Excerpts from the Starlight Chronicles

The lore and histories as recorded by scholars of the Crystal Towers, now housed within the archives of the Emerald Tower, the jewel of Serendell, pride of Ardoran, and one of only three remaining Crystal Towers in Illithine.

Volume 1 – Age of the Ancients
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Legend of the Crystal Rose

By Grand Archivist Selwyn Beltayne

It is with great pride that I have dedicated my life to unraveling the mysteries of the age of the ancients, a time long before any mortal feet walked the lands the Great Father raised from the endless seas. Within these annals, I inscribe the truth of our forebears, the First Children of Arhavel. The giants. The dragons. Even the fae, of whom this tale speaks. Listen well, for now, I will speak of a magic long lost to our people.

Long ago, Arhavel’s hands raised lands from the oceans, a domain to keep safe his children of the earth and air from Undalas, Lady of the Ocean, whose wrath and hatred of all living things knows no bounds. Save for one.

Her children, though sired by Arhavel, were loyal to their mother, and so resided in the cold darkness of her deep waters. There, they built cities of coral and boundless plant life, using fish-like tails, rather than feet, to navigate the world their mother had created for them, ever wishing to earn her love and favour.

However, as is the nature of all things, there were some among her children who began to change. Who gazed up through the waters that had always been their home and saw light. Some grew ravenously curious, venturing to the surface where their kind had never sought to tread. Though the light of the sun was not kind upon their eyes, the children of Undalas persevered, determined to pursue their quest of exploration to sate their curiosity.

There, they witnessed the feats of creation wrought by the Great Father and his favoured children. Mountain roosts that gleamed with ores of silver and gold, and crystals of every colour that glowed in the sun. Glittering cities of carven stone whose craftsmanship was both beautiful and foreign to their gaze.

The children swam the inlets and coasts of this new world, soaking in the sights that were for so long denied to them. It was many days before they had had their fill and returned to their home beneath the waves. But with them, they brought small trinkets, pieces of discarded gold and gems and crystals from the shores beneath one of the giant forges. One brave child had slipped a dagger from the rocks that had been left beneath the light of the sun and moon to charge the magical crystals within its hilt.

Then, came the stories.

The children who swam to the surface returned with stories the likes of which their people had never heard before. Though some listened with awe and admiration for those brave enough to venture to the surface, there were others who feared the repercussions of this adventure. That it might make the young ones too curious. Too willing to take risks. The elders did not wish for their underwater world to be discovered by the surfacers, and so they forbade anyone venture to the surface again.

This warning would go unheeded, and in fact, tore their people in two. Between those who followed the elders, wishing to continue their lives of seclusion, and those who wished for more, to bathe in the light and claim a piece of the beautiful world where the sun and moons and stars shone.

These children of Undalas would leave behind their home and venture to the surface, never to return. For when they reached the shores of Arhavel’s lands, they wove their magics around themselves to split their tails into graceful limbs to allow themselves to walk and explore these new lands.

What followed was a great rain that covered the land. The tears of Undalas, some say, that she shed for the loss of her children from her realm. And where these drops of rain fell, blossoms grew, shimmering with all of the beautiful light of the sun shining through the water’s surface, yet cool to the touch and as unyielding as ice.

So was born the crystal rose.

Volume 5 – The Wandering Tribes
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The Importance of Warhorns

By Historian Rythas Beltayne

I have long been fascinated with the crafts of our most ancient ancestors. Little has survived from before the time of Cailean, owing to the destruction of many artifacts and traditions that came of the enslavement of our ancestors by the fae. However, this does not mean we should not study what we can, using the gifts Arhavel gave to us.

Take, for instance, the archaic warhorns crafted by the ancient tribes. Few tribes possessed the resources to craft such implements, let alone the skill. However, chief among them were the Morvann, oxrun-herders of the eastern Great Plains before the collapse of the northern lands.

Among the Morvann, it is custom that when an oxrun dies of old age, their horns are taken and given to the tribe’s best carver, who fashions them into usable items for the family whose oxrun has passed. Most commonly, they functioned as primitive goblets. However, the best horns were fashioned into horns that could cast their sound across great distances. These horns were often used by individual families herding their oxrun so as to keep track of the locations of the rest of the tribe.

Horn-carving did not begin at an oxrun’s death, however. I have found evidence to suggest that the Morvann carved the horns of their oxrun before their deaths, and that each family had unique carvings passed down throughout the generations. In observing those few carvings that survived, as well as my own travels to the distant past to witness the acts myself, I noted that the carvings grew more elaborate with time, likely in order to record a continuous history of the family and their place within the tribe. Later artifacts also hold images dating back to Cailean’s rebellion, commemorating the event and the decades of peace that followed.

Thus, it could be said that such an heirloom warhorn was as much a practical tool as a historical record. A beautiful method of preserving the past. Though no longer a necessary tradition, such pieces serve as a reminder that even before the advent of Starsight and its convenience and use in scholarly pursuits, our ancestors were determined to remember and honour their people’s past.

