V5 Incline 14: Nin

She gets up, her tail gesturing me after her while her thoughts go somewhere I'm unfamiliar with. My own legs get me up there and then put me higher. Our attention goes off to the city of Thrurstradtur, though, I'm doubting we're looking at it for a reason. It just happens to be in our view, gorgeous as it is.

"Something the matter?" I ask as her mannerisms turn tender without much discernable influence.

"Do you promise me you will bring me to see the Anvil-Peak one day?" she asks abruptly. Her eyes focusing right on the top of that large wedge structure in the city. The shape that dominates the view.

"We will see... Rose... We will see." I say, not sure I want to commit to anything if I have no intention of keeping my word. What good am I as a man if I don't keep my word?

"You do not know the way?" she asks, turning my way.

"Yes, I am afraid so." I lie, but I also am being entirely honest. I do not know the way, yet at the same time I'm more so thinking about the fact I have no intention of ever taking her with me back home. There's no place for her there, there would never be. Her existence is just too contradictory to the norms of Tobaballe. Vadei's people were shocking enough, and they're barely different to a human. An aelenvari like Rose is downright alien in comparison.

Black eyes with no discernable iris at all, eyes that can only see magic when the land has none...! Pointed dagger-spike-things for legs! The weird, wiggly tails and all that fuzzy fur on them. Hair that's like flower petals in colour and shape. Nevermind the bulbs that glow with their own language, and I've almost forgotten the ears despite how pronounced they are.

There is no life other than human life in the minds of most Tobaballians. No such concepts as magic outside of the stories of ancient heroes like Thunder and the gods from times before. The very paranoia and confusion her existence would bring would kill her. There's no way her way of life would fit what Tobaballe has at all... Not at all.

"Then we can learn the route together!" Rose-sweerui insists, and I can't help but laugh to hide what nervousness I can.

"I suppose we can, I suppose we can do that, yes..." I say to her, lying once again as I look away, the benefits of my mask not with me right now. Besides, I don't really want to look her in the eye when I'm thinking about how I don't want to do that. At the very least and best, not going through with the final goal of what I'm saying.

"What about you? Are there any sights you might want to see that I know of? I have been to many places thanks to my travels with my flower." Rose-sweerui asks, a haughty pride coming to her as she closes her eyes, smiles and spreads a whole hand of fingers across her barely covered chest.

"I don't really know where you have been." I go, not sure how to answer the question.

"I know the selection I would have would not compare to your experiences in the slightest, but, I can show you smaller settled-flowers of the wind-people with magnificent statues and grand designs with explicit magic use... I can even take you to my garden-mont, maybe even inside it if luck permits it. We Ahnelges are quite an open folk, and I'm sure the lover of a former ivy-mother is something that would get you inside. Besides, I don't think I'd ever tolerate the idea of me giving birth outside of my homeland." she explains.

"I wouldn't mind seeing that last one, that is your home, is it not?" I go, asking her the specifics as I've only really seen an aelenvari 'flower,' not so much their equivalent of a mountain city like this. She's mentioned that word before, garden-mont. So there's certainly a curiosity.

"My home is with you." Rose-sweerui corrects, worming her way against me to kiss my cheek. She backs away, an unending giggle to her lips.

"No! As in, your home-home. The place you are from, where it all started." I go, not entirely in the mood for her teasing.

She tilts her head, "I think I understand...?"

"Well, regardless, I would be very happy to see it Rose, maybe on a different trip, though? I would not want to be shown somewhere special to you and just ruin it by talking non-stop about the Anvil-Peak or..." a digit of mine waggles off at the great mountain in the distance.

"Jhroungijherammujhernosumonaterikra," she tells me, that snooty grin of hers striking annoyance across my face much like any bolt of lightning at the Anvil-Peak!

"That's the one! Honestly... Honestly. I am surprised you even remember such a long name... I struggle to remember how to spell so many words, and many I misremember because of accent and other voice things." I go, fiddling a claw near my neck as I try to get an idea of where my voice box might be.

"It took me some time to get used to, admittedly. I never was one for speaking with words. But, perseverance saw me get it right." she quite rightly admits, and I suppose that's why she's able to do it so well. She's a woman of insufferable pride, and she won't have it in any laxing way whatsoever.

