Solo Of Conviction & Creed Pt I

[Alric Lysane]

18th Winter 521AV - Alric's Shack It had been a long slog since that day, a season ago almost now, that his past had been revealed to him. Despite his initial reactions, his acceptance at face value of what he was and where had had come from, he had spent many days since doing little but waste them and push away a lot of the philosophical and emotional clashes into the long grass of the future. Towards the end of fall, all other tasks done, and a long conversation with a Drykas he could have used in Sunberth at that moment, he had decided to try to confront what needed confronting and try to discern what the best path forwards was. Now, on the cusp of what felt like a pivotal moment in time for him, he had wavered and in traditional fashion had put aside the quills, parchment, library tomes and seeking to instead seek the bottom of a bottle. There was little light beyond the fire left anyway and Remmy had outright told him to leave her alone for the day, at least, as she had had enough of him poking through every scrap and journal he could before bothering her about things within them when she needed to work. She had helped him plenty, he knew, but he always pushed for more, the feeling of need and the desire to know nudging him to edge out his luck a little more here, a tad more there…but even she had her limits and she had been good to him over the past two score days. He could not fault her for wanting some peace, peace which he was having difficulty finding. He remembered reading in one of the myths and legends books – largely anti-mage propaganda written after Ordeck and Obel, Alric thought from the style – that somewhere, in the depths of time, the goddess Eyris had helped found the line of Alahea. The text was vague, providing little but hearsay and the accusatory line or two about gods and that they should stop meddling in mortal affairs as they made things worse. Alric was not sure he agreed with that argument but he could see why someone would say it. A god destroyed the world after all and not all gods were likely to be good ones, though he had never met any and the ones he knew of were largely concepts more than moralities. “Death doesn’t care who it takes…or doesn’t” he muttered into the crackling of the fire, half-finishing his cup of mystery spirit – he hadn’t asked what it was just if they had anything decently strong. He pulled his mind away from that line of thinking, tough he still got a flash or two in his minds eye of his mother’s blank expression, even whilst giving birth to that twisted thing. His closed his eyes, pressed his fingers into them until a few flashes of colour bloomed, and then finished his drink with a throaty sigh from the burn before pouring some more and looking at the dancing figures once more. No, he didn’t want those memories this night and so instead went back to wondering what he should do. He had met Taz the day before, their first meeting since the Dreamwalker, and it had gone well. It had provided a balm against the harsh realities of his life, for a while at least, but now back in Sunberth and running through the conversations they had had it instead provided him a shifting kaleidoscope of emotions. Decisions to be made about the hunting, the running, magic, potential travel plans, partnership or going it alone and a whole host of others he didn’t have the knowledge to firmly make a decision upon. He had spent most of his waking hours, for a long time now, trying to find the knowledge he needed but had failed so far. Truthfully, he needed guidance but had never traditionally been one to ask for it. And so he sat, brooding into the fire as he got slowly more drunk. Words: 674

[Alric Lysane]

There was a strange purpose to what he was doing, though he’d have been the first to say that it wasn’t particularly wise. Still he knew that it worked as he had done it enough times that the pattern had been established. He didn’t know what magic had been used to steal away his memories, but he did know that since the Dreamwalker the doors holding them back, for want of a better description, were weakened. All that held them in place was his inability to find a less immature way to access them. For whatever reason, though he suspected it had something to do with mental control, a little too much drink loosened the grip its hold had upon his memory. It was a balancing act, though, and it was not always reliable. He had wondered whether the meditation Moritz had tried to show him last season would help but he had never truly managed to rest his mind long enough to do it on his own. It was as if something within skittered and whispered, distracting him purposefully from finding that stillness. Perhaps he would find a way in the future but for now he simply lit his pipe and toom the next few sips upon his journey. He hated these evenings if he were honest with himself, free days from work or not, as they had a habit of throwing up visions he didn’t like to relive before he remembered things he didn’t already remember. “Isn’t that the point though?” he said softly into the empty shack, to himself mostly but also to the world in general as if expecting an answer, “that discovering new things takes a price? I should hope so or I’m getting a rough deal of it” he chuckled around his pipe stem at that, the merry stage finally being reached. It was true though, no knowledge came without a price as far as he could see – even if that price was spending days of ones life learning it. It was still a price, you would not get those days back, and if the knowledge proved too much for you or you gave up on it, would that then not be a waste of those precious days Days which could have been spent upon something else? That was not quite the whole truth though, he was starting to think, otherwise he had wasted almost half a season of his life – though he did not feel it had been wasted. He supposed, as he stared into the flames and smoke rippled around his face, that it depended upon whether you had a goal in mind? He teased that thought out and unravelled it, turning it and twisting it in his mind. It was an interesting one that had been growing within him for some time now. He had been searching for anything upon Alahea, the Nymkarta, his ancestors and somehow inferring from such things who he was and how he might turn out. He had found little but rumours and scrawling in the edged of pages. Many might see it as wasted time, the scores of things read nothing but grains of sand slipped through the cracks in one’s fingers. He didn’t see it that way, he had enjoyed discovering things, reading the minds of people long gone and laughing at their jokes long penned and probably forgotten. He had wondered more than once if he were a scholar rather than a fighter, or a thief. Whether, if circumstance had been different, he’d have never even considered such things and simply lived his life in academic arrogance. Would he have had more conviction than his current character seemed to have? His mind filled up with such wondering, turning more contemplative and melancholy now as he filled another clay cup. Words: 635

