[IC] Knights of Galvarok: The Forbidden Gate

[Lionheart]

The morning air was cold in Galvon, capital of Galvarok and home to it's prestigious order of knights. It's sprawling streets and wide plazas already starting to bustle with life as many go about their daily routines. Shops opening, smoke from the chimney of a forge, all common occurrences at the start of each day. Similarly was the Citadel of Bellator bustling as it's occupants slowly awoke to greet the day. The sun was just above the high walls of the castle, it's light reaching into the lower rooms and corridors. Young knights rising to begin their daily exercises, cooks preparing breakfast, stewards dutifully ensuring all was as it should be.

However, this morning in Bellator was different in one key respect. A the lone man stood atop the tallest rampart, perched on his arm was a majestic, silver falcon. Her feathers sleek and her beak sharp. The man smiled, stroking the bird carefully before it flew off his arm and towards the recruit barracks. Today would surely be interesting, the man thought to himself, truly interesting indeed.

---

And so the morning of the nine promising recruits was rudely interrupted. Whether they were asleep or not was of no concern to the falcon who flew in through the window, wreaking havoc on anything it could get a talon to. Tapestries pulled down, curtains, hats, feathers from pillows flying everywhere! Chaos, all from one bird, and what could it's purpose possibly be? "Grrrr, damn bird. Ain't no one messin' with my sleep!" A young knight with autumn red hair proclaimed, deftly tossing a pillow at the raptor who was perched on the windowsill. "Ah blast! C'mon!" The bird managed to avoid the improvised projectile, taunting caws full of pride permeated the air as the falcon flew about the higher portion of the room. The young man looked to his friends and fellow recruits,his eyes burning with determination, pride. "Guys! What are you just standing around for? Help me get that damn bird!"

[chukklehed]

A young brown haired boy lifted himself into a sitting position without a sound, his eyes unwaveringly focused on the falcon. He grabbed his own pillow, but instead of throwing it he stripped off the pillow case and wrapped it around his arm. Raising his arm, he gave a piercing whistle, inviting the bird to land. It hovered for a minute before deciding to accept his offer, swooping down and burying it's long talons in the soft material, luckily stopping just short of piercing it. The boy's softened as he gazed at the bird, stroking it's feathers lightly.

"What a magnificent creature," He said, standing up and moving over to the window. He lowered his arm so it could fly back out if it wanted, or if not he just closed it. Either way he turned back to the room and looked around, seeing people rolling out of bed. "I suppose that was our wake up call today. It was effective enough." He moved back to his own bunk and gathered his clothes for the day, along with the sword leaning against his bedframe. "I advise that the rest of you get a quick start on the morning. Today is an important day, after all." With that he quickly exited the room to find the privacy to change.

[Gisk]

In the chaos a loud crack sounded, echoing off of the enclosed walls, and accompanied by a bright flash. Alphonse stood with his spear in his hands, a burn on the ground where it had been laying. Summoning it to his hand had been his first reflex upon the break of the mayhem, but he had been tangled in his sheets in his rush to stand.

The sound startled the bird just as it was settling on the other boy's arm, and it flew up and started wreaking havoc yet again. This time, however, things were escalated as the young knights all followed suit and started grabbing their weapons, all swinging them about. Some were trying to chase it toward the window, others were content with the idea of killing it. Al was swinging his spear as if it were a plain stick, not wanting to kill the poor thing, just to usher it away from him. The chaos increased, and it was only a matter of time before ill-advised Magistra started flying through the air.

[Kumori Master]

Rhea was awoken by the sound of a bird cawing and the subsequent shouts of their fellow recruit Roland. The red haired knight shouted and was throwing things at the bird. "Get it?" She murmured hazily as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes. As soon as she pieced together what was happening Minato had the devilish bird on his arm. "Good morning guys." She sat up, her snow white hair hanging down in front of her face. She brushed her hair back and sighed. Letting out a yawn as she stretched her arms and legs.

However, the bird just as soon flew back into the air and continued wreaking Havoc. Rhea simply sat and watched her fellow knight recruits attempt to chase it off. Throwing a pillow or two at it periodically.

