The Second Phoenixfall ~An Introduction~

Book one: The Second Phoenixfall, of the Legend of the Dark Elf Saga.

The Second Pheonixfall
Introduction

                                                                  ‘Myr’ne’…
                                                                  ‘Birth’…

                                            “Draen’n’Ne’Linera, Aeh’trae’n’Myr’ne”…
                                              ‘Even in death, there is birth,’

          ‘Draen’n’Ne’Heal’lfirea’, Aeh’trae’n’Myr’ne’…
          ‘Even in destruction, there is Creation.’ The consciousness of She, the World, thought to herself. The sharp stab of desperate pain began racing over her; an echo of faded life. She felt the torment of the dying Phoenix like a jagged blade tearing through her. Her beloved child’s life-force had begun to spill from its deteriorating body, slowly crumbling as she perished. Arillus were deeply pondering the streaming thoughts of her most righteous of creations, running her spiritual fingers over the bleeding sadness she bore for the glorious being; lending to it her courage. For Arillus knew in the way that she just knew, an unfolding birth was needed for the inevitable fall of the dying creature -distant still, but immanent regardless. She decided, abruptly, that Phoenix would need again, the more-Worldly, righteous spirit of herself to continue on once more through the sands of time. Arillus know this well, for she were a higher being, grand and glorious, though confined to reside in a physical body of air and water, and fiery stone.
          Thus, with birth and death a conscious thought, Arillus finally set about creating a being of her will, an elemental of omni-reality, to fulfill the void which would be created from the death, and the transcendence from the land of Phoenix in her passing.  She carefully chose but only two things with her almighty strength of will; both the merest bit of essence from a planar energy, lain beyond the reaches of physical spaces, and from where upon her skin her creation would emerge. The essence, to be used as the fabrics of a living spirit, was drawn from but one great planar energy amidst infinite others. Of these uncountable energies, these very fabrics of all existence, she elected the very essence of Change to craft into a soul, and she took and held it deep within herself as if praying for salvation.
          As for location, she would decide to settle down upon the solitude where there walked a being, a loving presence within one of her many forests of shelter and compassion. The presence was one of the millions of others she could have turned to, though she was searching for a particular type of mind.  Thus, she settled on this one within the northwestern region of the continent of Arillus, deep within the giant trees of a woodland known as Varanessa, -lain North of a wood known as Hailvannisa, where none had lived in quite some time.  She knew that in this region, there were now very few to remain.  None had lived in Hailvannisa in fact, of the Elves, since the great wars of Domine over eons ago, -a very distant memory now tugging at her thoughts-, and now, only a handful lived on in an isolated existence, sheltered only by their tiny size and ways of compassion.
          However, only ‘She’ remembered the Old-minded and where they had hidden themselves.
          She watched from her ‘all-seeing position’ as a man from her most favored race, an Elf, -a middle-aged, quiet man- wandered through the aging trees.  Pale faced, and soft of steps and features, he merely passed along enjoying the natural world in all of its splendors with a gentle, pleasant smirk upon his lips. Arillus, as her children had named her, felt everything instinctively. She knew when someone were happy.  She could tell if someone were in pain.  But mostly, she slept until it were necessary that she should be consciously aware of the events that transpired upon her face, amidst her children.  It were in this case that she were awake, for Phoenix were great enough to awaken her and cry for help.  It were in this case that she were focused then, and she simply knew that this Elf; -a soldier at one time, known as one of the few-remaining, quite-honorable, Symphoniers- would be the one to care for a charge of birthing.
          She knew everything that there was to know about him. She knew that he bore light-browned, silken hair, hanging in smooth rifts down to his posterior.  She knew that he held large eyes of gray, though they were nearly silver in likeness and luster.  They were those which had come to be known as the Kind eyes, which as it were, truly were no more than soft or kind of heart.  It were an Elvine term that described particular types if Elvine eyes. For all the masses, only a certain percentage of Elves would still possess such alluring eyes in these days.  The Kind eye was the physical side-effect produced within Elves alone that arose when one developed such a great level of kindness and care in their heart and mind. It were not only with the gray to silver, but to all of the colors, with the exception of blue.  One of green eyes, for example, whom possessed the Kind eye would actually appear as if they possessed Emerald or Jaden eyes.  An Elf of auburn irises might possess rubied hues.  One of amber tones, might truly possess precious amber radiance or lustrous gold, and so on and so forth.  However, as far as this late year of her young life, Arillus bore very few Elves left indeed whom were caring enough to possess the eye of the Elvine Kind.
