The Trilune Fellowship

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The Oan equivalent of the Knights of the Round Table, the Myrmidons and the Apostles all rolled into one, the Trilune Fellowship was responsible for averting the Omnicide by playing Naraoch against Sylvanas, and with one swift, globally coordinated action, thwarting both. It was not only a triumph of good over evil, but of the collective action of mortals over the best efforts of the divine.
The Fellowship were undoubtedly the political lynchpins of the international effort necessary for victory and, generally speaking, among the individuals most directly responsible for the practical achievement of that victory. They are globally recognized as the saviours of all life and civilization. Salvation Day, a holiday in their honour, is the only holiday observed by all major religions and nations; and the Fellowship themselves are among the most traditional subjects for artists, musicians and dramatists worldwide.

Composition

The Trilune Fellowship, as reflected in the popular conception, had seven members:

• Kuros, one of the greatest warriors in Orcish history and by far the most successful khan;
• Eldath, an Elvish princess and bard destined for godhood;
• St Astras, a Dwarven cleric and the man that singlehandedly saved the world;
• Qo-ad-uhlu, a juvenile silver dragon that threw their lot in with mortals even after the dragons were granted divine reprieve from the Omnicide and immortality in exchange for their neutrality;
• Nap, a Hobbit thief who came from and returned to obscurity;
• Bo Blackchin, the Archmage of Anthur-Ro and the architect of the successful plan to thwart the gods; and
• Cedwyn, Astras' Yishanim ward and the steadfast squire of the group.

There are other notable associates of the Fellowship that are often the subjects of political, religious or tavern debates in terms of whether they are deserving of the same status as the Seven. Among the most popular are:

• The Abate Sisters: Travelling companions of Blackchin, Astras, Eldath and Kuros until their first encounter with the Tarrasque. Archers of legendary skill, they sacrificed themselves to draw the creature's attention away from a fallen Kuros and allow the others to escape.
• Warlord Rotuah: Kuros' loyal lieutenant, who defeated the Fired Earth Clan when it broke from the mutual non-aggression pact and sought to seize power while the other orcish clans were marshalling against the Tarrasque and then led the assembled clans in the vanguard of the final march on the monster.
• Gombergan: A wizard of meagre power that insisted on serving as the Fellowship's pack manager and camp cook, contributing any way he could. He was not noted as having contributed anything of value to the quest and only met the Fellowship towards the end of their quest. He was killed by an arrow early in the assault on Naraoch's fortress, but was sainted along with Astras as an example of the contributions even the most meek can make to the achievement of great things.
• Carlfor Crumblestone: A fierce Dwarven warrior reputed to have challenged Kuros for skill in battle, a hero of the assault on the fortress.
• Prince Thurdon: The tipping-point for Dwarven engagement in the conflict, Thurdon committed his forces to the effort and shamed the elder kings for their cowardice. He fell in battle against the Tarrasque and is held up as a paragon of bravery among the Dwarven people, although some still question whether their involvement was strictly necessary and worth the generational expense.
• Mote: A fey spirit that appears frequently in the legends. Historians and storytellers continue to debate the degree to which the fey influenced events, and whether or not this was an individual character or whether a "Mote" is a species or possibly a title.

As is the case with most myths, the reality of the Trilune Fellowship was quite a bit more complex and fraught than the popular conception of seven extraordinary heroes that banded together to singlehandedly save the world. In reality there were quite a few more individuals that really ought to have shared as much credit as those that survived to the last; and in many cases the actions of the legendary characters are more appropriately recognized as multilateral or international efforts. The fate of the world, of course, was at stake and seven individuals did not travel the globe on foot or defeat the largest land army ever assembled by sheer tyranny of will.
Still, even the most skeptical historian would not deny that the actions of the popularly recognized members of the Trilune Fellowship were anything short of epic. Some particularly iconoclastic scholars might undercut the contributions of Nap to the overall operation, recognizing him only for being a well-positioned asset of the larger group; or argue that Bo Blackchin's accomplishments were more managerial and technical than heroic. The academic and popular consensus, however, is immensely well supported. When an academic paper presented at the Symposium in Dartwright in 841WA sought to argue with some reasonably credible evidence that Cedwyn may have been misidentified in several records and granted credit for several actions of other members of his order, the normally staid, open-minded audience literally booed the author offstage -- and pursued her all the way to her yacht. Their fury was driven at least as much by methodology as by apostasy.

