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Historical References (Closed, Reference Materials)
#423079 - Sun Nov 30 2003 08:47 PM
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It's inevitable that eyes other than mine will be curious enough to look here. The purpose of this thread is for me to post large amounts of information regarding Morathi's history, both as additional material to supplement my profile, and as a reference for my future actions. If anyone actually wants to read this for fun, they are certainly welcome to, but I don't anticipate it will be of use to anyone but myself.
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Rahib Rising-Glory of the House of the Sun, Crown Prince of Jafaru, was born in 1330, the son of Gagan Illustrious (1290-1340), King of Jafaru and lord of many provinces. In early 1340, Libba, one of the more recently subjugated provinces, staged a rebellion, and led a force whose numbers were bolstered by wild coldlander mercenaries to storm the capital of Jafaru itself. While the House of the Sun defended itself most nobly, it also defended itself most inadequately, and only the actions of a nurse who disobeyed her orders and stole away from the Palace with Rahib and his infant brother Jabir Skilled-Hands (b. 1339) prevented its utter eradication.
The two children were taken to the North Wind Court, located deep in the northern mountains, where the Libban army had not yet the strength to reach. While Jabir was not old enough to remember the burning of the Palace and their flight, Rahib was constantly troubled by his experiences, and vowed often to visit vengeance on the usurpers. He gathered strength and supporters until his eighteenth birthday, and then led a savage counterattack against the Libbans and their sympathisers. By late 1348, he had pushed them beyond Jafaru’s borders, and pressed them back into Libba. The fight continued with little break for the next twelve years, and in 1360 the Peace of Rakhtoum was signed, not out of a desire to end war, but simply from mutual exhaustion.
Rahib returned to his capital and was crowned as the liberator of his people, with a reputation as a warrior-king that would rebuild Jafaru greater than before. But the inexperienced monarch quickly found himself spending all his time and energy repaying favours to the House of the North Wind and other nobles who supported him during the war. Knowing that Libba would eventually open hostilities again, keeping the coalition of nobles together was his only real hope for the future. With the noble houses essentially running the country, corruption was rife, urban crime soared, and debt-slavery was beginning to return to the provinces. As a reaction against deteriorating conditions, unrest began to break out among the common folk, and the king’s young government looked to fold in the face of peace.
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Having nowhere else to turn to for aid, in 1363 Rahib sent for Jabir, who had just completed his education at the School of the Mountain. The prince came to the capital, quickly assessed the situation, and made a number of sweeping changes. For example, the North Wind had used their hold on Rahib to run the tax administration and collection of the provinces. In addition to lining their own coffers with government gold, they set rates to drive a number of small farmers out of business, seized their land for non-payment, and forced the former owners to either work and pay off their debt on their former land, or run to the cities to join the urban poor. Jabir took control of taxation back to the central government, buying up the insolvent farms at a generous rate to soothe the North Wind feeling; he also cancelled the farmers’ debts, making them free men in theory. The farmers were given the option to remain as tenants on their former land, in exchange for a relatively fair percentage of their harvest.
While there was no actual alternative for the former debt-slaves, the farmers were treated much better, and were in the position to eventually buy back their farms. Riotous sentiment in the provinces slowly receded, and the numbers of penniless refugees coming to the cities grew at a slower rate. To lessen the load on the overworked judicial system and reduce prison populations, Jabir amended the code of laws so that vagrancy was no longer a crime, a number of less serious offences were made punishable by fines, and a number of more serious offences were made punishable by execution. The government saved money by maintaining a smaller prison system, generated more income from fines, and appeared more lenient with the poverty-stricken; in fact, it was applying short-term solutions and setting the stage for a thriving underworld. Jabir Skilled-Hands once wrote to his brother that, “Truly content people have no drive to move forward, they always seek to maintain the status quo. The people’s lives must be troubled enough that they will let you guide them to a better day.” These and similar comments have led to some few rumours that Jabir himself planned for, and controls, this underworld, but such things are never whispered in his presence.
