I return, shaken but alive. I gained clarity and guidance I had feared not receiving, but they are certainly not to be trifled with, not that I would dare.
Instead of being angered at my supplication, they seemed pleased, even saying that my very asking was a partial success of the test. Yet the test is not done, no matter that I have decided what I wished to do. It is less about my decision as it is what I am made of, who I am as a person, that they are trying to test.
I have never really had too much cause to consider it before, being as it is something that mainly comes up when faced with others who differ. Living alone for most of my adult life there was little need for it. There has certainly been more since coming to Phandalin. I see myself compared to others, and I find myself somewhat astounded by their awe at my clerical skills, while at the same time downcast at how, time after time, I have failed and struggled with the tasks set before me. I do not know what they will find, especially when compared with themselves. When alive, they must have been of such vast power to have retained so much of it beyond that life.
Yet for all their clarity in explaining the options I might choose going forward into Axeholm, I am wise enough still to have picked up the way the robed one uses words. He said to me at one point that my choices are my own, and that the three of them are not there to command, but to guide. That they were not slavers and I their property. But what is a cleric if not a slave to the wishes of their god, granted powers to see to those demands? I have memory enough of their wish for my soul, despite the fact that I had thought it already spoken for. I might not be a slave to their will currently, but my very autonomy to decide in this situation may well be the last I shall have once they decide amongst themselves what my actions dictate of my future, and soul.
I know many would struggle with this, fear it. I know I too have feared it, greatly, especially considering who I might end up serving in the aftermath. But I did not find myself walking away as I had before, terrified for the future. Even the huge figure whose skills and likes seemed focused on things I would rather not partake of, he seemed pleased by my subservience. He called my questions grovelling, and was happy with that. While I would still not be as content having to serve such a being, they seemed more approachable this time. They spoke to me more calmly, more concisely, and although the huge figure initially seemed pleased to make me worry over their discontent, overall the three seemed more… like normal people, than before. Powerful people, certainly, like kings talking to a subject, but still more tangible in personality than before.
In truth, there is relief in being told the options and then being told to choose, knowing there was no wrong answer so long as the outcome was successful. It was a relief to be told what to do when there is so much I do not know about so many things I have been having to undertake since coming here.
I was always guided by the tug on my attention from one mountain to another, sometimes guided to a place I might shelter if need be, or a place to hide if there was a foe that was passing by that I would not have triumphed over. But since coming here I will admit to having needed more than that. This place is not like the simplicity of the mountains, and I am being asked far more than to merely to find a fallen body under the snow, or cut down and put to rest one animated skeleton left on the mountain. Knowing the three are there, knowing they will talk to me and offer that guidance, it is a relief.