Industrious, stern, and enigmatic, the Dwarfs of Lasair maintain a surface appearance of being businesslike stone masons. Underneath the surface, though, the dwarfs maintain a growing, hidden fortress spreading out from
The Sink. Cloaking the nature of their enterprise with secrecy and obscure ritual, the underground city of
Bastion stands as a home for all dwarfs and a base from which a growing population explores hidden and dangerous ways deep within the ground.
History
As with the other mortal species, the dwarfs of Lasair are
uncertain of their origins. Though modern dwarfs are studious about recording their history, this did not begin until long after they had first appeared at
The Sink. While there is a small sect within the dwarfs' society that believes they may have originated from the Sink itself, dwarven historians have recognized no evidence of their origins.
Regardless of where they came from, the dwarfs today reside almost entirely within (and underneath) the Sink. They first began to settle near the Sink sometime around the founding of
the Empire on the other side of the continent. As their numbers grew, they began digging into the Sink for stone and discovered the richness of the marble within the depression in the land.
The western portion of Lasair was still very wild at the time: The
Orcs would still range south of the
Titan Wall, the occasional
Dragon would sometimes fly overhead, and small
Human settlements would sometimes send out raiding parties. Looking at the land that surrounded them, the Dwarfs made the decision that rather than building outward they would expand
downwards, hiding themselves from those that may harm them.
Digging and building into the walls of the Sink at first, the Dwarfs focused on fortifying and supplying their growing society. As they organized and build deeper into the ground, dwarven culture structured itself around a number of clans, each focused upon a critical part of what made Bastion function. Over generations, warriors, masons, miners, and others created formalized and ritualized initiation rites to teach prospective clanmates what their role would involve, how to best support the fortress, and how to keep it secret from the outside world.
The Great Record
One significant moment within dwarven history was the foundation of The Great Record. Early in the history of
Bastion, the historian clan recognized that an important facet of dwarven life would be a reverence for those that had come before and understanding of one's place within society. To this end, the historians began to record all significant moments within Bastion via what has become an enormous library of books. The Record's first pages were laid down nearly 1300 years ago, and over the centuries would come to document family trees, clan leadership changes, significant discoveries made while excavating Bastion, accomplishments of heroes, and more.
The Great Record resides within a library hall that extends deep within the stone underneath the Sink, in one of the strongest and heavily engineered sections of the fortress. Guard duty within the library is considered a great honor, generally given to those who have earned a respite from harder fighting and exploration. Access to the library is open to all dwarfs who are the member of a clan, though in practice the density of material means that the most common visitors are those of the historian clan. The clan helpfully maintains a corps of librarians whose role is to assist others in finding information that they require from within the seemingly endless shelves of tomes.
The Dragonscourge and Rise of the City-States
When the
Dragons launched their
genocidal war upon humans and elves, the dwarves' choice to establish their city underground and out of notice bore its greatest fruit. Showing the world a face of insignificance resulted in the dragons not considering Bastion to be a priority within the war. Those dragons that existed in the western portion of Lasair ravaged the isolated human cities, but largely ignored the dwarves. Occasional incursions by roving bands of dragonkin were easily turned back, and the odd full dragon that decided to drop in on what looked like an isolated quarry found themselves unexpectedly beset upon by an organized and immediate defense - over the course of the war the dwarves would end up destroying a handful of dragons.
The largest immediate effect of the war on the dwarves occurred when the world's small moon was shattered, a piece of it pulled to crash into the
Empire. The cataclysmic impact rocked the continent with earthquakes, the severity of which was enough to collapse several sections of
Bastion, causing significant loss of life among the dwarves. Much of the decades after the war was spent recovering from this incidental destruction.
It was during this period that the biggest change surrounding the dwarves would occur: the growth of significant human cities in the western region of Lasair. As refugees from the disaster in Imperial lands staggered to the west, they began to settle along the Lasair River and in other areas of the lowlands west of
The Great Plateau. This gave rise to cities large enough to create a need for trade - and for construction materials. While it took some time for these cities to stop raiding each other and fomenting war, the formation of the
Lasair Compact solidified the human cities into a coherent and peaceful economy.
Where before Bastion was focused primarily on a quiet survival in a wild land, the rise of the
City-States Region suddenly thrust the dwarves into a position of having the opportunity to gain great wealth.
