Cymbiir Oh, Druid of the Hearth

As the party basked in the afterglow of Arumbelle, they gathered their thoughts. The weight of their situation began to settle in. The Cult of Doun had been working toward their nefarious goals for years, and the extent of their knowledge remained a mystery. 

The race was on, a race against time and against forces that sought to harness the power of the Rites.

The Rite of Power was in the hands of Telloux the Pious, a fanatic follower of the Cult of Doun. The Rite of Slavery was potentially controlled by the Monarch, the self-styled ruler of the Vostewylde Alliance. The Rites of Betrayal, Murder, and Terror were still unaccounted for, their locations and potential activators unknown.

The party's mission was twofold. They needed to light the five shrines of Arumbelle: Candlestick Thicket (done), Stone Hearth, Misty Cave Shrine (also known as Den 47), the Homestead (on Wade's Bog), and Shropshire Square Sanctuary. Lighting these shrines would increase Arumbelle's power, which would in turn channel incremental power to the Chosen.

At the same time, they needed to seek out the Rites and prevent them from being activated. The Cult of Doun was intent on reviving all the Rites, perhaps in honor of their dead god, or perhaps in the belief that doing so would resurrect him. The activation of all the Rites would shackle Arumbelle, limiting her power and the power she could bestow upon the chosen.

The stakes were high. The Cult of Doun was a formidable enemy. The Cave of the Second Weir had been tracking the Dounwakers and Vallzan. They might have valuable information that could aid the party in their mission. The main goals were clear: light the shrines, prevent the activation of the Rites, destroy them to free Arumbelle, and gather as much information as possible about the Cult of Doun and their plans.

The race was on, and the fate of Arumbelle and Faerun hung in the balance.

But they had a new ally in the venerable old druid, Cymbiir Oh. The party decided to rely on his knowledge to go cleanse the next shrine, the Stone Hearth, Cymbiir's old haunt. They set out at once. 

As they traveled, they passed pilgrims from the forest races who had felt the rekindling of the shrine. Gnomes, elves, fernden halflings, and others. They went to shrine to engage in the age old practices associated with the venerated sanctuary. The party was pleased--Arumbelle was returning incrementally. 

On the trail, Cymbiir was a new man. He had a spring in his step and he spoke excitedly about the past and hopefully about the future. Each night they shared Delights, and the party was closer than ever. Falka, it seemed, had turned a corner. She shared more. She emoted more. She seemed to have lost some of her cruelness. Some of her malice. 

When they reached the Delimbyr, they became wary of Lords Alliance guards, and made for a quick river crossing. They happened to be passed by some river merchants and Dala'gse improvised with a memorable bathing scene involving Cymbiir and some wrestling, or tackling, or...something. But they crossed, not unnoticed, but unmolested. Well, sort of. 

On the other side, Cymbiir told them they made for the town of Leaf-fall, a wonderful town he often remembered that would surely help them stage their assault on whatever foul creatures corrupted the Hearth. And as they traveled, Cymbiir told them about himself. Not always chronologically, and painted in a much more self-deprecating light, but the following is what they managed to stitch together from his tales...

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Cymbiir Oh is a venerable wood elf Druid of Arumbelle.

He grew up a wood elf in the Southwood. Mother was from there, father from Treetops, a woodelf town in the High Forest to the north. Like most wood elves,  he fell in love with the forest at a young age, but his bond went further and he and devoted his time to knowing every inch of it. Took up with the Druids of Silvanus that were prominent in the region. Cymbiir passed many years this way growing as a druid and steward of the forest. But it wasn’t until later when he fell into the role of peacemaker and teacher that he grew in power and fame.

As civilization began encroaching on the forests, the humanoid races were logging without regard to the environment and sylvan races. This resulted in many conflicts between the forest inhabitants and the towns and villages expanding the frontier. It was around this time, while praying to Silvanus, that Cymbiir heard another voice. It was Arumbelle, an exarch of Silvanus and the goddess nature and homesteads. He took this as a sign to help broker the peace with the frontierspeople. With his gentle way, he taught them to plant two new trees for every one they felled, making sure it was the same species. He taught them what trees were best to harvest, and how to ask nearby forest residents for instruction. His greatest accomplishment, however, was teaching them how to see. To see the forest as something more than wood for their homes, and in doing so change their attitudes and hearts. In doing so the loggers became stewards themselves and passed on the balanced teachings to their brethren.

There were some druids and elves who took more extreme views on the forest, and they thought of Cymbiir as a traitor. But over many decades as peace returned to the forest and the nearby towns took only what they needed, from the sites of lowest impact, these voices begrudgingly came around and embraced the necessity of Cymbiir and his teachings. It was a golden age. During that time Cymbiir was growing in prominence among the faithful of Arumbelle and to solidify the foundation of trust between the forest and the towns, he founded the Stone Hearth shrine.

