After three months I have a new Metamor Keep story to share! I am
not sure how I managed to find the time to write with my little girl
but I managed it well enough! Big thanks to Chris Hoekstra for his
editing and his suggestions for Rickkter. I am very pleased with how
this tale turned out and I hope that all of you enjoy it!
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Metamor Keep: Dominion of the Hyacinth
by Charles Matthias
May 1, 708 CR
The moon's light bathed Metamor Valley in an azure faerie glow that
evening. The last of the crimson twilight had been washed from the
heavens leaving only the brilliant silver disk to paint the earth
with its sensuous light. In the streets below she could hear
impromptu revelry overtaking the Lakelanders. Flutes, drums, lyres,
and bells gamboled in boisterous acclaim as the men danced, the women
laughed, and the children played. The moon's rays were so bright that
they did not even need torches to illumine their merriment.
And it made it very easy for Jessica to fly from Metamor to Lake
Barnhardt; and even easier to find her garden atop the barracks and
that tall stem with purple flowers framed by long, green leaves. The
leaves were curled at the edges like cups and it was not unusual to
find a little bit of water at the bottom of each after a rain. But it
was not their ability to collect water that drew Jessica week after
week back to this barony. What beguiled her was the well of magical
force that ever deepened in this simple flower. What had been a
puddle only two months before had now become a lake whose depths
stretched beyond any shaft of light from sun or moon. Jessica peered
into the depths and felt as if she were surrounded by the
boundlessness of the sky.
In that time she had channeled many spells through the hyacinth to
give them a power that the hawk could never had conjured on her own.
Some of them had been brief incantations whose purpose had been
served. Others were still anchored to the hyacinth, chains of magic
wrapped about one of the purple flowers before curling down the long
stem like a vein of ivy into the luminescent pool. Jessica stretched
her wings, letting the tips of her feathers brush across the surface,
admiring the ripples as they crisscrossed in intricate patterns. A
warmth suffused her body, filling her hollow bones with light and a
tantalizing energy that drew all of reality into stark focus.
With this well of power at her command there was nothing that Jessica
could not do.
She did not taste long of the power, for she also knew that if she
dwelt too long in its embrace she could quickly forget the importance
of the world beyond. With only mild regret she took a step back from
the hyacinth and turned her vision from mage sight back to the
mundane. The moon bathed the hyacinth so that the petals seemed to
glow a faint nimbus which cast everything around it into subtle shadow.
A riotous dance trumpeted from the streets below and she began
tapping one talon in time to the beat. Jessica half-turned her body
so that she could for a time face the street and enjoy the revelry.
Her husband Weyden and his friends had been stationed here for
several months, and after her return from Marzac, Jessica had stayed
here with them. Over the edge of the barracks she could see many
familiar faces dancing, laughing, cavorting, and drinking. A part of
her yearned to glide from the rooftop and join them in their
moon-bought joy. And for several seconds she trembled, one talon
lifted and fighting uncertainty, inching forward only to fall back
and struggle anew.
The spells need you.
Jessica set her talon down and with one last glance at the
Lakelanders celebrating the warm Spring night, she returned her
attention to the hyacinth and the spells she had anchored within its
petals. The first she always checked because it was so dear to her
heart was the spell anchored to Maud that kept her a giraffe like her
husband Larssen. Her very first attempt at using the Curses to alter
shapes had been tested on Maud. She hadn't been certain at first
whether she wanted to be a giraffe as well, but Jessica knew that in
time she would be happier that way. How well the hawk recalled the
look Larssen had given Maud the first time he'd seen her in a body
similar to his own. He had loved her as a human, but now he felt
complete with her a giraffe. Every time Jessica saw the two of them
holding each other, now the same size as one another, it made her
heart swell with real joy. She desperately hoped that one day she
would be able to make the change permanent without having it anchored
to the hyacinth.
As her feathers brushed across the soft, delicate sinews of the
petals, images filled her of a large room with a hearth in one wall.
