(Maester Lyle: "On the Origins of Aelric" preface. (5516 A.M))
For those of you who have come to find themselves in possession of this tome, I extend unto you a warm greeting and strong hope that your quest for knowledge leads you to grander and more amazing discoveries than you could hope to find in this book of mine own theories, thoughts, and daydreams put upon from ink onto paper. It may be that like myself, of humble birth but of a curious disposition, you have asked the right and proper questions to the right and proper peoples and life has thus led you unto the path of scholarship and some mild success.
Perhaps instead, ye are of foreign birth, and the stories of our King and the mighty lords under his banner did reach you upon your shore, and of wanderlust and forward soul, you sought adventure and answers in the land of your questions. For I have found myself agasp in amazement that there should be any stories of our Kings of the Royal House Aelric as far as Asshai-By-The-Shadow, and perhaps further still, where the maps of civilized men doth not reach easy or at all.
I can recall in great detail a moment of my boyhood when mine own small brother Edwin did ask for whom he had been named after. For was not I his elder brother not named after our Grandsire, Lyle. And was not our father named Carl. Informed as he was that he was named after the King's Great-Grandsire; Edwin III. He then asked all the room, for the family had by now sat for supper, who the King was. In my infinite wisdom, I did educate him that, "The King is the King," but I do ask you not to think less of my low answer, I having been ten and two. Edwin then did harangue our mother and father with many a question on the King for which I need not expand further, suffice it to say that one question did plant itself in mine mind and did flower itself into the very script you now read. "Where did the King come from?"
I, who was fortunate to have been born in Esterville, a small but lively town some two leagues South from Maidenpool to a cobbler father of steady and humble practice did find myself fortunate enough to be allowed to study on mine free seventh day at the local parish which had been built in the year 5423 A.M [1] in the reign of Edward XVI who was called 'The Peaceful', the year of mine fathers birth. Like many a child on prayer days, I did hear from the House Sisters the retelling of many more fantastic passages that were easier to the sensibilities of a child.
How Saint Hugor of the Hill's prayers did manifest the Great Miracle, for he was as common as you or I, yet the Seven-Fold God did hear him. That the One God who is Seven did, as the Father, deliver unto his chosen people from their cries of deliverance his only begotten son Aelric. That the Maiden did make manifest her daughter Milos to be both as sister and wife to him, and to guide their chosen people West to safety. That as the Smith, God did charge the world to render itself onto him and to obey his son's words. That Aelric and Milos, who was also known to some old scripture as Yulia did bring our people to Westeros more than 4000 years ago, and that in unbroken line we have been ruled by the House Aelric since after his manifest.
But what if this isn't all there is to the story?
I am a King's man true as any other Westerosi, that shan't not change regardless of mine Kings origin, for he is as Westerosi as myself and more so his ancestors having led mine to this land of plenty.
Yet in my heart, I desire to know the Truth.
Like Maester Mortimer posits in his "A History of Golden Pupils-Leng & Westeros," such wildly distinct eye colorings don't naturally come about so far apart. Could the Scions of House Aelric be refugees from ancient Leng, perhaps as powerful magicians that fled the dark sacrifices of that lands Empresses? Or perhaps as Maester Gilbert has speculated in his wildly infamous, "Aelric: Proto-Valyrian," the Royal House Aelrics origins lie in Valyria, before or as the Valyrians as we know them started to tame the Dragons they ride upon. There is some merit to this. Do the Aelrics not marry brother to sister? Not simply to keep their divine power from diminishing, but also to uphold ancient tradition. Is their sigil not a winged serpent? Do the Valyrians not give unto Westeros a respectable berth, and treat with the royal house a measure of respect they refuse to give even the Princes and Princesses of the Rhoyne with their great water mages, and festival cities?
The Lords say it is the Homage due to a family so ancient, and divine. The Priests say it is because even a Dragon recognizes the power of the seven in the House Aelric. The Maesters say the Triarchs demand decorum, and the Dragon Lords obey.
But I wonder if it isn't that blood speaks to blood.
We cannot go back to the past to find it. The truth lays forward.
[1] A.M; After Manifest
Welp there you have it, a start I can get behind and which I can be happy with. Please tell me what all of you think of this. Alternate history may be to small a community for this, so I'll try to post this on Spacebattles and Fanfiction. But do tell me what you all think.
If the Grammars bad, I don't have a Beta. Point out something that's bothering you and I'll see about fixing it. I feel I'll be able to get into this Thread much better than my other stories (not that they've been dropped). Thanks for all your thoughts so far.
