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The city was wreathed in mist, a cold curtain that defied visibility, rendering the familiar shapes of the street abstract and strange; vague and deformed shapes teased the eye and mind, making monsters and demons of the mundane items that littered the street.
Snow covered almost everything, a deep layer of crisp white that blended almost seamlessly into the hanging mist. The city was wrapped in the blankets of cold and ice, swaddled with all the care, love and attention that any mother would pay to her child.
She padded barefoot and naked through the streets, between the snow and clinging mist the city was rendered all but mute, the soft crunch of snow underfoot and the occasional muffled thuds of snow as it slipped from branches or roofs were the only sounds.
She eyed the buildings as she passed, the roofs split and fallen in, windows shattered and hearths devoid of fire. With their inhabiting souls gone the buildings had already begun to crumble, only the deep crisp cold had saved them for rotting; just like so many of their former inhabitants the cold would mummify them, keep them preserved in a form for eternity.
There were occasional signs of life, animal tracks occasionally dotted the snow, wolves and bear mostly, the occasional humanoid tracks ran to and from the ruined shells of some buildings. She smiled. It was amusing to think of those that lived in fear of the cold, she imagined them as desperate creatures, reduced to base animalism in the simple struggle to cling to life. No gaudy balls, inns or time for idle discussion, such trivialness was cast aside, life rendered pure by desperation. The thought of those few survivors huddled together under what rags they could scavenge, cowering in basements like vermin. Those that fought to survive were blessed in one way, blessed with a purity of life, a life without the beguiling lies of fire or the decadent softness spread by those that licked and begged at the feet of the Flamehair.
She paused at one of the great district gates, smiling at the pointlessness of it. No doubt built to stave off some imaginary enemy, perhaps something as trite and transient as goblins or other foe. But steel and iron were useless against the weather; to hot in the sun and to cold in the snows.
She wished she’d seen it happen, when those blizzards and storms had pounded the city and the winds had torn away any warmth. How many cried? How many turned to Auril in praise; turning upon friend and neighbour to do her bidding that they might be spared her wrath? How many were frozen in their worthless temples, begging for clemency and aid from the gods that cared nothing for them? What happened to the fighters? Did they swing their swords and axes at the weather itself?
She looked back over her route, the empty streets and battered, cold soulless buildings, the tatters of carts and misshapen mounds of snow that marked the final resting places of so many.
She could see them; the weeping harlots and men of leisure, tears freezing to their face as their bodies so soft with decadence and vice went numb, froze and died. The devout of the lesser gods, praying in desperation as the whooping mob of those who had embraced Auril’s ways tore through the streets tearing open doors, snuffing fires shattering windows and hacking through joists that Auril’s breath might breath free across the city. The desperate fight of mages, incantations failing as fingers froze, the spells that might save them from their own frailty faltering and fizzing around them. The knights and warriors so proud in tin plate swinging at the elements, hacking at the mob, fighting anything just to keep warm, a desperate and doomed fight as the swords and armour froze to their skin, what had been the symbol of their live becoming their coffin in death. Still smiling at the images in her head she passed through the gates.
She passed the remnants of the Triumvirate, it’s splintered and broken joists jutting into the sky like the remains of some great beasts ribcage. There was no need to enter the savaged structure; she knew what was lying in those snow-encrusted halls.
She padded down to the waters edge, the lake that had formed a focus for the temples and barracks here, the water was frosted, splinters of ice probing out towards the centre of the lake and the object that sat at its centre. A great wall of clear ice sat at the centre, some great iceberg landlocked in the lake.
She looked over the shape, it sat like some blue tinted diamond, almost perfect but run through with the occasional tint of trapped bubbles and cracks. She walked out into the lake, past the fingers of ice and down into the water, walking until the water lapped around her waist as she moved around the block of ice. The bubbles and imperfections seemed to take shape as she moved, no longer random they became at first a pattern, then a figure.
Within the ice, shaped from bubbles and hairline fissures was the form of a woman, her figure made from flaws but fashioned to create a perfect beauty. Ice cold and eternal this figure gazed out over the city and the landscape, the vigil of a loving mother looking out over the perfect cityscape that had been created in her name. Her smile broadened as she closed her eyes and whispered the figures name, even the whisper sounded loud in the silence of the ice.
“Auril.”
Her eyes snapped open, the moon was fat and full above the stream in which she lay, a glacial stream that ran pure and frigid from the endless ice above and down towards the valleys below.
Another vision, the meaning unavoidable.
For months she’d wandered and served amongst the cold mountains at the top of the world, doing what was bidden of her sisters and brothers in faith but now her aim was set. Back to the damp valley; to bring the cold idyll of the mother to those who’d been allowed to grow opulent and fat in the warm glow of their precious fires.