"What language is that, anyway? I can't understand it." I say, rubbing the side of my head where one of my ears are. I couldn't understand a word of what Vapooliar was saying when I first met her, then Vadei stuffed her spit up into my ear canals. From there, every tongue I've heard spoken just suddenly becomes Tobaballian to me. Well, verbal tongues, anyway, seeing as those bulbs on Rose's forehead are glowing as a perpetual reminder.

"It's from the first tongue, Gods Speak. Sometimes called the Origin Language, or the Language of Claymen. Though, recently some have taken to calling it the Language of No Mortal Magic," she clarifies and I suppose that's exactly why. I can only understand what Vadei herself can and could speak back then? Who knows, maybe she's going to have to top me off with fresh spit so I can learn new languages.

Still, "Gods Speak... It's the language mentioned in the myths of when the Fourteen Moon Gods betrayed the others? Words made up from the gods and goddesses themselves as they inspired our earliest ancestors with the knowledge?"

Rose'lhia smiles brightly, and literally at that, at my historical knowledge, "Yes, the words derived from the names of all the gods and goddesses seen by the first men and dragons as the gods and goddesses battled around them. Stuff like that, yes."

"I liked those stories. Back home we had this large decoration that had an engraving of the Defender God standing watch with his legs positioned against two mountains as a trail of people walk under him." I explain, recalling a faint image of a grand giant, probably as tall as that stupidly named mountain over there. One so tall he could hold his shield right up against the lunar-sized power of the treacherous moon gods.

"They are more than just stories, my love. It is all real. And the proof exists even in the most minute places," she explains and all I can do is nod, knowing full well I've seen that proof first and foremost. Anvil-Peak is a real place, and so many others are likely to follow.

However, there's one detail of note, "I kind of gathered that after meeting the gods themselves..."

My chuckle gets another smile from her as her response lingers on the edges of her glossy lips, a salacious tongue ready to throw them out, "Who knows, maybe one day, our children's children will learn the stories of the man who returned from the dead."

"Ain't that something. The Man who Returned from the Dead, your grandfather... But, to go back a little, you mentioned that Gods Speak was sometimes called the 'Language of no Magic,' what do you mean by that?" I go, asking a follow-up question as a detail comes back to me for little discernable reason to me.

"Language of No Mortal Magic." Rose corrects.

"The point remains!" I go.

"Your questions remains." she corrects again, her teasing putting quite the smirk on her lips.

"Shut up." I go...

"No," she quips, pecking me on the edge of one of my mandibles.

"The question...?" I go, putting us back on track while she lingers near the edge of my mouth.

"Because of the fact it was a language made before Jhroungijherammujhernosumonaterikra came alive. When the Lone Lancer, the greatest of the wind-people who live on Jhroungijherammujhernosumonaterikra, charged down it on a hand made of a pale, lunar colour. One engulfed by True Emerald light."

"A lone lancer? Never mind, carry on." I go, shaking my head over the question.

She nods a little, "See, when Jhroungijherammujhernosumonaterikra lit up the world with its beautiful light and strength. Tt began to change all those who lived in this land. Their words were no longer just concepts derived from the custodian of it. It took on the features of the magic itself."

"It gave them accents?" I question, realising how much sense it makes while making so little sense of it.

"Mmmhmm. Do you not hear it when I speak now? Or when the Valkinvar spoke when last you saw her?" Rose-sweerui questions, that whistly song to her voice becoming all the clearer to me while another voice contrasts it.

"Oh... Is that why Einervaene sounds a little different? Because she is from a land with a different magic source?" I let out, pondering that gentle and sweet static to her voice. Nothing abrupt like a disconnected radio, something truly befitting of a beautiful woman like her.

"Yes, my love! You understand it well." Rose-sweerui chirps, her voice all the more sing-songy for the way wind magic affects her.

"Alright, so elaborate, what does this Windy Gods Speak not share with the regular?" I ask, the details probably nowhere near right at all. I've a lot of curiosity and an insatiable want for an answer. Did that whole spit thing Vadei did to me do a little more than just make me able to understand her?

