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Highbridge Class - HIS 105
(This is the timeline I wrote in order to teach a class at Highbridge University in 1015, summarizing what I knew of the Bedlam War. It reflects what I understood, and may miss some significant happenings. In addition, both Fae and Bedlam break the laws of time as mortals tend to follow them. Any errors are either mine, or Reality's.
- Rosetta)
Survey of the Bedlam War
HIS 105
Pre-History
Titans are beings of immense power, embodying concepts like "Knowledge" and "Horror." They fight through the eons, claiming the power of the ones they beat, and eventually there will only be one left, and that one's core power will be the rock that the next universe is based on, when this one ends.
Thomas, Titan of Madness, kills Ethan, Titan of Horror, and Malcolm, Titan of Death.
Thomas, "Mad Tom," enters the hallowed halls of Danann, a demiplane where the Tuatha de Danann make their home. They flee, lead by their King, Cuchullain, and reach a neighboring plane, Faerie, where the Cnuic na Sidhe live. Cuchullain shapes the plane with the Pillar of Fae, and the Tuatha de Danann shape themselves inspired by the Cnuic na Sidhe and become the Fae many recognize.
These Fae were eternal, and when they died they would "Cycle", their soul soon being reborn, often as an entirely new being but sometimes with the name or even some memories from the previous life. In the Courts, a valid way to move up in the ranks became to die and Cycle to be born into a higher position.
This period of time is now known as the First Age, and it was marked by many wonders of magic. The Cnuic na Sidhe became vast, distant figures, as inscrutable and wondrous to many Fae as Fae are to most mortals.
Speaking of mortals, the Fae and mortals begin to interact, including the practice of stealing children. One such child is the daughter of a blacksmith. When the blacksmith, Wayland Smith, discovers his child was stolen and replaced with a changeling, his rage leads him to create the Wayland Blades, bane weapons which send Faeries back to their true home plane, Danann.
However, at about the same time, Mad Tom had been advancing from Danann, which was now named after him, called Bedlam. It appeared as a demiplane of thick, inky blackness, from which the bois of Bedlam, humanoid pieces of Mad Tom with their own mobility, emerged. Bedlam spread and covered entire nations in the mortal Realms, and these nations were some of the earliest civilizations that existed.
An order dedicated to the protection of civilization was formed from early human tribes. They called themselves the Benevolent Order of the Wellmen. They fought Bedlam and tried to learn about it. They were unable to discover its secrets, or even of the existence of Mad Tom, but they were able to beat Bedlam back and seal it inside its demiplane, in what they called the Greatest Work. This seal shielded even awareness of Bedlam, preventing the gods from seeing inside. The seal could only be opened by using seven keys, more on that later.
As a result, Wayland Blades sent Fae into the heart of a sealed-off plane in the dominion of a Titan who had mastered Death. There was no Cycling or other coming back from it; Wayland Blades were ultimate destruction.
As the Fae Court went about its usual politics and games, the Duke of Magic, Duke Oberon, wished to become King.
Powerful Fae started to see a darkness coming and make preparations. King Cuchullain forged items which would allow him to return no matter how totally he seemed destroyed. His Queen, Maeb, made two of the five she would need, but spent more time trying to help others rather than herself. The Dukes and Duchesses largely were put to sleep in glass coffins.
Wayland gave his seven Blades to Duke Oberon, and Oberon lead forces loyal to him against Cuchullain's. Oberon's forces used the Blades so devastatingly that the time became known as "the Purging," and thoughts of another Purging terrify Fae to this day. Cuchullain and Mab, fell to these Wayland blades, and Oberon and Titania became the new King and Queen.
The Mysts of Forgetfulness caused much of this to be forgotten for a long time, and this marked the end of the First Age.
Bouquet and the Rites of War
Wayland's hatred sustained him beyond death, and he became a vengeful ghost, studying magic and trying to devise even better Fae-destroying weapons.
