The Conflict
Prelude
Lanskar, Dalben of 1033. Following King Aipilon the Second’s assassination, his twelve-year-old daughter Orilanthe ascends the throne. Since she is young, there are many parties attempting to influence her to rule in their favour. The first party is her mother, Dowager Queen Aileine. Opposing Queen Aileine is the Council of Merchant-Lords, who hold the executive power in Lanskar. While Aileine wishes to protect her daughter and influence her to decrease the power of the Merchant-Lords, the Merchant-Lords maneuver to gain more power and to push expansionist policies. At first, Aileine is successful at influencing her daughter, but the Merchant-Lords are wily and seduce the twelve-year-old with gifts, using her youth and lack of experience to sway her opinion. Seeing her control over the country slip, Aileine hatches a plot to depose of the Orilanthe’s main sycophant, Merchant-Lord Ruil Danthe. Unfortunately, the plot is discovered Skeath 1034, and at the Merchant-Lords’ behest, Orilanthe has her mother tried for treason and exiled. Watchman Captain Elddra Kerdovan, who was stationed in Derisle (Lanskar’s Capital) at the time as the Watch’s liaison in Lanskar, had strongly opposed this course of action. Unfortunately, her warnings were not heeded, and through the Merchant-Lords’ influence Orilanthe stops trusting the Watch.
By Falmira of 1036, Orilanthe has unwittingly signed over most of the remaining executive powers of the monarchy over to the Merchant-Lords, effectively rendering her a puppet queen and a mere figurehead. Now in near-complete power over the kingdom, the Merchant-Lords are free to pursue their agenda and begin pushing to expand their influence in strict violation of Kerdovan’s Pact. When Kerdovan’s Watch orders them to cease and desist, Queen Orilanthe takes fear and orders the Merchant-Lords to cease their activities. Unfortunately, having signed over her authority, she is powerless to do so. After a failed assassination attempt, she flees Derisle to rejoin her mother who had taken refuge in neighbouring Thash, which is ruled by Aileine’s father.
The Merchant-Lords send their troops after them, and attack Thash. To prevent Captain Kerdovan and her company from warning Thash and Ranhed, the Merchant-Lords simultaneously attack and capture the Derisle Watchtower, executing the 100-or-so Watchmen inside. As such, Thash is caught unaware and unprepared of the level of brutality that Lanskar was going to level at it, and is overrun within a few days. Most of the royal household of Thash and Lanskar are saved by the local company of Watchmen, who send an alert to Ranhed. Unfortunately, Aileine perished in the fighting.
Ranhed’s answer is swift. Within a week, a full Watch Corps (roughly a twelfth of the Watch’s permanent armed forces, which consist of three permanent armies of four corps) are deployed under the command of General Lance Kellian. Kellian first attempts to communicate with the Lanskari Merchant-Lords to order them to retreat back into their own borders lest they force the Watch to employ more drastic measures. However, the Merchant-Lords destroy the Strumar-powered communicator instead of complying to the Watch’s demands. General Kellian therefore moves his men to forcibly expel the Lanskari army from Thash, freeing Thash. Unfortunately, the battles were bloody and resulted in a great loss of Watch and Thashi lives, and led to the reorganization of Kellian’s forces into four divisions instead of the usual five. These divisions are led by First Lieutenant-General Everett Kerdovan (Wreyla’s uncle), Second Lieutenant-General Ambrose Anrdur Knotburne, Third Lieutenant-General Meliandre Kerdovan and Fourth Lieutenant-General Lucie Terence.
Following the Watch’s costly victory in Thash and the reinstatement of the Thashi monarchy, the Watch moves to the borders of Lanskar and orders the Merchant-Lords to renounce their powers and reinstate Orilanthe in excuse for a formal pardon and no sanctions to Lanskar for invading Thash. The Merchant-Lords agree. All that is left is a formal diplomatic envoy to seal the deal.
At this point, there is a division between General Kellian, First Lieutenant-General Kerdovan and Second Lieutenant-General Knotburne. Unlike most other Watchmen, Kotburne has true prior experience with war due to having spent his younger years on Zahyr with his father’s Ran Tesz’tskaa clan. Unlike Kellian and First Lieutenant-General Kerdovan, his experience tells him that the Merchant-Lords are being dishonest and do not truly intend to submit to the Watch’s demands. As such, he argues that the Watch needs to attack Derisle and forcibly remove the Merchant-Lords. However, his opinion is met in disgust by the rest of the corps and ignored, and Kellian threatens him with a court-marshal if he insists on being insurgent instead of doing his duty. Knotburn can only repress his anger as Kellian divides the corps and leads the first division towards Derisle, leaving the second division to patrol the border and the third and fourth division to help Thash with reconstructions. To stay coordinated, the leaders of each division hold a meeting each evening via communicator.
However, shortly after the first division’s arrival at Derisle, they do not respond to their communicators. Immediately, Knotburn is on high alert, and marshals the second and third divisions to march to Derisle. They meet the decimated remains of the first division in full retreat halfway there with General Kellian in critical condition. The highest-ranking commanding officer, the second brigadier of the first division, tells Knotburn that the Lanskari had responded to the Watch’s conditions by displaying the diplomatic delegation—First Lieutenant-General Everett, his Journeyman, Knotburn’s friend Ryke, and a couple others—impaled on Derisle’s battlements. Hours later, the whole first Division was attacked by all directions by armies come in from the neighbouring cities. With General Kellian out of commission and First-Lieutenant Kerdovan dead, Knotburn is now the acting commanding officer of the corps.
Knotburn's answer is brutal and immediate. He immediately calls for reinforcements from the third and fourth divisions, as well as naval reinforcement from Ranhed, and orders Queen Orilanthe to join the second division. What remains of the corps, as well as the fleet sent by Ranhed, surrounds Derisle. Knotburn then forces Orilanthe to spectate as her capital is burned to the ground and anyone fleeing is executed. The annihilation of Derisle marks the end of the Lanskar-Thash war.
Thash is freed and can be reconstructed. The Lanskari Merchant-Lords are either dead or subsequently hunted down and put to trial by the Watch. Queen Orilanthe is reinstated as queen, with the lesson of the terrible price of war forever scoured in her mind. Loss of over 1 000 000 lives in the flames. Election of Ambrose Anrdur Knotburn as Commandant-General of the Watch and forced retirement of General Lance Kellian.
Major depression of Lanskar's economy, change of the Merchant Lords, civil unrest due to bad economy. Lanskari and Thashi governments become close due to the reinstatement of Orilanthe as queen and the death of the perpetrators of the conflict, however the sentiment is not shared by the general population of Thash which is wary of Lanskari for invading. Countries in Andellion are either cowed or hate the Watch, and many secretly ally with Kerdaante as a result.
Within the Watch, many who served in the Second Corps were left with psychological scarring, and some, unable to stomach having slaughtered the people they had taken an oath to protect, deserted or retired.
Historical Significance
The opinion on the destruction of Derisle in particular divides the population and the Watch. There are some who believe that the retribution was justified, however, the popular opinion was that destroying a whole city including countless innocent civilians and travellers as retribution for the stupidity of a country's government was unjust and even evil. Eventually, the destruction of Derisle would come to be viewed as a dark day in history.
Derisle's Lament is a song written by an anonymous author which details the fall of Derisle and has become a part of Southern Andellian culture. Some say it was written by Orilanthe herself.
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