Laird of the Ring
A long time ago (it wasn't quite a long, long time ago but definitely more than some time ago), a human, an elf, a troll, and a goblin walked into a bar. It was obvious they were adventurers from their silly gear and their silly clothing. Oh, and their silly hats. Loudly, they sat down and began to tell stories of great daring-done to all who would buy them drinks. Predictably, they were silly stories.
As the evening wore long and the drinks turned to song, the troll let out an interesting riddle-song which they are known to do every now and then if you somehow run into a Trollish Loremaster and somehow manage to get him drunk. Anyways, it was intriguing but no one paid attention to it.
That is, no one except Canus Fourth Halfblade, an orc of nothing noteworthy - at least prior to this story. For some reason, upon hearing the riddle-song (which Trollish Loremasters are prone to do if you somehow manage to get him drunk, as mentioned before), Canus sat up and began to pay attention to every word. Now, it could have been the dusted space grog - which has been known to have a sobering effect on orcs - but for some reason, at least as pertained to this riddle-song, his mind became preternaturally keen and the more he pondered it, the more he understood the riddle. And he knew that the troll believed they had stumbled upon Something Really Big and they were heading back to it.
Some funny stuff happened which was lost in translation, but the end of the matter is that the orc finagled his way onto the adventurer's ship and left with them as they set out for [redacted]. Along the way, they came across a distress beacon which, as everyone knows, always turns out to be space pirates attempting to obtain ill-gotten booty. YAR!
Except it didn't go as planned because, well, these weren't pretend or make-believe adventurers; these weren't even the "stuff that legends are made of" adventurers: these were the Adventurers that Created Legends on the Fly and Tightrope-walk their Tales of Daring Do Down Your Throat and Into the Very Books of History - at least according to the Annals of Historical Adventurers Truer Than Ever Recollected - HATTERs for short, which most true adventurers are known as because of their Silly Hats. Of course they have silly gear and wear silly clothes, but their mark of distinction is, of course, their Silly Hats.
Note: Don't call it a Silly Hat to their face as they are sworn by the Unwritten but Oft Whispered Code of the Silly Hat to defend the Honor of the Pasty Skull, which is, of course, covered by the Code of the Silly Hat - and hopefully by the Silly Hat itself. I digress, and in any case all adventurers know this...
So they beat those pirates to dust and took their ship! (The battle really was about that long, rating just those few words uttered) Granted, it was a small pirate ship, but it was considerably larger than the six-seater space wagon that they were putzing around in, oft only used for fishing trips across the cluster. Rumor has it that the goblin lost their adventuring sloop in a gambling duel, but that's peripheral; anyhoo...
In the pirate's brig, there was a dwarf who happened to be the cook and ingineer (with an "i") for the ship - turns out he left a little too much gravel in the first mate's coffee and was tossed down into the hatch. Having no love for the rest of the lot and being the only dwarf on board (plus did I mention he was a cook and an Ingineer - with an "i"?) he joined up with the Liberators - which is what they called themselves (for completely non-heroic reasons), but it seems history has changed their name to the First Fellowship of The Ring, but let me not get too far ahead.
By and by, upon packing 11 pirates onto a space wagon made for 6 and sending it upon its way, they made their way to a planet whose name is probably known but its the practice of AAA to censor such information.
They got the gold. They got the girl. How come the girl was on a mostly unexplored frontier planet is beyond us, but this is what's recorded. They got the gold - did I mention that already? I mean the Mother Lode. They were stinkin' filthy rich.
Unfortunately, the dwarf wouldn't agree with only a 10% cut (ostensibly because he wasn't an actual team member, wink, wink). After much arguments (courtesy of being in HighSpace) he was, however, willing to forfeit his cut for this ring that was in the booty. It was rather plain, but he said it was a Trotskian ring - made by the joint lore and power (probably more power than lore) of trollish and dwarvish magic once upon a time when the two races had a compact on Homeworld.
Elf: "I don't think that's such a good idea."
Of course, he was overridden because that meant everyone else got a much better cut.
Elf: "I still don't think that's such a good idea."
But upon much conversation - OK, threats of expulsion and loss of cut - the elf says, "It's not a good idea but I won't tell you that anymore."
And thus began a series of interesting but unusual (and perhaps unfortunate?) events which resulted in a couple of deaths and the elf cutting the dwarf's finger off and casually tossing it into a neighboring black hole. The dwarf, of course, jumped in after his precious ring, and that's the last he - and the ship's problems - were heard of. We hope.
OK, maybe not.
You see, roughly once every 5 to 7 years, when a ship has all 6 races on board, an ominously spectral dwarf with a rather solid golden ring will appear on board the vessel and, after terrorizing those aboard for a bit, leaves said golden ring behind. Nothing good is recorded to happen afterwards. Such cursed crews are known as The Fellowship of the Ring and if they can't figure out the riddle of the dwarf (which is absurd because everyone knows that dwarves hate riddles and are pretty bad at them) and can't complete the re-quest - probably a re-quest because so many people keep failing it - the vessel disappears never to be heard from again.
During this time, The Ring somehow winds up on someone's finger (like "Tag, you're it!") and they are henceforth the Laird of the Ring. It's said that the Ring has some special power that grants a form of invisibility, or it at least works much like the sham-shield of a Royal Navy Specialist, in that he's barely around when needed (and never around to do work) - and he always shows back up later with a reason of absence and a written and signed excuse. It's rumored that those who die with the ring on become Sham Shield Ring Fiends, more commonly known as Wraiths of Wrath.
It's for this reason that most captains superstitiously avoid having more than 4 of the races of The Folk upon their vessels.
So, yeah... all that mysterious stuff going on and apparently only one party member got out of this in one piece - the orc, Canus Fourth Halfblade? See that mansion up the hill? Yup...
Historical Basis
Snoop's Database rates this legend as "Most Likely Untrue" as there are far too many discrepancies and few actual recordings of any of the activities relating to the story.
Spread
The story - and the accompanying superstition - is pretty popular through much of The Fringes and Out Yonder where this story was thought to have taken place. I mean, this is classic campfire and pirate material.
Variations & Mutation
Humans tend to embellish the story, typically taking the place of the wise elf who first foretold the problem and then solved the issue.
This is most likely the orcish version. Apparently, when told in orcish, there's something particularly delightful about a dwarf giving the elf the finger which results in the nasty wounding noted above. In most orcish versions, the orc quietly hands the elf a particularly sharp knife.
Other races have variations where there are two of their favorite disliked race and the telling race is cheated by those disliked.
Cultural Reception
The story is widely spread throughout the Sea as a underhanded way of cautioning fraternization with "the other Folk," which, of course, often depends on the variation and audience being told.
In Literature
This story pops up in one form or another every few years in Adventurer's Monthly and is the stuff of several books, not to mention numerous school reports.
In Art
One of the greatest pictures, said to be inspired by an artist on Serenity, portrays an uncannily surreal image of what's thought to be the original ship, crew, and ring. It's titled, of course, "Laird of the Ring."
Comments