Written By Sirius
Feb. 18, 2022, 1:49 p.m.(2/20/1017 AR)
Often I'm told that I must learn to understand the value of dreams, or dreaming.
But it is difficult, I must admit. Several family members have, before and concurrently, been describing to me these incredibly lucid circumstances they've found themselves in whilst away in their heads, presumedly sleeping. But what is it, that they see? Really? Are they not just memories? Memories being experienced through again with the misguided hopefulness of what we wished had happened, what we hoped we had been when they transpired, but weren't? Isn't it all an act of futility?
Dreaming thus, to me, feels like looking back. Like another word for regret. A more optimistic person would call it retrospection, and channel it into the realm of learning - and yes, we're never quite finished doing that (Read: learning), but then there is the issue that I have a hard time relating to these cogent dreams.
My dreams aren't as vivid as most, they're but a succession of images all translating into a conclusion of a thought. Nothing moves in my mind when I sleep, it is all a one-faceted display. Of memories deleted, fears I've forgotten, lessons I've chosen to unlearn. Because of it, in truth, I largely envy those who may visit a wholly new realm in their minds when they go to sleep, and in small part I begrudge them. I feel robbed of a chance. A blessing, maybe.
Perhaps not all of us are meant to be dreamers.
But it is difficult, I must admit. Several family members have, before and concurrently, been describing to me these incredibly lucid circumstances they've found themselves in whilst away in their heads, presumedly sleeping. But what is it, that they see? Really? Are they not just memories? Memories being experienced through again with the misguided hopefulness of what we wished had happened, what we hoped we had been when they transpired, but weren't? Isn't it all an act of futility?
Dreaming thus, to me, feels like looking back. Like another word for regret. A more optimistic person would call it retrospection, and channel it into the realm of learning - and yes, we're never quite finished doing that (Read: learning), but then there is the issue that I have a hard time relating to these cogent dreams.
My dreams aren't as vivid as most, they're but a succession of images all translating into a conclusion of a thought. Nothing moves in my mind when I sleep, it is all a one-faceted display. Of memories deleted, fears I've forgotten, lessons I've chosen to unlearn. Because of it, in truth, I largely envy those who may visit a wholly new realm in their minds when they go to sleep, and in small part I begrudge them. I feel robbed of a chance. A blessing, maybe.
Perhaps not all of us are meant to be dreamers.
Written By Sirius
Nov. 5, 2021, 11:27 p.m.(7/7/1016 AR)
In the capitol again, turned away from war for the moment, but never long.
I hadn't known how much I'd miss the metropolitan air when I first set foot out of Arx, scholar. That stale, clinging solution that failed to leave the nose, and stuck around like a bad habit. But it wasn't. It was a reminder, of Arx, that you are in it. And no sooner had I departed the fresher winds of the sea and set foot into the city proper was I hit by such radical reminder. At first, I couldn't help but disdain it, it was almost shocking. But as I sooner found out, delving deeper still into the nexus of our beloved mecca, it felt more like... a welcoming. A warm, if not pungent embrace. The Queen herself had outstretched her palm out the deep of her city's own nucleus and spared a minute's welcome just for me. If only to remind me of the price there is to pay when setting foot again where all the wheels turn.
There is so much beauty at first glance now, across these streets. Beauty I took for granted in the past and couldn't see; shops, and things that beforehand I failed to pay attention to. To admire for what they were, and are now. It is almost perhaps too easy to be lost in them, under this curated boulevard of modern arts and craftsmanship, but never for long. The Enemy has taught me too valuable a lesson, scholar, for me to do something as foolish as resting: where there is shape, a blade has been and will soon return. And with it, the carving shall begin anew. There can be no rest. One has to be realistic about these things.
But scholar, how I missed home. My mother. After the many battles at Bastion, I felt the need to pay a small visit to Sanctum, to see her face again. Father donned the usual scowling disappointment at meeting me so mundanely — unarmed and unmounted, but we had ridden in haste thorough the Grey stretch and hadn't looked back until we crossed into the March. And so my hindquarters were sore. He didn't care for it, but no matter. Mother. She hadn't changed a smidge since I last saw her, if perhaps more relaxed now that she is no longer remanded to her tower and is healthy enough again to ride and hunt how she likes. Renewed. Told me all she could about these new paths she had discovered, how the hares migrated with the passing of the seasons, and how the forest felt so different to her from the days she last roamed them. A lull of happiness in an otherwise turbulent year.
But now we are returned. And as I lay eyes once more upon the venerable colors of Valardin swooping down from our battlements, a familiar calm settles in me. Whatever comes, the white dragon shall face it with courage.
The only mistake we can make now is to be afraid.
I hadn't known how much I'd miss the metropolitan air when I first set foot out of Arx, scholar. That stale, clinging solution that failed to leave the nose, and stuck around like a bad habit. But it wasn't. It was a reminder, of Arx, that you are in it. And no sooner had I departed the fresher winds of the sea and set foot into the city proper was I hit by such radical reminder. At first, I couldn't help but disdain it, it was almost shocking. But as I sooner found out, delving deeper still into the nexus of our beloved mecca, it felt more like... a welcoming. A warm, if not pungent embrace. The Queen herself had outstretched her palm out the deep of her city's own nucleus and spared a minute's welcome just for me. If only to remind me of the price there is to pay when setting foot again where all the wheels turn.
There is so much beauty at first glance now, across these streets. Beauty I took for granted in the past and couldn't see; shops, and things that beforehand I failed to pay attention to. To admire for what they were, and are now. It is almost perhaps too easy to be lost in them, under this curated boulevard of modern arts and craftsmanship, but never for long. The Enemy has taught me too valuable a lesson, scholar, for me to do something as foolish as resting: where there is shape, a blade has been and will soon return. And with it, the carving shall begin anew. There can be no rest. One has to be realistic about these things.
