Post by Faie on Dec 31, 2009 23:28:08 GMT 1
Sparkling life, a strange vibration in the senses, a breeze dancing through the forest. Grand trees, beautiful flowers.. Behold the many wonders of Spring. But hark! What was that? There, listen! Did you see that? Over there, behind that rock. Not the tree itself, but in the crown, amongst the branches.
There are black, otherworldly eyes gazing out from the depths of the forest, watching every step you dare to take. A touch of something old, vibrating in time with nature itself, sweeps through the soil, through the air.
Ah! There it is again. Did you notice? These wonderful trees... Can you see the thorns climbing around the trunks?
As you walk further the forest grows ever thicker. Now the trees stand closer, their gnarled branches and twigs entwining and interweaving. The leaves so green and the thorns so sharp they could pierce skin, pierce flesh, pierce bone. This, my friend, is the border, the outskirts of the Hedge. Follow that path - aye, that one. It will lead you deeper into the Hedge.
Aye, dear friend. 'Tis true. It truly is beautiful and wonderful and strange. But beware! Knowest-thou that the Hedge is alive. Its thorns are sharp and can cut ye, tear ye into shreds. But the thorns will tear more than your skin. It may tear your soul, your hopes, your dreams and your thoughts. And thus can it drive you insane.
Aah. The precious, delightful sweetness of madness.
Know you now where it is you walk? This is the Hedge that lies between your home and theirs. Who they are? Dost thou yet not know that? Ahahaha! Ah, let me tell you, my friend. Let me tell you. See you that opening further down the path? Beware the roots on the ground, now. Can you see the forest that the hedge spills out into? Walk with me; I will see to it that you do not get lost.
Come. Let us leave the Hedge and continue our journey.
Look around at the great forest, its colours so alive. Feel the sparkles of life. Can you see the fields beyond? And over there, where you see those towers climbing high into the sky, that is the Castle, the heart. Can you hear the music? Feel the sweetness of everything, but be alert! Not everything is always as it seems. 'Tis not your homeland, this. 'Tis Annwfn. Aye, the Otherworld.
In Annwfn there is only one time: Now. Twilight. Here at the borderland or at the heart of the realm; everywhere it is the same. Just as in the old tales: people like you have wandered off into this world of eternal twilight, joined the wild dance of the fa'ae, lived here for the blink of an eye, only to return to your own land to find that hundreds of years have passed. Then again, others who get lost in the land of the fa'ae, searching for a door for thousands of years, at last find a path to return to their own land only to see that a mere moment has passed by, like a sip from a goblet.
Why, you ask, why and wherefore do we not always see them or their world? Why is this only granted to a few? Some humans and their like have been fa'ae-touched - madness you say, and lock them away. Aye, some say so when they do not understand. 'Tis all the ignorance of humans and their lack of understanding and their failure to see the true form of the Beautiful Ones. Sometimes their glamour hides them, it's true.
Their land lies, as you well know by now, beyond the Hedge. For others, it lies beyond a mist. Or perhaps the mist only exists in the human mind, because of the ignorance - now there's food for thought, my friend, yes? Perhaps we turned our backs at them, with this new way that hunts down and drives away the Old Ways.
Be gentle with them, for they are the spirits of nature. They go under so many names... Well, it's we humans that have given them those, through our tales, our songs, our dreams. We have called them Fa'ae, Fey, Fae Fä, Fe, and Fäe. Out of need to put names to all things around us, we have named them the Good Neighbours, the Gentle Ones, the Eternal Ones, the People of the Mounds. Call them Aoí Sí or Sídhe if you will, but know that is the name of their homes; the mounds and hills they live under. They are the Children of the Goddess Danu, more known as Tuatha Dé Danann. But then we have many names for the things we love, eh? And for the things we fear. No matter what we call them, they still are the same.
Ah, the glade. Let us rest for a while. Here are some berries. Eat.
The fa'ae might look like you and me, my friend. They might be big, or small, have wings or not, have twigs as arms, or fingers. They can be nothing more than that gentle wind that just brushed your neck. But many times they mimic us.
See that castle? Can you be sure it really is there?
Here. Have some berries. Water with that? No?
