2020-01-14: Wyvern Worries and the Codex's Call

• Log: Wyvern Worries and the Codex's Call
• Cast: Cyre H. Lorentz, Talia, Catenna, Jacqueline Barber, Ethius Hesiod, Ivan
• Where: The Cape of Breath
• Date: January 14, 2020
• Summary: During what seems to be a normal, casual day among the Caravan Kinship, a call for help from an unexpected source leads to preparation for an adventure.

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===========================<* The Cape of Breath *>===========================

Stretching from the edge of the slowly-spreading northern desert, the Cape of Breath is the lush southern region of Meria Boule. Farmland and livestock take up much of the hilly region, dotted with the estates and castles of Merian nobles, often at the height of elevation, but across temperate land to the west great forests begin, still part of the great resources of the Merian nation. In places the badlands of the north find mirrors here, hotter regions with accordingly sparser populations... where people could move. 

To the farthest south and east are the wide coastlines, each marked with large cities. Only the fortress nature of many estates at the hearts of settlements recalls much of Meria's more warlike history, after the great efforts of the late Queen to ensure peace for all Meria Boule, and the spread of knowledge. Nevertheless, the increasing spread of monsters can make travel without caravan or guards a perilous undertaking indeed.

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_gmgvAz8Ks

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

What do you feed a hungry wyvern*?

Damn good question! Cyre has been fortunate enough that a certain bulky texbook has had convenient answers for all of his wyvernlet-related questions. But as the little twins have grown a little bit older, it seems that he has another question for the tome.

Technically, he doesn't need to be bringing the wyrmlings into the Caravan for the consultation, but matters of technicality are somewhat immaterial when the creatures are extremely clingy, highly intelligent and in possession of very sharp and pointy claws.

And so it goes that Cyre stumbles into the Carakin's living room with one blue wyvernlet perched majestically atop his head and a second pink one wrapped around his face like some kind of living mask. It becomes fairly obvious what he's actually come to ask about, as the twins seem somewhat... mottled. Their hardened scales have shed in places, exposing soft, tender flesh underneath. Cyre feels his way around the furniture until he can find the couch, and promptly sits in a spot he knows is there before trying again to gently pry the pink twin from the front of his head.

It's a little rough. Those claws are really hanging in there.

(*For the record, meat is always a good bet, but they also like chilis as treats)

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia is sitting in the living room. She has a script for a play -- bound like a book -- in her hand, and she is flipping through the pages, idly. Her nose wrinkles, as she sits back in one of the chairs in the Caravan's living quarters. She flips a page, and then looks up, and she... blinks.

She sees Cyre stumbling, twin wyverns wrapped about her head. There is a moment's pause, before she closes the script, and then looks at him.

Her head tilts; one eyebrow quirks up. "Cyre?" she asks. "Are you all right? Can you see inside of the... er... wyvern pile?"

<Pose Tracker> Catenna has posed.

For her part, Catenna has helped Cyre out with dwagon duty where it has come up, but she's been content to let the catman take the lead on being a father to his pets. She'd hate to deprive him of the joys of being a dad, after all.

When Cyre does arrive, he'll find the Moon Shaman in one of her simpler dresses, sitting centred on a prayer rug with the Owlet dozing in her lap. She raises her eyebrows at the sight of her lover with his hangers-on.

Perhaps literally. In spite of herself, she smiles a little. "You and the wee ones seem to be having some adventures, don't you?"

With a sigh, Catenna sets Saarda-Shanta to one side, laying the little white bird among a pile of soft cushions. It frees her up to maneuver over to Cyre, leaning over his shoulder and curling her fingers a little as she lowers her voice to coo at the facedragon.

"Let go dada. Le'ggo dada precious. Le'ggo dada yesh you do."

<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

It really is a good thing they found the Codex. It was a very useful resource to have around - Jacqueline's not sure she got by before without having such a wide breadth of knowledge at her fingertips. And, it turns out, it becomes especially useful when one has exotic creatures to raise. They can't just go and ask the nearest professional about how to take care of a wyvern.

