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Author: lani
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The recent bout of "what ever happened to Gwen" along with a request by Apoletta on a different matter spurred me to try my hand at a bit of fan fiction. If ArenaNet won't tell us what happened to her, or atleast not in Chapter 1. Why not spin my own tale about the little loveable girl. I started out with the outline for a brief, humorous short story, but I got sidetracked a bit :-) Anyway, here's the beginning. I'm kinda stuck on what I want to happen to her in Kryta. I know what's going to happen afterwards though. Suggestions on Kryta are welcome along with any kind of feedback / criticism.
A story of Gwen:
Chapter 1: The searing
The Searing struck while Gwen was standing on the road to Ashford Abbey, contemplating her new found friend The Hero who'd given her a whole bouquet of flowers, a new flute after, she suspects, he broke it by accident, and a lovely red-cape to boot. As little girls her age are wont to do she was contemplating marriage. Of course there was Prince Rurik and who wouldn't want to marry a Prince? But there was also Lady Althea, a duke's daughter. How to compete with that, especially as she was so pretty and nice that Gwen couldn't resent her, much. There was of course also the possibility of The Hero, he'd been quite nice and given her lots of presents and flower. Mum had told her that was important in a husband, and Gwen realized this was so. For some reason Billy, the miller's son with the big ears kept creeping up in her thoughts too. Why? He was such a boring boy! And he was always teasing her and jerking of her wreath of flowers.
At this point the first meteor struck the city of Ascalon. Stunned, Gwen could only stand staring for a while as the first buildings toppled and crumbled down, crushing all unfortunate enough to be beneath the buildings as they collapsed. She could see Rurik rushing from the Player's plaza where he'd been receiving a scolding from Althea about his idea of a gift towards the city, loyal captain Osric in close pursuit. Then a meteor struck the gates, throwing Rurik and Osric back with the shock-wave. The Prince was up in a heartbeat and dashing onwards. The good captain remained lying, stunned or dead, Gwen did not know.
It dawned on Gwen that she was in fact in terrible danger. Where could she go? With whom would she be save? The Hero had ventured forth on the Path of Glory as he'd called it when he waved her goodbye, but the academy lies beyond the town proper and was already being struck by the bombardment. Rurik's mad dash into untold danger had quickly made her reassess his husband potential, so he was definitely of the list. Devona! Devona with the pretty hair and the big Hammer. Gwen always felt save when she was around. Of she dashed towards Ashford Abbey where she'd last seen Devona talking with The Hero.
She never met up with Devona though. As she crested the hilltop overlooking the small village outside Ashford Abbey, the Searing spread out across the lands and caught up with her in moments. She first tried for the Abbey, but it was struck by one humongous meteor and she was literally thrown through the air by it's blast. She ended up down the hillside road a ways, near a large rabbit hole. Shivering with fright and panic, she crawled in there a ways, wondering somewhere in the back of her mind how odd it was that the rabbit The Hero had spend so much time messing about with instead of just petting it, had made such a large hole. For a while she stared out of the opening, all the while cuddling the rabbit who'd made his way into this small nugget of safety as well, as one meteor after the other rained down from the smoky sky and destroyed all she new and loved. In the end, exhaustion and fear took their toll and she fell asleep.
Chapter 2: A promise made.
It was the smell that woke Gwen. An acrid smell of burned flesh and the noxious vapour of death and decay. The first thing she saw was ashes, lots of ashes. She looked out upon what was once the idyllic cottage village outside Ashford Abbey to see a desolate wasteland filled with ruins. Could the entire country be like this? It was hard to contemplate. Slowly, stiffend by her long tenure curled up in her little hidey-hole Gwen unfolded an crept out of the rabbit hole, briefly wondering what'd happened to its previous occupant who'd apparently scampered of during her sleep. Upon exiting the hole, little Gwen noticed the area wasn't as devoid of humanity as she'd thought. From somewhere up the road she heard the vague sound of groaning.
Making her way to the sound, not easy as she had to climb up the roadside which no longer sported handy handholds of grass but was made up of ashen topsoil over smooth rock, she got her first glance of death. Near her lay one of Ascalon's Guards. He'd apparently been running towards the now demolished mill when struck by a piece flying debris which had struck him squarely in the chest, pinioning him to the side of the road. Of course Gwen was no stranger to the soft and squishy bits found in animals, she stuffed entrails with lots of yummy bits often before, but this was something different. A humans squishy bits shouldn't be outside like that. Swallowing bile, Gwen made her way onwards towards the sound of groaning. It was Hamish that nice merchant who would occasionally give her a little treat. He was lying on the crossroads, his entire appearance blackened by soot or something. When she came nearer she realized he'd been burned all over, his clothes meshed with his skin and his body one total gaping wound.
He couldn't see and as she knelt beside him she heard him muttering in panic, “who, what? Who's there!”. “It's me, Gwen” she said. “Ah, the wee lass. Why can't I see” he responded. Gwen didn't know how to tell him, he'd been burned beyond help and even if an academy monk would happen by this instant she'd probably wouldn't be able to save his eyes, they'd been melted out of their sockets by the heat of the flames. It was quite icky to look at his face in fact, so she took his twitching hand in her own small hands and looked up in the general direction of what was once Ashford Abbey, centre of healing. Now a smoking pile of ruin. Nothing alive stirred there either.
Not knowing what else to do, she started singing some of the nursery songs her mother had taught here. When she couldn't remember any more songs, the hand she held had grown still. Gently she took her floral wreath and gently laid it on his chest. As she did this, she noticed that they'd been singed in the blast that threw her. She hadn't realized how close she'd come to ending up like Hamish. Carefully she picked one singed red Iris flower and stuck it behind an ear.
