There’s a monastery nearby, near a town called Crestview. There’s a demon named Saevis who was bound inside the monastery by some kind of arcanist. Now that binding is weakening. Saevis has been sending out wolves to cause pain and fear, and that helps weaken the binding.
Note: I need to learn more about arcanists in the area! I didn’t really even know what I’d bonded with for the longest time.
We learned about this by studying some of the wolves, who were attacking a merchant called Dwyer. Dwyer then introduced us to a woman called Anne. She in turn told us about a scribe named Neeta who had come from the monastery, then left again.
Note: we met Neeta! She was in a barn. I really want to talk more with her about scribing.
She told us about some tunnels that lead to the monastery. She said that’s how she got out. There might be slime monsters down there, but I think with Saraid and the Trimaldi Triad, that’ll be no problem.
What would a monastery want to do with tunnels, anyway?
Sputtermeer and Wolment (Vol XII) say that souls are everywhere, and everything is a soul or has a soul. I think of souls like tomatoes. You can have a whole tomato, you can dice tomatoes into chunks, you can purée a tomato into soup and put tomato chunks into it, and it’s all still kinda tomato in a way. You can add other stuff to the soup, or add tomato to other dishes, and it’s always some kind of distinct flavor.
Alys of Ratia wrote in her “Observances” that every soul wants to express itself somehow. Speech is a mode of expression. So are things like motion and color. She said that even things like cloth dyes have a soul of a sort. A red dye wants to be seen. It wants to be bright and exciting and attention-grabbing. I guess a tomato is red because it wants to attract attention too.
Saraid Sciury and the Trimaldi Trio are both more like natural animals than I am. I think the Trimaldis are actual raccoons. I know a lot of animals that speak, but not many that are intelligent.
Saraid said she can understand the wolves. When I call on the Mountain Book, I can understand any language. I wonder if the raccoons have their own language that they speak to each other? I think it’s probably rude to just ask out of the blue, and I don’t want to call on the Mountain Book to eavesdrop on them while they’re talking to each other. But none of that makes me any less curious!
Every soul wants to express itself. But for who and for what and why? Is every soul changed by its interactions, the way you can add other stuff to tomato soup to change its flavor? Is that what souls want? To be changed?
