Completed Bringing Problems Home

Tazrae takes her problems to the Founders of Syka

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Syka is a new settlement of primarily humans on the east coast of Falyndar opposite of Riverfall on The Suvan Sea. [Syka Codex]

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Bringing Problems Home

Postby Tazrae on December 19th, 2021, 8:07 pm

Timestamp: 11th of Winter, 512 A.V.


Taz had a lot on her mind as she woke up the next morning in a tangle of light isuas sheets. She’d returned late from The Outpost and had seen to the animals, hurrying through her chores, only to linger by the fire in the hearth and ask herself a million questions. It had been late in the night when she’d gotten home. Bree had met her at the Dovecote itself – evidently waiting there the whole time – with her big sapphire eyes full of questions. Tazrae had no answers for her… not really. She’d slipped onto the Ixam’s back and the two had headed home. With the salt air circulating The Protea and the scent of a fresh batch of yogurt quickening in the icebox, Taz felt at home enough to move out onto the deck where Bree lingered. She’d pulled open her journal and began to read what she’d written there to the Ixam.

When she’d finished, she closed the journal and had looked at the Ixam expectantly. Bree shifted, her long emerald claws stretched out and her head stretching from where it had rested on her crossed forelegs. Creature had moved out to join them, settling alongside the Ixam with his long tail wagging. Taz smiled at that, though in truth, she wasn’t happy… not now… not yet.

“He made quite the impression on you, didn’t he?” Bree commented, studying Tazrae carefully. “You understand how dangerous he is? A complete stranger, Tazrae. You know nothing about him…. except where he’s from and not even that, not really. And his parents? This Nymkarta thing sounds serious. And now your mother wasn’t really your mother, but was your aunt? And you have a sister out there? A twin?” Bree said, shaking her long scaled head, her eyes whirling with color.

It wasn’t anger though.

Taz could read anger in Bree. This was something else… this was almost fear. “Taz… listen. You know I never talk about where I came from… my upbringing and where you found me. Those men… the Symenestra and the Humans you settled folks call Barbarian Tribes? They don’t act on their own. They are controlled like puppets by powerful men, mages one and all, that utilize them for multiple things. I don’t remember much from before the sentient wand, not as I remember things now, but I know the men were looking for something out in the jungle. And we were doing it in the name of a powerful mage. His name sounded a lot like the name of the man who is your grandfather.” Bree said gently, looking concerned. “Florentin Arcadius.” Bree intoned, looking worried.

“Wait… what? What were the men looking for?” Taz said, confused as to how this interacted with her background and what had happened between her and Alric.
Last edited by Tazrae on December 19th, 2021, 8:18 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Image
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."


Garden Beach Syka The Protea Inn

"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
User avatar
Tazrae
Be savage, not average.
 
Posts: 1335
Words: 1916653
Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
Location: Syka
Race: Human
Character sheet
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Medals: 5
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Syka Seasonal Challenge (1)

Bringing Problems Home

Postby Tazrae on December 19th, 2021, 8:11 pm

[

Bree looked thoughtful, tilting her head right and left as if remembering was hard because it was before her sentience. “Plants. Stones. Exotic feathers. Exotic creatures. They had a list. They would gather them on the interior and then take them back to the coast where Svefra would pick them up and take them back to the powerful man. They were… called something… components.” Bree said thoughtfully. “Components for spells.” She added, shrugging almost human-like as she finally flopped down and snorted. “You need to tell the Founders.” She added, urging Tazrae to do the right thing.

Tazrae slowly nodded. “I really do. And there’s no better time than now.” The Innkeeper said thoughtfully, snatching the journal back and closing it uptight. Taking a moment, she slipped back inside the Inn, put on a light jacket, and grabbed her backpack. She tucked the journal into her backpack, shouldered the bag, and lightly slipped up onto Bree’s back. The pair didn’t have far to go. Bree headed south along the shore until Mathias’ bungalow came into view. It was a massive deck that stretched out onto the water and housed a half dozen chairs by its rail, some of which were already occupied by people doing the task the deck was designed for; fishing. Bree let Tazrae off at the stair to the beach and she headed up the steps. The Ixam didn’t join her but opted for a sunny patch of sand to sunbathe in while the girl had her chat with the founders.

Mathias greeted Tazrae brightly. “Tazrae… nice to see you. Please join us. Are you here to hook the big one? I know Buraga is.” Mathias said, then beckoned Taz to an empty chair on the opposite side of him. James, Buraga, Mathias, and Duncan were all here. The latter still had his head wrapped in bandages. Taz wondered idly if The Redynn healer had helped his site at all. Taz settled comfortably in her seat. “I’m not here for fishing, unless you call seeking advice something similar. I have a problem and I wanted to take it directly to you.” She told Mathias quietly. The other men’s attention was easily captured, and soon they were all staring at her, even blind Duncan.

