un: any fin is possible (audio & text)

[lancifolium]

While I doubt any of us expected it to be an especially happy one, I believe I’ve learned a piece of the ending to the story of our ghostly escort and the lady he gathered an army to rescue. Drawing from my notes in part and for those of you who might be making your own, I'll switch to writing this out.

[ Nevermind the prying ears, and how fed up she is with getting the third degree from the ghosts. ]

My friend the soldier has found peace - entirely due to the help of Wei Wuxian, but before going off to rest, he spoke to us about what happened when the army reached Taravast. Given the circumstances, I don’t have his recollection written down word-for-word, but this is what I wrote down as soon as I was able to:

Arha’s army was bound for Taravast to take the lady Hatisse from her Attaryl sisters during a time of conflict with the Bessis. The lady Hatisse told Lord Arha that she would open the gates so that his forces could slip into Taravast. They arrived to find the gates shut, and both sects of witches on the wall, raining down fire, tar, and arrows.

He mentioned seeing the lady Hatisse on the wall, and the last thing he had to say on the matter stuck out to me - he said he saw her and met her eye, “it’s long hurt, burning, but she watched me through it.” This stuck out to me. It almost sounds as though her eye were an object, or that she only had one eye.

I know at least one of you that I've spoken with encountered pictures of an eye when you were pulled into the caverns beyond the walls, and I can't help but wonder if it's related, and what it could mean. If her eye is an object, and it’s still in Taravast, it would be wise to know before we arrive, particularly if it’s something dangerous (my friend did say her eye burned) and still in someone’s possession.

Comments

un: yiling patriarch

[downswing]

Your friend. A spirit?

[lancifolium]

Yes, he was a younger member of Lord Arha's army in life.

[downswing]

( Wei Wuxian, entrusted with a spirit. )


How was he set to peace?

[lancifolium]

A cleansing, I believe was what he called it. I'm not familiar with the ability, but I am very grateful my friend could be helped.

[downswing]

( Thank the heavens. )

The spirit was eased, not forced?

un: xianxian of yunmeng jiang

[weifinder]

Oh, was that what he'd meant with the eye? I had thought it was more a metaphor, but it would make sense in this place if it was meant literally, if there was something of her that lent itself toward such.

[lancifolium]

It's pure speculation, but the way Izahad phrased it reminded me of another group member's visit into the walls - they told me they saw bits of parchment that had a drawing of an eye with a sun for a pupil on it by the tomb they were brought to. I can't help but wonder if the two are connected now.

[weifinder]

It's not impossible, just also curious. The group she was part of wasn't known for fire magic, but manipulations of sorts, right?

[lancifolium]

They weren't, but if both sects of witches were present at the wall for Arha's arrival they might have some sort of knowledge of offensive spellwork as both groups attacked the soldiers from the walls.

[weifinder]

Right, right, despite the claims being they were at war alone, things seemed to have resolved for coordinated attack at the city gates. Was Arha turned into the invading force, to unify, I wonder.

[un: sprite bulb] text;

[bearshermark]

It would make sense for an oracle to have a magical eye. I'd think it was some sort of power she held first, but.. this world is strange enough that if it were a magical artifact of some kind, it wouldn't be too surprising.

[downswing]

Why would a soothsayer not know the fate of the assignment?

[bearshermark]

[Spoken like a man that's never received a vision before]

Visions aren't always so clear. I had a difficult enough time interpreting visions of events that already happened. From what I've heard, visions of the future are far more difficult to divine.

[downswing]

As master Moran complains.

[lancifolium]

My thoughts exactly. And if it is an artifact it's wisest to learn what we can while traveling before we arrive and find it pointed at us.

[bearshermark]

Do you really think that's likely?

[lancifolium]

I don't know yet, but I don't think we should rule it out without more information. I didn't think it was likely I'd be swept out of a train station and to a lake in the woods in a strange world, but here we are. Anything is possible.

un: dappled pearl of the parted seas [voice]

[beitangmoran]

Hmmm... Given previous correspondence, this seems to imply that she either drew him into a trap, or she was coerced into doing it somehow.

[lancifolium]

It does make it sound like a trap, and I'm afraid I haven't found much information about her, or her motives beyond the bits of letters and what my friend has told me. That she paid to have the vanquished army put to rest afterwards is an odd detail with all this in mind, it suggests that it was a betrayal she felt some regret over, which may mean she was coerced.

[beitangmoran]

It seems from the bits I got that they had a fight during which she all but rejected him before he set on his way to free her from whatever hardship he thought she was suffering. He berated her for starting the fight with the Bessis, and she told him to just abandon her and not help then.

Which, from what one can glean of his character, would have made him jump to do just the opposite. She certainly is very eloquent.

[lancifolium]

Brilliant!

[ A pause before she quickly adds to that. ]

I mean the situation is hardly brilliant but that you're privy to this knowledge is. Would you mind terribly if I sought you out? I'd like to add the bits you've caught to my notes, and I'll share what I've written down already if you like. It doesn't make sense for us to have pieces of this puzzle and not work to put them together.

This does explain the haste with which he gathered his forces to go to the city, but it doesn't exactly clarify why it is she betrayed them. Why dismiss him, but also offer to open the gates?

un: ut malum pluvia | text

[somebadnews]

[ Kind of her to share her notes. That Five has a history with thinking an eye is the key to solving some hugely important riddle is just... an odd coincidence. ]

The soldier. Did he tell you where to find him?

[lancifolium]

No, but I knew what his name looked like. Why?

[somebadnews]

[ Apparently it's not enough for him to read too much into any clues, he has to read too much into how they got them. ]

He was lucky you stumbled on the right tomb. Have you made friends with a lot of ghosts?

[lancifolium]

It was the right thing to do, and no, just him. Why?

[ The why is just going to be a theme now, along with not at all being forthcoming. ]