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Story Hour
[5E] The Age of Worms - Solid Snake's Campaign
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<blockquote data-quote="Alexander Bryant1" data-source="post: 7520455" data-attributes="member: 6916184"><p><strong>Journal of Etona - 20</strong></p><p></p><p>“Do you see it?” I call.</p><p></p><p>“You were correct: here in about an hour,” she replies from the top of the Cairn hill. A solid bank of dark blue clouds flaring with lightning is approaching from the mountains.</p><p></p><p>From where Seraph lives.</p><p></p><p>Has it come to collect whatever soul the dragon possessed?</p><p></p><p>Rey comes back down the hill wearing an expression I had not seen before. It is alarming.</p><p></p><p>“We will be drenched,” she continues. “If there is anything like a trail, it will be lost.” Worry makes her voice crack. “But I think I saw it, where she came down.”</p><p></p><p>I am still not clear on all the little creases and folds of her relationship with Seraph, so I ask something probably pretty stupid.</p><p></p><p>“Do you want to find her … alive?”</p><p></p><p>Rey stares at me.</p><p></p><p>“Yes,” she states hardly believing my question. But her eyes widen as she understands. I had helped her kill a dragon. I would lend my effort to that cause again, if she wished. And perhaps it is what I want to do now….</p><p></p><p>I squeeze her hand. “Then we’d better hurry,” I say.</p><p></p><p>She takes off with Rishkar in tow, but I tarry to locate Egan.</p><p></p><p>“Are you coming?” I ask him.</p><p></p><p>“Nay, lass, eh, if ye don’t mind. I think I need ta stay here and make sure the Cairn doesna’ go anywhere.”</p><p></p><p>“You have enslaved yourself for some powers again, I see.” He smiles sheepishly so I continue. “I would speak with you about this when we return.” He shrugs. Infuriating boy.</p><p></p><p>***</p><p></p><p>The wind pushes us along. Whatever awaited us will have us scented. Though perhaps not: I smell <em>[eclai’ir</em>. The Common word for it is a funny one I cannot remember, something with z’s. ‘Ozum’ or something like it. They both mean <em>lightning-burned air</em>.</p><p></p><p>There is something else in the wind as well, an acrid scent, burning not from heat but more like the fumes of Diamond Lake refinery. It is chemical like the lab in Seraph’s lair.</p><p> </p><p>I hear something even through the gale and alert Rey but she has also already caught it: faint sound ahead coming from where we are going, which is toward a naturally-occurring basin made deeper by something recent and unnatural. The sounds are voices and, too, the ground physically bubbling. Something like heat shimmers the air.</p><p></p><p>“It is Ithane,” Rishkar says. “She was here. This is her scent. I also smell <em>k’sheek es’serast</em>.” 'Mistress Seraph' in his Draconic tongue.</p><p></p><p>A ring of this nasty soup the ground has become forms the perimeter of the basin. As we watch a moment, getting our bearings on the scene, it seems to be growing, moving slowly towards a rocky middle on which we see a humanoid form, very tall and very blue. It is certainly not a dragon nor even anything like its kin, but details are hard to make out because a whitish smoke swirls in the breeze.</p><p></p><p>We see the owners of the voices: more kobolds peering over a ridge on the far side.</p><p></p><p>Rey runs heedlessly down into the basin. <em>So this is how she must feel most of the time</em>, I think as I watch her retreating form, no plan, no fear, no thought. I run down after her firing volley after volley at the glaring kobolds. I try to hit the rocks around them, freezing and exploding them in equal measure. Killing them might provoke anger. Scaring will provoke fleeing.</p><p></p><p>“We have slain a dragon today: your mistress is dead. Will you join her?” I yell.</p><p></p><p>No response from them. Rey catches my eye. I glance at her face which has assumed a ‘What are you doing?’ look. ‘What?’ I mouth back.</p><p></p><p>She cries out something in Draconic.</p><p></p><p>Oh. They don’t speak Common. Right.</p><p></p><p>But they also seem unimpressed at Rey’s words as well which are halting: she doesn’t like to raise it, I know, and her Draconic is not exactly theirs. Fortunately our weapons and Rishkar’s bolts make our case for us, and they withdraw.</p><p></p><p>We arrive at the figure who is just getting to her feet with obvious pain in front of us.</p><p></p><p>She is unearthly, supernatural. Over seven feet tall, her height seems correct for her, not freakish and not an illusion. Her skin is pale blue like the waters of a shallow shore. Her eyes are solid cobalt, glowing beneath unruly, raven-black tresses. Her lips are dark blue. She should be resplendent in her shimmering blue-silver metals that appear to be woven rather than linked by chain, but they are torn and melted, and dark red blood seeps through the gashes.</p><p></p><p>She has horns. It should have been the first thing I noticed, but her presence is so commanding – even limping and grimacing – that this detail takes a moment to register. The horn that is still whole is curled, aquamarine, blending into midnight as it retreats under her mad hair. The other is broken, leaking more blood.</p><p></p><p>She walks on obviously fractured legs to Rey, utterly ignoring Rishkar and me, her mighty pride not allowing any other course of action. Yes, this is definitely Seraph.</p><p></p><p>She says something to her in the dragon-tongue. Later, Rey would relate the entire conversation so I will notate it here.</p><p></p><p><em>“She is dead?” Seraph asked. Rey nodded. “She was weak, not merely weak-minded – the acid-spitters are all insane – but physically weaker than she should have been. It is why I am still alive.” She spat this last out as if it angered her to admit it. “You killed her?”</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>Rey nodded again and added, “With help from my friends.”