One Against the League

One Against the League is a book discovered among the treasure looted by the Legion of the Black Hand.

## Description

Penned by Clas Lussier, One Against the League is equal parts historical report of the struggles of the silver dragon Xorithromlax against the Eventide League and religious propoganda intending to sing the praise and proclaim the power of Tohmos, Master of the Hammer.

## Research

### Completed by Bren

The name of Xorithromlax the Glimmer Knight is held in high esteem throughout the Realms, an irrefutable truth that generates little surprise. Bards and minstrels recreate his battles with the Basilisk of Ophidian when the Night Serpent was summoned into this mortal plane, plays have been created to commemorate his victory against the insidious actions of the Whisper Bairn, a fiendish creation of evil incarnate with an army of followers. Few can be faulted for assuming that Xorithromlax is not mortal, his creation was said to be divine by the very command of the True within the hands of the Goldhand. But this is naught truth, as was made plain during the struggles against the Eventide League - a band of assassins and mercenaries that attempted to coup the Realms of Atralran, Gawylthlan, Lachlen, Sunstone and Codorne in one simultaneous plot.

The Eventide League made their name as a valuable asset to any Realm during 766AG, when they were solely responsible for the breaking of the Siege of Esterving in favour of the forces of the Rose Throne. After the city of the minor Realm of Astedia had held fast for nearly a year and a half, the mercenary group sent riders to the King of Gawylthlan, offering to seemingly achieve the impossible - and make the city yield before the turn of the year. In exchange, they requested just one price - their Commander Seider Shudir finds a place in the court of Inverden to serve as a primary advisor for military matters in the Realm moving forwards. King Vendrik II Tawnbert accepted their offer - assuming their promises folly.

The city of Esterving did not take the remainder of the year to fall, for instead Gawylthlian banners flew from the ramparts within the next month. News spread quickly of this seemingly impossible task, catching the attention of many - Kings, Queens, Dukes, Earls, Viscounts - seeking to hire them for tasks petty and major alike. Each time they demanded no coin nor riches - but rather power, positions of authority and/or privilege in the circles that came searching for their assistance. Within a year, the higher echelons of the League held titles of nobility in greater density than all but the most long-standing aristocratic families - and so the attention of Tohmos was said to be caught. During Aita's Second Gift, the Master of the Hammer was responsible for deciding upon those that would be most fit to rule, granting them the divine blessing of blood of blue in place of the mundane resonance granted to the remaining populations of the Races. The League had claimed this for themselves artificially, and so decries by the High Priest of Tohmos Harmek Hophammer added this fuel to the fire with growing public distrust.

Paradoxically, this is thought by historians to have forced the hand of the Eventide League, starting the bloodshed known as the Evening of the Eventide. Using their influence, the generals, captains and other commanders of the League put their plans into full action before they were truly ready, and so did not find themselves carried out with the slickness that had come to characterise their previous successes. As they moved to coup all the major realms of the southwest of Ahlus, from the Peninsula of the Regal Forest in Sunstone to the Southern Timberlands they butchered any that stood in their final grasp for ascension - and would have managed more if not for one.

Both King Gilbert VIII Goldlor and his son Maxence were saved when Xorithromlax smote down General Pervar Kadz upon the battlements of Chalimar Palace, before the Glimmer Knight took flight, arriving just in time to rally the still-loyal troops of the Rose Throne against their turncloak brothers-in-arms. At the mouth of the Lotus Run Xorithromlax stood fast with the fleet of Lachlen at his back, freezing Oyster Bay to allow the soldiers of the Earl of Starhithe to raid the vessels of the League. In Sunstone, he captured a would-be assassin before they could break into the chambers of Princess Cavaria, driving the mercenaries in the region into the Regal Forest from which they did not return. It is said that Xorithrolmax did not rest or sleep for nearly half a year, flying between Realm and Realm to quell the threat wherever it reared its head, before finally the Glimmer Knight came across Commander Shudir, casting him into the fires of the great forge in the Duchy of Glatlinia.

Xorithromlax shunned the celebrations and revelry held in his name, instead seeking a place to rest but not before pledging that he would return when the Master of the Hammer called upon him once more.