Legend

Discovery of the Sylvan Threat: Bo Blackchin Alerts Anthur-Ro

The legend of the Trilune Fellowship as it is popularly understood begins with Bo Blackchin.
Recently appointed Archmage of Anthur-Ro, Blackchin was a compromise candidate with thin popular support among the magi. He was known for his brilliance as an artificer and his befuddlement when it came to interpersonal relations. Blunt, pragmatic and guileless, Blackchin was said to have been elected largely because every constituency could settle on a man that was conclusively not scheming against their faction. He would have mentioned it over breakfast if he was.
At the time of his appointment, Master Archon Blackchin was working on a conjuration box. He believed he could reduce the amount of conflict in the world by inventing a cheap, easily replicable artifact capable of conjuring food without the need for the user to have advanced arcane training. In place of a verbal and somatic component altering the Weave, he sought to make an artifact capable of attuning to and creating from the Green Dream: the raw 'stuff' of reality.
After several abortive attempts at a prototype, a frustrated now-Archmage Blackchin came to realize that the flaw of the device was that the strength of the Green Dream was a variable and not a constant. He threw together (what he considered to be) a crude measuring instrument and determined that the Dream was pulsing between strength and weakeness, but generally growing fractionally weaker after each pulse.
He was forced to conclude, provisionally, that something was draining the æther from which the world was made. An unfunded research project -- he would often return to this in later years -- revealed that historically the background energy substantiating creation had been a constant, regardless of where the measurement took place. By his calculations, the rate of decay was increasing and the Green Dream would dissipate entirely in the space of four years. Given the mystery with which the æther, or Green Dream was attended, the implications of its dissipation were literally unimaginable. What little was known about it was that it was effectively the substance of Sylvanas' creation of Oa. Would its attenuation and extinguishment mean the world would end? Or did it even matter? The world was presumably through being created. Perhaps it was naturally settling towards an equilibrium.
The Council treated the situation with considerable curiosity, though not with the urgency that Blackchin urged upon it. Nearly a year was spent in aimless deliberations while Blackchin and a few associates grew increasingly alarmed.
Finding no answers at Anthur-Ro, Blackchin continued his study until an opportunity for further consultation presented itself. He departed for the Yishanim metropolis of Aldua, now known as Correhal, to consult with an ecumenical gathering of holy persons there. With divine magic somewhat of a closed book to the mages of the Tower, he hoped to gather some intelligence as to what, if anything, the dissipation of that divine energy might mean.

Blackchin's Consultation with the Alduan Conclave

Blackchin would be the first to admit his presentation to the conclave was less than artful. It was highly technical, very boring, and borderline insulting, in its treatment of the mysteries of the divine as little more than an input, like water pressure or wire tension. The sources all agree that Blackchin was summarily but respectfully dismissed, though the faithful of all religions have all conveniently stipulated since that their representatives were more forgiving and concerned than the rest for one reason or another.

