#it is. so time consuming placing each and every sapling

[crepusculum-rattus]

my friends going to my base after a few days of not logging on and seeing an entire birch forest where there used to be nothing

[the-red-thread-that-strangles]

Family trees

The day Akai Shuuichi is born, his father plants a sapling.

A weeping willow, as is custom for his time of birth, raised from seed to sapling by the young couple while Mary was pregnant, put onto the earth at the same time as the child. While not as strong as the oak, or as regal as holly, they hope their son will grow to be just as flexible, able withstand the adversities life will surely throw at him.

.

As the child grows, he's taught to take care of his birth tree. It grows rapidly, and needs trimming each season so it stays healthy, so perhaps sooner than he should, Akai gets to hold the pruning shears, snipping away where his father tells him to.

.

He plays under it - he's too young to climb it yet, and so is his tree. It sways gently in the wind, a mosaic of light and shadow across his face as he weaves through the branches, laughing without a care in the world.

.

He gets a baby brother, and really annoys his mother that one time by hiding the both of them under his willow's branches.

.

By the time he's ten, the willow is as tall and lovely as it could be. In spring, the catkins bloom, small and hidden, without fragrance, but still buzzing with activity. The child is equally unobtrusive, unbothered by the insects. One of the branches has been allowed to grow sideways, close to the ground, and Akai is often found lazing around on it, napping or reading, shielded from the rest of the world.

.

By the time he's 15, the willow has reached full maturity.

It's only natural, then, that so has the boy of days-gone-by. He leaves his roots behind, branching out to find the one he lost.

.

Akai runs to the last place he called home when his cover is blown, to lay low and recover for a few months.

His family home has been abandoned for more than a decade now. Family friends have been checking up on the grounds to make sure there are no squatters, and a gardener came by every year to make sure it doesn't look completely abandoned up front, but the small garden behind the house is wild and overgrown.

He spends his time trying to undo the damage time and abandonment have wrought.

Some are beyond help.

His father's mighty oak has fallen, withered from within. He spends a week cutting it down into firewood for the winter, although it's likely he won't be here for it.

His brother's rowan needs pruning, having grown wild and unfocused, though there's a lovely set of wild roses that's grown beside it. He can't bear to cut them all down, so he just trims both of them down to size.

Below his willow, small white flowers that dwell in twilight have grown, their blossoms wilting in the late summer heat. It's a shame he didn't get to see them bloom. Poison ivy has started wrapping itself around the bottom of the tree. It might be poisonous to humans, but it won't hurt the willow while it's healthy, so he leaves it be.

If it's weak enough to be consumed by the ivy, then so be it.

.

He's not there to witness it, but when he's thirty-two, the willow is struck by lightning. The ivy burns with it.

.

The next time he visits, the willow is starting to wilt, itself.

Lack of care during its prime hasn't done it any favours, and it's probably really only still in shape because the ivy has wound itself around the stem quite tightly. In fact, the burnt and blackened parts, destroyed past recognition, are covered by it, making it appear healthier than it really is. But Akai has cared for his tree for years and years; he knows it will soon be time to cut it down in order to not become a hazard.

It's a bit of a shame; birds are singing in its branches, bugs and bees have made it their home, and when he kisses his lover behind a veil of leaves, for a moment, the world narrows in on just the two of them.

(He should've brought Rei sooner.)

.

They stay for a month, their first real vacation in years now, watching as the leaves turn brown and then, finally, fall.

While they wait, they tend to things - the house, the garden, themselves and each other. It's a far cry from the lives they usually lead, bringing with its own set of challenges, but they manage to weather them, together - even if it is strange and sometimes difficult for the other to be around at all times. This is the path they've chosen, the one they want to travel together. They're not backing out easily.

Which is good, because getting the necessary phytosanitary documentation for bringing a branch-turned-sapling to Japan is a bit of a pain.

They leave the old willow behind, cut up into firewood, the ivy grown in too deep to separate. One day, their ashes will be scattered together.

.

They dig a hole, together, and plant the sapling in the company of friends and family.

Just like the child it was bound to, long ago, the willow comes back from the dead in their new home. Theirs is a small house in the outskirts of Beika, much more of the grounds they purchased together dedicated to creating a garden.

For now, Akai tends to it. Eventually, his husband will retire there, too.

.

The seasons come and go, the years pass, and eventually, the willow is large and lovely, though a little lonely, standing tall and proud on its own. Flowers may grow in the meadow beneath, but all trees are kept a certain distance, to preserve its majesty.

It's Rei who makes the suggestion one evening as they're reading in the study, pointing to an illustration of 'àitason', the married vine.

For rather obvious reasons, they've never quite gotten back into drinking heavy liquor, but on occasion, they do enjoy a glass of grape juice, fermented or otherwise, and Rei's been pushing for growing some grapes of their own. He used to leave his husband free reign (leading to lots and lots of hydrangeas), but now that Rei's retired too - and hey, even a couple years early, Akai's counting it as his win - Rei's got his own ideas for what to do with their garden, nitpicking and nagging in that passionate way of his that just shows how much he cares. Akai wouldn't have it any other way.

So he agrees.

.

Despite their shared experience - Rei getting dragged in under grumbled protests many times throughout the years, though he eventually relents that it is actually quite pleasant to work side by side with Akai again - it takes them several years and just as many attempts to get the grapes to stick.

It tastes like defeat, every time they watch the vines wither and die, never even reaching the willow's tall branches. But if they've kept anything from the tumultuous days when they first started dating, it's their attitude to keep trying and trying to make things work. If a couple of years in a long-distance relationship, stationed on different sides of the globe, haven't managed to disentangle the pair of them, a streak of horticultural failures won't break them either.

They're revitalizing their life together, now that they can, and this challenge is just adding spice.

Shuukichi's twins save them, eventually, clambering up the tree to wrap the vines several times around a branch to steady it. Akai had insisted he could do it just fine, and then Rei had knocked the walking cane from his hand and caught him as he stumbled, stealing a kiss and handing the can back. While Akai prefers Rei's breathless 'yes', his cheeky 'no' is almost as good.

And when the vines still hold onto the stem in a gently curved arc after a storm, and Rei kisses him silly, well, it's just the two of them again, like so many years ago.

.

The willow turns twenty-five, and the pair of them renew their vows beneath its branches. They've taken good care of it, this time around; it will last a good twenty-five more, though the same might not be said for them.

Weeping willow is an accurate name for the occasion- they've never expected to make it this far, and now that they have, it's worth celebrating their roots.

The days are getting longer and harder, but their love is still growing softly and steadily, gently winding around them.

They've managed to produce just enough grape juice to give each of their guests a shot glass' worth.

.

The willow is growing old and rugged, despite good care.

Their gardening days are over, and so the plants are mostly left to their own devices unless family comes by to help out - which is every two weeks, when Masumi comes by and brings her kids. Grumpy teens they may be, but Akai once was one himself - he knows how to get them to open up about their interests, when to drop a spy fact to impress them.

Akai's been slowly losing his vision, leaning on his husband for support and descriptions. Rei's laughter, quiet, but true, by his side when he strings them along is his greatest joy. Maybe he did learn a thing or two from his husband's machinations.

.

They sit, one afternoon, under willow and vine, taking a nap. Akai doesn't wake up anymore, finally having found peace.

Rei keeps his husband's ashes, so when he, too, passes, they can be scattered together.

He doesn't have to wait long. Without Akai to grasp for support, there's little to hold him anymore, and soon he, too, collapses.

.

Together, they return to the earth from whence they came, under their beloved willow tree.

[progenycursed]

Chapter 4.5

The pale king stood watch over the palace from his perch on the empty balcony. The cavern stretching above, it’s distant gems reflecting the palace light, his light, appearing as stars deep underground. The palace fanned out over the majority of the cavern floor. Though much of it was hidden in mist, he could sense every building, every mind, every footstep or dropped plate, every speck of soul and essence drifting into the air. Though he gave his new body sight, it was never his first means to see the world. He was always distantly aware of how many and who was in the palace at any given time. So he felt the moment the White Lady entered the cavern below.

The setae along his body curled into his carapace. The thick binding he covered himself in was all that stood between the floor and certain destruction by means of his tail burrowing into it. She hadn’t been to the palace in sectors. Though they were always connected by their shared soul, he always missed when she was near. A feeling even his dread for what was to come, could not fully stamp out. Though it did muffle it severely.

He knew his mind would spiral into that dread if he let it. And the White Lady was not the fastest when it came to movement speed. Plenty of time to spiral to a place he did not wish to go again. Instead, he opted to think about their history.

Their relationship was a unique one in many ways. It was uncommon for a higher being to tolerate other higher beings. Unheard of for them to actually like each other.

The mortals saw them as a romantic couple, but neither of them had the capacity for that kind of love. Both of their kinds left their partners after mating. As it wasn’t a partner, it was a threat to the survival of their offspring.

New born saplings were expected to take care of themselves the moment they emerged. Their siblings just competition for resources, including what little attention their parent was willing to provide. A second parent would only steal resources from the saplings.

A new born wrym was costly, requiring constant food, attention, and safety for hundreds of cycles. And worship meant little to the bottomless stomach of a fledgling god. The requirements for two adults and minimum of two offspring, would lead to environmental devastation. Condemning any nearby civilization to die if it wasn't consumed already.

His parent had been unique. Earth-Shaker had enough power and territory to feel confident in raising two offspring simultaneously. Having a newborn even when their last offspring was still a juvenile with many hundreds of cycles to go before full independence. They were all very close, they taught him how to hunt, gather, subjugate, and fight. For his first hundred cycles he had never been alone.

He knew what is was to love a parent, a sibling, even followers. But no idea how to love the way the mortals thought how he loved the White Lady. It had been lost to Hallownest history how their relationship first started. Yet he remembered vividly. She annoyed him, at every moment she could, with her constant offer to breed with him.

But she was persistent, and patient. She grew on him, sometimes literally. They could spend days together. One talking about their new interest while the other not only listened, but engaged. Understanding and asking questions. They began to enjoy each others company, even in silence. The White Lady even lessened her ‘offers’ to breed. They built Hallownest together. Became the inseparable monarchs of a thriving civilization.

Until recently.

“My wrym,” her voice rang like wind through leaves. She walked onto the balcony, her bindings draping across her form like a dress. A cluster of her roots erupting from the back, complimenting the crown of elegant branches that defined her silhouette.

Her soul curled around him like her roots, prying into any cracks it could find, any hint to what he was feeling. He’d closed himself off so much for this plan, she couldn’t feel his emotions anymore then the vessel could. Even her essence pressed against his, like a warm embrace inviting him to relax.

“My root,” he rushed out as he turned away from her. Causing a guilt that weighed down his stomach to mingle with the anticipation that was churning his insides. It was a sickening combination. He was grateful his foresight had warned him not to eat. Not like he’d done that in cycles anyway.

“You requested my aid?” She joined him in gazing out over the cavern.

Though she stood next to him, it felt as if the chasm itself stood between them. Like the void on his hands, like the Radiance within the minds of their people, their relationship had been tainted. Being the monarchs they were, they had come up with the plan together. They were in it together, but he was the one to enact it. He was the one who knew how to fight, the one who could create the spells and glyphs to hold their ancient enemy. The god of the mind, capable of sensing the thoughts and emotions of any creature no matter how small. Something a vessel needed to lack for the plan to work.

It was just a vessel. Yet he still found himself here, brought low by primal instincts that he still couldn't stamp out. He shouldn’t need to bring her into this. She shouldn’t have to suffer like him. He could feel her gaze bore into him. He couldn’t meet it. Not with what he needed to request.

“I ask that you check the vessels purity,” he curled into himself. Even beneath the bindings, his tail dug into the stone floors.

A pause. He could only image what thoughts she hid behind her eyes.

“Who performed the tests?” She finally asked.

“I did.” He remembered watching as the vessel stood motionless for arks when given the puzzle sphere. It hadn’t even looked down at it after he left. The way it threw itself at Drya for even longer. Only stopping when it’s body failed it. Void shivered on and off all the way to the springs, but underneath there was nothing. No curiosity, no irritation, no heartbeat, no muscles, no organs, no breath, no soul, no hint of anything alive within.

It was just a vessel.

“All of them?” Her roots began to reach across the floor. He wanted to reach out, to feel the comfort in her touch. He curled tighter into himself.

It was just a vessel. A dead body dictated by void, only the imprints in its mask and lingering fragments of animalistic instincts left untouched. It was just a test.

His claws tore into its skin like silk. Deep gouges digging through its mask with little resistance. It was flung back into the spring. Its waters unable to heal the wounds before it had to crawl out.

It was just void. No different than what already stained his claws. Yet he could still feel its blood on them. Still feel the stains after countless washes as the sensation seemed to burrow into his carapace.

“Which was missed?” She kept her voice level, diplomatic. The voice of a Queen addressing her court.

It was just a vessel. An empty container to imprison the Radiance. It stood before him, shivering from fatigue, void spilling from its many wounds, quickly staining the front of its cloak.

It was just a test. A simple movement, a small pressure, and data. All he had to do was reach forward with razor sharp claws…

“The final phase of the pain test,” she must think him weak. At least he could be confident that she wouldn’t attack him like any other higher being would.

She shifted, her regal tone slipped. Concern and warmth slipping between the formalities. Something he hadn’t heard in what felt like an age. One the sickening lump in his abdomen told him he didn’t deserve.

“But that test must be performed to appraise the vessels reaction to extreme stimuli,” Her hand brushed across what most bugs called his forehead, across what only a higher being of light could see. A single scar where his light shown a little darker.

“I know,” he pulled away. He still remembered that day, that vessel, that lesson. “But I was unable to complete the task.”

It was just a vessel. An empty mask filled with his antithesis. The emptiness that would consume him with as much vigor as his nemesis if given the chance.

“It just looked so…”

It starred up at him.

It was just waiting for orders.

Shaking.

It was just fatigue.

Bleeding.

It was just a test.

Waiting for what he would do next. Helpless to stop it.

It was just a c-

“Please,” his throat felt dry. “As it’s other creator, as another god of life, you may have a different connection than I. You may sense something I can not.”

It wasn’t his, it was just a tool.

Her roots wrapped around his tail, gently prying it from the floor and curling around it. Her soul reaching for his. Sympathy, concern, longing. How could he ask this of her?

When she next spoke, it was no longer as the queen, but as his root. “Do you truly believe there could be a mind within?” He could feel a flicker of hope within her soul. He was ashamed he put it there.

“Or is there another reason for this doubt?” The flicker dimmed, tempered by cycles of disappointment. Cycles waiting above an empty cradle that would never be filled. Her roots coiled around his tail, holding it tight.

It was supposed to be a vessel. A means to save his people from a tyrant who lost a popularity contest he wasn’t even aware was happening.

