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The Heartwood
The Dirkwood Forest
Home Again
Attaday, the Eighth Day of Yrick

Bekkah, Cesare, Kadri, Keiko, Lyric, Pietro, Tomomi, Dominic Korie, Miss Emerald Mouse, Broke, Soft, Clever, a pair of Rats and most of the Pack, Lady and various and sundry other Forest Folk



From his spot against the wall, near the window shared by mouse and companion, near the spot claimed by the Pack’s First and Second, beneath the gaze of Home’s mistress and behind a concerned clever rat a shadow grumbled a bit, a soft, hard to notice sound that made a pair of round ears perk. Dominic, in turn, nodded once. He looked between Lady and Clever, met Broke’s gaze before tugging up the collar of his black cloak, so they stood tall and proper.

He looked between Lyric and Keiko, head canting a bit as if making a mental note. Cesare’s silent nod was matched by one equally simple. Pietro was leveled a measuring gaze, one that seemed to see nothing unexpected, which, in turn, was exactly what he didn’t expect. Which left Kadri, who got a slow exhalation and last, for Lady Bekkah, an odd small and world weary smile accompanied by the shrug of his shoulders.

He waited for a moment, for a heartbeat and then whispered, a whisper that could only be heard by those next to him or if you had the ears of a beast. When he did speak he slowly nodded.

“I’ll go with the majority counsel.”

It was clever that spoke next, to address two concerns, one brought up my Pietro and the other by Lyric.

“What do you think, Squire? They will be scared, they have never seen the sky. How does one understand what freedom is when it has never been had? What would you do if a stranger asked you to do something that would normally get you punished or thrown away? Will they do what all scared people do? Will they freeze, will they hide, will they run in all directions but the right one?”

His attention then turned to Lyric.

“Your choices are good, they are acceptable. Deer and cattle are strong for moving things, they lift and they break. Raccoon are clever. They do a little bit of this, a little bit of that. Alone they can only do fine things, together can manipulate more. You have placed them well. The Mice, just remember, they can go places but they can take no more than what they wear and a knife. Or two. They can get to places but they cannot pull anyone out of the Mines.

“As for the Pack?”

Broke raised her head and offered the minstrel a very dangerous looking smile, one all filled with sharp teeth.

“Just make sure you keep up, Minstrel.”

And that would probably be true. Once they started down into the Keep they could not afford to stop.

The most disturbing thing, however, was not the Keep itself or what would happen come the fall of night. It was the silence that claimed the commons after Broke set her head back down upon her arms.


… slowly the sun fell into the west, its path marked by a square of sunlight that slipped along the floor. The closer it got to the far wall, the more elongated it became, the more the commons emptied as the Forest Folk made their preparations. One by one, until it was more than empty. There was no one left to see that loneliness, of a place whose family had left it behind while on a deadly quest, not knowing who would return, if any.

If the fates were kind, maybe the hall would fill again with laughter.

Maybe …


Cesare’s concerns were partially resolved. When the Rhoni came down to the docks there was, indeed, a veritable fleet for the Talantal Admiral to command. There were punts of many sizes, the coracles they had made, a set of simple rafts and several other hand crafted boats he had never seen before – narrow things either carved from logs or with sap sealed bark laced to a wooden frame.

Inflatables, however, would have to wait another several hundred years to be invented.

Keiko’s first concern was also resolved. Just before she stepped down the stairs towards the pier, Lady handed her a pack.

It was full of ribbons.

Some of the boats would be towed behind the others as the Forest Folk had the advantage of being able to travel through the Forest. They were not river bound like those who would be affected by the Forest’s curse – that was anyone not of Mother Nature or the Horned God. If things became rough it wasn’t as if they had to return to Home in the boats; just ferry those from the mines to the shore.

