Helmond and Breach Storms

Contrary to Scholarch Tilsen’s opinion, there does not seem to be some internal or secret method that the Ten Clans use to predict the coming of breach storms. Rather, their society is built around the expectation that they will come. Their famous “steppes” have been carved in ways that naturally defend them from the abrasive storms, protecting most of their structures. Their farming areas are built around channels and canals that encourage snowdrift to pile up away from crops. The northerners make use of high pillars tightly wrapped in long canvas that can be quickly unfurled and anchored above the plants for the sake of protection from the blizzard, assuming it is a quick one and it comes alone.

Tilsen also failed to treat of breach chains. Whether this was because he did not believe in them or it simply did not come up, I can not guess. They are a rare phenomena, usually only occurring once or twice in a generation, though there are a few instances in their oral histories where they say it happened with greater frequency. These are the deadliest natural disasters that the Ten Clans face, and result in loss of lives, livestock, and crops in damning numbers. There are known cases of families freezing to death within the comparative safety of their homes. Several important historical famines occurred as a result of these breach chains, usually with significant cultural and ethno-political changes. A famous example known even as far as Belmar and up to the current day would be the famine during the reign of King Yulian Elrin, about six hundred years before the Ordering. A series of breach storms set into motion the long chain of events that eventually led to Wolfsong and King Beilan Elrin meeting and fighting alongside one another, and to the formation of the famous “Sons of Winter” who so terrorized the darklanders during the war.

Investigations into the Shine

“Third Autumn 12. We have now made our fourth attempt to cross the Shine, and reach the border of the Darklands at the Scarred Bluffs. Now, as with the three times before, we have found ourselves somewhere entirely other than we should be. Keeping the sun to our left in the mornings and our right in the afternoons, we still arrive back at the border of the Shine after five days of hard travel that should have covered well over one hundred leagues. My current theory is that some unknown property of the sand here produces a mirage powerful enough to misplace the sun, moon, and stars. Further research will be needed. I can report at least one major step in progress though: in Pashaan, we were allowed to study the so-called Shine-rot. It was an old man who refused to leave his home some twenty years ago, when the Shine finally overtook it. Though we estimate that the Shine expands at a rate of approximately three to four inches in a month, there are sometimes what the people here call a Shine Storm. In this very odd phenomenon, which I have not yet witnessed, the sands of the Shine withdraw from one place by some dozens of feet, and in a single day, stretch into some new place. This is always accompanied by a sand storm, during which people often go missing, and are never found again.”

Third Autumn 18. Shine-rot resembles a kind of leprosy, but does not appear to be contagious. Pashaan maintains a council of elders, and the seniormost among them have been a treasury of information. They say there is no treatment for it, and that even when removed far from the Shine, the disease advances at the same rate. Remarkably, this aligns with our investigations into plant life as well, which will not recover health again once they have begun to die at the Shine’s approach, no matter how far removed or how carefully tended. According to these elders, the disease is very slow. It first attacks the brain, causing periodic disorientation or forgetfulness. After a year or two, the ability to move can become impaired or even randomized. According to one elder, Mor’esh by name, short fits of madness may occur at this stage. A year or two after that the lesions and hardenings of the skin we all associate with the disease begin to appear, followed by gradual emaciation until death. I do not believe our company is in any danger, however, as they all agree it takes years of exposure to the Shine for the rot to begin. They still all discourage us from a fifth attempt to cross it, but I believe their reticence is derived from a general superstition.

First Winter 3. In Pashaan and Velsen both, there is a kind of distinct culture that has arisen around living so near to the Shine. Though they try to keep it out of our sight, knowing that we are representatives of the Crown and that such superstitions are outlawed, we have still been able to record some of it. Firstly, by the occasional slip of the tongue, it has become clear that they regard the Shine as a sort of living thing. From a purely scientific point of view it has been interesting to observe this, and to see how ancient man must have anthropomorphized those forces of our world which he was at the absolute mercy of. I have found some evidence of offerings, and even one stone altar on the side of Velsen that faces the Shine. When asked, of course, the residents fiercely deny any such thing. These traditions seem to be cumulative and generational, as the border towns nearest the Shine are composed preeminently of generations displaced by its growth. Each family here can tell you the name of the town their people once lived in, even if it was centuries ago, and there is automatic kinship between families who once came from the same place.”

Excerpts from the journal of Scholarch Leitral,
Recovered by a Courser from the saddlebags of a horse found outside Pashaan.
Secured by Scholarch Tayn in the 120th year of our third kingdom.

The Man They Name The Lion

To His Eminence, Arch Confessor Kayvar Soln, I hope this letter meets you in good health.
I write to you from Diadveen. In Sampur I heard some of the freefolk refer to the southern heretic as “the lion of Diadveen,” and so after gathering what information I could there, I and my company rode here. It is a town of middling size, and stands at the cuff of the Shine, which is slowly swallowing it. I am told that in older times it was nearly twice the size it now is, but the desert has pushed in on it, “and yet the Shine grows,” as they say. Still, they are an enterprising people and composed largely of traders who frequent the harsh journey along the Sandpath.

