Ashland Trust

**Ashland Trust** is *a Kingdom in the thinnest possible sense of the word. A series of forbidding volcanic islands off the coastlines*

## Description

The Ashlands are a series of volcanic islands off and around the coastline. They have some of the most fertile lands in the Eight Kingdoms and volcanic ash allows their plants to grow to great sizes. Little here is permanent, with volcanic eruptions commonly causing settlements to relocate.

## People

The Trust was built from necessity and involves the Orc and Eldari that make their home here. They worked together to defend their volcanic home from outsiders with increasing frequency over the years.

## The Trust Structure

A number of Orcish villages and the last remaining houses of the Eldari had a longstanding agreement to work together anytime anyone was stupid enough to try and invade their volcanic islands.

The Orc and Eldari eventually came to a more permanent arrangement when forces of the mainland ventured ever deeper into the Ashlands and their accord was called upon more regularly.

The Orc villages and Eldari houses maintain great autonomy, coming together in various holds and domains. There are 5 such of these holds, each with their own Jarl.

The Jarls are not kings, but they work as more or less elected officials at the will of the various village chiefs and house heads.

## Society

The Ashlands are a dangerous and inhospitable place. Home only to the Orcs and Eldari and occasional outsiders that have made their home in the extreme heat.

Orcish villages commonly relocate every 50 years or so as the eruptions lay waste to their lands. This reshaping of the land, emergence of new islands and disappearance of others makes the Ashlands particularly difficult to navigate or map.

The Eldari once had means to control the flow of lava and shape the volcanic rocks, but such secrets where lost in the time of their grandfather's grandmothers, many eons ago.

Now they mostly live in the weltering hills and mountains that once were volcanos. A crumbling people, in a crumbling castle, on a crumbling island.

## Languages

* Eldrasi
* Orcish (although Eldrasi is the official language of The Trust)

## Religion

The peoples of the Ashlands put no faith in higher powers. They are the power of their Kingdom.

## Allies

The longstanding Trust between the Orcish and Eldari inhabitants of the Ashlands is the only allied relationship. They seek no external allies but will trade on the coastal edges of their lands.

## Enemies

Anyone who ventures uninvited into the Ashlands would be considered an enemy by the Trust.

## History

The Eldari once held powerful arcane lore that enabled them to control and channel the volcanic power of their homeland. Most of this knowledge has been lost to them, taken by a group of outsiders - Dragonborn, Tieflings, Traitors.

The Trust viewed this arcane power as their final defence line, the power to reroute the lava and decimate any who made it deep into the Ashlands.

Shortly after the start of the Mage Wars, an outside event of little interest in the Ashlands, a group of outsiders betrayed the Trust and stole the lore of the Eldari.

They vanished from the Ashlands and have not returned. The Eldari retain traces of their previous arcane powers, but severely diminished.

The Trust declared Tieflings and Dragonborn enemies of the Kingdom and there followed a period of merciless cleansing of the islands.

Over the century that followed some outsiders have once again been let back into the Ashlands but are limited to the outer lands for trade and labour. None have managed to become trusted in the Holds since the Great Deceit.

The Trust have watched and scouted the Kingdoms for traces of their lost power and have seen signs of it within the desert lands of The Arid Frontier and The Swarm.

The Ashland Trust continues to swear vengeance on the descendants of the lore thieves and their capture and return would be worth a great bounty.