In the early 1000s, Cuchullain's forged items began to resurface, eventually being worn by the apparently-human Owen McKyre, who was revealed to be King Cuchullain, effectively Cycled after all this time. Cuchullain revealed how he had been usurped by Oberon, who until this point was all the mortals remembered as the King of Faerie, and the Rites of War began to take back Cuchullain's throne.
While this was happening, Wayland's ghost had devised the Wayland Bomb, an item which when detonated would send all Faeries as far as a shout could travel to Bedlam. However, as Bedlam was sealed and the details lost to the Mysts, it was believed that Wayland weapons totally obliterated Fae.
A Wayland Bomb was set off by accident, and its blast encompassed Bouquet D'Amandes, a well-liked Insectafae. Nero, a mighty Seer, used Cuchullain's Truth and called on his god Apollo, to help.
As it turns out, Cuchullain's Truth was one of the items the King had made, and it allowed you to learn the truth as he knew it, and he knew of Bedlam. In addition, Apollo is a Moon god, and Luna, the common Realms personification of the Moon as a deity, could see beyond the Seal because she is "the light in the darkness." This, and other coincidences, allowed Bouquet to be just barely protected from being utterly destroyed, and a way to retrieve her was learned.
This way came to the Realms as the song "To Seek Mad Tom O'Bedlam," which described an insane series of events including horrifically evil acts.
As it turns out, this song described how to get the seven keys to Bedlam's seal. The Wellmen had ensured that they had one, and the other six could only be acquired by committing acts of extreme evil that would violate distinctly different moral codes. This would ensure that it could only be opened, and the forgotten horrors inside unleashed, if the Wellmen and many others agreed it should be done. Bouquet was motivation enough, and the Wellman who agreed to help was known as Maudlin.
The quest to save Bouquet, known as Now to �Scape the Serpent's Tongue, included stepping through a giant journal called the Book of Moons, and traveling to a trio of planes known as World Horizon, Dawn Tomorrow, and Night's Sky. The moon of these worlds was crashed into Night's Sky, killing millions of star people. In addition, to acquire another key, an innocent child, named Jeremy, had his thighs cut out, incredibly painfully, and the thighs were cooked into meat pies which had to be fed to, and shared with, dark Faeries. Multiple people, realizing that this entire quest would likely lead to horrific evil, arrived at the beginning but refused to take part.
When the gates of Bedlam were opened, the bois immediately flooded out, as they had been waiting.
It was discovered that inside Bedlam itself, there was no sound, no light, and no magic. In addition, death there meant instant, total, irrevocable death (three ticks). A Magus of the Realms, Zeek, was able to use his power to make the weakest of spells function for half a minute, and with a Light he ventured in to look for Bouquet. He could not find her, and when he emerged he had almost no armor remaining.
Getting desperate and unwilling to let this entire quest end in failure, Nero, who was a descendent of gods, Ascended, becoming a messenger demigod. He was able to enter Bedlam and provide light, and he lead someone, Zeek I believe, to Bouquet. When Zeek carried Bouquet out of the gates of Bedlam, she whispered "bring me back" and collapsed into dust.
So, at great cost, Bouquet had been retrieved (and she was brought back, eventually Cycling to be Nimbus, and as Mab had not created enough items to survive the Purging, Nimbus took her place and became Queen of all Faerie when the Rites of War were won, ending at the Black & White of 1007).
Trip into bedlam, Dahal, 1005: "I note with deliberate care that the Bois is a dark destructive power that we have released to create a greater good, destroying the power of the Court of Wayland. May we be forgiven for what we have done, and may we find a way to destroy the bois utterly, as the madness and evil it represents is corruption itself."
Bedlam was opened, and it began leaking out into the world once more. In addition, Oberon, sensing imminent defeat near the end of the war, tore up huge chunks of Faerie, revealing the Bedlam underneath.
Relevant information now, here is a rough depiction of the planes at this point.
