A Study in Black

[Ataraxis]

Ettermire was the same as ever, a cyclopean cityscape sprawling with the hustle and bustle of booming industries. They spanned far and wide upon the Aleranian capital in black-smeared towers that would scale the very skies, were it not for the shroud of smog that smothered them out of sight. Never at rest were the city’s thousand factories, eternally besieged by the grind of gears and the hiss of pumps as blistering flames roared from within the marshaled hordes of blast furnaces. Hammers sounded in the forges like mallets against a drumhead, following the well-known beat of war as acrid smokes trumpeted from the smokestacks. Everything in Ettermire was evocative of war; all went by their lives under the baleful fog of conflict seen in the soot clouds overhead, prepared to wage battle with an enmity known only to them by the whisper they heard calling yonder the mountains, an ominous orchestra of fifes and clarions.


But the enemy is always closer than one thinks; to bring strife in Alerar, borders need not be crossed.

[Ataraxis]

It was not particularly cold or musty, but it did feel and smell of incipient dankness. Nose cringing under the burgeoning presence of mildew, Lillian scooted away from the bookshelves, putting the blame on one of the tightly-wadded books and booklets, or the interstices in between. It appeared that in the Library of Ettermire, things were not as orderly as the general populace was led to believe. While browsing one of the innumerable sections of the library, she had stumbled upon quite a few damaged spines, some scraped covers and one too many a bent corner. As a librarian – well, assistant librarian, at any rate – Lillian was appalled by such flagrant mistreatment of valuable articles, and the fetor of the dimly-lit nook near which she sat was the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back. In a huff, she left the stale corner through the vaulted alcove, clumsily lugging a teetering stack of brick-like volumes to one of the desks that lined the nearest study room.

In her amble through a vast marbled aisle, she stared in wonder at rows upon rows of knowledge-laden shelves, witnessing the black, burgundy and sunburnt spines glow under a nigh-ethereal light, something only true scholars could distinguish when roving through the wondrous corridors of Ankhas. This was where the magic of book-keeping truly shone, for here were displayed ancient tomes fraught with most of the world's arcane lore, worthy of a more-than-regal exposition to the public's awe, to nobles and paupers alike whence the four corners of the realm. Angling her gaze to the lofty heights of these varnished bookcases, Lillian could barely see the summit where ended the wood and black marble began; and this was only one walkway amongst many, many others. Staring back at the damp collection weighing on her willowy arms, she felt dramatically dwarfed - and perhaps a bit shamed.

Coming upon a sturdy rosewood table, she dropped the stack with a low tumble and rumble, perhaps by inadvertence but mostly because her arms could take no more. Silent, stoic glares rolled over her, allowing some condescending judgment to be passed, but it wasn’t long before their owners lost interest and returned narrow, beady eyes to their respectful pieces of literature. In a gripping surge of self-consciousness, the young woman briskly divided her book heap into four different piles and promptly drew her chair to sit, inching it back in with utmost care. A last sheepish glance at her entourage was taken before she silently kicked off her ankle boots, hearing only the faintest rattle on the floor; finally, she began the toilsome endeavour that was compulsory reading.

After all, she had been sent on the search for an answer, and she did not intend to return empty-handed.

[Ataraxis]

“Through many hardships our kin has seen; our forebears had fled the cradle of Quessiria, driven out by the scourge of the Fulkaurim. Upon Anebrilith, they came in a derelict ship; and though this ship was riddled with the scarring blight of olden enemies, it had swiftly seen our forefathers through the mercurial seas, to a land where their lives could start anew, beginning then the Minya Coronari. This great ship was the hope of our salvation, the saving light of our Blood; it was the Eledhwe. Though to naught but smouldering coals and grey ashes was it reduced, today, we remember it still with the yearly burning of a ship, symbol that our hope can never be forgot.

“The Durklans were native to Anebrilith, and had thrived along our own for centuries in what we had thought to be peace and prosperity. Alas, halcyon days had become but a thing of the past when the docile men ordered an attack on our settlements, engulfing all Elves in a state of utter bewilderment. Our lands were soom overrun, and again were we forced to withdraw. It was general opinion that fate had come full circle, and plans of fleeing to the seas had begun to arise; but so did the magicks of old, burning freshly in our ancestors' souls. The Art of Song-Magic was taught to both the elderly and the youthful, and promptly were the belligerent Durklans pushed back by the nascent ranks of Bladesingers, supported by the might of Tel Aglarim, until the final confrontation where the wicked melodies of the Enarlin had prevailed over their numbers.

“With this victory, years of hope were upon us; thus was created the Coronari Estella, a new calendar for a true, new start.” This was but an excerpt of A Country Claimed, which dealt with the distribution of the Elven population from the shores of their landing in Anebrilith to the Ered Lomei, the Mountains of Dusk, but told of the boundaries set by the Dwarven occupation of the these highlands; afterwards, a long period of stability settled upon the Elven lands. Lillian gingerly shut the copy of the millenial essay, thumbing its bossed back before moving on to a younger piece on Elven history, eager to learn of what created the social chasm between Raiaera and Alerar. She plucked what now lay atop the history-related stack, a thin, yellowed manuscript, protected by a black-leather slipcase; but though it was undeniably old, she knew it to be but a centurial transcript, its master copy surely kept safe in one of Ankhas' underground vaults. According to the front matter, the contents would be a concise, chronological retelling of what little could be garnered through the ages, referring to what the world knew as the ‘War of the Tap’. Pulling back behind her ear a black cluster of hair, she read on, curiosity crimping the space between her eyes.


Betwixt 2060 and 4020, Coronari Estella.

Althanas is at war. The Forgotten Ones prove to be remarkable enemies. Raiaera remains uninvolved from the conflict, even when Denebriel, one of the Forgotten, attempts to win over the High Bards to side with their forces. However, the Forgotten Podë, inhabiting the Great Forest, leads many onslaughts against Raiaera, and effectively draws the High Elves into the war, alongside the Mya. (…)

The Dark Elves deign the magic of their fairer blood too weak against the sheer power of their adversaries, and demand the opportunity to put their own plans into motion; this opportunity never comes, and the Dark Elves begin harbouring animus toward the High Elves. After many losing battles of Dark Elven soldiers under the command of High Elven leaders, the High Elves oust the Dark Elves from Raiaera, to the west. By then, the battle against Podë and Xem’zund appears to be lost. In Alerar, the Dark Elves fight the forces of Nyvengaal in hopes of recovering their pride. (…)

Salvar, largely underdeveloped and mostly barren, as it is devoid of any substantial population, becomes the ideal battleground for the Forgotten Ones and those who oppose them. Caradin is the location of the final confrontation between Aesphestos and the High bard of Raiaera. (…)

Ancient artefacts, the Masters of Light, are key components to a ritual (originally led by two Mya and the Bard himself) that would allow the metaphysical fettering of the Forgotten Ones. Aesphestos’ plan was to thwart the magical rite. He would have done so, his forces having weaved through Caradin’s defenses, were it not for the High Bard’s direct intervention: delegating his place in the ceremony to the Master Bard of Lissilin, he faces the Leader of the Forgotten head on and fights him to a stalemate using the nullifying magic of the Turlin. The High Bard’s voice is suppressed by one of the Forgotten’s spells; this should have logically equated a defeat, but the Bard claps on, casting his spells with the voice of his golden hands. (…)

In the end, the ceremony of binding is not completely successful, and the Master Bard of Lissilin is unable to buffer the flux of unbridled power, which nearly wipes all Mya from the face of the world and shatters the Eternal Tap. As for the fate of the Forgotten Ones, it is believed that the ritual has at least successfully sealed them away, if not erased them from existence. (…)

To this day, the repercussions of the War can still be witnessed, notably in the northernmost regions of Salvar, where magical rifts, frays in the weave of the universe as corollary to the supernatural deflagration that ended the War.At the end of the reading, Lillian frowned with moderate discontentment. Most of the manuscript consisted of otiose details concerning rises to the throne and deaths for those part of an erstwhile gentry, while vague facts were purported here and there about the main attacks of the Forgotten. All she had learned was that they were few and far between, but that when they did occur, they were always of considerable magnitude. Some passages had provided her with a better insight on the war and of the schism between the Elves, High and Dark; but alas, many questions remained unanswered: what exactly was this Eternal Tap, other than an ancient source of ultimate magic? Who were the Forgotten? Where did they come from and how did they acquire such world-shaking powers? And the Mya. Never before had Lillian heard of these people, but she surmised that they possessed an inherent affinity to the Tap, which may have been the ironic cause of their near-extinction at the War's conclusion.

What rang a familiar bell, however, was this reference to Masters of Light. Upon reading these words, unease had gripped her midpoint. Perhaps she was mistaken with the heroes of childhood legends or oldwives' tales. The young girl sat in unrest, squeamishly writhing upon the ruddy hupholstery in a vain attempt to ignore the agasting answer that churned inside her mind. She knew it. The term was eerily reminiscent of untold mysteries, secrets that riddled the pages of her mindscape at night. They were not memories per se, but ciphered messages, sent from beyond the Firmament. What affrighted her most was that she was never meant to see them... and that she was but a host, a mere vessel to these arcana's true Recipient.

In order to shed her qualms, she shook her head dryly and released a sigh, the wind wafting with it all worries that dwelled in and obscured her wits. Lillian had a job to do: she had no time to spare for personal introspection.

