Re: [ORP] Firestorm Manor
Posted: Sun Nov 11, 2018 11:27 pm
Nikola listened with interest to TK’s tale. She found she enjoyed listening to his voice, and could hear in it the memory of pain and suffering that had been a part of his story. She dared not touch him as he spoke, for fear that he might lose his train of thought and leave something important out. She understood some of the pain and anguish he felt, albeit not all or for the same reasons that he felt them. They were very different, and yet not so much in some ways.
Donovan and Orla were napping peacefully under the tree, a testament to their comfort around the orc. Orla lay next to Nikola and she stroked her golden fur affectionately as TK spoke. She noted the faraway, haunted look in his eyes as he looked out over the lake and tucked an errant lock of golden hair behind her ear as the wind tossed it across her cheek. She considered carefully where to start with her own tale as he packed his pipe in preparation for a smoke.
“I was raised by adoptive parents. I barely remember my own, although I often had a nightmare in which I almost saw them but would forget as soon as I was awake. I came to Secfenia with Bannon, my foster father, when I was still young. My foster mother, Rose, died along the way. At the time we had settled in a small village north of Secfenia, I don’t recall where now, and I thought my foster father would stay where we buried her, but he seemed determined to go as far south as possible, no matter what, as though it was not safe where we were. He never spoke of my real family at all. I think perhaps he planned to tell me when I was older, but he never got the chance.
We made it as far as Paz where Bannon looked for a ship to take us farther south, but none ever came. We lived in an inn in town for some time before he finally decided to make our stay permanent. He found a small cottage, deep inside the woods outside of Paz and we settled there at last. The vigilance in his manner and the worry in his eyes never waned, although he would never speak of it or where we had come from. I suppose he thought that the less I knew, the fewer the chances might be that we would be discovered.”
She thought back on those early years, a sad smile curving her lips ever so slightly. How she wished she could have spoken with Bannon of her real family, to learn from him who they had been and who she was. But it was never to be.
“As with the time we spent in the inn, Bannon rarely allowed me to wander beyond the confines of our home and the forest that surrounded it. I did not understand it at the time, but I obeyed. Whenever I questioned him, he always said it was for my safety. He did take me into town with him a few times, but only if I hid my face with a scarf or within the cowl of my cloak. I learned a little about the layout of the town during those rare visits, so that once I was on my own, I was not totally lost.”
She paused, remembering that last summer with Bannon. Her voice was soft as she continued. “He died during my sixteenth year, leaving me all alone in the world. I buried him myself under his favorite tree out in the woods back of the house. I was so afraid and unsure of myself then. He had sheltered me from the outside world all of my life, but now he was no longer there to protect me, I had to discover the world for myself.”
Orla raised her head and sneezed, licked Nikola’s hand and shifted her position, her eyes slowly closing again as Nikola stroked her head. “Johnstone was one of the first people I met when I finally got the courage to go into town the first time. I had made some soup to sell on the market and a Yvrm stole one of the bowls. I chased after it and John joined in the chase after being bowled over by the thief. Balerion also joined in for a short time. He was the first dragon I had ever met and I was a bit awed to have an actual conversation, however brief, with a dragon and counted myself fortunate to not have ended up as his lunch,” she grinned.
“At any rate, John and I became friends and then more than friends, and it was he who talked me into working with him on the Bravian Council. I knew nothing of Bravia at the time, other than how to get to the market in Paz and back home, so that was a whole new experience. As it turns out, I found I enjoyed being useful, and learned to do several of the jobs available. I even served a couple of terms as mayor of Paz, but most of my time was spent on Council.”
