Yesterday and the Future...

Ysolde

Ysolde

Member
Prologue:

A lovely purple haired woman sits by a tree singing softly as she brushes the grass with a hand. Her voice sounds like pure distilled beauty, ”And we'll all go together, to pull wild mountain thyme, All around the purple heather. Will you go, lassie, go . . .”

A delicate hand is placed on her shoulder and she looks at them. An old silver haired elf stares back at her and speaks ”The magic is going away there’s no guarantee that you’ll ever come back from this. Are you sure?”

She nods her head and says ”Do it and then go to the undying lands. Mayhap the tree will die and I will meet you there and mayhap the magic will return some day. Then there will be mages who will require my aid and protection.”

”Ever the protector even unto death. As you wish Sa'bin'ana'rath I will put you here in stasis and if the magic ever comes back it will activate the runes and if it does not, then you will simply have to wait for this tree to die.” The old elf laughs ironically as the tree is a bristle pine tree one that can live for longer than five thousand years and it is not even a century old. The purple haired elf shares the laugh until the older elf begins casting her spell. Then the tree’s roots fold around her and she can’t breathe she wants to scream, but she can’t. Everything is darkness and it lasts without thought or even dream. It lasts and lasts for what seems like an eternity.
 
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Chapter 1

The FBI had a job for Adèle. Find and infiltrate the ranks of the Tenerath Militia. This group had been involved in a number of illegal activities in Silicon Valley. Stealing high value secrets from Corporations was what they did and the FBI needed someone on the inside.

Adèle had made contacts with people in the group and finally a meet had been arranged for the last part of becoming a full fledged member of Tenerath. A journey into Inyo County California would bring her face to face with the leaders of the group who would interview her and she would either be in or she would be left for dead in the desert.

Here in the great basin desert the heat was nearly unbearable. Three men who looked far to much alike stood in khaki shorts and white polo shirts staring at her. Their muscles bulged and their hands were right next to gun holsters. The one in the middle spoke saying, “We are here next to one of the oldest living things in the world,” he gestured to the tree. “I ask you for the truth as we stand here today. Do you truly stand with the Tenerath Militia and our goals? Do you truly wish to rise up with us and plunge the world into a new darkness?”
 
Adèle stood, sweating in the great heat. She wore a white spaghetti strapped top and a pair of denim shorts, and fanned herself with her hand every few seconds. In her hometown of Aimens, sure, it could get hot, but it was never anything like what she felt right then. On her hip, there was a tight utility belt with one or two holsters, though only one gun; a Glock 17, one that she had had for quite a while. It was fully loaded, and her hand hovered over it in response to the three mens' aggressive nature.

She listened intently, not willing to mess up now. She'd gotten so far, and it was a hell of a lot of work. "Yes, I do." She said, though she would keep her hand over her Glock until the three men moved their hands from their own guns.
 
The three men nodded almost as one gesturing for the agent to come forward towards them, their hands going away from their guns. The man in the center of the three spoke again, “Okay that seems to be the first part of this done. If you’ll come closer we can tell you some more about us and the plan.”

As Adèle would move forward she would see the metal box behind the men. It was clearly some type of very strong storage box. The strange thing about it though was that it almost seemed as if a beam of sparkling light was connecting the box to the bristle pine nearby.
 
When the three near-identical men moved their own hands away, Adèle copied them, resting her hand just on top of her thigh. She was surprised at how easy the 'first part' was; she was expecting a fight, or a trial or some sort. She was honestly relieved that they were making it easier than she thought it was going to be. Carefully, she walked forward a few steps to listen to what they had to say, switching her brain on to remember every word.

As she walked, she noticed the box glinting off of the sunlight. At first, she guessed it was maybe a gun chest or something like that, or a chest full of equipment or orders. Then she noticed the thin beam of light, and her face crumpled up in confusion.
 
Adèle may not have expected such greeting, but her contacts had been good and her hard work had assuredly paid off. The three men even as she approached still seemed very odd and she wondered for a moment if it was really possible for triplets to be so very similar in appearance and manners. Still, she approached the case as what was inside might just break the case and if she could get a tracker on it a team could retrieve it.

