The Legend of Rogan

Long ago, in the days before Joseph of Arimathea brought the Grail and Christianity to Britain, King Rogan ruled in the Dales. He was a wise king, renowned thoughout the island for his justice and generosity. Some called him a coward, for he never led his warhost out from his lands to conquer those of other kings, but those who thought to take advantage of his cowardice by invading his land learnt their error in a bloody lesson.

After a reign of many years, during which he undertook many great tasks, Rogan died, and his soul passed on to judgement. He was unshriven and unbaptised, and so was turned away from the gates of heaven. As the demons were rising to drag him down to Hell, God took pity on him for his virtue, and sent his angels to guard Rogan's soul from the emissaries of Satan. Rogan saw that he was saved, and turned again to the gates of Heaven. But God's justice was firm, and they remained barred against him. Saddened, and a little bitter, Rogan left and searched out his way back through the lands of the dead to the Dales that he had ruled as a living man.

There he found that his sons had been defeated and their kingdom shattered, nothing remaining of his great feasting hall but the great throne, standing battered and defaced on top of one of the great hills. Rogan returned to his throne and wept, and for forty days and forty nights, it rained on the Dales. But Rogan had been a king, and his grief passed. And when his grief passed, he looked around him to see how he could serve his land. The cities and castles had gone, razed by the invaders, and nothing remained but pasture for sheep. Still, people crossed his land, and Rogan regarded all those within his land as his subjects, under his protection and his justice.

The Dales became known as the safest area for travellers, where infamy and villainy would be revealed, and the lost vagrants guided to a village by a strange man who vanished as they reached their destination. Those who lived there learnt to call on Rogan in their hour of need, crying out to him as a supplicant to his king: "Lord Rogan, regard your realm. Lord Rogan, regard my sufferings. Lord Rogan, come to my aid." And he would come.

But, in time, Christianity came to those lands, and Rogan was troubled, for he still remembered that he had been turned away from the gates of heaven. Those who called on him in the name of Christ he would not aid, nor those who put their trust in divine things. Churches he saw as part of God's kingdom, and not of his, and injustice committed therein he would not avenge. And so it came to pass that the priests claimed Rogan as a demon, seeking to seduce people from the worship of the true God. But those of us who are truly wise know that he is merely a king, respecting the authority of a greater king. As Henry will neither try the ambassador of Philip, nor grant him the king's mercy, nor will Rogan succour the agents of Christ.

But those who do not put all their trust in the Church, who retain some respect for those powers which were in the land before ever the church came here, may still call upon Rogan in the old way, standing in his realm and crying out "Lord Rogan, regard your realm. Lord Rogan, regard my sufferings. Lord Rogan, come to my aid."

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