[center][h2][color=8B0000][u][b]Empire of Matathran[/b][/u][/color][/h2][/center]

[color=8B0000][u][b]Northeast of Chalice, Cradle's Throat[/b][/u][/color]

The map was clear - the Totem of Lucrore was [i]near[/i], and the awful presence of the City of Chalice had faded over the horizon at last. Though everyone was still on edge from the monster attack they had witnessed, the destination of their journey being so near had renewed some of their excitement.

“You think we’ll find answers there?” Lee asked his mentor. Over the course of their journey his views had changed. “Maybe… but that’s not what we truly need, is it?” answered Ittain. “We need the right questions first. Yes, the questions. Those are important. Why open a peasant’s footlocker, when you could find a king’s vault? It are the questions, my young… prodigy. Those are important. You can answer a billion questions and not learn a thing, or you can make one inquiry that changes your world. And it doesn’t even need to be answered.” As always, Lee’s mentor spoke in half-riddles. Though instead of rejecting them downright, he began to ponder on them. Though his concentration was broken quickly. “It’s not for. According to the map we’re barely half an hour away from it.” Said one of the Seekers.

The remaining journey was somehow more remarkable than the way to Chalice had been, despite the similarities. There were fewer farmsteads and small dwellings here. The occasional remnant seemed more untouched and less weathered, the plains themselves seemed more wild and untamed. Eventually, after climbing a particularly steep hill just as the sun began to set, basking in the twilight sat a ruin which had to be what they were looking for.

The ruins had a much larger area than many they had seen before. Rows of weathered columns surrounding the overgrown gardens of what once must have been a handsome path leading within the ruined main structure, still barely supported by surrounding buttresses. Within, they could see the remains of what had clearly once been a large atrium-styled hall, and the beginnings of a chipped but still largely intact mural lain out along the floor. The massive twin doors that had once led into the chamber had both fallen, and whatever structure had once existed above - a spire, or a dome perhaps - was long gone, leaving towering but still exposed awning above the place, leaving the interior open to the heavens.

That was not all the group saw. A single figure had been sitting watchfully on the fallen monoliths that had been the twin doors. Whoever it had been - their details had been hard to make out, as they were fully cloaked in dark robes - they had spotted the group, as they leapt to their feet and ran within the interior. A lookout.

“Stop.” Lee said. He had learned from his time in the north. They weren’t welcome here. The three other Seekers huddled together, grabbing their knives. The mercenaries, better equipped to handle trouble, formed a circle around their customers. Lee, with just a bit of combat experience, had prepared for this possibilities since they entered Matathran. They’d go in slow, expecting the ambush. The books said he should try to surround it. But he had far too many people on his side to do that. Though all sense of tactics were thrown out of the gate when he saw that Ittain was not amongst the other Seekers. Instead, the blind madman had closed his book and walked up to the collapsed door, whistling. “What is he doing!?” Lee yelled. The entire group began to run towards the old man. Who inexplicably got so close to the ruin and managed to enter before everyone else. "Hello there! Hello!" he yelled, his voice echoing through the massive structure.

Nobody answered him, and if not for having seen the lookout run inside, the place would have seem abandoned. The interior chamber, though visibly weathered and flooded in several parts, still retained much of its grandiose nature. It was a long hall, most ot the floorspace dedicated to a long mural made of multicolored shards and chips of stone and slate, which had deteriorated in many places or lost its coloration where not covered in water, but the imagery was still clear - shining figures with gleaming auras surrounded a fallen figure, but one amongst their number - an individual garbed in brilliant red raiments with filigree of gold and turquoise - lay a hand shrouded in white flames upon the fallen figure. Above them, as the walkway and mural reached the end of the hall, a rising impression of the same fallen figure, now wreathed in resplendent light, was depicted rising over a depiction of what had likely once been a stylized overhead map of Askor.

At the very rear of the chamber was a raised dais of marble, surrounded by a rotunda of walls with faded, painted imagery surrounding it - most of them far too damaged by rain and wear to make out, but one of them depicted a woman holding a babe, kneeling at the dais' foot. Atop the dais itself-

The Totem.

