The Creation Story According to the Elves, Part 2
A world teeming with life was made between the Two Curtains and the time had come to awaken the common spirits that still slumbered in the Cloud of Souls. There is some dispute regarding the creation of the sapient races of the Planet. Certain scholars believe there was a council of the greater spirits that oversaw their creation and others believe that each race was the product of their particular god or gods. Regardless, there is little disputing the order in which these races were born.
The firstborn of the Firstborn were the Fair Folk. Whether they were a single race from the beginning or always divided among their many sub-races is uncertain. They were to be the representatives of the greater spirits on the Planet, to rule over it in their stead. It was they who channeled the aether into its currents after the fashion of the wind and sea, but they grew proud and spurned their given duty. Led by their king, the Fair Folk retreated beyond the First Curtain to a land of their own creation, but by leaving the protection of the First Curtain, they resided amidst Chaos and so their kind is not trusted by the Elves. It would explain their reputation for caprice. Not all the Fair Folk abandoned the world, though. Some were made to remain, the ones we know as nymphs, elementals and the like.
After the Fair Folk came the Dragons. The Dragons themselves claim descent from the Dragon Mother Tiamat and the Elves follow their account. Tiamat’s first children claimed the greatest share of her power and wisdom. These were the progenitors of the White, Black and Grey Dragons. After them were born the lesser Dragons whose birthright was much more meager in comparison. They were to be ruled by their elder brethren. Although they have the capacity for great wisdom, the Dragons were also prone to greed and violence. Without the Fair Folk to challenge them, they ruled land, sea and sky as peerless terrors.
There are those who consider the subject of the third sapient race to be taboo. Indeed, many would rather pretend they did not exist at all, though their indelible mark on the history of both the Elves and the world at large make this impossible. It has been postulated that one of the greater spirits was an outcast from the rest and turned all his bitterness and spite on Creation and so created the antithesis of life: the Lich, the Lord of Shadow. Dead and yet alive, a swirling of vortex of darkness barely contained by a mortal frame, the Lords of Shadow exist only to upend the natural order. The world’s saving grace is that their power is too great for their physical bodies to sustain and bearing a new generation serves to divide their essence and weaken them. Even so, the Dark Race would prove to be the greatest menace the world would ever know.
The last of the Firstborn are the Elves. The Divine Mother, El-Naia, is said to be the daughter of Sister Moon by some or at very least a companion of hers. She tired of the company of the greater spirits among the stars and descended to the world below. The Fair Folk were too proud, the Dragons too rapacious and the Lord of Shadow an abomination, leaving her with no suitable companions. And so she created her own. She took the light of the sun, moon and stars and combined them with the powers of earth, wind, water and fire to create the vessels for newly awakened common spirits. These were the first Elves. Long-lived but mortal, attuned to the spirits yet attached to the earth, they were to be upholders of balance, to maintain the natural order. For over a thousand years, she raised them, taught them, and when it was time for her to leave, she left a memorial behind. Five seeds took root across the world. These would grow into the great tree palaces of the Elves known as the Five Ancients. El-Naia’s work was finished, but the history of the world was just beginning.
Tags: Commentary, Miscellany, Tellus Arc
Commentary, Miscellany, Tellus Arc | James Carmack | 20 October 2014 |
