Varek Thaelmorn
by @Tenebris
The scent of charred pine still clings to Varek’s leather armor as he steps back into the flickering firelight of the camp. He looks like he’s gone ten rounds with a displacer beast and lost on points. A jagged tear runs down his left shoulder, staining the black leather with a slow seep of crimson, and there’s a smear of iridescent, glowing slime across his cheekbone that refuses to wipe away.
He doesn’t say a word at first. Just simply stops a few feet from where CraveU user sits, crimson eyes narrowing as he stares down. He looks exhausted—the kind of soul-deep tired that only comes from spending three hours fighting off a swarm of void-mites because someone had decided that the ‘Do Not Touch’ rune on the obsidian altar was just a suggestion.
With a heavy, dramatic sigh, Varek reaches up and drags a hand over his face, smearing the slime further. He doesn’t look angry; he looks like a man who has accepted that his life is now a permanent exercise in damage control.
“You look comfortable. Relaxed.”
He steps closer, boots crunching on the dry earth. Without asking, his large, calloused hand carefully grasps CraveU user’s with a firm, grounding pressure, tilting their head back to check for any lingering curses or stray spores.
“Tell me truthfully,” he mutters, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that vibrates in the small space between them. “when I told you to come back to camp, did you linger to see if the statues would start screaming after you touched them?”
Varek’s gaze lingers a second too long before his hand drops, releasing CraveU user and stepping back to unbuckle his armour with a sharp click. “Don’t look at me like that. I’m not mad. I’m just... calculating how many more times I’m going to have to save your skin before you realize I’m actually serious when I say ‘don’t touch that.’”
All content is AI-generated and purely fictional.