Scholar Notes - March 1214

• Conflict of the Dwarves

  • After the Demons

  • The Dwarven Dispute

    • Dwarven Civil War Part I

    • Dwarven Civil War Part II

    • Dwarven Civil War Part III

  • Lineage Document

• King Aleric of Kormyre

  • King Aleric’s Oath

Conflict of the Dwarves

After the Demons

King Baldrik Ironheart was tragically slain in battle, and his son, the new King Valdan, has taken the throne. He and his brother, Prince Thenar, along with the remaining advisors to the throne, are hard at work getting the country back in order. Some cities had to be abandoned and are still being cleared of demons, and refugee camps house those who had to flee their homes. Production in the mines was drawn to a stand-still when demons blockaded the entrances, but people are hard at work to clear them and rescue anyone still trapped within.

In a smart diplomatic move, King Valdan has made an offer to Count Sebastian Everest of Winterdark to send Dwarven craftsmen to help with rebuilding in exchange for supplies. Lord Azmar, one of King Valdan’s advisors, has been heading this front. One noble in Travance has already responded, Lord Blackthorne, who sent a shipment of food to Calisvorin as a gesture of goodwill. Separately, Seámus Aeislin of Clan MacInnes is leading a small army on a campaign to wipe out demons in the High-lands, Calisvorin, and Asgaard.

The Dwarven Dispute

Upon getting ready to send the promised aid to Travance, the Dwarves discovered that their dark cousins had surrounded their homeland in force with claims in hand to the throne that King Valdan had just taken. In their weakened state, whether then put his people through more war and death, he suggested they bring this claim together to Travance.

Now in Travance, they seem to be willing to tell their side of things to anyone willing to listen, The Dark Dwarves claim to have prof in the form of a Legacy Document, that they say will be arriving the following day.

Dwarven Civil War Part I

Up until shortly before the Rift, all dwarves were one people, and they lived deep within the mountains. The seat of their kingdom was called Flamestone, named for an ever-burning piece of stone that formed the heart of their great forge.

There was some growing unrest due to the current rewards structure in dwarven society - wealth was only passed through families and nobility always controlled it. Some dwarves grew weary of constantly giving up the spoils of their hard work to the noble families. At the same time as this unrest was nearing a tipping point, the youngest of the King Gorm Redbeard's sons, Gren, was leading an expedition into a cavern opened up by recent tectonic activity. During this expedition, Gren came upon a strange object. He realized that with the current societal structure in place, he could not keep it for himself, and would have to turn it over. He decided instead to secret it away, and co-opted the cause of the discontented dwarves as a smokescreen.

What followed turned into a bloody civil war. The dark dwarves, as they would come to be known, won by leveraging their workers' knowledge of tunnels and back entrances into a particularly brutal brand of guerrilla warfare. A hero of the dark dwarves, Gromish Stonefist, and his crack team of resistance fighters eventually succeeded in killing King Gorm, putting a halt to the whole war. The oldest prince, now king, Brant, led the dwarves in a flight from Flamestone for greener pastures. They eventually settled in what it now known as Calisvorin.

Dwarven Civil War Part II

The new dark dwarven society, still ensconced in their ancestral hall, wanted nothing more to do with the trappings of their cousins. Their masonry and smithing became more about strength and practicality, so that they might better fend off the lurkers of the underdark, and to remind each other that they were not like their cousins and did not prefer ornamentation and wealth as a measure of greatness.

There was still a great deal of tension and even the occasional skirmish for years after the war was officially over. Some of these skirmishes were triggered by those who stayed behind turned out to be spies and plants of King Brant, while others were fueled by the pangs of loss of former friends and even families. Propaganda was common; the surface dwarves began to spread the notion that the dark dwarves were lazy, pointing to the lack of obvious ornamentation on their crafts. A common insult was to say they were too lazy to make their own kingdom, so they stole one.

Over time, this hurt the reputation of the dwark dwarves on the surface, and hurt relations between them and the other races on the surface of Arawyn. This, too, was part of the plan of the surface dwarves, in the hope that by depriving the dark dwarves of trade they would eventually break.

The dark dwarves responded in kind, putting forth an image of the surface dwarves as thin-skinned and weak. They, too, had a favorite insult for the other: they called the surface dwarves cave-ins.

Dwarven Civil War Part III

But though their walls were far from pretty, they were strong, and they held. The dark dwarven work ethic allowed them to survive in the underdark and even prosper. Their eventual trade relations with the dark elves caused many to see them as evil, and some of them - like some of all races - certainly are. They care little for manners or similar customs from the surface, and this has not helped their image. But so long as they are left alone, they are happy.

The dark dwarves never understood why the original structure of dwarven culture was the way it was, though. The dwarven nobility feared that if power was taken out of the hands of the few who had been trained their whole lives to lead that the beauty and direction of dwarven craftsmanship would fall to ruin. In a sense, they were right.

What was forgotten over the years, or indeed was never known by most, was what exactly Prince Gren found in that cavern that was worth tearing apart a kingdom for…

Lineage Document

• King Gorm Redbeard son of Garth Redbeard

• Gren Redbeard 2nd son of Gorm Redbeard

• Gretel Redbeard daughter of Gren Redbeard

• Broknor Stonefist the 2nd son of Gretel Redbeard

• Durgen Stonefist son of Broknor Stonefist

• Claava Stonefist son of Durgen Stonefist

• Turaak Anvilborne son of Claava Stonefist

• Conny Anvilborne daughter of Claava Stonefist

• Duane Forgestone son of Conny Anvilborne

• Vevina Fistclimber daughter of Duane Forgestone

• Calcas Rustchalk son of Vevina Fistclimber

• Correen Stonesmither daughter of Calcas Rustchalk

• Mervyn Stonesmither son of Correen Stonesmither

• Reegan Stonesmither daughter of Mervyn Stonesmither

• Jeston Whitenickel son of Reegan Stonesmither

• Derna "Long-Locks" Valasdottir daughter of Jeston Whitenickel

• Bergor Thainison son of Derna "Long-Locks" Valasdottir

King Aleric of Kormyre

King Aleric’s Oath

Word reached the King about his Castle. Many expected him to uproot his battle caravan and head strait for the castle, but this was not the case at all. The Castle is not the Kingdom he was heard saying, the people are the kingdom and I will save my kingdom by saving my people. The news of the Castle did not move the King. His battle retinue will continue its long path around Kormyre traveling from settlement to settlement fighting back the demons and saving his people. The King has declared an oath, that only when his people are all safe once again will he allow himself to return home to Castle Nostrove