THE JOURNAL OF VINDOR CORION

This document was composed by the Master-Wizard Vindor Corion, maker of Tarlov's prison and creator of the great staff called the Amarth Ma-Nazgul.  After returning from Aran Galavier's expedition against the Ghost-Hand in the Quentari Year 4635, or LG 15, he entered his tower and collapsed it upon himself, becoming a Spirit-Circle that guarded the artifact until the present crisis.  After a group of adventurers who had pledged themselves to destroy Tarlov had satisfied him that the Amarth would not fall into incompetent hands, he presented it to Prince Kevynn Blackfox of Evendarr in October of 597, since Tarlov's lair was now within the lands belonging to King Mykel Endarr.  It is to be noted that by order of Hirildon Arienwen Cyllinith, the Queen Mother of Quentari, the journal is printed in its entirety, despite the fact that to nearly all Eledhel (or Surface Elves), suicide is considered a deeply painful topic, not to be discussed.

-Squire Elowyth Tarraninon, Sage of Galenor

PERSONAL NOTES

OF

VINDOR CORION OF THE HOUSE OF TIRANNON

MASTER WIZARD

ARCH-WIZARD OF SIGHT & SPIRIT

Set Down in the 657th Loa Elenaro at Padash in Quentari

(Not for catalog)

     It is somewhat unusual, the position that I find myself in.  Most would perform this final act of self-indulgence while still alive, and at least then an audience might be found.  In my current state, however, I must write my Last Journal after I am dead, for no one but myself.  Perhaps the act will ease the pain of what I have done, the need that has driven me to this.

     My story begins long ago, as the time of my House of Tirannon is older by far than the time of my own birth in the Eightieth year of Aran Thloestel.  I shall pass over the earliest years, as the time of my training at the Great Tower of Helevorn is of little consequence.  My seeds of the present belong truly to a time in the one hundred ninety first year of Aran Thloestel, when Morathak Calennor led his troops against the Elementals.  Little did we know then what was to come, or the choice of our allies might have been very different.

     Tarlov y'Koharitan held much promise in those days, especially for one of his kind.  This is of little matter now, as the result of the fighting has revealed his true nature to us.  We knew nothing at the time, except that our greatest Healers were unable to aid him.  We saw what we desired to see, in that his impatience led him to flee the known lands in search of what we could not give him.  I am ahead of myself, however.  This tale shall make no sense whatever if I jump about like a new student.  To return to the tale at hand, the time of my youth had not yet ended.

     This period still found me in residence at the Great Tower, sometimes as student, and alternately as teacher.  Late in Thloestel's third century, I felt that this time was ended, and removed myself to the estates of Tirannon, the better to perform the duties of Lord Researcher.  This period was one of great satisfaction for me, but as all things end, the death of Thloestel brought to life a new period.

     Galavier had always been a friend, and his ascent to the throne was expected.  I suppose my role in his court was inevitable.  The unexpected was soon to follow.  I had never thought that a Unicorn would be seen in the civilized lands, and so the distress of its news was all the greater.  The creature was not the first, but bands of so-called adventurers often strayed beyond the bounds of civilization to become lost in the mists of time.  Still, the pattern of disappearance had begun to take on unusual shape when the news came of the creature's depredations.

     Fortunately Morathak was possessed of a long memory, as he was able to bring together the news of the Unicorn with his own experience of centuries before.  Even so, the power of this new threat was beyond alarming.  To think that anything could destroy an Elemental of Life so utterly that it did not return to the Realm!

     The report of a creature shaped as a Human, yet able to utterly consume the spirits of its victims, was of nearly the same concern to the Court as it had been to the creatures of Life.  Upon hearing that the creature's minions called it Tarlov of the Ghost Hand, Morathak became quite agitated, causing the Unicorn no end of distress before Galavier asked him to abide.

     Even so, Morathak lapsed into silence only briefly before revealing to us the most amazing tale.  We had known of his service in the Cycle War during the time of Thloestel, but not of the details, as Galavier and I had been engrossed in studies at the time.  He told us that one of his erstwhile allies - a Sorcerer King, as they were called - had been called Tarlov y'Koharitan.  The man had served with distinction, being a powerful Wizard and a talented soldier.  This Tarlov had lost an arm, or part of one, Morathak told us, and he had left our lands, greatly bitter, when we were unable to aid him in restoring his arm.

