An eerie tale of friendship, loyalty and a place one should avoid

[Mrokii]

[this is part of a far longer story (possibly 10 to 20 times as long as this introduction only. It is written for about 99 percent but has only been published partly on a guildsite before, due to some open questions on how to end it and/or if it fitted Planeshifts settings. But these are cleared now, or so I think. And so I will post the full story if nobody objects posting a *really* long story. I just need to do some refinements here and there but, no matter what Mrokii's fate will be in the future, will try to end this story.

if anybody wants to hear about why Mrokii will act as she will in this story (which will only be of relevance at a far later point in this story, here is an earlier description of her, together with the circumstances surrounding her birth:

http://hydlaaplaza.com/smf/index.php?topic=32043.0

And now enjoy (though at this point I can only post the intro until I have tweaked the chapters a bit.]

***

An eerie tale of friendship, loyalty and a place one should avoid

Foreword

As you probably have noticed, Mrokii is an extremely curious Enki, even compared to others of our kind. And she was so from the first days of her life. Her mother, though proud of her daughters courage, often feared for her safety, when Mrokii was out in the woods all alone. And she would have feared even more, had she known the places, Mrokii used as her playgrounds.

The tale I have to tell is one, that even Mrokii herself doesn't know about, though she played a big role in it. This may sound impossible, but it is the truth. You see, when I found her the other day, just after the incidents I am about to reveal, she was devastated. In fact, had I come just a little later, I am sure Mrokii would have killed herself. She wasn't even able to tell me what happened, and so I had to mesmerize her to find out. And while I did, I also made her forget all about it. Or so I think, at least. Afterwards, when I asked her about it, she only frowned and looked at me, seemingly confusing, not knowing what I was talking about. I sighed internally as I thought it would have been a good lesson for her to know about the things that happened. But I believe that making her forget was the only way to save her from insanity or even death.

To my shame however, I have to confess that I wasn't able to "heal" her completely. Her subconscious still seems to remember what happened back then. At one point, a long time time later, she confided to me (indirectly, as she doesn't like to speak about her feelings at all times), that she fears to betray others under the right circumstances. Yes, just as high, as I found out during long hours of talks to her, is Mrokiis fear of hurting others in a way that could make them suffer from a fate far worse than simple death. You might think that this sounds foolish. But if what she told me is true (and I have every reason to believe that it is, as I personally experienced the end of this story), then she did exactly that to one of her closest friends as a child.
And this may be the cause why she still shies back at first from people who try to cross certain borders, such that doesn't even seem to exist for most of us.

But what exactly happened back in the days long gone, you might ask. Hold on a second my friend, soon enough you will know everything...

As I already said, Mrokii was an extremely curious little Fenki from her first day of life. But that was only one part of her character. She also was a very funny child, full of jokes and crazy ideas (which she never feared to put into practice, how adventurous they may have been. That, combined with her intriguing charm should have been enough to drive every young Menki around her insane and to make him fall in love with her.
But it wasn't.
In fact, most of the young Enkis in her village did not like her at all. And this was, at least in part, due to the most unusual circumstances surrounding her birth, of which I talked somewhere else. Anyway, the result was that she often was a little bit too self-confindent, making her act quite snotty, often up to a point, where she didn't listen to any others opinion. Or when she did, thought of them as idiocy that are not worth to consider.
The last thing that sealed her fate as a loner, was her greed for stories. The more creepy and bloody, the more she loved them. And you can bet that this alone would make most of the grownups around you suspicious if you are a child of seven years. There was one young Fenki however, who shared Mrokiis interest for creepy stories. But in contrary to her, most of them scared her a lot and so Mrokii was always alone, when she went out in the fields to explore the spooky places they heard about.

Looking back, I think Mrokiis seek for my friendship was inevitable. As the elder of her village I had heard a lot of stories from other visitors. And, I have to admit it, I have a desire for strange happenings too and so I used every opportunity to travel around the land, writing down everything I heard about weird or unexplainable incidents and spooky places.
Every time I came back to our village, my backpack was filled up with the things Mrokii lusted for so much. And each time she awaited me eagerly, usually sitting high up in a tree somewhere along the road. Come to think of it, I can nothing but wonder, how she always knew the time for me to return and which path I would choose. I only can imagine that she had a visionary talent, that might have been another "side-effect" of the incidents around her birth.

Forgive an old Fenki, dear stranger, for I have strained your patience far too much already. But I believe that all of it was necessary to explain why the things happened as they did so many years ago. Now, without any further hesitation, I will awake the ghosts from the past...

