The Cosmic Detour

[Caden Law]

Closed to myself and Fingolfin; we worked this out earlier tonight and it'll serve both as a jiffy quest and as a claiming of my Shoppe Reward for Part One of the Featured Quest in Raiaera.

Welcome to Tomorrow.

Welcome to the world N'Thayn'sal, perhaps better known to you by its current name: Althanas.

Welcome to the world that awaits you, twenty years hence. It's a place where Raiaera fell, and a bloody-eyed banner was hoisted from Eluriand's blackened towers. Where the people of Alerar saw the dangers for what they were and struck -- hard and fast, as best as they could. Where Salvar fell to internal strife of so many colors and kinds. Where Scara Brae is little more than a bowl full of dirty seawater and dead bodies, and Corone is nothing but a fond memory. Mile high towers dot the lands of Dheath -- the lands of Wyrm -- and the ocean boils with the ravenous howls of monsters better left unnamed.

N'Thayn'sal, where gods have died and the stars are going out and the only moon left is riddled with mile deep crevices and burning craters where you can still see the bodies of Things, some good and some evil and a lot that were neither one or the other or anything we can pin names to. It's a world that is, for all intents and purposes, dying.

The High Elves have fallen here, they're just a wandering band of refugees, beggars and hardened survivors now. Man has been broken to his knees screaming and enduring, but no better than others. The Dwarves would've gone to ground as well, had the Hordes of Haidia not sundered them from the veins of the world. Only the Drow remain strong, or at least recognizable, and even the lands of Alerar have shrunken with the fall of the Dwarves and the foothold empire of their murderers.

The goblins and their ilk hold power now, if only barely. They came in screaming from lands known and unknown, lead along by the mighty ogres. The wyrmkin have risen to dominance in Dheath. What was once Raiaera is now Durkland, and what used to be Corone is little more than a hundred feifdoms, ten falling by the year as the Reaper Queen carves her empire out of the flesh of the living, broken masses within.

What once was Salvar no longer is. It's not that the whole country has fallen from a dozen civil wars and twice as many self-proclaimed governments -- and it has. It's not that the Wyrmian Warlocks have infiltrated society and burnt the grimoires and tomes, hats and robes of the old Wizarding orders -- and they have. It's not even that the realm that used to be Sulgoran's Axe has somehow, perhaps by the good graces of whatever Sway still live, remained somewhat intact.

Nominally speaking, Salvar retains a government of its own, though most of its northern reaches don't even know the name of it. It's on monarchy number three in as many years, the previous two quietly installed and removed by a band of Wyrm Warlocks and its armies commanded by the infamous Gale Knights of Icetongue. The people here live between all the rocks and all the hard places; Orcs, Goblins and Ogres to one border, Xem'zund and the Haidian demons to another, and ever the looming threat of another raid by desperate Alerar or the Reaper Queen, or genocide by the Wyrm when the Warlocks tire of their games, or even of the death of their last few patron gods and the slaughter that would doubtlessly follow.

This is a grim, darkened place. This is where the last bits of humanity still look to the increasingly starless skies and delude themselves into thinking they can at least die free...

...and maybe, just maybe if you look hard enough, you'll find something unexpected here. You might not believe it at first. You might think it's ridiculous, you might think it's senseless, you might even consider it absolutely insane, but it remains even after the rest of the world is over.

It's hope.

Hope lives in Salvar, and hope lives in the dying world of N'Thayn'sal...

[Caden Law]

You'll find that hope has a Name, if you go far enough north in the realm known today, in the future, as Sulgore's Axe. It isn't the place you know, at least not exactly. Look hard enough and you'll spot a few similarities though. The feif structure remains, but it's gotten bloodier and there's no loyalty to anything but the outside military anymore. Icetongue Brood, headed by the Pale Lady Sulgore herself, runs this place now. They've gotten bigger, and they use the bitter cold and the constant civil war as a means of natural selection.

Only the strong survive here, and nowhere else will you find anyone quite so strong enough to hope as the man you're about to meet in the wilds near the Warlocked City of Evernorth. It's an area where the clouds are few but the snow is impossibly heavy, dotted with grand hills and roadside fortress towers by the dozen. There's a very specific road. It leads directly from the city of Sulgore's Axe to Evernorth, winding through a dozen fiefdoms between. To one side is the Forest of Iciol, where trees grow with leaves of ice, and far enough behind them are the Mountains of Denebriel. To the other is the frozen lake of Berevar, its ice reddened near the shores and a few bodies visibly frozen into it.

The Wyrm call it one name, but everyone else knows it by another: Redstone's Path, where a Wizard once tread.

Redstone's Path, where another Wizard stands in wait before a caravan lead by a Gale Knight, Arcturus the Iron-Hand, so named for the oversized iron hand, fully functional, transmuted to the stump where his left hand used to be. The Wizard is one that Arcturus has fought before, and they've had this dance before. Several times, in fact; enough for him to know that the Wizard's rebels, thirty in all, have him partially surrounded from the forest, and the ice has been thinned enough beneath the surface to crack should he run. Which is just fine, because Arcturus does not intend to run. He intends to end this pest problem once and for all.

With that in mind, he dismounted from his borselisk steed. With his proper right hand, he drew an axe bearing his Brood's insignia. He strode forward, and he tried to speak, "We meet again, for the last time--"

Operative word: Tried.

The Wizard drew wands from his sleeves, and that was where everything got bloody. First came the Missile, all bright white and singing discord. Arcturus decked the spell and ruptured it with his metal hand, its spiked knuckles made from Dehlar. Then came the lightning, and he twisted hard to catch it with the blade of his axe and cast it into the lake; ice shattered and water steamed on impact.

"You will die this day!" Arcturus shouted, and the Wizard laughed in his face as spell after spell met purpose-crafted metals and fell short every time. It was only when they reached point blank that you could find out why the Wizard was laughing.

He ducked forward beneath Arcturus' lunge, clasping his hands together. The wands crackled with magic energies of a dozen sorts, and then transmuted into each other before the mass exploded into a full-blown warhammer; a four foot shaft of tarnished silver alloys with a grey stripe down each side leading into a well-crafted block of solid Damascus. The head was covered in magic. There was nothing else you could call it.

He turned, he swung, and Arcturus was just fast enough to catch the whole thing in his chestplate. He went flying back with a sound like thunder gone to war, then came crashing back down into the ice just as hard. Water sprayed everywhere, and anyone else would've believed the battle to be over. It wasn't. But while it's at a lull, let's stop and actually meet the Wizard, the hammerman, and the sole beacon of hope to so many of the people in this desolate region.

He's six foot six inches for the sake of overkill, pale as a ghost and leathered with age and scars by the dozen. One of his eyes is missing, and skin's warped into a cancerous looking callous where it used to be. He's completely bald, and perhaps oddly for a Wizard of any age and world, he doesn't bother wearing the archetypal hat anymore. Mostly because it was cut from his head and set on fire about ten years ago. Time has worn him to the bone, but pure willpower has kept a heavy layer muscle on his frame. He wears the robes still, but they're black now. Stark, raving, frosty black as an disillusioned athiest's heart, worn over what may as well be the medieval rendition of combat fatigues.

He can be identified by two things though, even more so than his square jawed look of absolute determination. There's a black-and-grey tome chained to his belt and clasped shut with a Dehlar lock, and all of his clothes -- be it his cape, his coat, his underrobes or his underclothes -- bear the exact same streak of grey down the back.

