[Valdorian Age]A Short Story

[ghost-angel]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

I'm not sure she's self-reflective enough to yield more than a paragraph or two. Kessa, herself, isn't much of a storyteller, and doesn't spend a lot of time angsting, reflecting or thinking about the past.

 

Hmm. I'll consider it, anyway. It could be an interesting challenge, squeezing blood out of a stone.

I would recommend doing that voice in the first person present time, just setting in various periods before and leading up to her decision to leave. No need to be reflective about it at all.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

I think I have figured out a way it would work, though. The way the party is currently headed, they're going to be smack in the middle of Iceraven territory in 3 or 4 more game sessions. Her main reason for being so quiet is that she doesn't speak the language natively, so she keeps quiet to keep from using a word wrong. I figure it's bloody likely someone related to her will ask her what was going through her head. I won't get an opportunity to answer the question in-character, because she'll be speaking Tribespeak at home, and none of the rest of the party will know what she's saying. So I can have her answer the question in a very long, rambly piece of dialogue.

 

Dialogue, I can do.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Hmm. Turns out that, once you get Kessa talking, shutting her up is an issue. I'm still writing, and have written almost three pages, single spaced.

 

Gah.

 

Have a short sample:

 

"The only thing that's surprised me about all of this is how much it's changed me.

 

"I knew, from the moment Kell challenged the Wolfrock coward, that there would be revenge to seek. I had seen this man pick fights before, and I knew he'd do something underhanded and sneaky.

 

"I had thought, at the time, that maybe he'd injure Kell, make him rest and need tending for a few months. But when I saw him jump up, and charge at Kell's back, I knew it wasn't going to be that simple. I tried to warn my brother, but too late.

 

"I think that, what a lot of people in the Iceraven clan forgot was that Kell wasn't perfect. He was the Hope of the Iceravens, and the strongest and fastest fighter. He deserved all of the praise he got, but he was also arrogant, cocky, full of himself, and selfish.

 

"I loved him for his faults, but it was also why he died. If he'd known that he was so easily taken down by such a cowardly, low act, he would've been more careful.

 

"But he wasn't."

 

Will probably just link to the (non-friends-locked) journal entry when I finish it.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

There. It's done.

 

*shakes her fist at her stupid laconic roleplaying character who's been keeping all THAT in*

 

It was about 4 pages in 8- or 10-point font when Josh printed it the other day. That was single-spaced, before I added the paragraph breaks.

 

Arggg.

 

Anyway, the context is that she's gotten back with her clan, temporarily, and one of the younger kids asked her if she'd planned all this from the start, or if it was a surprise, how it ended up.

[ghost-angel]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

That happens. It's always the quiet ones that take up most of the novel...

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Evidently. O v O

 

Thanks for the feedback, by the way. ^ v ^

[ghost-angel]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

no problem on the feedback... so, where's more of the story?

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Well, a LITTLE more:

 

"On the boat from Abyznia to Valdoria, there were some other passengers, too. I passed some of the time by listening to them talk so I could learn the language better. They didn't pay me any attention, so I could listen as long as I wanted to.

 

"There was one Abyznian woman there who was pregnant, about eight months. She was always talking about a man on the boat, when she wasn't near him, anyway. He was a merchant who lived outside of Elweir, and she talked all the time about how she loved him, how they were going to be something called married. I understood the word 'wife', but I was confused about why she wasn't his already. It has something to do with bearing children, I know, so I still don't understand why she wasn't his already.

 

"After a while, I figured out that, when she said, 'love', she didn't mean it in the same way I do. I didn't know what she meant. So one night, I asked her.

 

"Once she got over her surprise that I could speak Valdorian, she answered that it's hard to describe, but you know when it happens to you. I asked her, 'How?'

 

"She thought about the question, then she said that she knew her man loved her because she was carrying his child.

 

"Never mind the weirdness of listening to a woman describe something in HER belly as belonging to the man who only shot some gooey stuff into her. I still wanted to know what she meant when she was talking about love. So I asked if sex was the same thing as love.

 

"She looked angry and walked away from me then. So I don't think that's what she meant at all. It doesn't make any sense, or we Iceravens would feel a strange attachment to a large number of men, and we'd talk of our children as THEIRS.

 

"I saw her again in Elweir. It was a few months later. She'd had her baby, and was working in a tavern. I never saw her baby, or the man she was so fond of. But I did see her taking money from men and leading them, by the hand, to a small room at the top of the stairs. The word they used for her was 'prostitute'. Some talked about her when she wasn't there, laughing about the man who'd run off to let her take care of a child on her own.

 

"I visited that tavern many times. I spoke to her once. I said, 'I see you've been lucky enough to find lots of love in the city.'