Also, during the Rites of War, the Duchess of Blossoms, Ophelia, woke. She was captured by Bedlam, and a particular type of bois called a Soul Leech tortured her. Not much was left of her when she was rescued by Cuchullain's forces, simply seeds, which were planted and grew her into a sword. Faelinn carried her.
The Bedlam War
By the summer of 1008, Bedlam was a known but little-understood threat. Most focus had been on the Rites of War and some things learned during the opening of Bedlam may have been forgotten.
People were actively trying to learn more about it, and Samuel, a Wellman though he denied this for years, began to cautiously share small amounts of information with interested heros.
At Feast of Chimeron 1008, Samuel allowed us to discover the map of the planes.
That night, Bedlam struck and engulfed a cabin in which several adventurers were sleeping. It was found to be akin to a shell of compressed bois.
There was an item, the Llewelyn Blade, which sucked Faeries into it. Sir Zula carried it at the time. It was known that bois and Fae had some similarities, including that bois are instantly dispersed by Wayland blades, so this was seen as a reasonable way to try to remove the "shell." Zula sucked some of the Bedlam shell into the Llewelyn blade, but in doing so it "overflowed." Zula became corrupted by Bedlam, which became a long-lasting illness with periodic flareups, and a copy of Zula was created by Bedlam, a version of him as a very powerful bois, which plagued us for the remainder of the war.
Later that summer, the Nexus appeared, a tavern whose doors became portals to different times and places, allowing us to help people and learn. One of the doors consistently opened to an area filled with mist, marked only be a giant clock. We found the clock hands could be set to different times, and when we so set them, we'd be taken to a time and place in what can now be recognized as the past and future of the Bedlam war. The later the hour, the farther into the war, passing from the Wellmen's first War with Bedlam, into our increasingly grim future.
Through this, we learned some about how the Wellmen had fought, and also what could go wrong. In particular, we saw the Zula-bois capture and torture Queen Nimbus, kill her, hunt down her Cycle, torture and kill that, and so on, until she would be entirely broken. This would be a key to overrunning Faerie, and, presumably, the rest of the universe.
Also, at this gathering, Cimone and Rekees had an orb with a sense of light and energy inside, called the Last Gift of the Deep Fae.
That night, the Nexus tavern began to collapse without warning, and as it did a portal opened. We all crowded out and found ourselves fighting bois, and found the same clock from before on the ground, only its hands were curled up and there was a "13" on the face. Soon after seeing this we found Cecil, not yet King of Chimeron, missing one eye. He yelled that we had to be illusions or a trick, and performed a spell to end Reality itself. Magus Bright had a Regional power to stop exactly that, and the counterspell made Cecil realize we were real. He said we had to bring the Last Gift of the Deep Fae, with us, "this time." He then lead us through the ruined remains of our world, with individual Knights of the Eternal Flame existing in small pockets, fighting against Bedlam. It was harrowing and mistakes were made. We saw Zula fight the bois-version of himself, and the explosion shook what was left of the world. Eventually we made it to wherever we were going, and Cimone thrust the Gift deep into Bedlam, and Cecil ended that Reality to allow us to wake up back in ours.
This vision galvanized many of us, myself included, to move from treating Bedlam from a small threat to a world-ending one, though many others took much longer to see it as such.
For a long time, Bedlam would appear and we would try to figure out how to deal with whatever new, unique thing we were finding this time. Bois began to further differentiate, revealing new powers and tactics. We gained what information we could, but it was hard because Seer magic that looked too deeply into Bedlam brought Bedlam to it, and the Wellmen would not acknowledge us, besides Samuel who was very careful and at times stingy.
A dark elf named Laurante became at one point filled with Bedlam, and was understood to be able to turn into something called a "Living Gate" if he so chose. Many immensely distrusted him for years after, even after he was struck by a Sword of Light and then remade to be free of Bedlam.
Laurante also performed a Seance to speak with all the gods involved in the War with Bedlam. This included Bedlam itself, surprisingly, and in addition to showing that there was an intelligence behind Bedlam (though all he sensed from it was nothing. Nothing but horror, madness, death, and destruction), it showed how it was hard to keep in place, and he had to end the spell before learning much for fear of it catching him.
