2017-05-20: Familiar Uncertainties

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  • Cutscene: Familiar Uncertainties
  • Cast: Catenna
  • Where: Outskirts of Adlehyde
  • Date: 05 May 2017
  • Summary: Catenna tries to forget Riesenlied, only for some new dread to erupt. Or is it an old dread?

The brook rippled past the nomad tent, on the edge of the wilds beyond Adlehyde's ranchlands. The stream's water ran just deep enough to let her bow deeply and immerse herself into it, then throw her hair back in a wet arc of raven tresses, droplets flung from it as she pushed long fingers through.

She folded her hands together and bowed her head, damp locks hanging around her face and clinging. Even in the blue sky above, the distant shadow of the moon could be made out atop the water. A familiar silhouette - one she could find without even thinking.

She stepped into that reflection. Let the water run past and carry away her doubts and fears. Immersed herself in Celesdue's presence.

She hadn't needed to purify herself for a long time - not since her delve into the caverns of Malevolence and fear, where her allies hastened to surrender their offerings to the pyre of the Unclean, not knowing the gravity of sacrificing a burnt offering to a spirit. The uncleanliness of that encounter had followed her. This time, though, it was different.

A softer stain upon her. An uncertainty she couldn't fully put her finger on.

Lowering her head, she closed her eyes and clasped her hands over her chest, and did her best to forget Riesenlied. To accept that the woman was gone now, and she would never come around again - thus ensuring that only one person would remain who could understand the world she came from.

Catenna lifted her eyes towards the Moon, exhaling. Not for the first time, a little spark of doubt tugged at her when she thought of the winged woman.

There had always been something not quite transparent about Riesenlied, she realized - something about her she was uncertain about, even while embracing her as a friend. Perhaps it was the lies the other woman told when first they met, or perhaps it was the sense that she seemed, somehow, different than other Beastmen. Catenna had set the doubts aside because the other woman came from roughly her part of the world - and no one else in these parts did. Besides - she was gone now. What more was there to be unsure about?

And yet....

And yet that sense of uncertainty was coming back to her now. A sense that something was unplaceably wrong.

Slowly, the stream's water sloshing around her thighs, she turned, shaking her head and sighing. The reflection of the Moon could wash away a taint of the spirit. A doubt was a stronger thing. She stepped towards the bank.

And watched with a sudden shock of thunder racing through her mind as a streamer of fire roared across the night sky - and descended upon the small, distant shadow that was Adlehyde.

With a gasp, she bolted up from the stream, grasping for her garments and her shotgun. Thinking about it was beyond her right now. All she could think about was that doubt. A different doubt, this time - a burning thing laced with sudden dread, and a sinking wrongness in the pit of her stomach. Something unnatural had occurred. Something unnatural /was/ occurring and she absolutely had to be there, and she had to be there /now./

It took her shockingly little time before she was dashing down the road towards Adlehyde, already loading shells into her shotgun and double-checking to ensure the stone tablet of her Medium was still with her. It was. She would need it, she was sure. Fire from the sky --

She redoubled her pace and dashed towards Adlehyde as fast as her legs would carry her, dragging an unfamiliar doubt with her.

(But why do I feel like I have felt this uncertainty before...?)