You
The evening passes with little to note. Endrea and Inalia pack their things, not rushing but certainly not taking their time either. There is a surprising amount for them to fit in their trunks, seemingly managing to pull various baubles and items from every nook and cranny of their home that apparently could not just be left behind.
But you find little trouble in waiting and spend the time looming by the door in contemplative silence. Your kind rarely sleep, doing so only at long intervals for extended durations, and the older you get the greater the danger that you will never wake up at all.
And you are so very old. Even discounting your time in suspended animation, which strangely you feel has refreshed your need to rest, you would have been the oldest recorded of your kind that had not succumbed to the eternal dream.
Ten millennia you have experienced, give or take. Most of that you spent consumed with hate and pain. The majority of your kind do not even make it past three before succumbing to their weariness or meeting their fate in some other manner.
Only your father you know to have experienced more than half of that. In the time before your loss, you had a will celebrated and unrivalled, set for a life greater than even the first of your kind. The thought brings you no satisfaction anymore, just a biting, bitter emptiness.
Thoughts of your sire come rarely to you, and you spend the night looking sadly back upon your own youth. Those memories are not so painful that you cannot gaze upon them, but all are corrupted by what came after. No longer can you feel the joy and laughter that was once the core of your being, merely recall them as empty expressions without the attached emotion.
When you are drawn back to the present by the first rays of dawn piercing through the small, grimy windows of the measly excuse for a home, you are afflicted with a lingering sense of melancholy.
By then your new travelling companions have made themselves ready, though the little one appears dead on her feet as she drags her trunk down the stairs, letting it thump loudly on each step.
“Auntie Jemma…” she begins, her words interrupted by a deep yawn that set her mother off as well. You are immune to such trivialities. “… here we come!”
Despite her enthusiasm, it is clear she is in no state to travel, and Endrea wasn’t looking too much better either. The older woman was swaying on her feet, her dull red hair dishevelled with heavy bags beneath her eyes.
Irritated by the weakness of the lesser races, which apparently Inalia inherited, you step forward and place your palm flat against the girl's head. Your people were born from the realm of dreams, banishing the human’s need to sleep was no great task.
Inalia first, and then Endrea, who reacts too sluggishly to object to your magics before you perform them, you cleanse of their exhaustion.
Of course, they are still human, or half-human. That exhaustion would return with a vengeance in but a number of hours, but it would be enough. Repeating the gesture would not be conducive to their health.
It had been an exceptionally effective method of torture though, you recall with something approaching fondness, to see the mortals driven to madness simply by depriving them of sleep.
Endrea clears her throat and then looks up at you with a mix of annoyance and relief. “Thank you. Although I would appreciate if you asked first, Vindaruil.”
You do not respond to that, merely stalking back on over to the door with your robes trailing behind you. Preparing yourself, you then begin to weave an illusion over your person, nothing so invasive as what was done to Inalia, but by your hand it would be equally impenetrable.
Of course, it was doubtful whatever mage laid the spell on the girl did so with such contemptible speed and ease as you. There is fair reason you rose to dominate the world.
Once quite particular about your appearance, it is not a trait you ever entirely lost and so you keep the changes to a minimum. Your ears, of course, appear to shrink below your hair and become rounded. The almost deathly pallor of your skin warms several shades until it is feasible a human may possess it.
Crimson was not your original eye colour, so you care little when you change it to a dull brown. It is too great of a hassle to affect your height, and you have no desire to, so it remains at the edge of believability. You leave the rest of your features, especially your hair, giving you the contemptible appearance of a uniquely handsome, particularly tall, middle-aged human with an unusual hair colour.
Memorable, certainly, but to identify you as an elf would be a stretch, even in your time when their existence was not the stuff of myth.
As a final touch, your robes shift and change into a set of travelling leathers with a flowing black cloak tied around your neck. This is no illusion, however, but rather a function of the many enchantments you have placed upon your attire after many centuries of use.
“Awesome!” Inalia gasps. You have had a million devoted servants kneel at your feet and proclaim your greatness, so her show of awe does not move you.
It is, however, far more genuine.
“Yes, yes. Time to go. We’ll have to be fast if we want to catch a ride north, the merchants usually set off just after dawn.” Endrea mutters hurriedly, sparing only a moment to take in your disguise before nodding and then rushing out of the door. She is dragging her daughter in one hand and her trunk in the other as she does.
Inalia is struggling to lift her own things and, foreseeing greater annoyances, you cast a relatively short-lasting weightlessness enchantment over it under your breath. Another whimsical stretching of your magical muscles that would leave most versed in the arts frothing at the mouth.
You hear her gasp excitedly and spy her looking up at you from the corner of your eye, but you refuse to acknowledge her. Gratitude is given only in response to kindness, and that is most certainly not why you acted.
Walking back out into the street is another test of your patience. Though darkness does little to obscure your vision, seeing the human city cast in colour only highlights its ugliness. So dire is it that you are suddenly glad of the boots that have formed around your feet to complete your disguise.
Endrea locks her home with a primitive brass key and then stands back with a sad look upon her face as she takes it in for what could well be the last time.
She does not linger long, however, and soon the three of you are moving along the street. In the morning sun, the city is far more alive than it was the previous evening. Humans swarm like flies as they flitter about their business, occasionally pausing to observe your appearance but never for long.
A few of the creatures even call out to you, females mostly, and you only barely stop yourself from incinerating them. The experience is one of the foulest you have ever known. Is it too much to ask of the lowly beings to comport themselves with dignity, and perhaps wash themselves once in a blue moon?
Eventually, the city seems to tidy up a bit, the buildings marginally less crooked and the level of filth less immediately visible. It is around then that Inalia suddenly stops in her tracks, nearly sending her mother tumbling to the ground.