Laurante began building alliances wherever he could, with whatever he could, for the inevitable final showdown with Bedlam.
The weapons which worked best against Bedlam were Swords of Light, which are holy artifacts of Aurora, of which there were three, and the power of the Knights of the Crown, an order dedicated to her, and Wayland blades, which require torturing a Faerie soul, and the Duchess Ophelia. All in all, not enough.
In addition, one Sword of Light was in use by the Queen of Worms, a demon queen whose dominion in Hell contained a Bedlam gate. With the Sword of Light she was able to keep the darkness at bay, though she required people powerful enough to wield it effectively.
To have another weapon, Laurante used a demon bound in a box to grant wishes to request a Wayland blade that he and only he would always be able to get. This recreated an older Wayland blade which had been destroyed during the Rites of War, to the anger of many.
At a play put on by and for Devils which many of us snuck into, it was revealed that Wayland's ghost had begun forging Bedlam itself. We soon ran into these creations: Fury-Bois, whose glowing purple weapons would cause people struck by them to be seized by madness and fight their comrades. This began to show the true danger of Bedlam: not only sheer physical might, but the ability to turn us against one another.
The Sword of Light was stolen from the Queen of Worms, which caused her to attempt to take Duchess Ophelia. At an impasse in Hell, Laurante chopped off his own right hand which held the Wayland Blade and gave it to her.
We learned of other aspects of Bedlam. It could live inside beings, undetectable until it emerged, like double-agents. These were called Turgem Weir, or sometimes "Skinwalkers".
One type of bois emitted "black sickness," which got into your soul and corrupted you. It made your more susceptible to mental attacks from Bedlam, eventually. Many, many of us got the sickness, and there was no known cure.
Starting to fight back
Over several years we learned and improved
We learned to recognize types of bois, their strengths and weaknesses
We learned to close gates by separating them from the darkness and Banishing them
We learned that Seeds were most important, the cores of Bedlam spreading
Magus Quinn of Chimeron began to commune with Aurora and with his own Light and learned to create first a Circle of Light, and then Light Missiles
We discovered a tool which could destroy the Zula-bois: A Light cannon which could shoot Missiles of Light. He was very hard to catch, however.
Generally, we began to learn that there was light and there was Light. It was Light that really worked against Bedlam, though light didn't hurt.
Bedlam, as before, came to lie over entire nations. Much of the land of Chimeron was overcome, with the notable exception of this university.
Book of Moons
The Wellmen had possession of the Book of Moons, and Samuel Cowperthwaite lead research into its use. He and his apprentice figured out how to use it to cross planes, including projecting minds across the impossible gap of Oblivion.
This was important for there was a world on the other side, Qetzal, which had a Bedlam seed in its core.
Forces of the Realms, in particular members of Ashenmark and the Chimeron militia, made a series of trips through the Book, in order to help the denizens of that world. Magic had long faded from the surface, but they discovered that the inside of their world was hollow and had a Sun of its own, which was being consumed by the Bedlam seed. There, too, they found the dreaded Dislumina, a bois which consumes all light and can only be defeated where the darkness is at its weakest. Thankfully, actively next to a Sun is one of those places.
The Emerald Path
A series of excursions attempted to discover secrets from the last time the Wellmen had fought Bedlam.
There was said to be a key to the secret of Bedlam, perhaps a way to destroy it which was too hard at the time.
The secret was supposed to have been locked away in a place that the darkness could never, ever reach, and it could be learned by following the Emerald Path
This turned out to be very strange. Apparently the Emerald Path could not be walked by us, but rather by heroes from another realm, who see through our eyes, know everything we know, and yet we cannot become aware of them. They may have walked the Emerald Path, but we did not discover what lay at its end.
