#syman

“Who, me?” Syman replied innocently as frost started to fan out in fern-patterns beneath his feet. “I’m just here for my stuff.” Syman finished before summoning a pair of ice-nunchaku so he didn’t feel quite-so-unarmed. Just then a fuming Gertrude slipped between the flaps, quacking angrily at Syman who proceeded to get into a defensive argument with her that very-much reminded those in attendance of watching a long-married couple squabble.

The irate dwarf, sails deflated in the face of Syman’s odd brand of insanity, sat back down and cast a sidelong glance at a gnome in a very fancy hat and coat with the larges pile of coinage in front of him before grunting. The gnome bore a trademark gnomish smile and winked at the table at large before slithering under the table to approach the frosty duo.

“Syy-Maaan!” The gnome chortled jovially, “You finally got your body back! Looking good too, iffin a humble MC may say so sah!’ The gnome slapped his thigh in delight as man and penguin embraced and made up before turning to address the MC.

“Zonga Zebbidiah Gonzaga Fonball!” Syman Shouted, picking up the gnome in a meaty arm to give him a playful noogie, something Syman wouldn’t have been able to manage in his old human form. “Did I miss any?”

“One,” Zonga replied, a smile on his face despite the ruffled green curls. “Zonga Zebbidiah Gonzaga Fonball McCallistor; Married a baroness a while back for her jewel mine, if you see my meaning!” Zonga said with a wink. He liked to think he was witty and clever, when really his personality would be better described as lecherous and greedy, key qualities in a Master of Ceremonies for a traveling circus. The irate penguin stomped up to him and attempted to start eating his fingers. “Hello then, B-E-A-uty, Syman, have you brought me an addition to my menagerie?!”

“What?” Syman asked, obviously confused. “No, no, that’s my wife Gertrude. Say hello dear.” The penguin continued to try and devour any piece of the gnome it could.

“’course it is, ‘course it is old boy.” Zonga hissed at the penguin, shooing it away from his trousers and socks. “Now then, come back for your old gear, have ye? Can’t say I was sure I’d ever rightly see you again chap.”

“Ohmyyes” Syman replied hastily. “Big things are happening, dontchaknow. Princess Amy even asked for my help!”

Zonga stopped rustling through an old chest long enough to look at Syman and ensure he hadn’t misspoke. “Amyria’s talking to you again? Blow me down, things must be bad.” It was at that time a nagging thought that been bothering Syman since he returned finally clarified; he recognized the body Syman now inhabited as one belonging to a man who had recently stolen a cave-bear from his menagerie mid-performance. “Syman,” Zonga asked, trying to sound casual, “Where did you say you got your body from?”

“Hmm?” Syman asked, distracted by the snow-man-band he had summoned to poorly play the various instruments Zonga had tossed from the chest onto the ground. “Oh, just some warrior, bear man I think his name was. Does it matter?”

“…Nnnot as such, no, only…” Zonga was certain it was the same person. He couldn’t attack Syman as there was no guarantee he’d be able to stop him from turning his entire operation into a circus-cicle, but his personal code of honor demanded recompense. “Only ‘sjust that, Syman, not your fault mind, but I’ve had a run in with this new body-toy of yours before. Stole somethin’ a mine ta-boot. Could be said he owes me something…”

This at least Syman remembered; he had been friends with Zonga for as far back as his mind recorded and was accustomed to the tradition of gnome-bargains. Syman patted the tunic Amyria had forced on him so he could ‘at the very least cover his shame’ emphasize his lack of funds for fiscal trading, but then he remembered the pile of Rexx’ gear he had left in the frozen pond. He smile at Zonga as, with a snap of his fingers, he reached through space into the frozen pond via a magic portal and pulled out the enchanted gear left frozen at the bottom of the pond, dumping them at the gleeful gnome’s feet.