It was the one element of the ruin that still retained its wholeness, both in form and power. It stood nearly four meters tall, its structure made of some rough, gleaming red crystaline substance that had been formed in chunks, traced through with lines of brilliant turquoise. It rose as a column to support a prong that rose near the top, with notable alcoves near the prong's base and near the ends of each prong, each one shelled with rippling silver and housing a faint, hovering light within. Hung and drapped down from the central prong was a rich red tapestry of silk, rimmed with gold and depicting a circle of white flame around a nucleus of a soft orange sphere of light.

As tempting as it might have been to rush out into the open, the entire hall was lined with columns that cast adjoining areas and passages in darkness - the lookout or any number of other individuals could have been lurking therein, waiting.

Ittain remained at the entrace, looking wid- eyed inside. The mosaic at his feet telling stories he had read about time and time again. Eventually, Lee and the group could catch up. Realizing Ittain was just Ittain, he didn't say anything but tried to get the old man in the protection of the mercenaries he hired. Yet the old man moved Lee aside and wandered on, into the room, looking everywhere around. "Come out now, come out. We're all here in this holy house together. Come out." He motioned the mercenaries to lower their weapons. Who wisely disobeyed the order.

"He's mad." One said. "He'll doom us all if he walks in too deep. There are thieves in here." Lee took a note of the merc's suspicion, but still ushered the group to follow a far too comfortable Ittain.

They had advanced not even halfway down the hall, Ittain perhaps three quarters down, when cloaked figures emerged from the darkness of the adjacent pillars - just as the twilight above faded, and the first stars began to shine. The only light in the room now came faintly from above, from the torches the mercenaries had thought to bring, and the totem - and so the cloaked figures seemed as wraiths as they cautiously approached. There were perhaps a thirteen or fourteen of them in total -

A fifteenth of the hooded figures emerged from a passage near the rear of the chamber, and strode confidently past the totem itself towards Ittain.

"You called this place a holy site. Prithee, are you a Primordial Worshiper, mayhaps? From where do you hail?" His voice had a booming quality to it, easily heard by the seekers and mercenaries behind Ittain, but at the same time seemed measured and collected in its intonation - the man sounded...intrigued.

"We can't move further." the officer of the mercenaries said, holding the whole group up. "Why not! He's all alone there!" Lee shouted. "If we get in any more, nobody here makes a chance to run out of here." Lee bit his teeth and held his drawn dagger close. When the worst came to be, he'd weave some illusion of a monster barging in.

"Oh from far! I've come from so far. I've sailed over waves. Dove in the deepest caves." Ittain's enthusiasm seemed to be blinding him from the obvious truth. "But where I come from, there aren't any of those... magnificent things." he said, pointing at the Totem. "With such a powerful and mighty sign of Their power, you must have felt power so grand. Oh I almost envy you. I envy your faith. To sleep in such a forgotten but beautiful place. You must all be great worshippers. Tell me your names, please. I beg you, brothers."

His inquiry was met by laughter and scathing chuckles from the surrounding shrouded figures as they stepped ever-closer to the group of seekers and mercenaries behind him, some of them moving to block the pathway out. Their leader - still advancing towards Ittain from the totem itself - alone answered.

"Oh yes, this place, the totem, its power - the power of Lucrore - is self-evident. One would have to be blind in more ways than one not to recognize it...to be in awe of it." His voice was exultant as he spoke. "It drew us all here with a common purpose. We are the Fraternity of the Empyrean Flame. You may call me...Pedagogue Ormoneric. I am the foremost teacher and...disciple here, you might say. But tell me, who are you, and what is your purpose here? I would know if our ends would be harmonious with one another..." An implicit threat hung from the last of his words like a poised dagger.

"Why else would we be here, if not to ask the questions that demand to be asked for years now? And to ponder upon them, of course. Oh but my prodigy told me to speak in clear terms. Forgive me, brothers. We are here to learn from Lucrore and glean his insight on rebirth."

"Fool!" The words echoed through the hall. Lee was no longer scared or calculating. He was angry now. "Do you not see that these people are [i]threatening us!?[/i]" A purple light shone in Lee's hand, he was ready to cast the spell. But his task just got a lot harder. These robbers were no longer allowed to survive.

Ittain, in the meantime, turned back to the man claiming ot be Ormoneric. "Is this true.. Pedagogue Ormoneric?" He sounded sad, instead of angry.

