Star Witch Estellise's Diary of Hopes and Dreams

[cmenden]

Tammuz 11th, IY 7787

I've taken Cosine once more as my apprentice. Aubrey was there, of course.

Aubrey has a way of making things better. I wish I could have met her when she was my age. I imagine we would have been completely inseparable.

The day has been a really emotional one, admittedly. Everything I'd been afraid of being done to me I was also doing to my own Master.

It's an unpleasant realization to come to and quite upsetting. I'm glad Zenithar Gaius took the time to speak with me. It took everything I had not to start crying right there in the observatory. It would have been humiliating...

Zenithar Oro needs to believe in me, but I also need to believe in my apprentices in turn. By that standard, he's done a poor job of trusting me, but I've also done a poor job trusting him and them, so I can't even blame him. I understand how hard it is to trust people, and how much it hurts when that trust is betrayed.

I realized I'd been terrible to Bestworth since his return, and possibly even before his return. I apologized to him and he accepted. It was probably the most genuine either of us had been to one another and further solidified just how much I had erred.

After all that, I look forward to relaxing for the rest of the day.



[An addition comes later...]

SHE IS A DOG AND A CUR, A WRETCH AND A MONGREL, SHE ONLY CARES ABOUT DINARS, SHE IS LOYAL TO NONE, FRIENDSHIP MEANS NOTHING TO HER
Why do they trust her? Why can't they see what's coming? This isn't about seeing the future, it's about opening your eyes and looking at what's right in front of you!

Do they know? Am I really being lied to? Are there really anonymous reports? Who would want to see me expelled from this order?
Why keep any of this a secret? I offered to help! I want to help but also I want to do my duty and I also have to keep the Well safe. Despite what everyone says, these desires don't conflict with one another!

I'm just so tired of this! I hate them all!

[cmenden]

Tammuz 15th, IY 7787

I want the election to be over I'm so tired of it.

Cosine is moping because I have fired him, even though I rehired him immediately, despite Zenithar Gaius advising me against it. He shouldn't have defied my request. He should have come when that wretch Shae went to retrieve him. He disrespects me and I hate it.

However, he's also my staunchest ally against some of the worst things we face.

I also need reliable people consistently near me as much as possible. It's been nearly two months since I last was able to divine my own future reliably.

None of my own futures are accurate owing to the interference of outsider forces, likely diviners with power far exceeding my own. Is one of them YOU? For some, the matter would be unsolvable, but not me. I can triangulate my own probable future via the futures of those around me.

Just two more days. Sol Auk will be Legate. I will likely need to apologize or explain some things to people. The election has been extremely unpleasant all around and many harsh words have been spoken on all sides.

I should also find Bestworth and make certain he attends Sol Auk's first Allotment. Futures where Bestworth argues for the allotment tend to see a larger portion into Astronomer hands.

[cmenden]

Tammuz 18th, IY 7787

Fitful sleep after the past few days.

Sol Auk was elected, as expected, yet Bestworth is dead. The Nadiri last night was right. It wasn't supposed to happen. Was he telling the truth or is it merely a coincidence that he knew that? Many more exhausting days lay ahead as I will need to perform new calculations to determine causal relationships and potential futures relevant to this branch. To do so, I will need to return to where it all began, the book I first learned from.

If I was a fatespinner in truth, it would be far easier. I am not, however, not technically. The order was destroyed during Ringfall. Ringfall was when everything changed, when I found the book in my own handwriting, the book that explained everything and provided the tools necessary to learn from the fatespinners' scrolls.

The writer of the book is me, but not really. She's functionally a stranger to me, yet she's also the reason I survived the wastes, and the reason I was able to make it to Ephia's Well. The least I could do is to see her plans through. I'm unconvinced there's a point, as she is likely long gone and unable to benefit from my actions, but I still wish to repay my debt.

The Nadiri said he was my apprentice.  Well, I'm quite certain my "apprentice" is surely lying. Transference? It's nonsense to even imagine. A book is one thing, but an entire person's consciousness? It defies reason.

[cmenden]

Tammuz 22nd, IY 7787

The days slip by under the new regime. I find myself having lower energy than usual of late. Perhaps it is the overwhelming frustration of being right about everything and having no one acknowledge it.

Zenithar Oro was wrong about Bestworth, wrong about licensure, and most importantly, wrong about Sol Auk. Despite my knowledge of future events, my words went unheeded again and again.

He controls the government and by association the Janissaries. The wretched merchants and craftsmen of the Gold League too. Adventurers? All they care about is dinars. It's the same for the Banda Rossa.