 

"She narrowed her eyes at me and walked away. When I told the story to my drinking companion, he laughed and laughed and laughed.

 

"When I asked him what 'love' meant, he said he wasn't even going to try to answer my question. Then, as if he was going on with the same conversation, he asked about the Iceravens. I changed the subject.

 

"'Prostitutes', by the way, were women who exchanged sex for money. They got good business, but men always denied sleeping with them. I had thought, at one point, about doing that, since prostitutes have no problem being approached by men. But I wouldn't be able to reject customers who didn't meet the standards I was looking for, so I gave up on the idea."

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Another NPC's story.

 

Gren Wolfrock first met Kessa Iceraven in his nineteenth summer, her fourteenth. He'd joined a hunting expedition, and gotten separated from his brethren. He hadn't realized how turned around he'd gotten until, approaching voices, saw they didn't belong to anyone he knew. Before he could run, they were upon him, demanding what he was doing in Iceraven territory.

 

One girl worked herself between the interrogators and their prey. Though she was not yet an adult, they listened to her advice that they ask him and give him a chance to answer, rather than assuming he was there to do harm. She'd noticed his startlement at their presence, and was impressed with his soft-spoken politeness.

 

He explained, flushing in embarrassment, that he'd gotten lost, and hadn't realized he'd stumbled into Iceraven territory. He apologized for trespassing, and assured them he'd head straight home, now that he knew where he was.

 

If not for Kell, the Hope of the Iceraven's, intervention, Gren might've been dragged back to the encampment for interrogation, anyway. But Kell stepped forward to side with his sister. For the inquisitive, trusting young woman was, indeed, Kessa. He asked if Kessa's judgement had been called into question before, and asked what she thought they should do with the Wolfrock.

 

She said, if he gave up his weapons willingly, they'd walk him back to the border of the territories and let him go.

 

Kell agreed this was the wise thing to do, and asked Gren for his weapons. Gren asked if he might give them to the one who trusted him. Kell laughed, and stepped aside so that Kessa might be handed Gren's sword, bow, arrows and two daggers.

 

Gren expected a quiet, grim march, but was again surprised by the Iceravens. Kell and Kessa chattered with one another, and took a leisurely pace in escorting Gren. He couldn't help but notice that Kell protectively kept himself between his sister and the stranger, and couldn't blame him.

 

The third time Kessa asked Gren a question to involve him in their conversation, Kell laughed and pointed out to her that he was their prisoner, and her enemy. Kessa made a face at him, and replied that the Wolfrocks were her enemy; this man could be a friend, for all Kell had given him a chance to show them. "Until a person gives you a good reason to think they're not, anyone could be an ally. Where they come from isn't a reason. Actions and words count, not birth," she said to him.

 

For his entire life, Gren had felt like an outsider in his clan. His brothers teased him for overthinking his actions, and wondering about things with no ready answer. They made fun of him when he refused to stoop to their tactics, preferring a clean victory rather than one won through deceit.

 

In this moment, he knew what set him apart from his kinsmen, because he saw it in this girl. She looked past his family and clan upbringing, and saw him as a person, not just someone from her enemy's camp.

 

He smiled shyly at her then, and she grinned back. Kell shook his head and said, "You'll regret that thought someday. You don't ever listen when they say all Wolfrocks are dirty liars." But he was smiling as he said it.

 

When Gren got back to his own camp, nobody had noticed he was gone. Kessa had returned his things at the border between the Wolfrock and Iceraven territories. He found himself burning with questions he wished he'd asked her, and conversations he wished he'd had with her and her brother. He felt very much that what she said was true, and wanted to test if a friendship could truly be forged between an Iceraven and a Wolfrock.

 

So he asked his tribal elders what happened if a Wolfrock was fond of an Iceraven, thinking that perhaps they might bar him from contacting her. Instead, they told him of the fraternization of Iceravens, and that it didn't matter which clan a man came from, so long as he was strong and intelligent enough to beat his chosen target in a fight, and brave enough to request the combat. When they asked him who he had in mind, he told them. They cautioned him about doing this before a woman had acheived adulthood, as Kessa had not yet. They said that, so long as he could wait, they would approve his actions.

 

So he waited. He didn't entirely avoid her in this time, though. He went to the Trading Post at every opportunity, hoping to run into her there. Sometimes he was successful, but found it nearly impossible to speak to her with the rest of the Iceravens who'd come along glaring at him. She recognized him, though, and acknowledged his attempts with a nod or a smile. Heartened by these signs, he renewed his wish to be with her, and began practicing for his eventual fight against her.

 

And then, nearly two years later, his brother, Belun, came up with the idea of going to take over some Iceraven territory, while they were busy celebrating the achievement of adulthood by this "Hope of the Iceravens". He scoffed as he said it.

