AVftS-19
 Part of a series of archived posts in AVftS | |
| AVftS-19 | |
|---|---|
| Author: | Casimir |
| Date Posted: | November 9, 2019 |
| Forum Post: | Linked! |
| Word Count: | 588 |
| Characters: | Ramår |
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A gust of wind blew through the corridor, bending the storm-grass and swaying the trees' foliages. In its stead, a young sylvan was hurrying through the brush, leaving a trail amongst the tall grass. Ramår kept running through the pasture till they arrived at the edge of the cilff. Being shorter than the graminaceous barley-like stems, they saw their vision almost entirely obstructed; and before they could even realise, they were plummeting off the promontory, and down, down, down, towards the rocky plain below. As their speed increased, they tried to throw a loose knot at a tree growing in the cliff, in an attempt to latch on to them and escape the—
The gods' graces being with them, Ramår narrowly averted an untimely and rather gruesome end. Finding themselves flat on their back in dead leaves, they acknowledged the gaping hole they had left in the foliage which had broken their fall. The angle and tint of the sunlight cutting through the canopy left them distraught at the thought of the time they must have been out.
“I can't go back, they thought. Not yet. Not so soon.” Searching around, they quickly managed to leave the forest, faring east. The knee-deep layer of humus made walking a tedious process, but they eventually arrived at the edge of the forest. The afternoon sun's light shining at present brightly in their eyes, they blinked, and attempted to sort out their situation. “But if the plateau's up there, what on Tsůnpar is this forest?”, they wondered. “Surely there's got to be some way to get back home from here. The cliff is south from here, and this forest is east of me. Surely there's mention of a birch grove in the Dåmar Tůclann. There's got to be.” Drawing the synusial description of their nation's land from their felt vest, they perused the lists of groves and geographical landmarks to find out where they could possibly be. But the map's westernmost point was the mountain, the peak of which constituted the edge of the plateau.
Beyond that, the lichen-paper was left blank, save for a straight line with no caption or comment. Ramår only then realised that the forest's edge followed a straight line, which reminded them of their nation's mountain ranges and tree lines. Refusing to give in to nostalgia, they looked around again, frantically trying to locate familiar landmarks. Yet the sun was going down, and already clouds were beginning to cloud their instincts. At last, disoriented and resourceless, they decided to move straight forward in one direction. The south was blocked by the unclimbable cliff of the promontory; the east, a dismal plain in the dawning night, seemed foreboding and exposed. As for the west, that forest, Ramår didn’t like the air that came off of it. Though the sylven themselves manipulated forests, planting trees in certain patterns in order to form corridors where sunlight, water and wind could flow towards crops, this forest didn’t just seem artificial. Its air was that of undisturbed, undying vegetation, the sap of which grows stagnant and putrid from countless aeons of immobility. This forest lacked the smells of decay and birth.
Hence, Ramår resolved to follow the forest’s edge, all the while keeping their distance. They plucked some marram grass from the fertile earth under their feet, and forced themselves to swallow their juices with tsampa and a pickled yam. They started walking. In the distance, northward, the sky seemed lit up with bonfires and torches. Ramår’s pace grew more hasty.