          Arillus let him see subtle things with his Kind gaze, from within his soft forest cloak as he passed in silent, casual strides.  She quickly determined that he possessed all the skills necessary to care for any offering she could ever hand to him. He were honorable and obviously gentile. He was skilled and powerful, even dangerous if he wished to be.  He was wizened by his years, and his life dedicated to peace.  But most importantly, he was a teacher.  He could prepare her childe, for the life that she knew he would be forced to live.
          She were drawing him onward, into the trees, caressing him with vibration of mind and body, and the deeper well of her soul.  The Elf, she determined, was known as Quilencce’ to his brethren, and the name suited him well. Drawn from his people’s word for ‘Well’, Quilencce’ was very well defined by such a term. He lived in a peaceful, schooling village by the name of Batteles, resting near a small river, beneath a rise.  The risen landmark of his home, lain just north of his village was called Bil’lae’, -the Elvine word for thunder.  Bil’lae’Elstaen, Thunder Rise, it was termed.
          None but Arillus herself knew exactly why, -aside from the terrific light shows- but Quilencce’, she knew, found it a nice place to be during the deafening storms of the lush Westlands.
          The river, as one of her many veins, she also knew well, known as Brae’Bresili’ to this Elf’s people. It was joined upstream by the small, twisting river, Bale’, which also poured from the West, though it began south of Brae’Bresili’s beginnings.  Both of the rivers together as one, flowed east, down through the lazy hills of the forest of Varanessa, as it collectively sat in the protective but saturating shadow of the coastal peaks of Stormwall.  United, their waters brushed passed the village of Batteles at a range of a quarter mile before carrying on to later join the great river Sable’deth and pass southward.  This wood, she sensed Quilencce’ knew, also ran further east up to the more distant peaks of the lofty Dragluln Mountains of the jagged dawn horizon.
          These two great ranges, -Stormwall in the west and Dragluln east- gradually merged together as they stretched northward. There was but one frosty pass out the northern end of the wood of Varanessa, but it led to a small coastal section of wood, frozen and barren, overlooking a frigid sea called, Islak.  The whole of Islak’s peninsula, and all of the pass of Frost for that matter, was encapsulated, crusted over with a chunky layer of salty ice.
None really knew of the pass of Frost anymore, and with good cause; for it was a waste of time to journey for a week, to reach much of nothing.
          However, Arillus’ thoughts trickled omni-potently, in all directions, all at once, and only one facet had turned this way, -mapping out her skin as the Elves knew it whilst the rest, remained focused on matters that pertained to Quilencce’ himself.
          She delved easily into his open thoughts, but she was not invasive.
          His home, Batteles, she knew from Old, for it had been founded within the ages that none recalled. However, Batteles as Quilencce’ knew it was much changed from the past. The village now was really quite quaint, even for an Elvine village.  It sat within this rich forest of surreal tranquility, full of streams, tiny rivers, ponds, and little lakes.  It was like living within a bowl of quiet life, amidst a three-quarter wrapping of mountains, and its southern border was a stark differentiation in terrain.
Again Arillus’ thoughts trickled into the Elf’s knowledge of her face.  She were made attentive to it by his recollection of his home-forest’s southern border.  It was because the end of the wood was a bitter scar on her face, one that left a scout’s duty in this time rather simplistic in monotony and inactivity.  She knew with ease, that the sentry duty of the Battelesians, was quite boring, bordering on tedious, simply by divining it from his mind’s description of memories.  However, She needed not wield his memories to remember such a scar to her face, nor how it were created.  But, Arillus would not dwell on the past, merely following Quilencce’s complacent thoughts.
          According to this Symphonier, there lay nothing of the Elvine tastes to the South of the Varanessan trees, and the duty of sentries had apparently become rather ceremonial, as well as being utilized as a testing of sorts.
          Balaste’Line’, the southern border of Varanessa, began at Balstakk; a great peak, off the eastern face of Stormwall.  It ran generally eastward from the western range, and only ended at the long strip of grasslands along the Dragluln’s foot.  The grasslands here were called the Vihbin’ by the Elves with whom Quilencce’ lived, but the Baradoran was its more common name.  It lay southeast from where Quilencce’ now strode, lost in his thoughts, finding himself thinking deeply of these things without knowing why.  He found himself remembering the lay of the great river Sable’deth, as it flowed southward from his woods, along the plains, and north of his present location to meet the curved face of the Dragluln, ‘neath the pass of Frost.  South, he knew the west’s largest river stayed content and remained on the plains like a mote of skirting before the eastern face of the forest of Hailvannisa, -Varanessa’s southerly, older sister.