With his brother to guide him, Rahib’s government prospered, and a number of shrewd trading contracts helped Jafaru make a swift recovery from the war. The king finally turned his thoughts to the succession, and re-establishing the House of the Sun. After a lengthy search was conducted by Jabir, a distant cousin of the North Wind, Lakila Soft-Breeze (1355-1379), was found to be acceptable, and the two were wed in 1370. While a move that strengthened ties with a powerful noble house, the young girl was often unhealthy after coming to the Palace, and seemed quite barren. After years of political pressure and talks of divorce in favour of a fertile Queen, Lakila gave birth in 1376 to Morathi Setting-Sun, whose augury name was a subject of some spirited discussion. Detractors of the royal house suggested that he heralded the end of the Dynasty of the Sun; supporters believe that he will bring glory in the west, specifically Libba. The truth of his name remains to be seen.
Lakila never fully recovered from the child birth, and languished for several years, dying before Morathi’s third birthday. As renewing hostilities with Libba took up most of Rahib’s attention, the young boy was raised for the most part by servants. Deprived of a mother, spoiled by a father who sent presents instead of his presence, Morathi quickly became a holy terror. Recognizing that he could get away with almost anything, the boy was shallow, vain, and vindictive, using a foul temper and childish pranks to ensure he got his way. In 1381, though, three Libban traders allowed into Jafaru on a trading license were caught attempting to infiltrate the Palace; a week later, another group was discovered to be instigating civil unrest in an attempt to turn popular opinion against the government.
In the aftermath of these incursions, all Libbans were expelled from Jafaru, their embassy was closed, and only the House of the Western Sea was granted license to interact with Libba, handling limited trade and diplomacy for the nation. Over fears for Morathi’s safety, the young prince was sent to the School of the Mountain two years before the standard age of admission. Jabir accepted a position as Chancellor at the same time, to ensure the boy was protected and raised properly.
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After a number of discipline issues arising from his change to a more structured lifestyle, Morathi thrived at the School. Over his nine years at Kadesh, he received an education befitting a future king: literacy, calligraphy, mathematics, history, natural philosophy, riding, astronomy, navigation, fencing, geography, philosophy, and classes in political, military, economic and magical theory.
A keen student in most respects, the young prince rated below average in philosophy and magical theory, a particular bone of contention between himself and his uncle; it was Jabir himself, the finest magician in Jafaru, who designed the courses based on his own work. “Magic,” he would often posit, “is the means by which we change our surroundings to meet our will. This is achieved through the use of spells, ritualistic words and movements that bend reality in clearly defined ways. Magic is a science, magic is an art.” Jabir attributed his nephew’s failings to a lack of diligence in studying by rote, and noted that Morathi only seemed to learn those few spells that were simple, easy, and had immediately beneficial effects.
In 1389, a visiting Philosophy lecturer from the House of the Moon, Master Shotoku, came to the School of the Mountain. Morathi immediately became entranced with the man’s rather radical credo that ‘all reality is one’, and devoted more attention in a single class than he had in an entire year. Jabir sent the man away very quickly, on the grounds that his variance from the curriculum would cause the less mature students to lose the grounding that traditional studies provided. The young prince, however, believed this to be an act of jealousy on his uncle’s part, and protested quite vehemently. Jabir assumed the Philosophy class himself, and restored discipline with a heavy hand.
Having had enough, Morathi chose to run away from Kadesh, with the short-sighted intent of making it to the Court of the North Wind and requesting sanctuary. While his training at the Mountain included survival skills, it was eight hundred kilometres of desert and mountain to his destination, and the youth’s inadequate preparation doomed his attempt to failure from the start. Three days later, he was found at the foot of the hills by herdsmen tending their flocks, and they brought him back to their camp to recuperate.
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For several months, he lived among the isolated tribesmen, helping them with their work in exchange for their hospitality, and largely enjoying a peaceful, unregimented life. When they returned to their town, Morathi went with them, and worked odd jobs to support himself until the next merchant caravan came through. With some of the money he took when he left Kadesh, the boy bought himself an escort to their destination, a port city on the Great Western Sea. And with the last of his funds, he purchased passage south to Jafaru, the city of his birth.
A problem immediately arose, in the form of his father. Hearing that Morathi had run away, and assuming that he would sooner or later return to Jafaru, Rahib posted pictures of the boy everywhere, and every guardsman seemed on ready to drag him back to the institution from which he so recently escaped. Not being very experienced in the ways of the world, it didn’t occur to him that the rugged hill-boy in the docks bore little resemblance to the well-kempt student in the posters, and in a panic he decided to leave the city. He quickly found a ship on its way out of port, and joined the crew as cabin boy.