[Ataraxis]

‘Ah, enough of history.’ With a short sigh, she slid the aged manuscript and A Country Claimed back on their stack, wiggled to her right and picked a book from the contiguous pile. ‘Let us now take a short course on Aleranian and Raiaeran geography,’ she thought to herself, an inward sigh rolling in the backdrop of her mind. There was no denying that she was an avid reader, and in other circumstances, she would actually be enticed by a prospective lesson in geography, regional and environmental, in addition to landscape ecology. It was the idea that this was a task given rather than a pleasure taken that made the activity far less alluring to the youthful girl. Leaning over the open book as her hands pinned it down by its embossed covers to the wood's polished grain, Lillian let loose a silent, wordless war cry, not too different from the clearing of a throat.

The article dealing with Raiaera was, at most, intriguing. More often than never, it would tell of the Raiaerans’ diet, which was contingent on what part of the country they lived on: wheat and corn and other field products in the austral regions and tubers, mainly spuds, in the north. ‘Or’, Lillian pointed half-amusedly, ‘as this overly-dated book says, the ‘septentrional’ areas.’ This particular eccentricity notwithstanding, it was a respectable and accurate detailing of the country’s landscape, starting from the bustling port city of Anebrilith to Emyn Naug, the Dwarf Hills. It would then describe the enigmatic presence of the Black Desert, oft pelted with downpours yet always parched, desiccated and utterly unwelcoming, home of many a strange creature who tunnel deep beneath the dunes, out of sight but always near. The Red Forest – once known as the Great Forest before its bewitchment by Podë, Lillian remembered – saw its expanse overseen by countless watchtowers and was host to innumerable villages that contended with the forestry of Cyper, Eklan, Trakym, Ulder and the coveted, red Nihon timber. The Plains of Raiaera were propitious for the raising of horses and the Dagger Peeks were impassable, but were gorged with Damascus ore and lined with many veins of Mythril, not unlike the Ered Lomei, Mountains of Dusk. ‘But as I am in Alerar, I had better call them the Mountains of Dawn, or Ered Anoron.’ A wan chuckle followed her tongue-in-cheek comment, providing her with a mild spring of entertainment in such a tedious labor.

Deciding she wasn’t fond enough of Alerar to grant it much care, she skimmed the seven pages dedicated to its verbose description, committing it all to memory in seven instants (her mind may be quick, but her fingers had their limits). Lillian was perfectly capable of leafing through all of the tomes that now littered the wide desk, but her choice of going against a continuous use of her prodigious reading speed, teamed with an unwontedly-absorbent memory, was simply out of respect for those studying in her vicinity: seeing an adolescent fluttering through hundreds of pages from books upon books could either inspire a helpless sense of diffidence in year-hardened scholars, or a scoffing mockery from cynical and derisive observers. In both cases, doing so would be exceptionally annoying to the ear, especially in the tense tranquility of the library, and Lillian was not one to willingly attract attention, particularly if it was malevolent.

Upon the bold lettering of ‘Salvar’ did her index fall, and her mind reeled back to the mention of magical rifts in the manuscript she had previously read. ‘This should prove to be helpful.’

Whenever she could, Lillian browsed over extraneous information, such as life expectancy (50 for males, 53 for females), the pie chart for racial breakdown (humans, dark elves, dwarves and others: respectively 86, 9, 4 and 1%) and the demographics (620 thousand for the kingdom, 60 thousand for the tribes), safekeeping all instances in her mind but elsewise not paying any greater level of heed to them for the pure purpose of saving time. What piqued her interest was Salvar’s topography, from Kachuk and its world-renowned mines to the osmium-slaked Ahyark Mountains, and then farther again to Sulgoran’s Axe, where dense pine forests, the tribal lands for hunters, gatherers and foresters, stretched through the northwest and rugged hills, home to tribes of hunters and herders, extended over the northeast.

“There, Berevar,” she whispered unmindfully, her mind clinging on all she could gather of the Northern Colonies, beyond the frozen sea. “The monarchy of Salvar has found reason to colonize the southern coast of Berevar: though tears in the weave of reality, by-products of the War of the Tap, have been discovered throughout Salvar, they are much larger and yield far more energy in Berevar.” She was almost reading out loud; the library’s stuffy air tensed as leers pricked at her back like snubbing needles; but Lillian was in a distant land now, where danger was plentiful and oh so exciting. The continent of Berevar was said to be infested with fearsome beasts and dominated by a ruthlessly chilling climate; but all risks were weighed, and the benefits were measured to be far heftier. With this much energy to harvest, Aeromancers could potentially power myriad of their towers, bestowing upon the Salvarans hospitable weather, and thus, a far better chance at survival.

Resting her eyes, she lolled back on the cherry seatrest and cycled air, dangling bare feet in the table's shadow. An inspired smile tugged at her lips as she flipped the pages until she came upon the boldened 'Corone' and, with renewed vigor, began the quenching of her thirst in paper pools of knowledge.


Though the setting sun and the rising stars could not be seen, either because of the obsidian dome of Ankhas or the thick, black smog that stifled the skies of Ettermire, Lillian could still feel the effects of wearing time. Cupping her mouth with a hand, she blew a sigh that sent glazing tears to her arctic eyes. In this single session, she had scuttled back and forth through the spokes of the marble wheel that was the Library, carrying, lugging, dragging scores of books, booklets, pamphlets, atlases, lexicons, codices, encyclopedias and the such, to the point that her whole body had become sore and aching; she struggled hard to keep her arms from popping out of their sockets, and wondered if that wasn’t already the case with the rest of her limp bones. ‘I didn’t expect physical exercise when I signed up for this… I’ve done my calisthenics for at least the next three months.’ After wriggling her bare toes, she hopped from her seat and slipped into her boots, feeling a strain at the small of her back. Much flailing around ensued, and one could only presume she was stretching, or having some sort of controlled seizure. “Miss, is everything alright?”

A smooth voice had called at her back. In a flurry of embarrassment, humiliation, mortification, shame and about seventeen other synonyms, she spun to face its owner, ceasing all strangely silly movements, in fear that he would call the guards on her. She was stunningly pleased to see the fine features of an olive, almost swarthy face, balanced atop the tall lean frame of the man. He was leanly swathed in flowing black robes that boasted drooping hems of silver-patterned filigrees and a collar cinched with intricate ivies that traced down his torso in moon-kissed coils, the tracings converging a few inches above the midriff in a stylish cusp. There a turbid red stone was inlaid, irrepressibly reminding her of a draconic carbuncle, as told in the legends of old. Craning her neck, she rolled meticulous eyes back to the stranger’s face, noticing fair silver hair parted in the middle into long, soft huddles, and tapered ears that rounded backwards, characteristic of the Drows. Her brain made a distinct ‘ping’ as she put two and two together. It was late. Only a few were still feverishly reading. Before her stood a well-decorated Drow, holding himself with a noble carriage as he awaited an answer to the simplest of queries, his lavender optics minding her with professional patience.

“O-oh. Yes! I’m fine.” Recovering a smidgeon of composure, she carried on with her own question. “Are you a reference librarian?” With a wry smile, he deliberately nodded. “Could you, perhaps, keep the books on this table for the night? I know this isn’t proper library decorum, but it would save me a great deal of trouble if I don’t have to look for them all over again when I return in the morning.” Still wry of eyes, the librarian nodded, perhaps jokingly, but Lillian had only pieces of a working mind to work with, and could no longer parse a person’s gestures and expressions. She left it at that, thanking him before cloddishly plodding through the long corridor, eyeing the shrunken exit far ahead. After crossing the vaulted egress, she would have to traipse around the soot-smudged streets of Ettermire and find her way back to the Moru Úr, a shady tavern in a shady district, but it was regrettably the closest resting establishment she had found to the Library. A long, long walk was in prospect.

'Someone hates me...'

[Ataraxis]

By sweet darkness was Lillian claimed, but the bitterness of day was quick to call the lost child back. Tossing under the wraps of a cool linen quilt, she no longer held the idle illusion of a porcelain doll, her voice a glum wail of refusal at the murky sunlight that pervaded the curtains and prickled her pillow-wrinkled face and periwinkle eyes. The wail grew to a lament as the morning assault went unrelenting, and no matter how hard the girl denied its existence with her rough grumbling and gruff grunting, the grey light tugged at the frays of her patience, which had entirely come undone when the queerest of sounds rasped at the door, stirring her up from the battle with daylight. “What do you want?” she snarled in the vicious ways proper to all those who loathed the morning larks.

“Oh dear. Not an early riser, are you?” At once, Lillian’s cheeks flushed a deep shade of carnelian, recognizing there the voice of Shairin Melarn, proprietor of the Moru Úr; and from the noises she had heard prior to her arrival as well as the warm fumet that now suffused the room, she had come bearing breakfast on a tray. “Should I come back in a few hours?” The woman laughed heartily as Lillian voiced her desperate dissent and sprang from the bed to open the door.

The warm smile of the female Drow greeted Lillian from across the threshold, its candor further enhanced by the aroma of the morning delicacies she had brought. “Oh, thank you so much, Shairin! And do forgive me for sounding so grumpy, earlier.” Lillian’s abashed beam was just as heartwarming, and the young innkkeeper was compelled to drop the platter and give the endearing girl a hearty hug; but her elven nature, exuding serenity and composure, had worked wonders in fighting her motherly urge. Padding into the chamber with innate elegance, she set the tray over an oaken end table near the eiderdown bed. Lillian tiptoed in suit after closing the door, keeping at bay any unwelcome visitor, and marched on the tall and tan female’s graceful strides. Lillian watched the innkeeper tend to a vased tulip, its petals as golden as her flaxen mane, kept off her shoulders in a long braid. “Thank you for bringing it here...”

