Voices of the Lost

One of Illefarn's most famous song paths was called "Voices of the Lost" after the song that activated it, the song that the portal system was meant to showcase. Created in -1517 DR, it was not deactivated when the kingdom was abandoned circa -1100 DR. The Illefarni noble in charge of disenchanting this song path could not bear to carry out his orders, and instead he simply took with him all available copies of the poetic work that activated the portal system so that no one but the elves would make use of the portals. He further separated all copies of the poem into smaller parts, so no whole version of it remained in existence, then scattered them across various elven libraries. After his actions, the “Voices of the Lost” song path fell into disuse for centuries, all but forgotten.
Description
Written by a master bard late in Illefarn's history, "Voices of the Lost" is uncomfortably prophetic, a characteristic typical of this realm’s finest artistic efforts. In “Voices of the Lost,” a human wanderer finds a broad, weathered stone in a field on which elven runes can barely be seen. He reads of an elven kingdom in a primeval forest that once rose where the stone lay, a kingdom of such grandeur that the wanderer is staggered and awed by the story. That night, the wanderer falls asleep on the stone and has a magic dream in which he journeys into the distant past to speak with the elves of this kingdom and tell them of their fate. The wanderer hopes to prevent the fall of this realm, but the elves already know their fate and have elected not to stop it. The wanderer, amazed and frustrated, travels even further back in time, meeting coronals and mages all the way back to the realm’s founding, but all of the elves questioned have at least an inkling of what is to come, and they accept it without question. By the song's end, the wanderer realizes that the elves, rather than attempting to prevent the death of their civilization, elected instead to manage the life of their kingdom so that it reflected the best of their ideals at all times, even at its end. The elves avoided the excesses in magic and temperament that doomed other cultures before and after them, adhering to their better nature to the end and rejecting hatred and bitterness at the natural cycles of growth and death. At the kingdom's end, its people scatter and plant the seeds for later kingdoms that will rise to even greater achievements, influencing history, civilization, and people on a gigantic scale. The wanderer awakens, a sad but wise man, and follows the example of the Fair Folk of Illefarn in living his life well while also ensuring the world will be a better place long after he dies and his name is forgotten.
Portal Network
The song path created to accompany “Voices of the Lost” follows the path of the River Delimbiyr by means of a chain of one-way portals. Each portal is tied to a large circular block of polished marble about 9 feet across and encircled with carved Hamarfae script. The fourth portal stone, which sits atop the Shining Falls, is unlike the others, dating back to a much earlier era. Activating each portal requires an individual to stand upon a portal stone while singing a particular set of stanzas from “Voices of the Lost” in Seldruin, an ancient elven tongue long associated with elven high magic. Once the set of stanzas associated with the portal are completed, the singer and any other living creatures in contact with the stone are then sent to the next portal.
Locations
Currently, the “Voices of the Lost” song path links six locations in a one-way chain, although originally it included seven locations, forming a loop. The song path’s remaining portal stones span the length of the River Delimbiyr, which serves as a metaphor for the passage of time, starting with the kingdom late in its history, tracing its history back to its origins, before jumping ahead in time to the anticipated fall of the realm. The entire cycle using the portals took about six hours on the average, counting periods of silence for reflection and rest.
1. Aelinthaldaarnar The portal system for "Voices of the Lost" originally began in Aelinthaldaar, capital of Illefarn. The first portal stone, known as Aelinthaldaarnar (literally “Stone of Aelinthaldaar”) originally lay in a broad meadow from which no trace of the buildings of the city could be seen. Long after Aelinthaldaar had been abandoned, the broken remains of the first portal stone were built into the streets of Waterdeep’s Sea Ward. This portal stone no longer functions, although a few pieces might be recognizable thanks to the faint, fragmentary Hamarfae inscription. The first set of stanzas of "Voices of the Lost" (taking about 15 minutes to recite) recounts the wanderer’s discovery of the stone at night. In addition to singing the initial stanzas, the wanderer needed to fall asleep atop the stone to trigger the portal. Now these stanzas serve as a nonessential introduction to the second set of stanzas.
2. Delimbiyr’ter’ael When the song path was created, the second portal stone lay in the flood plain of the River Delimbiyr, covered each year by the spring floods, near a crossing known as Delimbiyr’ter’ael (literally: “Shining Whetstone”) to the Fair Folk (a term that has long since fallen out of use but refered to the image of the river as a shining dagger that was sharpened over the rocks of the ford). The second portal stone of the “Voices of the Lost” song path is now the hearthstone of the Lady Luck tavern (#C1) in the town of Daggerford, once a two-story warehouse built on a flat stretch of exposed bedrock. The elven inscriptions are now worn and barely recognizable and simply considered part of the character of the place. The second set of stanzas of “Voices of the Lost” (taking about 15 minutes to recite) describes a realm in decline, late in the arc of Illefarn’s history, slowly marching to its inevitable end. The river is broad and shallow here, representing the dwindling numbers of the Fair Folk, scattered across territories far too large to hold.
