My Apologies to Leo Tolstoy

[Sighter Tnailog]

((For the mod: I was on the verge of calling this thread "War and Peace." After that great disrespect towards the late master, the only appropriate title seems to be..."My Apologies to Leo Tolstoy." This is for Letho and Arsene.))

It was a quiet day in the Peaceful Promenade. It was still morning, the sun nearly a quarter of an hour from its zenith, and so the late crowd hadn't even woken up yet; the few day-in, day-out drunks lounged at the bar. Near the door was a noble-looking gentlemen, sword strapped at his waist, clearly taking his morning meal in a place that made him feel like one of the people. And in the corner, lounging at a table, was Findelfin ap Fingolfin.

It was hard to quantify all the things that had happened since the fall of Eluriand. In what seemed the blink of an eye he had been whisked around the world by some awful spell of Varalad Del Tirin's, talked with Thayne and seen a future no living soul desired, save maybe a few perverse souls lost to depraved depths; ogre-worshipers and things worse than ogres. And now here he was, desperately trying to find a way to avoid that fate. His first thought had been Letho Ravenheart.

He tapped his foot expectantly, waiting for the Marshal to arrive. He had sent him a letter giving when he would be in the city, and giving a list of times when he would try to be available. He had been in the same place yesterday and the Marshal never came, and today was the last day he could stay in town. He was due outside the city soon, as one of his key business ventures, the one that would pay dividends to the Raiaerans and help keep them financially afloat to wage their resistance, had waged war. So now he had to come help them win a war they probably shouldn't have been in anyway. But there were undead still to kill, and a necromancer who loomed large over his consciousness. He couldn't afford to waste time like this.

He hoped the letter would work. He had made it mysterious and cryptic, mentioning all sorts of things that would strike the Marshal as mystic. His informants on that subject had been clear: the Marshal disliked mysteries, riddles, mystic mumbo-jumbo, and anything that didn't seem real. Yet, for some reason, precisely because he disliked them he would be the first to try to unravel their mysteries. Findelfin hoped he'd been told correctly; the letter he sent was mysterious indeed. Now to let Ravenheart's own curiosity lead him directly to the elf's table.

But he was there anyway. A coy waitress approached, clearly designed to entice him into something alcoholic. "Can I get you something, sir?" Her voice grated on his nerves; at any other time he might have appreciated her curves, but right now the only body he wanted to see was Marshal Letho Ravenheart's.

"No, ma'am. But if my guest arrives, please be here a moment after he sits down with a glass of wine for me and a pretty smile for him. And get him whatever he wants, I'll pay for it."

She curtsied deeply enough to show him cleavage. But his eyes were on the door. His eyes were always on the door.

[Letho]

Marshal Letho Ravenheart stood in the courtyard of the Ranger’s outpost in the outskirts of Underwood, the typical resolve on his face substituted by brooding reluctance. His horse was saddled and geared up, the gate before him yawning at the vibrant green of Concordia and the path that led back towards Willowtown where he could prepare for the oncoming war. He should take that road, he knew. His business here was done, reports signed and sealed and dispatched to headquarters, outpost inspected and found in satisfactory condition, men as ready as they could be. And yet instead of mounting his steed and making it trot westwards, his fingers flipped the mysterious missive he had received several days ago.

At first he had ignored the note, disregarded it as he would a death card from a deck of a tarot reader or a doomsayer shouting on the streets that the end has come. He had more urgent business than investigating some unconfirmed rumors, regardless how eloquently they were presented. Elves... They needed twice as many words to say half as much as normal people and even then you couldn’t be certain that you actually understood the message. Such was the nature of this invitation from Findelfin ap Fingolfin. The legendary elf wrote a lot in his letter without saying much, entangled words in riddles that Letho didn’t even try to solve. And if it were anybody else’s signature at the bottom of this baloney, Letho would’ve thrown the note away. But Findelfin wasn’t one to squander time and effort needlessly.

The Marshal had learned this several months back, when the same elf used the same enigmatic speech to explain something that rested in the bowels of the earth at Siukan’s Haven. Letho had been skeptical about the whole charade, assured that the only mystery to be found in that cave was some slumbering beast, a dragon at worst. But then he witnessed queer things, things that could scarcely be explained by regular means. Things that shook the prejudice he had towards mystic talk. That was probably why he wasn’t about to discard the possibility to meet Findelfin. The elf perhaps didn’t reveal much about his true intentions, but the very act of concealment and enshrouding made it clear that there was something to be read between the lines. And not knowing gnawed at Letho’s curiosity just enough to make him change his heading.