Airavarri and Temorse
As Bedlam showed up in more and more places, the risk increased
One time, a gate was found in Hell, surprising everybody. It was wedged "open" by an item. A mage, Airavarri of Creathorne, threw himself bodily into the gate to dislodge the item. Tragically, Airavarri had embraced undeath at the time, and the instant he entered Bedlam, the magic failed, and he died. He was spared from the truly permanent destruction of Bedlam, however, by the noble sacrifice of the soul of the defeated usurper Queen Titania, who heard, from her place in the Cycle, the anguish that Airavarri's loss caused. Airavarri was able to be saved, with mighty magics, though the experience changed him and may have lead to his eventual departure from this Realm.
At another time, as a Bedlam seed was being combatted, Temorse of Ashenmark strode too far into Bedlam, and was cut down by bois inside. Ashenmark made it clear they would go to any ends to save him, despite all knowledge saying it was impossible.
We began seeing a Temorse-bois, much like the Zula-bois.
Wayland again
We went to the demiplane where Wayland had his forge and was creating bois-furies. Wayland was killed, according to a ritual, but Bedlam escaped from its confines in the forge and filled the demiplane, a major tipping point in the amount of Bedlam in the multiverse
Wayland's hammer is Bane to all beings, but it was taken and is now secure.
Wayland's body was claimed by Bedlam and presumed destroyed, however, at a later date as Bedlam was attacking as was normal, the body was seen walking among the bois, and it made a declaration of war, saying "The hammer will fall on the third generation."
Father Yule, and the story
Father Yule was first seen during the Bedlam War. He appeared one Uncle Cecil's, and gifted the assembled nations the Northern Lights. These were swords, short but powerful, made of ice and Light, which were as effective at destroying bois as any of the other artifacts.
Each nation could have exactly one, and it had a unique name. Chimeron's is Save the Queen
We learned that if they broke, they were very hard to repair.
The next year, Father Yule showed up again, with more swords, for newer nations.
After that, we heard there would be a way to contact him with requests, and at the following Black & White we found the mailbox for the first time.
A few years later, the war was not going well. While we could win tactical victories, Bedlam was overrunning the Realms
The Wellmen finally contacted the heroes of the Realms with a direct offer to work together, and for them to outfit us with their strange magic items which were incredibly powerful
However, when we reached their base, Bedlam surged. Among the effects that were seen were every Bedlam seed known rising up two feet in the air at the same time, the seas surging higher, and incursions of bois everywhere. The Wellmen used everything they had available, even something called "Light bombs," but nothing worked, and the Order officially disbanded, commanding all agents to go to ground.
We fled, guided by one (now former) Wellman, through darkness with Bedlam everywhere. We were going towards a point of Light in the distance
Eventually we found it: Father Yule with a greatsword Northern Light, and the Krampus, a monster. Father Yule saved us just as we would have been overwhelmed, and brought us into his castle to tell us the story.
This is when he explained that he and Tom are Titans, and that nature. This included that Titans are the first generation, there is a second of immense power and age which includes the giants who made the Book of Moons, and we are the third generation, born of the Titan of Hope and of others.
He told us a plan to defeat Bedlam. Mad Tom would have to be confined to one place so he could be destroyed. He would be able to travel to any Bedlam seed. Father Yule could stop him from reaching any in the Realms, but we would have to destroy the Seeds in other planes, and we would need to destroy Zula-bois and Temprse-bois, who were akin to mobile Seeds.
Then, Peter could lead a grand army, of all the forces the Realms could gather, to draw Mad Tom's attention. Peter, with this army, would likely win, but slowly. He did not want to win, because then he would be the Titan of Hope and Madness.
So, at the same time, while Peter drew Tom's attention, we would sneak deep into Bedlam, so we could pin and slay Thomas.
Finally, we had an actual plan. And now initiatives like the Book of Moons were seen to be very important.
Laurante had been learning to use Wellman technology, and at this point he was unleashed, crafting all sorts of tools and weapons, including a lantern of sorts that actually kept Bedlam at bay.