Good. Be alert. Not always do things be what they look like to us. Do you see these berries in my hand? Take a closer look. Mmm? They look like ordinary berries, no? But wait. Look here: when the glamour is gone... Right, they are merely bark and mushrooms. Yet for them, for the Fair Folk, this would be berries because that was what it was. Ah, I know 'tis strange, hard to understand. But now you see why we sometimes view people that have been touched by fa'ae as insane.
This is water, I promise. Do not look so skeptical. I give you my word.
Yes, you are right. They do live under rules - the same rules that we truly live under, the very same rules that nature is part of. Giving your word to the fa'ae means that you are bound to holding that promise. Break it and nature will treat you gently no more. Aye, they are bound by the same laws, but again; be wary of the fa'ae! They can be- Hmm, what is it we usually say..? Cunning, playful and mischievous.
They can play with words, so always be careful what you say. You see, whatever you say, they might take literally, at face-value. Sometimes they correctly interpret the meaning of what you wanted to say, but not as you thought it up. But they do stay true to their word and promises They make deals and contracts often, for some reason. Perhaps they have an agenda, but if so, it is too alien for human understanding. I have still not figured them out. And let us be honest, here where there is no time as we know it. Ever since the elves, the humans and all the others came into being - and a long, long time has passed since then - the fa'ae have been strange to us. It was true in days of yore, and 'tis true now. See the old tales; they have a myriad notions of our Good Neighbours, and none seems to be correct. Yet still they paint the most wonderful world that has ever existed...
But come now. Why should we sit here trying to analyse them? Let them be as they are. Enjoy them. Learn from them. And, of course, be ever alert.
What is Annwfn:
The answers to this question are full of contradictions, odd things, things of wondrous beauty, things so terrible that one risks enchantment, or perhaps disbelief and madness upon first gaze. Here, one can find peace. More than a physical place, Annwfn is a state of being, which exists slightly out of sync with the material and yet is part of it. One does not travel to Annwfn in the usual sense of the word; it's more about opening one's senses to the absolute reality, and taking that first step to the other side.
Annwfn is the Welsh name for Otherworld. Both are common names for the fa'ae world, as well as Faerie and the Land of the Eternals. To humans, Annwfn is many things - the land of spirits and the dead, for example, as well as the land of Fa'ae and magic. Some say it is the world as it once was, gradually hidden from the humans as they turned their back against the Old Ways.
Within Annwfn are many places such as Afallon [Avalon], the Tír na nÓg, and the Hedge, which runs through Annwfn but also borders it - a living, sentient barrier between Annwfn and the mortal world. One can reach the main part of Annwfn by going through the Hedge -but mind ye, the Hedge is a place in which ye should not just go wandering, for one can easily be lost. The Hedge is a thick overgrown forest, with glades scattered throughout where one can see the sky if lucky enough to find such. It is a heavy growth of gnarled twigs and sharp thorns, living things that tear not only at flesh, but at hopes and dreams, at will, at sanity and soul.
The Hedge itself is alive, as is the rest of Annwfn; within it reside creatures beyond dream and sense, stalking the old trods. Goblin markets are known to be hidden here, strange places where one can be lucky but only to misfortune. Once through the Hedge, Annwfn looks much like the rest of the world, but in its truest, purest form. Within are high mountains and hills, ancient forests and pristine lakes, great fields, sloping to white sand beaches bordering great oceans.
Annwfn Is:
* Based on the Old Ways and the Old Folk Tales
* A story weaving room
Annwfn Is Not:
* Like other rooms. No cities or villages, or little faery families living in little faery houses and going off to school to learn magic, or to work in a little faery shop
* A fantasy setting like a Forgotten Realm / Dragonlance or any role-play company designed settings.
* Disney faeries [yes yes Tinker Bell is cute, I agree]
* An urban tale
The Folk:
What is a fa'ae? This is a question that has as many answers as encounters, storytellers and dreamers can generate. I will try to explain here what a fa'ae of Annwfn is; when speaking of the folk, I will be using the word fa'ae or Folk.
There are many labels for the various forms of fa'ae - human labels, as fa'ae creatures do not label themselves. But true it is, that some prefer a certain form, a certain way to express, act, be seen as. For ease of role-play, we use these labels to be able to write the tales we create, for we as players [most of us] are still bound to the human way of expressing a tale. But never forget: a fa'ae is still a fae, no matter what form it uses to show or express itself, or take action with.