Snow covered almost everything, a deep layer of crisp white that blended almost seamlessly into the hanging mist. The city was wrapped in the blankets of cold and ice, swaddled with all the care, love and attention that any mother would pay to her child.
She padded barefoot and naked through the streets, between the snow and clinging mist the city was rendered all but mute, the soft crunch of snow underfoot and the occasional muffled thuds of snow as it slipped from branches or roofs were the only sounds.
She eyed the buildings as she passed, the roofs split and fallen in, windows shattered and hearths devoid of fire. With their inhabiting souls gone the buildings had already begun to crumble, only the deep crisp cold had saved them for rotting; just like so many of their former inhabitants the cold would mummify them, keep them preserved in a form for eternity.
There were occasional signs of life, animal tracks occasionally dotted the snow, wolves and bear mostly, the occasional humanoid tracks ran to and from the ruined shells of some buildings. She smiled. It was amusing to think of those that lived in fear of the cold, she imagined them as desperate creatures, reduced to base animalism in the simple struggle to cling to life. No gaudy balls, inns or time for idle discussion, such trivialness was cast aside, life rendered pure by desperation. The thought of those few survivors huddled together under what rags they could scavenge, cowering in basements like vermin. Those that fought to survive were blessed in one way, blessed with a purity of life, a life without the beguiling lies of fire or the decadent softness spread by those that licked and begged at the feet of the Flamehair.
She paused at one of the great district gates, smiling at the pointlessness of it. No doubt built to stave off some imaginary enemy, perhaps something as trite and transient as goblins or other foe. But steel and iron were useless against the weather; to hot in the sun and to cold in the snows.
She wished she’d seen it happen, when those blizzards and storms had pounded the city and the winds had torn away any warmth. How many cried? How many turned to Auril in praise; turning upon friend and neighbour to do her bidding that they might be spared her wrath? How many were frozen in their worthless temples, begging for clemency and aid from the gods that cared nothing for them? What happened to the fighters? Did they swing their swords and axes at the weather itself?
She looked back over her route, the empty streets and battered, cold soulless buildings, the tatters of carts and misshapen mounds of snow that marked the final resting places of so many.
She could see them; the weeping harlots and men of leisure, tears freezing to their face as their bodies so soft with decadence and vice went numb, froze and died. The devout of the lesser gods, praying in desperation as the whooping mob of those who had embraced Auril’s ways tore through the streets tearing open doors, snuffing fires shattering windows and hacking through joists that Auril’s breath might breath free across the city. The desperate fight of mages, incantations failing as fingers froze, the spells that might save them from their own frailty faltering and fizzing around them. The knights and warriors so proud in tin plate swinging at the elements, hacking at the mob, fighting anything just to keep warm, a desperate and doomed fight as the swords and armour froze to their skin, what had been the symbol of their live becoming their coffin in death. Still smiling at the images in her head she passed through the gates.
She passed the remnants of the Triumvirate, it’s splintered and broken joists jutting into the sky like the remains of some great beasts ribcage. There was no need to enter the savaged structure; she knew what was lying in those snow-encrusted halls.
She padded down to the waters edge, the lake that had formed a focus for the temples and barracks here, the water was frosted, splinters of ice probing out towards the centre of the lake and the object that sat at its centre. A great wall of clear ice sat at the centre, some great iceberg landlocked in the lake.
She looked over the shape, it sat like some blue tinted diamond, almost perfect but run through with the occasional tint of trapped bubbles and cracks. She walked out into the lake, past the fingers of ice and down into the water, walking until the water lapped around her waist as she moved around the block of ice. The bubbles and imperfections seemed to take shape as she moved, no longer random they became at first a pattern, then a figure.
Within the ice, shaped from bubbles and hairline fissures was the form of a woman, her figure made from flaws but fashioned to create a perfect beauty. Ice cold and eternal this figure gazed out over the city and the landscape, the vigil of a loving mother looking out over the perfect cityscape that had been created in her name. Her smile broadened as she closed her eyes and whispered the figures name, even the whisper sounded loud in the silence of the ice.
“Auril.”
Her eyes snapped open, the moon was fat and full above the stream in which she lay, a glacial stream that ran pure and frigid from the endless ice above and down towards the valleys below.
Another vision, the meaning unavoidable.
For months she’d wandered and served amongst the cold mountains at the top of the world, doing what was bidden of her sisters and brothers in faith but now her aim was set. Back to the damp valley; to bring the cold idyll of the mother to those who’d been allowed to grow opulent and fat in the warm glow of their precious fires.