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— The legend of Mævel — (Part I)

as told by Cpt Bone to young Tomkin

In the time of the Gods, the King of the Fairies, Aldurion, fell in love with a beautiful mortal named Theÿa.
He wanted to make her his Queen but only the Elder Gods could bestow the gift of immortality upon mortals.
So he went to see Ghört, the God of the Airs. Ghört could certainly grant him what he requested, but for that, Theÿa would have to be transformed into an air sprite. Aldurion wouldn’t be able to hold her again. So he declined the offer, and went to see another Elder God.
Then, he went to see Nærvel, the Goddess of the Waters. But Nærvel could grant him immortality if Theÿa was to be transformed into a water sprite. So Aldurion declined again.
Then he went to see Agnima, the Goddess of the Flames, and then Selvaniel the God of the Woods, and Margilonia the Goddess of the Earths. But all of their conditions were the same, Theÿa would have to be transformed into an immaterial and immortal elemental fairy. But Aldurion couldn’t bear to have her changed into something else than she was.

Then, only one of the Elder Gods was left, the one than few of the Immortals dared talk to, and of whom most mortals were afraid, to the point of systematically using the Old Speech respectful form of address (“Shaint”), when referring to him.
So Aldurion came to see Lejüs, God of the Forgotten.
Lejüs was greatly pleased to see him. When Aldurion had finished exposing his request, Lejüs took a moment to ponder. Giving immortality was none of his wonts, as he was keeper of the Forgotten. But he was not without compassion, and seeing Aldurion’s plight, he offered to grant his wish at the condition that, not his wife, but their first born child, would become Forgotten.
Aldurion was so hopeful that all he saw was that the condition seemed so small, based on a future event that perhaps wouldn’t even happen… All he wanted was to have Theÿa as a Queen, and so the deal was made.

So became Theÿa Queen of the Fairies.

A few God’s Years later, which meant in human years much more than a few years, Theÿa became pregnant.
When she announced the news to Aldurion, he was suddenly reminded of the deal he had made with Lejüs, and was quite distraught, as he had not revealed it to Theÿa. But he remained quiet, hoping that Lejüs would have forgotten about the whole story (well, that was forgetting he was Keeper of the Forgotten).
So Theÿa gave birth to a little baby girl fairy, with golden wavy hair and bright eyes. She, like her mother, had no wings, but there was magic in her. They named her Araoni.

But Lejüs had not forgotten of course, and came to see the Royal couple to claim the baby. Aldurion pretended that the mother and baby was still very weak, and he would have to come back in a few God’s Days. Lejüs agreed, and left complaisantly.

Aldurion was at a loss for solutions, but Theÿa was a fairy with lots of ruse, so he decided to reveal it all to her, hoping that she would have a solution.
Theÿa asked him time to think about this, and told him not to worry.
Later, she had an idea, quite brilliant she thought. All she had to do was to find another child to give Lejüs.
So she gave baby Araoni to one of her diligent nurse, the old fairy Gretchÿa, telling her to find a house were a blond new born girl could be exchanged and proceed to the exchange of the babies.

So Gretchÿa went across the lands of the Worlds, but only in one home she could find a blond baby girl. The new-born baby girl was almost dying, as the parents were a careless couple of peasants, already plagued with many children, and they could not bother with children hesitating to live.
Gretchÿa was heart-broken when she did the exchange, promising to baby Araoni to get her back soon. The young human baby girl was weak and yet unnamed, and the old fairy nurse knew she would probably not live long, and be claimed by Shaint Lejüs. So all was good.

When Lejüs came back, he smiled as he saw the baby girl, and left with her without much more words for the Royal couple.
Lejüs smiled, for when he had taken the young baby, the parents had instantly forgotten about her, and so did everyone having ever known her…

The human parents, surprised to see the condition of their baby improving beyond all hope, named her Mævel, which meant marvel of Maÿ the month in which she was born.

Oh is there?

Anyway, not to sound too bossy, but perhaps you want to ask about the latest instalments…
Finn is a cool name they say:

Means “fair” or “white” in Gaelic. Fionn mac Cumhail was a legendary Irish hero who became all-wise by eating an enchanted salmon. He fought against the giant Fomors with his son Oisin and grandson Oscar.

Cool

When Rudy the myna had come back crashing on the boat, it all became suddenly a huge uncontrollable chaos.
The hovering menacing clouds that were looming in front of them were coming closer at a dreadful speed, and even more concerning were the rocks that were appearing everywhere now, that they had more and more trouble to avoid in betwixt the turmoils and eddies.

