The Plague Wars

How did it start?

The Plague Wars were first named the Mersow Wars.
The war raged for five years and took place between 1724 and 1729.

Thane Briar Stormbow from Clan Badgorsen had been elected Thane of the Clanlands only ten years prior.
Briar Stormbow and his entourage had grown arrogant and callous in their handling of the foreign powers around Alven.

The Thanes and the country as a whole had grown exponentially richer since the creation of The Arkivon, The Sanctuary , now that relative peace reigned among the clans.

Strong in the knowledge that the Rod of Power were under the Thane's control, Stormbow did not fear any rivalry from any continental powers.

Under his thaneship, the merchant guilds grew in number and strength, forging lucrative links not only within Alven but also with the political entities outside of the Clanlands.
The newly richy had developed a taste for the ‘exotic’ objects and resources that could be now imported from all of over the continent.

The Arkivon had spent a considerable amount of its means and resources in making sure the trade routes were secured and that goods could flow from one end of the country to the other.
Trade was brisk between the independent port cities of Mersow, Illicen and the affluent southern heartlands of Alven.

However, it became apparent to the Thane and The Clanbearers that goods from the independent port cities of Mersow and Ilicen were becoming more and more expensive to acquire and the import duties the Arkivon was extracting as taxes from these goods drying up.
Something had to be done.

Many Arkivens' delegations were dispatched to Mersow and Ilicen but to no avail.
The Mersow guilds, in particular, thought they had the right and the power to impose a one-sided trade agreement that would mainly benefit its merchant class.

The War

At that point, Thane Stormbow lost patience, and afraid to lose face decided to annex Mersow into the Clanlands.
This was, at the time, a hugely popular decision supported by most of the clans.

The White Seer , Floren Drakesong, had prophecized the war would be swift and decisive.
The Port of Mersow had a reputation as a merchant city, but its martial outfit could not compete with the clans' fyrds and The Host of Morgan.

On the day of the feast of Beltane, in the year 1425 NE, the rods of power were taken out of The Repository where they had been resting untouched since the previous war, some 50 years before, and The Rod Lancers armed with the powerful weapons marched East at the head of the Host.

The fight was uneven from the start, as Port Mersow did not have any rod of power in their store, but money will buy an arsenal if you know where to look.
For generations, the superlatively rich merchant guilds of Mersow had hoarded magical relics from all over Alven and beyond.

A few artefacts found their way into the guilds’ vaults and proved to be decisive in keeping the might of the Alven Host at bay for quite a long time.
Among the notable magical items was a ring so powerful that its runes - read by a Rune Wielder - could create a shield protecting the city from the blast of the rods.
The Mersow High Council had counted on such magic to hold the Thane's Host at bay.

However, there is a saying on the continent that nothing is more stubborn than an Alven clansman.
Stormbow waited five years to find a breakthrough into the city defences and then the power rods got to do their work. The city walls were all but destroyed in three days under the Rod Lancers' attacks.

Betrayed ...

As the story goes, Mersow did have a traitor in their midst - Mersow employed a rogue mage by the name of Oakley Valglen.
Oakley was the youngest son of Dart Valglen, the late chieftain of Clan Boarsden.

Oakley passed the Marks as a teen and was trained by the Arkivon before coming back to his Clanlands, but a few years after he returned to Swinhelm, he was disowned by his own father.

The nature of his crimes is not known, but Oakley left Farside and ended up in the cosmopolitan city of Mersow.
As the war started, he was working for one of the most influential families of the town: The Mersheens.
It was not long before he was wearing the ring - now known as The Mersow Ring.

In the fifth year of the war, Oakley fell out with the Mersow High Council.
Some presume that the fallout was about the inhuman pressure the Council exerted on Oakley as he was asked to maintain the shield around the town.

In the end, Oakley gave Thane Stormbow and his armies a way to circumvent the shield, and this is how the war ended.

The Plague

When the city fell the clans' fyrds, who had been promised many riches, were let loose in the town, and sacked it.
The blood of the innocents flooded Mersow's streets as the Thane and his Host watched on.

A few days after the massacre, as it had been prophesized by The Hermit of The Muddy Isle, the Seer Clairleu himself, a plague spread among the clansmen.

The returning armies brought the terrible disease back to Highfort and their Clanlands.

No one was spared, and soon, spouses and children accompanied the soldiers to the The Underworld.

Thane Stormbow himself died of the illness, only a few months after returning to Highfort.
Offerings to the gods had no success in curing the ailing monarch, and then the plague went away.

Aftermath

The Thane who succeeded Stormbow, Thane Snowpyk was a very pious man and spent his thaneship atoning for his predecessor's evil deeds in a bid to restore the gods' favour.

There was a very real fear that The Mersow Plague could strike again and continue to claim more clansmen's lives.

Thane Snowpyck spent a non-considerable amount of The Great Hoard to rebuild Mersow and ensure its future prosperity.

At the end of the war, Mersow had to sign legally binding treaties with Alven, which made sure that the Clanlands would be offered preferential trade offers, but the port of Mersow itself is still self-governed.
Mersow has survived ruination to become once more a prosperous harbour on the East coast.

It has to be said that its neighbour, the city of Illiden has now eclipsed the ill-fated port.
Illiden was spared Mersow's fate and because of its situation further south on the coast, is now fast becoming a huge metropolis of its own.

Mersow's fate has also prepared Illiden for the changing current of politics on the continent.
the Illiden High Counsel has made sure that part of its enormous wealth has gone into training a competent army and it has forged many treaties with the The Frencal Republic to the south: a country that Alven has no desire to offend.

The Mersow Relics

No one is sure of what happened to the magical relics that the Mersow High Council used during the conflict.
There exists conflicting accounts of their disappearance.

Some say that the Arkivon swiftly appropriated the infamous Mersow ring and the other magical artefacts used during the war.
However, others hint at the fact that the ring might still be hidden somewhere in Mersow.

As to Oakley Valglen, he managed to disappear towards the end of the war, and has not been seen since.