     We immediately thought that, if this were the same Tarlov, that he must now be some kind of magical construct, either Golem or Undead Lord.  The Unicorn spoke otherwise, insisting that its folk knew of these creatures, and that whatever this Tarlov might be; he was not one of those.  I wondered aloud how Wizard of Celestial powers, as Morathak named Tarlov, might obtain these new abilities, especially the glowing Hand which was said to be his main weapon.

     Regardless, it was inconceivable that we would not aid the Unicorn and its folk, and so I set myself to gathering a force of my brother Wizards.  Fully one hundred of them would accompany us in this venture, while Morathak set aside the mantle of statesman to don his armor once again, and lead a picked force of warriors.

     After a month of hard travel, we arrived at the place where the creature had its lair, and by the shore of the lake the battle began.  Weeks later, we brought Tarlov to bay in a place that we would know only later.  The fighting had spun wildly across the face of the land, the most powerful magics moving us vast distances in the blink of an eye.  Many of our number perished in the glare of the sorceries flung and reflected, and in the end we were unable to achieve the final victory.  Tarlov had foreseen this day and his magics were too powerful.

     All that remained was for us to forge a prison that would hold him until Time itself was done.  I shall not speak of what we have done.  The oaths that I have sworn prevent me from mentioning the means that we used, and only the Unicorns and I know the exact location of the prison.  All of the others came and went by means of my Gates, and no one of them ever saw the entire design.  In time, they all passed into Autmennesiel and only I remain, if that is the word for it.

     At the end, the final duty fell to me alone.  Amarth Ma-nazgul, it was called, the Doom of the Ghost Hand.  It was of my making, and it was left to me to defend it.  Even that means was to be a secret, and Galavier intended that it would die with me.  He did not know of my final plan, and likely would not have approved if he had.  Little choice was left me, though.  To make the item and then abandon it to the vagaries of Time was unacceptable.  Merely the movement of Chance would make me forsworn in short order.

     Perhaps half a year after the final act of construction, my Tower was destroyed in a burst of unusual magical energy.  My family wept as they searched the wreckage of the Tower, but there was nothing to find.  The Tree of Memory was planted, and life went on.

     Now we must go back some small bit of time.  My current situation found its roots centuries past, in the migration of the Nimeshab Gorbe, or Sarr, into the area to the north of our land of Quentari.  The reports of the telcontari gave us hope that perhaps we might permit them to stay, even though they permitted the practice of Necromantic magics.  Over centuries, we developed some slight trade relations with the Nimeshab, but as they disliked our Celestial magics as much as we disliked Necromancy, it seemed that we would be no closer.

     Truly war makes for strange alliances, and the horrors of the Dagorim Gurthrauko made for stranger than most.  At first, the Nimeshab fought to defend their own lands, and otherwise made no preference for the targets of their lightning raids. At last the choice came to them. For all that they used Necromantic spells, the Nimeshab hated the creation of the creatures of Undeath.  When an emissary of Gurthaiya paraded a telcontari patrol into the village, one that had previously enjoyed the hospitality of the Nimeshab, there was no turning back.  The battle that ensued was fast and bloody, and the Nimeshab evacuated their homes after it.

     During the ensuing decades of war, the Nimeshab showed skill and bravery, and the sacrifice of one of the Matriarchs led to the naming of the Nimeshab as full telcontari - an honor unheard of in the time before, but not thought unusual in the chaos of the War.  The Erinar had seen the Nimeshab in action, and this perhaps more than anything was behind the honor.

     After the War had ended, the Erinar himself, not yet Aran since his year had not yet ended arrived to tell the Nimeshab that they could have a new homeland within Quentari if they wished - and if they would abide by the law of Quentari.  After a night of bargaining, it was agreed, and the Nimeshab set off to see their new place.  The Erinar walked with them, and the place was found to be acceptable.  They called the place Padash, or Reward, and lived prosperously from that time.

     All of this leads us back to my current place.  I had spent a quiet period of several centuries in contemplation of a number of mysteries that I had never quite been able to puzzle out previously.  Perhaps it is my current state, but I believed that I had at last found an understanding of the nature of the Spirit in relation to the practice of magic.  Unfortunately, the Dagorim Gurthrauko interrupted my studies.

     The pain of watching my countrymen die is with me even now, over five centuries later, but my mission was even more vital.  The oaths that I swore over a thousand years ago held me fast even then, and I wept for them even as I held myself aside, knowing that my intervention might have saved them.  This will haunt me to the end, I fear, but Tarlov's fate will allow nothing else.  My energies were therefore divided between observing the events around me, and reinforcing the protective Magics that surrounded my place of hiding.  On numerous occasions I felt the roving eye of searching Wizards, but none were able to pierce the shroud.  Perhaps the very end of the war brought the greatest pain, as Gurthaiya was finally put down at the cost of my friend Galavier.