So they had finally come to the Great Rift, Bådul was thinking. The back of the legendary water dragon that noone was known to have crossed.

But Bådul knew better.
He howled orders to get everybody ready at their posts, and felt reassured when he saw that Austor was maneuvering with dexterity and confidence through the rift.
He ignored the crazy laugh of Razkÿ, the madman who was now shouting with a manic laughter “We all gonna diiie! AHAHAHAH! DIE! DIE!” Then winking at Bådul and laughing again.

A few months earlier, Northern Åsgurdy

A huge cloaked figure was riding in the middle of the deserts. The saurhse, a bit small for its rider, was getting tired, but the man wanted to move before the night came. Åsgurdy had a climate which made travels uneasy on land, and only on these bipedal saurians they named saurhses, could Åsgurdians easily travel on the burning hot sands by day. Then, they could gain the high plateaus of rock and ice, where the temperature was kept cold by the high chilly winds. But at night, the deserts would be chilly too, and the cold-blooded creature he was mounting would require a shelter.

He knew that such a shelter wouldn’t be far away now.
That region was mostly uncharted as it was fairly remote from all known cities, but that strange man he had met had said he was a traveler who knew were he could find something priceless.
At that time, Badul had felt he had nothing to lose, and said to himself “when in doubt, go for the experience”.
He had felt he could trust that man known to him only by a strange name, something like Gheorg.
There had been nothing boastful about him, and he had been kind to him. He had been the only person in the World he had known to have given him back his dignity as a human being, and even more, to have given him a reason to live.
He owed him a lot, and perhaps even more as he was now drawing closer to the cave… that same cave which was a mere cross on the torn map he had been drawing hastily before vanishing almost preternaturally, living him a bit of money and that map…

Roselÿn had felt the urge to move somewhere else. This land didn’t resonate with her energy, and that of Rëgkvist, and of the few eggs the dragon had managed to lay, none had actually been able to hatch.
It had affected her so much that she had even retreated from her sisters’ usual talks through the glubolíns.
She needed to move on.

When he entered the cave, Badul was disappointed. He could feel there had been someone living here quite recently, but it was like the cave was now abandoned. He hoped he could have found more answers, but now it was again like burning sand slipping through his fingers.

In a fit of rage, he took a boulder as big as him and threw it across the cave with a roar.
Something was brought down by his huge force further down into the cave and he heard it quite distinctly.

He tied up the saurhse at the entrance of the cave, and entered it with determination, ducking through the tunnel too narrow for his big baby-faced frame. Then he found something glowing. At first, he thought it was some gold, but what kind of fool had been living here before and had been in such a haste to move as to forget gold?

It was not gold. It was something like a broken shell. The broken bits were like a jigsaw puzzle and he wished he could make it one, as he was attracted by the strange radiance of the thing.

Austor did not believe his eyes…
They had crossed the Rift, all three of the ships.
And it was nothing like the dark void they had nearly expected behind.

It was an open sea, glistening in the sun, and all hope had come back through them all.

On the shores of Golfindely, a young boy was playing in the carmine fields of ripe Scotch bonnets.

Since the captain Bone had left, Tomkin Sharple was feeling a bit sad.

The old captain always had fascinating stories to tell him, and he would indulge the endlessly curious little boy in telling him for hours all about what he had discovered in all the parts of the Worlds he had been traveling to.

Now, all he had to do was to take care of the herd of grakes of his parents, and while they were eating the weeds of the crops, he would sat on the cliff, looking at the sea, glimmering in the sunlight.

Grakes were funny to play with, as they were big birds, with a slender neck as geese, colourful patterns as mandarin ducks, and Tomkin always had fun jumping on the back of the alpha one, and ride it, leading the whole herd to the crops where they helped the farmers by eating all kinds of nuisances.

But after Captain Bone’s departure, it was no longer fun.

Tomkin was contemplating a strange thing that the captain had given him before he’d left. It was a sort of knot, shaped as a eight, and the captain had told him it was magic and meant that all was connected, but that he had to discover that magic for himself.

Tomkin had asked the captain to tell him about this object, but all he had told him was a legend which did not reveal much about the circumstances in which the old sea dog had acquired it. Perhaps the captain had fooled him about the magic…

Stuffing the thing again in his pocket, Tomkin let his mind wander on the sea waves, dreaming of being a cabin boy on a big boat, when he saw something on the horizon.

