Phon Vos, the visions from last night still float in and out of your thoughts as you wait for Abnaki to return from his concert. You see again a hundred different paths of piety, anger, despondency, and vengeance. Walking those hard lessons has given you a new determination, but not a clear direction.
You think of all that is going wrong in the world. Moon rises in the east as the Fey flee the forest from gems and mirrors. To the south, River and her people and forced into an uneasy sleep. Efreet and golems haunt the streets of Hearth.
Where can water go, when the whole world is on fire?
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There wasn't much left in the tent in the morning, except for a single letter, sealed on the desk.
A Letter
To All,
My paths need to take me elsewhere. It is not my choice to decide, but sometimes the four have plans for us that we may never truly understand. I wish for you to know that I will be supporting you as best as I can, my prayers will be for you every day. I know Moon is a terrible foe, but there is more to this than just him. There is a terrible miasma in the air, something akin to what happened to Sky and it draws me.
What needs to happen is for el to be united. I know on paper this is a fool's errand but if I can hold in my heart these conflicting ideas, I know that others can as well. I do not ask you for forgiveness in these times of need, for I don't believe I am doing wrong, but I ask for your understanding.
This is more than what a single polearm can deal with, even if it is wielded with truth and justice.
I will hopefully come back at a later date, my life has recently given me new purpose, a drive. Where can water flow when the world is on fire? It can spread. It can make the ground wet so the flames can't grow. It can make the air thick to provide coolness to those burnt.
When you reach a crossroads, I just ask that you be like water in all things. Be flexible, be understanding, be adaptable. Our world relies on it.
Your sister in arms,
Phon Vos
There is some wetness on the paper, droplets from the consequence of a hard choice.
Samen, after the interrogation, goes looking for Phon Vos. He finds her tent empty, save for the obviously placed note. Even before looking at it, he knew what it meant, but he read it anyway.
"Cac."
Allies, friends, and family all come and go. What seems so solid and stable one day is gone the next.
At least this time, it's not because she's dead. Or whatever happened to Osna.
He goes and finds the others to let them know of Phon Vos's resignation.
Abnaki says nothing, but his shoulders slump. Another ally gone.
Stay strong Abnaki. People look up to you. If you can't stay strong and keep their spirits up, then who will?
He straightens, and gives his old smile. "She'll be fine. Phon's tough, tougher than almost anyone else I've met. When she comes back, I bet it'll be with all of elenity at her back."
--
Samen, do you have any idea what you might be looking for? I've shopped for a few magi in my day.
Shortly after you leave the tent, you see Half-Blind enter Phon Vos' quarters. He is there but briefly, and stalks away in the opposite direction half a minute later. The resting sneer on his twisted face tells you nothing of his reaction. He pauses for a moment to catch his breath, leaning upon his crooked whalebone staff. His hands seem to pain him; the rubbery-skinned phalanges massage one another like blind sepia spiders. In time, he limps away on his own errands.
***
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Samen recalls an enchanter who seemed somewhat reliable, at least as far as enchanters go. The process of imbuing inanimate objects with permanent magical properties does, admittedly, make many a good magus a trifle batty.
On various street corners throughout Hearth, you see couples dancing to the old fritan classics, as tradition dictates on the morning of riddles. Mustached musicians singing and playing accordions and guitars and mournful trombones serenade these elderly dancing couples, who seem half asleep and half out of a dream themselves.
You hear rumors of Moon being defeated in Light, and of the Blessed being seen back in Hearth. Sightings of Ibinu, the arch-sorceror of the Cauldron Lady, have been particularly common.
A spritzing drizzle, unpleasantly chill in the early spring air, follows you into the magician's corner of the Shops. The Charlatan's Quarters is mostly deserted. The stigma associated with sylphs and alchemy in the age of Moon madness has also made the arcane less popular in the city.
As if to hail Moon's coming, you see odd magical touches all over the Quarters. Cobblestone mushrooms rise and fall beneath your feet, likely illusory. Bricks in various buildings wink momentarily green and yellow as you pass. You hear faraway brutbreve matches from the other side of town, strangely distorted. An alleyway gives a glimpse of what may have been eite played with animate garbage cans. The entire district feels haunted by prestidigitative ghosts.
After half a candle of traversing this weirdness, you find it: parting the narrow laneways of squat wooden buildings--completely out of place--stands a two-story block of stone and mortar. Carved out of the stone archway above the entrance are the words: Old Owl Eyes.
The door opens on your second knock. An elderly sylph with a stooped back answers. You notice he is wearing a metal bowl on his head. Seeming to recognize Samen from a previous visit, he says in a querulous tone, "Ah, the grumpy magus. Are these more friends of yours, set to accuse me of misdeeds again? Or do you bring business this time?"
