Library/Isle of Tears
Librarians Note: The Isle of Tears is a dangerous place. We need more information about its formation, its effects in and outside the hedge, and what may come of any excess 'empathy' that is removed from Changelings who encounter the area.
Note by: Lux Shadowcaster: We should encourage expeditions to the island to retrieve more information
- Author: Unknown
- Hand of: Emily Puffin (NPC), Autumn Court
- Date: 1 October 2017
'This was an excerpt from a collection of aged pages hand typed and given to us by Xavier Gonzales, a local unensorcelled butcher, whose mother had been part of the Silver Tree. He died from complications related to a failed appendectomy before he could get the remaining pages to the Court. We are attempting to pursue the estate sale, but so far have had little luck. It appears the box must have been taken by a family member.
The Isle of Tears is the subject of much speculation among scholars both local and afield. The Hedge is often irrational, seemingly arbitrary, but what could have sparked the creation of such a dangerous locale?
Its first known discovery (see: the Bergmann text, paragraph 34, line 5) is in the year 1861 by Lillian Annette Miller and her brother Guillaume after the centennial celebrations for the founding of Tamarack Falls. The pair is rumored to have been quite the troublesome duo, and on this evening, they hiked toward the base of Tamarack Falls around the shoreline of the newly named Lake Brunsett, searching for a place to have a midnight picnic. Guillaume slipped on lakeweed and broke either one leg (see: the Bergmann text, paragraph 35, line 8) or both (see: the Hannon text, paragraph 14, line 2).
At that time, medical advances were rudimentary, and, with an hours'-long walk of several miles ahead of them, neither sibling was keen on the adventure. It was then that Miss Miller opened the Gate, selecting a likely spot between a pair of tall stones near the water line and entering into the Hedge in search of healing fruit to aid her brother. Sources are unclear regarding how she reached the island. The Bergmann text (par. 36, line 3) believes she was waterkin, and had no need to breathe air. The Hannon text (par. 16, line 4), however, claims she couldn't possibly have been strong enough to swim the distance needed, and postulates that she must have appealed to the softer side of local hobs for succor. This author is inclined to favor the Bergmann text, as the "Historia Hannonis" has long been noted for its misogyny (see citation index pp. 3-6 for supporting references).
Guillaume reported (Bergmann, par. 37, line 4) that his sister, when she returned, seemed different: colder, harder, unsympathetic. Using the (unidentified) healing fruits she brought back from the island, however, the siblings were able to heal his injury and returned home little the worse for wear.
Over the coming months, Lillian is reputed to have visited the island several times, each time returning less kind and less inclined to help others without tangible benefit in return. Guillaume eventually decided to follow her (Bergmann, par. 39, line 2) or, per Hannon (par. 17, line 5), was coerced into following her by Freehold leadership. There is a brief reference in Bergmann of a "potion" given to him by a local "witch" woman (par. 39, line 8) to enable him to swim beneath the waters of the Hedge without drowning.
It is this author's personal speculation that he must have employed the gifts of Smoke in some capacity, though the efficacy of an airborn entity in complete aquatic submersion is a matter of some debate among the Court.
He was wounded (Bergmann, par. 39, line 10) by the water weeds in a non-specific albeit bloody fashion while in pursuit, but managed to stay close enough to his sister to see when she arrived at the island. Little less shocking though it be today, Bergmann (par. 40, line 3) and Hannon (par. 18, line 1) both agree that a certain degree of scandalous nudity followed, and this author proposes that Miss Miller's lack of moral scruples regarding sodden feminine underthings was very likely an effect of the island's deadening of the tenderer feelings.
It is agreed upon by both sources, however, that Lillian Miller knew her way through the twisting trods of the isle, and that her brother noted the deadening mentioned above. Unfortunately for Lillian, he came too late. Others who shared the siblings' kinship with Faerie came upon her and, weaponless as she was, rent her to her component limbs before her brother's eyes (Bergmann, par. 41, line 3), promptly butchering and devouring their macabre meal. This author speculates that it is fortunate, if terribly sad, that his sister's blood was so broadly spilled, since his own injury would surely have drawn the isle's predators toward him had they caught the scent.
