The Black Lake of Osgog

Branwen's Branches

23 min read

Come, sit and ponder with me this dark and clear night.

Pull up a stone, listen to the wind, and sift through the rivers of lore.

~Branwen

Image: Branwen 2.0.png

  1. 12/5/2025 A Moon Shaped Horn Crescent moon horns are associated with the Moon King, whom know to be Gorgomog, god of the dead, and we’ve heard that he’s trapped beneath the lake. The lake is leaking black water into the world.
  • Silas’ vision of the Bear with moon horns - possible that the Bear (The Twins entirely?) are under the influence of some power that originates from the Moon King - some deathly power that is sedating the Bear.
  • The Tree is the other Twin - perhaps The Black Water is some of the Moon King’s power, and some of it has gotten into the tree’s water supply - see this tree note . This meshes nicely with the previous bullet.

MK power is affecting the Bear. Next question is who directs that power, and to what end?

  • Who?
    • Moon King is trapped beneath the lake. If he’s doing it, it’s been going on a LONG time?
    • Mons. Mons’ teachings have no mention of the Bear. Perhaps Mons knows the Bear is not in the picture because Mons himself has found a way to engineer his father’s power to subdue the Bear.
    • Sun King (who is that guy?). He sent Balthazar out to investigate the black water, Mali used the black water…Sun King uses the black water in some capacity. For sure. So, is he also using the black water to poison the Twins? This feels the most likely. The Sun King is seeking power, according to Copyn and others… Sun King came from “a place of death” ~Copyn
    • Admittedly, we must consider Gorgomog and Mother Night - is the Bear the ancient evil they sealed away with the power of the Dead? Doesn’t feel right to me, but I can’t rule it out yet.
  • Why?
    • Subduing the Bear would be akin to eliminating the wildness of nature, making Norvys more pliable for humanity. Total Mons behavior, or someone trying to take up his mantle (SKing).

These are some repeated themes we’ve encountered in our journey. The intent is to gather references for each and pray for clarity, Mother Night willing.

  1. Sacrifices A common theme is giving up something to gain something else. Give and take. Life and death. Balance and circles.

  • The Abbot, Bryok. He willingly gave his life as sacrifice for something. What was it?

  • Weyland: You must give up something - you must cease to see some things so that you may see others.  You must give me one of your eyes, and then you will be able to see what must be done.”  So the boy gave the King of Stone one of his eyes. And the King of Stone said:  “I will take your eye, and I will turn it into stone, and it will look like a storm in the sky, and I will cast it into the sea like the old oath”, and this he did.

  • Cricket. he found someone who understood that the only way for one thing to gain, is for another to lose.

  • Gwedhen: > And Gwedhen took a basket made from twisted grasses from the wreckage around the tree, and scooped what water she could from the well, and put out the last of the coals, but she saw that the tree was dying.  The leaves shuddered, and began to droop, and the flowers which the bees came to drink from began to drop their petals. Again, the Bear looked at her with his deep green eyes, and she understood his request.  She lay herself against the trunk, which groaned, and crack opened in its side.  And Gwedhen stepped into the crack, which closed around her, and she was seen no more. Hwedhel stood when she was gone, and walked to the tree, and placed his hand on the rough bark, and felt life return to the tree.  And he put his hand on the Bear, who looked at him with sad and kindly eyes, and nodded in thanks for the sacrifice, and then strode off to his cave.

    1. The Dead

  • Druids, according to Gwedhen: They gave their Dead to the earth, so that they would be protected, and distrusted the people in the valleys who could not see the beauty of the untamed wilds.

  • Mother Night: I was granted power long ago through no wish of my own.  Power is always granted from without.  Perhaps I was made from it.  Those that wish power must use force, but I have no such desire, and so no such need.  But the Dead are forgotten at the risk of greater harm, and when feared, well, let us say they have their revenge - a revenge they never sought.

  • It is up to the living to find the endlessly flowing wisdom of the Dead. ~Mother Night

  • As the dead  lose their grip the crack widens, i watch the best I can drinking from the well (The Twins / The Tree watches?)

  • Kerenja came from a grove surrounded by high dirt mounds, striding out with unusual confidence. She gave Gale to Mannix, said it was a “family heirloom”. Who is this Kerenja? Wife of Bremfyr.