“Oh, I understand your reluctance to dine with the gents down there.” Shairin grinned, turning a sharp green eye to the eating girl; the men were a rowdy bunch when they weren’t too imbibed in mead and ale. Right now, spittle was trickling from their mouths as their bodies were flaccidly spread onto the sweat-soaked tables of the dining room like beached whales cooking under the sun, but smelling much worse. “I’m actually glad I could get away from them. They’re probably quite docile right now; I don’t expect one to move before another good hour. That should give you plenty of time to finish up and leave for the Library. In the meantime, you eat up while I’ll plow a path for you to cross.”

Plunking down on the bed’s edge, she took a long whiff of the platter’s contents. She drank in the garden scents of the potage, the steam from a loaf of bread and even the nonexistent smells of an apple and a glass of water, so alluring to her now. Breaking the golden crust, she heard the floorboards creak and the floor below quake as emasculated wails sounded throughout like a torturous choir of prepubescent eunuchs. Shairin was hard at work. ‘Poor Shairin. If only she had some help, she could take a break from all of this.’ After finishing up her morning repast she snagged her boots off the bedside, picking up the melodious call of the innkeeper through flooring. “Clear!”

[Ataraxis]

Ankhas was as beautiful as ever, with the cursive shapes of its high rotunda and the four steeples that beleaguered the heavyset dome, guarding each of the Library’s eminent ingresses with their dappled eyes of blackened marble, instilling a reverent fear in all those who came to take advantage of the dark jewel’s infinite wisdom. The murkiness that spanned the skies of the industrious city could not even gutter the structure’s obscure glow; quite the opposite, the misty darkness actually seemed to feed the noble beast of stone with wicked power, this strange and mystical feature enrapturing the eerie glint in the young librarian’s gaze. She padded on, sounding faint on the cobbled path, aware of the towering oculus’ watchful glare; but she would not dwindle in its presence. A ravishing smile parted her lips as she greeted the obsidian-clad guards stationed at the northern entrance, who nodded back their noble heads in an abridged bow, their keen eyes gently narrowed in remembrance of her last coming. Once she had vanished into the gloom of the corridor, however, those who came after were hard-pressed to find any such compassion, rather feeling that they were staring down the barrel of a loaded pistol.

“What is this?” What giddy joy had once supported her feet through the ancient aisle had now crumbled into rubbles of dejection. The night before, she had parted with a table so booked with knowledge that its burnish was buried under the sheer amount of leather-bound information it supported. Now, the rosewood lay in its bare beauty, each and every one of its reddish grains visible under the domes of sorcerous light that idly hovered over them. Scholars uprooted their chins from the pieces before them, turning empty stares to the one they recognized as yesterday’s noisy romp. This time, she was actually hushed, and her eyes were glazing over in a storm of emotions. Her morning elation had been short-lived. ‘Don’t cry, Lily. Don’t cry.’

“Ah, you have come? I did not think you serious when you said you would return.” That silky, cascading voice was now the kernel of her anger. Behind her stood the Drowish librarian, the same she had spoken to on the matter of leaving the study desk as it were, the same who had agreed to carry out her request and the same who had apparently done nothing of the sort. More than regret or remorse for his mistake, he spoke with a tinge of amusement, deriving twisted pleasure from her misfortune. She spun round and faced him, budding tears sparkling wherein her eyes along with the seeds of wrath. This, the Drow saw, and was a bit unnerved by the intensity of her reaction. With a disquieting calm, she walked up to him so that their exchange would be but whispers, for she was still aware that this was a place of devoted silence. Reading threat in the action, the librarian armed himself with edged words. “What is it, runt? Do you wish for a shoulder to weep on?”

“I am glad to see that you hold to your word as well as you do your tongue.” The tension changed, and the Librarian could no longer feel the presence of the timid and blushing adolescent. Her voice was a low murmur, as clear and gentle as ever, but something to it was foreign, for in its implacable calm lurked a dark, dark poison, more potent than the venom of snakes and spiders, cold, glacial, like the burning sting of a winter’s storm. The Drow had nearly staggered as the sound seeped into his ears, burning them with its acid, yet its fierce softness felt as a caress through his mind; he was stunned beyond his wits that in him the whisper drew arousal.

“It… it isn’t as if you read those books, is it?” Feeling his pride falter, he quickly took the reins over his senses, discarding from his mind the oddity of her change, and went on with renewed arrogance. “I noticed you leafed through at least a dozen without more than a mere glance, as if you wanted to withhold the illusion of actual reading. Moreover, I had a glance at the titles: you only randomly picked them out from the History and Geography section, didn’t you? Were you trying to impress someone, little girl? Perhaps one of the great minds gathered here has tickled your fancy?” The drowish librarian had spoken too loud, and heads, both bald and thinning, were raised, but they hummed in mild interest as they looked the girl from head to toe, bobbing in quiet approval. His harangue was not finished, and he ended it without a change in volume. “Let us face it. What would a woman, let a lone an imp of a girl like you, do in a library – in Ankhas, for that matter? I’ll wage that all you think about is makeup and boys, am I right?”

Lillian had never been an outright extraverted person, and rarely spoke what weighed on her heart. That, however, does not signify a lack of fire in her soul; as a daughter of Fallien, even though she had never seen beyond the walls of the Outlander’s Quarters, she had her pride, and detested men who sought to overpower her, to control her through intimidation. Only, her flesh had been a cage far too thick to let her latent ferocity lash out, for the bars of inhibition were much too thick and the gaps of audacity far too narrow.

But once upon a time, in the Forest of Brokenthorn, a great Demon had taught the child three important things.

One. ‘No one cage is unbreakable’.

Two. ‘No man has the right to trample over a woman’.

Three. ‘Should one try, cut without mercy, to the depths of his soul.’

“How disquieting that the one who tells me what is on my mind, only has me on his.” Though the fearful depth of her voice was no longer, and though the girl’s presence was whole again, Lillian seemed far more intimidating and confident – perhaps even adult. The librarian realized his blunder, saw the opening he had left in the last strike of their verbal fisticuff, and was now blushing through his olive tan. “I am neither the one shirking his duties by disturbing the silence and those who relish in it, nor am I the one talking down on a ‘poor and defenseless little girl’ because being an insufferable ass with any other woman outside these walls makes his testicles shrivel up and crawl back inside his body. Now, which of us, I wonder, has most to do in this library?”

Four years ago, she had fleshed the perfect retort to the mockeries of the very same demon, one Sir Ifrit Obsidian, but had been much too young and far too afraid of the hulking hell dweller to emit any such utterance of it. With time, troubles and toil, she had learned to care for the soft-hearted being, the same Demon’s whose wisdom she still holds dear, but her inability to deride him upon their first meeting had always nagged at her mind. ‘Today is the day I will burdened by it no more.’ It was her turned to be pleased by the derelict countenance of the Drow, his face of humiliation as red as a freshly-harvested beat and his pointed ears reaching never before seen shades of flushing. For once, the nearby scholars had sided with her, now utterly withdrawn from their research and contemning the Drowish librarian with vehemence; she had even heard one call out ‘touché’ after her invective, and was overcome with gladness. “Now excuse me, I have work to do.”

It was over for him. Nostrils flaring wider than those of a horse, the librarian walked off in a crisp and heavy gait, mumbling under his breath a series of foul oaths, but his speech was impeded by the gritting of his teeth. One sentence, however, was intelligible to those near, though spoken in his native tongue: “Lotha hawrest zhaun ol jal… Usstan kestal dos harventh dosst ivress pholor natha zith lu' z'hrenen ulu elghinn…”

“Zhah nindel uss d' dosst zarachi'in? Nau brorn j'nesstren ph' jal phor dos.” For a moment of dreadful realization, the Drow had stopped dead in his tracks. He held himself in check, quavering with hardly-contained fury, but wisely left to save what was left of his hubris. There was a round of silent acclamation from those who had followed their spar with intrigue. Lillian’s heart was beating fast, it having hitherto fought hard to hold in rein any outburst of emotions. With an infantile grin, she swept the tears that never left her eyes. ‘And I didn’t even need to use my dagger.’

_________________

*(Little insolent know-it-all... I hope you cut your fingers on a page and bleed to death...)

*(Is that one of your lines? No wonder women are all over you.)

[Ataraxis]

‘Oh gods, I think I’ve learned more than anyone ever should about the feeding habits of Antolins, Mauls and especially Gorian Fels.’ Pushing back her chair with gingerly care, she set the musty copy of Vicious Beasts or Misunderstood Critters: a Bestiary of Althanas down on its correct pile before teetering away, a wan expression molded over her face, which had turned worryingly paler from the picturesque descriptions it provided on their methods of hunting and, concomitantly, feasting. The bulk of her nausea, however, came from the vivid depictions of their mating habits, mostly violent, bloody and sometimes quite literally icky; though she was trying her best at keeping her mind off of the mentally-scarring subject. ‘Good luck, Lily; that photographic memory of yours is sure to help.’

Lightly she padded through the dusky marble that lined the corridors, venturing from alcove to alcove with a comfortable smile and a twinkle in her eyes. She would always be amazed by the sheer array of subjects the Library offered, but her heart was further gilded by the familiarity of the books she was passing by: she glanced over titles concerning horse breeding in Fallien, the tricks and rules to glassmaking and all sorts of things that reminded her of her homeland. Only one, however, reminded her of her childhood with innocent passion. ‘The Tacky Tales of Tom Tabletop!’ Her burst of joy was almost painfully restrained as she hopped on her feet, picking the novel from the shelf with that childish giddiness that had never left her. ‘Oh, I can’t believe Ankhas actually has the whole series to date!’