The Stone Hearth was a simple, freestanding, chimney made of fieldstones from various riverbeds. It stood 50 feet tall and was constructed in the middle of a clearing in a grove of sycamore. Cymbiir founded the shrine as a gathering place and site of worship to Arumbelle. It was more frequented at night and during the winter, when a blazing fire was lit and foodstores and drink were shared companionably by the faithful and other guests. The tradition was, each new arrival had to share a recent favorite from their Telling of Delights. In this way, it became custom for devotees of Arumbelle to exchange delights by way of greeting when they met. It was during this time that Cymbiir became known far and wide as the Druid of the Hearth. The faith of Arumbelle was in its heyday and Cymbiir presided over an important “temple”. Over the years, he constructed four smaller chimneys, in each of the cardinal directions, around the central one. On a good evening, all the hearths would be ablaze  and the entire clearing would be shoulder-to-shoulder with disparate peoples gathered in communion. Sometimes a representative from Misty Cave Shrine would bring a tankard of plumfog and others would cart in barrels of ale or cider. The wood elves often shared their elderberry tonics. The Stone Hearth became a site of many festivities and even certain municipalities would use it for meetings. It also accomplished Cymbiir’s original purpose, of bringing together the forest civilizations (wood elves, forest gnomes, fernden halflings) and the nearby towns of Firsburg, Meadower, and Innesbyr, and even some of the tribes of the High Moor.

This was Cymbiir in his prime. He was a humble servant of Arumbelle, a steward of the forest, and regional diplomat. But all of that came to a sudden end with the death of Arumbelle.

It was the morning of Harvestide, marking the change of seasons from autumn to winter, and the kickoff to the main Stone Hearth season and the annual party was set. When Cymbiir awoke, he knew something was wrong. His prayers to Arumbelle for spells had gone unanswered for some time now, but today he thought to try again. Still nothing, though he felt a new tension, a panic almost. But he calmed himself down and knew the mystery would be revealed in time. And besides, he had too much to get done that day, and so turned to Silvanus for his magic and carried on his with the preparations for Harvestide. When he arrived at the Stone Hearth, he was surprised to see Isildawn, a budding druid who was going through a rough patch, and—the rashness of youth—had not taken kindly to feedback Cymbiir had given him.  Isildawn was from Meadower and one of the human druids who were so instrumental in connecting forest and town. Perhaps the young man was turning a corner and this was his acknowledgment of that. He had with him others from town and they asked, humbly, how they could help set up. Cymbiir was delighted and set them to work.

Still, something gnawed at him throughout the day. He was worried about Arumbelle, and he recalled the vision he had the day his spells stopped coming. "Beware of strange people bearing our signs..." And then seven constellations. He turned it over in his head as he set about his tasks, but couldn't make any connections. With the vigorous celebration tonight, maybe that would spark something new? 

And so the night of the party arrived. It was fantastic. Everyone was in high spirits. Delights were shared. Plumfog flowed. People shared tips on preserving food for the winter. And just before Cymbiir was about to climb the hearth to lead those gathered in a few words to Arumbelle and share some thoughts on the changing season, he saw Isildawn had beat him up the ladder. And he was wearing a mask over his eyes.

“What is this?” Cymbiir thought, pausing, for just a moment too long. 

The congregation quieted when Isildawn took the dais. He was nervous and fidgety. “Arumbelle is dead!” He yelled. “Felak’Doun is your god now!” The crowd took a collective inhale. That feeling that had been gnawing at Cymbiir was now painfully acute. He was suddenly running and casting a spell. Isildawn looked at him, smiled calmly, and snapped. Cymbiir was paralyzed. He flew through the air and thudded to the ground, landing face down in the dirt.

Chaos erupted at the Stone Hearth.

He couldn’t see with his face in the ground, but he could hear others were falling all around him. He heard the sounds of battle — some among those gathered were unaffected it seemed, but Isildawn had allies. He heard screaming. The clash of blade and chant of spells faded, replaced by groaning and cries of pain. He heard the sickening sound of blades penetrating flesh all around. This was a slaughter. A horrific hour passed as he heard the sounds murder all around him. Finally, he felt a hand roll him over. He could see in the dying light of the Stone Hearth’s fires, Isildawn’s masked face, splattered with blood. Madness was in his eyes.

“I think I’ll let you live, leave you hear to rot, so you will know for however long it takes for your wounds to fester, that this was your fault.” Isildawn stabbed him through the shoulder, and along with his conspirators, left the Druid of the Hearth alone among the fading fires of the Stone Hearth, where scores of the most important followers of Arumbelle in the region lay slain.

