middaeg | [Closed] February Catch All

I remember seeing that request.

[How fortuitous. At least she knows what happened there, small though it may be.]

Likely it'll have a happier, easier life even working with a hunter than it might in the wild. I can't imagine wildlife has a long life expectancy with Shades around.

I'd think so, considering all he has to do at this moment is eat, nap, and be put through some training paces for an hour or so a day. He has a great life overall, if I had to guess.

[She looks back at the Wilde in front of them.] I think it was the Cwyld that pushed them so close to civilization anyway. Unfortunate, that. Dangerous for them, and for the people, too.

That's true enough.

[Edelgard grips her reins a touch more tightly, eyes narrowing at something off in the distance. A refracted bit of light, maybe. Or some predator's lantern...]

I think that I see something, though. To your left, not far off the path.

Hm? [She turns that way, but... doesn't quite catch the glimmer so immediately. She's not a nocturnal creature - or turning into one - any longer, so it's harder for her to see, though she does wheel the horse that direction. Slow and easy, she lets the horse plod off the path, perked and alert to whatever it is. Perfectly ready to run, or to fight.

Probably fight. Maria has a bunch of that spunk to her.]

[Something certainly does jump out at them.

A rabbit. Large, kind of fat, not obviously infected...it tears from the bushes and bolts across Maria's path, weaving between the horse's legs.

Interestingly, and more relevantly, it leaves behind wet paw-prints in the dirt, though Edelgard's likely the only one to notice.]

...Well, that's not what I expected.

[It's mostly the sudden motion that makes Maria's horse flinch a little from the sight, ears rolling back and head canting to the side as the horse tries to get a view of whether it's a friend or foe, but otherwise doesn't panic. Especially not once it's revealed to just be a small, fluffy bunny.

Maria frowns at it, and considers jumping down to see if she can catch it for food, before deciding against it. She doesn't notice the wet pawprints, indeed - her night time eyesight isn't nearly as good as a vampire's.] The rabbit? No. I'm glad to see normal animals surviving out here, though.

No...

[Edelgard watches it go, but her focus is more on the tracks it's left. And on the implication.]

Not expected. But fortuitous. Maybe.

[She gestures to the soil, her keen eyes having picked up on that.]

Go the way that it came from. It's feet were wet, and we are seeking a pool. Perhaps we'll get lucky.

Hm. Very well. [As farfetched as it seems, she doesn't want to question the Vampire's senses. After all, she used to have a much better sense of smell before she came here, and she's sure the Monsters develop in unique ways.

But it's still a little strange, and it's still something she's trying to shake off as a sign of Beasthood to make her Hunter's instincts scream at her.

Instead, she pulls the reins of the horse to the side, and nudges the mare into a little faster of a walk, toward the way the rabbit came from.] A bit of a reach, but stranger things have happened.

No sense in not taking any potential clue.

[Besides, it's not as though it can hurt. Edelgard wheels her horse to follow at a gentle canter, keeping pace with Maria but not bringing the horses too close together in case they get competitive.

Fortunately, the guess is correct. After a few moments of silent trotting, the sight of moonlight reflecting off a pool illuminates a small clearing ahead of them, silver shadows cast up upon the canopy from the bottom.]

...What luck. Could this be it?

Edited 2020-02-18 02:36 (UTC)

[She really can't say much more, because they don't exactly have any other leads to go on, but... weirdly enough, it seems to be just the break they were looking for. Maria's eyes squint a bit as the horse steps up to the edge of the pool, but she stops a little ways shy.

If this is the right pool, it should be alright. But if it's not... well, no sense risking the horses. She swings her leg back off, landing on the ground easily, and approaches, slowly. The pool seems... well enough. The moon reflects nicely from the surface, and it doesn't immediately ping Maria's sense of danger. She still does not immediately get too close, however. Instead, she takes it upon herself to use her height advantage to scope out the surrounding area.] Let us hope. The night is stretching onward; dawn cannot be too terribly far off.

[Edelgard does the same, sliding off her horse and looping the reins around a nearby tree branch. She follows, keeping close, her axe lighting their way through bushes.]

