From Brush to Bow: The Story of Luqen Liatumal

From Brush to Bow: The Story of Luqen Liatumal is a book recovered from the library of Humbleblossom Estate.

## Description

From Brush to Bow: The Story of Luqen Liatumal details the claim to fame of the eponymous elven artisan Luqen Liatumal and his involvement in the defense of Estertan against the wrath of the Fiend Lizard Naavugrux.

## Research

### Completed by Vaedryn'Drada Arkenviir

In recent years, many Liatumals are known and famed throughout the Empire. Bihana Liatumal finds constant employ within the Esterving Printing Guild, working closely to provide illustrations for historians such as Loni Enbeden, Ruo Oatstalker, Sar Roli and Urisalor Veldria. Alamaria Liatumal is both famed and infamed for her activism, depending on the opinion of the individual in question, but it is Virric Liatumal, her brother that surely finds the highest status - a member of the Inner Sanctum of the High College of Claxinns and one of the Increscent Six alike. Despite the power that the name Liatumal now wields, alongside the symbol used to designate its interests - a longbow loaded with a paintbrush in place of an arrow - it is their ancestor that lifted the name into the public consciousness.

Before Luqen Liatumal, the elven family had found limited success as artisans in the town of Highholt, weaving polished timbers with refined precious metals sourced from the nearby dwarven-dominated Realm of Mol Boramm, alongside tapestries and paintings. Steeped in family tradition with techniques passed through the ages and refined through matter of trance, the work was of significant craftsmanship and quality - but the reach of their name short indeed. While pieces from such an era routinely sell for thousands of helias nowadays, with particularly exquisite items matching such quantity in lunos, this sum was atypical - and so the family resided in comfort, but no true wealth. Trade caravans from Mol Boramm carrying the materials with which they worked were common, given the surrounding Realms hunger for precious metals for sake of coinage, jewellery and other luxury items - and in time this caught the attention of the inhabitant of Mount Durnach, the Fiend Lizard Naavugrux, known also the Vermillion Prince. Hungering after the contents of the convoys, throughout the sixty-fourth decade since Aita's Second Gift the red dragon descended repeatly on the dwarven trade routes, plundering and pillaging their contents to add to his hoard. With fears spreading from the dragon's boldness, the Counts of Astedia turned to the neighbours - the Rose Throne of Gawylthlan and the dwarves of Mol Boramm themselves - to commission a series of hunts to bring down the Fiend Lizard. All would result in destruction and death, for the fury of the dragon was fearsome indeed. In retaliation for the incredulous actions of the humanoid realms, Naavugrux descended upon Estertan, the Astedian capital, passing by repeatedly until the once-populated town of some twenty thousand individuals was little more than smouldering ruins.

The reasoning for Luqen Liatumal's presence within the city at the time of the attacks has been long speculated upon by historians, for Luqen himself has been coy in the matter - simply stating it was surely the will of the Three-Eyed Light that he found himself there. If he was simply visiting to source materials for his next project or to discuss details of a commission, why not simply say so? Others therefore point to the Liatumals' struggling financial situation and thus assume that some clandestine deal or trade was taking place out of sight from prying eyes - and thus explaining Luqen's hesitancy to say as such. Whether with intentions licit or otherwise, or simply indeed destiny, Luqen Liatumal was undeniably within the settlement at the time, for when he clutched up a longbow from a fallen Moonguard patrolman and loosed an arrow at the Fiend Lizard upon his eighth pass, he seemingly changed the fate of the city and his family in perpetuity. Despite later claiming to have never shot from a longbow before, the arrow pierced the roof of the dragon's maw as he shifted to unleash flame once more, killing the Vermillion Prince where evocation and ballista alike had failed. At the time, Luqen reports to have just "listened to my internal voice, my thoughts whispering where to aim, when to release" - furthering the mysticism surrounded with such a victory. Regardless, his deed landed the Liatumals land to the north alongside masons, carpenters and labourers with which to construct Easel's Might, a manor house that would become a cornerstone for the creation of some of the most acclaimed pieces of art in the Empire - and the foundation upon which the Liatumals legacy was built.