The Lady dreams (part 2) For many mortal years, barely a second for the Lady, a new mortal religion had spread amongst many of Her people. An austere religion, ambivalent to the spiritual forces that underlay creation, it had found increasing acceptance in Kaeir, with its emphasis on inner discipline, rejection of blind devotion to the created beings that were the Gods, and of course, commerce. This new religion, called the Path by its adherents, first appeared in the City, and soon spread elsewhere. It initially experienced resistance in the areas strongest in the Green Traditions, and was almost dealt a death blow after Her people experienced a great catastrophe far to the south of the Land. Yet in the same moment that the evil She had not encountered for aeons entered the City, Her people that had embraced the Path came to terms with the spiritual reality of Celandra. Many returned to the Green Cult without abandoning this new Path that they walked, and many of the devotees of the Green Cult began to find the Path acceptable. The most noble idea that the followers of the Path now developed , She thought, was that the dismissal of the notion of perfection and infallibility on the part of the great beings of the Dreaming She only knew too well, without rejecting the importance of their power and influence. And with this renewal of the Path in Her Land, came a renewal of one resource She had long felt lacking. Magic. Schools were founded, and soon the Republic came to an agreement with Her, through the person of the most fascinating individual She had encountered after that lone soldier who had served as the instrument for the liberation of Her Land several mortal decades earlier. This man was not religious, and owed no allegiance or fealty to any of the Dreaming cults of Qaiyore, but was still nonetheless deeply spiritual, devoted to Her Land and its cause indirectly yet very strongly. He had long proved to be a great proponent of the Green Cult, though he was no son of the Green Traditions. And so it was that She made the first agreement She had made with mortals for a thousand Millenia, and permitted Her shamans to actively support and assist the development of magic in Her Land. This still though did not solve the problem of the ancient evil that resided deep in the City, hidden in its cloud of impenetrability. Yet She did not need to penetrate the void that was its aura, for from the slightest taste She had recognised who had dared befoul Her City. A foul son of the gods of the fallen goblins, She had once held him at bay, and a legion of his kinfolk. And now he had returned to walk Celandra, as he had once done an almost immemorable time ago. When She remembered this Her anger grew, though She quickly calmed Herself lest Her people suffer an entire year of storms and thunder. Yet this whole while, a group of Her people, some strangers to the Green Way, some not, had entreated Her shamans to the idea of an agreement between Herself and those of Her people that followed this new Path. Amongst them were a group of individuals, skilled in mortal magic, who lived lonely lives, consciously and willingly taking on the burden of facing the evils that existed within and without Celandra. They called themselves the people of the Night, the Night walkers, and amongst them She found Her solution. Their leader was a man descended in part from an ancient family of Her Land, and from an equally ancient family of the land of that ever-so-strange-but-silent Mir. A deeply spiritual mortal, he had dedicated himself to the cause of justice, and of opposing evil, and of using his considerably strong sorcerous abilities solely for that purpose. More importantly, he deeply understood the power and importance of loss and sacrifice, and was thus the perfect vessel for Her plan. No sooner had She found the instrument with which She could deal with this ancient evil that tainted Her City, than Her favourite son of the Land died. Poor brave Osric, a man who had lived his entire life completely for the Land, was taken from Her. His devotion had been so much that he had never given the time to continuing his own line, and so sadly the spiritual contribution that he could have made to the future of the Land was lost forever. Though the other branches of his line that he had brought from his birthland on the distant eastern shore contained much his vitality and purity, it still fell short of the spiritual intensity that had been him. Nevertheless, the Lady was determined not to lose everything that had been Osric. And so as Her people had gathered to bury Her son's body, She directly intervened, burning a poor old shaman out in the process. She commanded that Osric's body be taken to the Heart of the Land, a place visited by only the most select, and that the powerful talisman that had given birth to itself be given to Her agent-to-be, the young sorcerer of the Path. And so all the talk between Her shamans and Her people who followed the new Path came together. Realising his chance to come to an agreement with the Lady of the Green, the young sorcerer of the Path willingly followed Her directions, and took the first steps towards becoming Her instrument. Had he fully realised what this would mean for him in the aeons to come, perhaps he would not have, but more importantly he understand the necessity of his own personal sacrifice for the greater good, and for this reason particularly, he agreed. Tremendously intelligent for a mortal, the young sorcerer of the Path had known much of Her Traditions and history, and had understood the nature of the agreement She proposed to him. She would favour the Path, for it was highly compatible with the Green Cult, and none of Her devotees would ever experience divided loyalties on the Path, unlike many of the cults of the Dreaming, whose masters' plans sometimes conflicted with Her own. She would provide the magical means to the people of the night that would allow them to utilise a most unusual but powerful magic in their struggle against the darkness. This magic would be similiar to the foul magic used by the followers of the gods of the fallen goblins, but would use different patterns of symmetry and harmony, and thus made good what was once foul. Lastly, he would be able to utilise the power of the Lady to a degree that had never been possible for Her shamans. But... and here for a mortal second the young sorcerer of the Path hesitated, She would demand of him almost an eternity of service. He would have to almost completely forego the hereafter, unable to experience knowledge of the Divine until the end of Celandra, whenever that may be. She had asked of him possibly the worst price She could ask of him, but after a moment of consideration, he had accepted. He would encounter the Divine, he knew, but he would go through many aeons of constant rebirth, hardship and suffering before he did so. But such was the stuff this young sorcerer of the Path was made of, that he knew this was a good enough price to pay for the protection and good of the people of the Green Land and the Path. All of this would be made possible by the permanent linking of the young sorcerer of the Path's spirit with the Lady's. Well, a linking of sorts. It took several Celandran seconds or several Dreaming hours of discussion with that arguementative Coron in the Dreaming to force him to agree, but in the end Coron did, on the condition that after every lifetime, the young sorcerer of the Path be given a period of recuperation in the Dreaming before he was reborn again in the Land, his mind, soul and memory intact. --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Listen to over 20 online radio stations and watch over 5000 music videos on Yahoo! Music.---------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send mail to celandra-off@phoenyx.net.
