The Tambar Rebellion and The Axes of McCloughhaven

The Tambar Rebellion was a dark stain on the history of Illdrafn. Composed of an amalgamation of peasants, settlers, and Antarians, the populations of our house were very susceptible to the anti-church and anti-nobility messages of The Tambarists. Their ideology spread like like an insidious plague through our lands, from hushed whispers in back-tavern rooms, to openly in the streets and alleyways of our towns and cities. Our own noble families grew fearful of the spread of these words, the messages and calls speaking out against us, the rulers of our people. Our fortifications were shored against the coming storm, from the bastions of Ninevalon to the shining beacon of our grand lighthouse. Our troops, though not oft used, were armed and ordered to stand in the wake of the coming waves of political change. We spoke our hearts out to our people, tried to remind them of the good we had done in these lands, but even we had skeletons of oppression in our closet. Our saving grace, however, was laid hundreds of years ago. While other houses had leaned hard on their populaces, forcing religious unity and upholding heavy handed noble family hierarchies, our tendency to incorporate more into these lands tempered the furies of our citizens. The roots we had intertwined with those already living in these lands provided a common heritage that all shared, the integration of the local pantheons gave outlets of religious freedoms not found in the crumbling church structure, and the cultural practices spread by our newly integrated noble families gave both sides of our cultural coin a time to shine.
That’s not to say that our lands were free of bloodshed. On either side of our cultures the more extreme of the populace rallied themselves into a frothing fury, calls for our heads and the heads of our religious leaders rang out, and bloody skirmishes caused our streets to run red with blood. Over half of our churches were burned by the fervent rebels, chapels shining both to the Six and to the Red Sisters.Our holdings near the Emerald Dream splintered as the more fervent of the Antarians broke away from our kingdom. Our merchants and coffers took quite a hit as well, while some of our labourers took up arms, many instead protested by ceasing their production, refusing to send goods and resources to market. As our economy floundered, as our religious institutions burst into flames, and as we huddled behind the large stones and gleaming spears of our holds, we wept, waited, and prayed for this revolution to find some sort of end.
As the kingdom saw their noble houses slaughtered, either in the battlefield or in the streets of their own cities, we, shamefully some might say, cowered in our keeps. But that alone kept us safe, and gave us benefit in the growing storm of bloodshed. Many noble lines were cut short during the Tambar Rebellion; fathers, mothers, sons and daughters slaughtered to feed the passions of the disenfranchised. Not many other houses can say their familial lines lead as far back as ours, as through our prudent retreat we remained whole. As time grew on, as the sparks and embers of rebellion faltered and faded, we re-emerged into the pink fog of our holdings. We sought out the people who undeniably had been under our boot-heels, and began our period of reconciliation.
Iseabail McCloughhaven was a godsend to our family, and the head of the reconciliation effort. A minor noble of Antarian heritage, she and her family tended throughout the rebellion to the people of her holding. While the Warblewise forest was alight with the flames of rebellion, she often would walk among the streets with words of encouragement and baskets of bread and eggs. Tales tell of one day, when rebels from a neighbouring town marched their way to burn her shrine to the Red Sisters. Iseabail, in an act of defiance, and an act of such loyalty to her people, stood astride the town's militia, a wood axe in each hand, and fought side by side with even the lowliest of peasants to drive back the invaders. Her voice rang clear in the maelstrom of hatred that enveloped this kingdom, and with her people's words of dedication backing her, she began the negotiations to mend the bridge between peasantry and nobility. Her county, now declared McCloughhaven’s Reach, sits astride the foothills of the north Backbone and the Warblewise forest, only fifteen kilometres from the Treaty Hall of Farran. A burgeoning centre of culture for the Sixth House, McCloughhaven’s Reach acts as a sister settlement to the treaty hall, a place for members of Bantarevean nobility to reside during negotiations, and one of the most blended communities in the kingdom. It’s proximity to the treaty hall, and burgeoning forestry and druidic economies strive to further fill the cultural coffers of house Illdrafn.

Written by Albert R.