The trip to the Stone Wall was quiet. It was specifically timed – something Clever had pointed out from before, timing was essential. They arrived at the large dam just as the Sun set, her light very quickly abandoning the sky to the stars. Just as before those who could not climb the smooth Dwarven construction were lifted to place by Clever and his kin. When Pietro and Bekkah were tossed to the balcony of that first set of towers the Pack was already there, waiting.

The boats came next, set into the lake, and then the others.

From there the groups set to their appointed tasks.

“Lets take a boat …”

Dominic nodded to Keiko and Tomomi, commandeering one of the punts and finally answering the Rhoni wanderer’s question.

“We may want to save that manner of travel for emergencies. I have been told it’s kind of like being drunk.

“If you are a pint of Rory’s ale.”

Lyric, Kadri and the Pack took up a good portion of the remaining watercraft. This also included a collection Rats, one raccoon, a group of Mice and The Lockpick. She sat at the very back of a punt, clutching a small crockery cup-like thing with a wide cork pressed tightly into its top. Her cloak had a hood. Now that got a reaction from across the way. A certain Korie lordling looked more than a little jealous. As everyone moved into their appointed boats The Lockpick spoke up with a covetous whisper.

“If you drink this, it’ll totally ruin a weasel’s ability to track you by smell …

“… does anyone want it?”

Cesare’s small flotilla included a pair of deer, a triplet of rats, a mouse-girl and a passel of raccoons, including the lass from the night before.

Which left Bekkah, Pietro, several of the larger Forest Folk and Clever’s group at the end of the long bridge that led to the keep’s main gate. At those gatehouses Pietro would set his diversion; he could not just set himself in the middle of the bridge, his task was to draw them out and keep their attention.

No matter what the cost.

Keiko

And again Keiko listened to the silence that reverberated through the room. Heartbeats of silence, long breaths of silence — silence stretching into forever. This time it was the silence of waiting for the appointed time to do a difficult task. Perhaps the tension still remained. No. Certainly, the strain still remained, but it had mutated into something harder.

The mission was madness, and it was a promise made. It could go well, or it could go to places the young Rhoni did not care to contemplate.

She trusted Dominic and Emerald and Tomomi. She trusted herself. She put her trust in the currents and let her faith be guided by the teachings of the Ancestors.

Keiko also had a Duty beyond the promise she had made to her friends. Should she find herself in the depths of a Dwarven mine dancing with Krysta...

Well, she would not have exactly failed in her Duty. Nor would she have succeeded.

It was so like a Rhoni to find the middle way.

Not that she wanted to dance with Krysta anytime soon, despite Emmi being the Lady’s newest priestess. The mainland was large, and she truly did want to see so much more of it than she had seen riding with her Family’s Caravan. To travel with her forever friend and her Minstrel friend seemed...

It seemed...

Right. Proper. In accordance with all she knew and all she was. A Mouse might not be kith, and a Gaija might not be kin, but they were worth living for. To run where the brave dare not go, to fight for the right without question or pause.

Introspection was not a bad thing — not now in the time of waiting. The Card Reader knew her Cards well, knew the lines and colors of each and every one. She knew their messages and knew there was nothing they could tell her this afternoon that slid into evening — nothing that she didn’t already know.

How to defeat the Dwarves? Use your wits, girl! How to save the Forest Folk who were still enslaved? Use your wits, girl! Use your skills, child!

And all through the silence, she held her forever friend close. Tomomi was a brave little Mouse girl, and quite likely as scared as Keiko was. Well, had been before talking with Dominic and Broke.

As the others began their trek to the little wharf, Keiko took Tomomi’s graceful little hands in her own. “I know this is a scary thing to do. And I think you are a very brave Mouse. That is part of your name, remember?

“I do not like to fight, Tomomi. But I can. And when I do, I am very good. Not as good as the Guardians, of course, but in my way I am adept. You are not a fighter, though. If I must fight, you must flee to a place you know is safe. Please do that for me, my friend. I will worry and not fight as well as I must if I am worried that you will be hurt.