We have a few hours more. And I have my coverings, should we be forced to dally too much.

[Always prepared. She'll be fine.]

What do you think? I don't sense any danger, not immediately.

Nothing yet. But I never have trusted any part of the Wildes, no matter how uninfected it looks. [Seems really super unfortunate to get infected and have to have that part scraped and burned out to head off the infection.

So yeah, she's just going to be That Way. No, she will not relax, even if they probably should.] If it's not the right one, it will do more harm than good, as well. I suppose there's only one way to find out if it's the right one, though. [She steps closer, but stops just shy of the edge of it. ... Now that she's thinking about it, no matter what happens... she's probably not going to like what she's about to see. And... is it visible to others? She eyes Edelgard, suddenly wary.]

[Edelgard approaches alongside Maria, her eyes fixed on the pool. She's not sure what she's expecting, but the water does seem to shimmer a little brighter as the two of them look down into it.]

...Huh.

[It begins to coalesce into a bright and sunlit day, clearly showing the vision of a city on a harbor. It zooms in further, then further, swirling to flit through sun-filled streets lined with people. It's evident that the town is prosperous, as every single person is well dressed and clean. The city itself even is devoid of decay and so much as a dark alleyway.

The point of view wheels away, zipping across a sun-soaked landscape towards a shining white building rising out of a forest, with a banner bearing a Black Eagle flapping in the breeze over it. And then further, further, flying over a cold plain to show a fortress city with similarly prosperous people, and then flitting away east to yet another shining bastion of civilization that comes in the form of a canal-riddled city. All the while, each passing second shows more and more and more of Fodlan. Lush hills, hamlets filled with happy, prosperous people, flickering back and forth, back and forth in a dizzying array of smiling faces, bustling markets, laden caravans...before finally slowing down outside a modest manor house.

It's only then that Edelgard appears, seated outside on the porch, knitting something while conversing with a tall man all in black (Hubert), a woman in black with blue-green hair, and a handful of others. All of them smiling, laughing, just glad to be alive.]

[She looks... cautiously. In fact, she shies from the view a couple of times, likely cutting off whatever is shown a few times. Curiosity seems to win, eventually, though, watching the perspective go through its paces. She doesn't really recognize anyone in the picture; though she's seen Hubert haunting around a few times, even if she's never bothered to speak to him.

It looks... quiet. Peaceful. Idyllic, in a lot of ways. She wonders, for a moment, why it shows so many different people all over the place, but her mind recalls how Edelgard introduced herself at first. Emperor. A title that means nothing and less in a place like this, but back home...

Maria steps forward as the scene settles.] Well, if this isn't the right one, then your most twisted desires are strangely peaceful.

[She should. Probably back away before Edelgard does and the scene resets to her own fantasy. She doesn't, because it just... looks nice.]

[Edelgard is nothing if not devoted to her people, Maria. That is why she lives, this is the dream she holds closest to her heart. The promise of a better future, a happy tomorrow.

She knows it for truth the moment she sees it.]

This is my dream. This is all I could ever ask for.

[Prosperity and peace, for everyone.

She doesn't move away though, even as it does reset to Maria's own vision.]

Then, we've found the proper one. [She watches it for a moment more, realizing a bit too late as flower petals blow across the scene, transitioning the scene, that what is seen afterward is Yharnam. Or, to be most precise, it's some place outside of Yharnam - the city's sharp, jutting spires in the distance, the snow-capped mountains surrounding the place like a valley. It's a huge field of lumenflowers, sunflower-looking things with a slight bioluminescence, mixed with other wildflowers, swaying gently in the breeze. Little flashes of arcane blues and greens occasionally wind their way through.

There's no one around; it's a picture of a quiet, isolated life. The wind whispers through the flowers, the birds chirp cheerily, and they hiss against their stalks as they move.

A singular petal blows across the view, and there's a grave. Quiet, untended, overgrown, tucked up against an abandoned building. There's no name on the headstone. The same looking wind rustles the flowers growing on the grave, and they swing out, obscuring the view until it fades back in.