The Sink's rich marble supplies helped supply these growing cities - and
Mages building towers - with stone for construction. A few veins of gold within the marble gave the dwarves another source of wealth that suddenly could be spent. As wealth came into Bastion, it would flow back out as the dwarves bought supplies, better food, and metals for making better tools.
Becoming part of trade within the City-States allowed the surface impression of the dwarves to be that of an industrious society, content to trade their stone and gold for comforts and metals to continue their mining and quarrying. This impression is one that most are more than willing to accept, and it has made the dwarfs' desire to keep the rest of their society secret much, much easier.
Culture
Dwarven culture is extremely structured, built around ritual, law, and an expectation of order. While dwarfs in general do have a tendency towards desiring process and meeting expectations, the culture is built this way with one primary goal in mind: ensuring the secrecy and survival of the underground city of Bastion.
Clans
The primary organizing factor within dwarven society is that of the clan. To an outsider, one might view the clans as being similar to the
Guilds of the City-States, which are focused exclusively on economic roles. The clans, however, go much further than a focus on economy and instead define the roles that every dwarf living in
Bastion will fulfill. Whether a dwarf is a warrior, miner, mason, historian, provisioner, or some other role, they will have been chosen to join that clan through showing an affinity for that role.
Clan membership is not hereditary. Instead, young dwarfs are encouraged to spend time exploring throughout the clans to seek out a clan that appeals to them. Indeed, each clan has tasks that are particularly suited to introducing youngsters to that clan's duty. Whether learning calligraphy from the historians, learning the basics of stone carving, or being introduced to the ways that food is processed and moved throughout the city, every young dwarf will experience a sampling of what life in Bastion has to offer. The only requirements is that each and every dwarf spends at least one season with the warriors - in this way every dwarf will have at least a basic understanding of weapon use and armor maintenance. This effectively creates a militia that can be called upon when need arises.
After a dwarf spends a number of years exploring, they will at some point dedicate themselves to a given clan. Sometimes this is because they show a clear affinity for a given role and are a natural fit. In other cases, a dwarf may be uncertain, and may reach out to a few clans for advice. In these cases, those responsible for induction of new clanmates will meet and discuss the candidate and help place them in the right clan.
Clans are so important to dwarven identity that it factors into their names. A dwarven name goes Chosen Name - Clan Name - Lineage Name. So, "Malen Mason Korenkin" chose the name
Malen upon induction into the clan of Stonemasons, and their elder parent's name is
Koren (dwarven lineage names are made up of the eldest of their two parents with
-kin as a suffix).
Discipline
Essential to dwarven character is the concept of discipline. The dwarfs of
The Sink pride themselves on their absolute dedication to their crafts, their duties, and their city. This discipline manifests itself primarily in an absolute focus on whatever task an individual dwarf has at hand. Dwarves have a reputation as extremely diligent craftspeople, but outsiders truly have no idea of how deep that diligence reaches.
Whether building furniture, excavating a cavern, constructing a weapon, or documenting history, dwarves will dedicate the whole of their mind and body to the task. Until the task presented to them is complete, they will forgo all other activities save those needed for survival and to remain effective at their duty. This has resulted in dwarves being seen as rather taciturn - almost every person that has encountered a dwarf outside of Bastion has seen a dwarf who is on a specific task, often acting as a courier or or guard. They will almost certainly never encounter a dwarf who is in between tasks, when they are afforded some small bit of rest and recuperation. This has led to the myth that dwarfs of The Sink do not partake of alcohol - this could not be farther from the truth, but almost no human has ever met a dwarf who was "on downtime" and capable of sharing a drink.
This focus is very much grounded in how dwarfs maintain their secrets as well as their fighting styles. A dwarf who has been tasked with a military task - and their underground explorations have led to encountering many a hostile creature - will seem to be hard and stern, until that campaign or mission is over.
Dwarven Magic and Religion
The dwarfs' approach to magic is fairly practical. They rarely look to magic as the solution of any problem, generally preferring the work of hands, tools, and machines. They do, however, recognize that some forms of magic are extremely powerful and helpful in military matters and in underground exploration. One of the clans is dedicated to the practice of magical techniques and helping identify the best ways for individual practitioners to find the best way for them to connect to the world's latent magical energies. The specific way that a given dwarf draws upon that magic may vary but all are treated with similar respect whether their focus is upon powerful destruction or life-saving healing.