 

Gren replied that he wanted nothing to do with something so low. Belun took their oldest brother and nine others with him. When he returned, over a week later, he and his companions were out of breath, but laughing and clapping Belun on the back. They bragged that Belun had killed an Iceraven. And not just any Iceraven, but their beloved Hope, Kell.

 

Gren, even without ever seeing Kell fight, knew his brother could only do such a thing through trickery. But he swallowed his accusation and kept his words to himself. While his kin drank and celebrated this blow to the Iceraven spirit, he stayed in his tent, refusing to join in celebrating a man's death. At least, he consoled himself, Kell's sister was all right, and didn't have to witness the dishonorable way her brother had been taken down, or the celebrations of this dishonor. He'd learned of how highly the Iceravens valued honor, and didn't laugh it off the way his kinsmen did. He only hoped that he might learn to live under a similar code, himself, despite the idiocy he was surrounded with.

 

A month later, the news reached the Wolfrock clan that there was a new adult to contend with among the Iceravens, and it was Kessa. Gren went to his kinsmen then, and told them of his plans to beat her and win her for his own. They might all have their own shot at her later, he said, but he wanted the first try. All agreed that this was fair, though some were bemused to hear an Iceraven woman claimed so. Knowing his brothers' ways, Gren made sure that Belun and Madok agreed to this several times before leaving it be.

 

The next time he went to the Trading Post, Kessa was there. But he lost several opportunities to approach her, and didn't dare stray far from his brothers.

 

Then, Belun started to harrass and belittle a small boy, who was standing near the Iceraven goods to be traded. While he was laughing at the boy, who looked near tears, Kessa appeared between them, frowning at Belun.

 

Gren didn't know if she knew that Belun had killed her brother, but, by the look in her eye, he suspected she did. She looked far angrier than a protective older sister had any right to be.

 

But if Belun knew that Kessa was Kell's sister, he made no indication. He turned his taunting to her, speaking to her in filthy language. Gren colored to hear such words used, and directed at Kessa, no less. He walked over to intervene, but before he could, she'd challenged Belun, and was reaching for her weapon.

 

Gren spoke sharply to his brother then, reminding him of his promise. Belun laughed it off, then said he wasn't interested in such a woman, anyway. Only that wasn't the word he used.

 

Gren didn't blame Kessa in the least for charging Belun then; he could imagine doing the exact same thing, in her shoes. He was surprised, though, with the skill and strength with which she yielded the axe she carried, and the speed at which she moved. The battle was a few clashes of steel on steel, some feints and circling, then a few crashes more. At the end, Belun was on his butt, with her axe pressed to his cheek and drawing blood. She made him take his words back, and, when he did, Gren swallowed hard. He'd done it too easily; Belun still had something in store.

 

Luckily for her, Kessa, too, was familiar with Belun's lies and pretending to be defeated when he'd just begun. But, it seemed, she hadn't expected him to only attack her with words. Because when he jumped to his feet, she swung as if resuming their fight. But he had no weapon to deflect her blow, and her axe cut straight through him.

 

When Belun fell, Kessa swore, and Gren blushed again at the strength of her blasphemy. He stayed stock-still for several moments, unsure whether he should mourn the death of his brother (for Belun most certainly was dead) or defend her from his kinsmen, who had seen the fight and were approaching her. In the end, he stayed where he was, watching the argument between Iceraven and Wolfrock unfold. The Wolfrocks shouted that she'd struck an unarmed man, killed one of their own, and should be turned over to them for punishment. The Iceravens, who had joined in time to protect their kinswoman, shouted back that they took care of their own problems, and would sort this out without THEIR help. In the end, they all left for their camps angry and frustrated.

 

Gren listened to his kin grumble about the events that had unfolded, and listened as the story grew further and further from the truth. When the story had finally evolved to Kessa sneaking up on Belun to attack him from behind without any warning, Gren spoke up. He said, "You all sicken me. You knew Belun as well as I did. You knew about his tactic to pretend he was defeated, then spring up to stab his enemy. It was one of you who taught him how to do that. Many of you SAW what happened, and that it looked like he'd do the same, exact thing. Even if you weren't, you can see just by looking at my brother's body that she held her blade to his face while forcing him to amend his words, and the other cuts on his body show that there was a long fight between them, and that he deflected many of her blows. You all KNOW better than this.

 

"And even if she meant to kill him, who are YOU to say she's wrong in doing it? Aren't you the same men who celebrated the death of her brother at my brother's deceitful hands? So her motivation was revenge. What will OUR revenge on HER solve, except further revenge? This is stupid, and every one of you knows it."

 

That said, he went to his tent. He heard snickers, then outright laughter at his outburst.

