The Floating Crystal Lotuses of Nei Remmis
On the eastern margin of the Green Mountains, nestled in sun-touched valley, and fed by mountain streams and pure secret springs, the Lake of Rhomes does lie. And though a warm tranquility does hang like comforting blanket upon the lake, its waters are still, deep, and glacial.
Upon its eastern shore there does rise towering spires of marble and crystal, interwoven with gossamer crystal trestle and catwalk like fine spider silk. Bedecked in clinquant and sparkling sculpture, who by the anome of man and centaur do beckon and dance, the great citadel does throw no shadow. This is the home of the court of the king of Nei Remmis, he who did slay the wicked Sorcerer with thrown lance, the hero Rhomes.
And when King Rhomes looks out from his crystal citadel upon the western waters that his people thought to bless with his name, he does espy three gently floating lotus flowers lightly adrift. The flowers are sculpted of fine crystal and delicately blown glass and when the sun rises over the eastern forests, they do open, their crystal petals wide to catch the golden sun that is the symbol of the Zirrafim. And when the sun sets beyond the western peaks, emerald with the life of the mountain forests, the glass and crystal petals do close, a shining heart of light shining forth, like a star adrift upon the Lake of Rhomes.
Throughout the day the barge and rafts of the people of Nei Remmis do visit the drifting crystal flowers for each is a temple and the supplicants here find tranquility and wisdom.
The floating temples are guarded by the keepers of the host of Heosë. Clad in robes of white and gold, the keepers are the closest the Nei Remmis have to a priesthood. They are guardians of wisdom, tellers of history and legend, opener of ways. Here supplicants can commune in tranquility.
It is said that the floating temple of Usas, whose touch had nurtured the greatest trees in the wood and had made them tall and strong beyond the reckoning of any other tree, is the largest of the flowers and that its crystal roots reach deepest, it petals stretch widest. The guardians of this temple guide the dwellers of the weald woods and of those who travel far.
The floating temple of Hounn, who had driven the fell creatures of the elder dark before him with lance in hand when they sought to defile the wood with their passing, is the favorite of the sun, its crystal radiance the most bedazzling. The guardians of this temple guide warriors and mage alike and its sheperds are always present upon the border of the lands, ready to raise lance or spell in defense of Nei Remmis and its good king Rhomes.
The floating temple of Aeia, who was handmaiden to Heosë, and who danced on fields of flowers, is said to be most beautiful and delicate, its petals of such fine gossamer glass curling and unfurling in the sun as to rival the beauty of the zirrafim itself. The guardians of this temple serve the king and it said that king Rhomes visits the flower of Aeia more than any other. It is also the favorite of musicians and artists, of lovers and mothers, of the desperate and the lonely and it said that to all these the memory of Aeia brings a gentle heart and the whisper of hope. And indeed, in the dead of the darkest, most cloud-shrouded night, it is the floating Aeia flower which shines the brightest.
The Bounteous Glade
They watched with trepidation as the Sorcerer ensconced himself within their city, and they grew afraid as his power waxed full and he came to rule that country, and to shape it to his will. The wood grew hot and twisted in his thrall, and he sent his men into its depths on the backs of furious steeds to drive out any who yet dwelt there in defiance of his rule. The Covenant would not then face him, but for many years they worked in secret to resist him, and they kept glades within the wood where those who still loved the memory of Heosë could take respite.
Finally Rhomes, king of centaur, galloped forth with great horde from the places of hiding and in great battle did struggle with and slay the Sorcerer Arram. But alas, the passing of this evil did not undo the befouling of the woodland he had called home. The battle won, King Rhomes did order his followers to return to the west, to those woodland glades where the anome of the Covenant was most potent and cooling breeze blew gently through fair forest sanctuary.
Here was the heart of the bounteous glade, a great bending of aether. Crafted by the Covenant themselves, the will of the three zirrafim who best loved the land and its people, it took a form that best symbolized its creators: Usas, guardian of the woods, Hounn, soldier of light, and Aeia, handmaiden of Heosë, and child of flowers and dance. In their image the bounteous glade was formed.
The people of Nai Remmis have perhaps grown used to the light and the song, the drifting flower petals and the healing woods but should they stray too far they will soon come to the edge of the sanctuary and face, once again, the memory of Arram’s oppression. For beyond the reach of the covenant’s anome, a cloying and heavy stillness, an unmoving heat comes upon the air and the trees grow not high and proud but stunted and twisted, curled upon themselves that no light of sun or star might fall upon the traveller. Here the paths are choked with vine and brush, and fruit grows not and nettles and thorn prick and pull.
The careful eye might spy a gently blowing leaf or petal upon an unfelt wind, uncannily twisting gently between branch and briar, catching, where it can, the weak light of sun or star and reflecting a prism of color upon a dark and grey woodland. The petal may fall upon a twisted tree and there rest, gently, the mark of Usas, Hounn, and Aeia. The traveller, intrigued, might approach the gentle leaf or petal as it continues to glitter and shine, and coming to the tree may watch a slow magic unfold. Slowly, ever so slowly, the tree bearing the mark of the covenant will straighten its twisted limbs and reach heartedly for the life-giving rays of the celestial orb above. Grey and brittle leaf will soften and grow, take on brilliant near-translucent green hue. Rotting vine and choking briar shall fall away and retreat and a cooling breeze will finally blow.
Nearer to Nai Remmis, all trees have been touched by the blessing anome of the Covenant zirrafim and the trees grow tall and proud. The trees are tree but something else beyond. Their leaves are light, nearly translucent; the sun or stars’ light falls upon them and reflects wildly about. They are uncannily tall and strong, their wood the finest of all Algid earth, and in their boughs do bird and small animal make happy home, and beneath their branches do deer and lion dwell.
And when the gentle breeze does blow, and when it does not, delicate flower petals do blow from the woodland flowers, clear as glass and favored of the sun. Faintly they do sing and should many blow as one the forests are filled with choir. And these scintillating delicate blessings do spread far and wide, and should they fall upon the twisted blight that is the memory of the Sorcerer Arram, peace and sanctuary, beauty and wellness do soon follow.