Thursday August 4th, 2022

The exercise:

Write about: appreciation.

2 comments:

Greg said...

Is this a passive-aggressive suggestion that I should be nicer about baseball? I will just say that ice hockey is a far better game and let you decide how to answer that ;-)

Appreciation
Fabian took a moment to appreciate that the choice of Sebastian had clearly been the right one and then said, "Yes, there's something in here we want you to look at especially. We think it's connected to the elves, but... there's a lot in there that we don't understand at all."
Rystin resumed climbing the stairs, but the stomping was much reduced now, and the rest of the group followed him a little closer.
"You're not going to say anything more?" complained Sebastian as they reached the next floor and Rystin moved towards the door with its little 'exit only' sign on it.
"We're almost there," said Dread. "And, no, honestly. I don't my guesses to influence yours. We can discuss what we have when we've all formed our own opinions."
Rystin opened the door and ushered them through, and even though he was outside the room Fabian still saw the little streamers coming from the light that the Staff of Five Elements produced, pulled inwards by whatever the altar inside was doing.
He was halfway through the door himself when Sebastian made a choked sound, like he was trying to scream but something was squeezing his throat shut, and pointed at the walls. The symbols on there looked the same as they had last time to Fabian, and he peered at them, coming further into the room, trying to see what Sebastian was indicating.
"We don't know what they mean," said Dread. He sounded tense.
"They... they!" Sebastian started shaking. After a few seconds he lowered his arm and backed away as far from the altar as he could get, and then crouched, his head low, almost to his knees. "This is a transformation," he said. "It's so strong. It's pulling the life from the spider elves and wisp elves." He lifted his head momentarily and Fabian saw the gleam of tears on his cheeks. "This is BARBARIC!" he shouted.
Dread turned pale and stared at the altar. Then he lifted his hands and did something, a gesture of some kind that seemed like the start of something. The Maestro stepped back, standing next to Sebastian, and Rystin turned to watch Dread, his eyes alert and sparkling. The light from the Staff of Five Elements flared momentarily and Fabian saw, outlined in the air, some kind of scaffolding. He shook his head and it disappeared, and he slowly realised that he'd been briefly gifted with a vision of what Dread was doing -- constructing a huge spell.
"Necromantic energy," said Dread after several more minutes of silence. "It's there, but it's... I don't know, coated in something. It's been hidden, deliberately, but there is a huge necromantic sink here. That's what's pulling in the life from the elves."
"Why?" said Fabian. "It doesn't make sense?"
From somewhere below them came a loud crash, as though huge doors had been flung open against their desire to remain closed.

Marc said...

Greg - nah, only read yesterday's post response just now. And... I'm not at all sure how to take that.

Uh oh. On several fronts but, I suspect, most pressingly on the last.