I place my hand on the end of the tunnel and look back to the Crown of Conceptual War. A harsh blink closes my eyes, allowing a clear memory to play across their insides. And they open again, revealing the same shadow-rich room and its lone pedestal. My head tilts away, the lack of sense causing as much imbalance to my thoughts as it literally does to my skull.
"Perhaps someone will have something to say about this..." I mutter, putting my sword back into its sheath. My feet pass into the arch of the tunnel and my body and all its gear follows right after. I look back the way I came, half-way down the passage. My frown grows heavier and heavier with each tick of the clock. Each halfman through the day the Orbital-Halo passes high above.
Another noise of thought reaches my lips and I get back to leaving. I exit the tunnel and arrive back in the treasure room proper. My head turns towards the noise of conversing Valkinvar, and the clang and jostle of their gear. I walk on ahead, minding my business so much as it keeps me quiet, but I can't quite help not being nosey.
I might have a medallion of authority on my cape and its attaching strands, but I am not one of these people. The Valkinvar with the right to be up here are powerful beyond my dreams. It's almost painful to walk around here now. Where it's so natural to be of a certain strength, that one can let loose in a way they might not typically be able. Like a fat man with an all-too restraining belt or a woman back from a dance in a constricting corset.
They can certainly see the signs that I do not belong here, typically, as much as I can see what makes them deserving of their place here. Where my armour lacks decoration beyond what might as well be the barest of essentials to what a Valkinvar is. These superiors. Leaders of Wings beyond what I would've been entitled to... Duets, Flocks and more.
The difference between a non-commissioned officer and a commissioned one in any other armed forces or time.
While my eyes might meet theirs and theirs do the same, I am not so eager to approach them. They, however, are filled with curiosity and are looking for any chance they can to look at my medallion. The proof that the Point of the Compass, Eurultus-Valkinvar Pymonsia gifted to me. The proof that I am allowed up here at all.
"The Mass must be over." I mutter, not diving too close to anyone's idle chatter for my own sake. It's hard to say if the conversations up here are anything alike what I might find elsewhere throughout Thurn's Forge. For all I know, the Valkinvar up here talk about our plans relating to the war. Which, I suppose, is all the more reason to snoop... But...
My tongue clicks behind the safety of sealed lips, and I linger near the edge of a path. Several of my superiors make their way past, an assortment of Valkinvar-Imdvarce of the lowest highs to the highest of them all. Only really coming short for the lack of a Point of a Compass in their midst. I linger where I am, slowly shuffling into the open as my eyes follow their path.
"We're certainly not lacking officers." I muse openly, shifting aside again as a couple of Brother Ammimpaurst make their way down the hallway. Their hammers swinging away in their grips. I pass the ends of the great weapon shafts, heading on down after my superior sisters. Barely managing to keep their capes in sight and the noise of the metallic herd in view.
I keep on following them towards a sudden opening in the building, and I come to another stop. My head turns one way and then the other, taking in the coliseum-style architecture for what it is. The council-centric authority of the room becomes apparent and I mind a sister as she makes her way down one of the aisles.
The steps bang with my sabatons, and I place my hands on the low-rising wall. I look down across the ornate, open-roofed chamber. Valkinvar, who have been chosen as honour guards, line the ground floor. Covering each entrance with a ready-to-use blade, magic but a viper's twitch away. A shimmer of ruby enters my vision and I clutch the medallion on my chest, clenching it tightly. The fire magic within heats my hand and I release it, glancing at the heat waves as they distort the air.
A collection of bells ring about, their clappers carrying on long past the main bells themselves. Though, thinking of them as clappers might be a lie. The air is twinkling with all the decorations across them. They're as much wind-chimes as they are bells. Ones that are ringing and twinkling with growing intensity.
There's an odd familiarity to their layout and-
Doors slam open, resounding out through the great arena of a chamber. Capturing the attention of all in attendance and all outside of it. I glance around the rows of seats, watching as my sister and brother Valkinvar begin to segregate themselves in order of their Ordoars. By pure luck and circumstance, I find myself in the growing company of Valkinvar-Imdvarce.
"So this is what a meeting is like up here..." I mutter, unable to keep all my thoughts isolated from the ears of my superiors. My eyes twitch, sliding up as a familiar figure comes into view. Zaphadren-Valkinvar Gemorli, the Valkinvar of the True Emerald Wind.
She makes her way into the centre of the chamber as behind me continues to bustle with activity. Each twitch of the head shows more and more chairs filled with armoured and dressed figures. My many sisters of the Valkinvar and few brothers. I turn away from focusing on them and look across the arena, eyeing the massive difference in scale.
The Ordoar Staguiffmani nearly equal all other Ordoars in size here. Is that circumstance of waiting for others to come in or are they truly made of that many exceptional Valkinvar? Natural leaders all abound with minds far beyond the rest of us for strategic acumen? It's possible, but odd either way.
I suppose there is some sense to it, with how much responsibility is shouldered on them as the preeminent casters of the Valkinvar... But, still. It's an odd sight to see. Yet, perhaps a natural one with how the Zaphadren-Valkinvar is a Valkinvar-Staguiffmani herself. The True Emerald Wind is indeed a first among equals in writing, but in practice far more.
