Go and Tell It to the Mountain [Norani]

[Talisman]

Glade, Year 123

[Closed - Norani]

The mountain peak on which Drathera had been built was a stable, gargantuan mass. Steady. Safe. Reassuring, perhaps, after everything she had seen and experienced. In a few days, she would need to make her case to the Senate in hopes of procuring resources, manpower and firepower amongst them, in her bid to free the missing seasons. Facing the enemy with only her small party, even if one of them was Imogen Ward, might be something of a suicide mission.

If there was any comfort to be had, it was in the elements that were always there around her and awakened to her, and she to them. There were whispers aplenty of reassurance and encouragement. They believed in her. But would the esteemed members of the hallowed Senate? Time would tell, but much might depend on how she could make her case, and hopefully, the session wouldn't get derailed with other issues when she needed their focus on this one.

Unlike Solunarium, where light abounded, artificial though it was, her homeland had the opposite problem. Where the desert’s ecology suffered from ever-present, endless light, Ecith itself was dark, cold, and damp, and often wet. The ground went from soaked and soggy to mud to dryly packed. Crops were having a harder time growing, even with the presence of the dragons within their midst. The fel eclipse was not helping the jungles, even the depths of which rarely saw light in the first place. Just like it was aboard, the elements around her were out of balance.

Stones pushed through the soil as she walked along, diverting off to go in their own directions. These stones ranged from simple, dark polished pebbles to brilliant precious gemstones with multitudes of facets. They reflected what light there was there, making up a rainbow-strewn path down and away from the reaches of the city. They made their own patterns and mosaics that vanished once she was a handful of steps away, sinking back down within the ground. Their attitudes were solemn and stoic, though there seemed to be a bit of mischief in the way they kept on making the stones vanish once she was away from them.

If she chose, she could follow the trails it was making as they progressed into the mountain. Otherwise... she could try to ground herself with something else.

[Norani]

Glade 8, 123

Norani sighed, tiredly leaning against the balcony of one of the many landings that adorned Jarkor's Tail as it wrapped around the lonely mountain. She was weary, not from the exertion of her travels, though certainly some from her diversion in the desert, most of her weariness came from having to face what lay ahead. She looked out over the flooded and darkened farms and grasslands, and she felt conflict welling up once more within her.

The elements of this land were horrendously out of balance, and she could feel them crying out, some to her, many for any who would listen. This land yearned for light, for warmth, for a reprieve from water and darkness. Norani knew she could ease the pain for a small stint, but it was not a solution. No, the solution lay at the hands of the Senate she would be addressing in two days time.

She buried her face in her hands.

She had just finished speaking with a Senator, who made her repeat her story to an Arbiter just to glean some truth from this seemingly preposterous tale she was living through. She turned her back to the stone that served as a railing and she slumped down to sit in the water that was upon every outdoor surface.

Looking around her, she realized exactly where she was. This was the same landing that she had asked Yeva to meet her, to join her on the flight with her villagemates heading home. It was the first time that Yeva got to fly upon Ruvaf's back, straddled safely against Norani's body. A smile crept upon Norani's face.

That moment, that beautiful moment, where they had just pulled up out of the dive, flying toward the rising sun, out over this glorious land they called home, that moment always held itself especially dear to Norani. That was the moment that changed everything for the both of them, with Yeva being brave enough to travel with Norani. That was the beginning of the growth of their friendship into something much more beautiful.

Norani longed for more of those moments. She wished for Yeva to be here next to her, sitting in the rain with her, arms wrapped around Norani's broad shoulders, saying the words of encouragement that Yeva always seemed able to find. She longed to feel those crimson curls against her face once more, to hear the elven lilt of Yeva's laughter.

She missed her best friend. She missed the woman that made her heart spring open wide.

And the Senate of Drathera would end up determining Norani's likelihood of ever seeing Yeva again. If she couldn't convince them to give enough help to see this quest to completion, then in all likelihood, Norani would forever be stuck in the Everlasting Grove, likely dead, with the slimmest chance of surviving. And that was likely even if she managed to succeed at the impossible.

She closed her eyes, sighing once more, head between her knees.

