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Personal Style
Apparel
Skin
Scene
Measurements
Length
2.73 m
Wingspan
3.3 m
Weight
176.45 kg
Genetics
Moon
Tiger
Tiger
Pistachio
Basic
Basic
Mauve
Basic
Basic
Hatchday
Breed
Eye Type
Level 25 Tundra
Max Level
STR
115
AGI
8
DEF
6
QCK
75
INT
5
VIT
20
MND
5
Lineage
Parents
- none
Offspring
- none
Biography
“If you're anyone, you're someone more than I am.”
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 ginkgo _ wayfarer | exorcist _ they / he |
The first you see of Ginkgo is lightness. Light of word, light of finger, he seems to melt into the hazy glow of a winter evening himself – and light of heart? Perhaps. Light of word, because he has a bedside manner fit for a convent, with his gentle voice and gentler hands and that tender, heartbreakingly small smile that could mean a thousand things. Light of finger, because by the time you have known his name and given your own, he’s lifted one or three belongings from your pockets. He’ll give them back without hesitation if you catch him, but never with a sorry or an I-beg-your-pardon. He will apologize for many things but he cannot apologize for trying to live, just like you. If, by some miracle, you’ve asked him to do some small favor like cure a cold or stitch a cut, he’ll do it with grace, but long afterwards you might realize that dollar bill or silver amulet has been missing ever since. And light of heart? He has a soft laugh that puts you at ease, and a straightforward manner that’s friendly enough, if a bit reserved. He believes in the conversation of silence – to watch and wait and speak through actions rather than words. But spend enough time with him and there is a yearning, almost frightening ache deep beneath his smiles and nods and comments on the weather. There are scars of old shackles on his wrists and ankles, and his eye is hollow with a memory long scarred over. He calls himself the Chaser of Ghosts for a reason. He will do your wildest bidding, from faerie-hunting to crack exorcism, and all the while, he knows he chases the ghosts of your past to run from the ghosts of his own. |
“Are you going where I am going? Let's go together. The world is lonely, cold, and beautiful.”
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He speaks little of his past, claiming it has been too long to remember. But with patience and a fair share of force, it’s possible to press out of him the bottled-up history he has tried so hard to forget.
Born on the Southern Icefields, Ginkgo had always been fascinated with everything green and growing. He marveled that plants could survive on the barren tundra. He wanted to know all the world had to offer about life and how it worked, and above all how to save a life.
But it seemed he was doomed to cruel irony from the beginning. Among his Tundra flock, he was safe. They were his world, strong and warm and indomitable as the continents … until they weren’t. A slip, and a crack of ice, and crashing snow and a white world. And everything was gone. A traveller dug him out of his icy grave, half-frozen. It was only because of his small size that he had caught against a tree and survived.
Snow, a mage from the Starfall Isles, took the orphaned Tundra under her wing as an apprentice. He would always remember their first meeting — tiny and fluffy, gazing up at the great, grand Imperial who looked like she could squash him with a claw.
And then she put her massive head down on the ground beside him and asked, "Hello, Ginkgo. How would you like to learn how to heal?"
He was ecstatic.
Unfortunately, right from the start it was clear that though he threw his heart into his studies, his mind and his paws could never match up. When she told him a spell to repeat forwards and backwards, he said it backwards and forwards and sneezed halfway through. When this herb had to be diced and those books stacked, he diced the books and stacked the herbs. Many were the scoldings that went long into the night, and more often than not the little Tundra went to bed sniffling. Though Snow was a kind master, Ginkgo seemed to have a knack for pushing her beyond her limits. And the wrath of an Imperial was no trifling matter.
“Get your head out of the clouds, Ginkgo!” she used to shout. “I like you, but how can I teach you when you keep slicing up my textbooks and putting them in the fireplace?”
And he would reply, almost in tears, “I am, I am! I’m trying my best!”
It could not be long before he drove himself to disaster.
