I did some writing I’m feeling rather proud of today. It is storyline text from a Battle For Wesnoth campaign I’m working on. I’ve decided to post it here as a teaser and let my readers have the fun of deducing the kind of context in which it makes sense.
“WHO ENTERS THE TOMB OF AN-USRUKHAR?”
“I..I am Delfador, a mage of Wesnoth.”
“I am the will of An-Usrukhar, greatest of mages, he who bestrode Irdya in the morning of time, who sleeps now in a death beyond death until the unmaking of the world.”
“I am only a man, a living man seeking a way home from the house of the dead.”
“Living? …I see that it is so. Your breath stirs dust that has lain untouched since the Primal Aeon. And it was foretold that one like you would come.”
“Foretold?”
“Foretold in the Primal Aeon, years past beyond your counting. An-Usrukhar the Great, he of whom I am but the tiniest shade and fragment, foresaw in the Mirror of Evanescent Time that a living man would come here to be tested. AND I AM THE TEST!”
“I have felt the coils of prophecy on me before. I am beginning to dislike them.”
“It is only given to the small not to feel the hand of fate on their shoulder; the great must suffer its weight whether they will or no. Delfador, mage of Wesnoth, ARE YOU A SERVANT OF THE LIGHT?”
“I serve my king and my kingdom.”
“Your king will die in an eyeblink and your kingdom in the drawing of a breath. Delfador, I ask you again, ARE YOU A SERVANT OF THE LIGHT?”
“I serve my people and my land.”
“Peoples vanish and lands wither under the pitiless gaze of eternity; the true matter of the world is deeper. Delfador, I ask you a third time, and on your answer hangs your life: ARE YOU A SERVANT OF THE LIGHT?”
“I…I serve life against death. Love against fear. Light against darkness.”
(There is a momentary, brilliant flash of light.)
“IT IS WELL. Take up, O servant of light, the Staff of An-Usrukhar. The trials before you will be great. So is its power.”