Ch.1 Maige Beatha

There weren't always dragons in the Valley. Towers now climb from once fertile soil, and scorched earth has become of the people’s arable lands. Great men with scales for skin and stones for hearts accrue their wealth through the sale and labour of their countrymen.

Maige Beatha was once the largest of several farming communities sharing lush countryside. Founded at the head of the valley, early settlers were awestruck by the beauty and abundant natural wealth they saw stretching out before them. Inspired by a glimpse of their futures painted on the horizon, they struck upon the name ‘Maige Beatha’. This town sat atop the highest flat of the valley, overlooking all that lived below, seeing as far as the basin of the river that marked the deepest end of the valley, which would later be settled upon as Maige Bas.

Over several decades, many small villages and townships sprang up around the valley, dotting the landscape and spreading the hope of agriculture and art that was born of Maige Beatha. With farming and craft, the settlers also brought their pantheon and viewed this new home as a gift from their Great Chief and Father, The Deida.

As great as these people’s propensity was to cultivate their lands in peace, their greatest failing was borne of their greatest success – a complete lack of martial might. Inevitably, foreign eyes would turn to the land’s natural resources, and a great war machine was directed to the valley to adopt its riches and strategic position between salt, peak & trough. Taking the valley was decisively easy. There were no drawn-out conflicts, no clashing armies, no organised resistance. What strength does plough and shovel claim before a military host? Those who wished to live were quickly and efficiently absorbed into the host, and those who objected were simply killed where they stood. Villages burned, bodies were tossed to the river as a gift to Maige Bas, and the tools once used to propagate and renew the lands were repurposed to exploit its resources. The cries of the valley people rang out but were left unheard. The Deida had abandoned them.

With the loss of community and the absence of their Great Chief and Farther, homesteads fell to ruin under militarism and conquest, save for the larger farms that went on to supply a new population. Soon the foundations of a new nation rose from the bloodied soil of Maige Beatha, ruled by an aristocracy in place of community leaders. They named their new hub city Prognos.

As the first banners of the Gryphon were raised towering over the valley, a tone was struck. The blood and burning was being put to the past, replaced with a grand future of progress and wealth. Years would go by as Prognos was drawn up out of the soil, and those living in the new city were encouraged by a sense of normalcy. As Prognos was situated at the top the of the valley, it became a gateway to visitors from other nations. Trade, scholarship, and security flourished. Merchants from beyond the valley would fall under the watchful gaze of Emeakin Matia, the wolf headed grand watchtower that peered down the valley, sighting invaders and would be traders approaching from the basin’s forests. Conferences of scholars and ambassadors arriving by sea or by mountain would come to expect Perifanos Indicon, the dog headed bastion that fortified Prognos as an intersection for the outside world.

Within the city, guardsmen and their spears patrolled the streets and carried out their lords’ edicts, while Golden Knights in their winged helms paraded to and fro as they reported their deeds to the capital spire. To many, these warriors inspired hope and faith in the future. Those younger patriots could see the light reflecting from brass shoulders and iron chests and lose faith that there were any woes of the world that couldn't be faced and overcome by Prognos.

But there were some who didn't forget, those who remembered Maige Beatha. They mourned for their old lives as farmers and cursed their invaders. Ultimately, such grumbling would amount to nothing. As quickly as resentment boiled and swelled in their chests, would-be-rebels would resign themselves just as quickly back to their workshop toil and factory sweat on behalf of their great steel nation. Their bodies remained weak not for labour of love in their fields, but as farmers of weapons, of pitch. Some tried to speak out against Prognos and were spared the burden of a trial and imprisoned. Some actively resisted and were dealt with much the same way as those peaceful farmers whom at one time refused to be subjugated; swept aside like dust.

And some became stone-like, silent and rigid in their hatred. They would walk the city by day, attend the shops, fulfill their duties. But at night, they would gather like rats in the dark, and feign resistance to their oppressors, their spirits twisted as parodies to the kind and spiritual people they once were. Quietly they would murmur amongst themselves, the phrase that captured their ire, and marked them as traitors.

"There weren't always dragons in the valley".

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Thanks for reading a newbie story from a newbie writer. Your eyes and attention are huge support, and your opinion is deeply appreciated. If you have any notes on what you think is missing or that could be improved, my comments are open :)

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