...Well, unless that professional was Riesenlied, maybe, but they couldn't bother her with all of their dragon-related problems.

Just before Cyre stumbles into the living room Jacqueline is sitting with the others, chatting and enjoying their company when, suddenly, he appears, with wyverns wrapped around his face. She blinks, and stares for a moment, her eyes drawn to the hatchlings themselves.

"...Iii'll go fetch the book." She decides, standing up and hurrying back to her room. She emerges from her room a moment later, carrying the Codex back into the living room and setting on the table before opening it up and flipping to the section on wyverns.

"Let's see... mottled scales..." She murmurs to herself, scanning through the entry.

<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.

        Ethius is always skulking about. It's sort of what he does, for tolerable or for worse. Sometimes his appearances are abrupt, like he has impeccably chosen a specific corner or room to wait for someone to pass by for the usual stiff and uncomfortable exchanges. But this time... this time.
        The scrape of a specific sort of fabric gives away movement. The fabric of...
        The wyvern puppet-suit, which was made for two people to operate.
        "Is that where they went, then?" Ethius asks in that tone of voice of his that is just distinctly him. In a rough puppet-y facsimile of the wyvernlets' natural caretaker. He makes no motion to approach any closer than from the doorway in which the strangely suited man shadows.

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Ivan was so encouraged by the alchemy practice the other day that he is... trying to read a book on the topic! With 'trying' being the operative word. He is probably interrupting Talia's own reading with all of the groaning and sighing in boredom that he's been doing.

"Why does plant magic have to be so--"

Just then, Cyre walks in, covered in babies.

Ahh!! They're so cute!!! But no. He mustn't coo over the wyverns. He must be tough and mature! Say something cool instead, Ivan!!!

"I think there's something on your face, Cyre!"

Uhhhh.... well, at least it wasn't cooing.

DC: Talia switches forms to Ultraround Techno-Champion Gear Cuccobuster!
DC: Talia switches forms to The Charming Sellsword!

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

To his credit, Cyre probably was inside the wyvern suit up until a few minutes ago, but emerged in an inauspicious attempt to get a closer look at the wyvernlet's scales. And now look at him. Two little apex predator babies using his head as a perch, shedding heaven knows what kind of scaliness onto his everything.

"Nnnff dnff shff," Cyre responds in a wyvern-muffled, deadpan tone to Ivan's observation. "Mm ffn, jss rggrrtn," he answers toward Talia. If this is maybe hard to understand, then perhaps you might want to try talking with a wyvern on your face.

Catenna arrives to rescue Cyre's head from its captors, and the pinker one responds... Adorably. She makes a little squeaking noise and leans her head up and over to fit the tip of Catenna's finger right into the frilled mane of scales around her jaw. They seem looser than they should be, but maybe that's why the little one is leaning the way she is? But it seems Catenna's cooing has an unintended consequence! The facewyvern's brother seems to GET JEALOUS at this one-sided attention-giving, and makes a sudden squawk before nipping at his sister's neck. She hisses and snaps back! The pair lunge at each other, off of Cyre's face, and into a rolling pile of scales and claws that tumbles across the couch like an adorable hurricane. "Pwah!" Cyre gasps, free of wyvern hugs. "Haah, thanks Cat, I almost got turned into a scratching post-- hold on."

Cyre...

Reaches over and lifts the pair of whelps out of their ragepile and tries to nudge them over to their 'mother' in the doorway.

Meanwhile, Jacqueline has found the relevant page! It's a beautifully illustrated entry, and with the imminent crisis averted, she has all the time in the world to peruse it.

She gets halfway through the bit about how scales tend to shed in periods of growth but that it could also be a result of certain mites, when the page suddenly turns over on its own. It's an thick book, that's not entirely surprising-- but then it does so again. And again. And if she tries to hold it down to get a decent read, the thing would rifle and rustle under her fingertips, as if caught in a strong breeze.

...Which is odd, considering that Cyre is both not that kind of jerk and also presently occupied. The tome flexes and bounces, struggling desperately to turn its pages. The gem inlaid into its face glows with a faint, blue light...!

<Pose Tracker> Catenna has posed.