He had always been a passenger on ships before, and this was his first real taste of the kind of life ordinary people lead. His captain was a strict disciplinarian, harsher than he had ever thought Jabir or any other master at the Mountain. Cursing the man for a tyrant, Morathi jumped ship at the first port he came to, and found a new captain, Medovy, of the auspiciously named Mercy.
In fact, it was anything but. If the first captain was strict, the second was outright cruel; as the new cabin boy discovered, he was also a smuggler and occasionally a pirate. Morathi served on the Mercy for a year and a half, going into the tops when he was older. He learned much about the workings of a ship in this time; he also learned what broken ribs, and the lash, felt like. Unlike his first master, when Morathi jumped ship, Medovy came after him. Though he’d been trained in self-defence and the use of several weapons, the young sailor was no match unarmed against the physically large captain and his press gang.
In 1391, just before his fifteenth birthday, he ran away again, this time successfully, and ended up once more on the streets of Jafaru. Morathi Setting-Sun, Prince of Jafaru, was long since given up for dead, and this time the teen knew he wouldn’t be recognized. He decided to make his home in the city once more; but while it was the city of his childhood, he hadn’t been there for ten years, and during his residency had never been outside the Palace. He ended up on the streets.
The condition of the city was appalling to the young man, so long used to the refinements of the noble life. Corruption was rampant in the Watch, the poor were crowding the streets and alleys, and unemployment and the crime rate were critically high. With such problems facing the residents, they banded together, and helped each other as best as they could. Morathi was eventually adopted by a band of orphans who ran through the city, supporting themselves by picking pockets and petty crimes. Within a surprisingly short time, he put his morals aside and joined them.
The young criminals were employed by an elderly thief named Rankil, who taught the children his craft in exchange for a share of their take; the system worked well as they depended on each other for survival, and a real affection grew up among the band. For the young prince, it was his first real sense of family.
While his minor magical abilities, could have made the boy easy money, Rankil forbade its use. “If you rely on that to earn your bread, you’ll learn nothing in life but how to rely. Relying on things you don’t even understand, pfah! Let me show you something better,” was an often one of his contributions to conversation. For all his late introduction to the profession, Morathi was a quick study, and his nimble fingers and keen mind made him a natural talent for lifting wallets, picking locks, and spotting easy marks. For two happy years, he lived as the poverty-stricken did, working hard and slowly starving, making friends and burying them, fighting in the streets, playing in the streets, working in the streets, unburdened by the cares of complicated morality or a crown.
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In 1393, while working the crowd at a fair, he chanced to overhear a snatch of conversation in Libban. The thief’s early education included modern languages, and since the closing of the border twelve years previously, it was quite rare to hear it. He followed the two men, wealthy-looking burghers, out of the fair, shadowing them as he’d been taught, and trailed them to an abandoned dwelling in a rough part of town. He saw more men arriving, once again of a far wealthier quality than the surroundings would suggest. Curiosity overcoming his good manners, Morathi waited until the meeting was underway, then scaled to the roof and listened to their words through a gap in the dilapidated shingling.
Over the course of the next half hour, a horrific plot unfolded before him: the conspirators sought to kill his father and seize the throne for a highly-placed Libban sympathiser. This usurper would then reopen the border and grant their neighbours very favourable trade contracts, taking a high percentage of the profit for himself. Long-forgotten feelings of responsibility towards his family and his nation welled up in the young prince, and he vowed to foil the plan. But how? He couldn’t take on thirty men and their bodyguard at once, and the few honest Watchmen would never take the believe an obvious street rat’s tale of treachery, or that the aforementioned street rat was heir to the throne.
Displaying a great pragmatism, Morathi set fire to the house and ran to the Palace, hoping at least to pass some kind of warning to Rahib. While the teen expected the conspirators to escape, he also expected to have a healthy headstart on them. He did not expect horses. When he arrived, on foot and out of breath, it was to find two of the conspirators there ahead of him, climbing down from a carriage. He had very little time indeed.
