{"id":1521,"date":"2016-03-18T10:00:56","date_gmt":"2016-03-18T14:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jeezjosie.com\/blog\/?p=1521"},"modified":"2016-01-08T08:44:18","modified_gmt":"2016-01-08T12:44:18","slug":"rhiallis-teleportation-pt-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/jeezjosie.com\/blog\/2016\/03\/rhiallis-teleportation-pt-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Rhiallis: Teleportation, pt. 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

      Today\u2019s snippet, titled \u201cTeleportation, pt. 1\u201d, is a piece I wrote about my PC in Mark’s Pathfinder Campaign.
\n      Yes, another multi-part chapter. Chapter Forty was a beast – totaling about four thousand words, which may not seem like that much. Still, when you think that an average novel has about a hundred thousand, that’s 1\/25th of a novel. Which maybe doesn’t seem like much either<\/i> but really, it is. I swear, really.
\n      Be forewarned, there may be mature themes and naughty language below.
\n– \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 –
\n      \t\u201cReady? Let\u2019s clasp hands.\u201d
\n      \tRhiallis took Aimsley\u2019s hand in her left and Sadie\u2019s on her right. Celeste was between Sadie and Aimsley. Each of them had an enchanted bag securely fastened on their person, weapons sheathed – but ready – and for she and Celeste, full armor.
\n      \t\u201cTo Kenebres first. I think we\u2019ll aim for a clearing I know, not too far out the city.\u201d
\n      \tAim for?<\/em> Rhiallis fought the urge to frown and ask more questions. Undoubtedly, Aimsley knows what she is doing. She wouldn\u2019t risk our lives foolishly and besides, people had been teleporting across the world for hundreds and thousands of years. How hard could it really be? You don\u2019t need to understand everything Rhiallis, just let her do what she has trained for a century to do!<\/em>
\n      \tThe incantation was remarkably complex, but Aimsley did not stumble over a single syllable. Suddenly, with a sickening lurch, the ground dropped out from beneath them – or did they drop through the ground? – and Rhiallis experienced the wholly queer sensation that her body was a liquid-like stream of material sliding through a vacuum. Then her feet hit the ground again and she doubled over, dropping her friend\u2019s hands to cover her mouth lest she lose her breakfast all over the grass.
\n      \tGrass?<\/em>
\n      \tSeconds before, the now familiar cobbled streets of Drezen had been sprawled beneath her boots. Now, a dry carpet of brownish grass. She looked around. The fallow fields around Kenebres would need a lot of work to become fertile once again, but they were instantly recognizable.
\n      \t\u201cWe made it.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cOf course,\u201d Aimsley said. Her braid bounced against her back as she set off toward the gates. \u201cI need to pay my respects, once we get inside.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cOf course, we\u2019ll find a room at an Inn, visit the shops, and then-\u201d
\n      \t\u201cNo. Before anything else. I need to pay my respects.\u201d
\n      \tCeleste cleared her throat, but did not press the point. \u201cAs you wish. Perhaps the rest of us-\u201d
\n      \t\u201cI\u2019m going to go to Sera\u2019s grave, first off.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cBut- Well, all right. Rhiallis and I can make the rounds on our own then. Perhaps we should meet at, well, whichever Inn is still letting rooms – around noon?\u201d
\n      \t\u201cOkay.\u201d
\n      \tIt was strange, being in Kenebres again. She had spent several years in the city before The Fall, studying at the academy on Clydwell Plaza, drinking mead with her friends at Craimo\u2019s pub, laughing with Ema and Sera and Mira and the other folk she had once known so well. They\u2019re almost all dead now,<\/em> she thought morbidly. It is hardly the same city Viggo spoke of with such light in his eyes. He wanted so much to see it. And now, he never will.<\/em>
\n      \t\u201cI swear, Rhiallis. I can hear the macabre things knocking about in your head from here,\u201d Celeste said. \u201cWhy do you dwell on things so much? We should be moving forward – always forward – toward victory against the hordes. To all the goals we have left to accomplish.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cYou\u2019re right, I know. It\u2019s just-\u201d
\n      \t\u201cLove.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cThat, yes. But – we\u2019ve lost so many people. Strangers and friends alike. I find it so difficult to put them out of my mind.\u201d
\n      \tCeleste gave her a remarkably sympathetic look and lay her hand upon her shoulder. \u201cIt isn\u2019t easy. But the path we were called to – it requires that sacrifice. It demands that we look past the things we cannot change and give ourselves to the cause, to fighting against the evil that perpetrated these atrocities.\u201d
\n      \tShe chewed her lower lip. She\u2019s right, of course. She wouldn\u2019t linger over memories of the fallen when the battle is yet being waged. Graves would say the same. <\/em>
\n      \t\u201cThere will – Gods be willing – be plenty of time to mourn and indulge our sorrow once the \u2018Wound is closed and the people of the world are safe again.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cAre you reading my mind?\u201d
\n      \tCeleste gave a wan smile and looked away. A moment later, she pointed out their first stop. The shuttered building looked abandoned, but a bright red sign on the door read \u201cOPEN! COME IN!!!\u201d.
