Note: Updates will not be regular in the slightest. When a mini-series starts, it'll be posted daily, but as for the time in between series... ¯\_( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)_/¯
The Last of the Inyan, Part One
My name is Alexandra Ité.
Well, maybe I should say my name was Alexandra Ité, as by the time anyone reads this letter, they'll have found it in the pocket of a dried-out skeleton, picked clean by the vultures I see circling me now, waiting with impossible patience for my last breath.
I'm writing this so some memory persists after I'm gone. So someone, whenever and however this note reaches them, knows I existed.
My name was Alexandra Ité. I've wandered this land for a decade now. Though the exact days escape me, I believe I was nineteen years old, born in late June. Skin darker than the stone I tread, with purple hair and one matching eye, the other green. I am the last surviving member of the Inyan Tribe.
I should begin my story by describing the day my life began as it is now. It was one of the Inyan Tribe's market days, when we would arrive in the morning at a settlement, and sell the garments, scrap fabric, and rare stones we found and crafted over the course of the week. Our goods became coveted among the people of rural Vacuo, as I learned our kingdom was named. Though it could never be predicted where our tribe would arrive, business was always good. We'd use most of what we earned that night in the same village- buying enough food and water to last our tribe until the next visit.
It was a simple life, but one I miss.
One morning, we arrived at one of Vacuo's permanent settlements, though I forget the name now. I marvelled at the streets of stone and buildings crafted from hard wood, though my mother's worry prevented me from much exploration. I stayed in the tent my mother and father, the village chief and his wife, set up. Shining quartz and amethyst displayed in front of us. Many passed up the stones this day in favor of our cloth, I remember. The warmest days of Summer were coming to an end, after all.
The air seemed to chill as one hooded figure stepped up to the tent. She was shrouded in robes of black, a finer silk than any I had ever seen. A hood was lowered over her eyes, allowing us only to see her ghostly pale neck and chin, and blood-red lips.
"What magnificent stones!" she marvelled.
My father thanked her.
"Though, I've heard mention of another the Inyan possess. It's said to bring out and amplify the power of dust." The woman's lips drew into a grin. "You know about this, surely?"
My father's eyes narrowed. "How do you?" he questioned.
The woman's grin widened. "So it's true," she pressed.
"Crown Jewel is not for sale, nor will it ever be," my father defended. He stood up, yet his imposing height and broad shoulders did little to dissuade the mysterious visitor. "I insist you leave at once."
To my surprise, the woman left without a word.
"Father, who was that?" I asked in a hushed voice.
"I do not know," he admitted. "And how she knows of the Inyan Crown Jewel is beyond me as well."
The rest of the day passed as every market day did. By sundown, the cloaked woman had left my mind almost entirely. I sat inside the largest tent in the village, the one shared by my mother, father, and I. I read by candlelight. Most in the village learned only enough in the way of literacy and numbers to make sales, but being the village chief's daughter, I had access to my parents' old books, as well as a few my mother had picked out for me on particularly good market days.
The peace was shattered by an earsplitting scream. My mother dropped the shawl she had been knitting, and her eyes widened. My father stood upright, his head on a swivel.
The scream was cut off by a deafening explosion. An orange glow flashed across our tent, and a burst of wind threatened to topple it. Abject horror seized me, taking hold of my body from heart to the tips of my fingers and toes. Somehow I knew what, no. Who I would see as I peeked an eye out of a flap in our tent.
Crimson lips, drawn into a grin. Ghostly pale skin. Hair darker than night and frigid blue eyes. It was the woman from the market, still robed in black. She held a man by the throat, bringing her face near his.
"You. Do you know where the Crown Jewel is?"
"I-I'll never- tell you!" my tribemate struggled, gasping for breath between words.
The woman's icy blue eyes narrowed, and I nearly became sick as flames spouted from the hand grasping his throat.
Half a dozen or more of my tribemates had surrounded the cloaked figure. Without a word to signal their arrival, they guided their arms through a series of movements equal in grace and aggression. Spines of stone bore down on the cloaked figure from each direction, a ring of spears threatening her demise. She raised a single hand.
"Tempus diapsalma."
In an instant, a flash of ice dust blasted outward and imploded back into the figure with a peculiar sound. An ethereal layer covered the campsite, halting both tribemates and stone in place. The ice coated the outer wall of my tent, and in the dead silence, I felt as if time stood still.
With the wicked grin still upon her lips, the woman formed spears of ice and plumes of flame around the members of my tribe.
My mother pulled me from where I watched the scene unfold.
"Chief Ité! Another young man shouted, bursting into the tent. "A woman is attacking our tribe! She's killed Beryl and Jaiden!"
"Ancestors protect us," my father prayed, bowing his head. He winced as another cacophony of agonized screams filled the air. "I will confront her." He stepped to the middle of the room, rolling back the knit rug to reveal the dirt beneath. He raised his hands in front of himself, shifting the stone in front of me to form a hole, several feet deep, and about six feet long.
It looked like a grave.