With a little moue of lips, Catenna wiggles her finger just subtly. She raises her eyebrows just slightly as she feels that loosening of scales.

When the nippy twosome tumble off of Cyre, however, Catenna can only smile and lean in to give Cyre's cheek a soft kiss. "You have a nice face. I am hardly about to let the little ones scratch it up!"

The smile lingers as she looks towards Jay, brushing a lock of hair back. "Creatures like lizards and dragons tend to shed skin, that's all. I imagine that is what is happening here...."

Flip. Flip flip.

Catenna scratches her cheek with one nail, clearing her throat. "What on earth?" she questions, beginning to move towards Jay. "Something seems to be happening there, Jay...."

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia's eyebrow twitches a little at another interruption from Ivan. She might have been on the verge of some retort, or maybe just playing with him in some way, but that is ultimately cut short by the wyverns.

She fights a smile at Catenna cooing over them; then she looks at Ethius, and she shrugs her shoulders. She sits up a little straighter, and leans forward, elbows on her knees. Then she yelps, making a surprised noise when the pages of the Lifeweaver's Codex begin to turn rapidly, like wind is blowing.

Her hand goes to her side, to the knife she wears there, by instinct. She doesn't draw it, though. "Ah--" She looks at Catenna, then nods, and then exclaims:

"The gem, on the front!" she cries out. "It is glowing, no?"

<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.

        If nothig else, Ethius tends to be good at maintaining routines as specified. The routine as specified involves, in some form, having a ragepile reform around his person in pursuit of the all-important Foodstuffs For Growing Predators. The puppetsuit is only so protected from the sharp talons of wyvernlets. The 'mother' may be about to suffer excruciating pain from having them climb and claw all over in pursuit of more food and attention.
        "Yes. Something is happening," Ethius remarks as one wyvernlet hides his gaze of the room ahead of him, "I have been rendered unaware of a deviation to the wyver--"
        Rapid page turning. He knows Jay can rapidly thumb through the Codex in search of specific creature information in the heat of battle so the noise itself is not alarming - as noise is all Ethius has to go by. When Catenna mentions something strange is going on (and further clarified by Talia pointing out an odd light), Ethius puts a hand against his forehead.
        Which is to say now he has a hand up against the back of a wyvernlet who is now pressed against his forehead with nary but a slightly sturdier mask between them.
        "...You were not discussing the adjustment to their feeding times."

<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

Jacqueline can't help but chuckle a little as Cyre struggles to corral the wyverns. They seem to be playing, mostly, so it's all in good fun. But, thankfully, he manages to get free of them before long as they start to fight, with Cyre pulling them apart.

"Well, it's good that they're still energetic, at least." Jacqueline says, looking up from the Codex. She looks toward Catenna, then, with a nod.

"It seems to agree with you." She says with a nod. "But, it also says it might be mites. I think the menagerie should be clean, but I'll check the entry to see if there's anything we should do just in- ah!"

The page turns over on its own before she can read it. And then another, and another. She looks up to check the door, but... it might be open enough to let a breeze in, but there's not enough of one for this.

"I-I... I don't know, it's never...struggled, like this before." Jacqueline says, with disbelief. "...W-well, I mean, it's never done anything before."

It was just a book...or, so she thought. She looks toward Talia as she points out that the sapphire on the front is glowing.

"...It's never done that, either..." She says, with a frown. She thinks for a moment...and then, takes a deep breath.

"...Brace yourselves, everyone. I don't know what's about to happen, but... I'm going to see what it wants." She says... and then, she lets go of it so that it can do its thing.

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Catenna's efforts to free Cyre's face ends up sparking even more cuteness, including a tiny wyvern battle. Ivan is unnecessarily preoccupied with pretending not to be charmed by these proceedings when something... very mysterious happens.

Pages of the book in Jacqueline's hand begin to flip on their own, a stone on its cover glowing as the book begins to jump about.

"Be careful!" Ivan says, standing up and drawing closer to prepare for whatever the book may have planned.

"Sometimes books will attack!"

It's...it's happened in digs before...