But scholar, how I missed home. My mother. After the many battles at Bastion, I felt the need to pay a small visit to Sanctum, to see her face again. Father donned the usual scowling disappointment at meeting me so mundanely — unarmed and unmounted, but we had ridden in haste thorough the Grey stretch and hadn't looked back until we crossed into the March. And so my hindquarters were sore. He didn't care for it, but no matter. Mother. She hadn't changed a smidge since I last saw her, if perhaps more relaxed now that she is no longer remanded to her tower and is healthy enough again to ride and hunt how she likes. Renewed. Told me all she could about these new paths she had discovered, how the hares migrated with the passing of the seasons, and how the forest felt so different to her from the days she last roamed them. A lull of happiness in an otherwise turbulent year.
But now we are returned. And as I lay eyes once more upon the venerable colors of Valardin swooping down from our battlements, a familiar calm settles in me. Whatever comes, the white dragon shall face it with courage.
The only mistake we can make now is to be afraid.
Written By Sirius
Oct. 16, 2020, 12:35 p.m.(3/18/1014 AR)
Greetings, Custodian; it has been a while.
There's not much that I can add since my arrival to Arx once more. It has been a month and yet it feels as if I've only ever truly arrived but yesterday. The sheltering solitude of my room, the rare draft of cold that seeps through its window, it's a somnolent companion but the only I've wanted to cherish since the happenings in the East. Food has felt bland for some time now, compromise with the responsibilities of life unbearable, and meaning in it all hard to come by. Friends tell me it's but a phase from the duty faced there, in Elune. A recollection of emotions suppressed, trying to come out, but I know not if this is true.
Perhaps I shall linger here some time longer, awaiting that soon merciful oblivion that comes for us all. Morbid, isn't it? I suppose that, in that regard, I've never failed to deliver. Do not be disappointed, for there's much to ponder on, regrets to look back upon, dark truths to internalize from. I like to think inside such morbidity lies a fraction of truth, and the Queen will be laughing still, at the end of all my failings and remorses...
Either way, it is good to come back to you yet again. The journals help, and so does reading that of others, a reminder of life's stream flowing regardless of our successes and failings.
That is it for today, Custodian.
There's not much that I can add since my arrival to Arx once more. It has been a month and yet it feels as if I've only ever truly arrived but yesterday. The sheltering solitude of my room, the rare draft of cold that seeps through its window, it's a somnolent companion but the only I've wanted to cherish since the happenings in the East. Food has felt bland for some time now, compromise with the responsibilities of life unbearable, and meaning in it all hard to come by. Friends tell me it's but a phase from the duty faced there, in Elune. A recollection of emotions suppressed, trying to come out, but I know not if this is true.
Perhaps I shall linger here some time longer, awaiting that soon merciful oblivion that comes for us all. Morbid, isn't it? I suppose that, in that regard, I've never failed to deliver. Do not be disappointed, for there's much to ponder on, regrets to look back upon, dark truths to internalize from. I like to think inside such morbidity lies a fraction of truth, and the Queen will be laughing still, at the end of all my failings and remorses...
Either way, it is good to come back to you yet again. The journals help, and so does reading that of others, a reminder of life's stream flowing regardless of our successes and failings.
That is it for today, Custodian.
Written By Sirius
Aug. 13, 2020, 6:29 a.m.(11/1/1013 AR)
It has been quite a while, custodian,
Too long, in fact,
I had missed the smell of the Capitol every day I there spent in the land of Thrax, in Estroch, for however beautiful Elune may well be it cannot yet compare to the shine of our Compact's Capitol. As I arrived into the docks, stressing over where to go and when, a sumptuously-dressed peddler walked into my entourage, something dark and heavy wrapped over both of her outstretched arms. I took a step back, seeing what looked like claws or some such manifestation glinting in the candlelight of the jetty's poor illumination.
She explains that she had made a suit of armor stitched together by the hide of 'wolfmen'. Professed to me, she did, that a series of 'monster-hunters' had sold her the hide, obvious charlatans, and now she stitched it together. She set the suit down on a crate where a few left-over claws rapped against its wood with deadly weight, where she then unfolded it to show it whole, a ghastly thing of black and sharpened bones — a creature shorn of its insides, left to be occupied by man or some other creature seeking warmth in its emptied hide, and the head of the once-beast tilted up to look at its soon-to-be wearer, should one ever arrive.
Altogether fearsome, no doubt, and it left me pondering when and where this woman got such an idea in the first place. But those are the wonders of Arx, the people's imagination is limitless.
I, of course, didn't make a purchase of such a fraud and, rather graciously and infinitely kind as are my ways (haha), provided her for her efforts with lofty reward for such a spectacle and window into her imagination. To Jayus' benefit, of course.
Too long, in fact,
I had missed the smell of the Capitol every day I there spent in the land of Thrax, in Estroch, for however beautiful Elune may well be it cannot yet compare to the shine of our Compact's Capitol. As I arrived into the docks, stressing over where to go and when, a sumptuously-dressed peddler walked into my entourage, something dark and heavy wrapped over both of her outstretched arms. I took a step back, seeing what looked like claws or some such manifestation glinting in the candlelight of the jetty's poor illumination.
She explains that she had made a suit of armor stitched together by the hide of 'wolfmen'. Professed to me, she did, that a series of 'monster-hunters' had sold her the hide, obvious charlatans, and now she stitched it together. She set the suit down on a crate where a few left-over claws rapped against its wood with deadly weight, where she then unfolded it to show it whole, a ghastly thing of black and sharpened bones — a creature shorn of its insides, left to be occupied by man or some other creature seeking warmth in its emptied hide, and the head of the once-beast tilted up to look at its soon-to-be wearer, should one ever arrive.
Altogether fearsome, no doubt, and it left me pondering when and where this woman got such an idea in the first place. But those are the wonders of Arx, the people's imagination is limitless.