“I haven’t said goodbye to my friends!” she complains mournfully, apparently having only just thought of it.
You hear Endrea sigh compassionately, lowering herself to meet her daughter's watery eyes. “I know little songbird, and I’m sorry. But we have to go now. Maybe we can send them some letters when we get to Auntie Jemma’s?”
This is a lie; such is obvious to you. Endrea was obviously paranoid about her daughter and it would prove too egregious of a security risk. You find it almost amusing, then, that the girl who surely knows her mother far better than you trusts her without a second thought.
Immediately brightening up, Inalia smiles and exclaims “ok!”
A look of relief comes over Endrea, and then guilt as she meets your knowing eye. But she says nothing, and neither do you, and you continue.
You do your best to ignore the sounds, smells and sights of this pig-stye until, eventually, you reach the walls of the city. Skittering about a courtyard before a mere wooden gate is a collection of stalls, carts, stables and temporary shops that are often found wherever the travelling merchant class frequent.
Not unique to humanity, but your people’s equivalent were far more grand and sophisticated, to compare them would be an insult.
Endrea lets out a huff. “Alright. Now we just need to find someone headed to Hartonville. Shouldn’t be too hard.” It sounds as though the woman is trying hard to convince herself.
“I trust you can acquire your own transportation.” You tell her, unwilling to be subjected to whatever meagre accommodations she acquires for the journey. “I have my own means. I shall wait for you by the gate.”
Before she can offer argument you have disappeared into the crowd. Searching for a relatively quiet corner of the square, a task far easier said than done, you subtly cast a perception filter in an area around you.
Not an easy feat with so many wandering eyes, even for you, but it is the fastest of the options open to you. It still takes you several minutes, such magics are notoriously complex after all.
Then, mentally reaching out across the planes you search for the familiar presence, and are pleased to find it much where you left it. As faithful as ever, it answers your call without hesitation.
A circular portal appears, revealing a glimpse into the icy wastes that lay at the depths of Tartarus. The people around you do not bat an eye, unable to pay the incredible feat of magic even the slightest bit of attention.
To travel with such ease between the unyielding walls that separated the realms would once have filled you with a fierce jealousy. You have since come to accept your limits, however few of them you might have.
Stepping forth out of the hellish realm and into the mortal one is a being that could easily be mistaken for a regular horse, albeit one half again as large as most such beasts and with a coat as pristine and pale as your own hair. Such a mistake would be understandable, for that was the creature it was created to imitate.
Not by you, however. Such a feat of creation goes beyond what even you are capable of. Nor could you have brought it under your thumb with fear or domination, for there was little you could hold over it. No, you had to win its favour by means which you had once been so proficient but had almost thought forgotten at the time.
Persuasion. Genuine, without deceit or false agenda, for it would have seen through such immediately.
It was why you prized its companionship over any other, and why it alone was spared the purge of all your other servants. Because it was, perhaps, one of the few beings you might label something approaching an equal, and certainly the only one that held faith with you.
You still have not learnt how long it has been since you entered your stasis, but the being does not appear to have aged even a single century since you stole it from its vengeful master.
A Horseman without a horse. To this day the thought still amuses you.
“Armageddon,” you greet her in the mother tongue with a barely perceptible, but uniquely genuine, smile. “Did thy miss me?”
In response she neighs deeply and fiercely, the portal closing sharply behind her lest anything else sneak through.
Armageddon was incapable of vocalising her thoughts in her equine form and was immune to most magics other than her own, thus she could do so through no other means. But that did not make her unintelligent. Over the years you have learnt to interpret what she could communicate with, admittedly unreliable, accuracy.
The answer to your question is, essentially, yes. She seems rather upset that you left her for so long, however, and is demanding reparations.
You stroke her nose gently as she calms. “I shall see what can be done. We are most unfortunately amidst the humans as of present, as thy can see. The pickings may be slim.”
She huffed, and her silver eyes pierce your own with violent meaning.
“No, friend of mine. Not today. We already did that once; I am trying a different path now. Should it prove fruitless, as I suspect it might, then we shall restore the world to how it was. I fear, however, that there will be little sport the second time around.” You respond as you slowly lower the perception filter, re-introducing yourself and your steed back into the attentions of those around you without startling them.
Snorting, she agrees with you. With all the grace of your people, you swing yourself up to her back. She would accept no saddle or bit, and you would not inflict them on her for the mere sake of not standing out to a bunch of humans. Once she had worn armour of black mithril as you did, as befitting a warrior, but even then she had only grudgingly accepted it.
“We head to the gate, Arma, to await the subject of my study.” You lead her, not quite a command but hardly a request either. She would follow either way, you know, but you still know how to show respect to those whom deserve it.
On your way, you snatch with a subtle flex of telekinesis a handful of carrots from the cart of some human merchant. You were sleight of hand even in your earliest years, and the man is none the wiser.
“They are no Seralian imperators grown in the gardens of Titania, friend of mine, but they shall have to do.” You whisper into her mane apologetically as you reach out your hand to allow her to eat.
She wafts you with her tail and eats them begrudgingly.
Unfortunately, food imitated with magic was no food at all, and teleportation to acquire carrots of better quality was far from the best use of a resource and time extensive ritual. That was rather Arma’s forte, but you could hardly expect her to acquire her own carrots now could you?
Predictably, you arrive by the open gates before Endrea and Inalia. The human guards standing vigil, with their spears and shields and mail of simple steel, eye you warily. But you give them no reason to call you out, and as entertaining as provoking them might be you have no desire to prolong your stay in this cesspit.