It's evident from the bellows that board jobs are plentiful and crime is at historic lows. I should be happy to see such prosperity, but instead, I feel trapped. I am trapped in an enormous gelatinous cube known as Ephia's Well, scarcely able to move even a single limb, for all the impact I have upon these events.

I am trapped watching as the entire Well is unified in purpose but it is the wrong purpose.

They are all going to die.

[cmenden]

Tammuz 24th, IY 7787

I write this from my room in the Krak des Roses after a truly infuriating day.

I don't ask for much. I don't crave power for power's sake, I merely want to spare Ephia's Well its horrible fate. If that goal requires me to cast aside my title and robes, I care little. Unlike Cosine and that wretch Vergal, I do not derive pleasure from ordering others about.

I'm treated rather terribly in the Tower but I've long ago come to understand that the post-ringfall world is a very different place than the one I was raised in. No one accepts their place in hierarchies but rather they seek to tear down those who are better than them, driven by jealousy to acts of madness that would have seen a swift execution in my youth. Still, I had thought there were certain uncrossable lines and certain behaviors that would be considered unacceptable and see the offender dismissed immediately.

Only my own Master and my apprentices stood by me in that room, and even my apprentices wished for my cowed silence.

If not for the kind words and support of those I consider friends, and Lynneth for some reason, I would have been hard-pressed to find my way back to stable emotional ground. Lynneth was probably trying to take advantage of my emotional state, admittedly, but I'm not so easily manipulated by her as Cosine.

I am calmer now as I sit here. I am calm enough to look at it and not immediately press it to my lips, but is it the rational mind that stays my hand or is it fear?

[cmenden]

Tammuz 26th, IY 7787

She liked the poem I wrote for her but then she gave me this mocking gift. I would obviously never wear such a thing. It smells sweaty even, like she does. I'm not going to wear it.

I'm irritable at the moment and it's because of this awful Stele. The space between the stars is darker and draws the eye more than before, but this would hardly be a matter normally. I have more experience stargazing than most in Ephia's Well, likely only rivaled by the old men of the Tower.

No, what actually troubles me is that apparently even the written word cannot be trusted. I spent half the night writing out calculations until I nearly drifted off from mental exhaustion, only to find that the pages contained none of my mathematical calculations at all. Even now, with the latter half of the night before me, I find it difficult to muster the energy to return to my work. I just want to rest and forget about this

remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her
                        remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her
                remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her
                                     remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her

         remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her
                                           remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her
    remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her
                   remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her

                                                                                                                   remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her
                                                                                               remember her remember her remember her
       remember her remember her remember her                                                 remember her remember her remember her remember her remember her

remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember remember

[cmenden]

Tammuz 30th, IY 7787

Gellema is off the Stele and not a moment too soon.

The writing was growing more unnerving by the day and I will welcome no longer having to deal with it.

Despite the fact that I'd only just finished my calculations and now will likely need to recalculate anew, it's no significant matter as the post-Gellema calculations will go much more swiftly.

However, despite the change in Stele, I'm still left with this strange feeling that something is missing that is supposed to be here. I haven't a clue who the writing was even referring to. Ideally, the feeling will pass in time and it will prove to have been nothing more than Gellemede mischief, in the end.

Ugh. What did I promise to read her fortune? Now I'm going to have to do it.

[cmenden]

Maribeh 5th, IY 7787

I did the Cartomancy yesterday and as expected it was clearly displeasing to her. I should have been happy to see that look on her face, but instead, I was not. It just made me sad to see. irritated.

I'm uncertain what she expected. Portents around her have been exceptionally awful from the beginning. From visions of blood and death and the influence of dark magic to tools cracking during divination, to other terrible things still, it's a wonder the deck didn't get blown away or catch fire. I wisely requested to borrow Naelin's deck, just in case.

Am I still tempted to change her fate? Obviously.

I can't speak for the true fatespinners and their methods, but I've long known that difficult-to-change events require an overwhelming amount of magical energy to affect, and few sources of magical energy are as potent as a high-risk gambit.

What gamble would be required to see her future diverted, to see her saved?

And what of my own situation? Do I return to the Tower where the most powerful magic I've ever seen was used against me? Or was it used for me as the others seem to believe? I truly don't know. I lack the others' blind optimism, loyalty, or fanaticism. Even if I put aside the personal injustice of the decision, it still seems an enormous misstep.

I'm still no closer to understanding why I was chosen by the High Zenithar. I would say that if anything, I have more questions now than ever.