“I know you will not leave me forever, Tomomi. Just long enough to be safe. Please?”

Whiskers bounced up and down as the Mouse wiggled her nose. It was almost as though she really didn’t want to answer.

Keiko smiled. “I have only asked; I do not require a vow. At least think about my request, yes?”

They were the last two out of the room, the last two who were leaving Home tonight. So when Lady handed her the package full of ribbons, Keiko stared for a heartbeat before impulsively hugging Lady as she might hug her Mother or Grandmother. It was a precious gift.

“Thank you,” she whispered before she hurried down the stairs to catch up with Dommi.

And then she nodded at his explanation as she tucked the ribbons into her own pack.

“Well, I have never been drunk, but I have certainly seen enough people who were. And your horse was quite vexed by the whole thing, so...” She nodded. “Emergency transportation only. Excellent idea.”

At Lockpick’s question, the Rhoni looked from Mouse to Noble Dama and chuckled.

“Does pink have a smell I wonder,” she whispered to Tomomi. “Because that would probably be what that concoction would do to a person.”


[OOC: Because I have asked the GM approximately 1400 words worth of questions (including a request for drawings) for the other thread, this will be my weekly post.]

"I will do my best," she replied, "And I will not ask for special treatment. Rescuing the Kin comes first... The plan has a life of its own. As I have always been, I am expendable."

The Pack would leave, the Rats would leave, the Mice would leave, they would all leave. So much to do to get ready to try a thing so complicated that it might just fall in upon itself.

There was a weight of responsibility that now bore down upon the Minstrel. She had devised a plan, considered a number of things offered in response, and retooled her ideas to fit. And still it might not be enough. People were going to die today. That was the way of battle and of war.

She could stand and go to battle for her ideas and beliefs, or to see Good triumph over Evil, or Honor, Duty, and Courage prevail to right a wrong or an injustice. The could do battle to defend herself and those she cared about.

But she hated war. War was not about right and wrong, instead it was about winning and losing, and the perspectives that brought a person to do battle become muddled, confused, twisted, and maybe even lost altogether and then there is only victory and defeat, regardless of the costs.

The commons room was emptying out as those who had been gathered set out to prepare themselves, or to tend to the tasks necessary to begin this venture. Some might find a quiet place to seek wisdom or peace from a divine being. Lyric the Minstrel had no divine being from whom to seek comfort and wisdom.

Slowly she rose from the table, saw Keiko and Tomomi huddled, and didn't disturb them. She drifted out of the room in search of the alcove where she had spent time earlier today listening to stories from Keiko, Dommi, Emerald and Tomomi. Her pack was still there and now it was time to make herself ready for what was to come.

Once there, she dragged her heavy pack out to the middle of the floor and knelt beside it to untie the cords and straps and open it up. She paused as she looked at her possessions, all she was given after being driven like a wild animal fleeing a pack of hounds, and thus to begin her time of exile.

She reflected upon a life wrapped into a pack, and how so little of it seemed to be what she imagined her new future would be like... And yet now she would have to embrace the old again, in order to give some others a chance at a new and better life.

She stood, with her belongings laid out atop the pack, staring down at a 'That Which Came Before' that would become 'The Here and Now'.

"I am Banished," began Lyric's own form of prayer. She stripped herself of her clothes, almost ritual-like, unconcerned and unashamed that someone else might see her naked body.

"I journey to find a Song to save my people even if they do not want to be saved. I am on that Journey now, and this is a Path along the way to where I must go. Maybe it is here I will find a Verse of the Song."

Lyric began to dress herself again, this time not in the light layers of her dresses...

"The Before becomes the Now even if I do not want it to be so."

...but rather, piece by piece, from the stuff she carried in that burdensome pack that a few others had been so gracious to carry for her from time to time.

"What is needed of me by those who can not do for themselves is greater of purpose and nobler in deed than any reason I might have to resist this call."