Similarly, they do not have a formal religion of the same sort as the humans'
Virtues or even the
Orcs' shamanism, but one of the clans of
Bastion is dedicated to promoting the highest qualities of the dwarven society. These dwarfs fulfil a role similar to that of shamans within orcish society, serving as counselors and social leaders, but rarely count magic among their skills. Working closely with the historian clans, dwarven society maintains a strong link to its ancestral past while priding itself on continuity and stability.
In game terms, a dwarven magic user that is native to Bastion may be of any class that fits within the feel of dwarven culture. We won't necessarily define those as of right now but will spend time looking into it in the future. In general, dwarven magic users will trend towards clerics or wizards and generally away from nature-type classes.
The rare magic user from the "religious" clan will generally be of the Bard class.
Keeping the Secret
The foremost thought of any dwarf is that of maintaining the secrecy of the nature of
Bastion. To outsiders, the dwarfs are merely well-off stonemasons, living in the walls of a quarry called
The Sink. The true wealth and expanse of the dwarfs' territory is something that they have gone to extreme lengths to conceal over the centuries, and their experience during the
Dragonscourge only made that dedication stronger.
Part of every dwarf's initiation into a clan includes an intense indoctrination into the importance of the Secret, and in the methods that are used to protect it. For many, those methods simply involve not leaving the domain of Bastion, as most dwarfs rarely venture far beyond the Sink. For others, though, the training includes lessons in deception and in careful conversation. The simplest thing that helps to keep the Secret, however, is the existence of all of the ritual and formality within dwarven society. These elements make navigating dwarven culture nearly impenetrable for outsiders - thus any strangeness or unexpected events are chalked up to that.
Dwarfs that come to
The Sink from outside - some extremely small settlements of dwarfs do exist in the wider world, for instance - are welcomed into the surface portion of The Sink with open arms. Those who work in the quarry will treat them as long-lost friends and be extremely welcoming. But it will take a very, very long time before any dwarf from the outside is approached about the possibility of introducing them to what lays under their feet. But outsiders that prove their worth and their honor will eventually be brought into the fold.
Relations with the City-States
To most of the
City-States Region,
The Sink is just a far-away quarry down south. It is not a place that people travel to for pleasure, and the only humans that generally interact with the dwarven "settlement" are those performing trade. As such, the dwarfs do not generally enter the minds of most of the City-States' leadership.
The Lasair Compact
One interesting legal interaction, however, is that of the
Lasair Compact. Some of the aspects of the Compact are simple: the dwarves publicly follow all of the laws that refer to cities - they pay a nominal tax to the
Taxation Guild, they do not (publicly) maintain a militia greater than 500 strong, and they would certainly destroy any
wurmborn found among them.
Where it gets odd, however, is where the Compact guarantees citizenship to
Humans - and requires that no citizen blocks the duties of a
Mage. Dwarfs are, obviously, not human. They are not an active part of the society of the City-States. So what does the Compact do with them? In essence, nothing.
Some time after the Compact was ratified by the City-States, the leadership of the trading post at The Sink negotiated with the
Mages as to how they would view the dwarfs. The negotiations resulted in an agreement that the dwarves would not be considered "citizens", that they would not be entitled to hire of the
Mercenary Guild - and that the Mages would not pry into the dwarfs' affairs.
In practice, the dwarfs simply don't care about the first two of those aspects. They rarely travel to other cities, and even when they do while the City-States are not exactly cosmopolitan, their populations are not actively hostile towards other species. The inability to hire the Guild is irrelevant as well: anybody coming to trade with them will surely have hired Guild guards to protect their goods regardless of which direction they are traveling.
Keeping the Mages out of
Bastion? That is well worth the exchange.
The Great Record sounds amazing - I'd love to wander around those halls and marvel at all the books. I really like that the true nature of dwarven society is hidden and Bastion is a secret. That's such an interesting aspect to their culture. Has anyone ever come too close to knowing the truth?
Explore Etrea
"Has anyone ever come too close to knowing the truth?" I haven't decided yet! It's certainly likely that an enterprising Mage might have found their way in at some point - but the Mages aren't interested in conquest so it would just be a piece of knowledge for them to use in manipulation at some point.