Arma spends the wait intimidating the other beasts of burden that pass you by as they leave or enter the city. They sense she is their better even if they cannot comprehend why, and one and all they lower their heads in deference before her, mare and stallion alike.
One of the soldiers seems to notice, you hear, and whispers his observation to the other man standing guard with him. You hear the scathing retort of disbelief from the second, and then notice his heartbeat quicken as he realises his companion was correct.
Your steed does not share your compunctions about provoking your audience, however. She is, at least she was in your old court, used to a level of healthy fear towards her that does not involve her lessers whispering about her in plain sight.
Turning on the spot, she levels her gaze straight at the laughably youthful humans, both of which had likely not yet seen their third decade, and cuts short their chatter with a vengeful glare.
One of them chokes on his words, developing into a sudden coughing fit as the other looks on with a measure of worry and amusement.
They are saved from any more embarrassment, and potential soul-related injuries, when the familiar half-breed and her mother approach on the back of a horse-and-cart driven by a disgustingly portly, greying human.
Gluttony and sloth coming together to shorten an alright meagre lifespan. A problem unique to the lesser races, for you have known not one of your kin to become ‘fat’. There was not even a word for it in the mother tongue.
“Ho there! You wouldn’t happen to be the gentleman travelling with these lovely ladies would you?” the man exclaims with exhausting friendliness. His rosy cheeks and cheery smile are already trying your patience. What did such fleeting creatures have to be happy about anyway?
“Indeed,” you answer dryly.
“Excellent! Just excellent! The name’s Leroy, friend. Might I say that’s a truly magnificent steed you’ve got there! As my father always said, you can tell a lot about a man by the way he treats his animals.” This ‘Leroy’ continues, unabashed by your obvious lack of enthusiasm.
Arma, however, preens under his compliments and forgets about the pair of guards she had been intimidating.
You meet the infuriating man’s unwavering smile with a deadpan expression, your eyes lifting over his shoulders to see the girls admiring Arma with various degrees of shock and surprise.
“Let us be on our way.” You declare, growing bored of the man.
“Not one for idle chit-chat ay? Fair enough friend. These fine gentlemen here have a duty to make sure I’m not transporting anything I shouldn’t, and when they’re satisfied we’ll be eating up the road before you know it young man!” Leroy responds with a wink.
In your youth, such a comment from a mortal would have rankled you, set your eye twitching in irritation as you thought of an eloquent and humiliating response. Later, if any one of them managed to survive long enough to deliver it, they would have been cut down where they stood. If you were feeling particularly cruel then you may even have made a point out of their suffering.
Now? Against all odds, you resist the urge to chuckle at its absurdity, and that of the circumstances which brought it about.
The guards hurry to search the back of the rickety open-topped cart, keeping an eye on Arma as they do so. As far as you can sense, the only goods sharing the primitive vehicle with Endrea and Inalia's luggage are several boxes of steel and iron tools. Not even weapons, just hammers, pitchforks, scythes and the like. To your keen eye, their craftsmanship is so pitiably human.
Better than whatever the orcs could bash together. Vastly inferior to even the least skilled dwarven journeyman. Not even worth comparing to the craft of your people.
“Is that a unicorn?” Your musings are interrupted by the half-breed leaning over the side of the cart to get as close a look at Arma as possible, her wide eyes not even glancing up at you as she speaks.
You resist the urge to scoff, but are once more amazed by the girl's ability to prod every sore spot you have. There are no unicorns, not any more. They all ran back to the realm of dreams with their tails between their legs after what you did.
It wasn’t like you had a choice. They had refused to help of their own free will, leaving you no other option than to seek… alternative methods to extract their healing abilities. It hadn’t worked.
“No,” you say, perhaps a bit too harshly. The girl flinches back, her mother sending you a scolding look.
Internally sighing, you remind yourself that alienating the girl would be counter-productive. “Unicorns have horns.” You add in a more neutral tone.
“Oh…” Inalia then lowers her voice in a faux-whisper that does little to lower her actual volume. “I just thought she was hiding like you.”
Fortunately, you see it coming a mile away and ensure the wind obscures the words from any but you and her.
“Arma does not hide from anything.” You proclaim, and your steed agrees with a prideful flick of her mane.
Inalia giggles like it is the funniest thing she’s ever seen.
“Everything seems to be in order,” one of the guards says after rooting around in the boxes and conferring with his companion who had done the same, giving Leroy a firm nod.
“Thank you kindly, gentlemen. Have a wonderful day.” The cart driver says with sickening sincerity, then taps gently on his reigns spurring the old mare hitched to his cart onwards.
Arma trots out ahead of them, seemingly as relieved as you to finally vacate the city and get on the open road.
You let Leroy and his passengers catch up after that, you are in no rush after all. Significant portions of your extremely long life were spent travelling from one place to another, often frustratingly slowly. You campaigned across the entire world with whole legions at your back after all, a logistical nightmare to be sure and not one conducive to haste even accounting for teleportation. The amount of times you had to backtrack alone forced you to grow your patience to levels a mortal could not fathom.
Endrea seems to relax now that you are on your way, leaning back in the cart and running her hands through her hair as though to comb out the stress. Your wakefulness cantrip would last several more hours at least so she wasn’t yet falling asleep.
“Say, one of these lovely ladies told me your name but it must have slipped my mind. I do apologize, but could you remind me of it friend?” Leroy says as his beast of burden pulls up alongside you and Arma.
“Vindaruil,” you answer, leaving out your father’s court as you are pretending to be a human after all.
“Hmm, unusual name that, if you don’t mind me saying. What does it mean?” the frustrating mortal asks, and you get the impression you won’t get a moment of peace and quiet the entire journey.
Once more you re-evaluate just killing the man, and once more come to the same conclusion.
