Firiona Vie Everquest

A cold and hungry dread set in upon him finally. It had been three full weeks since Remis had been set adrift and still he had glimpsed no site of land. His plan had not worked out as smoothly as he envisioned.
First, the mast sail and oars had been removed from the small lifeboat.
Secondly, a soft offshore breeze was filling the depression and wafted Remis out further to the west.
Thirdly, the emergency supply crate which was always affixed to the underside of the spraydeck by a small net was sadly not packed to code.

He had been through it all 7 times already. Contained in a 3ft bamboo crate. (all but 4 short stick of which had been used as fuel for the fire-bowl)
10 bottles of clear spring water. (now empty)
1 300 ft fishing line (Decreased to 150ft by the one that got away)
1 300ft anchor line
1 skinning knife
4 fish hooks (decreased from 5 by the one that got away)
10 rectangular bandages (one worn on head)
1 tempered steel cooking pot
1 flint and steel
1 iron fire-bowl
1 Notebook (completely filled with Stormfollowers poetry)
Conspicuously missing were its usual
12 gnomish signaling flares
10 days rations
5 deflated flotation bladders.
1 anchor

Seven times he had counted out the last ten gifts his father had left him. 7 times he had cursed the empty spaces where the rest of it had been. Continuously, he swore about the book of terrible warrior prose and poetry his father had left as a joke. He had packed that crate himself many times and many others like it over the years. As a boy it was often put to him to pack all the standard survival gear for any extended voyages any tribe member or group needed to make. He also made sure the lifeboats were in order and had all their gear aboard. Vital things such as the mast, sail, tiller and oars.These things would not have been forgotten, they had been purposefully removed.

The freshwater had lasted 20 nights. He had stayed curled up under the sparydeck as much as he could to avoid the glaring heat of the sun. Occasionally he would come out to pear out to the horizon in search of some ship or green glint of land or to fish the abundant waters. The only challenge in catching enough food was to hook a fish small enough to bring into the boat. He would cook it on deck at nightfall, the fires small light keeping back the darkness for as long as he dare burn it. The darkness had been total, the moon having waned to new over the coarse of his drift. All he could see was the stars arching slowly across the sky above the coal black, undulating surface of the sea.

His will was now dashed by the realization that all the fresh water was gone. This 21st day he would remain under cover. He would not have a fire, nor would he eat. It would only be a matter of days now before the thirst took him. At least the moon had grown brighter.

Now he was left to ponder how he might like to die. Perhaps he would succumb to the "Pickling", the temptation to drink the seawater, as many did in the end only to die from the madness that stemmed from their bodies fight with the essence it contained. Not a painfull way to die, but to loose his mind... well, this scared Remis too deeply to be considered any further. For then all his fears would rise up and destroy him. His own mastery of dreams would become a sleeping suicide. Still, death by thirst did not appeal to him either. Maybe he would simply slip over the edge of the boat and sink into the depths below his remains secure for all eternity beneath the bounding sea.

A low rumble vibrated through every board on the life raft. Remis sat up suddenly. Something lurked below. Something far more ancient than anything he had ever sensed before. Its incomprehensible thoughts washed through his mind and spoke only of a voracious apatite. It was him... the being who Stormfollower had told him about all those years ago.

His mind shifted back to that day...

"Remis my son" Stormfollower had begun his tale on one of their many fishing trips. They had sailed 8 leagues out from the Red Sea Urchin Islands in a vessel much like the one he was on now. "There are things in this world undreamed of by man..." His serous tone told Remis, this was going to be a long one. He leaned back locking eyes with his father and mentally prepared himself.

(musical interlude... http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 8684360296 )

The salty sea breeze tugged at her long red hair, trying to release it from its braided restraint. The ocean was spread out before her, a blank field of greens and blues splashed with white from that same breeze. She closed her amber eyes and took a deep breath before opening them again and searching the watery expanse again. But the scene was the same. No little boat carrying her brother.

Radha knew in her heart that he was not dead. But she also had no idea where he was. The bond they once had was all but dead, polluted and broken by his dark activities. Why had she not sensed it, and warned her Father?

With a sigh she stood up, having been sitting on the edge of the dock with her feet dangling over the edge. She pulled her boots back on and straightened her sword into a more comfortable position across her back. With a last searching glance out to sea, she turned away from the dock and ambled towards Lightning. She untied the stallion and started leading him through the bustling dockside market of Qeynos.