I, of course, didn't make a purchase of such a fraud and, rather graciously and infinitely kind as are my ways (haha), provided her for her efforts with lofty reward for such a spectacle and window into her imagination. To Jayus' benefit, of course.
Written By Sirius
July 27, 2020, 5:49 p.m.(9/24/1013 AR)
Relationship Note on Niklas
Your Highness, I've just read your most recent entry and realized that I've missed your play. I'd apologize for failing to make presence but the unimportance of such a claim shines next to my knowledge that I've missed it altogether.
With the lost opportunity goes the lustre of life. Such a great loss for me.
Damn it. Don't tell me how great it was next we meet, don't even mention it, my heart wouldn't be able to take it. I know it must've been as wonderful as the last.
With the lost opportunity goes the lustre of life. Such a great loss for me.
Damn it. Don't tell me how great it was next we meet, don't even mention it, my heart wouldn't be able to take it. I know it must've been as wonderful as the last.
Written By Sirius
July 21, 2020, 6:31 a.m.(9/11/1013 AR)
I wonder how the public perception on the topic of the improbable has shifted after witnessing Prince Cerdic's ship going around soaring over the Thraxian ward. I've tried asking around but, it almost feels as if when a Prince of Valardin brings up the topic it almost always turns towards the polite and least scandalous.
I'd just like to know how the thing, against all conventional understanding, flies as it does.
It feels as if adversity has dissolved my mortal psyche and opened my skull to "The Truth" just by looking northeast at the wrong time.
I'd just like to know how the thing, against all conventional understanding, flies as it does.
It feels as if adversity has dissolved my mortal psyche and opened my skull to "The Truth" just by looking northeast at the wrong time.
Written By Sirius
July 16, 2020, 11:23 p.m.(9/3/1013 AR)
Relationship Note on Vitalis
I've just read your entry, Lord Clement,
While it isn't exactly an excerpt of forgotten and rediscovered lore that might interest you more, I've just made a little thing associated with my fabled ancestor. I hope you like it, even if it has somewhat of a comedic touch.
While it isn't exactly an excerpt of forgotten and rediscovered lore that might interest you more, I've just made a little thing associated with my fabled ancestor. I hope you like it, even if it has somewhat of a comedic touch.
Written By Sirius
July 16, 2020, 11:21 p.m.(9/3/1013 AR)
With the possibility of sounding and appearing as a fool, I'll be inflicting upon all you surveyors of the white journals my very first attempt at writing a song. I'll butcher the stanzas, the chorus will be without rhythm and the verses will have no melody at all, this I predict. Now, the more enlightened of you will say, "But Sirius, you fool, if you start with such pessimism, you'll never succeed," why, yes. Correct.
I won't.
Anyway, here's my first attempt. I pray Dame Sorrel never reads this, or she'll undo our alliance squire-to-dame and cast me into the Maw rather than ever admit association with me in any shape or form. She's too busy to even go through these, right? Should be. Only people with time to waste in their hands, like myself, have that lapse in their day-to-day affairs to come here and record for Vellichor how they failed today. Like myself.
"Cedric Valardin's ghost is haunting Sanctum's Keep,
Half the garrison have seen him, plus the Castellan and me,
And if you think we've had too much of that home-made rum-milk,
Just tell me where them flyin' boats n' ships keep sailing in from,"
Don't go down the wharf when there's no ship in anchor,
You just might hear a dragon's roar and get a nasty shock,
And if you hear an anchor drop, don't gaze out your windowsill,
You just might see a flying ship come sailing down with Cedric on atop.
We don't know why we're haunted here, or why it's he that haunts,
We've got a tontine pledge for when we're all hard rotting off,
In where we're all saving up for when he comes in next,
The best odds says he'll let us up along and we'll buy a ticket on.
Cedric Valardin's ghost is haunting Sanctum's Keep,
Not that we're complaining, since the view comes in for free,
But now and then we wonder what it means for the Arva-ni,
The ghosts of generations past are coming back to haunt."
That's it. Half the credit goes to a good friend called Goodman Jed, whose stringing of a dulcimer helped me put some flavour to this and inspired me greatly. Thank you Jed. This is with hope that any would-be troubadour hoping to worship Limerance with devotion to their music finds a degree of inspiration off of it.
I wouldn't, but who knows.
That's it from me Custodian,
I'll go bury my head in the sand now.
I won't.
Anyway, here's my first attempt. I pray Dame Sorrel never reads this, or she'll undo our alliance squire-to-dame and cast me into the Maw rather than ever admit association with me in any shape or form. She's too busy to even go through these, right? Should be. Only people with time to waste in their hands, like myself, have that lapse in their day-to-day affairs to come here and record for Vellichor how they failed today. Like myself.
"Cedric Valardin's ghost is haunting Sanctum's Keep,
Half the garrison have seen him, plus the Castellan and me,
And if you think we've had too much of that home-made rum-milk,
Just tell me where them flyin' boats n' ships keep sailing in from,"
Don't go down the wharf when there's no ship in anchor,
You just might hear a dragon's roar and get a nasty shock,
And if you hear an anchor drop, don't gaze out your windowsill,
You just might see a flying ship come sailing down with Cedric on atop.
We don't know why we're haunted here, or why it's he that haunts,
We've got a tontine pledge for when we're all hard rotting off,
In where we're all saving up for when he comes in next,
The best odds says he'll let us up along and we'll buy a ticket on.
Cedric Valardin's ghost is haunting Sanctum's Keep,
Not that we're complaining, since the view comes in for free,
But now and then we wonder what it means for the Arva-ni,
The ghosts of generations past are coming back to haunt."
That's it. Half the credit goes to a good friend called Goodman Jed, whose stringing of a dulcimer helped me put some flavour to this and inspired me greatly. Thank you Jed. This is with hope that any would-be troubadour hoping to worship Limerance with devotion to their music finds a degree of inspiration off of it.