As the girl leafed through the pages, mirthfully musing over when the latest adventure of the Paladimp would be released, she felt a foreboding cold breeze past the small of her back. Detaching her eyes from the passage in which Tom received an invoice from the Invidious Invaders of Vindala, Lillian rolled on her heels, only to see the swarthy shadow of an annoyance with whom she had wished never to cross path again. The Drowish librarian fleeted past her with that haughty swagger, scoffing as he spat a cursory look to the title of the book she had nestled against her bosom. “Pah! Infantile drivel.”

Though on the exterior, she ignored his taunt, she could feel her ears turn red and her lips purse at the insult. She had always detested being treated as some dimwitted child, and here her newfound nemesis had done exactly so in her most joyous and, therefore, most vulnerable moment. ‘At least I was a kid once!’ she shouted inwardly as she quivered with indignation. She resumed her reading in a huff and, a minute later, set the book back on its stead, much chipper. ‘I can’t wait to see what happens next!’ Her mind was flashing, imagining countless cockamamie scenarios as she headed towards one of the many reception desks to enquire about her next biggest passion.


“I’m sorry, could you tell me where I can find texts that deal with magic and/or the preternatural?” she queried politely, looking expectantly at the hoary librarian that doubled as a receptionist, who was surprisingly shorter than she was.

Lillian chided herself for her prejudice, reminded that dwarves could also be scholars, no matter how much they enjoyed beating on searing-hot ingots and picking at hunks of shiny rocks. This one had even lost the curt accent his kin continually boasts so proudly! ‘You’re doing it again, Lily.’ The receptionist looked at her quizzically, not understanding her amused beam but returning it nonetheless with that caring, grandfatherly smirk. “You can find copies of the most popular texts in the Realia Room in the east wing, with the newly-acquired artifacts on temporary display and other replicas of the library’s older exhibits.”

“Oh, where do you keep the originals?” Before the grizzled-bearded dwarf could even formulate his answer, she excitedly chucked a guess, quite certain that she had hit dead on the nail. She had quickly put aside her original objective, favoring the perusal of genuinely ancient lore. “In hermetical underground vaults, right? Are they off-limits or can visitors enter?”

“Well, if you’re interested, I suppose you could if a reference librarian accompanied you,” the Dwarfish librarian replied with a tentative tone, not fully understanding why she could not be contented with the copies. “There’s a stairway down the hallway at the left. Take it and it will lead you to the vaults. There, the people in charge will instruct you on how to proceed.” The girl could be quite nimble on her feet when she wanted to; her words of thank were already echoing as she scurried down the corridor.

[Ataraxis]

“I would like access to one of the vaults, please; the one that contains scrolls and tablets concerning magic,” she spoke in a single string of words, quite exhausted by the completely unnecessary sprint she had performed. Today, quizzical stares seemed to be dispensed without stinting, she remarked, watching the female Drow at the underground desk perk an eyebrow. “Please don’t tell me that I’m not old enough to get in. My age has already brought me so many hardships today!”

“There is nothing in the protocol that prohibits children from accessing the articles stored inside these vaults,” she replied professionally, not letting her bemusement show through her trained-to-be-bland voice. ‘That’s probably because there’s never been a precedent of a child interested in such things - by the Great Nether, I rarely ever see anyone, save those stuffy old historians, come here!’ She sighed, amusement hooking the side of her lips. There’s always a first time for everything. “A librarian must supervise you, however. You must understand that anything here can be extremely brittle, and we would like to avoid any damage to them. Also, you will feel parched and find it harder to breather upon entering, because of the nonexistent humidity and low levels of oxygen.”

Lillian gave the woman an understanding nod, uttering not one word of complaint. Being a librarian herself, she understood the crucial value of such protocols. “Who will be supervising me?”

“Helviana, I need you down here,” the Drow called aloud in her native tongue, speaking into the minuscule holes of a strange, brassy machine at her side. In the same language, a voice like viscous treacle murmured the most shameless of lines, hiding its tasteless humor under a semblance of propriety.

“My dearest, restrain your urges! Though I suppose I can indulge you, just for today.”

While the female Drow was busy being in a huff, chucking ireful whispers into the communication device, a wave of worry lapped at Lillian’s chest. Whether it was an extra sensorial augury or that fabled woman’s intuition, the young girl did not care one bit; though the voice was muffled by static, she could recognize that smooth timbre, that fallaciously modest manner of speech, brimming with that unbearably surly tat.

Her spine literally jolted when she heard those in crystal clarity as they were spoken from the marbled stairway. “Here I am, dearest. What would you have me do, oh mistress of–”

For such sour paths to cross thrice in a single day, only unfeasibly bad luck or the incomprehensible humor of jaded deities could be of cause. Catching a glimpse of one another, neither of the librarians deigned to hide their nettled scowls, their faces contorted into visions of nightmares.

“Oh, clearly has Aurient forsaken me, for you to be in my way,” he sighed. The light press of his spindly fingers supported his drooping forehead as he eyed her with plain and unambiguous contempt.

“Then I must have sinned a country’s worth, for Suravani to punish me with you,” she sneered dejectedly with hands on hips, despair exuding from her rolling eyes.

No theological reference had flown uncaught. The Drow, however, had then given too quick a retort, a tone of both condescendence and incredulousness seeping from his grimacing lips. “You cannot win against me in a battle of self-deprecating humor.”

“Perhaps, but it would seem that I have won every other kind.” Ah, the taste of yet another triumph; truly, she could get used to the feeling. ‘I have to admit I'm getting better at this,’ she thought victoriously as the Drow grudgingly led her to the fifteenth vault, at the sighing behest of the Drow female. For the longest of minutes did they plod along the dark-walled corridor, Lillian falling into his cloddish stride with a questionable enthusiasm until they reached the hermetic vault. Producing a key from one of the pockets of his rakish robes, the librarian disengaged a series of locks upon the circular door, before grabbing the large, spigot-like knob at its center with both hands; with a grunted yank, he pulled it open. There was a loud metallic clank and a wave of arid air floated out from the entrance, heavy with the scent of aging papyrus and arcane magic.

“Welcome to Vault Fifteen,” Helviana began, stressing his usual spiel with grunts and groans.“Harbor of all lore magical from Abjuration to Zoanthropy.”

[Ataraxis]

“In here, you must stint your breaths, lest you teeter on the edge of suffocation.” Though his voice had lost its rolling tones, the words seemingly spoken through tunnels of parched and crumpled sandpaper, he did not seem so incapacitated by the harsh environment. Thus he recited the mandatory instructions, with a monotony that showed just how little he actually he cared about her safety. “Use the dark lamps sparingly, for though they have an illumination of five foot-candles, they will still cause nominal damage. Gloves and tongs are at your disposal, if…”

“…you wish to handle artifacts or vellums,” she interrupted. “To turn pages, use a spatula tool… When removing a text from its protective casing, use the felted tongs…” Her breathing was arrhythmic, labored and heavy, as though some immense boulder had been placed over her sternum. Still, she had recited the instructions to the very end, unable to bear any more of that pompous Drow’s voice. “I read the notice… board before going in…”

Helviana said no more, quite pleased that he could forgo the usual tedium of reciting rules and caveats. He saw her wander off behind a row of shelves to the left, and that was all the attention he would afford the girl. He had intellectual interests of his own to slake and rarely ever had the opportunity to peruse these archives. Plucked a pair of sterilized gloves from a nearby dispenser, the reference librarian leisurely made his way to an aisle that appealed to him, labeled Conjuration.

Lillian began her exploration from the very start, naturally. Not because she had any particular fascination for Abjuration, but because the idea of starting right dab in the middle of something seemed preposterous; that was mostly due to the fact that she had read each and every one of her books from title page to colophon. Of course, she was well aware that the linearity of any text had nothing to do with the alphabetization of an archive, but there was nothing to do about it. The girl was neurotic on such matters.

Controversy of Magic and its Mechanics:The Power Within and the Power Without. The title alone piqued her interest, and she quickly proceeded to its reading. There were theories in this manuscript that, if upheld by any scholar in this current time and era, would make them no more than delusional heretics to the eyes of the community. It presented two different mechanics to the weaving of seemingly identical spells, one being the collectively accepted concept of the inner essence, whereas the other was the widely discredited outer essence. Though the nominal interaction with outer elements in the casting of magic had long been proven, the forceful application of one’s inner might, a so called life-force, was considered the true fulcrum to any reshaping of the world, grand or benign. It was, however, purported that spells could be cast without expenditure of this life-force by deriving the fuel from exterior components of the world, be they living or inanimate.

The layman would see only practicality in this revelation, but the learned man would be appalled and, quite frankly, terrified by the notion. It meant that the limitations of one man were lifted, and that any spell cast by such a wizard could in theory span the world itself. It was no longer localized destruction or limited creation, but a wide-scale reorganization of all that exists. The author of this ancient script conjectured that, if Althanas was to ever discover the existence of such mages, then what would ensue would be nothing short of an apocalypse.

Lillian sneered at that closing comment; she had always found that there was cause for concern when previsions took on the airs of prophecies. She very much doubted that the channeling of external essences had the alleged perfect yield rate that the author claimed, and he had utterly ignored the possibility of there being a critical capacity of energy for such spells. She decided to wash the bitter aftertaste with another document, Beings from Beyond and Beneath, which was securely kept inside a protective slipcase. Reaching in with the tongs, she gingerly pulled it out and set it on one of the nearby archival exam tables.

