(As told at Tall Tales Dec. 5 2019 by Lohkawas Wildmane)
Some of you may be familiar enough with Shu’halo history to know part of the story I wish to speak on tonight, but I believe it is time to remind us of this story in the hopes it prepares us for our future.
Soon after the Earth Mother called forth her children, some began to hear whispers from deep in the ground.
They did not know the source, which we know now as the Old Gods. Some of the Shu’halo believed the whispers, evoking feelings of fear. Fear of famine, death, cold, fear that others would take from them and they would not have enough. Fears many, not just Shu’halo, still succumb to, if truth be told.
These young Shu’halo returned to their people and what they told them was infectious and more and more the others began to hear the whispers, as well.
One heard the whispers and watched her brothers and sisters, everyone in the Tribe, Lohkawas explains, as they crafted more weapons and began to speak negatively of other Tribes; she watched as they hunted for more than what they needed, and even watched as they spoke less and less of the Earth Mother and stopped thanking the beasts for their sacrifice.
This youngling, a brave daughter of the Tribe, tried to speak on behalf of the Earth Mother.
This is fear. You are going to let fear ruin everything, she said. But the makers of new weapons and who would become the makers of war scoffed at her words.
And war came. Many of the Earth Mother’s children were lost, while the brave daughter held fast to her beliefs. She tried again and again to speak to them about hope and trust and believing in the honor and integrity of her Tribe and the Tribes around them.
But how hard it is, to get one to lower a weapon, when another weapon is levelled against you.
She was a youngling, but oh so brave and strong. She had the courage that many wish they had. She saw beyond the veil that the whispers had painted. She saw noble and fierce Shu’halo and knew that if they fought the real enemy, fought the fear in their own hearts, that they would overpower the words of falseness.
She went out from the camp to seek answers. She prayed for the Earth Mother to guide her. And she was answered, but it was the darkness that responded. She easily knew the whispers for what they were, and she drew herself up and drew on the only weapons she had, her strength and her courage… and she faced the darkness alone of all her tribe.
Lohkawas lowers his voice and his eyes and there is a stillness around him that seems to last an eternity before he speaks again.
She fell that night… returning to the village.
Her own people did not recognize her. That is the power of fear. It comes up with every reason to not trust, to not have faith. Fear tells you to believe the worst that can happen and not the best that possibly be.
She told them who she was, and they did not heed her, because they could not hope it was her when she had been gone so long. Fear had overpowered everything in the night.
When An’she rose, the Tribe saw the youngling, unarmed, lying outside the camp. They saw the weapon they had fashioned with their own hands embedded in her torso.
Her words were forever remembered as each looked inside of themselves and finally had to admit that the darkness was not in the earth, but in themselves… But as she had foreseen, many faced that darkness in themselves and defeated it, with Shu’halo strength and honor.
As I said earlier, there are some that can not admit the fear that lives in their hearts. Fear that makes them believe they need to accumulate all the power or wealth, in whatever forms fel, land, gold, that they can to stay safe. When it is the bonds of the Tribe … of our friendships, Alliance and Horde, that will carry us in the face of our greatest adversary, as it has in the past.
Let us hope we can stay true as we go forward against the whispers of this Old God… and if we survive, let us not forget we fought together this time.