Aearee

The **aearee** were one of the fabled creator races of Faerûn, known as the Iqua'Tel'Quessir by the elves. They prospered during the Days of Thunder, though their empires fell when the lands of Toril were destroyed during the Flight of Dragons, when the dragon Nagamat led his kind against the avian creator race. The Aearee was widely considered to be the ancestors of, or the very least the creators of, many of Toril's avian humanoids and monstrosities.

## Description

Depictions of Aearee are varied, as are the races known or believed to be descended from the Aearee. They are believed to have been an Avian race of varying size and build, with the three largest groups of the Aearee resembling different types of bird. The Aearee-Krocaa had the features of parrots and eagles, the Aearee-Syran those of eagles and hawks, and the Aearee-Quor those of crows and jays.

The lack of primary sources regarding the exact appearances of the Aearee has led to many confusing discoveries however- such as one made by Captain Eartharran Neirdre of Evermeet, who discovered a lost flying city of the Aearee thousands of years following the fall of their empires. While Eartharran's discovery is what proved the existence of an avian race for scholars (as there was previously a debate amongst them on whether or not there existed an avian or draconic creator race), the captain's own journal implied that the statues he found depicting the Aearee had both draconic and avian features. Eartharran's expedition was ended when his airship was destroyed by dragons, leading to a theory among some in Candlekeep that the captain had discovered some half-dragon enclave or even a still unnamed Aearee people.

## Religion

Though many of the religious beliefs of the Aearee have been lost to time, some of their deities are still known of today, either through old texts recovered by scholars, or by the oral traditions of their descendants. While major flocks of the Aearee had their favored patrons, their pantheon likely included a multitude of gods and demigods, all but forgotten today.

Krocaa the All-Father, god of creation, the sky, the sun, intelligence, and invention, ruled the pantheon. Krocaa was believed to have been born of the cosmic egg- the two halves of which formed the ground and the starry vault of heaven. Krocaa was a very ancient god, and like many other all-father gods, over the ages he grew distant from his people and his pantheon. He was largely an absentee deity by the time the Sarrukh enslaved the race. Oral legends say that Krocaa flew away, beyond the horizon, in shame after a great betrayal by his son Quorlinn. The nature of the betrayal is vague, purported in various accounts to be a theft involving the sun, or part of Krocaa's portfolio, or a magical egg. In one version it is said that Quorlinn sold his father into slavery in exchange for the mantle of night, an artifact of great power. Krocaa was the patron of the Aearee-Krocaa (the "people who soar").

Quorlinn was the son of Krocaa by a being known as the Bird of Night, which is believed to have been the Aearee conception of Shar. Quor was the god of twilight and shadows. He presided over a dark time for the Aearee peoples. In addition to darkness, shadow and dusk, his portfolio included trickery, quick wits, deceit and theft. Quorlinn embodied the ideals of cunning, stealth and humor — qualities the Aearee required in order to help them survive, steal food, avoid punishment, conspire against, and sometimes escape from, their Batrachi overlords. Quorlinn stole the secrets of magic from the Ramenite thearchs and taught it to the Aearee. He is thus seen as the Aearee patron of magical knowledge. As a result of his aid during the enslavement of the Aearee, his worship superceded his father's worship during this dark time. It was said by the Aearee that Quorlinn was ever-shunned by Krocaa for past treachery. Myths told of how Quorlinn would bring his father trophies from his exploits, jewels and shiny treasures he had won by his wits, to garner Krocaa’s favor. But despite his many efforts, at the end of every tale he was always rebuffed, never managing to regain his father’s goodwill. Quorlinn was the patron of the Aearee-Quor (the "twilight flock"), until he his worship was supplanted by the demon lord Pazrael.

Born of the last egg laid by Krocaa and hidden for an age by Quorlinn, Syranita was the Aearee goddess of the dawn and the radiant sky, who had hatched during the enslavement of the Aearee by the Batrachi. Veneration of Syranita took on special significance to the Aearee during the Long Night brought on by the Seven-Fold Winter, first as a symbol of hope and promise that the sun would return; and when the sun finally did rise again, as a symbol of renewal and a promise fulfilled. Even before the winter, she had become the patron of the Aearee-Syran ("children of the dawn"), who hoped and fought for the return of the dawn. Following the end of the Seven-Fold Winter, Syranita became the dominant deity of the Aearee, surpassing Krocaa and Quorlinn in worship.