I wouldn't, but who knows.
That's it from me Custodian,
I'll go bury my head in the sand now.
Written By Sirius
July 14, 2020, 12:20 p.m.(8/26/1013 AR)
Hello, custodian,
I'm back. Delayed, perhaps, but back nonetheless,
Odd were the times, when Alberich Valardin took stage in my life and decided on sharing some of his well-guarded wisdom to me. This was when I was much more than a childe, but of seventeen winters lived and two years before my planned departure to Arx. He knew my mind was set then to officership, and the leading of warriors, so he decided to impart upon me an insight he kept to avoid encouraging me until that very moment, where he knew my mind was set.
Never a man to dress words prettily, his had always been crude choice-tells to describe; "Never make friends with your soldiers, with your men. They'll despise you for it. Think you weak. But don't be a despot, either. A middle ground, Sirius, a middle ground."
Today, out in camp, his words resonated in me yet again. They come, juggling and jiving, from time to time.
I was in my tent when a Knight approached with a pained look upon his face. He bid me come, follow him, for there was something I had to see. I asked him beforehand what it'd be, but he said he lacked the words. He'd prefer I witnessed. So I looked down at my work - plotting the march for the coming days - but, judging by the look beneath his sallet's visor, it could wait.
Arm in arm had an Abandoned woman being carried into camp by two men-at-arms. By the time I arrived, a throng of knights and dames circled around this 'someone'. I broke my way through the crowd, and the company quieted down as I came into the clearing to find her unconscious on the ground. Her back was stripped raw and I know I could see a rib or two poking out. Thorns had broken off of some brutish whip for the task, embedding themselves in her flesh, and her skin was hanging in strands where it hung at all.
It was good she passed out. Not because she would be in horrible pain, but because I think she might not otherwise have stopped.
It was self-inflicted.
Many in the company said, told me, that her arrival was a bad omen. The more superstitious. Others demanded she'd be given sanctuary, healed, the more reasonable ones. Outnumbered by those who clung to tradition, they likened me to a hero should I throw her back into the dead bog they found her in, but I refused such an idea. Her wounds were dressed, her unconsciousness awaited by a Mercy on hand to augur her back into the land of the living, and with a translator, she was sent back into the wilderness with supplies to reach Arx. Before she woke, I had Dame Camille find her tools of torture and hide them from her. It is for little cause, but what else could I do?
Is mercy in the face of adversity tyranny? It is not. I'm not looking for validation. But when the world demands of us to compromise, and the act chafes, and it hurts, and it is difficult, I can understand the comfort of yielding. I considered it.
I am just glad she was fine, however long she'll want to keep herself as 'fine' as we left her.
That's it for today, Custodian,
Take care.
I'm back. Delayed, perhaps, but back nonetheless,
Odd were the times, when Alberich Valardin took stage in my life and decided on sharing some of his well-guarded wisdom to me. This was when I was much more than a childe, but of seventeen winters lived and two years before my planned departure to Arx. He knew my mind was set then to officership, and the leading of warriors, so he decided to impart upon me an insight he kept to avoid encouraging me until that very moment, where he knew my mind was set.
Never a man to dress words prettily, his had always been crude choice-tells to describe; "Never make friends with your soldiers, with your men. They'll despise you for it. Think you weak. But don't be a despot, either. A middle ground, Sirius, a middle ground."
Today, out in camp, his words resonated in me yet again. They come, juggling and jiving, from time to time.
I was in my tent when a Knight approached with a pained look upon his face. He bid me come, follow him, for there was something I had to see. I asked him beforehand what it'd be, but he said he lacked the words. He'd prefer I witnessed. So I looked down at my work - plotting the march for the coming days - but, judging by the look beneath his sallet's visor, it could wait.
Arm in arm had an Abandoned woman being carried into camp by two men-at-arms. By the time I arrived, a throng of knights and dames circled around this 'someone'. I broke my way through the crowd, and the company quieted down as I came into the clearing to find her unconscious on the ground. Her back was stripped raw and I know I could see a rib or two poking out. Thorns had broken off of some brutish whip for the task, embedding themselves in her flesh, and her skin was hanging in strands where it hung at all.
It was good she passed out. Not because she would be in horrible pain, but because I think she might not otherwise have stopped.
It was self-inflicted.
Many in the company said, told me, that her arrival was a bad omen. The more superstitious. Others demanded she'd be given sanctuary, healed, the more reasonable ones. Outnumbered by those who clung to tradition, they likened me to a hero should I throw her back into the dead bog they found her in, but I refused such an idea. Her wounds were dressed, her unconsciousness awaited by a Mercy on hand to augur her back into the land of the living, and with a translator, she was sent back into the wilderness with supplies to reach Arx. Before she woke, I had Dame Camille find her tools of torture and hide them from her. It is for little cause, but what else could I do?
Is mercy in the face of adversity tyranny? It is not. I'm not looking for validation. But when the world demands of us to compromise, and the act chafes, and it hurts, and it is difficult, I can understand the comfort of yielding. I considered it.
I am just glad she was fine, however long she'll want to keep herself as 'fine' as we left her.
That's it for today, Custodian,
Take care.
Written By Sirius
July 12, 2020, 9:21 p.m.(8/22/1013 AR)
Dog is not for sale anymore.
Written By Sirius
July 9, 2020, 10:12 a.m.(8/15/1013 AR)
Hello again, custodian,
Earlier this week I finally took that final step into joining the Faith. Took a bit, a good few years of deliberation, but I've realized that I've devoted enough time into the house of Valardin since my arrival to have earned some reprieve from military drill. Since touching the roads of Arx, every day's been one of physical strain. Training, trying to improve the body and, because of it, the mind's been somewhat sequestered.
No longer.