If she could somehow do the impossible of convincing the Senate, if she could do the impossible of rescuing Ghoron and the seasons, if she could do the impossible of escaping the Grove herself then maybe... just maybe... she could do the impossible of finding Yeva in the Astral Sea where she was lost.

Norani wasn't sure how long she sat there in the rain, unbothered by the cold that many of her brethren avoided, but eventually she found herself descending the stairs of the great mountain. She had no destination in mind, for Drathera wasn't her home, not really. Her home... would the lake have flooded? Would the waters have permeated the soil so deep that the great tree would become unstable and fall? Did her village even still exist?

Did her family?

Eventually her feet carried her to the soggy mud that made up the baselands around Drathera. She looked up and around her, seeing so many of her kind in hooded cloaks to protect from the endless onslaught of weather that they normally embraced, when it came in seasons. But now... even the rains were a nuisance, an inconvenience, when their arrival had always been sung with joy and farewell given somberly.

She shook her head, it was all just too much.

Opening her eyes once more, a flash of color caught her eye. Her eyes narrowed, and she saw a stone, one that was shimmering more than what felt normal for here. As she focused on it, she was sure she felt it chuckle before going silent.

Another flash of color.

Her eyes pulled away from the first stone to land upon a deep green emerald of stark size and color, one that would've been worth a modest acreage of land in the north. As the elementalist looked on it, it glimmered and shimmered in a way that could only be described as teasing. Norani stepped toward it, and saw more appearing in the distance.

She was not one to ignore the elements, and so, she boldly followed the path that presented itself. She didn't know the area that they were leading her through and to, but she trusted the elements, she always trusted them. She had been destroyed and rebuilt by elements pure, she was as much a part of them as they were of her.

And so, she entered the bowels of Drathera, following the mischievous stones, knowing that she was being called upon, and knowing that she would always answer.

[Talisman]

With the young Elementalist following along, the speed of the patterns and designs of the stones picked up. Sometimes it seemed like the same ones, as their sounds were familiar. Maybe there a great many, but whatever it was, they were all in harmony as they continued to light her way in the darkened, rainy mountains. Her steps, unlike those of many others, were sure. The earth itself ensured that she had purchase along her path as she walked, and the rainy dampness did not give way to mud underneath her feet.

Despite the twists and turns, they were definitely taking her down. 'Windwalker, can you tend to earth?' she heard a soft, quiet voice. IT was hardly even a whisper, a breath at best, and it was hard to tell exactly which direction it came from. Soon, it did not matter as the path of illuminated stones opened a small hole in the very mountain. Possibly it had been there a while, but before her eyes, it was growing a bit larger. It was not big enough to allow her through as she was unless she chose to widen it herself, but something else might do.

However she decided, once she got through the child-sized crack, it would continue to wind on down. Dragons were known to have their hoards buried deep within these tunnels, but it was unlikely that this was where she was being led to by the stones. They were no longer vanishing, but they were embedded in the earthen walls of the tunnel. They released a constant glow, helping her see where she was going. There was less air down here, and she was going to need to adapt or make her own. The tunnel's slope was fairly steady, curving down into the stone-lit darkness. Here, the murmurs of earth had amplified into rumbles, and they greeted her. They recognized her connection to the elements at large, and they were curious.

At long last, the tunnel opened up into a chamber. Crystals illuminated the ceiling, reflecting on the rocky floor beneath her. Deep in the heart of earth, there was still an imbalance of elements as water had soaked deeper than it normally would have. There was no heat from the sun or any fire down here, rendering the dampness quite cool indeed. "How would you tend to earth, Windwalker?" the question came again, though the phrasing was slightly different. It was not the same voice as it had been, but perhaps that was because the volume had changed. It was no longer a whisper, but a reverberation into her very bones.

[Norani]

Norani's elemental senses never really turned off anymore, not since she had been reborn from the elements under Agst'rasera's boughs. But earth was not the closest of elements to her, and she knew this was not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but it was something she did hope to work on. After all, she'd come to understand that all of the elements make up everything in this world, in differing amounts but always present.

And if earth was present for her, she'd be present for it in kind.

She watched and she listened, amazed at the patterns of stones and gems, trying to find pattern in them, but any time it seemed that she found one, it had changed again. And all the while, she walked along, feeling a comforting acceptance beneath each step.