     After the war drew to a close, the silence of my resting place was again disturbed.  This time, a telcontari patrol led a group of the cat-beings into the area, apparently in search of a home.  The group was led by an Elf whose identity was unclear to me.  From further study, his mannerisms and the deference given him by the telcontari Tirieldor led me to think that this was no other than the Erinar.  This was more than a shock to me, as Galavier had been childless at the time of my death.

     After the departure of the telcontari, I returned to my writings, thinking that peace had at last returned.  The error of my ways was soon to be seen, as a source of noise beyond any battle of the Dagorim Gurthrauko began.  I quickly learned that this was what the cat-people - known as Sarr, I later learned - called chanting, and that they were dedicating their new home.  Fortunately, this was not to be a permanent fixture, at least not to this frequency, and it quickly became bearable.

     The greater threat to my peace came from the natural curiosity, and contrariness, of children.  When the cubs learned the origins of the ruins of my Tower, they climbed about them as a dare.  The matriarchs of course ordered this to stop.  Equally obviously, the activity now gained an even greater mystique.  Indeed, it gained an aura of taboo, and those who ventured into the ruins gained stature among the groups of youngsters.  Unfortunately, there seemed no way to stop this behavior, as the cubs were born to a life of risk and death.

     Long months of this started an idea, and soon I had a plan to use this activity to my advantage.  If the cubs insisted on treating the ruins as a testing ground, I would give them a test indeed.  Within a few years, some of the cubs that were to set out on their Quest for adulthood chose my Tower as their object, and I could not disappoint.  It was not long after that they came to regard me as a guardian Spirit, perhaps even a manifestation of their own mystical ancestor.

     Over years, I reinforced in the Sarr the idea that the ruins were a place of power.  In particular, it was their place of power, and was to be defended at all costs.  It was soon after this that the Dagorim Gurthrauko ignited again, but most of the fighting occurred elsewhere.  Padash was never seriously threatened, but the cost of the war among the Nimeshab was to cause them great distress.

     The disappearance of the new Aran Elenaro, the son of my friend Galavier, at the end of this part of the Dagorim Gurthrauko, was an even harder blow than I had thought possible.  I had never known the boy, but even so his apparent passing was a source of great pain to me.  Even more shocking was the identity of the new Cheben Red - since the Belgeledh Pedai refused to admit that Elenaro was dead - Arienwen Cyllinith.  She had been a precocious child of less than a hundred-span at the time of my expedition against Tarlov, but that was seven centuries past.  I was quite curious what had happened to keep her alive two centuries past the normal span, and wondered if something connected to the Tarlov expedition was responsible.

     As these thoughts occurred, Prophecy - the ancient Gift of my House - manifested itself quite strongly.  I saw myself meeting Arienwen again, here in Padash, centuries in the future.  At this point, I knew that whatever the cost, I must act to ensure that the Sarr remained in Padash.  While this may seem a curious thought, it was apparent to me at the time that Arienwen was attempting to remove the non-Elven presence from Quentari.

     While I pondered how exactly to arrange the future that I needed, Arienwen ably provided me the opportunity.  By now the matriarchs were more than amenable to Spirit guidance, and a small matter of romance brought the chance for me to offer just that guidance.  Normally, when Sarr and Elves felt the need to mate, the Sarr - a male, in most cases - arranged to become an Elf, and all went along quietly.  Recently several Elf maidens made the decision that they would reverse the normal flow and become Sarr.  Arienwen became enraged at this, quite conveniently for my plans, and sent a messenger to demand the presence of the High Matriarch at the Royal Court.

     Perhaps a more diplomatic messenger would have caused me more difficulty, but Arat Otiro Norvaleth was not by any stretch a diplomat.  Matriarch Elhari met his open contempt for the Sarr with calm resolve.  She declared that she would attend Arienwen in due course, but that first there were preparations to be made.  Only the presence of Elven telcontari prevented Norvaleth from becoming openly violent.

     Elhari announced that she would spend three days and nights meditating at D'andur, as the ruins had come to be called.  My knowledge of the exact events at the Court is second-hand, but the Sarr had won at least a partial victory.  Within a few weeks of Elhari's return, a decree was delivered stating that the Sarr would no longer be considered telcontari, as that was reserved only for Elves.  The talk of forcing the Sarr to leave Quentari had ended, however, and so a victory of sorts was declared.  The telcontari themselves refused to give up the Sarr, regardless of what the Court desired, and the Sarr would stay in Padash.