“I…” Yet he could not stamp out the false hope, the doubt, that it could be more than just a vessel.

“I need to know for certain.” He was selfish, foolish, cruel even for asking this of her. He was supposed to be better than this. The price was his to pay.

Her soul reached forward again. Trying to connect like they had before this bleak plan. He pulled away. She didn’t need to know how close he was to failing. How much he wanted-

Her roots tightened around his tail “I can do this for you,” she whispered.

A tension released from his body. One he didn’t know he had been holding. Yet his chest felt heaver than ever.

“Thank you,” he wanted nothing more than for all his feelings to burrow into the abyss and die. It already felt like much of him had.

She didn’t let go right away. Didn’t move to leave the palace, return to her gardens. She just stood by him and watched the mist swirl in the cavern around them. He missed this, wanted her to stay with him more often, to be as open with each other as they used to. But he couldn’t ask that of her. To share a home with a creature that wore the face of her dead child. Not after what she had been through.

“Do you think it possible?” Her voice quiet, with a flicker of hesitation. He dared to glance up to her. Her eyes were distant. “That the void could do what we could not?”

It was a thought that had been in his mind since the first vessels crawled out of their egg within the abyss. One that reasserted itself with every vessel that failed. Feeding a hope that shouldn’t have been there. One that should have died when the first ‘pure’ vessel did.

Even in its final moments, with all the evidence that created doubt, he never sensed a mind. Never felt emotions. Never heard a sound out of them in reality or dreams.

“Which would be the brighter path?”

A bitter laugh caught in his throat, only silenced by the tightness in his chest. The void opposed time, it was immune even to his foresight. Blanketing everything it touched in a fog of uncertainty and shadows. The brightest paths were the only clears ones, the ones that fell to the Radiance. The only chance for the kingdoms salvation lay within the darkness. In paths he couldn’t clearly see.

If it was more than just a vessel, then the kingdom was doomed. Tens of thousands would succumb to her plague of mind, would be lost to her dream forever. Everything he and Root worked for, wiped from the world. But they would have a child.

It should be an easy decision. A choice with the clearest of outcomes.

Yet some sick part of himself held on to that vain hope.

Maybe she would find something. Maybe it could be more than a vessel.

He wanted to answer her, tell her something reassuring, but he didn’t know what would do that. His foresight couldn’t help him, his instincts couldn’t be silenced, his emotions couldn’t be hidden. Not from her.

“I do not know,” it was all he could say.

She shifted to move closer, but stopped. Instead, she just squeezed his tail once more. He was grateful, her gentle touch, her comforting presence, would break the last strands of resolve he had left for this plan. He couldn’t afford to break, Hallownest couldn’t afford him to break. No matter what it cost him, he had to save his people.

[wirewitchviolet]

Dear Game Developers, I don’t want to be a rapacious colonizing blight on the world.

I like a pretty wide variety of games, but one general thing I’ve always been particularly keen on is the sort of game where I start off just kinda naked in the wilderness with nothing and have to build up a bunch of infrastructure to accomplish something. So you know, RTSes, Civ clones, survival games, sandbox-y Minecraft stuff, Dwarf Fortress and similar things, but these all have this really annoying habit of making my character the biggest existential threat to the entire world, and I would really like them to stop doing that all the time.

So, just to open up with an example of how to do this sort of thing in a way I like, Subnautica is one of my favorite games. I recently streamed the whole thing, so, links to that if you’d like: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4

Subnautica actively confronts my issue head on, and handles it right. I’m not slaughtering everything I see, I’m not strip mining the whole planet, I’m not leveling forests. I’m here by way of horrible tragic accident, and by the end of the game I’ve done my best to clean up the mess from that and address some other global issues to the point where I can confidently say my presence over the course of the game has made for a net positive impact on the environment in which it’s set. Plus it’s a great game in a bunch of other ways.

I’m also pretty happy with Factorio, oddly enough. In Factorio I AM strip mining the whole world, slaughtering absolutely all of the local wildlife, and any forests I’m not clear-cutting I’m choking out with industrial emissions that leave nothing but dry withered skeletons where there were once beautiful stretches of foliage. The thing of it is, between actually tracking my environmental impact as a mechanic and having such downer visuals, it at least feels like the developers and I are sharing a really dark joke about how awful you are in games like this.

Then on the other side of the coin here, we have, say, Satisfactory. A game in the same weird subgenre as Factorio (do we have a name for these yet? Convey’em Ups?) but... really gross. The player is explicitly just heading down to this really beautiful planet to extract and process all the resources they can. You’re rewarded for killing... basically all life you see despite it not generally posing any sort of real threat to you, clear cutting all the vegetation, and to keep the factory building vibes nice and chill, when you tap into a coal vein or set up an oil well, you get an endless supply of those burnable fuels to use forever, with absolutely no consequence, as you just consume all the things to make all the other things and ship them out to meet quotas. And that’s... kinda gross? Again, the fact that nothing you do has any sort of consequence despite half of it being stuff that is literally killing the world in reality makes it way worse.

Meanwhile, lately I’ve been keeping a lot of modded Minecraft videos going in the background to stave off the social isolation with the whole plague and all with some human voices, and see what cool new ideas people are testing there. One of the real popular new mods is this one called MineColonies, and you know what? It’s really neat. The idea is you find a big open plot of land somewhere, throw down blueprints for really huge multiblock structures of houses and workshops and such, get those built up a little, and NPCs start wandering in you can start giving jobs to. Here’s someone to harvest and replant trees, someone to go mining for underground resources, someone to build and upgrade the rest of these buildings, people to provide renewable food and medicine to all these other NPCs. Schools for their kids to get their stats up to good places by adulthood, a whole higher learning system to advance a tech tree, it’s cool.

But the thing is, as you probably gathered from the name, it’s DISGUSTINGLY colonialist. All these people coming in are explicitly white, with British accents, explicitly gendered and explicitly heterosexual too incidentally, and a huge part of the general infrastructure building is having to set up guard posts and barracks all over, training knights and archers to defend against the local barbarians native to the land you’re building on who wander out of the wilderness to attack everyone with some regularity. And I mean, how messed up is that? This mod is explicitly adding in native people’s just so there’s someone for you to displace and murder as you colonize some big chunk of unspoiled wilderness in the name of prosperity for your... British colony. Which of course works on an explicitly feudalist system (and then also for some reason has everyone grumbling about how you’re spending your gold, which you aren’t even doing). It totally thematically ruins what I’d otherwise be super super into. And not long after this was released, baseline Minecraft did basically the same thing. There are now roving barbarian tribes who go around trying to kill you and any villagers near you and you have to concern yourself with wiping out whole groups of them with some regularity, whereas previously the only enemies you really had to deal with were zombies and skeletons and a few other weird explicitly monstrous things. It’s gross.

My distaste for slaughtering barbarians extends to the civilization games too. Which... I mean I have put a LOT of hours into a lot of Civ games so it’s obviously not a total dealbreaker for me, but... you’re always this weird immortal dictator and even if you set your civilization up as a democracy, you sure do win every single election regardless of how unhappy people are with you, and you spend a good chunk of time slaughtering local barbarians. And increasingly, with each new game, smaller independent nations because they really keep putting more and more emphasis on military conquest being, if not the best path to victory, one you have to push pretty far no matter what you’re going for.

And it doesn’t have to work like that. My favorite game, mostly in the franchise, is still Alpha Centauri. Where the “barbarians” are brain eating space worms, not other humans, and even then, you can (and I consistently do) be a big tree-hugging hippy, enact worm-friendly social policies, make friends with them instead of killing them, and have them go devour a bunch of violent anti-science anti-environment right wing creeps, strongarm everyone else into adopting similar policies, and, like Subnautica, leave the world better than you found it by foregoing all the easier wins and doing the thing where you find a permanent solution to the local planetary superconsciousness accidentally going berserk and eating itself at periodic intervals. Happy ending for everyone! Except for Miriam. Screw Miriam.

Meanwhile, someone I know not to long ago just randomly pitched a game where there’s a big nature ravaging industrial sprawl, but you play as some sort of reclaiming embodiment of nature, strategically... I guess spreading trees to grow up through everything and have rats chew through the wiring and stuff, and yeah, I would play the hell out of that game. If nobody else gets to it before I clear my plate of all these other projects, I might even make that game.

I should stress again too that it’s not even that I don’t want games to ever put me in such a role as the player, just if you’re going to do it, acknowledge that that sort of thing isn’t cool, and either make it clear that the player character has been forced into a really unfortunate position, or that said character is just awful. Or both, both works.

What I don’t want to ever see people do is rationalize a way out of the issues. “Oh this is an infinite supply of clean-burning coal” does not fly with me. “Oh we’re establishing a colony but it’s on an alien planet” is still colonialism. The weird fetish the whole game industry seems to have with leveling forests is not made better by having those trees give you saplings that fully replace every tree cut down in like 2 minutes. If you don’t want to unpack the moral implications of something, you can just not include it to begin with. None of the stuff I’ve been laying out here is actually necessary for any of these games to work. Just... quit being weird and making me play coal-mining conquistadors already.

[lailoken]

“Ash (Fraxinus excelsior).

In the nineteenth century it was believed that if ash trees failed to produce fruit — keys — disaster was foretold.

In Yorkshire:

Some people every summer examined the ash tree . . . to see whether or not they had produced any seed; for the barrenness of the ash was said to be a sure sign of public calamity. It was a tradition among aged and thoughtful men, that the ash trees of England produced no seed during the year in which Charles the First was beheaded. [Jackson, 1873: 14]

In East Anglia:

The failure of the Crop of Ash-keys portends a death in the Royal Family . . . The failure in question is certainly, in some seasons, very remarkable; many an old woman believes that, if she were the fortunate finder of a bunch, and could get introduced to the king, he would give her a great deal of money for it. [Forby, 1830: 406]

ROWAN Or mountain ash, an unrelated tree which has leaves similar to those of ash, was widely considered to provide protection. Occasionally ash itself was also believed to be protective.

Rowan and ash sticks were used to drive cattle . . . believed to be 'kindly' and both trees were believed to be endowed with properties that ensured no interference from harmful influences. [Larne, Co. Antrim, October 1993]

In rural areas 'even' ash leaves-those leaves which lack a terminal leaflet and therefore have an even number of leaflets-were used in love DIVINATION. In Dorset:

The ash leaf is frequently invoked by young girls as a matrimonial oracle in the following way: The girl who wishes to divine who her future lover or husband is to be plucks an even ash leaf, and holding it in her hand, says:

“The even ash leaf in my hand, The first I meet shall be my man.’

Then putting it into her glove, adds:

‘The even ash leaf in my glove, The first I meet shall be my love.'

And lastly, into her bosom, saying:

‘The even ash leaf in my bosom, The first I meet shall be my husband.'

Soon after which the future lover or husband will be sure to make his appearance. [Udal, 1922: 254]

According to a 52-year-old woman who described how she used ash leaves for divination during her childhood:

Start at the bottom leaflet on the left-hand side and say:

“An even ash is in my hand

The first I meet will be my man.

If he don't speak and I don't speak,

This even ash I will not keep.”

As each word is said, count a leaflet around the leaf until the rhyme is completed (this probably entails going round the leaf several times). When the rhyme is finished, continue by reciting the alphabet until the bottom right-hand leaflet is reached. The letter given to this leaflet gives the initial of your boyfriend. Two or three leaves may be used so that you get a greater range of letters. [Thorncombe, Dorset, June 1976]

In many parts of northern Britain ash was known as esh. In north Lincolnshire:

There is a widespread opinion that if a man takes a newly-cut 'esh-plant' not thicker than his thumb, he may lawfully beat his wife with it. [Britten and Holland, 1886: 170]

Burning the ashen faggot — a faggot made from young ash saplings — was a widespread Christmastide custom in Devon and Somerset during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. According to a late nineteenth-century writer, it was:

an ancient ceremony transmitted to us from the Scandinavians who at their feast of Juul were accustomed to kindle huge bonfires in honour of Thor. The faggot is composed of ashen sticks, hooped round with bands of the same tree, nine in number. When placed on the fire, fun and jollity commence-master and servant are now all at equal footing. Sports begin-jumping in sacks, diving in the water for APPLES, and many other innocent games engage the attention of the rustics. Every time the bands crack by reason of the heat of the fire, all present are supposed to drink liberally of cider or egg-hot, a mixture of cider, eggs, etc. The reason why ash is selected in preference to any other timber is that tradition assigns it as the wood with which Our Lady kindled a fire in order to wash her new-born Son. [Poole, 1877: 6]

Ashen faggots are still burnt in a few West Country pubs, and miniature faggots are occasionally prepared for burning on domestic hearths.

On the evening of January sth ('old' Christmas Eve) at Curry Rivel, a Somerset village situated on the southern edge of Kings Sedgemoor, the wassailers go visiting' around the parish with their wassail song and the ashen faggot is ceremoniously burned at the King William IV public house. The faggot is made from young ash saplings and bound with bonds ('fonds,' 'fronds,' 'thongs,' or 'bonds') of withies (osiers); bramble has been used occasionally in the past. The number of bonds is variable but since the bursting of any one during the burning is a signal to ʻdrink up,' decency and country logic demands a 'reasonable few'. Either five or six are normally used. At the appropriate moment the faggot is placed on the fire, traditionally by the oldest customer-one villager can recall the fag- got being brought in a wheelbarrow as was 'right and proper'-and as each bond bursts there is much cheering and a general clamour for drink. The landlord, Mr John Cousins, prepares a bowl of hot punch for the occasion to augment the barrel of beer usually provided by the house Brewery. Until quite recently cider was consumed in large quantities; the 'brew' of cider and perry donated by the (Langs) Hambridge Brewery in 1957 is particularly remembered. [Willey, 1983: 40]

In the first half of the nineteenth century:

Some towns in Somerset held 'Ashen Faggot Balls'. The one in Taunton on January 2nd, 1826 was 'most respectably attended by the principal families of the town and neighbourhood'. It was still held twenty years later, but by then the event was losing its appeal. [Legg, 1986: 54]

In some parts of southern England ash twigs were carried by children on ASH WEDNESDAY.

