The Eldritch Queen

All is not right in Bethmoora; good High King Balor of Silver Lance was assassinated for unprovoked reasons not one year ago.  All of Bethmoora mourned his grizzly passing; wishing for the high king back or a suitable replacement quickly, before another Faerie War broke out.  An erlkin with a small fief in Quiet-Post presented herself to the Parliament of East Tolori as the new candidate.  Her name was Nyneve and she seized the crown that very day.  She cast down the usurper Oberon as her first act as high queen; her second was to place all members of the Parliament under "indeterminate leave of absence".  About six months ago, the folk hero Robin Goodfellow spoke out against her seizure of the crown and turning of Bethmoora into an empire.  Nyneve, or by now the Eldritch Queen, arrested good Puck and placed him in Darknettle Prison, at the end of Traveller's Road in the Snow Mountains.  The Eldritch Queen enslaved the boggarts and dark elves to make her an army: an army of golden men to control her empire.  To help protect this secret project, she set up a spy network and secret police order, called in fearful whispers, the Dark Ones.  The Eldritch Queen was, about four weeks ago, about to unveil her construct army when Nuada, bastard son of Titania the Seeress and the enigmatic earl, Lugh, came to Lyonesse, her new capital, and having rescued some of the members of the disbanded Parliament, Announced himself the true high king and declared war on the Eldritch Queen.  Nuada, with the funding of a merchant named Stiltskin, formed his rebellion around Eiru Lake.  It has been called the Eiru Alliance ever since.  The Eldritch Queen, as seen recently, became quite desperate as the Alliance won a series of victories over mercenary armies of trolls and dark elves and her golem army was not yet ready.  She did the most dangerous thing done in this century; she went herself deep into the Tristram Woods and spoke to the vile sorcerer Merlin; who agreed to help the Queen only is she would marry him.  All political really, Merlin's demand, though Nyneve isn't half-bad looking.  Merlin, as agreed on, strode onto the field at the Battle of Lupin Bridge amidst the chaos and blood.  No one is sure how or what happened, but not one elf, dwarf, pixie, or troll survived the battle; all seemed to be laid to waste by that loathsome sorcerer.  Nuada, and I'm sure the Eldritch Queen both reeled from the destruction wrought at the battle, I dare say the Queen didn't realize what she had awoken and brought on Bethmoora.  In desperation, Nuada looked for Oberon, finding the petty pretender huddled in some village near my own home-stead; Avalon was the town.  It was just a thick mire of shattered rooftops, muck-filled alleyways, thieves, rapists, and victims.  Nuada apparently urged the coward Oberon to join the Alliance.  Old Merlin and the Queen seemed to have had an argument, because the battle fought yesterday, you know, the Battle for Tir na Nog, pathetic Oberon shuffled onto the field unhindered and in one piece; and then a miracle happened.  Something must have awoken in Oberon, for the skies opened at his command and fire destroyed the Queen's ogres.  Nuada, eager to take the throne, pushed on to East Tolori, the old and rightful capital and home of the Lia Fall; but their was suddenly an unexpected twist in the story.  Only this morning, Merlin, disgusting as ever with his patched robes and grimy beard, announced to all of Bethmoora that he supported the real claimant to the throne, Arthur, true son of Balor, and took him to take the Sword from the Stone this morning.  But did you hear what happened?  As little Arthur reached out his hand, he was assassinated!  By whom, I'm not sure, no one is.  My suspicion is that it was that Uther fellow, the new changeling from across the Wall.  Well, I think he did us a service, though Herne and that immortal Genevieve may undue what Pendragon did.  Anyways, I wonder, stranger, where you have been these past few months, to not know who the Queen or Nuada are?  But 'tis not my business.  Well I am off to Nimue, seeing as she is the only sane one in this realm.  Would you care to join me?  She offers protection to any Danann who comes to her.  No?  Suit yourself.  Pleasure metting you; oh, and stay away from Lyonesse or East Tolori, I hear a great battle is about to take place since Her Majesty's gilded army is ready.  Farewell!            

Spaceman

He was found on the seventh day of the month Maius during the reign of Antonius Augustus Pius; half dead and wandering out of the Pictish wilds. Soldiers from the Sixth Legion stationed at The Wall of Hadrian found him and he fell into a deep faint.  They took him to their garrison along the Wall, nursing him back to health enough to carry him to Eboracum for more extensive care.  The stranger spoke incoherently in a barbarian tongue and his dress was alien and unlike the thick plaid or furs of the Picts.  He was also clean-shaven, though a beard was growing in due to his time in the wilderness and his skin lacked the blue war-paintings of the northern Celts.  The legionnaires were confounded by the stranger and started to tell stories to each other as they returned to the mighty Wall that divided the civilized world from barbarian wilds.  What, they said, could be in the crags and valleys of the Picts?  Where did this stranger, barbarian he must be, come from?  They now stared out into Scotland with more curiosity and wonder than before.  The stranger, every now and then stirring and looking about wildly and stammering in that barbarous tongue, was cared for by the physicians in Eboracum.  He silenced rested in the city; no search party was sent out to look for his village or find out from where he came.  A message was sent to the governor of Britannia, who decided to visit the stranger.  The man was moved to the governor's palace and cared for by his own personal physician.  Local experts have examined the man's clothes, and have decided that he must com from the far north of the Pictish lands, as his clothes are of an odd design and texture; neither wool or leather.  A report was sent to Rome that included the strange men that is now the talk of the province: no reply has yet come.