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[b][u][center]The Greatest Ambition

Part 2

for Nataraj

by Draconicon[/center][/u][/b]

It was no longer bleeding, and it had a name, one that it had taken, as all true Fae must. That name, however, required meaning, and Euphorion would give it such.

The land was claimed, and as the days of summer slowly slid to fall, it took on the marks that Euphorion asked. Faerie rings and pretty things sprouted to mark the edges of the land, whispered tones and ancient bones drove the dead from its bounds, and faded wisps and gentle lips called new followers to protect it, for what mortal could resist the dancing lights that led them to the touch of Faerie?

And so, in its newly-claimed land, Euphorion grew. Travelers came, stayed, and would eventually leave, not Fae-touched, but different than they had arrived. They would dream, and they would remember, in shadowed, dim ways, their stay in a land that was not quite real.

For in truth, it was not. For as much as Euphorion laid claim to the land, for as much as it marked the bounds of its claim, it was not truly among the great Fae, nor did it touch the Feywilds. It lacked the strength to call true change to the land, and so it was not Faerie, and merely dream.

But it was a good dream, and a dream that Euphorion savored, until the summer fled, and fall too, and upon it came the Queen of Air and Darkness.

#

Rosalind was quiet as they left The Dragon's Hoard, rejoining the vast swathes of humanity, elf-kind, dwarf-kin, and the myriad shorter folk that walked the world. Al-Shazard was home to one and all, and it was difficult to call their wandering masses anything but a multi-piece shambling horde, pressing against one on all sides. Even with her magic, bolstered by a barrier spell that was projected from her belt, the elf could hardly keep herself upright as she was jostled from left, right, and back. Only the presence of her impromptu party kept her from being swept away by all the others around her, and she kept close for dear life.

Her staff became a tool of utmost necessity, and she planted it firmly with every step to avoid being bowled off her feet. The hundred steps from the inn to the Grand Plaza were a torment, and she pulled in on herself, trying to shut out the noise, the battering people all around her, and the endless hustle and bustle and shuffle and sound. It was nearly impossible, but she just about managed it.

She breathed again as they broke from the torrent of people, and Alarik patted her back.

"Are you alright?"

"I will be."

"You're not much of a people person, are you?"

"...No."

"That's alright. That's my job. You can be brain, and I'll be the lips."

"...Would that not be the tongue?" she asked.

"Only if people are into that sort of thing."

Her cheeks burned, and the tall human smiled, patting her back.

"You just try and relax. Me and Therwyn will do most of the talking, I think." Alarik glanced over his shoulder at the orc, Jazak. "I...think it'd be better if I did most of the chatting, anyway."

She nodded, though she could not have said why she agreed. There was nothing about Jazak that suggested that he was dangerous or stupid, at least, insofar as anything that was worse than the average monk. Not that she had good opinions of most monks, it must be said - bound by dogmatic thoughts, the lot of them, and generally as stiff-minded as they were stiff-bodied - but this one at least had the wildness of an orc to contend with, so there must be some redeeming factor there. He did not feel as dangerous as one might have thought, and certainly not what the average lay-person might have believed.

Yet, there was a feeling there that started her thinking, and as she often did, Rosalind let that thought go where it would, trusting her mind in the way that she would never think to trust the rest of herself.

Alarik and Jazak led them through the plaza, and she and Therwyn followed. The halfling patted her back, guiding her along, and the smaller woman chuckled.

"This is going to be grand, I tell you, grand."

"I would hope that it is quiet, and gentle," she said, shaking her head.

"Ah, but would such things be the things of stories?"

"I'm fine reading them. I don't need to be part of them."

"A pity, but I understand. Not all of us seek danger. It will seek us, though, of that I'm sure." The paladin patted her back again. "But fear not. I'll take care of you."

"That is kindly said..."

"It is kindly meant! Hah!"

"You are...um...forgive me...I had an unkind thought."

Therwyn chuckled. "Let me guess. I'm very loud."

Rosalind nodded, blushing.