[PrincessWeirdo]

Nox awoke with a start, jolting up from her position in bed as all hell broke loose. She'd been dreaming of vague, foggy visions, ones she could never quite remember but were always painted in a bath of unpleasant, anxious feelings. Wiping the warm, sticky night sweat from her brow, she tried to make sense of what was happening.

A falcon was desecrating their bedchambers in the wee hours of the morning and her fellow knights were scrambling around like chickens with their heads cut off in order to catch it. Gods. One boy managed to have the falcon steady itself onto his arm for a moment, only to have another boy startle it into taking flight again and causing more mayhem. Pulling the rough, scratchy covers of her bed sheets up over her head again, she tried to form a barrier against the frantic flying projectiles and her heavy lidded morning face.
There were few occasions that could cause Nox to have an incredibly unpleasant day like being startled awake could. Groaning and sitting up again, she grabbed her cloak from her bedpost and pulled it on over her arms, dodging an errant pillow as it flew past her head and landed onto her bed with a thud. She brought the hood up onto her head and surveyed the situation. Today would be interesting, wouldn't it. Gods help them all.

[ruronihs]

Koren was always among the first knights to arise, finding necessary to make his days as productive as possible, so by the time the bird began unleashing bedlam in the citadel, the young knight was already midway through his morning routine. Even so, he was startled by the sudden appearance of the rabid bird, but found the reaction of his fellow knights even more so. They were just as chaotic as the bird, hurling objects and spells around with reckless abandon, likely causing even more damage than the bird would have been able to do on its own. Koren remained calm, however, for he could see that this problem had a very simple solution, one that required nothing to be thrown at the bird.

Koren stood stoically as the other knights scrambled about like madmen, his ramient in one hand, and an empty pillow case in the other. Once the bird decided it was time to wreak havoc around Koren's neatly organized area, the knight struck the ground with his halberd, and not long after the bird tumbled to the ground. Birds were only capable of flight because they were so light and efficiently designed; simply doubling gravity was enough to clip their wings. The hawk flapped its wings in vain to raise itself off the ground, but before the beast realized its futility, the pillow case fell over its head. Victory assured, Koren calmly tucked the raptor's fluttering wings in so he could continue putting it in his makeshift sack without hurting the creature, and then finally engulfed the bird entirely. The bird would be uncomfortable, but so long as Koren handled the pillow case gently, it would be unharmed.

The young knight looked at the destruction the bird had wrought and shook his head. This could hardly be considered a victory. Perhaps if they had some semblance of organization they could have saved themselves a grueling morning cleanup. Writhing pillow case in hand, Koren said to his companions, "Shall I let it go, or shall we prepare a cage and wait for its master to come for it? These birds do not behave thus..." he motioned to the clearly deliberate vandalism about the room ..."unless they have been trained to do so."

[Zero Hex]

Sometimes days were just messy. A recruit would mess up or some unexpected accident would happen, well, this time the mess had started early and came in the form of an angry bird wreaking havoc in the room at the early hours of the morning. It was something new, at least. Barely opening his eyes and shifting his body around to stare at the bird shredding curtains that were neither his nor close to his own bed, Cyrus decided that, yes, he could do like he usually did and proceed to categorically ignore the mild nuisance. It wasn't that he wanted to keep sleeping, it was more a matter of principle, he'd get up of his own damn will and not because a bird happened to be making a mess. It was a bit harder to ignore what followed. Apparently the majority of the people he roomed with really hated birds, rude awakenings or both.

He decided he couldn't possibly ignore the mess anymore after an overeager colleague of his accidentally struck at his leg with his weapon, a polearm of some sort. The weapon bounced harmlessly off the decorated armor that had become Cyrus' hide, his raiment Soulforged, but chances were anyone else in the room would've had a decent wound to show for it. The kid that'd done it had barely even noticed that he'd hit something. Carefully pulling the now slashed covers off his body, he stroked his ever-forming beard for a while as he sat on the edge of the bed, shifting positions to avoid pillows and ill-advised attacks that might graze him. Finally, it looked like one of his room-mates, one Koren he believed, had the skills to catch a simple bird without resorting to swinging a weapon around like a drunkard. He was now asking what should be done with it.

