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xaeyruudh
Master of Realmslore
USA
1853 Posts |
 Posted - 26 Mar 2015 : 18:26:25
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The impetus behind this was a note in Jeremy's Cormyr: Flexing My Idea Muscle thread, here on Candlekeep.
This is "a day in the life of Filfaeril" --kinda-- but it's not meant to be just an average day. This turns out to be a rather exceptional (and long) day.
Also, his post mentions a day during the reign of Azoun and one after his death. This one is before she becomes Queen. So the other two are still open for someone else to write.
This will have several parts, and will probably take a few days. Constructive feedback is encouraged. 
1 - Rise and Shine
2 - Indigo, Scarlet, and Gold
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Edited by - xaeyruudh on 28 Mar 2015 05:36:37
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xaeyruudh
Master of Realmslore
USA
1853 Posts |
Posted - 26 Mar 2015 : 18:36:13
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1 - Rise and Shine
Wherein Filfaeril awakes and we meet Birgun, a saucy dwarf employed by the Selazair family.
Breulls are densely woven woolen undergarments, designed to be worn under heavy outerwear, though they can serve as nightclothes as well in cold climes... such as Mulmaster, where the Breull family lives and sells their lauded garments.
Any words/names you don't recognize from official sources, including breulls and the dwarvish words herein, are most likely my homebrew. I'll cite sources if/when I use something from official sources.
"Fae."
"mm."
She nuzzled into her pillow. A moment later the voice came back, louder.
"Fae! Get up, ye lavender-scented log, or I'll sling ye over me shoulder and carry ye outside like ye are."
"mmph. Lemme be. Til you finish."
"I'm finished already, ye sleep-addled potato! The floor's clean, yer clothes are pressed, the window in the study is open, and there's a certain priest of Lathander on the roof tryin te make the sunrise wait for ye. Sleep's done."
"Elachar is already here?"
"Aye, push yer golden locks out of the way and let the breeze clean the cobwebs out of yer rafters. The sky is already lightening, and he's already up there."
"Mmm." She sighed and enjoyed another few moments in her warm cocoon.
The warm covers suddenly whooshed away, and she flinched... then tried to burrow into her sheets.
"Argh! Ye lay there any longer, ye'll grow moss on yer head like me father's old mace."
She giggled at that.
"How long did your father's mace lay, before the moss started?"
"Hmph. Okay, maybe ye'll need te grow te about 90 summers, but ye're well on yer way!"
She tensed and laughed loudly as strong hands suddenly tickled her. They didn't relent until she wriggled free and rolled away across the bed.
"Good. At least ye're moving. Now put some proper clothes on and get upstairs, or the priest might decide to bring the sun inte the house for ye!"
"In that case I can get back in bed!"
"Fae...!"
She grimaced at her dwarven antagonist as she made her way around the bedpost to her armoire.
"Yes, dusham." She glanced back as she used a dwarven word (a rather profane one, to be honest) for a jailor or slave driver. She grinned triumphantly at her friend's exclamation and widening eyes.
"Ohh, lassie, if I was... where did ye learn that?"
She giggled and shook her head.
"I'm not telling you. You'd prevent me from learning more."
"Aye, I would teach the filthy miscreant a lesson or three. Might use me father's old mace to do it, too."
She chuckled again, and shook her head.
"I will tell you nothing about where I learned that, or anything else."
"Too smart for yer own good. Hmph." The dwarf grumbled for a few moments as Filfaeril giggled silently and quickly doffed her nightclothes and pulled on a much warmer set of breulls. "What would yer mother say, if she heard ye say that?"
"She would ask what it means, and I would tell her it's a dwarven word for... someone who orders others about."
The dwarf scoffed and rolled her eyes. Filfaeril smiled and kissed the dwarf's forehead.
"And you would agree."
"Oh I would, would I? Why would I agree with that elf-thin sugarcoat of the dirtiest word that's ever crossed yer lips?"
Filfaeril donned a warm indigo robe, delaying her answer and playfully ignoring the dwarf's imperious glare. She knew that priests of Lathander preferred the hues of the sunrise, but she didn't want to buy a red or orange robe because she would have no other occasion to wear it and she didn't want to explain the purchase to her father.
Furthermore, she didn't want to encourage Elachar quite that much. His desire to see her was pleasant, but she was wary of giving him the idea that he had won her. The realm needed good priests. She, in contrast, needed a man who would some day help her run her father's businesses... not a man who would spend every waking moment in a temple, or at least thinking about temple matters. It was right for priests to do so, and that was the life he had chosen... or, to hear him describe it, the life that had chosen him. To be his wife would mean forsaking her family and joining the temple, and that was --regardless of his kindness and affection-- unappealing.
