Post by Sika on Aug 4, 2004 0:09:16 GMT -5
To Celeste it was like a metallic taste in her mouth, a buzz at the back of her mind. She suffered from the sort of words that echo so far back in your brain that they cannot quite be heard. She could almost feel her sister turning over in her coffin buried deep within the earth. While her sister, somewhere unknown, tried to wake, she could not sleep. When she slept she could almost feel the map, how its tendrils of darkness wrapped around the mind and heart of whomever carried it. She it had been several days since she had come upon a body haphazardly dropped in a ditch. It had been there for almost a month she believed and the smell of decomposition was enough to bring even the strongest warrior to tears. Still, with a sliver dagger wedged in his skull and a look of surprise still strained across what was left of his face, she had recognized the tinge of darkness that still entangled the body. It was like a soft glimmer, but it was enough. The map had touched him, warped his mind and torn him to pieces before his strange coup d'etat. She had found in his sack a small journal. Most of it was too stained with blood or booze to be legible but on the last page there was a translation and etched in the middle was clear as day "Nephthys". It was dark elfish, a tongue she had only begun to begin even trying to understand but it was enough. She was a blood hound hot on the trail, unwilling to sleep, unwilling to eat, barely aware of anything but the map she could not find and the sister whom she had lost.
The presence of an old friend, Wolfbane, had eased her burden greatly. In the laughing way of fates, he had witnessed the murder, the changing hands of the map and while his memory was vague it had been enough to extract an image. Had Faith been a quiet, modest creature Celeste might never have enough to go on, but it turned out she had a reputation, and with the name Grayseerer on the tongue, she was hot on the trail again. She traveled through the woods most of this way, needing no trail and leaving no trail behind her. While she wore the delicate chain mail her father had once made her, the rest of the armor had been put aside for the sake of stealth. She dressed simple, unimaginatively, though she was armed with dagger, saber and a lifetime of skills. She would ask for the map nicely, and then if that should fail, she would behead whoever held it. These were not times for diplomacy, the whole of her people teetered and danced between greatness and extinction and she chose not to wait to see where it fell.
She passed into Grayseerer territory without crossing a single marker. The energies of this land though were dark and chaotic. She stopped for a moment, placing her hand upon a tree and breathing in deeply. There was a time when the life energy that flowed within her like waves upon the sands was enough. During those years she could sit happily and watch the grass grow, or better yet, make it grow for her own pleasure. Now, though, while the map might sew madness even deeper into Faith's already cruel and angry mind, Celeste too began to suffer from another form of its obsession and insanity. She was willing to collapse the whole building if that was what was necessary to touch the ceiling.
The presence of an old friend, Wolfbane, had eased her burden greatly. In the laughing way of fates, he had witnessed the murder, the changing hands of the map and while his memory was vague it had been enough to extract an image. Had Faith been a quiet, modest creature Celeste might never have enough to go on, but it turned out she had a reputation, and with the name Grayseerer on the tongue, she was hot on the trail again. She traveled through the woods most of this way, needing no trail and leaving no trail behind her. While she wore the delicate chain mail her father had once made her, the rest of the armor had been put aside for the sake of stealth. She dressed simple, unimaginatively, though she was armed with dagger, saber and a lifetime of skills. She would ask for the map nicely, and then if that should fail, she would behead whoever held it. These were not times for diplomacy, the whole of her people teetered and danced between greatness and extinction and she chose not to wait to see where it fell.
She passed into Grayseerer territory without crossing a single marker. The energies of this land though were dark and chaotic. She stopped for a moment, placing her hand upon a tree and breathing in deeply. There was a time when the life energy that flowed within her like waves upon the sands was enough. During those years she could sit happily and watch the grass grow, or better yet, make it grow for her own pleasure. Now, though, while the map might sew madness even deeper into Faith's already cruel and angry mind, Celeste too began to suffer from another form of its obsession and insanity. She was willing to collapse the whole building if that was what was necessary to touch the ceiling.