[Mrokii]

1. Chapter: Are you afraid of the invisible?

Mrokii was standing on top of a flat hill, turning her head to take a look at the landscape behind her. The people called it "wilderness", but to herself it looked just boring. Nothing but grassy plains were to be seen. And then she turned around again and smiled.

Her eyes slid over a wide area of ruins, stone walls, heavily damaged or completely destroyed by time and environmental influences, partly sunken into the ground or tilted over. Her mind was imagining all the fun she could have, climbing around an exploring the area that spread below her. But this wasn't what she was interested in, at least now. Her eyes moved on until they focused on a huge tree that stood some dozen meters away, almost in the middle of the tilled area. The branches of this old fellow spawned widely over the grass below it, blocking out the warm sunlight that Mrokii felt on her furry skin. When her eyes moved down, she saw a weathered wall made of stones. It surrounded the old trees stock in a big circle and there seemed to be no entrance into the inner area. Once again Mrokii turned her head and after a last look around she slowly moved down towards the tree, making her ways through the ruins. As soon as she reached the half-light under the branches, she heard the whispering voices and stopped surprisedly. Could it be that the elder had told her a true story at last?
While Mrokii held her breath and tried to listen to voices that seemed to be nothing more than wind that whispered through branches, the remembrance of yesterdays conversion emerged in her mind...

Mrokii and Arioli (her best friend, some would have said, her "only") were sitting near a fireplace and both held hands. To be exact, it was Arioli who had clasped her friends paw as if it would be a sheet anchor. And in way it was. The elder had just ended another story and it frightened Arioli so much that her otherwise clinging fur stood up and her face had turned to white. When Mrokii noticed her friends goose skin she snickered, but stopped after a look in her face. She felt slightly sorry for her friend and held out her hand which Arioli clasped immediately. And only very slowly she felt her fear falling apart and her heart beating slower.
"Is everything okay with you, Arioli?" the elder asked as he also had noticed her fear. He was sitting across the fireplace, showing signs of worry on his face.
Arioli blinked twice, looked over to her friend and back to the elder again. When Mrokii sat near and put an arm around her shoulder, she began to feel confident again and nodded smilingly.
"In that case, I guess you won't try to break my fingers anymore, are you?" Mrokii said grinning.
"What?... Oh! Sorry!" Arioli snickered as she eased her grip.

When the elder saw that Arioli was calming down again he stretched his limbs and yawned. "I think you both should go the bed anyway. It is late."
"No, please!" Mrokii began to moan. "Just one more, please!"
The elder shook his head and sighed. "You are never satisfied, are you?"
Mrokii grinned broadly and shook her head. "Nope, never!"
Once again the elder shook his head and then he looked at Mrokii for some seconds. "You should try not to be so gready, my child. Or eventually it might happen that you get more than you wanted to have."
"Pffff... Is this another one of your boring lessons?" Mrokii asked with a snotty tone in her voice.
"No" the elder said. "It is the beginning of another, the last story for today."

And so he began his tale about a lonesome tree surrounded by a wall of stones. And ruins. The same Mrokii was looking at now. And while she was still trying to understand the whispering voices that seemed to float around her, she remembered the elders warning with which his tale had started. Just for a second, Mrokii pondered about the possibility that he had wanted to warn her for real. But then she shook her head reluctantly. She would not leave without investigating this place further. And so she moved on.
Her eyes were focused on the stony wall while she slowly approached it and with every step the voices around her seemed to become louder. And when she stood right in front of the structure it seemed as the voices reached inside her head with invisible fingers.
Mrokii shook her head once more. "Go away!" she said with a demanding voice and, actually, the voices seemed to die away. But they were still there, like a supernatural blade made out of fog that tickled her head from the inside.
Anyway, Mrokii was satisfied with her temporary success and looked up the wall for a moment. Then she turned left and moved around the barricade to find an entrance. As it turned out, there was one, but it was bricked. Mroki rejoiced internally as she believed that every goal that can be reached too easy can't be worth to reach, anyway. And so, without further hesitation, she climbed up the wall, which was almost twice as high as herself. Her paws, trained in such kind of exercises, found the gaps between the old stones with ease and soon she kneeled on top of the stones, looking down into the gap between the barricade and the trees stock. Once again she was glad for her races ability of night-vision as the wall shielded away most of the sunlight from outside. Mrokiis view moved over the trees gnarly bark, following all the convexities and concavities down to its roots. She frowned irritated when she saw that the ground seemed to be clouded with a kind of mist. The longer she looked at it the more uneasy she felt. But it was so intriguing that it took her a lot of willpower to avert the eyes. For a moment Mrokii felt a slight disorientation and the voices seemed to be louder again. She once more shook her head loathly and stood up. Again she turned left and began to walk around the tree. About halfway she stopped in surprise. There was a kind of throne to be seen and it looked as if it had grown right out of the tree trunk. At one point slightly below the walls top, the bark split, formed a seat and went apart, moving along a hollow in the stock and joining again above it, forming a kind of wooden roof.