"Because if you told her what it really means, she would think you taught it to me, and she would not believe a less credible story about how I learned it."
She breezed out of her bedchamber and down the hall toward the stairs, the dwarf fuming close behind.
"Ohh! Lass, you're... ugh."
"Right? Yes, I believe I'm right."
"A right mundkun." The dwarf retorted quietly.
She stopped, blinking and pondering, then turned to find the matronly dwarf smirking at her.
"What does that mean?"
The dwarf gathered her face into a picture of innocence and gazed up at a point just above Filfaeril's head, smiled, and replied "why it's an old dwarven word, Lady Selazair... for a child who is always loving and lovely, helpful and generous... a perfect joy to hold and behold."
"Oh." Filfaeril turned back to ascending the stairs, puzzled. She stopped again at the top. "I thought you were going to call me -"
"A dreadfully smug little pain in the zdur?" The dwarf interrupted, and soundly swatted Filfaeril's rump, eliciting a pained yelp, and reached past her to open the door leading up to the roof.
"Bir!"
She glared at the chuckling dwarf, blushing and gripping her behind.
The dwarf just laughed and pushed her out the door.
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Edited by - xaeyruudh on 26 Mar 2015 18:42:41 |
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Jeremy Grenemyer
Great Reader
USA
2717 Posts |
Posted - 27 Mar 2015 : 19:31:44
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| I enjoyed that. :) |
Look for me and my content at EN World (user name: sanishiver). |
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xaeyruudh
Master of Realmslore
USA
1853 Posts |
Posted - 27 Mar 2015 : 20:18:50
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Thank you sir! Might have bit off more than I can chew, but it's good to challenge ourselves right?  |
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Gary Dallison
Great Reader
United Kingdom
6351 Posts |
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xaeyruudh
Master of Realmslore
USA
1853 Posts |
Posted - 28 Mar 2015 : 00:55:01
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I totally agree with that approach. I definitely have some kind of attention deficit thing. Marathons are not for me.
I may actually post them out of order too, because some bits will be easier than others. I'll get a linklist going in the first post with the parts in proper order, though. |
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xaeyruudh
Master of Realmslore
USA
1853 Posts |
Posted - 28 Mar 2015 : 05:29:27
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2 - Indigo, Scarlet, and Gold
We meet Elachar, a philosopher and lover of sunrises and pretty faces, and Filfaeril realizes that there’s more to dawn than getting up early and being cold.
Note: I’m not religious, and not trying to put forth any real-world message. I just figure religious characters should be “into” their beliefs.
There was a brief moment where she could feel the warmth of the house on her hands and the cold outside air on her face, and then the door shut.
Elachar stood a few paces away on the roof, looking not toward her but toward the eastern horizon. She found herself compelled to follow his gaze, and beheld a ribbon of orange limning the distant Thunder Peaks, as if the mountains were aflame. Above the peaks, the sky quickly cooled from fiery gold and pink to clear blue that gradually darkened until finally, over the Stormhorns to the west, it sank into a beautiful dusky amethyst.
"Again. Every time is the same anew." He spoke softly, so that she barely heard him.
"Every dawn?" She brought her eyes back down to him and studied his face, unsure of what he meant.
"Every dawn with you. No matter how brilliant, awe-inspiring, and splendid... no matter how majestic. It gets warmer, brighter, and more breath-taking when you appear."
His eyes were on hers then, just as the heat rose to her cheeks. She felt herself grinning from ear to ear, though she hadn't meant to. What else were they teaching the initiates of Lathander, in addition to how to make young women want to kiss them?
"Th-thank you, Elachar." At once she wanted to say more than that, and didn't dare say more than that.
He just smiled at her and looked back toward the dawn, and beckoned her to the eastern balustrade.
"That's extraordinarily kind." She allowed herself to speak again once she'd take a few deep --and cold-- breaths and reached the edge of the roof. He just kept smiling and staring into the heavens.
They were silent for some minutes, as always. She knew he preferred to enjoy the sunrise quietly... with her, but without words. She suspected there were prayers and hymns in his head, but she didn't ask him to share.
As the warmth left her cheeks she pulled her hands into her sleeves but the wind still clawed at her face and her eyes brimmed for no discernible reason. The air was already wet, and the unwanted tears just made the cold worse. She wasn't crying; there was nothing to cry about. All she could do was wipe the moisture away with her sleeve. And blink a lot.
While Elachar's gaze remained focused on the sky, hers fell to the earth. As the sun peered over the horizon, trees loomed out of the murk and the lowlands turned to gold as the light hit the fog.