His birthname's Jolstice Aramson, but you'll know him better by the same Name everyone else does.

Greyspine.

And with that out of the way, take note of the surging glow tearing through the ice en route to the shore. The fight's about to hit its climax, and even Greyspine knew it. He'd pushed his luck plenty of times with the Arcturus Caravan, enough that its members didn't bother fighting back and his own men didn't bother attacking because everything would be determined by which of them won and how decisive the victory was. Arcturus and Greyspine knew this as well.

What they didn't know, and didn't plan for, turned out to be N'Thayn'sal's very first telefrag.

It happened out of nowhere and everywhere at once. Arcuturs erupted from the ice, trailing water and bleeding from his snout. His axe was held high, his hand stretched forward like a grappling shield, and his voice ringing through the air like an air raid siren. Then it went silent. At about the same time, give or take a nanosecond, Arcturus Icetongue simply exploded. There was a flash of sunny yellow light from inside of his body, and then he exploded. Bits and pieces of him were still raining down all over the ground (and all over Greyspine, for that matter) by the time that the figure arguably responsible for it came to a landing.

It was with a stagger that he did so, and he was covered in even more blood and gore than Greyspine or the ground around him. He fell over, immediately aware of what had happened, and promptly started vomiting.

Greyspine, utterly unphased by this, simply turned to the slackjawed members of the caravan and smiled as his men and women stepped forth from the forest with weapons at the ready.

"I believe this is the part where you scaly dogs run back to your mistress in the Axe and beg forgiveness," he said, very intentionally taking control of the situation like he'd expected that to happen. And with that lunatic gleam in his eye, it's hard to say he didn't. "Now get the hell out of my sight."

It's at about this Time that Caden came to a certain realization that all unwitting linchpins of destiny eventually arrive at, be it before or after they slay the dragon and the Princess goes for the better looking knight who happens to be utterly and incontrovertibly gay.

Someone up there hates me...

[Caden Law]

It took three hours. Most of that time, Caden spent getting the crap kicked out of him while blindfolded and tied up. Simply put, Greyspine vehemently disliked the idea of anyone just randomly popping up in the likeness of one of his past students, let alone one who'd died rather horribly. All Caden could piece together between boots to the stomach and fists to the face were, fighting! and like a hero!, along with a lot of you mealy mouthed little shit! and bastard!es. His own mentor went so far as to yank off his hat, stomp on it and then give it to one of his men to do use as an impromptu toilet.

They threw him into the caravan, of course. Greyspine climbed in after him, and eventually started drinking. He always started drinking. Salvic Wizards in general always started drinking. Beer was about the only thing worth drinking up here, and even then you needed something strong enough to class as vodka if you wanted to warm up.

What eventually changed Greyspine's mind, in the midst of a barely buzzed You little bastard fest in back of one of the wagons, was what Caden said to him as he started really drinking.

"Your liver's gonna kill you in your sleep, you miserable old fuck."

It bears mention that the only Wizard who ever said this to Greyspine, and only as a young boy, was the one he personally Named Blueraven.

"...Swaying Stars," the old man cursed under his breath, and that was pretty much that.

Hour number three came with Caden getting his blessedly unsoiled Hat back (he took time to sniff and be absolutely sure before wearing the thing again), and the rest of the journey to Greyspine's field base in the forest was spent in something of an all around stupor. Among other things, it included...

"How'd you get here?"

"Quantum, I think," Caden partly answered, just before taking a good stiff drink himself. "Time messed up. Or something. I think it was a teleport spell gone wrong," he mused this part with a certain Wizardly awareness that his words carried an underline and implied something. It felt like he was in two places at once, except not, and kind of sideways with his head at a perpetual 180* tilt from the rest of reality. When he explained this to Greyspine, the old Wizard explained.

"When teleport spells screw up, you usually get splinched all over the planet. I remember stories of that happening, back when there were enough of us for it to be commonplace. Nevermind the damn doppelgangers that could pop up. Whole branch of magic's just plain unreliable by any standard."

At which point, the subject changed. It always does in situations like this, because sooner or later, curiosity will make it change.

"I'm dead?"

"Eighteen years and change," said Greyspine, with a voice that was underscored, I wasn't there, but I saw the aftermath.

"...how?"

"If I tell you, it could screw up the continuity of Time. Same reason I haven't told you a lot of things now. Hell, I probably just caused a paradox telling you you're dead." Cue a sip of vodka. Greyspine's tolerance for the stuff was legendary, even in Salvar.

"Screw Time. I'm already causing a paradox just from being here. For that matter, did I ever tell you how I visited the future?"

"...no..."

"Then--"

"You died before I could see you again."

"...ah. Then in that case, you could just be reinforcing the past and ensuring the world happens as you know it today."

"And that's better how, exactly?"

"It isn't. That's the point," Caden explained, just as the wagon they were riding in back of hit a bump. Something glass broke in a crate behind them. All things considered, it would've been poignant in fiction. Except Wizards aren't fiction. They live similarly to fiction, yes, but they're not fiction. Stories usually have happy endings preset for them. Wizards typically die hard and bloody and often without being able to get the relief of screaming.

So it was oddly comfortable when Greyspine simply blurted out, "From what I heard, you died screaming."

...but not that comforting. "Ah," was all Caden could think to respond with.

"Happened on the Raiaeran front, as I recall. You and your damn brigade were fighting your way over to rebels in Corone, during the Year of the Black-Silk Son. From what your men said, the Reaper Queen got you. Crazy bitch. Crazy strikin' bitch. Said you died screaming with a scythe through your chest after your spells failed. It was her last military victory before defecting from Xem'zund and building her own empire in Corone. We recovered your body at least. I think your men fought too hard for the bitch to keep it. One of 'em said they pried your head from her hands before escaping.

"After that...hard to tell what went to hell first, 'cos pretty much everything did, and mostly at the same time."

Caden absorbed all of this. Slowly, calculatingly, and with a certain numb detachment. Then he pointed out the obvious, "The Reaper Queen...is her name spelled with a V. and D., by any chance?"

"Viola Darkstalker, yes."

"I killed her. Barely an hour ago...from where I was teleported, anyway," he added the last part with the weight of twenty missing years.

"You say that like it actually means something," Greyspine muttered. "Striking bitch won't stay dead. Plucked out my strikin' eye after I burned the skin from her bones, Caden. Next time I saw her, she was as good as new. Better even. It was like dealing with Xem'zund's bitchy ex-wife."

Caden processed this too. As he mulled it over though, Greyspine kept going.

"Mind you, you weren't the only one we lost. Hell, I'm the only one who hasn't been killed or subverted yet. All the damn Weather-Mages went Wyrm years ago--"

"Is Cadence...?"

"Went down fighting. I saw it happen," and nothing more needed to be said of Blueraven's youngest sibling. Greyspine surprised him though, "Veshua went not long after that. You remember her, don't you? Your death killed her inside. Lasted a good five years after you died, then the stars started going out and Kaerul landed in her lap and passed away. I think that was the straw that did it. She went out on a suicide mission after that and we never found more than her lower jaw and a pile of ash afterward."

Caden stopped processing. Stopped thinking, in fact. He spent the rest of the ride home hearing a tally of death, and every single one of them made him a little more numb than the last. Eventually, Greyspine's tirade ended with three words that were going to give Caden nightmares for the rest of his life.

