Ar'belath Illaerothil - The Ill-begotten Reveries

[Blissey]

The First Reverie
A Pallid Autumn​

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Curved bark of the Phandar tree brushes my palm. It’s moist, dampened by the thick autumnal forest air. The bark curved impossibly, coiling like snakes. They faced one way, away from the wind. Rain had just fallen, we bathed in it, washed our scents away so that we melded into the Wealdath. I watched her stalk. O’Si, mother. She was now something to be feared. Not nurturing, nor caring – a hunter now with bow and spear on her back and in hand. A curved obsidian edge, molted, sharpened stone and gem – faint flecks of blood dried its sheen. Beyond the Phandar we saw Him; white gossamer fur, antlers proud and fully grown. We pause. She gestures for silence, and I dare not even to breathe. We watch Him graze, then stride, then graze again. He is beautiful, a singular white thing imperfectly camouflaged in a sea of orange and faded greens. I plead, wordlessly, to let him go. Her eyes are not on me, she still watches Him, needle-eyed. I feel grief for Him, then young tears come, but they do not fall silently. He cranes his neck sharply as the wind blows from past our backs. He cannot smell us, yet I wish he did. She nocks an arrow, then draws. The hempen bow-string strains, her arm quivers, but she breathes out one long breath, her aim solidifies then. I yell out as the arrow flies as both word and arrow find Him. He jolts, then springs away into the orange brush, beyond the Phandar. Mother still does not look at me. We follow the scarlet trail through the Wealdath. He turned sharp left, then right, deep strides made into the mud and soil, crushed Alder leaves, some soiled by blood. Then He is gone. The mud lies perfectly still, fallen leaves untouched. Mother nocks another arrow. I feel her fear, then even more so my own. The wind shifts, blowing against us, then something sharp breaks – like bone and flesh, a sound carried by the wind. We move through the Wealdath, and into an open grove. Below the Great Oak, that white thing laid. He was torn apart, limbs had gone and entrails eviscerated. He was not eaten. He was merely killed. Plucked prematurely from His death march by another terrifying something. She looks at me now, and I look at her. She is no longer the hunter as she wipes the tears from my cheeks. O’Si plucks me from the ground, holding me close to her chest. Nimbly she dashes through the Wealdath, beyond the Phandar. My misted eyes blind the gore left to rot beneath the Oak. Some other something looked back at me, past the gored elk, past the Oak and past the orange brush and the Wealdath – the monster of my reverie.​

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[Blissey]

The Second Reverie
An Empty Grave




‘Twere the days of my youngness where ephemeral light lifted every morning across orchids, canopies and skies, flittering rays of light that varied in the shades of seasons that came and passed where tendays felt like lengthened beyond the very meaning of the word. These things are now distant somethings shadowed by empty graves and a monster that does not err. Cold sweat crosses my brow. My palm feels taut, leathery – calluses tear easily against a hastily clad spear. I call out to her, O’Si. The Wealdath responds with a low, despondent groan. She does not whisper to the trees, she never could. She does not warn me here, the Wealdath does. I tread alone, following her tracks. She moved quickly here, then slipped; I find her shiv. Jagged stone, a chipped edge but no blood. She falls here, then turns left fiercely. She is lost, fear takes her here so the scattered leaves and broken branches tell me. I hate what fear I feel for her, I hate what fear I feel for myself. The sun crested over the mountains drawing long shadows now. My mind begins to taunt me. Might I turn to see her gored body? Might I turn to see absolutely nothing? Something tugs at my foot. I jolt, spin around. My foot is caught under a bowstring. I take the bow into my hand. A fine thing, well-made, expertly crafted. My eyes focus under the dark; a blotch of blood stains the cedar wood of it. I stare now into an open mound in the ground; her grave. It is empty, save for the smattering of anemone flowers to fill the bodiless space. My head throbs, and my heart pangs with a silvery white pain that flashes in bursts. Father tells me that Arvandor awaits her; a field of endless green and a tranquil song that plays for her evermore. He does not think to know of the creature that took her, he does not think to avenge her, he does not think of the dread I felt left imparted upon her bow. The Wealdath groans again, a cry for me to relinquish what is now the past and know that nature’s course has risen and fallen like the sun and moon, for my mourning shall and should be as brief as the tendays that now fly past me with each passing winter that jades me. What then is the bounty of love if not nothing more than loss, I think. I do not bury her bow. I do not bury her at all. I let my wrath take me. I let my anger boil so as to make it steeled and immutable. I accept that now I bury what dreams laid before me, and in trade, I become a weapon for the People, and in secret, myself. The day will come when the monster falters, and on that day, the Wealdath will weep.​

