Kaelin Thatcher
Lady Kilmeny Thatcher (a.k.a. 'Aunt Kilmeny')
Priest of Sastrines. Younger sister and second to Shae Isabella. Grove Guardian and wanderer. House motto: ut alat ac defendant. Personal motto: Toujours errante, jamais infidele. Currently makes her home with the AlGaia.
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Kaelin's Prayer
The Wanderer’s Prayer (Kaelin’s Prayer)
Beloved Sastrines,
Give me a few friends
who will love me for what I am,
and keep ever burning
before my vagrant steps
the kindly light of hope…
And though I come not within sight
of the castle of my dreams,
teach me to be thankful for life,
and for time's olden memories
that are good and sweet.
And may the evening's twilight
find me gentle still.
[Adapted, not player's original writing]
Sunlight on the Water; Starlight on the Stones
"Sunlight on the Water," Shay smiled and held out her hand, stained purplish from whatever apothecary work had been interrupted.
"Starlight on the Stones!" Kaelin grasped her sister's arm in the grip known as warrior's. "I've news, sister."
In this way do members of House Thatcher and those under their protection greet and identify one another, though many have forgotten why. It is a phrase that can be used to appeal to any Thatcher to gain aid. Every exchange of it reminds the people of Castle Drakehold and its lands of the bond between them, eternally renewing that bond each time it is shared.
The House colours of blue and gold to a Herald speak the language of loyalty, constancy, generosity, wisdom and strength.
To the Family, they are also the colours of sunlight on moving water - the truth that one may be constant, may endure, without becoming still and stagnant. That it is wisdom to remain able to adapt and learn, the better to protect one’s own. Thatcher people are enduring, indeed, but nothing about them is static. Sunlight on the Water, the quicksilver versatility of the Family, ever ready to adapt.
These shades also for the faint hint of colour on the ancient ritual stone circle at twilight. Older than the Family, it has accepted them since the times of cleansing as the territory’s new caretakers and has always answered the call of those of the blood. Starlight on the Stones, the steadfast devotion of the Family to land and people, ever ready to protect.
Applegarth
Although in her youth completely happy to reside simply in the cave beside the spring in Sastrines’ Grove, in her Autumn years Kaelin has been persuaded to build for herself a more comfortable dwelling, at least for the months of harshest weather.
The result is Applegarth, a low one-storey cottage of the local grey stone sitting beside a small winding lake, with forested mountains rising at its back. Its design is simple - an originally neat building with a long porch running across the front, to which extra rooms have been added as need arose so that it now sprawls comfortably and lopsidedly in the mountain’s shadow. A small extension of three rooms looking out over the lake waits unused, in the hope that Juliana and her family might one day return.
Behind the cottage and vegetable garden, an orchard climbs the beginning of a rise until it melts seamlessly into the forest. Here begins a mossy path of perhaps a mile leading to the Grove of Sastrines.
A small ‘bunk house’ takes up one corner of the orchard, used mostly to house the groups of children who come to learn from Kae or to help take in the apple harvest. The cottage itself has room for only a few guests, so larger groups of travellers or visitors for the shrine will find themselves cosily lodged here, comforted with fires of scented applewood and soft old linen sheets breathing the quiet perfume of lavender and rose. At need, the guest house can and has been used as an emergency hospital.
Fatemarked
Every night, now, the dreams. A forest that did and did not burn. Was and was not ashen wasteland. Voices - one voice? three? - at the edge of hearing. Sometimes she even saw and heard the ghost flames sweeping past in her waking hours now, and reached out frantically through them to reassure herself with the solid cool touch of holly and oak. Not here, she thought. Not here but - real. Real somewhere?