Working from memories of a dozen years previously, the prince went over the back wall and into the gardens, and from there into the cellars, seeking a laundry chute he knew as a child. That chute led directly to his father’s suite, and the young prince would often sit there for hours at a time and listen to Rahib’s voice as the king discussed his itinerary with the Chamberlain, or chatted with one of several mistresses he took after Lakila’s death. But now, rather than waiting for sounds of speech, Morathi made the torturous climb up the chute. Fortune was on the thief’s side, as the conspirators stopped to change, and he had time to make it into his father’s room, wake him, and explain the situation.
But the surprised king didn’t believe the plot, and couldn’t see the boy of five in the young man of seventeen. Rahib summoned the guards to take him away, but when the captain smelled of smoke, Morathi’s story became much more plausible. Jabir was summoned, and verified the prince’s identity, with the end result that the traitorous captain was taken away. The three royals then gathered a body of loyal soldiers to rout out the conspiracy, the young man’s descriptions of the men serving as a guide of who to confront.
Some surrendered, and were hung at daybreak for their crimes; others fought with their retainers and Libban allies. In one such fight, the last of that long night, Morathi killed a man for the first time. He cried, afterwards. Jabir simply advised him, “And now you are a man,” and left to order the disposition of the prisoners. His father was more comforting, and explained in gentle tones how sometimes killing is necessary for the greater good, or for self-defence. From their quiet conversation in the bloody dark before the dawn, the relationship between the two as father and son really began.
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That night, Rahib declared war on Libba. Taking lessons from the ease with which Morathi entered the Palace, Jabir ordered the creation of a new military unit. Intended for special operations, the members of this unit would be trained in infiltration, information gathering, and assassination. Morathi, old enough to join the army by two years, was glad to be included in this department. Since being reunited with his father, he began to regret the years when he had been absent from the crown and its responsibilities.
A surprised Rankil was recruited to train the men and women of the unit in several of their disciplines, and he in turn brought in other experts, people who could forge documents, others who could fight blind, con artists with the knack of feigning injuries or accents. They drilled rigorously for months, until each of them was as silent as the wind, as quick and deadly as an asp, and as innocuous as a child.
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Morathi lived in the Palace during this time, and spent all the time he could in conversation with his father. He learned much about statecraft, and politicking, and how to keep a nation afloat in difficult times; Rahib in turn learned from his son’s tales about the lives of the common citizen, and what Jabir’s policies meant to the cities.
To deal with the prince’s tireless social conscience, fuelled by years of living as a poor boy and by the guilt of running away from his responsibilities, Morathi was allowed to form an advisory committee to evaluate urban issues and make recommendations on how to improve the quality of life for city residents. Although his training left him little enough time for reports and meetings, he selected a team and operational framework that could function even in his absence. Under the committee’s auspices, workshops and guilds received tax incentives for moving operations into the city; this and a number of public-works projects reduced the unemployment rate to a more acceptable level. Some of the public-works included the building of a number of schools, libraries, and low-income housing, allowing many families to get a more solid grip on the future.
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1394-1399: The Second Libban War. The Special Operations unit saw heavy use during this war, gathering information and making key assassinations to sabotage enemy efforts. This time, Libba is exhausted more quickly than Jafaru, and severl key battles secure victory for Rahib. In the treaty of Hakta, important concessions are reached, limiting the size of the Libban military and granting Jafaru reparatory funds; such measures guaranteed that it would be some time, if ever, before trouble arose from that quarter
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At twenty-three, Morathi was a hero of Jafaru. Too recognizable now for the secretive work that had recently made him so valuable to the government, the prince joined his father’s cabinet in the new Ministry of Citizen Affairs, continuing his previous peacetime work with greater funding and authority. He clashed often with Jabir during meetings, still having something of a rivalry with his uncle.
With government popularity at an all-time high, and peace reigning throughout the land, Rahib counselled his son to seek a mate and secure the continuation of the House of the Sun. After some prodding, the reluctant prince was persuaded to meet an endless parade of princesses that Jabir solicited from all the nearby noble houses. Marriage to any of them would have brought trade benefits or increased power to Jafaru, but the prince, tempered by his years among the destitute, found them all either too tame-seeming, or too spoiled.
