User:Hithrael/Tales

Tales from the Windswept Peaks

These tales are from the Windwalker sect of the Nomads of the Arid Steppe, and will attempt to give a perspective on things from their view.

~Kraggur

Undead Walking

Precariously perched on a ledge in the mountains bordering the Arid Steppe to the west crouches a nomad. The hides worn are decorated with a multitude of bird feathers, flapping wildly in the winds that roar along the mountainside.

With a fading blue flash, a second figure appears next to the nomad, also clad in feather-decorated hides. The winds whisper and bring the smell of decay upon them. Such as has not been scented since the false Kir strode the Steppes.

The first nomad turns his head slightly towards the newcomer, apparently unperturbed by his arrival.

"It is as the winds have long whispered, since the foreigners first stepped past our lands. Much good and much evil came from their arrival, though they left tasks unfinished. But it is as the Winds of Fate dictate. We can do no more and no less. Time still flows though increasingly short."

Turning to face the wind, the first nomad’s mouth moves for a moment before he disappears in a blue flash similar to the second nomad’s arrival.

Turning Years

A nomad clad in a bronze scaled outfit designed as a wyvern dances slowly upon a mountaintop. Around him, precariously balanced, other nomads play a haunting tune on bone flutes.

The wind rises and falls, at times overpowering the flutes, but they only serve to play off each other in harmony.

Slowly the nomad's voice is heard chanting louder and louder in the tongue of the Windwalkers.

"Seasons come and change, let the Wyvern die it is its time. Scales come to rest and the panther rises to hunt."

The wyvern-nomad then sits down, and is revealed holding a drum as he lets then outfit fall from his shoulders. A rapid rhythm arises from the drum, and the flute players disappear in flashes of red and black only to be replaced by other drummers in similar flashes of light.

A crescendo builds then comes to a thunderous silence.

As a female nomad appears, in a flash of black light, clad as a golden panther, the drummers bow then vanish.

She slinks toward a small altar scattered with runes. Pulling a knife from within the skins, she cuts across her palm and lets her blood fall before the altar before swiftly binding the cut with a clean strip of cloth. Taking the runes in her other hand, she then kneels, her face turned to the sky, observing the stars in their patterns.

Minutes pass by before the wind seems to whisper, now! and she casts the runes.

Studying them for a moment, she then stands and returns to the center of the mountaintop. Slowly, the figures reappear: first the wyvern-nomad, then the flutists, and lastly the drummers. They all kneel before the panther-nomad.

"The omens for the year are as dark as the tainted winds that reach us. Yet, the golden panther shall hunt, and not be the hunted."

Y'Shai

For comments see here.

In two brief flashes of a black void, two nomads appear on a ledge overlooking the Trabe Plateau, which lies to the distant east. A harsh wind swirls snow around them, and settles in the elegant beard of the older nomad.

The older nomad says, "One of the soulless guardians has appeared on the Plateau. The winds have said such to me. They whisper that it is related to the stench of darkness that comes from the lands where the sun sets."

"Our mountains will likely protect us. What of the unliving cares for our mountains? Yet several of us have walked the winds to Forfedhdar to help them face this threat. Too well do we remember the days of darkness and the false Kir."

The younger nomad figets and looks nervous.

"What if they do come up here? What will we do then?"

"Do what we have always done - survive."

Healing

Bitter winds swirl across the mountain range, yet for now the snows have stopped. The screams of a few wounded come from the yurts carefully arranged on a broad shelf. A bearded nomad stands slightly to the side, looking down at the encampment.

A wise woman steps from the closest yurt, her leathers covered in blood up to the elbows, as well as down the front of an apron overflowing with bandages and herbs. The bearded nomad walks towards the wise woman.

"It is good we did not march to the lowlands, or that the walking dead did not come farther north. But it is also good that we send aid to the dwarves, for they have upheld their deals with us."

A series of flashes occur as a handful of nomads appear, some carrying others, about half of them wounded. They move into the tents. Shaking her head sadly, the wise woman replies over her shoulder as she turns to heads back toward the yurt.

“Death stalks us still though. None of the young have died yet, but the injuries keep coming. You know we are too few to survive if many die. Would you have the line die out completely to uphold our agreements?”

Touching a heavy onyx amulet that rests around his neck, bearing the sigils of the wolf, nightingale, and raven, the bearded nomad nods once without hesitation.

“Yes. Without honor and memory we are as nothing. Would you have us become as the Bonedancers?”

Quick as a striking snake, the wise woman spins and slaps the bearded nomad across the face.