"Don't know, don't care, not my problem. It was fun watching people make fools of themselves over a bird, might as well keep it in the sack until the owner shows up to laugh about the mess".

[PrimezTime]

Elia hated birds and now she was starting to hate her comrades.

The rather rude awakening of beating wings and excited, but also panicked squawks was enough to already pester the Midlander awake. However, the addition of voices screaming, people arguing, and objects being thrown was enough to really make Elia's blood boil. It was too early for all this noise and commotion and it had already been a restless night due to the excitement and nerves of what today might entail.

Furiously, Elia tossed her covers aside and leaped out of bed with intention of getting out of here. She still had the basic white night garments that hung loosely on her body as she began dragging her large chest, that sat at the foot of her bed, towards the exit to this room. On her way out, she turned and grabbed her spear off the room's weapon rack before kicking the door open and sliding out into the hallway, leaving that whole debacle behind.

Elia received a few curious looks by some early risers as she held her spear in one hand and dragged her chest in the other. She wandered for a bit down the various hallways, not looking for any place in particular but rather some place where she could get ready in peace. She found the castle larder to be rather quiet at this time, seeing as the first meal wouldn't be served for another hour or so and the occasional presence of the kitchen staff didn't bug her as she was not a shy girl. So despite the stunned looks of the male kitchen staff, she removed her night garments and exchanged them for preferred attire.

[Lionheart]

The Falcon only made the brown haired young man THINK she was friendly, for when she landed on his arm she purposefully dug her talons a bit deeper piercing straight through the pillowcase and puncturing the young man's arm. Not really deep enough to do any lasting damage, but enough to draw blood and hurt like hell. As soon as the pandemonium broke loose she jumped off the boy's arm and deftly dodged any pillow, Raiment, or Magistra aimed her war way with immense ease. No it wasn't until one recruit managed to ground her that she was caught and thrown into a sack. "Alright you got him! That damn bird, who do you guys think sent it?" Roland asked the group as a whole, clearly impressed by the skill of his fellow recruits.

However while they were talking the falcon was in a very bad mood within the sack, surely they should know that grounding her and throwing her in a sack would piss her off. But of course they didn't know just who they were dealing with..... Koren felt the bag go completely still for a few minutes before it exploded in a flurry of air and feathers, sending the falcon soaring towards the windowsill where she perched herself, purposefully staring at the occupants of the room. "Hey! Look at it's leg!" Roland pointed at the now perched falcon. And sure enough now that she's actually sitting still a note wrapped around her right leg could be seen. "How do you think we get that? I don't want to hurt it."

[Raikage]

Armendur Theme Song

Armendir stood silently with his arms crossed upon his chest as he watched the sun slowly rise into the sky, no one really knew but the young wood elf enjoyed watching the sun rise in the morning. It was one thing since he was a small child that he often had done when everyone else was asleep, being and Elf it was not general knowledge, but Elven people slept very little a lot of the time, only needing a couple hours of sleep to be fully rested compared to a normal humans eight hours. Sometimes Armendir imagined himself somewhere far away, in a deep wooded area, standing in some green meadow watching the sun rise in the sky. Armendir had never known his true home, he had been taken as an infant into the Knighthood what seemed like so many years ago now, a lot of the time he could see images in his head of his home, but often he did not know if it was glimpse as a child of his home or merely made up images of what he thought it might be. While he did not regret being here now, deep down inside Armendir did feel a small regret never knowing his own people. But he would Honor them always even if he never knew them, and the place in which he was born, for forgetting where you come from and forsaking yourself is a road which can only lead to destruction.

In a way the sun rising in the sky was a reminder to Armendir, that the real reason he was here right now where he stood, was to be one of the protectors of not only his homeland but the beauty that still existed in this world. That is why he held no regrets for being here now, because if evil were to come back to this world with its darkness, then he would stand in its way and every breath he would take would be to ex spell it back to the shadows. Armendir thought back to when he was young, and recalled the last words his father had told him one of the rare times he was able to speak to his father, whom had been a Knight himself, before his sudden passing.