3. Alukerymiilor When the song path was created, the third “Voices of the Lost” portal stone lay atop a hill just east of the confluence of the River Delimbiyr and the Ulbanlur (now known as the Hark River or the Highmoorflow). Known to the Fair Folk as Alukerymiilor (literally, “Place of the Water Swords”), the stone overlooked the steep cascades of the Ulbanlur, whose waters poured down into the placid waters of the River Delimbiyr to create an ever-turbulent pool. Alukerymiilor was later the site of a castle known as Floodmeet, built to defend the eastern reaches of Athalantar, Kingdom of the Stag. The castle has long since fallen into ruins, but the area is still known as Floodmeet, for the spring floods that inundate the northern bank of the River Delimbiyr. The third stone now lies, partially buried, amidst the broken, overgrown walls of the ruined castle, leading some to erroneously conclude that Floodmeet was once an elven fortification. In the current era, Alukerymiilor is used from time to time by hunters seeking shelter from storms blowing off the High Moor and by druids from the South Wood celebrating the arrival of spring (usually held on the ides of Mirtul), but mostly it is ignored by the halfing and human farmers who farm the north bank of the River Delimbiyr. Nevertheless, human and Halfling farmers to the west on the north bank of the River Delimbiyr might well observe the unexpected arrival of travelers at the long-forgotten portal terminus across the river and react with some amount of alarm. The third set of stanzas of “Voices of the Lost” (taking about 30 minutes to recount) describes the chaos of the Crown Wars and the mingling with the various Lawkeeper races that came in their wake.
4. Delimbiyr’alushtas When the song path was created, the fourth “Voices of the Lost” portal stone was set atop a flat-topped outcropping of bedrock that thrust up through the top of the Shining Falls, known to the Fair Folk as Delimbiyr’alushtas (literally “Shining Rain”). Although inscribed with the same Hamarfae script that adorns the other portal stones, the actual inscription is slightly different. The use of this rock as a portal stone predates the rest of the song path, as it had been established as the nexus of a portal network in the early days of Sharrven that crisscrosses the upper Delimbiyr Vale. At the time of the song path’s creation, this portal stone actually lay within the boundaries of the dwarven realm of Ammarindar, not too far from the entrance to the Royal Caverns of Splendarrmornn. The portal stone here is actually on a small, rocky, shrub-covered island in the middle of the top of the horseshoe falls, near the drop-off. Anyone standing on the island is engulfed in perpetual spray but afforded an amazing few of the falls, the Graypeaks, and the High Forest. The Stout Folk permitted this portal stone’s inclusion in the Illefarni song path, given that its uses as an elven portal stone predated the establishment of their realm and because it provided a convenient means for exchanging emissaries on those rare occasions when Ammarindar’s arcrown and Illefarn’s coronal needed to communicate. In the Year of the Curse (882 DR), lingering horrors unleashed by the Netherese of Ascalhorn overran Ammarindar, causing the dwarven realm to collapse. Although the Harpers managed to trap the leaders of the demonic horde within the newly renamed Hellgate Keep with powerful wards in the Year of the Fell Firebrake (886 DR), their lesser minions continued to terrorize the Delimbiyr Vale. In the Year of the Burning Tree (890 DR), the demons began digging tunnels to reach the mines of Ammarindar and (later) the Nameless Dungeon. The former effort proved successful in the Year of the Frozen Flower (1221 DR) and the latter effort reached its goal in the Year of the Worm (1356 DR). For over a century, the Royal Caverns of Splendarrmornn have been the domain of a triumvirate of liches whose phylacteries remain in the possession of the demonic leaders of Hellgate Keep. The Circle of Splendarrmornn, as the fallen Ascalhi wizards call themselves, command a legion of ghouls, ghasts and other lesser undead as well as a tribe of tanarukka barbarians, on behalf of their demonic masters. These troops command the banks of the River Delimbiyr, from the edge of the High Forest to the western Graypeaks up to 100 miles north and south of the Royal Caverns of Splendarrmornn. The Shining Falls lie at the heart of this territory, making the fourth portal stone quite dangerous to visit. The Circle of Splendarrmornn are well aware that the portal terminus exists and have left a skull watch* (CL 18th) in place to alert them to interlopers, an invisible ghoul glyph* (CL 18th) atop the center of the stone to temporarily detain such visitors, and prepared a teleportation circle (made permanent with a permancy spell) in the depths of the Royal Caverns to allow them to readily dispatch troops to the area. Five rounds after the PCs arrive, a warband consisting of a flameskullLEoF, 4 tanarrukMoF axeblades (CE male tanarruk barbarian 2) and 2 ghasts arrive via the teleportation circle, intent on killing the intruders and bringing their corpses back to the Royal Caverns for reanimation. The members of the warband have no means of leaving the island until the liches have them brought back, so, assuming the PCs prevail in battle, they should have enough time to escape before a more powerful undead spellcaster (a lesser lich or a spectral wizardMoF) comes to check on the warband’s success. The fourth set of stanzas of “Voices of the Lost” (taking about 60 minutes to recount) describes the grandeur of the ancient realms of the Fair Folk at their height and takes the form of an ongoing dialog between two great coronals (kings).
