Dialogue of the Founder and the Illuminated

Translated from the Mountain Dwaerkar.

The Founder arrived with his people on a Monern of Aalderas, according to the Old Tales.

His people knew nothing of Life and Death, Joy and Sorrow. Nothing of lofty Gods and lowly Worms. Nothing of radiance, nothing of virtue, nothing of grace, nothing of beauty, but nothing of sin. As children they had come, and even the Founder bore the features of a Child -- so young and innocent he seemed. It might have been confusion. It might have been apprehension. It might have been fear. For the Illuminated revealed themselves in wisps of moonlight, tall and dark beings clad in shimmering cyan.

"Who goes there?" cried the Founder, his eyes blind under the simple light of the Moon.

"Fear has no place here," said one of the Illuminated, the least of their Kind. "You must return the way you came."

"The way is fraught with perils. We have survived much to be here, to stand in your presence."

"And yet, you shiver like a Child. Extinguish that flame."

"I require it. My eyes are not used to the dark."

"The flame has no place here."

"We are the refugees of a Lost Land. We have escaped torture, we have escaped death. But at terrible cost... Do you not see the blood of Our Fathers? Do you not perceive the stench of their death?