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Paradise Lost
Posted: 11 Jun 2007 02:45 PM |
“More important than the nebulous threat of these Atalan is the ill wind that sweeps through our Queen’s realm. The stench of storm winds stirs in the air.”
“I have been told of incursions into the Ischlak’s Realm by one of his shamans, Great One,” the Priestess replied. “Followers of the airheaded enemy have been slaying the Ischlak’s people and plundering their wealth. It is... being dealt with.”
“See to it that it is,” the dragon snarled.
He arched his long, serpentine neck, bringing his narrow skull-like head almost down to her eye level.
“There is more. These whirlwind raids are brief and sporadic, but there is the stench nearby of a more permanent presence. A foul stormcloud lurks within our very realm. It did not come to my attention until recently... as if someone, somewhere, beneath my very nose one day converted to the windbag’s ways.”
"Find this presence. Destroy it, drive it out, be rid of it. Use whatever means you have at your disposal.”
He straightened, looking down the length of his nose again at the Half-Elf.
“I trust your priorities are clear now, Priestess.”
* * *
Shadows dance throughout the expanse of Thistle Creek, the movement of the wind their partner, blowing coldly at the few torch lights scattered here and there.
Saana had just made her way back to Thistle Creek. Her arrival ere morning twilight would not receive the usual manner that celebrated the return of all Windwalkers from their perilous travels. Her entrance into the haven she knew as home will not be accompanied by warmth and relief, but by shadows.
Shadows that danced independently of the light.
Atop the elevation that led down towards the vale, Saana watched the darkened settlement, the few torch lights scattered here and there like stars in the night sky. The wind moved the fire, and with the fire danced long shadows. The dance was mesmerizing.
She began her descent just as something caught her attention. A torchlight flickered at the edge of sight for a split second – a trick of the mind? The foreboding sensation that passed her by like an ill wind had told her otherwise.
Saana quickened her steps, those would-be tricks of lights appearing twice more.
Around her, eyes were watching. She felt she had been watched, but suspected these were merely the eyes of the tribe's guardsmen watching over their people at night. Those eyes were dead.
Passing through the encampment, she noticed none of theses would-be tricks. Perhaps these were indeed merely tricks of her mind – the possibility had passed her by when a sudden instinct pushed her aside, as if guided by a supernatural force of premonition just in time for a sudden gust to pass her by. A light flickered again. The only thought that filled her mind was obsessed with basic survival, hearing another gust pass somewhere unknown, and another, circling around the tribe in a precise rhythm.
Twilight broke – perhaps it had been only a few seconds, perhaps minutes, it felt like hours hiding in the darkness that housed these shadows with life of their own, their reach lengthened by the imminent breaking of dawn.
That small amount of light had brought the confidence of movement back to Saana, and she moved swiftly to catch glimpse of the interlopers, as one by one they flew from the encampment in all directions. From the high grounds above, where guards kept watch during the night, three more shadows slipped away. Elsewhere, a sheet flew outwards as another flew from the large pavilion standing at the northern edge of the pond that was the heart of the vale – dedicated to the Windwalkers and their journeys. Recognizing this, and in spite of her better senses, Saana moved swiftly and fluidly towards the pavilion. The shadow changed its course and made towards her. A split second had passed, but it was enough for her to commit into memory the hurrying figure as it crossed her eyes and struck her.
Perhaps by chance, some mystical intervention, or merely fine instincts, the strike had not been lethal, but she would not know this until the poison has been cleansed and her consciousness returned.
It was only seconds later that the tribe had been to its feet in alarm, and only minutes for huntsmen and scouts to hunt for the elusive interlopers of night.
But the shadows were no longer there.
* * *
Shortly after dawn, the attention of the tribe had already been diverted. Priorities had changed, as they often do, and by the time Saana had regained consciousness, preparations were nearly complete for the new goal set ahead;
Finding a new haven for the tribe.
