Post by Ravager Zero on Nov 24, 2014 19:38:21 GMT 12
The broadsheet folded neatly, no longer offering its reader anything new. It hadn’t for weeks, since the discovery had been announced—by the Dwarves. Few enough had known of them, rumours and hearsay, mostly. But everyone by now had heard of Atlas Cobalt, the irascible hero of the Dwarves, cast out forever having broken a single oath. An oath impossible to keep. But that had come after, and because of it Atlas now wandered the world of men.
Lady Sigrun Cyven left the broadsheet on the table, watching how the snow built up against the low windows. How times had changed from her years in the palace. War with Darrow had left them all weak, and Hygar had had it’s own concerns to deal with. In the east they’d finally dealt with the last of the Kin. Now, a decade after the war, Lady Cyven lived a much more modest life. She had far more time to continue her experiments into the nature of magick, so that was a bonus.
All her children were gone. Robert, dead, slain by the infamous crimson assassin. Simon, away on the sea, one of the first to brave the storms and find a new land. Gods only knew how he’d managed to survive the voyage back. And young Leah, in the prime of her life now, advisor to the new King Cyven, with possibility of being more. She was distracting herself from the task at hand—something she normally played off as part of her advancing age. Fifty was far from young.
The woman in front of her was young—perhaps youthful was a better word. Hair black as a moonless night, and eyes of pale blue. She was slender, and wore the formal dress with which she had been provided in a most flattering fashion. Lady Cyven blinked, shaking her head slightly. She knew about the tattoos; knew the effects they had. It was still distracting.
“Ms. Sorrows?”
“Lady Cyven,” China offered the former ruler of Cyven a slight curtsey. It cost nothing to be polite, and helped maintain the image of a refined noblewoman.
“What the Dwarves have been uncovering is truly fascinating, but I cannot make my own way there. Much remains to be done to see Cyven rebuilt. I know you are not fond of working for any of us, but it is the reality we live in.”
Lady Cyven turned away, facing the darkened window once more. China made to leave, her soft footfalls muffled by the thick carpet.
“And China?” the information broker stopped, half turning to look over her shoulder. “They found the eye of a god.”
The legends were true then. The magestone that the Heroes of Vidan had carried had never made it past Hygar. Unless… no. Only Rai-Tane had been injured in that celestial war. Then again, this was a Dwarven discovery, could the eye have belonged to a Dwarven god?
Murtan shivered, pulling the furs tighter about his shoulders. Dalton was damnably cold this time of year, but it as the closest town to where the Dwarves had made their discovery. They had asked for help from human mages, not having Talent amongst themselves to perform geomantic feats. He had been serving as a bodyguard for one of those geomancers, currently standing at his side. He’d taken the standard retainer to protect her, plus an additional stipend for time served. It was likely to be a long project.
She was, in all honesty, a difficult person. How she managed to keep warm during the days of the Great Fall was the reason for much speculation. Murtan knew that most of it was the fact she was a true disciple of Rai-Tane, lord of fire and stone. She was sometimes unpredictable, but very, very powerful, and gifted in both geomancy and pyromancy. At only 26 she was one of the youngest masters of her school. She wasn’t cocky, which was a relief to Murtan, but she could be overconfident at times, and could also be annoyingly bullheaded too.
Looking across the frozen waters of Dawn’s Bight, Murtan knew the convoy wasn’t going to make it tonight. In the far distance, just shifting over the horizon, he thought he could see an orange glow, and the grey smoke of a fresh fire. Just. His eyes were as sharp as Aliss’s, but he’d been trained to recgonize the signs. The convoy would be camping out for one more night on the ice. In the morning, noon at the latest. He clapped an arm around her shoulders and steered Aliss back towards the inn.
“Come on; we both know they won’t make it tonight, and the inn’s a damn sight warmer than camping out in the snow.”
“Okay,” she huffed quietly, kicking at the snow as they walked back. She’d wanted adventure, excitement, and this discovery of the Dwarves seemed to provide all of that. Seemed to. It was drudgery, purely utilitarian. There were better things she could be doing, but it was beyond bad form to break a Dwarven contract, so she’d be here, stuck in the arse end of nowhere for the next two weeks. Still, they might find something truly interesting in the temple.
Murtan wasn’t a bad sort, she’d hired him on a whim, seeking a capable guard for her trek from Darrow to Dalton, and he’d proved his worth more than once. He was professional, polite, and maybe one of the few people she could really talk to in this place. He had no Talent, of course, but he understood the finer points of magick better than some of her fellow students had at the collegiate. He was also quite wealthy, and that had proved surprisingly useful negotiating with the Dwarves—because his wealth was self-made, and they respected that more than anything.
