BEGIN ACT TWO

[acronius_ 199]

[!] The following in-character post is intended for your entertainment only and cannot be referenced in-roleplay.

 

Lorandil Sindarin knew that things would happen before they did, and he was proven correct. Alas, a sharp tongue and oft-drab attire made him no more convincing than a petulant child begging for yet another cookie. Time, and time again, he watched loved ones tread too close to the edge of oblivion and brush away the rope he cast to them. He watched them fall and lamented the latest failure. 

His fact of life was a constant languor born of the sense of inevitable disappointment that his efforts would yield. Recollections, vivid and evermore painful, flashed upon the back of his eyelids as a canvas and showed him exactly where his life had been decided. They told him what sort of man he would become. They burrowed into his mind, clamping claws of steel and conjured deceit that drilled deeper into the man’s soul. He became them.

These visions were called forth for a reason–that he could understand–but further thought eluded him. He felt himself frown but could not lift it. He felt his body shift in a forward motion through the artificial void of his subconscious and he could not drag himself back. His only choice was forward. His only choice was a frown. The crossroads came and he simply bypassed them, carrying on straight through a rarely-traversed frontier. A stranger on the roads, a beautiful, bright woman, offered him a smile in greeting, and he ignored her. 

He hit a wall. The void around him had become dark and deeper still, all light banished but from an inconceivable number of windows from which motes of swirling mana coincided with beams of gentle light appearing as if from dying lanterns. They flickered into existence, opened wide to accept what may come, then space would consume them just as quickly. When one closed, another was summoned from the Nothing. One appeared just before the man, and without thinking it, he was delivered into the window’s dim scene. 

Time turned in upon itself. He felt himself bend, fold, and be shorn of his skin, then sinew, then bone. Each fragment of his existence was removed, tailored, then returned in a smaller shape, with less muscle, less pain, less guilt. He felt lighter, yet awkward, as if he was walking above the clouds upon stilts. The contradictory existence he must sustain would not last long, he knew, but he was an actor in the play. He would follow the pull of the windows.

 

He came to the first scene.

 

Act One, Scene Two: Reunion in Remembrance

 

[Enter ILYTHYRRA SINDARIN, a fair ‘aheral of golden hair, playing a soft, strumming song upon a lute. Her face was hidden by a shroud.]

ILYTHRRA, singing: O’ far doth ancient path lead thee, thither mountain majesty, forging further, and again do you leave me, eternally. (quieting) Can he truly be lost? Thirty years–most of my life–I have not seen him. I showed enough defiance to survive. Did he not?

[Enter LORANDIL SINDARIN, a younger ‘aheral with bright silver hair shorn at the shoulders. He lowers himself into the alcove to speak with the minstrel.]

LORANDIL: Good lady of the light, I lift my eyes up to thee, but you are sat upon the earth. Such cannot be true. Your song belongs in the heavens.

ILYTHYRRA, blushing: The clouds do not have ears to hear it, and the birds do not have a voice to praise it. He who has ears to hear, let him hear, and he who has a voice to praise, I should hope he stands near.

LORANDIL: Your own sings rhyme and speaks it in the same rhythm with equal grace. I shall say my day has been made. Who do you sing for?

ILYTHYRRA, bowing her head: I sing for a man I lost a very, very long time ago. I miss him more dearly each and every day.

LORANDIL: A lover?

ILYTHYRRA: A brother.

[LORANDIL is quiet. ILYTHYRRA speaks again.]

ILYTHYRRA: I hope that he will hear my song. Perhaps you are right; I should sing in the heavens. There, he may hear me more clearly.

LORANDIL: I believe he can hear you just fine. Do you think his spirit would ever leave you, as long as you shall live?

ILYTHYRRA: I cannot imagine it so, but I cannot even remember his face. I cannot imagine much of anything. I can only hope, friend.

LORANDIL: What was his name, fair lady?

[ILYTHYRRA is quiet for a moment. She frowns pensively, eyes closed.]

ILYTHYRRA: His name was Lorandil. I can remember now. I named him.

