The Great Houses

The Great Houses are the foundation of Sundevalda. They are the nation's unflinching protectors and stewards, and the parasites who drain the land and its people to husks. Despite being engaged in near constant struggle with one another, the combined magical might of the Great Houses has still been proven enough to resist the imperialistic ambitions of Sundevalda's vast Northern neighbor, the Kryat Arcaneocracy. Through the accumulation of their vast wealth and power, the Houses serve as the unelected rulers of Sundevalda, the nation's military, and the enforcers of its unwritten laws. Woe be to any Houseless who offends one of the Housebound, for few would dare to speak up should the Bound choose to act as judge, jury, and executioner. Not that all of the Housebound are cruel with their power, but like so many things in life, power so often corrupts.

Each House is possessed of its own tradition in Craft, their own techniques for harvesting and utilizing the magic they employ.

## House Driar

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Historically one of the least of the Great Houses, House Driar has seen their fortunes rise in the last two decades. The exact reason behind this is unclear, though rumor and speculation abound. Such whispers are fueled by the House's interest in the Hill, and the Miasma which infuses it. It is speculated that their newfound prosperity in Craft is linked to that place, particularly seeming that the House appears to have moved itself to somewhere near that ruined District, or perhaps within. If they haven't, they certainly keep most of their Housebound there. Whatever the source, they are almost always the first to face the horrors that find occasion emerge from those crimson mists.

## House Dricaal

* *Go to: House Dricaal*

One of the Hidden Houses within Pirika's Wall, House Dricaal first rose to Great House status 124 years ago. Studying the Craft of oneiromancy, they quickly established themselves as potent agents of diplomacy and intrigue, rivaling even House Melifloran in that respect. While weak among the Great Houses in terms of the strength of their Wards, they nevertheless maintain an advantage in secrets and spycraft that they use to potent effect. While House Melifloran works in favors and rumors, House Dricaal trades in secrets and blackmail. It is rumored that within the vaults of the Great Library of House Dricaal, each Oathsworn and Housebound of any status at all within the city has their own bound book, full of rumors and hearsay.

## House Huurin

* *Go to: House Huurin*

Huurin might be one of the mightiest of Houses, but it is difficult to truly say, for they keep much of their strength well outside of Yosthaven. A full accounting of their power is rendered impossible, as they take great pains to obfuscate the true number of their Housebound. Their Oathsworn pull Meluc from the earth and sea, poisoning the land and rendering the oceans barren to empower their Mantles. Naturally, the House takes great pains to ensure that they draw forth what power they need well away from the prying eyes of others, sometimes sending agents as far as the Arcaneocracy to distil their Craft. More than one Kryat advance has been stopped in its tracks over the last three hundred years when a single Oathsworn to House Huurin snuck into their encampment and drew upon their Mantle, poisoning their water and rotting their supplies within their wagons. At least, so House Huurin would have the city believe.

## House Isillideras

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The people of Sundevalda do not put as much stock in the differences between the races as other nations, and Yosthaven is a melting pot of cultures and peoples. Yet even there, it is rare that the Bloodcursed do not garner at least a hard look in their dealings with others. House Isillideras is one of the founding three of Yosthaven, beside Yassir and Pravee, and even in its ancient past it was a House of the Bloodcursed. Not that the other races cannot find their places there, yet for three hundred years unbroken the Head of House Isillideras has always been one of their number.

While the House has suffered the same fluctuations in power and Craft that all of the **Great Houses** have endured, it has consistently maintained its position near the top of the pecking order. The bloodied **Oathsworn** of Isillideras have developed a reputation for brutal efficiency in their Craft rivaled only by the of the Black and Red Coats of House Yassir. The other Houses have learned, often to their detriment, that any conflict with Isillideras is doomed to become a brutal campaign of attrition. One in which any meager victory comes at half a dozen small losses.

## House Kühn

* *Go to: House Kühn*

Within Yosthaven, the **Great Houses** serve many functions, acting as both government, military, and industry. House Kühn is a House of bankers, a merchants guild who acquired enough wealth and talent to buy themselves a place first as a Lesser House, and now as one of the Great Houses of the City. Though some might disdain those who rose to power on wealth rather than raw talent, they soon find that the former is more than capable of buying the latter. House Kühn might have started as a Guild of upstart bankers and merchants, but **Meluc** is **Meluc,** and their investments in Wards and Oathsworn have served them well.

## House Melifloran

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While no where near the most sweeping in their power, House Melifloran nevertheless seems to subside as a rather steady and needed existence as the local House for Healing, Art, and Entertainment of all sorts, finding myriads of ways to bring joy to a life full of danger and hardship. Well known for both its non-hidden location, and its willingness to let allow more than those just bound to the House through its doors. Between these open Wards, and their notoriously low number of Oathsworn, they would appear at first an easy target. Yet somehow they have developed friends and tendrilled connections within many of the Great Houses, and many more of the Lesser, shaping and molding public perception of the whole system through their Art. It is not just the Citadel's shadow that keeps them safe, but the fact that the role they fulfill seems to be a vital one, and thus the Great Houses seem content to let House Melifloran carry on.

## House Mortren

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The House of the Architect is known as much by that name as their more official collective title of House Mortren. The peculiar 'nickname' arising from the predominate faith within it's elite and housesworn, the Cult of the Architect. A strange faith that seems to draw certainty from the notion that all is preordained according to the meticulous plans and designs of the Architect, a deity, or divine collective, that is claimed to exist in the places between Heaven, Hell and the Demonic Abysses. It comes as little surprise then that so many of the brightest minds of this Great House then are drawn to the essential and detail oriented sciences such as logistics, engineering, alchemy, and such sundry exercises of the mind to predict and mitigate what an ironically uncertain future holds. Their even hand can be felt throughout Sundevalda's eclectic and diverse domains and environs as a consequence... As it's their mind and will that trade flow along ordered paths and between ordered cities like blood in the vein of a healthy body. Their very identity stamped into the stones of countless roadhouses, bulwarks, fastnesses, entrapments and structures of both brutish and elegant design.