Zonga danced a primal dance of joy, recognizing with his finely-tuned and anachronistic appraise skill the value of the items before him far out-weighing the value of an old show-bear. He winked at Syman in turn and pressed a hidden latch at the bottom of the now-empty chest, as the false-bottom slid away to reveal a short flight of stairs down into a squat chamber. Zonga and Syman descended the stairs before the chest snapped shut behind them, leaving Gertrude alone with the hungrily leering poker-players.

Zonga and Syman stood (hunched-over, in Syman’s case) in the squat chamber which was bare save a small stone box in the center. “’eld onto these beauties a long time, thought you’d never come a callin’” Zonga said, reverentially lifting Syman’s heroic tools of the trade from their century-old hiding-place. Syman hurriedly shifted into them, a feeling of completion washing over him as his old robe slid over his head and massive beard. Zonga immediately re-filled the box with his newly acquired spoils of business.

An unexpected pang struck Syman’s chest, and he found himself saying “Careful with those!” in a rumbling basso before he coughed and checked his psychic bindings on the shifter’s spirit; as far as he could tell, Rexx was fully dormant and submissive inside his head. “Sorry,” He apologized in his more-normal old-man voice. “Just…those are…relics on their own. Treat them with respect, as I have entrusted you before.”

Zonga shot Syman a quizzical look before offering an elegant, flourishing bow of acknowledgement. He pulled the final item from the bottom of the stone box, a simple silver hoop a meter across with swirls of enchanted runes running along its inside track. Syman’s eyes gleamed at the sight of it as memories of 1,000 adventures flooded his fluid memory. He felt a cackle bubbling in his chest, but was barely able to contain it to a giggle as Zonga threw the disk at the wall where it snapped stock-still against the stones, suspended a foot above the ground.

“So,” Zonga asked, used to this stage in his routine, “where to this time, O-friendo-of-Friends?”

“I’ll need to be sent to the Temple Between. The Grand Hall, if you can manage it? Oh, mustn’t forget the wife!” Syman dashed upstairs while Zonga twisted sigils around the slowly opening portal inside the metal-loop, fine-tuning the portal to Syman’s requested location. Syman popped his head out of the chest from the top of the stairs to find Gertrude menacing the poker players (now cowering behind the up-turned table) with a broken bottle. Syman swept Gertrude up before barreling back down the stairs, seeing the portal yawn open as Zonga found the correct portal-channel. He dove headlong through the gaping wormhole, singing to the struggling Gertrude as they flew towards their destiny.

Not even the cackles of wicked spirits could taint the euphoria coursing through Syman’s newly-won body. Freezing the surface of a pond into perfect stillness Syman wiped frost away to use the solid plane of water for a mirror, taking stock of his bod’; Thick, bulging muscles weighed-down much of the form, an extravagance the wizard Syman had scarcely been able to comprehend in his walking life. He grinned sharp yellow teeth at himself, the massive beard obscuring much of the rest of his body behind its bushy bulk.

“Now this won’t do, won’t do at all this won’t” Syman muttered softly to himself as he appraised the various loot Rexx had formerly possessed. He continued to ramble nonsensically as he dumped the contents of Rexx’s pack onto the pond’s surface, shrugging out of the too-heavy chainmail before realizing the beastly-man inhabitant prior hadn’t bothered wearing any undergarments. “This will probably need a remedy, Gertrude, who wants to see an old man’s potato?” Syman shouted power down his unresisting limbs and ice, frost, sleet, slush, and snow all began to swirl together, blending in artic harmony until the frigid water had formed a massive ice-centipede which thrashed about in newly bequeathed life.

Scooping up Gertrude the penguin under one arm Syman leapt onto the iceipede’s back and jabbed his heels into its frosty chitinous folds, urging it forward toward Dennovar and the legendary Hall of Heroes. As he they scuttled across the plains at blinding speed a storm of centuries of pent-up ice magic began to unfold, the sky darkening with heavy grey clouds loaded with flakes in the wake. Though the ride had taken several days riding bear-back, the untiring iceipede hauled thorax across the empty plains and reached Dennovar by the following sun rise.

