavily like she had done it a thousand times before, though it was most likely more. Her gaze danced over him and she gave him a wink as she blew the smoke rings out of the lips. Passing the pipe back she took more sips from the wine. “I would rather your appendages stay attached,” she laughed a bit at the thought and shivered after wards. Her blue eyes were dancing like a thousand waves in the ocean, she was happy and dazed much like he was.

She moved with him and rested her head against his chest. The oracle did not like hearing that he had to leave. It burned her soul to know he would be so far away from her. “Just be careful.” She wrapped her arm loosely around him and kissed him softly. She was worried but that would come to pass. “I’ve had my fair share of run ins when it comes to Egjora. I rather hate snobby ass aristocrats.” She said the words as elegantly as she could before draining the whole glass of wine.

“I’ll be heading to Arri from here. Not a long journey from Angela’s realm but it’s what is in Arri that concerns me.” She was able to get a few rain drops in her hands. They floated up and she sighed, “As you know there are five courts in Arri under the Matron Mother. Well maybe you didn’t know that,” she gave him a smirk, “Angela is one of the Court Queens and so are each of her living sisters. When Angela’s sister Cyprus decided to wage war on the other four she ended up making the mistake of picking a fight with Angela and killing one of her only sons at the time. It was her first born in the realm of Daeluin.” The drop lets turned colors to represent the five courts. 

“When she ripped Cyprus’s heart out… They were left with a problem. Who would lead? Willow and myself had already been preparing for the possibility of Cyprus’s death for years. Two decades or so. She had a daughter that she planned to kill to sacrifice to a demon for more power since the child before that, Colden, did not work out as planned. When that child was born, we moved in and took the child from her arms… Umbilical cord still attached. Would have killed the bitch myself there and then but we knew we had to wait. That was Angela’s revenge. Willow raised the girl by herself to be the true heir when the time came. The only ones who knew where the girl was entirely were the four others, myself, Eldora, and Willow. Eldora is the girl’s older sister and with hatred for her mother vowed to protect the girl. Not out of sisterly love but rather vengeance..”

The story was long and she threw the droplets away from her. “The girl is in Sularia… and she’s made her move for the crown. I’ll go to oversee and make sure nothing goes wrong. The girl is too young to know everything about her court if she knows anything at all but I think she’ll do… It’ll be dangerous and she’ll have lots of enemies… but that’s why I’ll be there.”

Leaning her face over she kissed his chest. “I’ll leave when you do. I doubt Kirika will get herself killed in a night, not with Willow watching over her.” Taking the wine bottle she poured them some more and sighed. “I’ll miss you deeply, just try to be careful in Egjora. We can meet whenever you like.”