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Samen gives the merchant a backhanded wave. "Bah! That feels like a year ago. Bygones and such! You may be pleased to learn that the purchaser we were after, V'Apore, has shed all pretense and assumed his true form, that of a cowardly snake."
He leaves that subject on that cryptic, yet inarguably true, statement.
"This time we've come to shop." He raises an eyebrow at the gentleman's "hat". "But I see you're taking Moon's influence seriously. You rightly should. He can be resisted. He can be fought. He can be overcome. Spread this news, and if you can, help with the creation and distribution of will enhancing materials. Time is short, but the battle will be won or lost on the backs of our infrastructure, not the strength of our steel."
"Now then, what do you have?"
Ignoring your last question, Hoot Arcanic argues with you instead. "Pah! Bloody lot of good it will do to spread the marmalade when I don't have any more raw material to work with! Unless you happen to have a few spare golems lying around?" He asks sarcastically, tapping the bowl upon his head.
Gabriel will partway separate to go view the results of the riddle game, I will return, i have something to go check on
Gabriel,
Unconcerned by crowds or drunks or muggers, you take the most direct route from the Shops to the Barracks. You pass the north-south Temple road to enter the Docks, where the celebrations have clearly lasted all night; you walk over the Steam Bridge (or perhaps Stem Bridge these days) and give the looming Quiet Elder several neighborhoods of berth while you head north; past the ruins of the once-glorious Brightfield Arena, now just rubble where sylph orphans lurk; and finally into the southern half of the army district.
The smell of pogonas and pogona feed is strong here. You move quickly down the streets - the crowds all seem to be moving toward the enormous mess hall in the center of the district. The pogona scent dwindles, replaced by beer and fried food. You hear several ifrits make off-handed remarks about who the winners of the riddle contest might be this year - you notice all their guesses bear the v' honorific. Apparently this nobles have won the riddling for several years running. To hear them talk, they make it sound as if the vees deserve to win.
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Gabriel scoffs, Nobility disgusts him...how they treat those below them. That's one of the reasons he left his own house. Gabriel passes the ifrit, making his own off hand The nobility won't win this year, they're pampered children..
Gabriel walks over to the slyph orphans, takes a knee and offers a few gold coins.
"What kind of a mage do you take me for?"
Samen pauses dramatically for his own amusement, though it awkwardly comes off as though he were expecting an actual answer to a rhetorical question. He pulls a silver arm out of his pack and slams it on the table.
"Should we trade in gold, or store credit?"
Samen,
The old el's mouth hangs open, and you see his bottom front teeth are badly crossed. He closes it again with a snap, then swallows. "Eh heheh. Well, store credit it is. And you were looking for...?" You have his full attention now, his sylphan eyes round and curious.
Gabriel, you recognize the sylphan boy before you, who stays outside of your reach even as you offer gold. This is the same hungry-looking boy who acted as a messenger for Osna, delivering a letter to an ex-inquisitor of Volcano.
You see that he recognizes you. Still staying slightly away, body tensed to run, he says quietly, "Where's Osna?"
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I do not know ...He is missing, Take care of yourself little one, learn a trade or skill He continues on his way however
Gabriel, there are hot chocolate vendors on nearly every street corner this cold day. Barrels of the sweet stuff are tapped while still on the cart. The pogonas lashed to the carts mindlessly lap up spills here and there. You see ifrits blowing on their flaming drinks while sylphs and others ordering more mundane beverages. There is a hint of snow in the air, but none has fallen yet.
Within the Temple Courtyards the crowds are focused on one plaza in particular - the Plaza of Questions, the traditional location for the final rounds of riddling. The finalists stand off to one side, mostly ifrits and sylphs and one lone oread. The Council sits upon highback chairs, acting as judges for the day.
Gabriel notes the Hot chocolate vendors, abnormally for his usual stoicism...He takes out a rather large thermos style container and pays for more Hot chocolate than any one normal man could drink.
He enjoys the cold...The beauty of snow. Quietly thinking as he travels to the Plaza of questions to see his handiwork in action. Sylphs as expected...But the lone Oread caught him by surprise. The winner in the end didnt matter, as long as it wasnt an Ifrit, although he did like the idea of an underdog winning
Samen, the sylph stares, dumbfounded, at the pile of golem scrap you show eventually show him, beyond the initial arm. He gives a mad cackle that lasts an awkward period of time. You hear a few loud, insistent hoots! from another room, farther inside the concrete hallways.
The enchanter waves in the air, an acknowledgement of the unseen owl. "Fine, fine, I know I'm getting overexcited!" He takes a few deep breaths. In a calmer tone, he says, "Yes, I'm prepared to strike a bargain..."
