#just wait until I write my green knight/east of the sun west of the moon au

[potatoesandsunshine]

asdhkajsh very long and silly dnd lore under the cut. sometimes, when you make a character who’s whole thing is Being Illegitimate Royalty, you start wondering how they justify the whole royalty thing anyway.

  In the tumultuous times that plagued the kingdom, when the lords were disloyal and selfish and the King had fallen in battle, the Queen sent her son far from the palace to preserve his safety. With him she sent five knights, four squires, three servants, two advisors, and his one remaining cousin, the child of his father’s brother. By her order, he was not to return until she had brought the nobility back in line and restored justice to the people.   The prince was young and eager to prove himself in battle; he wept bitterly when she told him of her plans, and argued against them until his last day at her side. He worried that he would not be able to prove himself to his people if he were to be parted from them. And above all, he feared that his mother would die if he left her to navigate her faithless court alone.  But the Queen was resolute. It was her duty as queen to face the storms that plagued her people, and her duty as a mother to protect her son.   They say her conviction was so great that she did not even weep as his party rode out from the palace gates, despite the prince’s anger and sorrow.   Here the story changes, depending on the teller.   Some say the prince’s party went to the swamps in the south and were enchanted by the witch-wolf there, forced to remain in her service for a year and a day before her magic broke. Some say they went east into the woods and found another troubled court, the Feywild, where the prince’s advisors were so ensnared by a riddle they could not be convinced to escape the realm. Some say they went west to the deserts and fought beasts of legend, monsters of shadow and smoke, and that all five knights and all but one of the squires perished there. Some say the prince was so loved by his people that he did not even leave the city nearest to the palace, and was hidden in the families of his servants for many months. And some even claim that he left the kingdom less than a step outside the palace gates, spirited away by a spell his cousin crafted that would take them to safety and worked too well, dumping them halfway across the world.   The stories here vary in telling. Sometimes the wise advisors make sure the prince is counselled against dangerous contracts, sometimes the knights train him to be a greater warrior than any before, sometimes the compassion of his servants protects him from cruel traps, and sometimes the cleverness of his cousin is all that stands between the honorable prince and his own ruin.   But everyone agrees—three years after leaving the palace, the prince found himself in the mountains to the north where the Great Lion dwelt. And there, he faced his greatest challenge. ---   In the mountains to the north, where the peaks are tall enough to scrape the sky and the valleys so deep that they never see snowfall, there dwells the Great Lion and her court of animals.   The Great Lion is as tall as a mountain and greater than any storm; the dist that rises from her footsteps becomes blizzards and the lashing of her tail cuts the sky with lightning. Her claws are sharper than the sharpest sword and her pelt is thicker than the strongest armor, and her sharp gray eyes can see through any falsehood. It is said that she wrestled demons and angels alike to come to power, and that all who rose against her met the same final fate.   Three days of every month she walks among the mountains as a woman armed with scales and a golden spear, to ensure that none of the denizens there forget even their smallest duties. The unjust are punished and the just spared her fury.   The prince’s cousin, for he survives in every story, cautioned him against drawing her attention—for she was an ally to the first King of the prince’s kingdom, but swore no oaths to be his subject. And because the prince had learned to heed his cousin’s warnings, he hid away for the first three days of the new month.   On the fourth day of the new month, the prince’s party emerged from a snowy cave and made the perilous trek down into one of the deep valleys. There they found warmth. Though it was the deepest winter at the top of the mountains, it was spring in the valley. Birdsong filled the air and the grass grew soft and green.   The prince’s party set up camp in a clearing next to a stream, and all fell into a restful sleep, content in their knowledge that the Great Lion had returned to her business on the high peaks.   But the prince’s sleep was troubled. He had been away from his home for many months, and dreamed often of terrible fates befalling the people he loved there. The wisest counsel could not ease the worry of a son.   And so he woke in the depths of night, and walked to the stream to think.   