RP for the Soul

Lost in the recent fall of Tazoon, I shall ressurect this post with the remnants from my guild's own forums.

The short version of the story of Zermanas' coming to Istaria

I came from a land beyond Istaria. I was to be king after my father in a few more centuries, as the humans of my fatherland are long lived. I came here by way that other gifted are brought to the education centers, only I did not die to be brought. It was during the most arduous Coming of Age, at my centenial... This is only performed on the heir to the throne and the stress on your spirit is great. Somehow, the ritual from Istaria interferes with this process, and it pulled me away from my most peaceful homeland.

We had long ago lived in Istaria after Istara placed humans on this fair continent, but at the end of the Age of the Gods, Istara, as a gift to the faithful, Paladins of Istara as well as the Knights of her order, gave us a new land before leaving from the Prime. Perhaps she foresaw some of the sadness to come or maybe it was some part of her plans to dominate the races of her fellow gods by building us up in private and then sending us forth. Regardless, we cannot now come back, except through these strange means during my ceremony.

We were told not to go back untill Istara gave us a sign... Maybe this is the sign; a sign that our peoples shall be reunited in order to fight back your enemies from the Plane of Blight. I now wish to somehow send a message back to my homeland. I know that with their aid, we could push the WA back even faster than we now are.

But for now, there is no way, so I shall do everything I can to help Istaria as an ordinary citizen.

(On a Side note, I almost get the feeling Zermanas' is Psychic.... read closely and this ancient story predicts the fall of Spirit as much as it was unintended, being written long before such catastrophe was on the horizon... I find great mirrors in Zermanas' predicament and the fate of Spirit and those within it)

Anyways, please, do tell your stories

Tigris Euphrates Biography:

I was born to a poor family of Saris in a small saris town that was ground under the heel of the Aegis just before the Battle of Tazoon, which is located in the mountains on the north end of the area we today refer to as the Eastern Fortress. Back then there were two schools of philosophical and religious thought among the Saris - Puritans and Evangelicals. The Puritan Saris believed in purifying and strengthening the Saris. They were a very very old school of thought from before the Age of Lamentations, which drowned sickly small cubs at birth, and preached that they could communicate telepathically if a person had enough focus and self-discipline. The other believed that was wrong under eyes of Marrith to drown cubs and that the telepathy was hogwash.

Well my father was a Puritan and my mother was an Evangelical. They always seems to find common ground to work from no matter the issue. I was the runt of the second litter, so basically the bottom of the proverbial totem pole. Dad wanted to drown me, mom wanted to keep me. In the end, mom won out, here I am, but - as a compromise - I wasn't raised with any combat training at all to fight the Aegis - I was to help mother make clothes for the family. I was taught to be a tailor from when I was little. Dad didn't want me to help the fight against the Aegis - I was the shortest, smallest, weakest of the family. I had seventeen brothers and sisters that were stronger and taller - they were learning to help push back the threat from the east just as my mother (an elemental archer) and my father (a monk) did.

The Aegis were making their big march to hold the narrow neck of land between the smaller part of the continent - our current Istaria - and the larger eastern lands, and march on Tazoon to deal a crushing blow to the living races once and for all. Only Dalimond stood between Tazoon and Kion itself, so we defended our little town as long as possible. I hid in the house as the fighting in the streets began. I heard my brother and sister's voices as they were all slaughtered by the undead forces, and his in a barrel. I know Torrain Macalir was there, because he began reanimating the corpses of the Saris there - friends, associates, and my family - into undeath. I clearly remember my mother - or rather her body and soul reanimated and tortured into undead service - smelling me out in my barrel. Torrain and the Blight Lords got great pleasure from forcing my mother's reanimated corpse to shoot me between the eyes.

However, I assume my corpse vanished when she did so, because I reawoke in the ritual circle, having been Gifted. Why me and not any of the rest of my family I don't know - but the Rite of Life Everlasting worked on me at least. Perhaps because I was furthest from the Aegis soul-gathering machines at the time of the attack. I was forced to survive on the streets of Kion, having only what the priests in the Temple of the Gifted had to give me - clothes and a some training tools - and my very first bow - a training bow. I remembered my mother, and looking up at my mother's bow hanging over the hearth with curiosity and being told not to touch it. I needed to defend myself, so I was forced to ask the scout trainer in Kion to show me how to use it. If your young, copperless, and homeless in Kion, it's a nasty city. There are red-light areas and back corners with dark streets and dirty refugees. I wasn't able to to survive against the ******** gangs and street thugs that inhabit the dark corners of my people's home city, forcing me to go to New Vassarack - a place for young gifted to learn and grow, to live.