"Perhaps had you been of lesser ilk...but your desires meet ours." Ormoneric said, holding up his hands in a placating gesture. "You have come to learn of Lucrore, to glean insight on rebirth...That is our goal as well, you see. Forgive us our...temptations towards dispute. It is not everday we receive such enlightened guests such as yourself. This land is swarming with indolent, vagrant pedants who know not the potential of what remains here." He raised his hands and drew back his hood, revealing a tall face, long raven hair, and sparkling eyes set against bronze skin and pointed ears - a sun elf, albeit likely a half-breed given the coloration of his hair.

"Come, brothers, we are amongst friends - there is no need for such hostility...is there?" He looked past Ittain to Lee as he posed the question, his eyebrows raised. The surrounding members of his 'fraternity' stood poised at a distance immediately around the seekers and their guards.

"How do we know you're speaking the truth so we drop our guard?" Lee asked, still very much critical of what was happening and with the spell still ready. "Your people have not been kind to the Primordials. Your queen slaughtered the very one whose temple we now stand in. Why should I trust you?" he asked. Ittain looked down upon the ground, pondering the question. Letting Ormoneric answer.

"Empress." Ormoneric replied simply.

"That is no answer." Lee became ever more stand-offish. If this was Vallenguin, he would have the Seeker's vault summoned. If this was Vallenguin, Mist Mages and Sea Fangs would've surrounded the elves already. But this was not Vallenguin. "Why should I trust you?"

Ormoneric raised a single finger and wagged it admonishingly.

"Andromache is an Empress. Not a queen." He said neutrally. "It is important to keep the truth of the story straight in order to discern the truth of this place as it is now - and however much some may not like it, it is the height of delusion and folly not to recognize Andromache's status as it is. I shall recite...and you, [i]boy[/i], will listen, learn, and [i]come to understand.[/i]"

He snapped his fingers.

A brilliant, gleaming silver flame erupted at his fingertips, tracing its way along his body. The lights within the totem surged, and along the entire length of the hall, sconces of fire erupted with light, thin and pale flames dancing within as the interior was illuminated, casting the robes figures in greater detail. Many of them pulled back their hoods, their looks expectant as they turned their attention to Ormoneric.

Ittain smiled and sat down in between Ormoneric and Lee. "Listen to him, my Prodigy. This man knows what you want. If it makes you feel any safer, I will protect you." But Ittain did not move. He merely sat. Ready to listen. The Seekers looked at eachother. The first one slowly sat down, then another and finally all Seekers sat, except for Lee. Who remained defiant with the purple light in his hand. But not so defiant as to not listen to Ittain. "Fine, talk."

"Decades ago, an orphaned girl of fourteen found herself abandoned in the Cradle's Throat." Ormoneric began, his voice steady, if somewhat theatrical. "Left to fend for herself in the vale, replete only with monstrosities and terror, she came to this place seeking shelter, and seeking to despil it - herein, she took offerings left in praise of Lucrore for her own sustenance...and then, a miracle occurred..." He gestured behind the totem, to an empty alcove set in the wall of the rotunda surrounding it, where an empty and massive sarcophagus was raised against the wall. "The Primordial Lucrore, in the flesh, arose in this very chamber, when for thousands of years no other Primordial has been seen or heard from...! Now, the first question I pose to you, boy...Why would a Primordial, or even the Primordial Lucrore himself, have arisen at [i]that[/i] specific moment...? Answer." His tone was firm and demanding.

Lee was not a fool. The obvious question, the one religion would dictate, was that Lucrore returned so the others could too. But Fate had its tendrils everywhere. "He returned for... Andromache?" It was an answer and a question and Ittain smiled. It didn't make sense. Why would he return just to be killed? Why not return now, when he would be amongst those faithful?

"Possibly, perhaps...your answer is adequate. Not the best I have ever heard, but the question is a difficult one - you see, there was nothing special about the movement and position of the celestial spheres above. It was not a particularly fortuitous moment in the season. It was a day far from that of any of the Primordial Holidays celebrated in any culture, at least as far as I am aware. The date past the year when the Primordials vanished was odd and unusual. The foolish would say he rose to punish her for despoiling his shrine and resting place, but that was not the first time such had occurred - and so the natural conclusion is that, whatever quality caused him to awake, Andromache's presence was [i]sufficient[/i] for that purpose - or else, the quality is unknown and beyond our knowing." Ormoneric's smile became apologetic. "I apologize if that answer seems unsatisfactory - we are but mortals, grasping at straws in the wind, to understand the mind and motives of a god."