He returned the note into his breast pocket, climbed into the saddle and rode towards Underwood.

Noon was still on approach by the time the dirt gave way to cobbles and the forest of trees became a jungle of buildings and moving bodies. It was a hot day, a busy day, and no district in the town was a better example than the mercantile one. Unfortunately, that was where the Peaceful Promenade was situated, somewhere beyond the river of people through which Letho had to walk his horse or risk trampling someone down. The establishment itself wasn’t packed yet; it was still too early for the surge of regular drunks out for their daily poison and the local woodcutters out for their lunches.

With so many vacant tables, it wasn’t hard to locate Findelfin, even if he did choose to occupy the corner table. Letho walked across the room without a moment of pause, his spurred boots jingling almost in accord with the sound of his sword clicking against the armor. His face was epitome of seriousness, making it clear that he didn’t come here for drinks and palavering. Once he reached the table, he took a seat across from the elf without a word spoke, reaching inside his coat instead and procuring the rolled-up note. He tossed it at the middle of the round table.

“Findelfin ap Fingolfin,” he voiced the name almost grimly. “You have summoned me and I am here. So are you now going to tell me what you really want from me or do you want to continue to natter like in the letter?”

By the time he finished his not-so-cordial introduction, the busty barmaid was at their table, serving a tall glass of wine to the elf. “And for you, Marshal?” she asked humbly. He was a familiar face in these parts, far too familiar for his own liking. He sent the girl away with a shake of his head and a gesture of his hand. He didn’t want a drink. He didn’t want an eyeful of cleavage. He wanted answers.

[Sighter Tnailog]

It was with no small pleasure that Findelfin saw Marshal Ravenheart enter the doorway. He regarded him coolly, suppressing the hint of a smile that sought to play at the corner of his lips. The man looked for all the world like a Corone Ranger, from the dusty mop on his head to the dusty boots on his feet. Findelfin had to suppress his anticipation. He had been waiting for this discussion for a long time, ever since the Marshal had dropped a key on the ground outside Siukan's Haven.

Smiling at the door who brought the wineglass, he handed her a few coins, "Here, for your time, there's a little extra in it for you. If we need more, we'll call, but make sure we're left alone."

As he reached with one hand to lift the stem of the glass from the table, he reached out with the other and dropped a golden key on the table. It was large, maybe half-a-hand in size, and plain. The only mark of finery was the material of which it was made and a peculiar symbol on the bow and the blade, of a sword, helm, and shield emblazoned on a sigil of fire. The only important thing about it, to the Marshal's eye, would be that Letho Ravenheart had a key of exactly the same make, only slightly smaller. He let the key sit there for a moment as he lifted the glass, swirled its blood-red contents twice, and tasted them carefully. Average.

Setting the glass down, he said, "I'm glad you came, Marshal. My apologies for the mystic hodgepodge I put in that letter, but I worry that in today's political climate you might not have been the only one to read it." He leaned back in his seat, crossed his arms, and set a finger against his chin before continuing.

"Please listen to what I have to say. You'll want to comment, but hear me out. You can't have missed that Raiaera has fallen, unless you've stopped picking up the Radasanthian Reader. And Salvar is burning at the hands of the Church of the Ethereal Sway, whose leader just happens to be the wonderful Saint Denebriel. Alerar recently had a high-profile assassination, and I have good information that the one accused of the crime, Ashiakin Xan-ris Azzarak, did not do the deed."

He came forward for a moment, letting his arms fall on the tabletop, and affixed the Marshal with a deep stare. "And you know better than I that civil war continues here, battles between those who should be friends. Terrorist acts fill the street, and it's anyone's guess whether they are committed by the resistance or the government pretending to be the resistance. You know as well as I do that something in all of this does not feel right. Two of the Forgotten Ones, Xem'zûnd and Denebriel, walk again to wage war on the same lands they ravaged in the bygone past. And the two Forgotten whose methods of operation were always secret plots and puppet governments -- Nyvengaal and Podë -- why, the countries that most often received their ire are the same countries whose political systems now waver on the brink of collapse. And both these Forgotten were seen walking at least three years ago, when the first assault on Raiaera came from the Obsidian Spire."