"Yeah, I get that a lot. I'm afraid that I learned much from Brian the Blessed, an ancient halfling who could do little more than shout at the top of his lungs unless someone else gave him a different idea. But I will moderate myself."

"That would be...appreciated."

She felt guilty asking for quiet, but at the same time, she knew that she'd need it. There was something hard about being outside the guild; she'd come with Alarik when he mentioned that there was a chance of meeting something completely inhuman - bards had a nose for the supernatural, as all wizards knew - but she had underestimated the raw pressure of being outside of the guild hall. It had been years since she'd done anything but go down to the plaza for a bit of food; this was something completely different.

As they walked, she touched the various pouches and containers along her belt. A component pouch - three of them, in all honesty, divided between sizes - with two larger pouches for her spellbooks, and then a series of small daggers, each one of a different material. There were four little balls of liquid ingredients, and three more pouches on the far side of her belt for curiosities that she wanted. At her back was a scroll-box, stocked with four different scrolls that she still had to completely fill out.

Ink, she reminded herself. She would need to purchase ink before they left the city.

Left the city. That, too, was something that she feared, knowing that there would be so much that she had never seen before, so many people and so many things that she had never been around. Would there be monsters, she wondered? Would there be elementals? Dragons? Would they want to hurt her?

And it did not get better from there, her steps slowing and nearly taking her from the party. Therwyn had to bump her to keep her moving, and then do it again every few steps as she started getting more and more lost in her own head.

Enthusiasm, it turned out, was a great deal harder to maintain when you actually began to think about the consequences of your actions. Hyper-fixation had always been a boon for Rosalind in her studies, but now that it was forced inwards, there were more issues. She started thinking of everything that could go wrong, every mistake that she might make, the difficulties of a halfling that was loud rather than quiet, a bard that was talkative but not flirtatious, a monk that was not bound as firmly by honor as others -

Thump.

And as suddenly as she had fallen into the rabbit hole of her thoughts, she was brought back out of them again by Jazak's hard back as he came to a sudden stop. She blushed, looking around the orc, and realized that they were at the front of a line that cut straight through a crowd. They were standing before a desk, and behind that desk, at the edge of the Plaza, was a black-haired man that -

That -

Her eyes went wide, her mind momentarily overwhelmed. Spells danced left and right around the black-haired stranger, and they were of a nature that she had not encountered before. Not in person, at least, and barely enough in her research to have some chance of realizing what they were. She fumbled for her pouches, touching one spellbook before disregarding it for another. Pulling the leather-bound tome free, she started flipping through the pages even as Alarik began speaking.

"Greetings, sir. I heard tell that you might be looking for some help."

"That is quite correct. Are you offering?"

"I may be. Perhaps you can tempt me."

"I'm sure that one such as you deals with temptations on a daily basis," the stranger said with a small chuckle, shaking his head. "What may I tempt you with, pray-tell?"

"Oh, many things. Information, treasure, magic -"

"All of which may be yours at the end of the task that I have in mind, but how can I tempt you now?"

Even though she wasn't the one being addressed, Rosalind's finger stopped where it was on the page. There was something about the way that question was asked that sent a shiver down her spine, almost as if the question had been asked of her rather than of Alarik. She looked up without thinking, and found herself staring the stranger right in the eyes.

He stared back, though not so long as to call it a 'stare', but there was such depth, such knowledge as she had only ever seen in the greatest elders of the elves, and it took her breath away.

Then he looked away, and she had to remind herself to breathe. The only reason she didn't feel completely ashamed afterward was the fact that she was all but sure that her companions had suffered the same fate. Certainly, Alarik had to pause before continuing.

"Are you asking us to name our price? Careful, sir, that you don't bankrupt yourself."

"I would not hesitate to fulfill any request that you had. Trust me, I will not fail to reward you in whatever way that you find acceptable."