[LORANDIL hides his excitement.]

ILYTHYRRA: Lorandil, the Lover of Gold. Why? Because I had golden hair, and I wanted him to love me. I held him first, after mother had finally been removed of his burdening weight. He cried, oh, how he cried. His little lungs must have been two sizes too large for his chest.

LORANDIL: Your golden hair is beautiful.

ILYTHYRRA: And I was always near. I thought I must have chosen the perfect name, for when I held him and rocked him in my arms, he grabbed at my hair and held it like a Dwarf clings to jewels.

LORANDIL, reaching for her hair: He must have seen only you.

[ILYTHYRRA looks up. Her eyes go wide and she lifts her veil.]

ILYTHYRRA: And does he stand before me today, or am I living the finest dream?

LORANDIL: He still only sees you.

[ILYTHYRRA jumped to her feet and grabbed LORANDIL by the shoulders.]

ILYTHYRRA: Lorandil.

LORANDIL: Ilythyrra.

ILYTHYRRA, tears springing to her eyes: Now that you are here, I remember your face. How you have grown, brother. I am so proud of you.

[LORANDIL embraces her, hiding his own tears. ILYTHYRRA loudly sobs, clinging to her brother. The scene around them fades until it is only the two siblings, reunited.]

BOTH: Oh, how I’ve missed you.

 

Lorandil Sindarin was torn from Ilythyrra, sobbing silently. He wished to cry out, to reach for Ilythyrra, but he was leaving her behind. The window was closing, and it sought to drag his soul from whence it did not belong. Another was left behind, the younger, innocent Lorandil. The two siblings hugged each other still as Lorandil watched from afar. When he passed clouds, he reached for them as if they were solid, and did not feel even the damp chill of lofted steam. He sped up, above the world, towards the midday sun. He felt no heat. He simply was, then was not.

He returned to the Mind-Void. His tears evaporated into shimmering motes of light. He blinked, and the window was gone. It disappeared as if it had not been there to begin with. Lorandil looked up and aside, finding the same matrix of unseen possibilities. He lifted his will to one in particular, for no reason other than that it was closest, and it gravitated toward him. He chose it, this time, rather than the window choosing him. He peered within.

He saw a pleasant scene lit by means of a blazing hearth. He saw himself curled up on a sofa with a gorgeous woman in both arms, their forms relaxed against one another so that they appeared as one. Both wore gentle smiles and had eyes closed. They were so clearly at peace that Lorandil could not help but feel a deep envy. This was the life he was meant to have. He could sense that this Lorandil was older than he, but this Lorandil was not burdened by his dread. This Lorandil had both eyes. This Lorandil caressed his wife’s cheek with a biological left hand. This Lorandil kissed her with smooth lips. 

A small child toddled up on novel legs from the tall doorway to the sofa, supporting themself by their hands as their legs shook. The little one clearly spoke, though Lorandil could not hear, as that man’s eyes opened and fell upon the child’s visage. He smiled so fairly, so kindly, that Lorandil could hardly recognize the man as himself. The toddler tried to climb onto the sofa. 

Another person came into the room from the same doorway, one Lorandil suddenly recognized, yet could not remember. He knew he had seen it, or would see it, but could not recall such. He felt a distant tug at his soul, and he reached out to touch the window. Suddenly, silence was broken, and as he held the contact in the Mind-Void, he could hear the scene. 

 

Act              , Scene            : Antagonistic Victory

 

[LORANDIL SINDARIN and ANJWHW LQJGUWWV embrace on a comfortable sofa. A small girl, no older than three,  waddles over to them.]

GIRL: Maln!

LORANDIL, smiling: Hel-lo tinuviel. 

GIRL, mumbling: We made you tea. Come sit down.

LWJJIBWW: We? Did MAL sisters HANN

GIRL, JANNWO: Oh.

[GIRL looks to a corner of the room. She points.]

GIRL: Iblees is watching.

