EXNIHIL: Created page with "He ached. Memories of the wounds suffered at the hands of the so called Poisonous Lunatic bandits made his skin crawl and itch, and no part of his skin seemed unchaffed from being rain soaked for hours on end. While more wet seemed a poor cure for his woes, Gwynek’s thoughts persistently drifted to the comforts of a hot bath. A bath would offer some succor from the chill he couldn’t shake from his bones at least. With all his time at sea, he thought he’d be used to..."

2026-08-20T20:00:58Z

Created page with "He ached. Memories of the wounds suffered at the hands of the so called Poisonous Lunatic bandits made his skin crawl and itch, and no part of his skin seemed unchaffed from being rain soaked for hours on end. While more wet seemed a poor cure for his woes, Gwynek’s thoughts persistently drifted to the comforts of a hot bath. A bath would offer some succor from the chill he couldn’t shake from his bones at least. With all his time at sea, he thought he’d be used to..."

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He ached. Memories of the wounds suffered at the hands of the so called Poisonous Lunatic bandits made his skin crawl and itch, and no part of his skin seemed unchaffed from being rain soaked for hours on end. While more wet seemed a poor cure for his woes, Gwynek’s thoughts persistently drifted to the comforts of a hot bath. A bath would offer some succor from the chill he couldn’t shake from his bones at least. With all his time at sea, he thought he’d be used to the discomforts of wet, cold, and injury. Yet there he sat in the Hall of Lore, blistered and sullen, unable to follow the words on the page for longer than a moment.

The young elf removed his hat and itched at his scalp, before shifting in his chair, vainly attempting to find a position that didn’t make his backside ache while fixing his eyes on the text of Notable Trade Routes of Early Ta’Loenthra. It was no use.

“Reckon keelhauling is off the table?”

Gwynek cringed at the memory of his words. He didn’t know why he said it to Lord Teveriel, other than wanting to scare the burly bandit leader into saying something useful. He sighed and shook his head, as if the motion would banish his embarrassment. Truth was, Gwynek didn’t know how to be intimidating, had no notion of how to interrogate someone, and in the company of seasoned adventurers, Legionnaires, and veterans, should have followed his first instinct - which was to hang back, keep his mouth shut, and learn from the people who knew what they were about. It wouldn’t have saved him from being a liability when the band of miscreants summoned powerful magics - but, he’d at least have been less of a… he struggled with the word for it, could only wrangle some simile of it - Less a kitten pretending to be a tiger, less a pup playing at being a wolf. The humbling sting of facing Lorminstra’s judgement while others remain unbothered was something he never quite grew comfortable with, despite the many times he’d endured that ordeal.

He wanted to blame his indiscretion on the weather, consider it a momentary lapse, and move on with his work. Yet, as he chewed his lip and breathed in the scents of old paper, leather, and inexplicably brine, Gwynek acknowledged he had been coming apart for days. Since he’d started investigating the Carmine Triumph’s cargo at the library, or maybe a bit before. He’d taken to swearing in front of others, cursing the weather and the skies. Being bright took more effort than usual, and his smiles required more artifice. Gwynek had even slipped into speaking Elvish to others, which was a sure sign that he was approaching the edge of exhaustion. But the seas and roads don’t patrol themselves, and antique vases of questionable provenance don’t discover themselves - He had responsibilities, and no amount of chaffing, soreness, or exhaustion absolved him of the duties he inflicted on himself.

The young elf sighed and rubbed at his brow, craddling his forehead in his hand as he redoubled his efforts to make sense of the text, tables, and charts before him - searching for references to the Ilyan Cloud. Yet his gaze glassed over as he read the same passages over and over again. The words trembled sometimes, as a fatigued muscle might shake. He blinked and rubbed at his eyes to force them into proper shapes. The numbers then, in their neat rows and columns, dripped and spread as ink splashed in water.

Gwynek muttered something under his breath. He didn’t know what, but thought he heard the same words echoed over his shoulder. Words and numbers conspired with rows and columns - shifting and undulating, writhing and coiling, breathing from the page even as Gwynek felt breath on his neck. Words whispered, harsh and indecipherable, pregnant with blasphemies - praising all things stretched and broken, turned inward and outward, secreted within secrets; and he felt himself slide into the obscene ouroboros of the remnants of language roiling on the page as the breath on his neck grew hot and the whispered words more urgent. And then he was falling. Someone, somewhere, cried out.

Gwynek’s body jerked violently, his face coming away from the book as he sat upright. The world around him spun for a moment, his nap addled mind groping desperately to make sense of what had happened. The cool sensation of drool drying around his mouth and on his chin, and the smudged ink on the page knitted together the clues that he’d fallen asleep with his face buried in the book.

Spirits, he was tired. He glanced around, and seeing no one, dabbed discretely at the page now stained with his saliva, which only made things worse. With a sigh, he shut the tome, wiped his face, and prepared to leave. A bath, then bed, he resolved - hoping that comfort might smother the ache of failure, and lure of mad whispers.

Gwynek (prime)/Too Soft Too Tired - Revision history