It did not occur often, but it was the sole reason why the Aeolian tribes never erected permanent structures or landmarks – mobility. Every so often the seasons shift, winter comes and the birds leave to nest in brighter parts; here the storm is metaphorical, but the danger in the night had been very real. The Aeolian homes were secret, hidden out of sight – once it was no longer so, time would come to pack and move.
Windwalkers, who were the tribe's elite, headed the line alongside the priestess, from the rear the tribe's most capable huntsmen will keep guard, while further ahead from all directions scouts would ensure none will keep track of the exodus. Of no lesser importance, however, was the work of those who remained behind, erasing all tracks of human passage.
By the time the last of them had left Thistle Creek, there would be no sign that it had once been inhabited by man.
As for Saana, she did not accompany her people. Flying through the sands of the Kobai, sent urgently and without explanation, her eyes turned heavenwards to the Lady's perch atop the clouds –
Aerialle… "Paradise Lost".
How could any of them had known they may lose it again?
* * *
The same day, at noon, a small group of men appeared at the gates of Icy Vale, thickly laden they braced themselves against the cold to traverse the hazards of the Cold Lands. Like twilight shadows, in fluid movement without a sound, more appeared before evening, and further more at night.
Few of them will return…
But they were expandable.
Some things are not. |
WickedArtist: I think he needs a proper elf.
WickedArtist: A christmas elf!
Tasra: Any sort of elf that actually smiles ;o
Gasp! Scandalous!!! |
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 14 Jun 2007 02:09 AM |
| ((For best results, refer to Neverwinter Connections to convert event time to your time.)) |
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 24 Jun 2007 03:48 PM |
Loud rumblings broke the usual melody that graced the Court of Winds. Dozens upon dozens of thunderous echoes shook every brick and tile in the Cloud Giant fortress built into the mountain atop the floating landmass, like a great beast had awakened from its slumber and found its offspring absent.
Alton passed through the Cavern of Storm to notice the lightning spears of the giants pierce meld in with the powerful tempest, rain and thunder that raged in a ferocity that could knock even a dragon off his feet, yet at the same time slid past its would-be victims in a gentle breeze. The first giant that had noticed Alton approached him and slammed the butt of his spear into the ground, shaking the cavern and catching the attention of the rest. In a deafening unison the others slammed their spears, and whether by chance or consequence the cavern flashed in a terrible and furious light.
"PRIEST," the first of the giants rumbled in a thunderous voice, "THE GREAT ONE EXPECTS AUDIENCE WITH YOU AT THE HEART. THIS IS A MATTER OF URGENCY."
In agreement, the giants slammed their spears once again. The cavern flashed.
"What's this all about?" Alton tried to shout over the cacophony.
To no avail, the giant stepped aside along with the others to clear path.
Giants stepped in and out of the Court of Winds in what could only be perceived as a furious frustration, holding their spears high as if prepared for war, others with bows of a scale three times a human's size.
At the Heart of Vilyave, in contrast to the rest of the floating isle, the great dragon Vaast'liax remained calm, looking down the clouds towards sights only he could see. The heart was like a soundproof room to the pandemonium outside, mimicking the troubled serenity that was in Vaast'liax gaze. The great wyrm turned his serpentine neck around, followed by the rest of his body, with grace and agility unexpected of a creature his size.
"WELCOME PRIEST," the dragon lowered his head to level with Alton, the thunder in his voice greater than that of the giants, "AS IS EVIDENT, NOT ALL IS WELL WITHIN OUR PARADISE."
The dragon paused, arching his neck to look at the skyline of Aerialle, clearly visible from the Heart. There, Alton looked towards the massive spire climbing upwards past the highest of clouds, circled by great winged shapes that nested atop.
"A STORM HAS COME TO MY ATTENTION, A WHIRLWIND THAT STIRS OUT OF PLACE," the sudden boom of the dragon's voice startled Alton to attention, "THIS PRESENCE IS OF THE LADY, YET IT SITS IN THE WASTES OF THE COLD-HEARTED ONE. HER INFLUENCE CLOUDS MY SIGHT ON THIS MATTER."
