Anthropologeist
12-27-12, 01:46 PM
The spring was blossoming in Alerar. The day had been full of bluster and chills, though the hint of green clover springing up through barren yards along the Ettermire lanes were an indication that winter would soon come to a close. From the window flung open from her dorm to the streets below, Nathyl lounged on her bed, curled under a heavy quilt. The ebb and flow of the icy wind nipped at her nose, but she could better see the burgeoning tufts of sprouts pushing triumphantly through the dead garden in the yard across the lane. Listening for a moment as the quiet was punctured by the splatter and smack of the dregs of the morning's rains as they spilled from rooftops into the gutter, she once more turned to the tome open upon her lap.
The book itself was thin, at least thinner than most of the books she drug back and forth from her classes. It was a history on the Wyrmcrusher clan, noting the highest honors bestowed upon them in their time in Alerar. Somewhere beyond the city, where the rocky inclines of the mountains began to jut perilously from the earth, the clan crypts sat. They'd yet to be explored, as the Wyrmcrushers were only of modest wealth and the last of their line had not yet been dead a century. But still, the parchment that sat to her side on the bed was a missive that she must go.
They'd been given their projects for the semester, things that must be accomplished before the summer came and the school went on break to prepare for the next. How lucky, she'd thought, how fantastic, to be given the chance to do field work in one of her first classes. She hadn't thought she would be venturing alone into some ancient splay at least until her second year. Her expectations of the first year had been filled with group projects, under the watchful eye of an instructor as they dug for pottery shards in some long-picked over ruins. Although, she thought, she may not be completely alone.
The instructor had explained that each student would be sent to a different pre-approved site, and instructed to document and carefully excavate one item of historic or cultural importance. While they would not have an instructor or classmates with them, the school itself would conscript "assistants." However, there was a burst of thrill at the way they had explained the hired hands, and Nathyl was sure that what the school truly meant was bodyguards for who knew what untold dangers laid within the hidden chambers of the mountains?
Eventually, the sun began to sink, hiding behind the tops of the towers that rose up in the city. As the skyline took over, and dusk settled in, so too do the Drow girl put away her books and close up the window against the true frost of the night. Creeping back to bed, she settled down to sleep, determined to be up before she saw the sun again, ready and willing to take on the day and the challenge the crypts might hold.
The book itself was thin, at least thinner than most of the books she drug back and forth from her classes. It was a history on the Wyrmcrusher clan, noting the highest honors bestowed upon them in their time in Alerar. Somewhere beyond the city, where the rocky inclines of the mountains began to jut perilously from the earth, the clan crypts sat. They'd yet to be explored, as the Wyrmcrushers were only of modest wealth and the last of their line had not yet been dead a century. But still, the parchment that sat to her side on the bed was a missive that she must go.
They'd been given their projects for the semester, things that must be accomplished before the summer came and the school went on break to prepare for the next. How lucky, she'd thought, how fantastic, to be given the chance to do field work in one of her first classes. She hadn't thought she would be venturing alone into some ancient splay at least until her second year. Her expectations of the first year had been filled with group projects, under the watchful eye of an instructor as they dug for pottery shards in some long-picked over ruins. Although, she thought, she may not be completely alone.
The instructor had explained that each student would be sent to a different pre-approved site, and instructed to document and carefully excavate one item of historic or cultural importance. While they would not have an instructor or classmates with them, the school itself would conscript "assistants." However, there was a burst of thrill at the way they had explained the hired hands, and Nathyl was sure that what the school truly meant was bodyguards for who knew what untold dangers laid within the hidden chambers of the mountains?
Eventually, the sun began to sink, hiding behind the tops of the towers that rose up in the city. As the skyline took over, and dusk settled in, so too do the Drow girl put away her books and close up the window against the true frost of the night. Creeping back to bed, she settled down to sleep, determined to be up before she saw the sun again, ready and willing to take on the day and the challenge the crypts might hold.