“The Children of Stone”: struck from the Talus by lightning, the first and, they say, the best of races.
Created: c. 3,000 years before year zero (First Age), by Atlas · Orders: Stone Defenders · Magisters
Story
Atlas gathered lightning at the tip of Sky Spear and struck the Stone Talus, and the pieces that fell became proto-dwarves. They went to live inside the mountain. Because Atlas is a god of war, a sect of warriors with crude stone weapons arose among them, the Stone Defenders. They can see the Star Metal in the rock like anyone else, but they also feel it glinting, and it is one reason they never left. Above the deposit they built Kharag Duun (c. 2,000 years before year zero). They worship the Talus and the one who made him. The Fire Genasi also claim the name Children of Stone.
In year zero the Second Meteor blew open the First Fortress just as they were migrating into it. An entire order that had gone ahead was wiped out. It is their great wound, the one that only hardened them. Some hundred years later they left the Bronze Age by melding crystal magic with star metal, and the Talus raised the Magical Forge. Dwarf explorers mixing with Trenchborn became the Deepkin.
For five centuries they sat idle; since the Bazaar rose, c. year 500, they have sold star metal there. Then, in the Third Age, they declared themselves the first and best of races and walled Kharag Duun twice over (the Great Wall, c. year 610). They raised armies (c. years 620 and 630). Seeing humans become the dominant race, they took Greenhaven with the Talus (c. year 640). There was no massacre and nothing else changed. They became master diplomats, taught in their schools. Karros and Kassander turned them to the honourable way, but Atlas raised the evil Magisters among them.
Now
They are star-metal and magic smiths behind the Great Wall, full of diplomats, and they rule Greenhaven. Sky Spear is suddenly porous, with tunnels open that no one has walked.
Connections
- Kharag Duun: their home inside Sky Spear
- Greenhaven: which will win, the honourable way or the Magisters?
- Deepkin: half-descended from dwarf explorers
- Karros and Kassander: a good dwarf avatar of Astralis