FORGEMASTERS OF THE REALM

Homecoming was not a time of rejoicing, instead a somber, sorrowful event. Agnar was greeted with the woeful news that his mother had died due to a scorpion sting. Because his mother was racially human, the sting was always fatal (Elves are impervious to poisons). She was comatose within a day and died the next day. The funeral was held the day that Agnar arrived; everyone was kind hearted, offering consolations, and the Coven turned out in mass. The Elven villagers fabricated the pyre raft, amassed the wood and placed her gently atop. She looked regal, serene dressed in her best garb adorned with a crown. After services were finished, the raft was set adrift, and his father Afmyndur set the pyre afire with a fire-arrow. Agnar would not leave, even when all of the members of the Coven departed. Agnar watched the raft sink with sorrow. He was numbed by the death of his mother, dumbfounded and confused, like a lost soul that no one could console. She was a kind, gentle woman, always ready to come to my rescue when I was a lad. She will be sorely missed, her soft persuasive voice, always right when giving counsel. “Fyrirgefa mér” Agnar was startled, lost in thought, he didn’t notice his father coming up behind him. His father, shorter than Baldur by a head, was dressed in black, as most of those people in attendance. “I am so sorry for your loss. Your mother was a wonderful person; I will always have pleasant memories of her. ” “Faður minn. I don´t have the words to express...”, as choked Agnar. “If only I had departed earlier from the fort.” Afmyndur grasped Agnar’s both shoulders stared into his eyes and said “Don’t...” His father then hugged him. Agnar had never been hugged by his father; Elves do not display public emotions. The two of them stood silent for a moment, and then Agnar hugged him back. “Come, let us go home. We need to talk” said Afmyndur. After the two had entered the tree-house, Agnar scanned the abode, the first time since he came home really. The round door was as he remembered, with a small window in the oak door. Memories filled his mind with mother, meals together, when he was ill as a child, her singing in the evenings when he was sent to bed. “Do you want some melon-dew tea?” asked his father. “Yes, please. I probably feel a bit lonely as you. What now happens in the Coven?” replied Agnar, trying to invent something to talk about.