Beyond the Immortal Peaks: The Dragonlands

On the Political Cartography of the Eternal Spires

By Reitia Loreseeker
Beyond the Immortal Peaks that form the natural eastern border of Ghazeer lies a craggy land shot through with high mesas and even higher spires. The Eternal Spires of the Dragonlands are as ancient as the empire that spans its high peaks and productive valleys. Long ago, flights of dragons commanded the air and the toil of their reptilian thralls on the rocky ground below. Each dragonlord paid fealty only to their godly primate, the tyrant wyrm Tiamat the Black. Outside of her whim, their word was law. This hierarchy lasted for eons before the first Platinum Parliament met and a few brave dragonlords spoke for the serfs they’d been charged with. The most brazen of these delegates was the platinum dragon the body took its name from, Bahamut.
War seemed inevitable. Had Bahamut not acted swiftly, it is possible that we would know little of the bipedal cousins of the dragonslords. There remains no swifter way to wound a dragon than to take from their hoard, after all, and no one knows that as well as another dragon. Considering Tiamat's enduring legacy, many historians call the Justicebringer weak for sparing her when he had her so thoroughly defeated. Enlisting the tyrant’s aid meant the appearance of a concordance that stayed the wrath of many other dragons. Aside from some brief, terrifying divergences, that concordance has lasted and kept the Dragonlands peaceful and productive through many calamities in the wider world.
Patronage
Truly ancient dragons are rare even in the Dragonlands. They are reclusive and cunning, rarely leaving their lairs and preferring to act through intermediaries. While many dragonborn can claim a draconic patron, (most with honesty) few can actually convince that patron to present itself. Instead, it is an influential dragonborn that flaunts their patron’s power rarely but effectively.
While I was in the court of Lady Bixtylryst, there were whispers that Nymurrh favored her, but the most visible display of the dragonborn’s power was the constant stream of “donations” directed to the Lady’s many “charitable” institutions. So too do chromatic dragonborn conceal most of their true power. The artificers beneath Lord Yajerit are able to create siege weapons in a quantity far outstripping the carrying capacity of their holdings, but still orders are met in a timely and efficient manner. Here, I will mention that dragonborn are not as beholden to the color of their scale as their patrons. While Nymurrh may despise cruelty, the orphanages of the Lady Bixtylryst are no more welcoming than the maws of the cannons that make those orphans.
Politics
It should come as no surprise to learn that the politics of the Dragonlands are complicated. Even without the meddling of secret, ancient entities, the politics of the disparate nations that make up Oros are a maze of interests and sentiment. Imagine now that the dueling kings of Castra weren't just motivated by their public handlers but also by hidden minds so old as to be unrecognizable. The motivations of these patrons can be divined through their alleged long-term goals but the ways in which they manifest, short-term alliances, for instance, are labyrinthine at best.
In the last few decades, the Dragonlands have maintained their prohibition on exporting knowledge and technology. Countless goblinoids have traveled through the Elder’s Pass as they flocked to the Naggarithian banner. The seeking and cataloging of outside knowledge has grown more enthusiastic in recent years, especially among chromatic orders. New guilds of merchants and orders of wyrmknights have been raised, eager to trade and serve. Internally, these factions vie for power. It is not unusual for a traveling merchant to receive coded orders from their homeland with no more detail than "undercut Gardinax traders. Losses compensated in Ghazeer." The rivalries of wyrmknights are much more violent. A tapestry of insults and improprieties weave their way beyond the Elder’s Pass to the ears of these honor-obsessed warriors. Vendettas are soon sworn and a duel at the foot of a noble's throne is never far off. That the blood spilled is of some dragonlord's retainer matters little to the spectators, but somewhere in the Eternal Peaks a scaly muzzle smiles and marks a new asset.
The lines of this shadow conflict are no secret. Expansion and domination has long been the marching word of unhappy dragonborn across the empire. Some openly mock the isolationist stance that has guided the empire for centuries now, calling it superstitious and hollow. Among those that adhere to this dogma, there remains discontent. The powers of mortals have grown since the dragonborn’s subjugation. Human and elf and orc do not worship the dragon as their former thralls do. What weakness exists in Oros is rumor in the Dragonlands and there are many machinations between here and conquest.

Type

Geopolitical, Country