The bells grow in intensity, pulling my attention up with it as bright magic makes its way up there. A song carries itself higher and higher, mingling with the bells and the clappers and through the chimes. A familiar image comes to mind... That of the wind maps.
"Woah... That's... Well, that's pretty cool." I say, unable to think of anything else to say as one of my hands comes to my side. The conveniently named shade of Unondsburic Emerald makes its way up the clapper that's designed to emulate the Wind-Mountain. It rises up, or down, rather, building up and spreading across the bell-made visage of the world. All-That-Remains glows bright with the magic of the greatest mountain and three sets of doors slam open.
The marks of the Points of the Compass glow, lending their power so far as it is to dye it all. Even the Zaphadren-Valkinvar lends her own mastery to it, weaving her power in with it all. The three winds join the True-Emerald, shading the winds of the world as they travel. An aurora forms across the tolling bells and dangling chimes.
One of... The North Blue Wind. The South Gold Wind. The Eastern Orange Wind. And the True Emerald Wind.
The winds that head across Mogolawal and come around the far-off empire of the Ibenoroccons. The winds that defy the north and go south, weaving their way into the storms of Eusorochii. The winds that dig their way deep into the centre of the world, rising back up in a fury of fire and smoke. All to converge on their way back to Jherikra, up along the Dragon Coast with such pure, emerald fury as to warp the very sky its colour.
I look back to the Points of a Compass, unable to rip my eyes off of them. Bordeaon-Valkinvar Baalaeun, the only male of their number and the physically strongest Valkinvar in recent history. The head of the Ordoar Ammimpaurst. A man with slicked back hair that spikes away as if it is greased and combed and a busy moustache that comes around from ear to ear, bridging across the upper lip.
The familiar face of the Eurultus-Valkinvar is here, Sister Pymonsia. And although ceremony has her occupied, I spy a wave of greetings in her almost dance-like motions. Motions that show off the weapons predominant to each of the Ordoars. The Wide Sweep, the Impacting Burst, the Thrusting Advance and the Manipulative & Guiding.
Even the Point of the Compass of my own Ordoar, the Ordoar Imdvarce. Noustoster-Valkinvar Aimaboryim. A face that is familiar so much as she is the one who ordained me as a Valkinvar. Yet, with so many sisters and brothers calling themselves Valkinvar-Imdvarce, she is hardly approachable. Through sheer scale of responsibility, she is separated from the rest of us. Cold by a need to be distant, not because she is herself.
All of them are here. The entire leadership of the Four-Winded Valkinvar is here! To think I've been lucky enough to see one alone... To be somehow friends with one. But, to see them all gathered in a moment of-
I flinch back, catching a few chuckles from my sister Valkinvar-Imdvarce. My eyes close, breaking open barely as darkness fills the chamber. The only way to fight back the oppressive, unyielding vortex of emerald magic. One made up of so many battling shades, it is hard to tell which it is specifically. Unless...?
Is this perhaps what the shade of True Emerald is? I remember in my lessons from long ago that True Emerald was unalike any of the others. A mess beyond compare yet so beautiful in that regard. To even be able to see it is amazing, to watch it be controlled with such finesse is something else entirely...!
Yet, this awe is but the key to the door of my misery.
If we can amass such power in rituals like this, why did the Siege of Thurn's Forge even happen? Should we not be marching out? Slaying our enemies and felling their mountain homes with this power? Should we not aim it at them and watch the land vanish under the strain of such great, unmistakable power...?
"Excuse me... Sister Valkinvar, but... What is the purpose of this?" I ask the closest of the senior Valkinvar-Imdvarce and the mature-faced woman looks my way. Her lipstick painted lips curl, and she waves me closer as conversation breaks out among the others.
"This, my dear junior, is... Well, this is the discussion of our war plans." she answers, a bafflement to her tone that is downright shocking. I almost flinch back and I most certainly stumble.
"H-Huh!?" I go, unable to grasp why such an important event has been called when it not seems like nothing will come of it.
"There is a lot for you to learn. So, you best make best use of that trust given to you by the Eurultus-Valkinvar." she tells me, turning to some others and starting a conversation up with them. I take it as a hint to mind my affairs for the moment and head on off. Patrolling the innermost edges of the coliseum and what I can walk in hopes of finding an entrance.
Yet... There's nothing. No paths or anything. The vortex is too powerful to risk heading down and I doubt the honour guards will allow me to try. Never mind all the sisters and brothers up here with me.
"I suppose... I suppose I wait and see." I mutter, feeling as defeated as I am anxious and impatient. What am I supposed to do until that point? I know so little about my sisters and brothers up here, and I cannot even listen in on the war plans. What kind of council on this scale gets called and then isolates the majority?
Is this merely to set a mood...?
"I'm telling you, you've never seen someone get spooked and fly off so easily!" a group of my sister Valkinvar giggle away, leaving me aghast and pale.
I guess that's a no, then. Nothing happens up here. They're here purely because their positions require them to be. The leaders of the Valkinvar are using this as a time to chat and play like... Like schoolchildren!
My hand clutches the medallion again, "Is this what troubles you, Sister Pymonsia?"