"Son I don't expect you understand everything in the world, for you are still young, this world is full of hatred and evil, people who would hurt others and take lives merely because they can. As you grow into a Knight, you like I did at your age will come to know the pain that is when you first see it. No matter how much we can control our emotions, some day they will come out, and when that day comes I can only hope your ready to face that pain. An if there is anything that I want you to remember my son, it is that you must never forsake yourself or the Honor which has been imbued in you from birth. For if you forsake yourself it is a dark and lonely road ahead, and can only lead to destruction. Your life is meant to be a guiding light, like all life that is brought into this world, and one day you will come to that crossroad and you will decide if you would forsake yourself and your comrades, or be that light in the dark."

Armendir did not understand what his father meant back then, and maybe he still did not now, but he did understand what his father meant by not forsaking yourself, and Armendir truly hoped that if a time ever did come when he might forsake himself, that his fathers words would never be forgotten in the darkness of the world, drowned out by such pain. Looking down below at the town below, the many various people were already appearing out in the square, setting up shops, getting ready to serve breakfast, very soon Armendir's comrades would be getting up soon. Jumping down off the stone edge over looking the town Armendir made his way down back into the castle and then down to the room where his bed lay. Opening the door Armendir was instantly smacked in the face with a pillow, the scene that unfolded after this was quite the spectacle to see to be sure. The many men and woman were in and uproar trying to get rid of a Silver falcon that was going rampant around the room, Armendir merely shook his head as he made his way into the room and maneuvered his way around the men trying to get the Falcon. Reaching his bed one of the men finally did manage to subdue it, but it lasted not even a couple seconds before the bird busted from the bad in a fury of feathers.

"How do you think we get that? I don't want to hurt it."

Armendir averted his Elven eye's to the Falcon still perched on the windowsill glaring menacingly at the other recruits after their round with the bird and noticed that alas there was a note attached to the birds leg, obviously it would be meant for them to obtain, which would be no mere cake walk now given the uproar that had just happened. Stepping forward Armendir positioned himself near the windowsill and spoke in a deep but clear voice.

"Let me try, I think that bird probably hates you all right now after what you just did."

Armendir slowly raised two fingers to his lips and then started to blow, a whistle came from his fingers and mouth as he whistled toawrds the bird, it was an old Elven technique that was meant to calm down aggravated animals, hopefully the Falcon would find calmness and come down. Putting his arm out slowly with the black leather bracer facing the bird Armendir blew more notes to try and coax it to his arm.

[ERode]

Dry Lionblood Aelious, half-dwarf and self-proclaimed Strong Man of the Westland, was currently trying, and failing, to stifle his laughter. He would blame it on the aftereffects of that strong, well-aged wine he drank last night, but really, it would take much more than just a bottle to make him feel tipsy. What had just occurred simply reminded him too much of that harlequin show he had attended the week past, when a troupe had passed by the castle. Of course, in the show, they used a pig instead, and had a whole array of fanciful devices used to capture animals, but the effect remained the same. Watching his fellow recruits swing around their Raiments, toss their pillows, and making a huge mess of things in the presence of a chaotic falcon was really rather funny.

Especially so when the falcon first exploded into activity after that ponytail boy tried calming it down. That, Dry had thought, was utterly hilarious.

His mother had always taught him to smile in whatever situation, and even though his bedsheets were thoroughly ruined and feathers were drifted every which way, Dry's whole morning attitude was turned positive by the fact that he chose to think of what had happened as a comedy. Watching as a fellow Westlander, the elf Armendir, try his hand at calming the bird, the half-dwarf called in an act of moral support, “Good skill, my fellow countryman!”

After all, luck had nothing to do with it, regardless of how awkward 'Good skill' sounded. Dry wasn't known for being eloquent, after all.

[Lionheart]

The Falcon's head whipped to the elf who steeped forward, it's intense gaze staring holes in the elven knight. The musical noes were soothing, moreso then the human's notes before. Besides this elf had a more calm, diplomatic demeanor, and his notes conveyed the same. The Falcon took off and landed on the offered arm, wary for any sudden movements from the rest gathered.

