Date: Tue, 28 Oct 1997 15:30:23 -0400 From: "Quinn@GhostWheel" To: quinn@netsville.com Subject: GhostWheel Message(s) 88 - 92 from *Storylines (#5236) X-Mail-Agent: GhostWheel (casper.bga.com 6969) Message 88 from *Storylines (#5236): Date: Sun Sep 21 04:48:06 1997 EDT From: Seraph (#16551) To: *Storylines (#5236) Subject: ... The time had come, finally. Time to challenge fear. The windmill was death, and she hefted her lance, the small, gleaming syringe, thinking that indeed what they had told her was true, that is was not the weapon that mattered, but the wielder. They were the only ones who hadn't mocked her. The only ones who cared, she thought. The only ones that mattered in the end. They were the end, of course, but that altered nothing. Fallen needle and pile of dust. That would be her form until she came again, shrugging off familiar company to rejoin 'her kind' once more. There would be no smell of rot, no sign as to her passing, no trace of where she had gone, or why. Just a flash of silver in a pile of dust. There wasn't pain, or, at least, not anymore. She was dead to the world already, somewhere at the core. A seed of hope had sprouted, then died in a flash of light, and a pile of dust. She had run her fingers through them then, and wondered whose hands would claim her ashes, find the flash of silver, and _know_ where she had gone. She expected she might indeed be the only one to even notice. It was likely. She felt a soft, wet warmth fall against her neck, and wondered exactly when it was that she had started to cry. Wondering why was something that didn't occur to her. A soft keening rose up from somewhere inside, and she wiped the tear away with a cold hand. She turned the needle over, end to end, staring at it with love and hate in her eyes. The silence was suddenly too much, suffocating her as if to draw out her life before she could take it herself. It would snuff her out like a candle if she hid from them any longer. Nothing could be done, now, and no loyalty would save her. Care, she decided, was something for other people. The pain it brought was unrewarded by anything but more of the same. Her eyes closed with a sentimental finality. She had opened the box, and all tumbled out in reverse. Hope spilled its seed into her, and though she couldn't pinpoint the moment of its demise, she knew that the stony ground she offered it was probably the cause. The keening she recognized in a whirr, it was the sound of pain, driving her back into the silence, back to where she began, back to the time when she had been enough of a fool to believe that so long as she was innocent, nothing would harm her, and there would be some form of justice. She had stopped believing in justice longer ago than she could recall clearly, and her innocence hadn't lasted long. The box spilled out its poisons, and she filled the needle with the same. "So much for caring, Anne... " she murmured into the quiet. "So much for the living." For the end, she decided, there would be something other than silence. The viscous liquid was old, growing stale in the damp of the bag. It would take a day or more to claim her. There would be pain, but that would be little change. She had enough of that already. She was tired of the pain, and knew that this type of agony would find a definate end. The needle slipped beneath her skin like a blessing, spilling its venom through a single, gleaming fang. She would go out, she decided. To see, she told herself, if there was any reason that could be found to eventually return. She dropped the needle to the table, looking back at it with a loathing respect. "My deliverer... " she whispered, and headed out to the din of the outside. -------------------------- Message 89 from *Storylines (#5236): Date: Sun Sep 21 13:33:36 1997 EDT From: Seraph (#16551) To: *Storylines (#5236) Subject: Void... The place was soundless, and without form. No color, no shape, no substance that she could have defined in words. *Everything looks so small from here* she thought, *How very pathetically cliche* They were not with her. They had left her to get her bearings on her own, assuming it would be forever that she would stay with them. Less important now, she was just another voice without lips, not their vessel but one of them. *Am I voice in someone's head now?* That thought had always struck her with bitter irony. There was little of the world she cared to experience at the moment. There was the one pinpoint of light below, the one she had kept open, remembering what she had been asked. Reaching towards the shimmering beam, she sought to touch, just once, and let him know things were alright. It felt warm to her, but by experience knew it would be little more than a passing chill. She began to understand why it was they felt as they did, so little effect could be troubling had she not known what to expect. *Is the magic in the flesh, or what of me is left?