I still do not own Neverwinter but one day…
Ashmorlenna has returned to Neverwinter after defeating Palvance. She sits alone in her room at the Academy, thinking about what just happened.
CHAPTER SEVEN- Lingering Feelings
I'm a brute. Death follows me everywhere. Am I the cause of death for everyone… my mother, my father, Rasfael and Javeral, young Delphena and the rest of the plague victims and worst of all I could never see Salzatorre again. He could be dead. Was he dead? I had no idea of what had become of him. If he were still alive, did he remember kissing me inside the very essence of his being? I still could feel a part of me still within him. I fastened my eyes shut and laid back on my bed and visualized myself being held by my prince, Salzatorre, and caressing my lips upon his, joining together become one with him. I longed for him but I knew that if he were still alive that his life would end if he were to remain with me.
"I won't leave you," he spoke into my ear.
"But you must, you will die if you remain with me," I said reaching upward to him.
"I would die without you, I can't leave you. I swear by the heaven's stars and the land's ever seeing eye that I'll never forsake you and that I will stalk the sanctum of death with you. I love you and want to be with you forever," he said and braced me firmly placing my tear-drenched face across his chest. I wanted to stay there forever. With my prince, forever. I sang…
Listen as the mighty wind blows
Across the great divide; light and dark
My voice trapped in yearning for night,
While memories trapped in time for the darkness,
The moon is my companion
And the stars my guides,
Would I spend forever in the night,
And not be satisfied?
Stars twinkling fiercely over head,
Am I the only one, who sees them in their
True beauty gleam?
Or seemly the only to heed
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I stood up and walk down the halls of the Academy. It was bleak. The stale air surrounding me was teeming with the scent of death, thecorridors were empty as I made my way to the Halls of Justice and entered the room were I was supposed to meet with Fenthick. I entered the room and glared at Desther who was obviously not very happy to see me.
"I see that you were quick to answer the summons, but what else would I except from Ashmorlenna Di'Manstrana," said Fenthink as I neared him.
"You could have showered before coming," said Desther turning his head away from us.
"I apologize," I said toward Fenthick, "I have many things on my mind."
"See. This little girl will not be of any use to us. She cannot even organize her own mind," Desther said.
I reached for my bow but Fenthick graced my hand, "Ashmorlenna, we need you. There are no others left in the Academy."
"What?" I said looking over at Desther, "When did this happen?"
"The battle was too much, you are our only hope. Aribeth sees much untapped talent inside of you," Fenthick said.
"Aribeth is diluted with aspirations," Desther said cracking his knuckles, "Ashmorlenna possesses little skill and might I remind everyone that she was the one that allowed the creatures to run amuck throughout Neverwinter."
"I apologize for my err in judgment. I will rectify that," I walked toward the doorway and hesitated as I passed Desther, "And by the way I don't care what anyone thinks of my abilities, I will find the menace that beset this plague and their god will not be able to defend them."
"Why do you even care?" Desther snorted.
"I care because of Delphena. I help because some can't help themselves." I starred at Desther, "I want this…this evil vanished. We are safe but for how long? If we don't act then we'll suffer the fate of Delphie."
"You don't care for that little girl, you only what fame and fortune," Desther scowled.
"I have no need for gold," I said and quickly flashed my bag of gold, it wasn't huge but I could take care of myself with it, "And as far as fame, I could never amount to anything, I am just a bard." I smiled at him, seeing that he must care somewhat for the city, "I promise that after the corprates are identified and punished that I'll leave. I understand that there would be little need of me afterward."
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I walked out of the room and met with Aribeth who briefed me on my objective and gave me a bit of gold as well as a stone that was connected to the temple and would allow me to return there. It was late when I left so I headed for the Trade of Blades to relax a bit, and find a companion that knew the city to help me. I looked around and no one seemed to qualify so I sat and drank some ale. Listening to the tales they told enraged me but I composed myself,they were self righteous, money hungry scoundrels. I started to understand Desther attitude toward me,all adventurers couldn't be this way though. I needed to calm down, my passed few expeditions were assaulting my psyche.
XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO
With the room was filled with armor clad heathens it smelled of ale and perspiration, I looked around slowly as everyone's eyes followed me across the room and I was sittting in the middle of the large room and looked around at everyone as the room grew silent.
A young woman in red leather armor approached me and sat across from me at the table, "You are the one I've heard so much about. The Avariel from far away here to save us all. Ashmorlenna, I believe it is."
"Yes, it is a pleasure to meet you. Are you a local girl?"
"I am from Neverwinter, I've only recently returned from afar. I'm Sharwyn, you haven't the look of a warrior."