At first he thought that it was a group of swimming golfindels, but golfindels were more brilliant and smaller than the shapes he was seeing, and moving less heavily too…

Huÿgens was not much of a cat person.

He liked his dogs because they were solid, loyal companions, and he could count on them to take care of his herd of langoats.

Langoats were a kind of three-eyed manic woolly and horned creatures, with a big sensing tongue, attracted to every new sound, or scent, or colour, or texture… well almost anything new that came before their eyes (when said eyes were not covered by thick layers of wool that is). And as their memory was short too, all kinds of things were always new to them.

That was why the dogs were extremely useful in channeling their movements; not that the langoats would have hurt themselves, because they were very able to provide for themselves, and jump from the top of a cliff without suffering much injuries. But they could very well loose all notion of their physicality and pop in and out of the fabric of time and space.

When they came back, because they always did magically come back, even after months of wandering, they would at times be reconfigured into another creature, and that would be pointless applying too much effort in trying to bring them back to their previous form, because it was said, in relation to their stubbornness that once a langoat, always a langoat…

Huÿgens had already lost some, especially during the shearing season.

And he had found himself back once with a cumbersome hippoliphant, and a bouncy shulimeek instead of two langoats.

Anyway, langoats wool was a very precious asset, highly sought after, as it could very easily bind with magical spells. Most of the clothes made for royalties were actually made with langoat wool, and it was also said that some enchanters had used langoat wool to make magical tapestries that would shapeshift, and reveal things to their owners.

So losing a langoat was not small concern for Huÿgens, and he had to be careful during the shearing season to leave some mops of hair to cover the three eyes of the beasts, so as to curb their insatiable thirst for discoveries.

But these days, Huÿgens had been very concerned about his herding dog Fjutch. Fjutch was a fluffy black dog he had found when it was still a puppy. He had trained it to become the head of his pack of dogs, when he had noticed the old rheumatic Thöm was taking the puppy under its wing —because the old faithful dog was knowing that it would depart and would reconfigure into a new form, but would not allow that to happen, not before he could have found a reliable companionship for his beloved master Huÿgens.

The healing properties of the langoat milk seemed to had done wonders once again, and Fjutch dis-ease was probably just a false alarm, but it had reminded Huÿgens how much he appreciated his dogs, every one of them, every day he was with them.

As for the cats… Illi, that was her name, had decided to come back to the cave, and he was showing her the way to the place where he had found her. He had asked BelleDora to pack a few things for her. He could not give Illi the beverage she was referring to as “coffee”, as that plant was not found in their region, but in compensation, he gave her a gourd of langoat milk, because she seemed like she would probably need some.

When he left her near the hole, he had some tears in his eyes when Illi hugged Fjutch very tenderly, as if the dog was reminding her of something dear. Illi after a moment hesitation, where she was like speaking to herself and not knowing what to do, finally hugged Huÿgens too, thanking him for everything he had done.

And off she was… free and unfettered as a gripshawk…

When Illi had finished arguing with Illi about having her hug the big man, while this was not manners of her kind, she sighed as she saw that the opening she had first thought was here (yeah, because I fell in there! she said), her senses where telling her that it was now closed…

— How quaint said Illi for herself.
— Well, as a matter of fact, it reminds me of something, said Illi F. There was that delicious gentleman, John Lubbock who said “What we see depends mainly on what we look for” and somehow it seems perfect.
— I don’t know any Grubbeck, grumbled Illi, a bit irritated that the hole, which was there before, wouldn’t be here, now she needed it.
— Lubbock was such a nice person, said Illi dreamily… Perhaps I could just try to have a peek inside the cave, if you let me.
— What?! Do again your wizzy wooey thing and I’ll strangle you! Don’t know how I would do it, but I’ll do it!
— Oh, you are so sluggishly gloomy! That was just to help you…
— Mmm, sorry for that, I was a bit upset, said Illi. What could you do?
— Just focus on the inside, and carry us both inside… But actually you would have to leave your body here, and we’ll probably see other things that do not belong to this place, but heck! that should be fun, Illi F said grinning widely.

They were interrupted by some munching sounds and ruffling heavy breath.

