As Chronicled by
Genevieve
Destante…
I wait for the house to appear.
Taking another drag from my pipe, I exhale, watch the smoke curl and twist about, like a serpent trying to eat its own tail. Very symbolic - theWyrm Oroboros repeating through infinity. Will all this end as it began?
Fuck if I know.
I had a dream – a rather stable dream – which is saying something for me. Usually my dreams are nightmares of liquid mercury, ever changing, nonsense in motion. But not this one – that’s how I knew it was from him…
The Black God, Old Father Chaos.
The Messenger.
I dreamed of a house of green stone, resting in an overgrown garden. Beyond the foliage was a wasteland. Kind of homey that, but I digress. To this house came strangers, of the number of six. Six is a significant number – stable, Law doubled, the shield of Order. A good omen for them to open the way, it shows protection and warding. Fortuitous, if you know how to take advantage of things.
Ezekiel Hobbs was the first – his
grandfather
started it, after all, so it was fitting. His
mother
had left that house, unmarried and yet with child, thanks to the old
sorcerer’s
meddling in powers he did not quite understand or control.
She raised her half-human baby with a husband who could
instill values in the child. Thus
Two stumbled in wet and confused – a Pirate… oh, Privateer, excuse me… named Henri duMir, and a… ah… Cook named Tallywog. Complete and utter fakes the pair of ‘em. But dangerous, and I can respect that. My kind of people.
Another two – Jillian Greenbottle & Mayalee – got into this mess almost on purpose. They adventure for fun and profit, and have been looking for gates to worlds other than their own. Well, guess who got their wish?
Lastly, there’s Hank. Old Wizard Hobbs had dragged him from Limbo like he’d dragged so many others from where they’d belonged. Poor Hank just got stuck when the old coot got himself killed.
Well – those are the heroes. More will get sucked in (as they inevitably do), but the core of the House’s defenders have been picked. But I’m getting ahead of myself again. Here they were, mixed up and unsure whether the others were friend or foe, when they found clues that things were changing. The house moved forward through time, they age and died – their spirits trapped – their world grew old and died. Then…
Then they found the house restored - themselves as well - and that the house now sat in a wide open plain. In the vast distance they could see the plain was really a valley, surrounded on all sides by horribly high mountains. On those mountains sat titanic representations of the Old Ones, all the dark and awful powers that haunted the cracks in their worlds.
Then the Messenger came. Taller than the treetops, a black fluttering robe of mystery he was – the black god, Old Father Chaos. He spoke to them, as he spoke to me, and spoke of the of the challenge – hold the house for 24 hours (though as the gods hold time, how long is that?), and they can return home – fail and the powers that wait, watching amongst the mountains, will return in their stead.