Here are all threads from before the Fall of Emea in 719 and all threads pertaining to the Fall. As of Ymiden 719 (1st June 2019), this forum is locked for new threads and is a repository for old content.
The sun was about to set and painted the sky in countless shades of red, orange and pink. For a few precious moments the world seemed to become more than it really was, a magical place that was full of promise and hope and innocence, a place of endless beauty where anything was possible. Gradually the light vanished though, the magic faded, and darkness took a hold of the land. That brief flash of something good and pure had been nothing but an illusion, a respite from the truth. There was nothing good and pure about the world. There was no hope, at least not for those that believed in such noble ideals, the blinded, trusting mortals. There was only the law of the strongest. The only way to survive in the world of Idalos was to be better than the rest.
The Mortalborn stood at a window of the old fort deep in the mountains that had been his refuge for the past couple of trials, still as a statue, and gazed outside. There was something about the fight of the light and the darkness, about the encroaching shadows, that comforted him, that reassured him and even fascinated him to some extent, perhaps because it mirrored certain events in his own life.
Since that trial in the frozen wasteland of Oscillus, since he had made his move against the Immortals, he had been travelling. He had been on his way to Etzos to meet with those that shared his goals and discuss his next steps, but an encounter with a group of Xiur’s supporters had necessitated a detour. He didn’t want anybody to follow him to his destination. He was confident that he could have handled most of them easily, but he needed to keep her safe.
Her …
He stepped away from the window and furrowed his brow, momentarily confused, but then he remembered again with absolute clarity. There was a child, a daughter, born shortly before Syroa had come into his life. He knew that he should have left her, that he should have sacrificed her – she made him weak and vulnerable and slowed him down – but there was a part of him that cared about her, as much or more than he cared about the Immortal that had marked him. She would not suffer the fate of his first child, that little girl that had died on a cold trial in Zi’da, almost four centuries before.
Somewhere a bird cried, one of those large birds of prey that inhabited that part of Idalos, and then a loud boom rang through the old building. The Mortalborn instinctively reached for his sword. Another boom followed, and he realized what was happening. “They are at the door!” he called out to her. Somehow they had found him despite the fact that he had tried to lay a false trail. “Get your things. We need to leave right now!”
He seemed so sad. So sad and angry and Vega wanted to do something, anything to help him. He stood, looking out of the window of the fort where they'd stayed the last few trials and she felt her small heart breaking for him. She didn't really understand what it was that had happened, but Vega knew that Papa had done something and there were bad people chasing them now. They'd made this place as comfortable as they could, lighting candles and trying to make sure that they kept warm and cheerful, but Vega knew that Papa was worried. One of the candles was flickering as she looked at him and in the flickering light he seemed very old to the young girl.
She decided that she was going to go and speak to him, ask him what they could do, what she could do in order to make things easier but then the sound of the bird disturbed her and she looked around in surprise. She didn't have time to do more than that, though, as the place shook. "Papa!" Vega cried out in shock. She gathered her wits about her, quickly though. She was seven arcs old now and they only had each other, she and him. "I'm here, Papa", she replied with a much calmer tone. Un-slinging her bow from her back she notched an arrow and moved to stand with him. "Shall I go and lock the door, Papa?" She wasn't sure that it would help, to be honest, but she had to offer. The doors here were thick and heavy and might hold out against whatever was outside.
Her red hair was loose and she was wearing her favourite yellow dress. She liked this dress because it swished around. Vega's eyes were a deep violet shade, mirroring the depth of her own emotions. "There's nothing I need. They're just things. My necklace from Mama is here." She never took that off, after all. It was a small and delicate thing which was all that she had to remind her of the mother that she had never known.
As another massive sound exploded around them, Vega cringed slightly but she looked at him with trust, trying her best to be brave. "I've got my dagger in my belt, Papa. I won't let them hurt you." Her eyes scanned out of the window, not noticing the snow and rain which fell in a sleet-like haze around them and she breathed in through her teeth. "Papa, there's one of them in the old tree out the front. I can shoot him, if you want me to. Shall I, Papa?"
He might not want her to, she reasoned, because he might want her to run with him. He was so protective and she just wanted him to stop looking like there was so much pain in him. The fort shook again, though, and Vega's eyes widened. "Papa. I think we're surrounded!"
