The Basis of Order

(Original version written by Dorrin)

Order is life; chaos is death. This is fact, not belief. Each living creature consists of ordered parts that must function together. When chaos intrudes …

Order extends down to the smallest fragments of the world. By influencing the smallest ordered segments to create a new and ordered form, an order-master may change where land exists and where it does not, where the rain will fall and where it will not …

In contrast, control of chaos is simply the ability to sever one ordered element of the world from another … without the use of order, focused destruction is the highest level of control to which a chaos-master can aspire …

Simple as these words are, learning about what order and chaos truly are is far from simple. One might say that order is like water, that it can change forms, and that is vital to life, and that without it nothing lives … That is less than the beginning …
[Wellspring of Chaos Mentions this as being page 1]
(The Magic of Recluce, 222, Wellspring of Chaos, 77)


Learning without understanding can but increase the frustration of the impatient, for knowledge is like the hammer of a smith, useless in the hands of the unskilled and able to do nothing but injure the user who has not both knowledge and understanding … All things are not possible, even to the greatest, and even to those with understanding …
[In Wellspring of Chaos Kharl flips page, ergo, this is on page 2]
(The Magic of Recluce, 302 Wellspring of Chaos, 77-78)


Order cannot be concentrated in and of itself, not even within the staff of order, and no man can truly master the staff of order until he casts it aside.

For order cannot be divided in two without its power being diminished by four, and if it be divided into four parts, then its power is less by another fourth, so that the total of all portions is but one sixteenth of what it would have been undivided. Likewise, so it is with a staff imbued with order for whoever wields it …
(The Magic of Recluce, 378 456, Wellspring of Chaos, 331)


Love no one until you can love yourself, for love of another is merely empty flattery and self-deception for one who cannot accept himself without pretense.
(The Magic of Recluce, 378)


Order and chaos must balance, but as on a see-saw. The power of chaos is for great destruction in a confined area, for order by nature must be diffused over vaster realms. If you would battle chaos, or establish order, you must limit the area and the time in which it must be balanced.
(The Magic of Recluce, 378)


All physical items-unlike fire or pure chaos-must have some structure, or they would not exist …

Because all wrought iron has a grain created from the forging of its crystals, the strength of the iron lies in the alignment and length of the grain. Using order to reinforce that grain is the basis for creating black iron … Its strength lies in the ordering of unbruised or unstrained grains along the length of the metal …
(The Magic Engineer, 318 {pb 392})


If order or chaos be without limits, then common sense would indicate that each should have triumphed when the great ones of each discipline have arisen. Yet neither has so triumphed, despite men and women of power, intelligence, and ambition. Therefore, the scope of either or chaos is in fact limited, and the belief in the balance of forces demonstrated …
(The Magic Engineer, 318 {pb 393})


Pure order cannot nourish life, for living requires growth, and the process of growth is the constant struggle to bring order out of chaos.

When a fire destroys the great forests of the Westhorns, immediately order replenishes itself with scores of seedlings and bushes striving to recover the hillsides.

When a stone wall is built, the forces of frost and heat continually tumble the stones. So too is it with a house, once the constant order of the hearthholder is removed.

The function of order is to support that life which can order chaos; and without chaos to be ordered, there can be no purpose to life.

The function of chaos is to destroy order. Without order, no structure can exist-no man nor woman, no plant, not even an earth upon which to walk. Thus, the total triumph of chaos is its defeat.

What can be said of order and chaos, then? Since the world was, is, and will be, neither order nor chaos may triumph. Therefore, in the world as a whole there must be equal measures of each, and that Balance will be maintained; for, if it is not, there shall be either no world or no life.

And upon this world are the lands and the seas.

People call the sea chaos, but the sea contains a deeper order within the ever-changing waves and depths, and the seas wash upon the beaches and retreat, and that changes not.

Likewise people call the land orderly, for it changes seldom, yet beneath that surface order is great disorder, filled with the fires and chaos of the demons.

A people of the sea must be of order, for order must contain the surface chaos of the oceans and harmonize with the deeper order under the waves.

