onight a minstrel happened into our tavern, and began to entertain the
people gathered here. He asked for no fee, except for our attention,
and began to weave us a tale...
``Would you like to hear a story,'' he asked, ``of when the world was young? When gods roamed the earth, and the mightiest of heroes and heroines clashed upon the field of honor? Sit ye back then, my good people... and listen.''
``Thousands of years ago, the gods created many different peoples and put them upon the earth. There were the Grey Men, the High Men and so on. The Summer People were brought forth on this world by Nirian, the Compassionate One. These people were peaceful and beautiful, more so even than they are today. But there was one among them named Toril, and he was not beautiful. He had been born deformed, with a club foot and a lazy eye with a white iris which always stared off to the side. His features were dark and pale, and if people had not known better, they would have guessed he was one of the Undermen.
``Toril's mother prayed to Nirian to help her son, to make him healthy again. To make him strong. The priests augured and discovered that Toril was a natural birth, and was not sent by the God Who Rests Below. So they treated him as any of their people, and they loved him.
``But as Toril grew, he realized he was different. He was jealous of their beauty. Why couldn't he be beautiful? He studied hard, studied the theologies of Nirian, and those that were available from the other peoples. He would pray to Nirian. ``Why can't I be beautiful? Everyone would like me if I was beautiful.'' All the Summer People loved him already though. All but one. Himself. He decided Nirian would be no help. He was likely some sort of a test for Her people, to make sure they could love one as ugly as he. Well, it wasn't fair.
``And Toril was going to get even.
``Now Toril may not have had the beauty of the Summer People, but Nirian was generous in gifts to all of her children. Toril had a brilliance of mind unparalleled in all of the known world. He could see the patterns in nature, and in life. He could see things, understand things, and he could use that knowledge to make things happen. He could make plants grow, and wither. He could change the very nature of an object, by shifting its natural pattern around... Though, as many times as he tried, he could never change himself.
``Toril's brilliant mind now began to plot and scheme. To take revenge at Nirian for what she had done to him... for his pain and agony. And the best way to take revenge on Nirian, was to hurt those that she loved. The Summer People.
``The irony appealed to him, somehow. The irony in his plan. He had traveled to an island off the coast of the lands where the Summer People lived. He climbed a mountain and looked off into the distance. It was summertime, and the heat of the sun beat down upon the land. He brought forth clouds from the air and the water, and chilled them with icy winds. He instilled the essence of winter into them, and sent them to the people of summer. Colder and colder the storms grew. Winter covered the land. Winter colder than any that had ever come. The Summer People hid indoors. Did whatever they could to keep warm. But Nirian's people suffered, and each day more died.
``But Toril was a child of Nirian, and did have some compassion in his heart. When he felt enough suffering had been done, such that he felt even with the Goddess of the West, he let the seasons resume as normal.
``That is, except for one spot in the world which he bade to be different from the rest of the land. To be winter when the land knew summer, and to be summer when the land knew winter, all alone in the world. Like himself among the Summer People.
``There are, of course, other tales of this mighty mage, but they will wait for another time...''