“The door is already locked“, he told her. He knew better than to keep the door unlocked when there were people following them that might want him dead, that might want both of them dead. She seemed so small as she stood there, with the bow in her hand. His heart ached as he looked at her. What would happen when she grew older, when she realized that most would consider him a villain and that Xiur and Moseke were the so called good people? Would she come to hate him or understand why he had had to do it, that he had wanted the lies to end?
She was so good and pure, and she reminded him so much of her mother. She had died shortly after giving birth. She had been brave, just like their daughter, too brave for her own good. He almost laughed as she told him that she wouldn’t let them hurt him. She was good, she was beyond good – for a seven-arc-old. He had trained her since she had been old enough to hold a weapon, but she was no match for the people at the door, those monsters.
“Good”, he remarked as she informed him that she had her necklace. It was the only thing that was left of her, the woman he had once loved. Sometimes he wished he were a painter or that he could share his ability with his daughter so that she could see her mother in his memories, but he had never been particularly artistically inclined, and his ability only worked one way. Like most of his lovers Vega’s mother had never found out that he was the son of an Immortal, but died believing him to be human.
He tried to sound reassuring and confident and act as if he had the situation under complete control, but the truth was that he worried - not about himself, but about his daughter. He hurriedly collected his alchemical equipment and threw his potions into the bag that he always carried with him. One particular potion caught his attention. It was contained in a transparent glass bottle. It was grey and seemed to constantly be moving, like the snow and the rain outside. Perhaps, he thought, it would come in handy.
“Stay away from the window!” he warned her as she mentioned the man in the tree. He could see a number of tiny lights in the darkness beyond the fort now. His enemies had brought lamps and torches. “They might shoot you before you manage to fire your bow!” In a gentler tone he added, “Come to me!” As the fort shook again, he held her in her arms. He held her tightly as if he wanted to tell her that there was no need to be afraid, that she would be safe as long as she was with him, but the truth was that he didn’t know. The massive door finally seemed about to give way under the continued onslaught.
He made a decision then. He would not wait for them to barge in and risk a fight. He didn’t know how many of them were outside and what kind of weapons they had brought - and what they would do to her. “There might be a backdoor somewhere!” he called out to his daughter. “Follow me. I won’t let them take you!” He hurried to the next room and gestured for Vega to get inside.
He on the other hand stood in front of the doorway for a moment, took the strange grey potion and hurled it towards the entrance. The glass shattered with a loud sound, and the room was suddenly filled with smoke that made it hard to see anything. Perhaps, he thought, it would delay his enemies for a few bits or a few trills at least and give them a chance to escape.
He had never been one to run like a coward before, but it wasn’t only about himself anymore. He grabbed a candle and ushered her down a corridor just as the building shook one final time. There was a deafening sound as the old gate that had stood there for centuries finally shattered, and then it was quiet for a few precious moments before voices could be heard.
He gave his daughter a sign to hurry up, to run down the hallway that was behind the next door.
Of course the door was already locked, Vega thought and she blushed a little. That was a foolish thing to suggest and, though he never once said it Papa didn't like foolish. She nodded, though and smiled up at him with as brave a smile as she could manage. He was pleased that she had Mama's necklace and Vega lifted her hand to it, nestled against her skin. There were so many tales and stories about her mother that she had built up in her mind, but that notwithstanding, the simple fact that her father had loved her was enough for the young girl.
As he spoke, Papa was reassuring and he was confident and both of those things were good because Vega wanted to be afraid. More than that, though, she wanted to help him, to show him that she was brave even though she was afraid but when he snapped his warning, she flinched and moved quickly. Feeling his arms wrap around her, she hugged him fiercely "I'm sorry, Papa. I just want to help. I'll stay away from the windows, I promise." As the pounding outside continued though, she felt herself start to tremble, but she fought it and promised herself that, if it came to it she'd stand and fight as bravely as any grown up.
Papa, though, had other ideas and he made a decision. She followed him, obeying his words immediately, her eyes wide as she looked around, taking stock of where they were. It was a time to be tactical, she knew, Papa would be looking for the exits, the areas of weakness. But the whole place was reverberating and they were running. It must be bad, she knew, for Papa to run because he wouldn't do that. He was protecting her and she moved with him as he flung one of his potions.
The corridor was endless, they ran for so long and Vega was starting to think that her legs wouldn't run any more but then they turned the corner into the marketplace and the sunlight was reflecting so brightly on the snow that it was almost blinding. There was a bard singing next to the fountain and he sang a tale of bravery at sea.