In villages around Alton in Hampshire, and as far away as East Meon, near Petersfield, at Crowborough in Sussex, and doubtless in other places, children pick a black-budded twig of ash and put it in their pocket on this day. A child who does not remember to bring a piece of ash to school on Ash Wednesday can expect to have his feet trodden on by every child who possesses a twig, unless, that is, he or she is lucky enough to escape until midday. [Opie, 1959: 240]

I was born and lived as a child in Crowborough . . . On Ash Wednesday it was always the custom to take a piece of the [ash] tree around with you. The piece had to have a black bud, without it it was void. If you were unable to produce the piece when asked the rest of the children could stamp on your toes. I remember one day whan I was playing about with it in school and was told to take it to the front and leave it in the waste- paper basket-and all the way back to the seat had to dodge the stamps! Ever prudent I had another piece for play time! This all stopped at 12 mid-day. [Pershore, Worcester shire, October 1991]

[At Heston, Middlesex, in the 1930s] on Ash Wednesday we all took a twig of ash tree to school and produced it when challenged or risked a kick-and we had to get rid of it at 12 noon. We even risked the wrath of the teacher by rushing to an open window to throw out our twigs as soon as the mid-day dinner bell rang. [St Ervan, Cornwall, February 1992]

A widespread cure for HERNIA involved passing the patient through a split ash sapling, preferably one which had grown naturally from seed and had not previously been damaged by man. The tree was then tightly bound up and as it grew together so the patient would be healed. A full description provided in 1878 by the wife of a Sussex clergyman demonstrates how this cure, which required communal cooperation, was considered to be quite normal:

A child so afflicted must be passed nine times every morning on nine suc- cessive days at sunrise through a cleft in a sapling ash tree, which has been so far given up by the owner of it to the parents of the child as that there is an understanding that it shall not be cut down during the life of the infant that is passed through it. The sapling must be sound of heart, and the cleft must be made with an axe. The child, on being carried to the tree, must be attended by nine persons, each of whom must pass it through the cleft from west to east. On the ninth morning the solemn ceremony is concluded by binding the tree tightly with a cord, and it is supposed that as the cleft closes the health of the child will improve. In the neighbourhood of Petworth some cleft ashes may be seen, through which children have very recently been passed. I may add that only a few weeks since, a person who lately purchased an ash-tree standing in this parish, intended to cut it down, was told by the father of the child who had some time before passed through it, that the infirmity would be sure to return upon his son if it were felled. Whereupon the good man said, he knew such would be the case; and therefore he would not fell it for the world. [Latham, 1878: 40]

Similarly:

A remarkable instance of the extraordinary superstition which still prevails in the rural districts of Somerset has lately come to light at Athelney. It appears that a child was recently born in the neighbourhood with a physical ailment, and the neighbours persuaded the parents to resort to a very novel method of charming away the complaint. A sapling ash was split down the centre, and wedges were inserted so as to afford an opening sufficient for the child's body to pass through without touching either side of the tree. This having been done, the child was undressed, and, with its face held heavenward, it was drawn through the sapling in strict accord- ance with the superstition. Afterwards the child was dressed and simul- taneously the tree was bound up. The belief of those who took part in this strange ceremony is that if the tree grows the child will grow out of its bodily ills. The affair took place at the rising of the sun on a recent Sunday morning, in the presence of the child's parents, several of the neighbours, and the parish police-constable. [Bath and Wells Diocesan Magazine, 1886: 178]

An example ofan ash thus used can be seen in the Somerset Rural Life Museum at Glastonbury. A similar practice could be used to overcome IMPOTENCE.

In Wales the similar ritual was to split a young ash or HAZEL stem and hold it just fastened at the top. This made a symbolic vulva into which the impotent male introduced his recalcitrant organ. Binding up the tree again enabled it to heal, during which the impotence faded. [Richards, 1979: 13]

In Cheshire a cure for WARTS

was to steal a piece of bacon and push it under a piece of ash-bark. Excrescences would then appear on the tree; as they grew, the warts would van- ish. [Hole, 1937: 12]

In Wiltshire sufferers seeking a cure from NEURALGIA were advised:

Cut off a piece of each finger and toe nail and a piece off your hair. Get up on the next Sunday morning before sunrise and with a gimlet bore a hole in the first maiden ash you come across and put the nails and hair in; then plug the hole up. [Whitlock, 1976: 167]

In many areas 'shrew-ashes' were used to cure lameness in cattle and other illnesses. In a letter dated 8 January 1776, Gilbert White of Selborne, Hampshire, wrote:

A shrew-ash is an ash whose twigs or branches, when gently applied to the limbs of cattle, will immediately relieve the pains which a beast suffers from the running of a shrew-mouse over the part affected . . . Against this accident, to which they were continually liable, our provident fore- fathers always kept a shrew-ash at hand, which, once medicated, would maintain its virtue for ever. A shew-ash was made thus:- Into the body of the tree a deep hole was bored with an auger, and a poor devoted shrew- mouse was thrust in alive, and plugged in, no doubt, with several quaint incantations long since forgotten. [White, 1822, I: 344]

In the nineteenth century a particularly well-known shrew-ash in Richmond Park, Surrey. According to the park-keepers' tradition ʻgood Queen Bess had lurked under its shade to shoot deer as they were driven past’ [Ffennell, 1898: 333]. This tree was closely observed by Sir Richard Owen (1804-92), first director of the Natural History Museum in London, who lived near the tree, at Sheen Lodge, from grew 1852.

Either the year he came to live in the park or the year after . . . he first encountered a young mother with a sick child accompanied by 'an old dame', 'a shrew-mother', or, as he generally called her a 'witch-mother'. They were going straight for the tree; but when they saw him, they turned off in quite another direction till they supposed he was out of sight. He, however, struck by their sudden avoidance of him, watched them from a distance, saw them return to the tree, where they remained some little time, as if busily engaged with it; then they went away. He was too far off to hear anything said, but heard the sounds of voices in unison on other occasions. He heard afterwards from the keeper of Sheen Gate... that mothers with 'bewitched' infants, or with young children afficted with WHOOPING COUGH, decline, and other ailments, often came, some- times from long distances, to this tree. It was necessary that they should arrive before sunrise . . . Many children were said to be cured at the tree. The greatest secrecy was always observed when visiting. This was re- spected by Sir Richard Owen, who, whenever he saw a group advanc- ing towards it, moved away, and was always anxious that they should not be disturbed. He could not tell me in what year he last saw a group approach the tree to seek its aid. He could only say he had seen them often, and thought they continued to come for many years. [Ffennell, 1898: 334]

During a recent survey [of Richmond Park] the site of the old shrew ash was identified. This proved to be . . . the spot where an ancient ash still stood in 1987. A sucker from its roots was still alive, although the tree itself was passé. The storm of autumn brought the trunk down. A railing has now been erected around the remains, which are to be left in the ground, and a young ash is to be planted alongside the stump. Presumably it will eventually replace the old tree, but it means that the site at least will remain identifiable. [Kew, Surrey, February 1994]

There uses included curing EARACHE, RINGWORM, and SNAKE BITES.

The sap of a young ash sapling was used to cure earache. A sapling was cut and put into a fire so that when the stick started to burn the sap came out the end and was caught on a spoon. This could be put on cotton wool and put into the ear. [Daingean, Co. Offaly, January 1985]

Ringworm was more common in my childhood . . . a remedy resorted to was to burn ash twigs in a tin box or similar container and allow the smoke from the smouldering twigs to envelop the affected part—usually arms, neck or face. [Larne, Co. Antrim, October 1993]

Ash leaves are used to combat viper bites. When an animal has been bitten farmers boil ash leaves and give the animal the resulting liquid and place the boiled leaves as a poultice on the bite. Works on people too! [Dorchester, Dorset, February 1992]

Ash sticks were used as weapons.

The Joyces are tinkers . . . they are wary and row among themselves. They do have some fierce fights in which the women join in. When they have each others heads well cut with ash plants they settle down and are as friendly as ever. [IFCSS MSS 750: 242, Co. Longford]

Stories relating to Ireland's past tell of fair-day brawls where ash plants were used and blood flowed freely. [Ballymote, Co. Sligo, May 1994]”

—

The Oxford Dictionary of Plant-Lore

by Roy Vickery

[toothpastecanyon]

We Creatures, Chapter 5

When Alcor felt Mizar calling to him, he came to help. Perhaps, this one time, he should have stayed asleep.

Tagging @starryfansquid by request <3

See most updated version on Archive of Our Own.

______________________________________________________________

“Are you, uh, okay back there?”

The trees were thinning as they sped down the freeway. Alcor kept his hands tight on the wheel as he drove; he tried to keep his eyes on the road, but every so often they’d drift up to the rear view mirror and see her.

Stars, she still looked so much like Mizar. And she hadn’t said a word yet; all she did was stare.

“Okay, uh…” He cleared his throat. “Hey, what should I call you? I assume Mizar isn’t your actual name - heh, that would be a, uh, crazy coincidence…”

Silence. He gripped the steering wheel.

“Listen. I… I’m sorry. For leaving. And saying stuff that… wasn’t fair. You’re right, I’m not really in any position to talk to you about hurting people.” His shoulders slumped. “I guess in my head… I still think I am? I… I want to change, I want to be better… so I start to think I already am.”

He gave a little chuckle.

“Even though you seem to have a way better track record than me. I was watching you with that elf… you really have changed, haven’t you.” A little smile. “And hey, if you can do it, who’s to say I can’t be trying a little harder? Heh, I-”

There was a noise from the backseat. Alcor watched the Creature suddenly turn away, and slump across the seats with her back to him. He frowned.

“Hey, are you okay back there?”

“Leave me alone.”

Alcor raised an eyebrow. “What’s the-”

“Leave me ALONE!” She snapped, and then rubbed her forehead. “Sorry, just… Just stop… stop, okay? You’re… distracting, you’re…”

She trailed off, and Alcor felt a sense of deja vu as he watched her shaking hands. She’d acted like this before, and then she went into that cabin of magi orbs and- oh.

Alcor turned around in his seat. “Hey,” he said, delicately. She growled. “You’re… hungry, aren’t you?”

Her eyes met his, and suddenly he realised why the stare he’d been getting earlier was raising the hairs on the back of his neck. There was something hungry in it… hungry for him.

He gulped. “Okay,” he said, in a higher voice than he meant. “Okay, we’ll, uh… let’s sort that out.”

She was still staring him down as he turned back to the front and started tapping his fingers on the wheel. Well, this was unexpected - but another two seconds of thought and was it really, you agreed to help a vegetarian people-eater get across the country and you’re surprised it’s gotten hungry?

He really needed to think this stuff through. Okay… well, at least it was an easy fix, right? He summoned a handful of magic to his palm, and drove with his elbows as he moulded it into a ball - it looked a little like a glowing snowball, he thought. Then he turned back to the Creature, which was watching this all very intensely.

“Uh, here,” he said, and held it out. “I don’t know if this-”

And it was gone. Alcor flinched a little at the speed; he drew his hand back, and there were claw marks across his palm from how fast she grabbed it. And now she was eating it - he’d only given her a tiny drop of his power, but he could feel a prick on his soul as everything in the back seat went blurry.

Something of him was being consumed, and he gripped the steering wheel. Stared forwards. Tried not to squirm too much in his seat, until…

“Whoa… okay. I’m back.” The Creature returned to sharpness, wiping its mouth. “Was that you? Sorry, man. If I wasn’t all zoned out I could’ve pointed us towards something else.”

“It’s fine.”

“You sure? You got that high voice going on…”

“It’s… I agreed to help, it’s fine.” Alcor worked a shudder out of his spine, and then looked back at her. “Uh, how long’ll that last you?”

“If I don’t get stabbed or jump out of any more cars? Don’t worry about it, I’ll be fine.” She laughed, but she didn’t meet his eyes. “I, uh, get it. If it freaks you out. You don’t have to be polite. You’re already doing more than I expected by coming back.”

“You didn’t think I’d come back?”

“No.” A snort. “I told you, there’s a reason I lied to you. Creatures like us, we don’t tend to make friends real easy.”

Alcor looked at her through the rear mirror. She was slumped down in the seat, staring at the sky through the window. Her expression… he’d seen the look of an ancient being reminiscing before, looking back on thousands of lifetimes of memories, of mistakes, of regrets. He was sure he’d worn that expression before, as well.

He’d just… never seen it on Mabel’s face.

Alcor paused for a minute, took a deep breath, and then spoke.

“What are you?” He watched her glance back at him, eyebrows raised. “Sorry, I’ve just- do you know what you are? I’ve never known anything like you.”

The Creature stared a moment more, and then she laughed. Bracelets jangled as she sat up.

“Oh, you wouldn’t, would you?” She shook her head. “Yeah, I’d be surprised if humans knew the first thing about us - elves tend to get a bit cagey about it all.”

“Why?”

“Why? Well, because we’re elves.”

Alcor blinked. Then frowned. “What?”

“Yeah, I was born an elf, raised an elf. I barely knew what humans even were before I came to the sewers.” She chuckled. “I still don’t, really. Do you know what a cell phone is? It super blew my cover with that elf lady and I’m still not sure why.”

“But-“ Alcor spluttered. “I’ve met elves before, you’re… well, you’re-“

“Completely different looking?” She grinned. “Yeah, that’s what happens when we’re born without a soul.”

Silence. Alcor felt his blood run cold - without a soul? That was impossible… wasn’t it?

“Born Blighted, that’s what they call us.” Her grin sharpened. “And, you know, nobody notices at first. You don’t notice - sure, you look different, but no one treats you differently, do they?”

She looked out of the window again, at a single tree amongst the plains. Alcor watched her hug herself a little.

“You get a bit older, and you can’t do magic. You know.” She gave a dark chuckle. “Sometimes the story ends there, if you’ve got real paranoid parents. But mine… I guess I was lucky I got folks who gave me the benefit of the doubt, and maybe I was just a late bloomer. Maybe I wasn’t Blighted - because I started hearing whispers of that, Blighted.”

The Creature hugged herself until her knuckles went white. She continued.

“But I think I always knew, deep down. Food didn’t fill me; it kept growing, and soon I couldn’t sleep at night. I couldn’t think. It was like there was a hole in me, an emptiness, always growing, always knawing away at me - something had to give.”

Alcor looked back to the road. “What happened?”

“I was only about fifty. Went walking with my mother in the forest, and…” A breath. “Well, then when I came to and realised what I’d done, I left. Never went back.” A pause. “I’ve met one or two like me, in passing. We all had similar stories.”

He looked back at her. She looked solemn, staring down at her hands, saying no more. With a frown, he cleared his throat.

“I’m… sorry.”

She glanced up at him, then down again. “It’s fine,” she said. “It happened thousands of years ago. Doesn’t affect me much anymore.”

“Yeah…” Alcor stared down at the claws tipping his fingers. “Thousands of years ago… I used to be human.”

“What?”

“Yeah. It was…” He chuckled. “Quite the adjustment period, you know.”

“No kidding. How often does that happen?”

“What, becoming a demon?” Alcor gave a wry smile. “It happened once. Never before… and never again.”

“Oh.” A pause. “Bad luck, dude.”

“Hah! Yeah…”

“Wait, was that the whole Transcendence thing? Cause if so…” she reached out and tapped his shoulder. “I’m older than you.”

Alcor snorted. “That’s what you’re focusing on?”

