The King Who Never Was

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Overview

The King Who Never Was (Commontongue), also The Fortunate King (Commontongue) and Seans (Feytongue \ʃɑnts\ for coincidence), was named for the fact that he was eradicated in The War of Erasure. The outcome of the war was so terrible that those who know about it will not speak his original name, which was derived from his association with whimsy and luck. Lore about Seans Was is almost non-existent. The Fey refuse to speak to him. Lore only comes from the histories of Orisons who were close to the War of Erasure, but do not seem to have the same prohibition of speaking about it.

Seans was the Fey God of The Lost Court, which was eradicated in the same war as its monarch. He was also the God of the Pucks.

History

Seans was one of the original ten Fey Gods who arose during the Shattered Age, long before The Midnight Road.

In the late Shattered Age, he began what would be known as the War of Erasure. He created a form of philosophical warfare that could strip a Fey God of its Strange Power by demonstrating a categorical failure of their search for meaning. It is believed he had help from The Three in the development of this warcraft.

He was utterly annihilated by Lolth in the final acts of the War of Erasure, c. 1350.

Description

Seans appeared as a tall Elf man. His clothes, while regal, were slightly stained, threadbare, and ill-fitting, as if borrowed. His posture suggested fatigue thinly veiled by pride. His expression was one of worry rather than command. The most striking contrast to this general appearance of vagrancy was his crown, which was dark grey and curved with sharp looking edges.

In his surreal form, which is only speculated as there is no record of it by firsthand accounts, Seans appeared as a chaotic display of overlapping versions of himself. The images shifted over and through each other, as if showing where he had moved, or where he would move, or as if showing him from a variety of angles, or as if showing him from different times and places with different moods and expressions. By all accounts, it was a dizzying and maddening form to behold. It was called The Manifold Man.

Personality

Seans is described as calm, patient, and morose. He never raised his voice, he never uttered a threatening word, and he never postured. Instead, he listened and responded with a terrifying efficiency of words.

Strange Philosophy

Meaning cannot be escaped

Seans believed that there was no purpose to the search for meaning, because it simply happened, inevitably, when it was necessary. The core teachings of his Court were:

• No one chooses their beginning
• No one controls (or even fully preceives) the forces that shape them
• Therefore, meaning lies in how one is shaped, not what one chooses

Orisons

Most Orisons of Seans were the Pucks, formed by the philosophy of his court. But he did attract mortal Orisons as well, usually among the unfortunate: prisoners, slaves, victims of curse or disease, survivors of catastrophe. They gained his favor not through ambition, but through acceptance of their fortunes.