Then one night the dream flames were quieter, the chanting voices louder. Through the fire she could make out a circle, hazy figures moving within, their faces refused to her. With grief and hope undaunted their voices called on Sastrines, and their calling struck Kaelin to the heart. Through the haze, one figure grew clearer to her eyes, standing tall in the Circle’s heart. An elf maid, her dark hair like a cloud blown in the wind, power riding her voice. In her slender hands she held - clearer now, still clearer - only acorns, simple but shining, glowing with power, and her eyes-
Kaelin fell forward into those eyes and awoke in a forest that both was and was not home.
Drake Thatcher's Prayer
[Often chanted to open or close festivals and other gatherings in Thatcher lands]
We join with Sastrines and with each other
To bring new life to the land
To restore the waters
To refresh the air
We join with Sastrines and with each other
To renew the forests
To care for the plants
To protect the creatures
We join with Sastrines and with each other
To celebrate the seas
To rejoice in the sunlight
To sing the song of the stars
We join with Sastrines and with each other
To recreate our community
To promote justice and peace
To nurture and protect all our children
We join with Sastrines and with each other
As many and diverse expressions of one loving Mystery,
For the healing of the land and the renewal of all life.
History of House Thatcher - A Story told in the Orchard
“Tell me you didn’t throw the first punch, Duncan.” Kaelin sighed ruefully as she smoothed some of her sister’s salve gently along the lad’s bruised cheek, tactfully ignoring the hints of tears that trailed through a coating of Autumn dust.
Grey eyes met her own defiantly and a small chin jerked upward.
“No m’lady. Th’last one.”
She bit her lip, stifling an unseemly grin. “I see.”
She thought she did. Always, when outsiders came in to benefit from the harvest’s bounty, there was some young idiot with a mouth.
“These people are guests in our lands, lad. That wasn’t right welcoming of you,” she chided gently. The other children were abandoning their apple-picking now, drawing closer in support of their friend. A dozen murmurs beginning with ‘but-...m’lady, but-’ buzzed like bees about the orchard.
“Hmmm?” she held the boy’s gaze, and eventually the words tumbled out:
“They called us Farmer’s brats!”
It would have been a youngster his own age, she thought, some new-made squire, their pride as stiff as their first set of armour. It usually was.
“I see. Well, we are, aren’t we?” She smiled gently round at their mutinous faces, and beckoned them to sit in the shade of the tree. “You, me, my sister, all of us - there’s a reason people call us the ‘House of Farmers’. Only those outsiders, sometimes they forget what that reason is. And my dears, it’s something you must never forget, so I will tell it to you again.”
She set the basket of apples moving around the circle. Honestly, sometimes she wondered if they started trouble just to get a story. And an apple, of course.
“Who here remembers the name of the founder of our House?”
All of them. “Drake! Drake Thatcher!”
“And who knows what he did? Why is he a hero?”
“He was one of the Nine!” “He helped slay the Dragon!” “Dragon!”
Then hesitantly, a smaller voice: “He healed the land.”
“That’s right, Gelis. When the fighting was over, the weapons sheathed, and the Dragon lay dead, the rulers of Bernicia looked about them and counted the cost. And they saw that there was one place where the enemy had worked its greatest evil, lands that had suffered longest and most. Where the forests were tangled and dark, and the rivers choked with poison and weeds, and the fields were ash. From which any wholesome animals able to flee had fled, and no birds sang.
“Drake Thatcher saw this, and his heart grieved. And when the Crown would reward him and his companions he made only one request: “Those broken lands give to me and mine. We will heal the land. We will cleanse the waters. In Sastrines’ name, we will work without rest to restore and nourish and protect this place.”
Kaelin looked slowly around the circle. “And now you live in a land of tended forests, my loves, of crystal waters and golden harvests. Harvests so plentiful we have abundance to share with neighbours, and gladly given. A land we will protect forever.”
She reached out to ruffle Duncan’s hair. “So next time some fool from off calls you ‘farmer’s brat’, you feel that burn in your heart for the true honour it is. You tell them it’s true, that’s what we are right enough - you, me, Lady Shaye, all of us - and damn proud to be.”
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