Twenty years passed of living in tent in New Vassarack. I deliberately avoided the big twenty-year anniversary of the victory at Tazoon - bitter memories mostly. I heard of the Satyr caves that the living were struggling to rebuild. As a tenderpawed ranger I helped run materials to the machines they were building to cleanse Feladan - desperately searching for anything to further the cause of pushing back the Aegis that destroyed my family. That was when I met the leader of the Feladan reconstruction project, a dark furred Saris named Menkure Salitis.

He was rather upset when I met him, having had an awful time with his family, given he was already adept Disciple of the Flame at his young age whose father had just been sent to a Kion prison. We talked about our problems for a while on the Dalimond docks, got to know eachother very well, and became very good friends. Didn't seen him again for a while until I became caught in an arguement between the mines project and the machines project, in which case he stepped in. He likes to negotiate and be a dimplomat. We hunted a bit, and he showed me his love for the Flame and I even studied monk with him - allowing me to move back to Kion. Having gotten to know the Sslik very well in New Vassarack, I got to know Essiel the Storm Disciple, and trained with him. Menkure and I studied the discipleships while fighting the Aegis together, honing our disciplines until we had mastered them.

I suppose one of these days Menkure and I should get married in Kion, but we've been so busy dealing with the Aegis and all. After all we have cubs now; Shiye, Jazeera, and Jamuna. My mother would have been proud... or at least after berating me for learning to fight. But I think I would impress her with all the studying I've done in my combat and craft schools. Sadly the only way that will happen is if my mother and family's soul are finally put to rest.

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...And Tigris's Story... how she came to be... what defines her...
As posted in the RP for the Soul thread.
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They always said that the towns of the east were only populated by the bravest of the remaining settlers - and they were towns at arms - towns filled with those of tough fighting stock ready to meet the Aegis the moment they arrived on their doorstep. Here, in the Saris settlement of Avvon Ra, Tigris was born and raised. The runt of the third litter, she had a sister and two brother littermates to share her mother with at all times. As the smallest and weakest, according to Saris tradition, she would have been drowned at birth to promote the health and vitality of the bloodline, and control the population. But in these times of war with the Aegis, population control was no longer an issue, and all the Saris born were needed - and so Tigris was lucky to live. The movement that had supported that had been dying off slowly since the start of the Age of Lamentations, and the fission it had caused in Saris society had been reforged by the coming of the Aegis.

"Killing a cub may be common practice in your family." Her mother, Ganges, had told her mate on the subject while grooming the smallest newborn. "I feel the strength of life in her. She is not stillborn. In my family life was always most important - as it is in the eyes of Marrith. I will keep her. I will not have any of my children killed by their own blood - ever." She said firmly.

The father nodded drawing back his monk's hood to kiss and groom his mate's brow. "As you wish it, my love. You speak for the Goddess in this house." Ganges would reply.

So Tigris grew up - not trained to fight - but trained to gather, tailor, and keep house for her family and siblings. All her brothers and sisters were taught to fight. Her brothers were taught the ways of the monks - honor and fighting without weapons, strength and agility. Her sisters were taught the way of the bow - dexterity and accuracy. One to always support the other- for that was the way of the Saris - it was how the Saris had always made war. Meanwhile, the runt and youngest stayed in the house to weave, or gathered in the forest. She helped her mother in every whit. Occasionally Ganges would catch her youngest touching her mother's fine maple longbow with curiosity and longing, and was shooed away.

"No Tigris - the way of war is not for you. You haven't the strength of your siblings. But you have the making of a great tailor." The young cub would follow her mother and obey - never questioning. But it would happen again and again. "I've already decided, Tigris - you won't change my mind. I brought you into this world, I chose for you to continue this family. Someone must. We are the last Euphrates since the defeat of Feladan."