You do have to think for a moment when you decide to answer him. Translating from the mother tongue to this one is difficult enough, but the language of the fey is capricious. Its meanings can change entirely with inflection and tone, even the season or time of day, but, roughly, your birth name meant… “Song of the Dawn.”
Briefly, ever so briefly, the face of your mother flickers into your mind. Not as you last saw it, but as it was when you were a boy. Warm, joyous, full of that endless, perfect love.
‘Do you hear the birds as they wake? The swaying of the leaves in the morning breeze? Insects and all that slithers and crawls chittering in the constant dance of life? That is what I hear when I think of you, my little song. You are the warmth of the sun's rays and the brightness that washes away the night. You are my Vindaruil.’
You find, before you banish them back to the depths of your mind where they belong, that the memories of your mother do not burn quite as fiercely as they once did. You cannot decide if this is a good thing.
There must have been some inflexion in your voice that shut the carriage driver up because his questions stopped after that.
Absently you note Inalia covering herself with her arms, shivering despite the relatively pleasant morning.
Stolen novel; please report.
Endrea looks as though she wishes to speak, though her face tells you it is not to scold or complain but something altogether more gentle. Evidently, it is not anything which she would risk Leroy overhearing as she does not let it pass her lips.
Arma’s tale swishes at your leg and she lets out a soft huff, nodding her head and drawing your attention down to the path.
Ah. The ground had frosted over.
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Inalia
Almost unable to look away, Inalia’s eyes follow the mysterious elf as he trots along in silence, an expressionless look on his face. It was amazing that she had actually felt his emotions. Amazing, but sad. For a moment she had thought winter had come early, a chill breeze blowing through her hair and the sun’s light dimming around her.
Then she’d seen her own breath in front of her, and that same sensation of… grief overcame her, only so strong this time it was almost like it was her own.
It passed as quickly as it had arrived, but it left Inalia with tears in her eyes all the same. She quickly wipes them away out of embarrassment, though her mum gives her a knowing look.
There are so many things she wants to ask him but most of all, she thinks, she wants to give the cold elf a hug. Mum always made her feel better when she was sad with a big hug, and the elf was definitely sad.
It isn’t like she can just get up and run over, though. He is riding on his unicorn after all, and she is in the boring, rickety carriage.
She still thinks it is a unicorn in disguise, it only makes sense. Unicorns and elves went hand in hand in the bedtime stories Mum told her.
Arma, he’d called her. It was a funny name. Inalia keeps noticing her glancing over towards the carriage as she trots along. Mum always says unicorns are the kindest, best creatures to ever live. That they can always tell good people from bad people, so that meant the elf had to be really, really good if Arma is letting him ride her.
Inalia nods to herself as though she has just uncovered an ancient piece of wisdom. She wonders if Arma would let her ride on her back as well, and her face falls when she thinks she might not.
After all, she isn’t always good. She’s run off, snuck around, made mum worried. A good person doesn’t do that. It's not that she wants to upset her mum, but she just can’t stop herself sometimes. It can all just be so exciting.
But Arma keeps looking over, so maybe she hasn’t decided yet? With a fierce resolve, Inalia swears to herself that she will try harder to be good and do everything mum says so that maybe she’d be able to ride the unicorn one day.
As she is thinking this, her mum has a gentle hand entwined with her own, staring out over the golden fields as Athaca gets smaller and smaller behind them. It is a clear day, barely a cloud in the sky, and the warm summer breeze has since returned. She looks distracted, worried even.
Inalia squeezes her mum’s hand and smiles brightly up at her in the way she knows cheers her up.
Endrea looks down and smiles sadly at her daughter, who frowns at the sight. “What’s wrong mum?”
Her mum lifts up a hand and ruffles her hair in a playful way, the strange look fading behind a true smile. “Nothing for you to worry about songbird.”
Pouting, and quickly straightening her hair once more making her mum laugh, Inalia crosses her arms. “I’m not little any more Mum! You can tell me!”
Shaking her head with a sigh, her mum answers. “I was just thinking about your dad is all.”
Inalia’s face falls into something more serious, and when she speaks it is little more than a whisper. “You never talk about him.”
“Oh, Inalia,” her mum starts, pulling her daughter into a warm hug. “I wanted to, really I did, but it just wasn’t safe.”
Sniffing in her arms, Inalia turns her wide eyes up to her mum’s. “But you can now, right?
Endrea glances quickly over to Mister Leroy before nodding gently. “I guess I can. But only when we get to Auntie Jemma’s.” She tells her daughter sternly.
It does little to diminish Inalia’s joy at the statement, hugging her mum all the tighter and already wishing that they’d just get there already.
“Mister Leroy!” she says after a moment.
“Yes, little miss?” The friendly man calls back from the driver's seat without turning around.
“How long till we get to Hartonville?” Inalia asks without missing a beat.
“Well now, let me think. Should be about… three days or so I should think. In a rush are we?” He answers kindly
It is a challenge to stop her face from falling, but she doesn’t want to sound ungrateful. She knew Mister Leroy was being very kind letting them travel with him. Mum had told her so.
“No,” she says begrudgingly, and entirely unconvincingly.
The merchant laughs boisterously, “Don’t worry little miss, we’ll be there before you know it. Ol’ Daphne here will get us there fast as can be.”
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Leroy
Already Leroy is glad of his decision to offer his cart to the two girls, and their peculiar companion. Travelling could be so terribly boring on one's own, and especially since his son left to ply his own trade he has felt so crushingly lonely. Daphne, stout old thing that she is, unfortunately leaves much to be desired as a conversationalist.
Besides, Hartonville is less than a day out of his way and it is good for the soul to do kindness to strangers. He feels the symbol of Solaris bounce under his shirt as they pass over a bump in the road and offers a silent prayer to the sun god for their safe travels.