A fire danced within the brick lashing light across the room to
illumine two figures. Jessica felt her beak crack into an avian grin
as she beheld their long-limbed bodies, flesh covered in a yellow
hide with brown spots, pressed close together in a warm embrace.
Their necks craned together, even as their supple lips tenderly met
and their large hands with thick fingers and hard hoof-like nails
pressed firmly at their backs.
She felt an immense joy fill her at the sight of the two giraffes in
love. But she drew back from the spell after only that brief glimpse;
it would be rude to continue watching them. Instead she turned her
attention to the other husbands and wives who her magic had helped.
So far there was a half dozen Keepers who had come to her asking to
have one or the other changed so that they could truly be together as
man and wife again. The most notable pair was Richard and Norbert
from the Fellowship. Richard had become a rooster and his betrothed
Noreen had become a man. Now it was Norbert who was the rooster and
Richard had become a lovely hen. There was no end to the sacrifices
those that loved each other were willing to make and it gave her such
delight in making it possible.
But apart from the families she had helped make more compatible,
there were three other spells that drew her attention. She traced the
black feathers at the end of her wing across the soft violet blossom
and marveled at the eddying magical power within. Through that prism
she glimpsed a young dragon adorned with gray scales with red along
the edges and down the spiny ridge on his back between his wings. He
was curled up in a grotto of trees with another larger dragon with a
similar scale pattern, while a cloaked human-like figure rested
nearby. They were speaking softly together, but Jessica could not
hear their words.
Lindsey. Jessica had not yet been able to glimpse anyone through the
hyacinth when her friend had braced Calephas and Gmork so she had not
witnessed his transformation into a dragon. She hadn't even felt it
when the trigger spell had been removed, trapping her friend in a
child's body. The first she had learned of it had been when the
seabirds had returned to Metamor a week past to report the good news
of their triumph and the freedom of the people of Arabarb.
Jessica had gone to the hyacinth the evening she'd heard the news
intent on removing the spell keeping Lindsey young. And that had been
the first time she'd been able to see through the reservoir of magic
contained in the hyacinth. Just watching Pharcellus teaching Lindsey
all that he would need to know as a dragon had convinced her that it
was better that he be kept a child. He would more easily learn these
things. In time, as he mastered his new body, she could let the spell
weaken. It was better for him this way even if he had never asked for it.
Her attention moved to one of the fuller flower cups. The magical
energy nearly overflowed from the purple lips of the petals, and when
she touched it ever so gently rivulets streamed across her feathers
in a cascade of light. Her golden eyes dazzled as the interior of a
brightly lit inn came into focus. Patrons of all shapes and sizes
enjoyed a bit of food and mead, many of them travelers from all
corners of the Valley and beyond. Cleaning one of the empty tables
was a young lady skunk, comely in appearance with a soft innocence
and gentle confidence in her eyes.
Her name was now Rhena. Over a month ago she'd been an older man
named Berchem, a lout of a fellow from Glen Avery. Jessica had saved
his life and in the process of trying to understand what had been
killing him, she'd tried turning him into a woman to see if altering
the Curse would help. In the end it hadn't, but those brief moments
as a woman, and the events that had followed, had convinced him that
he needed to understand how woman felt and what they wanted from a
much deeper perspective. What neither Berchem nor Jessica expected
though was the power of the hyacinth to heal souls and reshape minds.
Jessica kept a close but discreet watch on Rhena in the weeks
following as she traveled across the Valley. And everywhere she went,
Rhena told more and more people of her invented past and of her dead
brother Berchem. Bit by bit Rhena began to believe the story was
true, forgetting day by day that she had ever been anything but what
she was now. Jessica had pondered intervening, but the more she
watched Rhena's smile, and the smiles of all those around her now in
her new life working at the Evening Crow Inn in Lyme Regis, the less
inclined she felt to do anything. Perhaps it was better for there to
be Rhena than Berchem. Berchem caused people pain; Rhena brought comfort.