Tigris was five when the Aegis reached their village, and the Saris protected their village with high sandstone walls and dedicated defenders. The Aegis ignored them, choosing instead of cracking the nut - to surround and cut the off - continuing their march to Tazoon. The Saris were resourceful in these hard times - using water from wells, and hunting in large parties for food and supplies. Then world came of the Aegis's defeat at Tazoon, and the Saris were overjoyed! At last - the Aegis's march to the west sea is halted! Tazoon stands supreme! With renewed courage they kept their town alive for a decade.

She was fifteen when the Blight Lords began to rally again. But the Saris were confident - for twenty years the Gifted Ones rallied to the ranks of the living, bolstering their ranks with near immortality. They even built a shrine to Marrith in their town through which the Gifted could tether their souls. But so deep in the frontier they were still cut off. The Aegis surrounded them night and day, though not as numerous as before...

And then the end came. Great wraith lords and other abominations marched - moving to fortify the narrow strip of land against the living - and to turn their annoying Saris town into a citadel of blight and undeath. All at once the battles began again, and each day Tigris helped her siblings build the funeral pyre for a fallen brother or sister. Inside a few weeks the standoff ended with Blight Wraith Lords laying waste to the still living Saris, breaking the souls of the fallen and twisting them to do the will of the Aegis - reanimating them into powerful reanimated Saris monks and archers - the ultimate abomination of the Life that the Saris held so dear.

Terrified, Ganges collected her youngest and hid her in a barrel deep in the basement of their manner house, and stood with bow held high to defend her. Though the battle lasted hours, the youngest daughter watched with horror through the cracks in the barrel as her mother was slain, reanimated, soul tortured, twisted, and made to fight for the Aegis. She could see her family - those that had survived to that last day - now reanimated monks and archers for the Aegis, surrounding her, tearing the barrel apart, surrounding her.

"Mommy...?" she pleaded for her life, sobbing. "Help me, mommy? Please?"

Perhaps what was left of Ganges hoped that her soul would escape - or perhaps her soul was fully twisted to the Aegis's will and meant to turn Tigris also. Ganges turned and killed Tigris with a single arrow - right between her eyes. The Blight Wraith Lords surrounded her corpse as the young girl's soul felt the urge to go towards the bright light of eternal peace. Dark hands and tentacles reached to take her soul away and break it...

The image - the memory of her mother - fur haggard and bloodied - eyes red and bloodshot with the taint of the undead, raising the bow and shooting her with it was forever burned in her memory. It would haunt her dream for years, as she began the life of a Gifted - now the last of her family line.


Sherry's Story:

...............................................?Pr o Log?..........................................

The flickering of the lighted wallscones lights my way as I walk down the hall. Towards my room at the cleric training center. Stepping in, I closed my door with a shakeing hand. Knowing it is time to preserve my past and how I knew I was a Gifted One, for the Loving Goddess Istara. Sitting at the huge oak desk I pick up the quill and begin.

The lightning and thunder had subsided moveing off into the far distance, as the moon came out to hang like a bloody red ball over the silent battle field. Only the shadows seemed to move. The men and women on the ground would never move again. The survivors did not dare the field in the dark. It would be morning before they would dare to trod the blood soaked ground to find their lost ones. For fear of drawing the Avatar of Pain's attention.
But on the edge of the field there was a sudden tiny movement, and it was no shadow. Something small was creeping to the muddy blood soaked hem of the battle field. Something knelt there, face shineing with grief. A child, a girl, the only daughter of Jaylen and Kaylah. They were no one special. But to the tiny girl they were everything.
The girl looked out across the dark field and like the others, did not dare place foot on the bloody ground. Then the wind picked up, tilting her head to the side as if hearing a far away voice. She looks up at the moon as a smile crosses her young face. At the same moment the blood color drains away from the moon. Leaving it pure and full. Takeing a deep breath, standing tall and proud as the others cry out trying to stop her. Crys of "No place for a child!" filling the night air. As she steps out onto the bloody field and another step. One person makes a grab for the child, but finds there hands smacked away.They looked around then gasp as their eyes take in the group of clerics gathered around. Shakeing there heads then saying "Let the child be" everyone bowed as they stepped back watching and waiting as the child walked on.
Her eyes locked on her mother and father, not seeing them in their death, not seeing the way their faces were constricted in pain, she saw them as her mother and father. The ones who sang her to sleep, the ones who she loves.
Sitting between them takeing their cold hands into hers, holding them close to her cheeks as her tears flow across them, takes in another deep breath drawing in calmness, looking down at them both eyes shineing, then saying softly "I will do for you mother and father as you two did for me".
Looking up at the moon she prayed to the goddess Istara for the strength to accomplish what she had just promised. As her sweet childs voice filled the night air with songs of life, not death, and of bees in the hive, birds on the summer wind. She sang of foxes denning and bears shrugging off winter. She sang of fish in the sparkling waters, and the first green uncurlings of fern in the spring. Never once did her song mention dieing, blood, or wounds, or the awful stench of death. Her mother and father already knew this well and did not need to be recalled to it.
When the song was finished it was as if both her mother and fathers corpse's gave a great sigh, one last breath as in release. The child stands slowly turning as the moon bathes her in the silvery light, faceing the clerics that are waiting on her. Raiseing her head to the moon whispering softly where only she and the goddess Istara can hear 'Thank you my loving Istara, I'm forever your faithfull servant", as she walks off the field to her new destiny as a Gifted One.