[cmenden]

Maribeh 13th, IY 7787

While slightly embarrassing, I cannot contain my mirth to see such a horrible man brought low!

But as the day draws to a close I wonder why the Zenithars even saw fit to alter fate to spare him from me. Am I more powerful than even the High Zenithar to have seen this possibility of his death at another's hand and work to remove all surrounding "noise"?

Or is this still part of his design?

Did Vergal's death come after he had already served his purpose or was it a grave interruption of a planned future? Did they save Vergal from me for his sake or to save me from becoming a murderer? Would she have hunted me for destroying Vergal or see it as a reasonable end to a foul and arrogant man who refused to even do the barest minimum of providing her a name?

What do YOU think about all this?

I didn't see you during my time staying in the Krak. Did my actions upset you somehow? Surely you are well aware that I hold the sacred wine. Or have I bested you as well?

Perhaps Seers and Zenithars truly are nothing before the power of a Witch.

[cmenden]

Maribeh 15th, IY 7787

This poem...

I have read it over and over and I cannot stop thinking about it, but also, these feelings are foolish. I am absolutely positive I will regret them.

I should focus on other things, like the worrisome matter involving Amelie. Would that she would come back to Ephia's Well, we could better protect her here. Whatever she is afraid of cannot possibly be as dangerous as that which we've already dealt with here.

She called me Estie. Not Amelie, obviously. Kythaela.

Something about the name resonates within my soul. It tickles the back of my mind like a childhood memory I've forgotten or a dream I woke up from and can't recall. It's why it irritated me when Mr. Gallows called me Estie. It was and is distracting. I will allow her to continue calling me it, if she chooses, for scientific purposes.

The book intimates that certain answers can only be attained by the formation of a paradox, but the book was clearly written in a less stable reality than the one I currently occupy. I am well aware that the creation of a paradox requires an enormous amount of magical energy and power I do not possess.

However, a paradox already exists as a result of my actions, even if I did not create it. Is this something I can leverage somehow or will I merely need to continue focusing on my studies?

[cmenden]

[A new poem finds its way between two entries.]

In shadows deep, where dangers creep,
Lies a gaze, so violet, so steep.
Eyes that pierce through the cloak of night,
Revealing secrets, captivating sight.

Amidst perils fierce, both daring and bold,
Those violet eyes, my heart does hold.
A symphony of danger and desire,
Igniting flames, an unquenchable fire.

Through treacherous paths, winding ways,
I'm tangled, lost in their violet haze.
Haunted by brilliance, unfailingly,
Danger's embrace, they beckon me.

Though danger looms, and fears reside,
From violet eyes, my soul can't hide.
Fascination, like forbidden art,
They entwine my thoughts, tear me apart.

Yet, amidst peril and uncertain plight,
Yearning for those eyes, their captivating light.
For in their depths, secrets unfold,
Emotions woven, a tale yet untold.

[cmenden]

Maribeh 17th, IY 7787

Being attacked is extremely painful and harrowing but it's impossible to enact change without risk.

Lynneth is a beast, so I am unsurprised that she attacked. Hypatia should have known better but was blinded by some manner of loyalty or affection for Lynneth. I hope, at least.

The alternative is more upsetting to consider. The swiftness with which Hypatia turns on me in social situations, and the lack of trust that she shows me, despite how much I have given her, hurts a lot more than any physical wounds. A strike from a fist or mace is immediately painful but can be magically healed. There is nothing of the sort for resolving emotional wounds or pain, unfortunately.

I may have benefited from taking a moment to consider those present. Just one more Balestriere could have turned things in my favor.

Is that true, though? I need to be honest here or there's no point in even writing anything down in these pages. There are no guarantees that any additional person would have helped me, Balestriere or otherwise.

I could write down all the different possibilities and hand-deliver them. I could tell Alfred that if he had just come clean with me at the Tower, he would still be a Student, but none of it matters. I may as well be telling a man with a full belly that I prevented a future where he starved to death from coming to pass. He won't understand or care about what I have done.

I can accept that. It is part and parcel of being a fatespinner, but what I struggle to accept is that for each terrible thing I prevent, I am instead met with heavier suspicion. The effects are even worse when I am unsuccessful. At this rate, I will never manage to prevent the Ephia's Well Disaster, because I will not even be allowed in the room when crucial information is provided.