He enjoys listening to the little miss, Inalia if he recalled correctly, speaking her mind and asking him whatever questions she can think of. Leroy is a bit surprised that neither she nor her mother seem particularly friendly with their travelling companion.
Leroy is getting on in his years. He’d seen his fair share of strange and fantastical things, and many more that he wished he hadn’t, but the chill that man had exuded upon answering such an innocent question had scared him more than he’d like to admit.
It had been like someone walking atop his grave, so he decided after that to leave the man well enough alone if he didn’t feel like talking. He does wonder, how can he not, but Leroy has found it is best not to assume things about people.
All he can surmise for certain is that, despite carrying no visible weapons, the man was dangerous. Now, dangerous doesn’t necessarily mean bad. Leroy had run across a group of paladins once and they had certainly been dangerous, very explicitly so, but they had devoted their entire lives to helping those weaker than themselves. So he tries not to judge the stranger.
As they travel on and he practically unravels his entire life story to the curious girl, Leroy watches the man. Initially, he was just trying to suss out the man’s relationship to his passengers. It is obvious they aren’t related, and though he is handsome and about the right age Leroy doesn’t think there is anything romantic between the man and his older passenger, Endrea.
A hired guard perhaps? He certainly has the build for it, and his mount is larger than any warhorse Leroy has ever seen, but without weapons and armour he looks a poor guardian.
The conundrum keeps Leroy entertained when he isn’t busy chatting with the young girl or her mother. At least until the sun passed directly overhead and the vast farmland turned to wild, impenetrable forest. Around that time he hears a series of fierce yawns from the back of his carriage, setting him off as well, followed shortly by two gentle snores. Looking back he notices his passengers have fallen asleep, Inalia resting her head in her mother's lap.
Thinking back, they had seemed in a bit of a rush so Leroy surmises they must have been up particularly early. Frowning, he hopes they aren’t in any sort of trouble, but upon recalling they hadn’t seen particularly worried about the guards he decides it isn’t any of his business. Unless they ask for some help, of course, in which case he’d be happy to lend his assistance to the young mother and daughter.
But it does mean he is now left alone with the silent and sullen ‘Vindaruil’. His boredom wars with his better sense and, after about an hour of nought but the sounds of the road, wins.
“So then, my good man, if you don’t mind my asking what’s your business in Hartonville?” Leroy asks, his voice catching after being silent for so long.
“I do,” the man responds immediately, rather rudely, without even turning to acknowledge the question.
“Ah, well, my apologies then.” Stutters out Leroy in awkward reply, and silence once more dominates their travel.
It isn’t until another hour has passed, and the great Cratertooth mountains begin looming over the horizon, that Leroy is startled by Vindaruil breaking it.
“Are you a religious man?” the stranger asks without inflexion, a rather ominous start to a conversation.
Happy just to be out of the awkward silence, Leroy jumps at the chance to answer. “Why yes, yes I am. I hold faith with all five of the pantheon, but I’ve always held to Solaris first and foremost. God of the common man, as they say. Might I ask, are you?”
As the man trots just ahead of Leroy, his mount beside Daphne, Leroy can’t get a decent look at his face, but he suspects the man doesn’t so much as twitch as he responds.
“Not anymore.” The words are devoid of emotion, but that in and of itself speaks volumes.
The response makes Leroy frown; a godless man is always an unfortunate thing. There are no doubts that the pantheon exists, the miracles of their followers evident enough, so those that deny them have either lost their way or been drawn from it.
Such a thing will inevitably be a sore spot, and Leroy has no desire to provoke the man so he lets it be. Mostly.
“A pity, discussing theology was rather a favourite pastime of my son and I as we travelled. He was more of a man of Rendon you see, a fighter that boy, didn’t really have the patience for simple merchantry. I don’t blame him mind, but I do miss it.” Leroy shares, starting off light-hearted as he tries to change the topic but accidentally stumbling onto something heartfelt.
“This son of yours, he is a soldier then?” Vindaruil asks, again seemingly without turning to acknowledge Leroy at all.
A little uncomfortable about the topic, but unwilling to go back to the silence, he answers. “No, no. Not a soldier, an adventurer. A rather more dangerous profession, I’d have much preferred he took a career in the army, but the pay is better you see. That, and it's more exciting. Or so I’m told, I was never much one for putting myself in harm's way.”
“Tell me, Leroy,” the man begins, using his name for the first time, “if your son were to meet his end at the blade of some bandit or rogue, what do you think you would do?”
Leroy is taken aback at the question, almost bringing Daphne to a halt. “I beg your pardon?!” He utters, raising his voice but still conscious of those sleeping behind him.
This time, the man turns on his mount, for it bears no saddle, and meets Leroy’s eyes. “If you were to discover that your son had been murdered, gutted like a farm animal, and his murderer was brought before you, what would you do?”
The anger rising in Leroy is quashed by the intense look in those brown eyes that seem to freeze him to his seat, and he feels compelled to answer. “Well… well I suppose I’d ask them why. Yes, I would want to know why they killed my boy.”
“And suppose their answer was simple greed, or wroth. Circumstances that were no fault of your child’s. What then?” The morbid questions continue.
“I… I’m not sure. That would be up to the courts.” Leroy mutters, shaking his head from the emotion that is rising in him, unwilling to truly contemplate such a thing.
“Why? Because the courts hold the power to decide the fate of men? What if you had that power yourself? Held in your hands the life of this murderer to do with as you pleased? Would your answer be the same?” Vindaruil does not sound cruel or vengeful with his foul questions, but rather almost curious, and exceptionally calm.