On and on his father had droned. The ancients this and Nature that. Some thing lurked on the Ocean floor that was really old and mindless. Yeah he got that!
In some way it was an allegory for paying attention in school or not daydreaming while his great uncle Oxbalm prepared him to be a shaman. On and on he had droned in his backward speak.
"just spit it out" he thought Why his father spoke in riddles and honed his words like a smith would hone a finely edged sword he had no idea. Directness was the key to good communication surely. But he sat and pretended to listen attentively while all the while he stared at his fishing line. Hoping against hope for the slightest tremor of a bite so at least then he would have some excitement and perhaps his father would shut up for a moment. But no such luck came his way. Stormfollower was well into the tale now gesturing wildly at the skies comparing the vastness of space with the depth of the sea. Ridiculous! Mad ramblings of an ancient story passed down through the spirits... supposedly.

"And in the depth of her caves Shedioudinla wove her crystalline cage about the leviathan in hopes to keep her thousand gibbering mouths from their feast. Seventeen cycles would pass before...."

"Bla Bla Bla" he had thought that day. "Cease the scary kiddy stories daddy, I`m not a child anymore!" He had wished to blurt out. But he didn`t. He sat and he listened like a good shamans son. But not just any shamans son. No, he was the son of Storm! The great and powerful Starwolf Champion Stormfollower! The leader of Wolf Cult , the dancer of the clans, healer of the north husband of the wind. And Oh how he was tired of it. He had heard how the other boys had whispered about his fame and fortune. He saw when the elders had looked the other way for him in the games and contests. How easy his life was they all thought. How great to be him. If they only knew, the loneliness the solitude of living as the child of one so famous. Only his twin Radha knew what he was truely like. And how he was different from his father In her he found solace. Thier time together had been his only joy for some years since thier early adolecence. Untill she had left for boot camp.

But now, truly alone on the vast sea with the sense of that thing beneath him he wished he had listened that day long ago. He had been through so much since those idyllic days of his youth. He had seen too much. He now knew his father had been right all along. There were things undreamed of by man. Things no one could imagine let alone describe without seeing them first hand

All his instincts for survival cried out at once in that moment. He would not become the feast for some unnameable creature of the unfathomable deep. He was getting out of here!

He scrambled over to the supplies once more.

"leave me out here to die will you father?" He croaked through a parched throat.

Taking some fishing line and straightening out a hook he began to sew three of the rectangular bandages into a diamond shape. The remaining 4 sticks bamboo from the crate would serve as the ribs for his kite. After what seamed like hours but was more like half of one he had his crude toy constructed forgetting for the moment that this was something he and his father had done before. He tested the wind and set it alight on the breeze... it flew well. It was not a strong breeze but it would do he had forward momentum instead of sideways drift. With his free hand he dipped the tempered steel cooking pot into the water on one side of the raft and then the other. In this way he had some form of steerage and he could set a course albeit a wavy one. Question was ...which way?

There was no telling east from west he had not been watching the beating sun at all from the shade beneath the bow dodger. But now he must . With only the one bandage over his head for protection he set out watching to see wich way the sun would set knowing only that The coast of Antonica lay somewhere to the east. He steered as best as he could in the direction he thought was right. An image of his sister sitting waiting on a dock flashed in his mind.

Every afternoon she would return to the dockside and spend her lunch time staring out to sea. Everytime she saw a vessel approaching her heart would jump wildly in her chest. But it had never been him. She didn't even know if his boat would come here. Unlike her brother and father, she had never paid much attention to the sea and did not know the currents and sea winds. She was more like her mother, sticking to the land, solid ground under her feet.

Today was another such day, a hot summer afternoon with a small vessel appearing on the horizen.

Four days he had "sailed" Finally confirming the direction east by the setting sun and the circling stars. Hi sfather had shown him their pictures and he followed them through the night.

Always the presence lurked below him driving him to keep going. for the little that he slept when exhaustion finally took him his course held fairly true. On the second day after he had made the kite a seabird had became entanged in it ruining one of the sewn bandages. But it made a fine meal, even raw as he had to eat it. Its nurishing blood sustained him until that day when he finally discerned landfall, and Qenyos.

And there on the dock he could see her. His sister Radha. A vision in her armor, the reigns of a great steed in her gauntleted fist. How noble she had become, how worthless he felt. Had he not needed the security and help of the docks he would have turned away for shame to seek some other place to land. But here she was wading in to grab his bowline.

"Radha," he cried. "forgive me." and he passed out.