[Alric Lysane]

“What are convictions anyway?” he mused to himself with a frown. Casting his mind back, the buzzing feeling of the alcohol helping to loosen his thoughts, the scattered memories of his parents coalesced into his mind’s eye. Even if it was what he had intended it wasn’t something he did lightly, they kept him up at night more often than not and the negative flashes of darkness and despair were the price paid for the brighter, lighter and more illuminating memories that he sought to retrieve. His parents had had conviction – in their ability to resist, in their decisions, in each other. He felt sure the list was longer and one day wanted to ask them why they had done what they did, was it worth it and a whole host of other questions. For now, though, it was enough for his thoughts to know that they had had that strength of character. But did he? He believed in very little beyond the acquisition of a warm bed and enough food to fill a stomach. Or at least he had done. He had had conviction about magic and now that was tattered. He had conviction that Florentin Arcadius would come for him and that he had to be put down…but was that conviction or simple truth and vengeance? Did he have the ability to believe in himself, or was it a case of desperate necessity? Would that be enough? He had seen the hard stubbornness in Serana and Kalas’ eyes, their resistance born from something beyond just base need. He was not sure that he possessed that. He had not been one for traditional belief, though he knew the gods existed and he had met many who would swear Ovek had granted them luck at Tall Johnny’s or the Dira had decided to take their enemy instead of them in some lucky happenstance. He had wondered quite a bit of late as to whether he could call himself a spiritual person, whether he was possessed of a destiny long ago written out – or at least outlined – and that he was now a chess piece in something larger, perhaps a game between one god or another. Or many. Certainly, things had changed for him so quickly and so overreachingly that it seemed a not too small stretch to imagine some divine interference. He had not lied when he had said that he felt closest to Eyris, but he was not sure what he had was a belief system as such, and though he had prayed more of late, faced with his troubles, he had no set schedule or ritual. He was not even sure she cared. Not because she had not answered, he was not so arrogant as that, but because from what he remembered of his mother’s teachings she didn’t seem the type to care for traditional worship. Which brought him back to his initial thoughts, puffing his pipe and sipping his drink, of what convictions he had. Or beliefs? Were they the same, or different? “Is belief in the divine the same as belief in one’s self? Or are they different but from the same source…deep down inside?” Words: 529

[Alric Lysane]

He turned it all back around, pipe smoke mixing with the taste of more unknown spirits as his thoughts seemed to grow more ridiculous. All he could say for certain as that he had no real higher conviction beyond vengeance and a need to know. It felt different than before, when he had spent the odd day curiously exploring something of interest. No, this was something more, a drive to know that underpinned his needs to discover more upon his origins. He couldn’t visit his parents, that much made sense for now, so he was relegated to trying to conjure up drunken remembrances and whatever fragments were found within Sunberth’s excuse for a library. He considered that for a while, the flames warming his cheeks as the drink warmed his stomach. Wasn’t that a conviction, of sorts? He enjoyed exploring the knowledge and though he annoyed Remmy no end when it came to trying to achieve his primary goal, he spent just as many chimes in warm conversation with her, begun by some reference or amusement within a random set of pages. The conviction that all things he read were of some value? Were there other things he held conviction over? Turning his attention back to his conversations with others he knew that he held the conviction that freedom was all important. That was a conviction. Yet he accepted that Sunberth held the antithesis also, slavery and exploitation. Did that make his conviction evaporate? Or was it just that he had no ability to stop such things but felt deep inside himself that they shouldn’t exist? Would he truly stand aside, as he had wondered with Zach, and let such things happen? Hadn’t that been that point of his parent’s little rebellion, to not accept outside fates from an evil source? “Yes….yes” he murmured to himself, feeling that there was some solid ground to that thinking, though also certain he’d not be able to stand steadily on it in that moment. Perhaps, after a fashion, he felt much the same and he could share that with them from afar. He too was placed inside a crafted destiny, by the same man, and had decided to start his own rebellion. His was smaller perhaps, for now, and his partner in it was far removed from himself. But it did seem that history was repeating, albeit slightly differently, and he felt strongly enough in the man’s evil that he would fight. Even if it meant falling. He wouldn’t find himself captured, no, he’d rather die. Having the images of his parent’s fates emblazoned in his memories merely served to make him certain of that. He wouldn’t let them take him alive but his plans were not about running, no he’d face and kill. That was a conviction, even if it were a darker one than he’d like to contemplate outside of fireside inebriation. He chuckled to himself darkly, perhaps he was more like them than he thought. His father had always seemed a hard man, that much he remembered. He was warm and loving…but hardened on the outside. The visions had simply confirmed that. He did not think he was as tough as Kalas was. Serana though…she had been softer and he shared much of her traits that he could remember, and had seen. He wondered, idly, if she had had beliefs…creeds by which she led her life. Not the shared convictions with Kalas, but her own beliefs. She had always seemed so sure of herself, so certain. He remembered that when he was younger he had thought she had known everything there was to know. Every question he had had she had had an answer for. He knew it was probably a rose-tinted series of memories but he still wondered if she had revelled in discovery as he did, whether they shared that. Words: 642

