Legends of Belariath

Lyann

Lyann's story

Once upon a time there was a small sylvan village that lived under the benevolent rule of the high elf king Glorael. But this was not the only thing that the small village of Elinmyr could count itself lucky, no, because this village was also a faithful tax payer for this good king. And Elinmyr was a rich village because of its greatest disgrace.

Yes you may say: “how it can be that you are rich because you have fallen out of grace?”. A good question that shows that I have an intelligent audience. Well the answer to this question was in a curse...when the good people of Elinmyr decided to settle in that wood they asked the local druid about in which place they could cut down trees to sow their crops. The druid told them that the Forest was angry for something that their forefathers had done ages ago...nobody could remember but, believe me, forests have long memories, so they could only cut trees in a rough and dry part of the forest. The people of Elinmyr were about to despair when someone suggested that this place was good to plant vines....the wine of Elinmyr was to be famous and the village grew rich and happy.

But one day this good king Glorael decided that his kingdom needed more money so he could build a new palace. Everybody was so glad...well not everybody his subjects weren’t so glad but they didn’t live in the old and draffy palace and their opinion didn’t count that much, besides, they were sylvan elves and who in his right mind would ask a sylvan his opinion?

The good king Glorael sent his envoys to all the villages of his kingdom to spread the good news: the king was about to build a new and wonderful palace, and the not so good news: they, the smallfolk, had been chosen to have the immense honour of paying the bill. The envoys said that many noble high elves had asked the king to be them the ones who paid for the new palace but the good Glorael had been adamant, the honour was for his faithful sylvan folk. As my clever audience might have guessed the good sylvan smallfolk didn’t believe a word of this but eventually they paid.

When one of those envoys arrived at Elinmyr he found out that the village was not in the best mood towards Glorael. The good king hadn’t paid the last three shipments of the famous Elin Old Red...their best wine. As it happens in situations like this one, the good king was innocent of this dire accusations...the one to fault was the evil steward not the good king. But it’s sad but true that the smallfolk doesn’t make this subtle distinctions, so useful in high politics.

“Your king better pay us what he owes if he wants us to pay for his stupid palace” said the people of Elinmyr to the loyal envoy. The Envoy, who was angry because of the long way to Elinmyr, returned to Glorael and told him about the rebellious ways of the people of that village. It was just back luck that he was taken to the presence of the good king in one of his few bad days. The Sages still discuss about what did happen to the good Glorael that day that he was in such bad mood, but it’s a mystery only known by Glorael, his royal wife the queen Finildas, his lover the lady-in-waiting Eswin, the royal steward Thilgol, the captain of the guard the valiant Umras “the Valiant”, also called “the Redundant”, Umras wife and former lover of the king, lady Biriniel, the lover of Biriniel, lady Ilmrien, Umras lover, the second commander of the guard, gallant Finrehil “the Great”, his wife lady Mirel, the royal prince Finor, royal princes Finariela, Finariela friends, Finor sworn enemies, the Royal Guard, the Royal Servants, the Cook, his wife, her lover and the Royal Thief, the only one entitled to steal from the Royal Palace... It’s one of those secrets that History has chosen to keep for itself.

Glorael was in really bad mood and decided to send back the Envoy with a heavy escort under the command of Finrehil himself. What can I say of Finrehil, it will suffice if I tell you that he was a heroic warrior that had never fought a real battle? Yes, I see it suffices. He wanted to fight a real battle so badly...that seems clear that Glorael was thinking in something else the day that he appointed him as the captain of the envoy’s escort. The fact that Glorael spent many days in lady Mirel’s chambers gives credence to this fact.

When Finrehil arrived to Elinmyr he was decided to prove himself as a warrior and finding the gates closed and the villagers on the walls didn’t disappoint him in any way. The truth is that if the Envoy would have been somebody better inclined to diplomacy everything would have ended very differently and we could still be drinking the fine wines of Elinmyr. Unfortunately the Envoy was angry and tired so he had no inclination for nice talk with the villagers.

Finrehil ordered the people of Elinmyr to lay down their weapons, open the gates and submit themselves to the king’s justice...stating that in any case they would be severely punished. His words had the desired effect and the villagers decided to fight. The sad thing is that, at the beginning, they even ignored who were those armed elves at their gates, they thought that they were invaders and they took their arms to defend Glorael territory. Seeing that his demands were not accepted Finrehil ordered his warriors to storm the walls a decision that put his name among the ranks of the greatest strategist of the elven history, just after Hurimil “the Dullminded” but before Khelar “the Easyslayed”. His assault on the gates was repulsed with heavy losses when the high elves chain mails proved to be no match for those longbows, and some have pointed that Finrehil lost his nerves and began to cry. Those who defile Finrehil name in such a horrid way, felons all of them, say also that the Envoy took control of the situation and ordered a change of tactics, he pulled back Finrehil’s warriors and then sent a few of them to burn Elinmyr’s fabled wine yards. Seeing their vines at fire the people of Elinmyr enraged and, before the village elder could stop them, a good number of them sallied forth to kill those evil arsonists. It was the moment the envoy has been waiting for, a twenty mounted high elven warriors charged against the Elinmyr villagers and slaughtered them as their families and neighbours watched unable to do anything.