Her forthright attitude matched her powerful build, I thought as I said, "And you don't have the look of a tavern maiden."
"For good reason, I am not, I am also a bard, and actually I am the greatest bard that Neverwinter has ever produced." Wow, another bard, I hadn't been around a lot of other bards, and this was the first female bard that I've met.
"So, did you return to save your hometown, to become a heroine," I looked into her confident eyes as she shifted her weight forward to close the gap that separated us.
"I am here because this is where I am. I can go anywhere and gain fame. I actually returned for a more personal reason but I figured that the town I hold so many memories in would definitely be in need of someone of my talents at this time of trouble."
A thought popped into my head, "I'm aiding Lord Nasher and Aribeth in a very important mission and I would be great to have someone similar talent to me to help me, I really need help to find my way around this town."
"Excellent," Sharwyn said with an enormous smile across her face, "give me all your gold."
"I'm sorry." I said.
"I need compensation, correct. I figure that you have very little so I won't embarrass you by having to have you barter with me."
"I have plenty of gold," I said patting my gold filled sack to create a ching-ching sound that was heard throughout the entire bar, "200 gold pieces seems fair."
"Okay," Sharwyn said leaning back in her chair, "I also want half of all we acquire from my services."
"Sure," I said and raised my hand as a tavern maid walk past and motioned for more ale.
"You seem different from the other mercs that I've met in my travels."
"My wings are spectacular and I do have the figure of a goddess," I said and sipped my mug of brew and spreading my wings.
Sharwyn grinned, "so where did you say you were from."
"I didn't." I said and sipped my ale slowly glaring at her, testing her patience, "I'm from Avarivase, the city that sits atop the great mountain Gamlesh. Have you ever heard of it?"
"No, but there are a great of many things that I've yet to accomplish and providences that I haven't explored."
"HICCUP!!!" I exclaimed turning heads toward my colleague and me as I held my hand over my lips.
"You cannot hold your snifter, aye." Sharwyn said and grabbed her mug and downed it all in one fatal gulp.
"I can handle, hiccup, anything. So where do you think we should start?"
"I could tell you but you haven't even told me what your mission is."
My head started to feel light and my ears started to tingle as I said, "Aribeth has assigned me that task of, hiccup, ah, wadder-davey-veeeeeh-Hahn," I held my hands as if I were making an invisible orb, "ah, little guys for the ah, ah thingy for the sick."
"You're drunk," laughed Sharwyn, "you haven't even finished your second mug and you are flat plastered," she yelped and leaned back in on two legs of her seat.
I thought to myself, 'if you are drunk, how come you feel okay.' Then I waved my hand in front of my face and said, "ten fingers see, I'm fine."
"That's just one hand," she continued chastising me, "you got double peepers, too. You getting totally smashed, Ashmorlenna. You should see your face, it's a gem," and as she said this she leaned beyond the point of return and ended up with her backside on the tavern floor momentary looking at the bar room ceiling. I raced around to see if she was okay and took one to many steps, I think, and ended up on top of her. The entire establishment, mostly male, circled us and watched intensely. Many also hooted and hollered as I, probably drunk, and Sharwyn, hysterically and a bit tipsy also, tried to climb off each other.
"Watch your hand," I said as I swatted her fingers off my chest, which conducted a loud set of provocative remarks toward us as we struggled up to our feet.
"Quiet your mouths," Sharwyn screamed as she hoisted herself and I off the ground, "if I've said it once I've said it a million times, boys. I'm too much for you all." That comment was followed by a string of disappointed awws, from the heavy fact that the entertainment was over and the fact that they had probably heard Sharwyn say no to them before.
She then placed her hands on my exposed shoulders andsat me down, "are you okay?"
I think that I was a bit drunk… "Yes, I'm oookeeedoookeee. You have soft hands, too."
"You are the worst bard I've ever met," Sharwyn said and walked me to a room in the back of the domicile and I plummeted onto a bed in the room and closed my eyes.
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He stood and the edge of a canyon looking into the sunset in front of me. I stepped forward and wrapped his waist with my left arm and leaned into his left shoulder and breathed in his essence. He looked even more striking with his teal eyes filled with the burning orange sun reflecting, he pulled me even closer to him and stroked my hair.
"I love you, Ashmorlenna," he said as he leaned in and captured my face with his hands and directed my lips toward his, I closed my eyes as I met his lips with mine. We stood there, united, for several minutes but it was forever for me. This is what I want, I want him. Could I give up everything for him? Could it be possible to be with him?
"Bye," he said and dove into the canyon and disappeared as the sun hibernated behind the veil of night, I felt empty and screamed out for him, I didn't want to be alone, and I needed him.
