The Forest - Chapter One

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by spiderwrangler » Sun May 12, 2013 6:40 am

Kast deftly picks the knife off the floor and unobtrusively holds the handle towards her, waiting to see if she responds to Rian's inquiry.
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Nioca » Sun May 12, 2013 11:15 pm

Vualn looked between Rian and Joyce, his interest piqued by the new development.
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Sun May 12, 2013 11:55 pm

Without a glance, Joyce takes the proferred dagger from Kast, grasping it with the practiced ease many elves and only a few humans develop through decades of expertly handling a tool of their trade, until it seems to have become an extension of their own body. She doesn't look up at Rian either, continuing to scan the paper as she speaks. "It's okay," she says flatly. "Just...a bit of trouble back home, which I'm gonna have to go deal with soon's we're finished here. Work first." Finishing her speech with clearly artifcial brusqueness, she stuffs the offending parchment into one of the pockets of her jerkin, crumpling it hard enough in the process to make it shed several flakes. "C'mon, I was kidding about us going downstairs; it's not a good idea. Trent ought to have a horse or three for you lot pretty quick here, so I'll give you a quick look around the rest of the function rooms and then we'll head out."
You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Nioca » Mon May 13, 2013 12:11 am

Vualn says simply, "You know, we've not actually been given an assignment yet. Perhaps this is something we could help you with... assuming, of course, that you desire help in that matter."

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Amara » Mon May 13, 2013 12:15 am

"What..sort of trouble, Miss?" Something was very clearly wrong. Rían didn't mean to intrude, but if there was anything he could do, the last thing he wanted was to leave someone that upset. "Please... If there is anything I can do?" She was given the most comforting smile the bear could manage; his brows drew sympathetically.

(His spot is abysmal, but is there any chance of him having caught a glimpse in transit from hand to pocket, or is it in another language?)

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by spiderwrangler » Mon May 13, 2013 5:57 am

Kast remains silent, content to let the other two speak.
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Mon May 13, 2013 9:44 am

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"Nooooo...yeah, definitely no. It's a private matter."

At Joyce's insistence you proceed into another room, this one clearly a storeroom of some sort. Most of the baskets, barrels and crates are closed, but a few stand open and reveal seeds, gardening tools, blades which might work as weapons but are probably better for clear-cutting vegetation, animal harnesses, mapping devices such as compasses, sextants, and plumb levels, and a similar assortment of goods. The small woman gives an extensive and entirely forgettable spiel concerning the various landscaping projects in at least ten of the sixteen Wards of the park for which these are used - trailblazing, soil conservation, encouragement of threatened species and careful culling of overproductive ones. Kast and Vualn are probably a bit irritated by the amount of interference in nature which these "Greenswardens" have apparently entitled themselves to, even while Rian is impressed by the contrast between their husbandry and the slash-and-burn farming techniques which he saw being practiced by the provincial folk on his way into Transylvaine.
You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
My long-neglected blog.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Amara » Mon May 13, 2013 6:37 pm

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Mon May 13, 2013 7:11 pm

With that roll, you got a glimpse of something which caught your eye, but not enough to make any sense of it. (So in other words Rian and you are in approximately the same mood.)
You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
My long-neglected blog.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by spiderwrangler » Mon May 13, 2013 8:25 pm

"The forest should be just that... not a garden...", Kast remarks, his brow furrowing.
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Nioca » Mon May 13, 2013 8:30 pm

"This is... quite an impressive little enterprise the Greenwardens have created. Although I must ask; who's benefit is this for?" Vualn asks with a smile. "The control the Greenwardens are exerting, to be more precise. I am not questioning your tour." Vualn adds for clarification.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Tue May 14, 2013 12:43 am

"There are those among us who would agree with you, Kast," Joyce says, her composure apparently recovered, apart from a slightly greater terseness to her demeanor. "We have quite a few sylvasetharsai in our group, not to mention the so-called high elves, and of course even some humans,--" she checks herself oddly in mid-sentence before continuing "--sometimes we also feel like it's better to leave well enough alone. The forest would be a lot more manicured if there wasn't a diversity of opinion; Hansel's currently top of the pops around here, but he's not without rivals for the 'Oaken Throne' (he hates that joke). If Tarver, Jycinthe, Silvergreen or Mother-forbid-Lisker were ever to get enough clout to displace Hansel as the dominant voice among the Speakers, things would move in a new direction. Unfortunately the only thing the anti-unitarian factions can agree on is that they don't want to unite; Hansel's way gets results, and he has quite a few backers who agree with the logic of his plans - I shouldn't say his, really, more like his family's, as they've had their hand in the potting soil down here since before the Empire had even heard of the neighboring provinces.