</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>“Mmm. You again,” she said to me though I did not the words. “Little Moon Girl.” She turned to Rishkar. “What of you?” she demanded. “What marks of yours are left on Ithane’s body?”</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>“Fire and frost, mistress,” he said, presenting his icy blade and bowing low to her. She nodded and was about to say something more but then coughed violently. Dark red blood hit the ground. It had metallic flakes in it.</em></p><p></p><p>“Mistress!” Rey said and stepped forward. I also started but she stopped both of us with a hand and switched to Common.</p><p></p><p>“Yes, yes,” she berates us, waving off her pain. “Attend! I have three tasks for you. We complete the first now. I cannot get to my lair in this condition so you will take me into the Cairn, somewhere I can sleep in peace for some time.”</p><p></p><p>“Rishkar,” Rey commands after thinking a moment, “you can fashion your hovering disk into a proper throne, can you not?” The serpent man bows again and summons the disk. It shimmers in the shape of a large reclining chair such as I had seen in Greyhawk and also in the Fey city I traveled to years ago. She forces herself onto it in a quick, graceful motion, huffing in pain just a single time. Then she settles, satisfied as it rises up again, queen of all she surveys.</p><p></p><p>As Rey and Rishkar move slowly back to the Cairn, I act as scout and ward, harrying those kobolds drawing too close. They are still out there, packs of them. We have been hearing summoning blasts from makeshift trumpets for the past hour, but we do eventually make it to the Cairn.</p><p></p><p>Egan is nowhere to be seen, but with the obvious activity outside I am sure he has retreated within. I stay just above the cave entrance – where Ithane had draped herself, incidentally – and watch. And wait.</p><p></p><p>They come, dozens, maybe scores in number. They are far from the entrance, but they do not know Angivre’s reach. I show them.</p><p></p><p>I <em>make </em>to show them, that is, but the Silver does not come.</p><p></p><p>“Why?” I whisper.</p><p></p><p>I run back to the others.</p><p></p><p>“They are gathering outside,” I tell them “but they are not ready to push forward. They seem to be waiting for something.”</p><p></p><p>We descend to the room where we had found Egan’s poor sister, dead on a dais meant as a bed to a demigod. The place has been considerably cleaned. In fact, the entire Cairn has been built out, lit, swept and made habitable, but it was still underground to me so I focused on my breathing. Rey needs me now.</p><p></p><p>Speaking again in Draconic, Rey related Seraph and her own words to me later.</p><p></p><p><em>“One task complete,” Seraph had purred as the floating throne pulled up alongside her place of rest. “Very good. This is suitable. You have not failed me. You must not fail me.”</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>“I will not, mistress.” Rey was all but shaking.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>“Yes. Well, it is time to reveal some secrets before my other tasks. You should know your father was one of my servants.” At Rey’s surprise, she’d continued, “Surely you did not believe you all lived in my shadow for so long with my having no knowledge of it? And he none of me?”</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>She had wondered that but had dismissed it. Faerellan, her father, had been a skilled ranger. Her more domestic mother, Emily, and little brother, Sanka, (e’isk in Elven, based on the word for pine needle) never strayed very far from home, so Rey had assumed that their little family had never been noticed. He had never said anything about a dragon.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>There had been a rich blue in several places around the house, a difficult color to make, particularly that shade. Where had it been? In clothing? Pictures? She couldn’t remember.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>“I knew him well,” Seraph continued. “He was unexpectedly useful to me.” She regarded Rey for a time. There was silence in the chamber. Then she said quietly: “Close, even.”</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>“He never mentioned….” Rey started.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>“Very close,” she overrode Rey.</em></p><p></p><p>She utters one last word, in Common.</p><p></p><p>“… daughter.”</p><p></p><p>Rishkar hisses, his tiny eyes as wide as I have ever seen them.</p><p></p><p>“Rey?” I say but she cannot hear me. Her shock has frozen her.</p><p></p><p>What about a daughter? Do we need to save or kill or have tea with Seraph’s daughter somewhere?</p><p></p><p>But no, that was not it at all, of course. The reality is unreal.</p><p></p><p>It had bizarrely all fit, Rey would tell me later when we talked about it: her human ‘mother’ never very close to her, even a little afraid of her, as was her ‘brother’. They had always behaved like favored servants to her father. Not kin at all.</p><p></p><p>And it explained all those other curiosities: her own body; her mind and how it worked; her natural grace; her strength which exceeded even her own father’s when she’d had but her dozen years behind her.</p><p></p><p>And of course the dragon mark. The magic she wielded without memorizing thick tomes, without a bargaining with a supernatural patron. Without a goddess to watch over her.</p><p></p><p>“Daughter? Rey? Do we need to find–,” I begin but she raised a hand at me. She faces me and all I see is lost. I want to go to her but it is not my time: this doesn’t involve me. I nod once and she returns it. <em>Later</em>, we have just agreed.</p><p></p><p>She faces Seraph again.</p><p></p><p>“Mother,” she says.</p><p></p><p>Daughter.</p><p></p><p>Rey –</p><p></p><p><strong>Rey is her daughter??</strong></p><p></p><p>Seraph chuckles. It sounds like wasps in a paper hive. “Mother. You acknowledge it quickly, my daughter. You were always decisive. It is why you succeed.”</p><p></p><p>My attention is riveted to Rey’s face. <em>It is somehow right</em>, says her expression. <em>Alien, horrifying, exhilarating, but correct.