Written By Cambria
June 7, 2018, 1:03 a.m.(12/6/1008 AR)
Thoughts on weapons:
My preference is to have between myself and a potential threat a lot of armed professionals. Axes, swords, spears. If they are exceptionally proficient with a weapon, then I shall be well pleased, no matter their particular choice. In fact, one of my Guardians is absolutely deadly with wooden spoons. I can hardly imagine the damage this particular individual might be capable of should a spoon of metal come into their grip.
My preference is to have between myself and a potential threat a lot of armed professionals. Axes, swords, spears. If they are exceptionally proficient with a weapon, then I shall be well pleased, no matter their particular choice. In fact, one of my Guardians is absolutely deadly with wooden spoons. I can hardly imagine the damage this particular individual might be capable of should a spoon of metal come into their grip.
Written By Cambria
June 6, 2018, 11:04 p.m.(12/6/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Isabeau
I am not well known in Arx for my bubbly personality. I do not flit hither and thither as other social butterflies, making friends wherever I go. This was not always so, but it has become so during my time in the capital. I realize, however, that reaching out for companionship is not a mistake. Denying it is a mistake.
Written By Cambria
June 6, 2018, 2:33 a.m.(12/4/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Driskell
"'You have understood me better than I wanted,' said the man in the mirror."
I only knew Brother Driskell through journals. I think he would have appreciated this.
I only knew Brother Driskell through journals. I think he would have appreciated this.
Written By Cambria
June 3, 2018, 1:07 p.m.(11/27/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Rohran
I have been compiling a fair bit of advice I wish to pass down to my son. Life is too complex, too varied, and too great to only leave a child with one thing. Still, in the spirit of what you wish to do, I will publicly share one of my lessons from a Lycene mother:
A person who will not listen carefully to advice honestly given is a fool. Of course, an individual who blindly takes any advice they receive is a bigger fool.
A person who will not listen carefully to advice honestly given is a fool. Of course, an individual who blindly takes any advice they receive is a bigger fool.
Written By Cambria
June 1, 2018, 4:16 p.m.(11/23/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Venturo
As a Lycene, I was raised with views more contrarian than elsewhere found in the Compact. I remember the Seraph of Ostria - a Mirrormask, for those who may not know or remember - once brought me a leather-bound folio of the White Journals written by an ancestor of mine. Written between the years of 645 to 647 AR, the Seraph bade me to observe the collection and tell him what I noticed. While I offered several obvious things (the leather was calf skin, it was written on Vellichorian vellum, it was over three hundred years old, etc), he seemed to be waiting for a specific answer from me. I opened the folio, and began to leaf through it. It was then that I realized this particular set of journals had never been read beyond page eight, for the rest of them, all four hundred and thirty seven of them, were uncut thereafter.
Only once I discovered this peculiarity did the Seraph further explain his lesson: That it was a warning to all, especially those convinced of their self-importance and puffed up with excess vanity. We Arvani, for whom the written word is of enormous importance, if not all-important, should try always to remember that despite the tenant of Vellichor, most people do not read; those who read do not understand; and those who understand forget.
Only once I discovered this peculiarity did the Seraph further explain his lesson: That it was a warning to all, especially those convinced of their self-importance and puffed up with excess vanity. We Arvani, for whom the written word is of enormous importance, if not all-important, should try always to remember that despite the tenant of Vellichor, most people do not read; those who read do not understand; and those who understand forget.
Written By Cambria
May 31, 2018, 7:06 p.m.(11/21/1008 AR)
Everyone unquestioningly believes that he or she is the leading authority on their own life, especially when it concerns ones thoughts and experiences. It is only when I began to doubt that such a realization came to me at all - as I do not imagine that many people frequently consider such things when they seem so very obvious. I was reading through a series of journals from several years ago and it struck me that if I were to die today, someone reading through these White Journals would know more about some of my own experiences than I would ever remember myself without having to resort back to these old journals.
Proof that memory is indeed fallible.
There are scores, if not hundreds, of such journals that seem to have little connection to me; that is to say my current version of me, though it was undoubtedly I who wrote them. Most alarming of all, one journal has my mother's dying words, which I wrote down at her request shortly before her passing.
'Dear family,
I enjoyed the time I was able to spend with you and appreciate your kindness and understanding. I am sorry to have to leave you.
Love, Adriana'
I only recall this vaguely, and could not swear before the Sentinel whether or not I passed her message on in person as well, or simply left it to be read after submitting the journal to the Archives.
Perhaps there are people who have recorded their lives much more thoroughly than I, but there must be even more who have left even less of a personal record behind. I must suppose that all description of mortal life, even a single life - ones own - is, at best, an approximation.
