Huorns are semi-mythical 'forces of nature' embodied by trees of the ancient woodlands of Avalon. They should not be confused with the awakened or roused trees as ents or shepherds: these are far more benign, communicative intelligences typically sympathetic to sylvan or animist types. See HELP ENTS for info on these living trees. The huorns manifest as groups of trees - often an entire wood - roused to a kind of reactive proto-intelligence. They are able to move from location to location, though they tend to be still and indistinguishable from everyday trees. They are able to act with extreme violence, at lightning speeds: imagine the progress of a tree working its root and branches under, into and through a stone wall over many centuries. Stone is stronger than wood but the tree prevails to break the stone, over the decades. Play out the aforementioned in a matter of seconds and you have an inkling of the potential power of the huorns.
Huorns are unaligned by nature, but take on the roused purpose of their ent-shepherds. They are derived from specific tree types often sharing kinship with the ent; certain trees have the capacity to enliven more huorns than others, and the older the tree the more huorn potential it will enjoy. Huorns, once roused to the foreground, can be very dangerous entities unless closely marshalled by their ent-shepherd. Left to their own devices they can wreak havoc, take life on a terrifying scale... or do nothing but wait, patient, blended into the forests. Individually it can be a hazardous venture to attack huorns: pointless without an effective weapon like an axe or a projectile fire. Legions suitably trained have the best chance of battling a huorn group but even then fatalities will be inevitable.
On the odd occasion the might of the forest has been turned against human civilisation - the last time many centuries ago - two ent-shepherds and a great but vengeful Ranger did rouse the huorns of the Bedillam and G'harran. Ingald, father of Ingold, had been driven insane by the death of his beloved and the failure of the healers of Ilmarael to offer cure; nor the sages of Alessandria to succour grief. So Ingald's thoughts turned to destruction and, under his ent-shepherds, these two ancient woodlands brought forth large huorn groups: oaks, rowan, birch and elms strung along the Parrian Highway and the Uruk Road; streaming through Mercinae and Eleusis while the citizens cowered indoors, frightened for their lives. Ingald beheld the Ilmarael ramparts, heard the council sue for peace and mercy as they saw the trees amassing about their borders, and laughed "...as one fey".
The two huorn-groups hurled themselves against the ancient walls of Ilmarael and tore the very stones to pieces, ripping apart fortifications and barricades, slaughtering the defending soldiers. Ingald was slain in the offensive but the huorns raged on, smashing beautiful Ilmarael to pieces, wanton destruction everywhere. The citizens fled, carrying their children, their knowledge and their valuables away. Were it not for the calming songs of the remaining Ilmarael Bards and the collective assertion of other, less renowned Rangers to assauge the ent-shepherds, who knows: the huorns may have brought chaos to the whole of Avalon (for Ingald was dead, his son but a babe). The remaining Rangers and their Bard friends, however, were successful. The ents were pacified, and eventually the huorns were led back whence they came; to melt back into their respective woodlands, their violence naught but dormant tree-memory.
Ilmarael, however, was destroyed and never rose again. Its citizens were welcomed into the nearby villages and cities (Mercinae particularly) and the ruins of the ancient capital remain to this day to the north of the Meeting Place, around the Room of Stars.
Such is a tale of the huorns. See HELP FORESTS and HELP TREES for further information about the ancient woodlands and their oldest and most noble inhabitants.
