The Emerald Claw
- DM's Note: The Emerald Claw here is distinct and seperate from the many thousands of year old cult to Erandis D'Vol. This, instead, reflects the much larger terrorist organization founded from the Karrnath "knighthood." They both, however, are referred to as the Emerald Claw.
Neutral Evil Secret Society
Symbol: A Green and Gold Karrnath War Flag
Appearance: Emerald Claw members usually identify themselves by the Phoenix symbol they've co-opted from the Karrnath flag (inverted) along with the Sieg Heil to the Furher (that is to come since Kaius' betrayal). In their fortresses, they tend to prefer their old military uniforms and paramilitary attire. Many are former Karrns, though members of all Four Nations of Human and Elven descent are welcomed.
Background: The Emerald Claw was a knighthood formed specifically from the Socio De Thule, an occult society composed of extremely wealthy and influential Karrnath leaders whom worshiped the Blood of Vol before King Kaius made it the State Religion. The group had association with The Aurrum to accumulate vast resources but broke away as soon as King Kaius became a full member of the society.
The Emerald Claw is, perhaps unsurprisingly, the group responsible for the Great Famine and Erandis D'Vol created the terrible winter storms after her people accumulated the necessary stockpiles to cripple Karrnath and force its conversion by the sword. They did not expect the war to last so long or their stocks to run out so quickly but they successfully resulted in their religion becoming foremost in the land.
The Emerald Claw then proceeded to begin recruitment of Elves, Half-Elves, and Humans of pure stock into their society. Half-Orcs, Shifters, Dwarves, and Dopplegangers were excluded completely in the early days even as the group has become somewhat more lax in recent years. The irony of their service is not lost on many of the members whom still maintain their chief doctrine of racial purity. It quickly became the foremost body-politic in the Karrnath state with its members holding almost all positions of importance in the Realm.
Curiously, though Cassius Du Crion converted to the Blood of Vol, he never joined the Emerald Claw despite ample opportunity to do so. Part of this most likely had to do with his former status as a Paladin and the fact that he reacted violently to the persecution of nonhuman Karrns. The Emerald Claw's magic and fear allowed them to maintain absolute secrecy about the majority of their works even from highly placed Warlords and military leaders.
The first of their secret projects, the large scale transformation of military assets into the undead, was made relatively public early in the war. This was something that required the Emerald Claw to murder countless dissenters in the government, clergy, and nobility while intimidating others. The Emerald Claws arrests of those who objected to the use of undead were quickly silenced with the Karrnath stoicism leading to a surprising amount of acceptance.
The second, more nauseous project, was the elimination of nonhumans in Karrnath. The organized mass murder of Hobgoblins, Goblins, Orcs, Kobolds, Changelings, and the like was carried out without much fuss from the populous. While a few hidden enclaves survived, the Humanoid populous in Karrnath is almost nonexistent with those that survived being able to do so largely because of The Blood of Vol. This was called "The Great Cleansing."
The Emerald Claw had begun a campaign of deportation, arrests, confiscation of property, and sporadic murder of more powerful groups (Half-Orcs, Shifters, and Dwarves) when King Kaius turned against them. Part of this had to do with his own rude sense of honor but also the fact that he viewed them as a threat to his nation rather than an asset. The regular military dwarfed the Emerald Claw and the undead obeyed King Kaius rather than them. Overnight, most of their most powerful fortresses were destroyed.
Stripped of their power, many Emerald Claw voluntarily renounced their allegiance and turned over their service to King Kaius while the hardliners were specifically targeted and arrested. Countless more went underground or fled to other nations with a substantial portion of the nation's coffers. Q'Barra and Breland both have substantial numbers of Karrns in exile that were later formed into a vast network of soldiery to restore their position of power.
The Emerald Claw is almost universally reviled across Khorvaire by those without an appreciation for their power. King Kaius has successfully distanced himself from them while blaming them for countless Karrnath atrocities (most of them being true). Many people have terrible dreams of a Claw conspiracy meant to take over the world at some point. They would be right.
Membership: The current "leader" of The Emerald Claw is Maxwell Donnarson (CE M Vampire [Human] Artificer 9/Aristocrat 4). Max is little more than a charismatic bureaucrat for Kazandra whom trusts him to handle the logistics. He's also an insane lunatic more interested in destroying Breland and conquering the other nations with money than anything military-based. He operates from a secret base in Q'Barra rather than Karrnath. The Crimson Covenant tend to make outrageous demands of his resources and generally leave him alone to experiment on vampirism while expanding the Claw's power base. Recently, Maxwell has taken to wearing a hood and calling himself Baron Ironblood
Thankfully, he's fine so long as he takes his Potions of Sanity in order to keep him docile. Gerald Schwartzvald's death resulted in the Emerald Claw's military leader being destroyed and the organization being somewhat crippled. Twelve Deadly Gods's leader Genai temporarilly handled the duties of planning for a substantial fee. He's now been replaced by Anna Morgan.
Second most powerful in the organization is Malevnor whom could easily lead the Covenant if he wasn't more interested in the esoteric nature of magic. The Mummy and his Necromantic circle of disciples spend most of their time recruiting black magicians, magical items, and subverting members of the government through faith in Karrnath than putting any real effort to overthrowing Kaius.
Taking nearly a third of the organization with him was Lord Shadowspawn whom made the controversial moves to recruit from nonhumans and Dreaming Dark Cultists as well as the Claw's servants. His degenerate Shifter status lent itself to reclassifying Lycanthropes as the "Master Race" that all humans and Elves of pure blood should be transformed into. His purging of the organization resulted in his full breakaway and crippling Claw power in Breland.
Zorlan D'Cannith, while not a member, is affiliated with the organization. Like the Iron Nation, he provides them with almost all of their weaponry through his minions. The Emerald Claw routinely sends him puzzles that promise incredible destruction and devastation while purchasing most of his randomly generated WMDs. He has Emerald Claw bodyguards protecting him since his exorciation.
Philosophy: The Emerald Claw's focus is the creation of a Utopic State that resurrects the culture of the Giants with it's Elvish-Human-Undead Hybrid supermen with the best qualities of all three. The fact that it bears no resemblance to the Giants in its aims, biology, or theology is unimportant. While Lord Shadowspawn's faction was open to all, the rest of the Claw discriminates against all non-humans and non-elves. Indeed, the elves privately considered the humans necessary evils to be dealt with or bred out of existence when the time came while the humans merely envied elvish lifespan.
The Emerald Claw uses terrorism as a method of raising revenue and gaining power. Countless extortion schemes are worked against the governments of the Five Nations and wealthy individuals every year to raise money that is often invested in whoever will benefit from the chaos they generate. Many Karrns in exile want to assassinate Kaius and take back their home nation while others intend to subvert and conquer other nations. They were very close in Breland when Shadowspawn ruined it.
