Ravenna never thought she'd be negotiating celestial treaties on a drizzly Tuesday afternoon. But then again, she never thought she'd meet a dragon either. Back to the moment of truth.
She spread her papers across the rock, ink smudging from the fine mist. Azrail reclined across from her, his scales shimmering like a mountain before sunrise. Waiting for her to speak, his massive amber eyes scrutinized her every breath.
"I don't understand why it's me," she admitted, running a nervous hand through her tangled hair. "I'm just a historian."
Azrail's voice resounded in her mind, mellifluous yet commanding. "Because history chooses those who understand it."
Ravenna exhaled, nodding. Words were her craft, yet assigning weight to each syllable felt foreign. Nonetheless, the ancient rivalry with the Moonlit Clans could no longer be ignored. With recent ominous signs—a shattered star, lightning that never quit, whispers of war—the hour for diplomacy had arrived.
At heart, Azrail was a pragmatist. "The Moonlit Ones desire the Amethyst Scepter."
Ravenna's eyebrows shot up. "That's a legendary artifact."
"Right," Azrail confirmed, shrugging, as if surrendering mythic items were quotidian affairs.
She sighed, eyes finding a pacifying rhythm in the pattern of the drizzle. Stories often skipped over the tedium of negotiations, but there she was, squarely in its epicenter.
Another meeting with the Moonlit emissary awaited. Ceruleus, with his silvery robes and mirthless features, appeared more illusion than being. He strode forward without acknowledgment, his expression a tapestry of disdain.
The timeworn temple echoed with the intonation of their clashing intentions. As Azrail's representative, Ravenna felt unequal to the task. Ceruleus and his ethereal entourage debated back.
"We should offer more subtler terms," Azrail insisted.
Ravenna's frustration boiled over, words spilling out before reason intervened. "The world won't uni(t)e on subtlety! We need substance, something credible. Perhaps a shared story."
Ceruleus blinked, a rare expression of surprise. "Explain, Historian."
Ravenna's mind streamed with the chronicles of old. She spoke of a guarded past, where dragons and moonkind had once sung the same ancient hymns. Those stories inspired awe and echoed unity—a grander type of magic than items.
Slowly, a notion unfurled within the grove: propagate an olivine accord, a tale exchanging suspicion for solidarity.
By dusk, consensus seemed within reach. Then the compromise upturned the fabled balance—perhaps even more. Azrail marveled at Ravenna, a simple historian who’d transformed into a potent storyteller:
"The amulet from my memories exists. But remember, it’s just stone and metal. Your tale breathes life between its weaves—share it, unequivocally."
It was a perilous choice, weaving the future on the premise of stories. Yet fear evolved into an elixir of clarity and hope.
Before dawn, the final parchment lay inked—etched with enough stalwart history to surprise even the most skeptical. The lingering acrimony had tempered into cautious optimism.
Ravenna and Azrail watched the valley spread below, as a lilac pre-dawn colored its eternal hills.
"Because history chooses those who understand it," she echoed—finally believing it’s true.