There was so much back and forth, and it was setting off a church's worth of alarm bells in her head. Rosalind knew that she'd heard of something like this before, this way of bargaining without actually negotiating, by skirting around and leaving all the terms vague. There was something to it akin to Thieves Cant, in the way that it referenced a thing while talking about something else entirely, but this was something older, more of a primal feeling that she couldn't quite place.

[i]Where is it?[/i] she thought, flipping through her book. [i]It's in here...I know it's in here...[/i]

"Perhaps we should go away to talk?" Alarik suggested. "Would you have a place to stay somewhere around here?"

"I would, if you are genuinely interested."

"We would say that we are semi-genuinely interested, insofar as you are semi-genuinely forthcoming."

"A fair enough statement, indeed. Come, come, let us go somewhere more private."

And then they were on the move, and Rosalind, poor, nervous Rosalind, was forced to put the book away to keep up with the rest of her group.

#

The stranger led them to a two story house that, while larger than the average home of a villager or even a well-to-do townsman, was hardly the sort of domicile that one would expect of someone offering them such riches to accomplish a mission. It stood solely on wooden timbers, lacking stone or metal supports, but unlike many, seemed to carry a theme of a garden from the front of the house throughout the inner walls. Creepers and vines wound through the walls, drifting towards the ceiling, and there was not a room in the house that was not decorated with flowers that hung down from the vines above.

"Are you a druid, perchance?" Alarik asked.

"Hardly, but I have connections," the stranger said, leading them past the entry hall and into a gathering room just off from the main corridor. "Come. Sit."

They did as they were requested, though Jazak was the least comfortable of them. The orc sat stiff and tall, both feet on the floor and his back as straight as if someone had rammed an iron rod down it. Therwyn and Alarik were more relaxed, the pair of them sitting down and crossing one leg over their knees almost in tandem, taking the offered trays of tea as invisible hands floated them over.

Jazak didn't drink, and neither did she. Rosalind looked about her, still feeling that presence of magic all around, and still trying to puzzle out just what it was.

It was not druid magic, though she could see the connections. There were elements of life running through all the different pieces of the house, from the walls to the creepers, from the flowers - glowing bright in her eyes as if they were living sources of magic - to the chairs themselves. Though they were formed of cut wood, they still had a shimmering essence of half-living magic through them, something that made her feel almost guilty to sit on them.

She shifted from side to side as the stranger remained standing. He looked between them, his eyes settling on her for what felt like slightly longer than the rest - those eyes, those horrifying, enchanting eyes - before moving on.

"Perhaps we shall begin with introductions. Shall I start?" he asked.

"Please," Jazak said, the first thing that he had said since they'd left the inn.

"I thank you for the privilege. You, sir," he said, turning to Alarik. "I shall call you 'Shorter.'"

"Um, that's not -"

"And you." The stranger turned to Therwyn. "You, I call 'Taller.'"

"Heh, giving nicknames, are we? What's yours?"

He ignored her, turning to Jazak. The orc gritted his teeth, his tusks showing slightly more.

"You? I believe I will call you 'Drinker.'"

"You -"

"And you."

He turned to Rosalind, then, and the elf felt glued to her chair. He opened his mouth, and she shook her head in the most minute fashion. Something was wrong. Something was coming from him that felt almost like fate speaking, something greater and more powerful than mere words, and she did not know if she could take hearing it.

"I call you 'Changer'."

The word was so innocuous, but it was nevertheless powerful, as if some mantle had been laid over her shoulders that she could no longer remove. Rosalind barely bit back the urge to reach for her neck, feeling for something, some collar that she was sure would be there. For a moment, she couldn't even breathe.

Then the moment passed, and Jazak was on his feet.

"What the [i]hell[/i] are you doing? What do you think you're going to -"

"I am merely giving you names," the human said, smiling slightly as he looked around, facing the taller orc without the slightest hint of fear in his eyes.

[i]Why would he be afraid?[/i] Rosalind thought. [i]He's named us...he's MADE us...[/i]

Neither of those was right, she realized. Her thoughts were still running a mile a minute, but she knew that much was true. He had done [i]something[/i], and that something had done something to them. She opened her mouth, wanting to warn the others...

