“This is your house?” Kre asked, his voice calmer than he really expected it to be.
The strange man turned a slow circle, taking in his surroundings with a look of contemplative contentment. “I suppose you could say that it is. I mean, as much mine as any of my people.”
He tilted his head down towards Kre and Kitalia and raised one of his dark, oddly ever-shifting eyebrows. “You too though, are not of my people. In fact, I dare say you are not even of the same people yourselves.”
“I am Kre, a Tehynshin, and Kitalia is Ylveryan.” He caught her sideways glare and noted that he should let her introduce herself from here on out if she were so inclined to do so.
Kre glanced around behind him, looking for any evidence that Bel had been there but found none. “And Lady Bel was here, but I think she left to…”
“I know where she is… as well as what she is, more than you do, apparently.” He waved his hand flippantly as Kre opened his mouth to protest. “Look, Kre… was it? Let’s not piss away out time here, it grows short enough as it is. I need something from you two.”
“Of course you do,” Kitalia responded dryly. “Fetch you something from the other side of the world, perhaps?”
“No, no.” he chuckled. “Nothing quite so droll as all that. A simple thing, really.”
The stranger ran his hand lovingly along the curved arm of a pew and he smiled. “I’ve missed this place, you know. It’s good to see it back like it was, before… well… good to see it for a little bit anyways.”
Kre and Kit gave each other a quick glance. Kre’s glance to Kit seemed to be a question of whether or not he should inquire further, and Kit’s glance back seemed to warn him not to.
“We don’t even know your name,” Kre prompted, hoping to get the stranger back on track.
The man looked up suddenly, his movement so quick that the odd way the air seemed to flicker around his body made Kre very queasy. He snapped his eyes shut and turned his head quickly to avoid seeing anymore of the unnatural outline.
“If you’re going to be sick, please wait until you go back to that rubble-strewn ruin. Don’t go desecrating this place any more than it has been.”
“So, this was a church then?” Kre asked tentatively, taking the opportunity to look around so as to avoid catching sight of the man’s disturbing outline.
The strange man simply nodded, not realizing that Kre wasn’t watching him. Kitalia caught it though and continued the line of questioning. It was partially on Kre’s behalf and partially to serve her own desire to know more about who this stranger was, even though she already had a rough clue.
“Who… or what did you worship here? I see no icons or statues.”
The man chuckled as he stepped over to the nearby pew and took a seat. “What indeed. Towards the end, our worships were many and varied. It was the eventual downfall, you could say. A civilization cannot survive if there is no central faith after all.”
He tapped his hands on the pew in front of him and smiled, “But this place. This house of worship this is… or was, I suppose I should say… dedicated to the one true God. Your God if I’m not mistaken.”