It took more time to get the ancient Teller up to Grandmother’s dwelling, than it took to round the old woman and her apprentice up. The Teller was quite winded by the time the two younger women had managed to get her settled into the pillows. The sunlight was moving on, but it still brightened that area of the room.

“Ahhh, Somaya,” The Teller said as she caught her breath. “When did the pair of us get so damn old?” There was mischief in her pale brown eyes.

Grandmother Weaver snorted as she settled in the cushions next to her lifelong friend. “It happened slowly, until one day we closed our eyes girls, and woke up old women.” She groaned as she settled back. “The time has come, my dear friend, to tell the story to the young ones who will follow us.”

“They are still so very young, my dear friend. Are you certain that the time has come?”

“Time grows short, for me, for you, for all of Charan.”

The Teller’s gaze sharpened. “What have you seen?”

The Weaver hummed deep in her throat. “I have seen many things, Ymari, so many things.” She shook her head. “Nothing unchangeable, but time grows short in which to make changes.”

“Ahh, then I understand” The Teller shifted, settling herself more comfortably among the cushions.”

“Teleka, do you remember when I was teaching you to weave visions?”

“Yes, Grandmother. I don’t think I will ever forget.”

“If only forgetting were enough to make it go away. Tell Ymari and Dylasha what you saw.” The Weaver said.

“When we were-”

“Ah-” The Teller interrupted. “Remember the patterns.”

Teleka frowned. “Why?”

“Tradition is important, words are important. All the history of Alsais, of our people, is kept in the minds of those very people. The Weaver and the Teller keep that history alive. There is magic woven into the patterns of our lives, the traditions of our stories. The words may change, from Telling to Telling, but the story, the history, remains the same.” The Teller lectured.

The young woman was still frowning as she began the story anew. “I tell this story in my own words for it is my story.” She began, “It was many years ago, when Somaya the Mother Weaver took me under her wings and became Grandmother to our people.”

Dylasha rested cross legged on a single cushion just outside the patch of sunlight. All three of the other women in the dwelling made no sounds to interrupt the story. This was a sacred moment, not to be lessened by chatter.

“One day she was teaching me to Weave water, to understand what water is tied to. As Weaver, she told me, I would need to understand Water beyond all others, for water is tied to dreams, uncertainty, illusion, to what has been, to what may be, and what is. A Weaver, she told me, must always know what is and what may be, it is given to the Teller to know what was.”

The current and future Tellers both nodded their heads sharply at that. “On that day, Grandmother taught me to seek the dreaming.” It was almost unconscious as Teleka drew a small grape-sized globe of water out of the very air, weaving it into a perfect, tumultuous sphere. “Within the water are currents, water resists restraint, rails against the Weave, she told me.”

“So I looked.” She said, glancing down at the globe floating above her hands and letting it dissipate quickly. She continued looking at her empty hands. “I found the eddies of the water, I looked deep within, for the ties to what may be. I found them.”

“First color, haze, shadows. Then I saw enormous trees, stretching toward an unfamiliar sky. It seemed we were riding the eyes of something, swooping into the trees, rustling through the branches, into a large clearing. Bridges and walkways criss-crossed through the massive, ageless trees. Then there was smoke. The view changed, massive mountains, larger than any that exist in Charan, even across the Outlands. The sphere went dark, darker than any night I have ever passed. A dark without stars, without moon. Darker than the deepest room of a dwelling.”

“I nearly dashed the spell when the light flared, so bright it stung my eyes after peering into that darkness. The image cleared, but slowly. A group of pale people, shaped much like Alsaians, with differences so stark. Large pale eyes, blond hair, and wings like a hornet. Antennae, I think.”

“Grandmother dashed the water from my hand herself as one of the figures began to turn toward us.” Teleka shuddered. “I think she was afraid.” She stopped talking for a moment before noticing the Teller’s fierce scowl. She quickly added. “This was my story, I told it in my own words that you may tell it in yours.”

“So what was it that you saw?” Asked Dylasha eagerly. “A future that may be?”

“I believed then and more so now, that she saw what was in that time.” Grandmother answered.

“You never told me this.” The Teller protested. “Why?”

“Would you believe me if I said that I hoped the forgetting of it would make it go away?” Grandmother sounded so tired when she asked that Taleka could believe she had held on to that hope for all these years.

“There is another story that must be told then.” The Teller mused. Grandmother only nodded sadly.

“May I tell it for you, Teller Ymari?” Dylasha asked.

Ymari shook her head, a frown building on her wrinkled face. “You will not know this story, child, it is not a story of the Alsaians and is only known by the Grandmothers.”

The ancient Teller cleared her throat. “I tell this story in my own words, as it was told to me by the Teller before me. Long generations have passed since this story was first told, but the truth of the story remains. It always remains, children. That is the magic of tradition, woven into the very souls of our people.”

