The Red Wyvern: Book One of the Dragon Mage (55 page)

AE as the
a
in
mane
.

AI as in
aisle
.

AU as the
ow
in
how
.

EO as a combination of
eh
and
oh
.

EW as in Welsh, a combination of
eh
and
oo
.

IE as in
pier
.

OE as the
oy
in
boy
.

UI as the North Welsh
wy
, a combination of
oo
and
ee
.

Note that OI is never a diphthong, but is two distinct sounds, as in
carnoic
, (KAR-noh-ik).

Consonants
are mostly the same as in English, with these exceptions:

C is always hard as in
cat
.

G is always hard as in
get
.

DD is the voiced
th
as in
thin
or
breathe
, but the voicing is more pronounced than in English. It is opposed to TH, the unvoiced sound as in
th
or
breath
. (This is the sound that the Greeks called the Celtic tau.)

R is heavily rolled.

RH is a voiceless R, approximately pronounced as if it were spelled
hr
in Deverry proper. In Eldidd, the sound is fast becoming indistinguishable from R.

DW, GW, and TW are single sounds, as in
Gwendolen
or
twit
.

Y is never a consonant.

I before a vowel at the beginning of a word is consonantal, as it is in the plural ending
-ion
, pronounced
yawn
.

Doubled consonants
are both sounded clearly, unlike in English. Note, however, that DD is a
single letter
, not a doubled consonant.

•   •   •

Accent
is generally on the penultimate syllable, but compound words and place names are often an exception to this rule.

I have used this system of transcription for the Bardekian and Elvish alphabets as well as the Deverrian, which is, of course, based on the Greek rather than the Roman model. On the whole, it works quite well for the Bardekian, at least. As for Elvish, in a work of this sort it would be ridiculous to resort to the elaborate apparatus by which scholars attempt to transcribe that most subtle and nuanced of tongues. Since the human ear cannot even distinguish between such sound-pairings as B> and

GLOSSARY

A
BER
(Deverrian) A river mouth, an estuary.

A
LAR
(Elvish) A group of elves, who mayor may not be bloodkin, who choose to travel together for some indefinite period of time.

A
LARDAN
(Elv.) The meeting of several alarli, usually the occasion for a drunken party.

A
NGWIDD
(Dev.) Unexplored, unknown.

A
RCHON
(translation of the Bardekian
atzenarlen
) The elected head of a city-state (Bardekian
at
).

A
STRAL
The plane of existence directly “above” or “within” the etheric (q. v.). In other systems of magic, often referred to as the Akashic Record or the Treasure House of Images.

A
URA
The field of electromagnetic energy that permeates and emanates from every living being.

A
VER
(Dev.) A river.

B
ARA
(Elv.) An enclitic that indicates that the preceding adjective in an elvish agglutinated word is the name of the element following the enclitic, as can+bara+melim = Rough River (rough+name marker+river).

B
EL
(Dev.) The chief god of the Deverry pantheon.

B
EL
(Elv.) An enclitic, similar in function to bara, except that it indicates that a preceding verb is the name of the following element in the agglutinated term, as in Darabeldal, Flowing Lake.

B
LUE LIGHT
Another name for the etheric plane (q.v.).

B
ODY OF LIGHT
An artificial thought-form (q. v.) constructed by a dweomer-master to allow him or her to travel through the inner planes of existence.

B
RIGGA
(Dev.) Loose wool trousers worn by men and boys.

B
ROCH
(Dev.) A squat tower in which people live. Originally, in the homeland, these towers had one big fireplace in the center of the ground floor and a number of booths or tiny roomlets up the sides, but by the time of our narrative, this ancient style has given way to regular floors with hearths and chimneys on either side of the structure.

C
ADVRIDOC
(Dev.) A war leader. Not a general in the modern sense, the cadvridoc is supposed to take the advice and counsel of the noble-born lords under him, but his is the right of final decision.

C
APTAIN
(trans. of the Dev.
pendaely
.) The second in command, after the lord himself, of a noble’s warband. An interesting point is that the word
taely
(the root or unmutated form of
-daely
,) can mean either a warband or a family depending on context.

C
ONABER
(Elv.) A musical instrument similar to the panpipe but of even more limited range.

C
WM
(Dev.) A valley.

D
AL
(Elv.) A lake.

D
UN
(Dev.) A fort.

D
WEOMER
(trans. of Dev.
dwunddaevad
.) In its strict sense, a system of magic aimed at personal enlightenment through harmony with the natural universe in all its planes and manifestations; in the popular sense, magic, sorcery.

