Thanolund

Ticonderos is dominated by a range of perilous mountains that carve their way out of the northern tundras and stretch all the way into the southern desert, their huge, unforgiving crags reaching their claws near to every coastline on the continent. As such, precious little area is left for forests, plains, savannahs, or other more settle-able land. But the view from the peaks, ah, hundreds of feet or more above the treetops, overlooking mountain lakes and green ridgelines. Breathtaking. But from the resolute mountain fastness of Godsreach, the striking, bronze and granite fortress of the Meduseldt royal family, pillar of the just that stands at the center of the pious kingdom of Thanolund... the view is somewhat more... stark.
The peaks and ridges of the awe-inspiring, continent-spanning mountain range covering huge swathes of Ticonderos are normally the domain of the Oreiad, an empire of feylike beings, thousands of years old, their skin like marble, their magical attunement granting them supernatural power over cold and wind and stone. But they do not dwell within a hundred leagues of Thanolund and haven't since the earliest days of the Dragonlord's reign. History, of course, is only as good as those that keep it and many have fled the region or died in the decades since. Did the Oreiad ever live here? What evil drove them away? Nothing green grows in the area. Perhaps it simply couldn't sustain them? Rumor within Thanolund has it that there was a fateful battle in the middle of where they've now built their kingdom, between the Dragonlord and a disavowed legion of Oreiad witchblades. It is said the Oreiad forces committed acts forbidden by their people to defend the Great Wyrm of Moonlight, yet their fight was still lost, and the Oreiad avoid the land now out of both shame and revulsion for what had been done there. But other tales are told out of Dragonscarred earshot...
Thanolund grew out of the failed movement to enthrall the whole of Ticonderos under the religious rule of the disciples of the Highfather Galebriast. Galebriastianism is the most widespread and influential religion in all of Ticonderos and in the chaotic vacuum of power directly after the Dragonlord's fall it was no king, no clan chief, no lord of merchants, but Asche Meduseldt, the War Chaplain of the Highfather's Hand (an armed, combat-trained branch of Galebriastians that had little following during the Dragonlord's reign but expanded into a brief but formidable military threat) who took the throne at Dragon's Roost and claimed dominion over all the human lands of Ticonderos. But after the allied forces of the other remaining religions and secular peoples of the continent rallied against him, Aschebourg retreated into the mountains far south, high into the abandoned lands where no one could, or wanted to, reach him. There he built Godsreach and there his followers carved out their kingdom. There, to this day, Galebriastians from across the continent make pilgrimage to affirm their faith or seek direct guidance from god.
Thanolund is a small, insular kingdom, unbothered by the goings on of those "lower" countries. The people here bow to a rigid and militant theocracy, old and powerful, the Galebriastians claim their god as creator over all realms and all peoples. Their god is both wrathful and forgiving, both vulnerable yet all-knowing and all-powerful. While they loathe the changed, and purge them from their ranks through exile and even, though privately, execution, the people of Thanolund also seek The Quickening from the Highfather, the "touch of lightning" that brings to them power and enlightenment - often manifesting, the changed would argue, in strikingly similar fashion to the the powers their religious zealots condemn as heresy or even devil-worship. The head of their order, Dashiel Meduseldt, Holy King of Godsreach and the Church of Galebriast now rules over the country with the same cunning ambitions as any nation's ruler, but he holds something the other kings do not.
Lately, kept private within the Holy King's most inner sanctums, Dashiel clutches something to his bosom, and he speaks with a bold voice on matters he should not comprehend. Secrets are laid bare, disciplines foreign to the Holy King are like an open library for him to pluck knowledge from. The Holy King of Thanolund is consumed by some artifact he refuses to let anyone see and claims to be spoken to, not always by his god, Galebriast, but by another force, aligned, he says, to the teachings of the Ten Wise Men, but those in his inner circle begin to grow wary... The things the Holy King utters are nothing short of blasphemy, and yet, he bolsters the might of Thanolund day by day, and adds new ministry unto the flock with each passing moment...
Holding the flock together are Dashiel's closest confidants and heads of their own noble Galebriastian lineage, lords Colin Leishbrae, the owner and wealthy preacher of Thanolund's largest worship hall, and Laryn Corwyyll, the deadliest swordsman in all the Highfather's Hand. However, while the Holy King is distracted by whatever it is that's taken root in his mind, it can be assumed his faith is not misplaced. As the Holy King's judgment, and even that of his own wife and children, is called further and further into question, where exactly would these two steer their country of godly men atop a mountain of secrets and curses?

Demographics

100% Dragonscarred

Alternative Name(s)

The Kingdom of God

Type

National Territory

Population

60,000

Location under

The Dragonlands