He was also right about the convoy. Another day—just one more day and she’d see Bethany again. Bethany, with the overly flowy long red hair, and a love of all things cold. Everyone at the collegiate had thought she would be a disciple of Skol, it was so obvious. Calm, cold, and almost expressionless, it only made sense. No one had known she was from the east, born of an illicit union between a western lord and a Jabi tribeswoman.
Bethany had become a wardancer, with just a hint of fulgromancy. Her performances were electrifying, and she had worked at the Sakura for several years now. This was her first time out in the world since then, and Aliss couldn’t wait to show her what they’d discovered in the lower reaches, the frescoes and mosaics—maybe not wardancers, but just as mesmerizing. And the statue room—though that place was still a little unnerving. Ten thousand unseeing eyes.
“Talon, if you keep falling over every root and stone under the snow we’ll never make it there before nightfall,” Jason von Drakoon looked back over his erstwhile charge. He was no bodyguard, but the man didn’t even seem to know how to swing an axe, taking out more of the tree behind him than the wolf in front of him. He hadn’t even known where to look for the other members of the pack. He might be able to pretend at being an adventurer, but he was going to need all the help he could get.
“Jason, wait,” Talon called out, pulling himself clear of the snowbank.
“C’mon, keep moving,” Jason pointed to the flickering orange lights in the distance. “We’re nearly there. I can see the lights of the watchtower.”
The clockwork mage took a few steps, following Jason, then stood stock still. The lights were wrong. Too much red shading through them. They weren’t close to Dalton. It was just a frost mirage. They were still several leagues away. Talon sighed, trudging forward through the snow, explaining as much to his guide. They had to rest. They were on the plains of the river Dahl, a few stands of pine and other evergreens in the distance.
Eyes danced on his palm, and Talon sent the little flyer into the open air, blinking slightly as he adjusted to the greater separation of their views. In the end he sat and closed his eyes, following Eyes’ journey, weaving the skeins around the construct into a path to follow and directions to look. The water’s edge was safe, and nothing was visible for miles in any direction. Except for clouds to the north and the east. A snowstorm was rolling in.
Jason had seen the clouds as well, that was why he’d been pushing to reach Dalton before nightfall. Of course, the image of Dalton being a mirage rather scuppered that plan, so he let Talon scout ahead with his little animated machine, finding a safe place to set up camp. In the morning would come digging themselves out of several feet of snow, piled around their shelter. Or the clcokwork mage might be able to make something again, something that cleared the snow as quickly as his last invention had. Of course, that still meant spending most of the morning snowed in.
He shrugged. That was what the Great Fall was like. At least that was something they had both been prepared for, unlike hostile wildlife of which Talon had clearly had little experience with. It hadn’t taken much to scare the wolves, a single stormwood arrow, lightning crackling from where it struck the snow covered path. Having rescued the clockwork smith Jason now felt partially responsible for his safety—at least as far as Dalton. There they would likely part ways, Jason finding work hunting the smaller game around Dalton, while Talon found an old friend to talk with about his work.
Dwarves had a habit of being annoyingly literal in their runic translations, he decided. Professor Darius Ivarsen set aside the notes he had been reading—annotated in Dwarven Karuhn script—and turned to his own field manual, written, of course, by himself. Outside of the runesmiths guild, he was the foremost expert on Runes within what remained of the university of Cyven, and thus, the foremost expert in the world.
This expedition could spell a great deal of funding for the rebuilding of the university, damaged during the war. But first he had to fix these idiotic translations. Runes were not a purely literal language—despite the effects their invocations could have. All runes had an artistic form, something more gestural, that subtly changed their meaning. Then there were the aesthetic runes. The language in the archeological site was a mixture of all three. There was poetry there, a language of subtle artistry that would be difficult for the less informed to follow.
Well, the Dwarves were not less informed, but their Karuhn script was much more complex, the glyphs having many shades of meaning depending on the subtle changes to line lengths and angles—something only Dwarven eyes seemed to pick up with any regularity. To them, human runes were simple things, like a child’s language. It was hard to make them see the importance of every symbolic variation.
Only the lost shall be chosen for death’s land.
Which, of course, was wrong. It took professor Ivarsen all of three minutes to correct the translation.
Only those who walk no path can complete the ceremony.
Better, but as always, it asked more questions than it answered. Wait… if that glyph had been transcribed just a little differently…
Only those who follow the empty path can complete the ceremony.
