Tag Archives: The Inner Watch

We Begin With Ourselves: The Stag Pool

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On the small platform at the end of Rask’s watch, he wakes Alexis, who has the next watch. Rask shares his watch observations with Alexis and then pauses, looks at Alexis with a bit of penitence and speaks quietly so as not to wake the others:

“Alexis, you bade me to focus on protecting Ca’armine and Ethelred and I agreed. After the camp the White Stag led us to, I was focused on protecting you, when you freed us from the call of that accursed inn, it was clear to me that I had been led astray…”

Rask hangs his head a bit, pauses, and then continues.

“The White Stag pool, then the Inn, then Zrithak in my dreams the other night… I am worried that my mind is weak, I have been working to strengthen my will, but I am worried it may not be enough…”

Rask’s concern hangs in the air, an unspoken request for aid lingers between the two men.

Iron Focus

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The morning after Alexis has shared the mantra and symbol of the Inner Watch, Rask wakes with renewed focus. He recites his daily prayer to Raiden and adds the mantra of the Inner Watch at the end.

His exercises are efficient, powerful, precise. His physical and mental existence aligned like never before.

When he is done, he catches Alexis and Ca’armine’s attention and approaches them.

“Brothers, ‘in the spirit of ‘We begin with ourselves,’ I have had an insight I would like to share with you. My path has been driven by a need for vengence for Thater, recently I have been focused on Shasherak, I believe in part because of my anger at being Dominated by his shadow in the round room of lightning. Even without the Black Blade, I have a weakness for anger and rage. I pray to Raiden that my anger be righteous and not pull me from my Path. I share this recognition of my weakness and ask you aid my in guarding against it. Thank you for all your guidance and support, up to and after this moment.”

Rask bows his head and offers a prayer of gratitude to Raiden.

Guided by Raiden

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Alexis dreams he stood upon a vast grassland beneath a gray morning sky.The grass reached nearly to his knees and rolled away in every direction, untouched by road or wall. Far away stood the dark line of a forest. Beyond it rose mountains crowned with snow. There was no temple. No throne. No choir. Only wind.

Then Alexis noticed a man walking toward him through the grass. He was tall and weathered, dressed not as a god but as an old warrior returning from a long campaign. His cloak was patched. His boots were muddy. An ancient sword hung at his side, and across his shoulders he carried a bow. His face seemed softened by humility. His eyes were tired. But kind. Alexis knew him immediately. Raiden.

Raiden stopped beside him and looked toward the mountains. For a long while, the god said nothing. Finally… “Men build walls when they are frightened.”

Raiden picked a blade of grass and rolled it between his fingers. “Then they build higher walls because the first did not make them less afraid.” He looked toward Alexis. “Shasherak built no wall of stone.”

The wind strengthened. The grassland vanished.

Alexis saw an ancient city beneath a burning sky. Armies marched beneath banners he did not recognize. Orcs, goblins, elves, humans, and creatures stranger still fought among shattered towers. Standing above them was a figure Alexis could never see clearly. Tall. Thin. Neither elf nor orc. Both elf and orc. Every time Alexis tried to see his face, smoke crossed the dream.

Raiden spoke beside him. “He believed the world had failed because those entrusted with its protection were too weak to command it.”

The scene changed. Shasherak stood upon a mountain surrounded by bodies. Above him burned lights like stars. The Gods. Shasherak reached toward them. And the heavens recoiled.

Raiden said: “He mistook obedience for unity.”

The vision changed again. Now Alexis saw Shasherak falling. But his shadow did not fall with him. It remained standing. Waiting. The centuries passed around that shadow. Kingdoms rose. Kingdoms disappeared. Forests grew where cities had stood. Still the shadow waited. Then someone approached it. A man carrying the symbol of a black and red hand. Bandesingh. The shadow turned toward him.

Raiden’s voice became grim. “Some enemies need not survive in flesh. Hatred can preserve a man longer than blood.”

Alexis asks “Is Shasherak returning?”

Raiden does not answer. Instead he draws his sword and drives it into the earth. The ground splits. Deep beneath it Alexis sees something crimson glowing in darkness. The Tear of Avv.

Raiden looks directly at him. “The old powers are moving again. Some will tell you that power must be destroyed. Others will tell you that it must be possessed. Beware both.”

Then Raiden steps closer. “You  hold something kings would murder nations to possess. Do not ask whether you are strong enough to wield it.” His expression becomes severe. “Ask whether you are strong enough to surrender it.”

