Whilst perusing a market, Waithvine’s companion hands hir a small statuette of an odd winged God. Nothing seemed to be odd about it, but, when ze handed it back, and statuette soon reappeared in hir pocket. Try as ze might, it always returns, while the merchant who sold it is long gone and the mysterious curse grows ever tighter… -- Deathshead419
Wraithvine had grown used to Girrautuvit sticking her hands in hir pockets. She had yet to learn that it was inadvisable to do that. Especially with attempted withdrawals. But since Girrautuvit was a twig-thin, undersized waif with no real name, Wraithvine was willing to put up with a lot more from her.
This time, she made a deposit.
It was a small, gilded idol of a figure with wings and a beard. There was a heavy toga and boots in the figure's ensemble. There had been gemstones in the eyes, but only one remained. It looked angry, and seemed primed to strike out at a moment's notice. "Girra," Wraithvine warned. "What and why?"
Translation: What do you think you were doing and why did you think it's a good idea?
"It's a gift," said Girrautuvit. "From the vendor back--" she pointed to an empty space between vendors. "Uhm..."
A sure and certain sign that things were going on. Wraithvine could feel a cursed aura around the idol. It had unfinished business and it intended to make that everyone's problem. The usual method of dealing with such things was to build a small altar and shelter the statue there, often with a small sacrifice to help the deity in question calm down.
Wraithvine built the altar by the road outside of the town. Laid out bread, meat, and wine for the offering, as well as a little incense. You could never go wrong with incense.
Except this time, the idol vanished from its new house and returned to Wraithvine's pocket.
Ze took it back out again. "Oh. You want me to deal with this personally." And ze could sense that this was about more than a missing sapphire. Wraithvine held the god close to hir heart and opened hirself to the Divine.
Ereshkygal grudgingly allowed this to happen.
North. This figure had business in the north. And until it got there, an unseasonable cold will follow its bearer. Which happened to be Wraithvine. Lovely. And Girra had to come along for the ride because she had been given the idol first. Which meant they both had to rug up as they started hauling themselves to the frozen northlands.
The god in question would not say anything more than that. Ereshkygal effectively kicked them out of Wraithvine's head. She was a very possessive goddess. The thin good news was that ze had hir portable tower. The bad news was that this god was going to keep things chilly until they reached their destination.
Perhaps, along the way, ze could research who the hells Boreas was and why he was so tetchy.
[Photo by MIGUEL BAIXAULI on Unsplash]
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