The Vigiles Amicae is a roleplaying guild in Everquest 2, on the Freeport and Antonia Bayle Servers.

Thursday, August 23, 2012

A plain, red-spined book - Apocryphal Journals: Folodu Amrunrosse

Archivist's note:
It is clear from contemporary records that Amrunrosse was fastidious about keeping her journals on her person or otherwise well secured, yet in the recent reorganization of the archive we have found loose signatures tucked among unrelated treatises on the applied arts of entropy as relates to the keeping of vegetable gardens in various climates.
Each is no more than eight pages of vellum, stitched with waxed linen thread and apparently in good condition, aside from having been at some point separated from the rest of its volume. The handwriting appears to be consistent from one entry to the next, though there are huge swaths of the work still missing.
What remains has been bound together in a probable chronology, and wrapper leaves were added around each original signature to hold such notation as is possible. The entries are undated in the original hand, but as many of the incidents are cross-referenced in the public archives, so a loose chronology may be posited.



This entry is unusually brief for the bardic-trained Amrunrosse, and reveals some of the considerable impact her stint in High Command as Acting Praetor had on her own abilities. 

It is uncertain what partisan Amrunrosse refers to in this entry, but Lenoire Du'Claire and her consort Kanaemar are confirmed in contemporary records as being deeply involved in the turmoil that surrounded the end of Amrunrosse's tenure as Praetor. 

This is one of few indications that come down to us as evidence that the turmoil was not born of chaos, but rather carefully orchestrated to create a path back to leadership for the deposed Hero and Protector of the Amicae. As so little evidence did survive, it has been a matter of much dispute among the chroniclers, but it stands to reason that after the very public manner in which Amrunrosse usurped the position that it would be impossible to reverse peacefully. It must not be forgotten that during her tenure, Amrunrosse enjoyed wide popular support, and that other private communication during that period confirms a deeply rooted mistrust of the deposed Praetor's temporal stability.

Even to this day, there are apologists for the usurpation, who question the trustworthiness and tactical stability of a leader who is so patently secretive about her history, her age, and her sanity. It is widely believed that the Praetor does not punish such treasonous agitation because she is unaware of it: historians who have investigated the history of the Heroes' Quarter in Maj'Dul hotly argue the reverse. No foreigner could have survived the ever-shifting sands of Maj'Dul politics for long - let along risen to a stable and uncontested prominence there - who did not have a canny understanding of political maneuvering and the exigencies of war.



This is a long and twisting path - Sytan is back among us, which is more than timely as I needed an agent who would be able to do the things I cannot. The house will pass back to Ari.

I have given him the information I have been working with, and he has seen my plan within it. Fafnier needs pushed away, as does Ari. If they leave the house under my regime, it can be painted as my poor leadership.

There are only a few ways this can go. I will do everything I can to ensure the House is strong...
that she leads it again.

One vocal supporter has been arranged. In the time I write this, the next has been as well.
I have struck Sin, and Ari comes soon. I had hoped to be more civil in this, but the way things have played out prevents that, now. I would give commendations if I could - Leni and Sin both are going above and beyond the call in the time of need. I will put my faith in them, that they will support Ari as Praetor.

They come. I will give them a good show.
I hope it will be enough...

Thursday, August 16, 2012

A plain, red-spined book - Apocryphal Journals: Folodu Amrunrosse

Archivist's note:
It is clear from contemporary records that Amrunrosse was fastidious about keeping her journals on her person or otherwise well secured, yet in the recent reorganization of the archive we have found loose signatures tucked among unrelated treatises on the applied arts of entropy as relates to the keeping of vegetable gardens in various climates.
Each is no more than eight pages of vellum, stitched with waxed linen thread and apparently in good condition, aside from having been at some point separated from the rest of its volume. The handwriting appears to be consistent from one entry to the next, though there are huge swaths of the work still missing.
What remains has been bound together in a probable chronology, and wrapper leaves were added around each original signature to hold such notation as is possible. The entries are undated in the original hand, but as many of the incidents are cross-referenced in the public archives, so a loose chronology may be posited.



This entry is unusually candid, for Amrunrosse.

It is usually advised that the student of history take her offered chronology and editorial commentary with a hearty grain of salt - but unlike most of her narratives, this passage has a rather narrow focus. In all the records we have of her hand, public and private, there is every evidence of a profound sense of her own centrality to events - and in this one, her tone is unusually sober. 

Like most of the bardic-trained, it does seem she was drawn into many of the pivotal events of her time. In this particular reflection she seems to have at least briefly gained a greater sense of perspective on her own involvement - and the inevitable consequences of her political meddling.

