May Event - All Too Familiar

[pumpkinhollow]

May Event - All Too Familiar

Content Warnings: Walking dead, character deaths, potential for gore | Special Thanks to Meghan and Kalineh

It was a fine spring day when mysterious letters began cropping up all over Pumpkin Hollow. Letters whose apparent senders do not remember writing them, whose recipients or discoverers were harmed by reading them. Eventually these mysteries, though still unsolved, come to a quiet halt as stealthily as they began, but not before a mail carrier in a cowboy hat trots out to Elsie’s tree with a letter in hand, unmarked aside from being addressed to her.

She gleefully rips open that letter, hoping it's another message from her father. It isn't and, at first, she's crushed. But only until she starts to actually read it.

Elsie,

River la Croix has been hiding something in her forge for a while now. It is called the Book of the Dead. In its pages are hundreds of spells from across time and space with the power to give life to those no longer with us.

Your father is doing his best to revive your mother. But this island’s barrier is blocking his will, resisting his magic. I can no longer watch you suffer in solitude when a solution exists. All you have to do is decipher the text, and its powers are yours. Your mother will be returned to you.

River does not want to part with it. She will become suspicious of you if you ask, and it will become harder to acquire it. You will have to take it without her notice by levitating it out of her forge. She, like many others, is fearful of the Book’s power. This fear isn’t entirely unwarranted for them, but for you, your connection to the Feywilds’ magic will be enough to grant you access to that otherworldly power.

Good luck, and all my love to your dear mother when she returns.

Fond regards,
A friend

Could this be it? Could this be the miracle she's been waiting for? Hope swells painfully in her chest as she clutches the note close. She mustn't celebrate too early. She still needs to get the book. At least her mysterious friend has already told her where to find it. Her jaw sets in a look of determination, and she speeds away into the dusk.

It doesn't take long to reach the forge. River has defended it well, but Elsie slips into her own shadow and sneaks beneath the door without so much as a whisper of sound. Only her hand extends from the puddle of shadow on the floor inside, like a disembodied arm hovering before the flames. Mustering her will, she reaches out to the ancient book and commands the winds to lift it. Sweat beads her shadowy brow while she concentrates, the flames flicker and dance around the slowly levitating book. Just a little more, a little more… There!

It's heavy in her hand, and remarkably cool to the touch despite having been pulled from the fire. She retracts her arm and the book back into her shadow and slips out the way she came. Her heart thumps in her chest as she races back to the safety of her tree. To her mother, who will soon be able to wrap flesh and blood arms around her like she once did. All that's left now is to read. Her friends have been teaching her how. Her mother will be so proud of her.

Carefully now, she opens the book, feeling her skin crawl as a sudden unease grips her very core. No, she will not be deterred. The language is unlike any she's ever seen. The letters, if indeed they can be called that, feel jagged and painful to her mind. Still, she will Not Give Up. She screws her eyes shut, thinks of her mother, and holds tight to her desperate hope to be reunited.

When her eyes reopen to behold the page before her, understanding strikes like lightning. Suddenly, she knows she can speak the words. As they escape her mouth, an unknown magic swells into the space around her, then beyond her. The ground shakes. The air turns foul. And as the trinkets in Elsie’s tree chime together in the unsettling breeze, ringing out with notes more sour than usual, it quickly becomes clear that the advice she received was not from any friend.

The forms of people begin to pry themselves loose from the ground all over town, as if emerging from water, leaving the ground unbroken as they lift themselves out of the ground. They bear horrid injuries, shambling along grotesquely, telling a story of death. However, these are not skeletons from the graveyard, housing the souls of long-dead locals. These are things of flesh and blood, however exposed they might be, wearing newer faces.

Much newer.

Since the barrier went up, many people have died, only to have their bodies vanish and replaced by a new one. Those bodies now walk the town, seeking to unleash a wrath brought on by the corrupted magic of the Necronomicon. Anyone who has died inside the barrier will have a violent, undead copy of themself representing each death wandering the island looking to increase their ranks. Which means that there will be many, many, many Yoricks.

Destroyed copies will remain destroyed for the standard overnight period of any other person. But there are too many of them to defeat this way, and their destruction is impermanent. Thankfully, help is on the way!

In the midst of the undead and their attack on the citizens of Pumpkin Hollow, tiny glimmers of hope appear in the form of folded paper birds. The little gold birds flit from fighter to fighter, small whispers promising that if enough enemies can be felled then the High Priestess can intervene. The necessary number is unknown, but if a bird alights upon someone, they will feel their weariness vanish for a short time, and perhaps, should she feel like it, they may receive a temporary boon to use against the undead.

Eventually the High Priestess will show herself, making good on the promises of the little birds. With a smile, her magic will wrap around the remaining undead, returning them to the unseen graves and binding them into Death once more, leaving the living to pick up the pieces.

Comments

[not_the_last]

Cassandra finds herself squinting at the page, and then shutting her eyes to try again, before realizing that the problem is the words and not her eyes.

"I can't seem to read it," she says as steadily as she can. "Can you?"

[hereticofthewilds]

Elsie turns her focus to the symbols... they hurt, but she doesn't look away. Slowly, she nods. "Elsie can... But Elsie does not know what they mean." She rubs at her temples, frustrated with herself because, no, that's not exactly it.