Lee, frustrated, threw his dagger against the ground. A loud clang rang through the hall. "That's not good enough! We came here with a mission. And I am not leaving until I get the answers I want." But then Ittain rose up. "Be silent, child." his voice was far from how it once sounded. The grandfatherly warmth was replaced with an ethereal greatness. The words lingered longer than they should and Lee looked on, shaken to his core. Never had he seen Ittain like this. For the first time, a power oozed from him. But then it stopped. His warmth returned with a soft smile. "I have told  you to ask the right questions."

Lee took a deep breath. "Ormoneric. We have come here in a bid to return the Primordials. On the whole of Askor, only here did a Primordial return." He took another deep breath. Trying to stay calm. "You clearly... have an influence on this place." Finally, Lee dropped to one knee. "If nothing else, grant us your knowledge." Finally, he had dropped on both knees, looking down in a combination of shame and sadness.

"Your prostration is unnecessary. Continue to listen - and by the break of dawn, you too, might wield the Empyrean Flame...or more. Perhaps the last key to solving this mystery has been a...foreign perspective or peoples." Ormoneric indicated slyly. "All will be revealed...but you must listen."

He turned and began to pace in front of the totem as he carried on with his story.

"Now of course, the Primordial Lucrore rose, and due in part to the Empress' own recalcitrant nature, the exact details of their encounter remains uncertain and vague. Only through years of study, not only of these ruins, but of biographies of the Empress' companions, questioning of those who overheard her speak at opportune times, bribery in the right places, and the procurement of secret Imperial papers, have we been able to begin to glimpse what transpired. You see, Lucrore was already dying when he returned. Whether it was due to whatever happened to the other Primordials, or whether his condition was incidental, is unknown - merely that in a personal bid to defy death, he had preserved himself in slumber, here, for thousands of years - until Andromache came. And of course, Lucrore himself, as I suspect you well know, was the Primordial of Rebirth." He turned once more to Lee. "There was an altercation between the two. Now, this is the critical detail - as far as I have been able to discern, the Totem itself activated - but it was activated by [i]Andromache's[/i] presence, not by Lucrore's evocation. Of course, Andromache then slew him, and now she possesses powers beyond mortal reckoning...So boy, I pose to you two more questions." He splayed his hands wide.

"What was the Primordial Lucrore's intent upon awakening, and what is the purpose of his totem?"

"She got the power to slay a Primordial." he recited to himself. "And it was Andromache who managed to activate the Totem." Lee rose and walked up towards the Totem. This very action made the robed figures advance a step, and Ormoneric raised a hand of warning. 

"No." he said harshly. "You are wrong. [i]Think[/i], boy. Why would an artifact made by Lucrore grant a mortal power necessary to slay him just as he awakens? I will remind you, the Primordials were gods, but even gods can die to mortal hands - the story and blade of Halwende alone are proof enough of that. Lucrore was already dying when he arose, Andromache being able to slay him at that time, while still incred-" "Andromache is Lucrore reborn." There was no lack of arrogance in Lee's voice. He stated it like a fact. Like it was obvious.

Ormoneric raised a hand to his face is disbelief, and a number of exasperated groans arose from the assembled figures.

"...That answer is obvious, and the common pitfall of those who come to study this place." Ormoneric seethed as he lowered his hand. "False! Evidently false! Andromache is not a Primordial. While it was difficult to do, she left many samples of her body where it could be acquired by my own means - spilled blood, strings of hair, nail clippings - I studied them extensively for some time, and have witnessed some of her potential first-hand. She is no Primordial. She is no Primordial reborn. A true Primordial would eclipse Andromache in every facet of being. Your answer, while foolish, does have one implicit connotation that is accurate however." Ormoneric gestured to the totem. 

"The totem [i]was[/i] intended to be the mechanism of Lucrore's rebirth. And as demonstrated, the only requisite for its activation was a quality which Andromache's presence was sufficient to fulfill. The Fraternity of the Empyrean Flame has spent decades trying to recreate that event, oh, you cannot fathom the troubles we have gone to..." He pointed at two of the robed figures in turn. "You two. Fetch the chattel." The nodded in understanding and hurried off to a nearby side passage.

