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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Edena_of_Neith" data-source="post: 1958198" data-attributes="member: 2020">There is a beautiful place in the Flanaess that few know about.  A place known as Aliador.  It has an Andelainian beauty to it, with naturally tall trees, green meadows, rolling hills, and a great vibrant health about it.  For those with magical sight, it is strong with enchantment.  It occupies the eastern third of the Theocracy of the Pale, and extends well into the Rakers to the east, this enchanted land of forest and meadow, rushing streams and wide pools.  All about it are plants growing with silver berries, strange magical berries that are extraordinarily nourishing and delightful to the taste.  In many places the berry plants have actually grown into large trees, which shimmer like molten silver in the sunlight.  The people of the Theocracy of the Pale do not venture here, because their clergy forbid it.  The intolerant clergy of the Theocracy have long been terrified of this place, and will not enter, and restrain their people from entering.  Yet the occasional commoner does enter, and when this happens he or she seldom returns, for what he or she finds is so extradinary, so pleasant, that the desire to stay overcomes any feelings for home.  Those that do return from Aliador typically remember only pleasant things, and never speak of elves or other residents of that pleasant, forbidden land.  The occasional humanoid or giant comes down from the Rakers into this land to hack, burn, and pillage.  Few humanoids or giants return to the mountains, and what becomes of those who have gone missing is not known:  divinations show they were not slain, but otherwise no information is granted.  What has escaped the notice of the heavily populated regions around this one, is that this is the home of two and a half million elves.  One could understand the mistake:  there are no elves visible.  People have searched for the rumored inhabitants, and found dryads and other forest beings aplenty, but rarely have they seen elves.  Clerics of the Theocracy have come with Detect Invisibility and True Seeing, but for all their efforts the magic of this place has frustrated their spells.  They have not found the elves.  Some powerful wizards have attempted Wish spells to garner the secrets of this place, but there are those here who wield magic as potent as any Wish, and thus no Wish has gained the secrets the casters so desired.  Only those who have come here with friendly and open hearts, seeking the rumored inhabitants out of a desire to understand, to learn, to befriend, have found the elves, and all of those have either stayed or kept the secret of this place carefully guarded in their hearts.  -  The elves live in the trees.  Literally.  The trees are the homes of nearly all the elves of Aliador.  Within the great trees of Aliador are what most would call extradimentional spaces, but the elves who know the truth call them the Arden Kiethlin, or Hearts of the Trees.  If a stranger is welcomed into one of the tall, lush trees of the forests here by the elves, that stranger would find oneself in a great cathedral of living wood, green light flooding down from the heavens, great natural archways and passages running upward beyond sight, and running downward into unguessable depths.  An impossible forest of great wooden stems, like pillars in a great hall but much more lofty, would extend upwards and downwards out of sight.  A breeze of life, a breeze of magic, would flow over the strange, and he would see strands of light - strands of the Weave - running in silver, blue, purple, white, and many-colored splendor to the lofty unguessable heights beyond the soaring wood above, and down through pools of impossible depth into unseen distances below.  If he looked long enough, he might see they soared away into other places, dimensions, and times.  That stranger would also hear the laughter of elven children, the singing of elven people, the chanting of elven wizards, the chatter of a whole society as it went about it's business:  the noise of hundreds of elves busy with their lives.  The cathedral is only the opening, the doorway to the house as it were.  The communal hundreds that live up those vast soaring passages, in the amazing labyrinth of enormous chambers beyond, the great caverns of living wood below, up to the skyvaults miles above, or to the depths of the roots miles below, would greet the newcomer with all the warmth and cheer and merriment the elves are justly famous for.  A new vistor has come calling, and the elves would delight in making her or him feel at home.  The visitor would quickly realize he was at the gates of a vast city, a city the elves call Varna.  For the trees connect, and the great passages run from tree to tree, and communes of like minded elves inhabit different trees, hundreds of trees, thousands of trees, for miles and miles through the lush forests of Aliador.  The visitor would learn that several hundred thousand elves live in Varna, in the trees, in splendor and glory, in might and power, to rival the greatness of the Suel Empire.  He would also find they are as courteous and pleasant, as friendly and merry, as a family welcoming their father in out of the snow on a cold winters' night.  The elves, the visitor and stranger would see, come in all colors.  Some are vibrant yellow with dark yellow hair.  Some are milky white with blue hair.  Some are blue with white hair.  Some are green with silver hair.  Some are bronzed with black hair.  Some are jet black with white hair.  Most are slim or slender, but some are fat.  Many are very young, and a few are very old:  the majority seem ageless.  Some are as tall as 7 feet, and some as short as 4 feet.  Some have extraordinary differences in their facial and body makeup and appearance, compared to others.  