Age Of Dragons: Alliance of Light

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When Ghost Dragon refugees, hounded by the Ascendancy, arrived in the Southern lands they found the twin domains of Arrantis and Kalarn, both riven with small wars and disunity.

The Ghost Dragons brought with them tales of the growing dominion of Endless Night in the North, and to their credit the dragons of the South listened. It had, after all, been two thousand years since the Ascendancy began its conquest of the North, but till now the stories of war in distant skies had seemed far removed and irrelevant to those so far south. However, with the arrival of an entire breed of Dragons (or at least what remained of it) Dragonkind had to sit up and take notice.

The Solar Dragons saw this as an opportunity to restore unity amongst the Dragons of Order, and brokered a treaty named the Alliance of Light that would guarantee cessation of hostilities between Pure, Argent and Solar draconic factions, and ensure mutual defence in case of aggression. The Ghost Dragons were included as well, but as refugees with no domains and little military might, there was an unspoken agreement that they would be second-class citizens in this Alliance, with no place on the ruling council and little influence. A small domain of little value or beauty was gifted to them as a "refuge", and they were instructed not to think to expand their territories beyond this domain if they wanted the Alliance's friendship. Weary from fleeing and fighting, the Ghost Dragons humbly accepted.

Seeking Allies

The Ascendancy had effortlessly taken over control of Sable, Blood and Velvet breeds, and somehow also convinced a number of Forest Dragons (namely the mountain dwelling Jade Dragons of the North) to join them. The Ashen Dragons had of course declared neutrality, the Ghost Dragons had fled to their enemies, and the remaining majority of the Forest Dragons remained deep within the Heartswood to the west, beyond the reach or interest of draconic society as a whole.

The Alliance, in contrast, had equal strength in theory, with Pure, Argent and Solar united, with the Ghost refugees in tow. However in practice, the Alliance was far weaker, with less unified leadership, a smattering of independent mortal armies rather than one huge one, and internal division still causing great difficulties. Ironically, many so-called Dragons of Order refused to do any more than pay lip service to the Alliance, and few were willing to risk personal resources to pursue a war that was still distant to them.

The Alliance of Light knew it needed to draw in allies, and so Solar emissaries were dispatched as ambassadors to the remaining breeds...

They first approached the Storm Dragons that ruled over the oceans to their South, and also the Chimerical Dragons of the Archipelago of Dreams in the coastal region. Both these dragonbreeds refused to be drawn in. The blue-scaled Storm Dragons declared that the affairs of land and sky were not their domain, and that they had a greater and older war to fight against their ancestral foes - the Krakens of the Drowned Abyss. A few of their number - mostly young dragons who were already enamoured with the world above the horizon - chose to join the Alliance, but for the most part the breed remained apart. The Chimerical Dragons refused to sign up to the Alliance, citing that they had no talent for war and that their numbers were too low to take casualties. However they agreed to present ambassadors and emissaries to the Alliance's court, who would observe, engage in further diplomacy and offer sage advice. Unknown to the Alliance the Chimericals also took it on themselves to dispatch ambassadors to the Ascendancy as well, with every intention of playing the war to the advantage of the Dragons of Dream.

Finally the Alliance approached the Sky Tribes of the Hunter Dragons and found to their surprise that the Hunters were more than ready to fight the Ascendancy, who they had already recognised as a greater evil than even the "civilised fops" of the Alliance.

However, their help would be conditional, and offered solely on the grounds that the Alliance would declare themselves enemies of the sorcerous Ashen Dragons. The Alliance decided that for all their physical might, the Hunters were simply not worth this price - the Ashen Kingdom's neutrality was the fulcrum around which the war moved, and the Alliance could not afford to drive such potent Dragons to the Ascendancy. Diplomacy continued, and eventually a single Sky Tribe agreed to join the Alliance without condition. This Tribe, named the Talons of Open Sky, had already clashed with Ascendancy forces that strayed into their skies, and in the battles that followed lost two-thirds of their number and been driven south. Now a mere eight dragons they had lost any standing amongst the Hunters as a whole, but were welcomed to the Alliance as equals, with the Solar Ambassadors of the Alliance hoping that they could be used as a diplomatic bridgehead to eventually bring the rest of the Breed into the war.

