Lost Wars

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The Lost Wars is a fictional war occurred in the Dragonlance universe.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Contents

[edit] Causes

One of Fistandantilus' goals was to be able to study, prepare and work very powerful spells. However, his status as a renegade mage made him susceptible of the Conclave of Wizards' attacks, as renegade mages are hunted and killed. He was also afraid mages may inform the Kingpriest of Istar what he was doing or planning to do. In order to prevent these interruptions, he prepared a complex plan to force a Conclave retreat from Istar, exploting the Kingpriest's distrust for the balance.

Beldinas Pilofiro's extremist behaviour was continuous, especially in his speechs. Being a follower of the gods of light, anyone worshipping the gods of evil was an enemy, and should be eliminated, as anyone supporting them. With time the followers of the gods of neutrality, who did not take an active posture against the followers of evil, were seen as a part of the problem instead of neutral beings, and began to be pursecuted as well.

The Orders of Magic followed a path much closer with the one the gods had in mind: a good and an evil side, with neutrality balancing them. One cannot exist without the other. Destroying one will destroy the other.

By using the Kingpriest line of thought to his advantage, Fistandantilus was able to provoke a war between the Orders of Magic and the Divine Hammer, the personal army of the Kingpriest.

In the end, the Kingpriest considered every mage, including the ones wearing white robes, symbol of the god of light Solinari, as evil, because they did not work for the further spreading of rightness, but instead assisted and accepted the evil side as something necessary.

[edit] Events

[edit] Recruitment

Detailed in the book Divine Hammer, Fistandantilus rescued a young black-robed mage, Andras Ranoch, from a Divine Hammer raid. The hatred Andras took at the Hammer for burning Nusendran, his master, in a stake, made him a willing student of the Dark One.

[edit] New envoy

The death of Marwort the Illustrious, the white wizard who represented the Conclave in Istar and the Master of the Tower of High Sorcery of Istar, brought a conflict when Leciane do Cirica, a red robed wizard, was appointed as the new envoy. The Kingpriest was able to hunt, judge and execute black wizards, with little interference from the Council, as Marwort did not protest. After his death, and since the Black Robes would not accept another White Robe as emissary, nor the Kingpriest would have accepted a Black Robe in his court, a Red Robe was chosen instead. Although the court distrusted the mage, the Kingpriest decided to accept her.

[edit] Attack

With his training done, Andras cast a very hard spell to summon quasitas, imps from the Abyss, which required him to cut his little finger. With an extra spell to protect them against clerical powers, the quasitas were used to attack the Bilstibo or great arena of Lattakay in moments in which a tournament was held in honour of the Kingpriest. The Kingpriest tried to destroy them, but the protective spell deflected his efforts. In the end, it was Leciane who weakened them with sorcery and allowed the members of the Divine Hammer to force the retreat of the demons.

[edit] Justice

The death of over three hundred knights in the tournament prompted a hunt. Using the powers of Leciane, the Divine Hammer was able to track and locate Andras in old ruins some miles away. He was captured and transported back to Lattakay to be executed in the arena, without a trial.

The Conclave of Wizards, however, wanted to try him in order to discover how a student was able to summon demons. Efforts to stop the execution were in vain, and at the last moment Leciane summoned the Conclave powers to transport Andras to the Halls of Mages in the Tower of High Sorcery of Wayreth.

While he was being questioned by Ysarl, the Head of the Order of the Black Robes, Fistandantilus worked his magic through Andras. Ysarl was destroyed, and Andras was transported to Fistandantilus' secret lair.

[edit] Parley

The Kingpriest called for a meeting between the clergy and the Orders, the Empire of Ergoth and the Knights of Solamnia, to which assisted, between others, Vincil, Head of the Conclave of Wizards, some helper wizards, Leciane, the Kingpriest, Silvanesti emissary Quarath, and both the First Son Suvin and the First Daughter of Paladine. When the clergy learned Andras had escaped, they accused the Conclave of protecting an evil wizard.