"I get exactly what you're implying there, Mr. Wings, but you're mistaken,"
the human girl continues, still getting a little flushed every time she looks at you. "Hansel's not making a power play or anything like that; his methods may or may not be the best, but his intentions are pure. The man would sacrifice anything to ensure the sanctity of Transylvaine, and Nature in general, and there's about fifty thousand humans who have their axes all sharpened and plenty of firestarter bottled up, just waiting for the druids to slack off on protecting the wilderness. Industry has no patience, and the memories of those who haven't been recently put in their place tend to be short. Hansel has a long track record of proving that if you give the encroachers an inch now and again, while sternly reminding them what will happen if they try to take a mile, they'll play along for as long as they're sure that you're watching. He's often said that there's no way to turn the harvest season back into summer; one way or another, change will come, and 'integration is vastly preferable to a conflict without quarter asked or given'. He wouldn't have so many people listening to that idea if it wasn't at least partially true, and well demonstrated time and again."
Last edited by willpell on Thu May 16, 2013 1:49 pm, edited 2 times in total.
You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
My long-neglected blog.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Amara » Tue May 14, 2013 12:49 am

Rían stopped pushing, but that didn't prevent his smile from gradually falling to be replaced by a faint, worried frown. He listened to her speech, and certainly all of this was new--and most of it was quite interesting--but he still had to wonder. ...and worry. It was the commentary from the other two men that finally snapped him back to attention, and listening to them both, he'd been about to pose a question of his own, before Joyce spoke up again. Once more, he fell in to momentary silence, listening. He knew nothing of the politics of this region, and could hardly offer an opinion of his own.

"Forgive me," he managed, finally, "...but I cannot say I am familiar with any of those names." Save of course, Hansel's own.
He somewhat feared any explanation would be a very long one. Wait.

"Why...would they wish to burn al--" Phieran help him. What more didn't he know? Industry. Of course. He had quite a lot to learn about this area's politics...
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Tue May 14, 2013 12:51 am

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You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
My long-neglected blog.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Amara » Tue May 14, 2013 12:53 am

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by spiderwrangler » Tue May 14, 2013 5:32 am

"While I prefer deep forest, I agree that an over-tended forest is better than none at all...", Kast replied, his displeasure shifting to the humans who would dare think to cut and burn a forest such as this.
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Tue May 14, 2013 11:52 am

"And this is exactly why part of the Greenswarden's mission is diplomatic. We're the entire reason the Empire set Transylvaine aside as a Preserve in the first place, and we're still working every day to keep the neighboring colonies mollified while combating their lobbies in the Capital who try to convince the Emperor that new construction is more important than old growth. Fortunately, scuttlebutt has it that he's strongly inclined to agree with us in the first place, but that doesn't mean he could afford to ignore a sufficiently large crowd chanting for a change in policy. So we need our advocates, both in the Capital and here on the border, working to win the hearts and minds. Naturally there's some controversy over that end too; Lisker and Thuntarver and Selesnius would all rather put the fear of Green into the lot of them, but we've gone that route with past nations, and have learned that after the peace is broken, there's no going back...you keep killing them while they keep killing you, until one side runs out of manpower or courage - and the Empire is a hell of a lot bigger than the past nations we've been forced to destroy. We druids play for the long game, so for now we're being patient and making a lot of compromises, hoping to avoid a scorched-earth scenario."
You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
My long-neglected blog.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by spiderwrangler » Tue May 14, 2013 4:20 pm

"I must admit, the politics have never been of interest, nor have they touched heavily on the forest I hail from... I believe it would be known to you as "Willow Ward". Indeed, I am unable to picture what is meant by those who speak of places completely lacking in trees. Just as well to speak of a place without air or color."
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Amara » Tue May 14, 2013 6:19 pm

Rían, however, listened closely. He was interested in the politics. "...I would think there would be some way of compromise... surely?" Ordinarily, (at least in his experience!) strong disagreement simply meant that both were in some part wrong, and in some part right.
...of course, he knew that not all problems had quite so simple a solution, and once politics were involved things seemed to become so convoluted and complex that he could only stare at the mess generated in a state of befuddled disbelief.
"My own village was...much smaller, certainly, and the woods beyond it were not so thick as they are here, but we were able to live comfortably with the forest as it was, and never felt a need to destroy more than we needed for our own survival. Certainly we needed lumber for homes, and fires, but we had more than enough space for ourselves, and our fields."
The idea of clear cutting an entire forest troubled him deeply, and seemed wholly unnecessary! ...but he suspected that such a desire was more motivated by greed than necessity. That was another thing he'd never been able to fully understand.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Tue May 14, 2013 9:09 pm

"I totally get that, Kast. I was like twenty the first time I saw an open field; to this day I kinda have to remind myself that forests are the exception to the rule worldwide. Still, except for the very driest wastelands and polar regions, there's virtually nowhere that you can't find some plant life, even if it's not quite so majestic as a labyrinth of trunks with a canopy overhead." Joyce gets a faraway look in her eyes as she says this last part.