But she could not. The moment was gone, and Alarik was on his feet, too, doing what he could to calm the orc. The monk slowly took his seat again as their potential employer turned to bring them all into sight again.

"I apologize if it's uncomfortable for you. It's a tradition for me. I name those I work with; it helps me remember them better. It means that they [i]mean[/i] something to me."

"And what should we call you?" Alarik asked. "Surely, a master of names has kept one for himself."

"Many, as a matter of fact, but you may simply call me 'Lord', for now."

"Just lord?"

"Lord. I can hear the shift in letters," 'Lord' said, smiling slightly. "Now, let us speak of your assignment, shall we?"

"That is what we're here for," Therwyn said, nodding with a broad smile on her face. "And let me hear what you've got to say, 'Lord.' No idea why you think I should be Taller, but I'll take it."

"Many halflings would not," Jazak growled.

"Then it's good that I'm better than most of them."

"Better, and more protective," Lord said.

"...Yes...How -"

"Another time," the human said. "But first, enjoy your tea. You will be leaving very shortly, and you might as well have something to restore you before you leave."

She didn't know what to think, but she felt that the suggestion was the only thing that made sense. And she needed something to steady her nerves. She tilted the cup back, and for a few minutes, at least, she was lost in the soft pleasure of warm herbs and soft fruity notes. The scents of the flowers all around the room helped, as well, and she did her best to focus on that rather than the new name that she had been given.

Changer.

She shivered. It was in keeping with magic, perhaps, but that didn't mean that it felt right to her. She would fight that, push back against it, until she made it clear that she would only be known...known...

[i]That would mean talking...arguing...can you even do that?[/i]

Not easily.

Not really.

No.

Rosalind sighed, just sipping her tea until her cup was empty. She made it last, and was the final member of the group to finish hers. The rest of them waited on her, and even then, she tried to pretend that there was some stubborn drop in the bottom of her teacup to keep from getting up.

Eventually, even that failed, and they were all gathered up and taken to another room. This one contained a map table, common enough in the guild halls, but not something that she had expected to see in a smaller house. Moreover, this was different, embedded with glowing jewels around the outside rim of the table and shimmering when she took a closer look at it. The lines on the map, the little forests that stood out from where they were attached to the table's surface, and even the roads seemed more alive, and yet, at the same time, faded, almost like a shadow of their real selves.

"What is this?" Therwyn asked. "This is...strange."

"It is a gift from a friend of mine," Lord said, smiling. "A little map that I helped him make, and he asked me to keep for the sake of our friendship."

Rosalind heard something quite different in that statement. This was not a gift, per se, but rather an exchange of gifts. Something that had been offered and received, something that -

It was complicated, too complicated, just like the way that he had talked with Alarik in the square. Lord was a creature of roundabouts, and just as Alarik had said, he was not human. His eyes had been proof enough, and his way of speaking only reinforced that to her.

He moved to the far side of the table from them, trailing his finger along the southern road out of Al-Shazar. He traced a line along the road for a time - flicking his finger back and forth between the different figures that seemed to creep like ants upon it - and then swerved it off to the side, right into an old ruin half a mile from the road.

"Here. This is where you will need to go," he said.

"What are we looking for?" Therwyn asked.

"Hey, hey, I thought that [i]I[/i] was supposed to be the one speaking?" Alarik asked, smiling.

"Heh, sorry. Just excited."

"Oh, I agree, but...as she asked, Lord?"

"You are seeking something that I need. This, here."

Lord reached into his jacket, pulling out a piece of parchment and passing it over. Alarik unfolded it, and Rosalind joined the rest of the party in looking at it. It depicted some sort of iron staff, something that was painfully constructed to be as rounded and smoothed along the shaft as possible, with runes on either end that curled too much to be demonic, and flowed too readily to be angelic.

"That looks like...Faerie script," Rosalind whispered.

