Location
The Grove Hall is a location in Neithernor. Deirdre Green knocked into Grove Hall during her second visit to Neithernor.
Description
The Grove Hall is a walled, shaded grove, full of towering white trees that explode into a silver canopy above. The trees are planted in a perfect grid, so as to resemble marble columns, and their white branches and silver leaves slope into a nearly perfect replica of a vaulted ceiling. Very little sunlight makes it through, but what does is bounced off the white tree trunks and leaves a serene glow below. Grass grows, but it’s a deep blue-green, like a night sky over a sea. There are old stone benches, some still in-tact, but the bottoms of the trees spread out wide, leaving comfortable spots to lie down in, in between the roots. Deirdre described it as the definition of tranquil.
The exterior of the Grove is surrounded by a fortress made of dried vines. Some are reedy tendrils, while others are thick as a fist; they reach even higher than the grove’s walls, as if a living castle had grown from the ground and surrounded the grove to protect it. The vines are so tightly coiled that they aren’t generally transparent, but a few gaps allow streams of light to come in. A dense forest exists beyond the vines.
History
Deirdre first described encountering Grove Hall in her blog post, “The Three Manners of Magiq.” Deirdre wanted to explore the rest of Neithernor, but realized that the door to the Warren could not be opened. Realizing that the Mountaineers had used a combination of knocks to get past the chronocompass on the Fletcher Dawson website, she tried using it as a knocking combination. Using the combination from The Road to Fragment Thirteen, Deirdre knocked into what she dubbed Grove Hall. She described it as being almost maze-like and was unable to find a way out aside from knocking back to the mundane world.
Deirdre described returning to Grove Hall in “The Storm - Part One.” She spent days searching the grove, looking for a clue regarding how to learn figuration magiq. She used a string to make sure she could find her way back to the knocking door. At the far west wend, she stumbled upon a small stone statue in the path: a fat toad. She soon realized that more statues were in the area, one for each animal in the poem The Minnying of Ojorad. Deirdre realized that all the statues were facing east, so she followed the path. At the far eastern wall was sepulcher, carved into the wall. It had an arched stone roof and columns, but the door was made of cut crystal, the color of indigo. Light moved behind it. It wasn’t a tomb, but a doorway. Carved into the arch were the words “May His Majesty Pass This Way Again.” There was no way to open the crystal door, since it had no hinges or clasps, but only a slab of transparent mineral. After casting her first figuration magiq, in which she imagined a story of all the people in her life who had passed on, Deirdre was able to pass to the other side of the door.
In “The Storm - Part Two,” Deirdre explored the other side of the wall, finding her way blocked by vines. She followed a “hallway” that had been created by the vines, but eventually, her way was entirely blocked. Looking up, Deirdre saw the skeleton of a giant armored bird, and realized that the wall of vines was created as a way to protect the Grove during the War of Neithernor.