THEIR NAME LIVES FOREVERMORE

[LithiumSedai 5750]

 

 

---

 

  To indulge in sorrowful memories remains, to this day, perhaps the most depressing habit of old men. Yet the lessons of years past, no matter how distant, have always been a stepping stone towards the greatness of our days, an important remedy for ailments of the present age.

 

I had once been but a child, a young heir emerging from my immediate House’s isolation upon distant isles - sent across the seas with an entourage of tutors and retainers along with my brother to gaze upon our glorious Empire; to impress our aunt, younger than the pair of us and then residing in the great City of Carolustadt, with our enlightened manners and education of Aeldinic noblemen. Yet upon our arrival to the shores of Atlas, a stroke of fate would have our plans of visitation turn to permanence: the final decree of our Grandfather, as he boarded our ship to make amends with my father before his imminent passing, named me the Baron Rennes, and Louis my heir presumptive.

 

The burdens of this new reality weighed heavily on my mind, in the thoughts of an eleven-year-old, as our coach traversed the roads of Atlas, trailed by the armsmen of our Home Guard - now formally under my command. Nestled within our velvet seats, Louis and I deliberated upon our predicament in sharp Auvergne - for in these days Imperial Common had been our secondary tongue, uttered by our Father and our governesses solely during lessons of Orenian history, culture and commons. Utterly consumed by our argument of commandeering the holdings of Rennes, where many baked, sweet treats would be found for the pair of young lords before our imminent (and in our young minds, terrifying) homage to the Emperor of Man, we were blind to the sights we passed by.

 

Our kettle-helmed retinue, in contrast, cast wary glances over the war-torn landscape. Piles of rubble and barren fields dotted the countryside past Velth’s Gate - only the first of many grim reminders of the terrible price of our Victory. We had, of course, already been familiar with the accounts of the final Coalition War, with the triumphs at Nordengrad and Arberrang, at Kal’Tarak and San’Kala. Back home, the sacrifice of war eluded our childish psyche; Louis and I wished to be chevaliers in shining plate, as did every boy within our sheltered social circles of Aeldinic nobility. War, in our minds, was the glorious pursuit of Immortality which our blood lay claim to, for we were the noblest sons of Orenia. Death and suffering, bar heroic martyrdom in battle, remained the affair of lesser men, we thought.

 

I cannot say whether our exchange would have breached this subject, had it not been for the change of pace past the summer-fields of Lorraine - stripped bare as any other - and our timely arrival upon the Imperial Road. The uphill path slowed our advance past the midday hours, I recall, and my bickering with Louis ceased, drowned by the incessant beating of hooves upon the cobbled slope. In annoyance, I did stick my head through the window - to be greeted by a most poignant sight.

 

An armed warrior stood in our path, perched upon the hilltop. Or so it had seemed - taken aback by the sudden emergence of this image, at a second glance I took note of his towering size, of his watchful stance and determined gaze, blade pointed downwards, and his make of fine stone. A statue that, evidently, lay mounted upon a base adorned by Imperial banners, atop a monolith of stone which grew in my sight as we ascended the hill. My lips parted in silent incantation as I perused the engravings it bore in Common. Familiar names of great Imperial victories, grouped in threes along with bitter defeats, rare as they had been, each bearing a tally of crosses. The primary inscription read:

 

 

---

 

TO THE GLORIOUS

RENATIAN AND

IMPERIAL DEAD

 

1 6 3 7 - 1 6 8 7

 

THEIR NAME

LIVES

FOREVERMORE

 

 

---

 

This had been, though I had no knowledge of it at the time, the culmination of my Grandfather’s tenure as Arch-Seneschal - the grand War Memorial he had poured his soul into, to honor the countless deaths of his comrades from the Third Crusade and onwards. For the moment, the sight of the monolith, circled by fields of poppies, captivated my attention, evoking in me simultaneous feelings of awe and unease. And the moment passed; our retinue paid their respects, our coach sped onwards to Carolustadt. I spoke to Louis once more - we discussed war, still as it had been presented in our noble accounts. I would be a Dragon Knight, I told him, a paragon of chivalric virtue in polished plate that would bear the Talraen arms quartered with the Red Dragon; he would become a cuirassier, and we would collect the heads of fallen ogres and heathens as the peasantry cheered on.

 

Later I was told that every etched cross meant a thousand perished souls. From the Adelburg Coup and the Battle of the Bloody Road to the Siege of Kal’Tarak, the tally, amended for the Coalition War, numbered nearly fifty thousand Renatian and Imperial fallen, wounded and missing soldiers. It did not include the counts of slaughtered citizenry, nor the casualties of those unfortunate realms of Man who had, throughout the bloody century, in vain opposed the Renatian forces.

 

 

The Imperial War Memorial of Axios and Atlas, funded and raised by Bl. Aran Talraen de Rennes, Arch-Seneschal of the Imperial Crown

 

This memory came to mind upon the day I stood on the bridge of Helena. I had turned thirty-three; I was, as my Grandfather had been, who then resided Blessed in the Skies, Arch-Seneschal of the Imperial Crown and Baron Rennes. Tailed by my men of the Home Guard, by Legionnaires in battered plate, and by a pair of crimson-clad Dragon Knights, I pressed on across the hastily repaired bridge, painful grunts escaping me with every step of my bent and beaten, limping leg.

