Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="WizarDru" data-source="post: 1049718" data-attributes="member: 151">This will be the first of several updates to follow.  I have decided to change the style to a more standard story-hour.  Let me know what you think.  I am currently two sessions behind on Avonshar, and we covered a lot of ground.  Expect more updates throughout the week.  It's my goal to get us completely caught up within the week.Enjoy.---------------------------------------------------------------------------The Journal of Strider Rannos, Book II"Mothers in Darkness"Part the First: LUNATICS  Prelude:Alset ran as fast as he could down the darkened alleyway.  He didn't know what they were, but he knew that they shouldn't be.  The way they moved....nothing moved like that.  Nothing should.  In the tiny part of his mind that remained rational, a voice tried to warn him that he was panicking.  It didn't matter.  He just had to run, and keep running.Where was everyone?  The merchant dashed left up another alleyway, then jumped some boxes, continuing on.  His rational mind was chastising him, now.  He was consumed with self-reproach.  Of course the streets were empty...why wouldn't they be?  All the smart ones had left during the exodus.  The city was a veritable ghost-town.  He had stayed, thinking this would be the opportunity to make his fortune.  As he heard the shambling from behind, he knew what a foolish thought that had been.  Faster.He ran into an abandoned building, sealing the door behind him and barring it.  Still he ran.  Up the broken stairs.  Look for a window. Be quiet.  Wait. Wait.  He listened the wet-slaps from the alley below.  Had they heard him?  Would they force their way in?  The heavy, wet footsteps paused, as if his pursuers were confused.  Then, just as suddenly, they moved off quickly.  Had they given up?The sound confused him.  It sounded a wet 'shlurrrrp', as if someone had thrown something wet on the floor.  It was behind him.  Numbly, he turned around, as a voice said to him: "Oh, no.   Can't have that.   We need you.   WE NEED YOUR NICE, SOLID FLESH."  Alset looked in the direction of the voice, but saw no one.Then he looked down.Had anyone been near to hear, they would have heard Alset's scream suddenly muffled by something wet and slimy being shoved in his throat.And then they wouldn't have heard anything at all.+++++++++++++++++++++++++Chapter I: The Eye in the MoonRannos stared down at his sketches.  He had spent no small amount of time refining his skill so that he could record images just such as these, to enhance the knowledge of the library.  He had long hoped that his journal work would become important tomes of the library of Bashad, documenting the wilderness of Avonshar.  He had not expected to actually find himself living there, but stranger things had happened since the Expedition of the Eye.  He had travelled widely since then, going off-plane for weeks at a time.  He was engaged to speak to travellers across the Great Wheel, surely the longest of all roads.After the second journey, he had found his things moved to the Great Library of Bashad itself, and that it had become a defacto center of government for the city.  After the Exodus, as it was now called, many scarcely considered Bashad anything other than a shadow of it's former self...barely a city at all, in fact.  Thousands had left...and not just from the city.  The outlying towns that had not been destroyed were emptied in a matter of days.  And who could blame them?  The Black Ral'Shar had slaughtered dozens, defeated patrols of the Traveller...and then disappeared.There were now only four settlements that remained, and those were all within a matter of miles of the city proper.  In those first weeks after the attack, panic was widespread.  People left without telling anyone in the mad rush to escape.  This only fueled the fire, as it was readily assumed that someone had been taken and killed, rather than just left without warning.  Hundreds of years of colonization lost in a matter of weeks.  Rannos sighed mournfully at the thought of it.His fault.His.None had said it, of course.  Not his friends, not the temple, not the council.  But he knew it, all the same.  Hundreds (thousands?) dead, and the blood was on his hands.And how had the church reacted?  They promoted him to the rank of Strider.  Why?  If they thought it would keep him quiet, they had miscalculated.  Had it been a genuine mark of respect?  He didn't know, and was becoming too cynical lately to think clearly on the matter.But where were the follow-up attacks?  Why had the slaughter stopped?  It perplexed them all.  After the initial attacks, the black Ral'Shar had disappeared.  Anywhere else, and the elders would have sought the knowledge of Fharlangann to seek the truth.  But divinations failed within the city limits of Bashad, and within a 50-mile radius of the city.  And no one could survive that far from civilization, not now.  Not knowing where the aliens were was, in many ways, far worse.But panic could not last forever.  When uneventful week followed uneventful week, the Exodus stopped, and like the tide rolling in, some returned.  Newcomers came, too....but usually the desperate and the degnerate.   Fools, outcasts and grifters.  Then, slowly at first, people began arriving.  The terror had ended, at least for now, and people saw opportunity again.  Then THEY appeared.  The very thought of what THEY had said about him was worse than anything he had thought.Before Rannos could think more of this, there was a knock at the door."Yes?", he called.A muffled voice stuttered some reply.  Rannos couldn't make out the words, but knew the boy's voice."Oh, Road's End!  Open the door, Eustace, for pity's sake!"The door opened, and the lad looked as if he had been slapped.  A short, sheepish lad, Eustace slid into the room.  He was known as a coward, according to Culain, and they hoped that Rannos would give him some backbone.  The opposite appeared to be happening.  The boy merely stood mutely by, looking anxious.Rannos cleared his throat, waiting."Er..well, that is...yes, Strider.  Strider Culain wants...um, he wishes that you would...ehr, that is..""Cuhlain wishes to see me, is that it?""Strider, yes...that is basically what he asked, yes.  Yes.  And your...ehr, the...those people who...ehh..""My travelling companions, yes?  Very well, lad.  No tea, then.  I have a feeling that I'll not have time, today.""Yes, strider."  The boy bowed low.  He was dutiful, but easily spooked.  Rannos hadn't bothered to tell him about the various events he'd seen in recent months.  No need in curling the boys hair any more than he had to."Go to the smithy section, and find Alden, lad.  Tell him and Delwyn, remember him?, to meet me at Culain's apartment.  I need to head to the Seventh League."The..THE Tavern, strider?  But Strider Culain asked for you right away, master."Rannos frowned, slightly."I am aware of that, acolyte..  Several of my companions will be found there.".The boy looked smaller than before, if possible.  He stuttered an apology."Forget it, lad.  There are some in our order who do just that.  Sometimes with just cause.  Merely watch that you understand the whys and whens of such.""Yes, Strider.""And send a runner...a female one...to the monastery where Tazendra is meditating."The boy looked ready to ask why it must be a female acolyte, but he knew the answer as well as Rannos.  Men were not welcome within the monastary's walls.  The very idea was very alluring to a young boy such as Eustace, who no doubt had his own ideas of what might go on in those staid halls.  He would be quite disappointed, Rannos knew, but there was little reason to correct the boy, regardless.  Smiling, he waved and dismissed the boy.Five minutes later, Casparo was doing the same thing to him.</blockquote>

Verification