Guillaume is the first of the faerie kin on record to register the presence of the Tears of Aomi with the Silver Tree freehold, as well as the first to learn of their true name from the lake's local hobgoblin inhabitants, though the family's tragedy does not end with the death of his sister. Guillaume, obsessed with the island and its qualities (Bergmann, par. 45, line 2), frequently returned to study the Tears and queer aquatic and amphibious hobs found in the vicinity. It is he whom we have to thank for the discovery of their profound impact upon the emotions of their consumer, though their additional effects upon oneiromancy were not discerned until Charlotte Webb's oneiromantic experimentation some few months after his untimely death. Hoping (Bergmann, par. 47, line 4 and Hannon, par. 20, line 2) to bring an end to his suffering, to heal the as-yet unhealable damage caused by the isle, he brewed an unspecified blend of fruits with Tears of Aomi, and, increasingly distraught under their influence, took his own life.
For the protection of the Silver Tree, no paths have been forged into the Isle's vicinity beyond Miss Miller's first-discovered.
The dangers of the Isle itself, however, remain a mystery. Scholars and those dedicated to seeking truth and knowledge of the Thorns' borderland have many speculations, but little which may be accepted as hard fact. The trees themselves, the source of the island's famed Tears of Aomi, seem to be a logical culprit, though research is understandably difficult.
One of few reliable reports comes from a local hob persuaded to discuss the island. This hobgoblin, amphibious, is reputed (Shelley, par. 3, line 2) to have witnessed the dreadful result of faerie violence at work. As the story goes, the hobgoblin was hunting bluecrab when the sound of conflict farther into the island's interior caught his ear. He approached the source, and it is well that he hung back so far, for the emotional resonance was strong even there. A group of wild fae, our kin, was working together to cut down a Tear tree. The explosion of powerful emotion caused by damage to the tree, the deluge of emotional sensitivity, while localized, was extraordinarily painful, disorienting and, in the case of the already unbalanced fae, maddening: with neither hesitation nor caution of any kind, they bodily tore one another apart, doing gruesome battle with their erstwhile allies. The hobgoblin attests that it took years for the damage to heal (Shelley, par. 4, line 3), which may explain the Dawner Massacre (Whitehall, par. 87, line 2) in the mortal year 1902.
It is this author's extrapolation that the elusive trees themselves are the source of the 'deadening' effect felt by visitors, and that to have Tears of Aomi, one must have this dreadful consequence. It is a logical assumption that they are, somehow, collecting the emotional resonance of those present on the island to distill it into their teardrop fruit, but as of the present time, this hypothesis is merely speculation.
This author has personally visited the island with a contingent of the Silver Guard, and, under controlled circumstances, has experimented with boring a hole into a tree. The subsequent explosion of emotion was unutterably strong, a battering ram to the psyche, but a plug of cork to seal the breach immediately cut off the worst of the leakage, and afforded us time to net the swarm of small creatures which seemed drawn to the effusion. Waiting various periods of time, none more than eight hours, before removing the cork seemed to have no effect upon the strength of the collected energy within the injured tree. While the outpouring from the tree's injury does seem to have temporarily mitigated the inescapable deadening of one's tenderer sensibilities, as it also drove two of the Guard inescapably insane in the process, one suggests using an alternative method of self-protectionto protect oneself. No methods this author has yet attempted have been able to do more than mildly delay the inevitable.
This side effect of visiting the island was worse while present on its shores, and stronger yet when near the trees, though the utter heartlessness vanished the instant we returned to the water. The stronger-willed among us found it easier to resist, though the longer they were on the island, the more difficult it became, and none of us escaped entirely unscathed. It seems no one does. Reports are, understandably, difficult to measure. Emotion, most especially relative emotion, is impossible to quantify via mundane means, though a lack of empathy toward others is, and has been, noticeable enough to date in carefully arranged social experimentation. There are signs that one tribe of local hobgoblins may have some more exacting form of this measurement, as they are extremely cautious of, and, to this author's observation, extremely proactive toward those members of their society who stray too long on the isle's dreary shores. The tribe's collective name has not yet been successfully bargained for, but this author hopes to acquire it, for the safety of our own posterity, should their methodology ever prove essential to the Custodians of the Tree [a small red sticky-note flag points toward the line referencing 'Custodians of the Tree,' with the word 'Name??' written on it in smooth graphite pencil].
There is no true conclusion, yet, regarding the source of the isle's strange power. It is not a Hollow, for the trods shift and change within it, and one may certainly become lost within the boundaries of its shores, yet it shares certain characteristics of a created place. It is too near the mortal realms to be a parcel of an Arcadian Domain, and our local council of Viziers attests that none of the Kindly Ones who regularly prey upon this area lay claim to it. It is, of course, of interest to them, but all save the Mother have sworn oaths not to molest our kind or mortals within its boundaries for two hundred mortal years.
