Eight Intertwined

75 - Creek

The desert sands were quick to succumb to the natural rolling pastures that came with entering the Riverlands, and Ophilia couldn't tell if she was more welcoming or fearful of what was to come. She had to admit that they had finished up with their journeys to Wellspring and the surrounding areas much faster than she would have expected, and her heart skipped a beat at the idea of what she knew was going to happen next. 

Now that they had gained the blessings of Sealticge, the next step was clear to all of them: it was time to make for Saintsbridge and investigate a potential shrine location in the area. Cyrus seemed rather confident at this point that they were going to find something there. Given that they had encountered shrines near the last five towns they had passed through--each in the second ring of Orsterra's civilizations--it seemed clear as could be that they would likely find the same blessings once more. Ophilia had no idea which god would be waiting for them, but she was oddly on edge about it all. 

Ophilia had known from the start that she would be traveling to Saintsbridge to complete the second part of the Kindling. That much had been the first thing that Josef told her when she decided that she was going to be taking up the journey in Lianna's stead. However, knowing that she would be going to Saintsbridge and arriving in the Riverlands near the city were two entirely separate things, and Ophilia didn't realize just how high her anxiety was running until the rushing of stream water replaced the blustering of sandy winds. 

She should have been fine with this. No, she should have been glad that they were finally back on track. She had been planning to go to Saintsbridge so long ago when the group had first met up with Alfyn, but all of that had changed because of Aelfric pushing her in a different direction. From there, the group was left winding through the rest of the continent wildly, and Ophilia felt as if everything had changed since the days when the group was in Clearbrook. Since then, she had met Therion and H'aanit, watched Primrose destroy the first man of the crow, gotten involved with the theft of the ruby dragonstone, fought against a twisted apothecary with no regard for human life, and seen a man turn to stone under the mysterious power of an unknown beast. So much had happened, and Ophilia didn't think she would ever be able to return to the person she had once been. The Kindling had set her on a new path, and she had no idea what she was supposed to think of it all. 

Back when she was first in Clearbrook, Ophilia had been confident that she would be able to handle whatever Saintsbridge had to throw at her... Though she supposed she should have known better than to let her confidence get the better of her. The last time she had been in the Riverlands before meeting Alfyn, she had still been living in the small village of Creek not far from Saintsbridge. In those days, Saintsbridge was caught up in a conflict with the neighboring Quarrycrest over matters of trade, and it erupted into a war that nearly consumed both cities. In the end, both Saintsbridge and Quarrycrest were able to stand tall after the fact, and while their relationship was not what it once was, they were making progress to return to the way they once had been. 

But Ophilia's home village could never be brought back to the land of the living. It had been a long time since she was last in Creek, but she could still remember the way the town sprawled out across the plains like the back of her hand. She knew the names of all of her neighbors, and each of them had done their part to raise her. Ophilia had loved her parents with all she had, and they had done the same for her. It was a simple life, but it was one that she had come to call her own. 

The battles between Saintsbridge and Quarrycrest took away all of that, and Ophilia didn't know how she was supposed to return to the Riverlands with all of that in mind. It wasn't as if she could necessarily hold much of anything over the heads of the people within Saintsbridge or Quarrycrest; they weren't the ones responsible for the conflict that took away her home and her family, and accusing them of such wouldn't be productive or helpful. Still, it was strange to Ophilia to think that she was going to be returning to the area of her home again after all this time, albeit under completely different circumstances.