"Compromise is exactly what we do, Mr. McCarthaigh. We work very hard both on demonstrating the benefits of keeping some wilderness basically untouched, and on helping our neighbors to cultivate their lands sustainably. But it's always a struggle; people don't want to ever accept that they've gone far enough and that it's time for them to stop growing, expanding, striving for more. Of course, a lot of Druids agree with them on that, even if it means having to kill them; Hansel himself is kind of the restlessly progressive sort, and if he wasn't on our side, he'd probably be one of our worst enemies, some captain of industry that thinks of nothing but the resources he could loot from all this land we're 'wasting'. Fortunately, he is on our side, and very thoroughly so; if anything, sometimes his fellow humans - like me - have to remind him not to get too carried away with plans to expand and strengthen the forest, for fear of provoking a panicky overreaction."
You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
My long-neglected blog.

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by spiderwrangler » Wed May 15, 2013 4:16 pm

Kast was reminded, as always, of the briefness of human lifespans... "Is our current task related to preserving this balance within Transylvaine?"
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Amara » Wed May 15, 2013 9:53 pm

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Nioca » Wed May 15, 2013 11:11 pm

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Vualn chuckles. "You should see the canopy from above, Joyce." His wings flit again for emphasis. "I am curious, though; we touched upon it earlier, but what exactly is the relation between the feyfolk and the Greenwardens? From what you had mentioned earlier, it sounded as if it was... less than warm."

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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by Amara » Thu May 16, 2013 10:43 am

Rían wasn't as happy with the answer as he could have been, but he listened, and nodded. He had much to learn about this place, and letting emotion run unchecked was a terrible idea; it was best to let reason catch up. He certainly seemed to be learning more just letting her talk than he was by asking questions, presently.

And, curious as he was, he perked up again at Vualn's question.
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Re: The Forest - Chapter One

Post by willpell » Thu May 16, 2013 2:20 pm

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"I totally get that, Kast. I was like twenty the first time I saw an open field; to this day I kinda have to remind myself that forests are the exception to the rule worldwide. Still, except for the very driest wastelands and polar regions, there's virtually nowhere that you can't find some plant life, even if it's not quite so majestic as a labyrinth of trunks with a canopy overhead." Joyce gets a faraway look in her eyes as she says this last part.

"It could be," Joyce says to Kast. "If you guys are up for that kind of work, and show a talent for ambassadorship. But there's plenty of other jobs needing to be done, if you don't want to have to deal with people (for which I would blame you not a bit). I will say that if you want to make a positive impression on humans, you're going to need to keep your 'little friend' out of sight. We've got statistical proof that fully half of all humans are phobic of spiders - females in particular, with myself being one of the rare exceptions - and that's just for microspiders with a mildly itchy bite that a few people are allergic to, even before we get to gigantic ones that pose a real threat to life and limb. It's not something that they can choose to overcome with practice; the fear seems to be wired right into their instincts, presumably from whenever they evolved (assuming you believe we did, which is another of the big controversies around here).

"I have, actually,
the girl adds to Vualn, smiling broadly. "Not quite the same I suspect, though; I was clinging to the back of a gwaihir for dear life, and wouldn't have wanted to look straight down even if I could have. Still, what I saw over his shoulder at a generously shallow angle was definitely a sight worth being a little terrified for. Technically, I could go flying again one of these days, by turning into a bird (we druids can do that), but...well let's say that I'm not short on challenges to overcome every day, and I'm only a novice skinchanger compared to most of my peers, so I haven't gotten around to taking a 'just because' midair trip so far.

"As for the other thing...well, as I've pointed out, there are a lot of things we like to argue about, both within the Greensward and throughout the larger druidic community (technically, every druid and wildranger on the planet is expected to cooperate toward our shared cause, but the reality is of course not that easy). One of the major bickering points concerns a gradually increasing body of evidence which suggests that the Fair Folk aren't truly 'part' of the ecosystem, or even native to the Material Plane.

"There was a study published by a professor of comparative ethnomythics at Grayglobe University, all the way north in Silvertara, a Scholar Emeritus by the name of Casimir Anselmo. He claimed to have documented 155 separate sources of evidence from all over the continent, proving that there was a mass migration from a now-vanished plane he called the Feywild, and said that every feyblooded race, from 'common elves' (his words, not mine) on up to the Eladrin Sidhe, had only been part of this reality for the past twenty millenia. That sounds like a long time, but there's evidence that the world is at least three times that age, and after that paper came out, a number of other prominent speakers in various communities began to throw around words like 'imposter', 'unnatural', or even 'invasion', claiming that the presence of dryads in trees and silkies in the ocean was some sort of deep-cover spy mission aimed at 'disarming the natural order of its defense against alien aberrations'. Which sounds stupid and insane...but there are such things as alien aberrations, and they are a very serious threat to the balance of life. So by raising even the slightest possibility that such a thing is true, it's possible to make people a little twitchy, and we have to make a pretense at taking the whole concept seriously, at least long enough for the furor to die down."
You either die Chaotic, or you live long enough to see yourself become Lawful.
Glemp wrote:To some extent, you need to be arrogant - without it, you are vulnerable being made someone's tool...for Herbert's sake, have the stubbornness not to submit to what you see instantly, because you can only see some facts at a time.
My long-neglected blog.

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