Loved child has many names:
Fa'ae, fae, fay, Aos Sí, Aes Sidhe, Faerie, the Gentry, the Good People, the Fair Folk... There are many names, yet they all refer to the same creature. Oh, what propensity humans have for creating words and names in order to understand what they see [what they think they see and understand, that is]. There are millions of names for the same creature, depending on who has seen it and written about it. The same object, when seen from different angles, can give rise to many different interpretations. This is especially true of the fa'ae.
Naturally, these words come from different places and languages of origin. For example, fa'ae, fae, fay and Swedish fe are all derived from Latin Fata ('Fate'). Of course, for humans the fa'ae are all about fate. Later, the word fae has come to include everything; the actual fa'ae as well as their land.
Take the Aos Si or Sidhe from Irish tales, for example. These words were originally used to name the places, palace, courts, residents, mounds, and hills inhabited by our ghostly beings. Later on, however, many English writers used sidhe both for the mound and the people that lived in them.
Misunderstandings like this one are commonplace when humans translate and write down tales of the fa'ae, and this is probably one reason why we today have a myriad fa'ae "races" where, in fact, there is only one sort of creature. In all likelihood, another contributing factor to this phenomenon is that humans divide themselves into "races" [which is, in itself, pretty strange] and therefore assume that the fa'ae do likewise. Mostly, we speak of the fa'ae simply as The Folk, to avoid stirring, angering or insulting these creatures.
The Fa'ae are far older than humans; they existed in the Beginning. Some, as simple as a breeze or a water-drop; many were formless or had many forms, tastes, colours and more. They roamed the world, they fought against beasts and beings old as themselves, they loved, raged and angered, and yet experienced a full measure of joy as well. As things changed and humans came to exist, the fa'ae began to take forms that were recognizable to the humans, humanoid forms that made it easier to interact with them. The Folk can be stunningly beautiful, marvellous and terrible, even ugly, and perhaps that is the reason humans invented the labels of seelie and unseelie. Humans have a concept of good and evil that does not exist in the world of Folk. For a fa'ae, every action has a cause; humans are the ones that apply good and evil to that action. It's very important to understand - and remember - that the Folk are eternal, they are not human, and think and act in their own way, without trying to "be" human.
....
There are black, otherworldly eyes gazing out from the depths of the forest, watching every step you dare to take. A touch of something old, vibrating in time with nature itself, sweeps through the soil, through the air.
Ah! There it is again. Did you notice? These wonderful trees... Can you see the thorns climbing around the trunks?
As you walk further the forest grows ever thicker. Now the trees stand closer, their gnarled branches and twigs entwining and interweaving. The leaves so green and the thorns so sharp they could pierce skin, pierce flesh, pierce bone. This, my friend, is the border, the outskirts of the Hedge. Follow that path - aye, that one. It will lead you deeper into the Hedge.
Aye, dear friend. 'Tis true. It truly is beautiful and wonderful and strange. But beware! Knowest-thou that the Hedge is alive. Its thorns are sharp and can cut ye, tear ye into shreds. But the thorns will tear more than your skin. It may tear your soul, your hopes, your dreams and your thoughts. And thus can it drive you insane.
Aah. The precious, delightful sweetness of madness.
Know you now where it is you walk? This is the Hedge that lies between your home and theirs. Who they are? Dost thou yet not know that? Ahahaha! Ah, let me tell you, my friend. Let me tell you. See you that opening further down the path? Beware the roots on the ground, now. Can you see the forest that the hedge spills out into? Walk with me; I will see to it that you do not get lost.
Come. Let us leave the Hedge and continue our journey.
Look around at the great forest, its colours so alive. Feel the sparkles of life. Can you see the fields beyond? And over there, where you see those towers climbing high into the sky, that is the Castle, the heart. Can you hear the music? Feel the sweetness of everything, but be alert! Not everything is always as it seems. 'Tis not your homeland, this. 'Tis Annwfn. Aye, the Otherworld.