</em></p><p></p><p>She is a dragon’s daughter.</p><p></p><p>She doesn’t look like a dragon. Not at all. She never has. She’s not a dragon.</p><p></p><p>“Why are you telling me this now?” Rey continues.</p><p></p><p>“It is time. You must carry out my two remaining tasks.”</p><p></p><p>“I must protect you,” Rey replies.</p><p></p><p>Seraph laughs until coughing again.</p><p></p><p>“That would be a waste. No. You must find the monster that infected Ithane and kill it. I have reason to believe it is also a dragon or assumes our form. Whatever it is has been tainting the lands for hundreds of miles in every direction. It is subtle, something that only we may sense, though perhaps elders among both of your peoples,” she nods at Rishkar and Etona, “have also noticed. You must bring this thing’s end.”</p><p></p><p>“I will,” Rey says pounding the butt of her spear on the ground. “What is the third task?”</p><p></p><p>Seraph closes her eyes. The air stirs. Something is happening. “You must slough off that human shell.”</p><p></p><p>“What do you mean?”</p><p></p><p>“This.”</p><p></p><p>Flare. White. Impossibly white. From … eyes? I hear a roar, a Seraph-as-dragon roar, and Rey cries out just as I am pushed off my feet away from them. Squinting through slitted fingers, I see Seraph has once again become dragon and is consuming Rey! But I can see Rey and Seraph is … what am I seeing? She has Rey’s forearms. She is still humanoid but the dragon is an ethereal image superimposed on the top. Humanoid Seraph has her jaws clamped down on the back of … her daughter’s … neck. Rey is on her knees, back arched, electricity flowing out of her mark, out from between Seraph’s teeth. It chases me yet further away.</p><p></p><p>Through pulses of current, I watch Rey’s body change: skin parts, bones move, muscles stretch. She is crying out, an unending bellow of pain. Stop! Stop! I yell, perhaps, I don’t know.</p><p></p><p>The woven armor during this torture slithers onto Rey. Its metal fangs bite into her at several points.</p><p></p><p>Finally Seraph releases her, quivering, to the ground. She wipes her mouth, smiles, and rolls back on her throne. I think she passes out.</p><p></p><p>I at Rey’s side in an instant. Her skin is very hot, hair singed. I can smell burning stone, roasted hide and even flesh. Her pulse is shallow and fast. O Silver Mistress what can I do? But she comes to suddenly, looking all around. She recognizes me after a wild moment and grips my hand.</p><p></p><p>“I’m here,” I say.</p><p></p><p>She sees Seraph, a collapsed heap that had rolled onto the Wind Dukes’ architect’s bed.</p><p></p><p>“Mistress? Mother? Mother!”</p><p></p><p>Seraph slowly, deliberately, blinks. Her lips are moving; Rey bends down to hear.</p><p></p><p>“I will, I will,” Rey says to her.</p><p></p><p>Seraph’s breathing slows to almost nothing.</p><p></p><p>“Okefsklur. Dragonsleep,” says Rishkar. He looks at Rey. “She regenerates.”</p><p></p><p>“What did she say?” I ask a moment later.</p><p></p><p>“’Daughter, whatever happens, return.’ I will, mother. I will.”</p><p></p><p>***</p><p></p><p>She has gently shaken me off. She wants to be alone, but she is also blazing with the task she has been presented with, so I give her space. I watch her as we return to the stairs. She is off-balance, but not from weakness. She is–.</p><p></p><p>Is she …?</p><p></p><p>She is <em>taller</em>. Is that right?</p><p></p><p>Yes. She is distinctly two inches or so taller.</p><p></p><p>Also, when she blinks there is something there that wasn’t before. An extra, slight movement under her eyelids. Because I am her subtle and tactful friend, I point it out of course. Imbecile. As if she hadn’t enough to worry about, had not had her entire world tossed out for this new one, and here I am with my little observations. No wonder she is keeping her distance. I do manage to not blurt out something else I notice, so faint that I didn’t think it real at first but I do now: her skin is tinged blue. It is not uniform: some kind of marbled pattern. I wonder if it is a pattern of some kind. It is very faint and is probably not even noticeable to most people, but now that I see it, it is obvious to me.</p><p></p><p>Her scent has changed subtly, too, though that might be the <em>eclai’ir</em>.</p><p></p><p>What do I do with a transformed friend becoming physically more like her maleficent mother?</p><p></p><p>***</p><p></p><p>When we get back to the surface of the cave, there is a kobold, black-scaled – one of Ithane’s – bound and muttering to itself. Egan has apparently captured it, but where is he?</p><p></p><p>The creature is huddled by the tall, round, standing ring of stone that has rested on its stone platform for who knows how many centuries. It had always looked to me like a raw and oversized version of a human waystone, quite dead. But that was before. It is active now.</p><p></p><p>I had never seen one working, but I read about them in a Fey library where there were also drawings and paintings. They could be almost any color. This one ripples with black liquid filling the ring, impossibly held upright by whatever magic is carved into the now-glowing runes all around.</p><p></p><p>We creep towards it until we finally spot a human man, but it is not Egan.</p><p></p><p>Swarthy, grizzled, wearing worn clothes, weapons and an eye patch on the left eye, he looks right at me. He should not have spotted me. He was putting a backpack together, I think, when he did. He does not seem surprised and doesn’t go for his blade.</p><p></p><p>“Who are you?” I ask.</p><p></p><p>“Trieg.”</p><p></p><p>“From Greyhawk?”</p><p></p><p>He laughs. “Yes, I suppose. Also from Greyhawk. As are you, I guess, at least recently. You’re Etona. And you’re Rey, and you, Master Rishkar from the southern swamp.”</p><p></p><p>“Why are you here?”</p><p></p><p>“Need to meet a young wizard.”</p><p></p><p>“Why?”</p><p></p><p>He eyes Angivre as I loose her and bring her into my hands. “I have a package for him.”</p><p></p><p>“Is he expecting it?”