 

Lorandil Sindarin held the contact as long as he could, until he was forcibly repelled by an unseen force. Those in the scene, including the version of himself he could not recognize, learned of him. They saw him watching. If he was truly meant to be there, they would not have seen anything at all; so he thought. He did not know precisely how this knowledge came about–it seemed as if he had spoken–but it had, and the three in the scene banished him back to the Mind-Void. The window slammed shut violently, collapsing in on itself. He could not see inside, but he knew that he had erased that existence. He dared to hope.

Hope was dangerous, see. Hope that he could renew himself, hope that he could repair his relationships, hope that he could call a family his own once more; all was in vain. He had seen the future he was meant to have and that Lorandil, the better Lorandil, pushed him away. That could not be his future.

Lorandil may have found himself at peace a century ago, and grown to be that version of himself, but he had deviated so far from the steady silence he once knew to a reprehensible position of intentional chaos. He had ruined it. 

Yet, he forged onward. Or, rather, he was taken again. The windows had their will and he was to bend to them, enter when they opened, and be thrown from them when they no longer wished to be so. That sole attempt to choose his own destiny, though he had not known what he had seen to be anything within the realm of possibility, had been fruitless. He could not choose. The Mind-Void chose for him. 

Another window to the material shimmered in the distance. It became clear to Lorandil that he was not moving. He did not feel the gentle tug any longer when his perspective appeared to shift in space. Rather, the edges of the Mind-Void became colored. Where there had been nothing, suddenly there was something, and it was more vivid than the most fragrant wildflowers. In fact, he noticed a near-overwhelming scent of wildflowers whence the thought was proffered to the Mind-Void. He willed the scent away. It went away. It was replaced with absolute tedium; there was nothing again. The Mind-Void had reached out to the motes of peace lingering in his shriveled soul and was denied. He lamented yet another loss of character.

As Lorandil did refuse the Mind-Void’s hospitality, the space around him ceased its collective movement and he was forced to drag himself through it again. He went, partly by his will, mostly by that of the Mind-Void, to the third window. This one held a golden glow and an undulating, warping surface that seemed ready to shatter. The power within was so great that it magnetized the soul of its observers and dragged them within. He did not go. He was stolen. He did not look. He saw. He did not listen. He heard. The visions were forced into his subconscious and settled into the material. He did not reach out, but he felt. He was touched. He was dragged forth into the arms of a protector, that embrace warm and motherly, and he was held close as he went into the next scene. 

 

Act One, Scene Seven: Passionfruit

 

[Enter LORANDIL SINDARIN, forlorn. He takes a seat in a tavern and is served a simple meal of pottage and tea. The setting is known to be Kalldur, a lost isle, home of the descendents before Azuras.]

LORANDIL, bemoaned: Sorrow, that is my liege. I bend to her, and she beats me with her wooden cane. Betrayal, that is my knight. He defends me from insult yet allows a barbarian to impale me. Loneliness, that is my eternity. I reach out to its subjects and they turn to their own. They do not see me. Alas, I see them, and long for them, but what attention can a wastrel claim? None, save pity. I am pitied, and that is worse than being ignored.

[He spills his pottage onto the floor deliberately.]

LORANDIL: I am not worthy of service. I should sit and starve. Pity my grave, all, and read my epitaph. Read it aloud and know thee fault. I could have been saved. 

[He sips his tea. He makes an ugly face at it.]

LORANDIL: Even my tastes betray me. What can I find joy in if not for lavender tea? To a ratio of one-part milk, three-parts broth, and a spoon of sugar? Where has the sweetness gone? Ah. I understand. I do not deserve sugar.

[He calls over the waitress, one JULIEA KORALI, an ‘ame of short stature yet strong presence.]

JULIEA: You shan’t have me clean your spill.

LORANDIL: No, no, fair Lady. I only ask what has happened to my tea.

JULIEA: It was brewed.

LORANDIL: There is no sugar.

JULIEA: I assure you, there is.

LORANDIL: There is not.

JULIEA: You must have strained it through your teeth.

LORANDIL, becoming annoyed: I cannot imagine such inflammatory speech proffered of fine lips.