One day, rushing out to contain a three-headed Emperor, Snow tossed him hurried instructions over her shoulder. “Don’t forget to feed the familiars and review the spells we were working on yesterday!” she called. “Wish me luck, and don’t blow up the lair!” And with that, she was gone. She forgot to wish Ginkgo luck.
His fortune held out till midnight, when a voice woke him crying, “Snow! Snow!”
Shaking the sleep from his eyes, he scrambled to the mouth of the lair and peered out into the darkness. “Snow’s not here. She’ll be back soon, I hope.”
Another Tundra paced outside. “Is that you, Ginkgo? Quick, it’s an emergency. My daughter’s been hit by a Centaur arrow.”
“Let me get some supplies.” Seizing a bag of first aid, Ginkgo sprinted out after the stranger. The night blew cold in his face. He heard the little dragon’s moans before he saw her, and flinging down the bag, searched through her blood-soaked fluff for the projectile. It was buried deep between her ribs — such a hit might have already punctured her organs.
“Shh,” murmured Ginkgo, “it’s okay. We’ll fix you up right away,” and dug through the bag, and went cold. Did he extract the arrow straightaway or break off the fletching? Was it spell first, to numb the pain, or bandage first to stop the bleeding? And all the while the hatchling’s cries were growing weaker and her breaths shallower. He had to do something. Trembling with panic, he eased the arrow backward out of the wound, wincing at the spout of blood that followed, and bound her torso tight with linen. Once he was sure the bandages were sturdy, under his breath he muttered the ditty that came with painful injuries.
Haste and bloody needs a rhyme
So call upon glacier snow and time
To soften pain and —
Mid-verse he stopped. “Oh gods, gods,” he groaned.
The Tundra mother bolted upright. “What is it?” she demanded. “My daughter will live, won’t she?” But Ginkgo had his head in his palms. He had forgotten the spell to close open wounds. That ought to have been the first step. Would it still work after the bandages and the numbing? Ignoring the mother’s exclamation of indignation, he tore off the linen and ransacked his memory for the right rhyme — and then it was too late. He held a rag-doll in his paws, and the icy plains were dead quiet.
“Damn you, you’ve killed her!”
Bowled over by the Tundra’s cuff, Ginkgo tried to fend off her blows with wings and feet. Her claws were out, and he cringed before the wild rage in her eyes. Unable to bring himself to fight back, he felt each strike sink through his flesh as he shielded his face.
“I — I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I tried —”
Silence.
“— I’m sorry!” He woke gasping on the floor of Snow’s lair. There was nothing to show the damage dealt by the Tundra mother except a few stray streaks of blood in his fur. The scent of healing magic was thick on the air.
A giant paw came resting down on his shoulder, and Snow crouched beside him. “Oh, Ginkgo, Ginkgo,” she sighed, and in five syllables her sorrow and disappointment thumped into him like arrows themselves.
“I’m sorry," he whispered again. “I’m sorry. You would’ve saved her, if you’d been there.”
“Can you get up, Ginkgo?”
Of course he could. Snow was far greater a mage than he would ever hope to be. He rose without the slightest ache. The Imperial stood over him with her eyes sad. Taking a deep breath, she handed him a parcel of food.
“Here you go,” she told him. “That’s as much as you can carry.”
Blank, Ginkgo let her hang the strap around his neck. “What’s this?”
“I can’t apprentice you any longer, Ginkgo. You’re a liability and a burden to me. With you here, you risk court-martialing us both, and this area cannot spare the loss of another skilled healer. For the good of everyone —” Snow’s voice broke. “Just go, child. My love goes with you.”
He stared at her. Reaching out, she pushed him in the chest till he stumbled backwards out of the lair. The sudden sunlight snapped him to his senses.
“Wait!” he cried, springing forward, but the entrance had become a wall of frosted grey stone without trace or crack. “Snow! Let me in! Snow, I’m sorry! I’ll try even harder! Snow!” His knees gave out. Sinking at the foot of the wall, he leaned his forehead against the rock and sobbed.