After this success the Envoy turned his attention to the village and barrage after barrage of fire arrows began to trail their way against the night. Soon most of the houses of Elimnyr where on fire and the poor people inside began to despair. They have seen their own people being massacred, and now their village was afire...there weren’t enough hands to man the walls and fight the flames and a tortoise of shields was approaching their gates. The village elder decided to make another sortie and try to save the women and children in the confusion he didn’t know that the Envoy was expecting this to happen and had kept his mounted reserve at hand, ready to fall on them.

We have to assume that somewhere the gods had finally heard the news of what was going on in Elinmyr and had decided to take part in the events just to help the poor Sylvans, if not, what finally took place would be very difficult to explain. What happened was that Finrehil managed to recover his nerves and took command back. He rode in front of the cavalry reserve that the cunning Envoy had left to patrol the outskirts of Elinmyr and capture anyone who tried to escape, and charged with style once he saw that the infantry had managed to break down the town’s gates. The infantry had been doing a good job, after all they were veteran warriors of Glorael Guard, they had managed to advance behind a shield wall keeping their losses really low, now they where inside the town and the Sylvan’s longbows were still unable to stop their advance, sooner or later the battle would come to hand to hand fighting and the heavy armour and training of the infantry would decide. It was then when Finrehil arrived charging, he could not see clearly because of the smoke, his own troops. The shield wall broke and the Sylvan archers began to pour arrows on the confused attackers, instead of an easy victory Finrehil had a battle, his dream after all.

The battle inside Elinmyr was fierce and terrible, small groups of warriors on each side fighting small skirmishes, slowly and at a great cost Finrehil warriors began to push back the defenders, by then most of the non-fighting population of Elinmyr had managed to flee to the woods. The Envoy saw everything and was busy hitting his head against a particularly strong oak but Finrehil was feeling like a Hero of Olden Times. He was riding his warhorse by the street of Elinmyr his armour glittering with the flames that consumed tree-housed and stone-houses alike when something happened, something that did not change history but speeded Finrehil to the halls of heroes of Olden Times.

There was a girl at Elinmyr who was fighting to defend her town. She had a longbow and only three arrows left, she was sad and terrified because she had seen her uncle and most of her friends being killed as they fought a hopeless battle, her name was Lyann. She saw him riding in the middle of the slaughter and put an arrow through his heart and this way died one of the most famous high elf warriors, bards and minstrels will sing his deeds for ages, of course they will have to use a bit of creative imagination too, but this is what bards are for.

The battle slowly came to an end as the surviving sylvan defenders managed to make their way into the forest and fled. The Envoy regained control of the high elf warriors and returned to Glorael place with the sad news of Finrehil dead, he ordered a huge barrow to be build in the place where once Elinmyr stood and there the heroic Finrehil lies waiting for eternity. Glorael decided, following the Envoy’s advice, that the people of Elinmyr had to be accused of treason to justify Finrehil’s dead and now the people of Elimys are hunted as criminals in Gloraels kingdom. The Envoy was promoted to Chief-Envoy and Brodathin, of whom people say is even more “heroic” than Finrehil, was made second commander of the guard, something that will ensure renewed heroic victories to Gloarel’s army.

Some of you will be wondering why this story is called Lyann’s story. A good question, guess it’s because she managed to survive and Finrehil didn’t, a no small deed. But if I have to tell the truth the main reason is that it was Lyann who told me this story when I meet her on her way to the Lonely Inn. I told her not to go to that place...but she didn’t follow my always-wise advice, a pity. This humble storyteller had meet Lyann before the sad events that I’m telling took place, when she was just the bastard daughter of a lady that loved my stories and my music. A valiant girl that didn’t know of her bravery, stubborn but gentle hearted she spend all the time exploring the forests and wilds outside Elinmyr. I miss those times sitting in her family treehouse drinking some of the best wines this bard has ever tasted as he traded gossip with Lyann’s mother and uncle. I miss those quiet afternoons that were the most precious treasure this minstrel has ever had, now it’s only a treasure of my memory.

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