~ The Beginning 
~ The Story ~
Murrah have lived for eons in the world of Pelmei, surviving and building and doing all the sorts of things that senient creatures do. They logged their histories and fought their battles, constructing their tribes through the years, and generally doing fine work of taking care of their Pelmeian home.
They weren't alone in this endevour, however. Along with the Murrah, there were the Urhein, a much faster and hungrier society of creatures who dwelled in the lowlands and the canyons. They and the Murrah had butted heads since before history had a meaning, and it was only a matter of time before Pelmei ran out of room, and the more powerful society would run over the other one. The Urhein won that struggle, ending the happy tale of Murrah existence forever. For the rest of time, the Murrah would spend their lives being bullied and enslaved by the Urhein. This was how it was to be, and even the most hopeful of the mystics saw only this gray future stretching out before them to the horizons of time.
So, what does one do when all of time and fate has cursed you?
...Find new ones, of course.
And, that is exactly what the Murrah mystics finally did.
~ The Nightmare Tunnel
Generations upon generations of Murrah lived under the rule of the Urhein before any answer appeared. While most of the Murrah had mostly forgotten that there ever was a life before the Urhein dynasty, a few dedicated their lives to finding out a way to fix it. There were Rebels on the outskirts of the Urhein cities, and roaming tribes who constantly evaded capture by the Urhein slavers. Mystics and scholars and dreamers, scattered throughout Pelmei, tirelessly holding on to hope of independance.
Finally...the mystics uncovered a miracle.
Knowledge of other places existing beyond the known world was hidden deep in Murrah mythology. Long before Pelmei, there had been another world, and the Murrah had escaped it to their current one, so the search was on to figure out how it had been done. It took decades for the fragments to finally come together.
The greatest mystics in Murrah society came together to cast the incantation, and sacrificed themselves with how much energy it took to create the gate. A hole in the world ripped wide open, in the most secret of locations, and a writhing black tunnel through eternity was created.
The first Murrah to climb through the tunnel, a rebellious buck named Teg, didn't return from the blinding depths of the tunnel. Some saw it as a sure sign that the tunnel was working, and some took it as a very bad omen. There was no way to tell if the tunnel even ended anywhere. For all anyone knew, Teg could have been dumped out into space, or even into the solid rock of a mountain.
It was nearly a month before anything happened with the tunnel, with no one able to agree on what to do with it now that it had swallowed up that young Murrah. Finally, one day they heard a voice issuing forth from the tunnel's entrance, and out popped Teg's face. He demanded to know where they all were, because he'd been waiting and exploring on the other side for weeks! When no one was able to answer him, all standing around in stunned silence, he grew bored and disappeared. But they had their answer...the tunnel to their new home was open!
~ Finding Haurah
The first attempts to send Murrah through the tunnel, after Teg's successful journey, proved a laughable failure. They found the horrific tunnel to be nothing like they expected. This 'portal' was not the ethereal glowing circle of light that they had imagined, something that would whisk them away like falling through air or dreaming the night away.
It was more like crawling through a stone tunnel, one with sharp edges and absolutely no light, which buckled and shifted and grinded it's unreal stone against the bodies of its intruders. The first few explorers couldn't help but panic and give up, scrambling blindly backward until they reappeared in their safe Pelmeian home. Some others got stuck along the way, and never materialized on either side of the tunnel again.
They almost gave up, but the Urhein's harsh treatment and the memory of Teg's hopeful face kept them trying.
When they finally succeeded, the explorers found themselves in an entirely new world, and never would have returned again had they not wanted to show their families this beacon of hope as well. The Murrah had found not only a small place of refuge, something that they could carve out an existence for a few lucky members of society...they had found a beautiful new land, stretching away into trees and mountains and silvery rivers.
The Murrah had already built their histories and their homes...but this land, and the idea of independance, was worth leaving it all behind for.
They named this new land Haurah, the Murran word for 'beautiful.'
They would have to start over here, carefully writing a new history into a pristinely wild and green slate. The Murrah had always been creatures who longed for the wilderness, to live amongst the natural things...so they found that sleeping instincts and primal memories woke at the site of the open land.
~ Trouble in Paradise
The Murrah elders worked together to establish order when word of the Tunnel got out. A system had to be devised to slowly free the Murrah and send who they could through to the new world.
The Pelmei side of the tunnel was kept carefully hidden in an area of the land run by Rebel tribes, and a guild of Runners formed to help refugees through to the other side. The Runners were Teg's idea, since he seemed to have a natural knack of finding his way through the disorienting passage. Heading up the group, he began to lead small handfuls of adults and--eventually--young fawns, to the other side. In Haurah, the Pathstone entrance was the first to be used, but eventually Teg discovered that the tunnel also branched to a nearby area. This second opening was called Blindtwin, for the fact that it was near the first one and discovered accidentally.
As time went by, and the Haurans were just beginning to explore and set up small dens near the openings of the tunnels, the Murrah violently discovered that they had not discovered an empty world. They had already known that there were animals and shy magical beings flitting through the wilderness, but as exploring parties delved deeper into the forests, something else let them know of its presence there.
In the first few months of exploring Haurah, a roaming Murran band ventured out of the little valley they all had settled in, eager to see what else this world had to offer. Into the wooded hills they hiked, and eventually came upon a strange group of obelisks that were obviously created by something other than mindless woodland creatures. They didn't have time to investigate however, as the air around them grew dark, and creatures descended down upon them while they were blinded. Only one of the Murran explorers were allowed to live, with a hissed message in his mind to leave their world.
Needless to say, that pandemonium broke out when the others discovered what had happened. The Murrah panicked, terrified that they would be forced to return to Pelmei, after all they had gone through and lost in order to get to Haurah. If they returned in failure, there would be nothing left to hope for. The most powerful of their mystics had already been lost in opening the tunnel, so there was no one left with enough knowledge and skill to open another tunnel safe enough to travel through again.
~ One Last Hope
The elders held counsel for days, on both Pelmei and Haurah. They knew there was a solution out there, and it would take both luck and creativity to figure it out.
Eventually the last few mystics came up with a terribly risky epiphany.
If they didn't have enough ability to open a tunnel reliable enough to travel through, then they would just have to open one for another reason. They were going to call for help.
And so, we reach a much more current event. The Murrah have opened a shaky tunnel from Haurah to another random world, which happens to be that of the humans.
Thankfully, they discovered that there were indeed humans out there willing to help them, but this could only be possible by a fairly dangerous magical process. By bringing a human and Murrah partially into the new Wavering Tunnel, and binding part of a Murrah's soul to a particular human, they found that both the human and the Murrah had the ability to partially manifest in each other's world. The human soul helps bolster the Murrah against the dark magic of the Hauran creatures, reducing the chance that they will be struck down by the shadowy beings.
So, the Murrah have once again began to flee their home world for the hills of Haurah, hoping to contact a human guardian once there.
©2007 - Shannon Legler