Likewise, a people of chaos can only exist upon the land, for the sea will rend them unto nothing.
[Fragment attributed to Section II]
(The Magic Engineer, 521-522 {pb 642-643})


Those who do not understand order or chaos say that the two belong only to those with the gift for one or the other, and that those who have such gifts are few. This is truth, and it is also a falsehood. Many men and women have gifts. Some are more intelligent than others; some are stronger; some are more patient; some have great courage; some have great understanding. So to say that one has a gift for order or chaos can be truth. Yet, to suggest that there is something improper about understanding order or chaos because it requires a gift is a falsehood. Each and every great talent, whatever it may be, requires a gift of greater ability. A man may have a gift for letters, and for distilling truth. A woman may have a gift for numbers, and for trading of goods. A youth may have the gift of song, and another the gift of hands that can shape iron or wood. So it is with order and chaos.

Yet many would claim that the gift to understand order and chaos is different from the gift of understanding other aspects of the world, that anyone can be a crafter or an engineer, but that only a special few can become order-mages or chaos-masters. This is a falsehood, for the great ones in any area of endeavour are few, whether that area be engineering, cabinetry, fishing, or order-magery …

In the beginning, as a child, a boy or girl can have the gift, not for one or the other, but for either, or, if the gift is great enough, for both … So can a man or woman, once grown, if he or she approaches order as might a child. For order is a wonder, and those who can yet wonder as children can have their eyes opened at any age …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 101-102)


 … a staff, or any other object, may be infused with order. If the Balance is maintained, concentrating such order must result in a greater amount of chaos somewhere else. Therefore, the greater the effort to concentrate order within material objects, the greater the amount of free chaos within the world …
[The Order War mentions this as being on page 50, 3rd section of 1st part]
(The Order War, 5, Wellspring of Chaos, 153)


 … all that is, everything that exists, is little more than the twisting of chaos in a shell of order, and the greater the complexity of those twistings, the more solid the object appears. A thumb of lead or gold may appear more solid than a feather or a flower, and may indeed overbalance the scales, yet there is no difference in the fashion in which they are constructed …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 153)


 … the form of everything under the sun is determined by the amount of order and chaos and the way in which they are combined and intertwined …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 153)


Water is of both chaos and order, yet it is order, and represents order, for its structure overweighs its parts …

Because water is both order and of order, yet comprised of parts that are totally chaotic, it challenges chaos with the depth of its order. Truly a river people or a sea people must hold to order or they will be lost. Chaos fares best upon the dry land, and least in a steady rain or snowfall …

Even a fog will affect a chaos-wielder, but only those who are of the weaker sort. A steady rain is a patterned fall of ordered chaos. A raindrop is ordered, and the fall of each is unpatterned, chaotic, yet all raindrops falling together results in a pattern ordered by chaos, and that order can weaken or destroy many of the links of power created by those who wield chaos, as the fires of sun itself can weaken those who wield order, if they do not understand that the sun is a furnace of chaos …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 153-154)


 … there is more that lies beneath the surface of anything, whether it be the ocean or the mountains … Do not assume that what lies beneath is the same as what lies above, nor that it is different …

In substance, there is no difference between chaos and order, for neither has substance in and of itself …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 155)


Is there a source—a wellspring—of order or of chaos? Can something exist without a source? And if there be such, what is indeed the wellspring of chaos? Or that of order? There is but one, for chaos can be said to be the wellspring of order, and order the wellspring of chaos. These are so because, for so long as there is life, neither chaos nor order can exist by itself for long without the other.

Yet for so long as there have been peoples upon the face of the world, there have been those who championed order over chaos, or chaos over order. There have been those who denied the power of one, or of both. All creatures that live are born, and birth is the triumph of life. All creatures, from the largest to the smallest, are brought low by death, and death is the triumph of chaos.