Cymbiir’s was still paralyzed and he was losing too much blood. He faded in and out of sleep. When he awoke, Cymbiir had lost two toes and a finger to frost bite.  He was light headed and passed out as he tried to move. But he could move again. Slowly, he shook his stiff body awake and knelt among the fallen. He sobbed and tried to reach out to Arumbelle, but there was again no response. No spells came. He was entering a state of trauma and pain-induced shock. His mind narrowed, blocking out everything except the dead in front of him. He began methodically seeing to them, burying or burning the corpses as fit their tradition. His wound became infected. He developed a high fever. He didn’t eat or sleep. Eventually he collapsed from exhaustion.

When he came-to, he still somehow clung to life. He stumbled out of the desecrated site. A stumble became a jog, a jog a run, until he was tearing through the forest. Where that energy came from he will never know. He has very little memory of that marathon, but by the time he had finished running he was at the hidden shrine to Arumbelle of Candlestick thicket.

500 years passed. Cymbiir learned of the death of Arumbelle at the hands of Felak’Doun. He traveled to the nearest temples he knew of an found similar destruction. The Homestead was a corrupted site infested with fell undead in a malodorous bog. Spell-less, he was powerless to cleanse it. Only Candlestick Thicket remained hidden away. So there he hid. After a time, he felt he could face the Stone Hearth again but found it a place of decay and rot, guarded by a vile Corpse Flower and a pair of Rot Trolls. Without his spells he was useless against creatures of that power. Besides, there was nothing for him there but suffering.

At first he thought it was a choice, an oath to never cast a spell until it was granted by Arumbelle’s divinity. But eventually, as the centuries passed, he tried and found he was unable to, even praying to Silvanus. It was blocked by grief or trauma, or severed at the events of the Stone Hearth. But it was all the same to him, he fell into a deep ambivalent depression and spent many years as an addled hermit traveling throughout the forests, spending more time shape-shifted as a small woodland mammal than as a wood elf.

Eventually, in the quiet and untouched places of the forests, he came to forgive himself and to understand that what happened was not his fault, but the machinations of evil powers beyond him. The pain never went away, but its acuity faded. After centuries in solitude, he re-engaged with the world. Even without spells, he was a useful druid to his circle and joined them on many adventures. On one of them, he was even gifted a branch from an elder Treant, enchanted by an avatar of Mielikki to become a Staff of the Woodlands.

After five centuries, Cymbiir felt an itching in the scab that was his grief for Arumbelle. He knew not what it was, but he returned to Candlestick Thicket, to wait, and to watch, and to listen. At age 746, though in truth he had forgotten his years, he saw signs in the stars—the Hearthsign at the shrine was gleaming and twinkling almost. Something was happening. And he listened, and he waited. And he felt their coming…

The rest took place with the party. He saw some intruders approaching and laid a trap for them. Catching them in his Portable Hole, but one escaped and he recognized the star sign on his arm.

He introduced himself to the party at the entrance to the shrine. 

And when Arumbelle came manifest to them in that sacred place, he wept. His entire life, devoted to her, and finally, for the first time, her divinity--even a shadow of it--was here with him. All was good again. Hope had returned. 

She spoke just to him, at one point, telling him:

"Ahh Cymbiir, my stalwart companion, the last alive who truly knew me. And yet I never was able to spend time with you while present in the pantheon. There were too many battles to be fought, too many adventures to be had, to much “good” to be doing and I could never sit quietly with someone like you. I could never focus all my "thought" on you. I am sorry. And what I missed! Look at you. And you sat quietly for 500 years, for me. You have suffered, much. You’ve had to split yourself in two, when I was trapped, bearing the burden of your trauma while trying to remain true and walk the path. Please, rest now, my friend. Let the anger seep out of you. You have done me enough honor for a hundred lifetimes. Let us finish this one in peace.

It remind me of what my dear friend the god Torm once endured. If you’ll  indulge me a series of thoughts originally expressed in our divine realm in pure form, but rendered here in words that I hope can do the original justice. These were composed by Torm after he lost his hand. He called it “Chimera”:

I thought myself lion and serpent. Thought myself body enough for two, for we. I found comfort in never being lonely. What burst from my back, from my bones, what lived along the ridge from crown to crown, from mane to forked tongue beneath the skin. What clamor we made in the birthing. What hiss and rumble at the splitting, at the horns and beard, at the glottal bleat. What bridges our back. What strong neck, what bright eye. What menagerie are we. What we’ve made of ourselves.

Cymbiir, I am humbled by your grace."

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Cymbiir, at last, was close to peace.