Fated (Chapter Forty-Eight)
Tuesday, October 27th, 2015 08:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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mindcrackloveSome of it is relevant right the fuck now.
That's been a theme lately, hasn't it?
Chapter list: http://tanadin.dreamwidth.org/382.html
Map of the continent: http://tanadin.deviantart.com/art/F
Character status spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet
Chapter Forty-Eight
Skettisren tunnels under Traz’madar, Minecraftia. October 26, year 573. Time instance 483Z.
When Niel awoke, it was with a single thought on his mind. He sat up a bit too quickly and flinched at the pain in his chest from his wounds, but looked Mitven in the eye and said, “Candle.”
Mitven slowly blinked at him. “What?”
“In my bag. There’s a candle that Velloh had when…when he…” Niel hesitated before plowing on. “Um, and Xullos might know what it is. It burns purple, maybe it’s a pigman thing?”
Mitven nodded slowly. “I imagine that it is. But you shouldn’t be getting u- Niel you stop that right now young man!”
Niel looked at her sheepishly. He had started to swing his legs down in order to stand and paused as she spoke. “I’m okay.” He assured. “I’ve gone through worse pain than this before and I was okay then.”
“That’s debatable.” Mitven muttered.
“I won’t be up for long, okay? And I won’t do anything active.”
“Promise?”
“Yep!” Niel smiled at her and got to his feet, hugging the skettisren briefly before grabbing his bag and leaving the room.
Already more confident.
No one really noticed Niel as he walked through the main room, mostly due to him being one of the more invisible members of the group, but also as there were not a lot of people awake yet. He passed Trymdas, who waved a little, on his way to Xullos. The boy with oddly colored glasses was sitting alone in the corner, reading a book that appeared to be made by the skettisren. He looked up as Niel sat beside him and looked a bit surprised.
“Oh, hey, Niel!” He smiled a little, uncertain. “What is it you needed?”
Niel pulled the candle from his bag and handed it to Xullos. “This was in Velloh’s bag. It burns with a violet flame- any idea what it is?”
Xullos looked it over for a minute before understanding crossed his face. “How do you know it burns purple?” He suddenly asked, suspicious. Niel subconsciously flinched away, disturbed by the almost hostile note in the other boy’s voice. It suddenly occurred to him that Xullos’ tusks, while small, were still pretty sharp.
“I…I, um…”
“You didn’t light it, did you?”
“N-no! I just…” Niel sighed. “Before Adrian had his… yeah… I was taking a walk and had sat down and then Velloh showed up and didn’t realize I was there. Before I could leave or anything he lit it and started talking to it or something. I couldn’t… couldn’t leave without him knowing I was there.”
Xullos nodded, satisfied with that explanation. “That’s probably what I would have done. Anyway, this is a magical candle created by pigmen to speak to the dead. Did you hear a name or anything when Velloh was speaking?”
“Um… I think I heard him say ‘torgah’ but I can’t be sure.”
“Torgah?” Xullos racked his brain for knowledge of the pigmen language, muttering to himself until he got it. “Sister! Right, it’s sister!” Xullos suddenly frowned. “He was talking to his dead sister?”
A now-dead man felt responsible for a dead girl.
“I guess?” Niel took the candle back. “Thanks, Xullos. That’s one mystery solved, at least.” He got to his feet.
“Anytime. Hey, hang on.” Xullos reached out and grabbed Niel’s arm, making him turn around curiously. “Maybe you should give it to Adrian and tell him what it’s for. I know he’s been beating himself up over Velloh’s death. It might give him a way to feel better, and let Velloh’s spirit forgive him.”
Niel nodded. “I’ll do that. Thanks, Xullos.”
“Cya, Niel.”
~~~
Adrian dreamed he was flying. He didn’t really notice how his body felt odd, longer, and how he seemed to be built completely differently than normal. He was instead enjoying flying, wings extended fully and gliding on smooth air currents. It was sunset, and the sky was alight with golden and orange flames reflecting off of the clouds. He turned his head towards the ground and suddenly the sky didn’t seem quite so wonderful.
