A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover

First Day of the Fifth Month 293 AC

"I simply think that existence should be organized more sensibly," you cannot help but quip back.

"As do we all, Your Grace," the ancient sorcerer replies. "It is only in scale that one can truly know the difference between pauper and prince, sorcerer and god." The implication is clear as day. Some would call it hubris, but for your part ambition seems the better word for it.

"Before all else I have not a question but a request that you play the cartographer again if you've the time for it." So saying you draw forth a case of maps, one depicting all of the Seven Kingdoms from the Wall to Dorne and then maps of its regions taken one by one.

"The North and the Riverlands I can improve with some skill," Brynden Rivers replies. "The first due to the many Godswoods still kept, the second because my eye is oft set upon those lands." Were there any Riverlords here to hear him you have little doubt their blood would turn to ice, but you reign in your curiosity for plans not yet unveiled and ask instead for what lore of the First Men he was able to transcribe from his dreams.

Rather than answering with words the Last Greenseer motions to a pair of simple chests half hidden amid the tangle of weirwood roots. From the look of them they are new-made by the hand of the Children who yet serve Bloodraven in his vigil. However, as you approach, you notice sharp-edged runes cut into the wood. With a spell drawn from your grimoire the markings shift into legible form: wards against rot and against fire, and beneath that hidden almost too well for even your eye to track are far stronger protections, meant to maim or slay any who would open them without possession of your weirwood staff.

Gained Runelore Trove

"I cannot now recount all that is in those books, nor would it serve much purpose," the ancient mage explains. "However, given your recent exploits, you might enjoy to learn how Rune-craft first began among the First Men, how the Smith stole writing from the Depths."

"The Depths?" you prompt, intrigued, as you take a seat on the same roughly flat stone you had spent so many hours upon during your last meting.

"It was a tale little told when the pact between the First Men and the Children of the Forest was young, and none carried it through the Long Night... at least among mortal kindred," Bloodraven spins his tale, one too ancient for even his sights to witness any more than faint retelling.

When the world was young and those whom history would remember as 'the First Men' yet dwelt in the east, there lived among them a smith, skilled in the shaping of bronze. Sharp swords and bright breastplates he made, but his true passion lay elsewhere. The Smith could make knotwork so fine men would lose themselves staring into it marveling, carvings so fine they were said to reflect the very soul of that which they showed. Yet as is so often the nature of mortal men whose time under the sun is short, he was not content with his artistry. He could offer a warrior a likeness of his beloved to carry into battle, but the words he could not bind in place, for they flew through the air like birds on the wing and would not be bound to fire and earth.

Long did the Smith seek the wisdom of the spirits. The beasts of the land knew each other by touch and smell and taste, by the their calls and the color of their coats. And so the earth was silent. So then trekked did he to the top of the highest mountain where dwelt the great Roc, that from that place he might speak to the wind. Alas that the spirits of the sky were no less well-disposed than those of the land: 'Why keep words in place when you can make new ones?' they asked.

So at last the Smith's eyes turned to the sea, to the lightless depths were dwelt elder things who cared nothing for men save when they would rise on starless nights to drag them beneath the waves. So went did he against the counsel of kith and kin to stand by the shore with offerings of gold, silver, and bronze. On the ninth night something rose to meet him, some old and nameless Thing filled with otherworldly wisdom and hungry not for flesh but knowledge. It had heard of the Smith's travels and wished to add his lore to its own.

Thus the man offered the monster a game of riddles, for he knew in its great pride the creature could not resist. Secrets were spoken then such as never had been before and never will be upon the face of the world as each strove to outdo the other in hidden lore, but of all of them men remember only the last riddle the smith posed:

It is said that waters thrashed in agony and the stones wept blood at the fel names the monster stoke trying to guess what fiend might be mighty enough to do all those deeds, for it knew not time so could not name it. For his prize the smith took the art of runecraft: the lesser runes by which men may know each other or send messages to those far off, and the greater by which great works of art and artifice can be wrought.

For all the runes the Smith learned from the Monster and changed then to his liking and the use of his people, none were as mighty as the rune he crafted of his own skill: that of time by which walls could endure an age only to be sundered in an instant, if one knew the way of it.

"How much of that is true and how much allegory?" you ask once Bloodraven had finished speaking.

"Allegory can also be truth of a sort," he again waves a hand towards the lore he had assembled. "I can say for certain that none of that is in any manner tainted, though perhaps its eldest principles began thus. It would go a long way to explaining where the First Men found lore that could contain and reshape divine. After all, the gods themselves would be hesitant to share such lore."

So Dany will have her armor at last, you think, satisfied and grateful to whatever craftsman first set runes to stone and bronze, whoever he may have been.

What do you wish to speak of next?

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OOC: I know there was more to the vote, but this feels like appropriate break off point. Also yes the riddle about time is adapted from the Hobbit though changing the references to iron and steel.