Love Lost: Part [Illegible]

Love Lost: Part III

Moved to act, the Great Bard set His Muse, Ferenthal, to help the mortals of Sapience unburden their laden hearts of the storming emotions plaguing them. With the progressing degeneration of the veil that separates individuals’ consciousness, the struggle to remain even-keeled and sane in the face of such whirling and often-shared feeling threatened to lay low many a fragile mind.

White candles were made available to all who would take them. Instructed to take them someplace quiet and will their burdens onto the snowy wax, scores of adventurers withdrew to the privacy of their places of solace to focus on the task at hand.

With every heart lightened thus, the candles became the bearers of those troubles, their niveous quality replaced entirely by a midnight hue. These the Great Bard requested be brought to Him in Caer Witrin, so their weight might be transferred partially to Him.

Preparations continued apace, and the appointed time swiftly approached. The Bard spoke to the gathered, hopeful crowd of the shared link that all living beings share; lived experiences and the effect every passing soul imposes upon all those it touches. The candles lit, He began a Song to ease the imbalance of feeling plaguing hearts across Creation. His music grew and His prowess soothed, and it seemed, for one shining and golden moment, that all would be well once more. And then-

–

“Yes, faithful of the Dread Lord, it will kneel before the Master! Continue!”

The whip cracked against the demon’s hide again, and again. Whimpering in pain, it acquiesced at last. Sartan, the Malevolent, would count among His ranks a new servant forevermore, brought low by the machinations and cruelties of His chosen people in Mhaldor Isle.

At the last moment, something unexpected happened. As the demon bowed before the oppression of the Faithful, the hooded figure in the corner of the room, whom the demon had thus far plagued, suddenly took up the discarded whip. She stamped upon the screaming mouth of the onyx idol that was the ritual implement and the vicious weapon cracked through the air once more, eliciting one final scream from Mhaldor’s defeated foe.

The pain and resentment stored in the idol’s opal tongue escaped, amplifying the scream into a cacophonous shriek that split the very air across the mainland with its piercing note.

–

Scarlatti’s Song was subsumed, for only an instant, by this amplified scream. Demonic in origin, made greater still by some sinister force, the sound split the Great Bard’s music for a moment. But a moment can mean the end of all things, where such powers are concerned.

From the Place of Eternal Song, a desolating Lament emerged alongside Scarlatti’s own. This embodiment of the dread of loneliness, the angst of loss, the wounds Love leaves, and so much more, immediately drained the warmth and hope from all the world around it.

Encouraging the gathered crowd to drive the Lament back, the Elder God observed as music of His own making was silenced, then disappeared with a cryptic promise of resolving the situation. The mortals now needed to hold out against the Lament’s ravages until His solution was brought forth.

~ ~ ~

Summary: To assuage the turbulent emotions felt by adventurers across the realms, Scarlatti performed a Song that would unburden them; before its conclusion, a terrible scream escaped Mhaldor Isle and unleashed an eternal Lament which wreaked havoc upon all those gathered and would return many times for renewed battle.

Penned by My hand on the 12th of Mayan, in the year 984 AF.