How can one say, then, that chaos is greater, or that order is?
(Wellspring of Chaos, 193-194)


 … each thing under the sun, be it man or a machine, a creature or an object created, is unique, no matter how closely it resembles another, and yet all these unique things are created from the sameness of order and chaos, and all that is unique is the manner in which order and chaos are twisted into the unique forms that we are and that surrounds us …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 207)


The greatest danger in practicing deception is not in the reaction of others, whether it be anger or cupidity. A greater danger is the cultivation of contempt for that which is. Deception is a practice of contempt, contempt for those whom one would deceive, and contempt for the world as it is. Just as understanding what is must be the first step toward using order, contempt for a true vision is the first step toward being a tool of power rather than its enlightened user …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 255)


 … often those inexperienced in using order will force raw order upon an object, thinking that such an effort will strengthen the object. Such an effort will indeed strengthen the object, even as it weakens the one who attempts this, but only for so long as the would-be mage lavishes his strength. When his strength is spent, the object will become once more as it was. Far better is to study the object, and to learn how it is tied together with order and chaos, and to gently change those bonds in keeping with what the object is, for if weak bonds are replaced by strong bonds within the object itself, those bonds will remain strengthened, just as black iron remains stronger than iron forged without ordering …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 255)


Black iron should only be created while being forged … attempting to change less-ordered cold iron into black iron is possible only with great effort, enough to exhaust even the strongest of mages …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 257)


Order is like glue, in that it links all together, while chaos is but the opposite. Its power lies in separating … and when even the smallest bits of that which surround us are separated, basic fire and the heat of the flame are released. A chaos-wizard channels that fire and flame, and yet he must use order to do so, lest he be separated from himself by the powers of separation …
(Wellspring of Chaos, 355)

The Book of Ryba

There were in Heaven in those days rulers of the angels, and the rulers had rulers above them, and in turn, those rulers had rulers over them.

More than half of the angels of Heaven were women, yet only some of the lowest of the rulers were women; fewer yet of those rulers of rulers were women; and none of the highest rulers were in fact women, nor even the Cherubim nor the Seraphim.

The angels of Heaven were each like unto gods, and each could throw thunderbolts from a hammer held in her hand; each could travel vast leagues in chariot drawn by fire, either over the ground or through the skies.

So when it came to pass that the angels of Heaven girded themselves for the battle with the demons of the light, those who were women asked this thing: For what reason do we fight the demons?

The rulers of the rulers of the angels replied: We fight the demons of the light because they opposeth us.

And the angels who were women asked again: For what reason do we fight the demons?

They revere the light of chaos and they opposeth us, responded the Cherubim; and the rulers were sore affronted at the question.

Still a lower ruler, an angel, yet a woman, bearing the name of Ryba, called for and answer from the Seraphim: the demons seeketh not our lands nor our lives, yet you would sacrifice our children, and our children's children, because the demons are not as we are.

There can be no peace between angels and demons, not in the firmament of Heaven, not in the white depths of Hell, answered the Seraphim, girding up their loins and clasping unto themselves the swords of the stars that are suns and the dark lances of winter that shatter lands with their chill.

You declare there can be no peace, when there has been peace, and you cannot yet answer why that peace mayest not continue. Thus persisted Ryba of the angels.

And the Seraphim and the Cherubim were most wroth, and they gathered unto them all the angels that were men, and the white mists that tell of the truths that are within men and within women, be they angels or mortals. And they encircled all of the angels within the white clouds.

Yet Ryba and lesser of the angels who were women broke from the circle and gathered themselves, their possessions, and their children unto themselves and unto their chariots, and they departed Heaven in their own way.

The Cherubim and the Seraphim drew unto themselves all the angels that remained and armed all with the swords of the stars and the lances of winter, and carried destruction and night unto the demons of light.

Across the suns that are stars, and even through the depths of winter between stars, the remaining angels pursued both the demons of light and the angels who had fled.

But the demons of light drew unto their own ways and resources and built for themselves the mirror towers of blinding light that dispersed back unto the angels the energies of the swords of the stars and the lances of winter.

The stars dimmed, and the firmament that contained Heaven and all the stars and even the darkness between stars shook under the powers of the Cherubim and the Seraphim, and the change winds roared across the faces of the waters and blotted out the lights.

Yet the demons were not dismayed, and mounted into their towers and hurled them against the angels, and again the firmament trembled and tottered, and this time, the stars fell into winter, and Heaven was rent in many places, and smoke that poisoned even the angels rose from that burning, and the Cherubim and the Seraphim, and the host of the angels perished, as did all but the strongest of the demons of light.