That looked better. Much better. But what was the empty path—the phraseology implied that it was both a concept and a physical entity—and what was the ceremony? What was it for? Was it necromantic, as the Dwarves had implied? Questions, so many questions. He needed to see the place where these were inscribed. Tomorrow, perhaps the next day—it looked as if a storm was blowing in.
Lady Sigrun Cyven left the broadsheet on the table, watching how the snow built up against the low windows. How times had changed from her years in the palace. War with Darrow had left them all weak, and Hygar had had it’s own concerns to deal with. In the east they’d finally dealt with the last of the Kin. Now, a decade after the war, Lady Cyven lived a much more modest life. She had far more time to continue her experiments into the nature of magick, so that was a bonus.
All her children were gone. Robert, dead, slain by the infamous crimson assassin. Simon, away on the sea, one of the first to brave the storms and find a new land. Gods only knew how he’d managed to survive the voyage back. And young Leah, in the prime of her life now, advisor to the new King Cyven, with possibility of being more. She was distracting herself from the task at hand—something she normally played off as part of her advancing age. Fifty was far from young.
The woman in front of her was young—perhaps youthful was a better word. Hair black as a moonless night, and eyes of pale blue. She was slender, and wore the formal dress with which she had been provided in a most flattering fashion. Lady Cyven blinked, shaking her head slightly. She knew about the tattoos; knew the effects they had. It was still distracting.
“Ms. Sorrows?”
“Lady Cyven,” China offered the former ruler of Cyven a slight curtsey. It cost nothing to be polite, and helped maintain the image of a refined noblewoman.
“What the Dwarves have been uncovering is truly fascinating, but I cannot make my own way there. Much remains to be done to see Cyven rebuilt. I know you are not fond of working for any of us, but it is the reality we live in.”
Lady Cyven turned away, facing the darkened window once more. China made to leave, her soft footfalls muffled by the thick carpet.
“And China?” the information broker stopped, half turning to look over her shoulder. “They found the eye of a god.”
The legends were true then. The magestone that the Heroes of Vidan had carried had never made it past Hygar. Unless… no. Only Rai-Tane had been injured in that celestial war. Then again, this was a Dwarven discovery, could the eye have belonged to a Dwarven god?
Murtan shivered, pulling the furs tighter about his shoulders. Dalton was damnably cold this time of year, but it as the closest town to where the Dwarves had made their discovery. They had asked for help from human mages, not having Talent amongst themselves to perform geomantic feats. He had been serving as a bodyguard for one of those geomancers, currently standing at his side. He’d taken the standard retainer to protect her, plus an additional stipend for time served. It was likely to be a long project.
She was, in all honesty, a difficult person. How she managed to keep warm during the days of the Great Fall was the reason for much speculation. Murtan knew that most of it was the fact she was a true disciple of Rai-Tane, lord of fire and stone. She was sometimes unpredictable, but very, very powerful, and gifted in both geomancy and pyromancy. At only 26 she was one of the youngest masters of her school. She wasn’t cocky, which was a relief to Murtan, but she could be overconfident at times, and could also be annoyingly bullheaded too.
Looking across the frozen waters of Dawn’s Bight, Murtan knew the convoy wasn’t going to make it tonight. In the far distance, just shifting over the horizon, he thought he could see an orange glow, and the grey smoke of a fresh fire. Just. His eyes were as sharp as Aliss’s, but he’d been trained to recgonize the signs. The convoy would be camping out for one more night on the ice. In the morning, noon at the latest. He clapped an arm around her shoulders and steered Aliss back towards the inn.
“Come on; we both know they won’t make it tonight, and the inn’s a damn sight warmer than camping out in the snow.”
“Okay,” she huffed quietly, kicking at the snow as they walked back. She’d wanted adventure, excitement, and this discovery of the Dwarves seemed to provide all of that. Seemed to. It was drudgery, purely utilitarian. There were better things she could be doing, but it was beyond bad form to break a Dwarven contract, so she’d be here, stuck in the arse end of nowhere for the next two weeks. Still, they might find something truly interesting in the temple.
Murtan wasn’t a bad sort, she’d hired him on a whim, seeking a capable guard for her trek from Darrow to Dalton, and he’d proved his worth more than once. He was professional, polite, and maybe one of the few people she could really talk to in this place. He had no Talent, of course, but he understood the finer points of magick better than some of her fellow students had at the collegiate. He was also quite wealthy, and that had proved surprisingly useful negotiating with the Dwarves—because his wealth was self-made, and they respected that more than anything.