</p><p></p><p>He smiles. It would be charming in other circumstances. “I don’t really know. But I have to get it to him. It’s from Alastar.” He stands and raises his arms in a friendly gesture.</p><p></p><p>“So you are a courier and nothing else?”</p><p></p><p>“Simple courier today, yes. But everyone is something else.”</p><p></p><p>A growing racket outside has been tugging at my attention. Rey doesn’t seem overly concerned by this man and so heads in that direction. I turn to follow, just for a peek outside and perhaps a breath of fresh air, if it can be managed, but when I turn back to throw a last check on Trigg-er, no ... the courier, I see him striding into the black like he was heading to his bedroom. Something churning on the surface of the waypoint, but a blast of sound from the cave entrance pulls me away running.</p><p></p><p>***</p><p></p><p>A revenge army is here, I gather, to take Seraph. Led by a dragonkin in heavy armor, quite a lot of kobolds have assembled – certainly more than we can handle. Rey looks worried and not for herself. I place a hand lightly on her shoulder, expecting it to be shaken off, but she rests her own hand over mine. It is still hot. She looks back at me. Her expression says it all.</p><p></p><p>“They will gain these tunnels dearly, Rey,” I say. “But we could use need reinforcements. Is there way to get word–.”</p><p></p><p>They come out of the blue, flashing clouds, out of the wind. Dozens of them. Golden eagle heads on humanoid bird bodies. As they arrive, lightning begins touching down all around the Cairn, bolt after bolt.</p><p></p><p>Ithane’s lieutenant – the dragon kin who would normally be an impressive figure – is attempting to valiantly lead his troops into battle, but the wind is knocking him on his tail. And really, trying to do anything valiantly with kobolds is a wasted effort. After a few moments, the entire assemblage largely retreats.</p><p></p><p>A trio of the bird-men land directly in front of us. They nod to Rey who returns the gesture.</p><p></p><p>“We are here to safeguard our Mistress,” one of them chirrups.</p><p></p><p>“Then we will help,” I say and draw back the Silver. Only it fails to appear. Again.</p><p></p><p>Suddenly I cannot get enough air.</p><p></p><p>“What is it?” I ask her, stroking her along her curve. “Should I not be here? Should I not be protecting?” Angivre has never spoken to me before and does not deign to do so now.</p><p></p><p>“I must meditate,” I announce to Rey and stride quickly off into an alcove.</p><p></p><p>“What? Now?” I hear her outraged demand behind me.</p><p></p><p>I settle down where we found Egan’s sister’s sleeping bag and reach out my thoughts. I am vaguely aware of Rey kneeling down next to me, but she doesn’t say anything.</p><p></p><p><em>Memories, emotions, sounds of my body slowing; these I pass through. When She comes to me, it is sudden, I am energized, my skin tingles, my spine arches. I feel Her cold fire in my blood.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>A game piece appears in the darkness behind my eyelids, one such as used by elves of the Fey to play one of their myriad games. This one emanates mists and lightning but it does not represent Rey: I feel sure it is Egan. It moves into a shadowy part of the board I cannot make out.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>I am Angivre firing an arrow after him, not to strike but to light the way. I become that arrow passing above many figures now: a knight shaped like a dragon; a piece that looks like part of a fortress surrounded by wailing ghosts; and then above the wizard that is Egan.</em></p><p><em></em></p><p><em>Off in the distance – not in front of me but to the side, trying to intercept us – is yet another game piece: ancient and armored with a blade that burns red, a ruby crack in reality through which souls are crying out. This figure is leaping to us from another board, trying to join our game. The board rotates a quarter-turn and it seems like we are running now toward his, except the dragon piece has leaped to yet another board herself. I do not know which way to go: I cannot make out which piece is most important so I travel up and explode into moonlight. I illuminate everything, all boards, for an instant, and understand.</em></p><p></p><p>I awaken standing on my feet, Rey holding me up. I am panting and leaning on her. Faintly, I hear the cawing of ravens, one of Her signature echoes, in my head. Its sound pushes the flash of understanding right out of me.</p><p></p><p><em>Why give me answers and then snatch them away again?</em></p><p></p><p>“There are games to be played,” I say to Rey once I catch my breath. I am soaking wet. “And the pieces are setting up. I see Egan – he seemed to be in the lead – but two more are coming. One of them might be Trelaine, the courier.”</p><p></p><p>“Trieg.”</p><p></p><p>“Yes, Trieg. If so, there is something of ghosts and stone about him. I do not think he wields the crimson sword – that is another. We must follow them; we must go through the waypoint.”</p><p></p><p>“You are talking crazy. You realize that, right?”</p><p></p><p>“Am I?”</p><p></p><p>“It has been a crazy day,” she concedes.</p><p></p><p>“I was just thinking that, too,” I say and grin. This finally draws a real smile, her first since we encountered her Mistress a mile off from here.</p><p></p><p>But it is true: Diamond Lake attacked; Alastar slain; Verdre back from the Fey; Egan with new powers presumably from yet another master; <strong>we killed a dragon!</strong>; we saved another dragon and it is <em>Rey’s actual mother</em>??; Rey has transformed subtly into something else and perhaps she is not finished; bird men of legend arrive to attack Ithane’s kobold army here to kill Seraph; there is a stranger in the Cairn not here an hour ago who has a package for Egan; the ancient waypoint seems to be active now; as clear and compelling a vision as I have received in weeks, perhaps months; we are to pursue the stranger and Egan and another with a red blade promising a new reality through this unknown waypoint, all according to Her Unknowable Mocking Laughter of Truth.