Despite having just traded away a fortune in distilled wizardry, the enchanter hums like high, reedy bassoon as he gathers the treasures. In the tedious gray rooms, he finds nooks and crannies where a pair of gold-threaded gloves here, and a patched cloak there. He picks up seemingly random gray chunks off the floor after Abnaki inquires after mind control countermeasures, his humming turning to wheezing everytime he bends over.
A wand plucked from the wall, nearly the same gray as the cement and impossible to see a moment ago. He shouts at a pair of boots by the door for five straight minutes, then throws them into a burlap sack and hands them over to Samen.
For all of his enchanting, Mr. Arcanic uses the strange translucent pipes that are located all along the ceilings of his many rooms. Bringing each weapon or piece of armor to a very particular location, he fiddles with various knobs and valves before blasting at the items with wind, pressure, and a healthy dose of raw magic.
When he gets to Samen's staff, he frowns. "Err, eh...is there some entity living in this staff? I'm not one to judge bottling up strange creatures in odd places - it happens to every magus now and then, aheheh. Just need to know so I can set the spell right."
You think you hear Abby scoff at the word creature, but she seems subdued in this place of piping winds and artificial pressures.
Samen nods. "Yes. Smoke elemental. Don't ruin her home or she'll take an interest in you. You don't want that."
Gabriel,
Captain Dove announces the contestants, his voice carried on the wind by the thin sylph's own magic. As you expected, the ifrits are nearly all vees, a preening collection of noble sons. The sylphs are mostly Chemes, Chymes, and Medicos, dressed in their Fallenday best. Captain Dove sits down, and gestures for the first two competitors to be chosen.
A great show is made of an old, blind priest hobbling forward to randomly select names from a velvet bag. The audience applauds, the lingering energy from yesterday's celebrations leaving them easily excitable. An ifrit and a sylph are called.
In this phase of the riddling games, opponents face each other in pairs. Contestants go back and forth, answering riddles, until a wrong answer is given, and that player is eliminated. If the other player gives the correct answer to this last riddle, they receive a bonus prize. A new pair is chosen, and so on, until half the players are gone, and the pairing starts anew.
With the introductions out of the way, the first riddle is recited by a high-ranking priest who looks like a younger, thinner copy of the Archpriest, perhaps a favored nephew. What can be hot or cold but never warm...
**
So far, there have been three pairing of ifrit against sylph, and every ifrit has lost. The demeanor of all the sylph players is that of careful neutrality, but the ifrit players have no such restraint. These noble sons are frowning and muttering, as if observing a pile of pogona dung on the street. They are unamused.
**
I am nothing, but I eat mountains and uproot trees. The priest, ruddy-faced from the cold by now, recites the words slowly and clearly.
The current player, Maddeo v'Iccio, answers far too quickly: The Dark! The crowds murmurs sour complaints; a terrible guess. The Dark is a malevolent being or god of corruption and death -- a far cry from 'nothing'.
v'Iccio is blushing angrily, shouting now, pointing at the judge in a most unsportsmanlike manner. He starts to argue his position, wheedle his way toward another try, when-
the sylph player steps forward, casting a small spell to gently carry his answer. The wind.
The crowd is suddenly silent. The priest nods his assent. The sylph smiles.
Gabriel claps at the correct answer, hooded but letting himself be seen and heard... for once. Maybe this blow to their collective ego will show them their own stupidity...why did i do this? involving myself...is unlike me. He keeps a smirk despite his internal questioning.
Was it because it's Just?
it was cheating...you cheated.
It needed to happen, they deserved it.
and you're the one fit to administer that?
...Someone has too. Nothing is being done for them.
To feed insult to his fury, the ifrit noble now watches as the extra prize is presented to the sylph--Angus Medico--for his correct answer. A bottle of rarest wine, bloodiest of the reds, is given to the delighted doctor. He looks over at the scowling noble, and, straightening his back, makes a choice.
The middle-aged sylph player walks over to the noble, crossing the court with a friendly and determined look. Uncorking the bottle with a small tool from his belt, the sylph takes a small drink, and offers it to the noble, a tentative smile on his face.
The ifrit's demeanor turns from general contempt to incandescent outrage in a moment - clearly the noble only sees the waste of an expensive object, not the gesture of peace that was intended. Jealous of a stolen victory, embarrassed in public, infuriated by a peasant's insolence and ignorance, the noble son goes from red to crimson, his skin suddenly boiling-
-and before you can blink, a cloud of Efreeti limbs, claws, and faces erupt from the v'Iccio, devouring the doctor in a bloody mess.
Gabriel will immediately jump down, Hood drawn now, All of you saw this crime! you see what constitutes Nobility...Will you allow this...This corruption... to continue Gabriel, turns to the Efreeti and draws his blade, No one with a shred of honor would allow one El to kill another...