Though the unanimity and harshness of his dismissal are disputed, the sources were also unanimous that only one priest came to speak with him after the conclave had risen. Either of his own accord or urged on by his clerk and squire Cedwyn, Bishop Astras (as he then was) came to calm a reportedly raging archmage, advising him in a thick Dwarven accent of a recurring dream in which a great beast, its visage shrouded in shadow but for its horrible, tortured eyes, towered above the Cathedral of Tyr. In the dream, the beast ravaged the city and the earth beyond, a great green aurora dancing about it in the pure black sky, pulsing to the beat of its wretched heart.
Blackchin confirmed that the Green Dream, when it manifests in the material plane, looked like the aurora he described. Bardic song and musical performance describing this meeting typically depicts Cedwyn and Astras singing in counterpoint, with Cedwyn boasting fortissimo about foiling the aims of Sylvanas to destroy the land subject to Tyr's covenant with the Yishanim people; whereas Astras sings more softly, grieving the potential loss of life, faith, love, history and the arts.
Deeply skeptical of a cultist's subconscious hallucinations, but nevertheless grateful for any form of institutional support, Blackchin unwittingly tied his destiny to Astras forever at this meeting. The three of them took their leave of the elders at Aldua, who some speculate were relieved to be rid of the peculiarly soft-hearted dwarf, and went forth together in search of answers. At the intersection of the divine and magic, of Creation and the Weave, one could hardly avoid seeking to find answers with the Elves.

Blackchin, Astras and Cedwyn Journey To The Elvish Lands

Where there is room for comedy in the great tales of this quest, it tends to be written either here or during the courtship of Eldath and Kuros. Pragmatic, callous, compulsively honest Blackchin journeys a great distance north with the grandfatherly, cunning, unerringly gallant Astras. The overeager, militant Cedwyn seeking to take lessons from the two simultaneously provides for a great formula.
In general, the journeys of the Trilune Fellowship are recorded much less reliably than their public appearances, about which there is often an official (if occasionally oral) record. There is some evidence to suggest that in the course of this journey they saved a town from a flash flood; defeated the hag Orbo (it is certain that they encountered her, but whether she was killed is disputed) ; met pixies and unsuccessfully attempted to earn an audience with the Seelie Court (though this may have happened later) ; and had numerous encounters with villainous goblinoids and brigands.
What is more certain is that along this road the company stayed briefly with Cedwyn's influential noble family, setting the groundwork for the Stonefolk to be among the first to join the war in later years. They also met the Elder Wyrm So'krono'elia-las, the Great Steel Dragon of myth, who cryptically refused to treat with them, stating that they were forbidden from doing so. (They would ultimately meet their end in single combat with the Tarrasque on Salvation Day. It is almost universally accepted by historians that the Wyrm had by this point accepted Sylvanas' offer of survival in exchange for the dragons' neutrality in the Omnicide, but gave in to their vaunted morals at the last minute.)
It is also known that along this path the company survived an owlbear assault and Astras charged Cedwyn to care for an orphaned cub that he would later release into the wild; and that the party encountered some form of insubstantial demons that taunted them and at one point caused Cedwyn to attack Blackchin. The squire was easily pacified by the archmage, but the experience was said to haunt the young man and temper his eagerness for battle against the unknown.

The Seekers Encounter Eldath

At length the company entered the Daylight Woods in search of Elde, the great queen of the Voronti-si (or "Wood Elves" or "Sylvan Elves"). They spent no less than two months seeking to enter the heart of the woods without success. Ultimately Blackchin was able to identify strong primal magicks that were not illusions as he suspected, but in fact changed the very nature of the perimeter of Sylvan territory to confuse them and prevent their entry. Alert to the subterfuge, Astras was also able to identify some of Elde's legendary Rangers in the thick, who had been weaving the magicks and forcibly moving the company without their notice as they slept.
Rather than forcing their way through, the company pleaded for a parlay and offered themselves as the Queen's prisoners. The Rangers were moved by Astras' entreaties and agreed to present them to court. Elde, however, and unbeknownst to the company, had receded into the Woven Woods the year prior, leaving her hapless daughter Eldóthë in charge of the tribes.