Legate Ailith didn't do much for introductions, and that is fine, she needed not enter any kind of deliberation with me as she's an incredibly busy woman. She, instead, laid upon my being an endless library of information for me to wade through. Journals upon tomes upon books atop piles and mounds of pages, dusty and new, with hand-stitched edges and others faded. I hadn't realized how much I missed being submerged in documentation.
I know in the past I told you it'd perhaps be the Prince of Stories who'd take me away, but in the end I chose Limerance. My choice was somewhat affected by an old friend, whose words moved me some while in the presence of His altar. Oathkeeping and duty have always been interesting subjects to me, avenues I feel for us humans to go beyond the mundane cravings of our mortal coil into something greater.
Either way, I digress somewhat. All the faces I've met thus far in my short tenure in the Faith have been unfailingly kind and I'm humbled by it. Now, I believe, is time to get to work.
Take care, custodian.
Earlier this week I finally took that final step into joining the Faith. Took a bit, a good few years of deliberation, but I've realized that I've devoted enough time into the house of Valardin since my arrival to have earned some reprieve from military drill. Since touching the roads of Arx, every day's been one of physical strain. Training, trying to improve the body and, because of it, the mind's been somewhat sequestered.
No longer.
Legate Ailith didn't do much for introductions, and that is fine, she needed not enter any kind of deliberation with me as she's an incredibly busy woman. She, instead, laid upon my being an endless library of information for me to wade through. Journals upon tomes upon books atop piles and mounds of pages, dusty and new, with hand-stitched edges and others faded. I hadn't realized how much I missed being submerged in documentation.
I know in the past I told you it'd perhaps be the Prince of Stories who'd take me away, but in the end I chose Limerance. My choice was somewhat affected by an old friend, whose words moved me some while in the presence of His altar. Oathkeeping and duty have always been interesting subjects to me, avenues I feel for us humans to go beyond the mundane cravings of our mortal coil into something greater.
Either way, I digress somewhat. All the faces I've met thus far in my short tenure in the Faith have been unfailingly kind and I'm humbled by it. Now, I believe, is time to get to work.
Take care, custodian.
Written By Sirius
July 4, 2020, 3:02 a.m.(8/5/1013 AR)
Relationship Note on Gianna
It's difficult to tell if these are saddening news or good news, but as are the Queen's wishes, the cycle continues and hopefully the next chapter in your life's just as exciting and meaningful for the denizens of the Compact.
I'm at least happy to have witnessed you as a Whisper before you moved on to focus onto different pastures, miss Delvecchio.
I'm at least happy to have witnessed you as a Whisper before you moved on to focus onto different pastures, miss Delvecchio.
Written By Sirius
July 3, 2020, 9:04 a.m.(8/3/1013 AR)
Hello, scholar,
Here we are again, in the cyclical act of coming to you at the beginning of a month fraught with calamity. Why is it that I only ever come to you in moments of despair and horribleness? Perhaps it makes sense; perhaps you're here to chronicle the fall of man in some ironic twist of the pen. Well, here it is, the declining spiral in written form of one Sirius Valardin.
I've made the longest trip I've ever done from Sanctum. Even here, on Arx, I take solace in knowing the winds of the Telmarch still reach me, however brisk and dwindled along the way; however mixed with the oaken touch of the Crownlands, still, they started off on those swift, golden fields of oats and wheat. That is all that matters.
I went East, far East, into the domain of Thrax and its isles.
Here, no such gale of home ever did reach, I had never felt so alone. At every other moment, jetties of water crashed upon the shoreline crags, as hard a boom as a ram into some iron-bore, darkling door. I could feel the salt digging into my face, the weight they gave my eyes, the taste impregnated into my tastebuds. Food didn't taste the same, water certainly didn't either. There was a greasy quality to my hair - more than the usual - and I had a chafing discomfort in my hindquarters since the very moment my feet set foot on this archipelago's cay bristling with ruinous rumor and ghastly riddles from the loquacious, scarce populace there living.
From that sinister wharf, there, high above; there, perched upon the isle's moor, I could see the once plenteous keep of Grimhall, now, a darker reflection of its former, palatial glory.
Singular, unsettling tales on our way up the crag-divided fell told by one garrulous helmsman suggested the castle itself was an abode of the damned, full of ghosts and some fabulous, unreckonable power. Naturally, I am a Prince of Sanctum, these histories did not frighten me and, on the contrary, emboldened me to get to the secret of these superstitious folks. To bring clarity and zeal to these evidently misguided few.
Once the doors parted and Duke Valdemar welcomed us inside personally, some things didn't make sense. A man of his stature, posture, living in such a bedraggled home, it didn't fit. The prospect -- it grazed against my common understanding of things.
Led inside, it soon all made sense. His mother, the dowry Duchess, was much like a Queen within her own domain. In spite of her advanced age, there's a light to her being, a candle that flickers against encroaching darkness and the inexorable passage of time. It's as if the whole of the keep is kept up beneath this sole, illimitable foundation of a woman. She wades through her servants like a bladesman drags a flourish of blows in the din of battle, and commands such a stately presence it surprised me she addressed me as her highness, and not the other way around.
With this newfound knowledge, the myriad of questions unanswered in my mind were snuffed out. This awesome woman was the answer to all the light to be found in the old Grimhall keep, the only reason it exists still I wager.
I couldn't consolidate sleep in my rest there, but I managed to confer to one kindly servant that I'd require a lavatory facing strictly West, to Sanctum, if I was to make it through the night. Luckily, they provided. With some more luck, my next visit will be less shrouded in mystery and, while there's some details to the visitation itself of which I simply cannot speak, I too pray that it'll be more associated with the having of a good time and less-so the having of a bad time.
That's it from me, custodian,
Here's to hope, that my next entry is of good, happier things.
