Relad's Little Moments

[LuckyD 141]

Relad, having finally stopped his running some short time ago, would have sat down in the terribly lonesome new home he had made. There was a fire cracking gently in the corner of the small entryway, the stairs leading up to the seating floor with it's poorly-sanded, handmade chairs and table. From there was a small hand-ladder up the wall, beyond which an iron grate led to his own bedroom and the attic guest room.

 

Relad was sat at the small wooden chair in the entry next to the kitchen, thinking deeply to himself. He had plated his food already, a simple collection of leafy greens and berries from the small garden outside that was accompanied by a cooked strip of beef flank. There was little to no seasoning - salt was for preserving and testing for Darkspawn. The steam still wafted from the food, but he had found himself too terribly anxious to find an appetite. His mind was wandering into distant ideas and places far too frightfully often, he had found.

 

Across him, another plate was set. There was a kind woman staying with him at this time, though the hours she was and was not at home were varied, she was good company and good conversation, two things Relad had not been aware how sorely he needed after all that happened. This woman had a beautiful heart, wearing a sympathetic and kind smile at near all hours. Truthfully, she lit up this new home far better than any light he had hung. However, with such busy hours that she had, he would always just leave food warm and a plate at the table for if she arrived home early. He wanted to be good to his guest, of course.

 

"She reminds me of you."

 

The voice that came from his lips as he sat there was his own indeed, but he had let his thoughts slip into words once again in this empty house. He had learned of God, of the Red Faith, or at least what people could spend the time to tell him. Relad still struggled to write severely and reading was very little better as he was able only to pick out very few words, so reading scripture to be educated was out of the question.

 

She was not here, the woman his words were directed to. He had learned, recently, that prayer was for some a means to speak to those who are no longer with them. Relad would lean back in his chair, close his eyes for some few, fleeting moments.

 

"...you would like this place, I think. I have met so many kind people here, bright hearts as your own was. The woman who stays with me now, she wept, Miss Senna." He began, opening his eyes to begin to cut his food. He spoke as if she were there with him, just across the table. "It seems all I tell your story weep, or all I tell comfort me in your loss. Would you have believed it if I were to tell you how many dozens of people told me how wonderful you would have been to meet?"

 

"This land is wholly unfamiliar. They were weary of me as a man of the Empire, but even the scabbed child, scored and burned as you were, offers his hand to me in friendship now." He continued, setting the cutlery down and gazing at the empty chair. How he wished he could simply will her to manifest here for this conversation, to speak of the day, of harvest.

 

"I never did thank you for saving my life, Miss Senna. You showed me what those people were like, what risk I was sliding into by working so hard for them." He muttered, before looking idly at the food he had half-cut. It was cooling down, now, but that was the furthest thing from his mind in this moment. "I worked for you, though. You were a good woman, unappreciated, overworked. I could see that, looking back on our time together. You were stronger than any of the Inquisition that bound you to that horse, braver than any of the Knights who watched your body fall limp in silence. I do not think I will ever meet another so astounding as you."

 

"...I know you would brush these compliments aside with your thanks and ask me to stop. That was the kind of woman you were. Strong, humble, dedicated. I saw in you the kind of person I wished to be, and wonder now if, perhaps, you saw in me the person you wished you still were."

 

The steam was gone from the room, now. Only the gentle curls of smoke from the firepit and smell of burning cedar.

 

"I miss our talks. Do you remember when we rode that week? You showed me the mines, but I was too nervous to attempt to ride a horse of my own. You sat me upon the back of your own, those legs of that steed blurring aross the grass as the land turned to smears of color." Relad would turn to look at the fire, now, those changing hues and shadows that dance along the walls. Perhaps her shadow was there, listening. He took a breath, intent on the wish that perhaps she was. "It was beautiful, to me. A freedom that I had never truly known with a person trapped beyond what I ever knew. I wonder still if you saw our days of travel for work in the same way. I hope if you are listening now that the memories are enough to bring you the joy I felt in those days."

 

"I am...sorry that we never got to have dinner that night, Miss Senna. I had made a pumpkin pie for you, the first of the harvest of the new crop. I think you would have liked that."

 

Relad would take a shallow, shuddering breath then. The food had gone cold, and he took his plate to place upon the warm coals to begin to gradually reheat it.

 

"I hope I'm living a life you would be happy to see me live, Miss Senna. If you ever return a terrible spirit upon the land, I might ask you find the time to rest here. I would invite you happily into this new home, away from those that hurt you, surrounded by people who would love your company."

