382YE Spring Equinox winds of war

Overview

It is a new year, but the war is old.

Salvage (Madruga)

Merry Lads and Lasses, The Mournwold is ours, but now our neighbours need us, and it seems our work is never done. We march to Madruga and our bills and bows advance steadily will drive the Grendel back into the bitter sea from where they came. Freelanding is the home of the Freeborn, now lets get them back their land.

Will Talbot, General of the Drakes

The Grendel swept into Madruga after the Autumn Equinox, a lightning raid agaist Atalaya and the Shining Pillar. They burned the shipyards, destroyed the Freeborn Storm, crushed all resistance on the islands of Free Landing, and then pushed on to raid the port of Quzar. The Navarr forces defending Madruga, the Black Thorns, were decisively defeated, pushed to the brink of destruction themselves.

After the Winter Solstice, the Navarr withdraw, marching north through Kahraman and the Mournwold toward the safety of distant Miaren. In the opposite direction, down out of the Mourn, come two Marcher armies to replace them. The Drakes and the Strong Reeds waste little time engaging the seafaring orcs. They drive south along the coast of Lightsea liberating towns and villages. There is some fierce fighting at Quzar, but it lasts only a handful of hours before the raiding pirates board their ships and flee back across the straits to Atalaya.

The invading orcs are nothing like the disciplined forces that have come to drive them out. The Marchers are methodical, marshalling their resources to ensure the fewest Imperial lives are lost. Seven and a half thousand soldiers against at most a few hundred raiders - it seems the bulk of the Grendel forces have already withdrawn to the islands. Sadly they take with them their ill-gotten gains, the booty of a hundred looted paradours and ruined businesses.

With the aid of the corsairs of the Brass Coast, the armies of the Marches push to liberate the islands of Free Landing. There is no navy, but the distances between islands are short and the people of Madruga are very angry indeed. There is some reticence from the Marcher captains. In the end, they are forced to admit that they either risk the sea or leave the Grendel in control of the islands. Some, of course, are more eager than others - there are yeomen born and raised among the boats of Meade and the rushes of North Fens who leap at the chance.

Soldiers of the Strong Reeds, our hard won victories do not mean we can rest on our laurels. The Empire aided us, now we in turn aid. A Steady Advance into Madruga to remove the Grendel scum.

Jack Flint, General of the Strong Reeds

The Grendel have little interest in fighting this season. A handful of hit-and-run strikes against Freeborn ships transporting Marcher soldiers, a few vicious skirmishes on this island or that. One by one the islands are liberated. Only at Atalaya is there any serious attempt to slow the Marcher advance; but it is clear that almost all the Grendel forces have already departed. Witnesses say that the great armada left, taking the land troops with it, even before news of the Strong Reeds and the Drakes reached the islands. They have also taken much of the wealth of Free Landing - including many priceless relics and artefacts of the first years of the Brass Coast looted from the museums of Atalaya.

Unfortunately, the difficulty presented by fighting over the islands does not complement the steady advance favoured by the Marchers. While almost all the islands are liberated, the troops are not in a position to take Atalaya which remains in Grendel hands. Several of the smaller islands are still occupied by Grendel forces, but they are opportunists - pirates - thieves. Not soldiers.

One more push should see the last Grendel occupation forces driven out - but such a push must wait until after the Spring Equinox.

Game Information : Madruga

The Strong Reeds and the Drakes face no organised resistance in their push to liberate Madruga. The main Grendel forces have withdrawn, leaving behind only scattered raiders and pirates. The Empire has retaken Lightsea, and is eight-tenths toward complete control of Free Landing.

Pyre (Sermersuaq)

A week after the Winter Solstice, eighteen thousand Jotun march into Sermersuaq, give or take. They march under the banners of the Queen in the North herself, the Jarl of Jarls of the orcs of Kallsea, the Skjalderborn. Heralding their way come the musicians and skalds of the Roaring Thunder, the army of Kyrac Gerdasdóttir. Impressive as this force would be by itself, they are further bolstered by what appears to be a great host of Jotun champions - the warbands that march under the banners of the greatest heroes of the Jotun - and by warriors sworn to the kirkja.

The way has been prepared by the Ice Fishers of Ldansk. Stark quickly falls. The village of Rest, and the Last Lantern become the base from which the Jotun expand to conquer the rest of the region. The ruined tower that stands near the village - The Sentinel's Rest - is briefly extinguished and then reignited by the orcs themselves. A great bonfire is raised, many times larger than the warning beacon traditionally used. Thus the Jotun armies announce their presence.

Despite the lack of any substantial force capable of holding back the tide the Jotun continue to advance cautiously with none of their normal bravado. All the signs suggest they expect a trap, preparing at any moment to fall back to their defenses. Some Winterfolk flee, many more stand and fight to defend their homes, but the Jotun advance is not even slowed. Hall after hall falls. As before, the bodies of those who fight the Jotun are treated with respect, interred beneath barrow mounds. Those who surrender are offered the Choice - but those who choose to become thralls are sent west out of Sermersuaq to Tromsa and Skallahn.

