So, in their wisdom, our great father and mother built a wall to keep out the Gaels and Slavers and Fomorians and Sinoese and the Darkling’s Goblin hordes.  The sea we leave to the war crows, on hill and cranog we live.

When raiders came ashore the clans gathered.  We would rise from the mist and annihilate our enemies until our lonely shore brought no raider.  Reavers knew to sail on.

Rarely they would come in greater numbers than we could easily crush on the beach so we let them come, bleeding them all the while.  At some point they would realize they had gained nothing and lost much.  The trip to the sea was harder still until they found their boats burned or taken and the end of the survivors was the same as the first to die.  Such was the way we dealt with invaders.

It was strange to see clans who fought and raided each other coming together against a common foe, or perhaps it had more to do with how most disputes were settled by the combat of champions and rarely involved general combat.

Our interior valleys are rich, our cattle grow fat on the hills and grain for bread and ale grows in profusion in the plains.  All our men have time to train in arms and to hunt.  But our heroes and champions train skills to levels unparalleled in the world.

It may be of interest and is ironic to think, that the mother they honor, Scota, is in truth that same creature, the Morrigan of war, that they abhor.

Central Gael

We called the land Dalriada for the confederation of Irish, Scots, and Picts that came together under McAlpine to make a Scottish kingdom.  Such was our hope, but no such thing happened.  Instead the gods, the children of Dana, seemed to drive off or leave with one splinter after another.

First the Rus, then the Sin, then Dana and her daughters fled to Eri with a faithful few.  Good ridance.  And Dalriada?  Well, far from coming together, the people split into smaller and smaller Tuaths, each more jealous of its honor than before and nursing a grudge at its founding.  The law was largely forgotten in favor of the sword and the spear.

The land was fertile which only made more time for war.  It was a time for heroes.  There was land to the north and west, still more across the Safron Mor.  But warriors would rather go chase the Sin, or try to hunt down escaped Umircens in the great Northwestern wastes.

Then Balor began to set up permanent camps across the Safron, but not to expand our territory and raise crops.  No, these were places to stage slave raids against the Sin.

At this time the folk that became the Scots left across the Safron.  Their purpose was to settle and build a culture apart from the Gael in Dalriada.  Perhaps not too surprisingly Balor’s coastal Fomorian slavers raided some Isolated Scots settlements and the Scots retreated south and eventually built their wall.

Later, the folk who came to be called Gaulatians left for the Southern continent’s Northern horn.

And we in Gael still war, though the fields don’t provide so well as they did, though the great waves of Gobli Hordes have come and gone leaving drifts of metal and bone, still Dalriada crys for blood and drinks ours, red and hot, when ever it is offered.

We fled the Gael who still pursue us.  We suffered the Fomorians who took us as slaves and worse.  We faced the Gobli first, the hordes of the Darklings, and then we took wing to protect our high fortified homes and our childrens’ futures from the Draken of those same dark lords.

Have we not met each enemy and defeated them?  We are secure in our castles of stone and now we sail our cloud ships to hunt the Dragons where they live.

But for how long?  Now, more and more, Sinoese fights Sinoese.  Our many cloud ships and brave dragon divers drove the dragons from the skies above our citadels.  Now sometimes the cloud ships can assail our cities of stone when no other force could.

Now there is a shogun who calls himself the Emperor of the North, an admiral called the Blue Emperor, and even a sinoese warrior who seeks to found “The Empire of the World.”

Bad enough when Gaels and Fomor tried to enslave us, now sometimes it is the Sin that sell their brothers and sisters into slavery.  This emperor of the World is the worst offender, for he fights in the disputed lands and takes slaves not only from the Gael, but also the children of Sin he frees from the slave pens of the Fomor and the Gael only to sell them to fund his conquest.

I am the mother of my people.  I am the chief of my clan.  I fought Gloona and beat her until she yielded.  I led our females to drive off the rouge, Mulak, when he killed Peltook.  I faced him and drove him off.  But Gloona was too proud until I beat her.

I am the mother.  I wish there was no need for males, no need for a mate, but we need young to grow strong.  We still raise Peltook’s last brood.  Moogat, the witch, says I should eat them as many mothers do when they rise.  This I will not do.

