Lan. That was the name my mother used to call you, and she did speak of you often. To the uninformed stranger, it would seem as though the two of you had spent more time together than a brief, passionate few months. Although love and children can begin their blossomings in a short time, sadly, generations of tradition and preceptions are not so quickly overcome. And so you left immediately upon hearing of her pregnancy. No doubt a curious and exotic summer turned into a very real responsibility, and potentially damaging to your heritage. You ran to escape. You were able to run. But the further you ran, the more the sting of "bastard" was burned upon my forehead, right next to your previous brand of "half- breed". I cannot hold ill will against you, my father, for many would have, and have already, done the same in your situation. And for my mother's sake: she holds nothing but a detached obsession for you.

It was not until many years into adolesuenece that I discovered that Lan was a common name beginning for the elves of Darsylon. I never had the heart, nor courage, to tell my mother about this. Sometimes I wonder if that is all of your name she really knew. Not a lie, but neither was it the entire truth. Maybe just personal enough to bring you into her trust, yet anonymous enough for you to slip out again once the fling was over. And so your "almost" name became me.

I never learned very much else about the elves. My mother would never let me see or speak with the very few visitors who stopped by our small cottage. "You're too precious, they'd want you for themselves!" she would say. When I think about it now, I simply guess there would be too many questions. Questions she did not want to answer. It was in an abandoned cabin in a mountain crevice filled with books that I learned all I could about the outside world. I tried to learn about what was beyond the forests and fields that I knew so well. I tried to learn about you.