"What is it? Why is it so important?"
Alton had many more questions to ask; something that stirred Aerialle this much had to be of immense significance. However, the urgency on this matter was obvious, so curiosity had to be denied for the moment.
"THE FOUR WINDS OF THE LADY ARE NOT ONLY IN NAME," the dragon narrowed his eyes in reminiscence, "BUT THEY HAVE BEEN LOST LONG AGO. THE NORTHERN HAS ALWAYS BEEN BOUND TO THE CLOUD GIANTS. THAT IT IS TRAPPED IN THE LANDS OF THE COLD HEARTED ONE UPSETS THEM GREATLY."
"What can I do?"
"THIS PRESENCE MUST BE RETRIEVED. THE SERVANTS OF THE COLD-HEARTED ONE MUST BE AWARE OF ITS SIGNIFICANCE, SO THAT IT MAY BE BROUGHT TO THE LADY'S REALM WITH NO HARM."
"But why would she help us? She's more likely to deny it from us out of spite, or even destroy it."
"FOR THE LADY'S HANDIWORK TO EXIST IN HER LANDS IS AN OFFENSE," he let out a stream of charged air from his nostrils, and rumbled in a displeased tone, "BOTH TO US AND HER, BUT TO DESTROY IT MAY BRING BACK THE DIFFICULT LESSONS OF THE PAST."
The dragon paused, his eyes narrowing further; the disastrous outcome of the battle of the three sisters played themselves in memory, the lesson taught so harsh that none might have survived to remember it.
"NEVER AGAIN," he added in a dangerously hushed tone.
"I know one of the priestesses there. We sort of get along together, so I think she'll listen to reason."
"ONE MORE THING," the great wyrm straightened and arched his neck towards the clouds behind, "THERE ARE MECHANISMS AT WORK THAT KEEP BEYOND MY SIGHT. AN ILL PRESENCE… A STORM BREWS OF WHICH THE OUTCOME IS YET TO BE DETEREMINED. DO NOT TAKE ON THIS CUP ON YOUR OWN."
"I'll take care of it as soon as I can."
"GIVE URGENCY TO THIS MATTER, PRIEST."
* * *
During the following hours, notices were posted across the land calling for the help of all friends of the Lady Vilyave and her followers in their time of need to gather at Brandibuck Vale at six days' time, wherein further detail will be given.
In correspondence, the continuous incursions into the Cold Lands by the unknown interlopers over the past week had ceased abruptly. Things in Icy Vale return to normal as these shadow figures no longer pass by and threaten to once again draw the Queen's fury towards the locals. An uneasy silence hangs over Icy Vale which speaks of the coming storm.
((The event will take place in Saturday Evening GMT. For more details: see Paradise Lost on Neverwinter Connections.
The event will be RP-oriented and thus open to all levels, both low-level and high level - anyone can participate.)) |
WickedArtist: I think he needs a proper elf.
WickedArtist: A christmas elf!
Tasra: Any sort of elf that actually smiles ;o
Gasp! Scandalous!!! |
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 30 Jun 2007 12:58 PM |
| ((Event will run in about four hours from now, meeting at Brandibuck Vale)) |
WickedArtist: I think he needs a proper elf.
WickedArtist: A christmas elf!
Tasra: Any sort of elf that actually smiles ;o
Gasp! Scandalous!!! |
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 30 Jun 2007 04:49 PM |
| ((Ten minutes, folks.)) |
WickedArtist: I think he needs a proper elf.
WickedArtist: A christmas elf!
Tasra: Any sort of elf that actually smiles ;o
Gasp! Scandalous!!! |
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 02 Jul 2007 12:02 AM |
| ((A few screens from the event.)) |
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about dying."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means lying in the ground with dirt on your face and holding your breath forever."