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

"Yeah but my face is for kissing, not for wyvern claws to scratch!" Cyre huffs, but smiles at the kiss. "I know scars are cool and all, but I think it only counts if they come from actual fights and not wyrmlet-wrestling!" Speaking of which, Cyre should... probably go help Ethius with that.

Thus, Cyre is conveniently out of the way and tending to the wyverns when the Codex stirs.

Jacqueline releases her hold on the Codex. Freed from her grip, the tome settles down, its pages rifling rapidly past every recognizable entry. It flies through the main body of the book, well past the encyclopedia and deep into the depths of encoded text that make up the latter half of the codex... Until finally it finds what it's looking for.

A... blank page?

No. The codex glows with cyan light. Ink spreads across the page before pooling into lines and curves that soon become recognizable as a map of the Meria region. A single point is marked with a cross before the page turns again, more lines spreading over the page, outlining an unfamiliar landscape and a path laid out through winding terrain. Again, another cross-shaped mark. A destination within a destination. This alone would be interesting enough, but--

There are words, there.

Words that bleed into the margins. The same word, repeated over and over and over again. "Help," the book repeats, the word copying itself hundreds and hundreds of times, until it becomes less text and more shading, adding detail to the pair of maps.

Ivan is right. Books will sometimes attack, it's true, but this one... This one is doing something else.

Cyre looks over from where the Wyverns have laid claim to Ethius-as-wyrmmom and stares as the last of the cyan light fades away into winking motes and the scent of lush woodlands. "...What just happened?" He asks, "Why do I smell trees?"

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"W-We shouldn't attack her book, Vanya!" Talia says. "It has a lot of useful information, no? About monsters. Though--um..."

Maybe it could be a monster?

Talia's eyes widen and she gets up, peering over Jacqueline's shoulder. Maybe she has other duties, but she still considers herself the Kinship leader's bodyguard. She looks down at the words on the page.

And the map. She draws in a sharp gasp. "Th-that is... very strange...!"

<Pose Tracker> Catenna has posed.

"I like you perfectly well with no face scars, dear. Preserve your boyish good looks." Catenna bats her lashes at Cyre with a little blush.

Moving to stand behind Jay and a little to the right, Catenna folds her arms across her midsection and waits to see what happens to the Codex. A second later, there's a little flutter, and Saarda-Shanta descends to her shoulder. The Owlet's grown a little larger recently, looking more like an adult owl these days.

<Interesting.> Saarda-Shanta tilts her head about seventy degrees to the right.

The pages coil out to draw that new map, and Catenna leans in with wonder - only to swallow deeply as the word begins to etch itself again and again into the page, a textual scream repeated over and over. Her eyes grow wider as she just watches it all unfold.

When the maps ae finally laid out before them, Catenna swallows once more before looking over to Cyre. "...I'm not sure," she admits, her voice a little smaller.

She pauses. Tilting her head, she draws a slow breath.

"...Someone is calling out, somehow...."

<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.

        The scent of forested lands is almost as overpowering as the scent of... something less important to the proceedings, as a wyvernlet flails at being sandwiched between two halves of a stock animation. "I was poised to ask that question after the others," 'the others' of which Ethius will not get to ask with very good reason. Very good reason like strange book-map intrigue.
        A very good reason to further deviate the return to the menagerie with the little wyvern pups in tow.
        "Is someone calling out, Miss Catenna?" Ethius asks. "I am afraid I am not hearing anything of the sort."

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Talia warns Ivan not to destroy a book filled with such valuable information.

"Don't worry, I'll slay it in one cut, so you can still read the pages!" Ivan offers. He summons a sword, but then, the book forms words...

Helphelphelp...

Ivan bristles. "Don't cry for help now! You're the one who started this fight!" Ivan accuses the book.

But wait.

...Someone is calling out, somehow....

And the words become... a map?

He lowers the sword. "You think it's a message?"

<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

Jacqueline chuckles a little at Cyre's response to Catenna, but her attention is soon taken up entirely by the Codex. The pages flip, landing on a blank page... that soon fills with ink. Jacqueline recognizes it immediately as a map of the region and quickly brings out her own map, setting it next to the Codex to compare. And then, the page turns.

