dill's lyre

they/ze/she || 22 || i am going to write things occasionally i promise

[bonesofmybones]

directory [wip]

The Dyr is a confusing place to find oneself in, even to those familiar with its winding roads and labyrinthian treelines. This is simply to help you get around - though if you are to get lost, keep your head down, follow the rivers, and do all you can not to go chasing the voices whispering to you from beyond the trees.

Worldbuilding

Anything tagged with this is to do with the setting of the story and will be written out of character. This includes ocgeography, which talks about the physical location, and legal system i guess, which outlines the political and legal system of the location.

Drabbles

Sometimes I am plagued with visions in the middle of the night and have to write something before I combust. This is for those. Each story has it's own title, some will be multiple posts long but they will mostly be brief, short stories that take place within the realm. Some will have lore relevance, some will not. Consider these fables, legends, backstories- the list goes on. Some will be part of a thematic series, each of which will be tagged. Currently, the only one is Calls in the Wilderness, a set of tales surrounding those deep in the brush that do not always choose to hide themselves.

Yapping

Sometimes i just need to yap okay yes this is an infodumping tag no i do not know how to dress this up in any other way than "i need thoughts out of my brain immediately"

[bonesofmybones]

FUCK IT ASPEN'S A PIRATE NOW

[bonesofmybones]

the royal family of crexucuria

the nation of crexucuria has sat in the north east of the Dyr for as long as any sources account for- a nation of warriors, they're a kingdom built on blood. a full assessment of their royal family are far beyond the realms of the following, but to understand their situation as it remains today, one has to consider only three generations.

bryan walstrand was a violent man even by crexucurian standards. he was never supposed to claim the throne- but after his elder brother was poisoned (by forces he had no hand in, of course) and his sisters executed or missing, he was the final sibling available to take power. responsible for their now internationally esteemed military, bryan ruled with an iron fist, treating his kingdom as if a threat to the power it bestowed upon him. he was never a good father, by any means, but he grew crueller the older his children grew- especially as he began to see himself in them. once they came of age, he sent five of his six children out into the dyr to pursue their own lives.

most of his children accepted their father was simply never going to be a man worth knowing. tjuase, his eldest son, joined the military of the foreign kingdom of anoidan, and would rise in the ranks until he found himself king there instead. eoifin, his second daughter, opened a thieves guild that dominated the southern regions until her death a decade later. mival, his second son, joined a convent and ceyr, his third son, joined the myrmik rangers and remained loyal to the central government until he met his end. only his eldest daughter, sioned, remained at home, tending to her father as his age took it's toll.

his youngest son, samuel dychylan, was always the most like his father, in both appearance and character. intelligent, threatening, calculating- he always had a scheme or a trick to play on his siblings. he had, unlike his siblings, inherited his father's ravenous need for power- the one thing he had taken from his mother was her sense of charm. it was this sense of charm that seemed to attract people to him, and brought him to lead a ragtag group of bandits across the dyr, at first mere aimless wanderings. when news began to simmer that his father grew sick, however, samuel knew the throne would never be his- not while his siblings remained alive. and so, he set his men to work, and began the gradual process of removing each one of them. samuel never raised a sword himself. he relied on his small team of followers to do the dirty work, and none more so than aspen grimm.

aspen was mere child when he and samuel met. after an accidental murder pushed him from his hometown, he had taken to the road at just twelve. within two years, samuel had met him, and jumped at the opportunity he saw within the boy. their relationship was always a complex one- they would describe their bond as a fatherly one, but neither had ever really had a good father to compare it to. even aspen knew samuel was manipulating him- but he simply saw no other future for himself, no way to avoid the dogs breathing down his neck, than to close his eyes and take the hand offered to him.

