Celyn’s Story of Getting His Name
This is Celyn’s story of how he got his name; please don’t read it unless it has been revealed in game
I was born in Clawyn, I don’t know if you know it. It’s a village, we make wine. I was brought up to the vine, and the grape, and the wine, from when I was tiny; from when I was almost as tiny I was brought up to the fey and their ways. The children that the fey seem to take to are often brought in to do the rounds of the maintenance of the spaces we have agreed to tend, pouring wine on the roots of oaks and hawthorns, keeping the standing stones clear of the wrong sorts of plants, that sort of thing. The temple steward taught me, but also the fey themselves did, because I had a gift for it he lacked. He favored the Mother, of course, like most of us.
Nobody was sure what to do with me when I came of age, the way it turned me sour and furious. It was not that they were unkind, of course, but I did not know what was wrong, and so they did not know what was wrong. They just knew that I went from a happy child braiding flower crowns to a furious teenager, prone to petty theft, breaking pottery, picking fights. The fey did not know what to do with me either, though one or two taught me to fight better, taught me how to cheat at it, in the hopes that if I were focused it would ease something for me.
The fey do not understand being born out of season. They never are. They carry their seasons with them, their times, their natures. They change forms so easily, and I do not think they understand how it feels to be stuck, trapped, in a body that is doing unfamiliar and extravagantly unpleasant things. I envy them that clarity, sometimes. I must have complained to one at some point, enough that they managed to grasp what was wrong, or maybe they figured it out, and they brought me to a place where the Wyrdling could find me. A holy place. There was a tree in spring bloom, even though it was autumn, and I lay down under the tree and slept, and dreamed of the Wyrdling in the form of two birds.
The first bird whispered in my ear and told me that I was growing into a man by the most difficult route, the one that made me strange and strong of heart. That my anger was because I was a man out of season.
The second bird whispered in my other ear and told me that I - that we - the men out of season, the women out of season, those like you who have seasons of their own crafting, are precious to them, that we will always be loved.
And the birds carried away my name, leaving me stripped like a baby waiting for my naming day. By the time I came out of the forest again I was Celyn, and I knew I was a boy growing into a man by the twisty route that was governed by hope.
Before too long, my dreams guided me to leave Clawyn and go north - towards Tafolwern - and I came to a larger town, one where the temple was to the Wyrdling rather than the Mother like it was at home. There was an acolyte there, a woman named Eirian, a woman who came to her womanhood out of season as I was coming into manhood, and the dreams guided me to her.
She taught me the things I needed to know: the herbs that stopped my courses, the brew that would deepen my voice. I never did manage to find the dose that would help me grow a beard, though. And she taught me the other things, so that I could properly tend to all our people out of their season, the treatment that would bring out womanliness, the things in all their forms so that those like yourself might choose what they want, if they want such things.
Eirian taught me other things as well. The art of shading my jaw so that I could look more like myself. The art of dressing to look as I preferred, to emphasize and to conceal. These, too, are the arts that the Wyrdling wished her to know, and wished me to know, so that I can use them, so that I can teach them. They also were quite useful when I was travelling with a theater troupe, I helped everyone with their costumes.
By the time I had learned to tend the needs of my people, of our people, these ones the Wyrdling loves, who cannot change shape so easily as fey but who strive and hope to do so, I could conjure light from my fingertips by wishing. When I can, when I can stop here, I will teach you these things, how to take care of our people. Perhaps it will help you too, to learn how to summon that hopeful light. I have a book, with the things I know about the herbs. I know the ones I need and can forage for them if I see them sprouting, so you can borrow it and copy it if you like while I am away.