Fable - Ask [Phorasmos] To Wake in the Night

[Tristan Locke]

Cold mist clung to everything like a child to its mother. Had they not seen the waning light of day before leaving the quiet village of Parumora, it would have been impossible for anyone in the group to have known what time of day it was. Pale light filtered softly through the dense trees of the Twilight Pines, falling like flowing curtains onto the treacherous, rolling forest floor below. The wind moaned its phantom presence through the pines, its chill biting at whatever skin it could touch. Night time had fallen, and the somber environs of the woods of Phorasmos were anything but quiet.

Beyond the muffled trudging of boots on moss, dirt, and fallen foliage, the group walked along side a creek that burbled away, uncaring of any need to sleep. Branches cracked and nocturnal fauna made their presences known, always just out of sight.

"Did we really need to do this in the dark, Master Ensis?" an uncertain voice piped up, the neophyte among the group making his discomfort known for perhaps the fourth or fifth time. An elven boy, fairly young in appearance, though with elves it was always hard to tell. "Surely first light would have been safer."

"Hardly so, but it matters not. The ritual we need perform can only be done beneath the light of the crescent moon, neophyte. It is of great importance that it be done, and an important lesson in your path to becoming fully fledged," Ensis replied, the old spiritsmith making good time despite his need for a gnarled walking staff. "Even so, you need not worry for fear of revenants. They rarely wander this far from the Charnel City, and even less so do they traipse this deep into the pines."

The boy visibly relaxed, the paranoia wracking his heart relenting somewhat.

"Don't let your guard down too much, Arlen. There's plenty else in these woods that would see us all dead if we were to falter," Tristan warned. It was a lesson he'd learned the hard way only a few years prior, when the Mourners had finally allowed him to start training in their ways. A chill ran along the lining of his armor, though a comforting one. Fane...likely agreeing, or at least attempting to elicit confidence. Tristan would never get used to that.

"Right..." Arlen hazarded, stiffening up once more, his eyes searching in the darkness for signs of danger. "Just where is it we're headed, anyways?"

"One of the warding monuments that protects the Pool of Remembrance. The enchantment which projects the ward must be renewed every so often, lest it lose its effect and the pool become exposed to corruption, or worse," Ensis answered plainly.

Tristan knew this. He looked over the ragtag group that had been chosen to accompany the elder spiritsmith. He imagined that most of them understood. Only time would tell how necessary such an entourage would be. Traveling in numbers always carried its own risk on the isle of Phorasmos...

 

[Aeris Silversale]

She wore a her helm that day.

After a night of restlessness and sudden despair, it had been difficult for her to find a moment to sleep and not be haunted by the images that played without her intention, but still, she had 'woken' this morning and came to realise dawn came and gone and the sun was reaching it's highest point that day. None bothered to question her when she finally left her dark room.

Throughout the course of the day, she had been in a fog, unaware of time slipping by her until she heard one of the neophytes complain about the lack of warmth as the sun began it's descent behind the horizon.

Silversale wore her helm to hide the dread she felt all day before this expedition. Today was a day she would be unable to hide her emotions, her true expression, and that would only make the newer Mourners worry. Of course, she was not the only one to have suffered, but she felt alone in her grief after all this time.

That's what survivor's guilt did to one's mind. How blame and grief rotted the light until it too became heavy with darkness.

"Did your mum never tell you stories about the Twilight Pines, Arlen?" Her voice was almost chipper, giving someone the impression she was grinning behind the helm. "They weren't stories to make children go to bed early."

 

[Sarah Lindwell]

The ground crunched underfoot. The dim whisperings of the trees crawled around them. Long, slow breaths drawn in and released. A threshold approaching. The scent of the dead in the air. Forgotten things twisting and turning. The eye of an old god judging all.

The figure was tall. Cloaked in a fabric as dark as the deepest caverns. Their armour covered them in its entirety. Solid black steel overlapping to reduce any weakness. Silver chain slid within the open gaps, and dark cloth separated metal from skin. A long blade hung from their left hip, the tip a scant couple inches from the ground. Long locks of platinum hair trailed down from their shadowed hood. The ghost of a face hidden in shade. Bright, blue eyes pierced from a half burnt face. Blackened char scaled across the right side of her face.

As she walked, her colors shifted ever so bit. Spots of glowing white, like stars, began to appear and dance across the plates of her armor. As they approached these places of the dead the changes would grow. Her blue eyes drained of color and became grey. Though they were no less distinct. Her hair lightened until it became a stark white, and her skin turned ashen.

This was a normal shift that her fellow Mourners were already aware of. Only a couple of the younger members of their number continued to flinch at her appearance. It was a mark of her particularly broken soul. A discovery that she had made some time ago with the help of a travelling necromancer. Then that knowledge had been reaffirmed here. In this land of the dead.

