Tales From Yore - Fragment #1

by

Arcanister Thule 

Obsidian College 

By order of Grand Dean Ermillia

 
In the fifth year of the First Era, before the abolition of wont and the interring of desire; the Great Realms were gripped like swine in a vice, tight beneath the burden of unwelcome conflict. The wonders of people and edifices they had made were soot-stained and rent by lightning. The brotherhood of civilisation was unravelling and all was in indubitable chaos. Beasts spewn forth from frothy demon portals met savage horrors that once cave-dwelt, bleating a harmonious cry of slaughter all mortal life.

Indeed, it was a dark for the civilised forces of the Great Realms. Kings of every race rallied forth soldiers from city and plane, mountain and forest, thus armed under their great halls by mighty sorceress forges. Arcane-blooded conjurer's summoned their fractured horrors from beyond the black cosmos to counter the surging host of Hell; blue-white golems crafted from some ether stone and clad in flickering runes, held together by their magic, clashed arms with screaming furies and scaley footmen, and the sky turned purple from the haze of strewn power; apparitions drawn from the ley-fabric of existence had their gaze commanded in defence of the Great Realms, to make battle with the hungry beasts from beyond the cosmos. The Kings set forth, their now mighty cavalcades of horse-borne men and women, slave-beast and eldritch bound summons, sorcerers and enslaved dragons, mindless warrior elementals shackled by their whim, all marched now across ruined lands towards their fate. Over salt-crusted plains, once lakes and sea, through splintered woods now smoldering thornfields as far as the magical eye might see. Drawn up now ‘neath the frozen sun of the North they stood, upon the spindled Roof of the World, where the ice rose and met the sky. Their breath was a cloud and their spirit a raging bull beneath the tormenting spear. The mighty host touched either end of the world, ready to plant it’s shield before the rage of hell, in defence of their land.

And like a beacon upon the clifftops, the pulsing star that guides the millions towards home, before the eyes of every mortal being of the Great Realm, stood the hero. The chosen Warden, the Champion of the Sacred, the Final Hope of All: gleaming, golden. He was called Arthur.

He stood tall above all others; a man carved from nought but stone and gold and bedrock fused with magic, with the breath of dragons in his chest and the blood of lions coursing through his veins. Every facet of his marble face was like the risen cresting of iron upon the suit of armor, the bristling horns of the great fire-breathing serpent; the steely upper lip was necessarily adorned with a mustache more solid than perhaps the unquaking stalwart courage that resided within him. Arthur was more was the stone edifice mortal resistance. His name was legend and his deeds were the archetype for all others. He was the knight of yore and all spoke his name alongside the vastness of nature and the arcane.

Hoisting his blade above him, he spoke, words resounding more earthquake than voice, to all before him, and beyond.

“Tremble, ye host of Hell. The hour-hand has struck the End for all, and I am Time’s deliverance. Prepare, unwanted, to welcome the dust.”

Their untempered roar of valor split the skies and soon the hosts clashed beneath the glare of the sun. With Arthur at their fore, the mortal Will of man crushed all resistance led by those furious articles of Hell’s depth, seeking soon to erase their despoiling presence from their land. But not without a price. The brilliance of arcane expulsion, hellbourne magics and the effervescent spilling of souls warped the fabric of reality around them. Demons cut in twain ejected their energies into the sky. The scintillation above them twisted purple and blue and red. Great threads of lightning split the withering dusk and a spectral dust began to settle on each belligerent. Hues were sunken and the clouds whirled above them. The earth trembled. The host of Hell sunk into the earth, their blood river running towards the glittering horizon. The ranks of man lay spent, arms low, brows high. the Warden Arthur stood high upon an outcropping of stone, observing before him the irreversible buckling of the cosmos before him, as his mortal fellowship gathered beneath him. A ragged cry had taken hold of their throats, but no joy came to that lonely vigilant upon his obelisk of stone.

Mounting the formation, behind Arthur now stood the Sorcerer-King of Mythra. The old humans wizened face was distorted and the air around him hummed. “Warden, hear me, there is little time. I feel the world tearing beneath me. Hell has been sealed, but our own cosmos is now threatened. The powers beneath the world, it hungers, it can smell the magic. Such forces have been unleashed on this day, the souls of so many have been set free. They seek to consume it. You…” The old man shrieked and bent forward, a flame alight upon his brow, nay, his soul; the very reality around him was consumed by a devouring azure haze. Arthur stood his ground before that eldritch fire, as the Sorcerer-King became less than ash. The old man's cries subsided, but others took its place. The Warden turned, and before him, the world, his world, the Great Realms, was on fire. Deep into the horizon, blue flame was into the heavens. Fissures split the dark earth beneath the crumbling remains of the mortal army, and men fell into the swallowing deeps.

