Notes
- Investigate the Sending room in Deldrin for use in transporting letters/parcels long distances.
- Tell Lyssa that if any Valley dwarves are ready to travel elsewhere, the City of Deep Refractions needs them
- Work on magic to help Kadia and Hella use two bodies
Questions
- Magdalena, did Catena and the Empress link their lives? Did you teach Catena?
- Could the Empire employ whatever adjudicators we need to erect our own Barrier with the Collective?
- Do I need to beware of more Ingans and adjudicators hunting Kaide?
- Empress, why did you choose elves for your Empire?
Ongoing projects
Elemental Mastery
Kaide and I worked with her directing my magic to control wind. This could be a good way of approaching my own elemental understanding. Freezing blood, moving earth with vibrations.
The Magic of Will
Anna, Kaide, and I worked out several pieces of a spell that would give an illusory creature weight, warmth, and some minor sense of its own will and intention. I suggested powering such a magically constructed mind using the creator's memories of whatever the creature is intended to be, letting it base its behaviour on real world examples of its kind. Nal and I discussed the potential of giving the creature a dream to pursue in order to inspire its will towards a goal. I offered the problem to Tira; I think she is well-suited to connect these fragments.
Heart Magic
The work Liliales and I have gotten into with drawing song and visions directly from the heart might be related to the Heart of Song herself. Magdalena has given me a journal written by one of her sisters on everything they know about the Heart's magic. In
23.1 What the Heart Wants she told me that she has made herself immune to it but one day she hopes I might be able to help her heal from that. Of course. How could I not?
The Legacy of No Moon
In
21.5 Drifting Apart Void gave me a book and a vial of blood which Magdalena tells me would let me inherit the essence of whoever this dragon was. She cautions me that it would pull at my sense of self the same way that my fae transformation did, and that I should be careful not to pull myself in too many directions too quickly.
In
Conversations with Onyx I learned that the legacy belongs to No Moon, the child of Darkness and Sky. His magic could blot out the stars on the sky and cast shadow over an entire nation. It's shockingly compatible magic for elves and the world would be a better place with that legacy returned to it. The price of it is inheriting a war with the Zephyr. So far I have not met any well-informed individuals who are pro-Zephyr so while this is a significant war to inherit, it's not one I'm opposed to. The odds are good that I will create my own war with them in the coming millennia if I can find them.
I should find Starfield, No Moon's daughter. Her mother is Starfire, who was a child of Fire and Sky (Starfield would have inherited Darkness, Fire, and a lot of Sky). Starfire died to her own magic before Starfield even hatched. No Moon saw so much of Starfire in his daughter that being near her was painful - she couldn't coexist with his memories of her mother even though he loved her dearly. Before she was 500 she left to wander the world, leaving behind a Soul Crystal so her father would know if she died. The crystal is lost now - it wasn't with the book or the vial of blood that Void gave me.
He was known to be meddlesome. He once kidnapped the kings of two nations at war and kept them in darkness for a year to think about things. When the kings were in darkness, he let each of them run through the stages of grief and then gave them visions of each other as they moved from anger to despair, both worried for their nations, and eventually, just worried for their families. When he finally let them out they found that he'd also left a barrier of darkness along their border and warned the kingdoms that if they fought before their rulers returned, he'd curse them for a thousand generations.
I have worried that a long lifespan would mean I need to distance myself from mortal affairs or continuously break my heart over their pain and suffering. From Magdalena I see that being involved does cause heartbreak but it also means you can take such a long view of recovery that it might be worth it for the people you care about, even if they can't possibly see your timeline. From No Moon I see that the difference you make can be small in the grand scheme of things but that doesn't make it any less worthy. Those two kingdoms probably weren't on a scale that would change the course of history but their people escaped a war because of his meddling. Especially if you can meddle without giving them your whole heart, you can still make good, small changes.
Something not known outside of the Bloodline of Darkness: No Moon never felt himself to be wise or powerful. He was someone who asked very good questions. He didn't like giving people answers, but if you went to him with problems you walked away with solutions.
