In the Dark of the Night

Prequel Chapter: The Journal of Trayps Verdan

1

It's been a while since I've kept a journal, but as I'm going to need to teach Galean writing soon, I thought I could use it for practice. It's also a way to keep my thoughts in order. Being as old as I am, I sometimes lose all sense of when something happened, if indeed I remember it at all. That's not a complaint - a perfect memory would be a curse when one has seen as much loss and pain as I.

I may as well start with the circumstances of my awakening from hibernation. A while ago (I truly have no idea how long, as I haven't yet found anyone who can tell me what year it is), I tired of life, as I occasionally have over the millennia, so I found a secluded forest grove where I wouldn't be bothered and took root there. I call it hibernation, but I've been told it looks more like "turning into a tree" by folk who have seen it. Either way, I'm not really conscious. With a few exceptions, plants don't have to think, they just exist. Like a sleeping person, I have some awareness of my surroundings, but unless it's some kind of major disaster, it's hard to get my attention. I was content to sleep there for centuries, possibly for all time.

I remained in that state until a few days ago, when I became aware of someone sitting in my shade and making music. I couldn't see who it was in my arboreal state, but I could hear and feel him. Neither his guitar or voice were played expertly, and I've certainly heard far more technically impressive performances, but something about it moved me. It's hard for me to describe why, but I'll make an effort. There was a sort of unguarded and pure nature to it that appealed. But it wasn't naive: I got the sense that the musician had endured quite a bit of pain even in his short time alive, but he wasn't crushed by it. Instead, he was looking forward to leaving it all behind, and wasn't the prospect of finding something better worth exulting for? I suppose it was that hope for the future that had been missing in my recent life, and I found myself hoping he'd stay. He built a fire with some deadwood (I appreciated that he didn't harm the trees, though I wouldn't have blamed him if he had), slept, and left in the morning without playing again - though he did hum as he packed up. That was when I roused myself from my slumber, returning stiffly to my humanoid form. I had to if I wanted to follow him, and hear that music again.

By the time I was ready to move, he was some distance away, but I wasn't concerned about tracking him. The forest spirits would tell me where he was as long as he didn't get too far from the trees. It had been they who had led him to my grove, sensing that he was harmless and in need of a safe place to sleep. I thanked them for that, and said my goodbyes. I also dug up the few valuables I'd hidden for when I'd next become animate: a small bag of coins and my Raven Brooch, a gift from Saiderin the Wanderer. He'd given it to me when he'd heard that I was planning to take root, and suggested I use it to see the world from a different perspective. I was too world-weary to take his advice at the time, but now I remembered the burdens and risks of being a faelakar in the world, and used it to change my appearance. I decided an eldakar form would be safe enough without forcing me to adopt a persona. I found that the brooch didn't just project an illusion like I'd expected, but rather changed my body physiologically. My sepia-colored skin faded to a light tan even as it softened from a thin bark to a smooth, elastic layer, and the moss-like filaments of my hair fused themselves together to form long strands, though they at least retained their shade of emerald green. I found that most of my senses were amplified, with sharper eyesight and hearing, at the expense of my innate perception of the spirit world. Fortunately, I found I could still access that sense with a little concentration, and more importantly the brooch's power was reversible. I hurried to catch up with my musician.

I caught up just as he was exiting the forest. To my surprise, he wasn't a human or an elf like I'd expected, but a goblinesh - an orc, to be precise. It was unexpected because the forest spirits that had led him to me should have kept away anyone with the usual goblinesh tinge of Darkness. While, as a being close to the spirit world, I have an instinctive repulsion to Darkness, I've come to learn that bearing it is no personal flaw, just the opposite in fact. However, I didn't expect the simple forest spirits to be able to see the nuance. I soon ascertained that they hadn't - this orc was simply one of the rare goblinesh born without any trace of Darkness. It's been known to happen, though they don't always survive long in the rather harsh culture of the northern goblinesh. I now understood why he seemed to be leaving them.