Practically speaking, it seems that every person here is a follower of the lion. I have not revealed that we are confessors and am not wearing the black, for they outnumber us impossibly, and I doubt that we would survive if we started arresting and trying them. That task must be entrusted to you and to an able commander of armed men, who would need to storm this city as though it were an enemy army in order to root out its heresy. Some of them say he is a prophet from beyond the Shine, bringing a religion from the darklands to our Ordered World. Many say he is a god. All agree that he is a man, though not all agree on his appearance, which has lead me to believe some of his disciples may sometimes impersonate him in order to throw us off the trail and make him harder to find. Though I can not conduct many interviews without raising suspicion, I have been able to speak to a few about the so-called miracles, including one woman who swears she was dead, and now lives. I will not sully your eyes by writing out all the absurdities I have heard, but they number in the hundreds. At present an alchemist is riding to us from Parthad, Vettiver by name, to test the wells and determine if some kind of poisoning has lead to mass hysteria. I will write again when we have his results.

In the Light of the Proofs,
Confessor Enaso Martani

Regarding the Calamity

“…I completely disagree with the assessment of Archon Palavast. To say that the Calamity was caused by some weapon of science would be like saying feces was the result of consuming fresh water, rather than urine. If scientific knowledge was the cause of the mighty blast that day, a blast seen from a thousand leagues away according to some nomads in the far north, then why have we, the epitomes of science and reason, been utterly unable to discover its mechanism. No, after a lifetime of research and the reading of hundreds of scrolls and tombs, I remain convinced that this was the result of an arcanum which has since been banned and forgotten. We have no doubt that the High King knew the true occult nature of this event, and that the very knowing of this was precisely why he forbade the arcane arts. That’s right! I have said it. We propose that it is not because magic was false that the High King outlawed it, but rather, that it was real, and when he saw its terrible power, he decided rightly that this did not belong in the hands of men.

I am not saying, wise brothers and sisters, that this art or science, if we call it a science as I think we should, I am not saying it should ever return to the realms of men. Let it be gone and forgotten. Still, I am a man of reason, and my reason forces me to admit that our current model does not explain the events surrounding the Calamity and the collapse of the second kingdom. Who among us knows why strange coils snake their way through the rafters of our royal palace in Belmaras? Coils, I will remind you, that have proven impervious to our weapons as much as our acids. And if things like sacred objects be only myth, then why did the Torch of Reason, our High King himself, melt the Elrin King’s sword as soon as he took it? Why did he cull the mages and kill the alchemists if there was no value, and therefore no harm, in their arts? You may call me an ugly finger, but I am merely a finger pointing at an ugly truth. Magic is real, and we have forgotten that. For now it is no harm, but I can not help but think it will eventually be our folly.”

~ Banned Scrolls Regarding the Calamity, Portfolio 229
Scholarch Visina’s Apology before his execution
Recorded by scriptor Rabbard, during Visina’s trial, seventy-second year of our Third Kingdom

On the Matter of Glaves

…To that end, I agree with the research of our late Scholarch, Halwin Farkasey: that the tradition of glaves, and royal glaves especially, is rooted in the relationship of King Beilan Elrin and his guardian Wolfsong Vinmondson. As Morrell notes in his Histories, it was Wolfsong of the northern tribe of Vinmondson who was summoned from Helmond on the matter of weaponry. When he arrived, it is said in a letter we have from that bygone era, he and King Beilan found themselves to be of agreeable nature and developed an amicable relationship that soon turned into steadfast friendship.

Darklanders invaded Solmar in the tenth year of his reign, which we approximate to have been five centuries before the founding of our glorious Third Kingdom. Wolfsong, according to one report, never asked to join the king in the ensuing battles, nor would it have been usual to do so, as the country of Helmond had no special allegiance to Belmar at that time. Rather, we are told that as soon as the news came, Wolfsong sent a messenger to retrieve several of his clan from his homeland with orders to bring weapons, armor, and a group of strong fighting men. What information we now have suggests that this was the inception of the relationship between Helmond and Belmar, and marks the beginning of a routine exchange between the two beyond the matters of iron trading and smithing.

Over the following decade, now often called the Ten Dark Years, King Beilan held the darklander forces at the Yawning Pass, at the southeastern end of Solmar. Though the forces of Belmar, Solmar, and Narrania came together to fight them, the numbers of the darklanders were as could be expected of ants and flies, and they could not be driven off with ease. Their light armor made them mobile, and they fought with close weaponry. Seeing this, Wolfsong Vinmondson installed training camps where the men of the army learned the northern way of wrestling. After a year of study and practice in this art, the royal army finally secured victory and sent the darklanders back to their desert wastelands and away from the King’s peace.

