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(The old sage being a helpless romantic, he would be against any sort of 'arranged' coupling)

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Is her likeness to Fae just coincidence

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Is she the lost '8th' Seventh sister

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Originally posted by The Arcanamach

Not sure I agree with this...El would do whatever Mystra commanded him to do.

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Originally posted by The Arcanamach

I hope this is the case because if they are related that means El had relations with a blood relative (unless the Shadowsil was just a 'favored' daughter of his and I misinterpreted the relationship between them...I thought/think they were lovers).

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Originally posted by The Arcanamach

Um, what? There's an 8th sister? Where can I get info on this at?

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I never understood the entirety of the story with Qilué Veladorn - she always struck me as 'a replacement'.

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Originally posted by The Hooded One
(...) the Bedine (...) were created by Troy for that novel, and weren't what Ed originally had in Anauroch at all. (...)

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The Strange And The Unknown Desert wildlife is little known to outlanders, and new forms are being discovered constantly. There are even rumors that a magical gate has been opened somewhere in the northern Sword, linking Faerun with the world of Krynn: adventurers have reported meeting with hatori, horax, skrits, and even tylors there. Explorers are warned: just about anything may be met with in the desert! Of interest to outlanders (only due to their odd appearance) are curious "fuzzy crawling brains"; (as the adventurer Thayalin of Baldur's Gate aptly described them) seen after rainfalls. These are giant velvet earthmites: vivid, hand-sized, wrinkled, furry, red, crawling things. They are harmless, unintelligent, and inedible, and emerge during the rains to eat termites, mate, and then burrow back down under the sands until the next rains.

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Originally posted by Realmsfan

Long time lurker first time poster. THO thanks for all the years of your posts and insights into the realms. I have two question that I would like to send to Ed.

1 What are the seven ages that he could identify in the realms history as a starting and ending points.
2 If he could name the 7 wonders of his realms?

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Originally posted by Realmsfan

Good one wooly. Both would be great but I take what Ed and THO dish out. Either by teaspoon or ladle.

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The short, simple reply is that no Faerûnian creature would have any “Seven Wonders” list. It’s not something they’d ordinarily think about or speak of, certainly never in terms of a ranking of rival “wonders.” Folk in the Realms DO speak of wonders they’ve seen in distant lands, in taverns (usually when explorers or other far-traveled wayfarers are vying with each other to entertain the locals for some drinks or to seem important or to manipulate someone into investing in a venture). If you asked a particular Faerûnian, his reply would depend on him: if he was a farmer or rural person who’s never traveled far from his home village, he’d probably say so, and disqualify himself from relevant comment on the grounds that “they talk of many wondrous things, but I’ve not been and seen enough to tell you anything useful. I saw a melon as big as a cow once, in yon market, but then I’ve heard tell of bigger melons’n’ that, in bigger markets, see?”
Even alert, informed merchants or soldiers would say some variation on this, recognizing that they’ve hardly seen enough to venture a useful opinion. Priests and devout worshippers of one god above others would list the wonders associated with their deity (“the little stone stop Tharun’s Mount that bears the shape of Eldath’s hand, where she touched it when weeping over the death of a flower”), and that points at the key to Faerûnian attitudes towards wonders, and the reason my answer is taking the shape it is: in the Realms, everything’s slanted by the fact that EVERYONE knows the gods are real, and respects their power even when considering gods they fear, hate, or shun worship of; the knowledge that the gods walk the world (from time to time) and make changes to it colours everything. So various individuals might give you wildly different “seven wonders” lists, if you asked them to pick seven (and why seven? the concept has no significance to them, of course), UNLESS they were stay-at-homes from the same village, and so shared the same life experiences (“well, we’ve both been to Suzail once, and there were some pretty wondrous mansions THERE, let me tell you!”). So, yes, the Waterdhavian and the Thayan would probably give different lists based on different life experiences, NOT on nationalistic (or even cultural) grounds. (By “cultural,” I mean that unless they were more stupid or self-centered than most folk, both would recognize and say that they’ve not seen enough in their travels to be sure they weren’t missing important “wonders,” as a preeminent factor over seeing things as exemplifying a slave-based culture [as good or bad] or a mercantile, cosmopolitan crossroads trading center [as good or bad].)
“The Faerûnian sensibility” is “in general more inclined to be impressed by a natural wonder” than a magical construction, with one caveat: the most awe is evoked by natural wonders for which no explanations are generally known, or no god is directly and clearly attributed as the cause of (so the waterfall or the natural arch NOT “known” to have been created by the god is generally more impressive than the one this or that god altered or created - - except to a devout worshipper of that god, of course. Everyone is impressed by major magical constructions like walking colossi or flying cities, but not as “wonders” UNLESS the means of making them is now unknown or forgotten (i.e. unless they’re now unattainable or mysterious). Yet this sort of “gosh wow” admiration is a step down and to one side of “the great wonders.” It’s more a “How did they DO that?” marveling (which is, to resurrect some very old Realmslore, why folk differentiate between “Marvels” and “Wonders;” the former being man- [or rather, sentient-being-] made items and magics and processes, and the latter being things that occurred naturally or mysteriously.

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