-Burt Reynolds, "The End" |
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 05 Jun 2008 10:07 AM |
An ordinary night's sleep took a sickening turn into a torrent of twisting images...
Strong winds make chaos of a thick screen of miasma, beyond which dark spires loom like rows of black teeth...
The image cracks into a barbed branching pillar of of light... or a stroke of lightening that is utterly deafening...
An enormous creature - a great dragon of blue scales, the greatest of his kind - folds his wings and bows in submission before an-ant-of-a-man who stands before him...
The image cracks... the thunder rolls irregularly into a limitless sky...
Four faces of the same woman, the epitome of elegance and beauty...
One hides beneath her palms... Second rots like a corpse... Third is covered in a veil... Fourth is turned away...
The image cracks... and the vibrations threaten to liquify all that is solid...
Three screams rend open the sky and split the earth...
Reality shatters like the broken shell of a nut...
The enormous creature spreads its wings and flies away...
The image cracks...
A visage of beauty dances atop an open peak in a gown red and black...
... careless as all around it crumbles under the full fury of the heavens...
It turns towards the dreamer...
... and Salt awakes.
All of the signs were there, all of it was clear, only Salt found it unthinkable. Easier to tell himself it was a vision of the end of the world, of some terrible, final cataclysm.
The winged beast that bowed before the man, it terrified him. He did not recognize it, even though he knew it... even though it was perhaps the dragon Vaast'liax himself who sent this vision to trouble his sleep. Even though it was the dragon Vaast'liax who submitted to the shadowy figure, who could only be a warlock of Naillamne.
There had been a cataclysm. Amon had sensed it, like a great bellowing cry going out upon the winds. Though he was not so attuned to the balance, Salt could sense it too once Amon brought it to his attention.
Something was happening far to the north. Salt and Amon set out together, departing from Brandibuck Vale, through the Bloodwood, to reach the Kobai. There were harassed by the minions of Desthedes - Salt thanked all the gods that the Avatar himself either slumbered, or permitted them to pass - and there was something else.
An army of Nethar'u had crossed the desert, slaying every living thing in its path. Cornugon and Balor, they taunted the druid and the seer, leading them on as though they wanted the two to witness their deed.
Proceeding cautiously, protected by powerful magics, the two ventured on. Amon was the force of nature. While Salt held his strongest magic in reserve, Amon flew ahead tooth and claw, cutting down one foe after another aided by the elements, and the elementals at his command.
Finally they reached the place called the Devil's Backbone.
Wyrmling dragons, strewn about. Their mother and guardian, near to death.
"MAGES... SORCERERS... WIZARDS... THEY COME HERE TO SLAUGHTER MY YOUNG, AND SO I RISE BEFORE THEM TO ENACT VENGEANCE...
"AND THEN... THEY HEX ME! THEY LAUGH AND LEAVE, AND AN ACCURSED FIEND IS LEFT BEHIND WITH HIS MINIONS TO SLAUGHTER ME!"
They did slaughter the dragon, before Salt and Amon's eyes. After the great reptile had given its testimony a lordly Balor brought about its death, reducing the dragon to nothing with a spell of implosion.
Salt could not help but think how that was one of Alton Highhill's favorite spells...
The mention of a hex also brought to mind the elven sorcerer, Valethrion. He and Salt had worked to develop just this sort of magic, to use against the armies of Undreath. The project had never been finished, though they had nearly reached the testing phase... Naillamne, it seems, had advanced much further in the use of this magic.
Amon, Salt and the strange still monk Avestan were received into the presence of Vaast'liax, and cloud giant who seemed to govern the realm of Vilyave along side of him.
Passing through the Vilyavean paradise, Salt sighted the North Wind, recovered a year ago from Helkris' realm. He had been told by those who had been on that expedition that warlocks of Naillamne had been there too, in the snowy wastes.
What the three learned from Vaast'liax and the king of the cloud giants, was the Naillamne had in fact sought to capture the winds that had strayed from paradise.