     Elhari herself provided the final surprise of this sequence of events.  After her return from Court, she came again to the Ruins to meditate.  At the end of this time, she swore an oath that she would serve me as payment for my advice and guidance.  Her Oath was to last until her final Death, and beyond, if I so desired.  Before I could answer, the Gift of Tirannon caused me to accept.  The consequences of this Oath would only become apparent some years later.

     A brief affair involving a more indirect attempt to force the Sarr to leave - oppressive taxes - was thwarted by the efforts of my old House, apparently at the prompting of the current Erinar, Elenaro's son Mirtaur.  This bears little on the events of the story, save that it was Elhari's last act before her final Death.  At this point, I became aware of the power of the Oath she had sworn to me.

     Fortunately, the next few centuries brought a period of peace.  The Erinar's intervention had eased the burden of protecting Padash somewhat, and so we settled, the Sarr and I, into a comfortable life.  The passage of time brought even more acceptance of my role, while the Sarr themselves expanded their settlement to move closer to the once-forbidden ruins of my Tower.

After a series of brushfires during an especially dry season, the buildings of Padash suffered greatly.  The resettlement brought them even closer to my Tower, even to the point that meditation in the ruins became an open affair.  The telcontari, secure in their belief that no Elf would linger after death, accepted this as a peculiarity of the Nimeshab; this did not prevent me from worrying, however.

     As the peace continued, a new trend developed.  Although welcome, Elhari's Oath was soon repeated.  This left me somewhat uncertain as to what to do with my growing army of Spirit Nimeshab.  In the event, the only safe decision was to command them to abide, waiting either for new orders, or to replace me in my vigil should I disappear.

     Perhaps inevitably, the peace that had enveloped Padash for so long came to an end.  As we neared the middle of the seventh century since Aran Elenaro had risen to the throne, the Gift of Tirannon came once more to life.  Try as I might, the news that reached me shed no light on my growing sense of unease.  At last, the veil fell, revealing the truth - Elenaro had returned.  By a most clever ruse he had concealed himself from the creature Guxx, who had replaced fallen Gurthaiya, but by the hand of a Human Wizard, of all things, he was returned to us.

     Unfortunately, all was not well.  It seemed as if the return of the Aran heralded a new age, for the Cycle began anew almost immediately after his return.  I quickly set about repairing the protections about my Tower and was delighted to see that they quickly settled into the expected forms.  An examination of this unexpected effect brought a number of disturbing conclusions to light.

     Primarily, several of the defensive mechanisms of the Tower were now only maintained by my own continued existence.  While this pleased me, particularly regarding the excellence of the designs wrought by Galavier and my companions so long ago, it also disturbed me in that for me to disappear now would almost certainly mean the failure of my mission.  After all, none of my newfound Nimeshab assistants could approach the level required to even assist me now, to say nothing of replacing me.

     I was also pleased to see that the Amarth Ma-nazgul had survived unchanged, although items of such power had often been observed to survive changes in the Cycle before this.  All of this brought to mind that I had done a thing of which I had never before heard:  none of the records at Helevorn had ever spoken of a single Wizard surviving to see three Changes in the Cycle of Ages.  In fact, now there were two of us, since I had not heard any news of the death of Arienwen.  I wondered what she made of the new world.

     A new thought had also occurred to me at this point.  Although my unique status had granted me some new powers, the nature of my Spirit's interaction with the Magic of Tyrra had altered with the Cycle.  Of course, this was as I had theorized some centuries previously, but with a new wrinkle.  I had often wondered about the power of Dragons, and I now had the answer.  A Dragon maintained such a link to Tyrra itself that it could not only sense the Cycles, it could anticipate them.  From this, much power could be gained, as the Dragons could reforge their own Spirits to maintain their original relationship to the Magic.  It was with great regret that I finally admitted that no mortal creature would ever set foot on those paths of power.

     Time moves as it will, however, and at this point events accelerated to the point of confusion if not outright chaos.  Just as I had set the final repairs into place, it became clear that there were no Nimeshab coming to the ruins for advice.  This disturbed me enough to venture as far as I could in search of the cause.  Fortunately, the truth was not far afield.

