Galdurhorn
The Storm Above All
Rising from the heart of Gravaskar like the haft of a sky-split spear, Galdurhorn is the tallest and most sacred peak in the Kaldurreach — a mountain so vast and towering that its summit is never seen, forever hidden above the cloud line in a perpetual, roaring storm. Lightning dances endlessly across its upper slopes, thunder rolls day and night, and the wind howls with voices the living cannot name.
Galdurhorn is not just a mountain. It is a living threshold between the mortal world and the storm realm beyond — a place the Galdurkin call Skellstrid, the sky-path of the honored dead. No jarl, skald, or Stormthane has ever reached its summit and returned. Those who attempt the climb vanish into the tempest or are found days later, frostbitten and half-mad, speaking only in riddles or songs. To the Galdurkin, Galdurhorn is the seat of the storm gods — a holy place where the wind speaks in prophecy and the lightning carries ancestral truths. Each year, during the Stormmoon's rise, the Galdurkin ascend to the Veilwatch Shelf, a high ledge nestled just below the cloudline, where they light the Skyflame Pyres and perform rites of seeking and remembrance. Only the most gifted are ever permitted beyond this point, and never during winter.
The mountain is named not for any mortal hero, but for the sacred calling of the Galdurkin themselves — the “horn” of storm-song and sky-prophecy that echoes down through their rites. Legends say that those who reach the summit can hear the first thunder of the world, and the last name they will ever speak. Even for those who do not serve the Galdurkin, Galdurhorn is a place of reverence. Warriors whisper oaths beneath its shadow. Forgemasters cool their blades in runoff from its snows. And when Stormthane Yrja Blackwake was chosen, it was said the storm above Galdurhorn howled her name three times before she accepted her title.
Though it looms above all the land, Galdurhorn does not watch. It listens to every oath spoken in the wind, every song cast to the sky, every soul given to the storm.
“Some climb for glory. Others for gods. But to climb the Horn is to be seen — and seen clearly.” — Galdurkin Hesta of the Hollow Winds