If there was some good that Jessica could do to make the world the
way it should be, then it was imperative that she do it. The hawk ran
her feathers across the blossom one more time, watching the droplets
of magical power bounce from her feathers like dancers bounding down
the stairs. A few days more and she would visit Rhena one last time.
If there were any vestiges of Berchem left in the skunk's mind the
hyacinth could bring sweet nepenthe to her.
And with that thought in mind she turned to the final spell anchored
through this remarkable flower. In the glint of moonlight she
witnessed another scene illuminated with streams of silvery light.
The room was small with crates and old furnishings piled over with
makeshift pallets and threadbare quilts. A single window with
vertical slats like an old sewer drain allowed the moon's light in.
Around the shafts of light a dozen children were gathered divvying up
food. Some of the children were really adults who could never be
older than ten or twelve again and it was these who led the other
natural children in their little gang of urchins. Amongst them now
squatted a tan-furred meerkat boy.
Jessica's beak cracked in a smile as she watched Kuna interact with
the other children. She hadn't quite known what would happen when she
first turned him into a child in response to his effrontery for
asking her to teach him her power. A part of her expected that Kuna
would have returned to the guild begging somebody to help him remove
the spell, but instead he had gone into hiding, far too ashamed to be
seen by anybody. And when Jessica had gone to check on him, the
little beast had tried to attack her with his fangs. If he was going
to act as petulantly as a child, then a child he would be.
Besides, it offered Jessica the chance to apply one of the defensive
qualities of the hyacinth on her own. Where Rhena had made herself
forget ever being a man Jessica would force Kuna to forget he had
ever been an adult or a mage. There was a kindness in it as well, for
the innocence of a child could heal the wounds of the many rejections
he had suffered in the last year in a way that mere forgetfulness
could not. When Jessica finally returned Kuna to being an adult she
hoped there would be a peace in his heart at last.
Although, as the sharing of food gave way to tumbling and play, she
couldn't help but feel a warmth at seeing Kuna joining in with
abandon. She had been trying to keep him from stealing, but perhaps
he was better off as an urchin. The meerkat looked happier than she
could ever remember seeing him as an adult. Her heart warmed to the
idea. If he really was happier as a child then she should leave him that way.
Satisfied with her interrogations, Jessica let the last of the
flowers bob in the air as she drew back her wings. The somnolent
radiance of the hyacinth in the festive light of the moon bathed her
in its cool warmth. Her predator's golden eyes glistened as they
delved within the arcane flower's being. Within two months of being
planted it had become a reservoir of vast strength and yet she knew
that it was only the beginning. Soon she would be able to extract
some of the bulbs and plant them elsewhere throughout the valley. She
felt her body almost lift itself from the ground as she contemplated
a vast network of hyacinths, her spells lacing from one to another
until the very Curse itself was under her complete control to remove
and impose at will. And of course there were many other types of
spells she could experiment with.
Why were the Curses cast in the first place?
The question was a fair one and the hawk scratched at the stone
surrounding the garden plot as she thought back to that fateful day.
Nasoj's armies were bearing down on the Keep having overrun Euper and
Keeptowne. But the Keep itself was too well defended for the vile
wizard's armies; he needed some unspeakable advantage to win his
victory. Transforming every single man and woman in Metamor would
make them defenseless.
Jessica's beak cracked in a faint smile. She could practice using her
transformative magics to see if they could be crafted into defensive
spells. An attacker finding his body suddenly warped would be much
easier to defeat.
They will never be able to defeat you.
Not once she mastered the Curses. She stretched out her wing one last
time to brush across her hyacinth. With a new goal in mind she leaped
into the air and flapped her wings several times, circling higher and
higher before heading west toward Metamor. Beneath her the
Lakelanders continued their feasting and revelry none the wiser.
----------
May He bless you and keep you in His grace and love,
Charles Matthias
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