3. Literature & Précises of Moonreach Keep

Literature & Précises of Moonreach Keep


  • The following are excerpts from the collected works, studies, research, and histories documented by various scholars, mages, and nobles of Moonreach Keep.

    Derelictions of False Lords

    Chapter excerpt from Nobles of the North, by Mara Stockley

    2.2.1(B)

    In the Year of Uncertain Futures, members of what we now call the Golden Geese guild were gone from Peltarch and the Nars writ large. That is by exile, travel, or otherwise. It would be an age before their homecoming, to the point that the North would all but forget them.

    Before the more recent calamities of yesteryear, the servants of demons laid waste to many smaller villages among the townships to the northeast of the Nars. The Town of Willowhaven burned, its inhabitants bled and died. But one of many. Few survived the attacks. Fewer still the trek through the cold dark to the strongholds of High Hold and Peltarch.

    Within those crowded walls they competed for lodgings and shelter. When inn prices rose and gold vanished, those who fled to High Hold petitioned Lord Eric. But he refused, unwilling or uncaring. If not possessed by darker spirits. "We must tend only to our own. Beware enemies without and within," he explained. His voice barely above a murmur. Like the gasp of a dying man. His skin pale, and his eyes milky and white.

    Those who fled to Peltarch instead petitioned King Thalaman Fisher. But he, too refused. "There is no gold," he slurred, it is said, above a shining mug filled with wine. Barely able to form words, or to stand, if even to see or think. The crowd insisted. Empty bellies beget desperation. It is not clear who threw the first fist, or swung the first blade. The most reliable accounts identify the King's guards as the instigators.

    The so-called King ordered his guard disperse the petitioners.

    A cry came forth, it is said. From the Lady Maude, leader of the Willowhaven survivors, protected by the valiant Sir Firnen Kaapo, squaring off against ten or more men. She presented the Thalaman Fisher with his own flesh and blood: her son, Caleb Fisher, borne from King George and her coupling, long ago secreted away to the town of Willowhaven with King George's blessing.

    But the King did not rescind his order.

    [DM Xanatos Gambit]


  • Refractions of Silver

    Chapter excerpt from Heterodoxy of the Hidden Moon, by May Celine

    1.0. Dispersions

    That there would be one exclusive understanding of any given faith is the most mortal conceit. This peril runs double for those powers that have existed the longest, among which is our Moonmother Selûne.

    It was ever ago, though I remember it clear. The night in which Lorenna Suaril, daughter to the High Priestess of Order of the High Moonlight, draped her attack in the cloak of a question. Her tone steeled with rhetoric certainty and skepticism. Certainty in her mother's orthodoxy. Skepticism in our then fledgling Order of the Hidden Moon.

    "Is the denial of Selûne's light not apostate? Our Moonmother is She is Who Guides -- and not, as it were, She Who Hides."

    So she spoke at the Waterdhavian House of the Moon, upon the eve of Selûne's Hallowing, during the Year of Winter's Chill. Before the whole of the church attendance, from the eldest priests to the youngest acolytes, traveled far and wide. To ask so publicly and opportunely was doubtlessly the plan. Borne, perhaps, in concern for her mother's position.

    "Ask not why she hides amidst clouds or brings forth tides to veil lands in crystal fog. Know instead that she guides even when unseen. Such is the difference between moonlight and nightgloom."

    So replied the late sage Mirabel Brokengulf, may she now peacefully rest, having laid bare our Order's foundation. Before the church, its leaders, and all those gathered for its most cherished holy day.

    Spurned by many of the attendants.

    Attendants who did not wish to displease the daughter of the revered and respected Naneatha Suaril. She who hesitated, and decided to contemplate rather than rebuke her daughter's insult.

    Many, but not all.

    [DM Xanatos Gambit]


  • The Cleimant Aspiration

    Chapter excerpt from Nobles of the North, by Mara Stockley

    2.2.1(C)

    Noble spirits were not cold to the disastrous tenure of Lord Eric of High Hold, and King Thalaman Fisher of Peltarch.

    Splinters formed amongst the leaders of High Hold. Jecken Stockley, true lord and rightful leader of his namesake. Ava Brokenblade, wizardess and legitimate heiress to the Giantspire Mines. Olivia Gor, stalwart voice of reason in that military line. Each saw the dangerous impotence of Lord Eric. They attempted reason pity out of a pitiful Lord, for those survivors of the razed townships.

    And in Peltarch, we saw Firnen Kaapo, former Kingsguard, whose honour and loyalty are irreproachable. Lady Maudeline, wise advisor and public servant, and mother, begged for those northerners who lost their homes and loved ones to the demonic attacks. And Caleb Fisher, son of George Fisher, Brother to so-called King Thalaman, appealed to a mercy in his sibling he prayed existed.

    Hopeless efforts, all.

    Those noble spirits turned instead to form caravan. One which welcomed each and all exiled and destitute, every man, woman, and child from the highest courtier to the lowest gutterer. Together, they ventured East. There, then, would they find shelter and succor of the lands and water, and of the storied stronghold Moonreach Keep.

    They styled themselves the Cleimants.

    An alliance which vowed to undo the failures of Lord Eric and Thalaman Fisher and having the just and kind Caleb Fisher rise as true Liege Lord and Uniter of the North.

    [DM Xanatos Gambit]