@unspooling

[hellrider]

Since Avernus, there has been no time. No time to grieve or to rage, no time to celebrate, no time to sing or pray. Not for Zevlor, at least. Some of the others have managed to eke out moments of comfort between them, and not all of those moments have ended in disaster, but Zevlor is always on duty. Two Hellriders and a group of untrained civilians does not make a secure expedition to cross the wilderness with.

Which is why tonight is so surreal. Yes, the party was his suggestion, because his people need the morale and their heroes deserve to be lauded. He's certainly not expecting to have much fun; he'll be fretting over their next steps all evening, but watching the others get drunk and cuddle ad dance will be something of a balm for his hell-scorched soul.

Not everyone loves a party, though, and as the night wears on and a few of their more notorious couples start to slip off into the bushes for a little more private enjoyment, Zevlor can't help but notice Kael looks ill at ease. There has always been something strange about him, to the tiefling's eye; he knows a warrior's thousand-yard-stare by heart, having seen it on other faces and in his own mirror, but with the massive drow it seems to be more than that. He looks like someone who's moving through the world on pure instinct, fueled by uncertainty, leaning into one immediate need after another rather than sitting back and making plans, remembering home, seeking connection.

Maybe it takes one to know one. Zevlor's sense of identity was shattered when he lost his home and his career as a Hellrider in one fell swoop.

He watches the drow disentangle himself, metaphorically, from Bex and Danis and their enthusiastic chatter about plans for their home in Baldur's Gate (yellow wall paint for the kitchen, blue for the bedroom, and white rugs are lovely but awfully impractical and they're going to have pets of course...), and takes the opportunity to approach him with a cup of hot tea.

"Man cannot live by wine alone," he says, offering it out. "You look like you could benefit from a break from socializing."

Comments

[unspooling]

Steps faltering in order to not steam through Zevlor, Kael's hands automatically reach out in a way that makes him feel instantly uncomfortable. To an onlooker, it would look like nothing more than two broad hands about to steady somebody else by the shoulders. For Kael, it feels like somebody else lifted his hands, puppet strings responsible for the way his fingers itch to splay and then clamp around something delicate.

It's a similar feeling to the creeping sensation of wrongness that refuses to abate no matter how enthusiastically he has tried to participate. Celebration seems like something anybody would enjoy, and yet he hasn't stopped feeling as though there's a shadow following him. A shadow that has been casting such a long way that he's desperately worried now about what might happen if somebody steps on it.

His icy eyes meet the flame of Zevlor's and, for a moment, he gives the tiefling the kind of look that isn't completely outside the realms of drowning and hopelessly looking for aid. The immediate follow on thought becomes so viscerally pungent in its intensity he only comes to again when he's almost on top of the man offering him a steaming cup of something. He'd been barely aware of stepping closer.

Blinking in his confusion, he frowns and shakes his head as though trying to loosen whatever had taken hold of him. An apologetic kind of grimace pierces through moments later. And eventually he finds his voice again as he gives Zevlor more personal space again.

"Is it that obvious?" He asks, smiling guiltily before adding in quick succession: "I like your people. It is... just discomfort at feeling at a disadvantage."

His eyes drop to the proffered tea, lips at least tugging into a more appreciative smile as he seems to flex his hands by his sides, shaking them out somewhat before even thinking of reaching up to accept the drink. Though eventually he does, fingers controlled to within a millimetre as he accepts graciously.

"Thank you."