Difference between revisions of "GLRP:EMs:Misc Events:2011:Brialla’s Journey"

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Brialla’s Journey

January 29, 2011

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Those wishing to retrace Brialla of the Seven Tears’ footsteps from Yew to Minoc met Louisa Clark outside Empath Abbey. Manny dressed in a traditional monk’s robes and went barefoot for the duration of the journey, mimicking Brialla. The walk wound south along the road out of Yew.  As they passed the Yew Cemetery, many experienced Brialla’s ghostly presence for a short distance.

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Along the road east of Yew, the walkers sought a respite at a small Royal Guard outpost.  Inside, the found Jerry the Guard willing to talk about Brialla.

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“We owe the walk a bit o' service, a memorial and history and all.

I read her journals a lot when I was a kid.  I like the parts where the animals are killing each other. She doesn’t leave anything out! Bears, wolves, even leopards tearing stuff apart, intestines all over the place! Those journals were great. The part with the stampeding horses is hilarious too.

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My favorite has to be the bees. Anyone remember that?  She’d been guided towards what we’d now call the Vesper shoreline by two gypsies.  Bryshen, who was quick as thunder and Baul, who was slow as a snail.  Baul was so slow, he could take an hour to finish a sentence. 

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One day, she and Bryshen were standing in the camp going over the maps.  Baul had plodded ahead to fetch firewood.  Well, Baul suddenly came running past them, faster than an ostard!  Without even turning around, Brialla and Bryshen drop their maps and run after him.

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Turned out Baul was being chased by bees!  The whole coastline was guarded by a wall of bees.  So on her map for that part of the coast, it’s marked “Here Be Bees!”  Hehe, cracks me up to think of them running like that.

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Yup, great woman, Brialla. Known for her gentleness and kindness too.  Well, except towards that one gypsy she stabbed to death.  Can’t really fault her for that. Not fond of them myself. Though I’d surely like to get my hands on a few pieces of that jewelry they’re hoarding.”

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Before Jerry could say anything that might get him into trouble, Louisa herded everyone back onto the road.  They continued north until coming upon the Royal Guard post at the southern end of Arrow’s Point Bay.

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There, they met Paule Steele, another Royal Guard.  He shared his recollections of Brialla and her life.

“Always good to see the old traditions continued.

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Brialla’s maps were a tremendous advance for her time. The journals were interesting too.

Sweet story. You know how surveyors mark out plots with nails or boards?

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Well, Brialla was doing that and there was a little gypsy boy following her around for a few days.

She explained to him that the nails were very important. She finishes just before the rainy season.  Next day, she comes back and the boy meets her, looking proud. He’s holding all the nails.  Kid tells her he picked them all up, so they wouldn’t rust!  She writes that his big dark eyes were looking up at her for approval and she had to smile.

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That was how Brialla met Kerey, of the Kandali tribe of gypsies.  The Kandali were nomadic gypsies who roamed the area around what is present-day Minoc.  Kerey took her home to meet his father, Guaril, king of that tribe of gypsies, and mother, Zigena.  They invited Brialla to share in their evening meal. The tribe was large and happy.

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The chief’s brother, Elek, was particularly pleased to meet Brialla. He’d made amateur maps himself and was eager to get advice on how to improve them.  The gypsy king, Guaril, seeing his brother so happy, invited Brialla to stay as long as she liked.  The clan’s healer had died, so Brialla’s early training was particularly welcome. 

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Brialla and Elek spent a good deal of time together; weeks passed.  She grew close to the entire tribe.  She wrote in her journal that she hoped Elek would come back to Yew with her or that maybe she'd even travel back to Yew to share her maps and then come back and become a gypsy with Elek.

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Then the journals break off, and when she resumes writing she’s halfway back to Yew.  She never spoke or wrote of the Kandali tribe again. She didn’t even edit that part of her journal.  ‘Tis a mystery.”

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With more information on Brialla’s experience with gypsies, the walkers continued walking east.

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In the Royal Guard outpost south of Newcastle Township, they found a slightly inebriated Robert McFarland, the Royal Surveyor.  He told more about Brialla’s time with the Kandali, including the stabbing mentioned by Jerry.

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“The journey, walked it myself on occasion. Decent woman, Brialla.  She got along with everyone, gypsies, trappers, fur traders, hermits.  I like... like how she wrote that everyone has something good about them, if you look.

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Those journals... Read ‘em when I was a kid. *hic* Liked when the gypsies convinced her it was pride to just wear a robe in the freezing north. They made her furs and showed her how to wear them too. Some gypsy trick to make air cir-circul-go around.  Heh, betcha she was just cold though. Makes it easy to be conv-convin-told. Betcha. 

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Funny to hear about her stabbing that guy though.  Yup, she stabbed him about a dozen times.  Would have been more, but the dagger got stuck in his chest.  Right above his heart.  You know what they say about a woman scorned.  There was an eyewitness! She stabbed him right in front of a kid.”

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When McFarland became more interested in his liquor than in continuing the story, Louisa led the group on towards the Britain crossroads.

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However, just before the Crossroads, they encountered Ceija the Gypsy.  While preparing her evening meal, she told them Brialla’s story from the “gypsy point of view.”

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“I can tell you a good bit about Brialla, from the gypsy point of view!  What she did to the Kandali tribe.

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First I’ll tell you of the happiness of the Kandali tribe, so you can see the innocence that was lost.