"Welcome to N'Thayn'sal...

"Helluva place, isn't it?"

-----

Greyspine's field base consisted of a well fortified hole in the ground. You could probably dress it up behind ten thousand smaller details, like all of its rooms and escape tunnels, but that's really all it was. The Wizards inevitably retired to a central study room, much like the one at a certain academy in Knife's Edge. As Greyspine sourly pointed out, the place was burnt to the ground now. Wizards had fought Warlocks had fought Things From Outside, and all that remained were charred ashes and page fragments in a perfect circle where snow never fell and nobody thought to build anything new.

The room itself had three rocking chairs and a fireplace, ostensibly filtering its smoke into the soil. There were shelves of half-written tomes, all compiled by a man who was desperately trying to preserve an art that was essentially dead, and doing so through only his own spare notes and razor-sharp memories. It had taken Greyspine a lifetime to learn what he knew, and it'd probably take another lifetime to convey it all. He hadn't taken on another apprentice in years, not since the last three -- a trio of Elven refugees -- had died. He did, however, make an exception.

"I don't really consider her an apprentice, mind you," he explained, "But she's got the gift, and she's got a fire in her eyes. I'd feel guilty not to try and pass what I know to her."

"Who is she?"

Here, Greyspine would've taken a drink. A big one. He didn't, but only because he didn't have one handy and the emotional impact got through without the gesture. He merely stared at the fire and said, "Justina."

"...isn't that--"

"The name you would've given to your daughter? Yes. I don't know if she's yours or not. Certainly has your attitude and she's got your hair, but I don't know. Veshua got loopy after you went, and...well, she is what she is. We let her have her mother's name, but--"

"Give her mine. Blueraven, Law, I don't care which."

Greyspine looked at him. Nodded. Said nothing. "She's not here, mind you. She's back at our actual headquarters, probably showing off fireball tricks to the rest of her creche..."

"Jolstice."

"...don't say it, Caden. I know that look in your eyes and it makes me think of whether or not you looked like that when you died."

Caden ignored the mental imagery this caused. He tried to, at least. It was a valiant but failing effort.

"Is there anyone who could help me get home?"

The old Wizard looked at him with his good eye. Perhaps more accurately, Greyspine looked right through him with his remaining eye, and then he sighed. It was the heavy, tired sound of someone who still hopes, and who'll continue to hope no matter what, but who knows at some level that it's probably a moot point.

"There is...one person, perhaps...I'm sure you know him..."

Aaaand Findelfin will have room for an intro after my next post. Sorry for the delay, but I need sleep. Badly.

[Caden Law]

Day came, eventually, and Caden couldn't help but notice that the sun had a slight greenish tint to it. As Greyspine explained, "It's been like that ever since N'jal ate V'dralla." Caden tried not to put too much thought into that. The idea of godly cannibalism, even in a pantheon he hadn't grown up with, was inherently disturbing on some level.

"Are you sure this is what you want to do?" Greyspine eventually asked him, after they'd spent almost twenty minutes standing in the woods surrounding the main entrance to his field base; the heavily camouflaged side of a steep hill, which was actually a reinforced door large enough to fit entire wagons through. "I was a little drunk when I thought he could actually help you get home..."

"And I was a pile of bruises and headaches," Caden replied.

"I guess I've gotten a little too used to telling people what they need to hear to keep going," Greyspine admitted, probably only because he and Caden were the only ones outside right now. "In all likelihood, the spell that brought you here with start taking you home at some point. The only question is when it'll do that. Are you sure you don't want to take a chance and meet your daughter?"

Caden stared. Not off into space, not into the clouds, not even at the ground; just stared at a tree and tried to think of words to say. Eventually, out came, "I'm trying not to even think about her, to be honest. If I'm still...here after I've visited Evernorth, I'd be happy to meet her. But right now, I need to...need to keep moving. If I get zapped back to the present, I'll need to be prepared and--"

"Incidentally," Greyspine interrupted him, in the way Wizards do. Caden looked over at him, just in time to see the senior Wizard unchaining the Grimoire from his belt. With no pomp or ceremony to it, he held the tome out for Caden to take. It was a heavy looking volume, all black with a grey spine and the writer's Name on one cover, enveloped by a curving set of intricately painted grey vertebrae. "Take this with you."

"I can't."

"You can and you will. There are a lot of things we haven't properly discussed, Blueraven. You're in the unique position to help change history. To help stop all of this. The spell that brought you here could kick in at any time to take you home. My Grimoire has everything. It's a history for things that, to you, haven't happened yet. Things you could yet undo.

"So shut up and take the damn book or I'll kick the crap out of you."

Needless to say, Caden did take the book. He didn't want to, but he still took it. It also goes without saying that a Wizard's Grimoire is very much like an imprint of his soul; it contains all the thoughts he's ever put to paper, maps of the places he's been, a running catalogue of the things he's seen, and all the spells he's learned and made and all the dirty little tricks he's come up with. For Caden, Greyspine's Grimoire would be a history book for things that hadn't happened yet -- assuming he ever got home at all.

Incidentally, "If the spell doesn't send me home, I'll give this back to you," Caden said, and meant it.

"If the spell doesn't send you home, Blueraven, I'll beat the shit out of you on principle," which was Greyspine's roundabout way of saying Thanks. Only a Wizard could put such a meaning to words like that and have it readily understood.

-----

Miles went scuffing by in what felt like slow motion as the Wizard Named Blueraven made his way through the Iciole Forest en route to the City of Evernorth. For every step he waded through knee-deep snow, he waved a hand behind him and decompressed it in his wake. After two miles of this, Blueraven finally took to the road, feeling as if something tiny and spiteful and cold were dancing in his lungs.

"We can't send anyone with you," Greyspine had told him, and that was fine. "We can't spare any weapons or equipment for you either," and that was fine too, since Caden was a poor swordsman by any standard. He could barely even hold the one he had properly, nevermind using it in battle.

It took him another hour by road, but eventually, Blueraven arrived in the Warlocked City of Evernorth. Of all ten thousand things he could've thought right then and there, the only one that came to mind was, This is not where I grew up.

It bears mention that the Warlocked Cities, with exception to Sulgore's Axe, appear as tiny villages until you actually step past a certain threshold to get inside. Once you do that, they have this funny way of simply being bigger than you thought they were. Miles bigger.

The City of Evernorth, for instance, was approximately five miles wide, with borders shaped somewhat like the outline of a cancerous tumor. As far as this particular region is concerned, Evernorth was also unnaturally warm and its skies completely clear. If you looked up, you'd be able to see why: The clouds literally parted around the city's borders. There was no snow in Evernorth, nor was there equality. Most of the city consisted of cheap masonry and shacks, interspersed around mile high Towers of Magic that were all thin like arrows and javelins, and all of them let off the neon green smoke of magical pollution like it was going out of style.

Children ran through the streets, laughing with denial rather than innocence. The adults looked hopeless and downtrodden, when you could get them to meet you in the eye at all. It was a much more cosmopolitan place than he remembered though; gone were the all-white crowds of humans, replaced with a diversity that spanned the ethnic rainbow, and while most of the people he saw were still human, there were plenty who didn't quite fit the mold.