 

[Blissey]

The Third Reverie
The Immutable Blade​

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Wreathed in vines and locked against mossy stone, I see it. The Immutable Blade. It comes when reveries are warped by rage and wrath. It fits ever so perfectly between memories of empty graves, of weeping kin, of the muted cries of the lost and the howls of broken mothers. It is a blade that rebukes the light of the sun and moon, a cold blade, indifferent and void of all the things that make a blade feel right in one's own hand. But it is a sharp thing. Its heft is eased when the mind is shrouded and fogged by malice. It is not a warrior’s weapon, nor is it a weapon of war; an honorable thing, something just and true. It is not made to protect, like what Corellon so desires, though it may seem so. It is not made to maim or injure, merely kill, and so therefore, it can never be sanctified, blessed or ensorcelled. The vines that hold it turn to chains, wrought iron forged in a fire that burns white hot. The stone beneath it morphs into a bed of searing magma, a deep orange ichor which the blade drinks with great fervor. The Immutable Blade is borne by a singular purpose; to quell a curse in a manner so violent and self-destructive that the wielder themselves becomes cursed in turn. What then, I think, is the nature of that curse? Not of the Y’Tellarien’s curse, no, but of the curse that this Immutable Blade would bestow upon me. But then, I think, there is no greater curse, for I will be this weapon. I will be this Immutable Blade. I will be the indifferent rage of my People. I seek no honor, I seek not even justice, for there is neither to be found in vengeance. True vengeance, a wrath that has forsaken all that was good in those that the monster has taken from me, because there is no good left now that death has taken them. Only then when bones fill empty graves, when my kin’s mourning finally comes to pass, does the blade bury itself too.​

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[Blissey]

The Fourth Reverie
Mother & The Trout​

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The Wealdath groaned, and the sun glittered between autumn’s oranges and winter’s whites. In the glen where the river curled, a secret in the wind blew with a great mystery older than Man and the People. The snow came fast. It crunched under my boot, fresh and young. The river was strong, ice on its edge fell to this strength. Where the sun cast amber rays that scattered the paling water, splashes rippled through the current, and white fins bobbed across the surface. There were so many, and they were so fast. My mother stands with me, our young selves reflected against the graying water. We watch the trout ride and swim with the power of the river.
Where do they go?
They swim to the bay and beyond.
Why?
Because soon it will be too cold, and their young must live, so they must live too.
The river helps them?
It does.
Why?
She touches my head. Her hand is rough and callused. She combs my hair, and smiles at me.
Because nature gives and takes. Come autumn's end, where winter spills into the woods, nature gives what little it has left to give until it can no longer. For afterwards, when the age grows cold and the snow falls draping everything in chill, it can only take.
And they all make it? To the bay?
Some do.
Not all?
Not all.
She kneels next to me, and I wonder. She takes my hand and nears it to the water. I hesitate, the cold bites. But her hand is warm, and I relent. We feel the fish rush past our hands. We are nothing to them. We are stones in the river bed that they glide past. She whispers against my ear.
See how they fly, my love? Eager to ride the water, free and willing. We all ride these waters to the bay, taking what nature gives, and relinquishing what it takes.
Will we make it to the bay?
Yes, my love.​

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