The Prismatic Circle

If the land of Thrull, and Valika as a whole, have a reputation as a land built on blood and malice, it is the druids of the Prismatic Circle who have forged that reputation—and who faithfully embrace the fear that reputation continues to spread. Preaching a hunger for blood and destruction that grows seemingly stronger each year, the Prismatic Circle is dedicated to violence, reaving, and sacrifice in the name of ancient prophecy.

Visions of the Past.

It was the elemental druid Kybard whose long-ago visions set the future of Thrull in motion. Believing that the Great Prismatic Wyrm Gormadraug had not actually been slain by the Seven Heroes of legend— Kentigern, the sorcerer Rune, Sýr the Seven-Bladed, Völgr Clad-in-Iron, Limgri Lightbringer, Morgöng Shadestrider, and Mithra of the Silver Harp—Kybard saw in his visions the great wyrm sleeping beneath earth and sea, ever threatening to wake. Knowing that the return of Gormadraug would herald the end of the world, Kybard understood that only by demonstrating that the lands of the north remained dedicated to conflict, raiding, and bloodshed could the Great Prismatic Wyrm be kept quiescent.
The druids of the Prismatic Circle spend much of their time traveling across Thrull between the ritual sites known as Sentinel Woods, where great sacrifices are made of magical trinkets triumphantly taken from the southlands, stolen livestock barged north throughout the raiding season, and humanoid victims—both the condemned of the Thrull-based clans and thralls marked as offerings to slake the hunger of Gormadraug’s sleeping spirit.
The total number of Valikan warriors fallen over a century of raiding, southlanders killed defending against the longboats’ attacks, and victims slain as part of the Prismatic Circle’s rituals might never be known. With each new raiding season, the ground beneath the Sentinel Woods grows ever darker with blood.

Hjadana’s Rule.

The Prismatic Circle is led by the Grand Druid Hjadana, who upholds the sanctity of Kybard’s visions, and whose fervor drives the cycles of raiding and ritual murder that have allowed the Prismatic Circle to hold the fealty of the clans of Thrull and Grarjord for generations. The Circle is formally defined as a communal organization, in which the grand druid calls on the insight and suggestions of all when forging doctrine and interpreting the rites of divination meant to seek signs of Gormadraug’s sleep growing restless. In practice, though, Hjadana acknowledges the advisors she knows will support her without challenge. The Prismatic Circle has been a dictatorship since her ascendance just over two decades ago.
The members of the Prismatic Circle know and accept that they have neither the numbers nor the power to stand against any organized assault on their order. It is known and accepted that the druids’ power relies on the fealty of the clans—and on the fervor Hjadana has stirred in the warriors of Clan Völgr. Clan Völgr is the most loyal of the three western clans, serving as the circle’s military might. More and more of late, though, indifference to the circle’s will spreads through the ranks of The Valikan Clans, including the leadership of Clan Sýr and Clan Rune. In the eyes of many, Hjadana already appears to be one step ahead of potential challenges to the Prismatic Circle’s authority, understanding that any breach in the unified will to fulfill a continued destiny of raiding and blood would quickly tear Thrull apart.

Voices of Dissent.

No member of the Prismatic Circle dares to openly criticize Hjadana’s rule over the order— and even those who do so privately understand that they put their lives in peril. Within the last five years alone, a half-dozen druids who publicly called for greater representation of voices among the grand druid’s advisors died in an accident and ambush while traveling to the Sentinel Woods. And in that same time, rumors outside the circle have begun to whisper of a cadre of druids within the order who are actively plotting Hjadana’s downfall. Not to end the evil that the Prismatic Circle calls for in the name of Kybard’s prophecy, but to create a new organizational structure for that evil.
These druids have read the signs of more and more non-Völgr clanfolk acknowledging fealty to the Prismatic Circle in word only, and of the raids of Clan Völgr bringing back less tribute each year. Likewise, they watch the rise of other druidic orders opposed to the circle—the Cult of the Great Wyrm and the Revenants—as they grow ever bolder in their attempts to destroy the Prismatic Circle. Against all these threats, the druids fear that Hjadana’s iron-fisted control of the order might eventually be its undoing.

Type

Religious, Druidic Circle