[color=goldenrod][i][h2][center]Gerard Segremors[/center][/h2][/i][/color]

[@Eisenhorn][@VitaVitaAR]

As their guide chauffeured the quartet through the impossibly green depths of the old wood and he felt the change in the air, Gerard fell largely silent, measuring his breath save for the odd grunt of discovery, maybe wonder. The deeper they delved, the thicker the forest grew with a sense of primordial life— like his Sunlit Lady’s warm rays on the morning, building into a strong summer’s day. His eyes, gliding over the canopy, began to notice more and more of an ordained pattern emerging in the fold of the leaves, the split of each branch, and the slow rise of the trunks.

He reached down to his belt, with that hand still free of his helm, and quietly released the latch on the sheath affixing it to his hip, electing to carry it as the trees melted from a forest to an oaken hall, pillars on either side stretching into a full archway high overhead.

And like shadows against the pillars of marble wood, they were too flanked by countless lines of black-armored warriors, a royal guard each as prodigiously sized as the fae ahead of him, wielding spears of pitch. He imagined being stabbed by them to in many ways be so very like those his old furor always tore into his heart with. Lucky they had come here on peaceful, amiable terms. Even without making considerations for keeping those behind him less suited for the task alive, the gritty and determined knight, stubborn in the face of death by anyone’s measure, still scarcely liked his prospective chances against even a third of the number that encompassed them as they walked—

He took in a deep breath, and expelled even the idlest of such musings. At the head of the hall he could see the great throne, grown from the earth like any one of these grand trees, and the hunter’s Lady upon it. She was pale, striking, statuesque to the point of perhaps being carved from marble more than flesh. Her face was fine and her figure full, the way such statues were. Her curtains of black hair seemed to ripple as she shifted, her dark stag’s horns like lacquered wood. Her eyes were deep sapphires, deeper even than the blues of the robes she wore, flanked by forest green trim. They met his for a moment as they approached, and he found himself glad he had cleared his mind such. Windows to the soul being what they were, in that instant he believed she had found much of the measure in his gold before he could scratch the surface of the blue.

An enchanting beauty as any he’d seen in his meager twenty one years. A silhouette that burned herself into his mind as an eternal memory— and yet, his heart could not bring itself to leap. She was no doubt fae… and no doubt, the master of this territory. She was too almost the size of her kin, and the throne itself already towered over them.

Yet, as she spoke her first words of address, naming their guide as “Faolan” in that clear and strong voice, the knight couldn’t help but feel an echo of Thrinax in the way her presence seemed to swallow the room, even beyond their differences in scale. He was a man before a storm.

And he, taking the front, had signed up to make their entreaties to the hurricane of the old wood. No pressure, big guy….

Slow and deliberate, he set his sword down to one side and his helmet to the other, before he, last of their number in it, dropped to a knee, steeled his nerve once more for surety’s sake, and spoke.

[color=goldenrod]“I trust that will be for you to know and us to find out. For now, we are contented with the honor of meeting you, fair Lady— and we wish not to waste your time.”[/color] he began, speaking clear enough for the hall at large to hear his low and even tone. His hands, freed of the steel they had carried, rested clasped upon his knee. The finer flowering on his words was thanks to his time in the dream, but he could not yet readily embody Cyrus’s lessons on loosening up and being [i]friendlier[/i] here. Not before he had properly shown respect, for what that may have mattered to these famously capricious folk. [color=goldenrod]”We sought audience so we may be enlightened as to the nature of the madness that has struck the sitting lord of Brennan Keep, Duke Thedric, at the foot of these woods. Our order was called here to aid in that pursuit— and when we arrived, his ramblings were incoherent save for the repeated mention of a figure called the ‘Moonlit Queen’. In investigating the trail out of the keep, we heard and answered Aithne’s call for aid. That lead us to the Gannek, which lead Faolan to us, and now he has kindly lead us to you.”[/color]

He inclined his head, humbly as he could. Reon, Mayon, Dame Serenity, anyone who had taught him how to choose his words with care in his life… he begged they guide his tongue.

[color=goldenrod]”Be there any guidance, or insight, you might be able to grant us regarding this matter, my fellows and I would be most grateful. This affliction appears something beyond the ken of us Children of Men.”[/color]

He tried to fight the urge to look her in the eyes once more.

He really did, yet… 

Up two golden disks came, hiding no intent.