After several months of this, the king and his brother tried a new tack, making Morathi the head of every trade delegation sent out to a foreign court. As Jafaru’s chief negotiator, the royals of every nation he visited would be sure to wine and dine him, and it was hoped under such pleasant and entertaining circumstances he would eventually fall in love with an unattached noble lady. Word having gotten about (via Jabir) that the heir to the Ivory Throne was looking for a wife, it was sure that many unattached ladies would cross his path.
Morathi grudgingly agreed to board ship on the trading mission, determined not to fall in love with a sheltered elitist. As it happened, he did fall in love, but fortunately for his republican sensibilities, it didn’t happen at court so much as on ship. Shiara (1373 - ?) was one of the sailors on the Golden Dawn, a proud and strong lioness who exhibited no fear in the face of storm or pirate. She couldn’t read, swore frequently, and liked to fight after a night drinking in a rough tavern; and she stalked into the fennec’s heart and made it utterly her own. Fortunately for Morathi, Shiara came to return his feelings, and they began a two-year affair of secret meetings on ship and shore, set against a background of some of the most romantic port cities in the world.
Morathi prolonged each cruise as much as possible, wrestling over every detail of a trading contract that he could, and convincing everyone that he was just on the verge of making between the royal daughters presented to him. And, once it was clear that he wasn’t going to make his choice, it was anchors away and a delicious sail onto the next city. Truly, these were the two happiest years of his life, and for the rest of his days, the prince would return to them in the moments between dreams and wakefulness, and smile with the memory of a rising sun illuminating Shiara’s features on the pillow beside him.
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And one day, she was stolen from him. On the day he was to leave on a tour of coldlander courts, he found himself breakfasting with a smug Jabir, rather than Rahib. “My brother is ill,” his uncle advised, “and won’t be able to see you off.” And when the two princes arrived at the dock, it wasn’t the Golden Dawn, but the Maiden’s Favour that greeted his eyes. He vaguely recalled, through the painful shock, hearing the elder fox advise that the Dawn was called away on other duties, but the Favour, being Jabir’s personal ship, would surely be an adequate replacement.
Morathi was hustled on board, too dazed to fight back, and spent three miserable weeks sick with worry, waiting to reach his first port of call. He jumped ship, and this time when the captain sent men after him, it was they who returned with bloody noses and empty hands. Alone in a foreign city, the prince needed to find passage back to Jafaru; fate sent him a gift in the form of his old captain, Medovy of the Mercy, in port for a quit refit and selling of illegal goods.
The prince stowed away on the filthy godsend just before she sailed, and revealed himself the next morning. Medovy didn’t remember the cabin boy of ten years earlier, but certainly didn’t appreciate the interloper’s presence; during the short power struggle that followed their reunion, Morathi repaid every stroke of the lash he had received at the captain’s now-broken hand. Feeling marginally better about the world, he made the Mercy’s first mate an offer he couldn’t refuse, and commissioned the crew to hunt down the Dawn.
After two months of tracking down rumours, he followed her to a trading outpost on the distant Bailic Coast, only to suffer a further shock. Shiara was not on the ship, he was informed, and hadn’t shown up for duty on the day they left for their current assignment. Sickened, frightened, infuriated, he returned home to confront his uncle, certain that Jabir was the architect of his misfortune. But the elder prince protested ignorance that there had even been a romance, let alone interfering with it. And, Jabir was quick to point out, while fun with nobodies was all well and good, hadn’t he got a pile of princesses at the door to choose from?
Morathi didn’t believe his uncle, and would have struck him down then and there, were it not for the other’s exquisite skill with magic. He left the court, much to his father’s dismay, and ran his ministry from a house in the city. All of his spare time was devoted to searching for his lost Shiara, but it was a hopeless task from the beginning; she had no family he could trace, her apartment was already inhabited by someone else, and none of her neighbours could remember her going.
The king kept finding reasons to summon his son to court, Morathi kept trying to avoid the family he felt denied him his love, and the situation was really coming to the point where he felt like running away again. But in late 1401, he was reminded of his duty to Jafaru once more by the return of an ancient and incredible evil.