    1. The Incident Long Ago According to The Boatman: > [[12/7/23 The one where we talk with The Boatman and make our choice#textthere-was-acan-be-dangerous|There was a man who delved deep beneath the earth and thought long and hard and succeeded in placing many names, and focused too deeply on the thing beneath the lake, and it escaped, and it escaped into him, and that happened long, long ago. Words can bring you too near to a thing and it can be dangerous.]]

Question: Have you been to Caer Osgog.

Boatman: I have, long ago. Long ago, people left their homes and followed one of the sons of Mons in his labors to try to contain that which some fear live beneath this lake. And they created a city in the name of the son who has long ago disappeared.According to a poem:> Deeper still into geologic gold

We know this a weak spot, but given proper direction, people could potentially travel along it.According to the Man in the Tower:> The man tells Cricket: “I was a watcher under the towers and I left long ago but part of me was wrapped in this shadow, but the burden has been lifted.”

About the Man: He sees in the space of Silas  a pale figure being buffeted and swirled around in this darkness. He doesn’t necessarily look thrilled to be where he is. The shadow is possessing him. Silas, a shadow, and a man, all layered over him. Silas is on the outside, the shadow, and then the man on the inside.According to the Triumverate:> The sun husband turned black (son husband?)

We see a feather in the water. Cricket picks it up. It appears to made out of metal - silver and gold. It’s a quill pen.

The statue in the village is of a man with a quill. We hear he left the village to watch.

Current theory is that Prydyh, watched from beneath the tower, and as a poet, put into words what he saw, and it consumed him. Or something, like he traveled into the land of the dead, through the prison we passed through, and released some evil. The poet was a watcher in the tower who was tainted by a shadow released through this event. He released a part of the thing locked beneath the lake.

  1. Trinities

Image: The harmonius pattern of strangely colored lobes carved into a stone at the base of the tree.png

  • Life, Death and Rebirth

  • Maiden, Mother and Crone

  • Land, Sea and Sky

  • The 3 children of Gorgomog and Morianoth (Mons Ceridwen and Torval), aka the 3 siblings in How Old Brother Found Fire

  • The 3 stone women: Stone, Sea and Storm (Maiden mother crone)

  • The God King (unreliable narrator, though. Careful.) : “three dark enchantresses who lived amongst the stones of the mountains - sisters who were possessed of the power of primordial chaos”, who “changed” Morianoth.

    • The three enchantresses are Stone Sea and Storm, who took affront to the King and Queen’s ordering of the world.
      • ..“he spoke the names of the enchantresses, and the earth shook, and the sky wept, and the seas raged as they battled across the earth”
      • Morianoth and Gorgomog sang secret names, and bound the enchantresses in a prison deep beneath the earth
        • On 4/16/24, the party encountered Stone Sea and Storm, after descending from the city. They were VERY interested in Krambler’s hammer. There was discussions of a prison or prisoners.

  • Conclusions: the 3, Stone Sea and Storm, are the primordial powers that tend toward entropy, taking umbrage with humans and their creation and ordering.

    • The hammer is of interest to them - it has something to do with the earth and this struggle of chaos and order.

  • Ursa Major, Dragon, Ursa Minor - in the night sky.

    1. Siblings

  • The siblings in How Old Brother Found Fire - Youngest Brother, Oldest Brother, and She of the Twins (oldest bro is the other twin). Mons - Ceridwen - Torval

  • The God King: “three dark enchantresses who lived amongst the stones of the mountains - sisters who were possessed of the power of primordial chaos”, who “changed” Morianoth.

  • The God King: The world was left in the hands of G & M’s children after they left - Gorgomog + Morianoth ⇒ Mons, Ceridwen, Torval

  • Silas sees the Two Brothers constellation in the sky

  • Five statues in the tower are siblings sired by Mons and Doldelhan. (Rhiannon, Osgog, Bremfyr, Kevnis, Priweythva/Crochenwen)

    1. Morianoth/Mother Night

  • Multifaceted goddess.

    • Morianoth, Mother Night
      • Many of them married to “god kings”…
        • Watching them?
        • Granting them power, working through them?

  • Geshwa - Icebeard finds her in the snow, or made of it:

    • “she had wings like a bird - also black like shadows of the wind, but also at time reflecting starlight, and all the colors it contained”
    • Honey Woman watched her, as she knew she’d bring trouble.