Mrokii looked down again on the strange mist and shuddered. She wanted to inspect that strange structure in front of her but she felt no urge to move closer to the wafting ground. And so she estimated the distance, constricted her muscles and jumped. She reached the throne without problems and grabbed the wooden structure. But as her feet slipped off her stomach hit hard on the wooden seat and that took her breath away for a moment. Mrokii gasped for air, tried to find a hold with her feet and when she did, pulled herself up.
She breathed heavily as she carefully turned around. Immediately she noticed that reaching the seat had been the easier part. As it was a bit below the walls top, jumping back would be far more difficult. But that was a problem she would reconsider later. For now she was happy enough with her achievement and so she sat down.
As soon as her butt touched the wood, the world around Mrokii blurred and the formerly whispering voices screamed deafening in her ears. Mrokii screamed out loud as well, shrieked back and hit her head hard against the wood. Stars exploded in front of her eyes and when they disappeared, she had a vision of countless people of all races, surrounding the tree and obviously listening intently to a sonorous and calm voice that seemed to come from the middle of the tree she was sitting in. In the background Mrokii noticed buildings, not broken and destroyed but looking neatly built up and she realized, that what she saw was the past of this area. And then the image flickered and suddenly she saw the ruins again. And she felt the presence of countless people once more, but this time not surrounding the tree but sitting right were she was now. They seemed to be there all at the same time, a feeling that was mind-boggling.
Mrokii grasped for breath as within just a few seconds she felt how the life of all of these people flowed out of their bodies while sitting here. And at the same time the voices inside her head raised higher and higher. Mrokii felt how she lost contact to the real world around her and for a moment she feared for her sanity. All the voices seemed to assail her, reaching for her mind with invisible fingers to rip out every sane thought.
Mrokii screamed again in fear and then she heard another voice inside her head. One she knew and one she trusted outright. Mrokii listened to that voice and with every word, she felt her fear falling apart and so she began to resist.
"Go!" she demanded loudly and for a moment it seemed as if the voices would lower a tiny bit. But then they swell again and Mrokii shook her head in anger, trying to get rid of the dizziness that wanted to overwhelm her.
"GO OUT OF MY HEAD!" she screeched as loud as she could and winced as she felt a painful sting in her throat. Suddenly there was nothing but quietness and Mrokii, half unconscious, sank back into the hollow she was still sitting in.

[Mrokii]

2nd Chapter: dealing with ghosts?

When Mrokii came around again, her blood was a thunderous river, pumping through her head. She groaned, not knowing where she was. When she remembered, her eyes opened widely and she started up. For a moment, nothing but the whispering wind was to be heard, but then the voices started again, fortunately not shouting earsplitting as before. But there seemed to be a great many of them and they were talking all at once. Mrokii pricked up her ears in curiosity and among a lot of incomprehensible jabber she discerned some understandable sentences.