Laying quill down standing at the window looking at the moon thinking I was only Seven.
As a sudden knock on the door draws my attention from my thoughts, I hear the head cleric giveing me my next task, to hunt the one called Dark Stalker.

....................................ô Part II ô.................................


Sighing softly as I return to the Clerics Guild Hall removeing
my cloak placeing it on the cloak stand. Shakeing my head in
true wonderment at how many times Darkstalker could return
from the dead. As the thought runs through my mind it must
be one of the favorites of the W A ..
Sitting down on the edge of my chair runing my hands through
my long blond hair as my left hand comes to rest on the smooth
handle of my mace. I remove it as I take a soft cloth across
the cold hard surface of the head knowing one must care for
ones weapons to keep them in well working order.
As I sit there the Sunlight comes in through the window it's gentle
rays caress my cheek. A smile comes to my lips as Long memorys
run in my minds eye. The gold band around the handle glints
in the sunlights warm touch flashing my eye with it's glint.
Bringing a very clear image to me. Of a man, tall very intelligent
looking every bit of a good kind soul.. He looked like a god in the
Suns fadeing light as the last rays caressed his cheek.
I do not know if he saw me watching from the portal. As Teinalia
my guardian came out from Dailmonds Merchants Building.
Teinalia grabs me by my hand looking down at me she says.
" Sherry one should not stare at people tis not right an some
take offence." I lower my eyes looking at my shoes."Aye your
right Teinalia." I walk with her. Glanceing over my shoulder one
last time trying to catch sight of this stranger but he was gone.
A sharp knock on my door brings me back to reality as I call
out for them to come in.
Teinalia stands befor me with a new Mace in her hands."This
Sherry is for you." A smile comes to my lips as I stand and take
the New mace. "Mmm So light but feels strong. Ohh whats this?
As I look closer I see a Very fine line in it. My finger tips run across
it and i feel the place where it opens.
Teinalia... Whats this?
She walks up to me takeing my hand in hers as I feel a warm small
object placed into my hand."Place that in the Mace and it will become
stronger." I look at her as I smile; knowing the Crystal for what it was.
A Pulsing I Crystal. As i slip it in I can feel the added power to the Mace
as a smile plays about my lips.
"Teinalia .. I must go out. I belive Darkstalker needs to see this..
Maybe this time I shall place that poor wolfs soul to rest."
Teinalia just looks at me and shakes her head. " Ohh sherry you
will never give up on that agent of the W A will you?'' Things that are
twisted like that will never change. They will always follow the W A."
I grab my cloak as I go out the door. Knowing I must try. As i say over my Shoulder.
Teinalia Thank you may the Goddess Istara watch over
thee..
As i think to myself as these words of wisdom stem from
my few loving childhood days sitting with my mother
come to mind.....

Sherry my little one always rember.An Never
give up..
For To give up means to forever be afraid of the Windstorms
of Life.. Should one press on the Windstorms will uncover
the joys in ones life and bring meaning.Even change..
Always rember.

As I rush out of the Clerics Hall hopeing this time
I can lay Darkstalker to his final rest.