Looking around in surprise, Vega slipped her hand into Papa's and she looked up at Doran with a confused expression on her face. "Papa, we need to find somewhere to hide. The guards are coming, look!" True enough there were groups of guards asking questions of the people and Vega knew, somehow, that they were looking for the two of them. She looked up at Doran and asked, with absolute loyalty in her face. "Papa, what did you do? Why are they chasing us?"
Whatever it was, she did not doubt that he was in the right, but maybe it would be important that she knew.
The old building trembled as if it were about to collapse. Dust and debris rained down on them. “Faster!” he screamed. He could hear their voices coming from the room where they had stayed for the past couple of trials now, louder than before. They were getting closer and closer. He quickened his pace, but even as he did so, he realized that she wouldn’t be able to keep up with him, at least not for long. Her legs were too short, and she already looked as if she was a little out of breath. He tightened his grip around his sword.
They were just a few steps behind them now. As he turned around, he could see their faces in the twilight. Their eyes met for a moment before he abruptly moved around a corner, urging his daughter along, even though he knew that it would be over soon. They wouldn’t be able to escape. They weren’t fast enough. If he had been alone, he might have been able to outrun them, but he could never have sacrificed her in order to ensure his own survival.
All that he could do was to wait for them in the darkness and try to kill them before they killed him – or at least hold them off long enough to give her a chance. He made another step, moved around another corner – the part of the corridor to their right looked as if it would be easier to defend – only to suddenly find himself in a marketplace. He stopped dead in his tracks and squinted. It took his eyes a few moments to adjust to the sudden bright light and make out the details of his surroundings.
Somewhere nearby a bard sang, a song that was as old as Idalos itself, of men performing heroic deeds. He approached him and joined the small crowd that had gathered around him. For a moment he simply stood there and listened and allowed himself to relax and enjoy the music, but as his daughter informed him that the guards were coming, he realized that it wasn’t over yet. Perhaps it would never be completely over.
“Come with me.” He took her hand again and hurriedly led her through the marketplace, hoping that the guards would temporarily lose track of them in the crowd. They moved around a corner and down a street as he looked for a hiding place. “There!” He pointed at a doorway that led into a small courtyard before he urged her towards it. As he did so, a mouse scurried away. The smell of freshly cooked food wafted through an open window above them.
He flattened his body against the wall, put an arm around his daughter and stood completely still as he waited with bated breath. The guards seemed to be moving in a different direction now. Their voices were getting further and further away. As she asked him what he had done, he abruptly let go of her again, knelt down in front of her and looked at her with a serious expression on his face for a moment before he answered.
“I already told you about the man named Xiur.” He waited for her to confirm this. “The truth is that he isn’t just a man. He is an Immortal, and I stabbed him. He was lying to people, and he was manipulating them, but they don’t see it that way. They have decided that I need to pay for my crimes and die. They think that I’m a bad man, a monster. I’m not. I did it all to make the world safer for the two of us. Do you understand?”
Just for a moment they stood together, her and her Papa and they listened to the bard singing and performing. It was nice and Vega leaned against him, catching her breath and resting her head on his shoulder. "It'll be alright, Papa," she whispered. If it would or not, though, it most certainly was not alright currently and Vega told him as she saw the guards.
As he always would, he took charge and they moved again, her hand in his. Would they always be on the move like this? Vega wondered if they'd ever rest again but she knew that she was being silly, worrying over things which just could not be solved. It was not logical, she chided herself sternly and she concentrated on moving with Papa. As they hid against the wall, Vega stood as still as a statue, like the games she had used to play before the bad men came to hurt Papa and, by extension, her. She felt safe with his arm around her but the mouse was safer, she knew. The mouse wasn't being hunted and they were.
All of it faded, though, when Papa knelt in front of her and told her all of it. Vega looked at him in surprise, shock filling her face. "You... an Immortal, Papa?" She whispered the words, as though scared that the speaking of them would make them real. "I.."
It was a real moment for Vega, for all that it was a dream. In the waking world, she was a follower of Xiur. Sea and stars was how she had been raised, after all."Papa?" She was confused and it showed but then, the simple bottom line of Vega's personality shone through, whether awake or asleep. "I trust you, Papa. I don't understand and it doesn't sound like a good thing, but if you say it was to protect us then I believe you. I won't let them hurt you." She put her hand up to the necklace she wore. "Mama would say the same, wouldn't she? If she was here. Everything you do is for me, I know that. We need to stop hiding and be in plain sight. Just, not be who they're looking for. We need to look different, Papa, then they won't know we're us. That stall we passed, it sold clothes. Shall I go and persuade the owner to give me some new clothes?"
