The Long Road Home

[Chaqery 427]

[Stevie 1598]

[[ i walk a lonely road the only one that i have ever known

[Scipp3r 451]

wb

[Kaiser 2347]

((clap clap clap))

[Peter Chivay 2494]

[[ 

[ACanadianCraft (Nate) 682]

Hoh!

[Avacyn 1712]

ERMAHGERD

CHERQERY IS BERCK

[Chaqery 427]

Updated. Declan's story added.

Marcel's will be posted tomorrow.

To anybody interested, these will be playable characters. Reave is already accounted for, but Declan and Marcel are not.

If you enjoy RP with Toov and are looking for something with a pre-existing story behind it, shoot me a PM. If not they'll just remain in the story.

[Urahra 5780]

*squee*

[Samoblivion 532]

 

((A brilliant read and a fitting return for one of the server's best roleplayers. I look forward to finally meeting Toov in RP ^.^ ))

[Avella of Thess 6]

The entrance to what the people of Anthos had called "The Wilds" was deserted, as it usually was at this time of night. Few ventured into the wilds during the night, as the creatures that thrived in the night were deadly and dangerous to all but the well-trained warriors. Only a lone figure could be seen moving past them, his cloak black in the darkness, and the hood pulled up around his face. Or, what would have been a face. Instead, a metallic glimmer could be seen under the hood of the cloak. Anyone watching might have been curious, but the figure moved too quickly for any to recognize the Lord Inquisitor. 

 

He moved past the forest quickly, weaving around the trees slightly so as to deter any followers. He moved around the small community that had been built in the forest and passed over the bridge at the river, moving onward, to an open field, the end of the forest. Over a hill he traveled, and then he knelt, gripping around a bit of dirt until he swung open the trapdoor that was hidden there, quickly dropping down the ladder and closing the hidden trapdoor behind him. Darkness engulfed him, but there was no slowing of his movements. He was used to darkness. 

 

At the bottom of the ladder he removed his flint, hesitating only a second before lighting the torch on the wall. He always hesitated there, thinking about his predecessor. If only he'd been taught to make flames as the last of his position had. Then again, that was just another motivation for what he needed to do in this secret room. 

 

Inside the small enclosed area was a desk and chair, as well as a mound of files and papers. He had kept them close to him on the ship, the only reason they hadn't been lost with all the other things. If anyone had known what they were, he would likely, at best, have them taken from him and thrown into the ocean. No one was supposed to search for the lost leader of the Rose and the Inquisition. And as far as he knew, only one was. The man called Blood the Hunter had been doing exactly what his name implied for years now. He was hunting: hunting for Baldir Toov, the former Captain of the White Rose, and Lord Inquisitor of Oren. His fellow. His friend. 

 

Blood settled himself into the desk, pulling out his last file as he had done again and again for months now. He knew there was nothing-no way of knowing where Toov had gone from this last bit of knowledge. Still, he jotted down the newest rumor he had found, the newest person who claimed to have seen the giant of a man. It wasn't as though he wasn't an easy man to remember, but something about the journey to Anthos had made Blood's job that much harder. Memories were foggy, charts and records were lost, people were missing or dead. The list of blocks that had been put in his path seemed to get longer and longer, and he knew that the longer it took him, the farther Toov would become. 

 

Blood leaned back in his chair with a sigh and reached for the clasps at his neck, removing the full mask from his head. He shook out his auburn hair and ran his fingers through it a few times, his blue eyes blinking at the brighter light. He felt as though he was wearing the mask more and more at time went on, what with his recent estrangement from his family and his wife's journey out of Oren. His list of allies seemed to be growing shorter as he continued to frantically search for his old friend. He put his face in his hands and took a slow breath. He needed to think, he needed to focus, and yet time and time again he found his thoughts wandering to Toov. He had promised Tanith and Viyr: he would find the man, even if he had to start combing the land itself. He had to find Toov. He just... had... to...

 

Blood snarled, his hands moving away from his face to rest against the desk. Without the thought properly going through his head he shoved, sending the desk crashing on it's side and the papers flying everywhere. "I swear to the Creator, Toov, when I find you I am putting my boot in your face for all the trouble you've given me! How could you just leave! It could have been worked out! We could have moved past it! There was no need to run away like a scared little girl who's lost her damned doll!" 

 

He kicked the desk - once, twice, three times - the metal edge of his boot leaving a deep gouge in the desk every time. He began to kick it again and then stopped, freezing in place. He sank down, crouching on the ground and putting his face in his hands again. He felt the tears beginning to come: tears brought on by fear, and despair, and a deep sense of loneliness that had been tearing at his heart for far too long. He swallowed them back: Hightower men never cried, he remembered. Then he growled. The man who had told him that could be damned. Thanks to that man he was no longer a Hightower all the same. He could do whatever he damn well pleased. 

 

He straightened, his face going blank, like the mask he wore so often. He may not be a Hightower, but he was Blood the Hunter, and Blood the Hunter did what was necessary. He didn't care, he did what had to be done. Blood the Hunter had no reason to cry, it was just a waste of precious water, and he didn't have time for it. 

 

Blood picked the mask up from the floor and placed it over his face, replacing the clasps that held it there, and pulling his hood up again. He stepped past the wounded desk and papers, picking up the final one. He had made a promise, and if there was one thing Blood would always do, it was keep his promise. He had work to do. 