He had a magical hand built for him out of metal, and eventually, the Star Person, Orion, who had come to help us, transformed into a Sword of Light that Laurante was able to wield.
Turgem Weir
Terrifyingly, Bedlam could seep into beings and lie dormant, to take them over when Tom chose to.
The largest known occurrence happened after much of Chimeron had been covered by Bedlam, with the castle on the Hill being an exception. A cloud of Bedlam hung over the castle, consuming even upper floors
We continued living there because what else would we do?
Bedlam got into all of us, and one Feast of Chimeron, just after the meal, it transformed most of Chimeron into bois, and the heroes of the Realms fought us off
Thankfully, they then learned a ritual to purify Turgem Weir, and were able to restore all of us to ourselves, as well as having learned a potent new weapon
Chancellor Tam Lin observes that it is good that Thomas is defined by his madness and not by his strategy, because we still had our magical abilities, and the power of the mages who had been turned was surely enough to crack the world open.
At around the same time, we also learned a cure for black sickness, which involved quiet contemplations of the weaknesses in one's soul, as a way to strengthen the self. It was slow but possible.
Desperation
In addition to huge sections of the Realms, other planes fell to Bedlam
Dawn Tomorrow was brought to its end because it was so overwhelmed with Bedlam that the entire seas were black
Fae held out for a long time, but bit by bit, it fell, until only the Unchanging Places and the palace were left
Then the Unchanging Places fell, and finally the Palace. The King and Queen, horribly ill with black sickness, came to be among the mortals, their friends and comrades from the Rites of War.
A mistake by the Realms allowed a copy of the Zula-bois from the future into our time. It would have to be destroyed before the "present" one because of the paradox.
Even memories were being consumed by Bedlam, through a terrible type of Turgem Weir called an Eater of Memory
The Taking of Death
As Peter's plan involved us going deep into Bedlam, we would need to be able to survive there more easily
A plan was devised to use the Watch of Lacune, which was the clock we saw long before and also belonged to the giants, to travel back in time to the moment before Tom killed Malcolm, Titan of Death. We would then kill Malcolm instead, and use the Watch to fix the point in time, so that no-one could pull the same trick.
Meanwhile, a strike force from House Griffindor of Chimeron managed to enter Bedlam, the part that once was Fae, and created a beacon in the ruins of Harkon manor. This would allow us to teleport in there, when the time was right.
In addition, we acquired the Eternal Flame, depriving a village of its protection, sadly, but allowing us another tool in the coming battle.
Cuchullain brought us the Pillar of Fae, which he had used to shape Fae, and revealed that we could use it to perform magic within Bedlam
I and several others found our way to a piece of Wellman technology which allowed us to look into the heart of Bedlam. I cannot remember what I saw there, for I have erased it from my memory, but I know in that moment of looking into what must have been true madness, my mind broke. But I did gain some mastery: I was able to speak at a whisper even in Bedlam, and could consume bits of my soul to command it. I never used that power. Others did.
We reached Malcolm, a giant ball of feathers and wings, as a net of Bedlam constricted around it. Before Tom could finish, we slew Malcolm ourselves, the final blow being done by Ophelia, wielded by Faelinn.
At last, we were ready.
Now to Stab the Serpent's Heart
We teleported into the beachhead created by Griffindor, along with a small portion of the great army of the Realms that Peter began to lead against the most-gathered forces of Bedlam
We had the Eternal Flame, which radiated the Realms out about five feet around it
We had the Pillar of Fae, for magic
We found that if we died in Bedlam, madness would begin to seep into us, infecting our senses
We had three orbs of ice and Light, which could be activated at significant points within Bedlam to help force Tom to manifest
These orbs would require ultimate sacrifices to be activated
We succeeded, and the three heroes who gave up their lives, whose names should never be forgotten, are Dame Altana Cecil of Chimeron, Dame Valerie Hart of Chimeron, and Kieren, Priest of Chronos. All were too young.
