Shattered Foundation
The Twenty Fourth of Elnu-hamba [Elnu Descendent] Year 1348 A. L. (After Landfall)
In all the days you have known him you have not seen Zaia drunk, in fact you have never seen the scholar partake enough to even slur his words, much less stumble forward hanging off the shoulders of Aubert and Jean. "Sailors drank the fucker under the table," the latter says with the kind of bitter laugh that leaves you to suspect the good doctor had not been overly generous in sharing his drink.
"Talk about it in the morning... hard enough to believe... when I'm sober..." Zaia manages to get out, struggling to find the words
You might have left it at that and gone to bed untroubled had you not seen tangles in his beard from running his fingers too roughly through it and the redness in his eyes.
Had he been crying?
Alas, Aubert and Jean have no answers for he had not taught them a damn thing apparently. 'All high and mighty with his fancy books he is', the former says and perhaps that is all there is to the tale, but as the faint sliver of moonlight slips into the clouds you cannot think of anything but the sight of those bloodshot eyes which follow you into your dreams.
Yet the strangest dreams and blackest nightmares could not prepare you for the news that the scholar imparts in the harsh morning's light... for the sight of the chart laid out before you. At first the lines are as unfamiliar to you as the odd seals of the Anwari script, then you recall looking over the charts of the
Princess Maria, the ship that had taken you to the holy land. You had been driven by haste then, hungry for glory and for absolution, so you had asked the man to explain which lands where which and how many days you might count from one port to the other.
"You found a map of home?" you ask, a surge of joy in your chest, even as your stomach informs you that it is not yet ready for another long journey over strange and storm tossed waters. Perhaps you should wait for summer... it would do little good to set out for home only find your end beneath the waves.
"Not home, not the lands we know, only the bones of them garbed in strange flesh..." the scholar sighed and visibly gathers himself. "It is more than the skies that have changed, it is the land. These are lands we have passed through. This... " he stabs a finger down at the chart. "Is where the storm sent us and these are the Spear Islands where we found the girl and the dead that waked. These are the Straits of Gades, called by some the Straits of Heracles..." More parchment rustled. "And this is where we are."
"Slower please good man, I do not understand...." Or perhaps you do not
wish to understand. You feel the smile slide from your lips, your chest tense as though in expectation of some blow from the blue. It is as though you are standing once more in the cabin still roiling with the last waves of the storm.
'Good news and bad all comes in threes', you remember your grandmother saying long, long ago. The winter cough had carried her off when you were a child barely out of leading strings, such that you could not recall her face, only the warmth of her hand and the kindness in her voice. Father had called it nonsense and mother had laughed and said you need not concern yourself with that for many a year.
"It was not only the skies that changed when we passed through that strange storm," the doctor explains. "We did not pass from one place to another, crossing lands and waters in a single stride. I fear we must have gone much,
much further as only the mind of God can in its fullness grasp..." Slowly and with care, or perhaps with the hesitation of a man who wants to be told that he is wrong, he lays down his reasoning forged of many pieces, from the place where the spices are grown to the form of the charts before you, to the accounts of sailors who gad traveled far and wide.
Would that you could say Zaia is wrong...
But he had proven himself wise in things great and small, without his aid
you would be as deaf and dumb as a rock in the face of this strange land.
Would that you could say Zaia is lying...
But he had shown himself a man honorable as he is bold,
and were that even no so he would have nothing to gain from a lie
It is as though a gaping abyss had opened beneath your feet, as though you had expected walk upon firm stone and instead found naught but shifting sands.
How does Roland feel?
[] Angry, at Zaia at fate, at God for setting him to wander in the wilds without hope of return
[] Numb, there is nothing you can do, nowhere you can go, just keep putting one foot in front of the other and hope things will make sense eventually
[] Determined, you will find your way home somehow come what may, you will cross oceans and forests, cold plains and grinding ice. As God is your witness you will get home
OOC: No write-in in this case, since this is too shocking not to have some kind of psychological impact. Given how Zaia has acted and how you voted to act towards him disbelief is not in the cards, not that I think you guys would be inclined to take that vote even if it were available.
