Kannadi's Account of Her Return [journal]

[Jackscarab]

An Accounting is in order, for to better commit recent Happenings to memory via paper on this, the first page of my new Field Journal.

 

It has been now three days since my return from the Battle at Carteneau, a return delayed some five years. I feel that I have sufficient evidence to say that the “Driver” of my “Carriage,” as it were, was Louisoix, by way of a Magic unknown.

 

Such changes, in the past half-Decade. Such similarities as well.

 

I of course found myself not aged a day past Twenty-Six. No hair or nail of mine had lengthened the slightest since the day of the Battle. No weight was lost or gained, or muscle atrophied. Save for the unusual dermal Patterning that had appeared below my neck & between my shoulders (discovered after some Contortion and examined more easily with a second mirror), I had no sign of Difference at all.

 

It was naturally of no small wonder to Mother or Father.

 

I stepped through their door, and my presence caused quite a terrible Confusion. It took the work of some minutes to return Mother to her senses. Father, having only recently returned from abroad, was beside himself with Joy. It was from them that After-Noon, as well as from Leyla (whom I later met at the Quicksands, same as ever), that I learned the present State & Condition of my Family, which I will here recount -- but only after one Detail of utmost relevance.

 

It seems that my family had forgotten my Face.

 

Evidently, all clear recollections of my Countenance had vanished from Memory -- and not only concerning myself, but all who were trans-ported. It is my further understanding that even our Names and Histories had been muddled into amnesia among practically all denizens of Eorzea. From what scant information I have gathered, only Adventurers present at Carteneau were Forgotten, and the Forgetting may have been a result of increased Aether following the Calamity, or of Louisoix’s spell, or both. Or perhaps neither. Further study is required.

 

At any rate, my family had not been afflicted with Complete amnesia of me. Mother and Father still remembered that they had a girl-child, and that the child was I, and that my name was Kannadi. (Perhaps they remembered more than most because they had known me as more than a simple Adventurer, or could they have a natural Tolerance for Aether? -- Study further.) As for my face, they knew they were not mad, for Portraits of me had gone unaltered, thus proving (alongside their own memories, and the words in my old Journal) that I had existed.

 

And yet they simply could not recall how I looked!

 

I find nothing about my absence quite so bizarre as that. Father, Mother, and Grandmother too, described their memories of my face as little but Silhouette. Even when they beheld the Portraits of me for many minutes on end, they felt no spark of Recognition, no glimmer of Connection, as if they were portraits of Tea-cups instead. Very bizarre -- worthy of further study! But, I am happy to write, they completely remember all aspects of me now.

 

As for them, and the rest of my Relations:

 

Father yet maintains his Museum, the History’s Torrent (a play upon words after his Name), but has expanded in the sector of Business, viz. the Gridanian Markets. He took initiative to help them, after seeing many other Ul’dahns do so, for the ruin the Calamity laid upon the Black Shroud provoked a very personal Sympathy. Mother, after all, once called Gridania home.

 

Regarding Mother: distressed at the loss of me, she redoubled her Faith, which was already great in quality and quantity, to Nophica, in the hope that the Matron would deliver me safely home. It seems Mother made Pilgrimage to the Wells, weekly at least and daily when possible, for the entire span of five years. So fervent was her Wish for my return, she now leads Liturgies as nothing less than a Priestess for the Nophican community of Ul’dah. Now that I have indeed returned, I suspect that not even one-hundred Dalamuds could shake her beliefs.

 

Her brother Avinash is now a widower. Aunt Amrita was slain by bandits not half a year after the Calamity. Uncle soon became distraught at the Ruin that had become of Gridania, and sold complete ownership and operation of the Lahar family’s textile business to Sunsilk Tapestries. This he did without consulting Mother, or indeed informing her until he delivered her half of the generous Payment. With his own half he poured himself into the role of a Quartermaster with the Adders. The Twins, now my age, remained with him. They fill their days with busy Crafting for their nation’s Grand Company.

 

Now I suppose is the place to mark that the Albedo family has suffered significant loss -- not precisely equal to Mother’s family in the Garlean invasion two decades ago, but comparable, and of sad Consequence by any measure.