It is perhaps the most interesting quirk of House Mortren then that for all their belief in the unerring plans of the Architect, they still believe that there is need, from time to time, for corrective action. After all, there are many beings that act outside the weave of fate and for each step or action they take, the Great Design must be corrected to account for it. It is this core tenet of their faith then that informs the heart of their Craft and sees the most trusted of their servants bound and directed by iron clad prophecy as adjudicators of the final will and censure of the Architect. It is this empowering and proactive manipulation of destiny and prophecy that sees them upon the same stage as other Great Houses as while it's cost is no doubt great, there are few that can argue with efficacy of those few who had been acknowledge before the eyes of the Great Houses as so burdened and empowered by such glorious purpose as executing the Great Designs of the Architect.

## House Pravé

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While most of the Great Houses of Yosthaven keep to Elmrock, a few find reason to lay their foundations elsewhere. The Necromancers of House Pravé are one such, finding far sturdier roots among the graveyards of Murkygate than any of the decayed protections the Somark's Road might offer. Bearing leather masks stained so darkly purple as to be almost black, the Oathsworn of House Pravé stalk the crypts and tunnels beneath the District they call home, drawing power from both the living and the dead.

It was from House Pravé that the **Undying** were first made manifest, and their proficiency in Deathcraft is unrivaled anywhere outside of Duun'Rath. The **Revenants** of House Pravé are a wonder and a terror to behold, multiple souls bound together to create engines of Craft that are swift and terrible. More spirit than flesh, they serve as the House's guardians and enforcers.

## House Reileta

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There's a great deal of money to be had to being able to guarantee a client's anonymity when they receive a product or service. It was the ability to deliver on that guarantee that provided House Reileta with the foundation it needed to rise above being lesser Craftsfolk to join the ranks of the **Great Houses**. The particulars of how the bookbinders and brothels became united under a single name have been lost to decades of rumor, gossip, and foreign invasion. The result, however, is a House that has made information the greatest of their available products, a product that they'll sell so long as doing so doesn't threaten their home or people.

## House Richter

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Craftbinding is, as it ever was, more of an art than a science. A skilled Craftbinder can weave circles of logic and special circumstances around a novice, bending the very rules of the universe in order to make the true untrue and the false into reality. Yet among those outside the Great Houses, even those skilled in Craftbinding may not have any recourse to enforce a broken contract through the incursion of Souldebt. Relying on such requires some measure of Craft, and most are not at all talented ins uch domains. Thus, the binding contracts and negotiated bylaws of day to day existence frequently requires an arbiter, a neutral third party to hear the matter of contention and make a Souldebt enforced ruling.

While the Oathsworn of any Great House can play the roll of Adjudicator, it is the Bound of House Richter who have truly claimed the work as their own. From within their Revealed House, the Adjudicators of Richter ply their trade, presiding over Courts of Craft and hearing petitioners. The House has risen far on the back of such labors, to the point where they are respected even among the other Great Houses for their ability to maintain their neutrality. Not that the House is wholly neutral, of course, but they have proven remarkably dogged in their determination not to dance the Dance of Houses.

## House Shanar

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While every Great House fulfills many roles within the city of Yosthaven, those Bound to House Shanar serve primarily as Couriers and Scholars of the unknown.  Masters of Realitycraft, they have spent more than a half century honing their talents into exploring the Great Mysteries and Lost Lore of the spaces between spaces. One of the youngest Houses in Yosthaven, they have only narrowly avoided being swallowed up by greater powers. Instead, as so many before them, they have tied themselves irrevocably to the unknowable, and therefor dedicated themselves to chasing the deeper mysteries of the unknown.

## House Shem

* *Go to: House Shem*

House Shem has carved their name into the obelisk, and so they stand. They were not the first and they will not be the last, but until the dreaming sea washes their name from its surface they will be Constant.

The obelisk does not exist. You can find it in your dreams, if you are particularly unlucky, and once you do it will anchor your dreams and they will never change. Night after night, dream after dream, you will return to the obelisk and its surrounding waters.

There's a community there, dreamers like you trapped and whiling away the hours until dawn. You can chat, if you're so inclined. Trade gossip, make deals, even touch and take and bleed. With the right arts, things can be carried back into the waking world though the price is steep and they will never truly leave. House Shem oversees this gathering of storm-tossed souls, and it is their House more than any physical building could ever be. It is where they meet. It is where they recruit. It is where they are still whole.

## House Yassir

* *Go to: House Yassir*

Far out past the plains of Kryat, and even to the foothills of the Northern Glaciers, whispered tales tell of creatures of profane magic and unholy nightmare.  Utterly inhuman, merciless, and fanatically devoted to their House, in the stories they drink the blood of their victims and devour their souls.  None of the versions are the same, except for one fact.  In each nightmare, the beast in question always wears a high collared coat of red and black.  Most of it is absolute hogwash, of course, but the Great House of Yassir is happy to maintain and even perpetuate the more nefarious mysteries and rumors that surround their red and black bedecked Oathsworn.  It makes travel in more rural areas more difficult, to be sure, but it is a simple enough matter to take the coat off when blending in is what is required.

The greatest and most feared of the Great Houses, House Yassir has maintained their supremacy for the better part of the last three decades through blood, deception, and above all, Craft.