Role

Chapter 1

Gwythienne's earliest memory was of the sound of the river outside the little
cottage she grew up on the outskirts of Galadon. It soothed her to sleep,
filled her dreams, nourished her soul in a way that she could never have
possibly understood as an infant. But that is the wonder of being an infant:
understanding is not an expectation. It is enough to simply be, to feel. And
feel she did. It was as if the water filled her spirit in some way. It would
be a thread that would tie everything together within the tapestry of her
life.

Gwythienne's father, Elarion, and her mother, Seraphia, worked at the
lumberyards within the Feanwyyn Weald forest. As Grythienne grew older, she
learned that this had not always been so. Her human father had once been a
traveling actor in a troupe that made a broad circuit between the various
cities of mainland Thera. Her mother, born of high elven heritage, studied to
become an invoker with hopes of being assigned a position within the royal
palace in Darsylon. When Elarion's troup came through Darsylon for a
performance, the two met and had an undeniable connection. The high elves were
unsupporting of a union between one of their own and a lowly human actor, and
so the couple decided to leave Darsylon. For his part, Elarion seemed happy.
But Seraphia felt a deep loss in the separation from her heritage and home,
which she tried to hide from everyone. Gwythienne, a very empathetic child,
sensed this loss and longing and it colored her perception of the world.

"Gwythienne," her mother called to her one early evening, as the sun set over
the forest. "Come here a moment. Look out there, at the river. Do you see how
wide it is? How powerful? Would you believe that once this river was only a
tiny trickle coming down from the mountains to the east? It is true. Water is
the great worker of change in the land. It is tireless. That trickle dug away
at the soil for thousands of years to become a small stream. That stream
became a larger brook, and that brook over thousands more years became this
broad and powerful river we see now. It nourishes life, including ours." Her
mother paused then, gazing thoughtfully out at the water. "It makes one wonder
what other small acts might produce large changes somewhere down the line,
doesn't it? In a way, we are all like the water, digging away at the world,
forming and shaping."

Perhaps Seraphia was thinking of her own past, and how her actions had flowed
like a river, changing everything, to bring her to this moment. But it was a
lesson that Gwythienne never forgot and considers daily: how do my actions, no
matter how small, shape the world? If I am a trickle of water, what river will
I become?