She stopped there, wondering just how much more to say. She did not want to monopolize the conversation, but her tale had been relatively simple up to that point. Now it diverged and became entangled with other events of the day. She looked over at the orc, marveling at how fate had seen fit to bring them together. He was a wild creature in many ways, yet noble and good at heart. He had married her cousin before she had known that she and Aida were related. She knew that he had taken Aida’s death very hard, yet somehow, they had become friends of a sort when she had moved to Fenia. Now…well, now she was not entirely sure what they were, but she knew a bond was growing between them and she both feared and treasured it. She feared opening her heart to another creature and giving them the opportunity to break it, yet she treasured his friendship and marveled at how safe and secure she felt in his presence. Something about him drew her to him and she knew not why. Part of her worried that he would find disappointment in her, or that she might somehow lure him unknowingly down a path that would lead him into more pain. Both options were born of fear, she knew, and she consciously shook those thoughts away. She had loved once, and still treasured the friendship she shared with John, but this felt different, although she could not have said why if she had been asked.
With a sigh she looked out over the lake as she continued. “I eventually became Vicerine and during the first weeks of my first term in that office, Balerion overthrew the castle and Rieron stole Cork from Bravia and handed it over to Kiene. I was young, and new to the role, and I had no idea how to handle either crisis, although I did what I thought was best. Looking back now, I should have done several things very differently, but I did what my heart told me to do at the time. I had an entire province to protect and I did what I believed was in the best interests of the people.” She closed her eyes, perhaps trying to shut out the memories of that awful time and all the heartache that came after. “Right or wrong, I did what I did because I believed it was best for Bravia. I served multiple terms as Vicerine and it was then that I met Aida. She invited me to your wedding,” she smiled at TK now, hoping he understood that she, too, treasured his wife and her cousin. “I had not actually met her until I arrived for the wedding, although we had corresponded on occasion on matters of state. It was an honor to have been invited and I attended the ceremony to represent Bravia. I don’t believe I ever got to actually meet you then, though.”
She thought back over his question, about what made her … her. How to explain? There was still so much she did not understand, but the reams of knowledge she had gained about her ancestry and heritage over the past couple of years had changed her entire perspective on life itself.
“My…powers.” She hesitated, not quite sure where to start. “I first noticed something was different when my drinks would suddenly become boiling hot whenever I thought about warming them. Without effort and without coherent thought. The real use of it first came to light on a trip I made with John into northern Secfenia during a break from Council duties. I had always thought I was a simple human girl from a family I barely remembered and from a land I never got the chance to know. What I did not know until recently was that I am not completely human. My first inkling of this came during a yvyrm attack when I was alone in the wilderness with only my horse. John and I had gotten separated and I had acquired Starr in an attempt to catch up with him. One night as we camped on the road, the yvyrms came out of nowhere and attacked. To her credit, Starr did not bolt and run, but stayed and fought alongside me with her hooves. She was as scared as I was, though, and I think it must have been that fear in such a desperate situation that awakened my powers. I did not even realize I was using them until later. At one point, I somehow encased her in a bubble of light that projected from me and protected her from the worst of the yvyrm attack, yet still allowed her to smash with her hooves any that came too close. I guess it worked kind of like how a glove protects the hand but still allows the fingers to work, if perhaps not as freely as when unsheathed. I did not even know how I did it, or that it was done until after and I could see the sheath of light surrounding her. Once I saw it, and drew near to her, it just vanished, but I could feel it as though something had returned to me. We were found by a peasant and his son who had seen what they called a light show from some way away and had come to see what had happened. I was very weak from the expenditure of so much energy and they took me in their wagon to the nearest village which happened to be the same village that John was in.
Sometime later during that same trip, we were attacked again by yvyrms. This time the power manifested itself as light and flame that streamed from my hands and engulfed my weapons without burning me or them. That battle and the use of my powers completely drained me of energy and strength and I fainted after it was over. John took care of me, but…” She sighed at the memory of the fear in his eyes. “I don’t know whether it was the magick of the power or that I wielded it, but there was fear in his eyes and he pushed me away for a time. It wasn’t until sometime later when we were at sea and a group of yvyrms attacked us during a storm that I used the power again, this time to save his life after he was washed overboard and the yvyrms attacked us with him in the sea and me on the sailboat. We never really talked about it, but after that he seemed to just accept that I had magick and was not the simple human girl he had believed me to be.”