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Mysterious raiding parties were wreaking havoc in outlying communities bordering the Great Desert; these were eventually recognized as the fabled anthari, the living-dead warriors of the reality-crossing Beast of legend. Rahib had seemed to age quite rapidly in the months since his son became estranged from him, and now lacked the vitality to lead his nation into battle. The command of the army was left to his son, as advised by Jabir; the two were once again to put aside their differences for the greater good. And so, Morathi gathered the thirty greatest champions of Jafaru, and formed the Company of Good Hope (named and styled after the original heroes to banish the beast), to be his bodyguard as led the charge into battle. The people rallied behind the armed forces, inspired by storybook quality of Morathi’s leadership and Jabir’s skill at manipulating the public press.
But after three years of hunting down nests of anthari and rooting them out, defending the city against armies of nightmare that appear from nowhere and vanish with the morning light, they were still no closer to ending the threat against their land. In 1404, the Beast made contact, and offered Jafaru a choice: to join his army alive, or to join it dead. The world, It advised, would once more be entirely under its power, and the rich kingdom was merely the first stop. This time, there would be no stopping him.
In a desperate gamble, the Company decided to cross the Great Desert to the lonely mountain that was reputed to be the ancient dragon’s lair of old. The rest of this story is told in his uncle's words.
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Children of Jafaru are not named until after they have completed their first year of life; it has been speculated that this tradition stems from the high infant mortality rate that the people formerly suffered from. At a naming ceremony on her first birthday, the child is given one name. Surnames do not appear frequently among the common citizens, who rely more on parentage or profession to distinguish themselves. For example, one person may introduce herself as Mada, daughter of Tamal the Priest; another might identify himself as Tahmores, servant to Almo the Steward. If a priestess is present at the birth of child, she may bless the child with a reading of the fates and give him an augury name, such as True-Friend or Long-Eye, to emphasize traits he will epitomize in his lifetime. Normally only the wealthy can afford to have a cleric summoned, so it is rare to see these names among the poor. As can happen with large families or through coincidence, there may be multiple people who share a given name and profession, in which case a nickname is often assigned. Should a common person ever be required to give a full introduction of himself (such as when being questioned by the Watch), the order proceeds as follows: nickname, given name, profession, father’s name, father’s profession. Should the person be travelling, they may add the name of their home territory as well.
For those who have wealth, there is less of a tendency to identify oneself by profession or nickname, and more by family or title. For example, one noble might be introduced as Jerek of the House of the Western Sea; another might by Taye, Lord of Callahsis. It is quite frequent at court for people of the same status to attempt to out-do each other by having themselves introduced in as lengthy a way as possible, in which case the order is as follows by given name, augury name, family name, titles ad infinitum, name of parent with greater glory, some of that parent’s titles. This is one of many reasons why Morathi disliked life at court, and encouraged his father to be introduced as succinctly as possible, since no one may try to out-do the king.
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Morathi’s mother was a quiet and gentle soul who was famed equally for her beauty and for never saying a cross word, even when challenged by other, more vocal, ladies of the North Wind court. Never of robust health, she would often sit by a mountain lake and write poetry, which she would send to her various admirers. After her death, it was discovered that Lakila was encoding instructions in her admittedly skilled poems, and that some of these admirers were in fact covertly working on her behalf to burn down or raid the manors of the aforementioned ladies who picked on her. Several of these ladies made attempts to sue Rahib for damages, but since the incidents occurred largely before he met Lakila, the king directed all queries to Teraz of the House of the North Wind, her father. The unfortunate Teraz was sufficiently distracted by quieting scandals and protecting his position to allow Rahib and Jabir great mobility in their various reforms.
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Located on the solitary mountain of Kadesh, mid-way between the capital and the Court of the North Wind, this academy is the center of education for all noble children. Lecturers in a number of topics gather from across the land share their learning with the next generation of Jafaru’s leaders. It is also a retreat for mystics, and numbers of citizens come every year to meditate in the austere and beautiful surrounding, and reconnect themselves with the world around themselves.
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Deputy to his brother the king, and possessor of many offices (Finance Minister, Chief Justice, Chancellor of Kadesh, etc.), he is an utterly pragmatic statesman with a far-sighted vision for Jafaru. While his policies seem ruthless, he has balanced the budget for thirty straight years and increased military funding without raising taxes. International trade and provincial industry flourished under his care, but at the cost of social services and urban infrastructure. In addition to his governmental work, he is the premier sorcerer of the land, and an accomplished warrior and leader, having participated in a number of special operations and military campaigns.