[Stevie 1598]

[[ nah

[Chaqery 427]

Marcel's introduction story added.

The next chapter is Toov's story of the Temple District. Stick around for more updates as things heat up in Forochel for the rebellion.

Criticism (constructive) is as always welcome, and I appreciate all of the +reps. Thank you for taking the time to share in this story with me.

Oh, and Blood, an excellent excerpt, I must say. If anybody else feels like following along the same lines, I certainly won't stop you.

More to be added soon. This story's got a ways to go yet.

[Urahra 5780]

Tanith's days passed with a steady beat. She woke up at sunrise, made a breakfast of fried potatoes, eggs, and toast for Viyr, helped him get dressed, and once he was off, she began her daily chores. For a few hours, she'd comb the farm plot, yanking up weeds and carefully trimming and tending the vegetables. The carrots had been growing especially nice this season. Tanith looked forward to stewing them together with potatoes and beef and cabbage during the winter. Cold weather always seemed to sneak up on them and the men would surely be grateful for something hot and hearty to warm their bones after a patrol. After tending the vegetable plots, Tanith would stand in front of the ovens they'd placed near her tent and contemplate what all to cook the men for dinner. Meat was forever in short supply. Though Tanith herself lived quite happily without eating meat, Thomas complained bitterly if he didn't get a fat cut of steak every now and then. Tanith mostly worked on making things that could be stored- salting meats, canning vegetables, and making preserves and jellies out of fruits - but the soldiers deserved hot meals as well. After a long day's work, she would go back into her tent, massage her sore muscles, and curl up under the woolen blankets of her cot.

One might think that this steady, uninterrupted process, as immutable as the passage of time itself, would leave Tanith little chance to sit and long for her husband. Still, the fact was there. Busy as she was, Tanith could not help but think of him and wonder about him. He was gone, never coming back, but that did not mean he was banished from Tanith's thoughts. Sometimes, as she sat stitching up holes in Viyr's tabard, she would glance over at her adoptive son and notice how the sheen of his hair so resembled his father's. Or, when cooking apples for jelly in her little tin pots, she would recall once how she'd served him a breakfast of apple jelly pancakes and coffee. The little memories lingered around her consciousness like flies over a particularly appetizing bit of garbage. They never stopped her from working, but each memory made her pause for a moment. The smell of a food he liked, or the sharp hiss of a sword sliding free of it's scabbard, or the crackle of fire, or the gleam of a stranger's blonde hair. All of it served to remind her of the person she had lost.

She wondered if he remembered her in the same way, if he was still alive. Did the delicate color of peach blossoms remind him of her hair? Did the smell of bread baking give him that same, somewhat bittersweet nostalgia? The color of red wine or the slate grey of an overcast sky; did little memories of her still cloud around him like gnats?

There was always a chance, if he was not dead as she'd suspected, that he'd moved on. Tanith could imagine him, living somewhere far away - perhaps somewhere cold, near a churning, teal colored sea - with a rosy cheeked wife and a hearty, big boned child. Maybe he'd put the mistake of marrying a dark elf behind him and thought no more of the red tabard he'd thrown aside. Maybe he had a big dog. Maybe his new wife had another child on the way - the precious continuation of the forgotten Gaesgro race, the child Tanith could never give him. Maybe the color of red wine only made him think of richness and merriment. Maybe he only looked at a grey sky and thought "Snow" or "Rain." Tanith hated to think that, though. Maybe even with his fertile, pink wife and precious Gaegro child, he occasionally looked up at the sky and thought of the times they'd stood outside in the cool darkness and watched the stars together. Maybe.

She felt closest to him when she performed the magic he'd taught her, though healing left her feeling painfully ill and weak. He had always said that his healing was tied to his love for her. Perhaps across thousands of miles and many years, maybe even the border between life and death, that thread of magic still connected them. It was his parting gift to her, the last testament of their love, the proof that he had been here and had been devoted enough to teach her. Her healing was a shallow parody of his, half as strong but twice as taxing, but it was a metaphorical red string tied to her finger. Even if death had claimed him, or if he'd moved on and forgotten her, she had proof that she had once been cherished and acknowledged and loved. So even though the stress of healing left her lying out cold on her cot or vomiting blood behind the tent, it was worth it. Maybe the gentle tug of that red string would guide her back to him one day.

She had cried and screamed too much already. She had crouched in dark corners and wept. She had contemplated all manner of dangerous and reckless things. She had thought that maybe if Toov wouldn't come back to her on the mortal plane, she could meet him again in the afterlife. The wicked sharp blades of her kitchen knives had often beckoned. But she was determined not to fall into darkness again, no matter how deeply her heart hurt. He had rescued her from her personal gloom and it would have hurt him to see her slip back into it.

So Tanith healed. And Tanith hoped. Tanith remembered him and wondered if he did the the same. After four years, the painful wrenching she'd felt when thinking of him dulled to bittersweet nostalgia and quiet longing. He wasn't coming back - she had accepted that- but if he did, he would find Tanith quite the same as he left her, except with perhaps a little more sadness behind her red eyes.

Much like a forest after a wildfire, she still bore the ashy marks and black scars of her mistakes, but she had still grown up again verdant in it's wake.