Blooms of the vine

[Admin]

The Crone passes pour boiling water over the purple blossoms and smiles. She plants her carved staff in the ground and recalls a simple incantation. She passes the cup to Joff. After a bitter first sip and about ten anxious minutes an uneasy retch is all to indicate that the concoction is working.  It began with a feeling that one might be looking through a wide-angle camera lens, focusing on details like, shadows, shapes, reflections and light; their relationship to other objects in and out of context becomes distorted yet strangely interesting.  There’s also a sense of shrinking and expanding perception and Joff's feild of view seems to be disassociated from the direction of her gaze.

She becomes aware of the soothsayer's chanting and the rhythm somehow seems to be repeating a mantra of her mother's name.  Her limbs  relax and muscle use becomes near impossible, and she is enveloped in a tremendous feeling of euphoria. Visually, a mist-like haze clouds your already distorted view of the world, spatial distortion becomes most prominent, giving rise to a dream-like state. The mind now wonders to observational topics, such as, surface textures, spatial awareness, light and their disconnection from general reality.  Joff is now fully immersed in the experience, and unaware of the passage of time. She finds herself standing in an endless sea of grass with a bright full moon impossibly large behind her. A totem in the shape of the shaman's carved staff is the only landmark. There is a strange sensation of being in a void, a feeling of distance, but this is not at all uncomfortable. A light mist-like haze seems to over shadow everything. Although visible in darkness, the haze is comprised of a multitude of colors and patterns, that seem to dance under Joff's control.  The Soothsayers voice is felt but not heard. "The mists can summon from the other side  and reward your concentration"  The Crone's chanting can still be heard far in the distance, as the intense euphoria and intriguing patterns enthrall Joff .  She is aware that this stage of the journey is where she may make  make contact with her ancestors.  Nevertheless, the only thing she could reach was a sense that one should keep true to forming ones own path. Her disappointment is not as devastating as she would have thought. After a while she is simply unaware of anything.

The sense of place and time came back long after the early evening fire had burned to ashes and dawn's golden lights had come and gone. The sun was hanging low in the sky again.

"I am not sorry for you to not find the spirit you sought. Whether this means she has yet to be free from her mortal life or has left the lands men walk to join the gods I can not say. It is said that some possess the ability to command spirits appear  through space and time though that unnatural magic is beyond the power of the vine-blossom."

[Liqcrys]

Damn, damn, and damn again!

Jenn    
 She hadn't said the name in years, and now it haunted her thoughts as she tossed and turned in the inn's rough bed. She had hoped for a better payoff for the pain of opening all those old wounds. Something, anything. Instead, the old crone had failed. The night blossomed berries had been just another blind alley she had fallen into. This journey had no end, and all the fighting and "adventure" had gotten her nowhere. She had nothing to show for it at all. No matter how many leads she followed, they always led to another mystery; just one more rumor, one more whispered conversation, one more scrap of information, one more dusty memory from an old man's  addled mind.  

    The hay stuffed mattress poked at her neck as she rolled over. She allowed the shame to wash over her once more. I wished you were dead Mother. At least that would have been an ending. How long has it been since they took you? How much time has passed since I last looked for you? Three years? The thought of starting the search anew ran across her mind and she shuddered in the warm straw. This world has changed. I've been gone so long.  All the markers are gone.

    She could feel the panic coming at her, so Joff began the focusing chant in her mind. Well at least those monsters gave me this much As her thoughts began to recede to the back of her mind her breathing relaxed. Her body slowly melted into the mattress ticking and she allowed her mind to wander. She could see no reason to stay here in Wolfsboro. I wonder if Maru likes that name.. All the reasons she had left Shattered Bridge were gone now. I doubt Mardoin even remembers what I really look like. This small village on the front line of disaster was unlikely to provide her direction, and having been gone so long she needed to get a lay of the land, socially speaking. Her thoughts echoed in her head as exhaustion overtook her. The book!