#poor communication

Wyll Ravenguard was sitting in one of the red-leather booths of Waukeen’s, a hot mocha next to his hand and his laptop open in front of him. The late-autumn wind whistled against the door as people came in and out. He leaned forward and squinted at the screen—maybe he needed glasses after all. Or maybe, the screen was destroying his eyesight after looking at it for far too long.

Isobel Thorm. Philanthropist. Executive Director of the Reithwin Restoration Project.

He’d already known that about Isobel Thorm. She was a devout Selûnite who, alongside her wife, (an Aasimar by the name of Dame Aylin), dedicated herself to helping the people of Reithwin both during and after the events of the Shadow-Curse—an event, as he and thousands upon thousands of others were aware, had been brought about by Sharrans in an attack that was eventually deemed to be an act of terrorism upon the city of Reithwin. Some Sharrans had been persecuted, others were still free, and many were now dead by the hands of time—but none of that had mattered when no one had been able to lift the curse Shar had left behind. Years upon years had been spent trying to cleanse the land, to no avail. The region had become a political dead zone, left to rot by ‘civilized’ society and leaving the few survivors to their own devices. It was she and Dame Aylin who had been able to release the curse with Selûne’s power, and for that she was destined to be a famous historical figure, written in textbooks to be taught to children forever.

Rightfully, he thought. To be one of the only people not to abandon the needy of Reithwin, after having been dead for nearly one hundred years… she truly was a saint walking on Toril’s unworthy earth.

In any case, Isobel Thorm’s initial rise to sainthood wasn’t what he was looking for. He needed more discourse on the politics of Reithwin for his project—because one could not create a restoration plan without knowing what needed to be restored first. That was to be his final paper for this class, titled Diplomacy in Wartimes: to develop a restoration project that they might, in theory, put into practice next semester, if the plan was deemed good enough. He, being who he was as a person, was of course aiming for his to be as perfect as possible—not just for the grade, but so that he could put his plans into action and do some good. Though he supposed he could always volunteer time over the summer if this didn’t work out.

Wyll jotted down a couple of things in his notebook, including volunteer over the summer? at the very top of his notes. He would need to find something to do with his time, and hopefully, a job to pay his bills. As strange as it was, he’d bonded with Dr. Woodberry over his general kindness and willingness to help a disgruntled poly-sci student, and he was inclined to see if he needed an extra set of hands. Hells, he could have sorted papers for all he cared, if he could make a couple of gold off of it. He leaned out of his booth for a moment and looked for the mycology professor, curious if he was still sitting nearby, but to no avail. He had seemed to be a bit… off today. Sort of tired-looking, or a little sad. He hadn’t been able to place it at the time. But then again, he’d only spoken to the man a few times, and it had always been for help with his lab. He didn’t know him in the way someone like Dr. Dekarios would have. Maybe that was just his face, and he was making assumptions.

It was strange. But it wasn’t strange enough to distract him from his work any longer.

He turned back to the Weavenet Wikipedia page and scrolled past all of Thorm’s personal information. That was interesting to look at, but of little use to his project. Below her section was the outline of the Reithwin Restoration Project, excruciatingly detailing everything that had been done so far, both pre- and post-Shadow-Curse. Excruciating was precisely what he’d been looking for. Wyll took a sip of his coffee, now the perfect temperature, and began rummaging through it, noting things down as he went.

Housing Crisis: New low-income housing being built with funding from wealthy in Baldur’s Gate and donations from civilians. Attempting to create public housing, waiting on confirmation from Baldur’s Gate. Housing focuses on safety, decency/longevity, and affordability/charity.

Affordable housing made sense, of course. It was impossible to recover from a traumatic event without somewhere to lay your head. The donations from Baldur’s Gate itself pleasantly surprised him. Father would have approved.

He frowned, shaking his head, and kept looking.

Rebuilding Damaged Buildings and Clearing Rubble: Restoring buildings related to production and mandatory resources, i.e. food production, healthcare, soup kitchens, grocery stores, etc.

That would bring jobs back onto the market too, he thought. The only issue would be convincing workers who had never lived within Reithwin to go to Reithwin, a place that many (horribly ignorant) people still considered to be ‘cursed.’ The way those people talked about it was the same way they talked about Elturel—they were the same breed who’d essentially exiled hundreds of innocent tieflings for “looking of the hells.”

Beneath all of the action plans was an interview taken from Isobel Thorm’s shortly after her resurrection. He’d never seen this interview before; not in full anyhow. Mentions of it had come up in academic journals, but it struck him that he’d never read the whole thing. Curious, he began to skim through it.

Thorm: “I’m glad to be back on this plane. It is… jarring, I must admit.”

Interviewer: “If you don’t mind me asking, do you remember how you died?”

Thorm: “No, I don’t mind. I struggle to remember who killed me—and if I did, I wouldn’t want to speak his name, even if I knew it. Things were complicated then. My father had me on the wrong side of the war. He was a tragic man. [She pauses, collecting herself.] I am safe in Selûne’s light now, and I am ready to do her bidding.”

Interviewer: “You don’t hold any malice for the one that killed you? That’s very forgiving of you.”

Thorm: “Don’t misunderstand me. This person still ended my life. He took me away from my beloved Aylin. He forced me to lie in a tomb for a hundred years. I hold no malice, but you do not forgive your killer, no matter how well-intentioned they might have been.”

Another fragment of an interview rest below:

Thorm: “I know it may not make sense to you. It hasn’t made sense to anyone else I’ve told. But like I’ve said before, I’ve chosen to forgive the one who killed me, even knowing who he was. There was so much misunderstanding then. He did the wrong thing, but acted in a way that he thought was right.”

Interviewer: “Will his name ever be released to the public?”

Thorm: “No. Never. He deserves to live his life—away from me—just as I deserve mine.”

The text gave him chills.

Ketheric Thorm was—well, had been—Isobel Thorm’s father. He’d been a powerful political figure in Reithwin over a hundred years ago, but it was rumored that when his wife passed away, he’d turned away from Selûne’s light towards Shar’s darkness. That had affected the board he worked with as he ousted people left and right, until in the end, he’d been was surrounded with others like himself. Some of the people of Reithwin had begun to grow nervous, and protests began. Instead of handling things diplomatically, Ketheric, whom Wyll presumed was no longer in his right mind, released a sliver of the Shadowfell onto the Material Plane and drenched Reithwin in darkness. It was then that the true war had begun, and Isobel, who was loyal to her father and trapped on the wrong side of things, was killed. It was said that she’d been assassinated mere days before she was to abandon her father’s grasp.