***
Ever afterwards Ginkgo would wonder if Snow wept with him on the other side of the wall. And the phantom sound of her tears echoed in time with his feet as he walked, everywhere and nowhere. They mingled with the breaths of the dying, which multiplied till it was like ghosts swirling all around him.
Whatever he did, too many times he felt his patients sink down in his arms and saw their lives melt away before his eyes. Whether it was his failure to recite the rhyme, or act in time, or tourniquet the limb did not matter, because he simply could never do the right thing. Snow would have mourned to see him struggling along with the rudest of country-healing, after all those hours of poring over scrolls and constructing lovely spells.
But he was Ginkgo after all, Ginkgo the Fool, Ginkgo the Useless.
And he was also Ginkgo Chaser of Ghosts, for as time went on, dragons knew not to ask him to heal. Instead they asked him to watch the dying, and ease their departure rather than delay it. They asked him to hunt down the cause of strange sights in the dark or voices without bodies or bizarre creatures vanishing in the mist. Yearnings floating free of heart or mind. Phenomena that most would deride as superstition.
But he went anyway, because it was easier to seek the wind than to unravel the lost and lonely tangle of his life. And as the months went by, it became a habit. Trailing after stray rumors, wandering with the tales under the jeering of dragons.
“You idiot,” they scoffed, “running after tall tales!”
And he would reply with a patient glance under his long lashes, and walk on with a lightness in voice that never made it to his feet. “Everyone runs after something. I just happen to run after nothing, because even running’s better than doing nothing at all. Lovely life, isn’t it?”
As he drifted or was driven from lair to village to town, he found himself upon the alpine frontiers of the Fortress of Ends. The first time he saw the massive structure rising above the horizon, he took it for yet another peak of the Cloudscrape range. And then he looked again at the hard lines of the fortress and knew it to be the dwelling place of the Icewarden, god of ice. Master of justice.
Knowing himself, if he made the slightest move he would misstep, and a misstep could well be fatal under the vigil of the Fortress guards. But where else could he go? He slowed his wings and began his descent into the nearest valley. A brown Tundra pulling a cart hailed him.
“Hey! You’re new around here. Where did you come from?”
Ginkgo shrugged, letting his tired wings droop to the ground. “Nowhere in particular. I’ve been travelling for a while. Is there any place I could spend the night here?”
“Yeah. Up the hill there, there’s a motel. I’m on my way in that direction — do you want to take a ride in my cart? You look pretty beat.”
“Are you sure? I can walk.”
“Come on now, you’re too worn out to fold up your wings. Hop in, I can handle it. I’m Orthel, by the way.”
“Ginkgo. Thank you.” He climbed into the cart. Barrels of various sizes loaded it, filled with grain by the scent of them. With a sigh, he settled himself on the lip of the tail and adjusted the pack around his neck. It was almost depleted again, edible vegetation scarce so high up in the mountains. Starvation had forced him to resort to the charity of clans he passed through.
Orthel set off at a brisk trek up the road, his fur fluffing out around the breast strap. Between puffs of breath, he called back questions. “So you say your name is Ginkgo, right? Where did your parents get the idea to name you after a broadleaf tree? I mean, I don’t think many of us here have ever even seen a ginkgo tree in our lives.”
“Neither have I, but they used to say I was so enraptured by everything green that they gave me the name of the greenest tree they could think of. My mother came from the Starwood Strand, so she knew a lot about plants.”
Orthel glanced at the pale Tundra over his shoulder. “You should visit the Viridian Labyrinth someday. I hear there’s plenty of greenery there.”
“I did consider it before,” he said, and looked up at the broad white sky. There was a tight feeling in his chest. “But that’s a six-months’ journey of hard flight across the continent.”
“Used to the travelling life, are you? Itinerant performer or wizard?”
Ginkgo hesitated so long that the brown Tundra cocked an eye backwards again, waiting for an answer. “Well … I guess you could say I’m a mage of sorts, yes.”
