History The Place Where No Shadows Fall
The moonlight reflection of Amber, Tir Na'nogth is, and always
has been, shrouded in qualities of mystery, myth and prophesy.
In walking through the Tir, one almost immediately notes that it
is not a perfect reflection of Amber. Or at least, not Amber as it is
today. Those with a historical bent will see and realize that the Tir
reflects Amber's city and castle as they were millenia ago. It is Amber,
frozen in time. But if one reads the sacred texts written by Dworkin, it
states in the Book of Hope that upon the creation of the plane of order,
Dworkin saw a city in the sky, created out of his dreams, and it was this
city he recreated upon the slopes of Mount Kolvir.
The Tir is Kolvir in the sky, though the peak of the great
mountain is never as solid as the city and castle that grace the lower
slopes, and is considered dangerous to ascend, even on a clear night. But
the castle, the city, and the Grove of the Unicorn are all accesible in
the Tir.
Little substantial information is known of the Tir. Once, when asked by
one of his great-grandchildren what force controlled it, Dworkin looked
puzzled and conceded that that was an extrememly good question.
As stated above, the Book of Hope claims that Amber was built to resemble
the Tir, but not many believe the rambling of the madman Dworkin. Indeed,
it is only those who follow the faith of the Unicorn who ascribe to that
particular theory.
What is known of the Tir is that it appears only on moonlit
nights, and but is only substantial enough to be visited on a full moon.
the rest of the times it is only a ghostly and vague reflection in the
moonlight. It contains one of the three reflections of Amber's Primal
Pattern. And it is legendary for the sometimes disturbing, sometimes
prophetic soundless visions it creates for visitors to its halls.
Gwyn recently discovered the existance of the Tears, a series
of nine pools located in the Grove of the Unicorn in Tir na'Nogth. They
ring the grove, in place of the nine oaks that are found in Amber's Grove.
They are according to legend, the Unicorns tears, shed as she was forced
to flee Amber to escape the Serpent's wrath. In order, they are Pride,
Vanity, Blood, Shame, Desolation, Mercy, Resolution, Sacrifice, and
Fulfillment. It is water from each of these pools that fills the small
pool under the temple in Amber, and is used in the Chalice of Souls. At
the center of this ring was a broken sword, a Pattern blade called Redemption.
What happened to the Tir when it was not seen in Amber's sky was a
mystery, even to Dworkin, though he suspects that it may be related
somehow to the Castle's mysterious Hall of Mirrors. It was quite the
incorrect assumption. The Tir is the gateway to a realm of pure light,
The Place Where No Shadows Fall. The only way to access this realm is to
be standing at the center of the Tir pattern at dawn, when the Tir
recedes to the shadowless realm.
This realm was home to Gabriel, once
thought to be no more than Genevieve's pet,
though later discovered to the the child of the Serpent and Unicorn.
Gabriel hid his mother the Unicorn there after she stole the Serpent's
eye.
Now the place with the only accesible Pattern, the Tir is guarded by the
Maerturi, a race who once occupied the shadow that contains the Keep of Four Worlds.
History
The Place Where No Shadows Fall "It was divine intervention that kept me from death, that
night, for I had waited too close to dawn to make my rebellious statement.
I had just collapsed in the center of the Pattern when the first light of
sunrise begin to dismantle the Tir about me. But I did not fall. I went
to the place the Tir resides when not in Amber's sky."
-Jenner,
describing his Tir Patternwalk to Gwyn
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