And frankly, do I have anyone as loyal to me as Lynneth does? I hate even writing it down here, but the answer is no. Cosine wouldn't dare to threaten his relationship with Lynneth (or anyone) on my behalf. Mae is a coward who would stand idly by while the worst happened to me and do nothing but watch petrified. Hypatia is so fixated on alternative realities that she will never see what I see and will always consider me a liar or worse. Kythaela would cut me down for a handful of dinars or for the favor of a Condotierro or for Naelin and Sephidra's amusement.

I remain alone and I was a fool to allow myself to think otherwise for a short time.

[cmenden]

Maribeh 18th, IY 7787

I am feeling somewhat better than before.

I realized that the whole matter went awry because Lynneth attacked me with words the moment I arrived to help and it informed much of what came later. Were she a more cunning foe, I would think it entirely possible that she started baiting me early so as to have an excuse to punch me. No. I think even a less cunning foe could devise such a plan. It just took longer than she likely expected, as I am more unflappable than those she's used to dealing with.

I concede that the victory was hers. I lost my temper and what started as a mission to see Amelie protected turned into something more foul and ego-driven. I have some fears that Lynneth has been present during too many of my most vulnerable moments making her a more dangerous foe than most. She has seen me lost and confused as a new refugee and she has seen me overcome with emotion as I was driven from the Tower in the wake of that unpleasant meeting with the Zenithars.

I remain confident that she knows little of what goes on in my head or heart, and for that reason, she is still far below the others that I must face.

Lynneth knows nothing of my joy at being protected by

Nigh, so near, I catch the scent,
Of sweat upon her, sweet, intent.

Close, I feel the warmth, the heat,
Her exertion, her body's feat.

In this closeness, I am lost, beguiled,
Her sweat, an elixir that drives me wild.

In its presence, a glimpse of bliss,
Her essence, a scent I can't dismiss.

Where was I before I banished those intrusive thoughts by putting them to paper? Yes. That was it. Lynneth and what she knows.

Lynneth knows nothing of my joy at seeing the Ecstatic Terrace whose beauty not even her presence could dampen. Even if the point of our meeting with the Princess was ruined by Cosine's additional guests and desire to speak on political matters, the sky palace itself was a sight to behold.

In truth, it's possible the Princess really did just wish to poll us on political matters, and Cosine would have still brought up the Legate and still needed soothing. I should have better kept my composure, but the irritations of the day were fresh and compounded by having to see Cosine and Lynneth again together, so soon after they had both mocked me together.

The fact that such an impressive meeting could engender boredom and irritation in me is something worth interrogating at some point. Have I been so thoroughly ruined by my journey inward and my past months here that I have come to prefer the company of feckless mercenaries to Princesses? Surely not. The timing was just terrible. I would have been fine on my own even or with someone else similarly sensible, such as Sergeant Colmes. I am certain.

[cmenden]

Maribeh 21st, IY 7787

I'm not even certain how to begin writing about this. My face burns anew at the memory and trying to put it to words is just making things worse.

Being dropped would have been barely an issue given the short distance to the ground, but still, I was paralyzed with fear and overwhelmed with other emotions besides. I enjoy high places. I often seek them out to chart the sky and have little fear of heights, however, the loss of control is unnerving in its own way.

That is what this whole thing is. The ultimate loss of control.

Is this an attack of some kind?

I must analyze my own feelings carefully and make certain I have not been compromised.

It has been some time since I've faced such a direct attack, but perhaps my rivals grow desperate with my recent successes.

[cmenden]

Maribeh 23rd, IY 7787

I had the perfect plan, but I did not foresee Lynneth apologizing before it could come to fruition. Fortunately, I was able to call it off in time. It was no longer an enjoyable prospect by that point.

It's also possible that Lynneth got wind of my plan and made the overture in an attempt to prevent losing her precious shrine. Either way, it is no great matter. It will likely be better if we are on relatively cordial terms when aiding Amelie as the task may be extremely perilous.

After Lynneth left us in peace, we ate cream pastries together until Cosine intruded upon us. It was related to aiding Amelie, so I could hardly complain, but I still wished to.

These feelings lately draw my thoughts to the book once more. I imagine a game of Xiangqi played over and over again. Each time the game ends, the board is set up anew, and a new game begins. Hypothetically, say you lost a piece in the fourth game and were currently on the fortieth game. Would it make sense to even care about the fourth game at that point? What if you were on the four thousandth game? What if a new player sat down at the table entirely, one who had no memories of the fourth game?

It is a metaphor I find suitably apt. Why should I not care more about my own pieces than hers?

[Further down the page some messy writing can be found]

Kyth
Ky
Kytha
Thaela
Kythie