          So incidentally, he knew that all rivers of his wood, poured into Sable’deth before leaving the forest and passing away.
          Thus, his thoughts trickled back to the southern border, lain as Balaste’Line’, the aptly named, ‘Annihilation’s End’. It were a sparsely living, rough and hilly strip of seemingly-unnatural grasslands squatting between the forests of Varanessa and Hailvannisa, as if a thief amongst a city’s garrison.  Balaste’Line’ was decidedly out of place, much like a scar of society, a scar for Arillus to hide away but never heal.  And he remembered east, over the river Sable’deth and Baradoran Plain, that the Dragluln was also well named, aptly termed by the Dwarves and Elves in Old alliances as ‘one who drags the skies clear of weather’. The mountains were clearly set to mimic Hailvannisa in her passage southward for hundreds of miles.
          This, a Dwarvish range, tore the skies in elevation at times, and bordered all of the ancient lands of Elves.  None of Quilencce’s people had been to the Dragluln in well over two centuries.  For certainly it was that not one Elf, since Quilencce’ himself, had ever so much as even passed into the Hailvannisan trees, and he was almost dismal at the thought.  Though, he remembered clear enough, the stretch of that great forest, passing just a short way further south than the Dragluln itself.  He knew instinctively that it were more ancient than Varanessa by far, and he knew from his lessons in schooling and in life that it had supposedly been the very birthplace of all life itself.
          It was a forbidden land now, and those whom lived within were not much heard from, for they lived far, far to the south. They kept to themselves, deep within the last reaches of the Hailvannisan trees.  They lived where the forest changed, and collided abruptly into drastic elevation drops and rising tropical temperatures.  The forest never actually ended, but with the change in south-bound climate, it became a completely different type of wood. It became the Glab’Gillendil’lin. It became a temperate rainforest all it’s own, dropping over Baecsl’Drop into sea-level elevations.  The Glab’Gillendil’lin was bordered on the north by a stubby, westward-running volcanic mass of peaks known only as Charaeng’.  It was well known to all that this rainforest were an inhospitable place, though Quilencce’ had never been beyond the great falls lain just to the north of the Charaeng’, or most importantly, lain north of its lone volcanic peak, Chare’Pyre’.
          However little he knew about the southernmost stretches of Hailvannisa and the Glab’Gillendil’lin, the falls Quilencce’ remembered well.  They poured all the waters of both Varanessan and Hailvannisan rivers into the ocean like the blood of the mother, every second dumping uncounted thousands of liters upon liters from the great cliffs of the western coast.  The cliffs began north where Stormwall’s mountainous blockage shrank and ceased, and they ended where the Charaeng’ began with Chare’Pyre’s smoking cap. Arillus felt his memory in the delicate touch of her essence, and she simply knew, Quilencce’ were indeed the one.  For she had remembered with him, all of this, seen his visit to the Charadeth Falls at the very mouth of the river Sable’deth.  She had felt how its beauty had taken his breath away, well over decades ago, just as it was about to be taken from him again.
          The Symphonier were not aware of her watching him, until he started to tune himself into the forest’s sounds and smells, and sights aplenty.  He made himself one with the World about himself, in the manner than all Elvine born could, if only they held the knowledge of their capabilities in race.  This is mentioned, purely for the reason that Arillus knew not all Elves could any longer align themselves with nature, as once they had before.  The ages of their roots had long since dried away in the heat of Time’s sun, and Arillus had now attributed this to her earlier assessment of a ‘Birth’ in need.  As surely as the years had passed, so too had the Elves forgotten their ways, or at least many of them had.  This saddened her, and she planned to change it, even though there were still some whom believed in the Old code.  This Symphonier, Quilencce’, was definitely one of them.
          Through all of these random, inadvertently forced thoughts running carelessly in his mind the Elf finally felt inexplicably as if he were being watched, yet not by some dark, bloodthirsty creeper.  Instead he felt loved, blessed and caressed as if by his yet-unmet, lover’s arms.  He rather distractedly slowed and stopped altogether, briefly glancing about with those silverine eyes.  The moment he halted, with Arillus’ mere bidding; -a Unicorn, pearly white and shining, came trotting from the trees in ghostly silence.  With all the glory of any fantastic tale he’d ever heard, Quilencce’ watched in awe, struck by the way the magnificence of this creature seemed to choke even the sound its hooves left upon the soft forest floor.  It happened so abruptly, that he had not a moment to even react.  He just stood there, for the first time in his long life. In all of his years, he could not recall a single moment that so much as even compared to the awe he felt in this sudden arrival.  For all the skirmishes he’d lived through, he’d never been as petrified as he was in the face of this glorious creature.
