[Mkguild] Divine Travails of Rats - Pars V. Ascensum (d)

[C. Matthias]

Metamor Keep: Divine Travails of Rats
by Charles Matthias and Ryx

Pars V: Ascensum

(d)


Wednesday, June 23, 724 CR - Morning


“After returning home I placed the stone on a 
chain and have worn it ever since.” Kimberly 
lifted the stone pendant from her chest for just 
a moment that Charlie might take a closer look. 
The amethyst was dull but in just the right glint 
from the witchlights he could see a flash of 
color. Along one side a small crack marred its 
otherwise smooth surface. He could not recall a 
time that his mother had been without it.

“It's not shattered,” Charlie noted in a soft 
voice as he studied the stone. “So unless you had 
Master Murikeer magic it back together again you 
did not reduce father to a rat true. Does... does 
he know what it is? After all these years?”

“I have never told him but I know he understands 
in part. It is a quiet way between husbands and 
wives. Some things are never said, simply known. 
So it is with this and with Marzac. Your father and mother speak thus too.”

He nodded and after rubbing the soft tip of his 
finger across the narrow crack in the stone, 
leaned back and let his mother rest it against 
her bodice. A slight glance, a tilt of the snout, 
a moment of profound silence, and so many other 
little things he had observed between his father 
Malger and mother Misanthe over the many years in 
which narratives deeper and truer than any words 
could convey were shared between them. “So what 
did you do, mother? I know it was another three days before... before the...”

“Before he went to seek the aid of Malger Sutt, 
your father?” Charlie swallowed and nodded. “Yes, 
I know of it. And I know what happened is the 
foundation of their friendship. I know there was 
no betrayal because Charles could never hurt me. 
No matter what Master Murikeer feared, Charles 
could never hurt me or you children.”

Charlie's whiskers drooped as he tried to 
remember anything from that time, but of course 
all he could think of was what he had learned 
from his sire the night before. “What baubles did 
he give us? I don't remember them at all.”

Kimberly rested her hands in her lap and sighed. 
“They were colorful little river stones. One by 
one they were all lost. I think you and 
Bernadette both lost yours on the journey to 
Sondeshara. By then it didn't matter.”

He nodded and grabbed the chewstick he'd brought 
with him. He nibbled on the end for a few seconds 
before asking, “So what did you do?”

Kimberly lowered her eyes. “I hoped and prayed. I 
was scared... so very scared for you all. But 
when Charles returned that night, he scooped you 
all into his arms with such love and gentleness I 
knew he could never hurt you. But..” Her throat 
tightened and in it he could hear her pain. “But 
Bertram was different. I could see it in his 
eyes, something I had never seen before. Hate.” 
Kimberly tensed, eyes closing tightly. Charlie 
expected to see tears flow but her cheeks were 
untouched. He gnawed on his stick and said 
nothing. After a few moments his mother opened 
her eyes and continued in a hush. “He would kill 
that little boy if provoked. I kept my hand on 
the stone all that evening. And the next few 
nights I made sure that Natalie and Bertram did 
not come or left as soon as Charles returned home.”

“It's hard to believe... Bertram?” Charlie shook 
his head. “Erick and he are practically inseparable now.”

“That frog is a good young man and a bosom 
companion to your brother,” Kimberly agreed, a 
smile touching the edge of her snout. “I think 
your father took him on as a squire to make up 
for what Marzac tried to make him do.”

Though he said nothing, Charlie wondered if the 
shepherd Silvas was given so much leeway in the 
Narrows for a similar reason. How many others had 
his sire hurt because of Marzac that he now 
offered an unending stream of generosity?

“So what happened next?”

Kimberly sighed and clasped her hand around the 
stone pendant again. “I kept our home as best I 
could with Charles off visiting the Narrows each 
day. I prayed and I watched, and I held this 
close and loved him as best I could. And then, a 
few night's hence, everything happened at once... 
It began with... I had... an unexpected visitor in my bedchamber.”

----------

Saturday, May 12, 708 CR – Eve of Midnight


The Lady Kimberly Matthias was roused by a sharp 
crack and sat up in her bed abruptly. The 
suddenness of the noise, so close at hand, had 
elicited the beginning of a startled squeak from 
her throat but the appearance of a looming form 
towering at the foot of her bed bade that squeak 
reach deeper and escape her breast in a full 
scream of fright. Instinctively she lashed out 
with the only thing that was readily, if not 
easily, within reach; she hurled a spark of fire at the intruder.

