How, Mist never thought he would ever wonder such a thing, would someone ever come to offer another their very soul? It was a bizarre extravagance in his eyes: a soul.
A soul had started it all, so long ago, and it was a filthy path he had once put his feet upon. One that would lead to vast destruction, unending corruption, the very death of life.
Believing that the young elf could have such a wretched moment of failure seemed a difficult thing, now. Now that he had turned from it. Accepted that he had fallen just long enough to be forever seen as a threat. Even realized that his choices to overcome it only made things look so much worse.
It all passed through his mind in a disharmonic loop of confusion. How, why...?
It was still a strange thing that someone like Cove would love Mist. Cove was an independent creature, he was strong, he knew the streets. His ways were dangerous and defiantly decadent; he didn't care who knew that or took offense from it. Yet, Cove was not just another brooding beast who needed understanding, he was a friendly, caring person who held his appetites on a careful leash rather than to be led by them.
For the most part.
Mist could see it gnawing Cove, from nearly the moment Cove confessed his feelings. How long would Mist live...? He was just a boy to his own people. Scarcely old enough to be on his own. An elf could live for centuries and more. A human had only a doubled handful of decades, if that.
The elf never expected Cove to hand him a silver chain, telling him to keep it safe, with eyes as pale and washed out as ruined silk.
Word ran around swiftly in the strange town of RhyDin. It was only a matter of time before a back alley practitioner of soul arts would approach Cove with a proposition. One that only mentioned that the soul would let a body exist forever.
Within hours of meeting with the soul-wizard, Cove's hunger was intense. For food, for drink, for the violence already at home in Cove's psyche. It burned, clawing deep into his mind and body, eager to drag him into a gluttonous madness of escalating lusts.
A leech. Marked onto the back of Cove's head, sunk into the skin, the soul-wizard had bound the hungers of Cove's reality to himself, betting that removing the soul would cause the man to lose all hold on himself and send him careening down a path of madness that would only last as long as it took for someone to kill him.
Cove wasn't just another seething madman barely held in check by some gentle lover. He held onto his control even when Mist purposefully tested it. Coldly calculating, the elf knew Cove would remain in control of himself - he wanted to see how strong the spell upon the man was.
A strong spell, Cove found himself in horrible combat against himself. The desire to taste, to take, the blood running from Mist's arm was insane, terrifying. How low could this mark drive him? Was it just the moving of his soul from one vessel to another? Would re-taking it drive away the desires which were becoming inhuman...?
Mist studied the mark that had been placed onto the back of Cove's head. It was alive somehow, spreading, sending tendrils of its inky substance into the mans body, his nerves, wrapping around his cerebral cortex: a parasite injecting alien chemicals into the hosts brain to produce the behavior it needed to survive.
Worse, the mark served as a touch point to the soul-wizard. The man fed upon the violence and lust Cove generated. And as all greedy souls, was not content with what Cove created by nature, the soul-mage must push him further, deeper, until there was nothing of Cove left but a ravening shell.
Shocked at the swift movement of the mark, Mist turned himself to the task, drawing over every inch of Cove's body as his own, preventing the leech point from spreading any more than it had. It was well placed, however, perfectly poised to wreak upon Cove's mind at any moment despite being caged within a network of runes spelled against it.
Until Mist knew more, all he could do was study over what he did know. Cove turned to himself, and then to strange places, to find ways to relieve the pressure of it. It brought him to nearly be flayed alive, and left him with a carving of skeletal wings over his back, to drinking poison, and still the hunger kept returning to him.
"Starve it out," Geist suggested, "Deny it the food it desires."
It was now up to Cove's own strength of will. Yet, it was will that he had. Reached deep past such material needs and wants, he found the strength to resist. The scourging lusts and hungers, he let wash over him, and held himself against the pain.
A soul had started it all, so long ago, and it was a filthy path he had once put his feet upon. One that would lead to vast destruction, unending corruption, the very death of life.
Believing that the young elf could have such a wretched moment of failure seemed a difficult thing, now. Now that he had turned from it. Accepted that he had fallen just long enough to be forever seen as a threat. Even realized that his choices to overcome it only made things look so much worse.
It all passed through his mind in a disharmonic loop of confusion. How, why...?
It was still a strange thing that someone like Cove would love Mist. Cove was an independent creature, he was strong, he knew the streets. His ways were dangerous and defiantly decadent; he didn't care who knew that or took offense from it. Yet, Cove was not just another brooding beast who needed understanding, he was a friendly, caring person who held his appetites on a careful leash rather than to be led by them.
For the most part.
Mist could see it gnawing Cove, from nearly the moment Cove confessed his feelings. How long would Mist live...? He was just a boy to his own people. Scarcely old enough to be on his own. An elf could live for centuries and more. A human had only a doubled handful of decades, if that.
The elf never expected Cove to hand him a silver chain, telling him to keep it safe, with eyes as pale and washed out as ruined silk.
Word ran around swiftly in the strange town of RhyDin. It was only a matter of time before a back alley practitioner of soul arts would approach Cove with a proposition. One that only mentioned that the soul would let a body exist forever.
Within hours of meeting with the soul-wizard, Cove's hunger was intense. For food, for drink, for the violence already at home in Cove's psyche. It burned, clawing deep into his mind and body, eager to drag him into a gluttonous madness of escalating lusts.
A leech. Marked onto the back of Cove's head, sunk into the skin, the soul-wizard had bound the hungers of Cove's reality to himself, betting that removing the soul would cause the man to lose all hold on himself and send him careening down a path of madness that would only last as long as it took for someone to kill him.
Cove wasn't just another seething madman barely held in check by some gentle lover. He held onto his control even when Mist purposefully tested it. Coldly calculating, the elf knew Cove would remain in control of himself - he wanted to see how strong the spell upon the man was.
A strong spell, Cove found himself in horrible combat against himself. The desire to taste, to take, the blood running from Mist's arm was insane, terrifying. How low could this mark drive him? Was it just the moving of his soul from one vessel to another? Would re-taking it drive away the desires which were becoming inhuman...?
Mist studied the mark that had been placed onto the back of Cove's head. It was alive somehow, spreading, sending tendrils of its inky substance into the mans body, his nerves, wrapping around his cerebral cortex: a parasite injecting alien chemicals into the hosts brain to produce the behavior it needed to survive.
Worse, the mark served as a touch point to the soul-wizard. The man fed upon the violence and lust Cove generated. And as all greedy souls, was not content with what Cove created by nature, the soul-mage must push him further, deeper, until there was nothing of Cove left but a ravening shell.
Shocked at the swift movement of the mark, Mist turned himself to the task, drawing over every inch of Cove's body as his own, preventing the leech point from spreading any more than it had. It was well placed, however, perfectly poised to wreak upon Cove's mind at any moment despite being caged within a network of runes spelled against it.
Until Mist knew more, all he could do was study over what he did know. Cove turned to himself, and then to strange places, to find ways to relieve the pressure of it. It brought him to nearly be flayed alive, and left him with a carving of skeletal wings over his back, to drinking poison, and still the hunger kept returning to him.
"Starve it out," Geist suggested, "Deny it the food it desires."
It was now up to Cove's own strength of will. Yet, it was will that he had. Reached deep past such material needs and wants, he found the strength to resist. The scourging lusts and hungers, he let wash over him, and held himself against the pain.