It discussed the existence of diverse and unrelated species of djinnis and demons that supposedlu inhabited a sizeable number of planes; a bold thing to say when most agreed that they all stemmed from the same irate ancestors. It was a relatively quick read, and she did not dawdle on it any further than that, favoring instead a vellum hermetically-sealed between two sheets of glass. Even with all the precautions undertaken, the cursive script had faded, which did not help decipher the dead language etched upon the lambskin. There were joint notes left by various cryptanalists, but none were highly conclusive of its true significance. Lillian tried her hand at reciting the translation, speaking as loud and clearly as she could with a raspy voice.



‘Hereon beckon the night, that she answers the summons,



And behold the veil where lies the eye she turns to thee.



As fair as bones and ashes shall she purge thy wretches,



As swart as ink and blood does she shroud thy kith and kin.



But should she ever a blind eye turn, cower and fear



For the Night sends to thee the greatest of her blessings.’



According to the verses, the analysts had only learned that one could only see the effects of this spell at night, and that they varied depending on the presence or the absence of the moon. That was decidedly very little to go on, but still, she found this mystery all the more thrilling.

The Drow afforded a peek through the shelves, his attention momentarily taken by her singsong recital. He scoffed, turning away as he dextrously leafed through a brittle black book with a miniature spatula. “As if she could truly appreciate the contents. Reading about magic does not make one a magician.”

[Ataraxis]

‘But I can appreciate it,’ Helviana reflected, thin lips warped into a haughty grin. The Drow was an avid reader, ever passionate of all that touched magic and, specifically, the art of Conjuration. Seeing him, some would say that his interest relied solely on the basis that a summoned being was bound to its summoner, that it was a powerless slave whose will was his and his alone. To all who knew him closely enough, he actually was quite a domineering bastard, and so the assumption was not so farfetched.

Helviana, however, did not see it as such. The summoned were not slaves; they were bound to him, yes, but just as much as he was bound to them. Only recently had he begun to master the art, due to the discovery that his unique powers lay in the rare branch of affinity. While most of his equals called upon the conventional elementals, demons and djinnis, he could summon the fabled Moonshed. They were a reclusive species and no scholar has ascertained whether they inhabited lands bathed in moonlight or if they dwelled the moon itself. None of that, however, changed the fact that they were a powerful caste of elementals – and this made him proud. He had learned of these beings in this very room, years past, and was all the more surprised to learn that his mindset, that his affinity had appealed to these secluded beings. Since then, theirs became a long-standing alliance.

But that had been ages ago, and his teachers now required that he display a mastery over different creatures, creatures that were poles apart from the Moonshed. While others found this a simple task, having only to cast a golem of frost to complement their flame beasts, Helviana could not allow himself any lenience in his choice. He needed something that would amaze his fellow conjurers in training as well as that tight cadre of stuffy old teachers, something extraordinary.

And in this fragile black book, he had found it.

They were beings without a name, a powerful yet obscure kind of elemental that derived its ferocious strength from the darkness. They could devour the light from the very skies, could turn broad daylight into a swirling abyss of haunting shadows. What is more, they could draw from the dark and instil a fear able to consume the mind as easily as it did the body. Indeed, to these wretches of the night, those plagued by their greatest fears made for the most appetizing meals. Helviana wanted their power, wanted to tame them into beings far less vicious, but he could not ignore the perils that would come with his attempts. A shiver overtook him, and the knowledge that he was afraid frightened him even further, a vicious cycle of which he was all too aware.

It was almost too late when he realized he had dropped the book; the shock would destroy it beyond repair. He lunged in a frenzy, his hand sweeping through the air, just in time to catch it by the edge of the binding, but the corners had caught the ground. It could have been the disbelief of his carelessness or something else entirely, but his vision shook as though overwhelmed by a transient darkness. When he recovered, he was standing, sheathed in sweat, the precious book held at arm’s length.

And the petulant girl was right in front of him, eyes wide in horror. She had seen him, seen everything, even the scuffs on the cover. Worst of all, Helviana himself knew that she was right to be appalled, for he had always been loathe of all the doddering fools who treated books with so little consideration. Right now, he realized, he loathed himself.

“I-It’s been long enough,” he blathered, turning hastily. He had no desire to dwell on his blunder. “The air is becoming too rare; it will have to be cycled before you can get in here again. I have more pressing matters to see to, anyway.”

“Ah, of course,” she drawled sarcastically, “walking and talking haughtily, being remiss of your duties…”

“For your information, I am also a student of the School of Conjuration, you impudent know-it-all,” he snarled, though his tone was surprisingly tamer than the girl had expected. “It is my duty to keep my mentors informed on my research.”

There was no snarky reply, which he found oddly disconcerting, and this made him glance over his shoulder. The look on her face was that of surprise, one he realized had been induced by his being somewhat open with his personal life. “Alright then. I need to get back to my compulsory reading anyway.”

“Why are you reading those books?” he found himself asking out of the blue, though not without his usual snapping. “What good will they do you?” he continued, calming his tone. He had evinced actual curiosity rather than condescension, perhaps clumsily so, but the girl seemed to take that as an effort and decided to repay it in kind.

“An… old friend asked me a question, and I need the answer.” Helviana considered her curiously, a hook in his brow. “It is a very specific question.”

“And it will be a very big answer,” he smirked despite himself.

The girl’s only reply was a nod and a smile, just as gauche as his had been. After returning the books and scripts back to their shelves, replacing a variety of reading apparati in their respective casings and disposing of their gloves in a receptacle near the entrance, they quietly made their way out of the hermetic vault. Helviana swiped a switch, dimming down the lights until the whole of the archives was immersed in darkness.

Something quavered in the gloom. A wet scuttling could be heard, like a soaked mouse scampering away. The hinges wailed and the round door shut, locks engaging in a succesion of clicks. Once more, the vault was soundless.

[Ataraxis]

“The rising number of faultlines in the hinterlands of Salvar announce… the recent scourge of prostitution in the slums of Knife’s Edge… caused by the giant bears of Berevar.” Lillian blinked, half-emerging from her daze when she noticed something inherently wrong with that passage. There was a spark as the gears of her mind jolted into action. Suddenly awake, the teenager backed away, regarding her workplace with scrutiny: she had been reading three books simultaneously, an accidental experiment that, sometimes apparently, gave the strangest results. A hand on her mouth, she repressed a giggle but was startled by the chorus of shushes coming from all sides. “Sorry.”

An impressive stack of books thumped lightly on the rosewood table. Helviana was back, and he had lugged with him a variety of helpful tomes and charts for her to peruse. After giving a cursory glance at the titles, she gave him a thankful yet quizzical look. “How did you know these books would be relevant to my research?”

“I am not incompetent, contrary to what you may believe. My wages do not solely depend on my handsome good looks and charming demeanour. Shocking, is it not?” Lillian had a quippy retort to his alleged competence, but she abstained from voicing it. The Drow was proving to be a, perhaps not exactly nice, but… sufferable fellow, it would seem. Ever since the day before, down in that underground vault, he had ceased his attempts at making her miserable. Lillian had her doubts, but she would rather leave them as just that, doubts.

“Thanks.” Resuming her work, she flipped page after page, stopping on each only for the span of a momentous glance.

“Do you actually understand like that?” the librarian asked in a whisper, wary of not incurring the wrathful stares of the other library-goers.

“Yes,” she replied cautiously, intending to say nothing more at first. The insistence in his eyes, however, compelled her to elaborate. “It’s just something I could do for as far as I can remember.” The answer was clearly unsatisfactory, but the Drow did not pry further. “I could go faster, but then you would get your wish, wouldn’t you?” After a fair bit of hesitation, she coyly, very awkwardly winked – she found the practice wholly unfamiliar.

The Drow, to his greatest surprise, replied with the faintest of grins – though still wry and arrogant. ‘Ah yes, the bleeding to death on a papercut.’ It was unfortunately not his proudest of moments. That set aside, she had amazed him with her grasp of the language. “Is that how you learned to speak Drow?”

“Oh, it did help, but where I come from, Drow Dictionaries are not exactly in vogue, so I had to make do with scraps of texts from here and there. There are also a few characters in my favourite books who spoke the language; their speech helped me get the general syntax and helped broaden my vocabulary. I doubt I could follow you in a long-winded conversation, though.”

“Ah, so there still is something I have that you do not!”

It was Lillian’s turn to smile arrogantly. “Not for long, you won’t.”

Her heart stopped. Her blood curdled, her stomach turned. Breaking the peaceful silence of the library was a screech from the depths of hell.

[Ataraxis]

Within moments, panic erupted in the crowds, moving from the source of the scream like a wave of wildfire. Lillian was too short to see what was happening, and the people scurrying all about did not help. That is, until there was a break in the chaos, a beeline between her table and the hallway that led to the vaults.

A row of ten little black critters stood in wait at the mouth of the corridor, eyeless heads darting every which way. One stopped its gyrating, its tapered head suddenly shooting forward, an arrow for the others to follow. They moved as one. The ten, followed by ten more, so on and so forth. Lillian could no longer move, her blood freezing her limbs still. They were swarming endlessly. Some of the scholars and visitors did as she did, legs falling numb and eyes wide in disbelief. Others were not so lucky, for they screamed and flailed haphazardly, their gaze distant as though the sole witnesses to a terror unseen, as though stalked by some invisible monster.

The librarians either ran for the doors to call the guards or stood their ground, weaving a barrage of powerful spells to fend off the nightmarish advance.

“What… What in the nine hells are those? What’s happening?” Lillian turned to Helviana, unsure of what she wished to see from the Drow. She, however, definitely did not expect to see him sweating like a guilty pig that had sent everyone else to the slaughterhouse. “Are you… Did you... Is this?”