Ryba, the least of the rulers of angels, thus became the last of the rulers, and the angels, having fallen from the stars after the time of the great burning, came unto the Roof of the World, where they gathered the winds for shelter and abided until the winter should lift.

Yet upon the Roof of the World, as a memory of the fall of the angels, winter yet remains.

So in that time, Ryba sent forth her people unto the southlands and the western ways, and told them: Remember whence you came, and suffer not any man to lead you, for that is how the angels fell …
[Canto 1, Section II (Original text)]
(The Towers of the Sunset, pb 69-72)


The walled city that serves as the key to the Westhorns shall not fall nor sleep so long as her ruler holds fast to the Great Keep, and that keep remains girded in three layers of stone.

The fields of Gallos, the groves of Kyphros, and the highlands of Analeria shall support the same great ruler; they shall support that ruler until they are sundered by the mountains of fire.

A man with a sword of white shall lift hills from the earth; he shall set a road of stone down their spine, yet none shall see that road, nor ride it, save the servants of chaos.

From the blackness of the stars shall come one like an ancient angel, building unto himself tools such as those forged by Nylan that first vanquished the reborn masters of light, and he shall be rejected by chaos and by order; neither shall give him refuge.

He shall make a city of black stone in a place where none dwell, north of the sun and east of chaos; and the hand of every person shall be against him; his tools shall prevail and shall anchor the course of order.

Yet chaos will prevail west of the black city, north and south of the sun; and those in white shall serve light and travel the hidden highways; they shall attain richness and every favor for their pleasure.

Those of the black city and in that place where it dwells shall remain girded; their ships shall travel the oceans great and small, and they shall prosper so long as they remain in their land.

For in time, the double sun will wax in the high sky and sunder the servants of light; their towers shall melt like wax upon a forge; and their highways shall be lost; men and women will revile their names, even as seekers quest for the knowledge of light.

Never shall darkness nor light prevail, for one must balance the other; yet many of light will seek to banish darkness, and a multitude shall seek to cloak the light; but the balance will destroy all who seek the full ends of darkness and light.

Then shall a woman rule the parched fields and dry groves of the reformed Kyphros and the highlands of Analeria and the enchanted hills; and all matters of wonders shall come to pass.

In the fullness of time, both order and chaos shall rise again. Those who seek order shall follow chaos, and those who follow chaos shall seek order, and none shall know which path to tread.

The sword called knowledge shall be unsheathed, and scholars and soldiers shall both proclaim its virtue and trumpet how it shall bring prosperity out of want, and plenty out of drought. Yet its blade will cut deep into the land and burn into the heavens, and many will turn from its terrors unto their own weapons.

Terrible indeed shall be those weapons-one shall be like unto the swords of the stars that are suns, and another like unto the lances of winter and yet another like unto the mirrored towers raised by the demons of light.

Dark ships shall speed upon the water, and destruction shall fall from the heavens, shattering the greatest of walls, and even the weakest of those who bear arms shall strike with the force of firebolts

For every shield shall there be a greater sword, and for every sword, a swifter quarrel to bring it low. For every firebolt shall there be a higher wall of ice, and for every wall of ice, a ladder of fire with which to scale it.

For every prophet shall come another who says the opposite, and whoever shall offer his words last shall the people follow, and they shall turn one way and then the other, for no road shall offer certainty, nor peace, nor rest. And none shall sleep easy.

Men and women shall question, and so shall the angels. Yet for every answer shall they find a score more of questions, each with yet a score more answers, until their words and their reason be stopped with words whose meaning escapes even the highest.

The dark ships shall cover the oceans, thick as sands upon the shores, and they shall come from the end of the earth to the city of black stone, north of the sun and east of chaos.

Those of the black city will cover their faces and wail loud lamentations, claiming that they had ever stood against chaos, and the dark ships of the sun shall neither heed nor turn from their course.

And on the shores of truth shall stand those serving neither order nor chaos, yet both, and without trumpets, without firebolts, shall they sow confusion upon the waters.