Moving closer to the case she noted there were odd glyphs on the metal and it was clearly not manufactured. This thing was from a time when blacksmiths pounded metal into shape and made things on a forge. The middle man spoke softly, “What do you know about elves?”
 
Adèle took close notice of the glyphs. She couldn't tell if they meant anything, or if they were just decoration, but why would you decorate a weapons crate? Every second, there was more proof that it wasn't something that had been made for holding pointless things.

She tore her attention away from the box when she was asked what she thought was quite a ridiculous question. She couldn't help but raise an eyebrow, looking between the three men. She almost asked if it was a joke, but decided against it unless it ruined the situation. "Elves?" She repeated quietly. She thought for a few seconds. "Like, Lord of the Rings elves?" She asked.
 
In the distance the sound of crunching sand and dirt as an SUV drove close. Four doors opened and a young blonde haired man stepped out. Adèle recognized him from her work in trying to get into this militia. He was Trent Marsten a Former LAPD officer and part time Security Guard for a number of high paying firms. She’d spent hours and days playing pool, talking, working security and more with this man. He was nice enough if you didn’t count his sheer hatred for tech firms and pretty much anything in the world that wasn’t his gun. Basically if he wasn’t such a slimeball she might have considered him a friend.

In any case, one of the triplets nodded to Trent and Trent actually gave him a smile and a nod and began to walk over. The middle triplet, in the meantime, had been explaining. “Not like that at all. The fantasy of Tolkien is just from England and Scotland. Pieces of old tales restrung into his imaginary world. No, no what we have is some of the last magic on this earth encased in cold iron. Do you know what cold iron is?”
 
Adèle turned her head at the sound of wheels on sound and couldn't help but stare in confusion at her old workmate. How does someone like that end up in the deserts of California? She supposed it made sense; Trent traditionally disliked technical things and the group specialised in stealing secrets, so why wouldn't he be with them?

The words 'cold iron' didn't clarify anything for Adèle; it just confused her more than it did before. She paused. "Iron that's cold?" She asked slowly, face clearly pulled into distressed confusion.
 
Trent laughed along with the other men, “No, it’s cold forged which means the smith took the ingot and banged on it again and again without forge heat to shape it. It’s an old superstition that Iron holds in magic and Cold Iron even more so. Well, maybe less of a superstition now isn’t that right?”

The three men nodded and the leader moved to the lock on the chest. “That’s what we will see because the indians who once lived near here had some old legends about the forests. Legends that our historians think mesh with old tales about elves. If we are right then when this opens here the item inside will charge and magic will again be in the world.”
 
Adèle nodded slowly, though none of what was being said really made much sense to her. The notion of magic didn't form correctly in her head, but she held any questions that she had in her brain. She didn't want to look naive in front of the men.

She shuffled forwards to get a better look at the chest. She let one question slip: "what sort of magic?" She asked.
 
“There we are a little out of our depth, but we’ve worked long and hard to get here and you worked long and hard to be a part of this. Trent saw how dedicated you were to our cause, how dedicated you’ve been to being here and getting a top spot at the beginning of a new world.” His brothers nodded and Trent just smiled little knowing that the group of them had been played.

The central triplet opened the box carefully and a cloud passed over the sun. He put his hand into the box and pulled out a short sword perhaps 4 feet in length in a metal sheath with chains around the hilt holding it into the sheath. Under the chains the hilt had a dark black leather guard and seemed to be made of pure onyx. A deep thrum filled the air and he began pulling the chains off of the hilt and Adèle could feel that place deep in her gut saying this was bad, really, really bad.

In addition to all of this off to the side Adèle also noticed the tree. A feminine figure seemed to be standing next to the tree. Whoever it was she was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
 
Adèle nodded, though her question wasn't really answered as she wanted it to be. She waited patiently, and shivered as the searing sun disappeared, replaced with a cooled temperature. She watched closely as one of the triplets opened the box. She instinctively took a few steps back at the look of the sword, and the sound in the air didn't do anything to calm her nerves. She took one or two more steps backwards, eyes fixed on the blade. Her eyes only moved when she saw slight movement out of the corner of her eye, and looked towards the tree. She saw what she guessed was a woman, but she definitely didn't belong there. She couldn't move her eyes from the woman, wanting to find a way to tell her to leave so that she wouldn't get caught up in anything that was about to happen.
 
