Auva had negligible intention of going to back to the Academy. Heightened hormones mixed with war, palpable tension and a dose of Apollo was quite enough for her tonight. She scowled at the idea of entertaining her roommates as well, knowing all she would see and hear are parchments scribbled with tactics and gossip of the impending war. Especially Athena's spawn, Lera.
No, Auva had a solitary and separate plan for the rest of the night. Much of it including a bow, arrows, and some hunting. And conceivably a douse of ardent spirits in her system. She lifted her wrist to wipe the drool at the anticipation of how sinfully tempting an amber infused crystallized-berry wine sounded.
With a wave of her hand and a step forward, she transversed into the ruins of an old temple and her prized hunting bow materialized along with her. Altair hardly equipped any bows, and anytime he so happened to, he preferred the golden ones forged to mimic the horns of a stag.
Auva, always the yin to his yang, settled for the silver types. Specifically, her aluminum one that was specifically designed to replicate the roots and branches of trees warping upwards, encrusted with gems in chipped places, wrapped with azalea leaves, and had the string made out of a spider's web.
With the second wave of her hand, another prized possession spawned. Her amber, berry burgundy hued wine with cracks of ice that flowered around the tumbler and minuscule snowflakes made out of diamonds that floated on top and within.
"Refreshing...you don't suppose there's any left for me?" the query arose from an entity behind her, whom she had no inkling was there. No one had heard a whisper of this temple, not even Altair.
So who was this enigmatic voice trailing behind me?
Auva rose her bow with the speed of a tortoise, fueling up to snap around and pin the cryptic figure with a poison tip glacier arrow. With a strum of her fingers across the spider web, a poison arrow dripping with ice externalized, being held and wrapped by the silky fiber. With the arrow nocked, Auva pivoted on her foot, turning her eyes into slits at the inky figure behind the marble pillar infected with age and wildlife.
"Reveal yourself," commanded the Daughter of Night, slipping power into her voice to echo and amplify it. Auva could feel the reverberations through the soles of her feet, feeling smitten about finally being able to put that to practical use without sounding like a cocky Zeus.
The figure seemed to slip and blend in with the night, much like her mother. Being seen by her movements and shadow, but not by her being. The figure twirled and clung to the withered pillars and trees that had fallen victim to autumn. Auva saw too many fingers moving, gliding and sliding. So many inky fingers gliding over decaying altars, slithering vines, withering branches, and even over her own ankles, to her forearms and over her lips.
"Who am I? I am no one, dear. But I ameverywhere." The figure breathed in her ears ever so quietly, or was it in her ears? Maybe it was in her mind? Auva had not an inkling of reality, or of what was occurring currently. She knew nothing but the fingers and voice that toyed with her.
She felt watched, drilled into place by a corrupt and sinister bewitchment. Her mind was struggling to tear itself apart from it, but to no avail, even attempting to uproot her fingers from her bow made her want to scream from a wailing pain that felt like detaching her atoms from her corporeal body. She did not even reckon to attempt morphing into her seraphic form, even the thought made her internally recoil.
"You shall soon recognize me soon enough my dear, until then, I part you with a gift." The figure glided over, all the sets of fingers disappearing except one, yet no body or face was visible to Auva, just long, silky hair that flowed to the side of its head with the wind. The fingers remaining languidly crawled down Auva's neck to her chest, "S-stop this!" Auva had barely been able to form that sentence, and how weak and feeble it sounded made her squirm internally.
"Hush, darling." a devious and fanged grin was all Auva could see before she scorched in a blanket of flames. "My gift has been sent," with an insidious giggle was all she could hear before vaporizing.
ALTAIR
He felt it. Altair felt the moment his twin had vanished. It was an ephemeral feeling, one that only twins could know and understand. Worst of all, twins felt it, they felt all of it. He felt the scorching pain, inability to move or speak, the slight fear that trickled down his spine.
He had never felt this from Auva before, always the collected and stern reflection of their mother with tamed emotions, never the frightful and cowering victim. Not that Altair was either, but he had never quite tamed his emotions the way she had, held himself the way she had, and acted in any way she had.
Altair guzzled the last of his sinful intoxicant, was it the third? Fourth? Fifth? He hadn't a clue, he did not even acknowledge how much time has passed since Killian had goaded him into this grody and macabre pub. He ran his hand over his face, "I must find my fucking twin now."
"What was that, friend? Another?" Killian whistled with his fingers to the bartender and pointed towards Altair, "Another for him, sire."
"No, no," Altair shook his hand, "I must be going." He already had sobered up, that's what a kidnapped, or whatever in Tartarus's ass, had happened to his twin.
With an attempt to get up from his barstool, he was met with an assertive and forceful hand that pushed him back down. "Not yet, I never told you you could leave, friend." And there was that fanged grin again, and this time Altair felt his own fear down his spine, not his twin's.