                                                      The Unicorn did nothing.
          It just stood there, causing this Elf to pause in his awe at great length. It regarded him intelligently with its stunning, familiar, blue eyes for a time letting the silence of its coming wrap all through the woods.  As if everything in the world were hushed by it beauty, the silence grew so thick as to leave echoes when it finally snorted lightly, turned in grace, and casually walked off into the trees. That moment where it were just the two of them, alone in the world staring one another down had passed with nothing more than that simplistic disregard of Quilencce’s presence.
          Quilencce’ paused where he was, still breathless.
          Then, he wordlessly followed the vision of this Unicorn, unable to help himself.  He determined that one were not a creature often seen, let alone encountered, even for the Elves of the deepest woods.  With all the grace of his Symphonier’s training through the centuries, and with all the confidence that a man of his age and ability could possess he followed.  He tailed it like a shadow, deft enough to stick to it without fail, and soon enough, he began to enjoy the supremacy of his skills seeing as the magickal creature began to make a game of it. Quilencce recognized this as the game that it were, for he had experienced many such challenges.  He’d tailed his students in their ‘escapee’ training.  He’d hunted them mercilessly, in efforts to show them better how to free themselves in the event of capture.  He’d even played this game with his few enemies, long in the past.  He pursued them like a daemonic shadow, spurring them into flight from his homelands so that he might not have to fight them.
          Fear, he learned, could go a long ways in the defense of one’s land. But, fear was not his intentions here, and both players knew this well.
          Try as it might, the stallion could not shake the Elfling, and Quilencce’ was intent to keep pace as if on the hunt until at long last the beast came to drink from a large pond.  In a rumble of shoe-less hooves, it came swiftly to a halt, and thereafter it were apparently uncaring that the Elf were present. Quilencce’ rightly hesitated and noted that it clearly and openly showed its lack of consideration for him by bowing low, as if in subservience, -but not to him. He simply watched momentarily as this beautiful beast drank deeply of the waters, thoroughly dipping and soaking its old, pearly goatee.
Quilencce’ glanced about curiously then stepped smoothly from the trees. At first his hesitation had arisen from suspicious, for the beast’s behavior was indeed peculiar, but now he wasn’t so sure.  There was not a living soul for miles that might plot to trap him.  There wasn’t even any reason to hunt a Symphonier in this forest.  They lived alone here, in peace.  And on top of this, one would have to be a fool, or a godly power to catch him off guard at home.  Not to mention overcoming his formidable skills.  What’s more about the suspicion he could have felt, it simply wasn’t solid.  Instead of wary, Quilencce felt loved.  He was caressed by a gaze he’d never met, but one he’d known since birth.  He’d been coerced to come here by She, the great mother, though he knew it not.
There were no reason for him to be guarded now.
          He came to a halt at the water’s edge, pausing to look about as he had somehow never been to this place.  He gaped in something akin to amazement, pulling down the hood of his cloak as he brushed back his silken hair.  He was awed into breathlessness, and his features went slackened, for this was more than a pond.  He found himself upon the banks of a lake, great and shining, sprung from nowhere it would seem, or merely hidden for ages from even the Elves.  It was amongst his first registering thoughts that perhaps he’d traipsed further east than he’d expected.  Perhaps, he’d been transported by the magicks that had brought this unicorn to him.  Or maybe he’d tailed it for longer and farther than he’d realized, coming to this lake as it lay in the less-visited edge of the forest. Its borders were far from straight or clear, cluttered with deep undergrowth, mammoth, mossy pines, and a strange combination of average and black weeping willows that towered tall.  Some of those willows bore black leaves and silvery bark, but they were only larger than the others.  There were sparse clusters of Ash, and white birch collected here as well, but they were no less in girth than the average willows.  Below the opening of this canopy the waters lay perfectly still, astoundingly clear, but shrouded in a head-high layer of surface mists, -which did nothing to hide the water’s clarity and crystalline shine.