"...What is it ... fenki ... wizard ... no ... small ... defenseless ... consumable?"
The following snicker made Mrokiis flesh creep.
"I am not consumable!" she said, trying to sound self-confident and hoping that nobody had noticed the shiver in her voice.
A moment of silence followed. And then the voices went on whispering.
"... she hears ... of course ... but how can she ... stupid fool! ..."
Mrokii couldn't hold off a snicker when an obviously affronted voice answered.
"I am not! ... you! ... a child she is ... stop laughing! ... can't be ... how dare you! ... let's examine her ..."
Suddenly Mrokii felt as if something was touching her with bodiless fingers, digging into her brain, trying to suck out her memory and making her dizzy. With a shudder she recessed and shouted once more.
"Do NOT touch me!"
Mrokii breathed a sigh of relief as she felt how the fingers backed off.
"... oh ... a child ... there is ... but strong is she ... more than one ... iiiiiiiiiiiinterestiiiiiiiing.... teeeeeeell usssssss aaaaaabouuuuuut iiiiiiiit, liiiiiiiittle fenkiiiiiiii ..."
"What do you mean?" Mrokii asked puzzled, terrified by the greedy tone of the voices.
Another moment of silence followed, and it was ended with a question.
"Mroki ... the other ... we can hear ... feel ..."
"Oh! She... died... for me, I would say. But she is not completely dead. I think at least..."
"ahhhhh ... what a gift! ... we understand ... nice half-dead fenki ... somehow like us ... "
"Where are you? Who are you?" Mrokii looked around as her curiosity prevailed over her fear.
More voices began to snicker.
"blind she is ... We ... doesn't see ... around you ... the obvious ... below you ..."
Mrokii looked down.
"I do not see anything but this strange mist."
The snickering grew.
"hot, little Fenki ..."
"You are the mist?" Mrokii frowned.
"no ... don't be ... and yes ... stupid  ..." she heard between a lot of snickering. "We are ... many ... what is left ... and less... and what has come... and more... to visit..."
Mrokii growled in frustration. "I think I don't understand." She heard a many-voiced sigh.
"We are ... bodies decay ... the essence ... but the spirit stays ... risen from ... down from ... what is left ... the Death Realm ..."
These last word electrified Mrokii as much as it gaven her the creeps.
"The Death Realm!?! Really?!? You mean! How can you!?! Tell me ab-"
She was interrupted by a choir of snickers. "Ssssloowww, little Ffenkiiii. Alll inn goood tiimmmmee..."
Mrokii sighed, then she frowned. "But- what are you? Are you ghosts?"
"... ghosts ... yes ... maybe ... and no... only part of ... spirits... maybe"
"Don't you even know what you are?" Mrokii asked with slight impatience.
Again the voices snickered. "We know ... but do you?"
Mrokii shook her head. "You are crazy! You sound just like one of the boring lessons our elder tries to teach us. If you have nothing interesting to tell I will leave!"
Mrokii tried to stand up, but sank back. Her legs muscles felt like jelly.
"Wait!" the voices shouted like a choir. "We have ... have you ... many interesting things ... to tell ..."
"Oh yes? Please tell me! I am so curious!"
Once again the voices snickered.
"We will tell ... impatient she is ... but there will be ... and not too intelligent ... a price ..."
"What price?" Mrokii looked disappointed. "I am a child. I have no money!"
The snickering grew again.
"... no money ... stupid little fenki ... your stories ... felt them ... in return ..."
Mrokii frowned once more when thinking about these mysterious words. Then it began to dawn on her. "Ah... when you stole into my mind, right" She snarled when she remembered the displeasing feeling.
"yes ... so, what ... sorry ...  you say? ... we more careful next time ... a simple trade ... won't hurt ..."
Mrokii tought about the irritiating answer. She wished these ghosts wouldn't have woven the different sentences like that. When it dawned upon her what they meant, she felt a goosebump again.
"Do you have to do that again?" she said, tipped on her forehead.
"... the only ... yes ...  satisfying way ... but we promise ... what you say? ... be careful..."
Mrokii sighed as she felt another shiver roll over her body. She WANTED to hear their stories. After all, they seemed to be real ghosts! And who could have told more creepy stories than such creatures?
When she listened to her inner voice Mrokii heard a warning. "Remember what you saw when you sat down!" She frowned, tried to recall what happened before but gave up almost immediately. She wanted to hear the ghosts stories and decided to ignore her inner voice this time.
"Okay" she said. "It's a deal. One story for another... and do not try to cheat me! I will know if you do!" Mrokii wasn't too sure if she really would notice a betrayal though. She just hoped that the other one within her head would help when necessary.
"Greeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaat! ..."
The greedy subtone made Mrokii shiver again.

[Mrokii]

3rd Chapter: Saturated

Hours later the sky had turned to black and Mrokii was still sitting in the tree. Only that she wasn't really sitting but merely burrowing into it. She cowered at the back of the wooden seat, covering her head between her arms, and her arms between her bended knees, breathing flat. To a random visitor she would have looked just like a bulky bundle of fur.
The voices had just ended another one of their horrible examinations and Mrokii could still feel the afterglow of the bodyless claws that had scrabbled deep into her brain to explore another one of her own stories.
As the voices started to swell again she whimpered quietly. "Please... no... more"
Mrokii heard something like a reluctant grumble that let her fur stand up, but she was even too tired to shiver.
"Already ... not ... heard ... as strong ... enough? ... as we thought ..." the voices whispered through each other again.
Mrokii felt something cold as ice stroking over her shoulder and shrieked out loud.
"Please... let me alone... I need ... rest".
"Yeah" her inner voice commented sarcastically. "A rest for the next 10 months probably!"
"you need ... but we ... not!"
When the bodyless voices tried to touch her again Mrokii felt how the anger rose in her.
"Stop that! If anything then it's my turn now!" she shouted as loud as she could (which was not very loud actually). But it was enough to make the creatures back off of her at once. When she felt the quietness in her head, she sighed in relief. She didn't want to hear any more stories today, maybe never again! Her only wish at this moment was to get away from this place as fast as possible. But she knew she would have to wait some time to regain strength. In her momentary condition she would have never been able to make the jump onto the wall. And the thought alone, of having to cross the gap by walking through the mist that wafted on the ground made her shake.