When the war was ended, Wolfsong never returned home, choosing instead to remain with the king. Before the end of his days he secured a pact with his homeland, and sent for his grandson, Cloven Wolfsong, to come and serve the children of King Beilan the same way he had served the king. With this, it appears, the tradition of a Kingsglave was initiated without any official decree. The arrangement continued for centuries, but was not formalized until His Grace and Our Savior, the High King Eden Belrase, wrote it into the principles and agreements of the Concordant, at the inception of our glorious Third Kingdom. With that, he created two positions instead of one: a Kingsglave to always guard the Belrase heir, and, mercifully, an Elrinsglave to always guard the living heir of the deposed Elrin dynasty, in honor of the beginnings of Belmar’s relationship with Helmond.

Ever since Helmond was brought into the fold of the King’s Protection, it has become commonplace for lords, wealthy merchants, and those of title, to employ a glave of their own. These bear no special title such as the Kingsglave and Elrinsglave do, and are called simply glaves. In the time of this writing, anyone can see a glave or two at an inn, tavern, or else on the mainways and byways of the Nine. In keeping with tradition they are most often from Helmond, and in that state, it has become seen as honorable employment. Many young men, and even skilled women, for they too are tall and strong in Helmond, grow up with the ambition of becoming a glave. The most ambitious of them aim to become Elrinsglave or Kingsglave, for which they must compete in the Great Tournament when a new heir is born.

~ Scholarch Bartrem’s On the Matter of Glaves, Chapter 2
Written in the Twenty and One Hundredth Year of the Third Kingdom
Alisso Bartrem is the scriptor

The Realm of the Concordant

Our supreme sovereign, His Grace The High King Eden Belrase, skillfully subdued the warlords and regional rulers of the eight states that surrounded the royal state of Belmar, and bound them together in the Concordant. First he conquered Rikkan to the north, for they lacked unity, and warred among each other for supremacy of the horse trade and lapis of their mountains. When this was accomplished and the other lords saw his might and the rightfulness of his claim, Grand Duke Darton Narventis of Narrania surrendered his rulership and gifted Narrania to His Grace. As the First to Kneel, the Grand Duke did not have to pay the joining ransom that the other lords did when they entered the Concordant.

With Rikkan to the north and Narrania to the west both conquered, The High King turned his attention to Galway by the sea. Lord Severi Marcano met him in several battles, putting up the longest fight of any nation, but in the end was defeated at the hill now called Edensgain, for with it, The High King took Galway. With Narrania and Galway thus taken, the southern state of Solmar, with no support, fell on its own and without battle. Four states strong, Our Lord, who is the Torch of Reason and of fairness and justice, secured the remaining three states by diplomacy.

Janu, being the southernmost state and closest to the Darklands, suffered the most from Darklander raids. Aware that without support they would be unable to defend themselves in the event of an invasion, a ruling descendant of Syuna Felivan, the ancient Queen of Oristan which Janu was once the heart of, Jireena Felivan, surrendered the land to His Grace. At the border of Janu and Parthad, nearly five leagues from the city of Parashrun, the Qushara of Parthad, Etrorin Qushara, met us with a might of twelve thousand men and one thousand horse. After three clashes spanning four weeks, the Qushara and his rightful king met in negotitian, both eager to spare the lives of their men so far as possible. In the end, Etrorin entered the Concordant, under the condition that the Upright Law not be pushed upon his people, and that they be free from the fears of the newly-formed Justicant and its Confessors. Though many urged His Grace against this agreement, his wisdom outshines ours as the sun outshines a candle, and for his own ineffable reason, he accepted, and brought Parthad into his protection.

Cardania had been silent, choosing a principle of non-interference, hoping to avoid the spread of our light. The High King saw that their naval power had to be ours, or else our shores would never be secured. Through cunning and intelligent ploy, we secured the last living son of the King of Cardania and filled his mind with the Proofs. At his son’s entreaty, King Owen Belkind bent the knee to His Grace and thus Cardania entered into his skillful rule. At that time, our Lord of Reason’s glave and protector, the northman Graveson Helmondson, returned to his ancestral home of Helmond. He fought the heads of the gavels in single combat and defeated them, becoming their Warchief, and then entering Helmond into the Concordant.

In this fashion the entire continent was secured, and the warring lands and realms became a single Ordered World, divided into nine states, Belmar at its heart. The eight who had once ruled, gathered at royal invitation in Belmaras, in our splendid capitol, and knelt together to pledge their loyalty to the High King. In his unperishing mercy, he allowed each of them to retain governorship of their respective state, and appointed over them a royal Regent, who would act as the High King’s mouth to their ear, and ensure they obeyed royal decree.

~Morrell’s History, Folio 2, Chapter 31, The War of Nine Kings.
Written in the Twentieth Year of the Third Kingdom.
Dedicated to King Arron Belrase, Heir and First Born of the High King Eden Belrase (gone to peace)
Scholarch Medisto is the scribe-hand