After the first terrified scream from a guard and a volley of bolts raining from the battlements Syman had the good sense to dissolve the iceipede, the eruption of frost blanketing the farmlands in a thin white powder. He approached the city’s walls slowly, on foot, though the madness within him was enough to cause him to walk, hop, skip, crab-dance, and eventually samba up to the gate guard. The over-confused guard was nearing the end of his rope already, and by the time he espied Gertrude’s futile struggles to become disentangled with the monstrous beard he felt as though he was staring into the void of madness.

‘Er…Halt?” A slightly more composed guard at the gate ventured; Syman turned a patented radiant smile on him, assuming the guise of the Nice King he used when speaking with non-adventurers.

“Hello-sir-it’s-me-Mister-Grrramblington-very-busy-man-about-town-dontchaknow-no-time-to-chat-cabbeges-to-be-de-eyed-and-such-truly-lovely-byeeeee!” All of this was shouted to the guards as Syman breezed past them in a chilly gale. He knew the city, even if it had been years. He dropped a few snow-minions, mostly snow-crabs and snow-geese, as a deterrent for anyone trying to follow him. Still clutching Gertrude he tapped into a deep well of power to allow his beard to fly him over the roofs of the sleeping city, a trickle of snow billowing out behind them.

Syman touched-down in the garden he recognized from the sky as the façade for the Hall of Champions; he let out a shriek of disbelief when he discovered the charred wreckage of the hall cordoned off from the rest of the city. Fire had clearly devoured the bones and flesh of the building, and all that stood now as the testament to heroes passed was a ruined pit of ashes. Syman unleashed frigid blind fury into the churning clouds above, bolts of ice hissing through the night air to send mana crackling in angry patterns over the looming sky, the snow becoming a bitter hail as it pelted over the cobblestones.

Just then a strong, slender hand clenched over the wrist of Syman, shaking his fury from him. He turned to a familiar face; Amyria gazed up at his towering form, grief welling in her eyes. Her soft voice was saddened, reproachful. “Oh Syman, you’ve stolen another one. You can’t keep running from your own body, old fool.” Though her words were harsh her body-language warmed as she spread her arms to accept Syman in an embrace. He sobbed into her sculpted shoulders, grief long-gone unexpressed shaking through him. Frozen beads of tears clinked down her simple cloak to shatter on the frozen sod beneath their feet.

“Princess Amy!” Syman wheezed, his age showing in his tone. “What happened to the hall!? Last I remember we had agreed to rest in our items should evil ever rise again? How were we so dispersed?” Amyria felt the madness shiver over Syman as the tears suddenly stopped and he picked up Gertrude and lifted her high in the air, calling her an ‘err-plain.’

“I weep to see the madness still holds you, dear friend,” Amyria replied, though no tears stained her perfect cheeks. “We were right to have stayed; evil has risen once more. Yet more cunning have they shown, as they first sought to disperse our allies before torching our sanctuary.”

“Whaaa?” Syman spun, rejoining the critical conversation. “What about Fonzie? Or surely Cut & Hammish haven’t turned tail?”

“My knowledge at this time is infuriatingly limited; whoever is acting against us has taken time to plan. Though I have been able to locate Khun-Bron I am afraid the other members elude me. But tell me, Syman; how did you come to possess this form? The shifter you have commandeered is from the party in whose care I have placed the Brightshield.”

Syman told Amyria (though the narrative wandered more than a child willfully lost to the forest) of all he knew; after what Amyria confirmed to be the theft of the Champions he was given to a foul Kenku-Blighter whose mind was too sharp to be dominated as Syman had assumed direct control of Rexx. The kenku, Blight, used his power to imprison and enslave the tribe of shifters before foolishly attempting to pawn off the power onto Rexx, as Amyria informed Syman he was so-called.