</p><p></p><p>And I have not yet even had dinner.</p><p></p><p>We walk to where the kobold prisoner is muttering to itself. After the briefest of discussions we decide to give the creature to the birdmen, which Rey does.</p><p></p><p>“I will enter first,” she commands as she turns to go escort the little monster to the entrance of the cave, probably to its messy doom.</p><p></p><p><em>Of course you will,</em> I think. <em>I am sure you have your own reasons, but your few words ever sing with self-sacrifice and protection. You are ready to take the lead, possibly to oblivion, at my say-so. Do you see my looks of wonder, I wonder?</em></p><p></p><p>She returns just as I am striding into the waypoint, a mischievous grin on my face just for her. She runs towards me, alarmed and exasperated, and …</p><p></p><p>It is as if a hundred giants breathed in, vaguely saying the word '<strong>WOP!</strong>' all at the same time.</p><p></p><p>The passage is smothering, dizzying. But it was also quick, at least from my point of view, though perhaps years have passed. I have no way of knowing.</p><p></p><p>I came out into a dark corridor, the waypoint forming its end. Ahead of me is Trieste, no. The, uh, courier. I will get the name correct one day. Rey is but a moment behind me; she emerges with an arm outstretched. I take her hand.</p><p></p><p>“What now?” she asks.</p><p></p><p>Yes.</p><p></p><p>What now?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Alexander Bryant1, post: 7520455, member: 6916184"] [b]Journal of Etona - 20[/b] “Do you see it?” I call. “You were correct: here in about an hour,” she replies from the top of the Cairn hill. A solid bank of dark blue clouds flaring with lightning is approaching from the mountains. From where Seraph lives. Has it come to collect whatever soul the dragon possessed? Rey comes back down the hill wearing an expression I had not seen before. It is alarming. “We will be drenched,” she continues. “If there is anything like a trail, it will be lost.” Worry makes her voice crack. “But I think I saw it, where she came down.” I am still not clear on all the little creases and folds of her relationship with Seraph, so I ask something probably pretty stupid. “Do you want to find her … alive?” Rey stares at me. “Yes,” she states hardly believing my question. But her eyes widen as she understands. I had helped her kill a dragon. I would lend my effort to that cause again, if she wished. And perhaps it is what I want to do now…. I squeeze her hand. “Then we’d better hurry,” I say. She takes off with Rishkar in tow, but I tarry to locate Egan. “Are you coming?” I ask him. “Nay, lass, eh, if ye don’t mind. I think I need ta stay here and make sure the Cairn doesna’ go anywhere.” “You have enslaved yourself for some powers again, I see.” He smiles sheepishly so I continue. “I would speak with you about this when we return.” He shrugs. Infuriating boy. *** The wind pushes us along. Whatever awaited us will have us scented. Though perhaps not: I smell [I][eclai’ir[/I]. The Common word for it is a funny one I cannot remember, something with z’s. ‘Ozum’ or something like it. They both mean [I]lightning-burned air[/I]. There is something else in the wind as well, an acrid scent, burning not from heat but more like the fumes of Diamond Lake refinery. It is chemical like the lab in Seraph’s lair. I hear something even through the gale and alert Rey but she has also already caught it: faint sound ahead coming from where we are going, which is toward a naturally-occurring basin made deeper by something recent and unnatural. The sounds are voices and, too, the ground physically bubbling. Something like heat shimmers the air. “It is Ithane,” Rishkar says. “She was here. This is her scent. I also smell [I]k’sheek es’serast[/I].” 'Mistress Seraph' in his Draconic tongue. A ring of this nasty soup the ground has become forms the perimeter of the basin. As we watch a moment, getting our bearings on the scene, it seems to be growing, moving slowly towards a rocky middle on which we see a humanoid form, very tall and very blue. It is certainly not a dragon nor even anything like its kin, but details are hard to make out because a whitish smoke swirls in the breeze. We see the owners of the voices: more kobolds peering over a ridge on the far side. Rey runs heedlessly down into the basin. [I]So this is how she must feel most of the time[/I], I think as I watch her retreating form, no plan, no fear, no thought. I run down after her firing volley after volley at the glaring kobolds. I try to hit the rocks around them, freezing and exploding them in equal measure. Killing them might provoke anger. Scaring will provoke fleeing. “We have slain a dragon today: your mistress is dead. Will you join her?” I yell. No response from them. Rey catches my eye. I glance at her face which has assumed a ‘What are you doing?’ look. ‘What?’ I mouth back. She cries out something in Draconic. Oh. They don’t speak Common. Right. But they also seem unimpressed at Rey’s words as well which are halting: she doesn’t like to raise it, I know, and her Draconic is not exactly theirs. Fortunately our weapons and Rishkar’s bolts make our case for us, and they withdraw. We arrive at the figure who is just getting to her feet with obvious pain in front of us. She is unearthly, supernatural. Over seven feet tall, her height seems correct for her, not freakish and not an illusion. Her skin is pale blue like the waters of a shallow shore. Her eyes are solid cobalt, glowing beneath unruly, raven-black tresses. Her lips are dark blue. She should be resplendent in her shimmering blue-silver metals that appear to be woven rather than linked by chain, but they are torn and melted, and dark red blood seeps through the gashes. She has horns. It should have been the first thing I noticed, but her presence is so commanding – even limping and grimacing – that this detail takes a moment to register. The horn that is still whole is curled, aquamarine, blending into midnight as it retreats under her mad hair. The other is broken, leaking more blood. She