Song of Homecoming

Discovery, Exploration

The nation of Alphatia forms after a grand merchant fleet is lost in a storm and a young child calls forth the islands through her song.

In the beginning, the Sea Gypsies were simple human merchants, who plied their trade along the coast of Westeros. One day, an immense storm diverted a flotilla of ships belonging to a single merchant fleet. Swept from the regular shipping lanes, they eventually lost sight of land, and without any expertise in open-sea sailing were unable to guide themselves home. As the days and weeks passed, their plight grew more desperate, and they turned their pleas to the gods, but to no avail. Their supplies of fresh water depleted, they abandoned all hope, and yet in their midst a child began to sing the song of homecoming, a song taught to her by her mother, a song passed down through the generations. As the child finished singing, the flotilla was engulfed by yet another great storm, which tossed the ships about and sent everyone below deck for hours without count while the storm raged. When the weary and dehydrated crew emerged from below-deck after the storm had abated, they found their ship beached on a shallow reef off a coastal island, one of many, forming a chain of islands now known as the Alphatian Isles, and thus was the legend of the song that birthed a land was born.