paladinchronicles

[paladinchronicles]

Dark Memories

It had been a long time since Araelon had felt this much rage building inside of him. A night of events that had tugged at several aspects of his now deeply rooted faith. The most minor the woman in red armour who had been asking after Zielia. Subtle snide remarks that had been made in reference to some of the Covenant he'd been working with the past few weeks. People he had known since his days as a squire back when he served the Cathedral. Part of him had wanted to put his semi-plated gauntlet into her teeth, the rage a hot coal in his gut, but the ingrained honor of his oath, the code against raising a hand to a woman, stiffened his arm.

The second had been the ceremony within the Cathedral. A building meant for the teachings of the Holy Light. For prayer, reflection, remembrance and holy ceremonies now serving as the medal ceremony for the events of the Hinterlands. Men wearing helmets inside a holy place had also ticked him off. Had visitors to the holy city of Tyr's hand really let decorum fly out the window?

The final straw...The void elf that had walked past him and had the audacity to wink. A disturbance and abomination in what was his sanctuary. It...She had sauntered passed, a fleeting shadow that had felt like a brand against his skin. The subtle tendrils of void magic clinging to the elf sparked a phantom agony. It wasn't physical, not precisely, but a burning itch beneath his skin, a thousand pins and needles dancing on his nerves and the air seemed thick with a sensation that he couldn't explain.

As more commotion occurred on the steps of the abbey, he turned and left for the libraries; his second sanctuary surrounded by the scent of aged parchment and the quiet rustle of turning pages. The giant tomes of untapped knowledge, teachings from a time before he was born. They normally brought peace, but tonight that brief encounter had left him rattled and unsure. His fingers turning the pages of an old tome, a translation book at his side translating the older Lordaeronian language into his more up to date common. He tried to focus on the text before him – ancient scriptures, their words a balm against the void's intrusion. But the letters blurred, morphing into symbols he couldn't understand.

He shook his head and rubbed his eyes, clearing his vision and lighting a handful of additional candles making his reading space brighter. The letters back to normal and he closed his eyes pinching the bridge of his nose. "It's not real." he mumbled. "You're in Tyr's hand."

Arae's gaze turned back to the pages, the burning itch in his arm starting to fade as he went back to studying in the quiet, the fading light outside turning to night and yet he didn't feel tired at all. Evening turned to night and the candles burning dripped wax onto their holders, the wicks melting to the passage of time.

He must have dozed off, jolting awake and looking about with confusion. but the library was no longer the library. He was back in the darkness, the air thick with the stench of decay and despair. Rough-hewn walls pressed in on him, the only light a sickly purple glow emanating from strange, pulsating runes carved into the stone. Chains, cold and heavy, bound his wrists, the void magic woven into them sending constant shivers through his body. He felt pain shoot down his right leg, the usual dull ache like knives as the bone was twisted and warped.

"It's not real..." Araelon muttered, trying to find relief to the stress pressing down above his body, his arms aching from being suspended for so long above his head. A figure emerged from the shadows. Tall, gaunt, with eyes that burned with cold amusement. One of the Harbingers. He couldn't recall the name, only the voice, a cold, sinister rasping whisper that promised pain and oblivion under the facade of relief and comfort. All he had to do was yield.

"Look at you, Light's little champion," the cloaked figure hissed, circling him like a predator. "So broken. So interesting. Yet still you don't break."

Araelon tried to speak, to call upon the Light, but his throat was raw, days of endless torment left his voice a strangled rasp. The figure chuckled, a dry, humorless sound.

"No prayers will save you here. The Light has abandoned you."

The Harbinger reached out, a thin ritualistic looking dagger lightly gracing over the skin. He knew that knife..Very well. He traced the burn scar along Araelon's face, the touch sending jolts of agony through him, far worse than the lingering effect of the void elf who had brushed past him earlier.

"Such disgusting scars, was it truly so awful?" the cloaked figure murmured. "Our artistry burnt away...Nevermind, we'll just have to redo it and scar tissue is so very painful."