 

"You were never an opportunity to me. You were never a burden. You were never an expectation. You were never a De Senna in my eyes."

 

"You were my hero, Miss Senna. I hope you have received a hero's rest. You have earned that and more."

 

Relad would blink a few times. There was the familiar sting of the tears welling, again, but he swallowed the bitter sorrow down. If she was watching, he knew she would hate to see him in such grief. So, he returned to the table with his food.

 

"...would it be selfish of me to say I miss you?" asked Relad to the room.

 

But only the popping of the fire answered. 

 

Another breath, another beat of silence.

 

Another breath, the consumption of dinner.

 

Another breath, into bed.

 

Another breath, the dreams set in.

 

Another breath of golden fields, fresh air, and the two of them talking over morning coffee of what to plant this coming season.

 

A good dream, tonight.

 

Spoiler

Hello everyone, I wanted to first thank you all for being so very welcoming to LoTC. This thread is intended as a series of notes, logs, and reflective events of Relad Orison.

 

I do hope this is the right place to post this, but if not, please do tell me and I will move it to proper areas straightaway.

 

Thank you for reading and I hope to continue having the wonderful experience on LoTC I have had these last few weeks for many more.

 

Edited November 7, 2025 by LuckyD

[TaraJess 2848]

Perhaps there were glimpses of her still around, in the rustling of the wind running through wheat fields, in the gaze of any pale horse that found him. Her horses were always white…

[Navigator 4260]

Spoiler

You're going far. This is beautiful.

 

I could read a thousand episodes, pages, editions.

 

It flows well, it reads well. Holy shit.

 

[LuckyD 141]

Relad had just finished tending to one of the cattle. Goodness how time would fly, how things moved so very fast. Why, it felt at times like years slipped between his fingers like running water. He could scarcely imagine what older men must feel like, those in their sixties or seventies must feel like years have become weeks. He truly did not know how the Elves kept sane.

 

Still, however, the topic of age was not the main thing on good Relad's mind in these recent days. He had begun the question of faith, a journey many men and women of the realm take at some point or other in their lives. Relad had been raised in a home which bore no cross, so to speak. Never was he one to claim to be a learned man, but he did remember that evening all those months ago that he tried to pray for Miss Senna. Goodness, why, he thinks he should do so again tonight.

 

It was some hours later in the eve, then. He closed the door to his kitchen - a much larger and more grand kitchen now, he might add - and set the Ferrum bolt upon it so that none might sneak in to abscond with his oats, or even life. The crackling pop of dry wood in the fireplace was his company tonight, but he set the table for four. Hearty bread with nuts, a wooden pitcher of cool water, a whole chicken, and pumpkin pie, freshly made with a knob of butter - these were the things set before him. He still knew very little of how to properly season anything, but enough sugar in the pie and enough butter under the chicken's skin made them more than good to him. The wooden plates were set, the platter for the food placed in the center of the table. Relad sat, then, and looked to the other side.

 

"My family has reunited, Miss Senna. I thought that to be the most important thing to tell you first." He began, rubbing a small, worn cheesecloth over the small wooden knife. No one wanted to chew a splinter, after all. "My little brother, Rorimack. Goodness, I'd not seen him in ten-odd years. You can imagine how surprised I was when I saw him on the road."

 

"I was riding that horse, you know the one. Just about Norland, by the far passage. Who do I see but him, lost! Looking for directions, not sure which signs pointed where." Said Relad. He paused, then, to take a mild drink of his water. It was a nice feeling, talking to her like this - well, even if it was a strange thing if others might see him do it. "You might imagine I scooped him up and invited him to live here with me. Well, you would be very correct, Miss Senna. On we went, trading stories and those little sibling jabs at the pride, like when we were children. He has changed little since then."

 

A breath, then. Cold. Lonely despite it all.

 

"My sister, too. Well, half-sister I suppose, but she has always felt a sister to me. She arrived just yesterday. Asked to be put up. How could I deny blood? I know you'd have done the same for a stranger like me, and I think..." He muttered, recollecting his thoughts for but a moment. "...well, I think that these two have taken all my guest beds. I might need to make another."

 

A breath, some laughter. Warm laughter. He felt a tad less alone.

 

"They would have loved you, I like to think. But goodness enough on this, so much news, so much news, indeed. I've been learning of the Red Faith recently, why even subscribing to it. It feels good to be sorrounded by folk who see everyone as equals, like you did."