She lost track of how far she had been going, confident the elements would never steer her astray.

And when the voice came, a whisper that raised the hairs on the back of her neck, a question asked, but by an unknown source. Could she tend to earth? She thought about what that might mean. She had learned just how earth came from life and gave back to it in kind. She knew how it provided structure to life, how nothing could live without it to some degree.

But that was all how to have earth tend to oneself.

And so, she was preparing to answer, when she saw the stones forming, or perhaps revealing, a hole in the mountain. She got close to the crack, reaching out with her elementally tinged aether, filling the stone with it. And she listened. All she felt was a beckoning, an urging, a welcoming.

Her natural instinct was to turn to wind, and pass into the hole with ease. But the question had been posed to her, and she knew that she needed to understand it better. So, she returned to her roots, and returned to the earth she grew up knowing, the soft loam of her home village, the silt at the shores of Lake Nora. She pressed her hand against the crack and closed her eyes, as her body slowly shifted into that rich, vibrant, life giving mud, and flowed through the crack. She traveled through it, feeling every little bit of the entryway, filling it out, then pouring out the other side, and reforming back into her Orkhan form.

She looked back where the crack had been, leaving it filled in with mud she built with her aether as she went. A marker, a reminder, and an offering of potentially healing that crack, if needed. Being a structure of stone, she figured that if it wished to accept the healing, it would, and if not, the mud would dry and turn to dust and blow away and the crack would continue on once more.

And then the guiding stones were back once more. She started to follow them down a slope, her excitement leading her feet quickly, listening to the many curious stones, eager drops of water, the heavy breaths of the winds. This gave her pause. She stopped, and listened. No, there was no winds down here.

And that's when she realized it was her own breaths that were coming heavy and rapid. Understanding came quickly, there was not much in the way of air down here. And so, Norani worked a new take on an adaptation of her abilities. She took the Elemental Echo ability of hers, and wove the aether a bit differently. From her bond with Ooshi, she took the ability of the wind spirit to not need to breath in and of itself, and she Echoed it into her own lungs with a deep breath. As the aether Enmeshed her lungs, she could feel it taking hold, and she waited a bit to see how it felt.

It was strange, it was not like holding one's breath, nor was it like breathing through her skin as the jellyfish did. Rather, it seemed her breathing was being fed directly by a very small trickle of aether, just as Ooshi was sustained by aether. She pressed a hand to her chest, and she could still feel her lungs rising and falling, but even with refusing to breathe air in, it never became urgent.

She was breathing from her own aether.

A satisfied grin grew on her face, surprised that she had been able to do such a thing but pleased by the results. And so she continued on, following her well lit and welcoming friends.

A long walk resulted in her entering a large chamber, one that was awash in multicolored light. Norani cast her gaze up in awe at the crystals above, reminded of the many large crystals and dragonshards that were scattered all over Agst'rasera. But just as soon as she had arrived, her ability to feel the imbalance in nature kicked in. There was water in abundance her, seeping in deep, weakening the structures of earth below. She could feel a stagnation here, a death in slow motion, a drowning, one drop at a time.

And when the voice boomed, shaking her to her core, she was ready with an answer, one coming from her instincts and her experiences with the elements, spoken confidently in reply.

"I will wait, I will listen, I will learn, and then I will give to earth, just as it has given to me, and to all."

She wasn't sure who she was addressing, but her focus was already on the situation here at hand. It simply was something that she could not ignore. Just as she took a detour to help a corrupted fire spirit, just as she had agreed to save the seasons, just as she had fought against the pained and raging elements in the mist storms of her home, she would not sit idly by while the elements were in turmoil.

Her feet turned to the mud of her home, and embedded her into the damp, stone floor, and from that point of mixed earth and water, she began to listen more closely. She sought answers, what was this area like without so much water in it? Where was this water coming from? Was the water fleeing or invading? Was the earth drowning or uncomfortable? She sought to get a read on them both, and as she was doing this, she spoke, a question of her own, "I am here to help. Might I ask who you are? I am Norani Windwalker, though it seems you know my second name already."