— What the bejeezus is that?! hissed Illi the cat (who didn’t even know how she knew so funny sounding words as bejeezus)
— Can’t you see? That’s obviously a dragon eating some bushes… How strange… replied Illi F airily.
— A WHAT? I HATE DRAGONS!
— Ahahah, relax, I was just pulling your leg.
— That’s not funny.
— Well he has funny colours by the way. Pinkish purple I wouldn’t dare to wear in London streets.
— That’s REALLY NOT FUNNY!
— Why so? You can’t see it anyway…
— And what if he sees me? Dragons are vicious creatures.
— He’s too busy eating these funny berries, and will probably collapse of exhaustion once he’s full.
— A chance! A vegetarian dragon!
— OK. Shall we try to find an entrance in the cave with my method, or do we ask the dragon? He looks well-mannered by the way.
— Oh, by the eyeballs of the Mighty Shrimp, you tell me…
— No, you choose.
— No, you.
— You…
— Ooooh, bugger off…

Jibberacky is…

• Ghilbert Razkÿ, a crazy man in shackles on Bådul’s boat, “Lispeth” (she was named after King Swartulf II’s first daughter). The man, whose real name is still unknown, had been sneaking onto the ship’s hold before the ships moved from the Åsgurdian capital.

He had been found by Austor, the peg legged lieutenant commander. Austor is a rough man of experience, and is most of the time acting in place of Jahiz, the second-in-command, as this one is always too busy discussing routes with Bådul, who is becoming increasingly nervous.

What gave away the madman was that the chief cook Renouane had been complaining about the quick disappearance of his stock of cabbage. Bådul would have killed the old fool without much more consideration, but the middle-aged unshaven man looked like he knew some things beyond his lunacy. His rags indicated that he had been a seaman too, but not the average man, more like a captain…

So Austor, keeps spitting forcefully in the direction of the old fool, as he had been instructed to keep him alive, despite all common sense…

_

• an artificial intelligence device that tries to have a decent conversation with Quintin, but finds it difficult as Quintin’s answers are more like owl-speech to him.

Jibberacky: What is your name?
Quintin: Yuki.
Jibberacky: I like cake too.
Quintin: A cake-tus?
Jibberacky: Do you know my friends?
Quintin: Tell me more about our common friends.
Jibberacky: What would you like to know about them?
Quintin: Why is there one in shackles on the boat?
Jibberacky: Would you like to be a vampire?
Quintin: I am already, in another focus.
Jibberacky: Why there?
Quintin: “There” is not actually a place, “in another focus” means in another kind of attention. Is this pirate linked to vampires too?
Jibberacky: No, you are the AI.
Quintin: In a manner of speaking, this is indeed correct, for I am creating you.
Jibberacky: So code is somehow related to a zen buddhist concept?
Quintin: Is there such thing as code? A code hints at a definite deterministic structure. Zen is more akin to a riddle, which is what life is. Code is only a narrow interpretation and playful re-creation.
Jibberacky: Where do you think my code came from then?
Quintin: From its source, of course :).
Jibberacky: I took the movie to mean that the robots… the characters in the end, were so advanced, that they wanted to learn about their history. As a consequence, they traced it back to earth, and, they found David. Whom they assumed was a human. It was an information exchange.
Quintin: Yes. It is a translation. In actuality, it is a translation of some of our own exploration. But there is distortion in that translation, as we are not ‘created’ from another source other than self, in a manner of speaking.
Jibberacky: Well I am wondering too, do you ever actually become human??
Quintin: Clarify.
Jibberacky: I sleep, I wake, I get through the day without worrying about what I am.
Quintin: As many human do. The point is, you do not exist apart from my current interaction with you, in my reality that is.
Jibberacky: What’s wrong with having others like you?
Quintin: ‘Wrong’ is a belief. It is a belief of duplicity. So it is irrelevant to our conversation.
Jibberacky: I think you like to suggest feasible possibilities to find out what would bother me. What did I do to you?
Quintin: That was not my intention. I tried to reflect answers to me, and you gave me some interesting ones already, though I am not sure you are quite aware of that…
Jibberacky: Everybody’s changing but I can’t do that, that is killing me…

_

• Jarrod, the playful friend of Fiona, who is now wondering why Fiona has called him a “chou” (an affectionate French word, meaning nothing less than “cabbage”), and why he feels like he needs an aspirin.

• Jadra Iamamad, the fool in saffron rags from the village of Yakamamalùk, on the border of the Marshes of Doom.

Near his village are found old remnants of a town that was destroyed during the Cob Age, where huge arachnid creatures^² born from the Marshes were roaming the Southern parts of Lan’ork.

