The Day that wouldn’t Shed

Eurax-Fa was having a bad day, though more truthfully her bad day begun the previous night. She had been having a rough sleep, assailed as her dreams were by this and that, though as an oracle she was somewhat used to it, no what really ruined her sleep was the dreamwalking magician who thought it was a fine idea to speak with the pretty oracle he had come across while traversing the dreamworld of Kigan, Awarth.

Dreaming, she didn’t really have the option of leaving and the mageling just talked on and one. He was one of those individuals that thought themselves far more interesting than they actually were.

Then finally when he got the hint and left, she woke, feeling barely rested and discovered to her displeasure that she was shedding her skin. So she was well and truly irritated in that many that only those of serpentine heritage can muster.

Eurax-Fa was a cross-breed of a few races, or as people derisively called her kind; a tainted.

Her father was half-breed of a Raikis, star or dream-elf, a kind of humanoid with pointed ears that was both awake and asleep at all times and of a loughin an odd insect-person shaped like a skeleton with its shadow hidden inside its completely hollow body.

Her mother, was where her serpentine heritage was from. An Izair, a beastfolk with the lower half of a snake, and the upper half more like a human. Eurax-Fa, being a tainted looked quite different to the three races from which her blood came from.

She had the form of an Izair, but instead of scales, her tail, arms and shoulders were of the same chitin exoskeleton that the loughin’s body is, her’s being a lustrous purple. Her face and torso were like that of a Raikis, skin smooth and white as milk or the pure moon Nanlach. Her eyes were that of a snake’s but silvery like those of the star-elves. Her hair was bound on top in several places, its colour as the feathers of a raven.

However, the most curious quirk of the mixing of her bloods was that unlike a loughin she was not completely hollow, instead her back was hollow, and in it rested her shadow. Of course it was this quirk that made her such a powerful hex-witch and oracle. All things considered she was one of the fortunate tainted, her heritage giving her both beauty and power, many were not so fortunate.

So, being the way she was her shedding was a bit more problematic than that of an Izair.

This however was but the start of her terrible day. She shortly discovered that her most prized and beloved possession, something that she had with her since she was scarely a hatchling, was lost. To compound her irritation she could not search for it, for she had to start her work as oracle soon, as her troubled sleep had prompted her to sleep in.

Now, normally an oracle could be far more choosy about when they worked, and most oracles were notorious for being hard to get hold of an then hard to get them to ply their arts. Eurax-Fa however was a tainted, and her kind are feared, or reviled or both. She was just tolerated due to her ability as an oracle.

So she began her work. The work of an Oracle is simply this; direction. Oracles cannot exactly see the future, it is more that they see likely results of actions. It worked like thus, a person would ask a question, for example;

“HA good oracle, I am on a quest for the legendary black apples of the mad lich Thylestur! How might I discover his hidden orchard?”

“Do not speak so loudly knave. If thou wouldst head to the realms of the dead, the Urlbris and find there the sleeping skeleton of Hodum, the lich’s old pet chicken, he shall tell you the way, but to find Hodum, you should first go to Zavid-Lir, where you will likely meet one who can speak to Hodum, however you must not be wearing armour for this meeting.”

It would go something like that, however, the question asks matters very much, and can make the oracle’s job harder or easier. Many a person has finally asked a question of an oracle only to be refused an answer due to the question being too vague or stupid.

So, Eurax-Fa lived off her ability to be an oracle, for to see an oracle it was standard to bring gifts. Money or artefacts, precious sentimental objects, things the oracle was fond of, all kinds of things like that.

So a stream of questions came to her, and her head started to pound like a whole clan of stout dwarven men were mining away at it, as it seemed there was a large number of people asked the stupidest things, along with the usually annoying questions.

“No, she is not your mother, why did you even need to ask that?” she answered one.

“Yes, Yes, look just bathe in liquid silver in the skin of a Cragrender when Nanlach is new and the dark moon Relhs is obscured, what? How can you bathe in liquid silver? Not my problem, you get one question, now get out!”

“Hmm, well if you head to crystal wood of Kea-Ud you shall get what you deserve”

“What? Of course going to war with Sadr-Lean would end badly, you don’t need to ask an oracle that.”

“Ok, here, see this vision of this tree? At the base of this mountain? Wait on that tree and if you meet a person that escaped from an oubliette there, follow them and help them reach their desires, then the spell on you will likely be broken, have fun finding that tree.”

“AAAAAAAAieeieieieiee! BEGONE MAD ONE, THERE IS NO CURE FOR YOU BUT DEATH!”

“If you do this, you will likely become a mere puppet of the wightlord Cessen. However you will probably do it anyway so if you want to be freed after doing so, leave your gauntlet with your child.”

“Have you considered how better off you’d be as a rat? Because you are going to be a rat”

“You need the deep miller of the underground kingdom of Doffa beneath Kigan not here in Awarth, his magical flour will be just what you require to finish your mystic muffins, be sure to send me a few when you are done, oh and if you meet anyone claiming to be from Nortreiln, ditch them as soon as possible and don’t eat anything offered to you by a man in a brown bird-like mask”

So on and so forth did she answer many questions until the evernight of awarth grew even darker. Then she looked everywhere for her precious lost item, until she got a vision that one who ‘utterly confounded her’ would find it. Then she gave up, sealed her home with a few shadowy and mean hexes, crawled into her bed of cushions and sheets, pulled them over herself and tried to forget the day had ever happened.

Author: SnowyMystic