[Talisman]

"We are Chryl'kirtess," the voice echoed down at her. Whatever Chryl'kirtess was, the reaction in her bones was warming despite the innate chill of the cavern. Crystals seemed to form under her when she sat, as if to make a custom-made seat just for her, though it did not lift her from the ground. Having sat down, it seemed to her that the earth was very much sodden. That may also have been because the water was drawn towards the guest that had heard the call and came down to the prismatic chamber that she was now sitting in. While she may not have been so far underground before, at least below the mountainous capital, it seemed that her work was never done.

The spirits told her their troubles: the water had nowhere else to go. It had saturated through so much of the earth around her, with the ever-present rain, that it was starting to wear in rivulets within the stone. The earth was uncomfortable, because the water was unstoppable. No matter what it did to absorb it, to try to dry it out, it just did not stop. And there was a limit to how much it could actually take. Water, after all, could eventually wear its way through everything, including rock, even if it didn't entirely mean to. There was simply too much of it, and there was nowhere for it to go. Even if it made exit points and tunnels to try to shunt the excess away, that just meant more water came down in other areas. It was too much, even for such an This was in complete opposite of the lands from which she had come from: Solunarium was as dry as a bone left to bleach in the ceaseless, unusual sun. But deep down, well beyond the range of it, there had been water that brought life. Water that fed roots systems, ancient and beyond the ken of mortals, largely undisturbed. At least, the refuge she and Imogen had found had been.

This was a different pain. It wasn't a raging inferno, but it didn't take much for a small pebble in one's boot to become a much larger problem over time. Discomfort could become an irritation. Irritation could become a wound. A wound could become an infection. An infection could lead to death. And over seasons, this little pebble, so to speak, had grown into a much larger problem. Part of the grievance, too, was that the water was damaging the seed crystals. "How would you tend to earth, Waterweaver?" Chryl'kirtess asked again, using yet another name that the fire spirit she had rescued in the Atraxian Expanse had given her. The spirit was not giving her instructions, it seemed, but it was open to hearing just what she would suggest now that the spirits had explained just what this was about.

Just one multifaceted problem after another.

[Norani]

Upon hearing the name, Norani repeated it, taking it to heart and memory. "Chryl'kirtess." She felt a warming comfort wash through her. And she listened to the spirits. Water could only flow here, downward into the world, until fire and wind sent it back into the sky once more. And earth was turning to mud, and eventually would be washed away entirely by water. Balance was lost, and Norani knew the source of it all.

She knew that the rains above were a symptom of her mission not yet fulfilled. The seasons were lost, and the elements were then without a guide. She had always thought that the seasons were mere phenomena, a way for Orkhan to differentiate the times of the year. But she knew better now. The seasons gave direction, purpose, even mentoring to the elemental spirits in all realms.

And when spirits were out of balance and without a guide, they became lost and damaging.

She cocked her head to the side at the mention of the seed crystals. She didn't know much, barely anything at all, about the natural formation of crystals, but from her time on Agst'rasera, and her own ability to make dragonshards, it made sense to think of them as having grown from seeds. But in the grievances from earth, she also felt its stoicism and strength. Earth would continue to bear the pains against it by water for as long as it could, for as long as its strength would allow, until it crumbled to nothing.

Water was highly adaptable, earth often wasn't.

As the question was posed, and another name spoken, Norani knew that anything she did here would only be treating the symptoms. And she knew she would be dealing with the problem soon, once the Senate decided if she would receive their help or not. And so she sat there upon the crystals and she pondered.

If water continued to flow unguided, it would carve deep wounds into the earth, into this mountain that many of her people, and so many more called home, risking damaging it entirely. But water would keep flowing here until the rains were stopped and dry season was allowed to exist once again. She needed to redirect the water to flow elsewhere.

But where?

The entire continent was under deluge and inundated. Anywhere she sent the water would be sent into a further cascade of imbalance and eventual failure. She felt the water slowly absorbing through her mudded feet, hydrating her body. She thought back to her time when she had lived as a drop of water, trying to find a lesson therein.

Hmm.