Eldóthë, or Eldath in the Common tongue, was much beloved by her kin as having earnestly attempted and catastrophically failed at every single task set before her in her 118 years of apprenticeship: leatherworking, fletching, fishing (though she would later boast in song that she was pretty good at panning for gold). In the course of her numerous apprenticeships, she came to know virtually everyone in her own tribe and those that they traded with in others; and she was generally consigned to sitting over there, where she could do no more harm, and where she would play her lute and sing, or gossip. Her skill with the latter was indisputible but practically invisible. She was a matchmaker, peacemaker, mystery solver and natural diplomat. Simply having this hopeless sweetheart in the city spinning her social webs was a delight to all, even if she was utterly useless.
Leadership for the Elves, however, is considered a trade like any other. Although nobility is inherited, royal blood is a mere prerequisite in their elective monarchy. Eldath was the sixth-born of seven children, but won the throne with shocking unanimity in the silent vote at her mother's passing. The Sylvan song Elde Aetera, "Elde Smiled", is a famous campfire song-turned-hymn that has as its theme the suggestion that Eldath's true skills were well known to her mother the Queen, and that her aimless apprenticeships were both her mother's legacy and a masterwork of statecraft. It concludes with Elde smiling to the assemblage after the vote and passing silently into the Woven Wood, leaving her people in sure hands.

The Elves Commit to the Cause

Astras made an impassioned plea for assistance in investigating the attenuation phenomenon, but was looked upon skeptically by the Elves, who held a barely veiled contempt for the Dwarves: their former slaves, and a race they considered to be risking Sylvanas' ire through their internecine militancy and growing industrialization. Their kin had been rendered extinct for less, and the assembled Elves were unsympathetic. Indeed, they saw no small amount of justice promised in the prophetic dream of Astras: the militant, colonialist adherents of Tyr would get their comeuppance from the Oak Father at last, just as their own kin had when they violated the balance of nature. Good.
It was Blackchin, unliklely diplomat, whose plea ultimately resonated with the Elves. He spoke without artifice (ironically enough) and described in detail that the world might be dying. Eldath originally proposed a coterie of her Rangers go with them as they investigated the phenomenon, but Blackchin's lack of skill with words sold itself: they did not need arms; they needed a diplomat to compel the assistance of other peoples.

In the course of his plea, the high priestess of Sylvanas assumed the floor and confirmed the nature of their concern. There was something wrong with the Oak Father. She had not dared to announce this before, for fear it was reflective of her own failings as a supplicant, but his omens had recently been furious, unintelligible. She feared that their God might be vengeful, or ill, or on the verge of abandoning Oa; it was impossible to tell, but she felt her own connection to him fading as his energy was inexplicably being concentrated and withdrawn from the faithful. Whatever was happening, it was beyond the powers of a handful of adventurers to heal.
The assembly dispersed for the evening and agreed to reconvene in the morning. Whether by divine intervention or some other force, Eldath awoke with her course laid out before her. She would take a small company of Rangers and go with the Archmage and the Bishop to weave some collective response to the rage of Sylvanas: some pacifying pact or restraint that would return the world to his favour. Leaving her sister Nórien to rule in her place, the company left to speak to the most likely cause of the Oak Father's rage.

Journey to the Dwarven Lands

One of the poorest recorded elements of the Trilune legend was this, the months-long journey from the Daylight Forest to distant Dun Rukaz. There is considerable scholarship expended upon the most likely path the Fellowship took, with the most critical consensus hovering around a path up the Salt Hills to the sea, and from thence a months-long journey by ship, thus explaining the comparative lack of records and encounters with communities capable of recording unusual events. A debate also rages about the omission of the Grand Mausoleum from the journey. Were they unfamiliar with the geography? Was Astras opposed to communing with death cultists? Were they as yet unaware of the fact that they would require military strength such that the droz'ohn-ka would be crucial allies?
One ascendant academic theory is that Blackchin was simply able to teleport the group to Dun Rukaz or close to it; whereas he would not have been able to pinpoint a target destination within the Daylight Forest. This would resolve not only the paucity of records from this journey, but would explain the remarkably fast sea journey they appear to have taken in order to complete what is normally a seven-month journey in less than five months.
In those days, the goblinoid races of the Salt Hills were considered savage and bereft of sophisticated language. The Orcs of Turos were only marginally more acceptable as a recognized body politic. A journey through the Salt Hills with (presumptive) stops in Turosian ports would have required great skill indeed in magic, diplomacy or both. Contributing to the quick-sea theory rather than the teleportation theory is the confirmatory evidence that more than half of Eldath's rangers failed to survive the journey, leaving only Rethuen (who would fall in an urban skirmish in Dun Rukaz) and the Abate Sisters to guard the queen.

