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Chapter 17: The Cooleys



The road to the Cooleys was a long, cold, and arduous one, despite being a long summer it was hard to see the paved roads made by the giants, Rhodri's road, it was called, the heavy forests that once covered the whole place are now being cleared so as to make way for roads and small settlements, the trees being cut down were to be made into pikes, ships, or fuel to feed the fires of warmth and industry, our guide, a Skinchanger wayfinder, Lorna, seem saddened at the changing landscape, the woman was fighting out tears as we watched a tree being picked by a giant who set it down on teams of lumberjacks who began to cut it apart with their bronze axes while a team of cattle wagons was waiting for the others to load them with wood 'birds lived there once' she told us as we continued on our way, we arrived at our destination. The Cooleys, home of the Ailpin tribe and capital of the Kingdom of Hengledd" - Maester Yandel's travels to the Kingdom of Hengledd.

Located on three hills south of the Vale of Thenn, the Cooleys, became the home of a branch of the Thenns called the Ailpin, local legends tells of a man called Pwyll who followed the trail of cattle and found them congregating at one of the hills where there are fertile patches of green and a spring with which the creatures would drink beneath the presence of three Weirwood trees, he called the place the Cooleys being that the place was a gathering spot of the cattle that became known as the Heilan Coo, it will not be long until the people who would be known as the Ailpin would migrate and tame the large herds of cattle and call the place home, establishing enclosures with which they would herd the cattle with their dogs.

It was this start that the Cooleys became a small village resting on one of the three hills, usually the clans that make up the tribe would often raid each other for cattle or for women, many songs were sung of the bravery of the early Caterans and it has been such a custom and a cause of tragedy to the Ailpin that a brave Druid known as Imar Map Myrddin called upon the clan chiefs and asked for them to cease their fighting, when the chieftains refuse he called upon the gods of the Weirwood trees who then struck three chiefs dead with bolts of lightning, there he tells of the remaining clan chiefs that they should cease fighting and elect amongst them a greater chieftain so as to prevent any more tragedies being sung, the clan chiefs did so and so elected amongst themselves a man called Bran son of Fionn as the Chieftain of the Ailpins, from Bran Map Fionn came a slew of successive rulers that was until the Canmores.

At the one of the hills of the Cooleys sat the Great Hall where Pwyll found and named the place, it was not like the Red Keep only that it is a simple great hall in which at its center was the godswood and a central fire being tended by Druids, at the other two hills sat enclosures and houses where people and their cattle lived, walls made of stone covered the three hills and at the surrounding place was a great stone wall being constructed by the giants themselves, lifting up great balls of stone and setting them down as men began to put mortar at its surface before another large rock was put into place, it will not be until the end of the moon when the great wall that encloses the Cooleys was finished and there was great celebration amongst the people.


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