“Great!” They had crested the hill. Puffing, Orthel shrugged himself free of the straps and rotated his shoulders. “That’s it. The inn’s the closest building to the right, and tell me if you plan on giving a show anytime soon, hey?”
“I suppose so.” Ginkgo gave him a noncommittal smile and hopped out of the cart. “Thanks again.”
“My pleasure, and good luck!” With a wave of his tail, the Tundra ducked back between the poles and heaved the cart back into motion. The wheels clattered against the cobblestones as he ambled onwards. Ginkgo watched him go, and instead of entering the low stone building he made his slow way into the pines by the road. When he had found a resting place, he opened his pack and looked at it in silence. It was fat and heavy with grain. Orthel would never notice, for he had made sure to remove only the topmost layer from every barrel. Anyone would assume the grain had settled in the journey.
The next morning a small cottage found a weary white dragon at its door, and the day after that a lair dug into the frozen soil took him in.
“A wandering healer,” he said, “I live a simple life and I won’t eat much. I can pay if you wish, though I haven’t got much money.”
“A healer, eh?” In the southern winter, sniffles and wheezes were abundant, and though dragons were quick to exchange country cures for coins and food, Ginkgo backed away from their offers until his stomach could stand it no longer. He roamed from one lair to another, down the streets of the town crowded with furry shapes. No one noticed him besides his patients. And he never spent a night in the same place.
And then, a Tundra bursting in, her armor clattering. “Quick, where’s Aigan? I’ve been looking all over. The Lady Raicho is ill.”
“Who?” Ginkgo looked up from where he sat on the curb.
“I’m not asking you, I need the sanctioned physician at once!”
An elderly grandmother stood in the doorway, shaking her salted head. “Like I just told this young fellow here, Madam Aigan is a day’s flight to the west, treating a fever epidemic. Now stop banging on the doors and let an old soul nap!”
Ginkgo stood up, hesitant. “I was apprenticed to a healing mage. I can try to help.”
Past the point of mistrust, the guard beckoned him on. “Well, then come on and hurry up.”
The Lady Raicho lay in a nest of sheets, the fine linen twisted and rumpled as she tossed. Blood stained her lips — she must have been coughing. A handmaiden stood at her side, combing out her matted fur. One look at her sunken face and glazed, half-closed eyes told Gingko that she was a bare breath away from the end.
Crossing the floor, he touched the dragon’s paw and glanced to the guard. “How long has she been sick?”
“A couple weeks. Aigan had been checking on her and thought she would recover soon. But the other day she began to have trouble breathing, and it only got worse from there.”
Ginkgo brushed back the limp forelock and considered a moment. He had precious few supplies with him, and as he bent to listen to Raicho’s breath, he heard the rattle in her lungs and knew there was little he could do.
“She was a good mistress,” the handmaiden murmured from the other side of the lady. “She bought my family and me from slavery and saved the town from the Centauri. Please save her.”
“I don’t know if I can,” Ginkgo admitted. “But I’ll try.” His pack was empty once again. Resting his paws on Raicho’s laboring chest, he closed his eyes and began a rhyme. Speaking a spell still left a sick feeling in his stomach, but what could he do?
Come ye winds from the green beyond
From springtime breeze and laughing galesong
To leaves aback the slipstream swift and sleek
Come and breathe for the breathless ailing.
No good. Her choking did not stop, and as he watched, Raicho let out a splutter of saliva tinged with red. A straining heartbeat of stillness as her body hitched, and when the inhale came it left her with a tiny whine. Ever so slightly, her head tilted to one side and then the other. No.
“You don’t want me to try to heal you?”
No. It hurt too much. She wanted to rest.
He turned around to the guards and the servants. “Give me some quiet, please.” Filing out the room, the last guard caught the closing door and eased it to. Silence descended. Raicho’s respirations broke it like glass.
For a long moment, Ginkgo gazed at the dying dragon. She must have been beautiful in health, her diamond-patterned fur merging with the brilliant blue of her wings. She had not lain long enough for all her muscles to waste away. Folding her forearms together, he brought a soft paw over her eyes and touched the spot over her heart with a single claw.