She brushed another errant wisp of hair out of her eyes after the breeze had teased it loose and sent it curling around her face. “I think it was the fear in his eyes that kept me from trying to learn how to use my powers. I was afraid of them and yet fascinated at the same time. Apparently, though, it is not good to not release them from time to time. When things in Bravia began to go all wrong, and people, who had not lived through what we had, began trying to destroy all that we had accomplished, I grew frustrated, and the power roiled within me to the point that one night I simply screamed in frustratoin one night while in my kitchen at home and the power raged through the scream and when I was done, I discovered I had rent a hole between this realm and that of the Summer Realm of the Sidhe. Specifically, I had created a portal between my house and the Beloved Vale, a sacred site to the Sidhe of that area over whom ruled Valen, Lord of the High Vale, King of the Mystic Mountain, High Sidhe of the Summer Realm…and my great grandfather.”
She chuckled wryly and gave the orc at her side a lopsided grin. “In short, I met the reason for my powers, he revealed my family’s history to me, the human side at least, and sent me to the Grimstad Estate as my house was being swallowed up in the healing of the rift I had created. He held the healing back long enough for me to return home, pack what I could carry with me and retrieve my horse. Starr and I watched from the road as my house was basically gobbled up by the wood. There is no trace of it there now. I didn’t search for it, but the wood itself seemed different and I suspect even Bannon’s grave is gone.”
She sighed again and looked down at Orla who had shifted again and laid her head in Nikola’s lap, pawing at her to be petted. Nikola obliged and ran her fingers through the dog’s golden fur, massaging her gently with her fingertips. “I learned much about who I am and where I came from that night. I learned of my blood connection to Aida, Casamir and Camelia along with a myriad of other family members I have never met. I saw my own parents as my mother locked away my powers and sent me away to safety. I saw their deaths at the hands of traitors.” She blinked back the tears that stung her eyes at the memory. “I saw them through Vaelen’s eyes,” she explained softly. She thought about saying more, but it seemed the wound was still too fresh even after all the time that had passed since that night. Shaking away the memories for the moment, she took a deep breath and gave a small smile to her companion. “I did as Vaelen bade me do and sent my steward, Iris, ahead of me to prepare Grimstad House for my arrival. I did not warn her that I intended to do one last hunt before leaving Bravia. That was during the Xanthreel invasion. They were destroying our mines and wreaking havoc on our markets. I somehow managed to talk Aishe and her family to join me in one last hunt and we went out to one of the mines hardest hit and faced the creatures on the battlefield. Bravia was in discord where it was not steeped in apathy. My family was dead. I had just learned about my heritage and was still confused as to what it all meant. I was wounded during the battle. One of the Xanthreels must have had iron stuck to its skin from the mine and a sliver was embedded in the last wound I received before I went down. I have never experienced so much pain as I did from that sliver. I am told that Morjiana suspected something was amiss and Aishe was able to find and remove the sliver from my body but by then I was delirious. Apparently, the power inside me needed to be released and just…well, exploded out of me. When it was over there was no sign of a single Xanthreel, dead or alive. My memories were wiped clean as well. I had thought they were erased, but as it turns out, Vaelen had a hand in that and simply locked them away for a time, to allow me a chance to heal, I suppose. Somehow in the aftermath of that explosion my body was completely healed as though I had never received a single wound, and a power bond formed between myself and Morjiana that I still do not completely understand.”
There was more, of course. Much more, but perhaps she had said enough for now. “The tale does not end there, but to make a long story considerably shorter, I slowly regained my memories over the ensuing months. I did eventually make it to Grimstad House and from there John and I made our escape from Bravia to Fenia by sea, not daring to pass through Kiene during those uncertain times. It was during that tumultuous time that John and I agreed that while we would always be friends, our paths simply did not align. What I needed he could not give and what he desired I could not fulfill. I remember meeting you in the Mysts Tavern not too long after arriving in Fenia and how you seemed determined to grill me for personal information.” She chuckled and added, “You sure know how to leave your mark on a girl.”
