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Her words cause Blackagar's eyes to widen further, narrowing after a long moment as his mind reverberates words, heavy in the astral space. «You would seek to undo death?» There is concern in his tone, for that is what it sounds like to him. A hand reaches out towards her, seeking to grasp and hold. «That is far too dangerous. I am not a mystic but my time here in these mountains has taught me some things should not be meddled with.»
*
The surprise might register clearer in the astral realm than their physical forms. Here he has a voice to shake the mountains with, but not the Scarlet Witch herself. Her soul is not impervious to a strike, no more than is Blackagar's projected thought-form.
The bleeding strands curled around her digits constrict the usual grace of her hands, stifling her in effect from another form of communication. Loosened, then tightened, the coils of the crimson scarf thread around her wrist and vanish under her sleeve for a moment, then wobble back. "Yes." Why mince words? Her chin lifts a notch and she turns her glowing gaze upon him. "In no sense did events follow natural law. The only means I have to fix this must be inside natural law and exist. Else how could I change someone's state?"
*
«The effects of our actions Wanda… they cannot be understated. When we do something, or fail to do something, there is an impact on all things.» Blackagar explains in a patient tone. «Even when I attempt to deny destiny, destiny finds a way to right it. But to alter one's destiny in order to evade death? That… that should not be done. Another way. That is what we must find.»
*
The unavoidable certainty projected from Blackagar is not lost on her. Neither does Wanda demonstrate anything but a solid certainty in her thoughts. "It is not so simple as that. His destiny did not stop at 'death,' then and there by that means. I should know." How she knows, that's another matter altogether. "Something changed to make this happen. Something wrong, a fork that should not and could not be. I cannot leave him trapped in that state. Not when it weighs so heavily on both of us. The only other choice is sending him back into death."
*
«A divergence?» Blackagar asks towards Wanda, his head tilting some. «The Monks in a village not far from here, I sat with them once over meals. They knew of my people, stated that we were a divergence from the natural order but one that had been left so long that it had become the natural order itself.»
*
Wanda shakes her head, cutting off the conversation she maintains on that track of thought. "But did your people change overnight? Did they walk one moment in shade, then the next in the sun, with almost no notice in between?" Her query comes with a genuine intent to listen, a focus that lies upon them both. "I do not mean to say they suddenly died. No, they changed. And it was like that?" A snap of her fingers leaves no sound, only the motion.
*
«It was a process, a changing over time.» The man admits with a studied look at Wanda, for the first time seeming a bit hesitant to speak further about a topic. «One that was not supposed to happen, but happened, and became what was meant to be. The river as it were diverting to its proper course over time.»
*
"A process not to be faulted much. You are here and whatever else, you care for your people," points out the young woman. The scarf continues to weave and coil around her in a restless ribbon of saturated colour, like so much wine tumbling into the hands of one of Dionysus' revelers. She is otherwise confined to stillness in that realm, for all the currents of thought and time move them both, submerged in the great river of being. "Did the monks dislike that your people were not like them? It was not like that under the mountain. They denied you. I still do not see what they thought to gain other than power."
*
«Some, that is all they need. The hunger for power. That is what they sought, in part. Some believe that power will bring answers, completion and fulfillment. That to be made whole they must have power.» Blackagar tilts his head at Wanda, «That to fix their brokenness they must use power, and if they have none, to find it. It means that the weak willed will offer themselves up to the promise of strength.»
*
"Fulfillment?" The word hangs in the balance between them. Wanda tips her head, leaving the entanglement of her elegant scarf around long fingers. Hopefully no eldritch spider will come along and threaten her with a game of knifey-spoony in the next few seconds, though you can never be sure with spiders in the high Himalayas.
"That is not how one obtains strength. I am not the best to speak of strength. But purpose, a meaning for life, these are things anyone can and really needs to have. Power does not mean killing other people to take theirs."
*
«But that is how some are swayed into believing to take the paths they do. Fear. Fear of being weak, fear of not having purpose. If I do not have purpose, then by taking yours perhaps I will find mine.» Blackagar shrugs his shoulders then. «I do not presume to understand the minds, fully, of those who would choose to do such things. Or those who … would attempt to alter the world for their own reasons.»
*
The surprise ripples around her and Wanda gives something close to a smile or a smirk. The shading between them is difficult to ascertain when her eyes glow in an inhuman register, and their spectral apparitions cast light that outlines her in shades incarnadine, rather than the usual blue-white so many astral shapes take on. Her colour is red, one that leans into the purple spectrum rather than orange.
