Machus

Machus:

220 years after the Sundering, a lawyer from the shipyard courts (where fugitive sailors who have jumped ship, smugglers and thieves are tried, and disputes between ship owners and incorporated merchants are resolved) in Yulinast called Deverus Machus, who supposedly came originally from Harenis (but all scholars make that claim), established himself in Preachertown following his 'Ruination' (dis-barring) for swindlin his clients. Machus claimed to have had a religious conversion when he was visited by an entity called the burning man. The apparition told him the real story of the god Aruh. He explained that Aruh, the celestial lord had forsaken man during the sundering because of his wicked and idolatrous ways and only a great cleansing would restore the lord. False gods, magickers and fel spirits were the cause of such wickedness. Machus was bid by the burning man to write a tome explaining the task that mankind must undertake and it was called the Jebbhor, a Van word for 'truth' or 'way'. Machus was widely loathed by the ungodly of Yulinast and was flogged when he tried to burn preachertown and sent to live out his final years on Blacktop.

Machus would have remained a scribbler on the fringes of Mill Landish society, ignored by the majority and ridiculed by the few, had it not been for the great trade crisis that gripped the Mill Lands in 230. In a bid to calm tensions with Dran in the year 230, trading concessions were granted to the city by Arc. Drained traders were given monopolies on wool. coal, tin and timber across the Greater Arc Sea for twelve years and the meagre exports of these materials from the Mill Lands abruptly ended. Mont Inaer, Trent, Hale and Drake all saw huge increases in poverty and vagrants were punished as they begged on Mill Landish streets. Machus had pointed out in his works that the cities of false gods would harm only those who had abandoned their own faith and this message chimed with the unemployed apprentice boys of Pelonastra who angrily protested and read Machus' works cover to cover. By 242 the Dranian monopoly ended but was renewed between 250 and 266. In the century between 250 and 350 three further monopolies have been granted, much to the resentment of the Mill Landers, most of whom know little of the cities of the great ocean and care even less, trade has increased with the Firg and the Karezi, but these customers are small fry compared to Arc and the other great cities. The Machenites have established themselves as a small but vocal sect on the streets of the major cities of the Mill Lands, associating the region's ills with the fall of Aruh (even though the main Aruhvian Church of the Mill Lands, based at the Hallow denies even that this has happened) with the constant economic and social decline of the region. The Machenites believe that Aruh can be resurrected at least in the Mill Lands (other godless, heathen lands don't stand much of a chance of redemption in their eyes) - through piety and self sacrifice and that the only chance the Mill Lands have is to embrace full devotion to their faith. As three bad harvests have brought hunger across the region, their numbers have swelled and the normal bureaucratic and administrative chaos that reigns in the Mill Lands has left the various militias of the cities undermanned and under trained. The Machenites are nothing if not cynics as well, however, and have negotiated a 'harrowed bargain' with sea mercenaries sailing from Scarpole to raid all the way up the river Shay, attacking for plunder and leaving the Machenites in charge of everything else. The Machenites know they need a figurehead to unite the Mill Lands under their religious ideas after the chaos has ended and have selected 17 year old Rhydain De Hauer as their puppet king