Post by Boros Paladin on Jul 31, 2016 11:10:22 GMT -5
Smith heaved a deep sigh and muttered to herself. Four languages at once, she noted. Still too unreal to rest; she could never sleep when incorporeal but could still feel leftover exhaustion from working while solid. She revelled in the labor, though her customers didn't like her taking longer for simpler enchantments. “So what if it's uncomfortable,” some of them said, “it just takes you a moment, why not use your full power?” They didn't it, and Smith doubted they ever would.
Of course, they never wanted to actually talk to her when she was less solid, she was always like a start, warm but too distant for it to be felt. She was tired of caring for them all, wished she could just focus on a few people right around her. It was ironic, really: when human she could make contact, but when ephemeral she had so much more potential ability.
She longed to strip off her armor at the end of a long day at the forge, exhausting even with Lee hanging around and making the work more pleasant, but she knew the armor helped her more than its absence would feel good. She had taken the time to add another layer of runes to the scales and repair a damaged line, but she would need to start on a whole new set soon; containing a goddess was not ready work, no matter how desperately the goddess wanted to be contained.
Honestly, it was strange to be mortal. She woke, she worked, she worried. It was a joyless undertaking, life.
She could have stayed quiet, once, and lived a normal life, but she couldn't settle the disquiet that haunted people like her. She could have stayed free and not bound herself, but still, she looked for peace from the maddening knowledge of who she truly was, who she struggled so hard to be.
Someone suggested that they could weave her a new, fleshy body, but they didn't understand how that would just start cycle of wrongness all over again. She was - well, not even she knew that name yet, but Smith worked well enough. She was Smith, and despite all her daily fights key to who she was she would have it no other way.
She had tried all their other ways, it felt like ages ago. Designing a new form for herself had its appeal, but she didn't want to be someone completely else. Trapped, she struggled.
And tonight's struggle was hardly unusual. Dis she wasn't too wear heavy armor to bed, or something lighter that just deny her sleep differently? Did she wasn't comfort, or a comfortable body?
(She didn't understand how dragonling was always comfortable with her, but it was nice to be so loved, even if she suspected he really had no idea.)
She ran a hand along one wall's line of runes, and her bedroom became frigid. The robes were rough, but she was no seamstress dared not tell anyone enough of the truth to have them make a cozier set. Her hands vanished as she took the gloves off; she felt their presence, but with them gone she could just wave them over the clasps to undo them.
Once the armor was off, she … stretched. It was akin to a yawn and ten different soliloquies, each pronounced in a hundred languages at once, her very existence pure words. She told the robes to lift from where they lay on the bed, and she slipped three of them inside each other before trying to get inside.
Just that one step - distilling a deity into humanlike form - took twenty minutes of effort. And even then she seemed more like a ghost than a person.
Still, it was enough to slip more easily into the other five robes and button them up. Fully dressed this way, she laid down on her bed. She muttered something under her breath - sixteen languages. Too many. Solid enough to sleep, not solid enough to dream.
Of course, they never wanted to actually talk to her when she was less solid, she was always like a start, warm but too distant for it to be felt. She was tired of caring for them all, wished she could just focus on a few people right around her. It was ironic, really: when human she could make contact, but when ephemeral she had so much more potential ability.
She longed to strip off her armor at the end of a long day at the forge, exhausting even with Lee hanging around and making the work more pleasant, but she knew the armor helped her more than its absence would feel good. She had taken the time to add another layer of runes to the scales and repair a damaged line, but she would need to start on a whole new set soon; containing a goddess was not ready work, no matter how desperately the goddess wanted to be contained.
Honestly, it was strange to be mortal. She woke, she worked, she worried. It was a joyless undertaking, life.
She could have stayed quiet, once, and lived a normal life, but she couldn't settle the disquiet that haunted people like her. She could have stayed free and not bound herself, but still, she looked for peace from the maddening knowledge of who she truly was, who she struggled so hard to be.
Someone suggested that they could weave her a new, fleshy body, but they didn't understand how that would just start cycle of wrongness all over again. She was - well, not even she knew that name yet, but Smith worked well enough. She was Smith, and despite all her daily fights key to who she was she would have it no other way.
She had tried all their other ways, it felt like ages ago. Designing a new form for herself had its appeal, but she didn't want to be someone completely else. Trapped, she struggled.
And tonight's struggle was hardly unusual. Dis she wasn't too wear heavy armor to bed, or something lighter that just deny her sleep differently? Did she wasn't comfort, or a comfortable body?
(She didn't understand how dragonling was always comfortable with her, but it was nice to be so loved, even if she suspected he really had no idea.)
She ran a hand along one wall's line of runes, and her bedroom became frigid. The robes were rough, but she was no seamstress dared not tell anyone enough of the truth to have them make a cozier set. Her hands vanished as she took the gloves off; she felt their presence, but with them gone she could just wave them over the clasps to undo them.
Once the armor was off, she … stretched. It was akin to a yawn and ten different soliloquies, each pronounced in a hundred languages at once, her very existence pure words. She told the robes to lift from where they lay on the bed, and she slipped three of them inside each other before trying to get inside.
Just that one step - distilling a deity into humanlike form - took twenty minutes of effort. And even then she seemed more like a ghost than a person.
Still, it was enough to slip more easily into the other five robes and button them up. Fully dressed this way, she laid down on her bed. She muttered something under her breath - sixteen languages. Too many. Solid enough to sleep, not solid enough to dream.