Reading is fundamental (OPEN)

R E M I "Well you will have to let me know if you discover anything. Other than the body that Isla and I did an autopsy on of a young woman who had died too close to the barrier, I am sure I know nothing more than you." Then again given that Jigano knew the medic, it was possible that she'd shared as much with him already. Remi nodded in agreement, finding it just as perplexing as Jigano's drawn-out reiteration of his words seemed to suggest. Back in Northaven you had one shift. One. And certainly no magic. To find himself suddenly possessing this wealth of—power? burdens? obligations?—was troubling to say the least. "Yes. Where I come from there was a sort of ceremony provided where you became a shapeshifter, or so we were called. Here I believe the word is Attuned? Remi's pale stare travelled across the books between them to see if Jigano's expression would either confirm or deny this suspicion. "But one evening I found myself—" Pausing, Remi's expression crinkled somewhat with the memory of his first encounter with Ludo and just how terribly it had all gone. Clearing his throat slightly, Remi's eyes fell to the feather and he gently trailed the upper part of the vane across the flat of his palm with a thoughtful sigh. "—I found myself in quite a violent situation out of my control and it suddenly happened." Holding up the feather, Remi regarded it with a crooked but adoring smile before refocusing his gaze across the table. "Ferruginous hawk." He said with a growing but lazy smile. A few blondish feathers appeared mixed in with his sandy curls for just a moment, before he ran a hand through him and his hair returned to normal. "Ever since I was 16. And then suddenly I found myself in the body of a lion." Pausing to shake his head, Remi exhaled and closed his eyes for a moment. "I am not sure if it is because the creature itself is so overpowering, or if it was because of the initial event, but the instincts have been hard to control in a way I have never experienced as a hawk." Tilting his head again the shapeshifter tried to identify in Jigano's expression a sigh that he either understood or that this information was just tangential. It was rather hard to explain what it was like possessing the body of something else - something that was you, but also seemed to have a strange primal sort of agency as well. "Mmm. Indeed." The alchemist nodded gravely, lips curling upwards in a queasy frown at the mere thought. No perpetrator of violence or revenge Remi couldn't quite believe that someone would do something so horrific and barbaric, but the indication that it was done regularly was right on the pages before him. At the mention of the luxere—and Isla again—Remi's expression brightened considerably as his cheeks dimpled with a smile once again. The scene the white-haired man was describing sounded like it could be a scene from a story, and yet Jigano did not strike Remi as the type to weave such a needless lie. Then again Remi was want to believe most people and the words they said, and so even if the bard was the sort to lie aimlessly, the alchemist would likely be none the wiser. "That sounds wonderful. And so they—" Glancing down, Remi's brows creased slightly as he read silently to himself, lips half-forming the words. "—can provide light during the LongNight." Creases formed in the corners of Remi's lips as they pulled down slightly, partially because the subject matter was not so appealing, but also because it was not information he had and such was likely to be a disappointment. "Honestly I do not know. I have never known anyone who could shift into more than one creature and there was no ...ahh..." Pausing the alchemist searched his mind for the correct word, but found his vocabulary lacking. "...what I mean to say is that I did not do anything to try and acquire it. It came about quite unexpectedly."