“Never mention that tribe again. They are as nothing. They listen not to the wind, only the dead silence in their hearts.”

Scout

Clinging to the side of the Hag’s Crag, a young nomad ascends the face of the mount, snow and wind threatening to dislodge her. A courier's case is bound tightly at her waist.

Above the battlements of the Raven’s Gate a figure wearing hides crafted from firecat pelts fires arrows into a mass of shambling creatures darkening the park east of the city.

Leathers torn almost to shreds, another nomad fights, then dies under a royal blue flag flying a black tower under a golden seven-pointed star.

Carrying a thick pack stuffed with cotton, an older nomad wanders the back roads before crossing a bridge to the south of a tall crystal tower. He carefully unloads the pack, gently stacking vials of naphtha in a crate that was nearly depleted.

Far from all these scenes, a withered crone steps back from a basin filled with water which gradually clouds over. She shakes her head sadly, yet a grim smile rides upon her face.

The Pillar

The wind howls and screams outside of a hollow cave in the mountainside. Around a fire sit several nomads while a few guard dogs bask sleeping in the comforting heat. Snow drifts are piled on either side of the trail running past the cave mouth except where the winds have blown it clear.

As one, the nomads start a drifting chant which focuses the mind then lets it float free. In the back of the cave a young nomad stiffens, her face exhibiting an image of sheer horror before it relaxes to a state of resigned unhappiness. Slowly she speaks of what she sees:

“There is torment as freedom is bound in our image and name… a fragment of the heavens locking in an ancestor’s soul in name. He screams for he has become bound, yet by binding him, he in turn binds the heavens. The shard has shifted and is now part of us.”

Beacon

An ancient crone stops suddenly in midstride before falling to the ground clutching her head. Hurriedly, the other nearby nomads run and delicately lift her, bearing her to her tent. She lays there whimpering as healers are swiftly summoned. Days pass and none of the normal remedies work. Finally, seeing no other recourse, the nomads seek aid from the seers.

The seers quickly take her to the highest peak near where this section of the mountains where the tribe is camped. There she is laid upon the finest wolf furs at hand, while they weave their magic upon her. One stands aloof, his face held to the wind, seeking the omens carried upon the howling winds.

Suddenly a hand shoots forward from within his robe, deeply scarred and worn from the years. The actions around the crone stop immediately.

“She sensed the beacon shining from far in the east. I too sense it as a challenge to rival the very heavens. It is laden with the prayers of all the gods, and has no place within the cosmos as we understand it. The shrieks of countless souls fill the crone’s second sight, blinding her to our world.”

He quickly incants a spell, and suddenly the crone’s body relaxes. He motions for the nomads to carry her back to her tent.

“That should allow her to regain control over her second sight.”

Raising the hood of his robe, he then sits, back to the group and loses himself in meditation.

Soul

Icy winter winds still blast the mountain peaks as a nomad struggles to ascend a mountain. Below her, along the steep-sided valley, lie the tents of her people, and even farther below are the herds of her tribe.

Struggling, she slips and falls for several yards before precariously catching herself and resuming the climb. Gradually, she reaches the peak, her hair covered with dirt and sweat, blood flowing freely from cuts and scratches.

The tassels on her leathers are whipped to knots as she turns her head to the heavens and shrieks a clarion call as piercing as a hawk’s cry. From the other side of the peak, appearing from thin air, a stout figure wrapped in a fine robe steps next to her, the glint of chainmail appearing from under the collar. Reaching into a sack, the figure draws a finely crafted metal knife which she takes.

Grabbing the nape of her hair, she sharply draws the knife, cutting loose her braid of hair. Loose blond strands snap free in the wind, and her shorter hair now whips around her face. Swiftly she bends and ties the cut braid to a pole set at the summit. Along side that she lays a bracelet woven from mountain flowers. With fierce pride she cries out again before sitting down and closing her eyes, and bearing her left shoulder.

The figure shrugs its shoulders in a wry manner, indicating that it is pleased before crouching next to her. Swiftly implements appear on the ground next to her, and the figure begins its work. Blood soaks into the folder leather at her shoulder as the figure works, gnarled fingers and hands steady despite the shifting winds.

At length the task is done, and the figure collects its tools and then disappears in a flow of black shadows. The woman stirs, and then draws her leathers up again, before slowly descending the mountain. Yet the tattoo becomes briefly visible, a golden eagle with its wings stretching down her arm and up her neck, with the pinion feathers just brushing her left eye socket.