“The thing I summoned in my examination last night looked nothing like these! Well, it was black and it did have that general shape to its head, but it was much smaller and scrawnier and...” From the look of barely bridled rage on the girl’s face, any further explanation on his part was hopeless. “Oh, there will be plenty of time to judge me later! Why don’t we get to somewhere safe, first?”

“YOU!” she snarled, repeatedly poking her index into his midpoint. “I thought I could... I can’t believe I actually… I knew it was too suspicious to be true!”

She was interrupted by the stifled scream of a man standing but a few feet away from her worktable. The grey-haired codger was lifted into the air, little sandaled feet dangling beneath him. His hands weakly flashed with sorcerous light, but the shadows would not relent. Like liquid pitch, they swirled from the head to the chest, and the faster they spun, the more hysteric the captive became. The shadows vanished; he stared into emptiness, mouth widening, trembling as he saw something approach. He had only begun screaming when his upper body vanished, bitten off by an invisible maw. Legs and arms kicked wildly, but quelled with with each ensuing bite, with each stolen chunk of his bloodless body.

Until there was nothing left.

Fear. Fear was all she could feel, all that she knew. And the more she could feel it, the clearer she could see. An immense mouth, lined with rows and rows of jagged teeth. It turned to her, the fishbone teeth rattling against each other. It was… smiling. She wondered, then, if it had reserved her the same fate.

Wispy yet strong arms closed around her, one gloved hand smothering her mouth before she could shout. “Stay quiet! Don’t be afraid – don’t scream!” Helviana. The monstrous teeth faded little by little, until she could see the beast no more. The fear had faltered from her eyes, replaced by unprecedented contempt for the man now holding her. “Judge me later, run away now!”

He had a point. Lillian nodded frenetically, and they scampered off as fast as they could, the wind against their faces, the spine-chilling symphony of shrieks spilling out of their ears.

[Ataraxis]

“There!” the librarian yelped through clenched teeth, dragging the teenager behind him by the hand. Fire burned in their lungs, the sprint through the corridors bringing about a choir of huffing and puffing. Helviana clutched the knob, hand shaking beyond measure. Lillian squealed for him to hurry, but she quickly lost patience. She grabbed, turned and pulled his trembling fist, then rammed him inside and promptly slammed the door shut behind them. Then, alarmed as she recalled his advice, she gave the Drow a swift jab into the guts. He doubled over, his thoughts no longer of sheer terror but of pain... and pain again. On the other side, they could hear a legion of minuscule feet scuttle by before fading away. It had worked.

Only then did she have the calm to realize that they were in a janitorial closet. “This is what you call safest?” There were stuck against each other, feeling rather encumbered by the amount of brooms and pails that littered the cramped space. The smell of ammonia did not help.

“Well, we are safe, so I do not think you should be complaining. I know I… am not.” She heard the half-mocking, half-gaudy snicker from the man. He wriggled a bit, rubbing his chest far too much against hers. Infuriated, blood rushing to her cheeks, she snarled.

“Vith'rell d' has'trasen!”

Had there been any light in the closet, she would have seen the olive tan of his face blanch to ash. “Foul language! What kind of books have you been reading?” He felt something sharp on his stomach, something like very bony, very sharp knuckles. “You may not like me very much… yes, yes, not at all. But right now, we have– ”

“More pressing matters at hand, I know.” Lillian breathed in and out, pushing away a few mops to give herself some room to move. “Tell me what’s happening.”

The Drow grinned, thinking Lillian could not see it in the darkness. “These creatures have no name, but for the purpose of this conversation, I will call them the Nightcast.”

“Highly original,” she interrupted with a sneer.

“Blessed Aurient, this is not the time! Alright, how about… Nuiten’Geyst?”

Lillian paused, then resumed. “So, what about these Nightcast?” Helviana spat an oath, and it was once again the girl’s turn to grin.

“They supposedly feed on light to generate darkness and to instil fear. The more fear a person feels, the more his or her body becomes… appetizing to them. When we went to the vault, I… I read a book that discussed them and the various rituals through which they could be summoned. I wanted to see if I could conjure one for my examination, yesterday. I did, though, and it was quite harmless to tell you the truth.”

Lillian lightly hopped where she stood, slapping him where on the backside of his head – her way of telling him how daft he was. “Yes… yes, you’re right. I believe the swarm was brought into existence when I accidentally dropped the boo– stop doing that! In any case, the reason they feed on light is not because they like the taste, but because it can literally hurt their shadowy husks after prolonged exposition.”

“Are you telling me your plan is to flash them with five-hundred foot-candles? Good luck with that.”

“Actually, that is precisely my plan. We will use light to drive them away, maybe even kill a few. We will weave through the masses, get back to the vault, take the book and figure out how to dispose of them all, and permanently.”

“Oh yes, a perfect plan. Only, we don’t have any light that even comes close to such intensity!”

“And I thought you read Tom Tabletop,” he sighed. “You should know by now that the inane man making the inane plan always has something up his sleeve.” He smiled, unkowing that his revelation did not go as planned. Oh, Lillian wanted to give him hell for mocking her reading of the series, when he himself...

Without a warning, Helviana kicked the door open. As opposed to what she had presumed, the swarm of shadows had not run by them, but had simply stopped to wait in utter silence. They screeched as a legion of insects, the battlecry so shrill that it sent Lillian to her knees, palms clamped over her ears. Helviana, however, bore with it, sweeping his arms crosswise, turning one palm up and the other down. A rapid cantrip later, he slashed his arms outward in a wide arc, calling forth a scintillation of blue lights and white specks.

The light grew more intense, its spheric shape now enswathed by radiant drapes, billowing as if they floated in dead waters. It was a blinding ghost and it burst into a hundred sparks that flashed, whirled and slashed through the ranks of shadow. The creatures hissed, their caliginous flesh burning until there was a clear path to the stairways that led to the underground archives. The Moonshed swooped back down to the summoner's side, orbiting around him as a luminous shield.

Holding Lillian close to him, he whispered, feeling the blood pump through his legs again. “Run.”

_________________

*(Fucker of monkeys!)

[Ataraxis]

“Do I need… to tell you how… they’re faring behind us?” Lillian managed in between shaky breaths. She hated herself for this lack of stamina, but she had never thought it would quite so literally be the line between this world and the next. If by some miracle she survived this, then she would indulge in a series of callisthenics every morning for the rest of her life.

“No need,” Helviana huffed, just as worse for the wear. “Catching up.” The marbles of the hallway, though dark, were clear of the monstrous crawlers. There was, however, little light for him to see, making his sprint a run down a blind alley. “And no… I cannot do anything about it. I knew I would… lose a lot by dismissing my elemental, but I was not… going to let them gobble it up.”

“I know.” Though others would call him a fool for choosing to save a summoned creature rather than himself, she could not do the same. Of course, she would have preferred if there had been an alternative to their assured death. Alas, she had long ago learned that expecting such things was as ludicrous as watching the grass to catch it growing. “I wasn’t going to…”

Rays of light snaked round the corner from a vaulted archway, burning explosive patches into the dark masses crawling behind. “Perfect… they caught on,” Helviana rasped. Whatever mages were in Ankhas had amassed here, and were providing cover fire.

‘That, or they’re just blindly shooting everywhere they see shadows move… which is quite fine by me.’ Lillian hared down the stairway, Helviana falling closely behind. He produced a key from his pockets, unlocking everything he could on the circular door before spinning the spigot and pulling it open with the girl’s help.

Like parched and sandy hands, the thin air caught their throats in a vice grip, slowly wringing the water out from skin and flesh. It was already hard breathing after that run, and now they had to survive in a place with nearly four times less oxygen. In retrospect, however, it was better to suffer this than to die devoured while living their worst nightmares. “The book… missing.”

“What kind of a librarian are you,” she murmured in a single string, too weak to turn it into a mocking question. The Drow growled in hackles, shouting that he knew he had returned it to the right shelf. His rant was cut short, however, as the sound of spider-like crawls became all that they could hear. “How big are those sleeves of yours...?”

The summoner sealed his eyes, answering inwardly. ‘Big enough to pull out one last trick.’ A crossing sweep of the arms, an outward slash of the thin air. The necessary ritualistic chant was nothing more than a susurration. However, there were no lights. In fact, the darkness only seemed to grow thicker.

Before him stood a small creature, whose silhouette he could barely make out. It stood on two short and stubby legs and was much smaller than its insect counterparts. What truly drew his attention, however, were the white glow in its eyes and the black book in its hands. “Did you just… summon another… oh this is so, very... tiresome.”

“I’ll have you know that I am also tired. By the by, thank you for all of your help.” Helviana could strangely not hone the sarcasm into an acerbic tone as he had wished, but then again he could barely muster enough strength stand on his feet. “In any case, this is the Nightcast I summoned yesterday… but it has the book. I don’t understand.”

Torn us from home. Sorrow. Helviana gawked as the childlike shadow spoke in chilling whispers. Apparently, that was not among the skills it had displayed the day before. Thrown us into Wretched Light, scalding. Torture. Why?

Helviana did not dare speak. What could he say? ‘Honor? Power? Pride?’ As a feeble answer, all he could do was to lower his head in defeat, to lower his head in hopes of penance for his wrongs.

The child did not see it so. It held tighter onto the book, the darkness of its flesh engulfing it whole. The strangely immaculate glow of its eyes vanished like the swale of a candle in a tempest. The creatures congregated about its small frame, dark smoke hissing as the hundred bodies melded into one. Helviana shuddered under this new, unbearable pressure, under the fear that stormed within his heart. He was reminded of his childhood, the days when he feared the dark – so childish, he once thought. But no, not anymore.