sioned dychylan ruled crexucuria for a mere month before her death. as the only one of his children in the city upon her father's passing, she inherited the crown, and immediately set about fixing what she could. for that month, it was almost a nice town to live in-

until samuel arrived, of course, and claimed the crown he had always seen as his. she was executed a week into his reign, leaving samuel to reign unopposed. he was, objectively, not as cruel as his father- but by no means a good man, nor a good king. debt-ridden, power-hungry and selfish, he never used the crown or his men for anything that did not benefit him. he put the kingdom under immense strain, cutting every budget and throat he could for his own gain. aspen grimm remained at his side throughout, legally adopted to ensure samuel had an heir he could trust. while the papers listed aspen as his son, they both knew he was little more than a guard dog, trained perfectly to his master's beck and call. regardless of any lingering guilt nor genuine fondness for the boy, samuel had to confess it was nice to have one man on his staff he found trustworthy, one man he could give any task and see it done without hesitation, one man he knew enough secrets about to keep under his thumb forever.

this, of course, would be his downfall. contrary to both of their beliefs, as aspen grew older, he grew less and less content with the blatant mistreatment he experienced. with more time, he began to listen more and more to the whispers of revolution amongst the commons. it is this crossroads he finds himself at on the embarkment of our tale.

[bonesofmybones]

cassandra's requisition, 1:2

it happened slowly, at first. prolonged gazes into the wood. hesitance at the river. pauses between sentences. small, curious little oddities that those outside the tribe would scarcely have noticed. then came the nightmares - screams of terror cutting through the night, babbling about the eyes in the corner of the room nobody else could see, half remembered glimpses of something he could never put into words. then, the big hunt - he had separated from his group for reasons obscure to anyone but himself and the source of the siren song in the thicket. he had been missing for only three hours, just barely long enough for the sun to set and the birds to fall quiet. in such a short time, he had metamorphized into a figure rosamund no longer recognised. gone was that rationality, his calm demeanour- he jumped at even the slightest noise, his nightly rambles becoming more and more common until they seeped into his day-to-day life. he was never sent out to the hunt again, out of fear one of his visions would strike. it was as if the man she had known her entire life had gotten lost somewhere, his husk now haunted by the spirit of something confused and frightened. her father had gone from the proudest warrior in the tribe to a mere prey animal, a hare that looks into the thrush and confuses twigs as the glint of wolves' teeth. he would be filled, at times, with this trembling terror- shaking, quaking, spouting words far beyond mortal comprehension. she wasn't sure whether that was better or worse than the silence- the despondent dissociation he spent most of his days in. between onsets of his ramblings, he would sit, staring into space as if lost in thought, as if listening to a voice only he and the wind could hear. the worst change, she thought, was his eyes. they had been soft, warm, with a sharp hint of intelligence. now, they remained empty, dull, thoughtless- save for the interludes where fear would send his eyes so wide his irises would drown in his blindingly bright sclera. the pastors and doctors insisted, at first, it was merely a temporary madness, a sickness akin to a cold he'd get over with enough rest. a reaction to the stress of his office, they had said. rosamund hadn't believed them for a second. she knew, watching him stumble home that first afternoon, something had changed in the man she admired so dearly. gone were the days of light laughter and healing broken wings- in their place was a silence heavy enough to crush their little household, and birds with nobody to catch them when they fell from the sky.

it was beyond a shadow of a doubt that something had come home with her father that afternoon, something that shifted the knife edge she and her mother had been balancing on for years. she had tolerated the insistence her father would recover if they simply pretended nothing had changed, she had accepted that her mother would never approve of her lover- but the suggestion she dispose of her child was a step too far. she had packed her bags alone that afternoon, saddled up her steed, and was ready to leave a mere hour after it had been suggested-

if not for her father, who had come stumbling out of the house, his eyes darkened by the figments he seemed to have been cursed by. he called her name for the first time since that first trance, gripping her shoulders tight enough that she was sure the marks from his fingernails would remained carved into her flesh for the rest of her life. she hadn't understood what he'd told her- a crown covered in blood, a prince with snakes in his hands, a man losing an eye but gaining two more, eyes in the wood- it had all seemed like nonsense. she'd cried out to him, and with a clarity she hadn't seen in years, he'd stared into her eyes. her father had smiled at her, for the first time since she was a child. it was warm, soft, loving, and for the briefest second, she was still a little girl, looking at a man she trusted to protect her. then, he had kissed her nose, told her to ensure her son knew he was loved, and to never let him wander east. with a snicker, a laugh at a joke nobody else had heard, he slunk back to the house, and she had mounted her horse and left her home for the last time. she wouldn't ever learn what her father had seen, nor that he would die mere days after her departure after days of silence. she never forgot, though, what he had warned her of- and when, five years later, her daughter became her son, it occurred to her she too had heard whispers in the woods that day.