Sighing, he took another sip of wine, continuing to hunker over the table like a life-long drunk on his fifteenth drink, dropping his eyes to ponder the grain of the wood. "Letho Ravenheart, I do not know you well. But I know you well enough to know you don't feel the urgency of legendary memories and fairytales. But Elvish songs stretch into the past; there is at least one elf I know of who was alive when the hosts of the free besieged Denebriel's capital of Caradin and put an end to the Wars of the Tap. So I want you to hear me when I say that I have a great fear. I fear that at least four of the five are at work again. And if the fifth arises, Lord Aesphestos, then fear becomes too faint a word."

He put down his wine, and looked back up at Letho. "Despair might be better." He had still not mentioned the key. He would let the Marshal bring that up.

[Letho]

Quite a few of Findelfin’s assumptions hit the mark with some precision, but that was to be expected. His kind had an almost annoying ability to perceive a lot from very little, draw insightful conclusions by utilizing their wisdom and the vast knowledge bestowed upon them by longevity. If you didn’t have sand between your ears, a couple of life spans of an average human made you witness pretty much every possible scenario, which made suppositions less of a shot in a dark and more of an educated guess. That was the case here.

Yes, Letho was aware of Raiaera’s unfortunate fall, and the upheaval in Salvar, and the mysterious assassinations in Alerar. You didn’t have to have an intricate web of informants to sniff out that information; it reeked to high heaven with every ship of refugees that ran aground on Corone’s shores. But unlike Findelfin, the Marshal saw nothing mysterious in those occurrences. Wars happened, as did subversions and bloody murders. The fact that they were happening almost instantaneously wasn’t an enigma, but an unfortunate coincidence. If there was a connection between these events, its ties were buried to deep to rouse suspicion. His elven companion had an explanation for that as well, in what Letho thought as the baloney part of his soliloquy.

“Forgotten ones?” he repeated in an incredulity-laden tone. The words weren’t meant to be condescending or even mocking; they were words of a man grown who was just said that the boogeyman was real and slept in your closet during the day. There was no ultimate evil in the world, no archvillains that were the very darkness embodied, out to enshroud and suffocate the world. There were just evil people doing evil deeds out of the vileness of their hearts. These Forgotten Ones were probably no different, just bad folk out for some nonspecific revenge.

Letho was about to give voice to this skepticism when his eyes caught the glint of the key the bladesinger set upon the table surface. And his doubt suddenly took a tumble for the worst. The key was an almost identical twin of the one he had in his possession, the one Findelfin and he discussed about at Siukan’s Haven. Siukan’s Haven, where nightmares and bugbears were more than just a tale for scaring the children. Letho’s hand went to his beard, stroking it at a slow, thoughtful pace. Another coincidence? How many more of those could his dubiety take? The stroking stopped and the bulky man folded his arms almost defensively as he leant against the creaky backrest a bit.

“Fine, let us work under the premise that these ancient enemies of yours truly walk the face of Althanas. What do you want of me? You said it yourself, two of these campaign in the North while others keep to the shadows. Meanwhile, there is an Empire out to snuffle the last remnants of freedom here in Corone. I can hardly waste time and resources on a witch hunt.” His words wound up sounding a bit hard, perhaps even inconsiderate given the fact that all of this was tied closely to the downfall of Findelfin’s home. That was why, when he continued, Letho’s voice was more placid, albeit still rather somber.

“Don’t misunderstand me; I mourn for the fall of Raiaera. They were forever our allies and friends, but also frontiersmen on a border between the civilized world and the barbarity of Alerar. But I cannot abandon the fire in my own backyard to help quench yours.”

There was an adamant sort of finality in his words, the kind that made it clear that, regardless of what Findelfin said next, it would fail to change Letho’s thoughts on the matter. But he remained sitting, if for no other reason than to inquire about another object of interest. For him the subject of Forgotten Ones seemed to be closed.

“Where did you get that?” he finally said, gesturing to the key. “I happen to have one just like it.”

[Sighter Tnailog]

Findelfin could see doubt in the Marshal's eyes. Even the way he carried himself -- arms crossed, head tilted slightly back, shoulders relaxed as if nothing in the world could ruffle him -- spoke to a bemused detachment. Findelfin had seen bemused detachment before. It tended to exist more in elves, whose many years on the earth were as likely to dull them to complacency as they were to deepen their wisdom. He hoped that he had at least avoided the former fate; he withheld his judgment on the latter. No human should have the convenience of bemusement. Their lives are too short.

