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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gregor" data-source="post: 5545557" data-attributes="member: 11751">Timbre manages a smile at Bannock's kind words, her dark walnut-wood colour eyes glimmering, through the pain of the endless flames that cover her body."The pain is ... immense, I cannot lie.  Many times have I lapsed into unreason and fear as my skin scorches and crackles without surcease.  The gift you have brought me today has returned me from the brink and I thank you."She gathers herself, focusing against the obvious discomfort she faces and calls a flaming boar forward so that she can take comfort from its presence."To answer your question, my noble young human, is no simple matter.  Humour me, please, as I try to explain.  Behind me stands the First Tree of Innenotdar.  It was blessed by a deity of life in time primeval, whose name and memory have faded into the past and whose portfolio resides in the realms of the new gods. Its first seeds were the Seela, children of the forest and caretakers of it. The Elves came ages later. I myself came from the Song of Forms, which when sung by the Seela, awakened me from the subconscious of the forest.  I can vaguely recall the oldest stories of the Seela, of how they learned the song from the rumbling of the earth, from caves deep under the forest."She takes a few breaths, gripping onto the flaming hide of the nearby boar for support."In a time of great crisis for the wood, when the Elves from the lands now known as Shahalesti first assaulted the Innenotdar Elves, the warrior Anyariel came to rest in this glade, and I came to care for her.  In time, I came to love her.  I gave her a most precious gift - a branch from the First Tree, a part of myself - and that branch became a blade when bonded with her hand.  With her sword, Anyariel lead the crusade against the Shahalesti, and drove them back. Years later, the forest was infiltrated by something vile, a creature of indomitable life which infested the nightmares of the forest and would not let natural death take its course.  As you know, Anyariel died after she  imprisoned the creature, and a shrine was erected to her, hoping that her spirit might be as resilient as that of the beast she defeated.  But when the Shahalesti came forty years ago, and set the woods ablaze, there was no hero to save them."Tears roll down her cheek and turn to steam instantly.  After a few moments of silent sadness, she continues."The spirit that lays imprisoned at the bottom of the lake is pinned there by Anyariel's sword, the branch from the First Tree.  That spirit is kept within the body of a stag, as I am sure you know by now, by the Song of Forms of the Seela.  Merely ending the song might release the foul entity, but it is unclear as to whether it will merely possess another and continue the cycle of pain and fire.  Also, the Seela will die and that breaks my heart even further.  However, there is a way to free the entity, end the song and save the Seela.  Those gentle Fey are more directly tied to the First Tree than to the forest itself. Though my tree will continue to burn if the song stops, the branch I gave to Anyariel may live on and through it, the forest may be reborn and the Seela may not die."She pauses and falls into convulsions as she struggles to maintain concentration through the never ending pain.  Through gritted teeth she soldiers on."I...am sorry...but this pains me greatly.  Anyariel's sword, the branch of my tree can only live on if it is bonded to another living creature.  If the you are of a mind to save this forest, I can bond it to one of you before you leave so that when you touch it and draw it from the bed of the lake, the life of the First Tree, the forest and Seela will be bound to you.  This will unleash the stag and the entity within again.  What it will do, I cannot know.  You may be forced to slay it.   The forest will burn down, but as long as the bearer of the sword survives, so will the Seela.  I too will die, burned to ash.  However, I humbly accept this fate, and I look forward to the chance to be with my dear sweet Anyariel in the afterlife."[GM]Jacob Driscoll, if you see this, know that you are an awesome writer and a great module designer.[/GM]</blockquote>

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