Stark falls quickly. The Jotun do not pause. They press north into Taikipari, with the same measured slow advance, prepared always for signs of treachery. More halls fall. Suaq hunting parties are intercepted, and given the Choice. A fortnight before the Spring Equinox, the Roaring Thunder and the fellowship of the Howling Bears take the Hot Springs of Taniki. The defenders are supported by Kallavesi warriors, by feathered mystics, but the Jotun roll inexorably onwards, crushing all who stand before them.

Quick moving Raðljóst scouts are spotted as far afield as the Face of Ikka in the north and Wreck in the east. Do the scouts know about the new mine in Suaq Fount? There is no way to be sure.

There are raiders everywhere. The warband of the Jarl of Aftanes pushes into Sealtoq to the east, but is repulsed with minor losses by the desperate Suaq. A feint, rather than a serious attempt to conquer. Testing the resolve of the defenders. Many Suaq fall; barely a handful of orc bodies are counted on the battlefield when the Jarl withdraws.

There is another matter of concern. In Spring 380YE, the Jotun invaded Kallavesa and over the course of the Summer established a presence there. While they later left the territory, their warriors still haunt the marshes of northern West Marsh. West Marsh lies just across the border from Stark - and if the Jotun were to turn their attention toward the ancestral homeland of the Kallavesi they would have a significant advantage in establishing a foothold there.

Furthermore, a band of hard-bitten Steinr wardens who patrol the plains beneath the Silver Peaks return to Atalaq, battered and bruised, shortly before the Spring Equinox. They bring news that a group of Jotun have passed into the foothills there. They tired warriors assert that the Jotun have been received by the Thule - a diplomatic envoy to the orcs of Otkodov no doubt. There is much heated discussion about what might happen if the warrior-born Jotun were to forge an alliance with the warlocks of Otkodov; none of it heartening. For their part, the northern orcs take no part in the invasion by the Jotun. They remain in their mountain fastness, seemingly disinterested in the slow advance of the western orcs.

Game Information : Sermersuaq

As the Spring Equinox dawns, the Jotun are dug-in at Stark, and half-way towards complete control of Tanikipari. They control most of the land between the western border and the shores of lake Atkonartoq. There are raiding forces all over the territory - any character who lives there could have seen or encountered them. The Jotun are being very cautious - but they are not afraid to spill orc or human blood in pursuit of their conquest of the territory.

Home (Semmerholm)

Dawn and the Eastern Sky has been awakened. Like a Beast waking from a winter slumber. Last Season we were but stretching our muscles. Now we are empowered and our fury untamed. The Druj will melt like frost in the first rays of the summer sun.

General of the Eastern Sky

The Winter Solstice saw the armies of Dawn, and their allies in the Golden Axe, victorious, the bulk of the Druj forces in retreat across Semmerholm, pulling back into Axmure. The Varushkans are not the only allies fighting alongside the people of Dawn. In an peerless act of Summer magic not seen since the time of Empress Brannan, Dawn's witches have called forth a grand host of elfin knights and goblin soldiers from the Fields of Glory, from the domain of Eleonaris, the Sovereign in Scarlet and Gold.

Now heralds of Summer fight alongside each of the four armies of Dawn. The golden cohort relishes every opportunity to prove their strength against the vicious, cowardly orcs of the Mallum. They sing as they fight, exulting in the chance to spill the blood of the twisted Druj. Their presence is an inspiration, and not only on the field of war. They offer and receive camaraderie with gusto, extending supernal hospitality to their fellow warriors, and accepting it in their turn. The golden palanquins of the noble fey never seem to lack for prime victuals, fine wines fermented from no earthly grapes, and shared tales of wild hunts, of glorious romance, and heroic battle in the summer Realm. The regimented ranks of green and black tents that house their soldiers - those squat, unrefined squires and archers - welcome the yeofolk to share their coarser fare, their strong spirits, and more earthy tales of conquest and desperate conflict.

Once Again the knights of the Summer Realm march with us. Rejoice in their presence and compete to Charge Triumphantly, more gloriously and show our strength. Prove our superiority in friendly competition too with the Golden Sun and enjoy the company of our fellows in the eastern sky and Gryphon's Pride and our Varushkan Comrades in the Golden Axe.

General of the Hounds of Glory

The Dawnish match their strange allies feast for feast, drink for drink, tale for tale. Gifts are exchanged; weapons and armour forged in Summer forges or bound with the light touch of Weavers. Trophies of great beasts from forests magical and mortal. Arrows fletched with unearthly feathers, or marked in the colours of noble houses. Flasks of dark purple wine, of thick brown beer; bottles of finest vintage, of strong Vaushkan mead. Some mortals and some courtiers of Eleonaris exchange favours. There are challenges offered and met, and fights "for love" between mortal and immortal, and even occasional dalliances in those timeless moments when the fires burn low and the moon hangs fat and slow above the trees of Axmure.