She mumbled, words of a song half-remembered came unbidden.

"I am dead
I am hollow
I am lost
Yet I follow
And I fight the endless night"

The fragment of a song, sung with the voice of the half-burnt, echoed quietly. It merged and moved with the deafening fog that encroached upon them. Some of the Mourners repeated in mumbles. Some stayed silent. It was a song that many of them knew, but not one that many liked to sing. It was, is, a sad song. Of a duty done in the service of those that will never know. Done in service of the dead that they all truly wished to rejoin.

Again, her steps crunched against the dead ground. Pain shot through her left leg with every step. It was a constant companion. A reminder of what she truly was even if her armour hid it. A cripple, broken and dependent on those around her. That is until they enter the Charnel City.

Her left hand gripped the pommel of her once-familiar blade. In her own journey through the pines, the creation had changed. An implement of brutish death constructed in the grand forges of Molthal was refined. Its purpose changed from orcish dominance to an implement of her will. It was an extension of her, in a way that was more intimate than any blade she ever held before. But maybe that was because of the armour.

They whispered to her. Her companions, 99 in total. They whispered warnings and opportunity. Of how to step, and how to fight. How to dodge and defend. But sometimes, they were loud. Thankfully they remained as whispers tonight.

The veterans thought she was well on her way to the final death. To the madness that awaited them all. She knew she was. But it would not take her yet. There were things that she needed to do. Reasons to take one more step. Then she heard a living voice.

Turning back to look at the front of their procession she watched Ensis lead the young Hopeful. No, that was what squires were called. Ensis led the Damned. He knew it too. The boy was unlikely to live for long. Few did. Tristan walked close by. He offered words of guidance. He had been here for some time. Longer than her, though he didn't have the same wealth of experience she did. And that was without her armour whispering the knowledge of warcraft into her.

Then Aeris spoke and Sarah smiled softly. Her relationship with the girl was strange. Something akin to a facsimile of a sister? They weren't quite friends. Then again, no one amongst them were friends. It was too dangerous. None of them wanted to feel their hearts crack again.

"Careful Aeris," She breathed as she stepped up next to the younger woman. Her domineering height casting a shadow over the girl. "Few of us are from the island, and less know of the tales. The Neophyte forgets because the stories are yet to be ingrained." Her voice came out with an air of authority and ease. A relic of her past paired with the freeing ability to be able to move correctly once more.

 

[Jin Lolthous]

Growing up on Phorasmos, this had been her life’s calling. Becoming a mourner… Though she hadn’t expected to take up the mantle quite as early as she had, her mother did her utmost to prepare her for any possible scenario. Even her unexpected death. Perhaps it was that or having lived the entirety of her life surrounded by it all that she was more resilient to the affects the gloom and doom of death had on most others.

Even now as their group somewhat somberly traversed the Twilight Pines, Jin bore the mood of one taking a stroll in their personal garden. With her expertly fitted ghost mail adorning her petite figure, she felt the warmth of her mother’s embrace soothe any potential doubts. Despite her leisure and easygoing gait, her eyes were sharply pointed ahead for any unsuspected signs of movement. The fog made her task significantly more difficult visually, however with all the moisture in the air, sensing any disturbance through it would be straightforward so long as she remained focused. Only the slight twinkle of pink in her pupils distinguished the usage of her powers.

“No, we aren’t speaking at the moment…,” she said quietly to herself. “Yes, but he’s being incredibly stubborn about it… Okay… Maybe. Wait, shh.”

In her distraction, she faintly heard the others speaking in the short distance behind her. Stopping briefly, she turned to take a peek back at them. Old Ensis giving the youth of their party some reassurance, she nearly immediately started walking again until Tristan found it in him to dislodge that momentary comfort. She snorted involuntarily, though she knew he spoke truthfully. Why she found amusement in the terror, she couldn’t explain. But at Aeris’ mention of stories, a smile pulled at the corner of her lips. Perhaps it was just in her nature to find intrigue in such horrors.

“I doubt one could so easily forget such stories,” she called back to them. Her fleeting smile had disappeared and a more nonchalant ease had replaced it as her gaze roamed over the serious, ashen-faced warrior. The multitude of burn scars and her crippled form jammed into her ghost mail might warn others that she was not one to be trifled with, but Jin was typically candid. There was curiosity there, as well as compassion. For the woman who seemingly carried the weight of the world on her shoulders.

“Do you have a favorite Aeris? Perhaps regale the tale as we make this slow journey forward,” she asked before turning on her heel again. Sometimes people needed a good diversion. Perhaps storytime could keep the greener of their lot preoccupied from thinking of death.