From that confusion, shall the dark ships of the sun seek refuge, but neither the mountains no the oceans shall provide succor. Mountains shall be rendered into dust, and oceans shall be burned and boiled, and ashes shall cover all, and chaos shall die.

Likewise, shall order die, and all manner of changing the way of the world, save through the tools of the hands, and the tools of the tools.

For, as a woman shall sow, so shall she reap, not as she wishes or would order that seed, but as the sun and the rain see fit, or as the water and nourishment she may bring unto her crops with her own hands.

Unto each generation shall the tales be passed, of how order and chaos once served, and how tools enhanced that service, and of how, in the end, order and chaos grew to such might as threatened the heavens, and were cast down.

An[d?], in the fullness of time, it shall come that the children of the angles will fail to heed those words, and come to believe that as one sows, so shall one reap, forgetting that once it was not thus.

Yet neither order nor chaos shall be vanquished, but each shall sleep unto the generations, gathering powers until, near the end of time, each shall awaken.
[Canto DL [The Last] Original text]
(The Magic Engineer, 28-30 {pb 35-36}, The Death of Chaos, 144 352 475-478)

Book of Ayrlyn

The ellipses are part of the original text, indicating textual breaks but overall continuity (i.e. there are missing parts, but each section comes after the next). The sources are all quoted right at the end of this section because every passage in the books overlaps with the next. (NB: there are some contradictions in the order of the text (I think Fall of Angels lack an ellipsis after "and those who followed the spirit.", and in collating this have followed the text given in the Chaos Balance)

There were angels in Heaven in those days, and there were demons, and the demons were the creators and the creation of chaos …

In that distant battle between the fires of the demons and the ice lances of the angels, the very skies twisted in upon themselves, and the angels, who came from cold Heaven, were cast down and strewn across the stars.

Those angels, the first and the last from far Heaven, when they found the world, knew not where they were, nor could they see even the stars from whence they had come. And they descended unto the Roof of the World.

There they build the Citadel of the Winds, the tower called Black, with those chained lightnings yet they had retained, carving unto themselves a high refuge and a reminder of their past.

So as they had come, so earlier had come those from the lands and heritage of the demons, and those were men who believed not that women should wear blades nor speak their minds and thoughts.

In the time of that first summer came armsmen, inspired by the demons, and there were battles across the Roof of the World, and blood …

Thus continued the conflict between order and chaos, between those who would force order and those who would not, and between those who followed the blade and those who followed the spirit.

On the Roof of the World, those first angels raised crops amid the eternal ice, and builded walls, and made bricks, and all manner of devisings of the most miraculous, from the black blades that never dulled to the water that flowed amidst the ice of winter and the tower that remained yet warm from a single fire.

Of the great ones in those times were, first, Ryba of the twin blades, Nylan of the forge of order, Gerlich the hunter, Saryn the mighty, and Ayrlyn of the songs that forged the guards of Westwind …

For as the skilled and terrible smith Nylan forged the terrible black blades of Westwind, and wrenched the very stones from the mountains for the tower called Black, so did Ryba guide the guards of Westwind, letting no man triumph upon the Roof of the World.

For as each lord of the demons said, 'I will not suffer those angel women to survive,' and as each angel fell, Ryba created yet another from those who fled the demons, until there were none that could stand against Tower Black.

So too, as did each of the forges of Heaven fail, did the mighty smith Nylan bend the fires of the world to his will and forge yet anew the black blades of Westwind.

Yet, despite Nylan's efforts in smithing the legions of the demons into dust, Ryba the mighty was not satisfied, and she asked for more black blades than the snowflakes that fell upon Tower Black, and for arrows that no armor could stop. And Nylan bent the forges to his will, and it was so, and still was Ryba displeased …

 … and so it came to pass that Ryba was the last of the angles to rule the heavens and the angel who set forth the Legend for all to heed. Yet Ryba did not wish the Legend to leave Westwind.

For with the going forth of the prophet Relyn, who told all east of the mighty Westhorns about the Legend and the triumph of order, Ryba became more displeased, and called unto her all those of her guards.

And from that day did the new angels accept no man full-grown, no matter how ill or disabled, leaving any man found in the domain of Westwind to make his own way or to perish upon the Roof of the World.