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An inspired orator and leader of men, perhaps the most popular king since Khaleb Indefatigable, who led the heroes of the Company against the Beast. Rahib led his nation to freedom from the iron grip of the Libban usurpers, and bested that nation in two long wars. While a leader who inspires awe and confidence in times of trouble, his peace-time governing is less capable, which is why he relies so heavily on Jabir, and to a lesser extent, Morathi. Puts his duties before family, self, and honour.
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Jafaru
#423998 - Tue Dec 02 2003 10:23 PM
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A wealthy city state on the shores of the Ivory Sea, located between the North Wind Mountains and the Great Desert. Citizens engage in small-scale fishing and herding, but its primary natural resources are its high-quality olive and grapes, and silver mines. Grand traders, Jafari ships can be found in any port in the world, and their delegations are famed for their ability to wrest any advantage possible in the world of commerce.
The area known as the Great Desert was once a rich and verdant land, according to legend, until the Beast came and laid it waste with its living-dead armies. It is from the date of this creature’s banishment by the mythical Company of Good Hope that the Jafaru calendar counts.
(OOC notes: Magic is not uncommon here, and the technology level is a rough equivalent to sixteenth century Europe. I was aiming for a Moroccan kind of flavour for the nation. This is hampered by my not having been any closer to that land than a television.)
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Players are contracted by a shadowy government agency to track down a number of celebrities suspected of being paranormals. Their mission: gather evidence and capture them. Or grab an autograph. Or steal their underwear. Whatever.
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After indications that the hook’s reality-warping original owner is trying to come to the Dream, Morathi decides the time has come to return to Jafaru and face his nemesis. As can be expected, things go very, very wrong.
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Threads
#425430 - Sat Dec 06 2003 10:54 AM
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Personal Development
His Uncle's Words (Poorly named, Morathi's introduction to the Dream.)
Paradox Springs V (Requesting to be Kai's student, sharing history)
The Watering Hole VI (Telling of tales and dinner)
Schroedinger vs Merlyn (Philosophy, history, altered perceptions of reality)
Eyes of Truth (Joining Kai as he faces the evil from his past; several instances of altering personal reality, references to Jafaru)
Around Comes the Circle (A final visit to Paradox Springs)
The Shadows of Ecstasy (Morathi is dragged unwillingly into a dimension of shadow, and finds a good cause that hits close to home)
Adventures in the Dream
Seikoku ni Kaeru (Following Kasumi on a journey into her past, which gets hijacked in a mysterious fashion)
King's Highway (Awakening in an dream within a dream, and fighting an impossible battle)
Tempora Mutantur (As a nameless shade, seeking his past in a shattered world)
Eggplantion, EC 00297338879 (A further invasion of the Dream by a foe that sounds sillier than it actually is)
LotF: The Two Worlds (The sequel to Legends of the Fallen, a period of relative peace is broken by the gathering of foes)
Trouble at a Town Named Tranquility (Meeting a mysterious stranger in the middle of a wave of mysterious killings leads to great mystery for Morathi)
As a GM
Fragment. (The Society for Enlightenment is under siege by hidden enemies on its latest project, and it's up to the Special Field Research Team to straighten things out.)
A Sundered Key. (A simple tale of pirates, treasure, rum, undead foes, vicious natives, volcanoes, explosions, inventors, bikinkis, and sequins.)
The Case (A group of mercenary avatars have twenty-four hours to recover a stolen briefcase, or suffer unimaginable consequences.)
Inactive or Complete Adventures
First Alert (Joining a team of aid workers as they train for relief work in former war-zones)
Verose (Hunting an extremely dangerous villain halfway around the world, and embarrassing himself at court)
The Disappearance of Maus Merryjest (A trip to another world in search of the missing Merryjest)
What the Past Left Behind (Morathi, sci-fi mercenary and explorer)
Heroes of Today (Morathi, a youthened clone of himself, in another plane)
Wasteland (Dr. Ulysses Monroe, medical examiner and alcoholic.)
Silent Skills Corporation (Morathi Santerre, fashionable art dealer and burglar.)