Water wanted to cycle. To fall, to flow, to rise, to flow, to fall once again. She needed to find a way to cycle the water out, to give earth time to dry, to settle. Out. She thought to the path of crystals that had led her to this chamber, and she cast her gaze over to where she had entered. They were still there. They had guided her down here...

She had an idea.

"While the seasons are gone, I shall try to guide the elements in their stead. And just as you showed me the way here, I can show water the way back to the sky."

But it was going to take a lot of work and energy. A wellspring of aether burst through her runes, three names called out into the elemental planes. And soon, they answered the call. Popping into existence were Ooshi, Glorpb Glorpb, and Hissa, the fire elemental she bonded with in the sands of Atraxia. She smiled at each of them, "Hello my friends. Will you help me to help them?"

She shared her intent across their aetheric connections and they all bobbed up and down happily. She called out to the earth elementals around her, asking for their aid, for she had not yet befriended one of their kind just yet. And when they began to answer, she closed her eyes, guiding her aether. She let the earth spirits guide her power, forming a string, a road, between each of the crystals from where she sat now up and out of the mountain. It was slow, careful work, as she tried to not overexert the stressed earth there, and made sure to stay on path.

Once she was confident she had strung them all together, a necklace of power, a path of shining stepping stones, she called her three friends over to her. All four of them held their hands up, and the air between them began to glow as their aethers mingled. The spirits supplied the elemental power, Norani sculpted and shaped it. She was forming a lodestone, for now, one heavily tinged with water, wind, and fire.

She gave it structure and shape, basing it on one of the forms she'd taken in the water cycle. A crystalline cloud began to appear. As it started to solidify, Norani took the aetheric string she'd connected to the many crystals that had led her here and embedded it deep within the newly forming Cloudstone. She felt the connection take hold, binding the lot together. She continued to focus upon the Cloudstone until it flashed bright, shining into full existence.

But she wasn't done yet.

She poured her aether through her rune and into the Cloudstone, and ran it along the string and then she took her own ability of Attunement, and Enmeshed it along the string of crystals, harmonizing them with the larger Cloudstone she had formed. It was difficult, for the path was long and the crystals many, her brow perspiring from the effort, as she felt each crystal chime as it joined in the attunement.

Until the final one up on topside rang clear.

Norani gave a final task, embedding it into the Cloudstone, and hearing all the smaller cloudstones ring out in unison, she purposed them with helping water here to be absorbed into the stones, to travel along the path, and evaporate back out into the skies above.

Tired, she spoke, "Chryl'kirtess, this is only a temporary measure, a bandage." She sat back on her haunches, "I will be seeking to free the seasons soon, to bring back guidance for the elements here. But in the meantime, this should help to guide water back into the cycle and give earth time to rest, to recover."

She smiled tiredly, content, hoping it would work. She could see the water being absorbed now, she just hoped it would be enough. She now began to study and scrutinize the new cloudstone that she had formed, reaching out to touch it, finding it both solid and airy, fascinated by it.

[Talisman]

When Hissa materialized in the dark, damp cavern that Norani had followed the crystals into, it seemed a bit aghast at these surroundings. The fire elemental, having spent nearly all of its considerably lengthy existence in the Atraxian sands, was somewhat surprised by this place. But the elements knew, as Norani knew, that everything was out of balance. Where Hissa may have reigned supreme in its usual homeland, there was nothing here of fire. Just water and earth, with some air. All the same, the elemental was willing to help, as were the other two. Hissa still had a lot of recovering ahead of it, but Norani had certainly saved it from a fate worse than death, and in return, it would help the young Orkhan.

Magic hardly came freely with the darkness above, but thanks to the presence of the Triumvirate of Ecith... the presence of Galetira, Raxen, and Syren... those who sought to use the complex, mystical arts were able to do so. And down here in the heart of the mountain, Norani was able to work. But the threshold of overstepping was coming quickly, especially after what had happened a scant few days prior. It was, however, going to be painfully slow.

There were many earth spirits around her, considering where she was, and more than one of them was willing to assist with her determined efforts. They understood that Norani Windwalker was trying to help them, and they, in turn, were willing to join their abilities to try to achieve this complex solution that the young magess had concocted. There was apparently some upset about the way the crystals currently in place were being used from some of the elemental spirits around her, though Chryl'kirtess seemed to withhold judgment for the time being. There was no harm being done to the precious stones, and certainly not to the seed crystals that they were so concerned about; they would see just what Norani was going to do. She had been brought here for a reason, and if she was capable of accomplishing this, then so mote it be.

