Writing Resources from Fifteen Minutes of Fiction

The History of the House of Lynch - Chapter One

The History of the Noble House of Lynch
by Elegant Butler


Near the mountains that stood above the old town of Oasis Springs was a small plateau. Standing upon that was the manor house in which dwelt the Noble House of Lynch.

The house was three stories tall at it’s highest set of rooms, a bedroom with ensuite. It was surrounded by a floral hedge with a pine archway leading from the well-manicured sidewalk to the front yard.

There was no formal walkway from the sidewalk to the porch, just a yard filled with flowers which seemed to say “All guests must frolic before entering”.

The house had been erected as a simple cottage when the town had first been incorporated in the year 1613, the same year in which a man thousands of miles away was publishing a book on the hierarchy of demons and the Globe Theater had burnt to the ground, taking several patrons and actors with it.

In the fall of 1612, Sir Kenneth Lynch, a young knight, had married Lady Sharon of the House of Morgan. It was they who had purchased the land the noble manor now stood upon, and they who had build the original cottage; a cozy room with a cookstove in one corner and a bed in the other with a little table in the middle just under the sole window. There was no bathroom back then. In those days each house, whether base or noble, had just a little chamberpot which was emptied into a little ditch after each use.

Outside there were two little gardens. One filled with flowers that cheered up the young wife on those occasions when her husband could not be home. The other was an herb garden in which she grew medicinal plants for the local midwife.

By the summer of 1614, Lady Sharon Lynch made it known to her husband that both her dresses and the house would need to be let out a bit. Sir Kenneth had been delighted and had got to work at once on adding a new room to the cottage. The Lady would have to have her dresses let out by someone else.

Kenneth and Sharon's Family

House of Lynch Part 2
Kenneth and Sharon - Continued


Sir Kenneth and Lady Sharon became the parents of a baby boy in mid June and twin girls three autumns later. The boy was named Angus after Sharon’s grandfather, the girls Magna and Ashley after Kenneth’s mother and aunt respectively.

As the children grew older, they improved in both grace and stature.

By the time he was fourteen, Angus was acting as his father’s squire. It was common in those days for the sons of knights to follow in the ways of their father, and important to Kenneth that his should do the same.

Lady Sharon did not approve of her son traveling too far during her husband’s errands, but as the opinions of women mattered very little in those days, she did not have much say in the matter. So she bit her lip save for those very few times when both had come home with wounds from some skirmish or duel. Then, she would tear into her husband with the fury of a wife and mother who has almost lost her two favorite boys.

Sir Kenneth and Angus would be almost to the point of contrition when the girls would join their mother, trying to look cross and wagging their fingers. However, at the age of eleven, and with flowers braided into their hair, this came off more as comical than cross and both father and son always ended up laughing heartily, despite their wounds. After a while, mother and daughters would join in, all just happy that neither father nor son was fatally wounded.

When the girls were of courting age, Lady Sharon brought them with her to a number of social gatherings which were held at the homes of the town’s three finest noblewomen; Lady Sarah of House MacMillan, Lady Dores of the Noble and Most Equitable House of Holmes, and Lady Bethany of the House of Stephens. All three had fine sons of courting age and it was the hope of Lady Sharon of the Noble House of Lynch that her daughters might be noticed but one such as they.

So it was to her horror that she had discovered that Ashley had eloped with Vincent Ainsley, son of John Ainsley who was butler to the House of Stephens.

The following year saw Magna married to Lord Albert Holmes. Ashley and her husband were not invited. This, as you may have guessed, caused a bit of a row between her Ashley and her mother when she spotted her sister in the marketplace several months later, both great with child and realized what must have happened.


As for Angus, he met with a woman warrior named Brynhilde Eriksdotter during a campaign that took him and his father across the ocean. The two began a most curious relationship, courting during quiet times, and fighting side-by-side in times of battle. It was shortly after one such battle that Angus received his knighthood. And shortly after this, Sir Angus asked for Brynhilde’s hand.

The warrior-maiden gladly accepted the proposal and the two married in the winter on the coast of the North Sea. In the following winter, their son Aldrik was born.

Aldrik and Dyrnhildr

House of Lynch Part 03


Aldrik Lynch was called Aldrik Anguson by his maternal aunt Dyrhildr Aerunasdotter after the old family naming tradition. His sister, to whom aunt Dyrhildr was midwife, was named Verdandi Byrnhildesdotter.

Aldrik prefered the quill to the sword. During the nights that followed the daily skirmishes of the long campaign that had waged since the early days of his sister’s life, he put tip to parchment writing down long lays on the subject of how well or poorly the battle seemed to have done that day, and short dirges in honor of those who had fallen.

That wasn’t to say that he did not see combat. The war in those days was so widespread that it was mandatory for all young men of fighting age to join the ranks.

Verdandi also joined up. Neither she nor her brother would ever forget the day she had taken up her mother’s sword.

Verdandi had been engaged to marry a farmer named Alistair Cottington, a goodly man whose great grandfather had come from across the sea when farmland in his home village had grown scarce after a tyrant had confiscated the lands and poisoned the crops.

The two had met at the town market during Verdandi’s sixteenth autumn and he had offered to take her on as a milkmaid.

The girl who bore a Valkyrie’s name was of a mind to tell him that she was a warrior maiden and did not take kindly to the offer of milking cows, Alistair had one of those smiles that you just can’t say “no” to and she soon found herself gathering up the old bucket each morning while he worked out in the fields with the crops.

It was this same smile he wore on the day he asked her to become his wife.

On the morning of her wedding day, she put on her dress, walked outside with her mother and father, and saw the flames that cover the house and fields of Cottington Farm. Stricken, she ran to the farm, seeing the tracks that led to and from its gates.

She could tell that this was no accident or divine act. So turning and walking quietly back to the house, she cast her veil and the ring he’d given her into the flames. She didn’t bother to change out of her gown as she girded herself with sword and dagger and mounted her silver grey steed Gunnar.

On the field of battle, she became known as the Bride of Doom, fearing neither death nor storm. Some called her Verdandi Tyrsdotter. Those last were those who followed her into combat on the morning after the leader of their group had been mortally wounded and had gone beyond this world in the night.

The battle had not been without its losses. Twenty men and two women were lost that day. Those who survived mourned their loss with mead and fire and listened to the dirges of Aldrik as he sang in respectful tones while the pyre-boats floated solemnly out to the great sea.

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