The Story

Please note that some of this story content was written a long time ago and hence may contain grammatical errors or minor inconsistencies. It should also be noted that parts of the story line have been reworked since the original version.

The War in Heaven

Though it is unknown to the mortal races of Vaëtar, the mighty Lánaraï – whose name means 'people of the sky' in their dialect – were once part of a powerful and ancient star faring race whose name and origin have been long since been lost to the ravages of time. Even the Lánaraï themselves remember only the tragic fall of their once great civilisation and little more.

The following is an a chronological account of the events leading up to the fall of this once magnificent people and the great civil war known as the War in Heaven.

The ancient race that the Lánaraï once belonged to reaches its technological peak, having made vast discoveries and accomplished many acts of greatness. Led by a council of powerful god-like beings called the Násr, they have forged an empire which spans the entire galaxy and for the most part – there is peace.

But there are a restless few who do not witness the stability and prosperity of the civilisation and its people with favorable eyes. The sprawling empire has long since outgrown itself and can no longer be ruled effectively. The long lives of its people have brought opposition to change. An end to progress. With disdain, they watch the Násr council become ensconced in endless sessions, debating meaningless trivialities while the once proud empire festers from within.

Instead of greatness they see decadence. Stagnation. Decay.

Frustrated by what he sees about him, Rhïas, one of the most gifted and ambitious of all the Násr begins his research into the artificial creation of life, though it has been forbidden by law. Initially his experiments end in catastrophic failure, but he eventually succeeds in creating life. His first creations are fragile and live for only a few days or even minutes at most, but working in secret, he gradually perfects his art and amasses a personal army from his vile constructs.

In an act of treachery, Rhïas finally reveals his secret army and orders the arrest of the Násr council. The council is caught completely by surprise and some capitulate without a struggle, others resist and many of the lesser Násr are slain. Rhïas’ army is no match for the more powerful of the Násr, who flee the shattered council halls and regroup upon a distant system, far from the reaches of Rhïas and his followers.

News of the treacherous coup spreads rapidly and conflict breaks out all over the galaxy. However, the exact details of Rhïas’ tyranny are quickly distorted by lies and deception and loyalties are declared on both sides. Rhïas denounces the remaining Násr as traitors and in the absence of the Násr council, he declares himself as the sole ruler. Believing himself to be a god, he names himself Rhïarrh, meaning ‘The Fire in Heaven’ and leads those loyal to him into battle against the surviving Násr.

The ensuing conflict continues for decades without a decisive victory on either side. Determined to turn the tides of war, Rhïarrh creates the Star-Tyrants – gargantuan and immensely powerful beings, each formed from the energy of an entire star. Entire solar systems and all the worlds contained within are destroyed in an instant by this single act of unspeakable evil.

WIth Rhïarrh’s treachery now fully unveiled, many side with the other Násr and wage bitter and hateful war against their own people, who in turn brand them as traitors. Thousands fall on both sides in what will later become known as the War in Heaven, their immense star faring ships drift as ruined hulks though the endless voids of space while others become trapped in the clutching gravity wells of nearby planets and plummet downwards.

Rhïarrh and his armies, their ranks now bolstered by the terrifying Star-Tyrants, win a decisive battle in the orbit of a frozen and nameless planet whose future inhabitants would name it Vaëtar. The ships of the defeated Násr and their followers are cast down unto the planet below.

At the height of their power, the Násr were near immortal beings of frightening endurance with great mystical forces at their command. Of those who fell unto the planet below, some are able to survive the horrendous temperatures of atmospheric re-entry and are plunged into the depths of the earth as their once great ships spear like fiery comets into the barren earth. The conflagration and violence of their impacts is so intense that it causes parts of the polar ice caps to melt.

With his attentions firmly focused on the battle over Vaëtar, Rhïarrh’s control over the Star-Tyrants begins to slip and a number of them elude his grasp, scattering to the far corners of the galaxy, leaving vast trails of devastation in their wake.

The Birth of Vaëtar

The great star-faring ships that fall over the planet of Vaëtar blossom with mystical fire and plummet earthbound; if there were any living upon the planet at the time they would have witnessed the burning hulks fill the sky with a rain of fire. As these fires fall, they melt the frozen, lifeless earth; and their heat transforms the first droplets of water into great, dark thunderclouds. For the first time there is rain, then streams, rivers, and finally deep, boundless oceans in the depths of which the first faint stirrings of life began to appear.

Knowing he has not destroyed them utterly, Rhïarrh leaves a contingent – those who will later become known as the Lánaraï, or ‘People of the Sky’ to imprison the fallen Násr and their followers upon the planet. Commanding them to search for the remains of the stricken ships and slay any survivors, Násr or otherwise, he departs the planet to search for the errant Star-Tyrants and rebuild an empire shattered by almost a century of war.

