The Gardier
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The Gardier are a mysterious, powerful race of sorcerers in Martha Wells' fantasy trilogy, The Fall of Ile-Rien. They employ alien magic in their conquests of other societies, which the skilled magicians of Ile-Rien cannot counter. They also employ armed airships to bombard target cities from above. The centers of their civilization are called Matons, once-elegant cities heavily developed into bland and utilitarian military and industrial enclaves. The Gardier name for themselves is the Aelin, and the language they speak is also called Aelin.
In the beginning of the trilogy, not much is known of the Gardier. They have successfully conquered several of Ile-Rien's allies, and are advancing towards the capital city, Vienne. The university-city of Lodun is besieged by the Gardier, trapping its powerful sorcerers behind an impenetrable barrier, making them unavailable to the war effort.
[edit] Armed Forces
The Gardier are vaguely fascistic, with an extensive military force. The forces are divided into three castes:
- Service - Members of the Service wear drab, unadorned brown uniforms and have their hair shaved in buzz cuts. Due to long hours inside their closed vessels and fortified outposts, they have a sickly pale skintone. Members of Service have their memories of their prior lives magically erased.
- Command -
- Scientists -
It appears that women are able to serve alongside men in the three castes. The higher castes, Command and Science, will plant observers among the other castes to spy on their own people.
[edit] Culture & Society
They are a predatory people, seizing and adopting inventions and technologies from their conquests, although are unable to perfectly replicate them, resulting in crude inferior copies of the originals. For example, automotive vehicles created by the Gardier are afar less reliable and sophisticated them those they seized and copied, ugly and not very powerful. Similarly, their use of the crystal technology is flawed, and poorly understood by the Scientists.
The rest of their society is deemed Labor, and subject to mass, forced relocation to work in Labor Pens regardless of familial ties or prior social status. Civilian laborers are deprived of all luxury goods, and eat bland, unseasoned food. Even dyed clothing is unavailable to all but the highest levels of Command. The majority of the people are impoverished and illiterate.
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