All the while, Mahir's condition was still deteriorating. It was a struggle to focus here. The whispering had become indistinguishable from hundreds of voices echoing up and down the tower. The others moved on to greater purpose, while he remained, a shell of his former self. Alone, with his Insanity. In rare moments he would be struck by the inspiration to search for a cure, a panacea, anything that could possibly push back against the unraveling of his being, but those moments were fleeting and Mahir's attention was quick to wander. This one, too, would pass. Predictable paranoia - the other famine horsemen avoided him, they had cast him out, it was only a matter of time before they would tire of sheltering something so useless.
The words on the pages of the journals he'd spread around him began to blur. This was pointless. He was pointless. The whispering was getting louder in his ears, and covering them did nothing to stop it. Mahir gathered his robes around him and ran, past the sand and rock of the famine floor, past ornate architecture and bridges spanning a lake of lilypads. He didn't stop running until he didn't even recognize where he was --
And collided with a tall and familiarly-robed conquest horseman, in a tangle of noodly shadow arms.
kuropeco