Some are well groomed and wear ornate, elaborate uniforms.  Some have unkempt hair and wear nothing at all.  Some wear conservative looking tunics and dresses, and some are dressed in outlandish contraptions that would shame the debaunched nobles of Greyhawk City.  But whatever they look like, and whatever they dress in, they all are welcoming and friendly, all seem comfortable and even merry, all seem to fit here as if they were a part of the wood itself, and all are curious about the visitor.  -  The visitor would learn that other great cities exist in Aliador, such as Varlaith, Varluirra, Varleea, and Verrenlorr.  All of them repositories of elves, with all their culture, their lore, their ancient strength, their communal togetherness among those of like mind, and their utter loyalty to each other and to their Lord and Lady.  There are dozens of these cities, and thousands of smaller communities.  There is even the occasional community of one, where elves desire solitude, but this is relatively rare:  only a few thousand of these exist.  The visitor might wonder how so many elves can exist together, without exhausting the food supply.  The elves, seem to derive their main food supply from the very leaves of the forest, and by mystical means make waybread out of them, even as humans make their own bread from specialized grasses such as wheat, barley, and oats.  The trees never seem to lack for leaves, though:  the vistor will never find trees stripped of their leaves in Aliador.  The elves also partake of the silver berries, and they say a couple of them will sustain one easily for an entire day.  The visitor might wonder how so many elves could stand to live together in communes, since communes are so restrictive and demand such uniform behavior.  The visitor would be made to understand that, unlike humans, elves take great delight in each others' company, are not threatened by each other, and are not bashful around each other (a point that has often driven humans out of their wits, since humans can hardly stand each other.)  The elves would also point out they are very, very tolerant of differences between each other, and bend over backwards to accommodate individuality (another thing that drives humans batty, since humans tend to prefer uniformity.)    The visitor might wonder how the elves could stand all the NOISE.  Especially the endless laughter of children and crying of babies.  It echoes through the great passages and chambers, through the magical constructs of the elves, up and down the strands of the Weave.  The elves would simply point out they can shut it out if it bothers them.  They never explain quite how.  The visitor might wonder that the elves never go outside their trees, and enjoy the lush forests and meadows and sunlight.  To this the elves would laugh, and smile secret smiles, and they would say that Things Are Not As They Appear, and the Guardians are always watching.  -  The trees ward the elves well, but the trees - for all their splendor and majesty and secret splendor - do not defend them.  The Guardians defend the elves.  Yes, the elves have their own army - every elf and elfess in the Realm would die to protect it and each other, and most are highly skilled in the (unpleasant) art of killing, but the real protectors are the Guardians.  The Guardians are those elves who refused Arvandor and the Afterlife to stay in the world, and train, and teach, and protect, and otherwise interact with the Living World.  These are the Morn and the Nymphs.  The Lord of Aliador is a Morn.  The Lady of Aliador is a Nymph.  Wielding the most powerful magic known to Aliador, the Guardians under the Lord and Lady have warded the borders, and maintained the enchantment, so that none could enter without detection, and none could escape again without permission, and none could glimpse the secret of the elves without their blessings, and most certainly none could deceive the elves in friendly pretentions, then walk out into the World and give away the secret of the elves to that World.  Until now.  Now the secret is out.  And the knowledge of the elves has spread to the farthest reaches of Greyspace.  -    The devils came, and they were strong enough to breach the defenses, grant the elves their dark gift, then reveal the secret of the elves to all, before the devils returned to whence they came and the Crystal Sphere closed.  Laughter is stilled now, in Aliador.  There is no laughter in the great chambers.  There is no laughter at the high windows looking out over the forests.  There is no laughter in the great pools in which the elves have so delighted, swimming unharmed down to unguessable depths, shrouded in blue magic.    There is solemnity among the elves as they sit in chairs of living wood, and the faces of elven children are frightened, as they lie in beds of soft wood that sink like cushions under their weight.  In solemn sadness and necessity elves and elfesses are picking up their swords and armor, calling to them their steeds, their griffons and hippogriffs, their mighty unicorn allies, the pegasi who are as much a part of the magic of the forest as any of the faerie, now also mustering for war:  grigs, atomies, sprites, sylphs, pixies, all cut off from their Home Plane of Faerie, and all sadly readying for the horrors of war to come.  The Lord of Aliador is quiet nowadays, often in Melding with the Lady, and the two are deep in council with the other Guardians and elven elders, seeking ways to protect their people from the calamity bestowed, to protect their people from the powerful enemies all about.  Tears are often on the face of both the Lord and the Lady nowadays, and they do not laugh or sing or dance, nor do they walk in the forests and lose themselves in it's breathtaking beauty and it's exhilarating magic, for soon that may all be lost if they do not find a way to save it.</blockquote>

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