The Evernorth of N'Thayn'sal was a rare example of a conquered city that took in more refugees than it let out. There were elves here, in small concentrations, and if you looked hard enough you might see an actual dwarf trying to forget about seeing his brothers rent limb from limb by Haidians. Orcs and their kin ran the streets to some extent, every roving mob headed by an ogre, and every ogre carrying a goblin on his shoulder like a parrot. All the goblins wore the same scarlet robes.

But even they were easy to miss compared to Evernorth's real rulers, the Wyrmfolk. Almost all the best shops were run by them, and their Warlocks walked the streets like they owned them. And they probably did.

As he stepped into this frenzied, spiritually desolate place, Caden was immediately aware of three things: Wizards stand out. He was, presumably, one of the only two Wizards left in the world. People were staring at him like he was made out of easily stolen gold.

Unsurprisingly, he was quick to take advantage of the urban maze. Alleyways and sidestreets became his friends, and his hand never once left the bowie he'd bought in Scara Brae a lifetime ago and a world removed. Despite the need for stealth, he never once changed clothes or removed his Hat. There was too much risk involved; too much of a chance that he'd get summoned back home and arrive missing something important. The only time he even tilted his Hat back was to stuff Greyspine's Grimoire into it.

All the way to the center of the city, in the shadow of Locklord Goran Icetongue, and Caden fought what he was looking for.

Perhaps it was a tavern, maybe it was a shop, maybe it was just a really vindictive insult to the Warlocks. Either way, it actually had RESISTANCE SUPPLY DEPOT written in bold facing all along the twenty foot wide sign its owner kept nailed up above the front door. You'd have to be absolutely blind to miss it.

But you'd need the schooling of a Wizard to actually read it, since it was written Sideways. To most people, if they noticed it at all, it would simply look like a primitive barcode where all the lines matched. To a Wizard, it was what it was. Caden saw it and had to slap a hand over his mouth to keep from chortling.

And people say we've got no sense of humor, he thought with a glance to either side. No-one looking this way. Good then.

Caden crossed the street, keenly aware that he stood out like a mangled thumb. He shoved his way in and quickly shut the door behind him.

"He might not be able to help you get home any quicker, but if you play your cards right," Greyspine had told him, "He might just be able to help you prepare for whatever comes next. He's my chief supplier and spymaster in Evernorth. Seek him out, Blueraven. His name is..."

"Is there anyone named Fingolfin here?" Caden asked, plastering on his best I Am Oblivious face when he did it.

[Sighter Tnailog]

"My dearest Findelfin, you really must wake up."

The voice spoke, and he woke immediately. There was no disorientation, no feeling of uncertainty at waking. He was merely told to wake and so he did, promptly, with none of the trappings that normally accompanied the action. He looked around and was in someplace beyond his comprehension; surrounded by what seemed to be clouds, or water, or light, or fire, or maybe even currant jam, or some mixture of all five at once and more besides. Yet his mind didn't rebel; something told him this was where he was supposed to be.

And now a man stood before him, young, not handsome, but not ugly. A normal man of normal height and normal bearing, wearing only robes and carrying a large black tome. The man looked at Findelfin and spoke, "I told Varalad to use that spell in an emergency, and I can see why he'd picked it for now. Please, take a seat."

Findelfin was suddenly sitting in a rich armchair. Just like with waking, there was no intervening space; no pulling up a seat, no bending in the middle, now settling back and getting comfortable. He was told to take a seat, and he was seated. He did not want to ask why he was here; just as before, it seemed appropriate. In a normal world, he might have been left hanging, unsure of what to do, disoriented. But this was no normal world. All the same, it seemed appropriate to feign disorientation.

"Why am I here? Where am I?"

The man laughed. "Well, allow me to introduce myself. I am Khal'jaren, the Sage. Raiaera's mortal enemy. And you aren't really here; right now, if I were to keep you here, you'd be there..."

And all of a sudden, the vision changed.

* * * * *

He was wiping a countertop clean, although the rag he was using seemed dirtier than the bar was to begin with. A motley assortment of weaponry hung on the walls, mainly swords and daggers, though bows and various quivers still hung here and there. Axes too; the occasional dwarf came by, and it never hurt to keep up what strained relationships still existed among the free folk by having the weapons they loved most for extra-special prices. Most of the weaponry seemed plain, either damascus or delyn, but here and there it seemed to glint with the edge that spoke of a concealed enchantment; and every once in a while the eyes would linger on a piece of exceptional quality, perhaps of mythril. These latter varieties were invariably covered in a layer of grime, mucked up, made to look worse than anything else in the store room. Otherwise, they would be the first confiscated in the raids that occasionally hit the store. Yet the real value of the showroom lay in them; masterworks concealed like geodes in the rock.

The face of the man now walking in was almost familiar. It hinted at the edges of Findelfin's memory. But when he asked for Fingolfin, the elf froze. That name had not been spoken in ages; when Coiameth fell and N'jalian Spidermages swept the streets, when the defender of Kilya died in droves as the darkling fires consumed their souls, Findelfin had fled. He had stood at every siege, been at the front of nearly every battle as the lines fell, mustered every rout into an orderly retreat to a new stronghold. But there at Coiameth his courage failed. He fled into the north on Pelektar. On the freezing plains he was forced to kill his horse and eat her flesh just to survive. And when he emerged from the battle he had taken a new name, one that reflected his changed position. He was now Cildorian Yenuial; the cowardly one of the twilit years. And so hearing Fingolfin spoken on the wind, the name whispering to him from the bitter past, he clutched his prayer beads closer to his chest, and whispered to himself. Aurient save us from the past.

But even as his blood froze colder than the air outside, he recognized the face from the past, the mage who he once sent to defend Vanwanen Bridge, back when hope still fluttered in the hearts of men and elves. "No one has spoken that name to my face in ages...Blueraven...though they still speak of it in hushed words among the resistance fighters, of the commander without a command, the Dagorathar who fled the Canyon of Liquid Flame, who now lurks in the north selling weapons to those who still have the guts to fight. And I'd like it very much if it wasn't spoken again...the name is Cildorian. Tell me what you're after, I'll quote you a price, and you can buy it and be on your way. Off to the battles, I suppose." They had not taken all the worlds yet; there was still resistance in the Dwarven-mines, still conclaves of Elven fighters deep in the jungles of Dheathain.

I'm the enabler of this madness. We've fallen, and yet still I am here, selling weapons to children who think they'll deliver us from all this evil. Galatirion, Star-Father, why do you send me this one now? He clutched his rosary even closer, fingers gripping the seven-sectioned wooden beads as they clicked fervently against each other.

[Caden Law]

Caden stared at him for a moment -- a very long, very quiet moment. He remembered Findelfin ap Fingolfin, after all. Point in fact, he could accurately describe the elf to a shiny tee, because he'd only spoken with him a few blackouts, twenty years and some hours ago. Findelfin was the sort of guy who leaves an impression on you though, if only because he'd radiated confidence and righteousness to the point that Caden could've gagged on it.

Caden had never been a big fan of the elves. After his day or two spent volunteering in the service of Raiaera, he wouldn't have minded seeing them kicked off their perch and stomped on. Preferably hard and with a very large, metal-soled shoe of some sort. He saw nothing redeeming in them in any way; they were supposedly noble by birth and good because they said so and if egomaniacal to the point of deep-frying you if you didn't make sparkly-eyes and worship the ground they walked on. They were chosen by gods because you'd probably die screaming if you said otherwise. They were perfect.

