Ptolemae (Natania)

Dear Tree, Sometimes I wish you’d just leave me alone. I’m trying my best for you, I really am, but the deeper I follow you the more I remember why I left you in the first place. You give me premonitions, you give me blessings, and of course I’m grateful. I use those things for good, I save lives, I help people, I do right by you and what you give me. But I am not suited to this way of life. I was not designed to have a good bedside manner, or any manners at all. When I try not to upset people, I upset them anyways, and when I try to upset people, well I shouldn't be doing that, should I? I don’t like people watching me, judging me, expecting me to do things that I won’t do. When I do the good I am capable of, they expect to do the good that I am not, and then they get angry when I don’t. And now it goes further. I felt gods watching me while I grounded the arc into that morganti, do you think I like that? Do you think I want all of those eyes on me? Do you think I like being surrounded by things far bigger and more powerful than me, that could crush me like a fucking bug, and know they’ve looked straight at me? Maybe you don’t care. I can’t tell with you. You’re a god, so maybe I’m just too mortal to understand you. When I write things to you, I think again, you’re a god, we’re like blades of grass to you. You won’t ever read this, this isn’t really for you, it’s for me. But then you do things that make me wonder, do you know me? Do you pay attention? You gave me a blessing: I was shielded against what was going to happen, and while I could give it to someone else, it felt like it was meant for me. You give me premonitions, premonitions that I have never seen given to any other follower of yours. Maybe you were one of the gods watching me during the Arc (you better have been, I’d hate it if everyone was watching me but my own fucking god). So maybe you do know me, and you do listen to what I say to you. Or maybe you don’t. That’s the thing about religion, it’s such a one sided relationship. I wonder about fate, about what you control and what I control. It was simple for me to do what I did, you know? I’m a doctor with no adventuring experience, save for earlier that day, barely any healer training, a history of fucking up people’s rituals, and yet it was so simple. You blessed me. Xitli and her mages had the Leytap. I had morganti. It only made sense to ground all that mana through me into the morganti and the Leytap, right? And when I did it, well, it wasn’t comfortable. It felt like being burned alive from the inside out. I hated it. I hated being around morganti so much I wanted to rip my skin off, and I can’t tell you how happy I was when it disintegrated. But it worked, at least as well as it could’ve given the circumstances. I survived, and in the end the only damage done to me was these scars. I didn’t need any special skills to do it, I just did it, the nothing that I am in these matters. I feel like I shouldn’t have been able to. Was that me? Was I using the things I had at my disposal well, or was I being guided on a path that already existed? Did you protect me because you wanted me to be safe, or because it was part of a greater plan? Or did you just feel like handing out a blessing for the All Hallows’ ritual, and that seemed like the most helpful one? One you’d give any of your followers? And why, when I do so well, does it get even harder to get along with people? If we do have totally free fucking will, I hate it. But I think I’d hate it even more if we didn’t. Whatever fate is and whatever it controls, it’s a bitch. It was simpler when I didn’t have religion. I’m not going to stop worshiping you, I’m not going to stop trying to do good for you, but I want you to know that this isn’t what I signed up for. I can always leave this life behind and go back to running that rigged blackjack game, and don’t you forget it. But thank you for the blessing. I probably would’ve permanently died without it, I really am grateful. I guess that’s why I keep doing it, even when I want to throw down my bandages and salves and never see another case of mana rash again, even when people in my party fight with me, or insult my religion. I want to do right by you and what you give me. Love, Ptolemae Tava P.S. if you really are listening, and you feel like doing me a favor, can you send me a premonition about how mom and the rest of them are doing? Ok thanks, love you, bye.