[Jade Stage] Stealing Fire - stories of rebels, gods, and sorcerors

[Lmns Crn]

[note]Comments, if you wish to leave them, may be posted directly in this thread. Questions are welcomed.

This is a writing exercise-- I've got a complicated tangle of ideas, and I'm trying to straighten them out by getting them down on paper. This thread is going to sort out:
- two nations
- various dwarven clans
- some gods
- sorcery
- the cold spring drinkers
- the chained order
- some secret societies
- some assorted heresies
- maybe some other things[/note]

The Song of Roots tells the story of the fourteen dwarven progenitors, the fathers and mothers of the seven clans, and how they were hidden away by their creators Salma Earthmother and Jatta Skyfather before they could be awakened to life. According to the Song, the nascent dwarven progenitors were discovered by Renán, sister of Jatta, jealous goddess of disease, madness, and deformity, of spite and envy and cruel retribution, of bitter winter.

Consumed with a hatred of her rivals' creations, Renán placed a curse upon the sleeping dwarves. A winter goddess, she cursed them with a malignant frost, a chill wind of the Void, but five of the clans could not be harmed. They had been well and strongly made, out of river clay and of heartwood, out of hammered copper and of wrought iron and of chiseled stone, and Renán's curse could not touch them.

The progenitors of Damira Clan, formed of river-water, were given the curse of unquiet minds. They would roil within their own heads, their thoughts devouring thoughts; they would be unable to separate nightmares from the waking world.

The progenitors of Catera Clan, formed of woven vines, were given the curse of withering and impermanence. They would create nothing that could last; the works of their hands would crumble to dust as they watched, helpless to prevent the loss.

When they saw what Renán had done, Salma Earthmother and Jatta Skyfather were dismayed. They could not undo the curse or its damage, but sought to mitigate its harm. To the sleeping progenitors of Damira Clan, Jatta Skyfather gave the blood of prophecy, the power to speak truths even through a haze of madness. He tore out his weeping eyes and placed them within the Damiran dwarves, one to the male and one to the female.

To the sleeping progenitors of Catera Clan, Salma Earthmother gave divine authority, so that the dwarves of all clans would unite under wise Cateran leadership, uniting the seven clans into a single, mighty nation. All Cateran works would be works of the whole dwarven people; in this way would the curse be defeated.

So it is written; so it is Sung.[/ic]

From the beginning of history to the present day, Cardannis has been ruled by a monarch of Catera Clan. These Cateran monarchs are not typically religious authorities themselves, but they derive their political power directly from the blessing of Salma Earthmother, as described in the Song of Roots. It is this divine ruling authority, given by Salma to Catera Clan, which gives legitimacy not only to the Cateran monarch but to the entire nation of Cardannis, uniting the seven dwarven tribes.

Not all dwarves were pleased with the leadership of Catera Clan, but the kingdom was well-set in tradition-- to oppose Cateran rule was to oppose the proxy authority of the goddess Salma. Nevertheless, a growing movement planned in secret to break away from Cateran rule and from Cardannis itself, and to form a new and independent nation.

Facing the separatist movement were many obstacles, and although many could be circumvented by the courage of dwarven leaders and the cleverness of dwarven statesmen, one stood out as vital and intractable: to be legitimate, their breakaway nation would need a divine sanction of its own, one to set it on equal footing with the kingdom Cardannis. The separatists must find a way to gain the authority of rulers, given by the gods themselves.

The path to divine authority is a crooked one, with many strange and unforeseen turnings.

[Towel Ninja]

Ok, if you dont mind i got some questions,

Are these curses specific to the clan under which you are born or join? Or is it a bloodline thing?

say a "honorary" member was welcomed into a clan.(dont know how impractical that is in your world) Would the new clansmen recieve the curse?

And as for these separatists, are they all part of the uncrused dwarven clans?

[LordVreeg]

Ok, i SO automatically reject the gods telling me who's in charge.
Go, Renan worship.  

[Towel Ninja]

Oh hey and, i just wanted to say that i would like to hear more about these spring drinkers and the chained order. They sound interesting.

[XXsiriusXX]

How much unrest is caused by the dwarves who want to break away? Is it just backroom plotting or are there dwarves spouting rhetoric in the streets?

[Lmns Crn]

The existence of "aberrant mages" was already known in this era, though not particularly well-researched or well-documented. Aberrant mages are individuals who develop a modicum of unbidden supernatural power, seemingly at random and completely accidentally.

Many aberrant mages are connected to the Cardan gods, either by superstition or by the faith's own dogma. Often cited is the astonishingly high incidence of aberrant magism within Damira Clan, attributed by many among the faithful to the combination of Renán's curse and Jatta's blessing (though dismissed by others as a glorified mental illness). Many other aberrant mages self-identify as "hands" of one or more of the gods, believing themselves to be deputized with a portion of their patron's divine power, and tasked with certain accompanying duties.

While certain unstable social support structures eventually took shape to look after these aberrant mages, during the era of the Cold Spring Drinkers, their prospects were grim. Many aberrant mages felt pursued and victimized by their own powers, which they did not understand and could not control. High numbers of aberrant mages took their own lives to escape their own magic, or were killed by the backlash of their untamed powers. Many who survived these fates fell to the vigilante justice of paranoid mobs.[/ic]

Having decided that death is a natural phenomenon, that supernatural power would be necessary to overcome it, and that supernatural power is in rare occasions conferred by the gods, the twelve scholars who would come to be known as the Cold Spring Drinkers resolved to commit their first great heresy.

They would achieve immortality by stealing divine power directly from its source.

[LordVreeg]

The 'First Great Heresy'.

Oh, this is going to be good.  trying to chest death is a starting point?