The Upwinder Prophecy

[Jim Roberts]

[Feb 6 afternoon – The Upwinder HQ]

> “Many of all races like to play GOD!” Ben exclaimed, frustration clear
> in his voice. “Because they believe they know what is best; do not
> question them just fall in line.”
>
> “Yeah! Preach it, Tall Guy,” a kobold burst out excitedly. The
> expression of several of his neighbors ranged from embarrassed to
> enraptured to disgusted.

Jeyshann stared at Ben, so astonished to hear the Abbot say this she was
at a loss for words (unlike the excited kobold), quite possibly for the
first time in her life. Before she could decide whether the sweet old
kobold high priestess would mind terribly if she sprang at the Abbot
hissing in vexation and choked the life out of him (just a little) for
not at least seeing that was how a lot of people perceived HIM, (most
definitely including the Cat Priestess herself), ‘Mother’ distracted her
just in time by picking up her story again.

“They were remarkably decent about it,” the old kobold woman admitted
and managed to keep her voice mostly free of any resentment. “Told me to
take all the time I needed to think it over. I am not sure what I would
have finally decided if left to my own devices, but I wasn’t. The Divine
spirits we had chosen to give our devotion and faith to rewarded our
loyal piety with a completely unexpected gift, with of course lots of
unexpected consequences.”

“The test of faith sometimes brings unexpected consequences,” the Abbot
intoned piously.

“This Tall Guy not so bad after all,” one of the watching kobolds
whispered louder than he thought to his neighbor.

“I still think him a big dummy,” grumbled another kobold behind them.
Glares were exchanged, but they were not QUITE bold enough to forget
their manners and touch off another ‘religious’ debate, not while
‘Mother’ was speaking at least. All bets were off should they meet
later, which probably explained a lot of the squabbles and tussling that
seemed an important part of kobold social interactions.

“Remember, while my faction in that warren was not yet dominant; I was
the most powerful and respected among the shaman there, with the largest
following of others with divine power,” ‘Mother’ told them. “But easily
half the tribe still held to the old ways. I am still not entirely sure
what the Spirits really meant us to do. All I know is right in front of
the whole warren, while I was still pondering what to do about the
dwarves’ ‘generous’ offer, I went into a trance - and spoke the Prophecy
of the Time of Travel.”

“Most interesting!” the Abbot enthused.

“I’ll be happy to show you the record of exactly what the Divine spirit
used my voice to share with us,” smiled the saintly old kobold. “I make
no claim I was anything more than a vessel; I haven’t the slightest
memory of actually droning on speaking the dratted thing myself, rather
embarrassing, really. But my acolytes AND the most powerful of my rivals
wrote it all down. And the dwarves assigned to monitor us somehow heard
the whole thing using whatever magic they had worked up to spy on us,
and even thoughtfully provided us a copy of what THEY recorded.
Remarkably enough all three texts were *exactly* the same other than a
few punctuation and spelling differences.”

“Wonderfully divine indeed,” Ben agreed, reverence in his voice.

“Now, just because we had, and have, a record of exactly what this
Prophecy said,” cautioned ‘Mother’. “Does not mean ANYBODY who knows
about it is absolutely sure what it *means*. My rivals who eventually
became the Social Justice Engineers over the intervening years think
that the ‘Time of Travel’ was our exodus out of the mountains of the
dwarves, and that this valley of the Waterworks is the new land we were
promised.”

“May we see or hear this Prophecy?” Finfin asked, hoping he was not
further sticking his foot in it for venturing a question without being
prompted to do so. But from what he could see, contrary to being
offensive, asking rather than assuming WOULD be the polite thing to do.
Hopefully the kobolds would not disagree.

“Absolutely,” exclaimed ‘Mother’ in delight. “Getting yet another set of
opinions on it might finally shed some light on what it means.”

“Or, further muddy the already completely opaque waters,” sighed another
kobold morosely.

“My acolyte has a point, I suppose, there are more opinions on some
passages than kobolds who have read it. My take on the whole thing is
quite a bit different,” she mused aloud. “I think the SJE are ignoring
the most important passage, which says (in part):

‘And, lo, the clouds shall come down, and walk among you. Let this be a
sign to you of the Time of Travel. Your toil in the valley of Muck shall
be at an end, and the dark and light Sisters of Silver shall show you
the beginning of the time of mingled change, terror, and promise. If you
choose wisely, you will come to the Land of Promise, where you can live
in peace and harmony after your righteous struggle to claim your new home.’

‘Mother' fell silent a long moment, her gaze taking in all the Tall
People and lingering a long moment in particular on pale Tramma standing
next to dusky Laquendi, both with shining lustrous locks of silver
crowning their heads. She let that steady gaze make her point without
speaking, her words when she continued instead continuing the tale of
her people.

