First Blood of Winter

Revolution

With strains in official and unofficial House agreements growing due to the prolonged Imperial War in the Untamed Lands, the Wolfspacks of Dun Faol united a band of traditional families together into a rebellious faction later named the Pack. The Wintersbloods of Dun Gemrad were the only House that could politically damage the Wolfspack's legitimacy to the High King's crown and unite the Korg peoples as they were in favour of the Great Western Empire, serving under them as Imperial Representatives for countless generations when the Empire first started. Because of this, the faction needed a way to get the Wintersbloods out of the picture entirely before taking back control over their sovereign land, Skìrah.   While the Wolfspacks of Thodir's Bane enacted the Edinbane Massacre, warriors of the Ironfrosts of Scalford were employed to pose as servants and kitchen staff in the imperial castle Dun Gemrad - the seat of Wintersblood power. In the late mid-winter months of the year 2121, elderly Earl Roddvig Wolfspack proposed that he should celebrate his 60th and possibly last birthday with his childhood friend in his much more luxurious castle. However, he planned on the best birthday gift he could wish for: the death of the traitors to Skìrah and beginning of a war he had hoped for all his political life.   As with Korg tradition, the festivities of the birthday started as Earl Roddvig arrived at High King Alnitak's abode at sunrise and a great sun-long feast was held. As expected, the Wolfspacks brought along a large party of House members, staff, and bodyguards, including his son and heir Drake Wolfspack, on leave from the front-line in the Untamed Lands. The two families talked and laughed and ate and drank, making the most of the day. Finally as a surprise to Lord Alnitak, Roddvig had had conversations with the "kitchen staff" on the final course which would be a gift to his High King for allowing him in to his castle.   As Commander Drake made a speech in his father's honour and legacy, the Ironfrost warriors brought out the cooked head of a black bull settling it in front of Alnitak's table. With the majority of his House being educated in Imperial ways, they missed the traditional Korg warning of death that was the head of a black bull apart from one, the eldest child and daughter of Alnitak, Ingjald. Ingjald quickly escaped the castle with her youngest brother Varg and rode off into the sunset before the dining halls of Dun Gemrad turned red.   Almost all together, the disguised staff and the bodyguards of the Wolfspacks stood down from their posts, unsheathed their weapons and started brutally murdering all Imperials they could find in the castle. Drake himself took down Alnitak's three other sons single-handedly before piercing the ancestral Sword of Wolves into the heart of the shocked High King. The betrayal took the lives of: Alnitak Wintersblood, High King; Idolaf Talvelson, Lord of Talvel's Point; Sirs Kristan, Olfrid and Ivarr Wintersblood; Alfhild Wintersblood, Countess of Streamwood; Fingal Aesmann, Earl of Streamwood.   With this bloody night over, the Frostern Civil-War had officially begun and the rebellious faction would have to band together as quickly as possible to defend the future retaliation of loyalist Korg Houses and the Great Western Empire itself. They had accomplished their task of destroying the Wintersblood line... or so they believed.