Proof that memory is indeed fallible.
There are scores, if not hundreds, of such journals that seem to have little connection to me; that is to say my current version of me, though it was undoubtedly I who wrote them. Most alarming of all, one journal has my mother's dying words, which I wrote down at her request shortly before her passing.
'Dear family,
I enjoyed the time I was able to spend with you and appreciate your kindness and understanding. I am sorry to have to leave you.
Love, Adriana'
I only recall this vaguely, and could not swear before the Sentinel whether or not I passed her message on in person as well, or simply left it to be read after submitting the journal to the Archives.
Perhaps there are people who have recorded their lives much more thoroughly than I, but there must be even more who have left even less of a personal record behind. I must suppose that all description of mortal life, even a single life - ones own - is, at best, an approximation.
Written By Cambria
May 31, 2018, 6:23 p.m.(11/20/1008 AR)
A Scholar who's work I was reading wrote that it is easier to give good advice than it is to take it, to which I think I would add: it is also easier to agree with good advice than to act on it. Enacting wisdom is a little like having learned a foreign language, which in your mind sounds perfect, but when spoken comes out with a heavy accent.
If good advice were easy to take, the world would have long ago been perfect. Or, at any rate, a great deal better off than it currently is.
If good advice were easy to take, the world would have long ago been perfect. Or, at any rate, a great deal better off than it currently is.
Written By Cambria
May 26, 2018, 12:01 a.m.(11/5/1008 AR)
I feel sorry for those who insist on continuing to do what they have always done but want the results to be different from what they have always been.
Written By Cambria
May 9, 2018, 7:30 p.m.(9/17/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Talen
Do you like big books?
Written By Cambria
May 7, 2018, 3:50 p.m.(9/13/1008 AR)
I have had several marriage proposals come before me in the recent past. Some of them contained within a great deal of emotion between each party, while yet another, on its surface, appeared most beneficial. Two actually came from the same source for different members of my family, which I thought peculiar, but then, life is often peculiar. I declined them all. I declined them even though I knew it would hurt those involved. I declined them even though others could have argued strongly that it did not appear to make sense, politically. I declined them because they were not right for my family, or even that of the other House. I had many considerations which I will not make known here, but the possibility of either party potentially becoming an oathbreaker (through divorce, or annulment, let us not quibble) was not the least among them when I made my decisions. It did cause heartache, and headache, and tension, but I do not regret those choices. While it is my hope that perhaps one day those relatives of mine who were involved will also feel the same way, I realize that such is a luxury for my station.
Written By Cambria
May 5, 2018, 3:53 p.m.(9/9/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Bliss
I wasn't being sarcastic. I really did have a good time.
Besides, self-denial can make things all the more enjoyable, later.
But if you want to drink a double measure, by all means!
Besides, self-denial can make things all the more enjoyable, later.
But if you want to drink a double measure, by all means!
Written By Cambria
May 5, 2018, 3:42 p.m.(9/9/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Bliss
In truth? Mine was fantastic. But it isn't always so for other women, I have been told! I did miss drinking wine, though.
Written By Cambria
May 5, 2018, 3:31 p.m.(9/9/1008 AR)
I suppose a child is an investment of sorts, which makes sense. It's a return on nine months of what many experience as misery and discomfort.
Written By Cambria
May 3, 2018, 2:54 a.m.(9/2/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Hadrian
My husband and I have not shared the warmest of relationships. It is no secret that my marriage to him was forged as much through a clever, even under-handed, bit of positioning on my part as it was arguably through thinly veiled coercion. I married for political reasons, without regard for feelings, because I seem to be one of the remaining nobles in the capital that still adheres to the belief that love is the last consideration for marriage between Peers. It has been fortunate, then, that the former Duke of Southport possesses a similar mindset to mine own when it comes to the running of a House. Early on we established that, though he had little more than personal contempt for me and what I had done to him, he was part of House Mazetti. What's more, he was immediately named my Voice, and therefore afforded (saddled), with all the responsibilities that came with the role.
In that regard, he has never disappointed. Which, as I have said to my family many times, is precisely one of the reasons why I chose him for my husband. Few are the men or women who would not choose to punish the House. Few are the men or women who would have even set aside their personal hopes and dreams to secure the continued honor of the family and seat they were to lose - all because their forebear signed a contract years ago. Whatever may have passed between us up until now, it is my desire to put to ink that the once Duke Hadrian Malvici is a man of conviction, perseverance and principle.