In Annwfn there is only one time: Now. Twilight. Here at the borderland or at the heart of the realm; everywhere it is the same. Just as in the old tales: people like you have wandered off into this world of eternal twilight, joined the wild dance of the fa'ae, lived here for the blink of an eye, only to return to your own land to find that hundreds of years have passed. Then again, others who get lost in the land of the fa'ae, searching for a door for thousands of years, at last find a path to return to their own land only to see that a mere moment has passed by, like a sip from a goblet.
Why, you ask, why and wherefore do we not always see them or their world? Why is this only granted to a few? Some humans and their like have been fa'ae-touched - madness you say, and lock them away. Aye, some say so when they do not understand. 'Tis all the ignorance of humans and their lack of understanding and their failure to see the true form of the Beautiful Ones. Sometimes their glamour hides them, it's true.
Their land lies, as you well know by now, beyond the Hedge. For others, it lies beyond a mist. Or perhaps the mist only exists in the human mind, because of the ignorance - now there's food for thought, my friend, yes? Perhaps we turned our backs at them, with this new way that hunts down and drives away the Old Ways.
Be gentle with them, for they are the spirits of nature. They go under so many names... Well, it's we humans that have given them those, through our tales, our songs, our dreams. We have called them Fa'ae, Fey, Fae Fä, Fe, and Fäe. Out of need to put names to all things around us, we have named them the Good Neighbours, the Gentle Ones, the Eternal Ones, the People of the Mounds. Call them Aoí Sí or Sídhe if you will, but know that is the name of their homes; the mounds and hills they live under. They are the Children of the Goddess Danu, more known as Tuatha Dé Danann. But then we have many names for the things we love, eh? And for the things we fear. No matter what we call them, they still are the same.
Ah, the glade. Let us rest for a while. Here are some berries. Eat.
The fa'ae might look like you and me, my friend. They might be big, or small, have wings or not, have twigs as arms, or fingers. They can be nothing more than that gentle wind that just brushed your neck. But many times they mimic us.
See that castle? Can you be sure it really is there?
Here. Have some berries. Water with that? No?
Good. Be alert. Not always do things be what they look like to us. Do you see these berries in my hand? Take a closer look. Mmm? They look like ordinary berries, no? But wait. Look here: when the glamour is gone... Right, they are merely bark and mushrooms. Yet for them, for the Fair Folk, this would be berries because that was what it was. Ah, I know 'tis strange, hard to understand. But now you see why we sometimes view people that have been touched by fa'ae as insane.
This is water, I promise. Do not look so skeptical. I give you my word.
Yes, you are right. They do live under rules - the same rules that we truly live under, the very same rules that nature is part of. Giving your word to the fa'ae means that you are bound to holding that promise. Break it and nature will treat you gently no more. Aye, they are bound by the same laws, but again; be wary of the fa'ae! They can be- Hmm, what is it we usually say..? Cunning, playful and mischievous.
They can play with words, so always be careful what you say. You see, whatever you say, they might take literally, at face-value. Sometimes they correctly interpret the meaning of what you wanted to say, but not as you thought it up. But they do stay true to their word and promises They make deals and contracts often, for some reason. Perhaps they have an agenda, but if so, it is too alien for human understanding. I have still not figured them out. And let us be honest, here where there is no time as we know it. Ever since the elves, the humans and all the others came into being - and a long, long time has passed since then - the fa'ae have been strange to us. It was true in days of yore, and 'tis true now. See the old tales; they have a myriad notions of our Good Neighbours, and none seems to be correct. Yet still they paint the most wonderful world that has ever existed...
But come now. Why should we sit here trying to analyse them? Let them be as they are. Enjoy them. Learn from them. And, of course, be ever alert.
What is Annwfn:
The answers to this question are full of contradictions, odd things, things of wondrous beauty, things so terrible that one risks enchantment, or perhaps disbelief and madness upon first gaze. Here, one can find peace. More than a physical place, Annwfn is a state of being, which exists slightly out of sync with the material and yet is part of it. One does not travel to Annwfn in the usual sense of the word; it's more about opening one's senses to the absolute reality, and taking that first step to the other side.
Annwfn is the Welsh name for Otherworld. Both are common names for the fa'ae world, as well as Faerie and the Land of the Eternals. To humans, Annwfn is many things - the land of spirits and the dead, for example, as well as the land of Fa'ae and magic. Some say it is the world as it once was, gradually hidden from the humans as they turned their back against the Old Ways.