He was also right about the convoy. Another day—just one more day and she’d see Bethany again. Bethany, with the overly flowy long red hair, and a love of all things cold. Everyone at the collegiate had thought she would be a disciple of Skol, it was so obvious. Calm, cold, and almost expressionless, it only made sense. No one had known she was from the east, born of an illicit union between a western lord and a Jabi tribeswoman.
Bethany had become a wardancer, with just a hint of fulgromancy. Her performances were electrifying, and she had worked at the Sakura for several years now. This was her first time out in the world since then, and Aliss couldn’t wait to show her what they’d discovered in the lower reaches, the frescoes and mosaics—maybe not wardancers, but just as mesmerizing. And the statue room—though that place was still a little unnerving. Ten thousand unseeing eyes.
“Talon, if you keep falling over every root and stone under the snow we’ll never make it there before nightfall,” Jason von Drakoon looked back over his erstwhile charge. He was no bodyguard, but the man didn’t even seem to know how to swing an axe, taking out more of the tree behind him than the wolf in front of him. He hadn’t even known where to look for the other members of the pack. He might be able to pretend at being an adventurer, but he was going to need all the help he could get.
“Jason, wait,” Talon called out, pulling himself clear of the snowbank.
“C’mon, keep moving,” Jason pointed to the flickering orange lights in the distance. “We’re nearly there. I can see the lights of the watchtower.”
The clockwork mage took a few steps, following Jason, then stood stock still. The lights were wrong. Too much red shading through them. They weren’t close to Dalton. It was just a frost mirage. They were still several leagues away. Talon sighed, trudging forward through the snow, explaining as much to his guide. They had to rest. They were on the plains of the river Dahl, a few stands of pine and other evergreens in the distance.
Eyes danced on his palm, and Talon sent the little flyer into the open air, blinking slightly as he adjusted to the greater separation of their views. In the end he sat and closed his eyes, following Eyes’ journey, weaving the skeins around the construct into a path to follow and directions to look. The water’s edge was safe, and nothing was visible for miles in any direction. Except for clouds to the north and the east. A snowstorm was rolling in.
Jason had seen the clouds as well, that was why he’d been pushing to reach Dalton before nightfall. Of course, the image of Dalton being a mirage rather scuppered that plan, so he let Talon scout ahead with his little animated machine, finding a safe place to set up camp. In the morning would come digging themselves out of several feet of snow, piled around their shelter. Or the clcokwork mage might be able to make something again, something that cleared the snow as quickly as his last invention had. Of course, that still meant spending most of the morning snowed in.
He shrugged. That was what the Great Fall was like. At least that was something they had both been prepared for, unlike hostile wildlife of which Talon had clearly had little experience with. It hadn’t taken much to scare the wolves, a single stormwood arrow, lightning crackling from where it struck the snow covered path. Having rescued the clockwork smith Jason now felt partially responsible for his safety—at least as far as Dalton. There they would likely part ways, Jason finding work hunting the smaller game around Dalton, while Talon found an old friend to talk with about his work.
Dwarves had a habit of being annoyingly literal in their runic translations, he decided. Professor Darius Ivarsen set aside the notes he had been reading—annotated in Dwarven Karuhn script—and turned to his own field manual, written, of course, by himself. Outside of the runesmiths guild, he was the foremost expert on Runes within what remained of the university of Cyven, and thus, the foremost expert in the world.
This expedition could spell a great deal of funding for the rebuilding of the university, damaged during the war. But first he had to fix these idiotic translations. Runes were not a purely literal language—despite the effects their invocations could have. All runes had an artistic form, something more gestural, that subtly changed their meaning. Then there were the aesthetic runes. The language in the archeological site was a mixture of all three. There was poetry there, a language of subtle artistry that would be difficult for the less informed to follow.
Well, the Dwarves were not less informed, but their Karuhn script was much more complex, the glyphs having many shades of meaning depending on the subtle changes to line lengths and angles—something only Dwarven eyes seemed to pick up with any regularity. To them, human runes were simple things, like a child’s language. It was hard to make them see the importance of every symbolic variation.
Only the lost shall be chosen for death’s land.
Which, of course, was wrong. It took professor Ivarsen all of three minutes to correct the translation.
Only those who walk no path can complete the ceremony.
Better, but as always, it asked more questions than it answered. Wait… if that glyph had been transcribed just a little differently…
Only those who follow the empty path can complete the ceremony.
That looked better. Much better. But what was the empty path—the phraseology implied that it was both a concept and a physical entity—and what was the ceremony? What was it for? Was it necromantic, as the Dwarves had implied? Questions, so many questions. He needed to see the place where these were inscribed. Tomorrow, perhaps the next day—it looked as if a storm was blowing in.
