Marisse --

I grew up in Dolbadarn. I don't know if you can imagine such a place - everyone was happy, all the time. No one ever got sick, injured or died. No one hated or envied anyone else, but liked and cared for each other. Everyone was content and fullfulled all the time. It wasn't fake or false or compelled; it simply was.

Except for two people: my mother and father. [He tells Marisse the story Adab] He loves her, I know, but he can't see her without remembering all he lost, and she knows that's the part she can't heal, with all her power. That such a place of happiness and contentment has such sorrow and longing at its core - that the whole universe I knew was based on such a contradiction - I can never seem to find words to describe how that affected me. I'm not sure I really even want to know myself that well.

My mother was very seldom home, and then never for long. She might be gone for weeks or years, then come home unexpectedly from her Quests, and spend a day or two with my father and me. After I'd been sent to bed, she would talk with him long into the night about the progress of her wars. Sometimes I'd sneak back and eavesdrop on them. The next morning she'd be off again to Save the World. I know I sound bitter, and I probably am. I don't hate my mother, but to me people are more important than causes. I kept it bottled up pretty tight, though. I only had it out with her once, many years later... [pause] but I don't want to talk about it.

[long pause]

Having overheard her tell my father of all the faraway places she'd been, I knew I wanted to be a bard, to see all those places and learn their stories for myself. My mother arranged for me to learn from the coven in Shando. Garrick and Jenna, the god and goddess, were distant relations, but there was no special treatment! They were tough (you had to be in a coven so close to Enseljos), and everyone had to earn their keep. My job was to hang around Enseljos as a minstrel, and warn the coven of pogroms and bronzer movements and transfers; anything that would affect the coven. I liked the forest, but I loved the big city! The activity, the people from all over the continent and beyond: people loving, hating, living and dying; and all their stories! Oh, you should have seen it! High Asgar at Orbfest last week was something like it, but no city was more alive than Enseljos under the original Necrodemus!

Working 'undercover', especially on the low side of town, I came to hate the bronzers. Not so much the Empire or the Emperor; they were too abstract. But the bronzers - they were the ones who killed coven and gave a bounty for the heads, particularly the heads of girls, and women of childbearing age. I can't say it was a big hate - that's not my style - but I enjoyed causing them difficulties when I could. Hah! I remember the time we broke someone out of Enseljos prison; that was a lark! I still have the map, after all this time. One of those young stealthmasters was a good friend of mine - we had such fun tweaking the Empire's nose! Well, it wasn't all that hard, I guess. Your average bronzer's a little dull and unimaginitive.

I learned about sex (boy, did I!) from the coven girls, for which you should be very grateful, my dear! Coven don't use money, but they made sure a bard always felt well-rewarded for discovering information useful to the god and goddess. I got involved in some of their hunts and rituals, too, and made some good friends. I can't say I missed "home" much. Looking back, Dolbadarn seemed like such a stagnant, boring place. Enseljos and Shando were my home. Give me a street bazaar, the open road, or a forest clearing at night - that's living! [Wedge sings "Ya Gotta Like It"]

There's a lot more I could tell you - about being held hostage then killed by Prince George, some Demon enemy of my mother's; about being killed and eaten by an Illithid and coming back, many years later, as the Deathgod, then being given a new body (this one!) , made by the Maker personally, and... oh, lot's more. But I'd better save some stories so we'll have something to talk about when we're old, my dear!

(September 26, 1996)