Nor was any man raised in Westwind allowed to lift a blade, for it was foretold that when a man next lifted a blade would Westwind soon fall, but until then would Tower Black hold against all Candar, east and west, and even against all the mages of the world.

When word carried to Tower Black that the smith Nylan forged mighty blades again, and that those of Lornth warred with ancient Cyador, the black stones shivered with the foresight of the Angel.

Then did Ryba announce that Lornth would rue the day it put its trust in the iron of Nylan and the songs of Ayrlyn, for all that a man builds with iron will fall to iron, and the songs that a man finds sweet can carry no truth.

And the guards of Westwind hardened their hearts, as cold and terrible as the ice that never leaves Freyja …
Section I [Restricted Text]]
[Formatted as shown in The Chaos Balance]
(Fall of Angels, 3 106, The Chaos Balance, 20-21 249)

Colors of White

The angels of darkness made the Roof of the World their home, and after deceiving the followers of light who had eagerly welcomed them, they wielded the ancient and dreadful weapons of Heaven and vanquished those who rejoiced in the light.

In those first dark years, there were none at first among the dark ones who could descend to the lower lands and bear the heat, and the lords of mankind, their true daughters, and their consorts rejoiced that this was so.

For the angels of temptation bore blades that slashed through armor and loosed arrowheads that treated iron bucklers as if they were rotten wood, and they raised a mighty stronghold called Westwind, anchored on Tower Black, that rivaled Freyja in power. And the followers of light, who had ages earlier forsaken the powers of the heavens, relinquished the barren heights to the dark angles and their evil powers.

The dark angels were women who made a mockery out of hearth and home, who reviled men and laughed as they destroyed all the armies of the Westhorns sent against them, as they forced the great lords to heap dust and ashes upon their own heads and to bend their knees and pay tribute, and to stand helplessly as their daughters were tempted from their hearths and consorts.

Yet an even more deadly evil was to flow from the Roof of the World, and none knew it, from the mighty Nylan, smith of the angels, he who builded the Tower Black, he who forged the blades of night and the arrows of the storms …
Colors of White (Manual of the Guild at Fairhaven) Preface
(The Chaos Balance, 11)

Disdaining the Angel Ryba, the smith Nylan, knowing the fate of the once-mighty hunter Gerlich, made his way from Westwind, with all the stealth and craft that befitted the one who had re-created the fires of Heaven and the rains of death.

The soul-singer Ayrlyn accompanied him, and a child, and far more harm than mighty Ryba did these three portend for all of Candar, and all lands, even unto the ends of the world …

The Angel and Marshal of Westwind was sore vexed, and sent she her guards after the three, but, against the dark arts of the smith and the singer, they could not prevail, and in time the three came to the ancient and powerful land of Lornth.

The people of Lornth closed their shutters as the angels passed, and feared as the dark shadows crossed their doors.

The leader of the council of Lornth was a woman, and guileless, and, beguiled by Nylan and the sweet songs of the dark singer and the seeming innocence of the child, she offered them respite, and opened her land unto these dark ones, despite the counsel of those who cautioned against what would come from the angels.

And there, for time, abided the mighty smith and the singer of dark songs, and the child.
Colors of White (Manual of the Guild at Fairhaven) Preface
(The Chaos Balance, 142)


In the mighty city of Cyad dwelt the mages of the white rainbow, whose ships fueled on fire and spanned the seas, whose white marble palaces glittered in the sun of contentment, and who pursued the knowledge of the distant stars.

Horseless wagons, harnessing the power of chaos to the will of man and mage, traversed the polished stone roadways smoother than glass. Those great firewagons sped more swiftly than the wind, bringing crops and goods and wealth to all of Cyador.

All were content in the order kept by the white mages, and seldom were necessary the shimmering shields and burnished blades of the mighty Mirror Lancers, for there was peace.

In those days had Cyador allowed Lornth privileges in the Grass Hills, among them the privilege to remove metals from the earth. Seeing this privilege, the smith Nylan, in his guile, asked of the regents of Lornth why they existed upon the suffrage of Cyad, when for generations they had slaved and the mages of Cyad had done nothing with the bright copper buried in the Grass Hills.