Nonetheless, this morose account is interesting to the student of history, as it reveals an unusually deep admiration for the contemporary Lady Commander Arquenniel Tinwe'sa of the Freeport Militia's elite Third Brigade.




The weight of her mantle is great. Not that she has made it any easier.
Ari is far more coherent than she has been in some time. She also spits acid and makes a great amount of extra effort on us all. I should have had her struck down in the depths of the D’Vinn stronghold as I had planned.
She needed the rest, and now, so do I.

What am I come to? She is my dearest friend - I do not deserve it. She seems to have to greater peace on why I did what I did, though I do not.

I have given her the only gift I can, right now. We have her beloved. He is ready. I can finally give the authorization for his resurrection.
May it bring her peace.

Arquenniel.
There is a complicated topic. I cannot fathom why I brought up the glass powder-poisoned rum. I suppose I must like her, and I also wanted to illustrate that information is key...and I think I utterly failed and now have to watch my step even more than usual. Even so, that was a fool move. I put a lot of faith in our acquaintanceship, and being useful to them.
I do not know how long I can survive in Freeport after this.
I owe Lucan for having a place to call home, and while I accept work for any who will pay and who doesn’t offend me...this is different. This is actual treason. Damn Fafnier anyways! If he had listened, he and his people wouldn’t have been killed, and I wouldn’t have tried to find ways to bring some sort of attack back home. And it wasn’t even her fault! It was his! I like her. I don’t know how this will go.

Were circumstances different, we could probably be very good friends. But she is a Knight, and that is what it is. I think she has no idea the history they had - how Pallidmortis ran it...

He is free again. Loose in the world, and making trouble for Freeport. I have heard nothing on him yet, though I have exchanged my time behind bars to be on call when they take him.

I hope she listens. I hope she sifts through all of the records. Old contacts are a valuable thing to a tyrant. Old friends can very easily be current friends. She needs to identify these people. I would do this, but...it is what it is.

I miss my normal duties. I miss gathering information. I miss having the ability to love those in my heart. How can I relax, when the duties are always so demanding?

I will continue to hold myself apart. Not much longer.
It is nearly time to pass the mantle back.

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Journal of Acting Praetor Amrunrosse

Archivist's note:
This volume overlaps many of the events in the so-called Apocryphal Journals, but it is presented here as it's own work as it was discovered in the recent remodelling of the Gorowyn offices. The octavo journal is bound in blue dyed leather, and it had been lost in a gap between the decorative redwood panel and the blackrock maple wall sheathing, presumably since the latter Age of the New Combine.

It is advised that the student of history take her offered chronology and editorial commentary with a hearty grain of salt. In all the records we have of her hand, public and private, there is every evidence of a profound sense of her own centrality to events. Like most of the bardic-trained, it does seem she was drawn into many of the pivotal events of her time, and this must have only confirmed to her that she was therefore a driver of them.

Contemporary records confirm that during the time covered by this log - which seems to have functioned as a kind of pocket memorandum book, outlining events for later reflection in memoirs - Amrunrosse did in fact seize the Praetorship, and lead the final assaults on the D'Vinnian territories in the campaign to recover the kidnapped Legate. By this time, he had been missing for several seasons, despite all efforts to track his captors, the Amicae seem to have consistently arrived after the hostages had been moved.

Despite her position of authority, Amrunrosse still did not set down dates on her observations, but the frustrated historian will be perhaps least frustrated by this fragment of her testimony, as the dates of these actions can readily be cross-referenced in the campaign reports and Council minutes.



-1-

A trying night.
What have I done? Dear gods, Ari will kill me, and it is because of that damn Yorrik and Valacor. Vithing pissing contest over Ari.

Yorrik is consumed with his infallibility, and thinks Ari possessed of some madness. Valacor decided to visit during her examination, and scared Yorrik senseless. Yorrik, of course, called in the military.

Dear gods, but Ari saw reason and Valacor did not - he refused to stand down, escalating the situation. Because he attacked the House, I tried to have all three detained. Valacor refused, and what is to be done? He will destroy us all before he surrenders, and I will not risk the House.

I have Ari and Yorrik detained, and have placed restrictions on returning her position once it is proven that the words Valacor spoke were false. This, I hope, will give me time to run the campaign against Marconis' orc alliance and retrieve Sytan.

Damnit all, but why does Ari seek to believe that he left of his own will? Damnit damnit damnit.


