Valas Baneshot's Journal
Author: Valas Baneshot (young)
Father gave me this book early before my seventh birthday. Says that I should write in it. Keeps telling me I'm smart. Mother says too smart for my own good. Adults are weird.
Place/Gathering Discovered: The Story-Tellers VI Date: September 17th, 1010 M.R. Transcribed by: Aven I don't know what to write. This feels silly. Like homework. I wish Father and Mother had gotten me the kitten I asked for instead. A kitten that could eat all the snakes around here. I don't like this book. Maybe I'll lose it in my stuff somewhere. Then I won't see it again. Then maybe I won't see a lot of things. Like ghosts. Nov 13, 986 M.R. ----- I never understood it, the need for writing in journals. The need to keep some sort of record of thoughts, hopes, dreams, and fears. Especially not out in the open like this. And yet here I am, writing this for... myself? For you? You, who is nameless. Formless. Some audience I hope to impress? But journals are meant to be kept private, he said to me when he handed it off. 'They're meant to be personal, only to soothe your own soul, and filter out your own mind from thought to pen on paper.''...he talked a lot. I wondered if he enjoyed the sound of his own voice. I'll never know. At any rate, my father says that I'm quite intelligent for a boy my age. And I just turned seven. Already I carry myself like a man, my father tells me, and thus I should have this journal. I should write in it. I should keep my thoughts on record, and yet to myself. ...I never understood it. My mother's calling me. Guess I'll put this away and-- well, I have no idea if I'll return to this or not. Seems like a silly thing in the end for me to have, really. I mean, who else is going to read this? Sep 08, 987 M.R. ----- Found this in the back of the trunk. Only two entries. Figures. I've never really been focused. The ghosts are still around. I don't know why. Mother & Father just moved the entire family; laborers, servants, everyone, into Fletcher's Country. I know my father makes a lot of money here for the bows and arrows we produce, and my mother... actually, I have no idea what she does. I'll go ask her later. The ghosts seem to take an interest in the arrows: its where I see them the most. Mother gave me a pendant not too long ago, made of amethyst. Said it would help me become a better diviner and to sort the ghosts where they needed to go. I never understood that, though. Too afraid to ask her *why* I need such a thing; I have been helping the ghosts go where they needed to go since I've been five. It's actually, I think, where I get my 'intelligence'. Father's never around much anymore, and Mother has me tutored, but the ghosts teach me a lot of things, say a lot of things. I've heard about lands outside of Blackwood, and kings and queens and forests that are actually green, not drab and gray, or black at night like ours is. The ghosts seem to want to go back home, but most of them I tell them they're dead, you see. And then I sneak out to the border with a lot of them, and push them out so they can float into the sky. That must be where ghosts go... and what clouds are made of. Ghosts. June 21, 988 M.R. ----- Tried casting my first seance' ever in secret. I don't like doing it when Father demands I practice, because I always feel weird for the entirety of the three minutes and no one shows up, anyway. It's just Father staring at me. I've learned to tune it out now, but sometimes I come back to my sense and Father's taking some paper away from me or is suddenly right there in my face. It's scary. This seance' though, went okay. A little girl actually showed up, all dressed in white. Usually I see through ghosts, but this one was different somehow. More like a friendly ghost than a sad one. She said that she had been watching me for some time, but didn't know how to approach me. That's a right awful thing to tell me: now I have to worry about ghosts watching me in my sleep, too? She laughed at me and wanted to be friends. She's a bit creepy... we'll see. Mother called for me not soon after to say that Father had brought home a pet. Turned out he got a huge snake from some place called the Kingdom of Flowers or some such, in the far seas to the south-east. I hate snakes. You can't pet them, you have to feed them live animals, and they never sleep. At least, they look like they don't. And Father insists I spend time with the snake; a bonding to a familiar, he called it. I don't want to get familiar with that animal. I'm not even sure it counts as one. I also discovered a word for what I'm good at: necromancy. It means I basically talk to the dead to divine the future. My father says that means I'm a 'seer', but I actually looked up the two words and I'm certain I've got it right. July 21, 988 M.R. ----- The little girl doesn't have a name, and refuses to name herself, so I've taken to calling her Aisling, or even Story-Teller, because she keeps telling me all these wonderful stories. Whenever I ask her how she died, though, the seance' ends rather abruptly. It's weird. Father and Mother are having yet another meeting with their friends while I have to stay home. They've all been friends for years, Father says, and it's good to keep ties even after moving. I wish some of their friends had other kids, though. It's lonely being the only kid