“But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as it is today. Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
A young man named Jomcara quietly wrote these words into a red diary as his first entry, before softly closing the book on the floor. When he was done he straightened his back while still on his knees, & gave a prayer to the lord.
Then, swiftly, he got to his feet and placed the diary on the desk next to his bed, washed his face in a bowl of water, and left the room.
Jomcara yawned lightly as he moved through the hallway and walked down the stairs to the lower floor. The boy was 18 years old, a man to some people, and a boy to many others. Nevertheless, many considered him handsome. Although he also looked like someone who had gotten on a witch’s bad side and been cursed with an affliction that never recovered.
Hair black as obsidian, & as white as fresh fallen snow at it’s tips. Eyes as deep blue as ocean waves, with the sclera of his right eye being made of some strange amethyst-like crystal. Two lovely silver horns bursting from his skull. They twisted delightfully around his head like some mad crown. His ear’s were not a man’s but a wolves, and likewise, he had a tail. A pole of sleek black soft fur with a white tuft at its end like a cow’s poking out of the bottom of his spine.
Around the young man’s neck was a chain made of sparkling, bright silver. From it hung an unlit censer in the shape of a knight’s helmet. A proud and dignified visor set in the center of a blossoming, beautifully designed rose.
Ah, I shouldn’t forget his clothes; he was wearing a large poncho that reached down to his ankles. In any case, the young man entered the kitchen. There, Jomcara yawned as the early morning light warmed his face from the windows as he parted the curtains in front of the sink. He used his tail to open the cabinets and collected food to prepare breakfast. When done, the young man walked back upstairs and went to his mother’s bedroom.
Hortensia was an alluring, tall woman. Around 6’5. Likewise, she slept on a large mattress. Jomcara walked to the right side of the bed and gently shook her shoulder.
The woman came awake slowly, Hortensia was heavily pregnant, so Jomcara gently aided his mother off of the mattress and she gave him a soft kiss on his forehead as a ‘good morning’ towards her special boy.
The lady was truly a sight you wouldn’t find twice in your life if you tried. Her hair was done in a mixture of rivulets and curls, it was thick and spilled down nearly to her midsection. The material it was made out of is what made it interesting to most; Hortensia’s hair gleamed like a deep crimson metal. As she moved, strands of seemingly platinum locks of hair would peek out from beneath the bushes of red, and shine in whatever light was touching the woman they belonged to.
What was interesting, is that the flecks of white gold peered out in a pattern of sorts. Meant to accentuate the lady’s beauty as she moved. She also bore bright and hot pink eyes, and her lips were honey gold.
They walked to the kitchen and began breakfast.
“So…do you think Leilah is ever going to give up on getting those dogs from Ishu Leyath?”
Jomcara dropped his fork on the plate and snorted into his elbow. “Ergm, no. No, there’s no way that’s ever going to happen! Ahahahaha…!”
Hortensia thrust her hands out in exclamation. “I KNOW! But it doesn’t make any sense! Dorlaomer tried his damndest to get past Sigumth’s scorning talons, but remind me: does it make ANY sense to get past a fortress city owned by a black dragon and two-look at my fingers, count them-”
Jomcara was clutching his chest in laughter, he had his hand against his forehead “I’m counting them, I can see them fine mum.” he said between fits of giggling and hysteric laughter. “But, listen, do you know the worst part?”
She raised her palm in a ‘hold on’ motion. “We’ll get to the worst part later. Let’s focus on what’s important!” She leaned over the table a bit and slammed her elbow into the table. Pushing her two fingers as hard into the air as she could.
“TWO djinn lords! A brother and a sister djinni rulership over an entire region bigger than all of Mangrath! One’s made a tie to the realm of ashes, and the other’s somehow made an alliance with the fay and tied herself to the garden of starlight! I mean, seriously, how in the name of Anael & Anapiel do you expect someone to, to, to…I don’t even know.” Hortensia’s face was in her hands. She was incredulous.
“I don’t even know how you could dream up a stealth mission through a place like that on short notice, just to get a pair of dogs through that-that-”
“Country?”
“No. Black dragon, not gold. So…”
“Heh, I get it. But back on my original point, do you know what the worst part is?”
“Enligh-OH!”
“Exactly! Sigmuth’s scorn is in the middle of the Ysol region! It’s full of dinosaurs and monsters like them! We’ve got to give Dorlaomer some credit, he managed to reach the talons while not becoming a raptor’s food!”
The two kept on laughing and talking about the circumstances of their town, Folhavanc. Their neighbor Darim and why he’d made such a strange choice such as painting the walls in his house purple. Excitement and bantering about how they couldn’t wait for an upcoming festival. A tradition where in the town square, anyone in the town would be allowed to play the collected instruments and the entire village would celebrate with the divine choir.
