Those who walk the paths of the Kingswood at night, for the most part, safe from the elves of the seelie court, who gather in the Holt of the Bloodied King (29.07) each night. But they are not safe from the bastard prince, a strange elf whose left half is of night black and whose right half is as white as cream.
He, and a collection of mirror images, will often walk up to bands of travellers and ask if he may perform an augury on one of them. If they agree, he will bind one of them still with magic and slash them just so with a silver knife. As the blood pours down he will mark how the blood falls on the ground in relation to the position of the stars above and learn something of what the future holds. While their compatriot lies bleeding the prince will excitedly tell them of his augury and perhaps give them rich gifts. The prince is a temperamental being and if those he meets react unfavorably he will either stalk off, continue his augury without giving their actions any heed or kill them all. Those who attempt to fight the prince will find doing so difficult due to his mirror images, mithril mail and various defensive charms. He has sometimes been known to chat pleasantly about star alignments with humans trying to kill him while his fingers drip with blood.
After each of his auguries he retreats to his tower in the northern edge of the Kingswood (34.04) and consults his volumes of curious lore. He believes that he is the heir to both the seelie and the unseelie courts and if he pries just the right secrets from the stars he will be able to bind the elven courts together and rule over both as their true king.
Perhaps there is some truth to his claims. Barely a day before the unseelie court went off into exile the unseelie’s queen favorite daughter bore him. Some say that the father was the Bloodied King’s eldest son and that this bastard child’s birth was the last straw that led to the departure of the unseelie court.
In any case, as the half-blooded prince grew to manhood he wished to see the stars that he had heard so much about. So he told the Bloodied King that as he had the blood of unseelie elves, he should be able to walk under the stars as his mother had done. The Bloodied King agreed and allowed him to walk under the stars as his mother and under the sun as his father, but forbade him from ever entering the Holt of the elves again. Since then he has kept away from other elves, his dreams growing ever stranger and grander.
Connections
- The Bastard Prince wears jewellry made by Toadvine (30.09) that alert him to nearby dangers.
Hooks:
- What has the prince learned from the stars so far? What is he trying to do that he believes will unite the sundered courts under his rule?