Note: I originally wrote this piece for The Cyrene Chronicles. After much deliberation, however, I have decided to post it to the Public Common Board. (If I have miscalculated, I hope aggrieved parties will forgive me.) This is my first post here, and one of only a few items I have posted anywhere publicly. Although I am confident about my scribbles in general, I am nervous about the potential for cluttering forums or taking some misstep with my posts. I hope I am doing none of those with this missive. I thank you in advance for any feedback you might wish to share.

An Outsiders Reflection on Cyrene and Eleusis

I arrived in Cyrene just as a new wave of strife with Eleusis was beginning. As I settled into my new home in the Vashnars -- learning the basics of house structures and Achaean geography -- my compatriots scurried about, fending off spore attacks and vine infestations. More than once, my questions about city protocol were put on hold due to these bombardments.

This is apparently the latest flare-up of a conflict going back many years. From ancient grudge, as they say, break to new mutiny. I shant bore the reader with history lessons or rehashing current events. My purpose here is merely to process what Ive learned by talking to folks from both places. I have no delusions about my inability to add breathtaking insights into the discourse, or prevent further conflict. My hope is merely to provide some food for thought and reflect the things Ive observed. Perhaps they will be worth the readers time.

I spent my childhood on the periphery of war. My guardian Davina knew nothing about the people who abandoned me, but she was sure they were fleeing from what she called the wretched conflagrations of our time. The deserts of Kroth were bordered by a civil war to the west, revolutionary (and counter-revolutionary) instability to the north, and a series of internecine retributive massacres to the east. The monstrous demanzwurm to the south were ironically the least menacing option, so we headed that way once I was old enough to swing a sword.

Many years later, I find myself ensconced once more in a conflict beyond my understanding. Even after dozens of conversations and days of poring through official records, I am unable to comprehend the driving forces of this conflict. This likely due, in part, to the fundamental inexplicabilities of every conflict. Personalities and passions mix with ideologies and honor, while loyalties are sliced into tranches of trust and (un)certainty. One Cyrenian told me: Its difficult to know the intentions of Gods. I find the same is true of most of those who send armies into battle.

Let me state here at the outset that I seek to provoke no nests of hornets, nor pillory any individuals. The only names I shall mention are those who have written in the public record. I have a profound gratitude toward those who spoke to me, and I hope my scribbles serve somehow to honor the perspectives of civil minds everywhere. I requested a tour of Eleusis, but was told by several folks that this was not appropriate. Therefore I wish to acknowledge my personal understanding of that location as woefully insufficient.

I know that I am wading into treacherous waters, but this is nothing new to me. I have suffered more than a few times for unpopular words laid upon the page; if I suffer again, so be it. The only necessity to which I devote myself with certitude is honesty about what I see, and creative usefulness in my expression. May the gods confirm that I have succeeded in these efforts.

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The Eleusians who spoke to me were gracious and forthcoming. If they are zealots -- as some of my Cyrenian comrades insist -- they are the most polite zealots I have ever met. (And I have met a few.) They are clearly motivated with great vigor toward their beliefs, as many people are. While I enjoy forests and rivers, I cannot profess any kinship with their views toward Nature. Still, I learned long ago not to judge others too harshly if I have not walked in their footsteps. (Never judge another before walking a mile in their shoes, Davina once told me with a grin. For then you are a mile away, and they have no shoes.)

I was surprised to hear, again and again, from residents of both places, about friendships and alliances blossoming through the years. That people forge relations of their own accords is nothing new, of course. But when things get heated, these relations always suffer. Ants are trampled, so they say, when elephants fight. I was not prepared, therefore, to see hopeful bonds between individuals continuing despite the current disarray. Eleusians spoke of the lovely wares sold in Cyrene. Those in my city recounted with fondness the time they have spent with Eleusian friends and associates.

This is not to downplay the significance of the transgressions suffered by various individuals and communities. I have tried without success to wrap my brain around questions of legitimate grievance and the emergent truth of a history told through a dozen pens in a dozen books. My sympathies in the abstract, I find, run as deeply with Cyrenes frustration as with the beauty of Eleusian claims to serve and protect Nature. Had the miseries of my early years involved fewer wastelands and more bountiful gardens, perhaps I would have aligned myself with Eleusis. Who knows?

One Eleusian told me: [O]f all the cities in Sapience, Cyrene is perhaps the most able to reunite with Nature and live in a community in Harmony with the Earth. This was followed instantly by the insistence that Cyrene is not WILLING to engage in such a reunification. Still, I was intrigued by the speakers desire to extend this unique solicitation to my home city. A friend in Cyrene, meanwhile, spoke with great joy about friendships with Eleusis folk, some going back centuries. The conflicts between governments and militaries are not their own, they said: You just learn to put that conflict aside when you are with that friend. Cyrene and Eleusis are at odds. [My friend and I] are not.

How, then, can I reconcile the proclamation of Andraste in Public News Post #21203 about the need to carry out the reclamation of the abhorence [sic] of civilization? How can I make sense of people in my hometown who are so warm and compassionate to me, stirred to a murderous frenzy against Eleusis? I refuse to ascribe some kind of true motive, to any one on any side of any conflict; such conjecture has no place in my truth-seeking enterprise. I can only suspect, with my profoundly limited and subjective perspective, that forces beyond my understanding are working unfortunate sway on the hearts of many folks on all sides.