The earth was a charred, smoking expanse, flames licking out from crevices or along trees that had not yet been completely devoured by the destruction yet. Through the smoldering husks of the trees ran a small, panicking boy with a camouflage cloak billowing out behind him.
The boy looked behind him as if making sure that nothing was following him, then came to a halt, leaning on a tree and breathing heavily. As he looked up to make sure nothing was coming after him, a horrible red monster leaped out from behind a boulder and swung its swordlike claws at him. Niel fell backwards onto the ground, barely avoiding being hit as the monster stepped towards him.
The monster roared, a sound echoed by Adrian as he folded his wings and dove toward the ground, dove to save Niel, with claws fully extended and fire blazing from his maw. As he descended, time seemed to slow as his point of vision was ripped from his previous form, drifting downwards to the monster that he had finally recognized as himself.
As his vision clicked into place once more, time resumed its normal speed. Adrian lashed upwards at the purple dragon as she descended upon him, but she spread her wings and flew just out of reach. He growled and turned back to Niel, but the dragon flew past and scraped her claws along his back.
As she made another pass, Adrian’s wings spread and he jumped into the air, flapping downwards to get more lift as his claws grazed Nessy’s underside. She roared, circling up higher into the sky. Adrian followed, wings straining to keep him aloft. They were more for gliding than flying, but he poured as much energy as he could into pursuing the small dragon.
A second form slammed into him, this one red, scaly, and scarred, but he kicked it away and made it fall towards the ground below. It caught itself in a glide but Adrian had bought himself enough time to swing at Nessy as she flew past him, trying to claw at his face. He turned faster than she had expected, long claws cutting through scale, flesh, and bone.
Nessy screamed and fell towards the earth, streaming blood, with her wings not far behind her.
~~~
Adrian jerked awake as someone touched his shoulder, lashing out at them but missing by a mile. Niel frowned, concerned, as he carefully pulled away. “Adrian? Are you okay?”
Breathing heavily, Adrian sat up. “Y-yeah… Just…” He shivered. “Another nightmare.”
Hellbent on making him sleepless.
He blinked, noticing the candle in Niel’s hand. It was about fourteen centimeters tall and struck Adrian as odd. “What’s that?”
Niel handed it to him. “It was with Velloh’s things. It’s a candle made by the pigmen that allows them to talk to the dead. I… well, Xullos… thought you might want it.” He shrugged a little. “Just…keep it, okay?”
Adrian felt a pang of guilt at the mention of Velloh, but nodded. “O-okay…” He looked at the candle silently for awhile until Niel left, then he double-checked that Nia wasn’t in the room. He got up and carefully shut the door before retrieving his flint and steel, sitting down on his bed with it beside him, staring at the candle.
He didn’t light it, but he considered it.
Guilt both drove onwards and backwards.
-~-
Blame sighed, practically leaning on Bdoubleo to look into his orb better. Shred was nowhere near Iirkolav, but Tarsen was, and the Skullblade was constantly trying to get a good look at him.
“Personal space?” Bdoubleo suggested, causing Blame to sigh and pull away.
“Sorry…”
“It’s fine, just weird havin’ you breathe down my neck constantly. Why don’t you look over Seth’s shoulder?”
“Tranpar is building and I want to look at it closely.” Seth protested. “Get your own.”
“I have my own, it’s just that Shred isn’t near him!” Blame fumed.
“You’re more interested in Iirkolav than anyone else alive.” Vechs reminded him. “Followed directly by me.”
After a short pause, Paul made a worried noise. “Uh oh. I think Samuel’s discovered that Tranpar’s missing…”
-~-
Samuel almost kicked down the door, gasping for breath and holding his spear.
He relaxed somewhat as he saw Tranpar look up, but as soon as he caught his breath, he snapped, “Quit running off!”
Tranpar shrugged and went back to fiddling with the wires and red dust in the metal leg he was creating. “I’ve been here all night.”
“You’ve WHAT?”
“He’s fine.” Tarsen said absentmindedly from where he was leaned against the wall. “Iirkolav and I have been with him.”
