Goodbye, Hailey Daye

A God of Death had once told the fairy she was strong enough to endure the trials ahead. If Halcyon Cassandra Daye was his strongest soldier in the land of Verdance, the cause was doomed. 

The fairy known as Hailey sat alone in her religious cell off the main Sanctuary. Every last one of her belongings had been sorted into two categories: keep or burn. The keep pile was tiny and fit in her satchel, consisting of a magically endless journal, writing implements, the journal of the blood father she'd never known, and a dossier of dirt on a religious rival she kept out of civic obligation. If what she was about to do worked, none of the items in the burn pile would matter to her.

Hailey Daye had become a reluctant representative of the new town. The other four individuals tossed into the role of Accidental Advocate would become her traveling companions. They were an orcish ranger, a goliath wizard, a dwarven warrior, and an elvish sorceress. In the beginning, Hailey had called them her friends without a second thought. In the beginning she'd considered them family and had killed for them. In her present, the fairy couldn't recall the last time she considered them her friends rather than traveling companions or coworkers. 

After the new town was settled, goblins raided and took children. The Accidental Advocates quested to find them and discovered a happy ending: the orphans had been adopted by The Bard King of the Orcish Alliance. While there, the Advocates were invited to partake in the Trial of the Dragon Scale. Their success made each of them a member of the Orcish Alliance. For the first time since she'd lost her family and fled to Verdance, Hailey felt a sense of belonging and community. She had not realized how short lived her joy would be.

While Hailey and her companions were traveling, she was approached by a hobgoblin. He had no memories and asked for her help to recover them. Still raw from the tragedy of losing everyone she'd previously known, Hailey jumped at the opportunity to help. The two became symbiotically and psychically linked, and helping Her Hob gave Hailey a reason to face each dawn she'd previously lacked. Falling in love with Her Hob had been inevitable.

The romance would come to an abrupt and volatile conclusion after she eventually learned another horrifying truth. Her Hob was the lost fae god of war that The Mustached Man sought. In fact, he was The Hob the Mustached Man had razed her hometown to resurrect. 

It was the beginning of the end when Hailey first had nightmares about The Mustached Man. Every time she had the vision, it ended the same: screams, fire, and blood. After she had the dream for the third time, she told her family.

Her parents, Enna and Danse, had exchanged anxious glances. Her aunt and uncle dismissed them as nightmares. When The Mustached Man and his men arrived, The Razing was exactly as Hailey dreamed, and none of them survived. Only Hailey's favorite cousin, Prudence, had escaped the slaughter. Pru left ahead of the attack to seek help after Hailey told her about the dreams. 

At least, that was what Hailey had believed for months. That light had since been snuffed by the cold, harsh, reality of life in Verdance. She'd since discovered that Pru already knew Hailey had the sight. It changed the seer's understanding - her cousin hadn't trusted her, her cousin had known the vision was real.

Unaware her baptism in fire and blood was what stirred Her Hob from a deep slumber, Hailey devoted herself to finding his lost identity. In the process, she accidentally started a religion in his name. 

The Advocates had been away for weeks when she discovered her Sanctuary had become a religious institution. Upon speaking with the gathered acolytes, who she'd dub "Friends in Fellowship", Hailey realized she had seeded the faith through her actions.

When Hailey and Her Hob were on their first date, she has used a miracle to feed the starving people of the city slums Apparently the notion of the hogoblin and the fairy using divine magic to help the down trodden had spread like wildfire. People were drawn to the message Hailey had unconsciously spread. None were more devoted than those who would have died were it not for Hailey's miraculous healing abilities.

Everything seemed so simple when she first arrived in Verdance. She had trusted friends she could count on. She had someone of great import to help and discovered she bore him romantic affection. Alas, nothing was the same after the attack of the changelings.

Enemy changelings had infiltrated their small community. One exposed herself by taking the form of The Orc Prince, unaware he was already in town. The Orc Prince, son of The Bard King, had become the paramour of the elvish sorceress. Once the ruse was exposed, Hailey's companions dealt brutal punishment under The Orc Prince's oversight.

Hailey pleaded with them to stop as they began to crucify the changeling with iron. Watching, hearing, and smelling fae flesh burn and crackle had caused Hailey to flee the scene. Only Her Hob had been able to comfort her in the aftermath. That night, they exchanged confessions of love, kissed, and he stayed with her until dawn.

Hailey woke up to her religious rival wishing 'the same as that wretch on the edge of town' upon her. With sickening certainty of what she'd find, Hailey walked to the edge of town in a daze. The remains of the changeling spy were strung up outside of town as a warning to others. 

While Hailey worked to give the deceased foe last rights, another changeling revealed himself. He was the warrior poet lover of their orcish ranger, who promptly placed a curse on Hailey so she couldn't expose him. 