The flaw with that being that Perfection is a state with no room for improvement. You're perfect when you're dead. Until then you're as flawed and dirty as anyone else.

Caden didn't like elves. But Findelfin had been different, if only because he radiated an aura of heroism for heroism's sake. Oh, yes. He'd been an elf. Casually better than everyone else, probably the type to call non-elves lesser races, prone to the unnaturally clear way of speaking that characterized elves and all of that. The difference was in the heroism though. If Findelfin was going to be humbled, Caden thought, it should've been a good old fashioned beating with a large blunt object -- the sort wielded by some big bastard who looks like he was victimized by logging in the Ugly Forest.

He shouldn't have been humbled like this.

"Your glamour broke," Blueraven noted, in much the same way someone might point out that a flag has a hole in it. "The last time I saw you was about...two days ago, give or take, in the fields outside Eluriend. You were on horseback. You practically radiated heroism and honor like a star radiates light and warmth. Am I to assume, Findelfin ap Fingolfin, that you let your pride shatter in lieu of your backbone?" he asked, every bit as longwinded as a Wizard can be, his pronounciation of the former general's name perfect down to the last syllable.

It bears mention that Caden, apparently, has something of a subconscious deathwish involving elves. This marks the second or third time in as many days that he's deliberately insulted one who could probably kill him forty-six times before his body hits the floor.

Fortunately or otherwise, it wouldn't come to that. As Caden put a hand on the countertop, prepared to argue the point and give "Cildorian" a classic Wizardly Pep-Talk (of the sort that generally involves violently purple fireballs and insults to one's mama), there came a sound of the doorbell ringing. Caden looked over his shoulder, made eye contact, and just as soon wished he hadn't.

The newcomer was a rough six foot two, not counting the bony crest. Slender in the way that magic makes you, if only because you're too busy reading and growing powerful to stop and eat healthy, but broadshouldered and somewhat wide in the chest. His skin was scaly and dark purple, colored a lighter blue around the throat, palms and probably the soles of his feet. Humanoid but not human, evidenced by everything from the four-fingered hands to the head shaped like a dragon's, right down to eyes that were white like a man's but different in all other respects; the irises were watery orange, the pupils were slits that reflected pale green in the right lighting.

To put it simply, he was a Warlock and he dressed the part. To give it more depth: He was a Warlock and he really dressed the part, complete with the flowing red robe with the black leather mantle, left open in front to reveal black riding pants and a matching shirt with golden details that individually looked like random sigils but collectively looked like a forked tongue. He had a ring on every finger, all bearing gems with red sigils etched into them. Perhaps the only crude things about him were his boots.

They were made from leather. Human skin, to be precise.

His Name is unknown, for now. Warlocks are even more paranoid than Wizards, attaching all sorts of special significance to their second names. It's a precaution against curses, mainly, whereas Wizards just use the Names for pomp more often than anything else. The name you'll know him by, for now and possibly forever more, is Anton Icetongue.

Caden nodded to him, and Anton stared right back. The tension between the two was automatic, and thick enough that you could've cut it with a knife.

"'Lo," Caden eventually greeted.

"Nice Hat," Anton replied, and it bears mention that he did pronounce that with a capital H. Warlocks and Wizards are not so divorced that they don't share a few commonalities, after all. Enough to spot one another five miles out and start plotting murder in less time than it takes to blink.

"Ah, this old thing?" Caden asked, and it's probably a show of abstract terror that he took the Hat off and made a show of poking at it with his fingertips. "Won it in an auction the other day. Just felt compelled to wear it, you know?"

Anton regarded him coolly. "Well, don't. People might get the wrong ideas, seeing anyone running around with a Hat like that. Especially in a shop like this one. They might even think you're one of those Wizards we outlawed. And killed. And ate," he said with a smile.

"Hadn't thought about it like that, sir, I'll make notes and everything," Caden answered, and promptly tucked the Hat under his arm. Incidentally, here's the part where he stepped out of the way. "By all means, I'm just stopping in to say hi to an old friend. And show off the hat." It bears mention that the lower case was intentional.

"I'm sure," Anton said, looking from Caden to the shopkeep. "Do you have the Athame I ordered yet, Cildorian? Or the powdered arcanite? Or the medallion? We're supposed to be giving an Acolyte his first experience with Familiarity tonight, provided it doesn't kill him somehow. Acolyte Worren, if I recall correctly. Hard to keep track of them all," he said, and by now had come to lean against the counter like he owned it. And technically speaking, he probably did. The whole time, he was eyeing Caden in much the same way your average dragon eyes a hapless sheep.

For his part, Caden turned to distraction like a fish takes to water. He scoured the shelves with intentional amateurism, and perhaps only his utter nervousness made it look real. He made it a point to try and ignore them, but it was a failing effort at best. You can't ignore the sound of the guillotine being drawn up, no more than you can drown out the racket of the crowd cheering for your head or the steady, maddened beating of your own heart between your ears.

Time to play Kingmaker, O ignoble shopkeeper.

[Caden Law]

There was a flourish of silver and gold, and a winding declaration of wars uncounted that was spoken in the perfectly unaccented tones that Elves are known for. The glamour fizzled a bit, threatening very much to come screaming back to the forefront in a rather bloody-minded sort of way. Through it all, from the first word to the last, Caden was dead silent.

And when it was over, he just sort of deflated and slapped himself in the face. Then he muttered something insulting about Findelfin's mother in one of the gutter tongues of a tribe long since wiped out during the birth of N'Thayn'sal. He dragged his hand down enough, spread his fingers a little bit, and squinted through them in a rather unenthusiastic sort of way.

"You sod-headed, round-eared little pointy-chinned, strike-eyed git. Now I feel like an idiot for trying to do the Wizard Bitchout of Encouragement," he said, his voice slightly muffled by the presence of his hand. All the same, he took the box with one hand and, rather nonchalantly, stuffed the thing wholesale into his coat. It was thin and flat enough to fit without issue. "Could've just said something like that right off the bat, you know. Instead of acting like a broken little shop monkey."

He continued muttering obscenities in this way for a few moments, no longer sassy so much as flat-out embarrassed.

"You Elves're gonna be the death of me, Cilfindordelfinian. Or whatever the hells you wanna call yourself."

It bears mention that the Wizard was indeed smiling when he said this.

It also bears mention that it wasn't a very pleasant smile. Point in fact, it's the sort of tight-lipped smile you might find on low-level management once the Corporate Machines have broken them in properly. Except that Caden wasn't management material and Gods tend to be a hell of a lot easier to understand than your average desk jockey.

For a few seconds, there was an uncomfortable silence. Caden rubbed at the back of his neck, and the sound of timeless harps returned. Each and every note carried with it the weight of ages and possibilities untapped, and of magic quite literally wrenching itself back into shape. It came from a direction that could only be described as Below, travelling up through the winding, senseless rivers of Time and Space and arriving into Cildorian's Depot like the fingers of gods about to press some ripples out of the fabric of existence.

Caden looked at Cildorian and started to speak. He never quite finished whatever he was going to say, but it likely boiled down to a half-assed apology for the insults, and maybe it would've included a request to look after Greyspine and the little girl named Justina; make sure the one didn't drink himself to death, and make sure the other actually grew up with some shred of hope in her eyes.

