Hera Braidstone’s history on Arelith
A young Sonnlinor Hera Braidstone arrived on the shores of Cordor, during a warm summer during her 44th year in AR 26. She departed her home hold, Mildenhaul, a dwarf hold along the Spine of the World mountain chain, in search of her brother, Deedle. While Hera had three brothers, Deedle had always been her favorite. They were so close in age, some said they might as well be twins, though Deedle took after their mother and was darker in skin and beard, while Hera took after her father; fair skinned, freckled and with flaming auburn hair.
Deedle, a trapsmith and wanderer, often left Mildenhaul to explore, but he had never been absent, both in person or in letters, for more than a year. Hera tried to persuade her older brothers, Harran and Duran, to follow her in the search, however Harran had recently married and had a child on the way, and Duran, a mercantile officer, could not leave his post. Against her father’s pleading, Hera left Mildenhaul the next summer, following the last letter she received from her brother, stating he just arrived in Cordor, on the Arelith archipelago.
Hera found Cordor strange. Despite being a regular visitor of some of the Ten Towns, she’d never seen such a huge human city. The stench alone made her ill, and she longed for the mountains. Hera soon met a young halfling priest of Waukeen named Sasha Silverscales, and they became fast friends. Cordorian guardsman, Ronus Stonehammer, escourted Hera to the Golden Halls of Brogendenstein, where Hera finally found another clue about her missing brother. But before she could gather enough information to move forward in her search, she was asked by the current Thane, Gorann Bloodletter, to aid in the ceremony to pass his crown onto a younger dwarf, Maxkar Delinar. Once Thane Maxkar was crowned, he then asked Hera to take position as High Sonnlinor of Brogendenstein, which she agreed to.
During the next few years, Hera was busy trying to learn more about the Underdark, as that was where her brother’s trail led, but also working to build a temple to the Mordinsamman in the Golden Halls. Beautiful as they were, they lacked a temple and Hera was determined to rectify that.
After some time serving under Thane Maxkar, Hera learned of his secret involvement with the church of Bane and pleaded with the Thane to ignore the bribes they gave him, to allow Banites into the spires, and even the halls themselves. This conflict grew and encompassed all kin in the halls and soon Hera was stripped of her title and exiled from Brogendenstein.
About this time, Bendir Dale was having trouble with a necromancer named Sadamara, who had killed many on the isle. Hera’s friend, Sasha Silverscales, the most outspoken halfling in the Dale, soon made enemies with the new Bendir Queen Necromancer, and her many questionable entourage, and was also exiled from the Dales. Both Hera and Sasha ended up starting over in Cordor at the same time. At this time, Sasha asked Hera to help her with reestablishing the Earthkin Alliance, started by Belrun Battlehammer long ago. The two women worked for a few years in Cordor, helping dwarves, halflings and gnomes who were not welcome in their ancestral homes, and with Yondolla’s priestess Aramentia, to build a force strong enough to deal with both the necromantic group holding Bendir Dale, and Thane Maxkar, selling the honor of dwarves to Bane.
Several years passed before the Earthkin Alliance was able to push out the pungent evil that had seeped into the very stones of the Spires Mountains and the lush hills of the Dales. In this time, Sasha Silverscales became mayor of Bendir Dale and the settlement thrived. Hera wrote letters to the former Thane of the Golden Halls, Gorann Bloodletter, asking him to return; that the halls needed him now more than ever. By this time, Thane Delinar had lost the support of nearly all the dwarves of Brogendenstein, and the Halls grew empty as most kin left.
To Hera’s joyful surprise, Gorann not only answered her letter, but returned, and agreed to once again, cast stones to lead the Golden Halls. The halls prospered under Thane Gorann and Hera again took up position as High Sonnlinor, and continued to work on the Brogendenstein temple, as well as follow the lead of her brother, into the Underdark.
Despite throwing down Thane Maxkar, the Church of Bane did not take the defeat well, and pledged all out war on the Golden Halls. Hera soon became embroiled in a long standing war, at times open, other times during unsteady truces, when word of another threat came to the Dales and Brogendenstein; The Covenant, led by a Necromancer Priest of Velsharoon, Sarog Penthanos. Again, Hera was embroiled in an effort to root out this evil with Bendir Dale Mayor, Sasha Silverscales. While they never truly defeated the Covenant, they worked tirelessly to weaken their influence, with moderate success.
