Falnorian Timejump for 2013 19 years have passed in Falnorian. The year is now 73.3.2.
The following is written by historical scholar Remus Bjarnwrite at request of the Falnin Historian Society, as a record of the last two decades and the events of significance therein.
Updated Political Map
On the whole, much appears the same now in 73.3.2 as it was two decades ago. Several shifts have occurred in the realm of government and the provincial borders, as some rulers have come into their own and others fallen out of favor. Much progress has been made, or had been made, in dimensions of society and diplomacy; yet it seems that Nature has not agreed, for at the end of it, so much has quite literally fallen apart.
After the dramatic events of the Gang War of Syenon, High Council member Evenfall Fen sought to bring into being measure which would work to prevent the events which led to such strife from occurring a second time. Working closely with the Bard Schools and with law enforcement, he set into place programs which would seek to rehabilitate imprisoned gang members and mafiya, and to educate against the underlying prejudices that governed many of their politics - most notably, those of the notorious Boots and Ears. Though originally employed exclusively on prisoners and others working through the legal system, it was also later employed to the citizens of Syenon themselves in order to stem the flow of recruitment to the still-existing gangs.
Improvement was slow, but has seen great success; in the latter years, Evenfall Fen has seen this applied to other troubled areas, such as the Falnorian-Pengongolin border with its history of hobbit immigration issues, and to Gildmar and its own mafia problems. The Bard Schools of Falnorian have grown powerful in this time, and have gained a great voice on the High Council and in the politics of Falnorian. With this surge of influence, there has been a fourth Bard School opened in Beltolir. All four Bard Schools have proceeded to use these newfound resources to send bards to many of the smaller towns and villages across Falnorian, allowing residents greater access to a basic education than they have had in this era yet. The Bard Schools themselves have become highly political entities, and are to this day filled with fierce debate about the nature of barding and its role in the functioning of society.
Syenon itself has changed greatly over this time. Fassil Lettam, in light of the leavetaking of Zari Nelfass, has taken rulership of Syenon along with his chosen successor Chelsea Amerite. In close coordination with law enforcement and with supplementary forces from Illionor, Fassil has worked to uproot the Syenon mafiya and to break apart the structure of the existing gangs. For the first few years, Syenon was a place of chaos as both violent resistance to these measures filled the streets, and as several prominent officials - including Meron Clawdence, archmage of the Syenon Mage School - were arrested for bribe-taking, collaboration with the gangs and mafiya, and other similar offenses. The power structure that has emerged in later years is much stricter than under previous rulers, but perhaps the better for it. Several gangs still remain a problem; but without the mafiya to fund and back them, they no longer have the hold on the city that they once did. By 62.3.2, major changes could be seen in the city; and by 70.3.2, Syenon could be considered comparable to other major cities in its safety and its value for commerce.
Another city which has seen a major change in leadership is Eldspel. In 56.3.2, the well-loved but aging Carrinne Sjonvey passed the rulership of Eldspel to her granddaughter, Cassira Sjonvey. We are fortunate that both Cassira as ruler and Carrinne as one of her primary advisors are still alive today; for, though the ceremony should have been a joyous occasion, it was interrupted by an attempt on Cassira’s life by none other than her aunt, Selena Sjonvey. The attempt was unsuccessful, and Selena fled; though the children she would have seen put on the throne - her son and daughter, Colann and Deline Sjonvey - were captured and her husband thoroughly investigated, Selena herself was able to evade capture for seven years by fleeing south to Xucu’an and seeking asylum there. Once her location was discovered, a deal was made to trade Selena to Falnorian, after which further investigation was conducted. Selena Sjonvey was found guilty of treason and for multiple attempts of murder on Eldspellian officials, and was morganti-executed in the year 66.3.2.
Despite Selena’s attempted coup, Cassira and Carrinne Sjonvey remain safe, and the rulership of Eldspel is stable. This has allowed Eldspel to, in working in tandem with High Council member Pelori Elenmar, become a base from which to negotiate with Xucu’an. For the first time since its aid against Illionor in the Falnorian-Illionor war of early 2.2, the Xucu’ani government has begun to entertain the idea of negotiations and perhaps treaties or other agreements with Falnorian. The process, of course, has been slow; but, trusting that this is due only to the long lifespans of elves, and that in due time such contact can be achieved, the diplomatic counsel has persisted, and hope to see a new ally in years to come.
Internally, politics in Falnorian remain relatively stable. The city of Bellmourn has risen to a state of great importance in the last fifteen years, as it has become an important site for military training and the development of new equipment such as the Burst Ballistas. Out of this work has come the new Stonedust Division, which has been trained to deal specifically with the kinds of defensive systems often employed by mercenaries. They were created in response to the waves of Forsworn which attacked and threatened to overcome Oldmin in 54.3.2. Though the Forsworn ceased their hostilities shortly after the turning of the year, as their intentions were unknown and the possibility lingered that they may simply have drawn back to regroup, the division was formed in case of the eventuality of their return. Thus far, the Forsworn have drawn back, and have not attacked Oldmin or other places en mass since.