  • Morianoth developed wings in The God King. She’s described as fair haired, but is changed by “three dark enchantresses who lived amongst the stones of the mountains”

    • Mog told us himself that his wife is Morianoth. (Is Mog actually Gorgomog from the tale?)
    • The 3 Statue Women indicated that Morianoth and Mabmnoss were the same.

  • How Old Brother Found Fire: “But I have brought you both a boon, from a Black Bird that flies high upon the winds of storms.  And I know that this bird brings many things, trouble, but also knowledge, and I think that we have much to learn from him, because I believe that he comes from our Mother.” (note: Honey Woman thought the raven woman would bring trouble)

  • Cricket had dreams where he’d be visited by a raven or by a raven woman.

  • In Weyland, a wolf takes Weyland’s mother, Morgan into the mountains, where it is cold and icy, and Weyland does not find her, but rather a burning heart inside the wolf.

  • Branwen’s visions of the Night Queen include the following: > The old battle with human arrogance is unending, and my time in hiding will run its course soon enough.  They always defeat themselves, but they need not cause such misery.  I am in the air, and the earth, and the flowing water, indifferent as they are And with that, she blows onto your face, and the scent of her breath is full of the smell of cinnamon, and the sounds of the night wind in leaves, and the voice of the river rushing over the rounded stones at its bottomThese references to air, earth, water are VERY reminiscent of Stone, Sea and Storm. Morianoth was “changed” by a spell placed upon her by the 3, according to the God King story. Perhaps this incident made her what she is today - no longer human, powerful, a Night Queen who reveres the dead, keeps the balance.

    • Maybe she did something to take their power and encase them in the statues?

    • More likely: she is a part of them, they are a part of her.

    1. High Kings

  • Gorgomog , The God King

    • I don’t think he wanted a title. He had real wisdom and real power - no need for a title.
    • Mons’ and his ilk added the title of God King, so Mons could sound important.

  • Mons, Mons and the God of Death

  • Bremfyr, son of Mons, father of Bryok, has been associated with the title, but only vaguely.

  • The Abbott, Bryok, the Shining Prince, renounced his claim to the throne of High King -

    • He seems opposed to the return of a King for some reason, thus opposed to the Sun King’s ideals.

  • The Sun King - claims to be a returned king.

    • King across the ocean, the Old World.

    • His people transformed Balthazar

    • Has sent minions after Balthazar, and to the tower in the mountains - looking for a girl?

    1. Order vs Chaos

  • Foamflower - men of the old world land and found Monsoth. We think the Boy is Bryok, as he is literally a foundling in the story. May be a leap of logic?> …following the Boy Who Had No Name - they walked up the stream until they reached a hollow between the three hills where a spring rose from the earth, and they were amazed, for the place was beautiful, and perfect.  The Spring stood as a perfect circle in a clearing that was also a perfect circle, and around the clearing were twelve trees, all tall and straight, and each of it’s own kind. And Kenza said: “This place is the world showing tribute to Mons and his twelve spoked wheel - it is a holy place, and shall be kept as such forever.”  But the Boy Who Had No Name said “it is not.  For Mons is a Lord of Men, and what they do with their hands, and yet this place has not been touched by the hands of men.  This is a place that celebrates a different power than the power of men.

  • The God King: Gorgomog + Morianoth vs 3 dark enchantresses.

  • Krambler’s hammer?

    1. Bears Bears

    2. Bees The God King: Bees swarmed around the stag that grew from Gorgomog’s head. Bees ⇒ Knowledge?

The Honey Woman uses bees to watch Geshwa

Beehive in the tree on the island 24 The One Where We Meet the Local Fauna

Raven Queen said to Branwen: “I am all powerful, and no more than the humblest of bees”

Maybe bees have some symbolism between life and death - messengers between the Elder Lands and Norvis?

Bees make honey…which could be life symbolism?