A spell formed upon Arthur’s lips. Words of magic once buried deep beneath the weight of years, an incantation privy only to his athenian mind. Raw thundering power swirled around him. The skies were boiling with unleashed magics and mighty geysers ejected swirling matter into the firmaments. With his final word spoken low, the sun exploded from his breast and all was consumed and turned dark.

Gareth Skettlebones: I Prefer Ice Fishing

“Welcome, friends, to this years annual Ice Fishing Exposition! Firstly, I’d like to thank the Ice Fishers of Ingratia (IFI) managing committee for allowing this amazing event to happen each year, and to Mrs Vermillia for her generous donations to the community. You guys are the best. Thank you, again.”

The chairperson, a Mr Zorbag the Forest Troll, sat down on a three legged stool. Besides him, a large avian, his adopted son, Thomas, squawked loudly and flapped it’s large yellow wings. Zorbag fished out worms from his jacket pocket and somewhat lovingly placed the squirming buggers in Thomas’ clapping beak.

The turnout for this years Expo was moderate. Numbers had been declining since the events heyday, but as times progress, as does interest in the age-old art of ice fishing; seemingly, in this case, for in the direction of disinterest. Gareth had been attending for a while now, after reading about the practice and event in an old gazette left as funeral gift, entitled “Sportsman of the World”. Ice fishing is an old practice, with it’s roots in the people who once dwelled upon the Great Lakes in the mists of prehistory; nowadays, of course, not many people are stupid enough to live on frozen water. To subsist, these ancient peoples would fish the waters beneath them using mixed ingenuity and sheer bravery.

The art involved carving a triangular hole into the crust of ice, then, after tying a rope to oneself, diving in and using a specialised, cone-shaped axe to hunt the fish. The fish, in this case, dwelt upon the bottom of the lakes, where the light barely reached. On his first attendance, he had attempted to swim to the bottom, but the lightness of his frame and buoyancy of his bones had hindered him, keeping him afloat. Alas, Gareth went more for the interesting people, and, more importantly, so he can say that he’s a veteran ice fisher; (“ice fisher? how interesting! you’re so cool, Gareth!”, “I am, aren’t I? Hah! And that’s not all; let me tell you about the bookbinding course I took last summer…”). Yes, Gareth truly is an insufferable hipster.



“Ho! That’s a big one!” The sun was high, and glittering light reflected up in blades across the plains of ice. A row of tents had been set up beneath parasols, opening upon woven carpets and small tables, each carrying a number of light drinks and snacks, including ginger ale, sausage rolls and, at the chairpersons behest, octopus-shaped cocktail sausages, lightly cooked, with peach chutney dip. Gareth was engaged in conversation with one of the newest arrivals, who sat besides a large walrus named Gumbo, who had just exclaimed very loudly in admiration of a rather large catch.

“I am not sure how you can condone their behaviour, Gareth. They’re just such icky people, they definitely do not deserve to be able to stand up like that and just say what they like without repercussion. It’s the duty of the powerful to be respectful of their power and not abuse it, and to maintain a degree of safety for all those who are without such power. By allowing those individuals and polyviduals the platform to spew their hateful rhetoric, you cannot predict how their words might affect those listening, be they active or passive, audience or passerby.”

“That may very well be the case, dear Marceline. But surely you must agree, being an independent, educated Dean of Neutral Studies, an academic to the fullest, surely you see that to shelter such individuals from disagreeable rhetoric instead leads to an insular mental state? If the lion is too afraid to eat the seal because it is afraid of breaking a tooth upon its hard shell, then how will it ever learn to hunt? If your listeners, passerby or no, never encounter words that might offend them, how will they ever understand offence?” replied Gareth, cocking his skull to the side, rubbing his bleached ulna. “Why, Gareth, do they need to know offence? Why understand a barbaric feature that society would best do without?”

“Surely you don’t mean that? Gosh, imagine the world! What would I say to all the sheeple who consume nothing but popular music and have their tea with cow’s milk! How would I ever inform them of the negative health consequences of drinking the milk of another creature, of the harmful bacteria and the hormone disbalance, if I must first consider how the sod would be offended at my slating of their drink of choice! Everyone may have the right to choice, but I must surely be free to tell one their choice is, frankly, a bit shite!”