[gender-is-a-scam]

New character parallels just dropped: Devoted like a knight vs devoted like a dog

[bonesofmybones]

I CAN'T. I AM IN THE MIDDLE OF SOMETHING I CAN'T TALK RIGHT NOW BUT ANDERAS TOWARDS ASPEN SO MUCH. something something he's not sure if he's living for the job or living for him at this point something something the reminder of his first lord coming back to haunt him something something he isn't ever really clear the context behind what he does for aspen he doesn't understand it but he loves it too much to stop. he's devoted to defending him like a dog but has to tell himself over and over that it's purely for the job because if it isn't. what does that say about him. what does that say about his ambitions. i love when i take a man and give him issues.

[bonesofmybones]

cassandra's requisition, 1:1

rosamund's father was always the sort of man it was easy to respect - an upstanding member of the community, renowned in the village for his rationality in the face of adversity. he was by no means a leader, but the elders would be frail without his support. when the rangers came for the village, legend had it that he had merely laughed at their curses and danced between the blades as though he could not feel them cutting into his skin. they had cut him, and he had bled, and yet did not cry out for help. he had merely brushed off each wound, driving his own sword past theirs with practiced ease. each thrust, each sweep, each twirl of the blade had been deadly, almost as though his hand had been guided by a higher power. he was unlike his fellow hunters - he did not hide his scars, nor exaggerate the events that blessed him with them. she had asked, a few times, about new ones that cropped up and ones she hadn't noticed before. he had told every story as if it had happened to someone else - as if the life carved into his flesh were not his own, instead mapping out some nebulous figure beyond their comprehension. the glint in his eyes, she'd been told, had been the same day he had led those men to their Mother. it seemed impossible that this was the same man she had gone on walks with her entire life - she recalled often how they'd once found a fledgling blackbird, strung out limply on the ground, it's crooked wing gnarled from a rough landing. he had brought it home with them, nursed it to health with a hand as gentle as the one she'd been raised with, and cried when it grew healthy enough to flee it's nest once again. rosamund thought it was ever so curious how that light, so warm and soft as she sat on his knee as a child, turned so icy when cast upon another. he had taken her with them hunting a few times, and each afternoon she would watch him string his bow with cool precision- those brown eyes seemed to turn a cutting, stormy black when met with his prey. he walked with poise, carried himself with an air so prim, met each moment with his head raised high. the man she knew so dearly, the quiet, gentle soul who tucked her and her siblings into bed each night, who danced in the kitchen with her mother, who mended broken wings and homes with the same gentle affections, turned into something so entirely opposite she struggled, sometimes, to unite the two as the same man in her mind. the ice behind his grimace seemed to melt whenever those dark eyes turned towards her or her brothers. her mother had laughed at her once, when she mentioned this- her father, she said, was a holly bush. prickly, sharp, but a perfect home for nesting blackbirds. she supposed holly was fitting for him - honest, defensive, a popular remedy for the villages' ailments. she loved her father, and she was not alone in that. everyone had thought so much of the man they called their chief hunter. perhaps that's why she was so surprised when their cries of glory took a more sombre note. perhaps that's why her mother grew so much colder without warning that fall, as if to match the tone of the dying trees. perhaps that's why it was so strange to watch the man she called her father fall prey to the whispers of the wood.

[bonesofmybones]

concept: the guilds

The Dyr is not limited to states and kingdoms- you also have Guilds, of which there are two types.

State-owned - These are run by the Eupatarchs, controlled by their equivalent of the military/police, the Rangers. In states owned by the Eupatarchs, normal people can report problems to the Guilds, who will go and deal with said problems or pass the issue on to a more crime-prevention-based department of the Rangers. These tend to be things like thefts, land disputes, and minor crimes. In each state are two Higher Guilds, which deal with fugitives/enemies of the state sightings. All state-owned guilds are run by a specific class of Rangers, Sheriffs, who often operate alone/in small groups and travel between guilds as ordered. The only difference between state-owned guilds and the regular Rangers is state-owned guilds take more reports from the public, whilst regular Rangers are directly commanded by the government.