JULIEA: Then what of it? Find your own sugar. You will have none of mine.

LORANDIL, loudly: I will wait for you. (quieter) Explain your distaste when the sun has fallen to rest. I cannot stomach my drink, nor your language.

JULIEA, smiling innocently: You may as well lay your bedroll upon the grass.

LORANDIL: So I shall.

[LORANDIL leaves the tavern empty-handed. He indeed lays his bedroll out upon the grass outside the tavern and resigns himself to await JULIEA. Hours pass. The last patron leaves the tavern, followed by JULIEA as she locks the door. She is surprised to see LORANDIL waiting with a glare.]

JULIEA, taken aback: The stubbornness of the ‘aheral rears its head and raises its hackles! You did wait!

LORANDIL, clearly remembering why he was upset: My tea had no sugar.

JULIEA: It did not! I admit and beg you banish the thought it had been intentional.

LORANDIL: Was it so difficult to admit your fault?

JULIEA: You so clearly consider yourself of immense importance. 

LORANDIL: I admit my own fault in accosting the owner of the establishment.

JULIEA, grinning triumphantly: Good man. Next time you shall not waste.

LORANDIL: I shall not. I was caught in my own mind.

JULIEA: So I could tell, were it not even for your outburst. You have the look about you of a man severed from his will.

LORANDIL, surprised: Can you read me as you would a novel?

JULIEA: I suppose I could read you as I would a dish.

LORANDIL: A dish?

JULIEA: Taste.

[LORANDIL grew flustered. He opens his mouth but cannot speak.]

JULIEA: And your complexion takes such color. It reminds me of the peppers I grow.

LORANDIL: Surely they rival your tongue in heat, for your words seem to have my heart skewered upon a glowing stake.

JULIEA: Can you handle spice, llir?

LORANDIL: I would certainly be willing to try.

JULIEA: Then have your taste.

[The two kiss. LORANDIL is left wide-eyed and gawking. JULIEA laughs.]

JULIEA: A blowfish, that is what you remind me of most. 

LORANDIL: And yourself, a lantern-lit temptress.

JULIEA: Oh, be strong, Ser. Do not fall victim.

LORANDIL: I am not a victim. I am a subject.

JULIEA: Mine own?

LORANDIL: Who else?

JULIEA: The woman you bemoan in your thoughts.

[LORANDIL shakes his head.]

JULIEA: Then you are mine.

LORANDIL: I would not have it another way.

[JULIEA takes LORANDIL’s hand and leads him into the quaint ‘ame village. They stop at her hut and she ushers him within. There, the ancient curse of Malin would have missed its mark. The sun rose upon the village and revealed the two intertwined underneath a blanket. LORANDIL kisses JULIEA’s forehead. She wakes.]

JULIEA: Can it be that morning has risen? I would have assumed our embrace to outlast death’s reaches.

LORANDIL: Such a scenario demands my eternity. I cannot give it to you.

JULIEA: Yet you proffer your blood?

LORANDIL: Something much more easily given, Juliea.

JULIEA: Call me ‘darling’ and you will tie the knot.

LORANDIL: Is a promise enough?

JULIEA: But it is a promise, Lorandil. It is a promise of that eternity. You crossed a line you did not wish to but did so with such vigor I assumed you had known the consequence.

LORANDIL: Consequence?

JULIEA: Eternity.

LORANDIL: Something I cannot offer.

JULIEA, exploding: Why not? You say your heart is severed of its bonds but it cannot be! You wear your sorrow, still!

[JULIEA stands, holding her nightgown shut. She pointed to the door with her other hand.]

JULIEA: Be gone. I will not abet a deceiver. If I had known, I would have steeped hemlock for your tea!

[LORANDIL gathers his belongings and quickly leaves the hut. The door slams behind him. He walks into a shadow.]

 

Lorandil watched from his perch in the metaphysical as he realized his deceit. Perhaps that is what this was meant to be, this journey into his possibilities; a simple reminder. He had met the Korali woman under the guise of a longing bachelor, and had delivered himself to her hands. He gave unto her a child, and in his selfishness, damned the gentle woman to death.