“Of course! Who else gets to say they’re older than a demon, huh? I thought you guys were all old geezers.”

“I’m still centuries old, you know.”

“Centuries? Oh, you are cute!”

“Ugh, shut up.” He rolled his eyes; she reached past him to fiddle with the radio. “I shouldn’t have told you.”

“You really shouldn’t’ve, kid.”

“Kid? Wh- I’ll… oh, come on!”

And they sped along the road like that, conversation turning lighter like trees around them turning to fields. They passed one last tip of forest hanging off the side of the road, and neither of them paid it much mind. Neither of them noticed three still figures standing under the branches, watching them pass. No, they were gone in a second, speeding out of their clutches, west.

Two elves saw this, and turned away. The third, the elder, bowed his head.

“No. This is not the end of the hunt.”

The elves glanced at each other, then back at him.

“They have left our lands, Tarathiel.” One said. Then the other: “We do not hunt the buck for its head. The Blighted One will harm us no more; let us return home, and enjoy the safety we purchased in blood.”

The other looked down. “Too much blood,” they said, wistfully. Tarathiel’s fists clenched.

“It is my place to decide that, not yours.” They whirled around. “Many of us have fallen, yes. We honour them by finishing what they started, not by letting their murderer go free!”

“Murderer…” The elf bowed a little, but frowned. “A murderer is unnatural. Does the fox murder the rabbit in its den?”

The other elf stiffened a little at that. Tarathiel went still at first; still, and then slowly, deliberately, they leaned forwards.

“Ask me that again, sapling.”

The elf stayed silent. He narrowed his eyes.

“Or do you remember your place? Do you regret speaking so rashly?” He grabbed the elf’s chin. “An Elder’s word is law. I did not disobey them when I was young, even when I disagreed. Now I am the one not to be questioned. Patience is rewarded, you know.”

They let go, and turned away.

“Now I must prepare the path. Soon we follow it west.”

With that, Tarathiel turned and walked into the nearest tree, disappearing from view. One elf rubbed their chin, the other stood still.

“That was rash,” said the still one. The other shot him a look.

“Am I wrong? This is madness. More of us have been eaten in this hunt than Blighted Ones have taken in a century. He wants to safeguard our lives? He should leave them as they are - it is the way of things!”

“Calm yourself.”

“Oh, I am calm. I see it clearly - it is Tarathiel who is letting his emotions lead him!” They lowered their voice. “It is no wonder. You know what they say of his daughter? How she-”

The other elf, which had been standing still, suddenly shot forwards. “Silence yourself!” They hissed. “You know what he does to those who speak ill of her.”

The elf shut their mouth. They looked east, to the waving cornfields and the setting sun, and frowned.

“Banishment… I feel banished already. Do you not?”

They stayed silent. After a long moment, they turned away and walked into a tree, disappearing into the bark.

The other elf stayed there alone, watching the cars drift by. Watching the sun dip and sink into the horizon. Watching the stars come out, the crescent moon beaming a dim light back onto the world. Watching the glow of dawn.

Watching.

Watching.

[kerra-and-company]

hiii 25 and any ones you'd like in 6-10 for the hc asks!!

Heya and welcome to my blog; happy to have you here! :) And sounds like a plan!

25. Horses

Ah yes, the cryptids of Tyria asdkjfasf. I feel like they've got to exist somewhere, but specifically on a level of weirdness that's kinda like that regular bear the Earth king has as a pet in Avatar: The Last Airbender. Rare, for whatever reason, and just not quite meshing with the rest of everything, but definitely still there!

Aaaand guess who went on a spree and answered all of 6-10: it's your host today, Kai!

6. How does an average asura’s average day look like?

Their days tend to be centered around academics and projects. It's common to find asura either up early or staying up quite late, fiddling with something and forgetting to give themselves proper lighting because they're too focused. On average, they'd probably wake up from like 6-7 am on the regular, or whatever time is necessary for them to arrive at their college classes or job on time. (6-7 am is just me basing it off our world, but I have no idea if asura would be better or worse about letting people sleep in. Potentially the second, considering how much drive they have for science.)

Mandated breaks definitely have to be a thing for them, like we have recess and lunch for grade schoolers and a required lunch break for workplaces, otherwise both krewe leaders and teachers might not be inclined to provide them (and culturally, the rest might be inclined to let that slide, but I also think they'd be persuaded by what's more productive in the long term, which is having breaks for sure). Discussions on breaks can range from more scientific discussion to talking about goings-on in the world or their personal lives to seeing how fast Progeny A can run to that tree as compared to Progeny B.

7. How does an average sylvari’s average day look like?

They wake up (earlier if they're a dawn bloom and at least slightly later if they're not, and potentially at a specific time depending on their job), consume some nutrients (could be rations, could be snacks from that one restaurant in the Grove, could just be fruit or nectar), and proceed with the rest of their day. If they're a sapling, that involves lessons from luminaries and mentors, as well as potential training. That overlaps with Valiants, who (from what I can tell from ambient dialogue) seem to receive specific training related to their Wyld Hunts when applicable. Wardens will go on patrols, chat with the locals, and defend the territory/area they've been assigned to.

(Side note that's not relevant At All, but I am now super protective of any of the Wyld Hunt Valiant NPCs that I run into while wandering around Tyria doing stuff. I think I just interpret them as Baby, and I've thought so much about the trauma that characters like my OC Kerra experienced because of their Wyld Hunts that I just jump in to help them with whatever they're doing even if I was supposed to be doing something else. I straight-up wiped out (temporarily of course since they respawn) a bunch of the Risen in one area of Mount Maelstrom because they downed a couple of the Valiants there asldjfasdaf.)

8. How does an average charr’s average day look like?

Out of all the races, I'd imagine their days to be the most rigidly structured (because Military). Get up, grab food (side note, do the charr have mess-hall-type places, like our world's militaries or colleges, or do they just all grab food from the type of places that we can see around the Black Citadel? I feel like it has to be both), and report in to your legionnaire for duty, whatever that happens to be. Cubs' training and missions are planned out by their primus--lots of training, both physical and magical, with water and snack breaks when needed.

Also, I wonder what the exact procedure is for legionnaires and centurions reporting in? My guess would be that they have a set time every day or every couple days to check in with the leadership above them, though it can vary. For example, if an Ash warband is on a stealth mission, they won't check in in the standard sense of coming to meet the centurion in person, but they might send messages and updates to make sure everything is on track.

9. How does an average norn’s average day look like?

This has got to be the most varied. Norn are very individual, and the way they spend their days can vary from taking care of a family and a homestead (and doing all the related chores therein, or getting their children to assist) to going on long solo hunts after dangerous prey to some combination of both.

(Wait, how does the norn education system work? Do they have one? They have to have something, right? Are the kids mostly homeschooled? I imagine they'd learn more about each of the great Spirits in Hoelbrak at each of the lodges directed to them, but do they have any sort of school-place that's like how most of us would think about school? I've somehow never considered this and I'm very curious now because I haven't played norn enough to have a proper idea, so if anyone reading this has a headcanon--or knows whatever the canon answer is, if there is one--feel free to weigh in here.)

10. How does an average Human’s average day look like?

I'd say that humans are the only race that has a specific time built in for worship of their gods. I'm not sure if it'd be on one day of the week or observed in some different manner, but there's definitely a set time for it, whether it's by praying/worshipping at home or by traveling to a nearby altar to pay their respects (like the ones in Divinity's Reach) or something else entirely. Outside of that, a typical day would likely be fairly basic--wake up, have breakfast, and go to their jobs (whether it be teacher, socialite, Seraph, Shining Blade, etc.) or schools (pretty sure humans canonically have schools? if not then that's also a headcanon of mine) and follow the schedules required there.

[lord-tathamet]

The Garden at the End of the World

 The twilight wandered.

The gardener ran their fingers through the soft earth of the flowerbed, kneaded the moist dirt between thumb and pointing finger. Fertile soil, not dried and dead, filled with potential and ready to birth new life.

A basket of woven branches sat next to them, inside of it a number of cloth bags each filled to the brim with flower seeds from the fields of Goldenshire and saplings of fey trees from the Gleaming Wilds and from many other places around the world. There were seeds of rose and apple, of lilies and ebony, of palm trees and mammoth plants and hundreds more. Of every plant that a name was whispered, there existed saplings in that basket.

The gardener reached inside and lifted one of the fey saplings out of the basket. It was a small thing in a small pot of painted clay, with pale skin and roots as thin as hair. Sickly, with only a few red and blue patterned leaves that hung limpidly from tiny branches. With one hand clutching the pot, the gardener began to dig a small hole in the flowerbed.

The twilight wandered.

A hum escaped their lips, a simple melody that bounced up and down through the fields and tried to fill the calm, hollow air of the garden. It achieved only the opposite effect.

The lone gardener filled the fissures in the earth and swept away the last few loose crumbs of dirt. Then they sat back, straightened their form and looked down at the tiny sapling twisting its branches up into the sunless sky.

“Your time will come soon. You will be part of something beautiful.” The gardener ran their fingers across the thin, red-blue leaves and their smile grew melancholic for but a moment. “Just not yet.”

The lone gardener stood and picked up the basket with its seeds and saplings and left the lone fey treeling to grow.

There was a sword. Tall, lonely and beautiful in its asymmetry. A broken cross guard and chipped blade, bronze, disc-shaped ornaments sealed across its hilt, a thousand nicked scars running across its edge. It was as old as the gardener themself and never once had it been used. With every year that passed, its edge lost another one of its many nicks. It leaned patiently against a section of low drystone wall that rose near a well-trodden footpath through the garden.

“Hello, old friend.” The gardener's face lit up at the sight of the weapon. They stopped in their tracks and picked the sword up by the nicked blade. “I'm sorry you had to wait so long. Want to take a look at the persimmon with me?”

Their finger swept across the false edge. To an outsider, the sword seemed to have been forged for someone who was far taller than the gardener, yet they swung the sword across their shoulder as if it weighted no more than a feather. There. Now they felt complete again. The gardener didn't like leaving his only friend's side.

The twilight wandered.

The garden was as immeasurable as it was limited in its size and blaze of colours. Cherry and apple trees rose in all their white-blossom glory over indigo-blue meadows and tiny fir tree groves cast long shadows over gorse and sprawling blackberry bushes. Grey dry stone walls and wooden benches dotted the old footpaths that criss-crossed throughout the garden. Scenic creeks and picturesque ponds glinted in the twilight like puddles of red gold.

In the centre of the garden there stood a hill and on its cusp there grew a pitch-black tree. Its bark was wrinkled like old skin and riddled with knot-like growths. Its crown carried thirteen branches that stretched like hungering tendrils towards the empty sky. The tree did not carry leaves, thorns, thistles, fruits or blossoms, only bright, pale-gleaming stars.

The tree was as old as the gardener and the sword. One day, when the time was right, it would bear a single fruit.

There was no shelter, no hovel or hut, as the gardener did not have to fear any wild animals. There was no sun and no moon, for the gardener did not need to sleep nor cared for the passage of time.

The persimmons weren't looking good. None of the branches bore fruit, the roots had gained a sickly yellow colour, the leaves were shrivelled and dark. Around them, the soil itself had dried and greyed. The gardener brushed the palm of their hand across the brittle bark, then they shook their head and sighed.

“Too much acid in the soil,” they said to no one. “They couldn't make it.”

The gardener planted their sword in the earth and flames consumed the trees, leaving behind only fertile ash.

The twilight wandered.

The gardener planted new persimmon trees in the ash of the dead.

The twilight wandered.

Finished with their work, the gardener washed themselves in a near pond. Dirt and grime had settled deep in their hair and between their claws, and they had to scrub with all their might to get even the last speck out from between the ear and the horns. When they were done, they shook themselves with relish like a dog. Then it was the sword's turn. Another blemish had disappeared from its blade.

The twilight wandered.

The gardener sat cross-legged at the shores of the pond, the sword across their lap. The long cloak of rough fur and black feathers lay in a crumpled heap next to them. On top of it throned the basket made from woven branches.

The gardener looked down at the surface of the waters. Three eyes glinted back, framed by matted pitch-black hair and growing horns. They poked their tongue out at it and laughed.

The twilight wandered.

On the way back, the gardener plucked an armful of apricots from a low-hanging branch. Loaded with sword, cloak, basket and fruits, they made to climb the hill at the centre of the garden. They balanced across the twisted roots of the pitch-black tree with outstretched arms, hopped from one root to the next, as if they were stepping stones in a roaring river. Finally, they arrived at their favourite spot. A broad, smooth root that arced like a bridge into the air, just right under the pale light of the star-bearing crown.

The gardener set the basket full of seeds and saplings aside in the grass beneath. They let their legs dangle from atop the cresting root, the sword leaning against their shoulder. From up here, they could see across the entirety of the garden, all the way to the distant slopes of the dome that closed around the gardener's home, blurred in the twilight. The gardener bit into an apricot. Juicy, sour-sweet. The gardener had looked forward to enjoying some persimmons, but they liked apricots all the same.

The twilight wandered.

Above him, one of the many star lights that hung in the black tree's crown was snuffed. One day, they would all cease to be and then their time had come. When the last light on the last of the thirteen branches of the tree went out, then the tree would bear a single fruit for the gardener. And then their sword would lose its last notch and it would gleam like a thousand suns.

They would eat of the fruit and the egg that held the garden would shatter.

And then they would kill the world. And something new would be born from the ashes. Something beautiful.

The gardener wished they could be there to witness what the new world would look like. But it wasn't time just yet. For now, all thirteen branches of the tree still were ablaze with stars. The gardener tossed the stone of the apricot down the hillside.

The twilight wandered.

Down below in the garden, a sapling with red and blue patterned leaves grew. One day, the gardener hoped, it would be part of something truly beautiful.

[freddy-hughes]

Trials and  Tribulations: Death and Decay

A pair of wings flew overhead. Freddy followed. It ducked beneath the branches, above the bushes, and lands on a sapling to preen beneath its wing. Freddy follows dutifully. 

It’s just this way, Freddy

The voice whispers, the soft chime of it caressing his innermost thoughts. 

What is? He asks, unsure where the avid is leading him. 

Just this way, Freddy. Just this way. 

The owl takes off, floating effortlessly upon the wind as it glides towards the forest's edge. The pins and needles of this place grew in intensity. The closer he got to where it lead, the louder the distorted voices of the trees became. Lamenting, wailing, horrid noises assailed his ears, but still the owl flew without a care. Finally it landed upon a low hanging branch, it’s seven eyes peering down at Freddy. 

It’s just right here. Right where he left it. Malformed and corrupted. Changed and cursed. You know this token, don’t you?

Freddy looked around the base of the tree, but saw nothing. He searched beneath the shrubs, brushed away the leaves, yet nothing caught his eye. 

