Paradise lost, paradise found. Mortals have a thousand and one stories about the perfect land, lost to them when Eden fells. Collective memory might have faded through the years, but Davheira had met druids that remember, fey that cannot forget. It had been a refuge without conflict, one upon a time, but it had been a refuge without willingly given agency and free will as well. Davheira had heard about Lilith, the rage that dwelt within her a legacy that had imprinted into humanity and into the fallen’s desires. Arvandor reminds him of the tales, present as they are due to the words he had been putting together through their journey. A homage to mortality on it’s all ephemeral beauty, the reminder that life is worth it all, it’s tragedies and triumphs. It’s a last resort, a hope that music will be able to reach hearts if words cannot, but one he fears might not work. Who is he, amidst the gods and nobles alike? Short in magic, short in temper with those they have now lost, the lonely commoner walking amidst things too big for himself, hoping and believing to trade an army for a song.
Ridiculous and outrageous, and yet he cannot stop trying, not when he had sworn to rise above his flighty nature, to do something worth more than a song for a six pence as he left everything behind. Not that it mattered much, not with Niko’s lack of memories and Isla’s reticence to his presence. Friend to all, confident to none, few had truly cared for the bard and those who do have greater bonds to worry about losing on the trip. A King waiting for his consort, a Chancellor waiting for his warder. Who would wait for the commoner when there is nobles and gods amidst them? When he is just the fool meant to entertain?
He does not know, but that does not mean he won’t try. Fragile as his bonds might be, easily forgotten as he believes himself, he had sworn to be of help to Mery, had promised Niko to try and return, to Isla that he would be there. Davheira does not know if they will care if he does not return, but he will, and that is enough to keep himself firm as he faces the goddess representing all he had ever done and was left to do: to dream, to journey, to seek the stars as his path.
“My tale is just one of many, likely not as inspiring as Aegnor’s, as tender as Dareth’s, as powerful for Aurora’s nor as charming as Yavie’s,” he begins, a self-conscious on his lips as he bows at Sehanine. “But it is still mine, still worth telling, for what story is it not? Each of us, travelers, chose to participate in this journey for a reason, a belief.”
Davheira moistens his lips, the realization hitting him rather suddenly that he had never, not once, chosen to tell his tale. All his songs and stories belong to someone else, surround someone else, never himself, and he wonders if it is because he has never thought himself worth a song. Despite his irreverence towards the noble eladrin, his irreverent treatment of Aurora and her father before her, he has always been keenly aware of his place amidst the fey. Few commoners distinguish themselves, few were remembered, few were seen as anything but subjects, as background characters for the noble among them. He knows this, despite his desire to pretend otherwise. He had been lucky, of all things, to have caught Meryasek’s attention, to have been deemed as worthy to know, and every time he reached for more, he tested said luck.
“My story is simple, a calm steady snowfall in comparison to the colorful chaos of my companions,” he admits with a shrug as he stands tall, arms clasped behind his back as he attempts to avoid fidgeting before the goddess. “I am just one amidst the masses, a commoner who fell in love with song and it’s magic, despite a lack of aptitude for the latter. That did not stop me for long, though, music something I could not keep away from long, and with it the desire to record history for the world to remember: the good, the bad, the in between. Ugly or beautiful, every story is worth knowing, and I took it upon myself to witness and record them all, from the creation of Rome and beyond. There was love to be found along the way, too. Love on the change of the seasons, on the glittering stars, on the kindness of a druid who chose to help even when that help was unwanted. Love on the short, but meaningful experiences that will be lost if the Courts fall. Dreams that will be cut short for mortal and immortal alike if nothing is done to change the outcome we fear.”
Davheira clears his throat as he looks down at the basin full of water.
“My story is not one meant to inspire awe, tenderness or to charm, but is mine. It is a story of a passion that pushed me beyond what was expected of me, beyond what others believed possible, of a desire to witness the end and beginning of it all, but it does have a lesson,” he admits slowly, eyes raising to meet Sehanine. “I am aware that everything is meant to end, Your Worship, that end is inevitable and all encompassing, and yet — Is it not Life’s duty and privilege to see it’s end, to see the madness, tragedy and grief that awaits and declare: no, not like this? We are here, not because we believe we can defy what is natural, but because despite knowing that everything must end, everything must die, we do not want our ending to be thus. We do not want the Drow Queen or the Queen of Spiders to erase us and replace all our song and our joy with a cruel darkness that does not allow for light. I do not know what my companions would like, but I know this: if my life is to end, I would much rather die amidst the light.”
A traveller but not a warrior, so many of her court had turned towards the darkness of a distant power, when she had called for the aid of the lunar elves they had not come. Hyperborea had fallen and it had taken Sehanine with her, the ice did not forgive. The Bard’s resolve was middling at best, his confidence lacklustre, and compared to Arvandor the boy’s magic might as well have been nonexistent. Sehanine respected the story, however it remained unsatisfactory, but most unfinished tales often did. Stoic and seemingly unmoved by his journey so far, she stood and moved to the edge of the parapet as Davheira spoke. Sehanine remembered a time when they sang their stories across the provinces, when the World Tree was alive with the sort of power that the bard spun across his tongue. When her closest followers ran rampant under the light of the full moon before her bastard brother appropriated that magic for himself. Neither a hunter or a noble, were this a different age then Sehanine might not have acknowledged his presence at all.
And yet, he had made it this far.
“Queen of Spiders, you don’t need to fear their names here.” Sehanine looked out across the trees, Lloth’s dead grove in the distance where Titania had taken her son. The rotted pair. “There was a time when Lloth was like a sister to me, Araushnee. I was there when her daughter was born, I held her in my arms and loved her like she was my own.” Lloth’s betrayal had cut her deeply, perhaps even deeper than Corellon who’d been too blinded by his one-sided affections to see that he was being spun in the demon’s web. “You do not know what you’re asking,” Sehanine turned to face the Bard once more, noble as he was, as self-conscious as he might have been. “I am a dead goddess, bard,” Sehanine reminded, her duty was cut down when she’d helped his ancestors escape. “I am bound to this place until the last of us die. Then I will fade entirely, I cannot leave these borders.” Many had flocked to Arvandor, but many remained elsewhere: Artemis among them. It was not in Sehanine’s nature to sit idle, Angharradh slowly growing in power but being able to do nothing with it. “But neither can I permit Lloth’s crimes to go unpunished.” Sehanine’s death. Sune’s death. So many others.
Patron of dreams, death, the full moon, and journeys, his story was still only just beginning. Her part in his story was only just beginning. “All too often the road takes more than it gives,” Sehanine knew that the eladrins could not weather the forces that rallied against them, the darkness that was gathering was indomitable in the state they were in. She turned from the horizon and did what was in the nature of so many Gods, Sehanine offered him a deal. “But all I can offer you is my patronage, power that you can take with you when you sail away from this place.”