Here we are again, in the cyclical act of coming to you at the beginning of a month fraught with calamity. Why is it that I only ever come to you in moments of despair and horribleness? Perhaps it makes sense; perhaps you're here to chronicle the fall of man in some ironic twist of the pen. Well, here it is, the declining spiral in written form of one Sirius Valardin.
I've made the longest trip I've ever done from Sanctum. Even here, on Arx, I take solace in knowing the winds of the Telmarch still reach me, however brisk and dwindled along the way; however mixed with the oaken touch of the Crownlands, still, they started off on those swift, golden fields of oats and wheat. That is all that matters.
I went East, far East, into the domain of Thrax and its isles.
Here, no such gale of home ever did reach, I had never felt so alone. At every other moment, jetties of water crashed upon the shoreline crags, as hard a boom as a ram into some iron-bore, darkling door. I could feel the salt digging into my face, the weight they gave my eyes, the taste impregnated into my tastebuds. Food didn't taste the same, water certainly didn't either. There was a greasy quality to my hair - more than the usual - and I had a chafing discomfort in my hindquarters since the very moment my feet set foot on this archipelago's cay bristling with ruinous rumor and ghastly riddles from the loquacious, scarce populace there living.
From that sinister wharf, there, high above; there, perched upon the isle's moor, I could see the once plenteous keep of Grimhall, now, a darker reflection of its former, palatial glory.
Singular, unsettling tales on our way up the crag-divided fell told by one garrulous helmsman suggested the castle itself was an abode of the damned, full of ghosts and some fabulous, unreckonable power. Naturally, I am a Prince of Sanctum, these histories did not frighten me and, on the contrary, emboldened me to get to the secret of these superstitious folks. To bring clarity and zeal to these evidently misguided few.
Once the doors parted and Duke Valdemar welcomed us inside personally, some things didn't make sense. A man of his stature, posture, living in such a bedraggled home, it didn't fit. The prospect -- it grazed against my common understanding of things.
Led inside, it soon all made sense. His mother, the dowry Duchess, was much like a Queen within her own domain. In spite of her advanced age, there's a light to her being, a candle that flickers against encroaching darkness and the inexorable passage of time. It's as if the whole of the keep is kept up beneath this sole, illimitable foundation of a woman. She wades through her servants like a bladesman drags a flourish of blows in the din of battle, and commands such a stately presence it surprised me she addressed me as her highness, and not the other way around.
With this newfound knowledge, the myriad of questions unanswered in my mind were snuffed out. This awesome woman was the answer to all the light to be found in the old Grimhall keep, the only reason it exists still I wager.
I couldn't consolidate sleep in my rest there, but I managed to confer to one kindly servant that I'd require a lavatory facing strictly West, to Sanctum, if I was to make it through the night. Luckily, they provided. With some more luck, my next visit will be less shrouded in mystery and, while there's some details to the visitation itself of which I simply cannot speak, I too pray that it'll be more associated with the having of a good time and less-so the having of a bad time.
That's it from me, custodian,
Here's to hope, that my next entry is of good, happier things.
Written By Sirius
June 30, 2020, 3:34 p.m.(7/26/1013 AR)
There are spiders in the garden.
Written By Sirius
June 26, 2020, 5:04 p.m.(7/18/1013 AR)
Relationship Note on Lys
The din of the living, brokered into the silence of the hereafter all in a singular dream. If only it were so easy, Baroness.
Ding, ding, ding-a-ling.
Ding, ding, ding-a-ling.
Written By Sirius
June 25, 2020, 12:01 a.m.(7/15/1013 AR)
Relationship Note on Iseulet
I do not love this animal, nor the cat.
If said cat decides to excoriate me again when I reach next for one of my volumes and tomes under the bed I'll have glass shards embedded into the windowsill as a kind of prophylactic measure, for I know that doom-laden feline doesn't come in through the door. He's too smart for that; he knows I'd see him coming.
They disturb the balance of my home, the peace of my sanctuary, one likes to clamber up onto all sorts of shelves and things and walk his 'toebeans' while slick in ink all across my missives, and the other? Other than his irreverent ways of pooping everywhere and being against the prospect of being trained, wants attention. All the time.
I don't have that kind of time,
Take them back, Marquessa.
If said cat decides to excoriate me again when I reach next for one of my volumes and tomes under the bed I'll have glass shards embedded into the windowsill as a kind of prophylactic measure, for I know that doom-laden feline doesn't come in through the door. He's too smart for that; he knows I'd see him coming.
They disturb the balance of my home, the peace of my sanctuary, one likes to clamber up onto all sorts of shelves and things and walk his 'toebeans' while slick in ink all across my missives, and the other? Other than his irreverent ways of pooping everywhere and being against the prospect of being trained, wants attention. All the time.
I don't have that kind of time,
Take them back, Marquessa.
Written By Sirius
June 24, 2020, 1:38 a.m.(7/13/1013 AR)
I greet you once more, scholar,
This is the darkest time I've ever come to you, for the succor of your wisdom,
Recently, someone who professes to care for me has gifted me with a Dog. You'd think, ah, why is the letter at the start of Dog bigger than it need be, well, I've decided that I'll not be naming this pelagic horror, but rather I'll regress it into being known as Dog and nothing more. I've come to a swift conclusion that if it's ever to be named it'd only gain more power, and choose to stay, as to continue feeding off of my misery.
For now, it's in a minor form.
A puppy, this Dog is, and he loves to get into all sorts of trouble. The week I've had him I've caught onto the strangest of rituals. During the day, he's lethargic, mostly sleeping. Snoozing. Slobbers all over the floor - when he's not peeing or pooping it - and he has claimed dominion of all that is below my bed. To the point that if I stick my hand under it, he'll either bite it or growl it away. He mostly bites.