“It is said,” She continued, “In other stories, that the world began in Darkness and that the lonely Darkness created Light. The cardinal elements were made by the friction between Light and Dark. The very Weave came into being to balance the connection between Light, Dark, and the cardinal elements. Opposites, friction, pull, push. The world is a constant war of differences, a tenuous balance. The Weave feeds reality, shapes it, and us.”

“It is said, in other stories, that for everything there is an opposite. For every force, opposition. For every light, darkness. For every hero, a villain. For every Alsaian…” She trailed off and shook her head, changing track in the middle of the story. “In time beyond memory, before the stories were kept, great and terrible beings warred over the world. The Gods fought, scraping out dominion, careless of what was smashed in their wars. The Great Mother breathed her blessings upon the Alsaians and gave us a sacred charge, a duty to the balance and to life. She kept us safe during that time of chaos, and so we follow her still. “

“It is said, in other stories, that the Great Mother is a being of light, of earth, of water. Above all she is a being of life, of nature and so we are beings of Light, of Earth, of Water, of Life, of Nature.”

“Remember, always, the old stories. Remember that the world began in Darkness. Remember that Darkness is still strong. Remember that without Light there will be no shadow, but true Darkness needs no light to be made manifest. Remember that there is a balance to all things. For every good, there is an evil. For every light, darkness. For Alsaians, there are the Kel.”

The old Teller paused, letting that single word seem to echo around the dwelling. The three listeners were silent. “Before Alsais, before memory was kept as story, the Sea of Howling Sands was a Sea in truth. These cliffs we call our home, the very backbone of Alsais, were bordered by water. In that time, there was no settlement here. We lived far from this place, Charan was a place we had not yet discovered. We lived on Aharan. Legends are the only remainder from those times, there are no true stories of those days. No memory. There was war among the peoples of Aharan, a great war that pushed the Alsaians off the continent, we sailed for distant shores and eventually came to the southern coast of Charan. Some Legends say that we fled the Kel even then. Some say that the Kel came later, it matters not. There are Alsaians and there were Kel.”

“We settled near the Great Dragon River, far to the west of this place. In the Outlands before they were Outlands. They came from the Ocean, a scourge from afar. The Kel are a true power of Dark. Like Dark, they work in shadow, using sly powers that manipulate from a distance. Legends say that they can manipulate the minds of others, bending them to their will. Man was their first victim.”

“Man has always straddled the lines between cardinals, between light and dark. They are capable of great good and great evil both. As victims of the Kel, the perpetuated evil like nothing seen before. In truth, there was much evil in the world then. The balance was destroyed. Chaos had its creature, Dark, Fire, Wind. Destruction and desecration. War and famine, swept the world. At first, all others blamed Man. Man was an easy mark for the ire of all others, for Man had done plenty of evil in its past.”

“No creature lies blameless in the chaos of that time. Eventually, after nearly a century of war, someone discovered the Kel behind the chaos. This Hero’s name has been lost to history, but we speak to their soul in thanks even now.” The Teller was silent for a short moment, thanking that nameless hero of old. “Finally with a source, a target, all the peoples of Charan united against the Kel. They Wove a binding, to send the Kel back to their mountain home and bind them there. Timeless slumber would overtake them and they would never awaken. As the stories go, the Kel are deathless, they will live forever in those mountains, bound for eternity.”

“Three hundred and eighty-five years ago the people of Charan worked toward one end, they bound the Kel in the Sleeper’s Mountain. What were the consequences of binding Dark’s minions?” A mirthless laugh escaped the Teller. “In the process, we destroyed the balance, tore the Weave, and plunged most of a continent into Chaos.” She shook her head. “We fled the danger and chaos of the Outlands, came here and went into something like hiding. We do not contact the others anymore. We tend our own balance, attempting to atone for the hand we had in the destruction of the Weave.”

“This was my story, I have told it in my own words, as it was told to me by the Teller before me.”

“The sleeping Kel have awakened.” The Weaver said as she rose unsteadily to her feet. “I have known since the vision we saw when I taught Teleka the Dreaming. I have tried to prepare her for what is coming since that day. I did not expect it to come so soon. Something tore the Weave again last night. The outcome of this War is anyone’s guess, but it has been too many generations since we fought the Kel the first time. The methods we used then are lost to us in the time before the Oral Histories were kept. Lost accidentally, or forgotten on purpose that we may never again do what we did before. The balance has been delicate and imperfect for generations, since the Weave was destroyed, but we have done our best to nurse it where we can. Now? Now we can only react.”

“The pair of you will leave Alsais. You will go out into the world of Others and warn them of the Kel’s return.”