Roland merely stared in disbelief. "Now that's a fancy trick! Good going Armendir! I wish I could do stuff like that..." The young man rubbed the back of his head before his eyes widened a bit. "Oh right the note! Quick grab it so we can find out what it says!"

[Raikage]

Armendir felt the bird grace his leather bracer as it slowly kept its eye's trained on the many recruits around the room. One of the recruits, a younger man named Roland complimented him on his coaxing the bird down. Armendir slowly brought his two fingers down and brought them gently across the birds lesser coverts and down to its secondaries, he continued doing this same motion for a couple seconds he hoped the bird was finding more calmness, he did not want it to freak out before he grabbed the note and its tenseness was almost clear see through from the way its talons gripped Armendir's bracer. Most did not understand how tense Falcons could be, even one trained like this one, in tight spaces or enclosed spaces its hostility would be high no matter if they had tried to subdue her or not. Armendir whispered something in Elvish to the bird lowly for her to hear.

"Av-'osto Le nar moina Queóni"

Armendir reached down and took the piece of parchment that was attached to the birds leg and opened it reading it first to himself then to the others after that.

"It says Dearest recruits, I hope you enjoyed my wake-up call. If you're reading this then you managed to at least subdue Anne long enough to obtain it, well done. Now of course your presence is required in the courtyard by noon."

Armendir slowly turned and handed the note off to Roland and looked at him for a second and spoke softly this time.

"Its is no big trick my friend, animals are very much like us, sometimes they just need a little more to assure their safety then we do. Falcons are very majestic creatures and desire respect, like we all do. It is very much like Minato's gift with animals, no better or worse just different, one day perhaps I can teach you a melody such as this if you desire."

Armendir raised his arm for the Falcon to depart if it wished, then he himself would leave the room and head for the kitchen to find something for himself to eat.

[Lionheart]

The Falcon, which apparently was named Anne, flew off and landed on the windowsill once again. Apparently not content until the recruits do as they were bid. Roland stared at the note, his right eyebrow twitching as he let the parchment fall from his grasp. From there the young man took a deep, calming breath......"ALRIGHT!" The boy exclaimed loudly. "What are we waiting for? Let's get dressed and go to the courtyard!" That being said the boy dashed to the trunk at the foot of his bed, gathered some clothes and dashed out of the room.

[chukklehed]

Minato wandered back into the room fully dressed, just in time to avoid being bowled over by Roland. Smiling bemusedly, he stepped aside for his fellow knight to pass and moved into the room, lifting his true weapon from it's spot on the rack. "What did I miss?" He asked, tying his Regalia next to his normal sword at his side. It came to rest at a different angle from the other, which seemed to be the only way he told them apart.

"I see you've managed to stop her rampage," He said with a small smile, nodding at the bird. "What tidings did she bring?" He walked across his room back to his bunk, sitting down and awaiting an answer.

[Kumori Master]

Rhea rubbed the sleep from her eyes as she began getting out of her bed. However, moments later she couldn't resist busting into laughter along with the half-dwarf Aelious. She laughed along with him and mimicked his cheering on of their elven comrade. "Yeah!" She raised her arm enthusiastically. Afterwards, the elf read aloud the contents of the note. Things quieted down after that. "In the courtyard by noon? That should be easy enough to manage." She remarked to herself as she finally pulled herself out of bed.

Rhea began putting on her normal pieces of armor and the rest of her clothes. She made it a habit of sleeping in her regular clothes, as to avoid having to deal with changing them if she needed to get going quickly. Which, her tendency to oversleep being the reason she had come up with the idea in the first place. After quickly putting all of her armor, which wasn't much, and other accessories in place, she pulled her Raiment out from under her bed. She simply fastened the sheath to her side, as she always did.

Rhea nodded to her fellow recruit Minato as he entered the room. "Yup, Armen over here stopped it.", she gestured over to Armendir as she explained. "It had a note strapped to it's leg. It said that our presence was requested in the courtyard by noon."