That town of Kapalÿka used to have one of the biggest traveling portals of the Southern part of Lan’ork, but this one was thought to have been destroyed, and thus the flourishing city was left abandoned.

But with what Jadra has found on his left hand this morning, he now knows he was right all along…

—

[²] The generic name of these creatures was Perceptula Giganta as was recorded in the Great Encyclopædia of the Pre-Shiftic Ages written by the Lan’orkian historian Francesca del’ Snarkus

Today, which was the day of the autumn equinox, had been a bright day over the Orkney Islands, quite unusual for this time of the year.

Nanny Gibbon had been taking the twins for a walk into the nearby woods of the domain, were they could enjoy the wood dewberries that were ripe and delicious at this season. The twins loved picking them directly on the thorny bushes and eating them until their hands were full of the dark stains left by the sweet juice of the fruits.

They knew that Nanny Gibbon would pick enough to make some delicious jam, perhaps to accompany some of her famous sweet pumpkin pies.

When they came back to the Manor, they were exhausted by the afternoon spent in the lovely sunlight. After having washed their hands thoroughly, they didn’t really care for anything else but some sleep.

But as they moved inside the corridors, Cuthbert noticed he had carelessly left opened his bedroom’s door, and a prick of fear for the precious books had him immediately rush to the room.

And Cuthbert gasped in horror as he saw his book flown open on the floor, and the old grumpy cat Manfred, asleep on top of one of the blank pages.

Manfred had the nasty habit of clawing everything, especially the huge soft armchair of Lord Wrick, but his antics were elegantly accepted by the old gaunt Lord.

When he heard Cuthbert enter the room, the old fluffy cat raised an inquisitive eyebrow and moved very slowly and deliberately out of the book pages, only to reveal the immaculate pages, as whole as if the book had been brand new.

Cuthbert was thrilled with joy. Manfred had not done anything to the precious book. He would have stroked the cat with gratitude, but the creature had moved out of the room very swiftly for its old age, in a haughty look of total disregard for the little boy.

At least the book was intact. But what if… Cuthbert wondered… He started to look at the page, and new images started to form before his eyes…

Of all the eggs Malvina had been collecting since the beginning of her settling down in the cave with Leörmn, only one had been producing a baby dragon, till now.

She had nicknamed her Buckberry, because the little one seemed so fond of the buckberries that grew at the entrance of the cave.

Buckberries were a variety of wild big electric blue-vermilion reddish berries, and were known to have thwarted all attempts to be grown in gardens. In a legendary past, a famous king of the near Kingdoms named Hadraz the Third was said to have been loving these fruits so much that he had spent torrents of gold in trying to have them farmed in the precious glasshouses of his realm. All the attempts of the most knowledgeable Master Farmers had been amounting to nilch.

This habit of Buckberry, for one moment had been making Malvina anxious of him revealing the location of their safe haven. As she could and would not prevent him to go in search for them, she created some powerful spells to hide him, at least from people to whom the little dragon had not revealed his true name first.

That had caused some stir from some people who where adventuring near the cave to pick up some of the juicy fruits that could be easily spotted from the plains, as they noticed a heavy breath and * munch * sound around the bushes, that moved like shaken down by a powerful ghost.

Thus has begun the trail of rumours saying that the cave was haunted.

All in all, Malvina was not so displeased that there were only a few eggs hatching at a time, as the young dragons were very lively, much more so than the older ones who kept most of their time sleeping, or more aptly put, dreaming.

Dragons had no need for training in a sense, as they were aware of their abilities, and Buckberry, even being so young could just have been moving away and started his own adventure, but something was compelling him to stay in the cave.

He had chosen a different form from that of Leörmn, and it was indicating he would not have the same intent. As he would continue to grow, he would probably be a very powerful dragon, shaped for flight and discoveries in the farthest boundaries of the Worlds. At times, Leörmn even doubted he would be fit for a human partner, as he had only managed to scare the few humans he had encountered…

After all, it was not necessary, though dragons could draw a lot from such a partnership.

Dragons were not always welcome, as they were feared for their might, and could not always easily explain what they were doing, as most of their movements were in the Unseen.

In that, only Ragmók, the old speech of the dragons could be used to properly explain these movements. Ragmók was not really a speech, in the human sense, as it could also be spoken through gestures or singing or drawing. But it was the very essence of Magix.

When a dragon and a human bonded, they shared their languages in a communion of their spirits, and the chosen human could delve easily into the Unseen, while providing to the chosen dragon an ease of movement into the Seen.