 

Uncle Alicanto and Auntie Aicha both perished in the very moment of the Calamity. As Leyla reported it, when I met her in the Quicksands, they had both greatly feared the Monsters roaming free in the streets. And so they had locked themselves within a Tower and barred the door to prevent Others, friend and fiend and stranger alike, from encroaching upon their Safety. When Dalamud broke, a stray flaming rock struck their hiding-place, and killed them both.

 

I felt that the World was better for having lost them, yet I dared not state that opinion, so I had asked Leyla how she had come by that Knowledge. The answer was her brother Rasim.

 

Rasim had the terrible luck to have been standing out-side the tower, shouting within at his parents at the moment of Impact. The tower’s ruin fell upon him, crushing his legs. He came to be rescued, in time, but nothing could be done for his unfortunate Limbs. In the years between then and now he had ascended to the rank of Doctor in the Phrontistery, all the more impressive considering his dis-ability. For want of legs, he travels about in a Wheeled Chair of his own design & construction. Despite that, I understand his life to be quite Comfortable, being that the Inheritance of his parents fell largely to him.

 

Why to him? This is why:

 

The eldest Albedo child, who has the name too bitter to write, has vanished. It seems he divested & sold all his Worth, privately, shortly after the Calamity. What Intentions he had, none know. No trace of that man has been seen in five years. And hopefully not for many more. I hope he found himself beset by Bandits as he fled the Sultanate.

 

As for Haytham, the youngest, Leyla turned Grim in her reporting. He too is lost, but not to Death or Injury, though that is possible for all we know, and would be the same regardless….

 

It seems the Garleans do not murder all whom they capture. For fit children of Haytham’s age, they proceed to Indoctrinate them to their horrible Cause. Such they have done with him. His health & location can only be guessed at. None in the family hold hope for alleviating their ignorance. Nor do they wish to, for fear of the Horrors they may learn.

 

The poor, blameless boy. So proud of his aim.

 

Happily, though, Leyla reported that her Sisters survive. Nadra, still a “runt” yet evidently of a mellower and less-selfish Disposition than when I knew her, lives & works with Rasim, tending to his requests and opening his doors. Dima, now older than me by Body if not by Calendar, married last year a Roegadyn (by name of Zaenlahz), and serves with the Flames as a Culinarian of no small merit.

 

Also, the family has regained one to help fill the Void left by the others. Uncle Rilo has returned. It seems the Calamity drove him home to see what had become of the Family he had once quit. I have yet to meet him again, but his return is well come. Only his distress at Ul’dahn Materialism had kept him away so long.

 

And finally, Grandmother, to no one’s great Astonishment, has scarcely slowed despite her age of four-score-and-four.

 

In the Calamity’s After-math, the family’s (which is to say Grandmother’s) wealth -- a product of Real-Estate and Lending and compounded Interest -- suffered a heavy blow, by the loss of many official Records in the very tower where Uncle and Auntie lost their lives. But Grandmother, Twelve bless her greedy heart and glass-sharp mind, leveraged decades of Experience and every last onze of her life-long Royalist Influence to mitigate the loss as best she could.

 

The thrust of it is this: Metal Mirrors Financing was absorbed entirely by the Platinum Mirage, in exchange for a complete settling of all Debts. Grandmother’s personal assets, which shall be Willed to Father in the fullness of Time (and not to Uncle Rilo who was adamant in his Disinterest), are now:

 

One lifetime S-Rank Platinum Mirage gaming membership (transferrable),

& her home at 2 Garnet Street, plus contents thereof,

& multiple shares in Black Brush Station,

& a respectable stake in the Gold Bazaar mythril vein,

& a few modest tracts of bare Land currently being developed near to the Silver Bazaar,

& her own substantial savings in simple gil.

 

All told, it is a considerable Diminishment of the wealth to which I am eventual heir, though I doubt if I shall ever call it that within ear-shot of my less Fortunate acquaintances.

 

I also doubt if our sur-name will ever again attain such power as when Grandmother sat on the Syndicate, or even quite as much as we had antecalamitas, but what worth is that anyway? Through Father’s ventures and Grandmother’s maneuvering, we are happily content in our plushed seats, malms away from Bank-ruptcy. The Albedos shall be comfortable into the Eighth Astral Era.

 

And now I have spent too long at this table. The Waitress looks impatiently at me. Another entry another time. I still have a reborn realm to explore…

 

 

~ Kannadi Albedo