Fistandantilus had provided Andras a fetch, an Abyss creature that had the power of copying the physical caracteristics of anyone. Andras assassined the First Son, and used the creature to mimic the corpse. With a spell that linked the fetch to his spirit and several others to prevent the mages assisting to the meeting from discovering the true nature of the replacement, the First Son stabbed the Kingpriest. The guards took retaliation, gravely wounding Vincil, who died shortly after transporting his party back to the Tower of Wayreth. Several knights and mages were killed in the skirmish.

The Kingpriest could heal himself, and declared a Holy War against the mages of Krynn.

[edit] Lost Wars

The wizards knew from the beginning they could not win the war. Even though sorcery was a great force in Krynn, the price for casting spells was too great. A mage can only memorise a certain number of spell incantations, depending on their power. The spells flare and disappear from the casters'memory as they are cast,forcing the caster to study them again. Furthermore spellcasting is physically taxing, requiring the mage to rest and recuperate before being capable of using magic again.

The mages ordered an immediate retreat from the different Towers of High Sorcery, by using portals that linked the different towers with the one in Wayreth.

Each tower held a virtually infinite amount of magical items, and there might not be enough time to transport everything. Thus, the Conclave ruled that, instead of letting such powerful items to fall into the hands of unexperienced persons, they would destroy the towers as a last resource.

The Church decided to launch coordinated attacks a few days later. The first Tower to be attacked was the one situated in the city of Losarcum. Then would come the attack to the Tower of Daltigoth, and to the Tower of Palanthas.

Duke Sarl, who had lost two sons while fighting in the moot against the mages, convinced Emperor Gwynned to attack five days ahead of schedule. By using a special seed sent by the Kingpriest they created a path through the Guardian Forest. As they were storming the tower, Iriale, Mistress of the Tower and her inner circle enclosed themselves in the Heart Chamber, and cast the spell that brought the tower down. Two hundred and four wizards and at least eight thousand citizens of Daltigoth died in the explosion, and a quarter of the city of Daltigoth was completely destroyed.

Although Quarath suggested a cease-fire after seeing the results of the first assault, the Kingpriest refused. On spring dawning the Divine Hammer, by planting a special cypress seed, a path was made. After defeating the different wards and the golems protecting the base of the tower, they entered. The mages resisted, and even though they were powerful, there were too many knights. When Marto, one of the leaders of the army, managed to break into the Heart Chamber, Khadar, Master of the Tower, released the powerful spell the wizards had been casting. The destruction was massive. Losarcum, City of Stone, was utterly destroyed, along with its twenty thousand inhabitants.

[edit] Peace

After the Tower of Losarcum was destroyed, the Kingpriest called for a new moot to end of the war. Two of the remaining towers were situated in extremely populated cities (Istar and Palanthas), and a massive destruction like the previous two could have been possible.

This new encounter was faster, and the terms were quickly arrived. The wizards would surrender the towers of Palanthas and Istar to the Church. They would be given the time to remove all the items from those towers, and carry them to the Tower of Wayreth, far from any important human city. Any attack on wizards would stop, as long as they stayed in their forest.

The Tower of Istar was surrendered soon after, and the Kingpriest was given a charm to protect him from the Guardian Forest. However, while the Tower of Palanthas was being locked, Fistandantilus transported Andras to its top floor, and forced him to jump out of the window, impaling himself on the exterior fence. With his last breath he cast a curse that transformed the tower in an abomination, where undeads rapidly took control of it until the Master of Past and Present, Fistandantilus, claimed possession.

Fistandantilus presented himself to the Kingpriest while he was inspecting the Tower of Istar, and after informing him he was the one who sent him the seeds that allowed the Divine Hammer to trespass the different Guardian Forests, convinced him to accept him as a member of the Istarian court.

[edit] Consequences

The Lost Wars is considered the first great defeat of the Kingpriest, even though he managed to exile the mages to the Tower of Wayreth. His main goal of eliminating arcane magic from Krynn could not be achieved, which inflicted spiritual and psychological damage on him.

Fistandantilus, at the same time, was able to push the influence of the Orders far from Istar. Without any other mages in the city, he was able to work his magic at will, and prepare himself for the Cataclysm.

[edit] References

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