I look up from the monotony of my polished sabatons, striding ahead and swinging back. An emotionally exhausted smile comes to my lips and I turn back the way I came. Thurnmourer-Jherikra is so far away now, so impossibly far away. And yet, so much of the grandeur of the Great Temple of the Four-Winded Valkinvar is clear to me.
If I listen carefully, I can still hear the clanging of steel. Both in the forges where the hammer reign and on the training grounds where armour and swords are supremely tyrannical. However, it's much harder now than it was at the start of my long, long walk. I am only a short way now from Thurnmourer-Thunlanann, home to most of Thurn's Forge's population.
"My, my... Aren't you quite the clock?" I ask, looking up at the Orbital-Halo as it teeters more and more away from its point of high noon. Falling by the looks of it, but as much a machine as any of the watermills and decorative windmills across the city. I nod away, understanding my place in all of this, and I get back on with my walk. Each step becomes quieter and quieter, ever more dominated by the hustle and bustle of tens of millions of people.
To think nothing of the city out of view and deep underground...
I shiver with excitement, already anticipating my long-awaited return to this half of the city. I've spent so long away from Thurn's Forge that it's hard to say when I was last here. The memories are clear to me, but that is all. Dates and times are foreign concepts outside of what the weather and sky were like on those cycles.
Though, with how fondly I think of them, I would rather think of them as days. Richly lit days where there's not a grey, rain-heavy cloud in sight. Just the halolight and its warmth, endless streets of spice and herb merchants, workshops and rooftop gardens blooming with enough flowers to be mistaken for actual meadows! Oh, I remember it all so clearly, the overwhelming smell.
I take in a deep breath, removing my helmet again for the however time this cycle. So many rich scents make their way up my nose, revitalising my efforts in a way the mind can not whip me into. I stop a half-step. A frown weighs my face down and I linger, staring at the near endless walls of towers and habitual blocks.
"Fruits, vegetables, nuts, roots, edible flowers and mushrooms...?" I let out, blinking at how limited the smells of the city are. There should be so much more. Bees and all sorts buzzing about, carrying away the nectar as they turn so much into honey and sweet delight. Emotivores feeding off of our joy and the uplifting colours of the city.
From dangling gardens, windowsill pots and trays to beds of grass with rodents and all. What should be there is so limited now. There's still beauty in seeing cherries bloom out of touch with citrus and vines of other fruits. But there should be so much more. What should be a means for people to bond, pass time and live their lives has been reduced to pure utilitarianism.
Farming for the fear of starvation during... During a renewed siege.
A cold shot strikes through my veins, leaving my blood full of the uncomfortable knowledge. That of the fear the people have in their hearts. Despite being in one of the safest cities in all of the world, they are terrified. They also saw the siege and how it was developing up into the Cycle of Screaming Witches.
I suppose it's easier to forget about them than I thought it was. At least, in the sense that actually matters and holds depth to it beyond simple acknowledgement. The Seven-Peaks Union of Jherikra, they really did have this city surrounded. One of the largest cities of the Jherikra continent and they had us completely surrounded.
The 'City that Spans Two Continents,' was cut off from the rest of the world. Blockaded on the ground by endless streams of shadow-faced soldiers and their siege engines. The sky was dark and bright with emerald spears, not because a dragon was migrating or the Valkinvar were celebrating. The sky was black with the shadows of thousands of airships. The clouds were scared away on an endless roar of war horns and mechanical tickings.
A sigh parts my lips, breaking the images of the siege in a manner I wish they actually had the power to do. My magic takes over, rising me above the endless traffic of the Great Bridge and I fly off. Gently making my way to the nearest rooftops, I look through and across what buildings I can.
So little seems off at a glance. The children are happy and the men are working away. Earning their pay and toiling on the housely chores and what have you. The mothers, wives and girls are all giggling away, baking cakes and gossiping about the latest local developments. Yet, when one pays attention, a feat anyone of clear mind can do...
They see the farms, the crops and the bushels. The animals growing fat from fodder and the catching of odd animals for the same purpose. Food. The shops are the same, even the clothes and toy shops are stocked with food in the strangest of places. Waiting to come on in out of the halolight like any other delivery.
I fly up higher, catching a small family of three, possibly two sons and their father. They're before their cellar, in the loosest sense of the word with how the city is... But the point of their actions remains the same. Slaughtered animals on hooks, preserved with high quantities of magic and barrels of drink of who knows how many kinds.
Thurn's Forge has always had farmers, though now it seems like everyone has turned into one. The city can already last decades under siege and still, everyone is trying to scrape together what they can to add on but a couple more years to that total. Our people are terrified. The city has grown so much these past grand-cycles, with all the refugees fleeing the invading heretical armies.
