3. A Speech on the Crystal Collective

A Speech on the Crystal Collective


  • _It is morning. The sun has yet to rise, but Senator Evendur Mildsilver already has. He has stayed awake through the night, putting the finishing touches on a speech that may well destroy his career if he doesn't deliver it just right. Still… he is convinced of his rightness, and is willing to sully his reputation if it means war can be avoided.

    He looks himself over in the full-length mirror set up in the far corner of his bedchamber. Not so appealing, but there are ways around that. He expertly plucks at the strands of the Weave, and through the grace of Azuth casts a rather helpful transmutation over his pallid, unrested form. Instantaneously, his skin takes on a pinkish hue, his dark hair shimmers with a lustrous sheen, and his normally piercing blue eyes become nearly irresistible pools of azure. He smiles to himself in a way that would be impossible without this spell and strides confidently out into the city.

    The sun has risen. Civil servants bustle about the civic district, dockworkers heave their oversized loads, merchants and citizens alike fill the markets of the commerce district.

    And so does Evendur approach the rapidly filling commons, preparing to deliver the speech that will make or break his authority as a Senator of Peltarch..._


  • Several days later, a recently returned Zanetar (oh, woe is you!) stands about the commons, conferring, conversing, and otherwise hob-nobbing with the Senator Midsilver. He seems in support of the mage's claims of foolish alarmism on the part of the people of Peltarch, and takes special care to place as much blame for it as possible on a certain sapphire skald.


  • Aelhaearn stands with burly arms folded across his barrel chest. When Evendur is finished yammering, he looks over at Lieutenant Azrael and rolls his eyes.

    Back in the Far Scouts billet, he mutters, "On one hand, it will certainly be more challenging to defeat them once they are inside the walls. On the other, the jurisdiction at that point will belong to the City Guard and not the Defenders. I am glad he has the confidence to stake the safety of the City on his personal beliefs. It is inspirational."

    He buckles all of his weapons and equipment securely to his belts and harnesses. With a grin, he stands up and says, "If anybody needs me, I am going to go deliver the key to the city gate to the giants. I think they have just been misunderstood, and I would like to buy them a drink at the Mermaid."

    Ael then puts a squad together for another patrol of the kobold foothills, and the soldiers slink out into the wilderness beyond the west gate.

  • V

    Occasionally Elissa takes the time to comment after that in reference to Evendur's speech. Quite often she points out that Bane only seeks to uphold law, too. And Shar wants everything to be quiet and peaceful and non-existant. Furthermore she spends some time commenting on the fact that the crystals are adapting to our environment and -accidentially- cause death and harm, which remains a fact. This truth serves only to show how utterly alien these crystals are. She can even be heard suggesting that maybe devils and demons only mean well.


  • Phanton who still is a mysterious figure who seems to haunt peltarch… Listens... and learns... but does not take sides... he is Naturaly against the crystals... but events may be changing his beliefs...


  • A guard walks up to Syne's cell with his food, a noticably larger portion than the one submitted by the comical blue bard. That snivelling wreck of a man simply did not know his place in the world.

    "Senator…" the guard began and whispered a few short phrases in the elf's ear.

    Syne waved him away and stared at his food for a long time, no longer hungry.

    "Damn you Evendur...what are you thinking?" he whispered into the darkness.


  • A brief, if not curt note:

    My Dear Evendur,

    Kara Dumonte does not have the ability to Raise the Dead and if she does it is through blasphemous abandon of her diety for the Collective of the Crystals.

    I urge your caution.

    Anna


  • From the back of the croud Chaevre' views and listens to Evendurs speach, wearing a hood low over her face and gripping a staff to support herself, bleached white hair, and deathly pale skin, her jet black eyes watch curiously as Evendur gives the speach, after Evendur finishes she glances around at the crouds dissaproval, making no attemt to intervene she silently slips away from the croud and heads south.


  • Evendur sighs at the responses, fully expecting them. He quietly tells himself:

    "These people will never understand the possible benefit of the crystals as tools of the arcane if they can be stabilized. They could preserve peace and order… They could destroy the Corrupt Union... It is my duty as an Azuthan to determine whether they might help the spread of the True Art."