E
LCYION LACAR
(Dev.) The elves; literally, the “bright spirits,” or “Bright Fey.”

E
NGLYN
(Welsh, pl.
englynion
.) A metrical form, consisting of a three-line stanza, each stanza having seven syllables, though an extra syllable can be added to any given line. All lines have end rhymes as well. In Deverry at the time of which we write, this form was so much the rule that its name would translate merely as “short poem,” hence my use of the corresponding Welsh term to give it some definition.

E
NSORCEL
To produce an effect similar to hypnosis by direct manipulation of a person’s aura. (True hypnosis manipulates the victim’s consciousness only and thus is more easily resisted.)

E
THERIC
The plane of existence directly “above” the physical. With its magnetic substance and currents, it holds physical matter in an invisible matrix and is the true source of what we call “life.”

E
THERIC DOUBLE
The true being of a person, the electromagnetic structure that holds the body together and that is the actual seat of consciousness.

F
OLA
(Elv.) An enclitic that shows the noun preceding it in an agglutinated Elvish word is the name of the element following the enclitic, as in Corafolamelim, Owl River.

G
EIS
A taboo, usually a prohibition against doing something. Breaking geis results in ritual pollution and the disfavor if not active enmity of the gods. In societies that truly believe in geis, a person who breaks it usually dies fairly quickly, either of morbid depression or some unconsciously self-inflicted “accident,” unless he or she makes ritual amends.

G
ERTHDDYN
(Dev.) Literally, a “music man,” a wandering minstrel and entertainer of much lower status than a true bard.

G
REAT ONES
Spirits, once human but now disincarnate, who exist on an unknowably high plane of existence and who have dedicated themselves to the eventual enlightenment of all sentient beings. They are also known to the Buddhists as Boddhisattvas.

G
WERBRET
(Dev. The name derives from the Gaulish
vergobretes
) The highest rank of nobility below the royal family itself. Gwerbrets (Dev.
gwerbretion
) function as the chief magistrates of their regions, and even kings hesitate to override their decisions because of their many ancient prerogatives.

H
IRAEDD
(Dev.) A peculiarly Celtic form of depression, marked by a deep, tormented longing for some unobtainable thing; also and in particular, homesickness to the third power.

J
AVELIN
(trans. of Dev.
picecl
) Since the weapon in question is only about three feet long, another possible translation would be “war dart.” The reader should not think of it as a proper spear or as one of those enormous javelins used in the modern Olympic Games.

L
WDD
(Dev.) A blood-price; differs from wergild in that the amount of lwdd is negotiable in some circumstances, rather than being irrevocably set by law.

M
ALOVER
(Dev.) A full, formal court of law with both a priest of Bel and either a gwerbret or a tieryn in attendance.

M
ELIM
(Elv.) A river.

M
OR
(Dev.) A sea, ocean.

P
AN
(Elv.) An enclitic, similar to -fola- defined earlier, except that it indicates that the preceding noun is plural as well as the name of the following word, as in Corapanmelim, River of the Many Owls. Remember that Elvish always indicates pluralization by adding a semi-independent morpheme, and that this semi-independence is reflected in the various syntax-bearing enclitics.

P
ECL
(Dev.) Far, distant.

R
HAN
(Dev.) A political unit of land; thus, gwerbretrhyn, tierynrhyn, the area under the control of a given gwerbret or tieryn. The size of the various rhans (Dev.
rhannau
) varies widely, depending on the vagaries of inheritance and the fortunes of war rather than some legal definition.

S
CRYING
The art of seeing distant people and places by magic.

S
IGIL
An abstract magical figure, usually representing either a particular spirit or a particular kind of energy or power. These figures, which look a lot like geometrical scribbles, are derived by various rules from secret magical diagrams.

T
AER
(Dev.) Land, country.

T
HOUGHT FORM
An image or three-dimensional form that has been fashioned out of either etheric or astral substance, usually by the action of a trained mind. If enough trained minds work together to build the same thought form, it will exist independently for a period of time based on the amount of energy put into it. (Putting energy into such a form is known as
ensouling
the thought form.) Manifestations of gods or saints are usually thought forms picked up by the highly intuitive, such as children, or those with a touch of second sight. It is also possible for many untrained minds acting together to make fuzzy, ill-defined thought forms that can be picked up the same way, such as UFOs and sightings of the Devil.