[prose log]
It was quiet on Magician's Isle. Every day was quiet, aside from the rare occasions when visitors appeared. But those too-methodical yearly visits were no longer an expected event; the Empire had dissolved. Lady Leknaat was no longer their seer. People no longer came.

He'd welcomed the peace at first. After all, he'd always preferred silence - it had been with him all his life. He was used to it. But now--now that he was home again, back where he'd wanted to be all these years--it seemed too quiet. The thought was a strange one, but it was hard to really deny. He'd grown used to the noise of an overflowing castle, the sound of waves crashing against the rocks outside. Sounds that had drowned out his thoughts, or become background noise just loud enough to distract. But now, in his comfortably familiar room at home...all he had was the wind. And somehow that made it worse.

There had been nightmares, a few times; dreams of people dying in the war, strangely silent as they fell, with no sound but the wind. He hadn't had these dreams since that first year in the army; a child contributing to the orphaning of others. He'd grown used to it though, just as he'd once grown used to isolation, and now that he was once again in that awkward stage of newness the nightmares had flooded back. Silence had become an enemy. To wake alone in his room and hear nothing but the wind in the trees and the distant waves - it was almost as if he hadn't woken at all.

He'd grow used to it soon enough, though. He always did. And he'd find order in his life once again.