Ayu'nama

**Ayu'nama** is the living personification of the earth within the Drakkari pantheon revered by the ice trolls. She is the oldest of the Nama'kai, sister to Nawida the Grey, God of the Seas. She is the bride of Gadesa, seventh son of Zaradan, and mother to Mor'thek, the God of Shadows and Ofasa, the Sire of Sunrise.

## Myth

The Drakkari tales tell that Ayu'nama is in likeness a woman of mud, stone, moss and clay. She is tall, and fat, and furred, with two jeweled tusks at the edges of her large lips and narrow eyes of opal. Her hair is a mane wrought in the gnarled bark of spruce and larch, aspen and birch, tangled together in knots of roots and branches dappled with green buds. Her ears are akin the ears of a caribou and they know the language of all things that are of her earth. When awakened she strides over the land clad only in a long shawl crafted from the fabric of clouds, gifted to her by her husband Gadesa.

### Origin

During the First Aroda, whilst Zaradan laid in slumber and dreamt the creation of his wonders, a sliver of his light already drifted from one of his twelve minds within the confines of his great cavern which is the universe. This light was driven asunder by a whisper of his voice, splintering into eight. These eight lights supped and ate away at the shadows of Zaradan's dwelling, growing large and bright until they hardened into earth. These would be the eight worlds destined for rulership by the eight sons of Zaradan. One of these worlds was named Emnerak, and upon it, Ayu'nama and Nawida were born of the light, eager and unwearied in the dawn of their youth.

In this ancient age, Ayu'nama was not as she is now: she was yet slender and green, and the earth that was her skin was soft and rich. Her eyes opened to a silent world, where there were no seas or rivers, nor lakes or hills, nor dells or mountains. It was an endless field of empty soil that stretched to all four corners of the world, yet unmarred by the passage of seasons or the step of beasts. For many years there was only a starless night, and Ayu'nama was free to envision the many things she would bring to blossom. Though she did not know nor see Zaradan above the sky, when he awoke she heard his voice speak life into the stars and bring the heavens alight, and she was glad, for she could now see the world more clearly than ever before.

Ayu'nama was thus filled with a great passion and a drive to birth life into the barren world. She began running freely across the empty heaths, when Zaradan unfurled the five stripes of the First Aroda, heralding the beginning of the ages. Inspired, Ayu'nama looked to the patterns made by the aroda, and spun them to her own design upon the earth. Plain fields became divided by ridges and valleys, wastes of empty ground were now filled with stones and slopes, and within them Ayu'nama hid precious gems and glittering jewels; so it was that the world that had been featureless, was featureless no more.

### The Visions of Life

After many years of moulding the earth, Ayu'nama sat by Nawida's side and watched as he granted his own creation to her work: the mountains. Strong and as high as the sky they reached, so that even she was dwarfed by them. They were things of bare stone and hard earth, that even the wear of time or weather could not cast down. There again Ayu'nama hid her gems, climbing to the highest peak of Mount Zarastor, set at the summit of the world, from whence she could lean and see all the land below her. Within her then awoke another longing as the fields she had endeavoured for years to create, were still hollow and barren. Looking to the aroda again, a new thought was born in her mind, and that thought was the thought of life. She began to envision life as it now is: vibrant, raucuous and ever-changing, varied and beautiful and marvelous to behold.

Taking a boulder of marble from the face of one of her brother's mountains, Ayu'nama began to grind the rock into a myriad of shards. These she named 'seeds' and devised for them to be embraced by her soil, so they could take new form and grow into mighty green and blooming things. Many were the shards she hewed, varied in both shape and size and make; they were carved from granite and shale, basalt or alabaster. These would blossom into trees, sturdy and impressive, ever striving to grow yet taller that they may match the height of Nawida's works. From gems, opals and beryls, sapphires, rubies and jets and garnets, Ayu'nama instead foretold that these would become flowers, colourful plants that would delight the eyes of all that looked upon them.

Thus Ayu'nama gathered all her seeds in the folds of her dress and set herself to bury them in careful and long-planned arrangements in such a way that would let them become forests, thickets and orchards. Long there she waited, as the years waxed ever on, but her seedlings never sprouted and her works never came.

### Negenga's Ploy

It came to be that after the worlds were born and full-wrought, Zaradan fathered his eight legendary sons who would themselves come to father the many races of trollkind. Emnerak was fore-chosen to be the domain of Gadesa, the seventh son, but Negenga, the fourth son, discontent with the small land he was given, came to seek out in secret the worlds which were to be given to his younger kin. So it was that he found Emnerak and, seeing Ayu'nama, he was infatuated and sought for naught more than to possess her and his brother's world.

Ayu'nama wandered, knowing nothing of the eyes that were following her. She continued turning her own earth, and scattering the seeds she had made far and wide, in the hope that somewhere they would take root. It was then that she came upon her brother, Nawida, as he quarrelled with a fair stranger beyond a high hill, who refused to forfeit his name or his purpose. Seeing her, and wearying of his struggle with Nawida, the stranger raised his hands and said:

> *"O' good woman of earth and stone, here have I come to you from afar above and beyond the stars, to soothe your woe and rid you of worry!"*
>
>

Ayu'nama was in awe, for long she had thought that her and her brother were the only things that lived in the world, and here now was another, who declared to be from somewhere higher than the sky. At once Ayu'nama was overtaken by a yearning of knowledge and she wished to hear all the fair stranger had to say. Nawida too, was fascinated, but his intrigue grew only in equal measure with his suspicion. He allowed the stranger to speak, yet only for as long as Nawida was present, and upon this the two men made a solemn vow.

Soon, at Ayu'nama's curiosity, the stranger began to reveal who he was. He named himself Negenga, and that was true, and he claimed to have forged the very stars, and that was false. So for every truth Negenga spoke, there followed a lie. But neither Nawida nor Ayu'nama knew of what he spoke, and so they were ensnared in his web of deceit. Long and without pause he spoke, his lies ever matching his truths, until he brought Nawida and Ayu'nama to the very edges of the world, where he bade them sit and there made a fire to warm them. The two Gods of the Earth were frightened and astonished, for never before had they seen the flame, and that was the first fire of Emnerak, which to this day it is said still burns at the westernmost bounds of the world.

There, Negenga worked his cunning again, and while he gave warmth to Ayu'nama, only smoke seemed to ever waft towards Nawida. Thus by some spell Nawida's mind was clouded in a haze and he fell sleeping. Then at last, while Nawida was still present, therefore respecting the vow he had made, Negenga began to seduce Ayu'nama. He confessed his intentions and his passions, and Ayu'nama was charmed by him, so he contrived to wed her and make her his, and he showered her in many gifts; the first of them was that of life, that he could give because he was the Son of Zaradan, from whom all life came. Thus from the union of Negenga and Ayu'nama the earth was riven with streams and rivers and deep lakes, and the earth began to blossom and bloom, the seedlings and the grains sprouted and grew and the earth became green.