 

A breath once more. This time, it was sullen, hollow, tired.

 

 

"...they let me add your name to the tree, Miss Senna. I used your first name, I hope you wouldn't have minded." He began, swallowing the dry lump in his throat. "Even the Norlanders respected you, Lorenna. Even the people the Empire hurt so badly, when they listened to your story, the Keeper let me memorialize you with their honored dead."

 

Relad closed his eyes, taking a slow, deep breath. The air felt cold in his lungs, not refreshing as it should. The grip came again, that familiar ice that spread through his body like worms through soil. His next question to the empty room, to the image of Miss Senna, came distant, almost disbelieving.

 

"Do you think I've gone mad?"

 

The room would not answer him. Why would it? There was no one there. He was speaking to an empty seat.

 

"Rori would call me so, I might think. I have met ghosts and know you are not here, yet I speak as though you were. I convince myself you can hear me. I barter with my mind to feel as if you, the woman whom I respected and looked up to, might not be fully gone."

 

The silence was so very loud, now.

 

Why must the quiet always shriek so boldly?

 

"I passed one of the De Sennas on the road today. I recognized him from that day, we spoke. He did not so much as stop to look my way, just rode his horse with a task in mind." Muttered Relad, his thumb working gently at the handle of his fork. "You must have left a lot to do in your wake. I've begun to think more of my own family and what I will leave my siblings with. I am the eldest, but..."

 

A heartbeat, then. Not his own, but outside. They must be home.

 

"...I suppose it matters little, now, if I am mad or not. I think of these as happy times, our talks. If you are listening, somehow, somewhere - thank you for everything you did for me. I hope my words might keep you company like your memory does for me, Miss Senna."

 

Then, without a word more, the door opened. In came the siblings.

 

The three of them were sat at the table. The spare plate was explained away as preperation for a guest that could arrive. The space was left open.

 

A memory hit him, somewhere between the conversation at the table with his siblings and the warm embrace of sleep, then.

 

His own voice. His own words, directed once to her, and time again since to others.

 

> "Well I tell you, Miss Senna, my home and table will be open to you always."

 

Good dreams of wheat and gold, once more.

 

How Relad loved their little talks.

[TaraJess 2848]

There was life in the woods.

[LuckyD 141]

 

[LuckyD 141]

His heart felt like it had been torn from his chest.

 

His lips were dry, his hands as he fumbled for the handle of his home would not - COULD not stop shaking. Trembling. Those terrible tremors flowing up and down his body.

 

Relad went up the stairs, for tonight he did not tend the fire. He barely registers Revekka taking care of it in the minutes to come. He collapses on the floor, not on his bed, or into a chair  - but onto the hardwood.

 

There was the painting. Lorenna's eyes upon him again. That gaze which had always held so much comfort, such warmth. He had studied it so much over these last ten years.

 

The room felt as though it was swaying around him, churning with his bubbling emotions as he sunk into a pathetic heap of a man upon his floor. It felt to Relad in that moment as if the very home he built was going to swallow him whole, the floorboards pulling him lower until his nose pressed painfully to the unforgiving oak. His eyes squeezed shut then so tightly that colors flashed in his blinded vision. There were hot streaks of fire that danced along the edges of his gaze, the veins of his eyelids from the pressure of his palms - that is what it must have been. At some point in this anguished, soundless moment he must have pressed his hands to his eyes.

 

A man five years from fifty clenched his teeth together so hard his gums may have bled. His scream was not of sound, but of air catching in the throat only interrupted occassionally by a deep, desperate, choking gasp.

 

Relad's muscles felt like they would tear thenselves apart as he turned upon his side, resisting the urge to vomit, swallowing back the hot bile in his throat. His ringing ears subsided enough for him to finally register the deep, loud inhaling and exhaling of his nose. He latched onto that sound, that feeling, focusing on the rythem of it. Something he could control, something he knew was real.

 

Relad stayed this way for several long, agonizing minutes. Broken. Shattered. Weak. Pained.

 

Then, it melted into a less primal thing. It melted into anguish. Into hot, stinging tears. Into terrible, burning sobs that tore his throat as he muffled them with the crook of his arm for fear his siblings would hear them. The primal agony had melted into a full, total meltdown. Relad would lie there under her gaze again, crying. Sobbing. The shuddering spasms of his body were the only things that reminded him to breathe past pushing his arm against his jaw and nose hard enough to nearly break them.

