#comndarem

[ohpollenpowder]

I...did not pose them there. They spawned like that.

Also I may or may not have made another sword...

[ohpollenpowder]

(Prefacing this with I'm rusty as heck with writing. That and sharing is...hard for me—I've been harshly criticized in the past and the joy of writing kinda disappeared because of it. If anything, I realize it might lack depth of emotion, for that's the hardest part for me to write as it's hard for me to articulate it properly.)

Blinding, striking pain lanced through his head, drawing a ragged gasp from him. His hands wanted to drift up to his head, yet they felt heavy, almost impossible to bring up. Instead, it felt like the tightened vice around the lower half of him released, he slumped down, falling on top of something soft and pliant. It was familiar in a way…but not one he could immediately place. Familiar voices called out as well, but not the one that he was looking for, as his consciousness slipped from him. All he could hope was that he was successful in saving Trahearne from Mordremoth.

The next time he remembered coming to, his companions were carrying him; his arms over their shoulders. But instead of the air being filled with joyous celebration and talks of the final battle… It was quiet. Dead quiet. Confusingly, there were a few, muted sounds of crying coming from behind him, punctuated with soft questions of "why?"

A frown spread across his face with his head bent down by gravity as he listened, his attempt to save Trahearne must not have been successful after all. Another flash of pain lanced through his chest, this time from no physical wound, but the hiss of pain drew attention still. The footsteps leading him on came to a stop, he could feel bodies turning towards him, one bending down slightly to look at his half-hidden face.

"Marshal Trahearne?" …What? "Marshal, sir? Are you awake?" He forced his eyes to open, blinking into the dimly lit jungle, they focused in on the aide-de-camp that Laranthir had issued to him before all of this had started. Those blue-grey eyes recognized him, yes, worried over him, certainly. But there was a lack of deeper connection in them, even though they had spent hours upon hours bonding over ale sitting by the campfire.

"Kirk…?" His voice came out raspy, as if he'd screamed his throat raw. No…not his voice. Familiar to him achingly well, but not his own. It couldn't be…

He stiffened in the arms that held him, forcing his knees to lock under him in order to at least get some semblance of control out of all of this. Their hold on him slackened from supporting to just hovering, another familiar face popped into view, Caithe. The concern on her face was striking, he had never seen her face look like that before. She'd shown lesser versions of it to him before when he'd gotten hurt as a Valiant, but this was different.

"Trahearne… Brother, please, let us help you." Her hands came up and cupped his face and Ventari help him, he couldn't help but lean into them as his eyes slipped close again. His head bent down and found itself pressed against her forehead, "Just breathe, brother. We're almost to Tarir now." Tugging his own arms free from those holding him, he covers her hands with his own, dragging in ragged breath after ragged breath.

Fingers grasping, gripping, he steadies himself against her for a moment longer before lifting his head out of her hands, "Caithe," he licks his lips, "What… What happened?" There. Again. Trahearne's voice.

Eyes open again, his vision swims, thrown off by seeing things out of two eyes instead of the one. There's movement behind him, a restlessness, that causes him to turn his head back. Briefly, oh so briefly he sees it, before Caithe has grabbed his face again, pulled it back down so he only sees her teal eyes, "No, not yet."

It was odd, seeing it from this kind of perspective. The armor not so much seeing as he spent hours caring for it, seeing similar pieces on others, but the hair… The gray curl of the leaves and dark blue of the petals, stamen laying flat against it all and dull. It was night and yet there was no familiar light blue glow pulsing in and out. His mind started to whirl at the implications of it all, of seeing that form, familiar and yet somehow not. Something had gone wrong… Terribly wrong. I tried to help, but...

"Go back to sleep now, brother."

His breath hitched as he felt the curl of Caithe's magic taking hold of his weary mind; drowning out the cacophony of confusion, anger, denial that was sweeping through him. And the world went blessedly dark again.

(Sorry if any it is confusing with just references of he/him everywhere. Since at this point Comndarem has only roughly started to figure out that he's no longer in his own body.)

[ohpollenpowder]

Weh. Forgot his birthday was before Astrella's. Whoops. We're out of order but oh well. 5 hours and 9 minutes for his birthday!

[ohpollenpowder]

There's a reason Bones is in here, I promise. They're trying to make a deal!!! Give them some bones and they'll "resurrect" Niven... Please ignore the fact that they're a Mesmer and not a Necromancer. Just give them the bones before they get to work.

But yeah, for them 1328 was a very busy uh...48 hours? Not to mention you've got the Swords popping up left and right. Maybe that's Bones' fault too...

[ohpollenpowder]

...Trying to work on that Elder Dragon week prompt list and... WELL. It's just turned into me blabbering about them and the encounter with each of the Elder Dragons.

The ramble I have gone on with Niven and Mordremoth...

And then there was the sudden brainworm that spoke about shoving Trahearne's actual consciousness (now years down the road) into Niven's preserved body. And perhaps with it, Nichneven's memories of Niven proper....

[ohpollenpowder]

So while I continue with other things. Also enjoy this post of Nichneven and her boys. ♥

[ohpollenpowder]

Comndarem was the next birthday we missed! His was back on the 30th... I could've made him ghost-tonic'd but he's not a ghost. Not technically speaking... He's undergone a color change since his inception, mostly for story's sake. 4 hours and 38 minutes for his first birthday!

[ohpollenpowder]

Thought it was hilarious to put the Commander banner on Comndarem for a few moments.