I see nothing, he says, looking up into the black eyes of the bird above him. 

Look harder. It’s just there. 

Freddy returned to his search, brushing more and more of the leaves away as he felt the pins and needles grow stronger. Finally he found a stone beneath the debris, and upon its removal, found a tiny wicker doll, wrapped in thorns. 

The seven eyed owl spread its wings wide, and let loose a screech so ear piercing Freddy feared the drums would rupture. It flew off into the distance, leaving Freddy to ponder the fetish in his hands, and with reverent care he began to slowly remove the thorns. 

Somewhere in the distance he heard what could only be described as a large body collapsing to the ground. 

————-

Fredrick awoke some unknown amount of time later. The sounds of the meadow were peaceful overhead. Birds chirped in the branches, mice skittered amid the grass, bees buzzed to the flowers, and it was nice. Slowly, Freddy rolled himself over onto his back, looking up towards the never ending dusk. “Where am I…” He whispered, hardly bothering to ask the question, because what did it matter? He was here, and needed to find his way out. 

With aching muscles, Freddy sat up, and made it to his feet. He used his branch to support his weight, and cast his gaze around the sanctuary he's so serendipitously found. It was an unremarkable meadow. Flowers blew in the breeze, the grass gently swayed underfoot, and the whole place was otherworldly in its juxtaposition to the haunting forest he left. Freddy spun slowly to look each way he could in a desperate attempt to find a way out. Behind him and to the left was not a way out, but instead a curious sight. 

The meadow was decaying. It was being overcome by various mushrooms that sapped the life from the very ground, and the ugly scar cut a swath back into the forest. “Oh no,” Freddy whispered, “Oh, what’s happened…” Unable to stop his feet from moving, Freddy made his way towards the fungi. 

The intruding mushrooms were waging manifest destiny into the little meadow. Several types of mushrooms were all clustered together like a vanguard on the front lines, pushing the flowers and grass further and further back. Though the ones in the front lines were relatively small, the ones leading further into the forest were a different story. At first they were merely a few centimeters taller, but the further Freddy tread into the decaying forest, the larger they get. Some went up to his knee. Others his hip. Those that hung on the dying trees overhead looked like they could be used as umbrellas in a pinch. 

Fredrick knelt down and splayed his palm over the ground. He closed his eyes to try to see what he could suss from the whispers, but of the usual murmurs of the forest, he heard what could only be described as a death rattle. The lungs of the earth heaved with an unnatural strain, the sound coming to him ragged, and pained. Freddy opened his eyes and looked around in horror. What had happened here? What evil had seeped into the forest to cause such decay and destruction? “Okay...okay.” He whispered, steeling himself for the trek ahead. “Okay. Okay don’t worry. Don’t worry I’m here.” Who he was assuring was anyone’s guess. 

Fredrick moved further into the dense forest, the smell of decay and damp moss all around him. He passed over the picked clean bones of various creatures, stepped over the fungi infested logs of felled trees, and tried to quell his racing heartbeat the denser and darker the forest got. Every chance Freddy got he would stop and feel at the trees. He would run his fingers over the bones, and pluck the mushrooms free in a feeble attempt to see what he could find. The hum of magic vibrated through his fingertips, but the feel of it was foreign. Different. Alien. It was almost like his own, however there was a fuzziness to it, no not fuzziness - thornyness. When it vibrated through his hand it left in its wake pins and needles. 

Freddy followed the hum of magic deeper. He began to move at a quicker pace, almost frantic. His hands swiped mushrooms off the ground as he moved, feeling them between his fingers, and then tossing them into his bag. He would grab a bone or two, roll them between his knuckles, and then put them with the mushrooms. He did not stop moving. Around the bend there was a particularly strange cluster of mushrooms. They grew from a small overhang of branches that covered a hovel at the base of the tree. The mushrooms sprang from the sides of the hovel, twitching as they released spores, and even a little trail of their flat topped heads lead into the tiny hole. 

Freddy felt his heart squeeze. 

Slowly, hesitantly, Freddy approached the little hovel. He pushed aside the dying leaves and mushrooms and peaked within, only to have his breath catch in his throat. A mother fox lay dead within the hovel, her body already having decayed into near nothingness. The holes of her flank were infested with mushrooms, their tiny bodies sprouting from the flesh, and consuming what they could. Fur cling to bones and dying flesh as all manners of insects and fungi gnawed are her. 

Curled against her bones was a single kit, shivering, and crying in the cold. “Oh...oh no…” Freddy whispered, heart breaking. “Oh, little one, I’m so sorry. Come here,” With tender hands, Freddy reached out to gently pull the kit from the hovel. 

It was skin and bones, frigid, and shivering. Barely old enough to be off its mothers’ milk, the tiny kit was only barely beginning to show its auburn coloration. As Freddy pulled the little creature close his heartache only grew. A mushroom cluster had begun to grow from the soft flesh of the little kits left eye. Likely from attempting to nurse from it’s deceased mother, the spores had landed into the eye, and grown with a painful slowness that took its sight. “Oh...oh I’m so sorry my friend. I’m so sorry.” Freddy whispered, running the pad of his thumb up and down the center of the kits forehead. 

He sat back on his hind end, the kit cradled close to his neck in an attempt to warm it up as Freddy dug around in his bags. Many people had always laughed at the array of things he carried with him, but Freddy knew he’d one day need them. So when the powdered formula was found, he cheered in excitement. “You must be hungry, huh?” He asked the little creature, rubbing at its cheeks as it gnawed on his fingers. “Yes, yes I can see that. I know, but don’t worry. I’ll have you fat in just a second here.” 

Tucking the little kit into his tunic to keep it warm, Freddy went about the process of preparing it. The kit cried, and whimpered. It squirmed around his neck in an attempt to get comfortable, but it was all in vain as Freddy plucked the little creature up and set it in his lap to feed. The little baby bottle he filled with the powdered formula and water was tarnished and worn, and holding it in his hand made him smile. Lydia had been tickled pink when he convinced her that he needed it for all manner of creatures he’d find in the woods. Freddy looked up to the pale blues and purples of the sky as he positioned the kit to nurse. He needed to get home soon. 

As the little fox drank hungrily from the bottle, Freddy took stock of the things he had. A few days rations, two water skins, a few trinkets, and his medical kit. While going through his things, Freddy remembered the bones and mushrooms he had plucked on his way up here. With one hand holding the bottle, the other fished through his bag, and pulled one of the fungi free. At every angle Freddy looked at it, it appeared to be nothing more than a mushroom. However the magic hum was still there, leaving his fingers with pins and needles the longer he held it. 

“It takes more than a wrong turn to find yourself here.” A voice whispers from above. “What poor misfortune has lead you here, mortal?” 

Freddy jumps at the sudden voice, head whipping around as he searches for the source of it. Sitting on the fallen tree above the ridge behind him is a fox, it’s three tails wrapped around its legs as three eyes peer at him curiously. The kit in his hands drinks heartily from the bottle. 

“Monsters chased me here,” Freddy says tentatively. “I found this kit by its mother, and, well, I couldn’t just leave it.” 

“Death is a part of life. As surely as the sun sets, so too do we depart. Why do you bother to stop the cycle?” 

Freddy looked to the little creature in his hands. The milk dribbled down its chin as it licked its chops and curled down for a nap against the crook of his knee. “He doesn’t deserve to suffer alone.” Freddy whispers, thumb softly rubbing at a velvet ear. “Nothing should perish cold and alone in the forest.” 

“That kit is not the first to have passed, nor shall it be the last. Your tender heart is admirable, but in this place it will only get you more, and more lost. Until you too perish, cold, alone, and there will be nothing to comfort you.” 

Freddy softly ran his palm over the sleeping kits back, ushering it into a sleep he didn’t know it would awake from. “Maybe,” He agrees, a shrug to his shoulder. “However I did make a promise to protect the forest, and the creatures that live within it. It was my oath as a Thornspeaker. Should the forest claim me, it will claim me, and through my death life will flourish anew.” 

The fox chuckled. It wasn’t overly cruel, or condescending, but it did laugh. Slowly it stood and walked across the log, hopped down to the burrow Freddy pulled the kit from, and sat before it. It’s tails curled back around its body, as it regarded Freddy with a tilted head of curiosity. 

“You will find naught but horror, and suffering in these woods. Those that came before you have twisted it to their liking, instilled their will upon the very life you seek to protect. Do you think you, a single man, can undo what has been done before your fathers, fathers, father was born?” 

“Do I not owe it to the forest to try?” 

A contemplative hum escaped the fox. Slowly it looked over its shoulder, to the death held within the novel. 

“Then I will leave you with this wisdom, little mortal. Your eyes will deceive you. Their magic is wicked and deep. Where you think the corruption should be, you will not find it. Look where it never should have been, and you will find it.” 

The fox unfurled its many tails to stand. Like a ghost in the fog it wandered back into the forest, leaving Freddy, and the little kit alone amid the death, and decay. 

Freddy sat quiet for a moment, hand still idly rubbing at the soft fur of the kit in his lap. A thought strikes him. With tender fingers he lifts the little life up to inspect, and though it looks healthy despite the mushroom cluster blooming from its eye, he looks it over. He checks its ears, gently opens its mouth to check, and then finally turns his attention to the encroaching fungi. 

“I’m so sorry,” He whispers, eyes welling with tears as his fingers hold the little kit more firmly. His free hand grips the mushrooms at the base. Slowly he begins to pull them free. 

The kit squirms, squeals, cries in pain as the root of the fungi pulls at whatever it had attached itself too. With more force than necessary, Freddy pulls. He tries to not crush the little life in his hand as worries flash through his head: was he potentially pulling the very brain of this kit from its eye? What had the fungi attached itself too? 

Finally, the mushrooms begin to budge. Like a carrot dug deep into the earth, the roots clinging to the dirt, the mushrooms resist him. Yet Freddy is undeterred. He keeps whispered tear filled apologies under his breath as finally, the cluster pops free. 

Tangled into the bottoms of the mushrooms is what appears to be dirt, as though he had pulled them from the ground, and not the skull of a living being. Within the dirt is a petrified eye, magic keeping the blue of the iris glossy as it stares into nothingness. The pins and needles shoot in Freddy’s arm like wildfire. Sharp, white hot needles were being jammed into every inch of his arm, making it shake, as the sheer evil magic radiated off it in waves. 

The kit went limp in Freddy's hand. Slowly, reverently, Freddy set its body against the crook of his knee and cleaned off the dirt and mushrooms from the eye in his hand. His hands shook as angry, frustrated, heartbroken tears streamed down his face. “How dare you,” He whispered, voice tight with rage. “How dare anyone do this. You are not welcome here. Understand? I will find you, root you out, and I swear by the trees themselves I will see you pay for this.” 

The glossy blue eye started into nothing. Freddy held it in his palm and slowly closed his fingers over it. He took three breaths to ready himself, and on the third he squeezed. The eye popped like a grape in his hand, dissolving into sand that slipped through his knuckles. Fire shot up his arm the moment the eye popped, the force of it so jarring it topped Freddy onto his back. 

He pants as though he’s run a thousand miles, his hand and arm feeling numb and stinging as though he had shoved it into a blazing fire. He lifted his hand only to see that a searing wound had been left in his palm, the black tendrils of the magic smoking off his knuckles until they dissipated in the wind. The wound remained. 

A soft cry caught his ears, and not a moment later the fox kit crawled onto his stomach, and looked down at him with a single golden eye. With a relieved, and confused smile, Freddy slipped into darkness. 

[lady-o-ren]

The Witch and the Red Man

Chapter One /  Chapter Two / Chapter Three  / Chapter Four

Chapter Five

The air within the oakwood chamber was damp, cool and richly lush with the fresh, clean, fragrance of wild mint and lavender that overlapped the twisted bark above as the knotted walls bellowed like the rise and fall of a creatures ribs moaning hauntingly so.

Nevertheless, the creeping night had been a gift of peace for Claire, who laid enveloped in the healing depths of slumber of which she had been without for so long. Where anguish momentarily lifted from her heart steadying it to a calming rhythm, spreading warmth in a glowing blue of harmony that mended not only her bruises and scrapes but also the painful strain of another's cursed psyche that had been consuming her mind, tainting her blood.

And it was that link so quiet as not to stir her from the sanctity and unbothered bliss of a dreamless sleep that had Claire waking with a sense of unease, questioning if the damned red man had absconded stupidly into the night.

Throwing off the muslin sheets where she was bared to her stippled moonlit skin, Claire dressed hastily in clothes unfamiliar but wonderfully clean, even as the thundercloud of her own accursed curls and low-hanging ivy slithering as snakes, blinded her in the rush.

Out the room where she crushed soft pennytops springing through the crackled stone floors, past the clustering white hemlock still curling wildly with infatuation that she slapped away, Claire was met with the oddest of sights that had her palming her eyes.

There sat Jamie, hunched forward on his elbows over the clawed table that was dotted with piles of acorns and pebbles, across the raven known as Boromir and glowering like an adolescent over what seemed like a simple game of draughts.

"You wee fowl of a cheat," Jamie grumbled, causing the accused to ruffle feathers so black they lustered blue and glinted green, while throatily voicing a declaration of his innocence which was simply that of an offended caw.

"Dinna give me any of yer beak, beag suid,or I'll have yer feathers plucked 'till yer fleshed pink." Jamie then continued to argue with Boromir, who practically molting from his rapid flapping, which is when Claire interceded with a clearing of her throat.

Loudly so. Then another. Causing Jamie to flinch from ruddy brow to cornered lip in mid verbal assault, keeping his back decidedly turned knowing he'd find a mocking grin pinching her cheeks.

"What exactly am I interrupting here may I ask? Other than the obvious threat of a full grown man towards an innocent bird."

"Innocent?" He grunted, narrowing his eyes at the percieved guilty. "This bastard was the most decent thing I've met in years, apart from a hare roasted over fire - that is until he defiled our friendship with dirty underhanded play." The accusation was emphasized with a hard pointed finger to the tabletop.

Hand on her hip, "How?"

"I dinna ken, but his mistress is a dark one and I shouldna see why a soul eater as he canna be as well."

"Or just possibly his thumb sized intelligence is greater than yours."

Claire was met with a sideways glare meant to melt her spine down to it's marrow yet, it only prompted a fervent press of her hand to the delightfully spasming muscles of her belly. The first she had felt since her days with Raymond.

"This genius here as ye so believe tried to swallow an acorn whole. Had to pinch his throat for him to caw another day." Boromir denied such a humiliating mishap by chancing a pecking at the broad back of Jamie's hand that he in turn waved in a warning smack to his beak.

"So you're telling me you've lost to a bird that you yourself have given a lowly opinion of intelligence to. No offense to you Boromir," Claire was quick to add, looking over Jamie's burning thatch curling as his annoyance peaked. "I think you're the one with sense."