          The Unicorn drank its fill and turned to grazing grasses for a time, as Quilencce’ looked about in wonder, taking this environment in like a fresh breath of exploration. In all his years, he’d not quite felt so serene.  The visit he’d taken to Charadeth Falls deep in the south was glorious, but the peace he felt now was greater by far. As the tranquility settled in, seeming too good to be true, the unicorn’s head would lift in a smooth snap. A slight breeze sprang up, sweeping in off the pond’s waters, billowing the Unicorn’s pearly hair and lengthy old goat, sending droplets of water spinning away.  It disturbed Quilencce’s own hair, brushing it back like a silken veil whose weave had unwound, residing only as threads.  It caressed his face like a gentle hand, and smelled sweetly of undergrowth pollens that reminded him strongly of his youth within Batteles.
          The wind blew the mists about with visual fury, but it bore an inviting feeling, almost playful as if the rifts of fog were dancing with one another. The fog became mere shreds of the smooth blanket it had once been, turning this way and that, barrel rolling, folding, flipping and rolling on again together before splitting apart to randomly begin anew.  Quilencce’ remained motionlessly where he stood rooted in place, feeling oddly peaceful, just watching as the winds and mist followed not of any sort of distinctive pattern.  Before he knew it, the wind grew more intense, drawing his attention to the waters now open and visibly shining with the day’s sparkling light.  Immediately, they suddenly rippled in perfect clarity, as if intentionally capturing his wonder, putting on a show for him and his equine friend. Then swiftly the waters began churning and rumbling, as if the entire lake had been brought to a massive boil within an instant’s time.
          The Unicorn dared not move away, or perhaps it was merely bold, but Quilencce’ took it as an omen of good faith. He also remained, simply standing there, not even tensed. The winds roughed the trees and brush all about him, but he was calmed in full.  Even as the churning water emitted a voluminous, ambient rumble, which spread into the very earth itself, Quilencce’ stood fast.  He glanced about uncertainly, the trance and tranquility losing its hold, and suddenly the center of the lake erupted in a pillar of its own waters, drawing back his gaze with a silverine flash.  He could almost see the winds that streaked away from him, diving into the column, wrapping tightly about the geyser only to sever it like a great tree, trimming it down into a tight ball.  Before his very eyes the pillar became a perfect sphere of the waters, squeezed and shaped tightly by the winds and mists. They’d been pulled apart by some unseen magician’s hand and sewn back together on high without a clear purpose.
          However, Quilencce’ had a distinct feeling that he’d been brought here for this.  He was to witness this phenomenon for a very particular reason. He may have been able to panic and flee at that moment, but he was a brave one and his courage held when he considered the facts of his presence here.  He was skilled enough to protect himself from many sorts of enemies on one hand, but on the other, there was nothing that told him that what he was witnessing was any sort of an attempt at his life. To make matters more secure, if any sort of sorcerer had gone to enough trouble to put him at ease in order to put on this sort of show, then it was very likely that he could have been killed a long while ago.  No, there was no threats in this display, and again, the unicorn stood mired where it was.  The beast itself was far too pure, not to mention intelligent to be caught in a trap.  It were a sort of proof that nothing wicked didst here stir.
          An instant later, the wind shifted directions, almost being pulled into the sphere from every direction, and it drew in leaves, branches, dirt, and even stones from the earth with unnatural strengths.  These elements were carried aloft, borne unto the sphere without great haste, and it seemed only to absorb them.  All that which were brought by the winds, and the winds themselves appeared to be devoured, swallowed up by the liquid on high as they’d never been. Even the very ambience of the air about the lake suddenly waned too dim, as even the light was consumed by the waters.  Holding the Symphonier’s gaze like a lodestone to steel, the sphere continued to draw items for a full minute, and the place became as black as night, -whereupon the wind abruptly died to an unexpected hush as if everything in the world had been absorbed and there was now nothing left but a faint haze everywhere one might look.
          Quilencce’s breath were taken now twice, and he swayed in his stance, feeling drawn as well, -out from himself and into the sphere.
          As he had been thrust forth by the pull of his windswept cloak, and released by the dying of the breeze, he felt taken. He felt changed, as ethereally and intangibly as any man might feel when they become a father.  He was the same Elf, and yet he was displaced from his usual feelings about who he was, where he had come from, and what he would become in times yet to unfold. And despite his sensations, the alterations he’d somehow experienced, the sphere simply hung there momentarily, mocking him with its unchanging face.
          As suddenly as the false night had come and the wind had died, belying the time within his thoughts and feelings, the sphere erupted into whitening light. As if it had detonated like a many kiloton force, there was not a single moment to escape, nor even a need to do so. There was nothing to see or feel beyond the light, as all things were simply washed away and made clean.
                            Despite the blast, Quilencce’ was unharmed.