It was with these that they hexed the dragon mother at the Devil's Backbone, and it was with these winds that Naillamne could one day make Vaast'liax himself bow to their might. Each of the winds was an aspect of Vilyave, after all.
Thus Vaast'liax and the cloud giant king asked the seer, the druid and the monk to recover the winds from the warlocks of Naillamne.
EVENT |
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about dying."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means lying in the ground with dirt on your face and holding your breath forever."
-Burt Reynolds, "The End" |
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 28 Jun 2008 01:40 PM |
Storms rage across the face of Vives, igniting the sky with blinding sparks and unleashing fury upon the surface...
They arrive as swiftly and unexpectedly as they go: appearing seemingly out of nowhere and traveling at rapid pace before vanishing once again. Burning flashes of lightning strike at the ground, accompanied by the deafening clap of thunder.
The Sky Realm of Aerialle has been rendered inaccessible; powerful winds circle the floating paradise, tearing hopeful visitors apart and sending them hurling back at the surface.
Near Buckshire, the perpetual winter over Fiirkraag has escalated: a swirling mass of storm clouds gathers around the tall mountain spire. Ominous flashes of lightning and sudden booms of thunder cast their shadow of the peaceful village - the source of the sky's fury?
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Re: Paradise Lost
Posted: 08 Jul 2008 12:23 PM |
Much of what Salt foresaw had come to pass. Still more was clouded however, distorted by the artificial and diabolical process that initially sent those visions into his mind.
When he and the rest - Amon, Talion, Eltarial and Tristian - were about to fatefully free the West Wind, Salt discovered the true source of his earlier premonitions about Vaast'liax and the Dark Tower of Naillamne.
E ceanira aniralaa vilsala illw selnyelv eo amemwla, Amon said of their double-speak.
I loath these games and mincing of words... But what the warlock from Naillamne's breakaway faction told them was vitally important.
At first Vaast'liax had seemed to be the source of the premonition, and this made sense. Salt knew that the mighty dragon had issued prophecies before, through his servant and priest, Alton Highhill. But there, in the cavern lair of the sect that seemed to worship the primal elemental, Salt was told that it was they, the Naillamne faction that captured the Guardian West, who sent the terrible visions.
Remarkably, their sway over Vaast'liax - sway that they held through the power of the Guardian West - allowed them to channel those premonitions to the seer through the agency of the great blue dragon.
The rest of what the warlocks told them no doubt explained the current state of the weather. Before Vilyave was known, they said, the four winds were free, not aspects of the goddess as they now were. If anything, she was an aspect of theirs... Setting free the West Wind was what the Naillamne sect claimed to accomplish. Free of Naillamne. Free of Vilyave. Free of you. I have unlocked its full potential. Because that is what a great being deserves!
But the visions! What did they still have to foretell?
How could any part of them be trusted, if they came from the aberrant sect of the Dark Tower?
Better to wonder: what were these visions meant to make him do?
One never knows the truth to a vision until it comes to pass.... Amon's words.
But perhaps still, there was a way to sieve through the premonitions and discern what was introduced by Naillamne, and what was drawn straight from the weave of things?
He could still see it...
The West Wind dancing at the top of a tall mountain, clad in the colors of Naillamne. Storms ignite all around her, blinding flashes of lightening tearing land to pieces...
This vision convinced Salt that the wind, if freed, would destroy Naillamne itself. So he had said, when the party entered the province on their fateful errand. But he was wrong.
Still, there was more to the vision. Something beyond what Salt could see, a conclusion that was confounded, kept from him by magic. If he could pierce through the veil that blinded his vision, perhaps he could gain an answer and a resolution...
Perhaps the answer lay within his reach. Though he had no ability to bring forth illusions, he had the means to penetrate them. Divination would be the instrument... |
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about dying."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means lying in the ground with dirt on your face and holding your breath forever."
-Burt Reynolds, "The End" |
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