Donovan and Orla were napping peacefully under the tree, a testament to their comfort around the orc. Orla lay next to Nikola and she stroked her golden fur affectionately as TK spoke. She noted the faraway, haunted look in his eyes as he looked out over the lake and tucked an errant lock of golden hair behind her ear as the wind tossed it across her cheek. She considered carefully where to start with her own tale as he packed his pipe in preparation for a smoke.
“I was raised by adoptive parents. I barely remember my own, although I often had a nightmare in which I almost saw them but would forget as soon as I was awake. I came to Secfenia with Bannon, my foster father, when I was still young. My foster mother, Rose, died along the way. At the time we had settled in a small village north of Secfenia, I don’t recall where now, and I thought my foster father would stay where we buried her, but he seemed determined to go as far south as possible, no matter what, as though it was not safe where we were. He never spoke of my real family at all. I think perhaps he planned to tell me when I was older, but he never got the chance.
We made it as far as Paz where Bannon looked for a ship to take us farther south, but none ever came. We lived in an inn in town for some time before he finally decided to make our stay permanent. He found a small cottage, deep inside the woods outside of Paz and we settled there at last. The vigilance in his manner and the worry in his eyes never waned, although he would never speak of it or where we had come from. I suppose he thought that the less I knew, the fewer the chances might be that we would be discovered.”
She thought back on those early years, a sad smile curving her lips ever so slightly. How she wished she could have spoken with Bannon of her real family, to learn from him who they had been and who she was. But it was never to be.
“As with the time we spent in the inn, Bannon rarely allowed me to wander beyond the confines of our home and the forest that surrounded it. I did not understand it at the time, but I obeyed. Whenever I questioned him, he always said it was for my safety. He did take me into town with him a few times, but only if I hid my face with a scarf or within the cowl of my cloak. I learned a little about the layout of the town during those rare visits, so that once I was on my own, I was not totally lost.”
She paused, remembering that last summer with Bannon. Her voice was soft as she continued. “He died during my sixteenth year, leaving me all alone in the world. I buried him myself under his favorite tree out in the woods back of the house. I was so afraid and unsure of myself then. He had sheltered me from the outside world all of my life, but now he was no longer there to protect me, I had to discover the world for myself.”
Orla raised her head and sneezed, licked Nikola’s hand and shifted her position, her eyes slowly closing again as Nikola stroked her head. “Johnstone was one of the first people I met when I finally got the courage to go into town the first time. I had made some soup to sell on the market and a Yvrm stole one of the bowls. I chased after it and John joined in the chase after being bowled over by the thief. Balerion also joined in for a short time. He was the first dragon I had ever met and I was a bit awed to have an actual conversation, however brief, with a dragon and counted myself fortunate to not have ended up as his lunch,” she grinned.
“At any rate, John and I became friends and then more than friends, and it was he who talked me into working with him on the Bravian Council. I knew nothing of Bravia at the time, other than how to get to the market in Paz and back home, so that was a whole new experience. As it turns out, I found I enjoyed being useful, and learned to do several of the jobs available. I even served a couple of terms as mayor of Paz, but most of my time was spent on Council.”
She stopped there, wondering just how much more to say. She did not want to monopolize the conversation, but her tale had been relatively simple up to that point. Now it diverged and became entangled with other events of the day. She looked over at the orc, marveling at how fate had seen fit to bring them together. He was a wild creature in many ways, yet noble and good at heart. He had married her cousin before she had known that she and Aida were related. She knew that he had taken Aida’s death very hard, yet somehow, they had become friends of a sort when she had moved to Fenia. Now…well, now she was not entirely sure what they were, but she knew a bond was growing between them and she both feared and treasured it. She feared opening her heart to another creature and giving them the opportunity to break it, yet she treasured his friendship and marveled at how safe and secure she felt in his presence. Something about him drew her to him and she knew not why. Part of her worried that he would find disappointment in her, or that she might somehow lure him unknowingly down a path that would lead him into more pain. Both options were born of fear, she knew, and she consciously shook those thoughts away. She had loved once, and still treasured the friendship she shared with John, but this felt different, although she could not have said why if she had been asked.