A hand reaches toward the sky, and the night flashes suddenly from day to night, the cosmos stretching above. The hand stretches, fingers splayed, upward, further and further. There's a vague flash of something not quite human that warps the hand, but it's not a claw so much as it is something... stranger. Something that bends and writhes like a human hand does not. Though the sight may be disturbing, it doesn't change that there's a sense of peace to the whole scene.

The hand lowers, blacking out the scene again, and then once again, the grave shows itself. Night. The wind has died down, now it's just... a grave. Days, nights, seasons, years pass; untouched, unbothered, unremembered. Slowly, the background fades out, until it's just quiet, peaceful darkness. A few flower petals blow through, glowing softly in the black.

It's death. Maria has other desires - desires of a peaceful life, of seeing the fruits of all the research she and her fellows did in Byrgenwerth - but at the end of it all is a single, quiet want.

One that, really, she shouldn't be sitting here staring at. One that she should be walking back away from, because this has been way too revealing, overall. She just doesn't want to have to explain why that's what she wants. So she does, turning abruptly to head back to the horse and fish through the saddlebags. She needs some materials for a teleportation spell.]

[Edelgard remains quiet, looking away from most of the vision when it becomes obvious what it is. She's no fool, she's no stranger to operas and how they so often end for people skilled at violence. Maria is...troubled. She always has come across as someone seeking something, and an ending is not un-fitting at all.

Maria is a strange one, but no. This is no great shock, and it's a desire she does not wish to intrude upon. This is private, and something she'll never share.

The Emperor fishes in her belt, pulling out a vial and a flask, taking a sample in each before turning back to the horses.]

Shall we be off?

A moment more. [This is why Maria does expeditions like this, though; because being left alone with her thoughts is more dangerous than not. She finishes sketching out a circle, and drawing out some runes along the perimeter of it in the soft dirt near-ish a tree so it won't be so easily trampled, but will remain close to the pool. Once that's done, and she's enchanted the whole thing - it glows a soft, arcane blue - she stands up, brushes her hands off, and turns back to the horses. It doesn't take long to re-pack the reagents.]

There. Now we can go.

[And also fall into a contemplative silence as she swings back up onto her own horse.]

A beacon?

[Edelgard watches, curious, still annoyed that she can't see the magic the way she should. Though she keeps that to herself, swinging up into the saddle once Maria is finished.]

Yes. It can be used to track a teleportation spell to, in order to make fetching more water easy. And if, for some reason, the pool moves itself, it can be used to mark where it has been, and to explore the area left behind. [She shifts in the saddle, and looks ahead.] It seemed practical.

Noted.

[She hopes it works. Though, at the same time, who'd want to return? That was eerie.

Of course, there's something else that she should say.]

I apologize, by the way. For intruding on your vision. That was wrong of me.

[And Maria's spine goes rigid. She was partially just sort of hoping this all would blow over, and wouldn't ever be addressed, but there went the elephant, tiptoeing across the room. At least Edelgard isn't asking more prying questions about it.

She sighs.] It was... invasive, certainly. But I saw yours as well, when I had no right to. We can call it even.

Of course.

[Her vision is nothing special, nothing even particularly personal. At least, not to her. All she wants is what any good ruler wants.

It just...is.]

[And... the silence is painful, stretching into the night. Perhaps it's just Maria uncomfortable with it, but the strangest urge keeps beating its wings against the cage of her mind. Finally, after a moment, she grips her reins a bit tighter. The horse makes a grunt as her legs tighten a little, and it's not sure what kind of command that is.] Don't dwell too much on it. It is not a... fate which can come to pass.

[Edelgard pulls up alongside her, giving her a quiet look. She didn't want to dig too deeply into Maria's past, or pain. It was not her place, she wasn't the sort of woman that people opened up to after all, and nothing about Maria indicated she was the type to talk.]

I won't. Not because I don't care, Maria, but because your story is yours to tell but only to those who wish it. I saw something by accident, and I am more than happy to listen, but I enjoy your company. I would not wish to pry or do anything which makes you uncomfortable.

[Closed] February Catch All

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