Chronicles of Caelan

I just got back from a travelling gig I was hired for (sorry, no Internet).  One of the patrons at work turned out to be a manager with the biggest Renaissance Festival in this region of the country and had it arranged with my boss for 3 of us to do Robin Hood for a handful of Faires during various weekends.  Of course we said yes, but we also had to leave right away.  We camped the whole time (which was niiice), though I was able to stay in touch with everyone by phone.

I know how irresponsible it must look to simply take off with so much going on, in both worlds.  I am able to “travel” to the Shire anytime I want (though very briefly, time is so different over there) and stay abreast of developments in dealing with Gasseroth.  I’m not the only one working on that problem…at this point, every realm on that side of the veil is working on it.

It seems that Gasselroth was in love with Alice’s mom and she was in love with the Fae King.  Complicated enough on it’s own, right?  When he found out they had a child (Alice), he kidnapped her and you know that story, for the most part.  We’re still trying to figure out exactly what his power is, how strong, etc. so we can neutralize the threat to the realms.  We’re also still trying to figure out exactly why there’s a threat to the realms to begin with, unrequited love stuff aside, because the Tome of Prophecy is in his possession.  Only a few of us know a few of the prophecies it contains and so, we’re trying to find out how that fits into this whole mess.

Speaking of Alice, she has come a long way in her lessons.  We moved into energy balls and defensive magick already.  There’s a noticable change in her disposition, like she’s building confidence, and it’s nice to see.  She’s a great singer also, not strange to the Fae, but she’s been helping me for a month or so with the different pitches in my own voice. 

Using various pitches makes a definitive difference in my vocal power and during one practice session, I managed to knock down a cup I had sitting on the cooler by my tent!  This keeps up and I could eventually knock ol’ Gasselroth down, lol…perhaps, anyway.  My next step will be to work on meshing the vocal power with words of power.  I’m not even sure if it’s possible, but I am an Elf…if anyone can figure the possiblilties out of something like that, it’s a magickal being.  Besides, it’s logical that the two would work together, so why not try?

I understand I was being vague with that last post and I apologize.  A lot’s been going on an I had to hurry to rehearsal.  At the rate I’m going, it could take some time to catch you all up since I’m always somewhere else these days.

A lot’s been going on lately.  At work, I got chosen to do the part of Maid Marion in Robin Hood.  Something about stage presence, but all I heard was extra pay and a few more hours.  My boss thinks I was away helping my father with his business while he took care of my mother, which is why I wasn’t fired for missing some rehearsals.  Strange thing is, my father turned out to actually own a pretty successful travel company in the Land of Humans…go figure!

I was only in the Shire for a week, but time is different over there, so it was really a little over a month (Elven time).  My mother was actually incredibly worried about me and that’s why she sent the Searchers to find me.  She and Prince Galen’s mother had gotten over the whole “nonsense” of trying to force us to get married, or so I was told.  Strange that it was dropped all of a sudden.

Apparently, it had more to do with consolidating our kingdoms than anything, which didn’t make much sense to me; we could forge an alliance without a marriage.  Asking that led to something about an ancient prophecy that “a future generation to hold power great, but at the price of a danger that can only be thwarted with love”.  To me, it sounded like some ancient hoo-ha designed to keep all the realms friendly or something.

Everybody was pretty concerned over the wannabe Searchers the Dark Fae sent after me.  One of my father’s oldest advisors mentined that the D.F. (whose name is apparently Gasselroth-I’d go by a title myself, LOL) has a strange obsession with the prophecy since he found it in a tome recovered from an old cave.  They say it’s what drove him mad.

Even considering all the craziness and odd behavior everyone exhibited, it was good to see the Shire again; I really missed it, but I’m glad to be back here and getting on with things.

The lesson with Alice went exceptionally well.  She’s either been practicing often or is a natural; she made raising energy seem easy.  Often with beings like ourselves, all that’s needed is some confidence because the talent’s nearly always there already.  With Alice, that’s definitely the case!