"Salzatorre!!!!!!! Come back!!!!!!!!! Please…."
Moon shining in its entire prime tonight
Then ruined by dawn
In daylight I close my eyes and in them
Is my darkness; wishes for night
In this world I stumble through, blinded
By the sunlight everyday of my life
Trying to find an honest word, even one
Only to find the truth enslaved
Everyone seems to speak to me in riddles
And rhymes; confusion throbs in my head
Stars twinkling fiercely over head,
Am I the only one, who sees them in their
"Salzatorre…" I whispered as I rose up on the bed and surveyed the room… I was still in Neverwinter. Then I noticed that Sharwyn was sitting in a chair in the corner farthest away from the bed.
"Are you … alright?" she asked.
"Yes, I just had a bad dream about… someone."
"Your love. I've seen it. I've been it. I once longed for a love as well but it just gets in the way."
"Love… doesn't…"
"It does, well at least for me it has."
"What happened?" I said as I sat up and felt my head throb, I was drunk.
"As a young girl my mother arranged me to marry a wealthy noble after my affluent father passed on. Even at this young age, I still possessed much of the charm and believe it or not I probably had a much more curvaceous body then and could have had any man that I looked at. Well, now that I think about it, I don't think much has changed. Anyway, we were invited to a ball for the many of the nobles and I was expected to charm a man named Lord Farthington and I spotted the man I believed to be him and fell heads over heels for him. He was witty, smart and had a divine voice, my heart was bestilled. I learned that this was not the Lord and met him later that night he could not compare to his apparent bard. Against my resolve, I married the Lord but soon I fell farther for the bard and we soon started to become well… very close."
"You cheated on husband," I exclaimed. I couldn't fathom that she'd been enraptured in a situation she couldn't handle, "I can't see you as the two-timing type."
She smiled at the comment, "Love does strange things to you. I had to please my mother but I also had to follow my heart. Sometimes, I wonder if my mother was right, if I should of just stayed with Lord Farthington. He was never passionate toward me but he did take care of me, maybe that was the way that he wanted to express his love of me and he did worship me but what chap doesn't, aye."
I smiled back, she seemed to be fighting back tears, and "do you want to know about my love?"
"It doesn't matter if I do or not, you're a bard, you're going to tell me anyway," she said.
"True, so. He's a prince, a real prince. He is wonderful and he fought off a demon for me."
"A prince and a demon. You should turn that into a ballard."
"I should. But anyway, I don't know how he feels about me and I don't know how the whole royalty thing will work."
"Do you believe that love is greater than anything?"
"I guess."
"Then all the facts don't matter. That's how I feel and have found out through my experience. You need to establish love before anything. That's why I came back to Neverwinter."
"Oh yeah, so what kind of family business did you need to do here."
"I don't… I think it would be better not to talk about it right now."
I started to sing again and Sharwyn sat glancing out of the window that transposed the light from the moon's afterglow…
True beauty gleam?
Or seemly the only to care
Moon shining in its entire prime tonight
Then ruined by dawn
Into this night I wander,
Its morning I fear and dread,
Another day of knowing of
The path I fear to tread,
Oh into the sea of waking dreams
I follow without pride,
Nothing stands between me here
And I won't be denied as the moon rises
"That's a captivating resonance, you're the second best singer I've ever heard." She said as she stood up and sat down by me on the bed. "So you are going to find the Waterdhavian creatures. I've heard of them, I'm a bard of course, I have to have a healthy knowledge of myths and legends."
"So you think you can help my find them?"
"If they exist, then I can find them," Sharwyn said and winked at me.
"I saw them, I know they couldn't escape so all we have to do is find them."
"It's gonna be like looking for water in a furnace…" she said and jumped up, "we will be so famouswhen we are donewe'll need to hire body doubles, though it will be tough to find someone to look as good as I." She looked right at me and said, "get and finish your song, we've got mystical beast to capture, let us be on our way." I sang the rest of the song as we enter the Beggar Nest…
Am I the only one, who sees them in their
True beauty gleam?
Or seemly the only to care
Moon shining in its entire prime tonight
Then ruined by dawn
Stars twinkling fiercely over head,
Am I the only one, who sees them in their
True beauty gleam?
Or seemly the only to care
Moon shining in its entire prime tonight
Then ruined by dawn
Good-night sun and clouds...
Good-morning moon and stars..
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I feel like Sharwyn is a bit OOC but I am not sure. Anywayz, R/R of course flames accepted, I write better after I get 'em. Tell what you think about Ashmorlenna so far. She's supposed to be very emotional and a bit rebellious CG actuallyso anytime you think she should have reacted stronger than she does FLAME ME, TheShadow(hasSPOKEN).