Something precious broke in Gwen in that moment, she realized her life as she'd known it was over, along with the lives of nearly everybody she knew and loved. Somehow, somewhere other people must have survived the Searing, but this Gwen did or could not know. Her mother had not survived, of this she was somehow certain. She was now, an orphan twice bereft. A terrible sense of purpose grew up in her small heart. She staggered upright and walked to where the Guardsman had dropped his two handed hammer. She tried to lift it, failed. Tried again and failed once more. Frustrated, she looked about and spotted another Guardsman lying by what was once a bridge over a river, now a pile of rubble next to a line of drying out sludge. There lay an unscatched Gladius next to his mangled corpse. This she could carry. She picked it up and lifted it to the sky. Staring into the blood red sun radiating through the smoking haze of destruction she made a silent oath of Vengeance upon whomever was responsible for this desecration of her homeland.
Stumbling onward with her new-found resolve, she came upon her flute, which she'd dropped when the meteor hit Ashford Abbey. For a while she stared at it, not recognizing it. Then she slowly bent over, picked it up, took it in two hands and twisted till it broke. She then dropped the separate pieces to lie there to be found by whomever happened upon them.
Chapter 3: Journey through the Shiverpeaks and Brechnar's despair.
Of what happened next, little is known. Gwen herself had only vague recollection of this period directly following the Searing. Scattered but unconfirmed and generally disbelieved accounts exist of Charr patrols found slaughtered around their camp-fires in the east, near Rin. The only tracks found near their stabbed bodies apparently those of a small child. Why, or how Gwen decided to head this way is unknown.
It is known however that one wintry day a bedraggled little girl with intense, penetrating eyes was brought before King Jalis and his brother Brechnar by a patrol which had found her beset by Hydra's in the Ascalon foothills. Upon questioning, Gwen, for it was indeed our little Gwen answered that she was trying to make her way to the Crystal Desert where she'd heard lived an ancient and wise Dragon who could help her in her quest. Alarmed by the thought of this, King Jalis denied her passage to the Southern Shiverpeaks for her own safety. Not even her pleading looks and little girl act which she'd perfected and used to good effect her whole life couldn't sway him from his refusal, though he was sorely torn by her predicament and those large teary eyes were hard to ignore.
Neither was Brechnar his brother unmoved by them, and it was he who came up with the compromise. He realized that the Dwarves were unequipped to deal with a young girl, especially one as obviously traumatized as the little Gwen. Sending, escorting her of course, back to Ascalon wasn't an option. The Dwarves hadn't gotten a clear picture of the devastation visited upon that country by the searing yet, as it had only been a few weeks since it happened, but that it was vast they were well aware of. So instead he proposed to escort little Gwen to the capital of Lion's Arch where the White Mantle reigned and were purported to take good care of orphaned children and other strays. To Gwen this appeared as an inevitable and acceptable detour on her Quest. She had no intentions to remain with the White Mantle, kind hearted as they might be. So it was that Brechnar and a patrol of sturdy Dwarves set out with Gwen towards Lion's Arch, capital of Kryta.
It was a dismal journey, not only were the Dwarves of the Stone Summit movement stirring and being troublesome to Brechnar and his fellows, something that worried Brechnar a lot. But little Gwen was often morose on the journey and no levity or bantering by the Dwarves seemed to lift her spirits. In camp she'd sit quietly staring disconsolately in to the flames of the campfire. On the trail she'd brood and keep quiet and was often spotted staring of to the distant south, lost in contemplation. A poignant look of terrible purpose in her eyes. After a while, her depressed demeanour began to infest the Dwarves' mood as well and thus it was a sad and subdued party that emerged from Griffin's mouth into the Scoundrel's mouth.
It was probably due to this general feeling of disconsolatude that caused the Dwarves not to set a decent guard that night as they camped on the beach. In an attempt to raise some cheer, Brechnar had allowed them to use the nearby wreckage to build up their campfire into a veritable bonfire, believing this area of Kryta to be save of marauding monsters. Night-blinded by the blazing fire they did not see the Mergoyles and Bog Skales creeping up on them until they were beset on all sides.
The Dwarves quickly formed a circle with their backs to the fire and little Gwen next to the nearly exhausted supply backpacks they'd been carrying throughout their journey. Gwen quickly scampered under the pile and hid. Dwarves are stalwart fighters, but they were no match for the draining powers of the Mergoyles and the life-leeching of the Skales. Never had they encountered these two races of monsters working in concert and Brechnar was highly disconcerted by this discovery. It boded great ill for the future. Soon the Dwarven party was decimated despite their stalwart efforts to protect themselves and each other.
Franticly Brechnar looked around for Gwen, it was time to high-tail it out of the area, but she was nowhere to be seen. Nor did his calling out of her name yield any response except renewed efforts by the Skales and Mergoyles. With his heart sinking he took the only sound tactical decision which was to flee for their lives. They headed of due East and managed to escape the area without further casualties. At dawn Brechnar felt his heart being torn once more as the wounds suffered by his few remaining fellows would not allow for a search of the area for the little Gwen, but warranted immediate travel to Beacon's Perch. The knowledge that Gwen was beyond hope was no consolation to this heart-broken Dwarf. Though he sent out search-parties as soon as he arrived at Beacon's Perch as far as the Gates of Kryta and even went on an embassy journey into Lion's Arch, it was all in vain. He found neither trace nor rumour of the little girl which had wormed herself into his heart. To the rest of his days he'd be haunted by a sense of loss and failure. A desire to redeem himself was forever present in his heart.
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