"Elsie can... feel them..." She'd read the words on instinct, with no comprehension of their true meaning. She doesn't know how that's possible, but that's what happened.

"Feels like... words are reading Elsie..."

[not_the_last]

Her eyes widen, but that's the only outward show she makes of alarm.

"All right," and she reaches out to turn the page over, "then I think you'd better stop."

[hereticofthewilds]

"But...?" She looks at the page, now turned over, forlornly. "How can Elsie help if she doesn't read?"

[not_the_last]

"You wrote it down and brought it here," Cassandra says, "that might be enough. Maybe we can find someone who can read it, or at least identify it ..."

And she pauses, frowns, and very carefully turns the page back again, just long enough to take another quick glance.

"In fact," she says slowly, "I might have an idea." And she reaches for her sending stone.

[hereticofthewilds]

Elsie nods quietly, trying her best to find comfort in this. It still feels like too little, but if Cassandra does know someone who can help, then maybe this was enough.



From the other end of the sending stone, John Crichton's voice rings through loud and clear. He sounds like he's jogging based on the heavy breathing, but there's no growl of zombies in the background. "Crichton here. Got any good news for me?"

[not_the_last]

"I'm not sure," she says, "but it might be. Do you remember that page of Eldritch writing you identified at the Ocularum meeting last year? We may have another."

[hereticofthewilds]

"You think you have more Eldritch writing? Where did you get that? Where are you right now?"

Elsie ducks her head bashfully, but if Cassandra looks at her for any indication that it's okay to share the details, she'll receive it in the form of a small nod.

[not_the_last]

"Greymare Library," says Cassandra. "Are you nearby?"

[Yes, the narration said Town Hall in error earlier, please pretend it has been edited accordingly.]

[hereticofthewilds]

"I am, actually. I should be there in under ten minutes. Hey, if you're right about this, be careful not to look at the writing for too long. Reading it can be bad for your health."

[not_the_last]

"Oh," just a touch too lightly and dryly, "we had gathered that. We'll see you soon."

And she turns to Elsie, ready to reassure her again if need be.

[hereticofthewilds]

That last thing she'll hear before the call ends is his breathy laughter. Not that the situation is funny, just that he's laughing at himself for thinking he had to tell Cassandra that when obviously she would already know.
--
Elsie is sitting there quietly fretting and picking at her hands. She meets Cassandra's eyes and almost looks like she wants to say something, her mouth opens and everything, but she can't seem to make any sound.

[not_the_last]

"It's all right," she says, as gently as she can. "You can tell me. What is it?"

[hereticofthewilds]

"What if... father is mad at Elsie?"

She tried to bring her mother back before it was time; what if he won't forgive her?

[not_the_last]

"He shouldn't be," says Cassandra at once. "You thought you were helping, didn't you? You aren't the one he should be mad at. I'll tell him so, if he is."

[hereticofthewilds]

"Wanted to help," she answers with another sniffle. 

Then last last bit finally catches up to her and she stares at Cassandra in awe. "You would talk for Elise?"

[not_the_last]

"If you would want me to," she says with belated caution, "of course I would."

[hereticofthewilds]

"No one ever... spoke for Elsie before." Not when she was just a small child who had no idea what her place in the world was.

"Elsie would want that a lot."

[not_the_last]

"Well, then," and her voice is brisk on the surface and warm underneath, "it's high time someone has. It may not be necessary, but if it is, I'll speak for you."

[hereticofthewilds]

Elsie smiles at last, comforted that even if she gets in trouble for what she's done, she will have one defender standing between her and exile.

And, with actual good timing for once, Crichton finally appears on the scene.


"Hello there, ladies. I cam as quick as I could. Why don't you get me up to speed?"

Elsie tucks her chin against her chest shyly and says nothing. Cassandra may need to take point.

[not_the_last]

"Elsie was sent an anonymous letter," says Cassandra, brisk and businesslike, "which directed her to a book, telling her that a spell in it could help her with a longstanding trouble. Circumstances suggest the spell may actually be responsible for the risen dead. We no longer have the book in hand, but from Elsie's recall of what she read, it appears to have been in Eldritch writing."

She trusts Crichton to understand her tone as discouraging further inquiry into what Elsie believed herself to be doing.

[hereticofthewilds]

Crichton picks up on her tone instantly and nods along to the description, while reading between the lines. If it were something he needed to know, she'd tell him, but the why isn't important to the what, and it's very clearly a sensitive topic.

"All right. I think I got that. Can you describe the book to me, Elsie? What did it look like?"

"A face," she says very softly.

Crichton grimaces before he can stop himself. "Thank you. That actually tells me everything I need to know."

[not_the_last]

"That means something to you?" asks Cassandra, and then in sudden misgiving, "Oh, no."

[hereticofthewilds]

Elsie peeks up, too, anxious to know the answer.


"Only one book I ever heard of looked like that with the powers you describe. You thinking the same thing I am?" The Necronomicon.

[not_the_last]

"Yes," says Cassandra with distaste, "I'm afraid I am. Is it likely to be dangerous to say its name?"