The Song of the Khayin

“Glory! Great honour shall be mine! Wenestl shall be last of his dastard line! Sword unsheathed and bow taut-strung, We rest not while a Norvajael stays unhung!” Over glen and trail the quaver spread; The Ilken sought sheaths of hapless dead! Seething, as one our spirited gunari rose To take upon glittering steel their vows War served but to strengthen the faltering heart! Massacre could not mar the flame within! Day after day they were torn apart Yet unswerving was their resolve to win! Burning, pillaging, the shendful Ilken horde Into scarred and blasted Estayn poured The few who ’scaped the relentless fury flew Unto Eyr Mu’in through paths strewn red with dew Inch by fell inch the battle raged ‘Til the Ilken began to wish the war unwaged Within the castle fretted Ynvartim The craven deserted the trust placed in him! The wails of Thousands for succour cried But for her they would doubtless have died Gisela, the gallant Gunari we joyously hail Refused in that perilous hour to turn tail! He called her Kháyin; heaped upon her curses Left her naught but those he named sick-nurses Left the Castle to be stormed and battered Her brother slain and so many lives shattered! The rafters rang with the attackers’ scorn The guard tower was empty, the curtain wall torn They charged, they bombarded – but all to no avail For how shall such noble resolve be suffered to fail? Against our Gunari Woden no dastard foe may prevail E’en the machinations of the Ilken-Knilde must fail Dull are enemy swords with blood, yet there she will stand Bright as gold and as bold, to guard her cherished land!