“Just because I have no memory of my eyes rolling up while glowing and
babbling all that in a terrifying clear voice all could sense was ripe
with Divine power doesn’t mean I didn’t memorize every single word
since,” admitted ‘Mother’ with a shake of her head. “I have pondered
what it all meant for all the years since. I just hope my guesses at
what we should do are not as much of an oddly formed egg as the SJE’s
take on the meaning.”

“I suspect,” Laurelin observed, “the Waterworks is just one step on your
journey.”

“Like, duh,” the Foreman snarked. It was pretty clear whose
interpretation of the Prophecy HE tended to favor.

“Turns out a needed step,” the elven priestess countered, “as it gave
you a way to further separate yourselves from the SJE.”

“Not far enough, yet,” the Foreman grumbled. “I’m hoping we can fix
that… sorry, Mother.”

Ben, however, nodded in agreement, clearly liking the Foreman’s notion.

Suddenly ‘Mother’ laughed, and observed, “I think the only people more
impressed with the whole Prophecy than either faction of our kobold
tribe that ended up ultimately producing both we Upwinders and the SJE
was the dratted dwarves. They never told us what they really thought was
going on, but they certainly made sure we knew the fastest and most
direct route out of ‘their’ mountains. I never got to give them my
answer about that protected village, either, oddly enough they never
asked me again, either. Ah well, their loss.”

As ‘Mother’ apparently concluded her tale and fell silent, one of the
kobolds who worked in the kitchens and hydroponic farms who had been
involved in the almost forgotten discussion about Laurelin’s gift of the
coin glowing with Celestial Brilliance offered the ancient high
priestess a large cup of something that looked like it might be fruit
juice of some sort. “Why, thank you, Scrag,” the kindly old kobold woman
told the cook warmly. “My throat IS a bit dry.”

“Scrag is happy to help, Mother Superior,” replied the kobold happily,
bowing and looking a bit flustered and happy she was speaking to him. “I
have more if you need it.”

“If I may,” the Abbot asked reverently. He then bowed his head for a
short prayer before stating with quiet conviction, “I believe, your
prophecy tells of our coming to help you. By the use of divine magic, we
can walk among and as clouds. I agree with Laurelin’s interpretation
that you are to separate from the SJE. There will be trials for you to
overcome. If you make the proper choices, the reward is the Promised
Land. When all is said and done, it is what your faith tells you to
believe.”

“That is more or less my interpretation,” agreed ‘Mother’. “We just have
to hope we have guessed somewhere close to the truth. The one thing I am
sure of is the Divine spirits can be quite subtle, and seem to have
healthy senses of humor.”

“Do I gather correctly,” Finfin queried, “that at some point the
fortunes between the two schisms reversed, leading to the SJE gaining
supposed control, with the Upwinders being driven behind the scenes?”

“There is an old proverb among the more militantly minded kobolds,”
‘Mother’ sighed, shaking her head sadly, shifting her piercing gaze to
the Foreman.

“It goes, ‘Quantity has a quality all its own’,” the Foreman picked up
the thread to observe grimly. “It is FAR easier to breed hundreds or
thousands of low-skilled foot soldiers when you simply do not care about
their welfare or outlook on life. As simple as that; over time they took
over by simply out-breeding us.” He paused a moment before adding a bit
grudgingly, “then, there’s all those undead, obviously.”

“One on one,” the ancient kobold high priestess sighed. “We Upwinders
generally outclass our ideological opponents fairly significantly. We
live longer, happier, more productive lives than all but the elite among
the Social Justice Engineers, and WE don’t expend a lot of our effort
fending off attacks from each other and plotting such attacks on our
peers, not to mention that Upwinders long ago decided that direct
confrontation with the SJE was a lose-lose proposition.”

“‘Mother’ is more worried about spiritually and ideologically conceding
to the assumptions of those SJE bastards than I am,” the Foreman
continued in the same grim tone. “She has a very good point, directly
fighting them will simply makes us become them in the end even if we
could overcome the odds and destroy them. My main concern is conserving
our forces. It has become military necessity as well as philosophically
desirable to let them think they have beaten us and we are just a
pathetic buncha no-good pacifists only fit for a little bit of manual
labor. Until youse guys showed up, I was never sure we COULD beat them
yet if they made an all out push.”

“The signs were never clear,” the ancient priestess told him with a
smile. “At the very least, it HAS been clear that our divine patron
counseled patience and forbearance. I know it has been difficult, my
son, but it really appears our faith has paid off handsomely.”

The Foreman just swept an openly skeptical gaze over the Abbot and his
people, half-consciously shaking his head before contenting himself with
a curt nod as he muttered, “let’s hope so, anyway. Not a fan of counting
on anyone but ourselves, but I suppose the Prophecy always warned us
this was coming.”