Phraarkiloorm, god of death, disease, rot, poison and predation, had his place in the divine flock. During the period of Aearee enslavement, Aearee often ended their lives as sacrifices to Ramenos, burning in the fiery maw of the great brass altars dedicated to the Batrachi god. Yet, the Aearee maintained their reverence for Phraarkiloorm, praying to him in secret, both for the release of a merciful death and to mete vengeful death upon their oppressors. Phraarkiloorm was a vulture-headed deity, and the patron of the Vulchlings, an off-shoot of the Aearee-Krocaa that had been twisted by Sarrukh experimentation. In the wake of the Tearfall, the vulchling clerics of Phraarkiloorm gained the respect of their Aearee brethren as the keepers of the rituals and sacraments surrounding death. His adherents included the canniest of hunters and the fierce Raptor Knights. In the years after the Long Night, his followers would hunt the surviving Batrachi to near extinction, raining death from the sky in retribution for past cruelties.

The divine flock also included Remnis of the eagles and Lady Fileet, beast lord of birds. Akadi, goddess of Elemental Air, was also worshiped by some of the Aearie. K’ooriall of the Winds, known also as the 'Skylord', was among the minor deities worshiped. Oral histories also speak of the myriad bood of demigods and hero-deities spawned by the All-Father, though none remain today.

## History

### Early History

Before the Days of Thunder, primitive Aearee nested in all the forests and high places throughout Abeir-Toril. They subsisted in small family groups and coveys. In the absence of agriculture, it was impossible for them to congregate in any kind of larger society, as the fruits of the land could not sustain sizable flocks. Forced to vigorously defend expansive swaths of territory just to hunt and gather sufficient food to power their flight and high metabolism, the first avian folk were territorial, fiercely devoted to family and clan, and hostile to other tribes and outsiders.

Ironically, only through enslavement by successive Sarrukh and Batrachi empires did the Aearee form a sense of racial identity and solidarity. Beneath the yoke of cold-blooded overseers, the Aearee learned the techniques of agriculture that would allow them to feed large flocks. With the cunning of Quorlinn, the Aearee filched the secrets of writing and magic from the slave lords. And with the patience and watchfulness of Syranita, they attended their oppressors, sowing in their hearts the seeds of civilization that would blossom after a storm of falling stars freed them from slavery. Every Aearee that broke free from their overseers was another future clan more equipped than the last, and soon many of these escaped avians began create their own fledgling civilization on a massive island on the Silver Sea around the year -31,500 DR. Their name for this kingdom and island has long since been lost.

### Rise of the Aearee Empires

In the wake of Tearfall – the blazing storm of stars that scoured the Batrachi overlords from the face of Toril – those Aearee who were still enslaved rose against their former masters. The few remaining Ramenite Thearchs were hurled into the bellies of their iron-mawed toad altars, to burn amidst the ashes of untold Aearee victims, sacrificed over centuries to the hunger of a rapacious god. When these freed Aearee joined their fellow Aearee in their newly found homeland, however, they found that the island had become home to many landwyrms- creatures spawned by the Tearfall of -31,000 DR. In addition to these new inhabitants, the island was claimed by the young god Xymor to be his own domain- who would go on to build a landwyrm kingdom called Myrmidune.

Unwilling to risk a fight with the landwyrms and their divine patron over a land that was quickly becoming less habitable after the climate changes the Tearfall had brought on, the Aearee left their first homeland to return to the former lands of the Batrachi. In the following migrations, the Aearee peoples settled the lands of Merrouroboros, filling in the power vacuum left by the fall of the Batrachi and becoming the third 'creator race' to form massive empires during the Days of Thunder. This change did not come immediately, however, as the Aearee almost died out during the brutal seven-fold winter.

In the west, the Aearee-Krocaa, followers of the All-Father Krocaa, established the grand aerie of Viakoo on Mount Havraquoar, which would become the capital of their great nation, which stretched from as far west as Maztica and as far south as the Lake of Steam. Mount Havroquoar stood far west of where the Sword Coast ends today, as it and much of the lands of the Aearee-Krocaa were destroyed many centuries later in the Sundering. It is believed that the Aearee-Krocaa sung powerful spell mantles around their aeries and sacred forests. These mantles, with the grace of Krocaa, shielded them from the harsher depredations of the Long Night that followed the Tearfall.