"First, we must at least assume one of the Forgotten still walks. If you admit Raiaera fell, then you must at least admit that. I am certain beyond doubt that Denebriel lives and moves, although I have no proof to offer that would convince skeptics or cynics."

Findelfin reached out and took the key, "As to this key, it's a funny story. I was in that land you call barbarous, Alerar -- and I would very much agree, although I will say that when Valinatal fell even Alerar was willing to accept our refugees, if grudgingly, and so I give them some measure of civilization. And I was in their land not long ago at the Library of Ettermire -- hardly a collection of barbaric texts. While there I ran into a man I once knew.

"We had grown up together, in a fashion. I had lived in Timbrethinil for nearly one hundred and eighty years of the sun; he had been living for scarcely a quarter of that, and yet felt the older. My training had been in song and archery before then, but he taught me the ways of the sword and woodcraft that even most elves do not know. And then he was gone one day, as soon as he had come. Later I struck up a friendship with his son -- " Findelfin trailed off for a second, thinking, then looked up to continue.

"But that doesn't come into this. In any event, I fled the library, and as I fled I came across this man once more. In forty-five years I had aged scarcely a day; my hands had grown stronger, my heart bolder, my head wiser. But he was as the eldest of my kind, bent and broken. I must admit; I had never really understood the differences between our kinds until that day. Not until my friend who was once ruddy and full of life appeared before me gray and thin, close to the ravages of time that wear so heavily on the shoulders of men. Although, even now I can't claim to fully understand it.

"He killed himself in front of me. Said that we were to fight, but that even as an old man he would be able to kill me in my state; I was wounded, and he was only old, not weak. But he wanted me to have his position; some ancient code said he had to die to pass it on, and so he did. He shoved his sword into himself as I watched, and as he died he handed me this key, along with a letter."

He held up the key, and looked at his companion. And then he concentrated, and these next words were heard only by the Marshal. "Telendor Nauvarin. It is not a name you would have heard; I had not heard of it before opening this letter and following up where it told me to go. It is a society that has existed since the end of the Wars of the Tap, a society that exists to prevent wars of that magnitude from ever happening again. It is at the smallest it has ever been. Its five leaders are to be the Diadem, the Elder, the Exhorter, the Protector, and the Acolyte, but as of now there are only two: the Elder and the Diadem, and their authority is symbolized by the keys they hold. And yet, somehow, you have received a key. From what I am told by the Elder, this means only one thing: there is a living Acolyte, and he wants you to join Telendor Nauvarin."

And then he broke the silence, on another topic entirely. He kept his voice low; this didn't need to be kept to telepathy, but it still wouldn't do to be heard. "But enough of my dead friends...you don't care, I'm sure. You say you cannot abandon a fire in your backyard, and I don't blame you. But Daer Taurë into which we elves have fled cannot hold all of Raiaera's fighters; and there are those among the refugees in Radasanth and Knife's Edge who feel some sympathy with your cause. I know that you are finding it difficult to hold Concordia -- don't look surprised that I know, as Diadem I know more of your troops than you think I do, a few of them are even members of Telendor Nauvarin already -- and yet if you could command the crossroads at Underwood you might divide the Empire at its core.

"Raiaera needs the right fighters, not overwhelming numbers of fighters. And so what excess we have could be sent to you. By nightfall your numbers could have swollen by nearly seventy or more battle-ready Bladesingers, with more prepared from Radasanth and Gisela by the end of the week. At month's end, if we can get everyone safe from Salvar, you would have nearly three hundred more heads than you have now, all of them more than ready to work with deadly efficiency within the forest."

Findelfin cocked his head to the side.

"So, Marshal Ravenheart, what do you say? Or perhaps...perhaps I should call you Rebel Ravenheart? One thing I've never been able to fathom, though, even with all my eyes and ears...what, exactly, is the Coalition?"

[Taskmienster]

This thread has been sitting since before the beginning of this year (2009). Since no response has been made to create activity I am going to be moving this. If you would like it to be reopened please feel free to PM myself or another admin and they will be able to move it for you back to the Peaceful Promenade.