"Does it? That would explain why I can't read it," Alarik said, shaking his head. "Is that what we're looking at, Lord?"

"A good eye, Changer." Lord nodded. "That's correct. The script on either side is in Faerie lettering, though it was not written by any of the Feywild. The fact that it is iron, and cold iron, at that, is a dead giveaway. I need you to fetch that for me and bring it here."

"Here, as in - the house?" Alarik asked.

"No. Here."

Lord tapped the map again, tracing a line from the ruins off to the east, cutting through wilderness and several abandoned stretches of land before eventually reaching a glen that had a faded name. 'Orion's Glen', it was called, and it was perhaps a mile in from the forest edge. There were no clear signs on the map as to how there would be a clearing of that size so deep in the forest, but a clearing there was.

"I will meet you there once I have word that you've retrieved it."

"And what do you want of this...thing?" Jazak asked.

"Jazak...come on...let me do my job," Alarik said.

"..."

"But what he said, yes, please."

"If you manage to get the staff, then I'll tell you. Until you retrieve it, I'm afraid that telling you more would make things far more dangerous for you." Lord shook his head. "The ruins are currently haunted by a number of dangerous beings, some spirits, some otherwise. I would imagine it would be easier for you if you could avoid fighting, so I will send you off with a couple of enchantments. Of course, I leave it to you and yours to decide what the best strategy will be for your needs, but I would like to see you succeed."

Jazak growled deep in his throat, and Rosalind briefly wondered why. There were secrets - that was something that she had puzzled out long since, just from watching her recruiter and the monk - but she did not understand why he would be here if he so clearly didn't want to be. She cocked her head to the side, wondering just what she had been dragged into.

"We'll accept anything that you're willing to offer, Lord," Alarik said with a smile. "Now, if you'll permit me one final question?"

"Of course."

"Is there any chance that you can tell me exactly what we're retrieving?"

"Hmmm..."

There was a moment of consideration, but before Lord could answer, something clicked for Rosalind. She looked at the drawing on the parchment, and her eyes went wide.

"Of course! It's the Stave of the Two Courts!"

"The - what?" Alarik blinked, then went wide-eyed himself. "Oh, gods! How could I miss that?!"

"Someone care to enlighten the rest of the class?" Therwyn asked.

"The Stave, um," Rosalind stopped, tapping the air with one finger as she lined up her information. "Yes, yes, I remember. The Stave of the Two Courts was a tool that was used long ago to banish members of the Seelie and Unseelie Courts. There was a great war between the two that was spilling from the Feywilds to our world, and they were using paths of shadow and forest to reach behind each other's battle lines in the other world. They kept coming here, bringing chaos in their wake."

"So, knowing the weaknesses of the Fey (and ignoring my purpose as historian and talker here)," Alarik said, cutting in part way through, "mages and clerics worked together to fashion a staff of cold iron, one that was marked with runes of banishment and power against both Courts. Striking a member of the Court of Summer with the end marked with the Court of Winter would be sufficient to send even Queen Titania back to her realm, and the opposite would do the same to any of the Court of Winter."

"Correct," Lord said. "I'm surprised to have found a group so well-informed."

"I, um...I read a lot," Rosalind muttered, looking down and crossing her arms over her front.

"And I talk a lot," Alarik admitted with a shrug.

"Clearly." Lord shook his head. "But that is correct. You are seeing the Stave of the Two Courts. Once you retrieve it, have one of your number send me a message. I will leave you with a Message scroll as well, so you can get in touch quickly. This is important; several others have failed before you -"

She realized that Jazak was about to say something, but Alarik had stopped him. Rather directly for once, reaching down and grabbing the orc by the balls through his tunic. She blushed, wondering what was going on, but knew better than to ask. Not in front of Lord.

"- but they did not listen to me. I told them what they would face, and they went off with nothing that would allow them even a fighting chance. I hope that you will at least listen and take to heart my warnings."

"We have, Lord. Thank you."

"Then...you will take this task?"