Both scream and spark guttered away before 
traveling far plunging the room into silence and 
her sleep-fogged vision cleared enough to see 
that the shadow was cast by a witchlight that was 
not her own and the visage it illuminated was one 
familiar to her. One harried eye looked down upon 
her, recumbent in her own bed, with the gaze of a madman.

“Murikeer!” She cried out indignantly, snatching 
the coverlet over her though her modesty was 
assured by the shift she wore when sleeping. “Why 
are you in my bedchamber!?” He had never gone 
anywhere near the private rooms of the Matthias 
residence in the many years he had visited, when 
she lived in Metamor and the Glen both. To find 
him intruding now, moreso while she was asleep, 
sent a shock of fear and drear through her that 
had nothing to do with the fright of his intrusion.

Grasping a bedpost with one hand he reached out 
with his other. “Come, milady, I need your help 
and swiftly.” The skunk hissed, his good eye 
gleaming under the steady glow of his witchlight.

“Murikeer, I am not in my modesty! Any you're in my...”

“I would wish any other manner, milady, but time 
is of the utmost importance.” His fingers grasped 
beckoning at the air. “Please, come with me now! 
Charles' life may depend on swift action!”

“Charles?” She sat up straighter, turning to her 
right to where her husband slept. Only his side 
of the bed was empty. Startled, she pulled her 
legs off the bed and stood, still clutching the 
coverlet close. “What has happened to my husband?!”

“We have lost him, milady.” Murikeer quailed in 
fear as he stepped around the end of the bed and 
reached for her shoulder. She shied away 
reflexively, backing toward the corner between 
bed table and wall near the closed window. “We 
have lost him, and I fear only you can find him 
again.” He approached no closer, dropping his arm 
to hold his hand toward her, palm up.

After a few moments of indecision she stepped 
forward and reached for his hand, gathering the 
coverlet close against her throat with the other. “Where are we going?”

“Not far, milady, but very far as well. I cannot 
easily explain.” Kimberly could feel the urgency 
in the gentle grasp of his long fingers as she 
lay her hand upon his. “Where does he keep his vine?”

“In the stables, below, why?”

“We will need it.” Helping her drape the long bed 
linen over her shoulders and wrap it around her 
Murikeer followed her out of the bedchamber and 
across the living room toward their front door.

“What of the children?”

“They hear nothing, milady, and sleep 
undisturbed.” He gently urged her toward the 
door, haste writ in every fiber of his being and 
bristle of the monochromatic fur tufting from the 
throat and cuffs of his wardrobe. “We will go, I 
hope, no further than the stables.”

“Will they be safe?”

“On my life, Kimberly, on my very life.”

Little mollified she preceded him through door 
and out into the cool darkness of the Glen 
commons. Circling around the tall buttressing 
roots of the tree they descended a short distance 
to the door of the stable in which Charles kept 
his pony, Malicon, and the vine that sustained 
him in ways none of them could fully grasp. “But, 
Muri, what do you mean you lost him?”

“After the others were touched by the tattered 
remnants of Marzac we feared, as I said when I 
gave you that talisman you wear, that Charles had 
not escaped it.” Drawing open the door he let a 
dim witchlight bob ahead of them into the 
stables. Malicon's head raised above the 
partition of his stall and a curious snort 
escaped his nose, short equine ears pricked 
forward. Against the back wall the vine spread 
from beat and post, shifting subtly in the light. 
“We watched over him, to see if the touch might find him.”

“We?”

“Garigan, myself, James and others.” Leading 
Kimberly over to a pile of straw near the back 
wall he bade her to sit down, her long rodent 
legs crossed as he had taught her during 
meditations to clear her mind before his 
tutelage. “But he slipped away, and I fear that 
he has been cast in the shadow through which we cannot see.”

“Marzac has taken him?” Kimberly quailed, 
clutching at the amethyst talisman Murikeer had 
crafted for her, horror widening her eyes and flattening back her round ears.

“Its shadow has reached out and touched him, we 
fear.” Sitting down facing her Murikeer reached 
out to take her hands gently in his. “And with 
all of our forewarning we cannot pierce that veil. But you can.”

“I?”

“Yes, Kimberly, you. No one else, you. From this 
place, with the conduit that I prepared.”