He leaned closer, his breath fetid against Araelon's ear. "We took everything from you, paladin. Your strength, your faith, your very hope. Just stop resisting and embrace your true calling"

"No...I..Walk in Light. I'll never succumb to Darkness." Araelon rasped, pulling at his bindings even if futile expending dwindling reserves of energy. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block out the image, the voice, the suffocating darkness. But it was no use. The tormenter's words echoed in his mind, a litany of his failures, his weaknesses, his deepest fears.

You are nothing.

You failed them.

You are broken.

You let them die.

You are weak.

You are ours.

The knife plunged once again into his face. He gasped, a strangled cry escaping his lips. He was back in the library, his body trembling, sweat plastering his hair to his forehead. He removed a piece of parchment from his face, stuck like a leaf to a window in autumn, the paper soaked through, the ink blotted. His inkwell lay on the floor, spilled. He stared, the dim light revealing his own candles extinguished, their tiny flames snuffed out by the force of his terror."

Had he been thinking clearly he would have cleaned up the mess, but his mind was in pure fight or flight mode. He stumbled to his feet, gripping the edge of the table to steady himself. His entire body feeling as though it was on fire and yet he was physically fine. He left the now suffocating silence of the library, heading out the abbey door and towards the Cathedral, still trembling, stopping only when near the altar.

He took out his prayer beads, removed the restrictive brace and knelt down on one of the prayer cushions, closing his eyes, focusing on calming his racing heart and slipping into quiet meditation, fingers running over his prayer beads almost as an act of soothing in itself.

Araelon soon felt the familiar warmth returning to him, the panic descending into a more serene calm as he fell deeper into an almost meditative stance. He didn't even feel the blanket that was draped over his shoulders by Sir Amornis Thornton, the half elf Junior Paladin who had drawn the short straw of watching the cathedral through the night. Not that he minded. He was happy doing the mundane tasks, and it wasn't the first time he'd dealt with Araelon's nightmares. They had been a lot more frequent at one point previous back when he was still training in Northshire.

As the priest meditated, he sat nearby on a silent vigil acting as a silent guard moving only to handle essential matters.

[paladinchronicles]

Araelon would discreetly leave a letter upon Wiktoh's armour in a fairly obvious place he would find it as he retreats to his bunk for some very overdue rest. The writing would be rather illegible in places, shakey in others, written by someone exhausted from hours of mending. Inside the envelope would also be a set of prayer beads, each one seemingly painstakingly hand-painted with each bead depicting either shared events, religious symbols or plain colours of blue, silver, gold and white. Not intended to replace any Wiktoh has but almost as if a gift.

I've thought about writing this a thousand times over for a long time, but never really found the words that would fit on the parchment. It never felt the right time or it felt empty and full of what I think you'd want to hear. There's things I wanted to say earlier too but could not be said with others watching and listening. It was also not the time nor place to throw that cascade at you when I know you were already being overwhelmed.

I know I owe you an apology. A proper apology. I'm sorry doesn't even begin to do justice for the pain and torment I have caused you. I left you with a deep wound out of selfishness, foolery and many other sins and I hope in time the Light and you can forgive me for my transgressions and I vow to make amends for them.

Expressing my feelings has not come easy to me for a long time. It took me a long time to realise my actions were just a path of self-destruction with little regard for anyone I hurt along the way, even if at the time I thought it was the right decision. I took everything for granted, became arrogant and overconfident and everything that was not what I should have been. I was angry, at many things and was trying to mask it behind this mask which was growing harder and harder to don each day. I thought my motivations were to prevent anyone feeling as I did, but the more we faced war, death, chaos and destruction the angrier I felt and the more I realise now I hated myself and the world and I wanted to find peace. I was also just looking for anything to try and fill the widening wound I had buried deep in my soul.

I was blindly tempted by what I thought was love. You can say "I told you so." I deserve it. They abandoned me shortly after my return from Khaz Algar...Apparently too selfish to focus on my own recovery rather than be with them. They left and honestly, I don't feel sad about it. If anything it was relief. I'm happier without that burden in my life.

I should have listened to you. You were right but I guess I was too immature to know you'd know best. Sorry Dad.