The process was perhaps more challenging than it would have been had she been able to rest and recuperate from her forays into other lands before she had returned home. More than once, her focus faltered, and the arduous process needed to begin again. Persistence and pushing through remained difficult, and there was a growing, throbbing ache in her head. It started small, but was steadily becoming more and more difficult to ignore and work through. Her sense of smell seemed to desert her, and the rumbles of the earthen spirits were becoming physically painful to her, though they did not intend to. Some of her scales were starting to crystallize, particularly on her arms.

"We thank you, Waterweaver," Chryl'kirtess' words were even more painful than the minor spirits had been as the migraine made its presence fully known. "With your assistance, the seed crystals may yet be safe and survive. How long do you expect your stones to last?" Lodestones, after all, did tend to become inert after so long...

[Norani]

As Norani's sense of smell left her, her ears picked up a rumbling she hadn't been paying attention to. Her eyes grew wide as she listened, taking in the complaints surrounding her changing the nature of the stones. Now she listened. She hung her head in shame. In a whisper, she spoke in the language of the spirits.

"I'm sorry. I said I would listen, but instead I acted first."

Impulsive.

"I... am new to this. I don't know how long this will last, I don't have a good understanding of my powers. I don't know what I am capable of, I don't know how to best help the elements and the spirits. I'm still learning, still needing gui..." She shook her head. No, she was an elementalist. She needed to be giving guidance to the spirits, giving them direction and focus, especially now while the seasons were missing.

"I am sorry, I did not treat you with proper respect. I... struggle with patience, with my impulsiveness."

She started into a tale of her life so far. She spoke of how she had snuck into the cave as a child to claim Ruvaf's egg on a whim, and gained a lifelong friend. She spoke of how her family had betrayed her and she traveled a continent away, abandoning them. She spoke of how she left providing aid for the Duck to chase Yeva only to discover Agst'rasera instead. Of how she had been destroyed and rebuilt while learning from the elements. Of how she had left Agst'rasera to find help before she could understand her powers. Of how she had diverted her mission to save a fire elemental and nearly got them all killed in the process. How she had followed the call of curious stones only to find them here.

Of how she nearly gave up trying to save everyone from this eclipse just so she could save Yeva.

She was a fool. A child. Impulsive, reckless, dangerous. She looked down at her crystallizing scales, shame and guilt awash. She was going to get someone killed, and very likely herself, if she kept on pushing herself to and past her limits like this without taking the time to understand. Even now, she wasn't sure if her fix would help or further the harm of this environment. She hadn't taken the time to understand, to learn.

To listen.

"Can... can you teach me how you can be so patient? How you can bear the weight of a mountain even while the world is fighting against you? How you can be so strong even while in so much pain?"

[Talisman]

The spirit did not interrupt her when she apologized, and words poured out of her like the rain from the clouds above the city, above the whole region. It seemed content to let her speak, to let her empty the weights and pressures that she was carrying, and release them. "You need not apologize, Windwalker," Chryl'kirtess' words rumbled through her enhanced bones. The spirit seemed to know that their words were painful, though they did not mean for them to be, but the state of which Norani found herself in through her efforts was not lost on the ancient one that dwelled within the mountain. That may very well have been the mountain itself. But whatever Chryl'kirtess was, the spirit was all around her.

"You are wind, you are water, you are fire. They are fast and changing, always moving, always growing. If they are stagnant, they will fade away. That is their nature, and that is your nature. But earth... Earth does not move quickly. We can... but it is not our nature. We do not grow so rapidly, but our treasures... our stones... our crystals... grow over time. We are the foundation of many things," the stones above her and around her cast their fractals anew, the different faces and facets reflecting a myriad of colour. "From the tiniest grains to the biggest of mountains... we grow slowly, we are formed and carved with time." The earth that held her formed up around her, cradling her where she sat. It supported her head, her back, her neck if she chose to lean back and rest.