  • A round brick.


  • Yeah, right. The crystal slaves are just happy, normal, everyday people….sure. I'll believe that when the pantheon goes bar hopping through Peltarch. These crystals are from an empire of -demon summoners- that were consumed by their own maigc, and we're supposed to listen to those controlled by them? If you listen to them, ya're about as sharp as a brick, if ya ask me.


  • Zyphlin eyes goes wide at how absolutely naive and easily manipulated evendur is. He sighs, levying a silent curse to beshaba that he still can not talk right. He walks off trying to find evendur immedietly

    And….he....calls...him...self....a....mage...


  • "Citizens of Peltarch!

    I stand before you this morning as a servant of the Jewel of the Icelace. I am a Senator of this fair city, and have always striven to prove myself an instrument of the greater good of Peltarch.

    War looms on the horizon. A group of individuals has gathered in the south in service to the ancient sentient artifacts known commonly as the Nars Crystals. This Crystal Collective, an unknown entity, has very naturally incited alarm, if not panic, among our populace.

    But we act in haste. We ban without understanding. We condemn without justification. We fear without cause.

    The common claim is that Peltarch merely protects itself against the threat of an expanding army. And yet we do not seek to verify whether this threat is real. Unfounded fear is little more than paranoia, and paranoia can lead to unnecessary conflict.

    Thus, in an effort to better understand this so-called foe, I have been meeting in secret with its leadership throughout the past tenday. I stand here today prepared to deliver a fair and even-handed evaluation of their beliefs and goals – the truth.

    Now I am sure that naysayers will immediately claim that I have been converted to membership in the Crystal Collective. Nothing is further from the truth, and I am more than willing to subject myself to a detection of lies at the hands of the city's most skilled clerics in order to prove just that. Others might claim that I am delusional or misguided. Rest assured that my mental capacities are sound -- in fact, my sense of magic, with which the crystals themselves are imbued, exceeds that of most everyone in the city.

    The goal of the Crystal Collective, from the mouths of their own leaders, is to uphold stability, peace, and order throughout the region. While this involves preparation to defeat a very real threat, whether imagined or not, in the return of the Defiler, these goals also entail the destruction of such chaotic entities as the Eastlanders in an effort to prevent war. The threat of the Eastlanders to our city is real, and potential assistance in their downfall must be considered in our evaluation of the Collective.

    The leaders of the Crystal Collective insist that the crystals continue to permit their followers to engage in acts of free will from the very outset of their taking control. Whether or not this is true, or whether said free will is merely illusion, the fact remains that not all who have touched the crystals have become 'enslaved.' [edited by Evendur due to OOC stuff]

    A key grievance of the city is that harmful crystals have sprouted up in our territory. The leaders of the Collective have explained that the crystals are still adapting to permit conversion to be as painless a process as possible. They have agreed, however, to remove the crystals from our territory if possible until the adaptation process is complete as a sign of good faith. Moreover, Lady Kara Du'monte has agreed personally to raise any of our citizenry who have perished or will perish as a result of these crystals' influence.

    Peltarch's other grievance is that the Collective is a hostile army who seeks to expand and violently win over others to its cause. While the leaders of the Collective do wish to spread knowledge of the threat that the return of the Defiler will bring to Narfell, they insist that they are not an army, and have no plans to march upon any of the towns or cities of the region. I will admit from firsthand experience that the town of Norwick is unharmed, and that its Chancellor is reportedly scheduling an amicable meeting with the new occupants. In fact, the members of the Collective devote their martial skill to defense against hostility from our own city, just as we defend ourselves from them.

    This is a cold war that must be thawed before it is too late.

    I entreat you, citizens, to keep an open mind about this Crystal Collective, and to hear their side of the story before leaping to conclusions. Should a representative of their number be permitted into the city to speak on their own behalf, do not throw stones. Listen, then judge for yourselves.

    Unity of purpose is of chief importance, and if through this unity war can be avoided, so it must, for the good of all Narfell."