She died by his will, alone. She delivered his blood at the cost of her own. She had no remaining family, nobody to claim her body but an acquaintance who endeavored to have her fate known to Lorandil. Alongside the messenger came a basket that carried an infant wrapped in cool quilting. The girl possessed shorter ears than he, and her visage held a golden tone. What marked her as his, however, was her pair of blue eyes. He gave her the name of Mira’lean, for he likened her soft cooing to his attention to a gentle summer song at the hands of a graceful minstrel. 

In siring a daughter, he betrayed both Juliea’s trust and that of the woman he had so-nearly pledged his life to, that woman whom he mourned for. She came back to him, in time, and he was forced to reveal Mira’lean to her. Despite the betrayal, they were wed, much to the disdain and near hatred of the woman’s blood. He was never considered one of their own save for the love of his wife. At times, it felt as if he was one with her, but those times were rare. It was more common for him to act as an observer. He watched as she kissed him and allowed his subconscious to decide his action. He watched when she bent over her garden and strained her withering bones. He watched when their home was besieged and she went to battle. He drank tea.

She achieved for the family a position in a ducal society. She rose to power as a duchess, dragging him along. Not a decision was made, nor proffered as a suggestion, from his lips. He was but a jelly carried without even languor on a lazy current befitting his stagnance. The Duchy fell. He was carried to Aelwen, the Sanctum of Malin, and given yet further clemency. She still loved him, still held him, still tailored his suits, still fed him, and still sought to deliver him a son. He was undeserving, he knew, but selfishness overruled his desire to be proper, to be honest. He reaped what he did not sow, and eventually the field dried. He found famine. Only then, when her affections began to fall away, did he finally decide to forge a path anew.

Lorandil Sindarin closed his eyes for recollection. When they were opened once more, and he gazed upon the Mind-Void, the window had gone. There was pure white in every direction, bright but not blinding. It was not alight, but simply colored for the quality of tranquility. His tumultuous heart would not be fooled. He turned to find the direction from whence he came, but found only more white. Had he turned at all? He tilted his head to the right, or rather made the motion of such as would be expected of a descendent. He could not see his perspective shift, nor sense any movement. Yet, he knew he moved. What was not seen, nor felt, was known. 

As such, he knew a presence befell him. He was turned without his will. First, an embrace of heat curled over his limbs that before could not feel. His soul was not burdened by machine. Where tendrils of flame wrapped around skin, the touch was reminiscent of the trickling fall of a hot spring’s outflow. He bathed in it. The presence beckoned him forth and he allowed his soul to float where it was desired. Blurred vision hinted at a wall of feathers, and sharper vision owed to an increased focus told him he looked upon a titanic gray wing. He snapped his head to the left, but this was not the will of the presence. His movement was ignored. 

His soul was no longer his. He was a spectator once more, an observer, free to comment yet choosing silence. He watched. He listened. 

“Once noble, once honorable, turned to a deceiver. A villain,” a voice spoke, feminine in nature and commanding in its diction, “And not a fine one.”

“What do you demand of me?” Lorandil spoke up. The voice made a sound like clicking its tongue, though the figure he assumed the voice belonged to did not betray the act. Its–her–eyes glowed a piercing silver hue. Her face was angled, reptilian in nature, and seemingly sensing the man’s sudden trepidation, the woman sneered to expose yellowed, gnarly teeth.

“Nothing at all. I wished only to accompany you on your journey. It is difficult to ignore an intrusion to my plane. Consider me a nosy neighbor.” The woman cackled, her trilling laugh bouncing off the walls of the metaphysical and centering on Lorandil’s senses like a gong struck in his head. He blinked. She was no longer tangible, discernable as an animalistic figure. She had turned to a swirling mass of light, both dark and bright, either side clashing within her form as they did in his mind. She had no mouth to smile with, but he felt the gesture. Her light touched him. “Who was she?”

“A lover. Nothing more.”