Whatever it was that he wanted to do, Vega sighed and reached out to hold his hand. "You're not a monster Papa. Don't believe them. I don't care what they say, you're not a monster and I'll kill anyone who says you are. We just need to be somewhere safe and be together and then it'll be fine, won't it?" In the waking world, the young woman's forehead creased into a deep frown, but in the dream her bottom line maintained.
As he looked at his daughter and waited for her reaction, the Mortalborn felt something akin to fear for a moment for the first time in what seemed like an eternity. He had faced Immortals and mortals, he had battled mages and slain terrible beasts, but that one little girl succeeded in what they had not managed. The expression of shock on her face shook him to his very core. He hesitated for a moment and simply looked at the child that reminded him so much of the woman that he had once loved, the woman that had died much too soon before he inclined his head.
“An Immortal”, he confirmed. The tone of his voice was a hint colder than before. Xiur would not be the last one. He would make them all pay, all that had ever wronged him and those that he cared about and spill their blood, but he knew that Vega was not ready to hear that yet. “Sometimes you need to do seemingly bad things in order to make the world a better place.” As she said that she believed him and wouldn’t let them hurt him, he simply held her hand for a moment. She was the reason why he kept on fighting. She would never suffer at the hands of Xiur or Ziell.
He wanted to believe that her mother would have said the same, but the truth was that he didn’t know. He had loved her, and she had loved him, but there had been too many secrets between them. “If I believed them, I would have handed myself over to them arcs ago”, he spoke in a somewhat bitter tone and paused for a moment before he reassured her, “It will be fine, I promise. We just need to get away from this place. There are people in a city called Etzos that will welcome us with open arms and help me fight my enemies. They think I’m a hero. Etzos is a beautiful city. You will like it there.”
He smiled at her, but the smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. He didn’t like what she proposed at all, but as he thought about it, he realized that it was probably their best option. His face was easily recognizable, but nobody knew what his daughter looked like yet.
“Go and talk to him”, he told her. “But if he gives you trouble or if you notice something out of the ordinary, immediately come back to me. Don’t try to argue with anybody. I’ll be watching you from here.” He bent down again and placed a kiss on her forehead. “Go!” Even as he said that he already began to regret his decision She was the only thing that was left of her. They could have hidden in the courtyard a while longer and waited for night to fall – or broken into the house behind them and stolen a few clothes. There were so many other options besides what she had proposed.
He reached for his sword. If anything happened to her out there, he would intervene.
"The smell reminds me of home, Papa. The smell of cooking and you. I'm sorry that they don't understand that you did it for good but I do." Vega nodded her head when he said that she would like it in Etzos. They would be fine there, she was sure. Faith in her father was something completely fundamental to her and she hugged him tightly, trying to let him know that it was fine. They would be fine and Etzos would be beautiful.
He agreed to let her try and get some clothes from the stall vendor and Vega kissed him on the cheek. "I'll be quick, Papa. I will. I won't argue and if I think there's anything strange, I'll come straight back." She turned and walked over to the stall which she leaned against with as alluring an expression as she could manage. Which, in truth, was not much and not well. Vega was many things and had many good qualities. Being seductive was not, at all, one of them. Especially when her father was watching.
"Well, hello," she got out before she slipped, knocking over a pile of clothes on to the floor. "Oh nuts!"
Vega knelt to pick them up as the store keeper came around and looked at her. "Give it up, Red, you're not my type. What do you want?" Vega sighed and explained that she needed some clothes for her and her father, but she had no money. He was about to say something when she realised that she had a bag of gold at her waist and so she paid for the clothing she needed.
She was still red cheeked with embarrassment at her utterly useless attempt at flirtation as she made it back to where Doran was. "I got them, Papa." Looking up at him with faith in his ability to get them there, she asked, "How long will it take us to get to Etzos? I'm hungry." She frowned slightly as though hearing something, but she dismissed it and turned her attention back to her father. As she handed him his clothes, she handed him the gold too. "You should have this back."
As the marketplace faded away from her dreaming mind, they were back in the dining room. Sitting at a large table, the two of them, candlelight flickering and a delicious meal in front of them. "Papa?" Vega looked at him very seriously, "may I learn to play the harp? I learnt to dance with Arlo and that was fun, but I'd like to play a musical instrument." A frown creased her brow as waking and dreaming thoughts collided and dreams themselves got confused in her head. "Why isn't Arlo with us? He's my brother, after all."