          He had the distinct sense that he was being blessed, for the light did not harm him, and the blast was not real.  The eruption disturbed nothing within the land, and to the Symphonier it came off feeling warm like the Sun’s very rays. And yet he could not shake a cold and harsh claw that gripped the heart of him like the deepest threats of evils unfathomed and wickedry unmatched.  The light emanating from the sphere, slowly lessened, and the false night was left banished as if the light of both goodness and wickedness had been given back.  Quilencce’s thoughts registered this, and he instantly realized that he’d been shown the nature of his world, but more importantly, the nature of the element of light itself.  Without even having to blink in his thoughts, he was given over to a revelation.  All things were possessed of a duality within nature.  All things were equal participants in good and bad, positive and negative.  The Balance of Nature, which most all Elves believed in, went much deeper than anyone had ever realized, or so he thought.
          Quilencce’ then assumed that he’d been brought here for this reason alone.  He’d been taken from his usual path, and set upon the path of the enlightened, a path that seldom few had ever truly trodden. He was truly now made to be an enlightened fellow, but he had not been brought here to become enlightened. 
          In fact, this had nothing to do with him at all, aside from his minor purpose in the greater scheme that were unfolding before him.
          Swiftly the sphere then fell, plummeting like a stone as if to rejoin the lake and leave the event fully unfolded and passed through. However, the sphere swooped rather than plunged into the exceptionally be-stilled waters.  It floated forth like a cart on rails, drawing up to Quilencce’ like a loving hound. It moved so swiftly as to catch him unguarded, only to come so very slowly to a halt, smooth as can be.  And there it hung before his bewildered Elvine face, letting him see his own reflection upon its flawless surface.
        Quilencce’ stood firm despite his surprise, finding that he could not move, even if he wished to do so. He could not look away.  He found that he could not even blink. He was forced by the unseen hand of the magician responsible for this whole day of his life. Thusly, he examined the sphere, as it seemed to examine him in return, regarding him like a curious child without personality. He watched the white light fade to a gentle glow and then die entirely, revealing not a ball of water, but what appeared to be a glass-like solid. It seemed to be a perfectly forged mass of crystalline matter, half-colored the coolest of blues, and the other half burning of the most-fiery of reds.
        Secretly, the World had hereby given him a choice to make with the choosing of colors, and he was unable to disappoint.
        With only experimental curiosity in mind, Quilencce’ was finally able to move and breathe and even blink if he chose, for he was now spellbound by the events that continued to unfurl. He reached out warily, curiously, and touched the blue of the sphere with but one finger.  He found that it was indeed a solid, yet it was so very smooth that he felt as if he were dipping his finger into the very waters from whence it had come.  Naïve to what he did, he rubbed lightly on the glassy surface, leaving a wake of visual ripples that did nothing to mar the sphere’s shape and solidity.
          So simply as that, his choice had been ignorantly made.
          Instantly, the ball slowly dropped towards the waters and the earth, becoming veiled by a wrapping of thick, black, slithering smoke that sprang from both, its own and the lake’s rippling surfaces.  Quilencce’ recoiled slightly at the sudden sinister of appearance of the smoke, which leaked from nothingness like steam from the kettle, but he still remained where he was.  The sphere was quickly encased fully in this nearly substantial, tangible smoke as it slowly sank to touch the surface of the waters.
        Unbeknownst to the Elf, the Unicorn watched silently on, forgotten by now, as the globe touched the lake’s surface and continued to sink.  As it became submerged, he could see that its black coating seemed to begin to dissolve, little-by-little, clouding the waters in black silt until it had gone under completely.
                              Here in the sphere’s stead, a child was born, submerged.
        Quilencce’ watched on in awe as the Dark Elf, the unknown elemental of omni-reality was born in secret.  He was the only witness, and yet, he did not fully realize just now, what it was that he was seeing. He watched as the underwater billows of black silt coalesced upon themselves, becoming not billows and rifts, but strands aplenty. The waters shifted away from the obsidian threads, and suddenly Qilencce’ found a patch of pale material hidden amidst the dark. Slowly, the threads spread wide, and the patches of porcelain became many.  Then, all at once, he recognized a foot, an infant’s foot amidst the oil. He spotted fingers.  Then a nipple.  A newborn’s chest.  And at long last, the silken strands were realized for what they were.  The hair of Arillus’ own childe was billowed away from the tiny body, much as hair is forced to do when submerged within gentle under-currents.  Quilencce found himself looking upon a baby Elf, a boy with ebon hair long enough to wrap his entire frame.  The darkness of silt and oily night simply dispersed in full, and the Symphonier gasped in disbelief, dropping to his knees to find the child gazing up at him, -awake, alert, and aware.