Meanwhile, the ghostly voices had begun to whisper anew, but now they sounded like coming from afar. Instead Mrokiis inner voice piped up.
"Get up and get out of here!"
Mrokii sighed and hid deeeper into the wooden seat. She almost fell asleep, but a moment later the same voice concussed her head.
"Move your butt out of here right now, by the Gods!"
Mrokii groaned. Then she slowly unwrapped her limbs, lifted her head and opened her eyes a tiny bit. Everything looked blurry. She blinked a few times and slowly her view became sharper. After a while she began to recognize every scratch and all small gaps on the wall in front of her.
All of a sudden, the bodyless voices rose again.
"Ready? ... can .. go on?"
"No." Mrokii whispered and discomforting shook her head. "I need... a rest"
"But ... we want ... we have ... so much ... a deal! ... more!"
Mrokii nodded weary. "I... know... and I will c... come back... tomorrow"
Again it seemed as if the cold claws came nearer but at least they did not try to touch her. "...Promise...?"
Mrokii nodded. "I k-keep ... my ... promises"
"Greeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaattttttt!"
There it was again, that greedy undertone, and it made Mrokii clumsily stumble on her feet with the only wish in her heart to get away from this place as fast as possible. She had to lean herself against the trees stock but at least she was standing now, though her knees shivered. As soon as she wasn't sitting in the wooden throne anymore, the voices seemed to moulder to incomprehensible background noise and Mrokii took a deep breath in the cooling night air. She was even able to show a light smile as her mind began to clear. After resting for another short while, Mrokii opened her eyes wider. The wall was clearly visible in front of her and after she had bended and stretched her legs a few times, she pushed herself off from the tree.
The moment Mrokii jumped, the fear overwhelmed her. She knew she wouldn't make it to the other side, would fall down into the gruesome mist instead and would just disappear within. Her heart pounded like a drum as she stretched her arms and legs as far as she could and a moment later, her knees hit hard hard against the wall, ripping off some of the skin. Mrokii yelped in pain, but nevertheless battered her claws on the walls top. For a moment they seemed to slide off but then they got stuck. Mrokii hung there for a moment or two, panting and shivering, constricting her muscles and pulling herself up. When she finally came up she laid flat down, breathed heavily and looked back to the throne. Again she heard her inner voice, warning her as it seemed.
"Many have vanished on that throne" it whispered.
Mrokii suddenly remembered what she had seen when she sat down there. So many people had taken that place. Some just died while doing so, others... they... truely... vanished. But not completely, as she assumed, shivering again.
"Yes" she thought. "That is exactly what happened to them. They just disappeared without leaving any trace."
"Well... no trace you would see even in the brightest light of the crystal" her inner voice commented and Mrokii felt the goosebumps returnn.
"And that might happen to you too" her inner voice interposed but Mrokii shook her head reluctantly. "It won't! I am strong! Even the creatures said it!"
"Yes, you are... but for how long?"
Mrokii thought about that question. In fact, just a few minutes ago, she felt more dead than alive. But now, her energy returned at fast pace. "Actually" she thought for a moment "I might be able to jump back again right now". She shivered while feeling her growing greed. But this time, her inner voice won the victory, and so, after a last yearning look at the tree, Mrokii turned away and climbed down the wall on the outside.

After a last look at the stoney structure, she began to walk towards her home. The further she got away from the tree, the more her mood raised. Short before she reached the tent she was living in with her mother she even began to sing quietly. But it wasn't a funny childs song. And when Mrokii realized it, she stopped at once, feeling terribly afraid. It was a song she had heard in her head when the bodyless creatures had shown her another story. Mrokii hushed, slipped into the tent and onto her bed. She groaned quietly as she laid down, feeling pain through her whole body as if she had overstrained every single muscle. She barely thought that she would never fall asleep feeling such pain, but a moment later her eyes had closed and Mrokii had fallen into a dreamless pit.

[Mrokii]

[btw. if anybdoy has anything to say or to complain, feel free to do so]