Within Annwfn are many places such as Afallon [Avalon], the Tír na nÓg, and the Hedge, which runs through Annwfn but also borders it - a living, sentient barrier between Annwfn and the mortal world. One can reach the main part of Annwfn by going through the Hedge -but mind ye, the Hedge is a place in which ye should not just go wandering, for one can easily be lost. The Hedge is a thick overgrown forest, with glades scattered throughout where one can see the sky if lucky enough to find such. It is a heavy growth of gnarled twigs and sharp thorns, living things that tear not only at flesh, but at hopes and dreams, at will, at sanity and soul.
The Hedge itself is alive, as is the rest of Annwfn; within it reside creatures beyond dream and sense, stalking the old trods. Goblin markets are known to be hidden here, strange places where one can be lucky but only to misfortune. Once through the Hedge, Annwfn looks much like the rest of the world, but in its truest, purest form. Within are high mountains and hills, ancient forests and pristine lakes, great fields, sloping to white sand beaches bordering great oceans.
Annwfn Is:
* Based on the Old Ways and the Old Folk Tales
* A story weaving room
Annwfn Is Not:
* Like other rooms. No cities or villages, or little faery families living in little faery houses and going off to school to learn magic, or to work in a little faery shop
* A fantasy setting like a Forgotten Realm / Dragonlance or any role-play company designed settings.
* Disney faeries [yes yes Tinker Bell is cute, I agree]
* An urban tale
The Folk:
What is a fa'ae? This is a question that has as many answers as encounters, storytellers and dreamers can generate. I will try to explain here what a fa'ae of Annwfn is; when speaking of the folk, I will be using the word fa'ae or Folk.
There are many labels for the various forms of fa'ae - human labels, as fa'ae creatures do not label themselves. But true it is, that some prefer a certain form, a certain way to express, act, be seen as. For ease of role-play, we use these labels to be able to write the tales we create, for we as players [most of us] are still bound to the human way of expressing a tale. But never forget: a fa'ae is still a fae, no matter what form it uses to show or express itself, or take action with.
Loved child has many names:
Fa'ae, fae, fay, Aos Sí, Aes Sidhe, Faerie, the Gentry, the Good People, the Fair Folk... There are many names, yet they all refer to the same creature. Oh, what propensity humans have for creating words and names in order to understand what they see [what they think they see and understand, that is]. There are millions of names for the same creature, depending on who has seen it and written about it. The same object, when seen from different angles, can give rise to many different interpretations. This is especially true of the fa'ae.
Naturally, these words come from different places and languages of origin. For example, fa'ae, fae, fay and Swedish fe are all derived from Latin Fata ('Fate'). Of course, for humans the fa'ae are all about fate. Later, the word fae has come to include everything; the actual fa'ae as well as their land.
Take the Aos Si or Sidhe from Irish tales, for example. These words were originally used to name the places, palace, courts, residents, mounds, and hills inhabited by our ghostly beings. Later on, however, many English writers used sidhe both for the mound and the people that lived in them.
Misunderstandings like this one are commonplace when humans translate and write down tales of the fa'ae, and this is probably one reason why we today have a myriad fa'ae "races" where, in fact, there is only one sort of creature. In all likelihood, another contributing factor to this phenomenon is that humans divide themselves into "races" [which is, in itself, pretty strange] and therefore assume that the fa'ae do likewise. Mostly, we speak of the fa'ae simply as The Folk, to avoid stirring, angering or insulting these creatures.
The Fa'ae are far older than humans; they existed in the Beginning. Some, as simple as a breeze or a water-drop; many were formless or had many forms, tastes, colours and more. They roamed the world, they fought against beasts and beings old as themselves, they loved, raged and angered, and yet experienced a full measure of joy as well. As things changed and humans came to exist, the fa'ae began to take forms that were recognizable to the humans, humanoid forms that made it easier to interact with them. The Folk can be stunningly beautiful, marvellous and terrible, even ugly, and perhaps that is the reason humans invented the labels of seelie and unseelie. Humans have a concept of good and evil that does not exist in the world of Folk. For a fa'ae, every action has a cause; humans are the ones that apply good and evil to that action. It's very important to understand - and remember - that the Folk are eternal, they are not human, and think and act in their own way, without trying to "be" human.
....