What he regretted the most had been the dwindling of the child’s stark white eyes. He felt the warmth leave him as he spoke. “Like a moonless night... a mercy lost.”

The darkness sembled, and he could see no more.

[Ataraxis]

But Lillian could.

It felt as if she were swimming through a sea of shadows, their touch more elusive than that of water itself. They were, however, not as cold. Whereas the mercurial seas robbed a poor man of his spirits, of his warmth and life, these fluid shades would caress and shield him from the harsh ravages of the world. One could not drown here, could not rot here. One could only drift in peace and ever be preserved. Lillian, however, would not revel in the oblivion as any other; not because it was a lie, a trick, but because it was not yet her time.

And again, unlike the dead, she could see.

Whatever the spawns of night had become, it was large enough to encompass the whole of the vault, which was now flooded in shadows from floor to ceiling. Even so, not one section of the archives had been damaged by the umbral magic that was at play. ‘I shouldn’t be so surprised. After all, shadows have preserved the oldest secrets of this world… and still do.’ But there was one secret, or rather, one mystery that it would not be able to conceal, this day. Not from her.

She drifted through the murk, only now realizing how slowly her body was moving. What unnerved her was also the complete absence of sound, save for the sluggish beating of her own heart. But she had to put that aside, to keep the fears at bay. The dead did not fear, and should the Nightcast sense it, they would know that someone had survived. As such, she swam to one of the shelves on the left, then schlepped back a glass casing to the examination table. It was the spell she had studied the night before.

Yet she had guessed wrong. Even in the depths of this darkness, the rest of the scripture remained faded and illegible. Somehow, the idea that some secret languages only emerged in the presence of heat or light made her believe that the same could be done with utter darkness. The notion was ridiculous, of course, to anyone else whose eyes were as good as blind after nightfall. Still, the answer was in that vellum. She only needed to learn how to read it.

Lillian started when a voice spoke in her mind. As a thousand echoes in an endless cavern, as faint whispers in a benighted land, it a voice all too familiar. Sometimes, it was hers; sometimes, it was not. It had followed her ever since her birth, had been there by her sides even before she had learned of the being that dwelled within her, a being foreign to this world and many others. There were so many secrets she wished to uncover in this world, but Lillian was beginning to wonder if there were not more hidden within her own shadow. And then, it spoke, the deafening shatter of myriad crystals. ‘You do know how to read it, Lily.’

The vellum burst alit, what little ink that remained upon it flaring into red wisps, as if a burning feather was once more scrawling over the parchment. Each letter was now complete, glowing a vivid red that slowly softened to a pale white.

Lillian kicked the ground to swim away with the casing, drifting back to the place where Helviana had fallen still and silent. Though she felt that the Drow was an insufferable prick, the shaky belief that he may be long gone… frightened her.

Frightened her. ‘Oh… no.’

The darkness moved at once, siphoned by an unseen drain until it caught her in its silent whirlpool. Deeper shadows moved along the edges, circling as would a shiver of sharks. Nonetheless, Lillian swam, battling the currents as she tried to gap the last few feet that separated her from the unmoving librarian. The caliginous shapes veered and darted straight for the girl, their inky black teeth seeming to lengthen and sharpen the closer they came. She opened her mouth to scream. Her words were swallowed by the oblivion.

But the shadows knew it was no scream of fear.

She had flung the casing away, the glass careening through the murk… only to hit the Drow in the head. The bright radiance of the inscriptions burned anew, breaking the shroud that had settled on his face. At once, he roused from his deep slumber, lavender eyes wide with an invigorating light. He spun, only to see the girl being drawn into a slash of darkness that grew wider with each shark-like shadow that flung itself into the gap.

Though he could not hear the words she mouthed, he knew what to do. Crossing his arms, he slashed. The Moonshed Elemental tore through the shrouded veil, purging the obscurity – but only for a moment. As soon as it had appeared, the shadows had sprung back, little by little devouring its vital flame. Lillian wasted no time, having no need for the vellum anymore; she had memorized it.

Even the sorcerous gloom could not hush her chant, for they were more than simple words, more than an incantation. The dousing of the Moonshed was interrupted, for the creature burst alit, becoming a sun… no, a moon unto itself. Lillian focused her wordless chant, maintained the haunting slew of primal sounds not spoken, but willed into existence. The shadows cried in pain, a storm of wails.

Stop. The voice was faint, the voice of a child made brittle by a deathly illness. Mercy.

[Ataraxis]

“Mercy?” she exclaimed, somewhat surprised to hear herself speak again. “You devoured countless innocent people. How… how can you even dare ask for mercy?”

Assailed us from all sides with Wretched Light. Retaliation.

“You devoured more than those who attacked you! I saw them! I heard them!”

Fear of the Dark. Hostility. It shocked her, how the voice had spoken so simply. Then again, many creatures of this world attacked those who feared them. Fear, after all, was the seed of hatred, and hatred of violence. She suspected that there was more to the link between these creatures and fear than Helviana had disclosed. Perhaps even he did not know. Wished to return home. Thought answer was in book.

“And it is not?”

Disappointment, frustration. Straightforward enough, as its words were punctuated with those exact emotions. There was a sudden gash in the space before her, and from this wound emerged the shadow’s bright, white eyes. True answer is in parchment. Hope.

“Is that why they followed me? Why they waited for me at the fore of that closet? Why one of them… smiled at me?”

Girl smells like Night. Salvation.

Those words unnerved her. ‘I smell like the night? What does that even mean?’ Then, the memory struck her. There, among the first verses of the chant, was the solution to it all. “'As swart as ink and blood… does she shroud thy kith and kin.' The night… it’s home to light and dark, as well as shadows. You were never enemies… in the balance of the night, you were never enemies.”

Moonshed are not enemies. Share our world. This came as a surprise. Lillian had imagined that the realm of these shadow beings would be fraught with darkness, yet upon further consideration, she realized how ridiculous that was. In such a world, there could not be any shadow. This also explained why they were unable to materialize in the pitch darkness of the closet, at that time: absolute darkness was as much of a bane to them as was absolute light... Wretched Dark, Wretched Light. Forgiveness. Cast the shroud. Home. Home.

“Helviana…” she asked, her voice so low he had barely heard the call. “Please, dismiss your friend.” He gasped, but upon the pleading stare she gave him, he silently complied. Now, breaking the darkness, was only the faint glow from the parchment scriptures.

Lillian resumed the chant, the very same she had begun in the presence of an artificial moon. Now that there was none, however, the dimness of the vault instead became immensely thicker, so dark that even she could not see through it. This proved, once and for all, that these elementals were not dark, but shadow-aspected. The gap grew wider and wider, but at its end she could see a faint twinkling that reminded her of moonlight.

The world bled away into the portal, all shadows dissipating within it until the archives were as they had always been. The artificial lights flickered back on, dim yet more than ever welcome. Both Helviana and Lillian had fallen from midair, landing on their rumps with groans. The dark rift still sizzled, strangely, as though something from within was keeping it from collapsing onto itself. When she saw those round, white, glowing eyes peeking from the void, she smiled despite herself.

“If you’re sorry, we’re not the ones you want forgiving you. Still, I don’t think you should show your face to anyone in this library, no matter how good your intentions.”

Did not ask forgiveness. Fear is Fear, Enemy. But girl is not Enemy. Will show face again.

“Wait, how? And why?”

Girl has affinity, for girl smells like Night. Respect. The white eyes seemed to squint, but Lillian was too flabbergasted to believe that it was from an invisible smile. The portal crackled once more, then shrank faster than the eye could see. A loud clap, a transient puff of smoke. With that, it was gone.With that, they were all gone.

Lillian slipped away, slumping on her back, trying to calm the wild gallop of her heart. “Affinity? What does that mean?”

Helviana did the same, propping his knotted back against a shelf. He sighed, then grunted. “It means I have reason to hate you again.” More jealousy than anger, more amusement than jealousy; but that barely even registered in the girl's mind.

“Ah. Well then,” she murmured, chuckling a bit before succumbing to exhaustion, “I’m glad everything’s back to normal.”

[Ataraxis]

After seeing the state in which this ordeal had left Ankhas, Lillian realized she might have been a tad too optimistic. When she had awoken, the girl had found herself stretched on one of the many tables carved from rosewood, most of which had been turned into makeshift gurneys. The dome-like lamp hung above her was blinding, giving her no choice but to look away to the side. Helviana was there, half-disrobed and sitting up straight on his own table while a healer sounded his chest. When the woman was done, he slid back into his dark robes and carefully locked unseen clasps before standing up, staggering. “Enjoyed your midday nap?”

“I’ve had better,” she said calmly, hiding a groan as she drew herself halfway up. “How long?”

“A bell or so, nothing long. You barely missed a thing.” There was something abnormal in his smile, one that made her doubt the veracity of those words. “I asked the healer. She was afraid that the life had been sucked out of you, but do not worry, I reassured her. I told her you had always been this scrawny.”

“Careful there,” she warned with a raised index. “In any case, I’m fine then?”

“Fine like a woman’s curves. Oh, wait…” He regretted not heeding the warning. For someone so scrawny, she had a rather powerful kick. “Alright… alright. Walk with me.”

With a sigh, she slipped down the table, landing on her tiptoes with unwonted poise. Even her gait seemed impossibly elegant, for someone whose only ailment had been excessive running. “How many… casualties?” she asked after a while.

“Well that is the one thing you’ve missed.” Lillian regarded him quizzically, but he simply rolled his shoulders. “None at all.” He saw the confusion in the way she shook her head, saw that she was considering the possibility of a bad joke from the puckering of her lips. “If you do not believe me, then look behind you.”

