Knowing one’s Heritage
It is not every day that your father tells you that you are descended from a great bloodline. Ancestors whom shared the world with the elves of so long ago. Men of the West we are called, or Westernesse to some.
This is what happened to me upon my reaching twenty winters in age. This was the time of year I were born, a harsh winter by all accounts, well according to my father it were.
I remember us sitting as we often did round a campfire out in the wilds where we travelled so often. For this were my home, it was all I had ever known. For sure I had visited such settlements as Esteldin in the North Downs, and Bree in the South, but I could never call the towns’ home.
I cannot now remember what we may have been eating, something which we had caught and killed that day. Stewed as I always liked it with various vegetables, I sat there when my father told me of my lineage.
At first he would tell me of my mother and himself, all the while I would be thinking yet another story of their love for one another, or the travelling they would do.
He would go on to mention our present Chieftain and descending right back through to the first, that being Aranarth. I had heard of such men, and women whom were blessed with this bloodline of longevity, but little did I realise that I were born from two such people.
I found myself becoming more engrossed in what he was telling me. Of course I had questions, why had he not mentioned before? Why leave it until now when he were leaving? Although for the first time in my life I would be without both mother and father.
My mother I had never known, or more to the point did not remember for she had passed away long before I can recall. Whatever his reasons for leaving it this long, he was telling me now.
I have since delved deep into the lore of my people, the bloodlines, the chieftains, and back even before them to the men of Numenor and beyond. I can understand to a degree why my father would keep this from me. To keep me safe, for our people have been hunted through the ages.
We are a dwindling race, the few of us left kept secret, for obvious reasons. I am proud of my family heritage, who I am, from where I have come from. A Ranger of the North, one of the Dunedain. However, save only to those whom know me, I am just a mere woman whom travels around….
(Images courtesy of: libertykid.tumtblir.com, cgsociety.org,)
(Music courtesy of Adrian von Ziegler)