With a sigh she looked out over the lake as she continued. “I eventually became Vicerine and during the first weeks of my first term in that office, Balerion overthrew the castle and Rieron stole Cork from Bravia and handed it over to Kiene. I was young, and new to the role, and I had no idea how to handle either crisis, although I did what I thought was best. Looking back now, I should have done several things very differently, but I did what my heart told me to do at the time. I had an entire province to protect and I did what I believed was in the best interests of the people.” She closed her eyes, perhaps trying to shut out the memories of that awful time and all the heartache that came after. “Right or wrong, I did what I did because I believed it was best for Bravia. I served multiple terms as Vicerine and it was then that I met Aida. She invited me to your wedding,” she smiled at TK now, hoping he understood that she, too, treasured his wife and her cousin. “I had not actually met her until I arrived for the wedding, although we had corresponded on occasion on matters of state. It was an honor to have been invited and I attended the ceremony to represent Bravia. I don’t believe I ever got to actually meet you then, though.”
She thought back over his question, about what made her … her. How to explain? There was still so much she did not understand, but the reams of knowledge she had gained about her ancestry and heritage over the past couple of years had changed her entire perspective on life itself.
“My…powers.” She hesitated, not quite sure where to start. “I first noticed something was different when my drinks would suddenly become boiling hot whenever I thought about warming them. Without effort and without coherent thought. The real use of it first came to light on a trip I made with John into northern Secfenia during a break from Council duties. I had always thought I was a simple human girl from a family I barely remembered and from a land I never got the chance to know. What I did not know until recently was that I am not completely human. My first inkling of this came during a yvyrm attack when I was alone in the wilderness with only my horse. John and I had gotten separated and I had acquired Starr in an attempt to catch up with him. One night as we camped on the road, the yvyrms came out of nowhere and attacked. To her credit, Starr did not bolt and run, but stayed and fought alongside me with her hooves. She was as scared as I was, though, and I think it must have been that fear in such a desperate situation that awakened my powers. I did not even realize I was using them until later. At one point, I somehow encased her in a bubble of light that projected from me and protected her from the worst of the yvyrm attack, yet still allowed her to smash with her hooves any that came too close. I guess it worked kind of like how a glove protects the hand but still allows the fingers to work, if perhaps not as freely as when unsheathed. I did not even know how I did it, or that it was done until after and I could see the sheath of light surrounding her. Once I saw it, and drew near to her, it just vanished, but I could feel it as though something had returned to me. We were found by a peasant and his son who had seen what they called a light show from some way away and had come to see what had happened. I was very weak from the expenditure of so much energy and they took me in their wagon to the nearest village which happened to be the same village that John was in.
Sometime later during that same trip, we were attacked again by yvyrms. This time the power manifested itself as light and flame that streamed from my hands and engulfed my weapons without burning me or them. That battle and the use of my powers completely drained me of energy and strength and I fainted after it was over. John took care of me, but…” She sighed at the memory of the fear in his eyes. “I don’t know whether it was the magick of the power or that I wielded it, but there was fear in his eyes and he pushed me away for a time. It wasn’t until sometime later when we were at sea and a group of yvyrms attacked us during a storm that I used the power again, this time to save his life after he was washed overboard and the yvyrms attacked us with him in the sea and me on the sailboat. We never really talked about it, but after that he seemed to just accept that I had magick and was not the simple human girl he had believed me to be.”