“Everything okay, Taz?” Duncan asked, his voice concerned.

“No… not really. It’s not okay and it won’t be for a while. You need to read something.” She said quietly, then moved to dig her journal out of the backpack she’d dropped beside the chair when she’d taken a seat. She opened it to the proper page and then handed it to Mathias. Nervousness filled her. She had no idea if this was going to result in her uninvite from Syka or even strict censure by the Founders. Be that as it may, they needed to know.

Mathias skimmed the page, raised an eyebrow, and quietly asked. “Is this for my eyes only or do the others need to know as well?” His deep voice rumbled. It was tinged with concern, for he didn’t like what he’d glimpsed already.

“Everyone needs to know.” Taz said quietly.
Last edited by Tazrae on December 19th, 2021, 8:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Image
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."


Garden Beach Syka The Protea Inn

"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
User avatar
Tazrae
Be savage, not average.
 
Posts: 1335
Words: 1916653
Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
Location: Syka
Race: Human
Character sheet
Storyteller secrets
Journal
Plotnotes
Medals: 5
Mizahar Grader (1) Overlored (1)
One Thousand Posts! (1) One Million Words! (1)
Syka Seasonal Challenge (1)

Bringing Problems Home

Postby Tazrae on December 19th, 2021, 8:14 pm

And with that Mathias nodded, and instead of reading the journal silently, read it out loud. Taz winced at that, embarrassed by its contents and what she’d written about her feelings for Alric, but Duncan’s blindness prevented the men from passing the tome back and forth until they all had heard the story. Buraga sat back in his chair, looking alert and attentive while Duncan had the opposite reaction of sitting forward. James turned sympathetic eyes on Tazrae as if he wondered how he could keep up his promise to her father to watch over the young woman. Meanwhile, Mathias kept reading until all the events were spelled out and hanging in the air before all of them like specters on a memorial holiday.

Finally, Mathias spoke. “Bree? Do you mind going to fetch Randal? He’s working on his surf shop further south. Bring him back here as soon as you can. Tell him it's about Tazrae and we need to have a meeting with all of us present.” He called down to the Ixam, who immediately rose, shook off the sand she’d dusted herself with, and trotted off down the beach towards town.

The men exchanged glances, and for once Tazrae was conscious of how much it was a man’s world they lived in. James, however, was the first to break the silence. “I knew some of this.” He said softly, shaking his head. “Your father… for I will think of him as nothing else… confided in me when he made me promise to look after you. We were good friends, childhood companions as it were, and I know Marketh would be furious hearing this. He sacrificed a great deal to protect you, Taz, and not because of his brother but because he really loved you. I also know Florentin Arcadius personally. He’s someone I had hoped to get away from coming here. He has no interest in Syka that I know of and would never find you here. He does, however, wish to rule Sylira and has made quite a name for himself there.” James added. “I don’t know Alric’s father, but I do remember his mother. I thought Serena was … just a concubine of Arcadius. She had multiple children by him, all of them stillborn. So much of this story adds up to what I know. I did not know, however, that she was Nymkarta but it explains a great deal. That’s not something I would have guessed, but it does explain why Arcadius kept trying to get her with child even after the second stillborn. Usually, such men cast concubines aside for such things.” He mused, looking thoughtful.

Randal arrived at that point, and Mathias handed him the book to read quickly, to which Randal nodded and complied.

Taz took a deep breath and continued. “There’s more to it now though… more to what was in the journal. I told Bree everything… and she said the men we found her with, the dead ones, worked for a mage, sent here to find spell components and things of power. It explains how I found the rod of sentience in her saddlebag and accidentally used it on her.” Taz added. “There are more of them too, many more, and they are out in the jungle. Bree’s group and its massacre were just one of them.” Taz replied, swallowing hard and feeling afraid suddenly.

Mathias nodded. “There are always explorers in undiscovered wild places. Falyndar is a mecca for that. People are drawn to the promise of riches here that feel untapped and wide-open spaces without people claiming them. I wouldn’t be surprised if more than one mage had men here. It’s something we’ve planned against since the day we broke ground on Syka. James and Randal nodded, with the latter closing his book and handing it over to Tazrae. She replaced it in her backpack.
Image
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."


Garden Beach Syka The Protea Inn

"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
User avatar
Tazrae
Be savage, not average.
 