[Alric Lysane]

Perhaps she had had some divine help, it would certainly explain how they had managed to avoid capture for so long. Upon reflection it made sense that she would have worshiped at least one, if not many. In the quest for preserving their family she’d have likely used everything she could, even potentially blind hope in higher powers – he knew he would have done. If he were honest, he could have used some divine intervention in his present. He talked much of fate but, truth be told inside his own skull, he didn’t see the divine in his life. Knowing what he knew now, the darkness of his past and the future that was so much a path of daggers that even if he made it to the to he’d like as not be sliced to ribbons. He closed his eyes and for a few moments he could see their eyes, both looking into his alternately, there were words that were muted but that sounded like promises. After a while, and a few more sips, even the words rippled out of his depths and they brought a few tears to his eyes. Promises of safety, of being special, of having a future to look forward to, that even if the worst happened they would meet again, that they trusted in their skills, and that his mother trusted in their family gods…whatever that meant. “Lies…all lies” he muttered to himself as he stared into the fire, finishing the drink and letting the bottle fall to the floor with a dull thud, the packed earth of his shack floor seeming to accept it as merely part of the routine. He shook his head and tried to rid himself of the memory but it refused, sticking with him for some reason, as if implanted so deeply into his mind that it wouldn’t leave and that, now discovered, it would force its way into his mind’s eye. It was insistent, nagging and tormenting in its sheer hypocrisy and pointlessness. Whatever his bloodline it didn’t matter, he had ended up a street urchin with no prospects and once his blood was discovered all it did was paint a target on his back. They believed, so strongly, he could see it reflected in their eyes. Eyes that wouldn’t stop staring at him, urging him to do something, to see something, to acknowledge something. Their voices tumbled and rolled inside his head, filling his ears as if they were there with him in the dirty, dingy shack their blood had been reduced to. Would they be happy? Was that their plan, to hie him so deeply even he didn’t see himself? Was it all some cosmic joke played upon him by the divine, playing their chess games, or whatever they played with mortal lives? The voices and eyes persisted, and he shook his head, refusing and refusing until drunken tears welled up and he was forced to his knees before the fire, almost sobbing at it all, at the irony and ridiculousness. “Alright! Alright!” he shouted into the interior of his shack, hands over his ears and trembling, taking in deep, wheezing breaths against the sorrow, staring into the fire and feeling its warmth, focusing upon that rather than the cold within, breathing easing slowly as he rubbed his face free of its mess, “alright…”he whispered at the end, slumped before the flames. “I don’t know what it was you both believed, beyond in yourselves…in us. I can guess, I remember a symbol, long ago, and your words about one goddess. I…I don’t know how this is supposed to work…but if you did it and it helped, for however long….then…what have got to lose?” he asked the fire sadly. “Uh…oh Eyris….no that doesn’t seem right…why would she want airs? Fine…fine,” he closed his eyes and breathed deeply, finding a stillness within that surprised him given the evening itself, “Eyris…please…grant me the knowledge I need…and the wisdom to use it…as I think you did my mother…I don’t know that I’ll ever be worthy of much but I could really use some guidance…some help…a nudge…anything” “Please” It was the best he could do, and it was sincere. He didn’t think Eyris cared about such things, such prostrations or prayers, but it was worth a shot. And maybe he’d get an answer, one answer at least for all of the things he tried to find, the knowledge that would bring not only salvation but revelation. He knew he enjoyed the journey of uncovering such fragments of knowledge, whatever they were. Perhaps that would be enough. And if not…well perhaps like his parents it might bring him some comfort. He sat and watched the fire for a time, not really knowing what to do and not expecting any answer. It was enough that he had remembered some memories and now that he had at least acknowledged the buried memory it seemed to have receded, still remembered but simply a normal memory once more.

[Alric Lysane]

Your Grades Skills Observation - 2 Philosophy - 5 Lores Dark Memories: Serana & Kalas Eyris: Goddess of Knowledge & Wisdom Eyris: Grant Me Guidance, Please Knowledge: Comes With A Price Knowledge: The Enjoyable Pursuit Knowledge: The Need To Know Philosophy: Conviction Vs. Creed Philosophy: Destiny Vs. Self-Determination