บท 22: Chapter 19
CHAPTER 19: Reconnect
Aside from the horns and tail, Diven looked like a regular human man in his forties with a lean build. His hair was trimmed short and pulled back with some sort of slick material.
His facial hair trimmed to slight sideburns and a clean-cut goatee. A few hairs were a white contrast to the much darker strands, showing some slight aging on his face.
He wore boots and an assortment of darker shaded clothes with a jacket overtop, covered in strange stains that frequently emerged along the ends of his sleeves. It was hard to identify them as the image projected was only black and white, Arkyn assumed it was paint colours.
"Ahhh Kresha, it's been too long." He exclaimed, his baritone voice seemed to buzz slightly from over the projector. "It's been almost eighty years, yet you still haven't aged a day."
Out of a whole cut in the lower back of his jacket, his long, thin tail slightly showing a harpoon hook shape at the end. It was hard to tell from image and distance, but Arkyn assumed it was flexing slightly like a small talon.
"Well I have everyone else to thank for that." Kresha chuckled. "You're one to talk though, you're supposed to be turning three-hundred pretty soon."
Diven let out a light chuckle of his own that almost seemed sad. "It really has been too long, I'll have reached three-hundred-and-eighteen winters by the end of the season. How are you feeling?"
"The same, though this time I found a bit of peace." She was about to continue, but another spotlight appeared in the corner, forming a tall shape with a bloated middle
The oddly shaped person began rendering into more detailed shapes, transforming into a scrawny man sitting on a stool.
While Devin appeared more like an artisan and aristocrat, this man looked more like a sleep deprived scholar that was half his age.
His light colored hair was dishevelled, this robe looked rather worn beyond any formal use, covered in splotches of black ink all across the arms and chest.
The strange bloated shape was originally from the way he was sitting on the stool. His knees were folded to balance a gem as large as his chest in his lap. At the same time, he was writing in a notebook that rested on top of it.
The man was so preoccupied with the task, that he never even looked up when Diven introduced him.
"Ahh, Kresha I don't believe you've had the chance to meet Harrow yet. The newest member of the Afflicted. How many years has it been since you took over Myriad's Keep?" Diven asked Harrow.
Harrow only held up four fingers before putting both hands back on the notebook, still refusing to stop.
The words 'eccentric and weirdos' echoed in Arkyn's head as he stared at the two newcomers' projections. He wasn't familiar with the standards of normal since the only person he could compare them to was Kresha, but even he knew that the whole lot of them were strange.
"Myriad left the Vault Keep?" Kresha asked now that it was her turn to be surprised. "Is she alright or did something happen?"
Arkyn could see Kresha's heart skip a beat at the thought of something happening to Myriad, making him slightly curious to who she was. Her reactions to everyday life were always minimal, unless she was angry or sad, but today was the first time he saw a bit of concern.
"Oh nothing to worry about," Diven corrected. "She just said she needed some time to explore the world again to amass more books and tomes."
"I see," Kresha sighed in relief. "She is always curious to learn so many stories."
"Indeed, probably the most outgoing of our little club. Now Harrow may not be frozen in age like you and Myriad, or have the life expectancy of a draconid like myself, but his first few years among the Afflicted has already led us into some groundbreaking work."
"You're a regular human Harrow?" Kresha asked, not hiding her shock, receiving a nod of confirmation in return. "Certainly a rarity, but a most welcome one. Is anyone else planning to join the call? I know it takes Silvesh a few minutes since she's the one that has to activate everything."
"Speak of the devils, and they may just appear." Diven said before another spotlight formed, conjuring the last person to join the meeting. "As far as I know, it'll just be the four of us today."
A tall and lithe woman appeared, her hair was so blonde that the projector's greyscale made it seem almost white. Her face was rather angular and narrow, having high cheekbones that really emphasized her almost oval eye shape.
Her outfit was sleeveless, and looked to be more mostly leather stitched together over cotton cloth. The pants were hemmed at the calf, leaving her barefoot as if it was midsummer and not late fall.
The most mesmerizing part about her was how her hair ran all the way down to her hips in such a straight and flowy manner. Arkyn almost missed that her ears were thin and sharply pointed above the lobes.
'She's an elf.' Was the only thing Arkyn had a moment to think before all hell broke loose.
Silvesh turned to see Diven and Harrow when they appeared to her in the Sky Keep, but it wasn't until she saw Kresha that her large eyes grew even bigger and shined in excitement.
"Praise the sun and moon! Kresha, it has been too long." She practically shouted at the sight of her, making her voice warble even more due to the intensity.
Arkyn was certain that if the holograms could touch, Silvesh would have run right into a hug.
Thankfully all she could do was bounce up and down in excitement. A few of the others were tapping on holographic runes that seemed to turn down the volume of her voice output.
Once the excitement of Kresha joining them had died down, they shared some stories and talked about the things they had missed over the years when the Sky Keep couldn't project their call.
Silvesh's Keep was on a large orbit to lessen the effects of the planet's gravity on the structure. It rotated slowly because of the path, which made calls like this one last for quite some time. The only downside was the window to make the calls only happened once every few months.
"So Kresha, are you finally gonna come up here and check out some of the hybrid plants I have been growing? I might have some stuff you'd be willing to smoke instead of that old Lay-Ash leaf."
"None of that is necessary yet, thank you Silvesh. I was just wanting to tell you guys that starting today, I'm ending all the research and projects in the Ash Keep."
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