Dressed in the most appropriate travel gear they could grab in the ten minutes they gave themselves; Lasutro left the Impaled Lupine behind, desperate to leave before the composure granted to them by their compartmentalization. As the darkness of night greeted their senses once more, a fresh and musky scent filled their nostrils. Looking up Lasutro watched as the deep blues and purples of the sky dulled as a great cumulonimbus drifted above the town, obfuscating the light of the moons. The sight accelerated their plans out of town more so then they were already, and so she made haste beginning their trek to their first stop: Kadmique.
Lasutro’s departure from Sutiretni passed with little issue, only having to stop once to hide as a pair of night shift guards made their rounds, if only to avoid being hassled for being out in the dead of night. When Lasutro arrived at the edge of town she looked back if only to reminisce for a brief moment on the ten years she had spent there before she pulled the hood of their new cloak up and made their way to the paths ahead. As she traveled past the final stretches of farmland she was met with the first drizzling of the storm she had hoped to avoid in the opening hours of their travel. Lasutro forced their way through the increasingly miserable travel conditions, the light of dawn obscured by the growing storm. It wasn’t long after the first cracks of thunder, and flashes of lightning, that she decided it was best to find shelter and wait out the worst of the weather.
No longer than ten minutes after resolving to find some shelter, Lasutro spotted a small series of trees with more than enough space to get out of the weather, just a short distance away from the greater forest left of the main road. With no reason to linger, she made haste towards the trees. Though Lasutro had packed light, she had all the tools needed to throw together some simple shelter and she began to do so as soon as she found a suitable place. Using a bunch of mostly loose logs and branches, Lasutro assembled a small roof against a partially collapsed trunk, before building a small fire pit. She had some hope that the weather would clear by the afternoon, so she thought to make use of the time by drying their damp clothes, setting up a simple rack near the fire pit before pulling out their flint and steel.
Lasutro tended to the growing flames watching steam fume out of their drying clothes all while trying their best to ignore the envelope beside them. She waited for some sign, some reason to not do as Gorv had asked. Seconds passed, then minutes, eventually she began to fiddle with the silver bracelet, it becoming a sort of release of the building anxiety. Lasutro’s mind, unsatisfied with the partial distraction from their growing sentiments toward the letter that demanded its destruction. Their mind moved to the silver band that adorned their wrist, despite knowing she was trying to use it as a distraction. She set about the task of examining the bracelet willed upon them. The solid metal work remained cool to the touch despite their continued handling of it, one aspect that gave them a tiniest bit of joy as its apparent owner. Rubbing their hands across its surface, Lasutro discovered the first of many symbols engraved upon it, although as quickly as she had become aware of them they faded back into the silver; as if they were never really there. As she fiddled with it further, a realization dawned on them, the more she “learned” about it the greater its mysteries became and if she focused too strongly on it she might just end up forgetting where she was in part or even in whole. Returning the bracelet to their left wrist, Lasutro let out a sigh with two meanings, one for the growing mystery that was the “gift” upon their arm and one for the realization that she couldn’t push back the task given to them by Gorv any longer.
Although Lasutro had determined to burn the letter, she did not do so with much haste or enthusiasm. Instead she pulled the letter from where she had previously placed it, taking their time in doing so. Grasping at the letter deliberately to allow themselves a final moment to reminisce upon it, before finally throwing it upon the coals. She watched as the edges of the parchment darkened, flames consuming more and more of it. The few words that remained intact became shrouded by the brief scorch marks before being reduced to ash among the glowing embers.
An hour or so after Lasutro burned the final message of Gorv Retnuph, the weather began to clear, the sun hung high in the sky. The air filled with the signature musk of rainstorm past,and the sounds of forest. Lasutro sat by the final embers of their fire, taking in the surroundings one last time before she began packing up all their belongings and continuing their trek to Kadmique.
Lasutro made their way through the damp greenery to the now muddy road, stopping briefly to reorient themselves properly with their destination, then setting off once more. She kept to the main road,trying to keep their mind on each step and their wits about them. With each passing minute she felt their mind wandering to one of the conversations she had the night before. She had done magic, she did the thing she had always wanted to do but she didn’t even know when or how.
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A scowl filled their expression as she continued on increasingly frustrated with themselves and the Judge. It remained there, as their mind fell into a cycle of searching for the moment she did magic, the conversation with the Judge, and the words of Gorv that implied their act of magic,the one said to be performed at least once by the Judge, that act was inevitable for them. Each thought becoming pervasive in their mind, fighting one another for Lasutro’s full attention. Despite that, she continued onward to their destination, albeit slower than she intended though the thoughts gave them much needed distraction during the long walk. The hours passed faster with their help, and dusk made itself known. With the setting sun Lasutro slowed down further, looking around either side of the main road, searching for a spot to set up camp. After a few minutes she decided on a spot not too far off the road near a series of bushes and young oak.
Stolen novel; please report.