5. Aerendelnar When the song path was created, the fifth “Voices of the Lost” portal stone lay on the west bank of the fast-moving River Delimbiyr, just north of the Eaerlanni port city of Aerendel, in a small glade known as Aerendelnar (literally “Stone of Rushing Waters”). The glade is cloaked in elven wards that muffle the ambient noise (giving a +10 circumstance bonus on Move Silently checks), allowing the sound of the rushing waters to echo through the glade. As the most accessible Eaerlanni ruin, the remains of Aerendelnar have been picked over for centuries for adventurers, and what treasures that remain are well hidden. The ruins of Aerendel and its immediate environs (including Aerendelnar) are now home to various predatory monsters and incidental marauders (including wild griffons and tanarukka warbands). For a decade or more, the most dangerous inhabitants of Aerendel have been a pride of dirlagraun (displacer beastsMM), led by a monstrous displacer beast pack lordMM. It is not uncommon for two or more dirlagrauns to be found hunting in the glade of Aerendelnar, as many creatures of the forest come down to the river bank here to drink, unaware that the lingering enchantments make it harder to hear approaching predators. The fifth set of stanzas of “Voices of the Lost” (taking about 30 minutes to recount) recounts the energy and laughter of Illefarn in its early years, when the Fair Folk were still expanding their realms.
6. Aulannar When the song path was created, the sixth “Voices of the Lost” portal stone lay near the headwaters of the River Aulantrar (also known as the Deepingstream) on a small island in the middle of the riverbed, known as Aulannar (literally “Deepingstone”), high up in the Nether Mountains. The River Aulantrar has changed its course over the centuries, leaving the portal stone in a now-dry stone-strewn valley some six hundred feet from the river’s new course. This territory is now the domain of the demonic spawn of a fey guardian of the mountain and a demon from Hellegate Keep. A twisted mountain guardian known as the Demoread (LE female half-fiend oreadFF) now protects this mountain valley with cruel zeal. Although she is unaware that the stone with elven script is a portal terminus, she is quick to attack anyone who arrives in the heart of her domain. The sixth set of stanzas of “Voices of the Lost” (taking about 30 minutes to recount) recounts the founding of Illefarn and the feelings of hope and laughter that accompanied it.
7. Faedrannor When the song path was created, the seventh “Voices of the Lost” portal stone lay at the mouth of the River Delimbiyr, atop a small outcropping of rock in what was then Delimbiyr estuary, a scattering of now-vanished bare islets. Later known as Mystra’s Dance, so named for the first altar of Mystra established by the Ruathyn settlers of Tavaray, the Fair Folk called this place of ancient magic Faedrannor (literally “One Song”). After the rapid topographic changes in the Year of the Deep Bay (302 DR), this portal stone now lies some twenty-five feet below the waves and 150 feet offshore, buried beneath a thick layer of mud. Anyone arriving on the portal stone must be able to breathe underwater or quickly swim to shore. Once ashore, the singer and his compatriots find themselves in the heart of the seaside territory claimed by the Crashing Thunder tribe of lizardfolk (see Chapter 2), who are notoriously hostile to interlopers. The last set of stanzas of “Voices of the Lost” (taking about 30 minutes to recount) recounts the foretold final days of Illefarn, when the ancient elven realm would finally fade away. Originally, reciting these verses would take the singer back to the first portal stone in Aelinthaldaar, but now they have no effect, leaving the singer stranded beneath the waters of the Sea of Swords.