Wandering Folk

The Wandering Folk are a supernatural race found within Modhes Dream Myths, who are said to guide lost souls down the path of reincarnation. They are one of the newest additions to Deysachni Mythology, being attested only shortly before the Calming, and are largely known of from a single passage by the Maharishi Aabde'ic Aonalh.

Aonalh's account

The majority of the known information about the Wandering Folk comes from the testimony of the Maharishi Aabde'ic Aonalh on 13.06.407 in Ngiy Ôch, and his subsequent interprettation thereof. It reads as follows, in its entirety:

I found myself in a clearing of sorts, a timeless aether, as though within cloud or steam of sea. I drifted through this mist, in faint knowledge of it as some core within the Dream World. Suddenly, before me, shadows emerged, with faint form upon such as is common in a dream, visages of strange men, of odd colors and features, clad in modest raggery, wet with unknown waters. They loomed over me, and carried with them the scent of rich salt, such as an Ouapean whaler.

I spake unto them. "O Spirits, who art thou?"

"We are as those who were, and have yet to be. We are The Wandering People, those uprooted and yet to take root. In exile and in search, of our home in time."

"Why, O Spirits, do you find me, come to my sight in this of my visions? Why have you chosen as you have, to pass through mine eye of eyes?"

"Lost, we are, lost forever, and eternal. All those who live will come to us in one day, and pass through elsewhere. Those within are temporary, but the wander is eternal."

"But O Spirits, I am not lost! I wish not to be lost! Why, O Spirits, have thou chosen me?!"

"Guided we are, by winds, and waves. No spirits, as you say of we, but flesh, though skin proof to rain eternal, and blood, though slow to years unknown."

"Men, you speak yourselves to be? If your speech is true, from what land do you hail? I know of no folk by your sight, nor voice, nor way."

"We hail from no land, O groundling, but the seas betwixt and beyond. We hail on the fringes of the world's order, to gather those lost, lest not they be found, and aid them to pass through to open land. We are eternal in this, we are of the Ways before Gods, the unspoken truth of man."

"Found, you say? By whom, if not yourself, in the deep of sea cataclysmic? Naught but high demons are known to that reach, and yourself no angel to dual them, by mine eyes."

The strange beings then, as one, silently moved to the side, and behind where they stood the Aether parted, and lo, I saw that of an island, so dark with shadow that which could be surmized was but a sillouette of terrain, where two ranges of cliffs, one great and forked and one thin, flanked a great central peak. Above it all loomed some horrible thing, which I knew to be alive, or something akin but antipode to life. It was long and slender, like an eel make of clouds such as would bring only the worst storm, and it circled overhead this awful island, writhing, undulating more fiercely, in the manner of a glutton beast basking in his haul. The whole of this image radiated a horrid foulness, a dread upon me such as no nightmare I have ever known in all my years. I felt as though staring directly into the gaping maws of Mas Kel-Thuurm. Perhaps I was.

"This land, The Black, where those without name live, who consume the unfortunate. Worse than any hell or demon of which you think, it is as true as this world eternal, the product of One Who Ends. It is The Pit. It is The Sinking Place. Some say that naught which enters emerges ever again."

"These horrible things, O spirit, I ask of you again, why do you show them to me?"

"A benefactor, who you know in name and image, has called us to warn of these things. You were chosen for a reason you would not believe. This benefactor, has done much to gain our grace, for else we never would speak to those who do not wander. To be lost is to be Lost. This shall be your one warning, spread it wisely, groundling dreamer. Goodbye."

It was then that I had suddenly awoke, in such a daze as though unslept, from the dream. I was told by one of my fellows that I must have slept for upwards of eighteen hours.

― An Account By Myself, Aabde'ic Aonelh, A Monk And Not A Dreamer, Of A Most Miraculous Vision Of A People Unknown, And Ruminations Thereupon, Chapter 1, page 6

Interpretation

Aonelh believed that the "benefactor" who the Wandering People mentioned was Saint Sarrhu, who in death continued to explore the fringes of the Selfnested Spheres of Creation, and came into contact with these fringe people. Aonelh's theory was that the Wandering People were a race of spirit created, either by Modhes Ywl or by an aligned Diety, to fascilitate in aid of reincarnation. Aonelh remained uncertain as to the nature of The Black, speculating that it may be a Gwprum Hell, the prison of Mas Kel-Thuurm, the remains of the Old Hells, or even some contained form of Mn'krapant. Regardless of its nature, he was convinced it was some form of punishment not before attested, which before innocent souls that were pulled into malice.