In the sharpest of dawns where time was still young in the lands of the west beyond the shadow of the King's Wall there was a boy. All men begin this way, and from this place some are mixed and kneaded and risen then baked into men both great and wise across the land. Often great men begat great men, and in other times they sprout only fools. With some, and in that case only a few, there are some who see to spring up from no single source. They come from a father without either breeding or uncommon commonness, their mother is good and wise but unremarkable and seems only to protect the child from the evils of this world. They are children of EO and they are the source of songs and ballads, the talk of younger children who say "again, again, tell it again." It is them that all mother wish to bear, and all father wish to seed. But all attempts at training such children seem to come to naught. They are not brought into being but sung, by the minstrel of all things great and small.
The land was Kalakumen. Once it would be a great land of mighty deeds, but for now it was quiet and dark. The people who lived there were still of the roughest sort, and their ways still spoke of uncommonly simple things. No trade came to Kalakumen in those days, or at least very little. They had naught but farms and a few rude journeymen who journey from place to place bartering for what have you. Targeyn was a good boy who spoke gently to his mother, and answered well to his father. He was one of seven children and the third among the lot. His brother was older by four years and his sister by one. Born under the stars of the winter his mother had named him after the dark bear of the sky who appeared only with the chill. "You are my winter bear," she would say, "the winter winds do not freeze your bones, but quicken your blood to course warmer through your veins." So it was in winter when all the other children huddled in dark furs Targeyn wore his leather britches and walked barefoot through the snow. In the night he wrapped himself in the skin of black bear he had killed as it slumbered in the snow.
It had been bitter cold that day even for him, and he had brought only a spear to hunt white rabbits in the snow, and a knife to skin them. He came upon the cave as even his body seemed to succumb to the cold. In the darkness he had come upon the sleep bear. Carefully he placed himself behind the great body and plunged the spear directly into the bears neck. The bear had risen with the great anger only to impale itself on the waiting knife bearing Targeyn up with it anger and driving him into the roof. He had awoken to find the bear dead and himself with a nasty bruise to the head. He had carried back the fur that day, and two trips were made to the cave to carve up the meat and return it to their house.
There were three seasons in Kalakumen. The first was winter. Lusken, who was the elder of the people of Targeyn's valley said that everything began with winter and would one day end with summer. Winter was nothing, winter was death, winter was the time before. Then there was spring, and that was for planting. The ground took crops easily and they were few enough that grew though. Targeyn did like the time of spring, Lusken chided him when he had told the elder this one planting day. "Spring is the beginning, spring is the work, then summer is the profit. What good would summer be without the profit?" Targeyn did not like spring, but he never spoke against it again.
Summer was building time. This was when the fun was to be had. Spring rains were gone, and now the land was truly green and the light shown well on the land deep into the evening. Even the youngest children stayed up late in the summer. Targeyn loved to slip noiselessly through the woods hunting the foxes for their fur, or the birds for their meat. He was a hunter among even the elders, none could match the silence of his footsteps or the sureness of his strike. He was neither tall, nor strong, but he was quick and precise. It was in this time that he seemed to come alive and the world opened to him as though all he touched was his.
When he was not hunting he joined in the building. House by house they went among the people. First to this place, and then to another, the carpenter's had cut the trees and prepared the logs all spring, and now they built houses. Larger, stronger, longer, more luxurious. One at a time they went doing what they thought best. All spring these things were discussed and planned, and the lumber prepared. No in the evening first the work--then the feasting. This too Targeyn loved midsummer feasting. Then there was dancing, and music, and the story tellers spoke many songs deep into the night as the children listened eyes wide with wonder. Then when late morning had broke they were alert and eager, and the cycle began again.
Always late in the year there was one evening the children were sent to a certain place to play many games, and do as they pleased. Luskan said this was where one began to be a man, and discern things one did not otherwise do when there was one older to instruct. Here many of the girls spent their time with the younger practicing the ways of their mother, and the boys struted and wrestled. One year Targeyn sat apart watching, and then wondered what the men and women did with this time. In the darkness he snuck away in silence. It was not hard to find even in the dark. Everywhere he went on the further side of the village he found many fires, and at them they sat. Mostly they were parents alone with their fire. He watched them in the stillness of the night and saw many things no one would tell him openly, and learned secrets that he had never learned before.
In the end he found Luskan's fire and found him sitting alone and staring into the flames. "Even you are not quiet enough my child," Targeyn came and sat at the fire with him. They said nothing for a long time, then Targeyn asked, "there are many rituals aren't there?"
"Yes," Luskan looked at him, "there are many, but in the end there is nothing left between you and if you are strong what was once divided becomes whole."
"Father of my father's," Targeyn began.
"Yes, child."
Targeyn looked up from the flames his eyes dancing with fire and starlight, "I see profit and danger in it."
Luskan laughed a deep throaty laugh such as Targeyn had not seen the somber man laugh before, "you are wise beyond many years child. Remember it is a wrestle and a dance. How think you the dance with those who are mismatched."
"It goes poorly, they are not one in step."
Luskan smiled, "both must dance to the same piper, and follow the same steps, even if often they are their own. There are many paths in this world child, but chose carefully who you dance with, because that dance does not end often."
They sat a long time silent before the fire, and in the end Luskan fell asleep and Targeyn crept away to watch the stars and observe the dancers.
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