The Overseers and the Inventors

As I travel the worlds I find some lands more sorrowful than others even if their own inhabitants do not think so.  I am reminded of the High Lands of Rum-ha-yi.  It is a beautiful and desolate land full of frost grass and herds of ferret-lemmings.  Because the only sure way to the highlands is up a fifteen hundred foot cliff framed by waterfalls, humans were late to reach that place.  When they finally got there they found the Deww.

The Deww were a happy race then well suited to their land.  Unfortunately, they never learned the secret of smelting or forging or making sharp swords.  It was a dark brutal war between the humans and the Deww, but the results were easy to predict.  The humans kept the Deww because of their talent and the Deww of course tried to rebel.  They failed.  In the end, they even tried to kill themselves as a race by not having any more children.  That two failed.  After twenty six generations failure and sadness has been inscribed into their blood forever.

In every human village on the high lands there is a smaller village where the Deww live.  It is guarded by the Overseers who keep a sharp eye on their wards.  Most of the Deww are of the grey skin variety.  They are eight feet tall, and very strong.  They are used as manuel labor.  Every now and then a blue eyed Deww with grey skin is born.  They are very important though no one can explain how.  They keep the Deww happy and in their tongue they are called the Harmony.

The important Deww as far as humans are concerned are the few born with black skin.  They are called the Inventors.  They have great magical powers and can create life from the soil of the high land.  It's a very valuable skill given the lack of variety of animals and plants in the high land.  Some Inventors can even create new life forms which are traded to the humans below the high land.

There are other castes of Deww but when they are born the overseers kill them.  There is the blue skin babies that would have grown up to be fierce warriors.  The red ones were once the natural leaders of the Deww.  No one knows what the white Deww did for their race but everytime one of those rare children are killed the entire Deww village mourns for weeks and even the humans feel sad for no reason they can put a finger on.

Everyday the Overseers see the wonders the Inventors perform.  Everyday they find a new way to kill the soul of the Deww.  Everyday they do not see their own pain as they ignore the pain they create.  That is a sadness that I shall never forget.