“After that, it was a simple shwoop-zwap-fwooo and I was here.” Syman turned to face the hall after his long exposition. “Good Graces! Princess Amy! The Hall of Champions has been destroyed!? Who could have done this??!!” Amyria attempted to re-jog Syman’s memories, but the psychic trauma he had endured while still (or at least, more so) alive had left his capacity for memory a tattered patchwork. She explained everything twice more until it appeared to have settled and been accepted by the icy void of Syman’s mind.

“Syman dear, listen to princess now,” Amyria instructed. She hated to indulge in his regal fantasies (in which he referred to any female as Princess and most elves as well regardless of gender), but knew him well enough to be confident that a Princess’ command would not be easily forgotten in the blizzard; “You must seek out your old clown compatriot. Acquire your relics. The Party to whom your body belongs, and in whose care I have entrusted Brightshield, has journeyed to the Temple Between. You must find the entrance here in Dennovar after becoming equipped and aid them however you can. I have had visions that however the looming evil will rear its foul head this party will be integral to its defeat. Can you do this for me, Ice King?” Amyria pleaded, hoping her faith wasn’t misplaced and that Syman’s mind hadn’t further degraded after centuries in solitude inside the crown.

“You can count on us, Princess!” Syman offered a luminous salute as snow cascaded in his silhouette.

In trying to walk Rexx Found that his arms and legs were still encased in ice, a silvery-blue color in the dimness of this echoing dome. The man hemmed and hawed before slowly approaching the still-struggling Rexx. He looked sad, Rexx realized now that the man was closer, and pained, as if he did not want Rexx to be imprisoned as he was. His human body was frail and emaciated, his fingers and overly elongated nose tinged black with fierce frostbite. He made an effort to speak an introduction, though he needn’t have bothered; without effort Rexx could feel the knowledge inside his own mind swelling and recognized this man as Syman the Ice King.

When Syman attempted to speak his voice came out in a rough, primal roar that echoed endlessly off of, what Rexx was able to surmise, the inside of his own mind. Rexx’ mind was not accustomed to thoughts connected to words, and Syman found there was no place for them in this cavity of a brain. He paused, startled at his own ferocity, and considered the enigma of Rexx; he needed to share the history of the crown, to explain its importance, but the forbiddance of words would make the exchange tricky. Rex attempted to escape the ice once or twice, but he found the more he struggled the more he was encased, until only his head was left uncovered.

Syman shushed Rexx’ struggles, lost in his own thought. After a time he snapped his fingers and rushed off to an impossible corner of the domed chamber, and when he returned to the light in the center he dragged behind him an object out-of-time; a full double-bass drum kit complete with cymbals and snare. Rexx reviled the object as an anathema, but Syman shushed more forcefully before sitting on the short stool behind the drums and beginning to play. His rhythm was simple first, bordering on primal beats from the basso skins. As he began to drum the cacophony filled the domed chamber of the vacant mind, and Rexx understood Syman’s intent.

The exchange of knowledge was two-way, Rexx’ info had simply been more compact; Syman had learned of Rexx’ tribe’s ritual of passing on knowledge through drum-circles and cave-paintings, and set about telling the long and tragic history of the crown in the only medium available to him. As he banged the skins and metal disks a phantasm of Rexx’ tribe filled the cavernous chamber and the walls took on the deep umber of ancient stone as black bleeding lines of primal paints blossomed, revealing images to accompany the bone-deep sense of narrative flowing from the drums.

Rexx saw as the lines swirled to a circle before jackknifing into jagged mountain-tops; the lines blurred as the perspective changed to show the mountains closer as rocks tumbled down in an avalanche; below the stones lay a blocky humanoid, made of living rock herself, who climbed from the rubble with nary a scratch; the paint stretched over the entire cavern, a mosaic of heroic deeds done by the stony avatar; she was shown to wield a massive axe and cast the power of snow before her wherever she strolled; a small unimpressive stick figure entered the paintings in the trail of the stone-woman; over time, the stick figure drew closer to the woman and Rexx could recognize the distinctive nose of Syman drawn over the figure’s face.