Setting down their pack and arranging their supplies for the night, Lasutro managed to clear their head, calmed by the light labor of preparing their dinner. As the final streaks of sunlight faded from view revealing the night sky and the moons in all their glory, Lasutro had the last couple bites of bread and prepared themselves to sleep even if it was with one eye open. She set aside all their cookware, if it could be called that: the small metal bowl, the wooden bowl and the spoon. Stuffing them all back to their previous place among the other supplies, Lasutro fetched a few pieces of the deadwood she had scavenged earlier in the night before she returned to the dying fire of their camp. After placing one of the pieces into the embers, she shuffled over to the bedroll she had set against the oak tree. As Lasutro laid down she found that she was far more exhausted than she knew, and drifted off to sleep in a matter of seconds.
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Dreams visited the young half elf sparsely since the death of their parents, and when they did make themselves known they always turned sour.When she was younger she had dreamt of dancing in a beautiful field of flowers with their brother only to trip and find themselves in a forest of thorns, surrounded by the sounds of creatures she hoped to never see. Briefly after their brother’s passing she would see him in the corner of their eye, watch them enter a door and give chase after him only to find themselves at the bottom of a lake drowning; then they would wake suddenly, and wish once more to never dream again.
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Lasutro lifted their head, finding themselves in a grand plain, surrounded by overgrown grass, and endless sky with no change in sight. The sun shined brightly above them, yet it radiated no heat, instead sending perpetual chills down their spine. She raised their head, and felt their eyes widening as the deep scarlet sun entered their vision. Suddenly very aware she wasn’t where she fell asleep, every sense she had becoming hyper aware of everything wrong with their surroundings. The ground sank under each step as if it wasn’t there, yet Lasutro’s feet remained on the surface. Gusts of heavy air pushed them down, and warmed their skin uncomfortably. Lasutro moved forward hoping that the faster she ran in this strange dream realm she might find their way out.
She ran and ran until the scenery changed. Not the landscape or greenery but the sun, the sky. The sun, replaced by three moons each seemingly moving through each other. The ethereal moons glowing each different color: black surrounded by a silver halo, a deep almost pulsating violet and a writhing red as if constructed of millions of serpents. The sight was disorienting, forcing their sight away. Lasutro braced themselves, placing their hands on their knees,taking a brief moment to return to some normalcy despite the oddities felt by their senses. Bringing their head up slowly to evaluate the scenery once more, the strange glow of the moons danced on the grass around them, that's when she saw it. A massive storm growing on the horizon, a bright cyclone of silent winds rumbling towards them.
With every second the storm drew closer, its strange heat passing through Lasutro in waves. Even with the unusual changes to their senses, Lasutro still felt the urge to run. Bursting into a sprint, at least as much as she could against the solid yet not solid ground, she attempted to move away from the storm, its quiet movement through the sky announced only by the rumbling thunder. Despite their efforts the winds caught up and began to pull them up into the whirling storm.
Lasutro spun as she was wrenched into the air, and as the distance closed between them, the reverse logic of the realm became clearer, at least in the case of the storm. Its white winds and its movements just hiding the occasional riverlike streams flowing through it one moment and gone the next, while dozens of small bolts of crackling energy scattered about the air and others diving towards the ground. She took in the storm in a matter of seconds before she found themselves spinning in more than one way, among the streaks of water and the crackling bolts. Lasutro’s perception of time melted away as the movement of the storm sent them into a daze. Streams of water shot out at them knocking the air out of their lungs pushing them deeper into the storm. She flailed about for something to grab while she struggled to breathe as a web of hundreds of bright and compact violet bolts of energy coalesced above them into a grand spear of lightning.
Less than a second after its formation the crackling spear pierced through Lasutro and before she could react to the pain she instead found their vision filled with hundreds of images, moments in time. Images of exteriors of academic looking buildings, the interior of a grand library, a dimly lit room filled with what could only be artifacts, the same academic buildings surrounded in flames, bodies with familiar wounds yet no faces and a familiar symbol of an eye in various forms, then darkness.
A brief respite before the images filled their vision once more, they were all the same with the exception of some alterations to the bodies and one other.It was an image of the interior of a room similarly designed room to the artifact storage holding a stone tablet chained to a dais surrounded by clear ritual circles and runic symbols, then the same room without the tablet the dais in ruin and the chains broken. The images stopped once again before returning in a similar manner, including a new set of changes to the bodies she saw the first time. The other difference this time being images featuring ruins under the sea, worn by the currents and an unfinished blade embedded inside a stone pedestal, before fading to black.
Instinctively, as if it would be obvious to anyone who saw the same things,Lasutro knew there was one final series of images. The darkness returned, and as fast as it had arrived, it left bringing a series of images of an especially dark library and a simple tome bound by three bright red metallic straps marked by dizzying symbols not nearly clear enough to recreate and piles of bodies turned to ash.
Then she found themselves in that darkness once more before all the images repeated themselves over and over burning itself into their mind until Lasutro’s vision returned. Their sight shifted to the bottom of the storm fading away, then she remembered where she was, in the sky falling with no hope of stopping. Fear rose through them,even faster when she turned to face the ground unable to live without knowing how far from the end she was. The ground got closer and closer, their panic reaching new heights. At the very last moment she shut their eyes tight as she whispered a prayer to the Specter, and the world turned black.