Rory O'Connor, Fiorfir O'Reilly, and Etain Finnegan were all Irish Gaels born in the western kingdom of Connacht. All three, like the rest of Ireland, or Erin, had a sacred devotion to their ancient Brehon Laws that governed their island. But beyond that, the three led quite different lives. Rory O'Connor was a younger son of a High King, Turlough O'Connor, and Fiorfir O'Reilly was Rory's main sword. Both had been afforded a life of privilege that Etain Finnegan never had. Etain Finnegan lived in an Irish rundale commune, an ancient system that Irish Gaels lived by, centered around basic survival and sustenance. Etain and her village had to work hard for everything they had and for everything they ate.
In Ireland in 1166, Rory O'Connor and the many Irish overkings, nobles, and land chieftains that governed their politically fractured island had known nothing but war and turmoil. The Irish landscape prohibited the many different sovereign clans and kingdoms from dividing the island's limited resources evenly among them. Governing their island this way, divided and fractured, has led them repeatedly down the same paths, to the same conflicts. Conflicts that the clans couldn't afford, with Irish Gaels and resources stretched too thin already.
Rory O'Connor sought to find a new way as he strove to become High King of Ireland, like his father. Fiorfir O'Reilly and his small sword clan swung their swords trying to get Rory there so he could enact his vision for a new and united Ireland. But even if they get Rory O'Connor to the throne, it may be too late. Old Irish conflicts have brought a new threat to their shores that none of them knew was coming, and none of them were prepared for. Can the Irish Gaels finally see themselves as one island and unite against the coming threat to save their Gaelic Brehon way of life? Or would the same old conflicts pave the roads of Erin towards their destruction?