Parley with the Dwarven Kingdoms

The Dwarves in those days were even less united as a people than they are today. The Salvation Day White Peace, now prevailing, was three years away, and the fragmented Duns were at war upon the Fellowship's arrival. At considerable length, Astras was able to command an audience before Prince Thurdon of Dun Rukaz, second son of King Gruith, the King having no time for priests and less still for Elves in the midst of what was perceived to be an existential 80-year campaign.
The lad was a man of faith and scholarship in addition to being raised in the honour-bound martial tradition of his forebears, and he took the warning with an open mind, spending several days with his guests in an effort to improve the severed diplomatic ties between their peoples. Seeing no terrible urgency or pressing threat, however, and still more having very little in his power to do about any such threat, he ultimately had to resign himself to offering the Fellowship the considerable comforts of the Dun until they were prepared to depart, wishing them farewell and good luck.
The disappointed Fellowship made their way from Dun to Dun, skirting battlefields, resting in military camps and encountering skulduggery here and there in somewhat minor adventures within the Dwarvish nobility and the seedy underworld of the Duns. In general, though, they found their pleas falling upon the deaf ears of remotely empowered lords and administrators. Bearing firsthand witness to the scale of the conflict between the five kingdoms, the weapons of war and the sheer toll it was taking on the local environment, the Fellowship grew more resolute in their belief that the Dwarves may have been primarily to blame for the wrath of Sylvanas, and numerous bardic retellings of the legend capture this moment as one of utter disenchantment and resignation. If the Dwarves were the people offending Sylvanas, and they could not get through to the Dwarves... what hope was left?

The Ruins of Dun Orgota

While under escort from Dun Dortho to their final destination of Dun Orgota, the Fellowship reportedly froze -- literally and figuratively -- on the peak of Ur Talmahek. They and their guides looked down upon the famously siege-proof stronghold of Dun Orgota to find nothing at all in its place.
The land below them appeared as though it had been furrowed recklessly by some unfathomable force, with a great pit at its center, like the socket of an extracted tooth, filling briskly with brown water. No trace remained of its labyrinthine stone walls, nor its vaunted halls either above or below the earth. Every Dwarf, every cut stone, every coin, gem, tree and blade of frosted grass had been utterly devoured. The only trace of the cause of its utter annihilaton was a cavernous opening in the side of the pit, filled in after a few dozen metres by a fresh cave-in. A faint green aurora danced about the entrance, pulsing faintly and gradually dissipating.
Whatever ill was to come, what tidings the Fellowship were blindly bearing, had arrived, and utter destruction had come with it. The Omnicide had begun.