 

Despite his words, he knew that he hadn't any idea what had truly happened. Had Kessa planned to challenge Belun, to get her revenge? Had her strike been calculated to fall when he was unarmed? Had she meant, truly, to kill him? Her surprised cursing indicated she hadn't meant for it to go the way it had, but how much of that WAS a surprise?

 

And if her motivation was to avenge her brother by murdering Belun, why wait so long? Why do it in front of so many people? Why throw away this honor Iceravens were so proud of by doing it the way she had, without simply cutting him down, outright? Why bother challenging him at all, and pausing to make him take back his words? She could've cut him down the moment he fell, but she didn't. Why?

 

The next morning, the Wolfrocks were plotting to send a party to speak with the Iceravens, and talk them into surrendering Kessa to them. Gren went into his tent, packed everything he owned, then told the elders he was leaving. They, knowing of his fondness for her, offered him a compromise. They said that, if he stayed, and went with the party to retrieve her, he could have her after they were done. He shook his head.

 

They asked when he'd return, and he replied, "Never. I'm not one of you."

 

He headed for the mountains, where, several days later, he crossed paths with Kessa herself. She looked at him warily, and his questions for her, bubbling up to the surface just moments before, faded and died on his lips as he took in her condition.

 

She looked tired, like she hadn't slept in days. Her shoulders were stooped, and she walked with a limping shuffle. She looked frightened of Gren, as if she'd run if she only had the energy. Nonetheless, she was already reaching for her weapon.

 

Gren turned away from her and began walking back. He didn't know where he was going, but he couldn't stand seeing the bright, energetic, trusting girl brought to this. And he hated the thought of what would happen to her if his kinsmen caught up with her in this condition. He didn't want to see that happen, and knew he hadn't the strength or motivation to protect her. He thought to turn and reassure her he meant her no harm only after she'd vanished over the next hill.

 

From there, he went to the Trading Post, figuring he could at least find work there. He was hired by the old documentarian, who was studying the tribes of the plains, as an errand runner and deliverer of messages. His work sometimes took him to the capital city, where he once heard a story of a young woman wielding an axe, who worked for a mage on the outskirts of the city. He did speak, briefly, to the mage, and verified that it was Kessa who'd worked for him. But, the mage said, she'd left without a word. He asked Gren if he knew her very well, and if he could tell him why she was always so quiet.

 

Gren shook his head and told the mage no, that he didn't know Kessa very well at all. After all, he thought, he had more questions than the mage did about what was going through Kessa's head.

 

Gren resigned himself to never seeing Kessa again, never having his questions answered. He found that there were other things to think about it that made it easier to sleep, that made the questions stop burning into his mind. And he went on with his life, as a barbarian without a tribe. Still, he kept up his combat practice. The day she did return, he vowed, he'd fight her, and get his answers one way or another.

[ghost-angel]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

quite a winding of stories you're getting here... Am interested to see where any of this might resolve.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Well, me, too.

 

Actually, we've run across Iliden (the mage who thinks too much) where we are in the game right now. The game before that, we were in the city where Kessa fought off some thieves. We're going a few sessions without any references to any of this, then we're going to run into some Wolfrocks during the same session we get to the Iceraven encampment.

 

According to Josh, anyway. Apparently he's gleaning quite a bit of useful stuff out of these.

[Play4Keeps]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

These stories are just sooooo cool!

 

Wow!

 

Thanks for posting them! :D

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

You're quite welcome. ^ v ^

 

I'll let you know if I write anything more that can be shared. I wrote one thing over the weekend, but it, uh . . . Well, it wouldn't get past the language filters, for one. It's also far different in tone, and only meant to convey something that couldn't happen on-camera in the game without embarrassing the other players. Deeply.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

More.

 

This one incorporates events from the latest game, but I put some notes at the top.

 

EDIT: It's being left there because it contains some strong language, and I'd rather have it posted in all its naughty-language glory. If you're really opposed to clicking on a livejournal link, PM me and I'll PM you the text.

[ghost-angel]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Wow.. quite a different person from the mage.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Heh. Yes, she is.

 

And yet, they're somehow made for one another . . .

[ghost-angel]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Heh. Yes, she is.

 

And yet, they're somehow made for one another . . .

or they deserve each other.... Karma has a sense of humor after all.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

or they deserve each other.... Karma has a sense of humor after all.

Yeah, I guess that's more what I meant.

 

Iliden is getting some character development in the next piece (which I can't start writing for at least a few more weeks - I have to make sure the plot is sufficiently advanced to give me room for these behind-the-scenes bits), so we'll see how that works out.

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: [Valdorian Age]A Short Story

 

Won't be writing much for a while. Putting together my own game, which will be running on alternating Sundays against this one. So plot advancement will be slower, I'll be spending more energy on my own game, and will have a better creative outlet in my own world.