Serpents First Knight

[Profezzor_Darke]

This would be the day. He was ready. Ready to leave home. Leave the Hospice.

Leave Melanie, who cared for him like a Mother.
Old Sister Victoria who taught him all there was to know.
Brother Bertram who showed him how to fish in the Arden.

Melanie already had packed him a bundle with supplies, some sandwiches and pasties for the road as well.

It was clear he wouldn't become a warlock of Hala years ago, no. Too ambitious was his demeanour. Too bright his place in the wheel of fate.

They all agreed it would be best if he would leave, find his destiny, himself included.

And so he set out. Out on a quest for the Quest itself. A Pilgrimage - towards the next duty. A Knight Errant.

Perhaps it was his ancestry that spoke to him.
Perhaps it was Hala's call.
Perhaps it was Destiny.

But soon, just a few days off from home, the mists came over him, and he stranded, like many others, in Barovia...

[Profezzor_Darke]

The start wasn't easy.

A proper Knight like in the stories.
The stories he wanted read to him when he was little.
Sister Melanie always complied in the end. Despite her young age she always was like a mother to him.
He loved to hear how the heroes of those tales were challaneged by their own virtues and ancient laws.

He asked if those laws were real.
Melanie said, "Once they were, yes... When the words of a Witch still had weight, when Chivalry was common practice, when Hospitality was respected..."

And so the young orphan grew up with ideals. Ideals, that were so ancient, they had almost been forgotten...

But that came with a requirement. He needed armour. And a sword! And of course a steed!

Well, the steed could wait. He couldn't ride.

All he could do was fence with a stick and a barrel lid, like he did with some of the village kids.
The ones that were ready to play with him, even if their parents told them to not play with the Vistani orphan that was raised by the Witches.
A bad omen, they said.

There was the abandoned Manor up the Hill. No one went there since it burned down all those years ago. It had been empty before. No land owning nobility was left in Mordent, besides the Weathermays, and those manors sometimes changed hands in deals of rich merchants, as investions alone. Who had owned the Estate last?
He couldn't remember.

He found some things that looked Knightly enough. Some armour pieces, a heavy sword, a shield...

It would be enough. Surely!

[Profezzor_Darke]

Old Mother Gertrude, as reclusive as she was, praised his good manners when they ate together each evening.
Else she frowned a lot, especially whenever Sister Melanie admitted that his medical studies were alright, but that he didn't show any talent to shape the weave.

"You know what this means."
"Yes, Gertrude..."
"He needs to go once he grows up. We will need to send him away. You will need part from him."
Melanie sighed, "Oh I know..."
"Don't be sad, Melanie, I can feel a ripple in the Weave about him. Hala has doomed him to a purpose, I am sure."
"Doomed?", asked Melanie concerned.
"It doesn't mean what people nowadays think it does, Melanie. But that is not your lesson to learn. Regarding yours, though..."

--

He had been a while in Barovia now, and this memory resurfaced.
When he took that old mantlepiece sword some inspiration awakened in him.
As if something always awaited to be released.
His tool wasn't the Athame, his was the Sword.
But to what purpose?
Until then it all had seemed a silly idea he had followed...
Chivalry.
Childs play.
But it convinced him...
And now...
All of this...

--

He had started meditating, as the Sisters had taught him, in that night he stayed in the ruins of the manor. And he heard whispers.

No hauntings, no, he knew those.

A woman talked to him.

In his mind.

He didn't understand the words directly, for they were murmurs everywhere, a sound as if a finely woven cloth was moving across a meadow in spring, but he understood the revelations they taught about him.

And the Mantlepiece Blade began to shine...