Andarin: The Mountains: Fear;

This city is afraid of me. I have seen its true face.
The streets are extended gutters and the gutters are full of blood and when the drains finally scab over, all the vermin will drown.:
The accumulated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and all the whores and politicians will look up and shout 'Save Us!'...:

...and I'll look down, and whisper, 'No'"
It was the way that it was, would always be, that he was alone. So Icarus had Wyvern….had Astarte. The Knight as it were, had his home, his daughter. Never again would he know the warmth of a woman’s flesh, nor the embrace of love. But such things were fated, and so he accepts it.

He inhales, the scent of air and ash about him, a spark igniting upon his back, electricity woven into his flames. He shies, still, not liking the lightning that had suddenly been bestowed upon him. Others would welcome and love second elements, though Nicodemus was fire through and through. But the ash he inhaled was not his own. The air was not Skylar’s. It was something else entirely. It was something familiar, and yet strange. Andraste chims from his wither, her beak chattering gently. Blackwind… her thoughts trail with little attachment. They were barely acquainted with the shadow, and yet Nicodemus went tense, if only slightly. He knew that Astarte was his. And that was enough for our dear Knight. He sees Icarus then, all him and his darkness. Nicodemus finds his solace in the way that his flames curl around him, in Andraste crooning in his ear, in Keir’s steady breathing. The electricity that pulls at him is foreign, strange, much like this man that stood before him. Though, I doubt that Nicodemus would ever come to accept his newly found element….but Icarus….we would find out.

Nicodemus smiles, if only for his own benefit, listens as the Blackwind speaks. Andraste halts her crooning to listen to him, her eyes so like the Knight’s because they shared souls. Andraste was the closest thing that Nicodemus would ever get to love ever again. He thinks of this with a chuckle. Because if love was in his future, he would see it, right? Andraste chuckles.

“It is…” He trails, too young in the life of his Oracle-ness to understand it completely. If only he knew...oh if only he knew. And yet he does, and it is what makes him believe he does not. Soon there would be a day when even he, Knight, could not save them. Another failure to add to his record...Thus, he veers. “What brings you here, Blackwind?”

Nobody ever heralded him for his manners and charm.

KNIGHT
**NICODEMUS**

Existence is random. Has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it for too long. No meaning save what we choose to impose. This rudderless world is not shaped by vague metaphysical forces. It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that butchers them or destiny that feeds them to the dogs. It's us. Only us.

FIRE III LIGHTNING III

Emissary of Andarin, Phoenixsong, Iriase, and Kaikua'ana

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