"We shall!" Alarik smiled. "It is a chance to be part of history, isn't it?"

"Splendid. I shall get your things."

#

An hour later, they returned to The Dragon's Hoard, each of them taking a different room. Since Lord was footing the bill, none of them felt like sharing a room with someone else. Rosalind did notice that Jazak and Alarik went to one of their rooms together, but she imagined that it was to talk, not to do anything else. They didn't seem to have that sort of lifestyle, or arrangement.

Therwyn, however, remained in the common room, and Rosalind rather wished that the halfling would go to bed. She would like to have some time to unscramble her thoughts, considering that they were as tangled up as one could imagine.

As Therwyn talked about the teachings of her god - someone that Rosalind couldn't care less about - she was trying to unravel the feeling of magic that had surrounded Lord. She knew that she'd read about it somewhere before, that it was somehow tied to the natural style of his house. Not druidic, but something else.

[i]Not elemental, no...[/i]

She flipped the pages of her spellbook, going through all the different magics that she had written out for herself. Most of them were not spells that she was capable of just yet, but she had always been fond of keeping reference materials on-hand, and there was every reason for that these days. One could not lug a library around behind them, unless they possessed a portable hole, and even then, the organization was a nightmare. It was best to have things shorthanded as much as possible, written in the way to trigger memories, and even if they weren't immediately useful, they could at least point out where one would have to look for more information.

But try as she might, there was nothing that seemed to fit with what she'd seen. The spells had flitted about Lord's body, always moving, always shifting, yet still staying true to themselves. They seemed to have some arcane touch, similar to a sorcerer's bloodline, but there was less distance than that. However, it was [i]innate[/i], so that meant that it did not come from a deal, nor from some pact, nor from worship. Whatever power fluttered about Lord was his own, but it was not something that matched the common types that were taught in the guild.

So...what was it?

Rosalind closed her book and put it away, but before she could drag out another, Therwyn let out a long, slow sigh. She looked up.

"Is something the matter?"

"Am I boring you?" the halfling asked.

"What?"

"You've kept your nose in a book since we've gotten back. Have you heard a word I said?"

"...I believe you might have been talking about your god."

"That was twenty minutes ago."

"...Um, then I believe about holy things we might see on the trip?" Rosalind asked, smiling hopefully.

"Forty minutes ago."

"...Sorry. I'm just...I'm confused about something, and I'm trying to find some kind of answer right now," she said, shaking her head as she looked down at her books again. "There's something not quite right about Lord, and it feels like if I can't figure it out, we're not going to like what happens."

"You're worrying too much."

[i]Says the woman that has a church to go back to, and a god that's looking out for her. I'm on my own. I've never done this. I don't know how this works.[/i]

No, no. That was bitterness and fear, companions that Rosalind had had often enough that she knew them when they were trying to creep in again. Like bullies that she had endured for years, they stood at her shoulders like whispering demons, and she shivered as she shook her head. Their voices were not gone, but naming them made them less loud, at the very least.

Therwyn was smiling. She didn't understand. The halfling offered her a hand.

"Hey. How about you come upstairs, and we'll talk about ways to get your mind off things?"

"I'm...I..."

"What?"

"I'm not into..."

"What, you thought I was looking for a way to get into your panties?"

"...You're not?"

"Heh, magic-girl, I'm a paladin. Oath of Celibacy, remember?"

"...Oh. I...I didn't -"

"Heh, come on. We can talk about other things than [i]that[/i]. What have you been reading? Bad erotica?"

[i]Apparently.[/i]

But she let herself be taken by the hand and led away. There were things that could be talked about, and maybe, once she had her head clear again, she could deal with the possibilities that were laid out in front of her. Right now, she was too scrambled to do it right.

Hopefully, she’d be less scrambled in the morning.

[b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]

Summary: Rosalind takes POV in this chapter, and they head to talk to this strange man, and find out what he wants.

Tags: No Sex, Magic, Eerie, D&D, Naming, Human, Elf, Orc, Halfling, Series, Fantasy,