She brushed another errant wisp of hair out of her eyes after the breeze had teased it loose and sent it curling around her face. “I think it was the fear in his eyes that kept me from trying to learn how to use my powers. I was afraid of them and yet fascinated at the same time. Apparently, though, it is not good to not release them from time to time. When things in Bravia began to go all wrong, and people, who had not lived through what we had, began trying to destroy all that we had accomplished, I grew frustrated, and the power roiled within me to the point that one night I simply screamed in frustratoin one night while in my kitchen at home and the power raged through the scream and when I was done, I discovered I had rent a hole between this realm and that of the Summer Realm of the Sidhe. Specifically, I had created a portal between my house and the Beloved Vale, a sacred site to the Sidhe of that area over whom ruled Valen, Lord of the High Vale, King of the Mystic Mountain, High Sidhe of the Summer Realm…and my great grandfather.”
She chuckled wryly and gave the orc at her side a lopsided grin. “In short, I met the reason for my powers, he revealed my family’s history to me, the human side at least, and sent me to the Grimstad Estate as my house was being swallowed up in the healing of the rift I had created. He held the healing back long enough for me to return home, pack what I could carry with me and retrieve my horse. Starr and I watched from the road as my house was basically gobbled up by the wood. There is no trace of it there now. I didn’t search for it, but the wood itself seemed different and I suspect even Bannon’s grave is gone.”
She sighed again and looked down at Orla who had shifted again and laid her head in Nikola’s lap, pawing at her to be petted. Nikola obliged and ran her fingers through the dog’s golden fur, massaging her gently with her fingertips. “I learned much about who I am and where I came from that night. I learned of my blood connection to Aida, Casamir and Camelia along with a myriad of other family members I have never met. I saw my own parents as my mother locked away my powers and sent me away to safety. I saw their deaths at the hands of traitors.” She blinked back the tears that stung her eyes at the memory. “I saw them through Vaelen’s eyes,” she explained softly. She thought about saying more, but it seemed the wound was still too fresh even after all the time that had passed since that night. Shaking away the memories for the moment, she took a deep breath and gave a small smile to her companion. “I did as Vaelen bade me do and sent my steward, Iris, ahead of me to prepare Grimstad House for my arrival. I did not warn her that I intended to do one last hunt before leaving Bravia. That was during the Xanthreel invasion. They were destroying our mines and wreaking havoc on our markets. I somehow managed to talk Aishe and her family to join me in one last hunt and we went out to one of the mines hardest hit and faced the creatures on the battlefield. Bravia was in discord where it was not steeped in apathy. My family was dead. I had just learned about my heritage and was still confused as to what it all meant. I was wounded during the battle. One of the Xanthreels must have had iron stuck to its skin from the mine and a sliver was embedded in the last wound I received before I went down. I have never experienced so much pain as I did from that sliver. I am told that Morjiana suspected something was amiss and Aishe was able to find and remove the sliver from my body but by then I was delirious. Apparently, the power inside me needed to be released and just…well, exploded out of me. When it was over there was no sign of a single Xanthreel, dead or alive. My memories were wiped clean as well. I had thought they were erased, but as it turns out, Vaelen had a hand in that and simply locked them away for a time, to allow me a chance to heal, I suppose. Somehow in the aftermath of that explosion my body was completely healed as though I had never received a single wound, and a power bond formed between myself and Morjiana that I still do not completely understand.”
There was more, of course. Much more, but perhaps she had said enough for now. “The tale does not end there, but to make a long story considerably shorter, I slowly regained my memories over the ensuing months. I did eventually make it to Grimstad House and from there John and I made our escape from Bravia to Fenia by sea, not daring to pass through Kiene during those uncertain times. It was during that tumultuous time that John and I agreed that while we would always be friends, our paths simply did not align. What I needed he could not give and what he desired I could not fulfill. I remember meeting you in the Mysts Tavern not too long after arriving in Fenia and how you seemed determined to grill me for personal information.” She chuckled and added, “You sure know how to leave your mark on a girl.”