Leroy realises the man isn’t trying to get a rise out of him or upset him, though he obviously doesn’t care that he does both of those things. No, he is looking for a genuine answer. It cools Leroy somewhat, even if it doesn’t placate him entirely.
Nevertheless, he finds himself answering. “I would not kill him, if that is what you are suggesting. Only the gods have the right to decide who lives and who dies.”
“And yet you invoked the courts. Is the legal punishment for murderers not death?” Questions the stranger atop his pale steed.
Leroy finds himself growing incensed despite the man’s stare, no longer quite so cowed. “The courts, and judge, draw their right from the king, who in turn draws his right from the pantheon. They deliberate, make their decisions without bias or agenda. They pursue justice, to take matters into my own hands would only be vengeance.”
“What is the difference?” The question is so sincere, so devoid of mockery despite feeling as though that is all it is, that it truly floors Leroy and saps him of his anger.
“That depends. In outcome? Very little, the murderer dies either way and my son would still be dead. But in execution? The perpetrator has chance to plead his case, whatever it may be, and make peace with his gods. He is offered the chance to see the error in his ways before meeting his final judgement, and may perhaps even seek forgiveness. With vengeance he is offered nothing.” Leroy explains, calming somewhat.
Again, Vindaruil is emotionless in his reply. “So you would give this murderer these concessions for… what? Would not your anger burn you alive? Would not your grief demand reparation?”
“Because it also grants me the ability to forgive. I would rob that of myself by seeking vengeance. Yes, my anger and grief may whisper to me and say otherwise, but I am more than the sum of my emotions. I can recognise a path down which awaits me only further suffering, even if I may want nothing more than to walk it, and choose to turn away.” More and more Leroy finds himself impassioned in his replies, feeling to an extent the same righteousness that oft overcame him when in prayer.
“What use is forgiveness? Would you not hear your son’s cries from the beyond demanding you avenge him? Would ‘forgiveness’ do anything to silence them?” This time the stranger is not quite as collected, a note of ferocity entering his voice that cools Leroy of his zeal.
“The dead do not mourn themselves; it is only the living which suffer that pain. Forgiveness is not something that you give, it is not a concession offered to those who have wronged you, though it is true that they benefit from it. No, it is something that you allow yourself, to let go of those crushing emotions and allow yourself peace. It does not mean you must forget their crimes, or allow them to go uncorrected, it means not letting those crimes cause any further pain. And I rather hope, and indeed believe, that my son would love me more than he'd hate his murderer. And that he would much prefer I live on free of that pain than carry it with me to my own grave. I once heard a cleric of Solaris describe it as a ‘selfless act for selfish reasons’, and I could not agree more.” Leroy is smiling by the time he finishes, almost grateful to Vindaruil for spurring him to a reminder of such wisdom.
The stranger holds his gaze for a moment longer, before turning back to once more look ahead. Visibly unchanged, yet Leroy gets the impression he’d given the man much to think about.
After a little while, however, a nervous Leroy finds himself needing to ask, “But that was just a hypothetical, wasn’t it?”
“Indeed,” Vindaruil answers dryly after letting the man sweat for a minute or two.
Leroy doesn’t feel the need to disrupt the silence again after that.
----------------------------------------
You
By the time the sky begins to redden and winds pick up their pace, Endrea and Inalia have woken up. Shaking off their sleep and yawning loudly, you notice as they observe the cold tension between you and Leroy that arose after your conversation.
He is a foolish man with foolish beliefs, and the only reason you picked his brain in the first place was because his initial question reminded you of why you were here. Not ‘headed to Hartonville’, but in this future you allowed to come into existence.
You took note of his jewellery. So obviously religious in nature as you could sense the extremely slight divine energy clinging to it. Many of those who had opposed you originally, most in fact, held faith with the gods of your time. And so you had thought this man may have some measure of insight.
Evidently you were wrong, or the faithful of your time were more stupid and disgustingly self-righteous than you had believed. That thought did not stop his words from lingering in your mind, however, like a memetic parasite spread through his rambling drivel.
“Is something the matter?” Endrea asks, her eyes wandering between you and the unshapely human.
Leroy gives her a smile that is only half forced. “Not at all. Sleep well?”
“As well as can be expected,” She replies as she stretches her arms out above her with a groan before looking up at the sky, “my, did we really sleep so long?”
“Don’t you worry about it. I am just about to stop for the evening, before it starts getting dark.” He tells her as he calls his beast of burden to a halt.
The girls dismount the carriage on wobbly legs and it doesn’t take your elven hearing to notice the rumbling of Inalia’s belly.
“Hungry are we?” Leroy asks good-naturedly.
“I’m starving!” The half-breed complains in response, and her mother looks sheepishly at the carriage driver.
“We were in something of a rush, didn’t manage much more than a cup of water on our way out. I don’t suppose I could trouble you for some provisions? I know you’ve already been so kind; I’d hate to…” she is interrupted by Leroy waving away her concerns.
“Don’t worry my dear, I always bring extra. Just in case. Tell you what, I’ll get Daphne here sorted then we’ll get a nice, big, warm fire going and we can all have dinner together, how does that sound? It won’t be fancy mind, just some bread and jerky, but that’s all I have I’m afraid.” He offers with a kind smile.
A relieved and grateful look brightens up the woman’s face, “that would be amazing. Thank you, Leroy.”
“It is my pleasure, Endrea.” He responds as he jumps down from his seat and begins removing the barding from his horse.
You feel the urge to curl your lips up in disgust at the thought of consuming flesh. As ever, the barbarism of the lesser races knows no bounds. Not that you haven’t done so in the past, out of necessity or… other reasons, but never for sustenance if you had alternatives.