In the north, the Aearee-Syran established their capital at the aerie of Phwiukree, in the peaks of the Star Mounts and nested in the forests all around those mountains (known as the High Forest in the modern day). These Aearee worshiped the goddess Syranita, daughter of the All-Father Krocaa. To survive the Long Night, Phwiukree spellsingers called forth towering crystal spires from the peaks of the central mountains, whose exquisite magics could control the very weather above the High Forest.

In the southeast, the Aearee-Quor carved out the domain of Shara from their rookery in the Orsraun Mountains- seeking heat first in its volcanic caves and vents before finding the hidden bounties of the Underdark. The Aearee-Quor's patron was Quorlinn, whose wits and cunning preserved their flocks through the worst times of the Batrachi domination and inspired in their hearts a fierce pride and determined self-reliance. Spreading out from the Shara rookery on the Orsraun Mountains, they grew into a loose affiliation of floating city-states that would eventually span the breadth of the continent.

It is claimed by some aarakocra storytellers that the Aearee breathed life back into the land during the Long Night, through druidic magic, the arcane art, and even a war between the Aearee-Syran and the icy armies of frost giants and uldra fey. Legends say that after this war, the gracious priests of Syranita from the aerie of Phwiukree negotiated a treaty with the Overking of the High Forest sprites. Together they planted an arakhor sapling, Mornungongbarae, a celestial tree-spirit of divine lineage – said to be descended from Emmantiensien himself. In the shadow of the Star Mounts, deep within the Unicorn Run, the little sapling grew to tower above the High Forest, guarding the pledge of friendship between the two races, a peace that would last nearly a thousand years.

Once the Long Night ended, it is believed that the Aearee were responsible for building great flying cities that predate those of any other civilization- all while villages on the ground put in work to make the lands of Merouroboros fertile once again. In time, all of the Aearee peoples would become as magically advanced as the Sarrukh and Batrachi before them- with some of the flying Aearee enclaves having the planeshifting capacity of spelljammers.

In -30,700 DR, after three centuries of peaceful and uninterrupted expansion, a thousand Aearee-Krocaa lost their lives fighting a much smaller force of lamassu. In an attempt to find a way to protect themselves, the Aearee-Krocaa begin performing magical experiments on domesticated landwyrms- creating the first winged wyrms on Toril, which they call Wyverns. Now with wyvern armies at its disposal, the Aearee-Krocaa empire grows even more in the following century.

### Aearee-Urgnari War

In -30,400 DR, the Aearee-Quor of the Kookrui-Shara rookery came into contact with Urgnarash, a militant kingdom of gnoll slavers. Highly organized and aggressive, the gnolls of Urgnarash held tribes of plains-fey, humans and even hill giants under their lash. The Ugnari used these slaves to help conquer more territory and support an expansionist regime. The warriors of Urgnarash raided constantly into the farms and holdings that supported Kookriu-Shara. Thinking to quash a minor annoyance, the Aearee-Quor assaulted the seat of power of Urgnarash. Flying over on their rocs, they blasted fireballs and lightning down at the gnoll king and his army. The gnolls responded by shooting the rocs from the sky with great ballistae. The vengeful gnolls then burned the farms and fields of Kookriu-Shara, setting the Shaar ablaze.

Having never been defeated before, the Kookriu matriarchs were enraged. Singing the ancient battle calls, they entreated the aid of neighboring rookeries, Awookreet-Shara and Oweeo. Together they sought to prosecute a war of extermination against Urgnarash. But the triune matriarchs underestimated the gnolls, for the hyena-folk were new to the lands of Toril. Gnoll shamans prayed to Yeenoghu, who loosed a school of terlen from the nether planes. From the backs of flying sharks, the gnoll cavalry swarmed the Aearee. The shark-riders carried arrows tipped with dung and pitch, which they set alight and fired upon the rookeries. Their voracious mounts tore through skeins of defenders, devouring knight after knight right out of the air. Before the day was done, the gnolls prevailed, and all three rookeries crashed in cinders to the ground.

Other rookeries in Shaar retaliated by summoning djinn and efreet to cause whirlwinds and wildfires in the kingdom of gnolls, but this only brought an even worse fate upon the Aearee. The shamans of Yeenoghu summoned marrashi – spirits of pestilence from the Barrens of Doom and Despair – to blight Aearee crops and spread a wasting plague among the avians. The Wasting Plague, as this pestilence would go on to be called, decimated the Aearee-Quor population. With their farmlands ruined and little workforce remaining to farm them, they set upon humans and fey tribes to the north of the Shaar in order to plunder their crops and enslave a replacement workforce to feed the hungry rookeries. Thus began a never-ending cycle of conquest, as the southern rookeries exhausted the resources of each successive region, and moved further and further north.