\n      \tWhen the noon-time bells rang, she and Celeste found themselves at a table in one of the make-shift Inns that lined the main boulevard. The matron was a lively little thing with a great deal of local gossip on her tongue; she told them that Queen Gallifrey had passed by and given Terendelluve a beautiful eulogy on her way south to Nerosyan and that a new flophouse or boarding house opened every other day, for there was no end of mercenaries and displaced peasants flooding the city.
\n      \t\u201cSend them toward Drezen, I imagine we can arrange an armed guard. Drezen has a rather severe drought of labor and Kenebres can scarcely feed itself at the moment.\u201d
\n      \tSadie popped onto a chair suddenly. \u201cThat\u2019s a good idea, Celeste. We should post a notice or something.\u201d
\n      \tAimsley was a few steps behind the hin and ordered a cup of tea as she took a seat with the others.
\n      \t\u201cAre we done here?\u201d she asked. \u201cYou two seem in good spirits.\u201d
\n      \tRhiallis and Celeste detailed the results of their shopping expedition over a lunch of roasted quail and golden raisins in a spicy gravy. Pleased, the four of them decided that they should avoid Nerosyan, where fighting was heaviest at the moment, and instead opted to head for New Stetven in the morning.
\n      \t\u201cAll we need now is someone who knows someone in the city or surrounds.\u201d
\n      \tThey looked at Aimsley with quizzical expressions. \u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d
\n      \t\u201cEr- did I not say that already? I can only teleport us, easily, to places I am familiar with myself. I\u2019ve not been to New Stetven, so I need to be able to scry on someone there – then I can direct us there with the spell.\u201d She swallowed a mouthful of tea and brushed her hair from her forehead. \u201cI\u2019m quite sure I mentioned that before.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cNo,\u201d Sadie shook her head. \u201cYou really didn\u2019t.\u201d
\n      \t\u201cWell, it shouldn\u2019t be so difficult, should it? Surely someone around here has family or friends in New Stetven. Right?\u201d
\n      \tIt was less difficult than Rhiallis anticipated. She and Celeste managed to find two people with connections in the capital of Brevoy. One, a young man who carried a miniature of his long-lost love who had been forced to move away by strict parents, was happy to help. A second, a grizzled caravaneer we less forthcoming, but still managed to provide them with enough details for Aimsley to use.
\n      \t\u201cI\u2019ll scry in the morning, and once I\u2019m certain I\u2019ve got the proper location – we\u2019ll go. Sleep sweet, ladies.\u201d
\n      \tRhiallis went to sleep that evening with a queasy feeling in her belly. This should be interesting<\/em>\u2026
\n– \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 \u2013 –
\n\"Signed,
\nNote: Image is “King Jagiello Statue Central” by (Mulligand) from SXC.hu; edited by me<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Today\u2019s snippet, titled \u201cTeleportation, pt. 1\u201d, is a piece I wrote about my PC in Mark’s Pathfinder Campaign.       Yes, another multi-part chapter. Chapter Forty was a beast – totaling about four thousand words, which may not seem like that much. Still, when you think that an average novel has… <\/p>\n

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