He works tirelessly for other people, whether it is with the Arvum Refugee Relief Group, or on a more individual scale. His concern for his former vassals of House Saik is nothing other than touching. Even Donkey Knights, an entirely non-serious (except when it is), light-hearted affair is done in the spirit of providing levity to others. As I spend my evening recuperating, and thinking about the past few years, I realize that I cannot recall a time when he has done something for himself.
Our child was so important to him he even spent months acquiring medical knowledge and skills so that he could deliver the baby himself. While not something I wish to spend overlong on, I will impart this: I was not convinced at first. I was barely convinced in the end. As a vain woman, as a first time mother, the very idea was less than thrilling, for reasons that hardly need elaborating. Now that it is over, however, I am glad for it.
Whatever may have come before must be consigned to the past. The man I call husband has fathered a future Guardian. He is now one of us, through bonds of blood. And again I say, I made the right choice. I hope that, even if it is not now, Hadrian feels the same.
In that regard, he has never disappointed. Which, as I have said to my family many times, is precisely one of the reasons why I chose him for my husband. Few are the men or women who would not choose to punish the House. Few are the men or women who would have even set aside their personal hopes and dreams to secure the continued honor of the family and seat they were to lose - all because their forebear signed a contract years ago. Whatever may have passed between us up until now, it is my desire to put to ink that the once Duke Hadrian Malvici is a man of conviction, perseverance and principle.
He works tirelessly for other people, whether it is with the Arvum Refugee Relief Group, or on a more individual scale. His concern for his former vassals of House Saik is nothing other than touching. Even Donkey Knights, an entirely non-serious (except when it is), light-hearted affair is done in the spirit of providing levity to others. As I spend my evening recuperating, and thinking about the past few years, I realize that I cannot recall a time when he has done something for himself.
Our child was so important to him he even spent months acquiring medical knowledge and skills so that he could deliver the baby himself. While not something I wish to spend overlong on, I will impart this: I was not convinced at first. I was barely convinced in the end. As a vain woman, as a first time mother, the very idea was less than thrilling, for reasons that hardly need elaborating. Now that it is over, however, I am glad for it.
Whatever may have come before must be consigned to the past. The man I call husband has fathered a future Guardian. He is now one of us, through bonds of blood. And again I say, I made the right choice. I hope that, even if it is not now, Hadrian feels the same.
Written By Cambria
May 3, 2018, 2 a.m.(9/2/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Reigna
Countess Reigna Keaton was kind enough to take time out of her own busy schedule to attend to me and offer her calm and experienced presence to my husband. While it is not my habit to write in overly detailed fashion within my White Journals, it would be remiss of me, as well as purely unkind and ungrateful, not to share my thoughts here for this remarkable woman. I am more than glad that she was there, and I am proud to name her a friend to me and my House.
Written By Cambria
April 29, 2018, 1:08 a.m.(8/21/1008 AR)
The only thing I hate worse than being fussed over is being ignored.
Written By Cambria
April 26, 2018, 6:05 p.m.(8/16/1008 AR)
Sometimes the safest, and sanest, thing you can do is let people know it's a dangerous world. Only a fool sticks his hand into the mouth of a wolf and expects nothing to happen.
Written By Cambria
April 22, 2018, 3:20 p.m.(8/7/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Daemon
With the sudden talk of proteges happening around the city recently, I began to think of my protege (whom I would argue is the best protege). I realized that we have now shared this relationship for more than a year. I hope Sir Daemon forgives me this slip - I really should have done something on the date of the anniversary. That said, I look forward to many more years as his patron.
Written By Cambria
April 15, 2018, 4:28 p.m.(7/21/1008 AR)
Relationship Note on Vitalis
Vitalis has returned to Arx once again, I dare say I am the only one that crosses their fingers when I admit to being hopeful that this time it will be for more than a fortnight. While we have not had a proper chance to catch up, it has been nice to see his smiling face within the manor.
The servants, I note, also seem equally pleased by his smiling face. The Marquis and Theron will just have to accept the fact that they are now, as I have heard it said, 'old news.'
The servants, I note, also seem equally pleased by his smiling face. The Marquis and Theron will just have to accept the fact that they are now, as I have heard it said, 'old news.'
Written By Cambria
April 15, 2018, 4:22 p.m.(7/21/1008 AR)
Last night I had the good pleasure of dining with the Harthalls. It is not often that myself and the Marquis find ourselves playing the role of guests, and I confess it was an enjoyable sensation. More enjoyable, however, were Marquessa Sunniva and her husband, Marquis Orvyn. Each were wonderfully charming, and the conversation was superb, for all that we spent a great deal of time on introducing ourselves to one another and navigating small talk while we found our stride together. I look forward to future get-togethers with them, and hope that they feel the same.
Please note that the scholars may take some time preparing your journal for others to read.