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Still, I find Cyrene the more conciliatory side in this conflict. Eleusians told me, over and over, that peaceful coexistence was impossible so long as Cyrene lived within city walls. One quoted to me from The Viridian Charter: The falsities of Iron and Stone exist only to excel the erosion of the world, and shall thusly be eliminated. I fail to understand how any read of such a fundamentalist perspective -- outside of the most generous and liberal interpretation -- could be seen as anything other than a call to eradication of my new home. On the other hand, Cyrenians described to me acts of forgiveness and accords of quasi-peaceful diplomacy in the past. Im left wondering what has gone wrong in recent times to start the latest round of bloodshed.

Insofar as the requirements of total infrastructure dismantling strike me as untoward, therefore, I cannot express anything other than dismay at the extremism of the Eleusian cause. I see a peaceful city of Cyrene forced to arms in self-defense after enduring multiple assaults. I have tried to challenge in my own mind Jiahs claim in Public News Post #21163: War rules Eleusis now. Not Nature. Alas, I cannot; I believe these words to be true.

It is, of course, possible that I do not comprehend the violence of the insults or oppression suffered by Eleusis. If so, it is not for lack of trying; for weeks I have done little else. This project has kept me from my work in the house of my studies, from adventuring, and from training in the TwoArts. I have heard talk of the unmitigated gall of [...] offering sanctuary and refuge to Eleusians, but I am perplexed by the sequence in which such a thing leads next to war. (If the leaders of Eleusis offered such refuge to emigrants from Cyrene, I might be confused, but not stuffed with violent retribution.)

If Eleusis believes itself to be so aggrieved that violence is its only recourse, it might consider the significance of how it is expressing those grievances. I am an erstwhile outsider who joined Cyrene very recently, and without any pre-existing devotion to its ideology. If I cannot fathom the rationale of the current bloodlust within my Eleusian friends. What might that say about its origin and impact?

I ask this question not for rhetorical purposes; I honestly wish to know. If anyone is tempted to reply as one Eleusian correspondent did, proclaiming my ignorance about how the Natural world outside [our] walls operates, I have obviously heard it before -- and I remain unconvinced.

Meanwhile, I urge my Cyrenian friends to avoid oversimplified perspectives of Eleusis as closed-minded bigots or hopeless fanatics. My travels have convinced me that no one is incapable of change, no matter how loudly they proclaim their unswerving commitment to a particular ideology. Indeed, often those who proclaim their fidelity to a cause the loudest must enact The Reconsideration Dance most quickly. How absurd they look in their attempts to save face while convulsing their feet hither and yon. Let us all, therefore, choose our words with care.

None of the people to whom I spoke, in either place, strike me as unreasonable monsters. I have faced creatures of remorseless evil in my time, and I believe I would recognize them if I saw them here. Obviously my inexperience and lack of historical understanding preclude me from stating anything with meaningful certainty in this context. Still, I can say that the people I have encountered seem overall to have more in common than opposition.

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After careful consideration of the conclusions toward which I have been meandering in these paragraphs, I have decided its fair only to say this: Every war to which I have been a witness, from Kroth to Sapience and beyond, has always shared one identical happenstance. Those who wage war insist that things will be better afterward. When we have driven out the invaders, one avows, we shall be happy. Once our enemys pestilence has been cleansed, swears another, our people shall live in peace. If these prognostications have ever proven truthful, Ive yet to see it. Most of the time -- nearly always -- the smoldering battlefield leaves behind only orphans and trauma.

If war is occasionally a necessary evil, we should never pretend it is not evil. I find that the instigators of war (and those who respond in kind once they started it) are experts at proclaiming a bountiful paradise on the other side of the bloodshed. Accounting for the actual suffering and heartbreak that accompanies these atrocities, not so much. And the instigations are rarely as they appear. What I see, most often, is one set of justifications on the surface and another buried deep beneath. I cannot say whether that is the case here or not. But I am not a cynical person; I have merely been taking notes through the years. And I ask of everybody willing to read these words: Tell us the truth.

Preventing a war, meanwhile -- or ending one -- usually involves one side (or, in rare circumstances, both) giving up something to which they are morally entitled. I heard tell recently of an end to the massacres east of Kroth when families on both sides met to find peace, thus breaking the cycles of vengeance and bloodlust. This could not have been easy, and no one would ever blame the brother of a slain child for seeking retribution for his pain. And who knows if this accord will last in that distant land? But if we seek peace -- truly seek it, as a priority beyond compare -- we must be willing to sacrifice some of our indignation and justified rage.

I cannot pretend to have the wisdom to end the conflict between Cyrene and Eleusis. I have no doubt that some in Cyrene will accuse me of lionizing or softening the image of Eleusis. And Im certain that my residence in the walls of Cyrene will be seen by some in Eleusis as proof of my dastardly offense toward Nature Herself -- and thus the violent insufficiency of my observations. But if this project has reminded me of anything, its that good people can find ways to sheathe their swords when a larger goal is agreed upon. As someone who has spent so many years among the scorched fields of war, I would be delighted if such a thing could somehow happen in my new home.

Penned by my hand on the 1st of Aeguary, in the year 873 AF.