"The timing of your arrival is most fortuitous - you see, we think we have finally acquired the qualities necessary to activate the totem once more. We have only come this close once more before...and we failed...but with you here, perhaps with your foreign ways, and faith, and knowledge...perhaps..." He trailed off, staring at Lee. His eyes had gone dark, his expression one of cold calculation.

Lee remained silent. He felt as if his honor was harmed. Though in fact it was his ego. He was a prodigy back at Vallenguin. One of the youngest to be allowed outside the borders. He had found hundreds of texts. Combed through languages some would never see in their entire lives. Yet here, he was treated like a common pupil. And a foolish one at that. "It's not fair." He muttered. "They have years of research here, [i]here[/i]. By Arreantis, if I had the time they had-"

"Your arrogance is blinding." Ittain said. "You say you do not have enough knowledge. Well then ask. Ask and ask again. Or think and think again." Lee's annoyance was evident. He did not expect to be schooled here. "You talk like you have the answers already." But Ittain just laughed. "Me? oh no, no. I know as much as you do." Strangely enough though, that was not so comforting to Lee. Who just waited for the chattel to arrive, all the while ponder the words of Ormoneric. Lucrore was weakend, but Andromache was but a child. The Totem activated because of her. What was it that made a fourteen-year-old girl do such things?

The two robes figures returned...escorting with them two bound, young girls, completely naked, neither of them older than sixteen summers. Both of them had long red hair.

"These two were...very difficult to procure, Pedagogue." One of them murmured as he shoved one of the girls to the ground at Ormoneric's feet. "As dictated, one is a virgin, one is not."

Ormoneric frowned. "I thought they were both virgins?"

"They were when we brought them here." The cultist indicated blithely.

"Ah. Of course. In any case..." He turned his gaze back to the seekers and their bodyguards.

"It only became apparent when I found the most secret of pages...thought to have been destroyed, it was only a copy perchance made by an apprentice practicing their writing found in a nameless village I was able to procure, but it gave us the answer we needed...Andromache's scar, the fact that she is barren..." He looked down at the two girls with a grim smile. "Yes...tonight is the night, I can feel it." He bent down and grasped one of the girls by the chin, examining her face.

"She's not terrified." He stated calmly. He turned back to Ittain and Lee. "To recreate the scene as accurately as possible, we have been cycling through various emotional states...terror, in hindsight, should have been obvious, but did not occur to us." Without even breaking tone, he backhanded the girl across the face, and then kicked her solidly in the side before grasping her by the hair and dragging her as she started to scream up the stairs of the dais to the base of the totem.

"Boy, come here." He indicated to Lee with a crook of his finger. "Your foolishness aside, you may be what we need - you shall be our instrument in tonight's Divine Revel."

Lee has been many things. Arrogant. Foolish. Curious. Impatient. But never was he cruel. He never had to be. Lee did not know if he had the capacity for it, when he walked towards the dias. "If the road was easy, everyone would walk it." Ittain whispered as Lee passed him. "Knowledge... requires... sacrifice." Ittain may have whispered, but it was not in his voice. It was in the voice of a ghost, or a creature not human. The old man pointed at his eyes, and a shudder went through Lee. "It was a choice?" he whispered back in disbelief. But Ittain did not answer. Lee continued to walk up the dias.Two more cultists approached with him, both of them grasping at the girl and holding her up against the totem.

Ormoneric muttered something under his breath, tracing a hand across his brow, and his form was illuminated with silver flame. "Undress." He muttered to Lee, touching his brow in turn - and Lee felt the silvery flames cross from Ormoneric's fingers to alight his own body. 

He felt suffused with power - the world seemed to become smaller, darker, sharper in relief as the white flames filled his own eyes.

Looking upon the girl, he swallowed hard. He never did anything like this. He looked back to Ittain, for a moment. Fear clear across his face. "Sacrifices." the old man merely whispered.

"Madness! Barbarism!" The mercenary's officer yelled, pushing a Seeker out of the way. The cultists surrounding him started in surprise, not moving. Two others joined their superior, once again drawing weapons. "Free the girls." he ordered. The merely nodded and marched forward. They almost reached the dias, until Ittain rose and blocked their path. "My friends. Let us not soil this holy moment."