The reason he didn't finish is quite simple, mind you.

The front door ripped off of its hinges, knocked over three or four shells and lodged in the space where ceiling met wall. Just like that, the terse peace of the shop evaporated, even as the sound of the harps grew louder and louder still.

"Shit," Caden spat in his native Salvic, his arms going up as spells Worked their way through his fingertips and--

He wasn't fast enough. A bolt of purple-tinged lightning shot dead center into his chest and sent him flying all the way into a back wall. Alchemist's Light splashed everywhere, arcane powder littered the air and stray magicks shot volatile sparks in every direction. By the time the racket subsided, the harps had hit a near fever-pitch and the whole damn room was starting to glow under the pale gold light radiating from where Caden was sprawled out on the ruins of shelves.

Re-enter Anton Icetongue, accompanied this time by a pair of Wyrmian enforcers; well-trained dragon-headed gents who could breathe icy blasts, used some rather stylish axes and wore vambraces of solid dehlar. Naturally, he made his re-entry in classical stylings, and the harps seemed to darken their tunes to accompany it.

"I'm sorry, Cildorian," he said, nonchalant and only as apologetic as your average pit viper. "But I couldn't help but overhear this gentlemen harassing you. No need to worry any further, as I'm sure he's quite dead after that," he spoke now with the grandiose precision of someone trying very, very hard to sound sophisticated. Which isn't easy to pull off when you're wearing human skins for boots.

His enforcers took point immediately, placing themselves between Cildorian and the Warlock, and by default, Blueraven. As this happened, he continued to walk and talk like it actually meant something. "Of course, considering some of the other things I heard, there's always the very real chance that you'll never need to worry about anything again. Honestly, did y--"

He stopped in mid-syllable for several reasons. The loudest was that the harps now drowned out every other possible sound. The most visible was that Caden had just thrown himself back to his feet with bowie knife in one hand the other lunging out empty until the last possible moment -- when a solid steel scalpel all bit flew out of his sleeve and landed in his grasp as neatly as if it were an extension of his fingers. Anton went to scream something, and darkened powers erupted around him...

But Caden had surprise this time. The scalpel jammed into the Warlock's throat, just missing a vital artery, and then the skin froze around it. Whatever happened next, Cildorian would not know.

Both of them vanished.

Suddenly and jarringly, the harps silenced and the light blinked out and the Wizard and Warlock were somewhere and somewhen else...

...and two enforcers stood in place, utterly dazed and confused as to what had just happened.

[Sighter Tnailog]

He had no time to think about what the wizard said. From the moment Anton had reappeared he knew this was trouble. A silent mind-message to Hilmandil and a few others in the back room was all he had before all hell broke loose. They had been planning for this eventuality a long time. He could hear the thrum of the portal as it activated; he would have only a few moments to get through it before it closed forever, and he knew that Hilmandil and the others were already through.

A sword appeared in his hands again, this time a plain steel blade. Ainalindil's unsheathing in war was for another time and place. With the other hand, he produced a throwing knife, spearing one of the enforcers in the eye before he could recover his senses. With a cry the one who called himself Cildorian jumped up onto the countertop, then leaped from it to plunge the sword deep into the chest of the other enforcer.

He tried to release and let go, after which he planned to flee from whence he came, fly through the portal, and escape. But it was not to be so. The wyrmian he had stabbed choked down the pain and grabbed the elf by the shoulder. He brought his other fist around to crunch, with an excruciating crack, into the elf's face.

The body crumpled to the floor, lifeless.

* * * * *

"And thus, in the world yet to be, passes Findelfin ap Fingolfin, named Cildorian, whose hand never again rose in defiance of his enemies.

"Quite an unsatisfactory end to our little saga, don't you think?" The voice now came from nothing; Findelfin stood alone, unclothed, wrapped in the light that seemed to be from everything and from nothing.

"I think so too, Findelfin ap Fingolfin. And so I send you back, with the hope that you'll tell everyone how nice I was, remember your gods, and please try to do your best to avoid that disaster in Kilya Gorge. If I may give you a hint; prayer never hurt anybody. Acolyte Xem, he prayed."

And then the voice rung with the boom of years uncounted, and in that moment even the eldest of the immortals on the planes of existence would have felt as a child.

"Now Go. My gift will be with you when you depart."

And the world was changed.

Spoils Request:

I would like a rosary. It is to be of seven sections, each section containing seven beads. The materials are expensive, and so I am asking that you consider my thread "Slings and Arrows," "The Field of Sighs and Sorrows," and "Beyond the Bridge of Souls," as well as the work of this thread, in approving this. Also, since this thread is of appropriate length, I would like to request an official judging. Here is the spoil.

The first section of beads is of diamond, in honor of Aurient, the star-mother, whose soul surpasses all gems on earth and whose spirit of adamant will stand ever firm in the face of danger.

The second section is of amber, each bead containing a small insect. Amber is the stuff of Galatirion, for it traps life within life and holds something like a soul in its rough resin. Amber is for Galatirion, the giver of life.

The next section is of black coral. Smooth and hard, this coral once held in it the breath and salt of the sea; it is the representative of Earlon the Rain-Star, whose gift of the sea must be recovered and cherished by the Raiaerans.

The fourth section is resplendent ivory, each bead carved with a likeness of Arddunwë, the Sweet-Star. Each depiction represents a different mode of beauty; young and old, male and female, living and dying, and Holy Other.

The fifth section honors Cuarye, the Swift-Star, and is of simple yew wood. The simplest and cheapest of the materials in this rosary, it calls the bearer to remember that the heart of Holy is not only in the trappings of wealth, but in simple lives and simple people; and it also reminds those who wield the Bow that simple weapons are often the best.

The sixth section is of smooth mythril. All other materials on this rosary are of substances that were once alive; even diamonds were once coal, which was once the stuff of trees and life. But in honoring Megillion, the Silver-Star whose gift is metal and its working, the prayers of the rosary remind the living to remember the dead; and that, in the end, metal is only a purveyor of death and not a means to final life.

The final section is of crystal glass, and set in these crystals is the living light of Findelfin's own memory. Each crystal evokes a different type of memory: people, places, events, things, evils, and lore. And the final crystal conjures the strongest memory of all: the memory of the star-gods in their glory before the elves were sent to earth. When Findelfin holds each bead, the memories associated with this bead will become more acute.

The sole power in this rosary is that it is somehow connected to Findelfin; no one can touch it besides himself, and the only power it has exists in its connection to Findelfin. Any powers it does have will be uncovered through threads, and not here.

Thanks for considering this spoil.

[Caden Law]

It bears mention that, even in matters where Gods are concerned and Time and Space are being ripped apart and krazy-glued back together, Elves tend to get the better end of things. Case in point: Findelfin effectively gets a first class send-off and a ride home to match, whereas Caden spent the jaunt quite literally tumbling through Infinity in much the same way your average Coach passenger goes homicidally insane while trying to block out screaming babies to one side, Gremlins on the wing, and an arguement between a rabid Trekkie and a LARPing Jedi Knight.

Complete with terrible flight attendants and that godawful Dungeons and Dragons movie for in-flight entertainment.