Left alone on Vaëtar, the Lánaraï are dismayed at the vast and empty expanse of the dead planet and realise that their charge is utter folly. In Rhïarrh’s absence, they are quick to abandon their appointed task, firm in the belief that the awakening of one of the Násr could not possibly go unnoticed. They settle down and turn their attention to the barren world around them.

Guided by the arcane arts of the Lánaraï, the first native life on Vaëtar begins to rapidly evolve from simple ocean dwelling organisms to the complex flora and fauna of their former home worlds. In a vain attempt to replicate the acts of their absent master, the Lánaraï attempt to shape life in their own divine image. They fail utterly and what they create is, in their haughty eyes, distorted and misshapen – a bizarre, yet strangely beautiful race of winged and tentacled creatures that become known as the Vaïar.

The Vaïar are quick to deceive their would-be masters and disappear into the wilderness. Appalled at the abomination of their unnatural existence, the Vaïar dedicate themselves to keeping the balance and natural order of Vaëtar in check, and savagely attack any who dare defile their woodland homes.

Learning from some of their mistakes at least – the Lánaraï create another, lesser race, the earthbound Lán-Rhïan, meaning the ‘People of Fire’. Originally created as a subservient slave-race, the Lán-Rhïan – simpler and shorter-lived than the ancient Lánaraï – rapidly multiply and spread, quickly become the most multitudinous sentient race on Vaëtar. Despite outgrowing their intended purpose, they remain loyal to the Lánaraï to a point, but they are consumed with visions bestowed upon them from afar and thus it is to Rhïarrh that they dedicate themselves wholly – body, mind and soul. Many of the Lán-Rhïan depart from the mountain homes of their masters and migrate to the deserts oases and river plains of the distant south. In time they will come to build great and powerful cities and forge a vast empire of their own.

Oblivious to the life blossoming around them, the first of the survivors – shielded from fiery destruction by the powerful arcane arts of the Násr – finally stir and awaken. They rise from the deepest and darkest places of the earth unto which they had fallen and see the earth for the first time, and they are pleased, for in the wilds where they emerge they see the lion and the unicorn, the oak and the orchid all living in harmony. It is they who name the earth Vaëtar, which means ‘giver of life’ in their ancient tongue.

However, it is not long before they discovered the cities of the Lán-Rhïan. Cloaking themselves in shadow, the Kheïtanni wander the greater cities, and are shocked and deeply saddened at what they behold. For the cities of man had been constructed in a damned mockery of the great cities of their own distant homelands, from which they are in exile. The Kheïtanni are overcome with great sorrow and longing for that which they know as their home.

They flee back into the wilds to seek refuge amongst the mountains, forests and river lands of Vaëtar, which were then still left unsullied by neither the calloused hand of the farmer, nor the greedy, bejeweled hand of the nobleman. As the last of them return from the Damned Cities, which they called them, they bring dark and terrible news.

The Lán-Rhïan in their ignorance have been given visions of the realm among the stars, and it is thus that they had been commanded to raise their dwellings in beloved mimicry of what they had beheld. And in their foolish adoration, they have abased themselves before Rhïarrh, The Fire-in-Heaven and taken him as their one true God – he who is the now the ultimate nemesis of the Kheïtanni, for it is by his traitorous hand that they have been cast down from the stars.

The Kheïtanni look upon this and are dismayed. Jealous are they of the Lán-Rhïan who are lavished upon by Rhïarrh, and this jealously grows within them, and is coupled with their malice, and the emotions that rage within them are great, for they feel not as mortal beings feel, but amplified a thousand times. Greatly do they desire to bring ruination upon the lands of man, but as great and powerful as they are, the humans are too many and they are too few. And knowing that the humans are given shelter under the flaming wings of Rhïarrh, the Kheïtanni withdraw to the wilds and their raging emotions consume them.

The Siege of Rhïanakharóth

Greatly weakened by the struggle against the dissident Vaïar, the Lánaraï withdraw into the Pillars of Heaven, leaving the Kheïtanni to spread throughout Vaëtar unchecked. It is during this time that the Kheïtanni, led by the exalted Ithakhaëron, discover the first of the sleeping Násr and begin, in secret, to attempt seek out and awaken them all.

When the Násr prophetess, Nekhára is awakened by the Ithakhaëron, she suffers a terrible vision and in her desperation and agony bestows on him her own curse and blessing – the ability to see all things as they will come to pass. Ithakhaëron loses consciousness and returns to the world to see it as it will be under Rhïarrh's rule, a dead land he dubs the Desolation of Rhïarrh. Having found himself in an endless desert utterly devoid of life, Ithakhaëron wanders for several years through blasted wastelands, ghost towns and mass graves in search of Nekharóth, the black-walled tower that is prophisised to stand at the end of all things, hoping to find proof of the doom that is to befall Vaëtar.

