#and i like their tome a lot too i think the memory fragments work really well in it

[qreepystuff]

t-shirt that says i 💖 tome 16: existence

[flawed-menagerie]

A TRUE ACCOUNT OF THE LIFE OF VOLODYMYR ALBESCU

AS DESCRIBED IN HIS JOURNALS

YOUNG LIFE

Volodymyr was the fifth son of seven children in the Albescu family and the last to be born. His family were lesser noblemen in charge of a small piece of land in Thedrell. He was a bright lad who picked up quickly on his studies but always seemed to ask his elders too many questions and push his studies too far. When it was time to learn to check traps in the evening he would be off on the roof of the family home setting up a telescope for star gazing. When he was supposed to be eating dinner he would disappear off into the woods to sketch all of the grand and exciting creatures he encountered. He would make little notes next to the drawings as he learned more about what each doodad or fluff of feather was meant for it. As he got older the drawings and notes he took were getting more elaborate. It was still seen as innocent fun. He generally behaved as a fine young boy of noble breeding when he wasn’t off adventuring so his parents didn’t fuss much.  

A NEW DISCOVERY

AN UNSETTLING REALIZATION

It wasn’t until an intimate encounter with death that Volodymyr shifted to a new obsession. He had been having a picnic in the wood with his grandfather when the old elf suddenly stopped talking. His face turned an odd hue and he kept wheezing and struggling to breathe. He had never realized that elves could die. He sat there frozen like a statue unsure of how to react to the situation. It was strange. The man had been there one moment and then gone the next just like that. How terribly peculiar. The memory was terribly vivid and burned into his mind. This situation had also provided him with a new trinket. His grandfather, who had always been fond of the youngest boy had insisted that his family ring be given to little Volodya instead of one of the more deserving and elder brothers.  

AN IMPULSIVE EXPLORATION

Wanting to understand more about death, and on the other side of the coin what makes up someone’s essence in the first place the elf began to look for something that might be hidden underneath the surface. While on his adventures with his notebook in the woods he brought along a small blade and began to document the anatomy of any dead creatures he happened upon on in his hikes. But animals were animals, perhaps they were missing that thing that spark he had seen leave his grandfather. Unwilling to let a few rules and locked doors hold him back he began to frequent and explore nearby catacombs as well. He asked his parents for more research texts and old tomes that might have something he might have missed never giving a clear answer when asked. “What’s this all about?”

A NEW WORLD

MEETING DIMITRI

On one of his many trips to the catacombs he soon realized that he wasn’t alone. A sharp tinkling of a bell could be heard as he passed through the dark and into an area where a fresh body lay on a slab of stone. Each time it rang it felt like something deep within him was being tugged gently. Squinting in the dark he spied a Diminutive Fae like being who had his ear pressed against the lips of the dead elf inside. In one hand the stranger was clutching a glass bell that seemed to glimmer in the dark. This stranger gave a little start when it realized it wasn’t alone. He explained to the noble that he was a tender of spirits and a master of the undead arts. Intrigued and not at all bothered that he had been disrupted from his studies he begged the fairy to teach him about his abilities.  

A GROWING FRIENDSHIP

Dimitri agreed to teach the elf about his kind of magic. About its dangers and its rituals. One of Dimitri’s favorite things to say was that “If you have an unbreakable will nothing is impossible” The pair couldn’t be more different. Volodymyr was Serious, Analytical, and preferred to break things down into digestible chunks. Dimitri was a spiritualist, Excitable, and looked at everything at a larger picture. Despite their differences they learned to play to each other’s strengths, and spent much of their spare time together.

One thing that was off limits in the lessons was the bell. Volodymyr was told he would need to learn to summon his own bell to Practice Necromancy. Each bell was unique to a bearer’s own energy, to use someone else’s was dangerous. Despite this warning Volodymyr focused his energy on learning how to dispel that rendered the bell unusable if in the wrong hands. He focused a lot of his time away from Dimitri learning more Magic in general. As the years passed Dimitri and Volodymyr grew close. For Volodymyr Dimitri was like a brother, better than a brother, but the young fae bore a complicated but deep seeded love for the odd elf.  

THINGS FALL APART

A DIFFERENT SORT OF DISCOVERY

While off on one of his many journeys with Dimitri Volodymyr’s sister Sofia followed him to a cemetery and watched in horror as she watched her younger brother treat the dead with such ill respect, in her and much of society’s opinion. When word got back to Volodymyr’s mother she confronted the young man who was now 43 years old. They got into a horrible argument about morality and spirituality that eventually ended in news that he would be sent to live with distant relatives in Wepkiir so that he wouldn’t bring embarrassment upon the family name.  

A HORRIBLE MISTAKE

Desperate and angry about the news Volodymyr spent the last few days he had with Dimitri lethargic and irritable. He was never going to see his friend again and this was going to be the last chances he had to break the spell on their bell and give it a ring. He stole the bell when Dimitri wasn’t looking and dispelled its protective magic. He crept over to the cadaver they had been practicing on controlling earlier and gave the bell a single ring. His body felt a great tug, but the ear pressed against the cold lips heard a single word that was completely muffled by the roar of Dimitri’s voice when he had realized what he had done. He scolded him for being so careless and that he had made the rule about the bell for his safety. Angry as well and ready to snap he squeezed the bell between his fingers and cursed at the fairy. Telling him that he was overprotective and being stupid. That he probably liked the bell more than himself. That he hated him. Furious he smashed the bell against the stone with the protective spell still inert. The last words that passed between his lips while he was still alive were I hate you, unless of course you counted the scream that ripped from his lungs as hundreds of diamond like shards of glass tinkled about him like rain. With Each hit ripped at his very being pulling his life essence from his body and ripping it to pieces.  

THINGS GET PUT TOGETHER

LOSING DIMITRI

In a panic Dimitris mustered the energy to summon a new bell for himself. He rang it frantically trying to pull his friend back to his body before it was too late. But it was too late, the pieces of Volodymyr were too fragmented to stay put for long. He kept slipping through his fingers like sand. Holding his friend’s hand in his own he felt the gem of a familiar old ring in his palm. It gave him a foolish idea. He couldn’t think of anything that he wanted more than to fix this right now even if it meant he wouldn’t exist anymore. He would be more than willing to die for his friend but this would be something more. He pulled the retreating soul shards closer to himself and let out a soft sigh. He rended his own life into something that could only be described as a glue to hold those errant pieces together and bind them both into Volodymyr’s old family ring. This object would serve as a phylactery holding them together in this world until the day came where it should be destroyed. In a way they made a new being completely that night. The new Volodymyr had aspects of Dimitri’s personality and knowledge in him, as well as the problems and strengths that came along with being undead.

NOT QUITE THE SAME MAN

The ritual that had brought back his mind and his spirit did not do the same for his body. Broken and clearly a mess he allowed his parents to send him away to the frigid city. There he was able to preserve himself temporarily until he could work out the proper alchemical and magical means to maintain his mortal body. Despite his best efforts decades of minuscule rot is starting to take hold of his softer tissues. He does his best to preserve himself but he doubts he can keep it up indefinitely.  Once he knew how to take care of his body without the cold he began to travel the world and study new places. All the while he is constantly studying new necromantic and medical techniques This is one of the only things he can do that reminds him of happier times back when he was really himself and he had a best friend at his side instead of within his very soul.