Jamie then muttered underbreath a garble of something surely belittling in gàidhlig towards her, which was a grand deal better than him directly saying so in words she could understand. And before he changed his mind on that, Claire decided (with sharp insistence of her stomach) she needed sustenance better than a laugh, no matter the small flickering warmth it brought her.

She sought the great iron pot gently steaming and spouting a bubbly croon over the black sooted hearth and stirred it's contents (what looked to be a delicious concoction of bobbling mushrooms, potatoes and other bountiful delights, spiced strongly with cloves of garlic and herbs that crossed enticingly under her nose), wondering where Geillis could be and for that matter the time of day it was. The light that sneaked through the crevices of the saplings glowed rather darkly like the haggard setting of the day and those hours lost ticked away in Claire's mind.

"Is it sundown already?" She asked with a furrowed brow to Jamie, who had been pawing at Boromir's loot of acorns before getting nicked by his beak.

"Aye," Jamie mumbled roughly past his lips where the injured finger was being nursed. "Of what day I canna say. One - two may have past that I've noticed. I suspect something in the water, even the air that's made a blur of it all and it must be something mighty to do us both in. Especially me."

"What makes you think so?"

Jamie's finger glistened with a small drop of blood near black that he smeared against thumb and forefinger before speaking again.

"I woke somewhere between the last we spoke to now, my mouth thirsting. I looked to that pitcher there beside ye as our fine feathered lad here deemed it well enough to drink. Next I knew I was on my face pooled wet in senseless dreams with Boromir pecking at my heid, clawing at my cheek."

Abuse Jamie welcomed as the dreams were nightmares echoing the past that threatened to choke him as the hangman's noose. The pool that drenched him his sweat from a brewing fever of fright with the black bird trying desperately to rouse him from his minds relentless torment. Jamie reluctantly lowered his head in gratitude to Boromir whose guarded stance relaxed to that of a dove.

"I dinna trust the water and that extends to the food. Been eating acorns and black currants from the vine that grows above us since noontide and no misfortune has befallen me yet."

While Claire knew Geillis had a perverse penchant for playing tricks, it wouldn't explain her own sedation as she was immune to all earthly poison. Pondering possibilities she deduced the most obvious.

"While I can't say Geillis isn't capable of doing such a thing, I think it was simply our bodies meeting their limits. Exhaustion overtaking us." Claire reasoned, spooning soup to two bowls crudely shaped from black walnut that sat purposefully aside for her and Jamie (Had Geillis been back since she left them that night?). She placed one in front of him that he wrinkled his nose to, then took her seat at Boromir's end who was ever the gentleman and shuffled aside.

"Even if I were inclined to believe ye, I'm no' touchin' food made from that woman’s baneful hand." Jamie shoved the bowl away, broth dripping down the rim as he reached instead for a large handful of acorns to gorge on without the squawking scorn.

"If we are ever to leave this place and never see one another again - which you've made quite clear is your desire as is mine, you will need your strength, Jamie. The faster you eat the better for us both."

Jamie fixed a single unblinking stare to Claire as he popped the acorns to his mouth, one after the other. Each louder than the last in stubborn emphasis.

"You child." Rolling her eyes, Claire left him to his chosen meal fit for bushy-tailed vermin and tucked in to hers. Lapping up a veggie stacked spoonful that swam hot across her tongue, a peculiar expression fell upon her face that had Jamie's brows pitched high.

"Poison." The word was spoken with an odd tone of smug validation.

"Pepper." Claire retorted flatly, with the heat of it catching in her throat. "Quite a lot too. Still, I'd wager it's a grand deal better than what you're having."

While Claire continued to eat, the steamy aroma relentlessly teased Jamie's fortitude that crumbled with every writhing lurch of his stomach, groaning so like a feral shriek it startled even himself.

Uttering, "Shit," Jamie grabbed for the spoon, provoking a smile that warmed Claire better than the soup. The heat of it spreading to her cheeks when her glowing amusement was mistaken for gloating and was met with a firm press of his boot over the tip of hers, 'Dinna say a word.'

She didn't.

Instead the whizzing and crackling fire did the talking with the nervous rustling of summers last verdant creation sneering back. Boromir's gurgling kraa filled the gaps between as he joined the feast at Jamie's urging. Bickering forgotten, forgiveness granted.

Time would have passed pleasantly, the silence preferable over a chancing of another snide remark taken farther then a jest, more cruel than a bite, if not for the entrance from the brisk outside of one who could see to the center of a man if evil be found there and relished in it so.

"Keep on wi' yer daggers stag and I'll tear yer eyes to crush beneath my shoon." Her white teeth gleaming in the dusky light, Geillis chuckled darkly at Jamie until Boromir shrieked in his defense, fingers tensing at the clasps of her cloak.

"Bleeding devil's, yer getting a mouth on ye. And the state of ye," she clicked her tongue sharply as she chucked her cloak to hang on the roots protruding from the walls. "Mussed as a drowned rat."

Despite his less than kind proclamations earlier, Jamie gently stroked his knuckle to Boromir's feathered back, softly speaking most sincere. "Ye've a most handsome feather about ye, lad. Dinna mind yer Mistresses foul withered tongue."

Defiant eyed, Jamie shrugged his shoulders dismissively as Claire hushed him, fingers curling in her lap as if to strike the words from his mouth but little too late.

Her unnatural feral eyes became entirely devoid of white, but upon hearing the hitch in Claire's throat pleading gaze, Geillis sighed and curled her lovely mouth so wide that it sent a chill through the three.

"Och, sweet on each other are ye now?" Her voice sopping with mockery. "Beware my kinsman, the glutton will shit on ye when his gullet is filled to the brim. Vomits when he dips his pecker in the drink too. But at the very least he swallows his own sick."

Amused with herself, Geillis walked to the hearth and raised her chilled palms to the fire, kindling bright as the flame. Her blonde lashes flicked nearly flittering closed when Claire asked where she had been.

"The sleep steal yer memories as well, mo calman geal? I shouldna be surprised what wi' the both of ye still-bodied as death when I shuffled about these days past." Her mossy eyes crinkled at the corners. "And ye ungrateful pair are welcomed for the clothes and food."

"You have our gratitude, Geillie. Immensely ," Claire's voice rose in appeasement, looking over her shoulder to Jamie who stared just as hard back. Geillis however hummed in appreciation.

"I've been asking around the wood to find ye both passage past where my name willna help ye. I conversed at great length wi' every spirit I have favor wi'. Exhausted me so." Her face flushed unabashed to the roots of her hair, giggling like a youth.

"But it was mo Aloisia, who held the way." She said fondly. "A nymph from the very waters of Iona, practically drowned me to do so. Had watercress in the crack of my arse."

Before she could detail any further where reeds and lily pads had caressed her, Claire hurriedly interrupted her. "So it's by the river we journey?"

"Aye, a wee boat long abandoned is drifting our way now to quickly set ye to Le Havre before the butcher can find ye. And he is searching mo leannan, the trees whisper it. Water is the answer."

"What do you think, Jamie?" Claire turned to Jamie who had been silent through it all to find his hands clapped to his face where he had gone green as the briny sea.

"Jamie?"

"Damn all ye soulless woman." He wretchedly groaned looking to retch right on the spot.

___

A/N: Thank you to all who continue to read this story.

[mythauragame]

Hey all! Welcome to our monthly development update, apologies for (another) late post! Here is what lies under the cut.

What’s new?

New Special - Python!

The Dashboard - Your home page.

New Monsters and New Item Patreon Illustrations.

Community spotlight - Lorehounds.

What’s new?

February has been a busy month for us behind the scenes - We had hoped to launch an updated version of the Beast Demo along side this update, however we have found some significant bugs that need to be squashed before release. Our talented front-end coder is working hard to get the updated demo into your hands soon, some of the features you can read about in our last development update.  But here is some good news - A new Special marking has been created and is ready to be played with on our current demo! The Python Special was created thanks to our lovely Patreon supporters who voted on the topic and design, thank you guys! The design of the special itself is the work of our resident artist Gelly. Python applies a marking similar to that of a Python snake, and works quite well with it our other reptilian inspired Special, Skink. I can’t wait to see what new designs the community comes up with.

Python is now live on the current demo! -> Click here to play!

Other game play elements are progressing this month - right now we have a focus on building social elements of Mythaura which includes the forums and their related functions. We’ll have more to share on that by March. We’re also developing and conceptualizing the Dashboard..

The Dashboard - your home page

* note that the above image is conceptual and subject to change!

Upon logging into Mythaura, you will land upon what we are currently calling the Dashboard.  The Dashboard will contain all the current events and snapshots of current events happening within the game. Each container will contain clickable links that will bring you to the updated areas. 

The upper container will show the latest news updates, clicking on this will take you to a news post on the official forums where you can read the entirety of the news as well as share your comments or read comments by others. 

The containers below the news will contain different topics depending on what is new or recently updated. For example they could show lore updates, current faction leads or status, or new items.

Below those containers again will live four others. Here there will be a randomly featured Beast from the community, trending forum topics, site tickers or current status and custom bookmarks. Custom bookmarks are any page on Mythaura that you can save to your dashboard to make it easier to navigate to your favorite pages. They can be changed at any time. 

We are still thinking of other ideas and features for the Dashboard - if you have any ideas or what you would like to see, please don’t hesitate to voice them! 

Mythic and Artisan Patreon rewards have the opportunity to work with the artists to create their own Monsters and Items that will appear in-game. Here are the illustrations that have been created this month. Many thanks to our incredibly creative supporters! Mythaura would not exist if it wasn’t for your amazing support. Monsters: Avakiru - Created with Malis! Armored Dale Wanderer - Created with Fizzywits! Celestial Stalker - Created with Mezzo!

Items: From left to right: Black Moonlily - Created with Keith Winn! Fish Spirit Pearl - Created with Sungmin Kim! Magic Obsidian - Created with Kirkeyressa! Geode Locket -  Created with TwinFishies! Dunkleosteus Skull - Created with Frillshark! Red Rose - Created with Aku!

Community Spotlight

There are so many awesome creations that the budding Mythaura community create every single day, I really wish I had more room to include every piece here! In the future, there may be a separate post showcasing both the art talents and the writing talents. For now, this month’s community spotlight will be directed upon the incredible lorehounds. Check out these fantastic head cannons and pieces of fiction inspired by Mythaura!

Created by Discord user Fimbrethil - A map of their own Port Damselfly built near Dawn Ruins and the Sleeping Waters.

An inspiring piece of writing by Discord user kevin!  

Feathers blessed by the stars, one often finds the beast conjuring charts between her claws. Those who hold the galaxy on their bodies are often found in this manner, the female being no exception. Much like the celestial bodies that drift from their pelts, the hippogriff's wings can't seem to take her close enough to the skies above. Mapping the marks on her wings sates the need to take on the sky, as even the dullest birds know that the universe is too vast for one chart. Yet this doesn't stop her from trying, eyes longingly gazing from her deep blues and blacks to the light-constructed diagram. Someday, a perfect map of the painted dome will be complete.

Discord user BettaSenpai’s poetic head canon on Hippogriffs! A beast of bird and steed: noble, graceful, and strange. A wing beat and the galloping of hooves. Never a day goes by I wonder if they live here, in this land filled with magic and dreams. Perhaps somewhere I am in my bed asleep, and my mind and soul found this place. Maybe I am daydreaming about magic and adventure strong enough to see this beautiful place. And yet, dream or not, the reality is I have never felt more alive to see their grace and power before me. I am humbled. Mighty beast, if you may hear me, know that I admire you. Know that I wish to understand you and that if this is a dream, I pray to return to you. To this world. Fly now dear beast; I shall awaken, and remind the world of your beauty again. There they are again. This time they soar and dive above me in some acrobatic show that dares you to look away. They move through the sky so effortlessly. Such fantastic beasts... They are closer now as if they have become used to me being here and now as they slowly get more comfortable with me I realize how much I admire them. Before I might have just looked on in awe but now as I return again and again it gets harder for me to leave them. I can hear them call, perhaps they are saying my name? If only I could decode such a melodic sound. Would it lose its magic if it was understood? Could it still be a mystery? Whatever they may be saying as I feel myself leaving their world I find it harder and harder to go. Rest now beasts of land and sky, noble, fierce, and graceful. I remind myself of who I wish to be. 

Discord user and Mythic Supporter Fizzywits description of the Armored Dale Wanderer Monster!

The Armored Dale Wanderer is what appears to be a peculiar cross between plant and animal. This hybrid of sorts has been known to consume insects of every shape and size, but evidently can also survive exclusively through photosynthesis. Armored dale wanderers are heavily dependent on intraspecies symbiosis, and will inevitably perish if separated from others of its kind for at least half a season's worth of time. 

 These strange beasts are named (rather uncreatively) after their characteristics: they possess tough scales that serve effectively as armor. Composed primarily of bark and chitin, these scales are difficult for insects to chew through. Furthermore, they often reside in or along valleys - though they begin their lives as sedentary creatures, when they mature a few years after birth, they migrate seasonally in massive herds from one side of their local valley to the other. They dig deep holes to lay and bury their eggs in; they stop to dig only when confident in the quality of the surrounding soil. They breed in the summer, and healthy saplings tend to emerge come early autumn.

 Little is known as to how these blind creatures are able to navigate - despite possessing what appear to be a heads, each wanderer has at least one pair of orifices and one mouth-like structure per head, none of which serves as a sensory organ for sight. They will lie dormant in the spring and autumn until a dramatic shift in temperature instigates movement. Although they are not hostile creatures, they will travel without rest during migration period, and feel no remorse for trampling anything that happens to be serving as an obstacle between themselves and their destination. As much as they depend on numbers for survival, groups do not seem to exhibit any defined social hierarchy with the exception that the eldest wanderer is the first to wake and thus leads the rest in migration. Skirmishes with these beasts are rare. They are neutral to other organisms who decide to inhabit their bodies. 

 Anatomically, armored dale wanderers resemble hydra. They are hermaphrodites and boast flowers and vines decorating their bodies. These floral arrangements may differ depending on region.

The official Discord has added some fun little emoticons of our favorite faction leaders - Esris and Reine. Click here to join in on the conversations! 

That’s it for now! Thank you all for being so patient, we will have more exciting things to share very soon. 

❤ Grif

[obstacleisthepath-blog]

To be necessary

January 13, 2021

Think about your life as the life of a tree, a slender sapling spiraling upward, and downward too, growing thicker every year.

Roots spread outward, reaching and anchoring, reaching and anchoring, each strand, each finger sending and receiving sugars, enzymes, participating in a microscopic community of life.

And branches, spreading outward, tips becoming buds, becoming leaves, a hundred thousand palms turned upward, following the sun, pulling sunlight inward, and exhaling, too, offering oxygen for all the breathing creatures who require it.

