Fable - Ask Beneath the Sands

[Rahma]

"'Mortals...'" Rahma parroted, cocking his head as he watched her preen the room for...something. He himself picked up a few pieces of jewelry that suited his style and stuffed them into his loose-fitting top. "So you're...what, an immortal, then?"

He made to follow her out, curiosity now thoroughly piqued.
"Hmph. Sport hunters," he grunted. There was a judgmental air to that assessment, though he couldn't place exactly why that was his instinctive response.

 

[Noor]

If Noor found her way out of here, she would have to bring her sister back here. Perhaps even some of the others. They did not need gold in the way most people did but the prizes of having parts of this ancient civilisation adorning their homes... well, it might even be a better trophy than a sand wyrms head. Her fingers trailed along the golden walls as they made their way aimlessly down the corridor searching for some kind of exit.

"Immortal, Demi-God," her shoulder lifted in a shrug. "There are many words people use to describe my kind. I have not seen one such as you before, not in the living flesh anyway," her eyes flickered to him, assessing, thoughtful. "You bare some resemblance to those worshipped in the White Fangs, but those Gods chose to Sleep long ago. Perhaps you are one of the beings they made in their likeness."

 

[Rahma]

Rahma sniffed the air. Noor seemed to have her own ways of finding their way out if the way she felt the walls was any indication; Rahma would take to the same task, though on a larger scale. Fresh air had a much different scent to the stale, dusty atmosphere that filled this place. He just needed to find the trail...

"Tch. And here I thought titles like that were reserved for people like Medja and Gerra. Sure are a lot of you so-called 'demigods' around these parts." he sneered. Too many divines in the desert spoiled the sands. That was probably how that phrase went...

Noor turned the topic back onto Rahma's origins once more. The half-jackal sighed and rubbed his neck. That 'resemblance' Noor spoke of had been what got his mother's hands wrapped around his throat once. "As for me, like I said: dunno what I am. Part of me wants to, part of me thinks it might just be more trouble. For all I know I'm just cursed. Maybe I'll have to take a trip to these...'White Fangs' you're talkin' about."

Just then, he caught it. It was faint, but unmistakable: an air current. It had to be from some cave leading out of here.
"We're on the right track. Left at the end of the hall."

 

[Noor]

In a surprising moment of self restraint, Noor kept her scoffs about Medja and Gerra to herself. Gods there were most certainly not, and if she had had her way - if her father had allowed her - she would have lopped off their heads for such a claim months ago. The only sign of her irritation was the shuffling of her wings and the way the feathers seemed to fluff.

"It's important to know what you are," Noor continued on in a hopefully calm tone after they took the turn he pointed out. "It gives you a choice then, in deciding where you belong rather than just being told," the pair were suddenly spat out into a larger hallway where a golden staircase curled round to the ground floor. Noor stepped up to the edge and peered over the railings.

"HELLO?!" she called loudly enough her voice echoed through the empty halls.

 

[Rahma]

Ohh, struck a nerve somewhere, eh? He had no idea what had done it, but the little *poof* Noor did just then reminded Rahma of his own hackles raising. Such was the problem of beast-kin, at least: you had more tells than the regular folk.

"I'm me. I may not always like it, but it's enough." he lied. He hated being Rahma. He hated what his mother had done, and how being himself had brought that about. He hated that even now, after all his time around Masika and the others, just being near Noor or any other woman put him on edge.

The half-jackal considered the latter end of Noor's words.
"...And I don't 'belong' anywhere."

He tensed as she shouted, fur going on edge. A long, pregnant pause followed.
"...Ya know, if there's somethin' out there that wants to, oh, I dunno, eat or kill us, we're not in a great condition to fight back. Maybe letting absolutely everything down here know where we are isn't a great idea?"

 

[Noor]

"It's definitely a more fun idea than just leaving," Noor sniffed and shifted her wing, throwing it an irritated look. Clearly she saw the break as little more than an inconvenience that was holding her back from all the fun she might have in a place such as this. Fun that perhaps her new companion might not be eager in having with her. She sighed at that thought, went over his words again, and sighed once more.

"Fine. Let's get you back on the nice safe surface so you can go back to being... you," her nose scrunched up in distaste. For the trophy hunter it would be far more fun to scavenge through these lost and ancient city to uncover its secrets. "Where is your nose telling you there's fresh air coming from?"

 

[Rahma]

Rahma squinted at Noor. He didn't much care for the insinuation she was making, and he didn't quite know why it bothered him as much as it did. Perhaps because, even for how nice she was, Masika had also teased him about being a spoilsport on occasion. That didn't sit well with him.

"Hey. I'm fun. What exactly would you have us do?"

For thoroughness' sake he sniffed deeply of the air. Huh...that was odd...air currents didn't usually just vanish out of nowhere.
"...Trail's gone. But before it wandered off, it was that way. Ground floor, towards the foyer and out."

 

[Noor]

Now it was Noor's turn to squint at Rahma. Fun was certainly not the word she would have used to describe the jackal-beast.

"Well, after finding some sort of medical supplies for the scrapes," an idle way of putting the various cuts and bruises they both sported. "Then if it were up to me, I would explore some of these mansions. These homes are over several thousand years old, there's bound to be all kinds of things here we've simply forgotten about over time. Maybe we'll even find people - doesn't it seem odd to you everything is so clean? In a sand pit?" The arrogance slowly eroded away in the face of her blatant - almost childish - love of adventure.

"Like that! Aren't you just a teensy bit curious how the scent of fresh air can just 'wander off'?"

 

[Rahma]

The demi-jackal let out a "Tch."
"Don't look at me like that."

He'd never known someone to refer to literal broken bones as "scrapes" before, but he supposed he'd been through worse. It did seem to him that a winged creature should want to fly, and Noor certainly could not with her wings banged up as they were. She did, however, make some fine points.

"Yeah, yeah I'm fuckin' curious. This shit doesn't make any sense, and a couple of answers would be fan-fuckin'-tastic."

He turned about wholly, scanning all of their immediate surroundings. This was probably the most exciting thing he'd encountered...well, ever. It was the idea of whatever monsters her people had told tales of living down here stumbling into them that gave him his current sense of apprehension.
"Look, like you said: we find medical supplies first. Preferably of the magic variety, so we can tend to the bones. Then we go dungeon delving. Deal?"

 

[Noor]

This time Noor's smile was genuine: it suited her far more than the imperious look she often wore.

"Deal," she nodded, glancing to her wing. Only her training was keeping the pain a background throb that stopped it from rendering her utterly useless. That resolve would wear down as the hours went on though and she intended to have dealt with the worst of it before the pain reclaimed her. Even if she would rather be exploring. Casting her eyes around the hallway she seemed to weigh up their options. There were at least five doorways on the level they were on not including the one they had just walked through, and she could see another four archways below them.

"Servants usually carry medical supplies," she nodded to the smaller stairwell on the floor below. "Or we could attempt to find a barracks or healers house in one of the other buildings,."