During this crisis, a young summoner in the rookery of Okwalak-Shara named Sieska Waewielonn, sought answers for the plight of her people in summoned elementals, celestials, and fiends. During her studies she encountered a plane she had never heard of before, and in that plane learned the name of an extraplanar being she believed she could summon for information- Pazrael. Upon being summoned, Pazrael appeared to her as the handsomest of Aearee with six-wings. He promised to show her awesome secrets and wonders, claiming to be a god. In truth, he was none other than Pazuzu, a demonic lord of ultimate corruption. With a sonorous song, he seduced the curious mage, promising gifts and powers untold if she would only pledge her soul to him- and she fell for his soothing words.

### Rise of Sieska

Through Pazrael's aid, Sieska was able to become the archmage of her rookery, and a skilled seductress herself. Pazrael channeled her hunger for knowledge into a hunger for power, investing her as the herald of his growing faith. All the Aearee of Okwalok-Shara would go on to join their song with hers and pledge their souls to Pazrael. Okwalok-Shara became a terror in the sky. Pazrael taught its arcanists how to summon magical servants called vrocks. With the aid of demon legions, Okwalok-Shara conquered far-flung lands. Soon they brought all neighboring rookeries under Sieska’s iron wing. Transferring her capital to the grand rookery of Aeng-Shara, the scion of Pazrael rapidly expanded her empire, usurping control of all the lands from Raurin back to the home-nest of Shara in the Orsraun Mountains.

The Aearee-Quor abandoned the faith of Quorlinn to worship at the talons of Pazrael. Those few faithful who refused to convert were tied to stones and flung from the edges of rookeries. One lone city maintained its allegiance to Quorlinn and escaped to the east. The rookery of Tiennkoo-Shara fled to the farthest peaks of Kara-Tur, where their descendants yet thrive today as the crow-headed race known as Tengu. The Tengu are the only branch of the Aearee-Quor who never lost their wings. The sweet promises of Pazrael came at a terrible cost for the rest of the Aearee-Quor, as Pazrael never gives any gift but for the price of the thing you hold most dear. For the gift of revenge against Urgnarash and domination over all, Pazrael took from them the power of flight. The Aearee of Shara never again rode the winds, except by dint of spell or steed.

Sieska first waged war against the gnolls of Urgnarash, eradicating the first true gnoll civilization off the face of Toril. Few gnolls, and even fewer of their slaves, survived the destruction of their kingdom and the subsequent sacrifices for Pazrael's favor. When Sieska had avenged her people, however, her conquests did not come to an end.

Sieska would go on to wage war on the other Aeraree nations to the north and west. Aearee-Krocaa is the first to fall. Aearee-Syran, defended itself with the aid of its fey allies, winged treants, and soarwhales against Aearee-Quor's near-endless demon vrocks and battle rocs. In the end, Mornungongbarae, who had guarded the High Forest for nearly a thousand years, rose up and brought down the Quor floating city, but at the cost of his own life. His tragic sacrifice is still sung by treant skalds today, in a saga called *The Lament of Mornungongbarae*. Though the aerie of Phwiukree was demolished, but the war with Shara was ended with the death of the tyrant Sieska. The eastern aeries of the Aearee-Syran survived, enduring an uneasy détente with the Sharan empire to the south. But the peace would last only a few years before a new foe revealed itself.

### Fall of the Aearee Empires

In -30,000 DR, the once-small wyrms that had hatched in the wake of the Tearfall had grown into mighty dragons. Over centuries, the dragons had increased their size manyfold, and their numbers by multitudes. They hid within caverns and swamps, in desert sands and mountain crags. Now, they intended to dominate the skies the Aearee had claimed for themselves. On that fateful day, some thousand years after they fell from the sky as eggs, dragons across Merrouroboros swarmed together in the first Flight of Dragons. They assailed the avians in the air, on the land and beneath the ground. They burned the cities from the skies. They snatched the Aearee from the air, swallowing them in mid-flight. They fell upon the home-nests of Viakoo and Shara, ravaging the aeries, destroying them utterly.

