Curse

Alathaea · May 28, 2008, 05:54 PM // 17:54

"To the Emperor."

Alathaea's mouth worded the chant that was spoken every day before and after each meal. Her eyes flickered to the statue of the Emperor on the mantelpiece, his proud figure stoking a distant, vaguely listless pride in her heart. She stood, with another nod to the idol, and was about to take a drink when she heard a voice from the corner.

"Come, child." Her great-grandmother, a decrepit, broken woman, beckoned with what little strength she had left. She was clothed rather dangerously - in traditional Luxon garb, but she never quite left the house, or even the room, any more, so it was doubtful that any of the Ministry's army of bureaucrats would notice. She moved, with soft movements, towards the elderly woman, and noticed, with a slight frown, all of the differences between herself and her great-grandmother suddenly seemingly highlighted. Alathaea herself was oddly fair for a Canthan, her great-grandmother was dark for one. Alathaea had red hair, her great-grandmother, amazingly, still black. Her great-grandmother had always had a strange habit of reading her mind, and today was no exception.

"Since I believe, through my divinations, that my time will come soon, I seek to instruct you of the greatest of your ancestors - a woman named Alathaea, as yourself, and in fact, you are named after her. It is a middle name that flows throughout the family, and I suppose your mother decided it was worth remembering." The old woman coughed a little - a newer, far less corrupting plague, that preyed on the elderly - any doctor could tell her what her communing told her of her imminent death. "This is the story." And as she spoke, she pulled a scroll from the very top of the bookcase, adjacent to the chair in which she sat. She unrolled it, and began to read.

----

Book IV of the Chronicles of Heroes
Chapter VII - Great People of the Shiverpeaks

Name: Alathaea Tlaloc
Lived: 1561 - 1633
Birthplace: Unknown - Somewhere along the Droknar's Forge - Yak's Bend Trade Route

Now we come to a most curious heroine, whose exploits carried her across the expanse of the Sea of Sorrows, through the sun-drenched continent of Elona and to our own great Nation. Her name will be recorded through history as Alathaea Tlaloc, wed into the house of Daeman, whose loyal commitment to the kingdoms of the world ensured her great stock among the Luxon Armada, and whose wise governance was sought in the smallest of duchies of the kingdom of Cantha - Bai Paasu.

Her origin is unclear, although her Canthan citizenship forms place her as being born within the grasps of the Shiverpeaks, which is how she comes to be filed as thus. She joined the Ascalon Vanguard in her mid-teens or some such, but all records have been lost of her since the final sacking of Ascalon. We know that she fled with the Prince of Ascalon at the time, but no record of him or his name can be found in Krytan records, so we can assume he did not survive the journey.

She was part of the Ascalonian settlement in Kryta and became a Knight of the Mantle, but all sources with the White Mantle have had no recollection of her legacy, so we can also assume she was part of the cell who broke away when they discovered the sacrificial nature of Mantle ceremony. She was also a part of the group who fled to the Crystal Desert - although we have no specifications of her time there, owing to it's inaccessibility at this time.

She then shows up in Droknar's Forge, formerly the capital of the Dwarven nation, and this is the time in which she enters Canthan history - summoned by one of the Great Five - Mhenlo, as an aid in Cantha against the growing threat of Shiro. She was part of the group that went, with Master Togo and Mhenlo, to the very bottom tip of Cantha - but she chose one direction only.

Despite her guild having a long affiliation with the Kurzicks, Alathaea chose to go with Master Togo's envoy to the Luxon Armada. There she met first the Luxons in a theatre of war - the Convocation, which she won, ably commanding a group of men and women who spanned three continents. This leads to the confusion around her story, because she has already contacted the Sunspears at this point, and yet there are no records of her in the Istani dock reports. The likelihood is that she was invited here also by Mhenlo, and thus was considered a diplomatic guest as well and her records stored in the now destroyed Sunspear Great Hall.

Anyway, whatever the circumstances of her group, she won the battle, and in doing so met the man who she would go on to marry - Daeman, champion of the Crab Clan. (Book II - Kurzicks & Luxons, Chapter III - The Luxon South). It is recorded that their chemistry was electric, and that when she left the Jade Sea, only his clan prevented him from joining her. But she would be back.

She played a relatively small role in the bringing down of Shiro - her in fact Kurzick triple shot made perhaps only a small dent in his armour, but she contributed, and after this returned to Tyria to fight the oncoming evil. We know little about the subsequent adventures, the history of Elona being cut off to us since Palawa Joko's recent take-over of Elona. We consign this to paper now because there may be a time in which no contact can be found. We know that she was part of the group who felled Abbadon and who brought Kormir to godhood.

And then she heads north. She is far more assertive here. She is the one who has the strongest connection of the group to Gwen, because Alathaea knew her well when she was young, and it was her crusading throughout the Charr Homelands that rallied the Ebon Vanguard for battle. She restored the reputation of Jora, the Great Queen of Jora's Reach, whose peak has never been assailed by any foe and is the last secure point of the most northerly, wild and ferocious Norn. She rallied the technological Asura to the biteback against the Destroyers, and with this mighty army of allies pushed the Great Destroyer back beneath the Earth, once and for all.

And then she, for lack of a better term, retired. She returned to Cantha, and took up a post offered to her in tandem from Elder Rhea and the Emperor - Governor of Bai Paasu Reach. One of two remaining pictures of her (below) shows her outside the Governor's house in Bai Paasu. The other shows her a few months before her wedding day, with Daeman, who looks his almost a decade over her. She is a noticably short woman, 5ft 2" to his 6ft, but her descendants, whom I interviewed for this chronicle, note that she looks firmly in control.

Alathaea Tlaloc died in 1633, on the very last day of Kainengtah, in Bai Paasu Reach, at the age of 72. Daeman, at that point 81, died on the first day of Changhai - one day later. It is fitting that two people so close should die so close together, and within the months of two of this nations greatest Emperors.

Images;
We could find few of her, however, the two we have are quite telling. The first is her on her first day of governorship in Bai Paasu Reach, outside her new home.

This second one is of her and her future husband Daeman. This is two days before he proposes - according to family history, he took her to Mourning Veil Falls, which the Luxons had captured a week earlier, and proposed from the water as she sat on the riverbank.

farmerfez · May 28, 2008, 07:08 PM // 19:08

uhh.....wtf?

Nemesis Xero · May 29, 2008, 11:02 AM // 11:02

Nice story

Rosa Vixen · May 29, 2008, 09:41 PM // 21:41

I like it ^_^