Posts: 1335
Words: 1916653
Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
Location: Syka
Race: Human
Character sheet
Storyteller secrets
Journal
Plotnotes
Medals: 5
Mizahar Grader (1) Overlored (1)
One Thousand Posts! (1) One Million Words! (1)
Syka Seasonal Challenge (1)

Bringing Problems Home

Postby Tazrae on December 19th, 2021, 8:23 pm

“Tell us about Alric.” Mathias said, shaking his head, as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

“I don’t know much, truthfully. But what I do know I believe because of the tea and the Dreamwalker. He was dumped at an orphanage at age 8. He doesn’t remember his childhood, and honestly with no trauma having happened and his memory gone it was probably due to magic. He was raised in Sunberth at that same orphanage, and now he does odd jobs like guarding and playing cards to keep afloat. He’s not a mage that I know of and I believe he’s just as shocked as I am about the whole events. He wants to go see his parents, but I feel like Florentin Arcadius will have them watched so that’s off the table. Arcadius is looking for Alric because while he didn’t get Serena with child, he got numerous other daughters by strong mage lines and any one of them could give him extremely talented grandchildren.” Taz added. “But Alric is a good person, strong and very intelligent. He’s not someone you’d think was from Sunberth – selfish and self-absorbed. He cares about others and about his city. And I think he’s very worried about Arcadius finding him.” Taz said softly.

Duncan shook his head. “You are in just as much danger, Tazrae. Not only from Florentine Arcadius, but from this Alric too. You don’t understand what the old-world mages could do. If they get ahold of a Nymkarta, they can bind him and siphon his magic off and add it to their own. If they can infuse their bloodline with his bloodline, the incredible djedlines that will come from that pairing are astonishing.

“I inducted you into The Zantani Djedline, Tazrae. It’s another old-world bloodline of incredible power. If you are related to Arcadius and have the Arcadius Djedline potential in you that I awoke with the Zantani, then you’ve got the potential for huge amounts of power as well. I would have never done that if I would have known who exactly you were. And that leads me to point out… if you and this Alric… come together and become entangled, that means his Nymkarta Djedline will fuse with a Zantani Djedline who has Arcadius potential…. It’s … unconscionable. The children you’d have would be on par with Queen Kova.” He said thoughtfully, a hand to his head.

Taz thought she heard him groan slightly.

Mathias nodded. “There was a reason the Emperor of the Suva wanted Queen Kova for his bloodline and was enraged that she wasn’t pure.” He said thoughtfully. “History tends to repeat itself.” He muttered, shaking his head.

Buraga nodded to him in agreement.

“Of course, Kova’s child was by Ivak, so if Alric is Nymkarta by that line, and he might very well be since it has been five hundred years and a lot of children were born afterward… he’s got the blood of at least one God too.” Mathias mused, shaking his head as if all of this was a lot to take in.

“If this man Arcadius finds out who and where you are, Tazrae, and that you’ve made 'friends' with one of the last Nymkarta’s… the whole settlement is in trouble,” Buraga added. “And trouble is an understatement.” He rumbled, his whole face starting to twist with something akin to sucking on a fruit well past its prime. “I am assuming you’ve been meeting with this man in The Outpost since he isn’t here.” Buraga added.
Image
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."


Garden Beach Syka The Protea Inn

"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
User avatar
Tazrae
Be savage, not average.
 
Posts: 1335
Words: 1916653
Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
Location: Syka
Race: Human
Character sheet
Storyteller secrets
Journal
Plotnotes
Medals: 5
Mizahar Grader (1) Overlored (1)
One Thousand Posts! (1) One Million Words! (1)
Syka Seasonal Challenge (1)

Bringing Problems Home

Postby Tazrae on December 19th, 2021, 8:30 pm

Taz nodded. “We’ve been meeting regularly… a few times… to talk about the situation and learn more about each other.” She said, biting her lip then adding. “We’d talked about training together… both magically and physically.” It sounded… childish now that she said it out loud… like Alric and Tazrae could take on this mage alone. She knew they couldn’t. They didn’t stand a chance.

“That’s not a bad idea.” Duncan said softly, though the rest could tell it cost him to say it. All four men agreed. Tazrae, for her part, just stared, utterly surprised. Duncan continued. “You are not even an apprentice at this level. A full mage would take what he wanted and you’d have no counter to it. If Alric is what you both think he is and what the Dreamwalker has verified, and you have the potential of two djedlines, then you both need to catch up. I don’t know how old this mage is or what he knows, but you can’t just do nothing.” He added. “I agree you need to train.” He added. “And I offer any help if I can give it.” He said softly, nodding to the rest. “But your core education in magic is lacking. You need more to that base in order to be a good mage. If you cut corners and skip the basics, your magic will fall apart at higher levels.” The water Reimancer cautioned.