When Hailey tried to talk to The Orc Prince about what happened, the curse activated and Hailey died and bled out before his eyes. Despite his shock, The Orc Prince revived the fairy with his own thaumaturgy. As a direct result, she came to respect The Orc Prince and considered him a dear friend.

A few days later their new town hosted a state dinner, and Hailey was cornered by The Mustached Man. She'd expected him to attack her, but the reality was worse: he called her Sister in Service and pleaded with her to make their lord whole.

The Bard King was poisoned during the meal but before the Advocates could respond, they were transmigrated to another branch of reality.

That reality that banned faith may have begun her true unraveling. The day before, Hailey had walked and talked through town with her elvish companion and the sorceress's grandmother. The elderly woman had doted on Hailey as though she were kin. 

In the faithless reality they'd landed in, Hailey's elvish friend's grandmother had become an inquisitor. After Hailey let slip mentions of Her Hob, that inquisitor had been given the fairy to interrogate and torture. Only the timely intervention of her companions saved her from death.

They returned to their own reality the instant they'd left - with The Bard King poisoned and dying. Hailey was terrified to try to heal him and risk defying the curse that had already felled her once. The curse caster had planned for this and telepathically offered a deal: If Hailey agreed to meet with her, the fairy would instantly receive an antidote. 

Thus, Hailey met her childhood hero: Vasilissa the Fair. Her reality was far from the stories Enna had raised Hailey with. The heroine of those tales was courageous, clever, and kind and defeated the wicked Baba Yaga. In Verdance, Vasilissa had become a cruel necromantic tyrant and caused the magical crisis that blighted the land by endlessly resurrecting her son.

The Mustached Man laid siege to the new town after the state dinner. Thus the darkest days of Hailey's life began. She lost her best friend, a tabaxi acolyte, in a bloody and brutal fashion that left no remains to be recovered. Equally if not more difficult to endure was the death of a child - the daughter of the first person Hailey ever healed. She had remained close to the family after her first miracle, and she watched the loss of the child break it apart.

Among countless other losses of the siege was The Orc Prince. To Hailey's surprise, her companions immediately declared he was to be resurrected. The Verdance Orcs considered necromancy heretical and unholy. The Orc Prince himself had denied Hailey's offer of a death ward the day he perished. It felt wrong to do something against his wishes, the orcish traditions, and the natural order. Under other circumstances, she'd have fought harder against the idea.

Just before the end of the siege, Her Hob had ceased to be. The Mustached Man had restored the memory of The Hob and reattached him to a violet fanatic base that now influenced his actions. When The Hob revealed his plans, Hailey surrendered to the others' will immediately. The fanatics who worshipped The Hob believed the only way to save themselves was to commit genocide upon the orcs of Verdance to free magic. Hailey agreed to participate in the ritual to bring back The Orc Prince so the orcs would have a lord protector.

Aside from preparing for the Orc Prince's resurrection, Hailey was desperate to save Her Hob. In an attempt to slow the return of The Hob's the violent and brutal aspects, Hailey tried to spread the message of Her Hob through song. She abandoned her previously modest fashion sense for something sparkly and scandalous. Her logic was that if people ogling her helped spread the word faster, it was worth it.

Hailey's efforts to save Her Hob ceased upon discovering the heinous acts he'd committed upon the unallied clan of orcs who ate fairies. Despite the revulsion, the conflicted Hailey snuck away from the others to see him once more. Gathering the necessary components for The Orc Prince's revival had led to Hailey encountering the unallied orc clan. Their chief had threatened to eat Hailey burned her flesh with iron. After The Orc Prince's revival as something more than mortal, the unallied orc chief began to wage war on The Orcish Alliance. 

In desperation to save her new family, Hailey asked The Hob to kill the entire unallied clan. Recognizing the reason Hailey wanted it was not because she believed in his cause, but for the sake of the Orcish Alliance, The Hob refused and left. After, Hailey was relieved The Hob had refused, and disgusted with herself as she'd realized she'd effectively asked him to commit genocide. Thus, Hailey's romance with The Hob came to an end - but not before she lost faith in herself.

She wanted to leave Verdance after that, but the God of Death told her leaving would be a death sentance. After that the only comfort she found was reuniting with her cousin Pru and meeting The Knight.

"Don't think about him!" Hailey shouted and pulled herself out of her reverie for a moment. She hadn't realized her eyes had become wet until salty tears fell into her open mouth. The fairy dashed them away and tried to bury the memories of The Knight. Her mind would not cooperate.