Our males are too young or I would choose from them and chase away the rest.  I must choose between two bad paths.  I must go to other clans and take a mate or I must find a band of ogres, bachelors who may or may not have gone mad with blood lust.

I am now mother.  I mate, but I will keep no mate.  Moogat warns that this is not the path of wisdom.  Moogat talks and talks, but I see no wisdom in her words.  Her council is empty.  Moogat talks to Gloona too and I know some of the words.

Perhaps I will chase Moogat and Gloona out of the clan like we chase off the old males that like to kill the females and eat the young.  Sometimes smart and swift is better than strong.

It is strange that only the mother breeds.  Don’t we need more young?  What if every mature female was a mother and a clan was like a gathering of clans?

This I will think on.

This little snippet gives an idea of one small Gobli clan. I doubt seriously that they will think of themselves in terms that Tolkien did. Perhaps I will come up with something better, but in truth these creatures are a reflection of nightmare in a mind touched by the All Mind. If that mind thought in Tolkiensian terms then it is possible that they would be known by Tolkien’s names. Perhaps I can construct a better foundation. Anyhow, this is a start.

This is a fragment with much information about Scythia that documents an encounter between Mother, Epona and Scythia herself. It is not currently in narrative form, being more historical in nature, but it is a good tale.

Scythia is the daughter of Epona, one of the daughters of Dana Bailey. She is a multi-generational leader by virtue of her association with the goddess and her extraordinarily long life. When the brown folk left and the climate turned bad most of the Gaellic world contracted around Slieve na Gael, there to eek out what living they could. When the Gobli Hordes washed over the plains, past the great inland lakes and to the very foot of Sliebe na Gael, Epona, with the rest, went to the mountains, but not Scythia and folk that stayed with her and those who came later as weather worsened were forged by heat , ice, and war on the grass plains into the Scythians.

Horses and cattle -sheep and goats- the Scythians are herders by vocation, but they are horse warriors at heart, raiders and thieves. With the great loss of life and food production Slieve na Gael guards their territory, fearful to loose what little they have. the disputed lands are almost peaceful — the petty kings have murdered each other and only the weakest remain in the empty cities. The Scots in the south are enclaves, all hungry and jealous. But the Scythians roam the empty plain taking their beasts where there is good forage and growing stronger and more numerous. If naGael was the center of the olk knowledge then the Scythians are the heart of the new reality.

Epona’s daughter stayed with the plains folk who remained to try to keep their animals free of the Globins and other Fell beasts. It was brutal, days in the saddle, desperate battle against long odds. By the end they were all veterans, they could sleep in the saddle, they could smell the enemy, they were alive. Scythia was in love.

Thomas O’Malley was a cowboy and horse wrangler, but after the long ride he was a leader. Everyone looked to him for his wisdom, horse sense, but Scythia looked to him for love and it was easily and truely given. She had seemed a spoiled child of privelge, but her commitment was made from her iron will not simply necessity and she had survived and thrived.

Others paired off, children were born despite the desperate times. But the O’Malley’s of Scythia were a strong clan even after Thomas was killed in a goblin raid, leaving Scythia and eleven children, the twelfth she names Thomas.

Scythia looks to be in her 20s, she is closer to 50. She becomes a war leader. What power she gathers she hurls against the gobli. her children learn the sword and the bo and the lance. They cecome a force to themselves “Scythia’s Thirteen they are called because Scythia looks their same age, some folk think that being now 60 she hides the decline of her once renouned beauty. The children accrete spouses and retainers and body guards until they are an army to themselves. To cement ties with another large clan, Scythia concents to marry the only son and war leader of the other clan.

It is a firey relationship. Fighting gives way to passion. Scythia in love, behins a second family. She embraces motherhood and leaves war to her children and her husband, Niall (name as with T O’Malley at least for the moment.) Scythia has five young children by Niall ages 5-15, she is 80 years old, but she looks like she might be in her early 30s.

There is a gathering storm in the North, Darklin overlords are directing the gobli to capture and fortify land. Raiding parties extend that territory and material support goes north to build an army and prepare for war. The Gobli have gained the skill of building brood pools so that groups can live and grow in the plains as well as in caves as before. Niall urges war, gathering the clans and fighting this new danger. Hearing his report she wants to avoid war to continue her mothering. Niall forces her to scout with hm and see what they are doing. It is a frightening dose of reality.

