Approved for circulation among the general populace by order of the Aelorian Archives.
Oh gather, ye wanderers, and lend me your ear,
For a tale of a village once plain and sincere.
Taron’s Crossing, where fog veiled the land,
No more than a stop where the quiet folk stand.
No kingdom claimed it, no banners were flown,
No songs had been sung of its fields or its stone.
Just hearths lit at dusk and the lowing of kine—
A place unremarked by the hand of divine.
In that humble crossing, where soft rivers bend,
Came Tavok the Cruel with a dark god to send.
With shadow and flame and a will not his own,
He came for a child to be claimed as a throne.
The villagers faltered, their courage worn thin,
For Tavok brought ruin and called it a win.
No walls stood to guard them, no army to call—
Just fear in the streets and the threat over all.
Yet three stood to answer where others withdrew,
Not bound by their birth, but by what they knew true.
A monk, swift as silence, with steps light as air,
A dwarven priest steadfast in faith and in prayer.
And last stood a warrior of serpent-born line,
A yuan-ti whose blades cut as clean as design.
He moved through the dark where the shadows took hold,
Unshaken by whispers, unbroken, unbowed.
Together they held where the village would fall,
Three standing alone where there should have been all.
Steel met with shadow, and flame answered flame,
And none who were present would leave it the same.
Tavok pressed forward, his laughter laid bare,
For he had seen courage give way to despair.
The monk turned like wind, the priest stood like stone—
But it was the serpent who met him alone.
Blade rang on darkness, and darkness struck back,
Each step a refusal to yield or to crack.
The clash was not long, nor was mercy its end—
For neither would falter, and neither would bend.
Then steel found its mark where the shadow was thinnest,
A strike clean and final, a moment so brief.
Tavok fell silent—his will undone—
But the wound he returned was not one to outrun.
The serpent-born warrior did not rise again.
He fell where he stood, and the field knew his name.
And in that still moment, where battle had ceased,
Where breath came in ragged and silence increased,
The boy stepped forward—not taken, not claimed—
But something unspoken within him now named.
No voice filled the sky, no thunder replied,
No herald of heaven stood there at his side.
And yet those who saw it would never deny—
That something had changed that no death could defy.
The air seemed to listen, the world seemed to bend,
As if time itself paused to witness the end.
Or perhaps not the end—for none could agree
On what it had been… or what it would be.
The monk bowed his head. The priest did not speak.
For strength has its limits—but truth does not seek.
And there in that place, where no power was known—
The boy stood as something no longer alone.
So raise up your cups when the fire burns bright,
For those who stand fast when they’ve no cause to fight.
For not every legend is forged by command—
Some rise from the choice simply made to stand.
And remember Taron’s Crossing, where fog veils the land,
Where three held the line and a boy made his stand.
Where one struck the darkness and paid with his breath—
And one stepped beyond both the living and death.