iceclad-chronicler

[iceclad-chronicler]

She had been Kriska. Tiny Kriska, pale Kriska and cursed Kriska. A child left in the gutters of Gloomholm. Year by year she fought tooth and claw to make it by, stealing what she could and begging for the rest. It was without her own understanding that she flowered into a beautiful young lady, and suddenly being of interest confused her. Before no one in the city had turned to see the curled up figure deep within the alleyways. No man nor woman had curiously lingered, resting their gaze on her scrawny but sculpted features. If they stayed too long she had demanded their words, seeking anyone who could tell her who she was and why she had been left. No man nor woman knew them, for she had not been left there by either.

And then one night, the words came to her. A voice carried on the wind, singing to her of a mothers affection, of a home to call hers. There was nothing in the city to keep her, and so she gathered her paltry belongings and walked into the wilderness. The first hunters to meet her told her to return. “Kriska”, they’d said, “you don’t belong here, go back to the city”. She was still Kriska then, so she returned. But there had been no one to welcome her, no one to tell her this was her place to be. That night the voice sang to her again, sang of how she could choose to no longer be Kriska.

And so she walked into the wilderness once more. Again the hunters would tell her, "Kriska, return to the city", but she would not, no, could not. The city was for Kriska, and she was Kriska no longer.

Days passed her by in the wilderness, and every night as she lay to sleep the voice sang to her. She could feel it in the murky waters, hear it’s notes in the raindrops hitting the leaves. It’s humming was the fetid air and the buzzing insects. The city had been dirty and rotten, yet the folk there hadn’t ever spared a breath to remind each other of its "beauty". No-longer-Kriska had found what was truly beautiful deep within the swamp. The singer had taught her of death and rebirth, of how each end brings a new beginning. It had promised her a rebirth, a new life where Kriska had died.

A humid night she had seen the singer for the first time. She needed no introduction, for the trees and leaves whispered it to her as she approached the figure waiting peacefully by a blank pond.

"My daughter" the voice sang, "you have died to begin this life. I name you Eha, and here in your new beginning I shall teach you all there is to know".

Under the guidance of her three mothers Eha grew strong. Their lectures awakened forces within her previously unknown and with the pale moon she hunted as a wolf, stalked as a cat and burrowed far below. She knew every smell and every sound, she heard the whispers in the leaves and knew the trees hushing them like grandmothers scolding a child. She was Eha, and the Greymarsh was her domain.

It was then her mothers presented her with her task. Until now she had protected them, been their eyes and ears travelling far and wide across the marsh. She had seen the docks and wharfs of Heavensgate, had stalked the perimeter of Fallhorn, gaped in awe at Crystalspire reaching for the skies and studied the folk of Firewatch. But she had also seen their corruption, their misguided will to live past their time. Her mothers had urged her caution, unwilling to send her before she was ready, but now the time had come.

The first to fall by her doing was an archmage and necromancer, thinking himself safe within his castle with wards and guards. She had sunk her teeth into his throat as he lay sleeping, and watched the blood soak into the mattress and drip unto the floor. And she had been Eha, dusk, bringer of the darkness.

The second was a merchant, fervently seeking a cure to mortality. His alchemists and scholars could do nothing but watch as her claws dug deep into his chest and ripped out his still beating heart. And she had been Eha, the setting sun.

Every one had been the same, pompous, prideful and vain, thinking they could cheat death. And because of that she was Eha, and she had a purpose.

As her strength grew, her mothers bestowed their blessings upon her. Carving their spells into her skin, and gifting her the guise of death. Her animal forms were now twisted and undead, bones marked with runes and marred by blades that had cut but not killed. And Eha revelled in it and the fear it caused, she tasted it on the wind every time she took their guise, heard it as even the leaves quieted at her passing. The Greymarshes knew their protector, and they feared her gaze. She was strong, she was the end to the corruption, she was Eha.

Then it came, first a whisper, then a murmur and then a crescendo. All living and dead, critters and plants alike had heard of the end. Of a world cleansed by fire to start anew.

"Two heralds" her mothers spoke, "they are like you Eha, where you water the earth with the blood of the unworthy, they burn it to grant the seeds fresh soil. They share your purpose." as her mothers spoke Eha knew she had to find them, to share in their purpose and glory.

To bring about the silence and the darkness that is left once the flames have died out.