To Ride A Rathorn, by Sheth Sharp-tongue
So, there’s a Nemesis loose in Tentir. There’s a Nemesis loose in Tentir. And I think eventually everything’s going to be okay, but I have no idea what’s going to happen next! And neither do any of you, and neither do your commanders, because there’s a Nemesis loose in Tentir. It’s never happened before, no one knows what the Nemesis is going to do next, least of all the Nemesis. She’s never been a randon cadet before, she’s as confused as you are!
There’s no experts. They try to find experts from the Jaran. They’re like, “We’re joined now by a scholar that once saw a Shanir in Gothregor.” Get out of here with that shit! We’ve all seen a Shanir in Gothregor. This is a Nemesis loose in Tentir!
When a Nemesis is loose in your keep, you’ve got to stay updated. So all day long you walk around, “What’d the Nemesis do?”
The updates, they’re not always bad. Sometimes they’re just odd. It’ll be like, “The Nemesis planned a seige?” I didn’t know she knew how to do that.
The creepiest days are when you don’t hear from the Nemesis at all. You’re down in the forecourt practicing the Senethar like, “Hey, has anyone…has anyone heard–” [imitates crashing sounds] Those are those quiet days when people are like, “It looks like the Nemesis has finally calmed down.” And then ten seconds later the Nemesis is like, “I’m gonna throw Lord Caineron’s chief advisor out a window! I’ve got nice claws and compulsion abilities, I’m a Nemesis!” That’s what I thought you’d say, you dumb fucking Nemesis.
And then… Then you go to brunch with people and they’re like, “There shouldn’t be a Nemesis in Tentir!” And it’s like, “We’re well past that.” Then other people are like, “If there’s gonna be a Nemesis in Tentir, I’m going to try to drug the Highlord!” And those don’t match up at all.
And then, for a second, it seemed like maybe we could survive the Nemesis, and then, fifty miles away, the Randir Matriarch was like, “I have a binding spell and I’m going to invade Tentir!”
And before we could say anything, the Nemesis was like, “If you even fucking look at Tentir, I will rip you apart with my claws. I dare you to do it. I want you to do it. I want you to do it so I can rip you apart with my claws, I’m so fucking crazy.”
“You think you’re fucking crazy, I’m the fucking Randir Matriarch, I live in a fucking cursed tower, I’m fucking crazy.”
And all of us are like, “Okay, okay, okay, okay.” Like poor Lord Danior at those goddamn Council meetings. “Okay, okay, okay.” And then, for a second, we were like, “Maybe the Tempter will break the Nemesis?” And then the Nemesis is like, “I have murdered the Tempter.”
