Verveine the Violet & Vicious, Legendary

Two poems translated from the original Shar by Ser Templeton Esq.

Introduction

The following two poems are to serve as a prelude to the cycles of serial stories & poems known as VICIOUS, LEGENDARY. Following this will be approximately 6-8 tales in prose or verse forming the Violet Cycle, named for the protagonist of the series. This is intended to be a liminal grim-dark, a voyage into a realm undefined and far distant from us. It is a forsaken place known to us here as Miasm: a realm where reality has fractured into disparate Fallows bound only by the mysterious non-reality known as Fog. It is the end of days, the world is dissipating, and few know what is to come next. Those who do safeguard their secret as a twisted power for their own ends.

Much of what has been transcribed comes to us from the tablets of the Professors, a clandestine order that recorded the tales of Verveine and ensured their preservation beyond the end of that cruel realm. I have translated these from their language, Shar. I am not a Professor, and thus I am not so proficient in Shar as the authors of these missives were. Nonetheless, I hope I have approximated their meaning sufficiently to leave the reader satisfied with their history—if a bit confused by their message.

I hope you enjoy these tales.

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Verveine the Violet¹

In the days after Gods | In ages long passed
Born of Ar'kheth | by the Elderkraft
Vicious, legendary | last Queen of Miasma
Consort of the Fallows, | Arbiter of Renewal
Verveine, her title, | for divine tears
shed at her birth | for her destiny
she was named | Verveine the Violet
last Queen of Miasma | last witch of Seden
last hand of Maktub, | Blade of Certain End
last enemy of Khrysis | last lover of Persephone
last vessel of the Hierophany, | Mantle of Wounds.

When the professors cast | first her name in iron
they called her Exalted One | they called her Mad Tongue
they called her Final Judgement, | Ender of All Lineage
they called her Tall Wolf | they called her Quiet's Mistress
they called her One Whose Eye | Sees Through Mercy
When the professors cast | first her name in iron
they called her Vicious, | Legendary in her days,
those final days of all | the world and living things.

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Vicious, Legendary²

Sing unto me, Professor, and tell them
How Verveine the Violet took Chrysippus
Twice against the stone slickened black,
Bloodied him, broke and left his body
For fiends of night and avarice;
How she claimed the Hierophany of Wounds
And bore it as her own plate,
Shielded by the language of her own suffering
Travelled the world twice over and returned
				empty-handed.
Tell them, Professor, of the white blade Maktub,
Fate Claimer, and how Verveine plundered
That forbidden keep—Oath of Forgotten Sorrows,
Dead since the Days Before, plunged
Deep beyond its walls and returned
With the Blade of Certain End, consigned
Eternal to its service.

In the Great Miasm, sickness of the earth,
Great floating realms of fog and fallow,
Roiling woodland and river-like roadways,
From Parm to Khorkesh, mountain and sea,
The veins of the Elderkraft pulsing,
Connecting Miasm, forging dawn;
The Pilgrims of Silver once claimed
All Miasm their purchase in the Days Before.
Came the Sunder, the Twelve Days of Ruin,
Cassiopeia and her Many Children;
Came Calliphas and Israfel, Marbok
				and Fein-rud-al,
Black Heart the Usurper, Dedrigog and Prule;
And lowly Morbesh of the Vorgul-braag,
Second son of the king, Argus the True,
And third of his mother, Queen Arquena
				of the Solemn Brow.

In this Great Miasm, following those Days Before,
Born of the Elderkraft, to Ar’kheth a child—
By her keepers acclaimed, Verveine, Mad Tongue,
The Whispering Lily, and Last of the Pilgrims—
Studied in the Path of Silver and Sage; wayward then,
A Scion of Blood; later, Maktub’s Yield—
Tell—the Trials of Chrysippus, his Fall
By her gauntlets, judgement was revealed—
Tell—the Bribes of Black Heart, his Evisceration
By her gauntlets, judgement was revealed—
Tell—the Sacking of Parm, her Revelation
By her brow, the Champion was made anew—
Tell—the Wailing of Verveine, her Death
By that white blade, the Champion was made anew—
Vicious, legendary—Verveine the Violet,
Quiet Daughter, Ar’kheth’s Heir—the One True Queen,
				Immortal Judgement.

Sing through me, Professor, this ancient lullaby.

1. I am poor at the Shar dialect, and my reedy eyes often confuse the serif of their etchings. I am quite positive this is the name of that last great warrior. Their title, the Violet, I am less certain about, but alliteration is lovely.

2. My title, from the text of the former poem.