Were the Thunderstricken Wastes not beyond Thurnmourer-Thunlanann... I suspect the city would be quiet of much of our people, too. After all, there is peace for the moment, peace they can use to flee. People might not travel as fast as soldiers on the march, especially soulless men like the shadow-faced legions of the heretics. But they can still get ahead of them.
Yet our walls do not let them. The gates are there, though they will never be opened. More so illusions than actual gargants of steel and gears and pulling rope. If they ever do so much as creak open so that a thin blade of light might get through. It will only be as our great city falls to ruin in the baptismal fires of war. Whenever it comes.
"Mmm... Where are you?" I ask myself, finding a clock-tower to perch on. I walk out across the decorative statue, keeping my stride to the very edges. I lean out, looking across the immediate city and its labyrinth of streets, back alleys and storefronts. Kids swarm about, evading authority figures, and I catch a few birds chirping away on the branches of a tree. Berries in their beaks for so short a time before annoyed gardeners come barging in, swinging away.
The little thieves fly away, unbothered by anything we have on our minds. Still, not them or the winds they fly on give me any sense of direction. The woman I am looking for is not in my sight. Eyes or otherwise. I try to feel out with my senses, but in the density of the city and the gratuitous population of it, I cannot focus.
Like trying to spit a glob at the wall as you face the oncoming gale and the storm above it. I can, but can is not the same as well... Can. A huff of amusement cracks my thoughts open.
"Aren't you a smart girl, Vapooliar?" I remark to myself, stepping out onto the open air as anyone might on a cobblestone road or a plank wood bridge. I keep ongoing, keeping the useless motions up until I let my magic take over as it naturally does. My feet go limp and my limbs adjust to their instinctual positions.
I fly down into the city, as low as the streets, but no lower than the third floors of most of the buildings along here. I keep on moving, taking in the sights as I focus my senses into as much of a scalpel as they can be. They reach out further than any limb could ever achieve, going deeper and deeper into the city until I can feel the very darkness of the subterranean parts of it. It all comes back, whipping my head back with such force my hair flicks with it.
"Eurultus-Valkinvar Pymonsia, where are you?" I ask myself pointlessly, not even sure why I'm speaking at all. The people of the city think little of us Valkinvar, they see us often enough as to become dull to us. Mostly. But a Valkinvar who keeps talking to herself? I'm sure that will catch me some attention and put the skylights on me with all the malice gossip can and does do.
My lips straighten and shift about, and I float on ahead, enjoying the city for what it is as my eyes try to keep their severity of look about. The bells ring in my ears, chiming away as gentle winds catch and knock them. Little fans and mills flutter alongside them, catapulting the buzzards and flap of wings with the sounds. The smells of the bakeries and shops rise on the heat of ovens, sending it off even higher.
I turn one street and then another, navigating the maze of repeating scenes and familiar heart-warmings. My goal eludes me, only taking me on a further trail of scenery and events. I come upon a crossroads and linger in its open centre. The sky ripples with the power of other Valkinvar, but never the one I am looking for.
Frustration tightens my hands into fists, and I fly up, a stiffness to my posture. All of last night was spent fruitlessly looking for Sister Dannatili, and I would rather not do it all again. Regardless of how important it is that I find Eurultus-Valkinvar Pymonsia. Yet, that is the thing. I need to get over the discomfort and the agony I can associate with it.
It is of the utmost importance that I find Eurultus-Valkinvar Pymonsia. I know she used to spend so much time over here, in Thurnmourer-Thunlanann. She loved to travel under the delights of the window gardens and the hanging baskets of flowers. Wicker-made or thatched from brown reeds with the texture of poorly loved hair.
Hopefully, she still feels the same way as she always has for this part of the city. I want her to be out here where I at least feel like I know I can find her. Somewhere around here or over there. A street behind or ten ahead. I don't know...
"Eurultus-Valkinvar Pymonsia, where are you? Do I need to pray or wish for you to appear like some divine entity, unlike the gods and goddesses above?" I ask myself, rising above the city and back into the open air again. My eyes cling to what Valkinvar they can pick out, the details of their lives and tasks and the oddities they all carry.
Some wear no armour and bear no weapons. All that I can use to identify them is gone, for they have stripped themselves of everything but the bare essentials. Nothing more than just another part of the city in any other part of the world. But this is not that, this is not some part of the world outside of the literal sense... This is Thurn's Forge!
Seat of an empire and the capital of the God of War, Waionr's Chosen Theocracy!
"You look lost, Sister Vapooliar. I hear you're even looking for me." a voice giggles so clearly even with no one clearly in sight.
"Eurultus-Valkinvar Pymonsia!" I let out, snapping my attention to the breadcrumb trail of magic she is letting float out our way. A shimmering snake of Moonrim Emerald...!