Put into more practical terms: Caden and Anton went down the timestream fighting like drunks who were trying to drown each other without being drowned in turn. Clocks flew by, a couch smacked into them and bounced off, a token catboy went screaming through space and oh, look, a TARDIS with a functioning Chamelon Circuit. Blood leaked out like molten ice around where Caden's scalpel had embedded in Anton's throat, and his other arm shook with effort as he tried to get close enough to rake his bowie across Anton's face and eye. The attempt was blocked by an elbow pressed into his own, and the same hand was wrapped rather awkwardly around the side of his head while Anton's other arm struggled to keep the scalpel from going any deeper or cutting into the major veins that it had so barely missed...

...and somewhere in the midst of all of this, there was kicking. The sort that crumpled Caden's already long-battered chestplate.

The whole way through, they jousted as much verbally as they did with blades and actions. Anton tried every Curse he knew, Caden spat back in a dozen different languages and twenty more that he actually didn't know, and none of it even made sense. Words have no meaning to Time, not even Words of Power.

"die Why ?you just don't," garbled its way out of Anton's mouth, completely out of synch even with the cords in his throat.

"yourself , Strike prick," was Caden's equally unsynched reply, actually spoken before the thing it was responding to.

This continued on. For twenty years and a bunch of spare change measured in worlds and possibilities; Time without time, moving as mortal minds cannot comprehend it. N'Thayn'sal became Althanas, the Reaper Queen went laughing madly backwards into her grave and Scara Brae imploded back into being. Things vanished from where they'd fallen and burned, and beings and forces unmeasured went backstepping into their crypts, their vaults, and their places of power.

Ah...almost there...

Time snapped. The Universe shuddered a bit, and those in tune with the Fourth Wall would've felt it when it happened. Maybe a few of the crazier ones would've seen the changes as chaos butterflies went up in smoke and the Timestream jarred itself onto a new course. With this, the Wizard and the Warlock were literally vomited from nothing; out of what may as well be thin air and desolation somewhere far north of civilization's reaches. They emerged with loud, raging screams, from a direction that could never possibly be named, and without a single special effect to show for it. They were just there, suddenly and inexplicably.

Together they hit the snow and finally rolled away from each other. Anton was fast, but shaken, and Caden had gotten very good at dealing with adrenaline rushes over the past few days; he was up faster and louder and with magic flowing into his bowie and scalpel. Anton was on his knees by the time Caden came down on him, but the Warlock wasn't to be taken easily. An elbow to the chest and Caden's chestplate buckled with a hard crunching sound; he staggered back and lost his footing, and Anton sprang back onto his hands, first one and then the other with his legs jarring out in rapid succession. Boots slammed into Caden and sent him spinning to the ground.

By then, Anton was standing straight and weaving his hands through the air as violet light sprang from his pinky rings and--

"Zieg! Sadoh! RIP HIM APART!"

Caden winced at the sound of that Voice, so easily conjured. He winced harder at the flash of purple to accompany it, and the wreaking stench of brimstone and the unbearable sensation that he was about to die just as Greyspine said he would -- bloody, screaming, and after all of his magicks had failed him.

"...what?"

Except for the part where nothing happened. Anton stared at his hands in utter shock. Caden registered this in an instant, stood up with a spin and crossed knife against scalpel with a shout; magic rippled between the blades and shot forward, visible as nothing but a thin blue blur in the air. Anton saw it coming only belatedly, but still brushed it aside like it was nothing. It took him a moment after that, during which time Caden had the presence of mind to start thinking the classic Prayer of Rincewind: Oh shit oh shit oh shit I am going to die!

"There are two things I want to know, Wizard, and you are going to tell them to me now," Anton Spoke, his Sorcerous Voice carrying the twin weights of power and anger. Against the literal pressure of it, Caden couldn't help but comply. "What did you do to my Familiars?"

"...I cut them off."

Even if he did so by lying through his teeth, and even if all this did was to infuriate the Warlock more.

"Liar!" Anton declared, his Voice ringing so violently that the snow impacted for thirty feet around both of them. Caden shuddered, but hid it well.

"Touchy?" he asked, ironically trying to buy time.

Whatever the reason though, Anton seemed to calm down at this. Irritably, he reached up and laid a hand on his neck wound. It was bleeding normally now, which is to say that the cold weather of the Far North was starting to freeze it in place on his skin.

"For that matter, how did you survive my lightning?"

"Trade secret," Caden grinned.

"You can either tell me or I can rend your soul and torture you for the next seven years before casting you unceremoniously into the nearest Pit of Sorrows," Anton shot back, in a tone that almost passed for casual. Caden considered this, in the way that all men do when told this sort of thing by someone who could, in all likelihood, actually do it.

Needless to say, he reached beneath his chestplate, into his coat, and drew out the small dehlar box given him by Cildorian.

"...ah. How utterly underhanded of you."

"Is that respect I hear in your voice?" Caden asked smugly.

"Of course not. This is simply the tone I'll have when I'm finished eating your face off."

It bears mention that there's nothing quite like seeing a Wyrm smile. Few other humanoids have that many sharp teeth on display. Silence followed it, mostly punctuated only by the sound of distant winds howling through an otherwise crisp, clear, sunny day beyond the icy lakes of Evernorth. Caden put his scalpel away and lowered his knife, and the box as well.

"I think we're at a bit of an impass," he said. "You've lost most of your powers. I can use this to negate whatever's left. You don't know where you are or when you are. So let's just walk away and never meet again."

Almost as soon as he said it, Caden knew he was wrong in every possible respect. Anton cemented the notion with a loud, horrible laugh.

"That's the funny thing, Wizard! I don't need demons to do my dirty work!"

Caden dodged. Pre-emptively, because he knew he'd die otherwise. Even as he did this, Anton's right arm was already up, and purple-edged lightning shot from his fingertips. Caden avoided this, but missed the part where Anton's left arm thrust forward and a frigid, arcane blast of wind came rushing at him. Colored with an edge of blue and purple, it slammed into Caden like the wrath of the arctic, and he went down in shock. He was a hardened native of Salvar's coldest regions, and Anton dropped him like he was nothing. He landed face down in the snow and, bar a shudder here and there, did not move again.

Anton stood his ground for a while after that, still poised to throw another wall of impossible cold should the need arrise. It didn't. When it was clear that it wouldn't, he relaxed a bit.

"Poor Wizard," he said, the way that hunters do when the lion has been killed from a good, safe distance. "You should at least die happy knowing a good secret, so I'll tell you one before you go. You did strip me of most of my power. I can't feel any of my reservoirs, and my Bindings have apparently come undone because of...whatever it is that you used to pull me back in time...and yes. Yes, I can feel that too. It's exactly 3:13:55 High in the Edge of Sulgore's Axe...we're probably not at all far from Icehenge, are we?"

He paused in mid-approach, his movements languid and relaxed now. He could tell the time. He'd probably always be able to now. Place, not quite so easily. It was, Anton would eventually figure out, bleed-off from Caden's mishaps with teleportation and time travel. Just a curious side effect, nothing more or less.

"Well," Anton mused, "I guess the real question is what I'll do after I kill you. I suppose this gives me a unique opportunity to change history to my own benefit but..."

He stopped again, taking his sweet time to reach into his Warlock's Robes. From them, Anton drew a vicious, glamourous looking sword. Curved like a scimitar and glowing icy blue and inscribed with numerous red sigils. The hilt was short and curved, barely hand-and-a-half.

