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He was seven years old when he first encountered royalty and it was an experience that would soon change his life forever—but we shall get to that in a moment.

His name was Äldehn, but that was not his true name. His real name has long since been forgotten; Äldehn was the name the fé’aries gave to him. It meant “stray” for he—but that is getting ahead of ourselves. At any rate, the only clue we have as to his real name is that it meant “the Wizard is King” in the tongue of the humans.

He was the blue-eyed, dark-haired ancestor of one of the most renowned heroes of Amethyria (who does not come into this tale but another). Now Äldehn was a poor peasant, mind you, living in one of the largest cities of the Westyr Desert and that was Bengdor. He lived in a small mud-brick house typical of those in his caste. It was only one story tall, but half of it lay sunken into the desert ground so as to keep it more cool during the day. It had but two rooms, one for eating in and one for sleeping in. And it was never clean for his mother was always much too busy begging for food or work to ever worry about it; and his father…well…that was the tragedy of Äldehn’s life so far. His father had died long ago of a terrible mysterious disease when he, meaning Äldehn, was only four years old. Äldehn had never truly known what had happened to his father save what his mother had always told him and that was his father had been taken away. Of course, Äldehn never knew where his father had been taken to or why, but he never questioned his mother.

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All right, here's my thoughts:

INFO DUMP! We care about the encounter with royalty, since that will change his life forever. We don't care enough about him yet to care about his real name versus his fé’arish name, or about what his real name meant, or whatever. And a kid whose father died of mysterious causes when he was little is not unusual. Heck, my grandma's dad died when she was four. I won't be interested in this kid's past until I know him better.

All the little narrator insertions are kind of distracting and frustrating. Every time you say "but that's another story" or "but we'll get to that later," my first question is, "Well, then, why did you bring it up here? Why didn't you wait until later, when that information is relevant, to tell me?" I understand what you're going for--a storyteller feel kind of like in Hart's Hope--but this isn't the best way to accomplish that. Directly adressing the reader on occasion is all right, but make sure it's with something that's immediately relevant.

So, basically, your hook needs to be the bit about the royalty, not about his dad. That's what I'm interested in as a reader, and that's what you have to snare me with. Later, after we care about him, you can tell us the rest about his dad and whatnot, and then it will make sense and we'll care.

One thing that Beth said, about coy and intrusive narrators...it's basically the coyness that will lose you the most readers. An intrusive narrator that seems interesting in his, her, or its own right is something that most people will like right off, even if they don't know there's a narrator and just think that's the author speaking.

I am opposed to infodumps in general - there is almost always a more graceful way to work in the necessary information. But I think starting with one, no matter how entertaining, is a big turn-off. What I want to read is a story, not a chunk of exposition. Hook me on a story, and I *might* be willing to read through an infodump later; but if you start with the infodump I am not going to read past the first page.

But, as others have said, there are many other ways to get the information out there that not only develops the character, but does it in a way that we really care about him.

I especially like Judith's advice (in general, since you obviously can't do the bit about the fé'aries naming him)--since this is a novel, you can take the whole chapter (maybe make it a prologue of sorts?) to give us this information, and it would be a good hook and a good way to get the info.

The thing that nags me the most is your narrator. You can do a great job with narrators if you do them well. But you can totally destroy a story with them, too, if you don't do them well. Your narrator has potential, but I would focus on developing his character. After all, this is the character that the audience is going to be spending the most time with, and if they don't like the narrator, they won't like your story. But he has to be nearly invisible, or they'll get distracted by him. It's difficult, but I think you can do it. Just keep in mind that people are going to decide whether or not to read your story within the first few pages--often the first thirteen lines--which is why they have to have a strong hook.

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“She is nothing other than a fé’arie. Amazing creatures fé’aries are,” answered Sirus.
“A fairy?” asked Saavro leaning slightly forward in interest.
“No, Saavro, a fé’arie. Fairies are quite different from fé’aries and are quite rare as well. Fé’aries have far greater powers than fairies,” Sirus explained. “They specialise in healing and magic.”

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About the info dump: yes, it's your story, you get to do what you want. But I want in-the-moment narration, and the summary of his naming and his background didn't interest me. I'd rather get to know _him_ -- whether I like him, for example. Then I'll care about the fe'aries.

And about changing "fé'arie" to something else...hoo boy, that's going to be difficult. I've got manuscript after manuscript I'm going to have to go through and fix if I do that. Plus I can't come up with another name to call them. Nothing else I can think up right now really fits them. I'll work on it, though.

I didn't think the fragment was at all bad; I liked it. I do have a suggestion (not for a change, but something you could use as a strategy later on).

If your narrator is going to be coy, make it part of his/her personality. Make the narrator a bit cranky about sharing, perhaps, or just the sort of person who would derive perverse enjoyment from deliberately making people wait. Go all the way with it, so it isn't just a mannerism.

After all, in The Hobbit, Tolkien was mostly likely doing that as part of reading it to his son Christopher, IIRC--and stories read aloud are very different than ones on the page. I think he probably liked the way it sounded and left it that way. And he was a man very in tune to the way things were spoken--the nature of words being his job, more or less.

Anyway, back to your story, I think that if you allowed the narrator to throw his/her personality around, it would end up lending your info dumps (which in this case seems necessary, and has to be fit in somewhere) a bit more character and color--they'd be structured the way they were because of the narrator's quirks, and not because that's the way they had to be. I don't know if I'm making any sense on this, but I hope it helps.

Edit: If you ever do want or need anyone else to crit, go ahead and send it along to me and I'll be happy to help if I can.

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He was seven years old when he first encountered royalty and it was an experience that would soon change his life forever—but I shall get to that in a moment. First, you must learn some things about this fellow, for not long after he had his first royal encounter, these things were forgotten. I am the only one now who remembers them and thus, I am the only one who can reveal them to you, so you must listen carefully.

His name was Äldehn, but that was not his true name. His real name, along with much of the knowledge of his former life, has long since been forgotten; Äldehn was the name the cé’ahnei gave to him. It meant “stray” for he—but I am getting ahead of myself. At any rate, the only clue anyone has as to his real name is that it meant “the Wizard is King” in the Ancient tongue of the humans. Not even I am able to remember what this means.

He was the blue-eyed, dark-haired ancestor of one of the most renowned heroes of Amethyria (who does not come into this tale but another). Now Äldehn was a poor peasant, mind you, living in one of the largest cities of the Westyr Desert and that was Bengdor. Long before he lived in the palace of the king, he lived in a small mud-brick house typical of those who had only enough money to live from day to day. It was only one story tall, but half of it lay sunken into the desert ground so as to keep it more cool during the day. It had but two rooms, one for eating in and one for sleeping in. And it was never clean for his mother was always much too busy begging for food or work to ever worry about it; and his father…well…Äldehn did not have a father. He had died many years ago and thus, Äldehn hardly remembered he had even had one. To him, there was only his mother.

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And I haven't gotten around to typing the rest of my first chapter up yet, so I might have to delay sending it for another day or so. And there's still so many things I have to revise before it's ready.

Beautiful!

A few minor nitpicks:

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At any rate, the only clue anyone has as to his real name is that it meant “the Wizard is King” in the Ancient tongue of the humans. Not even I am able to remember what this means.

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You just said what it means. What you don't remember is what it was.

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And it was never clean for his mother was always much too busy begging for food or work to ever worry about it; and his father…well…Äldehn did not have a father.

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A couple of things. It would flow better if you put a comma between "clean" and "for." Also, you could technically make this two sentences, like this:

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And it was never clean for his mother was always much too busy begging for food or work to ever worry about it. As for his father…well…Äldehn did not have a father.

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