While searching for entrances to the Underdark, Hera found a passage that led to a small marketplace on the edge of a deep gnome settlement, that was used by any and all races that dwelt there. And here, tacked on a grungy message board, was a stained parchment, a bounty declaration on an escaped dwarven slave known as Mithril Beard. Hera knew her brother’s nickname, and now had a fresh lead to follow. Deedle had been enslaved by Underdark slavers and had broken his shackles.
The next few years Hera spent searching the Underdark, daring even to venture to Udos and Grond, finding trouble with the most powerful drow house of the time, House Drak’aa. During this time, Hera, Gorann and Sasha had ventured to Red Dragon Isle to gather ore and gems, and ran into a notorious Banite monk warrior, Azuma. After threats were made back and forth, Azuma and Gorann committed to slaughtering each other and soon Hera joined the fray to try to slay the most nimble warrior she’d ever seen. Though they were unsuccessful and the monk escaped, Sasha remained neutral and did not get involved, which infuriated Hera. Though Gorann tried to hold her back, Hera unloaded her fury on her diminutive friend, and proclaimed they were no longer kin. Sasha, visibly upset, lensed away.
For some months, Hera refused all of Sasha’s messengers, letters and requests to meet. Hera was so deeply wounded that her closest friend could stand aside while they were threatened by a well established enemy, that she refused to converse with Sasha at all. Hera’s pain became fury, and her company for a time was most unpleasant to the point even Gorann avoided her. Hera buried herself in her search for her brother, becoming more and more comfortable in the under passages, and found yet another clue, given to her by a strange goblin messenger.
“Mithril Beard is free.”
While Hera desperately wanted to share this with her closest friend, Sasha, her pride and rage refused to relent, and so she decided to venture down again to find Deedle’s hiding place alone. An unwise decision to be sure, as House Drak’aa was already aware of Hera’s meddling in the Underdark. Not to say anything that Hera was traveling completely alone. No allies save for the elemental she often summoned for protection; Murphy – an enormous elder earth elemental who was famous for his appetite for aventurines.
The trail led her to the small marketplace by the crossroads in the Underdark. There, Hera was soon surrounded by drow assassins and duergar warriors, sent by House Drak’aa. Hera could not possibly tell the drow that their own missing slave was her brother, though she assumed that they probably already knew, and yet, she had to account for why she was trespassing, as a surfacer, on enemy territory. No answer satisfied the drow, and soon, blades were drawn. One male drow wielding two short blades, managed to gut Hera severely, but she was able to call on Moradin’s Vengeance and Fire Storms that killed all but one duergar as well as a curious kobold watching from a distance. Hera then allowed the remaining duergar to gather up the bodies and depart with his life. There, she remained for a time, watching the kobold.
Strangely enough, the curious kobold approached her and it was then Hera met Vippin, who soon became a fairly reliable informant on House Drak’aa and aided her in locating her missing brother, Deedle, in Wharftown. Hera had the chance to return Vippin’s aid years later during her reign as Regent of Brogendenstein, when Vippin was captured and made prisoner, after trespassing in the Spires. Not that she made that public knowledge.
Shortly after Deedle’s safe escort to the Golden Halls, their father, Sonnlinor Honorus Braidstone, arrived on a visit to the halls to again see his lost son and his wayward daughter. It was then that Gorann asked Honorus for Hera’s hand in marriage. The two older dwarves soon got into a verbal battle of masculinity and Honorus claimed the only way Gorann could marry his only daughter was to defeat the sitting duergar king in Umbrik’s Halls, alone. ALONE! Hera was both humiliated and furious with her father’s arrogance and desperately afraid for Gorann. Her beloved left on a tenday long journey to the top of the mountain, leaving Hera to wait in Brogendenstein steeped in worry.
While traveling through the Crystal Caves on a trade excursion to Cordor, Hera was pelted with speedy messengers from Sasha. Over and over the messengers arrived, pleading to speak to Hera. After slaying an old white dragon and irritated by the constant messengers, Hera conjured Sasha to her side as she leaned upon the dragon’s corpse smoking her scrimshaw pipe.
Sasha arrived in tears and soon unloaded her heart upon her dwarven friend, speaking her guilt of neutrality. Sasha’s father, an Amnish merchant, was murdered by Banites for refusing to trade with them when Sasha was a child. As Sasha grew older, she decided, purely out of fear, to take a stance of neutrality, taking no sides. This infuriated Hera even more, and she pleaded with Sasha to embrace her true matron, Yondolla, and that the Earthkin Alliance was more than just ink on parchment.
Sasha turned away from Waukeen and took up the robes of her divine mother, Yondolla and soon, Gorann returned from the duergar halls triumphant, and Hera officially became betrothed to the Thane of Brogendenstein.
….. to be continued.