Building Strength

With the Ashen Lands lying between the Alliance and the Ascendancy it became impossible for either side to advance any further. Though the Ashen Dragons could not compare to the might of either major faction, they had enough strength to tip a full-scale war one way or the other. The Ashen forbade any incursions of army or war-flight into their domain, and so no major battle was joined. Neither was it possible to flank around the Ashen Lands. To the west was the Heart Forest, impenetrable and dangerous, and to the East the Unending Sand, a desert too arid, barren and lifeless for any army to cross or for any Dragon to fly across. Small feints round the flanks might be possible, but certainly no major assault.

The Ascendancy and Alliance thus set about building strength, and though both raised mortal armies they built their aerial strength in different ways.

The Ascendancy set to empowering their dragons, by sharing secrets of demonic lore, and sought to increase numbers by setting up mandatory breeding programs to birth new hatchlings in massive communal Hives. They also sought to summon demonic allies, and to unearth ancient monsters from deep beneath the ground to serve their will. The Ascendancy strategy was based on the fact that should their strength be great enough, they would be able to continue their sweep south, crushing the Ashen Kingdoms first if they resisted.

The Alliance approach was somewhat more haphazard and varied according to the styles of the different Breeds:

The Solars continued their diplomacy, aiming to tempt dragons of different breeds away one by one rather than en masse. They managed to reform the ruling Council a little so that it was clear that Councillors represented the Alliance as a whole rather than their respective breeds, and even opened their gates to Dragons of breeds associated with the Ascendancy. So long as an individual Sable, Blood or Velvet was ready to renounce Endless Night they would be welcome. Despite discontent in the Ascendancy faction (resulting in no small part from the breeding programs in the Hives), this remained an unattractive option to most, as they knew they would face hatred and prejudice for the colour of their scales.

The Pure were less interested in expanding the Alliance and more interested in influencing it with their own culture. Over the course of time they made the Orthodoxy of the Mother Goddess something of a "state religion" for the Alliance, even going so far at one stage as to purge "heretics" with an Inquisition that lasted just under a century before sanity was restored. Over time their strategies became more subtle, with proselytsing taking the place of forced conversion, and a shift in emphasis to targeting the mortal populations of their allies' lands. For them, cultural and religious unity was a vital goal, as it ensured that the Alliance would remain strong and with coherent goals when all out war finally came.

The Argents played as Hawks to the Solar doves. While the Solars advised caution and building of strength, the Argents determined that the war was already in full swing. If they could not march armies across the Ashen Lands they had to find other ways to push forward. They began several intiatives, the most famous of which was the founding of a brave band of Alliance dragons named the Farsky Rangers, who would work in small groups deep in enemy territory sowing disruption with guerilla warfare, spying for vital information and sabotaging the Ascendancy's power build up. Other initiatives included the building of the Ironforge (an arms factory of blacksmiths and craftsmen dedicated to creating the tools of war), and the establishment of fortified Way Forts in Heart Forest and Endless Sands that would serve as resupply points for a flanking march.

The other breeds in the Alliance had too small numbers to lead such projects, and tended to fall in with the policies of one of the three Dragonbreeds of Order. The Ghost Dragons were an exception, with a good number of the breed dedicated to creating a new home for themselves in the wasteland gifted to them as a refugee reservation, which they dubbed Ghosthome, but which other Allies often unkindly referred to as the Graveyard or the Shanty.

This build-up has continued to the present day, and all in all has lasted almost fifteen hundred years, thanks to continuing strengthening of the Ashen Kingdoms and an inability by either side to find an advantage.

However, things are soon to change...

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