This time, the map is of an area she doesn't recognize. She puzzles for a moment as she tries to find its match on her map, when suddenly she notices a word.

One word, that becomes many.

Help.

"...'Help'..." Jacqueline repeats, startled. She sits back, overwhelmed, and then nods wordlessly as Talia comments on the strangeness occurring before them.

"...Something, or someone, is calling for help..." Jacqueline says, glancing toward Catenna. And then to Cyre, and then to the others around her. "...And somehow, they were able to use the Codex as a medium to do so."

A book originating - as far as she knew - from Lunar, had within it a map of a location on Filgaia... It's strange, and bizarre, but there's one thing she knows.

"...I think so." She says, nodding toward Ivan. "This place... I don't recognize it, but someone or something needs help there."

She goes quiet for a moment...but, anyone familiar with Jacqueline probably has an idea of what she's about to say next.

"...I don't know who they are, but if they're reaching out to us... I can't ignore it." She says, shaking her head. She points out the second map, then - the unfamiliar one. "Do any of you recognize this place?"

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

"I suppose something needs to," Cyre answers Catenna with a sigh. "I found white hair when I looked in the mirror this morning."

...

...Cyre's hair is all white.

All the time.

...

His attention turns toward the tome's sudden change. While he focuses on the mysterious second map, his gaze soon shifts to the endlessly repeating mantra. "...Calling out, huh? I never heard of any magic that could do anything like this-- unless the book is alive, or something. Maybe... I mean we did find it in a place full of weird, living things." The Menagerie of Withertallow was a strange and terrifying place, full of chimerical creatures of all kinds. But then, the Codex has never acted like a living thing before, so maybe it's just an unfamiliar magic after all. "I don't recognize the place," Cyre shakes his head, "Sorry. Maybe if it was in Ignas, but..."

The map of Meria suggests otherwise. But then, maybe being Ignan wouldn't have helped anyway. The marked location matches up with a place not far away from where the Carakin has camped out. But... The marker on Jay's local map isn't a town or a city or anything like that. It's the one that the Kingdom of Meria uses to denote dangerous or forbidden locations and landmarks.

The mark points them to a place called the Feywoods of Moore.

<Pose Tracker> Catenna has posed.

"I think it can only be." Catenna nods to Ivan gravely, folding her arms once again. "You saw the word. If it is not someone, then it is something calling out to us - perhaps even a spirit, or the earth itself."

The little joke from Cyre leaves Catenna to sigh gently, moving over to stand beside him and take his hand.

Her lips curl slightly before she exhales slowly through her nose. "I do not think the Codex is a living thing, but I don't understand everything about it. I don't know where some of the places on those maps are, though. That one looks like Meria, at least...."

Again she leans in. So does Saarda-Shanta. The Owl actually turns her head a full 180 degrees upside down and then rotates it back.

<And yet it does seem to be directing us to a location, does it not? How curious.>

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"I don't," Talia admits, quietly. She looks over Jacqueline's shoulder, then glances at her brother, and nods. She doesn't see much choice. They have to take some action.

They have to do something.

"But... we have a map, and..." She glances at the Owl. "...We know where to go, no?"

She adjusts her stature, standing up a little straighter, as she starts to think. Would it be a trap? Would they be lured somewhere dangerous?

Maybe, she should do a little more preparation.

<Pose Tracker> Ethius Hesiod has posed.