Ardel, on the other hand, has fallen out of favor in the last decade. Though the city remains an important piece of Falnorian trade and sea-commerce, the Merchant’s Circle which governs this commerce became increasingly belligerent and audacious, beginning with things such as circumventing shipping taxes and disbanding workers’ support groups, and later becoming even so bold as to attempt to wrest control of law surrounding Ardelian trade from both the Ardel guilds and Falnorian government entirely. This was to overstep too many bounds; a thorough investigation into the politics of the Merchant’s Circle was conducted and revealed a number of practices that have contributed both to the number of questionably legal labor sources and the overflowing debtor’s prisons, both of which have grown increasingly apparent in the last five years. The Merchant’s Circle still remains in power and still governs the trade that flows through the city of Ardel, but it is currently under close watch by diplomats and traders employed by the High Council to ensure that the Circle does not overstep its bounds again.
Though power shifts in the political landscape have been few, quite unusually, there have been several changes to the geographic boundaries between the seven provinces of Falnorian. This is due to a phenomenon dubbed the Waning of the Wildlands. For many decades, since the fall of Halimin and the royal family in that province, the Wildlands has been known as a dangerous place full of desert and near-desert conditions that are unable to support much in the way of basic civilization. Furthermore, because of the lack of civilization to impede them, the Wildlands had become a place of refuge for many of the fiercer and more aggressive creatures of Falnorian. Yet it has become apparent that, in the last two decades, the Wildlands have become somewhat more habitable; though the geography remains much the same, those few places within it that were able to support small civilizations have become available again. It would seem that many species previously identified as aggressive and dangerous, upon further study, were not quite the beasts they were made out to be and in fact creatures which could be lived alongside. Thus, neighboring provinces such as Eldspel and Gildmar have taken up some of the edges of the Wildlands for their own territories, and small towns have been constructed where one may live in relative quiet alongside the strange species of Wildlands gazelles or lions or their many counterparts.
Socially, due to the work of High Council member Evenfall Fen and the Bard Schools, there have been great improvements on the whole. Education is much easier to obtain due to the spreading of barding. Tensions with Pengongolin are much less strained than they have been in many years., due in part to Fen’s marriage to a princess of one of the Pengongolin clans. The same is true for Xucu’an; now that the potential for negotiation has opened up, the scattered villages of Ku elves which have peppered the border between these two countries have become somewhat less reclusive and more open to participating in some aspects of society which they previously avoided.
The one place where this newfound tolerance has not held true is in regards to witches. Starting in year 67.3.2, truly horrific happenstances began to occur, beginning in western Syenon and spreading into Oldmin and eventually south to Eldspel as well. A string of murders, as well as the presence of curses on many homes and villages, became apparent; each of these incidents was marked with the sign of a witch’s star, indicating the presence of a partiularly ill-willed coven bent on making trouble. The result of this are the reawakening of the Witch Hunts that were once so prevalent in Oldmin during 1.2; witch burnings and burials have become commonplace in many areas in western Falnorian, and are beginning to catch on in other areas as well.
These have been the majority of the events of the last two decades; the remaining few have occurred within the last five years, and as such it is too recent to determine what their eventual effects will be. The firstmost of this is the appearance of several entirely new races of trolls and ogres in Ardel. They were first seen in year 69.3.2, and described as possessing traits unknown to occur in these species before. Unlike the wood and water and other trolls with which we are familiar, the new species of troll seem to universally possess the ability to regenerate wounds dealt to them very quickly unless fire is employed to stop them; and the ogres possess a somewhat keener intelligence than their kin, matching and sometimes exceeding the cunning we are familiar with among humans. Both are somewhat darker-skinned than their counterparts, making them easy to identify, and perhaps speaking to a common origin point as well.
The appearance of these new groups have sparked a series of wars between the established species of ogres and trolls and the new ones, as the latter ones seek to gain territory and more from the former. It has been suggested that this is not as simple as territory, however, for those seemingly newer species appear to be on a mission to exterminate the existing species; bounty hunters in the Ardel area have reported entire camps and groups of slaughtered red ogres or blood trolls and the like, suggesting something more akin to genocide. These unfamiliar ogres and trolls seem also to have shorter life cycles than the ogres and trolls we are more familiar with, and though originally their numbers were smaller, they seem well on track to eventually matching or exceeding the populations of the ones we have known until this point. Some small splinter groups have begun to spread to other areas of Falnorian from Ardel, and are working to establish themselves there as well; but what shall come of this shall only be seen in years to come.
The second event has taken place just at the turning of this year 73.3.2, in the early winter months. Falnorian was wracked by several strong earthquakes which were devastating to those cities nearest to them: Falnin, Oldmin, and Ardel and their smaller neighboring cities in particular have all suffered severe damage from these earthquakes. Many roads have been split apart, forcing long and sometimes perilous detours for trade and travel between these cities; and it some areas, such as the city of Mandel - best known as the prison city to which many dangerous criminals are sent to serve their sentences - plagues and diseases have erupted in the aftermath of the earthquakes. Half a year later, though much work has been done to relieve the effects of this disaster, little more than a dent has been made in what remains to be done to restore the functionality of these places.
Thus, on this greatly unfortunate note, we end our summary of Falnorian history of the last decades. There have been, of course, many more events than we have summarized here; who could forget such things as the Great Windmill Catastrophe of Amindel, or the Walking Crops Wasteland in southern Oldmin? But as these events are not so far-reaching as those we have mentioned, and as this is meant to be a summary of events rather than a detailed account, we must leave them for another time. We hope, on behalf of the Falnin Historian Society, that this has been both informative and helpful as an account of recent history, and encourage further inquiry into the more specific details of the time that we have not had the time to cover here.