“But there is always something more.”

Lorandil bit his cheek. He felt no pain. “She was the mother to my daughter.”

This delighted the woman. He watched the swirling dark coincide with the light to make gray, then flickering blood-red burst without in the shape of musical notes upon a page. He heard the sound as if it was a distant memory of a choir singing the praises of a Lord. She hummed.

“You were responsible for her death.” It was not a question.

“Yes,” he answered, still, “I was.”

The woman laughed, a strange, grating sound like pebbles tumbling down a steep cobblestone road. “You did not even think to go back to her.”

“I did not.”

“Selfish.”

“Yes.”

“And you still married the other one? The one on the sofa?”

“Yes.

“Selfish.”

“I know.”

“You cannot fix it.”

He shook his head. “I cannot.”

He could tell the woman raised her eyebrow.

“But you could have.”

“I could have.” Such was known to him. There was a time when he could see his future so clearly it appeared as if it was already set in stone. He was able to decipher the writing on the walls. “Long ago.”

“It may as well have been yesterday. Time is fickle.”

“I will live much longer than many expect. I am hunted–”

“As a villain should be.”

“But, not so easy to find.”

He shook his head. The swirling light went nearly completely dark. Lines of gold criss-crossed where her head should be. They made two images of the letter ‘x’ where eyes would be. Lorandil laughed.

“You are awfully pessimistic.”

“It is my nature. That is all I know.”

“Is your position not worse than mine? I am free.”

“Are you?” Her voice echoed in the Mind-Void. He suddenly felt shackled. He lifted his arm, knew he did, but it did not appear in his perspective. He turned his head, felt the movement, but still he remained focused on the woman. He could not move. Each effort to shift his metaphysical body was answered with an opposite movement of space within the Mind-Void by the woman he spoke with. “Are you free?”

He was allowed to speak. He knew then that, if she did not want him to, he could not. “I would certainly like to be.”

“You cannot fix it.”

“I know.”

“Then why do you want to go back?”

He closed his eyes for a moment. “It is the only world I know.”

“You know mine, now.”

“But it does not know me.”

“I can introduce you."

“Please free me."

The swirling stopped. It froze as if reaching a limit on a crank and began to reverse. It swirled slower, now. The light thrummed with palpable energy like a beating heart. He felt his heart beat in tandem. With equal parts horror and awe, he realized she was controlling it. She was controlling him. She was him. The swirling light wrapped him in its embrace and dissipated. He felt her within, and he reached out with his will to touch hers. She spoke directly into his brain. 

“I wish to know yours.”

His thoughts were no longer his own. His disapproval was known to her before he had a chance to speak it. 

“I want to watch. Your life is interesting to me.”

He attempted to repel her from his mind but she latched on with iron talons. The pain was too great, and he ceased the effort with a heavy breath.

“Or I can keep you here, and you can watch my tedium.” He heard her hum, the sound vibrating in his chest. He was humming. He nodded. “Good.”

The Mind-Void remained as they did not. Finally, outside of her grasp, he was free to move. He turned his head and he found that the exit was directly behind him, a mundane cobblestone arch to his chambers. He was still in his bed, fast asleep, the candles burnt out by this hour. He was so near, yet had assumed a journey of days’ time. He knew he would never understand the woman’s nature.

“And I do not intend you to.”

He nodded, lips pressed into a thin line. He took a step forward to the edge of the Mind-Void. He leapt from the cliff down into the material and found his soul gravitating back to his true body. His pain returned, and he no longer felt his renewed limbs. His vision was halved. His heart strained. Worst of all, he felt a weight in his head from the presence newly residing there. One last little push, and a sharp pinch within, and he resigned himself to being a vessel.

 

He woke up.

 

[Begin Act Two]

Posted it correctly this time. Yay!

Edited April 16 by acronius_
typos

[Hush 112]

PEAKKKK!!! HOLY PEAK! THIS IS INSANE!!!

[Cheese 8882]

you may have just revolutionized the narrative post industry

[F1F4 121]

Neat!!