#weolcan

The Compass

Word count: 313

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Ruth stared up at the glyph on the wall. A massive circle rose before her, filled with lines and arches mimicking trails of stars. Constellations from ages long past. She took one step forward, then another. Her heels and her breath echoed off the stone all around her.

She’d heard stories of spaces like this. Inner sanctums, nestled deep within Ancient ruins, sheltered from the passage of time. Tall tales, fables, legends, passed from mentor to student, from peer to peer over a drink: many claimed to have caught sight of such spaces. Mere glimpses. Not many believed such tales.

But Ruth had always believed. And that belief had brought her here.

She took another step, but froze when a line beneath her feet flared with light. That light zipped forward, up the wall, filling another arc of a constellation in the circle. 

All the lights around her surged suddenly, blinding her. The Aether itself seemed to be dancing before her eyes.

The surge faded as fast as it had came. Now something floated in the air in front of her. A compass. It had no needles; instead, encased within a dome of crystal, was the same pattern of constellations that stood before her.

Awe caught Ruth’s breath, but curiosity drew her hand to the compass. She plucked it from the air like a forbidden fruit.

As soon as she did, all the lights from all the lines in the stones surged once more. Then faded to nothing.

Ruth suddenly found herself outside the ruins from whence she’d entered. But there was no entrance. Just a flat face of stone. Worn by time, overgrown by nature

But in her hand was still the compass. It still glowed.

Ruth clutched the compass to her chest, a thrill rising in her chest.

She’d grown up hearing legends. Now it was her turn to tell one. 

———

Well this was fun! Attempted @sandcastle-art’s species swap challenge with Scout.

The hardest part for all of them was probably figuring out how Scout’s damaged brand would translate—ended up giving each of the swaps different scars.

The hardest ones to design were probably the Glitch and the Zonai swaps.

So I decided to give my character Felix a cat-bird, plus wrote a little short about how that happened:

[Excerpt from Felix’s Journal]

47th Zeph

Today was quite interesting.

The crew and I were asked to sail to an island downwind of the Observatory—a small island, close enough to the cloud barrier to be quite temperate and forested. Ensign Rigel was to talk to the village leader about a supply situation, but I was just to navigate them there and back. So I had some free time, especially as a storm blew in while we were there, rooting us on the island for longer than scheduled.

It wasn’t the worst storm I’ve faired; had there been a need, I could have sailed us back with little issue. It was mostly a swell from the barrier. But there was no need, and it was around supper time, so the locals insisted we stay. Friendly folk. 

So we hung around for a little while just under the porch of the village head’s house—a small hut, but sturdy thanks to salvaged stones from the ruin I found on the south side of the island. But while we were making idle conversation with the leader’s wife, I heard some strange noises. Not from the storm—there was no thunder, just wind. It sounded like a watered whistle at first.

I left Rigel to continue talking to the locals while I investigated, and shortly I found the source of the noise: a tiny little cat-bird tangled in a bush, presumably from the storm winds. He’s a Blue Glider, but I’m positive he’s still a juvenile—he still has brown speckles across the back of his wings, and he is incredibly scrawny. Poor thing looked like he had been tangled for most of the storm. 

So I managed to untangle the little critter and bring it back to the others. But even after asking around the whole village, I wasn’t able to identify his owner. Because he looks like he’s been owned before, even if briefly. He acts like it, too—he took quite the liking to me within minutes of me finding him. More accurately, he took a liking to my sandwich. Snatched the meat out right as I glanced away, and he looked incredibly proud of himself for doing so.

The crew and I sailed back to the Observatory as soon as the storm calmed; we arrived just after 10 tonight. Not too bad, all things considered.

I’m keeping an eye on the little cat-bird until we can find his owner or someone to claim him. Maia decided to call him Nimbus as soon as she saw him perched on my shoulder—I told her to not name him too quickly in case he already has an owner and a name, but she insisted. Because of course she did. So Nimbus he is, for the time being. 

He’s a funny creature. Very bouncy, but doesn’t like to fly too far from me. Likes to sniff and chirp at everyone, though.

He’s perched on the edge of my desk now. Chirped to get my attention—now I think he’s staring at my quill.

[There’s a smudge of ink across the bottom of the page, just barely missing the writing. A ghost of a cat-bird’s paw print can be seen at the edge of the ink smudge]

———

Sailing through the skies on wings of wood and canvas

Started this picture early this year; didn’t finish it until now, but I’m glad I finished it.

I have this one setting I’ve been developing, called Weolcan, which is basically an Age of Sail / Steampunk fantasy world of sky islands scattered between multiple layers of clouds, so I’m gonna have to do more practice with clouds.

Felix Allbright: A famous explorer in Weolcan, up until a few years ago when injury forced him to retire from the field. The height of his explorer career was right before the Trade War picked up speed; nowadays he’s the Master Navigator of the Constellation—an adventurer’s/diplomat’s guild.

“…They call him the Lord of the Sun. The Judge of Tyrants. They say he can control light itself. Some even think he has power approaching that of deity. And lemme tell you…they’re not too far off.”

“Wait, you’ve met him?”

The compass in Ruth’s pocket went warm as she and Felix approached the opening. She fished it out, and the device was glowing—all the points in its simulated constellation were alight, pointing beams at the crystalline lens. The concentrated beam pointed forwards through the draping vines.

“I think this is it,” Ruth whispered—why, she didn’t know—as she pushed the vines aside. “The compass is pointing inside.”

Master Felix looked down at her, at the mysterious Ancient device in her hand, and then looked forward, parting the vines himself. Before the two of them lay an entrance, Ancient in build. Overgrown by nature and time but not overcome.

He nodded forwards. “Let’s see where that light leads, then.”