13.3 What is Home?

General Summary

Day 148

The journey out through Kadia’s forest is much less fraught with danger than it was just a few months earlier. What was previously a tense, fearsome trip feels more like a picnic now.   Our happiness at being on the road aside, we do take the time to bring Camellia to the island where we fought the winter fae. The area still feels a little strange, but no longer the eternal winter that greeted us last.   She tells us that he must have been a lost fae - one who never made it back to a tree (Kadia’s tree, I think guiltily). There are fae who go looking for these lost ones as well, just like elves have Seekers. We use my pearl to look back into his story so that Camellia can at least sing part of his song when she returns to the Grove. The scene is eerie - seeing the land around us summery and bright. I see the fae fighting with Kadia, alongside trolls and even another elf. Kadia’s voice rings out as she calls the elf a traitor. Not an Oathbreaker, but a traitor.   When we emerge from the vision, Camellia is shaken, and we give her some time to recover. Before we leave, she places a grave marker where her fellow fae died.   The turmoil of our visit to the winter fae’s grave does not end here. I watch Hella and Bran having a heated conversation before Hella storms off to calm down. I’m reminded of how young she is, and how near we will pass to Whitewater on our way to the Grove.   Indeed, when I settle down beside Bran he tells me he was trying to convince her to go visit her parents. Stopping in Whitewater won’t delay us, and he wants her to tell her parents that she’s safe and alive. Quite reasonably, I think, Hella is worried that they will hate her.   “But what if they could be proud of her?” Bran asks me, hopefully, “Isn’t it worth the vulnerability of being known for the chance to be loved?”   Openly, I agree. Privately, I can’t help but think that she is already loved, already part of a family, already has strong roots in a tree that spreads much further than her blood family ever would have supported her. But I would be a poor wise old wizard if I encouraged her to run away from her family and never look back. That’s not the sort of good advice I owe her.   Home and family are complicated ideas for anyone, but especially elves. I love my blood family, but I have a fully fledged Inner Circle and several others that overlap with it. Doraal’s Inner Circle is overlapping more and more with mine as I get to know Knotrael. Still...I stayed close to my blood family, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.   So when she comes to talk to me about the same thing, I drink my tea and I listen to her fears about the village. She’s more worried about her childhood friends being afraid of her than her parents. She tells me that her parents had always wanted great things for her, and that maybe seeing that she’s learning from someone like me would help. I promise to stay with her when she talks to her parents, and joke that perhaps I’ll finally make use of the dawnlike aura that comes with Dawnbreaker.  

Day 149

We draw closer to Ipth every day, and Alder and I fall back into our routine of morning perimeter checks. He, too, is worried about Whitewater and what our reception will be like from Elder Haman in particular. Given everything we’ve told him, it seems he’s got a very clear picture of what sort of man this is.   We agree that he’ll sneak in ahead of time and procure some blood for me, just in case Haman needs some convincing to do the right thing. I hope that between our powerful presence and my dawn glow, he’ll have enough sense to acknowledge us as powerful visitors and not threats that he can dispatch with torches and pitchforks.   Then, conversation turns to Ipth. He has been gone so long without missing it at all, which is sort of sad. But we know that the Baron was last seen trying to whip the people into a frenzy over the presence of elves in the woods. We ought to be prepared for the worst when we enter the city.   If we openly threaten the Baron with our own forces, we’ll just paint a target on the Keep. If we are quiet and meek, we’ll do the same. It’s an annoying puzzle, and I resolve to simply tell him the truth if he is bold enough to accost us. We have a small army, and we soundly defeated an Order of several hundred opponents already. We have no interest in Ipth, and expect to be left alone.