The female figure moved amazingly quickly towards the men and the strange weapon. Adèle could see that whomever this lady was she was entirely nude and had strangely purple hair. However, if the woman intended to stop these men from unchaining the sword she failed.

The dark blade was pulled from the sheathe and immediately the middle of the triplets seemed to burst into fire. A fire powerful enough to render him into ash and set his brothers burning as well. As those two fell to the ground rolling the sword itself seemed to be held in mid air and Trent was screaming like a child and running to his vehicle. The purple haired naked woman and the sword seemed to square off for a moment before the sword faded from view. This left the strange woman tending to the two injured men as Trent and his SUV drove off at high speed.
 
Adèle screamed at the heat of the fire. She jumped backwards, though the thin jacket she had had tied around her waist managed to catch fire. In a panic, she untied the knot and flung the jacket as far away from her as she could muster, and it burned into ash a few quick moments later. In this panicked situation, she didn't notice the strange lady and the sword's encounter, and didn't notice Trent drive off until the sand from the wheels hit her. She coughed and fanned at her face, and when the sand was all out of her way, she finally looked to see what happened. She stared at the scene in front of her, marvelling at it's ridiculousness. She stared at the woman in particular, though tried to keep her eyes away from less than modest places.

She breathed out. "What the hell just happened?" She whispered.
 
The naked woman looked up as she finished looking over the two injured men. “Usstan tlun taudl usstan xun naut kampi'un dos” She said in a language that was utterly incomprehensible. Seeing that Adèle was clearly confused by what she was saying the woman stood and moved closer. Her hands made strange motions and she spoke again, “I didn’t understand you. Could you say that again?”

Even as the woman was speaking the two men were sitting up each looking over their charred clothing and examining their former injuries. The one closest to the two women spoke, “John are you okay?” The other nodded, “I think so, but Jacob isn’t and that woman I think she healed us.”

The two moved quicker now standing and pulling out their weapons. "Adèle, capture her. We can use her for our plans!"
 
As soon as the woman spoke in that strange language, Adèle drew her gun. Her arms shook and shuddered as she tried to keep a steady aim on the girl. "What the fuck?" She whispered, staring at the woman, wide-eyed. This was not what I signed up for! She thought. When the remainder of the triplets stood, Adèle turned her gun to them and in a panic, pulled the trigger. Thankfully, she didn't even have her finger on the trigger; it was around the handle of the gun.

She looked from the men to the woman, thoroughly baffled and, though she wouldn't admit it, even a little frightened of what she had just seen happen. Was this the result of messing with 'cold iron', or whatever it was they called it?
 
By now Adèle noticed the woman’s pointed ears even as the two men fired shots near the naked woman. Still the woman did not even turn. “I am Arven’dallah. Can you tell me what this loud sound is? Also I am sorry but I do not know which fuck you are asking me about.”

The two men had, by this time arrived and each grabbed the woman’s arm. She twirled her fingers and said a few words and suddenly they were frozen in place. She stepped away from their grasping hands and pointed at them, “Are these the fuck you are wondering about? I do not wish to mate with them thank you. Will you tell them so if I release them from the hold spell?”
 
Adèle stared blankly. This wasn't a normal woman. This was only further solidified when the woman froze the men. Not ice froze, time froze. She kept on staring for a few seconds, trying to make sense. Eventually, she came to something that she thought seemed plausible. "Are you a witch or something?!" She screeched, not sounding as calm as she wished she would sound.
 
The violet haired and naked woman tilted her head, “A female user of magic, yes that is accurate. I mean you no harm miss and the Darkbringer has been released. We must tell your kingdom’s rulers and find a council of mages. It must be stopped.”

She looked at the two men again and then back to Adèle, “So should I release these two? Also, do you happen to have any clothes?” She pushed her hair over a pointed ear and looked back at the tree, “The ones I was wearing did not survive the stasis.”
 
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