walks on obviously fractured legs to Rey, utterly ignoring Rishkar and me, her mighty pride not allowing any other course of action. Yes, this is definitely Seraph. She says something to her in the dragon-tongue. Later, Rey would relate the entire conversation so I will notate it here. [I]“She is dead?” Seraph asked. Rey nodded. “She was weak, not merely weak-minded – the acid-spitters are all insane – but physically weaker than she should have been. It is why I am still alive.” She spat this last out as if it angered her to admit it. “You killed her?” Rey nodded again and added, “With help from my friends.” “Mmm. You again,” she said to me though I did not the words. “Little Moon Girl.” She turned to Rishkar. “What of you?” she demanded. “What marks of yours are left on Ithane’s body?” “Fire and frost, mistress,” he said, presenting his icy blade and bowing low to her. She nodded and was about to say something more but then coughed violently. Dark red blood hit the ground. It had metallic flakes in it.[/I] “Mistress!” Rey said and stepped forward. I also started but she stopped both of us with a hand and switched to Common. “Yes, yes,” she berates us, waving off her pain. “Attend! I have three tasks for you. We complete the first now. I cannot get to my lair in this condition so you will take me into the Cairn, somewhere I can sleep in peace for some time.” “Rishkar,” Rey commands after thinking a moment, “you can fashion your hovering disk into a proper throne, can you not?” The serpent man bows again and summons the disk. It shimmers in the shape of a large reclining chair such as I had seen in Greyhawk and also in the Fey city I traveled to years ago. She forces herself onto it in a quick, graceful motion, huffing in pain just a single time. Then she settles, satisfied as it rises up again, queen of all she surveys. As Rey and Rishkar move slowly back to the Cairn, I act as scout and ward, harrying those kobolds drawing too close. They are still out there, packs of them. We have been hearing summoning blasts from makeshift trumpets for the past hour, but we do eventually make it to the Cairn. Egan is nowhere to be seen, but with the obvious activity outside I am sure he has retreated within. I stay just above the cave entrance – where Ithane had draped herself, incidentally – and watch. And wait. They come, dozens, maybe scores in number. They are far from the entrance, but they do not know Angivre’s reach. I show them. I [I]make [/I]to show them, that is, but the Silver does not come. “Why?” I whisper. I run back to the others. “They are gathering outside,” I tell them “but they are not ready to push forward. They seem to be waiting for something.” We descend to the room where we had found Egan’s poor sister, dead on a dais meant as a bed to a demigod. The place has been considerably cleaned. In fact, the entire Cairn has been built out, lit, swept and made habitable, but it was still underground to me so I focused on my breathing. Rey needs me now. Speaking again in Draconic, Rey related Seraph and her own words to me later. [I]“One task complete,” Seraph had purred as the floating throne pulled up alongside her place of rest. “Very good. This is suitable. You have not failed me. You must not fail me.” “I will not, mistress.” Rey was all but shaking. “Yes. Well, it is time to reveal some secrets before my other tasks. You should know your father was one of my servants.” At Rey’s surprise, she’d continued, “Surely you did not believe you all lived in my shadow for so long with my having no knowledge of it? And he none of me?” She had wondered that but had dismissed it. Faerellan, her father, had been a skilled ranger. Her more domestic mother, Emily, and little brother, Sanka, (e’isk in Elven, based on the word for pine needle) never strayed very far from home, so Rey had assumed that their little family had never been noticed. He had never said anything about a dragon. There had been a rich blue in several places around the house, a difficult color to make, particularly that shade. Where had it been? In clothing? Pictures? She couldn’t remember. “I knew him well,” Seraph continued. “He was unexpectedly useful to me.” She regarded Rey for a time. There was silence in the chamber. Then she said quietly: “Close, even.” “He never mentioned….” Rey started. “Very close,” she overrode Rey.[/I] She utters one last word, in Common. “… daughter.” Rishkar hisses, his tiny eyes as wide as I have ever seen them. “Rey?” I say but she cannot hear me. Her shock has frozen her. What about a daughter? Do we need to save or kill or have tea with Seraph’s daughter somewhere? But no, that was not it at all, of course. The reality is unreal. It had bizarrely all fit, Rey would tell me later when we talked about it: her human ‘mother’ never very close to her, even a little afraid of her, as was her ‘brother’. They had always behaved like favored servants to her father. Not kin at all. And it explained all those other curiosities: her own body; her mind and how it worked; her natural grace; her strength which exceeded even her own father’s when she’d had but her dozen years behind her. And of course the dragon mark. The magic she wielded without memorizing thick tomes, without a bargaining with a supernatural patron. Without a goddess to watch over her. “Daughter? Rey? Do we need to find–,” I begin but she raised a hand at me. She faces me and all I see is lost. I want to go to her but it is not my time: this doesn’t involve me. I nod once and she returns it. [I]Later[/I], we have just agreed. She faces Seraph again. “Mother,” she says. Daughter. Rey – [B]Rey is her daughter??[/B] Seraph chuckles. It sounds like wasps in a paper hive. “Mother. You acknowledge it quickly, my daughter. You were always decisive. It is why you succeed.” My attention is riveted to Rey’s face. [I]It is somehow right[/I], says her expression. [I]Alien, horrifying, exhilarating, but correct.