Years pass and finally Ithakhaëron returns to the land of the living but he never speaks of his ordeal nor of what he has learned. Having awakened the fallen Násr and convinced them of his cause, they, along with the full might of the Kheïtanni draw up their battle lines on the plains to the west of the city of Rhïanakharóth. Tragically, as they prepare for battle, the hero Ithakhaëron's fatal flaw is finally revealed. Secretly in love with a human woman, a Mórian priestess by the name of Llyänna, he disappears from the army’s night camp, intending to get her out of the doomed city before the planned attack at dawn. He is seen, however and is gravely wounded by a human arrow. With Ithakhaëron strangely absent on the morning of the assault, command of the legions is deferred to his aging father, Aëron. The decision is hastily justified by the matter of Aëron’s seniority and claimed to be in accordance with the laws of old, but Aëron is known to be a bitter and twisted old man, consumed by many years of hatred.

With the might of the army at his disposal, Aëron reveals his genocidal endgame – he has not brought the army before Rhïanakharóth to capture the Great Pyramid of Rhïarrh as planned by his son. Instead, he intended to initiate a campaign to systematically execute every man, woman and child in the city and thus purge Vaëtar of the Lán-Rhïan race once and for all. Then having done so, he plans to enter the portal believed to exist in the deep bowels of the pyramid and ascend into the stars alone to challenge the Tyrant-God to single combat. Knowing that Rhïarrh will be mortally weakened by the utter destruction of his followers, Aëron believed that he can not possibly lose.

Appalled at his murderous plan, the army disintegrates around him. The Vaïar realise they had been tricked into taking part in a scheme that ultimately will only tip the scales of balance in favour of another rather than correct them, and they leave the field of battle to return to their sylvan homeland. Furious at their betrayal and desertion, Aëron rallies those of the Kheïtanni still loyal to him and charges towards the city. It is only then that Ithakhaëron realises his mistake – that the hatred of Rhïarrh and his subjects runs so deep within the Kheïtanni that even their near-immortal minds are blinded by the rage of such ancient enmity. He now knows that the trials he has endured at the hands of the Násr was not to prepare him to defeat Rhïarrh, but instead to correct the balance and restore the Násr and the Kheïtanni to their rightful place amongst the stars.

Though making himself the saviour of the Lán-Rhïan is an abhorrent notion to Ithakhaëron, he knows what he must do. He springs from his sick-bed, still nursing his near-mortal injury. Carving a bloody path through the raging battle, slaying Lán-Rhïan and his own kin with equal disdain, he finally hunts down his father and challenges him to single combat, a deadly match, for not only is Aëron a formidable warrior in his own right, but he has convinced the violent and bloodthirsty Násr, Ghór of his plan and has added his power to his own. Ithakhaëron no longer merely faces one of his own kinsmen, but rather a monstrous avatar of war and devastation. Veins coursing with fire and enshrouded by coruscating flames, Aëron answers his challenge and falls upon him with a terrifying bellow of rage.

Ithakhaëron is finally victorious and kills his own father – though he is himself close to death. The army disintegrates around him and the Kheïtanni flee to the grim islands in the north-east to escape retribution, abandoning the disgraced Ithakhaëron to his fate.

In the aftermath of the failed Siege of Rhïanakharóth, the Tyrant-God, Rhïarrh learns of the attempt to awaken the Násr and use their power to destroy him. In his wrath, he tears a rift in the fabric of reality which will allow him to enter Vaëtar from his distant dominion among the stars and unleash devastation upon his would-be assassins.

Despite only barely succeeding, and at the cost of his own immortal soul, Ithakhaëron is able to bar Rhïarrh’s path into the world, but in doing so he dooms himself to keep vigil for all eternity, lest the Tyrant-God should once more attempt to break through. Many attempts are made by some of the more fanatical Lán-Rhïan to destroy Ithakhaëron – hoping that by doing so they will allow Rhïarrh to enter the world in all His glory and destroy the Kheïtanni once and for all.

Through the vast power of the Kheïtanni and the intervention of the Násr, Móri and the complex spells woven by her priestess, Llyänna, the rift is shifted forwards through time and space to the distant future when the world is all but destroyed, and only the black-walled city of Nekharóth remains as the final bastion of the living. It is in the topmost tower of this doomed city that Ithakhaëron eternally guards the rift.

A Darkness Stirs

A darkness stirs in the depths. The drums of war sound once more.

Centuries have passed since the Siege of Rhïanakharóth and much of what the war destroyed has been rebuilt. But the years have not brought peace, shadowy daemons of unknown origin now plague the lands and racial tensions are strained. Sadly, many lessons that should have been learnt have not, and ancient and bitter enmities inspire acts of terror and violence again.

Worse still, the ever curious Lán-Rhïan have dabbled in rites which were better left forgotten, and rumours now persist that the ancient Star-Tyrants walk the lands of Vaëtar. The stage is set for a conflict that will rival even the horrors of the War in Heaven.

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