She did finally tell me what was bothering her.  It seems her friend from the Fae Realm had been different and eventually just warned her to be careful, that things were strange there.  It’s cool her friend cared enough to warn her, but nothing was ever said about why she’d been warned in the first place (she already knew to watch out for the Dark Fae).

In any case, I walked her home and was starting back to the apartment when I was grabbed from out of nowhere.  What (or who) ever had grabbed me had knocked us into a portal leading…you guessed it!…to the Shire.

Yesterday was, anyway…two of them even.  And I took one, doing nothing all day but relax.  I have no clue if the groundhog saw his shadow or not, but was well aware of the Imbolc celebrations that were going on around me.

The phone rang and it was my boss, wanting to ask me to be an extra in this week’s play because one of the actors quit.  Of course I said yes!  It would be such a change from the ticket booth, the kitchen and the tables…it might even be the only job in that place I haven’t done yet, besides management. 

I had to show up this morning for rehersal.  It’s strange to be there during the day, but it was fun.  We’re doing the Camelot legend and I’m going to be an extra at court.  Not much in the way of lines, which is actually a relief considering the notice (or lack of), but even the smallest of parts are an important part in a production.

Alice is on her way.  We’re both eager for her next lesson…building energy.  This one’s an Elven specialty but, with Alice being half-Fae, I have no doubts that she’ll excel in this as well.  She sounded a bit worried over the phone…I hope nothing’s wrong.

Well, the new cafe was great!  True to their advertisments, they did offer ‘gourmet quality cuisine at diner prices’, lol. 

The problem wasn’t the food…it was the ‘Watcher’ scoping us through the window.  I’m pretty sure Lucian noticed it too, he gave me a look suggesting so; if Ambrosia or Kristos did, they didn’t let on.  It didn’t seem to be doing anything but watching, but that’s plenty bad enough.

After we got back to the apartment, I decided to make protective charms for everyone, including Alice, in the jewelry styles they typically wear.  I once did an apprenticeship with a top Elven enchanter, so I can work these with an insane quickness.  When I gave Kristos his, he smiled and said he knew it was enchanted, quite well in fact.  It surprised me, but led to ‘the talk’…he knew I was an Elf this whole time and never brought it up because it ‘wasn’t his business and I’d tell him if I ever chose to’.  WOW!  He’s more perceptive than I gave him credit for, lol.

It’s been one of those days.  I really need to stop underestimating Humans; it’s an outdated (though ingrained) prejudice anyway.

There’s really not a lot going on today.  Work rocked last night, but when does it not?  My dad came over this morning for another lesson;  I know I haven’t discussed these much, but I’m sworn to keep state secrets, so I really can’t say a lot.

I forgot to mention the other day, but Cheddar’s was so much fun!  It turns out that I’m quite good at Ski Ball, lol.  Kristos is picking me up after work for a ‘late-date’ at the diner, then he’s staying over (on the couch…stop thinking that way!).  We’re going for brunch with Ambrosia and Lucian in the morning to check out this new place downtown.

For the remainder of the day, before work, I’m going to Alice’s to hang out.  Her mom has an afternoon date (!) that she’s bringing home for dinner, so Alice and I are going to clean up the house and fix the meal.  I made the suggestion for homemade borscht with pierogies–something traditional that’s also a little different.  I hope they like my recipe for it.

The new theme at work is the 43 AD siege at an impressive Celtic hillfort, Maiden Castle, which dates back 6000 years!  This is where the Roman 2nd Legion, under Vespasian, introduced (the first time?) the infamous ballista to the battlefield against the pagan forces (made up of stone masons and weapon-forgers from multiple tribes).  This weapon, with it’s awesome range, is the ONLY thing that enabled the success of the Romans.

I’m shifting my costume a bit, from that of a Celtic warrior to an everyday Celt.  No more ‘woad’ on my face or the faux weapons and leather armor I wore last week.  Everything else is basically the same.

The meal is going more Roman to reflect the progressing influence of that culture on the Celtic territories.  The main courses are pork, mullet (type of fish) and a root-veggie stew in a vinegar and anise broth.  Also, to be featured are a wheat flat-round, a fruit/nut bowl with plums, pomegranates, olives, dates and hazelnuts.  Milk and wine are the drinks, and water can be added to the wine for any patron looking to dine like a ‘civilized’ Roman.