 

After minutes more, finally, he could form words again. Finally grief had not taken his ability to speak away, like it had to her. 

 

"...you're alive..."

 

Those two words caused another fit. Another wave of agonizing grief that hit him harder than any blow he had taken since her death. Fury took hold, not at her, but at himself. She lived. She lived and he left her to suffer while he built a life in her memory?

 

The books flew from shelves, a table brought upon it's side, sheets torn from the bed, chairs swung across the room. He could not make a sound, crashing his body into a frenzy of action.

 

"You are ALIVE!?"

 

There it was. A scream. The world 'alive' left his throat like vomiting glass, drawn-out was it so that he grew horse of voice in his collapse once again to the floor.

 

"I am so sorry, Miss Senna. Allfather, Lorenna, I am so sorry!" He begged. He was sure he was looking up at her portrait again, but his vision was so blurred by tears that he could only make out dull swashes of color. "I left you...Allfather...you have suffered, I left you for dead, Lorenna..."

 

"You, who I so respected, who gave me a life, who shaped me into who I am now. You! You have been wandering the WOODS, alone, anguished, while I have built this life hopeful I might make your spirit proud of the man I became!" Came his confession, then. Broken, ashamed.

 

Afraid.

 

"Lorenna, I - I did everything because I wanted to be the man you made me feel like I could be. I became the Agricultural Head of a nation. I rebuilt the bridges with my family. I faught off a Demon. I have spoken to Kings, Emperors, Queens, Beggars. A true...part of my community. I have become more than anything I ever could have without you, BECAUSE I wished to honor what you saw in me!"

 

A knock at the door, he did not hear it. Perhaps Revekka or Rori had come, perhaps they had woken from the noise. On he went, for he spoke with the conviction of a man who had his world turned upon it's head.

 

"I found faith because of losing you, Miss Senna. You, who despite blue blood shed it toiling the same fields as a Serf. You, who despite everything going wrong in your life made the time for someone who no-one else thought mattered. You, Lorenna, YOU. You are the reason I found how much more I could be!" He wailed, standing up. In a flurry of emotion and choking desperation he would take the portrait from the wall, holding it tightly. This greaving man clung to this object as if his very life was balancd by it. Relad gripped the portrait of Lorenna de Senna as if the image of her was somehow an anchor keeping him from being swept away into the sea.

 

"I...Allfather, I am so sorry...please, forgive me. Please be okay. Allfather, Lorenna, I let you suffer for ten years...ten years...please be okay. Please. Please." Begged the man. He was pleading, clutching the painting in a room sorrounded by broken furnature. "Njáll, he - he said you were alive. Why did you never come here? I promised you, you would be safe. You would have a place at my table, always, Lorenna. You were my mentor, my friend, you inspired me to be a better man."

 

"...please, Miss Senna, please. I do not know what to do. I - I do not know how to find you, I do not know if you would even know me, anymore." Muttered he, shivering, sobbing.

 

"...Lorenna...I am so, so terribly sorry...Allfather, this is all my fault, if I had only searched...if I had not accepted your death so firmly, I- Allfather, what do I do? Please, I cannot do this on my own." Asked Relad, tearing his gaze from her portrait to look upon the burning candle in his room.

 

"Allfather, I beg you. Just...please, this once, please. I cannot do this alone. I am not strong enough, I am not a wise enough man, I have never been. The...the High Keeper, she said I may be a Paragon in death. The warriors of Norland tell me I have been as brave as the best of them. But...but I- Allfather, I failed to save even one woman who meant so much."

 

Begging his god for light to guide him in the deepest of darkness he had found himself in, the flickering candle did not move. Why would it? The Allfather had likely seen men in this grief before, why would Relad be different?

 

"Allfather...please, just...please. if I find her, stay my hand. Please give me the strength to save her. I...I do not have it. My flame is not bright enough to guide her home. Not yet. Not now. Please, help her, Allfather. Guide her though the cold, like you have me, like you had the good folk before."

 

Still, the flame only flickers. Relad spoke to an empty room. Relad begged the wrong god. He never knew who or what Lorenna followed.

 

Silence fell, then, as desperarion turned to a cold, terrible quiet.

 

"...I miss you, Miss Senna...but...but please...please, I beg fate he was lying to me. You deserve the peace you earned. You deserve to sleep."

 

 

A beat of the heart.