[/I] She is a dragon’s daughter. She doesn’t look like a dragon. Not at all. She never has. She’s not a dragon. “Why are you telling me this now?” Rey continues. “It is time. You must carry out my two remaining tasks.” “I must protect you,” Rey replies. Seraph laughs until coughing again. “That would be a waste. No. You must find the monster that infected Ithane and kill it. I have reason to believe it is also a dragon or assumes our form. Whatever it is has been tainting the lands for hundreds of miles in every direction. It is subtle, something that only we may sense, though perhaps elders among both of your peoples,” she nods at Rishkar and Etona, “have also noticed. You must bring this thing’s end.” “I will,” Rey says pounding the butt of her spear on the ground. “What is the third task?” Seraph closes her eyes. The air stirs. Something is happening. “You must slough off that human shell.” “What do you mean?” “This.” Flare. White. Impossibly white. From … eyes? I hear a roar, a Seraph-as-dragon roar, and Rey cries out just as I am pushed off my feet away from them. Squinting through slitted fingers, I see Seraph has once again become dragon and is consuming Rey! But I can see Rey and Seraph is … what am I seeing? She has Rey’s forearms. She is still humanoid but the dragon is an ethereal image superimposed on the top. Humanoid Seraph has her jaws clamped down on the back of … her daughter’s … neck. Rey is on her knees, back arched, electricity flowing out of her mark, out from between Seraph’s teeth. It chases me yet further away. Through pulses of current, I watch Rey’s body change: skin parts, bones move, muscles stretch. She is crying out, an unending bellow of pain. Stop! Stop! I yell, perhaps, I don’t know. The woven armor during this torture slithers onto Rey. Its metal fangs bite into her at several points. Finally Seraph releases her, quivering, to the ground. She wipes her mouth, smiles, and rolls back on her throne. I think she passes out. I at Rey’s side in an instant. Her skin is very hot, hair singed. I can smell burning stone, roasted hide and even flesh. Her pulse is shallow and fast. O Silver Mistress what can I do? But she comes to suddenly, looking all around. She recognizes me after a wild moment and grips my hand. “I’m here,” I say. She sees Seraph, a collapsed heap that had rolled onto the Wind Dukes’ architect’s bed. “Mistress? Mother? Mother!” Seraph slowly, deliberately, blinks. Her lips are moving; Rey bends down to hear. “I will, I will,” Rey says to her. Seraph’s breathing slows to almost nothing. “Okefsklur. Dragonsleep,” says Rishkar. He looks at Rey. “She regenerates.” “What did she say?” I ask a moment later. “’Daughter, whatever happens, return.’ I will, mother. I will.” *** She has gently shaken me off. She wants to be alone, but she is also blazing with the task she has been presented with, so I give her space. I watch her as we return to the stairs. She is off-balance, but not from weakness. She is–. Is she …? She is [I]taller[/I]. Is that right? Yes. She is distinctly two inches or so taller. Also, when she blinks there is something there that wasn’t before. An extra, slight movement under her eyelids. Because I am her subtle and tactful friend, I point it out of course. Imbecile. As if she hadn’t enough to worry about, had not had her entire world tossed out for this new one, and here I am with my little observations. No wonder she is keeping her distance. I do manage to not blurt out something else I notice, so faint that I didn’t think it real at first but I do now: her skin is tinged blue. It is not uniform: some kind of marbled pattern. I wonder if it is a pattern of some kind. It is very faint and is probably not even noticeable to most people, but now that I see it, it is obvious to me. Her scent has changed subtly, too, though that might be the [I]eclai’ir[/I]. What do I do with a transformed friend becoming physically more like her maleficent mother? *** When we get back to the surface of the cave, there is a kobold, black-scaled – one of Ithane’s – bound and muttering to itself. Egan has apparently captured it, but where is he? The creature is huddled by the tall, round, standing ring of stone that has rested on its stone platform for who knows how many centuries. It had always looked to me like a raw and oversized version of a human waystone, quite dead. But that was before. It is active now. I had never seen one working, but I read about them in a Fey library where there were also drawings and paintings. They could be almost any color. This one ripples with black liquid filling the ring, impossibly held upright by whatever magic is carved into the now-glowing runes all around. We creep towards it until we finally spot a human man, but it is not Egan. Swarthy, grizzled, wearing worn clothes, weapons and an eye patch on the left eye, he looks right at me. He should not have spotted me. He was putting a backpack together, I think, when he did. He does not seem surprised and doesn’t go for his blade. “Who are you?” I ask. “Trieg.” “From Greyhawk?” He laughs. “Yes, I suppose. Also from Greyhawk. As are you, I guess, at least recently. You’re Etona. And you’re Rey, and you, Master Rishkar from the southern swamp.” “Why are you here?” “Need to meet a young wizard.” “Why?” He eyes Angivre as I loose her and bring her into my hands. “I have a package for him.” “Is he expecting it?” He smiles. It would be charming in other circumstances. “I don’t really know. But I have to get it to him. It’s from Alastar.” He stands and raises his arms in a friendly gesture. “So you are a courier and nothing else?” “Simple courier today, yes. But everyone is something else.” A growing racket outside has been tugging at my attention. Rey doesn’t seem overly concerned by this man and so heads in that direction. I turn to follow, just for a peek outside and perhaps a breath of fresh air, if it can be managed, but when I turn back to throw a last check on Trigg-er, no ... the courier, I see him striding into the black like he was heading to his bedroom. Something churning on the surface of the waypoint, but a blast of sound from the cave entrance pulls me away running. *** A revenge army is here, I gather, to take Seraph. Led by a dragonkin in