- 2 -

A trying week. Valacor has decided to take his leave, and Yorrik had to be pressed in to service because he is our only healer. I cannot get Ari to promise not to kill me, so I cannot release her bonds. I will have to take the risk of it anyways - it would be just...

Finding I have support among the military -and- civilian branches. I am leading by paranoid dictatorship. This is backwards. This is not Vigiles. Will have to run campaign against myself. Planning to attack one of the House as a last resort. If reason will not win, what else can be done?

Beginning collecting the crimes I am committing. I want there to be no question how deeply my actions go. Might need to draft an arrest warrant.

- 3 -

We go after the orcs.

Released Ari. She didn't kill me, though I almost wish she had. If there is anything to be bitter about at this entire situation, it is losing her friendship. I have mishandled this from the beginning. I was so sure this would be cut and dry, and it would have been understandable, but the course was chosen rashly.

I wish Valacor would have backed down. I grow to hate his name, now. I have I time to cobble together a plan to stop him, so that justice might happen.

Asked Fafnier to kill Ari during the raid. She needs time to rest and lose her memories. She is having trouble with so many now. I don't think he understands.

Valacor is still at large. I can't move against him. Damnit, we need Ari.

- 4 -

Retrieved Sytan. Many losses.

Countermanded order to kill Ari. She is recovering and coping with memories.

Can't get the council on the same landmass together, much less the same room to reinstate Ariahdnia. Considering breaking the injunctions I laid out to do it anyways.

Too many are supporting me verbally in my tyranny. It is time to move.

- 5 -

[editor's note: update from ingame book]

Monday, August 6, 2012

A plain, red-spined book - Apocryphal Journals: Folodu Amrunrosse

Archivist's note:
It is clear from contemporary records that Amrunrosse was fastidious about keeping her journals on her person or otherwise well secured, yet in the recent reorganization of the archive we have found loose signatures tucked among unrelated treatises on the applied arts of entropy as relates to the keeping of vegetable gardens in various climates.
Each is no more than eight pages of vellum, stitched with waxed linen thread and apparently in good condition, aside from having been at some point separated from the rest of its volume. The handwriting appears to be consistent from one entry to the next, though there are huge swaths of the work still missing.
What remains has been bound together in a probable chronology, and wrapper leaves were added around each original signature to hold such notation as is possible. The entries are undated in the original hand, but as many of the incidents are cross-referenced in the public archives, so a loose chronology may be posited.



This entry wrestles primarily with events which occurred at least a full season, if not a year, prior to the writing of this passage. Given other evidence of daily memorandum books, it is possible that Amrunrosse had a longstanding habit of enlarging her record of current events only after she had some distance from them. 

It has also been suggested that her bardic training led her to delay the fleshing out of her records until she felt there was a suitably compelling narrative to drive the composition. The well-documented confrontation with Thrayson and Valinos was undoubtedly even more compelling at the time, and would have appeared at that time to offer a poetic circularity when contrasted with the repudiation of the Stormharrow alliance.

Contemporary records of the military actions during the Cel'Voda campaign are relatively intact, and the ally and slave mentioned in this passage are widely understood to have been Naccor Stormharrow and his koada' servant Wynteri, respectively. During this period, Naccor had paid for a commission in the Vigiles infantry for his younger brother, Malicce Stormharrow of Neriak, and records of the time suggest he was more interested in his brother's education and training than the boy himself was, and the friction between the brothers spilled over into the Cel'Voda campaign. 

It seems reasonable to conclude that cultural assumptions were made on the part of both the Stormharrow boys and the Vigiles High Command, which came out in the crucible of this protracted campaign. The schism that resulted did entangle the Vigiles briefly in a diplomatic dispute with the elder Stormharrow's adopted House, the infamous trade empire of Shaded Lotus.

Detailed records of the resolution remain classified, but it is hoped that some of the more historically interesting reports will be de-classified in the near future, especially as Amrunrosse clearly believed that both events in this passage were deeply linked.




I do not know what to say. Perhaps the beginning of the thing is the only place to start.

     The Priestess Chryso has returned to our midst. It was hard, having to drive her off to begin with, and it hurt another who had befriended her: Little Chryslinger, who has lost all and fights her void-lost twin. She still feels very much for her old unit, though she tells me she is not trying to rebuild. She asks me questions, I suppose trying to figure out how well I would fit their number, or to get a better idea of who I am.

     House first. Always the needs of the House.
     I don’t know how well she has understood that, but we will all be confronted with that, now.

