Fey Wars

The Fey Wars were a series of conflicts of varying relation to each other in Sossis and Tira Vella that arose out of the aftermath of Fey involvement in wars and growing distrust and dislike for the Fey among men.
While the Dark Age in Sossis ended around the late 11^th century with the ascendency of the Varani, wars continued as the Varani expanded and came into contact with other rivals.

The Menivunian Phase (1303-1341)

With Varani rule well establishes in Sossis by the start of the 14^th century, the state of near constant warfare between petty states gave way to the Mir Varanij. During this peace and Varani dominance of Oecumenical affairs, the Varani were able to organise the Menivun Accords, a series of pacts and alliances meant for fighting the Fey. Many of the parties to the accords were other Great Houses within the Varani Empire, but other states were party to it at times as well. This state of affairs came about due to a general desire among men at the time to punish the Fey following their actions perceived to be hostile towards men since the Pyrrhonian War in 834. This Menivunian Phase of general cooperation among men against a perceived common enemy held for over 40 years before giving way.

The Mad Phase (1341-1403)

The second phase started in 1341 when House Alvaleryn began to use the Menivun Accords to further their political ambitions rather than to fight the Fey. The Fey Wars devolved back into the convoluted system of alliances between men and Fey that defined the centuries prior to the Menivunian Phase, though on a larger, more destructive scale. This so-called Mad Phase was defined by excessive brutality and witch hunts, in which many people were tried and executed by local mobs for supposedly working with the Fey.

The Burning (1403-1406)

The horrendous destruction wrought by the 62 years of the Mad Phase caused the Varani Arcanum to take drastic action, and in 1403, they led a small, independent force into the Feywild. This began the third and shortest phase of the wars, the Burning. To the rest of the world, the situation was essentially unchanged, but after three years struggling to gain enough of a foothold in the Feywild for their ritual, on 1 the Wane 1406, the Martyrs, a group of 30 Varani mages, opened a hole in the Feywild to the Plane of Fire. The Martyrs were all killed instantly, but the fire began to consume the Feywild. In just three weeks, the entire Feywild had been burned down, entirely destroying the Fey’s ability to make war against or alongside men permanently, leaving only those Fey that managed to escape to Geshkara before being burned. While the action infuriated some, the news was met with celebration by many. The Burning had put an end to a brutal cycle of violence that had been ongoing for over 500 years, and while wars between men would continue, the sheer scale of violence caused by the involvement of the Fey was halted and the perception of warfare began to shift back to its more noble image it held before the Fey Wars as the scale and brutality of wars shrank. It should be noted, however, that this effect was felt most in Sossis, which had the most involvement in the Fey Wars. In fact, reactions to the Burning in Eussis were much more mixed, as Eussis had largely not experienced the cycle of reprisals present in Sossis. Many had been unaware of the Fey Wars entirely. Eussis would arguably not experience wars as destructive as the Fey Wars until the Wars of Enzimian Expansion of the 24^th and 25^th centuries.