  1. Trees The God King: “The souls of the trees held dark secrets that they did not understand.”

  2. Watchers

  • “the watcher in the tower”

  • Honey Woman watched and waited

  • Bryok reportedly left the city to keep a watch

  • The centaur and satyr and the insect

  • Drinking from the well”

  • The Boatman watched the black water - part of an ancient evil and there are those of us that are tasked to watch it and protect from its reemergence

    1. Dragons Gwen: She’s heard of a dragon. The dragon was an embodiment of the earth’s wisdom. It possibly might be eldest. It may be the oldest thing out there.

Osgog made a Dragon to free his mother.

  1. Horned beings

  • Balthazar

  • Mali

  • Mogg

  • Gorgomog

  • The monster of the God of Death

  • Mannix’s helmet

  • Horns are a symbol of wisdom

    1. Elemental Fighters

  • The ice warriors that fought us in the city - a monk and a warrior

  • We have fought several followers of the Sun King who have summoned elementals to fight us. They each had a tri-metal object.

  • Perhaps the Sun King is somehow controlling the elements?

    1. Foundlings

  • Abbott Bryok was called the Foundling in the village before falling in the fountain

  • Foamflower: “Kenza looked at the Boy Who Had No Name and said “Though we found you on a rock in the ocean in a place that no man should be, I have found you to have a second sight, and so if you think that we should go to shore, we shall go”.

    1. Powerful Entities / Gods | Name A | Name B | Maybe? | Notes | | | | | | | |---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---| | Gorgomog | Moon King | Mogg | Sun - referenced as the “Moon King” by Gwen - trapped under the lake?! | Gwen says the Moon King is a “god of the dead”, like Hades. | | | | | | | Morianoth | Mabmnoss, | Mother Night | Morgan? | | Raven Queen. | Came back changed. Was fair haired and full of living things… | | Purple and black imagery. Cold, dark. Everywhere and in everything. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Mons | | | Son of Gorgomog/Morianoth. The Great Fool. | Youngest of the Three. | | The fountain in Trenewydh, was a symbol of Mons. Golden, purple irises around it. | | | | | Ceridwen | | | She of the Twins, listens to the world, learns the names of things | | | | | | | | Torval | | | Old Brother (He of the Twins), Oldest of the Three. | Given fire - spoken to by the wind, brought on by a raven… | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Doldhelan | Noswaith | Watching Mons | Wife of Mons. Mother of the five below. | Mons and Bargos See the end. That’s her. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Kevnis | | | | | | | | | | | Bremphyr | Weyland | | One Eyed Blacksmith. Forger of Gale. | God king after Mons’ fall? | Father of Bryok. | | Married to Kerenja. | | Bryok’s father. | | Rhiannon | | | Sailor, horsewoman. Great warrior, healed through violence. Original owner of Gale. | | | | | | | | Osgog | | | Healer, scape goat | a darkness was within him, but whether the darkness of the nights sky, or of stalking danger, few if any could tell. | | Night sky darkness - Mother Night’s influence? | | Osgog and the Dragon | | | Crochenwen | Priweythva | | Potter | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Kerenja | | Watching Bremphyr | Gave Gale (“family heirloom”) to Mannix. | Bryok’s mother, Bremphyr’s wife. | Probably another incarnation of Morianoth, Mother Night. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Bryok | Shining Prince | | Son of Bremfyr and Kerenja | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The Sun King | | | This Sun King claims to be a king returned - could be Mons, Bremfyr? Gwen doesn’t think so. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Bear | | One of The Twins | Protector of Nature // These two feel like the Flora and Fauna of Norvys | | | | | | | | Tree | | One of The Twins | The World Tree - think Yggdrasil Is the tree a dragon? | Has a girl inside the it. Perhaps needs renewal of life periodically? | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Icebeard | | | | | | | | | | | Honey Woman | | | Unclear who these 2 are. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Stone Sea and Storm | | Primordial Chaos? | The earth itself? Norvys? The hammer. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The Dead | | | They seal away an ancient evil. The dead are forgotten at the risk of greater harm. | | | | | | |Random thoughts…

    • Icebeard and the Honey Woman** - These two seem to be ANCIENT.

    • The Bear**

    • The Woman and the Tree and the Bear - The Twins.** The Bear watches over the tree, the tree has a girl inside it (as if a sacrifice?)

    • The God Family Tree**

  • The God King - Gorgomog - Mog?