Without a word, my father walked to the foot of his bed, and clicked the hinge on a black box. From it, he produced a tiara crafted of dark, twisted stone. On it, a single purple gem that gleamed in the candlelight, two inches long and one wide, cut in perfect symmetry. He knelt in front of me.
"Alexandra. Take Crown Jewel, and hide in there," he directed, pointing to the hole in the middle of the floor. "Once we dispel our attacker, I will retrieve you. If I don't, know we watch over you, always. Know we love you."
Tears welled in my eyes, anguish clasping my throat like a clawed hand. "B-But father... I can't... you can't go!"
"I must. If I don't retrieve you, raise your hands above your head, and will the stone to move. It will for you, my daughter."
My trembling legs forbid me move.
"Promise me, you will keep Crown Jewel safe," my father continued. He hoisted me up by the shoulders, carrying my limp form to the hole in the floor. "No matter what becomes of us, you must promise me."
"I... I promise."
The hole wasn't deep enough.
I can still recall the agonizing sound of my parents' screams, of my mother's body landing on the ground above me.
I stayed in that hole until I could no longer bear my prison. Part of me feared the woman remained, and another part lied, insisting my father would come to retrieve me.
By the time I emerged, the Sun had begun to rise.
I tried my best to avert my eyes, to avoid the slain forms of my tribe. There were too many of them. Everywhere I turned, the seared, twisted faces of friends. The faces of family, frozen solid with their last tortured scream permanently etched into them.
I had to leave. I filled a stone canteen to the brim, fixing it to my waist. In a bag, all the food I could carry.
Then, I set off. My feet carried me forward, my mind in a daze. I had no idea where I was going, nor where I would arrive. I'm not even sure I cared. In a single night, I had lost everything, and everyone I had ever known. My father told me to protect Crown Jewel. As far as I knew, that was all I lived for.
And yet, I had no idea how Crown Jewel worked. I had moved the stone aside, but my father already taught me basic dust wielding. Crown Jewel is supposed to draw out its user's inner strength, synergize the user's soul with the dust they wield. I felt no connection to it, none of the innate strength my father promised me when teaching me its significance.
An endless sea of orange and brown surrounded me now, pitfalls at the edge of the plateau I traversed tumbling hundreds of feet down. It was silent, and oppressively lonely. I walked on for hours. The Sun above beat down on me, the searing heat I thought I had grown used to burning my skin. I stopped to sit, and opened my jug of water.
Once done with my sip, I looked to the sky. Around the sun, a ring of winged black silhouettes. I blinked, cocking my head in sudden curiosity. One of the birds was bigger than the others. Impossibly big.
My eyes widened, heart sinking as the largest bird suddenly pulled off from the ring. It beat its wings viciously as it began to descend upon me with a hellish scream. I ran as fast as I could, even faster than I thought possible. Yet I heard the Nevermore's shrieks closing in. I chanced a glimpse over my shoulder.
Its massive wings spread wide, the Nevermore pulled back, talons lunging forward to seize me like a falcon would a mouse. I dove to the ground, and felt air rip past my back. Stone shredded upward just feet in front of me where the claws tore through the ground, a plume of dust rising into the sunlight. With a frustrated scream, the Nevermore once again took to the sky.
My arms and legs trembled violently, losing all semblance of strength. My heart pounded into my ears, and I began running once again, gasping for breath through the cloud of dust, sweating profusely in the heat. I heard the beast circle back around.
In my horror, I didn't realize how close I had come to the edge of the plateau. As I looked over my shoulder, one faulty step sent me tumbling over the crest of the stone wall. My ribs struck first on a jagged outcropping, and I screamed as I tumbled over it, dropping ten, fifteen feet to a steep decline. The soles of my shoes and the skin of my hands shredded as I desperately scrambled in an attempt to slow myself to a stop. I succeeded half a dozen feet from a staggering dropoff, one I felt sick merely looking at.
My side felt light.
I looked down, and saw only the lip of my jug remained tied to my side. Its jagged and shattered remains scattered around my legs, water dribbling down the stone and evaporating before it got the chance to tumble over the cliff.
"No... No no no!" I lamented, lurching forward tp my hands and knees in a vain attempt to scavenge the pieces of my only chance at survival.
Another shriek, this one from directly above. I looked up, and saw a colossal beak opening far wider than my body, its crushing blackness blotting out the sun.
I ducked my head to the ground, curling into a ball.
Then, it struck me. Something stirred suddenly within me; a surge of energy like a jolt of lightning or a flickering of flame. All at once, energy coursed through my veins, to every muscle- every cell in my body. The Nevermore's scream cut off, echoing across the canyon wall and into the desert.
I dared raise my head.
A spear of stone, three feet wide at the base and dozens tall, rose from the dirt just behind me. It impaled the creature of grimm through the throat, into its body and leaving the base of its spine. The monster's wings fell to each side of me, slumping to the ground about a dozen feet in both directions.
It began to disappear.
Back then, I thought Crown Jewel had saved my life. Now I know that was my own strength. My soul, synergizing with all those who came before me.