The buildings in the town even had metallic sculptures of the Angels of music that amplified the songs of the townsfolk to resound throughout every nook and cranny of the place, and act as a ward against evil. The music would even be enchanted with the love of Faerie. The splendor of the music would make it so that no one who could hear it would feel anything from it save peace. Unless insanity was infused into their hearts.
While the family was talking, the door to their home opened. A woman walked in whose posture was straight and stature was dignified. Her skin was blue and her nails were like crystal stone. Her eyes were an emerald green and her hair was gray like a gravestone, but it actually twisted and moved even when she stood still. It was alive, and the woman strode in with a smile on her face. She wore a loincloth made out of bear fur.
“Stelgotta! How are you?” Said Hortensia.
Stelgotta kissed Hortensia on the cheek and huffed as she sat down. “The summer heat is insane! Tubiel’s ardor may be a blessing, but I prefer weather that doesn’t make me feel like I’m cooking alive!” She shook her head in a ‘if only you knew’ fashion.
“This-” she jabbed her finger into the table. “-is why the tundra is so much better than the feeling of being constantly roasted alive in this summer heat!”
Hortensia laughed and put a hand over stomach. “You must be roasting out here!”
“It’s a complete nightmare! And the worst part of it is that I can’t even get a drink of water to cool down in my own house!”
“Here we go.”
Stelgotta raised an eyebrow at Jomcara. “Yes. Here we go again, because I will never forgive those gnome bastards for destroying the sylph’s gift that keeps my water running! What did I ever do to them?”
“How about stealing their chief’s favorite hat and cursing the petunia’s in your garden, which you let them eat, to taste sour?”
Stelgotta flicked Jomcara behind his head. “They shot first. They’re fay. They know the rules, and I’m just talking about proper decorum relative to how one should address one prank with another! Me losing my water goes above and beyond a simple prank!”
“True. You know, has Hannah come by and settled the matter? What’s your situation with getting them to accept you as the owner of the property.”
“Poorly. I made an attempt by bringing them glazed glitter lilies from Gherngoh’s lake, but all that did was get them off of my back for awhile. When Crudewelt comes by to re-establish the sylph’s gift I’ll have water for awhile but it seems like it might just be a short truce from what the chief said. I implied that I’d return the hat and fix the petunia’s if he recognized me and he wouldn’t do it.”
Jomcara groaned. “That’s terrible.”
“This is starting to sound like a quest or a puzzle. Did Gertztrude allude to you needing some kind of special amulet or to accomplish a set of actions to properly claim the land? It seems like there’s some kind of secret the fairies are keeping from you about how to claim the land.”
Stelgotta raised an eyebrow and gave Hortensia a curious look. “Are you sure about that? It seems a bit more like they’re just not used to me. You should’ve talked to the chief when I first got here; he made it dead clear that Gertztrude was family, and I most certainly wasn’t. They were somber, just like a friend of theirs had died. Even though Gertztrude was just needed to help explore the shade shore.”
Both Jomcara and Hortensia made disgusted faces at the mention of that horrible place.
“Well, at least he’ll be able to have fun in some of the nicer places in the shade shore…if he can make it to the areas the raven Queen rules.”
The three talked to each other for a bit. Stelgotta enjoyed herself and Hortensia directed her to their closet. There, she got what she had come there for in the first place: a special jacket enchanted to keep away intense heat. An old relic of Hortensia’s.
Jomcara walked into the living room right as Stelgotta was finishing putting the jacket on. The young man wrapped his arms around her from behind, a smile on his face. She grinned and let out a small giggle.
They hugged, said their goodbye’s, and shared a kiss just as Stelgotta was leaving.
Grinning and happy, the young man wandered over to a special stand on the left side of the room. It was an ornate and large bowl raised on a singular pole, and it was filled with water. Jomcara reached into a pouch on a shelf behind it and pulled out some pink powder. He threw it into the basin and it began to broth and buble. Vapors of mist and a sweet smell that seared the nostrils quickly began pouring out of the water and with a wave of his hand, Jomcara made special statues appear over the basin.
They swirled out of the mist and floated perfectly still above the waters. They were statues of the different angels.
He summoned forth 9 angelic figurines: one of Amitiel, Ariel, Asariel, Barrattiel, Jeduthun, Lamechial, Mihr, Peliel & Asteraoth, and then placed them around a carpet on the left side of the room facing a tarp with 8 symbols arranged around it and a painting of an angel in the center. Jomcara knelt on his prayer carpet and set himself to pray with the angels.
“Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. I pray to you for aid. For support to be poured into my incoming endeavors. I am lost my father. Save a love of history, I do not know what my purpose is. What it is I truly desire to accomplish. Soon, I will walk into a sea of chaos yet I cannot see any reason for myself to be embroiled within it, save perhaps to savor it’s loveliness. Without that, anyone would sour.”
Then he left bathed in the rejuvenation of prayer, and fell into the long night without another word until the next week.