He sat watching the water for a time, before he was startled to hear a sweet voice.   “What troubles you?” the voice asked, and the prince sprang to his feet, alarmed.   There across the stream, he met gray eyes that shone in the dark. The woman looked near to his own age, wrapped in a cape of golden fur, and she looked at him with curiosity. Something compelled him to answer.   “I worry for my mother,” he confessed, and she nodded.   “I worry for mine, as well. I see her very rarely, and while I know she is doing what is best for me... it is difficult.”   “She ordered me away for my own safety, and I know it was right, but I wish I could be there to help her.”   After saying the words aloud, the prince felt lighter, and the woman smiled.   They spoke until the sun rose about many things; he told her of his travels and she told him of growing up in the warm valleys of the mountains, and how to tell edible plants from poisons, and how to avoid the lands of the more territorial animals. And by the end of the evening, each had fallen in love with the other.   The prince refused to move the camp in the following days, and the woman visited every night to speak with him. So caught up in his ardor, the prince did not notice that a month had passed until it was too late. He did not listen to his cousin’s warnings about the time passing, even when it led to the rest of his party retreating to the mountain cave to hide from the Great Lion.   On the night of the full moon, the prince went to meet his love at the stream as he always did. But instead of his love in her golden cape, there was a young lion splashing in the stream; and on the other shore there was a woman with a golden spear and a set of scales.   The prince knew instantly that this was the Great Lion.   “Who are you,” she asked in a voice like thunder, “to hide here in my valleys?”   The prince was afraid, for he knew the Great Lion was not kind to trespassers of any kind. But he also knew that she was an ally to his ancestor, and he had learned courage through his journeys.   “I am the son of the Queen,” he told her, “and I remain in this valley because I am in love with the woman who lives here.”   The Great Lion laughed, amused. “The only one who lives here, Prince, is my own daughter who you see in the shallows. Three nights a month I walk in this form, and three nights a month she spends in that one.”   The lion in the stream looked up from the water and the prince knew the words to be true, for he recognized the laughter in its eyes.   “So you see,” the Great Lion said, growing serious, “she is not as you thought at all. And though she does not yet summon blizzards, she will grow to be as great as I. Even a prince is unworthy of her.”   “I love her,” the prince declared. “I will not leave her now.”   Here, again, the stories differ. Some say the prince swore at once to prove himself to the Great Lion in combat, and met her spear to sword there at the stream. Some say he sought to prove his wisdom, and went in her name to negotiate with the rowdiest of the animal lords. And some say he chose cleverness and guile, waiting for the three days to pass and convincing the daughter of the Great Lion to help convince her mother of their love.   The Great Lion, however convinced, eventually agreed to their marriage. Her daughter relinquished her cape and her claim on the throne of the mountains, giving up her animal form. And she went south with the son of the Queen and the rest of his party, back to the palace, where they met his mother who had triumphed over her struggles. And all were joyful; the Great Lion in the north let out such a laugh that a warm breeze spread over the land, bringing the greatest spring it had ever seen. And her daughter smiled her gray-eyed smile, and taught her own children the pride a lion carries in its blood.   And from this story we have nine generations of rulers, queen to king in an unbroken line, leading to the honorable King Maximallian who rules now with the justice of the prince and the pride of his lion-bride.

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all this to say, the royal family of bee’s country claims to be descended from... some kind of lion deity maybe? or just a very powerful druid? yes this was written because I had like two sentences in the knights slice of life story where Reverie looks over and Bee has a kid riding on her shoulders while she stomps around and “roars” and i was like “wait why is she roaring.” very fun trying to figure out what values this story would push (family, responsibility, following the orders of the monarch) and how it could vary (the whole strength-wisdom-trickery) thing. a fun time writing something that will truly NEVER come up in play haha

#anna plays dnd #sword with a broken crown #sorry everyone for the 2k words of oc background lore #bee has her father's eyes which she has very strong negative feelings about - but in her kingdom they call them lion eyes #which is fully cool as fuck #this is like... not amazing writing but it was Fun Writing