onwesterlywinds:Ashelia Riot: Most of us here know of the Autumn War - a brutal conflict that ravage
onwesterlywinds:Ashelia Riot: Most of us here know of the Autumn War - a brutal conflict that ravaged East End and pitted the whole of Aldenard against Ala Mhigo’s newly unified army. This tale begins on a night much like tonight, nigh a century ago - as the fight was nearing its most bitter, and the days were among the shortest of the year.Ashelia Riot: A small platoon of Adder troops and Ishgardian knights were dispatched to the front lines. Their mission was to intercept any Ala Mhigan activity, for the snows that night were brutal, and the enemy were more accustomed moving about in such bitter conditions - this was, remember, before the great freezing from the Calamity - and they were thought to be preparing an all-out attack against the civilians living on the borders of the Twelveswood.Ashelia Riot: After hours of creeping through the forest in the bone-numbing chill, the scouts came upon the Ala Mhigans. But they were not preparing for battle - far from it. They stood before a single pine tree in a clearing - a lone tree, of the sort that has long been revered as sacred in the barren Gyr Abanian highlands - and decorated it in observation of their own beliefs.Ashelia Riot: The Ala Mhigans cut strands from their own clothing to create a long, multicolored garland and draped it across the evergreen boughs. They removed what few pieces of jewelry they still possessed and hung those from branches. Before that tree, they removed their gauntlets and cesti and other warmaking devices - and they gathered the heavy snow around them to create Father Frost: a massive snowman that Ala Mhigans believe will keep their loved ones safe during Winter’s Knell.Ashelia Riot: The Gridanian forces watched as their enemies, shorn of their weapons and armor, used the last of their precious matches to light candles. They tied these candles to the tree with great reverence and joy, and placed the remainder around their Father Frost as though he were a saint… and then, in that silent moment, some misplaced Gridanian footfall snapped a twig.Ashelia Riot: The Ala Mhigans saw that they were surrounded, about to meet their deaths. Yet the Gridanians hesitated, for they had never imagined that Ala Mhigans, their mortal enemies, could create such a beautiful scene within the Twelveswood - that they could care about the land and what became of it. And the sight of the tree was so beautiful in the midst of their seemingly endless war that they could garner no will to fight.Ashelia Riot: And so they chose to break their bread with the very women and men they had been sent to kill. They laid down their own arms, shed their own armor, and built a campfire. Though few of them spoke the other’s languages, they communicated as people do: through song, and food and drink, and laughter.Ashelia Riot: Perhaps this tale can be thought of as an aberration - that it reflects more on the circumstances of one night. But it happened again the following year - and in the next, and the next, until the war was at last over. They lost plenty among their number in the battles in between, but each Starlight, they set aside their nationalities to mourn and hope and celebrate as friends rather than enemies.Ashelia Riot: I know that this story is true because two of the Gridanian soldiers who bore witness to this event were my maternal great-grandparents. Upon the last of their Starlight meetings, one of their Ala Mhigan friends invited them to return to his home, where they lived out the rest of their days in the Peaks as one family. I believe, then, that this same capacity for love is within all of us, whether or not we so choose to use it.Ashelia Riot: On behalf of myself and the Riskbreakers, and of Ser Rosaire and the Institute, we hope very much that you will take this day as a means to do good for your fellow man. And above all else, if you have nothing to give, know that a kind word alone may change a world. -- source link