You asked me why I made no contact over all of these years. To begin with it was just frustration and anger, then it was regret and I didn't want to be a disappointment to you. I see you as more than just a mentor to me and for many years I have always felt that. You were and still are like an adopted Father and I think deep down it took me a long time to accept that and understand it wasn't a replacement of my own who'd passed. I wanted to find myself and be someone to make you proud and in my own arrogance I realise pushing you away only hurt the both of us.

You were the person who kept me going through hell. Days turning into weeks into months. I did just want to wake up and have you standing there lecturing me or knocking my head off. I'd have even taken being yelled at and forced to endure hours of hellish chores for an eternity. When I came too in Northshire Abbey, I considered their offer to send for you, but I also said no to protect you. I didn't want our first meeting to be like that.

My memories of what happened when I came round are hazy. I read the reports and I can stand in my conviction that keeping you in ignorance was a kindness at the time. I was in a sort of madness, not inflicted by shadows but from exhaustion both in body and mind, running on nothing but will and faith alone, the burns to my face and neck self-inflicted in sheer desperation to purge the darkness that had been torturing me for so long. I know in my heart that I couldn't subject you to seeing me a shell of what I was. I admit too, that I couldn't stomach the thought of facing you the day I was released from my oath as a Paladin. I was ashamed at first, like my world had gone. I think in a way I died perhaps not physically but it was like a cherry on top of a cake.

I can assure you it wasn't ex-communication. It was a long discussion with the senior Paladin at Northshire, Commander Baleric, who'd been put in charge of overseeing the recovery of survivors. The damage to my leg was permanent not through inability to heal but the passage of time. I would have been a burden to my brothers and sisters on the battlefield and I couldn't in good conscience put them at risk for my own selfish desire to keep a knighthood. I would be released from my oath as a Paladin and take up work within the church in some other form. I'll admit I am happy just being a humble servant of the light without title.

There was a lot of debriefings once I was able to stand. I'd sit and watch other survivors brandishing war stories of their imprisonment and embellishing them and I'd feel sick. I still struggle with what happened, I have nightmares, remember things that occur. I struggle with people touching me and I guess the most difficult part to explain is being afraid of the dark. I spent so long in darkness I can't sleep without a light, be it candle or other. I still have days I struggle with the scarring. It took a long time to not feel uncomfortable being stared at as though I was some sort of cultist of the void. It's not until very recently I could face public mass again, even with the Covenant.

I didn't attend public mass but I would during recovery spend a lot of time with the Bishop and senior clerics of Northshire during my recovery. Whilst others shouted of their 'heroism' in the darkness, I'd spend time with books and eventually start helping with some of the training of the younger ones, mostly in riding. Sister Alywn thought it'd be a good distraction. I started to learn I was happier with my books and thoughts than trying to scream from the rafters or show off or make a name for myself as some great hero. I think it served me well as I was cleared of being a risk to others rather quickly and limiting my interactions.

My thoughts did turn to contacting you again, but after so much time I think my own fear of rejection took deep root and disappointment and I guess my own failures. The Araelon you knew was very much dead and I wasn't sure if you'd be accepting of where I am now. I'm not that teenager anymore on the Cathedral steps (which by the way are still out to kill me). I find peace in study and prayer and helping others. Part of me still itches to be on the front line in some form but I know that will be a slow process. I would like one day to find those responsible for so much death, violence and suffering, but I also know if I were to act now it would be in personal revenge and not in Justice or Vengeance.

I think that's why I am sat writing this to you now. Seeing so much death today from the battle field. One was a soldier no older than I was and it was too late to save him, all I could do was ease his passing and make sure he was not alone. Words left unspoken but too late to share. I still find death difficult to manage. I have seen so much of it of late. Perhaps this is why the words come to me now I've been so desperate to say for so long but never been able to.

I know the road to regain your trust will be long and not without it's bumps. But I would love nothing more than to rebuild our fractured relationship. I have missed you not only as a friend and mentor but as something much deeper than that. You are like a second father to me and I don't say it enough but I do love you.

I've left you a small gift, something I worked on that I thought you would like. It's nothing special but each bead is made up of the memories shared and what is most important to me and I hope you.

May our paths be as one once again and in time we walk in the Light together like we used to.

Araelon