The Arcane Eye
The Arcane Eye was founded recently, only ten years after Guildfall, by Khelben Thann, a descendant of Khelben Arunsun and the new Blackstaff. He is comparitively young to the position. He received a premonition of the multiverse aflame, his fellow wizards hunted and reviled, and at the heart of the conflict were the Fae, and the strange substance known as Soil.
Witch hunts had begun in the northern Sword Coast about this time in response to events in Icewind Dale and Lusken, so trust between Thann and the new Lady of the West, Amber 'Deathsbane' Mills, was thin. So Khelben moved Blackstaff tower south to Ormpur. He established order in the city, brought the lands of Tashalar under his protective wing, and gradually earned the trust of the Wild Elves of the Misty Vale. However his personal studies centered about Soil, and how to obtain it and use it. He gathered a cadre of wizards willing to work with him and established the Arcane Eye.
He made a breakthrough and successfully harvested Soil for the first time - mostly by accident, as Thann held no malice towards the fae folk - and used it to establish outposts off-world, seeking to uncover the truth behind the coming conflict so as to better prepare for it. These outposts continued to capture and study fae creatures for any possible connection to the malice he sensed behind his premonition. However, despite the great care the Eye took to keep the knowledge of Soil a secret, Szass Tam of Thay proclaimed to have discovered the substance for himself in the year 14 and asserted that another world was on the verge of using the substance to make war on Faerun. Shortly afterwards, war broke out, and the paladins of the Divine Order from the world of Oerth appeared, bypassing Thay and making a direct assault towards his new home. While it was Khelben's counterattack that forced the invaders to retreat, the sudden assault had caught the Eye unprepared and left them shaken. The Eye expanded its territories, bolstered its defences, and overnight became much more aggressive in their pursuit of the Fae and their Soil.
Today, the Eye is more known for its activities away from Faerun. As Khelben understands the great cost involved in harvesting the precious resource, he uses Soil very sparingly, and so the outposts on other worlds have grown largely without his oversight and have become zealous...and desperate. They have integrated themselves into other societies and begun widespread hunts, rounding up everyone with even a smattering of fae blood in their quest to both harvest and understand Soil. Back home in Faerun, Khelben is more reserved, but he and his Council of the Eye are becoming painfully aware that the years have slipped by and whatever grace period Khelben's premonition granted him is now over.
These southlands grow a rich variety of spices, herbs and crops, but the mountainsides were stripped of the little iron to be found here long ago.
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