The pace of the drums changed; throughout the cavern Rexx’ tribe stood in phantasmal fury, a deep resonant chant accentuating the tale the drums told. The visions became more vibrant, showing the journey of Syman and the woman as they joined the legendary Champions of Bahamut, trolling across the country and snuffing out evil wherever they tread. Without warning a crack of the cymbals shattered the image of the stone-woman, the black paint raining down in a deluge of swamp slime. The ringing metal echoed through the otherwise now-silent chamber, and Rexx could see tears running down the face of Syman which turned to single snowflakes as they fell from his chin.

Syman resumed drumming, a somber aria if ever a drum was capable of playing one; the small stick figure distorted, hunched, and drew in the lines into the shape of a crown, a living memory of the bestoned heroin. The figure donned the crown, yet as he did so his own lines became blurred as though a great vibration of power ran through it. Before his imprisoned eyes Rexx witnessed the spirits of land, air and beast dance in a gritty miasma over the spectacle.

Rexx watched as the shattered team reassembled, though the details were obscured by a persistent snow-storm that raged over the visions. The Champions of Bahamut rose to power and slew a mighty evil, though by now the storm was so great Rexx couldn’t see what form the evil took. The images cleared away, leaving the blank stone of the cave once more. With a fading chime along the cymbal Rexx saw the smoky black swirl of evil rise once more, and silhouettes of his Party rising to stand against it.

Unafraid of petty concerns like ‘vision,’ Rexx strode confidently through the empty network of caves, Ber-Wyf trailing in his heavy steps. Through twists-and-turns in the pitch black Rexx knew with the assuredness unique to those who had spent their lives in the dark and twisted caves that the chanting was emanating deep from within the tribe’s hive; pausing for an affirming breath, Rexx grimaced when he at-last recognized the voice of the chanter belonged to his tribe’s Shaman/witch-doctor, Blyt. The twisted half-man-half-bird stooped over a bloody altar, a sonorous chant flowing effortlessly from her stained mouth.

She did not stop chanting until Rexx and Ber-Wyf roared in unison, a warning wall of sound that rebounded like thunder through the cramped caves; facing away from the pair she shuddered at the sudden noise before slowly turning a stunned face on the bear-pair. A slow, eerie smile crept over her face as she recognized Rexx, and the bow on his back. A gold crown, set with glowing-red rubies was looped through a thong attached to a simple rope belt around Blyt’s waist. She hungrily gazed at the bow, delighted to see such a sap as Rexx bringing her more power even now close the apex of her domination of the shifter-tribe.

“WHY…YOU…HERE?!” Rexx demanded, indicating the stone vault door behind Blyt meant to contain the wicked weapons of the Tribe’s darker past. She took a short, irritated breath before starting to speak, but Rexx cut her off; “WHY…THIS,” and here, Rexx removed the Bloodclaw Bow from his back to brandish it at Blyt, “NOT…IN…CAVE?” Her smile broadened, an expression that would have unnerved a wiser warrior. As it was, Rexx failed to intuit the dangerous aura that had enveloped Blyt since Rexx had last left his home in pursuit of the king’s favor his clan’s leader tasked him with earning.

“Ah, the Crimsonmaw, and the Bloodclaw bow as well, my my, this is a fortuitous day,” mused Blyt. Rexx, still trying to work through ‘fortuitous,’ was silent. “Yes, this can work better than I had hoped. You there, bear-fellow,” Blyt chirped, pointing a bony finger towards Rexx. “You were sent to win the favor of the crown, yes?” Blyt nodded, encouraging the quick-to-follow Rexx to nod along as though he was keeping up with the situation. “She did say to make sure it was kept out of the coming war, and where better than in the hands of a simpleton?” This, Blyt said to herself, having long-ago trained the shifters to not perceive her as speaking if she wasn’t speaking directly at them. She seemed to reach a conclusion; “Rexx, you were sent away to earn the crown, but returned with a bow. How?”