 

There, to our left, from the earthworks streamed a ring of standing stones, tied together by crowned archways of Royal Renatian purple-and-gold; lined with gardens of blood-red roses and poppies. Braziers atop their peaks illuminated our path in the summer evening; I approached the monolith of stone within their midst, flanked by two alcoves, in which stood statues of select Heroes of the Pertinax Cross. Its reverse listed four names every man, woman and child of Renatus had learned to revere:

 

 

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DONALD DABBER

LYONEL OF DUNHARROW

WREN ISTAF

LUBOK’LAK

 

1 7 1 6

 

TO THE HEROES

TRIUMPHANT

OF RENATUS

 

MAY THEIR BLADES

ALWAYS STRIKE

TRUE

 

 

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I looked to its face, pressing my bare palm upon the warmed stone. As if I were still a child, my lips once more moved in silent mourning, as they mouthed the inscription ahead.

 

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SER JAN SIGMAR

SER JAMES WINDSOR

BERENFROY DE FONTEVRAULT

SER FREDERICK BADEN

 

1 7 1 6

 

TO THE GLORIOUS

RENATIAN DEAD

OF HELENA

 

THEIR NAME

LIVES

FOREVERMORE

 

 

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My gaze streamed upwards, towards the brazier of everlasting flame. And I wept. For now I knew the terrible face of war; I understood the blood price of Victory. I had come to know the truths of sacrifice, of terrors, of slaughter, of battles and heroic strife. I wept, for my friends, my family, my citizens and loyal subjects had paid the ultimate price for our freedoms. Tears flowed down my visage for my Grandfather’s Crusaders; for the greatest friend that I had ever known, whose name lay carved in the stone before me, upon the pillar we had together designed; for my poor Louis, the cuirassier who had been my only brother, who now lay in rest where none could hurt him anymore. I cried knowing that within the torn, ruined walls of Helena, my spouse and my children were safe; I cried for all those fallen, of the Great War of the Emperors and of every war in which our Empire bled, of any race or creed.

 

I had come to know my Grandfather’s sorrow, at last. And in his steps, I built for my people a reminder of what true Immortality meant. 

 

The Siege of Helena Memorial, raised and funded by Ser Frederick Baden and Charles-Edmond Talraen de Rennes, Arch-Seneschal of the Imperial Crown

 

Today I am old and withered. A mere Saint’s Day parts me from the age of seventy-six. I no longer lay claim to titles of renown - merely those of Grandfather, Father and Husband. And as though my name might one day find itself within the annals of history, as it might rest upon the lips of my beloved, it is not right for these Memorials of War - which stood not solely as my Grandfather’s and my own legacy, but that of the Orenian People - to remain forgotten to the passage of time.

 

I have read, on this day, our Arch-Chancellor’s address; on this day, another Great War wanes after twenty years of wanton destruction and the suffering of thousands. And I say to him, and I ask of him and the Orenian People - will you allow the memory of our glorious dead to fade once more? Will you forsake the sacrifices of our forefathers, abandon one cenotaph to a fallen realm’s oblivion, and another to the whims of revisionists? Will we not grant our soldiers Immortality in remembrance and reverence, no matter their Nation, if they had laid down their lives for the Empire so it might thrive in virtue until the End Times?

 

 

---

 

BLESSED ARE THE GLORIOUS DEAD - THEIR NAME LIVES FOREVERMORE

 

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On the 12^th of Tobias’ Bounty, 1760

Charles-Edmond of the House of Talraen, 3^rd Arch-Seneschal Talraen of the Imperial Crown

Former Lord Regent and Minister of Foreign Affairs

 

[Axelu 4333]

An elderly Renatian of yore fondly remembers what once was, still appreciating what currently is, and yearns for what is to come. 

[trinn 5146]

Adeline gives a short salute from the grave, before going back to her daily face care routine in the Seven Skies.

 

[ferdaboy 3488]

Titus smiles from the Seven Skies

[osumanduas 1442]

Vilaesirath reads the memo with disgust, rightly remembering with his quick lizard memory the horror and wanton murder brought on by the Renatian butcher-Kings and the obedient dogs who chaffed beneath their boots. “Kinslayers and bastards all of em’.”

[wolfdwg 2677]

"It is too bad humanity will never be a force to reckon with. Rather they will collapse in due time, squabbling like rats, attempting to cling onto the legacy of the true sons of Godfrey." would comment Lyonel from the seven skies. He'd then go back to his mini golf tournament with Berenfroy.

[Evonpire 2014]

Evan Lethes  in the seven skies screams at the mentioned of a Windsor being honoured.

[Zhikarta 4064]

He remembered them, he remembered all of them.
 

The day was still young, the war reaching its peak. Bloodshed, and countless Renatian victories were something nobody was surprised by. The monument for their fallen heroes, under construction. The renowned Knight, and his closest friend was working hard to honour the dead. The news spread quickly throughout the city of Helena, and when the Knight Paramount caught word of the events that were soon to change his life forever, the world froze around him.

 

Frederick Baden, a man who he for as long as he remembered was able to count on, taken by the Marnans. Dread quickly became rage, and as the soldiers of the Imperial Renatian Legion, so did Aldis. They broke into the city of Reza, and slaughtered all that dared to stand in their way. They were victorious in their raid, but failed to save the one they swore to protect.

 

Aldis was used to the bloodshed, the violence. When he was but a young boy he scaled the walls of the Krag in Atlas, laid siege upon San’Kala and Arberrang. The War of the Two Emperors however, was different. They were not on the offensive, they were cornered from all sides. The roads no longer possesed the threat of lowly bandits, but were patrolled by the soldiers he once fought together with. Even though the Siege of Helena, where he was one of the last men standing still haunts him to this day, no event changed him as much as the death of his friend.

 

Ser Aldis Chase was still alive, but nothing but a shadow of his former self. An infamous Officer, a respected Knight who ascended to positions of power through nothing but hard work and unmatched discipline was nothing but an old, deranged man now. He had not seen anyone from the days of Renatus in years, but perhaps it was for the best. He did not want to be seen this way anymore, it would bring him nothing but shame.