The Burning Question

originally posted March 29, 2007

We are well into En'Kara, nine days in to be exact, and it seems the revelry of the first hand has quieted down at last. Of course, the violence in the Garden District, the seemingly random murders and arsons, did its part to quell the excitement of the new year. I heard tell of a toy-maker's shoppe in the Central Cylinder area burning down as well. One could imagine the vacant stares, the silent screams of the dolls on their ledges, never-to-be purchased by some doting free woman for her daughter. How the little girl would have clutched that miniature facsimile of the woman she might one day become, in small slippers and brocaded robes, many veils to obscure her face. But the dolls sat still on their shelves, the flames devouring them, lick by hot lick. The toys of young lads would have faired no better. A wooden gladius would be ready kindling for the rest. It would glow hot and then crumble to ash in time, never to feel its hilt in the awkward grip of a young one emulating the Ubar or other such luminaries as Dietrich of Tarnburg. Will it continue unchecked?