Within Suzail, darkness still shrouded the streets and walls like heavy cobwebs, so that she couldn't yet distinguish one cobble from the next. There were no citizens out yet but she could hear a horse stamping in the Court Stables, and three cats fighting somewhere beyond, and the clinking of a Purple Dragon patrol passing nearby. Then she noticed the calls of gulls and the salty smell of the sea. She thought she could even hear the slapping of waves against the walls of the Basin. After shaking off sleep, her senses seemed somehow more acute now. This was the only time she ever daydreamed about being one of those gulls flying over the city, or a sail stretching in the wind and tugging on an unyielding mast...
"It makes the world new again." She was snapped back to the rooftop by Elachar's voice.
He didn't look at her, but she stood up straight and looked attentive anyway. She resisted the urge to ask what he was talking about; it wouldn't do to have him think she was daydreaming again.
"Every dawn, everything begins again. Crops get more nourishment so that they can grow more, water evaporates from the sea and the lakes so that it can rain again, and everyone - you, me, the King, the shop owners and flagon washers and painters and bricklayers, even the criminals - every thing and everyone gets to begin again."
She glanced at the Palace, wondering if the King felt equal to a killer under the sun's indiscriminate light.
"If you broke something yesterday, you can begin mending it today. If you said an unkind word, you can make amends. If you failed to achieve something, you can try again today, and apply the lessons you learned while considering it last evening. Without the isolation and darkness, when there is no more that we can do under the light of the sun... when would we stop to learn? Without a dawn, when would we apply ourselves to changing and improving?"
She looked into the rising sun. The air was still cool and wet and salty, but it was strangely invigorating now, instead of uncomfortable.
"Every dusk is an opportunity to examine the day that is ending, and all our thoughts and perhaps ill-considered words and actions. Every dawn is an opportunity to live better, love more freely, speak from a deeper place in the heart."
He was gazing at her now, though she barely noticed.
"I serve Lathander out of love and duty, because I know that many curse the dawn and the renewed responsibilities it brings, and I would like to help them see it in a different way. For many who serve him, that's enough of a reason, but I have another and it strengthens me in the darkness."
She heard his words, but her mind was occupied with imagining every household in Suzail. If everyone in the city came out to watch the dawn, and not because someone compelled them to but because their own hearts impelled them to... if everyone saw the fiery orb in the heavens as opportunity and learning and the struggle to do better... if the night wasn't a cold and lonely time, but instead a time of reflection and learning and looking forward to tomorrow's opportunities...
"I serve Lathander out of gratitude, for showing me the most unspeakably beautiful things so early in my life. The desire to somehow become worthy of such blessings is a mighty encouragement."
She remembered him caressing her cheek for a moment, wishing her a bright and happy day, and then he went downstairs. She hoped that she had said something equally warm in reply, but she suspected that she might have just said it in her mind. The mind that was soaring over the city, basking in the light of a new day. A few minutes later she had noticed him enter the Promenade and return to the garden.
For some time she remained at the balustrade, watching the sun and smiling out over the city.
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Edited by - xaeyruudh on 28 Mar 2015 15:08:51 |
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Jeremy Grenemyer
Great Reader
USA
2717 Posts |
Posted - 31 Mar 2015 : 06:04:47
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| Seems like a priest of Lathander to me. Good stuff. |
Look for me and my content at EN World (user name: sanishiver). |
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Jeremy Grenemyer
Great Reader
USA
2717 Posts |
Posted - 12 Jul 2015 : 20:31:20
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| Ahem: moar please!!!!!! |
Look for me and my content at EN World (user name: sanishiver). |
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The Hooded One
Lady Herald of Realmslore
5056 Posts |
Posted - 13 Jul 2015 : 23:40:04
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I'll echo that!
love,
THO |
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xaeyruudh
Master of Realmslore
USA
1853 Posts |
Posted - 28 Aug 2015 : 00:19:52
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Thank you both! I've been um... derailed recently, but I'm hoping to come back soon.
I'm feeling hampered by not being familiar with all that's already been written about Filfaeril, and Cormyr. But I like the underpinnings of the story so I'm still hoping to tell it, even if it ends up being useless. |
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Jeremy Grenemyer
Great Reader
USA
2717 Posts |
Posted - 28 Aug 2015 : 02:38:57
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I know the feeling.
My unasked for advice? Tell the story.
Once you really get going you will find the story has its own momentum. |
Look for me and my content at EN World (user name: sanishiver). |
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Fanfic: Eyes on Filfaeril