“I told them to leave you a note.” Iirkolav muttered.
“Hey, fuck you, you did not!” Tarsen protested.
“Can you guys hush? I’m almost done.” Tranpar tightened a bit of metal and poured some more red dust in. The skettisren seated beside him chittered nervously but Tranpar shrugged it off.
“Hashis va.” He said reassuringly. “Kassen.”
Samuel blinked. “You know how to-”
“I taught myself with a book. Mitven helped a little.” Tranpar shrugged again. “It’s really easy. It’s just you have to make the hisses the right length or it changes the whole meaning.”
After fiddling with the leg some more, Tranpar motioned for the skettisren to flip a switch. As he did, a few lights on the inside lit up, as did the rest dust. Tranpar grinned and had the skettisren disable it, looking at Iirkolav and nodding.
“Okay, done. Let me just get everything all set and make sure it doesn’t fall apart.” He stuck some more metal plates on it and tested the movement of the thing before nodding, satisfied. He ran a hand over the faintly shimmering metal before motioning for Iirkolav to put his left leg up on the chair beside him.
The scarred man did so, flinching as Tranpar expertly removed the crude iron dragon foot from the older man’s leg, soon showing just the stump that was left of his biological limb.
“This will probably hurt.” Tranpar warned, shoving the old leg onto the floor and setting the new one that he had just finished making on the chair. He went about getting it set up, some parts of which involved sticking sharp bits into Iirkolav and the application of some magical dust supplied by the skettisren. Eventually Tranpar pulled open a metal piece on the front and flipped a switch. Iirkolav jerked slightly, feeling the connection between the metal and his skin tingle. Tranpar shut the panel and leaned back, satisfied.
“Wiggle the claws.”
Iirkolav hesitantly attempted to do as Tranpar asked, watching in amazement as the three metal claws of his new dragon foot responded to his commands. He swung his leg down and got to his feet, a little shaky but grinning widely.
“Kid, you’re a genius.” He walked the length of the room and back, much easier than he had been previously. “And possibly a lifesaver.”
Tranpar beamed. “Thank you! Let me know if it needs repairs.” He turned to the skettisren beside him and shook his hand, saying something to him in the skettisren tongue before jumping up and looking at Samuel.
“Can we get some food? I’m starving.”
Samuel nodded and led the group out, but paused when he saw another skettisren come running down the tunnel. She skidded to a halt in front of Iirkolav and saluted shakily before speaking.
“Kalt’on forces have been mobilizing for the past couple of weeks. They’re now marching on Sunspire.” She paused, gauging their reactions. “Maybe five days until they get here. Ahzzen thought you’d like to know, as you have a Skullblade in your party.”
Iirkolav’s eyes widened and he exchanged glances with Samuel.
“Oh, fuck.”
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Date: Wednesday, October 28th, 2015 01:24 am (UTC)/#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/ /#/
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Date: Wednesday, October 28th, 2015 12:25 pm (UTC)-Scott
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Date: Friday, October 30th, 2015 10:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Wednesday, October 28th, 2015 09:29 am (UTC)-Anon Cami
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Date: Wednesday, October 28th, 2015 12:25 pm (UTC)-Scott
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Date: Thursday, October 29th, 2015 07:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: Thursday, October 29th, 2015 01:41 pm (UTC)-the lurkiest lurker
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Date: Friday, October 30th, 2015 10:46 pm (UTC)So unless he's taken a trip to Sunspire...
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Date: Wednesday, October 28th, 2015 02:31 pm (UTC)Anyway, I loved this chapter (up until the end.) I love character development. There was a whole bunch of my favorite characters in this (Niel, Adrian, Tranpar, Tarsen, Iirkolav, oh my!)
(::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::)
-the lurkiest lurker
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Date: Friday, October 30th, 2015 10:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Wednesday, October 28th, 2015 11:59 pm (UTC)G.C.(::)(::)(::)(::)(::)(::)
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Date: Friday, October 30th, 2015 10:47 pm (UTC)