around sometimes... well, me and Aisling are fine, but the other kids that aren't part of Father's 'friends'... they're too rough for me. I get beat up a lot, now, and teased for seeing ghosts and spirits. The other day, when Mother and I came to the trading post, two women were whispering about how I was just a 'medium for the ages'. Now, I know what sizes are: large, medium, small, but I've never heard the word medium used in that way. When I asked Mother about it, she told me to shush. I tried to find my dictionary to figure it out, but its missing among my stuff. ...I think I'm strange. October 31, 988 M.R. ----- Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me; happy birthday dear Valas, happy birthday to me. I turned eight today. The servants celebrated with me, and Mother made an appearance. I'm surprised, given how busy her and Father have been as of late. I overheard one servant say to another that there was only one year left to complete a transaction. I had to look up the last word (I saved up and bought a new dictionary), but apparently my parents made some kind of deal that they have to pay back. I don't know why that would upset Mother or keep Father away for weeks at a time on business. It's not like we don't have the money: we're the richest family in town, now. I mentioned I saved up, right? Well, I thought about it for awhile and now I actually peddle my services, all by myself, to kids and young adults. They get to talk to all kinds of people, and learn things like I did... but sometimes I make it up just so I can get their money. It's fair trade for all the rough-housing from last year. They don't bother me so much anymore, now that I'm taller than most of them. Mother says I'm growing like a weed, and given the plants around Fletcher's Country I don't really think I like that. Maybe there's a way to keep me looking normal on the outside, even if I'm strange on the inside. Still haven't let on to Mother or Father about these thoughts, and it's probably for the best: with the way they've been working I don't want to burden them with something I'll probably grow out of. ...hopefully before I grow out of this bed. Maybe I should save up for a new one of those, just in case. November 19, 988 M.R. ----- Haven't written for a very long while. Mostly because someone went through my stuff, found my journal, and ripped out a whole bunch of pages. Why would anyone do that to my book?! It's MINE, don't they get that? Only left me a few entries, so I barely can remember Aisling and all sorts of stuff... I was told that when you're a child, you remember everything, and being an adult meant you started forgetting. I'm not ready to be an adult yet, but here I am, realizing how much I've forgotten in the past few months. ...and I don't know why. ...I'm scared. August 6, 989 M.R. ----- Locked book away in the chest. Am really starting to think I'm losing it. Ghosts are everywhere now, and even in my dreams. I see grand places I've never been to, and drink and taste all these things in my dreams. There's always some woman or man I'm arguing with, though, and there are masks everywhere. Everyone's hiding behind a mask. And no one believes me when I tell them I'm just a kid, and I don't know what's going on. And then the darkness comes in the front door, and I try to escape it, but the king catches me, and then I always wake up in some sort of pain. The servants say it's just growing pains in my 'joints' and that it'll pass. If this is what I have to deal with for the next few years, this is awful. I don't know if I can. Miss Mother and Father terribly. September 14th, 989 M.R. ----- Woke up and found snake dead in my arms. Servants were screaming and yelling, and I screamed too. Had no idea where Mother came from, but she was there. Finally was able to slink off and write. Don't know why I'm trying. I'm so confused and lost, and I don't remember anything that happened. What's happening to me? I'm really, really scared. Where's Aisling? How come she won't come back? October 26, 989 M.R. ----- Another birthday for me. I'm nine, now. Mother was able to find some way to get the dreams to stop with a spell (she didn't tell me which) on the pendant she gave me a while ago. I'll keep it near me from now on. There have also been a lot less ghosts around, so I don't have to practice my divinations anymore. Which is good, because everything I kept asking about pointing me to a desolate place filled with chaos, and then a growing darkness that seemed infinite that threatened to consume Blackwood and everything I ever knew... and why would *anyone* want to live in a place like that? I'll stay here in Fletcher's Country, thank you! At any rate, Mother had a surprise for me, a kitten! It's gray and white, but it looks like she rolled in ash from a fire that's died. Maybe that's what I'll call her. Ash. And Father has a surprise, too. I'm to meet with the adults and actually have a fine dinner with them. One of them, a young lord named Byecross, seems really interested in teaching me more about divination and taking me with him to study abroad. Neat! I hope I get to take this book. Well, Mother's calling for me. I'll write how it all turned out when I get back. November 19th, 989 M.R. |
Created by Janna Oakfellow-Pushee at 09-19-12 07:45 PM
Last Modified by Janna Oakfellow-Pushee at 09-19-12 07:45 PM