Volume 6 – The Rise of the Star-Seer
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On Cailean’s Golden Eye

By Archivist Lydus Verenn

Any Starseer with a modicum of talent has no doubt ventured into the past to study the life of Cailean Beltayne – though it is noted that Cailean himself never carried the name of the house he would sire as the clan name instead comes from Princess Rhiannon, his wife. And any who have ventured to Blackcliffe to see the statues of the rebel leaders who defeated the High King and freed slaves, human and fae alike, would note the unusual nature of the Grand Chieftain’s eyes. Eyes which are generally attributed to a blessing conferred by the Great Father in a time of great need to save the youngest of his children, our own ancestors.

It is known that Cailean’s eyes remained much the same throughout his life, save for the moment of his birth. According to an account given by Lord Eranis Beltayne, a Starseer of both great power and fair reputation, that Cailean’s eyes were the colour of sapphires at his birth. However, as the babe opened his eyes for the first time to see the stars and moons above, his left eye shimmered as if beneath a gentle ripple of water. The blue of his iris turned the colour of molten gold in mere moments.

With the change having come about so quickly, it is understandable that his tribe did not understand at the time that it was a gift of magic, rather than a natural, if strange, occurrence.

In the centuries since, it has been confirmed that such mismatched eyes do occur naturally in humans, if rarely. An instance of it occurring by magic, however, has not been recorded since Cailean’s birth or before it. Whether it has occurred in another is unknown. If it has, it has not been found by any Starseer in the past twelve hundred years.

*An Addendum: In the eight-hundred-forty-second year of the Fourth Age, it is recorded that a daughter of House Beltayne, begotten of High King Eoin Beltayne and his mistress, the shieldmaiden Haegyra the Great Bear, was born with eyes identical to those of the Grand Chieftain. However, according to the High King, her eyes appear to have occurred naturally. It is said that she does, indeed, possess her house’s gift. Thus, the Grand Archivist of the royal archives and the Archmage of the Emerald Tower have concurred that further observations are needed as the child grows.

Volume 7 – The Great Rebellion
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On the Treatment of Slaves

By Lady Arana Beltayne

The time before Cailean’s rebellion was among the darkest parts of our people’s history. Humans and fae alike were forced into servitude by those who fielded the greatest armies and wielded the most powerful magics of the age.

Once, the Fae Lords ruled over the lands we now call Ardoran. The descendants of the children of Undalas and Arhavel, possessed all of the strength of the Great Father and all of the cruelty of the ocean. And with it, after driving out the giants and hunting the dragons to near extinction, they turned their powers upon the humans, and even upon their own kind.

Lesser fae, whose magic was weak, naturally so or diluted by mingling fae blood with humans, were subjugated and made to serve those who raised themselves above the others.

Most famous among the Fae Lords was High King Fiachra, who established the practice of keeping humans as slaves. And many of the other fae with significant power followed suit.

It is known that the slaves were treated worse than cattle, as we know from the conditions of the Sunforge, which saw slaves packed into cage-like rooms, with only a select few allowed to have small, minimally furnished rooms of their own. Such privileges were most often reserved for slaves whose skills were of great import, such as the fae and half-fae smiths who worked the forges and needed more rest and better food in order to carry out their duties.

Blankets were scarce, with most slaves outside of the Sunforge merely huddling together for warmth, with many lost to hunger or cold. In the Sunforge, it was the heat that was most unbearable, and those with favour, such as the smiths, were housed further from the heated interior of the mountain complex. With some even allowed to keep concubines of a sort. A way for the High Lords to remind the humans that even if fae were kept as slaves, the fae slaves still ranked far above the short-lived humans.

Slaves were fed with grain and vegetables not considered to be fit for consumption by the High Lords or their vassals. Meat was rare, however, those who did the most physical labour were allowed dried meats and cheese for their bread. Occasionally, fresh meat would be brought in if the fae hunters servicing the Sunforge had particularly good hunts. This meat would find its way into stews, most often to feed the Sunforge’s guards, but also favoured slaves. Much the same could be seen across the many estates where slaves could be found. Those that were favoured received better food and quarters than the rest, if only just.

After Cailean’s rebellion, every slave was freed and slavery was outlawed across all of the lands controlled by the tribes who followed him. To this day, slavery is outlawed in Ardoran and all of its allied territories. However, to the south of the Silvercrown Mountains, in what is now the Daeorian Empire, slavery has been revived as a practice ever since the fall of the Crystal Towers, taking our own citizens into slavery to feed their hunger for power.

Though it isn’t well-documented, reports from the King’s Wolves suggest that slaves in Daeoria are treated only marginally better than those who were slaves under the Fae Lords.

I fear for our people living in the south and have urged the High King to declare their rebellion an act of war and march our armies south to retake our lands. But the Council of Clans is slow to decide and our mages are reeling from the loss of seven of the Crystal Towers. Our position is unfavourable, it’s true, but the Grand Chieftain would be aghast to see his legacy fall to the whims of the Onyx Tower and this upstart, Gallus of Daeoria.

The Lay of Karthalan