A Nightmare All Too Real (Morathi leaves his own dreams, and enters those of another)
Loss of Powers (Searching for answers after a mysterious shockwave robs the Dream of its mystic energies)
Intruders in the Dream (A rescue mission thrown off course by an invasion)
Darkness (One of a group of avatars vicitmized by hallucinations)
Fractured Dream (Slave of the powers that overtook the Dream, reality loses its grip on Morathi)
Changing Truth (Powers beyond Morathi's control make him human and give him his hand back. Confusion ensues.)
Ultimate Power Ultimately Corrupts (Burning towns and stolen souls, Beowin has a lot to answer for, and Morathi wants to ask the questions.)
The Physics of Faith (A plague of undead threaten the land and Morathi, shieldbrother Kasumi and a mute orphan must fight their way into the dawn.)
Residential Evil (Special Agent Morrisson, G-man with a job to do. And secrets to keep.)
Over Blood Red Sands (Colonel Morathi, seeking adventure in Martian ruins to avoid a social obligation.)
The Mist (The Carpenter, an amnesiac who wakes up in a shipwreck.)
Weave of Destiny (Morathi finds his lot thrown in with a group of avatars trying to prevent a demon army from overruning the world)
Please Save Our Dream! Eggplant RPG: Episode 1 (When sentient food groups attack, only the hungry will survive)
Legends of the Fallen (Morathi finds himself embroiled in war after he charitably offers his services to a small village)
Performances
A Gang of Idiots presents: Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet! (As 'Lord Capulet'.)
Mecha Bishi Warriors (As 'Mecha Bishi Magenta'.)
Persona (As 'Saul')
Dream Poker Tour (Chip Leader)
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Art
#425450 - Sat Dec 06 2003 12:18 PM
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I have been blessed by many people, and I thank you all from the heart.
Gifts and Commissions
Ichabod (A gift, the first picture of Morathi)
Maus (A commission, and I highly recommend the artist)
Xaotl (Another commission, and another artist I endorse)
Cyprian (From Wasteland)
Ende (From Wasteland)
NoName (From Changing Truth)
Daync (As a rule I don't request art, but Daync was in dire need of a large number of art projects)
May (Avatar Pog #27, for my excellent guessing skills)
Claedarius Twice! Thrice! (Gifts from an artist who wouldn't take a commission, but certainly has the ability)
Kai (A gift from my very good friend)
On Cards
Oni (PA Card)
C.G. (A Gang of Idiots Presents: Romeo and Juliet)
Patches (Loss of Powers)
Denise (Fragment)
C.G. (Silent Skills Corporation)
K.Gavlas (Wasteland)
Indigo (Eyes of Truth)
K.Gavlas (Physics of Faith)
K.Gavlas (Verose - Chapter One: The Seeds of Dusk)
Drift with windblown sands,
For some things cannot be held
By hook or by hand.
Haiku by Sophi Naya.
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How Morathi Came About
When I first sat down to make a character for MZDM, I envisioned a powerful sorceror, broken down and scarred by years of adventuring, but still capable of great works. By the time I was finished, I had something a little more like James Bond of Arabia, although the original concept survives somewhat in the form of Jabir, Morathi's uncle and rival.
The hook came into things as more of a personal defense mechanism; there were a number of invincible all-powerful godlings back in those days, and I just thought it would be great to have something that could cancel out all harmful magics. But I was determined not to be the powergamer myself, so I had to figure a way to logically explain its workings and limit its abilities to solve every threat. I then decided the hook could 'cut the weave' of the opposing spell, but then that phrase got me thinking further about how magic is put together in the first place.
By the time I finished all my thinking, I had watched The Matrix and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon several times, read a number of White Wolf's Mage: The Ascension books, the Tao Teh Ching and Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, and come up with Morathi's experiencing 'deeper reality'. This wasn't magic, per se, just altering your circumstances by perceiving your reality differently; in theory anyone could do it, and they are certainly welcome to.
A lot of these things came up in conversation with Kai in Schroedinger vs Merlyn, which remains among my most challenging and satisfying roleplays to date. And from that thread sprang the seeds of what will eventually by Morathi's homecoming adventure, in which he must settle all the mysteries and scores of his former life; look for that thread in about six months.
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A briefcase containing classified documents is stolen, its courier murdered. The contents of the document could cause a war, or stop one; make the possessor wealthy, or dead. Whoever has the case in twenty-four hours will have the power to change the world.
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