Rime
The date eludes me. Time has not been kind to my senses.
Yet I know this: today, I was born again. Not from the womb, but from the dark silk that swallowed me. My limbs still echo with stillness, but my mind is once again aflame.
Day 1 of Freedom
I awoke not in my body, but above it.
The world was a blur of shadowed light and muffled screams, the Silver Canopy pulsing overhead like the lungs of a great slumbering beast. Somewhere beneath the web-choked veil, my body remained cocooned - suspended, suffocated, sealed. But I found my voice again, and with it, my shape.
Ryn surfaced first. Of course he did. Ever the wide-eyed sentinel, drawn by the cries of the wounded. He reached outward, tethering our spirit to the flickering thread of combat below. A group of adventurers fought desperately against creatures I now call Emberachnids. Ryn wasted no time - he joined them, not with fear, but with hope. Hope that they would help us find our way back to flesh.
I do not remember how long we were imprisoned. Perhaps it was days. Perhaps years. I only know that we were not alone in that slumber. The canopy has voices - not kind ones - and I fear they have been whispering without cease.
When the battle ended, the others spoke to us. They asked questions - who we were, what we were - and we answered as best we could. It was then that Ronin emerged, knowing that this continent was once his home. There was recognition in their eyes, not of him, but of his people. That was enough.
The Serene tried to send us an image. A kindness, perhaps. But it was like firing a cannonball into a whirlpool of ships - the message struck only glancingly. I wonder if one day they will reach the ego they wish to speak to, without colliding with the others.
We rested briefly, and in that quiet, they told us their mission: to uncover the source of the Silver Canopy and put an end to it. Ryn spoke of Wildfire, of how it had imprisoned us, and they listened. When Kara offered Ronin a coin - a Reath symbol of debt and trust - he took it without hesitation. It meant something. It still does.
We followed a spider dragging a corpse, hoping it would lead us to the center of the web. To Wildfire. To an ending - or perhaps a beginning.
On the path, we found Gryphons - a mother and child, beset by Emberachnids. We intervened…