With a hawk's abrupt motion, Captain Dove leaps up, amplified voice giving a command to his guard. Two dozen alchemists, spread throughout the crowds, mix their bombs with precision and haste. The volatile brews, mostly blues and purples and whites, fall upon the Efreet like a hailstorm. The ice magic produces a cold so intense that the surrounding cobblestones crack. With a scream of inhuman pain, the ifrit turned Efreet falls to his knees. Another of the nobles, caught in the crossfire, gives a similar scream and attempts to flee the scene.
A second alchemical volley puts both emerging Efreeti down. As the Temple Guard move to shackle the two injured creatures, the crowd applauds their efforts. There is a standing ovation for the alchemists and the Temple Guard, and Captain Dove.
Gabriel, you see the city of Hearth celebrating the victory of sylph ingenuity over the corruption of ifrit nobles. Though not the outcome you expected, you cannot argue with the changes you have witnessed in the crowd. On the way back from the riddles, you hear more and more conversations speaking of the need to band together against the coming Moonrise, and stop relying on nobles to make all the decisions.
Good work Dove, keep doing what you do. The city needs someone like you Gabriel turns to go, letting his blade spark a flame, hinting at what he is.
All,
In your own good time, you find your way to the Swine's Blood, a second-rate bar good for cheap wine and gossip. Everyone is talking about the riddling, the violence of the Efreeti, and the victory of the alchemists. No one mentions the dead doctor.
Abbygailiwy coalesces as Samen enters. "That old ugly el did a wonderful job with your staff, my love. It is roomier, in some way I cannot express."
She selects a table at random, and motions as if sitting on a chair, but simply floats in midair. "Order me something that fulminates, darling."
Gabriel walks in, satisfied and smiling...for once Abby, let it be known that Efreeti are not as civilized as you. He sits with half a container of Hot chocolate, sipping still. a bit of blood spatter tainting the bottom of his favorite vessel
Do you think they sell fermented orange blossom petals here? I think you would like it!
"It's strange, dear, but I know what you mean. I can feel the increased efficiency of the magic rivulets coursing through it. While I hate the necessity of it, I'm excited to give some deserving soul a good thumping with it."
Samen orders her a black coffee, and the used coffee grounds as well. "This should be entertaining to you. What if smoke was mixed with water?"
Abby furrows her brow, taking the question seriously. "It just becomes nasty smudge on the top of the water, yes? It does not mix?" She touches her hair and shoulders and face, making sure she has no water upon her, the motion vaguely catlike.
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So many adjustments Krz. The more power we gain, the more we prepare for this fight, the more detached from elenity I become. This hat from Kylen... it makes it even easier to see through people.
Even without using my magics, the average El is lain bare before me. It's... delenizing.
"Fermented orange blossoms if you have any, and ginger wine if you dont." Abnaki glances at Gabriel's bloodstain, cocking his head as he hears the rumors circulating around him. "Who died?"
Abnaki, you can tell the ifrit waitress thinks your order strange, but easily shrugs it off as a joke because she finds you attractive. It all plays out on her face, obvious. She smiles. "Sure, ginger wine it is." Casually compelled by your looks and your scent, she walks with a spring in her step to retrieve the wine and the coffee.
A Slyph Doctor and one of the ifrit nobility who turned himself into an Efreet. The slyphs won the riddle game, i had absolutely nothing to do with that... Gabriel quickly exclaims, but quietly the crowd, stirred into a frenzy and decided enough was enough. Suffice to say my extra curricular activities may have resulted in the populace wanting to help against the moon. That Captain Dove, good man.
"That is far too kind, I assure you." The diffident tenor voice of Captain Dove precedes the el himself. The thin sylph, flanked by an el and ele in alchemist garb, sits down at your table, mithril chainmail making a tiny clink. He tucks his dark hair behind his pale ears. "Your merry little band has been making quite a name for yourselves. It sounds as if the city has you to thank for not being overrun by silver golems. And you are fast friends with the Fey. Quite a pedigree."
He glances at Gabriel, then back down at the table. "And you are far too modest. With that list of answers, I was able to squeeze a few troublesome pimples to the surface and relieve a little pressure. And all without, in the most technical sense, cheating. None of those sylphs had the answers ahead of time." He says all this without making eye contact, instead making grand, fluttering gestures to emphasize his points now and then. As soon as he finishes speaking, he begins fiddling with his beringed fingers.
"I have heard the latest report from your vaunted Captain Filipo. Well, you have my attention now. You are meeting with the Fey again, correct? If they have a way to help against Moonrise, the Council wants to hear it. Make sure you keep us apprised, and we will find a way through this hell together."