The Knight was the kind of man Hailey had daydreamed falling in love with as a girl. He was a gentleman and a scholar, asides from being clever, courageous, and kind. When she first met The Knight, Hailey had been sparkly, sad, and showing a lot of skin. He had listened to her weep about her heartbreak, and still the man fell for Hailey. Though she couldn't reciprocate his affection, something she hated herself for, The Knight became a beacon of hope for Hailey. In the end, she hadn't gotten to say goodbye to The Knight.

A wild magic surge tossed Hailey beyond space and time into the Dead Feywilds the fairy of Verdance traced their origins to. She wandered the wasteland for a month. Divine intervention of a Goddess who wouldn't tell Hailey her name spared her doom there. After, the fairy had been able to hitch a ride back to Verdance with the Silent Ferryman of Souls. 

For two months they sailed through the void. Though Hailey's health no longer worsened, she was left alone with her thoughts that were clouded by weeks of starvation, dehydration, and isolation. Once she made it back to the right reality, Hailey spent another four months hidden away under the care of the God of Death. While he nursed her back to physical health, the emotional damage she'd experienced was devestating.

Hailey spent seven months in isolation trapped with a mind she'd stopped trusting the night she'd considered genocide. She had experienced so little joy since the siege, and only encountered more despair. The Orc Prince's father had died, and The Orc Prince was now a God King. Three of the Accidental Advocates were staunchly opposed to any gods existing.

Even though Hailey ended her romance, she knew The Hob hadn't chosen to become divine. She couldn't condemn him for it. She hoped she'd find solidarity with the elvish sorceress whose beloved was now an orcish god king. Hailey was shocked when the elf woman had shrugged and declared hey'd hadn't known The Hob before he was divine.

'Except I did.' The Nameless Goddess had revealed one of the most destabilizing truths of her life. Hailey had lived once before - and she'd lost that life after devoting herself and falling in love with The Hob the first time. After learning this, Hailey feared the love she'd fought so hard for that had nearly destroyed her was never real, but an echo.

When Hailey came out of her healing isolation, mere hours had passed in Verdance. Yet, The Knight was no longer himself through magic Hailey didn't understand. He had become a different person who had no recollection of her.. As she'd still been unable to return his affection, Hailey tried and failed to convince herself it was better that way.

They found the pixie shortly after, while Hailey's mind was still frail from her wasteland ordeal and losing The Knight. The poor creature was tiny, terrified, and trapped in a bird cage. Before The Advocates could try to do anything, it had exploded in an eruption of guts and gore. The others had been able to keep going without issue after that, but Hailey couldn't stop thinking of the pixie and sprite who raised her. She couldn't stop imagining that it was Ma or Pa Daye who'd exploded instead.

After The Razing, Hailey had discovered her adoptive parents had concealed a great many secrets about her true nature. Despite an initial sense of betrayal, Hailey concluded the Daye's were her true family even if they didn't share blood. Her early life had complications, but it had been filled with love and support until the she lost the Dayes.

In the end, Hailey left the pile of items to be burned behind. She couldn't be bothered to care what happened after she left it behind. She'd gone numb since confronting Cassandra Daye. The pixie woman, Danse's mother whom Hailey's middle name had come from, had been yet another horrific revelation. The Advocates had discovered Cassandra founded a profane cult in honor of an apocalyptic dragon. There was no deed too twisted for Cassandra to perform, and she'd been attempting such in Verdance when the Advocates defeated her.

Afterwards, Hailey had gone back to town alone. She couldn't help The Accidental Advocates anymore the way she was. She cared too much about why people did the things they did. Her extreme empathy and contextual compassion had become a labyrinth that trapped Hailey in possibilities she couldn't see past. She had stopped feeling anything but despair since she lost The Knight, the last sparks of light in her world. Now she knew only darkness.

Hailey had devised a solution to her dilemma. The Nameless Goddess she'd encountered had granted her a blessing: a powerful magic that could change anything. In order to continue fighting for the people of Verdance and the greater good with the other Accidental Advocates, the fairy decided she had to say goodbye to Hailey Daye. What became of the items she'd been prepared to burn no longer mattered.

After leaving the Sanctuary Hailey found an isolated alcove so she wouldn't be disturbed. There, she set out a brief letter for her future self, entitled "read me" and laid down. Finally, Hailey clasped her hands together and spoke the words with a calm she's never experienced.

"I wish to forget every personal memory of mine associated with Halcyon Cassandra Daye except that I survived the ordeal of crossing the Dead Feywilds, Escorted the Love of the unknown Goddess to the Ferry Man, and became the Last Priestess of the Feywilds." 

When the fairy awoke, she had no notions of her past identity, and only a single short letter suggesting she find an orcish ranger, a goliath wizard, a dwarven warrior, and an elvish sorceress.