Due to the rebellious nature of Dog, I've chosen to let him roam as he wills, and so he's become acquainted with various guards in the Valardin Manor. Already, he gains followers. They give him free food, without my consent; he's returned with scarfs around his neck and stranger's socks betwixt his teeth. Naturally, I burn all such ill-gotten gains soon as I get my hands on them, a better fate than to be chewed to death by his eager and itching teeth. This doesn't deter him- if anything, it's an invitation to obtain more. His zeal for socks and things and chewables is untrammelled and unabated.
Today we had somewhat of a scare. The ongoing humidity of Spring means the outside gardens surrounding the little chapel in the Manor have grown a small quagmire in one of its corners, deep, bog-like infirmity of soil that invites all sorts of fetid bugs and things. A wise, understanding dog would stay away from such a horrible den, but Dog's not like any other dog. Dog went right and head-first into it.
I wouldn't have noticed, until a shrill cry pierced the doldrums of the tiny swamp. I rushed forward and saw him trashing in there, his snout swinging ropes of kudzu. The water was foaming and bubbling and his jowls briefly appeared and spent that second barking for help instead of breathing for any momentary extension of life. Immediately, I waded into the swamp. Standing over him, I stared into the mire with my eyes tracking left to right as though I was watching carp in clear waters, for I couldn't find him. Finally, I reached in and waving my hands in desperation, caught him, then untangled him from some treacherous contraption of fibrous density that had been tied around his tiny little paws, pinning him down.
He ran free and went between my legs, where he huddled wet and whimpering. I thought this experience would mollify his brazen behavior, but there he is, swimming and messing around his little fenland again. He's reckless and hates me when I keep him sheltered in the room.
To anyone who reads this, he's for sale. Ten silver.
His name is Dog,
Please purchase him.
This is the darkest time I've ever come to you, for the succor of your wisdom,
Recently, someone who professes to care for me has gifted me with a Dog. You'd think, ah, why is the letter at the start of Dog bigger than it need be, well, I've decided that I'll not be naming this pelagic horror, but rather I'll regress it into being known as Dog and nothing more. I've come to a swift conclusion that if it's ever to be named it'd only gain more power, and choose to stay, as to continue feeding off of my misery.
For now, it's in a minor form.
A puppy, this Dog is, and he loves to get into all sorts of trouble. The week I've had him I've caught onto the strangest of rituals. During the day, he's lethargic, mostly sleeping. Snoozing. Slobbers all over the floor - when he's not peeing or pooping it - and he has claimed dominion of all that is below my bed. To the point that if I stick my hand under it, he'll either bite it or growl it away. He mostly bites.
Due to the rebellious nature of Dog, I've chosen to let him roam as he wills, and so he's become acquainted with various guards in the Valardin Manor. Already, he gains followers. They give him free food, without my consent; he's returned with scarfs around his neck and stranger's socks betwixt his teeth. Naturally, I burn all such ill-gotten gains soon as I get my hands on them, a better fate than to be chewed to death by his eager and itching teeth. This doesn't deter him- if anything, it's an invitation to obtain more. His zeal for socks and things and chewables is untrammelled and unabated.
Today we had somewhat of a scare. The ongoing humidity of Spring means the outside gardens surrounding the little chapel in the Manor have grown a small quagmire in one of its corners, deep, bog-like infirmity of soil that invites all sorts of fetid bugs and things. A wise, understanding dog would stay away from such a horrible den, but Dog's not like any other dog. Dog went right and head-first into it.
I wouldn't have noticed, until a shrill cry pierced the doldrums of the tiny swamp. I rushed forward and saw him trashing in there, his snout swinging ropes of kudzu. The water was foaming and bubbling and his jowls briefly appeared and spent that second barking for help instead of breathing for any momentary extension of life. Immediately, I waded into the swamp. Standing over him, I stared into the mire with my eyes tracking left to right as though I was watching carp in clear waters, for I couldn't find him. Finally, I reached in and waving my hands in desperation, caught him, then untangled him from some treacherous contraption of fibrous density that had been tied around his tiny little paws, pinning him down.
He ran free and went between my legs, where he huddled wet and whimpering. I thought this experience would mollify his brazen behavior, but there he is, swimming and messing around his little fenland again. He's reckless and hates me when I keep him sheltered in the room.
To anyone who reads this, he's for sale. Ten silver.
His name is Dog,
Please purchase him.
Written By Sirius
June 10, 2020, 6:58 p.m.(6/14/1013 AR)
Relationship Note on Iseulet
I dispatched that thuggish chair in brutal fashion, so that all other furniture may hear of my arrival.
When I first entered your chalet, I knew. Such a straggled estate, a Mecca of lunacy and morbidity. My work began with that chair, but it'll not end there. Chairs and tables; shelves and rugs; cutlery and silverware. All will find their way to me, should they creak or prove unworthy.
When I first entered your chalet, I knew. Such a straggled estate, a Mecca of lunacy and morbidity. My work began with that chair, but it'll not end there. Chairs and tables; shelves and rugs; cutlery and silverware. All will find their way to me, should they creak or prove unworthy.
Written By Sirius
June 9, 2020, 6:21 p.m.(6/12/1013 AR)
You and I again, scholar,
To add to your pile of nonsense.
I have one friend from the North, one good friend; one friend who is no more my friend, but was, and I miss them dearly. I used to think they weren't, in fact, from the North- I had this ignorant belief that northerners were all stout, and tall, and resilient. Only one of those was, is, true.
For long I've entertained a fascination with heights. Peaks, the wind at my back, up and into that junction of arms and shoulders, feeling as if they elevate me. Recently, however, I've overdone it; I found a peak too cold too unkind for my Westernise blood.
I went North. Deep, into the forgotten realm somewhere near Bonespire, where winter is morrowless.
There, my breath appeared before me as though it were carried in purses of grey. A pain in my body started, slowly. Spits of snow. Winds that had come from ancient glaciers. One step sank my foot deep into the white powder and it was then I knew the rest of that journey would be a test of endurance.