     We marched on the dragon Cel’Voda to recover our Lost, Xeita. We found evidence that our other, the Legate, had been there briefly. Xeita confirmed this. When we got her back, I gated out with Xeita and a smaller strike force aimed for the heart of Cel’Voda’s lair.

     There, a false corpse was found, as well as a skull burning with arcana at least three days old. The dragon himself, however, is truly dead. Someone was there before us. I cannot believe anything else but that Marconis is behind this.

     During this, our ally brought danger to us all when his slave knelt to them in the field. They do not want to see how this was risking their life by pointing out one of note in the field of battle.
     I remember the Cel'Voda clan from before the civil war, and on my recommendation the Legate had us all march in Indigo livery, without insignia. It is an echo of a dusty past, when one house would make war on another, and provide just enough distraction that the law could plausibly ignore the action as one approved by a Power higher than theirs.
     He is to young - or too poorly read! - to know the rigid conventions of that old custom.
     He wants to argue her usefulness? Feh. He will not be able to accompany us any further in the field. I have purchased the slave he got bored with, so I hope his new one has all the discretion he demands of those around him.
     Whatever else may befall, the issue is closed.

     During that time, one approached seeking aid. I must speak with with them more fully as there is time. This gets at the heart of another issue, and I am very much inclined to sow dissention and have the brunt of the work done. I have taken the meager information to the Knights already, and will be taking more as I can get it.
     I hate working with them, and feel like there is a trap about to close about me. I must step carefully.

     All of these events have happened around Ari. The issue I have avoided so far...
     She has been becoming less coherent, jumping around her personal history and not being very coherent in the present. I noticed this a few months ago, but her ability to lead was still intact. That has deteriorated, culminating in last night.

     She was distraught when Sytan was taken: I do not know if that is what drives her from her mind now.
     Last night, the Chief Medical Officer was shown how to feed Xeita’s needs for energy very directly. Valacor drew the power from him to show him the cost requirements. Yorrik believed his life under threat - and ordered the house to arms, and ordered his ancestral spirit to kill Valacor.
     The spirit was housed within Ari.
     When he managed this, or why, I do not know, but none may have such a thrall within the Amicae. Yorrik will be punished, but right now I need those able to heal.

     Valacor leveled the accusation that Ari was not sound of mind for leadership - she did not remember her own name, and is clearly susceptible to the influence of another’s orders. I have relieved her of command pending review of a council to find her of sound mind again.

Until then...
     I am acting Praetor.

Campaign: Treasonous Stars - Incident Report

The Vigiles Amicae hereby declares the persona(s) known as:

Valacor Arios Valinos

among other possible aliases, to be anathema.

The wards are locked against him, and no move shall be made to stay the hand that is raised against him.

It is with sorrow and rage that we report the former Commander Valinos was unable to abide by our Writ, and repeatedly expressed contempt for the substance and practice of the same. Every reasonable effort was made to educate Valinos regarding the nature of the Amicae, and the meaning of the Writ and Rules that guide us.

That the former Commander Valinos has been employed in the gathering of intelligence and monitoring of evils which would threaten the Amicae is insufficient case for the profligate violations of our writ which have accumulated to his name. Further, he has fled from the right and proper charge of treason, and refused to stand at Courts Martial for the following charges:

  • taking and keeping a sentient person in bondage without due process of law
  • keeping of personal slaves in true bondage, against their will
  • feeding on the heartsblood of allied sentient persons against their will
  • threatening a faithful healer among the Amicae
  • striking an officer of the Amicae with intent to cause grievous harm
  • imposing his will against an officer of the Amicae outside of the direction of a healer
  • sabotage and vandalism of Amicae holdings
  • refusal to make proper use of Vlosillye stock to maintain his health as an officer of the Vigiles
  • abuse of his power over the soldiers in his charge

We therefore on this Sixth day of Scorchedsky in the Year of Rathe in the Era of the New Combine, declare Valacor Arios Valinos a traitor to the Amicae and to the Praetor to which he owed his loyalty. So long as he refuse to answer to Courts Martial, he is both Exile and Fugitive, and any hand may be raised against him.

By my will, Praetor Ariahdnia z'equidaii Chath do'Trinae, Hero of Maj Dul
 By my hand, Legate Bellum Fafnier Brangwyn
 By my hand, Interim Legate Pax Akhutai Ssarathi
 By my hand, Vigiles Captain Folodu Amrunrosse



Note:
This is an IC exile only, and only in the Antonia Bayle timeline. Continued rp with this player is allowed and even encouraged. All rp guidelines regarding consent and communication are to be followed.