“Rest well, my lady.”
Was that a flutter in her eyelids? A twitch of her tail? The Lady Raicho did not respond when Ginkgo whispered, more like a sigh than a word. “I’m sorry.”
She slept. The rattle grew fainter, and an hour later the guards opened the door to find Ginkgo standing by the lady, watching her face. She was dead. When they pinned his wings and pulled him outside, he followed without protest. The armored Tundra struck him across the head with a gauntleted claw, and he staggered back with a gasp but nothing else.
“Murderer!”
Ginkgo only looked at his arresters with a sad smile, one paw pressed to his torn and bleeding face. He had heard that one before.
***
A hollow echo skittered through the hallway outside, sound on stone and ice. It repeated itself within as the Tundra shifted to sit against the wall, putting himself between the window on one side of the cell and the door on the other, and his chains clinked together. Lamplight spilled through the barred window. Green. He leaned his head back and thought of how his parents had named him after a tree he had never seen. Lifting a paw, he brought it to his face and touched the raised scar tissue. He squinted. With one eye, he saw the cell. With the other, nothing.
He was waiting. He had been waiting for a while.
Marks and notes lacerated the walls of the cell, tribute to other inmates who had inhabited it before. What had happened to them? Were they set free, or sentenced to some worse fate? How long had it been since Ginkgo himself had been led into this place? His memory shrank and clouded when he tried to remember how many times he had seen sunlight peeping in through the windows. Reach back too far, and he would remember the first day ….
The first time he set foot in the Fortress. How the corridors rang with the tramp of the guards and their clashing armor. How the first guard held a blade at his throat, ready to slice off his head if he tried to run. Fogged and twisted shadows passed beneath them. His claws slipped on the floor, and he realized with a chilling shock that those were dragons, buried so many dozens of feet below in solid ice.
Then he saw the judge, and for the first time in his life he no longer felt like a fool but a felon charged with a crime. Here the pathetic little Tundra stood face to face with the Icewarden himself. All the host of guards dropped away, leaving him and the sword-bearer in the center of ice and echoes, and the Warden’s steady gaze pierced him to the bone. It was like being a wide-eyed youngster beside Snow’s ankle once again, but a thousand times more terrible.
And the Icewarden spoke with the voice of ancient air hissing out of a crevasse, and the reverberations of a glacier on its march to the sea. “Defendant, you stand accused of the death of the late Lady Raicho. See before you, and before the world, evidence of your sin. How do you plead?”
Remembering the whisper Raicho had given him, and her collapsing lungs and bloody mouth, he swallowed and replied in a croak. “Guilty.”
Guilty. As one, the guards twitched, but they knew better than to speak. And here Ginkgo’s memory flinched away still harder, not from the sentence but the judge who proclaimed the sentence ….
Could he have kept her alive until Aigan returned? Could Aigan have healed her then?
No.
It was Raicho’s choice. But he had still killed her. And in any case, it was too late now.
Keys jangled. The march of hundreds, abuse and scorn from faces behind bars. Time blurred, and Ginkgo was aware only of his own feet propelling him forward and the darkness of half his world. He smelled the acrid tang of sauter, and a guard with a wicked file sawed through his bonds and pushed a packet into his paws, wrapped in a dirty cloth.
“Go. You’re free.”
Behind him, dozens of prisoners received the same, jostling him out of the way. He stumbled out onto the barren tundra and breathed. He did not know what else to do. The bitter air crusted crystals on his eyelashes and burned his throat and lungs.
I’m free.
He had almost forgotten what freedom was like. The wide world revolved all around him, vast and in motion, without daily ration or nightly curfew. In silence, Ginkgo shook out the contents of the packet. Dried fruits. A map. The fabric itself was a faded grey shawl, and he put it around his shoulders and pulled it down over his head. In the folds of this, he tucked the food and the map. And then he walked.
art
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Purchased from Vet on 7 Nov 2016 for 85g
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