Rex grunted before speaking, obviously struggling to condense a wealth of info into words that would fit in his brain; “……slay…evil…find…bow…in…dark-den.” The shifters of the tribe used the term dark-den when referring to a place they felt was distinctly, intrinsicly evil. Rexx glared hatefully at the bow, as he had been taught it belonged in the evil-vault where the ancestral weapons of the exiled clans were kept. “How…bow…out?” he managed.

“A crucial query, to be sure,” Blyt tittered, joy barely contained behind the words. “I’ll tell you what, Rexx, why don’t you give the bow to me and I’ll give you the crown. It’ll be our secret; the tribe doesn’t have to know you failed.” Rexx considered this, but not for long. Blyt had raised countless generations of the tribe and knew they would not be able to resist her commands. Her small, black eyes tracked over the bow, keen to wield such dark power in place of the lunatic ramblings akin to the cursed crown on her thong.

Rexx hesitated for only a moment before slowly stalking forward towards Blyt, the bow held in front of him as though he thought it might explode, or worse, speak long words. His eyes focused on the crown, obviously eager to complete the quest that drove him from his home. Blyt’s beak clicked with excitement as she slipped the cord out from around the crown to hold out to Rexx. He surged forward, clasping the crown between his electrified claws, dropping the bow at Blyt’s talons. Rexx stared blearily at the crown for a moment as frantic whispers called a warning to him just in time; Rexx donned the crown just as Blyt let out a maniacal chortle and dived for the Bloodclaw Greatbow, drawing the string back as a bloody-arrow coalesced into existence in her hands.

Blyt loosed a volley of arrows at the bear-pair, but was stunned to find a wall of ice preventing them from burying in their marks; Rexx stood, arms outstretched, as power flowed from his form giving shape to the wall of thickening ice. Blyt let out a shriek of fury as she slashed her hand at the barrier, dismantling the energies as they poured from the crown. A voice shouted for Rexx to run, and he and Ber-Wyf turned to bolt for the enterance to their cave with Blyt in enraged pursuit.

Rexx leered down at his hands as he and his wife ran for their lives. Something was desperately wrong with ice shooting from Rexx, but the harder he tried to think about the less he could conceptualize where the problem with snow came from; Rexx liked snow, and ice, and the more he thought about it the more he felt that his actions had been far from the evils Blyt preached regarding magic. And it was Magic, Rexx knew somehow. The crown carried great magic and he could feel it even now, pumping energy through his limbs, allowing him an expeditious retreat. Rexx felt as though his brain was burning, new words and thoughts and concepts surfacing like eldritch gods from the briny depths of his cavernous mind.

Rexx and Ber-Wyf reached the end of their cave, left looking down the jagged spires of their range they had so recently scaled. Rexx turned to face his foe, unclear on why Blyt had turned on them so suddenly, or why he had tried to run; Rexx had never known fear, or to run from a fight. He feared now that he was not alone in his usually-vacant head, and could still hear the maddened whispers just out of aural range. As Blyt exited the cavern’s shadows ghastly images swam before Rexx’ vision of generations of tortured spirits, the warped souls of Rexx’ tribe bound in unrest by the actions of Blyt.

Fury shook throughout Rexx. Blyt has betrayed your people, the crown whispered. Turned them over to the giants as slaves in exchange for her personal safety, it told Rexx. She is more powerful than any of you ever knew, it said. Rex crouched to charge her, disembowel her, slay her as all the tortured souls of his tribe called out for, but was immobilized; ice flowed up his legs, rooting him to the spot as even more encased his arms. I’m sorry, the crown whispered, you cannot win against her…yet. With his body almost entirely encased in ice, Rexx could scarcely espy Blyt as she notched more tainted-blood arrows into the cursed bow and loosed the missiles directly at the hearts of Rexx and Ber-Wyf.