The Mage Hunts

Political event

Shortly after the loss of the dawn cities, the free peoples began to blame the mages for their troubles. That blame grew slowly into outward hostility, and in the year 867, the Mage Hunts began.   Mages were rounded up and executed, or shipped off to the island of Lightwark which was at the time a remote island in the middle of the Tinted Sea. This continued over thirty years, exiling nearly every mage and killing those who resisted. The Grey Companies were founded to keep the mages in line, and in many cases to prevent the spread of magic in the world.   The mage hunts ended after the First Great Council, where the ruling monarchs decided it would be better to turn the mages to work for the people than to continue the oppression. The decision also changed the role of the Grey Companies to that of bodyguards for the mages, as they went about their tasks of helping the world that had wronged them.