        Such crystalline sapphire wells regarded this world, and the first Elf they would ever know, as if filled with nothing short of disregard.
        Quilencce’ finally regained his wits, and his amazement was placed upon his back burner, pushed aside as he hurriedly gathered up the childe, thinking it would surely drown.  He cradled the Elvine boy, seeing clearly that it was indeed a boy. He took swift note of the lengthy black wisps of ebon hair that hung drenched and dripping, and he marveled at the blue, depthless eyes of sapphire light.
        He recognized without thought, that they were the eyes of the Elvine Kind, and yet, much more, for within their lenses, the pupils of his gaze, there lay a pronounced, miniscule light.  As if the twinkle were not enough, the coloration were ever-stranger to he of lighter hair and silverine visage. Though he knew of the Kind gaze that increasingly dwindled amongst the Elves these days, Quilencce’ had never seen blue, -not to mention a color so blue it were sapphire in luminance.
        He lastly spotted a birthmark upon it’s breast, lain over sternum, heart, and collar, yet took no immediate descriptive note before he suddenly felt as if the World herself were touching down upon him with great honor, beckoning him to care for the child as if it were his own flesh and bone.  Now understanding of the truth of his enlightenment, Quilencce’ accepted with honor. He now knew that his enlightenment to the truths of nature, had only been given so as to allow him to understand this childe.  He’d been given privy to one of the more elusive, philosophical truths of reality as a whole, so that he might understand his own son, the world’s childe as he grew to manhood. Offered to him, fatherhood was suddenly something that Quilencce’ found he would accept. Arillus virtually demanded it of him, and he silently obeyed without thinking to question.
        He looked out once across the again be-stilled waters of the lake he’d never known before recalling the equine whom had brought him here to this point in his life.  He glanced about swiftly, looking for the Unicorn itself, unknowing of what he would do if he found the beautiful beast. He felt as if he should thank it for its guidance, but he knew that it had been only a tool to bring him here, just as he too would be a tool, -in the guidance and growth of his son.  But, the beast was gone as magickally as it had appeared to him, and he was left only to turn and depart immediately. Quilencce’ stepped away from that lake greatly changed in mind, and he passed homeward without looking back as he bore the childe safely in his arms.  He pondered for a time, why the childe had been given unto him and not other.  He wondered what he should do without realizing that he was already doing just what was needed.  Quilencce’ felt as if he were living a dream that was not wished, and yet, he could not recall his life before this moment. All of his bachelor’s life had been erased.  He was a father now, in part at least, and he could not avert his course.
        He bore the childe West to his militant, yet peaceful village, Batteles of the Elvine people of Vara.  He was thinking as he went, that perhaps he understood exactly why the childe had been borne, but the truth of such a matter was beyond everyone, especially himself.  He rightly divined the reason for himself being the father though.  It was because this had happened before.
        Not this event exactly, but similarly.
        Quilencce’, as headmaster of the Battelesian school, had been entrusted with many a childe over the decades of his leadership. Many Elvine families from different lands, whom had the cause and right, -and funding- had sent their children to Batteles to receive the highest schooling in the Elvine martial skills.  The numbers were not many, but there had been some countable outsiders indeed given privy to the skills that were decidedly possessed and developed by the Vara alone. It was their culture, and no others.
      Thus far, he’d personally accepted whole handfuls of Elvine boys and girls whom were yet infants when they’d come into his care.  So that much was obvious.  He’d been given this childe, just like any other, and he was expected to train the boy as well as he’d been paid for this childe’s schooling.  And of course, he could not deviate, nor give any less than the value of the payment.
                                    Knowledge was his payment.
      Being enlightened, was no small matter to the Elves, and was as such, a very high form of finance all its own.  No, Quilencce’ would not short change his boy.  He would receive the highest degree and intensity of Elvine training the Symphonier had ever handed down, that much was for certain.
However, Quilencce’ knew that he had better come up with a good excuse as to why he was bringing this Elvine boy, this outsider into the village.  The reason, of course, could be handed down, just as it was with any other outsider whom was deemed worthy and wealthy enough to learn from the Vara’s well of knowledge.  It was simple, he knew. He could tell his six other masters that he’d been paid rightly, and that the family offering up this dark-haired childe was indeed worthy of their son’s training. This would be enough, he decided, for he could merely tell them that he’d been summoned in secret to retrieve the boy from the edge of the woods, seeing as the parents were likely not willing to trespass.