Kimberly felt the cool stone in her hand, the 
intricate tracery of dark lines crazing about its 
smooth surface under sensitive fingerpads. A 
quiet, whispering rustle moved about behind her, 
a light touch brushing across her tail, but 
Kimberly could not bring herself to move, to tear 
her gaze away from the skunk's lone eye before her. “What must I do?”

“Seek him.” Murikeer nodded to the talisman in 
her hand. “The way to his spirit resides within 
you.” Folding her hands between his own he closed 
them upon the stone. “Seek him as you seek the 
threads I have shown you; like fire, air, water.” 
Leaning close, the gaze of his single eye calm 
but earnest, his voice intoned, “His is a thread 
only you can see; it binds the two of you.” 
Kimberly felt something brush her shoulders, 
along her arms where they emerge from the draped 
coverlet. Leaves appeared beneath her sight as 
the vine wound about her forearms. Had she not 
known of the vine that helped her husband live 
the sight would have sent her into a panicked catatonia.

Even with that knowledge its serpentine animation 
left her heart cold with instinctive fear. But 
she did not move to cast it off while slender 
tendrils worked about her wrists and between her 
fingers. Murikeer drew his hands away ignored by 
the vine. Taking a breath to steel herself 
Kimberly bowed her head slightly and looked 
toward her cupped paws, through the tight bundle 
of leaves, and to the softly glowing purple stone 
resting in the shadows of her grasp.

Expanding her senses she listened for the 
telltale notes and subtle scents that Murikeer 
had taught her. Where he could see threads she 
could hear sound; the trill of birds, the pluch 
of a harp's string, a chord of distant music. 
Where Murikeer saw color she smelled spice and 
earth. In her palms a deep, throbbing melody 
rumbled in basso resonance. It was a complex 
melody she had never truly isolated before, it 
had always been around her, everywhere; subtle 
but ever present, always underscored by a quintet 
of brighter, dancing melodies in higher octaves. 
One of the quintet had faded, long ago, to a 
distant tremulous whisper but it had never truly been lost from the symphony.

But now, as she listened, the heart of the music 
had become entangled with that faded whisper and 
two had become jarring. Something harsh, 
burdensome and discordant had taken up the faded 
whisper and begun to mimic it. But it was 
frightfully off key, dissonant and sharp like a 
bow drawn too roughly across the strings of an over-tightened violin.

And the scents were of family; the stables most 
profoundly. Malicon's heavy equine spiciness, the 
wood and straw and light, soft sweetness of the 
vine beneath her chin. Murikeer's personal scent 
was a void in her physical senses but there was 
the other scent, her sense of the magic about him 
which he saw with his mage's sight was a complex 
melange of aromas which her nose could not prize 
apart. Mingled throughout was a scent identical 
to that of Charles, her children, Baerle and the 
others in the Glen; the curse. All such 
complexities she had long ago learned how to set 
aside so that she could focus on those scents and sounds she sought.

The dry acridity of fire, the scintillating 
coruscation of water, the unique musks of her 
husband and children. His and four others were 
strong, each tickled her senses with fleeting 
snippets of laughter and memory. The last was 
subtle, almost lost among those others, but as 
with the new strand of melody there was another 
that lingered with the scent of that faint trace. 
Somehow, despite being so strikingly similar that 
the mere tingle of it brought forth bright 
memories these was a dark coldness about it; a 
rancid bite that made her whiskers fold back. She 
could let the soft scents of her children slip 
aside to focus more upon Charles' melody and 
scent but, no matter how she plucked and pushed 
with her inner focus, she could not separate the 
corrupt scent and discordant tune mimicking something she had lost.

“Ladero,” Kimberly whispered, not lifting her 
gaze from the glimmering purple stone. Dark 
tendrils, the thread-thin roots of the vine, 
traced about the stone, dug into the tracery that 
Murikeer had etched upon it. “My boy, my Ladero.”

“He is there?” Murikeer murmured quietly, his 
voice shimmering at the edge of her focus without intruding.

Kimberly let her eyes drift closed, bending her 
ears and nose toward the tangled presence of her 
lost husband. “Yes, but no. Something.” She shook 
her head, unable to separate one from the other. “Master Muri, can you see?”

“No, milady,” Murikeer admonished gently. “I 
cannot see. That is why we need you to seek him 
through the veil of shadow that Marzac has enshrouded him.”