heavy armor, quite a lot of kobolds have assembled – certainly more than we can handle. Rey looks worried and not for herself. I place a hand lightly on her shoulder, expecting it to be shaken off, but she rests her own hand over mine. It is still hot. She looks back at me. Her expression says it all. “They will gain these tunnels dearly, Rey,” I say. “But we could use need reinforcements. Is there way to get word–.” They come out of the blue, flashing clouds, out of the wind. Dozens of them. Golden eagle heads on humanoid bird bodies. As they arrive, lightning begins touching down all around the Cairn, bolt after bolt. Ithane’s lieutenant – the dragon kin who would normally be an impressive figure – is attempting to valiantly lead his troops into battle, but the wind is knocking him on his tail. And really, trying to do anything valiantly with kobolds is a wasted effort. After a few moments, the entire assemblage largely retreats. A trio of the bird-men land directly in front of us. They nod to Rey who returns the gesture. “We are here to safeguard our Mistress,” one of them chirrups. “Then we will help,” I say and draw back the Silver. Only it fails to appear. Again. Suddenly I cannot get enough air. “What is it?” I ask her, stroking her along her curve. “Should I not be here? Should I not be protecting?” Angivre has never spoken to me before and does not deign to do so now. “I must meditate,” I announce to Rey and stride quickly off into an alcove. “What? Now?” I hear her outraged demand behind me. I settle down where we found Egan’s sister’s sleeping bag and reach out my thoughts. I am vaguely aware of Rey kneeling down next to me, but she doesn’t say anything. [I]Memories, emotions, sounds of my body slowing; these I pass through. When She comes to me, it is sudden, I am energized, my skin tingles, my spine arches. I feel Her cold fire in my blood. A game piece appears in the darkness behind my eyelids, one such as used by elves of the Fey to play one of their myriad games. This one emanates mists and lightning but it does not represent Rey: I feel sure it is Egan. It moves into a shadowy part of the board I cannot make out. I am Angivre firing an arrow after him, not to strike but to light the way. I become that arrow passing above many figures now: a knight shaped like a dragon; a piece that looks like part of a fortress surrounded by wailing ghosts; and then above the wizard that is Egan. Off in the distance – not in front of me but to the side, trying to intercept us – is yet another game piece: ancient and armored with a blade that burns red, a ruby crack in reality through which souls are crying out. This figure is leaping to us from another board, trying to join our game. The board rotates a quarter-turn and it seems like we are running now toward his, except the dragon piece has leaped to yet another board herself. I do not know which way to go: I cannot make out which piece is most important so I travel up and explode into moonlight. I illuminate everything, all boards, for an instant, and understand.[/I] I awaken standing on my feet, Rey holding me up. I am panting and leaning on her. Faintly, I hear the cawing of ravens, one of Her signature echoes, in my head. Its sound pushes the flash of understanding right out of me. [I]Why give me answers and then snatch them away again?[/I] “There are games to be played,” I say to Rey once I catch my breath. I am soaking wet. “And the pieces are setting up. I see Egan – he seemed to be in the lead – but two more are coming. One of them might be Trelaine, the courier.” “Trieg.” “Yes, Trieg. If so, there is something of ghosts and stone about him. I do not think he wields the crimson sword – that is another. We must follow them; we must go through the waypoint.” “You are talking crazy. You realize that, right?” “Am I?” “It has been a crazy day,” she concedes. “I was just thinking that, too,” I say and grin. This finally draws a real smile, her first since we encountered her Mistress a mile off from here. But it is true: Diamond Lake attacked; Alastar slain; Verdre back from the Fey; Egan with new powers presumably from yet another master; [B]we killed a dragon![/B]; we saved another dragon and it is [I]Rey’s actual mother[/I]??; Rey has transformed subtly into something else and perhaps she is not finished; bird men of legend arrive to attack Ithane’s kobold army here to kill Seraph; there is a stranger in the Cairn not here an hour ago who has a package for Egan; the ancient waypoint seems to be active now; as clear and compelling a vision as I have received in weeks, perhaps months; we are to pursue the stranger and Egan and another with a red blade promising a new reality through this unknown waypoint, all according to Her Unknowable Mocking Laughter of Truth. And I have not yet even had dinner. We walk to where the kobold prisoner is muttering to itself. After the briefest of discussions we decide to give the creature to the birdmen, which Rey does. “I will enter first,” she commands as she turns to go escort the little monster to the entrance of the cave, probably to its messy doom. [I]Of course you will,[/I] I think. [I]I am sure you have your own reasons, but your few words ever sing with self-sacrifice and protection. You are ready to take the lead, possibly to oblivion, at my say-so. Do you see my looks of wonder, I wonder?[/I] She returns just as I am striding into the waypoint, a mischievous grin on my face just for her. She runs towards me, alarmed and exasperated, and … It is as if a hundred giants breathed in, vaguely saying the word '[B]WOP![/B]' all at the same time. The passage is smothering, dizzying. But it was also quick, at least from my point of view, though perhaps years have passed. I have no way of knowing. I came out into a dark corridor, the waypoint forming its end. Ahead of me is Trieste, no. The, uh, courier. I will get the name correct one day. Rey is but a moment behind me; she emerges with an arm outstretched. I take her hand. “What now?” she asks. Yes. What now? [/QUOTE]
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