Not everyone is seduced by the camaraderie of Dawn's newest allies; some are less willing to embrace these inhuman knights of Summer. How can those who never die sing of the glory of a struggle between life and death? They fear for the outcome if this campaign becomes some unearthly pageant rather than a true battle to preserve the great land of Dawn. They point out that the inhuman Druj are a real enemy, not creatures of shadow from a storybook but cruel, ruthless, endlessly cunning orcs who will seize upon any weakness to murder their foes. They urge their fellows to remember that this is not a game, or a story, and that the enemy who waits for them will not easily be defeated.

Dawnish Knights, it's time to finish this. Push the line in Semmerholm and take back what is ours from the Druj.

General of the Gryphon's Pride

Regardless of these concerns, the host of Dawn rises and goes forth to face the Druj... only to find that they have quit the field.

The orcs are in full retreat - withdrawing south faster than the Dawnish armies can advance. There are the usual Druj tricks - traps and ambushes left to bedevil the unwary and the overconfident. Bands of saboteurs and guerillas who seek to outflank scouts and overzealous bands of questing knights and bring them to a bad end. As they fall back they fire the manors and villages they have conquered, sending plumes of greasy black smoke into the sky to taunt the armies of Dawn. They refuse every attempt by the armies of Dawn to draw them to battle, melting away like fog before the light of the rising sun whenever the captains think they have them within their grasp.

Oh, for sure, scattered bands of Druj continue to raid across the territory beyond the front lines. They burn, they loot, they murder. The Golden Axe spend much of their time hunting these groups, but for each band they corner two more slip through their fingers. During the Winter Solstice, a particular strike force raided the Pits of Brychel for example, carrying away a band of scholars studying the old Terunael ruins there. No sign of the raiders or the scholars is found. Those witnesses who survived the attack say that the Druj were not alone - that they met with certain bandit bands who had long harassed the people of Ulvenholm and Boar's Dell, descendants of the bitter orcs who once ruled all of Semmerholm. Now they are gone - retreated back south alongside the armies - and they seem to have taken the bulk of the bandits with them to the relief of the yeofolk and Navarr alike.

Filled with the might and power of Glory, we will charge the hated Druj and drive them from Semmerholm. For Dawn and the Empire.

General of the Golden Sun

Less than a month, and the legions of Dawn have liberated all that land claimed by the Druj. The next two months are spent rooting out the worst of the Druj hunting bands - but that is work perhaps more suited for knights errant than for the glorious hosts of the rising sun. There is perhaps some disappointment - there are few opportunities for glory.

Still, the Druj have made little effort to hide where they have gone. Their armies have crossed the southern border the way they came, back into the Barrens, back toward Dawnguard. Perhaps it is only fit that the armies of Dawn have a little time to celebrate their victory, to gird themselves for what must surely come next...

Game Information

Continue to march to Semmerholm in support of Dawn.

General of the Golden Axe

The Druj have fled Semmerholm without allowing Imperial forces any major engagements. Druj raiding parties strike various places across Semmerholm, but by the end of the season, those that have not been hunted down and destroyed have either fled the territory or gone into hiding.

Semmerholm is once again entirely in Dawnish hands.

Semmerholm Participation

This season, the magicians of Dawn summoned four cohorts of knights of glory to fight alongside their armies (and a further two engaged in other campaigns alongside armies from other nations). Any character whose military unit supported one of the Dawnish armies this season may choose to begin the next event experiencing a roleplaying effect. You are filled with absolute confidence; nothing is beyond you if you put your mind to it. Now is the time to act, to pursue goals you have been neglecting. Anyone who questions your prowess must be taught a quick lesson about the foolishness of doubting you.

Furthermore, if you are a changeling whose military unit supported one of the armies, the roleplaying effect is significantly more pronounced. In addition, however, you experience an additional roleplaying effect: you feel a yearning to see the Summer realm in all its glory, and the mortal realm seems dull and lifeless in comparison. The company of people who are not changelings of Summer heralds seems tedious and mundane, their concerns petty and limited. If you have the hero skill you have an additional hero point for the duration of the event. Such characters may also use their experience of fighting alongside the knights of glory to permanently increase the strength of their lineage.

Any character whose military unit fought alongside the Dawnish armies will receive a ribbon for a favour from one of the Summer heralds - you can make up your on story of you received it. If yourcharacter would not have accepted such a favour, you can simply hand it back in at GOD when you get your pack. You will need to provide your own phys-rep; they will generally be strips of cloth marked with symbols appropriate to Eleonaris.