"Freaking Primordial worshiping pigs." One shouted, raising his blade. But Ittain raised his own hand. His attackers eyes burst in blue flames as strange lines of glyphs snaked out of the fire. All the while, the soldier screamed and screamed, dropping to his knees and then on his side. But he kept screaming. The cultists finally overcame their surprise and drew daggers, all of them rushing the three mercenary soldiers with snarls and looks of contempt. The soldier took his sword and tried to stab Ittain. Yet the old man simply motioned as to stop the man, and he could not move a muscle. Before the cultists could even reach Ittain's victim, he pressed his thumb on his forehead. A burning mark remained, filled with purple embers. He too dropped down and the other one finally stopped screaming. The glyphs on his body remained for a moment, before retreating into the burned out eyes. Just behind them, their officer swung his sword in menacing arcs, trying to keep the cultists at bay - but he was one, and they were many. Two of them lunged for his exposed back, slashing through his armpits and repeatedly stabbing him in the neck and back - he groaned and fell to his knees, and the rest fell upon him, their bloody work done with in a moment of rising and falling wrists, daggers glinting in the starlight as they descended, and rising with crimson dappling their lengths.

Ormoneric pushed Lee away, a faint look of disgust on his face as he watched the spectacle. "Well, this is...most ill. There will be no revel tonight. Nobody else died here that day. We shall try again at a later time." He motioned to the two cultists holding the red-haired girl down, who dragged her sobbing form away, along with the other girl, who simply continued to stare at the floor with an empty expression as she was guided back through a passage behind the pillars. As they left, Lee felt the strength of the silver flames depart his body.

Ormoneric narrowed his eyes as the cultists surrounded and starting muttering angry accusation at the two remaining mercenaries.

"You brought them into this place. You will dispose of the rest." He said icily to Ittain. "I care not how, but those two must not remain here come daybreak." He clapped his hands, and the cultists surrounding the two surviving mercenaries retreated, grudgingly.

"Wait!" Lee yelled. Clarity returning to his mind. "They must live. We will... dispose of them. And the others will be gone by daybreak." Lee marched up towards the mercenaries. Taking them both by the shoulder and walking out of the temple. He needed them to get back. They saw too much, that was true enough. He'd have to kill them, probably. But not now. No, not now.

Ittain looked upon the bodies being dragged outside by the Seekers. "Most unfortunate. Lesser religions these days. They have no insight." He offhandedly said, as if he didn't just kill two people in a manner unseen for nearly five-hundred years. Though he did turn to Ormoneric. "I'm afraid my young prodigy will demand we leave by daybreak as well. You see, we are not guests in your country. But it would seem that we do have the same goal."

"If you are worried about your documentation, some of our brothers can procure more suitable dockets for you. You are free to remain as long as you need." Ormoneric said offhandedly - though his eyes were looking through Ittain, still calculating some untold thought.

"Much obliged." Ittain said, after which he pulled out a slate of clay. Where he got it, nobody could tell. It bore no seal. On it he drew a glyph. "My prodigy, for now, will be satisfied with knowledge about Lucrore and the Empyrean Flame. So will my country and my kin." he begun. As he kept drawing the strange, glyphic circle now. "However. I am not so easily satisfied. Something had to happen here, today and that did not happen. You blame us, no doubt. And we will blame you for not telling us. Petty grievances really. But still a grievance." He handed Ormoneric the slate. "This rune will allow you to contact me. Maybe a week after it's activation. Maybe a day. Who really knows." The old man said with a comforting smile. "When you carry out your ritual, I would very much like to know how it ended." And with that the old man just wandered the hall, staying away from the Totem. Ormoneric looked between the glyph and Ittain with something approaching disappointment on his face before sighing and heading for one of the side passages. As he left, the pale flames in the sconces along the walls flickered out. In their dying light, he gazed upon the glyph once more - it appeared...hauntingly familiar. Like something, he had seen ages ago and forgotten - though he could not put his finger on it...

He shrugged as the light went out. Perhaps he would study it later when his mind was not so preoccupied.
[center][sub]Collab between me and [@Terminal][/sub][/center]