(( Bits to be released to prevent spoilers, and perfect excuse to post lazily. Hurray! ))
"What a miserably long journey. I am so glad to depart these roads, again."
The Starweaver glanced back to the last fading signs of Avanthyr in the distance. It was odd, how the atmosphere soaked into the being, though. How the salt-air remained in every pore, and how far the seagulls would sometimes dare from their maiden city. Laughing in the sky above them all without a care in the world.
So contagious a laughter, even the elf had to join in. Just looking back on a long and hard road.
"You never know what you're really in for, do you. Until you've stepped to the very bottom. And to the very top, too." A comment slid to the seagulls amidst grinning lips.
The one armed elf lofting a hand to wave to them as they departed her company, or more then likely, simply her air-space. Too far and they'd risk the eyes of hawks and eagles, the duo of bird and elf to visit one another another time. The Starweaver found herself pausing just to look onto the glorious horizons surrounding her from but one hill top. Unmarked by anything but grass, flowers, weeds, and the humming of summer insects... she suddenly realized. Where was there to go, or do? Where was there to be, now?
Nowhere. She leaned into her cane of a sword heavily, and slid down until she could call herself seated. Letting grass taller then herself en-wrap her view about the edges, and look into the sky. The coming of stars. Her hour.
The witching hour. Where all her dreams were drenched in the old magic, and the rhythm of the world's pulse, rippling through every aching muscle in her body. Where everything stopped being certainty, and was left to spirits.
It'd all been for so long knee-jerk reactions, ever since she met the blight witch. The old crone. Her sickly form hunch backed, and marked by so many pocks it was hard to make out the silhouette of what was once some form of human being, or perhaps an elf. It hardly mattered any longer. She was 'crone', and that was all there was to her now. This poor diseased mess of a mad-woman.
What being could look on her. And not say to kill her? Who could think a mind deeper then the mere filth she rolled about within was present. A trail of Exigo's loggers led to here, hung from trees impaled by pikes and even covered in the fecal filth of their ogre slayers. What a disgusting display every moment had been, right down to the spirits of the old Viridale enraged and rattling the cages of the prime material's walls. Exploding with fury. All to find one woman, nestled atop that old hill?
Well. It was no wonder they'd all thought to draw blades. No wonder they'd considered her nothing but a mad woman obsessed with rot. And what do you do with a beast that has taken ill, but slay it, burn the body and pray that it does not spread to the herd. And so they'd turned in time to watch the old witch vanish into the woods, with that single purpose written across the Tuatha's blades, claws and instincts.
Burn the witch. And save the flock.
As the Starweaver knit her brow in thought, realizing her stomach had lurched with mob instinct. Struggling to understand what she'd witnessed, was more then a picture of carrion.
Still the call was echoed about them. Burn the witch. And save the flock. The elf struggled to find a reason not to. And struggled on, for several nights to sleep. She had to find the reason not to kill.
It was something Frazer had said, something that she hadn't expected of the intelligent though often-times borderline mad wizard of Exigo.
"You're only dealing with a symptom." he had said.
"And not the condition." she murmured.
So what precisely was the condition? What were the causes to bring everyone here? Not just them, not just the group of Tuatha, and Exigo climbing up a hill to defeat a so called monster. What were the strings, that brought her?
She had ached, and needed to know. The answers as cryptic as a sphinx's riddles. Finally. A challenge worth her mind to consider.
((Continued later. *Lazy moth*))
"What a miserably long journey. I am so glad to depart these roads, again."
The Starweaver glanced back to the last fading signs of Avanthyr in the distance. It was odd, how the atmosphere soaked into the being, though. How the salt-air remained in every pore, and how far the seagulls would sometimes dare from their maiden city. Laughing in the sky above them all without a care in the world.
So contagious a laughter, even the elf had to join in. Just looking back on a long and hard road.
"You never know what you're really in for, do you. Until you've stepped to the very bottom. And to the very top, too." A comment slid to the seagulls amidst grinning lips.
The one armed elf lofting a hand to wave to them as they departed her company, or more then likely, simply her air-space. Too far and they'd risk the eyes of hawks and eagles, the duo of bird and elf to visit one another another time. The Starweaver found herself pausing just to look onto the glorious horizons surrounding her from but one hill top. Unmarked by anything but grass, flowers, weeds, and the humming of summer insects... she suddenly realized. Where was there to go, or do? Where was there to be, now?
Nowhere. She leaned into her cane of a sword heavily, and slid down until she could call herself seated. Letting grass taller then herself en-wrap her view about the edges, and look into the sky. The coming of stars. Her hour.
The witching hour. Where all her dreams were drenched in the old magic, and the rhythm of the world's pulse, rippling through every aching muscle in her body. Where everything stopped being certainty, and was left to spirits.
It'd all been for so long knee-jerk reactions, ever since she met the blight witch. The old crone. Her sickly form hunch backed, and marked by so many pocks it was hard to make out the silhouette of what was once some form of human being, or perhaps an elf. It hardly mattered any longer. She was 'crone', and that was all there was to her now. This poor diseased mess of a mad-woman.
What being could look on her. And not say to kill her? Who could think a mind deeper then the mere filth she rolled about within was present. A trail of Exigo's loggers led to here, hung from trees impaled by pikes and even covered in the fecal filth of their ogre slayers. What a disgusting display every moment had been, right down to the spirits of the old Viridale enraged and rattling the cages of the prime material's walls. Exploding with fury. All to find one woman, nestled atop that old hill?
Well. It was no wonder they'd all thought to draw blades. No wonder they'd considered her nothing but a mad woman obsessed with rot. And what do you do with a beast that has taken ill, but slay it, burn the body and pray that it does not spread to the herd. And so they'd turned in time to watch the old witch vanish into the woods, with that single purpose written across the Tuatha's blades, claws and instincts.
Burn the witch. And save the flock.
As the Starweaver knit her brow in thought, realizing her stomach had lurched with mob instinct. Struggling to understand what she'd witnessed, was more then a picture of carrion.
Still the call was echoed about them. Burn the witch. And save the flock. The elf struggled to find a reason not to. And struggled on, for several nights to sleep. She had to find the reason not to kill.
It was something Frazer had said, something that she hadn't expected of the intelligent though often-times borderline mad wizard of Exigo.
"You're only dealing with a symptom." he had said.
"And not the condition." she murmured.
So what precisely was the condition? What were the causes to bring everyone here? Not just them, not just the group of Tuatha, and Exigo climbing up a hill to defeat a so called monster. What were the strings, that brought her?
She had ached, and needed to know. The answers as cryptic as a sphinx's riddles. Finally. A challenge worth her mind to consider.
((Continued later. *Lazy moth*))
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