Duchy of Tarnauld

The Tarns have always been a subdued people. Initially a Jendarri tribe, the Tarns traded instead of raiding from their small coastal village. The other Jendarri tribes look upon the Tarns with disdain and pity, for they have forgotten the ways of nature and the spirits. Money is the higher power in Tarnauld.
The war was not good for the Tarns, even though they stayed neutral during the conflict, they sought a way to protect their shipping lanes. With Murena enlisting the sauhagin, the Tarns turned to the "other fish people", the kua-toans. Over the course of the war, cases of insanity and madness increased in the city and coastal communities of Tarnauld. The outlying communities have had to fend for themselves as the Tarns turn ever inward.
Now nearly every ward of the city boasts at least one asylum as doktors study the insane searching for the causes of madness. The temples seem to hold little comfort as the darkness closes in.
Tarnauld stayed neutral during the war and freely traded with all of the various city-states. Trade flowed easily north to Hawkmoon and south to Elteare, but other routes are fraught with peril. The Trade Road to Hawkmoon wasn't as well-traveled as it once was due to increasing dangers from the Horgen Hills. Brineven, one of Tarnauld's closest allies, sat directly across the orcish lands of Darcos. Most trade to Sarten passed through Elteare or the Sart port city of Cartiene. Trade with Calastan all but stopped, but used to pass through Brineven. Valens, Murena and Theopolis were too distant for any real profit to be had.
When Hawkmoon and Brineven joined into the Northern Kingdom, the Tarns were suspicious, asuming a new military campaign to start the wars all over again. The fact that the Northern Kingdom used its might to rout out the humanoids began to brighten the spirits of the Tarns. When the Army of Reclamation cleared out some major tribes from the Horgen Hills, and yet turned away when they could have continued the attack into Tarnauld, an attack which may have been successful. The Tarns found trade routes opened for the first time in generations. They eagerly chose to back the planned attack on Darcos, considering it a payment for the destruction of the humanoid tribes.
As preparations for the cleansing of Darcos continued, the Tarnauld ambassadors spoke more and more of joining with this Northern Kingdom, and when Darcos was finally liberated, the Merchant Council agreed to become a Duchy of the Northern Kingdom.