There is a great war council and a brutal war ensues on the plains. The Gobli are the more technological society, they fortify and live in denser society, but the Scythians have the horse and their mobility and sudden savagery work to great effect. They are vulnerable in set piece battles and are crushed in several when they gather against consolidated armies. Niall dies in what seems to be a final stand and Scythians are scattered. The Gael fight on with the Gobli horde that masses and moves on to the great mountain, Sliebe na Gael, focusing on destroying humanity and wiping it away.

Scythia grieves, but soon enough she realizes that they had sucess raiding and destroying the Goblin holds that were being extended into the plains. They failed when they faced the assembled armies, but with the great bulk of Goblin might against the walls of Gael those hold fasts were vulnerable. It was like the early days with O’Malley, only now, in addition to evading to survive they could strike a telling blow and rid the plains of the scourge, slowly but surely.

And so she did, generation after generation of horse raiders, breaking open and burning Goblin strongholds and destroying the brood pools, melting away from strong forces, living and growing on the hoof.

Now for the most part the Gobli confine themselves to the East, the Disputed lands, in the mountains to the north and west of the great plains. The Scythians rule the plains and hound any incursion into their territory to death. Above all, the plains folk revere Scythia herself and view her as their leader even though they roam the plains as small clans and do not necessarily ever meet the Great One even in a full life.

So it was, when the actual clan group Scythia led herself was camped near the lakeside place the adventure of her life began that Epona, her mother, came to her. She has made a place among the Lokian mountain dwellers, her guard is of that short stout stock. She urges Scythia not to “waste her life on the plains, but instead to come to the mountains.”

Scythia scoffed, “live in a hole or I risk wasting my life riding the plains?”

The Lokians and the Gael have designs on the plains and Epona hoped to avoid the conflict. Scythia had seen a hundred years and more of non-stop war and would have none of it, “Build your fences and grow your plants in the hills, mother, or there will be conflict. And we will win as we did against the Gobli.”

Epona tried scolding the daughter that looked older for her petulance, though she seemed the petulant one. Scythia tried reason, “You see this land as empty, but we live here or you would find this land filled with Goblins and Trolls and fell beasts. We have fought and won to keep this plain for ourselves and the children of Epona.”

“So you call yourself after me?” This seems to touch Epona’s vanity.

Scythia laughs, “We care for them, our horses we name for you.”

Scythia’s body guard dared speak, “We are Scythians, many clans, and many families spread across the plains, still, called by any other name they, if you ask them, will say the same. We are Scythians.”

“Sorry mother,” Scythia grinned, “From me they see child after child spill out so they know where they are from, the horses they attribute to you.

There was tense silence, Epona muller her position, basically powerless, and now alienated from her daughter, “If you will not come with us, what can I do?”

“You should go,” Scythia nodded.”

“No no, how can I make this go better…”

“See that the mountain folk do not come on the plains uninvited.”

“I do not command.”

“Perhaps you can explain that we can defend what is ours. Let them take the land they need from the Goblins in the hills. If it is food they wish perhaps trade will serve both peoples.”

“I will try Scythia, I’m sorry it has been so long” Epona seemed emotionally fragile. (point of view?)

“Look Mother, a river flows one way, but if your friends could use our help with the mountain gobli perhaps we can be allies. Scythia frowned, “How good are these friends?”

“Loki is my brother, we…”

“Mother, make a place for yourself, better when you have access to such friendship, but do not rely on it ever.”

Then it was and for the wisdom her daughter had taught her and with the help of Scythia and too from her brother Loki, Epona made it her quest to establish a folk in the hills above the plains. So it was that a buffer between Scythia and the Lokians made a lond and a people for Epona. She earned for herself the land reading the Gobli and trading with the plains and Loki aquired material so all were satisfied and Epona enriched.

The Scythians still ride the plains and still they do so on the broad backs of the children of Epona. In the foothills are folk who owe their land and life to Epona, they remember her, but they do not name themselves for her. Still those hills in the mind of the Lokians and the Plainsmen, Scythians is Eponia to this day.