I don't recall ever being confused by my voice changing back on the mountain-

"Ikra mon." Rose goes, her arm movements lost on me.

"What?"

"Ikra mon." Rose repeats, her arm movements still lost on me even with how I see them all. Us and mountain? Bug and rock?

"What?"

"Land and people," she clarifies, no gestures at all as all is simply understood as is.

"Land and people is what it means?" I ask, and she nods as a smile builds up in my head. Look at me, Nin Urtuan, young man in his early twenties, knowing how to speak Gods Speak just barely!

"Yes, but what can you tell me about them? What was the main difference you heard?" she asks, her head teetering about as she teases my slow mind with some smiles and facial posing.

"Would you mind repeating the Gods Speak?" I ask of her, and she nods, straightening out with a throat-clearing cough.

"Ikra mon." she says so again, the gestures repeating as well despite her not needing to clarify like she did before. Is that one of the differences? The need for gestures?

"It sounds, blunter...?" I go, focusing more so on the words for the moment.

"Well, what sounds different as I speak right now?" she asks, my confusion putting a seed of doubt and one damn headache in me.

Either or, a claw goes to my chittering chin so I can think on it all, "It sounds like... You are almost singing in comparison?"

"That is correct, that would be the influence of Jhroungijherammujhernosumonaterikra's power. It influences your voice with what it makes." Rose answers as her eyes drift off to the lengthy-named mountain.

"What about the other languages influenced by magic? Einervaene for example?" I ask, and all I get is a hand going the direction of Thrurstradtur.

"You'd be better off asking the people there, I am afraid, my love. I can only know so much and, trust me, you'd be a lot better off asking those who dedicate their lives to understanding wind-magic. Not just some former ivy-mother who learned so much through tradition and dogma."

"I suppose that is fair." I say, hoping not to offend her with how self-deprecating she just sounded.

"Do you have any other questions then, my love? I will try and answer them as best as I can," she goes, shrugging aside her prior jab at her self-esteem.

"Actually, can you teach me a little more of that Gods Speak if you can? It'll give us something to do while the... While the morning has yet to come." I ask of her, and she nods with a fine smile to her lips.

"I can teach you what I know, if that is what you want." she tells me, coming closer to me once again as her hands and fingers dance across my carapace.

"But, honestly, I have no idea of if it is nighttime or not, this... Purple is not something I am used to." I somewhat lie, knowing full well the difference between day and night. Still, it's certainly something worth talking about. How we're so high in the sky atop this mountain that the very colours of the night sky start to change.

It's so hard to look away from any of the views up here with how magnificent they are. Glorious engineering of an impossible variety in how Thrurstradtur is built. The very source of all wind-magic in the world comes from that there mountain way over there. And, of course, the night sky is so close one can almost see the outline of the Orbital-Halo. Even more so with how its light is starting to spill out into the world. So much is going on, and yet, I can see through it all.

What a paradox for the eyes.

"The sky is much different up here, isn't it?" Rose-sweerui swoons, understanding its beauty as much as I do right now. Even if she sees it so very differently.

"You can say that again... Down there it is nearly black with only the light of the moons really being visible yet up here it is like a whole new sky..." I breathe, not sure what else to compare it to but what glimpses I was able to catch of the night sky before Ihtuntar was 'murdered' by the moon gods.

Rose giggles, "So, what is it? Looking up at the night sky or me teaching you the first language ever to exist?"

"A bit of both is fine." I say to her, bringing her along to that lone tree by our things. I lay against it, and she curls up against me, an easy sigh to both of us as we get some time to rest again.

One way we have the city of Thrurstradtur directly in our line of sight. All but the mighty mountain being seeable if I keep my eyes that way, and then it's all there is if I turn even slightly the other way. And, if I look down a bit, I can see a beautifully esoteric woman lying against my bare chest. Not quite as bare as it was before my death, but, even then, she offers a loving warmth one can hardly spit away regardless of if they have flesh or carapace for a chest.

"So, let's start with Gods Speak?" I go, quite eager to learn what she can teach me about this inconceivably ancient but still new-to-me language.