The small vessel coming in on the tide was familiar... a little too familiar. Telling Lightning to stay put she waded out into the water to grab the bowline and help bring the boat ashore. She heard her name spoken in a hoarse voice but he passed out before she could respond. She peered in and spied her brother lying on the bottom, pityful the way his clothes hung off his starved body. Beckoning a couple of men from the gathering crowd, she got them to lift him out of the boat and take him to the nearest Inn.

She ordered water and broth to be brought to the room along with clean blankets and a change of clothes for him. Her helpers left him on the bed then silently left, but stayed in the bar in case they were needed again by the young Knight.

Finally alone, she soaked a cloth in the water and brought it to his lips, hoping the moisture might arouse him a little, or at least enough to take a decent drink.

It took a long time before Remis was conscious enough to sip the moisture for himself. For many hours his sister had sat with him applying life giving moisture to his face and allowing the small amounts of fresh water to trickle into his mouth. Finally his swollen tongue and parched throat began to respond automatically again as they should. He swallowed again and again still too exhausted to wake.
When he finally did come-to he opened one eye just a crack and saw her sitting there in the dim candlelight. The candle cast a soft warm light all around her and through his blurred vision he saw an iridescent halo pulsing around her head as the candle flickered in the gentle breeze. Her hair was tied up in an elegant bun. An errant lock of hair swayed softly beside her head as she sat head bowed staring at his hand which she held and caressed in both of hers. Her eyes were soft and peaceful and she she had been speaking softly to him though he had not discerned the words.
She looked just as she had as a child when they had ran so free amongst their tribes people. Laughing and playing their hearts in the sky. Yet she was so much older now, mature and sophisticated she reminded him of Jetamio now as she tended him in this state. They were twins and yet he felt so much younger.
How could he face her after what he had tried to do to their father? There were no words to explain it to her without crushing her image of him. The image of how he was so long ago ....when they had ran, ...hearts in the sky. She would know the truth of things soon enough. He could confide in her.
"Radha" he whispered.

His voice brought her back to the present from the far off place her thoughts had taken her to. She smiled at him, but indicated he be quiet. She did not want him to use up too much energy speaking. She carefully propped him up a little on the pillows before reaching for the bowl of warm broth. She takes a small ladle and dips it in before bringing it to his lips.

"Drink, it will help you. We can talk after."

He drank the broth greedily. It was the best thing he had ever tasted. Its nourishment flowed though every fiber of his body. It sank into his bones and reignited his verve, that inner essence that animated every living thing. The sensation of revitalization was almost euphoric and indescribable to anyone who had not been starved. Remis had been on the doorstep of death and had begrudgingly peered through its opening portal. Slowly, sip after sip he felt his strength returning and with his strength his discernment. For the last several days his cognizance had been that of instinct alone, mindlessly steering a course towards shore and his salvation. Shore had represented two things to him food, which was life, and his sister who was love. His body had responded automatically to these drives. His mind was not absent, but moony, in a that dreamy state of sentimentality that descends upon those who approach so near to death. During this time he came to understand the beast which lurked below his life raft. He understood it was not so much mindless as singularly desirous. That leviathan of Stormfollowers story was not so incomprehensible now and on some level he could relate. Good and evil were not so cut and dried in the realm of such great need.

Finally he smiled back at Radha the glint of his keen mind redefined in his eyes.

Radha gave a subtle nod when he smiled at her and took the now empty bowl away. She did not offer him more yet because he would just be sick with his stomach being shrunk by starvation. Then she sat back in the seat next to his bed and gave him her full attention. Now she wanted to know, as much for her own peace of mind than anything else.

"You are safe here. No-one knows that you are here or that you have even been found. The tribe believe you to be dead." She leans forward slightly and holds his gaze with her own, indicating that she will not accept any untruths. "Now perhaps you can explain what you did and why?"

He looked back into her eyes. There was no denying the strength of will that smoldered from them. He began quietly afraid that what he was about to reveal would tear her from his life permanently.

"I left my training to become what father is when it became intolerable. The whole way he has led that tribe has been wrong from the start. I left to find a new way to be. A way that was not his and yet could achieve all he sought to achieve only much much faster." His words were tinged with a venom towards their father that she had no heard before.

"In Qeynos I found my Power." The way in which he spoke the word power was a direct mimicry of Stormfollowers pronunciation of it, a subtle inflection that gave the word higher meaning.

"Once I had discovered that I too could achieve great things, it became clear that I must claim that which is rightfully mine" His voice grew in strength now" ...Leadership of Wolf Cult. Our older brother Tortha forsook the path as first born because he saw the folly of our fathers ways, he knew long ago all his great plans would amount to nothing! But I, I will bring the Cult to glory! I will herald in the order our misguided father has only dreamed of."