The spirit let her reflect on that for a little while before continuing. "Worry not that some grumble. Earth is stubborn, earth does not adapt like the other spirits do. We may absorb, we may change... but we are slow to do so. You answered our call, and you saved our crystal seedbeds. For that we thank you, Waterweaver. We know that this was at great cost to you and your companions, and you must rest. To be like earth, Windwalker, Lightningrider, Flametender, you must learn what it is to be still. To ground yourself, to absorb, and not move. Not every action around you needs a reaction. And for one who began with wind, who is wind, that is the opposite of everything you do and know. It will be a long road for you. But every mountain starts from a single grain, Norani. And it grows. You will build. You will grow."

The words may not have seemed very comforting, but that depended on what Norani wanted to make of them. "That is your first lesson. To learn stillness, and simply be." And with everything on Norani's shoulders, with everything weighing down on her heart, that was asking a great deal.

[Norani]

As Chryl'kirtess spoke, Norani closed her eyes, feeling it resonate within her. Somehow it sounded more clear this way than listening through her ears. And with it, she felt... an embrace of sorts, she could feel more than the voice all around her, something big. And in that touch, she felt her heart slow to a calm, she felt her body start to still. And as she did, she continued to listen.

She opened her eyes now to see the glowing of the seeded shards, smiling in the wonder and beauty of the display. She felt the earth offering her to relax further, and so she did, laying back, held by it, comforted, supported. Norani thought on the words shared. She had only learned one lesson from earth while on Agst'rasera, and that was given enough time, all things grow stronger through change. But she hadn't thought about how something like a mountain might grow. She wondered how old this mountain might be. Could it remember back when it was just one single small stone?

Just how much could this mountain have seen?

Or any rock for that matter?

She was still a small stone. She was young. She was still growing, in so many ways. She had only recently learned what it was to be in love with someone who loved her back, and had visited a foreign country for the first time, albeit briefly. Her magic was strong, it felt strong, but she knew that she didn't know much. She thought back to many of the situations in which she had used her magic, to grow as rapidly as she had. It involved quick thinking and rapid adaptation. But her struggles came because she learned after the fact, because she acted first and let her mind catch up to try and save her.

Then Chryl'kirtess continued. As they mentioned worry, Norani started to fidget. She worried a lot, all the time. And had been for a long time now, it seemed. Ever since... ever since the day she learned about Juno, Norani had been shaken to her core. Anxiety, dread, doubt... She couldn't really remember ever knowing those things before that day. It had always felt like there was... a crack in her. Something had broken and she was unstable ever since.
And yet, she was expected to save the seasons, the world. She wasn't strong enough, she was damaged she was...

Not being still.

Even now, her mind was racing like the wind, thoughts burning away, water trying to fill the emptiness. Be still... she could do that. She could figure it out. She just had to stop moving, stop thinking, stop breathing, stop livi... How? How does one just be still? She was fidgeting upon the pedestal that held her. She wasn't uncomfortable, but perhaps it was the comfort that was the problem...

She sat up, her frustration growing. She couldn't even quiet her mind. She was always just trying to solve the problem. Problem after problem after problem, a constant storm of them. She could navigate storms, she could race through them, but to weather them?

She'd never tried, storms were a time of play and a time of joy for her as a child. She was born during a storm. And... there she goes again, reminiscing, remembering, connecting this moment to so many others. A growl of frustration, she tossed her legs over the side of the pedestal. She gripped the earth tight, feeling it. She was bouncing a foot back and forth, but she tried to focus on the hand. Just the one hand. She could keep one hand still. She could.

She felt a hand slip over hers, one she knew to well, the only hand that ever wished to hold hers in such a way. And in an instant, Norani's mind quieted, her fingers relaxed their death grip on the pedestal, and her foot stopped bouncing. She moved, laying back down, closing her eyes. She let her arms fit into the embrace of the earth, let its curves match her own. And she laid there, and she simply... felt. She didn't try to solve her problems, she didn't try to figure anything out. She just felt.

And she wept there in that cavern, and her tears were carried along by the cloudstones she'd set to task, so that the waters would not further damage the earth here. And eventually, she drifted off to sleep there, falling far deeper into rest than she had in years.