Those of Lornth pondered his words long into the deeps of the night and recalled that the Grass Hills were yet those of the Lord of Cyad.

As they pondered, then sang Ayrlyn the soul-singer of that darkness of despair that would follow when Cyad asked back what was its due, and when Lornth could no longer mine the bright copper of the Grass Hills.

What can be done, asked the leader of the Lornians, for she was a woman and trusting. How shall we hold to the delvings of our fathers and forefathers that have sustained us through the years?

In response to such questions, the dark angel Nylan offered a great wizardry against which the might of Cyador and her mages would not prevail, and, persuaded by the wily Nylan, the council of Lornth said, it shall be so, and they turned their eyes from the evil that Nylan proposed.
Colors of White (Manual of the Guild at Fairhaven) Preface
(The Chaos Balance, 198-199)


 … and when the White Lancers of Cyad had come at last to the copper mines of the north, those of Lornth threw down their picks and shovel and their blades, and fled into the Grass Hills, for they well knew that the copper mines were not theirs, and they were sore afraid of the righteous wrath of the Lord of Cyador.

The White Lancers rebuilt and refurbished the mines, and brought order and discipline back into the Hills of Grass, nor did they afflict the peoples nor their hamlets.

The wily Nylan, like the mountain cat who cannot face the the well-prepared hunter in the light of day, advised the guileless council of Lornth behind heavy doors, saying, If the Cyadorans cannot eat and they cannot sleep, they will not hold to the mines that your fathers and forefathers have worked. And they will depart.

The delvers and diggers of Cyad labored long and with great effort to bring forth the copper from the mines, trusting in the honor of the Lornians and in the forces of the most honorable White Lancers.

For in that time, none believed that even the wily Nylan would stoop to slaughtering innocent horses, nor to murdering hapless wagoners, nor to raising fireballs in the night and dropping them upon lancer and digger alike while they slept. All this did Nylan, and more, terrible and dishonorable deeds better lost in tumult of time. Yet remember we must, for this is how the dark angels came to power in Candar …
Colors of White (Manual of the Guild at Fairhaven) Preface
(The Chaos Balance, 307-308)


 … and when mighty Cyad asked that her lands might remain hers, that her gifts to Lornth be remembered in honor and peace, Nylan spoke quietly, saying that the legions of Cyad would rain destruction upon Lornth, and that the white legions must needs be repulsed.

Will you have Cyad take all that for which you and your fathers and forefathers have worked and earned, asked the dark Nylan. And all of Lornth said that Cyad must be destroyed. From the shimmering cities of order and their peoples to the polished stone roadways smoother than glass and the great firewagons that sped upon them more swiftly that the wind, Cyad should be no more.

None would stand and state that Cyad had been kind and just, and that her peoples lived in justice and peace. For such truth was struck down by the dark mage Nylan with his black hammer, and also by the dark Ayrlyn and her lute so that none would know the grace of Cyad.

The Mirror Lancers burnished their shields and lifted their lances, and the sound of the hoofs of their steeds echoed through rocks and stones of all Candar. The white mages, powerful in the paths of peace and wary of war, girded their robes and invoked the hopes of peace … but all were doomed.

For Nylan, the dark angel, again lifted his hands, and he unbound the Accursed Forest of Naclos, and the forest rewarded him, and rendered back unto him the fires of Heaven and the rains of death. And Nylan laughed and cast those fires and rain across the west of Candar. And Ayrlyn sang songs that wrenched soul from soul and heart from body.

The Mirror Lancers found their light lances turned upon them, and the very earth rose and smote them, and the righteousness of the white mages was for naught as their glasses exploded before them, and death rained upon all the armsmen of Cyad, until none stood.

The very ground heaved, and belched, and swallowed the great cities of Cyad and Fyrad, and the winds flattened distant Summerdock so that no stone remained upon another.

The Grass Hills were seared into the Stone Hills, so dry that nothing lives there to this day. And Lornth rejoiced … until its time had come …
Colors of White (Manual of the Guild at Fairhaven) Preface
(The Chaos Balance, 441-442)