The girl spun round, and was shocked by what she saw. Immensely glad, but shocked nonetheless. A sleeping old man with thinning gray hair, the loose yet dignified garbs of a priest and a pair of small sandals dangling from his feet. The very same man who she had seen devoured by the shadows, large chunks off his body vanishing as though bitten off by invisible maws. He looked horribly disheveled, sheathed in sweat, but he was very much alive. “Then, when they ate the people…”

“They sent them somewhere else,” Helviana said with another shrug. “My guess is someplace very similar to the one in which we were trapped.”

“To be preserved.” She whispered then, a look of compassion in her eyes that frankly made him uncomfortable. Helviana did not understand that she had feared for his life, in that dark world. Yet, he had not been killed by the shadows, the same way this elderly priest had been spared. “Even their enemies, they don’t kill. I’m sorry I misjudged them.”

“Well they might have killed no one, but the library is still in ruins.” This, Lillian had noticed, but had been kept in the backdrop of her mind, superceded by her concern for those who she thought would reap the losses. Now that they were all safe, however, she had a difficult time looking to the sides, to the sheer destruction. Cracked walls, toppled shelves, pools of books, charred pages and torn covers. All of that, and everywhere – her heart sank.

“Our wizardly defenders and those burly guards did most of the damage, though. Ironically, they are the ones getting decorated. See that group of Mazzra Constables? Came in minutes late. But it’s quite alright, they brought a bag of medals and ribbons!”

“I’m happier getting nothing, actually.”

“Oh, no. You will get one: I made sure of that. ‘The heroine who returned them to their plane using an ancient spell found within these very walls.’ You are now the figurehead of Ankhas – that is, until the place’s reputation is cleared for allowing that ‘small issue of containment’ to happen.”

“But… weren’t you the one who– ”

“Erelisstra?” came a disgruntled voice, interrupting her question. It belonged to a tall Drow with dark eyes and white hair. Not the silky white of their youth, but that of the oldest of elders, whose life spanned countless centuries. One would think that after all that time, his temper would have cooled. “I believe I told you to pack up your things and leave this establishment! Ruined us, you did!”

“Sir, I– ”, Lillian began as she stepped up, the gears of her mind spinning full bore to find some sort of defense for the librarian. Helviana quietly barred her way, respectfully refusing her aid.

“We lost two priceless artifacts because of you! The Treatise on the Spawns of Shadow! The Ode to the Night! People are already wanting to see the spell that was used to dispel these foul beings, but no, we will have to use replicas!”

“I was concerned about the health of the person who saved your precious establishment, sir. Either way, I never leave any of my belongings at the Library. Now, if you will allow it, I will proceed to step out of your sight and never be seen again. Agreed?”

The curator looked him in the eye, then simply turned heels and walked away. Helviana did the same, forcing the girl to run after him. “Is that all he cares about? Is that really the kind of person who runs this place?”

“My father is not as bad a man as he seems. After all, he told no one that I caused all of this.”

Lillian gawked, completely taken aback. “You mean the curator?”

The Drow only nodded, not wanting to elaborate. Helviana tried to take a deep breath, but could not repress the urge to made a scowl. “No doubt that he did it to save face, but at least I will be able to find work without being ostracized.”

They stopped when they reached the lofty arch that marked the northern entrance to Ankhas. The sun was still up, though from its light it was only an hour away from setting for the day. It was hard, however, to see it through the thick brush of dark clouds and smog that masked the sky. Neither seemed to care much, being simply thankful that they were granted a little bit of both.

“I’ll extend my stay in Ettermire, to help the Library in any way I can,” Lillian suddenly declared, something serene blessing her voice. “My friend will simply have to wait a little longer for his answer.”

The ex-librarian smiled; he wondered if she had found it, then wondered to whom she owed it. This girl was quite a mystery to him, all things considerered... and that was perfectly fine with him. “Good. Then if you have free time, I would not mind any help you could give me in, well, not being unemployed.”

Before Lillian could answer, someone had called out her name, startling her at first, but the dulcet tone of the voice brought a much needed warmth to her heart. “Shairin!” she cried out, answering back with a long, sweeping wave.

“I caught wind of what happened from a customer!” she shouted, her flaxen mane catching the wind as she scuttled closer. For a Drow, her tan skin was somewhat pale enough for the blush of physical exertion to show. Without a warning, she leapt forward and brought the little girl into her warm embrace, discarding what little remained of her elven composure. “I rushed here as fast as I could after closing down the bar, but I was afraid I had lost you already!”

Lillian’s blush was as abashed as ever, perhaps reaching new levels of carnelian as she answered the hug in earnest. “I’m sorry I made you worry, Shairin. I’m even quite alright, all things considered!”

“Oh, and this is a… friend of mine, Helviana Erelisstra,” she finally said after careful consideration, though not without a grin. “Helviana, this is Shairin Melarn. She’s the proprietor of an inn, the Moru Úr, just a dozen corners down that street. Which reminds me: why don’t you ask her if she has any need for a helping hand?”

Sweeping a stray strand of hair from her sharp green eyes, Shairin took the time to consider him. Though she had stopped running for some time now, her cheeks suddenly flushed. “Well… do you suppose you would manage as a waiter?” she asked, a bit sheepishly.

Helviana smiled, and elicited a curious blink from Lillian. It was the first time she had ever seen him smile so kindly, so… genuinely. “I think you’ve found the perfect man.” In a hurry, he added, “for the job. Perfect for the job.”

Lillian laughed there and then, the most unrestrained she had ever been. Then, without explaining herself, she tugged at their sleeves and led them onto the long path back to the inn. It had been a tiresome day, and with how things were developing, they would all need a fair bit of rest to face what new ordeals may come. Little did she know how true this thought would turn out to be.

As they made their way across the shadowing cobbles, a thin wisp of black trailed out from her backpack. Unbeknownst to her, that plume of darkness had left something in her possession. It seemed to be nothing but a small black book, as plain as any other, but it was in truth one of the oldest secrets that the hands of shadow had ever relinquished.

And that secret was a gift.


_________________

Spoils

The ability to say : ‘I read/found that during my research in Ankhas’ and then get away with it. Notable things: everything mentioned in this quest, including in-depth information on Salvar, plus the knowledge of how to purify Osmium ore at a low cost. Then a bit more stuff, because I can’t possibly list everything she’s learned. Don't foresee any abuse, because this is for storyline purposes. As for the Osmium thing, it won't be any value to her until she gets the equipment for processing it and, heck, the Osmium ore itself.

The Treatise on the Spawns of Shadow: Though it disappeared from the vault, it reappeared in Lillian’s backpack, repaired and recharged. For now, it will allow her to summon the shadow child. More information on it will be given at my level update, a noteworthy information is that the shadow child has absorbed the glass-encased vellum of the Ode to the Night, and can spew it out at any given time.

Ode to the Night: A vellum on which is written a single spell that has three different effects, depending on the presence or absence of the moon. Not to be confused with an actual magic item or spell that she will use: it is only for storyline purposes.

Edit: Oops, I forgot. It's a detail but she'd also get a medal from the Constables. No ability whatsoever, and it's barely even pretty.

PG Spoils

NPC: Helviana Erelisstra, a summoner/ex reference librarian. Lillian will call upon his help and he will work part-time with the (future) Lodge Vespera Geek Squad.

[Zook Murnig]

Quest Judging
A Study in Black

STORY ~ 23/30

Continuity ~ 6.5/10 I got a decent feel for why Lillian was at Ankhas. I liked the bits about her youth and the mention of Ifrit Obsidian.
Setting ~ 7.5/10 I have to say, not many people these days recognize how fragile books are, especially as they age. Thank you for keeping that in mind, and even using it as a plot device in the story. That said, sometimes the setting became more of a backdrop than an integral part of the story, except when action was high. Try to interact just a little more with the surroundings during the slower parts.
Pacing ~ 9/10 Mon dieu! Read this in two sittings, the first a short one finishing after post 4. I couldn't stop reading this after I got started again on post 5, and from post 10 on I forgot about my notes! Spot on!

CHARACTER ~ 23/30

Dialogue ~ 7/10 Great work with the interactive dialogue, but some of the internal dialogue was a little awkward. It just seemed too detached.
Action ~ 8/10
Persona ~ 8/10 Lily and both of the major NPCs, whose names I would butcher, were well detailed and their actions, speech, and the few thoughts you showed.

WRITING STYLE ~ 24/30

Technique ~ 8.5/10 Very well done! Even in action sequences, your flowing descriptions kept my higher mind entertained. However, there were a couple times when the flowery language became just too much and I wished that you had toned that down a bit. Those moments affected your Clarity score, as well.
Mechanics ~ 9.5/10 Very nearly perfect. Just a few word choice and spelling problems that were probably nothing more than typos.
Clarity ~ 6/10 I understood most of it, but there were times when things got too weird (or, as mentioned above, too flowery) for me to follow. I got it eventually, having trudged on through the murk to what I knew would be better pastures, but nonetheless it hurt this score.

MISCELLANEOUS

Wild Card ~ 9/10 I thoroughly enjoyed this thread, and I could tell it was a labor of love.

TOTAL ~ 79

Ataraxis gains 3689 EXP and 270 gold.

Ataraxis gains all requested spoils.

The House of Sora gains the NPC whose name I would butcher.

If you have any questions about the judgment or how you can improve, PM me or send me a message on AIM, screen name SuperSonicMatt1.

[Zook Murnig]

EXP/GP ADDED!