     The newly returned Aran had invited the entire population of Padash to join him at Court.  With this came news that he had righted the two insults to the Nimeshab - they had been restored as telcontari, and the oppressive taxation had been eased.  Unfortunately, Sarr pride is not so easily repaired, and the new Matriarch - Nerina by name - came to me for advice.  The people of Padash called for a confrontation with Arienwen in the Sarr manner, and I had no easy task dissuading her from this course.  In the end, the Gift returned to me with a formula that pleased Nerina.  She would say that the honor of the Nimeshab had been returned, and that the matter with Arienwen would be settled in its proper time.

     With this, the Nimeshab departed, and I began to set forth some of the conclusions I had reached during the change in the Cycle.  Soon before the Nimeshab were to return, an event that brings me both pleasure and consternation occurred, one that is of sufficient moment to record here.

     As I spent a quiet evening watching the events of the empty Padash, a flash startled both myself and the fox whose progress I had been observing.  While the fox was frozen in fright, fortunately I was not.  Moving quickly to my sanctum, I ensured that all of the protections about the ruins were in place, and not a moment too soon.  The raw power of the questing eye that swept the ruins was a shock, but no more than the identity of the searcher.  As I carefully observed from inside my lair, I discovered that Arienwen herself had come to Padash.

     Even more surprising than her presence was her failure to Detect me.  With the power of her search, I had felt certain that my time had ended.  A reappraisal brought the truth to light, however.  For all her power, the Magic that Arienwen used was simply too new.  She had somehow managed to maintain some powers from the last Cycle, but her Spirit was too attuned to the present.  The magics that veiled my sanctum were from two Cycles previous, and had maintained themselves using my unchanging Spirit as a lodestone.  The brute force of Arienwen's search was to no avail against the wall of my defenses, and the fact that I still maintained the edge brought sufficient joy to balance the worry that she had somehow felt a need to search in this particular place.

     My delight was also tempered by the knowledge that this was not the meeting that I had foreseen.  Still in the future was the time when we would face one another once again.  Her mood at the time was anxious, if not quite nervous, and I counted myself fortunate that she contented herself with a Magical search of the village before she departed as abruptly as she had arrived.

     My premonitions were shortly confirmed with the arrival of a Unicorn.  It was far short of the usual interval for such a creature to visit, and this alone brought distress.  The impenetrable blizzard that kept any creature of sense within shelter only made the implication worse.  Of course, only one thing could have caused such a visitation, and this suspicion was soon proven.  The Ma-nazgul was on the move, released from his slumber - if not the prison itself - by a Human warrior of all things.

     The agent mattered little, however.  The Ma-nazgul extended its grip and soon the entire North trembled.  The new Cycle was not yet stabilized, and showed no signs of settling soon.  Combined with the active attentions of Tarlov and his minions, there was no saying how long the prison would last.

     As if this were not enough to worry about, I was soon to learn that Tarlov himself had manifested a partial form beyond the bounds of the prison.  A clever series of actions brought the Humans of the North to the brink of war with Myrr and Quentari, with the result that the Aran went to the place of the dispute.  This was Tarlov's purpose all along, and he captured the Aran, using the power stored in his body to destroy the Second Chain.  With only the Last Chain in place, direct action was called for.

     Again, fate played a part, as news came to me that Elenaro had determined that the means to combat Tarlov were located in Northern Quentari, near the village of Padash.  This solved the immediate problem, as I had not yet determined how to bring the players to my lair.  Unfortunately, this left the other half of the puzzle.  I could not release the Amarth Ma-nazgul to just anyone.  While the means of the testing was clear to me, the form was not yet known.

     At this point, another problem arose, one of knowledge.  I presumed that Elenaro's search near Padash was the result of information left to him by Galavier.  The problem was that Arienwen had sworn the same oaths as I, but that she would be far more stiff-necked about revealing what she knew.  She had been part of the last group.  She had remained with Tarlov inside the Last Chain, ensuring that he slumbered while Galavier and I led the rest in the final stages of the other Chains.  At the end, she had chosen to commit suicide and Resurrected in Quentari, and I could not see her telling what she knew.  Worse, her attitude towards anyone not of true Elven blood made it all the more likely that she would go to Autmennesiel before telling a Human anything of the knowledge she held.

     No other course lay open to me.  I would have to test the seekers, since the Amarth would be in unceasing danger once it left my care.  And leave it must, for only with it can we all be spared from Tarlov's power.  So now I sit, writing my tale for my own amusement, scheming of the things I will soon be forced to do to ensure that the living will be saved.

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