Lyric stood there holding the last two objects of the ensemble, one in each hand. They belonged there, but for now they must wait. She was resolved and with that came the peace she sought.

She might die this day. If that was to happen, then it was meant to be. If it was not her day, then surely it would be so for those she faced. That gave her peace.

"What higher purpose could I have then to do Battle for Those Who Need Hope. I will fight for freedom..."

She took those two objects, one in each hand, and reached behind her to the small of her back, slipping them up into the hidden inset sheaths where they would rest until needed. She felt the firmness of them like braces against her back and she remembered days past when she last dressed as she did now.

Gone were the flowers, and her hair was loosed to be wild and free. It was its own metaphor for the woman who wore it that way.

Silently she mouthed an Oath, words to include her full name, and her declaration as a warrior born of a warrior people, Oath-swearing to give her life if needed so that others who had never known this hope might experience freedom for the first time.

Lastly, Lyric bundled up her remaining belongings and slid the much lighter pack back where she had been keeping it all day thus far. Slinging her mandolin over her shoulder with care, she left to find the Gathering of Forces, and the Pack. The sound of her soft boots on the wood decking boards was something she hadn't heard in some time.

Lyric

The Minstrel, dressed so differently now that it might take a sudden and second look to recognize who she was, strode with a confident and serious gait toward the docks and her assigned group, the Pack and those who would accompany them into the depths of the mines. Lyric's hair was loose and the breeze beneath the large Home tree splayed the tresses like brunette fire that trailed her as she walked with determination and purpose.

She wore a fitted, sleeveless leather hauberk. Clearly it had been made for a female figure. It also bore evidence that it had been worn before and often, maybe even showing enough age to have been passed down generations. But that would just be supposition.



The leather vambraces that protected her entire forearm from wrist to elbow matched the greaves on her lower legs. The pattern reflected a great deal of craftsmanship and pride and no doubt there was a leather worker in Lyric's hidden village who knew how to turn leather into armor as if it were art.

The greaves were strapped over a pair of leather boots, softer in their construction than the accompanying armor pieces, that rose to conceal her kneecaps. The soft leather riding pants were dyed a slightly different color than the boots and showed less age and wear than said boots as well. The pant legs were tucked into the boots.

The hauberk's length covered her from her shoulders to just above her knees and, as such, the Minstrel had about as much protection as possible to still allow free range of motion and as much speed as she might possess unarmored.







To those with a knowledgeable eye and the experience to recognize this, all of her armor had been stiffened and might even be leather shanked in critical places.

The smooth dark wooden hilt of a dagger, with a pommel cap of silver, could be seen at her belt along her left leg. At her back, when her long hair wasn't obscuring the view, there were two more hilts of a similar shape and design, except a little longer, but these were placed in such a way as to be grasped by reaching around to the small of her back and drawing the blades downward out of concealment within two hidden, inset, sheaths in her armor. All that could be seen were the hilts, but the armor's size and the fitting showed the blades to be no more than 16 inches at most.

"Forgive me if I have delayed you," she offered, as she stopped before Broke. "I have not worn this in some time."

****

Lyric would remain quiet for the trip along the river toward the Lake and the keep, speaking only if spoken to. Perhaps a smile for One Fang if she noticed his attention upon her. Her change, a revelation to those who knew her, might be welcomed or it might be shunned. Lyric is Lyric is Lyric though, and this truth is a part of her as much as who and what she had hoped her life would be in simple dresses and flowers. Keiko had said she was a complicated person. Truth in that.

And, once in the boats, though the Trickster Lockpick had offered the crockery cup with another of her concocted mixtures, Lyric did not respond. She suspected that Kadri would decline the offer as well, given the previous episode with the mushroom broth. But the option would be hers first. Both of them, Kadri and Lockpick, were servants of the same Divine Being as Dommi. This was a notable circumstance for the sheer improbability that one Divine Being was so well represented in this place.

If Kadri declined, then Lyric would accept the crockery cup when they reached the Lake. But not before...