“I – I will try, Muri. But he is... so distant. 
He seeks something, his thoughts are bent toward it.”

“Ladero.” Murikeer's soft churr was a hissing 
growl of irritation. “That is his bell, his 
hyacinth. That is the seduction that grasps at 
his heart.” The skunk let out a defeated sigh. 
“He is beyond us, Kimberly. Now, only you can 
reach out to him. Please, try to call him back. 
Let him know you're there, with him, wherever it is the shadow has taken him.”

“He seeks Ladero?” Kimberly's hands wavered as, 
behind her closed eyes, shadows began to take on 
vague forms in the darkness. A moving, upright 
form with a long shadow swaying behind it. 
Beyond, a looming shadow like a tower or tree. “Can he...?”

“No!” Murikeer hissed warning. “That veil none 
can pierce and return! Do not let him go there, Kimberly!”

“But...” Kimberly pressed on, striving through 
her focus to reach out toward the shadowy form of 
her husband in the misty darkness. He began to 
appear more real, more substantial; scent and 
sound assuming a familiar form. Before him, 
reaching into the grayness of the heights, the 
branches of a great tree stretched out overhead 
while buttressing roots bulked like walls from the earth. “He... he is there!”

“Kimberly, focus!” She felt the skunk's gentle 
touch. “The shadow that seduces him lies! Reach 
out to him, warn him of the lie!”

As she drew closer to the monochromatic 
half-dream form of her husband she sensed that, 
while the towering tree and gray skies cast no 
shadows upon the shattered ground over which he 
trod, there was a single shadow stretching behind 
Charles. Where it lay across the buttressing 
roots it took on a smaller form that was not Charles but walked at his side.

The shadow's music shrieked in her ears with the 
chord of Ladero and the scent was corruption and 
rot, but Charles strove for it. It was her son! 
But, it was not! Kimberly's heart withered in 
fear even as she yearned to reach out and draw 
her lost son to her breast once again.

But it was not Ladero. It was something – other. 
Some deadly doppelganger whose inky black talons 
had reached out to grasp her husband's heart, blinding him to its corruption.

“Charles!” Kimberly cried out, unsure if it was 
her physical voice that cast forth his name or 
merely her own imagined plea. “Charles, beware! 
He is false!” She strove toward the gray form in 
the darkness before her. But the shadow abruptly 
reared up, striving outward from the gnarled wall 
of the dark tree's root, and cast a pall between 
her and her husband. She felt it surge toward her 
and felt the icy vileness wash over her in a 
cacophony of ghastly noise and revolting stench.

In her hand the amethyst stone dimmed abruptly, 
the tendrils of the vine enfolding it suddenly 
blackening and shriveling away. The nearest 
leaves also blackened, wrinkling into desiccated 
husks and falling from the vine. Murikeer's fur 
flattened in dismay, frustrated that he could do 
nothing but witness the struggle through the all 
too frail seeming rat seated before him hunched 
over the dim purple glow in her cupped paws. 
Behind her the solid bulk of Malicon stood 
silently, like a wall, his head dipped over her 
shoulder but otherwise unmoving. The vine draped 
over his back from the wall of the stable, 
entwining over Kimberly's shoulders and about her 
arms. Even as its slender tips blackened fell 
more rustled forward, fully enshrouding the stone.

After a few moments the fitful dimness began to 
flutter with light, wan and pulsing, once more. 
“The shadow hears you, it knows you can pierce 
its darkness! Call to him, Kimberly! Warn him!” 
Reaching out, Murikeer laid his hands upon her 
forearms where the vine did not touch and lent as 
much of his presence as he could. There was no 
magic he could lend, her conduit was too frail, 
to tenebrous, to attempt any aid.

All Murikeer could do was offer the reassurance 
of his presence, like that of the quiet pony and 
valiant but mysterious vine. Grateful for what 
each offered, Kimberly tightened her grip on the 
amethyst, shaken but not deterred. Her husband 
was there somewhere. Her heart flowed outward to 
find him again, listening for his melody, 
smelling for his scent. And from her heart wended 
a melody of her own within a prayer. She wasn't 
even sure if it reached her tongue, but it was a prayer all the same.

“Eli, help my husband. Help us.”

----------

May He bless you and keep you in His grace and love,

Charles Matthias
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