2. Thieves' Guilds - Much older and much less organised are Thieves' Guilds. Though many are, they aren't all necessarily about stealing- they're more like vigilantes, taking reports of injustices and challenging the militaristic elements of the government. Some work closely with the government, whilst others are against the state to the point of being banned. They have consistently been relevant to the civil wars and revolutions that have challenged the state, with the first Thieves' Guild being set up by the woman that started the Revolution of the Roses after the defeat of her army. Each Guild operates independently, with their unique systems and differing cultures, dotted randomly around the continent. The south east (Knaerwood) has the most Thieves' Guilds due to a lack of serious law enforcement in the area. They have a similar report system to the state guilds, but operate uniquely and to different moral codes. They pre-date state guilds, which were created to try and lead people away from joining Thieves' Guilds, to varying success. Some Thieves' Guilds are permitted to operate at will, while those more explicit in their challenges to the state are banned and any members/promoters executed as traitors. Many will come to bring down the state that has kept them on a leash for centuries.

[bonesofmybones]

location infodump: the dyr

the Dyr is politically split into fourteen territories- thirteen of which are under the control of the regime, The Eupatarchs, each territory having it's own leader, all working under the Unnamed Main Bad Guy. twelve of these were taken centuries prior to the events of the story, in a series of invasions and wars that led to the Eupatarchs domination of the country. The thirteenth, Fenworth, is the far north-east corner of the landmass, claimed after a civil war known as the Revolt of the Roses (name subject to change) that the revolutionaries lost quite dramatically, with many of the people and species involved executed/hunted to the point of extinction/having to flee the Dyr. The fourteenth territory is the only one that remains free from subjugation to the Eupatarchs, Lyrianya (Lih-ree-anyah) - they are subject only to the loosest magic laws in the Dyr, and mostly free to do as they wish. The Eupatarchs have made multiple attempts to seize the land, but the people have refused to bow down and continue to resist whenever a claim on the land is made. The state map is below but names of states are subject to change at the moment.

within each state are several kingdoms- one, where the Eupatarch responsible for that state resides, is the capital- though there may be multiple major kingdoms in each state. Lyriania has no state capital, and instead operates as a triumverate between the three major nations within the state- Fenwir (fen-we-ur), Crexucuria (crex-uh-cure-ree-ah) and Lanriel (lan-ree-el). Hestia, the central state, is the one from which the Main Big Bad Guy rules the landmass with an iron fist. He aims to destroy Lyriania, by force if needs be- but in doing so will burn everything he has built to the ground.

[bonesofmybones]

location infodump: geography

starting the blog off strong with a bit of lore i'm relatively secure about how i want to go this is so awesome

the entire plot takes place within a landmass most commonly referred to as The Dyr (pronounced "dire", full name is Dyramus). it's this huge diverse stretch of land with mountain ranges across the north, swamps to the south east, plains in the south west and completely littered with forests and lakes and rivers. it's almost entirely disconnected from anything else, surrounded by an ocean notoriously stormy and brutal, meaning there's been little exploration of the world outside by its inhabitants, aside from old folk tales that tend to be dismissed as bedtime stories for kids. the continents' only bordering land mass is an area to the north-west, beyond a mountain range that stretches for thousands of miles. this area is known as the Badlands, an icy plain supposedly void of life. it takes around three months to cross if you're lucky enough to survive the blizzards and creatures that reside there, followed by a range of mountains littered in caves and ravines. beyond this mountain range lies the Isakov Vale, an area free from the oppressive government that rules the Dyr. The Vale is home to the few survivors of several species hunted in the Dyr - a set of grassy clifftops, followed by an ancient woodland and valley, before hitting the coast. as far as most residents of the Dyr are concerned, the world ends at the Badlands- a border set up by the Old Gods to protect them from what lies beyond. to those more learned, however, the Badlands are the gateway to their only sanctuary from the regime- and the key to the liberation of the Dyr from their rulers.