Dispatches Across the Continent

That immortal line lives in nearly every bardic saga about the Trilune Fellowship to signify the end of the first act, but of course it would have been a miraculous coincidence if that had been the Tarrasque's first appearance, and indeed the Omnicide had begun quite some time hence. The Fellowship was in a remote location and simply had not received word of similar occurrences at Oakstone, Artoh, and Echadnaur, as much as five weeks prior to the disappearance of Dun Orgota. The Fellowship was rather less well informed than most of the population on the central continent for months, as reports from survivors began to circulate about a great beast with a body like a wingless dragon -- but larger still, and with a head wreathed in shadow, from whose maw neither matter, creature nor light seemed able to escape. Few sane survivors were able to report upon its manlike eyes and its eerily soft voice; but those firmly gripped with madness spoke of little else.
As if that were not cause enough for distress, news had begun to emerge from northern Yishanim communities of unusually high infernal activity, and even some calls for aid from some of the better fortified coastal cities.
The Fellowship dispatched Sendings and snow ravens to every imaginable potential ally, demanding news and beseeching them for their allegiance against whatever forces might have fallen upon them and indeed seemingly all of creation. As they awaited reply, they repeated their demand for audience with the (now Four) Kings. This time their request was granted, though the results of their entreaties were predictably disappointing. None of the Kings trusted the others to lay down arms if they were to send their own men to confront the beast, and none would commit to being the first to do so. Despite a deeply aggrieved and urgent presentation -- often reflected in alternating stanzas between Astras and Eldath in Human bardic tradition, and one of the four great arias for the lead role of the Eldath soprano in the operatic tradition, together with the entreaty of the Orcs, her accusation of Sylvanas and her farewell to Kuros -- the Kings would not budge, at least outwardly confident that their Dun, properly cautioned, could avoid the fate of Orgota. Prince Thurdon was deeply moved by the presentation of his new friends, but held his tongue in the presence of his elders.
To their eternal credit, upon which account the Council frequently draws, Anthur-Ro responded to their Sendings almost immediately in the affirmative. The School of Conjuration had already turned to a wartime research footing practically overnight after the report from Oakstone, and the Archmage's intelligence on the origin of the beast filled in a lot of blanks they had been struggling to work through.
To the extent the histories have records of such things, it appears the Gnomish territories generally followed the lead of Anthur-Ro and agreed to contribute both arcane support and force of arms if necessary to the effort to identify and neutralize the threat to the mortal races. The Elves, of course, were already sworn to aid the Fellowship by fealty to their Queen and their concern about the wrath of their god. The goblinoid races, illiterate and unorganized, were not consulted; nor were the Halfling peoples, who were at this point in history too few in number and too agrarian in nature to have been considered worthy allies. The Yishanim nations varied widely in their response. The Stonefolk, settled in what is now largely Portavian territory, joined early, urged along by close allegiance to Cedwyn’s family and, later, the proximity of the massacre at Olthius, the location of which has still never been identified by scholars. (Gnomish geologists continue to test chasms and lakes in the region to exclude those features exhibiting signs of historical erosion or tectonic activity from consideration, though the prospect of any archaeological discovery at a potential site seems slim.)
The various nations in the farm belt of the central continent had only minor disagreements or limited conflicts at this point in history, and no special diplomatic efforts were required to obtain their assistance. The main concern between them at that stage seemed to be a lack of organization: who was in charge of this effort, what did they require, and how could the Yishanim nations – technologically and arcanically advanced but typically confined to disparate city-states – meaningfully assist?
Among the Yishanim holdouts were the Marsher Lords from whom the present ones took their name, who objected to the enterprise on religious grounds and welcomed the end of creation if it was the Oak Father’s will. The Emegians – tribal Yishanim of the southwest peninsula of the central continent -- doubted that they, who embraced enchantment and technology alongside their nomadic tradition, could possibly have offended Sylvanas and did not wish to do so by acting against him. For its part, the Grand Mausoleum responded cryptically, advising that they were unable to assist due to pressing engagements elsewhere. The overwhelming push from Pandemonium that had gone so far beyond the capabilities of the few thousand droz’ohn-ka that the entire Black Army was pressed into service was, as all parties would soon discover, not a separate engagement but a new theatre in the same developing conflict.
The Weave-gifted Roynlanders of the Eastern Continent offered their assistance in principle but advised they were in no position to contribute meaningfully, having been decimated by the Levaltian Plague that would in a few years’ time drive them to virtual extinction. Their leader, whose name is unfortunately lost to time, foresaw the likely demise of his people and arranged for the neighbouring Gnomes of Sitznubble-Po to collect the legendary magical arms and armour for which they were so esteemed, and to deliver them in waves to their colony, the ruins of which comprise the core of modern Nessardine. That arcane aid was a critical contribution to the war effort, which saw no shortage of Yishanim manpower but a persistent need for weaponry capable of harming either the Tarrasque or the more tenacious elites of the infernal incursion. Entreaties sent to Pandemonium and the Unseelie Court were dismissed with glee. Dispatches to the Seelie Court were replied to with characteristic aloofness, with the Court Herald advising that the time was not yet right for them to intervene. The few noble dragons known to mortals were offered great and extended supplication, but those few that had not absented themselves from their known roosts were either hibernating or feigning the same, much to the alarm of the wise. Even the Myconids of the Underdark received communications, and although they did ultimately contribute to the war effort unilaterally, the language barrier proved to be too much for a meaningful alliance.
In sum, the Fellowship calculated that it had just shy of ten thousand Sylvan rangers, a hundred and ten thousand well-equipped but hapless farmers, ranchers and tradesmen; four hundred pint-sized mages (other races still being excluded from instruction at Anthur-Ro) ; a battle-hardened death cult fifty thousand strong with nine hundred elite special forces completely occupied on the northern front, and little else. As the reports of full-bore infernal incursion and large-scale devastation in seemingly random locations increased, it became clear that this would not be enough to secure the entire globe, nor, potentially, to face this great creature and the armies of the Pit even if they were somehow able to force a pitched battle. If the thirty thousand hardened, mithril-laced warriors of Dun Orgota were no match for his force of nature, even leaving aside the demonic forces streaming south into the continent, the alliance as presently constructed stood little chance.
As far as the Tarrasque went, they needed another approach: some way to neutralize it without simply sacrificing their troops to its relentless hunger.
And as far as the Pit Fiends and their teeming forces of the damned were concerned, there were no two ways about it: if the Dwarves would not fight, the Fellowship needed the Orcs.