"But enough about me and my plans." He kicked Caden in the shoulder. Twice. Then a third time that actually had the desired effect of rolling the Wizard onto his back. "In case you don't know what this is, it's called a Magicide Blade. For your own personal reference, it's dehlar that's been enchanted. Try to figure out how when you're burning in Hell."

With a flourish and a twirl, he raised the sword up, then brought it back down...

Whatever happened next, it probably boiled down to divine intervention and/or stupidly good timing. Caden shoved his own dehlar box in the Magicide Blade's path, and two objects that were, despite all enchantments to the contrary, null magic personified, smashed into each other as the proverbial Unstoppable Force and Immovable Object. The resulting clash was enough to destroy the box in its entirety, reducing it to a spray of metallic dust across Caden's chest and arms, and the backblow from this threw Anton back several paces as he struggled to keep hold of a sword that now sang like a high-pitched bell.

As all of this was taking place, something else happened.

A wand fell from the ruins of the box, right into Caden's hands. It was about a foot and a half in length, and shaped like one continuous sword hilt of Akashiman make. The wrappings were blue-dyed leather, and each end was dominated by a blue-tinted cap of solid damascus. The actual casing was rywan beneath the leather, but the core was damascus or liviol -- it had to be. Caden could feel the shock of it through the bones of his hands. It was power made physical; a weapon meant for Greyspine himself.

And now it was his.

Incidentally, Caden was smiling like a maniac when he aimed the thing at Anton, who had only just managed to regain his balance and footing. He didn't offer any threats or insults at this point. There was no point. Caden simply focused his willpower, focused his magic and focused every ounce of energy he had to spare and let fly with a tight burst of what may as well be called, for lack of a better word, Hatred. All of the shit that had fallen on him for the past days, and every bit of indignity from being chucked through a door to being threatened and talked down to, hurting, dying by inches and being humiliated time and again -- Caden didn't just throw it at Anton, he sent it with interest and maddened glee.

All that power slammed into the Warlock before he could muster a single defense. The Magicide Blade wasn't in place to block it, he had no barriers set up and there was quite literally nothing he could've done to save himself from the attack. It hit, liquifying the snow at his feet and sending him flying a good twenty or thirty yards. Anton crashed back down with a scream, his sword thumping into snow a fair distance ahead of him, and the Warlock didn't move again for a comfortably long time.

During which, Caden just sat up, wheezing and holding his new wand with a savage look on his face. It said things better than any Voice could, defined by words like Triumph, Power, and Pride.

And then it echoed the earlier prayer-mantra of Oh shit. Which Caden himself repeated quite liberally, as Anton pushed himself up on all fours, his face a bloody mess, his robes disheveled and several teeth missing, but otherwise unphased. He dusted himself off. Took his sweet time about it, too. Then he looked at Caden and very calmly declared, "You're going to pay for that, Wizard."

...which is, of course, when the harps sang in again, from a direction that was now perpetual South. The shadows on Caden's body, and the lines in his clothes and the details of his face -- all of it lit up and turned gold. Despite himself, and despite everything else, he met the threat with a bastard's smile.

"Never next time, Warlock."

Got you.

He was gone with a flash, and the harps lilted to a distant stop just as quickly as they had arrived. Anton was left behind. Alone in the reaches of the farthest North, twenty years out of time and a world out of place.

Ten miles away, a native tribe heard his screams of rage and mistook them for angry Wendigo.

Spoils Request:

Damascus/Rywan Wand: An intricately crafted piece of work straight out of a future that will, hopefully, never come to pass. It consists of a Rywan casing around a Damascus or Liviol core, capped with Damascus at both ends. The entire thing is wrapped with blue-dyed leather strips, very much resembling the hilt of a katana. Measures in at a rough 18 inches in length. While it bears no permanent enchantments of its own, it makes for a powerful, durable focal point for Caden's magicks.

Any and all money I would've earned for my participation goes into this thing. It's the reward I want most for my participation in three FQ threads (the same ones as Findelfin). If my acquisition of it interferes with any of the spoils I requested at the end of this post from The Field of Sighs and Sorrows, then I'll readily drop almost all of them*. I leave it up to the Judge as to whether or not the wand is cored with Damascus or Liviol; either one is fine with me.

* The only one of the bunch I truly wanted was the Arcane Magic affinity. Siege Arcana will be out of Caden's reach for the foreseeable future anyway, and the Conscript equipment was mostly to stay in continuity with the Featured Quest RPs; they were likely to be destroyed at this rate anyway.

Knowledge: Timetelling: Owing to his jaunts through Time during a teleportation spell mishap, Caden has acquired the ability to give the exact time and date down to the last second, regardless of whether he has a reference or not.

Knowledge: Cosmic Positioning Sense: Owing to his jaunts through Space during that same teleportation spell mishap, Caden has gained the ability to tell where he is down to the city level, by name and even if he's never actually been there. Effectively useless for making his way through the inside of a coffee house, it's obviously no good for finding a way through mazes or dungeons either.

These are more for RP than anything else. For what it's worth, CPS will likely fade as time goes by, and only amounts to Caden being able to name whatever region, sub-region or city he's in at the time.

Besides all that, thanks to Findelfin for playing this out with me. I appreciate his help, and his tolerance of my constant badgering with questions Per his request, I'm submitting this for Judging. Thanks in advance to whoever picks it up.

BELATED EDIT: Greyspine's Grimoire does not count as a true spoil (to me, anyway). Caden won't be gleaming any magic bits from it or anything, for reasons that will be RPed when he finally reappears in the next FQ Chapter. It's just a bona fide history book with a plot purpose.

[Skie and Avery]

Quest Judging
The Cosmic Detour

STORY

Continuity ~ 6/10. This was pretty interesting, though had I not read the other FQ threads I would have been very confused.
Setting ~ 7/10.
Pacing ~ 9/10.

CHARACTER

Dialogue ~ 6/10. Plain, and sometimes a little more monologuish than I would have thought realistic when it came to an argument.
Action ~ 7/10.
Persona ~ 7/10. I think that Findelfin really shone here, as far as showing the change in him.

WRITING STYLE

Technique ~ 7/10. What hurts here, Caden is that I think you try too hard to emulate Pratchett. While writing LIKE someone else isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's bad when you try to write like them and miss the boat. Find your own style. There's nothing wrong with infusing a fantasy work with real world references and humor. But find your own voice to do it.
Mechanics ~ 8/10. There were awkward comma usage and a couple of tense mistakes I spotted. A few wrong words used, like fought instead of found. Nothing too big.
Clarity ~ 7/10. There were times when I wasn't sure what was going on, and there were some references Caden used that really threw me through a loop. Real world references aren't bad. They can be used successfully, and have been before here. Ter-Thok's writing is a prime example. However, you have to be careful with which ones you use, and how much explination you give with it. You mentioned TARDIS and Chamelon Circuits. I have no idea what those things are. It only confused me and made your joke fall flat.
MISCELLANEOUS

Wild Card ~ 7/10. Nicely done. There have been threads that play with time before, of course, but this was done well. It was interesting and relevant, and I thought the two of you pulled it off with great style.

TOTAL ~ 71/100.

Rewards

Caden Law gains 1236 EXP
Sighter Tnailog gains 1648 EXP and 85 GP

Other Spoils

Caden Law gains a Damascus/Rywan wand with liviol core, and internal GPS/clock abilities. XD
Sighter Tnailog gains the rosary as outlined.