 

"If...if I see you again, Miss Senna, I will do whatever I must to give you peace. If you are a madwoman suffering, I will end it. If you are a spirit lost, I will guide you. If you are injured, I will carry you upon my back."

 

A breath of air.

 

 

"It is my turn, Lorenna. I need to help you, now, don't I? Like I should have."

 

 

A nail in the wall.

 

 

"...please, hold on. I promise you, I will not let you down again."

 

 

A vow.

 

 

"I beg you, wait a little while longer, Miss Senna."

 

 

A request.

 

 

"Allfather, watch over me as I do what must be done."

 

 

A plea.

 

 

"To love is to lose. To lose is to live. To live is to be loved."

 

An oath.

 

She deserves all the happiness he has built to be shared. He will ensure it is. It was because of Lorenna that he was where he was today.

 

He means to thank her properly.

Edited January 5 by LuckyD
Grammar. :)

[SpicyBats0 97]

Absolute cinema as always, my friend. 😭 

[LuckyD 141]

It was hard to tell where the woman he knew ended and when Lorena began.

 

 

He had just spent the last few days working to gather his things for the journey. It would be today that he rode for Idunia, to get help. He needed that, needed help. Corann, perhaps he could help. Corann knew all sorts of magic, but for that he would need to go to Petra. The Templars? They were as likely to kill her as help her if they got involved. Perhaps Veta would know what to do? Veta was used to strange things like this, surely-

 

Njàll? At the gate? Seems he was with a pair of people. Relad would walk over, apologizing again for how he had treated him when they last spoke. He was angry, hopeful, upset, all kinds of things at the news that Lorena lived. Revekka held him back like a collage kid after one too many drinks and Njàll never deserved to have to be looked at the way Relad had looked at him. The woman beside him would close the distance to Relad then, lifting his helm. The truth was that Relad was so exhausted, so weary from the nights of little to no sleep this last week that he hardly managed to even register the action enough to stop it.

 

"God, are they working you harder than I did?"

 

That voice took a few seconds to fully set in, but once it did Relad felt quite like he had taken a blow to the head. He took her by the shoulders more to convince himself she was real than anything else. Feelings buried for years bubbled just below the surface, things that had festered for so many nights. Even now, she was still the one with a wider view of the world and more wisdom than he gathered in the near ten years since he last saw her.

 

Lorena took Relad by the arm, leading him to the tavern, out of the clinging rain. It was not a warm evening, or a warm gaze that she held when finally she sat. The two spoke, then. Mostly it was Relad's disbelief that she lived, regret simmering up in his throat like bile. Despite every apology, every protest, her gentle voice and soft hands even despite that sullen gaze she now wore - they reached out to comfort him. Words of affirmation, of that guilt was not his own, and that he, too, had in some ways been missed.

The following was a rush, for him. As Lorena left, again, of all the words they spoke to one another a singular interact had echoed fearcely in his mind.

 

 

"You know you always have a place at my table, miss Senna. Why did you never come? Why have you been alone so long?" He had asked, and her words to him were haunting, indeed.
 

 

 

 

"I did. I went to the farm, but I could not find you."

 

 

 

 

Relad had no real way to know she would return after death. After all, none else in his life ever had. But still, that pang of regret at having fled the Empire after her death so rashly, knowing that had led her to living this secluded life she now did?

 

The decision after she left him in the Alefather to return to this new life she had chosen was something he felt almost pushed by fate itself to make. He looked to the High Keeper, stood, and with all the shaking courage he could muster he would say four words, unknowing how much they would change his life;

 

"I wish for Drowning."

 

Thusly did he march with passion and sorrow to the Hearth Temple. Determination was bubbling within him. Never again, never fail someone you love. Not Revekka. Not Rori. Not Lorena. His hands did not shake, his voice did not tremble, and as he stood watching the waters of the pool the echoes of a dozen-and-dozen footfalls of the citizens of Verdegrad gathering to observe dulled into silence. Down went his armor, stripped to gambison. Away went his bag, dropped to the ground. Ringing in the ears, blood rushing. The High Keeper spoke words he had listened to as an observer once before. He walked forward. Few words at all were shared between the High Keeper Sissle and himself, only a momentary glance that shared enough to tell her all she needed to know.

 

Relad was ready to die.

 

A heavy urn embossed with Nordic symbols was placed into his hands and with an exhale of the breath he held, then, did he fall forward. Relad would allow the weight of the urn to drag him and hold him down. Now was the time one should have reached to a Paragon, now was the time when prayer was to be made for the strength to stay under.

