Friends & Neighbors in the Town of Forget-Me-Not 

Our Beginnings 

 

Across the Vast Expanse - 1695

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Three long years, after a grueling journey across landscapes that defied imagination, the Conclave Elders stood at the top of a high cliff, staring at the peninsula below, a spit of land that dared to exist within the immense sea that ravaged its shores. Rings of islands lay in the distance, and rivers, both small and large, meandered through the visible land as far as the eye could see until it became a field of deep blue. How far that sea stretched they couldn’t begin to know.

 

It was the farthest they could possibly go in their quest for freedom without worrying about their physical survival. If they couldn’t find safe harbor here, there would be no place for them.

But this place felt right.

 

The salt air spread a welcoming, familiar balm over their faces. The deep, musky scents of the forest at their backs filled them with a sense of home. The endless expanse of the ocean reminded them of another on the eastern side of continent, and that peninsula offered them a sanctuary, a seclusion to live their lives and create a community filled with harmony and peace and…magic.

The eldest of the Conclave, a warlock most powerful named Silas Deeds, leaned down and plucked a small flower from a field of blue.

 

“I know this flower. I’ve seen it many places in Europe, but I learned of it in the Germanic region. They called it vergissmeinnicht.”

 

“What does it mean, Master Deeds?” asked Constance Curtis.

 

“Forget-Me-Not,” Silas said with a smile.

 

“Such a small thing for such large aspirations,” Constance said.

 

“And yet, look how it blossoms here. It fairly covers the ground, holding fast and true to the land.” 

He glanced at the peninsula below. “We can be like this small flower. We can hold fast and true.”

 

“There are others here,” Richard Summers said. “We saw so many on the journey, and the smoke we’ve seen drifting through the trees and along the riverbanks indicates there are many already living here.”

 

Silas nodded. “We can share this land. We can offer friendship and peace, and with time, the people already here may grow to accept us, dare I say to truly like us? We can offer them so much in exchange for their fellowship. And if a relationship with them stays firm, we can form a community nestled within theirs. Our families will have a secure haven to grow and build and learn.”

 

“It is an honorable wish for the future,” Constance said. “Do you think the possibility exists that we could find acceptance and fellowship here?”

 

Silas sighed. “It can be no worse than the places we’ve left behind, my dear friend.”

 

“You speak true,” Richard said.

 

“We come with open hearts, with open minds,” Silas said, “and it is a sorry people who fails to recognize honest and goodhearted intent.”

 

“Others have,” Richard said.

 

Silas glanced at his friend. “And we have left them behind.” He twirled the small blossom in his fingers. “Forget me not… We will never forget what has happened to some of our fellows, but we will move on and forge ahead, holding their memories strong in our hearts. These small flowers give us a sign that even the weakest, even the smallest can have strength, and, my stalwart friends, our group is anything but weak. We will make our home here.”

 

And they settled onto the beautiful peninsula they called Forget-Me-Not.