To be required, to be necessary, to participate, even if you do not ever leave the spot you were planted, indeed because you do not leave that spot.  You are always moving, though, slowly slowly moving, upward, downward, outward, spiraling with time.

The wind bends you from side to side.  You pull inward in winter, stand naked through those long dark nights, new buds bright against the cold blue sky.  You unravel into spring and explode into summer, holding bird’s nests, inhaling sunlight, making shade.  You lose a limb.  The place where your limb once grew becomes a hole.  An owl sleeps there, tucked inside of you.  Another tree grows up next to you.  Maybe you touch and grow together.  You bend away so there is sunlight for both of you. 

In summer you make seeds and you release them into the wind.  You do this without a sense of risk, only generosity.  You do not know if they find the soil or unfold and become, it does not matter, you keep making seeds and sending them forth. 

When you get old, you will die from the inside out.  This spine that connects heaven and earth will crack and crumble and you will fall earthward, slowly slowly disassembled by insects, fungi, bacteria.  Or you might be consumed swiftly by fire, all of your stored inert energy released skyward in one bright blaze.

Either way, you keep moving outward, downward, upward, around the spiral of time.  You keep becoming, you keep providing, you keep being necessary.

prompt: Climbing  -Lucille Clifton

[evolutionsvoid]

The Lou Carcolh, or also known as Snail Dragons, are another prime example of how "dragons" are not an actual official family of creatures. As I have stated in previous entries, the term "dragon" is used for labeling or describing large, intimidating creatures that terrify locals and cause issues. The species that are indeed giant, reptilian monsters are referred to as "true dragons," as the regular dragons can refer to a conglomerate of species that vary wildly in anatomy, class and many other things. Grinning Dragons, Bone Dragons, Arctic Dragons and Snail Dragons all carry the label "dragon," but are so incredibly different from one another that even trying to link them together is silly. I mean, just in those four is a mollusk, a reptile, an insect and a mammal. Quite different indeed! Anyways, I bring this up because this entry is about the Lou Carcolh, which many like to call Snail Dragons. The Lou Carcolh live in temperate climates, setting up their homes in caves, tunnels, crevasses and other rocky structures. They are solitary creatures, only coming together during mating season. A Lou Carcolh prefers rocky terrain and a place that is either damp or receives a decent amount of rain. As a species, the Lou Carcolh do not need much to get by. They do not require a complex nest, nor a massive territory for hunting. Instead, they like to find a nice, rocky place to hide and then wait there for prey to come by. 

These large mollusks are ambush predators, catching prey that walk by their dens. When they wish to hunt, a Lou Carcolh will slowly crawl its way to a hidden spot. Some hide in the darkness in caves, some cling to sides of cliffs and crevasses, while some may even bury themselves in vegetation to hide their mass. Once properly hidden, they will snake their extremely long tendrils out into the open, hiding them in the foliage or blending them in with the rock around them. They will set their trap on trails and other places that show sign of activity and passage. There, their tangled net will lay, waiting for some poor sap to come trundling by. When prey steps amongst their tendrils, they will rise up and snare the creature in their sticky embrace. The tentacles of a Lou Carcolh have a natural adhesive and stiff hairs that allow them to trap smaller prey or properly hold larger, thrashing animals. When a victim is tangled in their grip, the Lou Carcolh will reel them back into their hiding place. The tendrils will bring them to their mouth, where they will inject them with paralyzing venom from their fangs. When prey is immobilized, the Lou Carcolh will seize them in their mouths and begin the slow process of feeding. Lacking powerful jaws for cutting and chewing, the Snail Dragons instead use a saw-toothed radula that takes up their entire lower jaw to slowly rasp away flesh. The backwards facing teeth help keep the victim in place and tear away at them as the Lou Carcolh works its jaw back and forth. Needless to say, being eaten by a Lou Carcolh is a long and painful process, as the victim is usually still alive. The venom only paralyzes your muscles, so it does not kill you instantly. Death will only come through asphyxiation or blood loss, and neither are all that great. The Lou Carcolh will continue to rasp away at its prey until it has broken down enough of them to swallow whole. After prey is consumed, they shall rest and digest for some time, before setting out their trap again. The trapping tendrils of a Lou Carcolh also aid in getting water, as there are small vessels that run throughout the tentacle. When thirsty, they will send their tendrils out to find puddles and pools. The appendages will submerge themselves and siphon water to the main body far away. That way Snail Dragons don't need to go out in the open to get a drink! Due to their large size and slow lifestyle, the Lou Carcolh can live for quite a long time. Some stories have claimed that certain specimens have been centuries old, growing to a size and strength that is impossible to slay. I have heard some tales that there are a few mountains out there that are notorious for causing travelers and climbers to vanish. They believe that a massive Lou Carcolh lives within the rock, sending out mile long tendrils to catch any who are foolish enough to climb its peak. Some even say that the mountain itself is there shell!   When it comes to reproduction, Snail Dragons are a bit different compared to other "dragons." The Lou Carcolh are hermaphroditic, possessing reproductive organs of each gender. This works to their advantage, as these creatures are quite slow when it comes to travel. When mating season occurs, the Lou Carcolh travel to find pheromone trails left by others in hopes of finding a mate. Since they are slow, this searching can take weeks until they find another of their kind. With that, you don't want the issue where you put all this time and effort only to find that you have tracked down an incompatible mate. Being hermaphrodites, any individual they find can do the job! So when two Snail Dragons come together, they do their courtship and then one (or both) of them fires a "love dart" into the other. These hardened, sharp "darts" are filled with sperm, and are how one Lou Carcolh fertilizes the other. They are located in the same region where the fangs are, developing prior to the mating season. When the time comes, the two shall do their dance and try to strike the other with this "dart." Whoever winds up getting embedded with this structure will be fertilized, allowing them to bear and lay eggs. In some cases, both wind up getting darted, so they both play the egg-laying role. Once the ritual is over, they part ways and head back to their hunting ground. The eggs will be laid beneath the soil and abandoned. The young that hatch will have to fend for themselves. Due to their large size and odd appearance, the Lou Carcolh are quite famous creatures to the locals. Certain rocky formations are named after them, especially if they look like a snail shell. There is a local vine that is called "carcolh tongue" due to its hairy, wandering tendrils that lay upon the ground. They are usually one of the first suspected when someone goes out to rocky areas and vanish, and many warn one another that "the carcolh will catch you!" The origins of the Lou Carcolh is also a popular tale in the region. The story goes that there was a time, long ago, when the dragons ruled the skies. The massive beasts were so plentiful, that they would blot out the sun for days on end. After years of darkness and destruction, one man decided to finally bring the monsters down. He donned his armor and crafted a great, mighty bow. With arrows the size of lances, he shot the dragons from the sky, causing them to plummet from the sky and splatter amongst the rocks. The dragons tried to slay him, but his abilities with his bow could not be beaten. Others took up weapons like his and they worked to clear the skies of these large creatures. During this massacre, there was a group of dragons who brought themselves to the ground, terrified of the lethal arrows. Seeking to avoid their own demise, they tore the wings from their backs and bound themselves forever to the earth. In time, they slowly became the Lou Carcolh, hiding in caves in fear of this mythical warrior. It is a fun story, but one that carries the same cliche every human tale has. For some reason, humans really like to act like they are the creators or cause of every living thing in this world. Every origin story centers around their actions. It's kind of weird. It's like how there are a large chunk of people out there that think that all of dryad kind was created by a lonely Mycomancer! It's ridiculous! (And it's also a tale I would not read to your saplings, because YIKES!)   Another thing that makes the Lou Carcolh infamous to the region is their "love darts." The large stinger-like reproductive organs are things people have a hard time understanding, and they also create some bizarre scenarios. There was a time, a while back, when people thought that the Lou Carcolh abducted virgins and used their "love darts" to impregnate them with their larvae (That is also another thing that shows up in a lot of human tales: monsters doing naughty things to others. Makes you wonder who comes up with this stuff.). It was also seen as the ultimate sign of humiliation for those who hunted the Carcolh. Since the "love dart" is situated in the mouth, those who get near its fangs or struggle in its grip may accidentally set it off. It has been said that those warriors who have accidentally been shot with this dart during battles usually wander off into the woods, never to be seen again. They apparently were too ashamed to show their faces ever again. The other thing their "love darts" are famous for is outsiders not realizing what they are. Days after the mating process, the "love darts" are pushed out of the body and discarded on the ground. Travelers have stumbled across these strange things and see them as potential weapons. They are barbed, dagger-sized and lightweight, so a little modification would turn them into a decent knife. These travelers would then show up in town and show off their new blade, which would cause every citizen to nearly die of laughter. The terms and names they call these people who wield them are not appropriate, and I cannot write them in here but trust me when I say they are quite colorful and descriptive. It has become a gag for certain locals to craft weapons out of "love darts" and sell them to ignorant travelers, so that they can chuckle behind their backs. They just love the idea of oblivious people walking around with these, thinking they are legitimate weapons and unaware of their origin. Funny enough, I actually do own one of these dart-knives, but I was aware of it when I bought it. I have always thought they were quite interesting and I always wanted to own one. In order to avoid the embarrassment, I told the man who was selling them that I knew what they were but wanted to buy one regardless. I told him that I had "always wanted one" in which he replied to me with a "oh yeah I bet you do," which resulted in a broken nose and a free knife. Despite the comments during the purchasing process, I quite like the blade and it is quite nifty. Though I must warn those who ever think of owning one, make sure you pay attention to which knife you are using for any task you do. When I was staying with some colleagues one time and it was my turn to serve dinner. When it came to cutting up the roasted chicken, I used the knife I had on hand to carve. It took me a second to realize why they were looking at me with such disgusted, horrified looks. Needless to say, no one ate the chicken that night. Chlora Myron Dryad Natural Historian ------------------------------------------------------------ A mythical creature that is a fusion of a snail and a snake?! Where has that been all my life?!     And yowzas that last paragraph was not intended when I first started writing this, but it was way too funny for me to pass up. Sorry there, folks.

[tabletoptrinketsbyjj]

Trinkets, Valuable, 1: More useful than simple baubles touched mystery, these items have either a clear purpose, a reliable ability or are made from a fairly costly material. The items could fetch fair prices to collectors of the strange, jewelers, antique or art dealers or simply to barter with if the owner is short on actual currency.

A 30 foot coil of giant-spider silk rope. The rope is extraordinarily light and strong, with incredible tensile strength and resistance to severing. On the other hand, the rope is highly flammable and burns quickly.

A ball that engulfs itself in harmless blue fire when thrown

A bedroll that changes it’s colorization slightly to match the environment.

A bejeweled statuette of a knight that is a replica of a famous sculpture.

A bird figurine carved out of lapis lazuli.

A black lace veil. Creatures viewed through it appear as emaciated skeletal versions of themselves.

A bolt of Randomly Colored silk that does not reflect in mirrors

A bone mask with foul smelling herbs burning in the nostrils. The herbs will not extinguish.

A bowl filled with dim, illusionary flames that change color when different materials are placed within it.

A brass spyglass that reverses the color of things seen through it, black becomes white, cyan becomes orange, red becomes blue, and so on.

---Keep reading for 90 more trinkets.

---Note: The previous 10 items are repeated for easier rolling on a d100.

A 30 foot coil of giant-spider silk rope. The rope is extraordinarily light and strong, with incredible tensile strength and resistance to severing. On the other hand, the rope is highly flammable and burns quickly.

A ball that engulfs itself in harmless blue fire when thrown

A bedroll that changes it’s colorization slightly to match the environment.

A bejeweled statuette of a knight that is a replica of a famous sculpture.

A bird figurine carved out of lapis lazuli.

A black lace veil. Creatures viewed through it appear as emaciated skeletal versions of themselves.

A bolt of Randomly Colored silk that does not reflect in mirrors

A bone mask with foul smelling herbs burning in the nostrils. The herbs will not extinguish.

A bowl filled with dim, illusionary flames that change color when different materials are placed within it.

A brass spyglass that reverses the color of things seen through it, black becomes white, cyan becomes orange, red becomes blue, and so on.

A carved marble elephant figurine

A ceramic pitcher that changes the flavor of the liquid poured from it to something else at random. The change in flavor is only rarely pleasant and wears off ten minutes if not consumed.  

A complex, but delicately made, marble maze puzzle.

A corn husk doll which dances under its own power when music is played nearby.

A crystal ball, when looked into the person sees themselves reflected but looking ten years younger.

A cube of ice that never melts

A cube of ice that never melts with an air bubble trapped inside it, each day the color of the bubble changes.

A deed of ownership to a ruined tower. According to the deed, the tower is owned by whomsoever has the deed in their possession

A deep blue piece of flint, that when struck with steel produces not a spark but a drop of water.

A fake mustache, when worn it adheres to the wearer and has to be shaved off. Reusable.

A flask that causes the liquid stored inside it to freeze at midnight, and unfreezes it at noon.

A flint and tinder that causes any fires light with it to be purple in color.

A flint smoking pipe that lights itself when tapped with a piece of steel.

A floating glass orb that follows its owner around and makes whirring sounds at random

A foot of wooden chain that feels warm when its holder is standing directly beside a sentient plant.

A glass orb that replicates yesterday’s weather inside itself.

A gold plated dragonborn skull.

A golden puzzle box with both infernal and abyssal inscriptions engraved upon the surface.

A golden statuette of a woman dressed for battle, with a serene facial expression.

A good quality wig of short platinum-blonde hair

A hand sized mechanical spider made of silver, that attempts to bite anyone slumbering next to it.

A hand-sized mechanical abomination in the shape of an unholy mix of human and spider that resembles a centaur in form. Made of silver and unknown dark metals, it will skitter to the darkest place it can find when set on the ground.

A harmless stage dagger with retracting blade and blood-compartment

A hemp sack contains a two foot length of reinforced, silvered chain attached to silvered manacles.

A jet black music horn, made of a shell like material. When blown it produces a deep and strangely disturbing sound. If by the water, crabs crawl up onto the shore, drawn to the music.  

A jeweled goblet that will never, ever spill its contents.

A marble statuette of a tiny elf holding a lute, seated on a chair that plays music every so often.

A miniature brass horn, silent when played, but fills the air with the scent of warm and exotic spices.

A music box that can only be heard by someone who as wound it at least once in their life.

A padded pouch containing a small mithril hourglass filled with a very dense, dark red mist instead of sand. It is surprisingly heavy.

A padded tube that holds a small, adjustable convex mirror, connected to an extendable rod (Enabling the user to peek around corners without exposing himself). The base of the rod includes a small hidden compartment big enough to fit a small gem, coin, or similar object.  

A pair of boots that leave ash footprints wherever the bearer steps.

