Another Chapter: March 1st. 2008

[The Librarian]

La Fontaine from "If Ever I Return"

Phaen sat in front of her vanity staring into the mirror looking for something not found with eyes. Since leaving her fathers ship and setting out to make a life of her own she had worked hard to create a place of comfort, and caring; a life that was welcoming and loving… It all now seemed a hollow dream, a fruitless pursuit when inside she no longer loved who she was and had little hope for the future. All too often her frustration with herself flared into fights with those closest to her, becoming all too sensitive to words and tones, looking for any slight to confirm the worthlessness she felt inside.

Carnival is supposed to be lighthearted fun, however this year it was frivolous reverie turned ugly under the February moons. Phaen giggled with Ismene as they exchanged the coins, Ismene had purchased a kiss for Augren, a bit of fun turned sour when the gift was not appreciated, the look on Augren’s face won’t soon be forgotten. Later an Orc, one that had caused no trouble and joined in the celebration, he paid his donation to the Orphaned Pooka fund, and Phaen held her breath to give him his kiss… Maybe Orc women like the mucus of their males on them but Phaen didn’t, thank goodness she had the sense to step aside and was missed by the spray directed at her. Frey was kind and offered her a towel; he had been a welcome addition to the Freehold.

Alyssia had come out and stood with Phaen, listened and cuddled the young woman, paid for another kiss to help Phaen past the slight she felt from the others. It was a temporary fix, once alone Phaen’s mind turned again to how she deserved to be treated such… something had to change before she was lost entirely. It was time to leave, Phaen’s heart ached for the sea, for a ship she had never seen and a people who didn’t know who she was; Port Westgate and the dreaming were calling to her heart. Just before dawn Phaen made the decision, hugging Ian close for comfort, Phaen asked quietly, “will you do me a favour?” “Done”, was Ian’s reply. “I haven’t asked for anything yet”, Phaen smiled responding. “Does it matter?” Ian answered…

Does it matter, did it matter that Phaen asked him to take her away? There were responsibilities to take care of, Fiona needed to be reached and helped to understand why Sage would take care of her enchantment till Phaen returned. Nix, dear Nix, Phaen needed to help her youngest friend to understand how much Phaen loved her and would send letters and presents while she was gone. James needed to know not to let Thyme bully him out of taking care of the Rose. Azrael… he too must be reached, Phaen had to return something to his possession, and let him know why she would not need it. Four visits, and to pack so that when the dawn light crested the canyon walls, a single trip to the desert and then a glance over her shoulder before she would begin another chapter.

[The Librarian]

Repost from Ian Xanthe:

The cooling winter winds drifted lazily over the pre dawn dunes near the remains of what was once the Freehold of Mirage. Ian slowly traced the appropriate pattern on the ankh of Compassion, and stepped back, watching as the fabric of reality shifted and parted, revealing the only trod to this worlds gateway into Arcadia. Icy wind on the other side bit deeply through the dry morning air of the desert, and his mind drifted back to the first time he had walked through this gate from the Fae homeland to the world of Sosaria.

He hadn’t seen Silvara in many years, not since she was a young woman in her mothers Kingdom of Dragon’s Eire. He had raised her along side her mother, but as with most Sidhe, eventually they drifted apart for sometime. She had returned home for a time hearing that he was visiting the Eire, and asked him to come back to a world called Sosaria, in which she had been Queen. He had stayed with her in the palace for sometime in Mirage, and he recalled the day she looked at him as the two relaxed on the balcony over a glass of wine and told him she wanted him to show the Fae of this land, what it meant to be Unseelie…

Slowly he turned from the open portal and looked to the ruins of Mirage… he showed them indeed, what doomsaying was like. So much had changed since then, Silvara’s passing, the reforming of a kingdom in Winters Rose, the loss of Seiren the mate he had found here in Sosaria, finding such an enduring friendship with Phaen, he’d been there for it all. He had been told many times in his life that he was a plague on the Fae, a walking Versalis storm. He wasn’t sure whether the dramatic changes he had heralded for a millennia and a half through Arcadia and now Sosaria were his doing, or if he simply had the best sense of timing to be there for it that any Unseelie had ever possessed. Either way, he understood, it didn’t matter in the end…”change is good” or so the first tenant of the Unseelie escheat laws says. After all he had seen in his long life he had come to understand that change, simply is. Whether it’s for better or worse becomes arbitrary.
Glamour hated Ian Xanthe, and with all he was he hated it back.

Ian’s fierce amethyst eyes looked from the ruins to Phaen standing nearby, hand on the strap of her traveling pack, and she too was looking with distant reflection on the ruins of the once mighty Freehold. He could feel the emotions of uncertainty rolling off of her in waves. Since their last trip into Arcadia, one to bring closure to Seiren’s passing, she too had felt unsettled. Fae life in this world was very unlike that of Arcadia, their spiritual homeland, and since they returned those months ago, she had been searching for herself and where she belonged. Ian smiled a bit, studying the young woman who had grown so much in this past year from the carefree wilder he had first met in Mirage.
He felt at times that she had left a great deal of herself beyond the trod through which they were about to walk once more. She had asked him to take her into Arcadia, to Westgate, the port town where the ship he had given her for her last birthday waited, still unseen by its new captian.

Though neither had yet discussed it, he knew she was not coming back for sometime, and that he would be returning soon, alone. “Take me away” had been her words a night ago. As Ian touched her shoulder gently, he knew what she had really been saying was, “I want to find myself.”

Phaen turned to him, smiling a bit as Ian asked, “are you ready?”
She nodded with a look of deep certainty that she was indeed ready for change: in her life, and in her future. It was no accident of fate that she had sought him to help her begin to find it. She knew better than most how dangerous a question it was coming from him, he was the Doomsayer afterall.

Softly Phaen replied, “I am Ian.”

Ian smiled, nodding to her, and both turned to the trod and the path between worlds, as the sun of the desert crested the surrounding mountains and its light spread over the shifting sands. Both of the Sidhe, wilder and grump, walked through the gate and like a dragons maw slowly shutting, the fabric of reality closed together once more behind them.

The winter ice whipped strongly across the now frozen plain on the other side as their feet crunched atop a thin layer of freshly fallen snow. Phaen took Ian’s hand, and together both set out on the first day, of the rest of her life…

Source: freeholdofroses.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=pubstory&action=display&thread=104