Then the wind rises. Raiden disappears.

But his sword remains buried in the earth. Wrapped around its blade is a single strand of crimson thread.

Alexis awakens.

Inquiries into the Inner Watch

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Rask approaches Alexis in the evening, near the end of the two weeks of focusing, training, and regrouping.

“Alexis, if I may, the Inner Watch? You’ve spoken a few times about it, and every time it… stands out?”

Rask is a bit unsure of himself.

“I don’t… I don’t listen for it, but it catches my attention almost is as if I were. It seems that you have learned more about it since you first brought it up, would you be willing to share what you have learned?”

Rask seems almost called to learn more about the Inner Watch from Alexis.

Time for Focus and Moving Deeper

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The group is spending 2 weeks focusing and regrouping. Alexis spends these two weeks mostly out of camp.

He finds the spot on the first morning. About a hundred yards up a slope from the group campsite there is a cut between two shoulders of rock, narrow enough that a man standing in it fills it, out of the wind and out of sight of anything below. He walks it end to end many times and does not come back down until midday.

He clears the floor of it to bare stone. He cuts a carving into the rock and lays ash into the cut, and chalks Raiden’s sigils around the outside of it, and holds the wooden focus Ethelred made him flat against the ground while he imbues the space with a subtle but pervasive power.

Alexis even finds a granite and quartz surface that he can grind coins against. He and Ethelred often talk about putting in the effort oneself to make a thing stronger. Alexis sweats to grind a couple coins at an awkward angle.

He gathers what will work for incense. Pine resin, a bark that smells of pepper once it dries, some mushrooms. He burns them in the mornings and chants over them a long while, not loudly. The smoke stays in the narrow place, sitting there and growing stronger.

He sits at the closed end of the cut, facing in, and keeps the watch himself. Incense burning and chanting the whole time.

Down at the camp the fortnight is unremarkable. The mornings are mild considering the season. There is a peace at camp.

Any of the rangers, if they walked up to look, find Alexis kneeling on cold rock with his sleeves shoved back, working and/or chanting. It is a great deal of labor in a very small space.

He comes down at midday and again at dinner. He eats more than he usually does and talks less than he usually does and is in his blanket early. Twice in the fortnight somebody lets him sleep through his watch, and in the morning he does not argue about it.

To Be Informed Is To Be Forearmed

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The island on the water level. The others sleep between the two palm trees. Alexis takes the far one.

He told them at the fire what his working was for. The Tear is close and he wants the guidance of the Inner Watch on the tear and the taint. Rask seemed to like the idea.

The carving takes most of the night. He scrapes the sand down to the wet layer and cuts it with the butt of his whip, a section at a time, sitting back to look along the line and then leaning in again.

What it comes out as, for anyone who woke and looked: a wall, drawn as a closed ring around the foot of the tree. Set into the inside of the wall, facing in, a single open eye.

Then he sits back on his heels and lets his eyes go, and for a long while nothing happens at all.

The sand inside the ring starts glowing faintly, evenly. The dim light fades and comes back. Haze comes off the water somewhere in there and settles at knee height around Alexis and his glowing working.

“It answers in the voice you expect,” Alexis mutters to himself.

“The Second Sun was broken and it was called progress as the ruins of what was wrought was stepped on.”

Later.

“The ancients keep it in in rings nobody wears.”

The light under the sand goes almost out, and returns.

“There are shadows around it, it doesn’t throw.”

“The ladder of the gods was climbed with mortal bones and entry was denied, but hubris never ends.”

“It seeks out its others. Its others are itself.”

A long time after that, quieter.

“You will be asked to set it down. Once by a one who wants it. Once by a one who loves you.”

“The one is supported by the two.”

“Find the one who feeds him iron and blood... the one who believes he can control him“

His hands are flat on the sand.

“It remembers.”

The haze is gone by the time he comes back to himself, and the sand has stopped giving light. His knees have locked. Alexis works the feeling into them, then goes around the ring on his hands and knees, putting the sand back in place.

“Well,” he says. “That’s more than I had.”

The Inner Watch

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The group is moving away from their camp back towards Nodden-Torr ahead. Alexis falls into step beside Ca’armine.

“Something came out of my studies this past fortnight. A name I didn’t recognize.” He glances over. “The Inner Watch. Some kind of sect inside the order.” He watches Ca’armine’s face. “Have you heard of it?”