A preserved frog that moves and croaks like a living frog, but to even an untrained eye is undeniably deceased.

A puppet that bears the likeness of someone familiar. It that echoes its owner’s movements when the owner places it on the ground.

A pyrography quill that burns script directly onto paper and parchment without the need to heat it up first.

A red feather that shines softly in the dark

A rope net that can draw itself shut when a command word is uttered.

A sapling that refuses to be placed into soil, but never dies and has a single sweet fruit on its branches that grows back after one day when picked.

A set of golden letters that move around when unobserved, creating random words.

A set of sturdy pair of hiking boots that render the bearer immune to high altitude sickness

A severed, active, zombified halfling head with it’s teeth removed.

A silver armband in the shape of a snake, with emeralds for eyes.

A silver plate that feels rough, though it were made from coarse stone, but never feels painful to touch.

A silver plated elf skull.

A silver sphere the size of a child’s fist, covered in sharp spikes.

A simple crown of woven rowan that glows faintly with unearthly light.

A six inch clockwork knight, made up of patchwork metal parts. If wound, the knight shuffles forward about 10 ft, whirring and clicking, before making a single strike with his miniature sword.  

A six inch square, pure white cloth that never gets dirty.

A small brass flute adorned with silver wire that is always playing faint music

A small clay cup that gives any water drank from it a sweet flavor.

A small crystal ball that is filled with a shifting white mist, occasionally when peered into it shows possible scenes of death that are about to occur.

A small glass orb containing sea water, it grows murky when their will be a storm at sea.

A small glass orb filled with water and a small living jellyfish.

A small hand mirror which only reflects inanimate objects.

A small iron coin on a piece of leather thronging, when allowed to swing free always points northwards.

A small jar of a waxy ointment that removes the physical blemished caused by frostbite.

A small silver rod which when rolled between your hands emits sounds as though a lute were being played softly nearby.

A small wooden doll that when held brings back fond memories.

A sponge that can absorb one gallon of ale (and only ale)

A square foot of soft leather that tarnishes any metal object wrapped in it.

A steel rod that produces tiny sparks from a red marking when a black button on the other end is pressed.

A steel smoking pipe that lights itself when tapped with a piece of flint.

A stick of charcoal that produces water-proof writing when used.

A stone mask that gives the wearer’s voice a low, rumbling quality causing it to carry further than usual.

A stone with a hole in it, when looked through on the night of a full-moon it shows the landscape as it was 100 years previous.

A strange yellow candle of foul smelling wax. Inscribed on the bottom of the candle is a single word; The name of the creature who touched it last.

A tarot-sized card whose face shows the last meal eaten by its holder.

A tiny gilded cage with a spotted moth inside, and an apothecary dropper filled with nectar. If the moth is released underground, it unerringly flies towards the nearest surface exit. If offered nectar, the moth will happily follow the adventurer, returning to the cage to rest or for protection against predators.

A tiny metal box with an arm mechanism that, when turned, produces tiny blades. Those in possession of it have the urge to draw blood, both their own and others.

A tiny sack that, when opened, is full of sand, but feels as heavy as a large stone when lifted.

A troll figurine made of bone, that reassembled itself if destroyed or damaged.

A unbreakable sealed jar of glowing water that hums when shaken.

A whetstone that can be used to give a razor edge to weapons in half the normal time.

A white stone that changes color, turning darker when placed on food the less fresh it is.

A wood chopping axe with a blade that never seems to dull.

A wooden mask that copies its wearer’s facial expressions.

A wooden pipe that produces color changing smoke when used.

A wooden seal which imprints a mysterious, unknown coat of arms into hard rock.

A wooden sphere with a white marking that always faces the sun, and a black marking that always faces the moon.

A yellow gemstone that glows dimly when a storm is nearby.

An empty whiskey tumbler that causes any liquid poured into it to taste like bourbon, but doesn’t make any other changes to the liquid.

An ever-smouldering lump of coal

An impeccable leather carry case marked with the twin moons sigil of the Aegir Brotherhood. Inside are the pieces of an exquisitely crafted miniature crossbow. Assembling the crossbow takes one minute. Three needle like bolts with tiny poison compartments are set into the lid.

An incredibly heavy bronze-like cube with alien hieroglyphs marking each side. If the hieroglyphs are pressed in a particular order, the cube resonates a low frequency thrumming, causing all nearby creatures to become paranoid for 1d10 hours. Each time the cube is used, the order of hieroglyphs changes.

An iron rod that bends in unusual ways when looked at directly, but rights itself when unobserved.

An ivory comb that when used, causes the creature’s natural hair color to fade slightly.

An masterfully crafted onyx statuette of the Goddess of spiders, darkness and betrayal. Males that hold this statue feel inferior to their female counterparts. Females that hold it feel superior to their male counterparts.

An orb that glows with a flash of green light at noon.

An undead fly tied to an invincible foot long piece of thread with a lead weight on the other end.

Three triangular platinum coins bearing the marks of an unknown kingdom.

[wootensmith]

Kirkwall

The dirty slush of frozen seawater and the crowds of the destitute made the Kirkwall docks even worse than he remembered from his short visit a few years past. So many people. Some leaving in hopes of a better future elsewhere, some tumbling from ships just arrived searching for the same. It was a scene he had witnessed countless times. Different cities, different ages, but always akin to this. Everything changed, except this. He had seen enough empires rise and fall to know that. Why was she bothering? Risking so much to help slaves escape. She would only send them into a different kind of slavery on another shore. And in a few years— it would all be finished anyhow. Why couldn’t she rest? Why can’t you? he thought. Haven’t you done the same, over and over again? He had thought it mattered, once, how the people he’d left behind had lived. How they’d struggled to right things. To do better, to be more. Some part of him knew he felt that way, still, though it was buried under a deep despair. That the right words, the right people could draw it out of him again. He wound his way through the slowly milling crowds toward the boats, the tang of salt and filth pricking his nose. The harbormaster was shouting at a frostbitten dwarf who cowered next to a fallen load of bundles. Solas bent to help him pick them up, placing them carefully together and retying the snapped cord while the harbormaster continued to scold. “What do you want, knife-ear?” he scowled at last. Solas helped the dwarf lift the awkward, shifting parcels onto his back before answering. “I wanted to find passage to Tevinter,” he said coolly. The dwarf scuttled off before the harbormaster could renew his tirade. The harbormaster glanced skeptically at him. “Most of you people are trying to escape Tevinter.” Solas remained silent, waiting. The harbormaster shrugged. “Only ship willing to go that far is the Casus Belli. Third one in the far dock.” He waved a calloused hand down the pier. Solas didn’t bother thanking him.

He knew he should go. It was perilous to linger here. If the Inquisitor saw him— if she tried to stop him, he knew he would yield. But leaving without being certain that she was well— what does it matter? he asked himself, even as he found a seat among the barrels of fresh water that waited on the dock, her fate is the same as all the others. A few years, maybe. And then— He pushed the idea away again, as he always did, and wrapped his cloak tightly around himself. A simple illusion made certain he was hidden to any casual passers by. He was relieved the ship was still in port. He’d expected her to slip out earlier than the prescribed week. His people had watched the house around the clock, but had seen only Dorian and Varric enter or exit. He’d camped outside the city, and each day passing without a sign of life from her was a heavy stone added to his back. The Inquisitor that he’d known would have protested the wait, eager and restless to be off. She’d have persuaded him within the day, and yet there was no sign of preparations and no ravens flew from the rooftop of Bartrand’s house. Who is left to send a raven to? he wondered and felt the hollow in his chest grow larger. He should take her with him. Once she left Dorian in Tevinter, only Cole would remain. And he did not need her. Or Josephine who was gone often on business for her family or visiting Orlais. An army of soldiers who didn’t realize she was flesh instead of stone, and Cullen who had no idea what to do with her. A smattering of shouts roused him. The sailors were readying the ship and Varric’s voice carried over the tumult directing the carriage of luggage and stores aboard. “Out of my way, rabbit,” snarled an impatient man. “I apologize,” the Inquisitor’s voice was a low current beneath it all and Solas strained to catch it. “I’ll thank you not to address my attaché with so little respect.” Dorian’s anger sizzled and Solas caught sight of the man hastily touching his forelock and retreating. “We should lay low,” said the Inquisitor. “It will be a long journey. We should try not to make enemies—” “It was rude. I would have said something even had it not been you. But as it is you—” Dorian sighed. “If you’re going to make me pretend to be your ambassador—” “It isn’t pretend, Dorian,” she protested. “Even so. We may as well use it to our advantage. Let me play my part. Let me lead. You promised, sorora.” “I did, you’re right.” “Good. Rest here. If anyone asks, you’re ensuring no assassin boards.” “But—” “Varric?” asked Dorian. “I’ve got her, Sparkler.” They were quiet for a moment and Solas shifted silently, wanting to see her fully without breaking his enchantment. It won him a partial glimpse between the barrels. “Stop worrying,” said Varric, patting her shoulder. “It’s going to go well. A gull from Isabella came this morning. They’ve reached the Eyes of Nocen. Everything’s in place.” “What if—” “Whatever you’re thinking, it won’t.” “She’s thinking, ‘What if the anchor gets bad again? What if I sink the ship?’” murmured Cole. “It won’t. Dorian checked, remember? You checked. You both agreed—” “What if we’re wrong?” she whispered. “I wish we could be sure. I wish—” she broke off and Solas could see her shoulder rise and curl inward. And then Varric’s arm around it. “He’s not coming back. I know you don’t want to hear it. I know the others don’t want to say it. We have to make do. We can call this all off, right now. No one would blame you. Go home, Inquisitor. Or stay here, with me. Retire. We’ll tag along with Fenris to find Hawke. You’ve done enough.” “No. I haven’t. This is important.” Varric let her go, and her shoulder straightened. “You’re right,” she said, her voice hardening. “He’s not going to return. Not yet. And there is work to be done. We’ll just have to hope that whatever— illness this was, is over.” Her hand flexed. Cole’s feet shifted uneasily. “Like a sapling cut back in spring. It will be months before it spreads again. The boat is safe. He knows better, now. He will be back before it swallows you.” “Andraste’s tits, kid—” hissed Varric. “He loves her,” protested Cole. Solas couldn’t help but send a silent thanks to the boy, though he knew it was probably best left as Varric had. “Thank you, Cole. It makes me happy to hear,” said the Inquisitor. “I know,” said the boy. “All hands hoy!” called a sailor and Varric gave them both a hasty hug. “Don’t worry,” he told the Inquisitor, “You and Dorian are the mask. We’ll handle the rest. I’ll see you in the spring.” “Be careful,” she answered and Solas heard her feet on the ramp.

Elgar’nan’s glare did nothing for his mood. Perhaps he should restore the statue. Just to decrease the balefulness of those dark pits where its eyes were meant to be. A project for another time. Before he brought her here. He was too tired to wonder when it had moved from a longing to a resolution, but he was certain the Inquisitor would be here before the end. She’d never have stayed in Skyhold. It was always meant for others. Maybe the escaped slaves she was helping. Maybe just the Inquisition, itself. Vhemanen’s expression of pity was harder to face. She said nothing when he entered, but her long look at the door, as if she expected another behind him, was enough. Harden your heart, he told himself, There is work to be done on my part, as well. “Loranil will be relieved you are back,” was all she said, handing him a warm plate of food. “He is tired of looking after an old woman.” “I think you are tired of looking after him,” said Solas, sitting on the hearth beside her. “He’s itching for the training yard.” “He would be better served training with you. Did you tell him how long you guarded the temple?” Vhemanen smiled. “Invisibility has served me well.” She plucked at the thin spot at his tunic’s elbow. “It’s served us both.” “Yes. But there are times I long to be seen, all the same.” “The boy is sweet and obedient. Too obedient. He’d never risk an ear tweaking for a bottle of Elgar’nan’s Heart.” Solas groaned a laugh. “Then he is wiser than I. That bottle was worse than the punishment. Very well, perhaps Abelas will tame his restlessness for a time. I would see them happy while time remains.” The smile faded from her face. “And you? Your time runs as short as ours. Is she— did you stop the spread?” “For now. Have you found anything further on Isevun? I fear she will lose the arm next time. It was much more dire than I had anticipated.” “No. Only that the growth of the magic becomes more rapid every time. Elgar’nan was not successful. It eventually consumed Isevun. I’m sorry.” He nodded. “As am I. But it was as Abelas warned me. I didn’t expect to find an answer, though I hoped I might pick up where Elgar’nan left off.” “Perhaps the Veil will slow the process.” “Perhaps.” She watched him for a long moment. “Why didn’t you bring her to us?” He smiled, but it was bitter. “Are you so certain she would have agreed?” “Solas, you forget that I saw her. How she longed to stay in Mythal’s home. How crushed she was at Abelas’s pronouncement. How she looked at you. I am certain she would have agreed. Just as I am certain you did not ask.” “She has her own work that must be done.” “As important as this?” asked Vhemanen. His heart rebelled, but his mind knew better. “Yes,” he said. “And we have our tasks here. I will bring her here, in the end. But it is not yet time. How is the spellwork on the amulet?” She straightened, aware that he was shutting it away, replacing his mantle again. “Stable, I think. It has always been difficult for me to measure these things since the Veil. Like touching something in the dark and trying to guess its shape.” He stood up. “If it holds, the amulet should be finished within the week.” “And then?” she asked. “And then I must find a way to either convince Mythal of my story or destroy the Titan before Andruil reaches it.” Vhemanen shook her head. “But you and I were not yet born when Andruil first found the Titan. And all the records are lost. Her people were buried with the titan. I’ve never heard of a single survivor. How are you going to find out how to stop her? As soon as you arrive, you will be lost.” She waved a hand toward his face. “And unmarked. You’ll be spotted immediately.” He touched his cheek. It was not something he’d considered. The vallaslin would have to be put back. He shuddered at the idea. “I will have to find someone who knows how it happened. Andruil’s people cannot be the only ones that know. Ghilan’nain’s people, perhaps—” he stopped as she shook her head. “They’re all gone, Solas. So few entered uthenera with us and of those, so many, like me, were woken and stayed awake. That any of us remain was unlikely. That someone with the knowledge you need did… Perhaps you should ask Abelas. He was alive, at least, when it happened. Maybe he will know of others who remain. Maybe they’ll be able to piece the story together for you. Enough so that you aren’t immediately killed.” He flexed his hand, staring at it, feeling the extra power he had drawn from the anchor pulse through him. “I will not die that easily.” Vhemanen crossed her arms and stared at him. “Do not fall for the same lie as the Evanuris. Their power did not save them. And it was not your might that trapped them. Your strength is in cleverness, Solas, it always was. All of us are depending upon it now. Do not go unprepared.” She was right. He nodded. “I’ll find Abelas in the morning. For now, I have more spells to start.”