        The oddball man would stare - well, he always is in some form, but semantics - as further discussion reveals Ethius' confusion for the sight/sound misconception gag that he has had the misfortune to bear, as the wyvernlet on his masked face starts to lose grip and loudly make wyvernlet noises before it finds a perch atop the head.
        At long last, Ethius can see out of the mask again. It is a miracle.
        "...I do find it odd." Ethius remarks as he brings a hand up above his eyes to stop a wyvernlet tail from draping over his sight anew.
        "Miss Jay is not shy about carrying the Codex out in the open. I cannot recall at present if anyone we have encountered has shown such keen interest or familiarity with the Codex that they would know to convey a message through these me--"
        Wyvernlet decides it doesn't like having its tail held that way. Wyvernlet bites puppet hand. Ethius' speech abruptly ends.
        "...I suppose further speculation is best saved for--"
        nom
        "There is a matter of--"
        chomp
        Ethius goes quiet for a while. Moments later...
        "At presen--"
        THERE IS A BITING THAT IS LESS EXPOSITION MORE WYVERNLET FEEDING

<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

"I haven't, either...but I don't think it's outside the realm of possibility." Jacqueline replies as to the various possibilities to how this is happening, shaking her head. He does have a point, though - they did find it in a pretty unusual place. Who knows what else this book was capable of?

But, the location...

"...They call it, the 'Feywoods of Moore'." Jacqueline says. "...And, this symbol on my map...it indicates a forbidden place. This... must be a pretty dangerous area..."

She frowns, thinking it over. If it was forbidden, that was probably for a good reason. If someone needed help in these Feywoods... well, they'd have to be careful not to end up in trouble too.

She looks toward Ethius, then, considering his words.

"...I don't think so - people have commented on it before, but only on its strangeness. No one's been familiar with it so far - at least, no one who's approached me about it." She replies, then looks toward Talia.

"That's right. And, what's more, we have a name the 'Feywoods of Moore'." She replies with a nod. "I'm going to start looking into it. There has to be information about it somewhere - I'd like arm us with as much knowledge as I can before we start making any plans to visit."

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

It seems that they will not be slaying the book, they will be helping it. Or rather, whoever is using the book to communicate. Ivan vanishes the sword and listens as Jacqueline describes the location that may be indicated by the mysterious message.

"Forbidden... dangerous..." echoes Ivan. "It sounds pretty great. Are we going, then?"

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

"Why would the land send out a cry for help through a Lunarian book...?" Cyre murmurs, his brow knit in thought even as his little wyvern children clamber hungrily all over their puppet surrogate. They'll probably need to check for mites, just in case. "...Well. I've never really thought much about it, but maybe the stone in the front is some kind of guardian medium? I've never heard of anything like this happening, though. If they want to send a message, it would be through their Chosen." Cyre hasn't seen or heard from Cecilia Adlehyde in a while-- maybe that's the emergency? Has she... fallen into a well somewhere, or something?

The situation is curious indeed. "I'll do some digging, too," Cyre says, intrigued. "If this forest is on a map, it stands to reason that the kingdom probably has record as to why. Maybe we can ask around and try to figure something out before we head in."

He looks to Ivan, then shrugs. "I mean, we have to now, don't we? It's not like we can call ourselves proper Drifters if we ignore something like this.

<Pose Tracker> Catenna has posed.

Catenna lowers her eyelids before giving Cyre a light nudge with her elbow. "We have at least two and ideally three High Priests traveling with us. By some measures, we are among the Guardians' chosen. But the point is well-taken. It's not like them to communicate by book."

<Can confirm, yes.> Saarda-Shanta gives her wings a flutter. <Though Miss Adlehyde seems a little scarce these days. Still, this is... hardly how it is done, were it the paradigm we normally consider here.>

"Less opaque, darling," Catenna murmurs to the owl. "You do seem to be growing up sassier."

<I learned it from Dad.> Saarda-Shanta rotates her head towards Cyre.

<Pose Tracker> Jacqueline Barber has posed.

"That's...a good question." Jacqueline considers. They don't really have a lot of information on who or what is responsible for what's happened here.

At the subject of Cecilia, though, Jacqueline looks between Cyre and Saarda-Shanta.

"I imagine she's just taking a well-deserved break after everything she's been through." Jacqueline considers. "I'm sure she's doing fine."

She hoped so, anyway. Being a citizen of Adlehyde Cecilia was her princess, after all.

She cracks a smile, though, at Cyre's comment.

"Yeah, that's about it. We aren't going to let danger get in the way of helping someone in need." She says. ...She just hopes this didn't end up being some terrible scheme.

...Well, even if it is, it's better that they find out than letting it go unnoticed.