* She didn't need to know yet, and slowly turned to catalog the void around her. *This will take time* -------------------------- Message 90 from *Storylines (#5236): Date: Mon Sep 22 00:21:31 1997 EDT From: Alluvia (#12737) To: *Druids (#12232) and *Storylines (#5236) Subject: The voyage home Alluvia watched Toraxyn slip into the shadows, hearing his bootclick as he left Morrigan's tower. HE took with him, her last tie to this land, her sleeping daughter. As she looked back, a form known to her stood in the ominous shadows. In a smooth calming voice he said, "You are ready Alluvia? The trip will be long, and rough. You know that of course. There are no ties left to this world?" Alluvia looked around the room. Small physical possessions remained in the room, their meanings reflected by the dust that collected upon them. She glanced down the hall, to Morrigan's study -- Morrigan who had been in a dreamless sleep for months. Her mind thought of everything else. Her children, her loves. All were accounted for. "No. There is nothing to tie me here, Rajen. Nothing left.." She smiled weakly, stepping towards him. He glanced at her tears upon her cheek, freshly stained against her tired face. "You cry Alluvia, there is someothing you will miss greatly. Worry not so. You never completely burn the bridges to this strange land... " His voice was soothing, and she nodded in compliance. She took his hand, feeling a warm rush of energies -- the fading of the sensory world around her. Everything was slowly dissapearing, breaking apart. The memories came in a last initial flood as her eyes were greeted with only blackness, then the brightest of lights ever to be seen. She traveled through this light, gasping at the sight. IT had been so long since she had seen this beauty, so long since she had felt it's kiss against her skin. Antriol was near to her. The journey would take some time still, though time did not matter. Bodies were not bodies in this movement, in this wished journey. Her mind dwelled on thoughts of the beauty, the purity -- the freedom from the darkness that prevaded before. Her eyes began to take in forms, similar to her own, clothed in white, practicing arts of the healing. She smiled, the faces all looking so familiar, so much like what she had left. It would take some time to know these faces again. IT would take some time to return to the arts she had left. ooc-- I don't know what i'm going to do with her really. I was going to kill her off entirely and leave it at that, but I got asked not to. SO for the time being she will stay in her home... THis is not temporary. IF I do bring her back, it will be after some time, and some entirely new concepts. Hell.. i've had her out for quite a bit of time.. She's sleepy and needs a bit of rest.:) Carey/Alluvia/Lise/Yoda/Natalya.. -------------------------- Message 91 from *Storylines (#5236): Date: Wed Sep 24 09:55:03 1997 EDT From: Ylaerin (#16541) To: *Storylines (#5236) She had been called before, many times, and had willingly gone. But being called and fetched through the dreamsleep is one thing... *seeking* the Otherworld from the waking land is something entirely different. Supposedly, it could be done... The Bard had done it hardly without thinking. There had been tales of others doing it as well; if they could, she could. She had her silver branch, was a respected Bard among her people (if there were any of her people to be had around here), was an Anruth.. it was possible. And so, having convinced herself after days upon days of thought, she shouldered her harp, took up her staff, and set out from her cavern to the tiny, secluded cave she knew was just beyond the gardens of Morlith. Lyr'tyzluthe was a flurry of concern. /If you won't wake.. can I pull you back? I can't fit into that little cave, Ylaerin, it will have to be my voice in your head../ Ylaerin only nodded, sending comforting feelings out to him, and more than just a little love. He snorted. /Well, even being your Bondmate, I can't stop you. I'll just have to trust you./ He nuzzles her neck, and she stopped and threw her arms around his snout. 'Luthe, I need advie that no one waking or living can give me.. there are very important things going on. You'll have me back, don't fret. Just don't tell Yshar before I do.. I don't know how he'll feel about this.' They parted (physically) in the garden, and Luthe lumbered back to Ursa Major to watch over Rowan. Etra barely let the child out of her sight... but that was all maternal instinct and affection, yes? Not fear... She steeled herself and clkambered into the cave, settling in against the sand. After several moment of silence, calm settled over her like a fine mist... the old trick she had taught herself so lng ago to escape the pain of physical torture had become a way to draw into herself for her studies and music. It had a calming affect on her Bondmate as well... she felt Luthe settle in, a watchful eye on her young son. The music started... it drifted from her harp in a way she hadn't truly heard before, and the staff felt warm against her back. As sound filled the small cavern, Laerin focused her thoughts on the Time Between Times.. the waving heather of the land of the soul... the gloaming light that was now so familiar to her... *** Continued... (gotta go to class ;) ) -------------------------- Message 92 from *Storylines (#5236): Date: Wed Sep 24 11:35:00 1997 EDT From: Ylaerin (#16541) To: *Storylines (#5236) Subject: The journey... (Cont. of post #91 ;) ) The music continued to float and sparkle around her, turning the blackness behind her closed eyelids starry and liquid. They were old tunes, ancient ones known to the fingers of all harpers since time before memory, but they grew up as she played the,; they rose into other songs known only to her. She heard herself playing the beginning strains of her own wedding ballad and then... There was a lifting sensation, and a cool sea-scented breeze passed over her. Somewhere, far away it seemed, she felt Luthe stretch his wings. She smiled to herself, and wound the music around the wind as best she could. It was pleasant, to say the least; the liquid darkness became deeper, the few 'stars' scintillated strangely. Without warning, the 'light' around her warped, became flat black darkness; her ears rang painfully and she struggled to keep her hands on the harp strings. She knew somehow that if the music stopped... well, she would be in a very bad way, to put it mildly. Her head felt tight, and still the ringing went on and on. Distantly, she felt the touch of her sapphire on her mind.. a far away warmth, a bead of light. She gathered her will and made her music louder - tried to add her voice. \\ A sharp jarring sensation... a pain in her head... her face being brushed by wind and heather. Lyetra gasped for breath, searched for Luthe's mind in her own and found it. She opened her eyes to find herself lying in a crumpled heap on the moor, her staff still safely on her back... her carven harp jostled out of her grip and lying a few feet away from her. Dizzily, she sat up; the breeze stirred her hair. She pulled her harp to her, and hugged it against her chest, breathing deeply to regain her composure. She'd done it, that much was certain... A swirl of mist.. two men stepped forward. Syyrl, in his violet cloak with his familiar smile and dark curls, and the Welshman known to many as The Bard, his green eyes flashing behind a lock of golden hair. Syyrl helped her to her feet, steadying her with an arm around her shoulders. Taliesin was less kind. 'Seven hells, child,' he sanpped, 'What ever gave you the impression that you could do this?!' She hugged her harp closer, leaning slightly against Syyrl and forgetting the respect she qould have oridnarily given him. 'I needed you, you never came,' her voice was surprisingly hurt, even to her own ears, 'So I came myself. Because I could.' The Bard considered her a moment, and amusement crept into his gaze. 'Aye, you could. You did. Very well then, here you are. I suppose you want me to deal with the matters troubling your heart.' She nodded, and took a few moments explaining the growing problem of the Elven Mage, the trouble it caused her soul. Taliesin listened thoughtfully, toying with his rings a bit as she spoke. When she was done, he was quiet for some time. At last, he spoke, 'I can see much, and have been given much wisdom, but I am no god. Truly, I wish I could give you more assurance, or some talisman; but what I will do is warn you against weaving your thread too close to the trouble this one creates. Often, folk like this 'Lord' bring about their own unravelling. You, lass, have indeed much cause for worry and sorrow, but I would ask you to focus more on *our* Arts than those of this lackey of darkness. Though perhaps you should at least try to help the young rider which is in his hands.' She nodded again. He was, of course, referring (in speaking of the Bardic Arts) to her own destiny, her rols as the one to chronicle the doings outside of Eire. He was silent a moment more, and Syyrl squeezed her shoulder. 'You know Our history,' Taliesin continued, 'And you know how weak Our ties are becoming amongst the living. I would charge you - Ylaerin, DragonBard and Anruth of Morlith - not only to record the Draconic history and teachings in song, but also to set down the Bardic histories and teaching for those outside of Eire. Take great care in doing this.' She consented, and the jewlled eyes of the dragons on her harp glittered and flashed. Syyrl let go of her, and The Bard patted her shoulder, smiling. They both kissed her forehead, for blessing and safe trip Home. \\ She woke, sand in her hair and stuck to her face. She spluttered without dignity for a moment, ridding her mouth of sand and brushing it from her eyelashes. Sunlight was beginning to peek through the mouth of the cave -- it had been dep night when she set out to do this... she must have been gone for hours. Surely Strafe was worried. Her fingers ached from prolonged playing, and the strings of her harp were warm and losing intonation. After a few moments worth of tuning, she walked home and clambored wearily into bed. Luthe rumbled, and as she drifted off to sleep they talked silently. It was clear now, thank the gods... and she felt some of the chill seep away from her soul and heart. Running a hand over her stomach, she thought of the coming child that so few knew about... then she slipped into dreamless sleep. OOC: I apologize for the length.. but heck, it's been a while since I *really* posted ;) Hope it didn't suck too much for ya. --------------------------