By popular request I am adding this note on pronunciation of the names herein.
Earymir Tadrierion: Eer-i-meer Tah-dreer-ee-awn
Koilin Riappi: Kuah-lin Ree-ah-pee
Cleavyan Rusil: Clayv-yahn Roo-sille
Lomode Nilmandra: Lohm-ohd Nil-mahn-dra
Eowóndil Til-Galdur: E-ow-ahn-dill Till-gall-door
Earelia Tinarandel: Ear-ehy-lee-ah
Danus Barin: Dahn-us Bah-rihn

            It was late into the evening, with only the dim and distant stars to lift the oppressive darkness. Earymir Tadrierion looked out the tower window over the surrounding stone walls built high and strong by those who had held his position long ago. He now stood in a bastion tower on the borders of his land, built to watch for attack from the sea, which it overlooked. It had been built in a time when people feared attack, though few could remember those days now. But war was again drawing near, and Earymir was not here to watch the sea as he had often done to pass the long nights, but to meet with his fellow rulers of the lands which he was sworn to protect. Sighing, he turned from the window to look upon those whom gathered here with him.
            “They’re coming.” He said to his friends and fellow rulers of the surrounding lands. “They’re coming, they will not be stopped and we are the last.”
            “Bah, we’ll turn them back as we did before,” grumbled Koilin Riappi, the Dwarven High King, sitting against the far wall resplendent in his highly polished armor. While the armor was only decorative, and worn only for effect, Earymir knew that Koilin knew his way around a battlefield as well as any. However battle hardened he was though, he did not like the height of the tower, and intended to remain as far from the windows as he could get.
            “Will we?” Inquired Earymir. “I foretold this day long ago, and you all thought me mad for it, do you not recall that I also saw our doom in it?”
            “’Even the wisest among us cannot see all ends,’” quoted Lomode Nilmandra, Earymir’s wife and High Queen of the Elven people, leaning back against the wall to his right, her musical voice a discordant keening to Earymir’s mind. “Perhaps you misread your vision, and it is possible to change the course of the events that you saw.”
            “And perhaps you underestimate the amount of time I gave in thought to these matters before sharing the vision with you?” whispered Earymir, very nearly growling his words in an attempt to control his anger. Lomode was as fair as any of her people, and many thought her even more so. The two had wed many long years ago, a marriage of convenience and politics arranged to bring the whole of the nation under one throne, and though she had come to love him dearly, he could not return that love, and every moment by her side, listening to the honey in her voice, grated his patience and caused his head to ache.
            “Perhaps we should continue on the subject at hand, friends, rather than stew in our anger and personal affairs. This is neither the time nor the place for such things,” rebuked Cleavyan, standing at the table in the middle of the room, her eyes, as always watching every move made by those around her. She was wearing simple armor, tried and tested in combat, and carrying her quarterstaff as a walking stick, though those who knew her well knew that she was more deadly with it than with any sword. “Have we not more important things to worry about at the moment than the problems of your personal affairs?”
            “Ah, an arrow to the point, as always, my dear,” Koilin said, trying not to laugh at the contortions of Lomode’s face as she faced down her ever-present rage at Cleavyan.
Earymir only sighed, returned to the table and took up the object that they had gathered to discuss. To the eye it appeared to be a simple knife with a serpentine blade, decorated only with a blood ruby on the cross of the hilt. It had much more grave meaning to those gathered here. This dagger had been passed down through the generations as a symbol used to deem a traitor’s life forfeit. It was a dagger used to condemn to death thousands of men, and though it was forged from the lightest steel, it felt to weigh a hundred pounds in Earymir’s hand.
            He looked up from the dagger and his own thoughts and to his face returned the stony strength that he was known for showing against any odds, no matter the personal loss. When he again spoke, his voice carried all the weight of his office, and all the heaviness of a man condemning his own flesh and blood. “Is there one among you who says that my son, Eowóndil Til-Galdur, is less than a traitor?” He slowly looked into each pair of eyes, gauging their conviction in what lie ahead. Koilin: silent and wanting only to get down from this tower, thinking his people safe against any attack. Lomode: more interested in how her dress flowed off her shoulders than the proceedings. And Cleavyan: somber and meditative of the matter at hand, for it involved her greatly on a personal level as much as a political and professional one.
            None spoke a word, and the silence was the only answer he needed. He grimly raised the dagger high in the air and said, in a voice that could be heard throughout the great tower, “So let it be known from this day forth that Eowóndil Til-Galdur is hereby deemed traitor to both the thrones of our people, and to all of our allies. He is to be killed on sight, without question or hesitation. Let it be known also that from this day forth that any who may give him aid are also branded as traitor, and shall share his fate. This is our decree, and it shall be done.”
            He looked over his comrades, weighing them on his mind’s scales, hoping they would have what was needed for what lie ahead. He struck the dagger into the wooden table to the hilt, and swiftly turned to leave the chamber. He paused at the doorway and gave only a soft word to his associates before departing. “The storm is broken upon us. let us pray we live to again see the sun.” At this, the room lit with the first flash of lightning from a storm for which none could yet see an end.