Arx - Journals

Unread Journals

Written By Gianna

July 3, 2020, 9:39 a.m.(8/3/1013 AR)

I have retired! From Whisper House. We remain staunch allies and I look forward to our continuing partnership. I learned much during my time as a Whisper, and those lessons have taken me very far indeed --- Whisper House has my eternal gratitude.

So. Party?

Written By Sirius

July 3, 2020, 9:04 a.m.(8/3/1013 AR)

Hello, scholar,

Here we are again, in the cyclical act of coming to you at the beginning of a month fraught with calamity. Why is it that I only ever come to you in moments of despair and horribleness? Perhaps it makes sense; perhaps you're here to chronicle the fall of man in some ironic twist of the pen. Well, here it is, the declining spiral in written form of one Sirius Valardin.

I've made the longest trip I've ever done from Sanctum. Even here, on Arx, I take solace in knowing the winds of the Telmarch still reach me, however brisk and dwindled along the way; however mixed with the oaken touch of the Crownlands, still, they started off on those swift, golden fields of oats and wheat. That is all that matters.

I went East, far East, into the domain of Thrax and its isles.

Here, no such gale of home ever did reach, I had never felt so alone. At every other moment, jetties of water crashed upon the shoreline crags, as hard a boom as a ram into some iron-bore, darkling door. I could feel the salt digging into my face, the weight they gave my eyes, the taste impregnated into my tastebuds. Food didn't taste the same, water certainly didn't either. There was a greasy quality to my hair - more than the usual - and I had a chafing discomfort in my hindquarters since the very moment my feet set foot on this archipelago's cay bristling with ruinous rumor and ghastly riddles from the loquacious, scarce populace there living.

From that sinister wharf, there, high above; there, perched upon the isle's moor, I could see the once plenteous keep of Grimhall, now, a darker reflection of its former, palatial glory.

Singular, unsettling tales on our way up the crag-divided fell told by one garrulous helmsman suggested the castle itself was an abode of the damned, full of ghosts and some fabulous, unreckonable power. Naturally, I am a Prince of Sanctum, these histories did not frighten me and, on the contrary, emboldened me to get to the secret of these superstitious folks. To bring clarity and zeal to these evidently misguided few.

Once the doors parted and Duke Valdemar welcomed us inside personally, some things didn't make sense. A man of his stature, posture, living in such a bedraggled home, it didn't fit. The prospect -- it grazed against my common understanding of things.

Led inside, it soon all made sense. His mother, the dowry Duchess, was much like a Queen within her own domain. In spite of her advanced age, there's a light to her being, a candle that flickers against encroaching darkness and the inexorable passage of time. It's as if the whole of the keep is kept up beneath this sole, illimitable foundation of a woman. She wades through her servants like a bladesman drags a flourish of blows in the din of battle, and commands such a stately presence it surprised me she addressed me as her highness, and not the other way around.

With this newfound knowledge, the myriad of questions unanswered in my mind were snuffed out. This awesome woman was the answer to all the light to be found in the old Grimhall keep, the only reason it exists still I wager.

I couldn't consolidate sleep in my rest there, but I managed to confer to one kindly servant that I'd require a lavatory facing strictly West, to Sanctum, if I was to make it through the night. Luckily, they provided. With some more luck, my next visit will be less shrouded in mystery and, while there's some details to the visitation itself of which I simply cannot speak, I too pray that it'll be more associated with the having of a good time and less-so the having of a bad time.

That's it from me, custodian,
Here's to hope, that my next entry is of good, happier things.

Written By Ilira

July 3, 2020, 5:39 a.m.(8/3/1013 AR)

Relationship Note on Valencia

The Shrine of the Thirteenth, it seems, blesses those that seek with the sweetest surprises.
Princess Valencia was a subversion of most my expectations in wondrous ways. Her open humility was so, I initially suspected some modicum of artifice. No--it is simply her inclination. She is silk over silver as other Foxes are, with a grace and sagacity to her word that belies the notes of innocence. Our chemistry came quick, through the eyes.

We are stars, each of us, you of particular effulgence. Rise on. I am endeared and humbled by you, and perhaps, in your company, I too may find my apex.