 

Thirty seconds.
 

 

The burning has not yet begun, but the pressure has built. His grip is firm. Relad would recede into the darkest corners of his mind, digging into memories he beloved. There, past the stinging eyes, the urn transformed into her abdomen, his knuckles white against her dress as she rode across the land. Grass and wheat, stone and mountain alike were but streaks of color as the two rolled along. She spoke to him of mining, of the state of wars that undoubtably were to come, and of how wonderful it was to work for the betterment of good people.


 

Sixty seconds.

 

 

The High Keeper had expected fully to have seen Relad rise from the waters by now, but he had not so much as moved. A dawning upon her, then, that this could be something of a miracle. Perhaps, yes, perhaps indeed there was more below the cowardice and guilt that riddled this man. May the waters wash them away.

 

Relad knew as the burning in his lungs began that he had to maintain his grip. His eyes shut, color blooming behind them in patters of spotty petals that pulse and ebb from the pressure of it all. He forces his hands through the handles of the Urn, gripping tightly upon it. Not even he notices the blood that trickles up from the water where the etchings have begun to cut into his palms. The dislocation of the thumb hardly registers past the pain in his chest.

 

He was somewhere else, despite all this. It was the field, his hands aching as they always had after having tilled by his lonesome. Other farmhands worked Lorena de Senna's lands, but never did he see them. Dinner was tonight, she promised she would sit with him and enjoy the spoils of the new harvest this evening. Wiping the dirt onto his slacks, Relad wandered down the road to Rittersberg.

 

The pain in his hands grew worse, then, as he felt his nails dig into his own bleeding palm. There she was, beaten by the Inquision of the time. There she kneels, head upon the block screaming that Relad had done no wrong. There she fell silent as the military at the time pushed him onto a horse. The mines were next, plucking away at ore to earn the horse she had already bought for him. All the while, that white-knuckled grip never left.

 

 

 

One hundred and twenty seconds. Two minutes.

 

 

 

 

Those observing had been gripped by a fear, curiosity, and sort of sick fascination. By now the crowd had grown to even those who did not know him, all wondering if he was indeed alive. Just as some folk were near to protest that surely Relad had died with no struggle, perhaps hit his head at the bottom, it came.

 

Red light filled the Hearth Temple.

The Red Comet had begun to pass, leaving crimson reflections upon the waters. It was then, in the following minute of stunned silence that Relad finally saw it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One hundred and eighty seconds. Three minutes.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Relad's very own words to the High Keeper after the conclusion of the ritual, some days later, he would try desperately to explain the following ten seconds.

 

"The Allfather looked back at me, never before had I felt so small. Like a flickering candle set before the light of a city aflame. Yet, in that moment, I realized he had truly seen me. From all his responsibility, from the duty of his eternal battle, he took that moment to look upon me."

 

"It is not a matter of what I believed I was, before. I have been Seen. Acknowledged by the Allfather himself, seen for something more. I have a duty to prove that I was worthy of such a thing, to others yes, but to myself most of all."

 

"Through my eyes the Allfather's Light will cast down the minions of the Dark. Through His guidance may my soul find it's way to His armies to continue the good fight."

 

"A passing glance to some, perhaps. But it was life-altering, for me."

 

"Be the man the Allfather wishes to have at His side, Relad Orison."

 

But before the end of the ritual, thus, what he had seen was darkness. Endless dark, cut away only by a figure wreathed in light and fire. The Allfadir, there he was appearing before Relad at the edge of death. No words were shared, only a singular, fleeting contact of gaze. He saw his god and his god saw him. Affirmation, validation, expectation. No Paragon before him, no Ancestor. Him.

 

When finally Relad broke from the water, coughing, sputtering, his muscles had near all life sapped from them. The Red Comet had passed, only traces of what those afore had seen of this miracle remaining in the tense air of the room. Relad used what remained of his strength to lift the Urn above his head and just when his body was about to fully give out, the High Keeper swung the Boomsteel Hammer to it. The Urn would explode into shards, sand within falling upon Relad in his rebirth. Initiate, Acolyte, Faithful. Cheering from many drowned out the ringing of blood rushing in his ears as the High Keeper instructed a pair to help him to his feet again. Relad would ask for Livius Flavius, dedicating 1,000 Mina to Norland on the spot - nearly his entire savings since coming to this continent. He had meaning, now. He would not fail these good people he so beloved. Not like he had others.