Journey to Artoh

With these two tasks before them, the Fellowship divided here at Dun Rukaz for the first time in more than a year. Blackchin would return to Anthur-Ro and lead the Tower to devise some solution to the threat posed by the Tarrasque. Half a world away, Astras, Cedwyn, Eldath and the Abate Sisters would accept Thurdon’s offer of a sturdier ship and adventurous crew. (The Sending Stone used by Blackchin to keep in touch with the remainder of the Fellowship from this point forward is presently the centerpiece of the Great Library at Anthur-Ro.) The diplomatic wing of the Fellowship would set sail yet further East, through a Northeast Passage that had never before been charted, in hopes of reaching Artoh.
Only a few Orcs had ever come to the central continent, as prisoners, curiosities, tradesmen, pirates, raiders or would-be conquerors. At this point in history there was only a small foothold of Orcish foreigners settling northeast of the Stonefolk, comprised of only a few roving bands of raiders. They were a nuisance, a far cry from the flourishing territory now known as Turos. What all of these Orcs had in common, however, was that they had their ancestral origin in Aberdon: the Orcish territory on the southeast coast of the Western Continent. While any of those expatriates would boast of their tribe’s strength and their khan’s relative position among the warlords of Aberdon, they would all be forced to admit – or to steadfastly refuse to admit the truth – that the Orcish civilization in the northwest of that continent was larger and more sophisticated by several orders of magnitude. If the Fellowship wanted to turn the tide of the infernal incursion and field a critical mass of bloodthirsty warriors capable of swarming the great beast, their hopes lay in the more formidable, far more numerous, reputedly more ruthless territories of Artoh.
It is patently not true that Dwarves, who as a rule resent surface travel, are the finest navigators and seamen on Oa. They will, however, cleave to that claim for the rest of time as a result of their successful voyage through the merciless and uncharted Untabat Sea through to the Western Continent. That journey took only some three months to complete owing to the arctic winds and the favour of Tyr, God of Storms and patron of Astras and Cedwyn. The tales of that journey, reasonably enough, were written and kept almost uniformly by the Dwarves. As one might expect, saying that those tales foregrounded the Dwarven crew is a drastic understatement. In the Dwarvish sagas the Fellowship are depicted as little better than cargo in the tales of the heroic captain Bront Bronzebreast, who challenged the unknown and kept his crew and craft together through his own personal strength. Great credit is due to him, of course, but divine intervention may have been worth at least a mention.