The wyrm-general Nagamat rampaged through the Underdark below the Orsraun Mountains, consuming the Sharans and burning their ancestral hatcheries. Nagamat took all of Shara as his lair, and finding many wonders there, he used Aearee magic to help found the first dragon kingdom. Sharan survivors escaped deeper into the Underdark, where their feral and twisted descendants became the dire corbies.

The survivors of Viakoo fled west to the land they called Anchorome. Five of their cities, all crafted from spelljamming helms, fled to the stars. Rulungwar, Donnakee, Phra’iskree, Oolatiel, and an unnamed fifth one, lost during the exodus, crossed the Sea of Night to the world of Coliar. Those aeries float there still, among Coliar’s manifold moons. Descendants of the Aearee-Krocaa are known today as the aarakocra.

Some few repentant Aearee-Quor begged Quorlinn for his mercy, and he led them to Kara-Tur to find refuge with their long lost cousins of Tiennkoo-Shara. The cost for abandoning Pazrael was high, for these pleading words the repentant Aearee-Quor would be their last. As his last 'blessing', Pazrael took their ability to speak- leaving them only with the ability to mimic others. Descendants of these people call themselves kenku, a name which some scholars believe derives from Kanee-Tiennkoo, which means “little brothers of Tiennkoo” while other sages think it merely a linguistic variant of the name Tiennkoo itself. Both peoples, the tengu and the kenku, thrive to this day in Kara-Tur. Over the centuries, many kenku have emigrated back to Faerûn and have a notable presence in the Unapproachable East.

The descendants of the Aearee-Krocaa and the Aearee-Syran, the Aarakocra, would not return to the lands their ancestors once inhabited until the Year of Eagle's Flight, 418 DR. This migration came thousands of years after the Sundering had split the lands of Anchorome and Maztica from the lands of Faerûn, destroying many of the lands the Aearee-Krocaa once ruled.

## Legacy

The aearee created or were the ancestors of the following races and creatures:

* **Aarakocra**, who descend from the Aearee-Krocaa and the Aearee-Syran who survived the Rage of Dragons by fleeing to the western edges of Anchorome and the lands of Maztica. A large amount of Aarakocra also live on the world of Coliar, being descendants of Aearee-Krocaa who fled the destruction of their empire using Spelljammers.
* **Alguduirs**, semi-aquatic and scaled avian humanoids who descend from Aearee slaves that were experimented on by the Batrachi. Native to marshes, swamps and wetland environments, these feral hunters are skilled predators on land, in the air and underwater.
* **Dire Corbies**, who descend from the Aearee-Quor who were trapped in the Underdark following the destruction of their empire. Unlike their Kenku cousins, the Dire Corbies never forsook their demon patron and ultimately regressed into a chaotic and savage life in the Underdark.
* **Dohwar**, a race of penguin-like humanoids who some scholars believe descended from Aearee living in arctic climes. Dohwar no longer exist on Toril in large numbers, instead being a race fond of travelling on Spelljammers. Dohwar also claim to be the root of all Aearee, though this disputed by all scholars with extensive knowledge of the Aearee (those that are aware of the Dohwar at all, anyway).
* **Eblis**, large stork-like monstrosities that were created by the Aearee. Eblis can be found in the wild jungles of Chult, and as far east as Mulhorand.
* **Kenku**, who descend from the Aearee-Quor who survived the destruction of their empire and gave up their worship of the demon Pazrael to seek protection from the god Quorlinn. For betraying Pazrael they lost their ability to speak without mimicry. Most Kenku live in Kara-Tur, though many have returned to Faerûn around the 13th Century DR.
* **Owlbear**, the monstrous combination of the wise owl and the ferocious bear. It is unknown which mage orchestrated their creation, but it is believe that one of the Aearee-Syran might've invented the creature to aid in the people's war against the winter fey.
* **Tengu**, who descend from the Aearee-Quor who refused to forsake their god Quorlinn during Pazrael's corruption of Aearee-Quor society. The ancestors of the Tengu fled to modern-day Kara-Tur, and are now the only descendants of the Aearee-Quor to still have wings.
* **Vulchlings**, a vulture-like offshoot of the Aearee-Krocaa that was created by Sarrukh experimentation. They were later incorporated into Aearee-Krocaa society as a small caste of untouchables, giving tasks no other Aearee wished to do. Vulchlings exist in Toril to this day, in the eastern lands of Mulhorand, Unther, and Thay.
* **Wyverns**, who were made by the Aearee-Krocaa to be mounts through experimentation with domesticated landwyrms.