Hey everybody, it’s Eaves this time.
There’s a lot to say, and first, I’m sorry, though I know you’ll probably tell me I don’t need to be. I am, and I hope you’ll accept my apology. It’s important to me.
I just went back to my previous posts. I could see the tone I had in my original update about life here at the castle just slowly dissolve into angsty, stressed-out mush over the course of the past couple months. I didn’t realize it was happening at the time. I was just trying to manage everything, be there for you and Saberlane, be here for Gav and Theo, be a point of hope for everyone at Lion’s Heart. It turns out that leadership is hard.
I don’t think I realized just how much I needed things to settle down for a little while, until they did, and then they were all suddenly unsettled again by the codex. Like something had broken through the castle’s defenses without us knowing, you know?
It’s just been a lot. Escaping the Silver, the journey from the other side of the world to the castle, losing the herald just before we made it here, finding out we’d also lost Ascender, and so many people who came to the sanctuary seeking a home and a way to learn more about who they were suddenly losing their connection to the magimystic when the age was born… It was hard to see them feel diminished, lesser than they were, and not be able to reassure them or help them.
I screwed up with the codex. Sending it, not telling anybody, all of it. I know. I wasn’t thinking. It could’ve gotten intercepted by someone, damaged, lost, or just stopped working the way Saberlane intended because it wasn’t where he left it. It was a bad move, I know. I just needed to lessen the weight I was carrying, and I knew it would be in good hands with Endri and Aether. I hope I didn’t screw anything up. If I did, I’ll do whatever you need me to do to make it right.
So that’s that. I’m sorry. I should’ve said everything, or something, to someone, but I thought I could fix it all myself. And I almost exploded.
So, onto the castle. For a brief second last Sunday, Charlie felt some kind of emotional aura when I was gone and everything went haywire. It turns out Sunday night was also a Leo new moon AND a lion’s gate portal, so maybe that’s why Charlie felt what he felt (a growing theory around BC34 is that some magimystic forces of the new age are connected with astronomical/astrological phenomena. Yuri is dying to explore that theory, but, well, you know…)
Regardless, something here is either scared of losing me or feeling like it needs to protect me, or both. It doesn’t seem to react to anyone else, and Charlie thinks it might’ve latched onto me because I’m the leader of BC34 (his words, not mine) and sort of the “steward of the castle.” Regardless of why, everything got worse when I started going through my particularly elevated emotional turmoil, including but not limited to cutting me (and everyone else) off from the outside world more and more often, specifically after the codex would do its thing.
We know Rasia knows a lot about Lion’s Heart, and her family has been keeping an eye on it and its residents for a long time, as far as we know, so Gav and a few others have “gone down the mountain” to find out what they can, about what this presence is, why it’s doing what it’s doing, and whether or not we can ask it to… you know, not.
Meanwhile, I’m up here with a skeleton crew and Theo hoping zero more things happen while they’re gone. I know it’s supposed to be protecting me, but I’m not so much about that haunted life, especially when Gav is gone.
So, it turns out our big stone puppy has some behavioral issues, and we need to get to the bottom of it before it gets worse because Guide knows the alternative solution, me managing to keep my feelings in check, is an even taller order than retraining a castle with separation anxiety.
They’ll be back first thing tomorrow morning, and as long as the power’s on, I’ll let you know what they learned if anything.
Love you all.