People don't know what they can't see in darkness so they fill it with what they fear most. I'm weak and ignorant, so I ask questions and I listen. It's what people fill the darkness with that gives me strength.
Whenever I start to feel like I know something someone much older and cleverer says something that either upsets my understanding or gives me a deep well of ignorance to tumble into. I take from this that No Moon was a sort of shapeshifter - whatever was needed is what the darkness can become. The only way you can figure out what is needed is to ask those deep, probing questions and then mold yourself and the circumstance to the answer.
Thalien
In
22.3 Heartbeat Magdalena gave me a list of components that I can combine to bring Thalien back from the Dreaming.
My progress:
- I crafted 20 grovewood boxes to keep them safe and slow.
- I gathered 8 flowers - one more than I need.
- Ipthina has told me that when I have the other components I should return and work magic to bind Wayin's life to mine or Thalien's in order to receive a gift of the essence.
- The silver-leafed dreamflowers, containing powerful sleep magic that could lay to rest even the most powerful of the Undying. They bloom only in the greatest of adversity: Tears, struggle, and hope; not blood. They can be cultivated in the right conditions, she notes.
- Essence of an eldritch spirit. These spirits are reclusive figures who dwell deep in the eldritch forests around groves. Now, that likely means they remain accessible only in the North. She tells me that persuading one to part with its essence will be difficult but so is harvesting the essence from a slain spirit. She is unsurprised when I dismiss this option. "I have long since realized that your softness is strength, not weakness,"
- Soul grass that grows around the headwaters of the Great River which Mystery told me about. The river is fed from the Spring of Souls and the grass growing around it will cut your very soul if you are not careful handling it.
- Crimson spirit crystal. It seems that this is the first component on the list that is known to mortals and as such it is valuable and treasured. It forms deep in the dwarven mines to the South, transitioning from pale yellow to blue, purple, crimson, and finally a light-devouring black. In all its forms it extends the lifespan of the user, but the older crystals are more powerful.
- Seeds from a heartwood tree. These trees take five centuries to mature fully and Magdalena has only ever seen them in the trolls' ancestral home. If I'm able to withstand the flames I could probably retrieve some. Or...I could approach the Eldest and ask. Their magic is closely guarded and perhaps not known to even trolls at large, though once they were used to extend the vitality of their most precious elders.
- A piece of bloodmoon jade, mostly found on the other side of the sea. It is sacred to the Church of the Bloodmoon (Mora, the red duellist) and so some devout may have brought it here with them. It is used to sustain one's health, vitality, and fighting spirit.
- One last component that Magdalena says I will not be able to find myself, so she will go instead. It is found on still another continent, one I have not even heard of.
Fulfilling the Contract
In
27.3 Corrosive Presence I met Zeesoo, an adjudicator with a leashed Ingan who is puzzled about my presence. He tells me that his people were contracted to maintain the Barrier for 5000 years and that my presence on this side would dissolve it in less than a millennia. I agree to return within a century.
In the meantime I can attempt the restitution of the contract. I'll need five signators to agree that I have fulfilled the terms:
- Extinguish the flames of the trolls' home
- Restore ten lost groves
- Bring five signatures from the original signatories to allow the dissolution
Signators
- The Three Great Trunks
- Temira the Red Thorn
- Phaseoleae the Vine
- Ericoideae the Blossom
- Caryophyllales of Rains and Floods
- Cichorieae the Wandering
- Artemisia the Dream
- Nepenthes of Wakes and Revels
- Fabaceae the Vanishing
- Ampelocissus the Bitter Sweet
- Rutaceae the Daybringer
Progress:
- I'm going to speak with Rainbow about extinguishing the flames. In the meantime I will have to work on my understanding of elemental fire.
- I have restored Dreamfall and the Celestial grove.
- I have notes pointing to two other hidden Seasonal groves. I've given this information to Andstella.
- I have directions towards the lost Grove of Samsara
Fighting the Collective
If I want to resolve a war with the Collective I think we will have to journey to the island in their sea and tussle with the Ingan who lives there.
A part of me also wants to dissolve whatever magic the Ingans gave them to bind them all together in unity.
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