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Their king Guaril, leader you would call him, was popular and just.  Smaller gypsy groups joined with the Kandali to be lead by him.  His speeches were a wonder. His azure eyes shone with energy, his voice boomed with strength.

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The tribe’s musician, an important role in a gypsy community, was his younger brother Elek.  Elek was quiet and shy, dusky and poetic. His brother’s opposite in every way.

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Guaril kidnapped his wife, Zigena, from her tribe, The Icy Ones.  Some say they were called that because of their eerily colorless eyes and skin.  Others say it was because of the Icy Ones’s animal slaughter rituals, which are utterly silent but would be considered cruel today.

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Zigena had a baby boy, Kerey. Zigena and Guaril both doted upon the boy.  Ten years passed after Kerey’s birth and all was well.  Then innocent little Kerey brought that Brialla home.  Zigena was on her guard against Brialla from the start!  She was powerless to stop her though...

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Brialla set her sights on Elek and none would hear a word of warning.  Brialla killed Elek!  The boy, Kerey, saw it with his own eyes!

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He ran screaming from the tent and brought the whole tribe back with him, but Brialla was already gone, though her foul dagger was still wedged in the corpse.

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By the time the tribe checked the tent she’d been staying in, she and her bits of paper had disappeared.

Just as the group realized what had happened, the leader, Guaril appeared, having come from the banks of the nearby bay.  The one that is now aptly called “Lost Hope Bay”.

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Upon learning that his brother was dead, the great lion of a man was silent, his eyes brimming with tears.  When the group said they should set out after Brialla, he shook his head and said that it was a tragedy that his brother had loved so unworthy a woman but that Elek wouldn’t have wanted her hunted down like an animal.”

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She then bade the travelers to leave her to her supper and continue on their journey.  Louisa quickly led the group on to the large Royal Guard base at the Crossroads.

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In the eastern part of the structure sat Holt Wilder, citizen of Minoc.  He cautioned against taking all the scandalous stories about Brialla to heart.

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“I learned a lot about human nature and morality by reading her descriptions of animals.  Though the rumors could be a lesson in and of themselves.  Personally, I’ve never put much stock in the gossip.  You know what they say about a lie going around the world before the truth can get on its boots.  Started enough wild rumors myself --heck, heard enough wild rumors ABOUT myself!-- that I don’t put much stock in rumors that someone did something so contrary to their character

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I will tell you this that I know for a certainty about Brialla.  She found a lot of bleached bones of former explorers on her journey and she stopped to bury each and every one of them. Even when she was starving or freezing.  Not a lot of people would have done that. Heck, I wouldn’t have!”

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Louisa continued the walk towards Minoc, stopping at the last Royal Guard outpost on the road to Vesper and Minoc.  There they found another citizen of Minoc, Winifred Wainright.  She consented to share a few of her thoughts on Brialla’s life.

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“I never cared for Brialla’s journals myself. Too gritty.  She certainly was honest though.

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For instance, how that stampede of horses caused her to dive into a prickle bush, which turned out to be a rudimentary flint mine she “discovered” by falling down it! Hah!  Now, if I’d made an important discovery arse-first, I’d have changed it a bit in print.  Not our fair monk though. On her map she even marked the spot differently. The surveyor notes go: ABC1, ABC2, ARS, ABC3.

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Not that her honesty made Brialla the most popular person in Yew...  She once naively told that the Yew town baker that his son looked more like the blacksmith. You notice they don’t have a blacksmith in Yew anymore?”

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Leaving Winifred to resume her business, the group continued on the road to Minoc.

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As the approached the mining town, they passed the permanent gypsy encampment.  There they met a man named Djano who said he was the current King of the Gypsy tribe.  When he learned of the group’s purpose, he led them to The Barnacle tavern and chose to impart the true story of Brialla.  One kept secret since Elek’s death so many centuries ago…

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“I have now come to the age where I should pass this story on to my heir and die peacefully, believing my duty done.  I could leave it to the next generation to choose a time to tell the truth.  I ask myself though: why should I trust that my descendants will have any more guts than my ancestors on this issue?

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Brialla of the Seven Tears did not murder my many-times great-granduncle.  Or should I say, she did not murder my many-times great-grandfather!

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The little boy, Kerey didn't realize the truth himself until many years later. Many years, many, many.  His mother, Zigena, on her death bed, little suspecting what she was truly saying told him the secret of his parentage.  In a flash, Kerey knew the truth.  He realized that Brialla had had her hand on the dagger to try to remove it and that she meant to try to heal Elek, lost cause though it was by that point.  Kerey realized that the man he thought was his father, Guaril, had killed Elek, in a jealous rage.

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Kerey meant to seek after Brialla, to make the journey to Yew.  By that point though, Kerey was king of his tribe, with heavy responsibilities.  So each year he put it off, until finally he was too bent over with age to go.  He made his daughter promise that she would go and put things right but she too was burdened down with duties. So on her deathbed she made her son promise, but he became engulfed in war with new settlers in Minoc.  As he lay dying he made his own son promise, but it would have been too great a blow to gypsy pride at that moment in time…

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And so we've continued.  Those who would serve Justice must sometimes choose between Compassion and Honesty.  On that day, Brialla fled silently, choosing Compassionately not to deprive a little boy of the father he knew, especially not on the day that his true father had died.

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So that is my story.”

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With the truth of Elek’s murder finally known, Djano removed the tarnish on Brialla’s good name…

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