        However, Quilencce’ knew that there was bound to be some trouble with his reasoning, for he had no monetary to show for the childe being bequeathed into the school’s care.  The mage siblings, Gaidahn and Gaeda’, and the druidess, Elwynn, were bound to see through him in a moment’s time.  The tactician, Rillphirin, would see that something was being hidden soon enough.  And the younger, master Archer, Bieltne’ was a sharp fellow.  It might take him a bit longer to discover that there was no funding for this black-haired childe, but he would know that Quilencce’ was covering something up from the get go.  Balaemaer, descendant of a Symphonier of old, was much like Quilencce’ himself, and had it been any of the other masters whom had found, or been given the childe, -then it would have been the two of them who were not sharp enough to catch on that there was no funding.  So, perhaps Balaemaer would never have to find out, but even so, Quilencce’ was closest with Balaemaer, based on their skills and minds.
        He didn’t relish having to keep a secret from the only one of the masters whom he actually associated himself with on a personal, social level.
        He turned his story this way and that, trying to settle on a firm alibi as to where the funding was, or what had been given in exchange for the childe’s teaching, but there was nothing he could come up with.  No matter what he tried, he was guaranteed to catch hell from his associates, and perhaps the civilians of the settlement of the last of the Vara.  After all, everyone actively participated in the rearing of the children.  Families whom were not involved in the schooling of militant, martial skills, would often participate in the social growth of the youths.  They would also provide the extra foodstuffs for the students that became part of the trainees’ numbers, and their clothing would likely be forged by the skilled craftsmen and women whom had chosen for themselves, not to be involved in the schooling.
        Such peoples had simply pursued arts other than the martial kind to excel at.  Or more accurately, they had fallen in love with someone in the settlement, for the students were not allowed love of the sensual kind.  Not until they had mastered their skills. If one fell in love, they were expelled, but understandably, and kindly so. It were perfectly acceptable for any student to choose a different path in life, and it were not the masters’ place to deny them that choice.  It were simply accepted, and openly embraced as their choice.  However, once a student had mastered, then they might choose to be wedded, or they might choose to travel. New masters might even choose to stay on and become one of the teachers’ aides, as was the case with Bieltne’, whom had grown, mastered, and succeeded his predecessor.
        But regardless of what choice an Elf might make in Batteles, it was accepted, and they were not lowered, nor were their voice lessened in the matter of the village’s workings.  It were these voices that might strongly attack Qilencce’ for the acceptance of an outsider infant without proper payment to be shown for his decision. Even though he was the headmaster, he did not have totalitarian control over the village. Being as honorable and skilled as he was, the Symphonier was highly held, and he did have a great deal of influence.  But, he was frightened of this case, because something like this had never occurred before.  It was well known to the outsiders, payment must be presented, on time and in a professional manner, or acceptance would be denied.  The Battelesians, the Vara, were the very best, and they accepted no less.
          Quilencce’ found himself cringing in the face of what might be decided against himself, but he was now enlightened and confident that he would come up with a way to convince the others to accept this childe into their school.  He almost joked with himself, thinking that perhaps this childe would save him from scrutiny.
        “Gaeltecae’Uh’Cae’N’Dreemn’n’Shalon.”
        “Perhaps you could be my Savior.”  He almost asked of the boy in his gentle grasp, as if suggesting to him that he should be able to at least try.
        The boy simply regarded him, as if seeing straight through him.
Quilencce’ rightly received the impression that this boy actually understood him, for there was a contemplative look that came across his infantile features.
        “Shalon.”
        “Savior.”  The boy spoke, an infant’s drawl and nothing more, but it was a world full of shock that reached out to greet Quilencce’s ears and thoughts.  The boy’s very voice, had shaken him deeply, as if a giant were who he cradled to his chest.  However, the volume of the infant’s voice were nothing more than an average baby boy’s.  The touch of his words, had gone deeper than mere sound. It were something greater than Quilencce’ had ever experienced before.  Shocked as he was, the Symphonier abruptly knew and decided how he was to convince the others.  He would simply share with them, the knowledge, the enlightenment he’d been given in exchange for the boy’s care.  He would give it to the rest of them as well, so that they might understand the whole of the situation, but he would have to do so discretely.  He would approach each of them separately, and give the knowledge to each of them under a different light, beneath a different tone.
        ‘And that would have to be enough.’ He told himself, heading home.