"We all change the world because that is what living is. It is our way of being, as people." She pauses for a time on that, fixing her thoughts and allowing the speed of mercurial belief to settle those ideas into fixed paths. "You have a role and work to do. Surely? Is it guidance here or a people, your people? My path is a thorny and unhappy one, you have to see that. It has none of these luxuries of distance or reflection. It never has. You have a great gift in the freedom to view with clear eyes what so many of us cannot."
*
«Do you believe that this came without a price?» Blackagar asks to Wanda, almost incredulous in his tone and expression. «If you knew what I gave up, what I turned my back on in order to walk away. The selfishness that I am pained with daily. If your path is thorny and unhappy than mine is like the mountain trails we nearly died upon my dear. This is no luxury. This is hiding. Running away. That is what I have done. That is what I offered you… and why I am glad you rejected it, for your own sake.»
*
"Did I say it was without price?" That if nothing else keeps the slender curvature to Wanda's mouth in place. A rhetorical question hangs in the air. His incredulous response is matched by the freeze-frame around the sorceress, her focus narrowing down until she is rendered in fine, translucent relief upon the mental dimension they occupy. "Tell me, then. Let go of your pain by sharing it. You know mine."
*
He shakes his head for a moment then locks his eyes on Wanda. «We speak of Destiny. Mine was set while I was still in the womb. Who I was to be; King of my people. Who I was to marry. When I was to eat and sleep. Every part of my existence was pre-determined.» There's a bite of his lip as he looks at Wanda. «I cannot even speak without risk of destroying this world. Where I go, destruction follows. So I run. I run not from threats, I run from myself. But no matter where I run, Wanda, my destiny follows me. Just as yours will follow you.»
*
A king, and the literal traveler upon the road meet in the otherworld, and learn of one another's lessons by the painful experiences they have. One could not possibly stand in the other's shoes with any understanding beyond the hypothetical, surely.
For a time, Wanda is quiet to process the weight of what Blackagar thinks and says. Being a leader is one thing. A life plotted out is another. Her eyebrows gently slope together above her wrinkled nose, thought shaping a somber mask. Still young but history carved her with a wickedly sharp knife, whittling away the excesses and it shows.
"You do not want these things? A crown, a wife, a palace of some kind. Because it was already given to you without any say, and it keeps chasing you down." It is a paraphrasing of his statement to be sure she understands, rather than factual. An important difference, all said and done.
"My destiny is a mirror, is it not? I was carried with another in the same womb." Almost reflexively she runs her fingers over her throat and jawline, pinning the scarf in place for a moment. "I came out into this world with him. Our path has been together. Many attempts to cut it apart failed. I reflect my brother, he is me and I am him in some ways. What severed us was not made of this world, it isn't natural or right or… it should not be. No scientist knows why. No monk has given me an answer yet. I want him back. So you run from yourself. I am looking for myself. How ironic to be so divided."
*
«Then if it is what is to be, it will be, Wanda.» The man states softly to her, letting the words fall like a whisper in his mind to come outwards onto them both in this place. «Just as our destinies cannot be denied. If mine is to lead me back to the path I was meant for, then so will yours lead you to your brother again. For every time are paths cross, they are pulled apart once more, are they not?»
*
"I may have a forgiving nature. This crime done my brother is beyond what I can imagine. My hand in it, however it is," Wanda says, "requires action. I cannot sit. Patience is not my virtue in this life. You have advantages. The gift of wisdom and sight. Do not forget these things." Her breath is pulled in as she flits out of sight a moment, reforming by floating just above the ground. "I must take to the mountains for answers. This time I do not mean to turn back. It is not for myself, this, even if it seems to be."
*
Blackagar nods his head slowly as she begins to move to depart, rising from his place as well and looking at her form. «Perhaps one day, one day… when you are done pursuing for others. Perhaps you will find me.. when you have time for yourself.» A small grin touches his lips, «Be well, be safe… and know that should you need me..»
*
"There is a lesson. Stop running from yourself. Seek you instead. Not the you they tell you to be. Not the you you fear to be. Become the you you want." Wanda's fingertips span a circle, and that shape fills in by a square, another within that spinning on a counterclockwise follow, the march of glyphs shaping what she needs. "I know your pyramid. You know me. Call when you are ready."