Doran watched his daughter with bated breath as she approached the merchant. If anything happened to her, he decided, he would kill him and everybody around him and burn the marketplace to ashes, even if he alerted all the Immortals to his presence and paid with his life in the process. He was about to reach out with his mind, to use his powers as she slipped and fell, and the merchant spoke to her so rudely, but a moment later she was on her way back to his hiding place again, and he allowed himself to relax and breathe a sigh of relief.
He realized that she had done something to him. He had never been that nervous before she had come into his life. He had been completely in control of his emotions and treated those around him coldly and nearly condescendingly. He had not cared about anybody besides himself. But she had brought out a side of him that he hadn’t thought existed anymore and made him feel things that he hadn’t felt for centuries. She made him feel human again, and he was even more determined to succeed because of her.
“Only a few more trials”, he answered as she wanted to know how long it would take them to get to Etzos. “We’ll be there soon, and then everything will be different”, he reassured her. In truth he didn’t know how long it would take, how many problems they would encounter during the journey and how many more enemies they would have to fight before they would finally be safe. He didn’t want her to worry though. Even now that she had shown herself to be more than capable he wanted to shelter her as much as possible.
As he took the rest of the gold from her, the marketplace around them suddenly disappeared, and they were in his dining room, and he wondered why his heart was beating so furiously and why his hands were shaking as if they had narrowly escaped death when they were obviously at home and safe. He felt as if he had just awoken from a nightmare.
The food on the plate in front of him was delicious, and the wine was among the finest that he had ever drunk, but it couldn’t make that strange feeling go away entirely. There was something about the world that wasn’t quite right all of a sudden. “Of course”, he replied as his daughter asked him if she might learn to play the harp. “Did you know that your grandmother was a musician? She played the lute. She used to tell me that the music helped her calm down.”
He rarely mentioned his mortal mother – and never his father. There would come a trial when he would have to tell Vega about his family, but he hoped that it was still far away – and that she would never develop any powers, but remain human. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do if she suddenly began to change, like the sister she had never known and became a danger to herself and those around her in the process.
As she asked about her brother Arlo, he furrowed his brow for a moment before he replied, “He’s not your brother. I don’t have a son, you know that. Who is this Arlo? What did he tell you?” The tone of his voice was sharper now. The feeling that something was wrong intensified. He was worried that this Arlo had done something to her.
“I know that you are lonely”, he continued in a gentler tone. He realized that his daughter had not had a lot of contact with other children, one of the consequences of a life on the run. It was understandable that she would invent a family and friends and grow attached to anybody that was even remotely kind to her. “But please be careful when you talk to strangers. I promise that you will have a lot of other children to play with when we are in Etzos.”
There is a moment when dream and wakefulness collide, sometimes the dreamer is aware of it and becomes lucid. However, more usually the dream shifts and changes or ceases altogether. "The lute, Papa? Oh, I didn't know that we had lutes on the ships. I don't remember ever hearing one. I'd like that, though." Ships? That wasn't right and Vega shook her head, ever so slightly. That one didn't do it, didn't shift the dream so much that she couldn't roll with it in her subconscious mind.
But Arlo wasn't her brother? Vega frowned slightly and dreams and waking moments collided together. "Arlo. He's. He told me lots of things, we lived together in the house and went to the Dawn Ball. We found the skeeterwampulus and it was just a cat. And we saved a little girl, Papa. She was so afraid and it was dark and there was a very short woman." Vega looked around and frowned. How could Papa not remember Arlo? That seemed odd and she thought that she might not quite remember it right. Her dreaming mind couldn't get rid of the memory of her father, nor of the short young chap she was talking about.
"I'm not lonely any more, Papa, I promise. I didn't really ever know I was. I just... never thought I'd make friends here. But I have and they're good people. You'll like Arlo, I promise. We're going to travel together. To.. I think we're all going to Etzos. That must be it."
Vega looked at Doran and dropped her knife and fork, suddenly, gathered up her skirts and ran to him. "Papa?" She moved to sit next to him in the chair and her hand slipped through his, as though he was not there. "Papa?" Lifting her hand to his face, which was rapidly fading away, Vega felt her fingers slip through the air as the man in front of her faded into nothing. She didn't notice the room do the same, nor the surroundings. Her focus was entirely on him.
"Papa! Don't go, Papa!" She called into the void even as she woke, calling out for her father.