I can’t wait to see what the anise and vinegar broth does to that stew…it sounds like an interesting combination.

This evening, Alice and I decided to work on recognizing energy, which is a necessary step to learning to raise it.  We sat in my room, on the floor, and I asked if I could blindfold her.  Being used to my unorthodox methods, she agreed and once done, I set to the task of testing how well she noticed changes ‘in the air’ around her.  Right away I noticed her sense of perception as immaculate; she knew where I was at every turn…and I was as quiet as a mouse, maybe quieter.

Next, I tried it with my own energy under disguise.  She felt the energy, but couldn’t recognize it as mine.  The next logical step is to combine your centering with your recognition, which iswhat I had her do.  The tricky part here is learning to listen to and trust your own inner voice…it’s rarely wrong, but this step is easy to miss.  She didn’t do bad, but it’s something you can’t instantly figure out.  We decided to leave it as homework and continue next time.  She’s learning a lot of info in a relatively short amount of time and adapting beautifully…it would be a waste to push her harder than she can go.

It was still early, so we decided to rent a movie and just hang out.  We were having so much fun that Alice decided to stay over and felt we could work more on the lesson later.  Her mom agreed to it.

After the movie, she confided in me that she had noticed something different lately, and she thought, perhaps, it helped her lesson that her perception seemed to be on kinda full-blast.  I asked her what it felt like and she told me she thought she was being watched.  I froze for a second and asked her some questions about her experience, to get a feel and see if there may be a connection to my problem.

It seems as though she especially feels it when she’s having a telepathic conversation with her friend from the Fae realm.  I suggested it may be that anything around would notice the raise in her aura that comes with something like telepathy and be drawn to it.  There are lots of cases where this is completely harmless.

I’m worried, but I’m not sure if I should say anything to her about my being followed and attacked or what my intell suggests.  What do you guys think I should do?

Kristos calls today and asks me if I’d like to go out with him tonight for dinner and some games.  He said it’s a place called Cheddar’s that has a restaurant and game room, for kids and adults to enjoy.  It sounded fun, so I agreed to go.

It’s been a long time since I’ve played pool or anything like that, but from what I understand, they also have basketball courts, mini-golf, arcade games and something called ski ball.  I’m a little curous to see that is and maybe give it a try.  And whack-a-mole…sounds silly but that could be fun.

Wish me luck…I have no idea what I’m in for exatly!

This evenings lesson with Alice went very well.  She told me she had been practicing the centering exercise every chance she got.  I don’t know what my actual expectations were on that, but whatever they were, she exceeded them!  Proudly, she showed me how easily she could calm herself.  She’s learning fast!

To continue, I went on to show her how to visualize and concentrate focus.  It may sound easy, but if you’ve ever tried it, you know doing it at will can be difficult…especially if you’re under distraction.  It’s not all like daydreaming.  We started with her creating a mental image and then building on it, adding more and more.  The idea is to hold as much detail as possible without missing anything of what you’ve already put there. 

The next step involved my distracting her while she visualized.  I even had Lucian and Ambrosia randomly popping in to ’see if we needed anything’ or ‘if we were hungry’, etc.  The idea here is to give her a feel for the usual types of things that can distract someone during an energy-building.  This is definitely not something that can be mastered in one session; she’ll have to keep working at it until it becomes easy for her.

She did surprisingly well for her first time and when I thought she was ready, I moved on to focusing.  I asked her to see her picture again and then focus in on one detail, all the while maintaining a ‘background view’ of everything else.  It’s somewhat easy until you realize that you have to focus on every little minute detail of that detail while holding the back view, like mental multi-tasking.  Following that, I asked her to shift back and forth on the whole picture to the details and back again.

This is the type of lesson that’s hard to monitor another person’s progress on.  The only exception is someone you have a telepathic link with.  I had to go by her vibes and what she told me was going on with her.  From what I could figure, she is learning everything beautifully.  The change in her confidence level is a great thing to witness; she’s absolutely blossoming.  I do believe she’ll be ready for our next lesson!