I wonder how the women and men of old did it, living in those parts. They sat around campfires with all the world out to get them. Sat in the darkness surrounded by flurries of ice. Sat in isolation. They were born there, that must have been their trick. Ignorance was their warmth. Only a man who knows no better could live in a place such as that.
The company I entertained, guides and scouts, staggered and fell and couldn't get back up with quite the speed they used to. A few even took to coughing fits and others looked about ready to succumb to exhaustion. Only the strongest of the bunch could carry on without a hitch. It is those who surely share a link with the ancestors of that horrid land.
This friend of mine, they lived their whole life there. Surrounded by a predatory world whose very making is contrary to human decency. Perhaps I judged them too harshly.
Perhaps, like winter and spring, you cannot have one and the other together.
Only you could know, custodian.
To add to your pile of nonsense.
I have one friend from the North, one good friend; one friend who is no more my friend, but was, and I miss them dearly. I used to think they weren't, in fact, from the North- I had this ignorant belief that northerners were all stout, and tall, and resilient. Only one of those was, is, true.
For long I've entertained a fascination with heights. Peaks, the wind at my back, up and into that junction of arms and shoulders, feeling as if they elevate me. Recently, however, I've overdone it; I found a peak too cold too unkind for my Westernise blood.
I went North. Deep, into the forgotten realm somewhere near Bonespire, where winter is morrowless.
There, my breath appeared before me as though it were carried in purses of grey. A pain in my body started, slowly. Spits of snow. Winds that had come from ancient glaciers. One step sank my foot deep into the white powder and it was then I knew the rest of that journey would be a test of endurance.
I wonder how the women and men of old did it, living in those parts. They sat around campfires with all the world out to get them. Sat in the darkness surrounded by flurries of ice. Sat in isolation. They were born there, that must have been their trick. Ignorance was their warmth. Only a man who knows no better could live in a place such as that.
The company I entertained, guides and scouts, staggered and fell and couldn't get back up with quite the speed they used to. A few even took to coughing fits and others looked about ready to succumb to exhaustion. Only the strongest of the bunch could carry on without a hitch. It is those who surely share a link with the ancestors of that horrid land.
This friend of mine, they lived their whole life there. Surrounded by a predatory world whose very making is contrary to human decency. Perhaps I judged them too harshly.
Perhaps, like winter and spring, you cannot have one and the other together.
Only you could know, custodian.
Written By Sirius
June 5, 2020, 3:24 a.m.(6/3/1013 AR)
Hello scholar,
I've sequestered you two weeks now, I realize, and extend to you my humble apologies,
A group of priests have finished their madrigal in our shrine's ward and I noticed their humble gathering attracted many of the younger noble scions of this family. These were followers of Limerance, and there they preached the values of oath keeping and the importance of love and devotion to our everyday affairs, never leaving anything to half-measures and to always fear the dwindling of the soul towards polite routine.
To me, it was strange- I forever before envisioned children as perhaps more favoring of exuberant things, like Lagoma's flame or perhaps something else; something trite and conventional to their whimsical, childish ways. Skald's freedom, Petrichor's dominion over nature, something-something that'd perhaps arise interest in their burgeoning hearts.
So young, so thirsty for the wonders of the world, it was the 'Limerite' dogmas that echoed in their budding souls. Now, I'm no good with children from the perspective of an adult, in fact, I've always felt like I've always been one of the children- I'm much better at this. At sitting with them, there, in their little crowd and listening. Playing with them, as one of them. I've long surrendered to the notion that I have a baby's face, and argue with my mother no longer on the matter.
The goofy looks, the little silly jokes, being naive and a doofus, much better than the responsibility of being, setting, an example. This I can do. Acting my age? Too frightening, I think. Raising children, especially not my own. Makes you late for dinner. But something about seeing them makes me feel at ease.
I realize, seeing so many youngsters arming themselves for the up-and-coming trials and fallouts of this world, makes it all seem worth it. For the first time, I'm beginning to understand the many times I've heard those much wiser and aged than me when they said: "We do it for them." The children. Perhaps it is your own hand, and you're imparting your wisdom to me on this after all, scholar.
Thank you,
If not, thank 'me'.
I've sequestered you two weeks now, I realize, and extend to you my humble apologies,
A group of priests have finished their madrigal in our shrine's ward and I noticed their humble gathering attracted many of the younger noble scions of this family. These were followers of Limerance, and there they preached the values of oath keeping and the importance of love and devotion to our everyday affairs, never leaving anything to half-measures and to always fear the dwindling of the soul towards polite routine.
To me, it was strange- I forever before envisioned children as perhaps more favoring of exuberant things, like Lagoma's flame or perhaps something else; something trite and conventional to their whimsical, childish ways. Skald's freedom, Petrichor's dominion over nature, something-something that'd perhaps arise interest in their burgeoning hearts.
So young, so thirsty for the wonders of the world, it was the 'Limerite' dogmas that echoed in their budding souls. Now, I'm no good with children from the perspective of an adult, in fact, I've always felt like I've always been one of the children- I'm much better at this. At sitting with them, there, in their little crowd and listening. Playing with them, as one of them. I've long surrendered to the notion that I have a baby's face, and argue with my mother no longer on the matter.
The goofy looks, the little silly jokes, being naive and a doofus, much better than the responsibility of being, setting, an example. This I can do. Acting my age? Too frightening, I think. Raising children, especially not my own. Makes you late for dinner. But something about seeing them makes me feel at ease.
I realize, seeing so many youngsters arming themselves for the up-and-coming trials and fallouts of this world, makes it all seem worth it. For the first time, I'm beginning to understand the many times I've heard those much wiser and aged than me when they said: "We do it for them." The children. Perhaps it is your own hand, and you're imparting your wisdom to me on this after all, scholar.
Thank you,
If not, thank 'me'.
Please note that the scholars may take some time preparing your journal for others to read.