    • From the God King:
      • befriended the Sun (Gwen’s Moon King… Moon is a friend of the sun?)
      • how to farm, tame the land

  • Morianoth - Mabmnoss - Mother Night - Raven Queen

    • Sang the winds’ songs to the Moon (Gorgomog!)
    • Loved all that grew, and a huntress. Cultivated life while also taking what life needed for survival
    • Metamorphosis from Morianoth to Mabmnoss.
      • From God King:
        • Morianoth: fair-haired, wings of a falcon
        • And after many years of wandering, Morianoth returned, but she was changed.
      • From Weyland:
        • Morgan had a way with flames, they never went out. Fire in her heart.
        • Taken by the greatest wolf to the north, snow and ice.
        • Wolf slain, burning hot heart, no Morgan to be found.
      • From Geshwa:
        • far in the north, Icebeard found something - or someone.  Trapped in the snow, or made from it, he found a woman, both beautiful and terrible to behold.  Her skin was like the snow and ice: pale, and hard, and her hair was like the shadows of the wind.  And as he began to dig her out, he found that she had wings like a bird - also black like shadows of the wind, but also at time reflecting starlight, and all the colors it contained.  
        • Honey Woman gave her honey, and brought her back to life - or perhaps to full life for the first time…this woman will bring trouble wherever she goes…
      • Conjectures.
        • Newer idea: The Moon King (GMog) got into some trouble (maybe Mons overthrew him - GMog IS the god of death) and trapped him under the lake. He and Morianoth defeated the 3 enchantresses:> Morianoth and Gorgomog sang secret names, and bound the enchantresses in a prison deep beneath the earth.  And Morianoth and Gorgomog cast down the throne from the heights of the Temple where it shattered utterly on the ground.  And they joined hands and spoke to the stones of the temple, and asked for passage into its interior and descended out of the world abandoning the people, so that no being could be possessed of their power until the temple is broken. And so the world passed into the hands of their children, who lacked their wisdom and strength, and so there is still sickness, for the names of ancient evil have been lost, and none now know them.  But it is said that some day their youngest child will arise, and with the child’s help Gorgormog and Morianoth will be found, and that the people will live in the bliss of the world’s bounty forever.I think the two of them found power from the Dead to defeat* the 3 (Stone Sea Storm) (tame the chaos of the world?). In doing so they “became” the gods of Death - the Moon King and Mother Night.
        • *Note: I am in the air, and the earth, and the flowing water, indifferent as they are. Did Morianoth join with the Stone Sea and Storm?
        • Older idea: Questionable, at this point. How can it relate to the above point? Morianoth/Morgan escaped a trap from the 3 by expending her inner flame, which burned a bowl into the mountain, left her cold, drained and exhausted, and changed. She no longer has the fire, but still has the love of living things - with the respect for the circle of life. The blacksmith son (Weyland/Bremfyr) found this location while searching for his mother and setup a forge
        • Random thought of the above. Bremfyr is Ceridwen’s son. Morgan could be Ceridwen. Maybe mother and daughter followed the same path - Ceridwen had to contain a wild evil (wolf) and gave herself to the dead, became a part of death, joined her mother in sealing the chaos??? See Cricket’s message: > There are some who live as both a flying thing and its prey. The story of daughter and mother: one and the same. Are all things circles? We move the pieces on the board, but who moves us? The sun and moon turn in circles in the sky; bees and pawns and mothers.

Children of Mons, based on Statues in the tower. Includes the gifts they may have given Mons, as per Mons vs God of Death

One and one are eldest. // Tree and Bear? icebeard and honey woman? The Sun and Moon?

Seeing all that was or is

They found two mysteries // One mystery in the snow is Morgan. The other one?

   within the snow

Again they are well hid // ? Bear is sleeping. Tree is elsewhere…

—--------

Three made twins both unalike // the 3 (Stone storm sea) made twins… Bear and the Mother Tree - Silas’s Page agrees here.

And so five ancient powers // the 3 + their twins…the 3, the bear and the Mother Tree?

To them went eight then thirteen bees. // the honey woman watches with bees. Bees are watchers?

We watch within our towers // Who are the watchers?

—---------

But she will come who sees the way

Of deeps she’ll take the sounding // This sounds like Rhiannon, the sailor daughter of Mons.

Known by nameless family name. // The daughter of Bryok was nameless.

Await the coming of FOUNDLING. //

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