The conversation was getting heated. Marceline the frilled lizard was shuffling in her seat, and Gumpo was eyeing Gareth, his lip twitching and his fins curling around his teacup. No doubt cow’s milk resided in that brew, but it was too late for Gareth.

“And quite so, Marceline, what if it was to transpire that you decided to take offence to something which I had quite deliberately posed to mean quite the opposite! Say, a warm-hearted compliment directed at your frills. Would I therefore be in the wrong for my good intentions? Nay, I say! Nay!”

“How dare you!” she trilled. “Just because I have frills does not make me any less of a citizen of this realm! You bigoted scum! I knew this was a bad idea….I’m getting...I...I...I’M TRIGGERED.” She shrieked loudly at Gareth and flared her frilly plume of lizard-skin, shaking it wildly at Gareth, repeating how she was now TRIGGERED. Gumbo, stepped up and started shouting furiously at Gareth, and the chairperson, Mr Zorbag the Forest Troll, came bounding over, Thomas squawking close at his heels but stumbling over its rather stupid feet.

“What’s happening here? Miss Macaroon, please calm down. Please, we have a nice safe trigger-zone in the far tent; there’s cookies and cow’s milk and lots of books on social oppression for you to read. Mrs Yiff, please take her to the TRIGGER-tent.” Zorbag turned to Gumbo, who was clouting the air with his fins and yelling at Gareth. “Ok Gumbo, that’s enough. You can go with her too.”

Zorbag was standing pensively in front of Gareth. Many of the other Expo attendants were glaring at him, or turning away. Zorbag’s hunched frame was taut, resigned beneath his robes; socked feet peered from beneath the hem and strap of sandal. “Gareth…” he hummed. But Gareth jerked, standing, towering over Zorbag. His white skull blocked the sun above his head; his eyes stared down upon the troll, enveloping him with their gaze, absorbing him. The ice was thrumming beneath them, the brightness of the sky glared from beyond his head. All stood still. Gareth leaned in closer.

“Hey Marcey you stupid skink, frilled lizards suck and you’re not very good at ice-fishing!”

Gareth strode from the Ice Fishing Expo, the sun framing him, painting the tall black figure with a brilliant glow. The echoed screams of triggered individuals cascaded like fire around him, into the sky and through the ice. He strode away, never looking back.

Gareth might be an insufferable hipster, but Gareth fucking hates stupid, self-entitled frilled lizards.

Gareth Skettlebones: What A Long, Strange Life It's Been

The rain was dancing outside. It looked to Gareth as if it were having fun, cascading in sparkling waves, down from an illuminated white sky. Ripples in puddles showed their steps and the patter upon wood their laughter. Tight rays of light struck some and iridescence flashed from behind it’s vibrant body. Gareth could hear the piano-piece of rainfall beyond his window, and it soothed him. He enjoyed looking out across the graves on a rainy day, when the sky is overcast yet lit from behind by a white sun. Rivulets obscured the image and made it impressionist, embellishing his windows with depth. He smiled, he sighed.

Within his mushroom, he waited for the rain to cease. Seated besides the window, where the light sat beside him, he read a book and drank tea. It was on days such as these that tucked into the pantry biscuits, where he lit a fire and put his feet up. His bony toes were exposed, and he wiggled them with a smile.

A small animal lay by his fire, breathing in slow rhythmic fashion, sometimes stopping for a moment before jerking and resuming. It wheezed and grunted, ever so softly, to the music of the rain, and the crackling of the hearth. This was Gareth’s home, his domicile-within-the-mushroom. He had spent many winters besides his porthole window, immersed in his bucolia.

Upon one of his bookshelves, across the room from where he sat, was a picture within a mahogany frame. It was on the highest shelf, scraping the roof, where he kept a stack of old pamphlets from his youth, a small box of fishing gear and a some mystery novels. Dust was thick and the webs where tangled. From where the oasis of distorted rain-lit light danced, from where he rocked gently in his chair, from where his eyes rested upon the pages of his yellowed book, he could see the picture. He could see the colours beneath the winter coat of settled dust. He could see it but he dared not look. Sometimes he felt that he had succeeded, and he couldn’t see it, that he needn’t reach up there and lay it flat any longer. But it was always there, always reminding him. When the rain fell and the gray-blue sky illuminated his rooms with its melancholic glow and the ivory keys played in his ears, that was when he saw nothing but the ache of the picture.