And this land is not as barren as you left it. You dismount Arma, leaving her to her own devices, and make off into the woods. It has been quite some time since you last ate, and though your appetite is not what it once was the need for sustenance has not abandoned you entirely.
“Mister Vindaruil! Mister Vindaruil!” You hear a high-pitched voice call after you, and turn to see the half-breed hot on your heels. The other two notice, and look over with concern.
“Where are you going?” she asks as you stop for the moment.
You answer, if only to spare yourself greater headache. “To forage for something more appetising.”
“Can I come!? Can I come!?” her voice is filled with excitement as she practically vibrates in place, looking back between you and her mother.
Curious, you wait to see what Endrea says.
The woman sighs, “If it is alright with Vindaruil?”
You find it interesting that she would entrust her daughter to one she has known less than a day. Whatever her experience with your kind, it must have instilled a level of innate trust in them. How pitiably naïve. How… oddly amusing.
Weighing the disturbance to your peace against the amusement, you choose the latter. You nod your head towards the half-breed's mother in the affirmative.
“Do everything he tells you, and don’t wander off!” she commands her daughter with a stern look.
Inalia nods back seriously, “Yes mum!”
Turning once more, you stalk into the darkening forest, making nary a sound. The half-breed follows quickly with only a fraction of your grace, keeping up easily with your rather sedate pace. You are in no rush.
“So, um, why were you in the coffin thing?” she asks once you have disappeared from sight of the camp the others began making.
“Have I not answered your one question already?” You respond to her query with another without so much as glancing down at the girl, your eyes scanning the forest floor looking for anything of interest.
Her voice shifts into something approaching a whine. “But… but that was ages ago! Don’t I get another one? Pleeeeease?”
The sound grates on your ears and already you regret allowing the child to come with you. “Fine, so long as you cease annoying me.”
You observe out of the corner of your eye as the girl gives herself a celebratory fist-pump as you begin to respond.
This time you are not so inclined to give quite so wholly a truthful answer. “I grew old, and bored. I placed myself into a suspended animation spell out of the hope that the world would be a fraction more interesting when I awoke.”
“Whoa. So you must be like, really, really old then? How old are you?” She asks greedily, only to be silenced by your stare.
“Right, yeah, sorry,” Inalia mutters sullenly, relenting.
She follows silently as you harvest various roots and mushrooms that, though plain, are far better than accepting the human’s food.
You are just uprooting a particular herb when something urgent draws your attention. Now, elves naturally have senses that bring in a level of information far in excess of what can be easily consciously processed whilst maintaining concentration on some other, even mundane, task.
You in particular, as an elder of your people and through the various rituals you have done over the centuries to gain further power, put even that level of overstimulation to shame. So it is natural, then, that you have learned to trust your subconscious, your ’instincts’, absolutely. It is a part of you, with far greater context than you can process in such a short period, telling you what you would do if you consciously knew. And so you listen. And so you act.
Shooting across the small clearing you find yourself in, with haste and grace unrivalled in all the realms, your hand clasps firmly onto the tiny wrist of the half-breed, caught only a hair's breadth away from a mushroom famed, at least in your time, for containing the most deadly contact poison on the continent.
The wind takes a second to catch up to you, blowing leaves and sticks in your wake as your hair flutters wildly. You yourself take even longer to understand.
Where was the danger? This fungus posed no threat to you, why did you react?
Ah, then you realise it. It shocks you not because it is so difficult to piece together simple cause and effect, but because you cannot recall a time your instinct ever drove you to save another in the last few millennia.
It does make sense, on second thought. Even you may not have been able to save the girl, and it would have been a rather great inconvenience. You never really did quite master the healing arts, at least when it came to others. The most powerful magics harnessed emotion after all, and you were lacking when it came to the empathy required to maintain life.
“It would be wise not to touch anything you do not recognise,” you tell the shocked little girl calmly, pulling her away from the fungus before releasing her.
“Woah!” she exclaims breathlessly, looking over with wide eyes at the tree you had been next to just a moment before.
Resisting the urge to sigh, you stand back up to your full height and regard with a critical eye the mess you made of the forest floor. With a slow wave of your hand, the furrows fill themselves, the leaves return to where they were and after a few seconds no evidence remains of your little burst of speed.
Feeling what you have already gathered in the pockets of your cloak, which are far deeper than would seem possible, you decide it is enough. You set off back the way you came, the half-breed following along quickly lest she be left behind.
“That was so cool!” the girl exclaims as she skips alongside you, “Will I be able to do that?”
You take a moment to think about that question, despite not wanting to spur her on by answering more than you said. In truth, however, the thought of it intrigues you, you know not what a half-breed could be capable of.
There, in that trail of thought, exists an experiment that could hold your attention. So long has it been since you stretched your academic muscles. And it wasn’t like you were a stranger to breaking rules, even your own.
“I am uncertain. It is clear you possess some of the grace of your father's people, and likely a degree of potential in the arcane. It is farfetched to assume you will ever reach the heights which I have achieved, but the same can be said for any full-blooded elf. Perhaps I will find out,” you peer down at your enthused listener and remember that you couldn’t exactly force it out of her, as you have done for other experiments in the past.
Fortunately, however, it seems you have quite the willing subject so such methods would not be needed.
Although, a little… encouragement may not go amiss. “Or, should I say, perhaps we will find out. What do you say, Inalia of the Court of Bail-Shan?”
The beaming grin she gives you is answer enough, but you do not expect her to surge forward with her arms outstretched. It Is clear she poses no threat to you yet still you struggle against reacting with violence at the unexpected incursion into your personal space. It is this moment of indecision that allows her to wrap her little arms around your waist in an attempt to… hug you?
Acting only slow enough not to injure the half-breed’s neck, you place your hand on her forehead and push her away from you with barely concealed disgust.