It was a grueling battle
Orion was used to destroy the future Zula-bois
We found records from a Wellman who had been lost in Bedlam the first time, who had figured out how to destroy it
We would need to forge our gods into swords, and use them to impale the seven heads of Mad Tom, which would allow us to destroy his heart.
We destroyed a manifestation of Horror, believed to be the main remnants of the Titan Ethan.
The aftershock allowed Darkness to consume all our minds, trapping us in a web of Bedlam
In that web, we found the ghost of Wayland's daughter, and allowed her to pass on
We then found Wayland's ghost, and revealed her reaching her final reward. This, at last, calmed the wronged smith down
Wayland was willing to use his hammer, which we thankfully had, to forge gods into swords. A great discussion was had on whose gods it should be. We knew we would need five, but we would only have one chance so if some broke, we would need backup. I believe seven were made.
This was at great cost: these gods were weakened and immensely vulnerable. We feared it would be irreversable, as well, and they would remain forever swords.
On the approach to Mad Tom, we passed his tail, and there the sword of the Dark One was broken, and Rhode of Grimloch Ascended to take his place, as we believe was Rhode's plan all along.
We found the Temorse-bois, and after Ashenmark defeated it with teamwork and force, we found Temorse himself, and sent him back from the front lines to heal.
On the final approach, looking to have more Knights, Laurante and Zula made their Squires, myself and Rorin, into Knights of the Red Branch. It was a power grab on their parts.
Moments after that, Tom reached out and consumed the artifacts which had been protecting us. Kieren, able to speak and perform magic due to his sacrifice, granted us the power of speech in Bedlam for 30 seconds. I used my magic to prolong it when that ran out. This was enough to let us regroup and not fall apart. We marched on, and found ourselves on a plane, with the five heads of the great serpent across from us
As we stepped on, we saw Tarnisha's Gate, and a hand reached through and placed an orb. Our dead revived, our magic refilled, our armor reset, and we knew in that instant that despite facing down Tom, we were in the Realms. This was the other side of the gate Cimone put her hand through those years ago, in that reality where we had failed.
The battle was difficult, as the heads were incredibly dangerous. Some could slay gods with their bite. But one by one, we pinned them, and at last we flooded down the foul neck, and tore Mad Tom's heart apart with our bare hands.
Aftermath
Tom's body, Bedlam, collapsed into nothing
Where it had lain in the Realms, there was new, fertile soil, though no trees.
The plane of Bedlam was revealed to be Danann, and the Courts of Fae, lead by Cuchullain and Nimbus, left to their original home to heal. Danann is now akin to the Summerlands, for Fae who have cycled long enough, and for heroes of Fae. All who were lost in Bedlam can also be found there. Zula and Harlest, among others, departed from these lands to be with the Courts.
The end of Bedlam was an event, a triumph of Hope, which echoed throughout the planes and the times, and serves as a beacon.
Valerie and Altana were made Avatars of Chimeron for their sacrifice
Faerie itself had been nearly consumed, but here and there, wild patches remained. Duchess Ophelia, restored to her full self, was able to use the twisty nature of Faerie time to regrow. It is now the Fae Wylds, full of new and old. Most new fae you meet are of the Cnuic na Sidhe, not of Danann like myself.
This is also why much knowledge of what affects Fae, such as cold iron and faestones, may not still hold. You might find a Fae who obeys totally different rules, for they are Wyld. Of course, some of the older legends came from rare encounters with the wyld parts of Fae.
I believe the ruins of one or two of the Unchanging Places may be somewhere out there.
The caretaker of the Book of Moons lost herself in the final push to save Qetzal, but was saved by the hard work and caring of the Realms. She, Margaret Bookwalker, now uses the Book to travel to different places
Some god blades were stored safely in temples and dungeons. Others were unmade, such as Luna, returning to their original forms
Our reality was greatly damaged by Bedlam; cracks remain, and this may make us vulnerable for a time. It may also have uncovered new things we never could have found before. |