 

In the following four years, Relad Orison would be invited to live in Solgaard as a Norn properly. He would watch his sister finally grow into her own woman, even finding a man she seems at the moment of writing keen to be wed to. Relad would partake in battles of the war between the Empire and Four Brothers. Relad would speak to Kings and Princes, Queens and Princesses. He would Ward under the Princes of Idunia to set the cobblestones for a better future between Idunia and Norland. He would train harder than ever before. Why, he would even join with Darona's guild of Monster Hunters in the city of Viru. Most recently, he would experience the pain of losing mobility in his legs before the grace of the Shamans from Idunia, to Norland, to the Empire all each took part in his slow cycle of healing.

 

He had met many good people, made many better friends, and learned much more of the world than ever a simple farmer might know. Patience, restraint, honor, duty, dignity, charity, responsibility beyond what he ever believed himself capible.

 

Relad Orison was a Serf no longer.

 

Head of Agriculture of Norland.

 

Guardsmen and Auxilury of the Northern Host.

 

Acolyte of the Red Faith.

 

Hunter of the Gremio Cazadores.

 

Norland's Cultural Representative of Idunia, Ward of The Idunian Royalty.

 

Norn of the strong men and stronger women of Solgaard.

 

Uncle.

 

Older brother.

 

Friend

 

Llir.

 

Solider.

 

Merchant.
 

All these things more than a simple man, now.

 

Yet still, he must do more. He must do all he can for the people who have done so, so much for him.


 

As Relad sits at his new home, tending a fire in Solgaard, his thoughts of the emptiness prevail. Revekka lived with Wayde now. Rori had been at sea for years. Newt, his new neice, visited only fleetingly. Some elves had come to work for him, wayward and inexperienced folk, staying in his guest rooms and helping to stock his shops.

In that moment of loneliness, when the house is quiet, Relad reaches for something very, truly special. From swirling mist would come a woman, someone whom he had only just recently gotten to know, but who he felt knew all of his life.

 

Her voice dripped like the sweetest of honey, her personality bubbly as the most mirthful child that ever he had met, and her demenor so purely good that he had known they would achieve great things even on first meeting. As soon as she appeared, her words flowed from her aquamarine lips like a song.

 

 

"What do ya wish for, boss?"

 

 

Relad paused, then, sitting on the edge of his bed and gesturing to the portrait of Lorena afore the wall. The paint had faded over the years, but still that woman was beautiful as the day they rode the countryside.

 

"...I wish to make a world where people like her are happy. Where my siblings do not need me to check under their bed for monsters. Where the dark is no longer a thing to fear, in the hearts of men, or in the body of Grendel-kin." Spoke Relad, gazing at the painting. He would watch his new friend touch it, her fingers tracing gently the intricate work of art.

 

"Alrighty. Let's do it. You can count on me, boss!"
 

When finally Relad fell asleep again, for the first time in a very long time, he was excited for tomorrow. Perhaps it was the oppertunity at hand, perhaps it was knowing he finally had the power to do good on a scale bigger than himself, perhaps it was just a happiness to have met someone who finally believed in the world he dreamed of giving people.

 

Whatever it was, Relad would dream that night, and the dreams were of full bellies for all the world, of kindness among Descendants, and of the spreading of happiness. Lorena, he thinks, would like to see a dream like that be real. Somewhere in his mind, he hopes she visits again for that dinner they never had. Somewhere deeper, still, he hopes she found the peace she was looking for.

 

Then, even deeper, in the furthest corners, ths touch of his new friend's soul upon his own was a warm comfort that he had not felt since he was a boy. The comfort of seeing the world not as something to struggle against, but as something to be made better than he had been born into it by the time he finally has to leave.

 

 

Spoiler

I want to add a genuine and sincere thank you to the dozens upon dozens of people that I have interacted with over the last few months. Even if your meeting with Relad was a brief one, I try to keep screenshots of every person he has meaningful interaction with. Recently, it has become so very many that is is becoming hard to keep track of so many names!

 

Sincerely, you have all made my time on the server so far one of the best roleplaying experiences I have ever had. How Relad has survived this long is beyond me, but I look forward to all the interactions from here on out. Thank you, all of you, for encouraging me to interact with this wonderful community and game.

 

Flame Guide you, gamers.

 

Edited January 27 by LuckyD
Grammer and ooc comment.