“Do not do that again.” You command firmly, but keep the venom from your voice.
“Oh… sorry,” she mutters sheepishly as you carry onwards back to the others.
Already sensing her growing upset and having no patience for it, you nip it in the bud immediately. “We will discuss your training upon reaching Hartonville.”
The smile returns, but she is wise enough not to test you again on the walk back.
Wise indeed, for the silence leaves you thinking about the last time you had been hugged and it puts you in a truly foul mood for the rest of the night.
Inalia quickly makes to tell her mother the good news as you arrive back whilst you stalk on over to Arma without so much as a glance at the humans. Gifting her some of your spoils, you eat your meagre fill and then find a tree to lean against.
You spend the evening attuning yourself to the thrum of the forest around you, preferring it to the senseless prattle of the humans. The fat one tries to share his foul rations, inviting you over to the fire and trying to engage you in conversation, but you silence him with a glare and are thankfully left alone the rest of the night.
Foolish as they are, the three of them set no watch rota, falling asleep atop thin rolls the merchant had brought with him under the warm summer stars.
When they have each drifted off to the realm of dreams Arma trots over to you and gives you a peculiar look. The girl had been fussing over her earlier and your mount had taken it in stride, she was conscious of her master’s wishes after all, but now she was curious.
Of course she had borne witness, through one means or another, to what had occurred in the forest. Arma’s gaze never strayed far from you after all. She was asking… well, just asking. You didn’t think even she really knew what her question was, just a general confusion with your actions.
As you gaze into those silver eyes, you find you have no answer for her. You know what your goals are, loosely, and you have a rough plan to achieve them, but they are undefined at best and whimsical at worst.
You feel as though you lost… something during your time in stasis. Not yet have you discovered what it is, or even if it is good or bad, but you feel its absence keenly all the same.
This you communicate without words as best you can, and Arma has known you long enough that she seems to understand and she goes trotting off to harass Leroy’s mare.
Alone with the stars, which are as unchanging as ever, your mind wanders. You wonder why thinking about that hug was so painful. It wasn’t like the last time was with… with them. No, it had been later than that.
A student of yours, one of the twins. Well, not just a student. An apprentice. A slave. A relative. A minion. Looking back, you find yourself cringing at your actions. You had been so consumed by your emotions back then, when the pain had been fresh, that it had clouded your mind. It’d made you irrational, chaotic, unpredictable. A danger even to those that had called themselves your allies.
And there had been those which suffered because of it, those that, upon reflection, never deserved to have you inflicted upon them. Loyal, faithful… and family.
Perhaps that is what provokes such a reaction from you. You would hardly call the half-breed a student but the offer to teach her and subsequent joy had brought up bittersweet memories, tainted moments that leave you feeling hollow and tired.
Strangely, you find yourself quite set on not repeating that particular mistake a second time around.
Even if it was only for a half-breed.
----------------------------------------
Leroy
Vindaruil is quiet as Leroy wakes up the next morning. It doesn’t look like he’d slept, but nor does he look any more tired or out of sorts than before.
His silence stretches on throughout the day as they continue their travels, infecting the group with a sullenness that Leroy tries his best to dispel. The pale-haired stranger had been brooding, and it isn’t until they reach the foot of the Cratertooth mountains and enter the narrow pass through them that the spell of his foul mood finally seems to lift, like a physical weight off of Leroy’s shoulders.
He hadn’t said a word to anyone in the meantime, not even to the girl who had seemed so excited in his company just last night. Vindaruil is very much a conundrum to Leroy, and not in a good way. Ever since their conversation he’d been watching the man carefully, and has been getting a sinking feeling in his stomach whenever he does.
There is something not quite right about him, Leroy thinks. What kind of a man turns away free food and good company?
Even peculiar still is how he seems to change as they enter the pass, dismounting his horse despite having enough space to ride alongside the cart and running his hands along the rocks. All the while maintaining that impenetrable look as he glances around, taking in every sight.
“What is it? Is something the matter?” Endrea asks worriedly after a while of observing this odd behaviour.
He doesn’t so much as glance in her direction as he answers. “I am just… recalling the last time I was here.”
The words unsettle Leroy for some reason. Vindaruil almost seems wistful, but in Leroy’s experience nothing good happens in Bleakbow Pass, as it was occasionally called. Twice he had been robbed, and once he’d almost been set upon by a flight of roc’s, on all occasions only narrowly escaping with his life.
Of course, the life of a merchant could be a perilous one and he’d taken the pass a great many times in his life without issue. It was one of the only easy routes from the relatively isolated city of Athaca to the rest of Tordon, the alternatives were another pass some miles west or following the coast and taking the long way around the mountains. Neither were conducive to haste, and time is money after all.
It isn’t really his poor experiences which sour his thoughts of the pass, though they didn’t help, but the unnatural, jagged formations of the cliffs that made it. Nature was smooth, regular but not precise. A balance between order and chaos.
But Bleakbow Pass looks as though a giant of myth had carved through the mountains with a single swing of a colossal blade. The cliffs are sheer and sharp, the path unerringly straight, and it is cast in dark shadows at all times of day.
Every man and his dog, after a few pints, had a theory about how it came to be, though none knew for certain. All Leroy knows is that it gives him the creeps.
It is why, when he sees a man step out from behind some leftover rubble from one of the many landslides that afflict the area and stop in front of them with a sickly sweet smile upon his face, Leroy knows they are in trouble.
“Ho there, friends! I seem to have found myself in a spot of bother, I wonder if you could help?” His words are friendly, but the sword at his waist and the roughness of his attire speak more clearly of his intentions.
Bugger, Leroy thinks. Not again.