He rose up with great effort onto his elbows and eplored his sister to understand, but his eyes were filled with madness. "Father must give the power over to me! But to do that he had to think himself unworthy. Those bullies I had him slay in the bar were of no consequence. But thier deaths confirmed my dream hold on him, If only we had not been caught by mother I could have taken him up on the sacred trial and freed our people from obscurity!"

He fell backwards into the soft mattress, exhausted by his ranting. His eyes darted around the room but at no time now did they fall upon Radha.

The Paladin raised an eyebrow. Tortha had never wanted power, he was happy simply to be with his people and his wife and child. She had secretly thought that a waste of his unique talents, but she knew that if the time came, Tortha would join them in any battle to preserve their people.

She said nothing at first, simply leaned back in her seat and watched her brothers deranged gaze dart around the room...his eyes anywhere but on her. Perhaps he was still delirious, but Radha had seen that same madness upon the ship weeks ago.

"But why Necromancy? How will that lead our people to greatness brother?" Her voice was still calm, she did not appear to be angry.

He looked at her again and puzzled at the formation of his next words. After a long silence in which he stared intermitently between her and the floor he spoke. His facial expression fading in and out between epiphany and confusion.

"What indesicrate vastness won could be dreamt of from within the confines of a living mind? It is only from within the realm of the long slumber that there is greater insight into the final victory for our people. The dead speak of these things to those who can listen and long hath been my listening...my master hath told me more of this too.

One said: "I have seen, from cliffs of doom,
The seven hells flame up in flower
Like a million upas trees that tower,
Massing their realms of poisonous bloom.

I have gone down where dragons writhe,
Mating within the nadir slime;
I have caressed in some mad clime
The Gorgon's ringlets, long and lithe."

Another answered: "I have known
The undated hour of agony
When sightless terror leers and crawls

Out of mere soil and simple stone;
When horror seeps from out four walls
And trickles from the unclouded sky."

Therein lies the power for us, their perspective on that which lies beyond shall bring us to glory. Our father will never be able to see this place from the musings of his little spirit friends. Master knew his weakness

"The shadow of a sorrow haunts the light,
And sense of dreamt, forgotten tragedy—
Surviving phantom of a memory
Slain by the dawn with shades of yesternight.

Like the blue pallor of the daylight moon,
Most clearly seen within the enshadowed stream,
The wan waste face of some dead, tragic dream
Peers from the twilight places of the noon.

Till, half-bemazed, I am as one who stands
Upon the summit of a misty hill,
And hears remote, one moment loud or still,
The dolor in the bells of blinded lands."


It is all so very clear to me. How can I explain this better? He hath told me the way would be hard to convince to others. The words fail me again. It is likened to....., well it is much like... he had said.



"The harsh, brief sob of broken horns; the sound
Of hammers, on some clanging sepulcher;
Lutes in a thunder-storm; a dulcimer
By sudden drums and clamoring bugles drowned;
Crackle of pearls, and gritting rubies, ground
Beneath an iron heel; the heavy whirr
Of battle-wheels; a hungry leopard's purr;
And sigh of swords withdrawing from the wound:—

All, all are in they dreadful fugue, O life,
Thy dark, malign and monstrous music, spun
In hell from a delirious devils dream ! . . .
O! dissonance primordial and supreme—
The moan, the thunder, evermore at strife,
Beneath the unheeding silence of the sun !"

The task at hand is to assume the authority, to take control and..."

He saw the look in his sisters eyes and he stopped, He rolled away from her on the bed and curled his legs up, hugging them against his chest.

Radha was silent for a long time as she mulled his words over. In a way, it made sense. But she had always thought of Spirits as helpful ghosts of those who had gone before. Spirits and the Dead were not things she understood well, polished steel and fighting the Undead were her forte. She was the Ying to the Yang of her brother, both having weakness where the other had strength but together they would be formidable.

But now he had burned the bridge, their father considered him dead to the Tribe. A great sorrow filled her, for even if he were ever allowed to return, he would never be trusted. If she tried to speak for him, would they turn on her too?

She sighed softly. Her faith dictated that she should destroy him, her heart refused even to acknowledge the possibility. He was her brother, she could not harm him. But she really didn't know what to do to help him either, so she sat silently watching him even when he turned his back on her.

After some time he rolled back towards her. the mania gone from his eyes.

"I will go. There is a place for me, deep within the labyrinth of a crypt. You must not risk thyself for me Radha. I will hide from those who would know me and bide my time. That is one thing I have over our father...Time."