Taz took a deep breath, hating what she was hearing, yet understanding why they said it.

James spoke up at this point. “Like I said, I know Florentin Arcadius not exactly personally but by reputation, and he’s far older than he seems. I would assume he’s older than all of us here. He has patience about himself too. You might have a bit of time, but not much. I wouldn’t bet on anything at this point.” The captain confessed, shaking his head.

Meanwhile, Randal had something to add to the conversation. “I know this isn’t your doing, Tazrae. You stumbled into this thing blindly and probably out of a need to help someone. But you aren’t ignorant of it now, and there are things you can do to protect yourself and this settlement. You'd be a fool to take him as a lover, or trust him with the things we've talked about here.” He said thoughtfully and bluntly.

Tazrae knew Randal was right. And she knew he didn't say anything lightly. But she also knew there were other parts of her involved now too... like her heart.


“First and foremost, this goes no further than those who are present here. You need to make sure any trips you have out of the settlement are carefully planned and you aren’t spotted or watched. You need to be unpredictable and random, moving in disguise and not meeting at someplace public like an Inn. You should also consider inviting Alric to join us here on the edge of civilization. It will take this mage a long time to look someplace so obscure as Syka.” Randal said, shaking his head. “But it’s a long trip from Sunberth. And you can’t join him there. You have too many responsibilities here. You swore an oath to Kihala to be her guardian.” He reminded her.

Tazrae knew this. It was something she’d shared with Alric. “I told him about that. He knows I can’t leave.” She said, nodding to everything Randal said and knowing she’d have to do better.

Buraga spoke up then. “We should work on your physical training. And we’ll definitely bump up security and tell the Rangers what they need to know to be more protective. But if there are rogue groups working for this mage in the jungle, we need to know about them and eliminate them. It's best if no one thinks Falyndar is easily penetrated and harvested for components, regardless of who sends them. If we don’t discourage it now, we’ll constantly be getting company that doesn’t involve paid tourism and will lean more towards piracy.” He added, then glanced at Mathias who had remained quiet and contemplative.

Duncan winced slightly, almost unnoticed. He was back to rubbing his temple again as if his wrapped eyes bothered him.


Mathias nodded, rose, and slipped back into his Bungalow. He returned with a huge book in his hands and an oilskin to wrap it in for protection. He offered the enormous volume to Tazrae. “This is for you. It’s the encyclopedia of Arcanology. You’ll need to study it to get the fundamentals. It has all the common types of magic in it with an explanation of how they work. It also has information in initiation and learning. Don’t try to learn everything in here, but pick and choose carefully. Do learn the fundamentals through and carefully study the sections on djed and overgiving.” He said thoughtfully, handing Tazrae the book.

She nodded at his words, running her hands over the giant book. “Thank you all. I’ll take all your advice to heart. And again, this is not something I wanted to happen. I’m very sorry this is encroaching on the safety of Syka and involving all of you. I hope I don’t bring problems to Syka, but if you are forewarned, hopefully, we can counter it together. I will learn and take any lessons Duncan and Buraga want to give me. And meanwhile, I think playing the role of a simple Innkeeper will be the best cover I can possibly have to hide in plain sight from a mage looking for another mage.” She said softly, rising. “I’m going to leave you now to talk. I know you’ll need to and without me. Buraga… Duncan… can you swing by when you have time or send me a message and I’ll come to find you to figure out some sort of training schedule?” She added, wanting them to know she was serious about their offers and was taking them seriously.

She managed to slide the volume into her backpack and shouldered it without effort. Then she hit the stairs to the beach to meet Bree and head home.

Words: 3173
Image
"A mark of an open mind is being more committed to your curiosity than your conviction.
The goal of learning is not to shield old views against new facts, but to revise old views with new facts.
Ideas are possibilities to explore, not certainties to defend."


Garden Beach Syka The Protea Inn

"Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows."
User avatar
Tazrae
Be savage, not average.
 
Posts: 1335
Words: 1916653
Joined roleplay: May 3rd, 2020, 2:02 pm
Location: Syka
Race: Human
Character sheet
Storyteller secrets
Journal
Plotnotes
Medals: 5
Mizahar Grader (1) Overlored (1)
One Thousand Posts! (1) One Million Words! (1)
Syka Seasonal Challenge (1)


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