To my honored mother Altise Lowenrowenoe, the roots of my successes and boughs o'er my travails, and my most honored father Tirqie Lowerowenoe, clever beyond words, your daughter Mynqa Lowenrowenoe sends strange news.
My travels beyond the forests of home have been fraught at times, enjoyable at others, and I thank the spirits you smiled upon my wanderlust. I find myself in the lands of the Hrothi, particularly within the bounds of the realm of good Layan Ieana of the House Kallar, as she is styled in the native tongue. The mountains have an austere beauty that cannot hope to match the warmth and life of your home among the ironwoods, but it has grown on me--and will continue to do so.
I do not mean to trouble you with memories of old squabbles long buried by the family, but do you recall great-great-aunt Rylli? She ran off with that Hrothi merchant before you brought me into the blessed light of the dappled wood and, as luck would have it, he did rather well for himself in their eastern mountains. Their children did likewise, rising socially, and so on until I've been given to understand the line petered out--but I am scrambling to the crown without a line now. In the company of rough and boisterous Brudvir from the marcher duchy of Dawnmire, I found my way to a gala thrown by the queen herself and after most of my new companions passed out early I made the acquaintance of a dashing couturier, danced, drank some more, and then the cycle that Aunt Rylli began came to a close and renewed itself with an announcement in the queen’s name.
Mother, father, your daughter is a mayor in Hrothi lands.
Not officially mind, there are complications with inheritance and law and you know how stiff and inflexible their minds can be, which is how I find myself peering over the shoulder of a proxy most days. She is an able administrator, the people are brusque but friendly, and my position affords me some softening of response when I discovered that their locks are terribly out of date. The town though, the town is something else entirely.
Pacyengast. Delving of writers, thinkers, hard men and women steeped in faith. As the story was related to me, in their war between Virtue and Vice Pacyen sheltered beneath the mountains, wounded sore and stricken low. To this day, those trapped and labored breaths of patience waft up from the depths and carry inspiration to the devoted, and reinforcement to the faltering. Of course I was also told it was not Pacyen, but some Hrothi luminary, ancient Shield and ancestor to the families of the delving today. I have seen fist-fights over the same, though the acrimony seems most theatrical.
Whatever the truth, for I'm not convinced either way that it isn't just a pretty name dreamt up on too much mushroom wine, the spirit of that naming is strong here. Care is lavished upon every detail, the tunnels washed chalk-white and lit with the glow of sculpted glow-vines, holy days observed without fail, and such vigor in the exercise of thought and talent! The local cult extols Pacyen in dance and speech, hours into days of exhausting whirling and thumping for the former, and ferocious debate and criticism in the taverns and winesinks the latter. The stationers do good business--never have I seen such flurries of paper and parchment as I have in this little hole in the mountains, and the energy I fear is infectious.
When the warm wind stirs from the lower tunnels and whispers up and out in to the river valley above I find myself pausing to listen for some word. Some flash. An echo. I find myself greeting miners and monks with greater ease, the stubbornness and mistrust in their look lessening with each day, or perhaps it's my eyes that are changing. I miss the forests and you, mother, father, but in that wind as it sings through archways and light-shafts, across broad squares and through vaulted galleries I hear home.
I will see you at the next Passage: as daughter, mayor, and perhaps a badger. At the end of the cycle a delving may just be a hole in the ground, but Pacyengast is my hole in the ground, and far more underneath than one sees at first glance.
Your loving daughter, eternal squirrel-chaser, and jewel of your forest, Mayor-in-shadows Mynqa Lowenrowenoe
